The kid had come with both of her parents...we had planned to have all the small kids in the rooms in the ground floor, so that they can be easily managed and also safe....this particular girl, came to the class room with her parents and they made her sit in the allocated place, spread all her materials(pen,sketch,etc..etc..) on the table and was standing there for quite sometime. The kids started coming in and it was time to start the competition....the room coordinator asked her mother to wait outside the hall,so that the children can start the painting....the lady too obliged and started out...suddenly this kid started crying at a decibel that I (who was standing outside managing the crowd) came in, only to see this kid crying all the way and the room coordinator stuned...The kid would listen to none...I don't know Kannada and I couldn't expect the kid to know English. The unluckier part is that the Lady too cannot converse in English...
I had to call on expert help(Venky knows Kannada) and even he was unable to control the kid....the Kid would stay quite till the mom is there nearby...once the lady attempts to go out, she would start crying....seeing this kid crying and the attention she gets from her mother, other kids too started crying....and their parents were moving in....GOD that was real bad...we wouldn't control the kids...moreover all the kids were small(may be some 6-7 years old), so no amount of logic would work....we asked the lady to move out of the hall...she was very sympathetic and immedaitely moved out....the girl was still crying...
We tried all the tricks in the book, including chocolates, bribing, making monkey faces, playing around with whatever we can lay our hands on...what not...nothing could make the kid stop crying...It was then that Dipti was brought in...I don't know what she did(she doesn't know Kannada)...but she was able to control the kid...The kid was not crying loud now, but it was all the time sobbing quitely...Dipti tried all the tricks too..but the sobbing wouldn't stop...all the while the mother was watching all these from the corner, not visible to the kid....
What the kid did next blew all of us out...She said, she wanted to go to Loo....So, the responsibility fell on Dipti..she took the kid to the Loo...once the kid came out of the class, she saw her mother and again started crying in a even louder voice...The mom came running to the kid and the kid refused to go to the Loo....when asked she told she doesn't want to go...the lady took the kid inside the class and got her settled in the seat and left....once the child came to know that her mom had left, she started crying again....this time too she said, she wanted to go to Loo...but her mom had hidden in a better place this time and the kid was unable to spot her...so this time the Journey to the Loo was uneventfull...but once inside the loo, the kid had told that, she doesn't want to use the loo...Dipti took her back to the seat and after sometime, again the kid stars the "Me-to -Loo" story...The loop continued for 3 times, before the lady came out and said that she would take her kid back....she was very sympathetic with us and told that she didn't expect her child to cry this much and she was very sorry for it....I told as Event Management Committee, we had foreseen such instances and it was okay..she didn't want to feel sorry for it...after all it's a kid and is bound to do such things....
But what was even more interesting is that, we had taken a photo of the girl with Dipti...Look at the smile in the kid's face...I think that smile would be enough for me to do anything...Such a cute smile from a kid would be worth more than anything....A nice experience with the kid...I enjoyed the whole episode...though there was a momentary anger at the kid, it was at the height of the moment, when there are hundreds of parents waiting outside and the crowd getting bigger and you are hard pressed for patience...but I learnt a lot(Managing kids is a tough job)...Hats off to my MOM.....Look at the smile at Dipti's Face...Was the smile for passifying the kid???