PAPER DREAMS

Like most netizens I have received funny emails about the world seen through the eyes of kids. I had a similar experience for real recently. On Nov. 14th (Children’s day) Sakshi heard about Chacha Nehru at school. Coincidentally Suresh and I end up talking politics at home and Sakshi asks, “what is government ma?” So I try and simplify things for the 5 year old and say that it is a group of people led by the President and Prime Minister who take care of the country. So Sakshi says, “Oh like Chahci.” Now I am not the most on-trend person in town (Mickey D and all – that is another story altogether). So I am thinking maybe that is what kids are calling our President, Pratibha Patil, nowadays. But I am not sure. So I ask the inevitable question – “erm… who Chachi?” Sakshi says, “You know he wears the white cap and the red rose.” And before you take up cudgels and blame me for not teaching her Hindi, and gender differentiation, better, you must understand that we are Malayalis who are based in Dubai and speak a mixture of Malayalam, English and Hindi at home. And since she speaks English the best of the three, she thinks she is English (we are working on changing that notion). Anyway the bulb over my head lights up and I say, “Ah! Chacha Nehru. Do you know who he is?” And Sakshi says, “Yeah. He is the first prisoner of India.”