My wife’s dad was born in China around 1916.
I say ‘around’ because no one’s exactly sure.
In 1922, when he was a small boy, a massive flood obliterated the entire region.
It destroyed all the villages, and drowned everyone who lived there.
It was know as The Great Typhoon Of Swatow.
They estimate up to a hundred thousand people died.
Again, they don’t know exact numbers.
All my father-in-law remembered was that for three days and nights he clung to a tree.
A little boy on his own.
All he could see was water, as far as the horizon in every direction.
Eventually he was rescued and taken to an orphanage.
He thinks he was somewhere around five or six years old.
His entire family had been wiped out along with everyone else.
But after a year or so an uncle came looking for him.
This uncle had missed the floods, because he was away working on the rice boats between Thailand and Singapore.
So at about eight years old, my father-in-law went with him to work on the rice boats.
After a few years he decided he liked Singapore so much he stayed there.
Working at anything that came his way.
Buying and selling things, fixing things, transporting things.
Whatever wanted doing, he would do it.
Everything was an opportunity.
Despite the fact that he couldn’t read or write, mechanical things made sense to him.
He trained himself in electrics, plumbing, engines, building, drainage.
He just looked for every opportunity and did it, whatever it was.
He never read a book, or passed a test, or studied for a qualification.
How could he?
He’d never been to school so he couldn’t read or write.
Eventually he opened his own company, a plumbing contractor.
He didn’t do the work to industry standards.
He’d never learned anyone else’s standards.
He did it to his own standards, how he thought it should be done.
It turned out his standards were higher than anyone else’s.
And his company became one of the biggest in Singapore.
He decided his suppliers’ quality wasn’t good enough.
So he started making whatever he needed, himself
He opened a stainless steel factory and a cast-iron foundry.
His business had grown so much he needed bigger offices.
But he couldn’t find a builder he thought was good enough.
So he did it himself.
He built a massive office block for his company headquarters.
Without being able to read or write he’d somehow assembled a huge plumbing and building conglomerate.
All because he looked at what everyone else was doing and decided it wasn’t good enough.
Even though he’d never been taught how to do it.
In fact, because he’d never been taught how to do it.
I believe that was his strength, that he had no training.
He couldn’t read and write, he’d never been to school.
He’d never had anyone else teach him the right way to do it.
He had to work it out for himself.
Sort out what made sense to him and what didn’t.
He wasn’t just another product of the educational conveyor-belt.
Where someone else tells you exactly what can and can’t be done.
What the limitations are.
What’s acceptable and what isn’t.
Creativity must be about questioning the way things are and doing them differently.
You can’t do that if you’ve had all questioning knocked out of you.
If your brain has been turned into a receptacle for current wisdom.
If all you’ve learned is to regurgitate the expected answers.
The academic world doesn’t have the same opportunities as the real world.
I completely agree.
Coming out of the education system myself, all I feel like is everything I’m doing is wrong, simply because it’s different.
You can’t do it that way. We have a way we do things.
You’ve lost marks, and so on.
And of course, who am I, but just an arrogant kid, when I’m telling teachers and lecturers that I think things are wrong, and I want to do them differently?
The education system breeds people who aren’t allowed to ask questions.
People are too afraid of a kid asking a question the teacher can’t answer.
Jack Smith - 13 February 2013 10:26 am
Jack,
That will always be true if you’re inside a system.
The system won’t agree with you questioning it.
The people inside the system are people who want it the way it is.
So don’t be limited by the system, but don’t expect any agreement from the system.
Dave Trott - 13 February 2013 10:36 am
http://styled-comments.blogspot.ro/2013/02/331.html
Anca - 13 February 2013 12:34 pm
IT’S people like your pa-in-law who make things great. Because they imposed their own high stadards, things got better.
Now that standards have been established, many businesses find ways to just meet the acceptable levels. To your pa-in-law, it was about passion and integrity. To many modern businessmen, it’s about money, shareholder ROI and directors’ bonuses.
Sad.
Robin. - 13 February 2013 1:56 pm
I wept as I read this post.
steakandcheese - 13 February 2013 3:02 pm
I wanted to be an architect.
I trained 7 years.
I learned how to question every idea into submission.
Analysis paralysis.
I worked a few years as an architect.
It made me miserable.
Then I saw an ad – Freelance Photographer Wanted.
So I rang them up and told them I was one of those.
How hard could it be?
That was 7 years ago.
I’ve been blagging it ever since.
Figuring things out for myself.
Making my own rules.
And I’ve never had so much fun.
Thanks Dave.
Your post resonated.
Martin Phelps - 13 February 2013 3:27 pm
Unfortunately my most recent experiences are of lecturers asking students questions who have no answers.
john p woods - 13 February 2013 3:36 pm
Dave, I guess that’s why I always blanche when I’m slated to go to a “conform.”
George Tannenbaum - 13 February 2013 4:11 pm
George,
What’s ‘conform’, we might have a different expression for it.
Is it the final stages of putting a commercial together: colour-grading, sound-levels, etc?
Or is it a thing they do in the Catholic Church?
Dave Trott - 13 February 2013 4:23 pm
Steak & Cheese,
Was that good weeping or bad weeping?
Dave Trott - 13 February 2013 8:38 pm
Anca,
I always like what Democritus said in 300 BC:
“The mind is not a vessel to be filled but a fire to be kindled.”
Dave Trott - 13 February 2013 8:40 pm
Great line, Dave!
Anca - 13 February 2013 8:51 pm
It was both, Dave. Heart warming and inspiring on one hand. Saddening on the other when I look around myself and see the people calling themselves creative, yet they don’t even qualify as stylists.
steakandcheese - 14 February 2013 9:49 am
Always love hard earned success stories. Saddening to see myself easily satisfied while not working hard enough to be successful. Ah, hello comfy couch and comfy zone!
Irfan - 14 February 2013 11:15 am
Great article Dave. I live in Hong Kong and the attitude that you describe above about your father in law is evident on a daily basis. The locals seem to thrive on figuring out their way of doing it which is often the best, and despite the protestations of westerners who have arrived and think the way they learned is the way to do it. Nice one.
Geordie - 15 February 2013 2:52 am
IMHO the utimate quote on education belongs to ‘Iron’ Mike Tyson’s Boxing Manager and Trainer, Cus D’Amato. ‘A boy comes to me with a spark of interest, I feed that spark and it becomes a flame, I feed the flame and it becomes a fire, I fed the fire and it becomes a roaring blaze.’
john p woods - 15 February 2013 3:44 pm
Agree, nice one John.
Dave Trott - 15 February 2013 10:53 pm
Dave,
We don’t conform in the Catholic church? lol!
That’s a general preconception.
Half of us are irish,
and the Irish don’t conform to
anyone or anything.
(including placing a comma before an “and”)
Even the Pope has just abdicated
which to me is a marvellous example
of humility in action.
Pope Benedict:-
“Hmm I’m top of the tree now
but I’m stiff as a board with arthritis
and cant do the job the way I should.
What shall I do God?”
God:- “Better abdicate.”
Benedict:- “Fair enough.”
We all view Catholicism differently.
My sister’s views are different to mine,
different to my brother’s different to my son’s.
That’s what makes it such a great faith.
We realise we are all sinners. (lol)
Kev - 16 February 2013 12:42 pm
Kev,
My fault, lame joke that didn’t work.
I didn’t mean ‘conform’ I meant ‘confirm’.
I remember some of my mates had to do something called ‘Confirmation’.
Dave Trott - 18 February 2013 9:50 am
Lol..(absolutely no offence taken)
I used to serve on the altar Dave.
Imagine this:-
A timid priest measuring 5’1″
being led to the altar by a thirteen year old 6’3″ lump
wearing red Dr Marten Boots and a black cassock a foot too short for him
dragging an almighty hangover from a saturday night out with the lads.
Any religion that can embrace that kind of diversity has to be worth it.
Kev - 18 February 2013 10:24 am