The photos that I receive coming from inner land do not lie. My two grandsons have found the ideal place at the river beach to learn how to swim. With the help of parents and air bracelets they enter into the balanced relationship between gravity and buoyancy. The water has other advantages of course. In the morning and in the afternoon one can cool off. During the hottest hours of the day, coolness can better to be found within the thick walls of the traditional village house. They are not in that South of the heat wave where sun-seeking tourists today are angry as defeated by too much sun. No, they are in the South their family comes from, at 2 hours distance of the city they normally live in and where they have roots. Their parents and they themselves know it is better to seek coolness indoors than at the hot water's edge, as soon as the sun reaches the zenith and until it sinks further west again.
Indoors, according to my youngest grandson, the only additional cooling from a fan someone can need, is at the toilet. It helps if, as a restless three-year-old boy one have to sit still waiting for the daily deliverance. For the rest, all good, all fine.
What also strikes me is how in the small inland village where they alternate river beach with playing indoors and in the garden, they go back to those very simple tools their grandmother also used. Together with some small pewter pots and plates, with some miniature pottery supplemented by a few plastic miniatures deposited here by some global absentminded Santa Claus, grass, plants, mud and earth are the ideal ingredients for make-believe games through which whole dishes are conjured up. And after the afternoon river visit, when darkness falls there is the starry sky. This time I didn't get any pictures of it, but I did get a comment about how nice it is to be able to look at the stars at night when the artificial light is scarce or absent, confirming what the youth book writes about constellations.
Coincidentally, while looking at those pictures and imagining the accompanying stories based on previous stories, I am also rereading some texts about learning based on written documentation and learning based on personal experience and oral tradition. I cross it with the book Viver Devagar (living slow) that I was recently shown, about how to resist as family against the acceleration city life often imposes on the less forewarned.
I’m glad to see how my grandchildren supported by their parents develop for themselves the mach between experienced knowledge en written knowledge without rushing up against time.
Indoors, according to my youngest grandson, the only additional cooling from a fan someone can need, is at the toilet. It helps if, as a restless three-year-old boy one have to sit still waiting for the daily deliverance. For the rest, all good, all fine.
What also strikes me is how in the small inland village where they alternate river beach with playing indoors and in the garden, they go back to those very simple tools their grandmother also used. Together with some small pewter pots and plates, with some miniature pottery supplemented by a few plastic miniatures deposited here by some global absentminded Santa Claus, grass, plants, mud and earth are the ideal ingredients for make-believe games through which whole dishes are conjured up. And after the afternoon river visit, when darkness falls there is the starry sky. This time I didn't get any pictures of it, but I did get a comment about how nice it is to be able to look at the stars at night when the artificial light is scarce or absent, confirming what the youth book writes about constellations.
Coincidentally, while looking at those pictures and imagining the accompanying stories based on previous stories, I am also rereading some texts about learning based on written documentation and learning based on personal experience and oral tradition. I cross it with the book Viver Devagar (living slow) that I was recently shown, about how to resist as family against the acceleration city life often imposes on the less forewarned.
I’m glad to see how my grandchildren supported by their parents develop for themselves the mach between experienced knowledge en written knowledge without rushing up against time.