By Dr. K. Javeed Nayeem, MD

The weekend that has just gone by, was a very nostalgic and emotional trip back in time for me, because it marked the passing of a full fifty years of the moment I joined medical college, to embark on my ten-year-long journey to becoming a doctor, with post-graduate qualifications.

It was on a Monday morning, on the 18th of August, in the year 1975 that my sixty-six classmates and I, clad in our smart, new white coats, attended our very first class at the M.R. Medical College, Gulbarga. And, it was to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of this momentous event of our lives, that all my classmates decided to meet at Lonavala, near Pune, the location we had chosen for it.

The first time we had met after leaving our college, was for the Silver Jubilee of our batch in the year 2000, when we had a two-day get-together at Gulbarga itself. That was a very significant moment for us to pay our gratitude to our Alma Mater and all our teachers, thanks to whom, almost all of us had become successful doctors, medical practitioners and medical teachers, with post-graduate qualifications. It was a very enjoyable and memorable event, when we were all very much like how we were when we graduated and there was no difficulty in recognising each other or remembering each other’s tricks and traits.

And, since I had been chosen to anchor the introduction of the participants, I was able to do it with ease, remembering and calling out each one by name and roll number and telling everyone in the audience about their strengths and weaknesses and their favourite friends and even the favourite dresses they used to wear and the songs some of them used to sing at college functions.

I remembered their tattoos too and spoke about them! Interestingly, when I embarked on narrating the funny incidents associated with some of them, a few of them even pleaded with me not to say anything dangerous and damaging, because they were with their spouses there. But they had nothing to fear because as a true friend and confidante, I knew what to reveal and what to hide, while still keeping my narrative interesting and my audience entertained!

But this time, at the golden jubilee of our batch, with the inevitable toll taken by time, we had more years, very visibly etched on our countenances, more silver on all our heads, that had not yet gone bald and perhaps some wisdom too, albeit invisibly hidden inside them. But I tell you, all our hearts were just the same, beating as one!

The happy proof of this was evident from the joy and exuberance that we all radiated and the hugging and hand shaking and the thumping and punching, that marked the arrival of every new classmate at the reunion venue.

During this fifty-year-long epic journey, we had very sadly lost ten of our dear friends along the way, to whom we all paid homage, first thing, before beginning our meet. But the very interesting coincidence was that with this loss and with some absentees, as expected and then with the addition of our spouses, our number of registered participants, stood exactly at the original sixty-seven!

Four of our friends had come all the way from the US for this meet, while the others had come from various places across the country, every one of them with great eagerness and enthusiasm. The whole event had amazingly been organised to perfection, by our classmate, Dr. Shrikant Mhasker, a busily practicing Urologist and his wife Dr. Sangeeta, who holds a Doctorate in Music, who are both settled in Pune.

There was the inevitable sharing of stories about our families and how life had gone for us and there was much dancing and singing and merry-making too, that lasted late into the nights of both the days we spent together.

But the undisputable highlight of the event was the musical treat provided by the winsome doctor couple, Dr. Sujata and Dr. Ashutosh Kelkar, a Gynaecologist and General Surgeon respectively, who happen to be the close friends of the Mhaskars. The duo are outstanding maestros with their Harmonicas (mouth organs) and they really succeeded most effortlessly, in casting a mesmerising spell upon every one of us, with their soul-stirring and foot-tapping performance.

To know what I mean, you only have to see their many videos, readily available on YouTube and you’ll realise that it is not at all surprising that they are both recipients of many international awards and prizes.

Many years ago, while trying desperately but in vain, to squeeze some meaningful music out of a rusty harmonica lying among my childhood toys, with some help from YouTube, I stumbled upon their videos and I’ve been hooked to their music ever since then, forgetting my own very elusive musical goal!

It was my great desire to meet them in person but I never knew if I would and when my friend Shrikant announced to us that he would be inviting them to perform at our reunion, my joy knew             no bounds! Our much-awaited reunion was a two-day-long affair that passed off like two hours, for every one of us and when we had to bid goodbye to each other, we did it with much pain and a sense of regret, with some understandably doing so very tearfully too.

The happy finale to it was our unanimous decision to continue to meet like this, at least once in every two years from now on, to stay in touch and celebrate our friendship, that has held us all together over so many years.

Since nostalgia is where happiness lies, especially when you happen to be my age, I hope we chase and realise this dream, over the coming years!

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