3 stories

STORY 1

Today I got my car to be serviced. It was a major service as this is the 3rd 20,000km.

This service centre is located at Kawasan Perindustrian Bkt Serdang
Equipped with the basic facility and a car wash service beside it.
The car wash area is a mere car park sized facility,
"outsourced" to an Indian man in fourties, who brought along his 10 years old son.
They will clean the car entirely after the cars had been serviced.

I was greeted by a young guy (who i knew later to be the tauke's son) ,in his early twenties
He explained the service politely and listen to my problem attentively,
Soon we agreed with the job scope, everything seems to be satisfactory,

Suddenly the Indian car-wash man approaches the young guy,
Car-wash man :"Sana ada satu kereta hitam tak tau siapa punya, nak cuci tak?"
"Apa !!!"The young man yelled at the Indian who is standing 3 feet infront of him
The Car wash man repeated again.
Then the office clerk came out and said that black car is their customer's car who wanted to het his car washed.

Upon hearing that statement,
"Bongok, tak tau tanya orang tu ke? Bodoh betul!!" The young man scolded harshly
The Car wash man looked around, and our eyes met.
He felt shameful, i can feet it, and i switch my glance away.

Then, he and his son walked back to the car and started their chores
He is looking down.
He is an elderly to the young man scolded like a child

I knew this is the common scenario,
from the spontanous words that came out from the mouth of the young man
The tauke(father) and Tau-ke-soh (mother) were in the workshop.
maybe they already got too used to it.

STORY 2

Last week,

One of my "mother-status" friend told me her son was punished in the school
The son threw paper clusters at the teacher when the teacher is writing on the board.
The teacher knew it was his doing and caned him few times on his hands, NOT palm

The mother, heart-broken
went to the school the next day,
demanding for explanations,

She assumed that caning was only allowed on palm,
after the child had been clearly explained of the wrongdoing.
The teacher got irritated and suggested the mother to transfer her son.
The mother was agigated and with her forceful manegerial ton,
The teacher finally broke into tears.

Only than the mother let it off.
I knew the teacher's feeling.
She was very helpless,
headmaster, and school's administration usually will not defend the teacher.
Moreover, the teacher was hinted to apologize.
They were scared of the news to get on the papers.
When that happens, the state education department will investigate the case.

I agreed that the teacher is being unprofessional,
Not rational and hot tempered probably the consequence of 50 students packed in the class.
Caning is suitable only for minor offence such as bad result or late pass-up.
Deliberately opposing the teacher is definitely a major offence.
It is an humiliation to a teacher who is teaching whole-heartedly in class.

If this were to happened 30 years ago, where chinese community used to respect the teacher like their father,
The child who did this will be severely punished in school, probably public canning.
When the child reached home, the father will give him the 2nd round slaps and whipping,
for tarnishing their family's fame or "lose face",

Now not only he was spared from that,
He knew his mother was going after the case, forcing the teacher involved into tears.
Although the mother told me,
She scolded her son for the wrongdoing,
she believes her son will not repeat the mistake again.
Chinese proverb sounds 上梁不正下梁歪
Even the mother had been disrespectful to the teacher,
What more can you expect from the child?

STORY 3

Last month,
My 14 years old nephew, scolded his Kakak from Sumatera.
He was back from school,
blowing up temper when he saw his room was tidied up
"I cakap jangan sentuh bilik saya, awak bodoh mcm babi!"
The Indon- maid understood that,
She just continue mincing the onion in the kitchen
Every members of the family including the child, scolded the maid everyday.
It's too common for her.
The interesting part is,
the commotion took place in the living room,
where the mother was watching TV,
while the father was reading newspaper.
Apparently they heard the arguement,
but they kept silence.

In the 3 true stories above,
the child seems to be kurang-ajar
They scolded the elderly Indian car-wash man,
They threw trash at teachers,
They roared at the maid who tidied up their room,

Nevertheless,
Not only they parents are showing no effort
Their parents even supported their wrongdoing passively,
by keeping themselves silence,
by reprimanding the teacher involved,

FINE ! FINE!
The parents had deprived the learning opportunity of the kids,
They will get away from it,
but
the son and daughter will have to pay a very high price,
for the lessons that they should have learned.