Growing up in the village

When I see today's young children spending their times mostly in front of the T.V, I really pity them for what they miss out, in comparison with my own childhood in the village, amidst the entire splendor nature has to offer. When I think of those days a pleasant cozy feeling fills my heart.

The house I lived had all my extended relatives under one roof. My great grand mother was the superior of the household. Then there were my grandparents, parents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and guests from time to time. Meals time was a grand affair. Children were looked after with so much expertise handed over through hierarchical experience.

Home remedies treated most of the minor complaints. Going to /and the availability of the doctor was very rare. Everyone seemed healthy also. What with walking all through the length and breadth of the street long house, doing everything manually, drinking pure water from the well, milk from the household cattle, vegetable from the backyard garden. Name any fruit, vegetable or flower, it was there. In fact people were actually ashamed to complain about health. We can also add the unpolluted air they were lucky to breathe, the timely simple meals from organic vegetation they ate.

Every alternate week the children were given either ground tender neem leaves with curd or castor oil. [To ensure our stomach were cleansed of any toxics, Of course with lot of resistance from us!] Weekly oil baths were ritualistic. Morning baths in the temple tank where children learnt to swim without the aid of coach, from one another, and flaunted their prowess.

Play hours in the mango groove afternoons spent playing indoor games with different aged people were really great. It was a real bonding time with elders, the dayakattam and pallanguzhi. Kallukai-I even remember some of the songs we used to sing, and hand eye co-ordination we developed by playing with pebbles and tamarind seeds. We never knew what it was to get bored. But now day’s children, inspite of all the so-called sophisticated gadgets to amuse them do not know how to keep themselves occupied or entertained