On 10^th March, we reached the venue for the annual day exactly by the stipulated time which is kind of a cosmic miracle considering my life-long issues (should I say my legacy) with time management. Looks like the school authorities had accounted for Indians’ Standard Time (which is basically being at least 30 minutes late for any program) and the program was nowhere near getting started. Slowly the venue started getting filled.

The rebellious mothers of my daughters’ class decided to ditch the golden color overcoat for the girls and instead to use a mini-apron in the same color as the skirt. I basically left my wife to sit with my daughter, her classmates and their respective mother and moved to another row to sit with my daughter’s classmate’s father. As I looked at the bright and colorful costumes of kids in other dances, I felt that may be my wife was right about my daughter’s dance costume. Seriously, what was I thinking? I should have been extremely naïve or extremely audacious to doubt the judgement of an Indian Mom. Lesson learned: It’s ok to doubt the judgement of your wife in her role as wife, but it’s naïve to doubt her judgement in role as a mother. Thankfully my daughter’s class teacher did not object or question the slight change in costume for the girls and what could have been an unpleasant conversation was averted.

My daughter’s dance program was listed as the eleventh one in the itinerary. There was only one skit which was kind of narration skit that introduced each and every dance performance. In all there were eleven dance performances for songs including Barbie World, Macarena, Tarzan and Jane, Witch Doctor, etc. There were even a couple of Hindi And Tamil folk dances too.

Once the Annual Day Programs started they proceeded at a break neck speed. Each class had its own dance performance. The school authorities ensured that all the kids in the class including kids with special needs also participated in the performance, which is commendable. For all the dance programs the respective class teachers would also dance in front of the stage so that the kids follow them and dance. It was kind of funny and heartwarming to watch the activities of the kids on stage. The dances were far from perfect but even imperfection is perfection when it involves kids. Some of kids were distracted seeing their parents capturing videos of the dance performance, which was exactly what the school authorities forewarned and forbade.

My daughter’s dance performance went very well. The showstopper of the evening was a speech by a girl thanking all the teachers and parents. She spoke very well for five minutes with just one minor hiccup which for her age is a tremendous achievement. At the end of the Annual Day function after the National Anthem, most of the people were in a hurry to leave the venue which I could not understand as the program got over well ahead of time.

We went onstage and took a few snaps of my daughter with her friends, class teacher and school head. We also thanked our daughter’s class teacher for all her efforts. The Teachers should be thanked for all their efforts and preparation for the annual day. It is very difficult to make children of this age perform in unison and the teachers had done a remarkable job. On the way home, my wife sponsored our Celebratory Dinner at Cream Center.

On 10th March, my daughter’s playschool, ‘Eurokids – Kotturpuram,’ conducted their annual day. The event was held in another school’s auditorium in Alwarpet. The school had planned for the programs in such a way that all the kids participated in at least one program. My daughter was participating in ‘Tarzan and Jane’ dance. In the run-up to the annual day, my daughter kept us informed with the happenings in her dance practice sessions.

About ten days back when my daughter’s class teacher revealed the costumes for the dance, the mothers of girl children in the class almost blinked in sync in disbelief. Since the song was based on Tarzan, the teacher had chosen for girls’ black full hand t-shirt, black full trouser with a blue mini-skirt and a golden over coat. They had problem with choice of costume, the color, etc. My wife was one of the rebellious mothers who was hell-bent on ensuring that her daughter shines like an angel from another world.

My wife and my daughters classmates’ mothers were left fuming further when they came to know the choices made by other class teachers: Pink Barbie Gown, Colorful Beach Trousers and T-Shirts, Gagra-Choli, etc. In the days leading up to the annual day, I can safely assume that these mothers hated their daughters’ class teacher more than their respective mother-in-laws. There were suggestions and counter-suggestions going back and forth. Not a single day passed without my wife complaining about the dance costume and feeling bad that while other kids would have wonderful costume, our daughter would have a (a perceived) funny costume. I finally managed to pacify her saying that ‘we would buy all kinds of good looking costume for our daughter but not a jungle themed costume; so in way the teacher is doing us a favor!’

Two days before the event when the teacher handed over the costume to us, my wife’s blood pressure reached the stratosphere. I tried to reason with her and calm her down; however she suddenly took George W. Bush kind of stance against me, ‘If you are not with us you’re against.’ Not wanting get crushed under the wrath of the Lady Tsunami in the house, I basically chose to confine my logical opinion to the safest corner in my house, which is basically within my own head!!! My wife rang up one of my daughter’s classmate’s mother and the two moms brainstormed on how the situation can be salvaged.

My wife altered the length of the skirt and with the remaining cloth made head bands and rubber-bands of the same color for all the five girls in the dance. My daughter’s classmate’s mother went even further: she managed to trace down the cloth used in the skirt to a shop in T. Nagar and found a tailor who would stitch a mini-apron for all the five girls in one-single day. And on the day of the event they were getting ready to unleash a ‘Fashion Revolution.’ Wow, hats off to these Supermoms!!! Viva Fashion Revolution!!!

Well, what did the dads do? One, we never interacted much, so the idea of coordination between us is never going to take flight. Two, our fashion sense is as weak as the depleted knee bone of ninety year old man; so the lady in the respective household is never going to allow us to decide on something as important as the costume for the daughter’s first annual day. Three, we are VERY LAZY to do so much work in one single day; Therefore all of us should have independently come to the same conclusion: ‘we would buy all kinds of good looking costume for our respective daughters but not a jungle themed costume; so in way the teacher is doing us a favor!!!’ I think that was the right conclusion since we need not be disturbed from our state of bliss called as ‘Inertia!’