When Chris Wat Wing-yin decided to publish a book chronicling her observations of controlling parents, the mother-of-three never imagined she would be seen as a tonic for local parenting problems. Nor did she imagine she would be hosting a radio programme on the subject.
We Are Not Monsters, which began airing this month on Sunday evenings at 10pm on RTHK Radio 1, follows a string of talks in schools on the subject of parenting since the release of her first book, Monster Parents, in November 2010.
The former Next Magazine journalist was appalled at the way overprotective behaviour by parents who constantly complain had become the norm in Hong Kong. There was the mother who asked a school to reprint a yearbook because it contained too few pictures of her child. Then there was the father whose son was given detention for throwing a rock through a window. He threatened to sue the school if his son's fingerprints were not found on the rock.
The term 'monster parents' originated in Japan but is now widely used in Hong Kong. 'Why do we have the so-called Hong Kong child [defined as having low emotional intelligence and an inability to cope by themselves]? It is because of the monster parents,' Wat, 45, says.
Her book was largely overlooked when it was published, except by a small number of educators. A month later, however, the parents of 400 local students stranded at London's Heathrow Airport demanded the Hong Kong government charter planes to fly their panicking children home.
The parents' reaction was an example of what Wat's book referred to. Before long all 3,000 copies had flown off the shelves. Monster Parents became a must-read, and when she released a sequel in July - Monster Parents 2: Revenge from Kids - that print run of 3,000 copies sold out within a week.