As I was sifting through pictures of Yardley English Rose on Google for the previous post, I found this really interesting Yardley Print Ad published in the year 1968. No wonder monopoly seemed prevalent and worked in sculpting solid evergreen brands!
Back in the Anna Nagar days, we loved visiting our grandparents (mom’s parents specifically) during weekends. Savi thatha’s place was always like a candy house to all of us as we were stuffed with icecreams, chocolates, sugar candies, indian sweets and basically the bunch of us were dipped in anything sweet.
It was also fun to be there coz we loved rummaging through thatha and paati’s stuff. They visited a lot of foreign countries and brought back goods from abroad that fascinated us immensely. To name a few evergreen products, there was always some gillette tube from US and then the Yardley soaps and talcum powders from Europe and milk powders from all over the world. These were absolutely interesting as they were completely new to the kids and were basically products that adults always shoved away from us.
Recently, my dad got me a Yardley soap for old times sake. Yardley English Rose – Savon de luxe. It seems like yesterday that we were given Yardley bars to bathe in whenever we were at Savi thatha’s place. Janaki paati always used the Yardley English Rose much before Camay and the rest of the foreign soap gumbal made their space in the popular foreign goods section.
This is a fragrance I can always associate with Paati. She smelled great. There were times we would call her the English Paati not because she was fair…. but because of her need to be polite and in the best of behaviour. Funny how some products always remain etched in your memories…. and even if you don’t think about some people too often, these memories are tightly wrapped in some corner of your brain so that products like the English Rose remind you of the good old times. Miss you Janaki Paati, my English Rose.
I have never really believed in making resolutions on the eve of every new year. Even though I find the tradition very commendable, I have always found it hard to stick to resolutions and ensure I seek to achieve what I have taken up for that particular year.
It is quite interesting when I see and read about resolutions that others take… And even more interesting in analyzing how far away they are from achieving their targets for the year. Like most human beings, I love to criticize. I’m open to give out my opinion free without inhibitions. And like every other human being, I absolutely detest it when people tell me where I’m going wrong or what changes I should be making in my life.
So this year I have decided to give it another chance but with an amendment to the entire art of making new year resolutions. I will think and reveal one resolution every week. This, of course, I believe would be a lot more sensibler and practical in the path towards realization of my yearly goals.
Let’s see… my first resolution for the year is related to something that is long-time pending. I have intended to do this but never gotten around to it in a full-fledged manner.
Resolution #1: To read 50 books this year (I will reveal the list shortly. I’m working on it. Once I’m done collating, I will try posting it by the end of this week when I reveal Resolution #2)
Why books? Because over the past one year, I have managed to somehow buy a LOT of books that seemed interesting or ones that have gotten amazing reviews or ones that have been highly recommended by someone or the other. The best part is I have never been able to read them. It always seems to get stuck at page 14 or page 10. Never past that! So this year’s first resolution would be read atleast 50 books. And 50 books I have been meaning to read for a very long time.
Rest in Next!
