IS IT THE GENES OR THE ENVIRONMENT?

This issue of the Chinese man, Zulhaidi Omar, who was raised as a Muslim after being accidentally swapped at birth presents a pretty curious case...

Apparently he was not well treated by his accidental Malay-Muslim family...

He did not feel comfortable, having been teased and poked at his 'Chinese-ness' during his formative years...

At 13, he had enough and decided to move out of the family...

But, he is (or was) a so-called 'bumiputera'...

He could have seek out the 'privileges' accrued to his 'bumiputera' status...

But no, he chose to leave the family and now, the Islam religion...

In other words, at 13, he became independent, and started to work to support himself...

(I am shaking my head just to think of what great things I did at 13... probably zero...)

Now, is it in his Chinese genes that got him to strive and persevere despite the hostile circumstances?

He has been with his real family since his sister accidentally discovered him at a supermarket years ago...

His 'partner-in-victim'... the Malay boy, Teo Tian Fa, who was mistakenly switched the same time...

He of course, has been raised by his equally accidental Teo family as a charsiew-loving Chinese boy...

He apparently has no intentions to return to his 'real' Muslim family...

Hmmm... could it be the Teo family 'environment' that he was brought up in, that leads him to decide so?

Or perhaps, in this case, the 'genes' are not so big a contributive factor as Zulhaidi's case?

I know, I know... I am probably stretching my imagination a bit too far...

Anyway, I hope that the so-called religious authorities will leave them alone to decide for themselves if they want to continue lavishing the lard-laden, cholesterol-packed char koey teow or whatever...

Good luck to both Zulhaidi and Tian Fa...