Thursday, 3 May 2012

Being a child

We played Musical chair in childhood!

I remember the wild thumping of my heart when i went round and round the chairs, in fear of being left out i paused an extra little time whenever there was a chair facing me. ( I won too, twice ) The gifts would seem ordinary today but at that time they were the objects of my desire, usually there were musical barbie doll erasers, other stationary items, hair ornaments for young girls, sim-sim balls for the boys and most cherished of all - The story books! And God , i loved them.
The wonderful moment i got hold of a story book in my hand, i was the happiest kid  in the world who wanted nothing more than to get through the colorful book with all the amazing tales it had to tell me. I would come back home from the recreation club, get into night clothes and sit huddled up under a pool of blankets reading the story books. Even now, i read all kinds of text but back in that time my favourite had been interesting journeys of the narrator, ( the likes of 'A journey to the centre of the Earth') and the horror stories .Luckily, having recognized my love for the books my elder sisters brought me story books whenever they came back home. And luckily, again, they brought me Urdu Books as well. So i attribute my adequate skill in Urdu Language to my reading habits from that time. Also, this hobby instilled in me a deep love for learning and i started to observe everything closely at a very small age. As a result of which, i was not led by bias or blind opinions though many were going to be  fed to me later in life.

As a child, i badly wanted to have a 'hobby' i would lead everyone in. I remember my brother un-sticking  stamps from the evelopes which arrived by post and keeping them in a neat diary made for the purpose. I envied him, almost. Until the day he gave up on this hobby because apparently the new hormone-induced interests of adolescence diverted his attention. So i took his stamps but  my heart was never into it. I wanted something more colorful and play-able, not for a record-breaking hobby but for my own amusement and the answer was Dolls!
Its funny how girls love 'collections' from the early part of their life when their collections are focussed on barbie dolls to the part where wardrobe-frenzy consumes most of their time and thinking. I, for one, absolutely , deeply, undeniably loved dolls and they are the only thing i have ever been stubborn about. 19 and a medical student, i still collect dolls and stuff toys, though my insight into wardrobe isn't slight either.

They say friends are an important part of your childhood but there had not been an abundance of friends in mine. I was close to my immediate family and first cousins and i am, to this day. Unfortunately, the closest friend i had back at school, damaged my self-confidence to the level where i thought i could never beat her at anything but fortunately the dormancy period of my mind stayed only until my mentor, my eldest sister took charge of the situation and made me do my homework regularly.She had just got done with her medical education  at that time and was  to be married three months later.  She worked on me, made me believe in myself and from that time onwards, I always stood first.
Today she is well-settled with three beautiful kids and i am re-living our past in form of a very intimate bond with her eldest son , with whom i talk about the world, of all its mysteries  and realities and occassionally give him advice on how to handle the bad crowd at school. If he makes a mark in this world tomorrow i will take pride in the fact that i had a major role in formation of his character. ( And he realizes that too, considering we can be on a skype-date, talk about our stuff for 3 hours and not get bored, he is 8 by the way)

Looking back at that time, and hearing tales from the people who have been naughty in their time  I should admit that mine was a quiet childhood. However quiet isn't a synonym of dull. There had been one big happy family with countless small happy moments, It was the time when one pack of mango ice cream highlighted the family union at the end of the day and lulled us all to a happy sleep of contentment.  When i didn't have to worry before a maths test because my father like a magician would break up all maths riddles in neat, easy pieces for my perceptive brain to comprehend and take it further. The way he taught maths sharpened my mind and to this day, i can do complex multiplications and additions mentally .

As a kid, I never found it too hard to wake up early in the morning. I loved mornings and the smell of jasmine in the air it brought so I used to get up eagerly and brush my teeth for a long time until mother announced that breakfast had been set. My favourite breakfast had been buttered toasts and tea with lots of sugar in it ( I still crave it, but cannot take such a high-calorie meal so unscrupulously anymore ) Also, i vividly remember the cartoon movies which came on PTV at that time. I liked Dexter's laboratory but they were alternated with Bob the Builder sometimes. There also used to come 'a prayer for the nation' by the time we were done with breakfast. Listening to it today transports me back in time and i can remember the fragrances of early morning in that house with a dull ache in my heart. When i started going to school, two of my eldest sisters were done with secondary education. So, it was the four of us who walked to school under clear sky , chatting wildly, clutching lunchboxes and trying to locate our own group of friends on the road. I was the youngest so i trotted behind as an unspoken rule and looked at their important-looking bags , wishing i would grow up soon.There had always been great support for me in the fact that i had three elder siblings attending the same school. I could get back at bullies by just complaining to the eldest one, as she was the proctor there. I was bullied and cheated by some elder girls in my form ( i started school early ) but i never complained though it damaged my spirits badly. I would , instead, go to my eldest sister and sit with her in her classroom. Even today i find escape from a tough situation more desirable than a confrontation.

Sometimes, during our monotonous routine of school there came an excellent break in form of heavy rain. We would come home , excited about the prospect of bathing in rain, get into easy clothes, and come out in the lawns waiting for the rain to fall more heavily. If it rained on a holiday, i would be sleeping cosily until my sister came over , her voice worked up to a very high pitch due to excitement , telling me to wake up, telling me about the dark grey clouds she was sure, would rain for hours on end.
Mother made french fries and delicious other things to go with the weather.
All the kids made paper boats.
We collected water in deep furrows in grounds, in the bath tub and the laundry area which had a raised platform as boundary on all four corners. We, then made loud splashes in the water and stamped hard in all the natural pools and puddles of water. We played until we got so tired that our bodies ached. Rains today can never be as much fun as they had been back in childhood.

Another break in our dull routine came in the form of our cousins coming to stay over for a long period of time. it was the treat we looked forward to whole year and when they came there was no end to our talking, playing and eating. We ate guavas and pomegranates from the plantation at home in sunny afternoons. We watched movies on cassette-players. The guys played cricket and went around like they owned the place. Today, we all inhabit different corners of the planet and nothing is the same anymore.


In my childhood, that had been in the 90's which is just a decade and a year or two ago, everything had been so simple. Yet it had been perfect, i was a perfectly happy child and my happiness depended on no fancy gaming devices kids today ask their parents for. The golden rules of respecting the elders and lowering your eyes when you talked to a teacher were taught until they became habits. It was considered a serious offence to say anything disrespectful against a teacher or an elder person. Today , i don't find myself much different from the child i had been and that is understandable because what you sow as your education to your child is what you reap , as his behaviour as a grown up.

I have seen almost two decades of my life now, and spent a major part of it in company of the younger and i have noticed what kids today are in dire need of:
Children today need originality from the past. There are many things money can't buy and many things money won't replace. Parents need to consider this in order to keep their kids from associating their happiness with materialism. Also, spoiling a kid never helped him, rather it makes him an outcast later in life when he goes out and deals with the world , expecting everyone to hail him like a prince. Kids are intelligent and open to our influence, they need to be inspired, their abilities need to be analyzed , groomed and challenged. That makes tough men and women humanity is in need of.
I believe that whatever happens in your childhood influences you for your lifetime. You can never run away from the person you were in your childhood.
 Therefore, in my interaction with kids I remain mindful  of the fact that the way i behave with them will leave imprints on their personality forever. We, are the books children learn from. So, present a neutral, if not positive outlook on all the things they ask questions about. Misleading a kid will only make him go astray with a blindfold of bias in front of his eyes. This attitude leads us nowhere And by the Divine, We don't want the next generation to run blind in hatred and rule this love-deprived world the way it has been ruled since forever.

For the rest, Play, Laugh, Love, Help and write- to spread the message.

A picture of me from the childhood, taken at the age of 5



4 comments:

  1. The picture in the end is of the sweetest kid i'v ever seen .. =p

    ReplyDelete
  2. Very Well written. And the picture of yours in the end makes me smile for looking at the shine in your eyes and your smile <3

    ReplyDelete