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Uncle Olmaz and our children, or how to bring up a moron

By Aliya Hagverdi

Don't tell me that you have never heard the brilliant phrase "Gachma, yikhilarsan." The word-for-word translation – "Don't run or you will fall" – does not express the full charm of this educational phrase so popular in our country.

Don't tell me that you have never heard the brilliant phrase "Gachma, yikhilarsan." The word-for-word translation – "Don't run or you will fall" – does not express the full charm of this educational phrase so popular in our country.

They think that to bring up a child means to keep him satiated, clean, dry and warm. That is why children are fed under the lash, with a scandal, or each of their meals is turned into a theatrical performance. Since early years children are wrapped up so warmly that they swim in sweat, and the mothers constantly change the children's clothes, demonstrating their quickness as a mother to the people around them. Going outside is turned into a flight into the space for there are any kinds of microbes outdoors, as well as wild animals that can defile the sterile baby with their dirtiness. Each attempt of the child to touch something or, for instance, to go up the steps is marked by a heartrending yell of his mother. I personally know a woman who in the 40-degree heat let her 3-year-old daughter to the garden, in the summer house, in socks and screamed in an altered voice when the child's socks became dirty or wet.

Then a combat for education starts, with the parents doing everything in their power to turn the child into a trained monkey, oh, sorry, an excellent student. They use every means – threats, promises, they hire tutors and present bonuses in envelopes to school teachers to make them tender. Boys playing football in the yard will soon become history and a subject of nostalgia of "true Baku residents" just like the trams. To be more exact, exclusively the children of the "common people" play outdoors, while the offsprings of the medium class now stay at homes burying themselves in tablets. Parents accompany their children to school up to the tenth grade – anything may happen, especially if the child is a girl. How can she go by bus?

So, the child turns 16. He has never played with animals because they are dirty; he has never been in a forest because there are ticks in the forest; he does not know what is where in the city because he has never gone out alone. He does not know how to do shopping because his mother herself buys him what he needs; he has never made decisions on his own; he does not know what bus goes where; if left alone in the house, he will either burn the house or die of hunger in a week. The parents choose a university and a profession for their children in such families. And they pay for his education if the child fails to be admitted to a free department, in spite of the teachers on eight subjects who put the squeeze on him since the fifth grade.

Other nice peculiarities of national mentality are used after that, for instance, the custom of picking a life partner for their offsprings. Haven't you heard the phrase, "Do you know any girl to be a match to our Rufatik?"? If not, it means you simply live in your closed small world of advanced marginal persons and do not see that the country's population has married and keeps marrying off their children for centuries.

Do your children have the ability to think and also to feel sympathy and empathize with others?

The only difference between the social layers is that representatives of the "elite" buy an apartment and a car for their sonnies and get a job for them in their bank, keeping to be "in charge" of their lives, while ordinary, "black people" marry off their son to his cousin, ensuring a workforce for themselves, bring their daughter-in-law home and leave their son to help his father in the shoemaking workshop. The core is the same – even after receiving a passport, the young people remain wimpy, they remain mother's children, lacking in initiative and good for nothing except living their miserable life by routine.

There is another expression, having no exact translation: "Bizim uşaqlar olmazda böyüyür" ("Our children are brought up by prohibitions"). It reflects the situation as well as possible.

So, what civil society, excuse the expression, do you expect from these people? They even fail to be in charge of their own life.

It is quite natural that each parent seeks to protect his child. But are such primeval methods helpful? He was not allowed to climb a ladder at 3 years? Very good! He will fall off a ladder at 13 years old. A girl is not allowed to ride a bike? She will smash her husband's car some day because she is unable to get her bearings on the ground. An 18-year-old girl must be at home by 9:00pm? At 25, she will run off the rails, while you will think that she is at work.

To let the 3 kg and 600 g flesh become a free person, from the very start, you should acknowledge his right to mistakes and experience, his right to his own life separate from yours.

I say nothing of the fact that a person's life is much more colorful and rich when he is allowed to explore it on his own. How a child's world will be enriched with hikes and night bonfires, rivers and wild blackberries. How beautiful and healthy he will become if he is allowed to move, take a lot of walks, roller-skate and even fight with other children. How much freer and more natural behave the children who grew up without a fear of punishment and idiotic restrictions, and free of excessive demands.

Why do we constantly care about the outward indications of successfulness and forget about the quality of life? We have certain norms and standards for ourselves and our children. At a certain age, our child should have certain weight. He should say names of 10 fruits and 10 vegetables. He should get excellent marks. He should defend a thesis. He should marry. If everything happens at the right time and is "no worse than that of others," we sigh with satisfaction. Is the fulfillment of a plan all that gives you pleasure, people? What gives you happiness? What makes you and your children happy?

What about communication, reading, travel and creative work? Do your children take pleasure in talking to you, discussing news, do they ask you questions about friendship, movement of celestial bodies or origin of animal species? Are they capable of working in a team with other children, do they respect the personal space of other people? Are they happy? Or do they constantly worry that they fail to reach your ideal, does it make them nervous? Do your children have the ability to think and also to feel sympathy and empathize with others?

Haven't you heard the phrase, "Do you know any girl to be a match to our Rufatik?"?

You cannot realize yourself as a free person if you have neither a responsibility nor an authority. You cannot learn anything if you have no experience. A free person knows what he is capable of and what he wants and there is no daddy and mummy in his life settling the "incomprehensibilities" and solving his problems. But he has parents whom he cares about and respects. To let the 3 kg and 600 g flesh become a free person, from the very start, you should acknowledge his right to mistakes and experience, his right to his own life separate from yours. At first, let him have his own toys which belong only to him and which you have no right to touch without his permission. Then let him have his own hobbies, friends, partners and job – and he should choose all this himself.

When I hear a mother yelling somewhere in a park "gachma, yikhilarsan," I want to come up to that caring mother and say that the child who does not run so as not to fall is a moron. It is a sick and defective creature. And that I am afraid for the future of our society, and for the present as well.

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