"I-think-one-hundred can."

1 March 2011

"GOOD. I-think-one-hundred-can.", the Little Genius confidently declared as she buckled her seat-belt when i picked her up from kindie today. Today was her 1st semester test and it was her BM paper.

She continued, "All correct!". She sounded so convincing that I then quizzed her whether her teacher had already marked her test paper. "I think not yet. But i think all correct."
"Oh, okay.", was my response.

Moments later, she continues babbling on.
Little Genius: "The boy next to me wrong, er. In the "kau-ser" (Mandarin word for 'test'), he put 'MATA - DAGU'".
Mum: "How do you know?"
Little Genius: "Because i saw his paper."
Mum: "Why do you look at at his paper?"
Little Genius: "I finish my test already then i just look at my friend's paper. I saw he put 'MATA - DAGU'. Then i tell him wrong. 'MATA is LIHAT'. He said, "Correct, wat. Who said wrong?"
Mum: "Ai-yah...why did you tell him? Then what did he do?"
Little Genius: "Then he rub off his answer and put 'MATA - LIHAT'."

I couldn't help but burst out laughing.
Of course, the motherly advice followed on straightaway... "next time, don't look at your friend's paper and tell the answer to your friend, okay.... in case your teacher sees it and think that you are copying someone else's answers.

Fast forward to the next day.
It was her English paper. The same routine follows. Little Genius gets into the Family Taxi and the driver duly asks her, "So how was your English test today?".
Little Genius: "Good. Today i didn't say anything to the boy."
Mum: "Hmm...good girl."
Little Genius: "But the other boy try and copy my answer!"
Mum: "Huh...are you sure?"
Little Genius: "YES! I doing my test then suddenly i see (at this point, she imitates how the boy rolls his eye-balls to the left corner of his eye) the other boy do his eye to see my answer!
Mum: "You sure? Then what did you do?"
Little Genius: "I tell teacher."
Mum nods her head dutifully in return.

Fast forward to the third day of her 1st semester test.
Little Genius gets into the Family Taxi and very promptly and proudly declares, "Mummy, Mummy. Today I put my bag and my water bottle next to the boy and then i put my hand like that, so he cannot see my answer!"
Mum: "Huh...why?"
Little Genius: "Teacher say do like that one."
Once again, Mum nods her head dutifully in return.

~ Jottings by a blessed Mum who continues to be both amused and intellectually challenged by the unstoppable very quick-witted Little Genius.  She did indeed score one hundred in all her test papers. Full credit goes to her own initiative at picking up her school books to self-revise without either of her mum or dad asking her to. And like she always says, "my brain very keng-one, my brain tell me..."

Though the Little Genius can really test one's patience to its maximum limit, I wouldn't trade all these little blessings with a return to the corporate world madness...just with a couple more blinks of my panda eyes, my little 5 year old girl would soon blossom into a teenager with different challenges and more tales to tell...

Just last night, as she was acting up again refusing to get into her bedroom during bedtime, Mr T started counting ONE... [the routine here would be that Mr T would count from ONE to TEN before brandishing the all-powerful rotan!]... as she turned around and started to walk very briskly to her room, Mr T stopped counting...she then stops in her track and shouts out to her Dad, "Huh? Only ONE...never count already?.....".