Times have certainly changed. One of the biggest difference is that the world is so much more dangerous now. I'm not even talking about terrorists, just people you might meet if you take a walk in the neighbourhood, what with the newspaper reports of perverts and other shady characters. When I was little, I used to play with my siblings and cousins at the void deck of the block of flats we lived in or at a field nearby. I also walked to school by myself, a good 10 minute walk away, even early in the morning before the sun was up. Maybe I am just paranoid but I'm not ready to let my kids play outdoors by themselves, not just yet.
Anyway, as I was feeling nostalgic, I decided to reflect on what stuff from my childhood survived to be enjoyed by my kids today. This is what I found at home -
1) Colourful paper ball - you spend as much time blowing air into these things as you do hitting them about.
2) Biscuits with white/green/pink/yellow icing - I used to like to bite the icing off before popping the rest of the biscuit into my mouth.
3) Rabbit milk sweets - the only candy I know of with edible wrapper.
4) Square shaped candy with nut picture on the wrapper - I was never crazy about these but we didn't have a very wide variety of candy back then.
These are today exactly as they were when I was a child.
Another thing I am very pleased has survived to this day - battery-operated cars and bikes. When I was a kid, I would always choose a car, and when the time was almost up, I would ride the car as far away from the vendor as possible so that it would take a while before he would catch up with me to take the car back. Now it is a routine for the girls to ride these battery-operated vehicles whenever we have dinner at Changi Village. Of course it costs a lot more now than back then, but you can't put a price on nostalgia.
8 comments:
That's what I used to do with the biscuits too! Haha...must go and get it for my boy and see if he does the same.
Sometimes we hang out at Changi Village too but I've never let the boy rode any cars there. A few times we just brought his bike for him to ride around.
We got some white rabbit candied sweets for the kids from Sin and they really like it. So now it's become part of our shopping list for things to get from S'pore.
you forgot Haw Flakes - in the red and yellow paper wrapper - unchanged for the past 40 years.
When I was a kid, my sisters and I and our little friend used to play in the monsoon drain behind the house, walk to the shops by ourselves, walk home from school when I missed the schoolbus (a good 2 mile walk) - we were probably aged between 7 and 10 though - older than your girls I think.
When my dad was a kid in Taiping, he and his brothers and sisters spent the whole time roaming around town with no supervision at all - very few cars or, apparently, perverts in those days.
sesame: There's something about those coloured icing, just crying out to be bitten off.
tai pi's aunty: I read that if you dissolve the milk sweet in a glass of hot water, you will get a cup of mlk.
fbt: Oh I remembered haw flakes (or san za we call it) and my girls do eat them now and then; just that I couldn't find any lying about the house that day. Yes, those are still the same as in the good old days.
Paper ball, still available? B'cos you have a pix with it?
The biscuit was something I think most of us grew up with.. I haven't let Zara try it let, b'cos of the colouring in the cream. Maybe soon.
When we were kids living in the kampong, nobody locks their doors until bedtime.
I only remember of 1 case of burglary and the culprit was from another village. I heard that some of the guys gave him a beating.
zara's mama: Just happened that I had one of those coloured paper balls around bec my daughter got it in a goodie bag recently (birthday party of the boy who rejected her birthday card - refer to previous post). Yes you can still get those. I think these things are kept alive bec parents buy them for their nostalgic value.
chun see: That's why they call it the good old days. Life can never be that way again.
Hi "Road to PSLE", you've been Yesterday-ed!
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