unfair life lessons from the epics

if there is one thing our epics teach us is that life is unfair 

take ramayana . rama deserts sita, most unfairly, because of a false allegation and a rumour tainting his kingship. 

everyday we see this disassociation with people until proven innocent. institution too precious to risk for individuals no matter how unfair the allegations may be. one is only safe till the next rumour

 

then, krishna tricking karna to help arjuna win

how blessed is arjuna and how cursed is karna

the prodigal son in the bible... feted above the loyal son who stays. happens in real life all the time too..

 

so what is one to do? are we like the chosen few, to be supported by the gods?. or has our lot been cast with the karnas and sitas of this world? or is it all a matter of rising and falling fortunes? there were good moments in karna's and sita's lives, and terrible ordeals in the lives of rama and the pandavas.  surely its not only the ends that count but the process of life too?.

holidays in Singapore

we tried chek jawa. lovely place. we found the right date- low tide date on 14 Dec. ashwin had read about a tower and we went looking for that. breathtaking views really. q

walking back we saw three wild boars. monkeys leaping from tree to tree. 

back at our bikes we saw monkeys had had a party. they had unzipped our lunch bag, opened our disposable containers (only remnants of onions in there) punctured holes in our box of chips(only rubbish in there) opened our grape box and finished all the remaining grapes and strewn the container and lid aside! we were stunned. we threw away everything properly and appreciated their dexterity and cleverness. also relieved they only ate grapes. not likely to cause indigestion hopefully. 

we also sheltered from the downpour singing songs. chippi irrukuthu muthu irrikuthu, sangeetha jathi mullah, sangeetha Megam rum bum bum etc. super fun really. 1 hour of that. nature walks. cycling. 

loved it! 

another fun day was 4 hours swimming in the sea followed by yummy lunch of briyani and Vietnamese cuisine.

other days ok. gardens by the bay and the bird park. 

soon to be heading to universal studios and maybe sungei buloh. nothing else planned

I'd like to take them to some stables yo see and ride horses. 

and maybe to changi to see some dinos on display. let's see. 

also the loyang temple. 

alone with my thoughts

I fear I may never go to the birdpark again

I saw some marvellous birds today. 

but I saw more in cages than I usually do. I usually spend time in 3 big aviaries and the rest are just a blur. 

however today we spent time at the cages. 

I am now by Goodman arts centre and a flock of little egrets (I think) or milk storks flew by me

that is freedom. 

to have wings that can soar but only hop from bar to bar is no freedom. 

packed weekend

just want to put down what a great weekend we had i had 

1. made veggie egg cups for breakfast that everyone liked 

2. helped eleicer goodies and pizza for deepavali with while family 

3. attended a writing class! found theophilius kwek who can be a good resource for us

4. attended chess class with ashwin 

5. watched an awesome play with amelia virtually about Malay identity Nadirah. 

6. went cycling with my dad to upper pierce. exhilarating hills! Great coconut drink 

7. went to temple to support a nagarathar class

8. went to art class and attended a work meeting 

9. attended chess class with aishu 

10. watched breathtaking Amara with the kids

woo hoo.  a weekend with art and culture, intellectual stimulation, writing and exercise.  by God's sweet grace  

miscarriage of justice

the statue of liberty and lady justice should not be in America

miscarriage of justice. police brutality. blatant discrimination.  how did the country ever rise and how can it ever prosper given the multitude of sins it commits. 

America has no right to talk about human rights violation in any other part of the world. they are power crazy and corrupt and filthy to the core. 

context 

1. american elections today

2. watching Chicago 7 now. 

3. George Floyd happened. 

sickening is not the word. not much has changed since slavery ended. 

they are no better than China! 

invading vietnam and destroying the country and people for over 30 years.no morals no scruples nothing.

deny a man his constitutional rights and berate him for interrupting proceedings and gagging him and trying him up for days when he was not even there.  disgusting 

let me not

Let me not grow so cold

as to not notice

the beauty of a single leaf

on its delicate stalk,

the map of its veins dancing

across its yellow green shades.

Let me not grow so cold

as to not notice

the beauty of a single leaf

on its delicate stalk,

its veins dancing across 

yellow green shades.

let me not grow so cold

as to not notice

the beauty of a single leaf

on its delicate stalk 

its veins mapping 

across its yellow green shades

let me not grow so old

as to not notice

the beauty of a single leaf

its delicate stalk

its intricate veins

its yellow green shades 

its dance in the wind

changes in the hody

my body is changing

and I'm not sure I like it

little spots now where there were none before

my breasts head down 

a little paunch at the tummy

sigh

2020

how does one begin writing about 2020? 

we are contending with cmimate change that is catastrophic 

we are living thru a pandemic 

we have dangerous people in power playing dangerous games politically 

we are so divided as a world at a time when unity is the only way to move us forward

1. trump. in power playing games creating division. usa seems to be the brink of a historic election that could bring about chaos and even a civil war of sorts. both sides are armed and ready to take to the streets if their side loses, both convinced the other would have cheated to win

democracy itself at stake with nothing to believe or hold on to. not even the power of the people to vote for their leader 

2. the virus.  100 000 cases in usa alone. europe in second or third place. everywhere a crazy resurgence id the virus. lockdowns imminent. pockets of safety in sg and nz. nowhere else seems safe. this may go on, interminably. 

3. violence. France. cartoonists. beheading of teachers and killing of people in churches. instead of calling for calm leaders standing behind the cartoonists. Poland. protests against abortion laws. 

lost wordsq

The Lost Words: An Illustrated Dictionary of Poetic Spells Reclaiming the Language of Nature

From acorn to wren, a vibrant encyclopedia of enchantments reweaving our broken web of belonging with the rest of nature.

BY MARIA POPOVA

“Words belong to each other,” Virginia Woolf’s melodious voice unspools in the only surviving recording of her speech — a 1937 love letter to language. “In each word, all words,” the French philosopher Maurice Blanchot writes a generation later as he considers the dual power of language to conceal and to reveal. But because language is our primary sieve of perception, our mightiest means of describing what we apprehend and thus comprehending it, words also belong to that which they describe — or, rather, they are the conduit of belonging between us and the world we perceive. As the bryologist and Native American storyteller Robin Wall Kimmerer observed in her poetic meditation on moss, “finding the words is another step in learning to see.” Losing the words, then, is ceasing to see — a peculiar and pervasive form of blindness that dulls the shimmer of the world, a disability particularly dangerous to the young imagination just learning to apprehend the world through language.

In early 2015, when the 10,000-entry Oxford children’s dictionary dropped around fifty words related to nature — words like fern, willow, and starling — in favor of terms like broadband and cut and paste, some of the world’s most prominent authors composed an open letter of protest and alarm at this impoverishment of children’s vocabulary and its consequent diminishment of children’s belonging to and with the natural world.