My other half and I were discussing about how Obama got his words "twisted" and immediately called for damage control and how our leaders are always blaming everything nand anything on someone else or better still NOT accepting the blame at all and NOT passing it to someone else-that would be more accurate!! At least if our leaders blamed someone else for all their idiosyncrasies, surely we have that someone else to catch and "balun habis-habis".

I am talking about the arrest of a black Harvard scholar, Gates, by a white policeman. Gates was arrested by the officer for using foul language when the officer refused Gates entry into his home even though Gates showed proof that it was his house that he was about to enter. What exactly transpired is good a guess as yours and mine but it culminated in the arrest of this decorated man. When Obama was interviewed by a reporter, he said that the cop behaved "stupidly". For using this word, the whole police dept staged a demo of protest and demanded an apology from Obama. Obama quickly called for a press conference and explained thoroughly what he meant and didn't mean-short of an apology. It was immediately accepted by the police contingent. Later, he invited the said cop and Gates for a round of beer at the White House. All that didn't go well, ended well.

Here in Bolehland, we moan and groan and rave and rant and scream and shout -only to be handcuffed and thrown into jail by our so called leaders. We are victims who are again and again victimised MACC interrogated Teoh in their building and Teoh is laying dead in their building and MACC was the last person with Teoh in their building-AND THEY ARE NOT RESPONSIBLE! How can this be?? This brings to mind the Datuk who was acquitted of murdering a Chinese national some years back. A 16 year old boy is dead in his house, in his swimming pool, which is guarded by security guards and personal bodyguards and the main witness is deported for overstaying her welcome. It was his house, his pool, with tight security and there is a dead body in his house, in his pool and HE IS NOT RESPONSIBLE!! How can we accept this?

Some years back, a foreign tourist lost all her diving equipment in Cherating when her boat capsized and she was hobbling in the water when another boatman only agreed to take her if she paid him the amount of money that he demanded. She said all her personal stuff and money was lost and the boatman only saved her when she promised to pay him as soon as she got to her hotel. The next day, our then Tourism Minister, Kadir I believe, was launching "Visit Pahang Year" at the same hotel where this tourist was staying. She took the opportunity to vent her anger and frustrations on the catastrophe that befell her. Instead of apologizing to this woman, Kadir told her that the launch was not the place for her to display her emotions and that she should make a police report. The flabbergasted Swedish woman got so paranoid that she vowed to tell everyone back home what a lousy country Malaysia is. What should have Kadir done? Apologize to the woman, ask her if she is okay, get his PA to go to her, sit with her and make notes of time of accident, place etc. Accompany her to the police station etc.This would have been the right thing to do. But instead he says,"This is not the right place."

Then it dawned on me...How many of us actually accept responsibility for the things that we have done wrong? How many of us take the trouble to apologize and say, "Hey, this is my fault. I must do something about this." I am talking about simple things that we do in our homes. How many of us, as parents are guilty of having scolded/reprimanded/punished our child/children for something that they didn't do but was too egoistic to sit our child down and say,"Son, I was wrong to talk to u like that. I should not have said those words to u. It is not your fault". We don't do this but rather take our kids out for shopping or a movie or buy a PC/PS game and delude ourselves into thinking that we have apologized. But in actual fact we didn't. How are we to teach our children about taking responsibility for our actions if we don't DO IT OURSELVES? This is where I believe we have failed miserably. We have failed to teach our kids about assuming responsibility.

Many a times in the shopping complex, when a child wanders away from the mother, the mother retrieves the child n gives the child a good spanking in full view of all and sundry (because she is actually embarrassed for having let her child off her guard). Does she hug her child n say, "Sweetie, please don't wander, stay close to ma, ok?"When the child is spanked, she would think that it is her fault. It is not her fault because she is a kid and kids are suppose to wander. Did the mother teach the child here that she is responsible? No.

As an employer, when you have wrongfully reprimanded your employee, do you take the trouble to iron things out? Perhaps you don't have to say sorry, but there are many other ways of doing it.

In short, it is not our CULTURE to accept responsibility and apologize. We never learned to apologize because from our fore fathers to our parents - never taught us to say,"Hey, I was way out of line and I am sorry." How many husbands apologize to their wives for yelling at them for no reason at all because they were stressed out? SO, IT ALL STARTS FROM THE HOME!

Now, we know why the Westerners are different from us. They have better parenting skills than we do. We are learning from them. We are trying to change ourselves to be better parents. I m sure many of us in SABM are many times a better parent from our parents or are we vice versa?.We have access to books and multi media and we can educate ourselves better. But in order to do that, we must first identify our weaknesses, acknowledge it, accept it and then, embark on a strategy of rectifying our faults and misgivings. Only then we can relate better to our children, shape their minds and our children will be a more responsible, accountable and transparent leaders of tomorrow.

The million dollar question is : HOW MANY OF US ARE PREPARED TO DO THIS?

I have started and am on my way.............