29 posts tagged “parenting”

Growingup

7 A.M. Saturday morning. Alarm rings.  Mom, never a mornings-person wakes up.  Brain immediately goes into hyperdrive.

"Darn, it is 7 already.  But then it is Saturday.  Oh, someone called on the cell at 6.30 and I silenced the phone. Who was it? Prabandam mami. Wonder what she wanted so early. Maybe she wanted me to watch some prabandam show on t.v. But then, she knows I don't have a t.v. Well, I'll call her up later and talk to her. Should  I boil yesterday's milk or today's?  And there is a lot of yesterday's decoction left. Maybe I'll make my coffee with yesterday's and make fresh decoction for A.  Why the heck is my head hurting so much early in the morning? Maybe the cold. I wish there is some sunshine today. I am sick of damp, cold clothes.  You know, next time I get a payment, I am definately going to invest in a drier. I think I deserve to wear dry clothes.  Oh, I need to finish up a proposal today if I have to take tomorrow completely off.  Maybe I will work on the capacitor proposal. I need to find out why I should coat MnO2 with CNT.  Perhaps I can use some of the background section from the old proposal.  But am I going to make a case for a pseudocapacitor or a capacitor.  Oh well.   Need to read up some more. I remember Ajayan had a neat paper..got to look at it. Oh, have to talk to G3 about the Maney project.  I hope she will be able to help me there. I can't handle the project myself..especially with my regular work. Maybe we should go out to breakfast today.  Or maybe not. We will most probably be eating out tomorrow. CAn't make it a regular habit.  Besides this month has been such a terrible drain on the purse for some reason. Gotta tighten up.  But I still have stuff to buy. V's birthday stuff. I am totally slacking. Last year, by this time I had everything, including returnn gifts for V's friends ready by now.. I have not even starting thinking about it yet.  And there is the srgm trip coming up too. I am having second thoughts about the srgm trip. Maybe we won't go.  I have way too much work. But then V will be disappointed. LEts see.  And I really want to go to the Parasala concert tomorrow..don't know how to work the logistics. Stupid priya..why does she have to have school today? I can't even leave V at TN and get my work done today.Have to call up mil to see how she is doing.  Don't think I can visit them this weekend. She is going to be upset. Well.  I better get Pongal and sambar going. Damn, I really need a break from this stupid cooking..you know,like a forty-year break or something..sick of planning breakfast, sick of planning lunch..sick of dinner..and it is not even like I cook well..the food tastes yucky anyway...how I wish I were rich enough to afford a full time cook..."

At this point, the six year old wakes up, ambles up to mom and says :

"Amma, you know how castles are made of stones? Our castle is made of diamond and gold and jewels. If you enter it, it sparkles."

Can I please be six again?
 

Soon-to-be-six: "Amma, I told Malu that I am not going to have a party for my birthday and she says that everybody MUST have a party on their birthdays.  Is that true?"

Mom: "No.  You can have a party if you want.  If you don't want to have a party, that is fine too".

Soon-to-be-six:  "But Malu says that I will stay at five-and-a-half if I don't have a party."

Mom: ???

Chess

When it takes one hour to defeat your soon-to-be-six year old in chess, it means (a)  you suck at chess or (b) the kid is good.

Maternal vanity makes me choose (b).

Parenting

"If you don't finish up your Dosai, no karate class for you".

"If you don't clean up the room, no more books for you".

"If you don't finish up your lunch in school, no more lunch for you"

"If you don't braid your hair, it will fall off".

"If you don't drink up your milk, you are going to end up with osteoporosis like kollu paati".

All of the above within a span of 20 minutes. I am well on my way to becoming a professional blackmailer.  Anyone need my services?  Charges nominal.

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Soon-to-be-six: "If you tell a lie, God will dance in your brain and you will get irritated" 

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Neighbour:            What do you want to be when you grow up?
Soon-to-be-six:      A big girl.

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Soon-to-be-six:  "I don't like boys.  They are rash".
Mom ruminating: "I'd like to hear that in ten years.  ummm..on second thoughts, I don't think so."

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Soon-to-be-six: They show Tom&Jerry and Mr. Bean on TV during AV period in school. I don't like it.  I want to read my book.
Mom ruminating"YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS".

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My five-and-half year old stands on tip toes on a chair next to me, and says,

"See, I am standing next to you. We are now married.  And I am taller than you.  So, I am the husband."

Dracula

You'd think that having been a parent for five years now, I'd get have sufficient sense of what and what not to tell a five year old ? 

In an attempt to be a "cool" mom, and to make the wait on a red signal bearable, I told the kid a very diluted, and what I thought was a kid-friendly version of the story of Count Dracula, and now the child won't even go to the adjacent room alone at nights.

Is there any hope of redemption for me?

Kattabomman

Summer is here to stay.  And how. Today was a preview of what is to come over the next few weeks with the sun beating down mercilessly to melt tar on the road that sticks to footwear and sweat evaporating straight from the sweat glands.  That, and viral attack on the alimentary canal of a certain five-year old precluding outdoor activities, we are now confined to the current address.  A many-hundred-page activity book donated generously by Terri's daughter, was completed within hours.  Books issued by the school today for the following class were perused and proclaimed "satisfactory" for the next round of education. Latest spoils of war from Odyssey (e.g. The Magic School Bus - Blows its Top & Going Batty) reviewed and found interesting, and one book in particular taking the mom by surprise.

This book is one in the "The Underwater Friends" series brought out by Think Big Books, and is called "Kattabomman's trick". It is a really cute story of Kattabomman the turtle (who incidentally hates to be mistaken for a tortoise) playing a trick on his friends - a crab called Kumudam, a sword fish called Uncas, a fish called Forgetful, another one called Gunavathi and a prawn called Pran.  It is a simple story, made my daughter laugh, and tickled me pink with the absolutely cute names (Kattabomman, Kumudam, Pran), a far cry from pretentious Anglicised names found in books in English for children, written by Indian authors. And the language is simple and elegant (I am still reeling from watching an Tamilized episode of Dora, where Dora says "The star is here only"..bleah).  Each page has a small area that the child can colour.  This book is written by Sowmya Rajendran and illustrated by Nivedita Subramaniam.  Kudos.

We are now all set to collect the entire series, and given the low cost (Rs. 49/book ~ $1/book), it is not impractical.  I would strongly recommend it for kids five and under.

Mavadu

From the "I-don't-want-anything-even-remotely-recommended-by-mom-as-traditional-delicacy" phase, my daughter has graduated to eating lots of maavadu (aka vadu manga) pickle with a teeny bit of rice.  I am gratified that the genes are beginning to show.

Among the three of us, we have polished a few kilos of mavadu (made by the mil) in the past one week, the girls particularly acting like there is no tomorrow.  There are people who make these pickles and use it for an entire year until the next season brings more of the tender mangoes into the market.  We are NOT one of them.

Digression:  While searching for a good image to use with this post, I ran into a really nice blog in Tamil; the author, a descendant from dude's home town - Srirangam.  Dude is amused that I am excited about it.   I am too.

Image from http://food.sulekha.com/dishimages/578.jpg

Exam stress

I have ranted about this time and again.  Yet, every time I am faced with this situation, my blood pressure rockets and I have to control myself from creating a scene at the site of provocation.

My five-year-old moves to first class next year.  Her school, whose language of instruction ("first language") is English, requires that she chooses a "second language" in class 1. She is allowed to choose between Hindi and Tamil.  The principal of the school called for a meeting with parents of soon-to-be-first graders to advise that it is probably in the best interest of the child to take up their native language as their second language (e.g. Tamil for Tamilians, and Hindi for those that speak Hindi at home).  Sounds logical to me.

Some parents prefer to put their child in a language that is alien to their so-called "mother tongue", with the explanation that the child would pick up the mother tongue at home, so it helps if the school can teach a new language.  Which is also fine.

What I take strong exception to, is when parents, like a mom I was talking to today, believe that the child should take one language rather than the other because, that is the only way, in the tenth class public exam (which incidentally, is ten years away), the child would score a better total.  Why is it that our entire life is driven by the numbers that come on the report card that is granted on one year of our life?  Why are we subjecting ourselves and our kids to undue pressure to perform for the sake of those numbers?  Why has "learning" taken a backseat over "marks"? Why cannot a child enjoy the beauty of the Thirukkural or Silappadhikaaram or Rahim Doha when in school, instead of rote-learning something that can be vomited in the exam to score better marks, which would get him/her into a premier institution, perhaps, so that life would he handed to him/her on a golden platter, making the child a spoilt brat, unable to face difficulties, unable to enjoy beauty, and driven by secondary recognition all her life?

The importance given to the "public exam marks" bothers me particularly because I faced such enormous peer pressure in school to "score" at the expense of "education". The "school-first" rolling shield in the 12th Public exam remains nothing but a fuzzy distant memory.  The shield and the accompanying report card, that lies gathering dust somewhere in the loft gave me nothing other than a rude shock when I was out in the open facing life's many calamities (notably two back-to-back layoffs during the last financial recession), unable to handle it for want of perseverence, taking the setback as a direct indication of personal failure.  Precious years were lost searching for the true me, understanding that the 98% aggregate in 12th class was not quite an accurate image of me as I had assumed it to be.

A 12th standard boy in my daughter's school died of brain haemorrage, blamed on the enormous stress on the child to score in his public.  I dread to look at the newspapers soon after the public exam results are announced to read news of young boys and girls, with a rainbow life ahead of them killing themselves over a few numbers.  I feel impotent rage when kids at our elite institute of higher learning give up on life, unable to handle failure because the numbers that were so reassuring all these years were not satisfactory in one measely six months of their many years of existance.

Who is to blame?  Parents like us, who plan the child's public exam marks on the night they were conceived in love or passion. Will this ever change? Will there be fewer Lakshmi's who have nightmares of failing in exams, many many decades after they wrote their last exam in life?

Image source: http://www.leeds-yoga.co.uk/exam%20stress1.jpg

Dude is telling V a bed-time story, and in the process, asks her what happens when salt is added to water.

The very sleepy child replies "it gets wet".