Mama mia

Parenting is a wonderful journey of self-discovery. Children make us sing in joy, tear our hair, heave in sigh and of course they make us laugh a lot. Sharing some such hilarious episodes of parenting.

“Mama mm…Mama mm…” my 4 yr old sobbed in between deep sighs as he attempted to complain about his 6 yr old brother over the phone, when I made my regular afternoon call from work in the afternoon to check on the house help and my sons. “Yes baby. What is it?” I asked softly trying to comfort the hassled child.

“Mama annayaa hit me mama soooo hard…” he wailed “Oh that’s bad dear. Where did he hit you?” I gently prodded “On that part Mama with which we bend our hand, which is like the knee of the leg” he wept as I stifled a guffaw at the other hand, enjoying the tiny tots attempt at describing the elbow and aptly making  up for the vocabulary deficit!

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Speaking of vocabulary, the multi-ingualism of India threw up interesting episodes with children.

“Shut the door Yajat” his granny shouted out in Telugu one day “Eegall vasthaayee” ( ‘Eegall’ is ‘house flies’ and ‘vasthaayee’ means ‘will come in’ )  My 4yr old with a highly perplexed look turned around and asked  “Which eeagall will come in grandma? Telugu eagall or English eagle?” 

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In my mother tongue  Tamil, we call it 'mazhal' when children use ‘Ls’ instead of  ‘Rs’  Our little one had a problem with saying ‘F” and chose to conveniently omit it whenever the sound came up in a word. So ‘fish’ was ‘ish’ and ‘coffee’ was ‘coee’ etc.

We were in NTR gardens one morning showing the place to a visiting friend who was one of those tourists who does his detailed research of every place he visits and HAS to by all means have the tick beside his check list of ‘places to visit’ when he leaves the town/city. Well so it was with him that we went ‘sight-seeing’ NTR gardens.

My son who was all of 2 years then was terribly delighted by this whole adventure as he’d never been to a public park before. He is blessed with miraculous lung power which was currently boosted by fresh doses of adrenalin rush. “Mama Daddy  look there” he shrieked shivering in excitement and pointing  his fingers at 2 big beautiful sunflowers that were glowing in the pre-noon sunlight. “Lovers Lovers” he shouted because he could not say ‘F' for the life of him.

Bad enough you think? There’s more…voila! Who should be sitting on the other side of the flowers? But of course an innocent couple who had hoped to spend some time in the anonymity that a public park gives.  Needless to say we got the dirtiest stares from those around for the kind of ‘education’ we were giving our child! The child was not only identifying amorous couples but also enthusiastically sharing it with his parents.

We smiled a foolish smile, gritted our teeth , mumbled something  loudly enough for the benefit of the public and did a disappearing act that would put P C Sarkar to shame.

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Children have a knack for creating the most unexpected and embarrassing scenarios whenever there is a visitor around. I can never forget that morning with uppity Mrs Mehta our neighbor in the building. She was as usual at her bratty best despite ( or perhaps because of) having come home to borrow money to pay the gas delivery guy. The guy left but Mrs Mehta didn't. 

 It was a Saturday and hubby was around. Mrs Mehta chose to settle in our drawing room and her banter meandered from colouring her hair in Singapore to the tattoo that she was planning to get done at a designer studio, hubby and I bore it all with a neighbourly smile plus the routine “Hmm”s at the appropriate moment.  Our son who was just over  2 years  then had  meanwhile strolled into Mrs Mehta's house which was just opposite ours.

The three of us were sailing through the apparently unending monologue, when our son  who’d been playing quietly in Mrs Mehta’s drawing room, suddenly dashed out onto the corridor  brandishing in his hand a bright red pair of lacy inner wear, whose ownership was beyond questioning.

 In 9.3 nano seconds 93kilos of Mrs Mehta had transformed into a blubbering blob bungling her way down the stairs as she chased her booty which was well on its way to ‘stardom’  in the able hands of our sprinting 2 yr old. ‘Nahi beta who nahi’ she gasped between her brave attempts to juggle speed and speech.

Clearly she was no match for the rocketing boy with a mission at hand and so I had to pitch in while hubby had to pitch out (considering the ‘cause’ of the run). I’d never been to a ‘Jockey’s second’s sale’ but got a fair idea that moment what it must be like. Mid-way through the chase I realized that with two of us on the run there was scope for mistaken identity of ownership of that now-in-the-air XXXXXL

I froze in my tracks and yelled “Harshu”. The little one screeched to a dramatic halt right in front of the elevator. The elevator stopped at our floor, doors opened and half a dozen men, all members of the senior citizen chess club stepped out. ‘Hello’ they greeted. ‘Hello’ I greeted too, sliding a red something behind my behind. Just in time for the no-show.

A scene that could've made for spicy conversation ended instead as a bland exchange of pleasantries.

Very forgettable for the gentlemen I am certain but one woman I suspect won’t quite forget that Saturday morning. And the credit goes to my little sonny.

Life would be far less colourful without the innocence and mischief of children I guess.