Racing Hearts, Country Boys and Tamarind In the Stomach

The boys are all around 14. They meet often on weekends at M’s place. He lives on a property with some acreage, set on hills and valleys on the scenic road to Eildon. The driveway to his house is sloped and not a sealed road. It is quite a bit away from the nearest neighbour – you can barely hear them shout, but not clearly I expect. There are no shops or malls nearby. One cannot even get mobile phone reception over most of the property.

These boys often like to meet at M’s place. One would wonder why, considering these are modern teenagers who are always plugged-in, online and connected to the Internet whenever they can. They seem like unplugged robots when detached from their electronic connections most of the time. They often relate to each other through the medium of a computer, TV or game screen when meeting at homes or in town. They like all the comforts, distractions of technology, malls, and stuff just like any of their city cousins. It seems intriguing why they would make time, go over to this friend’s place, spend hours and hours without much regard to creature comforts and not miss their seemingly integral connection to the Internet.

Apparently all the latest gadgets and technology still does not overcome some basic instincts and traits of boys all over the world. It turns out that M is into cars. His family is too. They have worked with them, taken them apart, put them together, modified them and generally grew up around them. M has the knowledge, confidence and skills around cars that many grown-ups like me simply do not. Most boys like cars and trucks. All of M’s friends do too. Even if they lived in the city, they think they have driven race-cars, because they have, on video and computer games. They all have the idea of being a race-car driver as one of their dream jobs! They talk about the latest models, pick up, the engines, the tracks and endless details. Many of them have never been in the driver’s seat. But M and some of these country kids have. They can with fair confidence and skill.

On his own property, with the guidance of his skilled parents, M has always been around and handled cars. He knows things firsthand that the other kids only do in theory, a simulation or animation.

Naturally, they gravitate towards M’s place. They look and learn. They sometimes have a turn sitting in the driver’s seat. One cannot beat the thrill and feel of being behind the wheel of a car or truck or Ute. M and his family have actually worked on those. They are familiar with the details. These boys can talk endlessly about cars and girls. We are thankful when they come back from M’s having some hands-on experience on the former. They come back thrilled, even if it is a tentative experience. It is something city kids cannot have easily. These boys like to go back for more.

When I grew up, in India, my family did not even have bicycle as a family vehicle. I used to dream of riding a bicycle like the characters in Enid Blyton novels. Sometimes, in my dreams it would feel so real. In real life, I would fall down, unbalanced due to sheer nervousness and anxiety. It was by renting a bicycle with my pocket money over a summer holiday in my teens, without my parents’ knowledge, with a friend at the back holding me up for balance that I learned to ride a bicycle. I finally learned to balance after several failed attempts and inexplicable painful injuries to hands, knees and the groin (I was too embarrassed to learn riding on a girl’s bicycle without the horizontal cross bar). It did not seem to matter that the injuries themselves were more embarrassing sometimes! Dreams of driving a car never even occurred to me until well into adulthood and living in the US as a graduate student in my late twenties.

The next generation, however, is itching to drive cars, trucks, Utes and dreams of owning the million dollar Bugatti Veyron when twelve years of age! I wish them well and hope they can earn their way to fulfilling their dreams.

These boys go and have a fine time at M’s place. Apparently they have been quite careful not to have any accidents and not pushed the limits of safety. But this is what boys will do. They will like to not share everything with their parents until after they have learned something and then proudly tell their parents. I have been privileged to be confided in recently. I can understand. One can take away the greatest fun and thrill of childhood and friendship by being too supportive, too intrusive and understanding and being there all the time. I pretend like I am not too interested or worried.

However, each time I see these kids return safely I say a mighty thanks to the higher powers. Now when I see them go away to M’s friend’s place, I feel something. It reminds of an expression we have in Tamil culture for that very feeling. The saying translates to “To churn and mix a solution of tamarind in the stomach.”

For those of you who do not know, ‘tamarind’ is a tropical fruit that is sour when green and becomes dark brown jelly like and sweeter as it ripens. Even the ripe fruit gives a subtle sour taste to certain dishes and has to be consumed in limited quantities. Too much of it can give you a queasy, uneasy feeling in the stomach. That is exactly the feeling a mother claims she gets when she sees her child off battle or some risky venture. A typical Tamil mother would use that famous expression of having “tamarind being mixed in the stomach” to let you know how she is feeling. I realise that fathers get the same feeling too. Only they do not say it aloud or express it that way.

Boys will be boys and parents will be parents. The hearts and cars of the young ones will race and the stomachs of the parents will churn tamarind, even if silently!

Copyright  (c) Kannan Narayanamurthy 2012
All rights reserved