'Daughters are like spilt water'

I read with interest today's Straits Times' special on the social issue of gender imbalance in the Hainan province of China. The traditional preference for boys over girls has led to a troubling sex ratio of 136 boys to 100 girls within the group of offshore islands. Straits Times reported the rise of 'bachelor villages', with many young men unable to find a match.



The traditional preference for boys stemmed from many practical issues. Many of the Hainan dwellers are farmers/ fishermen. Such trade is considered unsuitable for women. Boys are also required to carry on the family line and to care for the parents in old age. When daughters grow up and get married, they are thought to 'belong' to the other family and their duty is to care for their in-laws in old age.



The China one-child policy complicates matters further as if couples can only have 1 child, they would want a baby boy. While scans for baby sex and sex-selective abortions have been made illegal, there are ways around these restrictions.



The Chinese government is going through great efforts to change people's attitudes about having baby girls. Financial incentives like one-time payments, school fee waivers and free medical treatment for female new-borns have been implemented. Still, time is needed if people's mindsets are to change.



I know a friend of Hainan descent in modern day Singapore. She comes from a family of 2 daughters while her uncles had at least 1 boy in their families. Some of her relatives subscribe to such sexism and naturally express favouritism towards the families with boys. While its pretty funny to laugh at some of the things that happened before, there is inevitably some bitterness enmeshed in those memories. Its sad how such prejudices can be so deeply in-grained. Of course her encounters are nothing compared to it being a life-and death situation for female foetuses in certain societies.



On a happier note, the article also highlights the kindness of a middle-aged couple in Hainan who adopted 14 abandoned girls even though they had 5 children of their own, 2 of which are boys. The family is not well-off at all, but the couple made sure that their adopted girls were well-fed and have access to education.



Humans have played with nature in too many ways already. To play with the gender balance in the human population might be something that can back-fire pretty badly.

KuSu... Tortoise Land

I went to Kusu Island with my family today :). Kusu Island is off the southern shores of Singapore. It is really small. One could walk around the island in about 30 minutes. It does not have the vibrance of Sentosa (another Singapore off shore island, and a favourite haunt for tourists). It has no crazy theme parks, fancy restaurants, or ornate museums. It only has a tortoise sanctuary that is home to 1000s of terrapins, tortoises and turtles, a chinese temple and a mosque.

Kusu Island is also known as the 'turtle' island. The island was in a shape of a turtle before land reclamation took place. Legend has it that a giant turtle turned into the island to save 2 ship wrecked sailors. One sailor was chinese, and the other muslim. Thus a chinese temple and a mosque was erected on the island to thank the turtle who sacrificed itself for them.

My parents, my sister and I had a really good time just lazing about on the island. Peace and tranquility are 2 things Kusu Island offers, that Sentosa can never. We had a really nice picnic lunch with sushi, sandwiches, breadstick with guacamole. The weather was just right, though it was switching between slight drizzles and sunshine. We had a choice of hot coffee or iced juice depending on how warm or cool we were feeling :). Sister brought some funny picnic 'tents' which could be folded up. we unfortunately took a very long time to figure out how to fold and twist them in the right way when packing them away.

I performed my usual ritual of feeding the turtles in the turtle sanctuary :>

Let's talk about tea and coffee

I've been many times to the local coffee shop with my mother since I came back to Singapore last Tuesday. Everytime I take a sip of the iced yuanyang (coffee and tea with condensed milk), I never fail to think about how different people in England drink their tea and coffee. Even more with sweet reminiscence, I recall the time at a SOUL residential when my young friend accidentally put coffee and tea in one cup and was feeling silly about having done so. I was telling her that that's one of my favourite drinks back home.

My friends in england usually drink tea or coffee with fresh milk and/ or sugar. It is not usual that condensed milk or evaporated milk is used. No body ever mixes tea and coffee together.

In Singapore coffeeshops, Kopi (coffee) or Teh (tea) if drunk with milk, would be with evaporated milk or condensed milk. I'm not really sure how this drinking style came about. Singapore coffee shops were opened by Hainamnese immigrants from Singapore's olden days (Hainan Kopi?). Wikipedia describes this type of 'milk tea' as originating from Hong Kong and spread its seeds to many Asian countries. In Malaysia and Singapore there is also the popular Teh Tarik (pulled tea) in which the milk to is made frothy by pouring it from one cup held high up to another cup and from that cup back to the first in the same way, several times.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hong_Kong-style_milk_tea
(has links to yuanyang and teh tarik)

Milk tea is so popular it is also sold in cans. My friend once told me how he bought lotsa of milk tea of a particular brand when he was in China. He was returning to Singapore with them, but the airport immigration authorities barred him from bringing on the plane a few cans of milk tea. This was post-september 11 I think. and he had to ask all his friends to finish them up before getting on the plane.

I thought it was quite funny that the wikipedia website talked about how westerners do not hold 'milk tea' in much esteem. It has been thought to originate from Holland but does not seem to be something that has captured the imagination of western tourists. Travel guide books apparently fail to mention milk tea when informing people on what is good to eat in HongKong.

I actually only knew about Yuanyang from a friend not more than 4 years ago. I never knew tea and coffee put together could taste so good. :p An even more recent discovery was ginger milk tea at the indian drinks stall. :p Its amazing how even up to this age (I'm not that old I know, but I reckon I should know my own country quite well by now) I never knew of such a drink. I thought it was like the chinese ginger tea in which ginger is boiled with water and a little bit of sugar is added to taste (brewed ginger is supposed to be good for wind and stuff). I did not know it was a variation of milk tea too.

Its humbling to know that there's so much to learn from something as simple as tea/coffee.