Hope, Love, Pragmatism and Barack Obama

I've been thinking a lot on hope recently, especially Barack Obama's message of hope, of unifying a deeply divided nation, of not doing things the same way with the same mindset.

I've begin to wonder if Singapore had gotten it all wrong.

I've been thinking of the 27 girls and the principal that has asked for them to leave the school in hopes of not pulling down the overall grade of the school. What a blow it must be to the girls! I do not wish to rehash the opinions of other bloggers on this issue. What I do wish to do is to abstract this a bit further.

We are familiar with the Singapore Mindset: Practicality above all, survival as the primary consideration. Survival requires us to make hard decisions. Practicality drives these decisions. There is no room for dreams, compromise, or hope. Winning the game must dominate all.

Is this correct?

I look back on Singapore's history, often cited as an economic miracle of proper governance, and of making hard decisions to survive. We did what we had to, and we did it well. We adopted a hard-nosed pragmatic mindset to survive, and we've done well. We've kept to it till this day.

Why is it, then, that while keeping this pragmatic mindset, we as Singaporeans have become increasingly dissatisfied with pragmatism? What has actually changed? I suspect it may be that we've forgotten that hope and pragmatism aren't always enemies.

We have forgotten that what drove Singapore during its early independence was not just the goal of feeding mouths and putting roofs over our heads. It was also the hope that there would be better days ahead, that what we would suffer for now would ultimately be repaid to us tenfold.

That was the difference. That was all the difference.

Yesterday, I read the Barack Obama has gotten the Kennedy family's endorsement, not because he had the best policies, or the greatest chance of putting them into action. He obtained it because he is slowly teaching a nation how to hope again.

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In the recent past, I spoke to a friend of mine, troubled with love problems. Her problem was simply this: she did not want to enter into love again without some assurance that it would work out. I found this an entirely rational response and completely unwise.

My response is simply this - if both sides do what is rational, love will never happen because each side is treating each other at arm's length waiting for something to happen. The only way for something to happen is to break the deadlock, do the irrational, take the leap of faith.

In that sense, is it ultimately pragmatic to lose love or to gain love? I don't know, but I do know that equal parts of pragmatism and hope ultimately worked better than mere pragmatism.

As far as I know, my friend and her current beau are still happy together.

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The Singapore Mindset has permeated all aspects of our culture. Pragmatism above all. In truth, I have nothing against pragmatism. It is the exclusion of hope that I fear.

We need hope. We must have hope. History has shown time and time again what men without hope do. Hope curdles easily into desperation. The lack of hope turns easily into despair. Yet, for such a fragile thing, hope remains eminently persistent, for no one can give or take away hope, only displayed as an fine light in hope that others will follow.

I hope. Do you?

Starting Over

I feel my one-month absence from training.

Yesterday's training was very much about easing back. I don't think I did badly, apart from a moment where I was seeing stars after wrestling. My shoulder muscles have shrunk, my paunch is returning, but my CV is somehow better - I attribute that to all the walking and running around I did during NS.

My load-bearing doesn't seem to have suffered. Then again I wasn't wearing my full armour. That being said, I think my wind has improved and it's translated into more willingness to press the attack. I also tried out a few other things that I otherwise wouldn't have done, which suits me just fine.

My pivoting seems to have deteriorated and my sword is all over the place - evidence that continuous practice is the best way of maintaining form.

That's all to report for now. I am still chewing over some aspects of my training but I feel it's a bit premature to write them down. Suffice to say, I'm thinking hard on the comments that have been left on my blog - especially Illka's comments about yielding only to superior pressure.

*****

I also seem to have developed a congestion in my chest area. I feel laboured when I breathe and a slight cough seems to be developing. I have no phlegm though. I suspect it's the warm weather conditioning I acquired in NS conflicting with the air-con environment.

Apart from this, I don't quite feel 100% psychologically. I feel much better after training though, so I think it might just be a function of venting aggression and frustration from NS.

Returned to Sender

I'm back from ICT.

Many many weird things happened. I'm certain I cannot speak of any of these events. All I can and will say is...I'm appalled at the depths of which SAF officers will sink to protect their careers.

Having lost the first three weeks of the year, I'm now in an odd time warp where I'm slowly adapting to the new work year while the new work year seems studiously intent on avoiding me.

In other news, I've not been to training since the year started. I'm going on Sunday, for sure, and I have a lot to think about with regards to swordsmanship.

Happy New Year!

Am heading off for national service on the 3rd. Will be blog once I get back.

Updates

I've begun training as a senior now, and I'm glad for it. I've rectified at least one issue - the issue of standing straight and not bending over. I tried maintaining it for the length of at least 2 free spars, and my back aches a lot less after training, so I must be doing something right.

I'm also learning more new drills, for which I'm very thankful. Lately, my attacks and defenses seem very much the variations of the same theme - long frontale, yield-to-counter, grab if they come close. Doing 5th drill and 1st drill for the first time opened my eyes to the possibility of strato deflects and pushes, along with fenestra "oh-shit" defenses.

I'm also very thankful for the fact that I'm alive and unhurt after a two-foot piece of steel hurtled past me. No further details needed.

I'm also glad for having spent time with my loved ones, friends and drinking buddies, ate like a pig, and for SAF's E-Mart purchases that comes with home delivery, so I don't have to skulk around Clementi Camp for the shit I need.

All in all, a wonderful and fruitful holiday season. I hope you've had the same.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Wishing my readers a merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Training Issues

I made it past the recent evaluations but I felt like I didn't really deserve it.

My current complaints? A whole host. I feel like I know what the issues are but I haven't the faintest clue about how to get around them. I'll list them down - if anyone has any ideas from their own experience with martial arts and competitive sports, I'm very willing to listen.

1. I'm suffering from a power blockage at the hip area, where my leg joint connects to my hip bone. What I mean by "power blockage" is that when I rotate my hips, I am unable to transfer the power from my hips to my upper body smoothly. The end result is that I end up very reliant on shoulder and upper body strength. It gets me to a point, but I'm feeling the inadequacies of this technique already. I think this is a result of my extreme lack of flexibility but I'm not sure.
   
2. My footwork needs work. I tend to step from the heel rather than stepping from the balls of my feet. It's gotten slightly better but I'm still by no means consistent with that.
3. I can't help but to think I'm picking up bad form from stress training. I'm not sure what basis I have for this statement, but I feel it happening when I do drills - I tend to want to punch a guys face in rather than concentrate on what works for the drill. In short, I've not made the transition from connecting "executing proper form" to "winning" yet.
4. I tend to hunch my shoulders and lean forward to get those extra 2-3 inches of range, but at the cost of being able to balance well. It's a bad habit and I'm looking to break it because of the strain it causes my lower back and shoulders, not to mention wrecking havoc with my form. I think that it's a combination of breaking in new armour and my brain cross-firing saber and longsword techniques.
5. There's a point I get to where I'm VERY unwilling to go faster. I -think- I can go faster but I've never tried going faster. The reason for this is that I associate speed with losing control, and losing control with injuries. I'm deathly afraid of causing someone else injuries. This has related issues as well - I freak out mentally whenever I train techniques I -know- are meant to injure or kill, like drawing the sword across a human body. I'm not sure how I can get around that, or if it's just an issue of desensitization.
   

I think the focus for the new year for me should be (1) more flexibility exercises and stretching (2) more focus on form and less on stress training and (3) learning to stand up straight.

Word of the Day III

Convenience

1. the quality of being suitable, useful or convenient
2. anything that makes for an easier life
3. a convenient time, especially in the phrase at one's convenience
4. (mostly UK) a public toilet

Conversations with fellow corvidae lead to strange thoughts, especially when one speaks to others later in the week.

A conversation later in the week spun forth additional vectors of thought that I now seek to bind into runes. Context is everything in my craft, but I fear I may only present part-context in this case. Suffice it to say, the word of the day is in the context of romantic relationships.

For a word that is of fairly common usage, I find it damnably difficult to bind the various vectors in my thoughts into a useable form. The problem I face is that convenience is itself a mutable concept.

Would one enter into a relationship of convenience? The intuitive answer is both no and yes - "no" because no one wants to be the object of convenience, "yes" because, well, what else is a relationship but a coincidence of the right emotions, at the right place and time?

On further probing, I realise that the problem is not that the vectors cannot be bound, but just that the vectors are individual. I can abstract to the point where all individual concepts containing convenience can be bound, but in doing so, I bind a lot of non-related concepts alongside it. I can bind the vectors I am aware of individual, but that rune would only function for myself.

In short, I can bind them, but to do so would not be convenient.

Eternal Hoodlums

Warning: My apologies in advance. Unlike my usual musings, this is deliberately written to conceal the identities of those involved. My reasons are my own.

I lunched today with some old friends, Alchemist, Morningblade and Strider. I've lunched with them individually over the course of the year I was back, of course, but it's literally been decades since I've lunched with all of them at once.

Lunch conversation was surprisingly light on reminiscing, given that this was the group I've learnt virtually all of my knowledge of the mystical arts from. As Alchemist puts it, individually, we are already quite scary, but we also taught tricks to one another.

Among us, Alchemist is the master transmuter. He is entirely gifted in most forms of the Craft, but chief among his gifts are divination, synthesis and transformation. His skill in the transformation of other people's gifts to unexpected forms and functions is especially noteworthy.

Morningblade is a master enchanter. His skills lie in the art of beguilement, deception, illusion and truth. It sounds entirely contradictory until one understands that only through the mastery of truth for truth's sake can one start mastering his art. Like me, he too is a swordsman. Though I've often criticised his chosen sword form for the lack of dimension, the fact remains that he was once my teacher in the arts of the blade.

Strider, my brother, is a master nullifier and numeromancer. His art is to find truth through complex linear forms. Through such forms he is also able to resist, nullify, and curiously enough, enable through the nullification of nullification. Though we are blood, the directions our Craft has taken is completely different. Strider possesses the most curious ability to work his Craft without noise or motion, something I've never been able to master.

I am the master evoker and runesmith. My truth is intuitive, direct and often without form, and needs to be bound with the use of symbols. The effects of my truth often deal in extreme high or low energy states in geometric (not necessarily Euclidian) shapes. Mine is the power to impart, alter or cease motion vectors.

Four forms, but always one truth. How I missed them.

Closing a Chapter

I've often wondered what the phrase "closing a chapter" actually means, in the context of life.

Unlike the pages of a storybook, life isn't sorted into neat little bundles of narrative, where events happen sequentially. Unlike prose, there is no discernible main plot and subplot to life, no protagonists, no antagonists, no foreshadowing, no metaphor beyond what the interpreter of life chooses to impose.

Where does that leave Pan Narren's, the storytelling ape?

I'm glad my friend has sorted out his issues. It's been such a long time. To be frank, I don't even miss the money anymore, because I've long since given up hope on it. I'm just glad that he's sorted himself out.

I wonder now, as I've wondered a lot in the past year, whether the money would have honestly made a difference. I don't know, but the speculation drives me fretful. I still wonder to this day, if I was able to make a difference, would I have made that different choice? Would I have avoided the pain, knowing that doing so I would give up the wonderful life I have now?

Life isn't a narrative. I can't flip the pages back, because I don't have any pages to flip back. I can't look forward and skip to the ending. All I can do is to live my life as best as I can.

In that sense at least, perhaps I can "close" this "chapter" with some dignity. Best wishes, old friend, and know that you mean a lot to me still.

Everything I Know about Leadership....

.....I learnt from Optimus Prime. Old School man, Old School.

If Prosperity is so Important....

...why not go the whole hog?

I think I've been reading too many "Freakonomics" and "The Undercover Economist" type books recently. The latest in the series is "More Sex is Better Sex" where the author proposes certain improvements to our justice system. In the appendix of the book, he notes that David Friedman makes an even more radical proposal - that there should be many competing "microsystems" of justice as possible, with individuals subscribing to whichever justice system they prefer.

I say we go one step further.

If economic prosperity, minister performance and politics are so intertwined, I say we go the whole hog and allow a plutocracy in the truest sense of the word. Some points are:

1. Everyone casts a DOLLAR vote for the candidate they want in power. Top 84 nominees takes all.
2. All monies will be paid to a central depository. Electors can deposit cash any time they wish. Elections are triggered whenever the pot hits 10 million, and electors have 1 month where they can deposit monies from the day the pot hits 10 million.
   
3. The winners of the vote has to fork out the cash. This cash goes to the people who have voted, equal to the amount they were willing to fork out.
4. The excess in the pot goes to the lowest, I dunno, 10th percentile in terms of income.
5. NONE of the money involved in this transaction will be taxable. Ever.
   
6. MP's and Ministers get no cash pay. Instead, they get a basket of properties reflecting the overall economic prosperity of the country.
   
7. Anyone becoming an MP and Minister must disclose all financial interests for the period they remain as MP's.

I sounds incredibly chaotic, but there's an elegance to what I'm proposing. What the system essentially does is to turn government over to the highest bidder. If no one likes the government, they can always be overthrown when the pot hits 10 million - which is a really small sum.

To maintain power, one must always be leeched of money to the lowest 10%, which will eventually accumulate enough to vote credibly as a collective body. Furthermore, to maintain power, one cannot just please the ultra-rich, cos a sufficiently big pool of middle class people will be sufficient to trigger an election.

The idea here is that you don't derive ANY benefit from being in government apart from your ability to make the economy grow. In short, you -will- be putting your money where your mouth is. If you can make the economy grow bigger than the money you've forked out, congrats - you've enriched yourself and everyone else in the process. If you can't, someone else will raise the 10 mil and overthrow you.

So, what do you think?

Hierakonpolis

Home of history's first recorded zombie attack.

Armour Upgrade

This is the latest iteration of my armour. I've dropped the coif, and added a gorget and spaulders to the mix. In addition, I'm now wearing knee cops (not shown in this picture), and will be adding elbow cops, a breastplate and possibly a helm, and my kit will be complete.

I've originally aimed for a Milanese style kit, but my kit is starting to look more Early Gothic Transitional, which is just as well.









The rest of the demo team has obtained upgrades too. Here my knee cops are visible.





Tome and I are still primary sparring partners, even in demos. Tome prefers staying at a distance while I prefer going up close and punching/grappling. It's still a toss up whose style will eventually dominate. Here, the ending is scripted - it casts no aspersions on Tome's ability as a fighter, the pesky dance-around-er. :)



The boys with some well-deserved R&R after the demo.

Quote of the Day II

Scene: Greg briefs us for our latest demo. Most of us are clad in chainmail, some with bits of plate reinforcing vital points. One of my sword buddies, Uncle Chio, in particular has only recently started wearing chainmail regularly despite being a senior student.

Greg: Okay, Tome and KC will be doing 2nd and 3rd drill, Page and Josh will be doing 4th and 5th drill. The rest of you will stand around and look pretty. I know it's hard, but try.

-cue cheering, the loudest from Chio-

Greg: Oh wait, Uncle Chio will be reserve for 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th drill.

Me: -turning to Chio- Well, I guess it's true then. Chainmail doesn't stop arrows.

Malaysian Judicial Corruption

I stumbled across this in the course of my work.




For the benefit of those of you who do not know who Ahmad Fairuz is, he is the Chief Justice of Malaysia. This tape allegedly reveals a top Malaysian lawyer, VK Lingham, brokering judicial appointments in the Malaysian Judiciary.

What makes this potentially more inflammatory is that the person who released this video is none other than Anwar Ibrahim, former Deputy Primer Minister and member of Justice Party (Kelidan). Here, he writes an heated critique of the Malaysian judiciary on the Wall Street Journal.

Former Lord President of the Federal Malaysian Courts (as the Chief Justice was then known) and the 9th Yang-di Pertuan Agong Sultan Azlan Muhibbuddin Shah has given a scathing critique of the Malaysian judiciary during the 14th Malaysian Bar Conference - an event poorly attended by Malaysian judges.

On September 26, 2007, 2000 Malaysian lawyers marched to the Prime Minister's Office in Putrajaya. Labelled the "Walk for Justice", their demands were clear - remove Ahmad Fairuz as Chief Justice.



Today, the New Straits Times has reported that Chief Justice Ahmad Fairuz' term has lapsed, and it is unclear at to whether his term has been renewed by the Yang di Pertuan Agong.

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The reason I write about this is threefold.

The first is to give recognition to the forces of globalisation - what happens to our nearest neighbour will undoubtably affect us. I have am dealing with a number of pending cases in Malaysia myself and news like this shakes my confidence that these matters will be handled fairly.

The second is a follow-on from the 377A fallout. While I am deeply disappointed with the failed attempt to repeal 377A, I am at least glad that there is some indication of listening in the Singapore government - much more so than the lack of response regarding the alleged corruption of the Chief Justice of Malaysia. In retrospect I suspect things could be a lot lot worse in Singapore, and for that, I am grateful.

The third is a cautionary tale concerning mixing religion with politics and justice. The former Chief Justice Abdul Fairuz is one of the judges rejecting Lina Joy's appeal to convert from Islam to Christianity. I note with a sense of irony the obvious parallels between this and 377A. To me, sauce for the gander is also sauce for the goose. What of the right to use a condom? How far away are we truly from echoing Lina Joy ruling?

*****

As a final word - I'd prefer for this post not to be seen as a post in support of the failed 377A repeal, but of a timeline for a series of events that is happening very close to our shores. I intend for this post to raise more questions than answers, to discomfort more than to soothe. I see this as the only way we will learn to ask difficult questions about ourselves and state of affairs.

Jetsetting

Jakarta last thursday, KL on Monday and Tuesday, Bangalore probably next week. Have fun guys.

Shameless Emotional Manipulation II

Roy's brother: Wanna play blocks with me?

Roy: More than anything.

Retrospective is a trick of perspective. I've made mistakes. Some of them still haunt me today, taking me by surprise in unexpected moments. Caught in these recollections, I cannot help but to look at my past with the perspective of who I am today; stronger, wiser, more mature.

Knowing this helps little. I view the past wondering what I should have done, could have done, but not realising that those events are the very ones that made me stronger, wiser and more mature.

I believe in the afterlife. Having made the mistakes I have, I am unsure whether I will have an afterlife like Roy's despite having tried very hard. Nevertheless I get my choice of afterlife, the one I want is Roy's.

An afterlife where all will be forgiven.

Discovery

What happens when you discover that all the trials you have faced are just lessons to prepare you for the ones ahead? That all the pain and suffering you went through was for a reason, where you have one more chance ahead to turn all your failure and heartache into something magical, something wonderful - if you can face down the trials ahead.

Do you take the road of safety? Or once more head down the path of peril?

I know my answer already.

No regrets.

Motto of the Day

"People forget how crucial it is to keep trying, even if they screw up now and then. They figure that if they can't manage it perfectly every second then they should pick some other alignment because it'll be easier. But it's the struggle that matters."

Moral lessons from a comic book with stick figures. Wow.