old family albums

As I was going through old family albums with my family, gathering pictures for the project, I came across pictures that dated back to approximately 1920's. My family is from India, and during the 1920's India was a colony of the British empire. Most people have the misconception that all Indian people were treates as slaves by the British empire. However, when I was going through the pictures, I found many that have my grandfater ( dads father ) and his brothers, dining and at social gatherings with British.

When I saw these pictures I asked my father more details about the pictures. He didnt know much about the pictures, but remembered that his father had actually bought a car from one British officer before India's Independence in 1947. This was an amazing discovery so to say for me. My late grandfather had told me this story once when I was much to young to remember, but when I saw the pictures I realized how honorable my famiy was back then. To be friends with the British, and to not have to work for them in order to acheive that status was a very big deal back then. This meants that your family was one of very high class.

Looking through more pictures, I found out that around the time when British were leaving India, my dad's uncle also left with them, to work in London. There is a picture of him at the airport standing with his dad ( my great-grandfather).

From my grandmother's side ( dad's mom ) I found out that her oldest newphew (who happened to be older than her, because of the age differences between my grandmother and her 6 other siblings) was one of the first Indians to work in Air India ( International airline for India ) in the United States, in the 60's, 70's and 80's.

This project has allowed me to find out so much about my family, by just looking through old albums with my parents.