Part VI - My Adolescence Memoirs - Larkana in 1970s

Part VI

I attended Government Pilot Secondary School from class 6^th to 10^th during 1970-75. It was a real fun time at secondary education level. Good teachers (often punished us on incomplete homework), neat & clean, wide airy rooms, learning, chatting, gossiping and playing went all along. During winters, most of the classes would run in open, under the warm sun, in the parks and gardens in front of the school building.

Break time or recess was anxiously awaited when all pupils would rush to the side gate of the school where they could buy ample eatables like Chholay, Dahi-Bhallay, RahaaN (boiled beans), toffees, Layee (a sweetener with a shape of flat sheet about half an inch thick), peanuts, etc. within 5 or 10 paisa coins. I used to get 10 paisa pocket money which later increased to 50 paisa by the time I completed secondary schooling. When the school time was over, we would all run to the railway line (built on high embankment crossing between Jinnah Bagh and Civil Hospital) to watch a train with steam engine chugging on the track from Sukkur. It was not mere watching and enjoying the train, we used to put coins on the track to see them overrun and get inflated under heavy and huge train wheels. 

It was (it is) a grand and beautiful school building with a large playground. Regular sports (athletics) activities, cricket and hockey tournaments kept our afternoons very busy. Besides, regular Scouting Camps held almost twice a year when students-cum-scouts turned from all over the country to Larkana. Being a very shy boy I never participated in any of such activities but loved to see my elder brother Munir in almost every such event.

We, I and Munir, used to commute school on a Sohrab bicycle that our father had bought us. We would go together in the morning but would often return separately; one of us would take the bicycle back home. Once we both forgot to take back the bicycle to home thinking that other would ride it. In the afternoon when we needed it for buying some grocery, we found it missing. We ran to our school for it and found it parked alone in the Lot.

My two classmates who were cousins to each other; Kareem Jamali and Aijaz Jamali commuted daily on their respective bicycles from Jamali Goth, about 3 miles away, on eastern part of city outskirts on Aaqil Road. This area is brimming with Guava and Date orchards. Guava of Larkana is famous all over the country for its sweet taste and flavor. It ripens in cold winter season. As the temperature drops, guava gets sweeter and tastier. Aijaz was my best friend and therefore, we used to visit his orchards on weekends plucking guavas from trees and enjoy eating them. Usually he would guide us which one to pluck as we could hardly recognize and differentiate a ripe and sweet guava from the rest. He would also lead us to the lone guava tree in his orchard that bore seedless guavas. That was the sweetest and tastiest breed.

As we, brothers, moved into class 6 and 7 respectively, our father arranged a tutor named Mr. Narayin Das who would come at our residence in the afternoon/evening for teaching us English and Mathematics predominantly but Science as well. Mr. Das was an excellent teacher but very fearsome too. He spoke hoarsely and his hand was quite heavy. When he would slap us across the face it left his finger marks on our cheeks. Besides, the room echoed with the slap sound. On one such occasion our Mom could not resist, dashed into the room and complained to the teacher as to why he was hitting her children so hard. The teacher felt embarrassed and tried to justify that her kids were being inattentive and obstinate. From next year onwards Mr. Das taught us at some other place near Surhiyo Padhar where he could slap us across our faces at his liberty.  

It’s worthwhile to recall that during our schooling time the favourite hobbies a good student could have were; collecting postage stamps, having pen-friendships, recipient of international magazines and relevant printed material (free of cost) and be a member of some children’s social organizations. I poked my nose everywhere but nothing doing. Wrote many letters to all embassies in Islamabad for sending me some literature about their respective countries, only China and Saudi Arabia responded but that too only for a couple of times. Tried to get into pen-friendships but remained successful only once, that too from an aged person hailing from Mastung, Balochistan who used to write in very difficult Urdu. Our Classmate Mukhtiar Shaikh (Works in Customs, Karachi, I reckon) was a genius one in getting involved in all of the above activities with enviable degree of success. With the help of Mukhtiar I remained, for a short while, member of a children committee running under a Sindhi Children Magazine called “Gulan Jehra Barira” meaning “Flowers-like children”. Such committees existed in almost all cities and towns of Sindh. 

In mid 70s while preparing for our board examinations i.e. class 9^th and 10^th I along with three classmates namely Najeeb Bhutto, Owais Laghari (now lives in US/Canada) and Khushal Das (migrated to India) would visit Circuit House Park, Locomotive Shed Park or Gyan (Zulfiqar) Bagh in the wee hours of the each day for study. Our preferred place was however, Circuit House Park. Loco Shed Park was usually crowded with boys hailing from Darri Muhalla (most of them belonging to Shaikh and Hindu communities) while Gyan Bagh was not ideally located (near a graveyard). We all were average students and mostly relied on cramming books and notes, though my friends considered me as better among us at studies. We would hardly study for half an hour sitting away from each other in the different corners of the Park, and then resort to playing, exercising/stretching, doing athletics; long jumps, and high jumps over bicycle or going to the nearby Rice Canal to enjoy bathing in its shallow water at one of its banks.

We also happened to be in the same cricket team called Shaheen Cricket Club Rialy Bagh where Najeeb used to live. Our team consisted of Najeeb’s 5 other elder and younger brothers named: Ashfaq, Riaz, Rizwan, Irfan, etc. Owais was a good all-rounder, Najeeb, a good batsman while I (considered myself better at bowling and fielding) and Khushal (we called him Dhukkai, a fluke hitter) were just there to fill in the gap and to make a team of 11 players. Continued ……

Part V - My Adolescence Memoirs - Larkana in 1970s

Part V

I studied class 5^th in P.V. School near Kennedy Market. This market was a modern and beautiful commercial building named after slain US President John Kennedy. Some of my classmates I remember in Class V were: Aijaz Jamali (not sure he was there!), Farooq Gaad (Died in 2010), Sikandar (gave up further education due to poverty and became a Tonga driver), a girl named Zaib-un-Nisa, etc.

With simple life and abundance of time (remember that no one owned Refrigerator, TV, Telephone, etc.) we would spend much of our time playing various games, like; Gilli-Danda (Deeti Dakar, in Sindhi), Pithoo, Wanjh-a-Wati (In Urdu they used to call it; Palay Palay) and Kho-Kho. It was a girlish game that we, boys and girls, used to play together. Later after growing up, we started playing it separately. My young sisters would play Ball-Pikklay. It was like tossing a Ping Pong ball in the air and catching it before landing while picking seashells (coffee beans shaped called Kaudi) cleanly from the floor. The best place to play Gulli-Danda and Pithoo was a wide but deserted street along Girls Primary School near Post office. Other advantage of playing there was that it had a small open drain on only one side of the street i.e. we would not have to retrieve the Gulli and Pithoo ball from filthy drain frequently. Few other games were Rope skipping, and Hop-scotching; marking lines and squares on the floor with a piece of coal or chalk, throwing an object in the last pattern/square and retrieving it while hop-scotching without touching the lines.

Our youngest of siblings Noor was born in 1970. His birth was awaited since long because parents wanted to have 3rd son before they stopped further production. He was named as Noor about 5 years ago. In between my two sisters Nasim and Yasmeen were born. Until Noor I was adored more than anyone else among all siblings. Nevertheless, the whole family was delighted on arrival of Noor. As he started growing up, our house got flooded with toys, not costlier though. When he turned 3-4 years old, father bought him a toy-car with paddles that he instantaneously learned to drive. Father, Munir or me; one of us would always run behind him in the streets as he drove his toy-car almost every day. In the late evenings one of us would also take him to the railway station as he enjoyed watching moving and stationary trains. At times we would make him sit in the passenger car of the train as it stood briefly on the station.

Our grains, onions and some other traditional vegetables for home consumption usually came from the ancestral village where we had some land holdings. Sacks of wheat and rice remained stored in our house. Mother would wash some wheat to cleanse it from dirt and other impurities almost every month. We would help him wash it and then keep it for drying upstairs on Charpai in the sun. Once dried completely she would give either of Munir or me in a canister contained about 10 kg of wheat to get it grind into flour from the Chakki (Grinding machine) located at some distance from the home. We would put it on our shoulder on both ways. Regarding grocery, I would usually be assigned to buy vegetables while father or Munir would buy Mutton, chicken and fish.

Our evenings both in summer and winter were also of routine chores, and predictable in the sense that everyone at home knew what their duties were; during hot summer when the day would begin cooling down we would go to upstairs, line up the Charpai (beds) and lay the bedspreads so that by the time we returned for sleeping the beds get cool down. Father would bring mangoes while returning from the work or anyone of us would buy in the afternoon and these would be immersed into a bucket full of water. Once Mom would prepare rice in the supper we would take the mangoes out of bucket and eat them with rice. Sometimes Pakoray would replace mangoes. Every one of us, siblings, would get four Pakoray to consume with a plate of plain rice. Sometimes we would play tricks; conceal a Pakora in rice and pretend to Mom that we got one less than our share or would hide it for the purpose of revealing it later and enjoying when all had already eaten up their share. My mother would prepare “the finest parathas of the world” that we took in our breakfast before leaving for school.

Around 1972-73, father bought a used motorbike because he was getting it difficult and tiring to paddle bicycle on long hauls. It was a yellow colored 110 CC Honda (or 100 CC Yamaha!) fully loaded (with extra garnishing, lights and a radio transistor installed). Father started learning and driving it simultaneously. A few days later after buying the bike he came home with his hands, arms and knees badly bruised, with some bleeding marks. After getting First Aid he told us with a pale smile about what went wrong with him: While I was driving the bike in the city center an acquaintance waved at me and said hello. I replied back with a smile and waving hands. Here I fall tumbling down on the road injuring myself.  We loved it and laughed back at him. Continued ……

Part IV - My Adolescence Memoirs - Larkana in 1970s

Part IV

In early 1970s, there were three cinema houses namely Royal, Empire and Nigar (Al-Manzar was the forth cinema that started operating in 1974). Royal cinema used to show Urdu family films portraying love stories, social and non-violent subjects. These films featured famous actors like Mohammad Ali, Waheed Murad, Nadeem, and Shahid, etc. And the renowned actresses were Shabnam, Babra Sharif, Deeba, Zeba and Shamim Ara, etc. The Empire Cinema was designated for showing big budget & box office hit movies, including English films during morning (at 11 am) show on Sundays. Whereas Nigar Cinema was exclusively showing hit, full of violence Punjabi films featuring famous actors namely Akmal, Asad Bukhari, Sudheer, Ilyas Kashmiri, Iqbal Hassan, Mazhar Khan, Yousuf Khan, etc. The famous actresses were: Firdaus, Naghma, Asiya, Aliya etc. The legend Punjabi hero Sultan Rahi came to instantaneous fame after the release of “Basheera” perhaps in 1972. Being a movie-worm, especially action films, I used to hover around Empire and Nigar cinemas and stayed away from Royal cinema which showed romantic movies.

Watching movies was our craze even at that tender age. New releases always came to Larkana cinemas about one to two weeks later than Lahore, Karachi and other big cities. This was unacceptable to us. Once I along with Munir traveled to Sukkur on railcar train with the sole purpose to watching some new hits. After reaching Sukkur in the afternoon and securing a room in the hotel on Ghanta Ghar we immediately went to enjoying two consecutive shows in two different cinema houses. Next day we returned home feeling jubilant that we had seen those movies that were still to be released in Larkana.

Our mother was also fond of films. She would spend whole day in house chores but would love to visit a cinema at least in a week for the last show starting at 9 pm till 12 midnight. Usually I or Munir accompany her. Father avoided going late to cinema and preferred sleeping earlier. Sometimes she would go alone too. We would just help her get a Tonga on hire.

I and Munir had established criteria for a best movie; it must contain at least six fighting sequences. Less than six fights, the film would be termed as skunk. If the movie had plenty of fights especially with swords, it got our highest ranking. Watching a film poster in the street or newspaper that would depict a fighting scene we both would get excited and utter a simultaneous sound: Dhainnnnn. It’s an expression equating a similar background music of any fighting sequence.

My classmate and best friend Aijaz Jamali and I would often go and watch matinee shows preferably Hollywood action movies at 3.30 pm in Al-Manzar Cinema, especially during hot summers because of long days. Watching matinee show suited Jamali to reach his village before sunset. But before we headed on for a movie, sharing his bicycle to cinema, we would make detour to drop a utensil at a buffalo barn from where I used to buy fresh milk for our family every afternoon. While on way back from cinema I would collect/buy 2 liter fresh milk and take it to my home.  

It was also a golden but short-lived period for Sindhi film industry as many local language films were released and enjoyed by masses. Some of the successful Sindhi films were Chandoki, Shahru Feroze, Sorath, etc. but Sindhi film industry based in Karachi could not survive and compete with the big and powerful Urdu and Punjabi film industry of Lahore, hence, it slowly vanished from the scene.

Larkana had a big, beautiful and clean Civil Hospital serving middleclass, poor and the needy. Later, upon opening of Chandka Medical College the Civil Hospital was attached to it and went through much extensions and renovation. But till that time, the city had also some famous private practitioner doctors who used to do thronging business (or serving the people!). Some notables were: Dr. Allah Bukhsh (in our street), Dr. Haque, Dr. Tufail Siddiqui and Dr. Roshan Shaikh. Our favorite family doctor was Tufail Siddiqui. He could be called anytime at home to attend the patient in case of any medical emergency. The doctor would merely charge a few Rupees for his visit.

As mentioned above, Dr. Allah Bukhsh ran a GP (General Practitioner) clinic adjacent to our house. He was a recognized MBBS doctor. After mid 70s two more doctors also opened their clinics opposite our house. They were Dr. Fateh Muhammad, a quack (he was compounder with Dr. Haque. When Dr. Haque left Larkana after ethnic violence between indigenous Sindhis and Urdu speaking immigrants from India), and a Homeopathic doctor (forgot his name). My father had nicknamed all of three: Allah Bukhsh as “Saah Peevna” (Blood sucker), Fateh M as “Hun Khun” (Take the prescribed medicine, breathe your last) and Homeopathic as “Choorh Ghut” (Strangulator). Continued .....

Part III - My Adolescence Memoirs - Larkana in 1970s

Part III

Being a younger sibling I was completely copy-cat of Munir, my elder brother. While he was brimming with confidence I was a very shy and lacked confidence, on the contrary. Whatever venture he would attempt I copied and tried the same, with less passion and skill though. From swimming to watching movies, from exercising /jogging and body building to playing cricket, and from acquiring reading habits of Sindhi literature to Urdu stories, digests and novels I poked my nose into everything and everywhere. Since Sindhi literature was not my cup of tea, therefore I spent little time on it whereas I tried my level best for the rest of the stuff. Nevertheless, I excelled in kite flying where Munir was a mere novice one. We both had read almost entire lot of books at Sultan’s Library numbering in nearly 500. Sultan didn’t charge us the book reading rent after some time, and in return we both managed to run his library in our spare time.

In our spare time (we had all the time in the world) we used to sit on the hardware shop located at the mouth of our street. The shop was selling paints, glass, nails, screws, nuts and bolts etc. The owner had full trusted in us and he would often leave his shop in the sweltering hot afternoons to dozing at his home while we ran the shop as salesmen. Interestingly, the top of the line Robbialac (Berger, now) Paint Container weighing 1 gallon (or nearly 5 kg) was priced at 49 Rupees while SPD Paint (the 2^nd best category) Container was available at 25 Rupees.

It was a time everyone used to be called by their nicknames or distorted and broken names, like I was called in the street as Ijjoo (distortion of Aijaz), my elder brother as Munnu (Munir). Other such names in our street were; Manda (a boy who limped named Aslam), Gullri (Rehmat Gull), Gheeta (Zaheer), Wadero (Aslam), Rachhoo (Waqas!), Mukhra (Mukhtiar), Golai (Rehmatullah), Deno (Salahuddin), Lubbi (another Salahuddin), Balloo (Iqbal), Kuro Kuro (Aslam Kathiawari), Jugnu (Karamullah), Diesel (Shabbir), Jhirki (Munir), Punhoo (Muhammad Hassan), two sets of brothers called: Waddo (big; Atta-ur-Rahman and Hafeez) and Nandho (small; Ebad-ur-Rahman and Kalimullah) and so on. Mukhra’s elder brothers were Goldsmiths. They were wealthier and Mukhra had a habit of lifting/slipping some coins from his shop without his elders’ permission. With this ‘lifted’ coins we would enjoy hanging out eating and watching cinema etc.

During this time we used to wear shirts that had pockets underneath the collars too; on either side. We would hide coins in the collar pockets because they were safe from pick pocketing. Some boys would also put currency notes in them. In case of more coins we would push those into the narrow closed funnel like round space for shalwar (pajamas) belt (Azaar-bund) fastened around the waist.

All street boys would usually roam the city in nights particularly in the month of Ramadhan either aimlessly or playing a game. One particular game was “Rung Rung” (color color). After doing Taraveeh we would often begin playing this game. It was like making two groups consisting 4-5 boys each and one group would ask the other to find for them purple (or any other) color and then bring it to them. After that the first group would search for purple color i.e. any piece of pencil, paper, piece of cloth, thread having purple color. Once they get hold of it they would begin a massive hunt in the dark alleys and closed city bazaars for the other group members. On capturing them they would show the purple color to them. The game ends. Now the other group will declare its color. Normally, this went on till Sahar (fasting) time when we retired to our respective homes.

During one such occasion when we two brothers returned home we found our father in waiting and in absolute furious mood over our wasting the whole night instead of studying our books. He tied our hands and feet with Azaar-bunds and left us crying with pain on the floor till our mother came to our rescue.

Punhoo, my friend, just lived across the street. His father Nabi Bakhsh ran a shop selling coal and firewood that was attached to rear side of our house. Punhoo was a special kid of our street because he used to attend one of two English medium schools in the city while rest of us, went to Sindhi/Urdu schools till class five. Punhoo and I had a couple of things in common; we used to watch action English films (without understanding dialogues) and then narrated stories to each other based on our visual comprehension. Punhoo had a quality of narrating in a dramatic way as if he was watching the movie at that moment. Besides, almost every sweltering afternoon in sizzling summer, he would walk to a bus / taxi stand, trap a foreigner tourist and bring them at his house for gossip over a cup of tea. I would usually join them and then we would begin a chat with the European and Caucasian tourists in broken (Tooti Phooti) English. We would resort to asking text book questions: What is your name? What is your country?  What is your father? Do you like our culture, food, and people? Did you like Mohen Jo Daro? Did you like Pakistan? When did you come here? When will you return to your country? Can you give us some gifts? Our vocabulary would not last long, therefore, much of the time the tourists would talk.

 

Once, Punhoo went to Jodhpur, India for a couple of months to meeting his relatives. On return, I grabbed his arm, forced him to sit on the doorstep of our house and asked him to narrate all film stories of about 60 Indian movies that he had watched in Jodhpur, starting from the fighting movies. While sitting with him listening to loud action packed narration, my young sisters also enjoyed listening to Punhoo from inside of the house. This story-telling went on for many days. Continued…..