Stubborn

慧 survived the first week of nursery relatively unscathed. Not the second week though, for she fell ill (a common thing amongst first time schoolers, we were told) late in the week and for the days when she did make it to school, she started getting sticky (to use my sis's words) to her parents.

Unscathed also largely in the sense that she didn't cry too much. There were a few token incidents but it went largely ok. Here is one of these incidents though, which was due to her stubbornness:

It is standard operating procedure to ask the children if they need to go to the loo every hour. And 慧 being 慧, she will answer no to almost every question we ask her, or rather, a short and very curt “不要！” unless it is for something she wants very badly.

So after the first hour, when asked if she needed to wee, she gave her usual “不要！” This despite her feeling "it" a little. Halfway through the second hour, I suppose her bladder was close to bursting point. Realising the hole she has dug herself into and not knowing what to do, she cried. The kind teacher walked over and asked her what was wrong.

"慧慧want to urine!" (the teacher had taught them to use the word "urine" earlier)

I have to commend the teacher here. She was perfectly understanding, didn't scold her (she realised 慧 had learnt her lesson anyway) and brought her straight to the loo.

When class was over, my hawk-eyed sis could tell immediately that she had cried earlier (my mum and bro-in-law couldn't). When asked why, 慧 replied truthfully,

“慧慧要xu xu loh！” (yes, with the "loh"!)

74 days to go.