2 days ago, I was riding my electric bike and as the signal turned red I stopped. I saw these 2 little children with their mom near the signal sitting on the divider of the road.
They seemed siblings to me. The little girl directed her small brother to go towards me and sell keychains. Maybe, I looked like a prospective customer to her. Her brother refused to go, so she came near to my bike and was trying to sell keychains to me.
I said I don’t require keychains . She stayed there and observed my bike and was amazed to see that there was no key on my electric bike.
So she asked me “Yeh Chalta hai!”. I said “Yes, dekho Chalo hai!” So then she asked “Par Yeh Chalta kaisa hai?” So I stopped my bike, and started it again and took it a little forward and backward and demoed her how it operates.
Suddenly I felt like I was the sales rep of this bike and demoing to this inquisitive, curious customer.
After demoing, she still asked me “Par yeh chalta kaisa hai? I told her “Yeh Petrol se nahi chalta. She asked me again “Yeh Chalta kaisa hai?” I thought she didn’t get it that “Yeh electric bike hai”.
The signal was green and I had to go. I took a turn and a guy in Mercedes, he made me stop and asked me questions about
How is this bike?
What is the average?
What is the price of this bike?
Is it stable for long rides?

In the span of last 8 months, I have got many people looking at my electric bike, curious to know about it. The questions about the bike are always the same. They ask about the charging, average and price but this little street kid was so different and was led by her curiosity to know “How it works?”, but I showed her “How it operates?”. I realised that she asked me multiple times as she wanted to know “How it works” rather than “How it operates”. This is true innocent curiosity, as a child you possess to know “how things works? this is what amazes them.
None of the adults asked me this question, weren’t they curious enough, I wouldn’t say so but it’s so different than a child’s curiosity and their questions are so different than adults.

I believe encouraging children to question, to be curious is a must before we push them towards producing right answers.