e-Addas

Sometimes I feel that the whole of social media is just one big adda!  My article in today's Deccan Herald Living on this topic - It's virtually anytime meet-up in the gizmo world

Tooth fairy tales

Ever wondered what two 6-year-olds talk about? Here's a sample. (I've tried to stay true to their language)

Scene: My kitchen. I'm making chapatis, and Puttachi and her friend K are sitting at the kitchen table, having dinner.

Puttachi: Look how much my tooth is shaking.

K: Look how much mine is shaking. Anusha's tooth is shaking so much that today in school, blood came out of it.

P:  Ganesh's tooth also. When my first tooth was shaking, lots of blood came out.

K: When my first tooth fell, the tooth fairy gave me a gift. She left it under my pillow, but she forgot to take the tooth away.

P: (laughs)

K: Why are you laughing?

P: The tooth fairy is your parents.

K: What? No. The tooth fairy is really there.

P: No, there are no fairies.

K: But you are always talking about fairies.

P: Oh I looooove fairies. I love to imagine them and think about them.  But actually there are no fairies.

K: There are fairies. They live in the sky and come down sometimes, like the tooth fairy. Like Santa Claus also.

P: Santa Claus is also not real.

K: Santa Claus is real. He gave me three gifts once.

P: Santa Claus is also your parents. Your parents gave you the gifts.

K: Noooo why will my parents give me three-three gifts? It was Santa Claus.

P:  (looking at me) Amma, how do I make her understand?

At this point, I quickly changed the topic. I sure hope poor little K hasn't been too scarred by Puttachi. I can just not understand how someone like Puttachi who is always in her fantasy-world can be so clear and particular about reality!

More of Puttachi's thoughts on the Ramayana

So we are into the two-dozenth retelling of the Ramayana.  I have written before about how I've told Puttachi the Ramayana in different stages, adding on layers and sub-stories with each retelling.  And since the last post, we've progressed, and so have her questions. 

If you remember, last time, she'd asked me 

Did Lakshmana also try to lift the bow? If he had, do you think he would have been able to lift it? Then he would have married Sita, no? 

Why didn't Lakshmana's wife Urmila also go to the forest? Wasn't she bored? She should also have gone. 

This time, she asked me:

She: Amma, when Hanumanta went to find Sita, he offered to take her back with him.  Why didn't she go?

Me: She wanted Rama to come and defeat Ravana and then take her back.

She: I think Sita is quite silly, Amma.  She should have gone with Hanumanta.  See, war could have been avoided.  So many people were killed in the war, such a waste.  All that would never have happened if Sita had gone with Hanumanta.

Me: (Smiling at her logic.)

She: (eyes lighting up) Ohhh.. Amma... I think I know why!

Me: Why?

She: Perhaps Valmiki* just liked long stories..... like I do!

*Valmiki wrote the Ramayana.