By Karan Thapar

Do you remember the days when a bottle of coke would cost four annas? That’s twenty five paise in today’s money. Even at the time this was not an insignificant sum. I would have to cajole Mummy to buy me a coke. And it wasn’t just my teeth she was concerned about!

Those were the days when we would collect Coca Cola bottle caps. We’d been led to believe that if they carried the coke bottle symbol they could be exchanged for a gift. I collected several but never got a gift.

Coca Cola is only one example of how our world’s changed. Language is even more tellingly so. In the ’60s and ’70s rupees were referred to as chips and bucks. Money was called dough. Chicks was how we spoke of girls. And movies were dubbed flicks. This was the smart way of talking. We all did it.

When it came to music our choices might seem restricted to what’s on offer today but we thought they were abundant and plentiful. We would hear vinyl records on our radiograms. Those who were lucky had tape recorders. Later both were overtaken by cassettes. Now, none of this exists and few would know how to identify them.

We wrote letters in those days and urgent news was delivered by telegrams. The post office sold ten paisa postcards, green inland letter forms and blue aerograms. Today, you might not even find them in a museum. I haven’t seen one for years.

At school we wrote with pencils, which required sharpeners and, if you made a mistake, rubbers came to your assistance. At the time we didn’t know that rubber has another meaning! We also had geometry boxes with dividers and compasses. And we all got up to mischief with rulers.

Even though cricket may have been popular – I can’t say for sure because I’ve never been fond of the game – what I do recall is hopscotch and even gulli danda. Does anyone still play them?

The truth is those were the days my friends, we thought they’d never end. The words of that haunting song are also true of our lives. Alas, like Mary Hopkin it’s all become history. You have to be past three score and ten to remember.

Would I be mistaken if I said there was a charm and innocence in the third quarter of the last century which we have lost? Or is this a sign of age misleading me? We didn’t have emails and smartphones. There was no Bluetooth and we did not artificially whiten our teeth. Instead, we wore bellbottoms, kept our hair long, participated in jam sessions and listened to the Date With You and Binaca Hit Parade on All India Radio. It was thrilling when a friend sent a request for a song in your name. When it happened to my sisters they would giggle with embarrassment, apprehensive Mummy and Daddy might find out.

L. P. Hartley once wrote the past is a foreign country, they do things differently there. If I’m not mistaken that’s the opening sentence of his best-known novel The Go-Between. When I read it in my teens, I did not grasp it’s meaning, though I was enchanted by the book. It seemed clever, no doubt, but perplexing. Today I can agree with every word.

They say as you grow older you start to live increasingly in the past.  That would be sad if it were completely true. But it’s not untrue either. No doubt time moves on and things improve but what’s left behind, and often forgotten, was not so bad. In fact, much of it was rather fun.

That’s what I want to remind you of this Sunday morning. The world we leave behind as we march forward was the happy world of youth. Age has brought us wisdom and maturity but it’s also brought concerns and tension. I’m happy living in 2025 but I was equally happy in 1965 and 1975.