How Can You Prevent Children Running In The Road? Travel with reins or a safety lead

Yet another fatal accident. And no end of near misses.

UK flag

Near Miss
For example, in the UK, in Harrow, London, England, I was passenger in a car which tried to overtake another, not realising the car had stopped to let a pedestrian cross. This happens frequently.

Singapore Flag

Singapore Fatality
A mother cross the road with three children, one on either hand and the third one runs ahead. (Fatal accident in Singapore. If I remember rightly, the accident killed the Korean mother and the three children. The British car driver was in prison awaiting trial for about a year before being released.)

Kindergarden Crocodile
When I was in kindergarten, we children had to walk in a crocodile, in pairs, hand in hand. Sometimes children have to march hand in hand in silence.

Lollipop Ladies
At a road, we all waited until the traffic stopped. A 'lollipop lady' with a lollipop shape, banner visible to cars, held up the traffic. (Alas now aended.)

Reins For Control
My mother kept me on a simple lead, called reins. Now you can get dog leads which can be adjusted to allow a dog or child or even an adult to stretch the lead and go no further than a distance you set.

Running In Public Places
I see children and even teenagers running around and shouting, making sudden movements, walking backwards or sideways, watching their friends, oblivious of their aurroundings.
I was prompted to write on Facebook:

Reins
This type of accident hapens again and again. Children under five, like dogs, should be kept on a lead and taught to walk about calmly and quietly.

They should not run around in public places but walk next to mother, father, parent or teacher. You see toddlers and children careering arond everywhere, racing along the street and out into the road, rushing around supermarkets and knocking over displays, bumping into adults including the elderly and hanicapped, piercing the air with their excited screams so that people zone out and cannot tell horseplay from an emergency.

Children should hold mother's or father's hand, or be attached by a lead. these deaths are preventable. What do you think the answer is?

Stations And Safety
Earlier this week in Singapore at a city centre railway station I heard a child shrieking for its mother. The child was racing in circles around the station platform. The mother was ignoring it, reading her mobile phone. I was two floors above. Everybody on the station could hear the child, except the mother. On a UK platform without barriers the child could have run over the edge onto the tracks.

Courtesy Campaign Improving Behaviour
What is the answer? Legislation?

Maybe a campaign worldwide like the ones in Singapore which encourage you to stand up and offer a seat to the elderly, turn down loud music, put your bag on the floor to make space for more.

Illustration from Wikipedia article on Signapore's courtesy campagn

Visiting Singapore
Singapore is an interesting country to visit. Most station platforms have barriers which makes them safer and fewer delays.

Useful Websites
NEWS OF ACCIDENTS
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7061405/Boy-three-dies-hit-car-residential-street-north-London.html?fbclid=IwAR22emkaE8-AgwK5CWkcU9Uf6klFYSMSqysVrdjI6-mfMHt0bRO7-cvqJYk
SAFETY & COURTESY
https://www.pwc.com/m1/en/publications/guide-on-reducing-road-fatalities.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Courtesy_Campaign_(Singapore)
TRAVEL
singaporeair.com

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. Please share links to your favourite posts.

How Learning A Language Can Help You Even If You Stay At Home

Problem
I am learning Portuguese. On Duolingo and TinyCards. Only about five minutes a day. Sometimes I miss a day. When I come back I feel  like I am starting all over again. Then it gets easier and I do double the daily amount. Suddenly the stystem tells me I am 17% fluent. Hurray!

They have put a lot of effort into what seems silly but apparently is vital to making people stick with the course. Continuous rewards, smiling faces, consoling words when you make mistakes. They have done a lot of research, compared language learning systems and popular games and which features make people start, and stay.

I read that on one of their information pages. At first I just wanted to get started learning, not bother with what I thought would a lot of self-congratulatory stuff.

Later, I was puzzed, as well as full of praise for the ingenuity of the sytem. I wanted to know how they made each change and why.

As for the 17% success, at first I thought that mean I had completed 17% of 100 lessons they set you, and that I would make continuous progress. Then it seemed that the system was simply testing my speed at answering questions, and my persistence in keep up with the course every day.

I wasn't sure that I would be going on the trip needing Portuguese. Then I got confirmation of flights. Suddenly, learning the language seemed more urgent. More relevant.

Apart from the 17% message, have I made any progress? Yes, definitely. Surprisingly, the page where I did not learn any new words has proved the most useful. It was the grammar page on Duolingo. At first I missed out on the grammar page at the start of a course or a section. It depends on the size of your screen. I hope to progress from a laptop to a full size screen, like a small TV.

You might have an old screen lying around, abandoned by a family member or co worker. I decide I was getting round-shouldered, poor posture, short-necked, with back and shoulder ache from being hunched over a laptop on a kitchen table or dining table, or hotel desk or study desk. I am waiting for the dable to arrive. Meanwhile, vital things are disappearing off the bottom of the screen. I rf=frequently fail to spot the vital button. I think I have entered information. The submit or continue button is on the bottom right of my screen.

Regarding the Portuguese, I discovered the grammar information below one of the first couple of pages I had been doing that day on Portuguese. I learned about two vital things. Orange juice in Enlgish becomes juice of orange in Portuguese. The use of the de, which is superflous in English, has to be inserted.

I may be likely to forget that. However, today on Facebook I was reading comments on a post showing a video of teeny turtles, red eared sliders. I turned on translate and read the English. Then I went back to what was Portuguese. I could see all the constructions in Portuguese using the word de. I could work out whether the translation was a mistake and awkward, or simply the way that the Portuguese language is constructed.

I was immensely pleased with myself and happy. The message I have for you is that learning a language has enormous benefits, to your morale, and your understanding and feel of control, not just when you visit a foreign country, but also before, during and after, simply when looking at translations on the itnernet.

Useful Websites
https://www.duolingo.com
https://tinycards.duolingo.com/courses/C2yji/duolingo-portuguese-course

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. I have several more posts on Portuguese and other languages as well as placed to visit. Please share links to your favourite posts.