Saturday, March 13, 2010

Things Peanut Says

Thought I'd just list a few:

* 'Mama, you cheeks soft like a bay-bee.
...and You got be-yootifool pimples'.

Yes, one of the various side effects of impending re-maternity is a return of the acne. In the form of a few bright spots on either of my cheeks - which show no hope of getting better since Peanut enjoys pawing them with her grubby paws while snuggling up to me. Oh yes, and once she broke into 'Pimples...pimples...' to the tune of 'Fimbles...Fimbles' on Ceebeebies.

* 'No, Mama, you no gorjus. Baby gorjus!'

We're kind of vain when we're dressing up in the morning for school and office. We like to look in the mirror when we're ready and admire ourselves and fight about who's more gorjus.

* 'Mama...you are so very nangu!'

Err...kind of stating the obvious when we're having a bath.

* 'Daddy, aapi-aapi karo'

Said very matter-of-factly when Vijay is pretending to be helpless and trying to get her to feed him some fruit.

*' Nappy aaya...Poo-poo pehna do'

We're trying with the potty training and keep her out of her nappy most times, but she insists on wearing it for pooping. She of course means 'Poopoo aaya, nappy pehna do' but is under a bit of stress at such times so mixes it up.

* 'My baby sister in my tummy...and he gonna come ouuut!'

Umm...Yeah. I'm glad we explained the concept of your baby brother/sister Pickle just right. Well done, Vijay and Y.

Friday, February 12, 2010

Y Gets Old

30 years old. Sigh, Cry, Moan and Groan.

There, I said it. I'm finally old. It no longer matters that I'm a 'Child of the 80's' as some of my friends born in '79 refer to me. It's all downhill from here, my friends.

This was a rather unusual birthday, though. Thanks to my loving family and friends, who I think were mindful of the fact that I might get a bit depressed thinking about the fact that I'm now at the half-way mark. Mid-life, you might say.

Anyway, so Vijay got Peanut to sit with him for an hour and coaxed and cajoled her into singing 'Happy Birthday Mama' - it was really sweet. He played it at midnight for me. It began with a slightly freaky shout though. I think he had asked her to say it so many times that she got frustrated and screamed 'Hippy Burday Mamaaaaa' - he then looped it five times, but not before adding an echo to it. Then the song began, and it was heartbreakingly cute. If I could figure out a way to upload it, I would.

Then, in the morning, Peanut and I woke up really early and found that Vijay was already up. He insisted that we go for a walk together. I thought it was a good idea but didn't quite get the hurry. I asked him if it was okay if I went to the bathroom first. While I was in there, I noticed an SMS on my phone. I picked it up and it said 'God, she takes a long time in the loo. Bet she's reading a fat novel'. I looked down guiltily at my fat novel - Jeffrey Archer's 36 - and got out quickly to ask him what the hell he was up to and who that SMS was meant for. He looked a bit stricken and then quickly recovered to tell me that it was my sister, who wanted to know the plan for the day.

We stepped out for a walk, and I was in a contemplative mood. I was chatting with him as we took a few rounds of the park, and then he suggested that we go back. I said I wanted to meditate, as it was my resolution to take better care of myself in a more wholesome manner now that I was so old. He reluctantly agreed and after about 3 minutes of deep breathing, he broke into my reverie and said 'Let's go'. I had been thinking in the last 3 minutes about how I needed to make some changes and become a better person for the remaining half of my life and started to discuss it in earnest with him, the biggest being how I wished to become a kinder person and stop getting annoyed by the little things. He made a pretence of listening to me for a while and then abruptly stood up saying 'Ya ya, let's go back now'.

By this time, I was really annoyed with him and sulkily got up and followed him. In a bit, he realized I wasn't happy and immediately tried to make up for it 'Oh, yes, meditation will help you be a kinder person - I have something on my Ipod, 17 minutes of Loving Kindness, it will help you, I will lend it to you', he blathered on. I ignored him. He tried another card 'Just now, you said that you wished you didn't get annoyed at little things. Isn't this a little thing?' He beseeched me. We'd reached home and I didn't bother to answer him. I opened the door and went in, and to my shock, my sister leaped out towards me from the right - the shoe closet-type room we have there, with a 'Happy Birthday'!

I had just about recovered, managing a mild 'Oh-aah. Thanks', when there was a flash of blinding light from right in front of me, and the phenomena responsible for the same was my very own mother who materialized from one of the rooms where she had been hiding, holding a video camera to capture my stunned reaction. Scarcely had I got over this when my sister's friend A popped out from Far Left, from behind a sofa, with a digital camera that caught my open mouthed reaction. I think my exact words were 'Aa' and 'Gaa', respectively.

They then pointed out the breakfast table which had been set for me in my absence - with a sumptious breakfast of saugages, eggs, pancakes and maple syrup, brown bread - and of course, there was a dabba of alu-paranthas exclusively for Vijay. We dug in, but not before they made me open my presents, which consisted of about 18 sweaters. Very nice, they were too, and I was only sorry my birthday comes at the end of winter( and subsequently pretty happy about the continued cold-ish wave).

My sister informed me that they had been waiting in the car downstairs and then up in the house for about an hour, a consequence of my unusually early rising, Vijay's phone being unreachable, his failed attempt to get me out of the house on time, and his failed attempt to get me back into the house on time. Peanut had been excessively amused and delighted at the fact that the three of them scrambled to hide everytime a sound floated in from outside the house.

Frankly, I was really surprised. The evening surprise parties that have been a fixture for every birthday in our home for the last few years have surprisingly, ceased to surprise, although they continue to delight. This was really unexpected.

And the effort it took on the part of my mother and sister, who are not exactly early risers ( and presumably Friend A is not either) , to get up at about 6.30 a.m. and come over all the way, wait in the car, mystify the driver by saying 'Don't go near the house' when he decided to get out to stretch his legs a bit and generally make all the fuss, did a lot to make me feel loved.

(My sister also said that my mother's first reaction after they woke up was to look at her witheringly and remark 'What a dumb idea'. Shows how much effort it took, eh?)

Of course, there was the party in the evening at the club, to which I discovered Vijay had forgotten to invite some of my best friends ( I rectified this, embarassed) , but which turned out to be a roaring success primarily due to Vani's purchase of a White Board on which we all played Pictionary ( in two opposing teams - the silver hats and the pink hats) - and then a little dancing, the highlight of which was Peanut dancing with great skill to 'Ibn-e-Batuta'. Very cute. I also noticed that Vijay, my sister and A had done up the place with Balloons and Streamers, as if I was about six.

All in all, it was a fantastic birthday, and hard to remember that I was 30, and not 6. More importantly, I think I have the most amazing family and close friends ever possible.

Not bad, for the half way mark.

P.S - I guess I might as well tell you now. When I blogged earlier, I never really mentioned being an expectant mother and one day there was a post 'Oh guess what, I gave birth earlier today, here's a picture of the new baby'. Well, anyway, Peanut will be joined by Pickle, sometime in the next few months. But let's not make a big deal about it, shall we?

Friday, January 22, 2010

Music on a Wintry Evening...

Yes, it's a bit late to write about it but ah wuz they-ah - at the Kailash Kher and Rahat Fateh Ali Khan concert. And I thought it was pretty darn great.

We were in the (ahem) VIP area, which extended to about a mile from the stage. About half a mile away, were my husband and I and the mother and the mother's sister, otherwise known as the masi. Anyway, it was crowded but it was beautiful (Purana Qila - had never been inside before) - and despite the cold weather, it all warmed up pretty soon and was thoroughly enjoyable.

I thought Kailash Kher was a really great performer, sang really well and had loads of energy. The best part was watching him gel with his band, who had a really cute guitarist ( the minute I mentioned this Vijay took a dislike to him - although let's face it, I had to slip on my spectacles to make out Kailash's form, so I could be pretty wrong about the cuteness of the guitarist). But the band was really talented and they looked they were having so much fun!

Kailash kept making these comments during the performance, and he made a lot of fun of those of us in the VIP area 'these VIP types are too cool to get up and cheer, etc'. I looked around me and had to agree, they were a pretty stuffy lot and kind of old. Not my mom and masi, huh! The others, the others!

Anyway, so he also made this comment at one point about Aman Ki Asha being a very noble 'cose' and a distinct and unkind murmur of mostly female laughter went up at his pronunciation. But I thought he was really sweet.

After a few songs, he made way for Rahat and I was very surprised to hear how incredibly beautiful and melodious the latter's voice sounded - he isn't quite the performer that Kailash is, but the voice, the voice. Really, truly amazing.

But to my disappointment, he ended up singing mostly songs that I knew rather than some nice Pakistani numbers - I didn't even know before this how many Bollywood movies he's sung for. Given the context of the whole concert ( Indo-Pak peace), one was hoping for a little bit of Pakistan in the whole performance but after the first couple of numbers and I think one Dumadum Mast Qualandar type, there really wasn't much. He even sang that song from Singh is King that Peanut likes (Teri Ore), and it really wasn't that hot. But the voice!

Towards the end, he invited Kailash on stage for the only song they song together - Piya re, I think. Was nice, but yeah...nice. By this time, I had abandoned my VIP status and pushed to the front, pulled up a chair in imitation of a gutsy north-eastern girl and jumped on top of it to clap along, with my husband behind me waiting to catch me when the inevitable fall came.

So...fun. Should do this more often. Were you there, too?

Saturday, January 2, 2010

Happy New Year, 3 Idiots!

...and the above title is not meant as an insult.

Happy New Year to everybody! All da best, ji.

Moving swiftly, along - we actually went for a movie in a hall - an unheard of thing for me and Vijay since Peanut came along.

A colleague of mine remarked how for some reason, almost everyone he knows who has gone for the movie, ended up going in groups of three. I scoffed, as is my wont, until I realized that the same was true for my mother-sister-friend trio who had gone the previous day. I was filled with wonder when my sister-in-law-brother-in-law-neice-in-law also ended up going together. And what was even more surprising was when we finally decided to bung Peanut in the car and take her along with us - her first movie in the hall ever at the tender age of 2 years 5 months.

So about the groups of three thing - coincidence? Or some kind of mass-hypnotization-collective-subconscious thing? You be the judge.

Anyway, about the movie. Now, Peanut is an avid TV watcher and we told her we were going to show her a BEEG TEEVEE. She was fine with the basic idea and being as cute as she is, she was eventually allowed by the security guards to carry her little Nirula's ice-cream cup inside the hall, so was okay for about the first three minutes. Then she realized it was kind of dark, loud and people on the screen were around thirty times her size. She panicked and started insisting - 'Ghar jaana hai' and wailing. I was immediately embarassed and started to get ready to bundle her out but Vijay was determined to watch this particular movie ( I walked out of Kaminey because it was 'disturbingly violent' on the rare occasion that we went for a film together). He asked me to sit back and relax, took Peanut from me and started to 'explain the story to her'. Miraculously, it worked and after some coaxing, Peanut agreed to resume her ice-cream eating and watch with wide eyes what was going on.

And so it went. There were occasions in the middle when she got bored, and wanted to leave, and very manipulatively told me 'Mama poo-poo kiya, saaf kar do', which turned out to be a blatant lie. Thankfully at interval, there was a big bag of Popcorn which gave us a fresh new lease of life.

So basically it turned out fine. And we all went back home fairly happy. Vijay really liked the movie, Peanut liked the songs, and I kind of liked seeing parts of my old campus again, although it was a bit weird seeing those hallowed halls used as a movie set, but hey. Also, while I usually dislike Aamir with a strange inexplicable intensity, I thought he was actually okay in the movie. And the best part was, I really didn't remember the book being anything like it - in fact, I had only agreed to go because my sister said it was funny and a review said it was not anything like 5 point someone.

And yesterday, it was very amusing to hear about my baby's conversation with my sister.

She looked up at her and said 'Maasi - BEEG TEE VEE - All eez well!'

My sister immediately looked at me and said 'You took her for 3 idiots in the hall?'

Now, that's communication.

Saturday, December 26, 2009

Assorted...

First of all, many thanks to you, kind Phoenix. It worked, the image verification thing. No more spammy comments. Yayyy!

And now, some simple notes:

* My husband is taking some time off from work and using it productively to teach Peanut many new things. Such as:

- (On Christmas Day) So Peanut...do you know where Santa lives?
I am very impressed that he is teaching her about festivals - a little cultural background is being constructed.
He continues: He lives in LUDHIANA...Ha ha ha...Santa Singh, right? Ha ha ha ha ...
( Is joined in his cackling laughter by little Peanut, who covers her face, and laughs along, even slaps her knee as if it's the best joke in the world. Little pretender. Encouraging him, for no reason).

- He's taught her all sorts of phrases - including 'Arrey Yaar', which he thinks is very cute ( I don't agree); and some weird dances too ( Hum tum jeet gaye, dushman haar gaye - wherein they both hop around in a circle like a pair of monkeys).

Peanut gets her own back, occasionally -

- She pretends to have food in her mouth long after it's disappeared, and mumbles 'Mu mein hai'. Flummoxing the father, and delaying his attempts to get food into her. On the other hand, when she's eating something he likes, like Makhana and he asks for it, she peers into his face and announces Aapke Mu Mein Hai, and continues to stuff her own face and chomp away.

- She likes to do everything herself, that is, Aapi Aapi. And when Vijay is trying to distract her from watching Ceebeebies by getting her interested in her jigsaw puzzles, and says Hey Peanut, let's do this! Her response is 'Dada, aapi aapi karo', after which she turns away from a sputtering Vijay and goes right back to the telly.

And me? In all this, I am being sidelined as he spends all his time with her filling her ears against me. In the mornings, I am summarily told 'Mama offish jao, jaldi jaldi'.

Good work, Vijay.

Saturday, December 12, 2009

I have just two questions...

1. Have you also been getting these spammy comments all over the place on your blog? I am so glad I enabled comment moderation, but they are annoying. Any clue how to stop them?

2. What makes you think the onus is always on ME to amuse YOU whenever you come around here? I am particularly bored and annoyed today and I DEMAND that you tell me a joke or some other amusing anecdote right NOW.

Humph. It's a selfish world.

Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Spontaneously wonderful

Vijay: Peanut, Mama ka nose kahan hai?
Peanut: YE raha! ( smacking me on the nose)
Vijay: Aur Mama ke eyes kahan hai?
Peanut: YE aaijj! ( poking me in the eye)
Vijay: Aur Mama ka head?
Peanut: YE Head! ( bonking me on top of the head)
Vijay: ...aur Mama ka dimaag kahan hai?
Peanut (taken aback by this unfamiliar term, but recovers quickly) Chidiya le gayi!

Needless to say, there has much mirth and repetition of this little interaction - whenever Vijay finds a new audience.

But I'll get my own back.

Sigh.