unexpected

MY FIRST EVER CELLULOID HERO
A very real invident
In the year 1955 or so, when I was doing my engineering at Coimbatore, one day, I went for some shopping along with my friend in Seventy Feet Road in R.S Puram. ( At that time 70ft road was an arterial road of pride for R.S. Puram, Coimbatore) Another friend of ours who was a day scholar, happened to come to that shop with one of his friends who looked senior in age and size compared to us. That friend introduced the new person as one Mr Mohan ( if I remember correct) and said that he was a cine actor; and that was enough to electrify us .We both were thrilled to the core and even as we could recover from our state of ecstasy, he introduced us to him. We felt honoured and shook hands with him. The very feeling of seeing a cine actor in flesh and blood at such close quarters and the fact that we got the privilege of touching and feeling a cine actor enthralled us in no small measure.
In those days I was, so to say, a cine fanatic and to have a sacred darshan of an actor and that too a hero was considered a matter of great lifetime achievement, a moment of great pride and an unparalleled honour and all the words at my command are inadequate to express the thrill that I experienced then. Immediately the actor himself came forward to talk to us (oh! what a great honour) and told us that he had acted in a picture as a hero to be released in a theatre at Coimbatore shortly and requested us to see that picture without fail. Having heard from the horse’s mouth of a picture in which he had acted as a hero , we couldn't believe our own ears ( I could hear properly at that time) and eyes and we felt that the purpose of our birth was realised. We said we would definitely see the picture at the earliest and after a few pleasant exchanges, handshakes and Namaskarams, we left the place most reluctantly with a heavy heart, our heart full of grief over the fact that we had to take leave of our celluloid hero so soon.
No need to say that night was a sleepless night for us, the hero occupying the entire space of our heart, brain and mind and what not. We had to wait for three full days for the picture to be released which looked as though we were waiting for ages, (eons and eons- yugas and yugas). At last the picture was released and as you could have rightly guessed, we two were the first and second to enter the theatre to see our hero on the silver screen. That was a dream come true situation.
After some unwanted and irritating wait for a few minutes by way of some stupid ads, the picture started. I think the name of the picture was Nagadevathai. In the first scene, there came a prince, decorated with a glittering crown covering half his forehead , wearing a jewellery shop round his neck, covered with garlands made of various flowers on earth, who sang a cheerful song in high spirits with his just wed young princess dancing to the tune. And alas in the garden when both of them were in such high spirits , the prince was bitten by a senseless venomous snake, and died instantly before delivering a dialogue.
The heroine was a princess who had just then married the hero who had met with this tragic end and the princess started wailing aloud in the usual cinematic way and started praying with a heart rending mournful song of those days, she being one of the chastest ladies comparable next to Seetha, Savithri, Anusuya, Ahalya and so on, and after about half an hour, one Demi Goddess appeared before her in all her splendour and glory, moved by the copious tears shed by the princess and her incessant and sincere prayers and asked her as to what boon she wanted. The princess being a great celibate lady on the lines of Savithri asked for the life of her husband whose body was lying in a boat nearby. As usual after some hesitation, the Demi-goddess stipulated certain impossible conditions on fulfilling which, she said that her husband would revive and join her and after offering the boon, the Devathai disappeared as expected. The princess thanked the demi-goddess profusely by a lengthy song and in fulfilment of the requirements of the boon, she towed the prince’s body in a boat along all the sacred rivers in the country ( those rivers were not polluted then to the extent to which they are today) to different holy shrines and temples across the country, overcame many of the obstacles and that was the rest of the picture for the next two hours interspersed with some prayers and heart rending songs. The dead prince was lying dead all through with his face covered with wreaths of flowers and festoons. In the last scene, the Devathai reappeared with a sense of satisfaction and sprinkled some holy water in the dead man's face and to the utter delight of the princess ( and to the audience) the dead man came alive and then the picture ended with a happy duet song.
All the time we were wondering as to where our hero was whom we met the other day and whom we were not able to identify till the end. When we came out of the theatre, to our great disappointment, we were told that the one who died at the beginning of the story and came back to life at the end of the story was our hero whom we were searching for throughout the picture. I can never forget this great experience of mine not only in this life but also in my many more Janmas in future to which I am ordained.

R.Guruswamy