If you think about it, us Gen-Xers were born slightly more than a decade after Merdeka. Our parents and grandparents lived under the Brits and the Japanese. When I got into university (there were only six public universities then), I was only the third of my 40+ cousins to do so. Of course My parents were proud of me. They then gave me a monthly allowance that was a big chunk out of our household income.
So I valued my education. I valued the effort made to ensure I had a degree and a better life. Sure, we also fooled around, broke curfew and played too much football sometimes, but we didn't take things for granted. We were the first generation of post-Merdeka kids given the opportunity to be smarter and better off than than the generation before (where only the rich could afford to go study overseas).
We HAD to "make it". It wasn't a joke cos we knew everything laid solely in our hands. So yeah, Gen-Xers are proud of the fact that we can spell and have pretty decent manners. There really was no other way...
