Family, Movies, Books etc..

I was feeling quite low due to my sickness that has forced me to stay home for the past two days. So thought of writing something that has a high feel-good factor to cheer me up. Could not think of anything better than memories from my growing up years to make me feel better. I can think of at least three things that definitely run in our family (for three generations, if not more) - 1. we all love films 2. we all (with minor exceptions) love reading and 3. we all (and no exceptions this time) are people of strong likes and dislikes.

My grandfather used to take my Dad and my Uncle (when they were kids) to watch every movie first day, first show. If they missed to make it to the first show due to some unavoidable reason, it was more or less like a mourning in the household. When we were kids, it was our fortnightly routine to cram into our poor old ambassador (2 adults + 5 kids + 2 or more cousins, oh my God!!) and go for a movie on Sundays. I don't think we would have missed watching any movie that was released from late 70s to mid 80s. It was only during late 80s when VCRs became more popular and movie theatres were considered a place where shareef log don't go that this routine came to an end. Thank God things have now changed. So even now, no family gatherings are considered to be complete without watching at least 2 movies in as many weeks :)

The habit of reading also comes from my grandfather. He was not just an avid reader but also a regular contributor in a magazine called Dharmyug. Long after his death, during one of my summer vacations (I think I was in 8th/9th std), I chanced upon some of his books - complete collections of Oscar Wilde, William Wordsworth, Maithilisharan Gupt & Dinkar. What a treasure it was!! My Dad's reading mostly included classics and management books. I remember having read books like 'Born to Win' and 'Don't say yes when you want to say no' when I was in my early teens :). My Mom mostly reads Grihshobha/Manorama and lately some religious books. When we were kids, our parents used to give each of us short-story collections of Premchand as birthday gifts .. until they exhausted all of them that were published! In our generation, I can read just about anything if I have started it (that has its own disadvantages, trust me), my younger sister is more into romantic novels, my elder sisters are currently reading only children's books (thanks to their kids) and my brother reads nothing but comics & an occasional Car & Auto or Computer Today kind of magazines. And we all (parents included) are die-hard fans of comics. We still drool over Phantom, Mandrake, Flash Gordon, Garth, Lt Carry Grant and the best of all - Amar Chitra Katha!


Regarding us all being people of strong likes and dislikes .. I would rather not go into details for my own good. I don't know which of my family members might be reading this :)

(Phantom photo: http://www.germworks.net/)