The Boy Who Climbed The Tree

My dad gave me a lift to work today and we took a detour into Marine Parade. Following a staggering traffic, our car arrived at the road along a familiar place. For a couple of years during my career, I have spent my life at Tao Nan School, as none other than a Primary School teacher. To be precise, Primary One teacher. Because I was new and inexperienced, I was placed in a lower Primary class and those few years happened to be the best time of my career, being with young children and peering into their wonderful worlds.

I recall this incident, which to my surprise, was still recollected by the people there, who witnessed it some ten over years ago. There was this naughty boy who climbed up a Frangipani tree, one which was a young branch then, but a crowning glory now. The boy climbed up the tree and my colleague then was unable to coax him to come down from the tree. So the smart alec in me came along and I went over, told a blatant lie to the kid. I told him I was very impressed by his tree-climbing skills and asked if he could come down and show me how to do it, well, step-by-step. He fell for the trap and came down only to find a pinch on his ear-lobe by his class teacher and lots of reprimands.

This amusing incident was always remembered but only to this point. I had seldom mentioned what happened after which because it was all wrong. All wrong in the sense that we should never for any reasons, devastate the trust in a child, especially one who was all enthusiastic about sharing talents and abilities to others, others whom he thought looked up to him for things he felt proud of himself.

But this is not all. His class teacher, who incidentally reprimanded him aggressively, did not realize why the child had climbed the tree. When I spoke to the boy after all his reprimands, asking why he did such a foolish and dangerous thing, he simply pouted and did not answer. Then he showed me a crushed flower. "For Mrs Law", he said.

It was an amusing incident but all wrong.

As the car made way off the traffic junction where the tree stood, I only wish I could apologize to this boy for telling him a lie, and to tell him how proud of him I was.

And still am.