玩物喪志 ~ An Obsession with Pets Degrade One's Ambitions (Chinese Idiom)

You enter into a certain amount of madness when you marry a person with pets. ~Nora Ephron

I was fascinated with ornamental fishes since I was a child. My penchant for fishes never grew out of me as I found everlasting love with the goldfish hobby. When I finally get my hands on breeding goldfish, it was a road of no return.

At certain juncture of my life, all I could think of was just goldfish. The goldfish hobby had messed up my life, my family and my job like a gambler, helplessly drawn to his compulsion.

Fortunately, I have a very supportive wife who stood by me all these years. We work things out so that I could see that that life is not just about the goldfish. I don’t know how she managed to put up with me and my hobby during those years. Today, my wife is fairly good about telling the quality and varieties of goldfish even though she has not touched them all her life. Perhaps I have always drifted our conversations to goldfish, or perhaps, too many of my analogies were drawn from the goldfish. Even the children's projects I helped to supervise were bias towards goldfish☺

My sincere advice to people who embark on the goldfish hobby: Be mindful of the lethal goldfish fever and be responsible for the people around you. The hobby is best enjoyed with people whom you love - your family and your friends.

Pictures:

1) My elder boy and the goldfish kite project.


2) My youngest boy "helping" to catch some fishes.


3) The mess at home in the peak of the goldfish breeding season.