W. B. Yeats

Am suddenly thinking about this wonderful poem.

He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven

by William Butler Yeats

Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths,

Enwrought with golden and silver light,

The blue and the dim and the dark cloths,

Of night and light and the half-light,

I would spread the cloths under your feet:

But I, being poor, have only my dreams;

I have spread my dreams under your feet;

Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

Unending Love

Was reading up on the life of Audrey Hepburn, and came across this lovely poem recited by Gregory Peck (her co-star in Roman Holiday) after her death.

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Unending Love

by Rabindranath Tagore

I seem to have loved you in numberless forms, numberless times...

In life after life, in age after age, forever.

My spellbound heart has made and remade the necklace of songs,

That you take as a gift, wear round your neck in your many forms,

In life after life, in age after age, forever.

Whenever I hear old chronicles of love, it's age old pain,

It's ancient tale of being apart or together.

As I stare on and on into the past, in the end you emerge,

Clad in the light of a pole-star, piercing the darkness of time.

You become an image of what is remembered forever.

You and I have floated here on the stream that brings from the fount.

At the heart of time, love of one for another.

We have played along side millions of lovers,

Shared in the same shy sweetness of meeting,

the distressful tears of farewell,

Old love but in shapes that renew and renew forever.

Today it is heaped at your feet, it has found its end in you

The love of all man's days both past and forever:

Universal joy, universal sorrow, universal life.

The memories of all loves merging with this one love of ours -

And the songs of every poet past and forever.

(Translated by William Radice)

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What the Modern Woman Wants

I happened to stumble into this blog and read this piece of prize-winning essay written by a 15-year-old Singaporean student. All I can say is that I admire the young lady who authored this piece, but I salute the woman who raised this child.

I pinched the essay to share it here, so it is in no way mine.

*****

What the Modern Woman Wants...
By Amanda Chong Wei-Zhen

The old woman sat in the backseat of the magenta convertible as it careened down the highway, clutching tightly to the plastic bag on her lap, afraid it may be kidnapped by the wind.

She was not used to such speed, with trembling hands she pulled the seat belt tighter but was careful not to touch the patent leather seats with her callused fingers, her daughter had warned her not to dirty it, 'Fingerprints show very clearly on white, Ma.'

Her daughter, Bee Choo, was driving and talking on her sleek silver mobile phone using big words the old woman could barely understand. 'Finance', 'Liquidation', 'Assets', 'Investments'... Her voice was crisp and important and had an unfamiliar lilt to it.

Her Bee Choo sounded like one of those foreign girls on television. She was speaking in an American accent. The old lady clucked her tongue in disapproval......

'I absolutely cannot have this. We have to sell!' Her daughter exclaimed agitatedly as she stepped on the accelerator; her perfectly manicured fingernails gripping onto the steering wheel in irritation.

'I can't DEAL with this anymore!' she yelled as she clicked the phone shut and hurled it angrily toward the backseat. The mobile phone hit the old woman on the forehead and nestled soundlessly into her lap. She calmly picked it up and handed it to her daughter.

'Sorry, Ma,' she said, losing the American pretence and switching to Mandarin. 'I have a big client in America . There have been a lot of problems.'

The old lady nodded knowingly. Her daughter was big and important.

Bee Choo stared at her mother from the rear view window, wondering what she was thinking. Her mother's wrinkled countenance always carried the same cryptic look.

The phone began to ring again, an artificially cheerful digital tune, which broke the awkward silence.

'Hello, Beatrice! Yes, this is Elaine.'
Elaine. The old woman cringed. I didn't name her Elaine. She remembered her daughter telling her, how an English name was very important for 'networking', Chinese ones being easily forgotten.

'Oh no, I can't see you for lunch today. I have to take the ancient relic to the temple for her weird daily prayer ritual.'

Ancient Relic. The old woman understood perfectly it was referring to her. Her daughter always assumed that her mother's silence meant she did not comprehend.

'Yes, I know! My car seats will be reeking of joss sticks!'

The old woman pursed her lips tightly, her hands gripping her plastic bag in defence. The car curved smoothly into the temple courtyard. It looked almost garish next to the dull sheen of the ageing temple's roof.

The old woman got out of the back seat, and made her unhurried way to the main hall. Her daughter stepped out of the car in her business suit and stilettos and reapplied her lipstick as she made her brisk way to her mother's side.

'Ma, I'll wait outside.. I have an important phone call to make,' she said, not bothering to hide her disgust at the pungent fumes of incense.

The old lady hobbled into the temple hall and lit a joss stick, she knelt down solemnly and whispered her now familiar daily prayer to the Gods. 'Thank you God of the Sky, you have given my daughter luck all these years. Everything I prayed for, you have given her. She has everything a young woman in this world could possibly want.

'She has a big house with a swimming pool, a maid to help her, as she is too clumsy to sew or cook. Her love life has been blessed; she is engaged to a rich and handsome angmoh man.

'Her company is now the top financial firm and even men listen to what she says... She lives the perfect life. You have given her everything except happiness. I ask that the gods be merciful to her even if she has lost her roots while reaping the harvest of success.

'What you see is not true, she is a filial daughter to me. She gives me a room in her big house and provides well for me. She is rude to me only because I affect her happiness. A young woman does not want to be hindered by her old mother. It is my fault.'

The old lady prayed so hard that tears welled up in her eyes. Finally, with her head bowed in reverence she planted the half-burnt joss stick into an urn of smoldering ashes.

She bowed once more. The old woman had been praying for her daughter for thirty-two years. When her stomach was round like a melon, she came to the temple and prayed that it was a son.

Then the time was ripe and the baby slipped out of her womb, bawling and adorable with fat thighs and pink cheeks, but unmistakably, a girl. Her husband had ticked and punched her for producing a useless baby who could not work or carry the family name.

Still, the woman returned to the temple with her new-born girl tied to her waist in a sarong and prayed that her daughter would grow up and have everything she ever wanted.

Her husband left her and she prayed that her daughter would never have to depend on a man. She prayed every day that her daughter would be a great woman, the woman that she, meek and uneducated, could never become.

A woman with 'neng kan '; the ability to do anything she set her mind to. A woman who commanded respect in the hearts of men. When she opened her mouth to speak, precious pearls would fall out and men would listen.

She will not be like me, the woman prayed as she watched her daughter grow up and drift away from her, speaking a language she scarcely understood.

She watched her daughter transform from a quiet girl to one who openly defied her, calling her laotu, old fashioned.... She wanted her mother to be 'modern', a word so new there was no Chinese word for it.
Now her daughter was too clever for her and the old woman wondered why she had prayed like that. The Gods had been faithful to her persistent prayer, but the wealth and success that poured forth so richly had buried the girl's roots and now she stood faceless with no identity, bound to the soil of her ancestors by only a string of origami banknotes.

Her daughter had forgotten her mother's value. Her wants were so ephemeral, that of a modern woman. Power, wealth, access to the best fashion boutiques and yet her daughter had not found true happiness. The old woman knew that you could find happiness with much less.

When her daughter left the earth, everything she had would count for nothing. People would look to her legacy and say that she was a great woman but she would be forgotten once the wind blows over, like the ashes of burnt paper convertibles and mansions.

The old woman wished she could go back and erase all her big hopes and prayers for her daughter now that she had looked out of the temple gates. She saw her daughter speaking on the phone, her brow furrowed with anger and worry. Being at the top is not good, the woman thought, there is only one
way to go from there –down.

The old woman carefully unfolded the plastic bag and spread out a packet of beehoon in front of the altar. Her daughter often mocked her for worshiping porcelain Gods. How could she pray to them so faithfully and expect pieces of ceramic to fly to her aid?

But her daughter had her own gods too, idols of wealth, success and power that she enslaved to and worshiped every day of her life.

Every day was a quest for the idols, and the idols she worshiped counted for nothing in eternity. All the wants her daughter had would slowly suck the life out of her and leave her, an empty souless shell at the altar.
The old woman watched the joss stick. The dull heat had left a teetering grey stem that was on the danger of collapsing.

Modern woman nowadays, the old lady signed in resignation, as she bowed to the east bone a final time to end her ritual. Modern woman nowadays want so much that they lose their souls and wonder whey they cannot find it.

Her joss stick disintegrated into a soft grey powder. She met her daughter outside the temple, the same look of worry and frustration was etched on her daughter's face.

An empty expression, as if she was ploughing through the soil of her wants looking for the one thing that would sown the seeds of happiness. They climbed into the convertible in silence and her daughter drove along the highway, this time not to fast as she had done before.

‘Ma,’ Bee Choo finally said. 'I don't know how to put this. Mark and I have been talking about it and we plan to move out of the big house. The property market is good now, and we managed to get a buyer willing to pay us seven million for it. We decided we'd prefer a cosier penthouse apartment instead. We found a perfect one in Orchard Road . Once we move into our apartment, we plan to get rid of the maid, so we can have more space to ourselves...'

The old woman nodded knowingly. Bee Choo swallowed hard. 'We'd get someone to come in to do the housework and we can eat out – but once the maid is gone, there won't be anyone to look after you. You will be awfully lonely at home and, besides that the apartment is rather small. There won't be space. We thought about it for a long time, and we decided the best thing for you is if you moved to a Home. There's one near Hougang – it's a Christian home and a very nice one.'

The old woman did not raise an eyebrow.
'I"ve been there, the matron is willing to take you in. It's beautiful with gardens and lots of old people to keep you company! Hardly have time for you, you'd be happier
there. You'd be happier there, really.' her daughter repeated as if to affirm herself.

This time the old woman had no plastic bag of food offering to cling tightly to, she bit her lip and fastened her seat belt, as if it would protect her from a daughter who did not want her anymore. She sunk deep into the leather seat, letting her shoulders sag and her fingers trace the white seat.

'Ma,' her daughter asked, searching the rear view window for her mother. 'Is everything okay?'

What had to be done, had to be done.
'Yes' she said firmly, louder than she intended, 'if it will make you happy,' she added more quietly.

‘It's for you, Ma! You will be happier there. You can move there tomorrow, I already got the maid to pack your things.'

Elaine said triumphantly, mentally ticking yet another item off her agenda. 'I knew everything would be fine.' Elaine smiled widely; she felt liberated. Perhaps getting rid of her mother would make her happier...

She had thought about it. It seemed the only hindrance in her pursuit of happiness. She was happy now. She had everything a modern woman ever wanted; money, status, career, love, power and now freedom without her mother and her old-fashioned ways to weigh her down...

Yes she was free. Her phone butted urgently, she picked it up and read the message, still beaming from ear to ear.

'Stock 10% increase.' Yes, things were definitely beginning to look up for her and while searching for the meaning of life in the luminance of her hand phone screen, the old woman in the backseat became invisible and she did not see her in tears.

*****

The Road Less Travelled

There once lived an American poet who wrote a poem that gave much to think about:

The Road Not Taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveller, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-

I took the one less travelled by,

And that has made all the difference.

- Robert Frost (1874-1963)

And I wondered if it was an homage to the value of courage and curiosity when M. Scott Peck opted the book title 'The Road Less Travelled' for his writing 32 years ago.

Of the many books I've read, I think this is a rather unique one in terms of the response it evoked amongst readers. I was recommended to this brilliant writing by my friend, WW, whom I must really thank for sharing it with me. I would guess that WW found the ideas in the book insightful and thinking it would benefit me, recommended that I take time to read it. And I did. And because I found the ideas truly thought-provoking, I gifted it to another friend of mine, whom I believe will benefit from it. And she did. And she in turn gifted it to another friend of hers, whom she thought desperately needs the insights of the book. And he did. Believe it or not, my friend WW picked it up as a recommendation from her friend.

I think this continuous cycle of recommendation is a convincing testimony of how enormously helpful the ideas in this book are.

I believe the book appeals to many because it discusses a central theme we all share: life is a series of problems. Life is difficult because confronting and solving problems (depending how severe the problem) can be very painful. And because we fear this painful process, we attempt to avoid confronting problems, which ironically only results in greater pain.

In this book, Scott Peck proposed a rather sound argument to the psychology of our escapism, the discipline-or our lack of- to confront pain and our shortcomings, the fear of challenging our reality maps and belief systems, and the miracle of our unconscious. He also discussed the mystery of love, and I think he argued eloquently the idea of love versus dependency. He articulately defined love as, "The will to extend one's self for the purpose of nurturing one's own or another's spiritual growth." An entire section is dedicated to discussion of Love and its myths, misconceptions, and power - all of which I believe most, if not all, of us struggle with at certain points in our lives. Here's to give a very brief idea what he thinks love is and is not:

• Love is a strangely circular, evolutionary process.
• Love includes self-love with love for the other.
• Love is effortful, not effortless.
• Love is an act of will; we choose to love. 'Falling in love' is not real love because it is not a conscious choice.
• Dependency and self-sacrifice is not love, but antilove.
• Genuine love is self-replenishing.
• Love is separateness; the distinction between oneself and the other is always maintained and preserved because genuine love respects the unique individuality of the beloved.

The book also discussed the concept of grace, miracles, evil and laziness as the original sin. In essence, it methodologically defines the purpose, motivation, barriers and promises of spiritual growth. And I believe that we could all very well benefit from a deeper understanding of ourselves. I personally felt the book was not easy to read because it evokes a lot of self-examination (which most of us would prefer to conveniently avoid) and critical dissection of the beliefs I hold true thus far. Can you imagine coming to the realization all that you think is true and best, is not? At the same time, it is also comforting to know some of my thoughts and questions were affirmed on print by an experienced psychiatrist. It somehow makes the journey down the road less travelled less alone.

I felt compelled to blog on this book because I believe it had been a comfort to the few lives I know who've read it. And I wish to extend this recommendation to everyone with an interest or curiosity in spiritual growth. I believe when we've gained greater insight of ourselves and of life, it becomes easier for us to understand the pains of other people and be compassionate to them. And I think from there, we will be able to call out great courage from within ourselves to take the road less travelled.

So, do go ahead, pick it up and enjoy a good reading =)

～みはる～

Buddhism and Modern Science

Came across this very curious article.

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Buddhism, the only real science

by Venerable Ajahn Brahmavamso Mahathera

I used to be a scientist. I did Theoretical Physics at Cambridge University, hanging out in the same building as the later-to-be-famous Professor Stephen Hawking. I became disillusioned with such science when, as an insider, I saw how dogmatic some scientists could be. A dogma, according to the dictionary, is an arrogant declaration of an opinion.

This was a fitting description of the science that I saw in the labs of Cambridge. Science had lost its sense of humility. Egotistical opinion prevailed over the impartial search for Truth. My favourite aphorism from that time was: "The eminence of a great scientist, is measured by the length of time that they OBSTRUCT PROGRESS in their field"!

To understand real science, one can go back to one of its founding fathers, the English philosopher Francis Bacon (1561 - 1628). He established the framework on which science was to progress, namely "the greater force of the negative instance".

This meant that, having proposed a theory to explain some natural phenomenon, then one should try one's best to disprove it! One should test the theory with challenging experiments. One must put it on trial with rigorous argument.

When a flaw appears in the theory, only then does science advance. A new discovery has been made enabling the theory to be adjusted and refined. This fundamental and original methodology of science understood that it is impossible to prove anything with absolute certainty. One can only disprove with absolute certainty.

For example, how can one prove the basic law of gravity that "what goes up comes down, eventually"? One may throw objects up one million times and see them fall one million times. But that still does not prove "what goes up comes down".

For NASA might then 'throw' a Saturn rocket up into space to explore Mars, and that never comes down to earth again. One negative instance is enough to disprove the theory with absolute certainty.

Some misguided scientists maintain the theory that there is no rebirth, that this stream of consciousness is incapable of returning to a successive human existence. All one needs to disprove this theory, according to science, is to find one instance of rebirth, just one!

Professor Ian Stevenson, as some of you would know, has already demonstrated many instances of rebirth. The theory of no rebirth has been disproved. Rebirth is now a scientific fact!

Modern science gives a low priority to any efforts to disprove its pet theories. There is too much vested interest in power, prestige and research grants. A courageous commitment to truth takes too many scientists out of their comfort zone.

Scientists are, for the most part, brainwashed by their education and their in-group conferences to see the world in a very narrow, microscopic, way. The very worst scientists are those who behave like eccentric evangelists, claiming that they alone have the whole truth, and then demanding the right to impose their views on everyone else.

Ordinary people know so little about science that they can hardly even understand the jargon.

Yet, if they read in a newspaper or magazine "a scientist says that?", then they automatically take it to be true. Compare this to our reaction when we read in the same journal "a politician says that?"! Why do scientists have such unchallenged credibility?

Perhaps it is because the language and ritual of science has become so far removed from the common people, that scientists have become today's revered and mystical priesthood.

Dressed in their ceremonial white lab coats, chanting incomprehensible mumbo jumbo about multi-dimensional fractal parallel universes, and performing magical rituals that transubstantiate metal and plastic into TVs and computers, these modern day alchemists are so awesome we'll believe anything they say. Elitist science, as once was the Pope, is now infallible.

Some know better. Much of what I learnt 30 years ago has now been proved wrong. There are, fortunately, many scientists with integrity and humility who affirm that science is, at best, a work still in progress.

They know that science can only suggest a truth, but can never claim a truth. I was once told by a Buddhist G.P. that, on his first day at a medical school in Sydney, the famous Professor, head of the Medical School, began his welcoming address by stating "Half of what we are going to teach you in the next few years is wrong. Our problem is that we do not know which half it is!" Those were the words of a real scientist.

Some evangelical scientists would do well to reflect on the (amended) old saying "Scientists rush in where angels fear to tread" and stop pontificating about the nature of the mind, happiness and even Nirvana. Neurologists are especially prone to such neuroses (Neurosis: an undue adherence to unrealistic ideas of things).

They are claiming that the mind, awareness and will, is now adequately explained by activity in the brain. This theory was disproved over 20 years ago by Prof. Lorber's discovery of the student at Sheffield University with an IQ of 126, a First Class degree in mathematics, but with virtually no brain (Science, Vol. 210, 12 Dec 1980)!

More recently, it was disproved by Prof. Pim Van Lommel, who demonstrated the existence of consciousness activity after clinical death, i.e. when all brain activity has ceased (Lancet, Vol. 358, 15 December 2001, p 2039).

Although there may be correlation between a measurable activity in part of the brain and a mental impression, such co-occurrence doesn't always imply that one is the cause of the other. For instance, some years ago, research showed a clear correlation between cigarette smoking and the non-occurrence of Alzheimer's disease.

It was not that smoking cigarettes somehow caused immunity from Alzheimer's, as much as the tobacco companies might have wished, it was only that many smokers did not live long enough to get Alzheimer's disease!

Thus a co-incidence of two phenomena, even when repeated, does not mean that one phenomenon is the cause of the other. To claim that activity in the brain causes awareness, or mind, is plainly unscientific.

Buddhism is more scientific than modern science. Like science, Buddhism is based on verifiable cause-and-effect relationships. But unlike science, Buddhism challenges with thoroughness every belief.

The famous Kalama Sutta of Buddhism states that one cannot believe fully in "what one is taught, tradition, hearsay, scripture, logic, inference, appearance, agreement with established opinion, the seeming competence of a teacher, or even in one's own teacher".

How many scientists are as rigorous in their thinking as this? Buddhism challenges everything, including logic.

It is worth noting that Quantum Theory appeared quite illogical, even to such great scientists as Einstein, when it was first proposed. It is yet to be disproved. Logic is only as reliable as the assumptions on which it is based. Buddhism trusts only clear and objective experience.

Clear experience occurs when one's measuring instruments, one's senses, are bright and undisturbed. In Buddhism, this happens when the hindrances of sloth-and-torpor and restlessness-and-remorse are both overcome. Objective experience is that which is free from all bias.

In Buddhism, the three types of bias are desire, ill will and sceptical doubt. Desire makes one see only what one wants to see, it bends the truth to fit one's preferences. Ill will makes one blind to whatever is disturbing or disconcerting to one's views and it distorts the truth by denial.

Sceptical doubt stubbornly refuses to accept those truths, like rebirth, that are plainly valid but which fall outside of one's comforting worldview.

In summary, clear and objective experience only happens when the Buddhist 'Five Hindrances' have been overcome. Only then can one trust the data arriving through one's senses.

Because scientists are not free of these five hindrances, they are rarely clear and objective. It is common, for example, for scientists to ignore annoying data, which do not fit their cherished theories, or else confine such evidence to oblivion by filing it away as an 'anomaly'.

Even most Buddhists aren't clear and objective. One has to have recent experience of Jhana to effectively put aside these five hindrances (according to the Nalakapana Sutta , Majjhima No. 68). So only accomplished meditators can claim to be real scientists, that is, clear and objective.

Science claims to rely not only on clear and objective observation, but also on measurement. But what is measurement in science? To measure something, according to the pure science of Quantum Theory, is to collapse the Schroedinger Wave Equation through an act of observation.

Moreover, the "un-collapsed" form of the Schroedinger Wave Equation, that is before any measurement is made, is, perhaps, science's most perfect description of the world.

That description is weird! Reality, according to pure science, does not consist of well-ordered matter with precise massed, energies and positions in space, all just waiting to be measured. Reality is the broadest of smudges of all possibilities, only some being more probable than others.

Even basic 'measurable' qualities as 'alive' or 'dead' have been demonstrated by science to be invalid sometimes. In the notorious 'Schroedinger's Cat' thought experiment, Prof. Schroedinger's cat was ingeniously placed in a real situation where it was neither dead nor alive, where such measurements became meaningless. Reality, according to Quantum Theory, is beyond measurements. Measuring disturbs reality, it never describes it perfectly.

It was Heisenberg's famous 'Uncertainty Principle' that showed the inevitable error between the real Quantum world and the measured world of pseudo-science.

Anyway, how can anyone measure the measurer, the mind? At a recent seminar on Science and Religion, at which I was a speaker, a Catholic in the audience bravely announced that whenever she looks through a telescope at the stars, she feels uncomfortable because her religion is threatened.

I commented that whenever a scientist looks the other way round through a telescope, to observe the one who is watching, then they feel uncomfortable because their science is threatened by what is doing the seeing! So what is doing the seeing, what is this mind that eludes modern science?

A Grade-One teacher once asked her class "What is the biggest thing in the world?" One little girl answered "My daddy". A little boy said "An elephant", since he'd recently been to the zoo. Another girl suggested "A mountain".

The six-year-old daughter of a close friend of mine replied, "My eye is the biggest thing in the world"! The class stopped. Even the teacher didn't understand her answer. So the little philosopher explained "Well, my eye can see her daddy, an elephant, and a mountain too. It can also see so much else. If all of that can fit into my eye, then my eye must be the biggest thing in the world." Brilliant!

However, she was not quite right. The mind can see everything that one's eye can see, and it can also imagine so much more. It can also hear, smell, taste and touch, as well as think. In fact, everything that can be known can fit into the mind. Therefore, the mind must be the biggest thing in the world. Science's mistake is obvious now. The mind is not in the brain, nor in the body. The brain, the body and the rest of the world, are in the mind!

Mind is the sixth sense in Buddhism, it is that which encompasses the five senses of sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch, and transcends them with its own domain. It corresponds loosely to Aristotle's "common sense" that is distinct from the five senses.

Indeed, ancient Greek philosophy, from where science is said to have its origins, taught six senses just like Buddhism. Somewhere along the historical journey of European thinking, they lost their mind! Or, as Aristotle would put it, they somehow discarded their "common sense"! And thus we got science. We got materialism without any heart. One can accurately say that Buddhism is science that has kept its heart, and which hasn't lost its mind!

Thus Buddhism is not a belief system. It is a science founded on objective observation, i.e. meditation, ever careful not to disturb the reality through imposing artificial measurements, and it is evidently repeatable.

People have been re-creating the experimental conditions, known as establishing the factors of the Noble Eightfold Path, for over twenty-six centuries now, much longer than science. And those renowned Professors of Meditation, the male and female Arahants, have all arrived at the same conclusion as the Buddha.

They verified the timeless Law of Dhamma, otherwise known as Buddhism. So Buddhism is the only real science, and I'm happy to say that I'm still a scientist at heart, only a much better scientist than I ever could have been at Cambridge.

Courtesy: Buddhist Society of Western Australia.

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Have a Little Faith

Several months ago, I picked up the book "Tuesdays with Morrie" by Mitch Albom thanks to recommendation from a few friends. It gave me a lot to think about life, death and how we (and I) are living our present now. It was then timely as I was struggling to find the meaning of life and living in the past, present, and future.

Almost a year later, I picked Mitch's second non-fictional account, "Have a Little Faith", also by recommendation. Interestingly, it was also now timely read, because I've been pondering questions on faith. Like the author, I think about what the meaning and sense of faith is to me and what bearing it has in my life and the place I live in today.

Have a Little Faith is Mitch's account of his journey and experiences between two faiths, which started when his rabbi, Albert Lewis, requested for Mitch to write his eulogy. He accepted the request on the condition that he get to understand this rabbi as a man and we read this journey of 8 years. In parallel, Mitch also tells of his involvement with a pastor, who is a reformed drug dealer and convict, and is preaching to the homeless in a run-down church with a hole in its roof.

It is a lovely book, very well-written and gives much to think about. For me, it is a reminder of how I made life difficult for me by missing the simple yet elegant points in life. And how faith can help to keep us from discourse when we fail to see these points in life. There are a few quotes from the book that I would like to share:

"...faith is about doing. You are how you act, not just how you believe."
- Albert Lewis

"Be satisfied. Be grateful. For what you have. For the love you receive. And for what God has given you."
- Albert Lewis on the secret of happiness.

"Sometimes, if they are communicating well, they have a good chance. If they have a similar belief system, similar values, they have a good chance. Love they should always have. But love changes. Love-the infatuation kind - 'he's so handsome, she's so beautiful'-that can shrivel. As soon as something goes wrong, that kind of love can fly out the window. On the other hand, a true love can enrich itself. It gets tested and grows stronger. That kind of love - the kind you realize you already have by the life you've created together - that's the kind that lasts."
- Albert Lewis on survival of marriages.

"I think people expect too much from marriage today. They expect perfection. Every moment should be bliss. That's TV or movies. But that is not the human experience. Like Sarah (his wife) says, twenty good minutes here, forty good minutes there, it adds up to something beautiful. The trick is when things aren't so great, you don't junk the whole thing. It's okay to have an argument. It's okay that the other one nudges you a little, bothers you a little. It's part of being close to someone."
- Albert Lewis on marriage.

"A happiness you cannot find alone."
- Albert Lewis on commitment to each other in marriage.

"Would you want the world to all look alike? No. The genius of life is its variety. Even in our own faith, we have questions and answers, interpretations, debates. In Christianity, in Catholicism, in other faiths, the same thing - debates, interpretations. That is the beauty. It's like being a musician. If you found the note, and you keep hitting that note all the time, you would go nuts. It's the blending of the different notes that makes the music. (The music) Of believing in something bigger than yourself."
- Albert Lewis when Mitch asked why is the world so fractured (with many different faiths).

"That is not faith. That is hate. And if you ask me, God sits up there and cries when that happens."
- Albert Lewis when asked what if someone from another faith won't recognize yours or wants you dead for it.

"But today is not yesterday."
- Mitch Albom

"That kindness saved my life."
- Cass on Pastor Henry Covington providing him shelter and food when he was homeless.

"I know it. I done 'em, too. But it's not me against the other guy. It's God measuring you against you."
- Cass when Mitch commented that Henry has done some bad things in his life.

"Maybe all you get are chances to do good, and what little bad you do ain't much bad at all. But because God has put you in the position where you can always do good, when you do something bad - it's like you let God down. And maybe people who only get chances to do bad, always around bad things, like us, when they finally make something good out of it, God's happy."
- Cass on Henry Covington's past and his work for the homeless.

"If you could pack for heaven, this was how you'd do it, touching everthing, taking nothing."
- Mitch Albom

"Mitch, it does no good to be angry or carry grudges. It churns you up inside. It does you more harm than the object of your anger. (Let go) or don't let it get started in the first place. You know what I found over the years? When I had a disagreement with someone, and they came to talk to me, I always began by saying, "I've thought about it. And in some ways maybe you're right.""
- Albert Lewis on forgiveness.

"And I should be ashamed of thinking I knew everything, because you can know the whole world and still feel lost in it. So many people are in pain - no matter how smart or accomplished - they cry, they yearn, they hurt. But instead of looking down on things, they look up, which is where I should have been looking, too. Because when the world quiets to the sound of your own breathing, we all want the same things: comfort, love, and a peaceful heart."
-Mitch Albom

"Please love one another, talk to one another, don't let trivialities dissolve friendships..."
- Albert Lewis in his final message to his congregation.

～みはる～

For You A Thousand Times Over

Of late, I seem to have a knack for picking really emotionally wrecking books.

The Kite Runner.

I never intended to pick up this fiction although my friends had given raving recommendations, well... at least not yesterday. But I had time to spare while waiting for my Japanese lessons, so I loitered around the Bestsellers section of Kinokuniya. And thought, why not read a chapter?

Six chapters later, I was queueing at the cashier paying for this Khaled Hosseini debut.
And finished it in one sitting.

It's been a long time since I've read a fiction so riveting it vexed me out, so raw it hurt me hard, and so painful it cried me down. I finished the book with puffy eyes. Damn.

The Kite Runner is a story revolving around Amir, a wealthy Pashtun boy, and Hassan, the son of Amir's father's Hazara servant, in a backdrop of politically-morphing Afghanistan. Playmates from birth, a tragic childhood incident haunted them into adulthood, driving them apart. Wiki's got a lengthy review of the book, so I'm not going to do it here.

What moved me most about The Kite Runner was Khaled Hosseini's style of storytelling. He didn't use fancy words or alluring phrases to impress. It was straightforward and to the point, yet so emotionally evoking. I personally think his scoring point was that he used themes so human and universal: longing, fear, cowardice, loyalty, love, jealousy, shame, guilt, forgiveness, redemption. In short, emotion.

His depiction of Hassan's loyalty was so altruistic it made me cry. That Hassan bore no resentment towards Amir for the sexual assault he had to go through and his sincerity to Amir regardless the stark contrast in their status,... my tears flow for the pureness of Hassan's humanity was not valued by the person he so loved most.

As good fiction does, the story was thought-provoking. It pained me when Amir didn't stand up for Hassan when he was sodomized by Assef. As the story was written with Amir as the protagonist, we get to follow the emotional turmoil he had to go through as he battles the demons that haunt him after the incident. And how he finally redeems himself.

Personally, I think that what Amir had done was unforgivable, regardless whatever he does after the incident to redeem himself. The damage was done, and "I'm sorry" will not reverse the sexual assault that has happened. At the same time, I don't think Amir is to be blamed. In fact, I don't think there is anyone whom we can lay the blame on.

Amir had made a decision at the alley where Hassan was facing off Assef. He had two choices: to step in and prevent the assault, or to stay rooted and watch the assault proceed. Amir had decided on the latter. And for that, he had to bear the consequences of making that decision, which was to live with the fact that he could have saved Hassan from emotional (and physical) scarring but opted not to. And bear the shame and guilt for as long as he lives, alone. In retrospect, even if he had made the first of the two choices, that is to step in and prevent the assault, he would also have to bear the consequences, such as getting himself bashed up or assaulted by Assef instead.

Why then, had Amir decided on the latter over the former choice? This is where I think the environment factor comes into place. Amir was brought up in that precise environment, nurtured in that precise culture, exposed to that precise conformations of that precise society he lived in, all of which leads to his decision. Amir's decision was a consequence of the his upbringing, i.e. the result of the actions of other people all his lifetime. In fact, I think it doesn't apply to just Amir alone, but every character in the story: Hassan, Assef, Baba, and so on. Therefore, I think at that state at that time, Amir's decision was inevitable. Rather, it was a result waiting to happen, a result of all the actions in the past.

It brings home the point of which I have been mulling over quite a while.
Life is living with the consequences of the actions you take.
At every moment in time, we are making decisions, consciously and subconsciously. And every choice that we are presented with brings with it consequences that we have to carry, significant or insignificant. But how do we know which choice to make? Which is right, or wrong? We don't know. There is no right or wrong. We make decisions based on our rationale, our values, our thoughts. And our rationale, values, and thoughts were molded by the environment we were brought up in. And the environment we live in is a continuing consequence of actions by our families, friends, enemies, society.

That is why the Lord Buddha preaches of the cause and effect: karma.

.
.
.


Like I said, the book was thought-provoking. And it gives me material for reflection.
The verdict is The Kite Runner is one hell of a fiction that you shouldn't miss. Evocative, as Chicago Tribune put it.

And the tagline gives me goosebumps no matter how many times I read:


For you a thousand times over.

～みはる～

Underground

Rarely do I find a book that moves me to tears.

Haruki Murakami's Underground did.

A window to the minds of the Japanese, whose lives were derailed simply because they took the wrong train, wrong carriage at the wrong time. How the Tokyo sarin gas attack changed (or not) their lives.

Imagine just another Monday, catching just another routine rush hour train to work. And just another passenger beside you dropped 2 packets of lethal sarin on the floor of the train carriage. That could be the last Monday of your entire life.

Underground is a chilling account of how the biological terrorism changed some of the perspectives of the victims and the people close to them. A particularly heartbreaking account is that of a pair of siblings, Shizuko & Tatsuo Akashi's. Shizuko was rendered temporarily vegetative, and has since regained consciousness, but have yet recovered from the brain and muscular functions damaged by sarin. The attack robbed her of her speech, memory, mobility and her future. And her brother Tatsuo bears the mental and physical burden of the tragedy that had so wrongly befallen upon them.

However, Shizuko and Tatsuo perservere; trying to move on with their lives and coping with the tragedy. Their story provides us all material for rumination. As Haruki Murakami puts it thoughtfully:

"...what does it mean to be alive? If I were in Shizuko's place, would I have the willpower to live as fully as she? Would I have the courage, or the persistence and determination? Could I hold someone's hand with such warmth and strength? Would the love of others save me? I don't know."
-Haruki Murakami, Underground

～みはる～

Code Geass Manga

I got new Code Geass Vol.4 manga!!!!

A kick start to reviving the heat of Code Geass.
Bring on Code Geass R2!!!!

ps: While I'm a Lelouch fangirl, don't you think Schneizer looks seriously cool on the cover?

～みはる～

RXJ Manga

やっときた！
ロミオX ジュリエットの漫画が。

Front cover

Back cover

Okay, so this is the RXJ-niac writing.
I got hold of the only (remaining) copy of Romeo X Juliet Japanese manga last weekend. Wai~~!

With the anime ended (T_T), the manga version is slated to release until next year. And the first volume made its debut in Japan since 25th August. The story is essentially the same, but the sequence of events were slightly altered. And get this: the manga version has a slightly more romantic impact. The drawings are comparable to Gonzo's, but much cuter (with all the chibi's) as Juliet was granted larger and more adorable eyes and prettier dresses and hair curls. I could keep gushing about how pretty the drawings look, but I'll let the splash pages do the talking (although the horrible resolutions of the images do no justice to the actual gorgeous-ness):

Splash page

Volume #1 splash

When's volume #2 releasing??!!

A Plasmid Fairytale

My experiments lately keep bumping into dead ends, and while searching for information online, I came across this very interesting site. The allegory is very relevant to what I'm currently doing, and I can't help laughing at the personification of the bacterial molecules. I'm sure bioscience students, and those who are not but understand the terms, will find this tale funny XD. Enjoy.


The wise molecular biologist tells us the tale:

Once upon a time, a plasmid met a cell, and they struck up a conversation. Saith the plasmid, "Kind cell, I bring thee a gene for antibiotic resistance, and if you let me in, I shall repay you by showing you how to make an enzyme that might save your life one day." The cell replied with annoyance, "What use hath I for the likes of thee? My food is all gone, I'm freezing my pili off, and you think my biggest problem is antibiotics? Maybe you're just a selfish gene, looking for a cell to make copies of you. Begone!" The plasmid smoothed out his supercoils, dodged a DNase, and tried to think of a suitable reply.

Just then, a massive wave of thermal energy struck them both, and it was all he could do to not lose his footing, standing as he was on the cell membrane. The plasmid trembled, partly to distribute the energy uniformly to his vibrotational degrees of freedom, but mostly at the thought of how painful thermal denaturation might be. Fortunately, it was not coming to that. Not this time. The temperature was high enough to pop a few hydrogen bonds, and his strands were breathing a bit, but he was covalently closed after all. He could handle it!

The cell was not so lucky, however. His membrane, which had been reasonably firm to this point, began to swirl and form vortices, and lost its smooth surface. The cell had gotten used to the cold temperatures by boosting the fraction of short chain and unsaturated fatty acids in his membrane. While it gave the membrane a good consistency in the icy cold, it was completely wrong for this new, higher temperature. The van der Waals interactions weren't strong enough to maintain cohesion, and errant lipids were now leaping through the bilayer like divers at a mosh pit. Huge patches of the membrane were involuting, bringing massive gulps of medium inside. The cell was just seconds away from a complete membrane breach!

Then, as quickly as it had started, the problem was over. The buzz of thermal energy was drawn away by some unseen entropic sink, and dissipated. The membrane returned to its glassy-smooth state. The plasmid was now inside the cell, having been carried through the membrane in its moment of weakness, but the cell was too preoccupied to notice the uninvited guest. The cell was using his last remaining energy to bail out the excess liquid, and set his ion gradients to rights. When he thought he could do no more, that his determined course would be senescence and death, a warm flow of fresh medium restored his spirits.

"Ah! Tryptone, and yeast extract", he said as he gratefully derepressed half a dozen operons. His ribosomes got right to work, making the enzymes that would help to catabolize the new food source and restore the structure of the cell to full health. He almost exclaimed, "I thought Darwin had me for sure that time!" but being a cell with little memory he had already forgotten the privations of a few minutes earlier. Thirty minutes passed, and he found himself cast onto a wide surface that was warm and rich in nutrients.

"Not bad", he said. I could live like this for generations!" But then, the horrible sounds of dying cells reached him. All around him, his brethren were being killed by an unseen attacker. An antibiotic was there, and was destroying the entire population. Oh the humanity! He braced himself for death, but then ... nothing happened. He was alive!

"Remember me?", said the plasmid. "I told you that I might save your life one day, and now it has come to pass." The plasmid, which had gone unnoticed since the thermal catastrophe, had been copied several times and transcribed by the cellular machinery. It had provided a gene that encoded an enzyme that destroyed the antibiotic before it even got into the cell. Although more antibiotic was diffusing into the neighborhood, the enzyme was on the job, and prevented it from doing any damage.

"Yes, you were right", said the cell. "I am grateful that you transformed me, and now that I have a logical explanation for my good health, I don't have to develop survivor guilt either. Stick with me, plasmid, and I'll make sure you are provided with a high copy number."

The generations passed, and the cell divided many times. Each time there was fission, the two daughter cells received an inheritance of plasmid copies. There was widespread prosperity.

I would say "They lived happily ever after", but sadly that is not the end of the story. The daughter cells grew into a prodigious colony, and soon had destroyed so much of the antibiotic in the immediate vicinity that the real danger had passed. Some cells that had not perished in the original attack even managed to survive and grow nearby - little "satellite colonies" seeking refuge from the high levels of antibiotic elsewhere.

Then the cells in the big colony became lazy. The plasmid was not replicated to the same high copy number - it no longer served the interests of the cell to do so. Sometimes, daughter cells did not inherit even a single copy of the plasmid! As the colony aged and grew, the proportion of cells that carried the plasmid became less and less.

The colony actually believed itself to be quite progressive on this point. Some of the more strident cells even argued: "Why should young cells be forced to make enzymes that they don't need?" They said "We want to evolve higher order characteristics, not merely regurgitate the knowledge that served our great-great-great grandcell!" Before long it was unfashionable to carry the plasmid, though a few still did, but the colony grew faster without the added responsibility of the added synthesis.

One day, a toothpick scraped the colony from a plate and carried it high into the sky. "At last," the progressive cells thought, "we are entering a bold new era in which we are going to be able to realize our true genetic potential!" The toothpick was dropped into a tube of fresh medium. The fresh medium had fresh antibiotic.

What happened next is almost too horrible to tell. The cells that still carried the plasmid lived of course. They produced the enzyme that destroyed the antibiotic. The cells that had not inherited the plasmid were unworried at first, because they thought that a protective shield of enzyme could be built by the others, but being in liquid medium there was no hope for them. The antibiotic was not limited by diffusion, as it had been on the plate, and they were soon overcome.

The few wise cells that had not lost their plasmid went on to eternal storage in glycerol stocks, and were written about in books and famous journals. They were grown in huge 10,000 liter fermentation tanks, and provided with the very richest medium that had ever been made!

The end.


～みはる～

Nodame Cantabile on fire

My favorite bookstore Kinokuniya is having a members-only-sale for the month of December 2006. Not wanting to miss the great discount, I traveled downtown today to get some good bargains. Earlier, I had caught on the heat of Nodame Cantabile, and so had bought the first two volumes of Nodame Cantabile Japanese manga for reading pleasure. Maybe it is the influence of the spectacular drama, but I find the two volumes enjoyable (plus, the Japanese is not very difficult to understand haha), so am quite looking forward to get a few more volumes since there's such a good bargain now.


Nodame Cantabile volume 01 and 02

Much to my dismay, volumes 1 thru 14 are all SOLD OUT!! T_T
When I asked the bookstore assistant if they have anymore stock other than those displayed on the shelf, she said it's out of stock in Singapore and even in Japan! Because the Nodame Cantabile drama is now airing in Japan and is extremely popular, the manga ran out of print! And there is still no word as to when the new batch of print will be produced.

It's amazing how the drama can create such increbile fandom for the manga. Ninomiya Tomoko must be laughing her way to the bank now XD. It's sad that I couldn't get the volumes I intended to buy, but the dry stock is a reflection of Nodame Cantabile drama's popularity. I'm very glad that it is popular, as I think the drama cast did a wonderful job in the acting of the show.

However, Lady Luck must be at my heels today as I managed to spot a f.i.n.a.l copy of Nodame Cantabile volume 9 on the shelf. Of course I grabbed it before the next person had the chance to. Bwahahaha. On top of that, after paying for it and tearing the plastic cover off, I realized that volume 9 is the volume I wanted to read. The drama version ends at volume 9, and I get to read where the current episode 09 left off. Double bwahahaha.


Nodame Cantabile volume 09

今はのだめカンタービレすごいにんきがありますよね。。。
みんなさんもぜひドラマもまんがもやってみたいね。
どちらもすごくよかったですよ　～＿＜

Ninomiya Tomoko manga

～みはる～

美しい日本の私

美しい日本の私 (Japan, the Beautiful and Myself)

I came across these beautiful poems when reading the autumn edition of Kateigaho magazine featuring Kawabata Yasunari's Nobel lecture.


春は花夏ほととぎす秋は月冬雪さえてすずしかりけり

-道元（１２００年～５３年）の「本来面目」-

( "In the spring, cherry blossoms, in the summer the cuckoo.
In autumn the moon, and in winter the snow, clear, cold."
- quoted from 'Innate Spirit, by Dougen )

雲を出でて我にともなふ冬の月風や身にしむ雪や冷めたき

-明恵上人（１１７３年～１２３２年）-

( "The winter moon comes from the clouds
to keep me company.
The wind is piercing, the snow is cold."
-by Myoe )

...月を見る我が月になり、
我に見られる月が我になり、
自然に没入、自然と合一してぬます。

( "Seeing the moon, he becomes the moon,
the moon seen by him becomes him.
He sinks into nature, becomes one with nature.”

- quoted from Japan, the Beautiful and Myself
Kawabata Yasunari, Nobel Laureate 1968 )

I have an innate fetish for abstract and reflective poems or haiku and the likes, so bear with the literary phrenetic mood of mine. I find it simply amazing these poetic maestroes can churn such emotionally rendering words.
本当に美しかった。

～みはる～