Lament by Qu Yuan

LiSao   Lament   

Lament

By Qu Yuan

Before old age o'ertake thee on thy way,
Life still is young; to profit turn thy day.
Spring is but brief, when cuckoos start to sing,
And flowers will fade that once did spread and spring."

A musing

The power of the living dead

Goodbye and the right to be forgotten

If life is a dream ,the death is an awakening isn't it?

The power of the dead on the living has seen us  preserving past monks to state leaders in living corpse that don't decompose according to the laws of nature.

After their death ,the present uses the past to reenact the dead because of their usefulness to remind the present -don't forget the past contributions.Why not judge the present by what they do in the here and now and let sleeping dogs lie.

This fetish  for the living dead dishonours them for they wouldn't let the present change as they are still in the grips of the dead.

If we don't preserve their actual bodies,them we carve and erect statues of them to make sure they are not forgotten.Only humans would do that-for animals accept death as a part of life and let go of the dead to return to ashes and dust. Humans are so a musing..

Is vice a form of neurological affliction?

After knowing the neurological basis of addictions,how would big businesses love to get a grip on the findings to make us into addicts of goods and services.

When retail therapy keeps businesses roaring,what else are we so compulsively obsessed with?
Of course to get a shopper's high is not the lesser of two evils compared to gambling or drinking,nevertheless burning a hole in our pockets and sinking into debt fuelled shopaholism destroys one's credit-worthiness but looking at how tourism spending in Asean seems to hit on such addictions like sex tourism,shopping tourism or gambling tourism,there is a mountain of wealth to be made from addictions to vices.What causes people to be addicted to virtual reality like compulsive online activities to overeating on fatty and sweet food to risk taking behaviours surely stem from some neurotic disorders or psycho /mental disorders.Sin is more profitable than virtue.

The bonds of time

How does a family break up?


The story started with grandpa Chan who worked in a rice importing shop at Petaling Street.He had a stern face but was hardworking.According to mom ,they had a quiet life after retirement but their love diminished into a cold war when he had psoriasis and felt she was reluctant to help him dress his sores.Two strangers living under the same roof who used the grandchildren to pass messages to each other .he pored over traditional chinese herbs,brewed concoctions and used himself as a guinea pig for his poultices.The one striking memory is in his meticulous recording in chinese writing of the acupuncture points of the human body and the other of his wonderful green fingers in which he poured his heart into growing vivid dahlias,zinnias,gladiloli,japanese roses and even delphinium in the small patch of land in front of the shophouse in which half was occupied by  Merlin photos and the other half was our tailor shop.Grandma the matriach was a food connoiseur who lovingly made niengao,fried peanut puffs and all the New Year delicacies.I kept the grinding stone mill in my home as a momento of the rice flour she ground to steam the nian gao.I inherited the love of plants and greenery from my grandpa's deep abiding passion in flowering plants.
    Mom was frugal and my earliest memory was of  her sewing our swimming costumes and buying pink organza to sew our Chinese New Year dresses.How Hardworking their generation was as the shop only closed on Sunday when all the cousins,aunts and uncles would gather at our shophouse and everyone pitched in to cook a feast ,the coconut pancakes,the hairy gourd pancakes sprinkled with dried prawns and waxed sausage bits.They devoted their time and energy to the children and immediate family -the homecooked nasi lemak and barbeque at  Templer's park and Port Dickson or when mom saved her money to takes us to see Disney on ice or a Chinese acrobatic show.
     Every New Year ,she went to yap Ah Loy's temple the Sze Ya temple at Petaling Street to ask for blessings for the New Year.Dad was the gung ho guyb  who loved fishing,the outdoors swimming and hunting and a deep passion for eating.Now one's ashes are scatttered at sea and the other
s ashes at the Kwangtung temple cemetery.The extended family on both sides are unhappy with us for breaking them apart in death.

Jia Bian

The novel by Ba Jin strikes a chord in my heart now that the family has fallen apart ,driven by the potent divisive forces of both religion and money.

Ba Jin 's novel on the disintegration of a family in the early 20th century reminds me of that trip to Anren old town in Sichuan which coincidentally was the birthplace of Ba Jin. It would be wonderful if a drama version of the Family could be reenacted in Anren as it has the aura of nostalgia ,old world grandeur and a certain charm of that era when individual's destiny was dictated by filial piety .Influences of the West clashed with traditional values but come to think of it,those Confucian values were wiped out during the Cultural revolution which pitted the Red guards of the youths against the traditional values of filial piety .

the rains

It's been raining tropical thunderstorms every evening.My favourite time when the air is fresh and free of haze except for the infamous traffic crawl and flooding.Couldn't life be just simple with my plants growing well in the wet weather and me curled up viewing indie movies and reading "The girl who kicked the hornet's nest."I've  just finished reading "radio Shangri La" and an autobiography of a Tibetan activist.A slow life at snail pace that's all I ask and I would love to retreat to the rural countryside of Kalumpang or Frasers where I can garden to my heart's delight and write a novella.A simple ,quiet life far from the maddening crowd.
Bliss.


I've just viewed two director's indie movie that  has been enriched by cross cultural adaptations of cinematography and style of narration."The Lunchbox" an indie movie by Ritesh batra starring Irrfan Khan  and Nirmat Kaur was a rom comedy with a streak of realim of people living lives of quiet desperation-women trapped in loneliness of loveless marriages or elderly women fulfilling their marital duties after that spark of love has vanished .I like the particularly  local context of the dabawalla system ,the way Indian life revolves around the paneer and roti and that love is  expressed not so much in words as in deeds.The heart wrenching scene is very eloquently still and quiet when the main character Saajan looks longingly at the warm scene of a family with children and parents enjoying a scrumptious dinner.Unlike Bollywood movies that go for a song and a dance too long and the archetypal gangster and in law,this movie is realistically directed.Despite the difference in culture ,the emotions and scenario are universal themes.It reminded one of the miscommunication in the Hollywood movies of You've got mail or Sleepless in Seattle.I'm so looking forward to his next movie 'The sense of an Ending" which I've just read.

The other movie by a Taiwanese director called the Assassin was so different from the usual flying swordsfighter martial genre.Again I 'm impressed by the Western style of cinematography of black and white versus the stunning landscape .The emotion is muted and understated instead of the usual melodramatic plot,the sense of betrayal and conflicted emotions between love and duty resonates throughout.It reminds me of Terence Mallick "The tree" in terms of using the setting to showcase what is not openly expressed between the characters.

The only thing is that there are so few who can appreciate the subtle indie movies so that I could view our local indie movies by Hu yao Gang and the other on Moving house in which the practice of transporting the whole house by gotong royong is seen.Our locals win accolades abroad but is not recognised by mainstream audience cause they don't play by the rules of blockbusters.

That which all students dread-Exams

Exams aren't all that bad-it's not the be all end all of life.Now Life- that's another story that will test you again and again at the most unexpected time and place.Well, at least one good thing about exams is it's all up to you-to prepare for it or not but in  life there are some things or events which are out of your hands.

You think the HSC was hard? Try being an adult!

Date

November 3, 2015 - 9:00PM

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Alan Stokes

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Now you're on your own, we've jotted down a few handy hints to get you through life.

The strain of sitting your HSC is nothing compared to some of the things life will throw at you. Photo: Wolter Peeters

Well now, our little girl with the fishing spear in your head, that's it then. Fourteen years after we almost lost you, your Higher School Certificate is done.

Enjoy the break while you can. Because there's one little thing we forgot to mention as we mollycoddled you through, paid $200 to fix your cracked iPhone screen, made you breakfast in bed, picked up your wet towels, drove you to and from school, tried to make you be bothered, helped draw up study timetables which you ignored, dropped you at parties, bought you formal dresses and shoes, transferred cash for your takeaways while we slaved at home making you dinner, ironed those rotten pleated skirts and picked up your dirty make-up wipes. And did we charge you for the free psychological counselling sessions? No. Not that you ever listened to us.

But here's that one little thing we didn't mention.

If you think the HSC was hard: try adulthood.

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Just in case you find that daunting, we've jotted down a few handy hints:

Forgive early and forgive often. Everyone makes a mistake or two hundred. Think about the teenager who's walking along with his five-pronged fishing spear, unsheathed, through the crowd of kids next to the swimming pool at Palm Beach. So the spear pierces your skull. You are three years old. You are going to die. They fly you to hospital. In our minds we make funeral plans. Then ... voila! The X-ray shows the prongs missed your brain by 3 millimetres. You have to make allowances for stupid actions like that teenager's. We chose not to pursue charges against him. We hope you are old enough now to understand why. If there's a pattern of stupid behaviour, of course, all bets are off. Don't take crap from nasty people who refuse to admit or learn from their mistakes.

If someone hits you, they don't like you. And guess what? They certainly don't love you. No excuses. No second chances. No "I have to stay for the sake of the kids". Find help and walk away. Watch out for the danger signs among your friends, too.

Judge others as you would want to be judged. Imagine being blindfolded. Feel the face of the person opposite you. Ask them questions about their life and what they feel. Notice the similarities? Now name the person's skin colour. Nuff said. 

Children are why we're here. If not your children, then nieces and nephews, foster kids, adoption, school students or youngsters overseas desperate for a fair go.

Money does not matter to us. But it matters to people who don't have any. So be generous whenever you can. And that means being happy to pay tax if it means better services for those who need them.

Never think that just because you can do something everyone else should be able to as well. We're born with different skill sets and come from different backgrounds. Respect the differences.

Boredom expands to fill the space. Spend your time learning or helping others instead.

The world has a million places to see and a million people to meet. Don't die without seeing and meeting most of them.

Career choices aren't made at 18 or 21 or even 30. Have a go at as many jobs as you can – and that includes the dirtiest, smelliest ones. The odour of grease trap and septic tank will remind you that we're all the same beneath the veneer of self-importance.  

You have a talent and a passion. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to discover yours.

And above all ...

Start listening to your parents for a change. Especially the next bit: Please come home whenever you can, for as long as you can, because it's where you belong and we'll always need you here.

Such is life ...

astokes@fairfaxmedia.com.au

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