My neighbour is building a new house. As a matter of fact there is nothing new about that piece of news. Almost everyone seems to be in the process of building either a new house or pulling down an old house to set up a concrete monster in its place. The new houses are changing the whole landscape of Kohima as I remember it, the Kohima of Supplee’s famous song, “Kohima will shine tonight,” the Kohima of my childhood which was really a one-horse town where everyone knew everyone else. It was a good, good place to grow up. Back then, Kohima was a much cleaner town because every school had social work hours where students cleaned the school compound and it instilled civic sense in them. In spite of the fact that it was on the ‘edge of the earth’ we were happy with what we had. We kept abreast of the wider world beyond us, listening avidly to the Beatles, and CCR and Abba in turns until Smokie and Dire Straits took over. Never behind others in fashion, it was minis, midis, maxis, bellbots, drainpipes, sideburns, you name it, Kohimians were already at it.
People closely shared the same music tastes and very much the same fashion tastes. My father’s generation could all sing Belafonte, Frank Sinatra and Pat Boone. In that order. Old was gold and old is still gold. There are many in my generation who fondly remember the Ruby cinema hall which was blown up in February 1973. Ruby Cinema hall was the venue for many social events in town. It was there that my uncles performed their concerts as the first rock and roll band called “The Merrymakers.” It was there that Kohima Village Students Union held their variety shows and played practical jokes on the audience by announcing that there was a coughing epidemic coming. Following this announcement a man walked onstage with a few dried chillies burning in charcoal. The whole hall of people began to cough immediately from the smoke of the burnt chillies.
Long gone is the quaint little Mission chapel where many a soul was saved. Whatever its faults, the old Kohima was a dear place to grow up in. It’s sad that the familiar landmarks are gone or going away. Does anyone remember the little pagoda-top library which used to stand where the NST presently stands? Going further back, my mother tells me that rhododendrons grew wild in the town area before the war. There were, of course, only two cars on the road then, one belonging to the District Commissioner and the other to the missionary Supplee. Since then we must have exploded the car multiplication slate.
Some from my generation might remember the semi-circular tin houses at North Police station area. One of my classmates lived in it and how I envied him. Many years have passed since that was torn down. Gone too are the days when my mother used to bake our birthday cakes and Christmas cakes in an old British army ammunition box. It had a glass window and it was forbidden to open the ‘oven’ until an hour had passed allowing the cake to rise. If we were impatient and opened the oven before its time, our cake would sulk and transform itself into a brick.
All these memories were safely stored in houses of Kohima. Our old crumbling houses which newcomers cannot appreciate because their memories are not stored within those houses are our treasure troves. When they are dismantled, chunks of our childhood disappear with them. So long as they are standing, the physical sight of them revives latent recollections of childhood encounters and adventures.
Old is gold. I wish there were government regulations that made it illegal to dismantle 50 year old houses. I wish funds were available for renovating rotten planks and weak roofs of both government and private buildings that are above 50 years. I really appreciate the renovation of Razhu Pru and Heritage house. These are part of our history and our identity. Let’s learn to take care of them in the right manner. Let’s value the rest of our old houses in the way they deserve to be valued.
People closely shared the same music tastes and very much the same fashion tastes. My father’s generation could all sing Belafonte, Frank Sinatra and Pat Boone. In that order. Old was gold and old is still gold. There are many in my generation who fondly remember the Ruby cinema hall which was blown up in February 1973. Ruby Cinema hall was the venue for many social events in town. It was there that my uncles performed their concerts as the first rock and roll band called “The Merrymakers.” It was there that Kohima Village Students Union held their variety shows and played practical jokes on the audience by announcing that there was a coughing epidemic coming. Following this announcement a man walked onstage with a few dried chillies burning in charcoal. The whole hall of people began to cough immediately from the smoke of the burnt chillies.
Long gone is the quaint little Mission chapel where many a soul was saved. Whatever its faults, the old Kohima was a dear place to grow up in. It’s sad that the familiar landmarks are gone or going away. Does anyone remember the little pagoda-top library which used to stand where the NST presently stands? Going further back, my mother tells me that rhododendrons grew wild in the town area before the war. There were, of course, only two cars on the road then, one belonging to the District Commissioner and the other to the missionary Supplee. Since then we must have exploded the car multiplication slate.
Some from my generation might remember the semi-circular tin houses at North Police station area. One of my classmates lived in it and how I envied him. Many years have passed since that was torn down. Gone too are the days when my mother used to bake our birthday cakes and Christmas cakes in an old British army ammunition box. It had a glass window and it was forbidden to open the ‘oven’ until an hour had passed allowing the cake to rise. If we were impatient and opened the oven before its time, our cake would sulk and transform itself into a brick.
All these memories were safely stored in houses of Kohima. Our old crumbling houses which newcomers cannot appreciate because their memories are not stored within those houses are our treasure troves. When they are dismantled, chunks of our childhood disappear with them. So long as they are standing, the physical sight of them revives latent recollections of childhood encounters and adventures.
Old is gold. I wish there were government regulations that made it illegal to dismantle 50 year old houses. I wish funds were available for renovating rotten planks and weak roofs of both government and private buildings that are above 50 years. I really appreciate the renovation of Razhu Pru and Heritage house. These are part of our history and our identity. Let’s learn to take care of them in the right manner. Let’s value the rest of our old houses in the way they deserve to be valued.
