a summary of my present

Mental State: Sleepy. Content. Bored. Tempted to go out.
Physical State: Unbathed. Since 26 hours.
Stomach contents: Grapes, plums, iced coffee and homemade chicken burgers.
Song that is stuck in head: Hips Don't Lie- Shakira and Wyclef Jean
Person I'm Missing the Most: Pavs
Need: A Quickie (not with Pavs)
Financial state: Precarious.
Want to be: in Koh Samui sipping cocktails in the day and dancing feverishly in the night
Want to watch: Goya's Ghosts (not released yet)
Want to read: Swimming in the Monsoon Sea by Shyam Selvadurai (on my bedside but still reading A Million Little Pieces)
Going to: Watch Prison Break now.

grousings

Any country that holds legitimate elections between several political parties is labelled a democracy. At least that is my (layman’s) view.

But don’t you think that if all the parties involved practiced legitimate politics and enacted better policies and then held legitimate, genuine elections that would be a better definition of democracy?

Too much to ask of human nature I guess.

This somewhat lucid argument materialized in my dream. It came about in the midst of the most wonderful black-forest cake dream. I don’t know how and I don’t know why.

I’m too tired to take this post into anything more than what it actually is: an ode to my superior ability to churn out utter rubbish.

The above was written in early April and it’s already the 30^th. Time flies I tell you.

I will now proceed to trying to redeem this post and drag it to the vicinity of something that might, hopefully, be considered remotely interesting.

It never ceases to amaze me how inane Singaporean published news is. Everywhere I look there are headlines screaming out something profound like ‘8 in 10 people in Singapore have acne’ and ‘Five Dead Pigeons Found Lying at bottom of HDB.’

Even though I cringe every time I read something like this, I completely understand it. Any small country with a stable economy and a stable government will have a problem keeping a publication alive if they only published something that was actually worth reading or had some impact on people’s lives.

As usual I don’t have a point with regards to this but I just wanted to whine about Singaporean media. My real grouse is that I’m not usually a reader of the news; it has never interested me all that much so when I actually do pick up the paper I am expectant. I expect to read something that will educate me and inform me of the world out there. I also expect to see well written stories that will help me add to my vocabulary arsenal. It doesn’t happen and that is why I get so annoyed because in my personal opinion, I hate the writing style of the national newspaper. You might think I’m talking out of my ass (refrain from getting mental images, oops, too late) but this is just how I feel.

Another problem I have is that some stories are intentionally written in a way so as to wreak the public with a sense of fear. For example, if someone gets murdered in Singapore, after all the objective details are reported in the news, inevitably, a life lesson/warning will be monotonously doled out.

If a maid kills her employer, everything goes mad in Singapore. The tabloids squeeze the life out of it, Channel 5 or 8 makes a television special on it, television news executives heave a sigh of relief because now they have something to say and the government asks for some air time so that they can warn their peoples of danger invading their homes. And what’s more, all this will be said in an overly objective manner so as to showcase its remarkable ability to be fair but unfortunately for them and us, it becomes an exercise in handing down damnation and judgments on the overall and largely harmless and hardworking population of foreign maids (with explicit and specific focus on the word foreign).

What the Singapore government needs to realize is that people are quite intelligent to take away a lesson or two from something that is objectively reported in the papers. Wouldn’t it be common sense to be wary of anyone other than your family if they were living in your house? There needs to be a balance in between wanting to come across as a caring government and one that comes across as being too preachy and controlling.

Nobody wants to live in a society that is pervaded by fear. What Singapore lacks (gains) with a low rate of crime it more than makes up with the fear of being attacked, robbed, raped and murdered. In small doses, the preachy tones of the media and the government are good but if there’s too much of it, some of the joy that we get from casually walking down the street is lost.

am I in uni again?

Note: This post was written about two weeks back.

Today I woke up feeling nasty. I felt sluggish, hung over and completely out of sorts. I didn’t drink last night but I still felt like I had sandpaper stuffed down my throat and little, leaky pustules of hydrochloric acid lining my stomach. Yep, I felt nasty.

I suppose I deserve it. The body is quite remarkable when it comes to rolling with the punches but one fine day, it rebels. I’ve actually made this observation a number of times and I have notice that when the body does rebel it does so only mildly. This I think is just a warning to stop fucking around. If you choose to ignore the bodily equivalent of one of those infernal NUS friendly reminder emails you will get bitch-slapped big time.

Anyway, the past few days have been terrible. I’ve been drinking too much as usual and feeling like shit the next day. It’s not really the hangover that gets me down but it’s the depression that follows after all that illicit substance consumption. I get broody, moody and superbly needy.

The good news is that I’ve met a bunch of nice people who are absolutely wild, hence the over indulgence in my life. The crème a la crème of this bunch is a chick who goes by the name of Mihiri. My friend Shiny and I came across this specimen at Attica a few weeks back and after a rather infamous comment concerning African Americans, large endowments and graphic usage of the word vagina the ice was broken and we were getting along like a house on fire. She’s a firecracker this one. With a Jessica Alba body and a Halle Berry hairdo she really can’t help it.

Other interesting people I’ve met are two guys from India by the names of Dhruv and Pierre. I don’t know for sure, they are definitely somehow affiliated with the fashion designing industry in Delhi. Pierre’s a soft-spoken guy who is hard to understand at times but has the funniest dance moves (think female Opera singer having a coronary) and can cook amazingly well. Dhruv is a bit complicated. He’s very sweet and can make you feel at ease almost immediately but doesn’t give away too much about himself. Sometimes that kind of quality makes one come across as less than genuine but who knows and more importantly who cares anyway? Both Dhruv and Pierre are safely back in India now and I hope we will meet again one day.

And then there was Tara. She’s quite fabulous and is also from Delhi. She’s doing her Bachelor’s in Political Science and South Asian studies at the National University of Singapore. My friend Nadeeka did the same degree and hates clubbing with a passion (sorry Nads, but its true) but the situation is completely the opposite with this girl. She takes the term ‘partying till the wee hours’ quite literally I tell you! But I have a big problem: I can’t decide whether I like or love her bum. I will decide and let you know soon.

OMG. That comment was infested with innuendo but I’m all about talking figuratively.

of pregnancy and life

A friend of mine is pregnant. She is unmarried but the father is the long-term boyfriend. All of a sudden, she can’t be a kid anymore. She needs to grow up and prepare for motherhood and marriage. She can’t enjoy the new condominium her parents bought recently and life just goes on, no break, no breathing space, and no respite.

Sometimes life deals with you blows that are only ‘blows’ when they happen. Sometimes, when you really think about it, you see a whole new world opening up for you. We all hold on to the constant so persistently but yet we take it for granted. So much so that we don’t realize that the vice-like grip we had on our existing life was completely justified. Do you understand what I mean?

Anyway, when stuff like this happens to my friends, I become cautious. I try to be as boring as possible and not take risks. I procrastinate and I make two-sided lists on almost everything I do or must do. It becomes a paranoid lifestyle when it comes to a point where you think taking a swim is a fight between health and vanity.

I do think, however I have the ‘remarkable’ ability to adjust and become used to something. I am after all the king of justification. For example: my work. I go into work every morning completely energized and motivated but by mid-day I hate it. When we’re closing shop, I’m looking forward to working the next day. I know I am not getting paid as much as I should be but it’s ok, I’m an optimist and I will deal. I know my friends are probably going to go out and get better jobs when they graduate and I know that will irk me no end, but I will try to keep my feelings insulated against such pointless comparison because, in fact, I like what I do. See what I mean? Rationalization galore.

I feel for my friend because this will call for such a big upheaval of her life but I am also intensely proud and respectful of her. It is such a great thing to make such a big decision when you are only so young. I think things will really work out for her and I believe she deserves it. I pat myself on the back for being able to see the good in everything but will I really during crunch time? Am I just a spoilt brat who hasn’t really gone through anything? Who knows, but when you have a friend like this, it’s an opportunity to learn and live with your self.