Kannamkulam Illam: Part III: Family members I knew

Kannamkulam Illam: 
My father's ancestral house
 Part III
Family members I knew: Thampanettan

As already mentioned, the present occupants of Kannamkulam Illam include Thampanettan’s son Narayanan Namboodiri (76) and his family. His younger brother Kesavan who retired as a teacher constructed a modern house with all modern facilities in the Illam compound and is staying there with his family (his wife is working as a teacher and son, an engineer by profession, is working with an NGO.
Thampanettan (Sankaran Namboodiri) is the eldest son of my father’s eldest brother. He was an all-rounder, having interest in temple art forms including dance (Nrutham), repair of electric equipment and watches and clocks, woodcraft/handicraft and so on. He died at a young age of 40 when his children were of school age. I gathered from members of his family that he didn’t recover from Malaria/Pneumonia he happened to get infected during one of his regular visits to a forest temple (Kottiyoor) in Kannur District. When I went to Illam first, I remember to have seen him working busy in his room amidst an assortment of clocks, watches  and torches. His eldest son Govindan died a few years after his death.

My Muthassan and other members of that and previous generations used to go to Thiruvananthapuram for participating in “Murajapam” organized by the Travancore Royal Family periodically. 

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