The Day That I Was Born...

The sonogram my mother took in her 2nd trimester couldn't exactly determine the sex of the feotus. The millions of family members and old uncles and aunties my parents encountered, told my mother that it was going to be a boy.


"Believe me, I know these things. If your behind sticks out, that means its a girl, but since your tummy is really big, that means it has to be a boy!"- Was the awesome piece of information given to my mother by a neighbour who neither had any knowledge of Gynaecology, nor a Degree in Sex-Determination-Of-Child-By-Observing-Belly-Size-Of-Mother.


But still, they all knew. And my mother wasn't looking forward to it. "Preferably," my mother often says, "its nice to have one of each. But I would have been a teeny bit sad if I had two boys."
"Teeny bit" was a lie, in my opinion. Boys are dull. They have a limited selection when it comes to clothes. Their only idea of fun, at the age of 10 is to bash up girls, and at the age of 20, it changes to running after them. Their egos are bigger than their heads themselves. Why would anyone want TWO of that?!!


So as everyone had already lectured my mother and told her the sex of her yet-to-be-born baby, she was preparing herself for a life devoted to bringing up two little boys. Until the day that I was born......


"Doctor, what is it?"



"Shhhh....It's a girl."


"A girl?Oh what a surprise!!"

 

And with that, my mother smiled, and  plopped her head onto her pillow for some well deserved sleep. Giving birth to a 7.5 pound baby isn't an easy task!


 

N.B :- In my brother's great opinion, my mum did not plop her head onto the pillow to rest, but she "fainted from the shock of having given birth to something so horrible." Really now. Boys!! :P

Of Noogles, Dolipops and Crowd Mothers.....

Children are inquisitive little beings. "Why", "For what", "Who", "How" and "Where" are the top words on their vocabulary list. I was no different. My mother still dreads the moment I open my mouth to say "Mum..can I ask you a question?". But her answer to most of my questions about Grammar, or word pronounciations or anything concerning the language my brother considers his mothertongue would be, "English is a funny language." And I'd have to agree. Hell, there are more exceptions to a rule than inclusions! But as little children just beginning to read and talk, we couldn't care less about spellings or grammar, or even making proper sense or a word, as long as we thought it was right. My brother for one, was always "get-upping" from sleep or "hurry-upping" for school.


I myself, although a pretty well-read 5 year old, had a difficult time understanding that a "chicken" is NOT a room where one cooks food. It is the "Kitchen" where we cook the "chicken". And the capital city of Hawaii is not Honolululululu. (You just HAVE to stop after two "Lu"s!!). Funny it was, when I would come home from school and demand a plate of "Maggi Noogles" for lunch. "It's nooDles", my mum would correct me. "Yes momma...noogles is what I said!". It also quite impressed my aunt, that I managed to read a whole paragraph from her book about the 16th President Of the United States. But come to his name, and I would go, "ABE-RAA-HAM  LIN-CO-LIN".  Oh go ahead, laugh at me, but why would you add letters to a word if they are supposed to be "silent"?! I sure thought I deserved a sweet or lollipop for achieving such a feat. Or as I used to call it, a " big huge dolipop".


However, the most distinct memory of my funny pronunciations, one that my parents and I still have a laugh about, is the time my mother tried to teach me how to say the word "Proud". It goes something like this.....


"Mom, are you crowd of me?" I would say, whenever I did something worthy of her praise, even if I just got a golden star in my school book.
"Honey, its not crowd. It's proud."
"Crowd?"
"No Huzie..Proud. P-P-P-P-P...PROUD."
"Yes mom, P-P-P-P-P.....Crowd!! Are you crowd of me?"
*Sigh* "Yes baby, I'm very crowd of you."


I guess some things are just too hard for 5 year olds to grasp!! ;)