Wednesday 9 November 2011

Curiously Me

They say curiosity kills the cat. But somehow or the other, they never seem to mention the monetary damages part of the whole phenomenon of curiosity. Or maybe that applies only to me. But hey, you can't exactly blame me for everything. Something need to be disproven. Let me try and illustrate. When I was 8, my parents took me to the local store to shop for groceries. Now, I had just learnt what the word 'unbreakable' meant so as soon as I saw this label which said, "Solid Unbreakable Glasses", I was excited. I thought if they could make something like this, my mom would finally let me use a glass tumbler to drink Bournvita from (which was a big deal seeing how I still had to use a really old porcelain mug and it was starting to smell). So I picked up one of the glasses and threw it straight down. To my surprise, it shattered and I had the whole store looking at me. My parents had to pay something like a hundred rupees (this was also in the pre-inflation era, so that's pretty cheap) and I got a beating all the way home. The only thing I could say was that the cover said 'unbreakable'!!!

A few weeks later, I had finally figured out how the sewing machine worked and had fun just stepping on the pedal and watching the wheel spin. Surprisingly, it's also good exercise!! Anyways, I sort of wanted to know what would happen if I tried stitching my finger. So I did what I always do: blindly put myself in danger for the sake of knowledge........alright maybe not relevant knowledge but I get life lessons so I don't complain. I place my finger under the needle and gave the pedal a good press. Luckily, I kept my finger nail up but that didn't stop the needle going right through my finger and breaking off, leaving me with a 2 inch piece of steel sticking right through my finger!!! Very surprisingly (even to me, honestly) I didn't scream or anything. I just grit my teeth and calmly pulled the needle out, went and sat in the easy chair and looked innocent. And I forgot to mention, most of these activities took place in the afternoon, when everyone else in the house was knocked out in their siestas. My mom later woke up and, with that inexplicable intuition mothers have, went straight to the sewing machine. Once again, money exchanged hands and later, those hands fell on me.

Many years later, I was now a mature 12 year old, though my curiosity never left me. I decided I'd surprise my parents by making an omelette all by myself. I heated the pan, made the egg mixture and turned out a beautiful omelette. I heard my dad ring the bell and rushed to the door to open it, expecting him to smell the aroma and praise me. I closed my eyes since I only wanted to hear his reaction, not see it. The next thing I know, I feel a stinging slap on my face and open my eyes to see a livid father holding the omelette pan. I look at the table and see a huge hole, charred and still smoking. I apprently put the pan on the tablecloth without a coaster so it ended up burning right through the cloth. I didn't actually get yelled at for this since my parents recognised I was actually trying to be sweet so they let me go but since then, I'm not allowed to enter the kitchen without supervision.

Now, I've learnt to curb my curiosity though it still comes out at random intervals. Good thing I have my own purse now.....

Çiao!!