Grade 1 in ribbons, clubs and ball.

Wow! It's amazing to watch how meimei and her friends handle these 3 apparatus after just learning them in less than a mere half a year. Although not so professional yet, I am really wowed by their ease and determination to learn how to control them with articulation. It's just so amazing.

I personally love the ribbon the most. I feel the movements or dance with the ribbon is just awesomely graceful and mesmerizing. It's by far the hardest to control as the ribbon they are learning at this age is 5m long and they need to keep moving the ribbon so it's continuously moving throughout the whole routine.

The grading/competition took a whole full day. Luckily I had one day to rest after my HK trip. I forced the boys to go with us, since I didn't feel comfortable at all to leave them alone by themselves. I refused to let them bring any electrical gadgets to play and they were told to think what to bring to entertain themselves or fill up their own time, presumably for 12 hours straight.

Eventually, they brought a remote controlled helicopter (which was abandoned after a short stint as the battery died on them), badminton to play and books to read. Fortunately, there were many others who needed to tug their sons along too, so there were other children, all boys, whose ages ranged from 6-14 all hanging out in the lobby area where the school the grading were held in.

Some of them brought basketball along, so didi and korkor had almost the whole day sweating out with them, just playing like normal boys do. I felt sooo proud of them that they overcame the day without complaining how bored they were.

A mom I knew asked me why I didn't let them bring the iPad and I replied her that it was one of the main reason I hauled them with me, away from the computer at home. I said these electronic games just killed their creative cells to think how to occupy their time and they also lacked the time of running, jumping, sweating and playing with other kids. The mom nodded and said.. that's true also. I guess most parents these days really are taking the easy way out and just passed these electrical gadgets too easily to their kids so they don't bother them, without thinking how much damage there is. See? My boys could just spend the whole day eventually, without the need to come and complain to me how bored they are! (also because I warned them beforehand  of that too! hehe!)

Almost near to the end, korkor was exhausted and I told him to sit down and read a book which I had gone to buy for him the night before. He said ok la, and started reading it. A few pages into it, and I saw he was so engrossed with the book he didn't seem to care what was going on around him. I think it was a very good book indeed to had captured his attention so much. The book is called Matilda by Roald Dahl. He didn't put it down right until he got to the last page which was about bedtime that day.

As for meimei, though she hadn't been the star or even among the average of her peers, I feel very proud of her indeed. I only wished I could have learned this when I was young too, and I hope she knows how privilege she is to have this opportunity to learn RG. Now, she's progressing on learning another new apparatus, that is the hoop. And a whole new routine (dance) for rope and freehand respectively as well, to be graded end of this year, on her birthday! That is why the practices are still ongoing even during school holidays and I had been sending her to school every other day, except Thursday and also stayed there to watch them.