THE DIRTY GAME OF THE LOST AND FOUND BINS AT SCHOOLS

UNTIL you have scoured the lost and found sections at your child’s school for weeks on end, hoping that that newly bought R300 school jersey would show up so that you don’t have to buy the item again, you have not appreciated the pain of parenting.

Whether they are five or 15, I realised that when it comes to their school uniforms, some children just have a penchant for losing their stuff which can be a total nightmare for parents.

And, yes, they do still lose them whether you punish them or not. It is understandable really, the probabilities of losing an item or two a year are high with the hectic school schedule our kids are subjected to.

Sometimes, in a day, the child has to, besides attending normal classes, go to two extramural activities such as debating at 1.30pm and then some hockey, soccer or rugby match at 2.30pm.

Lugging around all the books and their other stuff, they often forget that jersey, jacket or tennis racquet.

My sister recently went through an incident where she and my niece turned themselves into Sherlock Holmes trying to find the school uniform she lost worth hundreds of rands.

As Murphy’s Law would have it, my sister had just bought her a new uniform from shoes, socks, skirt, shirt, jersey and blazer, including the highly overpriced sports tote bag embossed with the schools logo that many schools insist you buy only from their school uniform shop.

After her school day, my niece was playing netball when her tote bag, now carrying her full newly bought uniform, disappeared from the sidelines of the grounds where they were playing.

Bamboozled by how that could have happened, my niece went home dejected after she had walked the school grounds ragged trying to find her tote bag. The next morning, mindful of the hefty fee that she pays for security cameras at the school, my sister demanded the footage of the cameras at the grounds.

Luckily, it was not one of those cameras for show that some companies tend to have, only for you to discover that they are not working when you need them most.

My sister and niece were called in to an office to view the actual footage where they actually saw how innocently one of the girls who was hanging around the sidelines with a group of friends, mistakenly took the tote bag belonging to my niece.

The camera had to zoom in on her and her face and she was promptly identified.

This detective work happened three days after the bag was lost and what was curious was why did the parents, upon discovering that their daughter brought home the wrong bag, not notify the school.

But, trust me, these things happen where parents often only discover during weekends that their child’s forgotten lunch box from Monday at the bottom of the bag is crawling with maggots because they don’t check their bags daily.

Anyway, unlike many parents, my sister’s tale had a happy ending as they did find the clothes.

I have heard how many parents will pounce on any item that vaguely resembles the ones lost by their children so that they do not have to replace them.

That is the dirty game of the lost and found bins at these schools.

It now makes sense as I have been wondering how likely it is that my son can lose his jacket and jersey in succession in a few weeks yet they did not land up at the lost and found box.

Some clever Alec of a parent surely took it home.

“Some kids just have a penchant for losing stuff