We are never going back to the Cyberport Wisekids Playroom again. I don’t think I can suffer the gaze-averting staff or whatever it is the other regulars think/ try not to think about tantrums. We all work with the hand we’re dealt and Rockstar will have to live with his mother’s deep-seated need for approval (stemming from her own affection-linked-to-achievement-oriented childhood). Well, she thinks, at least she’s not on drugs. She vows never to inflict that kind of childhood on her own son, but nonetheless, we are never going back to Cyberport Wisekids Playroom. Yes. For the moment, never. Not until his mum has recharged some of her GlaMum superpowers. She’s working on it, even as she relives the incident over and over, to see if she could have managed her son’s meltdown better (did she mention she was mildly obsessive compulsive?) and yes, taking stock of which regulars were in the room with us, for when we bump into each other again in the neighborhood. There were:
3 Wisekids Playroom staff
1 regular mum (just 1, thank goodness – and she’s the mum of the toy stealer who ignited Rockstar’s previous ‘tude anyway)
2 regular helpers (1 with real attitude – she asked me what job I used to do before minding Rockstar fulltime, and which other children he goes to school with because evidently all the helpers at Bel-air have little gossip circles, so I’m pretty sure by now all the helpers know my son had a meltdown, and – stop it Aileen. Stop it stop it stop it. You are supposed to be GlaMum. A dark day this is, for GlaMum.)
2 regular mums-in-law from China, most damning – they’re the mums of the fathers, not mothers, of the children (who are both well-behaved, I must say) and I have had remarks about Rockstar still wearing diapers, Rockstar looking like a girl (he has delicate features), Rockstar being really small for his age, and am I really Rockstar’s mum? (No, I’m not kidding – this is not the first time someone from China has asked me if Rockstar is my biological child. It stems from more and more foreigners adopting Chinese babies from the orphanages and living in Hong Kong. Both my hub and I are Malaysian Chinese who went abroad for college and work, but according to my Chinese inquisitors I don’t look Chinese. (Ok, fair point, I am Peranakan Chinese and enjoy a good curry and roti with my fingers – and I still have my kebayas.) Usually the next question after I confirm Rockstar is mine, is “well, is the father Chinese? Because the baby looks Chinese.” Rockstar gets a seal of approval for his putonghua play sessions (more on that later) – neither his father nor I are Chinese-literate and we wanted Rockstar to be.)
Also a smattering of walk-in non-regulars with their toddlers.
Ok, so that’s all the people I need a plastic smile on my face for. Meltdown? What meltdown? Oh, Rockstar gets bored with the music sessions, he badly wants to do something else. So no, I don’t suppose we’ll be going to Playroom again for awhile.
Rockstar got mad because, coming into the music session after this little girl kept taking all his music instruments, prompting us to leave the previous session mid-song, he now had extremely thin skin. I would have thought toddlers wouldn’t have that kind of memory (it was 2 days since that happened and it was just for like, 2 minutes! His pediatrician, Dr Leo Chan, once deadpanned “Good, his memory is developing. He remembers he hates my nurses.) But Rockstar takes things so seriously. Disrespect him, and he has the memory of a little elephant. The ‘tude comes from him thinking someone else was doin’ some disrespectin’ – except it was another mummy enthusiastically playing pass the ball to the music who took the ball from him a little too roughly.
So first, Rockstar refused to participate in the songs and dancing, lying flat on the floor, with downcast expression. Then he got up and walked out mid-song. One of the regular Chinese mums-in-law flinched in surprise. In all the times we’ve been there, I’ve never seen another child walk off before the music is over. All the way out he goes, his back steel-rod straight, politely but curtly waving goodbye to the staff (who are again avoiding my eye), then finding his way out the exit and putting on his shoes without a single look back.
When he finally cools down, he looks at me with a winning smile. “Cuddle?”
<cuddle> “Yes, I still love you, but really, please don’t ever ask mummy to bring you back to Playroom again. Not after what you just did. We won’t be going back there.”
<pause> “Go swimming?”
<sigh> “Yeah.”
