Should be 6 ...not 5

Today is the first day of a longggggggg summer school holidays here in Amman… no more waking up so early in the morning for mimi and izzat …. I’m also glad that school has finally over….Izzat will be in grade 8 next September and mimi as the teacher told me last Tuesday, she could either continue with her kindergarten ( she’s going to be 5 this July ) or she can already register to be in grade 1 next semester , Alhamdulillah (many Jordanian kids enter primary school at age 6 if recommended by the pre-school teachers . ) . However , I told the headmistress that we’ll most probably be going home next autumn , InsyaAllah.

First school holiday activity …..this morning we went to a newly-opened shopping mall , The Istiklal Mall (Independent Mall ) located on the istiklal street. It’s a huge mall . the grand opening was on the 6th of June which we couldn’t be present there because my two kids were still having their final exam then.

Looking at the big building from outside, I imagined to see many shops and outlets inside. However, only a very few shops have started their businesses, the rest of the shops are still empty. I planned to have our lunch there but we ended up having it at another mall., Mukhtar Mall.

I had vegetable lasagna, izzat ate Chinese noodle and mimi enough with McD happy meal…. Then mimi ‘flew’ around in ‘her’ helicopter at the mini kids park and later Izzat enjoyed bowling at the bowling center.

Before leaving the mall , we stopped by a toy shop to buy 5 presents for my neighbour’s kids who 2 days ago gave mimi 2 little ‘ kindergarten graduation ‘ presents. I didn’t expect them to buy presents for mimi since she’s only ‘graduated ‘ her pre-school, not her high school. I know they really celebrate their high-school graduation with parties thrown by the parents and friends, complete with fire-works , traditional dancing and feast . Well, maybe this is also their custom, a little girl going to start her primary school next semester would also be celebrated and congratulated.

mimi with her two ' graduation ' gifts from the neighbour's kids ...

By the time I reached home, I realized I should have bought 6 presents instead of only 5 .. I bought for Maryam, Sobah, Salim, Hanin and Manal but I forgot about Qusai ( 5 years )who wasn’t going to school yet since he is not a normal child, a little bit handicap, he was born twins ( Sobah is her twin sister ) , so Qusai is seldom outside playing with Mimi but when he does, he will walk and play using his walker….

mimi with maryam, salim and qusai.

How could I forget about him??? I promised Manal to get a present for Qusai sometime tomorrow….I’m so sorry Qusai….you’re my darling boy …..

dari kiri..manal, mimi, sobah, hanin, salim, izzat.

While typing this entry, Salim came and informed me that the present that I gave him was given to Qusai by Manal because he wasn’t at home just now.. So, instead of buying a present for Qusai , I ‘ll buy a present for Salim…. Manal...Oh…. Manal , an 11-year-old girl is ‘wiser’ than I am… instead of giving a present to Salim, she gave it to Qusai, which is better because Salim is a grade 4 boy and he can wait a bit longer to play with his present , but Qusai is surely a happy boy to get the present first….. Luckily I bought a toy which both Qusai or Salim can play with, toy for boys.

So, I regarded this incident as a reminder for me to always be 'wise' and next time when I want to buy any gift, do not miscalculate the numbers again…