school admission

My dear son,

Both your kaakis think you are a prodigy. One of them says because you were saying z for zucchini last year. The other said because you can pronounce r for refrigerator. I am not sure you are a prodigy. Analytical like your father maybe you are…

Anyways I wanted to tell you about something very important that we recently concluded. Your admission to a ‘big’ school. While I love your current school, it was limiting you in extra-curricular activities, stage performances, sports. It was also getting too expensive. And you are getting pampered like anything by your teachers, friends and the faculty as you were the naughtiest and the youngest in your class. And I would really miss this school. But from a small but exclusive school which has one section per class you will be moving to a school which has 8. From a class strength of around 20, you will be sitting in a class of close to 32 kids. Ofcourse it will be a big change. But I am sure it will be easier for you to adjust now when you are still a slightly wild enthusiastic kid, ready to mingle and learn. So we chose Heritage for you. Or more like heritage chose you. But you are not ready to go to a different school yet. I know you will miss all these friends you made in the last three years L

We went to close to 8 schools in the last 2 months and the funny thing is, none of them are teaching as much as your current school. You are not yet 5 but you already know about nouns, adjectives, architecture of different countries, vowels, rainbow colors etc. I checked at all the schools and some of them don’t even start half the things you already know like addition, subtraction, writing 5 letter words etc. To be honest, I would be happier if you become a bit more sporty rather than being grammatically correct at this age.

And in other news, you are the only kid in class who refuses to practice Hindi and English alphabets in class. So much so, that your teacher actually scowled at us while ranting about your errant behavior in class. It seems, instead of practicing in the journal like the other children, you draw. About family holidays in Hong Kong and other countries where we are yet to go… Of puja ceremonies in which you make stick figures of your favorite uncles, aunts, grandparents and cousins and cosmic rangoli drawings in which, very strangely, you insert Hindi alphabets.

Last weekend, we went to the mall and I was assuming you would ask to go to the toy shop or even the gaming arcade. How little do I know you! You insisted for half an hour so we had to go to a hypermarket. You picked up detergent and dettol from there for your father. I fear stranger things might happen still.

It was Ganesh Chauth last weekend and we went t a couple of house to pay our respect to the God. At the first place you were missing your prayer book. At the second place you smeared lots of tika on your forehead, several times. You ate the Prasad on your own and while the other children touched the deity’s feet, you did what we call a dandwat pranam. You lied down on the floor to seek God’s blessings instead of just bending over.

Signing off now because the next one is going to be longer as it will include metro, train, flight, helicopter and maybe a horseride. 

Mr Bollywood

Dear Darsh, 

Lately, I have started calling you bollywood. No really. I think the name suits you because you are totally in love with the songs, dance, dialogues etc. After seeing bajrangi you started chanting I love Pakistan. I think I did mention the BB locket in the last mail.

Even while we were adjusting to you dance version of jai jai bajrang bali, you gave us the soulful rendition of mai tera hero. To say you are in awe of salman khan will be an understatement. Maybe this will portray your true feeling: last night during yr dinner when I play your favorite youtube videos you made me type out and search for darsh and salman khan. Yes you did.

Moving on… you tried to buy kinder joy with an india gate fridge magnet that resembles a credit card so I gave you some old cards and you picked a manly wallet from my collection (it’s brown with white flowers) and you kept all the cards in it. The last time I counted you had more than 20 cards including a metro card, a bodyshop card and several other brand cards.

Last night you narrated a hilarious incident that happened in the school loo. You had gone to wash your hands and a friend was shitting so the whole bathroom was stinking so you quickly washed your hands and covered your nose and ran from the bathroom. Your principal caught hold of you and asked the reason for the haste so you informed her very politely that XX is shitting and the whole bathroom is stinking so she let you go then. I have always believed that narration is the key to a story’s success and you I believe have already mastered it. Your stories are always funny or maybe I am wearing the mommy goggles but I love all your stories. I hope one day you get famous for your stories my baby.

Last weekend was janmashtmi and we had tried to make it a big event for you to enjoy. You made rangoli design that was pretty with hindi alphabets you had learnt till now. For some reason you were against painting English ones there. You made river ganga, made your lego characters participate and helped with the strategic placing of the clay statues your nana got from Allahabad. In the evening you dressed up like Krishna, pretend-read bhajans and tried to sing and also accompanied us on the drums. On Thursdays too, you sit with me and read sai baba’s story books. In short, you really enjoy the pujas.

Last weekend we had to get you blood tested and we were very scared for your first such encounter with the needle. So was the blood collector. But you shocked us all. You did not finch, cry or scream. I guess I was most shocked because I get loud and abusive and teary when injected.

You are pretty excited about going to a birthday party this weekend you have not been invited to. I tried to tell you but I guess you are too excited about it in any case.

Habits:

The night rituals have become longer. You first try to sleep with us for an hour during which a lot of book reading and tickle attacks happen. Then you pick up your blankie, your pollow and your water bottle and go to your daadi’s room. After another hour you come back and sleep in the middle.

And for some reason you have started using your own bathroom for all short and long durations. Maybe it has to do with that bathroom incident. Maybe you are as fiercely independent as your mother.    

After almost a two year gap, You have started sleeping again while holding on to the blankie for some reason. 

the august letter

 Dear Darsh,

You are finally over PK, but at what cost! Every night before sleeping you make us play bajrangi bhaijaan the movie, without any forwards. You dance at all the songs and rush to the bathroom so that you don’t miss even a single scene. This has been going on for a few weeks. Yesterday we had gone to the market and you made us buy the now-famous BB hanuman gadda locket. You dance to selfie le le re wearing it. We had put an animation movie for you today but you slept during it! Did I mention you never sleep when BB is playing… I am not anti-bollywood at all but you have become an extreme Bollywood fan and it’s hilarious and exasperating at the same time.

You refuse to go to the park as you are afraid of the bugs and lizards there. You have hardly gone to the dance class this month. Infact you have devised a new form of dance for all your favorite songs sung by atif aslam and arijit. I feel it’s a slow kathak and western mixed but the jury is still out on that one.

You are learning physical violence in school. Today you punched me in the nose and when asked, you revealed that one of your friends had hurt you in school. But you still refuse to hit back your friends and depend on your teacher to intervene on your behalf. Let’s see how long that goes.

You made us buy a microphone last night and made us listen to your Bollywood renditions, speech on Japan and instructions on discipline among other things. And then we had an interesting session with you on mic and me on drums. You have realized you can’t wait for your birthday to have a party so you invited all your friends for a party and then told me about it very solemnly one evening.

The bitter-sweet relationship with your father continues. Things had peaked last month after the famous fallout when you pinched and pulled him repeatedly for a week even though he kept telling you it hurts. Finally he threatened to lock you in the bathroom which led you to believe he is you enemy no 1. The incident, you narrated, told and retold to all our relatives, random people in the lift, all your school friends, teachers, your vice principal and even a toddler and his parents in the mall. Ofcourse it has reached epic proportions now since you are a Bollywood fan and in the last version I heard, you were showing mosquito bites as places where he had hurt you! I did try to tell your teachers that your fabrications (please read LIES) have become quite fantastic but they praised you for your story telling skills and creative bent.

It was my birthday this week and after the dinner-out you were still wondering where the party was. Needless to say you were hugely disappointed to finally figure out what a grown-up’s party really means.

On rakshbhandan day you were very excited to get all the ten rakhis tied and you kept proclaiming loudly that you love all your sisters very much. However, you refused to get even the second rakhi tied, took off the first one within one hour and were ready to leave the minute you got the rakhi gift from your cousins. You grabbed the bags and told your daddi, “chalo daadi ho gaya”. Yes we were a little embarrassed.

But all in all you are cute kid making us proud with you perfectly formed sentences and new learnings every day. We love you and your funny antics!

the right fit

My dear son,

The family project this Saturday was pingu cake for you as you had been chanting for it for almost a week. Somehow during the summer break, while you were on a daily puja schedule with your grandmother, you had quietly learnt the benefits of chanting. It worked like magic for you this Saturday. However, chanting for a water-park theme cake is a little too much for my patience lever, especially since you just eat the fondant and not the cake itself.

This last one week, you have been obsessed about telling me a story about three friends – ironman, hulk and captain America. How hulk was angry and threw around cars, creating a lot of fire. I guess the fire troubled you. You wanted an explanation for hulk’s behavior. So I had to tell you the truth that Hulk wanted burger but his mom packed him a sandwich for lunch so when he saw that he became a big and green with anger and hence the fire. How did the story end? Captain America took Hulk for lunch to his house where his mom made burger for everyone and Hulk was not upset anymore. Which is why I have been telling your father I need to order the entire Avenger series since I was those kids who grew up reading diamond comics, not DC comics. I am sure you would not even know who Saabu is or how intelligent chacha Choudhary is. I will tell you in detail later.

The entire week, there was something we talked about daily. Either with each other, with friends, relatives, retailers and even your dance teacher. What kind of under-pants would make you comfortable the most. And we got lots of different answers. From no underpants, to cut ones, to long ones, cotton ones, etc. The jury is still out on that one but I am proud to say we have all the variety in colors and shapes for trial. However, you still look pretty uncomfortable to me.

July 6 

fly to singapore

My dear son,

Yesterday, after months of waiting, your dream came true. PK (the movie which has an alien trying to go back to his planet), was being showed last night on television. In anticipation, you jumped up and down, danced to the PK tunes you could remember and sang loudly. We are used to it  actually so no surprises there. Then the movie started at 8 pm and you sat down and since you were sitting with Big Daadi you assumed she knows nothing about PK so you were fore-telling her. Each scene and she had to listen too. Infact we were told not to talk so that you could listen to the dialogues, sitting very seriously on the comfy-end of the lounger. All was fine until the songs came and then all hell broke loose. You were mimicking all of PK’s antics, expressions, dance movements, neck cranes during the songs. During your favorite song ‘bhagwaan hai kaha hai tu’, you were even rolling on the floor, and fake dipping in holy water, with extremely spiritual facile expressions. Like your Big Daadi said, “PK’s spirit is haunting you” and we hope to see the end of it hopefully.

In other news, you have changed loyalties and now you are not interested in going to Pakistan any more. You are in fact interested in going to Singapore to visit your favorite brother. And there was a “problem” at the house last weekend but it’s stuff that I can only tell you about and not write so remind me when you are actually old enough to read this.June 22, 2015

movie marathon

Dear Darsh,

We saw a few scenes from Spiderman 2 yesterday. You were very excited to see Toby McGuire’s bravado. I made you close your eyes during the kiss scene and you did for me. I don’t know what you think of this when you read this but it was so cute you closing your eyes with your little hands cos mama told you not to watch the smooch.

And we watched another hindi movie in the theatre Sunday morning. Your father got you ready and was slightly taken aback when you chose your clothes and the accessories(read bag) and the shoes. He was amused that you went through your entire shoe drawer to figure out the perfect matching shoes to complete your ensemble. In the evening we decided to go out again but you didn’t want to part from your doremon tshirt. So you decided to get it re-ironed.

On Saturday, you played with me non-stop until it was time to sleep. It felt like you were making up for all the lost time during the week. Saturday eve there was a birthday and you threw up ten minutes after reaching the place.  

June 8, 2015

your first crush

My dear son,

Today at 7:30 am, after your morning rituals were over, I decided to teach you how to spray paint with a tooth brush. This was one of the very few art works I loved to do. You sprayed the brush once with your thumb, looked at your hands and ran off to wash your hands. At your return, I asked you to resume the brush art work. You nodded, showed me your hands and said “now hands are clean”. That was the end of that. You screamed at your very good friend because she messed up your room. It has been a couple of days since then but you are still refusing to do a play-date with her because of that incident. Yes, I think like your father, you are a cleanliness freak. 

Yesterday, you insisted on going to the market in your superhero cape and mask. And for some unknown reason you were very kicked about the fact that children might laugh at you. And vainly you roamed the market like that until a little girl laughed at you. Thankfully you removed your superhero gear then. I guess like all the children in the world, you want to be a superhero too.

Last Saturday was a revelation. You went with us to the opthamologist and responded to her in the most mature way possible. I think you also fell for her a little bit as you have been religiously following her advice – to the point of even reminding me also that the doctor told you to have a banana,

Yesterday, you woke up at your usual 6 am but said you were sleepy. So I asked you, “should we sleep some more?” To which you replied with a question, “no office today?” You are 4 years, 3 months old now and for the last 3 months, since I joined office, I am sneaking off to work, literally. The few times I tried to say good bye to you, you would start crying. But in the last 3 months, I am proud to say you have become more independent than ever before. In the bathroom. You still refuse to eat food on your own and we are still threatening / cajoling on a daily basis during all meal times.

I made you join dance class this week. For two classes you just observed and your eyes were glued to the dancing children, but you refused to dance. And then just like that, at the tail end of the second class, you got off from the chair, told me not to follow you very emphatically, and joined the other kids.

A few days back, we had gone to meet your little cousin Tia. Your grandma had not accompanied us. And you were quite miffed about it. So much so, that you took my phone and faked a conversation with her for 20 mins trying to convince her to come and join us.

In the month of May, we were involved with two dinner dates. You threw up in both. We organized a couple of splash pool party cum play dates. We also went to HK which was a hit and you fully enjoyed the flight, the hotels, riding in the metro, bus, and ofcourse the highlight was hour-long market visits while you were perched on to your dad’s shoulders.

 Two movies and you slept in both. The second movie, you insisted on sitting on your seat and not sharing it with either of us. I ended up watching the movie from an aisle below.

Everytime you poop, you go check your weight and height. Your favourite channel is rhymes tv and these days you are obsessed about eating jackfruit. So we sliced and offered melons and you were happy to eat our version of jackfruit. You wear the blue-pink car shoes for every outing and fall asleep listening to pepper stories. Every night.