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Showing posts from August, 2012

I Live In A Bazaar And Am Loving It!

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Fire station at Dandia Bazaar Opp. my home As a member of our national fraternity organization, I was once confronted by a very strange request. A typical tight upper-lip gentleman gynecologist from one of the four huge metro cities of India walked up to me and said: “Can’t you rephrase your postal address? Dandia Bazaar – what an address!” Well my postal address is indeed “Guru-Krupa”, Opp. Alankar Apartments; Dandia Bazaar…   I was amused. I asked him: “What is wrong with Dandia Bazaar?” Out came his bias “You live in a bazaar? Dandia BAZAAR – so middle-class!” I burst into an uproarious laughter.  The typical tight upper-lip snob Some years ago I was told by a gynecologist friend: Do you know – one of our federation office-bearer who is always so proud of having studied in UK for three years (forgetting he studied in India for twenty five years preceding) and wears bow-ties (probably even while sleeping) to look so upper-crust British told me – “How you can be clos

Helicopter Parents (The vice of over-parenting)

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The other day I went for a haircut. Seated on the chair next to mine was a child of about four years and hovering around him was his mother. I was amused to see her continuously instructing the hairstylist as to how to cut and with what instruments. Just as the stylist moved she would move around the head of the child, supervising each and every strand of the hair getting styled. I could obviously feel the discomfiture of the stylist who was struggling to balance his work with the incessant instructions of the mother. Little did I realize that the child too was getting uncomfortable till he loudly shouted: “Mama you please go”! A hush fell in the salon but the mother – a cool cucumber just asserted “You don’t understand anything. You just keep quiet and let me do my work!” The child was obviously bullied to silence. That was a helicopter parent in full regalia - a classic example  of  what Time magazine once described as "Over Parenting" This incident reminde