Musings off a little red book

2009-09-05T01:14:00.003-07:00

Lightning and Thunder, and a Bit of Home

Once again, Summer has come to it's abrupt death.

It was only months ago we witnessed the coming of spring. The blooming flowers, amidst the bluish marble sky, and the sounds of birds chirping in unison. All this, came together as part of an age old rite. This rite was witnessed from the days of yore, where our earliest ancestors left the comforts of their dwellings, to envelope themselves in lush greenish pastures. It meant for them with the coming of the sun - life: the reaping of the harvest, and the fulfillment of the promise of months upon months of persistence and perseverance. However, the summer was never marked to be just the fulfillment of their temporal dietary needs. They knew that the summer, and whatever life it brings with it, must and will eventually come to an end. Thousands of years before Newton developed his First Law, men understood that everything that has a beginning, must have an end. However, there are many ends to conceive, especially one which determines future survival. They, our first ancestors, knew that eventually everything will come full circle, and the cycle shall begin yet again. With this knowledge, they stored their surplus harvest in storehouses organized through the formation of complex social structures which form the basis of society we know today. They too, began looking for new lands to till, with the coming of the next summer in mind. Men learned that to survive, not just for herself, but for each of her own, one has to bear the hardships dealt to them by life, and soldier on.

Today, our daily struggles involve far more than just worrying about the next harvest. Many of us have issues of our own. I've heard stories of how people struggle to find work; friends who are under incredible pressure to fulfill the social expectations laid upon them by their parents to get a good job for themselves after the financial investments they have put into their college education; some of us have personal problems - struggles with our own identity, with our love lives. Myself, well, I just do not know where I am going with my life and I can't seem to get around doing something about it.

Some would describe this coming of Fall as a transition marked by depression. The leaves wither and die, the birds migrate to warmer climates, and the Vancouver sky is shrouded in mist and fog, and the land is covered in icy snow. I concede more often than not, I'll be one of the first people to say that I wish summer was here again!

But last night, I heard the sound of thunder roaring through the night sky. Given that I have been a victim of a lightning strike in my teenage years, I was never fond of the coming of a thunderstorm. But it was different last night, as I watched the momentary flashes of light. I guess it was because as I closed my eyes, and heard the raging roar of nature, it reminded me a little of home. Being so far away from home, and held present in a foreign land, these brief moments of internalization actually served as a source of comfort - that even amidst the strangeness of where I am, I still could witness something I always saw back home, back to where I was most familiar with.

So what of the change of the seasons then? I believe that it is not so much what the seasons hold. The seasons, as our ancestors knew, will come and go. Eventually, it was what the transition of the seasons meant for each of ourselves. As each of us reflect upon the challenges of our lives, it is pretty easy to channel all those problems unto the natural setting we see before us. However, if we are to remain strong and resilient like our forefathers were, even amidst the most torrid of nature's rage, couldn't we persuade ourselves that summer would eventually come? That our problems regardless of whether it is summer or fall will always be there, and that all we need to do the lessen the burdens laid upon our souls is to take that first step and work towards the betterment of ourselves. Even if we were to fall short, at least we tried, but failed, but the whole experience has made each of us stronger and wiser. Failure, will not just be an end itself, but rather a rejuvenation of the self, when summer comes again. For this is the rite, the rite which all men had been through. It is up to us to decide for ourselves if we are to appreciate these rites beyond the passing of the seasons.

2009-04-09T17:34:00.002-07:00

Them and us

I was having dinner with a couple of friends last night when we inevitably broached on the topic of the hostage crisis occurring off the coast of Somalia, where a U.S Citizen was held hostage by four pirates. So what inevitably happen was that a US Destroyer was deployed to the area and negotiations began to free the captive.

So we began like mocking what was obviously a mismatch - four Somali Pirates against a US Destroyer the size of a football field armed to the teeth against AK-47 wielding former fishermen. But the humor slowly began to evaporate, as we began talking about how we should deal with the situation. One of my friends, an American (he doesn't know I have a blog so I'm at liberty to quote him) thought that " we ought to teach this people a lesson, they just wouldn't learn". In reply, my other friend added to the litany of disdain for 'this people' - " we should just blast down right out of the water!" Well, given that I was in a social situation which required me to go with the flow, I simply just nodded my head and somewhat agreed with them. But, I felt disturbed.

Then I got off and began surfing the net and my regular trawling through the HuffingtonPost and I came across an article about the hostage crisis, and since we were just talking about it,I wanted to find out what were the latest developments. Like most major news sites, the Huffpost side also encourages readers comments on the various issues, and so with every article, you would usually see a whole diversity of views. But it being the HuffingtonPost, there is a certain left-wing bias in the commentary. Which made it even more surprising when I went through the comments to realize an avalanche of views of the 'nuke them' and 'kill them all' variety.

So I turned on the news and LIVE on CNN it was Breaking NEWS coverage of the hostage drama. They were doing interviews with various 'piracy experts', former hostage negotiators, the usual fare u get on 24 hour network television. But most striking was the personalization of the hostage victim - his picture was flashed on the screen and every few moments the anchor reminded us who he was and where he came from. I'm not American, but I did identify with him and I can imagine Americans or people in the Western world seeing him as the atypical everyday guy who works an honest living, just like many of us. For me, he reminded me of my dad.

Then the reality, that this individual who is one of us, is now taken captive by savage pirates. These pirates who have no morals, no ethics, who are greedy money grabbing crooks, who totally deserve to face the full force of the American Navy for their intolerable actions of barbarity.

But who exactly are these pirates? I wonder.

I recalled what my friend said earlier at the pub, " They just never learn." I guess for he, like many others, these pirates have been arbitrarily categorized as part of 'the other' - a club which includes Jihadist, Terrorist, Gun wielding psychopaths.

But consider this, Pirates were not made overnight. Unlike Al Qaeda, they don't plan to put an end to 'Western Civilization'. They don't fly planes into buildings or plant IEDs along the streets of Baghdad. They have no nuclear ambitions and unlike the ever-lovable Kim Jung IL, they sure don't have the means to launch missiles to threaten their neighbors.

They are individuals who just seek a means of survival, albeit adhering to a means which we deem to be unlawful and unethical. But we should begin by asking ourselves, why aren't they adhering to the basic universal principles which you and I here in the 'civilized world' adhere to?

Firstly, Somalia has not much of a government in place. The last time a government was in place, it was an Islamic government, so the Ethiopians with the urging of the 'Civilized World' decided to run them out. Without a semblance of any authority, there isn't any judiciary, much less a system of justice which form the basis for law enforcement. Without a semblance of law and order, we have ourselves a situation where people just simply take the law into their own hands.

Secondly, Greed. Well, Greed's bad, just look at all those Wall Street Bankers our governments are bailing out, from which comes debt which you and I, the younger generation would have to bear in future, mind you! So yes, these Somali Pirates are greedy - for using brute force to comissorate what does not belong to them, as such they deserve their fate along with the rest of their kind. How I love the masculinity expressed in those words.

But beneath all this rhetoric is another side of the story, which I do not claim to be the truth, rather something we should consider before we 'nuke those bastards'. Many of these pirates were former fishermen, their livelihoods depressed because of the insurgence of international trawling companies into their traditional waters. Because of the absence of the means of their traditional mode of making a living, coupled with the non-existence of law enforcement, we have ourselves the creation of a sub-culture where piracy is seen to be an honorable means of making a living.

This is not to say what they are doing is right, or my denial of their actions to be wrong. But I think the last decade - the futility of the Wars in Iraq, the unprecedented violation of human rights by governments of 'civilized nations' utilizing the scourge of terrorism to push for unfetted powers over their citizens have taught us between right and wrong, there are always shades of grey.

Everyone Im sure, hopes for a peaceful end to this crisis, and that the victim would be safely reunited with his family and his loved ones. For him, we pray.

But at the same time, we have to be aware that if we allow the specter of the moment to drive our actions and press for retaliation that doesn't merit the situation, those arbitrary categorizations that were enacted in the pub would not just be arbitrary categorization. We might just, as we did in the past, spawn new coastal communities of jihadis bound on destruction.

2009-04-04T13:33:00.002-07:00

Giovanni Francesco Anerio's Requiem Mass (Introitus) - In memory of 奶奶

This is part of the Introit of Anerio's Requiem Mass. Under the traditional Latin Rite of the Mass, Requiem masses are introduced with a prayer to God that goes as such (Courtesy of Wikipedia as usual):

Requiem æternam dona eis, Domine,
et lux perpetua luceat eis.
Te decet hymnus Deus, in Sion,
et tibi reddetur votum in Ierusalem.
Exaudi orationem meam;
ad te omnis caro veniet.
Requiem æternam dona eis, Domine,
et lux perpetua luceat eis.

And in English:

Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord,
and let perpetual light shine upon them.
A hymn becomes you, O God, in Zion,
and to you shall a vow be repaid in Jerusalem.
Hear my prayer; to you shall all flesh come.
Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord,
and let perpetual light shine upon them.”

And to grandma, it's been so long and yet we all miss you dearly, in pace requiescat..

2009-03-22T03:40:00.006-07:00

Reversal of Roles

Sometimes you just wonder, why our parents always do their best to make things pure and simple, and to portray the world as a this really nice place - full of joy and happiness. But only for us to realize, as we grow, that things are far from simple. Yes, I never quite understood why? Until not long ago, I still held onto the notion that I'll be a lot better off if they had just unveil to me life's realities at a much earlier age.

But now I understand.

As most of you know, my brother Greg just entered junior college and he is taking up this new subject called Knowledge Enquiry - it is almost akin to a introductory philosophy course in College. Anyways, he is sorta finding the subject tough to cope with, because the course introduces several abstract concepts that require lotsa brain work and the most dreaded part of being a student of humanities - reading. So Greg, knowing that I'm pretty into Philo asked me a few questions about some thinkers he needed to read up for his class.

First, he asked about Hegal and his dialectics, along with why is it so significant in our understanding of current events.

So I did explain to him about thesis, anti-thesis, synthesis and how eventually culminates in the end of history.

But then, the next part of the question was hard to answer, not because I did not know the answer, but I did not know how I should put across the answer in such a way I would not confuse my little brother. I wanted to tell him how Hegal's ideas formed the basis for Imperialism, Colonialism, Cold War Theory, Bush Doctrine, Manichean World View. But I just felt disturbed having to educate my brother on how the world is so artfully complicated and yes fucked up. Yes, I was suffering from major dissonance, because here was a kid I taught time tables and Alphabets, now I'm telling him that more than a hundred million people died because of this framework many of our fellow men had choose to blindly adopt and adhere to.

So, without thinking much, I watered down my explanation to the extend I sounded convoluted, not just to keep things simple, but to be able to answer to my conscience. But, alas, like how I somehow always knew there was something more than meets the eye when mum goes around in circles rationalizing a bad situation, my brother perceived the self-imposed censorship I slapped on myself.

He smiled, and he asked me, good v bad, them and us, just like how they justified the invasion of Iraq.

I was awe-struck, but I should have known. Because just as my mum had tried dancing around the real spot of trouble she was in years ago, so was I today. But she did, and I did it, because as she loved me, and I as I was concerned that I would crush that perfect world I pre-supposed my brother still believed in. But I also should have known, that like me, he also knew that things were far from simple, and that the idle world which we all once possessed, had long passed into memory.

2009-02-21T00:52:00.003-08:00

Playing life's game

Yes, as it comes, it goes, and we herald a new school week, with the reading break all but behind us.
I did hold myself to certain expectations - that I'll dedicate this week to catching up with the back log of readings. That, rather unsurprisingly, I have failed to attain, but anyhow, it is all but behind us now. The ever constant urge to procrastinate, the extra hour in bed, or the frequent excursions I took to lala land, just proved too hard to transcend. But even that is all but behind us now. With the old week deceased, comes the promises of the new. Although it presents itself as a Herculean task, but I guess I must at least make the effort. It is never what we get out of it, but rather the memory of the effort, the knowledge that we have tried. The memories of the ends will just evaporate with time. But effort, well, we will acknowledge it, for it is not just purely substantive, but it holds us and defines us as the individuals we are.

We are all dealt a hand, which holds what life has bestowed on us, that is beyond our control. Some perpetually the pair of As, others well two odd number cards. But in essence, the hand we are dealt, how we are to play it is solely determined by us. So when the flop and the river cards are dealt, we may find ourselves doomed by destiny's hand. We can be foolhardy and take a bet with destiny, which by pure chance, we may triumph over destiny's sway. But we may also be beaten, and capitulate to her dictates. We can fold and live to fight another day, but never should we fold and give up on life itself. Rather take the bet if you must, fall hard and rise again. Or fold, if your temperament demands of you, and go at it again some other day. Whichever way, we will win some and loss some, those are the ends. But the memory of playing destiny's game with a poker face, will be cast upon eternity.

2009-02-19T16:34:00.002-08:00

Summer Itinerary

Just a slight alteration for Summer 2009 due in part to Mum making a huge din about the shortness of my length of stay in Singapore

So instead of being back from June 14 to July 4, I'll be in Singapore from June 14 to July 24. Yay! Oh ya instead of departing from LA, I'll be departing from San Fran instead.

2009-02-17T00:18:00.003-08:00

Japanese Finance Minister in a drunken stupor at G8 Press Conference

Rachel Maddow totally rocks!

"I dun speak Japanese, but I do speak hammer, and that dude is hammered!"

Oh btw, that drunk dude, Shoichi Nakagawa, he lost his job adding to the already escalating unemployment rate in Japan.

2009-02-16T00:51:00.004-08:00

Ice Skating/Academy of St Martin-in-the-fields

I apologize for the sketchy title.

Those two activities have little or no relation with one another, with the exception that it took place on the same day, and at the end, I felt that both activities went really well and were really fun in their own ways. A huge credit goes to the company, with good company, regardless of any unexpected hiccups or misadventures, things will still turn out well, and it did.

I say so because I totally dislike ice skating. Seriously, I just don't get the notion of threading around in ice, with really uncomfortable shoes that gives you really bad foot aches and blisters, and with little kids romping pass u making u look like a total idiot. Yeah, that' sums up the experience - my first ice skating endeavor.

But the company was great. Anthony like me, played the fool. Well, Jennifer and her sister, they were real good! And they were pretty good teachers as well, except I was a really slow learner who just could not get my footing right. The whole time, I was just so afraid to fall on Kristen, shes barely up to my shoulders and I know the consequences would be disastrous if I fell on her.

Well then to the second event of the day, this time it is a concert featuring the Academy of St Martin-in-the-fields, held at the grand old Orpheum Theater. It is literally the grand old dame of the cultural scene her in Vancouver, and the facade of the buildings says it all. The rich lush steps, adorned with overarching walls, with mirrors decked along the sidewalks reflecting the majesty of concert evenings, where fine ladies and gentleman throng through the hallways in their full regalia, exhibiting all the pomp and circumstance of the occasion.

The academy dished out a repertoire of Baroque pieces, namely Bach's Violin Concerto No. 1 and 2. I'm no music expert, but in my humble opinion, it is definitely one of the better interpretations of Bach out there. The form is majestically maintained, with little exuberance, in full deference to the composers' work. The performance on the whole was very disciplined and the piece well articulated.

It was great to have Serene there, I mean she's the most avid armchair critic u can find. When the music is good, she listens with a nod of satisfaction and when it was beyond everyone's understanding, she just folded her arms in anticipation(I think it is more wtf, I paid 40 bucks for this?).

Yeah for some reason, the last piece was just mind baffling. With little or no form or structure, a theme invariably present in today's contemporary classical compositions. William Walton's Sonata for Strings, as Serene so tacitly pointed out said one thing - a rejection of the status quo and I guess the Academy being what it stood for, did not just coincidentally arranged the Walton piece as an after thought to Mozart and Bach, two of the cornerstones of the Classical Music tradition. Well, if indeed it was supposed to be a statement, what a statement it was, because people started leaving after the Second Movement. However, some in the audience saw the point, stayed on and gave the academy a rousing standing ovation.

Haha, but it is THE Academy of St-Martin-In-the-Fields, of course you applaud them.But as a whole, I throughly enjoyed the experience and the company most of all, haha.

So with all that, that is my eventful day, I hope yours went well too.

2009-02-14T02:19:00.003-08:00

Yes here we go again, towards the warmth and comfort of Summer

First, our esteemed national carrier has decided to shut off it's operations to Vancouver effective April 25th. This drawback certainly reflects the pathetic state of their finances, and I offer my deepest regrets and wish them well. My only hope is that they will not take away my precious Krisflyer points or stiffen the criteria dictating the redemption process, which is as complicated as it is.

But there is always something good which comes out from even the most dire of circumstances..

So as i struggle to scavenge every detail I could find with regards to my return ticket, I began to see a whole new set of possibilities enacting itself. Apparently, our esteemed national carrier (via Air Canada) has decided to fly us down to the States, from where we can board the flight for Singapore from either Los Angeles or San Francisco, which in itself doesn't present such a negative prospect afterall. Although it translates to a full 24 hours on the plane, and having to go through American Customs.. which can be a real nightmare.

So here's my plan, in view of the unforeseen turn of events, my Summer iteinary would be as such

04May - 12 June: Summer School I
13 June - Exams
14June - Leave for LA
15 June - Leave for Singapore
16 June - Reach Singapore
16 June -whenever - Singapore Singapore Singapore
Sometime in June: Community Service in Cambodia
04 July: Back to Vancouver with Dad
05 July: Summer School II

So yes, LA for a day! For such a negative turn of events, it really doesn't hold such a negative prospect after all.

2009-02-12T22:20:00.003-08:00

Thucydides wrote

" The Strong did what they did, the weak suffered what they must"

Bullshit..

2009-02-08T01:46:00.002-08:00

Oh lamentations, the repose of nature's burdens
From whose cup, every scorn I shall fill, and every love I shall drink
Do not allow me to be overwhelmed by you this time
for I can scarcely allow myself to be succored into your ways
But let me be gone from your oppressive hold
and allow me to cherish what beauty has brought
For this I beg of you, and will offer in return, my heart and soul.
And if you shall refuse, only disdain and contempt I shall return.
For even you shall not hold, for I shall know myself no more.

2009-02-02T00:44:00.002-08:00

Dear Aunty N

So I've heard and I am deeply sorry that it has turned out so
What pain this pronouncement must have been
What sadness this sentence must have drawn
But in this weary moment of confusion
I pray that you do not for one moment waver in affliction
but that you would be strong for all you love
As they stay strong for you, whom they love

I am a son as well, dear aunty, and I know a sons love for a mother
It is never quite pronounced or as finely articulated as it should be
But nonetheless, the love for a mother is second nature to us all.
Although we might frown at your seemingly petty quibbles
Or express nonchalance at your torrent of nagging concerns
But in our shallow reticence, we do know your love for us.
Although we struggle to express that same love we have of you.

So Aunty, please do not waver, as you prepare to mount this struggle
Against the pernicious spirit of our body's weakness,
We can only hope to summon the strength your spirit possesses.
A spirit which is free and undying, and never ceases to inspire
all you've touched in one way or another, through all this time, through all these years.

It is the same spirit which I believe, will enliven your weary being.
And as we go forth, to be healed by the almighty.

2009-02-01T11:58:00.003-08:00

Dear Mum ,

Please do not work so hard
Your friends are dropping like flies
All because they tried so hard
And never had thought twice

Is it all worth while to work the night away
To slave and toil, sweating blood and tears
All for those ungrateful fiends
who scarcely gives a fuck
should anything happen to you
maybe a basket they will send
just to wish you well
but if your life should end
there's a whole ground swell
where they can pick and choose
a replacement for you.

Dear Mum please do not work so hard
Maybe you do not know
But your children loves you so
much that we do not care for worldly riches no more
But just want you, our loving mum.

2009-01-30T10:14:00.002-08:00

Voi Che Sapete

All thanks to Anthony, I came to know of this UBC Online Classical Library which contains a treasure trove of classical pieces from a whole host of performers.

http://internal.ubc.classical.com/index.php

Unfortunately, if you aren't a UBC Student, you would not be able to access it.

I've always been fascinated with Mozart's chorals and operas - having watched Amedeus and seen how Mozart composed the Requiem with his dying words. The piece seem to express the wishes of a dying man for eternal absolution from the almighty. It takes a true genius, to be able to utter those words and compose the melodic repetoire under so much distress (Mozart while facing death, was in financial ruin, and his estranged wife had left with him, taking his son away from him).

But Mozarts ability and willingness to express our inner most emotional states is reflected beyond the Requiem. As I have said, I have always been fascinated with Operas and Chorals, and some having gotten access to the online library, I decided to listen to a recording of the Opera - 'The Marriage of Figaro'

If you want a synopsis of this, go read it on wiki. However, that said, there was this particular aria that perfectly articulates the sensuality and the emotional state of one in love. In our post-post-modern age, where the articulation of love is nothing more than cliche, or as a means to sexual gratification, this might just seem out of touch to us. But Mozart far from ignores the sensual aspect of love, rather he embraces and recognizes sensuality, but he also articulates the personal struggle one faces against the bounds of social dictates and morality - as one is lost in confusion, enacted by his or her encapsulation to one's mortal state. But his expression of love, is done through the articulation of sensuality in word and song, rather than just mere physicality.

This is Voi Che Sapete..

In this aria, Cherubino, the page boy serenades to the Countess, whom he is madly infatuated with and is singing a peice he (Cherubino) wrote in her honor.

Translation from Wiki (hehe)

You who know what love is,
Ladies, see if I have it in my heart.
I'll tell you what I'm feeling,
It's new for me, and I understand nothing.
I have a feeling, full of desire,
Which is by turns delightful and miserable.
I freeze and then feel my soul go up in flames,
Then in a moment I turn to ice.
I'm searching for affection outside of myself,
I don't know how to hold it, nor even what it is!
I sigh and lament without wanting to,
I twitter and tremble without knowing why,
I find peace neither night nor day,
But still I rather enjoy languishing this way.
You who know what love is,
Ladies, see if I have it in my heart.

2008-11-26T01:40:00.002-08:00

Knowing grateful.

If anyone has been noticing at all, over the last few weeks, I've been reducing the content of this blog to pure cynical angry mutter. Yeah..I was just PMSin, cmmon' even us guys do get our off periods.

But today, I am grateful and thankful, even as I'm sitting here at 1am in the morning rummaging through what is my second essay in a week. Although I must admit the history grades sure did help a lot.

I am grateful firstly for turning 24. I never quite gotten to the extend of really savoring how stable my life has been. It was never a bed of roses, but somehow or rather there was always a way out and by some strange divination? I always got out of fixes unscaved.

I also possessed great and wonder parents that had brought me into this world, something which I always took for granted.

I am grateful for my brother, for even as I am writing my essay, he was sitting right beside me on his com, playing some silly MMORTS game online which I think is completely ridiculous.But I felt a little nostalgic when I realized for a moment that it felt like A levels all over again, where he would sneak into my room to play computer in the wee hours of the morning even though we had school the next day He was in primary school then, but he is all grown up now.

I have, as well, somehow grown out of my A level days, I hope. But I do know if I could hold on to this optimism in the midst of all this exams..all the struggles to come (although exams seem to be too trivial to be categorized as life's struggles) , I guess I wouldn't be too far off saying that somehow or rather from here on now, everything is going to be all right, everything will be just fine.

2008-11-19T18:06:00.001-08:00

I've tried

Yearn I have, try I must, fail I may, tried I had.
When all comes to light, when push comes to shaft
I can just take a walk away, without a tinge of remorse
or a void of emptiness.
I can say at the end of it I did try
I will pay no heed to callous calls,or the proverbial coronation
of the archetypal loser.
I will not watch in disgust the sweet sucklings ennobled
to the other
I will not be feel the need for self-comforting, or the concoction
which might take my cares away
Or that callous self pity so many availed themselves to
Or that mortal distress that shimmers from the nether vaults
of our existence
I will instead stand tall and proud, and curse away the bitter gripes
the mar my trembling lips
And patronize that arrogant brute who holds in his hand the sweet
price of victory
And toasts the musings of all the bystanders and onlookers whose
has made one’s misery their soaring commercial
For yet again I told myself I’ve tried.
Even if I feel ill or empty, solemn or sorry
Or meet with periodical distress, for a part of myself has been
taken from me
Or infused with deep resentment and anger towards the jurisprudence, fate
has meted upon me

I’ll tell myself I’ve tried
They have all tried
Everyday of their lives
Everyday, the struggle.
Now they are dead and
I’ve tried and I have had enough.

2008-11-19T03:45:00.003-08:00

Brandenburg Concerto No. 3 - J.S Bach

{Brandenburg Concerto No.3 in G BWV 1048} Allegro - Johann Sebatian Bach

I'm addicted to this piece, I've been replaying it over and over again, while slugging through my classics paper. It's just what the baroque is all about - control, grace, style, pomp and precision.

2008-11-15T23:11:00.004-08:00

Does anyone remember those early formative years, where we yearn for almost anything that bears or conjures any fascination. It seems so long away, but I remembered in spite of my petulant insistence, I did not get what I want all the time. But why did we want those little animate objects - those toys and figurines, what could it possible give us? What joy? What elation? A certain possession? That is what we ask, now that we have grown. For we have grown out of those toys, those figurines, but have we grown out of ourselves - our wants, our desires?

Or has it just metamorphosized into something that is now beyond the scope of conscience, of control, of curtailment?

Like a child who plots to portray a semblance of good behavior, he wants the toy, and for the toy he behaves. Now that he has grown, he plots as well, he get what she desires, he gets what he wants irregardless of what it takes. For it is the toy he wants.

2008-11-14T17:07:00.003-08:00

Family

I was speaking to Greg on MSN a couple of days ago and something sort of struck me abt the different characteristics each member of my family possessed and all you needed to do was to look at each of their personal messages

ME - Liberty lies in the mind, divorced of the soul, befallen in life (Life sucks, I know)
Mum - GOD is GREAT! (Yes mum, praise the lord..)
Lil Greg - I'm starting at perfection! (Please Greg, I know its gonna be 6 pts, but enough already)
Cousin Maurtiz - Intelligence plus character, that is the goal of education (Like you were even in school..)
BIG Cousin Matthias - Because it is Love.. (Err...dun tell me its that ridiculous gal I saw at Cine)

Well, dad doesn't do MSN - but I bet if he had a personal message it'll be - What a great family we have.. now lets grab some beer and talk politics.

2008-11-11T00:02:00.003-08:00

A misanthropist heaven

We've found this quiet little corner at the library to study in between lessons, I would say as Emily Bronte did - that it is the perfect misanthropist heaven, at least so for a imperfect misanthropist like myself. But it is funny that in this silence which was suppose to facilitate actual studying, we've come across some odd features around us that we would never have had realized if not for the situation we have put ourselves under.

From that odd man who brings along a sleeping bag, and places himself between shelves DS231 - DS280 without fail every single day, he would just lay on his 'bed' and simply read his day away. It seems like the shelves provides the walls of his habitat and books the fodder for his existence.

Then there is another, an elderly man, who I gather to be in his late seventies or early eighties. He dresses well, in his well pressed coat, he seems to be around all the time, punching the keys to the keyboard and screeching his eyes through those dark rimmed glasses. He is also a regular feature, I glanced at him once, he looked back and nodded his head in recognition, as if he knew I was wondering what was he doing there everyday.

Then we have the students like ourselves, who somehow have found fondness for this part of the library. They come and they go, but then over time, you somehow know who is who. Not that I knew them, we've hardly spoken a word, but their mere presence somehow assured me that I was not on the wrong set, and life just goes on.

So is it with the odd old man or that odd man slumped in his odd sleeping bag. I look for them everyday to be there, if they weren't for some reason one day, I guess I would then become the perfect misanthropist in a perfect misanthropist heaven.

2008-11-10T01:10:00.004-08:00

J.S Bach: Unfinished Fugue (Contrapunctus XIV)

Bach's final piece, it is unfinished because he died, but what a beautiful piece he left us all with, even though unfinished, the sudden abruptness of the ending brought meaning to it all - that Bach would rather meet his end upon a unfinished work than a complete masterpiece. He wanted to have the rest of the piece written for him, by us, to make sense of it all, for ourselves - the living.

2008-05-18T12:58:00.004-07:00

Trepidation from Loss

In the last few weeks, we've seen episodes of loss throughout the world. Some of these 'losses' have massive life changing consequences - such as the loss of life experienced by many survivors of the earthquake in China and victims of the Cyclone Nargar in Myanmar. Life for these individuals will never be the same again as they have lost many of their loved ones; their personal possessions - articles which one would have used as gauges to assess the future have been painfully wiped out in a single blow. Now, everything is lost, everything is gone, the future seems tenuously bleak and it is tough to phantom how one can go on living as they once did or to summon the courage and optimism in the mix of all the bitter cynicism that surrounds their existence.

Then we have loss, in a very different sense.

The Democratic Primary between Senators Obama and Clinton have come to a head. Obama has a mathematically insurmountable lead in the race for delegates and superdelegates. However, Senator Clinton ardently refuses to concede the race, claiming a greater stake to the nomination on the basis of her electability amongst white voters and her ability to win large bell weather states. In spite of the rhetorical slashing and dicing, everyone is fully aware that eventually all has to come to a naught, and the race has to end in accordance with the premises that have been set forth. That would undoubtedly point to Senator Clinton's eventual withdrawal from the race.

Accepting loss on the other hand is never easy. To meekly surrender one's life long ambitions for the greater good of a larger cause can sometimes come across as destiny's deceit which has rob one of his or her ambitions, one would convince oneself to be so rightly his or hers . For Senator Clinton, the refusal to accept lost is fast becoming out of touch with reality and an insistence of preserving her right to an ambition which was never hers in the onset. Instead, such a right is a right that is exhibited and demonstrated by the numerous primaries and caucuses, of which millions exercised their right to elect their parties nominee. Senator Clinton's insistence on staying on can be acclaimed and applauded on the values of perseverance, but it also borders dangerously on arrogance, and worst of all the failure to accept the collective will - which as time passes, jeopardizes the chances of the eventual Democratic nominee in the General Election against John McCain. One can certainly imagine the prospect of having four more years of the same old shit.

When I pause and reflect, as I watch the streaming news reels of the increasing death toll that marked both tragedies, I feel deeply sorry for the victims of both disasters as they were not the masters of their destinies, but instead have had destiny robbed their dignity and their right to life. The ineffectual and reticent attitudes of government in the Naga situation further adds scorn unto the wounds that has been already afflicted upon those victims.

On the other hand, we have the race for the Democratic nomination. Loss here, comes in the demise of one's life long ambitions, held together by the aspirations of millions who see their fates tied to the fortune of their candidate. It is tough to hold one's destiny by the hand and accept the inevitable end - to step aside for the good of all. While one might argue that Mrs Clinton has been robbed of her destiny, in truth, she has no one to blame but her own follies. She has in the words of one commentator 'the surest path to the Presidency, but has spun it with one mistake after another.' If Mrs Clinton were to hold herself true to her own words that only the best candidate should be the nominee for the party, she has to recognize that she has outdone herself - by allowing Senator Obama go inhibited in his 11 state route and choosing to opt for firewalling Obama in Ohio and Texas (and she and her team didn't realize that Texas not only had a primary, but a caucus as well and made the realization only at the 11th hour). Not only that, Senator Clinton has to accept that she has been well and truly outdone by Senator Obama.

The Freshman Senator from Illinois, has outraised, outspent, and outmaneuvered what was touted as the well oiled and seasoned campaign machine of Senator Clinton. Detractors would call him fortunate to have done so, given the follies of the Clinton campaign. However, as Machiavelli has so famously articulated, 'Fortune Favors the Bold'. Nominee Obama has capitalized on Mrs Clinton's mistakes and put together a strategy which played to his strengths in concentrating his resources upon states whose demographics were favorable to him, while anticipating momentum to carry him through those that were not. As we near the end of this primary season, we can now see where that strategy has carried him to.

2008-05-12T01:09:00.002-07:00

It is great to be home. Over the past week, life has been good. The bottomless binging, the over indulgent shopping, the royal treatment one gets at home - all this is all too much to ask for. Right now, I am currently running a massive deficit of Bush administration proportions. Thankfully, I have the most doting relations to bail me out of my exploits. Moreover, unlike the Chinese and Japanese, I do not even need to pay them back a single dime, much less with interest For all this, I'm grateful for I know it's their little way of saying that they are really glad to see me alive and well and I guess I can only make non binding promises that I'll return the favor some day.

This little vacation is so much more than an R&R. It is a time to look back, and reflect as to what has gone right or wrong. In terms of academic wise, the grades were pretty good and all, but I guess on the social side of things, I failed miserably. I unwittingly allowed myself to be bogged down with the troubles with and within the apartment and allowed those issues to take a personal toll on my relationships with others. Furthermore, I got stuck more often than not within my comfort zone. All this has to change for the next sem, which would be my third, which I'll strive to attain a more balanced outlook towards all matters. For starters, I have made a definitive decision to live alone. It wouldn't be exactly the most economical decision, but one which will entail more personal space and hopefully, that will trickle down to effecting other matters as well.

Till then, I guess it'll mean more food and shopping. Part of this enterprise has lead to a new addition to my inventory. Right now, I'm blogging this entry in the all new 'sultry' Macbook, all 13 inches of it, with all the additional gizmos and specifications which I will fascinate myself with, albeit while the fascination lasts.

2008-04-27T01:11:00.000-07:00

Weeks End

Here is this coming week’s repertoire. I utilize the term repertoire because everything has just been so meticulously planned out and there is no room for anything else. Let’s see, Exams end-Shopping-Packing-Shopping-Packing-Movie-Moving-Goldfinger gig-Moving-Airport-Flight-Incheon-Flight-Singapore-Sleep-Sleep-Sleep. And Mr Tan’s birthday of course.

Anyway, I look forward to seeing all of you and if anyone wants anything in particular from this part of the world, e-mail before it’s too late.

2008-04-21T18:46:00.002-07:00

Crito

Socrates, standing upon death’s kneel, refused to relent against his convictions.

The laws that confine me to this state are unjust, but they are the laws of Athens. Without Athens, there isn’t me. My father, from whose seeds I came forth, will not have married my mother, if it wasn’t for those laws. If it wasn’t for these laws, and wasn’t for this state, I wouldn’t have the rum in my belly or the intellect I possess which I acquired through learned education. What is me is given to me by Athens, and as such I am beheld to the laws which emanate from Athens.

So my dear Crito, even if my death shall bring you a bad name for not doing your part as a friend, for not injecting the necessary convictions within me to plot my escape and make mockery of these laws, I shall stay, albeit reluctantly, to await the next day when the cup of hemlock is laid before me. I shall drink and partake of the hemlock, as this is the will of Athens. For if the laws are transcended, what do we make of these laws, and what then do we make of Athens from whom these very laws emanate?

2008-04-20T00:33:00.004-07:00

The Econs Paper went pretty ok, I think. Although I was constantly invoking the god given art of smoking my way through with pretty much most of the questions, and everyone knows what that enterprise usually forebodes. But I think, I should take comfort in the knowledge that I could actually have fared a lot worse than what is about to come, given that I was still trying to figure out how to proof Savings=Investments via the National Accounting mechanism like 5 mins before the commencement of the exam and had no idea what it meant like 5 hours after the whole exam even though I answered a question relating to that. That was Econs for me. Furthermore, I bask in the knowledge that I will would henceforth, cease having to see the world through random numbers and excruciating mathematical formulas and hypothetical models for the rest of my academic life. Amen to that.

Anyway, that excruciating experience aside, I was watching this really funny impersonation of George W Bush by Will Ferrell. It is freaking hilarious, with Jon Stewart actually 'interviewing' him and asking him about the wind down of his presidency and all.

Yeah, it's smoky burn out time you no good microfiche!

2008-04-18T00:57:00.004-07:00

Vivaldi Four Seasons Summer Presto 3rd Movement by Sarah Chang

I think this has to be one of my favorite classical pieces, somehow or rather, it just brings the opulence of the renaissance and the baroque era to life with it's depictions of summer time. Well and can there be any better person than Sarah Chang to play it (Can't belief I missed her performing the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto with the VSO), but she's just lovely and she brings in the enthusiasm, pomp and intensity that are so essential in this piece. Enjoy.

Anyways, how are exams? Truly, I wish it were over already.

2008-04-12T09:44:00.002-07:00

Updates

It's officially the end of the semester, and exams are up. Although I used to be vexed during this period in past years, there is a certain sense of calm this time round. It began, I belief with the realization that there is only so much one can study or for that matter, attain a certain grade due to the aforementioned effect. Furthermore, the grades from the term papers and mid terms came back, and I'm pretty happy with all of it. I guess knowing that, sort of takes the steam out of the whole equation.

That said, we are also getting ready to move out. Harpreet and the rest of the gang have been frantically looking for a place to put up. It is kinda sad moving out and going our separate ways (not to that effect), but I guess sometimes it works out that way for everyone. The new arrangements will benefit us in one way or another and in the long run, only will we realize how much we've missed without each other's company. However, this whole time has been a great experience, though it was far from rosy, but at least I've know realized how difficult and complicated it can get living with individuals other than your own family members. It takes a shit lot of tolerance on your part, and also on the part of your room mates. I guess I've come to realize it's not just about oneself in life, one has to take into account the aspirations and attitudes of the people around you, for things to work out. I'm glad we've met with some measure of 'working out'.

2008-04-06T22:22:00.003-07:00

Ave Verum Corpus

Today during the 11am High Mass at the Cathedral, the choir sang Mozart's Ave Verum Corpus for the offertory hymn. I was kinda surprised as I had not looked at the hymn sheet for the day and I always thought it was only meant for the feast of Corpus Christi - which is the Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ. But irregardless of when it is sung, under whatever circumstance, the hymn just simply ascends you into the highest heavens.

Ave verum corpus,

Natum de Maria Virgine,

Vere passum, immolatum

In cruce pro homine,

Cuius latus perforatum

Unda fluxit et sanguine,

Esto nobis praegustatum

In mortis examine.

Hail the true body,

Born of the Virgin Mary,

Truly suffered, sacrificed

On the Cross for mankind,

Whose pierced side

Flowed with water and blood,

Let it be for us, in consideration,

A foretaste of death.

2008-04-06T09:36:00.004-07:00

An Utterson

I think this is what I've more or less ended up with, after a decade of adolescence, as so aptly described by Robert Louis Stevenson:

Mr. Utterson the lawyer was a man of a rugged countenance that was
never lighted by a smile; cold, scanty and embarrassed in
discourse; backward in sentiment; lean, long, dusty, dreary and
yet somehow lovable. At friendly meetings, and when the wine was
to his taste, something eminently human beaconed from his eye;
something indeed which never found its way into his talk, but
which spoke not only in these silent symbols of the after-dinner
face, but more often and loudly in the acts of his life. He was
austere with himself; drank gin when he was alone, to mortify a
taste for vintages; and though he enjoyed the theater, had not
crossed the doors of one for twenty years. But he had an approved
tolerance for others; sometimes wondering, almost with envy, at
the high pressure of spirits involved in their misdeeds; and in
any extremity inclined to help rather than to reprove. "I incline
to Cain's heresy," he used to say quaintly: "I let my brother go
to the devil in his own way."

Yes, I've become an Utterson, with some variations.

2008-04-04T03:38:00.002-07:00

Blood Sport

I remember rather vividly one November evening sometime in 1990 ( a long time ago) where I stood in front of the television watching a peculiar scene on TV. It was a scene which I had acquainted off from one of the many cartoons I’ve watched in my then young life – of blazing laser neons and spaceships, very bad guys hell bent on wreaking havoc, only to be put down by the almighty hero, who saves the day and rescues the planet (I believe Captain Planet was the first pop cult environmentalist, not Al Gore). But, it was only a few years later, where I realize that the scene which got me captivated that faithful day was in fact, real. This time, a 12 year old me stood in front of the same television set (we were pretty poor back then) watching the same scene repeat itself in surreal rapidity. For the same images which were imprinted in my young ‘clean slate’, stared back at itself six years later. It was yet another war, another flash of explosion consuming it’s natural surroundings and the countless number of lives it took along with it. Even then, I never understood the full complication of that moment.

Now, I’m 22. War, has now become a staple part of reality. I know and am taught to know that war is a consequence of man’s diverging ambitions and for one, it is just inevitable as long as men walk the face of thee earth – the globe trotters are we. Many took this realization by subscribing to a brand of cynicism called reality. I became creative, I choose idealism. But one can’t help but feel undone by the many vicissitudes that culminate from this search for an answer, for a greater meaning or purpose to this all. For it usually contains an ascension to the tumults of intellectualism, but stood at odds from those who choose the realistic alternative.

Then I remember again how it all happen 15 years ago. How grandma struggled with the new gadget which she was so fascinated over, she tried pressing the numbers she now learned would alter the scene on the screen, but to no avail. For the same daunting scene reappears, afflicting itself upon my young fragile mind and she knew it. Some years later after she died, the same scene reappeared. This time Dad had that gadget in his hands, unlike grandma, he knew it’s mechanics inside out. And unlike Grandma, he turned the volume up. ‘This is it son, war.’ You could almost hear him say that, in the most matter-of-fact manner it can be pronounced.

2008-04-03T15:05:00.003-07:00

ApartmentGate

Now, I found out the reason why we were actually evicted was down to someone living below us actually complaining that we were too noisy. Apparently, we were so rowdy that we have cost the landlord to lose a tenant - who apparently in a fit of rage moved out because he or she could not take our nonsense anymore. Furthermore, a total of three warnings were issued to us, warning us of our transgressions. Unfortunately, we never received these warnings. Which makes for three possibilities. One, we lied. Two, the landlord lied. Three, no one lied, and it was just by some chance that two pieces of paper slipped under our door just went missing on it's own accord. I guess chance has a way of working itself out to the advantage of those who possess the necessary resources to claim chance for their own. This episode, is a reflection of this bitter reality. Although this realization has filled me with a sense of injustice and seething rage, I know fully well that this is an end we can't turn around, at least not yet.

To that individual who took the last post literally, no I'm not going homeless, because you would see me in Sunny Singapore soon enough.

2008-03-31T16:18:00.009-07:00

HOT OFF THE PRESS: WE HAVE BEEN OFFICIALLY EVICTED!

what this means is that we will soon join the multitudes in Vancouver without a roof over their heads.

A bleak bleak future awaits...

2008-03-30T23:00:00.003-07:00

Lost Causes

I woke up feeling like the 38 Degrees that was burning within me – hot, weak and not in the best state of mind. I feel the sickness run amok through my veins, teasing every tissue in my body, sapping the very last ounces of strength from the earthen meat upon which it feats upon – in a state of delirious merry making, all at my expense . It is in this state of things that I sort to cheer up my dropping spirits and began searching to for a movie to watch, and there I came upon it – Attila the Hun.

But it wasn’t Attila that fascinated me, it was his nemesis – Flavius Aetius

Aetius comes from the a long tradition of men defending lost causes – men like Socrates (who sought to inspire the thirst for knowledge in his fellow Athenians, but was make to drink hemlock for his troubles); Gustav Stresemann (the statesman who sought to save the doomed Weimar Republic); Lin Zexu (who valiantly resisted British aggression during the Opium War) just to name a few.

Aetius was in Edward Gibbon’s words, ‘the last of the Romans’. Such an accolade was vested in him because he was indeed the last of the Romans who was able to grasp the geo-political situation of the known world and possessed the military astuteness that brought about Roman dominance for centuries.

But Aetius’ Rome, wasn’t the Rome that was once the dominant superpower. It was a Rome knocking upon death’s kneel – teething with social problems, threats from Barbarians to the borders of the Empire, rampant corruption and vicious power struggles that had earlier split the empire into two. There were two Romes that Romans knew of – the present Rome and the glorious Rome of the past. As most Romans struggled to merge the two, Aetius was clearly aware of the differences that lay between illusion and reality. He recognize that Rome was feeble and weak, and it was past it’s days where it could deploy it’s legions to every corner of the empire to impose Rome’s might upon those willing to challenge it. He knew the new realities required him to play a tacit game of statesmanship – the ability to play one against another, to divide and rule, while hopefully buying the much needed time and resources Rome needed to recuperate it’s former greatness.

Although Aetius was willing to accept and challenge the realities, it was only right that eventually reality caught up with him. The jealousy of his Emperor Valentine III over Aetius’ military achievements and affection he possessed amongst the Senators and the plebs drove the Emperor to assassinate Rome’s last standing hope. The dagger’s thrust brought with it the final nail on the Empire’s casket.

But Ateius’ determination to carry on the course of a seemingly failed enterprise lives on to inspire. He realized, like the others before and after him, that the road was murky and impassable, but he defiantly took that realization in his stride, and held onto the belief that one’s destiny lied not in grim perception, but in the belief of one’s ability to alter the inevitable, to change one’s realities while not expediting it as idealism.

We need such hope today, such hope that is intermixed with astute determination to alter our realities. To be bearers of lost causes and not be afraid to fail in the process. And should we fail, at least we did mark our destinies with our own hands and pour scorn upon fate's hideous work.

2008-03-29T07:09:00.003-07:00

One never knows the full breath of liberty until one finishes all his (my male bias) essays!

Take that from me, because one thing I've come to fear as an Arts student is a term called 'dateline'. I shudder at the rampant warnings of academics that thou shalt art not plagiarize . I'm haunted by the sounds of the clattering keys emanating from keyboard echoing through the silence of the morning. Such is the life of an arts students, no thanks to the derivation from our motto - To Procrastinate beyond reasonable doubt, and when doubt shall arise, FREAK OUT!

But that is all past me, for this period at least. One things for certain, that is the certainty my monumental struggle with essay writing is bound to re-live itself sometime in the near future.

And to that individual who think that it comes naturally to me: NUTS!

2008-03-25T00:38:00.002-07:00

Witticisms

Here's my attempt at witticisms, I can't say there were all my own.

Perish with ignorance you ill rotten fools, for your self acquired knowledge has quite expired

One does not need to ask oneself what he knows, it’s just a simple click away

Hypocrisy is a lovely thing, for one has to be oneself at a time and later part with it and embody somebody else.

Don’t blame life when things go wrong, it’s just that we have forgotten our better half.

It is almost vulgar to talk in niceties, for we will forget what we uttered almost certainly at the point of it’s utterance. Vulgarity is a different matter, we take pride at our vulgarisms and constantly save it for our own consumption.

Such pretty lasses and charming boys, I'm sure they manufactured more of them at the plant.

In life, there is no such thing as a hard and fast rule, the only rule in life is to break all the rules in life. (Somewhat plagiarized from Wilde)

2008-03-23T03:44:00.004-07:00

In History: The Battle of Little Round Top

In 1863, with the American Civil War into it's third year, General Robert E Lee, the Commanding General of the Army of North Virginia set upon the invasion of the North, with the hope of capturing Washington D.C and ending the war. The Union forces decided to put up a stand against Lee's juggernaut at a little town in Pennsylvania called Gettysburg. At the end of the Union left flank stood a hill called Little Round Top, which was defended by the U.S 1st Brigade, 1st Division. The 20th Maine Volunteer Infantry Regiment commanded by Col. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, with just 385 men were positioned to the left of the Union lines.

On 2nd June 1963, the Alabama Brigade of Confederate General John Bell Hood's Texas Division were ordered to take Little Round Top. The 15th Alabama Regiment then maneuvered to the East in search for the Union flank Col William C Oates, commander of the 15th ordered an attack on the Union's Western flank held by the 20th Maine and 44th Pennsylvania. The attack was marked by steadfast confederate persistence and tenacious Union defenses. Col Oates in order to overcome the stubborn resistance of the union forces ordered his forces to maneuver to the left in an attempt to outflank his enemy. Colonel Chamberlain in response extended his line to prevent the flanking maneuver to the extend that his line to the extend that his line was one man thin. Having repelled tides upon tides of Confederate attacks, Chamberlain realized that the casualties were rising and they were running out of ammunition. Knowing that he has little chance of resisting another onslaught, Chamberlain ordered his troops to fix bayonets to the passionate yet defiant cry - 'Bayonets!' with the intention of ordering his troops to charge down the hill beginning from the left flank, in a swinging door maneuver to the right

The charge took place with the Union forces charging down the hill and their momentum held the confederate forces bespectacled as such a maneuver was deemed unorthodox in warfare of that day. The maneuver crippled the 15th Alabama and lead to the eventual Union defeat of the Alabama Brigade, a force which outnumbered their Union counterparts several times over.

2008-03-22T01:30:00.002-07:00

Good Friday

A day of prayer and abstinence – I guess I’ve adhered at least to the second part of it, I think I just don’t possess the temperament to kneel for a period of time reading down the my list of problems, usually I’ll just tell God that…Well God, you are God, you know me true and through, so just please make all my problems disappear!

From experience, such a recipe usually bears mixed results, from my point of view at least. I do not think God actually measures the length of your prayerx to the propensity of Hisher graces. I mean I know of people who really belief in that sort of thing, I mean what else can account for the multitudes of people who flock to the front peels of Novena Church every Saturday and cement their knee caps upon the kneelers for hours. But if they belief what they’re doing makes a difference, good for them, but I’m certain that knee hurts really bad after a while.

As to the abstinence part, I did observe it. However, I think I was really enjoying myself gulping down frostered flakes with whole milk. So, even though I observed the necessities of not consuming meat, which is suppose to make your life a living hell, I actually found no trouble munching through a whole box of cereal. So I guess I did adhere to the letter of the law, but not the spirit of the law – which I assume is to starve yourself silly and that renunciation of all that pleasure is suppose to knock some sense into you and enable you to better reflect as to whether you’ve been naughty or nice.

For me, as I stood at the back of the church for the 3pm service (It was so darn pack! I actually had to squeeze myself into the other service being held at basement) I told myself that I think I’ve done pretty well, at least well enough not to be lock into eternal damnation. I hope so for my own sake.

Standing at the back was quite fun, I mean you get to see everything. The service of course, the choir girls, a few familiar faces here and there, and how the collective behavior of people who were just individuals before they stepped into church. When one kneeled, everyone kneeled. Someone utters a response, the crowd chases after his or her utterance. I guess the atmosphere where everyone is accepted as one in one community without the prejudices and biases does give us all a reason to feel good about ourselves. And some even get overboard and seek to superimpose upon you. I was lectured as to the proper technics of venerating the cross, why? Because I did not have a rose in hand and I think in Filippino culture, putting a rose by the cross is part of the whole ritual. So I just nodded in agreement as an old Filipino lady gave me her rose out of the dozens she had and told me to kneel and touch the foot of the cross and kiss it. I did just that because as she walked away, she was looking behind her back ensuring that I was following her instructions. I’m sure she just didn’t want me to burn in hell for not following the dictates of venerating the cross – a tradition probably crafted from the days of old and edited and exaggerated every generation since. But she gave me a Rose, and I knew she just meant well.

So tomorrow is Easter and the little kids would be imagining queer little bunnies hopping down their lawn. Too bad, it’ll just be gorging over Easter eggs for them, and a long weekend for me. As I said earlier, tomorrow is a time for feasting and merry making, so like how I fastered on frosted flakes with milk ceaselessly, I shall have a real Merry Easter! And I hope that applies to all of you as well. Here’s to a happy and joyful Easter! Stay Safe, but keep the faith!

2008-03-20T04:58:00.001-07:00

A Maundy set of Ramblings

Econs Test was a breeze, to my surprise, I was expecting in all honesty something a lot tougher given the amount of input the prof puts into his lectures. I guess the all nighter I pulled through was well worth it. Just a little aside, as I was handing up my paper, the prof walked past me and gave me a soft nudge with a cheeky little wink. Did not quite get the hint initially, but man, as I was packing up only did I realize that I was sitting next to a real hottie. I guess even she caught the Profs’ attention and is the just added motivation I needed to attend my 4pm econ lectures more regularly instead of attending the earlier one.

Anyway, with the long Easter break coming, it seems like everyone has a plan or another to get some well deserved fun out of the few days of rests before the finals. For myself, I didn’t have any plans and I only realized it fully when a friend of mine asked me on a trip to Seattle, something which I really wanted to do, especially given the company. However, its just the way things are, there’s got to be keeners like me in this world to make it go around, otherwise how would all the fun loving people get their fun in the first place.

Talking about keeners and slackers and what not, I remembered a point in time where we used to establish individuals to be such and such a person because he or she is just a loser, period. We do not even give much thought as to why the individual presents him or herself as such. Instead, labeling one does give the individual who coins the label a certain sense of superiority over the other – a top down comparison. So as it is easier not to think, and it makes one feel good about oneself when one resorts to labeling and stereotypes, people just go ahead about it without much thought and without realizing the farcicality and hubris involved in such actions.

If we think about it real hard. It’s just not keeners and losers we’re talking about. It is terms like terrorist, defeatist, patriots, democrats, republican, liberal, conservative. We have become enslaved to the dictatorship of terms and stereotypes, usually those tag lines are not even our own to begin with, but scraps we picked up from popular culture.

A close friend of mine once quoted Shakespeare in his famous soliloquy, “The world is a stage, we are all actors.” I nodded in agreement, for I know by my life, I’ve been living by a plot, a plot that from which we enact from every single day of our lives, a plot that has long been written. It is written in our genes, it affixes our temperaments, it translates into our idiosyncrasies, and most of all it crafts the environment in which we live, which partially constructs the individuals we are. As such, aren’t we products of these interweaving plots? Stage Actors, who in a final brush with deception, are lead to belief that we are free to exercise our autonomy over ourselves and even others. So then who are we? When we are to commit an action, no doubt it is of our doing. But it’s motives, it’s dimensions, it’s every livid detail was and is made up of elements and intermediaries beyond our human determination, rather engineered by complex neural and cognitive networks imbued in us beyond the scope of our autonomy?

Upon this realization, we do we do with ourselves? Wouldn’t it be contrary to say people can change, because people are such and would not and are not capable of altering themselves. No, people can alter their belief systems, but they do so only because they possess the characteristics which enable them to do so. These characters they possess outside of their decision pattern, but it is something in them which enables them to do so. Similarly, when an individual curses and scorns at another for a transgression, another individual on the other hand reacts in nonchalance. We will then say that the latter possesses a good temperament, whereas the former well, it has to learn to be more understanding and tolerant. We tacitly recognize both possess differences in nature, but we pause from going any further, as that will compel us to recognize the failure of our control of our own self-determination. However, if we do venture and take that step into the unknown, we cease to talk of our natures as free, but natures which are determined.

2008-03-19T00:18:00.002-07:00

It is in the scent..beware! beware!

"Herr God Herr Lucifer Beware! Beware!
Out of the ash I rise with my red hair
And I eat men like air."

-Sylvia Plath in 'Lady Lazarus'

Plath might just be right, if psychological research is anything to go by. Except that it takes a little more than a puff of ash.

Anyway, psychologist have ascertained that the key factor that sexually attracts women to their male opposites is the symmetrical dimensions of their facial and bodily features. The more balanced your facial features are (if you've that fat lip or that lazy eye and have issues, know you know why) and the more symmetrical your body is (Yes, those abs!), apparently the more sexually attractive you are.

Evolutionary Psychologists have reasoned that the possession of such features present the male subject as someone who has a tendency to be more healthy and as such possessing superior genes.

However, women do not have to see to know, they can sense it - through the scent of the man.

In a recent study, a few men of varying body symmetry were asked to put on clean shirts and to wear them for three days without changing. In other words, the shirt will be stenched with their odor.

Later, a group of women were called into the lab and asked to pour through the shirts left by the men. (In other words, sniff) There were then asked to ascertain who they thought, just solely by the scent alone, who was the most sexually attractive male.

True enough, most of the women selected the shirt which was worn by the man who possessed the most symmetrical bodily features!

Not only that, when asked of their menstrual patterns for that month. It is found that there is a correlation between high ratings for the 'symmetrical' shirt with that of women who were ovulating. In other words, when the woman has a higher tendency to have a child, the greater the attraction to the symmetrical male. Hence, this pattern of correlation point to the earlier evolutionary factor we talked about.

As the prof talked about this, I looked around the room and I saw that the only people laughing were the males. Most of the females just listened on reticently. So, is that tacit acknowledgment of some truth to this? How would males react? I also told a few of of my friends of this finding, and everyone of them made responses that reflect a immediate urgency of heading to the nearest gym and working out to get the much needed toned body.

2008-03-17T01:21:00.004-07:00

Normative Statements

Sometime last week, I went through the whole exercise of coping with emotive self destruction - where your being yearns for something, but you know full well that what you seek is quite beyond your reach and in my case, extends beyond one's own ability to turn the tide.

That isn't in anyway - meek acceptance. Meek acceptance and genuine retrospection are two very different matters.

Meek acceptance is to scorn and curse at one's fate, and pray for divinity from the heavens.

Retrospection, on the other hand, is to take things in your stride, recognize your weaknesses and move on to fight another day.

However, I have no hard feelings of the episode, only to say that I genuinely treasure the agonizing and often painful dispensation of brutal truth and the painful assault it brought upon the emotions/senses - for it douses you with the springs of reality and extinguishes the desire for any illusions or fantasies.

However, there is still hope, not some abstract longing, but real expectations based upon some hard facts and objectivities.

Or there may be more disappointments to come, but seriously, I always ask myself how much more worst can it get.

Hence, a new week starts, what will come about it?What shall materialize? It is Lent, a time of (My mum so aptly reminded me) a time of 'abstinence and penance'. Amen to that. So tuna sandwiches on Wednesday, Celery Bolognese on Thursday, Abstinence on Friday (No Alcohol, No cheap 2nd hand tobacco, No Sex) and well you can eat a whole damm cow on Saturday because Jesus is risen from the dead..

Still it's Monday and I still have a whole chunk of emotional baggage to feast on from last week.

(In the LATEST installment: She (who spend half a Saturday fiddling with some damm watch which practices HR Hyperinflation) proudly boasts that she has gotten a full refund for the watch! Well, congrats for getting a full refund)

2008-03-16T02:49:00.003-07:00

Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 5 (2nd movement)

Van Cliburn played Beethoven's 5th Piano Concerto at the Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow, 1960. In my opinion, it's got to be the most beautiful piece of music and especially this particular rendition. Van Cliburn, as an American, was playing the piece in front of the entire Soviet Leadership, yes including Nikita 'Shoe-stamping' Kruschev (google Kruschev 'shoe incident') He eventually impressed the judges so much that they awarded him the first prize, with the approval of the Soviet Leadership. A piece of musical history indeed!

2008-03-16T01:45:00.004-07:00

When time gets ahead of you

Today involved some heavy lifting. The Madame of the house had her watch give up on her and having spend quite a fortune acquiring it for aesthetic purposes, she saw the need to go through the trouble in getting it fixed. So I followed her, went around a bit, patronize a few watch shops, got disappointed, decided to fix it ourselves, went to the dollar store - got ourselves a set of tools, went to superstore, bought the battery, took the watch apart (mind you, in the middle of Superstore!), affixed the battery, realized the watch still refused to work, checked the old battery, realized she got the wrong battery, tried inserting a one cent coin to give the battery a firmer connection with the mili-circuit, failed! Tried paper, failed! Decided to go to a watch shop instead, stopped by Grand and Toy (She has spoken: 'It is The Source LAH! Not Grand and Toy!) okay lah... bought a new battery, realized we lost one of the screws of the watch, took it apart, out with the 'old' in with the new, it did not work, banged it a few times, it worked! got scolded for fixing the watch on the floor in the middle of the shop and hence obstructing potential customers (To which I pointed out that I just bought a battery from the shop) Watched fixed! - And our madame savored all the full three hours of work she put into the watch. It was, a pretty nifty little thing! It could measure your heart rate and the work rate of your heart with pin point accuracy. So when my reading came up to 256BMP! and 96 per cent heart work rate. I was pretty darn surprise I was still alive and standing. Harpreet did better, 365 BMP!

By then it was pretty clear that there was a morale of the story. Do not get anything off Craig's list just because it saves you 50 bucks. It really aint worth it.

2008-03-15T00:17:00.006-07:00

Pictures..

Question from mum: What have you been doing for the last whole week?

That's the answer..

Grek: what have you morphed into having not cut your hair since December. I guess here's the answer.

hmm..I think this is a more accurate portrayal

I guess that assures you all that nothing much has change.

2008-03-13T22:51:00.003-07:00

Of neighbors and blinds.

Well kids, here's a word of caution, next time you want to engage in any carnal actions, please pull down your blinds, because someone didn't and half the apartment block got to witness the whole freaking episode! I mean everything!

But it was really something!

I just got home from dinner, tired and all from sleep depravity. So I threw myself on the couch and began talking to my room mate about life and all. Then as he walked away to pick up a call, something from the apartment opposite mine caught my eye! At first it didn't occur to me, it failed to register in my mind! It was just a bobbing head, then upon closer observation, it was just not a bobbing head, it was a woman going ballistic! She was being humped vicariously! And she was just simply out of this world, in full view of the pairs of preying eyes from across the block.

I motioned to my room mate, he just stood in front of the window and watched and they just went on.

He asked in utter disbelief,"Is she dancing?"

I answered,"Nooo.. I think she's in a self induced trance!"

I guess they did not even freaking care! So it went on for a good five minutes.. (only?) and we continued to be held in disbelief, stopping only to ask each other, 'why didn't they pull down the freaking blinds?'

The episode ended like it started, abruptly. She stood up, and left. Then the guy stood up and pulled up his pants and then mechanically went on his business on the computer. For those two, it seems like everything is all in a days work.

2008-03-07T06:26:00.002-08:00

Montagues & Capulets by Sergei Prokofiev

2008-03-02T20:08:00.001-08:00

2008-02-25T02:32:00.001-08:00

A crappy, real crappy existence

You know how it is with pop-ups these days, (no doubt diminished thanks to firefox) they just come about at you whether you like it or not, pricking your nerves at the most unsavory moment when you so yearn to get onto soccernet to check the latest EPL results. It gets better! In the past, all you got to do is to hit the X button on the right most corner of the window and wala, the pop up disappears. These days, pop-up innovators have gotten smart. They actually sort of pioneered a bug, in which a hit by an unwary user on the X button generates for the user more ‘pop ups’ on his way. Just Great! I think you guys are really innovative and all, but go screw yourself and your deluded interpretation of the freedom of information act.

It is not about pop-ups I want to write about today, but something kinda vaguely associated with it. The pop up episode is just one of many instances when irritating situations just has a way of getting right in your face. Take for example Saturday when I was reeling from the prospect of having to get back to school on Monday, there I was sitting right there in my room and the realization that I have not been doing anything productive all day and that my stats mid terms were like a week away and I don’t know shit about regression towards the mean, much less being prepared for it. Then came the emotional out of control spiral, the house stunk like a concentrated ghetto, the cars were buzzing away in arabesque fashion down below, even the beautiful sunny day turned into an intense mockery of my dull sullen state. I wondered now what was it that started it all – I guess it was nothing, but my past inactions which has caught up with me. I scurried for my stats book, and flipped vicariously through it, only to stare blankly at the animated figures who’s strange features unlocked the very last resistance to an outburst. The outburst, unlike it’s source was silent and without contempt. All it did was to locked me into the deep reticence and that I did for the rest of the day. Studying and tossing and turning intermittently.

So my weekend willowed away and now another week has begun. What I yearn for, I feel, seems far reached and implausible for I dispute the whole notion of seeking a purpose as a purpose always dies upon itself when its means to zenith enlightenment expire, often by a natural death. I would say therefore contrary to most ardent pro-lifers, I need a distraction as a distraction always captivates the mind and beholds the senses, while a short term measure, it’s paralytic charms auger one’s memory to forgive all transgresses.

I guess I found my distraction and I think I am going to lay my hands on that.

2008-01-16T00:32:00.000-08:00

Change Anyone?

It’s depressing noting that questions are flying in all cylinders, from all quarters. No, it isn’t by the virtue of the questions itself that is responsible for my seamlessly bleak reproach, but the quality of the questions being asked. It is just horrifying!

The latest presidential primary race is one fine example, in where the tenacious race between Senator Hillary Clinton and Senator Barack Obama has reared its ugly head and has descended into a whirlwind fracas over race and gender. Obviously, some things just remain the same in the midst of all the invocation for change ringing throughout political circles.

Indeed, having a first woman president or a first black man as the president of the worlds’ greatest democracy signifies a change in outlook of the electorate. But remember the old adage that ‘they just come in different shades and sizes, but are one and the same’? Hopping on the ‘change’ bandwagon by virtue of an object coming in a different shade does not represent a fundamental change, for the object is still one and the same.

It is this phenomenon we should be concerned about and for a change, question its roots. The world has gotten tired of eight years of non-conservative war mongering and fiscal ineptness, and we need ‘change’. But who represents this change? While I am tempted to make a qualitative judgment, I shall refrain from doing so for a change.

However, I think for a change, we could construct a logical equation. Can we expect a system that has churned out a man like George Bush as president be any effective in being an instrument for change? I think not. Although American democracy is the shining beacon for all of civilization, Bush V Gore is the nothing to shine about.

The talk of Michael Bloomberg running as a third party candidate is a breath of fresh air. Although many critics point out Bloombergs’ credentials as a technocrat and as such has the corporations interest at heart, a strong third party candidate will certainly break the partisan deadlock that exists today and bring much needed galvanization to government.

Even if Bloomberg’s candidacy results in failure, his potential attraction to independent voters and moderate democrats and republicans is enough to alter the landscape of American politik permanently. That would certainly be a change and if we start questioning and discerning from there on, maybe we can get that much needed change as to how we all do business.

The writer is a maniac obsessed with change that he has ridden all his under garments and can't make up whether he is for stripes or poker dots and is currently seeking enlightenment and guidance for the matter. Maybe Hillary's conviction will do the trick?

2007-12-06T01:27:00.000-08:00

Her Birthday

A second unfold, a minute uncover
The hand struck twelve, as the hour ceases
24 rounds, a day is woven
By months end, we’ve endured 30.
That’s not all, for 12 months woe
It is a year, for all we yearn and
Disdain for all we’ve lost
But now know you stand for another year
And only the best can be made of it
For this is how life is suppose to be
As the years encompasses the months
The months, the days to come
The hours, as the minutes unravel
And with that, the seconds tick by.
That then we see life go by in a flash
And realize how much we have lost
But for lost to come we first must gain
And gain we have if we do understand
That is life is just this systemic ritual
In which all of us partake without consent
So I guess it’s all in your hands my friend
Just be happy and love life as it is
And that should be our motto and creed
To live it to the full without regrets

Happy Birthday my friend.

2007-12-04T13:33:00.000-08:00

Exams

Here it comes again, the dreadful hand
Of fate behold, the system molds.
This quarterly exercise, this madness
Takes hold, my mind behold.
My body battered, my soul whimpered
My procrastination rewarded
To the angst of my foes.

This is the time where students go mad
The frantic shuffling of pages,
The ceaseless clatter of the keyboard
This is the time where silence holds sway.
In the cherubim halls of the learned

This is where the best are defined
Where the weak are identified
And arbitrarily rooted
This is the time where society is made
The best become the best.
The weak the scum of our age

This is where the doors of the ivory tower open
Where the learned are inducted, the weak indicted

This is where I stand aloof, and show my disdain for this fucked up system.
This is where I conform and adhere to the road which many took before me.
This is where I am the student, who studies his ass off, just to be what is demanded of me.

2007-10-29T04:04:00.001-07:00

2007-09-22T02:10:00.000-07:00

Tutorial

Something happened during Philosophy this week, it went something like this:

T is for my friend. G is for me

T: What are you doing now?

G: I am sitting in here listening to you lecture

T: Why are you sitting in here? Why are you listening to me lecture?

G: Well, because I am suppose to attend this class. I am doing this course and as such to do well in this course, it is essential I listen attentively to your lecture.

T: Why do you then do this course? Why do you then want to do well in this course?

G: Firstly, I love Philosophy, I believe it represents the one study which transcends our mundane lives. Secondly, doing well in this course will allow me to be on my way to getting a good degree, which will get me into graduate school and for me to seek the job I always wanted/

T: Why do you want do get that job you always wanted? Why do you want to transcend this mundane life you are talking about?

G: Well, I guess because it is the job that will get me the most fulfillment. And for the second question, I guess being able to transcend the mundane life will grant me fulfillment as well

T: Why do you want to seek this so called fulfillment?

G: Hmm.. Because finding fulfillment is the reason why we are able to continue sustaining ourselves. Without fulfillment, I can imagine what life will become

T: But why the need to sustain ourselves? Why the need to fear life without fulfillment?

G: Because if we can’t sustain ourselves. We can’t go on living. And if I can’t find fulfillment, I’ll fear living.

T: You can’t go on living?

G: Well. Maybe living physically, but my inner self would completely lose the zest for life

T: So, this fulfillment? Do you find fulfillment in all things?

G: No, of course not.

T: Then do you find fulfillment in some things?

G: Yes.

T: Are all these things morally permissible?

G: No.

T: If so, you find fulfillment in some things you would deem immoral.

G: Certainly.

T: So, if you find fulfillment in things immoral, that makes part of what you seek immoral?

G: I guess so.

T: If such, do you think these immoral things serve for the betterment of your life?

G: Certainly not, some of it is harmful

T: As such, how can you say fulfillment is the sole ambition of your life?

G: I do not. I mean it is what we seek.

T: Do you seek, even in part, what is wrong?

G: No. We do wrong, we do not seek wrong

T: But you said you seek fulfillment and part of what fulfillment presents for you is wrong. So how can it just solely be fulfillment that brings about the betterment of your life?

G: Well, then. I may seek fulfillment, but not all fulfillment that I seek is the best for me.

T: Certainly sounds like it.

G: But what is wrong? And what is right?

T: Crafty.. but I do know that we have to find something much more objectively convincing than fulfillment.

2007-09-08T08:38:00.000-07:00

First Friday

It is officially the end of the first week in school.

I must say that things are going quite well, well as in some sense of the word. Aside from the hustle and bustle of rushing between lectures and tutorials (which I find excruciatingly irritating), and my 'girly' pursuits, things are well and fine. Things are well and fine indeed, I actually got to see Peter Singer in real person. Singer is a prominent Philosopher, and some would argue activist, who argues that we in the developed world are morally obligated to alleviate poverty. He goes to the extent of suggesting that we should part with a huge chunk of our income (to the extent where it isn’t maladaptive) to bring about the latter. I’ll leave that as that, but it was a great experience to actually see for myself a formal lecture such as this.

I’ve got an essay due next week, another the week after, and..Cheer up bloke, it is the start of the academic year.. Sorry for the abrupt ending but yeah, that’s the theme. The rush of abruptness in it all.

2007-09-03T11:49:00.000-07:00

Passing People

Finally got sorted out and moved into the new apartment. I must say for the record, this time I’ve certainly outdone myself. One reason is that it actually does look better than my abode in Singapore! I don’t think my mum would be amuse to read this, knowing full well that she would be parting with quite a handsome sum to allow me to indulge myself. Anyway, as they say, ‘all work but no play makes Jack a dull boy’. So yes mum, I think good accommodation does partially equate to better results!

Last night while I was about to go to sleep, with my head rested on my pillow (as such my head was held inverted to its surroundings), I set eyes (albeit rather blurry) upon one of the most beautiful scenes I’ve seen. As my bed lies adjacent to the open window, I held in full view the apartments across the block, which was separated against mine by a rose garden. Usually, these apartments look like what it is, a block of apartments. However, last night was slightly different. With my head rested on my pillow, I saw the world in inversion. The stacks of concrete which I was so used to seeing now played itself into a metamorphosis of a shimmering vision from years past – a towering beacon with lights illuminating from its every niche, festooned from under the rock solid earth. Haha, I might be getting way ahead of myself here. I certainly did think about it, and I knew full well that in those little bright illuminating niches, laid an individual like myself. I see him or her everyday, on the streets, as passing people. Now, in my deep sodden solitude, these little glimmering niches were in possession of these very passing people.

2007-08-29T10:09:00.000-07:00

The Night mortifies itself into Day

It is funny how the night flirts with one’s emotions and for one to awake the next morning feeling a totally different person. As the day wears on, and as the whirlwind of emotions began to churn to life, hopefully what was yesterday, presents itself as a catacomb of yesterday’s memories.

2007-07-11T15:45:00.000-07:00

It's gonna be one heck of a semester

2007-07-02T10:59:00.000-07:00

Fools, as fools are we

I got a job, I asked for it and I got what I asked for. I can’t put down a precise adjective to my current situation, but ‘mayhem’ comes pretty close to it. Having played the role of a student all my life, the teacher has always seemed a role that was far more liberating. No time tables to follow; no assignments to hand in; no set of silly rules to adhere to and of course a propensity to do as one like. After all, the sadistic streak that exudes from the austere veneer of my Sec 2 Science tutor, perhaps persuaded I that the privileges a teacher enjoyed vis-à-vis his or her students were a fact of life. I certainly thought so.

Fast track eight years and now I stand before a class of students – a teacher. I still bear the same impressions, unfortunately. It is because of that I vowed never to allow any under my tutelage suffer that anguish dictatorial pillage of my self-esteem I received as a student. I was consumed, in my idealism, to perfect myself as the perfect tutor – to give to my students the intellectual freedom they so deserve as young boys. That’s where I forgot which side I was on. I am now the teacher.

Teachers, teachers, horrid creatures.

The creed every student has swore to uphold, to mark his or her teacher’s grave, if need be with insolence and pride. I was battered, scarred, trampled upon. My every sustained effort to counter their ignorant screech was marked by a tumultuous wave of laughter; my every instruction taken as toil upon their senses; my every sensitivity to cover up their ignorance taken as my weakness. What more is left of me to do then to hoist the flag, not the white flag, but my state, my colors. I shall show them no mercy, no quarter, for I shall consume them like air. Yet again, the lines are drawn. This time, I would put those insolent scums in their place.

Chopin's Piano Sonata No. 2 3rd Movement - Marche funèbre

2007-05-26T00:02:00.001-07:00

In the deepest darkest recesses, in death, there breeds hope of new life

2007-04-29T07:20:00.001-07:00

DO NOT GO GENTLE INTO THAT GOOD NIGHT

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

- Dylan Thomas

It was at a Poetry Symposium that I came upon this poem, the presenters were coincidentally 3 PRC students, who made a real gallant effort in bringing out the essence of the poem. Death was the main theme. Of course, not death as death itself, but a reaction to death. Dylan Thomas wrote the poem urging his ill-stricken father not to give up the fight for life, but instead to stay the course and to persevere in his good fight for life, against death’s conquest. Thomas goes to the extent of expressing his disdain and his seething anger at the “dying of the light”, which he saw as life’s ultimate betrayal.

In all truth, when I first heard of this poem, I thought little of it. I thought of the poem as an emotional psychological reaction to one’s encounter with death and that the poet was failing to recognize that it was time for his father to leave this life. I guess my association with the poem was abruptly put to an end at that very juncture, and I committed it to the deep recesses of my memory banks, until yesterday…

Now I know, Thomas knew the realities he faced. Like a child, whose only weapon is her rage, he channels his anger at this indomitable facet of life. For one, entrapped in a childlike malaise, we can only hope that reality overturns itself, even against all the odds. Will it? Can it? We stubbornly ascertain it has to. It must!

2007-04-19T06:43:00.000-07:00

Tag a rag tag

Ok to cast all the gloom aside, I’ve decided to entertain myself to this little tag a rag tag. Of course, I got tagged, tagged by Gavin, who got tagged by someone else. I think I’m suppose to tag someone too, and that someone is to tag another person, get the idea!

Rules of the game: each player of this game starts off with 10 weird things or habits or little known facts about yourself. People who get tagged must write in a blog of their own 10 weird things or habits or little known facts as well as state this rule clearly. At the end you must choose as many people as you like to be tagged and list their names. No tagbacks!

1) I am fastidiously superstitious. I always repeat rituals that promise success such as going into the exam hall with 2 blue pens, one black pen, 2 pencils, an eraser, and a ruler. I did not follow that recipe for my As, and I screwed up!

2) I have a really high external locus of control, in other words, I’m a fatalist! Which is perhaps of the reasons why I believe that there is no such thing as ‘free-will’ or ‘free-choice’

3) I dig my nose unconsciously/consciously all the time, to the disgust of everyone around me..Hehe

4) When I was a kid I was afraid of sleeping on my back as I was afraid I might see the bogey man when I wake up in the middle of the night

5) I always talk to ladies like talking to guys, which is why I never get very far in relationships.

6) I’m a mummy’s boy! Amen to that.

7) When I make Milo. I must always mix the milo powder with the evaporated milk, then make it into a dough of sorts, and then add hot water into it to make the drink.

8) I think in images, not words. Some of you might find tat surprising, if you know me well enough.

9) I can never figure out the easiest things. Try teaching me how to open a locker or to use a simple programme. Before you know it, I’m back there asking you the same questions and usually the cycle repeats itself

10) I always use any random words that come to mind, why might explain the queer vocab usage

I know, it’s boring, but I just can’t think of anything else that might satisfy my own curiosity. I tag anyone who has not been tagged by this tag-a-rag tag.

2007-04-18T06:42:00.000-07:00

In pace requiescat

The shadowy hue of an April morn, cast a blank shroud upon these solemn walls,
The dedication upon which these stone bricks bring, the excellence of academics it promises
A reflection of the young and old, who through the years have thronged through these halls, and envisaged the attainment of knowledge, of fortune this knowledge will bring. For it took pain and anguish to attain, to achieve it took pride, pride in oneself and the age old code, of which all recite at the back of their hand.
Of history, this tale will tell – not of promise as one would perceive. But of death and anguish it will say, this is the plot this tale will tell.
A raging madness, a yearning for revenge, embedded in one single mind, his thoughts possessed. That death must come to all who live – upon the code which this world stands. For the sight of this world brings in him – the feel of seething rage and revenge. Upon which no act can come to past, but death, only death will be the answer.

Anger personifies a humanoid, for three quick rounds the clock hand weaves. The weapons – the articles of destruction, embellished with a tart and a rancor of rage.

The fumes of death arise, above the age old walls which stand. The perfection of excellence with it, as a silent clam overcomes the heinous site. Of grief, we will tell, of grief, we know. That tomorrow, will be a different day. For the same cheery faces we see, they are gone. For the sweet smiles that enlighten each brutish day, they are past. For our existence, it seems vulnerable. The whispers of “it could have been us” hushes through the walls, a silent fear what tomorrow will bring. There is one who stands afraid, for she knows not what will happen to her kind. There is another who stands astounded, a hero himself to have fought rage’s work, but he too is confused. There is this individual who captured it all, but he too seeks solace from the scene.

So what can be told of this tragic tale, but it’s victims of which we mourn. All 33 of them .

No sorrow can replace their lost; no grief would bring them back.
But only the realization of those beautiful moments, their young lives have touched or would have effected. For it is this promise which we will keep, the promise of life which they have been robbed, which now each of us possess, to live a better life, a better life in their memory, a better life for us all.

To the fallen 33, In pace requiescat.

2007-04-08T00:28:00.000-07:00

Exams..

Erm..wow..exams are round the corner..and time is running short.. running short like everything's in a rush.. I've got econs, psych and philo..before the night is done..everything's come short..in this metha lonely hunt..for grades..for scholarship.. whatever the motivation..or just to please sweet mama..even that I'm not quite certain. Just one thing I've been made to learn..it is time..time..time..and we're always running short of time.. If I can scream my rage at time for it's deep unconcerning gleam at my deep pathetic state is time my shroud to be for time prences by like some jolly christmas fun to cheer the old folks and filthy cheery kids lampooning as sad old nicholas as he so jolly be!

Note..this aint how I feel, I'm doing Plath's poetry, and I'm just trying to mimic her..

2007-02-18T04:11:00.000-08:00

The Free-Will Issue

I’m certain that many of you here look back at your actions in retrospect and for that moment think – could all that have been avoided? The answer often is YES! It could have been, I could have thought it in such and such a fashion and the consequences would have been far more ideal. Unfortunately, that realization came about in retrospect and that action upon which the regret is conjured upon has left itself in the sands of time. Some might then say, “Alright! Look! I’m not going to make that mistake anymore! Lesson learned, period.” Some might see this as an alteration in one’s attitudes towards a particular situation and as such one’s exercise of her or his own ‘will’ towards a particular matter. As such, some will argue, as one is able to exercise one’s will over one’s life, hence one is able to exercise free-will over her or his life.

Point taken. I’m certain many of you here will read this and go, “yeah! That’s right! I am in full control of my life! No one can tell me what to do with it for I am in full control of my will!” While this individuals’ zest for life should be applauded, I do not think it’s reasoning should be allowed to be further proliferated. Why? Well, the claim here states that one possesses a will, and as such the will is exercised with or without inhibition to carry out a certain life-changing action. But what is the ‘will’. Is it a magic word that allows one to state a super normal transcending self conscious mechanism which allows one to overcome all obstacles in life’s many decision making processes or for that matter retrospective life regrets? Or does it exist at all?

‘The will’ is according to the Hard Determinist, Paul Holbach, the brain and its many biological and psychological cognitive processes. Holbach argues that our thought processes are results of the ‘will’ which processes whenever we are caused to make a decision. An everyday man will look at this initial premise and say,” True. But do not we possess the body which holds the brain, which possesses the will, which carry out our actions?” True. But do we own the body, the brain, the will which carry out our actions? There is a seriously flawed assumption here that belies the claim that one possesses ones will. That assumption will be brought to light when we identify the consequences of the claim. If we own our wills, then, wouldn’t we say that if we are to reflect upon a previous action, face scant regrets for our previous actions, that if we were to artificially turn time back, given that condition and situation (of the will) at that given time where the folly was made, I could have made a different choice then the folly I undertook? Therefore, how can we control ‘a will’ which holds itself constricted by time?

One would immediately hold himself against the claim and point out that indeed we are constantly held by time. As I am typing this entry of sorts, time is ticking by every time I key in a letter, by the time I finish typing this entry, it would have been an hour and I might have regretted my decision to have stayed up into the wee hours of the morning blogging my thoughts down. Do I regret it now? I might. But what persuaded me to write down this entry an hour ago? What condition and situation I faced at that time? Well, I was reading Sherman’s blog and thought that it was a long time since I entered a entry. But why blog on a redundant issue like – ‘Free Will’. Well, because I needed to complete an essay on the topic by Tuesday and I was too lazy to read a formal essay, so I thought a good way to get started was to write an entry of which I can generate ideas for my essay. Well and fine. So I wrote and an hour later I looked back. But now I feel tired, it’s 4 am in the morning and I need sleep. But I was motivated an hour ago and now I am tired? Cause and effect statement? Or has my motivation an hour ago causally determined my feelings of regret and tireness I feel of having stayed up so late into the morning? Then again when I delve back in time- what was it at that moment which drove me to have taken those actions? One would say I choose to write the blog. But what’s behind the choice. Sherman’s blog, the essay, yes. But wasn’t it my mind that interpreted the satisfaction I’d have gotten, wasn’t it my social conditioning which allowed me to understand the populism of bloggersphere? Wasn’t it my body that felt well enough to continue with my effort? Do I control these factors? Or these factors form fragments of ‘me’ that constitutes the ‘I’ that I am? As such if it is this ‘I’ that makes a decision towards a certain situation, than the decision would be the same decision, with time held.

So what becomes the issue of Free-Will? Does it mean that we aren’t that free of after all as we have perceived? Or does it mean that we aren’t that free at all? I do not claim to know that answer, but can only elect to see the flaws in the current claim one has over one’s freedom to will.

2006-12-20T15:31:00.000-08:00

A Semesters’ End

Semester has come to an end in itself and I’m basking in the full afterglow of its sweet demise. Hmm, maybe it is just the merciless tropical sun beating down on my back, but surprisingly even she is hidden in the grey ash clouds of December. What a pity. All this way back, all 18 hours of it, and it rains, like back in Vancouver. But pity stops there, instead replaced by the realization that – yes, I am home.

2006-10-29T11:02:00.000-08:00

A First

I’ve always wondered what it was like to be amidst a demonstration. You know, the scenes on TV you see of disenchanted youth burning flags and effigies, as a protests against a particular situation. For us Singaporeans, it is just ridiculous; or rather it is something quite beyond the scope of our comprehension. We’ll rather just get on with our lives and just whine about it until the next thing comes about. I mean, it’s not that there are no merits in this. Investors love us because they know it is not in our culture to hold demonstrations or strikes that will affect their business. Hence, we’ve got an investment friendly environment and people are willing to invest in us. Well, that’s at least what they say and I’ll patronize their version of how the world comes around until I can think of something more ridiculous.

Anyway, that was then, when I was back home. Over here, I pretty much made up my mind I was gonna find out for myself some aspects of living which would never be possible to attain in Singapore. So when I received a broche spreading the word about an Anti-War protest, I knew immediately that this was one of things I wanted to experience for myself. Idealism has bounded me with the knowledge that a demonstration is far more than just a bunch of disenchanted souls gathering for a common cause, it is at it’s best, the expression of one’s democratic freedoms. Anyway, that is just idealism talking. The real me was just in it out of curiosity and fun & games.

So, I got a few people together, made plans and agreed to meet up for the protests. It is an Anti-War protests and I admit I do not share the sentiments of the protestors. I think that the war in Iraq and Afghanistan was a mistake, but withdrawing from Iraq or Afghanistan now would be a catastrophe. IT would just diminish the international standing of the United States & its allies and lead to the creation of fundamentalist regimes in both Iraq and Afghanistan. However, as I stated last paragraph, it was not the war that I was concerned with here, but the freedom to express oneself.

So the few of us gathered at Waterfront and being virginal protestors were initially hesitant to join in the crowd. Not knowing what exactly to expect, I was kinda afraid that the situation would get out of hand like what we’ve seen on TV. However, our Ecuadorian friend, who is a seasoned protestor by now (having been involved in his fair share of protests back home) assured us that the situation was fine and everything is gonna be alright. So, in we went to join the crowd.

How can you do without it these days - an effigy of President Bush, this time as the grim ripper

It was not quite what I expected when I got down there. It was a small crowd of about 300-400 people holding banners and signboards, singing and chanting Anti-Bush, Anti-Harper denunciations. They were a multitude of people from all segments of society present – New Democratic Party, UBC New Democrats, BC Labor Union and other mostly leftist groups. One could see that these people were out there to vent their disenchantment for all to see, and they were ready to take their course to the extend of blocking off roads; getting honked at by not so amused drivers; even to be ridiculed by their fellow Canadians – such was their resolve. However, if it ever shown, it was shown in the Canadian way – which is epitomized by a slow leisurely stroll down downtown’s main streets on a nice cool Saturday afternoon. Yes, we did walk down Robson St (think equivalent Orchid Road and some of the protestors were chorusing into a particular anthem which would have not been taken lightly in Singapore). So the march started and it carried on. It was chaotic, of course when you have a few hundred people converging at a particular area. I bet it gets chaotic too during the Great Singapore Sale. However, people while psyched up and eager to make their voices heard, preserved their civility and walked on the stipulated route which was sealed off by Vancouver Police without any trouble.

During the march, I was fascinated by the array of signs hoisted by the various protestors. There was a ‘Viva la Hugo Chavez’ (Long Live Hugo Chavez). For all you folks who didn’t know, Hugo Chavez is the President of Venezuela, and during the recent UN General Assembly called President Bush – ‘The Devil’. I was really tempted to go up to that individual and ask him didn’t he think it contradictory exalting Chavez against the character of Bush; when Chavez himself is guilty of repressing the opposition movement in his country. Well, I think political correctness got the better of me and I decided that I could just figure the answer out for myself – he’ll probably accuse American propaganda for the bad rep on Hugo Chavez. However, kudos to Chavez, he is in history, one of the few who survived an American sponsored coup.

The thing about being in a protest march is that things begin to get political. I was by mid way point engaged in a conversation with the Ecuadorian friend, I spoke earlier about. Since everyone was fascinated about the Chavez poster, we talked about the resurgence of the left in South America. My Latino friend, to summarize, basically states two problems with South America – poverty and corruption. Those two factors just spiral downwards and transcend into the very reaches of government and society. He stated that he is resigned that the situation would stay as it is, regardless of whoever is in power. However, as the left constantly represents change, especially to the majority of the people who are living below the poverty line, the left represented the best hope for them to have their lives turn around. I then asked him since the process wasn’t functioning, what in his mind is the best way to change the lives of the people in South America. He just shrugged his shoulders.

It wasn’t before long, actually it was round about 1 hour, when we finally reached the Art Gallery where a slew of speeches were suppose to take place. Somehow or rather by this time, all of us were feeling kinda tired after that long walk and one could see that the majority, amongst the group of us, were beginning to swing in the way of getting da hell out of here and finding some place to eat instead. I wanted to listen to at least the first few speakers, however, I guess I had to give in to a craving appetite and the whinces of my peers. So, just like how it started, our little adventure come to an end, albeit abruptly.

All is not lost though. While I did not feel the ‘resurgence within my soul’ as some activist would have infused within him or herself, I did today understand something about, in all oddness, life itself. I guess all of us, being the emotional and unpredictable beings that we all are, need an avenue or medium or vent out frustrations and discontentment once in a while. Even though these protests had no impact whatsoever in changing the mindsets of world leaders or even their fellow citizens, it did give those partaking of it a sense of control over their situation, that they were doing something about a situation they are against. Yes, the freedom to express oneself does bring about change when change is needed, a much larger turn out would have brought about a more vocal standpoint and politicians might have listened – the system functions in itself. Even though it is far from perfect, but this is democracy, which reflects the will of the majority.

2006-10-27T23:24:00.000-07:00

Pondering on home

It’s been a while since I updated my blog. In fact, I think it is kinda redundant now and no one actually bothers to read it. (I think..) Anyway, I’m almost half way through the semester and the results are beginning to trickle in, albeit with heightened anticipation. Afterall, I don’t think I’ve recovered from A-Levelgate just as yet. Why? I guess it is the same reason which spurred me on to be so garang during national service – the fear that I’ll be never good enough. For all you geniuses out there, yes, I look to you with envy and for all the muggers out there, I wish I could possess some of that determination. Unfortunately, I stand neither, but possessing me. An individual trying to craft a niche for myself within the strata of society.

And seriously, that isn’t my ideal sort of life.

While everyone in Singapore, including myself, was hogged up by the excesses of Wee Shu Min, another piece of news hit the headlines. Ah Hao, the individual who was found guilty of murdering 5 year old Huang Na, was bound for the gallows after his pleas for Presidential Clemency was rejected. I read the news on Channelnewsasia with a sigh of nonchalance. Afterall, we execute than highest number of people per capita in the world, so another individual to the gallows isn’t such a big thing.

So, I went on reading about what the forums had to say about Wee Shu Min and apparently her father, the Senior Wee, is somehow involved in the whole saga now. (Looks like it’s playing up to be our own little Watergate) However, I felt kinda strange. Somehow, the previous news of Ah Hao just couldn’t get out of my head. It just didn’t follow. In fact, I was troubled with the way I took the Ah Hao piece of news so trivially and instead found amusement in some melodrama.

So, I clicked back to the Channelnewsasia article and read it through. Apparently, Ah Hao had a strong case for an appeal, and in fact, the appeal process took longer than the usual 3 months which made his lawyer hopeful that the appeal was successful. I was getting really curious, so I did a google seach on Ah Hao and more information surfaced. Ah Hao, the verdict of his guilt was upheld by a 2-1 decision by the Court of Appeals. Apparently, one of the Justices recognized that there was a possibility that Ah Hao’s actions did not directly lead to the death of Huang Na. Doubts began to creep into my mind.

While the high minded side of me was telling myself that the judiciary functions as a majority in this instance, the other side of me was regressing this thought. I mean, shouldn’t we be absolutely certain that Ah Hao killed Huang Na before we even entertain the notion of executing him? Furthermore, what justifies that the judiciary in demanding ‘an eye for an eye’? No, what is the function of judiciary? To mete our punishment fitting the crime? Or to reform individuals from their criminal past? I guess at this moment, I do not possess the ability to produce an absolute answer on this. Sure, I can generate an answer for my narcissistic pleasure, but I’ll just make a complete fool of myself at the end of the day. Rather, I just wish that Ah Hao wouldn’t have to die, another mother losing her child and a child losing her father. All in the name of justice.

However, there was something I realized. I think that sometimes we just take things for granted. What I mean is that we take things too much of face value and would rather keep it that way. If ever anyone complains why Singapore is the Singapore we know, I think the answer lies simply in that we have failed to question and act upon answers, even if we did.

2006-08-05T09:05:00.000-07:00

Breaking News: Gerald capitulated at the inaugural SICC Kaya Toast Eating Competition by half a toast to a relatively unknown 14 year old whom can only be described to be a featherweight compared to the gigantic monstrosity of his opponent.

No DVD player; I feel cheated; made a fool of myself and my digestive system’s going crazy.

2006-08-04T14:46:00.000-07:00

Ok, lesson learned, never mention sin at an ice-cream joint. You’ll utterly embarrass yourself.

Gerald: I’ll have the sundae.
Counter Girl: Toppings?
Gerald: erm..
Counter Girl: Fudge or Caramel?
Gerald (Bewildered Pause): Fudge, I guess.
Counter Girl: Sprinkled or laced?
Gerald: Huh?
Counter Girl: Sprinkled?
Gerald: Erm (Pause), ya ok la.

(She prepares the ice-cream prob not knowing that wasn’t exactly what I wanted)

Gerald (Obviously trying real hard to strike a conversation): These things, they’re sinful aren’t they?
Counter Girl (Chirpily): No la, the Vancho Monster is even worst, that is really sinful!

EVERYONE THINKS GERALD’S A TWIT!

Counter Girl: (Enthusiastically): There is so many of you ar, you all really should try the Vancho Monster, it’s worth it.

Yes, we live in real challenging times where sin is deducted from the amount of calories you consume in your food. We can never say we were spoilt for choice.

2006-07-26T10:38:00.000-07:00

Today was one of the most fruitful days since I started my leave off the military, even though I slept through the most part of it. I guess, if I had a choice, and not have to suffer the reprisals of being awake through the night, I would have taken the liberty of sleeping through it. That said, I’m glad I didn’t do so.

Lunch today was something special. My superiors hosted a farewell lunch for both of us, that is Gavin and myself. The big boss began asking us of ourselves, exchanging the usual table banter of which I gleefully partake off (even going to the extent of engaging Colin on the subservience of our civil service to government). Food was served by I must say horribly distasteful fashion tragic waitresses clad in gab one would recognize to be the uniform of our esteemed national airline. I’m certain the rest found it quite still amusing.

The object of the afternoon though, lied not in these trivial observations, but the fact this was our superiors’ recognition that now we are two individuals that have done our part and are no longer under the hand and eye of the military. I’m glad but at the same time, I am, quoting Gavin, feeling a tinch of nostalgia. I must say that I went through national service with a mixed bag of feelings. I hated it, yet I loved it. I hated the gross exploitation, but I love the camaraderie formed between people, incredible people whom I’d never have met. Gavin, Sherman, Colin, Slacker Huang, Weiyang, Alex, Wong Keng, Henry, the list just goes on. Through these two years, working with you guys through countless hours, tiresome night duties, and grossly depressing weekends, I guess there, through all that, we built a bond that I’m certain will withstand the test of time. It is a comfort to know that two years and four months were not wasted, having all of you to call friends.

The Regulars too I would miss. Mr Tan, who has been an incredibly motivating superior and one willing to expend his monthly paycheck for the sake of our culinary indulgences. I would always remember his grim lessons on Philosophy, though I guess I’m still too young to comprehend most of it. Warrant Mike too, for always bringing laughter when everything seem doom and glom. Major Lim, for being an exceptional superior, period. I never thought well of lady bosses, not that I’m a sexist, but she definitely buckled the trend.

Thus, my national service comes to an end. I guess now life just goes on from here. Another challenge lies ahead, I’m sure this experience has taught me well to rise to the occasion.

2006-07-22T13:35:00.000-07:00

Leaving home

It has hardly struck me, but I should have realized it.

In no less than a month and a half, I shall depart from this country. I will carry with me no less than my physical possessions which marks a transition from a life of dependency (not that mum and dad are not paying my bills!), to one of independence. This is in no way a declaration. I’ve seen my fair share of individuals basking in the full glow of post-teenage exuberance, who took the very same steps I’m taking, but choosing to divorce all links that they see themselves leaving behind. I for one am excited at the daunting prospect of living a new life, but I will miss what is here, for they will and always will be an essential part of me.

However, this is no excuse for reservations. It is a new country, new people, new culture. It will, I’m certain at every step, trigger a foreign taste upon the senses, challenging every perception. I can choose to shudder in fear and lock myself in the dim enclose of a culture shock or re-evaluate and consider my perceived world. If you ask me now, I can certainly elect the latter, but I’m well too aware of myself to know that it will take a whole lot of bravado to put aspiration to realism. It is indeed going to be an experience, not just in coming to terms with my new life, but most importantly, coming to terms with myself.

So, to the week ahead, more fat lunches and indulgent dinners.

2006-05-25T17:38:00.000-07:00

An Irish Airman Forsees His Death

I know that I shall meet my fate
Somewhere among the clouds above;
Those that I fight I do not hate,
Those that I guard I do not love;
My county is Kiltartan Cross,
My countrymen Kiltartan's poor,
No likely end could bring them loss
Or leave them happier than before.
Nor law, nor duty bade me fight,
Nor public men, nor cheering crowds,
A lonely impulse of delight
Drove to this tumult in the clouds;
I balanced all, brought all to mind,
The years to come seemed waste of breath,
A waste of breath the years behind
In balance with this life, this death.

-W.B Yeats