It’s not an exaggeration if we say J and K grew up with it.
Everyone in the family loves his pork ball noodle. We have been patronizing this particular pork noodle stall for a long time.
So often that we have become friends with the friendly owner.
Whenever we order, without the need to show privilege card, we always end up with a bigger portion of noodles, not to mention extra pork balls.
Sometimes when it’s not packed with customers, the owner sits down with us and has a chat. He likes to joke with K especially.
Today is no exception. Even though it’s lunch time but the business is slow. Hence, he had the time to sit down and talk with us.
Though the conversation was short but he taught us about one simple yet important parenting tip.
He has seen many customers with young children at the coffee shop. And he has seen, on many occasions, parents spoil the children with choices. And the result? Waste food unnecessarily.
He doesn’t mean that we should not love the children and parents should decide what the kids eat. On the contrary, parents must explain to the child that he has the right to decide what he wants to eat. But once the food comes, he must at least finish it.
In reality, as he has observed, many children do not finish what they order and they want to order something else (in many cases, after just one or two bites). Fearing the child will starve, parents give in and let him order whatever he wants a second time. When the next choice of food comes, same thing happens. The child doesn’t like and doesn’t finish what he orders.
It pains him to see the children waste food in such an irresponsible way.
What the parents should do is to teach the child to finish what he orders since the choice is made by him and not the parent. Also the child must learn to respect food and those who prepared the food, right from the farmer.
Many parents still cannot see the fact that we should not go along the child’s whims and fancies and waste food.
The irony is that the middle-aged noodle seller makes more sense than many parents that I know even though he is still single and childless.
