I would like to do many things at the same time. I am a born multitasker, a trait I got from my mother. While she would teach in the day, in the evenings after coming back from college she would cook food on ‘daan’, a small earthen or brick stove, as it tasted much better on that.

My grandmother was also there. I have beautiful memories of her. We used to call her Radha. She was a smoker and had a beautiful ‘hookah’, which while growing up and after having started smoking, I would take a few puffs of. And she too would take a few cigarettes from me. We had that kind of companionship when my grandfather was not around. Under her tutelage, my mother had to be on the ‘daan’.

My mother was a multitasker. She would guide us not only in our homework, but debating, wearing the right clothes, eating right food, and also ensure that our father took us out to a restaurant and to Delhi for holidays in winter.

There was a 15–20-day period during winters which we would always look out for because that was the time when we would have our annual winter holidays. Summers used to be, I can tell you, at the scout camps in Pahalgam, Gulmarg, Manasbal Lake and other places with friends. These camps were the most beautiful part of my life.

This continued even in medical school where boys from different backgrounds and religions would do all sorts of things such as swimming, hang around and play games.

My father had great love for songs besides his fascination with mystics. We still have them in Kashmir but not as many as we had them while we were growing up. Those were real good quality mystics. I call them good quality mystics because even that got diluted over the period of time.

My father would visit them and occasionally take me along. At that point of time, it never sunk in. But I do the same now. I visited Ahad Sahib, Badshah Qalandar, Rahman Bab, etc. They have had a significant influence on my life.