Why Are We Celebrating Autumn?

 

Please get this right. We have no seasons in Singapore.  It is either,  hot, humid, rainy or the governmental elections season.  However, Singaporeans will always find a reason to celebrate regardless of occasion and season.  When our friends in the Northern hemisphere celebrate a winter white Christmas, I found it quite amusing that one of the local malls would be decked out in Christmas decoration with glitter-dusted cardboard cut-out snowflakes hanging all across the ceiling.  Furthermore, a giant inflatable snowman would sit outside the mall’s entrance, next to a snow machine that pumps out real snow.  I often found that odd and hoped that no small kids were mentally impacted by this ludicrous picture of a snowman and real snow in the tropics.

This month, we would be celebrating Autumn.  I knew Autumn was at our hot and humid doorstep when I could not find nice dresses in the shops.  The clothes racks at every shop were filled with fur-lined, fur-collared, quilted and woolly things. When I had decided to comfort myself by browsing for nice sandals at the shoe shop, I was dismayed to find boots of different lengths and colours lined up at the shop window…some even were fur-lined. For goodness sakes, we are in the tropics!

Tomorrow, Chinese all over the world will be celebrating the Mid-Autumn festival with Mooncakes and colourful lanterns.  I was not even sure when Autumn began in Singapore, yet we would be celebrating mid-Autumn tomorrow.  I started surfing the internet for more information about the Mid-Autumn festival last week.  It was part of my commitment to revisit my Chinese roots, if you remembered my last blog post athttp://thecrazyangmoandhisangrywife.blogspot.com/2013/09/going-back-to-my-chinese-roots.html

My research uncovered that the Mid-Autumn festival was surrounded by ancient myths.  One version of the myth was that in ancient China, there was an archer called Hou Yi who successfully shot down  9 out of the 10 suns that appeared in the sky to scorch and destroy the land.  He left only 1 sun in existence to provide light and life, not allowing the earth to fall into darkness.  Celebrated for his prowess, he became King and married the lady Chang Er.  Over time, Hou Yi became a despot obsessed about continuing his rule by searching for an elixir.  This elixir promised eternal life.  When the elixir was found,  Chang Er decided to consume it instead in a bid to prevent her husband from continuing his despotic rule forever.  She then transformed into a fairy and flew to the Moon on which she lived.    The grateful people on earth lighted their lanterns on earth so that Chang Er could see them from the moon.  That is why today, the Chinese hang lanterns around their homes during this festival.    Hou Yi grieved for his beloved wife so he put out a table of offerings of cakes and sweets to honour her every Autumn.  Today, the Chinese consumed moon-shaped cakes with the same intent to honor her.   To find out more about Chang Er, do read it at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chang%27e .  

The Mid-Autumn festival was always a wonderful gathering of family members enjoying Mooncakes and sipping tea under the light of the full moon, while children carried lanterns and ran across the garden.  Sometimes, if you were lucky, you might hear a scream from the kitchen when a child’s lantern caught fire and his or her mother came running with a kettle of water to put the fire out.  Often the mother and her visibly shaken child would be okay, but it was totally hilarious for the rest of us peering from the other side of the fence.

Mum will be cooking up a storm to celebrate the Mid-Autumn festival tomorrow.  Our dessert would be the ubiquitous Mooncakes in different flavours.  I personally liked the ice-cream Mooncakes, but Mum thought it was an abomination to the Chinese culture.  She did not rate the chocolate, truffle-filled and lychee martini ones either, and thought they were too ”angmo” for her.  So I had decided to get my own Mooncakes – Hello Kitty ones.  I even got a Hello Kitty lantern to match.

Mum saw festivals like these as an opportunity to gather as a family.  I saw them as an opportunity to relive the memories of my childhood.  Autumn was not about the weather becoming colder, the leaves turning from green to a rusty gold and certainly not about the calorie-laden Mooncakes.  It was a season that celebrated my childhood, and I knew every year that when Mid-Autumn festival came around, it would not be too long before  the “cold-wintry-white” season of Christmas would arrive.  That was yet another wonderful opportunity to relive my childhood memories.


About the writer:
The writer of this blog post is a 44 year old mother of one, who spreads her time between her day job as a marketing professional at a financial institution, her hobby as a certified professional tarot reader and numerologist, and her family which includes a 19 year old son and 3 dogs with personality disorders.  She's married to a Scot who has been affectionately called "The Crazy AngMo" and prays that he does not find out that the term when translated, has labeled him as a "Ginger Head".   Together, we create a home made up with more nuts than a fruitcake but filled with plenty of love.

Hello Kitty Mooncakes.  Too cute.  They came packaged in this Hello Kitty bag.

Hello Kitty lantern.  Super cute.

Going Back To My Chinese Roots

What is that one little fact you could never have guessed about me? 

In my 2^nd year at Primary school, I did very well in my Chinese examinations, with grades that got me ranked as the top student for Chinese.  I won a book prize for that feat. I bet you never knew huh!.

Mum and Dad were so happy that they got be my first furry friend, an uncharacteristically “gay and emo” poodle by the name of Blooie.  Blooie was gay and emotional simply because he did not like female dogs.  He humped only male dogs.  He was deeply sensitive and emotional, and would snuggle by me when I was sad, literally licked my wounded knee when I fell and threw a tantrum when I showed some affection to the neighbours’ dogs. 

I Love My English Teachers At School

My language skills were very much like that "emo" Blooie.   I favoured my English teachers and disliked the old and fuddy-duddy Chinese teachers, so I built a special bond with my English teachers who had over time deepened my love for the English language so much that it became the subject I majored in, when I was at the local University.   My English teachers left an indelible mark on me because with their true dedication to the craft of teaching, they guided me through my writing and speaking skills even outside of the classroom.  My kindergarten teacher was the first to leave that indelible mark on me when she gently nudged me onto the stage to do a graduation speech.  I was then 6 years old.   My English teacher Mrs Mary Tan, encouraged me to read and write beyond what the lessons taught.  Due to my love for English, I could write prose and poetry even during my free time and Mrs Tan would painstakingly edit them during her lunch hour.  

I Dislike My Chinese Teachers At School

My Chinese teachers lost their places in my heart.  I disliked learning the idioms, I disliked language rules, I disliked writing Chinese characters wrongly only to be tapped on my knuckles with the teachers’ pencils.  Most of all I disliked the weekly Chinese spelling tests which almost always made me ill.   I do not even remember the names of my Chinese teachers.  I only had faint memories of one Mrs Leong whom you had to hold an umbrella to when she scolded us because she often spluttered a spray of saliva in our faces in the midst of her scoldings.

Therefore,  in spite of walking around school half-dazed most of the time, I had not expected to be recognized for my speaking and writing skills in Chinese during my 2^nd year at Primary school.  Today, I still haven’t the faintest idea how it happened because along the way home from then, right through adulthood, it was as if I had been struck by lightning which rendered me dumb and deaf when it came to anything related to the Chinese language.

Going Back To My Roots

My dislike for Chinese also had roots in the way I was brought up at home.  I came from a family of  Peranakans.  Peranakans were Straits-born Chinese (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peranakan ).   My ancestors came from a line of Chinese merchants who had settled in Malaya and married the local Malay women.  I told my husband a different story.  I told him that the Chinese Emperor sent his daughter to marry the local Malay Sultan and hence, the Peranakan race was born.  Up to this day, he believed I was royalty and rightfully treated me as one.

Peranakans formed a unique indigenous culture of their own, complete with their own unique fashion, language and foods.  Dad could not speak Mandarin.  He spoke a mixture of Malay and Hokkien which was traditionally unique to the Peranakan culture.  The family was matriarchal, placing a lot of importance on the “head” of the household, my great grandmother, when I was very young.  So I told David that I was Empress of our household, and he, merely the Empress’ consort.  Having been brought up in a Peranakan household meant that Mum and Dad would converse with me soley in English.  And as Dad was a lawyer, he had expected me to be one when I grew up, thus demanding that I excelled in the use of the language.

Over time, my skills in the various Chinese languages, be it Mandarin or the dialects like Hokkien and Teochew were reduced to a pitiful smattering of English-accented Chinese mix with hand signals.  My grades for my Chinese examination paper became a consistent C in my secondary school years and a dominant D during my junior college years.

The Importance Of Being…Chinese

As an adult, working in an Asian-based multi-national corporation , creating marketing brochureware and advertising creatives that are in both English and Chinese, meant that I needed to be effectively bilingual.  However, I started to feel that I was missing out on so much more by not having a good command of the Chinese language.   A good command of the Chinese language went  beyond effectiveness at work,  it went beyond the ability to fluently order a takeaway lunch from the staff at the Chinese food stall without getting the order wrong, and it definitely went beyond my sensitivities when a colleague, at a discussion table broke out into fluent Mandarin in an attempt to call me a “stupid cow” because I refused to accede to her unreasonable request.

No matter how one would justify the need to be effectively bilingual, the simple fact was that I needed to be because I am a Singaporean Chinese.  I lived in a cosmopolitan city spiced by an interesting melting pot of different races and worked at a multi-national corporation that dealt with different markets which meant that English was an important language needed to bridge geographical and racial barriers.  However as a Chinese, proud of my heritage borne from  my forefathers who once sailed those ships across the treacherous  South China Sea to come here as tradesmen and builders so that we could live the way we do today,  I made up my mind to go back to my Chinese roots, understand the culture better and speak the language better.  One day, my son, and his children could possibly thank me for it because their lives would be made much richer for doing so.

Embracing The Beauty Of The Language

Another thing that convinced me of the need to go back to my roots, was the beauty of the language.  One of my fellow Tarot reading friends bought a pre-owned book from Amazon last week.  When it arrived, there were some Chinese text written within the inside back cover of the book.  I tried very hard to decipher the script and got some help from one of my staff.  This was what it said, “Loving a book is like loving someone.  The deeper your love, the deeper it adds up to that surprising sweet ending.”  It was beautiful, and I would not have been able to feel this book lover’s passion if I had not taken an interest in the Chinese text.

So this is what I am doing to embrace the beauty of the Chinese language.   I have been speaking in Mandarin to my colleagues at work.  While I have a few colleagues designated to approve Chinese copy for the brochureware and advertising creatives that we develop, I had started to get more involved in it.  I started taking an interest in reading print advertising headlines in Chinese.  I have also been watching Chinese drama serials on TV so that I could brush up on enunciation.  The only thing I have not done is to learn to sing a song in Mandarin, which I suspect, might be the next thing one of my Karaoke-crazy colleagues might be pushing me to do.  Wish my neighbors luck when that happens.

About the writer:

The writer of this blog post is a 44 year old mother of one, who spreads her time between her day job as a marketeer at a financial institution, her hobby as a certified professional tarot reader and numerologist, and her family which includes a 19 year old son.  She's married to a Scot who has been affectionately called "The Crazy AngMo" and prays that he does not find out that the term when translated, has labeled him as a "Ginger Head".

Unconditional Love

In Good Times And In Bad

Today,  I learnt an important lesson about Unconditional Love from a little love-note Dad had written to Mom as a birthday gift for her this morning, with his fragile, stroke-strickened hand.  That note was scrawled with crooked letters that was barely legible but it was well-strung together to create such a meaningful impact that almost brought tears to my eyes.

This was what the note said - "Elaine, Happy Birthday.  Thank you for the unconditional love and care you've given me.  Bock Chuan"  Such a simple note, but it carried a lifetime of joy, sorrow, laughter, tears, pain and gratification.  This note underscored my parents' lifelong commitment to their marital vows to stick by each other in good times and in bad, for richer and for poorer, till death do they part.

A Commitment

Decades ago, when Dad was incarcerated for months, for "alternative"political views by the establishment, Mum spent those months in a daze, lost in the dark woods of despair, not having Dad beside her to  assure her that everything was going to be okay.  It was her will to keep the family together, that led her to march right up to Dad's boss at work to demand that he continued to pay Dad his salary and to keep Dad's job while we waited for his release from incarceration.   I thought Mum was bold then, but really, she was driven by her love and commitment for Dad.

Today, Mum cares for Dad as his mobility had been affected by what they called, a "silent" stroke.  Naturally, Dad's health deteriorated with age and  because of his condition.  Mum showers, changes and feeds him everyday.  She talks to him and urges him to walk, or rather shuffle, a little, just to get him to be active.  Undaunted by the heavy wheelchair, handicap-unfriendly public transport, staircases everywhere, the blazing sun or a heavy downpour, she made it a point to take him out regularly so that he could still enjoy the great outdoors, meet people, and eat his favourite foods at his favourite restaurants.

Dad's mind is still lucid although a little slow, and sometimes he might look a little dazed and confused because he needed more time to process information that he sees or hears.  However, it must be true love, that rendered it needless to process this.  Their housekeeper, Marites, on learning that my Aunt Shirley was returning to Singapore for a visit from Seattle, asked Dad what Aunt Shirley looked like.  Marites had never met Aunt Shirley and was curious to know if Mum and Aunt Shirley looked alike, as  sisters should.  So Marites asked Dad who was prettier, Aunt Shirley or my Mum.  Dad immediately retorted that Mum was prettiest!  Mum laughed so hard and one could see her face lighting up like a school girl having a crush when she heard that.

Guiding My Marriage With The Same Commitment

The commitment between Mum and Dad have truly inspired me to guide my own marriage that way.  I hope David and I will grow old together holding each others hands in good times and in bad, for richer or for poorer the way Mum and Dad did.  In fact, I don't hope, I know I will because David said the other day to me, " I don't always like being married, but I love being married to you."

About the writer:

The writer of this blog post is a 44 years old mother of one, who spreads her time between her day job as a marketeer at a financial institution, her hobby as a certified professional tarot reader and numerologist, and her family which includes a 20 year old son.  She's married to a Scot who has been affectionately called "The Crazy AngMo" and prays that he does not find out that the term when loosely translated, has labeled him as a "Ginger Head".

Dad and Mum on their wedding day on 27 Dec 1968...hmm...interesting..it doesn't add up...I was born on 1 Aug 1969!

Can't remember when this was taken, but clearly Dad was looking like "Da Boss!"

Dad and Mum at Gardens By The Bay when it first opened in 2012. Mum looked like "Da-Boss" now!

Dad and I enjoying a bit of father-daughter banter on 13 August 2013 after celebrating Mum's birthday with a scrumptious dinner

Dad's love-note to Mum, scribbled with his fragile hands that can't even feed himself with ease.
Now, that's  unconditional love.

Enjoying A Very Long Weekend

Vacations Are A Waste Of Time

I am a nightmare to my team at work on my days off.  I usually spend my vacation time feverishly responding to emails on my Blackberry,  sending them on  panic-stricken wild goose chase around the office in their bid to respond to my decisions made remotely while on vacation.

If you thought I was a nightmare to my team at work on my days off, you should have a chat with my family who would usually revolve their time and schedule around my vacation time so that they could get some conversation time with me.  Usually by the end of that vacation, the husband might be looking for a butter knife in an attempt to slit his wrist, or the boy might decide to elope with a local girl.  All these just because I kicked up a fuss about the Angkor Wat not having any WiFi, or perhaps the nearest Starbucks in Siem Reap was an ocean away back in Singapore.

My vacation time was never fun, I never felt relaxed and I felt that there was more stress while on vacation than when I was at the office.  Having a day off was definitely frivolous and decadent to me.  I saw it as a complete waste of time when I could do so much more with my time.

My Stressful Moments

However, in the last few months, as I was thrown into a neck-breaking schedule of balancing the management of a huge project at work with my Tarot coaching and reading appointments,  there were so many stressful matters on the family front that had been simmering under the surface within my environment.  

Joel had a "meltdown moment" with his nursing course.  While he loved the hands-on practical side of nursing during his industrial attachment at the hospital, he disliked the academic aspects of studying for the examinations.  It did not help that one of his course mates had decided to quit the course halfway to pursue other interests.  I could see despondency and confusion setting in his mind.  Clearly my boy needed me.

My grandmother had a fall 2 weeks ago in the bathroom and broke her wrist.  The accident affected her ability to walk and because she needed physiotherapy, she was warded in the hospital for 2 weeks, with her arm in a sling.  Granny is a spritely old lady with a mind and a spirit of a 25 year old.  Most of her misery at the hospital was due to the fact that she did not have many people to talk to and worse, she could not play mahjong.  This was compounded with the fact that half the family were residing overseas hence leaving Granny with only a few people who could care for her.   Clearly, my granny needed me.

During those 2 weeks when Granny was in the hospital, my Mum did the grand tour of hospitals in Singapore because Dad was also checked into one to get his Glaucoma fixed and he had to have medical check-ups before and after that surgery.  Dad and Mum clearly needed me.

Then there was David.  This hubby extraordinaire  had been standing by as my pillar of support.  He fetched and sent me to the hospital to visit Granny,  accompanied me to visit Mum and Dad, counselled Joel during that meltdown, and throughout all that, I forgot that he needed me too.  David usually took on work stress in his quiet and stoic way.  I was the more verbose of the pair and would be talking at length about how stressful work was or how upset I was about Granny's fall or Dad's surgery or Joel's meltdown.  In the Tarot world, I called David my King of Cups (more on the King of Cups can be found on the post dated 12 Aug. 2013 at www.facebook.com/SunGoddessTarot), always calm, composed and nurturing.  I was on the other hand always high-strung and perpetually dramatic about everything happening around me.  

So I had decided that vacation time was not about toting the camera to climb Mt Kinabalu or slathering on the sunblock whilst sipping on a glass of pina colada by the pool.  My vacation time was quality time with the family just doing nothing but enjoying the moment with them.

Much To Be Thankful For

Incidentally, Singapore celebrated its 48th National Day last week  with a long weekend that coincided with another public holiday when my Muslim friends celebrated Eid al-fitr ( http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eid_al-Fitr ).  I love long weekends because it meant I had more time to blog, walk the dogs, sleep in, and wake up to a scrumptious brunch.  However, this National Day celebrations got me thinking about how much I was thankful for.  We were in a stable and prosperous country, with an eclectic mix of races that provided me with friends from all walks of life and my family was safe and happy.

So I had decided to make the long weekend even longer, by taking another 2 days off work to enjoy some time with the family.  It was timely also because I wanted to make time to celebrate Mum's birthday with a day dedicated to pampering her.

My Very Long Weekend

So my very long weekend was spent:

1) reminiscing with Granny while visiting her at the hospital, about that silly time when she had decided to purchase a scooter to relive her youth.  I remembered she fell off that scooter while riding it and ended up with a fracture too;

2) gallivanting around town with Joel to find accessories for his newly constructed terrarium.  I cannot understand his sudden love for plants.  I might have rubbed it off on him;

3) tending to wee pots of Lavendar, Strawberry, Caribbean Chilli Pepper and Coffee together with Joel.  As a birthday present, Joel got me some dirt...yes, dirt, and some seeds so that I could cultivate my green fingers on my days off;

4) watching Dad's favourite programme, Ellen together with Dad.  I cannot understand Dad's obsession with Ellen DeGeneres, but he loved her humour and it thrilled me to see Dad laughing heartily while watching her antics on her talk-show;

5) flying kite with David at the Marina Barrage.  Let me rephrase that.  David would be struggling with getting the kite up while I held on tightly to the dogs for fear that one of the wee dogs might get entangled onto a neighbouring kite-flyer's  kite-string and fly away into the sunset;

6)  having dinner and drinks with our BFFs because one of them was celebrating her first National Day as a new Singaporean. Ok, being originally Malaysian and always claiming that our Singapore national dishes were actually Malaysian, she was too embarrassed to have her Singaporean status made too publicly known, so I would spare her by not mentioning her name here;

7)  spending the day with Mum, taking her out for a shopping spree, enjoying a scrumptious lunch with her, introducing her to the world of cafe au lait, cafe lungo, cafe piccolo and cafe latte and just having a nice mother-daughter talk about the trials and tribulations of being a mother.

Enjoying My Days Off

My days off spent most simply are always the best.  No expensive shopping trips and exotic beaches could replace the time spent with the family.  Because I had sufficient time to catch up with my family and enjoy every moment I had with them in the last week, I am now more ready than ever to go back to work very much recharged, re-energized and well-rested.

"There's never enough time to do all the nothing you want. " ~Bill Watterson,   Calvin and Hobbes

About the writer:

The writer of this blog post is a 44 years old mother of one, who spreads her time between her day job as a marketeer at a financial institution, her hobby as a certified professional tarot reader and numerologist, and her family which includes a 20 year old son.  She's married to a Scot who has been affectionately called "The Crazy AngMo" and prays that he does not find out that the term when loosely translated, has labeled him as a "Ginger Head".

David and I enjoying a picnic with the mutts.  Spot that kite all tightly rolled up waiting to be flown?

Genuine Pride In Our Work

Putting The Team Through The Test

This afternoon, while having lunch with some business partners at DOMVS restaurant at the Sheraton Towers, I came across an interesting statement printed at the bottom of the menu which said, “Women Only Wednesdays” – Women diners get free dessert for every set meal ordered.  I thought, “WOW! That was a creative way to honor us, women.”  There was definitely a big reason to celebrate and I wrote this blog post to celebrate a wonderful team of women whom I am fortunate to work with.  I call them the A-Team.

In the last couple of months, the team was put to the test when we were suddenly asked to support a mega project at work.  We were not strangers to mega projects, but this one came falling on our laps at just a couple of months before launch as the list of action items on that project plan seemed to get bigger on a daily basis.

Last week, after many sleepless nights, stressful deadlines and almost seemingly insurmountable hurdles, we finally completed the project and launched the program to plenty of accolades. 

One of the bosses patted me on the back praising me for the leadership rendered to the project.  Frankly, I disagreed.  It had nothing to do with my leadership, and everything to do with these women who had built a sisterhood of authenticity.

Authenticity

What did I mean by authenticity?

That was the key driver to the success of this team.  However big or small the projects were, these women were authentic about everything they did.  And here are the reasons why this is so:

Genuinely Cared About The Business

These women genuinely cared about the company and the value they brought to the business.  This meant that when it was necessary to voice their concern on decisions that were not right, or when they felt that an idea could be better improved, they were the first to speak up in front of senior management in a bid to do the right thing.  It was this spirit of authenticity that allowed the team of non-actuary trained “fluffy” marketing professionals to influence the creation of a product that was launched as a first-in-market insurance product that provided coverage for pregnancies from conception through IVF.

I asked this team of women what drove them each day to want to come to work in the morning, and to leave the office happy in the evening.  They said, “Pride In The Work.”  That said it all.

This was a team of very bold women who approached their jobs with the sole purpose of doing the right thing.

Genuinely Cared About Each Other

These women genuinely cared about each other. They formed a sisterhood bound by an unbreakable bond of trust, honesty and open communication.  When that mega project unceremoniously dropped on our laps, they banded together to work as a team.  I saw resilience, “response-ability” and proactive efforts to step up to the plate when one of us dropped the ball for some reason or other.  

During the planning stages for the launch event, two of my team members were hit with family emergencies, so the rest of us banded together to divide and conquer, and filled in the gap where there was one.  I saw a team member stepped up to the leadership role of managing all the “business-as-usual” product marketing work when the rest of the team was thrown into delivering on the last minute details of the creative work or launch  plans for this mega project.  I saw another team member who was hired to do something completely different earlier in the year, only to have her scope changed midway to deliver on this mega project.  I saw yet another team member who was never part of the project team initially, who had decided on her own accord to step in at eleventh hour to manage the execution of all the creative materials when she saw the team struggling with the workload.

I asked them what drove them to support each other with so much enthusiasm every day, even when sometimes; the work goes beyond their respective agreed scope.  They said, “Pride In The Work.”  Again, that said it all.

This was a team of visionary women who had a generous spirit that allowed them to work with each other, with a lot of selflessness and mutual understanding.

Pride In The Work


So for anyone who asked how I managed to build an exceptionally strong team of co-workers who managed their roles with depth of authenticity and almost always exceeded expectations in the delivery of their work, the secret is not my leadership, but the genuine pride in our work within the team.

I am very grateful to this team of women who have done so much to create value in everything they did for the company, the generous sharing of the tears and laughter within the team, and the gift of authenticity they brought to the table.  I am so proud to be the manager of this team of wonderful women.


About the writer:

The writer of this blog post is a 43 year old mother of one, who spreads her time between her day job as a marketeer at a financial institution, her hobby as a certified professional tarot reader and numerologist, and her family which includes a 19 year old son.  She's married to a Scot who has been affectionately called "The Crazy AngMo" and prays that he does not find out that the term when translated, has labeled him as a "Ginger Head".

Nothing Is Ever What It Seems

More Than Two Sides To A Coin

In the past month, I learnt so much about the fragility of graciousness and civility in a society full of educated and talented people.  However I refused to believe that there was only one party who was culprit to the disintegration of social graces, tolerance, good manners and good sense.

Paula Deen In The Frying Pan

Half a world away, I had witnessed cooking show host and food author Paula Deen’s massive empire crumbling before her as stories about her using racial slurs raged through social media.  The self-proclaimed “Queen of Butter” who often served a heart attack on a plate, almost gave me a heart attack without her cooking when she claimed these racial slurs used were “a joke” and was only in “a single incident”.  I abhor bigotry.  Discrimination of any kind, racial, cultural, or sexual should never be condoned. However, while accusatory fingers wagged at her, I was appalled that this unacceptable behavior was left unchecked for so long.  It saddened me to think that this racial discrimination had been left unchecked for a long time due to her commercial value to stakeholders profiting from her popularity, and was only brought to the surface because she “pissed” the daylights out of someone hell-bent on spoiling her day in retaliation.


Hello Kitty Goodbye Sensible Behavior

Closer to home, I had witnessed adults in Singapore, embroiled in very public displays of irrational tirades against the McDonald’s restaurant crew just because they failed to get their hands on the Hello Kitty plushies. Videos of these incidents were circulating virally across social media too.  Funnily, just a few years ago, a similar scene played out in the newspapers which reported that customers who queued for Hello Kitty plushies at a McDonald’s restaurant were hurt when a glass panel broke during the mad rush for these toys.  Again, it saddened me to think that these public displays of irrational behavior could long be forgiven and forgotten since the last incident because of the commercial gains seen from both sides of the coin from either the sale of 1) Hello Kitty plushies on ebay and 2) the sale of more McDonald’s Value Meals.

Masking Fundamental Issues

When our city was blanketed in haze due to illegal practices of forest-clearing in Sumatra, Indonesia, I had witnessed long queues of irate Singaporeans rushing to buy N95 masks at supermarkets and hospital pharmacies.  This was not without incident too as I spotted a video virally circulating across social media depicting a man snatching a pack of N95 masks off a lady shopper’s grocery basket, then challenging her with this remark, “Stop me if you can.”  This man was lucky that I wasn’t that lady shopper, or that video would have ended with a footage of him frantically searching for his testicles in the bin then.

That brought me to have a think about the fundamental issue of unpreparedness.  I could not understand how the establishment could be unprepared for this outcome when the illegal “slash and clear” practices in the Sumatran forests had been happening for so many years.  Again, it saddened me to think that as the environment came under siege with the forest fires that had been on-going for years, nothing was done because of the commercial gains from the big corporations who profit from it.  These corporations that came under scrutiny due to the forest fires, were known to be linked to the establishment…not just ours, but our neighbors’ as well.

Read In Between The Lines

So as the newspapers, my Facebook wall and my Twitter feeds are filled with stories everyday about unpleasant behaviors like the ones I had recounted in this post, horrific incidents like the floods in India, important milestones in gay rights like the death of DOMA in the US ( Defense of Marriage Act) and unimportant milestones like naming a celebrity’s baby North West, I continue to read in between the lines so that I could form an objective assessment to these issues. I trained Joel to do the same so that he could grow up with the notion that nothing in this world is black and white. 

Even when I read the Tarot for my clients, I had always approached these readings with an objective view knowing that my intuition will always guide me to understand that there's more than meets the eye to the clients' issues.

An ex-boss once said to me, “Nothing is ever what it seems”.

About the writer:

The writer of this blog post is a 43 year old mother of one, who spreads her time between her day job as a marketeer at a financial institution, her hobby as a certified professional tarot reader and numerologist, and her family which includes a 19 year old son.  She's married to a Scot who has been affectionately called "The Crazy AngMo" and prays that he does not find out that the term when translated, has labeled him as a "Ginger Head".

The Daddy Heroes In My Life - Happy Fathers' Day

What Dad Taught Me

As we honor our Fathers this weekend on Fathers’ Day, I had decided to write this blog post to honor the most important men in my life whom I think are possibly the best Dads in the world.

Dad is truly my hero.  Everything that I am today, I owe it to him.  Dad held 2 things closest to his heart – his family and his political beliefs.  So I grew up with the notion that life offered me only 2 things worth fighting for – my family and my right to an opinion. 

My tenacity and never-say-die attitude were all aspects of Dad that I grew up with.  My conviction to always stand up for what I believed in and to not be afraid to lend a voice to these beliefs, were all nurtured by Dad.  When Dad was incarcerated for his political beliefs that fell outside the approved pantone code of that whitewash dished out by the establishment, he taught me that oppression was the worst form of abuse that should never be tolerated.   When I saw him being led away by the clipboard-toting establishment lackeys when I was 8 years old, not because he was a criminal but because he did not share the same political convictions,  I “found my voice” that day by telling these lackeys how wrong they were to label an ideological difference as a crime. I was then just 8 years old.  Ever since, I never stopped lending my voice to a cause I am passionate about. 

I Found My Dad In My Hubby

David will deny this vehemently.  However, he is somewhat like Dad.  A typical Scot steeped in traditional family values, David is extremely protective of the family and will do anything to ensure we are not in want of anything.  Even though Joel is his step-son, that term was never used in or outside the home.  To David, Joel is his son.  In his paternal role, be it the disciplinarian, the counselor, the best friend, or the teacher, David was first and foremost Joel’s “Pops”.  David was the one who taught him to swim, the one who taught him to ride his first bike, the one who comforted him when he failed his exams, the one who counseled him when he had girlfriend issues, the one who taught him how to shave, the one who gave him money so he could go repair his bicycle tire, and the one who baked him a cake for one of his birthday parties.   My Dad did all that for me and it was heartwarming to see the world’s best stepdad doing that for my son. 

Just like Dad was feisty and tenacious, David is the same.  He stands up for what he believes in and his ego never gets in the way of what he needs to do when he believes in it.  When Dad did not approve of our marriage many years ago, David visited Dad 4 times with the aim of convincing him about how serious he was about me.  Each time, Dad would chase him out of the office and told him to leave.  David never gave up and was very persistent.  He told Dad, “I don’t care if you dislike me, but I want you to stand behind your daughter because she deserves the love and support of the most important man in her life.”  I will never forget that because that tenacity had since been nurtured in Joel.

When Joel had to navigate his "Gaylord Focker complex" a year ago, when he was allocated to a nursing course which was not his first choice, it was his tenacity that turned that complex to a situation where he found his aspiration.  He said, " Mum, I am going to be a Nursing Director at the hospital and when I have saved enough, I will one day open my own private nursing care business." I am so proud that David taught my son to have guts.

Dads Are Heroes

Joel and I feel very blessed to have Dad and David in our lives.  

I am at the stage of my life when I am juggling multiple commitments, managing mounting workload, leading a team and running my Tarot consultancy.   This is the time I need these men in my life most to hold my hand as I walk along this journey to find my bliss.  

Joel is at the age now where he needs a Dad most.  He is managing the intense workload at nursing school braving days of grueling training at the hospital as well as doing projects at campus. While doing so, he is at the age of discovering strong friendships and developing a relationship.  Dad carried me through the challenges of my varsity days, when I discovered boyfriends and when I had to maneuver through the challenges of a divorce and a second marriage.  So likewise, David is carrying Joel through his challenges too.

Indeed, Dad and David are our heroes.  I grew up with so much of Dad in me.  I am certain that Joel, having grown up with so much of David in him, will one day, be the best father ever too…..BUT NOT TOO SOON PLEASE, JOEL.


About the writer:

The writer of this blog post is a 43 year old mother of one, who spreads her time between her day job as a marketeer at a financial institution, her hobby as a certified professional tarot reader and numerologist, and her family which includes a 19 year old son.  She's married to a Scot who has been affectionately called "The Crazy AngMo" and prays that he does not find out that the term when translated, has labeled him as a "Ginger Head".