Choti Nalu

N of #AtoZChallenge

Nalu म्हणजे Nalini, my Aaji.

My Aaji has a played a BIG role in my life.
My Aaji (Mum's mum) and we lived together till she passed away.
I got her, all for myself till the time I was twenty-one years old! 

She was not just my Aaji, but my roommate, my sister, my friend, my Guide, my Teacher!

All rolled in one!

My Aaji would often tell me stories.
And some of these stories would be memories about her childhood.
Whenever she narrated I would immediately be transported back in time,
to the Mumbai of the late 1920's and early 1930's!
My imagination would turn sepia and
I would see my Aaji as a दोन वेण्याची छोटी choti Mulgi (but with my Aaji's face)! 

Aaji grew in the heart of Dadar. Her father taught my Aaji everything!
He put her in the best school of Dadar (King George semi-English),
he helped her in her studies through school,
he encouraged her to sing and learn the harmonium, he taught her to cycle on the famous Dadar bridge,
he trained her for elocution and taught her to lay stress on words and spaces to make an impact.
The way I see it, he was a pakka feminist and a true-blue father! 

In school, we had a lesson about Lata Mangeshkar and her father and how he taught a Choti Lata
to be what she is today!
There was a caricature of them sitting together on a sitaar. 
I never saw a picture of my Aaji when she was Choti Nalu.
But I imagined my Aaji and her Baba to be exactly how Choti Lata and her Baba were in that picture! 

Aaji grew up in Dadar around Shivaji Park area.
It was a time when Irani hotels were booming,
when there weren't many motors on the roads, and when people were friendly and honest!
She grew up in an era of paav, buns and when 'Mava Cake' were soft and
freshly made and given wrapped in newspaper! 

Aaji would love to narrate this particular childhood story! 
No matter how many times she had narrated this story before,
she would always tell this anecdote over and over again with a lot of pride :) 

I imagine Aaji to be around seven or eight years old.
Her parents had sent Aaji to buy some mava cake from  a nearby Irani cafe.
Choti Aaji went to the shop and ordered some mava cupcakes.
The owner was running a Lucky Winner contest to boost his mava cupcakes sales.
The lucky customer who finds the ‘free coupon’ inside his or her mava cake pack,
would get another pack free! 

When Choti Aaji opened her packet of mava cake, she found her ‘free coupon.’
Aaji promptly went up to the shopkeeper and claimed her free mava cupcake pack.
The shopkeeper was happy to give a ‘free gift’ to this lucky child!
Little did he know what would follow :)

Aaji opened the ‘free pack’ and saw another ‘free coupon’.
She got it back to the shopkeeper.
The shopkeeper was confused, ‘One more lucky draw?’
But he gave choti Aaji another pack of free cupcakes. 

Aaji opened the new pack and found yet another free coupon!
By now the shopkeeper had gotten weary.
He reluctantly gave another pack.
When she opened it, she found one more free coupon!
Now the shopkeeper was definitely unhappy!
How did this little girls keep getting lucky packs.
He told her she had ‘maxed out the offer and can now go back home!’

But Aaji didn’t give up.
She insisted on playing fair.
The shopkeeper got irritated and tried to shoo her off.
The fellow customers too had begun to notice the commotion.
They gathered around Aaji and stood around her.
Aaji remembers she was this little girl standing in middle of the customers,
looking bravely at the irritated shopkeeper.
The other customers supported Aaji
and told the shopkeeper, ‘You need to keep your word and give this little girl what she has won!’ 

That day Aaji walked out of the cafe with her hands full...
with her winning loot of mava cupcakes and with a proud grin on her face :)