Mylai Memoirs

Mami Mess

It started as sprinkles, turned into heavy rain. I was just sitting with Aanju (My darling Labrador) and sipping strong filter coffee by the window seeing kids run around for shelter in the Karaneeswarar koil street.
My ancestors were here for more than 7 decades and the cozy house still smells fresh. All the womenfolk get together during such times and discuss all earthly issues at such times. As I took one more sip, my childhood memories flooded back.
This was somewhere in mid eighties when I was about 11 years old, I was the favorite (I am still the favorite) among the kids in the house. I was the eldest girl among the 16 children in the house. I had 9 brothers and 6 sisters, two of the brothers were elder to me by 4 and 6 years.
Our house was about a mile away from my school ssk in short for Sir Sivaswami Kalalaya (SSK in short), I used to take 10 kids with me, and rest were either too young or too sick for school. On my way back home one day, I saw a new restaurant opened in the locality of school. It was The “Mami Mess”. Suddenly, I remembered Amma telling aunts the other day that Aappam Mami won’t be roaming around the streets selling Aappams anymore as she started her own small café at her house nearby the Kapaleeswarar Koil. This must be it.
They have newly painted the place, decorated it with kolams and ribbons and placed a bright blue board by the entrance “Mami Mess”, just by the side was a small statue of Karpaga Vinayagar.
Mami saw us all and invited in, she even gave us a fistful of her signature chakkira pongal, yummy. I ate half of it and ran home to give Amma the rest. She was happy too.
It was mid October and a set of fierce rains have just taken a break, the terrace, balcony and the yard were all wet and still smelled of rain, perfect time to play and fool around. Mother would be too tired to catch hold of us and Appa would be busy worrying about all the mails he left undelivered and everybody else too were preoccupied with their own chores.
We never needed help at home, with all the aunts and uncles with us, we always had surplus love. However after the rains, everybody was too tired to cook or work. So, Appa called me and said “Chinni, go to Mami mess with Raghav, Mano and Roshini and bring 3 plates of Dosa, 2 plates vada, 1 Pogal and 5 sets of Poori” and gave me about 25 rupees and some change. Raghav and Roshini are twins and are 4 years younger to me and Mano is 2 years younger to me.
The roads were no good and to avoid any incident , I made sure we walked in straight line and made Mano walk at end of line and me leading the line to the Mami Mess. Ever cheerful Mami was more than happy to receive us. But she already had many customers and made us wait for 15 minutes before she gave us all the items we wanted and made a bill of 32 rupees and 45 paisa. I told her that I had only 25 rupees. Her face immediately shrunk. I told her to let Roshini and Mano stay till I go home and get the change, she asked me to hurry up.
So, Me Raghav ran home to get the change. As I reached home, Amma found us running and enquired why we were running around, I told her the story and she took the bags from our hands and told appa to give us the change. Appa was in terrace and asked us to collect change from uncle in backyard. Uncle gave us the change and we were leaving, aunt from bombay has just come in bringing us sweets and snacks. We immediately ran towards her. As we were all eating them, Amma came in and took away the snacks and stored them before we could empty all of them.
Another uncle, who is just back from worshipping from Aandavar koil turned on the radio and as they read out the weather forecast, we were all ears, Apparently rest of the week would be dry and yet on a precautionary note, schools were declared leave for the rest of week.
Our happiness knew no bounds as the news was relayed and the 9 kids there in the hall (including me) jumped in joy and danced around. Even Swami, who was acting sick all the week got up and jumped in joy as can now happily skip his test.
After jumping around for a while and it was almost noon and Amma asked us to come for lunch. It was then I realised the cling cling in my pocket was change I needed to give to Mami to relieve my twin cousins.
I raced to Mami mess and was shocked.
In addition to Roshini and Mano, there were other cousins too, (6 in total)
Jayaseelan (For the Ravadosa (7rupees) and Idiyappam (4 rupees) bought earlier by one of the elder brothers)
Vedanth (For the Godhumai Upma (4 rupees)
Pushpa and Vinodhini (For 2 Masala Dosa and Aappams(6 rupees and 28 paisa)).
I now owe her 7+4+4+6.28 => as I counted my fingers out, Mami shouted 21.28 and 15 rupees extra for Rava dosa, Semiya Upma and idiyappams, my lovely cousins ate while sitting there.
I ran back home, informed Appa and he came along with me paid Mami, apologised for the confusion and took me back home scolding me all the way back.

“Lavanya, get up.. go.. get the clothes out from the rain..”, Amma’s call brought me back from the past to present and aanju ran along as I jumped to the terrace along with Pushpa and Roshini.