All in the family. Oh yes, one very large family.

This picture titled "All in the family" came in day-before-yesterday's Deccan Chronicle which attracted my immediate attention because of, what else, but gorgeous Angelina. Oh, I did see Brad also in the pic, but what about him ?

The next thing about the pic was their brood of kids - 6 in total of which 3 are adopted and
3 are their biological offspring. And from what I hear, both of them have still not have had
enough of kids and plan to add to their family by either adopting more kids or having more
of their own or a combo of both.

I grew up with 2 siblings and when my parents were planning their family, the population
though a minor issue was not as much a serious problem as it is now, when we seem to be
breeding like rabbits. Actually, we seem to have left the rabbits far behind in the race.
At that time, the government's exhortation to the citizens was "We two; Ours two".
Ofcourse most parents of that time conveniently ignored this advice, including mine.

Actually some parents for eg, my BIL's parents, just laughed at the whole two-two idea as
they went about bringing 10 kids into the world. Oh yeah, 10 kids was more an exception
rather than the rule then. But still, imagine being one of 10 kids in a family. Hey, you are
just short of 1 kid to make a cricket or football team. :-)

As the population explosion became more of a serious issue, the Indian government made
a small change to their slogan, which they thought would automatically reduce the birth
rate by half. The new slogan now is "We are one; Ours is one". Pardon the grammatical
errors in the slogan, because if the point gets through, it is a job well done.

Parents today seem to be very careful about the number of kids they have - no broods of
10 for them. But still, they do not really swear by the government's idea of limiting the
number of kids to just one. Most have atleast 2 kids, while there still are those that go for
the magic number of 3.

There are also lots of couples who restrict themselves to just 1 kid, but that I think is more
to do with the escalating cost of education in India. The other day a friend was telling about
another friend who shelled out Rs.100,000 + change for each of their 2 kids for getting
them admitted to a decent school. And guess what, these kids are in kindergarten. My
4 years of Engineering cost just half of what they paid for 1 kid - all expenses included.
Go figure ...

Anyway, coming back to Jolie and Brad, the main thought that hit me (ie. after I got over
gorgeous Angie) when I saw the snap was, "How the hell do they manage to remain sane
after travelling with 6 kids?". Me and my wife do quite some travel with our son and even
with just 1 kid, sometimes it gets a little too much. At the most, I might be able to handle
another kid, but that's about it.

Just having to baby-sit 6 kids would be a nightmare for me. Let alone having to travel
with six of them. You sure have to hand it Angelina and Brad - they are tough nuts.

P.S.: As if this isn't bad enough, a lady gave birth to octuplets few days ago in the US.
Imagine bringing up 8 kids of the same age !!!