ajsab! nice to hear from you. i mostly stayed outside home and never said namaskar until a year ago. its been three years i have been staying in usa but left home when i was in 5th grade. Here, One day i went to Hindu Temple where a pujari told me the real meaning of namaste. Namaste is derived from a sanskrit word which means "The god inside me is saluting the god inside you" i never noticed this word such a powerful meaning before. I prayed god and definately i was doing Namate to god and it made some sense then... yea the god inside me is saluting the god inside that stone. i am not saluting the stone.. but the god inside the stone. In Nepali culture we say both Namaste and Namaskar. Its hard to find the differences between those two words... but practically what i have seen is that... Namaskar is the version of namaste that you greet somebody elder than you and the other person can reply you as Namaskar or maybe Namaste (since you will be younger). so its like if you are older than me.. and i greet you namaskar.. then ur reply would be namate (since i am younger than you) or you might say namaskar. so i dont think namaskar would be something which is assigned to say others but not parents.... and yea i had not greeted my parents before that when i talked on phone. i am curious.. how you greet ur parents... if you care to share...