Sitting sizeably, at 14 inches in length and 12 inches in breadth, this dark wood box could easily be mistaken for an ornately carved low side table. However, come closer and the magic inside is revealed. The vanity cum jewellery box from the early 1900s, sits pristinely preserved in the hands of its third owner.
My grandfather, Divan Mohideen, bought a red and yellow tin coin bank in 1968, when he was 22 years old. It came from the Madras Central Co-operative Bank Ltd., one of the oldest banks in the city, its roots reaching back to the 1930s. The British had a curious habit – banks in London often gave small metal coin boxes to families, especially children, to teach them thrift and discipline.
My grandmother’s wedding card, the tea set she brought from a refugee home in Bikaner, and her mid-century Bengal Potteries plates together map her movement from Kulachi to Rajasthan.
The box was gifted to 10 year old Sushi by my grandfather Digambar Singh Karki in 1955. The small box made of brass or peetal has a latch, circular lid and a curved handle.
In 1972, a family friend gifted this Nutrine box to my maternal uncle for his birthday, and originally it was filled with toffees. As it emptied, like the fate of most chocolate or biscuit tins in South Asian families, my grandmother filled it with sewing accessories – spools of thread brought by my great-grandfather from Singapore many years earlier in 1953.
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