oil bath and grand mother

Recently when I had been to Chennai, I had the opportunity to get a Facials, Pedicure etc done from a beautician. She had told me that I need some oil massage for my hair for it to be healthy. When I raised my eyebrows, she said heat some oil and once it is warm massage on your scalp and wash it with a shampoo.
Today I remembered that and heated the 'nallannai' (sesame oil) with some whole pepper and curry leaves. That triggered lot of memories especially of my grandmother.
When we were children it used to be a weekly ritual to have what is called an oil bath. (which is nothing but what the beautician called the oil massage) . Every Friday it was our (girls) turn to have oil bath. Every Saturday it was the turn of my brothers to have their head massaged by my grand father. I vividly remember my grand dad making the sound of a moving train while massaging my brother's head. My brother used to say" come on let the train move faster" and it used to be such fun watching them.
This oil bath ritual if I remember correct continued in my family too, with my kids on Fridays and Saturdays till we were in Pune. My hubby dear took over the 'train' part. I don't know when all this disappeared from our life.
Coming back to my childhood, I used to be so impatient with my grand mother to finish the oil massage faster so that I could wash with what was called 'shiga kkai' ( a kind of nut powdered and used to clean the oil on the head) and go and play. Half the time I never had the patience to wash the hair properly and used to look too oily.

The other traditional ritual was the combing of hair. We all had plaits and my brother's wife used to have a long plait which I used to look at longingly as I just had two pigtails for plaits . (which my dear brother used to tease as 'elivaal pinnal meaning a rat's tail) . My grand mother used to sit and comb our hair nicely and put a tight plait(which I used to hate) and I had to wait for my turn as she had to comb my mom's hair and then my sister in law and then it was my turn. As usual I was impatient and used to say 'come on make it faster'. She told me once that one day you will feel sad that nobody is there to take care of you as this is part of taking care of you which truth I realize today.
Some how all these thoughts came to my mind today. We pay money to the beauticians to take care of our hair, our nails and face and what not when in olden days the grand mothers used to do this adding lot of affection and love apart from the massaging and combing.
May be our Society was fully evolved and we never realized it and changed all that in the name of Modernity and losing our support system which gave us physical support as well as mental support.