Featuring in our library are my picks for CROCUS2009 @ Saffron Tree.

Mamma Do You Love Me?

Muskrat Will Be Swimming

The Journey Of Tunuri And The Blue Deer

Whoever You Are

This is the favorite corner of my home.

Our bookshelf.

I love it. From the curtains, to the rug, to the file holders, each thing was hand picked by me with my precious books in mind.

The previous owners had converted a bedroom in to a media room. So instead of a traditional closet we have shelves. This is the space that houses the books we have. The bottom most shelf for my school stuff and large books. The next two shelves from the bottom are for the kids books, arranged so that the whole front cover of the book is showing. These books are rotated every two weeks. Books that are piled with their spine showing, on the side shelves are placed in the central area so that the front cover shows. I rearrange the books with a theme in mind. After this I casually let the kids in to the room. They notice that there are new books and their comment is , “AMMA YOU PUT OUT NEW BOOKS!!!!” Most of the books we have had for the past two years, but by showing them only 10 books at a time, they have renewed interest. If a book that has been put out has not been touched in spite of it being ‘new’, they are retired to a storage box in the garage.

The rest of the books that belong to the adults in the house arranged in a certain order. As the shelf height increases the appropriateness(for Chula and Mieja) of the books differ. First comes Harry Potter series, LOTR, English and Tamil version of Ponniyin Selvan, Roald Dahl, R.K.Narayan etc. Above them are Catch22, Fountainhead, Alexander Maccall Smith, few Grishams, Robin Cooks, Douglas Adams etc. As the height increases the adult content of the books increase. The idea is Chula and Mieja will be a certain age, hmmmm 30 may be, by the time they are reading books with sexual content. So they better not climb on chairs or tip toe to get those books.

On the very top shelf are my ORACLE, C++, Operation System, JAVA books from my former jenmam. These are way high, not to keep them away from the kids, but to be out of my sight, so that I can be free of nightmares.

Oh, I forgot to mention, the books are grouped and sub grouped by categories like by author, height, chronology, theme etc. For example, all Tulika books are in one basket, starting with Tamil books arranged in height order(unless there are two books with similar theme, then the height order is sacrificed), then the bilingual books in height order, then the English books in height etc. The book HAS to go back in to the very specific spot that it came from, otherwise God forbid, a reorganization is in order. It takes me a weekend to reorganize the bookshelf because, I first draw a rough sketch, a flow chart, catalog, sit in a corner and read a book and then arrange them.

IF (in capital because most people who know me have stopped borrowing books from me) some one borrows a book from me, I almost make them sign a binding contract that lets me cut their right ear off if they accidentally took my book to the bathroom(yuck) or folded a corner or folded it open along the spine or spill something on it or crumple any page or…..okay the list goes on.

* ! I love my book shelf ! *

Okay folks, now march on to Saffrontree, read our reviews and leave comments. Only if we hear you, we will know what you are thinking.

[tags]books shelf, how to arrange books to keep kids interested[/tags]

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Contd from part I.

She is at home because her school is closed for Gandhi Jayanthi. She washed her hair, children stayed off from clawing each other, her best friend was going to stop by and the husband was on his way home…. a good day…an over all sense of elation is prevailing.

She opens the door to check mail and she sees a package.

Her mind races at the speed of light. Books from Amazon? Nope. She didn’t order any. Besides why would Amazon gift-wrap it like this? Gift from India? Yeah right! Dream on greedy person……

She picks the package and looks at the ‘from address’ Wait a min….. Tharini from Winkiesways? Package from T? She has a rough idea as to the ‘why’, but the ‘what’ is still throbbing in her head.

OMG, she loves surprises. She loves presents. She loves opening presents. In fact she loves it sooooo much that as of a year back, she was opening all her kids’ birthday presents. This is like….this is like….pure joy. She feels like a small child. She is shaking and sniffing the package trying to guess what is inside.

Ok, she gives up. Inside her head a voice is screaming ‘OPEN AND OPEN IT ALREADY.’ She runs the tip of her car key at the corners of the box, opens the package and wrapped in a newspaper is ……..

A throw cushion with hand made embroidery
showing a mother and her two children, all three,
full of glee,
under a tree,
not any tree,
but a Banyan tree,
with the Sun all shiny
and the grass dewy,
for it is the blog banner of yours truly

With the package is a hand written letter taped to a thank you card. The sight of the neat script, that is so precise and beautiful, some how completes the experience. She is thinking ‘Aren’t hand written notes the best?’. She is scanning the notes from top to bottom, savoring the feeling, making the sense of completion last a bit longer.

All this kindness for what? Because she advised T to take it easy and relax?! Apparently yes. T says in her note, “I wanted my ‘Thank You Loads’ gift to be a gesture of the permission for the relaxed time you enabled me to sanction myself and here is the fruitful endeavor.”

All that is running through her mind is, ‘I must be truly blessed. Not just for all the love and kindness that is bestowed on me. But also to be able to recognize, be aware and appreciate the kindness that comes my way.’

[tags]kindness, thankful[/tags]

Technorati Tags: hand embroidery, kindness, surprise packages, thanks you, throw pillow

 

As my children started showing interest in books, found myself in a tight spot. There was no dearth of books, don’t get me wrong. I found it difficult to pick the right kind of books. That is when I discovered Saffron Tree, every contributor so unique in their tastes, but all bound by the same thread – parents from India with a love for books.

After following Saffron Tree for eight months, I was asked to join the group. This invite, I felt, was an honor for a sporadic blogger like me. On Oct 23, Saffron Tree is celebrating its third anniversary and I am still happy to be a part of this group.

As a special treat we have our book festival ‘CROCUS 2009 – Around the World in Seven Days’ in which we will be reviewing culturally unique books from all over the world. Its not just reviews, we have author interviews and games.

Folks, hop over and see for yourself. Its a fun ride and as Praba says, you don’t need a passport or a plane ticket

Technorati Tags: children's books, CROCUS, kids literature, kidslit, Saffron Tree

Navarathiri has come and gone. Our golu dolls have been packed and tucked away in plastic boxes. For those who are wondering what I am talking about, navarathiri “means nine nights”. Golu is arranging dolls on steps in one’s house.

So why do South Indians display dolls for nine days during navarathiri? The belief is Goddess Durga, in order to slay the buffalo headed demon Mahisha – who was the embodiment of evil, meditated for nine days in order to gain strength and focus that was required to perform this deed. So dolls of gods and goddess are displayed on the steps. These dolls are considered the durbar of Durga and must not be moved/disturbed for the whole nine days. Special offerings are done very day in order to appease these various assortment of gods and goddesses in one’s home.

Not all South Indians celebrate navarathiri with golu. What used to be a matter of choice in the olden days became a family way of doing things. Growing up, golu was not the norm in my house. So as a child I have made sundal vists and dodged requests to sing. It is believed that people who come to golu have to sing in order to please the gods. But me singing would probably be in direct violation of the first premise that the dolls must not be disturbed. So I have always evaded the requests to sing with my trademark ‘asattu sirippu’. Who ever came up with the theory that all women have singing capabilities and those adhigaprasingi people who think that they can just say, “You have to sing. Otherwise you cannot leave my house.” *Rolling my eyes.* I always felt like answering, “Fine, I will move in….and will sing 24×7. Now THAT will teach you a lesson.”

In R’s house golu was celebrated in flourish. They used to be a joint family with all brothers, their wives and children living in a huge house. So golu was an occasion for the women in the family to express their artistic abilities. They made their own dolls, they created miniature parks and towns using what few things were available around the house. I am talking about 1960, when art and craft stores were non-existent. What with dressing up the kids, welcoming the visitors, golu was a major social thing for them. After R’s grandfather – the patriarch of the family died, the joint family arrangement slowly disintegrated and some how my MIL stopped the golu affair altogether.

I wanted to start golu at home, in order to show Chula and Mieja that we have a cultural equivalent of the Christmas tree. The understanding in the house since Chula has been 2.5 is, ‘You have a Christmas tree in your school. Your friends have a tree at their homes, because they are a tree family. But we are a step family. Every year around Oct we make steps and keep dolls for nine days. This is how our family does things.’ We waited for Mieja to turn three, so that she will not bring the steps down.

Year 2009 marks the first year that we formally start celebrating golu in our house. We did a five step golu and invited very close friends home for vethalai pakku. The idea is to keep the jing-bang relatively small and simple, so that I can sustain the tradition of golu for many years to come.

What one of my friend’s mom told me made a huge impact on me, in fact this was a driving force behind this post. She said,

“Devis, in olden days wore sarees had weapons and went on animals like lions or tigers in order to remove obstacle and to make the world a better place for every one present and for the future generation. You Devis, now a days wear pants, drive cars, but you are still doing the same. You are making the world a better place for your family through your love and you do everything in your capacity to remove all obstacles for your children.”

At that point I started thinking about all the Devis in my life. The more I think of all the support I got, the more I am moved by the love that surrounds me.

My chithi(my mom’s baby sister), who made a trip from Boston, to stay with me for two weeks, because this is my first golu. Though she is my chithi, she is only 12 years older to me. We grew up together and for all practical purposes, as sisters. We skip an entire generation, I call her by her name and Chula and Mieja call her chithi. For every major mile stone in my life, she has been there physically contributing her best. How can she miss my first golu? She did not make this trip to help me, she knows I can very well handle the golu and much more. But she said that she made this trip so that she can keep an eye one me, make sure that I don’t chew more than I can swallow and end up tired and all golued-out( pardon me for the expression ). Every step of the way, she was with me, bringing me back to focus when I spent half a day decorating and redecorating the golu backdrop, urging me to keep things simple, helping me make the prasadams, making kolams with the girls and clearing away the sink at the speed of lightning.

My mother, MIL and my SILs, though they were in India, I know for a fact that their hearts were in my house. Every moment of the nine days, they spent fanaticizing what the children would be doing, how I had arranged the dolls, how many people I would be inviting, how will I balance, work-home-kids-school-golu-visiting friends. Earlier this year my MIL and SILs visited us for about 6 weeks. Before their trip, my mother, my MIL and my SILs combed Chennai with a fine toothcomb in order to get dolls for my golu. How difficult is it to get a specific doll at off golu season, only they would know!

As I looked at my steps, I look at the different dolls I have acquired over the past years. Every single doll that has been displayed has a history behind it. Some highlights are

The electric silver lamps that my mother walked the whole of T.Nagar to buy, the pseudo banana tree that she looked for and drove my father crazy, the marapachi she sent over so that Chula and Mieja would know what kind of dolls she played with when she was a kid, the sandal wood Mahalakshmi my parents bought for our fifth wedding anniversary.

The foam Ganesha that YaadaYaada gave that reminds me of Meija. Something in the innocent hepless eyes or the way the Ganesha manages to loose his bindhi inspite of me super glue-ing the bindhis….

The chettiyar bommais that my first SIL bought. Mieja ALWAYS mixed the head and the body of the male and female and I would walk in to my living room and go, ‘Hmmmm something looks odd, but I cannot quite put my finger to it’.

The last step was for the kids. I gave them full autonomy as to what goes on it. They put all their Perler bead work on the last step. I have to point out to picture 15 in the slide show, the way the cups are hidden behind the house. When I suggested moving the cups in front of the house, I was rightly reprimanded by Chula, “Amma, the cups are not behind the house. They are IN the house. The people are having tea IN the house.” She walked away shaking her head disappointed that her mother couldn’t get this simple perspective.

Picture 16, the gold plated car R got from New Orleans when he went for a conference by himself. The first souvenir he bought back home without me asking ?

And for the laughs, when I asked the girls to get books from the bookshelf for Saraswathi Poojai, they got Twilight as MY book. I pointed that we must keep educational books and Twilight was fiction. They both echoed, “But, but you read this ALL the time?!”. Now you know of my reading tastes and why R calls me ‘thirty year old teenager’ ?

And then there was one act of supreme kindness a good week after navarathiri, that basically taught me that love is omnipresent and omnipotent. I will adjourn it for my next post, because I want you all fresh and alert when you read about it.

Now to my smilebox. Thanks for reading. LOVE, LAUGH, LIVE.

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[tags]navarathiri, golu, nine days[/tags]

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I am currently dropping Chula’s classmate at her house on the way back home from school. This child’s mother is travelling and hence she requested I do the pick-up-from-school-and-drop-off-at-home service. This other child, let us call her X, is the same age as Chula. She is a mellow, sweet kid and gels well with Chula and Mieja. All three were having a conversation in the car that I was privileged to listen to.

Chula is narrating the events of last weekend to X. She is talking about the navarathiri trips, golu visits and the friends she meets only when there is an occasion. At this point she says, “…and I was crying in S’s house.”

This piques X’s curiosity and she asks, “Crying? Why were you crying?”

To this Chula replies, “That’s because my sister left me alone in S’s room and closed the door. She was holding the doorknob tight from outside. I tried to open the door, I tried and tried and I got scared. So I started crying for my mommy. My mommy was sitting in the couch with P chithi and P aunty and A baby and N uncle. She heard me cry and started wondering where I was and what happened to me. So she walked through the kitchen, listening to where my voice was coming from. She walked down the hallway and came to the room I was standing and crying. She removed Mieja’s hand from the door knob and opened the door and kneeled down on the floor and hugged me tight and asked if I was okay. I said yes and started crying and my mommy helped me go to my heart and calmed me down.”

Yes, she does not talk in sentences, but in pages. There is no period, only ands and commas and the narration goes on and on. She was shut inside the room, but she had vividly imagined how I would have reacted when I heard her cry, how I reached the room ‘listening to her voice’ and removed Mieja’s hand from the doorknob before I opened the door. This is my Chula.

As to Mieja, she must have felt left out with S and Chula jumping and having fun. She must have tried her best to talk the other two girls to include her in the play. I can totally picture her drawing her to her full 30 inches of height, hands on hips and saying, “Hey, but I want to play with you guys too”, for I have seen her do it only a billion times. She must have gotten frustrated that words were not making an impact, she must have been more angry at her sister than at S for not including her, so she must have taken it out on her sister. I am positive she would have waved her right index finger at her sister and would have said, “Then, I am not going to play with you any more. I am walking away from you.”, this I have seen a kabillion times, and closed the room door. One thing Mieja knows, if her sister storms out of the closed door, she would come out and express her displeasure physically. So she stood outside the door holding on to the doorknob, so that Chula cannot come out. While I understand what she did, I do not approve of it, disclaimer in case these kids grow up and get to read this and accuse me that I take sides, this is my Mieja and she is like this only.

Anyways, where was I? Yes, in the car driving to X’s house. X being an only child is mortified. All this locking out drama appalls her. But X adores Mieja, she probably thinks that Mieja is innocent, helpless and is not capable of such an act. So turns to Mieja and asks her, “Did you do that?” I am looking at Mieja through the rear view mirror. She is looking out of the window as if she is the only passenger in the car. It looks as if she never heard the conversation. At this point X appropriately draws her breath in sharply and in her most disapproving tone says, “That is so mean of Mieja”, Chula nods her approval. X says, “Mieja is so mean. Let us not play with her anymore.” For this Chula replies, “Okay, but I have to play with her in the afternoons*.” X is puzzled and asks her why and Chula replies, “Because she is my sister and I love her.”

At this point, Madam-pretending-not-to-listen turns to her sister and says, “Akka, I love you too. I want to be your friend too.”

I am smiling. I grew up as an only child I am not sure of all the sibling dynamics. When my children are constantly in each other’s face, I wonder if this is normal and if they will turn out to be tolerant and loving to each other in the future. But instances like this give me reassurance and satisfaction.

 

Technorati Tags: Sibling Love, sisters