Start of the Healing

 

The year is coming to an end and so, I thought I would try and write about a few reflections. At the time of writing, things on the geopolitical stage look pretty awful. America has just put back its most erratic an incompetent president into power. The genocide in the Middle East looks set to intensify and there seems to be no end in sight for the war in Ukraine. The world, it seems is turning to s***.

Still, life has carried on and as always, I manage to find an optimistic side to things. For the first time in 13-years, I am single again. My 13-year marriage to Huong, that determined and focused Vietnamese girl, ended in March of this year. We’re still friendly and I’m glad to announce that she’s since remarried and seems settled in the USA. Ironically, she’s found happiness in Washington State, the place where my stepfather Lee and his family live.

When I told Kiddo that I had officially ended things with her Mum, she asked if I’d still be her dad. The answer remains yes but she’s now an adult and this experiment with parenthood goes into a different phase of letting your kid find her own way and respecting it no matter how much you may disagree with the choices she makes.

Sold our home in July. There’s nothing like seeing the physical emptying of the house you once shared for the message that “It’s Over” to really sink in.

 

 

I do miss her. She remains by far and away the best looking and most focused of the women to touch my life. I got to see the “real” Vietnam, thanks to visits to her Home Town and more importantly, she brought Kiddo into my life.

The pain of divorce was cushioned by the fact that I had fallen for someone else quite deeply – as in the, I’ll my body in harms way for you type of love. It was kind of unexpected but it happened and I’m glad it did. It was like I gave her a portion of my life force and whenever I was around her, I felt that the world was mine to conquer.

Unfortunately, things are not meant to be. In a rare moment of vulnerability, she revealed that I am a cause of pain to her and since my presence in her life is painful for her, I shall remain outside and away from her existence.

I am, as the Americans say “Playing the field.” The main person in my life is a nice girl, who seems to want to make life better. She admits that she realizes she’s “not my type” and given that my mother has described “my type” as “sh****” it’s probably a good thing and I could get used to being around someone who is genuinely, in the words of my youngest brother “shockingly normal.”

So, amidst all these developments in my personal life, I work on pampering myself a little. Exercise remains a fact of life and occasionally I get my head shaved by a professional and on the odd occasion, there’s afacial treatment to get my 50-year-old self looking presentable.

 

 The family I was born into, remains a source of strength. Mum organized a family trip in Malaysia for the event. It was good to see the family. We’re all growing older we remain as close as ever.

 

 

 

Professionally, I remain in the insolvency trade. Never saw myself in anything resembling legal or accounting but I remain here, celebrating a decade with the same employer. I have gone from the guy who couldn’t hold down a job to a guy who has been in the same job in the same place for a decade. I enjoy the fact that I remain “unqualified” in an industry where everyone is obsessed with paper qualifications.

I have no idea what the next year will bring. I’ve heard from two sources that the fortune tellers tell me that I shall soon be approaching the decade where I make my fortune. I can’t verify any of this but I will do my best to be as decent a person as I can be, even if the world goes to the dogs.

The White Lions

 https://www.sunway.city/kualalumpur/the-white-lion-kingdom/

I had a late night with the Loveable Pillow, who took me to see “Mufasa the Lion King,” in a luxury Cinema in Johor Bharu last night. The story of Mufasa is the prequel to Disney’s “Lion King” and tells the story on Mufasa, the father of the proverbial Lion King.

While Disney may not have intended it, the release of the movie in Asia close to Christmas proved to be highly significant. Let’s face it we are celebrating the birth of someone who became the first real champion of Outcast or “God from the Gutter.” Read the gospels and you’ll notice that Jesus is constantly having a go at the established characters like the scribes and the pharisees and speaking up for the outcast like the whores and tax collectors.

The story of Mufasa has a similar theme. The central character, Mufasa gets lost from his parents and ends up getting adopted by another pride. The theme of “outsiders” becomes very prominent from this moment. The King Obasi, the leader of the pride he adopted into, has rules against outsiders, stating that dilutes the background and so on and so on. However, his Queen, Eshee, speaks up for Mufasa who is finally adopted into the pride but on condition that he hangs out with the females, which is a “snub,” a sort of we’ll let you stay but you do the s*** work. King Obasi tells his son, Taka to follow his lead and exude power – which is to sleep.

Then, there’s the moment of truth, when Queen Eshee is attacked by the villainous White Lions, who are bigger and meaner than the average lion (in the movie – bears not biological evidence), her own flesh and blood son hides and trembles whilst his mother is attacked. It is Mufasa, the cub she adopted who fights with her, effectively rescuing her. It is Mufasa who has the skills and the brains to know that the White Lions are coming for the pride.

So, how is it such that the “stray” functions so much better than the heir? Well, it starts out with the fact that he was sent to be with the females. It’s supposed to be a “snub,” a way of saying he should be grateful that they’re letting him live provided he does all the “s***” or in this case “female” work. However, in a Lion Pride, it’s the females who do the hunting. They are the ones who bring home the food. So, whilst their work is deemed “lowly,” they’re doing something essential for the survival of the pride. Mufasa learns to hunt from his adopted mother and he learns the necessary skills for survival. So, by the time Mufasa and Taka are told to flee the pride, its Mufasa who takes the lead because he’s the one who’s had to go out and do things. Taka, who later becomes Scar, snivels away and expects things to happen for him, because, well, he was destined to be a prince who exudes power by sleeping.

Think about how many times we’ve snubbed someone because of their job but had problems the moment they stopped doing their job. Think of Communist societies where the top guy is known as the “General Secretary.” Ironically, this job was considered unimportant, which is why Stalin first got the job. It was Lenin’s way of trying to push him into obscurity. However, whilst everyone was looked elsewhere, it was the General Secretary who was appointing his people to every lever of power in the party and government.

The other characters are also “outcast” so to speak. Rafiki, the “wise mandril” is an exile from his tribe because they think he brings them bad luck, even though he actually gets it right when he predicts danger.

So, the lesson is clear, the things you consider “virtues” may not necessarily be so. Taka has “blood” relations with this family but flees at the first sign of trouble. Mufasa the stray, fights with the pride that adopted him.

Then, there’s the lesson of never snubbing people based on their profession. Mufasa sent to hunt with the females, is the one with the skills needed to survive. When push comes to shove, he’s the one with the ability to get thing done.

Ironically there’s a flip side to this in the shape of the villainous White Lions, who are cruel and incidentally more powerful than the average lion. It turns out that the white lion pride is not an organic pride but a collection of exiles from prides who exiled them for looking different. Being rejected by the ones supposed to be on their side gives them a sense of vengeance.

Think about the calls for mass deportation from Western countries and bans on Muslims. Yet the truth is rather different. First generation migrants are funnily enough the ones who are the most loyal citizens. They’re grateful to be far away from wherever they came from originally. The problem is not the migrants but the second generation. Think of the guys who bombed London on 7 July 2005. They were people born and bred in the UK.

The lesson here is very clear. Welcoming people and treating them with dignity works. Alienating people who look different gives them a reason to want to harm you.

Mufasa should be made compulsory viewing for kids in elite schools. The messaging on leadership is clear and people born into privilege need to get the message as early as possible that they need to understand that warmth and kindness are not weaknesses but the essence of good leadership.

The Art of Kissing Up

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Bananas, Apples and Coconuts

 

My mother takes a certain sense of pride in the fact that all her children are “Bananas.” We are “Yellow on the outside but white on the inside.”

I never really liked this phrase as I grew up. As I grew up in WASP country (White Anglo-Saxon Protestant) country, I went to great pains to show that I was not one of them. I only maintained a smattering of Cantonese dialect because it was the one thing that made me different from all my school friends. I actually dreamt that I would be able to be in a position where I would only wear a “Mandarin Collar” in public.

Although growing up a “WOG” (Western Oriental Gentleman) has given me a lot of advantages (speaking with the right accent helps when you have to deal with British or American immigration), I’ve always felt and still feel that there’s something lacking in me. I never wanted to be part of the clubs of colonial masters. I wanted to be the rickshaw boy who was secretly a member of the Boxer Rebellion. I wanted to be small Oriental guy in black pajamas who sent the GI’s packing. Up till this day, I maintain the position that the only good colonial is six feet under and the only thing better than a colonial master six foot under, is the act of putting him there yourself.

Whilst I sign my name as “Li Tang,” rather than my birthname of “Tang Li” (Deng Li if you use Pinyin), I only do so because I was living in a society where I was “Li Tang,” a fact that it took me a while to accept. I remember my mum telling me it was better to be flexible than to constantly correct people over my name. I’ve been told that the “Colonial Legacy” has gifted me what I do for a living, to which I’m still curious as to why that should make me grateful for that legacy.

Having said that, I’ve now reached the age that although I may have wanted to be the “stereotype” Chinaman, my mother is right. While I am Chinese and my name is Tang Li, there’s actually very little else that’s Chinese about me. I grew up speaking English. It was the language of the home, school and now work place. To compound that, the only other language where I am vaguely literate in, is German. My American and German families are White and some of my best mates are WASP (OK, a lot of Welsh too).

The only thing that disqualifies me from being a “Banana” is the fact that the people I’ve had most affinity with, have inevitably been from South Asia or Arabia. I can pick up a few words of Hindi here and there from watching Bollywood but the only Hokkien I’ve picked up in over twenty-years of living in Singapore are the curse words. I am very comfortable in Hindi music lounges and greeting “Namaste” or “Salaam.”

I recount all of these emotions growing up as an Oriental kid in the West because there is a lot of talk about “Best of both worlds, mixing East and West” and so on. Ironically, it was my “White” friends in the UK, who encouraged me to maintain what little Chinese language skills I had because it was my advantage – both “Eastern” and “Western.”

Well, I get the logic. I look Chinese and speak English like a native. However, at this point of Middle Age, I think talk about being both “East and West,” is more wishful thinking. One is either Eastern or Western. I have to be honest here, I moved back to Singapore because I believed that the action would be in Asia-Pacific rather than in the West. Statistically, I am right. However, culturally, I would have to make a lot of psychological adjustments to operate outside of the Westernised bases of Singapore and Hong Kong (though Kiddo tells me I should learn Vietnamese and spend my final years there).

Incidentally, everything I’ve said here doesn’t make me particularly unique. I’m not the only “Banana” around nor is the Oriental Community the only one with fruit. In the USA, the “Native Americans” have “Apples,” (Red on the outside and white on the inside). The UK recently made history by having its first “Coconut” (Brown on the outside but white on the inside) Prime Minister.

So, like all sorts of fruit around the world, I have certain hang ups about straddling the world of my complexion and the world of my cultural make up. However, its not an impossible task. In fact, its an essential task.

I spent my birthday at the “Cheong Tze Fatt – Blue Mansion,” in Penang Malaysia. The original Mr. Cheong was a giant in this part of the world He was born in China and made his fortune trading commodities, amongst other things in this part of the world. When he died in Batavia and they transported his body back to China via Singapore, Penang and Hong Kong, the Dutch and British Authorities saw to it that flags were flown at half-mast.

 

 How did someone who was known as the “Last Mandarin” and actually served the Imperial Government gain so much respect from the Western Colonial Authorities?

Whilst Mr. Cheong was inevitably as Chinese as you can get (admittedly the rest of us don’t think of the Hakka as such), he was able to straddle and operate in both worlds. He never swayed from his cultural roots (The man had more than one wife, which was perfectly acceptable back then), he saw the good things about the Western world.

Mr. Cheong did a lot of social work and kept a lot of Chinese people employed. Hence, he alleviated suffering, which could easily have been turned on the colonial administrators. He employed the best of Western technologies too. His house is an example of that. It’s built to the best of Fung Shui Principles but at the same time, used metal work from the UK.

 

 So, yes, for fruit like me, you’re inevitably going to feel more than Easter or Western. However, the world is such that you’re going to need to be able to operate in as many worlds as possible. To do that, you need to recognize the best that both worlds offer and use them to your advantage. Don’t be linguistically chauvinistic. Whenever I hear ABC’s tell you “I’m an American,” when you speak an Oriental language, I’m inevitably inclined to ask “Are you too stupid to speak something other than English?” Reality is, knowing Mandarin or anything else is going to be a necessary skill. Yes, emotionally, we might feel a certain way but as fruit, we should never be afraid to operate in as many worlds as we can.  

Still Trying to Figure Out What I want to do When I Grow Up

 I’m turning 50 in two days. Mum has got her side of the family down and we’re off to Penang to celebrate me hitting this milestone. Since I will be 50, I thought I would try and say a few things about turning 50.

This is an interesting enough milestone. On one hand, I’m no longer young but I don’t believe I’m exactly old (a point that Kiddo reminds me of whenever I try to tell her she should look after her “old dad.”).

While 50 is not exactly “Old” in the normal sense of the word, your awareness of aging becomes very acute. A lot of what I’ve been doing, particularly in the area of physical fitness, is governed by the fact that I am aware that I will be “old” soon enough.

The human body has a way of making you know that its had enough. At 20, you go out and get smashed and then head to work the next day. Maybe you can get away with it at 30, but by the time you reach 40, the body starts letting you know that it would rather you don’t abuse it. Then, when you reach 50, you become very aware that if you don’t look after the body and things like late night drinking continue, the likelihood of being weak, old, sick and broke

 

Sure, there are plenty of things that you can still do at 50 (just asked Mike Tyson, he went eight full rounds), but your choices in your 50s will determine how your 60s, 70s and 80s will turn out.

So, I’m now fitter than I’ve been in a long time. I do things like exercise in my late forties when I never exercised at all in my 20s and 30s (lifting pint glasses in not resistance training) because I’m terrified of being a cripple in my 60s. Any compliments about my physical presences are nice but not the main motivator.

On the flip side, you also become aware that while you may have this “value” called “experience,” your working life in corporate or the civil service is pretty much over. Nobody likes old fogies and as far as corporate Singapore (or just about anywhere else), being a fogy starts at 45.

So, what do you do when you get older and realise that your resources are strapped and the chances of waiting for another paycheck become slimmer with each passing day? Ironically, the answer is – “get creative.” Sure, nobody wants an old fart hanging around the office cooler. However, as one of my Karang Gunni men says “You still have your wits about you and the friendships that you’ve built up through the years.”

I’m lucky in as much as I’m still working. However, I’ve got to use this chance to network and focus on what my actual value to anything is. I’ve lived a better part of my working life, excited by the fact that I’ve never been a “prisoner” of a profession but at the same time, I remain fairly unfocused on what my innate magic is. Unlike Colonel Harland Sanders, I don’t have a secret recipe and need to search for one.

So, now that I’m in this limbo of too old for certain things but too young for others, I need to focus on doing things that I can do. Old age isn’t far away and getting creative is the only way to do something about it.

This is to say that I can’t have fun. Now that Kiddo is officially an adult, I’m slowly but surely being freed of certain responsibilities. No longer married, so I’m doing certain silly things that I didn’t get to do when I was.

 

I’m told that I need to “chill” as I get older. However, I actually enjoy getting emotionally involved in things, now that the need to put up a façade is declining. I don’t think that age should stop one from feeling alive and caring about things.

This milestone that I’m going to cross in two days is very scary. Everyone around me is growing up or old. I’m getting older and am not “ready” for it. Yet, at the same time, it feels very liberating. Perhaps its time to live properly.

In-Laws and Out-Laws

 

I’m a twice divorced man and I’m probably one of the few people who made his family happier at the point of divorce than at the point of marriage on both occasions. For the amateur psychologist amongst those reading this, you could say that my parents are guilty for my inability to stay married as both them are now on their third marriages. Both parents, have on occasion let slip that they have a sense of guilt for my f***ups in life in as both assume that I’m somehow psychologically damaged from the split.

The truth is somewhat different. Yes, I am a little damaged but not in the way people would imagine a child of divorced parents would be. For the most part, I’m actually very blessed that my parents had multiple marriages. Both my sister and I are very proud of our “patchwork” family. The multiple stepsiblings, step nephews and step nieces have given me a wonderfully large family of loving and diverse people. Sure, I’ve only really lived in the UK and Singapore, but extended family have made the USA and Germany home too. The highlight of my sister’s wedding last year, was the fact that the patchwork showed up.

In a way, the central character is my Mum who saw to it that she remained on good terms with her former in laws on both occasions. Two days ago, she dropped into town and made it a point of seeing my eldest paternal aunt. However, credit also goes to the grandmothers on both sides (both grandfathers passed on early). I remember my maternal grandmother telling ex-wife with a certain amount of pride that “Tang Li’s grandma is a nice lady. Just because our children are not together anymore, it doesn’t mean we have to stop being friends.” Old age meant that the two old ladies saw less of each other towards the end but when my maternal grandma died, my paternal eldest aunt came down to pay respects.

 

 The example of my parents was that marriage was not the end but the creation of something new. Whatever issues my parents may have had with their former spouses, they kept away from me and it reached a stage where we had the weirdest and most wonderful family gatherings. Stepdad number one has spent Christmas in Germany with Mum and Stepdad number two. Mum and Stepdad number two have spent Christmas in Singapore with Dad and Stepmum number one.

Where my parents’ divorce did damage was it conditioned me to understand that endings were not endings but the start of something else. This was what I grew up with. Marriage is not the be all and end all and divorce was never the end of the world.

Then I got married. I’ve made no secret of the fact that the marriage was not the happiest moment of my life. If you minus the sex, there was nothing really keeping us together. The Old Rogue used to say “She wants a fire place and you want to be out there.”

OK, part of the reason was legal. Under Singapore law, you need to be married for three years before divorce proceedings can be initiated (roughly how long you need to be in an HDB flat before you sell it). The other part was the fact that her family treated me very well. Father-in-law gave me one of my most generous Ang-Pao’s ever and mother-in-law always saw to it that I ate well whenever I was over there.

The in-laws were great and I didn’t want to lose them as family. However, when it became clear that I would need to take an extraordinary legal measure, they proceeded to cut all ties and suddenly I was not only no longer part of the family, I simply ceased to exist in their eyes.

In hindsight, it was a good thing. Both of us have soon moved on and my experiences of being with her actually made the front page of the Today Newspaper (though I wrote under the pseudonym) to protect the identity of my in-laws.

It was at that point that I understood that whilst relationships can evolve (friends to lovers or lovers to friends etc), there are certain relationships that need to vanish from your life. If both parties are to move forward. My first marriage was a clear example of this. We were simply bad news for each other.

Sure, things may have been different if we had something to hold us together like a kid. However, while we may have lasted longer, I’m not sure we could have been “healthy” for any kids to be raised by us. The total ending of the relationship was the only way either of us could have moved on.

I credit my parents for being the living example of showing me how relationships could evolve and how all parties could grow stronger. However, I also need to credit my first wife for showing me that there are some relationships that simply need to vanish.

Safely Being You

 On Wednesday (13 November), I had the good fortune of being invited to a talk on managing “neurodiversity.” The talk was oragnised by The Fund Finance Association and was given by Ms. Kavita Chandradhas of Undivided Consulting.

 

 This was a timely talk in as much as the concept of “diversity” has come under challenge. Thanks to the first election of Donald Trump in 2016 and his subsequent return, people in all sorts of places have become very open and very vocal about only wanting to be in places with people who look, talk and pray like them. Hence, people are now happily asking “what’s wrong with being a racist, sexist, religious chauvinist etc?”

Suddenly “diversity” and encouraging diversity is seen as “woke” and therefore not something not to be encouraged. As America and many Western societies face incidents of social unrest between very different groups, the parts of East Asia that have experienced high economic growth, have been celebrating their “conformity” as the reason for their prosperity and social unity.

However, whilst people might be finding joy in wanting to conform, the reality is that the world, specifically work places are becoming more diverse. Businesses simply cannot afford to turn away customers because they’re “not like” the business owners nor, despite what they might like to think, turn away staff who are “not like” the owners.

Much has been said about managing racial, cultural and sexual diversity. However, very little is often said about “neurodiversity.” So, what exactly is “neurodiversity.” Well, based on the talk, neurodiversity is about one’s brain chemistry – which is often the thing that dictates our way of thinking and personality.

 

 

 

If you look at the slide that was presented, you will notice that neurodiversity does include things like AHD, which many do consider a “mental” condition, something that many HR professionals tend to shy away from.

What makes it particularly poignant is that the topic of managing “neurodiversity” doesn’t seem to have a defined set of rules – more “art than science.” The importance of “empathy was emphasized but there were no “right or wrong” answers.

For corporations this seems like a pointless task. Efficiency particularly in the age of “mass production” has been about “standardization.” Everything until recently has been about “processing” and getting people to do the work has been about getting people who can fit into the system. People who don’t “fit into” a system get thrown out.

Whilst that might have been true in the industrial age, it’s becoming less true in the post-industrial age, where an individual’s innate genius for something can be the difference between success and failure.

So, organisations need to move away from mass model HR practices and to figure out how make the most of everyone’s strengths.

Let’s start with the obvious. Forcing people to fit into an environment where they have to be something else is counterproductive. People will eventually tire of wearing the “mask” and “burn-out.” Just look at the “LGBTQ” example. This is a community that is considered “fringe” and even with the growing acceptance of LGBTQ within the main stream, many have been forced to “mask” their “real” nature to fit into the mainstream. The results are often psychologically damaging on the members of the LGBTQ community and by extension their loved ones.

Then, there’s the fact that certain people who may not “fit it” can have “genius” in many aspects that are needed to make a task successful. One only needs to watch Amadeus to understand that many of the great artist, musicians, writers, scientist and innovators were “misfits” and “odd balls.” Their genius went unnoticed and they were discarded by the mainstream. Allowing genius to be recognized was perfectly OK when economies were driven by mass production. In the post-industrial age where innovation and creativity are vital for survival, organisations and societies cannot afford to waste genius. They need to manage it.

I take the example of a former colleague, whose people skills were so bad that I once publicly told her I would do her physical damage if she spoke to me. Her dealings with colleagues, subordinates and clients were cringeworthy.

Yet, despite that, she could plough through the paper work. She was like an investigation machine. Leave her in a room with a load of files and she’d make sense of them within hours.

If I had to do it again, I would still see to it that she got hired and well compensated for her talents. Wouldn’t allow her near people but I’d happily put her on a diet of documents and get another person who had people skills to do the people aspect of the job.

Does it require effort and “cost” to tailor work environments? The answer is undoubtedly so but the outputs that would come from every individual would be more than worth it.