Pre-school Picture(s)peak

A short while back, Let’s Play, School! was born. A still shorter while later, I sit here, forgotten as a mom. As my son warmed up to the newness of a routine in school and new play mates to use his abundant creative and naughty energies with, his mother was relegated to a singular role - that of dropper to-picker from school, hanging the bag and bottle behind her ageing back. And turning away a little disappointed every morn. Why? Well, the ta-tas to her were said as cheerfully as the good morning to the teachers. Sometimes, while running excitedly to enter his school, he even forgot to turn back as he waved adieu. While I wallow in this disappointment trying to gain a saucer full of sympathy from fellow parents, I also reveal how happy it makes me to think that not a single time did he say – ‘Mumma, no school today.’  

However, to be curious is human; but to be killed by curiosity simply stupid. Curiosity, the cat had its paws around my throat and was knocking on my heart’s door saying – Are you not eager to know what your child does 3 hours away from you every day? Don’t you want to see what happens within those beautifully coloured and welcoming walls – between him and his friends, his teachers and his didis? The devil ruled away all thoughts of appropriateness, and off I went to consult the principal if I could spend a few minutes in their school, hidden from my little imp’s view but with a camera to capture what it could. 

Here it is then, a sneak-peak into my pre-schooler’s life, where I will let the pictures speak. Well, almost. 

[To see further, please click here]

Games of Yore

I wrote about Games I Play some time back. That is, games I play with my family and friends, and which I consciously rescued from oblivion called cartons-in-store-ledges. Here, I sit and think back into my childhood. And when I do that, the reel that runs inside my head conjures up images of play-time, and more play-time (unless of course it was report card day and then the story is in a different tone altogether). Why? Since that is what being a child once upon a fun time was about. Playing … in gay abandon. 

Outdoors!

Remember hopscotch? Stapu, as was lovingly called in our house. One chalk one stone, make that a flat-ish stone, and a life-size game board drawn on the street or on the driveway. Even on top of the roofs, kindly lent to us for a few hours. You could practice those jumps-on-one-leg, alone. Better still, call the whole neighbourhood to take turns at hopping, reaching 8, then standing beyond it all and throwing the stone backwards, ‘No looking, please!’ 

[To read more, please click here]

We Two, Our One

So many are roaming around breathless just now. They just finished talking to me about the Merits of Having Two Children, or more. Truth be told, I am a little breathless myself. For looking for air space to explain my views. Got none, their enthusiasm for me to deliver another child far exceeding my own will to make another bundle. 

But, I am happy. 

Not just because I finally know I can make people breathless, but also because the arguments used for forwarding the idea of having more than one child are something I carry my own answers to. And that, our decision of ‘we two and our one’ is not taken merely because everyone says so or that’s-how-it-is, but because we are the parents who reasoned between ourselves and decided to keep it that way.

And when I look around I realize that in this we are not alone. 

An increasing number of couples are opting for a single child. Reasons are aplenty ...

[To read more, please click here]

When the Daddy is away ...

… the mice are not out to play. Or are they?

Daddy has to go away sometimes. Travel for work as they call it. Boss says go for a 3 day conference, daddy goes for 5 – conference plus travel time plus reaching home in the middle of the night. 8 pm on the first day of his absence and you can see the child waiting for the bell to ring. Papa will come in a little while, you say. Dinner is had on the bed. Who will dip my roti in the daal, he asks a little perturbed. He senses that something is different. By bed-time, when the lights are dimmed, papa’s pillow rests unused. His eyes widen, sleep is knocking but curious questions abound. But I want to give good night 'kissy' to papa! What do you say? It’s not even one down, and there are 4 more days to go!

Between answering some and keeping quiet on others, the days pass. As the morning sun rises on the 4th day, daddy’s absence has become a given now, no matter how incomplete the picture at home may be. Children accept it I think, or do they? 

So, what do I do when my child’s father has to travel for work? Here’s a peep

[To read more, please click here.]

My Santa Claus, real-ly!

I love Christmas! For 25 years now I have hung stockings, decorated trees, made wreaths from leaves, bells with Styrofoam cups, and had cakes upon cakes – since that’s what you eat when Christ is born, or so I want to believe for my gastric merriment sake. It’s a different matter that often socks in place of stockings and potted look-alikes (or those shimmery ones from China) rather than original Xmas trees were used. It’s also a different matter altogether that eating the cakes took precedence over getting the buntings up in time, maybe. Be that as it may, my Christmas has never lacked cheer or a stocking on Christmas eve. Because Santa Claus never forgets to drop by!

I am 30 years old and my son is a little over 2. Here is a picture of us from last Christmas, with both of us believing that Santa Claus is coming to town. I have decided to perpetuate this myth for as long as he starts to reason with me, and then reply to him ...

[To read more, please click here.]

Why no Ravana?

Dress them up in Dusshera costumes, the school circular read,

And the mother of the little child stared at it in complete dread.

Was a first, this fancy dress, and she knew not what to do,

Advice from well-wishers she did seek, even though they were so few.

Oh, you must make him a Rama, just get him a saffron dress,

The crown you’ll get in a costume shop or make it all yourself.

Lakshman is a better idea, said one of them to her,

Not many think of turning their kids into Rama’s younger brother.

Why, Sita too, a few chirped in, she can make her little boy,

That was sure to make the teachers see the naughty fun and joy.

Just no one said, “Oh go ahead, dress him in black, why not”

And so she thought, as Ravana she will make her tot trot.

[To read more, please click here.]

Let's play, School!

The hunt was on. No, I don’t mean for the Kingfisher calendar girl. They are probably still looking for one who will model for nothing (no pun) even as they try to keep the planes afloat. I mean a different hunt altogether. I mean prey, oh pardon me, play school for my toddler.  Today was his first day, and even as he sits doing something away from his mother’s madly beating heart for the first time in 2 and half years, I write this. Hence, please excuse geysers of excessive melodrama and plunges of deep philosophy as I try to tell you how my journey of picking the most suitable play-school for my child has been.

Once upon a time I wrote ‘No play-doh without dough’ Today, I care to share how the final decision was reached. 

The how

How I went about looking for suggestions? Word-of-mouth, with all shapes of communication channels experienced, explored and exhausted (including Grapevine which is more complex than E=mc2). It did not mean I went around with a ‘Play-school suggestions needed’ tattooed on my forehead. I asked people I trusted ...

[To read further, please click here.]

Taming of the Poop

Till your child is toilet-trained, you feel no qualms about discussing chhee-chhee topics in public, without even bothering as to when your companions last saw the inside of a diaper. So that should explain the presence of this post on such a dignified forum. Kindly excuse me, please. But my obsession with social media tells me that toilet-training is indeed one of the most important concerns bothering parents everywhere. A friend recently messaged me asking me what I am doing to make my son go in the right place, with the exact aim and the perfect sense of time. Another is distressing over how her daughter’s potty seat had to be strategically covered with Goa’s beach sand to keep it from driving away the tourists, even as the little one insisted that here, and here alone, she will go potty (I don’t blame her. She has scenic taste, I say). And a few days back, when a friend from school shouted out to me for tips and tricks, I promised her this post.    

Basically, the moment the clock strikes the 2nd year, the cuckoo comes out to say – Hey you, start worrying about the poop, before it hits the roof. Here is what I did ...

To read further, please click here. 

Home-Maid Lessons

The relationships we share with our house-helps are usually a potpourri of emotions. Maids know how to open our best most charitable corner of the heart, every passing Diwali or daughter’s school fee day, whichever occurs more often. They also bring out the longest faces our visages can manage, what with those undeclared leaves right after taking 2 month’s salary in advance. I have seen myself going from one end of the emotional spectrum to the other like a pendulum oscillating drunk, for reasons which are every home’s story. She comes (or not comes) for an hour every day and helps me with what she is supposed to, at least with 60 per cent of the job profile that was pre-decided when I kept her. She seems happy, especially since the other residences are Houses of Horrors for her and mine a halka ghar, whatever that means. 

Houses of Horrors? She tells me bizarre stories of how some ‘momsters’ have asked her to clean verandas with cold water in peak winters and bare-foot please, the child may catch infection from her slippers. How her colleagues have often been falsely accused of eating burfis by the Madam, gossiping about Sir, having an affair with the driver, and being married to a murderer lodged in a village jail – all untruths and only spread to fire them and even keep another from hiring them. Their character certificates are written and re-written at the drop of a mop, and the stories continue - not just of how they treat us but also of how we women mistreat our own helps. 

This post is about my maid, who comes and goes with a big smile on her face, so I am assuming she is happy with me...

To read further, please click here. 

The Darned Things He Says

This epic post is all about what things my son can say,

Oh dear Gods forgive me, what darned words this may contain.

Parents too I will advice, throw not caution to the air,

Shut those eyes the moment you see what shouldn’t be here.

The first cry was just a mew, but that didn’t last a day,

“Ailaa Ailaa” is how he howled when he wanted to have his way.

Filmy and sweet is what you say, but lightening too once struck, 

When Miss Punjabi heard “Laila Laila” for herself, uttered.

To read more, please click here. 

Sense of Self, or Shame?

‘Shame shame puppy shame, all the donkeys know your name’

Remember this jingle, sung in chorus back in our childhood when the elastic of our shorts gave way or the skirts turned traitor in the wind? It was an age when we were too young to be mindful of our bodies in times of gay abandon, but old enough to know that the 5-letter-word meant reason to blush when heard for our own selves. Why the sweet donkeys, of all animals, would bother knowing our names in such moments of slips-and-misses is a riddle we need not solve. What we can question, and answer, is the puzzling way in which the psychology of shame finds place in the minds of our young ones. 

At a public facility recently, I was busily pulling up my son’s shorts after a ‘what a relief’ moment when he, watching a female fellow-toddler undergoing similar fate in the hands of her mother, chose to announce without warning – ‘Oh oh. Girlie has no wee-weelie-weenkie.’ I confess - it was the only time in all these years that I was scared of a woman’s bag slapping my face. It was also the only time I thanked myself for choosing such a non-telling pseudonym for my son’s manhood. The latter kept the former away, as I quickly tucked in his tee and ducked out of the scene. 

And then I sat down to think about it all ... 

To read more, please click here.

The 3 Must-do Ms

It is amazing how, soon as you become a mother who happens to write for a living, the most frequent catalysts for ideas come in the form of what other mothers have said or done. Like a chain of sorts, albeit not the yummy food one, but of actions-reactions and more, that Newton’s IVth Law of Mom-tion spoke about once upon a time. While sharing my thoughts at a mahila meeting recently about how important I consider it to take a toddler for a fun day-out, I was met by a boulder straight from the black and white television era – 

‘Our mothers never went out when we were babies. But we grew up just fine!’ 

Now, who am I to contest that statement, especially in one of those situations where Lord of Reason should keep mum, hide inside my head and finally come out through my pen onto this paper in safer climes - to be shared with reason-able readers? So, here I am about to tell you of the 3 Must-do Ms that we as a family believe in, and you may like to too.

To read more, please click here.

Belling the Cat

A baby adds to your life by leaps and bounds.  Objects you have never seen before, activities you never thought you would do without an “Ew” and emotions you thought only Karan Johar capable of. As the baby grows up, more gets added to the potpourri of nouns, verbs and other kinds I speak of. But something gets subtracted too as soon as a baby takes his rightful place to sleep between you and your beau. I think you know what I mean. And yes, I am entering your bed room right this minute, as I tell you about mine.

To read more, please click here.  

Advert-ently Wrong? Complan's latest on TV

Some time back I came to a conclusion. I realized that there are only two kinds of adverts running on TV – the ones you will never forget and the ones you will not bother to remember. Since most fell into the latter category serving no greater purpose than making you dream of fairer skin and low cholesterol chips, I had relegated them to background scores for bathroom breaks as my favourite TV soaps took theirs. However, Complan’s latest advert made me sit up and take note, and not for a single right reason. Let me explain!

To read more, please click here.

Family Values - An umbrella without a handle?

Have you closely observed those touching your feet bending to be blessed? I have seen many trying to dangle their hands somewhere around my femur, leaning 20 degrees at the waist with minds and free hands fixed on keeping the falling pants or pallus in place. Not my idea of showering blessings – on those younger with visibly younger underwear, often. A warm ‘hi’ makes me feel respected, or even just a genuine smile! Which is not to say that I am stowing feet-touching away into the box of memorabilia in the attic, as yet. God knows, as do all the elders, that it was one of the most beautiful gestures to bless and be blessed by. This here is just my attempt to examine how everything has a lifeline and a deadline - even ideas of family values and their associated gestures. And how we need to evolve our thinking even as Darwin’s theory and some such evolve the other bits!

To read further, please click here.

To have? To not have, as yet!

Readiness is all. 

But when it comes to having a child and becoming a parent, readiness plays peek-a-boo. Try as we might, saying ‘yes’ to 9 months and 90 years of parenthood is something that makes our knees knock, our Adam’s apple swallow itself and the heart zoom out the thoracic cavity and into our mouth, all within seconds of hearing “planning a family” – an act of such bravery it seems that it can put Gladiators to shame. 

When I got married to my friend from school, little did I know that the physics chemistry mathematics engineering permutation and combination that he excelled in will one day make him pronounce an exact date for father-hood. ‘5 years from our wedding day’ and the bomb dropped - a bomb at least for a Literature type like me who viewed most things subjectively and certainly not in set numbers – even, odd, prime or whichever else. I did not understand the deadline, and after 2 years of our marriage I happily realized neither did he, when he again pronounced-without-prompt – ‘I’m ready!’ So much for Mr. Calculus and miss-calculations!

As we enter our 3rd year of parenthood and look around, attributing to ourselves greater wisdom than we have actually acquired over the last few years, we wonder what makes people ready to have a baby, or rather, what keeps most of them saying abhi nahi! Once upon a time, the first child was conceived in Shimla, Udaipur or Goa – on the honeymoon itself, that is. The second after 3 years of the first, as Doordarshan advised. And if the rest were to follow they just did anyway, in no particular order of merit. Today, the only people talking about childbirth as a logical next step soon enough after the wedding vows are the ones who contributed their 2 cents to the population nearly 3 decades ago. It is their progeny which is the abhi nahi variety in a typical educated urban working professional setting.

Why readiness is not ready to come.

Life is no longer about Mehta & Sons or Kumar & Bros. Life is no longer about a handed down pattern of work and profession, with a swivel chair and a business waiting to be passed down to the daughter or the son, or a letter of recommendation for accommodation into daddy dear’s ex-office. Mostly, life is contained somewhere within cut-off scores, entrances, jobs, designations, apartments, cars, better jobs, better designations, bigger apartments and fancier cars. In short, life is about Ambition, and why not. Not just the feel-good variety, but ambition for reaching points in time where we feel financially stable and materially sound enough to afford anything from Rs. 5 an egg to Rs. 5000 a month play-school fee and eventually Rs. 5 lakh a year higher studies tuition fee for the ones we will call our progeny. 

However, in the process of the pursuit of what makes us happy and will hopefully keep ours happy, time is the victim for it refuses to stop ticking. More time at work means lesser time at play, and hence wondering how we will find time out from our work schedules, impending promotions, travel plans and shifting jobs to plant the seed of the first step even, if you know what I mean, let alone bring up a whole new being. Life keeps us very busy. And then we decide to keep our life busy in return.

Even if busy means worshipping football and beer, Saturday nights and rock concerts, cosy coffee shops and cosier corner seats in movie halls. When love knows no bounds, it may prefer to rock the lover to sleep every night, rather than a hiccupping baby. And then every office party has at least one well-wisher who may be a father-of-two himself but who considers it his life’s dharma to warn you – ‘Life changes after a baby. Be prepared!’ With a picture of a mysterious future looming out their voice and a baby crying in their arms, they put a little germ of doubt in your head, making you cling to your partner in complete fear of having to forgo the couple-y activities you so enjoy, together.  

Talking of doubts, often times the doubt about becoming a parent is about traits of our own personality. Interestingly, no other age or stage in life brings in a battalion of self-doubts as planning a baby does. Not love-at-first-sight, not the 21st birthday celebrations and not even the permanence of marriage. Am I patient enough? Am I too independence loving to be tied down by maternity gowns and feeding bras? Will I ever be able to think straight without my weekly dose of movies? Are oxytocin, ovulation and ovaries relatives or are they pills? And mostly, will I make a good parent? 

But why readiness should come, soon.

That bum with a baby at the party who told you life changes after you have a baby was right. But whoever told you it’s only about pee-poo, burp cloths and sleepless nights was wrong. It may not be a one-way ticket to a luxury spa but neither is it a contract which pronounces you to stay-sane-sober-celibate for the rest of your life. It is simply a step forward into growing up in life. And sometimes, you have to leap to see for yourself what the other side of the fence has to offer. No joke, becoming a parent, but in all seriousness, no one can tell you about it either – neither ones like me who say ‘Go for it!’ nor others who sing paeans of the latest contraceptives. Parenthood is for you to see and experience, and to finally understand. 

Money is important, ambition even more – one as insurance for the future, the other as assurance of self-worth and self-love. But neither needs to stop in its flow once a baby enters your life. If anything, you will find greater avenues to spend the former and beautifully reinvent the latter to include your baby and his/her future within its folds. 

And before you even learn to spell their name right, you will find that time has itself shown you paths around which it can be better organized. This is not to say time will conspire to increase your day to 25 hours. This is just to assure you that you, as an individual, will learn to manage the 24 given to you, automatically, and in a fashion better suited to everyone’s needs – including your own.

And no, that certainly does not mean you will not spend those hours drinking, partying, socializing, dancing, shopping, gossiping, reading, eating, etc. You will do all of that still, but with an added array of items and activities, like baby food, baby shopping, baby gyan sessions, baby parties and baby book reading, on your platter. Who said you’ll miss out on fun? I promise you, that you will only end up adding to your kitty so many more joyous reasons to celebrate! 

Oh! About that patience! Well, no better way to learn it than to test it, perhaps.  And the self-doubts, forget them all, and go make a baby. I cross my heart and tell you this that they are born so blinded with love for you that everything from your cracked voice to your funny nose is soul food for them. Because those belong to whom they call their parents.  (Of course, the flying pink hearts last only till they grow up enough to realize you are no Lata Mangeshkar or Richard Gere. After that, you can burn this post away!) 

Just one more thing - Happy Baby Making. And may the best swimmer win! 

(First published on Parentous.com)

Sometimes, we forget to tell our children ...

Generation Gap?

That though we prattle and play together what deserves reprimand today will not be postponed to tomorrow. Hitting, bullying, hurting another will get what it should, today. Not when you are older but exactly now, when you are old enough to be bad towards someone. In the hope that you will understand how the angry “Don’t you ever do that again!” was important today to prevent causing hurt from becoming a habit in the future.

We forget to tell our children …

That we see the hormonal roller coaster behind your adolescent mood and stubborn acne, and that we are there to help in this transition towards adulthood. Not just label you defiant in public, but remember our own time. That the reproductive system is biology and sexuality is a part of life. That menstruation is not a hush-hush stigma but science, even if those who call God their own consider it otherwise. That being a teenager is important, as important as it is fun. And that we won’t stand in your way as you learn and unlearn, but wait on the side so you know we are there, just in case.   

We forget to tell our children …

That our dreams about you do not dictate your future, but your dreams of the future are ours to dream. You go ahead and become what you want, and we’ll watch your back - ready with our ears, our hands and shoulders, whichever you may require. You figure life out, leave home, choose, do, lead - for today belongs to you. Not to our age-old myths, time-weathered ideas or unfounded fears. Feel free, and feel free to fail, for there’s always tomorrow and there’s always us. So, take it easy! 

We forget to tell our children …

That an over arching universal idea of ‘family values’ is pure rhetoric and stuff that class 4 school debates are made of. That family values mean what all the members of a family value, together, by a shared consensus. Not codes of conduct which have been passed down generations, as unquestioned vagaries struggling to fit into today’s context. Look around on your own, discern what it takes for the fittest to survive in the time we call 'now', find your principles your values your opinions, share them and let us rediscover what our family values, all over again!  

We forget to tell our children …

That we will never remind you of all that we did for you – like favours, or debts or burdens forever for your shoulders. We did what we could and best. Just as you will too one day, for your child. If we were to make a list, then perhaps we did not understand the meaning of what it is to be a mother to a child or a father to a child. Not everything is quantifiable. If it is, then perhaps it’s an expectancy from tomorrow. Let there be nothing expected by us from your side, except respect and love. And let us as parents understand how best to earn those two from you too.   

We forget to tell our children …

That you are more important to us, than the whole society and its many minds put together. Society did not give birth to you, and neither did it produce us. This relationship is personal, between you and us. That we will never make a spectacle of your follies or compare your scores with the neighbour. Just like we as parents will not excuse your misdeeds either. Perhaps find another way to communicate than to bring in the world as an example - to unlearn wrong, to forgive and finally move on towards a tomorrow where no mistakes are repeated. A promise between us, and one which does not require the society to watch over! 

And we forget to tell our children ...

That while we were born to be your parents and you our children, we should be the best of friends. That different times of growing up and different expiry dates do not mean understanding cannot be found. Tell them that generations are not born with permanent spaces in between. That bridges are possible, and necessary.

As I see these lines suddenly transform into a prayer, I make a promise to myself. I will remember to tell my child that his parents will forever strive to build that bridge and try meeting his newer-age stance at the Golden Mean. And for that, I will remember to ask him to teach us parents too as he learns from us. Only then, when we grow together will we remain riveted as one - a happy family, without any gaps between our ever-evolving minds.   

Amen.

It's Raining, Frogs!

I woke up to the mating call. (Oh, not his, no! He could barely see his toothbrush that hour). I woke up to a mating call of an amphibious kind... 

Monsoons in Delhi are associated with certain images and ideas that refuse to leave me. Over the last 13 years here – as I went from 17 to 30, I have seen rivers flowing down flyovers and flyovers flowing down rivers, to join the sea at the next intersection and the Pacific Ocean at Dhaula Kuan. I have sat in rickshaws launching towards Arts Faculty sans any propellers, taking 30 minutes every 100 meters and 30 times the fare. A downpour always meant LSR hostellers in chappals and shorts, sitting licking ice lollies right when the class began, and till much later when Literature was back on the shelves. Wet umbrellas have served as handy missiles for bus misbehaviour en route India Gate – where more ice creams and splish-splashing awaited. Even going to the DU gardens, and guiltlessly disturbing the love-birds with our teasing ooos-n-coos. Then, one stage later, it was all about swiping the entry card to the HT Media building in time, even if it meant squeezing yourself from between the railing on the divider to cross the road – just so the Chandni Chowk kohlapuri remains dry and high away from the flooded underpass and its hanky seller. And now, real joy as a mother in seeing the joy that rain brings to my son’s being. One roll of thunder and windows are opened, doors unlocked and curtains drawn apart to see and be seen by the raindrops outside. To be one with the sight, the sound and the smell of monsoons! And later, to see him “helping” me clean the verandah with a wiper – cleaning it of all the baggage that the rain carried as it fell on our doorstep. 

And then Today happened after I heard the mating calls … 

Actually, he did. “Froggie mumma, froggie calling outside” and then I realized what the din was about. There must have been a dozen of them, although they sounded like 12000. The back lane, CPWD’s favourite dumping ground had drowned in the morning rains and in its place was a huge pool of floating swimming leaves, twigs and Mr. and Miss Frogs - totally abuzz, like a prom morning where every croak was either a pick-up line or a successful hurrah! Some were swimming like there’s no tomorrow, others just floating around with their limbs outstretched, letting the ripples made by others bob them around. Mr. Show-off sat on the parapet displaying his wares and Mr. Happy came out to show us an ear-to-ear grin. Least mindful of the light drizzle, we two too went ribbit croak ribbit ribbit at our little gate – celebrating this beautiful rainy morning with who-could-have-thought, little speckled Frogs all aglee where once there was a gutter in a bed of dry leaves.

Just Being plain lazy - in Froggy Land

Mr. Show-off - croaking the love song 

Mr. Happy, with an ear-to-ear smile for the Peeping Toms

 And as I sat cleaning his sandals of wet mud and wiping slush off his tiny legs, the inevitable happened. That which catches us small-towners by surprise, or every time it rains. Nostalgia! We get transported to those carefree hamlets we have left behind to get on with our lives in condominiums, corner offices and coffee shops. And I to those days full of gay abandon from my childhood, in Dehradun, when rain was not weather but an occasion. When the older children danced in the downpour and the younger ones tried to too, albeit in rain coats. Where we sailed down Rajpur Road in paper boats and soared high in the wind with plastic bags attached to strings. Where exposed ends of pants flapped on scooters like excited flags getting wet and shared auto rickshaws for 6 charitably carried 12, umbrellas included. Puddles and leaking bus stops, getting late for work or soaked socks never dampened the spirit, a spirit that only had one thing to say at the end of a very wet day – Some chai and pakoras, what say? 

Every city has a face, and every city has a face for a rainy day. And like they say, every frog has his day too. And today was mine – on Heaven No 7 and Cloud No 9, when it rained and rained frogs!

I swear iPotty. Marry me!

Toilets are important. Ask that bladder’s belly in the post-beer queue or the one running hysterically to hug the nearest tree. You can also ask the lady who swooshed past you in the ladies line and hopefully reached the destination point well-in-time. One of the loudest truths of life is that we all need a place to PnBe when nature calls. Gone are the days of gay abandon when relieving oneself was about walking behind the cave (if at all) and reaching back well in time for the bonfire, dinner and cave painting. From no hole to hole dug to humble hole to ceramic-n-steel to automatic, toilets have evolved just as their users have. 

And loo and behold, our companions in stress/distress recently made news, and how!   

News Number 1 (shun the pun): 

In a certain district in MP, future grooms are posing with toilets at their homes. Rule book says it doesn’t matter whether they stand next to it, sit on it or just point towards it with one hand, make a victory sign with the other and say cheese. Point is the picture, as evidence, ensures them registration at the mass marriage ceremony organized by the government in the district. That’s only one step done. Second, the toilet in all its photogenic glory helps them woo their ladies and make them skip to my ‘loo’, my darling! How? Jairam Ramesh rightly told us a little while back how providing a toilet to the women in the country will ensure them security, self-respect and confidence -  for every single woman out of the 60 per cent who don’t have access to one. So, what do we have? We have men going the extra tile to woo their life partners into their hygienic lives, thanks to an exemplary scheme by the district government towards providing basic sanitation facilities for women. A single photo ID of a man and a giant leap for womankind! 

News Number 2 (shun the pun still):

iPotty. I mean the gadget. You haven’t heard? It’s a training toilet for toddlers with an iPad dock attached. A 360 degrees rotating case which let’s your toddler switch from horizontal to vertical viewing. Complete with a clear screen protector for the gadget, in case of misfires and with a cover which converts it into a regular seat. (Yes! I’m still talking about the iPotty and not NASA’s latest space ship to the Sun.) So well, the iPotty keeps your children entertained till the pressure far exceeds holding capacity and they finally “go”. All the while, learning and unlearning with technology what perhaps no one could teach them at home anyway. Now, rumour has it that men-of-notes are wooing their ladies with the idea of an iPotty. How? Well, if you can afford and iPad today you surely can get an iPotty tomorrow, and if you are thinking what I’m thinking, it’s another way to tell your lady – ‘Hey hun! Our kid will be in good hands, er, seats. So have some with me, please?’ And the same rumour mill tells us about a sudden spurt in registration of marriages in a certain section of apple-shaped humanity. There, like they say, iApple a day will get a woman your way, and even keep that tiny bum poo-pooing away!

The iPotty

And this morning, as I come out after “getting fresh” fully, a new light has dawned upon my clean insides. That poor cartoonist who went to jail for depicting the Parliament as a WC made a huge mistake. What did he mean by comparing the country’s foremost symbol of respectability to a yellowing ‘Cera Vitreous’ kind of outdated toilet? Preposterous and utter balderdash, and extreme ignorance of the latest in toilet tech. The bio-toilet is where it’s at, now, cartoonist ji. Commode to bio-tank with decomposing bacteria to chlorine to what do we have as an output – only a little water and just a lot of gas! But of course, I am not suggesting anything here.

No play-doh without dough

The following account surpasses what nightmares on elm-lined streets, psychos wearing their dead mothers’ wigs to kill, ghosts that needed busting, shapes like rings or signs six seven eight made me feel. It may send chills down your new-daddy-mommy spines too and worse still currents up your neck into the head that thought evil was dead. It isn’t and is very much alive, singing happy songs as you read this.

My son turned two, and just like a Punjabi daughter turning 23 attracts mothers-aunties-cats-n-kittens of suitors, I suddenly find my house full of visitors who pray to tell me all that I need to know and certainly do not need to know about Play-Schools. Here I was happily busy showing him the world as I see it and as he knows it already, and there a whole new phase of toddler-hood was waiting to come pouncing down on us. And pounce it did, in varied shapes and sizes, as the mothers of school-going brats came to make friendship with me to guide me in Step 1 of my son’s path to academic glory and excellence and maybe a Harvard at the end – but for now his Play School.

Now, this play school business is no child’s play. It is business. Start asking around about one and you realize how right the poor being was who said, ‘There are no rich and no poor. Only different levels of poverty’. Come play into our hands your green dough and see your child grow, they all seem to avow. If I want to send my son to play with other sons and daughters of the nation called New Delhi, I have 2 stark choices today:

1. I send him to Chopra aunty’s ‘Ding-Dong Kidzz’, Sharma aunty’s ‘Gay Way Play’ or Singh aunty’s ‘Happie Tottie’ - names for drawing rooms converted to empty rooms with cushions, mats, some toys, posters of Mickey Mouse and Ben 10 looking like they cross-bred and 2 ayahs to make sure the mats remain dry and clean. Mid-day meal of Maggi (all kids love it, you see!) included.
2. I send him to big budget play-schools starting with Euro (the strongest currency I believe?) or Zee or Alpha Beta Gamma Theta or Father’s Pride or something even bigger than that pride. Names for play-rooms with fancy swings, fancy chairs, fancy toys, fancy nannies and fancily-dressed teachers.

Fancy that now! The devil and the deep sea, together!

My experience with reading 5-star food menus like books written in Urdu, from right-to-left, came in handy when I turned to Mr. Google for a little help. I read the fee first, and then the “facilities” being offered to make my son into a demi-God of blocks, coloring books and hip-shakes to rhymes. And guess what, I hugged the devil, jumped into the deep sea with him and called it a day, that being the best option to deliver myself of all evil for the time being!

Am I to choose a school where I can walk and drop and pick-up, or one where I pay a few trunks extra and get a private Hundai Accent pick-drop-facility-school-cab, with AC and stereo, in case your ward likes to pee in his diaper with Radio Mirchi playing his tune? Am I to pick the simple teacher speaking fancy or the fancy teacher talking simple? Is a mowed lawn important for my child’s growth? Should the ayahs wear uniform or it matters not? Should toilet-training be on the list of responsibilities parents can absolve themselves of or my baby’s little bum goes and comes in his teddy-diaper I lovingly wrapped him in? And basically, should I sell my wedding jewellery to get my son admitted in his play-school or should I just sell the car and walk him over to admit him into Mehta aunty’s “Chubby Cheeks” (no pun)? Play-schools or Prey(upon-your-fat-wallet)-Schools, hello there devil and deep sea – here I come, again. Splash!

Next day Good Karma came back, and his doctor asked me to wait a few months more before introducing him to paid play. The well-wishing ladies swishing into my living room and making it my killing room went home to save-up on their precious breaths. And for now I go to bed, sans devils and deep seas but always with this thought in my head – Does anyone know the most important part of the shoe that needs to be polished? It is not the M&S calf-leather toe on your tiny tot’s tiny foot. At the end of the day, it is the one that’s standing inside the shoe that needs to shine the most!