Sunny Saturday

On a fine sunny Saturday just two days before Christmas, Sean and his Dad set off for another day of fun.

The first place that Sean's Dad wanted to visit was a big toy store. It's a chain store. Sean's Aunty Annette calls it Toys-R-American. I'm sure you know it. When Sean and his Dad arrived, it hadn't open yet and neither of them had eaten breakfast. Luckily, another US-based chain store (as they say in the news) had a store downstairs. So, they went there for breakfast.









As usual, Sean organized some take-away for himself. He filled a little take-away bag with sachets of sugar, stirring sticks and even some plastic cutlery.

After visiting the toy store and choosing a Christmas present for Sean they had lots of time to kill before the next thing that Sean's Dad wanted to do. So, they decided to have a look around in a big furniture store that was also nearby. It's a Swedish one that you've also probably heard of before, too.





Sean had lots of fun playing silly games with the stuff in there.

I'm not sure why he didn't like the footstool shaped like a turtle but he really tried to strangle the life out of it.



Then he started to play balancing games with whatever came to hand. He had a lot of fun even though they were just killing time until Dad's appointment at 2:00pm.














Before they left the furniture store Sean found a corner filled with boxes of soft toys.

He found one little dog toy that he particularly liked. So that became his Christmas present from Dad.

Before they left for Dad's appointment, Sean's Dad tried to teach Sean how to use his camera. It's not difficult but Sean wasn't really interested in taking pictures of his Dad.

The reason for the camera lessons was that Dad had to go and be fitted for a baseball uniform. Not because he is going to play baseball but because he is going to act in a TV commercial featuring the famous Taiwanese baseball player Chien-ming Wang.

Sean was supposed to take pictures of Dad in the uniform but when he and his Dad got to the studio, the production assistants scared him a bit. Sean receives a lot of (unwanted) attention from young women in Taiwan but being an 8-year old he doesn't know what to do or say when two or three 20-year old women are telling him very enthusiastically (a little too enthusiastically even for his father's liking) how handsome he looks. In the end, no pictures were taken because Sean spent all the time hiding under his new soft toy.

Finally, they got on the scooter again and began the long trip up to Guandu Nature Park. When they arrived, Sean put on his full bird-watching regalia. It was quite a sight.











Luckily, he found some birds to look at before he and his Dad went inside to see the movie/lecture. It was his only chance to use the big pair of binoculars that he had carried around all day.


















When he was watching the movie Sean answered all the questions on the little question sheet that had been handed out.

He even turned the sheet over and took notes during the pre-movie lecture. He was extremely serious about preparing himself to answer questions from the lecturer after the movie.

So, it was very disappointing that the lecturer chose to deliberately ignore Sean's raised hand several times and not give him a chance to answer a question and receive a freebie. The lecturer's behaviour was so obvious that an elderly woman sitting two seats over from Sean began giggling and staring at Sean and the lecturer. It was astoundingly rude and I was surprised Sean didn't feel more aggrieved than he did.

Anyway, later on, when Sean and his Dad were still in the bird-watching centre, they went back in to the theatre to watch another short movie about the city government's efforts to clean up the creek that runs into the wetland that is now the nature reserve in front of the bird watching centre. Then they went upstairs to the big observation binocular telescopes to look at the birds from there.







Sean hid his anger about the lecturer well. After he got home he told his mother and she told his Dad how disappointed he'd been about the lecturer's antics.

Dinner was at the same Spanish place that they'd been to two weeks before. But this time the service was very poor. Sean's Dad's dinner came quickly while Sean had to wait half-an-hour for his tiny steak. He had to exist on hot chocolate while he waited because he didn't like the look of his Dad's paella even though his Dad tried to share with him.

He also played with his new toy dog to while away the time.















This time Sean shared dessert with his Dad. Sean was supposed to eat half first. This is what it looked like when he gave it to his Dad to finish.

While his dad was eating that, Sean went and took some pictures with his Dad's camera. The restaurant had some special Christmas decorations.

On the way out he took a picture of the restaurant's name.
















Then, it was back on the scooter for a long, cold ride home.