Of ketchups and sports stores...

One evening, my five-year old son (Siddarth) pointed out to a Ketchup bottle and told me proudly that he and paati (grandmother) bought it at a store that day. In a burst of fatherly inspiration (the kinds that helps us folk get away fairly unscathed despite having kids), I asked...

'Do you know that Israel has banned tomato ketchups?'

He gave me a puzzled look that said 'why the hell would anyone do THAT?' but lack of vocabulary made him shorten it to a simple 'Why??'

'Cos it does not have tomatoes'.

'But it has tomatoes dad. It is TOMATO ketchup.'

'I know, son. But they feel it has more chemicals than tomatoes.'

'Oh!'

A pause. I went on setting the dinner table.

'But India has not banned it. Why?'

'Because, the Indian government feels that many kids here want tomato ketchup and so they would not be able to ban it here.'

'Really?'

'Yes, so if kids keep asking their parents for tomato ketchup everytime they go to a store, then it would never be banned and all kids in India would grow up eating chemicals.'

'Dad, we should also stop?'

'That is up to you Sid. I wont interfere. If you want to stop, you should tell mom.'

'I am going to tell Mom to stop buying it.'

'That is going to help a lot, Sid. Then slowly other kids will also want to stop, so if the government sees that tomato ketchups don't go away from the shelves at all then they are going to want to stop the wastage, and hence stop production.'

Then he realized what he had signed up for. So he quickly asked 'What about that other ketchup that doesn't come in a bottle but is in a pack instead?'

I knew he didn't want to give up on ketchup.

'You could get ketchup from Nisarga (a local organic store) instead.'

'Nisarga? Why?'

'Cos chemicals would not be much in those ketchups and it might just be real tomatoes.'

'Oh yes! I am going to tell mom to buy only from Nisarga'

Cut to an hour later, when Niel (his mom) walks in from work.

'Mom, come here, come here.' He drags her to the ketchup bottle and says, 'Don't buy this from now on. It has chemicals.'

Niel gives him and me a puzzled look and says 'ok....?'

'Let us buy it from...' he pauses. 'Decathlon!' he says emphatically. Decathlon is a popular sports store.

Niel goes 'Are you sure? Decathlon doesn't sell ketchups.'

'It does mom, dad told me just now.'

Niel looked at me and all I could do was roll my eyes.

Yet another interesting chapter in the book of parenthood!