掩饰

掩饰是人与生俱来的天赋，
还是经岁月累积的成就？
每一个成年人似乎都能将它发挥得淋漓尽致。

掩饰不见得是谎言，
倒像是人们严格遵从的一种纪律。
在适当的时候做适当的事，
在不适当的时候不做不适当的事，
真正的想法若有偏差就加以掩饰。
我们必须服从这样的规则，
才可以被这样的世界接受。

然而，当感情无法明明白白释放出来，
又无法完全舍弃的时候，
好多的，压抑着的，
只好让它们慢慢死亡。
心中逐渐堆满了埋葬千万种死去感情的坟墓。

所以不要再劝谁或谁要更冷静了。
因为最冷静的那个就拥有最多的掩饰。
然后那个冷静的谁变冷漠了，
你又无法了解他为什么总是无动于衷了。

Wise Men In Their Bad Hours

Robinson Jeffers

Wise men in their bad hours have envied
The little people making merry like grasshoppers
In spots of sunlight, hardly thinking
Backward but never forward, and if they somehow
Take hold upon the future they do it
Half asleep, with the tools of generation
Foolishly reduplicating
Folly in thirty-year periods; they eat and laugh too,
Groan against labors, wars and partings,
Dance, talk, dress and undress; wise men have pretended
The summer insects enviable;
One must indulge the wise in moments of mockery.
Strength and desire possess the future,
The breed of the grasshopper shrills, "What does the future
Matter, we shall be dead?" Ah, grasshoppers,
Death's a fierce meadowlark: but to die having made
Something more equal to the centuries
Than muscle and bone, is mostly to shed weakness.
The mountains are dead stone, the people
Admire or hate their stature, their insolent quietness,
The mountains are not softened nor troubled
And a few dead men's thoughts have the same temper.

* * * *

Are we fools by the way we live?
Not for the past, the future only the present.
Like the wise men in their bad hours.
Leaving behind not a dead stone,
More like dust and ashes.

F1 Grand Prix

Feeling like an F1 driver! At 61km? Not quite...

At least I got this shot sharp and clear.

Raffles

He stood solemnly amidst the competing skyscrappers. He observed the changes and awed at how much the city has grown.


The shadows of the past still linger on; as if those from the yester years, like himself, too have found a foothold in the present.


But the once bustling quay side is now without a single soul. The bumboats have long departed, leaving behind a quiet serenity... so clear and still like a mirror, reflecting the past and the present concurrently.


Could he have imagined a city sophisticated by day and stunning by night?


He would have loved an intoxicating evening enwrapped by arts and music, no doubt about that.


These changes, welcoming or not, are inevitable. The process is continuous, like a flow of lights without a destination. Time and tide wait for no man.


Yet the colonial past will never be fully erased. It has injected uniqueness into this place, blended in with modernity to perfection.


And we will rise further, shine brighter. It is what this place is about, where the creation of a new life never stops...

Mon cœur s'ouvre à ta voix

Song from the opera, Samson and Delilah, known in English as "Softly awakes my heart".

Literally translated as "My heart opens itself to your voice". If only I can hear your voice once again...

Original French Mon cœur s'ouvre à ta voix, comme s'ouvrent les fleurs Aux baiser de l'aurore! Mais, ô mon bienaimé, pour mieux sécher mes pleurs Que ta voix parle encore! Dis-moi qu'à Dalila tu reviens pour jamais, Redis à ma tendresse Les serments d'autrefois, ces serments que j'aimais! Ah! réponds à ma tendresse! Verse-moi,verse-moi l'ivresse! Ainsi qu'on voit des blés les épis onduler Sous la brise légère, Ainsi frémit mon coeur, prêt à se consoler, A ta voix qui m'est chère! La flèche est moins rapide à porter le trépas, Que ne l'est ton amante à voler dans tes bras! Ah! réponds à ma tendresse! Verse-moi,verse-moi l'ivresse!

English Translation My heart opens itself to your voice like the flowers open To the kisses of the dawn! But, o my beloved, To dry my tears the best, Let your voice speak again! Tell me that to Dalila You will return forever, Repeat to my tenderness The oaths of other times, the oaths that I loved! Ah! respond to my tenderness! Pour out to me the drunkenness! Like one sees the wheat the blades undulate Under the light breeze, So trembles my heart, ready to be consoled, by your voice which is dear to me! The arrow is less quick to carry death, Than is your love to fly into thy arms! Ah! respond to my tenderness! Pour out to me the drunkenness!

There is no darkness like ignorance

Thanks to TWK for sending me the link on International Literacy Day. It was just 2 days ago.

I was making fun of myself how I have felt "illiterate" in countries like Japan. You must have felt that way too sometimes. Can you imagine:

- trying to find your way to somewhere but can’t read street names;
- trying to order food while at a restaurant but can’t read the menu;
- trying to keep up with current affairs but can’t read newspapers.

I sure can. I have experienced illiteracy first hand.

5 months ago I was in Ethiopia visiting a World Vision development project. We visited one of the local school and I had my first "real" contact with the African children. At the school, when our arrival was officially announced, the children ran into the classroom with such enthusiam. They were active, curious and eager. We will never find such zeal amongst the students in our schools back home.


Fittal Primary School



There were many of them packed onto one bench. The children were of all ages, some clearly overaged for primary school. They were chatting, murmuring; most were smiling. Their excitement of meeting with their foreign friends were obvious and perhaps, they even felt somewhat privileged. Really, the privilege was mine.

The kids were so happy that we were coming and they arrived in the school compound early that day to wait. They brought all their books, even though some had no classes for the day. I flipped through a torned and tattered notebook from one of the boys, careful not to damage it any further, to see what kind of stuff he is being taught in school. Algebra, arithmetics... not bad. Even I am still struggling with those.



The school is doing a great job, especially when operating in a difficult environment like this and with limited resources. Teaching materials have to be shared by all the classes in turns. They are painstakingly prepared and painted by the teachers. Such commitment to their profession deserves our uptmost respect. The most impressive part is that the school's curriculum is very comprehensive: English, Mathematics, Geography, History, Biology are some of the subjects covered.


Teaching materials

Literacy is the basic product of an education. There are a thousand and one reasons why parents do not send their children to school, even if education is available to them for free. Cultural differences, gender discrimination, poor health, distances are some of the likely reasons. But more so, the competing requirements in their daily lives are the biggest hindrance.

In the village of Yaya Gulale which I travelled to in Ethiopia, most of the parents are farmers. Their children help out in the fields as soon as they are strong enough to do so; usually at the age when they should be entering school. Between subsistence and an education, the choice is clear. One needs to fill one's stomach, as well as those of the family's.

If they are not working out in the fields, the children are responsible for the daily water supply. They trek in the wilderness, walking long distances only to fetch water from dirty streams. They are lucky the water did not make them sick. Even if so, one trip to and fro may take hours. Who has time for school?

To increase the chances of these children receiving an education, we first have to relieve them from their burdens of subsistence. A new water point closer to home, for example, will save the children half a day’s walk each day. They can now use the time they have to attend school instead. Providing tools and training to the farmers in agriculture techniques increase their efficiency as well as yields. With that, the children will have to suffer less hours of toil in the fields.


Kuchu Tengego Water Point

Education and literacy rates are intertwined with basic livelihood matters. I did not know there are so many indirect ways we can help to shape the future of a child differently. In Yaya, I finally understood it. Although education is no solution to all of life’s problems, it is the means towards having a better future, at least to be presented with opportunities. It helps one to live with dignity too. I recall an account of a Cambodian boy who is a HIV carrier. He told stories of how he used to be discriminated by his school mates because he is “different”. However, he is passionate about learning and despite his frequent headaches (side effects from his HIV medication), he persisted in his studies. Now, he has top the class and won the admiration and acceptance of his peers.



Presenting prizes to top students of the school. A school bag, a book and a pen bought with some of the money my friends have contributed before I set off for the trip. Thanks!

I will now share a quote written on the wall of Fittal Primary School in Ethiopia: "There is no darkness like ignorance".

Hope meets despair in equal measure

An exerpt from the book I am reading, "Six Months in Sudan" by James Maskalyk, a Canadian doctor who was with the Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors without Borders), and has worked in a war torn village in Sudan. Here are bits of the harsh reality of his work and how this experience has changed him.

Sometimes, I really marvel at human compassion. For humanitarian reasons, some people travelled distances, to places infested with diseases and threatened by wars. It is not that they are unafraid, but are convinced of the worthiness of their pursue.

As the author puts it, "Some of the work in repairing the world is grim; much of it is not. Hope not only meets despair in equal measure, it drowns it." I would like to think that the world is full of hope and a caring place too.

I salute these heros!

* * * * *

"He is talking about an acquaintance, a nurse, who worked during an Ebola outbreak in the Congo years before. He recounts her story of how, after days of watching people die of the incurable virus, she and her team decided that if there was nothing to offer those infected, no treatement, no respite, they would give them a bath. They put on goggles and masks, taped their gloves to their gowns, and cleaned their sick patients.

...I heard ten seconds of a story, and during them realised there were things I had not reckoned on.

It was the taping of the gloves. The whine of the white tape as it stretched around their wrists, forming a seal between their world and the bleeding one in front of them. I could imagine the grimness with which it was done, could see the flat faces of the doctors and nurses as they stepped into the room.

I rewound to a film loop of me kneeling on the dirt floor of the long hut we had build out of wood and grass to accomodate the surge of infected people. I was kneeling beside the bed of an infant who was feverish and had stopped drinking. I was trying, with another doctor to find a vein. The baby's mother sat helpless on the bed as we poked holes in her child. She was crying. She wanted us to stop. Small pearls of blood dotted his neck, his groin. We failed, his breathing worsened, and he died. I stood up, threw the needles in the sharps container, and walked away to attend someone else. Behind me his mother wailed. I can see my flat face.

People who do this type of work talk about the rupture we feel on our return, an irreconcilable invisible distance between us and others. We talk about how difficult it is to assimilate, to assume routine, to sample familiar pleasures. Though I could convince myself that the fissure was narrow enough to be ignored, it only took a glance to see how dizzyingly deep it was.

The rift, of course, is not in the world: it is within us. And the distance is not only ours. We return from the field, from an Ebola outbreak or violent clashes in Sudan, with no mistake about how the world is. It is a hard place - a beautiful place, but so too an urgent one. And we realise that all of us, through our actions or inactions, make it what it is...

... I believe that which separates action from inaction is the same thing that separates my friends from Sudan. It is not indifference. It is distance. May it fall away."

Bizarre memory

I have a bizarre memory relating to this song.

Many years ago, it was so long ago that I have forgotten which year it was, a guy confessed in me. He was in love with a woman, but the trouble was, he was married to another.

I did what a loyal friend would do... I listened. Listened to his happiness, his anguish, his guilt and confusion. It seemed that he knew he should not carry on an illegitimate relationship, but was unable to stop.

The radio played this song and we were silent. He dropped his head down and kept his hands busy, pretending to be engaged with something which I cannot remember what. Maybe he was avoiding further conversation. I took one glance at him, afraid that he would look back because I would then be lost for words to say. The air was so tensed, nearly suffocating. I sensed the emotional turbulence going through in his heart and at that very moment, it was as if I could feel every inch of the pain that he felt. That man was helplessness in a tangible form.

I told him to follow his heart. Now that I look back, it was one lousy advice to give. Moral value wise, I scored zero. It was better that I had said nothing, for who am I to comment about matters of heart? And men, they are strange creatures to start off with. They have so many desires but carelessly have little to give in return. Their world is in a constant state of impermanence; so fickle and mutable are their characteristics. No offense guys, I just don't understand. Yet, I have willingly fallen victim to you.

The last I heard, he was expecting a baby with his wife. Whether he has sort out his thoughts or is merely submitting to reality, I do not know. Whichever the case, I hope he is happy now. That is what choices in life should be based on.

爱情
作词:姚谦
作曲:张洪量



若不是因为爱着你
怎么会夜深还没睡意
每个念头都关於你
我想你 想你 好想你

若不是因为爱着你
怎会有不安的情绪
每个莫名的日子里
我想你 想你 好想你

爱是折磨人的东西
却又舍不得这样放弃
不停揣测你的心里
可有 我姓名

爱是我唯一的秘密
让人心碎却又着迷
无论是用什么言语
只会 只会 思念你

若不是因为爱着你
怎会不经意就叹息
有种不完整的心情
爱你 爱你 爱着你

焕然一新

博客换了全新的版面，我自己相当满意。

不定期的更换版面，这是我为经常到访的朋友准备的小小惊喜。除了能增添新鲜感，每一个版本更是我当时的心情写照。

博客的点击次数接近1万了（并不算多）。我不经意回头想想，这两年来在这里都做了些什么事。有时分享心情，有时发发牢骚；家中的大小事、我大惊小怪的事，就是我文章的基本素材；旅行、节庆、纪念日也在这里落了脚。这里就是窥探我生活点滴的一个视窗。

我的花花世界里，经常很虚无缥缈，有时又繁琐踏实。目前的状态是：生活还是实在一点的好，平凡的事更需要用心体会。我将在这里把一天内发生的最特别的事记录下来，提醒自己每一天都值得纪念。

虽然跟其他名人、明星的1千万点击率比较，我那区区1万只是望尘莫及，但我保证，所有的文字、图片都包含了我1千万分的诚意。希望你们在这里曾经找到有意义的，有共鸣的，甚至被感动的一个小段落。