The Morning Alarm

Once again taking you all to my nostalgic lane. Out of so many favourite pastime one of my pastime was watching the market activities sitting on my window pane. Yes "window pane" in those days houses used to have large doors and windows with broad window panes where one can sit and sip down their favourite beverages. Kolkattians are in the habit of buying their veggies, fruits and fish early in the morning. As such the market footpaths or the outer market as one would say was the place of hawkers. These small scale vendors used to lay down their products very early in the morning. The first thing in the morning was the ice truck which was unloaded on the road in front of the ice shop. These ice slabs were very heavy and were covered with saw dust,  and unloading the same was a real thing, for the labourers used to unload it by pulling it down with an iron hook and then again pulling these into the shop. These ice slabs were then supplied to the cold drink shops, fish and meat markets to preserve their goods, since, there was no refrigerator or cold storage then. The saw dust covered ice looked very dirty and I never used to like it. I always used to think why it is covered so??🤔later as I grew up I knew 'saw dust' slow down the melting process. This ice truck after arrival used to ring a bell,and the truck's reverse turn also had a rythm by the cleaner boy, who used to bang his hand on the sides to give direction to the driver, this was my Alarm Clock for this truck used to reach daily exactly by 5am in the morning. The next is the 'Phool Wali' who used to lay down her flowers ,mogra, genda, jaba phool, tulsi etc, she will be calling out " phool niye nau takhoorer janne"5takka ek mala"..... this voice will be curbed by the banana vendor. "Ek dozen kola,  du takka, du takka kheye dekhun ekdum misti". (One dozen bananas only for two rupees its very sweet like rasogulla) All these noices, rather, I would say melodies, used to break my slumber and I  used to jump out of my bed to have the view and relish the morning. The spirit it gave was immence, for I used to get inspired by them,  I always wondered how dedicated these people are,  to make a livelihood they never missed their time or duty. The best part was the radio played by the tea stalls. Oh what a wonderful mornings were those. Songs of old hindi movies used to reach my ears mixed with all those chaos around. I an ardent lover of music used to relish the melodies flowing out,  and my storage book,  my mind,  used to download all those wonderful songs in my memory bank. Those days,  all songs of Lata ji was on my tips.,I used to remember every line and just hearing the background music,  I could guess the song. Listening to these radio melodies, I grew up and hindi movie songs are a part of me now.  The repeated hearing of these songs daily made me a small gayika. And this is still a part of my daily routine. Without music and melodies I find myself listless.  My radio is always humming songs for me through out the day. And I pay my tribute to Mohd Rafi ji, Kishore Kumar ji, Mukesh ji, Manna dey ji ,Talat Mehood ji, Mehendra Kapoor ji and all  others. I  really  miss those wonderful mornings which were filled with innocence and tension free.

Pic courtesy Google images