Long back when the concept of cable television did not intrude into our country and our lives life was much simpler.I was in school back then in a small town and I rode a bicycle.I was the proud owner of a metallic blue BSA SLR gifted by my loving parents on my 12th birthday.
Our neighbourhood was an archtypal idyllic place and it was my entire world.The houses were neatly placed in rows, some of them had garish colors like rose and yellow but still it seemed so beautiful.We also had a brook running beside our’colony’ that completed the cosy picture. All the families knew one another quite well, our mothers would actually speak to each other for hours over the compound walls of our houses but what they spoke about for so long will always remain a mystery to me.
We used to play cricket on the streets.We were a motley lot of varied age groups of mixed gender, but it never occurred to us that boys had to play with boys and girls with girls.We enjoyed our cricket, our I Spy(which we used to pronounce as ICE BOY, it was later that I realised that it was actually ISpy) We also had our very own book club a la Oprah .Yes we had a library of sorts which we christened as’Raja Library’ much to the consternation of our neighbour uncle whose name was Raja.He must have felt strongly about it since he convinced us to change the name to Childrens Library which was unoriginal but apt enough.
I remember the time when my Dad bought home our very first Television, it was a black and white television box which went by the yesteryears brand name of Texla.We kids were beside ourselves with joy. Our very own TV!. My dad spent a week setting up the antenna on the roof all by himself and our patience was beginning to wear out. But when we saw the first image hazily displayed on the screen that was a moment of exilaration and joy which knew no bounds.
Doordarshan was the only channel that was broadcasted then but that was good enough.We used to wait anxiously to get home from school to watch TV .Nevermind if most of the programs were in Hindi which at that time I did not understand. Even a dull and utterly boring program called’Krishi Darshan’ became the bane of our existance and if a krishi darshan could excite us a Hindi film song feature called’Chitrahaar’ made us go bonkers!.To say that we were glued to the idiot box was an understatement.
One of my favourite programs was an english one called’Giant Robot’ it was about a small boy who had a giant robot that he controlled with his watch and together they had some adventures and no matter what the giant robot would always save him in the end.Oh how we loved that program. I remember an occasion when during’Giant Robot’ the power went off and we all kids walked down to the powerstation(yeah we could do that) and we begged them to turn the power on just for half an hour till giant robot could save the boy(we were scared he might not be able to save him if the power did not come on) . Its another story that the officials politely declined and we grieved.
Sundays bought a package of excitement of its own . We had ek do teen char in the mornings and spiderman in the evenings and life was complete!.My parents realised a little too late that we were getting a little too involved with our’texla’. My Dad tried his best to make us stop watching TV and start doing our homework but to no avail. so he came up with the brilliant plan - the carrot and the stick.If we completed our homework in time we get to see spiderman else we had to give it a miss but rest assured the homework was completed in time!.
Back then it was only a single channel and there were a few watchable programs and no reruns.
Life was all about my BSA SLR(except when I had to clean it dutifully on Saturdays) and my friends and my black and white Texla TV. But life was fun and life was complete!