Life Is Different For Kids Now!

The last fifty years have seen a transformation in the way kids live their childhood days, if you think about it.  Children of the 60's/70's grew up differently, compared to the current pack, in several ways.  This author would not venture to hazard a statement to the effect that one is better than the other because that is a matter of perspective and personal experience; and also, he knows what is good for him.  The safest way of describing the situation would be to fall back on that TV commercial about Maggi sweet and sour sauce - `it is different'.  To reiterate, this is not an attempt to pass judgement on anything relating to the different generations figuring in this essay.

To begin with, do kids have to go to 'school' at the delicate and vulnerable young age of 3, when they are just attempting to differentiate between home folks and strangers?  This diabolical oh-so-early-to-school conspiracy must have been hatched by a bunch of harried working parents with no family support for managing life's chores, so that they can park the kids in some seemingly safe place for the better part of the day.  We are all sympathetic spectators to the sight of the wailing and flailing child being stuffed into some vehicle which is built to hold only half of its current consignment.  As a post-script to this morning ritual, a concerned parent jogs along the wobbly contraption, administering the final admonition to the driver:`Ensure that she does not fall off in transit'.  With that the lopsided journey into `development' begins for the child and symbolically the vehicle is so overloaded that it is at least entertaining vague thoughts of tilting to one side.  Would the kid be happier to be playing randomly with other children in the neighbourhood, learning a bit in the natural environment, as was the case earlier?  We will have to wait for some elite market research company to publish an investigative  report on this, as there is no known record of kids' preference on this particular issue.

During the later years in school, a veritable rat-race inevitably takes over and all parents are compelled to participate and children are left with no choice.  Earlier, if a child went for tuition, that meant he/she is marginal in a specific subject; today, however good he/she is, tuition classes after the school are de rigueur and are akin to an insurance policy the parents gladly elect to take.  They baulk at the thought of a cynical neighbour or interfering uncle laying the blame squarely at their door if the kid has sub-optimal marks  in a critical test and consequently misses out on, err..... whatever.  Coaching classes for competitive examinations are an incremental burden for the children to carry, making their already bustling lives hectic.  I would love to decipher if these kids miss flying out of homes after  school, playing two or three different games serially every evening and spending a lot of time in the open with friends??  May be not, because they don't know better and they are likely to be satisfied and comfortable with their video games and other in-home entertainment.

When children are a bit more seasoned, say at 5, they begin to take buses to `international' schools (the only determinant factor here is the hefty fees, one would think) which are suitably located farther away.  They spend some 3 hours daily in the commute in some cities, shrivelling in the heat, pollution -- go to school half asleep, bleary-eyed and return almost unconscious! I wish somebody would do a study to see if kids who begin schooling only at 5 or 6 (if this tribe is still around) are any less `successful' in adult life.  It is entirely possible that due to the later start and lack of early use of the brain, they will be something other than software engineers - how bad can that be??  We were able to walk/cycle to school, come home for lunch and be free by 4.30 pm.  This is not to suggest we turned out to be geniuses but at least life definitely was not so painful.  `And that explains a lot', one can hear a representative from the later crop, smirking a bit more than usual.  And my dear wife seem to agree, going by that smile of hers!

The previous generations' males, even the alpha-ones, to the chagrin of their spouses, often betrayed this child-like weakness, a heart-wrenching yearning for their mother's cooking from time to time.  This was the inescapable result of being tied into mom-cooked delicacies consumed avidly till one moved out of home. While there may still be some lingering signs of this now, it may not be as prevalent to be a serious point of friction between the spouses as it used to be.  Obviously the older trend was primarily due to the home-bound eating habits of the family those days.  Restaurant meals were frowned upon, considered unhealthy and it was also an avoidable expense -- except on very rare, special occasions.  Children being blessed with pocket money was a rarity.  Today, kids thrive on restaurant food, aided and abetted by tired and willingly collaborative parents (who themselves are forced to eat out) and they grow to like and prefer that fare.  No blaming the working parents, who understandably have genuine difficulty in catering to all such requirements, while they hurtle back and forth like the shuttle in the weaver's loom.   With due respect to those moms who still engage in cooking for the children without the intervention of external agents, let me say that a majority of the grown-up children living away from parents today are likely to beat a straight line to a favourite restaurant of theirs in their home-town, directly from the train station!!  The good thing is they think that is par for the course.

Take festivals now.  Deepavali always was synonymous with a plethora of sweets and crackers for the earlier generation.  Today, one can see the ironic sight of middle-aged fathers going berserk with explosive crackers and smoking rockets, while their children, big and small, keep protesting from the sidelines about pollution of all sorts and the resultant damage to the earth.  The kids are absolutely right, no doubt, in their `child-is-the-father-of-the-man' behaviour and in thinking that the older generations have actually brought things to this pass.  Having said that, one wonders if even some rejoicing in the traditional way on Deepavali is taboo for these kids!  Dietary restrictions bellowed out by mothers to kids kick in when it comes to consumption of sweets on Deepavali or any other festival day, even as we see fathers nursing bellies of varied sizes, stuffing their mouths with all the goodies.  How life has changed!

One other facet of life has undergone a metamorphosis and that is the family reunions that kids used to enjoy during holidays.  All members of a family enthusiastically congregated every year at the native place and spent a few days in a celebratory and convivial atmosphere; renewing relationships, with the kids enjoying the warm and somewhat exaggerated attention of the elder relatives.  A lot of mirth was on offer during the helter-skelter of group interaction.  Reality today is that many kids sadly do not even know the existence relatives somewhat removed.  Honestly, where is the time when the children are busier with their school schedule than the elders?  When it is time for a vacation, families settle on a fashionable venue in a distant land rather than converging at the native village or town every year.

It would be fantastic to gauge whether kids of today would prefer the other kind of childhood.  But that is going to be well-nigh impossible to fathom.  So, the easier alternative is for the older generations to chew the cud on this and determine whether they would have preferred to live their childhood like today's kids. What say??