Of ABCs

A long time back i wrote this. The same friend is now mother to a year and some months old infant. Now considering that she got pregnant about 6 months after her newfound interest in books, she found herself reading up on pregnancy, what to expect and all that. Of course, since she bought her first pregnancy book in month 4, she skipped the first 3 chapters. Why read up what has already happened right?

Anyway, now that she is a responsible parent she is taking the buying of books very very seriously. And so picture books, nursery rhymes, story books and of course, alphabet books are being bought whenever possible. Now one would imagine the imparting of knowledge from picture books or alphabet books wouldn't be much of a challenge right? Wrong.

For starters, picture books are not what they used to be. So when she picked up a book on dogs, she expected cute stuff like cartoon dogs and lots of *bow wows*. Instead she gets a mini encyclopedia on the various breeds of dogs, most of which she can't even pronoune. So she decides to do the easy thing and tackle the english language. But apparently my friend is more than a little stumped when showing her boy letters of the alphabet. Why? Because ABCs arent what they used to be my friend. No siree.

No more does A say Apple, or C say Cat or F say Fish.

A says Ambulance.

C says Camera.

F says Fire Engine

The poor woman is having to relearn everything because when she says A and Apple in the same sentence, the poor kid is left looking at the photo on an ambulance.

Oh, and Z says something called Zeebu.

Yes. You read that right. Any wonder that the poor girl is baffled?

Pinky and the Fellow

Maybe the Fellow was trying to make up for bumping his best friend’s little girl on the rear-view mirror, or maybe he finally realised that children aren’t all that bad. Or maybe he slipped and hit his head in the bathroom in the morning. Either way, yesterday was a definite first for him – he actually bonded with a 3 yr old girl (lets call her Pinky after the pink tee she was wearing), and enjoyed himself!

Here’s how it happened. Sunday morning saw us going to the zoo, primarily because Pinky wanted to see the animals. Little did any of us anticipate how the Fellow would react when faced with fake alligator slides and an enclosure full of really massive Sambar deer! Lets just say that the locals were quite amused with fake-I-got-caught-in-the-alligators-mouth posing for the camera and some really out-of-tune rendition of Rudolph the red nosed reindeer! And all through this, Pinky was looking on with an expression of “aren’t I the kid here?”

Anyhoo, once back in the car, and on our way to the fort (we were being all touristy you see), the Fellow surprised us all – he started talking to the little one. Well, actually he started entertaining her with random stories about how a massive paper clip in the glove compartment was actually a baby croc, and then he would pretend his finger got trapped in the croc’s mouth and end the whole charade with a range of noises and expressions! And Pinky loved it!! She went around with the paper clip catching his finger, his nose and even his ear, giggling the way children do at his fake shriek of pain.

And then bored with the croc, the Fellow decided to broaden Pinky’s horizons (much to the dismay of her mother). So he started with confusing the little child about mothers being crocodiles (or something like that). This wouldn’t have been hilarious if Pinky hadn’t turned around to look at her mum with a look of intense confusion and fear! Next Pinky was introduced to the car horn – more specifically, how to work it. And so the Fellow and Pinky took turns to honk the car horn (while we were parked to one side of the road) and then laugh insanely. Third was a bottle of water, lots of shaking, funny sounds and bubbles. This was quite cute since Pinky would end up shaking more than the bottle! Of course, the chances are that she will now try it on an uncapped bottle and then we shall have some fun!

All in all, Pinky and the Fellow ended up having quite a good time in the car, what with all the noise they generated! Then when we reached the fort, the tiny tot trotted (alliterative huh?) after the Fellow, wanting to be picked up. And to the surprise of everyone, the Fellow scooped her up, planted her on his shoulder and headed off, chattering about crocs all the while!

Baby Bumping

The Fellow is scared of children. Much like rabbits are scared of eagles and illegal hawkers are scared of the BMC van. His theories on what parents with children should do, and how children should be handled in general, are quite nightmarish at the worst and completely inhuman at other times. I for one am left with an open mouth and a ready punch whenever I hear one of his ‘You know what these parents should do…” lines.

Finally, yesterday, something occurred which had me shocked, tickled and amused, all at once. We were out on a drive, with the Fellow in the front passenger seat. The Fellow’s best friend was driving, and his daughter was in the back with her mum and me. All through the drive she kept jumping up and down, chattering away, wanting to climb into her dad’s lap while he drove. Suddenly, the Fellow turned around and picked her up, with the intention of taking her into his lap. I say intention because, never having swung a kid from the back seat to the front (ever), he didn’t realise the obstacles to be wary off – like the rear view mirror. And so while the kid was all happy to be going to the front seat, she also ended up bumping her head into the mirror!

Luckily for the Fellow the mirror was rounded and the girl not a cry baby. She only settled for an ‘uncle not nice’ about 10 mins after the bumping. The Fellow would probably have continued feeling all contrite and guilty if, after another 10 mins, she wouldn’t have asked to go sit with uncle again.

Apparently the head bumping led to some memory loss and damage to the judgment making cells of her brain.