must i quote gerald durrell?

Family get-togethers are always chaotic.
No, no, chaotic is way too timid a word. Rowdy is more like it. Proud grandparents (the hosts), loud aunts, eager mums, reticent dads, a nerdy nephew disgusted about being the only boy around, giggly nieces, newborns wailing in the background and sussuing like clockwork, teens reenacting scenes from F.RI.E.N.D.S and still watching the reruns, young adults learning to be experts at diverting attention just when conversation deliberately reels to “that handsome CA boy who came to dinner yesterday”— put them all under one roof, and you have ear-splitting gossip, tons of bitten-back retorts, and food abundance.
And visitors. Yes, more people who’ve seen you “when you were soooo smaaall” (said with hand describing a tiny dashund sized person very close to the ground). “How you’ve grown! Children grow up so fast these days…” (Bitten back retort: I promise I tried to stay that size so we could’ve avoided this conversation).
I tried telling one obscure uncle I didn’t remember him, and threw myself into his nostalgic abyss for a very long hour. He promptly went and fetched the photo album in which, he, dressed in tight bell-bottoms and a large collared printed shirt, was planting several sloppy kisses on my eight-month-old tummy. “You always laughed when I did that,” he said dreamily, pointing to my very petrified-looking baby-face in the photograph.
Some people can never read expressions. Even if you stick your tongue out at them, they’ll offer you a tongue-cleaner.
Then you have the TV-starer. This is one person (usually male and over 40) who, poor thing, has the remote control stuck in his hand, and is seemingly hearing impaired (assumed since you have no way to tell if the volume control is jammed). As all the women gather around the dining table or in the bedroom, filling gossip gaps, and men stick it out in the living room, itching to trade tittle-tattle too but forced by habit to discuss Jayendra Saraswati, this lone ranger doesn’t take his eyes off the TV.
“Please eat lunch…” grandmom will gently urge him. To keep her heart, he’ll walk like a zombie to the table, fill his plate and plonk himself back on the TV-facing sofa. Of course, by the time he does this, a cousin would’ve swooped in and tuned into ET, but his hay-day would last only for a couple of minutes. The disgruntled cousin must automatically return the power-staff when the TV-starer returns with his plate. It’s a phenomenon, this TV-watching. I for one truly look up to such perseverant estrangement (though not the potbelly. They always have a potbelly)
Strangely, all the economy you’re taught throughout the year is flung right out of the window in a houseful situation. Everyone wants to pay for everything. A bill has to just arrive and it’s a race to who fishes the wallet out first. My granddad, to many people’s apparent annoyance and secret delight, has perfected the art of footing the bill. When that heart-beat-stopper bill is delivered in a leather bound folder (we eat at places that can afford leather only when more than one set of parents is at the dinner table), his hand sweeps it right off the table, while his “lovvvely assistant” grandma holds the fort by bringing up a contentious issue like the will, or granddad’s suddenly failing health. (Yes, they’re utterly shameless) Before you know what hit you, the waiter has left with the money. Granddad attributes his swiftness to years of hoodwinking smugglers as a Customs official. I attribute it to his years of handling ready cash instead of credit cards...
Hmmm... It was three absolutely tiring, glorious days with people you’ve grown up with, noticing how last year’s teenage mustache has turned into a cool French beard, laughing about that kitten we thought was going to die of bum-cancer when it menstruated, remembering the green backyard that had now given space to the guest house (we unanimously hate it, btw), sighing sympathetically about the terrible clothes your aunt never fails buys for you….
The best part? I got a family photo out of all this. Not some stupid formal one with stiff smiles and height order. But one that is asymmetric, chaotic and slashed with laugh-lines. Patience was only a small price to pay.