A dose of youth

So I took a trip to Madhepura Christian Hospital last week, which is on the other end of Bihar where I also reside at the moment.  The journey was long and uneventful but with the sense of independence that I’d recently acquired, I felt convinced this is something I should do. And amongst catching up with an old friend and interacting with contemporary examples of missionary doctors, I stumbled and staggered across a delightful bunch of siblings that have inspired me to write this.

Anand, Numrata and Dheeraj; aged 11, 7 and 6 respectively (and approximately). The Ninan kids. Now most people who know me know that I’m quite clueless regarding how to interact with kids. I remember when I was young (or younger), I knew this problem might emerge; that I wouldn’t be able to relate to kids or understand that phase in their lives (was I weird or did ya’ll think of stuff like this too?). So I thought I’d start writing a diary of sorts so I could always use it as a reference to figure out what kids would be into at that age before I talk to them. Obviously that didn’t work out.

So I entered their house, took a nice long look at their piano which brought out an involuntary smile and yearning in my eyes; I would imagine.  Suddenly in a flash of seconds I felt a small but firm grasp on my hand leading me outside to see the rabbits.

Dheeraj, a tireless bundle of energy with a toothy grin possessing an impressive impression of Gollum from Hobbit; started rattling on about the names of the rabbits, the guinea pigs, how he couldn’t come up with a name for the third rabbit yet, how he didn’t bounce up at the suggestion to name him bugs :/ He even knew how to tell their gender! I was soon joined by Anand (who’s honestly too intelligent to still be a kid) and Numrata (who’ll make certain she can catch up with the boys). Together they took the conversation towards going to see the ducks; who as it happened were not in the enclosure. “To the duck pond!” cried Anand, and he lead the way. I felt like I was in the famous five heading off into a mystery. And I haven’t felt like that since I was a kid.

So they ran. As kids should I guess. And so did I, In my formal black pants and shirt, past the muddy field and into the foliage of the woods. It was scorpion territory; they said. We shouldn’t be here; they said.
“Yeah we should probably go back huh?” I said looking at the ground hoping to avoid a painful sting. What an adult thing to say! “Don’t worry, we know this place.” said Anand as he led on towards the pond. As we reached, the ducks swam away and we turned our attention to something else.

“Oh Dheeraj remember when we found that big spider here?” I was like “where!?” turning around trying to make sense of why children would play here, and walked into a web, which thankfully seemed inhabited at the time. “Oh yes that was huge, it was like this big!!” Smiled my toothy friend as he held up his hand and spread it as wide as it would go.

“Are you allowed to be here” I asked, but only the leaves responded with a gush of wind. And then there we saw it, a beautiful big spider, more accurately close to the size of my hand.

Careful not to walk into that, we exited the woods and entered the ‘panther’ territory. Down the heaps of sand we descended into a large field of unused space (again, with my formal black pants). “Oh! There’s a hole over there!” exclaimed Anand. “I wonder what lives there. Remember that crab we caught here? That was so big!! I know, lets dig up the hole and see what lives there.” Now I’m all for curiosity, but the next statement really turned it up a notch. He picks up a shovel, walks up to the hole in the ground and says: “I wonder if it’ll be a crab. Perhaps it’ll be a snake. But that’s ok, I’ll just cut it in half with this shovel.”

Feeling pretty dumbfounded and irresponsible as an adult, I decided better me then them. Before which Dheeraj asks me: “Are you strong? You’re fat. You’re fatter than my dad.” To which I grimaced and responded Yes, Yes I am.
We digged for a while and upon finding nothing we decided to head back. “What are you good at?” Asked Anand. “Can you run?” I wanted to say yes but I’m more of a musician! Apparently kids don’t wait for long hesitant answers cause he ran off, as did I (again, with my formal black pants), after which I believe he acknowledged that I could run.

We head off towards the basketball court (because you know, who’s tired?). Along the way we made some conversation, and they laughed at all my jokes! Sweet kids. We then started to play Ice and water, something I hadn’t played since I was 10. And might I say, I still had some dexterity in me 😊

The rest of the evening we spent in the house, playing uno, enhanced uno, racing piggy backs

and building a maze out of magnetic pieces, with ‘horrid’ dinosaurs at every corner (awesomeness).

The creativity, imagination, lack of restraint… the reach for the stars attitude, and asking why not at every opportunity. The enjoyment of life with child- like perception, is something a lot of us have forgotten isn’t it? Perhaps this is what Jesus was talking about, to receive the kingdom of God like a child. Perhaps it’s the worries that drag us down. All I know is that I had a fantastic time with these guys, and they’ve really brightened my view on things 😊