Negotiation

This 13 month old amazed me today when I saw her attempting a negotiation cum barter deal with a 3 year old fella in our apartment block. The boy that I am referring to is Rakshit who is the grandson of 401 Uncle (actual name is Mr. Sundarajan but I prefer to call him '401 Uncle' owing to the apartment he lives in). So when Tara and I get bored we take the stairs up to 401 Uncle's apartment, play with Rakshit for a while, chat with 401 Uncle and 401 Aunty and head back to our boring lives. This evening Rakshit was in mean mood and decided not to let Tara touch any of his toys - he kept pulling away whatever she laid her hands on. Tara was upset when he took away a nice big red ball away from her. She went upto him whined a bit and didnt get any favourable response, so she came to me pulled her cap from my hand and threw it at Rakshit (not a smart start to negotiation - JUST like her mom!) and put her hands out to catch the ball (she thought Rakshit would give her the ball in exchange of the cap). But our meanie 3 year old (hope his mom is not reading my blog) just wouldnt give in, so Tara pulled back her cap from his lap (as aggreesivey as she threw it at hime before) and came whining back to me. Now now I understand that Tara's execution of the negotiation deal was slightly annoying and terribly unsmart but atleast she tried :).

Here is a picture of Tammy Cat post her haircut

The Bong Immersion Month

Tara, Vinay and I had a TERRIFIC vacation across the last 3 weeks of Dec09. The vacation was ‘home delivered’ and started with Maa-Bapi’s visit on Dec 9 who were closely followed by the Mukerji Gang from HangKang on Dec 23 who stayed put (and cooked n cleaned ofcourse) for the next 10 days.

For Vinay and me this was really after a loooooooooong loooooooooooong time that we got my side of the family over for 3 whole weeks and Vinay went through a comprehensive Bong Immersion ritual – yup the Menon apartment smelt of mustard oil and lau n bori n kumro n rui maach all the way until we ushered in 2010 with some burpy Chinese food.

Tara spent a fabulous fun-filled time with her Nana-Didu, Mashimoni-Wella, Didibhai and Dadabhai who spoilt her rotten.

Fun-filled it was – from a decently grand first birthday party, to learning how to walk (the video says it all), to getting to go the cinemas at such a young age (Tara blissfully slept throughout the movie ‘3 Idiots’), to watching her Mashimoni & cousins paint ceramic at Claytopia, constantly hearing about the goofy golfing escapades of her Achhan and Wella and playing endlessly with Dadabhai n Didibhai.

Not to forget, she was very much a part of elaborate family meals at Coast to Coast, Kubay, Mainland China, Golkonda Fort, ice cream at Corner House, burpy Chinese from Chungs & Peking, pizzas n pastas from Dominos and FAME respectively. With 6 adults at home the water supply and my cook gave us trouble off and on but we still managed to hold the fort and enjoy ourselves – thanks to my big sis who continues to show clear -sparkling-brilliance of leadership when it comes to home management!!

With so much happening around her Tara was in her element and seemed to have suddenly grown up – she displayed oodles of attitude and a wide range of emotions – I think I’ll get her married by this summer.