Hapless Baby

After days being irate and puzzling over the details happened and said last weekend, not only I loathe my mother-in-law for her money-mindedness and incongruous demands from her sons, but also my (what’s the euphemism for s*****?) brother-in-law.

Days before my husband’s cousin’s son’s 1st birthday party, she reprimanded that two of her elder sons give RM50 each as Ang Pow for the “whole” family, which is RM100 altogether. I did not expect to share the birthday gift with her family as my husband and I are married and having a baby boy on the way, therefore, I consider us a nuclear family and I prefer to buy our own gift as husband and wife, which makes it more personalized. In addition, she has two grown up boys, whom she baby-sits and she treats them as “family” as well. From what I heard from my husband, he had informed his mother that he did not want to share the Ang Pow with them because we have thought of buying a gift for the baby earlier.

Anyway, on the day before we leave her house to the birthday party, knowing that we have bought a birthday gift, as she incipiently packed the Ang Pow, my brother-in-law asked how much money to give to her.

MIL: RM50.
BIL: What?!
Husband: We have already bought a gift, so I won’t be giving Ang Pow.
BIL: Why do I need to contribute RM50 for the two of us (himself and girlfriend)?

MIL chuckled and said, “You Fang Fei Zi” to my husband. What?! My husband did not agree to share the birthday token with them in the first place. Secondly, she still asked for only RM50 from my brother-in-law. I think her statement to my husband is a pretext for being guilty taking more than expected from her sons. How shameful of her.

Unexpectedly, my brother-in-law asked us to contribute RM10 each. What does that mean? Does he want to contribute RM30? Is that what he meant? Don’t he already know that we have decided to buy our own gift? Our body language repudiated his suggestion.

BIL: What is there to buy for a 1-year-old baby?

Huh?! Overabundance?

Then, he made a biting comment, “Your gift is made from China.”

What?! Again, what does that mean? Firstly, it is none of his bloody business what present we bought. Secondly, does that mean that our gift is cheap stuff? He does not even know what we bought in the first place. Although the gift is not cheap, he was calling the kettle black. He is the one who buys Pasar Malam things.

Stunned at his caustic statement, we ignored him.

In summary, if my brother-in-law is not willing to give RM50, then he should just contribute the amount seems comfortable to him. Nobody put a gun on his head to give RM50, right?

Anyway, I am glad the baby received lots of gifts from his parents' friends and relatives on that day otherwise it will be very disappointing to the baby and his parents.