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When it comes to families, one is bound to find similarities while talking to one’s friends, cousins or even a stranger. It could be parents arguing about something, gossiping with siblings, a forgotten story of losing something precious or spending quality time over a cup of coffee. The Awasthis of Aamnagiri by Shubha Sarma is like a friend telling you stories about her family as they grew up, making you chuckle while you recollect similar incidents.
The Awasthis are a big family of more than 20 people, residing in a beautiful crimson-coloured bungalow surrounded by aromatic Parijat trees. With the never-ending bickering of the head of the family, Pandit Ji and his wife Shakuntala, addressed as Mata Ji by everyone, chattering among their seven children and their spouses, and their grandchildren running around wildly, the house is always brimming with life. Sarma rightly captures the essence of a family in their everyday life, including the incessant sarcasm used by parents or a mother’s rant about her life after marriage.
The stories in this book span across decades, relating incidents that the family members encounter, such as stolen necklaces, egg-eating ghosts or missing breakfasts! Like any typical old Indian family, there are family members who believe in superstitions and astrology to keep bad omens at bay, which make for funny stories of getting duped and other times of miraculously bringing back a lost item. Each story is well narrated with a good balance of funny, sweet and emotional that would make you miss your family immediately.
Even though the family is living during patriarchal times and the daughters-in-law of the Awasthi family manage the household, there are times when they are encouraged to pursue their dreams and even gain support from the male members. The family being full of lawyers, there is a time when they even hold a court at home! Complete with a judge, a lawyer accusing the help and another lawyer defending her, bringing the lady of justice to the Awasthi home.
The book had me smirking with the writer describing the stories with a sense of wit and a pinch of sarcasm. Although there are a few chapters that drag on for too long, Sarma has beautifully visualised the bungalow and the surroundings in Aamnagiri, tempting me to pack my bags and spend a month-long vacation there. The characters too blend well with the story, some of whom tend to remind you of your own relatives and neighbours who love to gossip and slander people like the vamps and villains in Indian soap operas!
A change in pace
One of the chapters, which begins with animals and birds holding a meeting to save the mango tree, breaks the flow of the book, giving it a children’s fiction quality, which is jarring. With certain peculiarities that only belong to the ‘North Indians’, not all readers will be able to relate to the characters. This gap increases with the use of a few words in Hindi, references to characters or incidents from the Mahabharata and certain rituals only familiar to the Hindus.
Along the years as the family ages, there is also a change in the tale with younger members slowly moving out of the big bungalow to their own small homes in cities. Not directly juxtaposing the distinction between a nuclear and a joint family, there is a hint of how the lives of parents are altered without the younger generations’ liveliness at home. Even someone like me, who has grown up with a nuclear family in a city far away from my relatives, could easily associate with this sense of loss.
This book is perfect for those living in a city, away from their family; it makes you miss your parents and prods you to call them. It is a good read-aloud when you get together with cousins and loved ones.