Diary of an Expat in Singapore (27 page)

“Why can’t I have a dog?”

Well, let’s see, you really wanted to get a guitar and then you lost interest.

“But that’s because I wanted an electric guitar and you got me a classical one.”

You wanted to do wushu and then you quit, tennis and then you quit.

“But that’s because I’m a quitter.”

Don’t say that. You are not a quitter. You really wanted that thing that shoots darts and then you lost interest. The Ben 10 watch, where is it now?

“On the high shelf in your closet because you said that when my friends came over they would want to play with it and they would break it.”

Good point.

“Mom, those are all things, but a dog is not a thing.”

That’s what I’m worried about.

“A dog is different. I would love a puppy. Or at least a rip stick. Or a scooter. One of those three things.”

Well, how about a puppy that goes on a rip stick? Or a scooter that barks? That would be cool.

“See, now you’re doing that thing, joking. I don’t like it when you do that.”

Strange how my kids never like it when I joke.

Skateboarding

Alexander has started a new school. This school offers many more sports than his old one. He’s doing swimming, basketball, aerial troupe, and athletics. Maybe he was sports-deprived. But to be honest, we’re not that sure he’s really keen on swimming. After the many laps he had to do to get on the team, his first words as he got out of the pool, were: “I’m going to get you for this.” That can’t be good.

I have to confess that like most expats who live in Singapore surrounded by pools, I have always been completely paranoid about having both my kids become good swimmers.

On Friday, Alexander had his first swim meet after school. He came in last. I was excited he had competed at all. He complained that the kids he swam against were so big that when they jumped in the pool they created a tidal wave that overwhelmed him. I figured he was exaggerating until I saw them. This kid needs some protein, pronto!

I admit that in part I am influenced by my older brother, who was on the swim team at Yale. But Alexander likes to dash those dreams. “Of all the sports I do, swimming is the one I like least. Just so you know I’m only doing this for you.” (Excellent reason.) In fact, yesterday he confided that all the other kids on the team told him that they also do not like swimming but are just doing it because their parents want them to.

Finally, I feel like I’m part of a team: Annoying Parents Who Force Their Kids to Be on the Swim Team. Okay, so it’s not so catchy but will it fit on a t-shirt?

Writing in my journal

Swimming: The True Storie
(as read in Alexander’s new journal): “I think I am supposed to love swimming, but i just dont, my mom and dad are trying to make me love it or something I can tell because all my life (so far) I have done swimming lesson after swimming lesson I am on the swim team but did I want to be on it no!! can I quit and join something else like all the other kids NO!! so now I am stuck with a bunch of kids I dont know and my mom says I am supposed to “bond” with them? To me swimming is just something you learn to not drown but no you gotta take swimming to a whole new level with the amazing, fantastic Championchips?? I just dont get it at all.”

I’m starting to think he doesn’t like swimming.

Watching a magician on the TED conference

Ever since Alexander got a book on Harry Houdini he’s been into magic. This kind of reminds me of my brother Stephen. As a kid he worked for hours secretly in his room perfecting his tricks. Finally, he called us in. As we sat in our chairs eagerly waiting for the show to begin, he announced: “And now I will pour this milk into a paper cone and
voila
watch as it disappears.” Then, much to my mother’s chagrin and our disbelief, he waved the cone to one side and
all
the milk went flying onto the wall. His career as a magician didn’t really take off after that. He did go on to become the managing director of a big investment bank… so he probably retained some of his earlier magic trick training.

Starting a rare coin collection

Or something on his own. Let’s face it, playing Monopoly with a five-year-old sibling can be a trying experience. Possible scenarios:

a. They get kind of grumpy when you get money from the bank and they don’t.

b. They throw a tantrum because nobody is landing on their property.

c. They
really
don’t like the “Go directly to jail, do not pass Go, do not collect $200” card.

In fact, I sometimes wonder if my family’s own obsession with real estate is directly linked to having had a TV-deprived childhood and therefore spending inordinate amounts of time playing Monopoly.

Learning a poem

Alexander is thrilled by my enthusiasm for poetry. Okay, that’s a slight exaggeration. This is the new
quid pro quo
scheme recently introduced: before he gets to buy something he needs to memorize a poem: “Right, new cleats for soccer? Here’s ‘The Road Not Taken’ by Robert Frost. You have one hour. Time starts now.”

Reading a book

Last night, Alexander was looking for something to read (he’s become a voracious reader and considering I nearly compromised my liver trying to teach him how to read in second grade this is no insignificant detail. In fact, he gets away with a lot because he’s reading all the time… I’m that happy, still.) Anyway, he picked up my copy of ‘Catcher in the Rye’. I had a moment of thinking: “Wait a minute, I’m not sure J.D. Salinger is really appropriate for a just-recently-turned nine-year-old. But that feeling was replaced with an intense curiosity to what he would say and what he would think about it. After a few pages he put it down, saying he liked it but he wasn’t going to read it right now. And then, after further consideration, he came up with: “Was this book like the ‘Diary of a Wimpy Kid’ of your time?” Spot on.

Eliot last night couldn’t fall asleep. I started reading her ‘Cinderella’ and she burst out in tears: “What if you die, then I’ll get a stepmother. Or if you fight with Daddy and he changes his mind about loving you and then I get another mother. Or if you die, but then you come back and I already have a stepmother.” First, I reasoned that I wasn’t dying, that I would always be her mother, and I even added as a reassurance: “Your Daddy would never marry somebody evil. She would be nice.” But this provoked an even more frantic reaction: “But he doesn’t know anybody, he doesn’t have any girl friends, it might be somebody who seems nice and then is evil.”

Hard to fight that sort of logic. So, I did what any rational and sensible mother would do. Put away ‘Cinderella’ and pulled out ‘If You Give a Mouse a Cookie’.

Playing basketball

There is no basketball hoop in our condo. In fact, at the last council meeting, the proposal to install a hoop (even a donated one) was immediately shot down. No surprise, as all upgrading proposals are unanimously rejected. So now basketball is an endeavour that
only
involves jumping over a gate to enter the only condo in the whole neighbourhood that does have a basketball court, hoping the guard at that condo doesn’t figure out he and his buddies don’t actually live there.