News of Appu Ghar closing down was flashing on TV when the chatty family was having a post dinner banter session. I vaguely remember going there with my parents when I was about 3. My parents went mad clicking pictures of their first born (me). There’s pictures of me on all the rides there. In fact, there are even pictures of me sitting on the upper berth and smiling at the camera. We have an entire cupboard filled with my baby pictures. (This sometimes irritates my sister who doesn’t have as many baby shots :)). It was time to bring the albums out and scan the pictures. I love looking at old pictures. I remember the Yashica camera my dad brought back from Japan. It was a slick camera to own then. At the first possible excuse my parents would load the camera and click away to glory! I still don’t know if it was their love for photography or just an excuse to click crazy pictures of the family. My dad used to let me take one off pictures under strict supervision! I once wanted to take a picture of a fly sitting on an especially fat sasthrigal’s back at a function. Predictably, the fly flew away before I could click and when the pictures were developed, my mom couldn’t figure out why we had a picture of an exceptionally fat hairy back!!
We have a tradition in the family. We go to a photo studio all dressed up and click a picture each year on our parents’ wedding anniversary. I have to admit, I thought it was a little corny as I got older, but when you compare the shots from the last 24 years, there’s the newly wed’s coy smile to the familiar happy smile of the couple to a kid standing between the two on a stool and holding their hands to posing with 2 kids instead of one to proud smile of parents with 2 teenage daughters standing on either side. There’s a story associated with most of these pictures!
I took about 1000 odd pictures when I went to Europe last year. But they’re all on my laptop, neatly arranged in albums by Picasa. Somehow, that doesn’t even come close to the joy of holding a photo album. Its almost as though feeling the photo takes you closer to the moment you frozen in the frame. I know its possible to get these photos printed. But they will never feel as special as my Yashica pictures did 🙂
Jest Me 
True…the joy of holding a photo album in hand does not match with the slide shows on the notebook…and i too love looking at pictures…one look at the pictures…all the memories flooding back…during my first year in Germany that’s what kept me smiling most of the times..
Wow! my dad had a yashica camera too. And I have had a similar photo-filled childhood (and my dad being a photographer, we have piles of albums just from our childhood). And every single photo would have myself and my sister posing in the same way – having our hands to our hips! I still ask my parents about that and they simply reply, “you guys used to obey us back then!”.
And yaa, paperback albums are simply incomparable. And u’r sasthrigal attempt was hilarious. This is probably one of u’r best posts I hv read. Kudos!
@Ela – I’ve decided that when I have enough money to get my own place, I’ll have a wall full of photos! 🙂
@Arun – enga amma andha photo voda goram thaanga mudiyama kizhichu potanga 😀
In fact, not satisfied with their pictures, I have one album clicked by a professional photographer who was my mom’s friend.
All my poses had their trademark buck teeth smile. 🙂
thats power of images…u should check out HCB’s interview in google video..or James Nahtwey’s TED talk…
Hard copies of photographs definitely evoke the nostalgia that soft copies just cant match! My Dad’s Yashica is still locked in the cupboard. It’s been a while that I’ve even touched it. This post got me to lay my hands on it. Wish it worked! 🙂
Good one… these are simple things that we have started missing these days.
Gaytri…I wish u best for that…i do have a wall of photos in my sleeping room and it is really great…to go to sleep and wake up looking at those people who had made my life wonderful!
I so agree. Now that am home 🙂 I am going through these snaps and feel soooooo good! How are you otherwise di?
@venkatraman – i have to google to figure out what exactly you said 🙂
@spiky – I went looking for the yashica too.. couldn’t find it!
@balaji, Ela – Thanks!
@Nandu – yenna ma kalyana pon, I’m doing great!
Nice.
I have this one particular album featuring black and white photos of my newlywed parents, me as a tot and then the coloured ones of when my sister was born. It’s hardbound with transparent interlays and no online program has come close to the nostalgia I feel everytime I flip through it. Somehow we have too many pics of every single thing these days – I wonder if it makes them somehow less special?
@Madhumita – its not just having too many pictures, its too many impersonal pictures!
hey,
totally random…must confess i dont remember how i came across your blog. Anway, Appu Ghar is closing down? how? why?!?
guess i would have figured out by the time you reply.
must also confess that yours is the second blog i’ve ever enjoyed reading unlike the usual nonsense most people post(the first being my friend venkatdeep’s).
congrats…
yes…i’m on orkut, no…i’m not on facebook and no…i dont send “frandship” requests to strangers 😀
Tejas Rao
Rochester,NY
True! Atleast 100 times I would have thought that I should print all my pics. But my camera is clicking faster and my laptop is running out of space. May be I should cut down on trips!
totally with u on this…theres nothing like a photo you can hold in ur hand…just like nothing beats reading a real book…well, maybe thts coz, laptop is pretty difficult to take to the loo…
Even we are a Yashica family.. That is the only cam we’ve ever had..
And bout’ pics in a photo album being better; for me pics on the computer works better. Maybe thats cos’ we’ve never had a proper photo collection at home.