Great Expectations!

Much of life's disappointment stems from our ridiculously high expectations.

The other day, I took out a Chinese workbook meant for kids aged 3 to 5, in a rather embarrassing attempt to teach myself how to scribble a few Chinese characters. This was what I had learned, instead: If I were my own Mandarin tutor, I would have lost all patience with a student like myself. My blood would boil and I might just end up strangling myself ... 



Jumbo writing, indeed! 

All I had to do was to follow the dotted lines on the page, yet the pencil chose to be rebellious and had persistently refused to obey. It was as if the paper had put a charm on the pencil and lured it away from the dotted lines. No. It was not my fault that my lines did not coincide with the dots. It was truly the pencil's fault. Or maybe the paper. Or maybe the uneven floor.

All I had to do was to follow the dotted lines 

That got me thinking - nobody had expected me to write perfectly. There was no teacher or parent to punish me even if I were to produce the most horrible writing in the world. Why then did I get so upset and defensive? Truth be told, I have been like this since young. It's one of my many bad traits, I admit. If someone were to keep my record, this should be diagnosed as a severe DISEASE (not even a disorder) which needs to be eradicated, failing which may eventually lead to death, or insanity (whichever comes first). Too bad the eradication process is easier said than done. 

As far as I can remember, I have always scored averagely good results throughout my primary school years. In fact, I recall the distraught I put my family members through when I had my first B in Mathematics back in Standard Four. Not only had I shed buckets of tears, but I had also refused to go to school and was inconsolable for days, even though my aunt tried comforting me. I thought my world had crashed.

Paradoxically, the situation in secondary school eased a little as my studies began to deteriorate. Nonetheless, I would still stress myself silly to get relatively good results, albeit without having to study hard. 

At this point, you may think that my parents must have been slave drivers when it came to my studies. You cannot be more wrong. To put it a little crudely: My parents couldn't be bothered. What I meant was, they NEVER had to worry about my academic results at all. There was no need to put any pressure on me because I had already put enough pressure on myself. My brother had always been the problematic one in his studies. =) So problematic, in fact, that my parents were too preoccupied with his performance to dwell too much in my academic success. They had just assumed that I would do well eventually. And I usually did. Well, except maybe during STPM ... but that is another story altogether!

Someone once wrote that being born as a second (or third, fourth, fifth etc.) child in the family is like competing in a race, but you have to wait ten minutes at the starting line. I cannot agree more. 

While it may be rewarding to wait, watch, and learn from an older sibling's mistakes and blunders, it is equally exhausting having to keep up with the things they do and to vie for the affection that they had inherited as the firstborn. I did not know what I wanted to prove by doing well in school but I secretly thought my parents would surely love me more if I had scored my fair share of As. The irony, though, is this: the better my academic results were, the less my parents had to worry for me. Instead of getting more attention for performing well in school, I had relieved them of their worry and ultimately, their attention.

As if studies were not stressful enough, I pushed myself to do well in whatever form of tests I could lay my hands on. I tried my best not to fail a single piano exam. And when I was barred from sitting for my first undang (some theoretical paper for driving) due to my poor eyesight, I decided to make up for it by scoring full marks on the paper. Although the administrators at my driving school were surprised, I was not. It was, after all, another test in which I had expected myself to excel. If I were to hide behind the sugar-coated truth, I would just say that I was trying to give my BEST in everything I did;  

... but to call a spade a spade, I had gradually been consumed by a horrendous Chinese monster named Kiasu. 

Kiasu 

Definition of Kiasu

A pinch of kiasu-ism (if the term, indeed, does exist) goes a long way. Well, both ways, in fact. For one, it serves as a great motivator for success. In reality, Kiasu-ism and Great Expectations are merely siblings from the same parents. Behind each kiasu soul lies an individual with great expectations. Even so, without such expectations, one may not be inspired to succeed. Take the protagonist of Charles Dicken's Great Expectations for example. Given Pip's humble beginnings in life, he would not have become a refined gentleman in his adult years if not for his ... great expectations (even if his motives may sometimes seem thwarted)! If he were to live in our present-day Asian society, you would probably accuse Pip of being a kiasu, too, even though all he ever wanted was to be able to sing along with Robbie Williams i.e. "to be a better man".

 

On the other hand, when we set our expectations too high and place the doormat for the kiasu monster to move in and make itself at home, we set ourselves for even greater disappointment and discontent. Years ago I read of a 12 year-old girl who hung herself because she did not score straight As for her UPSR. It may have seemed like a big deal to her at that point of her life, but I wished someone had the chance to tell her that if she had only clung onto life a little longer, she would eventually arrive at a stage where she wouldn't care two hoots about her UPSR results anyway. PMR would also amount to nothing. And as long as one gets admission into college after SPM and graduates, the SPM cert wouldn't matter much, too. Even if one fails to graduate, that is not the end of the road. I can name many more people who contribute more to the society and earn more than I do, all without having any tertiary education to brag about. As an educator, it may seem rather 'blasphemous' for me to give such strange advice but I am merely stating the truth. 

I kept in touch with a boy who received his SPM results a few days ago and although he had 10As, he was a bit upset about the one B+ that he received. It is so easy for us to lose focus on the 10As we have in our pocket if we choose to look at the one B+ that in a way 'marred' the otherwise perfect result. This reminds me of the story of 99 gold coins. You can read it here: http://mythologystories.wordpress.com/2013/01/19/99club/

To cut the long story short, a king wanted to find out why his servant was so much happier than he was. His advisor suggested that he place a bag with 99 coins (not 100, mind you!) for the servant to discover. The rest is history as the servant began recounting the coins just to make sure that the 100th coin was not missing from the bag. He began to work doubly hard, became extra grouchy, and less of a human just to be able to top the amount to a complete 100. Yeah, that is what ridiculously great expectations can do to us, too. Wouldn't you agree that it is more disconcerting to score a 99 than a 96 in an exam where the full mark is 100?

I guess the worst damage that results from one's great expectations is not the loss of our own happiness and life, but more so the happiness and lives of our friends and loved ones along the way. We will know that the situation has gone out of hand when we begin to impose our expectations on others, be it in terms of education, work, or even relationship. Throughout the years, I have slowly learned (and am still learning) that it is not right for me to expect things/favours/accomplishments from others. If my students want to fail despite my best efforts, there is nothing I can do about it. If my best friends are not aware of the special treatment I have reserved for them, there is nothing I can do about it. If family members are not satisfied with what I do for a living, there is also nothing I can do about it. It does not pay to work myself up over how other people choose to treat me or to expect others to understand. But this is not an easy lesson to learn, I admit.




We are not potatoes but humans

Am I then suggesting that we should go through life with nary an expectation at all? Definitely not! We are not potatoes but humans. We are creatures who need to be challenged and motivated. Can you imagine waking up in the morning without any aim? (Yes, it may be a relief for a day or two, but what about a lifetime?) Nonetheless, as with everything else in life, it is always good to strike a balance between having no expectations at all and setting ridiculously high standards for us to achieve. Should we fail to do that, we better brace ourselves for greater disappointments in life.

Here's to a good week ahead! 
 

Occupational Wardrobe Malfunction: In True Janet Jackson Style

Underarm pads from Daiso

I came across these underarm pads in Daiso the other day (trust the Japanese minds to come up with the most eccentric yet practical technology) and could not resist purchasing a packet for myself.

Now, don’t tell me you have never experienced sweaty armpits. Even if you were blessed with smooth tofu-like underarms with nary a pore nor  a strand of hair, you must have had a friend or at least seen a stranger struggling to hide sweaty armpit stains on smart-looking (and esp. plain-coloured) shirts/blouses. Sadly, the more one tries to hide, the more the stain gets magnified.

Talk about sweat stains ...

A close and attractive friend of mine has 4 flights of stairs to climb each day before getting to her classroom. She is slim and rather fit but since she is always in a hurry, she is not spared from this wicked underarm crisis. A few years ago, she found a solution to her problem: she tried stuffing tissues and leaving them under her armpits to absorb the sweat and it worked miraculously.

I have a few plain-coloured blouses myself. Sometimes when the weather is too hot and my sweat glands run on an overtime mode, I am left with that undesirable patch. One day, I decided to adopt my friend’s brilliant idea. If it had worked for her, why shouldn’t it work for me, too? I rolled up some toilet paper and shoved them under both arms. As I stood in front of the classroom, I could literally feel the tissues working their wonders and I was as confident as the Rexona girl because I knew that the patch was no longer visible to the naked eye. Alas, imagine my horror when I walked into the washroom after class only to discover that the toilet paper under one arm was missing! I tried looking around for that rather generous chunk of tissue but to no avail. The tissue was gone for good, and till this day, part of me wants to believe that it had just disintegrated into thin air and not fallen out of my sleeves, onto the floor, in full view of my entire class, all without my realization.

This little anecdote has never failed to make my listeners laugh. Their standard response is, “These kinda things only happen to you!” I do not beg to differ but perhaps it is also because I am thick-skinned enough to bring such embarrassing stories out in the open. (Warning: And if you’re unfortunate to be my relative or friend, your story might appear here, too.) 

In conjunction with the 10^th anniversary of Janet Jackson’s infamous wardrobe malfunction, do allow me to expose more stories of highly unintentional indecent exposures. Sure, they may not be as sensational as Janet’s but I assure you that they are, nonetheless, equally amusing and real.

Janet Jackson's wardrobe malfunction in 2004

I confess; I do not have a mirror in my room. I have never fallen in love with my own reflection, so the only mirror that I look at albeit for a split second before leaving the house is an A4 sized glass hanging above the kitchen sink. I would never notice if I had worn my clothes inside out, buttoned wrongly, have a stain, or worn shorts when I meant to wear long pants instead. I recall my former colleagues laughing at me for arriving at the office one day with my blouse all buttoned wrongly. I had walked hundreds of metres from the car park and met many students along the way with my blouse in that unprofessional manner, yet no one had said anything.

But then again, perhaps I do have a reputation for dressing sloppily to work. A case in point: I strongly believe in giving students a break in the middle of a class. It certainly helps students to freshen up and to stay awake for the rest of the lesson. But I guess not many students know the humble origins of such breaks. It was during one of my first semesters in college when I was caught with my fly down, literally. Today, I would probably have enough confidence to ask nonchalantly, “Class, why didn’t you tell me that I have forgotten to zip up?” and turn it into a big joke (while sprinkling some of the Amnesia Dust that Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson used in Tooth Fairy, on my unsuspecting students).

Back then, though, I was still young and easily embarrassed. I quickly announced a class break, much to the relief of my students, and pulled my zipper up at lightning speed, not realizing that the reflection on the whiteboard was visible to all. Ever since that incident, I was always extra cautious and highly suspicious whenever I notice students giggling and whispering to each other. My automatic response would be to speedily run my fingers across the zipper or to take a quick glance down at my blouse.

While wardrobe malfunctions are common everywhere, people from some professions tend to suffer greater consequences than others. Such occurrences probably do not matter as much to one who is constantly confined within a small office space with a few close colleagues. Certain professions, like being a superstar for instance, would require you to meet many people at any one time. Being a lecturer or a teacher is pretty much like being a superstar, minus its fame and fortune. All it takes is a small blunder and the entire class will be left roaring with laughter and a hot subject for gossip whenever students are dissatisfied with the grades they have earned.

I wished someone had warned me of the importance of one's physical appearance when I had my first teaching stint in a private school. I was having a semester break after my first year in university and was merely filling in for a teacher who went on a maternity leave. I thought it was enough to just replace my daily jeans and t-shirts with auntie-looking blouses and slacks. What no one mentioned, though, was how to maintain the cleanliness of my apparels until the end of the day, despite being given coloured markers to write on whiteboards.

For most females, the most protruding part of their body (in front, at least) would usually be their upper assets. The main subject which was assigned to me then was Prinsip Akaun which required A LOT of writing on the whiteboard. Failing to maintain the right distance from the board always left me with marker stains on my blouses (I do not think I need to specify where). I was aware of such stains but I thought those stains would escape the eyes of high school teens. That is, until one day, of course, when I heard someone sitting in the front row whispering a bit too loudly, “Did you notice that she always has stains on her ****?”

A stapler a.k.a. a life-saver

Nonetheless, all the instances above are considered minor in comparison to my most ‘triumphant’ moment in all history of occupational wardrobe malfunctions, and to think that I owe it to a stapler. I have a friend whom I nickname ‘razor butt’. She has the talent to rip pants apart, not vertically i.e. along the seams but horizontally. She has done this not once, but twice, and on denim pants, no less. I used to laugh at her but one fine day, retribution came knocking on my office door…

It was merely 5 minutes before class when I suddenly realized that the seams at the back of my pants had slowly given way. The pair of slacks was almost a decade old and I guess I was also packing on the pounds. Neither my colleagues nor I had a sewing kit with us. I would have settled for a safety pin but the 15cm tear was just too long and I was not about to risk sitting on those pins. My mind raced as I pondered how to prevent the class from getting a full view of my rear.

I could always wrap a sweater or a scarf around my hips but even someone with as little fashion sense as I do knew that the colour and print on the scarf was just too distracting and was sure to arouse suspicion. Also, what if the scarf suddenly falls off? Armed with nothing else but a stapler in hand, I decided to hide in the toilet and staple the tear. I made sure that there was not a single space between each staple. I then pretended to walk confidently into class. The staples were so neat and tight that I decided to leave them there for many more washings after that. It was my fear of not being able to clear through the metal detectors at the airport which finally forced me to undo the staples and to mend the seams using the conventional method i.e. with needle and thread.

By now, you may be laughing or gawking in disbelief at these stories. These incidents may seem improbable to anyone else but if you knew me well enough, you would know that they are all true. I have shared these accounts to many people and one of my friends even employed the stapler method when her pants ripped at work. You may want to keep your eyes open. Who knows? A wardrobe malfunction may just be around your corner and I sure hope that it is not you who is caught with your pants down.  

Japan in Pictures: Day 3 (Wednesday, 29 January 2014) Part 2

If you reject the food, ignore the customs, fear the religion and avoid the people, you might better stay at home. - James A Michener

We were determined to try all kinds of Japanese food. Nonetheless, little did we expect to come across our most interesting dining experience when we made our way to the second destination i.e. Kinkaku-ji.

Delightful Dining Experience: Okonomiyaki

Sandwiched between a row of shops along the street is an obscure little restaurant that serves okonomiyaki i.e. Japanese pizza. The word okonomi is translated as 'what you want', while yaki means 'grilled', so the literal translation should be 'grill whatever you want.' Others know it as Japanese pancake/pizza. I would term it as a massive omelette with anything and everything you like.

A small intermediate lot selling okonomiyaki

Okonomiyaki = Japanese pizza

I usually do not fancy having to cook my own food once I am already in a restaurant but this was an entirely new experience. We were absolutely clueless but the waiters and waitresses were very helpful, paying extra attention to us because they knew we were first-timers. Or perhaps, they were just afraid that we would destroy their cooking utensils! =)

A hotplate/grill

The ingredients for okonomiyaki

Stirred into a batter

A mini hour-glass as our timer

We were one of the few adult patrons in a restaurant crowded with school children, yet we behaved like little kids who were introduced to the art of masak-masak for the first time. We had a blast cooking this traditional dish on our own.

Step by step

After our hard work, we were rewarded with our own pancakes.

A slice of bacon okonomiyaki

It was one of the most satisfying and filling meals we had. We then proceeded across the street to one of the most famous icons of Kyoto, the Kinkaku-ji, also known as The Golden Pavilion. 

Kinkaku-ji a.k.a. The Temple of the Golden Pavilion

This has been listed as one of the top tourist spots in Kyoto. The top two floors of this temple were made of real gold.

Ticket to Kinkaku-ji, Kyoto

A very picturesque scene of The Golden Pavilion and its surroundings

Although we had initially planned to follow the route as suggested on TripAdvisor http://www.everytrail.com/guide/highlights-of-kyoto, we decided to give Ginkaku-ji (The Silver Pavilion) and The Philosopher's Walk a miss seeing that our parents were already tired. We decided to head straight to Kiyomizu Temple.

Kiyomizu-Dera 

Our choice to take a cab instead of the bus to Kiyomizu Temple proved to be practical because the slope up the hill was quite steep and far. Nonetheless, it was exceptionally thrilling as we walked past colourful, busy, and to some extent, rather claustrophobic little stalls along the street. One can find snacks and souvenirs along the way to the temple.

I wish I had taken a better photo of the stalls along the street but this is the closest

The entrance to the temple seemed pretty impressive. We were, however, disappointed that the temple was undergoing some maintenance/construction work. 

Spot the crane at the top right? 

This temple is supported by 40-feet tall pillars and was built without a single nail. If I had known this earlier, I probably would not have been as confident climbing all the way up and down. 

40-feet tall pillars that support the temple

Endless steps

Kiyomizu is literally translated as 'pure water'. Little wonder, then, that people queue up to take a drink of water that runs down the nearby hills. 

It has been said that, "Ignorance is bliss" and to the tourist, this is sometimes true. I have never really studied how cherry blossom trees were supposed to look like, so in a country such as Japan and during winter (when trees are void of leaves, anyway), it is extremely easy for one to imagine that each tree he/she sees would be flooded with cherry blossoms come springtime. 

The fact that these trees have no leaves certainly leaves me with lotsa room for imagination

We have been told that this was the best place to view sunset in Kyoto. Although I am a die-hard fan of sunsets, we were too exhausted to stay on and be caught in the evening rush hour once more, so we decided to make our way back to the hotel. 

It was then that we were rewarded with a beautiful view of the sunset, not in Kyoto but in Osaka, and it was SIMPLY BEAUTIFUL. Yet another day well spent, indeed! 

Photo of the sunset taken near Hotel Monterrey, Osaka