All makes one

Somewhere in the narrow bylanes of Mylapore is a nameless shop. It has a large window, the grills gathering rust. The shop appears out-of-service, but there is no sign explicitly stating its demise. It must be rather old, I think, standing under Chennai’s sweltering May sun with six others. We are on a walking tour, organised by Story Trails, to one of Chennai’s oldest areas. My impending departure from the city I grew up in has made me quite sentimental; I want to know Chennai in new, unfamiliar ways. But the heat is already compromising my attempt at homage.

Divya, our storyteller, says the shop-owner was fondly called janal mama (window uncle) as his modest eatery served steaming south Indian delicacies through the window. With several low-roofed, traditional houses lining the street, and the mighty gopuram of the Kapaleeswarar temple towering on our right, we are seemingly in a time warp. I try to picture the rhythm of life in a different era. While history rarely records stories of the Everyman, oral narratives fill in with fascinating details.

Cities within a city

Story Trails takes you on a journey where quotidian sights become stories and people, characters. A generous dose of the colloquial takes you closer to the narrative, prompting a re-imagination of worlds that seemed too distant to be of any interest. The trails explore areas in Chennai that have a distinct ethos, including Mylapore, Sowcarpet and a coastal stretch heavily under a colonial hangover.

Several buildings on this coastal strip display an Indo-Saracenic style of architecture — a bastardised style favoured by the British colonial architects of the late 19th century. The deep-set jharokha or balcony was borrowed from Mughal architecture. It functions much like the modern-day tinted glass; if you are on the right side of it, you can see the outside world while remaining hidden from it. “For all you know, these women sat in their balconies and happily ogled at men,” says Akila, another of our storytellers. In a society that observed purdah, the jharokha was probably conceived not just as a stylistic element but also a utilitarian one.

The wonderful thing about Chennai, I realise on the trail, is that it nestles both young and old history. Its character changes every few kilometres.

English summer in Madras

The arterial road from Fort St George to Anna Salai was where the British in the erstwhile Madras lived out a close imitation of their English lifestyle back in the Old Blighty. In and around the race courses, the clubs serving the choicest alcohol and cigars, and the many bakeries dotting the area, they rode on saddled horses, swaddled in layers of clothing despite the tropical heat. That, in turn, spurred the American Frederic Tudor (aka Ice King) to ship ice to this sweltering British outpost for a tidy profit.

“They were the ‘bastions of snootiness’,” says Akila, before pointing out that the vestiges of it remain intact even today. The wait for a Gymkhana Club membership stretches into years, while the Madras Cricket Club only recently began permitting desi attire on its premises, following a directive from the High court.

The wide roads and stately buildings recede to give way to the village-like Mylapore — the ‘Black Town’ where the first Europeans came in search of raw material. The larger history of the area predates the arrival of Europeans and the birth of Madras/Chennai by a couple of thousand years.

Inside the Kapaleeswarar temple in the early hours of the morning, the meanings behind routine acts of prayer are explained to us: breaking a coconut denoted crushing the devotee’s ego, with the coconut representing a human head; pradakshanam (circumambulation) denotes worshipping the god within you; the ringing of the temple bell was meant to drown out other inauspicious sounds; kolam , or floor decorations, use rice flour to help feed ants.

We then move to the Santhome Basilica, a cathedral built in the neo-Gothic style in 1896 at a spot where a simple Portuguese church stood before, we learn that Christianity arrived in India ahead of the Europeans. Thomas the Apostle landed in Kerala sometime between 56 and 72 AD. I spot Mary in a sari , and Jesus on a lotus flanked by peacocks. The Indianised touches include kolams at a few entrances. Inside, the priest is delivering a passionate speech on the ills plaguing advanced countries; “What is advanced about these countries?” he asks, without really waiting for an answer. “Only the speed of divorce is advancing,” he says dismissively. And the audience nod, with some appearing to want to applaud but unsure about the appropriateness of it.

As I try to come to grips with the long interactive history of our cities, I am overwhelmed by the pluralities enshrined in them. We barely acknowledge how much our identities are shaped by the worlds that precede us. I will leave this city soon, but will take comfort in the knowledge that it is as much a part of the worlds beyond it as the different worlds are a part of it.