Dehradun, Sept. 15 -- Author's Collection.

There is no mistaking the husky voice at the other end of the phone. It is Moni Ghai, the ex-owner of the twin Kwality restaurants in Mussoorie and Dehradun. In our youth, that's where you would have found us hanging out. On reading a piece of mine, he remembered a meeting, albeit brief, with Sir David Lean, who happened to be staying with his friend, the Doon School headmaster, the legendary 'JAK' or John Martyn.

'The filmmaker told us about a film called The Bridge on the River Kwai that he had shot !' he recalls.

The first steam engine was introduced to Sri Lanka (then known as Ceylon) by the British. The smoke-belching dragon appeared, looming larger than it actually was, a black monster t...