Padmajav’s Weblog

I took my son to the Citicentre today. Thought he’ll enjoy the festivities. at 3 and a half, he’s more tuned to Christmas than Diwali. Thanks to Thomas & friends and Bob the Builder, he knows all about Santa, Christmas Tree & Gifts.

Sadly the only thing he knows about Diwali is the fire-crackers. And he’s terrified of them.

Today, he loved the huge Christmas tree in the atrium of Citicentre. But again was terrified to go into the Santa-house. Loved going into Lifestyle even more because of all the toys he can get.

After a while, I was browsing some T-shirts for him. He just announced ‘I’m going’. I assumed he must be going back to the toys, so he can nag me for something else he finds there. About 10 or 15 seconds later, I looked for him and he was nowhere to be seen. I was pretty cool because I knew he’ll be around nearby. But after 10 minutes of searching all the aisles in the kids section, I couldn’t find him. Getting desperate, I started asking every shop assistant I could see. Nobody had seen him. By then I started having visions of him kidnapped or something as bad.

I ran to the counter and was directed to customer care downstairs where they can make an announcement. And two sweet ladies offered to look out for him in case he was still in the first floor. I dashed into the open lift, pressed the button and prayed. Has never been so scared in my life!

The lift door opens and there he is, in the arms of a shop assistant with a mike. They were just going to make an announcement!

Thank God! My first instinct was to slap him across is face to have created so much panic. But then he looked as scared as I was. So I just stopped with a mild scolding session. And when we went upstairs to thank those ladies and let them know he was safe, he said in a small voice, ” sorry amma…”

A friend who was joining us called to say she’ll be there in half hour. “I’m going home,” I told her. When I told her what I’d just been through, her wise advice was “Never tell your husband what happened. You’ll never live it down.”

True. But knowing what a motor-mouth I am, the first thing I’ll say when he walks in would be ” Guess what? I almost lost your son today!”

PS: Tried searching for those ladies, but couldn’t find them.