The key to the future in the past?

They say that the key to the future is in the past. Really? Many do not agree with this statement. 

Dodo bird - from the past!

Sure, how would one know that fire scalds if he is not given the opportunity to feel the brunt of heat traversing on the tips of the finger? Once burnt twice shy, they say. The mere thought of the pain of being scorched is enough to keep one on his toes to avoid the same experience. 

The memory of the misery of a checkered past continually playing in mind is a sure way the same mistake and even be a stepping stone for higher achievement. A regular reminder of the past may spur to strive harder and remind one of the missions in hand.

On the other hand, we are accused of clinging on to the past, living in the past, drawing in a shell and residing in the self-pity or nostalgia. As if nostalgia was a bad word!

In environment concerns, records of the past are needed to predict the future. Our knowledge about extinct species may prevent further disappearances of lifeforms. Data from other planets in the solar system may help to avert the bleak future that stands in front of us if they do not care for Earth.

The same goes for our history which tends to repeat itself. Napoleon and Hitler did not have the benefit of hindsight before attacking Russia. They would have probably resisted engaging in war in winter if they have given adequate attention to history.

It is anybody's guess what lies in front of us. Nobody has a crystal ball to predict our future. We make our moves and decide as we go on. Using our mental faculty and the experience of our previous failures, we take calculated risks and plunge on into life, hoping for the best.

Life is a constant change. We accept, we grow, we reinvent, and we tread with caution.

https://asok22.wixsite.com/real-lesson 

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Pain, but Divine!

Brass, pots, grinding stone, the sacrificial fire, 

millets all essential to symbolise the threadbare

of our existence and the power of the Universe 

over our every action. Till death do us apart 

this irrevocable union for continuity of the 

species. ©FG.

It is that time of my life when friends and relatives start inviting me to their children's wedding. Sometimes I wonder why they do that. Me, a cynic, one who derives schadenfreude by just watching the world go by from the background. The one who sneers within himself which of the weddings that he attends is going to be in the doldrums, which loving couple is going to two-time, which lovey-dovey couple is going to be at each others' throat and much more.

Maybe because of my status of being married, staying married for a reasonable period of time whilst dodging all the curveballs that were hurled my way in my lifetime (thus far) makes qualified to bless the newlyweds. The family may wish me to part with a bit of wisdom to that effect. Maybe, I, being the eldest in the family, had to represent my recently demised father to do the necessary deeds. He, however, was not a great fan of it either and would scoff all the unnecessary displays of fake niceties and falsehoods seen at these functions. Perhaps, the groom's family just wanted the numbers to show their in-laws that they had the manpower and numbers to defend if accusations of shortchanging or shortcoming should arise.

The ancestors knew that people were the worst of eyewitnesses. That is why a Hindu wedding, unlike others, is irrevocable and irreversible as it was done with the elements of Nature as the presiding judge. The sanctity of the occasion is vouched by the elements of Nature - water, fire, wood, wind. The approvals of the spirits of Nature is invoked through the rituals of symbolism and sounds. For good measure, a camera with its watchful eyes is placed amongst the paraphernalia essential in the cajoling procedure. If onlookers in the human form do not stand up if the sacred union were wronged, leave it to Elements. Offenders to the dharmic order would be dealt with and straightened up in their impartial ways.

The couples' intentions may be private but private intentions involving the privates need the approval of the Higher Forces. Within its act, are disseminated the seed of life. Somebody ought to take responsibility for it. Something so good cannot be without a catch. There is no such thing as a free lunch. Somebody has to clear the mess!

You may get away in the mortal world through legal wrangles but beware of the Void. Even video recordings can be brushed aside as fake, Nature, the silent observer would remain anything but quiet. It will definitely get you. If it does not, the guilt and the forces within you would. ©FG

 https://asok22.wixsite.com/real-lesson 

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

An imaginative depiction of Life

Westworld Season 1 (2016)

Someone said the other day that we are going through the golden age of television. As the competition to make newer themes and fresh ideas get greater, we, the viewers, can relax, sit back and just watch the fun. All the love and adventure themes seem to have run out. Now, the storytellers have to look no further but somewhat inwardly into our minds. And believe you me, there is a landmine there! With all the vestigial connexions in our grey matter and the smartest amongst us only use ten percent of our real brain potential, the mind is an ocean, of which, our imagination is the limiting factor.

Yes, the story of Westworld is a complicated narrative told in a flip-flop manner over three timelines, probably as analysed by one online commentator, 2015, 2018 and 2052. In a nutshell, it is a story of a Western-themed entertainment park where paying guests go to re-live the adventure of living in the Wild West. The park was curated by Robert Ford (Anthony Hopkins) and is run by a group of executives. The characters in the park are advanced robots created by Ford and his partner, Arnold. These robots are called hosts and are initially subservient but develop a mind of their own. Hosts are killed in the course of the story and are refurbished (rebirths). They are given memories of performing their work by the creator (God). Over time, the hosts develop consciousness and revolt against their creator.

The offering is a refreshing outlook on life as we know it. Humans, symbolically portrayed by the hosts, were created by God or Nature. The only instinct for them to go on living is the will to continue their existence is the little something called consciousness. They develop a memory of what they learn during their time on Earth and improvise their understanding of things as they go on. Self-interest is the primary force for their survival. This, they realise through the pain and sufferings that they endure during their tenure. They kill God when they understand the dynamics of how things work around them.

The great story of Life and Survival of Mankind told theatrically. Are we all players in God's game show? And He is the owner of the amusement park? That person of affluence and power (the guests) can get away literally with murder? Makes you think...

Decision, decisions

When I was young, either by ignorance or defiance, I tended to look down at the wisdom laid down by the Eastern sages but looked up at what, at that time appeared avant-garde, pop culture. With age, hopefully, wiser, I am exposed to the much wisdom that the Eastern philosophers had to offer. And I was just thinking of something I heard the other day.

Amongst the numerous moral dilemmas highlighted in the Mahabaratha, there is one which involved a priest. He was just sitting minding his business doing his priestly work. Along came a group of desperate men apparently running from something or someone. The desperate people were running from a band of thieves who were out to rob and probably kill them. They did not want the priest to tell them the direction of their route.

Sure enough, moments later, a group of menacing looking robbers appear.  The priest was put in a spot when asked about the whereabouts of the earlier men. His understanding of life is that one should be telling the truth, and nothing else would do. If he were to show them the right direction, which is the right thing to do, the innocents would be killed and robbed. If he were to deny any knowledge, the dacoits would surely beat the truth out of him. To lie and show them the opposite direction would be deceit, which was a no-no! Hence, the dilemma! He did what he thought was the best thing to do, to tell the truth. Apparently, the Gods were not happy when he died. He was sent to Hell.

Another moral conundrum evidenced in the Mahabaratha, as from many, is the process of assailing of Drona. The teacher who changed allegiance, after being humiliated by the Pandavas, had the knowledge of a secret weapon. The only way to defeat him was to catch him off-guard. Krishna, sometimes referred to as the inner conscious, suggested that the Pandavas tell a white lie. He was to be told that Ashwatthama, his son, was dead.

The truth of the matter is that Ashwatthama was not dead, it was all a facade. The question was that whether it was alright to lie. Krishna asserted that winning for an honourable reason was noble. When an enemy could not be defeated in the usual the straight-forward manner, victory by deceit is acceptable. For Yudhishtra, the eldest of the Gaurava's sons, who could tell no lie, could not proceed such a line of a devious plan. He was made to be convinced that indeed there was an elephant named Ashwartthama which was killed. Hence, technically he was not lying! For other brothers, Arjuna and Bheema, it did not really matter. They felt that they, of the warrior stock, just wanted to win.

The point here is that it is not easy to make the right decision that would satisfy all quarters. Nobody actually knows whether an act is a noble one at that juncture. Prevailing circumstances and the societal set of moralities determine its appropriateness. The wisdom of a particular action could be a judgement in retrospect. We are mere mortals, how are we to know?

N.B. These are just part of a tale of intertwiningly epic proportions. Every action in Mahabharata is justified in sometimes contradictory fashions. What is good for the Kings may not be appropriate for the peasant. Like Schopenhauer said, we glorify the past and the points that suit our agenda. Not everything in the past is bad, and not everyone in the past was noble.

We are alone!

The Pervert’s Guide to Ideology (2013)

Most people would go watch a movie, get immersed in its fantasy for a while, forget their daily aches and pains, re-live their fantasies and then come back to earth; but not all. Some dissected, analyse and read the fine prints and between the lines. One of them, besides yours truly is modern day ‘Rock Star’ Czech philosopher Slavoj Zizek.

He glides through some famous and not-so-famous movies to try to read the real messages imparted by them. The films he chose range from famous blockbusters like ‘Jaws’, ‘Sound of music’ and ’Titanic’ to obscure ones like ’Seconds’ and Russian movie ‘Fall of Berlin’.

In his typical engaging hand gesture and tics, he dissects the ideologies behind of some of the most seemingly innocent movies. Zizek himself is the narrator, and he tells his story in the background of the movie’s recreated set.

They say that cinema is the alternative platform of reality. We project our inner unfilled or desired feelings on the silver screen.

1988 film ‘They Live' shows the real meaning of the ideology of modern living is shown. The protagonist finds a box of sunglasses. When donned, the wearer ‘sees’ the reality of things around him. An advertisement poster depicting a voluptuous model in bikini actually says procreate and have kids. It also shows the indifferent attitude of people who want to see the world the way they want to look at it and resist any attempts to understand the real meaning of things. The invisible order of apparent freedom just suits them fine. We enjoy the illusion. The painful truth, when liberated, can only be done with extreme violence, a revolution.

 1965 'The Sound of Music’ takes a swipe at the institution of organised religion. On the one hand, it makes it followers feel guilty of enjoying simple pleasures in life. In a contradictory way, through a song (Climb Every Mountain), it encourages everyone to attain greater heights in everything they do, including having pleasure!

Coca-Cola and many of the commodities of the capitalistic world pushes one to attain the unattainable - the Real Thing. The advertisements put it to us that it is our duty to enjoy. A desire for the unknown, a desire to desire some more!

It is interesting how Beethoven’s 9th Symphony ‘Ode to Joy’ is universally accepted by people of different political ideologies to push their agendas. Hitler, Stalin, China, Guzman leftists in Peru all use this song to promote solidarity amongst its members against the others, inadvertently unifying their select group of people against the people whom they consider enemies! This is all done with self-interest. In ‘Clockwork Orange’ (1971), this song is placed in various bizarre chords to highlight its schizophrenic nature. Interestingly, the second part of this symphony is indeed chaotic in its composition. Ode to Joy became a big boys’ club song to unite a common enemy. Talking about the enemy, ‘Jaws’ (1976) is not just a horror movie but a movie that tells a story of people different ideas (on killing the shark) but a tale of people getting together against a common intruder. This intruder (the metaphor for the shark) can be immigrants, communism, people of different skin colour, belief or even capitalism. In fact, Jaws turns out to be Fidel Castro’s movie.

The delinquents in ‘West Side Story’ (1961) tell their story of how they become trapped in the conundrum of police brutality, poverty and lack of opportunity. The people in the lower rung of the social strata know they are doing it wrong, but they are still doing it anyway. Even the powers that be the sociologists are aware of this vicious cycle. Are we merely objects of circumstances? Do we all have the margin of freedom to react and to construct our own fate? Is increasing surveillance, police presence and harsher punishments the way to kerb this problem? Is there a concerted effort to maintain the status quo to preserve the hierarchy? We always these same stories whenever there is civil unrest.

‘Taxi Driver’ (1976) depicts violence as a symbolic deadlock and fantasy fundamental helps certain deficiencies in our reality. Not everyone who is perceived to be a victim is actually a real victim. Perhaps they enjoy their helplessness and do not want to be redeemed as seen John Wayne classic ’The Searchers’ (1955). How is this related to real life? Look at the American military intervention in Vietnam and Iraq to liberate their population from tyranny. The outcome of these wars showed that the people there did not want to be helped. They were quite happy with their life.

Conflict is said to be the basis of capitalism. The mere fact that there is conflict is a fertile ground for new ventures and moving of capital. Crisis pushes it to revolutionise itself.

Movies like ’Triumph of Will’ (1935), ’The Eternal Jew’(1940) and ‘Cabaret’ (1972) are overt fascist movies with hate message spewed all over them.

In modern day consumerism, the guilt of over-indulging and over-spending is offset by cleverly justifying their ‘spendthriftness’ by giving away measly sum to ’noble’ charity cause. Capitalistic expansion seems to have taken precedence over ecological awareness. Wastage and thrash are accepted as a necessary by-product of progress.

Walter Benjamin who is often quoted to have said that ‘History is written by the victors’ is also known to have said ‘history is appreciated when we see our stages of waste being taken over by nature’. This is why doomsday nihilistic movies are quite a hit, e.g., ‘I am Legend’ (2009).

‘Titanic’ (1997) crudely and cruelly reminds one of the suspended grimaces in the pleasure of pain. Incidentally, this theme appears more than once in Mahabharata.  Stories of sages taking a form of deer engaged in a sexual activity and being hit by a stray or intended shot of arrow are common occurrences. The mammoth unsinkable streamliner built at the height of glitz of mankind’s engineering feats when the world was a peaceful place before it fought its two wars hit a snag on its maiden voyage. It also smells of Hollywood Marxism where fake sympathy is shown to the lower classes. The upper-class members are still seen ruthlessly abusing the latter, but the illusion of eternal love is the vanishing mediator.

Many atrocities and unkind gestures are done towards fellow man are justified as being done for 'The Other’, a somewhat vague end towards which everything seems to head. Stalin’s brutal actions (The Fall of Berlin, 1949) and Czech invasion by Soviet (Oratorio for Prague, 1968) are justified by this excuse.

You always have explicit unmentionable rules (Bro Code) to keep the group intact (Full Metal Jacket, 1987). Public life seems democratic but beneath the surface lurks sadistic rituals and victimisation (If, 1968). Are the actions of the military in Abu Ghraib prison a reflection of the obscenity of the forces?

Our society only can only function in a lie. As seen in ‘Dark Knight’ (2008), telling the truth in the form of Joker is a distraction. Lies are needed to maintain order. The system would actually collapse if the real truth is revealed.

Jean Paul Sartre had apparently said, ‘If there is no God, then everything is permitted’. Religion is said to maintain sanity in society. If one were to scrutinise daily global, he would not disagree that “if there is God, then everything is permitted’. Many atrocities, murder and heinous crimes are committed by its congregation using religion as its shield. Hence, it does not matter if a person is religious or atheist, man justifies his actions.

Stalinism often quotes ’The Big Other’, a vague entity loosely associating history to help the nation towards success and progress. It is the ‘Big Other’ that we need to maintain our appearance. It is an agency to confess, tell our predicament and justify our actions. Like a rape victim or a whistle-blower who cannot wait to tell his whole story so that his woe would not befall on others, he is hoping for the ‘Big Other’. The truth is that there is nobody out there to listen, like Jacque Lacan, said, “We are all alone”!

For a non-religious secular man in the modern era, bureaucracy is the only contact remotely close to divinity - ‘Brazil’ (1985). People engaged in administration enjoy positions of spiritual states doing acts of purposelessness and serving nobody. They decide what is right in an atheist / secular society.

‘The Last Temptation of Christ’ (1988) again debunked the idea of the ‘Big Other’. We are all in subjective destitution as evidenced by the famous line, ‘Why have you forsaken me?’

We are responsible for our dreams but unfortunately, we have to dream the correct dream as we are responsible for our dream and it outcome (Seconds, 1966). Are we to just make do with what we have and not dream too much? Do we need to change our dreams? (Zabriskie Point, 1970)

Be a realist, the change is within us!

Lucky to be alive?

My nimble mind tells me that karma law says that the soul must complete the cycle before reaching moksha. Depending on how good the soul behaves, it moves up the ladder. The step above man is devata (wise man or demigod). Along the way, the soul has to endure being born a speck of dirt, algae, grass, tree, a maggot, a roach, a quadruped, an ungulate, a man and finally, the soul would break the chain of rebirth bondage.

That always made me think that your miseries reduce as you climb the rung of the proverbial karma ladder. The physical body of the soul of the low-life would be trampled upon. Their outcome is non-sequential to the equation of the universe. I wonder how they could boost their standing in their next birth. Dirt and amoeba do not think.

In fact, one wonders whether 'lesser' life forms in the hierarchy, below man, even think beyond their primordial needs of fulfilling the satiety of hunger, lust and sleep. A cat does not visualise and have ambitions of wanting to be a famous exemplary cat for the cat kingdom to emulate. Neither do they aim to do good because they fear being judged on Judgement Day or being stuck in purgatory, nor do they have ambitions or worries about what is in store for the future.

Is philosophical contemplation possible?
©FG

Paradoxically, being born in supposedly higher strata bogs you with many life uncertainties and undue worries. There is a social contract that needs to be met. Family obligations need to be fulfilled. The curse of mankind, memory, keeps you awake with thoughts about how your life could have turned. You ponder upon the things you omitted in life. You curse yourself for missed opportunities. You lose sleep about how your offspring would turn out or whether you have the best arrangement for them. You worry about your twilight years and how you would bid farewell, alone, peaceful, at the mercy of others, a nuisance or rotting.

And they say you must be privileged and be thanking your lucky stars for having the honour of having this birth. In the same breath, they also say that life spent on Earth is a kind of punishment with all the aches, pains, failure and helplessness. But then people hold dearly to their dear life no matter what. The good die young, so the living must be bad. It does not compute.

If Man has so many dilemmas, imagine what a demigod (a devata birth) would have. We already have that on DC and Marvel comics. With great powers come great responsibility!

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

You breathe!

So you think you are so great? That the universe owes you a living, that the you were sent with a mission and people around you are duty-bound to care for you, pave the path for you with petals of blessings and perfume of comfort. That, it is your right to demand this and that. And put the tag of duty to it, laying down your own rules on how those before you are expected to behave. As if the ones before you had it on a silver platter. Have it slipped your mind that it is their toil that cradles you to slumberland without a care in the world, without a  flash of thought on your next meal and next course in life.

Now with the strength that you picked from the broth fed to you spruced with parental love and care had turned vile against your feeders.  Their actions and inactions are glaringly plain to you as if they were retard of faculties. That new science that you proudly sing is just a rationalisation of your inefficiencies, not theirs. They gave what they had with the best of knowledge, best of intent, best of faith. Not accepting remunerations but for the sin of the minute's pleasure which is the seed of civilisation.

You are lucky. You were lucky. If not for the stars, for constellations, you may just be a crying seed or half a seed washed down the abyss of mice infested cesspool of filthy muck.
You were just plain lucky that the universe, one day, at the time of your formation, decided that you should have the right chemical milieu and neurotransmitters to develop pass beyond the trilaminar plate to be what to you are. Nature took pity and allowed your existence. Nature, the hostile un-nurturing parent, gave you the armamentarium to exist. It did not happen by chance. Maybe it did, but the master plan, the chaos of the butterfly effect of randomised probability were, in that micro-fragment of microsecond, blinked and you exist!

Mellow down, descend your mighty saddle. You and I are just alms of that nidus called existence, so fragile, so flimsy that a slight sniffle from the mosaic of life could send all to non-existence. Crying over spilt milk is futile and would only give a bad unpasteurised after-taste. Repent? Or is it just the game orchestrated by the dice thrower?

Still judging by the outer cover

The distributor told me that whatever is said, people still judge the book by its cover, hence emphasising the need for a captivating eye-catching cover. Once the book cover caught the eyes, only then would the potential buyer make an attempt to browse through between its covers! Like the Malay proverb says, 'from the eyes to the heart' and 'what you do not know, you do not fall for' - 'dari mata terus ke hati', 'tak kenal maka tak cinta'.

In real life too, things are not much different. Sometimes, we are fooled by external appearances. A person can dressed in the nines in tandem with the latest in haute culture cities of world equally spankingly manicured, pedicured and groomed smelling like a rose garden. The enchantment stops short once the person open the gab, enough to give anybody  a heart attack! No, not because of their putrefying halitosis but the illiteracy and nincompoopery that they exude. Well, on the other hand, the most brilliant of mankind may be simply dressed. One who has the gift of the gab may have more things to hide than his mental inefficiencies just like a hottie who revealed too much has more than her flesh to cover!

It is all too easy to profess that beauty is in the inside and external captivation is skin deep, but how many of us are not guilty of stereotyping, profiling and judging the book by its cover?

All-or-none law works in science, in life?

The roller coaster of life of survival.

Everybody has some goodness in him. Sometimes, he thinks he is doing the right thing. Well, from where he is standing, that is how it looks to him. He has to protect his own interest or that involves people around him. He says charity begins at home. When a family is taken care well, society and humanity will take care of itself. His servants may agree to his action and those at the receiving end of his actions may abhor. The victims may cry for help and may curse for him to burn in the eternal flame of hell. They would refer to history and scriptures to justify their actions or inactions.
At the end of day, at the end of life, the sums of things done in a man's life can never be either black or white. It can only be in shades of grey. It seem totally unfair to gauge the goodness (or evil) of one's action using a 2D yardstick with pre-set rules which never changes seasons over seasons and generations over.
Surely at the Pearl Gate, the dichotomy cannot be so straight forward. The deeds done in a lifetime cannot be all be easily classified - thumbs-up or thumbs-down. And it seem unreasonable to be given a new slate just because you repent at the last minute after a trail filled with heartaches, misery and disappointments. An all-or-none rule works does not seem the plausible way of doing things.There must be a halfway house between heaven and hell.

  

No right, no wrong!

Don't know why, this week, two of the people just went on rattling about the problems they were having with their kids. Not to solve their problems but to ventilate, hoping to hear that they had not done it all wrong but they did all right. To hear that they did what was right in that particular frame of time, in that specific situation, with the resources that they had. It looks like everyone is in the same boat, expectations on the duties performed. The receiving party, however, feels that it is their birthright to be given on the platter. Through thick and thin, the providers provided, feeling that the responsibility was theirs to shoulder (ain't too heavy 'cause it is their flesh and bone).

What they expect in return is gratitude and respect that they had given their elders. But then, times change and values change. Gratitude in the medieval times is paid back with life, in the spanking new technology-driven 21st-century world, it would be a 'like' on your Facebook!

What the provider really want is for the recipient to be able to weather the storm which may strike at any time in their unpredictable lives and also to be a steadfast rock for future dependents! That's all.

Grand ol' Dame

Great ol' dame

Between 18 and 20 a woman is like Africa, half discovered, half wild, naturally beautiful with fertile deltas.
Between 21 and 30 a woman is like America, well developed and open to trade especially for someone with cash.
Between 31 and 35 she is like India, very hot, relaxed and convinced of her own beauty.
Between 36 and 40 a woman is like France. Gently aging but still a warm and desirable place to visit.
Between 41 and 50 she is like Yugoslavia, lost the war - haunted by past mistakes. Massive reconstruction is now necessary.
Between 51 and 60, she is like Russia, very wide and borders are unpatrolled. The frigid climate keeps people away.
Between 61 and 70, a woman is like Mongolia, with a glorious and all conquering past but alas, no future.
After 70, they become Afghanistan. Most everyone knows where it is, but no one wants to go there.

Like a glorious prima donna who stands majestically after a glorious past, refusing to admit the end is nay, she lives day by day reminiscing the bygone days. The days, when she was newest and most exciting thing in town. She was the talk of town. Every guy wanted to lay his eyes on her and wanted a piece of her. Her captivating persona and hue used to be envy of others. That was 20 years ago when she was spanking new and clean. Now what can offered is only the fond memories of the good times with her.

Greens?

Time's up!

That is the story of Pangkor Island Beach Resort. We remember going there 20 years ago. And it was good time to go back to reminisce the good times that we had there. The times of our youth when our life was laid bare for us to mold and to evaluate our journey that we had taken thus far. Things have definitely changed, just like us. Some of the staff who were there during our first visit were still there, albeit aging gracefully with us. These people know us as one member of our entourage had been a frequent visitor there all these years!

The building is slightly run down weathering the frequent beating of nature. The greens of the golf course is hardly green due to the current hot spell and neglect.

The peacock and hornbills which were the mascots and the pull factor of the hotel were still there (of course must a different generation than when the hotel started!). The peacock still walk around the compound showing off his hued spread of feathers. Now, he must be happier than usual in the smartphone era to be pixelized at the rate photos are captured these days. 

The hornbills still fly around to lay claim on the restaurant that is named after their species!

The hotel may be old and tired but it is still exuding its charm and charisma to its visitors, sending them back with more fond memories.

Till next time...

Come June, this old Dame would be put to rest for a 2 year period for refurbishment. During this period, her status is to be elevated from a 4star status to a 6! With all the cosmetic changes, she hopes that the glorious past and fame would rekindled.

After a short weekend retreat, we too returned rejuvenated to face the challenges of the world. At the back of our minds, we remind ourselves that we too have to give a good fight trying to fulfill our obligations on Earth until we are slowly phased out to be replaced by a new set of fighters....

All things will/must pass...

A coincidence happened a few days ago to convince me that all things will pass and not to get upset about things. And it also convinced me to look at the other side of things. Somehow, wearing the other person's shoes, the problem does not look like a problem anymore!

 A few days ago, my neighbour's puppy started barking incessantly. Prior to that, nobody in the neighbourhood even knew of the existence of  a dog in their backyard until the eventful day. Calls after calls rang of the  hook of my neighbour's phone complaining about the nuisance so much so that he became phobic receiving calls and stopped answering them.

Almost like magic, during a casual conversation with my sister living 300km away a few days later, she was complaining that her neighbours were unhappy with their loss of sleep over the continual barking of her dog. She was at wit's end trying to get to the root of the problem with no avail.

Back in my neighbourhood, the barking ceased. It could be one of the follows: dog died/put to sleep/whatever offending the creature was removed/ dog just stopped barking/in somebody's cooking pot! Whatever it is, my neighbour never saw his neighbours the same way again after all the hurtful words hurled at him at the spur of the moment.

 On the other side of the 300km end, my sister zeroed it on the fact that the dog must be feeling cold after an overzealous grooming. After probably the disappearance of the initial irritation and adaptation, her dog stopped whining in the next few days and everybody in her neighbourhood were all smiles again. 

And life goes on.... Hurdles, tragedies, ailment, loss and calamities are just obstacles that we have to pass through in our voyage of life. No point getting upset as all thing must pass. Sometimes we pass with them too but we may be in a better place (so they say)......

A Wonderful life...

So one by one, the cycle is complete. By the end of the year, all of us would have completed half a century of living. 28th October, another bites the bullet, bites the dust.
Our friendship started in secondary school, especially after Form 3 and especially after my family moved from RRF to Brown Garden.

A care free time no doubt but the uncertainty of what the future held for us hanged above us like a Domacles sword, we still had a good time, the best time of our lives which we still linger in our minds. So much so that, we have tried to relive the moment via the use of social media- Whatsapp, Line Chat and Facebook!
After having a whale of time, the best time of my life, in Form 6, we went separate ways. I, to USM and he to UPM. Like the movie 'When Harry met Sally', our lives got intertwined along the way.
In school, he was a happy child, forever laughing and smiling. He was liked by everyone and was the shoulder for everyone to lay their troubles on. Even girls were telling him their intimate problems. Sometimes, we wondered...

We stayed connected all these years. In the early years, we kept in touch via the media which is quite alien to  the present generation called snail mail but in those days the only mail we knew. It is surprising that we actually wrote all those 3 or 4 pages of narratives on a monthly basis. We exchanged happenings of each others' lives, about the fauna and flora in UPM, about his room mate, his adventures in the dairy stables and pig sty!

It's a wonderful life!

After graduation, we landed in the same town again, in Klang. At that time, all my friends and cousins wanted to get to know him as he was known as the guy with KFC vouchers!
Then, we went separate ways again. Fate had it that we found ourselves together, in Melaka. By that time, I was married and he was a swinging single, swinging and lost in the chicken husbandry. He was so fed up with chicken that he did not eat chicken throughout his stay in Melaka.
Then with the advent of mobile phones and internet, keeping in touch became a breeze. 

And we had in touch since then. 

We have been together in each others' happy and not so happy events over the years. Sasi, hope to see you smiling like this like you have always been since the first time I met you  some good 37 years ago. Wish you all the best in the future undertakings and may this friendship lasts forever more.

Only the good die young!

So at the funeral pyre, the crowd sobbed at the passing of a likable 53 year old lady who succumbed to the devastating effects of the malignant crab of an organ which held the seeds of life (not death).
The family members and friends have been prepared and even relieved to see her go. Seeing her organs fail one by one to be supported by modern science and pain (oh, the pain)... Death was the saving grace. After stopping all medical interventions and returning home to the comfort of the familiar company of her family members and family home, in the echoing chants of prayers, she breath her last breath.
One relative who was perplexed by the turns of events confided why she should just whither away so soon, being a seemingly kind lovable religious vegetarian and all, at an age where she should be enjoying the fruits of her life struggle. She finally came to terms that this was one of those unexplainable things in life that nobody could decipher. The only thing she could do was to do good, pray hard, do the necessary medical tests and hope for the best!
....The evil minded devil's advocate in FG got him thinking...
Maybe, the dearly departed was so lovable that even God wanted to have her close by his side! If not, why do you see so many seeming evil man and evil women still roaming the world? Would not a bolt of lightning just strike at the right spot to jolt them into place? People who allegedly had great disservice and atrocity to humanity, should they not be eliminated early to maintain peace, law, order and sanity on Earth?
Chin Peng, who is griped strongly by a big group of the people in this nation lived to a ripe age of 89. There are even some plotting devious plans of dominance and ill intent against his enemies at this late twilight of age. So, my friend, this adage of doing good to live longer does not hold water. On the contrary, only the good die young. Furthermore, living on Earth is supposed to be the punishment of the soul in the cycle of karma!
When you pray, are you communicating with a bigger Being who would change the course of your life after taking pity on your plight of getting fed up with your constant harassment? Is it not just a monologue or a self pacification to give encouragement to counter the daily challenges of life?
The more you think of things like these, the more confused you would be. People with limited knowledge probably with vested interest would tell you this and that attempting to cow you into submission with talks propagating siege scenario. So, the best thing for me to do is to run and clear my mind..... 42 here I come...
Only the good die young, so be a bad*ss!

Be imaginative, they say!

David Bowie - The Chameleon!

The management gurus will always come in say that in order to stay in vogue with the ever changing times, we have to re-invent ourselves. To stay relevant, we have to re-brand, re-train and to stay afloat with the flow.
Errr... It doesn't sound right of you are an accountant and you start getting creative in your accounting. What about your trusted medicine man who starts becoming imaginative with his treatment modality and decides to experiment with new treatment avenues just to be different, giving a new meaning to the name of his office - the practice. He gets creative to make you more sick than you really are! And when things go wrong, he would say, "Oops, I'm sorry" and carry on with his next client/patient/victim. Of course those in the artistic arena would benefit and survive from regular face lifts. Their clients are easily bored and forever yearn for something new and fresh.

Bowie - still strong! 30yrs on

Fresh face actors, avant garde inventors, revolutionary designers and attention craving performers need to shed their exoskeleton every once in a while to turn heads. Even lawyers have to repeatedly think of ingenious ways to dodge their clients' wrongdoings ( the truth does not come in the equation) by creatively creating loopholes or doubts in the legal framework to sketch an element of doubt for their 'pathetic' clients to escape punishment!
Even conmen and thieves are becoming more and more slick these days. And the Nigerians with money stuck in frozen accounts... Do I need to go on?

Perfect sense

Growing up in RRF, Amma tried all the ways that she knew that could impart the values that could mold her son into a knowledgeable individual. One of the ways that she carried off her duty was reading aloud the proverbs and quotations printed on the daily leaf of a Tamil calendar. This calendar had daily chart of good and bad astronomical times together with daily saying of the day. The leaf of the calendar is torn daily and viola, another gem comes out.
Mother read me about JFK's 'Ask what your country has done for you...' long before I knew about American foreign policy, about 'turning the other cheek' from Gandhi and Jesus, and Socrates' call to think critically and question intelligently. I would then in turn rebut with some wise crack ridiculing the sayings but must helped in thinking outside the box.
In the growing and trying age of teenage, quotations were a big deal. Teachers' autograph on annual school magazine were treated as gems. LHS' 'plough hard while sluggards sleep' and 'cows may come and cows may go but this bull stays here forever' were inscribed permanently at my reading corner!
The Gen-Y may have missed all these while they were growing up.  Like they say, a poor man and unhappy man are philosophical men. Our parents, from the doldrums, have many gems that they have learnt in the course of trailing the pebble-stoned path of life.
Anas, a fellow Free, had complied some of life lessons from his parents that make perfect sense today, even at the time of 4G and Google!

What is life?

So this is life? After 52 years of wedded bliss, what do I have to show to myself? What am I left with? A big house which used to be a home with hive of activities that never tend to stop, the Christmas parties that never ended, the stream of friends that we never knew we had. Now I only have loneliness as my constant companion. Solitude is my trusted friend who lassos remote almost forgotten visions of my one and only. The bond that we shared were beyond physical worldly pleasures. Beyond the age of physical allure, our magnet attracted each other like no magnetized ferrous chunks could. 

Prove of our union love is the five lovely offspring that we cared for so much. A little squeal from one used to sound like a wail to you. And the ups and the downs that through together. And the sickness and the health! You are the only that I knew. 

I know I cannot be sniffling like a teenage girl over your demise. I had more than my share of happiness in the lifetime.

Oh God! I am so lonely. My shelf life is approaching its expiry. I do not wish to be a burden to our bearer of our traits. They have their commitments just like we had ours when we were in the prime of our lives.

After all the time doing all the things together, I cannot fathom the idea that I cannot touch you, feel you, question you. They say you are no more around. They say that you are in a good place and I will join you one day to continue the conversations at where we were rudely interrupted by the dreaded crab. But why is it that you appear in front of me ever so often? Why are you so silent with that cheeky smile that stole my eons ago? Why do I feel the aura of your presence? Why do I smell that brand of deodorant and after shave that you were loyal to all your life? Are you here as my guardian angel? Are you lonely there? Are you waiting for me?

You remember all the places that we had worked and gone for holidays together? You made it a point to bring a momento from each of your destination? Now, each and every part of these items have a bitter sweet story to tell. Every touch of an item opens the flood gates to an avalanche of memory with you, I, the kids and our dog Boo.

So, what is life? We sprout sheepishly, spring coyly, spread majestically, stand defiantly, bow progressively and slowly wither away with no trace, leaving only specks of memories to hold on to.