One of the toughest things a parent faces is when your child misbehaves.
Just yesterday, we were at Shokudo, Raffles City. There's a nice little play area for kids and a slide thrown in for good measure.
My boy was getting ready to climb up the slide when another boy, about 3 years his senior, came charging in and cut the queue.
The wife chided the boy gently and asked him to take his turn, hoping that his parents would do likewise. However, the boy's parents were not in sight and so 'charging boy' got his way. And he did not stop at that; he continued cutting the queue of other kids.
This was when I came in and gave the kid a stern 'you must take turns' but to no avail. By this time, his parents had appeared and we so hoped that they would do something about his behaviour.
I walked away from the slide to chat with some friends. Some time passed and from the corner of my eye, I saw the wife come fuming towards my direction and muttered something about wanting to give that boy 'a tight slap'. 'Charging boy' had wanted to jump the queue again and my son was in the way. For some reason, 'charging boy' decided to take a swipe at my son, throwing a punch at my son's head because he could not get his way. Thankfully, he is not a born boxer and missed.
I stood up and headed toward the direction of 'charging boy'. His parents were not around again. I walked up to him and as soon as I did, his parents reappeared from nowhere and beckoned him to follow them home. In response, he gave a scream of dissension, to which, his father (i suppose it was his father) gently told him in a soothing voice, "No son, you cannot do that."
Not giving his father two hoots, he ran out of the restaurant into oblivion.
I do not claim my boy to be an angel all the time. He has his moments and there are times when we have to deal with him. Of late, he has gotten into the habit of throwing a tantrum by lying on the floor and beating his arms and legs on the floor. Sometimes ignorance works; other times smacking him works. But in all those cases, he got the idea after we applied discipline to his behaviour.
With 'charging boy', I do not actually blame his behaviour. It is his parents I have to take to task.
There was a story documented some 3,000 years ago, of a father who was a high ranking religious leader in a foreign country. His had 2 sons whom he raised but were a handful for him to handle. The 2 sons went into neighbouring countries to rob the people and rape the women. When this religious leader found out about their deeds, he called his sons and basically said this to them, "Sons, I have heard about the things that you have done. It is not good."
And that's all he said to them.
His sons became more rotten and eventually were killed in the midst of executing their evil deeds. Their father, upon hearing of their deaths, slipped and fell to his death.
My friends, parenting is not an easy task, but it has to be done. I pray you have the courage to do what is right for your children, and for society at large. Otherwise, the people that will suffer might ultimately be yourself.