No excuses

IT is a subdued, rainy Monday afternoon in November, the week after the 2016 United States presidential election, and 91-year-old Linda Tsao Yang is musing about the vote. Not so much about the results - a topic on which she clearly prefers to demur - but on history, Chinese proverbs and things worth struggling for. "It's been almost a hundred years since the US passed a law that allowed women to vote, which was in 1920," she says, reflectively.

"We've waited almost a hundred years to have a woman be a candidate for a major party... many suffragettes over the years worked very hard, fought very hard to pave the way for my generation and the younger generation. So yes, especially women who have the benefit of a higher education... needless to say, I think they feel crushed."

But Mrs Tsao Yang, who is visiting Singapore from her home in Davis, California in the US, remains stoic, citing the Chinese idiom yu gong yi shan, or the story of an old man who tried to level a hill with a shovel. "His neighbours said, 'what a stupid man, why do you do that?' And he said, 'well, you know, I may only be able to level the hill just that much but my children will, their children will and one day the hill will be levelled.' We learn a lesson this time, we'll do better next time... Don't be discouraged."