忍一时,风平浪静? Yeah right. As if.

Hi guys. When I was a kid growing up in Singapore, we had to memorize a lot of Chinese sayings for our exams, I'm sure many of you had to as well. Some of them may come across as cliches today, but such is the way the Chinese language is. You memorize the cliches and when you're good enough, you may have the liberty to make up your own wise and witty sayings. Now one of them which I was made to memorize was, "忍一时,风平浪静 - 忍一世,海过天空" (bear with it for a moment and it will be peaceful, bear with it for a life time and you will achieve great things). It is a saying often used to tell those dealing with volatile situations not to react with anger and haste, but to be patient and calm. It preaches the value of suppressing one's anger and to endure/tolerate suffering (the very essence of "忍"). 

Well, I beg to differ. 

Can we blame this on Chinese culture?

I've never been a fan of Chinese wisdom to begin with. Let me tell you a story that started way back in 1985. When my family were at the 1985 Tsukuba World Expo in Japan, my dad wanted to buy some candy and snacks for us. I was only 9 years old then and waited with my mother and sister whilst my dad was in the queue. He came back some minutes later without any food and extremely angry, claiming that the Japanese woman behind the counter had refused to serve him because he didn't speak Japanese. He didn't confront her or scold her, he just left extremely unhappy. That was a good 31 years ago and he is still hateful, angry and frustrated today and still brings that up from time to time. Another great Chinese expression comes to mind, "不甘愿" (to be unwilling to accept something). It has been 31 years after the Japanese candy incident and my dad is still 不甘愿 with the outcome. So, this begs the question: why didn't he do something about it there and then, to address the situation on the spot? My dad's reply was, "忍一时,风平浪静 - 忍一世,海过天空" - which I thought was complete bullshit. 

Did my dad gain any great insight about the power of "忍" after having failed to confront that Japanese vendor in 1985? Nope. He's just bitter, angry and twisted. There was nothing for him to have gained in choosing to walk away from that Japanese candy vendor without saying a word. He did it because he did not have the guts to confront her, scold her and make a scene there and then. The fact is he reacted the way he did and then tried to find something to justify his actions to save face - which is very typical of my dad, really. I have even pointed out to him many times that if he had scolded that Japanese woman on the spot, he may have been spared this feeling of 不甘愿 that would follow him around and make him unhappy for the rest of his life. Thus when I was faced with a similar situation in Berlin last week, I did the complete opposite of my dad and kicked up a huge fuss when I was ignored in a German fast food restaurant (follow this link for the full story). I wanted to make a scene, I wanted everyone around me to notice what was going on and hopefully start filming me on their mobile phones. I walked out of there feeling quite satisfied.

My dad is still angry about stuff that has happened over 30 years ago.

Of course, I couldn't resist comparing what happened in Berlin last week to what happened in Tsukuba in 1985. My dad of course, doesn't like my approach. He thinks I am too aggressive, that I am going to get into trouble because I am spoiling for a fight. "What if someone hits you because they are offended by what you said?" I replied, "I'm strong, bald, ugly and pretty scary looking. I'm can do martial arts. I'll like to see them try and if they're dumb enough to do so, I'll hit them back but ten times harder so they will realize what a mistake it was to have tried hitting me in the first place." To be fair, my father is quite a lot shorter than me and not as fit (he will never admit it though), when you are a lot shorter than everyone else around you, of course you're going to feel quite differently about any kind of physical confrontation/attack as such compared to say, if you feel confident in your ability to defend yourself in a physical altercation. So he probably has more of a reason to want to avoid any kind of physical confrontation than me, but again, being your typical Chinese dad, he'll never admit that as he'll "lose face". 

But one of the points that my dad has raised is this, "what do you have to gain by scolding people like that? Does putting down someone make you any better? Do you really feel that much better by insulting someone, belittling someone, bullying someone like that? Is that the kind of person you want to be?" Well, if I deal with the incident on the spot, I get it over and done with - I respond and then I draw a line and say, that's it - that's over, I have dealt with it. I then get to move on from that incident and get on with the rest of my life. I don't want to still talk about this 31 years from now, in a very 不甘愿 manner and wish I said or did something then to have dealt with the incident. Life is too short for regrets. In short, I think my father's approach is plain wrong and whilst I can try to be nice and explain why he did what he did then, it still doesn't change the fact that my father had been very unhappy about what happened in Tsukuba, in 1985 and the moment he had walked away from the situation, he had missed the opportunity to have done anything about it. He should have either done something about it on the spot by confronting that woman or choose to let it go and forget it - instead, he choose foolishly and allowed it to upset him for the last 31 years. That seems to me, to be a pretty dumb option and no amount of 忍一时,风平浪静 stupid Chinese crap can ever justify it.

Am I wrong in reacting the way I do?

As I have explained, I had survived three periods of my life when I was in an environment where bullying was endemic. In such environments, turning the other cheek was simply not an option at all: turning the other cheek meant telling others that you are a perfect target for bullies. No, the only option was to stand up to your bullies, confront them, so that you will send not just them, but everyone around as well, the vital message that they are messing with the wrong guy and you are a predator, not a prey - back off at once. So whenever I encounter a situation when someone seems to be taking advantage of me or disrespecting me, my reflex response is always to stand up to them and put them in their place. That approach has served me well so far and I do not intend to change my ways even if I may come across as quite a nasty bully at times. If some people will dislike me as a result of this, then tough, I can live with that. I'd rather piss off some people than to be bullied - it's a no brainer.

Contrast that to my father, who in sharp contrast, worked all his life as a primary school teacher in Ang Mo Kio. He has spent his entire working in the primary school environment and that's a double-edged sword. On one hand, he is in a very safe environment, where he is spared the worst of the kind of office politics bullying culture which many of us have had to contend with in our jobs. Most the time, he has to deal with children who respect his authority in the classroom and it wasn't a bad way for him to make a living. But the moment you take him out of the safe environment of the primary school and he is completely unable to deal with a situation such as the one he encountered in Japan. I think what bothers him most was not that he was ignored by that Japanese vendor, but more the fact that he was made to feel powerless and helpless in such a situation - it was embarrassing for him as a father to be unable to do a simple task like buy some candy for his children. However, what happened in Japan wasn't an isolated incident at all.

How good are you at resolving conflicts?

My parents have always had a somewhat difficult relationship with their in-laws (thankfully, we're talking about my sister's husband's parents, not my partner's mother). They have pushed the limits with my parents and have said some things which has definitely come across as at best tactless, at worst very inappropriate. What do my parents do when the in-laws say something offensive? Nothing. Well, nothing at the time: 忍一时,风平浪静 and all that stupid Chinese bullshit. Then they get home, get angry, say horrible things about the in-laws to each other and then when they meet me or Skype me, they start recounting the horrible things that the in-laws have said in the last few years (as if I can do something about it) - I have even attempted to say, "fine, let me see if I can help you resolve this - allow me to use my powers of diplomacy to speak to them and mediate" but my parents are like, "no no, let's not make things worse." I persisted, "if they are not even aware that what they have said has caused such offence, how are you ever going to stop them from saying something like that again in the near future? The onus is on you to speak up at once, without delay, the moment they say something like that. You have nothing to gain and everything to lose by keeping quiet. You have to either deal with it or let it go - instead you're allowing it to fester and eat you up from inside?  Good grief. They may have said a lot of stupid shit, but your response is not clever either."

But no. You know my parents, they never listen to me. They see me as a lost cause, a very angry boy who keeps getting into fights and arguments with everyone - my mother has even described me as a loose cannon who cannot control his temper. Perhaps there is a compromise to be struck, a middle path away from either extremes - maybe you don't need to be as volatile and angry as me, but you have nothing to gain by being a total doormat like my parents. Okay, the in-laws are tactless, I get it, they say stupid shit at times (they're not educated, it happens) - but they are not bad people at the end of the day and short of my sister getting a divorce, they're still family that we have to deal with for a long time to come. But the problem with my parents is not so much that they are stuck in their ways, the problem is that they have very low self-esteem and thus they imagine that admitting that they have used a wrong approach (and thus they need to change their tactics) would tantamount to losing face in front of their children (yeah right, as if we give a damn about this bloody stupid Chinese bullshit concept about 'face' when it comes to our own parents). So it is impossible to try to help them or give them good advice, they would rather suffer from their own ignorance than to accept our help. At this stage, I don't even blame them - they are a product of their stupid culture. I can only spit on Chinese culture, piss on Chinese culture and blame them for making my parents the way they are - it's easier to blame 'Chinese culture' and use it as a scapegoat then to hold my own parents responsible for the dumb shit they do.

Has Chinese culture become the scapegoat for me?

Now you may wonder why I am so spiteful towards Chinese culture in general - let me explain please. I had always been a difficult child when I was young with my parents, I constantly challenged their authority. If they asked me to do something, I would always ask "why?" rather than just silently obey them as most Chinese kids do. Now given that my parents were not very educated, they would often struggle to explain why and they were not very good at explaining things to me, especially anything pertaining to one's morals and complex issues involving trying to figure out rights & wrongs. So instead of trying to use their own logic to try to explain things to me, they always default to passing everything off as 'Chinese culture' and "we do things this way because we're Chinese". It came across as quite lazy and often the answers were not satisfactory. Going back to the 忍一时,风平浪静 example, it clearly hasn't served my dad well at all - instead, it has prevented him from dealing with problems when they occur and saddling him with an angry heart full of regret and grudges. It may seem so clear to you and why where he is going wrong, but he has a blind spot when it comes to his own faults because he has his blind faith in Chinese cultural values and beliefs.

So that's it from me on this issue. I do believe it is not a case of 忍一时,风平浪静 (bear with it for a moment and all will be peaceful) rather it is more like 忍一时,  久久不甘愿 (bear with it for a moment and you'll be left feeling very dissatisfied for a long time). What do you make of this then, how would you have reacted in such a situation? Do you believe in the principle of 忍一时,风平浪静 or it is just bullshit? Please leave me a comment. Many thanks for reading.