One hot day, when Farhan came back home from school, he noticed a white paper pasted on the refrigerator in the kitchen. He never saw that paper last night when he woke up last night to drink some water from the refrigerator. The paper was quite long and unfamiliar to him. There was also a note left by his mother to him,

            

            “We are going to the hospital to visit your uncle. It is an emergency. Can you help me run an errand and buy those things I listed? I will need it to cook our dinner tonight. We are very sorry again and thank you very much for helping. I have prepared some money for you to do the shopping. Use the money wisely.

To his surprise, his family went to the hospital to visit his uncle and he need to run the errand for his mother and prepare all the ingredients for his sister to cook after they came back from school next two hours. He sat down for a while, wondering how he is going to do this as he never did this before. To make it worse, he needs to do this alone. He read the long shopping list again,

·         500g of onion

·         300g of garlic

·         2 small boxes of coconut milk

·         Half slice of medium sized pumpkin

·         700g of prawns

·         2 paacked mix vegetables

·         20 pieces of eggs

·         A loaf of bread

·         2 boxes of milk

·         1 kg of flour

 

Then, he noticed a small envelope at the back of the list with some money in it. “This must be the money mom meant in the note. How hard can running an errand would be is it? I can do this.” He said to himself. He changed from his school uniform into his home t-shirt, locked the door and pull out his bicycle again to go to the nearest grocery shop to his house. The weather is burning his skin as it is already 2 in the afternoon and the sun in high up in the sky. As soon as he arrived at Pak Mat’s shop, he showed the list and waited patiently at the counter for Pak Mat and his orders. He is very proud f himself, “This is very easy. I even can do this every day.” He let out small laugh and of pat on his shoulder. Pak Mat came with his orders with a smile, unfortunately, he only got five things out of ten from his orders. He paid the amount and went out from the shop, why did one shop did not provide all the things he needs? Without further a due, he cycled again to the other side of his village to find Mak Limah’s shop. 

 

After he greeted Mak Limah, he showed her his remaining order and hoped that everything left were there in her shop. She asked him to wait first and will come back later. He then saw an ice-cream lorry stopped in front of the shop and loads the new batches of ice cream into the refrigerator. He gulped and can already imagined the sweetness and the chill of the ice cream in his mouth. He thought of rewarding himself for running an errand in this hot weather. He took the ice cream ad screamed, “Can you put this ice cream into the bill, Mak Limah?”. He saw her nodded from afar and he bite into the cold ice cream, enjoying his time of reward.

After 10 minutes, Mak Limah came back and bring all of the things he ordered. He almost jumps up high in happiness thinking that he could went back home and read his comics. He pulled out all of the remaining money and hand it in to her. “Farhan, the money you gave me is not enough by RM3.” He was shocked to hear that. But, how could he did not have enough money? Did his mother was trying to trick him? Or Mak Limah did? Looking upon his curious face, Mak Limah said, “I think the RM 3 that is not enough came from the ice cream you ate just now. Do you remember?”. Now he regretted his own foolishness which he did not asked the price of the ice cream first. Mak Limah tried to calm him dow by saying, 

“It is okay Farhan, I will call and inform your mother about this first and you can come and pay me later, is it okay with you?” he just nodded weak. After she finished talking with Farhan’s mother, she told him, “She said she will come by later and pay it for you. But your pocket money will be reduced for RM3 this week. You can go back and rest. You have come a long way here.” “Thank you Mak Limah.” He pulled out his bicycle and cycled back home telling himself, “I am not doing errand alone again.”

 

In the hot Africa I lived,

I have black dots on my body,

I can run so fast,

I am the cheetah, the sprinter of the land.

 

I am here, I am there,

Wherever is food, I fly so high,

I stop and bite,

A happy mouse is what I am.

 

I am the oldest of all

In the cold water I prey for all

Stay silent and quiet if you see me

I am crocodile, the generation of the dinosaur.