LIVING IN THE SIXTIES

I turned 62 today … YES, sudah ENAM PULUH DUA … born in the 60s and living in my 60s.

A tiger 🐯 of 1962 and lived for a good 62 years … boy, that is a long journey ... so far so good ...👍

First, let me say that I have not been actively writing for a while now. Used to write an article every month or two but my last article was almost a year ago. No excuse … just plain lazy … hehehe ... 😝

OK, so I am 62 today … what is it like to be 62?

Well, I am ALIVE !!!` … now that is a good sign, isn’t it?

Depends ... "staying alive" and "living a live" are two totally different things.

And things can happen in a snap ... I have seen too many people, some quite close to me, who seems to be healthily up and about, suddenly just drop and gone ... yes, one too many really.

But having said that, I am glad for now, I am alive and living a life even though it is at a later part of my life.

At this age, things slowed down quite a lot … physically especially. Like many old uncles, I tried to show people that I can still move a bit … so go trek in the forest, weekly badminton games, cycling around in the neighborhood and some other physical activities but I know it is not like before … the stamina, the strength, the mobility and the flexibility are not performing so well.

Albeit the slowing down … I still try to stay active physically and also keep a mentally active mode. Try lah … balance it for as long as I can.

Balance … now, you hear a lot of people talking about life balance or a balanced life … so, what is balance?

You worked so hard in your younger days and now you enjoy all you can for the rest of your life? You made so much and you must spend so much? Or, you worked so hard and you party as hard too?

Well, that is not wrong ya … everyone has their own ideas of what is a balanced life.

But, for me “balance” encompassed a lot more things … quite a broad range of things … at least in my life.

OK, what is balance to me?

Food … not diet (I come to diet later) … whatever you consume, the extra calories must be burnt ... the extra calories means fat and this fat MUST go. But many don’t really take this seriously. We all enjoy our food but we must also be aware of the fat that we are accumulating and the extra fat (visible and hidden) collected is not good. It is not that we should not eat the food we like … eat as much as you can but the EXTRA calories must be shed with proper exercises or physical activities.

Drinking … now, old uncles like me likes to have a bit of alcohol every now and then. Be it beers, wines, whiskies, tuak or Moutai … very often we sit down with friends and have a glass or two in casual and social gatherings. As usual, sometimes we tend to over-indulged, well more often than not actually. So, how do we balance situation like this? For me, the balance here is measured against your tolerances, your threshold, your awareness and most important of all, it is measured by the limitations of the law (especially if you are driving). Drink responsibly.

Social media … we are exposed to a host of social media platforms … FB, Instagram, Tiktok, Twitter (or X as it is now known) and other similar platforms. We spend long hours with our eyes glued on our phone or pad or computer, scrolling every day … so much so that it has become unhealthily damaging. So how do we balance this in our everyday lives?

We must stop it? Don’t kid yourself … we can’t live without these social media nowadays. But yes, we can balance it … how? My formula is simple … the amount of time we spend looking at the phone or computer … we spend the same (if not more) looking at trees, leaves, ponds, lakes, clouds and the sky. Yes, it is that simple.

Diet … how to balance your diet? Look, you don’t have to say that you must not eat this or you must not eat that unless it is on doctor’s orders. We can eat whatever we like … just that we must be aware that certain health problems can arise when we have too much of something … for example sugar.

So, just consume moderately of certain things … just be aware that if you have too much meat yesterday, maybe today you take less meat or if you have a sweet cake in the morning maybe you cut down the dessert after dinner. You have too much carbo during lunch, maybe take a bit more fiber at dinner. You must be aware of what you are consuming, then you can adjust your intake of carbo or fiber or sugar or fats accordingly.

Activities … what is a balanced daily life? … especially for retired people. Move, be mobile and be active. Do things or find things to do. If you go morning walk for two hours every morning … what about for the rest of the day? If you are lazy and just want to sit and watch TV or play games on laptop or your phone … you are not living a life, you are just damaging it or rotting it away.

Do things … in the garden or maybe in the kitchen. Sing, read or write. Make something … paint, draw or photograph. Maybe line-dancing or taichi or qigong. Stay on your feet and keep moving.

Core and structure … are you standing properly? Can you bend, squat or simply turn without pain? How about your posture? Strengthen your core, your structure … go to the gym. Not to build yourself like Arnold Schwarzenegger (you can’t anyway) but you can do some pulls and stretches, pushes and bends to strengthen your core and structure. Go search on youtube … there are plenty of ways to do just that. If you like, you can do it at the comfort of your home too. If your core and structure is strong … you walk better, you move better … you live better.

Mental … are you learning? Learning is the best way to keep our minds active. Whether we are learning about new things that are happening in the world or we are just learning simple things like a new recipe or a new game, it keeps our mind working. Yes as we grow older we spend more time reminiscing good memories and the good old times but we must not look at the rear view mirror too often. Our minds, our thinking must keep moving forward accepting new things, new ways, new discoveries and new ideas.

Relationship … when people grow older, there are those who like to keep to themselves and adapt an “I call you, you don’t call me” attitude. Well, I cannot say that it is wrong. But I think we need to be mixing and corresponding with people … we need to maintain a balanced engaging relationship between family, relatives, friends, neighbors or ex-colleagues via gatherings, visits, invites … have games group and attend social meetings or at least have dialogs through video calls, messages or chats regularly.

OK, that’s all I could think of for now … maybe you have more to add to your life.

So, you see living in the sixties (I mean living in your sixties, not living in the 1960s ya) is not so boring actually … not like what people said … “when you retired, you are staying at home waiting to die”. Of course, maybe the activities are not as happening as your younger days but the important thing is, living in your sixties can be very enjoyable at a slightly slower pace.

Very often you hear people say …“live and enjoy your life” …  yes, but to live your life and enjoy your life when you are in your sixties (or even older) … you must be in a good and fairly healthy lifestyle.

To be in a good and fairly healthy lifestyle … you must have a balanced life.

 

THIS IS WHAT I CALLED A CAMEL !!!

THIS IS MY CAMEL !!!

What? Eh, excuse me, typo error? Auto correct? Are you on some hallucinating substance?

NOPE … you read it correctly … C. A. M. E. L.

What ? Really ? Halo ???

Ok, Ok ... wait ya … I will explain ... please bear with me for a while.

Look, people make statements about themselves or their achievements … some very motivated ones will say …”the sky is the limit”. Some daring ones will say … “fear nothing but fear itself” and those who like to challenge big things in their lives will say … “if your dreams don’t scare you, they aren’t big enough”.

These are the very common statements (or quotes) we hear every day … they are words that people used to show their successes or express their achievements.

Some people might not have that kind of big successes … so maybe their statements are a lot more down to earth … a good example will be what my late father said … even though he died penniless but nevertheless he considered himself successful and said … “I don’t owe anyone anything”.

I turned 61 several days ago … from where I started and being what I am now … I can say I am successful in a humble and simple way … hence I said … “I am at my best in my simplest form”.

Some people may not express their themselves in actual words but maybe from their lifestyle you can see what they are trying to say … like a rich businessman driving a luxury Mercedes … he may be trying to tell people … “I have arrived”. A hotshot female lawyer in a sports convertible … very likely she wants to tell people … “what I drives says a lot about me”.

So, you can see where I getting to … about statements that people make.

Now, here is the gist of my story … recently a guy (I met from a social gathering) was talking about his new (very expensive) luxury car … from what he disclosed, the car is worth 5 times my son’s degree … plus some cash to spare … I think you can figure out how much the price is. And that is just one of his 6 cars as I was told.

Anyway … it is a statement he made that rubbed me a bit. While he was telling a few of us about his new acquisition, he said … “THIS IS WHAT I CALLED A CAR !!!”

Yes, those were the exact words … you can more or less guess the tone and manner and the way he stressed the words.

Well, like I said … people make statements … some motivating, some daring, some interesting and some are just simple words but this one … just arrogant !

OK, if that is what a car is … then what the fuck am I driving all this while ?

What I am driving has 4 wheels (plus a spare one in the booth), has a steering (senget a bit due to the misalignment of the wheels), has a 5-speed auto transmission (including a gostan gear), has 4 doors (back left cannot open, lock broken), has brakes (on all 4 wheels and come with sound effects), has a roof (duct taped to prevent rain water dripping in), has two wipers (from shopee), has an engine 1.6L (with fuel injection some more), has an exhaust pipe (at good times it breaths white smoke, at other times it is black and loud), has a radio (with AM & FM channels), has a speedometer (always stay at zero) … plus a pair headlights (fogged a bit), 3 brake lights (plastic covers faded to almost pink rather than red), 2 reverse lights (one without cover), 4 signal lights (all sides working … left, right, front and back) and last but not least, it has a working hand brake (that pull up to almost 90 degrees to the floor board).

Now, let me ask … aren’t these the characteristics of a car ??? Well, maybe to some arrogant fellas … it is not worthy enough to be called a car.

OK, no problem … it is a camel then.

Hmmmm, I think we have more camels on the road than the whole of Sahara.

What do I leave for my children?

In many conversations with close family members, relatives and among friends … there were numerous times that people asked me … eh, what do you want to leave for your children?

I think this is a very common question … especially for Asians and particularly for the Chinese.

Traditionally, Chinese are very concerned about what they can leave for their children. I can say that a lot of hard working Chinese parents would like to make sure that their children would not have to work so hard like they did … so, if they can, they will want to leave a fortune for their children.

In the younger days … we were told 孩子多努力一点, 父母就会好一点 (haizi duo nuli yidian, fumu jiu hui hao yidian) ... and that was on my mind when I was old enough to work.

Like me, many worked hard to help ease the financial burdens of our parents … help put food on the table, roof over the head and make sure that the needs of our younger siblings are taken care of.

But today it is more like 父母多留一点, 孩子就会好一点 (fumu duoliu yidian, haizi jiu hui hao yidian) … really, I believe many parents (though they may not admit it) do feel that it will be better for their children if they can leave some wealth for their children.

Now back to the question … how about me and what do I want to leave for my children?

OK, let me put it like this … I don’t have a lot … for now I still have some properties, some savings and small investments. By law, whatever I still have left (IF there is anything left) when I leave this world … they will go to my children.

NEVER have I ever thought of what I am going to leave for my children. I give them what they need to help them as they grow, as they progress and as they move into their own independent world.

It has NEVER crossed my mind what I am going to leave for my children.

The question that is ALWAYS on my mind is … what children will I leave for this society and this world? That, is what I am really concerned about.

There is a Chinese saying that goes like this :-

不要问你会留下什么给你的孩子 … 问你会留下什么孩子给这个社会和这个世界

Translation : Ask not what you will leave for your children ... ask what children you will leave for society and the world.