…in my books, 11 years old girls are just too young to own a handphone…even if you have enough duit raya to buy one yourself…wait till you’re 21 ok…public phone got what?????…
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Nina, my dear Facebook Friend, put up a status that got me thinking today.
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My initial response was: “I told my Monchies, until they have a steady job to pay the monthly bill, they have no rights to ‘luxury’.”
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And then I got thinking, that as parents we always try to compensate for the very thing we cannot give our kids. Time. We buy them cellphones, for instance, with the excuse that in emergency situations they can call us easily. Or even in non-emergency situations, it enables us to communicate with our kids worry-free.
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But in any situation, do we really communicate with our children? Do we listen to them? The phone enables us to hear them, yes. But can they really talk to us, heart to heart, on the phone and off the phone? Do we take time to communicate with them?
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Also, as parents, every time we buy our kids something ‘big’, we justify the purchase with, “Oh when I was your age, my parents could not afford this. But now at YOUR age, I can. So I get it. So you get it.”
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But then again, I got thinking…what would our kids say to their kids? And the thought scared me as I realized that luxury can do a lot of damage to character building. How are we going to teach them to be humble when they are so used to having everything? And not just everything, but everything NICE.
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As cliche as it may sound, “If it is too easy, it never lasts.” my mother was right. And so I am sticking to my principle that, unless you earn it, you don’t deserve it.
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And that is also MY reason for not believing in this Duit Raya custom. I apologize if it offends those who take it as a charity. But I see it as a way of teaching our children to have unrealistic expectations. We do not give money for nothing, nor do we get money for ‘free’. Being a good person is not something that you get paid for. Well, not in this life anyway.
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Me Monchies have been asking why they are given money on Hari Raya. Other than saying that it is the culture of and custom for Hari Raya, I do tell them that it is a ‘donation’. Kitreena is happy to receive Duit Raya, but she has been asking, “Mom, I am not an orphan and I am not poor. But why do I get donation?” So I told her, that people just feel like ‘giving’. And like usual, she always has the last why.
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Anyway, the way I raise my Monchies, I want them to see that money is earned. That’s the reality for us adults, and that’s the way reality should be for children. Otherwise, I should expect Duit Raya from my family, friends, foes, and those Dunkin Donuts‘ cashiers at Ikano.
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