Take a walk!
One thing that really ticks me off when I go to the shopping mall is seeing all these able-bodied men and women lining up to use the elevator. It does not matter if there’s a big sign right beside the lift admonishing everyone to give priority to the handicapped, the elderly, and pregnant women. There are some healthy adults and teenagers who would still “box out” grandparents and babies alike from the elevator door as if they were going for a crucial rebound in the PBA. It also does not matter if they’re actually just going one floor up or down or if the escalators are just a few meters away. Unless you were always blessed with perfect timing, escalators are actually faster since there is no waiting time. And even if you had to take the escalator up through five levels of a large mall, it would probably result in, at most, a cumulative walking distance of no more than 50 meters. Either some people think that walking is a disease or standing in tight enclosed spaces really turns them on. I see the same phenomenon sometimes with commuters of jeeps and buses. I notice how passengers would ask the driver to stop every 10 meters just so that they could be dropped off at exactly the spot they want. And this in slow moving heavy traffic! In an even more inexplicable manner, the same strange habit can also be observed with some pedestrians who would rather risk their lives playing patintero with speeding cars and buses along a busy highway like Commonwealth instead of walking an extra few meters to a pedestrian lane or going up a flight of stairs and using the overpass. Only in the Philippines can you find a street sign that warns people “Huwag tumawid, nakamamatay (Don’t cross, you’ll get killed)!”
All kidding aside (but not so much), however, I really am concerned about our apparent aversion to literally walking the extra mile. For me, it’s not just a question of good manners or improving vehicular traffic and safety. I think that it’s also a question and a symbol of good health. As we all know, exercise or physical activity is an important part of overall health. And while it is obviously quite important to us adults and our increasing cholesterol levels, it is very critical to our children as well. More than previous generations, our children today are, as one writer notes, “on a fast track to becoming unhealthy adults.” And we parents are mostly to blame. We have not only been loading them up with unprecedented amounts of junk food; we have also been (wittingly or unwittingly) encouraging them to have an overly sedentary lifestyle by letting them spend too much time on the computer, playing video games, and watching television. Allowing our kids to have physically inactive routines promote laziness and can lead to lack of fitness, poor health and obesity.
Experts advise, however, that parents should not just turn off the TV set or the computer and force children outdoors. Perhaps most important of all, parents should model the kind of lifestyle they want their kids to develop. After all, they are the biggest influence on their lives. We can’t expect our kids to take their physical health seriously if we don’t practice what we preach. We should, therefore, take the lead. Our children need to see us eating healthy food, limiting our own sedentary activities, and being more physically active ourselves. It also does not necessarily mean that we should push our kids into competitive sports (unless they want to). In fact, some health and family gurus encourage more fun physical family activities that can be bonding opportunities as well. It does not have to take so much time everyday to stay healthy either. It’s cumulative and so every little bit counts. Children are inherently active, they say, and all we need to do is to “establish movement-filled routines for lifelong health.” Examples include biking, gardening, washing the car, playing tag, or simply regularly taking a walk together around the neighborhood. And if I may also add, using the stairs or escalator instead of the elevator, getting down from a PUV a block or two before your stop, and going up pedestrian bridges!
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Please e-mail your reactions to kindergartendad@yahoo.com.
