The list of animated movies is long this summer.
Those yellow creatures wearing goggles and blue overalls, if you ask me, pale in comparison with the story of Riley. This eleven-year-old only child had to move with her parents from Minnesota to San Francisco. Poor little girl. Her apprehension rose with the new school, the new hockey team, and the new way a pizza tastes. Riley struggled with the five emotion characters coming from her prefrontal cortex; she simply didn't know how to put them in the right order.
I can't tell you how many times my daughter cried throughout the movie. Okay, the truth is she cried a lot, so much so that I'm convinced that it's a touching story.
On the way back from the cinema, we talked and went over her feelings carefully, the way you feel for a hurting aphthous ulcer with your tongue. She began to tell me her worry about new school year. One after another. And soon we discussed how much she feels unprepared for our domestic maid's leaving this year (after working for us for five years). That is one of the worst feelings we can think of, to have had a wonderful maid, to know you had the luck, and then to lose it.
It's time, I know, to teach my girl the nuts and bots of finding an island to keep track of wonderful memory. The way five paper dolls (Ticky and Tacky, Jackie the Backie, Jim with two noses and Jo with the bow) are stored in Julia Donaldson's The Paper Dolls.
Monday, August 10, 2015
Friday, August 7, 2015
Dive Hard
Anyone who has tried scuba diving or snorkel will attest to how gorgeous the underwater world can be. I tried that in Mexico more than ten years ago.
We snorkeled with our five-year-old daughter this time in Okinawa. To be totally honest, it scares me. My wife bought her fins and snorkel before departing. We learned the know-how by watching the YouTube and rehearsed at our bathtub.
Turns out, we didn't have to say much. She did well except some problem with fitting the diving mask to seal off seawater. It was so heartwarming to find my daughter singing when she was under the water. I felt the way she lighted up when she discovered a school of fish swimming by.
A whole new world.
We snorkeled with our five-year-old daughter this time in Okinawa. To be totally honest, it scares me. My wife bought her fins and snorkel before departing. We learned the know-how by watching the YouTube and rehearsed at our bathtub.
Turns out, we didn't have to say much. She did well except some problem with fitting the diving mask to seal off seawater. It was so heartwarming to find my daughter singing when she was under the water. I felt the way she lighted up when she discovered a school of fish swimming by.
A whole new world.
Parent
Travel with friends and one's kid can be minefields for parents, in case the kid gets whinny or moody.
I call myself lucky during my Okinawa trip, not because my kid didn't act out. She did. On the very best days - though those were very, very rare - my daughter would smile for the whole day. The real luck is that we travelled with the most placid classmate of my daughter. An easygoing boy who is the second happiest kid in the world, next to Mr. Happy in Roger Hargreaves's stories.
Another stroke of luck comes from my pick of book for this trip. I happened to finish the novel Everything I Never Told You before leaving for Okinawa, and it's hard to find a better one. Fortunately I managed to borrow the inspiring book by Robin Berman: Permission to Parent.
"When my kid goes down the rabbit hole, I try so hard not to go down with him. But it's so tough not to go tumbling down after him," says Robin Berman - a quote I keep coming back to. To make myself clear: it's really hard not to get stirred by our child's pain. Picture your child breaking down in tears, telling you her friend doesn't want to play with her anymore. You might not have to imagine too far. Admit it: not so long ago, your kid told you exactly the same piece of news. Of course, I did. Robin Berman told us a similar story that goes like a textbook answer to stay out of the rabbit hole.
The daddy in the story did a great job by giving his tearful daughter a long cuddle. "I bet that does not feel good." Cool as a cucumber, he wiped away her tears. "What are you going to do now?" he asked.
"Well, I guess I can play with a girl I know with brown eyes and brown hair."
"You mean you?" the dad blurted out the obvious answer.
"Yes."
"Great idea," the dad replied, and off his daughter skipped.
How did the daddy feel? He was just as upset as his daughter, but he didn't let his true emotion complicate the rabbit hole issue. A very clever approach.
I call myself lucky during my Okinawa trip, not because my kid didn't act out. She did. On the very best days - though those were very, very rare - my daughter would smile for the whole day. The real luck is that we travelled with the most placid classmate of my daughter. An easygoing boy who is the second happiest kid in the world, next to Mr. Happy in Roger Hargreaves's stories.
Another stroke of luck comes from my pick of book for this trip. I happened to finish the novel Everything I Never Told You before leaving for Okinawa, and it's hard to find a better one. Fortunately I managed to borrow the inspiring book by Robin Berman: Permission to Parent.
"When my kid goes down the rabbit hole, I try so hard not to go down with him. But it's so tough not to go tumbling down after him," says Robin Berman - a quote I keep coming back to. To make myself clear: it's really hard not to get stirred by our child's pain. Picture your child breaking down in tears, telling you her friend doesn't want to play with her anymore. You might not have to imagine too far. Admit it: not so long ago, your kid told you exactly the same piece of news. Of course, I did. Robin Berman told us a similar story that goes like a textbook answer to stay out of the rabbit hole.
The daddy in the story did a great job by giving his tearful daughter a long cuddle. "I bet that does not feel good." Cool as a cucumber, he wiped away her tears. "What are you going to do now?" he asked.
"Well, I guess I can play with a girl I know with brown eyes and brown hair."
"You mean you?" the dad blurted out the obvious answer.
"Yes."
"Great idea," the dad replied, and off his daughter skipped.
How did the daddy feel? He was just as upset as his daughter, but he didn't let his true emotion complicate the rabbit hole issue. A very clever approach.
Friday, July 24, 2015
Tempus fugit
If you're planning a trip the first thing to do is find your travel companion. We went with my old friend's family to Thailand this summer.
One of the highlights of our Thailand trip is the visit of Kaeng Krachan National Park. Eleven of us, as young as four years and up to ten times the youngest one’s age, trekked to Pala-U, one of the highest waterfalls in Thailand. Step by step, we plodded next to a stream, surrounded by forest over 1000 years old and stunning number of butterflies. The route is tough but the destination is great for families. The stream itself, teeming with carps, makes for the perfect site for feeding fish and swimming.
Trekking with my good old friend brought to mind our school days. By the time we are in Thailand, we've known each other for more than thirty years. You read that right. We were in the same primary school, secondary school and university. Then we became roommates in the student hostel.
One of our favorite activities was stream trekking. That means a narrow, and sometimes slippery, path parallel to a stream. We didn’t have smartphones at that time, and would not bother if there is signal coverage along the trail. We used compass. Instead of photo sharing by Instagram, we had to wait till the films were developed. We didn’t have waterproof backpacks but still went ahead during rainy days. That’s silly, I know. An even dopier mistake was bringing along a medicine textbook when it was raining cats and dogs. Who did it? Not me. Not my old friend. My future wife.
Do you know what happened to the physiology textbook?
It turned cat-eared and dog-eared, I'd say.
One of the highlights of our Thailand trip is the visit of Kaeng Krachan National Park. Eleven of us, as young as four years and up to ten times the youngest one’s age, trekked to Pala-U, one of the highest waterfalls in Thailand. Step by step, we plodded next to a stream, surrounded by forest over 1000 years old and stunning number of butterflies. The route is tough but the destination is great for families. The stream itself, teeming with carps, makes for the perfect site for feeding fish and swimming.
Trekking with my good old friend brought to mind our school days. By the time we are in Thailand, we've known each other for more than thirty years. You read that right. We were in the same primary school, secondary school and university. Then we became roommates in the student hostel.
One of our favorite activities was stream trekking. That means a narrow, and sometimes slippery, path parallel to a stream. We didn’t have smartphones at that time, and would not bother if there is signal coverage along the trail. We used compass. Instead of photo sharing by Instagram, we had to wait till the films were developed. We didn’t have waterproof backpacks but still went ahead during rainy days. That’s silly, I know. An even dopier mistake was bringing along a medicine textbook when it was raining cats and dogs. Who did it? Not me. Not my old friend. My future wife.
Do you know what happened to the physiology textbook?
It turned cat-eared and dog-eared, I'd say.
Tuesday, July 21, 2015
Luggage
One way of writing travel memoir is to recollect what's inside the luggage of that trip.
An enormously clear-eyed and quite personal look at how we travel. And a chronicle of how my daughter grows. Absolutely. Do you know we still packed a can of milk powder and a milk bottle for my five-year-old? We did so for our recent trip to Hua Hin in Thailand, as has always been the case. I meant it. The truth is, my girl hasn't weaned from her bedtime bottle.
What else did we take with us?
More story books than I have teeth. We allowed our daughter to pick whatever books she loves. Whatever - no hardcover, if possible. Biff, Chip and Kipper. Charlie and Lola. (By the way, D.W. has also recently been added to her favorite list.) If her milk bottle is a must for her bedtime routine, bedtime story reading is compulsory. And if my wife had a dollar for every time they read a bedtime story together, she wouldn't have enough room in her pocket.
Of course, each of our itineraries come with a chock-full of colour pencils and sketch books. There is a lot more. We took a book of paper-and-pencil games this time. That opens up oodles of fun possibilities. Hangman. Tic-tac-toe (Os and Xs). And many long-lost gems.
Oh, wait - we can't forget a big eraser. I mean, my daughter's mercurial mood is as volatile as the weather in Thailand. As combustible as the Queen of Hearts from Alice in Wonderland, in the event of a mistake in her drawing. It really is.
An enormously clear-eyed and quite personal look at how we travel. And a chronicle of how my daughter grows. Absolutely. Do you know we still packed a can of milk powder and a milk bottle for my five-year-old? We did so for our recent trip to Hua Hin in Thailand, as has always been the case. I meant it. The truth is, my girl hasn't weaned from her bedtime bottle.
What else did we take with us?
More story books than I have teeth. We allowed our daughter to pick whatever books she loves. Whatever - no hardcover, if possible. Biff, Chip and Kipper. Charlie and Lola. (By the way, D.W. has also recently been added to her favorite list.) If her milk bottle is a must for her bedtime routine, bedtime story reading is compulsory. And if my wife had a dollar for every time they read a bedtime story together, she wouldn't have enough room in her pocket.
Of course, each of our itineraries come with a chock-full of colour pencils and sketch books. There is a lot more. We took a book of paper-and-pencil games this time. That opens up oodles of fun possibilities. Hangman. Tic-tac-toe (Os and Xs). And many long-lost gems.
Oh, wait - we can't forget a big eraser. I mean, my daughter's mercurial mood is as volatile as the weather in Thailand. As combustible as the Queen of Hearts from Alice in Wonderland, in the event of a mistake in her drawing. It really is.
Wednesday, July 1, 2015
Separation
There must have been a page that somehow goes missing in our children's school book. It's the page or lesson about separation. That very page has been either torne by a nursery-age kid or got eaten by a dog before any teacher noticed it.
What if we can't teach our kids how to deal with separation? (Often we can't.) What if your kid (like mine) attends a school where turnover of classmates is as high as the staff attrition rate in a public hospital (and mine, too)?
Somehow our children learn their way of facing separation. And pretty well. Sometimes they cry, sometimes they don't. My daughter's story of separation started with her best girl friend who moved away from their kindergarten to a new primary school. I felt freakish and worried. My wife did, too. It was not until my daughter showed me her picture, showing those two lovely girls living next to each other in heaven, that I stopped praying.
Last week, my daughter said goodbye to another two girl friends on the last day of this school term. Those aren't the kinds of goodbye for the sake of summer holidays; they won't come back next school year. I didn't ask if they cried, and I was afraid to do so. Then I learned that one of her classmates went to meet his buddy who had gone back to Japan. The two of them, I remember well, summon up everything good about childhood friendship: silly songs in the class, after-school soccer games, sharing bath tubs in lazy summers. They haven't seen each other for months and really treasured this reunion. They laughed. A lot. Here is the one tiny problem: the two kids cried by the time they had to say goodbye again. They cried so loud that I seemed to have heard them here.
This brings us to the matter of how children, as they grow up, learn their own way of facing separation. We don't quite know how to teach them. They just know. One of my favorite writers, Anne Lamott, tells us when her six-year-old son realised that he and his mum weren't going to die at the exact same moment, he cried for a while, and then said that if he'd known this, he wouldn't have agreed to be born.
What if we can't teach our kids how to deal with separation? (Often we can't.) What if your kid (like mine) attends a school where turnover of classmates is as high as the staff attrition rate in a public hospital (and mine, too)?
Somehow our children learn their way of facing separation. And pretty well. Sometimes they cry, sometimes they don't. My daughter's story of separation started with her best girl friend who moved away from their kindergarten to a new primary school. I felt freakish and worried. My wife did, too. It was not until my daughter showed me her picture, showing those two lovely girls living next to each other in heaven, that I stopped praying.
Last week, my daughter said goodbye to another two girl friends on the last day of this school term. Those aren't the kinds of goodbye for the sake of summer holidays; they won't come back next school year. I didn't ask if they cried, and I was afraid to do so. Then I learned that one of her classmates went to meet his buddy who had gone back to Japan. The two of them, I remember well, summon up everything good about childhood friendship: silly songs in the class, after-school soccer games, sharing bath tubs in lazy summers. They haven't seen each other for months and really treasured this reunion. They laughed. A lot. Here is the one tiny problem: the two kids cried by the time they had to say goodbye again. They cried so loud that I seemed to have heard them here.
This brings us to the matter of how children, as they grow up, learn their own way of facing separation. We don't quite know how to teach them. They just know. One of my favorite writers, Anne Lamott, tells us when her six-year-old son realised that he and his mum weren't going to die at the exact same moment, he cried for a while, and then said that if he'd known this, he wouldn't have agreed to be born.
Tuesday, June 23, 2015
Not Dead
Most of our day-to-day tasks - buying birthday gifts, getting an annual check, writing thank-you cards to teachers before the end of the school term, filling of tax return, applying ethical approval for clinical trials, redeeming rebate - are set with deadlines. Such deadline always looms large when it's around the corner. We begin to become a little edgy. Okay, we panic. We sigh and moan and wish we had more time.
Deadlines, by definition, are deadly. As deadly as the MERS-coronavirus. There is no vaccine to prevent it, and there are no drugs to treat it.
Yesterday, my colleague posted his update on Facebook after fighting with time to admit patients to hospitals, barely beating his deadline to submit research grant proposal. "Had a hectic day running between PCR and CPR." That's what he says. Which is basically medical doctor gobbledygook for "mission impossible." Within half day, there were a dozen replies. Condolence. Praise. Encouragement. Long enough to fill a page, I swear. We all know it's tough.
What is it that makes deadlines so dreadful? And why can't we go without deadlines? How much better would our world be if deadlines are scrapped?
Actually, no. Merits of deadline are backed up by behaviour science. For evidence that supports the use of deadlines, consider the British example of the Economic and Social Research Council, which means funding opportunity for university researchers interested in areas of global economics, security and education. At one time, the council decided to remove research grant submission deadlines and accept proposals on a rolling basis. And that, in essence, means more freedom for researchers who won't need to submit proposals on a fixed day (like my poor friend); they can simply submit a proposal whenever they want. No more deadly deadlines. It looks as if that's a big improvement, at least in terms of flexibility.
But wait: do we really know what happened after this new policy?
Proposal submissions plummeted by 15 to 20 percent.
Deadlines, by definition, are deadly. As deadly as the MERS-coronavirus. There is no vaccine to prevent it, and there are no drugs to treat it.
Yesterday, my colleague posted his update on Facebook after fighting with time to admit patients to hospitals, barely beating his deadline to submit research grant proposal. "Had a hectic day running between PCR and CPR." That's what he says. Which is basically medical doctor gobbledygook for "mission impossible." Within half day, there were a dozen replies. Condolence. Praise. Encouragement. Long enough to fill a page, I swear. We all know it's tough.
What is it that makes deadlines so dreadful? And why can't we go without deadlines? How much better would our world be if deadlines are scrapped?
Actually, no. Merits of deadline are backed up by behaviour science. For evidence that supports the use of deadlines, consider the British example of the Economic and Social Research Council, which means funding opportunity for university researchers interested in areas of global economics, security and education. At one time, the council decided to remove research grant submission deadlines and accept proposals on a rolling basis. And that, in essence, means more freedom for researchers who won't need to submit proposals on a fixed day (like my poor friend); they can simply submit a proposal whenever they want. No more deadly deadlines. It looks as if that's a big improvement, at least in terms of flexibility.
But wait: do we really know what happened after this new policy?
Proposal submissions plummeted by 15 to 20 percent.
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