Youthful Spirit

Ramila Mistry (left) set the mood of the morning by swaying and clapping to herself as she cut across the Garden from the Gate and danced her way to our group. “Hansta hua nooraani chehra” (the Lata Mangeshkar-Kamal Barot duet from Parasmani) became our theme song on the music system. And as usual, Srichand Arora, Razia Khan, Yusuf Rassiwala and Nafisa Syed kept the youthful spirit soaring.
What made Ramila-ben appear so full of beans and playful today, we shall not know. But it was nice to see her behave half her age as she refused to concentrate on exercising… till Arora let out an angry animal growl, which sent her scurrying back to her place. (She had skipped two places to confabulate with Santosh Tyagi, thus distracting everybody.) Of course, true to style, Arora apologized afterwards.
The liveliness was however, not restricted to Ramila-ben alone. It was infectious. If Yusuf-bhai was lip-synching song after song, Nafisa actually enacted the scenes, eyes closed and arms flailing in the air, unmindful of the attention she was drawing to herself. Even Mrs Harbans Singh was seen repeatedly exchanging high-fives with the ladies around. And when the Parasmani number came on full-blast, everybody went berserk. The exercises became incidental as everybody, including Motwani and Khatoon Baig joined the crazy banter.
We reproduce here the lyrics of the first stanza of that yesteryear hit to give you a sense of the leg-pulling that went on, especially since Yusuf-bhai, Razia and Nafisa were at their comic best. Sing along and picture them:
“Hansta hua nooraani chehra
Kaali zulfein rang sunehra
Teri jawaani tauba tauba re
Dilrooba dilrooba, dilrooba dilrooba (2)
Pehle teri aankhon ne loot liya door se, pehle teri --
Pehle teri aankhon ne loot liya door se
Phir yeh sitam tan tan ke dekhna guroor se
O deewaane, O deewaane
Tu kya jaane, haan tu kya jaane
Dil ki beqaraariyaan hai kya!
Hansta hua nooraani chehra
Kaali zulfein rang sunehra…”
Arora tried to wriggle out of the situation by declaring he was no longer young. “Sirf chaar saal kam hoon 50 se,” he clarified, only to attract all the wagging fingers at him: “Teri jawaani tauba tauba re / Dilrooba dilrooba, dilrooba dilrooba”!
Thus it went on. And another week came to an end on a high note.

Renu Babani says:
Old is gold! These old songs have so much meaning and sound melodious as well. Despite all the latest songs(who can forget Munni badnaam hui?) we revert to the sweet music of Kishore Kumar, Lata-ji, etc. These are the true songs of yesteryears that reveberate till today and no matter how many times one hears them, they always sound beautiful. We, maybe, are getting on in age, but will always remain young at heart. Our spirit and energy, no one can change, and it will always remain that way. Way to go members, let's show everyone how much fun we can have no matter what!
--Renu