REMINISCENCES OF FAMILY HOLIDAYS
Recently I read an article on how
holidays are now being planned by
families, to meet their extended family
members and grandparents. I was
surprised to read that the get-togethers are being arranged at a holiday resort or
other place of tourists interest, sometimes even
abroad, depending on the financial background of the families planning their holidays. Arrangements
are planned for the grandparents also to reach the
destination. That is how the bonding is made among the children …the maternal or paternal side
cousins. Of course the article was about
the families in the upper classes .But then, after reading it , I felt that it
will not be too far in the future when the idea of this kind of holidays for meeting
grandparents, cousins ,aunts and uncles
will soon percolate to the middle class of our society . Already holidays abroad , rather than a trip
home, has now become the in thing among the middle class , what with the plethora of
holiday packages being promoted by the travel agents and banks offering Holiday loans !
A
time is soon coming when the home of the grandparents will cease to be the meeting point of the
second and third generation. Forget about the
grandchildren , even the sons and daughters are finding it
boring to go and spend a few days with their parents living in villages or small towns. Thinking
on this brought back memories of my
own childhood , decades back when we children really looked forward to the
annual visit to our grandparents who were settled in a small town , almost a
village in Kerala miles away from where we were living. In fact , in those days just before summer holidays the main discussion among all the children in the classrooms used
to be centered around trips to “native”
place!
I still remember
how our grandparents would be waiting at the
gate for us ,when we arrived to spend
the holidays with them. For them it was a change in their humdrum life ,to have
young lives around them ,albeit for a few weeks. For us it was the excitement
of running around the house and the vast compound full of trees- palms, jackfruit, mangoes, guavas
,custard apples etc. Normally holidays were planned in such a way that all the
grandchildren would to be there together at least for a few days. Those
were the days of merriment ,carefree and joyful ,away from the hustle and bustle of
the city we lived in. More than anything it was the pampering of our grandmother that we enjoyed the most. Our parents' lost their control on us the moment we were taken under the wings of our grandmother. We grandchildren were princes and princesses when we were with our grandmother. We used to enjoy
listening to the stories of our wonderful grandmother who was an extrovert ,fun loving , so full of love and affection There was
never any generation gap between her and
us- the grandchildren! Grandfather on the other hand was an introvert and a strict disciplinarian , but
would not dare risk raising his voice
against all the pampering we children got from our grandmother. ! Our grandmother would
regale us with stories of her childhood and younger days, of how she was a
teenaged bride who never saw school beyond the fourth standard when she got married to our grandfather who was
a doctor attached to the Burma Medical services in Rangoon, of their journeys
aboard ships and of their return to
India after the World War and so on. It was a hilarious story of how he
first “refined “ her and how she finally
“tamed” him ! Listening to all the old tales was our
pastime in the evenings as in those days there was no television or computers to distract us. And our grandmother in turn was always keen on hearing about our life in Northern India.
We cousins also used to share
with each other, our experiences and lifestyles in the far off cities
we were living in. We used to organize skits to entertain our grandparents/uncles and aunts. The bonding those days were through such
living together ,sharing and caring for a few days . It
was miles away from the joint family system which had its own minus points and
which was anyway getting obsolete, by then .
And now we hear of holidays away from home ,
in hotels and resorts. It certainly will not be the same as a
homecoming to grandparents’ place. I wonder what the present and future
generations who are organizing holidays away from their parental homes would have,
as memories, and what the level of bonding would be with the extended family members. Of course with
the fast pace of today’s living and changing lifestyles ,I suppose such holiday- get-togethers in strange places are
still better than reaching a stage ,when dates would be specified for
remembering grandparents, uncles ,aunts and cousins like they do on Mother’s Day, Father’s day etc .I feel that the day is not far away when with the shrinking sizes of families , and
loosening of family bonds , enjoying
holidays in the company of only friends would be the preferred option !
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