The Big Party

An Indian get-together was held recently that we planned to attend. For some inane reasons, that was being referred to as party. When Anirud was told that we will be attending a party, he assumed that to be a 'birthday party', as that is the only one he is aware of and kept pestering us who the birthday boy / girl is. At last, he did realise what that is when he attended the event and even christened it as 'Big Party', based on the number of people who attended it.

That 'Big Party' did have events for children and Anirud participated in 'dumb charade', which was meant for his age group. As none of the children actually caught the concept of dumb charade, it was amusing to see children blink and show some funny shapes to their team mates. In case of Anirud, he and another child slight elder to him by few years came forwarded to enact their word. The word that was given to them was 'house' and the organisers helped them to show the shape of the roof. Seeing the other kid doing some shapes, Anirud just repeated whatever he did and funnily enough shouted 'It is a triangle'. :) As the time ran out, the show ended. Nevertheless, it was great on the part of the organisers to have put their thinking caps on in organising something of this nature.


Anirud (in blue t-shirt) enacting the word 'house' to his bemused team mates.

Flower Pots

Recently we bought couple of indoor floral plants, one of which is called 'nandhiya vattai' in Tamil. When we bought it, there were quite a lot of buds in the shrub. We pointed all of those to Anirud, teaching him to water the plants and explained that the buds will bloom into flowers later. All through the day, he kept checking the plants every five minutes and when it didn't bloomed as expected, he started demanding explanations. Perhaps, this is what poet Vairamuthu meant by 'Naan nattadhum rojaa indre pookkanum' (நான் நட்டதும் ரோஜா இன்றே பூக்கணும்). :))


A day later 'nandhiya vattai' smiled much to everyone's happiness.

Kadodhgajan

Guess who is Anirud's latest favourite character? It is the mythological 'Kadodhgajan'. Few weeks ago, Anirud watched the classical Tamil movie 'Maya Bazaar' and particularly took a liking to the famous song 'Kalyaana Samayal Saadham..'. Since then, he has watched that song few hundred times already and has now become a die hard fan of 'Kadodhgajan'. He will be all excited upon seeing that character make his appearance on the screen. Perhaps, he thinks it is really possible for the 'real' Kadodhgan to make all the laddus fly into his mouth. On the other day, I showed him a plate filled with some food item and in a flash of a second, replaced it with an empty plate claiming that I ate them all like in that song. One should have seen his face to realise how awe-struck he was. In the end, it took a while to convince him of the truth, though he had a piece of advice for me - 'appa, andha madhiri ellam saapidadhe. appuram, neeyum raakshasana maariduve' (Daddy, don't eat like that. If you do, you will turn into a demon). :P

Pink is for Girls

A shirt that Anirud's grandparents had sent him for Deepavali happened to have shades of pink colour. He immediately refused it saying that it looks girlish to wear that. On the other day, we were at a shop and were looking at a mat that was in pink. Anirud could not even digest the fact that we were looking at something that only girls would use. He doesn't specifically say that pink is for girls, but in general keeps that colour away saying that it is meant for girls. Wonder if someone told him all these or he picked it up through hearsay.

Health Visitor

Anirud's health visitor for the last 3+ years is moving out of our locality and there will be a new person as her replacement. Basically, Health Visitors are qualified nurses with further specialised training and are experienced in child health and health promotion. Here in UK, they will help the parents deal with any of the behavioural issues with the child. I am not sure if other parents consult the health visitor, as frequently as we have been doing. In case of Anirud, she was the one who adviced us on many things including but not limited to - sleep issues, eating habits, attention seeking tantrums etc. Several times in the past, we have called her up with some silly question or other and she would always have some suggestion that would work well on Anirud. Even at times, when she used to tell what we know already - it will be reassuring to hear from the horse's mouth.

She made a home-visit to our place recently and Anirud signed up a 'Thank you' card for her. Thanks Nikki for all you have done.

Deepavali - 2008

Deepavali was celebrated with a reasonable bit of fanfare this year. Last year, we were in India for the occasion and Anirud was not that very happy with the noise of the crackers. But this time around, he was excited on that count and enjoyed lighting quite a few sparklers on his own. With the presence of few other children of his age from our apartment block, Deepavali eve turned out to be a fun night. He even pestered me to let him try the crackers, but that has to wait for few more years.

New School

Since October this year, Anirud has been enrolled at a new school who follow the montessori way of teaching. Seems that he is enjoying it quite a bit there, as sometimes he wants to stay back and refuses to come home. Unlike the nursery he was into before, this is more like a proper school. Hence, he needs to be there at the appointed time, for which he needs to wake up by a certain time, which requires that he should be going to bed at night at a set time. So, his sleeping pattern is all set and that is certainly not the only good thing to happen.

Perhaps, the foremost thing they have taught at school is to stay organised. These days, as soon as he is back home from anywhere, he immediately removes his shoes, places it on the shoe rack, rushes in to the room and changes his clothes - all of these without being prompted. More often than not, he puts away his toys in the right place once he is done. Of course, there are some odd days when he doesn't do any of these, but honestly we don't have any regrets about that, as long as that doesn't become a habit. :)

Three weeks into his school, they had a 'half term' break as well. He enjoyed every moment of that by waking up late (around 9-ish) and staying till late. Thankfully, he got back to his routine fairly quickly as soon as the school reopened.

Typical Brit

Anirud is fast turning out to be a typical Brit. One of the first things he talks about every morning is the weather. "Wow.. What a beautiful sunny day" / "Oh no! It is a windy day", he exclaims/frowns as if the weather means something to him. Well, in a way the weather means a lot to him as that is the one which decides whether or not Anirud will play in the school garden. With him picking up the accents and slangs from school, very soon we are gonna have a tough time following his words.

Undiyal (Piggy Bank)

On the auspicious Vijayadasami day, we got a undiyal (piggy bank) for Anirud. We drew up the rule that he will be rewarded with few coins before going to bed, if he had been behaving well. Any other special accomplishments would also be rewarded. Like it always happens, we promptly forgot the rules that we drew up. One month on, he seldom remembers the piggy bank, but whenever he does never forgets to mention that he is gonna buy a 'blue cycle' with the money he saves.

Art work

Oh yeah... that's a Robot.

"Ben hates me"

One day as I picked Anirud from the nursery, I noticed that he was very upset. His key worker said that he was alright until about 10 minutes back and suddenly became very serious and moody. Upon questioning him, he revealed that his playmate had said 'I hate you' for some reason and that seems to have put him off. With a very sad tone, he mumbled "Ben hates me Appa". While comforting him, I was surprised as how sensitive he is. Some day, he might realise that there are things not worth worrying about and this is one among them.

Mighty Mind

One of our relatives gifted Anirud a game called 'Mighty Mind' and what a wonderful gift that was. It comes with about 30 different shapes (squares, triangles etc) which can be assembled into various different figures (house, animal etc). We taught Anirud the basics of the game and he has learnt it to play by himself with very little help from us. He is sure gonna get the next level of the game - 'Mighty Mind Super Challenger' very soon.

Image Courtesy: Baby Jireh

Overnight Success Story

For the last few weeks, Anirud has been without nappies during the night and gladly, there had been no accidents. Touchwood! Barring the time when we go for long drives, he is nappy free during the day as well - which is one another giant step towards 'big boyhood'. :)) Perhaps, this is not the kind of post that he may want to see in this blog when he grows up big, but this is the kind of news that gives us big relief.

மழலை (Mazhalai)

அது சூடூவா இருக்குமா - அது சூடா இருக்குமா? (Is it hot)

நான் பயமூமுருத்தினேன் - நான் பயமுறுத்தினேன் (I scared him/her)

Laptop Addiction

In the recent few days, Anirud has become addicted towards laptop. As he has learnt to use the mouse very well, he is happy clicking at whatever link that comes his way. That is fine if he does that during his allocated time of 15 minutes a day, when we let him wander around the CBeebies website. Most of the times, he returns the laptop after the allocated 15 minutes - if we show him the clock and say that his time will be up when the big hand of the clock reaches a certain number. But whenever we use the laptop, he sits besides us and tries to click the mouse on something or other. Sometimes, he just grabs our hand to prevent us getting anywhere near the keyboard / mouse and is particularly unhappy if ever we pull him up for doing such stuff. The sooner we address this issue, the better it will be for all three of us.

Vegetable Farm

Vegetable Farm

A week ago, we visited a vegetable farm nearby. What a nice experience it was for Anirud, that he got to pick apples from the trees, dig out carrots & beetroots from the earth with a spade, pick loads of beans from the creepers, rasp/black berries from the plants etc. More importantly, he would have probably learnt that carrots and beans don't get 'created by magic' in plastic covers at Sainbury's or Tesco. It was funny when he said, "En pa dirty carrots ellam vaangare?" (Why are you buying the dirty carrots?).

Cars

Do all the boys like cars? Probably yes. Like most boys, Anirud is crazy about cars and very often takes a vow to drive a car when he becomes a 'big boy'. Once when he was asked 'Which school will you be going to?', he replied 'Driving School'. Funnily enough, ever since he saw someone in our neighbourhood getting into a driving school car, he is pestering us to look for a Kid's Driving School. Well, he is presented with the kid's version of so many things from books to chairs to meals to what not. So, he expects a Driving School for kids as well.

That one apart, his specialisation on logos have diversified into cars as well, as he easily picks out - Nissan, Honda, Volkswagon, Toyota, Ford, Renault, Vauxhall cars by their logo even from a distance.

Flags and Capitals

One interesting bit of learning for Anirud due to the Olympic games was the awareness he gained about various different countries and their flags. These days he instantly recognises the flags of China, India, UK, Switzerland, France, USA and few others. We thought of extending this a bit further and told him about the capital cities of the above countries. He was fine with most of them, but when it came to 'Washington DC' he was a bit intrigued with 'washing', but nevertheless carried on. When we moved on to the next capital, his imagination started to run amok. Before we could tell the name of the next capital, he was like 'Dishwasher DC', 'Fridge-ton DC' - replacing 'washing' with what ever appliance name he could imagine.

Olympics

Thanks to the Beijing Olympics 2008, Anirud now has got a fair idea of what different games are about. His favourites are track cycling, boxing and swimming. Apart from the above, he claims to like 'bulti' (gymnastics), hockey, running (athletics) and diving. Through out the duration of the games, he woke up with thoughts on olympics and watched the telly to his heart's content. We promised to take him to the next Olympics (London 2012), but the problem was in making him understand that he has to wait for 4 years, as he doesn't know to think in terms of time.

Love Film

One fine day, as we were walking past Blockbuster, Anirud asked me to rent the movie 'Shrek'. I said to him that we can get that movie through Lovefilm (an online movie rental service we have subscribed to) and asked him to remind about that when we get home. I expected him to forget about it and rightly so, he didn't bother about Shrek for some time. Few hours later, Anirud went near the laptop that was not only left unlocked, but also had an Internet Explorer window open. He moved the mouse to the address bar and typed some character in random (it happened to be 'L'), pressed the down arrow and hit 'Enter'. To his joy, the website that loaded in front of him was lovefilm.com.

From that point, he started to take control. With the combination of mouse clicks and scroll buttons, he navigated around the site, reached the page where the teaser for 'Shrek' was displayed and just stopped short of reserving / ordering the movie. Leaving aside the initial excitement after he landed on the said website, not for a moment he hesitated while navigating around. Such was his confidence that it appeared that he knew everything about the process like the back of his palm.

Lovefilm.com is a harmless site. At best or worst, he could only reserve a movie. But this is a gentle reminder for us to 'sign out' properly from all the sites, especially the ones like Amazon, which has got features like 'single click ordering'.