Ra Ra 10...

My sunflowers Ria and Jia

Nope ive not seen Ra.One.  But i liked the expression when Ri shouted hey Ra Ra.10! Reminding me at once of Ra Ra Rasputin and Sharukh's latest international sci-fi RaOne.  Now that's not a bad exclamation at all! I must say quite creative!

Ri turned 10 on March 10. I had promised her many things to her choice once she crossed that milestone. For instance frying eggs on the stove, making tea and coffee and so forth... Of course she had the freedom to assist me in the processes involved in these great activities all along. But only in mixing the ingredients or fetching spoons and cups.

Freedom to cook on the fire blazing underneath requires quite a sense of responsibility, as my Amma says. And I guess I had to prepare Ria for that before I actually let her light the stove and actually cook. (Amma, I love you for those beautiful lessons.) I remember rolling the laddoos while she dipped them in the bubbling oil in the huge frying bowl! Mouth watering memories...

Ria is yet to make her official omellete all by herself... Right from buying the eggs and vegetables, tendering the right change at the grocers, bringing home the eggs without breaking them, placing the eggs and vegetables in their respective trays in the refrigerator, planning for the meal, cracking the eggs, slicing in the chillies and tomatoes, lighting the stove and frying it on the pan in butter or ghee (a choice she has to make), toppling it without breaking it, sprinkling corriander leaves on it, rolling it into a fine roll and placing it in the plate with the same spatula, slicing it into neat mouthable pieces and finally the salt and pepper! (Wish we had hens at home to train her how to fetch the eggs every morning like how we did in our village)

Now do we really have to do all this for an omellete? Well how else can one explain the essence of enjoying what we do? How else does one explain the beauty of the food that warms our appetite? And we women develop our multi-tasking skills basically from the kitchen. From the fire that we light each morning for the day's meal to the dishes we wash, wipe and set aside, there are ever so many opportunities to write pages on the health, safety and environmental concerns plus the organising skills that we should be aware of... Phew... im on fire!

And you know what Ri loves? One touch cooking... Microwaves! Not surprising at all given the fact that I do only half the kind of cooking my mother used to!

Ra Ra 10.... Many happy returns to my Ria and let me grab some for myself too for the exciting ten years of motherhood! I loved every day of it. Only wish time went a wee bit slower....