Modelling good example

On Saturday , we went to the funfair at the Bishan Community Centre. It was a fun experience as they have worked with many volunteers and also some external vendors to set up many games stations where kids can try their hand at different occupations. They pretty much filled out every level of the community centre with stations and it's quite fun as kids can go already earning stamps for trying or each occupation and they get to redeem the stamps for some presents at the end of the day. 

I felt quite impressed by the scale of the events as the stations were very fun (from sports on inflatables to robotics and balloon sculpturing) and many of which I have not encountered before at other events. Furthermore, I was a student councillor before and I know that organising such events with limited budget and manpower is no mean feat. Best of all, entrance ticket was merely $5. As such, we had a whale of fun there the entire afternoon. You can check out my Instagram for videos and pictures. 

However, two incidents caught my attention :

Incident 1: 

Many stations involve using of 3 tables with game materials and abou 2-3 volunteers. As they packed many stalls in a small area, there wasn't proper queue systems or lines . One simply needs to ask the stall keeper and wait for a turn , a seat or the materials. It wasn't perfect but it wasn't a big problem. At most we missed a turn. However, there's this angry father who started scolding the stall keeper about how there wasn't a queue system and how they could organise an event without catering for crowds at a certain station. The poor admin girl was just being scolded by that father. It was clear that she's just an administrator at that stall, and not the overall event organiser. It's probably not her fault that there's no "queue" system. But honestly, yes there was a crowd (not all that big), and there's a bit of a mess (but it's a low budget funfair that's really quite fun so far) , but nothing some grace and patience can't cure. I don't see why the big fuss. And worse of all, the kid was probably taking all these in. How bad an example the father was setting for the child! 

Incident 2 

I was waiting for the balloons, to get something for Cayson. A bespectacled kid of around 8-9 years old brushed past me. He muttered loudly to himself ,"where is the goddamned queue?" 

I was quite shocked by his outburst. When has our younger generation become so foul mouthed? Why do we need a proper queue system for everything? Can't people just be flexible, have some grace and just wait for your turn to ask the in-charge at the stall? It's a really small stall by the way, not some entrance area leading to NDP parade or Jay Chou concert. I don't know why he behaved like that but with my first incident earlier on, I'm guessing that perhaps the parents could well be impatient or lacking grace in general. Or perhaps he had picked this up from his friends. 

Nonetheless, my learning from these episodes is that educating our younger ones doesn't mean just sending them to schools and tuition. It starts with the small things at home like being flexible,  having patience and a bit of grace. And the easiest thing that we can do is be a good role model ourselves for actions speak louder than words.