Hi hi.it's been quite some time since my i aired my daily rants.a few days back i stumbled upon the little vs notebook which i scribbled down the parts in mitch albom's book which i really liked.that explains the previous few entries here.tuesdays with morrie is such a sit-by-the-fireplace-on-a-winter-night book.i greatly enjoyed it.simple wisdom :)

went for commando test earlier today.or shall i say on monday.haha it was a pretty amusing affair.no one seems to talk about the transition from civilian life to army.that presumably means everyone just gets thrown into the deep end and you learn to swim,or sink.and thats it,you just do it.or maybe i just havent bothered asking enough seniors about their army life.but i did managed to talk to siliang on sunday about commando stuff since he's in there himself.

i still cant figure out if this whole thing is a compliment or an unfortunate catastrophe.talked to commando kwok (wahahahaha!!) till damn late on sunday night about this whole thing.well it sure sucks having some 3rd party,in this case the almighty State,be the sole custodian or controller of your fate man.but i guess on smaller scale,our fate has been repetitively placed at the mercy of others' eh?makes me think of the council interviewing period.lol.

was v tired by the time i got home.took a short nap before going to parkway to meet jarren for dinner.much love forever and ever and ever :)

hmmm another week ahead and ah we are once again nearer to the prelims.someone tell me why im not mugging as hard as i should.COME BACK TO ME MY MUGGING MOJO.

oh btw i changed my number but the old one's still gonna be around for some time.motorola phones are such sexy things yo <3


and morrie says...

"That's the thing. Sometimes when you sacrifice something precious, you're not really losing it. You're merely passing it on to someone else."

morrie

Learn this from me. Holding anger is a poison. It eats you from inside. We think that hating is a weapon that attacks the person who harmed us. But hatred is a curved blade. And the harm we do, we do to ourselves.


oh boy,it's been quite a weekend.the good,the bad and the ugly.but mostly,it happens in my head.now thats the sad part.ah well!!

mitch albom

The truth was, they had not kept in touch. War could bond men like a magnet, but like a magnet it could repel them, too. The things they saw, the things they did. Sometimes, they just wanted to forget.

mitch albom

Lost love is still love, Eddie. It takes a different form, that's all. You can't see their smile or bring them food or tousle their hair or move them around a dance floor. But when those senses weaken, another heightens.

Memory.

Memory becomes your partner. You nurture it. You hold it. You dance with it.

"Life has to end," she said, "love doesn't."

we win some and lose some.no one wins all the time.aaahhhhhhh

seems like no one has it all together after all.and we all gotta learn how to prioritize.

at least i had a good lunch today (:

happy birthday to the world's most important lady in my life in a few minutes' time <3

i really shouldnt be dedicating an entry solely on this,but nonetheless i cant help my move my fingers to reflect my mental thoughts up in my head as i peruse through the sdp's amusing website.since freedom of and unfettered expression/speech/rights is what they supposedly and uncompromisingly espouse,i shall conform!!!FREE SPEECH!!WOOOHOOO LETS PRACTICE WHAT THE POLITICAL WANNABES ADVOCATE!!

the sdp should be clear of what it is.first and foremost,it is a political party.beyond dictionary definitions of what such an entity ought to be doing,lets be completely practical here.when it proclaims that this protest was a success,what quantifiable yardsticks are we talking about?it is a success because 19 of your comrades got charged in courts?it is a success because hooray,you have a youtube video that is being viewed about 200 times and now being freely publicized and discussed on a kid's blog?understand that unless your actions convince and galvanize people,it is not successful.

for an attention-deprived media personality,any publicity is good publicity.for any political party worth its salt,not all publicity is good publicity because adverse publicity translates into an undermining of your credibility and without credibility,you are only attracting to your casue the segment of society which is disenchanted,dislocated and disillusioned.in other words,the "hate votes".and for a largely affluent society which has been socialized and conditioned to the PAP rule,this surely amounts to a failing strategy for the numbers are simply not sizable enough in any contested constituency.and at the end of the day,what do we get?a SDP which perpetually does not get into parliament.

and you call these means to that end a success just because you caused some hype in the foreign media,which by the way,is certainly more caught up with reporting on events far more oppressive and in more clearer blatant disregard for human rights than the situation we have here in spore.but as we all know,the sdp is running out of options.as dr cherian george said in his book,chee must upkeep this whole veil of utter and unsurpassed repression so that his constant imprisonment and bankruptcy (not like he can get bankrupted all over again,but you get my point) will hopefully and minutely capture the fleeting attention of the international,mostly western,human rights groups and the foreign media.

and really,what exactly is the end of all this means?he has been going at it for the past decade,since his first "hunger-strike-but-i-secretly-drink-glucose" debacle back when NUS sacked him due to his misusing university funds.and to me and the majority of sporeans out there,it befuddles,and really,is beyond us how the sdp can consider their cause advancing in relation to the popular support they are receiving.against what yardsticks are they charting their supposed progress?

and if there is no progress,for goodness sake,any amateurish motivational speaker will advise you,correctly,to change course.keep doing what you doing and you keep getting the same or deteriorating results as simple economics teaches us.but alas,i have to concede,the naming of the protest,"tak boleh tahan",can arguably be passed off as being creative as you show some vague and loose connection with the Malay ground.well done on your first politically shrewd and savvy move!

i am personally intrigued by the minds of the sdp supporters.where do they see this whole enterprise going,really?do they think the conditions and grounds are fertile for their envisioned political revolution to take place through their deeds and words?do they practically think that political dramas,as seen in our neighbors up north,will replicate in spore with consequences favorable to their long-term cause and viability?it they do,i am,as aforementioned,intrigued and befuddled.

and how do they expect to get my vote when i can vote-or the majority of the electorate's vote for that matter-if we are largely befuddled and intrigued by their political antics?certainly,we are not bought over that they make a better government.it is one thing to point out mistakes and quite another to be able to correct them.observe chia li tik saying that these price increases are "ill-timed",and not "ill".there is a world of difference: being "ill-timed" price increases,it is implicit that they,though unpopular,are ultimately unavoidable.so in other words,it is a matter of "when" and not "if" that government allows prices to go up as dictated and necessitated by global market forces larger than us,the little red dot.

perhaps it isnt an exactly fitting example to look at,but look at what Msia is doing.they have gone down the slippery slope of subsidizing and now have realized the ultimate unsustainability of such a policy.and through painful empirical knowledge,they are reversing the very trend which the sdp seems to be slanting towards-artificially delaying the inevitable so that voters will be happy and peace and joy will reign supreme in this utopian land called singapore.

while it must be acknowledged that keeping voters happy is the simplest reduction of politics,a reality check cannot accommodate such a view.the reality check tells us that spore cannot go down that slippery slope and we must arduously safeguard ourselves against the "we-have-arrived" mentality,so aptly related by philip yeo in today's papers.once we start thinking the government is rich enough to do this and do that,manipulate this and manipulate that,where do the contentious lines start and stop?like the debate on ministerial pay rise,there will always be such tough and "unpopular" policy,but necessary they unfortunately are.and if political capital be spent,i say it is prudent expenditure the PAP must endure.going around subsidizing things will not be sustainable and therefore,cannot be done in a moment of mounting pressures from vociferous opposition and forgoing our long-term objectives for short-term interests.

well,siege mentality aside.in any country,rich or poor,asian or western,what we are legitimately demanding from a credible opposition is visible evidence of your governing abilities and competence.certainly not your ability to write and call for-but not act upon-high-flown,insubstantial rhetoric.wealthy in style,bankrupt in substance.how can they bode well for a spore-God forbids-under the SDP or a presumptuous PM Chee?oh the horror if that day shall ever befall us.

nonetheless,i still maintain that opposition is needed for both theoretical and practical purposes.the former because it is a latent desire of a society with a majority made up of middle-class citizens,which is what spore,having progressed and prospered under the PAP government(and not any other SDP/WP/SPP-government,by the way)has flourished into.the latter because we have to honestly admit the impossibility of having a flawless ruling party.no matter how competent and able,there is always that dark place for human failings to manifest itself slowly,insidiously and most dangerously,institutionally.there is indeed a practical need for a credible opposition to act as a "check-and-balance",to keep the ruling regime on its toes and ensure that in the parliament,there are deviant voices probing and promoting where and when it matters.

certainly,the current state of spore's opposition is far from the above ideal scenario.whatever the cause,be it internal or external,this is the current situation and what is the opposition doing to do about it?whine all day?parade all day around HDB hub hoping that by some magical and celestial alignment of the stars,the silent majority will be bought over by the vociferous minority?or keep getting into the news for unpalatable reports and hope that the votes sympathy can buy will one day outweigh the need for substance to win votes?

i wonder what is the long term plan and viability of what the sdp is doing.is it civil disobedience,as advocated and popularized in countries with a way more fractious social,economic and political climate than ours?if it is,than good luck with the political experiment,and amusement,SDP democrats.i hope the celestial alignment of the stars do occur in your lifetime.

i'll have a more normal blog entry soon.i was just feeling a bit stifled by the bull crap coming out of the sdp website and their youtube pages lah :D

oh haha wanjoo just showed me cute kids' videos on youtube and i think they are such laughters-inducing material,they ought to be shared!!so enjoy!!

monday was one of the most manly and materialistic days in my life.the former because of the rite of passage of all 18 yr old pseudo soldiers.and the latter because i bought 1 pair of shoe from zara and another from gap all within an hour?hahah positive/negative peer pressure i dunno but it was sure fun shopping at vivo after the checkup.

and it just shows that when you least expect or plan for it,things happen.i spent the whole sunday with the intention of getting shoes but the sizes just seem to elude me.when i didnt have the slightest intention to get them,i got two pairs.funny how things work.and dinner with zai bryan and george at ikea was good :)

today i ran afoul of the law and didnt go to school.but i did manage to catch up with kehui and jerlyn in town after schooling hours :) which were really my sleeping hours.hur hur.lido ftw!!

i'll finally be going back to school tomorrow.this is it man.time to buck up and mug hard because there's not much and no other time.jiayou everybody!