And the waves became silent

Parayail Abraham Tharakan – Fondly remembered

Our association started sometime in 2006 after both of us had decided to enter the blogosphere.  Since then I have followed his voluminous output with so much respect, so much interest and much kinship, for we had similar tastes though so apart in age (That comparison was not to signify how far in age he was, but how young at heart he was). Interestingly we became good friends after he helped me source an article on Mehaboob the Singer. We had never met and even though Abe, that was how I called him, invited me on a couple of occasions to his ancestral estate located at Olavipe as his village was called, I never managed to get to traveling down south to meet him and his family. I think he was bit miffed by that, and I had always had that lapse prick my conscience, and it continues to do so.

Abe communicated less after his heart attack in 2009, but continued his presence on his blog as well as Mysore blog park, a portal where both he and I contributed thanks to a person named GVK or GV Krishnan (an eminent journalist, now retired), who brought us together. In fact at that time, our small group comprised a few likeminded individuals, some of whom who write less these days. As you can see from Abe’s blog Song of the waves, he continued to be a voluminous writer, posting many hundred posts in these 8 years.

Olavipe Thekanat Parayil Abraham Tharakan aged 81 (a.k.a Papachan) - On the professional front, he used to be a General Manager for the Kerala unit of Apollo Tires and a director for Excel glass. Abe was also a sports buff and cared much about its development in Kerala. He wrote a number of articles on those subjects, be it hockey, cricket, athletics or tennis, his favorite. I am sure he would have been the first to rejoice that Sania Mirza had won a grand slam title for the mixed doubles at the US open this year, after many years. Ironically, his last post was titled ‘God bless Indian sports’. Abe had represented Kerala in Hockey as its goal keeper in 1950.

But you can see from his posts that he enjoyed politics, TV and all that was happening around him while living at Madras, often traveling back to Kerala for family meets at Olavipe. I assume nostalgia caught up and he soon moved back to Cochin for good in 2011. He loved photography, be it quaint objects, flowers or trees. There is so much more to Abe I presume, though I knew him only a little and that too, through the bits and bytes that we put up on the virtual world called the internet.

Yesterday I got the information of his passing through a comment from a mutual friend Ashvin on my latest blog where I had mentioned him. Sadly his younger brother had passed away just a fortnight ago.

May his soul rest in peace. God Bless………………….


Abe - The waves may have become still but the songs will remain in our memories…




Abe’s blog – Song of the waves



Share:

10 comments:

RAJI MUTHUKRISHNAN said...

Sincere tribute, Maddy.
We will miss him.

Parvathy Sukumaran said...

Hi Maddy,
Touching tribute to a great human being & wonderful writer.

My acquaintance of Tharakan Sir was solely through his wonderful blog. Through his blog, i feel, he wrote about everything that he cared about, on a wide range of subjects, be it casteism or corruption, arts, sports or personalities. If i remember correctly, i came to know of your blog from his 'I FOLLOW' list.

Last time, we discussed how difficult it is to move on from the loss of a dear person on your touching article 'Photos on the Mantel' but look how quickly we lost some one very dear to all of us. Unlike you, i have never met or talked to him on a personal level yet the pain & shock is strong.

I am at a loss for words right now & all i can say is that i will definitely miss Tharakan Sir.
May his soul rest in peace.

Happy Kitten said...

Have no words to express.

Calicut Heritage Forum said...

RIP, Abe Tharakan. I used to enjoy his posts.

Bernard said...

Thank you for letting us know about his demise. We sure will miss him.

Gowri Mohanakrishnan said...

Thank you for sharing this. He became a part of my world, though I never met him, and I respected him.

ER Ramachandran said...

Abraham Tharakan became part of our world, where the seniors, after retirement learnt computers and took up blogging with the same zeal as when they were working, may be a bit more, as they could put their heart and soul in their thoughts freely. Abraham Tharakan's output was phenomenal and touched on variety of subjects. He maintained quality of highest standards throughout. His last couple of posts were on hockey match on which I was lucky to engage with him through my comments. Only day before yesterday some of other bloggers met at our place because GVK was visiting Mysore; Bapu Satyanarayana, Dinakar ( Mysore Musings), Senior journalist Krishna Vattam couldn't come and we discussed Mysore Blog Park.

Like the waves, he touched anybody and everybody that went near him to leave memories for a lifetime.
The Song of the waves may have been stilled. But its tunes will hum through those whom Abraham Tharakan touched.

Thanks Maddy for your touching tribute.

ERR

Dinakar KR said...

AT's sad demise which I came to know through ERR prompted me to come up with a tribute in my blog: http://mysoreanmusings.blogspot.in/2014/09/abraham-bids-final-adieu.html
Only the other day we recalled AT as ERR mentions above.
Rest in peace, AT Sir.

Maddy said...

Thanks to everybody for their comments and for sharing their thoughts
We will miss Abe.....RIP

Unknown said...

Thank you Maddy, for your touching tribute, from his older daughter, on behalf of all his children and grandchildren. It takes a generous and perceptive human being and another good writer to render such an account of a friend's worth. And thanks to everyone who responded.