By Kollengode S Venkataraman, (Written in 2009)
He was in Coimbatore in December 2009, to spend three weeks with his old mother in its suburb. He was walking one evening along the shopping area on D.B.Road (Dewan Bahadur Road) in R.S.Puram (Ratna Sabhapati Puram), a mostly upper middle class professional neighborhood. With temperatures in mid 70s, it was pleasant.
Coimbatore, a second-tier city in India and the most commercialized and industrialized city in Tamil Nadu next to Chennai, has reached this position by the hard work of its enterprising ethnic groups — the Naidus, Gounders, Chettiars and others — without too much government help. Their philanthropic institutions are scattered all over the city as simple and ornate marriage halls, primary and secondary schools, and colleges in higher education in the sciences, liberal arts, engineering & technology and healthcare.
He has been living in interior US for decades, and has not even seen tropical flowers for quite sometime. As he was walking along D.B.Road, the fragrance of jasmine wafted in the gentle breeze. This was quite refreshing to his olfactory senses. He turned around and saw a flower vendor selling fresh and still-blossoming jasmine buds densely tied together on strands of fibers of dried banana stem (வாழை நார் in Tamil or വാഴ നാർ in Malayalam).
To his utter surprise, the floral scent of jasmine brought back memories he thought he had completely forgotten. He was amazed — you can even say he was shocked — that he recalled the finer details of the event with such stunning clarity even after FORTY years … …
It was early 1970, and he was in his late teens or early 20s. In connection with the wedding preparation for one of his neighbors’ daughters, he had to go to Mylapore in Chennai to talk to the caterer who lived near the famous Kapaleeshwarar Temple. His very good friend — she was close to his age and was related to the bride — also went with him.
They got off the bus at Luz Corner in Mylapore and were walking to the place where the cook lived. As they walked towards the temple, the fragrance of jasmine wafted in the air. He saw flower vendors at the street corner selling strands of fresh jasmine.
With the irrationality of his youth (he was 19 or 20 years old), and with great hesitation, awkwardness, and anxiety, he bought two strands of jasmine and gave them to her.
Only after giving them to her, he realized, what he did might not be quite appropriate.
What would he do if she did not accept the flowers? Or worse still, if she took offense at his gesture as improper? These thoughts rushed through his mind. He was completely ill at ease.
But much to his surprise, with a simple “Thanks” uttered sotto voce, and with an imperceptible smile and sparkling eyes behind her glasses, she took the flowers and kept them on her short curly tresses .
His sense of relief that she did not take offense at his gesture of giving her flowers was more than his exhilaration that she accepted the jasmine!
That was the only time he ever gave flowers to a woman before his arranged marriage a decade later.
More than forty years later, when he smelled jasmine on a street in Coimbatore, he was surprised that the fragrance triggered the fountain of memory to gush out spontaneously from the depths of his unconscious. Something he thought he had forgotten a long, long, long time ago.