Bambi

When I was a little girl, I was in such a hurry to grow up. I did live in the present, but I fantasized more about the future. I wanted to be so many things that I have not been able to be. Well, maybe soon I will become a doctor. That, I did dream of. Well, kind of.

I was in such a hurry to grow up that now I long for my childhood. It was a time when I thought that life was timeless, deathless, never-ending... I thought I could conquer the world and do many things while at it. I would be a doctor, an actress, a dancer, a maths teacher, a restauranteur, a taxi driver, a footballer, a princess and many other things. That was when I was an 8 year old girl living somewhere in a little home in Africa.

Back then I used to read Enid Blyton's The Faraway Tree series. These books outlined my earliest understanding of the world. I believed that anything was possible. There was a time when I actually thought little fairies and magical things did exist. But they only happened to those who believed in them, and I believed. And I thought that if I played under that huge tree in our back garden, fantastic things would happen to me just like in the book.

I was not afraid of bugs and I always looked for grasshoppers. I played with the little white kittens and went on lizard hunts and rode my bicycle in circles around the garden. I flew a heavy kite I'd designed and made after watching a children's TV show. But for some reason, my kite would barely lift. And I'd take it back inside for some remodeling. I'd enter through the front sliding doors into our sitting room and smell beautiful aromas from the kitchen. It would be noontime. Who else but my lovely mommy preparing lunch cause daddy was going to be home soon. And this song would be playing in the stereo. Back then, it was all about cassettes... and this is a song that has never left me.