When Apra washed a Tiger

A few days ago, in the afternoon, Apra came into our office. Ramona was working at the computer and when Apra came in, she turned around. Apra stretched out her hands, keeping them carefully away from her clothes, saying ‘Ma, I have to wash my hands!’

Ramona looked at her hands but they looked clean. Nevertheless she followed her to the bathroom and on the way asked, already suspecting something, ‘How did they get dirty?’

‘I cleaned my tiger’, was the answer, referring to the big stuffed tiger in her room.

‘With what?’ Ramona asked, already wondering if she really wanted to know. ‘With water?’

‘Oh, no, just like that’, Apra answered as she walked through the bathroom door.

‘But with what, a cloth, a brush, anything else?’ Ramona urged our daughter to elaborate.

‘Yes, a cloth’, came the short answer again, while Apra pulled a chair to the basin so that she could climb up.

‘A wet cloth?’ Ramona asked again, already knowing the answer. It got better than she thought though:

‘Yes, wet, with foam! Don’t touch him now or your hands will get dirty as well!’ was the matter-of-fact answer of our daughter.

At this point, I came in and Ramona, who had been in the middle of an important work, just asked me ‘Can you please take care of the tiger situation?’ 🙂

Oh well, what does a devoted husband and father not do? Obviously, tiger-washing is part of these duties!

With the joined forces of Apra, Pranshu and Guddu, we moved the tiger to the bathroom and washed his foam-coated tail until it didn’t drip white bubbles all over anymore. Apra then dried the tail with a towel while the boys wiped up the water and dried the room, so that it didn’t feel like shower area of a swimming pool anymore!

Apra was very content with the outcome of this task she has set herself: the tiger is clean and she has had a great time!