Suddenly he looks up and says, “Dad, this Hercule Poirot reminds me of you” 

Huh? “Why?” 

“Because, just like you, whenever Hastings tells him something cool, he responds with something else that’s much cooler, but also much older.” 

Me: “Hahaha” 

Meeta gave me a look: “You’re laughing as if that’s a compliment.” 

abu: mamma, some people are so mean … you know when the Peshawar attacks happened, a boy in my school said, “moral of the story is don’t go to school”

i caught myself masking the irony of feeling satisfied because abu didn’t find that funny…

rabad: … as if that is even a story …

~ ~ ~

as i wonder about the kids’ view of society and its sensitivity or lack thereof, i find myself hoping that the boy in school had read this on WhatsApp forward and it wasn’t his original line.

i wonder if anecdotes like these will spread through forwards in place of the rape/murder/objectification/etc jokes…

I was once told by one of our relatives that I was being selfish by going with what I wanted instead of what was good for my kids (who I hadn’t even conceived, yet!)

Abu was hanging around. We didn’t even know he was listening and he in what is now becoming typical-Abu style,

wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. so, pappa and you decided that you didn’t want to have kids in the US … AND … you were being selfish?!

We all laughed out loud and Abu and I high-fived!

In that instant, I was so proud that he noticed the subtlety and was so sensitive; proud that he could spot the unfairness in a passing remark as a passer-by.

“The kids of this generation have very boring mothers and fun grandmothers. Kids of the next generation will have very boring grandmothers and very fun mothers.”

Touché.

“You cannot trust anyone.”

After a pause, “except yourself.”

After a longer pause, “and your family.”

I smiled a smile of relief and added, “and friends.”

he- “naah”

me – “no?”

he – “not really. until you find out they are telling the truth, then you can trust them.”

me  *pretty much stumped* – “hmmm”

~ ~ ~

This morning, while taking them to the school bus-stop, rabad’s friend T from the building, hopped into the car. After the two-minute ride, abu says –

“Mom, did you realise, I was the only male in that car.”

me, a little amused – “oh yeah.”

As an afterthought, I asked jokingly, “Why that thought? Does that make you uncomfortable?”

he – “yeah”

me, the obvious “Why?”

he – “I don’t know, just like that.”

me – “But it’s ok na, it’s your mom, your sister and your friend.”

he – “She is NOT my friend.”

me – “ok, ok. You really take the word ‘friend’ very seriously, don’t you? It is very important to you?”*

he – ‘Friend’ is a strong word.

Bus arrived, kids left. I am left stumped once again.

Digression – Must admit I felt a secret sense of pride here. I remember treating the word “friend” with a touch of preciousness too. Have no clue, what it is about being a parent that makes you proud when you see your child behave like you – even if they are not necessarily all that positive. Anyway, different topic, different post. *sigh* – end of digression.

Of course, a teeny-weeny voice inside says, this is nothing to worry about. I don’t need to bring up the label ‘trust issues’. Maybe I should also be slightly worried about him thinking of the situation in a gender-specific way.

But, largely, I wonder, what life experience of this 11-year old leads him to such well-defined thoughts/opinions, cynical as they might be. If I am to give him his space, and make his own deductions and mistakes, I will never know. Oh well…

Maybe, I’ll ask once. Just once, I promise. ;D

In a similar vein, not consciously, but it just so happens that we don’t listen to anything that is vulgar/not appropriate at home. Imagine my surprise when abu, one day, is singing “bhaag, bhaag, d k bose, d k bose, d k bose, bhaag d k bose” (will be translated soon enough in this anecdote). He was singing it so well, with complete lyrics. That “don’t know whether to laugh or to cry” moment because except for that one play on words, the song is pretty cool. And the other kids in the house were laughing their hearts out while asking for an encore whenever abu went “abhi aaayi yaaaa” (listen to clip below to see what I mean).

And this had become one of those routines for about 4-5 days. I couldn’t say don’t sing this song, lest I’d have to explain why. I didn’t want to bring in extra attention to something not worthy of it either. But ha-ha! If only parenting were so rosy to let it slide. The time came.

abu – mamma, A was saying that ‘bhaag bhaag’ is a bad song. D K Bose is a bad word. No na, mamma? It’s just a guy or girl’s name, right?

me (gulp, think, gulp, think, gulp) – well…yes…it is a name…

(gaining better control) see like when you say “ram, ram, ram, ram” too many times, it sounds like “mara, mara, mara, mara, mara” (Who knew this common silly, joke-type thingy would come in handy as a parenting tool!?) similarly, when you say “D K Bose” together too often it becomes a word which has a very bad meaning. So bad that even adults shouldn’t really be saying it. (I wanted to add, “come to think of it,  I don’t think I know why it is bad”, but let that be.)

abu – ok

me … (*phew* that was easy) … I left the room, only to think the song ain’t that bad and the way he sang it, lyrics and all, it was worth encouraging. Here’s hoping I haven’t caused any serious damage to my 9-year-old’s developing brain/IQ/EQ/whatever…

Meanwhile, for your listening pleasure – abu’s version of ‘bhaag bhaag’

I was sitting at my computer, and suddenly, without any warning or context, the following facebook chat message from Mr. X to me popped up:

why dont u die
we dont want you here
nobody
just go

Now Mr. X is a pretty sober, and mature, Pune entrepreneur, so I instantly realized something was wrong. Assuming that his Facebook account had gotten hacked, I sent him SMS, and the following exchange ensued:

Navin to Mr. X: Did your facebook account get hacked?

Mr. X to Navin: No why?

Navin to Mr. X: Chat message you are sending me right now: why dont u die. we dont want you here. nobody. just go.

Mr. X to Navin: Jeez that was for my friend sorry haha

And on Facebook he typed:

Arre sorry
Wrong window

Abu walked past my computer when all of this was happening, and he saw the first facebook chat message from Mr. X to me.

Abu: Did somebody write that to you on Facebook?

Navin: Yes, Abu

Abu (with frown lines on his forehead): But why would somebody tell you “why dont u die.”? You are the best dad in the world.

Thank you, Mr. X, for creating this opportunity!

• Why did God make mothers?
  • [Abu]: Because if mother didn’t exist, you didn’t exist
  • [Rabad]: Because there has to be one person who scolds us every time, otherwise we will not learn
• How did God make mother?
  • [Abu]: Because he is God
  • [Rabad]: There was one more mother who made the other mother
• What kind of a little girl was your Mom?
  • [Abu]: I don’t know. But I guess she was normal. She liked books.
  • [Rabad]: Very sad girl, because if she did one mistake her mother used to hit her.
• What did Mom need to know about dad before she married him?
  • [Abu]: His last name, so that she knows whether her new name sounds alright.
  • [Rabad]: Did he go to college, because some people stop after 10^th and they don’t have any knowledge
• Who is the boss at your house?
  • [Abu]: Dad. Because Mamma calls him ‘Suno,’ and no one calls him by his name in the house
  • [Rabad]: No one. Because no one acts like a boss.
• What’s the difference between moms and dads?
  • [Abu]: Moms are usually kind, and Dads are usually strict.
  • [Rabad]: Mom is really strict, and Dad is really kind.
• What does mom usually do in her spare time?
  • [Abu]: Talks with me
  • [Rabad]: Sits with me
• What would it take to make your mom perfect?
  • [Abu]: Nothing. She’s already perfect
  • [Rabad]: If she gives me a lovely gift

Rabad saw this and insisted that she also wanted to learn how to use the online stopwatch. So I taught her how to go to Online-Stopwatch.com, how to start the countdown timer and so on. That made her happy and she started exploring the features of the website.

Just as I had finished explaining to her, meetu came in the room, and we started discussing some work stuff (related to wogma). Rabad continued playing with the stopwatch while we had our discussion.

After the discussion, I left the room, and Rabad followed me out.

“Daddy,” she asked, “Do you know what I was doing with the stopwatch?”

“No.”

“I was counting how much time you and Mamma talk,” she announced, with what did look like an evil grin.

“Huh?”

“I was counting how much time you get to talk to each other and how much time you spend with each other. So now whenever you or Mamma complain that children don’t allow you to spend time with each other, I will bring the computer and show you how much time you spend with each other.”

So now there are high-tech weapons deployed against us. It’s a losing battle.

me – huh? why? (wondering if she noticed my schoolgirl crush. or if she had one for him)

rabad – then he’d ask “when is your birthday?” and then…

ever since abu and rabad understood what birthdays are, they’ve been told, “see, abu’s birthday is on the 22nd of April, rabad’s is on 23rd, Sachin’s is on 24th and N’s (abu-rabad’s first cousin) is on 25th.”

I think rabad feels bad that Sachin doesn’t know such a cool thing.