“Amma, it feels like you have put on the AC. Air has grown cold”, said my 7-year-old lifting up her beady eyes from her maths homework. A cheery hurray followed. I shook the clothes firmly and filed them neatly on the cloth stand. Yes, indeed. There was a light nip in the air. Not due to AC. And, certainly no change in the temperature. It was still a blazing 38 degrees outside. I smiled and was whisked off to my childhood days. To my nondescript haven that would have looked more picturesque in a child’s sketchbook than in reality. A chawl which housed 14 flats adjacent to each other, spaced out at an arm’s length. A place where people were knitted closely together regardless of what social standing they were in. A place where we children had not one but many houses at our perusal to watch television, eat lunch, sleep under the warm covers and take refuge from the angry monsoon spells. A place where aimless wanderings were honoured but not bothered by ruthless meanderings of the rou