Natural born reader

I am no legend but there was a story told by my mother emphasizing the fact that I am a natural born reader. It all happened when I was a toddler, aged around 1 year old.

During that fateful morning, I was left on my own, somewhere on the floor nearby the brother-in-law of my great grandfather who was to look after me. He was sitting on the floor reading newspapers, by putting the newspaper on the floor.

The Malay houses during the 70s were made of wood, and rarely had couch to sit on to. Thus, normally everyone would sat on the wooden floor covered with a tikar.

As he was so into the reading, out of blue I was said to crawl slowly on to the newspapers. And instead of crumpled the newspapers, as any toddler would do, I look at the words written on the paper as if I was reading. At the end, he took me unto his lap and we read the newpapers together. He was so taken aback with the whole thing and mentioned this to my mother later.

So, you can see now how reading is part of me. Sigh! I will read everything as long as there are sentences written across the paper, which is well-known amongst my family and closest extended family, and my friends. Sometimes to the extend that it annoyed them.

Oppss! Forgot to mention that playing was also one of my hobbies but being the only rose amongst the thorns in the village, I was strongly advice not to crawl too far from home.