From Blackberries to Strawberries
For years, I have been entrenched in a corporate role, accompanied with the corporate culture, privileges and subsequently, the corporate wormhole as I call it. It has only been recently, that I made a fateful decision to step out and build my own business. In the months to come, I have realized that it has also rebuilt my perspective on life and such.
How so?
Let me backtrack a bit, perhaps all the way to my childhood. Growing up as a young boy in Singapore (this was like the mid-70s), where life as a soon-to-be teenager meant being exposed to the onset of Western popular culture on this Asian state of an island. Simultaneously, we were brought up in an Asian context where family ethics form the foundation of our society. In other words, we obeyed everything and anything, from rules to patriarchs and matriarchs.
Education was laid out for us like a pre-determined road map. This not only applied to myself, but my peers as well. We were taught to have a university degree, without which our lives would fail and that a life of hardship would inevitably follow. With such intimidation so ingrained in our young and fertile minds, it was no surprise all those around me dutifully complied.
And so did I, for a while. That was until puberty, and the onset of the female fascination, which quite frankly, put a somewhat distraction on yours truly. But more than that, was the access to popular Western culture. Movies, music, computers, computer gaming - all of these began to infiltrate our minds, my mind.
Before long, I began to develop and harbor ambitions and dreams of, in sequence, a writer, a movie star, a director, a music composer, a rock star. But then, this was Singapore in the 70s we are talking about. Having a career in any of those prior mentioned roles was nigh impossible. And even if there was a glimmer of a chance, chances were I would not profit much from it.
Continued on the next page
Follow Technorati