Ordinary Gweilo

In amongst the usual dross there are sometimes a few words of wisdom in the SCMP letter column:

Parents sending wrong message on trains

Hong Kong parents have a very annoying habit when travelling on the train with their children.

They let their two- to three- year-olds occupy a seat in a crowded train when the child can sit in the parent’s lap and let another weary passenger rest his feet.

These "little darlings" clearly do not need the seat, judging from the way they restlessly fidget, squirm and kick, and worst of all, tramp their dirty shoes all over the seat.

I have only seen this kind of behaviour being tolerated in Hong Kong.

Parents do not seem to appreciate that this is very unhygienic. When you ask the parents to remove the child’s shoes or move the child from the seat, you either get no response or you get a look of irritation.

Presumably these are the same adults who will, in a few years’ time, be allowing their young sons and daughters to rush onto crowded trains and grab a seat in front of passengers who have queued in an orderly fashion.

Nina Cheung, Sha Tin

Very true, and only this afternoon I was travelling on the MTR and saw a small child standing on a seat, exactly as described. I fear that Hong Kong suffers from “Little Emperor” syndrome – some parents are apparently quite unaware of how selfish they are being.

You see the same thing in swimming pools: a complete lack of consideration for other users of the pool, and this absurd habit of allowing children to stand on the benches in the changing room because the floor is wet or dirty – which duly makes the benches both wet and dirty for everyone else.