August 2002

Interview with an Old Man - 8/2/2002







Joining me today for "Thoughts on your Birthday" in the studio is Mr Limitlim. He was born in 1974, way back then ... and we're pleased that we could chat
TOYB: Welcome to the show ... err mr limit ...
LMT: My pleasure.
TOYB: So what's it like turning 28 today?
LMT: Well, I'd like to begin with a little analogy about difference. Look out there, see the stars? How far away do you think they are? A million light years away? Ten million? A billion perhaps? The fact is a million and a billion are only vague numerical catergories that we read about and use. Realistically speaking you can't really tell the difference, at least not in the same way you can tell the difference between one and ten or ten and a hundred.
TOYB: So you mean difference isn't about the numbers?
LMT: Not quite. It more that we take difference for granted. We assume we know or at least can adequately map difference. Perceptually at least, we say that's different without quite knowing how it is different.
TOYB: So you're saying that difference has to be pinned down?
LMT: Yeah in the sense but not in the sense that it is an absolute thing. You're only different if you compare things. Difference itself, how do you pin that down? But we need frameworks to talk about difference.
TOYB: So how is this all related to you turning 28 today
LMT: It's about difference isn't it, age? How different are you today from yesterday? The change is imperceptable. But in terms of a nominal value there's a sudden leap. So we're talking about how different descriptions of change fragment the sense that this is an individual. I guess I don't like the fact that I'm growing old. Maybe that's why I'd rather it creep by.
TOYB: Right. Thanks for being on the show.







vindictive - 8/5/2002







What would you do for a million dollars worth of fame? To hear the TV stations playing your name? What would you do for money enough to study the world over and over? Prayers chanted and incantations rising to greet you every morning - for this what would you do? Perhaps it doesn't mean much when you're ordinary and living a squared existence. Perhaps when this room caves in and through the debris they find a figure dusty from writing with a manuscript pen, they won't want to whisper anymore.

I get sick in my stomach just trying to keep away. The waves of nausea remind me what's at stake in this life. Once, crawling out of bed and tracing my fingers on the glass, I carved out of condensation's palette a signature. But it was borrowed, a queer smiling face without any significance except that everybody knew it. Those were trying days when getting out of bed and sliding to the window was a wonderful achievement. Then, as now I remember it, the cold floor was scant relief from the immobility I felt when my joints reacted against lying, drugged, hours on end. When all the wrong people sought you out. You wanted friends, lovers, certain family faces to surround you in an Om of undying love. You wanted Kerouac to know you, to write to the rhythm of your wheezing chest. The Holy Goof to show you transcendence within the cold clinical walls.

And seated on the bed to make you happy. Rising like a child pyjamas clad. What would you give if innocence could once again hum and whistle and be glad? Curling up ball-like waiting to recoil. Moments of relief perhaps.

"Sing sing ..."

Regression is painful when the memories evoked are embarassing preludes to the humiliation you must face. I think back on the embarassment of writing reams of poetry only to look back and cringe at the thought that I thought it was readable. Drugged up high on anti-depressants, one catches a glimpse of the over-confidence one should possess but never will. Cleaned out, full of odd regrets for the strangest part of love is the will. Sorry has a painful ring to it. A thousand times sorry. The table tennis game tick tocks in the sanitised hallway. Today, they get to go home. Today, the tick tock becomes the seconds stretching over this hardened hour of consciousness. Unsure of the time, I make a phone call to find out. The lines don't go out from here. They ring the Nurses' Station. To get to me, you need to press the buzzer once, then wait. If you can spell my name correctly, they'll let you in. But remember, dialect names are important when sanity is the thinly veiled difference between you and I.

But they let the wrong people in. Once, as I lay there, cushioned on chocolate, three broad shouldered officers walked in. Attempting to speak to me I guess. I roll away. Embarassment then vengeance. No wrong - none of your fault. If talking exonerates, why should I speak? Response is the act of cancelling a memory. What needs re-writing we can do later. Now, pay. My only defence becomes the paranoid insistence that you're here to get me. I do not come near to your apology. Remain haunted by my vindictiveness. Remain unforgiven in your memory.

You cannot be depressed. You have a life. You have a family. You have a memo from the dr. that says they will not pay you for the days you are sad. You cannot be depressed, clinically or no, because God says so.









Hurrah Hurrah - 8/8/2002







When we stand up for Singapore, tell the nation we will count the cost, believe that we will get there, proudly shout Majulah Singapura, remember:

LIM CHIN SIONG

Lim was a founder member of the PAP in 1954. In 1955 he stood for election to the Legislative Assembly Election in Bukit Timah constituency and, at the age of 22, became the youngest assemblyman in Singapore history.

In 1961, when Lee Kuan Yew was campaigning for merger with the Federation of Malaya, Lim voiced his opposition in a reflection of the deep differences between the stances of the mainly English-educated leadership and the Chinese-educated radical wing of the PAP. In June that year Lim was among those
expelled from the PAP. This group then formed the Barisan Sosialis, a party of which Lim became the first secretary-general. In 1963 Lim and several others were rounded up and detained by internal security forces moving to forestall subversion against Merger(Operation Coldstore).

The British Commissioner in Singapore, the Earl of Selkirk, and his deputy, Philip Moore, had argued that such arrests would not only be undemocratic and unfair, but also failed to take into account that Lim and his party had been engaged in constitutional struggle.

The Commissioner's arguments for democracy and fair play were quite extraordinary and out of line with London's official thinking, but were eventually rejected by superior officials in London, especially the British Secretary of State.

The mood at the time of Lim's arrest during Operation Cold Store has been likened to "white terror", vividly described in a dedicatory poem by Tan Jing Quee, a former trade unionist who is now a lawyer and who himself was later detained on charges of being involved in communist united front activities:

On the second day of February thunder raged through frightened streets lightning blighted all lamps

Remember
C V DEVAN NAIR

IN the Singapore of the early 1980s, Lee Kuan Yew was the captain and Devan Nair his loyal lieutenant. Mr Lee, independence leader, then prime minister and now senior minister of the tiny Southeast Asian city-state, laid down the law. Mr Nair followed it. As head of the national trade union congress, then president of Singapore, he loyally parroted the "LKY" line on the importance of social order, the dangers of Western-style democracy and the evils of littering.

Then, in 1985, came a shocking break. Mr Lee told Singapore's parliament that Mr Nair had resigned because he was an alcoholic, a charge Mr Nair now calls a baseless slur. Three years later, he left Singapore for good after publicly quarrelling with Mr Lee over the arrest of a well-known government critic. Then he dropped from sight.

Mr Nair got to know his "captain" when the two were fighting to free Singapore from British colonial rule in the 1950s. A teacher whose father emigrated from India, Mr Nair taught Shakespeare while he was a member of the Anti-British League, an irony he still savours. When the British threw him in jail as a subversive, holding him for a total of five years, Mr Lee was his lawyer.

The two remained close after Singapore won its freedom from Britain. Together, they fought off an attempted communist takeover, weathered Singapore's ejection from the neighbouring federation of Malaysia and transformed their country from a run-down sea port to an economic dynamo bristling with skyscrapers. "I supported him because he was an eloquent champion of the dreams I had for Singapore," Mr Nair says.

Being president, he says now, was "the silliest job in the world. All you had to do was cut ribbons." His frustration grew.

But before he could speak out, Mr Nair found himself at the centre of a rumour-mongering campaign that labelled him a drinker and womanizer. He says he was neither, and he suspects that Mr Lee had government doctors slip him hallucinatory drugs to make him appear befuddled. "Lee Kuan Yew decided: This man is going to be a threat, so I'd better begin a total demolishment of his character. He's very good at that."

Mr Nair is not bitter. He gives Mr Lee credit for making Singapore a wealthy, stable place, an accomplishment in which he is proud to have shared. But how much greater that accomplishment would be if Singapore were a wealthy stable democracy. To him, Singapore today is a soulless place whose only ideology is materialism. Whether he could have changed that, Mr Nair wishes now he had spoken up earlier.

Remember
CHIA THYE POH

Chia Thye Poh was 26-years-old and a university lecturer when he was arrested in 1966. His crime - joining a breakaway faction of the ruling People's Action Party. He was accused of being a communist and detained without trial under Singapore's tough internal security laws.

In 1989, he was released from prison and confined to a fortress on the island of Sentosa, south of Singapore. He was eventually allowed to return to the mainland and even take a one-year scholarship to Germany, but his movements were limited.

Now, Singapore has agreed to lift all restrictions on Chia Thye Poh because it says he's no longer considered a threat to Singapore society.

However, asked what his political beliefs are today, he is unrelenting. "I feel there should be a fair, just, democratic society. Down-trodden people, low-income people should be helped."

Asked whether he holds any grudges against Singapore's Senior Minister and former veteran prime minister Mr Lee and his People's Action Party which has held an iron grip on power in Singapore since independence in 1957, Mr Chia said: "I have no personal grudge against anybody.

"My main concern is the policy [of detention without trial], because if the policy is not fair, many people will suffer."















Trip Through the Wires - 8/15/2002







Thursdays were difficult to get through. The promise of the weekend lingered tantalisingly out of reach, in the morning at least. The plodding of feet up the stair-well made it difficult to hope that the day would pass quickly and the wooden banister was poor support. Still work had to be done and scripts had to be marked.

He shovelled his great bulk into the staffroom where no one was yet stirring. After a while, heads started popping up from the table tops. One two then the whole place was abuzz with the roar of a swarming army gathering for war.

But this Thursday was especially difficult. First the morning had already brought bad reports. Student misbehaviour again. A list of names that had skipped classes, served to him by the Discipline Mistress. Yes he would have to inform them to speak to her. He felt a little awkward and stumbled through the laughing faces of the crowd after he had pointed them out. Oblivious about what this meant, they continued laughing. Then, later one, slouching toward the canteen for his customary cup of coffee, he saw a group of his kids being reprimanded in the centre of the Square. Perhaps for their uniform he sighed. And stumbled on.

What matters? What's important? What changes the world?

When he was younger he believed that music could change the world. That the Blues would make people cry their prejudice and hate away, that Rock and Roll would energise everyone into a frenzy of setting things right and that Dylan would show the way with his wisdom. Nowadays what did THEY believe? Did they believe that Evil could not triumph? Did THEY hope that they would crusade for truth? Did THEY dream of more for everyone and less of less for less? No.

They believed that dreams should be dreamt on tassled cushion, velveteen and fluffy. They believed that the future was one that held the promise of luxury and money. Change? Yes, please change the rules so we can all sleep in late, have a day off and procrastinate. Revolution? Yes, make sure I can get away with a casual show of emotion.

Their dreams were of holidays and lovers, of camps full of noise. Of skirts that made them look attractive and hair-cuts that were stylish. Music is just a phase, poetry just a fad. When you've had enough, when you've drunk your full, don't bother to wallow in the vomit you fool.

Actually it was as simple as not wanting to go for class, as simple as being lazy. Why charge it with all this existential angst? Why think about the shallowness of all the reasons and the fact that this is even worse than not having a cause?

Perhaps you wish that what you see could be turned in a direction. That the daring and nonchalance actually meant something. That they weren't just imperfect cogs in the machine but that they were precious stones waiting. Perhaps perhaps.

Look out. Here they go again.

They say ev'rything can be replaced,
Yet ev'ry distance is not near.
So I remember ev'ry face
Of ev'ry man who put me here.
I see my light come shining
From the west unto the east.
Any day now, any day now,
I shall be released.

They say ev'ry man needs protection,
They say ev'ry man must fall.
Yet I swear I see my reflection
Some place so high above this wall.
I see my light come shining
From the west unto the east.
Any day now, any day now,
I shall be released.

Standing next to me in this lonely crowd,
Is a man who swears he's not to blame.
All day long I hear him shout so loud,
Crying out that he was framed.
I see my light come shining
From the west unto the east.
Any day now, any day now,
I shall be released. - Bob Dylan









Of Leaving and Loss - 8/21/2002







Dealing with the prospect of someone close to you going off far away for a certain significant amount of time is difficult. After all, the Two of you have become One and physical closeness does make things a lot more comfortable and tangible. All the abstract notions of caring for someone at a distance fall away after you've been married for some time. But then I guess finding that distance is now going to the governing reality of our lives, these abstractions, these vagaries now figure prominently.

Have never dabbled much with love poetry. I suppose this is the closest I'll come to it.

The thought of you
instead of listing words that try
to pin ygu down i'll be the first one to admit how
difficult it is, this thought of you.


Perhaps it's like a poem filled with references
that you had to read up on to understand
resulting from emotions that have to be experienced to be
articulated. This thought of you - unrhymed,
seeking a conclusion, weaving its way
through the density of assumption
ending often only in an intepretation
this thought of you

perhaps this thought of you is like
the intricacy of a cell drawing-
magnified precision. Made clearer when simplified into vacuoles ,
nucleai and mitochondric strands-
but unable to capture every detail or each moment.
Cells breathe multiply unstable but become caught in time when drawn:
a schematic by which you're
remembered but left unfulfilled, this thought of you.

so instead of listing words that try to pin you down
i'll be the first to constantly remember,
provoke, laugh cry and sigh fondly at


this thought of you.







Got to Go - 8/23/2002







Is morning now. Saturday morning. Have to have Tea with some MOE Director. Bloody irritating. At first thought that it would be a big crowd. And I could just turn up for food. But the mailing list was very short. And people have told me it's a small group. MOE's way of pretending they track their scholars. Rubbish. Wanted to not go. But although it's an invitation. You need to give your reason. Through your Principal. ie you have to go. Will puke at people scrambling for air time with the Director. Will puke at my inability to say what I really feel because am too socialised and too polite to criticise people to their face. Puke Puke Puke. Sound like Holden Caulfield. And then will come back and feel terrible that I've sold out. That I drank their tea and nibbled their sandwiches and nodded submissively at their comments without raising my voice or shouting them down. Puke. So how will it go?









How it Went - 8/24/2002







This takes off from the previous one. I guess I knew Tea with the Director was going to be a boring affair. So I tried to make it more interesting by making observations that might perhaps be entertaining for this page. However, the whole affair got me depressed. On several counts:

1. The other people having Tea with the Director are like me - ie teachers who have taught for 2 years, who were on some kind of MOE or PSC scholarship

2. I thus assumed that these were teachers who were enthusiastic, ON about their students, loving caring blah blah.

3. I'm pretty sure they are. They seem nice enough and all that but here's the catch.

4. With the Director, most of them turned into politically correct yes-men. The "issues" that they brought up were just mundane and repetitive regurgitations of policies that we've heard about for the last several years. That got me depressed.

Anyway - some other observations:

1. The circular we got said to come in work attire. That to me meant a shirt and trousers. So I wore my checkered blue shirt and pants. But I guess some teachers take their job seriously. The guys came with ties and briefcases. And some of the female teachers - were wearing jackets / suits! Even the Director commented when he first got in - "Wah so formal ..." What does all this say to me? Bloody trying to impress.

2. We had name tags with numbers on them. And the eleven of us had to sit in numerical order! And this after the injunction to "just be yourselves, relax" ... irony

3. The whole affair laster 3 hours! Yes, 3 whole hours of repetitive droning. I can't believe teachers are that a. DUMB, b. UNAWARE, c. desperate to IMPRESS. Why Dumb? They were asking stupid questions about what the Ministry does, how to get a transfer, how teachers are assesed - information that is all available on the Net. Why Unaware? They kept going on and on when it was obvious that no one else was interested in what they were talking about. And lastly - the worst - everyone had an opinion on every topic. So you would get these awfully stereotypical comments that were always "balanced" by "I know that MOE has its constraints" or "I probably don't have the bigger picture ..." And when it was running late, some idiots kept bringing up more "issues". Look - nothing's gonna be done about your "issues" cause MOE's got a feedback on these things already. Given that, why bother to try to show the Director that you're "in tune" with things.

My part in all this.

I was good. I just shut up. I was the only one of the eleven that just didn't say anything. I made my observations, played with my palm pilot. Shifted uncomfortably in my chair. Closed my eyes when the conversation got awfully boring. Stared at the shoes of the female teachers. Rolled my eyes and tried not to shake my head at the stupidity of some of the comments.

Oh yes. I believe I made a most significant contribution to the proceedings. After a while I really had to go to the loo - so I excused myself -

And what do you know - as I walk out of the room, several others come running after. Later, some others also go to the loo. Bloody sycophants - kept the conversation going and had no guts to even go to excuse themselves to go to the loo!

And sadly, I realised that I'm probably in the minority. I'll never work in MOE HQ because I never want to turn into bureaucratic yes-man. The rest of the room want to get postings to MOE HQ quite eagerly (it was no secret why - the Director explained that MOE HQ was where you got to know the important people that could help your career). They made silly statements like - "I want to work in HQ in the Dept that can help change the mindsets of people ..."

Came back and told Ms Tan about the whole thing. I guess she's right to say that I'm an arrogant snob about these things. That I need to see that other people have their ideas and believe in them sincerely (Doesn't that make things worse ...?) Well, at least I know that the MOE is in "good hands" with all these young enthu teachers that want to change the world by issuing memos ... That gets me depressed as well. I treasure the position of marginality. But people think that it's really fake. That it's put on. That I'm just an angry rebel without a cause. So I feel compromised as well. That I just sat there and shut up. (I had promised Ms Tan I wouldn't do anything stupid - given that she's going off to New York for a year next week - like be sarcastic ... they probably wouldn't have caught it anyway ...) So I'm rather depressed about my pointless cynicism as it seems. Ah well - at least I have my books ...

By the Way - the food wasn't even good.

"so of his gentleness
Knowing I lov'd my books, he furnish'd me
From mine own library with volumes that
I prized above my dukedom." Prospero, The Tempest









Now that you're going - 8/26/2002







I suppose realisation dawns upon even those of us who would rather live their lives in obscure oblivion. The fact that you're going has come upon me slowly. This last weekend with all the arangements, the finalising of details and the numerous meetings with friends, colleagues and students that you've had to attend has crystallised that sense that you won't be here very much longer. In the beginning, I guess it was easy to shrug it off. After all it wasn't as if you were going off to war with a wooden sword to die for a cause that didn't exist. You are, after all, going to study at one of the best universities in the world, and even if you will be gone, it will only be for slightly over a year.

But I think I've taken for granted the fact that you've been around for the last two years. The fact that I fall asleep with you beside me and wake up gazing on your form softly breathing. I've gotten used to watching you care for and love those around you, be they animals loved ones or friends. I've taken for granted the old age we will spend together, quietly reading out passages that thrill our hearts and tickle our minds. And a year apart just doesn't seem to be what I've come to expect.

I guess this gives me the license to mooch around for the whole of this week. The corridors I walk down early in the morning are especially quiet and the bus ride home doesn't give me much to look forward to. Of course I'll bury myself in work but even words on a page are resoundingly silent when you speak to them. Of course I'll learn to talk to myself but the monotony of hearing my own voice will drive me mad.

Now that you're going, I tell myself that the best part of silence is the firmness of the echos and the prospect of hearing you afresh. Now that you're going, I'm learning to get used to these silences that dwell in my head.







Luggage - 8/27/2002







I'll be left with the cats I suppose
You can't pack them in. I'm sure they'll miao loudly
and the machines will stop in their tracks.
And they'll wonder why your bags
whimper and why scratching noises
creep from the insides of your cases.

I'll be left with the cats I suppose
And remember how they used to irritate you endlessly
as you tried to grade papers
By crawling onto the piles
and purring into the words.
How they'd nudge your hand,
Poised to give a mark,
with the impatient brushes
of feline insistence.

I'll be left with the cats I suppose
Mittens and Duke
Crippled and orphaned reminders
Of how completeness should be cherished,
never assumed.







Hellos and Goodbyes - 8/30/2002







Today was most interesting. Started out with action in school. The Banner - I guess will go down in history in several different ways. Very touched by the effort put in by the class in painting the banner. I guess it's not everyday you see your name writ large. Unfortunately, it became the Banner Incident. Almost like an episode in a sit com - the One with the Banner. It's interesting how the sincere and direct (read as "creative" and "original" or "non-conformist" and "rebellious") energies that lie outside formal structures get muddied by the "larger perspective". Ah well - sensitive issues all round. But I must say - 02A12 was very sweet and made an otherwise difficult day much brighter. I dare say I was quite proud of them! Anyway - am thinking about where to keep / hang the banner - it's really quite a beauty - ok - better not go on - better stop my ego from speaking ... But I suppose that it's my own experience with how stifling systems are that causes this kind of, well, appreciation for these special acts. But I am also aware of the dangers of banging your head against the wall, and for the sake of the class, hope that there will be no adverse ramifications - but that's the future - the memory of today - I'm still savouring ...

So that was quite a way to say Hello to the New Day.

Goodbyes - said goodbye to Ms Tan today. Well, wasn't the only one at the Airport. Her girls came as well. I must say the girls really took Ms Tan's going rather badly. They were crying and sobbing etc. But I suppose, saying goodbye is hard to do, even if it is only for a period. We'd actually talked about it. Ms Tan warned me that if I merely shook her hand and said, "all the best", she would not be pleased (did that once when I had to go off for a short trip some time in the distant past - quite funny ...) Anyway - we talked about how difficult saying goodbye would be - wondering if we would cry etc. But I guess it was alright today. Ms Tan cried a little - I teared a little - so did our parents. I suppose we need to remind ourselves that in the larger scheme of thiings - this is really but for a short while - that we'll see each other during Holidays, that technology makes it impossible to not keep in touch and that God will keep us both by his grace.

Ah - hellos and goodbyes !