Love at best

Two things that will stay in my mind this weekend and possibly stay there for some time...

Even if they don't, we have this blog to remind us, don't we?

First conversation:

We were busy at home Saturday in the living room

Jr. Screaming from bathroom : Daaaaaaaaaaaaaady! Done!
Me : You said you were going pee-pee!
Jr.: It is pee-pee!
Me : So why do you need me? Wipe yourself!
Jr.: (more yelling).. Daaaaadddy, come daaaaady!

Sometimes she surprises me by saying pee-pee and does more than pee-pee!) Must be that, I say to myself. Go there and see it is only #1, do the wiping anyways.

Me : You went only pee-pee. So why are you calling me? Don't you know we are busy?
Jr.: I love you daddy. That is why I want you to do everything for me!
Me : !!!!!!!!!!!

Earlier tonight the little one was sniffling. I knew San was going to apply Vicks Vaporub on the little one.

Little one came running to me after some time when she heard my sneeze.

LO : Daddy, I want to put vicks!
Me : Didn't mom put vicks on you?
LO : No, daddy, I want to put vicks for you!
Me : (seeing that she has some vicks on her finger) Okay!
LO : Rubs the vicks on my nose and says "I love you!"
Me : (Worried that she has left the vicks bottle open, yell out to San in the other room) Did you give her the vicks?
San: No, I already rubbed the vicks on her and the bottle is up on the shelf!
Me : (to LO) Kanna (darling), where did you get that vicks from?
LO : From MY nose, daddy!
Me : !!!!!!!!!!

For a second, didn't not know what to say. Then saw her long face when she realized that I was probably upset. So I quickly gave her a big hug and kiss. It was not the right time to have the "Don't share the vicks from your nose!" conversation.

My kids definitely have their own way of showing their love!

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A view of the future

If trying on grown up undergarments is bad, it gets worse...

(the secret video.. shows a door for almost a minute, but that is what secret video's are all about. Listen to the soundtrack for hilarious dialogues)

All this reference to babies has to do with peer pressure. Let me explain. Everytime, one of her classmates announces a baby brother or sister, or we go to see newborn babies of office colleagues, there is peer pressure on the real mommy in the house!

Typical conversation in the last few weeks:

Jr. : Mommy, can I have a baby?
Mom : No. when you grow up and become a big girl, maybe.
Jr. : When I am 10 years old?
Mom : aaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrghhh!

Jr. : Mommy, when is your tummy going to get big?
Mom : Not unless I eat a lot and put on weight..
Jr. : When will there be a baby in the tummy?
Mom : !! What part of No don't you understand?
Jr. : But, Mrs. xyz (a teacher in her school) is having a baby! and she already has kids..
Mom : Enakku maamiyaare vendam di, nee podum!(I dont need a mother in law here. You are enough to drive me up a wall!)

Add to these, the embrassasment of Jr. asking any women we know "do you have a baby in your tummy?" and they feel like strangling her! I bet this alone keeps the women who have recently put on some weight from visiting hour house!

In a fit of what can only be called 50% rage and 50% exasperation, mommy was heard cursing the little one yesterday.

Here is as close a literal translation as possible:

"I am cursing from the bottom of my heart, that you also have kids, who are exactly like you, and they trouble you, just like you trouble me! Only then you will know what I am going through now!"

On further investigation, found out that this curse runs in San's family and generation after generation, the moms curse their girls along these lines and the grandmoms smile, knowing that their curse came true!

Who knew?!

In any event, it is too late now. The curse has been passed on to one more generation.

ps. The MIL driving one up the wall reference, is more of a cultural thing. San gets along real swell with my mum.

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Black Body Radiation

Still do not understand the Physics behind why a five year old wants to grow up so fast and try on her mom's bra. Now the two year old is doing the same thing, by following her sister!

Everytime we fold laundry, both the kids jump all over the pile of clothes, run away with a few items (usually daddy's or mommy's) and amuse us in oversized clothes or underpants!

It is fun to watch the way they get the clothes all wrong, so we do not stop them..

ps. For some reason the Bra is referred to as "body" in South India.. Found the origin.. The word "Bodice", which was the word used by the British for a corsette, over time in India, became body!

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A time and place for everything

7:30 AM Friday Morning

Daddy and Mommy are in the kitchen, striping off their clothes like there is no tomorrow!

Daddy curls up all the clothes on the floor, into a big ball and throws it in one corner.

Mommy bends down to reach something on the floor and dad gives mom a quick glance. They make eye contact. Dad, who is very good at reading moms eyes, realizes instantly that he has forgotten something....

Still in his underwear, he rushes back to the cabinet and quickly grabs a...

CUT... CUT.. CUT..

He rushes back to the cabinet and quickly grabs a .....kid that has just finished throwing up all over daddy and mommy, from the kitchen countertop!!

Yep. Truth is so far from fiction. Even the present is so far from the past!

Flashback to three days ago!

The little one decided to taste the pacifier from a sick baby in her daycare and came home with a stomach bug. As is customary, she will only ask for Daddy when she feels insecure. That means sleeping on daddy's shoulder all through the night, including when she is throwing up.

Lets just say, we ran out of sheets to replace. Now daddy is sick as well, thanks to taking four baths a day, no sleep, laundry chores at 1AM, 3AM, 5AM, 7AM. That means mommy is under extra pressure as the only healthy person in the house and Jr. is moping because she cannot come near her sister or daddy! The whole house has a gloomy feel to it at times.

Now back to that scene in the morning! Daddy did a fantastic save in the living room that would have made Jonty Rhodes proud! In one smooth motion, he swooped down the little one, who had just given her warning cough, grabbed her and raced to the kitchen. His clothes were gone, but he managed to save the living room carpet!!

He screamed for reinforcement and mommy showed up to clean the baby. She did not know that the little one had more in store for her, than she had for daddy and was in trouble as well.

===== We interrupt this post for an short break =====

As irony would have it, Daddy was about to write, "well the little one has stopped throwing up since evening and daddy might get some sleep after all" when she did the warning cough again!

A fumble by daddy this time, who in the process of extricating the kid from the bunk bed, bumped her head pretty badly. Daddy did not stand a chance. Deciding that cloth is easier to clean than hardwood, he opted for, yet another midnight laundry session.

Ladies and gentlemen, the saga continues.....

Someday, I will write a book about "Dealing with stomach flu. What the doctors don't tell you, your parents don't teach you, and your kids won't care if you do not know!"

For now, I am going back to bed for a precious few hours so we can get ready for the 3AM show!

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To have or not to have Pongal ?

Pongal is a festival that gives us a chance to thank the Sun for shining down on us and giving us food to eat!

2006 was great!

2007 Pongal was spent in Bombay with the in-laws (We had just reached, and were starting to go out)!

2008 brings us some questions. My aunt passed away a few weeks ago in India. My dad, who is the only sibling left of what was a dozen kids, could not even go to the funeral as he is tending to my recently operated mom in a city that is alien to him! I know that he shed a silent tear or two and moved on because of his current circumstance. That said, my mum told me over the phone that this year, there is no Pongal for us!

I do not know if this is a custom restricted to Indians? south Indians? Hindus? Brahmins? a sub set of Brahmins? etc. etc.

It is possible to understand the sense in the one year mourning(yes, it is a no festival celebrations rule, till the anniversary of the death), to remember the person who passed on. It might make that person's soul happy, when they are looking down and they see their family is toning it down when the rest of the townspeople are painting the town red, but no one can actually verify this.

The thing that gets me is that this is very hard on the kids. Many a year, as a kid, when my parents would declare no Deepavali due to the death of some older relative we have hardly met, we would actually curse that relative! If kids are closer to god and we were actually cursing the dead relative, the parents were doing more harm than good by not celebrating! They could have cut down the prayer and given the kids the sweets and fire crackers.

However, I do have to add that when two of my uncles (dad's brothers) passed away within a three day period, I really did not feel like celebrating anything for a long long time... I was also not a kid anymore! That was 1993 and those two back to back events left my dad and his elder sister the only two left out of a 12 pack!

On the one hand, I am torn by what my dad is going through. None of his generation is left. He might be feeling lonely for all I know. I do feel that my aunt (who I knew) could be remembered by a toned down pongal!

Not fair to Jr. and the Little One though. They do not know my seventy year old aunt. Jr. spent 10 minutes with her three years ago, and the litte one has never seen my aunt!.

I have decided that there will be no prayer, but there WILL be Pongal for the kids to eat. Planning to make the Pongal myself, with a silent prayer for my aunts soul to rest in peace.

In the event I do not make the Pongal, we know at least two local Indian restaurants that will have free Pongal! for all who eat there...

Here is my grandmother's recipe, in case you are interested in trying...

1. Take 3/4 cup rice+ 1/4 cup moong dal + a few spoons of channa dal, roast in pan in low heat to make them dry. Then, put in pressure cooker, add two cups water, one cup milk, cook partially (let your cooker whistle once if it normally whistles thrice) and set aside.

2. roast cashewnuts, raisins, cardamom seeds in ghee (clarified butter) and set aside

3. soak some saffron in a few spoons of water and set aside

4. In a big vessel, add 1 cup jaggery (or 1 cup of molasses liquid, if you are in a place like Troy, New York and Jaggery is not available! works the same) and 1 1/2 cups of water. Stir till the consistancy of the liquid is such that when you take it on a ladle and drop the liquid back into the vessel, the liquid does not break or spatter. Remember the ad's you see on TV where the cough syrup smoothly coats the inside of your throat? That consistant!

5. At this point, add the contents from the rice cooker to the sugar syrup and start stirring. Add some more Ghee and the saffron water and keep stirring. When the ghee starts to segregate, add the roasted Cashews etc.

6. Finally, sprinkle some pachai kalpooram into the pot (literal translation is green camphor. don't know where this is available in the USA. we have a small box, which I got from India in 1998!) and give it a final whirl.

You are now ready to taste something that is downright Divine!

To all those out there celebrating, Happy Pongal!

"Iniya pongal nal-vazhthukkal!"

May your year be as sweet as the Pongal you make!

A footnote: it is spelled pachai and not pachchai!! Here is the Wiki Link to the edible camphor! Got to go find out if this tree is available in the US! and plant one in the backyard right away...
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