Forest and Sea

Ban đầu đọc tiêu đề mình không hiểu ý nghĩa của tiêu đề. Cá gai là thế nào nhỉ? Cá gai chắc là trông xấu xí lắm nhỉ. Đặc điểm của cá gai là gì? Ngay cả việc đọc giới thiệu về sách cũng khiến mình mơ hồ. Chắc là sách viết về tình cảm cha con. Nhưng chẳng rõ ràng gì cả nhỉ. Thấy sách được đánh giá cao nên mình mua đọc thử. Phải nói là đọc cuốn sách này là một hành trình khó khăn. Một phần vì sách dài hơn so với mấy cuốn mình hay đọc. Một phần là vì sách gì mà chả có lấy một đoạn vui vẻ. Nói đúng ra thì không phải không có lấy một đoạn vui vẻ mà là những khoảnh khắc vui vẻ quá ít, quá ngắn và trôi qua quá nhanh. Cả cuốn sách là quá trình đấu tranh chống bệnh máu trắng của đứa nhỏ. Ban đầu mình cứ nghĩ là ắt hẳn đứa con sẽ chết, sao cứ kéo dài sự đau khổ thế này. Mệt chết mất.  Nhưng mà không, tác giả làm cho người ta bất ngờ. Theo ...

  First they killed my father (Photo courtesy of Netflix)  It is a historical movie which depicts the horrific period in Cambodian history: Khmer Rouge. (1975-1979) It is based on a true story of a daughter of Cambodia. She was born with a silver spoon in her mouth. Her father worked for Lon Nol government. Then Khmer Rouge took over and the nightmare began. Like other families in the city, her family had to move to the rural area and did manual work. All properties were left behind and no luxurious items should be seen by Khmer Rouge soldiers. Poverty and hunger The protagonist, only 6-7 years old at the time, had to join the force like other children and work on the field. They had to do heavy manual labor without having enough food to eat. Scattered families Her father got killed. He was called off on a duty and he never came back. Her mother was afraid that her children would have the same fate so she demanded them to scatter in different directions so that "even one is ca...

May we all become "free thinkers" Free thinkers are defined to be those who follow what they think to be true and are able to go against the prevailing norms to protect what they think. These people help drive change to happen when an adverse social norm is widely practiced. Speaking of change, I made some notes of the report I read on social norms: how to break negative social norms and build positive ones. KAP - Knowledge - Attitude - Practice Knowledge and attitude can go hand in hand. When people have more knowledge of an issue, they are likely to change their attitude towards it. The relation between knowledge and attitude are positive but that between attitude and practice can be different. People can understand the problem, they know the solution but they still fail to practise or take action to change it. For example, a mother who doesn't want to have her daughter go through FGM (Female genital mutation/cutting) knows that it's bad for her daughter but she sti...