Lesson #2: Be Happy

I am not unreasonable. In fact, it is my humble opinion that I am far more reasonable and rational in my philosophy than my counterpart, Ms Nomer. In the previous post, I said that it was important to prioritise and to channel your energy into a worthwhile cause if you want to have something to show at the end of the day. And all of you nod your servile heads in agreement. But what is a worthwhile cause, you wonder?

Though by no means do I wish to prescribe what is worthy of your life’s endeavour, I would like to suggest this as the most worthy cause for a human being: being happy. The logic by which I reach this conclusion cannot be faulted. By the end of this post, you will have to agree that this is by far the best, the most meaningful, the most excellent goal of all human endeavour.

Let me ask a question: how many things do you know for sure to be true? Some of you will say: the physical laws I know to be true, such as gravity and melting points and the like. But I ask, is gravity true in space? Isn’t it only true only within the context of your experience, that is, here on earth? An apple falls on Newton’s head somewhere in the continent of Europe. Will that same apple fall universally?

The fact remains that everything that we observe is only true within certain parameters. We cannot be absolutely and completely certain of anything. Does that mean that there is no such thing as absolute truth? Does that mean we are left to flounder in perpetual flux?

Ah, but there is one thing that is sure: that which is within our own hearts. If you cannot have faith in what you observe, have faith in the instrument! As long as you are satisfied, you are true to yourself, and that happiness can never be taken away from you. Does making a name for yourself make you happy? Work your butt off for that cause. Does experiencing new things make you happy? Do it until you want something else, then do that instead. Does doing good to others give you fulfilment? Seek to exceed Christ in good works!

This way, at the end of your life, you will have no regrets and can at least say: I have been true to myself, the one thing that I am certain of.

Gaily yours,
Anthrope
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Lesson #1: Prioritise

If you want to succeed in life, you need to prioritise. You've got to channel your energy and ambition into a cause that you want. I'm not being didatic about what are worthy or unworthy causes, it's your call, but you've just got to decide.

Look at Ms Nomer. She is out running this morning and guess where she is running to? To work. On a Saturday morning, and get this, to pick up 5 Bibles to give to Cambodian children. Let me ask you this: you say the Word of the God is sweeter than honey, but can this book fill a child's empty stomach? Or is it just to placate them and keep them from rising up from under the yoke of injustice? Thank god these well-meaning foreign missionaries did not go while Cambodia was still under the Commmunist Khmer Rouge, for if so, I'll bet my bottom dollar that the people would still be suffering atrocities today.

Religion is a medicine. To soothe, to placate, to numb. It's good for developed countries like America because it is an alternative lifestyle. Like I said at first, I'm not being didactic about what is a worthy or an unworthy cause. If you wanna be a famous and rich pastor, by all means go ahead, but make sure that your energy is channeled and that the end of the day, you have something to show for it.

Look at that fool Richard Foster. For a period, he was the most sought after Christian speaker in the world! But he threw it all away to tend to a mentally retarded invalid, refusing to accept speaking engagements, saying that he has "retired" from public life. Retired my foot! You only have one life my friend. Squander it, and it will disappear as smoke from a smoldering log.

Wilfully yours,
Anthrope

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Mwhahahhaha!

Hi, let me introduce myself. I am Ms Anthrope, Ms Nomer’s evil twin. Ms Nomer usually keeps me locked up in the circle hollow of her guitar, torturing me with love ballads late into the night. Have you ever heard her pluck her guitar and belt the sorrowful dirge “Why does the sun go on shining?” at midnight? It makes you wish you were dead.

Well, she forgot to lock me in tonight in her haste to go to bed early in preparation for a morning run tomorrow, so I’ve escaped and hijacked her blog. It is a mark of my superior intelligence, ability and personality that I’ve taken over this blog. Besides, this blog has been wishy-washy for far too long! Ms Nomer doesn’t know who she is, what she wants, where she is going, or even how she got to where she is. Look at the name she chose for herself, for crying out loud! This blog needs a leader.

Needless to say, I know exactly where I am going with this blog now that I’ve taken over ownership. No more of this sentimental feel-good crap. No more geeky book reviews; no more mundane run reports; and especially, no more teenage angst.

Ms Anthrope will lead you and be your queen.

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A thought

What if somebody hijacked my blog tomorow and starting posting his or her own stuff, would you be able to tell the difference?

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(: Smiling like an idiot :)

Han's is my favourite restaurant in Singapore!

I love everything about it: the variety of food, the outdoor seating at the Central Library branch, the happy balance between self-service and service, the price, the taste, everything. Some restaurants, in a bid to focus on their niche, cut their menu down to a few core dishes of a certain genre. Not Han's. You can find everything there, from Western set meals like Chicken Chop (better than their fish and chips) to Chinese favourites like Hor Fan to sandwiches (good deal) to hamburgers (try the yummy superburger!) to pasta (increasingly popular), and get this, it is all good.

They do all things well!

On the way to work this morning, I stopped by the Central Library to return a few books and decided to stop by Han's for breakfast. For $4.50, I bought their breakfast set called "Scrambled egg bacon". For the same price I could also have bought "Scrambled egg ham", or "Scrambled egg sausage", or "Fried egg bacon", or "Fried egg ham", or "Fried egg sausage", you get the idea. I collected my coffee with milk and sugar and sat down to wait for the food.

When the food came, it looked ordinary: a lump of egg, 4 half pieces of toast with butter, and two strips of bacon. But when I first bit into the egg, it was heavenly. I'm not sure what they put in their egg; there must be some cheese in it or something, because it melted in my mouth. The toast was perfect -- not too hard, and the bacon excellent too. I ate the bacon lock, stock and barrel, fat and all. As far as the bacon goes, it is just hard to find anywhere that would serve you real bacon (as opposed to turkey bacon like Burger King) now that a lot of restaurants are going the Halal route. This must be the first time I'm having bacon in years.

The best thing? It is served on a real plate. Needless to say, I smiled like an idiot all the way to work.

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Search for significance

Some days, blogging feels like I'm trying to keep an empty verbal game going. And work, even meaningful work for a non-profit organisation, feels like a chasing after the wind. At the end of it, what is left? Just a few people we had loved, a few memories, and if you're lucky, a few stories of your existence here on earth.

The Total Perspective Vortex in Douglas Adam's Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is a torture machine that makes you see your place in the perspective of all infinity. The idea is that the shock of seeing your complete insignificance in the scheme of things will kill you.

But who decides significance? Is the cup of cold water given to a good man as significant as all the work the good man does? Yet both receive the same reward. How significant is the death of a single man on death row in an age of widespread executions, war, and inhumanity?

Significance has to be found internally (or perhaps relationally?). One man, Zaphod Beeblebrox, survives the torture of the Total Perspective Vortex because the machine told him "You are the most important being in the universe". He only saw what he wanted to see. Of course he also had an ego the size of the universe.

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Childish nightmares will haunt me forever

I must be stressed about the meeting this morning because all night long I dreamt I was taking a Chinese test I could not understand. Worse, my friend sitting beside me didn't let me copy. If there is something I can fail at royally, it will be a Chinese test. God knows how I passed my `A' levels.

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Jessie Superstar

Does Jessie get to eat as much Milk Bone as she wants now? :)
(Link: On the Package, thanks Eric)

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Running Safely

I've been running on the streets for about two years now and there have been a couple of times when I've nearly gotten into an accident. A father of a teenage girl was killed by a motorbike while running in my neighbourhood, and everytime I run near my home, I invariably think of his family's loss, and what we can do to keep ourselves safe.

These are some rules I try to adhere to:

1. Run on the pavement rather than on the road.
2. Always check for turning vehicles in both directions, even when it is a quiet road.
3. When there is no pavement and you have to run on the road, don't listen to loud music.
4. Don't assume a car's direction.

The fourth rule was something I picked up after a few near accidents. One time, I was running into Labrador Park and there was a huge lorry about to move off. I thought the lorry was going to reverse out so I ran in front of the lorry, but I was wrong. The lorry had to brake for me.

The other time, I was running on Nassim Road, where there were a lot of driveways. There was a car halfway out the driveway and I assumed it was reversing out of the driveway so I ran in front -- turned out it was driving into his house instead.

What are some rules you have to be safe?

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Tagged!

I’ve been tagged by Carine

The RULE: Remove the blog in the top spot from the Final Five list and bump everyone up in one place. Then add your blog to the bottom spot.

The Final Five
1. YounGorgeous feat Kelly Clarkson
2. Shahruddin.com: Project Sha
3. Simply Hirol
4. Moi-Carine
5. Pencil Shavings

You’re Next
1. Jim
2. Eric
3. Canopy
4. Titania
5. Sembler Fatigué

So here goes.

What were you doing ten years ago?
This time of the year, ten years ago, I was doing a lot of things in church, and struggling with glasnost, interior monologue, and supply and demand graphs on the side. Played a lot of volleyball, ate a lot of ice kachang, and spent a lot of effort trying to sneak into class late without the teacher noticing.

Five Songs Which You Know All The Lyrics Right Off Your Head Now
This is the song that never ends
Come O thou Traveller
Lean on me
White as snow
`C' is for Cookie

Five Things You Would Do If You Were A Millionaire
Buy a home
Buy a car
Get broadband
Treat my friends to dinner
Buy Smole a Jaguar

Five Bad Habits
Snapping at the parents
Eating too much twisties
Going to bed without brushing my teeth
Worrying too much
Counting the pennies

Five Things You Like Doing
Blogging
Running in the sunset
Talking with a friend
Getting lost in a book
Cycling at the beach

Five Things You Will Never Wear, Buy Or Get New Again?
Matching orange overalls (don't even ask)
Grey cotton track pants with yellow stripes
Pink plastic spectacles
Cullocks Culottes with pleats (more specifically, cullocks with pleats sewn in Home Economics class)
Navy blue bloomers

Five Favourite Toys/Things
Timex watch
NIV Exhaustive Concordance
Creative 5-speaker system
My bolster (His name is, well, I'm not telling)
Black jacket at work

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Cafe Latte Grande

A disproportionate number of posts start with a comment about coffee, but I make no apologies. Today, in my Monday morning astuteness, I noticed two things.

1. The longer I work, the higher the level of coffee. Check out this picture in April 2005.



Look at how high the coffee level has risen in less than a year! Going with this trend, I'll need a larger cup by November 2006.

(The pictures I post are also getting larger.)

Now, if the amount of instant coffee I used for each cup of coffee remained the same, then it doesn't make much of a difference -- I'll just be drinking more water; but no....

2. I add the same amount of instant coffee grounds, i.e. one happy heaped tablespoon, for my one cup of coffee as my colleague, except that she is making a POT of coffee for three.

I think I should have given up coffee for Lent.

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Old friends are like wine

Friday, 11:30pm. I turn the corner and there you are, clutching a green Heineken bag full of marking, eyes tired from lack of sleep. We have been friends for over fifteen years now. I smile when I see you.

“I was just messaging you. Wanted to come up to give you back your money.”

As I reach for my wallet and take out $110, you tell me that you’ve been awake since 3am and that you have marked non-stop to 6pm, stopping only for breakfast and lunch.

“No wonder you’re so tired,” I say sympathetically, “Where are you heading to?”

“Back home,” you say, and I say, “I’ll walk you,” and we both start walking to the train station, talking along the way.

“I have a pain in my mouth,” you say, “I think it is a wisdom tooth, but it can’t be ‘cos there is no more space for it.” You stick your index finger into your mouth, poking at your gum and say, “Air yis sore air..” You stop in the middle of the pavement with your finger in your mouth so you can feel the sore spot better.

I think for a moment, and say, “It doesn’t matter than you don’t have space you know. Have you taken an X-ray?” You say, “No? It doesn’t matter? Oh dear! I hope it isn’t a wisdom tooth..”

We look at each other, and immediately we say together, “No, no, we don’t mean that. We hope it is only a wisdom tooth. What else can it be?”

We walk a bit in silence. “You have dental woes, you know?” I say to you.

“No lah, I’ve only had a root canal.”

“A root canal! Whatever! People who have had root canals are like people who given birth.”

“Erm. I think there are more people who have given birth.”

We smile, laughing away the tiredness of a week.

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Orient Express, by Graham Greene

The cover of this book is so pretty! And the pages have rough jagged edges. That is reason enough to read this.

Published in 1933, this is the first and last time Greene "set out deliberately to write a book to please". And it is quite a pleasing novel. All the action happens on a train rushing towards Constaninople:

In the rushing reverberating express, noise was so regular that it was the equivalent of silence, movement was so continuous that after a while the mind accepted it as stillness. Only outside the train was violence of action possible, and the train would contain him safely with his plans for three days...

The novel is full of such lovely detail and description. The characters are distinct and well-formed for a short novel; the plot substantial.

While pleasing, Orient Express isn't frivolous. It is about class, race, and political differences: yet it is never didactic or forlorn. It simply describes. Greene describes a self-conscious and rich Jew in this novel: it is troubling to read of the safety this Jew felt in Western Europe and to think that this was written in 1931, just a few years before the horrors of the Holocaust. Chilling.

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Never let me go, by Kazuo Ishiguro

I'm not sure how to write about this book without giving it all away. Mystery is probably the most compelling aspect of this novel, and if I take it away by telling too much, the novel simply does not work.


Ishiguro's students are more personable and memorable than Huxley's Alphas, Betas, Gammas and Epsilons in Brave New World, but in his effort to humanize them by writing about their aspirations, dreams, creativity, sexual desires, and social interaction, he never once addresses the issue of religion, and the age-old need for mankind to have a God. Even Huxley addressed the need for God in Brave New World. How did mankind lose their need for God? Was it suddenly, or gradually, like the passing away of "the old kind world" of before?

"a new world coming rapidly. More scientific, efficient, yes. More cures for the old sicknesses. Very good. But a harsh, cruel world. And I saw a little girl, her eyes tightly closed, holding to her breast the old kind world, one that she knew in her heart could not remain, and she was holding it and pleading, never to let her go."

The closest readers get to a God in this novel is Hailsham and her governors. The students plead with the governors for deferment, almost like a person prays to God, but ultimately, the governors are not powerful enough to grant their request — it is a God of good intentions only. Interestingly, the rumours are said to arise spontaneously even after repeated stomping out, as if it is instinctive for humans to hope.

It is a sad novel, but I cannot imagine the world as I know it coming to this, not in this generation anyway.

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Kool-aid for Christian groups

I bumped into the director at the lift landing mid-way through a very large gaping yawn, and he said, "Had a late night?" And at precise moment, I thought that I had better either take my coffee before I leave the house, or come to work earlier to drink my shot.

Shucks, guess I can't apply to be a Mormon.

American Mormons drink a lot of Kool-Aid and eat a lot of ice-cream at their college parties, since they can't have caffeine or alcohol. When I was in college involved in an inter-denominational evangelical group, we had a lot of kool-aid too, that bright red drink that drove the minister's wife nuts because the students would spill it on her white carpet. Heh. Kool-aid + college kids (regardless of denomination) + white carpet = inevitable disaster.

And since we are on the topic of Kool-aid and Christian denominations, here is a joke my dad told me the other day.

A preacher was preaching in a Baptist church and in the middle of his sermon, he asked, "How many here are Baptists?" Everyone raised their hands, except for an elderly lady in the front row.

So he asked her, "What is your denomination, Madam?"

She said, "Methodist".

So he asked, "Why are you a Methodist?"

She said, "Because my great-grandfather was a Methodist, my grandfather was a Methodist, my father was a Methodist, and so I am a Methodist."

The Baptist preacher thought for a moments and teased her, "So if your great-grandfather was a moron, your grandfather was a moron, and your father was a moron, what does that make you?"

Without skipping a beat, the elderly lady replied, "Baptist".

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