Dear Rockstar,
Enjoy your childhood. Googling “children growing up too fast” gets you about 9 million hits. It took awhile for Mummy to write to you about this, because she never really figured out how to put it. Mummy’s pretty scared.
Mummy spent a decade of her life sheltered among derivatives. They did exactly what they were supposed to do. Mummy had full control.
Put this option in, the investment product will pay that amount, if the market moves this way. Don’t believe the market will move this way? Then sell away the benefit from the market moving this way (you don’t believe it’s going to anyway), and use the cash magnify your return in the direction you do expect the market to move.
Mummy seems to have arrived at the party late, to find parenting is umm, not like that. Sex. Internet. Tweeting. Very, very diverse personalities. You now have the power to royally screw up at your fingertips – just hit the “send” on your twitter without thinking.
You’re going to grow up in an environment Mummy’s struggling to figure how to raise you in. She doesn’t want to restrict you unnecessarily. But she also believes you shouldn’t be exposed to Stuff you have yet to learn to deal with. She doesn’t find it easy to figure out when to do what. (But praying is always good).
1) One of your earlier playmates before they relocated to Singapore, was the daughter of one of Mummy’s friends H. H wanted a child for many years, yet when Mummy was newly, unexpectedly pregnant, H was so unreservedly happy for her. Mummy prayed for H nearly every night since, while she was pregnant with you, that H be similarly blessed with a child.
She was – a perfect little girl was put up for adoption within about 6 weeks of her completed application, sometime around your due date.
(Quite unheard of in Hong Kong where people plan pregnancies very carefully, though it’s still quite common in China – your parents’ Pastor Brett adopted 2 China children, to join their family of 2 other adopted Caucasian children. When he travels with the kids Hongkie taxi drivers start at the different-colored children calling him Daddy and ask him if he has 2 wives.)
Mummy always remembers the joy her friend experiences every day with her little girl N, but will also mention just this once – N’s biological parents were both 12 years old when she was conceived.
(Mummy has yet to wrap her head around what N’s tweenaged biological mother went through emotionally and physically to have the baby she then put up for adoption, focusing instead on the love and care she is showered with and the joy she has brought to Mummy’s dear friend.)
2) The other day when Pok Fu Lam Playtown was particularly crowded, Mummy watched 3 older children playing while you were engrossed in parking your favorite orange and green car. Given their size (and the fact they were white), she would guess they could not have been older than 7 or 8. (In fact, there’s a good chance they were younger, because your mother often errs on the side of thinking white kids are older.)
As Mummy watched, the two boys, under the pretense of playing, pulled the girl aside and touched her repeatedly between her legs. Mummy watched, speechless and unbelieving, as the boys’ helper arrived on the scene and hauled the boys off the little girl, barking and herding them away. One boy caught my eye, and looked guilty and defensive. The poor girl just looked embarassed throughout.
3) Mummy also has a rather disturbed ex-colleague whose 7 year old pops her hip à la Britney Spears and asks “Daddy, do ya think I’m sexy?”
(His response is “K, that is not appropriate behavior.”)
Where in the world did kids learn to behave that way, so Mummy can forbid you to tour there til you’re like, 30.
As you get older, let Mummy also tell you about the Evils of Webcams.
1) Bloomberg posted an article several days ago of two 18 year olds being charged for filming a third 18 year old’s homosexual activities and callously inviting “anyone with iChat” to watch the repeat telecast. (Yes, they offered a repeat show.)
When, in their quest to grow up fast, did kids miss out on learning to be people?
In the striving to keep track of test scores on excel spreadsheets and update daily parent-teacher diaries, have parents forgotten what a Real Education should entail? More likely, they can’t get to Real Education for their own workload and parent-teacher diaries.
2) Here’s one closer to home, reported in the South China Morning Post late last year. A 16 year old student at Australian International School in Hong Kong (which can charge up to >HKD 100,000 in annual school fees) was arrested in Kowloon for threatening to post nude pictures of his ex (also a student there) unless she paid him. She had stripped off for him on webcam, unaware he was taping her.
Upon interviewing AIS students, they then also discovered 16 year olds selling muscle-building steroids – not to mention watching the nude Youtube video of their classmate on their cellphones on campus before getting suspended for it.
Why the hell are 16 year olds taking freaking body-building steroids?? WHERE did they get the brainwave? And erm, who’s their supplier?
Mummy considers these crimes of privilege. You don’t have webcam and steroids problems among kids who don’t own webcams or get the kind of tv/ magazines that teach them to use freaking steroids. And if you think Mummy is harsh, bear in mind she has friends who want to send their kids to some mouldy old English boarding school where cellphones are not allowed.
Kids might pride themselves on growing up fast, but well, grownups don’t get to behave like children without consequence
When a toddler swipes a toy, it’s k-ind of still acceptable (albeit you often remind Mummy it’s irritating) toddler behavior. Little children are still learning right from wrong. Grownups however, get locked up for stealing. By the time you’re grown, you’re supposed to have figured out there are some things you don’t get to do without consequence.
You are absolutely hungry to grow up. It’s how Mummy gets you to feed yourself, sit in grownup chairs, refuse strollers, behave yourself in restaurants (“Rockstar, if we cannot have grownup conversations with you around, we will have to have them without you around.”)
Play with grownup toys, expect to be treated like one (grownup, not toy) – not so much fun when it comes down to jailtime. (You probably don’t get Mister Maker in there.) You might not be old enough to realize the full consequence of your actions, at which point someone will jump in to educate you fast if Mummy drops the ball on that one, because of the potential victims and damage that can be inflicted.
So, you get your toys when you know how to use your toys (responsibly). Throw your ball at someone, lose your ball. Go for those long morning bike rides you love so much if you don’t let them mess up your lunch or nap time. (So you and Mummy have agreed on an equitable solution – to ride your bike for longer, you eat your lunch and settle for your pre-school nap faster. Doesn’t always work, but we’re both figuring things out along the way.)
Don’t do the crime, if you don’t want the time. If someone did something to you, Mummy would want their punishment to be cruel and unusual. She figures other Mummies would feel the same way about you. She hasn’t decided which end of the stick is scarier.
Love, Mummy
Ps: Mummy admits she would have been even more terrified if you, her first born, her first shot in parenting, were a girl. Be glad you’re a boy – your father has decided if you were a girl you would never be let out of the house.
(But yeah, Mummy knows, everyone says you look like a girl :P)
