Y's school craft

Y came home with some craft last Friday. It was so unbearably cute to see her toddling towards me, a huge smile on her face, clutching her "trophies" proudly. One is a pink fan-like contraption which she very clearly has NOT made :) The other was a white sheet of paper, much crumpled, on which she had scribbled all over and she said it was meant to be a "doggy".

This week, they are learning about fruits, in school. Every day, she is supposed to take a different fruit with her to class. Monday was mango day and she insisted I click this photo of her clutching the mango. Check out the colour-coordinated outfit and shoes!

Sick sick sick

We have all been sick ever since the beginning of last week; not sick enough to have visited the doctor, but sick enough to cause plenty of inconvenience. On Tuesday night, Ads threw up on the bed a couple of times - I deduced the result of eating not one, not two, but THREE bread rolls at lunch in school that day. The greedy pig! He was complaining of stomach pain and had a low-grade fever on Wednesday and ended up bunking two days of school. On Thursday night, Y threw up (again in the middle of the night, on the bed) no less than SIX times. I felt like I was back in time to my post-partum days when one had to get up every hour to feed or soothe a crying child. It was exhausting and very very yucky. Aaah - the joys of a child-free existence. Y's puking, was, once again, the result of some gluttony. Her thatha (S's father) was visiting for a couple of days and he bought her some chocolates. Though she just had a couple of small slabs, it was on top of some potato chips that she had demolished earlier in the day.

Yesterday, we all decided to take a Metro ride and on the way to the station, she said "Amma, vaandhi" and just when I was thinking, how can a 21-month old express the feeling of wanting to vomit, she had puked all over the carseat! We were all more impressed with the fact that she had actually managed to give a warning rather than feeling bad that the poor girl had thrown up :)

OMG.............more cleaning. 

And today, I was sick. Thankfully it's the weekend so no school; on the other hand there have been two bored kids needing to be entertained. I left them to their own devices (as usual, S got dragged into some weekend conference calls).

Y's latest is the Happy Birthday song. She bursts into a lusty "Happy budday to you!" whenever we say "Cake"! She was upset today because she had her weekly shampoo bath. She should get her hair washed more often but she screams and wails so much during the entire process that I have limited it to once a week. She started her mantra of "Yampoo (shampoo) no" as soon as she saw me prepping her for the bath. 

Sorry for...almost anything

We are a very polite family. No really, we are :) To the extent that we even apologize to each other for the wrongs we did not commit. This weird trend has been kick started by our resident goonda (I've decided that this is the only adjective suited to her), Y. Whenever she commits a mistake or gets into trouble, she orders the nearest person around (usually Ads and I are caught in the line of fire) to say sorry! "Sorry sollu!" is the reigning anthem. The way she says it, it comes out as a very cute "Yoyyi yoyyu!" so of course the command is hard to disobey.

So, if she stubs her toe, we say sorry. If she hits Ads and promptly bursts into tears, he says sorry. If I admonish her for something she did, I say sorry.

If she is like this at the age of two minus, I shudder to think of Y at age 16. As PG Wodehouse would say, the mind boggles.

Mommy's little helper - or not

I tried to get Y to help me with some chores around the house. She was bored, I had work to do and I needed to keep her occupied. Realized very soon that it's an activity more suited for a child older than two and a half. She kept misunderstanding me and wanting to play rather than help! What we got out of it was a) One very messy bed b) Several clothes-pegs that got flung from the 4th floor onto ground floor. Bonus: She got into the swing of things and threw some of Ads' toys downstairs, prompting a screaming fit from that child.

Remind me not to try to engage Y in "constructive" tasks from now on :(

Pushy and headstrong

These are the adjectives being used to describe my daughter, less than a fortnight into school. And they mean pushy in the literal sense - she has been pushing older kids around! How did my gentle Ads get a sister like Y? Beats me!

She goes the whole hog - 9 am to noon - from tomorrow. She has been doing well, except for a daily crying fit that begins the instant we step into the reception area and ends 10 seconds later when Mrs. B, who seems to be the Assistant Director and who is extremely nice, takes her in hand, tells her "Ok, what is this drama, you're a big girl now, come with me and play with your rabbit" and whisks her away.
I see most of the other moms lingering on, watching over the fence to see what their kids are upto, whether they have stopped crying, whether they seem happy. I feel like telling them it's pointless, their kids ARE happy, don't get stressed over a few tears and please please don't hang around. Kids can sense their parents' presence uncannily well; and as long the mom/dad is around, the kid is not going to stop crying. But it's none of my business and in any case many of them get ticked off by the teachers for hanging around too long!
On a related note, Y has started calling me - "Aei, amma!" in a bossy tone of voice. I wonder when she will dispense with the amma altogether and just call me Aei!

Y's first few days of school

Y has been going to school for 5 days now, slowly moving upto staying there for 90 minutes (without me). Overall, the transition has been going as well as expected for one so young. She cries when I hand her over to the teacher, but I am told she is easily distracted and stops once there is some other amusement to be had. The playschool director told me she would probably not cry at all if only she were not in the "settlers" class, where all the kids are new and on an average half the class is bawling at any given point in time! Probably, but there it is and we have to make the best of it.

It has been interesting to compare my reactions to this first separation from each of my children. With Ads, I was worried and agitated. But Y......... I let her go with far less anxiety. I am older, more experienced, hopefully wiser and more zen about a lot of things nowadays. None of that excitable nervous state which was a staple emotion those first few days of being separated from Ads.

Today, Y walked out of her class clutching a big white plush rabbit. Apparently she had been clutching it for more than an hour and staunchly resisting any attempts to wean her way from the rabbit. It was almost as tall as her. The rabbit in one hand, a toy dog in the other, backpack on shoulders - she could barely walk!

The passing of mommy

Last year, S asked me "When will Ads stop calling you mommy?". Because mommy is, well, a kiddy word. You don't see a 14-year old calling his mother, mommy. Mummy, ma, amma, mum, mom - those are all acceptable and common. But mommy clearly falls in a small child's precinct.

But some months ago, soon after we returned to India, Ads did stop using that word. Mommy morphed into Amma and now that's what he calls me all the time. Y had never been in the habit of calling me Mommy so that moniker has died a quiet death.

Darn. I miss being mommy. It sounded way cooler than Amma!

My littlest one is flying the coop

For a few weeks now, I have been seriously considering the idea of admitting Y into playschool. Granted, she is very young (only 20 months), but here were the reasons for and against.

Reasons for:

1. I need that most precious commodity - TIME. I have exams in May. I am supposed to put in a minimum of 4 hours of work everyday to even attempt my papers. However, at this point, if I work for an hour everyday, I consider myself lucky.

2. Y is bored at home. In the morning hours, Ads leaves for school, I am busy with household chores, cooking & studying. The maid is cleaning. Appa is asleep until 10 am and leaves for work around 2 pm. Y has no company and spends her time mooching around the house. Clearly she needs some stimulation, interesting activities, and social interaction.

3. There's a terrific playschool just around the corner. I visited them and was very impressed. They have a philosophy of "being at one with nature" - a sentiment highly appreciated and called-for in this concrete jungle! The school has an artificial pond with ducks and geese, a walk-in aviary, resident roosters, a fish-tank. The buildings are low-rise earth-friendly structures, there is no AC (only natural cooling), and when the Director told me "not to buy too many toys for your kids, just allow them to use everyday objects as rein for their imagination", I was floored! I suppose this is a classic case of supply creating demand!

Reasons against:

No logical reasons, just emotional ones, with the constant thread of mommy guilt running through them all. What if she's too young? What if she cries her heart out? What if this proves I am a bad mother? And so on. Fortunately I managed to check myself before I got too hysterically confused, and despite the negative comments I am already getting about my decision, we decided to go ahead. A few conversations with understanding and supportive girlfriends (who had been through the same thing) worked. Please note that even though the decision was jointly taken by me and S, I am supremely confident that if anyone gets the flak for it, it will be me and only me!

So, there it is. She started today. She will go from 9 am to noon, 5 days a week. Accounting for  the time I spend driving to, and spending at the school everyday, I get 2.5 hours to study in the mornings. Ads has also been consigned to the care of the school bus from today (he went quite happily), which saves me a cool 1.5 hours. 

The playschool expects a 7-10 day transition period for kids as young as Y, so today she was at the school (with me in attendance) only for an hour. For the next few days, we stay for no more than 2 hours, and gradually the time that I spend at the school with her is reduced until she has got over the "settling" phase and can separate from me without any fuss. A simple and sensible procedure that all schools should adopt, but don't.

I clicked a picture as we were leaving for the school this morning, and later realized how similar it was to the picture clicked on Ads' first day of school in September 2008. The same colour of outfit, the same blue Thomas backpack, and the same brave smile!

At the school this morning, Y was enthralled with the ducks, the "kakas" (birds), the stone statues of a lion, hippo and tortoise, and the colourful fish. The fingers are crossed, the heart is full, the feelings are bitter-sweet, and I already feel like my little girl has flown the nest. 

Tagged!

I was tagged by Life_refactored quite a few days ago and thought I should throw in my own 2 cents. Here goes.

Following are the rules:

Please list at least ten things you have ever wanted or done which your gender is not supposed to. The tag is called ‘My Sins against Gender-Stereotypes’. And you must tag twelve blogging friends or else you will be cursed to wear blue clothes pants if you are a woman and pink shirts if you are a man – for next twelve years.

Well, neither do I have 12 blogging friends and neither do I know whether I can come up with 10 whole things that were "not supposed" to be done by my gender. But here goes.

1. I've had, for several years, a "boy-cut". I remember that the first time I cut my hair really short was also the time that my brother had really long hair :) Our poor parents!

2. I love driving and think I am reasonably good at it. Never got the hang of a motorcycle but other easy-drive two-wheelers are fun. For many years now, it has been a car for me.

3. I've lived all alone and fended for myself, as a paying-guest, in the big bad city of Mumbai. Travelled alone in trains and buses at odd hours.

4. I've travelled without a ticket from Chennai to Calcutta by the Howrah mail. I used to dash into the loo everytime the ticket collector came along :) I was desperate, it was a friend's wedding and for some reason we hadn't reserved our seats!

5. I used to have many more male friends than female friends. That has changed now, not because I got rid of the guys but because I made lots of girlfriends!

6. Until I had kids, I never expected to be picked up from the bus station/railway station/airport and escorted home or wherever it was that I was going. It's a different matter that whenever I landed in Chennai, my dad would always be there to escort me! Now, with kids, I prefer that someone meet me and handle the messy logistics.

7. I don't like talking about what I cooked today, maids, gossip about neighbours etc etc. 

8. I've travelled alone (only on work though) and enjoyed the solitude and freedom.

That's all I got for now! It's been fun thinking about these things :)

Encouraging words

My girl-destined-for-Bollywood-or-Kollywood has been obsessed with the Raavan song - Beera Beera. She likes the Hindi version more than the Tamil version for some reason. Can't deny that the foot-thumping number is one of my current favourites too, and we have been playing it on youtube several times a day, whenever Y comes upto me and says (pointing to the laptop) - Beeya beeya! Peese?

One of her new words are Commocayyot. Take a wild guess as to what it could possibly mean. It's pomegranate! Her other new words are Thallu (Move in Tamil), Peese (please) and Wait. Ever so often, she will admire Anna's drawing and encouragingly say "Anna - nice!"

Angels and demons

"Amma, you are NOT the queen of this house. You are too hyper. You have to be calm like Appa."

I deserve this little homily from my son. Yes, I am too hyper, too impatient, too quick to find fault with myself and with my little cherubs. 

Sometimes, especially on days when they have been good, I don't feel like I deserve them. I don't deserve their constant and overt affection, their touching ability to believe that Amma is perfect, their delightful smiles and laughs, their little arms encircling my neck and their warm faces nestled under my chin. I wonder at this state of grace and feel grateful for it.

And yet it cuts both ways.
Every single morning, Y wakes up crying when I am in the bathroom brushing my teeth. Every day. There are NO exceptions. There's some sensor in her body that goes off when I leave the bed. And 95% of the time when I am taking a shower, Ads bangs on the bathroom door, howling for something or the other which cannot wait for the 2.5 minutes that it takes me to have a bath. A relaxed cup of tea? You must be joking. It happened last on 22nd December 2009.
As they say - you win some, you lose some.
As I type this, early on a Sunday morning, Ads is already up. I just convinced him to lie in bed for a little while longer until I finished gulping my tea. Gotta go now!

Holiday "homework"

When school broke for the summer, all the kids in Ads' class got their holiday homework. Nothing too scary, just a slim booklet containing some colouring pages and activities to do over the summer - drawing the family tree and growing a plant were two sample activities. The booklet was faithfully transported to Chennai in the faint hope that one of the grandmas would sit down with Ads and help him with his "homework"; in the whirlwind of socializing that was our summer break, this went on the backburner. 

Back home, I am confronted with a bigger task - sprucing up Ads' handwriting (something that I have blogged about here). It has been frustrating for me, not because Ads' brain as regards the alphabet seems to have been wiped clean over the summer, but because teaching him brings out the worst in me and exposes the biggest faults in my personality. My irritability and impatience viciously feed on each other to create a mommy monster who is scary and detestable. I hate myself when I let myself go like this, and especially when the object of my rage is a hapless four-year old, and when the whole exercise is so patently pointless.

Even more scary was the thought that I may just be evolving into one of those hyper moms who moan and groan about their kid getting *only* 90% and not getting into IIT. If I can traumatize my son about his ABCs, surely I am not far from being that parent?

Enough. Deep breathing should do the trick. I think!

Setting up and decorating house

We got back to Delhi, to be greeted by 25 cartons of stuff that had arrived from the US. The shipment was almost 2 months late (we were supposed to get it by April-end). My first reaction on seeing the boxes filling up precious floor space was one of irritation, because my unpacking enthusiasm had waned completely.....how was I to find the energy to unpack all these boxes?

As I started on the task, my irritation grew, supplemented by a sense of wonder at my own foolishness, near-sightedness and acquisitiveness. Why on earth did I have so much STUFF? Specifically, why do I have so many clothes? My clothes spilled out of every box. I had used them to pad our curios, kids' toys, my kitchen stuff; and there were enough left over to ship to every woman in Somalia. Oh well, I exaggerate, but I am so mad at myself. I have imposed a moratorium on any more clothes purchases for myself for the next one year. I'm confident I'll stick to it. 

I lovingly unpacked many of the curios I had purchased on our travels to Mexico and Canada. It was a delightful exercise to think about where to place them (some place Yukta-inaccessible, of course), and move things around until everything looked just right. I leave you with some snaps of the apartment. Still a few wall-hangings to be put up (some need to be re-framed), and I need to get some balcony furniture too. But the latter can wait since it's still too hot and dusty to think about sitting outside.

This display in my study has the boomerang (Australia), a Chinese tea set (Chinatown - Vancouver), and sand painting (Arizona Indians). The stand next to the couch has two cute drums (Hawaii).

The kids room - lots of Ads' artwork and I still have to put some more up.

Living room - 2 paintings depicting the Ramayana (Bangkok), my beloved Mysore painting (a housewarming gift from S's aunt) and a random bright yellow vase picked up at a thrift shop in the Bay Area!

My beloved Warli shares space with a piece of pottery depicting the Aztec calendar (Mexico) and a mask from South Africa (which I have never visited; it was a gift from a friend who holidayed there).

Some thrift-shop finds with green tequila shot set (Mexico).

One of my favourite paintings - the San Francisco skyline. My brother bought this for me.

Indian Summer

What a summer it has been. 4 weeks down South, in Chennai and Bangalore. The highlight for me was the sheer and very satisfyingly large number of people I managed to catch up with - friends, relatives and cousins. The highlight for Ads was no doubt the wonderful day he spent ogling all kinds of wild creatures at the Vandalur Zoo, in company with his beloved Chennai Thatha (my father). The highlight for Y - well, who knows what it was? - but she got spoilt rotten by everyone, and that must have been it!

Ads was the cynosure of many eyes at the family wedding that we spent three whole days in, not only because he was one of the youngest kids there, but because of the ease with which he would launch into a conversation with just about anyone. His natural shyness put aside temporarily, he won many hearts (especially those of the older crowd) by expressing his interest in the Ramayana and Indian mythology. He was a source of much amusement when he swaggered into the venue one day, swinging his toy gadai (mace) above his head! It warmed my heart to see him running around the hall with third cousins, sitting in a great-aunt's lap listening to the story of Vaali and Sugreeva, and perhaps glimly understanding that his "family" is a lot larger than he thought it was.

Caveat: All this hob-nobbing with extended family is all very well when you get to do it once or twice a year.I have the liberty to gush about it on this blog. But it would drive me mad if I lived in Chennai and had a family function to attend every couple of weeks. Have been there, done that, you know :)

Anyway, even Y has lost a LOT of her stranger anxiety and is much friendlier to people now.

What else did we do?

The three of us spent 5 days of "quality time" with S's parents at Ooty. Grandparents and grand kids had their fill of each other and enjoyed the sightseeing and the tons of activities that the resort laid on for guests every night.
I caught up with many dear friends, and the children got to know new uncles and aunties who showered them with affection and gifts! 
My dad and I took Ads to his first ever movie in a theatre. The movie was "How to train your dragon" (3D). Hard to say which one of us enjoyed it more, but it led to a fresh resolve on my part to take Ads to age-appropriate movies on a regular basis from now on. My dad also took Ads to the zoo in Chennai, an experience he talks about all the time.

I shopped. We all ate too much. Kids ate way too many sweets. Ads watched too much TV.

We all missed S, stuck in the Delhi heat and missing out on all the fun, particularly as his birthday and our 10th wedding anniversary fell during this period.
As we count down to the last few days of the summer break, and wait to be reunited with daddy dear, I am busy soaking in the terrific Bangalore weather and hope that Ads enjoyed his holidays as much as I did!

Not my post

My kids' maami, blogged about her discussions with Ads, here and here. It makes for an interesting read; and, as always, I gain a fresh perspective on how my child thinks (or indeed, how many kids may think, but of course I retain the right of believing my child is absolutely unique!).

Thanks, Yuvika!

Latest artwork

Ads is obsessed with jungles and wild animals especially the big cats. Every recent drawing of his has been faithful to this theme, with the exception of one he drew yesterday which was from the Ramayana (Lanka burning). His style has changed to reflect the scenery he puts down on paper. I love his use of colours and the way he blends them. He already seems to understand the concept of shading.

One week of summer break

School broke off for the summer last week, so for the last 5 days, Ads has been at home. He finally (fingers crossed!) seems to have entered a phase where he can occupy himself and not whine every 30 minutes about how bored he is. This, if it continues, will be a major milestone indeed. Our stuff from the US has been terribly delayed. We don't expect it to reach us before the end of the first week of June. So the poor fellow has not even had the comfort of playing with familiar toys or flipping through well-loved books.

How has he been occupying the days? He has been doing a lot of drawing, sitting on the floor in his room. He tried to do a paper model construction of the ocean floor using a book someone had gifted him; I have to say the instructions were super hard to follow even for me, so I advised him to give it up! He has had one playdate. He has watched an hour or so of TV everyday and discovered a liking for Tom and Jerry. He spends huge amounts of time everyday screaming and running around the house and fighting with the girl from next door, Aarushi. He gets an hour to 90 minutes of outside playtime in the park, every evening. In the absence of his books, he has been listening to books on Tumblebooks, a truly wonderful resource.
A couple of times, he helped me make my daily ration of lemonade, squeezing the lemons, adding the sugar, salt and water and mixing it all up. Today, for want of anything else to do, I stripped both the kids down to the basics, plonked them in the bathroom with a full bucket of water, a mug, two rags and instructions to clean a stool and some decorative items (unbreakable ones!). They had a blast and in the process managed to clean my stuff too :)
He has developed a keen interest in Indian mythology, thanks to Amar Chitra Katha and movies like Hanuman. He has announced that he is going to request a mace, a bow-and-arrow set, and all the DVDs of Chota Bheem from his grandparents, as an advance gift for his birthday.
It's only been one week of summer break so I haven't needed to think of useful fun activities for Ads to engage in. The novelty of being at home and free from the school routine seems to have been enough for him. In a couple of days, we leave for balmy Chennai where I am going to let the grandparents think of ways to amuse him!

Rituals and fetishes

How important routine is to a child, was evident even when Ads was a baby. At the age of almost-5, he still continues to relish order and predictability in his everyday life. For example, he has a breakfast routine. He finishes breakfast and then orders me - "Wash my hands, wipe my face, give me water, then juice." There is no way I can change the order of any of these tasks. He gets very agitated if I do. Most days, he washes his hands by himself, fetches his own water, pours his own juice; but some days, he is plain lazy or just wants mommy to pamper him, and I oblige :)

Another one is to always ask me whether he is wearing his shoes on the correct foot. Before inserting his feet into them, he places them on the floor, and asks "Is this the correct leg?" Every single day. I don't think he has made the slightest effort to figure out or understand which is the correct foot; he just wants someone else to give the answer every time.

A new fetish is to ensure that he gets more kisses than Y. The fellow really has the sharpest ears -- anytime he hears me kiss Y (which I do very often), pat comes his cry "Did you give Yukta a kissee? Give me a kissee RIGHT NOW!"

Not to be outdone, Y, the attention-seeking Scorpio that she is, likes for her audience to clap enthusiastically every time she does something clever. Nowadays, that signifies anytime that she speaks a new word. She looks around, starts clapping her hands and in case someone is being so boring as to not clap, she will cry out their name "Anna?", "Appa?", "Amma?" as the case may be.

What next? I'm waiting.

Some new words

I gave Y a small tumbler of apple juice this morning, set her down on the floor to drink it and returned to the kitchen. A minute later, I heard her say something she'd never said before. It took me a couple of seconds to recognize the word. "Kottiduthu" (she actually said "kottitthu"). And sure enough, she had spilled the contents of the tumbler all over the floor, an act for which she (much to her surprise!) received a big hug and kiss from a delighted mommy. It is the longest word she has ever spoken, and the hug and kiss was to reward her not for the  multiple syllables enunciated but the super-cute way in which she said them! Her (still limited) repertoire now includes several Hindi words, thanks to my maid - bas, aao, jaao, hato, beta, chalo, didi, bhaiya are the ones that come instantly to mind.

It's probably safe to say that she will pick up Hindi and Tamil in equal measure over the next few months and year. Once she starts preschool (and I assume we are still here at that time), I predict her Hindi skills will overtake Tamil. Also, by that time a heavy dose of reading and talking to Anna will probably have accelerated her English knowledge. Try as we might, Tamil will fall forlornly by the wayside :( A live example in the form of Ads proves my point. I wish he would show a little more interest in learning Hindi, but so far he has resisted all attempts. Peer pressure has to do it's work.

Surely I should carpool?

I have been driving for 9 years now. 6 years in India and 3 years in the US. Initially, I found it difficult to drive in America. I was used to the kind of defensive, survival-of-the-fittest skill we are used to practising in India, while behind the wheel of a car. The fact that everything (or mostly everything) on the road could be predictable, orderly and rule-based was not only astonishing, but also unnerving. For many days, I would instinctively slow down while approaching a traffic light. My driving instructor, who guided me for three classes, would get irritated and ask me what on earth I thought I was doing? It seemed absurd to explain that in India, I would fully expect someone to come hurtling at me for some other direction at an intersection and so I was just being cautious.

Never mind. I got used to this new strange style of locomotion. I even began to like it. Driving became a pleasure due to it's ease and simplicity. In India too, I had revelled in driving my little cars, not because it was fun, but because I derived a grim satisfaction from navigating our crazy traffic, and coming out alive.

For 2 years in the Bay Area, I was the designated dropper-off at Ads' preschool. The first school he went to, was just 4.5 miles from home. It took me exactly 15 minutes to get there. I don't remember ever having been caught in traffic, or some other bottleneck, and having to re-route, or arriving late at the school. 

Now that I am once again designated dropper-off for Ads, the situation is, as you can imagine, more than slightly different. For starters, we have to take an unscenic byway - the picturesque (not!) village of Bhangel. My car executes what can only be described as a cacophonic motorised twist in between a crazy concoction of motorbikes, cycles, cars, trucks, buses, and random vehicles precariously carrying long steel rods and sheets of glass. 10 minutes of sheer torture later, we emerge, hopefully un-scratched, into the relative peace of the New Dadri Road, as it is called, a nice smooth road marred only by the undisciplined driving. It's after coming to Delhi that I realized that as long as drivers aren't educated on road discipline, as long as any fool can buy himself a driver's license, it matters little whether our roads are good, and whether we have the requisite number of 4 or 8-lane expressways and flyovers; traffic will always be chaotic, and let's not blame our oversized population which forms but a small part of this problem.

Anyway, back to the school route. The Dadri Road is interesting in that the exits from this high-speed road have been constructed in such a way that they are the default choice - if you aren't careful in moving to the left side of the road well in advance, you will find yourself pushed into one of the exits and taking an unintentional U-turn! Having escaped from this particular pitfall, we take a right to take us to Sec 49 where it appears that the entire population of one UP village has congregated right in front of the driveway to Kothari International School. There seems to be a market or something in progress, every single day. Tractors, concrete mixers, rickshaws, jostle for space with Skoda Octavias, Honda Citys and other cars of lesser vintage; pushing past this jam takes nerves of steel and a certain recklessness which I happily seem to possess. Needless to say, constant pressure on the horn and a few choice Punjabi swear words will also help!

The contrast between a swank "international" school, complete with swimming pool and lawn tennis ground, and the milling crowd of villagers, farmers and constructions workers just outside this school, is so typical of India. Just like the unintentionally ironic billboard near my apartment, advertising one of the many "global" schools, perched above a whole line of asbestos-roofed huts, where not a single kid would be attending even a Government school. I wonder which outdoor advertising company dreamed up such a location for their board???

I wish I could say that this situation is unique to the NCR region. Sadly, it is a mirror image of what is happening with minor variations in all our metros, and every other small town in India. So I fully expect many more driving (mis?)adventures as I continue to play household chauffeur. The bright side (yes, there is one!) -- I have my fill of several FM radio stations and am staying current with all the latest Bollywood numbers! 

It's spring

Not here in Delhi, of course. Here, it's just plain boiling.

But in Sunnyvale and Santa Clara, and Mountain View and Cupertino, pretty flowers will be in bloom everywhere. California poppies, pansies, forget-me-nots, cow parsnips and scarlet pimpernels will nod their heads in the breeze (yes, even someone as horticulturally-challenged as me knows the name of a few flowers, if only not to appear like a complete ignoramus in front of Ads). The weather will be fantastic (as it always is), I will drag S and kids along on hikes to see wildflowers, we will see pitifully few wildflowers and then we'll realize that the city is chock-full of them and we need have ventured no farther than our own doorstep. Ads will have spring break and as Memorial Day draws near, I will gleefully start planning our trips for the year.
Sigh.
I miss the Bay Area. I miss it with a sickening ache that is not just painful but also astonishing. I have moved cities 12 times, no less, in living memory. In three decades, I have never ever longed to be back in the place which I had just left. I may have missed old friends but I have never missed the sights, sounds and smells of a particular place.
Why am I surprised, though? The Bay Area is such a fantastic place that anybody would miss it. Especially if they had taken the idiotic decision of moving back to Delhi just as summer was rubbing its palms gleefully and getting down to business.
I know my brains are getting a little addled by all this heat. It isn't like me to complain about minor annoyances. Over the years, I have consciously metamorphosed into an optimist. But the heat, the heat.....it's getting me down and sapping me of all my energy. I never thought I'd think this, but honestly the prospect of heading back to Chennai in May (MAY!) is almost appetising :(
No, I don't hate Noida or Delhi. I'm happy we came back. I see Ads has adjusted well and that is such a relief. I know, in time, I will begin to...no, let me rephrase that............I am determined to like living in Delhi.
It's just the darn heat, you know!!! Can you blame me for missing California? :)

Some fun ways of spending hot summer days

Cleaning the verandah with lots of water; pillow fights; and playing dress up!

If I haven't said much about Y lately,

it's not as though there's nothing to say; but my kids are at that stage where Ads says a lot of weird/funny/silly things and those tend to stick with me. Y is still very much a do-er and chronicling her activities takes more effort. She communicates whatever she needs to, reasonably well, through gestures and the limited number of words at her disposal. She is nowhere as verbal as Ads was at the same age (17 months) - probably all her energy goes in running, kicking, shouting and generally being the tomboy of the house. 

So what has Y been upto? She has been growing taller. She seems to have put on some weight after coming to Delhi. I haven't actually measured her but it definitely looks like she is "healthier". She loves to dance. She loves to dress up. She loves to sit down with me when I am massaging cream on my face, and mimic my actions. She has lost most of her stranger anxiety. She loves to be involved in Ads' games, whether or not she understands what is happening. She loves to go down to the playground every evening and never wants to come back home (her brother, on the other hand, is ready to get back inside the house after a mere half-hour of play!) Her favourite seat is on her brother's lap, facing him. Whether on a chair at home or in the car, that's where she loves to be.

She is a vibrant bundle of energy. And oh my, the tantrums already when she doesn't get what she wants!!! I'm pretty sure the terrible twos have started already.

"Amma I don't like you at all...

But I love you soooo much!"

My son says this several times a day, to me, to his father, and to his sister. When my mother was here, he  used to include her also in this cute expression.

Where do they come up with these things??

Ad-lib #4

Ads has developed a disease of smelling his fingers. And what's more, I hear a running commentary on what he is smelling. He also quite unnecessarily asks me whether he can do it, after he has done it! Some examples:

I washed my hands and smelt my hand. Can I do it?

I touched Y's face and smelt my hand. Can I do it?

I touched my feet and smelt my hand. Can I do it?

I digged (dug) my nose and smelt my hand. Can I do it?

...............and several more unsavoury instances of having touched other parts of his body and thereafter smelt his hands :(

Both Ads and Y have also developed the habit of hitting themselves. It's a big game with them. One starts by banging his/her head with his/her hand and shouting "Adi!!" (Hit). The other follows suit and each one hits himself or herself, the whole macabre game accompanied by much laughing, mostly at my annoyed expression I suppose.

A random incident

The school allowed me to escort Ads right into his classroom for the first 2 days. On Day 3, the security guy standing at the entrance to the Primary Block accosted me and asked me to leave Ads right there. I said he was a new student. The security guy said "Theek hai, magar kal se aap ise yahin par chhod dena". Okie-dokey, I said. 

The next day, we reach the Primary Block and I say my goodbyes to Ads. He trots off and stands next to the guard. He looks up at him, looks down again, and hesitantly reaches out his hand. It takes the guard a second to figure out what's happening. He takes Ads' hand in his, somewhat bemusedly. Most of the other kids just walk in confidently and I suppose he's rarely ever had to take some kid by the hand and escort them to class.

That instant, when Ads placed his hand in the guard's, trusting him to take him to a safe haven, has been captured as a precious image to be stored forever in my memory. Unexpected tears pricked my eyes and I was glad I was wearing my sunglasses. I don't know why that moment should have moved me so much, but then all the emotions associated with parenthood are a great mystery.

The older I get and the more experiences I have with my children, the more I understand some of the choices and decisions that my parents made, and the things they said and the feelings they felt.

A new beginning in a new school

Butterflies in my stomach. That sinking feeling of wanting to throw up. A dull heavy ache in my heart. These are the uncomfortable sensations I have been carrying around inside me for the last week. All because, come the 5th of April, Ads starts a new school year in a new unfamiliar school. 

I visited the school twice to purchase the regulation uniforms and books. I labelled his backpack, read the circulars several times and kept hammering into Ads' head that his new session was approaching. In the midst of all the hectic unpacking, purchasing and "settling in', I also found the time to sufficiently agitate myself, wondering how Ads would handle the new environment and how I could ease the whole transition process. 

Silly me forgot that a) This is Ads' third school in two years and therefore he should be able to handle the pressure of a new environment b) He is not a 3-year old any more c) Children are far more resilient than we give them credit for, and definitely more so than paranoid mothers think.

It turned out that I had tied myself into knots for...ABSOLUTELY NOTHING! The sense of relief is overwhelming. He woke up this morning, proudly wore his new uniform and marched off to school with me and S. His class teacher seems nice. He only needed to stay for two and a half hours today and for the next two weeks (they increase the school day to four hours after two weeks) and when I went to pick him up, he was happy and well-fed, having gulped down some rice and a glass of milk. His class teacher told me he is a very "good" and "obedient" child.

I suppose mothers have to keep reminding themselves that their children have grown up!   

Here are some snapshots of the little fella in his uniform and in his classroom.

r2i so far

It's been a while since I wrote. So much has been happening in the last two months that time has been at a premium. Updating my blog has been the last thing on my mind. We left the USA on 26th February. The last week was a whirlwind of packing, unpacking and re-packing, cleaning (the apartment), saying goodbyes, attending farewell dinners and ticking off the million other things on our to-do list. I was extremely stressed. We finally ended up with 6 pieces of luggage, a car seat, a stroller, a backpack and a laptop bag - all to be transported with us on Cathay Pacific. S rented a large SUV which took us to the airport. Carting ourselves to the airport and returning the rental car to Hertz was probably the last DIY activity that we performed in that land of the independent individual.

I hadn't had the time to stress about how the kids would behave on the looong flight to India, but they surpassed my wildest expectations. Truly, they were good as gold. They slept a lot on the flight and the whining and grumbling and crying was at the absolute minimum. So when we landed at Chennai airport, we were tired (who wouldn't be?), but in a decent mood. The body clock adjusted to IST in just one day and two days later, we had embarked on the mandatory temple visits to Tiruverkaadu and Tirupathi.

Tirupathi, where we went to get Y's head shaved, was a torment, as it always is. Every time I go there, the only praying I do is to wish that this is the last time I visit, and perhaps my prayer will come true this time. 

A week after we landed, S's parents organized a large get-together of the extended family, so that everyone could meet the kids. It was held on the ground floor of the apartments where they live, and it was a blast. 

Three days later, we were off to Delhi to hunt for schools and apartments. Ads will go to K.G in Kothari International School (Noida) and after a lot of hunting, we found a lovely 3-bedroom apartment in a large community in Noida. Everything is great except that the school is a 20 minute drive (one-way) from home, a slightly longer commute than we would have liked. The mistake was mine, I did not extensively research a couple of schools that would have been closer to this apartment. We shoould have interviewed with them too. Oh well.

S joined work a week ago and we flew back to Chennai, only to leave for Bangalore a few days later where I had hired packers and movers to empty our apartment and ship the furniture and kitchen stuff to Noida.

Back in Chennai now and we leave for Delhi in a week. My mom will accompany us to help us settle down, 

Whew.

The physical exhaustion is a given. The mental exhaustion, caused mainly by the horrifying realization that we have accumulated SO MUCH STUFF in the last ten years, is greater. The thought of shopping, or adding more stuff, is annoying, even disgusting. I've always enjoyed packing. The process of deciding what to keep and what to throw has always been mildly therapeutic. Unpacking, however, is a lot like opening Pandora's box! And I am not looking forward to doing this once we reach Delhi.
To sum up,  the relocation so far has been incredibly smooth. For this I am very thankful. Hopefully Ads will adjust well in the new school and S will also enjoy his new job. It will take time but we will get there.

Farewell to our minivan

So our beloved Mazda5 gets sold tomorrow and I am feeling uncharacteristically low about it. I really don't care much about cars, and know even less about their mysterious workings, but our lovely minivan has been a favourite. Is it any wonder considering that I have spent so much time driving around in it? We had a nice sedan earlier - a Hyundai Sonata. It got totalled in a crash and we upgraded to a minivan. We didn't want anything as large as a SUV (ugly and harder to maneuvre) but the Mazda struck the perfect balance between looks and comfort, convenience and aesthetics. Before anybody thinks I am moonlighting in a Mazda dealership, let me tell you what a cousin of S's told me a month ago when he peeked into my car. This is what he saw:

1. A stroller

2. A child's scooter and helmet

3. A bag of sand-toys

4. A rug for spreading on the sand/grass

5. A case of mineral water

6. Several bottles of Gatorade

7. A jar of hand and face disinfecting wipes

8. A box of tissues

9. A clear plastic case containing complete change of clothes for each kid, including spare shoes, jackets and caps.

10. 2 umbrellas

So clearly we are always well-prepared to sit out an earthquake or thunderstorm in the car. The only things missing are snacks and diapers, of which I always have a stock in my baby bag (which I always carry with me:))

Is it then surprising that I love the car -- I spend so much time in it that it's practically my second home!

S's cousin commented that I am well on my way to becoming the quintessential suburban soccer mom, which is exactly the thought that had been crossing my mind as well!

Horror of horrors!! Definitely time to leave this country :)

The best age to have children

I chanced upon this article in the New York Times and it ties in with the conversation I have had with friends about the best age to have children. I always tell them that if they want to have two kids, then they need to work backward and see how old they want to be when they have their second. Not only do eggs not work as well the older you get, the fact is child-rearing is an energy-intensive activity and it’s a far more pleasant experience the younger and fitter you are.

I turned 30 one and a half weeks after Ads was born. I was more or less on the median age for women of my generation, a little older by Indian standards and exactly on par with the rest of my friends, who all had their first child when they were 30 or very close to it. (I only have one solitary friend who had her first when she was 26 and even that was an accident!)

If I had to do it all over again, would I change my timing? I highly doubt it. I had 5 carefree years of marriage before getting buried deep in diaper duty, I had the time to figure out what I wanted to do with my career and I had more than 3 years to establish my credibility in my chosen field, after bowing out of the corporate sector.

It’s old-fashioned to ask a woman to have her kids early; but in this case old IS gold. And well, isn’t 30 the new 20 and all that jazz??

Why are you going back?

The immediate comeback question when I inform other desis (and unfortunately, many friends and family living in India) that we are r2i is "Why?". WHY? WHY? This has to be the second most irritating question after "What do you do all day?" (which also I encounter more frequently than I care for).

No, I am not a jingoistic flag-waving type who thinks all Indians should stay in India. In fact, I think that nationalism, and religion are both outdated concepts. (Hmm...I should do a post about this). But it amuses me that when we told people that we are moving to the USA, not one single person asked me "Why?". It's assumed that the westward movement must be for the good, but the eastward movement is somehow more suspect. Why would someone want to come back to the dust and grime and potholes of India, leaving behind the oasis of America, right?

I find we have created a certain amount of dissonance in some Indians who are straddling the fence, emotionally attached to India and longing to go back but not mustering the initiative to take the plunge. In many cases, it's too hard, and justifiably so. As one of our friends put it, he is "terrified of sinking back into a middle-class lifestyle in India". In many cases, one spouse is desperate to move back, but the other isn't -- so of course they never do. I completely get that everyone has their reasons for staying, even if that reason is intertia! But the constant questioning of our decision to go back is not something I enjoy.
So, whether in India or USA, we are resigned to smilingly (not) answer the "Why" question with; "We never intended to stay here long-term"!

Ads' update (2 of ?)

Ads' obsession with drawing and Buzz Lightyear continues. He got to hear about the Power Rangers from somewhere and asked me what they were. I pulled up some videos on Youtube but they were violent and not something I wanted him to see. He didn't insist on watching them but seemed to understand that they were some variety of superheroes, and therefore, legitimate fodder for his over-active imagination. As I write this, he is jumping about on the couch simulating some Power Ranger moves!
He still goes to school for 6 hours (9 am to 3 pm) and seems to be the better for it. Sheets of phonics are regularly brought back home. They have been learning about the Americas in school (Montessori has a strong emphasis on geography) and he stumped me the other day by telling me he knew where French Guyana was. The only other place where I have heard this country mentioned is in the pages of The Economist! The day before that, we were talking about fruits and how they could be grown someplace else and consumed someplace else. I picked up the clementines we had bought that week and told him "Now, see, these oranges come from a country called Ecuador. Ecuador is in..." and he completed the sentence for me - South America!! IMPRESSED :)

The other habit he has picked up of late is to chide me when I repeat something a tad too often. "Amma, I already KNOW that!" he will whine. And sometimes add "Can you please not say that again and again?" It has conveniently escaped his notice that he never does anything if told only once, and that it requires sustained nagging to get him to perform any task!
He is mostly very good with little sister too, including her in a lot of his games and reading voluntarily to her. His biggest irritant is that she makes fun of him (yes, it's true -- the 4-year old is upset because the 1-year old teases him!) by mimicking his crying bouts. Whenever he is even a little bit whiny or cranky, off she goes, parodying his whining tone. Instantly he retaliates "STOP THAT!! I am NOT crying!" The more he protests, the more delighted Y gets, setting in chain a vicious cycle of protests and more whining. I have asked him to ignore her when she does this, but not giving his sibling the gratification of annoying him is a concept he is unable to grasp.

I have been very lax in getting him to speak Tamil at home. I used to be very diligent about this earlier but for the last several months, I have slipped; and it shows. Where he used to be very fluent in Tamil, increasingly English is the only tongue he speaks. I console myself with the thought that the next couple of months in Chennai and onward to Delhi will remedy this situation and soon he will be speaking Hindi as well as Tamil and English.