Grandma's place......

Grandma’s place was filled with bees… Curse my cousin sis who burnt the entire bunch of them before I could snap a picture!!! It was full of drama, like it was a swarm of killer bees and the entire household freaked out, and panic shouts and;

“Don’t go there its filled with them!!!”

“There’s one more there!!!”

“CURSE THE BEES!!! Kill them!!! KILL THEM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

But the truth was, it was only about 30-40 of them and they didn’t come attacking in a whole swarm, they came in groups of 3’s and 4’s in succession… But de drama!!! I could’ve sworn that it was like reliving an 80’s horror movie of sorts, “ATTACK OF THE KILLER BEE SWARM!!!” with lights turned off in the house so that we can lure them into a place for them to be smacked by newspaper weapons…

*laughs heartily*

My grandma’s place has always been this lively; either it’s something like this or some prayers whereby one of my relatives falls into a deep trance and go berserk or my cousin mysteriously disappears and a whole commotion goes on about why and how he had vanished…

Mom: I want to go to grandma's place tonight. Must do dressing for mama (my uncle-in-law, whom got married to my aunt, my dad’s sister).

Myself: Ok, what time??? How’s mama’s leg??? (was recently hospitalized for a bad leg infection and was back home nursing it, my mom is now helping out, changing de bandages and re-dressing his wound. Mom was an experienced nurse)

Another previous occasion,

Mom: Attha veethele gathering irekkan da… Veliya porena sikkirama vantere… (There’s going to be a gathering at grandma's tonight… If you’re going out better be back early.

So yea, I grew up there, and I love being in my grandma’s wooden house on stilts. The quintessential “kampong” house… So many of our get-togethers and special prayers of sorts has happened there, with children shouting, running around the house chasing each other (I used to be one of them many years ago) and adult women chattering away about how they have been getting the latest scoop on new designs of Indian attire and also the men, playing cards with glasses of Jack Daniels in ice for their drinking pleasure…

I love that place but Cookies and Cakes, always make fun of me because of the amount of food I end up ingesting every time a visit is due…

Mobile text;

Cookies and Cakes: Wat r u doing up so late?

Myself: At grandma’s place….

Cookies and Cakes: Patti!!! Atta!!! N ate!!! Helloooo…..*waves frantically*

Myself: LMAO!!! I jus told dem u said hi….

*tells people in the house that CnC said hi*

Cookies and Cakes: Pls dun go parading around wif my reply. k…its embarrassin… SO wat hav u ate ther??? Sum chicken curry with thosai n lotsa ghee???

Text messaging ends, well, at least for the time being…

My grandma and her daughter, my aunt, are great cooks… They make the best Indian curries, sweets and dishes… I love having dinners at their place but sadly it comes with a heavy calorie tag… But more than the fact that food is definitely lip-smacking delicious, it’s all the love my aunt puts into her cooking that makes the difference… Every time I am there I am taken back to revisit my childhood… I had a very interesting time growing up in a house where grandma had chicken coops, we had mango trees (which heavily bears fruits during its peak; bags and bags of juicy orange fleshy mangoes), and there’s this constant buzz of relatives around the house… Sometimes I miss those carefree, jolly, gay days when all we were worried about was our unsettled Math homeworks (12x3= …………36 rite???)

Fancy chasing a rooster for slaughter anyone????