My early memories of Jayanagar

I still think, Jayanagar is the best locality to live in Bangalore.  Though, arguably it has grown beyond its breeches, with crass commercialization all around; it still retains the old world charm in some pockets, with its quaint streets lined with red flowering trees interspersed with old-style individual bungalow type traditional houses. The recent plethora of apartments/flats bombay-style, is booming all around Bangalore and Jayanagar is no exception to this trend.  As the availability of empty sites is less, and arguably residents are loathe to give up on their old bungalows, the trend is a bit slow in catching up to the rest of Bangalore.  The offerings of flats are few and far in between and most flats are built for individual residences by the owners themselves.  The commercial popular branded builders have hardly any property presence in and around Jayanagar.  I think that speaks volumes on the mindset of the residents who would like to hold on to their spaces rather than fall for the big bucks being offered by established builders.  Happy to see that Jayanagar didn't go the Indiranagar way, in terms of commercial greed, at least. 

There was a time when this beautiful extension of Bangalore was bereft of people.  The lonely streets stretched long and were filled with dread.  It was scary to travel alone on these streets during the late evening/night times.  The traffic, those days consisted of mere bicycles and scooters; with a few cars scattered here and there.  As kids of 60s and 70s, we used to play cricket and other games like the lagory, soorchand, bugari, gillidandlu and so on, on the empty streets.  Games unheard of these days!  

The Shopping Complex in 4th Block was just the boys' playground where we had our initiation into tennis ball cricket.  It was the unofficial school ground for us High School students, where we spent the 'games period' with a variety of sports like the kabaddi, kho-kho and the like.  The multi-storied shopping complex was still a few years away.  There are so many tidbits of memories tucked away in a corner of my brain that it is hard to pick and choose a few.  I rack my brains for the prominent ones and here are a few.  The search light beams dancing in the night skies of pockets of Jayanagar area that emanated from the Circus tents of Subhash nagar grounds; the lingering taste of Orange ice candies of shellys Ice Cream corner; the gingery taste of masala tea of Bharat Cafe; eating groundnuts with my parents, seated on the stone structures (situated on the four corners of 4th block complex grounds); watching with trepidation when dead bodies were being carried for burial (in 4th block burial grounds behind the main bus stand) in bright green coloured coffins by a group of people wearing handkerchiefs as head-bands; shivering with cold and fear while walking along the empty 9th main road stretch. These are some odd memories that has remained with me to this day.  What an epic time and era that was! If we are to go back in time and recapture those forgotten childhood days, the only way would be to stop progress and development.  Alas, that can never be!  Just reliving these old memories puts a smile on my old haggard face!