It was a bright, sunny day. Ah Ba and Ah Ma decided to take their four children on a picnic by the seaside. The children shouted with joy when they heard the news and ran to pack their swimmers and their spade and bucket set. Ah Ma speedily prepared some tuna and sardine sandwiches while Ah Ba checked the oil and the tyres.
After packing all the picnic things and other odds and ends into the car, they set off in a cloud of black smoke. All through the journey, everyone sang songs to the accompaniment of the rattle and clank of the car exhaust. It was altogether an uneventful journey and they reached the seaside in 15 minutes.
The children – Aye, Bee, Cee and Dee, jumped out of the car and sprinted towards the sea. Ah Ba and Ah Ma, left on their own, struggled with the picnic things. With much puffing and panting, they carried everything to a coconut tree conveniently placed fairly close to the sea.
Ah Ma spread the picnic mat in the welcome shade of the tree and arranged herself on it. Ah Ba spread his newspaper and leant back to read. Aye, Bee, Cee and Dee changed and plunged into the sea. Cee and Dee came out quickly because they didn’t know how to swim. Dee began to build a beautiful sand castle complete with moat and turrets, while Cee ran up and down pouring buckets of seawater into a hole he had dug. He was trying to see if he could drain the sea, you see.
The sun rose higher and higher. Ah Ma called the children to come in the shade for lunch before they all got sunburnt. Ah Ba climbed the coconut tree and plucked two coconuts. He took out a chopper that he kept for occasions such as these and opened them. Everyone had a refreshing drink of coconut juice to wash down the sandwiches.
After lunch, everybody felt lazy and lay back on the mat, shutting their eyes. In a little while, Aye and Bee got restless and started to kick each other. Ah Ma decided it was high time they went home. She pulled the picnic mat out from under them and started packing everything into the car. Cee and Dee pretended to cry but nobody took any notice of them.
Ah Ba started up the car and they headed home. As one, all the children turned back to bid farewell to the sea. On the way home, they were stopped by JPJ for having black, smoky emissions from their car. Otherwise, it had been a most enjoyable day.
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