I don't know why I bother, since whatever I say, people generally only use it to laugh at me. But I guess one line can't be the source of too much hilarity:
I have to start shifting my loyalties and stick to them.
There comes a point when you have to admit that you have a problem, and then you have to take steps to confront the problem, take it by its proverbial horns and wrestle it to the ground until you triumph with a mighty HAH! and feel so good about yourself that you immediately go on a self-destructive binge all over again.
Of course, I am talking about my addiction to books. Or rather, the buying thereof.
This is a schedule. I will stick to it. I hope.
1. Moby Dick, Herman Melville - currently reading
2. The Fourth Bear, Jasper Fforde - something light to soothe the pain of reading Moby Dick
3. Something non-fictional here. Maybe How Proust Will Change Your Life, Alain de Botton
4. Heavy-duty fiction. Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy or Feast of the Goat, Mario Vargas Llosa
5. Then light fiction to give my brain a break. Salmon Fishing in the Yemen, Paul Torday
6. Non-fiction. How the Mind Works, Steven Pinker
7. Light-heavy fiction that will make me feel like I am accomplishing something. Either The Sea, John Banville, or The Harmony Silk Factory, Tash Aw
8. Whichever one I didn't read in #7
9. Whichever one I didn't read in #4
10. Back to non-fiction. Infidel, Ayaan Hirsi Ali.
11. I'm guessing that would lay the ground for something pseudo-intellectual. Perhaps Things Fall Apart, Chinua Achebe?
12. And light fiction again. The Cutting Room, Louise Welsh or The Courage Consort, Michel Faber, or something like that.
At the end of these 12 steps, come up with 12 more. Wish me luck.
]]>The other day I was at Plaza Singapura and we walked into Carrefour and lo and behold, they were having a book clearance sale. I bought three books for $3 each, and on the bus home I took out two of the books and read the 69th page of each. I made the Russian do the same.
This is the Marshall McLuhan test to see whether you'd like a book -- I mentioned this in my very first post.
We both preferred the page in Dan Rhodes' The Little White Car to Michel Faber's The Courage Consort. That reminded me of a lesson I'd learnt in lit once -- that sometimes you can learn a lot about and from a book when you take a passage out of context. The page in Rhodes' book was more light-hearted in its tone but I could feel like it was just a gloss over some darker mood brewing in the story. You could also tell that the story was more character- than plot-driven. The page in Faber's book didn't tell me much about the characters, so I suppose it's more plot-driven, which also meant that it was harder to appreciate out of context. The writing was more polished than Rhodes', but also more distant.
I think when you take a page out of context like that, you realise these things -- the author's style, the overall tone and mood -- that could help you to understand the whole story better when you've read it from front to back. I think usually I'm so engrossed in just finding out what happens next that I don't take time to figure out the mechanics of the writing and thus lose out on some meaning (whether intended by the author or perceived by myself) I could have derived from the book otherwise.
So from that night I've made a vow to read the 69th page of a book before starting on the first page, and then after finishing the book, see if my reading of it still stands at the end.
The first book I've been able to do that with is How to Be Free by Tom Hodgkinson, which I'm beginning to read tonight. It's a sort of self-help book for anarchists and socialists, all about throwing off the shackles of capitalism and consumerism to be... well, free.
Ok, I cheated and read the introduction first, so I had a little bit of context to help me. But nevertheless, here's what I've gained from Page 69:
It starts with "Yes, yes, yes! As long as there's enough for beer and fags today, then tomorrow can look after itself."
I like the fact that the book is less instructional and more "Whopee, come play with me!" But I suspect it will also be more amusing than life-changing: The rest of the page is about how the author likes aristocrats, because they look down on work and instead spend their days being idle and throwing parties and being patrons of the arts. He says we shouldn't resent the aristocrats their money, because with great wealth comes great responsibilities and thus, shackles. It's this resentment, he says, that is an obstacle to ending the class war.
Not very realistic, I think. Someone's got to do the work while the aristocrats open up the theatres, eh? Still, I'm interested to know how he thinks we can eliminate resentment among people who have to hold three jobs to feed their kids. Also I think I'll enjoy the book. Just maybe not become a freer person at the end.
We'll see if I'm right when I finish reading it!
My only resolution for 2007: Watch more films!
Ok ok, also: Don't stop learning French!
I don't have much time to check movie listings regularly, so if you happen to know that any of these are showing and want to catch it too, drop me a line:
Borat (duh)
The Last King of Scotland
The Science of Sleep
The Queen
The Aura
Fast Food Nation
Running with Scissors
Volver
A Guide to Recognising Your Saints
The History Boys
Little Children
Marie Antoinette
Our Daily Bread
Shut Up and Sing (if they do show it here. Do we have a Dixie Chicks fan base here?)
The Good German
Notes on a Scandal
Quinceañera
The past couple of weeks, I've suddenly been feeling a great urge to relive my pseudo-intellectual university days: reading political essays, learning philosophical concepts and getting passionate about social justice. On top of that I've also been yearning to read more non-fiction about anything at all -- science, anthropology, art, etc.
Part of it I think is just an innate need to keep my brain at work. I've always liked learning new things. You know that "Oh" moment that starts in your head and flows warmly down to your toes when you find out something you've never known before, and it's something substantial and significant, like "what is DNA made up of?" or "How did the East Asian economic crisis happen?" and not like "what is Maslow's hierarchy of needs?" or "why is Madonna important"? Well I got that feeling while reading some of the latter pages of Introducing: Evolution recently and it made me realise just how long it's been since I last got it. I want that feeling to keep recurring.
The other part I think is the upcoming IMF-World Bank meetings. After one year of lapsing into a mind-numbing working-life rut during which I've slowly forgotten or stopped being angry about unfair trade policies, neo-capitalism, fast food and the idioticisation of society by the media, I've suddenly realised that the world's financial leaders are coming to Suntec City and this will be the closest I've ever come to taking part in the resistance and after years of building up rage against the machine, it would be extremely stupid to let this moment pass by without taking any more notice than I have to for work's sake.
The other day during lunch with my colleagues I commented that it would be a sad day for the world if the IMF-World Bank meetings were not greeted with protests. My colleague Simon replied that if there were no protests, however, it would show the world just how efficient Singapore is. I responded that, to the contrary, it would show the world how oppressive Singapore is. He said that protests were bad, because violence tends to ensue and people get killed, as they did at the last IMF-World Bank meetings in Hong Kong. I said, well, people are well aware of that possibility when they come out to protest; you don't have to take part if you're scared of getting injured or killed -- it's like participating in extreme sports. You have a choice. Having that choice is what's important.
After lunch, when we'd returned to the office, another colleague, Alice, who was also at the same lunch table, sent me an SMS that read: Simon is a right-wing conservative hack.
And that's also the kind of thing that makes me want to be a bleeding heart leftist liberal hippie all over again.
I've been sick for eight days now. I wake up freezing and aching, and then after I take my drugs I feel super warm and sweat profusely. One day I'm nauseous. Another day I have a sore throat that prevents me from swallowing.
Eight days man. It's been enough time for me to get paranoid about getting fired for being away from work for too long. Enough time to realise that even if I do get fired, I don't really care. Enough time, in fact, for me to start looking for a new job.
But looking through the classifieds has only reminded me that I don't really want to do anything besides write. Even if I'm not in love with my job, my unhappiness has got more to do with certain people in the office and my utter disillusionment with the way that the local media has to operate than with the work itself.
So eight days on, I realise the solution to my problems is not finding a new job. I think I have to do my post-graduate studies somewhere else and just hope that will lead to something better.
Last weekend my parents gathered my brothers and me around for a talk. If you remember, my parents had had a talk with me alone some weeks back and you know how that went, so I wasn't very happy when they announced this one.
The reason for that last talk was my perceived absence from the family environment; the reason for this one? My 19-year-old cousin has started clubbing and drinking, so I, at all of 24, had to be sat down and reminded to behave.
They told us about her sinful deeds in hushed tones and vague phrases, like government PR people trying to tell you not to write something negative about their policies, while I rolled my eyes and said, "It's normal what."
Predictably -- and in fact I fully expected this -- my mother replied, "So you've done the same?"
I rolled my eyes again (and my eyeballs would get plenty of exercise throughout the one-hour talk) and said, "With an 11 p.m. curfew? I can't have."
Apparently my cousin has scared my parents so badly that they now want to hold weekly family sessions during which we pray together, and then sit around discussing the Quran or hadiths. My father suggested that each week, my brothers and I read a religious book or a hadith and then share with the rest of the family what we'd learnt.
It was imperative for them to keep reminding us of what is right and what is wrong, my parents said, because they didn't want to be held accountable if ever I or my brothers strayed off the path of Islamic righteousness.
My father said that his own brother, my uncle, had blamed my grandparents for his shortcomings, for failing to instill in him a sense of morality. They didn't want their own children to be able to say the same of them if ever we became adulterous, irreligious, disrespectful deadbeats. Or drunk Malay kids.
I think my parents are very insecure of their own parenting skills. I don't think they realise how much my brothers and I understand about Islam compared to the average Singaporean Muslim. I don't think they realise how deeply Muslim they've made us, against our willingness to attend the thousands of religious classes they've sent us to. Against our consciousness even.
They come down too hard on themselves, and on other parents too. Whenever they read or hear about teenagers who have sex in parks or take drugs, they inevitably blame the parents. They don't seem to realise that parents can't control everything.
But what really pisses me off is that they don't seem to know their own children very well. The fact that they think it's possible for me to become a drunken slut that will get pregnant anytime now -- still, despite the fact that my formative, adolescent and post-adolescent years are OVER -- does hurt. That they don't seem to realise that I'm happiest in front of a computer or a book, not in crowds, not in groups of many people and that that rules out a lot of possibilities when it comes to how I spend my free time.
During the talk they asked me what my aspirations were. This was just a couple of days after I wrote that post about not knowing what I wanted to do with my life, so of course my answer was, "I don't know." Not that it would have been any different if I had in fact known. I know better than to tell them these things. They only live to tear down my dreams.
Case in point: After I gave my sulky response, my brother offered his aspirations. He said he wanted to be a doctor and move to the US. I thought it was a good one.
But no, in fact it wasn't. My parents immediately rounded on him and listed all the reasons why it was a bad aspiration. He wasn't doing well in school to begin with. And why move anywhere? Why can't he just stay in Singapore? Being a good Muslim is already so hard in Singapore, what with all the temptations swaying you, what more in the US? And didn't he know that Muslims are discriminated against in the West? People get thrown off airplanes if they have different-coloured skin. He should just stay here and try his best to be a good Muslim. And then my brother said something idiotic about the second coming and this led to a long sermon about the end of the world.
The end of the world. This is what you get when you want to be a doctor in the US. So thank God I didn't say anything about taking up smoking in Paris.
But even without having said much during the session, I managed to get criticised anyway. My mother kept referring to me as "her big headache", "her biggest worry". I suspect this has something to do with the fact that my parole officer keeps reminding us about how dangerous my crack addiction is to my illegitimate unborn child. That or the fact that the love of my life is an intelligent, law-abiding, all around decent Chinese guy with a respectable, stable job. I can't remember, my priorities get mixed up sometimes.
Also during the talk my parents -- and a couple of brothers -- discussed how often I should come and visit when I'm married, and whether I should still have to participate in these weekly sessions. (Note that I wasn't part of this discussion.) The agreement they came to, I think, was that I should come whenever I could. Because I had to be reminded of God, didn't I? And was I really ready to guide another person into the religion?
By the end of the talk, I was completely overflowing with God. Mostly His wrath, I think, and His penchance for vengeance. But at least one good thing came out of it: there's nothing like a talk with my parents to remind me of what I want to do with my life. It basically involves whatever pops into my mind when I ask myself "Where would I rather be right now?" while my eyes are rolled to the back of my head and my parents are talking about how Christian converts in Malaysia shouldn't be allowed to change their ICs and get married. No matter what the situation is, I've found the answer to be rather consistent, give or take a few minor details (parrots in the background, or monkeys?).
And that's why I'm writing this post. To help me remind myself of that answer, whenever I feel lost and confused. It's what you need your parents for.
I realised that by googling some very simple and obvious words, anyone could have found my last blog. I was afraid it would be found by people who could do nasty things to me.
So thank you, Joon, for the invite to Vox.
Given that I want this blog to be more secure and all, I promise there'll be fewer boring-ass work-related posts. Fewer whiny posts too, I hope. Less use of the word "depress" in all its conjugations and tenses.
Haha, so what's left, right?
I don't know, to be honest. But I'll try.
How's this for a start -- I read an article on Guardian Books that says a good way of deciding whether or not you should buy a book is to read page 69. If you like it, buy it. Marshall McLuhan came up with that tip, by the way.
I tested it on Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy... and I'm still not sure whether it works or not. So you can go and test it for yourself ok, and then let me know if it works.