Swings & Roundabouts

The next person to take up my guest author request is the blogger behind Baby Loves Books, mum of one and one of my oldest friends, Rupa Raman. Here she is, asking you what’s the worst parenting faux pas you have ever committed.

When Lavz asked me to post on the topic of ‘child safety’, the voice in my head went,”You’ve.got.to.be.kidding me!” and I have no idea why I agreed. Here’s the thing: Not only am I not qualified to write on child safety or anything remotely close, I am, in fact, on the verge of being included in the Clumsy New Mom’s Safety Handbook, under the section titled How to Keep Baby Safe – When Mom is Around.

Hmm…child safety. Child friendly. Where should I begin?
* How about the time I accidentally locked myself out of the car, leaving my 8-month old strapped to her car seat, inside, alone? Boy, did I spend the longest 15 minutes of my life waiting for the locksmith to arrive!
* Or the time when my 6-month old had her immunization shots and, eager to relieve her discomfort I gave her an overdose of infant fever medicine. (Although the nurse later assured me that the quantity I had given was well within the safety limits – not really an overdose)
* Need I even tell you about my first attempt at helping my daughter wear her bicycle helmet, when I nicked her neck while tightening the strap?

Don’t get me wrong. I am all for parents taking full responsibility for their children. I assure you I am one of those parents despite what I’ve just shared. But, truth be told, keeping a child safe is no easy task these days with or without a parent to watch over.

Step into a mall and you never know when a lunatic will decide to unleash fire arms. Send kids to daycare and Junior’s best buddy is likely to share everything with her, including the latest exotic virus doing the rounds. With roller coasters falling off their tracks at amusement parks and sharks attacking swimmers at the beach, where on the planet can you take your kids so they can be safe and happy at the same time? Let’s say you decide to keep them home. Voila! A sea of plastic toys, (who knows how many contaminated with ‘toxic lead paint’), welcomes them. Plug in the television, DVDs or video games and you get an earful about how screen time impairs their development. Take them out to eat and you risk turning them into obese tweens.

So, you see, although I’m not particularly proud of some of the times I inadvertently put my daughter’s safety at risk and granted. But whilst I may not be the most eligible candidate to write about child safety, I’m pretty sure I’m not alone.

I challenge you to show me a parent who has never accidentally bumped her baby’s head against a wall, given her a lead-painted toy to chew on or one who has never left his baby unattended on the bed just for a teeny bit (and it’s very likely that the baby who hadn’t as much as tried to lift a toe until that point somehow decided to roll over for the first time and crashed head first onto the floor at that precise moment.)

So, if you’re a parent reading this – out with it! What is the most embarrassing/worst parenting faux pas you dare to own up to? Do share so we know we aren’t the only ones guilty of parenting oversights and parent-induced boo-boos. And hopefully we can learn from each other’s experience.

As for me, in the 3 years and 11 months that I’ve spent learning the ropes of parenting, I’ve discovered that no matter what the safety ratings on a product says and no matter how big a fortune you spend on baby-proofing your house, there really is no such thing as 100% baby safe. And I now know why they say keeping kids safe has less to do with intelligently designed products and a whole lot more to do with mom’s instincts…even if she’s a little absent-minded.

Article by Rupa Raman

The author in NYC with her daughter M

A voracious reader herself, Rupa Raman believes that reading to children regularly enriches their lives, expands horizons and changes attitudes. In her blog, she writes about everything from Karadi Tales to her love of picture books. Visit her blog at Baby Loves Books today!

Kiran Manral’s guest post brought up the oft-raised in an Indian context – that of Health & Safety. There have been various incidents in the past decade alone that have result in the needless loss of innocent lives, lives that may well have been spared if a few precautions have been taken beforehand.

Tragedies like the Kumbakonam School fire, the Garuda Mall mishap and of course, the recent accident of Aditya Dube, to name a few, may well be averted had basic Health & Safety procedures in place. A fire drill at the school, with a set procedure to be followed in event of a fire, could have prepared the staff and students at the Kumbakonam schools for the actuality of a fire. They could have merely followed procedure and assembled at a pre-agreed assembly point (as they do in the West), instead of running pell-mell and adding to the chaos.

Similarly, if the malls and restaurants had rigorous Health & Safety guidelines that they HAD to adhere to in order to remain open and strict building regulations that they had to follow to ensure the safety of their patrons, the tragedies that followed may well could have been prevented.

Whilst it is ultimately the responsibility of the parents’ to keep their youngsters in check, it is the duty of the owners of an establishment to make sure their mall / restaurant / cinema hall etc is safe enough for their patrons to visit without losing an arm or a leg or their lives. We go to a restaurant to have enjoy a meal and deserve to do so without wondering if we will fall a few floors to our death if we step on a tile.

Accidents like these focus on how little regulation is there to ensure the safety of our lives in everyday India. How easy it is to grease palms and speed things along, instead of worrying if a building will pass muster with the officials regarding its construction, design etc. How there are no standardised methodologies in place to ensure the safety of the users.

I wonder when the powers that be will sit up, take notice and take issues such as Health & Safety seriously. What needs to happen to bring that about?

As promised, here’s my first guest blogger, uber writer Kiran Manral, with a plea to the Indian restaurants to up their child-friendliness stakes.

Hotel Ramee Guestline, Juhu

When Lavanya invited me to be a guest blogger on her newly revamped blog, the theme she told me, was “child friendly”. Write on anything child friendly, she said. Yars, yars, I nodded sagely, and scampered to googlebaba to figure out what I could write about that was child friendly related and something parents across the globe could identify with.

And then this happened over the weekend. Friends of a friend lost their son when he fell to death from the sixth floor of a restaurant. While the parents were dining with friends.

What is scary is that the parents didnt think of looking for their son until they had finished their meal. When I read of such incidents, I think that I err on the side of paranoia, and that is a good thing to be these days. I have the deepest sympathies for the parents, but this incident is a symptom of the malaise that affects parents in restaurants here in India. Let the kids wander off once they’re done with their meal so that the parents can eat in peace.

Which also comes about because of the total dearth of restaurants with child friendly facilities here in India. For a family with small children here, the only dining options are fast food places like McDonald’s, Pizza Hut, or Papa John’s. Or else restaurants like the ones with a wild dining or a theme like a Village Festival etc, to keep the kids entertained and busy.

No restaurant, except for Mall playzone/food court combos, have spaces within the restaurant premises which have supervised playing facilities, adaptations of the main courses to fit children’s appetites and discerning palates. High chairs for infants and toddlers, children’s toilet seats are something most restaurants already have in place. Basically, restaurants are telling us dont bring your kids along. Which is why the maids are dragged to restaurants to wait uncomfortably out in lobby areas, walking and entertaining the small babies. Something that gets my goat, but well, to each his own.

What we need here are child friendly restaurants which welcome kids, have a dedicated employee or two to supervise the children in a safe hygienic section of the restaurant, with adequate toys, games etc to keep the children busy.

Apart from this, a child friendly restaurant will offer colouring kits, jigsaw puzzles, toys, and such like to keep children occupied. And will even have a designated supervised spot on the premises with a small play area, with a play pen, rubber flooring, slides and the like to let the parents drop their kids off, and eat a meal unhurriedly. If only restaurants in India understood that the demise of the joint family does mean that many young parents forgo dining out because of the difficulty in keeping young children entertained and out of the plates of the other diners in the restaurant.

And the attitude of the staff! At a lunch with friends at Moti Mahal, in Bandra, the staff and the maitre d’ made it very clear to us that we were obliged to finish our meal quickly and leave the premises because of the rather vociferous fun our two boys were upto, albeit confined to our table. Needless to say, I have never gone back since. On the other hand, when the child was bored at a family lunch at Mainland China, the waiters were quick to engage him in a quick chat, and the maitre d dug out a random toy to keep him busy and entertained. Guess where we have returned umpteen times?

Are any restauranteers reading this want to try this concept? I guarantee the restaurant will be double booked from day one.

Article by Kiran Manral

Uber writer Kiran Manral

Mom, freelance writer, India Helps charity founder, blogger, voracious reader and a “good egg”, has been writing since she could hold her pencil on her own. She has over 20 years of experience writing for some of the top Indian publications.
Kiran blogs at Thirty Six & Counting and Karmic Kids.

What do you do when it is nearly tea-time, you haven’t got anything interesting to eat and your child’s giving you baleful stares? Simple! These quick and dirty cup cakes!

Quick Cup Cakes

To make these, you need
Self raising flour, 125 gms
Caster sugar, 125 gms
Sunflower oil, 125 ml (or if you have it, unsalted butter / margarine, 125 gms)
Eggs, 2 large
Vanilla extract, 2 tsp

Pre-heat your oven to 180 deg C / Gas mark 4.
Take a big mixing bowl and add in all the ingredients. Rope in your pint-sized slave as sous chef and make him/her do the mixing.
Pop in muffin cups into a muffin tray and half-fill it with the cake mixture.
Bake for 12 minutes.
Allow it to cool and decorate with icing / hundreds & thousands if you have any.

Makes 10.

P has been eating my head to bake him a cake for quite a while and so, I searched the ‘Net for a simple, no-fuss one. And I found one that uses no butter or oil! Wa-hey! It is called Aunt Martha’s Sponge cake and I got the recipe from Cooks.com. It was rather easy to make and uses just about five ingredients. The result was a real yummilicious cake. P was absolutely delighted with it!

If you want to try this at home, you’d need the following ingredients:
3 eggs
1 cup sugar
4 tbsp. warm water
1 cup flour
1 level teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
(yes you read it right, no fat!)

Lightly grease a baking dish. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees celcius, Gas mark 6.

Take the eggs and beat for a minute at low speed. Add a cup of sugar and beat for five more minutes until the mixture becomes thick and takes on a lemon colour.

Next add four tablespoons warm water to the bowl and mix for a minute. Sift together plain flour (maida) and baking powder and fold. Make sure you don’t get overzealous and mix it too much – then you’d end up with a rock-like cake!

Lastly, add the vanilla essence, give it a stir and transfer to a shallow baking dish. Bake at gas mark 6 for five minutes and then at gas mark 5 for 15-20 minutes.

Cool and serve.

P decided to decorate it with ready-made icing and some hundreds & thousands. Sugar overload!

Pancakes are my son’s favourite breakfast dish. Though the flavour of the moment is generally labelled as ‘favourite’ by him, giving him pancakes for breakfast, lunch, tea or dinner is a surefire way to make him clear his plate. So, here’s a ‘child-friendly dish’.

To make the pancakes, you would need the following items:
Plain flour (maida) – 110 gms (sieved)
Egg – 2
Milk – 200 mls
Butter – a tablespoonful
Salt – a pinch
Sugar – a spoonful
Ghee, for cooking

For the filling, round up the following bits
berries, chopped – 1 cup (go for strawberries, raspberries, blueberries or blackberries – any or all, as you wish!)
banana – 1, chopped
maple syrup – as required
powdered sugar – as required

Now that you have the above mentioned things, you are ready to get started. To make the pancakes, all you’d need is a flat bottomed pan (a tawa) and a spatula.
First, crack the egg and beat it till it is well mixed. Next, comes the tricky bit, you might need to rope in your helper for this. Add the sieved floor to the beated egg slowly, all the while trickling in the milk. Keep the whole process slow and fluid so as to not get lumps in your batter.

Now, add the knob of soft butter, salt and sugar and stir everything in. The consistency of the batter should be that, it must be thick enough to coat the back of a spoon neatly. If it is too runny, add some maida. Too think, trickle in some more milk.
Your batter is now ready.
Heat the tawa, put a spot of ghee in the middle and give it a good shake.
Pour a ladleful of the pancake batter and coat the tawa with it by holding on the handle.
Let it cook a bit.
If you can, shake it loose and toss it. If you are apt to decorate the ceiling with it, coax it out with a wooden spatula and flip it over.
After a few more seconds, transfer the steaming pancake on to the plate.

Now is the most fun bit – your helper would love this. Plonk the fruits onto the middle portion of the pancake – go crazy and add however much you want. Once you are done, roll it up. Drizzle some maple syrup over it and finish by dusting some icing sugar over it.
Ta-da! Your pancake is now ready for your tastebuds.

Chef’s tip: This is a good dish to make with your children. They can help beat the egg, trickle in the milk, fill the pancakes etc. As they helped you out so much in the creation of it, they would be more amenable to helping you in demolishing it as well!

Submitted for May’s WBB#11 Summer Fruits as well as Trupti’s Spring Fling 2007: Family & Friends in the kitchen.