He does not know his name?

Milosh has taken to listening to rock songs. (I wonder if there are very many 5 yr olds who listen to rock music). He likes it loud and he like it hard. His current favorites are - "Papercut" and "In the end" by Linkin' Park; and because I could not take listening to the same song 5 times over back to back, I introduced Metallica to him - and now he likes "Sad but true", "Nothing else matters". Until I introduce something new, he will be stuck on this - the moment we get in the car, there is rare compromising (except when I have to talk to someone on the phone, or if he is too absorbed in his snacks to look for the next piece of entertainment).

Its interesting - when I was in college and got introduced to songs like these, I would listen to them over and over again - there are many cassettes (Yes - I did own some!) that had to be bought again because I had listened to them so many times, they stopped functioning! Fun for me, not so much for my neighbors :p In my hostel, I used to share a wall with a batchmate who was never very friendly with me - I finally now sympathize with her state as I worked through my cassettes ;)

Anyway, you would think he is a teenager by his choice of music. But such doubts are quickly dispelled when he asks follow up questions about the meaning of songs. E.g. a song said "...i don't even know myself" and Milosh asked me - if he does not know his name (:)). Then there is a part where a song goes "..i tried so hard and got so far ... in the end" .. and Milosh explained to me - that he is trying hard to do counting and he is not able to do it. He gets the pain and frustration that the artist portrays, its only mapped to his world :)

   

Milosh riding his scooter

Milosh is starting to ride his scooter!  This weekend, we even went to the near by park for his soccer on the scooter. He really enjoys it. Sometimes it gets too fast and we dont know how to stop it/ apply brakes. And sometimes, we get Mommy to carry the scooter back :)

Look who is learning to play chess!

One day I went to pick up Milosh from his school and he was playing chess with his buddy Shivum. Shivum evidently knew the rules and was coming up to me to explain how Milosh does not know the rules. I find it very fascinating - sometimes these kids will simply report how someone is not playing by the rules or something - they are not angry or annoyed - just reporting the problems in great detail and with great patience and continuing to play with each other.

Anyway, Milosh's naana had already got him the game of chess. It seemed like a good opportunity to start this at home. Naana is very patient in explaining the rules, he also knows who has to win :p- and Milosh is picking up chess very well :)

Of course, in his quest to win, he has to make some exceptions. Board is an artificial barrier after all ;) The best part is naana joins him outside the board - and continues to follow the rules :)

And sometimes the pawn (sipahi) gets mounted by the knight (ghoda) because it has no other way to be saved (see in the picture below)

And then Milosh tells me Shivum does not agree to the rules that naana has taught :)