TINKLE DIGEST Magazine - December 2014

In this issue

Once there was a boy named Vivek who loved to cook. He would spend his weekends in the kitchen and learn from watching and helping. A few weeks into school, Vivek chose to join the Cookery club. In their very first club meeting, Vivek and his classmates were taught to make pudding. Naturally, Vivek was far more experienced than the others. The chef-teacher was very impressed with the speed at which Vivek was handling the ingredients. Soon, Vivek poured his luscious pudding batter into a bowl. Now, all he had to do was put it in the freezer and wait for 15 minutes. Tick-tock-tick-tock… it was taking too long! Vivek quickly opened the freezer to check if his pudding had set. Of course, it hadn’t. He put it back in the freezer and shut the door in a huff. Next time, Vivek decided, he would wait for a whole minute before checking. A minute later, he opened the freezer and jiggled the bowl—his pudding was still liquid. Waiting was more difficult than anything else he had done all day! But try as he may, Vivek could not stop himself from opening the freezer again and again, and again. Finally, when the 15 minutes ended, all the kids took their bowls out of the freezer. Vivek couldn’t wait to show off his perfect pudding! But instead of a solid, yummy pudding, he ended up with a watery, semi-solid mush. The teacher at once knew what Vivek had done wrong—his constant fidgeting hadn’t given the pudding enough time to set! Vivek, like many others including myself, had caught the bug of impatience. Often, we want things from our parents, or want certain wishes to come true. But we don’t have the patience to let things take their time. We want it and we want it now! But in being impatient, we not only end up with a bad result, but also end up making the wrong decisions, just as Vivek did. So this Christmas, I have decided to ask Santa for the gift of patience.