Thursday, 11 October 2007

• The Little Emperor (and the eyes of society)

  I had intended to put up more pictures of my recent trip to Saigon, but I think I shall skip that for the time being and talk about something else- something still very much practised within the Chinese and most Asian communities.

  The Emperor of China refers to any sovereign of Imperial China reigning since the founding of the Qin Dynasty in 221 BC until the fall of the Qing Dynasty in 1912. When referred to as the "Son of Heaven", the Emperor was recognized as the ruler of "All under heaven" (i.e., the world). In practice, not every Emperor was the holder of the highest power of his land, though this was largely the case.

  The title of "emperor" was hereditary, traditionally passed on from father to son in each dynasty. There are also instances where the throne is passed onto a younger brother, should the deceased Emperor have no male offspring. By convention in most dynasties, the eldest son born to the Empress succeeded the throne. In some cases when the empress did not bear any children, she adopted a son as her own (all children of the emperor were said to also be the children of the empress, regardless of birth mother). In some dynasties the succession of the empress' eldest son was disputed, and because many emperors had large numbers of progeny, often led to wars of succession between rival sons. In attempts to resolve disputes after death, the emperor often designated a Crown Prince in early times. Even such a clear designation, however, caused problems within the imperial family involving jealousy and distrust, whether it was the crown prince plotting against the emperor, or brothers plotting against each other, and did not actually ensure a peaceful succession. Some emperors, like the Yongzheng Emperor, after abolishing the position of Crown Prince, placed the succession papers in a sealed box, only to be opened and announced after his death.

  There is this little town where I used to live in. I still live there, but I don't go back to that place that often anymore now that I've moved to another place for reasons I have yet to find out.

  Little town

  A little town usually consists of people that look almost like that...

  

  Just like in most little towns, you usually have families that regard themselves very highly in the eyes of society...

                           The crème de la crème of high society

  You also have various other types of townspeople such as these...

     

  And most families that are like that...

  

  Or like that...

   

  Oh, and let's not forget the animals too...

  

  In this little town that I come from, there's this one family that regards itself very highly in the eyes of society. The head of the house is a doctor. And then there's the missus, who is the doctor's wife, and also three kids who have been programmed since infancy to score straight As in every major school exam.

  The first two girls in the family secured scholarships to study medicine in other countries. The youngest in the family, whom I shall call "Little Emperor", was also very successful in school and got straight As in every major school exam- 'cos he had been programmed since infancy to do all that, you see.

  And so, Little Emperor was sent to another beautiful country to pursue his studies in medicine as well. I mean, the dad's a doctor, so it's natural for the Little Emperor to end up as a doctor as well, right?

  Anyway, everyone in town expected Little Emperor to come back and take over the daddy's business empire- one stretch of shophouses converted into a clinic.

  One day, Little Emperor comes back for a holiday and drops the most frightening piece of news that a father and mother could ever hear...

  Mummy, daddy... I know you love me and I know you've sacrificed much for me to have a good future. But I don't think I want to do medicine. I've always been interested in fine arts, and, and... I can't go on studying medicine anymore... I hope you can understand what I'm going through- I mean, I just can't do this anymore... I'm sorry...

  When I heard that story, my face could only go like this:   

  In this little town where this one family regards itself very highly in the eyes of society, the lady of this house is known for her style, à la Victoria Beckham, and sternness, à la the Empress Dowager Cixi.    

  Victoria Beckham

  The Empress Dowager Cixi

  To have the parents of Little Emperor hear such a shocking confession is akin to having a man suddenly finding out on his wedding night that his beautiful bride is actually not female. 

  There can be only a few reactions that I can think of coming from Little Emperor's mother...

  1.

  2.

  3.  

  And the reactions from both parents...

   

  Poor Little Emperor.

  In the eyes of society, status is of utmost importance. But we can't please everyone because in the eyes of society, we have more than one pair of eyes looking at us, and each pair of eyes would have different ways of perceiving us.

  Each pair of eyes are also linked to different types of brains. Some have big brains, and some- not so big brains.

   Dexter, the boy genius

  Homer Simpson's brain

  For a cute story about "pleasing the crowd", click here.

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