STORY 9: The flower kids

We 'military kids' are raised differently. Being a daughter of a fauji, I have experienced and concluded that our upbringing is wierd. I am not saying it's inappropriate but it's ...it's just WIERD. 

And I am writing about this today because something funny happened. 

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It was almost six in the evening when my mom returned from Sunday Market which is actually a weekly vegetable and fruit market in a nearby field. As soon as we heard her footsteps on our porch, we all jolted and ran to the door to welcome her. We all are in mid 20s but we still run to mom or dad when they return from market, like toddlers do.

Now before we could have the bags from her hands, she said "Aren't you guys alive! Kids have plucked all the flowers! Were you all sleeping!? Go and look what they have done...."

Baffled, I went outside and found that someone had plucked a flower or two from our mini garden, and had spread the petals on the front road like you sprinkle chopped coriander leaves in your self prepared dish. And since the petals were white unlike coriander, it was looking like it had snowed on the road. 

My mom yelled in air for at least an hour. She also complained about this to papa on phone (for another hour). He is posted in Delhi. Then he also yelled at us on speaker saying "Why have I raised these kids? ...What do they do all day inside the rooms? ...Do they even know how much hardwork it takes to grow these flowers? ...Have they ever done gardening? ..."

I looked at my sister and she looked at me. We both chose to stay silent (what options do we had). My younger brother, no no, he is of no use. He didn't realise that we ALL were being scolded and were supposed to feel the guilt. He was in his own world. 

Well, I wondered who were these kids? When did they do this? And most importantly, why?

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I remember, years back when we used to be kids like them, we would've not even imagined of doing so. We would've not even approached someone else's gardening area without permission, leave alone plucking flowers from their garden. 

We never gave our parents this opportunity to scold us for plucking flowers. They never got to hear from our neighbours "aare aare, aapke bachon ne humare phool tod diye".

So, basically we accomplished this now! Our parents got to scold us because some random people's kids plucked our flowers and for that, we were being scolded! 

I am happy that this year is ending with at least one accomplishment. Phew!