Marco Polo and 昌平公主

It suddenly struck me that cultural differences have a way of interferring with social relationships. Well, it's customary for Caucasians to hug and kiss mere aquaintances but in SG such gestures are labelled as wanton frivolity. Being Marco Polo isn't easy, I remembered the words of John Connor to his young apprentice in Michael Chricton's "Rising Sun."

If the Japanese bow to you, its a form of courtesy. You don't bow back, because you will not be able to do it right. A wrong bow is an insult to them.

It's a withdrawal symptom of a shrinking world. Reservation is not eclipsed, but confronted by liberty, and both bring excess baggage that entail detrimental ills within a global village. Just as the British opuim traders assumed the Manchurian's pigtails a national oddity, so a similar void lies between the shy bitch and the cassanova of the 21st century. Technically, he fails to understand her system requirements, the implicit messages she receives behind the guise of friendly gestures or pick-ups. So Marco Polo was lucky, he visited the middle kingdom during the rule of the Great Khan. The Mongols were foreign rulers of China, and their massive empire allowed vast cultural exchanges along the dirty paths of the Silk Road. Even so, he had no choice but to prostrate in front of the emperor, even though he never did that to the ruler of his own country.

Now shifting back to reality, it is crucial to keep values in check, simply because an expanding party is made up of many unique individuals with different backgrounds. It becomes the fine line between being there for everyone, and intruding right into someone's personal boundary. Little discovery has been made into the dynamics of intra-social deviance, but here are the critical points where an opinion can be accepted or discarded.

1) If perceived as fragile, do not attempt to play. Once broken, considered sold
2) If US companies complain our bah gua is too red, take it with a pinch of salt
3) If radicalism is rampant, strive for balance and consistency
4) If single-handed management is taking its toll, call in for early retirement and settle down
5) If aquiring new property, consider the surroundings and its relationship with other houses.
6) If languages are your forte, be speak Latin in Rome and Hokkien in Taiwan
7) If you want a shy bitch, draw her close to all your friends and observe the security cams (haha ok that's evil)

Skylines

It's 3 in the morning, and the tea within still reeks of caffeine.

It was a well deserved break. I slept twice in the afternoon, after my complete dissection of Umberto Eco's Travels in Hyppereality. It was a book borrowed from a cousin whose complexion had been invaded by maggots. Just musing about media theory is enough to split the black dye from the follicle, but thankfully, I was able to use the white hairs to work on my essay. It's always the culture that counts in every equation of intepretation, no matter the juxtaposition of any text. Globalization is the disease of diversity, the postmodern Babel syndrome. Everyone attempts to rally one another within a common framework of understanding, cloning color-blind spectators who can only watch in monochrome.

Upon the advent of sunset, with my folks out fishing for food in a boiling pot, I joined the oldest friends in the world, for a time of food, furniture and frenzied shopping. Oh, someone says that the size of the hanger can affect the elasticity of the clothes, so those hangers they sell at IKEA are ergonomically designed to preserve the texture of closet fabrics. It feels strange, those wooden bows sold there are no different from the samples provided in the resorts. Then again, I have an olfactory fetish for wood, so the smell was pretty intoxicating.

Step into BORDERS and its the overload of the lingua franca. Nothing beats surfing through the abundance of fiction and fact, looking for that elusive cover that catches your eye and the diamond story that raptures your mind. Sadly, cash was bleeding down my shorts, thus my short lived perusal of some fine SF works. St Augustine's City of God just skipped my mind, and I figured that too much of book therapy can certainly make me lose focus on the more essential word.

The arrival of midnight failed to deter the hyperactive king from supper, and a stroke of official intervention gave us the honor of having a special guest over a cup of teh-o. She's small, brown and funny, like those kids who wore Mickey Mouse hats and sang to you over the TV. I felt we were sadists, for being worned out after a hard day's work, she still had to force a smile in front of us. We asked her weird questions accompanied by anecdotes from my horrible past. Once in a while, its good to give them that fun, for it tells the colorful story of a decade of friendship, and the thrill of a lifetime.

The little girl was honestly amused. Bearing that in mind, I do believe our own history will certainly outlive all of us.

"When she ages"

The silver cloud casts a shadow
at the shutter of an iris,
a flash on a color-blind canvas,
her face becomes dried petals,
prancing on strands of planet rings,
each touch bound for vapour,
raining sparkles of lunar ash,
to cover the dead with dew.

Taste is tangible friction
of collected novelties,
a singular sensory glow,
dimmed by its own progeny,
lined up on paths forgotten,
pieced together again,
on fingers of digital ink,
to cover her image with life.

St.Joel,September 2005

A broken 玉花瓶

"有这么一夜，剧烈的心跳无法平静一颗沉重的心。
有这么一天，她的出现使我面对以往的过错。
说真的,以前的希望已变成今天的遗憾. 想要的,想爱的,也失去了心处之味."

A restless mind, biting nails and dream-filled sleep. This is stress, the falling of the sky on my head. The hesitation at picking up the pen, or even the pride at not calling for help. It's been fun knowing so many new brothers and sisters, going back to the stage, getting the adrenalin rushing through my veins, creating a joyful euphoria not witnessed in years. But once the final bow is taken, reality is brought back into prime time, and I carry the burden all over again.

Social psychology is a potent science. Knowing it opens your eyes to the interactive zoo of human relationships. The individual is subject to forces acting directly on its sphere of influence. Expressions function as verbal and facial cues to project the type of emotion and elicit the same response as it establishes contact with members of the same group. The domino effect is contagious, but it is also misleading. Minimal reluctance is amplified, due to inherent perceptions that polarizes a particular ideological bias. A word of caution in reading vibes: Do not exaggerate the message, or extrapolate its meaing into a wider context. If the domino formula is applied, it results in mass extremism.

To go or no to go, that is the question. I have small essays of rats biting at my shoes, an ingrown toenail that ever swells without pain and a current social parliament that is media savvy enough to make me the big daddy cum prime minister. Fridays used to rock because I get to meet and dine-in with all the members of the party. Oh, I must add that the latest shy bitch is a high-octane motivator too. But then again, duty overwhelms desire now, and if the frames are not up for the constructions of ideas, not even classmates the likes of Jessica Alba would get me up. Even as I deliberate over the contents of this entry, my inclinations take a trip to truancy. Is it worth listening to someone who tries to listen but really can't seem to?

Superstitious bliss

Working for four consecutive days with balloons, posters, stage props and mascots. They even had chickens dispensing free packets of snacks. My talking antics on the poduim turned from glamourous to burdensome, so I finally decided to keep the stage floor rubbish free instead.

I felt the things I did just fell a little short of being a major screw-up. The monotony of life brought little color, and already I was running my engine without a muse. I hate to spend my days as a security guard, an uncharmed life made up of eating, sleeping, getting abused by managers and admiring the sweetest thing from a distance. I caught the preview of Eric Khoo's latest film on TV, it sure was a provocative picture. Life in the fine city can rust more than the quiet nomadic plains of Mongolia, where the horses run wild and free.

I became an urban refugee who fled the pressures of others, taking solace in my most recent project. It was a feature story for a school assignment, on the exposure of online predators. Two lovely vamps from an alternate universe have taken the law of the Internet into their own hands, saving thousands of helpless damsels from the clutches of evil, wanking phallic pervs. Do check it out ( http://yourguysxxxposed.blogspot.com )

Trends are spinning faster along the edge of reason. This means that more people know more about Angelina Jolie than Audrey Hepburn, even though the latter had more class and beauty. Shy bitch v.02 is one hot great eastern babe. No complicated add-ons or make up, she's sleek simple and silent. Just the way I want it to be. Its the perfect configuration for old school Romeos. I've ordered mine, have you?

Now here's a little piece of black and white history. I kept a muse for 3 whole years, breathing not a single word to anyone who wanted to know. I told my story to beggars, children, and a companion who never cared. When the secret finally died, I held a simple ceremony for its burial, before whispering my final goodbyes. By the time I saw the human incarnation of my past inpsiration,the spark of divinity that defined her was no more.

But auras are hard to forget. It happened to the lovers, and even now my senses bring their tidings to my ears even before I lay eyes on them. For her, it struck like a wave, catching me unawares. I wasn't even supposed to turn back as I sipped on my drink with Luke talking to me. The smooth reaction, the seemingly effortless awareness as I said hi to her, it totally surprised him.

I was rather proud of myself. The kid inside had finally got his groove back.