Rude kids at the playground

I was reading Sasha's post today regarding a "cili padi" in her son's class. Some kids can be really rude and annoying. Not even scared when an adult reprimands him/her. Reading her post brought me back to an incident which happened about a month ago at the playground in our apartment.

Joshie had wanted to slide down. He was already climbing up when he saw two kids (a boy n girl, siblings I think) sitting up there. You knowlar, the small space up there before the kids slide down, don't know what's the proper term for it. I don't think they had the intention of sliding down soon, looks like they had set up camp and would be sitting there for quite some time. As usual, he looked at me. I went over and told my son this, "Joshie, say 'excuse me' to koko and jie jie. Ask them nicely if they can please share the slide with you." My son can say 'excuse me' (although not very clear) and 'please share'. I didn't want to help him as I wanted him to learn to speak up for himself.

So we were standing there for a while...........Joshie still standing on the steps, obviously waiting for mummy to tell them to please share with him. And mummy was observing what would happen. Would Joshie just give up and climb down the steps? Or would the kids be nice enough to make way for him?

While I was standing there, glancing between my son and the two kids, the boy suddenly spat at me. I tried to avoid but his dirty saliva fell on my legs. I tell you, my blood began to boil!!!!!!!! I certainly didn't expect the boy to spit at me. I glared at him and told him very loudly, "do you know you are very rude? Are you going to apologize to me?" He just stared back at me but when he saw my angry face, he looked elsewhere. I immediately turned to Joshie and told him that what koko did was really rude and he is NOT to follow. Carried Joshie and started walking to the toilet to wash my legs. At the same time, I was glancing at the two kids' father who pretended to be oblivious of what was happening in front of his eyes. Maybe, he might not have seen his son spitting at me, but I am quite sure he heard my loud voice reprimanding his son. I wonder if he will scold/discipline his boy or just ignore what had happened.

Second incident.

There's this other boy at the playground who would suddenly just pick a victim and go around scolding him/her. Joshie has been his victim before. For no reason, the boy would come up to Joshie and scold, scold scold. This boy also brings quite a lot of toys to the playground, ie his scooter, ball, cars etc etc and would leave them lying around. So sometimes, when Joshie or other kids go near his toys, he'd push them away and scold them too. His dad has intervened many many times, scolding him and even inviting the other kids to play. When the dad is there, he keeps quiet if Joshie touches any of the toys offered by his dad. But once the dad walks away, he would grab the toy back and scold, scold, scold. Not a good example when I am constantly trying to teach my son to share huh? Again, I have to repeatedly tell Joshie that the boy is not being nice, not sharing with others and he is NOT to follow!!!

The end!