In the summer after 8th grade, I went on a bus tour of the East Coast with about 30 other kids my age. In Washington, D.C., we visited the National Zoo, where we saw the two giant pandas Hsing-Hsing and Ling-Ling (both of whom are now dead).On a wall inside the Panda House, I saw a collection of letters to the pandas written by children. All the letters were on the same kind of tablet paper, and all began with the words “Dear Hsing-Hsing and Ling-Ling.” These were clearly not letters spontaneously composed by panda-loving children across the nation. Apparently, a first- or second-grade teacher in Maryland had taken her class on a field trip to the zoo and then assigned her students to write letters to the pandas.
Most of the letters were entirely panda-focused, consisting of expressions of admiration (“I think pandas are really neat!”) or questions (“What does bamboo taste like?”). But one letter stood out from the bunch. It said:
Dear Hsing-Hsing and Ling-Ling,
I liked the hyenas best.
Sincerely,
[kid’s name here]
I don’t remember the kid’s name, but I remember thinking to myself, “Someday this kid will rule the world.” I imagine he pleaded with his teacher to let him write a letter to the hyenas, but she insisted he write to the pandas instead. So he followed her directions verbatim, while still saying what he wanted to say.I’ve often wondered where that kid is now and what he’s doing. Of course, he’s not a kid any more; he’s probably about 28. And it suddenly occurred to me last night that this newfangled Internet-thingie might help me find out what happened to him. Hey hyena kid, are you out there?
7 comments:
What a terrible comment, by someone with my initials.
I'm going to have to side with JB, Jeff. My prediction that Hyena Boy would someday rule the world stemmed from my naive 8th-grader belief that individuality gets rewarded with leadership. Now I know better. Individuality has its rewards, but leadership is rarely one of them.
And sadly, as JB notes, libertarians have very little influence in real-world politics.
Pardon me. I thought Z had identified unprovoked hostility; I must have been mistaken.
By "Z" I mean "I".
Hyena Kid said what he wanted to say while still prescribing to the rules... This seems to fit into, if no other paradigm of leadership, that of a politician.
Of course, with politicians, its often what their funders want them to say moreso than what they "want" to say--but they do want that funding.
But hey, here's hoping Hyena Kid is a libertarian and not a politician.
No, your mom!
wow tooooooooo cute!!! I would like to take a look of the Pandas as well.
I love Panda... and just bought a Panda Bag from the following Blogshop:
panda.cwahi.net
Nice to meet you.
Post a Comment