When young kid stole money from the family 小时候的做的坏事- 偷钱

I believe most people did some bad things when they were young. When I was about 4 to 5 years old, I developed the tendency of stealing money from my mom and gramma. We were pretty poor and didn’t have a lot of necessities back at that time. As a young kid, I was craving for something sweet, but my mom had better use of the money and didn’t spend it on the candies.

相信每个人小时候或多或少都做过一些坏事。在我4-5 岁的时候，我居然有了偷窃的习惯- 就是从妈妈和外婆那里偷钱。当时我们很穷，家里没有很多生活多余品。年幼的我，非常喜欢吃糖。可是妈妈的钱总是有其他的用途，她基本上不给我们买糖。

There were few hawkers selling barley candy in villages. They always hold 2 small iron pieces in their hands that made “ding” sound when touching together. As soon as we heard the “ding” sound from distance, we knew that they were in town. It’s kind of like ice cream truck, whenever we hear about the familiar music, we know ice cream is here. Barley candy was a big whole piece before they were chopped into small pieces. You paid for what you got. The hawkers used the 2 iron pieces to cut them like hammer and cuter. This is why barley candy had another name in our village as “ding ding” candy.

以前小贩卖的是麦芽糖。在各个村里兜售。他们手里拿着两小块铁片，可以发出叮叮声。一路走一路敲着。只要听到叮叮声就知道他们来了。这有点象现在冰激凌车，大家只要听到那熟悉的音乐，就知道有冰激凌吃了。麦芽糖在卖前是一整块的。还没被切开。买多少他们就切多少出来。小贩把一片铁具当榔头，一块当剪子，对着剪子一头敲，就敲出小块，因此，那时候我们那里都叫麦芽糖是[叮叮糖]。

The hawkers would accept several things in exchange of the candy if we didn’t have money. Things like toothpaste shell which was made in aluminum. Most kids like us would always collect the empty shell, and would always check if the toothpaste was about to use up. We would be very happy if they were, if not but was getting there, we would squeeze the remaining toothpaste into a bowl and gave the shell to the hawker for candy. Most of the time, we would need to buy the candy with money. Since mom didn’t give us money, I started to think other ways and try to steal.

换叮叮糖的人，很多东西都可以收。你可以用铝制牙膏壳去换。所以每次想吃糖的时候，我们就去看家里的牙膏是不是要用完了。如果差不多的话，我们就会把多余的牙膏挤出来，然后把牙膏壳拿去换糖吃。大多数的时候，还是要拿钱去买的。可是家里穷，妈妈不给我们钱去买糖，所以我就开始偷。

Overall economy back at that time was bad, most people lived under poverty level. Old aluminum coins were still popularly used in our village. There are phased out now. As income of each family was very low, even 2 cents could buy a lot of stuffs. I remember one year, my grandpa gave me 2 cents as “red envelop” for CNY. I was worried that I may have lost it overnight. So I put it into my mouth and slept with it. When I got up in the morning, the coin stuck firmly to my upper jaw. I was scared as I was worried that I may not have taken it out. It took me awhile to eventually take it out with help from my mom. Lessons learned that you would never ever sleep with coins in your mouth.

当时国民收入都很底，大多数人都在贫困线下。那时候还流行用旧式的铝硬币。现在这些硬币已经不流通了。那时候2 分钱的硬币都可以买很多东西。记得有一年爷爷给压岁钱，就是给2 分。我怕弄丢了，晚上睡觉前把它含在嘴巴里，结果到第二天早上，硬币被紧紧地吸在上颌，着实花了好多力气才把它拿出来，虚惊了一场。所以告诫大家，千万不要含着硬币之类的睡觉。

My mom and gramma used to put some coins in their pockets. To get the money, I tried to cuddle with my gramma, and then put my hands into her pocket and took out few coins to exchange for candies without her notice. I also tried to check the pockets of mom’s cloth and see if there was any money in it.

妈妈和外婆的口袋里都会放着一些这样的硬币。我很多时候就假装搂着外婆，另一只手就伸进她的口袋，偷偷地拿些硬币出来。我也会偷偷去翻妈妈换下的衣服裤子口袋看有没有钱拉在里面。数量不多，但总能拿去换点糖吃。

I did it for a few times and I was pretty successful without being caught. One day, I stole a big bill (rmb100) from my mom. It was more than one month income of the whole family back at that time. And guess what, I was busted.

偷了一段时间都没有被发现。有一天，我的胆子也大了，没找到硬币，我居然偷了一张100 块钱的大炒。可想而知，这事被妈妈发现了。 当时的100 块前可不是小数目。是全家一个多月的收入。

My mom was really mad at me, she tied both of my hands and dragged me to a tree and hung me there and whipped me badly. I was crying out loud and begging her to forgive me. She was crying when she whipped me, she said, “how can you steal money? If you dare to steal money now, when you grow up, you may dare to steal something bigger and become a bad person. “. In nowadays, my mom could have been put into jail for abuse child. But back at that time, the system was not established.

我妈妈异常生气。她把我的双手绑起来，把我拖到门口的树下吊起来狠狠地打。边打她自己也边哭。我一直哭着求妈妈放了我说以后再也不敢了。妈妈继续抽，并一边哭着跟我说：“你怎么敢偷钱？你现在这么小就敢偷钱，以后长大了你就敢偷更多的东西，最后成为一个坏人。” 放到现在，我妈估计会因为虐待小孩被抓起来。但那时候体系没那么健全。

She taught me a big lesson in life. This was the only memory of me beaten by my mom. Looking from hindsight, I am really grateful for what my mom did. She was right, if I was not caught, I may have developed the hobbit and would always thought that I would not be caught, and eventually, I could have had been turned out to be a real thief when I grew up.

妈妈狠狠地教训了我。这也是我唯一印象里被妈妈打的记忆。现在想想，非常感谢妈妈当时的做法。她的做法是粗暴的但也是对的。以前教育孩子没有很多科学，特别是农村，家里孩子都好几个，而且父母都忙着挣钱，和孩子都缺乏沟通。我很庆幸自己被捉住，否则我可能会觉得自己一直那么幸运，最后可能就真的变成一个大偷了。

And when I made the principle mistake, my mom didn’t tolerate it. Even though she hit me really hard, and I was complained about her, I dare not to steal anything since then. When the child is young, they are like white paper. Close guidance from parents is critical to help them setting up correct value. For parents, it could mean that they will have to play hard cord sometimes, and ignore the crying from the kid, esp when it’s about principle issues.

而当自己犯了这种原则上的错误的时候，妈妈没有姑息我，虽然当时打得狠，心里也怨妈妈，但自己也真的以后不敢再偷东西了。孩子在小的时候是张白纸，父母的教导对孩子树立正确的价值观和人生观非常重要.有时候，作为父母的该狠的时候也是要狠下心，不要被孩子的哭闹而心软，特别是在原则性问题面前。

I am not proud of what I did when I was young. But I am willing to share this to you and hopefully it can ignite some thinking and discussion. Did you also do some bad things when you were young? And how did you get away from it? If you are interested, pls leave your comments below. Thank you.

我对小时候做过的这些不光彩的事很遗憾。但我愿意在这里和大家分享。希望能够引发一些讨论和思考 。你小时候是不是也做过一些坏事，有兴趣的朋友可以在下面留言大家相互交流一下。 谢谢

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