Kerala - Kochi   

Collecting bottles is his passion

DELIGHTS: Retired schoolteacher Joseph Kollakkompil and his wife in their house with the bottle collection.

It is an obsession with a difference. For Joseph Kollakkompil, a retired schoolteacher, bottles are a passion. So he collects bottles of various sizes and shapes whenever and wherever he can. Those that once contained the heady brew, which stored perfumes, hair oil, even measuring bottles become his prime target to add to his collection, which he claims has already been noted by the Book of Records.

He claims to have in his possession nearly 3,000 bottles and the list is growing as his well wishers and friends supply him with his pet objects whenever they can spare them. There is a good number of miniature bottles too fondly called "baby bottles." The smallest in the collection measures 3.5/0.5 cm. He says that there are bottles from several countries and some are high value antique items.

Joseph began collecting in 1996 and he has stacked the bottles in his home at Mukkalam, 15 km from Mundakkayam in Kottayam district. He is now busy downloading materials from 100-odd websites on bottles to enrich his knowledge about his collection. He sources his items from houses and junk shops. He depends on the re-cycling trade in the metros where a variety of bottles turn up on a daily basis.

He says that nearly 1,000 bottles in his collection are the ones used by the cosmetics industry. His belief is that bottle making should be one of the ancient industries in this land. Automatic bottling plants might have taken place only in the 20th century, he said.

Bottle collection emerged as a hobby only after 1960s, Joseph said. There are several collectors in foreign lands who had developed the work of "unearthing" bottles into a fine art.

But while others collect only perfume and soda bottles, Joseph is an avid collector of all sorts of bottles.

K. Venkiteswaran

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