from PostSecret

For more interesting reading on giftedness, see A Very Modern Epidemic: Gifted Children at WSJ.com’s The Juggle. And for a peek into what being gifted is like in Singapore, check out Of Kids, Education and Everything Else Under the Sun by Monica Lim. I especially liked Monica’s post, How to tell if your child is intellectually gifted in which she says:

Being gifted and being “smart” is not the same thing.

People have often argued that the GEP (gifted education program) is discriminatory because there are late bloomers who do pretty well later on in life. I think this arises because there is a confusion between being gifted and being smart. It’s probably safe to say that all gifted children are smart, but not all smart children are gifted. Research shows that in general, about 1% of each cohort is intellectually gifted.

Elegance is important to you. You rather stay with the past than love a new trend.
When in public, you look good and say the right things. Only your close friends and family know the real you.

Dear Singapore I wish I had peace.

What tremendous insight into his soul.

Oh puhleeease.

For more on what kids are “learning” through play, check out Lilian’s post at Wrong Side of Thirty.

Me: ## Street Name, SINGAPORE #######

Customer Service: And is that still in the United Kingdom?

Me: @#! No, that’s in Singapore. Republic of Singapore.

Also visit me at: Eye on DNA - How’s it going to change your life?

• Don’t label your children. They’re changing all the time. So instead of saying “you are such and such,” say “you can be such and such” so that you don’t limit their perception of themselves.
• Don’t spank or hit.
• Don’t yell or scream.
• Don’t give general praise like “good girl.” Give specific praise like “That’s a complicated 3″ silver robot you drew with the Faber Castell pens I got you at the stationery store 16 days ago.”
• Don’t tell them what to do or boss them around. Engage them in choosing the right way to behave or to accomplish something.

I break almost every one of those @#! rules every day. (Notice I said almost.)

So now I’m reading about Barack Obama’s childhood in his book, Dreams from My Father, and guess what? He had a far from perfect childhood with far from perfect parents. His white mother married his black African father at a time of rampant racism. His father then leaves him and his mother to return to Africa when Obama was only two years old. Then his mother marries an Indonesian and they move from his grandparents’ home in Hawaii to Indonesia where Obama runs around with the neighborhood kids in a squalid environment where people cut the heads off chickens and lets them run around in circles dripping blood from their necks until they drop dead. Obama later returns to live in Hawaii with his grandparents without his mother who is too busy with her own life to bother herself much about him.

With this kind of parenting you’d think Obama would have grown up to be a serial killer instead of the first African-American presidential nominee of a major U.S. political party. And he’s neither bitter nor filled with resentment towards his parents.

Clearly I won’t be like Obama’s parents but I should probably quit reading parenting books and driving myself crazy with guilt.

Shouldn’t it be the opposite?

After all, foreigners have a perspective that combines their global experiences. In my case, I’ve lived in Taiwan, the United States, Japan, Vietnam, the United Kingdom, and now Singapore over the past 35+ years. Given what I’ve learned from all these places, my thoughts and opinions on what I encounter here in Singapore are unique.

I’m not saying that my opinions are so important that everyone should stop, listen, and take action. What I am saying is that my views on Singapore life aren’t any less relevant than a “fellow Singaporean.” What defines a Singaporean anyway? There are plenty of naturalized Singaporean citizens here who may or may not qualify as Singaporean in the eyes of those who were born and raised here. Popular Singapore blog, Mr. Wang Says So, proposes that “the hallmarks of a Singaporean are suffering and struggle.” My American six-year-old declared himself a Singaporean after living here just five short weeks. He rooted for the Singaporeans in the Olympics rather than the Americans!

No matter my nationality or ethnicity, I have the right to say what I think about life here on this small island. I’ve sung Singapore’s praises for many years and am grateful to have the chance to live here. But, just as there have been everywhere I’ve lived, there are irritating and weird people walking the streets (when they’d be better off staying at home) and I like telling you all about it here on my own personal blog.

Foreigner or not - I’m interested in your opinion.

…laws mandating the use of hands-free phones are little help: the increased risk of injury is attributable to the cognitive impairment from the phone conversation, which distracts in ways that a conversation with a seatmate does not, and was just as high for those using hands-free sets as for those with hand-held ones.

~Caution - Driver May Be Surfing the Web, NYTimes, August 24, 2008