Am I that easy to forget?
[apologies
to Debbie Reynolds]
In the beginning there was a town. It was called
Bambalapitiya. In that town was a bus station. It was located on the sea side
of Galle Road, opposite St Peters’ College, at the southern end.
We were both 16. 1964 was a great year for young teens sprouting
off the earth in Gods little acre. She was blonde, blue eyed and Burgher. What
more could a brown skinned Moor boy have asked for, to talk about and show off
too, to his mates at school?
To have a girlfriend while still attending secondary school,
in the 60’s, was a huge fillip to any young lads ego. And, if she was a beauty
like Suzy was, then all hell broke loose. So, it passed, that each morning,
Monday to Friday, we would carry our books and be at the bus stand, to meet, engage
in a quick chat, and take the 105/106 bus together. Suzy hopped off at Lindsay,
at the Bambalapitiiya junction, and poor young me, had to leave the gal of my
dreams behind and move on further ahead. The bus took the right turn at Bullers
Road and then turned left on to Thurstan Road, all the way past the University towards
Royal. Another school day began.
Dad used to give each of us Rs 1/- per day for school expenses.
Commuting, by bus, to Royal and back cost me 40 cents. So you think transport
is expensive today, huh? Ten string hoppers with coconut (pol) “sambol” and
beef curry, for lunch, took a hefty 30 cents at Mr Saranapala’s canteen. An ice
cream, from the Alerics tricycle man parked outside the College gate, grabbed
another 10 cents. A tiny newspaper cone filled with peanuts, 5 cents. That left
me with 15 cents per day saving for five days, totaling a nice 75 cents per
week. That’s a good 3 bucks at the end of the month. That was how the middle
class lived in that era.
Now, what were boyfriends and girlfriends supposed to be
engaging in, in those halcyon times? Sharing comics, magazines, and novels was
one successful way of keeping the relationship steady. It also brought forth
useful topics for discussion. One can’t always be pointing to the sky, like
Englishmen do? Dad subscribed to Life Magazine, The Readers Digest, The
Illustrated Weekly of India, Titbits, and a few others. I still remember the
full page Titbits crossword puzzle that the whole family used to grapple with at
home until the solution was delivered in the next edition. Holding hands at the
Piccadily Café after a 25 cent scoop of
vanilla ice cream was awesome. Discussing the latest hits, broadcast on Radio
Ceylon, of Elvis, Cliff, Ricky, Gentleman Jim, and later, the Beatles, rocked.
Exchanging records, 45’s, EP’s, & LP’s, was a great piece of technology of
that era that kept us engaged. A walk along the beach, holding hands, by the
rail tracks facing the Kinross club, was always a great way to see the sun go
down into the Indian Ocean, in the 60’s. The Wadiya wasn’t even born yet.
Sunday morning at the Savoy offered a special showing at 10
am for young people. Tom used to chase Jerry all over the place and then a
musical, usually, followed. All the young folks in town were there. The Savoy
was the place to be on a Sunday morning.
How does one ask a gal out to a movie with only 3 bucks in
the pocket? That’s when Grandma came to the rescue. She lived with us since I
can remember and always had her daily expense monies knotted up at the end of
her sari fall. A ten rupee note was always forthcoming whenever the situation
demanded. 13 bucks was a lot of money for a 16 year old. Two balcony tickets
cost Rs 7.20. That left a chunky Rs 5.80 for ice chocs, drinks, and cashew nuts,
and also another scoop of ice cream at Piccadilly Café before saying bye for
the day.
O Levels came along. We had to take time off to study and
pass. Exams were as important as girlfriends. I passed offering 8 subjects in
science. Suzy did well too in Arts. She always wanted to be a writer. Yes, she
was a bright little blonde.
It was while we were enjoying another ice cream at the
Picadilly Café, this time with fruits and nuts and sugar sprinkling on top at
50 cents a scoop, that she broke the devastating news to me. The changing
political climate and the sordid language issues, that were plaguing the island
since the late 50’s, had forced Suzy’s dad to take the inevitable decision to
leave Ceylon for good. They were planning to sail to the UK to seek their pot
of gold. I walked up to the juke box, dropped a 25 cent coin in, and played
“Suzy Darling”. What was poor Dick Whittington, in Bambalapitiya, going to do
now?
The day finally dawned. Suzy left. Time flew. There was no
more communication. Not even on snail mail. News filtered through the grapevine
that Suzy had married an ex Thomian cricketer, the wrong school of course, and
lived in London. I moved on too. We both had our own families now. I left the
country, with my family, in 1979.
Social media was born several decades later. I had no choice
but to look for Suzy online, at least just to know what she was up to, how many
kids she has, what she was reading, and how she had spent her life. It’s not
easy searching, online, for such a common name like hers with not much
additional data available. She was never found although she still popped up in
my mind.
Our two gals grew up and chose to migrate to Canada and
Sweden, respectively. I finally quit my day job in the mid-east and flew to
Canada to spend some quality time with the rest of the flock. The shocking news arrived through a very
strange and unusual source. The messenger was a mutual friend, Suzy and I knew
in the 60’s, who had migrated to Canada long years back and now lived in
Scarborough. Suzy had passed away in London in 2017, after having been
diagnosed with cancer a few years before.
It was so sad to find out but it was also some kind of
closure for me, in a way. The human mind has this strange facet of leaving no
stone unturned until it finds out what it seeks. I’ve been away from Sri Lanka
for forty years and only returned home to roost in October 2018. Piccadilly Café is no more. The Savoy and the
Kinross club still stand. Each time I pass by that bus station opposite St
Peters’ College, I still think of Suzy, standing in her crispy clean well
ironed white school uniform with the purple tie hanging low down from her neck,
her blonde locks reflecting the sun, holding her books with both her outstretched
hands as she always used to.
“Oh! Suzy
darling,
I thought
you knew.
You were all
the world to me,
All my
dreams come true”
Fazli
Sameer
Mar 2019
