How to be an Undercover Terrorist Disguised as a Teenager

Now that you are a teenager, you will feel the need to prove yourself a supremely misunderstood being.

Whoopee! At last, your much-awaited teenager years have arrived. And with it, have descended on you the long awaited special privileges!

Here’s all that you can do, once you’ve been afflicted with teenagitis:

1. Scream Blue Murder

Now is the time to open your cupboard and go berserk throwing all your stuff out and screaming at Mom, “I have nothing to wear!” while rummaging through the hundreds of clothes your parents have provided you with.

2. Leave Your ‘Mark’

You can also leave a trail of worn clothes around the house for Mom to pick up as part of her daily obeisance to you.

3. Practise Selective Hearing (!)

Now is also the time to have an adult talk with Dad by telling him you will no longer be guided by his old-aged values, rules, career choices, boring “future talks” or worse, “When I was your age…” monologue. After all, you know it all.

4. Put Your Best Scowls Forward

You become an expert in body language and practise it abundantly, e.g. rolling your eyes when your parents talk to you; shrugging your shoulders when they ask you about your poor grades; scowling, frowning, gritting your teeth and generally spreading misery with your attitude all the time.

5. Get With the ‘Emotional Blackmail’ Programme

Now is the time you can emotionally blackmail your parents for the latest gadgets in the market and fool them into surrendering to all your expensive demands by convincing them that these are all important for you to do well in life. Now that is the key word that turns them into your slave!

6. Rules, Schmules

And once they get you the mobile, PS system, X-Box, etc., with the promise that you will follow their rule of when to use it and for how long – simply agree. And then, once you do get the object of your desire, go wild with it – having a texting party, talking endlessly on your cell on the pretext of doing school work and playing violent games by convincing them that this is the only way you can release the stress of your academic load!

7. Exercise the Right to ‘Be Moody’

Becoming a teenager also gives you the license to be moody. So you can bang your door to say you want your space and then blame your parents for not “being there” for you. You can withdraw emotionally and accuse them of “not communicating” with you.

8. Challenge the Adults

Another privilege teen age gives you is the ability to challenge everything adults around you say to you. That means challenging the teacher’s rules in school; challenging your parents’ peace of mind by demanding money, branded clothes, night-outs, parties, trips with friends and every kind of wild behaviour that can turn the home into a war zone. Any attempt at disciplining you is met with drama of the Academy Award standard.

9. Teach Shakespeare a Word or Two

“Cool” is a word you and your generation have a copyright on. So when your parents disapprove of pierced lips, body tattoos, drugs, all-night parties and general rude behaviour, you instantly pronounce them “uncool”. You even have “cool” words in your vocabulary like F.., Sh.., and abbreviations such as WTF, ROFL, etc. You are convinced that if only Shakespeare had discovered this profound way of communicating, his books would have been bestsellers. If only the dinosaurs around you could understand this insightful language! Ha! So uncool!

10. Yell “At Least I’m Studying” for Everything

Unlike the West, where teens are politely asked to leave the parental home and go fend for themselves, you are convinced that in India, you have given your parents the privilege and honour of being born to them. It is now their bounden duty to look after you and provide for you.

“In return, I am studying, am I not?” you scream. And they dutifully keep quiet so as not to disturb you in this momentous duty you are performing. In fact, they feel really grateful that you choose to study at all. So disrespect, screaming, breaking curfews, all go. Even your shouts of “I hate yous!”

And after all this picnic, when your grades turn out to be low and your parents send you to a counsellor, you roll your eyes and say… “They just don’t understand me!”

(Neelam Kumar has battled cancer twice. A writer of 5 books, including one with Mr Khushwant Singh, Neelam’s latest book ‘To Cancer, With Love – My Journey of Joy’ was published by Hay House Publishers in 2015. It is the first humorous book on cancer to come out of India. Neelam lives in Mumbai and can be reached at [e-mail])