The Asian tiger mom that Amy Chua portrays in her new book may seem like just one more species in the genus Extreme Parent — the counterpart to the hovering American Parens helicopterus or the Scandinavian Curling Parents, who frantically rush ahead of their children, sweeping their paths clear of the tiniest obstacles. The common characteristics include an obsession with a child's success, a reflex to treat kids as extensions or reflections of oneself and patterns of conduct ...

Re "The Roar of the Tiger Mom" [Jan. 31]: As a young Chinese American who has been on the receiving end of this sort of discipline, I can say that the ways of the tiger mom are effective and laudable to an extent. What worries me is the lack of creativity Asians instill in their children. Without creativity, we can only follow paths that someone else has made instead of making our own paths. Grace Wu, FREMONT, CALIF., U.S. It is disturbing ...

It is an irony not lost on the Chinese public that the Year of the Tiger has not been good for the big cats. On Tuesday, state media reported that dozens of tigers and other endangered animals had died of malnutrition over the past two years at the Northern Forest Zoo in the Chinese city of Harbin. Workers, who later leaked the story to the media, buried their bodies in a 3-meter pit to hide the animals ...

Will Tiger catch Jack? As this year's Masters teed off on Thursday morning, what was once an easy question — of course Tiger Woods will break Jack Nicklaus' record for most wins at major tournaments, 18 — seems harder than ever to answer. Since Woods won the 2008 U.S. Open in superhero fashion, playing on a broken leg to beat Rocco Mediate in a playoff, he has failed to win a major. A torn anterior cruciate ...

On the tiny resort island of Pulau Macan, about 85 km north of Jakarta, you might not notice the solar panels mounted above the sun-drenched pier, or the energy-efficient lightbulbs tucked into corners of huts. As you snooze in a hammock, no diesel generator disturbs your peace. Instead, energy comes from an incongruously bright red battery bank behind the clubhouse. Fed electricity by the pier's solar panels, which rotate to follow the sun, it provides power for ...

It was the "Little White Donkey" incident that pushed many readers over the edge. That's the name of the piano tune that Amy Chua, Yale law professor and self-described "tiger mother," forced her 7-year-old daughter Lulu to practice for hours on end — "right through dinner into the night," with no breaks for water or even the bathroom, until at last Lulu learned to play the piece. For other readers, it was Chua calling her older daughter Sophia ...

Lee Westwood finally takes No. 1 spot from Tiger Woods The Englishman becomes the world's top-ranked golfer after Woods held the spot for a record 281 weeks. Lee Westwood had little reason to think one year ago he could be No. 1 in the world, a position that looked "unattainable" the way Tiger Woods had been dominating golf for so much of the decade. Golf can take some peculiar turns, though, which Westwood knows better than most. Westwood reached No. 1 on Sunday for ...

Tiger Woods is No. 2 as Westwood Takes Top Spot he turmoil in his personal life has taken a toll on Tiger Woods. After a reign of more than five years as the world's number one golfer, Woods has dropped to second behind a player who's never won a major. CBS News correspondent Tony Guida reports that when Woods congratulated Lee Westwood at a tournament four weeks ago, he knew Westwood was gunning for his crown. Sunday, after 281 weeks at the ...

Tiger Woods, at the Virtual Tee First The first time I met Tiger Woods, in 2005, I was shocked to find myself talking to a real person. Standing in a deserted Sheep Meadow in Central Park, he waved off his handful of P.R. people, and we spent about 15 minutes just talking about video games. Personable, gregarious and altogether down to earth, he lighted up as he told me how much he enjoyed the Socom special forces games because his father ...

Tiger is getting to know himself We might never know Tiger Woods, but he might finally be getting to know himself Everybody, not just the famous, has both a public and a private face. Those two versions of ourselves are never completely reconciled, nor would most of us want them to be. Our interior life, our soul, our truest sense of ourselves, whatever you call it, is too difficult and changing a thing to summarize easily or share widely. But when the gap ...