Who else are the Prime Ministers?
“Who else are the Prime Ministers?” asked my seven year old out of the blue, sitting at the back seat. “Huhh???” I responded absentmindedly, my hands were on the steering wheel. On the way home from school, it seemed to be that his expecting his half-sleepy mother giving him the right answers was beyond possible. Surely I knew who wanted to be. “I know Mr.Gordon Brown,” he added in an expectant voice in the hope that my tired brain could have popped out some names. Hmm. I was intrigued what was being discussed in his class concerning the UK’s national and council elections next Thursday.
“How about Indonesia?” he continued as a result of my silence. I was so tempted to answer that Mr. Cameron might be the next one from the look of it and perhaps he would share it somehow with Mr. Clegg. In a million years. If only the future ones were taken into account. Also I was thinking of Churcill, the demise one. “Indonesia hasn’t got one,” I shook my head. Ah. Mr. Obama! Yes, Mum?” Over a year ago, few days before the US election his class teacher asked each pupil to choose between ”Mr. Curly hair” and “Mr. White hair”. I was chuckling to recall that it was 22 votes for Mr. Curly and 8 votes for Mr. White. “Neither does the US have a Prime Minister”.
When we stopped at the traffic light, I saw from the rear mirror that my son was pondering. As the light turned green he then resumed, ”So which countries who have [Prime Ministers]?” “Hmm…France, Russia, Pakistan, Iceland…..” In my days, for some unknown reasons it was only the Prime Minister of France who had been made aware of besides Tito and Ho Chi Minh. “What’s their names?”he snapped. I knew it would be coming. “Well, I knew the France president’s name….” I sighed, trying in vain to remember the current one, for Francois Mitterrand kept appearing in my mind. Clearly, I was stuck in the past.
“Let me get back to you, ok?” I replied after a long pause, feeling sorryto myself. Did I ask any question like that to my mum?
This morning I found a six days old paper which had not gone yet to the recycle bin. Having skimmed the pages, I was a bit excited that I had collected three names of Prime ministers . My son would be delighted. It is just unfortunate though that their countries are in turmoil. Oh, sugar.
I would say he would be asking me, “Why are they in trouble?”
Shall I hide the paper now?
(Why wants to be the Prime Minister anyway?)
