Over the last three weeks, I found myself in good activist company as I interacted with more than 15 young people who passionately champion causes ranging from food issues to sustainable development.

We all share the same impetus to act: we cannot accept the status quo.

How can injustice be so widespread? How can people be so nonchalant? Surely change is the only acceptable response? we ask with bright-eyed indignance, as if everyone else should feel this way too.

A colleague, however, has a response to my dreams of making the world a better place.

"If you still want to change the world after six years of working life, I'd be impressed," the 28-year-old said over lunch, revealing the cynicism he's come to embrace over the years.

What he said bears thinking. The truth is, while most people may have an affinity towards an issue or two, the harsh realities of this dog-eat-dog world often set in to waylay idealism and hope, leaving some too tired to try.

Instead, they opt to donate in cash and kind, and volunteer when it's convenient.

Of course, there is nothing wrong with doing so, and doing some good is better than doing nothing.

And then there are those whose passion, once so fiery, just expires.

The true test for this new generation of young activists, some of whom are in our Saturday Special Report today, is whether their idealism — and mine – can survive as we grow into adulthood, middle-age and perhaps even old age.

It requires tenacity and perseverance that can only be developed by overcoming obstacles one at a time.

Still, there is reason to be optimistic.

Environmentalist Geh Min, 59, recently told me about a self-taught artist who uses paintings to share his passion for the great outdoors.

The junior college teacher has even found a way to bring nature appreciation into the classroom – an effort that he hopes will have an impact on his teenage students.

"He has been able to turn his passion into his job, and has overcome the odds to do it," says Dr Geh. "People like that really give me hope."

Indeed, perhaps change isn't just about huge crusades and stadium-wide rallies. It is also about making it count in our spheres of influence, doing what we can to give fresh perspective to issues in our everyday lives.

If American anthropologist Margaret Mead has it right, all we need to change the world is a small, committed group of people.

We just need to keep our eyes on the prize, and our idealistic hopes alive.

Read more about Singapore's young activists in Saturday's Edition of The Straits Times: Young and passionate... Apathetic? Not them. More and more youth are stepping up to the plate to champion causes and make the world a better place. Cassandra Chew reports.

Today they are household names, a legacy that decendants must continue, because their success is pride, joy and a livelihood that the entire family shares in.

I can relate.

I still remember when my enterprising grandfather, chairman of his father’s confectionary ingredient business, was perfecting a recipe for a konnyaku jelly powder mix some years ago.

For months, Sunday family lunches would end with variations of the jelly, and his 11 grandchildren would tell him if it was too hard, too chewy, or just right.

And then, like Taiwanese bubble tea and Rotiboy coffee buns, the konnyaku jelly craze hit Singapore, and I could proudly tell friends: "You know, my grandfather has a mix you should try."

Now a third-generation business, much of my family’s identity has become fused with the business - practically every uncle or auntie I have works there.

Yet among the fourth-generationers old enough to help out, we have chosen to join the ranks of teachers, lawyers and journalists instead.

In fact, joining the business is an option I have hardly considered, which leads me to wonder if any of us great-grandchildren will finally be in-charge 50 years from today.

But I must say that there is something alluring about having a legacy; the idea that generations down someone will be Googling a business, an issue or a movement, and find your name amongst its milestones.

It’s the idea that what you’ve done was so significant, others can’t help but talk about it, and when someone mentions your name, everyone responds with "ah"s of recognition.

Despite growing up in a family of businessmen, my preference for shopping rather than keeping shop probably means I’m unlikely to continue in the tradition of business.

But to have a legacy and know that I’ve made a difference -- that’s something else altogether.

I’ll let you know I’ve done something worth Googling.

Read about how family and small businesses are coping in today's Saturday Special Report.

But a week after chatting with Chinese tradition experts like chefs, professors and grandmothers, I wasn't so sure.

I grew up closely with my Hainanese grandparents, and every year we have a steamboat reunion dinner, a sharks' fin soup lunch and multiple exchanges of well-wishes in between.

But before this week, I had never heard the stories of how my great-grandmother would sprinkle sugar over every dish at our New Year's Day lunch, to sweeten the new year.

I only found out through the research I was doing for today's Saturday Special Report on reunion dinners.

"None of us liked the taste of sugar in our food," Grandma said. "That's why none of her children continued it."

And just like that, a tradition that my great-grandmother brought over from Wen Chang, Hainan was put to eternal rest. If I didn't ask, I would never have known about it.

This led me to wonder: Is this the way of our traditions today?

Citing hectic schedules and work demands as reasons, pragmatic Singaporeans decide what customs to follow and which to junk.

Some hold their reunion dinners way before New Year's Eve; others have it in restaurants instead of at home. And some like my Grandma, prefer to dispense with specific practices altogether.

But as our traditions get discarded, simplified or stripped to bare bones, I wonder if 20 years from now, our cafeteria-Chineseness will result in the burying of an entire heritage?

I know it sounds a tad dramatic. But my hunch is, probably not.

By any yardstick, I've never been traditional and my woeful grasp of the Chinese language probably bears this out.

But strangely, discovering how easily traditions can be put aside and forgotten these last two weeks has jolted me out of my cultural complacency.

I realise traditions change because life changes, and the fundamental truth is, the future of our traditions lie squarely in our hands.

If we love it, it stays. If we don't, our children will never hear of it.

All of a sudden, I understand why Grandma still insists on wearing red or pink, or faithfully serves nian gao (traditional sticky rice cake) on New Year's Day.

They are one of the few things we still do that is remotely traditional, and customs that I now know will continue only by our choice.

It is a responsibility that I'm just beginning to realise requires commitment from my cousins and I, and I fully intend to have Grandma lead by example.

So while my family celebrates the Year of the Ox with a steamboat dinner and a shark’s fin lunch, I might put in a special request to have sugar added in everything else next week.

Happy Lunar New Year, everyone.

Read Cassandra Chew's Saturday Special Report and see more pictures here.