Flip through the latest issue of Gulf Weekly.
I had a very interesting experience this week. On my way to running some errands in Manama, my father thought it would be good if he showed me round some of the places where he spent his childhood.
I got the chance to visit memory lane too because it was there that I spent my own childhood and it was such a surprise to find some of the elderly people just the same and some houses still standing there.
I was in awe at how much our country had preserved its traditions and culture. Children still played games that I thought had vanished with the advance of technology. Furthermore, some of the elderly people still sat watching the television through analogue signals as opposed to the mainstream digitized versions our generation has been accustomed to.
My father sat down with some old friends who still lived in his former neighbourhood and watching them reminiscing made me wonder even more how much of our past we have forgotten. One old man told me he was disappointed that the current generation has forgotten the Bahraini tradition of hospitality and that more and more kids fail to visit their grandparents and the elderly.
On a personal level, I only really visit my own grandmother once a week and it made me realise that I do not see her that often. We live in a world in which we tend to forget those loved ones who truly need us even more than we need them. Visiting the elderly with my dad that day provided me with a sense of emotion and wisdom. My advice you ask? Simple: do not forget your loved ones and your past. In order to understand ourselves and our present, we need to understand our past as well.
