Still crowded, still the same

My memory of the 6th Avenue at Besant Nagar is that of a wide road, crowded with every demographic category that inhabits Chennai. There was always a variety of everything - age groups, genders, clothes, colours, you name a parameter and you could get both extremes and a lot in between, if you were hanging out along 6th Avenue. The road itself runs parallel to Elliots Beach for about a kilometre-and-a-half. That's a straight stretch, where the motorcycles could show off their pick-up, speed or any kind of calisthenics its rider was inclined to do. And hey, if you were cool, you had to be there on Sunday evenings.

It is surprising how some of those images refuse to go away, even after quite a few years. The Sardar at Cozee Corner reeling off Tamil far more fluently than I could; the lone policeman trying to get a look at the number plate of an RX-100 that did a more-than-usually-noisy wheelie; young couples shutting out the rest of the world by staring ardently at each others' toes as they walked the length of the road - all of these jumped into my mind's eye as I neared the beach on a Sunday, a few weeks ago.

But it was morning, not evening. 6th Avenue was deserted. Even Barista, with its orange board bright in the sunshine, seemed to be drooping off. But it was nice to see it this way. Now I have a reason to come back some other Sunday, in the evening and see for myself that nothing has actually changed on this street!