My bonding with cinema started ever since the time I could remember. My mother tells me, I used to keep staring at the screen for the whole movie even when I was too small to understand what’s going on, on the screen. Those moving images on the giant screen used to mesmerize me to the core. When I was very small, I used to think those are the real people moving behind the white transparent back ground. As I grew elder, I got to understand the physics behind cinema, but the chemistry of it on me has never changed.
It is now that, no weekend passes for me without watching at least a movie on the giant screen and no day passes without watching a movie on TV or laptop, but cinema doesn’t used to be this kind of regular affair back then. My dad used to take whole family to the cinema only twice or thrice in a year, mostly on festival days like sankranthi, Ugadhi, Dushera and Deepavali. Watching Cinema on Deepavali day used to be a mother of cinema watching experience’s those days. On that day, my mom and dad used to do fasting till Durgamma puja is over. Puja used to get over around 3.00 pm and we would have a family lunch following puja and our next stopping would be cinema. Deepavali used to excite me more for cinema than for crackers.
Apart from theatre watching, Doordharshan (DD) used to telecast a hindi movie on sunday evening and a telugu movie on Saturday evening. Later they changed it to Telugu movie on Saturdays and Hindi movie on Sundays. Added to this DD used to telecast a regional language film on Sunday afternoon. We didn’t had a TV in our house, and my source to watch TV used to be Ramesh’s house. Ramesh and I study in the same class in the same school.
My biggest shock of my life till then happened when I was in 7th class. My dad didn’t take us to cinema this Deepavali. After the Puja I was ready and as usual excited thinking about the movie I am gonna watch, but my father simply said, we are not going to any cinema today as he is going out on some work. I was wordless, I cried, made noise, broke my geometry box, threatened I will not have dinner in the night, but nothing worked and mother told not to disturb her as she is busy arranging the things in place after puja. I was shocked, very sad, totally lost, and dumbstruck and didn’t know what to do. After some time, my mother tried to calm me down with some crap words and my sister (she is 2 years younger to me but 4 times stronger and heavier to me) with her sweets. (she has this habit of preserving her share of sweets and chocolates when I am having mine and once I am finished with my share, she would take hers out and eat in front of me making strange noises. I feel like hitting her then, but I am very scared to do it. Because once I hit her and she hit me back even stronger that I almost fainted). Strangely I was the only one making noise. My mom and sis were completely OK with us not going for a movie on a Deepavali day.
I felt my dad is the biggest villain on the earth. My dad came back, smiled at me and told he would take us for a movie very near. I was not satisfied. A villain is a villain. I felt even ‘Amrish Puri’ in ‘Jagadeka Veerudu, Athiloka Sundari’ and ‘Bhavaani’ in ‘Shiva’ are less cruel compared to my dad. I deadly wanted to take revenge on my dad, but didn’t know how to take. In all the movies I have seen so far, the hero takes revenge on the villains for the sake of his mother/father/sister/brother or friend. No hero has taken revenge on his father. So, I didn’t know what should I do to make my father upset.
After some days an idea flashed in my mind. Ramesh’s grandfather used to fell ill regularly and he used to ask ramesh’s father to take him to hospital. Ramesh’s grandfather was very fond of visiting hospital, he asks his son to take him to hospital even for mild cold. Ramesh’s father is a very good person (every other father looked very good to me compared to my father) and he used to take very good care of his father and obeys him most of the times, but sometimes if he is busy with his work, he tells his father to take some medicine and rest for some time and that will cure the illness. Ramesh’s grandfather used to look very sad for the whole day, not going to hospital used to add to his illness and his illness would get cured only when someone takes him to hospital. So my idea is that, one day I will grow elder and my father older and he will ask me to take him to hospital, I will ask him to get ready and after he gets ready and when he is about to come out of the home, I will tell him, we are not going to hospital today. And he will feel sad and shocked. Ha ha ha, I felt very satisfied with this thought. I prayed to god to make this happen. I felt I should have had a time machine like one in ‘Adithya 369’ so that I can travel forward and see how my father’s face looks when I don’t take him to hospital.
Days are passing. My mom, sis, father, all are normal. My dad used to talk to me as if nothing has happened. Everyone has forgotten what happened on Deepavali day, but not me, hero never forgets villain and what villain has done to him. Part of me was counting days to next festival (when my father would take me for a movie) and the other part of me is saying not to go to a movie ever with my father (Hero never goes to a movie with villain). On one Sunday, I got up early as usual (I don’t’ know why, but I used to get up early on Sundays. Waking me up on other days used to be a big herculean task for my mother), and as I was about to go out to play, my mother stopped me, gave me a steel vessel, and asked me to go to the milk vendor and get milk. (We used to get milk from a vendor near our place, we should go with vessel and he milks his cow in front of us. This was my father’s task every day, sometimes on Sunday’s or holidays he used to take me or my sis along with him. Sometimes I used to ask my mom to send me alone, but she never did send me alone, saying I am too small to go alone). I asked my mother, why me and not father. She replied, your father returned home very late yesterday and he is tired now and to wake him up would not be good. I asked her, you didn’t send me alone all this day’s when I kept on asking you, now I stopped asking you and then you are asking me to go alone. My mom replied, you have grown up now, you can go alone. Aah, I was satisfied with this answer, I am grown up now (This is strange; I wanted to grow elder when I was young and I want to look younger now when I am elder. Think this is the same with every one). I happily took the vessel, went to ramesh’s house, called him, told him what I am up to now and asked him to join me. He was first afraid and said his mother would scold him if she gets to know about him going out alone, I replied him, you are not going alone, you are going with a grown up boy and dragged him. We started walking, I asked him to hold my finger (My father, my mother, my uncle, everyone ask me to hold their finger when I am out with them), he held to my finger very tightly. Oh! Little boy, I thought, I should take care of him now in this journey from my house to the vendor and from the vendor to the house.
We returned from the vendor and my mother was happy and gave me 50 paisa. I purchased 4 burfees (a kind of sweet), I hide 2 of them, called my sister, and told her, “see, I have got 2 sweets, and I can give you all of them, all you have to do is, eat them in front of me right now”, she hesitated for a second, but took them and had them in front of me. Once she was finished with, I took a burfee I had hidden in my pocket, and started eating it in front of her, making the sounds exactly as she used to make. I was enjoying this, her face grew anger now, I didn’t wanted to take the risk of staying in her reach and ran to the terrace, took out the other burfee from my pocket and started eating it slowly. The thought of “I have grown up” made me feel very good. Suddenly, an idea flashed in my mind, now that I am grown up, why I should wait for my father to take me to movie, why cannot I go with my friends. I liked the thought. It started small. But grew big with time. I decided I have to act on it.
Next day, I told Ramesh about my thought, he looked at me as the world looked at Aristotle, when he told the world that the earth is not flat in shape, it is actually round in shape. He didn’t say anything; he just walked away with a strange look on his face. I didn’t leave him, after some days passed with my continuous prodding; he started talking about the thought. He asked how can we make it possible, how can we make it possible and not let anyone know about it. I told him, Everything will happen if we plan correctly. The first thing we need is money to buy tickets. So we have to start saving money. We calculated, we need 15 rupees altogether (10 rupees for buying 2 balcony tickets, 2 rupees for buying eatables in the interval and 3 rupees as standby incase of any emergency). Since I am the grown up boy and it was actually my thought and my initiative, I said I will arrange 8, and he has to arrange 7. He agreed. Whenever my mother sends me to get small items from general stores like salt packet, match box, candles etc, I would also buy some chocolates for 25 paisa or 50 paisa and my mother would not object it. This is same even with Ramesh. So, our plan is instead of buying chocolates or something else, we shall save money to make it 15 rupees.
We started saving money; soon we had 10 rupees together with us (5.50 mines + 4.50 ramesh’s). Now that we are in the vicinity of making 15 rupees, we wanted to plan the next important thing, when are we going and how are we gonna hide it from our parents. We had serious discussions, in the end what we decided is, we will be going on a Sunday morning, we tell our parents we are going to play in a ground which is in adjacent street, and we will go to the cinema theatre which is 1 km far from our place.(‘Kshana Kshanam’ was the cinema playing in that theatre that time, we were not much bothered about what movie we are going though, all we wanted is watch a movie) We didn’t wanted to go to a far theatre, which will take more time to travel both to and fro. We wanted to get back to our homes as soon as possible, because, sometimes if I make too late to return my mother will send my sister to the ground to call me. Also we decided we will be going by walk, not on ramesh’s cycle. As there is a chance that someone may notice his cycle when we park it in the theatre. And the next big thing, we pledged, we would not tell about this to any one, and even if caught, we will tell them anything but not our plan. Everything is planned; soon we had 15 rupees with us.
Sunday came, I was very excited and also tensed, so was Ramesh. As per plan, we said we are going for playing to our mom’s and started walking towards the cinema theatre. We reached the theatre in no time. I asked Ramesh to wait outside. I went inside and got 2 tickets, came out and showed him the tickets, he could not believe it. So was I. I asked him to go inside the theatre, I went outside to get something to eat (This was also in our plan, we didn’t wanted to come out of our seats in the interval, as there is a chance that someone may see us and tell our parents). I purchased some chocolates and a potato chips packet, and as I was about to get in to theatre, I was shocked to see ramesh’s father shouting at Ramesh. I hide myself behind a wall. Ramesh’s father looked very angry; he was asking Ramesh in high tone, “How dare you come to cinema alone, that too without intimating mom or me”, Ramesh’s father was asking many questions, for which Ramesh had no answer. He just stood silent. Ramesh’s father didn’t notice me as I was hiding. He fiercely dragged Ramesh to his bike and drove away. I stood there totally confused. I came to my senses slowly, I was sure ramesh’s father would beat him and he would surely pop out my name and my mom and dad will get to know about this and they will beat me even more bad. I was sure I cannot escape beating. But then, I thought if it’s sure that I am gonna beaten up, why don’t I do the crime and get beaten up. Part of me was telling to go inside the theatre and the other part is telling me to go home. Finally the first part of mine won over the remaining part of me. I decided I will go inside and watch the movie and get beaten up by my mom and dad later. I went to the ticket collector, he asked my ticket, I put my hand in my pocket, and there are no tickets. I searched all the pockets, but no tickets. Oops, when I showed tickets to Ramesh, he saw them, took them and put them in his pocket. I was totally lost. I won all the battles, but lost the final frontier. I slowly walked back; I was in no mood to go home soon. No matter when I go, my mom and dad would be waiting for me, only to beat me. I walked to the ground, sat there on a rock. Some boys are playing cricket and some others football. I sat silent looking at them. Suddenly my sister came from behind and told mom was looking for me. I walked home with my sister. I was horrified thinking about the beatings I am gonna get. As soon as I returned home, my mom asked where have you been, my sister replied “mom, he lied you, he said he was going to play (my heart beat increased), but he was just sitting in the ground”. My mom took me near and asked me why you were sitting; I replied I was tired and feeling week. My mother cursed herself for not giving me glucose in the morning when I was going to play and went inside kitchen and came back with a big jug of glucose. I didn’t understand what is happening but I didn’t say anything. I silently took the jug and started having glucose. My mother came near me and said, “Look, Don’t ever mingle with Ramesh, you are a good boy, but Ramesh is not a good boy, you know what he has done today, he has gone to watch a movie alone, not intimating his mom or dad. I don’t know how he can do that. I don’t understand how an 11 year old boy can get that kind of a thought. His parents are very angry on him. I know, my son will never do like that. Not only Ramesh, we should also blame his mom and dad, it is all because of their upbringing ………….……………………..”
PS:
- As per our initial plan, Ramesh didn’t pop out my name.
- I being in the ground when my sister came worked to my favor.
- I going to get eatables near the theatre also worked to my favor.
