Relationship blues

Yes, we know teen girls obsess about boys — but there are limits to how much of that our columnist can take, she discovers!

I UNEARTHED my Sex And The City (SATC) DVDs last week and have been watching the series from season one, an episode or two before bedtime or when I feel in need of a laugh (re-runs of The X-Files were really getting me down).

I started watching SATC in my 20s and at the time I could sort of relate to the women in the show – not to Carrie Bradshaw’s shoe addiction, but to the dating misadventures experienced by the character on her journey to finding a man to spend the rest of her life with.\

I’m 45 now and find that I no longer relate to Carrie, or any of the other characters. There is an episode at the start of the second season in which Miranda Hobbes, Carrie’s sensible lawyer friend, loses her temper because her friends only seem to talk about men. She says, “Why do four smart women have nothing to talk about but boyfriends? It’s Iike seventh grade with bank accounts. What about us? What we think, we feel, we know... Does it always have to be about them?”

My thoughts exactly and this is also why I remembered being less than charmed by the final season of SATC – because there they were, still obsessed about finding “The one” and not dying alone (yes, even Miranda).

I mean, there is nothing wrong with wanting to share your life with one special person, but I don’t like how the series and its characters behave as though that life would mean less without that person. Are they saying that, if, for whatever reason, you end up single, it means you are incomplete? That’s really not the message I want to pass on to my daughter.

The thing is, although SATC is a series for adults because of its very adult content, Candace Bushnell, the writer of the book Sex And The City (on which the telly show is based) now has a young adult book series called The Carrie Diaries and it’s also being turned into a TV series.

Now, I don’t know what Carrie Bradshaw was like when she was a teenager, but I’m willing to bet that she was even more flaky than her 30-something SATC self.

I have not read the books (there are two so far), but the synopses on Amazon.com describe Carrie as a small town girl, the eldest of three sisters who live with their widower dad (I wonder what happens to him and the younger sisters – fans of SATC don’t ever get to meet any of Carrie’s relatives. In fact, the four main characters all appear to be orphans).

In The Carrie Diaries (the first book in the series), Carrie is a high school senior with three close girlfriends, one of whom is a gay guy, and a tall, dark and handsome admirer called Sebastian Kydd who sounds like an adolescent Mr Big (who Carrie marries in the TV series).

According to the School Library Journal review featured on the book’s Amazon page, “Carrie keeps letting boys run rampant over her”, which sounds very like the SATC Carrie we all know and long to smack because, really, why does a woman who supposedly attended the prestigious Ivy League Brown University (so it is revealed in The Carrie Diaries) behave like she was dropped repeatedly on her head as an infant and then force-fed crack until puberty?

You can excuse such idiocy (allowing men to treat you like dirt) in a teenager, but not in an adult. Still, I don’t think I’ll get myself copies of The Carrie Diaries and Summer And The City (the second book in the series). I know that teenage girls spend a lot of time obsessing about boys and relationships, and it’s natural and all that, but I think I’d rather read YA books with heroines who, while they might think a lot about boys, don’t behave like utter morons.

In fact, I’m a little tired of reading YA books in which relationships and sex are central to the plot.

I don’t mind one book of that sort for every half a dozen or so I read, but I think I’m due for a period of total abstinence from ink-and-paper sex and boy-related angst.

Everything in moderation, right? I can laugh at Bella Swan’s Edward-addiction in the Twilight Saga and I wouldn’t object to any young woman I care about reading the books, but I also want them to read books about teenagers who have more than sex and the opposite sex on the brain; who have so many interesting things to consider, places to go to, people to see that sex is just a tiny distraction, an amusing diversion, not an all-consuming passion. A tall order? Look out for the list on The Places You Will Go page on Facebook and post your recommendations too.

In the meantime, Happy Reading!

Tots to Teens By DAPHNE LEE-

> Daphne Lee reads to wonder and wander, be amazed and amused, horrified and heartened and inspired and comforted. She wishes more people will try it too. Send e-mails to star2@thestar.com.my and check out her blog at daphne.blogs.com/books.

Friends for all seasons - priceless

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People who are friends in good and bad times are priceless

Monday Starters - By Soo Ewe Jin

THE MAS-Air Asia alliance remains very much the talk of Corporate Malaysia. In the many analyses so far, the recurring theme seems to be about how erstwhile enemies are going to work together as friends.

My colleague used the Sun Tzu quote, “Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer,” to lead off the cover feature on the deal in StarBizWeek on Aug 13. Somewhere in the story, there is this quote by Tony Fernandes: “You don’t have to be an enemy forever, life is too short.”
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Actually, there is not that much that separates the corporate world and politics as far as alliances are concerned.

In politics, it is said that there are no permanent friends, only permanent interests. Politicians are fond of referring to their adversaries as “strange bedfellows” but will not hesitate to climb into the same bed if it suits their interests.

In the world of high-finance, bitter rivals can easily sleep on in the same bed, so long as it is good for the bottom line.

For some business people, however, friendship is not a word that exists in their vocabulary. Many good friends who go into business together learn the hard way that years of friendship count for nothing once the business issues get into the way.



A friend told me once that he will never hire me, or ask me to be his business partner, simply because he values our friendship too much.

I once met a man at a hospital as he was dying. He told me how he had pursued wealth and success at any cost. If a family member or close friend went against him, he would not spare them any mercy.

“But look at me now. I do not have long to live. But if I recover, I will surely be a different person. I will seek the forgiveness of those I have hurt. I will forgive others. I will give back to society. I will try not to be so nasty to people,” he said.

I was there to bring him a message from a former business partner who was somehow not able to bring himself to see him personally. He told me to tell him that he did not hold anything against him and to wish him well.

Tears came to his eyes. “I wish he would come and tell me this personally. I have done so much harm to him and his business. But he still thinks of me and is concerned for me.” I told him, “I hope and pray that you will both meet up and forgive each other.” They never did. He died one week later.

I was thinking about friendship this past week after a friend posted on his Facebook this simple reflection: “It has been said that everlasting friends go long periods of time without speaking and never question the friendship. These friends pick up like they just spoke yesterday, regardless of how long it has been or how far away they live; they don’t hold grudges. They understand that life is busy and know that you will always love them.”

Whether we want to admit it or not, sheer numbers of acquaintances in itself is no reflection of the number of real friends we have. Just ask anyone previously in a high position who has retired and he will tell you about the sense of “abandonment” that one feels sometimes.

Suddenly, no one is free for lunch or for teh tarik, one such person told me recently.

This is not to say that it is not possible to have real friends within working relationships. But it can only come about if we are genuinely concerned about the person, and not just the title he or she holds.

And the test of that friendship will come when you are going through a difficult journey, and he is there for you.
● Deputy executive editor Soo Ewe Jin is thankful for friends, near and far, new and old, who bring that special touch into his life, through good and bad times.