My Cousin's Recollections Of His Uncle

Alfred Gunasekaran, Ruston, LA, USA

This is only a short account of Mr. Samuel Durairaj, with whom I was acquainted for about 35 years, and a testimony to the rosy picture that his own daughter, Olivia Kanna has painted about his life as a tribute to her late father, an erudite man, who led a simple, religious, yet bold life, which he inherited from his parents. Samuel Durairaj was born ca.1928 in an ordinary family, in a place often termed as the granary of South India, and he was not far from our own family circle. He was the eldest brother of my mother, and I am the last and the eighteenth grandchild of Samuel’s parents.

Mr. Samuel Durairaj was indeed a self-taught scholar. Being the eldest of a half a dozen siblings, and when electricity was not a common household thing, he and his siblings grew up with a meager amount of basic supplies, including food and other necessities. Every day evening, after Samuel and his siblings came from school, they had to do the usual evening routine in the house,… not a usual task everyone will think of... Samuel’s mother, my grand mother, had an unusual interest and insatiable love for pet animals… she had cows, sheep, chicken, turkey, dogs, parrot, you name it…. The house used to be a mini zoo… no exaggeration..! All the children had to clean the house, take care of these delicate life stocks… prepare food, wash clothes, etc… All these children would have been qualified instantly to become the “dirty job heroes”. Samuel’s mother had also arranged for someone to come every day early in the morning to milk the cows. It was in those days, Samuel and all his younger siblings had had to finish their homework with a portable hurricane lamp or candle light. Being the eldest son, Samuel had to wait patiently for his turn almost for everything…Samuel never used his first-born rights to compete with or snatch the study lamps or any other things from his younger siblings... Samuel used to wait until all his younger siblings finished their work and get to bed by ten o’clock in the night. It was only then Samuel would start his reading undisturbed in those days... From childhood onwards, he seemed to be very enthusiastic about learning and fascinated by books, and entranced by the idea that knowledge is power, which he could transfer to his own children later in his life. Being the first born in the house, and that too, as a male child, he would have been given an agenda to support the family, the tradition that continues even now in millions of families in India.

Samuel’s house was indeed a power house of knowledge with lots of books in a small library. Nearly four decades ago, when I was a small kid, I used to like to go to Samuel’s (my uncle’s) house to see the beautiful books about animals, fishes, and so on, … just to see the pictures in those books. His house was the only outlet for all the small kids to learn about wildlife, marine life, etc… when television was not very ubiquitous in those days. Many families are gifted to have a prodigy child, and some families are even more blessed with more prodigies. Certainly, Samuel’s family is one such family, as Samuel himself was a prodigy in his parent’s house.

The funniest thing I could remember about Samuel Durairaj was that just because he had some bad dreams one fine night, when he left the house next day morning to work, he advised his youngest son Gladius not to go out of the house that day. Whether it was a divine intervention or psychological fears that made Samuel Durairaj to take that decision that day was not known, but a father’s decision to protect and save his son will always be remembered and told for generations. Even funnier was that when Samuel’s son, Gladius stayed at home and started washing clothes near the well in the house, his elder sister, Millicent, uttered, “You don't go near the well....you may even fall...”. That was hilarious… ! As I think of it now, it might just well be another divine intervention..!

These are just my random thoughts, that resulted from some of the stories that my mother told me as her childhood memories, that would concur with Olivia’s memories.......!