Here's another entry in the "it takes a village...of young Arab men" category of baby-raising experiences here.
The grocery store checkout line this afternoon was long, so I let Sterling out of the cart to walk around a little as we waited. He was instantly drawn to a large display of colorful beanie baby-type stuffed animals with huge, shiny eyes. Sterling can't say anything other than "uh-oh," but with lots of coos and goos and smiles, he let everyone in line know how enchanted he was with these stuffed animals. Then, using his new-found skill of "sharing," he chose a stuffed animal from the display and tried to give it to the two teenaged guys behind us in line.
Speaking of - it is common practice here to let someone behind you in line go ahead of you if you have a lot of things in your cart and they only have one or two. I think this is the norm in the US, too, except here, people will often just go in front of you without really asking. Since my cart is almost always full, I almost always end up letting someone go in front of me. The other day, I let FIVE people go in front of me.
The teenagers behind me were only buying a bottle of water, so I asked if they wanted to go ahead. They declined, which, since going in front of me would have been the norm, was really a nice thing to do.
Anyway, when it was our turn to check out, I had Sterling put back his precious stuffed animal.
But then! I was walking out to the parking lot and who came up to me but the two teenagers who had been behind me in line. One of them handed Sterling the stuffed animal he'd been playing with and said, "excuse me, but we just really wanted to give this to him since he liked it so much."
THEY BOUGHT THE STUFFED ANIMAL FOR HIM. Just like that. I'm pretty sure Sterling thinks this is the best thing to ever happen to him. And I can't get over how nice that was! Hooray for Arab teenaged boys!
The grocery store checkout line this afternoon was long, so I let Sterling out of the cart to walk around a little as we waited. He was instantly drawn to a large display of colorful beanie baby-type stuffed animals with huge, shiny eyes. Sterling can't say anything other than "uh-oh," but with lots of coos and goos and smiles, he let everyone in line know how enchanted he was with these stuffed animals. Then, using his new-found skill of "sharing," he chose a stuffed animal from the display and tried to give it to the two teenaged guys behind us in line.
Speaking of - it is common practice here to let someone behind you in line go ahead of you if you have a lot of things in your cart and they only have one or two. I think this is the norm in the US, too, except here, people will often just go in front of you without really asking. Since my cart is almost always full, I almost always end up letting someone go in front of me. The other day, I let FIVE people go in front of me.
The teenagers behind me were only buying a bottle of water, so I asked if they wanted to go ahead. They declined, which, since going in front of me would have been the norm, was really a nice thing to do.
Anyway, when it was our turn to check out, I had Sterling put back his precious stuffed animal.
But then! I was walking out to the parking lot and who came up to me but the two teenagers who had been behind me in line. One of them handed Sterling the stuffed animal he'd been playing with and said, "excuse me, but we just really wanted to give this to him since he liked it so much."
THEY BOUGHT THE STUFFED ANIMAL FOR HIM. Just like that. I'm pretty sure Sterling thinks this is the best thing to ever happen to him. And I can't get over how nice that was! Hooray for Arab teenaged boys!