HUG

It's often said in 'The Secret' that the law of attraction will get you far in life, and positive thinking attracts positive things your way.  But there's something missing from this equation.  I like to call it "Let the Universe Give You a Hug."

This principle is very simple.  Whenever something bad, untoward, or unlucky happens, immediately stop, and think about how much you wish someone would tell you everything is going to be alright.  Then tell yourself, instead of everything is going to be alright, that you deserve a big hug, and that even though it's not perfect life you have, the universe loves you anyways. 

The reason this is so important is because positive thinking doesn't work well when something bad happens to us.  Humans are cautious by nature, and feel like they can expect bad things over time.  During a 'bad time' or 'a stroke of bad luck' we still need a way to weather stormy times.  Because positive thinking doesn't always bring good things our way.  Sometimes it brings bad things our way. 

From the thinking side of things, it's important we think about why things happen to us so we can move on with our lives.  Otherwise, we repeat the same mistakes, over and over again. And that's bad.

From the practical side of things, I find the desire to get a giant hug from something bigger and paternal key to making this make me feel infinitely better.  Because I think love is what you need to be happy in life, and how we should measure ourselves is not when things are great, but when things are difficult.  We all need a little love from something bigger than us when things are hard. 

So let the universe give you a hug.  It's feel really nice.

IT'S NOT WHAT YOU HAVE

Sometimes living in a big city, you compare yourself and what you have to what other people have.  I know that I often find myself caught up in a race against other people and the things they are doing.  Often the feeling you are left with is, "Why does this person have so much, but I have so little?"  It's not the comparison that bothers me, I find, but the feeling your left with.  The feeling like there's a big hole where all the appreciation for what's in your life should be.

I find myself often thinking, "Yes, I have this, this and this, but I don't have this, this and this."  And the focus always seems to be on the things I don't have, on the problems in my life, on the little failures that don't actually mean anything.  And finally, I often ask, "Why can't I be happy, with all the good things in my life?"

Sometimes, when life gets off track, the one and only thing to remember is that happiness comes through trying, not through hoping happiness will arrive.  More than that, I realized that for the last couple years, I have been focusing on the problems that are in my life, on the things I wish that weren't in my life.  It's kind of like focusing on what you hate, about yourself, about your life, about your day.  And then I would try and pull myself out of some deep hole I was in by focusing on what I love and trying to busy myself with that.

What is strange is that when I thought back to those times when I was truly happy, I realized it wasn't because I wasn't focusing on what I loved, or what I hated.  Those two things are constantly in a battle for my attention, but that's not how we can be happy.  Instead, when I was happy, I was focused not on things, but on people.  And not on people that I love, but on the people that love me. It's not what I do, but what others do for me that makes me happy.  We can do all the good deeds in the world for our friends, and yes it can give us a kind of happiness.  But it's not what we do for our friends, or our families, our peers or strangers.  It's what they do for us.

It's not what you have.  It's what you are given that makes you happy.

FAMILY

I've had a rough couple weeks with being sick and all, and I have been pretty lucky because my wife checked in on me.  And I have been thinking a lot about the various kinds of relationships in my life, and which ones are good, which ones are ok, and which ones seem to do nothing but invite disaster in my life.  (I'm trying to remedy that number.  Eh heh.)  What I have been thinking about this week is all about family, and all about how much my family matters to me. 

You know, it's times like this that I think of Aristotle.  (Which is rare, because most days I choose not to think about Aristotle.  Not a fan, I guess.)  He had some really great ideas about the oikos, or 'family household' that still translate across the ages.  Artistotle said that the family was the building block for all society.  It allows people to become members of the polis (city-state) because it's the basic unit required for good living in a larger community.  In essence, society can't exist without families.  And, in a way, neither can we.  The family comes even before the individual, because you need a group of people to acknowledge roles and places in society.  (Now, I'm paraphrasing a bit) 

Anyways!

More importantly, I think it's important to remember how valuable it is to have a family, no matter how big, or how small.  Families can change, grow closer, move apart, but more than anything, families will always, in their own way, accept you for who you are, and help you when you really need it.  (Not necessarily when we always want it, but hey.  Can't always win.)

No group, organization, or other sort of group can replace your family.  They are yours for life, and their history and accomplishments are part of your successes, accomplishments, and happiness.  Of course, on the flip side, their negatives, their failures, and their inability to love at times is also part of your identity.

I really am lucky to have the family I have, even though it's not always perfect, and many times, it's pretty complicated.  But on the bright side of all that, I am lucky to have a family that is built on loving people in their own way.

The Difference Between Nice and a Friend...

 

You know, I learned sometime around January 2010 a really awful truth. 

'Nice' is not a good thing. 

Which is funny.  Not like 'ha-ha' funny, but more like, 'Am I on the Twilight Zone' sort of funny or 'Did that really just happen' sort of funny.  Odd, I suppose, is the right word.  It's strange how horrible nice can be. 

There are a lot of nice people in the world.  Nice means smiling, seeming to care, feigning interest, and generally remaining neutral to your cause, feelings, problems, and mistakes. 

Some people like having nice people around.  It's nice when people seem not to judge you, seem not to mind what you do, seem to like you.

But 'nice' isn't a picture of reality.  And nice people aren't your friends. 

Some of the worst things people have done to me have been while they had a smile on their faces.  They were trying to be nice.  You know, that thing that seemed so alright at the time?  But then all those nice people who were feigning interest about things you care about are still feigning interest while they watch your life collapse around you. 

Here's the difference between a friend and a nice person.  A nice person will walk by you in a burning building and comment, "That's really such a shame."  A real friend will pull you out of that burning building. 

We all have something in this world to give.  And some of the best people in the world I know, love and respect are not 'nice' people.  (Heck, most people wouldn't call my mother a 'nice' person, but she's the first to give her shirt off her back for people she absolutely despises.)  The people I love are: cranky, miserable, awkward, generally flawed people with eccentricities and foibles.   And I love them anyways.  And I hope they love me back the same.

It's hard not to want to be surrounded by 'nice'.  Everything's pleasant. no one judges your actions, you feel so safe. 

But, that's not real.  Good friendship to me requires a certain level of respect for a person, but also respect for their feelings, thoughts and actions.  Not to mention the ability to criticize those thoughts and actions when a person gets to close to the fire.  I think Nietzsche said it best when he said, "Go up close to your friend, but do not go over to him! We should also respect the enemy in our friend." 

In life, we are surrounded by enemies...inside ourselves and without.  But the best victories against these enemies come from a true friend.  Nice people just don't cut it in real life.

Is Right Versus Feels Right ...

So, this week I've had some very hard decisions to make, and it just always reminds me, it never gets easier to make a difficult decision.  You know, the kind where it's like, "I'm screwed if I do, I'm screwed if I don't."

What I've learned in these situations is that sometimes the only thing you can do is what is best, safest, and healthiest for you and yourself, and nobody else.  And this often means that people are going to get hurt because of your decisions.  That's right, the ones you wanted to make that you hope would benefit everyone else but you know it only benefits yourself.  And you feel like a jerk because of it.
 

What I've learned over time is that if I don't respect myself and my needs, I will ultimately end up resenting the people I'm trying to please, or harbour deep seated grudges against others like it's their fault that I chose badly.  But the truth is, I'm usually just angry at myself for making the worst kind of decision--the one that denies what I want and manages to screw me over at the same time.

When you make a decision that is right, versus a decision that feels right, you are choosing yourself over all others.  And there is nothing harder for some people.  (People like me, for example.)  Sometimes, you have to choose yourself.  And when you make a choice because it 'feels right' and stops you from having to face unpleasant realities, you're actually doing yourself a disservice.  No one deserves to live in a dreamland.  And more importantly, you and I will never grow if we continue to propogate those kind of decisions as decisions that are good for us.

At some point life is about waking up and realizing just how precious life is.  We don't always catch the scent of it, we don't always know how valuable it is, but sometimes we only see it right before we have to make one of those kind of decisions--the hard ones.  And life is all about choices.

In the end, all we have are the choices we make.

The diffrences....

I have been talking a lot lately with friends and family about people not being good with commitments.  It seems to me that there are a lot of people in the world (and I include myself in this, guilty as charged, absolutely) that take advantage our your time and seem to consistently fail to help you when you need it, or at least spend time with you when you need it.

In some ways, it's always our own fault when we rely on acquaintances and false friends.  We're only setting ourselves up for failure when we rely on people we know can't be relied upon.  And usually we have a pretty good sense if someone is a commitment-phobe, reliable, or comes-and-goes-with-the-weather.

Everyone in this world deserves respect, but not everyone in the world deserves your time.  The most precious thing in the world we have is time.  And no one should waste their time on people who don't even know the value of spending time with you.

You know, I learned sometime around this year a really awful truth. 

'Nice' is not a good thing. 

Which is funny.  Not like 'ha-ha' funny, but more like, 'Am I on the Twilight Zone' sort of funny or 'Did that really just happen' sort of funny.  Odd, I suppose, is the right word.  It's strange how horrible nice can be. 

There are a lot of nice people in the world.  Nice means smiling, seeming to care, feigning interest, and generally remaining neutral to your cause, feelings, problems, and mistakes. 

Some people like having nice people around.  It's nice when people seem not to judge you, seem not to mind what you do, seem to like you.

But 'nice' isn't a picture of reality.  And nice people aren't your friends. 

Some of the worst things people have done to me have been while they had a smile on their faces.  They were trying to be nice.  You know, that thing that seemed so alright at the time?  But then all those nice people who were feigning interest about things you care about are still feigning interest while they watch your life collapse around you. 

Here's the difference between a friend and a nice person.  A nice person will walk by you in a burning building and comment, "That's really such a shame."  A real friend will pull you out of that burning building. 

We all have something in this world to give.  And some of the best people in the world I know, love and respect are not 'nice' people.  (Heck, most people wouldn't call my mother a 'nice' person, but she's the first to give her shirt off her back for people she absolutely despises.)  The people I love are: cranky, miserable, awkward, generally flawed people with eccentricities and foibles.   And I love them anyways.  And I hope they love me back the same.

It's hard not to want to be surrounded by 'nice'.  Everything's pleasant. no one judges your actions, you feel so safe. 

But, that's not real.  Good friendship to me requires a certain level of respect for a person, but also respect for their feelings, thoughts and actions.  Not to mention the ability to criticize those thoughts and actions when a person gets to close to the fire.  I think Nietzsche said it best when he said, "Go up close to your friend, but do not go over to him! We should also respect the enemy in our friend." 

In life, we are surrounded by enemies...inside ourselves and without.  But the best victories against these enemies come from a true friend.  Nice people just don't cut it in real life.

 

Ideas on beginnings.....

I recently started a new book. Well, not so recently. I just haven't made as much progress as I'd like. I'd been flailing around with it and for many months I couldn't figure out why. I loved the premise. It had a strong plot. I could even weave in some interesting themes without being intrusive to the story. When I finally sit down with all of my observation ,character studies, images, and plot outlines it often overwhelms me. Who's story is it? Will it work best with one point of view? Two? Should I tell it in 1st person? 3rd person? What are the stakes? How can I raise them? How far can I take it. Is that far enough?

And then there's my worst enemy -I no more have an editor, who from the very first word on the page begins to criticize direction, question word choice and order. My previous editor is such a pain, that I've been known to throw a pillow case over the monitor just to shut him up. Yes. I've done that.

A character in a book I recently created up came to me while I was watching to LIMITLESS  movie.What might it be like to be his BFF? Challenging, I'd bet. So I started with that idea and worked from there. I ended up with one of my favorite (albeit difficult) characters.I almost always think I'm going to write a story in 1st person point of view. I'll write 10-15 chapters that way, and then I begin to feel restricted. I start all over again in 3rd person, but now I know my character. I can work the immediacy of 1st person thoughts into my 3rd person POV, and still have the flexibility that 3rd offers. Maybe someday I'll get a whole story down in 1st person and make it work. Maybe it'll be my current WIP. We'll see.

I tend to want perfection from the start. I forget that sometimes it's best to sit back and let the story come. This time I'm going to tell it all the first time, even those parts that won't make the final cut. Give myself permission to ramble. Edit later.  *Puts a reminder post-it on the monitor* Yes, edit later...

Now, I never lift someone completely from life. Every character is unique, has a little of myself sprinkled in them, and is a composite from many sources, even snippets of conversation in the elevator.

But they usually start from something external. So it's time for me to pay attention again.

How about you? Do your characters originate from observations? Or do you make them up from scratch?

Keep writing,

Firdaus

Out of my head: Unknown

So, this week I've had some very hard decisions to make, and it just always reminds me, it never gets easier to make a difficult decision.  You know, the kind where it's like, "I'm screwed if I do, I'm screwed if I don't."

What I've learned in these situations is that sometimes the only thing you can do is what is best, safest, healthiest, and the most important things is economical for you and yourself, and nobody else.  And this often means that people are going to get hurt because of your decisions.  That's right, the ones you wanted to make that you hope would benefit everyone else but you know it only benefits yourself.  And you feel like a jerk because of it.

What I've learned over time is that if I don't respect myself and my needs, I will ultimately end up resenting the people I'm trying to please, or harbour deep seated grudges against others like it's their fault that I chose badly.  But the truth is, I'm usually just angry at myself for making the worst kind of decision--the one that denies what I want and manages to screw me over at the same time.

When you make a decision that is right, versus a decision that feels right, you are choosing yourself over all others.  And there is nothing harder for some people.  (People like me, for example.)  Sometimes, you have to choose yourself.  And when you make a choice because it 'feels right' and stops you from having to face unpleasant realities, you're actually doing yourself a disservice.  No one deserves to live in a dreamland.  And more importantly, you and I will never grow if we continue to propogate those kind of decisions as decisions that are good for us.

At some point life is about waking up and realizing just how precious life is.  We don't always catch the scent of it, we don't always know how valuable it is, but sometimes we only see it right before we have to make one of those kind of decisions--the hard ones.  And life is all about choices.

In the end, all we have are the choices we make....

Operation Blackbriar: look at us....

Well it's a 4 years late but I finally finish examined The Bourne Trilogy, I believe most people have probably already watched this movie; and some have probably downloaded it further hurting the hand that I hope will one day feed me. It was a good end to the series, for me it's "fit" very well. I'll admit that I was not excited when I first heard about the Bourne Identity and it's star Matt Damon. In fact I had waited till almost 2 weeks to check it out at cinema. I was impressed, and further more was excited when Supremacy came out. Ultimatum on the other hand was a tuff sell for me. The trailer offered nothing new, the story definitely offered nothing new, the cast almost the same except for one bad ass CIA agent that pretty much saved the show. David Strathairn plays Noah Vosen, a CIA man who runs the black ops in the CIA. Pretty much he can do whatever he wants. His new job is to of course take down Bourne and pin the Ops that created him on Landey, played once again by Joan Allen, or kill Bourne... well do they? The story really is nothing new, the acting is actually quite nice, but I don't want to talk about the well known damon acting. I'm more interested on the symbolism of CIA via Black ops, secret mission, assassination and etc.

Operation Blackbriar-Treadstone Upgrade

We don't know what this program was. They tell us it wasn't water-boarding or the other torture methods. (You do realize that "harsh interrogation methods" is a euphemism worthy of the Nazis or the Soviets, right?) They tell us it wasn't the massive surveillance that essentially rendered the Fourth Amendment so much empty language.

They also tell us that it was never an "operational" program, even after nearly eight years. Oh, bullshit. To believe that, you'd have to have your head buried so far up your ass that it would be looking out your navel.

Dick Cheney, the true power of Duhbya's maladministration, ordered this program kept secret from Congress, kept immune from the oversight of democracy. He explicitly evaded the rule of law. (Again!) This was - and still is - the canonical impeachable offense. It's also a violation of his oath of office.

There is no way that Darth Cheney would have been interested enough in "planning and some training that took place off and on from 2001 until this year" to suppress disclosure of it. The New York Times is playing along to even print such nonsense.

Note: In all the wingnut foofaraw about Nancy Pelosi accusing Leon Panetta of lying about the CIA's legal obligations to brief Congress is the most obvious bullshit. Panetta did not say the CIA always briefed Congress in compliance with its legal obligations. He said that it was not the CIA's policy to withhold legally required briefings. Is everyone in the media too dense - or too happy to play along with the inside game - to notice this?

value

I think this week I have spent a lot of time managing my own time.  And, rather badly I feel.  I have had a couple of 20 hour days lately, some of them in a row, and it all kind of came full stop after 14 hours of sleep.  I probably could have slept longer, but I made myself get up.  No rest for the weary. Sometimes when things get a little too crazy, when things are really insane and there seems to be no end to work, that's when we seem to appreciate small moments of rest, small things that other people do to us, or for us.

I have thought a lot about laziness, about what it means to have a healthy life-work balance, about what kind of career path I want to take, and it all comes back to time.  Time we have to spent, time that is taken away from us.  All opportunity requires time.  All failures are often a misuse of the most important resource of all--time. 
 
We only have so much time to give, to spend.  Everything always comes back to our mortality, to the choices we make, and to how we choose to use the time we're given.  What is a better life...one that is packed to the gills with activity, or a quiet life of contemplation, relaxation and self-enjoyment?  What is a better use of time?
 
There's no easy answer to the way to live your life.  But we all have a certain kind of freedom, a certain kind of truth.  Everyone has time, even if they have nothing else.  It's all dependant on ourselves to how we use it.
 

Why canada!

So, I just had a weird dream last night.

My wife and I were flying back to Canada, and we had flown into a smaller airport for some reason, taken a bus, and then somehow got stranded in the middle of Ontario. While we were looking at the map of Canada, she said we were very far away from where we needed to be. I said, No problem, and proceeded to move a red dot on the map that represented us and drag the red dot across the map closer to where we wanted to go, somewhere around a border between Quebec and Ontario. When we looked up, we were standing beside a highway, and I couldn't decide whether we were supposed to go left or right, and my wife said we go left, that's the way to Toronto. (We were trying to get to Toronto.) So we began walking left, and immediately ended up in a giant beach resort with the sun shining and people laughing and carrying around drinks and flowers in their hair. The beach resort was named a small place that I ', so familiar with although I can't for the life of me remember what it was called. (I saw a sign in a dream, but it changed when I looked at it three times from Vespa Beach, to Perdue, to what it actually was, which I don't remember.)
 

My wife looks at the map, and says, with an extremely distressed tone, that we were VERY far away from where we needed to be. At this point there was a bit of a commotion, and for some reason, Tim Allen showed up with the lady who played his wife off of Home Improvement, with really gray hair, being followed around by about fifteen people all asking if they could take pictures of him, and he posed and was pleasant to them. My wife also asked to take a picture of him, which she did, and I wanted to stop her because, hey, the man's on a vacation. That's no way to treat him. After they left, he sighed a sigh of relief, and walked over to the beach to sit by himself. I was now alone, and I don't know where my wife went, but I assumed she went into the store to figure out a plan how to get to Toronto. I walked up under a little side hut attached to the main lounge, and looked at Tim Allen sitting on the beach all by himself, with the tide coming on a perfect sandy beach, and felt pretty forlorn over the fact that I was supposed to be in Toronto and that I was in a beautiful beach resort miles and kilometres and days and days of walking away from my destination. I heaved a big sigh and started to walk away.

Then someone called from behind, "Hey man, why you so sad?" I thought for a moment it was Tim Allen talking to me, and since I didn't think I really ought to deserve talking to anybody famous, I felt pretty flattered, like I was in one of those TV miniseries where good things happen to people who are down on their luck or Sidekicks with Chuck Norris or something. (Yes, I know. I was dreaming.) I turned around and I big group of black guys that I didn't notice before were staring right at me, as if I was the new show in town. This one guy with dreadlocks started talking to me, asking why I was so sad when I was in such a nice place. He said he's always happy, and he lives off of water and eating small things like seeds. He reminded me of King Louie from the Jungle Book, with the way he was talking to me. I was afraid he was going to start breaking into Bob Marley's "Don't Worry, Be Happy" with his posse as back up singers. Luckily, Tim Allen happened to come over and asked what the problem was. The guys answered for me, and said I was miles and kilometres and days away from where I was supposed to be and so I was sad. Tim Allen wanted to buy the men a drink for being so nice to me, and they tried to turn him down because they said they don't drink or eat a lot of things that he was offering them, but then one of the beach waitresses came around, and Tim Allen looked at her, and she said, "Don't worry, I'll bring them some vegetables and things they like." The guys looked pretty happy, and Tim Allen asked me to go sit a little ways away under the shade with him and talk about things. He asked where I was going, and who was that girl I was traveling with? I said she is my wife, and Tim Allen nodded, and then we sat for a while, just staring out, watching the people, and I suddenly felt a lot more relaxed and like I shouldn't worry so much about where I was going. We talked a little more, and then one the waitresses came and bothered him, to which he said a few things. I was surprised he didn't have bodyguards or more people around him since he had a pretty big career, and he said that People with less fame than him walk around with a horde of people following him just because they want them, and he has only one person. He sounded kind of critical. We laid in the sand for a little longer in silence. Then he started talking about various things, most of which I don't remember, since I then woke up.

Dreams are strange things.

Are You Willing to Go For A Dream? ....

You know, we all say we want to achieve our dreams.  The phrase in english, as it's put, is "Reach for the stars."  I think we say that because we think that dreams are something far away, twinkling in the sky, making us happy just to think about them.  Currently, I'm dreaming about Motorbike but maybe that's more a daydream.  Eh heh.  Right!

We all have dreams for the future.  Either for our families, friends, loved ones, and, of course, for ourselves.  It's interesting that our dreams so often rely on circumstances outside our control or beyond our ability to foresee the future.  Having a baby, becoming a famous musician, getting married, getting the job of your dreams, these are things we can imagine.  But we never seem to know how things are going to turn out in real life. 

I talked with my wife about having dreams and achieving them, and I think we both shared a similar feeling that we thought adulthood would be a somewhat safer, happier place as we go about achieving what we consider to be our dreams.  The truth is, however, is that achieving our dreams means taking serious risks...risks that sometimes mean we fail.  And nobody likes to fail.

People that we think had star-studded lives actually has serious issues and conflicts that they faced, and were only rewarded for persevering.  Tun Mahathir lost his political career after fired by Tunku but one of his teeth by time he became prime minister, and was in constant pain for the rest of his life.  Lance Edward  Gunderson known as Lance Armstrong one of the most successful athlete, he was diagnosed with testicular cancer, with a tumor that had metastasized to his brain and lungs and he survived with a record seven consecutive times. at Tour de France. People have pain.  People have problems.  Most of the problems we have are insignificant compared to people plauged with disease, famine, or the loss of their friends and family.

The truth is we shape who we are, and we choose who we are and we can be anything, really and truly anything we want to be.  Everything bad in our life can be a disaster, or an adventure.  It can be an obstacle, or a challenge.  The reason most of us don't reach our potential is not because we aren't capable of achieving our dreams, but because we turn back when the obstacles seem to be too much for us to surmount. 

I guess we all think we want to achieve our dreams without thinking we have to sacrifice anything.  We want to have success with the hard work.  No one wants to change when they think about their dreams...most people just want the results without the consequences.  All things in life come with a price, whether it's time, money, or health.  Nothing in this world comes without a price.  But, that can be comforting, because that means that even we have a value that can't be nullified, as individuals.

There is no obstacle in life so large we can't overcome it to achieve our dreams.  As long as we are alive, we have a chance to change our lives and realize our dreams.  It doesn't mean that dreams get easier as you get older.  It seems to me, dreams become harder to achieve the older you are, but they are always, always still possible.

But what are you willing to give up in your life currently to make a dream real?  And how long are you willing to toil for a dream you have?

2011 it's alright....

You know, I have a lot of things to do this week.  And I would like to take up the old adage:  "The Devil finds mischief for idle hands."

This is so true.

I can easily say the less I have to do in a week that really challenges me, the less I have to do that makes me think, "Wow, I'm doing the things I want in the way I want," the more I feel bad.  I do.  I just feel bad when I'm not expressing 'me.' The more time I try to deal with daily details, small things and boring to-do items that grind on my creativity, my personality, I(and frankly) my well-being, the more I feel like ending it all, and taking it all with me.  (Hypothetically speaking, of course.  I don't actually wish anyone any harm, not even my worst enemies, if such things exist.)

I know that I have to work hard to feel good about the things I do.  I think I have been expecting my life to magically right itself when I'm surrounded by things that are constantly draining on me, and not helping me grow as a human being. Thankfully, I have been able to limit a lot of that business, and now I am focusing on the most important thing in the world:  Me.  And it feels really great.  My life was meant to be busy.  I was meant to work hard.  All the time.  I like it.  I don't know where I got this idea that I should try and slow things down.  Let's speed them up again.

How hard have you been working to achieve your dreams lately?  What makes you feel inspired?  It's funny, it doesn't take much to make me 'feel' successful.  I just need to work with people I like, and work hard.  That's pretty much it.

Well-being for me is tied to being able to express myself, to create myself, the kind of me I want to be.  And I know that there are a lot of things in my life that aren't quite right and that there are a lot of things that never seem to turn out the way I would expect, but I am happy that I am starting to do things the way I want.  And, eventually, I will be able to do the things I want, all the time.  You know, when I'm really famous! 

Then again, maybe that will limit my freedom a bit.  Eh heh.

I am happy for my family,my wife and all the friends I have in my life, and I'm thinking of you all the time.  This year is going to be the best one ever!  Believe it!

Blogging on the Bus ( or BotB for short)

Why is it that I didn't find out about the joys of blogging via email
earlier?? This is so convenient! Would have saved me from that one
year no update thing .....

I am currently stuck in a clusterfuck known as KL traffic, which
is so bad that I'm not even out from the town yet and I'm in it. Uh huh, no
kidding. We are moving at a slow, snail pace, which basically means
that the bus driver hits the brakes every 2 seconds. Have you ever
felt that super nauseaus feeling you get when you're in a car and
someone else is driving and they keep accelerating and braking? Yeah,
I'm developing one of those right now. The whole physics of "a body in
motion tends to stay in motion" is knocked into my brain everytime I
get these vehicle-induced migraines.

I already miss driving. At least when I was traffic, I was mad but i wasn't
nauseaus. Good thing I'm dieting; nothing to puke out. On the other
hand, bussing means I get to blog while we're stuck in traffc, which
is pretty cool :)

I'm going to start assigning words to my day that reflects how my day
was. Today's word is "sardines". Why sardines? Well, I need a couple
of the canned ones, for one. And for another, I feel like a sardine
packed in a can based on how closely seated beside friend of mine 

Note to other people: my ass is big. I am a big guy. If you are
similarly big, please sit next to one of of the skinny people. I don't
need to simulataneously be in a sauna while I'm on a bus. It is not
cute for me to get out of the bus and the whole side of one leg looks
sweaty because it has been in constant contact with yours for the past
hour.

Suddenly I'm thinking need one of those Mini Coopers. Now if I can
just scrape the money for it .....

The art of history.....

I read this last week when I was waiting at the doctor's office, it's a little snippet from old issue of Newsweek:

In translation to English, it sounds like... the word... you know... sometimes language is not so convenient and sometimes I'm embarrassed."
Fuk King Kwok, a Chinese immigrant, on his decision to change his name to Andy Kwok after people repeatedly mispronounced his name. 

The poor guy, of course his name was supposed to be pronounced differently, but as usual the Americans mess up everyone's name. Sorry to those who feel insulted, but you do!! Some of the people I've known  can't pronounce my name right, and mine isn't that hard to begin with. Other people who have made the same decision to change their names are Monica Pinas and April Showers.

Another person who's name was.. ermm.. made fun of is Jack Abramoff. The perpetrator: George Clooney. Here's what debonair George has to say about Abramoff:

"Who would name their kid Jack with the last words 'off' at the end of your last name? No wonder that guy is screwed up."
Actor George Clooney, thanking lobbyist Jack Abramoff "just because" in an acceptance speech at the Golden Globes. Frank Abramoff, the lobbyist's father, called the speech a "glib and ridiculous attack" and Clooney "an idiot."

Ouch. Looks like not everyone is a fan of Clooney. To be fair, while Abramoff is an embezzling scumbag who pretty much stole money from native Americans and helped raise a lot of money for the Bush campaign, y'know what, I don't feel like being fair. Yes, it was a low blow by George , but considering the hatred a lot of people must be feeling for Mr. Jack-Off, whatever that is thrown to him is pretty much well deserved. here's the bit that I read from Wikipedia that I was really shocked about:

Government of Malaysia

Abramoff's team also represented the government of Malaysia, and worked toward improving Malaysian relations with the United States, particularly with trade relations. Because Grover Norquist worked with a lobbying firm that represented Anwar Ibrahim, some have alleged a connection between the two, and theorized that Abramoff and Norquist were running a scam in which Norquist's firm would create issues that Abramoff's firm would then take care of. Abramoff also reportedly wanted to spread his influence deep into the Muslim world through a front group called the Lexington Group.

What a low life. What an asshole. Five years and 10 months in jail isn't long enough for Abramoff. I wish the US doesn't have the plea bargain policy so that he would get what he deserves. I'm just mad right now because for the past few days, I've just been reading articles that just tugs on my heart strings. Some things in life are just not fair. Take for example, the marine shooting incident in Haditha. Here's an excerpt from the artical in Time magazine.

Eman says she "heard a lot of shooting, so none of us went outside. Besides, it was very early, and we were all wearing our nightclothes." When the Marines entered the house, they were shouting in English. "First, they went into my father's room, where he was reading the Koran," she claims, "and we heard shots." According to Eman, the Marines then entered the living room. "I couldn't see their faces very well—only their guns sticking into the doorway. I watched them shoot my grandfather, first in the chest and then in the head. Then they killed my granny." She claims the troops started firing toward the corner of the room where she and her younger brother Abdul Rahman, 8, were hiding; the other adults shielded the children from the bullets but died in the process.

Eman says her leg was hit by a piece of metal and Abdul Rahman was shot near his shoulder. "We were lying there, bleeding, and it hurt so much. Afterward, some Iraqi soldiers came. They carried us in their arms. I was crying, shouting 'Why did you do this to our family?' And one Iraqi soldier tells me, 'We didn't do it. The Americans did.'" Time was unable to speak with the only other survivor of the raid, Eman's younger brother, who relatives say is traumatized by the experience. U.S. military officials familiar with the investigation say that after entering the house, the Marines walked into a corridor with closed doors on either side. They thought they heard the clack-clack sound of an AK-47 being racked and readied for fire. (Eman and relatives who were not in the house insist that no guns were there.) Believing they were about to be ambushed, the Marines broke down the two doors simultaneously and fired their weapons. The officials say the military has confirmed that seven people were killed inside the house--including two women and a child. The Marines also reported seeing a man and a woman run out of the house; they gave chase and shot and killed the man. Relatives say the woman, Hiba Abdullah, escaped with her baby.

It hurts to even think about grown military men shooting towards a 9-year-old girl and her younger brother. while the whole artcile is heart wrenching, here's the portion that shocked me:

The U.S. has paid relatives of the victims $2,500 for each of the 15 dead civilians, plus smaller payments for the injured. But nothing can bring back all that was taken from 9-year-old Eman Waleed on that fateful day last November. She still does not comprehend how, when her father went in to pray with the Koran for the family's safety, his prayers were not answered, as they had been so many times in the past. "He always prayed before, and the Americans left us alone," she says. Leaving, she grabs a handful of candy. "It's for my little brother," she says. "I have to take care of my brother. Nobody else is left."

You can barely live 6 months on $2,500 dollars. Some would argue that due to the exchange rate, it might be more to the Iraqis. Really? Unless USD$2,500 translates to, oh say 20 million in Iraqi currency, I still think it's an unfair trade. A US Court awarded 2.7 million to a woman for simply spilling McDonald's coffee on her lap. When did the chilhood trauma of seeing your family killed weigh less than the trauma of being burned by coffee?

Life isn't supposed to be fair, yes, but it's not suppose to suck like this either.

The Malay...

The reservations some quarters have against the notion of Malay male is some kind of retribution to the paradox of ultra-conservatism, of backwardness, of sexual fetishism and of oppression that engulf these group which many for years have learnt to both love and loathe with the latter now taking center stage in light of current events involving the upholding of moral values and stability of family ties.

Despite these, I for one have not stopped to confess on every road traveled that I'm a Malay through and through, that I am unashamed of being labeled as a serial rapist and incestuous and a wife-beater, for i am very well aware that all these demonizing are retributions of part jealousy part envy by the same quarters for their lacking of their own self identity they thought ought to do them any proud.

Once a good species is now no longer, pronounced some Western-educated, Oprah-motivated feminists of the fairer skin who actually failed to garner the attention of the best of the jewels this near extinct group has to offer (:)). Yet harping on the prejudices and some loophole faults mongered by luck-ridden individuals are ways to mend their broken hearts while the efforts are far from noble, it is destructive for that not all men in this world are born free of shortcomings;and when they claim that they are, one ought to doubt the genuineness of their man-ness.

A threat to human survival is when men can no longer act the way men are supposed to act, when decisions in life are finalized by emotions rather than thoughtful rationals, and when balls are handed over on a silver platter. A greater threat to human existence is when governing is by ideals, not by realism and practicality, which have governed us all for millenniums, and which have ensured us all our survivals from generations to generations.

I am proud to have been born and grown up as a Malay male, for in that I have been warned and taught of the dangers of "dayus" (male subservience) that many men of other descendants have to live with everyday, and the complexities they have to face handling this new age of human extinction unheard of by our forebears in the golden years of human civilizations.

I fear that with the demonizing now raucous and infectious , a species which follows the good old ways of living this life albeit all its discrepancies will vanish from the face of Earth, leaving those with tamed hearts and leashed balls ruling this world with their offspring of the same tamed hearts and leashed balls, unable to pay its due to the once great Shahs of the world, who happened to have tied their balls closely in their crotch (otherwise you and I would not have seen the light of day).

This is maybe a bit chauvinistic, but being a Malay male...this is exactly what we are...and for that, one ought to be grateful...

Epitome of Utter Disgust......

To sum up there are those amongst us who, after having achieved resounding successes in life and career (such as getting scholarships to further tertiary education at overseas institutions and subsequently getting hired at top GLCs), have become forgetful of who they were and what had made them what they are today.

To these people, their successes are the fruits of their own effort and hard work, without realizing that the 'rezeki' that they have received would not have been possible without the contributions of the upper hand who had initially had high hopes of seeing them giving back for the betterment of the community, in exchange for the aid sought for them.

We need not say more what can be made of them. Values my parents taught me are 'not to bite back the hand that fed' and I shall never once become 'kacang lupakan kulit'. Or,I'd be less of a person that they are.

And I do not want to be that....

Wax on Wax Off....

No, it's not the end of the year. It's not the beginning of a new year. Not my birthday, no major changes happened, no earth-shattering major event happened. The only thing that is different is the fact that I have no boss in the office, and I want a change. I had a blog before that I was only intermittently updating, and I want to change that. I have projects that I have started but never completed, and I want to change that, too. My Room is only half-cleaned, and I want a change.

I want a change, and I want to change me. No more half assing. No more waiting for things to happen. I want to start something, continue with it, and see to it until the (possibly bitter) end. Time to find something I love to do and share with the world on why I love it.

So this blog will contain:

1. My life. well, Stuff about my life, more like. I'm a still 27 year-old Malaysian (*imagine I'm squishing my face here and trying to say the word*),Husband to pre-Dr.Noor Faridzatul Ain living in Putrajaya pursuing adventure, independence and, most of all, personal fortune. (In case you haven't figured it out, I hate the word "Schizophrenia". But more about that later.) Since this is my blog, you will (unfortunately) hear a lot about my life, or at least what I acknowledge on paper anyway. But don't fret, because I'll also write a lot about.
2. Food. If you're thinking "oh no, another food blog?", the answer is, heck yes! Food is sustenance, and you have to eat it, and if you are, no reason why it shouldn't be delicious. However, I'm not that good enough of a cook to be posting original recipes in my blog. I'm busy enough that there's usually one week per month that I would survive on eating out every few days and surviving on leftovers.
3. Books. Oh yes, I love to read. I am also a member of wattpad e-book of Urban generation who I really enjoy spending my time with. I'll post our take on whatever book it is we're reading for the month.
4. The eternal struggle with weight loss. This is going to intermingle a lot with the other things on the list. So a recipe might be modified because I'm not willing to go ape-shit with the butter or have my meal consist solely of deep fried concoctions ("brown" is not a food group you want to associate yourself with). I might also just put a review on a health book okay, this part might not happen right now, but it might happen in the possibly near future. Look, bottom line is, you'll hear some stuff about eating healthy and going for walks because I gained 30 lbs last year and I want all of it off and then some.

I feel that that's long enough for a transitionary email from old blog to new blog :) Not sure how many people will actually be reading all of the above, but if you are, thank you, and hope you'll stick around for the whole ride!

 

War Stories...

The book i'm currently reading now is about war story in Europe, though i must admit most people are not that much of a fan of aggression, but actually you look at it,any amount of wars actually provide these kinds of solid underlying foundations of any civilizations wishing to make its mark in the history of men. long before there were history and historians we had people fighting and aggression over territories and necessities and today it hasn't changed much from the yesteryear's.

It is some wretched political ideal of population control where it is thought that much of the problems that exist in the world today is the result of people making so much love thus having so many babies to populate and contaminate the earth. this, has to be handled in many ways and one of the ways is extermination. scientists also have this idea that how Mother Nature is suppossed to curb overpopulation by being emotional and violent during sessions of her menstruations; thus justifying the occassional earthquakes and the accompanying tsunamis where hundreds of thousands perish.

Of course, all these are simple-minded thinking of the atheists whose godless lives have led them to resort to using common sense and nothing else for any untoward incidents that have come upon us. we Muslims don't wanna believe these simplistic views of explaining misfortunes and from time to time, we try to decipher how God's message is transferred through all these calamities and complexities and we try to learn and make amends from them. it is good that despite all these we manage to pull ourselves together and submit ourselves to Him rather than question on why are we the ones with hardship why the others are spared. we don't demand justice for we know that justice has always been served only that we fail or refuse to recognize it.

I will try to summarize a few paragraphs from sea of poppies that i managed to finish reading last weekend, somehow. it is quite a thick book with many plots but none that are inconsistent or incoherent with the main topic. it is a beautifully crafted book with beautiful lingo and styling and reading it is a pleasure in itself. i've already gotten another book by Leon Uris but that's not to be read until i have at least finished another Booker nominee ( i got my copy of the widely acclaimed 'The Betrayed" by David Hosp  now waiting for its turn to be savored).

Ref: a friend ask me"why not you directly involved in politics, don't you think about it?" Me:  Irregardless of the politics. it’s time we stopped dicking around.I’m telling you..NUCLEAR! is the only way out...

So Little Has Been Done.....

Human heart  is not complicated. its tenderest when its in is pristine form. its roughest when its  been, well roughened. its like this simple chemical formula, when the outcome is all about the inputs. you treat people good, you get kindness in return. you spill rat's poison into your neighbor's milk, all you get is probably, your life being taken away from you.

it is not the same with a Malay though. i am no politician, and i don't give two hoots about what any politicians in this country has to say (except for those wise words from the good old Tun Dr Mahathir and his apprentice) but drive your little self to the beautiful island of Penang and check for yourself the kind of injustice  that was brought upon to the Malay population on that island. What's this, squatter dwellings on the verge of expensive edifices, a flashback of  to Singapore and its marginalized Malay 'citizens'? Is this the next Singapore? (Despite these, Malay Singaporeans claim to be much better-off than Malay Malaysians, which I like to take of as a grain of salt (of insult). Come on, if i were a Malay Singaporean, my chance of securing a much-deserved scholarship for an expensive, top class American education would be slim to none. Malay Singaporeans at top American and British institutions are almost unheard of when we have plenty of top Malay Malaysian students at all these places. Malay Singaporeans prize mediocrity more than Malay Malaysians do, it seems).
 
Is there any Malay with good conscience out there who is aware of 'this', and has done or willing to do something about it? I'm gonna be really Third World on this one (as a Western loyalist would presume), but will the government decide that it is now time that 'George Town' goes back to its 'Tanjung' name? We have Bombay changed to Mumbai and Madras changed to Chennai and even Ceylon has long been gone, all that's left is Sri Lanka. I beg the government to expedite the transformation, as my plans  to send one of my kids to the prestigious Georgetown University in Washington D.C, United States (where Tun once gave his lecture and where many of world's statesmen graduate from) cannot be deferred. Wouldn't want such an exclusive institution to be confused with the colonial name of a city in all its pretensions , wanting to be European. Or are we still colonies?
 
I pity the Malays in Penang, much. But just pity wouldn't change a thing. And we don't need the Agong to interfere so that all these squatter dwellings would be  turned into mansions with Malay masters in them. What a rhetoric.All we need is solidarity. Well-off Malays looking out for the left-behinds.Right. Look into a Malay dictionary and see the meaning of the word 'tolong-menolong'. The definition is - seperti enau dalam belukar, all looking out only for themselves.
 
If you ask if me I'm angry, yes I am. Where have all the cowboys gone? as Paula Cole would put it. The cowboys (these forgetful well-off Malays) are busy making their negligible small fortunes unworthy of the larger sense of the world; when they should be sharing. They claim of being pro-expropriation when in reality they are only concerned about buying more expensive furniture than their next-door Malay neighbors, or getting their kids to Akademi Fantasia ore mediocre institutions such as those filled with competitors their kind.Simple minds of the simple folks. Isabelle Bird and Tun are yet to be proven wrong.

If this were to happen in Detroit,wouldn't you wonder the kind of respond the Blacks are gonna give? Or expensive, SoHo-like penthouses near the trailer parks in the south cities? If you ask me, would my vote go to Obama in the NEXT US electorate? I'd say no. It's no longer time to live in good old day  of puppet government. Symbolism is good though. But I don't need to become Prime Minister to make a change in this country.
 
So little has been done. So much we still have to do. But who's gonna do it? Nobody. I am no purist, but I hold on to where I come from as much as I can. Miss Bird might have made such a sweeping statement but if she were alive today, she'd begging for forgiveness from me over and over. And should I forgive her? Malays always forgive the superior races, though they always find it impossible to forgive among themselves.
 
Damn I need to cool off. Luckily I have David Wroblewski's 'The Story of Edgar Sawtelle' and Tun's 'The Malay Dilemma' that I have read over and over because they are such revelations. When I need to learn how the whites evolve and how much their religion of Christianity has turned them into such a progressive race I always have Ken Follet's 'The Pillars of the Earth' to let myself lost into. Are the Muslim Turks and Uzbegs not good examples that Islam too is a progressive religion? Most Malays don't think so.