A Singaporean In Australia

The highlight of the weekend of a short few minutes spent with boys. We never had little boys over at our place before but on Sunday we had two. As expected, they began their exploration of our place from the first minute. Boys will be boys. To adults, a house is a house. To boys, a new place is a new maze and that of course, spelled fun.

Generally the boys were well behaved. Cheeky laughter were expected around the house and they delivered. Big brother would be wrestling his young brother, sending chuckles from his entrapped victim. Other times, they would be playing hide-and-seek around our dungeon-like rooms and doors. Then they rode on plastic toys we collected in advance for Albany, admittedly more suited for boys so it was a great fit. They were just natural with them.

What was unusual about these boys from normal Singaporean boys was that they were not bespectacled yet. Heh. That was rather interesting, given how much time they spent in front of a television or computer. They even weeded my garden without instruction given. Jen was delighted and burst out in laughter when she learnt that. Their mother told me they were trained to help out at household chores at a young age, like many of the Australian kids here. It seemed obvious because before long big brother came over to offer a hand at making Pizza.

Before long, younger brother also came over to assist. So Penny obliged and gave the boys a basic lesson on making their (first?) pizza. Though they were too short to reach the bench top, they managed to do a decent job rolling the dough and filling them up with a generous amount of ingredients they liked. Then waited eagerly to taste their work. When it was ready, the brothers took the pizza outdoors and shared it. Their cute little sister got her share too. I was told that the siblings were given responsibility of taking care of one another without parents' supervision as much as they could. I thought that was a great idea.

When Penny offered to cut up their pizza, the brothers coolly raised their hands and chorused, "No!" and went on splitting the pizza among themselves without any tools. It made me, a mummy's boy, cowed in shame secretly.