Grey Nomads vs Families on the Road

So I’m writing this by the pool at Katherine. I’m always amazed at the behaviour of other people. Particularly the interaction of travelling families and Grey Nomads. We have met some truly lovely grey nomads. Couples who have welcomed us with open arms, filled us full of wonderful advice, fed us delicious food and adopted our children as their own grandchildren. And then there are the ‘other’ grey nomads. Those who seem to hate children with a passion. Those who run screaming from the commitments of family, as opposed to those who miss their family dearly. It is always interesting to see which type of grey nomad our neighbours and others in the campgrounds turn out to be. I’m amazed at the quantity of people who hate children though. Perhaps, as a teacher, it’s just that I’ve not had much exposure to them before. It doesn’t take the children very long to work out which way is up though, and it certainly doesn’t take these nomads long to throw a discouraging expression or a grumpy grunt their way. Ha! I have just overheard a conversation where they are speaking with glee about “grandmother’s revenge” and the fact that they haven’t met their youngest grandchildren yet. I don’t get it?!!?

Mind you, I am also amazed at the poor behaviour of some children. In Darwin, there was a group of young children playing in the deep water of the pool by the bistro. There was a girl of about 5 or 6 who was very water confident, but looked very little. She played a game where she sank under water and waved with one arm at her friends sitting on the step at the deep end. A group of 4 grey nomads noticed her out of the corner of their eyes and called out “Who’s watching that girl?!” No-one answered so a lovely man in their group dived FULLY CLOTHED to rescue her. She needed no rescuing, didn’t understand what had happened, her parents DID NOT thank the man profusely, and they did not even tell her off?! Pretend drowning, or any game that can be confused for pretend drowning is NOT appropriate pool play. It certainly made for some interesting discussions with our children later…