Kiasu Quotes

My mind skipped to a sunlit Saturday morning a few months ago when Noah was supposed to be revising for his exams. I caught him looking out the window instead, distracted by a roving butterfly. “Noah, you’re supposed to be studying!” I scolded. He replied languidly, “I am! I’m studying what’s out there.

i bring my kiasu friend to the airport leavings are never easy, not for long and though we both saw blur along the way memories flooded present tensions. in the curry of his life no lemak remained so now the predictable exit signalled the end of his roundings, his bombings– he can bluff like hell, ma, he got style– and left me thinking about home, my kampong.

Kiasu is the Hokkien word for “the fear of being left behind” or not getting enough. It’s a common affliction, not only in Singapore, where the phrase originates, but around the world. Far more than FOMO, it’s a grasping insufficiency that drives many people forward.

Of course, kiasu is actually about fear and insufficiency. And it couldn’t exist if we trusted ourselves enough to know that we’re already on a path to where we seek to go.

Kiasu is the Hokkien word for “the fear of being left behind” or not getting enough.