Impression

This isn't one of author-artist Leo Lionni's famous books, a four time Caldecott Honor Book awardee. However, this is one of my favorite book because it gave me an opportunity to show to the children a delightful and light example of an ethical idea.

I was told by an acquaintance that a mom from one of my former class decided to stop communicating with people coming from my country. I was told that she had a bad experience as someone borrowed money from her and then disappeared. That person was a teacher.

Whenever I see a scruffy looking person in the street, my first impulse is to walk towards the other side of the sidewalk so as to avoid that person. In my mind, I am avoiding getting into any situation that I might not be able to run away with. This is entirely baseless. It is a reaction triggered by constant reminders and stories of mugging, threat or extortion. Something that I am not immune to.

I once took a cab before and the conversation between me and the driver went like this:

Driver: I look at the passenger who hails my cab as I am wary of those who gets in.

Me: The same goes to me though but it is tough to choose since it is dark so I take a chance.

Driver: It is difficult because we work so hard and then we get robbed.

Me: I fully understand as I had been robbed as well. But it is not just the mean looking guys or girls that are bad. Some are even dressed well, and they have bad intentions.

Driver: That's right. The world we live in is different. We do not know how bad looks like. It is always playing chances.

So I walk the field in a way that I am always alert of my environment, sensing danger when it approaches but giving everyone a fair chance to show their colours. We know when someone is not going to be nice, it's an instinct. We move away from them. But we should never apply one bad impression of someone to all. As one of the mouse character in the book called Uncle Raymond would say, " One bad bird doesn't make a flock." It's absolutely true!