Thank you God for this wonderful mother of mine! Thank you
my dearest amma! For shaping me into a confident, sibling loving person.
Working in a big educational institution has gained me a
wide collection of young friends and fans. One such friend of mine is this
small girl from class V. The start of this mail’s thanks giving is the outcome
of my interactions with this girl.
I enjoy watching these kids when they disperse for the day.
They are still bubbling with energy and seeing them is an instant energiser for
our team. My favorite pass time during such dispersal will be to strike an eye
contact with one of the kids and to smile from ear to ear. The result will
invariably be a shy half smile, after a few steps, turn around and check if I
am still watching them. I can expect my new friend to take the same route the
next day for a bigger and brighter smile. It would be bonus for me if I get a
“Guduvening mam!” from them.
One such student is Bhavna a class V student. A small shy
girl with attractive features, black eyes, curly hair, wheatish complexion. In
about 3 days time, we have become friends. Bhavna would touch my sari pallu and
will rearrange it with shy smile. Very few conversations, but I have understood
that the girl likes me. One evening, after touching my sari, she asked me “Mam,
why are you wearing such a light color?”. I was surprised because, this was the
least expected question. So instead of an answer mine was another question to
her why if the sari was not appealing enough for her. To my surprise she said,
“No mam, this light cream color - my mother says will suit a person who is dark
skinned like me. But you are so fair, you can wear some darker color no mam?”
It was a mixed reaction for me now. I have accepted my
darker skin tone and now, this small girl is complementing me for a fair skin!.
As I was thinking of this, I was even more surprised at the girl’s words which
expressed how she has taken her complexion to her negative. Slowly, I prepared
myself to motivate this girl and to make her accept herself as she is. I
started a lengthy conversation,
“Why my dear! You also look good! Why should you feel that
you are dark?”.
“No mam, my mother always tells me that I am dark. She
always tells me that I am dirty.”
I was speechless and beyond that my adult brain was clouded
with rational thoughts like, image identity for this girl, and her low level of
esteem for self and to top it all her mother’s efforts to kill the child’s self
confidence in herself and her mother’s version of good looks. I prepared myself
to make life better for this small friend of mine. I told her few things like
to wash her face and hands as soon as going back home and reasoned it out that
washing her face will make her brighter and fresher. I also told her to comb
her hair after returning home as she had good curly hair which can turn out be
unruly by the end of the day.
After a few days of salient smiles and few words, the girl
came back to me and said, “Mam, will you talk to my mother and tell her to
plait my hair in the evenings mam? Also will you please tell her not to call me
dirty girl mam?” She had prepared a small chit with her mother’s number in it. After
this, I did speak the mother and appreciated her daughter for her spontaneous
conversation and all those small talk which will make a mother proud of her
daughter.
It took me a week to discuss the small girl’s problem. But,
it was during this time I had a flash from my childhood memory. The day when I
came home crying from school as a class XII student. It was one of those days,
when my classmate had again chided me for my oily pimply dark skin in front of
the whole class. My grandmother or little sister could not console me on this
day that they were waiting for my mother to come back from her office. My
mother had her own way of making me a strong person. She smiled at me and said,
“Is this my same daughter who had a smart tongue as a six year old girl?” Then
she explained the event, when I was six and my sister four, the neighbors
apparently would ask me repeatedly why I am dark when little sister is fair.
After few days of repeated questions on this, the little elder sister took the
responsibility to bring her younger sister home to safe and went back to the
neighbor’s door and had shouted, “At least my sister is fair in my house, How
is it everyone is dark in your house aunty?”
Though this had little impact to the problem I was facing, it
had surely brought my young sister to take the matters in her hands. To make it
short, the next day, I found some of my friends running to me to tell, the girl
who commented on me was cornered by my sister and her friends. When I rushed to
the scene, my sister or her friends were nowhere to be seen but my classmate
was the lone person to stand there with brimming tears and on seeing me she
started to apologise profusely for her comments. Later on, there was a well
established friendly relationship between us sisters.
This memory thread made me understand the contribution my
mother had made in making me accept myself and the type of bonding that still
exists between my sister and me.
Why can’t all mothers be sensible like my mother? Why can’t the
mothers accept their children as they are? Do we still find mothers who would
care for complexion and skin tone? Why can’t the mothers during the growing age
of their daughters take up the responsibility to groom them than commenting and
criticizing them on their looks? Why can’t this mother keep her daughter neat
and clean so that the child need not have to lean on a third person for a
simple recommendation to plait her hair in the evenings?
Thank you God for this wonderful mother of mine! Thank you
my dearest amma! For shaping me into a confident, sibling loving, clear headed person.
