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Showing posts from April, 2015

Can't Rely on your Children

The life plan of people of my generation was laid out thus; get good grades, get a good job, get married, get children… and hope that your children will remember that you had to get good grade, hold down a good job to get married and raise them. So, they too will need to be sure that they get good grades so they can land a good job, with good pay, so they can give some back to their parents. Filial piety is and has been our culture, and is taught by all religions, but we must stop this vicious circle. So, to all parents, I say, do not burden your children and please be self-sufficient. Do not put pressure on your children. Don’t put them on a guilt trip, repeating the overused phrase of “One mother can raise 10 children, but 10 children cannot take care of one mother” . That’s unfair. Those children have children to take care, too. That mother who raised 10 children lived in a different time than the 10 children. If you children do remember you, and take very good care of yo

Rollercoaster and Life

Here is something I learned from Kak Long. After her SPM, she was still undecided of what she was going to do. I was worried when she finally decided she wants to study medicine. I was worried, not because I doubted her abilities, but I was afraid that she had chosen that field because we (my wife, my mother-in-law and I) thought that she should be a doctor. Later, Kak Long told me, the real reason she chose medicine, was that; looking at the subjects she has to take, she thought she can handle those in medicine, rather than learning physics and add maths. I laughed, and commended her. I liked the practicality of her answer, rather than a naive but noble ones like, I want to find a cure for cancer. Well, maybe she will. Thus far she's been doing well. She has her priority straight, I guess. Which is something prevalent only in the women of our family.  The men folk are frivolous, and only seek instant gratification. Ok, maybe I just described 95% of all men on earth, but, it