Never Mind

All these days, we had been telling Tiny that Little is her younger brother and she should not hurt him. We were advising her as to how she should play with him, share her toys etc. The only time when I saw sprouts of J factor in her was when I played or hugged or sang a few rhymes for Little. Tiny did not heed to the advice much, but i saw she was trying to be good little by little. I thought to myself that we as adults show sparks of jealousy in our little day things at times.
I returned from work one day and got to know that Tiny behaved very well the whole day, used her potty, had her food and milk (our toughest goal to achieve for the day),did write her ABCD's and did not hurt her brother. Wow i said Tiny needs a big hug and applause. I gave her one. I played with her not acknowledging the Little guy on his vibrating chair. He watched for a minute or two and then screamed alarmingly. I lifted the little guy and was wondering what made him scream that loud. He was happy and laughed at his mom as he got his job done. Ah, he needed attention....I then told Tiny, Never Mind... as the world stands on Survival of the Fittest from day one.

Tiny's Day Out

There are somethings which you would want to do and some which you know you are calling for trouble. But you still ought to do them. Same with my Tiny, she never budges. She likes to have fun her way her ishtyle. No matter what you say.
My parents were here with us to help us out with the second arrival. Little, our second one was just three months old. I decided to take my parents to downtown leaving Little & Tiny at daddy's day care. No not at all, Tiny gave a hard time and so had to take her along. She created a big ruckus all through our visit. Yes you got it, she made our trip memorable in a way. Thanks to the grand parents for coaxing her and getting her along, otherwise i was thinking i would leave her at Lake Michigan and return home. I am not a bad mom, but she loves the water......
We saw all that we could with a terrible two and a half year old. By the end of the day, my arms and legs were about to detach, when we boarded the train back home. As the wise say "Were it not for hope the heart would break", i had a little hope that she would sleep on the train. And lo my heart breaks, she does not sleep, but i was sleepy. She does not allow you to do that either. She starts a conversation with a lady behind us in our mother tongue. I knew both did not get each other and thus was a passive listener. The lady behind was eating her chips.
Tiny: You eating chips (in english)
Lady : Ya, Do you want some?
Tiny : No (in mother tongue)
Lady finishes her packet of chips...
Tiny turns to me and tries to yap off something. She turns back to the lady and says
"Wow you ate away all your chips???" (in mother tongue)
Good lord, we have been forcing her all day to eat and she does not react to it.

A proverb I love

I was in my second grade when i joined this convent. All of a sudden, i landed up in a different city, a new school, new uniform, new faces. Ah, reality struck me, my dad had got transferred to a new place. All were new for quite sometime, but they left permanent marks as memories life long. I enjoyed each little thing and this happened to be our school motto: "God helps those who helps themselves". Little did i understand the inner meaning of this proverb. But now i cherish it...I am ever grateful to God who gave me this wonderful experience in life.

Road To Heaven

After a slow day at work, i thought i should read the news to keep myself refreshed for the rest of the day and also to find out what is happening in my HOME SWEET HOME. To my surprise, I found an item with the title "Road to Heaven". Opened the page to read it. It talked about the not so good roads in metro city in India. They had pictures of the potholes and the number of accidents that would have taken place at that spot. I thought to myself, if one has complaints about roads like the one that i saw, they should as well come to my place. It is ROAD TO HEAVEN VIA THE HELL.

Naughty Natured like her dad

My daughter always loves to be out. She accompanies me where ever i go, be it the laundry. I saw a neighbour of mine in the laundry and greeted her. I was loading all the clothes to the washer in one part of the laundry room. My daughter ran to the neighbour and was talking to her. She kept on asking her what's your name etc.Believe me she can get irritating at times. Then my neighbour asked her, her name. She replied Divya, which is her name. I guess the neighbour did not hear her properly and thus said a Haaan. This little girl tells her Olivia. I wonder how she said that. Olivia was a friend of hers in school and she was the only girl Divya talked to at school.

Kids are best imitators

My daughter is 2 years 9 months almost. She is getting potty trained. I can say she is almost there but there are bad days when she just resists and goes back to her diaper. We try to scold her, coax her and tell her to use the potty. This morning i was changing my son's diaper. She comes to the room and yells at him
"Did I not tell you to use the potty? When will you learn?" I was awed. My son is going to be 4 months in couple of weeks.

Is this Professionalism?

It was a friday, returned back from work. My old schoolmate and a good friend had left me a voicemail. She sounded down. I quickly gave her a call to find out what was wrong.She was rejoiced when i called back. I guess she was pretty hurt and wanted to vent out her mind. She was saying that assume X and Y are 2 contractors working on the same project for almost a year. X goes on vacation for sometime and returns back to work. Within this span of time, the project shifts hands from one manager to the other. The new manager knows Y from the start and likes Y. X is on vacation and when he comes back has to prove himself to the new manager. X comes back and tries to make the manager feel high through his work. Manager sends X an email thinking he knows best about something. X forwards the email to Y just to make sure he understands right since he was on vacation for sometime and he might miss something. Y does not respond too well. So X instant messages the manager and clears out all the doubts. After making sure X comprises a detailed email response back to the manager. In the meantime, Y has compiled his email but not as detailed as X did. Before sending Y instant messages X asking whether he should email X and manager the reply. X replies that he already replied to the manager and that should be good. Inspite of this Y sends it to the manager and X. Now my friend's question is Should Y have done that? I was confused for a while, but i felt a little sympathy for my friend who was X. I told her this may not be professionalism but definitely cunning behaviour. Sometimes i feel, we do cheap things just to get a little name and fame. But all this does not last long as both were contractors and their project was getting over in a few days. Alas this is all in the game of work, where each person has to prove himself. So i could say both are not wrong, but it hurts a bit.

Tiny's First Few Words

Tiny is the pet name of my daughter. Why Tiny???? When she was born, she was just too little. I remember the gynecologist telling me:
"She is a little peanut. Can i put her back in??"
I replied :
No Not after all this pain!!!!
She never went through the crawling phase and started to walk and talk early in about 9-10 months.
I feel bad, I had to leave back to work when she was 3 months. Parents and inlaws were here to take care of her for a while. But then there came a day when she had to step out of the house and go to my neighbour who was a baby sitter. They did not speak the same language as us. The below was the translation list which was the interpreter between the two.
BABBA – Want to go out for a walk
UKKONU – Want to sit
ONU – I want it
VAANDA – Don’t want
SHAYA – Put it properly, it’s hurting or irritating
MUM MUM – Food
SHEAL – Cereal
THITHO – Water
APRU – And then
BIKI – Biscuit
CHINNI – Small
KAAI – Carrot/Beans
BATANI – Peas
ABBU – Got hurt/indication of arm’s scratching
AIYOYO – Oh! My goodness
SHIMMIM – Swimming
THATHA, PATI – Grandpa, Grandma
YENGE – Where, for e.g.
Appa yenge – Where is Daddy?
Amma yenge – Where is Mummy?
INGEY – Its here, for e.g.
Q) Doggie (the rocking toy) yenge?
A) She might point out -> Doggie ingey!

When you know nothing

It was my first few days in chicago. I came to this country in the December colds. Snow Snow everywhere. It had snowed almost 14 inches. The layers below had iced up on the pavements. Most of the roads were clear. Hubby had bought his new car and was a new driver too. With all enthusiasm, we wanted to go around. We were driving, after a short distance i just felt everything around me was turning round. It was the matter of a few seconds. The car stopped and i had a great time. We were traveling thru a less frequented route. I had little idea that the car skid on the icy road and took a 720 degree turn. Hubby was scared. Luckily there was no traffic on either sides and we were exactly at an intersection. Then i realised that when you know nothing, you really don't realise the seriousness of the issue. But the next couple of winters, when I had to drive to work, my imagination haunted me.

Editing One's Nature

Sometimes i feel i edit myself too often for no fault of mine. I wonder where i went wrong. I keep correcting myself every now and then. Am i always wrong or do i need to express things right???? I sometimes think we should stand up for what we think, but ya then you are called adamant!!! Should you go with the crowd, Oh then you are called Submissive!!! Well the confusion prevails. Well All i could say is Think Right, Stand up for oneself and respect thyself..