The warrior princess diaries - XII

So the last warrior princess diaries post was on 3rd April and I'm seriously lagging behind. Fortunately, FB comes to my rescue because I jot down little things about her as my status, which not only updates my family and friends about her antics, but also helps me when I compile these posts.

Xena is now at an age where she thinks about things, and processes information and makes little statements that touch my heart. Every day on the way back from school, when the bus would take a sharp turn and she would cling on to me, scared. I would hold her hand and say, "It's okay, baby." One day, as the bus turned, before I could do or say anything, she took my hand and said, "Sokay, mommy."

Then there are other times when a potentially touching moment becomes hilarious. She was peering into my face with much interest so I peered back into hers, tapped her nose with my finger and said, "Mommy loves you." She tapped my forehead with her finger and said, "Mommy has pimple." Great.

But then the touching moments always come back. Once I held her face in my hands and said, "Hey, beautiful." She then held my face in her hands and said, "Mommy beautiful." Then she held Viv's (whom she calls 'poppy') face in her hands and said, "Poppy beautiful." Then she finally declared, "Sab log (everybody) beautiful."

And then the other moments come back. She came running to show me her latest bruise and said, "Mommy, please sayang-sayang!" ('Sayang' is a Malay word for 'caress/pat'.) So I sayang-ed her bruise and just for fun, showed her an old scar on my hand and said, "Xena, please sayang-sayang?" She took one look at it, realised it was not worth her time or sayang-ing, and said, "Mommy, please sayang it yourself." :|

I didn't know she observes me so keenly whenever I take a cab with her. We were at a friend's place and he offered to drop us home in his car. As soon as she sat down and belted up, she turned to him and said, "Siglap". (That's where we live.) It was a facepalm moment of course, but it was hilarious nonetheless.

In April, my mom-in-law's sister and brother-in-law had visited us and went back and recounted her antics to my mother-in-law, such as how she says, "Xena almost gir gayi" ("Xena almost fell down") when she stumbles but doesn't fall. My mother-in-law could take it no more and planned a sudden visit to see the live show. Xena had a lot of fun getting pampered by her grandma. And I started making chai again (I only make it every day when mom or my in-laws are here). Xena was once playing with an umbrella when I suddenly felt mean and adventurous and gave her a long set of instructions, "Baby, can you put the umbrella back in the bag and then go out and see if paati (grandma) is awake and ask her if she wants chai?" To my total surprise, she put the umbrella back in the bag, went to the living room and said to her napping grandma, "Wake up, paati. Chai?"

I'd also asked my mom-in-law to bring a plastic cricket set from India as I couldn't find it anywhere here. Xena was super excited to see it and took to it like a fish to water. Viv was so proud.



As outdoorsy as she is, she loves to help out with housework too. This also helps me keep her occupied in the late afternoons, since I still don't let her watch any TV. Whenever she sees me with a broom, she asks for her "blue wala" and sweeps the floor, aka, pushes everything that I'd swept back to its original location. So I just allocate a corner to her and tell her that it's VERY DIRTY, and as she rushes there to launch a vicious attack on the non-existent dust, I quickly sweep the rest of the room.



She also likes to peel boiled eggs and garlic, which works great for me since I hate peeling garlic. She gets really engrossed in it. Once, to liven up the tedious (to me) activity, I tried to make small talk with her. Without looking up from her garlic, she said, "Xena is peeling garlic. Please don't disturb Xena." Whoa. My mom-in-law had told me that when Viv was a kid, he once pointed to the crescent moon and exclaimed, "GARLIC!" I was very amused when the first thing Xena said when she saw a garlic clove was, "MOON!"



She's a total chatterbox, and forms full sentences with ease. I love looking at the world from her perspective, and figuring out why she says what she says. And some of the words she uses send me into splits. Once she pulled the skin at my elbow and said, "Wrinkles." I bent my elbow and she was totally amazed that the 'wrinkles' disappeared. She straightened my elbow, pulled at the skin again and said, "Mommy, please switch off the wrinkles again!"

Just yesterday, I introduced touch-me-not leaves to her at the beach yesterday. I got her to touch the leaves with a stick and she had a blast watching them close. On the way back, she was surprised not to spot any (it was getting dark and the leaves had closed) and asked me, "Touch-me-not kahan gaya?" (Where did the touch-me-not go?), and then answering her own question said, "Home chala gaya, dudu peeke, teeth brush karke soooooo jayega." (It's gone home, it will drink milk, brush its teeth and go to sleeeeeeep.)

Lately, more and more people are saying that she looks a lot more like me than Viv. Muahahaha. I still maintain that she looks most like my dad, but then I look like my dad so it's ok. Last week, she and I were on Skype with my parents and I was telling them how much she looks like my dad. Just for fun, I tapped her nose and asked her, "Is this Grandpa's nose?" She said, "Nooooo," and pointing to my dad on the screen said, "Grandpa already has nose."

Honestly speaking (and touchwood), I'm not having a hard time with the so-called 'terrible twos'. Yet. She's generally well-behaved and does not throw tantrums. It's possible to reason stuff with her in a calm manner. Of course, I do use my 'stern mommy face' when needed. Once, she was about to throw a toy to the floor when I glared at her with the sternest face I could make. I'd never given her this look before and I think I even scared myself a little bit. She looked at me for a few seconds, gently put the toy down, burst into tears, came running to me and said, "Mommy, happy face, please!"

Of course, I'm not the only one doing the scolding. It comes back to me too. I was reading a book and cycling at the same time when I got a rap from my little safety inspector, "Hold the handles, mommy!" Did I mention I was riding a stationary bike?

We spend our afternoons singing a lot of songs and nursery rhymes (I had to actually Youtube some to recall the lyrics!) and she seems to love it.



She's eating a little better now, though she's still very very underweight (8.5 kg at 2 years and 5 months). Her teachers tell me that she's started self-feeding a bit, so that's great. Her average lunch at school is still about 2 spoons (the teachers note it down for me every day). I have stopped pureeing everything and she's tolerating a little texture now. Sometimes she surprises me by actually asking for food. Once she was reading a book where an elephant was drinking orange juice from a glass with a straw (don't ask) and she said she wanted to drink orange juice from a glass with a straw! You can't imagine how high I jumped with joy, and how fast I produced the deliverables in front of her. She's also been eyeing this strawberry kitchen toy set that I have been withholding from her. Now she knows the drill. She will point to it and say, "Strawberry wala toy chahiye." ("I want the strawberry toy.") and then she will say, "Xena bahut sara khana khayegi, dudu piyegi, big and strong ho jayegi, toh mummy strawberry wala toy degi." ("Xena will eat a lot of food, drink a lot of milk, become big and strong then mommy will give the strawberry toy.")

When the haze hit Singapore, we had to stay indoors all day, which was a pain. Luckily, I always keep a stash of library books which pulled us through. I also think that the haze had hindered her photosynthesis so she was actually asking for food. Look, she's having popsicle for the first time! Of course, she had three licks and politely returned it to me, but still!



My haze-hindered-photosynthesis theory was further supported by the fact that when we were making banana 'happy face' pancakes for her school project, she actually ate a 1 mm x 1 mm x 1 mm piece!



And ooh, she finally fit into a very pretty dress that our friends had given her for her 1st birthday!

Recently, her Bubblegum masi (one of the bar's bewdis who met me and became best friends with Xena instead) came home, armed with her DSLR and took some really nice photos of Xena.







Speaking of great photographs, here's one of Xena and me taken by my sister-in-law at the beach.


Last week, her school celebrated Hari Raya Aidilfitri (Eid) at school. Children could dress up in traditional Malay clothes if they wanted. I braved and scoured the Hari Raya bazaar for two hours and came back armed with a kebaya for her. I wish they had it in my size too! (Purple is my favourite colour.) The teachers were thrilled to see her in the outfit.



She also celebrated Singapore's National Day on 9th August, dressed in the Singapore colours of red and white. I had dressed her up in a red and white dress, red and white socks, white shoes, a red and white clip, red and white flag stickers on her wrists, and armed her with a flag. OTT much? I think so. But I reckon she will only let me do inane things like this for another year, after which she will learn to roll her eyes at her crazy mommy. Till then, crazy I shall remain.

My musical monkey

I'm so thrilled. Xena is showing interest in Hindi songs! I was humming Piyu bole and she seemed to take a keen interest in it, even attempting to sing some of it with me. Here's the video of us singing Piyu bole.



And oh, do you guys know of the cup song from Pitch Perfect? I didn't, till my sis-in-law mastered and recorded the very complex-looking cup moves that go with the song. I showed Xena the clip and she was so fascinated she wanted to try it out! Here she is, having a go at it. (Not that she gets anywhere, but it's music to my ears.) But before that, here's a fascinating a cappella cover of the original.

The fast track

Half an hour to spare??

Wow.

It was a glitch in the matrix. It was most definitely a glitch in the matrix.

I had dropped by the mall before picking up Xena from school, to buy a new swimsuit for her. Perhaps I hadn't expected to find one so quickly. Perhaps I hadn't expected to find exactly what I wanted, in the very first shop I went to. Whatever it was, I had an extra half an hour on my hands, which by my planning should have been 10 minutes -- just enough for me to grab a quick bite at the food court and head for the bus stop. 

This is usually how our weekday works. As soon we Xena wakes up, all of us quickly get into the smooth groove of perfect dovetailing. While Xena is brushing her teeth, Viv is bathing and I'm getting her breakfast ready. He comes out and starts feeding her. I start making his breakfast and as soon as they are done, he starts eating his breakfast, while I get her into her uniform and tie her hair and pack her snackbox and water bottle. After kicking both of them out of the house, I grab a quick breakfast over a physical newspaper, and if my work deadlines are not crazy, head to the gym with a book (the cross-trainer has a book-holder), which thankfully is just downstairs. I get back in 45 minutes, bathe and start working. Depending on whether I'm eating dinner leftovers for lunch, or having lunch near her school, or running an errand like today, I leave home. I get her back, bathe her, give her milk, put her down for a nap and start working again. I work for an hour and then finish any household chores so I'm all hers when she's up. She wakes up around 3-4 pm and then we play, take photos and videos, and do some fun activities. I give her an early dinner (which doesn't take long because as you know, she hates food) and then exactly at 6 pm, we head to the beach or the playground for an hour. Viv is back at 7:30 to take over and I start cooking dinner (most weekdays I like to cook dinner, but we do eat out once or twice). By the time I'm done with cooking, she's had her bath, milk, brushed her teeth and is fast asleep. Viv and I then have dinner with a movie or conversation. On most days, I manage to sneak in some gmailing and fbing. On good days, I manage to sneak in some blogging. And thus, the perfectly-planned weekday ends perfectly. I like it to be like that. Fast. Efficient. Well-planned. Well-executed.

Yes, I know the importance of me-time, especially for mommies like me who work from home and don't have domestic help, but I don't get much of it, and definitely not in the weekdays. But I'm not complaining. The thing is, if I had too much me-time, I'd probably get a little sick of it. Or worse, use that time to plan the non-me-time time. Horrifying, isn't it?

So today, when I realized I had half an hour extra in my packed day, I was amused. I honestly didn't know what to do with it. So I decided to spend it at MOS burger. I love their spicy MOS cheeseburger and never have the time for it before picking Xena up as I eat at places where I don't have to wait even a bit for my food.

Compared to other fast food places, MOS takes a while before giving you your burger. They give you your drink and a token number and bring you the rest of the stuff later. So I sat and waited. It felt strange. I felt jobless. Like I could be doing something more productive than this on a weekday morning. But I had to kill time. Wow, I can't believe I said 'kill time'. That phrase rarely appears in my vocabulary. (If I had a smartphone, I'd probably be busy on it. But that's precisely why I don't have or want a smartphone. It consumes you.) So I sat there and wondered about what I should be wondering about. I wondered if I should spend that time planning the rest of the week and making some fun weekend plans. But guess what? It was all done. I literally had nothing to do. I was not used to that feeling. At all.

So I sipped my drink and looked around and took everything in.  Things I generally wouldn't notice. Like how green the seats were. If someone had asked me before what colour the seats at MOS were, I would have had no idea. I was noticing them for the first time. And just like that, sipping my iced peach tea, waiting for my burger and fries, staring at that rather revolting shade of green, I relaxed. The gears in my head slowed down and stopped turning. Agreed, I was most definitely not in my comfort zone, but I felt like I could do it. I should do it. I didn't want to think about anything in particular. I just wanted to sit there and... you know, just sit there.

And I did. For a while at least.

It felt good. 

I had managed to slow down. In a fast food restaurant. 

Sing-ing praises

This is a week of milestones.

Today marks my 15th year in Singapore. On this very day, a clueless 18-year-old me (okay fine, you know my age now, hmmmph!) landed on the shores at the airport of Singapore, not knowing what life had in store for her. And now, I have lived here 15 years. That is more than twice as long as any city in India I've lived in. My dad's an ex-banker so we moved around a lot and I kind of grew up all over the place. And that is why I don't really identify any Indian city as my 'hometown'. Of course, I have a huge soft corner for Jharkhand where I spent most of my teens (if you want to know more about my hilarious Jharkhand days, you have to read my Jai Jharkhand series), but I still can't call it my hometown. If there's a city that seems effortlessly 'homely' now, it is Singapore. You know how we all crib about India but if any outsider does it, we jump to defend it? I feel like that very very strongly about Singapore too, and I think that's the greatest sign of me being a Singaporean. Sure, it has its issues, but then which country doesn't?

It was not an easy decision taking up Singapore citizenship. We were emotional about giving up Indian citizenship, and it took many many years before we realised that if we're going to be here for good, it just makes sense to exchange our dark blue passports for red ones. A passport is just a piece of paper that enables international travel; it does not make us any more Indian or Singaporean than we ourselves feel from within. It took a while for this thought to sink in, but eventually it did and I'm glad. Because I love Singapore and I'm proud to call it home. Of course I miss India and my family (and roadside pani puris... and winter!), but I also miss Singapore a lot when I am elsewhere. I can't choose one and I don't want to choose one. So until India starts handing out dual citizenship, I shall be a Singaporean with an OCI card.

So here, in no particular order, are five things I love about Singapore:

Food - We say that eating, shopping and complaining form the national pastime here. I don't do a lot of the second and the third, but I sure do a lot of the first. Though virtually every cuisine you can think of is available here, that's not the cool part. The cool part is the local food. The wonderful, delicious, amazing local food. Think chilli crab, chicken rice, rendang chicken, laksa, ayam penyet, yum, yum and more yum!

The little red dot - It is amazing what the country has done in less than 50 years. It is a tiny dot, measuring 49 km from east to west and 25 km from north to south. And yet, it is highly urbanised without compromising on greenery. Things are hair-raisingly efficient. Stuff actually works. The public transport is great. (I mean buses and trains. Not cabs. Definitely not cabs. I don't believe they really exist. Cabs are just an urban myth.) It is really clean, yes, even public toilets. And yes, while the rest of the world laughs at our chewing gum ban, when I compare the streets of London and Singapore, I prefer the ban. If you love travel, it's a nice central hub to explore the region from. Another nice thing is that people from all kinds of cultures and races live in harmony. They may not fully understand one another's cultures, but the basic respect is there.

Distance to India - You can skype, call, sms, or email, but whatever said and done, physical distance matters. My parents, in-laws and other family are in India, but because Singapore is just four hours away by flight, sometimes I don't feel like I live in a different country. For all I know, if I were in India in a different city from them, it would take me longer to reach them than it would now. This is also one of the big reasons why we chose to settle here rather than the US.

Safety - I know I should not take safety for granted anywhere in the world, but Singapore's safety levels amazed me from day 1. During my university days, I'd go jogging on the roads at 1 am. After orientation (that's just a fancy term for ragging), I'd walk back to my hostel by myself at 3 am. And it was fine. I never felt scared. That is something I, coming from India, appreciate very very much.

Viv - "Huh?? Viv??" You ask. Well, Viv and I came to Singapore from very different parts of India on the same scholarship. If either (or even both) of us had turned it down, we'd have never met. And though my life in that parallel universe might not be too bad, I just can't imagine this one without him and Xena. So yes, it was Singapore that brought us together, and I'm grateful and thankful.

So there, that's my list. Of course, there are things about Singapore that annoy me, and some day if I'm in a ranting kind of mood, I might list those. But today, I am celebrating my 15 years here, and reminding myself of all the good stuff.

But... there is a hidden agenda too. Through this post, I am also attempting to yank back old friends I miss who have moved to Dubai, New York and India. You know who you are.

Move back pronto. 

Run of the mille

My dad reminded me that my blog's thousandth post is coming up, and that I should write something significant for it. So I decided to skip writing about other matters of national importance, such as a survey on What Bewdas Really Think of Deepika Padukone's Accent in the Chennai Express Trailer, and write something about the bar itself.

The bar. Ah, the bar. Where to start and how to start. So let me not even start and simply point you to this post, which explains why I call this place a bar, and you guys and girls bewdas.

Sometimes I can't believe that the bar has been around for 8 and a half years. Even more incredible is the fact that some of the bewdas have been with me all of these years! I mean, blogging was 'in' when I started, but it is 'out' now, isn't it? We just don't have the patience to read long posts anymore, do we? We find even long emails addressed to us tedious. That's why many of my blogger buddies from ye olde times have moved on to Twitter. Blogging is old school now. So why am I still a blogger and not a tweeter? One, I feel Twitter is a platform more suitable for celebrities; two, I have too much to type (how will I ever ramble in just 140 characters?); and three; I can barely keep up with updating the bar and Facebook, I can't imagine having one more thing to update. So, for the record, I am not on Twitter and never will be. The plan is to blog as long as I possibly can, and that's that.

Some day in the future, when I'm old and retired and don't have much to do, I will start reading my blog from the beginning to relive bits and pieces of my life. Since I started my blog, I have moved from being a clueless fresh graduate to switching my career and starting at the very bottom, getting my master's degree, building my career in publishing, getting married, getting pregnant and becoming a mother. Yes, yes, I hear you bewdas who are shaking their heads and going "Yaar yeh aajkal sirf apni beti ke baare mein hi likhti hai..." I really don't know what to say to that. It's like that cheesy line "Pyaar kiya nahin jata, ho jata hai." Xena ke baare mein blogging kiya nahin jata, ho jata hai. I can't help it. I seriously can't. But in a way, I like that the bar always reflects what is going on in my life, and right now, as you know, she's top of the goings-on in my life.

Sometimes, I read some old posts and wonder if it was really me who wrote it. In many posts, I sound so silly, so childish, so juvenile, so egoistic, so deluded, so utterly foolish. But in a way, it is interesting how the blog has chronicled the changes in my thoughts, my character, personality and writing style over the years. I started this blog not because I had a lot of thoughts (actually I don't think I had any, looking at my first post!), but because everyone else around me seemed to have one and I felt left out. Seriously. My colleagues couldn’t stop talking about this ‘blog’ thingie. Apparently, they all had one. So I decided to get one myself and find out what it was all about. Never did I ever imagine that I would keep the blog going for so many years. But to be honest, I'm taking too much credit here. The blog is alive because of the bewdas who made this their adda. True, we blog for ourselves, not others. But it's also true that sometimes it's those others who keep us going. I can't count the number of times I was pinged by a bewda and reminded to get back to blogging. Truth of the matter is - I love blogging. I LOVE it. But sometimes, it takes a backseat, and I honestly miss it. So thank you, bewdas, for your support, your patience, your comments, your emails and your love.

Assuming that at the very least, I spend about an hour (yes, even on this post!!) on each post, that's 1000 hours I have clocked in at the bar! Some may consider it a total waste of time, but thankfully I don't. It has been worth it and more.

Thank you for choosing the bar for your addabaazi purposes, bewdas.

I made the bar happen, but you make the bar happening.

Hospital-ity II

First of all, my very sincere thanks to all you bewdas for your overwhelming wishes sent for Xena. I'm seriously struggling with some of my writing deadlines because I had been in the hospital with Xena for five days, but I feel like I really owe it to you guys to update you that she is now home! After five days, most of which she spent in an oxygen mask, she was finally discharged yesterday. She still needs to be given the ventolin puff regularly to clear her lungs, and we have been referred to a specialist, but other than that, she's all active and jumpy and umm, monkey-like again.

As soon as we got home, I gave her (and myself) what I would call not a bath, but a hosedown to wash away the hospital germs, after which mommy and baby were off to slumberland. The bed never felt better. We were so exhausted and sleep-deprived that as soon as we touched it, we dozed off. I would have slept longer if I'd not discovered her sitting on my neck and trying to pry my eyelids open with a "Mommy, please wake up!"

In the evening, we couldn't wait to get out. I decided to take her to the park in the beach. It felt SO awesome to see the roads and trees and sand and water and everything else we had not seen in five days. However, I have to say that the hospital stay was not all bad. Xena had entertained me (and the doctors and the nurses and the interns and the nursing students and the cleaners... the list goes on) quite a bit with her antics and I thought I should do a sequel to my hospital-ity post from two years ago.

- Xena now says almost everything in full sentences and likes to provide running commentary of everything around her. Every morning, when the doctors did their rounds, she'd stand up in her cot and hold the railings of her cot like a jailbird and give me a full account of everything she saw. "Doctor aa gaye. Ek aur doctor aa gaye. Two nurses aa gayi." and what not. Once, a whole troop of about twelve came - doctors and medical students. She exclaimed loudly, "So many doctors??!" All of them burst out laughing.

- She soon figured out that the people in the white coats were doctors and the ladies in the white dresses with the colourful teddy bear aprons were the nurses. She would refer to them correctly. Once, she called the main doctor on her case "Aunty". The doctor was very surprised. "I am Aunty today?? Why??" She asked. Then I pointed out to her that she was not wearing her white coat, and that's why she was "Aunty" and not "doctor".

- Whenever the doctors would check her, she would play with their stethoscopes. They usually have toys hanging from the stethoscope to make it less scary for their patients, but Xena was more interested in the apparatus itself. You guys know I take devilish delight in teaching her to say long words like 'photosynthesis' so 'stethoscope' was no big deal. It always amazed the doctors every time she said, "Xena want stethoscope. Check mommy." And they would give it to her and she'd actually check my breathing, while they stood there laughing.

- Ditto with the nurses. They came over several times an hour to check her temperature, her BP, her breathing rate, her blood oxygen level, or to give her the ventolin puffs or other medicines. They always had stickers in their pockets and Xena loved them (both the nurses and the stickers). She would actually take the smiley face round stickers, put them on her forehead, and declare, "Bindi lagaya!" while the nurses exploded in laughter. She would ask them for more stickers, but after I told her that she can only have one because the nurses had to give them to the other children too, she stopped. The next time they came around, she took one sticker and giving the box back, said, "For other children".

- Two doctors once came to check her and she tried to offer them her stickers. She gave one to the first doctor and said, "One for doctor...", paused looked at the other doctor and said, "One for another doctor!" Later, her running commentary went, "Doctor checking, another doctor standing."

- One of the nurses had a tiny slipper-shaped keychain. While she was counting Xena's breathing rate, Xena took it out and actually tried to wear it on her foot! "What are you doing, baby??" I asked. "Xena ghoomi ghoomi jaayegi," she said. :')

- The machine that measured her blood oxygen level was low on battery and one afternoon, it started making a loud boing-boing sound with the display saying "Low battery". She looked at it in alarm and said to me, "Xena darr gayi!" I told her it was okay and that the battery was down. When the nurse rushed over, Xena updated her, "Battery down. Loud sound. Boing boing boing boing!"

- The nurses would use a supermarket-style scanner to scan the tag on her hand every time they gave her any medicine. After the first day, whenever the nurses came, she would simply hold up her hand without even looking up from whatever she'd be doing. It was hilarious. Sometimes she'd remind them, "Puff puff time?" and they'd laugh and say, "Not yet, baby."

- Within the first two days, she had learnt that if the machine beeped, it meant that she had to put her mask back on. Obviously, she hated the mask and kept trying to pull it off, but the moment her blood oxygen would go down and the machine would beep, she'd put the mask back on by herself. Sometimes she'd even say "Oy ma Gode!" (Oh my God!) when the machine beeped.

- The nurse who first gave her the nebuliser told her that if she didn't cry, she would get lots of candy as a reward. Viv and I were laughing our heads off. First, Xena never cries on the nebuliser, and second, they were trying to bribe her with FOOD?? Ahahahahaha!

- The kid with cerebral palsy was discharged a day before she was, and when he went home, she rejoiced too. She kept saying, "Baby ke poppy stroller lekar aaya, baby home chala gaya!"

- The first few times, I had to remind her to say "Thank you" to the doctors and nurses each time they checked on her, but after a while, she started thanking them herself. THe funniest was when one of the nurses woke her up at 3 AM for the ventolin puff, making her cry. She was crying by the time the puffs were done, and between her tears she said, "Thaaaaankyou, nurse." and promptly went back to sleep. The nurse looked like she was going to cry!

- There was a nursing student who would always come by to play with her. She always had her mask on like the rest, and I would identify her from the way she tied her hair all the way up in a bun. When Xena was discharged, she came to see her without her mask. Xena didn't recognise her! Oy ma Gode! Poor nurse looked quite heartbroken, until I gave her the mask explanation.

- She used to say "Thank you" to the cleaning lady who changed her bedsheet every morning. The lady was from China and did not speak any English, so I taught Xena how to say "Thank you" in Mandarin. The lady would always smile and respond. On the day Xena was discharged, the lady gestured to me that she wanted to take a photo of Xena with her phone. I said okay, she happily snapped away.

- At one point, I really started to run out of ideas on how to occupy her and keep her inside her jail. So I asked her, "What do you wanna do now?" She replied with a "Wipe chahiye." So I handed her a wipe and guess what she did?? She started cleaning her hospital cot! She even wiped her blood oxygen machine clean! Don't believe me? Evidence below. :)

Catch-up #5

Hola, bewdas!
I know I have not posted anything for more than a month, and I'm quite shocked myself that there was nothing at all on the bar's notice board all of June. I didn't think I could go a month without blogging. I meant to write a post on 30th June, but guess what? We are back in the hospital again, and Xena's warded on oxygen. We came here on the morning of the 30th and have been here since. This is the fourth time in four months that we have had to bring her to the hospital for breathlessness. The cycle is exactly the same. It starts with fever, then a cough that doesn't go away, and then her blood oxygen level starts dipping (yes, we have an oximeter at home to track her blood oxygen levels; after two rounds of hospital visits, we decided we needed it) and we rush to the hospital. So here we are, back in the hospital where Xena was born and I was reborn. It's been two days and she seems to be okay when awake, but when asleep she's unable to breathe normally without oxygen support. Her doctors say she can go home as soon as she can do a full night without oxygen support. They can't say yet if these recurrences indicate the beginnings of asthma or it's just that her lungs are still too weak to handle any kind of trigger.

And what a trigger we had last week. You might have read about it -- forest fires in Indonesia caused a thick blanket of haze on Singapore and the psi was close to 500 at one point. 300 is already considered hazardous and anything above 400 can be life-threatening for the elderly and ill. Singapore is one of the cleanest and greenest places in the world and yet, we were so helpless when the haze hit. Even though we had her on full house arrest with all windows and doors shut tightly and the air purifier and air-conditioner running overtime, it didn't feel enough. We were especially worried as Xena has weak lungs and is more susceptible to such things. But the haze passed and I thought that was it. Well, I'm still not sure if it was the haze that caused her hospitalization or some other trigger, but she's here and we gotta get past this.

She's taking a nap now and as I move my eyes away from her face behind that oxygen mask and look around, my mind is filled with so many thoughts. One, to always be thankful for what I have, because many others have it much worse. There's a kid in the bed opposite Xena's, and he has cerebral palsy. He is also here for some respiratory issue, and nothing can compare to what he and his parents are going through. When the doctors do their rounds and discuss him, I hear words like 'morphine', 'palliative', and I feel so heartbroken for him and his parents. I'm not sure if he is aware of pain, but from the sounds he makes all day and all night, I really do hope he can't feel the pain associated with them. Every few hours, the nurses use a tube and suction to make him a little more comfortable. Compared to him, Xena, who when not coughing or trying to pull the oxygen mask off, is generally chirpy and happy, seems like she doesn't even belong here. I don't know why it always takes someone else's misery to trump ours before we come to our senses (actually sometimes we don't) and stop ranting about our lives.

The other thing I notice is how articulate and patient the doctors and nurses are. I don't know why I expect them to be rude and snappy. Maybe it's because this is a government hospital. Maybe it's because they have been dealing with sickness all day and night. But they totally surprise me. I am especially amazed at the nurses' dedication. Doing your job is one thing, doing it with passion and feeling, is another. Of course, I deeply admire the doctors for their knowledge and skill, and how patient and clear they are when explaining things to me or answering my questions, but I admire the nurses more because they don't even get the credit and recognition the doctors get. And they do the 'dirty work' day after day after day. How do they remain so polite and cheerful after having a full work day that involves putting tubes down throats and cleaning up perfect strangers' waste? Xena coughed so violently once, she threw up in her oxygen mask. I could not believe the speed with which the nurses managed to get the mask off, clean her up and get her new clothes and a new mask, reassuring her all the time that it was okay, and that it was actually good that she managed to get rid of the phlegm. The very next second, housekeeping had already changed her bedsheet too. It felt like I was watching things in fast-forward mode. 15 years of living in Singapore and I still stand amazed at the level of efficiency here.

Yet another thing I notice is how the doctors and nurses do manage to catch a moment of respite from their gruelling work. One of the Filipino nurses came over when all was quiet in the ward and asked Xena to teach her some Hindi in exchange for some stickers. "Baby, I don't understand what you are saying, but I find it very very cute," she said. She's now armed with some Hindi, courtesy Xena and her translator (me). When she comes over to bathe Xena, she says, "Baby, nahana nahana?" Then there were these two junior doctors who came over with a small box of toys and played with Xena for half an hour. I don't know if it was part of their medical training as pediatricians to get to know their patients more, or just them looking for some light moments to include in their tiring day. But I do know that all three of them had an absolute blast together. Xena kept asking me, "Doctor klangya? Doctor coming soon?" after they had left. For Xena, harder than staying in the mask is staying inside the cot, considering how jail-like it is and how jumpy and outdoorsy she is. So one of my main struggles is keeping her occupied and happy and so I get Viv to bring me a few of her toys and books each morning. (I really don't want to plonk the iPad in front of her just to relieve her boredom.) I'm eternally grateful to my friend N, who has brought me lunch every one of these days and helped to keep Xena entertained too.

I have stayed here with Xena for two nights now and am gearing up for a few more. Viv has offered to swap with me so I can go home and get some rest, but he's too tall for the parent bed they provide and I know he will have a horrible work day if he's not well-rested. Besides, last night one of the kind nurses who saw me sleeping like a horse aka sleeping standing up with one hand holding Xena's (she wakes up very often and asks to hold my hand so I just decided to stand next to her cot and sleep), she asked me to hop into Xena's cot so I could be next to her and still get some sleep. "Is that allowed? And more importantly, can this take my weight?" I pointed to the cot, looking for a 'maximum weight limit' sign. She made a "Tchah, it doesn't matter." face, so I lowered the side of the cot and curled up next to my baby, hoping that the cot wouldn't give way in the middle of the night! I must say both Xena and I managed to get some good sleep this way, and the cot didn't break either. But I'm pretty sure Viv won't fit if he replaces me tonight, even if he curls himself into a ball. So his job is still to fetch things for Xena and me in the mornings, and take back stuff in the evenings. This has also made me realise the importance of keeping a tidy house. On the first day, I sent him a list of some 40 items that we (mostly Xena) would need during our stay and though I had written down their exact locations, it still took him an hour to get everything together. So I have made a mental note to keep our home tidier than it is. I've noticed that when I am away on stuff that is out of the ordinary routine, such as holidays or hospitalization, it always makes me think of things that I generally don't think of, such as how to live a better life.

So there. While the doctors discuss whether this is just a viral infection of Xena's weak lungs or whether she is likely to develop asthma in the future, we're here, wishing and hoping that we can go home soon.

On a final note, I have some life-altering philosophical advice for you - tidy up your home. And oh, lose weight. So that if needed one day, you can sleep in a hospital toddler cot without breaking it.

Planted evidence?

This post is a thenga to those who did not believe my photosynthesis theory. Here she is, admitting it herself. Ha!

My two cents

Today is 13 May 2013. The date is significant to us because this was my edd, my expected delivery date. It's a different matter though that li'l Xena had to be taken out two months early to save my life and hers. For babies born that early, the edd is still used as their medical birth date till they turn two. This is known as their 'adjusted age'. They are expected to catch up to their peers by the adjusted age of two. So, today is the day Xena truly turns two. So far, Viv, Xena and I have done good, and things have more or less turned out okay.

Viv has been asking me to document all the 'right' things we have done so far in raising her, and now is a good time. We are at the two-year threshold, a good time to look back, and prepare for the storm (if there is one) ahead. Of course, there are lots of things which have been less than ideal. Ideally, I would have delivered at full term, Xena wouldn't be in the ICU for two months, she wouldn't have had surgery at the young age of six days, she wouldn't have had a host of other health problems, such as bleeding in the brain, holes in her heart, and weak lungs. Ideally, she would be wolfing down her food, instead of being solely on milk for 15 months, before starting on puree very reluctantly. Ideally, she wouldn't be stuck in the 3rd percentile for growth, while her peers grew in all directions. But this post is not about all the things that went wrong, it's about all the things that went right. I won't go into the obvious ones like the importance of breast milk, and reading to/with your child etc. etc. I will just jot down some specific things we have done which have made managing Xena a relatively easier task. (Of course, if the terrible twos are as terrible as I have heard and read they are, I will need a whole new set of strategies to deal with it. Any tips from experienced parents?)

So here's my list of 'How we stayed sane for the first two years':

Read read read
And I'm not even talking about Xena's reading yet. I'm talking about my own reading. All first-time pregnant women read. A lot. And then as the kid grows, the reading goes down. I have seen it with myself too. But I still try to read about new research findings, new parenting approaches, etc. Some may argue that there is no point reading all that and it's just information overload and one should just follow one's instinct, and maybe the advice of the elders. I don't quite agree. Well, for one, we live in a different world now, we have access to many technologies, good and bad. There are new gadgets which can make our lives easier, but come at a cost. Our kids are exposed to new and different things, whether we approve or not. Our parenting instinct is simply not equipped to parent amidst all of these distractions. Researchers now know that TV is bad for kids, but the long-term effects of the iPhone and iPad on this generation of kids now will only be seen much much later when they're all grown-up (and hopefully not screwed-up). So I read a lot and I talk to everyone in my support groups and I gather all the information first. And then I let my instinct take over and pick what seems most scientific/reasonable/practical.

Support groups
I was never a big fan of support groups before I got pregnant. But now I am. They are not just an incredible source of support, they provide a wealth of knowledge and experience. Parenting is really really hard (I sense parents nodding and non-parents skipping this post) and sometimes you need more than just your primary support system. As a first-time mom, I had a thousand questions and not everything was on google. At the moment I am in three different support groups - the premature babies support group, a group of local mommies with the same edd (yes, there are 92 of us with kids the same age!) and another, comprising mainly expats, based in the east of Singapore where I live. So I get a great mix of eastern and western views and I can pick and choose the advice I want. I am still moderately active in the premature babies support group but more as a 'senior' now. From asking questions, I have graduated to answering questions of the 'freshies' whose babies are in the ICU. Most of the time, we 'seniors' just show them the before (when they were in the ICU, with all the tubes) and after pictures of our warriors, and that itself gives them a lot of courage. Pictures do speak a thousand words.

One-on-one time
My sister is a big advocate of one-on-one time with babies, and because of her insistence I went and read up half the internet on the topic. And I have to say she is right. I am glad I quit my job to be with Xena all the time and give her my undivided attention. It's not just good for their mental development, it is also critical for their self-esteem to have an adult who will only focus on them in their early years. Almost all of my mommy friends went back to work after their maternity leave. Some didn't want to ditch their careers. Some say they can't be a stay-at-home mom because they'd go crazy at home (it's true; I do go crazy at times), and others say they just can't afford to quit their jobs (again, understandable considering the living expenses in Singapore). Fortunately, Viv and I have relatively simple lifestyles and we are able to manage. For a start, we have slowed down our home loan payments. I don't buy as many shoes as I used to, and we take the bus everywhere. Besides, I work as a freelancer writer/editor from home and though the income (I call it 'diaper fund') is only a fraction of my fulltime job before, I have never once regretted quitting my job for Xena. Yes, it's true that I was crazy in love with my job, and at times, badly miss working in an office, but the one thing I don't feel is regret. Seeing what we have been through, it is likely she will be the only kid we will raise. If I'm going to do this only once, I want to do it myself and I want to do it right.

Blah blah blah
Because she wouldn't eat anything, her doctors were concerned that lack of chewing would cause a delay in speech as the muscles would not be exercised at all. Terrified of that possibility and determined like a tigress, I talked to her ALL THE TIME. I would describe everything around her, including the details of changing a diaper. When I took her outside, I would point at everything around and describe it in great detail, even though she seemed to show zero interest at first. But I see the effect of all the hard work now, when she speaks in full sentences and is able to process her thoughts into words very well. She has also picked up on how detailed I am with my descriptions, so when she sees a construction site, she doesn't just say "truck" or "uncle". She says "Big big truck yellow helmet and yellow shoes pehne uncle digging digging making road". When she sees a jogger with a dog during our walks, she doesn't just say "dog", she says "Big brown dog walking, aunty running running". When she sees two birds, she doesn't just say "birds", she says, "Two white birds walking". I'm also following my sister's advice (she's second only to google) in trying to make Xena bilingual at the very least. I speak to her in Hindi at home (Viv and I have different native tongues, neither of which is Hindi, but I figure Hindi will serve her well in any part of India if she were to travel there), and she's learning English and a bit of Chinese at school. Some say that learning too many languages will confuse the kid, but I have read that the challenge the brain faces in switching between languages at an early age just makes the brain more efficient. A forum on premature babies' development that I attended reinforced this view. The doctors there said that multilingual kids may not be proficient in all the languages they learn initially, but they will catch up soon, and will also have a better ability to focus and multitask in their later lives. So it's not just about how many languages they will learn, it's about sufficiently and appropriately challenging the brain at an age when their grey cells are rapidly multiplying.

No entry zones
As soon as she started crawling, she was all over the house as expected. But somehow, we managed to make her stay out of the kitchen (I do include her in the cooking process like making her peel boiled eggs, or letting her watch me chop vegetables, but she does all this while seated in her high chair) and bathrooms. If she tried to enter, I would immediately take her out and firmly tell her that she can't enter. To my total surprise, she simply stopped trying to enter these rooms. I never used a safety gate to keep her out, and even now, at two, she runs and goes everywhere, but if I'm in the kitchen or the bathroom, she waits at the door for me to come out. I'm still really surprised that this works so well. And I'm glad that she simply takes our word that limits are limits. Of course, she does get restless and then I just hold up my hand and say, "Patience, baby. Mommy is doing the dishes." Now she knows the keyword "patience". She says it herself and even holds her hand up like me when she says it. It's hilarious. This is also teaching her an important life skill - waiting. Studies show that children who are able to wait patiently for delayed gratification are able to handle stress and frustration better, now and as adults.

Bye bye
Long long before she started talking, we introduced certain important keywords to her, the most important of which has been 'bye bye'. When we wanted to take something away from her, instead of simply taking it away and making her bawl, we'd tell her that it was time for her to say 'bye bye' to the object. Whenever people left, we told her that it was time for 'bye bye'. I see the real benefits now. When I have to leave her and go somewhere, there is no crying fit. I simply say 'bye bye' and she says 'bye bye'. If she's in a shop and excitedly points to a toy, I simply acknowledge her excitement by telling her that yes, it's a nice toy and that it's time to say 'bye bye' to it. To our surprise (every time!), she says 'bye bye' to it and we leave. At some point, she completely stopped eating, and as much as we hated it, we had to resort to the iPad for a while to feed her (she's a 2-year-old who weighs as much as a 9-month-old; she's been stuck at about 8 kg for months now; she doesn't gain weight but loses weight at the snap of a finger every time she falls sick). To minimise the harms the iPad can cause, we avoided all flashy/loud/superinteractive apps, or anything that would make her zone out and just stare at the screen. She didn't get to work the iPad, we did. We basically used the flashcards app to take her through pictures of animals, etc. And we'd say 'bye bye' to the iPad as soon as she finished eating. She never protested. Thankfully, that was just a phase and we don't use the iPad anymore. Even though she needs distraction during meals, we use books and toys. And because we were particular not to teach her the word "no", she also uses "bye bye" as a substitute when she wants to reject something (mostly food, of course). She actually waves to the food and says "bye bye", which I feel is more polite and less infuriating than if she were to say "NO!" The 'bye bye' approach also helps when she misbehaves. If she throws a toy, we remove it with a 'bye bye' and she knows better next time. If she misbehaves at the playground, we remove her from there with a 'bye bye'. It also makes her more receptive to taking medicines ("Medicine se cough ka bye bye ho jaayega.") It also helped her settle down in school. Right from day one, she never protested or threw a fit about school. She simply said 'bye bye' and went inside. We have been successful in conditioning the 'bye bye' approach, which simply means that people and objects come and go and we just say 'bye bye' without a fuss.

Tidy up
From the time we introduced toys, we have demonstrated to her that we need to tidy up after playing. Now she knows the rules and follows them. She says "Tablap" ("Tidy up") after she's done with one toy, such as her box of blocks or play doh, and tidies up before asking for the next one. She does seem to try and break this rule when we have visitors though, when she realises that these 'new' grown-ups will probably tidy up and she won't have to. We have to reinforce the rules then, and she's okay after that. At times when she is very reluctant to tidy up, I tell her we'll do it together. That gets her excited and she tidies up almost by herself, saying, "Together tablap!"

Roni roni
I'm not quite sure how the words "roni roni" (crying) came about. I believe I was reading a story to her about some character who was "rone lagi" and she got "roni roni" from that. But she knows what it means. Roni roni means someone is sad or hurt and that is not good. Now that she's at the age when she's trying to assert her independence, I use the term to tell her what she can and cannot do. For example, she can't throw a ball at her friend's face because "it will hurt him and he will be roni roni", and she stops, knowing that roni roni is not a good thing. I also use it to tell her why she can't stand on the seat when she's in the bus because "when driver uncle brakes, she might fall down, hurt herself and roni roni" and most of the time she listens and sits down. I have realised that she reacts better when I get down to her level, explain the consequences of her actions, no matter how complicated they are, and whether she fully understands them or not. It's perfectly logical, isn't it? From their perspective, "Why is mommy snatching away the long pointy stick I found near the playground? It's so fun to swish it around!" It is much better to explain to them that they can hurt their friends with it and it is not nice if their friends get hurt and roni roni.

Apne aap
Just like roni roni, another pair of words that has worked wonders is "apne aap" (by myself). Whenever she attempts to do something herself, we always tell her how proud we are that she did/tried it "apne aap". Now she takes pride in it. After putting the blocks back in the box, she carries the box and puts it back in her toy corner and then tells me, beaming, "Strong baby! Heavy box! Apne aap!" This is also how we got her started on enjoying brushing time. It used to be a total war zone, with me pinning her down and Viv trying to clean her teeth because she would simply refuse and flee the scene. Now we give her the toothbrush and tell each other "Look, Xena's going to brush apne aap!" And she does. She brushes even the insides and her tongue. And then she gives us a dazzling smile and says, "Xena brush apne aap. Shiny shiny white white teeth!" Sometimes she also says hilarious things like "Uncle helmet pehne motorbike chalaya apne aap!!" ("Uncle is wearing a helmet and riding a motorbike.. by himself!!")

Almost there
Another key word I taught her is "almost". I have seen kids throw a complete hissy fit because a feather touched their hand or something. The thing is - the deal is only as big as you make it. Kids will fall, they will hurt themselves. It is a part of growing up and finding out about their surroundings. If we run to them every time they stumble, they will never learn and they will make a bigger deal of things than they actually are. Every time Xena would stumble or trip, she'd look at me for my reaction. I would stay calm or totally ignore it. Pushing her luck, she'd say, "Baby fell down..." with semi-tears in her eyes. I'd say, "No, baby almost fell down." She picked up from there and now even when she falls hard, there's hardly any howling. She just comes and shows me if she has any bruises and we fix it. We also show her Viv's cricket bruises (some of which are quite nasty because my wicket-keeper likes to dive a lot) and tell her very casually how they happened. She's now cool about them, she simply says, "Poppy playing cricket... fell down... bruises".

No TV
A friend of mine asked me how on earth I entertain Xena all day if I don't use the TV at all. She said she leaves the TV on all the time, even when her kid is not actively watching. Another friend told me that TV is very good for babies because they learn a lot of things from it. Yet another has bought a whole box of DVDs to make her kid as brainy as Einstein. The bottomline is: TV is NOT GOOD. Not even baby TV and baby DVDs. The AAP recommends no TV till the age of three. Read this article about how TV actually makes kids less intelligent than they can be. It may be very tempting to use the TV as a baby-sitter just to get a breather, but at what cost? It's hard, but not impossible to find better activities to keep the little ones busy. We have never ever shown Xena TV. We are sticking to no TV till three, and perhaps even after that. Even though we know that research findings may change from time to time, the point is -- what is the real need for her to watch TV? We have taught her the alphabet using flash cards, colours using play doh, numbers using foam stickers in the bathtub. We read books and go out to the play ground or beach every day and learn a host of new things. We have fun. This is the time for her to be out and about. She has her whole adult life to stay glued to a screen (though I hope not).

School
I was not a fan of putting kids in school too early. But her doctor and dietitian thunked their heads on the hospital pillars and told me that they are out of ideas on how to get some food inside her, and they can only advise us to put her in school to see if peer pressure will help her eat. So we did. We found a nice school and put her in on a half-day (morning) basis. On the third day of orientation, she was in the hospital with a stomach bug. The doctors said that she's too weak to be in school and we should reconsider. We had a long discussion and we decided to pull her out, give her a few weeks' break and put her in another school, one that was open-air with a lot of outdoor activities. Luckily, we found the perfect one. Though it's far away from our house and crazy expensive, it really is perfect, touchwood. The teachers genuinely care about fixing her feeding, there is a lot of outdoor play, they have water play every Wednesday and a sports instructor comes every Thursday to teach them new sports (yep, Xena plays rugby!). Yes, she has fallen sick in this new school too and has been in and out of hospital twice in the last two months, but we look at it this way -- kids will fall sick when they come in contact with other kids. It's inevitable. Even perfectly healthy, full-term kids with extra-strong lungs fall sick when they first go to childcare or school. We'd rather she fall sick now and build her immunity in the process than fall sick in later years when she can't afford to miss school. School does seem to help with her eating, and she's also become much more social than she already was. She readily shares her toys with her friends, and knows all their names, and comes back and reports everything to me. And by everything, I mean everything. I get a report on who pooped, who wore what, whose mummy came on a bicycle, whose poppy came in a car, whose aunty (helper/maid) came with a stroller, who fell down, who cried, who ate what, everything.

Routine
In the beginning, I was of the view that one should let the kid be free in what he/she wants to do. I would put her to nap whenever she looked sleepy, but I soon found out it was hard to work around such a random routine. Luckily, someone in my support group advised me very early that it's us who need to set their routines, and not the other way round. It's true. From the babies' perspective, everything is new. All it takes is one distraction for them to skip a nap and then become super cranky because they don't know what is happening and then drive you completely nuts. From the time I started to follow a set routine, it became a breeze. Brushing, bathing, milk, naps, play time, night sleep, everything was suddenly falling into place. Now she knows the routine. She naps at a fixed time in the afternoon and is off to bed by 8 pm. Yes, going to restaurants for late dinners is still a challenge (especially because she doesn't eat anything, she gets really restless in the high chair. We take turns to walk outside with her, while the other eats). However, we are able to host friends at home almost every weekend and we truly have a stress-free good time because she's inside, sleeping soundly.

Manners
It is never too early to teach them manners. She started saying "Please" very early because I would simply ignore her if she said something like "Mama, open!" when she wanted to open a play doh container. Then I would say, "Please?" and she would immediately say, "Mama, please open." and I would help at once. Now she says "please" on her own. She also says "hello", "bye bye" and hugs even our friends before they leave. We are working on "Thank you" now. Though it doesn't come naturally to her yet, she does surprise us sometimes by saying a big "Thank you, uncle!" to the cabbies before we alight. Just this morning, she said "Thank you!" to the bus driver who gave her a toffee. I suppose they learn what they see. Viv and I are now more careful about saying "Please" and "Thank you" even to each other. Because Xena is watching and learning. All the time.

No special concessions
Given what we went through, the fact that she is with us today is a miracle. Sometimes I look at her and find it hard to believe that she is right here, with me. I want to kiss her and hug her and protect her from anything that can hurt her. When something like this happens, it might be tempting to raise her into a little princess-child who gets everything she wants and never gets reprimanded, just to make up for all the rough times she went through that no baby should go through. But the whole point of trying to make her "catch up with her peers" is not just about size and growth and weight. Yes, the start was not a normal one, but we are trying to make her into a normal little kid eventually. Sure, she has been through very rough times and she was incredibly brave and strong, and some day we will tell her all about it. But there is so much more to life than merely looking at past struggles and glories with pride. If she wants to do truly extraordinary things in life, she needs to learn to be ordinary first.

Five little monkeys and an angry bird

Aaaand... Abhijeet is back at the bar! This bird is not just cross... it is cross-eyed as well. (Btw, I think I will actually be sad the day she stops referring to 'Angry Bird' as 'Abhijeet'.)



And here are my little monkey and I singing about five little monkeys (watch out for the part where she says "No more doctors" instead of "No more monkeys").