Heart and Soul: Prudent ways of yesteryear

The writer as a young man in 1965. Photos: Thiagan Mathiaparanam

Dad, having green fingers, would plant a great variety of vegetables in the ample backyard. During our schooldays, there was no book aid for students. So, as soon as the book list was out, besides those received from our elders, we would quickly do some networking to get as many as possible of the remaining textbooks from seniors at half price.

Grooming our hair with Brylcreem or Tancho hair cream was beyond our budget. Every member of the family had to use the fragrant green-coloured hair oil, Chandanadi. Come to think of it, we had already gone"green" during the 50s itself. This hair oil has passed the test of time, as it's still available in Indian sundry shops.

The rearing of fowls provided us with a constant supply of eggs to supplement our diet. We had a brood of about 20 fowls. At times, mum would keep some of the eggs for hatching purposes. In a rectangular cream cracker tin, was spread a layer of paddy. The eggs were placed on this paddy spread for safekeeping.

To cut costs, my brother would recycle some of the damaged shuttlecocks by plucking out the better feathers and carefully inserting them into another shuttlecock, and adding some glue to it. It was as good as new! Those reconstructed shuttlecocks would last for quite a while too.

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