Theory over, now it is time to get in!

If you had missed the elaborate introduction-to-swimming sessions which Akshara was put through, check this post. After the brief unsuccessful attempt in Chennai, we continued trying when we were in Malaysia. Slowly, but surely the situation was improving. The swimming pool was visible from our hotel room and Akshara spent a lot of time gazing at the pool with us explaining about the possible fun that could be had by being inside it!

Then, we went back to the usual ploy of a photography session. The constant exposure to the pool seemed to have worked with this photo session happenning much closer to the water (and in contact too!) than the previous ones.

We were back in Chennai by then and back to the same old swimming pool. We noticed that Akshara was more forthcoming to the water this time and the only difference from before were the arm-balloons (or whatever you call them!) she was wearing. Maybe it was the security concern that was keeping her away all the time… But, the reason didn’t matter, the final result did and we were happy.

Next Step: Get her into the water. This happened almost instantaneously without any resistance. In fact, Akshara started to enjoy splashing and jumping around.

She wasn’t happy with my company and wanted the duck also to come in. She sat on the duck and started paddling around. This was a big improvement over the situation that i had to be next to her always.

Then came the part which had all us surprised. Since the pool was around 2 feet deep (just until her chin), she was actually moving around the pool by pushing her toes on the pool floor. She was actually moving from one end to another on her own. This was way too cool to watch!

I later became very ambitious and held her up so that she was in a horizontal position. She started pedalling her legs. Maybe, this comes to kids automatically. But the lessons had to stop here, as proceeding beyong this required the instructor to be knowledgeable, which i definitely wasn’t. So, the hunt is on now for a pool in Pune which takes in 2 yr olds.