Warning - Long post ahead.
These few days of gathering with my brothers, made me think back a lot of things from the old time.
My grandparent is rich. They have quite a lot of land and property. However, they sold off quite of them to pay for my dad studies and business. My dad business never succeed because of his attitude. He is a terrible boss and never go to the field to monitor the business progress. In the end, he still ends up working for people.
With RM1800 per month, he needs to feed my mom, and 3 of us. We never have enough every month. We know the feeling of being poor. We don't get to join Uniform Club in school because each uniform cost more than RM100. We sometimes can't buy books to be used in school because we don't have money. When teacher asked where is your book, we can only answer, we haven't buy because don't have money. Feeling sympathy to us, sometimes the teacher will just give us the book for free.
We also never had a car at home. We rarely sit in car when we were a kid. We owe money to some mini markets because we don't have enough to pay them. We only have 1 motorcycle until I was in form 3. Situation forced my dad to buy another motorcycle so my elder brother who had the motor license can fetch my younger bro and me to school. It's actually a way to cut cost so my dad don't need to pay for our school bus fee anymore.
Situation got worse when my dad retired and my mom passed away. I was in Methodist Pilley Institute then. My elder brother stops studying and starts working so the house can have some income. I try not to stay at home because no one is cleaning it until I started my new life in KL.
First 2 years in KL is not easy. With RM1800 earning per month as a starting pay, I am struggling to live a normal life. There are a few months I need to borrow RM50 or RM100 from my elder brother just to have my meal. At that state, I cant even send money back to my dad.
While my bad situation in KL, my elder brother is not having a too much of good life too. He is struggling to make the ends meet. My dad who is not providing to the family anymore, need to be taken care by my brother. In the end, my elder brother quitted his job to take care of my dad.
My younger brother who started his new job, faced financial stress. He started his job with good pay but got stressed by dad to provide some money to family. Yeah, it's normal to send money back to parents at home but considering how much we earn and we are not stabling down yet, sometimes, it's really stressful to provide too much.
That is all what happened at the past few years. We are all born poor. But we don't want to die poor too. That's why my brothers and I are working so hard to earn more. Being cheapskate is what we always do to cut cost. But cheapskate is one thing, we also look at efficiency. For example, we went to Jogoya Starhill on last Friday. Driving there is definitely cheap. However, the stress on the road, the parking, petrol, time taken, totaling all of that together, plus Starhill is in Bukit Bintang area, we decided to just take Uber. It's more efficient and not really much more expensive than driving too.
Born poor is not our mistake.... but dying poor is not a mistake too. Some people don't even had a chance to become rich. Or even a chance to live a normal life. Sometimes life needs a bit of luck.
I heard of a story before, a real one, there is a girl who is good in her studies and thought she will live a good life when she graduates by getting a good job. Her parent owned some land, a house and a few big fishing boat. One unfortunate event happened where the girl's mom fell down. She got taken to hospital and need to be hospitalized for around 5 months. Her parent sold off everything because they need the money to pay to hospital. House, fishing boat and land too. She ends up has no enough money to finish her study. Miserable life.
These few days of gathering with my brothers, made me think back a lot of things from the old time.
My grandparent is rich. They have quite a lot of land and property. However, they sold off quite of them to pay for my dad studies and business. My dad business never succeed because of his attitude. He is a terrible boss and never go to the field to monitor the business progress. In the end, he still ends up working for people.
With RM1800 per month, he needs to feed my mom, and 3 of us. We never have enough every month. We know the feeling of being poor. We don't get to join Uniform Club in school because each uniform cost more than RM100. We sometimes can't buy books to be used in school because we don't have money. When teacher asked where is your book, we can only answer, we haven't buy because don't have money. Feeling sympathy to us, sometimes the teacher will just give us the book for free.
We also never had a car at home. We rarely sit in car when we were a kid. We owe money to some mini markets because we don't have enough to pay them. We only have 1 motorcycle until I was in form 3. Situation forced my dad to buy another motorcycle so my elder brother who had the motor license can fetch my younger bro and me to school. It's actually a way to cut cost so my dad don't need to pay for our school bus fee anymore.
Situation got worse when my dad retired and my mom passed away. I was in Methodist Pilley Institute then. My elder brother stops studying and starts working so the house can have some income. I try not to stay at home because no one is cleaning it until I started my new life in KL.
First 2 years in KL is not easy. With RM1800 earning per month as a starting pay, I am struggling to live a normal life. There are a few months I need to borrow RM50 or RM100 from my elder brother just to have my meal. At that state, I cant even send money back to my dad.
While my bad situation in KL, my elder brother is not having a too much of good life too. He is struggling to make the ends meet. My dad who is not providing to the family anymore, need to be taken care by my brother. In the end, my elder brother quitted his job to take care of my dad.
My younger brother who started his new job, faced financial stress. He started his job with good pay but got stressed by dad to provide some money to family. Yeah, it's normal to send money back to parents at home but considering how much we earn and we are not stabling down yet, sometimes, it's really stressful to provide too much.
That is all what happened at the past few years. We are all born poor. But we don't want to die poor too. That's why my brothers and I are working so hard to earn more. Being cheapskate is what we always do to cut cost. But cheapskate is one thing, we also look at efficiency. For example, we went to Jogoya Starhill on last Friday. Driving there is definitely cheap. However, the stress on the road, the parking, petrol, time taken, totaling all of that together, plus Starhill is in Bukit Bintang area, we decided to just take Uber. It's more efficient and not really much more expensive than driving too.
Born poor is not our mistake.... but dying poor is not a mistake too. Some people don't even had a chance to become rich. Or even a chance to live a normal life. Sometimes life needs a bit of luck.
I heard of a story before, a real one, there is a girl who is good in her studies and thought she will live a good life when she graduates by getting a good job. Her parent owned some land, a house and a few big fishing boat. One unfortunate event happened where the girl's mom fell down. She got taken to hospital and need to be hospitalized for around 5 months. Her parent sold off everything because they need the money to pay to hospital. House, fishing boat and land too. She ends up has no enough money to finish her study. Miserable life.
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