Oh, those parks...

(image copied from http://www.foundshit.com/merry-go-round-teddy-bear/)

I don't have good feelings when it comes to parks of our town.
* they are overloaded. Often big children are playing a kind of football there so you have to be careful not to be hit by a ball while trying to relax yourself
* Ilaria has to eat there because everybody has something to eat in the park (usually she is served by somebody else, as I don't use to take food with us outside the house).
* there we have to play babies because everybody plays babies.
* entering in a park without a ball is like killing myself slowly, as Ilaria also wants to play the ball. And she insists.
But, on the top of everything, the worst is that I have to educate other children there. I don't say here that I know everything and that I am the standard of parenting, but it doesn't take an expert eye to realize that there are too many spoiled and nasty children left alone in the parks to survive in society's jungle as toughly as they want.
Too many parents of nowadays seem to be too busy to include into their daily schedule any of their own children's education.

So, I try to avoid parks as much as possible. But, of course, this becomes harder and harder.

Two days ago we were in a park and Ilaria wanted to enjoy herself in a merry-go-round. This kind of merry-go-round:

Unfortunately for us, when we reached the park, merry-go-round was already "taken" by a boy and a girl 5-6 years old. Boy's mother was sitting on a bench speaking on the phone and not giving a damn about her son. Girl's grandmother was there, near the children, tongue tied, proud to hear her niece proclaiming herself "wind's princess, as I like the wind so much!".
Both children showed to be troubled by "baby" Ilaria who was just coming to spoil their "so much fun". From now on they had to spin slower and, as the girl said: "slow is so boring!".
As long as we stayed there I had to defend ourselves of remarks coming from 5-6 years old children!!! Remarks like these:
"I was the 1st one here, so we will spin fast, as I like fast" (girl) (I suggested her that maybe being the 1st there made her bored already so she should try some other activity. I wasn't cogent enough. She stayed.)
"I have an idea. I will spin as fast as I can so the baby will stun and she will leave" (boy)
"Oh, that baby girl! Here she comes again! Ufffff" (girl)
"This baby drive us bored. We are older and we want to spin faster." (boy) (I suggested him too that maybe having fun somewhere else would have made him happier. Again I wasn't very cogent. He also stayed longer.)
......

I am pretty sure those children were the future selfish people, each of them the one-and-only child of their parents, never having to share something with a "baby".

My heart went out watching my little girl sitting there, next to so much nastiness, being unable to defend herself. At least not yet. And my second thought went to children that are "different". Children that won't be able to defend themselves ever. Society and "normal" people would simply ignore, marginalize and destroy them from the very beginning of their life.

It's such a pity to hear people around us complaining so often when speaking about education: "Teaching is not as good as it was in the past!". I would say parenting is even worse!

P.S.: today we visited the same park and history seemed to repeat. Merry-go-round was "taken" again, this time by 2 girls and 1 boy. The boy was spinning the merry-go-round. His mother was there and when the speed was "too fast for girls" she intervened immediately and warned her son to slow down. At a second glance I noticed that boy's mother was pregnant with her 2nd :-)
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