Waiting for Saturday!

RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE

I see Deccan Herald has a Saturday page for the younger folks to wait for and contribute to. It takes me back by eight decades or more, to Madras and the Saturday issue of Madras Mail, which was the prime newspaper of those times. A A Hayles was its iconic editor. We children waited for that paper every Saturday to grab our page and head straight for Wendy Hut!

Wendy Hut was a kind of club that invited children to join it and participate in its various offerings — puzzles, games, stories, and so on. My sister and I joined Wendy Hut and were excited to receive our membership card — a beautiful, palette-shaped white card with a confirmation of membership calligraphically recorded in golden script!

A popular feature of that page was the riveting story of Count Curly Wee and his exploits to take on the wicked and right all wrongs. He was a formidable-looking pig, dressed impeccably in a three-piece suit and a polka-dotted tie. The narration was in a 10-line verse under the changing pictures of the Count in action!

Then there were advertisements targeting children with free samples of products in daily use. There were forms waiting to be filled in and mailed free, and very soon the postman would bring little parcels to be opened with great excitement. “Have you Macleaned your teeth today” was the slogan of Macleans toothpaste. This toothpaste was very popular for the cool and foamy brushing it gave and a feeling of fresh breath! Kolynos and Forhans were mere followers.

Nestle chocolates offered the picture of a different western film star with each slab. These pictures were to go into an album with blank spaces, with the names of the film stars underneath. The idea was to fill all blank spaces with the pictures from the slabs of chocolates. The albums, when fully done, would be submitted to Nestle in return for a box of chocolates to start the process all over again! Errol Flynn, Olivia de Havilland, Merle Oberon, Charles Chaplin, Eddie Cantor are some of the names of the stars that come to my mind. Wrigley’s chewing gum was another favourite advert which put ideas in our minds — four annas for a packet of four!

Times have changed, and I cannot see any child being influenced by all that childish stuff in the current times. Anything that any youngster wishes to see these days is on tap and can be summoned at will to the screen of the mobile phone. I would, however, choose any day to wait expectantly for that one day a week for my own page!