A home for Tink !

Green house that is home to Tink.

Harini,my daughter has gone crazy.She has taken to Tinker bell,the fairy in such a big way that she sleeps,eats,drinks & breathes Tink .Really this is quite exhausting.Her exams are on & the only thing she can concentrate on is the fairy.

She coerced her dad to get her a VCD on the latest film on that two winged tiny creature & has watched it  umpteen times.She also brought in her chums to watch it -obviously to get them converted like her.I dunno if she succeeded.But all this is going on in the thick of her exams ! How I wish she could concentrate atleast one tenth of what she does so passionately for Tink on her studies but then ,such is not my luck nor the teachers as they will discover from her answers.

In all this frenzy for Tink,Harini was inspired by the movie to build a house for her newfound love.She scrouged our  house & got a cardboard box.From this, she cut out squares & rectangles to make windows & a door.She camr across squarish pieces of glass which she painstakingly added as windows.One of the galss piece is a sealed window & two other pieces are open windows.The door is of  cardboard & is rectangular.

She took some cotton & made it into a bedding & a pillow for Tink. This is laid on a cardboard bed .The cardboard bed is a rectangle resting on four cardboard legs.On the cotton bedding she put a piece of velvet cloth-cut from her discarded dress sleeve.The velvet is  violet in color.From the same sleeve,she cut out two more pieces.She punched it at one end with a paper punch to make holes.These pieces were to be the curtains for the open windows .She took a straw & hung the curtains after passing the straw through the holes punched into them.

Then she took a polythene  glass  & covered it with a  circular cardboard lid .This was taped to the side of the house.This is the mail -box for Tink.Harini also built a table & chair -both from cardboard for Tink.On the table is placed a ceramic kettle & a tea cup & saucer.This tea set is a present from  her cousin .The roof of the house has an opening covered with a polythene sheet so that one can view it from the top.


The door of the house has a grand stand resting on two cardboard props with a roof attached to the house.There is a bell hanging from this roof to ring.This bell idea is copied from the movie.

Then Harini covered the roof with newspaper & painted it blue.She also painted the house  with green & yellow colour on the outside.I helped with painting.This was more out of compulsion rather than choice as Harini had taken out so much of paint from the tube that I felt compelled to use it.I also used brown colour to cover up things on the cardboard box.

She also put stars & other shiny embellishments on the walls of the house -on both sides of the door.On the side ,one can notice that it belongs to Tinker Bell as the name Tinker Bell is glued on the left side of the house in the snap.

On the door there are some flowers struck to make it look inviting.


The house does not have a floor -it is open from below.Harini uses the emergency lamp to light up the interiors of the home .Actually,she wastes a lot of energy on lighting up.A lot of other things were wasted in this venture-cello tapes.I am thinking of investing in shares & stocks of a cello tape manufacturer now.

But apart from that,all other material used is waste material .So this is a Green house -as it has made use of recycling waste materials.She did it fast in three to four days -a record time ,wouldn't you all agree ?

Moreover, she has painstakingly built it with lots of  love for Tink .The result is, that the house that she built for Tink has become a home now !

On second thoughts,  if only , our builders could take a lesson from all this ? !

Resident dad.

One day in the morning by around 10 o'clock,my dad got breathless & started to sweat profusely.We all manged to make him wear a formal set of clothes & arrived at the hospital.He was admitted into ICCU( Intensive Care Cardiac unit ) as he is a heart patient.

As per the hospital guidelines,any patient admitted in ICCU has to be accompanied by a relative continuously.The relative is made to sit in the lounge outside the ICCU ward.So I would be there in the night staying in the hospital & later on during the day as well, whenever I had to relieve my mother.

It was here, in the lounge, that I met Shri Moorthy,a senior citizen - old enough to be my dad.I had observed, that he would be there eternally like a fixture- nobody seemed to come & relieve him.One of my dad's colleague came to visit my dad & he introduced me to Mr. Moorthy.I came to know that Mr Moorthy's wife was an asthma patient.Mr.Moorthy had two daughters- both married & settled abroad- one in Gulf & another in the USA.Mr Moorthy got talking with me.He was always full of praise for the Gulf & obviously USA.He was sure, that his daughters were lucky that they had settled there .The fact, that nobody was there to help him or his wife in emergencies did not deter him at all.That is why,nobody was there to relieve him.Occasionally,a relative would come in the mornings to relieve him & he would be back after his morning ritual of a bath & breakfast.

I felt sorry for him.I erred by asking him ,"Why don't you ask your daughters to come as your wife is so ill ?"He was furious," How many times can they come ?Recently only,they had visited us when she had been hospitalized a month back."Also,he made it very clear, that he was very snug with the fact that they were all abroad where everything was plenty & better than in India.How does he & his wife pass time ,I wondered.I came to know that he had taken up consultancy after retirement & as for his wife-she was usually down with asthma attacks.This was in sharp contrast to my father's wish that my brother who was abroad with family should come back & settle down in India.

Time passed & my dad was discharged from hospital but Mrs. Moorthy continued to be in the ICCU.Later,she breathed her last.I still ponder, as to whether Mr. Moorthy is in India or has settled abroad in greener pastures.lounge,