Being In China Brings Out The Tiger Parent In Me

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I am a Chinese mother. But in my Singaporean family, I was raised with western ideals of “individualism” and “freedom of speech”. When I watched “Gilmore Girls” for the first time (I have since absorbed the series in its entirety at least five times), I idealized that mother-child-as-best-friends-first relationship and believed that I would be that way with my own offspring.

But that was not to be.

I don’t know how and I don’t know when, but as my child started to walk and talk, my inherent parenting style came out much closer to the Helicopter and Tiger mom than to the “super cool best friend mom”. I would demand my child finish his chores (Water plants, make the bed, fold laundry, take out the trash, ) before he was allowed screen time. I would raise my voice and put him in timeout if he misbehaved, even (or especially) in public. When the holidays rolled around, I made him do pages of BrainQuest every day to make sure he wasn’t “slipping back” and just “wasting time”.

Since coming to Beijing, I realised that these Tiger Mom tendencies may have been fanned into an inferno as the multitudinous parenting and school WeChat groups put more pressure on ensuring my child gets the most out of his fleeting youth and international school opportunities. The other day when the list of Enrichment Activities (EA) were released, one parent in the school WeChat group announced at 7am that morning, “The list of EAs are out, quickly register! The early bird gets the worm!” I found myself panicking and scrolling through the list and selecting 1 to 3 activities on various days that I knew were open to my kid, and I was about to sign him up (they said quickly!) when I stepped back and thought,

Wait a second, how do I know he even wants to sign up for these?

It wasn’t as if the EAs were free either! One “Creative Barbie Fashion” EA cost RMB 1280 for the semester, and that was next to the cheapest EA available. So what exactly was the “worm” that the early bird was supposed to get? I’m still not sure. But as it turns out, my kid was completely uninterested in any of the EAs, much to my chagrin. I tried to cajole and I tried to reason – my most compelling argument being that of the “10,000 hours to master” theory that claims you need to spend 10,000 hours practicing something before you become a master at it, so the earlier you start, the earlier you become a master. But my child remained unconvinced.

He was already in a bit of a conundrum with first grade. While he did enjoy school, he would undoubtedly choose to spend the day at home just being with mom and dad, and playing with toys. So many times now, he would tell me it wasn’t fair that he had to go to school for 5 days and only get 2 days for the weekend. To which I would say, “You’re right. It isn’t fair. So if you want to change it, go to school, graduate, and then start your own school and make it better!”

Isn’t that why we care and do so much for our kids – so they can have it better than we did? Not to say there was anything wrong with the way I grew up, but the world moves faster and differently now, and so we evolve to meet the new challenges. In this way, my parenting has to continually evolve as well. I’m not a Tiger Mom, nor do I believe I should be, but I certainly see merits in discipline and structure for the kid. I’m not about to stop making sure he stays productive and learns something every day, but I’m steering clear of after-school activities that seek to fill his day to the max.

I’m just going to be a pussycat parent, for now.

Images: Pexels

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