The angriest bird alive

Fri, 14 Sep 2012
2 min read
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So my grandmother turned 83 yesterday. She is a total angry bird.

My angry bird grandmother is totally NOT HAPPY that she's 83.

She looks like an angry bird because she’s not smiling, and she’s not smiling because she seldom smiles.

Angry bird.

Why doesn’t she smile often? Because she doesn’t have a full set of teeth.

Now, why she doesn’t get dentures is beyond me, but hey – if she’s happy without false teeth, so am I.

Nani and I

That is: I’m happy for her too. Not that I’m happy without false teeth – but that’s another story for another day.

BECAUSE! The story I wanted to share with everyone is this:

My grandmother celebrated her 83rd birthday yesterday so we all went over to her place for dinner.

Not all of us, mind you – my useless sibling and cousins are either injured, overseas or gainfully employed.

So I had no choice but to sacrifice what little time and freedom I had being unemployed to represent the grandchildren at dinner.

During dinner, my aunts (and possibly, my mother) were yet again proselytising in an attempt to get me to join the weird-ass spiritual/religious thingamajigs they participate in.

I, of course, wasn’t having any of that, so I just carried on eating the carb-fest on my plate a.k.a. Sindhi food.

Upon noticing how I was being harassed unnecessarily, my very awesome angry bird grandmother then started relating a story to the dinner party about how ‘Kamal’ once told everyone at Sindhu House that he didn’t believe in any other god/teacher because the only god/teacher he believed in was his mother.

(OK – perhaps to understand the significance of this statement, you need to read this story.

It may or may not have been the context that was being referred to, but it’ll help to contextualise the role of the mother in Indian [Asian?] culture.)

For the record, I don’t understand Sindhi very well and I needed some translation too – so my grandmother may have been misquoted.

Nevertheless, right after my angry bird grandmother uttered that statement in her angry bird voice, a hush befell the table.

I was, like, “Oh my gosh, Nani – you’re awesome!” and stood up to give her a hug while muttering “Hug for you but none for the aunties.”

She gave a toothy chuckle, and said in Sindhi, right after I sat down, “Pass the papad.”

Well, I guess some things never change, huh.

Lynn Lee and Wikileaks – more scandalous news.

Mon, 5 Sep 2011
1 min read
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(Conversation conducted via SMS)

Lynn Lee @ 6.40pm: LOL – I’m sitting in Aunty Vera’s car and [redacted]. Aunty Vera says [redacted] is like “Shylock Holmes“. Hahaha! So cute lah, she.

Laremy Lee @ 9.11pm: New surrogate daughter now, are we? LOL. Was washing Le Poots just now; it is so hamsum now. How’s life post-Wikileaks?

Lynn Lee @ 9.19pm: It’s okay, lah, but I’m so tired – [redacted]. Instead I have to drink copious cups of Milo for comfort. Thanks, anyway, for everything. You’re a good porklet.

Laremy Lee @ 9.21pm: Eh, no worries. It’s, like, you’re Vincent Chase and I’m Eric Murphy and I’m just clearing the way so you can walk. Haha! *snort*

Lynn Lee @ 9.22pm: Haha! That’s such a good quote (along with Shylock Holmes, of course). You should put it on your FB.

Just following instructions… Although after this, I think she will never communicate with anyone ever again.

Or perhaps only if they sign some kind of non-disclosure agreement beforehand.

ADDENDUM: Just got scolded after she saw the post.

In my defence, at least I redacted important information.

*sulks*

Scumbaggery in the UK.

Sun, 14 Aug 2011
2 min read
2 Comments

Anarchy in the UK.

(NOTE: For the young ‘uns, the title of this post and the image is a reference to a song by the Sex Pistols.)

I’m quite tired of people hijacking the event popularly known as the London ‘riots’ for their own agenda.

Some examples:

  • “This justifies the strict laws against rioting and protesting we have in Singapore”.
  • “This is why we need to love our government, regardless of whoever is in the government”.

I don’t think those two claims are relevant or appropriate to the situation.

The first misses the larger point – this is not a riot, but simply a case of looting and theft carried out by opportunists who have purposefully disregarded social mores and notions of prop(ri)erty.

The second claim entails a blind subservience without moderation or calibration; a one or the other approach seldom makes sense, especially in contexts like these.

In my opinion, the most pertinent issues that seem to have conveniently been forgotten are:

  1. How this scumbaggery has been wrongly labelled a ‘riot’ or a ‘protest.
    This merely legitimises the actions of the looters and thefts and encourages them to be bolder in their impunity.
  2. How everything including the kitchen sink is wrongful fodder for blame with regard to these acts of “feral” scumbaggery.
    When in actual fact, the adage of “Those who criticise [the younger] generation forget who raised it” has never rung truer.

These articles may flesh out my arguments better:

  1. The UK riots and language: ‘rioter’, ‘protester’ or ‘scum’?
    (via Yu-Mei)

  2. Britain’s liberal intelligentsia has smashed virtually every social value.
    (via Andrew)

BTW with regard to the second article, I disagree with the portion on the “destr[uction of] the traditional nuclear family”.

I think the traditional nuclear family is ONE of the ways in which the problem of “a world where the parent is unwilling or incapable of providing the loving and disciplined framework that a child needs in order to thrive” can be resolved.

Also, I’m advocating a moderate approach to parenting/discipline – it’s okay to ‘let children be’, but at times you really have to rein them in.