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Mommy wars

The holidays have begun. Yay! Freedom from the early morning rush, the tussle over breakfast, the struggle with homework, the hurry-hurry-hurry. We intend to sleep in, go for long walks, cook and craft and read and watch films together.

This academic year has been exceptionally hard on all of us and I’ve done more than my share of yelling. Now’s the time to make up for all of that. Everything else will wait now – work, freelancing, even blogging to some extent – everything. I intend to be the funnest mama ever this summer – no rules, no yelling.

However, day one of the holidays and I am already wondering if that is even possible. I have a bunch of mums living inside me counselling and debating and struggling to assert themselves. They all have different takes on how I should handle the kids. I wrote earlier about the struggle between Sane Mum and Mushy Mum here. This time round it’s the Fun Mum (the one who believes kids should just have fun) and the Evil Mum (the strict disciplinarian) fighting it out. If you would ever stumble upon them you might hear a conversation such as this one…

Fun Mum: Yay holidays! Disappear now, will you?
Evil Mum: Noooo you don’t mean that.
FM: Of course I mean it. I love my babies, I intend to show them just how much. We’re going to have fun together.
EM (stubbornly): Well, they’re my babies too and I love them, perhaps more than you. You’ll spoil them silly. I’m the one who looks out for them. I’m not leaving.
FM: They deserve to be spoiled once in a while. It’s the holidays for goodness sake. You’ve done your thing. Your time’s up. See you in June.
EM: I thought you’d planned to help them catch up with their studies during summer.
FM: I do remember very well, thank you. And we SHALL do that but in a FUN way. No slogging, no yelling. Leave now, please.

EM (A trifle slyly): You sure you won’t need me? Two months is a long time.

FM: Sure, certain, positive.
EM (Pretending to leave): Well then perhaps I’ll take a holiday. God knows I need it. By the way I do hope you have a plan on how you’ll handle the endless TV watching, the iPad madness, the bickering and the fighting, the refusal to switch off the light at night. I’m sure you have a FUN plan. Goodluck. Ciao.
FM (Flustered): Err umm.. wait on, will you.
EM: Let me see.. Mussourie sounds good this summer or should I head South?
FM: Hey wait, maybe you can hang on at the fringes and show up just once in a while?
EM: What? You requesting me to stay? Sure, certain, positive?
FM (Petulantly): ALL RIGHT I’m sorry. Guess we can’t really do without you. But stay out of sight. I’ll call you when I need you.
EM: Works for me. (Linking hands with FM) We make the perfect couple, you and I.
FM (Agreeing reluctantly): I guess so. They do need us both.

Edited to add: As it turned out the kids fell ill right on day 1. Both EM and FM have retired to some sorry corner to wait out their turn while Mushy Mum and Fussy Mum have taken over completely.

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Five reasons malls are bad for kids

Here’s a confession – I like shopping. I well remember the Becky Bloomwoodish feeling when I stepped into a mall after a year of abstinence during my pregnancy (I was on bed rest most of of the time). I’m not a great spender though, thanks to years and years of conditioning – of being taught to think before you spend. But I like browsing, I enjoy window shopping, I love hanging out at coffee shops. However I make sure it’s only on weekends. I cannot stand the crowd.

When the kids were tiny I would put them in their stroller and head out to the mall. I’d park them in the food court and dawdle over my coffee while spooning mashed bananas into their tiny mouths. I liked watching people and they did too staring around eagerly with their button eyes. 

A visit to the mall was quite a treat till..

…they discovered their feet

That was the end of all the peace and quite. Since the day they crawled out of the stroller they never stopped. They kept growing and so did their need to explore. They looked everywhere including loos, trial rooms, lingerie sections and under mannequin skirts. 

Then they discovered ‘want’

.. and after that nothing was enough for them. It was ‘I want’ ‘I want’ ‘I want’ all the way.

9 years later

I dislike malls with a vengeance. They make the twins go a little berserk. I wrote about their mall adventures earlier here. A friend said it was because I didn’t take them often enough, which may be true. However there are other reasons: 

Here’s why I’d rather not take the kids to the mall

Malls are exhausting: 

The unending aisles, the walk-walk-walk, the no-place-to-sit (The coffee shop is a bit of a dream with two restless kids tugging at the leash).  Almost always the twins end up cranky and so do I. The air-conditioning and the crowd might have something to do with it.

They offer too many choices: 

And that’s not a good thing, not for kids. They end up confused and unhappy as they flit from store to store and toy to toy. Either I am waiting endlessly for N who can never decide what she wants or I’m dragging H away because he wants everything.

The kids never have enough: 

No matter how much we shop or how many games they play, there is always that one more thing they want or one last game they need to play.

They encourage mindless consumption:

Even as a rational adult (I hope!) I end up spending more than I intended. I can fully understand how much tougher it would be for the kids. We started off with the one-toy-each-visit rule. However, even that is such a waste. Why should we shop for a toy (even one) if that is not the purpose of our visit to the mall? What’s worse, it will probably be lying forgotten within a few hours of reaching home adding to the ever-growing clutter.

They offer nothing new and the kids learn nothing: 

.. other than mindless consumption. After a point malls are just the same. They do not stimulate the kids’ minds specially since they outgrew looking under trial room doors!

Mercifully the kids dislike shopping so I just find it easier to leave them home. Somedays I we do make a trip together – when they need to be fitted out for something or when we plan a gaming zone-food court trip. But that remains an occasional treat.

Do you like frequenting malls?
*******

Linking to ABC Wednesday for the letter M. With grateful thanks to Mrs Nesbitt who had this wonderful idea of bringing together bloggers from across the world through ABC Wednesday and to Roger who keeps it going week after week.

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This thing called love

It makes one laugh, it makes one cry
It matures in a moment, yet brings out the child
It’s the simplest thing yet ever so complicated
It freezes time yet makes the world go roundA strength a weakness, a puzzle to solve

What is it
this thing called Love?

It drives some crazy yet is someone’s sanity
Some hold on for it, some let go for it

Some kill for it some die for it
All pervasive yet oh so elusive

Simply strange yet strangely simple
that’s what it is, this thing called Love.

Beyond analysis, beyond thought
Beyond all what the mind has wrought

It is friendship and passion, affection and romance
brotherhood and motherhood, a fleeting glance

A moment of insanity or plain humanity
it’s all of that and much much moreThat’s what it is
This thing called Love.
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Linking to ABC Wednesday the brainchild of the wonderful Mrs Nesbitt for the letter L.

Of course L has to be for ‘Love’

 

 

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K is for kite flying

This is a completely wrong time to talk about kites and kite flying in India. But try telling that to the kids. Do they care? Not a whit. And so last weekend they decided they wanted to make kites. Here’s what they came up with:

We used kite paper, some sequins and sketch pens. Fed up of all the sticking and drawing they went on to make some simpler ones that were done in a jiffy. I seriously doubt these will get anywhere close to the skies but the kids had fun. 

While on kites I will not be true to my hometown Lucknow without telling a tiny bit about kite flying in my city. We call it ‘patang bazi’ or ‘kankauwe bazi’.

While all over India kites are flown on the festival of Makar Sankranti around 14 of January in Lucknow we do things differently, just like the twins! For us the kite flying day is the day after the festival of Diwali, sometime in October/November. The festival is known as Jamghat (literally translated it means ‘gathering’). The idea behind it is that all evil flies away along with the kites.

The entire city comes to a stand still that day. Shops are shut and so are offices. The entire population makes its way to terraces and fields brandishing their kite-flying gear for some serious action. The idea of a kite fight is to tangle the opponent’s kite in yours and then cut it off. The string plays a crucial role in this action packed drama in the skies. Known as manjha, it is coated with many layers of a paste of crushed glass mixed with a binding agent. It’s quite lethal and I well remember, for my cousins a good day at Jamghat invariably meant cut and bleeding fingers. Not that they cared one bit as they gloated about the kites they had cut and the victories they had scored. Of course the amateurs only got to hold the charkhi (or the spool) till they finally progressed to actually handling the kite.

Jamghat is said to have been initiated during the times of the Nawabs to bring together all communities of the city. The nawabs were known to be large hearted if degenerate rulers. A story goes that they used golden or silver strings so that anyone who got their kites could benefit from them. It was Nawab Wajid Ali Shah who brought in kites similar to the ones we have today.

One last word: Long long ago kites were also used to convey romantic messages. The only catch – you never could be sure who got your message! It must have resulted in plenty of intrigue I’m sure. 

Linking to ABC Wednesday for the letter K. Head on over for more K posts.

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10 things to remember on a journey without kids

I had often wondered if/when I could ever leave the children and travel on my own. Well, finally it happened. As it turns out the Husband was home and it was just four days (out of which two were over the weekend). 

Off I went.

It felt weird – to say the least – to be travelling without two small hands to hold on to. If you’re a mum too and have forgotten quite what it’s like to travel alone you might find these pointers useful.

1. It’s normal to carry just a single piece of baggage. Nah, you haven’t forgotten anything. And it’s not even important whether the bag is pink, blue or yellow.

2. On the flight, you are not allowed to cuddle people sitting on either side of you (to be on the safe side, keep your hands off the hand rests).

3. If your boarding pass says window seat, you actually get to sit at the window.

4. You can survive a two-hour flight without a visit to the loo. As a bonus – you also survive take offs and landings without admonishing your neighbours to ‘hold it in’ even while wondering anxiously if they will hold it in.

5. You can get through a flight without a single apology.

6. You don’t need to ask the airline staff for favours – no change of seats, no extra water, no extra tissues to mop off said water.

7. Airport shopping zones are a grossly misunderstood lot. Far from the disaster-waiting-to-happen-zones you thought them, they make for blissful browsing.

8. You get to decide what you want to do on the flight – reading, listening to music and sleeping being real options (over visiting loos, ensuring co-passengers don’t get kicked/ pushed, mopping messes and refereeing seats).

9. The baggage carousal is just that – a baggage carousal, not a forbidden slide you cannot allow your kid on.

10. A two hour flight is way too long. After a point you don’t quite know what to do with yourself.

A last bit of advice. Sit back, relax and try to enjoy yourself just as much as the kids are enjoying your absence back home.

Linking to ABC Wednesday for the letter ‘J’ for Journey. Joyful thanks to Mrs Nesbitt who thought up this wonderful meme.

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