Author: Tulika

Posted on

If you have a daughter…

… you must learn to
1. Make friends with the colour pink.
2. Drink endless cups of make believe tea and attend many many imaginary parties.
3. Thank her effusively when she does your hair or polishes your nails (even if you look like a clown) and learn to set it right surreptitiously.
4. Buy shiny over the top accessories which you would have earlier dismissed as ‘cheap’ or ‘loud’.
5. Mind your manners for the little lady will remember everything you ever taught her and will sharply point out your slip ups.
6. Make friends with Barbies.
7. Never ever discard things like bits of ribbon, pieces of shiny wrapping paper, old rakhis, mismatched bangles, broken buttons, smooth stones…. No this is not rubbish.. this is ‘treasure’.
8. Stop reasoning with your husband over issues that concern her.. she has him completely wrapped around her little finger (need to fall back upon the cliché because it says it all).
9. Bear with her mega tantrums (oh yes she’s not all angel) and then comfort her when her overactive conscience sends her on a ‘I know I’ve been a very bad girl mama’ trip.
10. Dance. She loves it and expects mama to show her the moves.
11. Explain the intricacies of makeup. She needs to know why aunty has blue colour on her eyes.
12. Wait for your turn at your own dressing table.
13. Handle the waterworks.. she already knows the power of tears.. specially when the daddy is around (refer 8)
14. Enjoy being pampered… she’s a born mama and will mother her mother too.
15. Define what you feel as you watch her growing up – pride, awe, gratitude, happiness or just overwhelming love.
Posted on

I like to choose!

The right to choose. How important and how dear is that right. This is brought home to me each day by my two kids. Ah the pleasure of choice – to choose what they’ll wear, what they’ll eat (even with the limited options they have thanks to my culinary disability), what they’ll watch on the telly, whether they want to go down to play… choices, choices, choices …till I’m driven up the wall torn invariably between two different ones.

The irony of course is that it’s I who has offered and encouraged the exercising of these rights. Now I’m well and truly caught in a web of my own making.
What happened yesterday underlines how important the whole choice thing is. My younger one, though a habitual food-dodger loves khichri, only because as she says, “I don’t need to chew it.. I can just swallow it.” The older one has a more evolved taste in foods and doesn’t really stick with khichri. Naisha had an upset stomach and so the food preferences suited me fine. I made khichri for her and chapatis for Hrit.
At dinner time I asked Naisha how she was feeling – whether she would like to have khichri or chapatis (knowing full well she’d opt for the former). Predictably enough khichri it was. Just as I was serving them Hrit started up a howl – u didn’t let me choose. Uh oh.. how could I forget??? After trying to convince him that I KNOW he doesn’t like khichri and so had given him chapatis… I gave up. I asked him then, “What will you have Hrit?” And he replied, “Khichri,” only because he had seen the chapatis on his plate.
I know when I’ve lost a battle. I gave him what he wanted. And the boy who cribs forever about not liking khichri, has sometimes howled his guts out because I didn’t make chapatis, cleaned up his plate in a jiffy.
So much for choices.
Posted on

Exotic flavours of the ad world

“I want Blucon d, mama,” said Hrit one day. Drat! I thought.. the advertising world’s caught up finally. What my dear baby didn’t know was that he’d been drinking ‘Blucon d’ for months together only he called it Nibu Pani. And now when I tried to explain, he thought I didn’t want to give him the real thing… aren’t kids supposed to have faith in their parents? But wait wasn’t it me who taught him to question everything.. me included? Well so then I showed him the pack, which thankfully matched with the one on the telly and peace was restored.
The kids had a relatively sanitized television viewing till they turned four. Before that it was just cds or Cbeebies. Enter the furious fours and advertising has hit them like a deluge.
May I have some ‘exotic flavour’? Hrit’s second demand had me stumped. He didn’t quite catch the ad. He didn’t know what ‘exotic’ meant or what ‘flavour’ was but he wanted it. That was a tough one to get out of.
Hrit being the more avid TV watcher gets it worse than Naisha. One day he asked me for chocos with milk. Personally I could never stomach the soggy combination hence I’d never given it to the kids. Hrit however couldn’t get over the chocolate boat zooming on a river of milk and he pestered me no end. A single spoonful quietened him and he’s stuck to the dry chocos ever since.
Naisha baffled me with her constant demand for ‘milky barbiewefa’ which turned out to be Milky Bar with Wafer… whew.
Once while at their grandparents they had a harried Nanu calling on the phone asking us to pick up a chocolate smoothie, whatever that was. In a fit of affection Naisha nicknamed Hrit chocolate smoothie because ‘he’s sweet and has smooth cheeks’. The name comes and goes depending on how much he has harassed her each day.
When I overheard Naisha saying ‘Aye Bunti.. apka sabun slow hai kya?’ I could only be relieved she modified the ‘tera sabun’ to ‘aapka sabun’. Small mercies.
However the award for the all time high irritant goes to the Poppins ad ‘Doon Kya’. I wish I could really give it to that kid for giving it to my kids.
Posted on

Fun to be four

Four is a great age to be. Here’s why..
They aren’t really babies any longer so
  • no more bottle boiling
  • no more carrying food/milk to malls
  • no more arduous hours of burping (thank Gawd!)
  • no more having to handle howling kids at night (Generally)
  • no more carrying them around
  • they understand/ share a lot of things
  • they are great fun to talk to
  • they can run small errands (get my phone, switch off the TV, find my keys) of course only when they want to
…. and they aren’t too grown up either so
  • they do not have loads of homework
  • they still love to cuddle and hug and kiss (I so hope they NEVER outgrow that)
  • they still think you are the best (unlike the teens when they’ll get all judgmental)
  • they still think your cooking is out of the world (even I don’t think that)
  • they still don’t seem cheeky or oversmart just cute (another year and cute turns cheeky)
Posted on

Golden Hamster surprise

OMG.. landmark day.. I knew this day would come but that it would come so soon … nopes hadn’t expected that.

At the dinner table Naisha was trying to talk with her mouth full. When I told her to finish her food and talk she insisted it was something ‘potent’ (important). So I told her to keep the food in her cheeks so she could talk clearly.
“… like the Golden Hamster,” commented Hrit.
“Golden Hamster?” queried a rather zapped me, “Where did you hear that?”
“Teacher told me mama. The Golden Hamster is an animal. He doesn’t have hands so he collects food in his cheeks.. he has big pouches in his cheek,” he elaborated.
Wow.. I didn’t know that. I really didn’t.
Out of old habit I went to old friend Google who told me what Hrit said was bang on.. completely true.

The Golden Hamster — this is what it looks like

When the kids were babies I taught them the rhyme chubby cheeks that ended with “Mama’s pet, is that you?” Then they joined playschool and came back singing “Teacher’s pet, is that you?” I really didn’t like that .. when did teacher replace mama?
That was the first sign that they were growing up and now this.
I used to be surprised if they knew something I hadn’t taught them and now they know stuff I don’t even know…sigh! They are growing up. It’s a good thing of course but a part of me wants to have them just the way they are now.

PS: A big thank you to their school and teachers… Thank you.

Privacy Policy Proudly powered by WordPress