Friday November 9, 2007
Idiomania
By OH TEIK THEAM
WHEN I was in Standard Four, I won a prize on Sports Day – my only prize on a Sports Day in my 13 years with the school.
Two weeks before the event, my class teacher asked me, “Shall I enter you for the Sack Race?”
“Oh, no,” I said. “I think the gunny sack might irritate my nose. I don’t like to sneeze throughout the race.”
“What about the Three-legged Race?” he asked expectantly.
“Three-legged Race?” I said. “Does it mean I’ll be tied to my partner by the ankle?”
“That’s right,” he replied. “That’s the reason it’s called the Three-legged Race. I know that sharing a leg is no mean feat, but I think you should be able to put your best foot forward.”
“Maybe next year,” I said.
He looked at the sheet of paper in his hand and said, “Egg and Spoon Race?”
“Can I hold the egg in the other hand?”
“No,” he said, waving a forefinger playfully at me. “That will be like using a stepladder for the high jump.”
“Can I use a potato instead of an egg?”
“A potato?” he said, a small laugh escaping him. “The spectators will be all eyes, and you will become the laughing stock of the whole school.”
“If there’s an Arithmetic Race in the programme,” I said, “I’d like to be an entrant.”
“Wonderful,” he said, patting my cheek.
In the100-yard Arithmetic Race, each participant was required, at the halfway mark, to do a few sums on a small desk that was placed in his lane. I finished second in the race, but I took the top prize when the boy who crossed the finishing line in first place was disqualified for getting half the answers wrong. (Tears ran down his face when he heard the bad news.)
I was in seventh heaven, for my prize was a beautiful wooden House Money Box with a slot in its red roof. A key to the pale yellow door opened the roof like the lid of a pedal bin. This key was kept in a secret drawer that nestled behind the slidable board along the base of the left exterior wall.
Many years later, I searched high and low for the House Money Box, but without success – it had inexplicably disappeared into thin air.
What/how about: (Used to begin a suggestion, to show disapproval, or to ask for information or opinion.)
Put one’s best foot forward: To start doing a job or a difficult task with as much effort and determination as possible.
All eyes: Watching eagerly and attentively.
A laughing stock: A person or thing that is regarded with ridicule.
In (the) seventh heaven: Very delighted or happy.
High and low: Everywhere.
Disappear/vanish/melt into thin air: To disappear completely.
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