This day, last year

I found this little word doc hiding somewhere in my laptop today written one year back.

Nine year old 1: “Hi.”

Nine year old 2: “Hey, listen. What do you want to be when you grow up?”

1: “A cryptologist.”

2: “A what?”

1: “You know… a cryptologist.”

2: “What do cryptologists do?”

1: “They decode coded messages.”

2: “Wow! Sounds interesting. What will you have to study to become a cryptologist?”

1: “Mathematics and Computer Science mainly.”

After witnessing a conversation like that between two nine year olds, only a dimwit would sit idly and do nothing about it. I guess I should at least record it. How many children would have heard about cryptologists, leave alone spell it correctly, at that age? Where is the world heading?

You guessed right. She read ‘Digital Fortress’ by Dan Brown. I was amazed too. It’s not like she read it for the sake of reading or for putting pseud for the book was not bought for her in the first place. The book brought for her was good old Nancy Drew which she finished in just a few hours.

“That’s preposterous! How will she understand that high a level of English?”, you ask? It turns out that she has a remarkable command over the English language and manages to read the book without too many visits to the dictionary. Well, she probably didn’t understand ‘Fuck’ but she was thoughtful enough not to ask anybody or maybe the suspense of the story made her skip every occurrence of the word.

The other day, I got a text message.

“07/07/07 07:07 am. 7 days/week, 7 janma, 7 seas, 7 phere, 7 wonders, 7 colours. Why 7?”

I meditated on this all morning but couldn’t figure out a satisfying explanation. Googling didn’t turn up anything substantial either. That’s when I asked this to her almost completely certain that she would have no idea and would appreciate my processor for having come up with such a brilliant question. Pat came the reply – “Because God created the world in seven days.” She knows that too! And that too a belief attributed to another religion.

Recently, at a medical store she was overheard saying in hushed tones, “Doesn’t that look like the fake medicine they showed on TV yesterday?” Oh! Come on! Spare the news atleast!

That brings up a strange question. Will such a generation reach an age when there will be nothing left to learn? Freaky!