What are they thinking...

Puddi is at a very interesting stage of development right now. All her gears and wheels and cogs are constantly turning as she explores the world around her and tries to figure out how it works. These days, you only have to use a phrase once for it to stick in her mind, and I find myself amazed at the way she can call it to mind at apt moments. She recently learned to say 'Pata nahi' (I don't know). Yesterday the lady who's looking after her temporarily while our regular one is away on vacation asked her, "Where is Anuroopa?" Promptly, the little tyke says, "Pata nai". Puddi was visiting our downstairs neighbour when I got back from work last evening. While turning to leave, I said "Theek hai" about something. Immediately the little one pipes up, "Theek hai, bye, cheeeyuuu".

She's always up to something because she really wants to test her limits( and our nerves) - climbing on and off the sofa, the arm of the futon, the glass table in the drawing room, trying to jump while perched on a swing or on my parents' rather high bed...She loves water - maane, as she calls it - and one of her favourite games, after drinking as much as she wants, it to take some in her mouth and experiment as to what sounds she can emit. She also picks up whatever water glasses she can find ( all steel tumblers, thank god ) and carefully props them one on top of another, trying to check in which position they will stay upright and which way they'll fall down.

She loves books and runs around digging out books from Chubbocks' bookshelf all day. She carefully opens them - by now she knows not to tear the pages - and looks at first one page then the other to figure out what's written. She'll let out a laugh at an illustration, as if she finds something really funny about it. At night, when Chubbocks is having his 3 stories read out to him, madam cuddles up to me, having duly picked out a book or whacked one from his selection, and asks to be read to. I don't know how much of the story she understands or even how many of the words, and whether she is only mirroring Chubbocks, but it's fascinating to watch.

She loves music too. These days, Chubbocks is into watching the Krishna cartoon on cartoon network, whenever he's up that late. Puddi, if not otherwise occupied - i.e. gargling with water, running around the house like a loon, tumbling off the bed - also watches alongside, and loves the song which comes on afterwards. She can't not dance if there is any music coming from anywhere, and now tries to sing along to the show's tune while swaying her tiny body. Chubbocks has picked up the words of Bum Bum Bhole from TZP, and Puddi has learnt some of them from listening to him, so whenever he's singing, she also says, "ba ba doday", swinging her chubby little butt from side to side. It's fascinating to see, if we put on a music CD, that for each song she varies the steps and the way she moves her body - for some she'll just swing her hips, for some she'll try to jump, for others she'll raise her pink index fingers in the Bhangra gesture, and for others she'll move her arms up and down. All the more intriguing because I haven't started teaching her the typical song and action stuff yet.

She's been watching my parents do their daily puja and prayers and has learnt to do a beautiful namaskaara, where she lays her whole body down on the floor. She loves ringing the small bell at prayertime. Yesterday, she picked up the bell in one hand and the brass plate for aarti in the other, and rang one and made circular motions with the other in perfect imitation of dad, while singing her own prayer - a chant composed of la la la ye yo do da...

I know I went through this period of intense curiosity even when Chubbocks was small and I'm going through it with Puddi. I wish there was some way in which I could get inside her head, to understand how she's learning and processing everything she sees and hears, what she's making of it all, what she's thinking, what her emotions are as she goes through her action-packed day. There are so many books on the human brain and on adults and the way they think and feel - fiction and non-fiction. But I guess, limited by their ability to communicate, we have no such resources on toddler minds, and all we can do is stand back and marvel at what God has gifted to us.