A Vegetarian's Guide To Survival In A Non Vegetarian World...

A couple of weeks ago we had 'Open House' at school. For the uninitiated and for those who may not have read my post about it a few years ago, it is a day when teachers and parents mingle in school over tea, coffee and snacks, and then we follow a mini version of our children's daily schedule. The teachers in each class talk about the syllabus, their rules and expectations and yes, Indian/ Indian origin parents are forbidden from asking 'How is my child doing?' !! ( Translation : Will he/she be the next Satya Nadella/ Sundar Pichai/ Indira Nooyi. Please understand it's an American school so we Indians are willing to give references they would comprehend immediately!) Jokes apart, Open House takes place when school has been going on for less than ten days!
This Open House had one major change! The number of Indian/Kenindian parents has gone up in the last few years and the number of vegetarians has dramatically increased. The school seems to have taken cognisance of this and we actually had 'pure' vegetarian snacks laid out for us on pretty platters! I remember many a day when the only thing I could pick from the whole array was a sorry looking cookie which probably had egg in it...Times had changed and how!
Times change but Indians don't! Even as I stood in queue for the veg samosas each 'pure' vegetarian was frantically confirming from the other. "Are you sure it's veg?' 'What is in it?' "Potatoes, peas, carrots?' 'Are you SURE?' 'Double check!' Most of us neatly dissected the Samosa the minute we plopped it onto our plates. The biology teacher would have been proud of us! We trawled through the stuffing the way those foraging for gold in rivers sift through silt. Once we were completely satisfied that there was 'nothing' in it, did it find its way into our mouths, 'nothing' being a euphemism among vegetarian Indians for chicken, fish, meat and often eggs too.
And so I thought this was a good time to put into writing a guide that has been bubbling through my mind for many years, especially as many vegetarian Indian students are leaving home and hearth for the first time to go and study abroad, notwithstanding the fact that the Indian Rupee stands at an all time high with respect to the American dollar. I know I am laying my head on my non vegetarian friends' well scrubbed chopping boards but so be it! This survival guide is based on lessons learnt during the thirteen years that I have lived outside India, out of my twenty vegetarian ones. Yes, I know I just opened up a can of worms right there but I will not elaborate on that here!

1. The Samosa and/or the Spring Roll. The Samosa, a deliciously sinful creation of carbohydrates stuffed in fried refined flour dough, is available on every street corner in India and can be eaten there without undergoing the ritual I described earlier. However the world outside India has come up with their own non vegetarian version which has chicken/meat and may be fish at times. So you will say you will order a vegetarian one and be done with it! No! Hotel freezers are chaotic places and the two versions often get badly mixed up because they look exactly the same from outside! This happened to me on a pristine beach in a popular resort in Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania. But cautious me had broken it into two first, only to find that it was the meat version! Back it went where it had come from and I refused to accept a replacement because obviously their veggie and meat ones were jostling next to each other somewhere in their kitchen!
Ditto for spring rolls! These Chinese creations, now comfortable in their spicy Indian Avtaar, come in the chicken variant too and get mixed up with the veg version. It happened to me during a late, lazy Sunday lunch in a tranquil garden restaurant in Nairobi, Kenya. But clever me had cut it into two first to check and sure enough slivers of chicken flesh burst onto my plate in all their stringy glory...I did not go back to that particular restaurant for the next two years!
 Moral: Chop and examine thoroughly before consumption!

2. Pizza. That tempting creation of the Italians now trademarked by the Americans! Pizza Hut came to India and the eating out part of life, as we knew it, was never the same again! Indianized Pizzas with spice and all that's nice soon began rolling out of those customised ovens and every kid wanted a birthday party in a Pizza Hut outlet. We took our four year old daughter to one such brand new place for her first 'not made at home' pizza and ordered one choc full of veggies. The one that landed up at our table turned out to be choc full of chicken instead! The lady in Pune, India, had messed up our order! I was VERY suspicious when I looked at it  but still took a tentative bite against my instincts, only to spit out the tiny morsel. My poor daughter was so traumatised that she did not eat pizza, unless it was home made, for the next four years! Had this happened in the United States, I've been told, we could have sued them for sure!
Moral: Dissect your pizza too. Yes, even lift the puddle of melted cheese and see if anything that was once living, is lurking beneath!

3.Burger. Mcdonald's outlets in India are, by and large, quite careful and other than Indianizing the menu to sooth our hot and fiery palates, also have a green dot on the box to indicate vegetarian items. But once you step out of India, you better watch out! On a crisp,cold summer morning nineteen years ago, my husband and I set out to visit the Tzar's Summer Palace. We decided to have breakfast in a Mcdonald's outlet and poor, ignorant me, ordered a cheeseburger. The sight of the warm, brown burger bun stoked my appetite and young, hungry me took a giant bite! The next moment all hell broke loose in St.Petersburg, Russia as it turned out there was a meat cutlet in a CHEESE burger and I spat it out as fast and as thoroughly as I could, without caring a fig for my table manners!
Moral: Lift the top portion of the bun, scrutinise the innards with a magnifying glass, replace the top, consume if satisfied.

4.Ice cream, jellies, custard and cheese. If we have lived in India all our lives we assume ice cream is vegetarian as are jelly and cheese. Sadly, outside India one has to look for ice cream which says suitable for vegetarians which means no animal fat has been used by that particular brand to make it creamy. It's the same case with cheese so look for ones that are made without animal rennet and be sure to ask your pizza/burger place which cheese they use, if you, like me, are extremely particular about what you pop in into your mouth. Vegetarian jelly crystals and custard powder are not always available and most imported brands use gelatin derived from animal sources. So I simply pack a few packets of various flavours and get them with me.They are available at your neighbourhood grocer in India! And yes, don't give your kids gummy bears or other sweets that contain gelatin.

5. Miscellaneous: Oil! Oil that has been used to fry non veg food items imparts a fishy odour to the veg items that might have been fried in it later. So make it clear to who ever is in charge to use fresh oil to fry your food! It happened to me at an Indian "acquaintance's" house in Dar Es Salaam. No, my friends would never make such an error! I forced down that tiny veg cutlet with great difficulty and said NO to seconds!
Pasta sauce: It looks like tomato sauce but often has a meat base! So call for the chef and ask if you are eating at a buffet table. Don't assume it is vegetarian because it 'looks' vegetarian!
If you are a vegetarian and are invited to someone's home for a meal, please specify before hand what you DON'T eat! It's not rude. It's even worse to say no after they have taken the trouble of cooking for you! It happened to me in Nairobi where two of the three dishes had egg as the main ingredient and I landed up eating only the boiled squash! I had assumed they knew I did not eat eggs, unless invisible in a cake!
Beware of dimly lit 'romantic' restaurants! A pricey Indian one in Nairobi nearly turned out to be my undoing as they served us chicken tikka in a gravy instead of the paneer (cottage cheese)  tikka we had ordered. Only my paranoia of being served non veg saved me as I asked for another candle to examine the dish before I served the kids! And sure enough I had to return the item!
Once in a foreign land, specify what vegetarian means! Spell it out by saying no chicken, no meat of ANY kind, no fish and no eggs, if applicable to you. Soup from which those floating chicken pieces have been removed, is not classified as vegetarian. Nor is rice from which the meat has been picked out. So open your mouth and ask/ tell, else who knows what you might unwittingly put in! There are no helpful green for vegetarian /red for not dots made compulsory by the Indian government for all packaged food items, once you leave your native shore. So use your brain, if in doubt just refrain!

Disclaimer: This is not intended to hurt any sentiments but is a genuine attempt to help fellow vegetarians, specially the students with their brand new passports and matching Louis Vuitton luggage, as colleges reopen the world over! So my non vegetarian readers, do take this with a spoon of salty vegetables!

Fitting Into Your Teen's Jeans

Fitting into your teen's trendy jeans
Makes one feel like the Queen of Queens!
You'd thought they were to step into your low heeled shoes?
And instead you are sliding into their skinny denim blues?

Those long ago bloated times one is quick to recall
Those few months of the nine when nothing fitted at all!
Only baggy tracks and a baggier tee,
At that point were comfortable for me.

Bringing up the kids in my twenties and thirties took their toll
And around my waist crept up a bulky fat roll!
I hit the treadmill with renewed determination,
And soon those fat cells faced extermination.

The great results were visible for all to see
'Are you sisters?', people often ask my teen and me!
'Mother and Daughter', one proudly proclaims,
'She's NOT my sister', the teen loudly exclaims.

'Dear girl, you'll always be smarter and better than your mother
So don't work yourself up into a foamy lather!
For Child is Father/Mother of the Man/Woman,
And we really hope we've produced a better human.'

In twelve short months you'll be gone to college
Where you will be garnering scientific knowledge!
At your empty cupboard I'll be left staring,
All the while wondering how you are faring.

Leave me a pair of your faded jeans
A small reminder of your wonderful teens!
They will ensure I won't eat my way through my sorrow,
After all, we are sending you away for a brighter tomorrow.

And I hope I will keep fitting into your jeans,
Even when you are years away from your teens!
And one day I hope you will fit into the jeans of YOUR teens,
For remember I gave you MY genes...

Of Venerable Veterinarians And Other Incredible Indians.

'What a summer this has been!' Summer because it's an American School so it was the children's summer vacation. But since we were in India, it would be technically correct to say 'What a Monsoon this has been!'And because we live in Kenya below the equator, the correct phrase applicable here would be 'What a winter this has been!' Irrespective of the name that we accord to the last two months, the fact remains that it was one of the busiest but most fascinating times in my life and the children's lives.
The story that culminated in this experience has its origins in the routine visits to the veterinarian for my parents' dog, the cutest looking dachshund imaginable and it all began more than sixteen years ago. When my daughter was a toddler, I used to drive my mother down to the vet's clinic many a time, puppy and baby in tow! I thought it was a good chance for our little one to see various breeds of dogs that she used to look at only in books. And to see a few cats too, for her love of animals was apparent even as a fifteen month old when she used to fearlessly hug and cuddle our dog and enjoy being licked, while carefully turning her face away as she knew our strict rule where her face was concerned!
Should we have been surprised then, when as a mere five year old, she declared with absolute conviction and confidence that she wanted to be a veterinary surgeon? That's an age when kids are still struggling with their ABCs and 123s... And to top it all she went and declared it outright to our vet during our dog's next check up, also coolly informing her that she would practise with her, except on the occasions when she took a holiday to model! Model??!! This was one of the most embarrassing moments for me as a parent and I fervently hope our vet has forgotten it!
And so time flew and we moved to Kenya when she was in 8th grade. The American system allowed her to choose subjects that would be absolutely required for veterinary medicine and she persevered on her chosen path. When we began meeting representatives from colleges around the world last year, we discovered that to apply to colleges outside India, she would have to include some experience of having worked with animals on her personal statement. And so the agenda for our 'summer' was set!
As an educator and an educational entrepreneur for the last seventeen plus years, I have become used to people coming to me for help and advice regarding schools, colleges, coaching classes, the various education boards we have in India and the biggest hurdle 'how to face a school admission interview.' I have been tirelessly giving my time and energy, without charging a dime, as I always said it was my way of giving back to society for the fact that both our children got into Pune's top school, without influence or shelling out capitation money, on sheer merit alone. And now, I found myself holding the other end of the stick! I had to contact people and ask for advice and request them to accommodate my daughter, so she could fulfil a college application requirement! Now all the help I had extended to countless people seemed to be coming right back to me!
The system in India works differently. You are admitted to Veterinary College on the basis on your marks in 12th grade and the entrance exam. No one asks for experience before hand, unlike the rest of the world! So first we had to explain in painstaking detail why she needed to do this. Then we had to work out suitable timings with each person, as the colleges require varied experiences. Club this with her Advanced Placement Biology and Calculus coaching classes and our hands were more than full, well they were overflowing actually!
The first person to give her permission to observe practice was our own dearest vet, the lady who, along with our dog, was responsible for setting our child on this path. She is one of Pune's busiest vets but gladly accommodated a vet-to- be, giving her the vantage point to view the surgeries too and making her feel needed in the clinic! There is no concept of veterinary nursing in India as far as I understand, so she has trained two ladies to help her and these two were kindness itself to us, often signalling to me from inside to wait for just five more minutes, when I went to pick up my daughter and even telling us on which days surgeries were scheduled so we could come accordingly! Since I had my own students to teach too, my mother often went to drop her along with my son and my three year old niece, with all of them sitting outside the clinic for hours, observing animals ! So in essence, the whole family had to be included for the sake of one aspiring vet, but we never heard a word of complaint!
The Pune zoo was a different story altogether. It covers hundreds of acres and has many animals all of which are under the 'wild' category and so there is little routine vet care given. The Deputy Director was sweet enough to give us a quick call when they had to treat an animal as an emergency or when they had to, sadly for us, post mortem one. My daughter, son and I had to rush there then, just so she would not miss a minute of the action and once again we were made to feel very welcome. We invaded their kitchens, morning and noon so she could observe how food for herbivores and carnivores is prepared, (Twenty sacks of carrots alone, no joke!), asked inane questions like 'Why are you adding saw dust?' (It turned out to be wheat chaff!),  all of which were answered patiently. From the Director to the Education Officer, from the Head Animal Keeper to the Tiger Feeding In charge, everyone was gracious to us and eagerly shared their roles with us, never making us feel superfluous or unwelcome. We got to see tigers, and leopards and bears being fed with just an iron grill separating them and us, and saw the intricate locking systems used, making us realise afresh every job is important and should be given your utmost, just as these people were doing!
My sister in law's super kind friend's husband owns nine race horses and he got us into the hallowed precincts of one of Pune's most famous colonial landmarks - the Race Course. And we suddenly found ourselves face to face with thorough breds! My daughter got to see India's top equine surgeon in action as he castrated colts as adroitly as we would chop our daily veggies! Wounded horses were expertly dressed, yet others X rayed and a few injected. And again we got a close and personal look at the whole set up, a warm welcome and lots of advice! They were all genuinely interested in her aspirations and desires and gave candid advice, despite their obviously busy schedules. It was the first time I had seen six or seven veterinarians together and I was awed! The Pune races had just got over and we had barged in into what was a super busy day for them all, but not a "neigh' did we hear! We will always be grateful for this.
I drove the fifty odd kilometres down to the veterinary college closest to our city. A professor I met there welcomed my son and me warmly and deputed a student who had just finished her final year Viva Vocce to take us around the college. She and another post graduate student spoke to us at length about the merits of various colleges in India and abroad, the struggle for seats for a Master's Degree in India for people like us who belong to the 'Open Category' and the woes of sharing a bathroom with many other girls in the ladies hostel!
At the end of a summer of blood and gore, healing and death, I asked my daughter ' You are sure this is exactly what you want to do?' The answer was a resounding "YES!" Why was I not surprised?
My son, on the other hand, categorically declared that veterinary medicine was one field that was definitely NOT for him!
The holidays were an eye opener for me because I realised anew that there are lots of people out there in this world who are willing to help you and go out of their way for you. Incredible as it may seem, we were never turned down, though these were their work places that we were invading and their personal territory that not just one, but most of the time three of us, were trampling on! If there is a lot of evil in this world, there is a ton of good too. You just have to open your mouth and ask and sure enough the good flows your way! Regardless of whether she gets accepted next year into veterinary medicine or not, we will never forget this 'vet' monsoon/summer/winter!

                                                                Pune Race Course

                                                           Pune Wild Life Centre

Reunion 2015

When school friends after decades meet,

It is, indeed, a sweet treat.

It is icing on the cake of life,

Momentarily ones forgets one is a mother and a wife.

As we all go down memory lane,

It is, as if, we are in school again.

Long forgotten anecdotes are revived,

That was our life and we survived!

Memories of beloved teachers are stirred up again,

It's clear their lessons were not in vain.

A faded uniform is dredged up by a mother now grown old,

The sight of it is more precious than gold!

The miracle is, in it, our friend still fits,

From her we surely need some diet tips!

On the surface we may seem just the same,

But life's not always been a smooth game.

Greying hair, a wrinkle, an extra pound or may be a few,

We've gone too far to step back into that Bata shoe.

Girls of fifteen sixteen we are no more,

Some hearts among us will be forever sore.

A mother, oft times a father, did not see their girl as a blushing bride,

And yet the daughters took it in their stride.

A husband gone to the Maker far too soon,

What happened to that wedding boon?

A child snatched back by the Gods,

Who knew life came with heart wrenching odds?

A special child needs his mother's constant attention and lots of care,

But then we didn't know life wasn't always fair.

For yet others separation and divorce loom,

They never imagined this when they garlanded their groom.

The brightest amongst us is already a Star,

Did she look down and witness our reunion from afar?

One day we will tell her daughters their mother will always be missed,

Of her virtues, to them, we will read out a list.

Did we realize on that long ago glorious March day,

That LIFE, not us, would have the final say?

'Maggi'cal Two Minutes or Miasmic Ones?

A few years ago, the brand that is making headlines in India over the last few days for its purported high lead levels and mono sodium glutamate content, asked for personal 'Maggi' stories, for advertisement purposes. For the uninitiated, ( read my readers of non Indian origin! ), Maggi is the name of the most popular brand of instant noodles in India, marketed by none other than the multinational giant Nestle, of the Kit Kat chocolate fame. I, mercifully for me and my husband and children, have never been a fan of Maggi but I did have a couple of personal stories that I never made the effort to send to them ! Now when every Arnab, Rajdeep and Vishnu and every Barkha, Shobha and Tavleen is airing his or her opinion on every single Indian News Channel on television, let me add my 'masala' (spice) to the hot water too...
A tight, rigid, socialist economy in India meant that as school kids we were exposed to barely a couple of international brands while growing up. So imagine my surprise one day, way back in the year 1983, when huge boxes were brought into our class room at school and brightly coloured packets popped out. We were each given a free packet to take home and try. My sister brought home one too and we had our first taste of instant noodles! Nestle started with just one flavour - Capsicum- to entice the Indian market and that was the start of a huge revolution where, slowly but surely, many Indian school kids were weaned away from traditional Indian home made snacks and Maggi was introduced in their stead, in many homes across different strata of society. I still remember the cost of a packet then. It was all of one rupee! (1/65 of an American dollar!).
In India it was cleverly marketed as something your mother fed you because she really loved you and cared for your feelings and wanted to cheer you up. They picked up the "tag" line that kids say all over the world to their mothers the minute they are able to verbalize their feelings " Mummy I'm hungry! - Mummy bhook lagi hai, in my national language Hindi ! And the solution? The mother could cook and serve the noodles in just a couple of minutes! The child would feel great and the mother would feel good, duty done with minimal effort!
Thankfully for me, my own mother never fell pray to this gimmick but my sister was a fan of this new snack on the block, so we did have it occasionally! One such occasion was when an unexpected guest had dropped in and my mother did not have time to make us a hot snack by the time we came home from school. So she handed me a couple of rupees,(yes just two rupees, hard to believe but true!) and asked me to buy two packets of Maggi. We lived in a huge colonial bungalow as my Dad was then posted to our home town Pune. So I got onto my bicycle and pedalled up the drive way and opened the high gate without getting off my bike, by shoving it with my foot. My little toe got caught in the chicken wire that was entwined on the gate and I yanked it out. It hurt a bit but I cycled to the shop, bought the Maggi Noodles and cycled back home. By this time, my little toe was swollen and throbbing and I just collapsed on the sofa. Diagnosis? A fractured and dislocated toe which had to be set under general anaesthesia. Those packets of Maggi certainly proved expensive for my parents since my Dad rushed me to a private hospital and not the free Army one!
Cut to a few years later and we were planning my sister's ninth birthday party. We were scratching our heads hard for an appropriate return gift when we suddenly hit upon the idea of a Maggi noodle packet for each child. By the late eighties, the price of a packet had shot up from a rupee to five rupees but it was still very affordable and much loved amongst most kids. So it was indeed a brainwave!
The party was a huge success, every one ate to their heart's content but each child's eyes really lit up as those yellow packets were brought out and there were shouts of glee! Such was the excitement that instant noodles generated in our childhood... The next morning every single mother called up mine and told her their child had insisted on making and having the noodles that very night! They could not even wait till the next morning for this treat. Stomachs full of party food were no bar for Maggi Magic!
By this time Tomato and Masala flavours had been added to the original Capsicum one and they introduced a non vegetarian flavour too. It came as a boon to students in hostels, to bachelors and to many harried mothers who had started working full time by the time the nineties dawned. It was a god send to Indians travelling to countries where finding vegetarian food was a challenge. Maggi needed just hot water and two minutes to make! Soon, Maggi with real vegetables was introduced and then Oats Maggi "with fibre" was marketed with a vengeance, though how processed food can have fibre is beyond my thinking skills! The punch line this time was "Taste bhi (also) , Health bhi," probably to assuage all those guilty consciences who knew they weren't ingesting the healthiest of foods...
 Long ago, my own mother was once excitedly telling me how our neighbour's nine year old son drew up a chair to the kitchen counter each day, lit the gas and cooked himself Maggi, since his mother was out for work when he returned. I was in my mid teens at that time but the incongruity of it struck me even then. I asked her if it was really safe for such a young child to light the gas when alone at home and secondly was it really good to have Maggi every single day?
That is the question our government is now asking too. Many of the Northern states of India have banned sales of the yellow packet for the next few days and every single state is now carrying on independent tests. The verdict remains to be seen. But my daughter gave her verdict long ago, as a seven year old, while studying in the Indian School in Dar es Salam, Tanzania. When asked by classmates why she brought 'parathas' (Indian whole wheat flat bread)  to school in her lunch box every single day when practically every Indian expatriate kid was getting Maggie, she was quick to answer " It's because my mother cares about my health!"
Yes, my kids can safely say, "Mummy I'm hungry". There's no way they will be served mouthfuls of lead and MSG, ban or no ban !

Whirling On The Whirligig Of Time ...

What a dizzying academic year this has been! And it has finally come to an end. School closed yesterday for the summer break and today is the first time in many months that I feel I can sit down and catch my breath. Life is rushed for everyone, of course, these days but with a daughter who just finished 11th grade in the American system and a son in his last year of Elementary school, things can get really busy.
At the beginning of the year I made a list of all the exams that my daughter had to appear for during the course of the year as a pre requisite for college admissions. Unlike India where we feel rushed after the 12th grade results, here the students start applying to various colleges right at the beginning of their 12th grade. She converted the whole list into a wall chart and we realized she would be giving some exam or the other practically every month! The beauty of the American system is that either you can choose to do the bare minimum required or you can do it all! No prizes for guessing which way most Indian parents and students go! And being Juniors this year, they also had to organize and host a number of social events for their Seniors, the 12th graders. For two major events they even had to raise money on their own, through bake sales, beverage sales and goody basket auctions.
Work life balance is an important part of this system. We, back home, cannot imagine that our children will be running around organizing the decor for a banquet when they have a major exam just the following weekend. But, as my daughter succinctly pointed out, their national level exams like the ACT and the SAT do not test what you learnt 'by heart' the previous night! It is test of your cumulative learning throughout your school life, specially your high school years. And the amount of work that you do besides academics counts for a lot too, as it is the school teachers who give recommendations, which form an integral part of your college applications. No college wants a student who cannot pull his or her weight, along with the rest of the class!
Add a couple of Art courses to this jamboree, which were allotted to her in the same term this year, and neither she nor I fell asleep before 1:00 am on any given night! She, because she was busy perfecting that illustration or completing the painting assignment and me because I cannot rest till she is safely tucked into bed and asleep! We could have filed a patent for raccoon eyes in humans! The other good thing about this system of education is that you have to complete a certain number of sport, art and technology credits to graduate from high school. Can you imagine Indian students in India doing this, unless they specifically want to enter those fields? Even my extremely vivid imagination fails me here...
My little one who, I realize from time to time, is not so little any more, was a busy bee this year. He was chosen to be a part of the leadership team in the Elementary school and had major parts in two plays. He went on his first Cultural Field Studies Trip and to a Leadership camp too. He started drum lessons and started learning his fourth language, French, too. It may not sound like much when it is put down here, but try planning and scheduling these events and classes, gathering props and shopping for necessities for camps and overnight trips and it added a new dimension to my life altogether!
This was also the year of the health scare. My husband was diagnosed with multiple gall stones (yes enough to make a pretty yellow necklace and a matching ear rings set)  and flew to India for a quick surgery. He was diagnosed just when he had been transferred to Colombo, Sri Lanka, the Emerald Isle. So it turned out to be the year of a Big Decision too! An offer from a British company dropped into his lap just then. So should he move and should I stay in Kenya with the kids till our daughter finished 12th grade became the moot question. Moving her in her final year of school was not an option at all. Had he been transferred a year later it would surely have been 'Kwaheri (Goodbye) Kenya for us! Finally we decided life was too short and too unpredictable to stay apart when we could choose to be here together. Also it will be our last year as a family as she moves away to college next year and then will come home only in the vacations. And, as we all know, it's never the same again...And so it was onto a new job for him! All those prayers that were said for us to continue in Kenya till she finished 12th grade had, indeed, wrought a miracle...A heartfelt thank you to all who prayed for us.
Club all this with my students in India who I teach on Skype, managing the education franchise that I own back home and the volunteering I do in school here, I really felt as if I was on a top that spun rapidly and just kept on spinning with increasing velocity! This month saw guests from India coming here on a vacation and planning their trip to Tanzania and then the Equator and taking them around sight seeing and shopping in Nairobi added another fun element to all that was already on my plate! When three of the four ladies adopted baby elephants at the Sheldrick's Elephant Orphanage, I felt it had been worth the efforts I had taken to ensure an enjoyable holiday for them!
The last few weeks of school saw me attending the drum recital where my son showcased his new found drumming skills, my daughter's induction into the National Honor Society, her academic prize program and  the art event where she won a second prize for her painting 'Beaded Bystanders' in the mixed media section. I missed my son's group dance at the talent show as my guests and I had to be in another part of town that day but did manage to make it for his Promotion Ceremony where he and his classmates graduated from Elementary School and have now moved on to Middle School! He is growing up!
The final event of the year was a huge one that is a tradition in the American School system. We, the Mothers of the Junior Class, along with our children, host the tea that follows the High School Graduation ceremony which marks the end of school life for the 12th graders. It is a land mark event and we catered for six hundred and fifty people all by ourselves! It was exhausting but with everyone willing to pitch in and help we pulled it off very successfully!
Once that event was over day before yesterday, I could feel the whirligig slowing down but only until the next academic year, of course! All this just made me realize that time is flying, the children are growing up and away...As my daughter says, imagine now WE are the Senior Class! No, I cannot imagine, looks like my imagination has failed yet again!

                                     Time is Whirling! Elementary memories are swirling!

                                         Suited and booted, ready for Middle School

                                                         Drumming away to glory!

                                                          And the award goes to.....

Of Mothers And Daughters, Of Tea And Tears...

I had been reading those Senior Mother Daughter Tea invitations in the on line school weekly news magazine ever since we moved to Kenya almost four years ago. And though it sounded good I did not give it more than a fleeting thought simply because my daughter was eons away from being a Senior, or as we say in India, a twelfth grade student. Or so I thought...
I saw the invitation a couple of weeks ago too and then I realised WE would be the ones to whom that invitation would be addressed next year! This seems to be a traditional American High School event and we have nothing even remotely like it in India, as far as I know. And then a week ago I got an invite to help for this event. The teacher who invited me explained that they invite a few mothers of Junior girls to help set up and serve the tea and snacks so that they, in turn, can continue the tradition the following year, when their own daughters are Seniors and ready to graduate from school. When it comes to volunteering I am often the first one off the block and if it means a totally new experience, I am more than ready. So I immediately agreed to come and help and looking back I would not have missed this event for the world!
A weather forecast of heavy rain in Nairobi last Sunday afternoon entailed a last minute change of venue from beside the school pool to the Elementary School library. Tables covered with spotless white table cloths, jars and huge shining kettles filled with the prettiest flowers Nairobi has to offer formed a colourful backdrop to the tea party as we quickly set everything in place. Pretty printed disposable plates, colourful paper napkins in pastel shades of pink, green, yellow and blue and flower patterned delicate bone china cups as part of the centre pieces gave it the perfect feminine touch required. The flower filled jars of varying sizes nestled up in colourful cotton Kikoi cloths which were scrunched up in the centre of each table, offering a deep East African connect, as it is from this continent that each young lady invited that day will soon step out into the real world of adulthood, independence, college...
And then the Senior mothers and their daughters began trickling in. A bit of chit chat, mingling, introductions, even as we Junior mothers observed and marvelled at the self possessed young ladies who were so well coiffured and perfectly turned out. Soon after every one had tucked in into the delicious food and fruit punch, it was time to sit back with a cup of tea or coffee and await the unfolding of the main ceremony. It began with a blessing by a Senior mother for all the girls as they entered this last month of their school life before they left this safe and secure world of school and home forever. Then each mother in turn had to say a few words about her daughter and bless her with a small gift, usually in the form of a scarf, a stole or a shawl which signified that the daughter would always be covered with the mother's love, blessing and prayers, no matter where in the world she might be.
Before they began this ceremony, they passed around a basket of small packets of tissues, daintily tied up with yellow ribbons, and each mother and daughter helped herself to a pack. There were three other mothers of Junior girls who were helping out along with me and we were at a table by ourselves and the basket almost by passed us as we were not sending away our girls just yet, but I was quick to grab a pack! I have inherited the most weak lachrymal glands possible. They leak even when I laugh so you can imagine what happens when a situation actually warrants tears!
Each mother, though determined not to shed a tear, was soon crying freely as she, in her turn, spoke about her own daughter and shared her inner most thoughts and hopes for her daughter. Sobs and sniffles dominated each speech. Some mothers spoke extempore, others had flash cards but could not see enough to read through their tears, still others had typed out words on handheld devices but forgot passwords or had to search for their spectacles, clearly spelling out that they did, indeed, have grown up daughters! Most of the girls had tears in their eyes too but were smiling broadly as well, eager to taste a new life. Many held on to their mothers as they struggled to speak, as if to lend them strength, as the mothers spoke of mentally preparing for the fact that all too soon it would be time to say good bye. At our table too, the Junior mothers tore open my packet of tissues as we could see ourselves right there at this time next year...My pretty yellow napkin was already a sodden mess and I, too, grabbed a fresh one from the pack. As expatriate parents at an international school, we send our children  away not just to a college in the same city, or to another city in the same country or to another country on the same continent. We are or will be sending our children to a different continent altogether, often a couple of continents away! So that makes it even harder, especially as the children are just seventeen and eighteen years of age...
There was laughter too amidst the rheum, as a mother spoke of how her own mother had gifted her a towel when she first went away to college! She had had it for many decades and it always reminded her of her mother. She finally threw out the threadbare towel one day but has regretted the action ever since. So she gifted her daughter a beautiful blue, ribbon edged towel and hoped it would soon become a precious item for her!
Another mother draped a colourful African stole around her daughter's shoulders and said the girl's late father had bought this for his daughter and she had chosen to give it to her on that day, as a reminder of the fact that the father would always be a part of his daughter's life...A few mothers spoke of daughters raiding their wardrobes, their jewellery boxes and their shoe closets. These were the little slices of life, as mothers of daughters, that they would miss, as the girls moved away to start their own life.
Yet another lady spoke of how this particular daughter had been born just a couple of months after her own mother's death, leading her to always seeing her own mother in her daughter and she and her husband have even given the baby the grandmother's name. A mother daughter bond that has transcended death...
Whether it was an only daughter, or the first one or the middle one or the youngest one that was going away, one thing was clear to me, that it never became easier and the pain seemed raw and fresh, as was evident from the reactions of even mothers who, by now, had become veterans at saying good bye, having sent older children away to college earlier. It simply spelled out the fact that each child is unique and has his or her own special place in a parent's heart. The fact that they were sending out their precious girls into an uncertain and dangerous world was underlined by the fact that the elder daughter of one of the Senior mothers there had been in Nepal during the earthquake last week. She had been at the airport, ready to leave, when the quake struck, leaving her stranded there till she was able to safely fly out a couple of days later.
And so we Junior mothers sipped our tea in this oestrogen charged atmosphere as we watched the mothers and girls exchange reminisces and hugs, promise to keep in touch, take pictures and pray for each other, even as the little nestlings looked set to fly... Can you blame us if our tea tasted a tad salty?

                                                                     The stage is set!

                                                                          Tea Time!