Tales From Ambalapuzha

[Inspired from a real-life story. First in a series of stories inspired by the lives of some people from my native place in Kerala. ]
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Time flies. Seems like yesterday, when I left my home and this beautiful countryside to work for the Marwadi in Mattanchery. I was young then, just out of my teens. Matriculation was considered high education in those days. My father, who was a singer in the court of Travancore king, did the best he could to support my education up to that point. With the four younger sisters after me and a toddler brother to support, I could not ask him for the money to pay for further education.

My friend Shastri who lives down the street proceeded with his higher studies and completed his B.Sc. at University of Travancore. He retired few years back as the Head of the Physics Department in the university which was later renamed Kerala University. My cousin Ananthu in Thiruvananthapuram could afford the cost of professional education and is a successful doctor today. But all that I could think of after my matriculation was to start earning and help father in supporting the family.

In those days, the country was going through a post-independence transition. Nehru was going strong in Delhi and Patel was getting the nation stronger across the region. Everything else was in a disarray. The partition had left a deep vaccuum in trade and commerce. Many companies in the Madras presidency were owned and operated by Muslims who fled the place in the fear of communal attacks. Some of them settled in the Kozhikode region seeking refuge under the Sultan of Mysoor, and many travelled further north in search of safer places.

Perhaps due to this politico-economic uncertainity, I could easily get a job as assistant to a Marwadi trader in Mattanchery, near the Jew synagogue. Fifteen rupees a month. To avoid excessive expenditure, I refrained from frequenting home. In six months time, the Marwadi recommended me and Sukumaran to a tea estate supervisor in Munnar. The pay was an unbelievable sum of Fifty five rupees a month! Sukumaran and I had adjacent tables in the otherwise dark dingy office that resembled more of a godown for the tea. The room had unmistakable scent of tea, and a lot many stinks were concealed under this smell. Besides the two of us, we also had an assistant Kuttan.

When it seemed life was settled, I got a letter from home. Mother felt that I must be close to my ailing parents and with the land feud with Govindan mama twisting deeper, they needed my support. I was disturbed. The comfort and good pay of this tea estate job on the one side, my parents and the problems back home on the other. And what about a job even if I decided to move back?

As if she had read my mind, I got a letter (again written by someone else at mother's dictation) saying that a job has been arranged for me at the Ambalapuzha Middle School, at a stone throws distance from home. Now I was definitely in two minds. Sukumaran and others tried to convince me to stay back. I was sure I could not get more than the salary or the luxury of the life I was leading there at the estate. In fact, I would not get a sum anywhere close to this one. But caring for my parents and siblings is not something I could turn a deaf ear to. So I decided to move to Ambalapuzha, the place where I grew up.

I joined the school for a pay of Twenty rupees a month. (Yes, from a lavish Fifty five rupees to Twenty rupees!) Life was difficult. I was working at almost one third of my earlier pay. There was just two earning hands and eight mouths to feed at home. Medical expenses, celebrations, fees for siblings, the list was infinite.

But like they say, even that phase passed by. I got my sisters married off. My brother got a job. Parents were with us for a few years. I got married myself after a couple of years. My son today works in the UGC division of the government in Delhi.

I am sixty five now. Personally, I have not earned much money. I taught at the school for thirty years and retired as its Headmaster. Some of my students have reached very high ranks in the society. The whole town today knows me as' Iyer Sir', an achievement I consider above the monetary benefits of a private job.

Time has changed a lot. Ambalapuzha has changed equally. Three buses a day from Alapuzha has now grown to more than fifteen. People from all over South India come to worship the big temple, which used to be the temple of this town and its people. The beauty of the place remains intact irrespective of all these developments.

I read in the newspaper yesterday that Sukumaran has become Managing Director of the tea company, today Kerala's No.1. Had I continued with him, even I would have become someone. We would have had a lot of money, a bungalow perhaps and my son would have become a doctor or engineer or a lawyer. He would not have had to take commerce simply for getting a job quickly. Yes, things would have been different, very different.

Today, I do not have wealth but I have the satisfaction of having taken care of my parents and supported the family when they needed me the most. As a teacher I have the satisfaction of shaping a few honest and dedicated people who will play significant roles in the future. The honour of being in such a noble profession and the respect I get everywhere I go.

They were two different roads entirely. When I die in a few years from now what I shall be remembered for, will be decided entirely by that bus ride I undertook on a rainy afternoon from the elevated tea estates of Munnar to the low lying plains of Ambalapuzha.

It is the one decision that truly changed my life!