Gene Theory

While I was in Kumamoto last December, Ling and Hannah spent a good amount of time at our Lentor family home, staying with my parents.

After I got back home, Ling shared with me her experience of staying at Lentor, including listening to the many stories my Mom has of this particular branch of the Foo clan. For those of us not in the know, my Mom is a very colorful story teller – she’s the type who could tell a story of a wall getting painted, and turn it into a bestseller!

It was during this period of stay that Ling finally saw firsthand evidence proving that I take after my Mom. Including how I interact with the spouse (LOL), the way I absolutely cannot abide lateness of any sort, or that I frequently throw away used stuff that Ling would want to keep (Ling’s a pack rat). Ling finally saw for herself exactly where I got all those traits from her, and it was scarily familiar! :)

In any case, Ling also took the opportunity to pour through the photos my Dad took of us as babies and infants at our old home in Sembawang Hills Estate. While I got my looks and most of my traits and character inclinations from my Mom, I got the obsessive compulsion to record both in imagery and text from my Dad. My Dad took hundreds of pictures of the three of us using his old twin-lens reflex camera.

Just as a comparison: while I was doing my weekly backup of Hannah pictures and video, I took a note of how much videos and pictures I’ve kept of her in the first 8 months 3 weeks. And the tally goes like this:

– 1,571 pictures (about 13.6 GB)

– 196 minutes of HD video (17.6 GB)

The actual image frame count I suspect is probably three times 1,571, since I typically keep about a third of all the actual frames I trigger. Now, if I were to translate it into 1980s technology with 36 exposure film rolls, it’ll work out to about 44 film rolls assuming if I keep every one of those exposures.

Another interesting stat: Hannah’s about 264 days old. That also means on average, she gets about 5.95 pictures taken and kept of her everyday since birth.:)

I should had been an accountant!