Jack Trout, the eminent Brand Management guru and co-author of Positioning, when addressing a group of marketing professionals a few years ago in Chennai, minced no words when he thundered: “Your city fathers can do what they want with names, but this city will always be remembered as Madras! The image is indelible.”

Having migrated to Madras over six decades ago from Calcutta, those words ring truer now than ever before. To the impressionable mind at the time, it seemed that the city’s outer limits were Perambur, Parry’s Corner, Aminjikarai and Adyar! Huge expanses stared us in the face when we drove out of the city beyond Adyar to Mahabalipuram. The green fields, the sleepy bovine herds and the shepherds grazing their sheep, have all drifted into oblivion! The words of the popular song ‘Where have all the flowers gone’ by Pete Seeger keep haunting me as I enjoy the luxury of a retired life.

While pursuing this line of nostalgia over an expansive beer-laden lunch, our wizened old gang decided to drive down to Kilpauk, where we had spent our young and innocent days for a quick look! What a shocking experience it was to find that this patch of green had now morphed into a concrete jungle! We were unable to find many of the grounds where we had played cricket and hockey – from beyond Taylor’s Road through Kilpauk Garden Road, Orme’s Road, Balfour Road, Kelly’s and beyond to Doveton Corrie.

Once a proud resident of Professor Subramaniam Street, abutting Vasu Street, which flaunted the famous 12 (or 16?) branched coconut tree in the Soora compound, I was taken aback by the cluster of buildings here – this compound now houses the Ega Theatre in the foreground on Poonamallee High Road. The famed coconut tree is now a memory – not even traceable amidst the crumbling collection of sepiatone images that I have in my fading collection. We still remember the famous Soora persona, heavily burdened with dust-covered files getting down from the Route No.15 bus from High Court and trudging into his huge estate. Did Uncle Scrooge, as we fondly called him, have to suffer this bumpy ride clutching his huge property, so to speak? It all seemed so ephemeral now.

At the other end of Professor Subramaniam Street, beyond the high walls, once stood the famous Citadel Studio and our minds went hurtling down time to conjure up images of dark and handsome knights on their white steeds rescuing damsels in distress and then bursting into song and cavorting round a fountain during the shooting! “Hey, come off it, old boy,” says a friend rudely shaking me out of my reverie, “What you see in front is a huge cement-and-mortar beehive better known as RBI Staff Quarters.”

It is heartening to learn that the City Fathers are trying to re-create the beautiful lakes that once stretched along the railway tracks from Chetput to almost upto Egmore. In between were playgrounds which provided budding cricketers the chance to show off their prowess during the make-believe ‘Test Matches’.

I vividly recall the bus-rides with elders to ‘Town’ for all kinds of shopping from textiles to jewellery. After the shopping spree, it was time for hot snacks and badam halva at Anand Bhavan (or Arya Bhavan?). The scenario changed, with T’Nagar taking over as one of the densest shopping centres in the world in terms of turnover per square foot; our shopping activities too shifted focus accordingly. Today, the retail axis – both high-end and general – is gradually moving into Cathedral Road, Alwarpet and Mylapore.

The changing face of Kilpauk is but a representative microcosm of the changing face of this ‘Urbis’ which today competes on an equal footing with the other three Metros while fending off competition from Bangalore and Hyderabad through its own largesse of pubs and lounge bars and the newly branded ‘Biriyani’ which dons its own ‘talappakattu’ and takes on a challenge from the Hyde­rabadi ‘Paradise’.

Dining out at multicusine restaurants – flaunting Chettinad, Japanese, Thai, Mexican, Korean and Lebanese cuisine – and chomping at pizza parlours has wiped out memories of Jaffars’ and Dasaprakash. Yet, Rayars’ and Karpagam Mess have their own loyal following! There is a strong ‘Madras’ element in Chennai which can never be wiped out as history will bear out!

Anna Nagar, the OMR and ECR, offering a mix of novel real estate, entertainment and IT technology, have added muscle to Greater Chennai; the city wears a new complexion.