The waahhs and the wows!

                   When I say “babies” and If your face lights up, the funny baby videos you watched on youtube come to your mind, then it means just one thing and one thing only…You don’t have one yet! Babies also cry which is fine for a while, but if it doesn’t stop you could lose your mind over it. The constant drooling and the puking can also be dealt with, but they make the nastiest smelling poop! And it doesn’t stop till they do stuff for themselves.

                   Kids are like puppies in many ways. You pick up the poop your puppy made with your hands, and that’s how much you love it. And that’s the same with kids. Yeah they are cranky and clingy, but they are the closest we have of god. There’s too much work involved but we still love them to death.

                 “Bala vihar” is an art class for kids from five to seven from the TFA (Temple of Fine Arts). To watch the kids learn slokas and dancing is a lot of fun. Read it again please! To watch…To teach them is a different task all together.

It was decided to have a musical production. The script was carefully prepared by the dynamic teacher of the class, keeping in mind all the kids (close to forty). The right ones were taken for each part after auditions. There was a monkey dance , lunch break scene, at- night scene, Krishna dance, class room scene 1 and 2 and singing group. The “akkas” (sisters), teen agers who are also dance instructors took the challenge of training each group for the final performance.

                          The first few days of the rehearsal was cha-O-tic! The kids who were quiet and at their best behaviours in all the previous classes have become noisy  and uncontrollable. No one listened and no one wanted to listen. The “akkas” found it very difficult to manage them. There was shouting…from both the sides! There was real struggle!

                           In the commotion a child who was not unwell puked in the middle of the hall. And there was a girl who kept crying from the start of the class (since six months!) The teacher told her in an assertive but not so rude voice to stop crying and then she quietly took a mop and cleaned the puke herself, got back to her group like nothing happened.She handled all kinds of chaos so well and got them back to normalcy so easily.

                           And after class this one woman also dealt with the teenagers. A seventh grader (in charge of the “exercise group”) was in tears after rehearsal, so innocently she asked “is it that difficult for the kids to stand straight? Why won’t they listen to me?” Real tears! Real work!

                            Though I was a mere spectator in the class one day I had to watch six girls till they were called for the voice recording. We were all on the terrace, while the recording took place in one of the rooms downstairs. The teacher was with the recording group. The girls kept jumping around as they were very excited to be there. I was asked to keep them quiet so as not to disturb the recording. I tried everything, nothing worked and a tiny stick of lipcolor did the trick! I let them watch me as I took it from my purse slowly…after all the wuuuuh’s and wow’s they silently waited for their turn as I put it on their tiny pretty lips. Absolute silence! No one wanted to shout or jump anymore. Phew!

                     All the noices and all the tears faded into nothing on the day of performance. It was sheer magic on stage! All the work that went behind the stage finally paid off. The kids all shone like the stars that they are! The proud parents watched, their sons and daughters sing and dance and recite slokas, with tears in their eyes. 
                     The teacher and the “akkas” are still waiting for the video of the performance, as they were standing behind the curtains!