Sisters Who are So Close Like Twins, Siblings without the Rivalry

The closeness of sisters, it’s very rare to see, translated…

Every time I see a set of twins, I’d gotten reminded of my younger sister who’s three years my junior.

Since we were growing up, we were like twins, it’s just that her saving up every penny and my spending listlessly, became such a strong contrast.  She was my money provider, because she’d always given me her allowances.

As we’d gone to college, the living expenses of $10,000N.T. per month for the two of us to share, I’d taken $7,000, and she didn’t seem to know how to voice her displeasures, and would come happily to my place on the weekends.

After graduation, she’d tested into a public organization, and I, started teaching at a private institution.  That year, when I was having it rough, I’d called her, “I want to quit, can you give me $10,000N.T. per month for my living expenses?”, without thinking through it first, she’d said okay, and that had helped me to relax that entire year, to prepare for my examinations.

Before she married, she feared that her older sister who hadn’t found someone yet, said to her other half, that whatever my sister goes through, I will help her out.

And, being so reliant on her, every time something happens, I’d called her up too, and she’d put her life out on the limbs for  me, and it would often make her husband question, WHO is the older sister?

When I fell in love, because my husband and my temperament, family backgrounds are quite the opposite, as I was hesitant, my younger sister invited us both over to her house to stay for a week, and, my younger sister became the matchmaker and my husband successfully won me over.  Back then, she’d even warned my husband, “Other than her head on her shoulders she won’t lose, everything else that’s worth something might get lost, you MUST think this through thoroughly.”

On the day we wed, she’d told my husband, “The tradition of the Lins is that ‘all sales final’, I hope you can treat my not-so-perfect sister perfectly.”

After we married, my husband’s economic situations made it hard for me to adjust.  My younger sister who married before I did knew how I felt, and would often asked me to shop with her (and, naturally she’d picked up the tabs), and she’d given me a TON of makeup, moisturizers and face care products by the bundles, to make life seemingly the same for me before and after I married.

Sometimes, I’d complained of how a push-over my husband was, that his careless with money around friends had caused us to have it hard, at which time, my younger sister would joke, “So, you can divorce, and, we’ll sign the papers”, and that, had helped put the thought of leaving my husband out of my head.

I’d often believed that I can smile so radiantly, other than having a great marriage, my younger sister should be getting the remaining credits!

And so, this pair of sisters, they got along very well, perhaps, it’s because how their temperaments complemented each others, and this, is very rare, especially in this day and age, because there are so many stories on how siblings rivaled about things as menial as monetary matters.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Troubles are Nothing Between the Siblings

On filial interactions, translated…

There are four brothers for my house, and on my wife’s side, there are two sons and two daughters, I’m the second child, my wife, the firstborn. My brothers and I are spread out all over the places, while my wife and her siblings all lived in Taipei.

My wife has an optimistic nature and is independent, she’d put herself through college, part-timing, saved up all the money she could, what she hated the most, was “troubling others”, everything she could do on her own, she’d NOT ask anybody else to help out, she wouldn’t even ask her parents, OR her siblings for assistance either, and so, she’s not very social with her siblings, and, it seemed that they’re drifting, further, and further apart.

Looking at my brothers and I, we’d gathered a lot, we’d head over to my oldest brother’s place to eat, to spend the night at my younger brother’s house, or, get an entire bed-and-breakfast for our whole family, we’d asked one another to go everywhere with, and, whoever that’s able, puts up the money, and whoever that has the time, gives the time, we’d NOT only nickeled and dimed with one another, we’d often fight to see who would pay.

Because I don’t have a car, every time I’d gone to my brothers, I’d told them the time I wanted to be there, and so, they’d pick me up, and my siblings would also ask me whether or not I wanted to eat in their homes, and what I’d wanted to eat, where I wanted to go, and we feel like a “whole family”, natural, and comfortable.

In my wife’s mind, however, she felt, that I was bugging them, and questioned why my siblings would fulfill my requests, and had clean out the bedrooms in their houses, to treat us to eat out, to put off all other activities that they were doing. I couldn’t find a good reason, but we all know, that we’d cared too much about the affinities we’d come to share, so, we’re not afraid of getting bogged down, and so, my siblings and I are becoming even MORE closely knitted! And so, there’s the comparisons of the two families, the wife’s and the husband’s, and it is normal that the wife would feel bizarre, because she’d NEVER had this close relation with her own siblings, and, it may have to do with birth order too, and, the point here, is that the siblings should NOT nickel and dime what they are giving, and what they’d gotten in return, after all, they ARE, one family!!!