The elder was scolding the child, “Why did you give your food to them? What about yourself?! You are so stupid!”
“I - I - I didn’t give..” the child protested meekly.
“If you didn’t give, then why did they take?! You cannot do this! I’m going to see your teacher about this!”
“The teacher saw..”
“So stupid! Why didn’t you take back your cookies?!”
I wasn’t sure if the child’s cookies were being stolen by her classmates or she gave the cookies to her ‘friends’ but it sounded like the adults were busy condemning and scolding the child. If this is how they teach her, no wonder she ends up being a rude, selfish kid. Oh, she gets bullied at school but gets scolded by elders at home. So, she learns to be a bully to others who are weaker than her.
My tadika cert - just discovered this after so many years. So I scanned it :)
In another incident, Mom related her work to me, “My colleague. I was already not feeling well but he took my pen - several times today - and only gave it back at the end of the day.”
She continued, “The pen, I know, belongs to the company. Anyone can use. But please give it back to me after he had finished using it lar. No. He threw the pen to me when I was writing something! It was rude.”
“I show you,” she grabbed a marker pen and threw across the table where I was typing. Grrrr..
I grabbed the pen and gestured hitting her, “Huh! If I were you, I’d throw it back to him.”
“I told him nicely, “I’m already not feeling well. Put back the pen from where you took it.” He got angry.”
“Do you think you are too polite and obedient?” I asked her.
“I know I am obedient. Sometimes it’s not helping me.”
Uh huh. She was going to full defense mode.
“Then.. you’ve been so polite and understanding to him for how many years? Sometimes you need to scold him! He thinks he’s what? Bullying you. Just because he shows his temper, then all of you have to adjust your behaviour around him! Why did you let him bully you?!”
I realized I sounded like the elders. We hurt the ones we love even though we know they are innocent/weak. We want them to be stronger yet we crush their spirit by scolding them because we can’t stand them letting others bully them. Yet how different are we from them?
We don’t know or aren’t with (physically) the other person bullying/hurting our closed ones so we lash out on the nearest person at that time.
I lowered my voice. “Although you didn’t ask him to bully you.. you are not helping yourself by being polite and so reasonable with him all these years. How many times already has he treated you like this?”
“Yes.. I was sick also, I helped to do his work.”
“Why did you do his work?!”
“He complained I didn’t do my best to help him.”
“Is it his job or your job?”
“I’m not sure - forgot already.”
Sick already, still want to take other’s tasks? Did that colleague appreciate it? If he does, he has a twisted way of showing it by throwing tantrums like a child.
“Try a different way of handling him. You’ve already been polite all these years. Any improvement from him? No. Sometimes we have to show our temper -”
“I don’t want to scold.. I don’t like to scold.”
“He’s the temper type. Maybe when you just remain calm and polite to him even when you are angry at him, he thinks that it’s fine - there’s nothing wrong.”
If water can’t put down the fire, then let fire fight with fire!
We all say