Comparisons

During my early years, we as children were being compared among ourselves by the elders in the family. Words such as "Oh my! he's just like his brother " or " Why dont you learn some of your brother's good habits" would be commonly heard in the household. This , directly or not , sometimes even led to sibling rivalry.

We never understood the purpose of that exercise by elders. It would inadvertently lead to unpleasant situations, like say during our annual results time.  Veena has seen a fair share of these things as well, in her growing years. 

When we had twins, we realised that this is one of the main things that we will have to guard ourselves against doing. Actually there isn't anything the kids would have to do. They just have to be themselves and we should let them be that. These girls arent even six and we are already seeing many issues. 

Raising two girls of the same age who are very different in nature has been a challenge in many ways but the biggest challenge has been to treat them differently but yet equally. Veena has taken this responsibility upon herself almost fully and that is fantastic. This particular aspect has given us many sleepless nights, has been the topic of  humour, has forced tears down our cheeks..

It is humorous when 

people talk about Neha being shorter than Nidhi and she sees this ad on TV and insists that her mom should buy her Complan. We were using Boost as the energy drink for kids. Now Neha actually drinks Complan and thinks she is growing faster. She goes grocery shopping with Veena, carries back home the Complan pack herself and proudly announces "appa, it has 23 vitamins!"

It is amusing to

watch Veena tell them their bedtime stories. She has to sleep between them, her hands spread like eagle wings to act as pillow for their heads and her own head has to face the ceiling. (equi distant from either of them). She turns it one side and the kid on the other side gets upset.

It hurts when

people chide nidhi for being more mischievous. She being very sensitive, equates that to her being a "bad girl" and comes and asks her mom "amma, why did you ask god for two papus?"

Faces

You'd remember that Neha is the kalpana of our house. She is usually mild mannered but goes bonkers sometimes & in those moods, becomes a treat to watch.
The collage shows various expressions that her face wore, on a recent trip.

Gifts of Life

One of the earliest photos I have of myself, is the class photo when I was in "preparatory" class. Then the nursery classes were called lkg, ukg & preparatory. So that was my 6th year of life. I remember my friends from that class, remember my teacher and had in fact met her later in my student life. So for me, anything before my 6th year is a blur and after that I remember several things. When I realise that my kids are now in their 6th year, three thoughts come to my mind - "you are getting old, but great memory, wow, kids are already there!"

The last comment is amazing to me because I still remember very vividly the moment they were born on Apr 2nd evening, 2004. That defintely has to be the moment of my life. I remember my brain jammed. There were so much excitement and so many thoughts going through it that I felt I was carrying a numb muscle in my head. I was trying to recollect what all I felt then or if somebody has written on a similar experience felt. 

Recently I read up this rather interesting essay by Atul Chaturvedi called "Gift of Life" in "Chicken Soup for Indian Soul" and I felt he has described most of what I felt when I became a dad. I have reproduced a good portion of that essay here (thanks to Atul) :

"she leaned towards me and handed my daughter over to me. I felt her warmth. She was small, delicate, she was simply beautiful, wrapped in this soft white linen that still seemed too rough for her. Till that moment, I used to think she was mine... but now I realized it is just the opposite. I was hers. I held her close. The true motive of my life stared at me through those half-opened eyes. I was responsible for her now. I had to protect her, nurture her, love her; not because, she was mine but because I was her slave. I knew I wouldn't , even in my dreams, be able to repay her for what she had given me; happiness, contentment, courage.

My heart now beat within this little being.

I had never held a baby before in my life. I felt awkward. And then I remembered she had never been held by anyone in her life. And yet there was no fear in her. If she was not scared to live her first moment then why should I be fearful? She was teaching me things already!

She stopped crying, perhaps because she was in my arms. I thought "Will I be able to protect and comfort her always?" The answer was no. She wasnt going to be with me forever. I was taken aback by the thought. A tiny tear rolled down my cheek. I held onto her, promising myself that I wouldn't waste a moment of our time together. I would teach her everything she would want to know.I would prepare her to face the world. I would be there with her forever. I'm her father.

I'm scared - will I make a good father or a bad one? But I do know this - that I will do my best to make sure that she has a fulfilled life, a happy one. I will make sure that this tiny bundle in my arms will live a better life than I did"

And I felt like this twice in two minutes!

Two kids & Their Three Birthdays

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.

# 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.

Heights!

remember the post about two birthdays approaching fast (school birthday this month & actual birthday next month)? I mentioned how the kids are eager and preparing for these events.
Yesterday Neha bettered herself and probably hit the heights of birthday preparation.
She was practicing how to give the chocolates to her friends on the D-day!
she was holding a pen holder as the chocolate box and telling me and veena "take one more"

More on the plus sign on a doctor shop

Thanks to my cousin Shylu, I was able to find the answer to neha's question :-)

The plus sign on the doctor shop or a "red cross" is in fact one of the emblems of the Red Cross Society. Their other symbols are - a red crescent and a red crystal. According to the Geneva conventions, any of these emblems can be used by the following:

• facilities for the care of injured and sick armed forces members;
• armed forces medical personnel and equipment;
• military chaplains;
• International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement organizations such as the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC), and the 185 national Red Cross and Red Crescent societies.

In India, the red cross emblem is misused by doctor shops and pharmacists on their name boards. (you'll even see it on a first aid box or on a doctor's car) There is a recent movement to do away with misusing the emblem and you may notice that many doctor shops now don't carry a red cross. Some doctors have created their own emblems cleverly using the red cross in some form. I saw one dentist in our neighborhood using red cross in the background and the staff with two snakes in the foreground as his unique symbol.

The pharmacists in India are switching over to using a green cross. This is the symbol of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain and they allow usage on a pharma shop. Notice the green cross on a Lifeken shop when you visit it next time.

A blue cross is used to indicate an endeavor in animal care. So you might see that on a vet shop.

Phew, feel learned and relieved now!

Plus Sign on a doctor shop

Neha played with bare feet in the sand pit in kids' play area and had a cut underneath the middle digit of her right leg. Not wanting to take a chance around contamination of the wound with tetanus bacteria, I took her to a doctor nearby and he gave her an anti-tetanus injection. I could see a glimpse of my grown-up & shy neha there. This was the first time we went to this doctor and so neha was shy to cry when he gave the injection. She tried her best to hold back the tears and remained silent when he asked did it hurt her too much. This is the same neha who acted like kalpana for a previous injection! I felt sad in a way cos she is already choosing dignity over her kiddish behavior. Maybe its a transition that I should get used to. My T-shirt slogan would not be "18 till I die" but "35 till I die cos then my daughters stay at 4"

On the way back, she was her inquisitive self and asked me - why do doctor shops have a symbol of "one standing line & one sleeping line". That took me off guard and I had never wondered what the plus sign on a doctor shop meant. I googled around for a while to look for meaning of the usual medical symbols. And found out about two of them:

Rx
The symbol "Rx" has two representations. It is meant to signify the eye of Horus (Egyptian god for light, sky & goodness) or it just means prescription (take this). So its either a god's symbol to wish good luck or a direction to take something to get well.

The symbol of staff with two snakes coiled to it:
It is the staff of Aesculapius (also called Asklepios), the ancient mythical god of medicine. His Greek name was Asklepios and his Roman name was Aesculapius. In reality, Asklepios may have once lived and been renowned for his gentle, humane remedies and his humane treatment of the mentally ill. His followers established temples called asclepions, temples of Asklepios, temples of healing. According to mythology, Asculapius had a number of children including Hygieia, the goddess of health (from whose name comes the word "hygiene") and Panaceia, the goddess of healing (from whose name comes por word "panacea" for a universal remedy). Today, the staff of Aesculapius is a commonly used symbol of medicine. It is the symbol of the American Medical Association (AMA) and many other medical societies.

+ sign
I could not find the meaning of the "plus" sign. I'm expecting it to be something very basic but cant find it. Do you know?