Letters To Koko

 Dear Koko,  The phone has become such a constant in  your life now - the Roblox, the FIFA, the hundred other games which sit on my paid memory for no good reason. What i did not realize is that you are also a connoisseur of all things absurd that the internet has to offer.  Just the other day you start a story, "Ma this is a regular Madagascar story, ok?" Now Madagascar is easily one of my favorite animation movies. I mean who doesn't love Marty? I know, you're more of an Alex fan. So i was quite pleasantly surprised when you wanted to share this story. I thought maybe this is something you heard in school, in between your Pokémon card trading.  So what I gathered is that there is a an own called Flaco who was the resident of the zoo in New York. You said that his face reminded you of Hedwig. I mean sure, how many owls do we know? So our Flaco was an eagle-owl who was born in captivity. He lived ten long years in the zoo. While he was there, he was not really a...

 Hi Koko,  Do you know what I love more than anything else in the world - freebies! If I suddenly get a free shampoo in my grocery order, or an extra serving in my KFC order I am the happiest happy person on the planet. So let me tell you the story of a chance that i got to see an exclusive art exhibit, with wine and cheese and all! So we were on the last leg of our Italy trip and we had a lazy day where our plan was to just walk around and explore Rome. As we were walking through the ruins of the Pantheon we heard the word which can strike terror into the heart of any parent who se child has recently graduated to a diaper free life - potty! Yes, there in the middle of ruins (literally!) you needed to get on with your business! What's with you, wonders of the world and potty. But more on that later.  So while we asked you to pose or some such other irrelevant trick to divert your mind, you had only one thing on your mind and we had no choice but to hunt for a toilet there...

 Dear Koko,  Today is the day when you returned home early because of a bomb scare! I mean, what world are we living in? I remember when we were in school and we would get an early off or a day off due to heavy rains and we would have the time of our lives. The most "man-made" of these day offs would be a bandh, which was quite a frequent affair since we grew up in a Communist state. Communism meant something back then, seems eons ago though.  But this is new, this is something I have never experienced and hope never to. It was morning and i was on an office call at 11 AM, when my colleague, who also lives in Bangalore pinged me, enquiring of I had been following the news. Of course I had not. Who has the time to look at what's going on in the world when there are beautiful Excels to admire? When I did look at the phone, it was filled with new of several schools in Bangalore getting bomb threats. The news was just developing so much information was not available o the cha...

 Dear Koko,  A few days ago, you had a field trip. This is an annual ritual which you quite enjoy. When you were in kindergarten, you went to a car showroom and I believe that day Maruti had zero sales on Sarjapur Road. The ocean of questions they had to manage! Last year you went to a farm and did pottery and whatnot.  This year was a similar experience - there was ridding of horses and feeding of rabbits. Your takeaway was that horses shit a lot and rabbit stink. All valid life lessons. There were some other activities too, like rock climbing and zip lining.  When you returned from the trip, we went to pick you up from school. It rained so much that day that our big black umbrella tore and I was completely drenched when Baba picked me up from across the road. As with the strange Bangalore rains it was apparently quite dry on the other side of town so when he saw me he was quite surprised! Anyway, we had to cross quite an amount of traffic to finally reach your scho...

 Dear Koko,  The lifelong struggle of mother and son has begun - homework, homework and more homework! It seems like a never ending saga, where you try to get out of work and I try to best you at your game. We have all done it, disclosing only as much is needed, artfully hiding facts, giving out half truths as per your own convenience. For generations children have duped their mothers so.  So I will tell you what happened a couple of days back. You had to complete your Kannada homework and there were a number of questions to be done - around four or five. Now while I make an impression that I am checking your work, to be honest I cannot tell one letter from the other in Kannada. the script is just pictures to me and I am quite illiterate when it comes to this language. So mostly I have to go by what you tell me. So I tell you "Koko you have this homework and you gotta complete it".  You begrudgingly sit down. You make five trips to the bathroom, sharpen your pencil t...

 Dear Koko,  Let this letter bear witness to how one hero fell and the other emerged in your life. Also, how you apparently hated Harry Kane at a time and now worship his every move.  Every generation has a hero figure. If the conversation is about cricket, our parents would talk about Gavaskar and Kapil Dev and how they are just a class apart. When we were young and we would go ga ga over Sachin, Ganguly and Dravid, they would reluctantly agree they are maybe half not bad. If we were discussing football, I remember my father saying Maradona or Pele are the best that the world has seen. They would smile in amusement when we were besotted with the Beckhams or Ronaldos of the world.  Well, history repeats itself and how! When you would talk about Virat Kohli and how amazing he is, I would eyeroll. How can anyone be better than Sachin? And then, Kohli equalled Sachin's One Day hundreds and I think to myself, move lazily in the couch and take notice, alright, he is not h...

 Dear Koko,  When I was young I heard these stories of my father growing up with so many siblings and cousins in the same house. They would be running around the village enjoying themselves like there is no tomorrow. My mother's side had similar stories - of festivals and bhai phonta.  I grew up as a single child but always had cousins around me, at least in the same city. So if it was a birthday or a family function, you would have those familiar faces who you could look at as you were cornered by a pesky relative and they could make you smile from across the room. Sometimes I think about you and feel such a secluded childhood you are having. Your cousins are in different cities, in different parts of the world. you don't really know them. The other day you tell me, "when we go to Kolkata this time will we visit my cousins?" "Which ones" I ask.  "The ones who had a dog named Goochie" You were referring to a friend's kids. I correct you and you...