Clouds are singing a song, marching along, just like they do.

"In all those years he was the beneficiary of the infinite generosity of women, but he was the victim, too, because their forgiveness made possible the deepest and sweetest corruption of all, namely the idea that he was doing nothing wrong."

- Salman Rushdie, The Satanic Verses

School has started again for me. I woke up just half an hour before my first lecture (overslept) but arrived on time anyway. (because really, it takes just 10 minutes by the taxi while it takes an hour by the train/bus)

I didn't realise that I never stepped into school since my last paper last semester until I was having lunch in the afternoon. YOG isn't counted since I only went to NIE compound and part of the North Spine during the period.

School food is really cheap compared to what I've been stuffing myself with for the past few months. I must raise my discipline because all the cheap food especially Mr. Bean is tempting me to over-eat.

Church, Competition and Create

Attending "Create" last night made me realise something that has been at the corner of my small mind - competition improves quality, but kills meaning.

Being in the youth ministry, I've seen how competition has played a big part in almost everything that we do. Every time there's an event, we become all secretive about our projects, we poke around to see what others do. Intelligence, counter-intelligence, I've seen enough of this in the military. And then this attitude goes full blast especially when it comes to "Create".

I'm not saying that competition is all that bad. And I'm not saying that I'm totally not competitive either. But when the event becomes a time to outwit each other in terms of talent more than just enjoying a time of performance, something is seriously wrong.

Perhaps it's the introduction of the Inter-Region points, or the sheer number of events that the youths go through, but I realised that the way people from CGs view "Create" and the way people from YCGs view "Create" is vastly different.

For CGs, "Create" is just a time for them to get together and do something creative, something interesting outside of the usual church stuff. For the YCGs, "Create" is really more of a time to prove themselves, to showcase their respective talents to the rest of the congregation. I'm not saying either way is better than another, I'm just saying that the view that YCGs hold is slightly easier to tip over the edge, becoming a competition to find out who's better than who. (if you get what I mean)

And again, I must reiterate that I'm not saying that I'm not competitive here. I'm competitive, or I wouldn't have been in a competitive sports team myself. But when winning becomes a goal bigger than gaining experience, then perhaps we need to reconsider what we are doing this for. (even in canoeing, we still maintain the attitude of "experience over medals". We aim/train to win, but winning is really secondary, because the real reward is the training we put in and the experience we gain)

Personally, I believe that gaining a valuable experience, or learning something new is a greater reward than some vouchers or even gaining the title of "Best X of Create". And that was the main reason why I went out of the way to get myself out of the video team and put myself into the dance team. (okay, Christian Body Worship)

And now we learn that there is a very high possibility of us being last (because, out of point, yes), that doesn't mean that we will sulk our faces and go onto stage to do a mediocre performance. We'll still go up there and dance our best, because really, winning isn't everything.

(and I hope the finger pointing don't start, because we've discussed this issue at length even before we started practices, and we all agreed that we'll do this even if it meant that there was chance of it being out of point.)

Time

If I asked you, what time is it now?
What would you tell me?
23:19?
Wrong.

Because as you tell me it's 23:19, it has already jumped to 23:20.
There is no "now", or "present".
Even as I say "now", it would have been something of the past.
The "present" is nothing more than the future moving, transforming, becoming the past.
Time is fluid, in fact, too fluid for us to even think of measuring.

Because if I were to ask you the same question in London instead of in Singapore, it would have been 16:19 instead.
While we think our world as in the night, another man, in the same world, think his as in the day.
While we sleep, another awakes.
While we rest, another begins to work.
And that is just on our small tiny little planet.
Think of it in terms of the universe, of the galaxy.
If it was 23:19 here in Singapore, what time would it be on Mars?

Because if not for "time", you wouldn't even know what time it was.
If I had stolen away all the clocks and calendars in this world,
if I stopped the Earth from orbiting the Sun,
would time continue to run?
Yes, time would continue to run, but would we still know what time it was?

Because, if I asked you, "what is time?",
what would you say?

I would perhaps tell you,
that time is the most unreal thing in this world,
that has become the most real thing to us.

i'm not listening.

"Hey, do you have a scanner in your room?"

"Yes I do, why?"

"Oh, can you help me scan my IC?"

"Can."

"Ok, coz I need a photocopy of my IC la."

"Oh, you need a photocopy? Then I just photocopy for you la."

"Your scanner can photocopy? Ok, photocopy lo. Thanks."

"Is this for selling the house?"

"Yes... need the photocopy of my IC..."

"I won't do it."

"What?"

"I won't do it. I won't photocopy your IC to sell the house."

"What, don't like that la."

"I'm sorry. If you want to sell the house, go do it on your own. I will have no part in the selling of this house."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

damn it.

And I’m always pretty happy when I’m just kicking back with you

This post should have been published about 2 weeks ago, but it never did make onto the online world because:

1) I was writing halfway and then I stopped.
2) I thought I saved a draft.
3) The draft wasn't saved when I came back to check.
4) I didn't have the time/inspiration to write anything since.

Anyway, It's been 3 weeks since I started working as an Assistant Chef, or Chef Assistant, whatever makes you happy. But technically, this is only my 2nd week at work, because the past week was spent... er, preparing myself to protect my motherland (whatever). My job scope is simple, assist the chef in the kitchen, and sometimes, be the chef in the kitchen. And this includes, cutting the ingredients, preparing the ingredients, cooking the dishes, washing the dishes, cleaning the kitchen, clearing the trash, packing the fridge... amidst other random things like eating sandwiches and steak.

Overall, I like this job. It's really quite an experience, and I'm learning quite a lot. No I don't actually learn how to dish up the "fantastic" dishes because most things are already prepacked, but I did learn many "kitchen skills", and of course, I can differentiate an onion from a garlic from a ginger from an asparagus from a spinach from a broccoli. I can smell what things went bad and what can still be used. I know if something is burnt or if it's undercooked. I can cut almost anything and not make a mess in the kitchen. And most importantly, I discovered how amazing a microwave can be. And to sum it up, it's been a tiring, painful, and fun experience for myself.

It's tiring. Yes it is. Standing in the kitchen and working non-stop for up to 10 hours is seriously no joke. If I'm not washing the dishes, I'll be cutting vegetables. If I'm not cutting vegetables, I'll be packing the ingredients. If I'm not packing the ingredients, I'll be clearing the trash. If I'm not clearing the trash, I'll be cooking. If I'm not cooking, I'll be washing the dishes. Simply put, the work never stops. (and as my colleague told me, if the work stops, there won't be a need for me to work part time)

It's painful. That's just part of the deal I suppose, and it made me realise just how unprepared I was to work in the kitchen even though I had experience cooking at home. First day at work and I cut my thumb while trying to chop some tomatoes. The knife is sharp, VERY SHARP, and it doesn't take much effort to leave a deep cut on my thumb. Technically, the kitchen knife is the chef's best friend and worst enemy. And since then, I've been wielding my knife like a pro. (I'm exaggerating. I just haven't cut myself since) Second day at work and I burnt my fingers. Left quite a few blisters on my fingers. (but as my colleague says (again), every chef has burn scars to show *and then he shows me his*)

It's fun. And I'm just glad it is. Well, I actually find it quite nice that people in the cafe calls me "chef" (even though I know it's probably because they don't know what else to call me because they don't know my name). Kinda feel a little important in the place. Okay, no big deal, I know. I also picked up a whole bunch of "chef lingo", and here's a few just for starters.

a) 打仗 - to fight a war - basically, to "battle" the rush hour, usually lunch hour, madness. It is actually quite mad working during lunch, because the orders just keep coming, and one wrong move could cause the orders to just jam and... well, things can get quite crazy and frustrating. So yes, it's like a war.

b) 清场 - to clear the battlefield - well, after each dish is served and there is a little pause between orders, it is mandatory that the chefs clear whatever is around his workzone, such as ingredients, knife, bowls, whatever. It can get quite messy, and if things are not cleared, it gets messier.

c) 你来戴帽子你来做啦 - you wear the hat and do it yourself, lah - a very common retort to the crew members who keep rushing us for their orders to be ready. Basically, rush hour is frustrating for everybody; the chefs are trying to get everything out, and the crew is trying to get the orders served fast. So when people get rushed, they get irritated. Simple.

In other news: 'Inception' was amazing. And I enjoy it all the more because I've always been someone who have been very interested in dreams, because I dream a lot, and because I love my dreams.

I won't go so much into providing a review, because that would cause this post to have 2 topics (which it already has anyway, but I want to pretend there isn't) and that would be overloading. But I like how they map the dreams so realistically, not realistic in the sense that they are real, but in the sense that this is how I dream. Love things like having dreams within dreams, how you don't know how you end up where you were and you never bother to question it, and the "kick". So true.

One thing though, the dreams were too "real", too logical, to be dreams. Okay, I know it's subjective, but my dreams are damn weird, and they are set in the weirdest places with the weirdest characters. And the things I do are things which are damn weird, and have no logic in them. And here's the best part: I don't find that there is anything wrong in my dreams. In my dreams, weird is logic.

I don't wanna gain the whole world and lose my

Soul. What is a soul?

The event last Friday at Hearts on Fire was quite ambitiously named "I don't wanna gain the whole world but lose my soul", but I never got to find out what a soul is even after the event is over.

I never really got involved in the event this time, other than pumping my brain dry of ideas during a meeting at Somerset 313, which happens to be becoming our favourite meeting location for the Region B think tank. My mind was really on other irrelevant but "soulful" things.

For all my life as a christian, and I have been a christian for a really long time, I have been told that animals, ALL animals, do not have a soul. Only humans, we GREAT humans, have souls. Well, I understand the whole theory behind this, that humans are more superior than animals, created in God's image, therefore it is unthinkable that animals have the only immortal thing that humans possess - souls.

But that is really a difficult theory to accept. I will not go into how it is difficult to assert if we were created in God's image or if God was created in our image (because that is really too darn dangerous), but I will have to say there is nowhere in the bible that ever mentioned the non-existence of souls in animals. All we have are references and interpretations. So it is safe to say that no one actually knows for sure that animals have no souls.

Before I even go on to explain why, I think it is only fair that I define what soul is. Alright, this is no formal definition, but this is just how I define soul and what I will use for this write-up. Basically to me, a soul is really who I am. My character, my emotions, my memories, my identity. It is what defines me as me.

I came to this definition only because I watched the movie "Wall-E". And the last scene showed how Wall-E, though fixed from his damages after saving the plant, lost all his memory and identity and emotions. And on the spot, I'm sure most people would say he had lost his "soul". The body is an empty vessel which does not last, if not for the soul that it contains. As C.S Lewis so aptly put it, "You don't have a soul. You are a soul. You have a body."

And animals, they have character, they have emotions, they have memories, they have identity. I have interacted with many animals (okay, cats) and I know it straight away when I look into their eyes that it isn't just an empty vessel that I was looking into. Animals have souls, and when we go to heaven, we will be seeing animals there as well. Cats, lots of cats for sure. And if you need a bible verse, here you go:

From Isaiah's description of "New Heavens and a New Earth" in Isaiah 65:25, "The wolf and the lamb will feed together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox, but dust will be the serpent’s food. They will neither harm nor destroy on all my holy mountain, says the LORD."

So that's animals in heaven for you.

But maybe animals have "lesser" souls, souls that are inferior to us humans. Well, that is an acceptable theory, considering how God specifically made humans in his image. However, the skeptical me just can't shake off the whole idea of how stubborn and self-centered we are. Don't we just love to put ourselves in the center of everything? But I'm going out of point.

Nevertheless, if there is any one difference between the human soul and the animal soul, it is that the human soul needs saving, and the animal soul doesn't. Jesus came to save the human race only because the human race needed saving, only because the sins are only sins by human standards.

And perhaps, I shall close with this story I got off the internet:

An elderly widow's beloved little dog died after fifteen faithful years. Distraught, she went to her pastor.

"Parson," she said, tears streaming down her cheeks, "the vicar said animals have no souls. My darling little dog Fluffy has died. Does that mean I won’t see her again in heaven?"

"Madam," said the old priest, "God, in his great love and wisdom has created heaven to be a place of perfect happiness. I am sure that if you need your little dog to complete your happiness, you will find her there."

You'd break your neck to keep your chin up.

I have a rather queer habit.

Every time I listen to my iPod, I like to put it on "shuffle", so that the songs I listen to will be random.

However, I would always already have a song/songs in mind that I would like to listen to, and the iPod would usually never play the song/songs I have in my mind. And then, I would keep hitting the "forward" button until this song/songs play.

So, does my iPod really have the freewill to choose for itself what songs to play?

Do we really have the freewill we think we have? Or is it a freedom equivalent to one of a dog on a leash?

Oh there will be love love love wherever you go

Sonnet 14 - If thou must love me, let it be for nought

XIV

If thou must love me, let it be for nought
Except for love's sake only. Do not say
'I love her for her smile—her look—her way
Of speaking gently,—for a trick of thought
That falls in well with mine, and certes brought
A sense of pleasant ease on such a day'—
For these things in themselves, Beloved, may
Be changed, or change for thee,—and love, so wrought,
May be unwrought so. Neither love me for
Thine own dear pity's wiping my cheeks dry,—
A creature might forget to weep, who bore
Thy comfort long, and lose thy love thereby!
But love me for love's sake, that evermore
Thou mayst love on, through love's eternity.

- Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Talismans/men

Two pieces of talisman.
Black ink on yellow paper.

A secret message,
an ancient riddle.

He dare not read
any deeper.

the glass eye

I walked home today
without my spectacles
showing the world to me.

How different would my life be
if I had perfect eyesight?

Or, if I am actually blind.

oreos are now upon us

Ipsen and his good friend Colin worked at a tavern in Treno.

One day, Ipsen got a letter. The letter was so wet from rain that most of the writing was illegible. The only part he could read said, 'Come back home.'.

Nowadays, we have airships and stuff, but back then, it was really hard to travel.

He didn't know why he had to go back, but he got some time off, gathered his things, and set out on his journey home. He walked a thousand leagues through the Mist. Sometimes he was attacked by vicious monsters, but he made it, because his friend Colin was by his side.

And then, after much time on the road... He had to ask Colin something:

"Why did you come with me?"

"Only because I wanted to go with you"

- Zidane, in Final Fantasy IX

And who'll hear the echoes of stories never told?

“Think of this – that the writer wrote alone, and the reader read alone, and they were alone with each other. True, the writer may have been alone also with Spenser’s golden apples in the Faerie Queen, Proserpina’s garden, glistering bright among the place’s ashes and cinders, may have seen in his mind’s eye, apple of his eye, the golden fruit of the Primavera, may have seen Paradise Lost, in the garden where Eve recalled Pomona and Proserpina. He was alone when he wrote and he was not alone then, all these voices sang, the same words, golden apples, different worlds in different places, an Irish castle, an unseen cottage, elastic-walled and grey round blind eyes.”

– A.S Byatt, Possession

Flight of Icarus

They stood at the ledge, both Daedalus and Icarus, ready to escape Crete in magnificent flight. Two wings were specially furnished, fashioned remarkably in wax, waiting to bring the two mortals into the open sky.

Looking out towards the sea, they could see only the water and horizon. Freedom laid itself out before them, the open water and the endless sky. They would escape Crete at last.

"Are you ready, son?"

"Yes, father, I am."

"Remember, never go too near to the sea nor to the sun. For the sea will dampen your wings, making it too heavy for flight and the sun is too hot for your wax wings."

They jumped off, and their wings flapped in silent flight. Angry waves were crashing below, and the sun was shining greatly above. The two mortals took flight like angels, or some might even believe them to be gods.

As they were in mid-flight, Icarus began to fly higher and higher. Some said the heat got to Icarus, and that he became giddy. Others said he was dazzled and fascinated by the beauty of the sun. As he went higher in flight, the wax on his wings began to slow drip off, feathers were slowly becoming bare arms.

"Icarus! Stop! You are too near the sun!" Daedalus screamed but his caution landed only on deaf ears, for Icarus was not listening. He was in his own world of thoughts.

"What's the use of flying if I could only fly to a certain height?"

Icarus's fingers began to show.

"What's the use of wings if I was only supposed to return to land?"

The wings were disappearing, his hands were showing.

"I shall fly high, even if it meant that it would be my last flight."

There were no more wings, and he plummeted toward the sea.

"At least, I've been higher than where I was supposed to be."

At least, he flew.

Our paths they did cross though I cannot say just why

And, yes, it's my birthday. Yeah, I am 22, I am so happy.

I do believe I've grown up, despite my rather childish behaviours. It's just... everyone is growing, everyone is losing their youth every second, but they only realise this once a year and it's already too late. I just want to... be childish before I can no longer.

Well, anyway, I've received this card from a group of my friends (Alex, Andrea, Bryan, Chen Min, Dixon, Jeff, Jia Yan, Shu Ting, Xin Di, Ying Hui, Yong Jie and Zhi Wei). Not the small birthday card that you can buy from Kinokuniya, but a big custom card on which all them drew their variations of Cloud, who is one of my favourite characters from my favourite video game, Final Fantasy VII.

It is a very touching gesture, and I know that many of them would not have known who Cloud is and would have needed to go onto the internet to find out, and I know that many of my friends aren't exactly artists, but still, the pictures were all excellent and the effort made everything even more beautiful. This gift of friendship is invaluable and I would not trade it for the world.

I shall not do the card injustice by taking a picture of it, so just try to imagine its awesomeness as it lies in my room while I try to think of a place to properly place it.

Okay, my birthday aside, I must tell everyone who is reading this a very special something which I saw one morning when I went for training at MacRitchie. I forgot when this was, sometime during last week. As usual, I arrived at the reservoir in the early morning, and I saw on top of the water a layer of mist. And the whole place looked like a dreamscape.

Mist is such an interesting phenomena. Maybe it's called fog, I am not sure. But it's actually water evaporating from the surface, but then, never quite left the surface of the water. It's as if it's in a "liminal state". Trapped in between leaving and staying, and yet at the same time open and ambiguous, free from definition.

"Liminality", this has been the word on my mind for quite some time now. We are liminal creatures. Always transiting, always ambiguous, always not open for definition, and yet, we are trapped in this very ambiguity that we surround ourselves in. We contradict ourselves but yet affirms in contradictions. We are mutable and our mutability becomes our only constant. We believe only because we doubt. We let go because we love.

We are like mist, which wants to ascend to the sky but at the same time, misses the water body. And then we remain there, in a state of limbo, not wanting to lean to one side or the other, because we do not know what's on one side or the other. Could it be hell? Could it be heaven? We choose not to make a decision because we fear the consequences of making one, but in choosing we have already decided. We have decided that we shall be this way, hanging in the in-between, as if we were trying to keep the see-saw from leaning on one side.

Like the mist, we disappear eventually. We could be blown by the wind, we could have returned to where we came from, or we could have really ascended to the sky. And the beauty of creating a dreamscape becomes only a short lived one. However, the beauty, though short lived, would have remained eternal in the eyes of those who beheld it.

All of us are dreamers and dreams at the exact same moment.

And it was all yellow.

Long break from writing, everybody must be wondering what has happened to me that I have not written even though exams ended 2 Fridays ago. So here's a little update of what happened in my life, courtesy of myself to all my friends and possible unknown stalkers who might be interested in what's going on for reasons that I will never be able to comprehend.

Church. The number 1 most time consuming part of my life. Practically the whole of last week has been taken up by the church in preparation of the "My Idea of Heaven" event that happened last Friday. I'm not complaining though, because I was really impacted by the responses that I received. If I haven't decided to push that extra step and go the extra mile, I probably wouldn't have discovered what I found. My thanks to Rita, Xingyi, Boon Lai, Jeff and Yong Jie for working with me on this project. It's really the experience that I am most thankful for. And for my friends who aren't in church, this is what I've been working on.

Canoeing. The canoe team is training every single morning from Monday to Saturday now, and it's really tiring. Not the physical training kind of tiring, but really the need to wake up early every morning kind of tiring. I'm not a morning person, as many of you probably know. So it's really an epic struggle for me to get out of bed at 7am in the morning just to go for training. Training has been rather discouraging as well, because I'm rowing in a new boat now and I am extremely unfamiliar with it, causing me to capsize countless times in the reservoir. Just this morning, I thought about why I am canoeing. Other than the fact that it is helping me to be less fat than I would have been and that I have great team mates, I really don't know why else I am doing this. Perhaps it would have been better that I picked up a performing art, one that I can ask my friends to come for a concert and see me perform. When it's canoeing, we only train for races, and none of my friends would bother to watch me race or even talk about it anyway. But then again, it was just a passing thought.

Work. I have applied to a whopping number of 6 companies in search of a temporary job as probably an admin clerk or something. It has been a week and none of them has responded and it's really very discouraging. I really want to get a job so I can afford the Taiwan trip that we are planning for this August and also the PS3 that is calling out to me.

Scholarship. I got shortlisted for the "Lim Kim San Memorial Scholarship" which is technically a scholarship for people who come from families that earn less than $5000 a month, like me. It's a bond-less scholarship from the SPH Foundation for students of languages, which for my case is English. The interview is next Tuesday and I have no idea what I'm supposed to prepare for it, but I'm excited nonetheless. Really thank God for this opportunity! And I hope I don't mess up the interview! Oh gosh, getting all anxious now.

And also... I have nothing more to say. I am reading Possessions now and there's so much that I want to quote from it. Basically a whole bunch of religious and literary quotable treasures that I found.

And... I just got reminded by Andrea Khong Lilian that I should get started on researching the Taiwan itinerary.

So... I should stop writing.

Will you still love me tomorrow?

Alright, I don't have much time here but I feel like blogging so I'll do a short one. Training in the morning so it's not really wise that I stay up too late (insomnia or not). And, I probably won't be able to do any writing because the "My Idea of Heaven" event is really dragging me down alot. It is hard to get things done. And it's actually even harder to get people to get things done.

Oh well, anyway, I decided to check out what some of my friends' names meant. The list isn't exhaustive and there are probably other meanings that I could have missed out. I don't have the time to list everybody's so please forgive me if I missed out yours (I've just met these people for the past 2 days so they are on my mind right now).

Alex: Protector of mankind (Greek)
Andrea: Courageous (Greek); Brave (French)
Bryan: Strong one (Irish)
Don: World leader (Irish); Dark stranger (Celtic)
Eleanor: Light (Greek) ; Shining light (English)
Gladys: Lame (Welsh) ; Sword (Latin) ; Princess (Irish)
Jeff: Divinely peaceful (German)
Joel: God is willing (Israelite) ; Jehovah is God (Hebrew)
Sabrina: Cactus fruit (Hebrew) ; Legendary princess (English) ; Princess (Irish) ; From the border (Italian)
Simon: It is heard (Hebrew) ; Hear/Listen (Scottish/Spanish)

Most of us have really interesting names, isn't it? I didn't know we had a cactus fruit with us all this time. And I'm not making fun of anybody's name, okay!

Can't read my poker face.

Yeah I'm back to blogging again, from a nearly 1 week long hiatus. Well, the week's been really bad, and there were times when I really felt like I wanted to blog because my muse was completely active (for the bloody wrong reasons) in the middle of the night while I was mugging my head off for the paper in the following morning. So imagine me trying to concentrate on writing notes, and my muse is urging me to write on the blog. Total distraction.

Anyway, the fact that I am blogging again doesn't mean that my exams are over. On the contrary, well, what else could be on the contrary? It's not over. There's still another paper in a week's time on Friday, and you know what? I don't give 2 cents about it. Well, actually I do la (I'm still not that crazy), but there's still ample time as it is a relatively easy paper, in my opinion. Media writing, you get a story and some other stuff, you write a news report and a press release. Er, maybe not that simple, but I'll start revising probably on Monday and shall take this weekend to breathe.

Exams were really, urgh. Smoke-out for most parts, especially HL107 Classical Lit, because I am so ill-prepared for it because I don't know how to prepare for it. I've never written such short essays for a lit exam before (2 pages). Okay, maybe I have. But that's not the point, the essays are still too short for examination standards! MB107 Business Law is worrying too. I felt I did okay for the paper because I covered almost all the areas in the questions, but people are coming to me and telling me that they are glad they S/Ued (not sued) the paper, or telling me that they flunk it, such that I am getting a little worried myself. The worst thing for an academic is to NOT KNOW that you do not know some things. You think you know what you are doing, but you actually do not know it, and then you will screw up real bad. If Socrates is considered to be the wisest man in history because he knows that he does not know, then the opposite can be easily translated as stupidity.

One of the more prominent thoughts in my head recently is self-identity. I've been asking myself, how much do I really know about who I am. Okay, just some technical stuff for those interested. Self-identity is separated into 4 parts known as the Johari Window. So there are parts that are known to the self, unknown to the self, known to others, unknown to others. So when you put these parts into a matrix, you get the 4 areas in the Johari Window: OPEN, BLIND, HIDDEN, UNKNOWN. Just like in the diagram below.


Alright, that's the brief introduction to self-concept. The diagram is really just for reference anyway, because in actuality, our identity is not as equally spaced out as the diagram shows. Some people have hidden areas that are extremely huge (which is really common anyway), while others have huge blind areas, so on and so forth.

Okay, and that's it for self-concept. Thank you for paying attention to Don's self-concept 101 lecture

Anyway, yes, so by thinking about my self-identity, what I really want to know is, just how much of myself do I not know, and what are these things actually? If you refer to the Johari Window, that's the blind and unknown area for me.

Sometimes I really feel that I do not know myself very well. You ever get the feeling sometimes? Like there some things that you have no idea why you do them, some words that you have no idea why you say and some feelings that you have no idea why you feel. And sometimes, people gets irritated or angry at you and you don't even know why. Such events really call for some self-reflection and character enhancement

Okay, and since we are at the topic (I thought of switching topic at this point but decided to just stick to one topic per post and talk about other stuff in other posts) of identity, I suppose it's good talk about the HIDDEN area as well. If you don't know yet, you should probably know now that people are very much not what they seem to be. There are those who are more real than others, but what you see in almost everybody is easily just the tip of the iceberg.

An iceberg is the perfect example (though overused) for identity. Like an iceberg, most people only show a small small small portion of who they are in the outside world. Only the tip of the iceberg floats on the surface of the water, while the rest of it lies submerged in the water. For those who knows psychoanalysis, this "iceberg" is the super-ego, ego and id (from surface to bottom). I'm not just saying someone who's a hypocrite or have multiple identities, even the simplest and innocent and pure person falls under this theory as well.

You can be as real as you want, but the truth remains that everybody hides something from everyone else. It could be romantic feelings for some people, it could be some inferiority complex, it could be some feeling of inadequacy among friends, it could be anything. But whatever it may be, people hide things for a reason. Some times it's good for some things to be revealed, but most times it's better to just remain quiet about it until an appropriate moment, or not speak about it at all.

So to round it all up before this post gets too long and becomes something you get from a textbook (which it probably already seems like its becoming), it is good that if you find out a secret or something hidden from somebody, it's really best that you keep it to yourself unless you really have to do otherwise. Don't be a gossiper, or you'll easily be the one gossiped about. You know full well that you have your own secrets to be kept as well.

'Cause you bring out the best in me, like no one else can do.

Dear Students,

It has been brought to my attention that some of you did not procure the prescribed course texts. Only the Aeneid, the Metamorphoses and the Confessions are not available on edventure. I will allow you to bring alternative editions of these three texts into the exam as long as you e-mail me publication details of the alternative texts you're using prior to the exam. Anyone caught plagiarizing from the critical apparatus on these books will be crucified upside down.

I realise that the bookshop failed to order the books, but in the age of internet shopping - which some of you appear to be able to do even while listening to lectures - there's absolutely no excuse for not having the right books for your classes. Please do not come into my classes in future with this kind of careless attitude. I was very emphatic at the start of the semester about the requirement that we all read the same editions of these texts.

I realised today that my lecturer has been harbouring a great amount of hatred for us which has penultimately led up to the sending of this email, threatening to crucify us upside down. On hindsight, I wonder if those throwing of greek-bombs at us, such as 'method = meta + hodos', were really ways of getting back at us for not finishing the required readings or for the few people who can't keep their mouths shut during lectures.

I realised also, that if he indeed had been harbouring such a great amount of hatred, we could be in really deep trouble this Wednesday.

Tonight's the night, for the sinners and the saints. Two worlds collide, in a beautiful display.

I am not become any kind of an Atheist, nor yet positivist, at least, not as to the extreme religious position of those who make a religion out of Humanity - for although I wish my fellow men well, and find them endlessly interesting, yet there are more things in Heaven and Earth than were created for their, that is our, benefit. The impulses to religion might be the need to trust - or the capacity for wonder - and my own religious feelings have always been inspired more by the latter. I find it hard to shift without the Creator - the more we see and understand, the more amazement there is in this strangely interrelated heap of things - which is yet not disordered...

...The truth is - my dear Miss LaMotte - that we live in an old world - a tired world - a world that has gone on piling up speculation and observations until truths that might have been graspable in the bright Dayspring of human morning - by young Plotinus or the ecstatic John on Patmos - are now obscured by palimpsest on palimpsest, by thick horny growths over that clear vision - as moulting serpents, before they burst forth with their new flexible-brilliant skins, are blinded by the crusts of their old one - or we might say, as the lovely lines of faith that sprung up in the aspiring towers of the ancient minsters and abbeys are both worn away by time and grime, softly shrouded by the smutty accretions of our industrial cities, our wealth, our discoveries themselves, our Progress. Now I cannot believe, being no Manichee, that He, the Creator, if he exists, did not make us and our world that which we are. He made us curious, did he not? - he made us questioning - and the Scribe of Genesis did well to locate the source of all our misery in that greed for knowledge which has also been our greatest spur - in some sense - to good. To good and evil. We have more of both those, I must believe, than our primitive parents.

Now, my great question is, has He withdrawn Himself from our vision so that by diligence of our own matured minds we might find out his Ways - now so far away from us - or have we by sin, or by some necessary thickening of our skins before the new stages of the metamorphosis - have we reached some stage which necessitates our consciousness of our ignorance and distance - and is this necessity health or sickness?

- "Randolph Henry Ash's letter" in Possession, A. S. Byatt

So kiss me and smile for me. Tell me that you'll wait for me.

Today is the first time in a long time that I actually stayed within a 1km radius from my house (I can't say home because I did leave my house to buy lunch) and I realised that I accomplished so much more than an average day out.

Here's what I accomplished:

1. Read Possession. (slow reading, because I really want to take my time to enjoy this)

2. Practiced guitar. (Scales, cords, tried songs but it was so difficult that it got demoralising so I stopped)

3. Swept and mopped my room.

4. Paid credit card bills.

5. Bought lunch home from Yew Tee.

6. Rented 十月围城 ("Bodyguards and Assassins") from video store at Yew Tee.

7. Watched 十月围城 ("Bodyguards and Assassins") while having lunch.

8. Revised for HL105, which is for this Friday. (HL105, in my opinion is the easiest Lit paper to revise for. Because there is so little text, and so little to revise, compared to... you know, 107 )

I really feel that I've done quite abit, but on the other hand, I feel a lack of connection with my friends because I have not corresponded with them for the entire day. I practically have not held a conversation with anyone except my mum (of which the conversation consisted only of dinner contents).

This is declared an effecient day, but not healthy for my social life in the long run. (public life V private life, Butterfly V Beetle, Abraham's Promise)

in other news: I am still convincing myself that we ACTUALLY booked tickets for Taiwan already. It's so surreal. It's like a dream, that we are really going to fly off this August. I am happy. It's the kind of things that will keep me smiling in my dreams for weeks.