A High School Drop-Out's Guide to Tiger Parenting

(Don't) Spend Money

You'd think that as long as my dad had a job, we lived fine if we were frugal. You'd be partially right—we were fine, living better than many people. However, this is reality and reality says that my dad has absolutely no self-control and no idea about the concept of saving. Why do I say that?

We never really had money. It's not that he doesn't have money; he doesn't want to give it to his children, because he prioritizes other things more. Like fulfilling his various addictions: alcohol, cigarettes, gambling, and substances.

After the beginning of his nightly escapades, I remembered two distinct things about his returns: the sun and the piercing stench of alcohol in his breath. With the alcohol came his surprisingly upbeat mood and a red face that further proved that he had been around alcohol in the night. But it wasn't the alcohol itself that was his addiction; it was the nightlife and the environment in which the alcohol could be found. Alcohol meant fun, friends, and wealth. Alcohol was found in every uncomfortable party that my dad brought me to—involving me getting fed and him smoking and drinking his stomach away with other friends whose teeth were stained with the exact thing that Tiger was destroying his body with. Those parties were one way we were fed with "delicious" foods; we were made to come out of our house just for the purpose of eating. I didn't complain because my stomach was warm and full at the end of the night. However, as I tentatively ate the grand spread of dishes Tiger ordered with his friends, he only drank and smoked. Slouching on his seat, he glanced at us a few times to make sure we were still chewing something, before going back to vigorously argue with his friends in a drunken haze.

The tiger couldn't get enough of lazing around in the sun, with the sun being parties, and lazing being drinking, talking, and laughing with his friends. As for his family, they busied themselves rushing between fryers and customers, trying to maintain the restaurant he so desperately wanted to build, and to keep. Whilst my mother, brother, and I forced smiles, lifted trays, and got burned by oil to earn the money that a tiger will spend, Tiger laughed boisterously, clinked glasses, and was soothed by girls.

Alcohol became merely a brief nightmare as Tiger resumed responsibility of his own restaurant after his trial run with taking advantage of my mom expired. Cigarettes, however, never declined. In fact, it only became more frequent under the stress of managing a restaurant without the person who had handled it all before: my mother. With no one to guide him and needing more time to relax from cooking, cigarettes could be seen dangling from his crusty lips. Most of the time, he would smoke in the back of the restaurant, where his throne was. Behind was a backdoor that was often held open by a bulky lock, the smoke diffusing out for the plants to consume and cough out into breathable oxygen. Other times, he would smoke whilst cooking. I would watch as a stove fire rose in parallel to the light gray smoke blossoming from his face unsteadily, the burning stick bouncing up and down at the rhythm of the stir-fry style. The sweet, pleasant scent of soy-oyster sauce would gently greet my senses first, before I was smacked in the face by the smell of burning and ash.

This scent is unforgettable and absolutely recognizable. It sticks to every surface and every inch of clothing, especially to the leather of the tiger's car. The car was another one of Tiger's smoke-spots. Getting a ride with a tiger also meant getting a puff of smoke. The moment I opened the dark blue car's silver handles, I was greeted with beige leather stained gray and yellow, fitting for a smoke that tends to discolor. Even if the staining was not due to his cigarettes, the smell was. The leather seats stunk of stale plastic mixed with burning cloth, a not-so-subtle nod to the many times a cigarette was lit and made to torture the passengers.

One cigarette per ride. That was the unspoken rule, one that my body was forced to adjust to. With smoke curling through the largely enclosed car—the only window open being the one adjacent to the driver's seat—and only 2 feet separating my face from his—I was essentially second hand smoking.