The Splenderful Chronicles

I've Moved

2006-02-19T11:53:00.000Z

Jane Sunshine has moved folks. New chronicles here.

p/s: some features in new template made possible with the help of my friend, may. many thanks sweets.

HELP

2006-02-14T21:35:00.000Z

HELP. My entries have all merged together all of a sudden. What happened to my paragraphs? Can someone explain how can this happen and how I can sort it out?

Valentine Indeed

2006-02-13T20:37:00.000Z

Happy Valentine's Day everybody. I know its commercialised and all that brouhaha but a girl should never complain when when any excuse is a good excuse for gifts and dinner.

post coitum omnia animal triste est

2006-02-11T17:50:00.000Z

A psychologist told me this. And I cannot agree more. After lovemaking, all animals feel sad. There’s so many shades to this phrase that it is simply mindblowing. Think of a fabulous belgian chocolate. You sink your mouth in thinking that it is going to solve all your problems. It takes a few minutes to realize that at best, it was a temporal satisfaction. That my friends, is sadness.

This hole in my heart is in the shape of you, and no one else can fit it. Why would I want them to?*

2006-02-07T06:10:00.000Z

The articulateness of someone who mattered enough to grieve over is not made anodyne by death. The death of her and me. A friendship. Somewhere deep within my past is a Tina shaped hole.

This Tina shaped hole brims with all the sun-dappled joys and aches of girlhood. Starting when our spirits melted and merged in true kindred-spirit meeting moment.

And ending without a backward glance.

We were the ones who spent hours after class feeding teh tarik addiction at the mamak. Starting a few crazy fashion trends in college, beaded hair included (I’ve still got a remnant of the look tucked between the pages of my 1997 Diary). Drooling at some of those melt-in-your-mouth male varieties that sauntered around the uni square. Dreaming together under the sweltering Kuala Lumpur skyline. Philosophy, plays and poetry interspersed by giddy debates and soul searching. We were together so much that we became Tina and Jane said-in-breathless-unison to everyone else.

I don’t know when things started to crumble. First, a boyfriend, Ken who fills Tina’s space. Night and day. I am resentful that she let the friendship suffer for the boyfriend. It doesn't help that I don’t think much of him and tell her so. You deserve better that this guy I point out, perhaps a bit cruelly. Maybe she’s angry. Maybe she thinks I am jealous. I claim that I am not jealous-I am her best friend and want what’s best for her. That’s what I honestly believe. I am hurt and try talking. But something’s missing now, some intangible thing I cannot point out. Then I meet someone who opens a new world, new friends and parties included. I keep busy.

Then, just like the vision of a white tissue floating out of a train window on a blustery day, its gone. Tina and Jane said-in-breathless-unison.

Where did it go, I ask later. Today, I find out that she just had her first baby. Mentioned in the passing by a third person. That’s how far we’ve drifted away.

What ended with Tina was not just friendship but the idealism of girlhood. Next thing I knew I was out in the world and slipped into a new life, complete with job, credit card and car. The abundant college years, penniless but rich in face-crinkling laughter was light years away. We live in different continents, battling different destinies now. But how do you splinter the memories? Which one is mine, and which one is hers I wonder.

Still, I am startled by women who resemble her. Then, I remember the Tina shaped hole deep in my heart.

*Jeanette Winterson

Something about the cake and the eating and what's the point then

2006-02-04T10:26:00.000Z

I caught a rather controversial documentary on Channel 4 on Friday about why women can't have it all : the career, marriage and kids in-a-nice-package-deal. It's a myth says high flying journalist Amanda Platell. Somewhere, something gets sacrificed and no thanks to the angry feminism of the 60s and 70s, its the marriage and kids.

"Amanda embarks on a personal journey to examine the plight of the have-it-all generation of women today and, in doing so, reflects on her own life choices. She investigates whether feminism has unwittingly damaged a woman's chances of real happiness - with a husband and children - liberating them from the shackles of housewifery, but offering an unrealistic dream of being able to have it all, whenever they want it. While she acknowledges the great debt women owe to the trailblazing feminists of the 1960s and 1970s, Amanda asks whether it is the independence they granted women that has made it so hard for today's generations to settle down and have a family.

She meets some of the key thinkers on women's issues, among them feminist icon and author Fay Weldon, who was at the heart of the women's movement that transformed society. In her interview with Amanda she confesses her doubts over the achievements of feminism, suggesting it may have gone too far. Amanda investigates why equality now equates to young women behaving like men - competing with them in the workplace but also matching them drink for drink in today's ladette culture.

Amanda, herself a high-profile career-woman, believes it is a myth that women can spend their twenties relentlessly pursuing a career and their own agenda then suddenly switch tracks and try and find a life partner and dad for their kids. She tackles the taboo subject of the biological blight of delaying motherhood, speaking to the two senior doctors who were pilloried for suggesting women are damaging their chances of having children by waiting until their late 30s or even 40s. And she asks if the blame for the increasing disintegration of marriage can to some degree be laid at the feet of women who are too keen to put themselves ahead of their relationships.

She meets Minister for Women Tessa Jowell who admits that government policies can only go so far to promote the right work/life balance - ultimately women are responsible for their own life choices. In a visit to a leading girls' school, Amanda meets a class of 17 and 18-year-olds; the next generation of women, who talk about the pressures they will face in the future - juggling careers with an old-fashioned desire to settle down. Like Amanda, they believe women can't have it all and that somewhere along the line they will need to compromise aspects of their lives."

Hmmm..............

Why must we live through the whole life-business in the bloody dark? Whatever mistakes we make sighed and chalked as experience? And passed on as wisdom to the next generation. Why were we all not given life-operation manuals as we came along?

My Intellectual Mr.Big*

2006-02-02T14:13:00.000Z

*fn: C. Bradshaw, soul mate re Sex and the City.

I look for Holden Caulfield still.

Somedays, I mutter a silent prayer so as not to ever see my Catcher in the Rhye hero as a big city corporate lawyer. Anything but that I say. But what if he turned out to be an aimless loafer who bums around? Yet, something always tells me that he did hold on to his dreams and is now an impoverished writer, scribbling away feverishly in an old attic to illume humanity with hope for the young and the brave.

Yet it is with regret that I have to come to terms that I have outgrown my teenage hero. Although I never ever thought that it would come to this, Holden today has been reduced to a mere figment of my imagination, not that tangible kindred spirit with whom I had cried "freaks of the world, unite!" with. But I must tell anyone who ever wondered about life after Catcher in the Rhye this much: yes, there is a world beyond Holden Caulfield.

Franny & Zooey is a lesser known work by that wonderful J.D.Salinger but a masterpiece in its own right. People everywhere who grapple with the lost of their teenage friend Holden would be able to identify with Franny and Zooey Glass. Of course, I don't think that Salinger wrote F&Z with the intention that it should be in furtherance of the Holden Caulfield experience. There is no apparent link at all to the two. Yet somehow I feel that the impression is magnified for someone with a Catcher in the Rhye background. There seems to be answers here instead of all the mere questions propelled in Catcher.

The thing about books and friends is this. Some books, like friends, we hang on to at a certain stage in life or period of time. Sometimes, we move on and lose touch. We start again with new ones. Occasionally, we bump into the old friend and then cannot help but be imbibed in the nostalgia of the past encounter. Some however are not periodic. There is an initiation and unfolding of kindred spirits that is sealed forever, through all the stages of life. Lifelong friends and lifelong books are never easy to come by. When they do happen, if ever, they become one of those great gifts to treasure always.

Franny and Zooey has been a life-long book that has continually watched over me these growing up years. Now, that I think that I am adult enough in an adult world, F&Z still companies me with a quietude that comes from a best friend's familiarity, understanding and trust. I first read F&Z with the smugness of a 16 year old who relished in the joy of identifying like minded people. Begone, the phonies and hypocrites that populate the world at large (Maths teachers included).

Of course, at that point in time, it was also for me, more than anything else, a vehicle to be beyond the trivialities of that trash churned by Sidney Sheldon and (god forbid) Danielle Steel that gripped my classmates. There was a relish of discovering something beyond Holden Caulfield and Catcher in The Rhye and thus being able to book name drop about it with nonchalant ease, the little snob that I was (okay, okay,there are things from my past that I am not very proud of but hey, I was 16). F&Z is lesser known than Catcher and subject to some derision by critics who profess to think they know better. I will deconstruct any such detraction with a wave of my hand. Only if you take the time to read this book will you embrace the delicate nuances and pockets of tenderness that sluice the pages of the perfectly calibrated F&Z.

Little did I realise when I picked it up at a second hand bookstore many years ago that it would be the coming-of-age novel of my life. F&Z became the avatar of my young angst.

An elliptical tale of family ties, intellectual probing and spiritual questing, F&Z is Salinger's recondite exploration of the Glass family, a clan of ruptured intellectuals. Franny and Zooey are the youngest children who not only live in the shadow of their older brothers, Seymour and Buddy, but also now, as adults, have to deal with the intellectual and spiritual burden of a precocious childhood. Weaned on religion and the true path of life before being exposed to all that "fashionable lighting effects-the arts, sciences, classics, languages”, both Franny and Zooey, have at different times, felt that they are far removed from their peers who handle youth with equal degrees of bluster and levity.

F&Z can be seen as entirely 2 different novellas. For me however, it has always been one story with different viewpoints. Franny sees our first rate beauty, Franny Glass, alighting the train into the arms of the self-absorbed boyfriend Lane Coutell. Franny Glass is a study in dichotomy. Wistful and esoteric, her need to reach out to others is great but at the same time, she abhors the superficial pretentiousness of the world. The nadir of her breakdown is her inability to handle this contradiction (and with superficial boyfriend like Lane Coutell, puh leeze. You just know those artifical, arrogant types don't you? There would be many men I would meet later in life whom I would mentally file as Lane Coutell material and therefore suitably disposed).

In the second part, Zooey, a narrator appears for us. Capturing the 3 Glass family members; Franny, Zooey and their affable mother, Bessie (the rest of the family would receive sporadic mention ala “Banquo's Ghost”), the family dynamic slowly reveals significance at the end as the mystical and temporal cope together. What I like best is the way Salinger tells us the story in a most conversational way. We later learn that the narrator of the tale is the second oldest (living) brother, Buddy, writer-in-residence at a girls college. I have almost always thought of it as a film Buddy Glass captures on camcorder and then puts in writing. There is a spot of sunshine as Bloomberg the cat moves away. Another shot shows Bessie chinking faintly in her housecoat as she moves about in her large apartment. Then the camera gazes back lovingly at Franny, languishing in the living room. Somewhere in the horizon, painters are marching steadfastly from the bedroom.

F&Z has been a literary journey into my spirit. I must be quick to point that there have been many other books that have touched the very marrow of my being. Yet, there is none of the febrile passion that F&Z evoked as it grew with me. It is the book upon which I founded a portion of my identity and also shaped my literary taste.

I will tell you why.

Somedays, it is almost epiphany to read F&Z. All of you who have been depressed and wake up some mornings wishing that this hypocritical world was dead will know that this is the book for you. It companied me during dark moments of despair and heartbreak, watched over protracted anguish and lended support on ceaseless days. F&Z has and will always be my refuge from the world. I realize that the emotional translucence saved me from a heard-it-all-before sophistication that my smug 18 year-old self was dangerously perched to drown in. I was just like Franny. Her angst satisfied in me a spiritual yearning and embodied the various transmutations of the years.

"All I know is I’m losing my mind,” Franny said. I’m just sick of ego, ego, ego. My own and everybody else’s. I’m sick of everybody that wants to get somewhere, do something distinguished and all, be somebody interesting. It’s disgusting-it is, it is, it is. I don’t care what anybody says…..Maybe I am stark, staring mad and don’t know it.”

F&Z performed a most fundamental role to the insecure young woman not sure of where she fitted in such a complicated world. That my place in society was dictated by my string of A’s, articulate English and well-placed degree gripped me. Inwardly, there was a very real fear of being marginalised for not conforming to such expectations. F&Z was my cheerleader during those years of unsurety and confusion. Believe me, it took me years before I could close a door and ask myself what I thought of people instead of what they thought of me.

Then there are the days when I wonder about the state of being Zachariah Martin Glass. It is Zooey with his blue eyes, “a whole days work”, that defies me. Till date, he is hazy in my mind. I know the tenor of his voice, the wicked glint in those blue eyes, the wide shoulders, his own brand of vanity and madness. Zooey the abstruse, who oscillates between disbelief and bigotry. If only he knew that I have been in love with him for years. I exclaim silently at this strange draw I feel towards him. I too realize that my mother can actually, during moments of time, say things with such alacrity and precision, she could hit an emotional bulls eye with me. Somehow, I too either really take on to people or feel that life is better off without some at all.

“You either take to someday or you don’t. If you do, then you do all the talking and nobody can even get a word edgewise. If you don’t like somebody-which is most of the time-then you just sit around like death itself and let the person talk themselves into a hole. I’ve seen you doing it.”

Et tu, Zooey?

However, as much as striking a fundamental chord within my spirit, F&Z has at different times confounded and infuriated me. It can and has shredded my very make-up. The very nerve of F&Z is the need to find the pulse by which life is to be lived. What has happened to me is that unconsciously, I cannot just live everyday for the moment. Everything has to be linked to the grand purpose of life. I have been so busy planning my life 20 years ahead that the beauty of today is wasted on me sometimes. Some days, I accuse F&Z for fracturing me this way.

But the questions that Salinger was asking is as relevant for me today as it was my eager 18 year old self. Why do we do art? For ego gratification? To help society? To serve God? This was mystic fuel to the questions within me. Of course, Eastern gurus have been talking about all this aeons ago. The Hindus and Buddhists call it dharma. This would of course lead to the other criticism of F&Z pandering to the westerner’s fascination with all that is eastern mystic. Some may find all the highbrow spiritual leanings of the book to be a turn off. The fundamentals however, are elementary.

We can all relate to the premise that although we are basically flawed, at the end of the day, if we live in accordance to the dictates of our heart, we would have lived a good life. That’s really the simple way to happiness.

The complicated way would be to get a psychiatrist.

Some have panned it as just a bit too-smug and self-involved. It may be a bit clever at times but never pretentious. F&Z has heart but it is not always easy to find. That is why it is not on anybody's bestseller list and mostly only Salinger fans are wont to subscribe the pure unadulterated joy it resonates with.

How do you fundamentally reconcile ego-gratification: our desire for money, fame and that promotion with religion which advocates control of senses, humility and the sublime? The unabashed and ulcerous Zooey Glass says it best as he impersonates Buddy: Do it for the Fat Lady. The idea is all about living a true life and loving true loves. Whatever you choose to do, whatever the outcome of your decisions, just live. But live with all your might. After all, you’ve only got one life, so give it the best that you have. It’s that simple. The gist is condensed by Buddy Glass in a most profound and honestly written letter to his brother Zooey, the actor: “Enough. Act, Zachary Martin Glass when and where you want to, since you feel you must, but do it with all your might.”

And so, it has come to that while F&Z may have its detractors, the truth of the matter is that it is the book that has companied me over all these years of growing-up. I have yet to read the other Glass family saga for example, Raise High the Roofbeam, Carpenters, Seymour and A Perfect Day for Bananafish. But that experience will be another tale for another day.

This is my tribute to Franny and Zooey, with love and squalor.

If there was no Winter there will be no Spring to look forward to

2006-01-25T01:01:00.000Z

Work, Work, Work, Work, Work, Work, Work, Work. Repeat till the page is full.

[Inspired of course from Humbert Humbert: ‘Lolita, Lolita, Lolita, Lolita, Lolita, Lolita, Lolita, Lolita. Repeat till the page is full’.]

How come when he said it, it was so full of all breathless, visceral pain and sour-sweetness of yearning? My version sounds like the hoarse rattling of a battered old car that refuses to start?

Maybe because work weighs my shoulder down, a straggling millstone. It's got a life of its own I tell you, these drafts that I am working on. Every morning when I wake up, they would have readjusted themselves to suit strange whims.

Fancy that.

Over the weekend, 2 very different movies. Woody Allen convinced me that Luck plays a bigger role in peoples lives than they care to admit.Matchpoint had a noir-ish quality that surprisingly sucks you in. Dark passions, a very hot Scarlett Johansen and big doses of luck.

Brokeback Mountain , a haunting lyrical beauty that took my breath away. How many of us find a love that fits like a snug glove and becomes an imperceptible part of ourselves? Ennis and Jack had that.

Here's to all things Fabulous

2006-01-15T13:33:00.000Z

Over two weeks into the new year. Ah, I haven’t posted at all since.

Yes, it has been a frantic few weeks. Work took on gargantuan proportions. I have a breather now but next week its back to the grind stone. And what of 2005, that sweet-sad, chest-gripping, strange sort of feeling year? (okay, okay I stole that line from Murakami).

It whizzed past without a backward glance I must say. I did manage a small pocket of time to do my annual stock-take. Some highs, some lows and many days of frustrated struggle (mainly work related). I have only now gingerly opened 2006 and am planning to delve deep and hard and enjoy what the year has in store. It may throw good things and un-good but I am ready. As 30 should be.

Ah, yes. I turned 30. With quiet contentment.

We ran away from London, deep into the Welsh country for a few days. M took me for a swanky dinner, with scattered paper stars and moons on the table overlooking a bay. As we linked fingers, I watched the dark waves dance the night away. I am glad. To leave behind the madness of the 20s. There is of course the rose-tinted nostalgia that accompanies reminiscence of this kind. The 20s were filled with all the mayhem, anguish, delight and sheer rush of college, work, relationships and what not.

When I was 18, I sat and wrote a list of all the things that I planned to achieve by the time 30 rolled by. I opened the tattered, yellowed paper that I have been carrying all these years:

I have since done some of those things. Some I haven’t and some are plainly, no longer important. But as the sea and sky merged into a curtain of inky peacefulness, I knew that there is much to celebrate.

So much to be thankful for. Companied with all the love and good wishes of family and friends. Who are with me in love, play and work. Cheering me, de-stressing me, being goofy with me and loving me despite.

So much to look forward to. Some travel awaits, some get-aways, meeting new people and the many parties to be had in our love-filled new home.

So much to learn. From the books that gleam wickedly on the library shelves. From the experiences of yore. From the wisdom of my parents. From friends. New things about M that I keep discovering (for example I just found out that he knows the lyrics to really random songs).

So much to cherish. The past that colours the present. Once upon a time foibles. Halcyon girlhood. The choices I made (or maybe think I did) sum up what I am today.

So much to give. To send lots of sunshine to friends and family.To share knowledge with my students, to exchange ideas and thoughts.

One thing to pray for (that’s my secret).

I can sense it in my bones that the 30s are going to be fabulous.

So, here’s to 30 and Possibilities. Blessings of great magnitude. Swirls of grace and beauty. The goodness of people. The kindness of thoughts. The joy of oneness. Here’s to shimmering dreams unfurling, showers of joy, laughter and magic, pure and simple.

It’s going be great. Fabulous 30.

Remembrance Week

2005-12-25T06:07:00.000Z

From World Wide Help
"Last year, on the 26th December, an earthquake, and then a tsunami, killed, wounded, or impoverished hundreds of thousands of people in South Asia.

During the course of the year, other disasters took their toll too. Most devastating of them: Hurricanes Katrina and Rita on the South-East coast of the USA; and another enormous earthquake near Pakistan's border with India.

These disasters took their immediate toll, and, each time, the world tried to help. But as calamity piled upon calamity, there has been a certain amount of fatigue. Perhaps people's stock of goodwill has run low. Perhaps seeing too much suffering hardens us.

But, the fact is, the suffering from those disasters has not ceased. Parts of South Asia have still not recovered from December 26th, 2005. In the USA, normalcy hasn't returned to New Orleans. In Pakistan, thousands are still homeless, and may not survive the harsh Himalayan winter.

They need your help.

Last December and this January, the online community came together as never before to help in the aid efforts in South-East Asia. The lessons learned there were put to use, and improved upon, when the other tragic events of the year unfolded.

Can we harness that goodwill, that togetherness, that willingness to help once more? "
Here's a list of donation agencies that are still working on these projects:

Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC)

British Red Cross

Doctors Without Borders

Oxfam Earthquake and Floods Appeal

XXXXX

I'm spending the day with some of my favourite people. On boxing day, we will be lighting a single candle-in remembrance.

Warmest Wishes

2005-12-24T14:30:00.000Z

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and Happy New Year everybody. In a way, I am glad that the year is coming to an end. Enough calamities, suffering and pain for one year, I must say. May 2006 bring us all a happier and more peaceful world.

2006, can you please slow down?

2005-12-23T01:53:00.000Z

Aiks. Why can't 2006 slow down a wee bit? It's already faintly grazing my neck and I am not ready at all. I have so much to finish work-wise that I haven't had time to sit and do my annual 'the year in retrospect' thingy which is accompanied by loads of 'notes to self' and stuff. This is making me feel very edgy.

Hold on for a bit will you, 2006.

Bah, Humbug!

2005-12-21T11:57:00.000Z

Plan I am so NOT going to Oxford Street for some store-induced Christmas spirit. No way. I have a tree up in the living room and that's that. I am going to stay at home and do work. Yes. You heard me right. I have a great trip planned mid-Jan. So, I need to get cracking NOW in order to enjoy my trip.

Reality So, there I was- not planning to get into any of the year end festivities at all. Unfortunately, everybody ELSE is making plans and the phone keeps ringing.

The devil of consumerism comes-a-calling and I have succumbed. I am going away for the weekend with friends who for all intent and purpose are going to attack the boxing-day sale with great gusto.

If glee and guilt can mix, I have one heady cocktail in my hand now.

10 Things You Didn’t Know About Me

2005-12-12T15:44:00.000Z

1. I should be doing my work but am more content to stare at the window and day-dream away. I am dreaming of waves crashing gently on a white-sand beach where I am reading without a care in the world with a hibiscus on my hair and Andrea Bocelli streaming in the background.

2. The only ambition I ever had since I was 10 years old was to be a lawyer (don’t ask me why, but my hunch is that it’s a middle-class parent mentality that is transferred, osmosis-like to the child ie myself). But I am not a practising one now, even though I have spent a great amount of time in law school. Whatever decisions that I have made in life, I am certainly quite glad about this one.

3. I am going to adopt a child in Africa in the New Year but M doesn’t know this yet. I want a little girl, who would benefit from a monthly stipend (It would be money I would spend on something random as in No.4 below anyway, and if it is going to make a small little difference in a child’s life, I will be very, very happy).

4. I have paid 40 quid in library fines (in 1 week) and I am not planning to tell M.

5. I felt really sad when Brenda was voted out of X-factor last Saturday. And I think Colin Jackson is going to win Strictly Come Dancing (Hey, this two shows really require talent…okay, yeah, I watch reality TV. So WHAT?).

6. I am thinking of opening a dinky little antique shop one day.

7. I cannot sing to save my life-I was born tone deaf. When I was a child, I thought that I would never be successful because I had no talent whatsoever. Now, my definition of 'successful' has changed.

8. I was an awfully serious child.

9. I wake up in the middle of the night fearing that I am not going to finish the goddam thesis and am going to be a failure.

10. On my 18th birthday, I sat and wrote down all that I wanted to achieve in life by the time I turn 30. I still carry that list, frayed and yellowing, in my purse everyday. It’s just that I am afraid to open it now that I am going to turn 30 very, very soon.

Of Salt and Saffron

2005-12-08T22:56:00.000Z

I have been looking for a Kamila Shamsie book for aeons. So, when I finally found the acclaimed Salt and Saffron, I have been sneaking a read in between work. She is particularly appealing as a writer because she embodies a disparate voice: young, bold, woman, Muslim, Pakistani.

Salt and Safron has good moments. The legendary Mariam Apa (Aunty Mariam ) and her mouth watering orders to the cook are definitely highlights. The whole story centers around a woman’s search for a sense of self and love. The central character hails from an upper class family, leaves Karachi to study in London but has her heart in Pakistan. It is in London that she meets the handsome poor student from the other side of her hometown, who is salt, common, to her rarified saffron.

Yet. The search for self and all that is just a bit too pat. And all that talk about food throughout the book gave me indigestion.

Why is it that when I read books displaying Muslim women's voice, I generally come out disappointed? I feel as if something is missing. Like being invited into a house with no windows. A stifling house that encloses with too much clutter. I am being told too many things. And at the end of the day, nothing. I had the same feeling when I turned to the last page of Ahdaf Soueif's In the Eye of the Sun and Monica Ali's Brick Lane. Disappointment.

Perhaps, I should try the highly recommended Sara Suleri’s Meatless Days instead. Anybody can suggest a book that carries a Muslim woman's voice with greater sensitivity?

Revealation

2005-12-08T22:43:00.000Z

I didn’t realize I grew up on a diet of Marxist philosophy until I started teaching Rule of Law and Marxism.

When my fresh-faced students look at me with great earnest when the topic of Karl Marx comes up, I tell them what the syllabus says I should teach. That Marxist philosophy fundamentally opposed the concentration of power in the bourgeoisie (ruling class). The proletariat(working class) must obtain consciousness to revolt against the concentration of power in the hands of the bourgeoisie because the bourgeoisie relies on the proletariat to run his industry. Imagine, I tell them. A big fat bourgeoisie smoking a big, fat cigar behind a big, fat table. He does nothing the whole day because he squeezes the blood, sweat and tears of the Proletariat in his factory. The Proletariat must come to realize that the big, fat guy cannot survive without them and thus, revolt.

This I tell them.

What I really want to tell them is to get a B-grade Tamil/Hindi movie from the 80s which I used to watch. That’s where I learnt it all. Big factory. Bad boss. Mistreated workers. Revolt. See parallels? Plus this one has added bonus of one moustachioed hero and flimsy saried heroine. Look it up.

Oh, and I haven’t gone to Highgate to pay my tribute yet. For all his working class ideals, Marx ultimately appeals to the thinking class. I wonder what he thinks of that?

How I miss KL

2005-12-03T19:36:00.000Z

Musings in KL

Just between you and me, I must tell you
that I am no KL-ite. Home is tucked away
placidly up north. But KL is like a second
home, like your mother-in-law’s place,
a home that you marry into, something that
creeps into you with a perverse familiarity.
Like the traffic jam, the haze, Federal Highway,
the mamak stall near Sogo, the cacaphonic rush
of the lunch time crowd.

So, what right do I have to talk about KL?
Come onlah, people are all here to make a
living. I am one of the crowd.

If KL was a woman, she will be a whore.
A classy one at that. I am just the average
Malaysian, one of the clients she services.
I must say that she solicits with a randy
suggestiveness-all those palm fronds and
light strobes for this paradisical, touristy feel.
Just the way the orang puteh like it.

Looks very nice on the postcard, this
two dimensional cut-out. Then again,
the ringgit rolls in, so who is to say anything?

She has over the years taken to embellish
herself with these towering monstrosities.
Her crowning glory of course is that Twin Towers
which stick out like giant phalluses with a
self-righteous kiasu smirk. I must tell you that
it is all show and not much performance.
A lot of bluff really.

After all, she is not that nubile nymphet anymore.
There are lines under her eyes and the breasts are sagging.
That is why the need for this coarse touch-up:
to proffer this exotic, pseudo-rustic face.
Or else, she is wont to lose her clients.
But then again, these are modern times and
this is your archetypical modern woman. If you
want an anak dara you had better balik kampung.

But take heart.
I will share a secret. She really is
a very beautiful woman, inside and out.
After all she did not ask to look like this.
This was a fate thrust onto her by
those who Know Best.

Give her time.
As sweet and true as first kiss,
you will realise that the raunchy
side has a heart.

Most of all be patient.
Take time to journey into the marrow of her spirit.
Learn to understand her mood and colours.
Unravel that volatile chameleon, denude her off
that cosmetic face. Traverse into her and she will
take you into her folds.

And there, you will see a coy mistress. Quite
unsure of herself. Trembling and aching for an
honest lover. She will give you her soul with
so much trust, you can weep, man.
She will share with you hopes, dreams, fears.
Success and failures.
Laughter and tears.

Then.
Then you will want the whore
for a wife.To grow old and grey with.

I wish that she (and all women) came with an instruction
manual.

But maybe, you will find her amidst
the throng of humanity in Jalan Ampang,
jasmine garlands in Little India,
the crisp vigour of growth in Kampung Baru,
the strain of bargain in Petaling Street,
the deep rumble of the LRT,
the balik kampung exodus.

(c)Jane Sunshine (2001)

Oh Life

2005-11-29T11:00:00.000Z

To: Prof Vacation [vacate@never.here.ac.uk]
From: Hopeless inadequate useless bag of rubbish [self_pity@here.now.ac.uk]
Subject: Bleeeeeaaaah!

Dear Prof,

Boooooohoooooo, snivel, snivel, bleeeeaaaaaah...

/END MESSAGE

Source: Richard Butterworth, who did a Phd and did not go mad. Currently, my inspiration. I need to stay sane. Arrrrrrrggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

Season of Mists and Mellow Fruitfulness

2005-11-22T04:42:00.000Z

Sprawling Autumn is a golden swirl of falling yellow leaves and sombre nights. The beauty is one of sublime grace, a generous benediction. Crisp mornings bring along a misty golden dream, unfurled amidst carpets of crinkled leaves. The retreating flowers colour-away and fade amidst the spreading gold.

It is an apt season for me as I become more resilient and focused. Life is simple really. After all, which is the reality, which is the waking dream? The mellow gold season brings with it resignation and acceptance. Yes, it is laced with melancholia and sewn with deep, deep pain but such things are best tucked into cavernous recesses and never brought again. It is bearable in hapless Summer but Autumn demands resolve and strength of steel.

This I will give Autumn.

Out, Damned Spot!

2005-11-18T12:35:00.000Z

The milk of human kindness hath runneth dry. I cannot say one kind word about an unfortunate production. The BBC has been reinterpreting Shakespeare with the finesse of a strutting buffalo. Yes, clumsy, meandering and grey. The idea is to transfer Shakespeare comedies and tragedies into modern settings. As a result, on Monday, I watched the most passionless Macbeth of my life. The 21st century Macbeth is a chef in the restaurant of Duncan Docherty. It was really painful to see a wispy Macbeth wielding a kitchen knife alongside a screechy (Lady) Macbeth, forgettable Macduff and the rest. Duncan was the only character which stayed true-benign, sweet and wronged but it just wasn’t enough.

I don’t even want to talk about last week’s Much Ado About Nothing, set in a newsroom, though it did have the benefit of better lead actors. Next week is The Taming of the Shrew and I really would like to know how they plan to reinterpret the most chauvinistic of Shakespeare’s plays. Maybe not.

Blonde Day No.327

2005-11-16T22:45:00.000Z

This is Cruella de Ville season. Velvet is BIG this Autumn, apart from the horrendous military-look jacket, everywhere, I see coats, skirts and trousers in velvet. Black, dark blue and brown being perhaps more forgivable versions. Even aubergines and deep reds can past muster. Though the overdose is getting to me in an Addams Family House kind of way-ghoulish and dreadful. I used to not mind it. Once upon a time, I even spent a lot of money on a slinky black velvet dress for which I recieved a fair share of compliments. I have to further concede that at times, a rich black velvet skirt can look stunning. But the problem with velvet is that it also spawns Yellow, Pink and Green versions of aforementioned clothes. That’s when I want to yank the said velvet –wearer and rip it away from causing further aesthetic injury. Yank, yank, yank.

Marriage Means Being in Love for the Rest of Your Life

2005-11-13T00:31:00.000Z

My sister and her Mr.R still celebrate monthly wedding anniversaries. I laugh because I can’t recollect that time anymore: when you are still celebrating hourly, daily, weekly, monthly anniversaries. When everything is all sappy mush and there is a hallow emanating from your other half. Awww.

Where, I wonder, are the rose-tinted glasses that I had used to view M with? The same M who doesn't read me poetry, who's watching Braveheart for the 14th time this weekend, who used to open the car door for me, who thinks that the house can self-clean and whose idea of fun is watching The Simpsons.

But after a long day, it is M who will make me laugh myself silly, especially when I tend to take things too seriously (which is often). It is M who would have surprised me with a nice home-cooked dinner and hot tea afterwards. And it is M who would listen to my tirade about latest research problems or the joys of a new found friend in what is a relatively new city for me. When my limbs are weary and heart heavy, I snuggle up to him and know that all's right with the world.

Before our wedding, I had our rings engraved with 2 lines from a Browning poem. Mine says Grow Old Along with Me. His reads The Best Is Yet To Be.

The spirit of Browning’s words didn’t materialize immediately. The early days were not smooth sailing. We were both strong headed, highly opiniated and foolish. Recipe for turbulence. Further, I was so used to being by myself. I was after all, an independent KL girl. Things were all so honky dory when we were going out but suddenly, I felt claustrophic and longed to coil in my own space. I resented sharing my mind with such intimacy. I would shut away the stories I was working on. Why did I have to share everything just because we were married?

But slowly (and I mean slowly), the guarded layers peeled away. And I felt relieved to be loved despite. To be loved despite knowing the worst side there is to me, the one that is tucked away from the world and harbours demons of various guise. There was nothing else to do but to love back.

So, this one's for you, M (and to sis and her Mr.R as well).

Marriage Means Being in Love for the Rest of Your Life

Marriage is love walking hand in hand together. It's laughing with each other about silly little things, and learning to discuss big things with care and tenderness. In marriage, love is trusting each other when you're apart. It's getting over disappointments and hurts, knowing that these are present in all relationships. It is the realization that there is no one else in this world that you'd rather be with than the one you're married to. It's thinking of new things to do together; it's growing old together. Marriage is being in love for the rest of your life.

(Chris Ardis)

The Problem With Acerbic Stupidity

2005-11-12T20:29:00.000Z

Some people are so simple. They think that blogosphere is a cowboy town. They have illusions that they can say anything they want, defame anybody in particular and get away with it. Sorry to tell you the news sweetheart but you just can’t do that. Not here, not there, not even in Zanzibar. Trust me. I know defamation laws better than YOU. And I will put it simply for you, no legalese. Just don’t think you can spew falsity, with regards to ‘prominent persons’or anyone else and get away with it.

It was almost the worst Divali ever...

2005-11-08T10:01:00.000Z

...only it wasn't.

Finally, things are holding together. The clothes are in the cupboard, books are on shelves (almost), washing machine is whirring placidly and the shed is all sorted. Again, almost sorted is the apt word. Jane Sunshine has been through a mad, mad month or so. She was ill for a few days, was having extra classes, the laptop had virus, the water pipe broke and flooded her front lawn, a plumber had the nerve to tell her that it will cause 1,000 quid to sort the pipes out, it turned out to be nothing, she had learnt that plumbing and plastering are jobs that pay very well, she went into fits whenever the builders brought mud into the house on rainy days and the dust and noise became a permanent fixture.

Was it a surprise then that she was truly depressed this Deepa Raya? M went to work and she gave the builders some shop-bought murukku on Divali. The autumn chill kept her spirit frozen. She will refuse to admit it but there were a few hot, opalscent tears as well.

Then, a parcel arrived. Carrying along with it a whiff of Malaysian sunshine and warmth that thawed her heart. She melted and broke into a smile when she opened the never ending package of murukkus, chippi, omapudi and love. Lots and lots of love. Further sent by telephonic means.

All's well now. Jane is ready to conquer the world again.

So Silent for So Long...

2005-10-10T20:27:00.000+01:00

....due to all house-moving related madness. I have missed Splenderful and all my blog friends. British Telecom is being a pain. I am writing this from an internet cafe. The house is looking less like a war zone and more liveable but it's slow, slow. Hmmm...i suppose Rome wasn't built in a day.. plus these are busy days with the teaching term in full swing.

It doesn't rain. It pours.

Kak Teh and Ewok, I agree with makan plans. I am missing the times when M and I used to gallivant all the Ramadan markets around Kelana Jaya, s14 etc. Mmmmmmm...........

Ctrl+ N

2005-09-30T00:22:00.000+01:00

And thus,a new page. Mr and Mrs Jane Sunshine are moving home. Blogging will halt until things settle/broadband is sorted.

See y'all real soon.

For the Record

2005-09-28T18:50:00.000+01:00

A few days ago, a particular person left a rather toxic comment on my blog. My immediate reaction was to delete it, which I did. In retrospect, I am wondering if it was correct for me to delete the comment. After all, I have always been passionate about rights including the right to free speech. I have spent a great part of my life studying about rights and championing it. For a brief moment, I was filled with trepidation. Blogosphere after all, is a free space-surely everyone is free to go where they want and say what they want?

Yet, when a comment is plain bitchy and causes hurt, should I just leave it there?

That's the problem. The right to comment.

I am a firm believer that a right, if not corresponded with duty, would become meaningless. The fundamental rights framework that informs the world today is basically a western idea. It has little or no place for 'duties'. If however we look at eastern philosophy, duties come even before rights. Today, there is a profound realization, even in western philosophy, that rights without corresponding duties becomes an impotent idea.

Blogosphere is a whole new ball game but the basic rules should apply. While everyone is free to say anything they want, they must also be duty-bound to not incite hate/terror/unrest.

My point is that anyone is free to comment anywhere. But please, at the end of the day, it is also important to remember one's duties as a net/blog citizen.

If a person is not bothered with this, then, surely I am free to remove such a comment? I am not claiming to be some kind of net/blog police, but when something wrong happens and it is within my control, I should be able to act on it.

Further, even if we don't go into the language of duties, there is also this thing called manners. When someone is downright RUDE, I have every right to shut them up, thank you very much.

Sisters Mine

2005-09-26T09:50:00.000+01:00

September has been a month of special birthdays. Both my sisters, firm Virgos, celebrated theirs. I miss the boisterous birthdays of our childhood. The ones filled with singing, home-made cakes and noisy games. Now, each one is flung in distant cities, chasing different destinies. But the strong bond that holds us together walks along with us on every adventure. It is one that spans the lightness of girlhood and the inevitable reality of womanhood. Tinged with syrupy childhood scrapes and grown up guffaws. Holding us together during the darkest hours. Always.

The lifetime of memories.

Toothless grins. New dresses and shining eyes. Homework and pink pencils. Ponytails, ribbons and clips. Sports Day and Speech Day. Girl Guides and rope knotting. Measles. Sharing stories. Pimply teenagers. Movies, music and books. Cute boys and horrible ones. Madcap college girls. Sharing/stealing clothes, earrings and make-up. Discos, lectures and exams. Falling in love and out. Work, bosses and weekend getaways. Weddings, tears and happiness

… K & G, here’s to cherished dreams coming true this birthday and every one that follows. How I look to up you and admire you both. Each a great woman: beautiful, intelligent, warm, compassionate and full of life. I am so glad we are sisters, best friends and soul-mates.

Random

2005-09-23T18:08:00.000+01:00

There are way too many NUTS blogging. Some even make Ayah Pin sound like the most sensible person in the world in comparison. I am serious.

But it also means that I spend wayyyy too much time trawling through blogosphere.....The library is closed for stock-taking and I have nowhere to go. Get a life Jane Sunshine.

Hello Life...

2005-09-22T14:36:00.000+01:00

...I've missed you!

Been drowned in piles and piles of blearghhh theory and other boring things. Yesterday, allowed self to be indulged by doing absolutely nothing! Ambled along the high street, sat in a cafe to read and even went to the park to enjoy the honeyed sunshine.

Then, went to catch Pride and Prejudice in the evening to find the queue snaking away. Apparently, some free ticket promotion was happening plus, every woman in town wanted to watch Mr. Darcy. I would have battled the queue but M refused- going to watch the movie itself was a big deal for him, 'sappy chick-flick'), so we went home, watched some random movie on TV.

I was just happy to have not thought of any ...... theory for a whole day.

Thoughts for the Day

2005-09-10T08:45:00.000+01:00

Know that joy is rarer, more difficult and more beautiful than sadness. Once you make this all-important discovery, you must embrace joy as a moral obligation-Andre Gide

I need to hear words like this when there is so much pain and suffering around. Somehow, I am quite glad that the year is coming to an end soon. Too many calamities for one year to take.

XXXXX

Best friend Rats is in town and we are going to go places next week. Yeay.

XXXXXX

On another note, I have just discovered what I must say is one of the most articulate and interesting blogs in the Malaysian blogosphere-Beta blogger's Jalan-Jalan. Do check it out. It will challenge you. And question. But never takes itself too seriously, which is so important in Blog world. Jalan-jalan is a class above the rest. For now, however I have to be patient as I gather that Beta blogger is taking a break but will wait patiently for October.

Meme

2005-09-08T09:22:00.000+01:00

Update: I deleted this post after a few weeks because I thought that it revealed too much about the real Jane Sunshine. In fact, 2 persons actually outed the real-life Jane Sunshine from the blog id. They were former students! I became very apprehensive about the whole thing. I am however putting it up again. It is MY blog at the end of the day. The blog cannot sum my whole personality. It will always bear pieces of Sunshine, but never everything. So here it is again.

XXXX

I was memed a few days ago by dear Kak Teh . Was oh so, so busy and finally got down to it. This was real fun.

20 years ago (1985, age 9)

-I was gangly and one of the tallest girls in class.
-Had to sit right at the back in class due to height.
-Still, I wasn't good at any of the high jump/long jump events.
-Was a nerd.
-Was class monitor, prefect and was proud to be the No.1 student in class.
-Read the abdridged version of Thomas Hardy's Mayor of Casterbridge, a book I love to this date.

10 years ago (1995, age 19)

-I was accepted for a course of my choice at a uni of my choice.
-Started wearing make-up.
-This will be the last of my slim years.
-Got involved in a shallow relationship. Thank god it was brief.
-Carried everywhere J.D.Salinger's Franny and Zooey, the book of my youth and growing up angst (Still carry it today).
-Read loads of angry feminist stuff which I have now forgotten.

5 years ago (2000, age 24)

-First job, first car, first credit card.
-Soon realized that I hated first job right down to my bones.
-Life was work. Nothing else really.
-Started putting on weight.
-Didn't read for pleasure anymore. Read and drafted legal documents.
-Considered doing Masters degree.
-Receieved marriage proposal(s). Shocked. Turned them all down for various reasons.

3 years ago (2002, age 26)

-Went back to uni to do Masters and teach.
-Dropped from being highest paid amongst motley class of 2000 to lowest paid.
-But surprisingly enjoyed teaching very, very much.
-And loved long, solitary days of research. No boss hollering nearby, no office politics.
-Just me and my lovely, Kung-fu loving supervisor.
-My supervisor turned out to be one of the most gentle and kind persons in the world.
-M, my friend from yore, was becoming more and more important in life. He made me laugh. For the first time, I felt light.

Last year (2004, age 28)

-We got married the year before and had been doing the long distance thing. Me in KL, M in UK. It was supposed to be for a few months but dragged on to a whole year.
-Was 70% through the Masters and was not willing to quit at that time. But the long distance thingy was trying.
-I had been accepted at a few unis in the UK for the PhD. Besides, I got funding (yeay). The option of converting Masters to PhD however came to naught.
- So, everything worked out well, though was apprehensive of starting a whole new research project again after the massive Masters.
-Was real proud of my distinction.

This year (2005, 29).

-PhD is slow and agonizing. The thing seems to have an obdurate life of its own.
-Somedays its good, somedays its not.
-PhD supervisor turns out to be a darling. Would criticize my work to no end. But always checked if I was okay, bought me lunch and gave words of encouragement in a restrained Irishy way.
-Have a zany bunch of friends, who form PhD support group.
-Had a long break over summer for Sis No.2's wedding. Cried at wedding. Happy that she is happy but sad that we will be all so far apart. Sis No.2 moves to sunny California.
-Start this blog to fill both sis No.2 and No.3 with some of my stories.
-Meet some very interesting people in blogosphere.
-M and I will be moving to the house we purchased soon. Will fill it with lots of love if we run out of money to fill it with furniture.

Next Year (2006, 30)

-Landmark birthday. 30.
-Middle stage of PhD. Hope to cover as much ground as possible.
-Maybe fill house with some pitter-patter.
-Found a dear friend who will join me at Creative Writing class which we are going to do over spring.
-Travel a bit more.
-Lose that kilos.

Ten Years From Now (2010, 39)

-Teaching in a nice uni (but, hey, I am already doing that).
-Win Booker prize and write hit TV series ( I might as well dream big)
-Give advise on how we can improve human rights standards.
-Be super svelte (this one is beyond dream, it is fantasy).

Mississippi Crying

2005-09-05T12:28:00.000+01:00

When I was young, my mom used to tell me the story of Huckleberry Finn and his friend Tom Sawyer. I loved listening to Huck's adventures down the river Mississippi with Jim the 'Nigger'. I loved the word Mississippi. Try saying it slowly, it is such a fun word to say. The novel dwelt on many issues regarding class and slave labour. I always adored Jim, the slave who was running away from captivity. He was such a nice fella, I tell ya.

(Mom would always hush me about the nigger bit. That's a rude term Jane.
But mom, why did Mark Twain use it then?
People like Jim are African-Americans, Jane. Mark Twain wrote the book a long time ago. Things have changed now. Especially after the Civil Rights movement. Everybody is equal and free).

Today, the river Mississippi overflows with the carnage of Hurricane Katrina. The areas around are inflicted with a tragedy that I cannot believe can happen in our time. But mom, if everybody is equal and free, why are there so many Jims left behind and still suffering?

My Language Is Mine: Ya In Sing Mata Kaji and All*

2005-08-30T10:58:00.000+01:00

Merdeka greetings to Malaysians everywhere.

Selepas mendapat ilham daripada seorang kawan, saya akan berbahasa Malaysia sempena Hari Kebangsaan. Merdeka adalah suatu perkataan yang membawa pelbagai makna dan konotasi bagi setiap rakyat Malaysia. Tetapi adakah ia hanya memori suatu imej hitam putih Tuanku Abdul Rahman dari zaman yang telah lalu? Atau adakah Merdeka itu suatu hari dalam kalender untuk bercuti? Mungkinkah ia suatu hari untuk perarakan, fiesta dan ucapan dari ahli politik? Merdeka boleh membawa pelbagai makna. Ia adalah detik kelahiran suatu negara yang sekian lama digengam oleh imperialis. Ia menandakan masa untuk setiap rakyat bangkit dan membina sebuah negara. Tetapi jika Merdeka itu hanya kenangan semata-mata untuk kita semua, pengorbanan generasi yang lalu menjadi tidak bermakna.

Ini kerana Merdeka memerlukan introspektif dari setiap rakyat. Kita harus bertanya sudahkan kita mencapai kemerdekaan rohani? Sekian lama selepas Merdeka, negara kita telah mencapai pelbagai kejayaan fizikal. Pembangunan yang dialami telah menjadikan Malaysia sebuah negara yang begitu moden dalam sekelip mata. Tetapi pembangunan rohani dan jasmani menjadi suatu tanda tanya. Persoalan ini tiada kaitan dengan tahap moral. Persoalan ini adalah mengenai jiwa Malaysia. Saya takut ia sudah mula dinodai dengan wang ringgit dan kemajuan fizikal. Ini tidak salah tetapi harus ada hadnya. Pada pandangan saya, sebuah negara tanpa jiwa adalah sebuah negara yang miskin.

Di manakah seni kita? Karyawan kita? Bahasa kita? Saya masih menuggu untuk Sasterawan Malaysia yang akan menjadi pujaan dunia. Yang akan menunjukkan kepada dunia kekayaan sastera negara kita. Apabila saya mendapat tahu bahawa banyak puisi dan syair tradisional kita yang asli disimpan di muzium di United Kingdom dan bukan negara kita, saya merasa sedih. Dan marah.

XXXXX

Mengenai bahasa. Saya tidak pernah merasai bahawa bahasa Malaysia bukan bahasa saya. Apabila saya mendapat pangkat 'A' di peringkat STPM bagi BM, rakan-rakan saya semuanya hairan. Tetapi bagi saya, ini adalah reaksi yang ganjil. Mengapakah BM itu harus saya anggap sebagai bahasa asing? Adakah kerana bahasa ibunda saya lain?

Bagi saya, bahasa ini adalah bahasa saya. Ia adalah kepunyaan setiap rakyat Malaysia.

My Language is Mine.

*Any Malaysian worth his/her sambal will tell you that Ya In Sing Mata Kaji is a famous line from a movie made by the legendary filmaker, P.Ramlee. It doesnt really mean anything, really.

Razz MaTash

2005-08-27T22:07:00.000+01:00

Since there has been a bit of a buzz about The Harmony Silk Factory, I feel that I need to put in my 2 sen worth. Sure, I am glad that a Malaysian writer has reached Booker stature. The caveat is that I am just the average reader, not a professional critic. Yes, I am opiniated but don't expect anyone to agree with me.

So, is Tash Aw the token Asian/African writer in this years Booker long list?

Make no mistake. Tash Aw can write and Harmony Silk Factory is an assured debut. Set in the lush tin-rich Kinta valley, it is the story of a Chinaman called Johnny Lim, squat features, dirt-poor, Communist sympathiser but great salesman. He marries Snow Soong, the daughter of a tycoon, TK Soong. That's about the only thing that is clear I think. Nothing else is black and white. Aw explores every shade of grey in his characters. This makes an interesting, if sometimes confusing read. Yes, yes shades of Ishiguro here. I think the influence is palpable.

A good book for me is one that leaves me with a snapshot of images. And Harmony has many of that. When Johnny Lim hurts the white-guy boss at the dredging mine and the court scene subsequent with Charlie Gopalan, the local lawyer helping him out. When the broken boat drifts away slowly on the way to the Seven Maiden Islands. When Snow and Kunichika meet in the sun dappled garden. These are nice imageries.

I also like that Tash Aw never italicised colloquial words nor is there an obligatory glossary of terms of local language. I really, really think that this is the strongest point of the book. That the author wanted to tell a story, not pander to the Western reader.

The little adventures within the main adventure of honeymooning in Seven Maiden Islands made an interesting read. Though it is so strange to go on honeymoon with so many people. But how will I know, maybe people in Malaya circa 1941 did just that? I also can't help but pick out a few historical inaccuracies which the Mat Salleh reader is wont to miss. The first thing of course is the little fact that 'Malaysia' didn’t exist circa 1940. How can the book then be an account of a Malaysian Chinese family? Also, Snow’s father, TK Soong is said to have studied in University Malaya(UM). UM only existed in 1949 with the merger of King Edward V11 College of Medicine and Raffles College. How could TK Soong have gone to UM, got married and have his daughter Snow Soong go on her honeymoon in 1941?

I am also not sure about the Hang Jebat anecdote. Hange Jebat was a great warrior in the Melaka Sultanate (circa 1511). I only remember him as the sexy one who stood up to the Sultan and fought his friend, the infinitely famously Hang Tuah. Did Jebat fight the Portugese invasion of the Sultanate as alleged in the book? I am not very sure. I could be wrong on this one.

I wonder if the journey to the Seven Maiden Island a metaphor for the journey into the psyche of Johnny Lim or some other character in the book? Or the relationship of Johnny and Snow? I don't know. I suppose it is to reflect all the different layers of the characters but still don't get it. But again, I am no professional reviewer so it could be me. I also didn't like Snow Soong. I tried so hard to emphatize with the only major female character. She turned out to be vapid and devoid of any real emotion. I couldn't care less what happened to her and was hoping that the ridiculous diary of hers will get lost/stolen/destroyed. You see, the writer uses different voices to explore Johnny's character and what really happened. First, is the voice of Jasper, his son. This is told in a crisp narrative and the most engaging one. After that, Snow Soong's diaries appear. This is when I started losing focus. Then, cames the aged Peter Wormwood, friend of Johnny, with his version of the story, by which time I really couldn't care less anymore.

Then again, like I said, it could be me. Being all cranky with so much work over this bank holiday weekend.

Ha Ha Ha

2005-08-24T09:29:00.000+01:00

Fleeting Week

2005-08-21T22:06:00.000+01:00

The weekend is over.

While the sense of time (and summer) fleeting by hovered in the background, the weekend was filled with music, lazy afternoons and the rush of warm friendship. Long, languid evenings filled with stories from days long gone by and easy chatter. Good friendship is really the best form of therapy.

Monday beckons.

I know that most of you are going to hate me for saying this but I love Mondays. I love the spanking, shining possibilities of a brand new week. A week to be filled with love, laughter and work. The weekend I use as a receptacle to hold all week day stress. The best weekends are ones that are quiet. Time to unwind, have late breakfast over The Times, walk unhurriedly along the grocery aisle and basically energize for the coming week.

So come Monday, I am all ready to conquer the world.

But try talking to me on Wednesday. That's when those mid-week doldrums have seeped into every pore and I am frantically ranting about the misery of routine. And dreaming of the weekend again for time to exhale.

I tell you mate, it's Wednesday that's the problem, not Monday.

Recent Conversations

2005-08-17T10:52:00.000+01:00

Self and Guy at Department

‘I am trying to learn Spanish’.
‘That’s good’.
‘I am sure you speak a few Asian languages’.
‘Not as many as I would like to’.
‘What can you speak?’
‘Well, among others, I can speak the National Language of Malaysia’.
‘And that’s…Portuguese, right?’

Self and Former Classmate

‘Wah, I heard you study some more one, ah?’
‘Yeah’.
‘Why you not fed up study all de time?’
‘Dunno, lah’.
‘No money onelah. Work some more better, I tell you’.
‘I suppose’.
‘I tell you what. Now I open bisnes. You be my London
pardner okay or not?’

Self and Aunt

'So, when is baby coming along?’ (wriggling index finger and shaking head)
‘Ehm…ehm…’(forced smile)
‘Not good to tie up your tubes like this’ (lowers head with admoishing sounds)
‘Ehm…ehm…’(looking very interested on wallpaper)
‘When I was your age I had 2 running around’ (self-righteous nod)
‘Ehm…ehm..’ (looking very interested on cushion cover pattern)
‘You are getting too old. Where are you going to get the
the energy to run around with them?’ ( admonishing sounds)
‘Ehm…ehm…’

Loving Mangal Pandey

2005-08-14T15:31:00.000+01:00

Movie: Mangal Pandey-The Rising

Cast : Aamir Khan, Toby Stephens, Rani Mukherjee

When Indian Sepoy Mangal Pandey (Aamir Khan) asks his friend Captain William Gordan (Toby Stephens) ‘Who is the Company?’ Gordan takes a moment to think. Then he tells him, you know, from the Indian mythology, you have the evil Ravana? Well, the company is many Ravanas put together.

These are one of the many questions that gnaw Mangal Pandey, the ordinary Sepoy serving the British East India company. The Rising attempts to capture the fire that kindled the Indian Mutiny of 1857. The role played by Mangal Pandey in the Indian Mutiny is still subject to controversy among historians but in the movie, Pandey is placed as the impetus for the rising. Hence the eponymous title for the movie. It has roots in Pandey’s gradual unease with his role as a loyal soldier. Firing at innocent villagers makes him feel like a pawn in the game played by the Company. The usage of cartridges laced with beef and pig fat which the soldiers must bite to load their guns are immediate reasons that make Pandey’s Hindu sensitivities rage. But, as he later tells Gordon, it is ultimately his need to fight for his own and the country’s dignity that stirs him. The crying need to be treated as equal amongst men. It is not a matter of my life, he remarks. India is already rising.

The movie has managed to effectively capture 1857 India with great care for the set and costumes. It works especially well in showcasing the psyche of the downtrodden Indian with a sense of humour and pathos. Strong performance all round by a stellar cast. Aamir Khan doesn’t let down. He shifts from a young man forging friendship, enjoying wrestling and liquor to a restless, angry fireball with ease. Toby Stephens, playing the Company officer William Gordon who befriends Mangal also delivers his conflicted, torn-by-conscience-and-duty role brilliantly.

The movie provides a snapshot of the rapacity that drove the British East India company. Chartered in 1600, it is the progeny of the modern transnational corporation. It is also a prime example of an early corporate violator of human rights. It is staggering to imagine that a company minted its own currency, maintained its own army and exercised legal jurisdiction within the regions where it did business. The question posed by Mangal on who is the company is an important one. How can a trading company rule countries? Yet, when we think of the modern transnational companies violating the Ogoni tribe in Nigeria, running sweatshops in Cambodia and destroying the environment, one wonders who is ruling still.

Sometimes, we forget the early fight for human dignity. A movie like The Rising reminds us. I particularly liked the part where Mangal speaks up against the royal emissaries who want to join forces with the sepoys. He accuses the Indian kings of gambling away the country and how the people must now fight for the country’s honour. It will be the country of the people hence.

Rani Mukherjee's character Heera shows how women were traded like chattels, to be used and abused by the company soldiers. Her role is small but she has what can be called one of the most biting lines in the movie. When Mangal harshly dismisses her and other prostitutes and tells them to go and sell their bodies to the English soldiers, she snaps back. The prostitutes only sell their bodies but the soldiers sell their souls, she says. Mangal’s eyes wince in pain. The truth that he knows deep within is articulated for the first time.

The music by A.R.Rahman left me spellbound. I loooveedd it. Especially the meditative Mangala…Mangala…..

XXXXXX

I am also reminded of dear old Samad Miah, father of twins, husband of Alsana, friend of Archibold Jones from one of my favourite novels, Zadie Smith's White Teeth when watching the exploits of Mangal Pandey. Samad Miah, of Willesden Green, North London, had a strong conviction, nay he knew deep down, that he, Samad Miah was desecendent of Mangal Pandey. This believe, that the great Mangal Pandey's blood coursed his veins, was one of the enduring character trait that I truly like about Samad Miah.

The first time we took the tube to Willesden, I scoured the place looking for him.

Sneaky Reading

2005-08-12T10:52:00.000+01:00

I couldn't wait for Christmas. I sneaked and read The Gift of the Magi again.

The magi, as you know, were wise men--wonderfully wise men--who brought gifts to the Babe in the manger. They invented the art of giving Christmas presents. Being wise, their gifts were no doubt wise ones, possibly bearing the privilege of exchange in case of duplication. And here I have lamely related to you the uneventful chronicle of two foolish children in a flat who most unwisely sacrificed for each other the greatest treasures of their house. But in a last word to the wise of these days let it be said that of all who give gifts these two were the wisest. O all who give and receive gifts, such as they are wisest. Everywhere they are wisest. They are the magi.

Now, I am feeling all warm and fuzzy again.

Review: Raincoat

2005-08-10T16:57:00.000+01:00

Last night, M and I caught Raincoat on DVD. I know that this movie came out aeons ago to some acclaim but we missed it due to a variety of reasons. Loosely based on O’Henry’s short story, The Gift of the Magi (incidentally, a story that will warm your spirit on a cold winter day), the movie is directed with sensitivity by Rituparno Ghosh and stars Ajay Devgan and Aishwarya Rai. There's not much of anyone else in it though (M is already groaning, oh no, one of those artsy fartsy movies. I am hooked the minute the folksy background music seeps in).

Raincoat speaks of old loves, broken promises and missed chances. Calcutta (should I say Kolkatta?), shrouded in smoky rain, brings the old lovers, Manoj and Neeru, together. Manoj’s life of misfortune drags him to the bowels of the city. Hovering in the fringes of chilling reality is Neeru.

Ajay Devgan’s simpering Manoj lurches into the movie right from the first scene. The interminable rain fills the mind, unleashing imprisoned memories and eviscerating inner decay. Then, Aishwarya’s Neeru emerges from the darkness. Manoj takes in her darting, wounded eyes and aged face. The place is her crumbling home. It is musty and cluttered – a nest of cobwebbed dreams. He is a broken man, no job, no money and no immediate future. She is someone else’s wife. Meeting again after many years stirs memories and cloistered skeletons. Pride, and a convoluted sense of dignity, snakes its way. Amidst all that is left unsaid. After all, how many of us are going to be truthful about our mundane present lives when meeting an old lover? You lick your wounds, glaze your eyes and say, almost shrilly, how perfect it all is now.

Perhaps, Manoj and Neeru can never not love each other. The rain is a pivotal character in the movie, not just a landscape or metaphor. It unleashes old wounds and pries open the mistakes and regrets. Of the old love you left behind. For the deep feelings that once consumed your spirit. It is the rain that washes away both Manoj and Neeru’s rusted emotions. Rituparno Ghosh weaves a lovely study of human nature. We are selfish, stubborn and resentful of criticism. Yet, above all this, we love and are loved back. This is our gift. And tragedy.

The haunting background music lingers in the mind. It wells up within, building a crescendo of sadness and finally, releases an aching void. Utterly beautiful. Ajay Devgan has improved his craft and Manoj is the result of an actor at his prime. Manoj merges into the crowd and has no distinguishing features. The heritage of sadness weighs on him, both emotionally and physically. As he breaks down and cries in the dark bathroom, the downtrodden Manoj is shifting and pathetic.

Unfortunately, the same cannot be said of Aishwarya. She should stick to the regular masala fair. Stop deluding herself that she can carry a heavy movie like this. It would have been a much better movie if Neeru was played by a better actress.

XXXXX

Rani Mukherjee perhaps. After having watched her in Veer Zaraa and Black (which I will try to review soon, at least to gush about Amitabh Bachan), I think Rani can do no wrong.

The Story So Far

2005-08-09T23:32:00.000+01:00

It has been 10 months since I registered for the PhD. 10 months of being a full-time student.

What have I been doing? Frittering time away, secretly watching Countdown, Richard & Judy and CSI in the evenings, cooking up strange new dishes that have ended in the bin and not the plate and parking self at museums and galleries instead of desk. That's what.

It's not been easy. There have been so many nights that I have cried and told M that I want to quit. Pronto. I can't take the ordeal of looking at obscure cases reported in 1875 anymore.

Yet, on somedays, when I do stumble on an angle which I think I can take or find the most interesting literature in my area, I feel light and happy again. I remember the joys of research and why I had wanted to embark on this journey in the first place. Just think. I can make a difference in scholarship. That is such an honour.

Earlier this evening, I met the lovely H down the corridor and told her much her words have helped me on dark days. She had told us that ‘the PhD will be the most intellectually satisfying journey you will ever have’.
‘Thank you’, I tell her.
‘Thank you for giving me these words-they are my source of strength, sometimes the only reason I can think of to continue, to forge ahead’.

These are the words that have become my survival mantra.

No.5: Thou Shalt Not Covet Thy Neighbour's Book

2005-08-09T12:50:00.000+01:00

Some observations about tube travel

1. Commuting without reading material in hand often makes me feel inadequate. I always feel that the people around me are arching their eyebrow and saying 'Ah look, a bimbo'.

2. This notwithstanding, I think most commuters enjoy the moments of aloneness. I like the disconnectedness - no mobile phones when underground and people around you in their own oblivion. Long commutes are great to take stock, do emotional audits and plan the day ahead.

3. During rush hour, always stand along the aisle. So, you are the closest to the next available seat. This is a technique which a non-Londoner will never know.

4. People sitting next to me do often remark that I have a great book in hand and that they had enjoyed reading it. There is a camaraderie among the reading commuters this way.

5. My pet peeve however are those who always find other people's book/reading material more interesting. I often find the person sitting next to me peering into my book, not just checking what I am reading but actually, ehm, reading it. Now, at such a moment, I can just hope that the bloke next to me doesn't have smelly breath.

Remembering The Wonder Years

2005-08-08T07:39:00.000+01:00

I got this from Lindsey and it reminded me how much I miss my favourite TV show, The Wonder Years. For those of you who never had the chance to follow this heartwarming series, it is about the central character, the adult Kevin, reminscing his younger days in a small suburb in the States. A bittersweet tale of growing up, Kevin narrates his story with tenderness and sense of homour. The dysfunctional family, not-very-bright brother Wayne and sister Karen. The nerd best friend Paul. And the beautiful girl next door, Winnie. We watch them all change over time.

(The closing monologue to the television show, "The Wonder Years")

Once upon a time there was a girl I knew, who lived across the street.
Brown hair, brown eyes.

When she smiled, I smiled.
When she cried, I cried.

Every single thing that ever happened to me that mattered,
in some way had to do with her.

That day Winnie and I promised each other that no matter what, that
we'd always be together. It was a promise full of passion and truth and wisdom.
It was the kind of promise that can only come from the hearts of the very young

The next day Winnie and I came home. Back to where we'd started.
It was the 4th of July in that little suburban town.
Somehow though, things were different. Our past was here, but our future was somewhere else. And we both knew, sooner or later, we had to go.

It was the last July I ever spent in that town.
The next year, after graduation, I was on my way.

So was Paul. He went to Harvard, of course. Studied law.
He's still allergic to everything

As for my father, well... we patched things up.
Hey, we're family. For better or worse.
One for all... and all for one.

Karen's son was born in that September.
I gotta say, I think he looks like me. Poor kid.

Mom, she did well: business woman, board chairman,
grandmother... cooker of mashed potatoes.

The Wayner stayed on in furniture. Wood seemed to suit him.
In fact he took over the factory two years later...
when dad passed away.

Winnie left the next summer to study art history in Paris.

Still we never forgot our promise.

We wrote to each other once a week for the next eight years.

I was there to meet her, when she came home...
...with my wife and my first son, eight months old.

Like I said, things never turn out exactly the way you planned.

Growing up happens in a heartbeat.

One day you're in diapers; next day you're gone.

But the memories of childhood stay with you for the long haul.

I remember a place... a town... a house like a lot of other houses...
A yard like a lot of other yards... on a street like a lot of other streets.

And the thing is... after all these years, I still look back... with wonder.

[Fade to black]

Growing up happens in a heartbeat.

Of Shady Dealings and Victorian Spirits

2005-08-06T10:42:00.000+01:00

Sue Trinder’s fiendish escapades in Sarah Waters Fingersmith is keeping me engrossed this weekend. It has a Dickensian appeal that brings alive 19th Century London with vivid colours and shady undertones. All grimy and dark passions. Lovely.

Talking about 19th Century. M and I just found out that our flat was built in 1845 or so! Amazing. It’s one of those Victorian buildings that’s been partitioned of into smaller portions. I had of course imagined all along that the whole place was once upon a time a magnificent mansion with carriages and servants, fine ladies in elegant jewels and all the quaint Jane Austen touches. Of course, sometimes when I stay up to do my work till very late, my skin tingles with thoughts of some Victorian spirit hovering in the corner.

Happiness is A Daily Decision

2005-08-05T11:05:00.000+01:00

It is so easy to lapse into depression. To let self degenerate in a morass of self-pity and think that the whole world is crumbling. That is really the easiest thing.

It's when I see people still smiling and finding faith in their lowest hour that I truly feel a jolt in my spine. The people of Bombay city, my heart goes out to you.

XXXX

Yesterday, 6,600 policemen prowled the London tubes. It was Thursday. I wasn't sure but I thought that the carriages were emptier than usual. Eyes darted oh-so-casually to the person sitting on the next seat. Feet shuffled. When I reached Liverpool Street, for the first time, I felt my heart twist. Clenching my knuckles, a nervous habit, I sat frozen. It may have been the most irrational thing, but for a few minutes, I just thought what if.

Finally, when I reached my stop, I gasped for air, winked at the policeman and went on my way, dissolving into routine.

My Tribute to Libraries

2005-08-03T05:37:00.000+01:00

When queuing at a supermarket line, I always notice various plastic cards gleaming when people brandish their purses. Credit cards, debit cards and all other plastic tools created for ease of purchase. My purse showcases another variety of cards-library cards.

Libraries always have a calming effect on me. There is something so reverential about the rows and rows of books lining up before your eyes and stretching away. Older libraries especially have a familiar bookish smell, one that quickly fills my spirit with quiet contentment. On ceaseless, truly depressing days, those days when my heart freezes over, when even a spot of retail therapy doesn’t work, I find myself looking for a library or bookshop. You see, then I can lose myself in other people’s minds. While being gruff and monosyllabic.

I do get terribly crossed when books are not in their correct shelves. I find it very insulting to see that a book has not been categorized properly. It’s like living forever in somebody else’s house, I tell the librarian in despair. How will you feel?

Even as a child, I had an affinity for libraries. Whenever we had a free period in school, I being the geek that I was, would head of to the library to find a new read. It wasn’t a big school and the library was small. By the end of primary school, I had read most of the books there.

For many years, I couldn’t afford to buy much books. I just couldn’t go to a bookshop and pick from a choice. So, libraries became my sanctuary. There wasn’t much of anything else going on in my little town. But I knew I could change the world if I wanted to. I could become anybody I wanted when I read. With books, I truly believed that I could achieve, not just aspire, to paraphrase Oprah Winfrey.

When I was older, I dreamed of falling in love in a library. The idea of having a good looking man reach out for the same book as I was something that fuelled many youthful romantic fantasies. That happened to Latha in Vikram Seth’s A Suitable Boy. Okay, she and Kabir meet in a bookshop but that’s my second favourite place after all (Many years later, I would meet my husband in the most ordinary place but we are in every sense of the word truly happily married, our first meeting notwithstanding).

Anyone who spends a crazy amount of time looking for books in library depositories and still enjoys it must be absolutely mad. Depositories are those dingy places at basements where they store out-dated books, ones that are out of print, out of circulation and out of general interest. When I find Roland Mitchell in A.S.Byatt’s Possessions spending an inordinate time at the basement of the British Library, I truly feel his pangs of anxiety. What treasure will he discover among all the dusty tomes?

My love for libraries was always fuelled by my parents. Whenever there were birthdays or when we did well in school, my sisters and I always got book gifts. We read together and I always shared my stories with them. These are happy memories of my girl-hood. One day, I will share the books that I adored as a child with you. Soon.

Some Days are Blonde Days

2005-08-02T12:41:00.000+01:00

Shami Chakrabarthi is everywhere. The Director of civil rights NGO, Liberty, she is articulate, intelligent and an expert in anti-terror laws. She was on TV last weekend urging young, displaced British Asians to rethink their sense of displacement and assuring them that they can enter into a dialogue with the powers-that-be to initiate change.

I personally however can only think that she is so gorgeous. The thing about very intelligent women is that they always floor me when they are beautiful. And always make me wonder about the men they marry. It speaks so well for a man that an intelligent woman chose to marry him.

Now, now. This simply means that I would not have much to say about a man who chooses to marry the likes of Anna Nicole Smith.

Review: The Glass Palace

2005-08-02T12:28:00.000+01:00

I have been meaning to read The Glass Palace for a long time now. I finally managed to get hold of it and have not been disappointed. Amitav Ghosh has an acute sense of observation and facility to weave history into a story of love, life and death.

The Glass Palace is a delicately layered, sprawling saga that starts with the fall of the Burmese monarchy and ends in junta-led Myanmar. Trailing the ups and downs of 4 generations, the lush book spans from Rangoon, Madras, Ratnagiri (India), Calcutta to Malaya. The variegated lands provide a dense backdrop. It is on the shadowy main road of Mandalay that the central protagonist, Rajkumar, chances upon the beautiful Dolly as she accompanies the royals into exile. Rajkumar’s story is weaved with the tumultuous rule of the British Raj and the ensuing travails of the locals in all these places. Poignant and honest, the book contemplates the implications of the empire and questions of identity incisively.

As we follow Rajkumar, from a ragged orphan into a timber tycoon, the first generation ravaged by the expanding empire becomes the focus. The subjugation of the Burmese royals marks the beginning of the impending sense of loss, shame and displacement that will be translated to the following generations. Rajkumar symbolizes the tenacious individual, seemingly unaffected by the rapacious empire, building his wealth in oblivion. He realizes his folly at the end, with tragic circumstances.

Dolly on the other hand, cannot cope as well. The ravishing beauty retreats further and further into her shell and finally seeks solace in religion. It is the second generation however, the children of Rajkumar and Dolly as well as their friends, who turn to form the pivotal study. Amongst the colourful cacophony of characters, Ghosh chooses to develop a tale of bewildering passions. Rajkumar’s two sons, Neel and Dinu explore different destinies. Hovering amongst them is the angst and corresponding canker-infested search for a sense of self amidst countries huddling under imperial rule. Love blooms amidst the sombre days, resuscitating a sense of hope. Yet, peace is far away. They wait much longer for freedom. Fear hounds in the background and each clutch on to the other. Not really sure of the right feeling.

These themes are explored further with the Japanese occupation, particularly in Malaya. Promising an eastern brotherly hand, the Japanese turn out to be like any other power crazed pack. Death begins to smell distinct everywhere. Finally, at the end, they are free from the clutches of a ravenous empire but they find that they cannot free themselves from their inner demons. Of what they thought of themselves and what they had eventually become. It is only when they truly reach out to each other and open themselves to love that they purge the inner demons.

Ghosh's best writing may still be coming. Apparently The Hungry Tide which is a newer novel by him is better than this. I will be looking for that book soon.

Clear Light of Dawn

2005-08-01T04:40:00.000+01:00

There is something surreal about the first light of dawn. As the cavernous secrets of night lumbers away slowly, a sense of change diffuses the air. An awakening from the dark recesses. Purity saturates with promise of a new beginning. It is the hour of possibilities. Of having a bright canvas stretching, unspent and free. The spiritual communion is in perfect symmetry.

Dawn soon to be swallowed by the stirring life. Lost forever. But an eternal promise. Shining.

This is God’s true gift. A new day. To shed the past and forget. A day to live.

Oh, hello August.

If you could get rid
of yourself just once,
The secret of secrets
Would open to you.
The face of the unknown,
Hidden beyond the universe
Would appear on the
Mirror of your perception
~Rumi

Current Obsession

2005-07-27T03:48:00.000+01:00

The realization of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights are currently preoccupying me.

Hayek pronounces that political freedom is impotent without economic freedom. He explains: The economic freedom which is the prerequisite of any freedom cannot be the freedom from economic care which the socialists promise us and which can be obtained only by relieving the individual at the same time of the necessity and the power of choice; it must be freedom of our economic activity which, with the right choice, inevitably carries the risk and the responsibility of that right
Friedrich Hayek, The Road To Serfdom (reissued 1971) 75.

Meanwhile. Tick tock. The clock goes. Thursday already. I have a report due in two weeks. Tick Tock

The Missing Shalimar Mystery

2005-07-21T08:39:00.000+01:00

Have I collapsed into some literary blackhole? Has Shalimar the Clown, being awaited by self with bated breath been released? Without my realizing? Soon, somebody will be telling me that Zadie Smith's third book has been on the shelves aeons ago. *indignant pout*

On another note, yesterday's papers had something about Zadie Smith's husband up for a prestigious poetry award I am sure Nick Laird is suitably peeved. He can go on to win the Nobel prize but for all the world, the poor bloke will still be 'Zadie Smith's husband'. Every woman who has been called 'XYZ's wife' will identify squarely with Mr. Zadie Smith. My heart goes out to you mate.

Splendour In the Grass

2005-07-20T12:41:00.000+01:00

London is awake and alright. Picking up from the debris of hate. Bruised and bleeding but trudging along nevertheless. Holding steady. Chin up.

On Sunday, I took in breathtaking views from the London Eye. The city unfurled in cacophonic colours. The Thames coursed serenely, a blue ribbon around the city it celebrated. The buildings became smaller, like tiny lego blocks. Each representing a memory, of times gone by. Victorian and Edwardian beauties. The monstrosities from the 60s. And from the distance, Canary Wharf gleaming in the East Side. Immodest glass structures spiraling, as if in competition. Then, there were the patches of emerald gardens. Green lungs puncturing the recesses, like an open dark green manila folder. And what seemed to be toy cars moved languidly on a perfectly lazy Sunday.

As the summer sun encased the capsule, I could really tell that this is one of my favourite cities.

Later, afternoon tea at the Marriot Library lounge overlooking the House of Parliament. The Thames shimmered like a million diamonds. And Big Ben chimed every quarter of the hour without fail. How absolutely grand.

Though nothing can bring back the hour
Of splendor in the grass, of glory in the flower
We will grieve not, but rather find
Strength in what remains behind.
Wordsworth

Dubai on Transit

2005-07-14T12:43:00.000+01:00

On transit in Dubai. There is again the anticipation that always accompanies a journey, whether long or short. Long ones, especially leave me in deep contemplative stupors. What will this trip culminate in?

I cannot yet call London home but it is a city that has been kind to me. When I was desolate and alone, London embraced me warmly into her folds. So, I return. Fresh with images from July 7 etched in blood. To a London that is scarred.

Yet, the journey back to Malaysia also made me realize that Kuala Lumpur is ingrained deep within me. Too much perhaps. Kuala Lumpur watched me grow as young person finding her voice. Everywhere I go, I remember thoughts, ideas, successes, heartbreaks. This collective memory is merged in the sinew of my Kuala Lumpur youth.

London I think is witness to my more mature years. I am happy to turn 30 soon. I am more in control of my life, my wants and needs. There’s pain, hurt and all shades of brokenness but there is also conviction that the 30s are going to be the best years of my life.

London Blasted

2005-07-07T22:45:00.000+01:00

The death toll climbs as the horror of the blast sinks in. I didn't realise the magnitude of the tragedy until I switched on the TV. Major tube stations have been targeted.

Why? Why? Why? So senseless. So merciless.

Splenderful Magic

2005-07-06T12:50:00.000+01:00

Splendid + Wonderful= Splenderful

Isn’t it lovely how some words make you feel? Like sublime. When my tongue hits the palette for L, I already feel transported into a serene halo of benedictude. There are other such Divine words. Truth. Peace. Diaphanous. Rhythm. Dignity. Kismet. Luminous.

Simple, honest words. Joy. Shine. Kind. Song. Tree.
Rambunctious, tumbling words like Lachrymose. Cacophonic. Raggastani. Perpendicular. Gargantuan. Flummoxed.

Pure fun words like Hi-fi. Yoyo. Banana. Hip hop. Rotund.

Words that are truly classy, Regal. Glorious. Resplendent. Stentorian.

Sad, aching words like Melancholy. Sorrowful.

The magic of words. I string them together everyday to make sense of everything else.

First Post

2005-07-05T12:55:00.000+01:00

Hello. First post.