So we’re due to fly at around 12.30 in the afternoon for 56 minutes, transit in Melbourne an hour and 20 minutes, then long haul 8 hours 50 minutes home to Hong Kong and land just before 10pm. This is my Least Preferred Flight. On night flights the Rockstar can sleep through most of the flight, Kings can sleep almost anywhere, and I can sleep with the help of a prescription sedative. But – 9 hours-ish in a plane seat with Mr Hyper During Waketime And His Sidekick Mr Back-to-back Inflight Movies With Loud Earphones (who tries, really TRIES, but then… Loud Earphones…..!)
We try to wake Rockstar early, cutting his night sleep by an hour or two so his afternoon nap on the plane will be longer. It’s worked before, but not this time – he is still barely awake when we pull up at the breakfast cafe. Unfortunately, his parents woke up early.
Just before boarding for the first leg of our journey, I spy an unassuming little box of Lego – for a 6-12 year old (tiny, tiny parts!), convertible into 2 different airplanes or a speedboat.
Enthusiastic Rockstar works on the first Lego plane, with me handing him the little pieces (well it is for a 6 year old) while we wait to board. He attracts the attention of an Asian boy of about 6 or 7, slightly plump, who’s travelling with his mum. It’s not just the heavily Beijing-accented Putonghua, it’s partly also the haircut and shape of the head <sheepish – I hope this doesn’t offend, it’s just something I happened to notice> that made me guess they were from China – we often see kids get off the tour buses filled with Chinese (as in from China) tourists at the Peak sporting the same “look”. I used to shave baby Rockstar, until Chinese shopkeepers looking from him dangling in front of me in the harness to me repeatedly asked, “Is the father Chinese?” “Because the baby looks very Chinese.” Yet another reason I grew Rockstar’s hair long at one point 😀
Baby Shaven Rockstar (who, btw Chinese Shopkeepers, is dressed in a Ralph Lauren jacket and unlabeled others - not head to toe Baby Dior/Burberry/Dolce/Armani etc. Humph.)
Boy with Beijing Accent has a shaven head, which also makes it a lot more obvious the back of his head is very, very flat.
Someone once told me that is because the baby only ever lies on his back (which of course cuts SIDS), and babies have such soft skulls. I guess as in not in baby harnesses, or being breastfed for long periods etc, but pushed around in a carriage face up too. (Btw I was very terrified of SIDS and all manner of other afflictions to young babies, so much so that I would almost prefer not to have another child, for reliving the fear. But then my mum, obsessed about this one little cosmetic thing, would sit in young baby Rockstar’s room for hours, meticulously turning him on either side and just watching him, while he slept in the cot. Only when he wasn’t actively “watched,” or being fed or toted around in a harness would he be on his back for long periods.)
Anyway, Boy And Mum With Beijing Accent (who is quite polite and soft-spoken – and sporting nicely but not overly coiffed hair and a real Gucci bag but otherwise not decked head-to-toe in obvious branded goods) are sitting very close to us, and I smile at the boy. He returns a tiny shadow of a smile but says nothing, alternating between Lego-ed Rockstar and laptop-ed Kings for a few minutes before his mum says something to him in Putonghua. Then he walks up to the Aussie airport attendants and engages them in conversation – in perfect English with no discernible accent (I mention because in HK you can fairly often tell strong Hongkie from Chinese from Aussie from British from American from Sing/Manglish accents among the kids and sometimes guess what schools they’re attending – a girlfriend moving her 2 kids to Singapore thought it was funny they took some time to understand the Singlish on the playground haha).
I guess his mum told him to walk over and practice. With his back to me, I can see the airport attendants’ faces. They’re very impressed, and continue to chat with him all the way until we board. I might have hid it a bit better than they did, but the truth is, I’m pretty impressed too <guilty – why should it surprise me? I read a report sometime back about how the number of Chinese speakers who also spoke good English in North Asia far outweighed the number of English speakers who speak good Chinese>.
Anyway we board, transit in Melbourne, then re-board for Hong Kong, which as usual is when I’ve switched our watches back to Hong Kong time on the flight and put Rockstar down for a nap, based on Hong Kong time (just a 2.5 hour time difference anyway).
By the time we’re cabbing home from the airport, it’s past 11pm and Rockstar is munching a raisin bun. (By the time we’d cleared immigration I had my Octopus card in a back pocket to zap for a bun and water at one of the kiosks just outside the arrival hall (don’t like to use airplane toilet a lot so drink a lot before and right after flight) so as not to have to fumble change while toting luggage.) Rockstar had a fairly good nap (during which I watch Too Big To Fail – it’s brilliant but the guy playing Bernanke looks a little dopey), but otherwise he was yakking or exploring the inflight entertainment or basically just not sleeping for most of the flight. I’m tired.
This Is How Horror Movies Begin... With Unassuming Looking Toys Before You Realize They POSSESS Your Children <cue scary music> (Well it IS almost Halloween)
But after his bath around midnight is when the real fun begins. Because tired Rockstar decides he wants to build the hardest Lego plane (not the one above) before he’ll sleep.
This is where Rockstar and I appear to switch roles.
12:57 am. “Mummy. Sorry….” Because those Lego pieces are so small if he clicks one in wrongly, he can’t get it out, I have to do it for him. In fact, they’re so small, my nails have already split a few times (with all the sanitizer-use and non-manicuring or even moisturising, my nails are weak). I’m exhausted, I just want to go to sleep. On the other hand, I don’t want to introduce Rockstar to the habit of giving up on projects halfway either. Of course sometimes he still does (even at more earthly hours), but if he doesn’t, I try to never talk him into giving up (as opposed to him leaving a tv program half-watched or cookie half-eaten, which is fairly often). But it’s late. So then what I really want is for him to just finish it quickly (ie not make mistakes). Only he is tired, he’s making more mistakes than before. Half-heartedly, I tell him he’s making more mistakes because he’s tired, would he consider sleeping on it. Nope. I don’t ask again.
1:00 am. I want to SCREAM in frustration. He won’t leave it half-finished so I’m torn between my own tiredness and my wish to not encourage him to give up on constructive projects – and he won’t let me do the whole plane for him either.
Bloody, bloody hell. F-ing 1:00am. If we were still in Adelaide it would be 3.30 in the morning, thereabouts. I struggle not to curse out loud. Hard.
“Mummy. I’ll fix it.” Patiently. Calmly. Big quiet round eyes stare straight into my face, but otherwise, his face is completely expressionless. I want to burst into tears. I clench my teeth with the effort of keeping it in. Can you imagine, I’m the one who seriously wants to bawl and bellow in frustration. My under-4 year old is completely calm, sitting there in bed with his back upright like there’s a steel rod where his tiny little backbone should be. And ignoring that I’m about to have a meltdown. Just like I’ve done with him countless times, to keep from him totally losing it. But he is completely exhausted – the only way I can tell is because he is making a lot more mistakes in fixing the Lego than he did the first time he put it together (this is the second). Otherwise – no anger, no frustration, no emotion, even as I’m choking right there. Supposedly, I’m the parent.
Me: It’s wrong. Look at the instructions. (No, not at all my finest moment. I’m so ashamed. But it is when I’m going completely to pieces that I realize to what extent Rockstar is completely not.)
Rockstar: Oh, kaay.
Me: It’s still wrong
Rockstar: Oh, kaay.
Me: Still…. WRONG!!!
Rockstar: Oh, kaay.
Me: No!!!
Rockstar: Oh, kaay.
Me: I… Want…. TO SLEEP!!!
Rockstar: Oh, kaay. <pause> After we finish this.
The eeriest thing at this late hour is he won’t engage me in a fight. That’s when I take out my iPhone and start typing this post. I’m spoiling for a fight and my child is not giving me one. Rockstar’s not giving me any reason to clear it all away and inflict bedtime. We agreed bedtime was after the plane, we agreed he would forgo bedtime stories just to finish it. I’m the one trying to renege on “what the deal is” (Rockstar’s famous last words) – and we both know it.
1:25 am. Rockstar finishes the plane. Carefully, he puts it in his box of unread bedtime books, then turns over and goes to sleep. After graciously accepting my apology for losing it.
“Oh, kaay.”
Then not another peep. The Rockstar is asleep.
Where’s the father during the drama of very sleepy mother and sleepy but determined child putting together a lego plane?
He came in earlier on n tried to get Rockstar to stop with the plane, I said can’t cos that is not the agreement we made so he went back out.. Kings is usually most productive getting work done late at night (also prefers watching tv to sleeping which I always say is why he looks older when we r the same age :D)