[Our Parent’s advices]

A lot of us take advice seriously from our friends, our colleagues or classmates.
It could be regarding a new job offer or the girl whom you always want to know.

What should you do, how would you do it.
It’s not new to you because we are doing it almost every other day.

Our parents were among the first person we approached for an advice.
Most of the time, they would tell you what you shouldn’t be doing.

My mum is a typical negative minded person.
She would oppose in almost anything I want to do.

Like the design course I wanted to apply after O levels.
Like my choice of friends and the places I wanted to hang out.

She would say no to almost everything that came out from my mouth.
To her, having a steady job means more than anything in this life.

My passion, my dreams were something that is unpractical and perhaps unreasonable.
So I grew up my life listen to all her rejections even until this very day.

All my ventures, my proposals simply went down the drain the moment I speak to her.

My father on the other hand, never gives any advice.
He would only listen to what I want to say then let me say all the things I want.
Then he will not comment on it.

Normal reactions would be “Can do arh?”

You can say he’s more constructive in a way because he’s mentally challenging the possibilities in the problem.

There’s only one advice which he told me and sadly until today I still didn’t the importance of his advice.

“When are you going to get your driving license?”
I remembered he told me shortly after I came out from the army… almost 10years ago.

I would think it’s a bother to go through all the lessons and exams without the need of wanting a car. However, a license can be useful even if you don’t have a car.

My dad had the foresight and asked me to go for it.

I didn’t then, I had to now…

Looking forward, how will I advice my son one day?
If he comes to me with a problem, how would I help him?
If he comes to me with a passion, will I brush his hope away?

I hope not.

A lot of us failed to understand how much influence we have on others.

You'll never realized how much you can affect another person's emotions just by behaving negatively infront of him/her

[ Leaving Home ]

“When are you finally going to clean up your room?”
My mum will nag about this all day long as I sank deep inside my own world.

“Maybe tomorrow…. ”
I guess this answer would come almost immediately as the dreadful noise pollution continues.

“If I feel like doing it….”
This would be the heart’s answer.

How I miss those words.
How I miss the 30 over years that I’ve stayed with my parents.

Maybe some of us will laugh at the fact everyone will go out and build their own home at certain points of their lives.

Being independent and growing up.
That’s adulthood and the true facts of life.

Recently I’ve finally moved out from my parents and have a place of my own with my wife. It took us a lot of effort to raise the funding to purchase our flat.

The first night of our stay, I couldn’t sleep.
I remembered that telling my wife that I missed mum’s nagging.
She would always nag across the room before we go to bed.

It would either be about my messy room, about me being overspending or simply complaining what a hard life she is having. Sometimes I would answer back with a sense of rebel and most of the time I will end up at the losing end.

It was all quiet as we switched off our lights.

No nagging, no complaining, no sound.

I know all of us always have the urge to leave home one day.
We know we will be the kings and queens of our own little palace.
We can cook whatever we want and we can always leave the cleaning to tomorrow.

That’s probably the good side.

I’ve realized there are so many things which I won’t have know until I moved out.

Doing your groceries shopping is an art.
Some days you can be at the supermarket and realize that there’s no vegetable at all.
Buying the correct things at the correct supermarket can save you some dollars.

Cooking is not putting in all the ingredients and expects it to turn nicely as how our mums would cook. Doing laundry and mopping the floor exerts more energy than climbing stairs.

As we slowly get use to managing the whole house ourselves, I learn to appreciate all the nagging that I used to have.

As far as I hate nagging, it is still a communication skill that only women perfect the art.

It is an art of driving a message across your ears, bypassing your logic senses and directly hit your brain and memory.

Somehow no matter where you go, how far you’ve been, you will always remember your mum’s nagging.

These days, we only go back on Sunday.
She doesn’t really nag anymore.

“When you step out of the house, you are an adult now. Soon you are going to be someone’s father; I don’t need to nag at you anymore”

I know I might be labeled a sissy in front of my friends
(ok never mind that, all of them don’t read my blog)

I missed her nagging and miss her.

Thanks for all the nag that I’ve received in my life.

You’ll never know how much you miss it until you missed it.

[A Letter to My Child – Part II]

Dear Son,

Time seems to move very fast when you are busy.
You are in your 31st week and we’ll be visiting the gyne later on.

Your mum and I have decided on your name.

You know, a name is the actually the first emotional gift that a parent gave it their child to unify the bond between them. Every individual child’s name is special in their parent’s ear and every name has a different meaning.

Perhaps due to the fact that I was born in an uneducated parents and being Taoist, there wasn’t any English name for me.

One of the earliest questions that I was ever asked was, “What’s the meaning of your name?”
I went home and asked my parents as I was totally unaware.

“Oh, cos one of cousin was named Wen Yi, so we followed his “Yi” and named you “Shun Yi” loh” my mum explained.

“Har? Like that only arh?” and I thought I was special.

“No lah, we want you to be filial and righteous that’s why we named you “顺义” which is 孝顺，讲义气!” my mum followed after seeing my dreadful look.

31 years on, I looked back and asked myself whether I’m a filial & righteous guy.
I hope I’m, I wish I’m more.

Your mum’s name” 红梅” was named by her grandfather.

Her explanation of her name’s origin was based on the first sight of the newborn where your great grandfather resembles one “林黛玉” character in Dream of the Red Chamber 红楼梦.
I never had a chance to ask him why he wanted to name her this way.

Both your dad and mum grew up using our English name rather than our given name.
But we’ll never forget the story and meaning behind our name.

We hope to give you a name which is meaningful yet unique and easy to call.
We want to name you “Alvy Lim”
It may make you sound like a branded bag but there is a special meaning behind this name.

Alvy is Anntonii Lim Vanilla Yu