Tormented by excessive parental care
Monday, 10 December 2007
Sifat Siddiqui
"Get up! Get up! Get up for heaven's sake! Again, you are going to be late for the class as usual. When will you ever develop some sense of responsibility...........!"
Are you not aware of this very dialogue? Why, this is the very special dialogue with which I open my eyes every morning on all the 365 days of the year! Doesn't your mom say the same thing? Well, in my case, this is just a minor part of the morning show!
Only getting up in time does not really tend to satisfy my mom. Even the slightest frizz accidentally occurring on my hair after I am ready seems to upset my mother. Perfection is obligatory! The benefits of taking milk regularly, the way your appearance will make an impression on others, the use of suitable verses at suitable places and the daily hours needed for both education and recreations are the suggestions bombarded by my parents relentlessly on me every morning on the breakfast table. One must have a look at their face when I dare to abandon a half-eaten apple. Is it not the greatest sin ever made if you don't feel like eating any more of it while the entire world is starving for food? According to my folks, it is!!!
Are you free to sit in any way you like even if you live in an independent country? The slightest displacement of a cushion on the sofa or the few chips that somehow crossed the dead-line of the packet and landed on the carpet can prohibit your ever sitting on a sofa; of course only if you take a life-time oath never to let yourself relax in such an insolent manner again. Talking on the phone with a friend for minutes can be exaggerated into talking for hours. After an entire day of classes that never tend to end, lectures that force your eyes to roll for naps and impregnable traffic, who would feel like rushing for a bath just as you step inside your home? But it is I who do so as my presence in the house happens to be completely psychedelic until I finish my shower, even if I look as fresh as the green vegetables. I am too much of an imperfect person in a world of perfect parents!
Watching a TV series raises the spontaneous necessity to stop it and sit for studying whereas watching BBC is the most legitimate thing on earth. The door of my bed-room seems to burst out open due to the thunderous banging when I dare to lock it for a second-even if to change clothes! Moving to flagrant markets with my parents is safer than visiting a friend's birthday party. Even if you always arrive in time in the dining room, no one bothers to cease shouting your name.
In my house, majority rules and that is my parents. But you know what? When mamma comes around and puts rice on my plate, caressing my hair and places a little kiss on my forehead before I drift to sleep, the long blazing flame inside me seems to go flat within a second. Well! After all, what else can you do when you are blessed by the Almighty with parents having some unblessed qualities!!!
Sifat Sidiiquei is an A level student at Maple Leaf International School, Dhaka
"Get up! Get up! Get up for heaven's sake! Again, you are going to be late for the class as usual. When will you ever develop some sense of responsibility...........!"
Are you not aware of this very dialogue? Why, this is the very special dialogue with which I open my eyes every morning on all the 365 days of the year! Doesn't your mom say the same thing? Well, in my case, this is just a minor part of the morning show!
Only getting up in time does not really tend to satisfy my mom. Even the slightest frizz accidentally occurring on my hair after I am ready seems to upset my mother. Perfection is obligatory! The benefits of taking milk regularly, the way your appearance will make an impression on others, the use of suitable verses at suitable places and the daily hours needed for both education and recreations are the suggestions bombarded by my parents relentlessly on me every morning on the breakfast table. One must have a look at their face when I dare to abandon a half-eaten apple. Is it not the greatest sin ever made if you don't feel like eating any more of it while the entire world is starving for food? According to my folks, it is!!!
Are you free to sit in any way you like even if you live in an independent country? The slightest displacement of a cushion on the sofa or the few chips that somehow crossed the dead-line of the packet and landed on the carpet can prohibit your ever sitting on a sofa; of course only if you take a life-time oath never to let yourself relax in such an insolent manner again. Talking on the phone with a friend for minutes can be exaggerated into talking for hours. After an entire day of classes that never tend to end, lectures that force your eyes to roll for naps and impregnable traffic, who would feel like rushing for a bath just as you step inside your home? But it is I who do so as my presence in the house happens to be completely psychedelic until I finish my shower, even if I look as fresh as the green vegetables. I am too much of an imperfect person in a world of perfect parents!
Watching a TV series raises the spontaneous necessity to stop it and sit for studying whereas watching BBC is the most legitimate thing on earth. The door of my bed-room seems to burst out open due to the thunderous banging when I dare to lock it for a second-even if to change clothes! Moving to flagrant markets with my parents is safer than visiting a friend's birthday party. Even if you always arrive in time in the dining room, no one bothers to cease shouting your name.
In my house, majority rules and that is my parents. But you know what? When mamma comes around and puts rice on my plate, caressing my hair and places a little kiss on my forehead before I drift to sleep, the long blazing flame inside me seems to go flat within a second. Well! After all, what else can you do when you are blessed by the Almighty with parents having some unblessed qualities!!!
Sifat Sidiiquei is an A level student at Maple Leaf International School, Dhaka