In Asian Buddhist beliefs people feel EVERYTHING has a spirit or soul.... even inanimate objects such as rocks and trees or things in your home such as a plate or a desk. These things don't move and can't take care of themselves so they rely on us to do that for them. From what my parents said, this is why a lot of people in Japan and Taiwan try to keep their houses immaculate .. not only is it better for a person's health but it also respects the things in the house... Regardless of whether this is true of not, the rationale did work on me ... as after that I did become a lot cleaner and less messy. I felt I had a responsibility to my room's "soul" to take care of it since it could not do so itself.

I tried to apply that logic to a Japanese kid earlier ... and it didn't work out so well ....

Last year while I was still back in Taiwan, on one of my final days on the island, I babysat my friend Haruna's (aka 小春） little brother Takeshi (or Tak), in the South since she and her boyfriend Ronnie wanted to go to Beitou 北投 to spend a weekend at a hot springs hotel.

Haruna's mom remarried a few years back and had another child quite late in life, so there's a 15 year age difference between Haruna and Tak.

Prior to babysitting her brother, Haruna (who is 潔癖，a rude term in Chinese which means someone is an OCD neat-freak） told me that the kid was messy beyond belief. He never picked up after himself and asked if there was any way I could train him a bit. I told her that's what you get when you have crazy rich parents that spoil their kids rotten. She replied to me with two words. The first word started with an "F" and the second word was "you".

I said I could try, as I was pretty messy myself and still remember a lot of the logic my mom and dad used on me.

When I arrived to their place and saw Tak's room, I was pretty shocked. Now I will admit that I'm not the world's cleanest person, but Jesus Christ, even I thought his room was pretty gross. There were socks on dirty dinner places, ketchup on the doorknobs, and soda bottles with mold that looked like something that had come out of the Alien Xenomorph.

"Good morning, Uncle John." said Tak while he was watching some cartoons on his iPad.

Tak, like Haruna, studied in England so along with Japanese and Chinese, he also spoke the queen's English. His pronounciation of the word "morning" rhymed with "yawning"

"おはよう御座います、武さん。元気？ [good morning Takeshi-san. You are well?]” I asked him.

"Yeah I'm all right" he replied. "

I looked at his room sardonically.

"Dude, what the hell is up with your room? This is a mess." I said to him. "貴様はいつ掃除? [when the hell are you going to clean this place]?" I asked in disbelief?

"Uncle John." he replied while looking at me sarcastically. "This is my room. Didn't you say last time we met is that we all have liberties to do as we please so long as it doesn't affect others? This mess is confined to just my area and not others."

Jesus, I thought to myself. How the hell am I gonna convince this nut to be cleaner? I suddenly remembered something my dad told me a long time ago.

"Takeshi," I said while grabbing his ketchup-ridden dinner plate. "So let me ask you something... so when you are about to use this plate, is that when you clean it?"

"Yeah." he replied.

"But by doing it that way, the plate spends most of its life being dirty. If you clean it right after you use it, it spends most of its life being clean." I replied. My father said those exact words to me as a kid.

"So what, uncle John???", he exclaimed. "It's a plate ... it's not anything alive!!! Who cares if it's dirty for most of its existence?

You know, I think that was the same thing I said back to my dad. Lemme think so what did my dad say to me after that? I think at that point he gave up and made me talk to my grandmother. Now what the hell did SHE say... Oh I remember now, she brought up the Taoism/Buddism link... let's try that ...

"That's the thing, Tak," I replied. "Objects such as plates, clothes, and computers are not alive like you or I, but they DO have an spirit or soul or [靈魂]. When we take ownership of these things, we have a responsibility to take care of them since they cannot take care of themselves."

Tak got silent for a few seconds. I think I just freaked him out.

"Oh my god." he said in disbelief... "are you serious?"

"I am." I replied. "These things can't move, but they do have a soul, and they can be HAPPY or SAD AND they are part of our family. Their feelings can influence the overall KARMA of the house."

Tak sat up suddenly. He was motionless for a few moments.

I continued. "You know how after you clean up the house or room, you feel better?"

"Yeah????" said Tak quietly.

"That's because you make the room or house happy, and that happiness contributes to the overall mood of the environment. So by taking care of these things and keeping them clean, you make these things happy and they can make YOU happier." I said.

"Oh my god uncle John." exclaimed Tak. "He grabbed all the dirty plates in his room. "本当にすみません [I am really sorry]" he said to the plates.

He freaked out. We spent the next 4 hours cleaning every corner of his dwelling. We scrubbed the floors, washed and dried his clothes, and washed every dirty plate in existence.

It got to the point where to the end, he was complaining to me that I was not hanging his clothes in the closet so that they were all facing in the same direction.

"Uncle John, he yelled at me. How are my clothes going to socialize with one another if they are facing the wrong direction?" he asked me angrily.

When Haruna and Ronnie came back they thought for certain I had replaced their ACTUAL TAK with some android. I assured them I did not.

Over the next few days, Tak continued to be super clean. Ronnie called me few weeks later and said whatever drug I gave to that kid, I needed to sell it.

I didn't think much else about it until a few weeks ago, when Haruna called me in a mad panic.

"John what WHAT THE HELL DID YOU TELL MY BROTHER?????" she asked me angrily.

"Haruna, I was doing the Taoist/Buddhist thing with him I just told him all things have a spirit so he should take care of them and keep them clean." I yelled back at her. "WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED NOW????"

"Your Buddhist "thing" is going to land that kid in JAIL FOR BEING A PERVERT. He just told the little girl next door that since we are always wearing some items of clothing every day, it's a shame because that means our clothes can never be all together.

I thought about that for a second. "OK I can sort of see that. Plates can be all together when you wash dishes at night. Shoes can be together when you are about ready to go to bed. But NOT clothes since you are always wearing something." I replied. "That's sort of cute"

"Yeah I thought so too." yelled Haruna, "but then he told the little neighbor girl that we should fix this by going NAKED ONCE A MONTH SO ALL OUR CLOTHES CAN BE TOGETHER AND HAVE A FAMILY GATHERING!!!!"