I have written this last Saturday, but took such a long time to prepare the video. But hey… I am getting better…
——————- Written on 24th February 2007 ——————- Spent an afternoon at Hwei Min’s office today.
Ginza Plaza was hosting a lion dance performance today. Managed to do an hour of work on my introduction to the Internet. It’s coming on quite nicely now. Just trying to streamline the information further.
It was quite a disappointing turn out for the lion dance performance. Hwei Min said most of the guests went for their holidays over the weekend. Thankfully, there was a family with kids around. There were three girls who really enjoyed themselves.
Now that I have figured out YouTube. I’ve decided to piece a short video of the dance troupe together. Enjoy.
We had a great ‘aha’ today about financial education.
I was just thinking about my kid’s education. Hwei Min and I were discussing on when we should teach our kids to pick up academic skills.
I talked about making learning interesting. We thought about it and realized that maybe the reward system most parents practise (“You get 90 out of hundred for 3 subjects and you will get the latest Superman figurine”) is a way to create short term goals for kids to aim for. In a sick kind of way, it makes learning a little more ‘fun’.
Then I said that I wanted to train our children to like passive income, and we should make the reward passive instead of one off reward.
Suddenly, I realised, isn’t child’s allowance something like an adult’s paycheck? We go to school to get an allowance. Some kids are not given allowances during school holidays. We go to work to get a paycheck!
If in primary school, we get 5 dollars a week, in secondary school we will get 10 dollars a week. What has changed? Did we study harder? No. We just got older! Now what does that do to our mindset when we start working? We get “greedy”! (Go read “Rich Dad, Poor Dad” for the Rich Dad’s definition of greedy)
So here lies a very important lesson which we have yet to grasp. We must really rethink the system in which we teach our kids about life, and about money! Maybe we pay allowance based on performance? Maybe the allowance comes in the form of passive income?
This year, we had a couple of new additions to the family. My little cousin, Aaron, and my not so little cousin Terence. Aaron is the life of our party. Just having him around and the rest of us pampering him added a lot of fun and laughter to our gathering. I’ve noticed that Aaron is quiet, but very smart with his hands. He plays and picks up spatial skills pretty fast. He is shy when trying out new stuff, like new words he learnt for example, but you can see that he understands what you are saying.
I guess this is a problematic age for parents because he is just beginning to understand boundaries and also beginning to test those boundaries. How much discipline to apply? Spare the rod? Will it spoil the kid? Aaron is just at the brink of cuteness turning into naughtiness.
Meanwhile, Terence is a cousin we have not seen for at least 12 years now. The last time we met him, he was only slightly older than Aaron is now. Now at 17, he is a stranger, but still familiar, still family. He still has the same looks, for one. It’s as if he got stretched by Willy Wonka’s stretching machine because he looks the same except taller, and his face is longer. He’s quite handsome too, so it’s not as bad as how I am sure you are visualizing in your head now.
I came back last night. As mentioned, a brief update on my chinese new year. How did you spend your new year? Pigging out like me?? 😛
A typical chinese new year’s eve begins at home with my mom preparing a dish for the reunion meal. I say meal because we usually have lunch instead of dinner.
Then we move off to my grandma’s place (Teo Family) in JB at around 10 a.m.
No point going too early, cos my grandma would be making prayers. Nowadays we are helping her, as she is not so mobile any more. Traditionally, the gods will have their meals before the mortals do, and the ancestors before the living. Don’t ask me which gods and which ancestors they are. We lay a few dishes and three sets of chopsticks, whisky and tea. My cousin, Han mentioned that he finally understood who those three sets were for, but that’s blasphemous and disrespectful to both Taoists and the Christians, so I shall not mention what he said now.
We move in to the living room shortly after and different sets were laid for the ancestors of the family this time. Only when all the traditional ceremonies are done do the rest of us eat.
Every year, we have all the meats;- fish, duck, two styles of chicken, roast pork. We would have my mom’s dish with mushrooms, fat choy and ho see. And not to forget, the very expensive soup with abalone and sea cucumber in it. Very nice!
By the time we start eating, it’s 2pm, so I tend of overeat my first meal.
We will spend the day and the rest of the days at my grandma’s place watching movies together, playing mahjong, eating. Just chilling. Ok… not really chilling cause it is really quite hot in the house, and stuffy at times, what with 18 of us in the small 4 room HDB equivalent sized house. But hey, it’s the only time we get to meet, and I sure do cherish the moments.
Ever since my grandpa (Tham side) passed away, my father’s side of the family meet on the 1st day of lunar new year at my 1st Uncle’s place. Very huge gathering, my 1st Uncle alone has 3 generations under the same roof. I have 9 uncles, my dad is the 7th, and he has 2 elder sisters and 1 foster sister. Each of my dad’s siblings have kids, and some of them have kids, so you can imagine how many people there are in the gathering.
So a lot of ang baos are exchanged. Now that I am getting married, I am thankful that the currency for ang bao exchange is in RM and the norm is 4RM each packet. Phew…
Anyway, I tried the youtube upload again. Ya’tta! It works this time! Enjoy! (Note : The video takes a while to become active after upload.)
So it’s a short break for me from blogging not because I don’t want to, but because I can’t. No Internet there. I will write when I am there and post everything once I come back Tuesday night or Wednesday.
So here is where I shower you with tons of greetings like Gong1 Xi3 Fa1 Cai2, Wan4 Shi4 Ru2 Yi4, Cai2 Yuan2 Gun3 Gun3, yada yada yada.
