Yamaha flute instructor at Plaza Singapura declines to teach child because of his autism

Sad.

Nyi Nyi Thet | August 14, 2017, 06:10 PM

Yamaha runs a music course for children above six at their stores.

One of these locations is in Plaza Singapura.

Parent complains

Ivan Lim is a parent who sends his kid there for lessons.

He had been sending Alex, his 12-year-old son there for around a week now.

Alex is not completely new to the instrument though, as he had previously trained with a musician friend of the father.

The first lesson went well enough at Yamaha, with Alex even declaring his excitement for the next lesson, as well as how much he enjoyed the first one.

Unfortunately, there would be no second lesson.

The irate father wrote a Facebook post explaining why.

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Facebook post

That's a pretty long post, so we've tried to condense it into a timeline.

Here is the timeline of the events:

- Grandparents enroll Alex into school

- Informs school that Alex has autism, and would, therefore, need an instructor who has the experience and ability to handle that.

- The instructor apparently had no problem with during the first lesson.

- Everyone's happy.

- Some 75 minutes before the second lesson, Yamaha allegedly called the grandmother to try and cancel the lesson.

- Grandma does not answer the phone.

- Grandparents, and their helper Rizza arrive for the music lesson.

- Lim arrives later.

- The staff informs the grandparents that the teacher does not want to go ahead with the lessons because of Alex's autism.

- They blame the grandmother for not answering the call.

- The grandparents asked the staff to let the instructor explain his actions.

- Instructor, who is in his 60s, apologetically explains.

- His explanation was as such, "I discussed with my wife, and she said cannot teach. So I cannot teach him."

- The instructor's wife is a nurse.

- One of the instructor's student suddenly barges in and demands the conversation not involve the instructor's wife.

- Lim tries to confront the student, but he is shielded by Yamaha staff. He proceeds to call the student a dog (he later regrets the negative connotation this will have on dogs)

- Instructor taunts him from behind the staff.

- Grandparents decide to deescalate the situation and leave.

We've reached out to Yamaha at Plaza Singapura for comment, and will update the article when they get back to us.

Top image from Abdulsaatmyaga.blogspot.sg