Miss Yith had her first
proper swimming lesson today.
We've had a bit of a saga with this: I first took her into pools at nine-months (earlier than you're supposed to probably--I never read any books on parenting), holding her all the time obviously, but she loved it, and once a month or so we'd check into a hotel on Saturday night just to use the pool and relax: a bit decadent, but unparalleled for 'family time'.
So for a few years now she has had no fear of water whatsoever. I have countless videos of her bombing into pools at various resorts, but she still can't
actually swim. Last year we sent her to a class with her friends, but half of the children their age were
terrified of the water (full-on tears and shrieking), so although she had a lot of fun (once the shrieking was concluded), they never once had them out of their depth without armbands (don't Americans call them "water-wings"?). Anyway, in terms of learning it was a waste of time and we abandoned it after a few months.
Here in Korea, there's 'THE ESTABLISHED TIME' for everything (blame Confucius), and most kids don't usually try to learn to swim until they are at least five or six, so there aren't any 'lessons' she can easily take. Also, I've begun to notice that a surprising number of Koreans can't swim at all--which strikes me as incongruous given that they inhabit a long peninsula. Anyway, fortunately, my wife mentioned this to the instructor who taught my
her sister to swim (as an adult), and he offered to give my daughter one-on-one lessons an hour a week, possibly more depending on how it goes.
This chap clearly knows what he's doing: zero floatation devices, immediately out of her depth, doing breathing exercises and spending time
under the water. I can swim pretty well myself (it isn't pretty, but I can do it all day--ahem), but this chap is some kind of humanoid-dolphin and my daughter began to trust him immediately and loved the lesson.
That's my unwhinge.
Thank you for reading.
