Some would call Sid a spoilt rich kid. He was not mean or hard-hearted. He had just not given too many things a serious thought. He was the cool kid. Hanging around with his friends. Aimless about his future. Having fun in the ease of the present. There was no time for a worrying mother.

His mother didn’t know English. She didn’t give up trying to speak in the few broken phrases she did know. School was ‘isschool’. She liked her boy in shirts and wished he could be a film star some day. He was handsome enough! She waited for him at dinner, worried about his exams, tried to cover for him in front of his father. She did what mothers generally do.

Sid failed in his exam. Had a massive fight with his father. Stormed out of his comfortable life into the unknown. Learnt the value of things. Learnt responsibility. Learnt the sense of accomplishment that follows hard work. Learnt he misses his mom.

Wake Up Sid is one of my favourite movies for many reasons. This scene below is one such reason.  A mother sits in her quiet house flipping through memories. Her son walks in. A quiet private moment between a loving mother and a son who has come to appreciate all that she means to him. He comes in a white shirt for the mother who takes care of him. She confides she speaks English just for him.

 

 

Another mother, who doesn’t get a chance to finish her cup of coffee as her house wakes up. Morning tea and snacks for a friendly wise mother-in-law, tea and morning newspaper for her husband and finally getting her kids ready for school. She sells her homemade snacks and sweets. Laddoo is her speciality. She dances in secret with her little baby boy. Then waits for her husband to come home for dinner.

Whom should she share her sense of accomplishment and happiness with when outsiders praise her laddoos? Whom should she show her broken heart when her family thinks that she is only born to make laddoos? Who should wipe her tears when her own family mock her bad English pronunciation? Not intentionally mean, they just don’t see how hurt she is and how inadequate they make her feel.

She goes to her daughter’s English speaking school. Gets through the day with genuineness and dignity. Comes out proud of her smart daughter. She takes her daughter’s hand in hers and gives it a kiss in love. The daughter doesn’t see the twinkle in her mother’s eye. She only sees her own humiliation and embarrassment in a mother who is not as cool as others.

 

 

I’ll probably make my mother breakfast in bed today. I will go with my father and get her a card today. I might even get up extraordinarily early to call and wish her the first thing today. But for the rest of the year,  I’ll try noticing her feelings that little bit more. And when I remember, I will try being kind, not only to her but the people around me, a tad bit more.

Happy Mother’s Day!

 

Wake Up Sid – Another Favourite Scene

 

AARWEN’S INDEX

 

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