Valentine's Day Special - Stories about Love (14/02/2015)
| Venue | ： | Causeway Bay Kiddyland Basement, 68 Yee Wo Street, Causeway Bay, H.K. |
| Speaker | ： | Lisa Tam |
Review
Valentine's Day in Hong Kong is mostly celebrated by lovers but it is in fact a celebration of love for anyone. Celebrate it with anyone you care about whether they are family members, friends, relatives or classmates! At Blooming Club we celebrated with our "Valentine's Day Special: Stories about Love" at Kiddyland on 14 Feb 2015.
To encourage young children to learn languages, Lisa Tam , who is one of the few storytellers proficient in English, Cantonese and Mandarin, told each story in a different language/dialect. With some adorable Monchhichi dolls dressed in pretty costumes to play the characters in Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream, Lisa charmed the audience with her lively recount in English of the chaos and confusion in the woods outside Athens as a result of two fairies making mischief for some lovers. Both parents and children agreed that the Bard wasn't as difficult as they thought. His stories can be easily abridged for a younger audience to enjoy.
Lisa's story Love At First Sight told how Venus, the Goddess of Love, asked her son to shoot a beautiful girl called Psyche with a magic arrow to make her fall into love with a monster out of jealousy. The children seemed to be a bit shocked by Venus' viciousness and were surprised by the turn of events and touched by how the lovers overcame obstacles in this story of love and forgiveness. Lisa brought the story to life not only with her dramatic presentation; she also lit a candle to add to the effect when she told how Psyche broke her promise to never see Cupid's face.
As the Year of the Ram was coming up in a few days, Lisa told the last story in Mandarin from her latest book 《隨心去追夢》 called "What should I do with my money?" to show our members that love can be expressed in various ways to people around us. She encouraged children to use some of their Lai See money to help people in need like the little girl and boy in her story; and the boys and girls there seemed to be of the same mind too!
Children in Hong Kong indeed are lucky to be exposed to English, Cantonese and Mandarin. We are really impressed by their understanding of all the stories. If parents can just take about 15 minutes every day to read to them, it will really do wonders in building a foundation for their language skills and teaching them values with stories.
In closing, Auntie Christa, Blooming Club’s project manager, reminded the boys and girls how lucky they were to have a loving family and then led them in singing the Barney I Love You song.
