The Avon Lady’s perfume brooch
Last year, my mother gave me a carnelian-coloured brooch from Avon, circa 1970, that belonged to her mother. I’d always known that my grandmother used to be an Avon Lady
Shyamal Majumdar’s light measuring Ikophot
An ikophot is a handheld meter made in the 1950’s by Zeiss Ikon in Stuttgart, Germany. My grandfather Shyamal Kumar Majumdar probably procured this in the 1960s from Fancy Market, Kidderpore, Kolkata. It has a bubble glass at the front that takes in the light, which then drives the meter needle. It is covered by a little black lid which can be removed while using the device.
The East Pakistan Motor Driving Licence
The Motor Driving Licence was issued in the former East Pakistan (present day Bangladesh) in the city of Dhaka, where my mother tells me her father lived for some time.
The Ridges of a Thekua Mould
In the year of Madhubala’s Tarana, my great-grandfather bought an ornate wooden item for my great-grandmother from Madhubani. It was a Thekua mould made out of mango wood in the colour tan, lightweight and palm-size, the first gift purchased after their marriage.
Pachisi, Sepoys, Cowries: My Grandparents’ Tabletop Story
Throughout history, pachisi was the ‘poor man’s chaupar’. But to my grandmother, whose childhood pachisi grids were scribbled in chalk, my grandfather’s novelty board — like rubies, emeralds, sapphires, and pearls sewn together — seemed no less regal. “She embroidered each bead herself,” she tells me, looking back at the outbursts, meltdowns, and amusement this game brought to my grandparents’ living room 60 years ago. “I guess she’d be your great-great-grandmother”.