More updates about the home…

I’ve recently done some counting and I realised I see my nephew and niece more than they see their parents on weekdays. Here are the numbers:

7am: wake up, prepare to go to Kong Kong’s place

8am: Arrive at Kong Kong’s place; parents leave for work

7pm: mum comes home, but wait, mum does not want to see the kids! She’s telling their maid to not tell them she’s back!

7.30pm: mum eats dinner, kids realise she’s home. mum tells them not to disturb her, she’s eating! So maid takes them away to watch tv

8pm: she’s finally free. Ready for dad to come for dinner and send them home.

8.30pm: reach home

9pm: sleep

A total of 3 hours spent looking at the parents, 2 hours spent interacting

On an odd day, where the mother is on leave (maternity leave on paper)

7am: wake up

9am: send kids over, dad does this

12pm: mum comes over for lunch and some interaction

1pm: kids go for nap nap, so does mum. mum puts them to bed, after which she goes to the guest room to sleep

3pm: kids wake up, shhh. don’t disturb mum, she’s asleep (don’t care about uncle who is also asleep)

5pm: mum wakes up, let’s go to the playground!

5.30pm: come back! mum needs to do some work now, maid takes kids away

6.30pm: dinner time, eat together. you’d think mum will feed the kids, WRONG. maid feeds them. she needs to eat and not waste time feeding them.

the rest of the evening is the same

total time 4 hours.

It seems that this may be very common in households these days… Parents producing children and having someone else take care of them while they are at work. However, note how my sister-in-law makes a conscious effort to avoid them. Taking the wonderful maternity leave (that is supposed to be used on spending time with kids) to sleep and do more work.

If that’s not enough, there’s the ever so common, church going priority. My brother and sister-in-law have this tendency to leave their children at my place while they go to church/bible study. Then there’s the “couple time” they like to have every other week, again, my place while the go off and have a nice dinner or trip (in which the children spend the whole time at my place).

argh… then there’s the “one kid is sick” issue… to quarantine their other non-sick child, the sick one is left at my place. regardless of me complaining that I don’t want to fall sick!

I know my brother lives really close to me. I also know that there are many young couples out there who seek domestic help to handle the workload. Seriously, you can get a maid, nanny, babysitter, etc. Do you really have to leave the entourage at my place??? burdening me, an undergrad, making me sick and disrupting me of my sleep/study.

I have begun to take the stance that they do not belong in this house. They can visit, but not stay here more than they have to. I am their uncle and I should be seeing less of them than their own bloody parents. From now on, everyday I see them, I’ll be reminding them of how their parents don’t care enough for them to take care of them and how I don’t give a shit about them as well. My mum says that they can’t handle the 2 kids on their own, but for some strange reason, they are having their 3rd! So I’m ignoring my mum’s comments on this.

My dad will continue to scold the shit out of them, while I continue to remind them that they are not loved by the people who brought them into this world.