I remember I used to draw a small hut in the middle of a piece of paper, decorate it with some coconut trees by the sides. Behind the small hut is a paddy field, green with 'V' or 'W' shaped paddy in boxes. I like to draw two mountains in the background with the Sun hiding behind them. To complete the drawing, I will draw birds flying home, 'cos its almost dark.
I'm sure I'm not the only one drawing this view. My classmates in elementary school draw the exact same thing as described. We used to draw it over and over again in our spare times.
One day, when I visited my aunt at 16th Mile Jalan Penrissen, the elders left us kids at home with my elder cousin. She don't know what to do with us, since she never babysit anyone (and she is the youngest in the family), she brought out some crayons and papers. She handed them over to us and asked us to draw something with them.
The only thing that we knew to draw was that view of the paddy field. So, we took our time to draw the small little hut, the green paddy field, some coconut trees and the mountain in the back. As I was about to complete my drawing, I thought, do I want to draw the sun behind the mountains or is it still noon time.
When I finally decided to draw the big yellow Sun high above the hut, I saw my brother is still using the yellow color crayon. He was drawing the Sun too. I could not wait for him and pick up whatever color was available. I started to draw a BIG RED Sun.
After finishing the drawing, we showed it to my cousin and she commented like a teacher. Oh how we laughed at her reaction. It was really funny. We went home with the drawings that evening as souvenir of a good laugh.
Next day was Sunday. Me and my little brother helped Mum with some weeding in the front yard. It was hot and sunny that day. We collect all the trimmed grass and pile them by the corner. As the pile gets higher, Mum said we can start to burn it. I went in the house to get match. She started the fire and we watched it burn, as Mum continued trimming.
As we watched and play, we saw that the sun is unusually RED.
'Uh oh!', my brother said. 'No wonder it was so hot today. Maybe its because you drew the Sun red yesterday, and now the Sun is so red and hot. I think Sun God is angry', he continued.
'Quick! Get the grass and lets worship the Sun God like what they always do in the cartoon', I responded.
We grab some tall grass and start doing what the cartoons do to worship. The grass was our joss stick. We even go round the pile fire like the Red Indians, sometimes on our knees begging that the Sun God not to be angry. We totally looked silly, but we were so worried that the Sun God is angry. After several rounds around the fire, the Sun returns to its yellowish color. That relieves us, and we ended the day.
Few years later, when our city is covered in haze, I saw the BIG RED Sun again and remembered that funny incident. I started to laugh when I remember how naive I was, thinking the Sun God was angry of me back then.
But to think of it, perhaps, God is giving warning on this little event that with the burning and global warming, we are hurting the Earth.
I learned my lesson, terribly and jokingly.
