Wednesday, May 03, 2006

When my mother was a little girl.

My mother was Swedish. When she was three, she, looking at an encyclopaedia picture of the river Ganga , pointed it out to my grandmother. My grandmother looked at it and said “Yes, I know you will go there one day and never come back.” My mother left Sweden when she was 20 , came to India and visited Sweden only once after that.

She would tell me stories of her childhood, of how she and her brother had to go through a wood to reach their school, of how she would go skating down streams at a speed I could not imagine, of how in the summer holidays she earned pocket money by picking berries…I forget which kind, of how she would sit for hours in farmhouses of friends because kitten had fallen asleep on her lap and she could not bear to wake him up, of how her uncle had brought up a moose baby, of the night her father encountered a ghost and several times after that, of Christmas nights when a bowl of porridge and milk was left in the barn for the elves to eat, of the Christmas baking that would begin late October....so much more...

Then she would tell me stories of how her family sent gift parcels of food, clothes, books, crockery, cutlery and what not to war devastated Germany and of the many friends that were made because of.

So many stories….I will try my best to recall them and write them down….I hope I remember them all.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Looking forward
-Finny

Anushya said...

yes!!tell us more...Especially about the baking.I remember that 1st christmas at your place when your mother had baked the most delicious mouth watering cakes by the dozens.oooo the varieties.Remember we made those ginger cookies together?

She was so beautiful.I will never forget that image of her in that CUPA's fund raiser art show in winsor manor.She looked so regal and utterly stunning.And how she would yell at Tippu.She donated him several times over to me because of his crazy behavior.

Many time I've called up your place and spoken to her for looong spates of time because you werent at home.She was so interesting to talk to and I can never forget her laughter.It was always so strong, confident and genuine.

She was an amazing woman yasmine.You have so much to be proud of.:-)

Yasmine Claire said...

yep Anushya....Hope I can become a wee bit like her.

Anonymous said...

yas! ur all that already and more, may i say.
-Finny

Anonymous said...

Interesting website with a lot of resources and detailed explanations.
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Anonymous said...

I believe they were blueberries. There are lots of those in "Dalarna"