Kidz (1)

09 May 2003
I went down to do a lecture in Exmouth. On the way back, pootling sleepily up the branch line to rejoin the main Penzance/London artery at Exeter, a young family were sitting opposite me. The little boy (about four, at a guess) was asking a nonstop stream of questions as all healthy children always do. At one point, he discovered the emergency instructions sticker on the carriage wall. One illustration on this sticker shows a stylised picture of a woman moving away from a source of danger, from one carriage to another; her direction of travel indicated by a fat curved red arrow.

Boy: "What's she doing, Mum?"

Mum: "She's moving through the door into another carriage."

Boy: (pointing along carriage) "That door there?"

Mum: "Yes; that's right."

Boy: "What's the red arrow for?"

Mum: "That's just to show the way you have to go."

Boy: "Oh..." (moves out of seat into aisle, to examine space near door into next carriage) "...where is it? Where's the arrow? I can't see it!"

Mum: (puzzled) "Where's what?"

Boy: "The arrow!"

Mum: (laughing) "No - there isn't really an arrow there; only in the picture!"

Boy: (disappointed and puzzled) "Oh..."