All that he wants

My nephew wants a yellow car and a cake for his 3rd birthday. that's what he said when I asked him on phone today. I am writing this down for Toto to read when he grows up that there was a time in his life when all he wanted in life was a cake and a toy car....

I still remember being 5 years old and being taken for getting my head shaved off every summer (nyaramundi as 5 year olds with shiny, balding plates are called lovingly in Bengali). I would howl and protest this injustice being perpetrated on me by my mother. Somehow all Bengali mothers used to have this strong belief that having a shaven head till your child was at least 10 years old would guarntee a life-time of silky tresses (well, it certainly proved wrong at my case at least), and so I would be dragged to the neighbourhood hair cutting saloon (parlours were unheard of when I was 5). And what would I ask for compensation for such a momumental loss every year? It would only be a pair of Amar Chitra Katha (Ramayan and Mahabharat being special favourites) and a pack of Phantom cigars. They were actually made of Menthols and left this incredibly fresh taste in the mouth while all the time you could hold a Phantom in your mouth and pretend you were smoking, all VERY grown up. And that was all it took to bribe me to go through the humiliation of being a neri (a nyara female).

Now when I look back I wonder how was it that at 5 all that you asked for in life was a bunch of comic books and a pack of chewable menthol sticks, and at what point life moved to being all about wanting what was unattainable. I know that in just another 10 years time Toto would look back in wonder, like me..