A natural wanderer

A night of suddenly cancelled tuition allowed for some father-daughter bonding.

After dinner, I was complaining and whining to my dad about Neko, and I said something like how I could face more discipline problems with boys in the future.

"Well, now you're getting a taste of what your own teachers went through" Daddy grinned.

"Excuse me, I was a well-behaved kid during school ok?"

"That's not what your teachers said!"

"Huh? What did my teachers say to you?" This was new. I never really knew that my teachers got exasperated with me enough to call my dad up.

"Like during excursions? You were always wandering off by yourself and pulling your friends along with you!"

"No I didn't!" I truly had no memory of this happening. Then again, I know my memory sucks...

"Yes you did! Especially when your class went to the zoo! We used to go there very often, so you knew all the shortcuts! And you would wander off by yourself while your teachers took the class on the proper routes!"

"Are you sure??"

"Yes, this happened for EVERY excursion you went for in school! And you would pull your usual gang of friends along with you! Your teacher would do a headcount, and when she realised that some girls were missing, she would immediately start a search for YOU! You were always the ringleader!"

"Sure or not??"

"How do you think your teacher knew the number to my special line, the one that no one else calls?"

My deficient memory refused to pull up memories, though I vaguely remember one day in the old museum, when I suddenly found some other exhibit in the other side of the museum more interesting, and snuck off with my friend. We spent an hour or two wandering through other areas of the museum before we finally rejoined the rest of the class, much to the ire of my already irate teacher.

Then I remembered the British Museum and the Louvre. I remember walking along with Juls and the rest for the start of the journey at first, before my eye was caught by a particularly interesting exhibit. I started reading the description of the exhibit, and when I finished and I looked up, everyone had disappeared. (!!!)

I walked around a while, but I couldn't find them. I walked ahead, hoping to catch up with them, but I didn't. I retraced my steps in the hope that I would find them, but I didn't. In desperation, and irrationally afraid that I would be lost and stuck in a foreign country for the rest of my life, I started hunting for a payphone to call Juls, and that's when the Turtle found me and I rejoined the group.

Even when I recently went to the Vatican exhibition with DF, I was steadily ahead of him in the exhibits, because I read the cards faster than he did (^^!) It wasn't long before we were totally separated, and I had to retrace my steps to reunite with him again. Thankfully it was a small space, so no chance of totally losing me, like in Europe (^^!)

Hm. What can I say? A born wanderer...