I had supper after work with three 20-somethings yesterday.
Well I happen to be their boss but since it was after office hours, we morphed into friends. Well, sort of, because they still persist in calling me
Sir. But that's more of their
Asian Way of keeping a little respectful distance from the person who writes your appraisal report. Even if it sounds wierd using such formality when you're bitching about someone else's body odour or some strange sexual shenanigans going on in the inner bowels of the workplace (yes it happens even in the stuffy Civil Service!). A little idiotic really.
But I digress.
Talking to them made me feel strangely guilty and uneasy. Because in the course of our daily grind, I have moulded them to think and talk in my image. So much so that precious individuality has somewhat been eroded and they now take on little duplicates of my persona that they have perfected to almost uncanny, life-like similarity. Whilst listening to the 2 young men, it suddenly dawned upon me that, hey, isn't that something I would have said exactly the same way 10 years ago when I was a 23 year-old faced with a reticent subordinate? The young lady, however, has taken on a huge dollop of my cynicism. When barely 6 months ago, her cup was always half full, it is now perpetually half empty, ending every other sentence with a
but on the other hand...So it takes an informal setting such as this one, a conversation whilst sipping Sugar Cane juice and slurping on
Char Kway Teow, when for once there is no talk of Key Performance Indicators or quotes from relevant sections of the Law, to make me realize that these are not my clones. It is evident when the talk turns from business-trot to rot.
They do have intelligent, alternative opinions that they don't neccessarily have the ammo to back up for now. But will, soon enough, as they built up life's experiences. They can define the dimensions of the box, before even trying to think out of the box, and can differentiate between boxes and cartons. So what if its a basket? It takes more practice but I think each is becoming more adept at sketching the mental bigger picture before taking care of the details.
All this gleaned from a conversation about Body Odor =))
Perhaps the
Stinky One should always be allowed to walk amongst us. As a reminder that, as it is an individual's right to not bathe for days, it is also an individual's right to think.
And think differently.
Labels: Musings