Friday, September 3, 2010

A special "Kad Raya"

A few weeks ago I saw my youngest daughter making a greeting card for his Malay classmate, Farreeze. (there're 2 Malay boys in her class and she's close to Farreeze who sits next to her)
Some time ago I met Farreez's mother during the "report card" day. She told me her son has interest in Chinese language and therefore she puts him in a Chinese school. I feel that she is very open-minded and courageous because both she & her husband are Malays and can't understand a single Chinese word. I can't imagine myself sending my kids to a Tamil or Japanese school!
Kids are so pure & sincere. Tian Zi wrote "...Hope your Chinese gets better."

Farreeze gets along very well with his classmates, I'm sure he can pick up the language fast. Furthermore, he's a very smart & cheerful boy who's good in sports too.

Aww... so sweet... it reminds me of Yasmin Ahmad's movies, ha! ha!

Before I go on vacation next week, I would like to wish all my Muslim friends "Selamat Hari Raya Aidil Fitri"

4 comments:

Unknown said...

..children are colorblind..and your daughter is sweet..selamat hari raya..

citiding said...

See, we are all 1Malaysia!
It's those irresponsible politicians who spoil everything.

YuinTing said...

Dear Pakmat, please excuse me for extracting the following from your blog before gaining your permission to do so. What you wrote (in Oct 2009) is so true and I learn a lot from it. It serves as a constant reminder to me to teach my children to appreciate the beauty of diversity.

TITLE: I'M RACIST
"I have become more racist these days..and I cannot help being so..5o years onwards from our first general elections..independence and the end of the emergency, the only tune our political masters kept on singing is about the double 'r', race and religion.. old coots like me had been reconditioned to be a little bit racist..my children and, without doubt, my grandchildren, too..

..yes, we have become a dynamic nation..our economic growth is the envy of neighbours..we have our submarines and even dared talk about nuclear energy..

..but along the way, we have lost a lot of things..mostly the ability to laugh at ourselves..we became kiasued in our compartmentalized lives tinged with racism..we dare not laugh at our little differences..afraid that it might hurt misplaced sensitivities..for, indeed, we have become hyper sensitive..to the colour of our skin, and the nature of our customs..we dare not even dare called Tanjong Keling, Tanjong Keling..afraid that it might hurt others sensitivities..shall we now renamed Masjid India, Masjid Malaysia?

..time was I can called an apek, an apek..and he will shouted back, 'hey, melayu' as a rejoinder.. and we thought nothing about it...we cannot make fun anymore of our idiosyncrasies and differences..

..somewhere along the way, we blundered..big time..and I dread thinking the legacy we are leaving our children and grandchildren..they have to make their way out of this mess themselves.. somehow... they have to crawl out of those thick shells that we have cocooned ourselves in..

YuinTing said...

Mr citiding, you're right! Those who want to gain political milage mess it up & disturb the harmony of this beautiful country. Fortunately, all of us have friends of different race, and we know there's a world of difference between observing someone's race, and being racist. With those irresponsible politicians around, parents' role become even more challenging :-(