When
Angel was not completely settled in her day care, J* sometimes used to give her
a toy right at the time of dropping her so that her mind is drifted from the
separation. So once while J* did this, her teacher remarked “You have been to
IKEA again”.When J* narrated this to me, I asked what does she mean by 'again'
(meaning how does she know that we have been there twice) and Angel comes to my
rescue and tells me “Mamma, again matlab phir se”
She sure is picking up a lot of Engilsh, accented at that!
***********
I had to travel to another branch of my office due to some technical issues in my regular branch and I was telling Angel about it. And here is our conversation:
Angel: Is that office far mamma?
Me: Yes baby, its even farther then my regular office (I have a long commute to my office)
Angel: Oh, then you will be so tired mamma, you find a garden on your way and sleep under a tree. And when you get up remove the leaves that will be stuck in your hair (it was autumn then) so wash your hair once you are back.
Me: That’s a good plan
Angel: Mamma, also beware for monkeys on the tree (She was definitely thinking of “nakalchi bandar”)
***********
The public library here is spoiling us. It’s such a delight to be able to borrow more books than you can read. It’s as if the books on the shelves wink at me and say “Me! Pick Me!”
Angel loves it too. In her own words: “Mamma, this library is so much better than Bangalore library as I can take more than one book”
I wish India had public libraries.
***********
She once came to me excitedly and said : Mama this toy is so cool!!
Hiding my surprise (since I had never used the word ‘cool’in that context with her), I asked : Cool matlab thanda? (Does cool mean cold?)
Angel: Nahi, cool matlab achha (No, cool means nice)
This is something she has picked at her day care, so now we have a lot of‘cool’ stuff around :)
***********
Angel loves pretend play and she can carry on with the stuffed toys for the whole day. She loves to talk to them, solve their problems (yes, they do have problems), hug and comfort them. She has names for all of them too.
I was overhearing one such session and she was instructing Ellie (the elephant) to hit bad children. I asked her if hitting is good. She immediately replied that "Spiderman hits others" (She is a huge fan of Spiderman – thanks to the merchandise)
I asked her how does she know as I have never watched Spiderman with her. She said that she had seen it on the TV while we were staying with our friends when we had just landed in Canada. This re-affirmed my belief of no-TV for her as long as I can. I then said that Spiderman doesn’t hit children and she confidently said that Spiderman hits bad people though. She then turned to Ellie and told her (yeah, the genders of the stuffed toys are decided too) to hit bad people.
This was one of the moments of contradiction – where we teach something to our children and they get some entirely opposite view of the same thing by watching their favorite characters – cartoons and people do that.
I then explained to her that it was just a movie and its all unreal and hitting is NOT an answer to any problem. I am not sure how much of the film making part of it she understood but she agreed to me nonetheless!
She sure is picking up a lot of Engilsh, accented at that!
***********
I had to travel to another branch of my office due to some technical issues in my regular branch and I was telling Angel about it. And here is our conversation:
Angel: Is that office far mamma?
Me: Yes baby, its even farther then my regular office (I have a long commute to my office)
Angel: Oh, then you will be so tired mamma, you find a garden on your way and sleep under a tree. And when you get up remove the leaves that will be stuck in your hair (it was autumn then) so wash your hair once you are back.
Me: That’s a good plan
Angel: Mamma, also beware for monkeys on the tree (She was definitely thinking of “nakalchi bandar”)
***********
The public library here is spoiling us. It’s such a delight to be able to borrow more books than you can read. It’s as if the books on the shelves wink at me and say “Me! Pick Me!”
Angel loves it too. In her own words: “Mamma, this library is so much better than Bangalore library as I can take more than one book”
I wish India had public libraries.
***********
She once came to me excitedly and said : Mama this toy is so cool!!
Hiding my surprise (since I had never used the word ‘cool’in that context with her), I asked : Cool matlab thanda? (Does cool mean cold?)
Angel: Nahi, cool matlab achha (No, cool means nice)
This is something she has picked at her day care, so now we have a lot of‘cool’ stuff around :)
***********
Angel loves pretend play and she can carry on with the stuffed toys for the whole day. She loves to talk to them, solve their problems (yes, they do have problems), hug and comfort them. She has names for all of them too.
I was overhearing one such session and she was instructing Ellie (the elephant) to hit bad children. I asked her if hitting is good. She immediately replied that "Spiderman hits others" (She is a huge fan of Spiderman – thanks to the merchandise)
I asked her how does she know as I have never watched Spiderman with her. She said that she had seen it on the TV while we were staying with our friends when we had just landed in Canada. This re-affirmed my belief of no-TV for her as long as I can. I then said that Spiderman doesn’t hit children and she confidently said that Spiderman hits bad people though. She then turned to Ellie and told her (yeah, the genders of the stuffed toys are decided too) to hit bad people.
This was one of the moments of contradiction – where we teach something to our children and they get some entirely opposite view of the same thing by watching their favorite characters – cartoons and people do that.
I then explained to her that it was just a movie and its all unreal and hitting is NOT an answer to any problem. I am not sure how much of the film making part of it she understood but she agreed to me nonetheless!
4 comments:
I am glad she understood. Not hitting someone is a difficult lesson to teach but I guess we have to keep on repeating as long as it's sets in their little minds.
I am so happy to hear that you are now settled and she is doing well too... Hope you guys enjoy reading more and more books.
Lobe to Ojas!!!
Children's world.. its so much fun..
Its really impressive that she got the nuances so well.. hitting only the bad..
Although hitting and not hitting is learnt only with time and age..
Shes so innocent with her questions and answers :) Would be so much fun to interact with them.. Keep writingg!!
@Manali : That's right! No wonder my mother still keeps on repeating the things unless she gets satisfied that I got it :P
@Ishani : Fun it is! At the same time, its also exhausting ;)
@Utsav : She is at a great age where curosity and exploration is at its peak. Our moving has just enhanced her inquisitiveness and its fun to see how she compares the things done here vs Inida :)
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