26th february 2007 - a flurry of thoughts

hee.. was writing a reply to gmail when a torrent of words just came out. it was about a topic i proposed, about rewriting history textbooks, and i suddenly found myself summarising my academic adventures, and i thought it would be make a proper post on its own right.

the sciences, social sciences, economics, does get more difficult, as students climb the academic ladder (provided they want to). yeah, telling students newtonian physics isn't really true, can be kinda disturbing, but i got through with things, and i study quantum mechanics, relativity, with great relish, though i can't understand them. back then, i already knew that most economic theory was just that - theory, and few things hardly ever worked in reality. but then, i got to know game theory and its applications. and as for history and social studies, i thought things were as simple as THAT, but then, reading about the cold war and everything, changed my perspectives of geopolitics.

of course, i hoped more people would understand things in greater detail, with greater nuances, but then again, most people wouldn't care about details anyway, thanks to the tribulations of everyday life, which concern us in a more pressing manner. thats why we like thought-provoking movies, because they make thinking so easier to come by. haha.

anyway, enough of personals. its just that, if history is written (just?) for the sake of nation-building propanganda, we'll see the world with tinted eyes, and look at people with (reinforced?) prejudices. like, for example, most of us, before we understood the meaning of suffering, thought nothing of the atomic bombing of hiroshima, and more controversially, nagasaki, and thus ending the pacific theatre of the world war. but now that i know more, i now really wonder if the atomic bombs were really justified. thinking like that puts things in perspective, and ultimately leads to a more informed populace. there really is no better weapon against ignorance, apathy and insanity (nazism, fascism, salafism?) than knowledge and awareness...

26th february 2007.. back at home, resting my legs, for the ultimate torture of fatigue tomorrow.

hee. tomorrow there's SOC training. and besides field camps, probably the most other tiring thing any NS person has to go through is the SOC...arrh well, that aside, i had a rather surreal and whimsical trip back home on bus 155.

but the telling of that adventure has to come after the following reflections. the conversation/argument/debate with rui qiang left me thinking, that in some sense, i have indeed grown. now that i've known more, i can expound (if i dare use the term) about the faith more. i can better demonstrate the validity of christianity against those who see otherwise. in that sense, i've grown. and all the books that i've been reading, becomes a source of ideas that i can utilise during arguments, and thats value beyond measure. so yeah. i can take today as an encouragement that i've indeed, gone forward, even a little bit, in my spiritual life.

now, the adventure that co-inspires this need to blog.

the old man was seated in front of me, at the turn of windsor hotel, as i see the old man turning his head to and fro, seemingly in great nervousness/anxiety. i presumed this man to be loss, or searching for his destination, or even doubting that he was on the right bus, of if he had missed his stop. so out of kindness, i asked him, where are you going?

he turns to me, half-outraged, half-anger, all-old man, and retorts, where are you going? i knew that it was a rhetorical question, so i didn't answer. then he continues his line of argument and goes, i just wanted to see the windsor hotel. do you know how much its changed? who are the owners? and how it will change?

i didn't answer. he then continues, in that kind of air of superiority that only age can bring, and goes, i've lived here for 70 years, and i know the comings and goings of this place. i'm a singaporean. as we are coming into circuit road, he asks me, do you know the name of the road. obviously he doesn't know english, and many more bus stops later, he tells me, because this road goes in a circuit, its called circuit road (duh...). and then he tells me this area was all kampong, of tall grass, of crickets, of green and red varieties. and then something about the transformation of the area, which i didn't quite catch, but anyway, he then asks me where i stay, and he goes on to tell me that it was all kampong and all good for catching red crickets (for fighting) and green crickets (which don't).

he's now smiling now, in a whimsical fashion, as if talking to a little boy. how, he 60 years ago, was busy catching crickets for fighting among friends. so there's an imagery now in my head, of a yellowed video, of him and some other kids with their matchboxes and fighting crickets...

i dunno... i'm kinda... pensieve, i guess, about this old man, and many more others like him. for people like him, they no longer go through physical distance, but chronological distance, because the distance, the kilometres, the miles, don't matter to him anymore, only the transformation that only time can bring matters to him. i can easily imagine him going through the reels of his own memory, and everything that happened to him... i guess its also loneliness, a reminder of youth when talking to a young person, and all the stuff about crickets. makes my heart crack (not break) for this old man.

if i were to go on, i would had shed tears, and my heart would break. i just hope he has company, wherever he is.

as i go on home, he waves at me, a child-like smile, a wave, as if i was his dear grandson or something... sigh... i guess in old age, the greatest enemies are both loneliness and purposeless, having nothing to live for, and live with...

haha.