Car Horn

On the other day, I was telling Anirud about why and how people sound the horn in their cars. When I asked him if he understood what I was saying, he replied with a perplexed face keeping one of his fingers on his head pointing upwards, "naan horn paathirukken pa.. head mela one madhiri irukkume" (I have seen the horn. It will be on the head, like the numeral one). Apparently, he mistook it to be the horn that many animals have on their head. Further, he thought that the radio antenna on top of our car to be its horn.

Back to Nursery

Anirud is back at the nursery since the beginning of this week, after a break of 3 weeks. He is reportedly very happy and talkative. The only thing he is unable to digest is that he is being made to wear shorts (instead of full-length trousers), which according to him, is not an attire to be worn outdoors (not a 'bye-bye' dress, but only an 'aathukku pottukara' dress).

Where are we now?

Normally Anirud makes a mental note of the roads we frequently drive on. Upon entering a particular road, he would normally guess the destination we are headed to. Many a times, he would even tell the locality / town we are driving through. When we were driving through a new locality, Anirud's mom asked him, "where are we now?", with the idea of cornering him. Pat came the reply, "We are on the road".

Wii Board

Wii Fit is the latest toy that we have got for ourselves. The gadget comprises of a console attached to the TV and a Wii Fit Balance Board. As we work out on the board trying to shed those extra pounds, Anirud steps in trying to make use of the board at the same time. Normally, we give him some time to use the board all by himself, but as is the case with most kids of his age, he would want to use the board only when we need it. After a bit of thought, we took out the weighing scale (the one found in a physician's clinic) and told Anirud that it is a Wii Fit Balance Board for Babies. As Anirud is fond of anything that is meant for kids, he is more than happy with the weighing scale and letting us work out in peace. One never know when that bugger will find out the truth.

Aththai Visit

Anirud's aththai is on a two week visit to UK at present. In the days leading to her visit, Anirud was all excited about meeting her and was telling us about visiting the airport to collect her etc. On the day of her arrival, he woke up 1.5 hours before his usual time and was eagerly looked for her arrival. Not disappointing him, aththai brought loads of goodies that included a school bag, black slate, toys etc. After letting her settle down, he is royally driving her nuts by asking her to play with him all the time.

Upon observing us explaining to her about various things she might find new in this country, Anirud thinks that she is one person who doesn't seem to know a thing (sort of 'oor naattaan' in Tamil). It is funny to watch him explain her about all the little things - right from how to eat dosai (dosai-ya pichchu pichchu saapidanum) to how to switch on the telly.

Little Worries

Sometimes, Anirud worries like a grown-up and all of his worries would be on trivial things that actually has nothing to do with him. Couple of days ago, he woke up crying early in the morning. Upon being comforted he said, "Tesco-la vaangina new basmati rice-a use pannadhe" (don't use the new basmati rice bought at Tesco). After being assured that we won't be using it, he went back to sleep peacefully. Probably, he had a bad dream or something that made him worry about the Basmatic rice, of all the things in the world.

Another one of his recent worries is that I might go to work wearing a veshti (dhoti). He calmed down only after seeing me wear formal clothes.

Kadalamuttai Chocolate

What the rest of the world calls 'Snickers', Anirud calls it 'Kadalamuttai Chocolate'.

Lets buy a baby

When we were entering Tesco Superstore, a lady was coming out with her bags of purchase on one hand and with a two month old baby on the other. Upon seeing this, Anirud said without a moment's hesitation: "nammalum Tesco poy, indha maadhiri oru paapa vaangalaam pa" (Lets buy a baby like this from Tesco).

Best Behaviour

During the past week when Anirud's mom was not well and needed complete bed rest, Anirud packed up all his naughtiness and behaved in the best possible way that one could expect of a three year old. As his mom was suffering from conjunctivitis as well, it was important that she was quarantined. When told about that, he left the room quietly closing the door, confined himself to the lounge for most part of the day watching the telly at a low volume and even answered the phone couple of times. Needless to mention that we were mighty pleased with him on the hour of need. This post is to make sure that we not only make note of his crankiness, but also his good behaviour.

Puzzles

Anirud is very fond of jigsaw puzzles. He has crossed the stage of solving 6, 12 and 18 piece puzzles, but certainly not ready for a 500 piece one - which is sure to rob his interest if introduced to him at this stage. I am not sure if it is right or wrong - he doesn't solve the puzzles by looking at the picture. He does it by trial and error by trying to to fit in various pieces of the jigsaw and eventually gets it right. Very soon, we shall increase the challenge level in such a way that his interest level on this remains intact.

Question

Anirud had a poser for his mom today, "mummy, unakku kalyanam aayiduthaa?" (Mummy, have you got married?). Apparently, he had listened to her asking the same question to someone else. :)

Thittaadhe please!

The latest buzzword for Anirud these days seem to be 'enna thittaadhe please' (don't scold me, please). When he does something naughty, he could foresee our reaction and as soon as we open our mouth, he would say the above with a sorry look on his face. This, despite the fact that in the recent days we are extra cautious about not scolding or frightening him for his naughtiness unless he does something that is totally unacceptable.

Make it clear

As a big fan of Tesco, Anirud always has a question or two about the superstore. We were driving past a Tesco Express (smaller version of Tesco) last week, he asked me if that shop has got a parking space. As I was engrossed on something else, I mumbled a weak 'hmmmm'. Obviously annoyed at my answer, Anirud said loudly: 'appa, clear aa sollu. parking space irukaa, illaya. yes or no sollu' (Appa, say it clearly. Is there a parking space or not? Say, yes or no'.