The Ties That Bind

The tiny tots in Indonesian schools are required to walk everywhere in single file, arms akimbo, as their teachers valiantly attempt to control their exuberance. This means they must adopt a curiously camply mincing gait. This is both very funny and oddly touching.

I had the privilege of observing the above in one of the four schools we visited today. We, and me in particular, probably struck the kids as impossibly distant, alien figures. But, curiously, I was irresistibly reminded of my own primary school days. The run-down buildings were not a million miles away from those of the old St Mary's, Denton, and there was that same sense of the total immersion of the little ones in their endlessly fascinating little world(s).

And that same sense of hope. And wonder.