Lost in KL?

Lost in Bukit Bintang?

It has been a long since I came to this side of town. More than 30 years ago, this place was 'happening' like the lingo in those days. A place brightly lit with neon lights, the epitome of capitalism, the enticement of the giant evil as it ushers in its sheep to the slaughter. Innovative advertising and enchanting window dressing were baits to detach the salaryman from his hard-earned in a jiffy. That is capitalism 101. There were a few choices back then, and Bukit Bintang was it. The place to be for the hip and trendy.

Now, I feel lost. Walking on the footpath, I feel like a foreigner in my own 'Tanah Tumpah Darah Ku'. Everyone passing me looks foreign, speaking in incomprehensible tongues. Even the servers at the stall that line the footpath do not look local.

Like a deer caught in the headlights, I felt like the proverbial deer that entered the village (Rusa masuk desa). I was too afraid of how things had morphed so fast since the last time I brought my kids here.

Oh, deer! An Englishman in New York?

Come to think of it, this is how my 84-year-old mother would be feeling right now. Born at a time when Malaya was under the tooth-and-nail of the Japanese Army, she must have a green, lush, malaria-laden tropical country transform into an oasis of modernity with skyscraping structures lining its skyline. With modernity came automation, artificial intelligence and self-working services that needed users' input. Computers and remotes are complicated for the non-IT-savvy individuals who missed the boat to educate themselves to be computer-literate. To top it all, the mind is willing, but the body and brain functions are weak, frustrating any attempts at wanting to partake in events of the changed world. 

With declining cognitive function, I fear the day when she would feel like a drowning person struggling to hold on to straws, trying to make sense of the murmurs that surround her telling her to do something...

What is it for the rest of us who want to be included in the wave of changes? It constantly reminds us that we should stay abreast of things. We do not want to be like India, thrown under the bus while Britain rode the bus of the Industrial Revolutions' first and second waves at the expense of India's raw materials and market. India is now doing a catch-up. Why bother with the bus now that we have hoverboards (hint: Back to the Future)!

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3 for the party of 2?

Past Lives (Korean/English; 2023)

Director: Celine Song

One thing that created the rift between two men who dared to venture into the crypt of our mind and try to explain why we act and react the way we do remains unresolved. 

Sigmund Freud posited, in simpler terms, that our learnt experiences, together with unresolved pervasive sexual desires, are the main reasons for actions, inaction and maladies. His mentee, Karl Jung, thought some external events and forces might manifest as meaningful coincidences.

The question is whether we have only one life, just here and now and then we die, or we come here again and again. The film is selling the Korean Buddhist idea of 'In Yun'. We are all somehow connected cosmologically through reincarnation. When we meet people and feel we know them, we may do. There may be some unsettled business that needed to be settled, left from our previous encounters, god knows when. This could be our umpteenth trans-birth meet. Or it could be a ruse to get into each other's pants. 

The Mahabharata is full of these stories of paying back the evil deeds of past lives. King Shantanu's first wife, the mighty Ganga, drowned seven of her newborns. The eight escaped. Her justification was that her eight children were the eight elements that acquired a curse from a sage for coveting a cow in their previous lives. Like that, every action and reaction in this epic has its roots in the past.

As it turns out, in the film, a thirty-something Korean girl whose family had migrated to North America has a chance to meet her childhood friend. The last time they met, they were twelve-year-old classmates who shared something of a puppy love. After migrating to Canada, the girl, No Young, changed her name to Nora and started life anew in her newfound home. The boy, Hae Sung, stayed and progressed in his own way. Out of sight, but not really out of mind. The lost touch.

3 for the party of 2?

With the help of social media, they reconnected twelve years later. Life took its course; Nora got married, Hae Sung went to study in China, got into a relationship and failed. Another twelve years later, Hae Sung announced his arrival in the USA. This created an awkward situation between the three in the party of two. Nora's white husband worries she might return to her first love. Nora fears rekindling the old relationship, and Hae Sung is probably a forlorn romantic. 

The story is about how they resolve an issue that is a non-issue. After being tied down in a relationship, it is human nature to wonder how life would be if we had taken a different path. That is when we should slap ourselves awake, douse water on our faces and remind ourselves that whichever path we take, the journey and the outcome are invariably the same. The paths may vary, but both would be filled with ups, downs, joy, heartbreaks, achievements and letdowns. Just eat what we have, enjoy the flavour served and stop wondering what another flavour would have tasted. The end result, we know.

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Be ordinary?

The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck (Documentary, 2023)

Director: Nathan Price

Based on the book of the same name by Mark Manson (2016)

I have seen this book staring with sad eyes at me numerous times, pleading to be picked up. I always gave it a pass. Firstly, with profanity flashed on its cover, I thought the target readers must be Gen-Ys or millennials. They may find a reason to seek a book on self-help or, perhaps, perfect the art of not giving a damn about anything or whatever. I, on the other hand, was beyond help.

When a trailer bearing the same title appeared on Netflix, curiosity got the better of me.

After going through the documentary, I find that the content is more profound than its low-brow title. There is much philosophy to learn, as narrated from the life and times of the author, Mark Manson, by himself. 

He started his teenage years on the wrong footing. Caught with drugs in his locker, he got into the wrong side of the law. His parents divorced afterwards. He drifted through his late teenage years and early adulthood in a daze, experiencing the death of a close friend and unfaithful girlfriend. Somewhere along the way, he received a sort of epiphany that made him question the purpose of life. That soul-searching gave birth to the book and, now, the documentary.

What I gathered from this presentation is this: The modern society feels that the purpose of life is to experience happiness. It constantly tries to avoid pain and anything that stirs the psyche and raises anxiety. Pain and tragedy are bad words that must be avoided at all costs. Through his personal life experiences, the author posits that pain and tragedy are the necessary evils that strengthen us. We become resilient to whatever curveballs that life throws. Like what Nietzsche said,  probably parroting Vedanta's teachings, events in life are cyclical. Things get better and turn for a dip every so often.

The current Western teaching where happiness is the be-all and end-all of everything, we end up feeling entitled. We demand nothing else but to be satisfied. We want to be in control all the time.

The author thinks that a nihilistic outlook on life leads to more contentment. We should realise that we do not control anything. Everything is beyond our control. We should be humble enough to know we are mortal, just waiting to die. Being cocksure about something may lead to our downfall, exemplified by the example of  Lt. Hiroo Onoda, the last Japanese WW2 soldier to leave the Philippines in 1974. He spent a good 29 years in the jungle, convinced that Japan was still at war. Despite numerous attempts at bringing him back, he was confident that the whole exercise was fake news. What a waste of fruitful years of life?

Be ordinary; that is what he is saying.

You are nobody. You are not unique, which contradicts what the psychological community and management gurus say. The modern world tells each of us that we are entitled, and the rest can just go to hell. The 'me' as the centre of reference disappoints us when things do not go our way because, in our mind, we are special.

Many may not agree with his rhetoric. People need to think outside the box. Society needs mad people who can push the boundaries and would not stop at any extent to prove their point; civilisation needs them.

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Mercy? Murder?

Mary Kill People (Miniseries; 2017-19)
S1-S3; E1-E6

In 1967, surrounding the abortion debate, psychologists came up with a moral question, the trolley dilemma. It involved a speeding train about to hit five people working on the track. You are given a switch to divert the train onto another track. Unfortunately, it would involve hitting and killing one person. The question was, would you sacrifice one life in place of five. People found it easier to kill one as it is better in the greater scheme of things.

Over the years, the dilemma scenario was expanded. One involved the interviewee being allowed to push a fat man before the train to dampen its speed. People refused to agree to pushing someone personally, i.e. killing someone, to save lives. The consensus was unanimous - no killing. We have been hardwired to treat life as something so sacrosanct that we have no business ending it.

No matter how bad a convicted has been in real life, the general public, at least, refuses to be the one who would condemn another person to death. What if, despite all the advancements in forensic sciences, the public inadvertently sends an innocent person to the gallows/electric chair/lethargic injection/ firing squad. It is not that such things are not happening.

Let us turn to people who are genuinely in a near-death situation. Maybe they are afflicted with a terminally ill disease where all treatment modalities have failed and are spending their time in their few days or months of painful life. What if all cognitive faculties have failed and are left with a vegetative body kept alive, electrophysical only, by machines until the plug is pulled. 

Is it justified to insist that life is so sacrosanct that only the Giver had the right to take back what He gave, not mere mortals? Does easing the pain not include ending the very life that is inevitably coming to an end, albeit so ever slowly? 

Increasingly, more societies are asking these tough questions. The answers are more straightforward if theology is put aside and objectively argued with tangible facts and figures. In this time and age, as society has to deal with the longevity of its citizens and the costs of fighting aggressively near-fatal situations, resources could be set aside for the living and those worth saving. Or is every life worth saving, old, young, poor, rich, elite and pauper?

This miniseries does not ask or answer these questions directly or indirectly. It tells of a team of a nurse and doctors who identify patients who are terminally ill and seek relief from their sufferings. As euthanasia is illegal worldwide, this team offers a hush-hush discrete service for a fee. Their preferred choice of poison is liquid thiopental mixed with champagne. They hope their sympathetic act will go unnoticed as the victims are dying anyway. Unfortunately, sometimes, things do not work out as planned, and they encounter unexpected hurdles and failed attempts. To top it all, a police team is hot on their trail, eager to catch them in the act.

The medical dictum dictates 'primum non nocere' - first, do no harm. Are we causing harm or alleviating pain by offering medically assisted suicide after a comprehensive, multipronged assessment by medical and psychological experts?

The Utilitarianism school of thought would believe that killing one to save five is appropriate for the greater good. Deontological ethics dictate that ethical actions follow universal law. Wilfully killing someone is wrong. Period.

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Everything cancels out in the end!

The 4th Beatle? Paul is dead? 🐕

A successful Bollywood star was once interviewed for a podcast. The star had apparently struggled to climb the ladder of success without any connections or dynastic lineage to boost. He delved deep into his humble beginnings as he cosied up to the interviewer. Soon the whole conversation became up, close and personal. The Tinseltown star started reminiscing the times he grew up pathetically poor.

The family lived on the poorer side of town. Five family members, parents and three siblings squeezed into a tiny bedroom. A slight cough, hiccup or even sigh would alert the others to inquire whether things are alright. Besides pacifying each other, they would prepare some kind of concoction. Whether the home remedy worked or not, the love shared obviously did the trick. They were closely knit.

Jackie Shroff

Lady luck dropped in, and stars sparked brightly. With fame and fortune came a big mansion. Each family member had a private bedroom and attached fittings. The star was happy to 'pay' back to the family for standing by him through thick and thin. 

As cyclical as life is, life had its unexpected turn of events. Early one morning, the mother was found dead. Later, she had a massive coronary event the night before and succumbed to her condition.

The star then became philosophical. If only they had stayed together like before, when they were poor, one would have looked out for the other. The mother would have been rushed to the nearest medical facility, and appropriate treatment would have been instituted. 

But then, life is more complex. With minimal savings or medical insurance, expensive cardiac interventions remain a piped dream. With affluence, morbid conditions may be detected earlier and treated accordingly. To what extent should one give up the joy of living to worry incessantly with fear of dying? As Murphy's Law dictates, anything that can go wrong will go wrong if it is meant to. And Sigmund Freud chided Carl Jung for proposing something like 'Synchronicity'.

When we were young, we yearned for that plate of fat-laden juicy mutton varuval; we just could not afford it. Now, when possible, our cholesterol levels give a disapproving head shake. As the Tamil proverb goes, 'When there is a dog (and you need a stone), there are no stones; when you have stones, there is no dog in sight!'

Like the Epicureans, we have to rejoice in our wheat and water. And the Stoics, King Rama being the great example, troubles will pop up in torrents; we should face them valiantly and do the right thing to the best of our ability. 

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Life is a battlefield!

My body and mind went overdrive as things typically do while partaking in one of those age-defying mindless Sunday morning recreational run-cycle-run combo of Powerman Malaysia 2023 Edition. Staying mindful of the traffic flow of fellow madmen, the condition of the roads, my heart rate, race timing, the remaining distance to cover and gears, I had my hands figuratively full on top of everything else I was doing.

Behind it all, buffering silently in the background, basking in the inebriation of all sanguineous perfusion of flurry vascular tributaries is the creative part of the brain. It wants to keep up with the rest of the body. It, too, tries its hand at neuroplasticity. It sprouts out dendrites to establish long-lost connexions. And it engages in its internal soliloquy. I just happened to be there eavesdropping the murmur. 

Life is a battlefield. In modern times, the enemies we are supposed to fight are no longer the co-creations created in His image but the one in the mirror. The demons have all gone internal, so we tell ourselves. The jihad that they were fighting to steamroll our ideology has gone underground. Now, it seems jihad refers to fighting the inner demons.

Now, we are supposed to be kind to each other, come together and feel alright. We are not supposed to be having ill feelings towards the other. Instead of all these, we should focus on fighting the inner demons that lurk within us. Then there will be heaven on Earth. 

In real life, it does not work this way. In Nature, there is a constant need to push to a higher level. It is a question of the survival of the fittest. Darwin proposed it. We condemned it but cannot sweep the reality under the carpet. 

Even as a newbie starts cycling, running or trekking, he always tries to keep up with the group's oldest and weakest link. If he can reach the stage when he can outperform the slowest of the pack, he knows he has qualified to be a legitimate fellow group participant. 

You are given one life, not to brood over but to make the best

despite all the seemingly unending adversities that come and 

go. Sisyphus, given the life sentence of rolling the boulder up

the hill will have to find joy in reaching the pinnacle, 

knowing very well that the boulder will roll down and he has to

repeat the process again and again.

When training for a competition, a participant has to train with someone stronger than himself to improve. During the actual event, he has to benchmark himself against the better ones if he were to outdo himself. There is no meaning in merely pushing ourselves to improve without a yardstick to follow. In competitive mode, we look for prey, the feared 'the other' and the potentially beatable. We want to improve our standing by overtaking others, one at a time.

There is a place for active competition. The world is cruel and does not give concessions to the weak. So, affirmative action will work only in a short time. When used indiscriminately, it would be counterproductive. Hard times create strong men. Strong men create good times. Good times create weak men. And weak men create hard times. (G. Michael Hopf)

Like it or not, we improve as a human race by challenging the status quo. Jealousy can be a healthy virtue as long as to push oneself, but not in destruction. But he would be devastated, nevertheless. As long as he knows, he will return bigger and stronger. 

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Mortality grounds us

Living 2022

Director: Oliver Hermanus

You remember a time when you were looking at the world that passed on by. You see the stream of people all grown up, handsome, poised, brimming with confidence. You tell yourself that you want to be like them with lots of friends and be likeable. You just could not wait to grow up. In your inner circle, you have friends who think highly of you. You consider yourself the life and soul of a party.

And poof! You find yourself to be an old fool. You are a party pooper, a bore, a high-strung individual and a killjoy. People shun you. The younger ones would rather stay away from you to have a good time. They look at you as Scrooge and find excuses to stay away with a six-foot pole.

You wonder whatever happened to the bubbly youngster that you once were. Have you become that lone child in the playground with a perpetual sourpuss face who does not want to share his toys?

We sometimes lock ourselves in a comfort zone. We think we are all mighty and immortal and that there is no need to conform to the needs of others. Everything changes when death stares you in the face. Suddenly you realise the futility of it all - the pride, the Ego and the meaningless self-aggrandisement. You want to leave your legacy, nevertheless. You become one-minded, wishing to leave behind something for people to remember you by. The mind is willing, but the body is not. You become jealous of all the young people with such a positive outlook on life and with one thing they have, but you do not - time.

Mortality grounds us. It gives a purpose in life. It questions the meaning of all life and, in its way, tries to justify the reason for our existence.

In a purely artistic way, this message is conveyed in this film. It is a remake of Akira Kurosawa's 1953 masterpiece 'Ikiru'. 'Ikiru', in turn, was based on Leo Tolstoy's short story. Read here about Ikiru.

Set in 1953, in the office of the City Council of London, where stiff upper lip and haughty British class consciousness rules, the head of the Department, Mr Middleton, is diagnosed as having terminal cancer. He is a lonely man, having lost his wife earlier in life. He is not exactly close to his son and daughter-in-law. They see him as a necessary burden they must tolerate before they can lay their hands on his retirement money to improve their living conditions. Mr Middleton is not exactly pally with his subordinates, either. He believes in maintaining his distance from them as the hierarchical order dictates.

His chance to meet with one of his younger workers outside work as he digests his disease helps to re-ignite the ember he had lost. He made his life ambition to push for a children's playground that some members of the public have been tirelessly seeking.

Middleton dies, leaving everyone talking about his dedication. His workers vow to strive to improve the system. After the wake, as everyone returns to their daily routine, it is business as usual, back to its usual snail's pace. Nothing actually changed. All the resolutions to change are just small talks in the passing.

Without the fear of death, or if the thought of death is far away, people become complacent.

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