Just be yourself

I cut my hair, which went several inches past my shoulder, very short. I felt I was not ready to change my hair to such a short style so suddenly, and I regretted that I asked my friend to cut it and got such short hair. However, I was okay after a few days. But somehow I looked funny when I woke up with ‘standing’ short hairs, they didn’t obey even when I pressed them down.
My friend asked me, “Your husband liked that you cut your hair short?” I replied, “He doesn’t care whether I want or don’t want to cut my hair.” I know what she means – men like ladies with long hair! For me, I don’t think I need it – to have long hair because of my husband.
Nevertheless, I would like to find out whether it is true that men like ladies with long hair, so I asked Steve, “Do you prefer me with long hair or short hair?” He said, “You look beautiful with long hair; you also look pretty with short hair.” This is a smart guy’s answer. I wasn’t very happy with it and I asked again, “Don’t men like ladies with long hair?” He said, “There are many men who like ladies with long hair, but many like ladies with short hair too.”
The answer sounds like it is not an answer. Sighs… ladies, just be yourself!

Family communication models

A conversation between a mother, who has three kids in college, and me who doesn’t have any kids:
“SY has three kids also, but her kids are so great. My kids are not that great compared with them… They don’t want to tell me their business at all.”, she said.
“If you want your kids to talk about their business with you, you should be like a friend and share your business with them.”, I said.
“My husband always doesn’t want me to tell adult’s business to the kids. He was never in contact much with his parents & family, unless there was a very serious medical issue with his mother. Then only his brother called to tell him. My father was also the same. I am closer with my mother and we can chat.”
“Normally we would transfer our communication model from our primary family to our new family, and continue to have those old models. Your kids might also transfer those models to their new family in the future. So, if you don’t want it to continue, you should start to change yourself. The family is the biggest influence on kids while they are growing. Like some growing up in a family with abuse might not be aware, and abuse their new family members in the future too.”
I grew up in a family with a serious type father and a complaining type mother. My late-father never had fun with us, and my late-mother complained about her husband (my father). We are their seven kids who grew up in this family. Of course, not all of us transfer the old models to new families. However, I realized my third brother is obviously the same as my late-father. Maybe he worked and was closest with father, so he was more influenced…
Are that many people not aware they are continuing the communication models from their primary families?

Food in the shadows

Ron, a friend/former co-worker of Joe, and another co-worker also named Ron (here I describe him as Ron 2) were in St. Louis for 2 days on business. Joe (working at the same company with Steve, and has traveled several places) wanted to meet for dinner.
The five of us met at an Indian restaurant and we started to chat after we sat down. Ron 2 is a very good story teller. He told several funny stories and made us laugh. One of them was a story about Chinese-Malaysians (I guessed maybe he got to know I am Chinese-Malaysian from Joe). He said when he was in a college in Illinois, they had quite a population of Chinese-Malaysians. During lunch time, they would go to buy their 1 buck chicken rice lunch from people in the shadows. That’s illegal as the seller was not licensed to sell food. So when they are dealing it in shady places, it's kind of like dealing drugs. Once, he was with a Chinese friend and it was lunch time, so he wanted to follow this friend for lunch. The Chinese guy led him to a place to buy chicken rice, but the seller said no when saw he was American. The Chinese guy persuaded the seller, as they were together. That’s dealing like for drugs. Haha….
US$1 exchanges to about RM3.50, and chicken rice is about RM3.50 in Malaysia. However, it is not possible to get chicken rice with US$1 (I am not sure how many years ago this story happened) in the USA, that’s why these Chinese students go get food in the shadows…

That also reminds me about our New York trip, when we were in a store at China Town. The boss saw Steve is American, he ignored our inquiry about a CD. After we went out, we guessed the store might have some illegal CDs and were afraid a Westerner would report them….