A long, long time ago, in a place where I once roamed....

Actually, I am talking about my growing up years, if you are wondering about my heading for this topic.
All of us have our own childhood experiences. Some of you may wish that the memories be best buried. Not me, though. I had a whale of a time when I was young. My childhood friends were a motley crew of youngsters like me who came from varied backgrounds.
There was one Indian boy by the name of Peter who took me fishing at a nearby river. It was actually located in some rarely visited part of our terrain. A bit wild, plenty of leeches and a fast-flowing river.
Now that I think of it, it was a bit dangerous for a young chap like me who could drown faster than I could swim. But nevertheless I had some fond memories of seeing a guy who caught fish by planting short stakes with a short line and a hook with a worm attached to it at the edges of the river.
The procedure was to check out the numerous stakes at the various points of the river the next day. There was a good chance that his hard work had produced a fish or two. It was a bit primitive (method) but at that age then, I thought it was certainly one of the most exciting things I had come across.
Then there were the Malay kids who taught me how to make glassed string by smashing blown-out bulbs into powder form. We misec the powdered glass with boiled glue in an used tin can and later run the big coil of string through the concoction.
The idea was to have this slightly stiffened ball of string that would "deadly" in the battle of kites. Even back then, when the windy season came, children my age gathered at the nearest field to fly our kites.
The unwritten rule was to challenge other kids' kites high in the sky. Those who were unfortunate enough to lose their kites in the air due to the "sharper" string (maybe ours) would have to give up their kites.
The other low-tech activity was to collect spiders from faraway environs. At that time, "fighting spiders" was a favourite hobby among semi-rural children. There was a particular species of spider that fights another one of its kind on sight.
We used to fan out into the furthest parts of the neighbourhood to search for these prized specimens. Occasionally, we wandered off further than we should but in the end, we come home, heavily tanned but none the worse for wear, other than being slightly tired but exhilarated for bagging a couple of "great spiders.
We kept our spiders in metal cigarette boxes and fed the spiders with houseflies. I don't see this kind of activity among children of the present generation. What a pity. They would have a great time.
Growing up also meant having a wild time with our imaginations. There was always the popular subject of ghosts. Children all over the world love what they cannot understand and fear what they cannot see.
As adults, I have found out, the rules have not changed since those early years. However, I recall that the older children loved making our hair stand on end by telling us exaggerated tales of ghostly sightings.
The fact that we told these stories late at night only added to the excitement of the occasion. Hearing ghost stories was one of our favourite and most feared pastimes. Imagine a young child whose strongest asset was an unbridled imagination of borderless proportions.
Now visualise the surroundings: wind blowing gently, perhaps an owl hooting at a faraway distance, shadows dancing on walls and rooftops of houses, insects' sounds in the bushes, and a bunch of kids doing what they did best, that is, trying to frighten one another to death.
It was a wild, scary pastime. We loved it. We would not want to repeat it every night but it was fun while it lasted.
Now on looking back, I miss those years. Those experiences didn't warp our personalities. We grew up more or less normal. We matured a fair bit along the way and we now feel sorry for our own children for not sharing the kind of games we used to play.
The world has changed so much while I was growing up.