Well, technically Youth Day was yesterday, but i'll bet that we all care more about the Youth Day holiday than Youth Day itself. and if, like myself, you are a 1992 baby, this Youth Day will be your last :( haha, nothing like "hey, you're not a youth anymore, are you?" to make you feel old.
six years ago, my last Children's Day passed by me without incident, probably because i was ironically still too childish to realise that it wasn't simply a lost holiday every October 1st that came with this milestone, but really a sudden nudge to cross the line from child to adolescent. thinking back, 12 is actually as magical a number as 18 when it comes to age, but unfortunately 12-year-olds rarely have the intellectual capacity to see this at their young age. it was an age when "so cute!" turned from a compliment to an insult (for boys, anyway) and restaurants stopped serving you smaller portions at discounted prices. for many, this would be the first time they will become separated from their friends as everyone splits up to go to different secondary schools. while primary school kids were generally "mischievous but ultimately benign", secondary school would be the time when the punks and rebels really start to diverge from the mainstream. 12 marked the beginning of the end of innocence in us all, a sad but ultimately inevitable and necessary step in life to forcefully disillusion us and see reality for what it really is.
and just as 12 was a time of disillusionment, 18 is a time of decisions. ever since we were born, we had all of our life-changing decisions made for us. or rather, there really wasn't much of a choice in the first place. the first 18-19 years of the life of a singaporean seem rather set: get an education. so for 18 years we read our books and took our exams and received our certificates, and suddenly we are faced with the very first crossroad in our lives, and probably one of the biggest. the choices at this junction are infinite; who can say which path is the best and which path should be avoided at all cost? nobody has ever found a winning formula for life and it is safe to say that nobody ever will, so any path is possible. in fact, what's with all this talk of "paths"? many have succeeded in life by trekking through the wilderness and creating their own paths. 18 is a time when all the side roads and narrow alleys that were barricaded in the past are now open and free for you to stroll through. drinking, smoking, driving, legal permanent employment, non-compulsory further education; suddenly the path isn't simple and straight anymore. the only path that can't be taken is the path going backwards, the path leading back to simpler times.
but in spite of all that, it's still the only way for us to grow up. we can't possibly remain children forever in neverland, so we might as well embrace the change. happy Youth Day everyone :)
anyway, here's an awesome Iron Maiden song called Aces High:
for some reason i find the the chorus lyrics to be very inspirational and fitting for the situation:
Run, live to fly, fly to live, do or die
Run, live to fly, fly to live, aces high
in the face of all the crossroads of life, the only certainty is that eventually a path will have to be chosen. so the only certain decision for us to make is that we all have to keep running, keep flying, keep living.
