Friday, July 24, 2009

Funny kids, us...

This morning on the way to work, I saw a middle aged lady walking. Her gait was slow I think due to 2 heavy looking bags she had on each arms.

I stopped and offered her a lift. She assessed me for a few minutes, to see if I am a knife wielding material I suppose and agreed. Her journey wasn’t far but she was glad anyway for the help.

Today’s episode reminds me of my mother from whom I learnt to do just that. She would forever stopped her vehicle to offer lifts to ladies and children walking at the road side, sending them to their destinations. She would be extra generous if it is in the middle of the day when the sun shines directly above your head.

“Kesiannya…” she would say before stopping her car.

Anyway, whenever she offered anybody a lift, us kids would always and I say always gather around to look curiously at our passengers. Don’t know why we did so unsmiling, with our eyes never leaving their faces.

They would be further puzzled because as soon as the car stopped, we would be waving and saying goodbyes like old friends. As the car moved on, they would hear snickerings. He he…

One day yeah, we were on the way to seksyen 11 and Mom stopped to pick up an Indian lady about 40. She was on the way to TNB so in she entered. So there we were, like the natives of a remote island who had never seen other people before, gathered around looking at her solemnly.

The woman looked at us and broke into a smile. She was not intimidated or got self-conscious like other passengers before her (ha ha) but smiled and smiled and smiled. In fact her smiles never faltered at all.

I have to say, we were rather taken aback by her demeanour. Usually the hitch-hiker (can I say that when mom is the one who offered the ride ? I just don’t want to use passenger anymore is all) would give an initial smile then would look away when they do not know how to handle being put on exhibition by 5-6 children.

But this lady took us in the eyes, one by one and beamed. At the end, somebody started to laugh and collectively we sighed in relief and guffawed and snorted and giggled too. It turned out she had the upper hand and managed to unseat us instead.

She got out of the car still smiling and waved about with us chorusing our goodbyes.

What a woman. Must be a mother...

Heh..

No comments: