Last Saturday, all the three formats of the kids fifth year birthday got over. The birthday at school happened on Mar 20th (on the last day of the term) where they distributed "cadburys munch" chocolates to their friends and basked in the attention they got. Apr 2nd was the actual birthday which was a rather quiet day. A visit to the temple nearby and many of the relatives calling & wishing them happened through the day. By evening they got frustrated and were refusing to take the calls. The frustration was more about the party not being there that day rather than anything else. I or rather my work was the major culprit for moving the party to weekend & Apr 4th.
And it was a great party & the kids and their friends enjoyed thoroughly. There were about 25 kids who turned out. Many others were away on their summer breaks. Here are a few snippets of the day & events leading up to it:
# we took the kids to a toy store last week to buy them some gifts and told them that they can choose. I was ready for the pocket to get lighter by 2k or so. The kids went around the alleys of saphire toy store in Jayanagar, gleefully, knowing they had a free license to buy. After the initial excitement of "I want this, I want this too...", they settled down on two things. Nidhi picked a soft toy of her favorite character - tom (his friend is jerry :-) & a pack having barbie headband & magic wand. Neha picked up just the headband & wand and insisted that she doesn't want anything else. I was not satisfied for a while cos that costed much lesser than I thought. The soft toy was like 200 and the head band & wand set was 55 each. Better sense prevailed in my head after a few minutes saying cost doesn't matter, their happiness at getting the toys they wanted matters. As I write it now, it seems so very obvious but money (the less of it in this case) can malign your ability to determine the real worth of a material sometimes.
# Back home, Neha wore the head band and went around wishing for things by holding the wand in hand. She came back to me and asked " appa idharalli yaake magic agalla?" That moment was worth tons of gold for innocence shown. Again the dumb guy in me thought "aha that is why you didn't want anything expensive in the toy store; you thought you could get everything through this wand". I was wrong again. Though Neha appeared a trifle disappointed, she went around wishing with the wand with the same enthusiasm and now she knew there is no magic as well. I wanted to kill that guy in me who told me twice that day that money can buy happiness.
And it was a great party & the kids and their friends enjoyed thoroughly. There were about 25 kids who turned out. Many others were away on their summer breaks. Here are a few snippets of the day & events leading up to it:
# we took the kids to a toy store last week to buy them some gifts and told them that they can choose. I was ready for the pocket to get lighter by 2k or so. The kids went around the alleys of saphire toy store in Jayanagar, gleefully, knowing they had a free license to buy. After the initial excitement of "I want this, I want this too...", they settled down on two things. Nidhi picked a soft toy of her favorite character - tom (his friend is jerry :-) & a pack having barbie headband & magic wand. Neha picked up just the headband & wand and insisted that she doesn't want anything else. I was not satisfied for a while cos that costed much lesser than I thought. The soft toy was like 200 and the head band & wand set was 55 each. Better sense prevailed in my head after a few minutes saying cost doesn't matter, their happiness at getting the toys they wanted matters. As I write it now, it seems so very obvious but money (the less of it in this case) can malign your ability to determine the real worth of a material sometimes.
# Back home, Neha wore the head band and went around wishing for things by holding the wand in hand. She came back to me and asked " appa idharalli yaake magic agalla?" That moment was worth tons of gold for innocence shown. Again the dumb guy in me thought "aha that is why you didn't want anything expensive in the toy store; you thought you could get everything through this wand". I was wrong again. Though Neha appeared a trifle disappointed, she went around wishing with the wand with the same enthusiasm and now she knew there is no magic as well. I wanted to kill that guy in me who told me twice that day that money can buy happiness.
# Last year, the kids would rush to the door to welcome their friends and snatch the gifts from them. They did that this year too. And they did something better. They went to one of their friends house, snatched the gifts from her at her doorstep and got her to the party.
# I was playing the "2007 bollywood hits" CD on the music system and was enjoying humming "in dino, dil mera ..." when one of the kids came and said "uncle can you play something new?". That was shocking. Wow. 2007 is old to you I thought. To me 1970s or 80s songs are old. Then I realised that if you are 5 or 6 years old, 2007 songs were hot & happening when you were almost half your age compared to now. So that must be a while back. So I switched to slumdog songs without putting up much of an argument.
# The birthday cake had tom & jerry on it. The favorite characters on TV for neha & nidhi and in many ways, characters they ape. These two girls cannot stop fighting when together and cannot live in peace when away.
# Note the label on this post. Their sixth year has started.
# I was playing the "2007 bollywood hits" CD on the music system and was enjoying humming "in dino, dil mera ..." when one of the kids came and said "uncle can you play something new?". That was shocking. Wow. 2007 is old to you I thought. To me 1970s or 80s songs are old. Then I realised that if you are 5 or 6 years old, 2007 songs were hot & happening when you were almost half your age compared to now. So that must be a while back. So I switched to slumdog songs without putting up much of an argument.
# The birthday cake had tom & jerry on it. The favorite characters on TV for neha & nidhi and in many ways, characters they ape. These two girls cannot stop fighting when together and cannot live in peace when away.
# Note the label on this post. Their sixth year has started.
2 comments:
hehe! rofling on the 'can you play some new songs'....
Just 2 gud! As sweet and innocent as it gets! :)
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