I trust, value and consider this as the most natural and sincere relationship

One of the most natural, sincere and 100% valued relationship is that of grandparent and grandchild. As a child of the 70’s and 80’s ;  I have soaked, bonded and enjoyed this relationship with both my set of grandparents – maternal and paternal. Summer holidays meant rejoicing with a gang of maternal and paternal cousins at my grandparents home at Nanganallur and Mylapore – the two suburbs of Madras.

Today with many things that have changed, this relationship too has changed. Many children unfortunately miss and don’t know the value of such relationships. Summer holidays for them mean hopping from one summer camp to another, occupied with electronic gadgets or visiting malls or exotic destinations on vacation.

Fortunately there are many children like mine,  who get an opportunity to bond with their grand parents. Both of them bask in the love of their maternal and paternal grandparents and even their grand uncles and grand aunts to learn rich values from them which acts as a 100% natural summer camp. Their rich native wisdom and values are taught to them at no extra cost but with dollops of unconditional and sincere love. Their love and pampering many times make me feel jealous of this beautiful relationship and makes me yearn for my own.

My children bond with them by playing native games, board games, solving Sudoku, learning to read and write my mothertongue, to cook, to sew, listening to their personal stories of yore, mythological stories, helping them and by simply observing their natural qualities that displays enormous willpower, determination, concentration, sincerity, devotion , culture and other values which are things of the past. They also inturn teach their grandparents to handle complex electronic gadgets and their applications.

Whenever they lose a game of chess with their grandmom(maternal), they have learnt to accept it gracefully when their grandmom a good chess player consoles them by telling that ‘Tholviye vettriyin mudhal padi’( failure is the stepping stone to success) and ‘Muyirchi thiruvinayakkum’( try until you succeed) and today when they lose over some game or competition they take it under their stride, put extra efforts again to win over.
Many a times my children come across a difficult task, they give up citing ‘Impossible’( Mudiyalai/mudiyadhu), it is the other grandmom(paternal) who takes over to encourage and tells them ‘Mudiyadhdu edhuvumay kidayadu’ ( there is nothing that is impossible),  'mudiyadhunu sollavay kodadu' ( Don’t ever tell impossible). These motivating words help them to finish even the most difficult task conveniently and easily. The satisfying smile and the heave of relief they give after the task is done is  a moment worth capturing. 


Witnessing their retired grandfather(maternal) help their grandmom with household chores like washing vessels, cleaning and cooking have made my children realize that there is no work that is defined by gender and they infact love and relish the potato curry and other culinary creations their grandfather makes for them with love. This infact has earned their grandfather's creation the title ‘Thatha’s alu curry is the best in the world’.

From their other late grandfather(paternal) they recollect through their photos  the qualities of humility, patience and simplicity.
Though my children have born and live outside their native state, it has not deterred them from speaking our mother tongue fluently. Infact they are learning to read and write every summer. All thanks to the bonding with their grandparents.


Many more instances and values helping them to become good humans are taught at this natural summer camp, their only grouse is that they don’t have many cousins like I do. (they have just 3 cousins, one who is 12 years older to them stays in the US and the other stays in China during summers, while they just have the company of their 8 year old cousin whom they treat like a Barbie doll)

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