Heavy-duty Childhood

This Sunday, the newspaper had a children’s day eve special column… actually... not a column… it was two whole pages. The articles were nicely done, no doubt; but they were disturbing. Not that there were sad or traumatizing news pieces, but thinking about them made me feel… I don’t know what word I should use here... Perturbing? Distressing? Disturbing? I don’t know.

There was this part, which had interviews of four children. An actor, a kid with two CEO parents, a 10-year-old girl, and a12 year old kid who works in a tea stall.

What caught my attention, were the interviews of the latter two.
The girl, at 10, says her favorite brands are Zara and Armani, talks about fashion sense, and doesn’t go anywhere without her earrings and lip-gloss!!! On being asked if she would like to remain a kid, or grow up, she says I like being a kid. Okay, good. That’s the answer I expected out of a kid. But why does she want to remain a kid? That is because this way she gets to socialize (!) and have her own space! Her favorite TV show is desperate housewives. Shahrukh khan is her favorite actor, but she doesn’t like him in the new lux ad, because… he looks gay!! Man! Either I just woke up from a very long sleep, or the kids are growing up too fast. At 10, I didn’t even know what the heck is gay! I mean at the most I must’ve known that it means happy. I really don’t like this. Kids should act like kids. Lip gloss! At this age! Alright, I cannot compare all this with myself, because it’s been a decade since I was 10 and the world had obviously changed, and moved on. But this isn’t exactly my idea of progress or advancement. The kids keep getting smarter… good, but learning should be at it’s own pace. All this makes them lose the innocence and purity that kids stand for.

Next to the interview of this girl, was another interview of a 12-year-old kid. He was also not very naive, but because of completely different reasons. Because of his survival instincts. He knows he has to take care of himself and earn for himself and his family too. He works at a Mumbai tea stall, works 12 hours a day, earns 900 rupees a month, and sleeps on the pavement. He never gets to watch movies or television; he only occasionally listens to the fm radio, which was there at the tea stall. His idea of a holiday is getting enough sleep. Happiness, to him, means meeting his parents – which he gets to do not more than once a year. His dream is to build a huge house with 4 rooms, in his village. He has no idea what children’s day is and has not heard of people called Mahatma Gandhi or Pandit Nehru. He doesn’t know who’s Sania Mirza, and can vaguely recall someone called Sachin as a guy who plays some sport.

I don’t know what I’m supposed to write now. I can’t explain what I think. But then again, I am just a part of a big crowd, which notices that these things happen, and stand there and watch it happen. There’s a whole bunch of kids who love wearing lip gloss, and who knows hair gel too; have favorite international brands, and ‘need space’… and then there are children who can just dream about living in a 4-bedroom house and being with parents.

We had compulsory moral values classes everyday in school, which were always conducted as the first lecture of the day. Of course, we didn’t really look forward to them, and actually found them boring and time wasting. But now, I and I’m sure the rest of my schoolmates too, understand that how important, and necessary they were. We as children do not know what we should learn and what not, but we learn when we are taught, and then retain it. Schools are for this purpose exactly... Education… Teaching. Certainly, parents are the biggest influences, but then schools play a major role.

There was another article in the same newspaper about the new generation of kids and schools. Pre-school kids are taken to McDonald’s’, Pizza Huts and Shopping Malls in the name of field trips. A particular school has Reebok shoes as a part of it’s school uniform. Kids are taken to departmental stores to show them what varieties of rainwear are available in the market. I can’t seem to make sense out of this kind of a course curriculum no matter how hard I think. The children in these schools are given Lays once a week, and something else on the rest of the days… so, I guess health food is out and junk is in!?!? The schools are actually teaching children that lays is food?

May sound hilarious, but seriously, I am already worried about my future kids! No kidding.

The average daily pocket money of these kids (I didn’t know pre-school kids get pocket money too!), is 50 bucks. I thought, at least parents should pay attention to what is happening, and put their children in better schools. Schools - which haven’t run out of things to teach children. But then, that hope fades away when I read a parent’s statement. Her kid says ‘I’ll not go to school in that car today!’ He’ll only go in a particular model of car… and… I don’t believe this… She just laughs it off?!

Wake up people!!!