Nalia and the Kardashians

Nalia has been out of school for three weeks now.  It’s hard to keep a 7 year old busy all day when both her parents are working….without giving into the TV and computer.  So I promised her she could go on a work trip with me. 

Kind of ironic because one of my favorite parts of going on work trips is… well… that I get to watch cable TV at the Save the Children guesthouse at the end of the day.  There’s something that E! network really does for me… transporting me to somewhere else maybe.  And on E!, they have the Kardashians.  After a hard day in the field or at the office, Kendra and the Kardashians are what I look forward to.  Maybe it’s that they are so over the top and do so many things I don’t even imagine that makes them fascinating.  Or maybe it’s that they actually say things I only imagine myself saying in my head… like expletives for a coworker who is a total jerk.  

So Nalia was with me, and really, I did give it some thought.  Do I let Nalia watch the Kardashians?  Will she get it?  Will she understand how over the top they are or maybe she’ll actually look up to them and like them.  This was a big risk.  I mean, they wear 4-inch heals to the gym and wear their make up to bed.  These are all things that Nalia thinks are v. cool.  But I really wanted to watch and it couldn’t really hurt Nalia once or twice, so we settled in and plugged ourselves into Kourtney and Khloe in Miami.  She got really into it.  At one point, she blurted out, “I know why they call their store DASH.  You know, the KarDASHians.  Get it?”  Dominique, the other woman staying in the guesthouse, and I were impressed.  No, we hadn’t gotten it. 

The next day, we came back from a long day in the field… we’d left at 6:am and come back at 6:30pm.  Coincidentally, the Kardashians started at 6:45pm.  When we opened the door to the guesthouse, there was someone new there.  I had heard there would be a consultant coming.  She introduced herself as Joan, from New York, and she was documenting Save the Children’s early child development program.  Immediately I began to wonder and worry how Joan would react to the Kardashians, because Nalia had told me in the car that she was excited to watch it again.  

 Joan struck up a conversation while I was cooking dinner--she had a Kindle and was exploring the idea of purchasing Kindles for libraries and schools in Africa because it’s so much cheaper than shipping books. 

Joan asked me if Nalia would like to try out the Kindle.  She wanted to find out how easily kids could figure out the technology, so she was testing kids throughout Africa while she did her consultancies.  “You can just ask Nalia if she wants to try it,” I said.  Joan asked Nalia and Nalia didn’t answer… I was sweating as I cooked our pasta, because I knew exactly why Nalia didn’t answer.  Nalia smiled sheepishly and turned away.  “Nalia, you can just tell Joan if you do or don’t want to do it.  She won’t care either way.” 

Nalia paused, and then smiled again, embarrassed, turning her eyes away.

“I want to watch the Kardashians first,” she whispered.

Nice… and Joan is a child development specialist.  I swallowed hard, waiting for this woman to take down my parenting skills and style in one fell swoop, to tell me that if we were in the US, she’d have CPS after me, to admonish me as just another tired worn out e working mom who gives into any TV program to babysit her child…but, after what seemed like light years, she smiled.  

“A girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do,” Joan replied. 

Nalia did try the Kindle after the Kardashians were over… now she has discovered the iPad, and is trying to talk me into buying that…”because we could do the Kindle and so much more, mommy.”