I happened to see a small collection of hand bags of my mother Bhramaramba when I was in Rajahmundry last year.  The bag in the picture reminds me an old memory.  I got it for her from Madras sometime in early 1980s. It was bought from one of the art shops in the main road of Madras. It is a leather bag with traditional south Indian art depicting the beauty of three women called Golla Bhamalu (గొల్ల భామలు) carrying pots stacked on their heads. This art refers to the romantic appearance of working women of a specific class dressed in a particular fashion. It is a common artistic theme of those days. Madras has now become Chennai and perhaps these bags are no more available in stores.

I used to see two of my mother's hard bound note books since my teenage.  One has the notes of her music lessons. My mother mentioned about a music master teaching the sisters at their home. The date on page 4 of the note book is May 20, 1951.  I think she was about eleven years old by the time she began taking music lessons. The book has 175 pages filled – perhaps the lessons went for a year or more.  However, I recall that she used to ask us to turn off the radio whenever Carnatic music started after film songs. I did not understand at that time, but I can guess the reason now. The music master could not even write her name correctly – leave alone the lyrics of the songs. He was such a bad teacher that the children disliked the classical music altogether.  Despite that we used to listen my mother singing Keerthanas (కీర్తనలు) and Mangala harathis (మంగళ హారతులు) melodiously during women's festivals and social functions.

In my childhood, my parents used to tell us about "Ramakoti" (రామకోటి). It is a symbol of devotion towards the God Rama (రామ). They started writing Ramakoti (రామకోటి), the name of the God Sree Rama (శ్రీరామ) repeatedly for 100,00,000 (కోటి) times.  I found one of those books in my mother's collections.  The picture shows page 216 from her Ramakoti, written on January 25, 1964, perhaps at around 45 thousand times of the koti.  It is a long journey requiring the completion of several volumes.  As the time goes, writing gets faster and letters become more compact. There is another such a volume in her collection.