old enough

I recently watched 'Old Enough!' on Netflix, it's a Japanese reality series that documents toddlers, aged roughly 2 to 5, completing errands alone for the first time, all while being under supervision & recorded by camera crews in disguise along their journey.

I find the premise of show and the execution of it very interesting. Having a toddler of my own, I even imagined how mine would look like in the scenario. One time I even floated the idea to my wife - to set up one simple errand and to send our kid out for a quest, with all the candidates (relatives/neighbours) who could join as crews, the checkpoints along the route and what not. I would't say she's very amused with my pitch haha.

The lacklustre reception to my idea makes sense because there's significant cultural differences between Malaysia & Japan in terms of approach to child-rearing. Japanese puts more emphasise to and encourages early responsibility and self-sufficiency. And the fact that their crime rate is one of the lowest, on top of many other factors that characterise them as a society such as the neighborhood, policing, discipline, respect, and social harmony - all makes a safer environment for such experiment showcased in the tv show.

But I'm not giving up with my plans yet. Would be so cool if we get one done for the home videos collection, and show it to our kid when he's all grown up right? haha