Family Homestead

A grandchild rekindles memories of a grandfather

5 min read·Aug 16, 2022

This Sunday, I returned after visiting one of my kids who live on the Gold Coast in sunny Australia. My ten days with her and her family were one of my best times this year. The highlight of my trip was spending time with her two-year-old daughter, my granddaughter, Darcy.

In those ten days, I woke up to the calls of ‘Papa’ every morning. An early breakfast sitting opposite each other first thing in the morning with Darcy was a great start to the day.

I put my otherwise regular busy life on hold to spend time with my granddaughter. Likewise, Darcy did not attend her daycare during those ten days. I watched her run around the house, questioning everything with a curious ‘why’. It was amazing, a little kid’s sense of wonder and happiness. It was pure joy.

Playing with her, reading books to her, and listening to her, I remembered my childhood, the joy of growing up with an extended family and sharing love and kindness. The presence of my extended family boosted a part of my self-confidence; my grandmothers, granduncles, grandaunts, uncles and aunties and cousins, second cousins and third cousins.

Now I see the cycle of life, having lived through three generations, child to parent to grandparent, seeing life pass. I saw the joys of an innocent and curious kid, how my daughter’s house was filled with a little voice, toys and books in every corner. I flew kites with Darcy on the sandy beaches, carried her around and watched her confidently navigate herself in kids’ playgrounds in the suburbs. She played the guitar and sang, holding a mock mike with loads of self-confidence. Darcy washed clothes with me and played in her playhouse in the backyard of her home while I hung the clothes to dry on their clothesline. Through her laughter, I recalled how the house where I grew up was filled with relatives back in the day in Sri Lanka. It gave me immense joy, the only way a little kid knew.

There is a big difference now. My kids have nuclear families. So did I, raising my kids with my then-wife in Dubai and Sydney. But as a kid, I lived in an extended family, growing up in a large house, not knowing limits or personal space. Like I lived on a homestead, open to many.

An aunt, my mother’s sister, lived with us. She loved me like her child. Two grandmothers also lived with us. Then a grandaunt who thought our house was her refuge, an indifferent uncle who came on the weekends. Then, many granduncles and aunts stayed in our home whenever they visited every three months or so. Also, many uncles and aunties, my parent’s cousins from both sides of the family, from all corners of Sri Lanka, visited us without notice. They were welcome any time of day, even at night. We made do with them sharing everything we had with no questions or qualms. Our home was an open home, a home of the community of extended family, no questions asked.

Me, in April 2022, with two of my grandkids

In our home, we ate together and shared our resources in limited spaces — beds and chairs. Everyone used relational names to address each other, brother, sister, uncle, aunt, son and daughter. We did not function as individuals. It was a different way of being and living in a generous commune.

Me, as a one-year-old with my grandmother and parents

Soon after arrival, grand aunties and aunties changed into their home clothes and joined my mother and grandmother in the kitchen. Fortunately, a lumpsum meal would turn up at our long dining table that could seat ten people. The meal, prepared by a combined task force, tasted different and yummy. There was food for everyone, and kids received priority in serving. The elders always offered health advice to kids on eating green vegetables and mallung, a salad lightly roasted with grated coconut flakes.

I spent most of my time with my granduncles, chatting with them on our front veranda. Some could speak English and wore suits, and some were simple villagers and farmers, wearing sarongs and a coat with a knot of hair on top of their heads. Almost every day there was a visitor to our home. These visits worked vice-versa. As I grew up, I spent my school holidays in their homes. sometimes staying for weeks.

When my ancestral home was renovated and extended, the workforce was entirely from the family. Everything was kept inside the family business, trust included. My mother’s cousins and my uncles were the workers who laid bricks, laid the tiles and did all the carpentry. They added four new rooms to our home, built by my grandfather a few decades earlier.

I am sixty-seven now. My beloved aunty is now eighty-three, the only surviving member of my parent’s generation. I yearn to visit her and tell her I love her so much for everything she did for me as a young boy. But that is not possible due to the worst economic crisis and resulting social unrest now enveloping Sri Lanka, my old country where I was born and raised.

My aunt lived with our family until I was eight. She was full of energy and kindness. When I was little, she carried me around. She took me to school on days when my grandmother was busy. When she went out and returned, she brought sweet lozenges for me sprinkled with sugary flour.

Back to Darcy. During those ten days, I sat around watching her. Her every move was immensely delightful. I felt great seeing another generation experiencing life with curiosity, in complete unison with her grandfather. It was adorable. Darcy, two years, calls me ‘Papa’ confidently, with delightful open eyes. A full cycle of families is manifesting in front of me, just like I experienced over a half-century ago in an island nation some eight thousand kilometres away from Sydney, from where I pen this.

I feel that in my past life, I lived in an open homestead with my extended family, 24 hours a day.

Darcy is a part of a big, beautiful family. She is part of this beautiful life, proudly passed down from the generations before her.

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