"Where do you come from?"
For some time I have been parrot-teaching my kids:
When someone asks where are you from say INDIA, if they ask where do you live say HONGKONG.
In Arunav's soccer class today a child asked him'where you come from' Arunav had just got back from school, he said,"From school, French International School." The child said,'no no I mean which country you live' Arunav said,"Of course HongKong, same as you silly(!!)" The child now was really impatient and said,'where were you born?' and Arunav said,"Tokyo, Japan" :))
I was amused and yet at the same time realized I keep under-estimating one important fact. Till the time we go back to India, they are Third Culture Kids and they face challenges which we find difficult to identify with. The moment they are asked a question simple enough to us,"Where do you come from?" their challenge starts!
First time parents
A dear friend became first-time mother last Thursday. After I visited, and held the baby it took me back to the days of Arunav. It is interesting that it is always the first-born that comes to mind. Because only with the first born is that uncertainty, the stress of not being in control in spite of all your best efforts, the desperation to get it right, to perfect it and that occasional wish "these tiny little things should come with User Manual"(quoted from a friend) :)
She was such a cute little bundle moving her arms, making a fist, crying her lungs out when hungry - life so simple, so beautiful. I wondered why my eyes watered as I watched the nurse station - watching life evolving and forming is always a touching experience.
5 years of this blog
I was casually browsing back on my posts when I realized it has been 5 years since I started this blog - yippee, I am happy I have kept it going :)
10 years
We celebrated 10 years of our marriage. I am so happy that some things really grow better with time. "Drink life to the lees" : our anniversary was the most memorable time we have ever spent together.
Flash back
Tonight we step back and revisit the past.
The moments are they still lingering around
or has time flown them away...where our reach cannot reach
Is there a familiar scent still holding on to the times
or have the fresh flowers engulfed one and all.
I step back and see.....yet I am afraid -
to spoil the beauty that my memory holds
Will the light of reality shine too harshly on my eyes ?
But my heart is hopeful, the light will be soft and mellow
and the times will be beautiful, forever and forever.
School admissions
I hate these times for what it does to the parents. Thanks to so many lovely parents, a big majority of the children are quite oblivious of the pressure - it is the plight of parents which make my heart ache.
It is difficult for parents not to take the performance of the child as a statement of their capability. Logical or no, they always will. Mentally the parent is so involved with the identity of the child that the two becomes intermingled. That day, that hour will the child agree to go in the interview room or will (s)he cry or feel too nervous to do anything? Who knows and who can control?
