changes

It is interesting to notice the sudden change of one's perception, attitude, interest or likes & dislikes.

For food, usually the change happens when I tasted a very nice dish of that food. For example, tofu and fishball were far from the list of my favorite food. Actually these were food I didn't like. Until I had the grilled tofu in 加藤壽司 and the fishball soup in 新樂園. Now when mom makes tofu soup, I'll enjoy the tofu pieces. And when I'm tired and hungry, fishball soup is often the first food I will think of.

Crab is a special one. The change happened when I was in Sydney. Friends around me often say that I'm good at distinguishing nice and bad food. On one birthday, a group of friend treated me a big gourmet seafood dinner at the best Chinese restaurant in China Town. They specially ordered a mud crab dish. Be honetst, at that time I didn't like crab at all. But they thought that I must love prawns & crabs; and to students, it was an expensive dish. Not wanting to disappoint them, I pretended that I was so happy to have crab. But from that night, I started to love crab as it marks the moment I realized the love and friendship of these friends that I didn't expect.

Well, as "Man shall not live by bread alone.", such kind of sudden change does not happen to food alone too. The growing interest in international affair is a change that I'm aware of recently. Thanks to the Holyland trip again. Recently the care for Israel and Kenya has been slowly speading out to other places in the world. Being a supposedly mature adult in her 30's, actually I should have better common sense in political issues. There are a lot to catch up.

Saying "NO" to influence from childhood is another area of change I have just started and want to work harder on. The"good kid" label often implies trading off chances of exploring the self and one's own interests since the instructions and rules imposed by parents or guardians become the only way one would follow. For example, when a child cries but got neglected or even punished, that child might grew up being unable to express his/ her emotion in a healthy way as expressing, especially negative, emotions was something disapproved by the figures he/ she looked up to. One can of course blame those who have contributed to the hurt and continue to feel bitter and grief forever. But being an independant adult, one can choose to change and break such influence, especially if one is aware of the cause already.

I believe every individual got some kind of "chain from childhood", if I can so call it, as none of our parents or guadians were perfect. Let's get up and break the chains. Let's grow up and enjoy life more fully :)