Making history : first person I know to fall into Swan Lake of Singapore Botanic Gardens

Date : July 19, 2008 (Saturday)

Time : around 10 am

Venue : Swan Lake of Singapore Botanic Gardens

On Saturday, Snowylad made history by being the first person (I know) to actually fall into the waters of Swan Lake in SIngapore Botanic Gardens.

It was supposed to be a normal weekend outing for the family, except this time Snowylady and Snowylass decided to take a walk around the pond in a different direction and told us boys to go ahead.

We were armed with fish feed and the children (and mummy) love to feed the fishes, the terrapins and the swans.

After pouring out some feed to a capsule for Snowylad, I settled down to do so for myself when a wild swing caused the 2.5 years old boy to lose balance and splashed into the pond.

While that end of the pond was not so deep, it was deeper than the boy was tall.

Fortunately, he ended up falling backwards and he floated with his face above water ... and he didn't struggle much.  His face registered shock, surprise, not thankfully, no panic.

In my hastiness, I couldn't locate the mobile phone in my pocket, and lowered myself in without removing it.  I got him and a kind man helped take him from me.

It was another good thing that there was a short ledge so the waters were just halfway above my knees.  Neither my mobile nor my electronic car lock got wet.

As I stripped the wet clothings off boy, his mum and sis came back.  And of course he flew into her arms.

Good thing I packed chocolate milk, his favourite, on that outing.  I think it helped calm him down.

By the time I returned from putting away the wet clothings in the car, and changing my shoes, he was already walking barefooted along the pond again with mum and sis.

Snowylady confessed to me later she had a scare when she learned he fell.  She still wonders whether he had a bad fright.  For what it's worth, he was laughing and able to tell others "I fell to the pond." 

Snowylad always liked running around, especially in the park where we lifted most restrictions on him running.  Hopefully he'll remember this lesson positively.

I had always read of kids falling into ponds, creeks and streams in books where people lived closer to nature, but this is the first time I actually saw it happen, and to a 2.5 year old.

Well, Singapore doesn't really have much opportunities for kids to fall into the water and get wet.  I won't have much of a fright if it happened when Snowylad was older.