Vulgarity Of Frugality

Frugality is using only one drop of toothpaste when you can use many, thrift is not wasting, not even one drop.

My Penang lang friend beat the drum loudly announcing to our friends I too have brought the famed Penang trait to Australia.

You brought your Penang frugality habits, the squeezing of the toothpaste till the last drop, to Australia. He was referring to my last blog about the meticulous way I roll up my tube of toothpaste. No, bro. Frugality is using just one measly drop of toothpaste. Hey you, use it sparingly. Thrift is about not wasting, not even one drop of toothpaste is flushed down the sink. You may use a few drops but hey you, do not waste any. Brush your teeth thoroughly before you rinse your mouth. I had to point out the difference, does that mean I have a disorder? Another friend, the Kiwi, encourages me to keep sharing, it’s a great way to let people know the real you, a little at a time. The rumination of a man. I hope that doesn’t make me a narcissist, it would be the ruination of me. Which begs the question. Why do I reveal my soul here? Why bare myself? Soon I’ll be the one without clothes, except I can never be the emperor. It’s a bit like packing up all that we have accumulated over a lifetime, taking a good look at them before we chuck them out in the landfill. This is more than spring cleaning. Spring cleaning is just tidying up, getting rid of surplus requirements, especially stuff we would never use again, dust collectors, space eaters. For me, blogging involves the close examination of my whole life. I have been lucky, for all my childhood and teenage life, my biggest fear was losing a parent or both. My Pa lived till 91, albeit bedridden in his last two years. Ma, touch wood, is still well at 96, well, as well as can be for a nonagenarian. Before a blog, I would collect my thoughts first, re-examine my principles, re-question my ideals and recheck my ideas. That’s the theory of it, my intentions of sharing my stories before I write. But when the ideas flow, maybe past injustices, unfair biases, ingrained attitudes, intuitive suspicions, newly learned philosophical arguments all collide and I reveal my true self anyway. Wu Wei is my new way. From the Tao Te Ching. The Dao is what the natural way is, untainted by desires. I have long called myself the idiotes- an old Greek word, but will I stumble upon the idiot inside me? But, this isn’t spring cleaning, it’s much more than that. It’s the final clean-up. No more clutter of the mind. It’s time to know what to unburden, what to let go, which to forgo, who to forgive, we will ultimately forget anyway. Wu Wei, if it isn’t relevant, we will do without, eventually forget. Let go, go with the flow.

But, this is about frugality. For me, there is a huge difference between being frugal and being thrifty. And then there is being cheap. The main idea of all three terms is about saving money. Saving money; that can’t be a bad thing, right? Which do we fall under? Let me use mandarins as an example. My Ma taught me how to select the best mandarins when I was still a boy. The skin must be smooth and thin to touch – otherwise you’re paying a lot for the skin, and the fruit must not be airy and light when you hold it. The heavier the fruit, the juicier it is. So, this knowledge is well taken advantage of by The Mrs. She leaves me to pick the fruits from the fruit and veggie shops. She says I know best. She’s Hakka, they are taught to leave some good ones for the next customer. You shouldn’t pick all the best ones and leave only bad ones for others. It is vulgar to be frugal, she may easily conclude. The frugal one will pay as little as possible for the best ones, and use them sparingly, as few as possible each time. For a family of five, the frugal mother will serve at most five mandarins for dessert. They will not have second helpings, no matter how hungry they still are. When I was a little boy, Ma would cut an apple for eight of us to share, equally. But, by her definition of what equal means. To her, equal meant eight slices in equal thickness, irrespective of our age, need or degree of hunger. In my example of the mandarins, a thrifty mother would hand pick them of course, the freshest with green stalks and heaviest, and at the lowest price. She would make sure the green stalks are all broken off, she will never ever pay for unusable weight. She would serve them to her family of five but would make absolutely certain that nothing is wasted. They will all have enough to enjoy. Not a slice would be left uneaten, nothing is wasted. The thrifty is in fact wise.

As for the third type, the cheap, they will always go for the cheapest, and therefore usually the lowest quality. It doesn’t matter if the mandarins are damaged, drying up, and past their use by dates. The cheap will just want cheap, they hate spending money. But when they do, the lowest price is their top priority, they will like it best when it’s free. Have you been out with a friend to the local pub where they offer a buy one get one free deal? When it’s time to pay, the cheap will say his was the free meal. Urghhling.

Gee, You Squeegee Too?

Sebastian Maniscalco in Why Would You Do That? appears to be laughing at me too. He declines invitations to stay at friends’ homes whenever he’s travelling. Once, his host handed him a squeegee for the bathroom. What? You want me to squeegee the shower cubicle after I’ve used it? I laughed out loud but then stopped abruptly after my fifth cackle. I was laughing at myself, I mean, who doesn’t stoop low with a squeegee to dry the walls of their bathroom immediately after finishing? Immediately means after drying myself but before drying the walls. Nah, the comedian exaggerates when he says his scrotum might inadvertently scrape the floor if he squats to squeegee the wall tiles. Never mind, it takes me no more than a minute to leave a reasonably dry cubicle after I am done. Let them laugh.

The same with squeezing the last drop of tooth paste from its tube. Before the advent of soft pliable plastic, my toothpaste fights with The Mrs were frequent. Did I say fight? I could never win a fight with her, flight would be a better word. During those days, squeezing toothpaste was an art form, we couldn’t simply squeeze it anyhow we like. Collapsible but not completely, those tubes were made of tin and lead. Aiyaya, you’re too wasteful. Squeeze carefully, meticulously and evenly from the bottom. Make sure it’s totally empty before advancing it up the tube. Waste not a drop. Be sure to screw back the lid tightly, do not let the contents dry up! Even with the plastic tube, we cannot successfully push out all the toothpaste. Aiyaya, do not waste a drop. Scissors please.

I am usually placid and calm. Omitaba. Except when I’m on the road, there I’m a beast. I cannot stand stupid drivers. Green means go! Don’t start and stop! Don’t hesitate, you’re not choosing what clothes to buy. Go! I am on my way to the city, there is a musical in town, and I have been given two free tickets. I know it is going to be great, anything free is a bonus. At the traffic lights, a bloke in front throws out a cigarette butt. Doesn’t he know the butt eventually goes out to the sea? I honk him long and loud. He gives me the middle finger. I honk again. Luckily the traffic light turns green, he doesn’t get to storm out of his car to menace me. Luckily for him, I mean. During the show, they sang a song about what Jesus did when they sentenced him to die. The lyrics pricked at my conscience. Man up. He had to man up.

I’ve gotta stand up
Can’t just clam up
Its time to
Man up!

Alright, alright, let me man up. The bloke who chucked the butt onto the road did get out of his car. He was a huge guy, with mafia looks. He who hesitates at the lights would not hesitate to head butt me had I not changed lane and roared past him when the lights turned green. Luckily for me. The Mrs lectures me. Bla bla bla. You’re a nobody on the road, why do you think you’re a somebody? Who are you to correct others? Bla bla bla. I wish that incident happened after we had attended The Book Of Mormon, I would have given The Mrs the perfect reply which I learned from the musical. In that part of Africa, when something bad happened, they would throw up their hands to the sky and sing.

Hasa Diga Eebowai!

Please don’t ask me what that means. Hasa Diga Eebowai!

The Mrs was heavily pregnant with our first son when I released a Silent Bomb in bed, a most pungent evil smelling fart I had ever made, it caused her to convulse and turn pale in the face. I didn’t understand pregnancies can cause convulsions. That’s the problem with flatulence, you never know what you’re going to get. Will it be loud or silent? More importantly will it be harmless and leave without a trace or will it be embarrass me? Since then, I no longer let one off intentionally in bed. Which makes life most cumbersome, I am seen getting in and out of bed to set off the bombs in the bathroom numerous times a night. Adelaide’s home heating system isn’t as efficient as those boiler systems you get elsewhere. In London, I can be in a t-shirt in my son’s home and won’t feel cold. Here at home in Adelaide, even the Londoner complains about the cold inside the house. To have to leave my warm bed in the middle of the night in the middle of winter just to let off some air from my system is a nuisance. But, what choice do I have? Every now and then I can offer the excuse that it was an accident, unintentional, ageing has its benefits. This is one of them. We can say we no longer have total control of our farts. The Mrs can’t understand why hers is sweet-smelling and mine can be so violently obnoxious when our diet is exactly the same. Despite my efforts, sometimes the evil smells follow me back to the bed.

Hasa Diga Eebowai!

It’s Bizarre About Bob Lazar

Conspiracy theories, I love them. To me, they are as interesting as the J-curve and the inverted yield curve. Despite the WTO clearing China of currency manipulation, Trump repeatedly accuses the CCP of wilfully depreciating the yuan. It’s about the J-curve, in the immediate short term, a devalued yuan would mean a shrinking Chinese economy as imported goods become more expensive, but it won’t be long before it delivers a boom to China’s exports, boosting her GDP. When the long term bond yield is lower than the short term bond yield, the yield curve is inverted. What does it mean to have an inverted yield curve? Inflation expectations for a number of years into the future are lower than today’s and that can only mean a slowing, and therefore contracting, global economy. Since the 2008 global financial crisis, China’s debt instruments have quadrupled to $39 trillion, or twice that of the US. Historically, the inversion of the yield curve predicts accurately the economic recession that follows it, the imploding sharemarket will end the bull run. The yield curve has inverted and we should sell our shares, this is not a conspiracy theory unlike the stories about who shot JFK, the fake moon landing fifty years ago, the 911 attacks being a CIA job or Bob Lazar’s Area 51 stories about little aliens and their saucers.

Some say the assassination of JFK is “the mother of all conspiracies”. Oswald shot Kennedy and Ruby shot Oswald. Case closed, clear-cut, except we do not know if Ruby was killed three years later. Except for the 103 witnesses who “conveniently” died, and the tampering of evidence, even JFK’s body was highjacked from the hospital. Seven eyewitnesses saw smoke in the grassy knoll? Ignore that. Over 1100 documents withheld by the CIA due to “national security” concerns. Douglas Horne, the chief analyst for military records was 90-95% certain the photos in the National Archives are not those of JFK’s brain, they showed an exit wound in the front, consistent with the official verdict that Oswald shot the back of JFK’s head after the motorcade had passed him. JFK’s real brain revealed much greater damage to the rear, consistent with an exit wound and thus evidence of a shot from the front. So, the magic about the “single bullet” still evokes much discussion, how it went through JFK’s skull and throat, passed the governor’s back and wrist, broke two bones, and tore through 15 layers of clothing, and if we were to believe the official photos, somehow change its trajectory to hit JFK’s skull from the front.

As for the moon landing by Apollo 11 fifty years ago, the conspiracy is no more! There is no need to debunk the lack of stars in the perfectly taken photos from cameras hung from the astronauts’ necks, or the lack of blast craters below the landing module or even the inconsistent shadows from the astronauts and their equipment, hinting at various light sources on the moon. NASA finally produced photos of the landing site taken from the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter on 5 November 2011. Unfortunately, there is no photo of the fluttering US flag. The official word is that it was conveniently knocked down by the dust kicked up by exhaust thrust of the lunar module, and is now buried in the lunar dirt. If NASA can photoshop the tracks left by Armstrong, why did they not add the flag to quell further debate?

And then there are the 911 BIG LIES. Jet fuel cannot melt steel, certainly not in a short 56 minutes for the South Tower. Expert witnesses argued convincingly in a Youtube video that even if the steel melted, it would not cause the Twin Towers to collapse in free-fall within 9 seconds. There was simply too much concrete, steel, and other building materials to prevent a free-fall. Besides, there were too many testimonies from witnesses in the building describing the pop-pop sounds of controlled detonations and debris flying off the lower levels, before the buildings collapsed. The Pentagon on the other hand, suffered very minor damage when flight AAL77 hit its wall. Out of the 85 video surveillance cameras on the grounds outside the Pentagon, none managed to capture any image of the aeroplane as it flew over the ground of the Pentagon before impact. Footage showed hardly any wreckage of the plane, and nothing of the passengers’ belongings, no toys, no cabin bags, no toiletries, zilch. The FBI didn’t give any reason why all the footages were confiscated. Just hide them from public view and maintain silence. No cover up, ahem. The hole in the wall was tiny also, far too small to have been caused by the wide wingspan of the commercial airline. That’s a big hole in that story.

Finally, I get to write about Bob Lazar. In the 1950’s, we learned about Roswell, little green men and Area 51. It wasn’t until 2013 that the CIA confirmed the existence and purpose of Area 51, its secrets so tightly held it must be in the national interest to not disclose it to the public for 58 years. Lazar spilled the beans in May 1989 that nine saucers of extraterrestrial origin were being test flown and analysed in Area 51. He knew about S4 in Area 51 when S4 wasn’t common knowledge, because he worked there. He told us about a guy by the odd name of Mike Thigpen who worked for EG&G, a little-known federal agency that recruited people for S4. It took a journalist 30 years to finally find Mike Thigpen who admitted he interviewed Lazar in the 80’s. He told us about the hand scanner that measures the length of our bones decades before its existence was confirmed as a high security device for entry into S4. His job was to reverse engineer the power and propulsion system of the saucer, a system that emits and amplifies gravity into a wave with an antimatter reactor, fuelled by atomic element 115 which didn’t exist in our world until synthesised by a joint team of Russian and American scientists in August 2003. He spoke out against the suppression of extremely supreme advanced technology and unknown science. That it is a crime not to tell humanity about another civilisation that is (more) intelligent and that we have some of their artefacts. The code name was LA 1000 for E115, somewhat copper in colour. It takes a thin three dimensional triangle of E115 to make fuel for the saucers. It’s quite bizarre, fuel without heat and flames? A cylinder of E115 consisting of many discs stacked up and fused together is machined into a 3D cone from which layers of odd pieces are sliced to make the extra gravitational energy. They do not believe Lazar, they even deny employing him in S4. But at least the world now has E115.

No Style With Stye

I used to think I had style. My sons taught me to look after my appearance, not just for appearance’s sake. You will feel good about yourself. It’s about self esteem, another chimed. When you respect yourself, others will too, added the third. Dress well, walk straight, and don’t smell like an old man. Have some style, old man. For all my married life, I hardly peered into the mirror. Why bother? My peers don’t care, The Mrs certainly doesn’t, why do I care? Even when I was the Financial Controller of a consortium that developed retirement villages, it did not occur to me to be stylish. Sure, I may have held meetings dressed in my ill-fitting sky blue Roger David suit, strode intently along Pirie Street with matching scuffed brown shoes and a scuffed brown briefcase containing dreaded white bread sandwiches for lunch. Dreaded it so much I avoided opening my briefcase wide open. Back then was my heyday, my catchcry was make hay whilst the sun shines. Style wasn’t trumpeted by me, it was always about content, content, content. As long as I spoke with substance, there was no need for bespoke suits and shoes, right? I had it all figured out. The emperor without clothes is still the emperor. Hans Christian Andersen was absolutely correct to write about the emperor’s invisible clothes. It didn’t matter to the masses, for they feared they would be considered dumb and unworthy if they pointed out that he was naked. Likewise, in my case, everyone would be too respectful of my position to scoff at my poor fashion sense. My job offered me the status and gave me the self belief to speak with authority. It is remarkable how far illusions can take us! I only stopped The Mrs from cutting my hair after my sons squealed and successfully protested against being subjected to their mother’s elementary haircutting skills. They were still in primary school, whereas I was well into my thirties. We all had the same haircut, we looked clearly from the same family. The Mrs knew how to cut only one style, friends called it The Coconut. I am still amazed at how the sons knew to dislike that style at such a young age. In my thirties, it looked quite alright to me. If my sons reckoned they didn’t look good with the coconut cut, it made sense to follow them, three votes win. Since then, I have been quietly copying them, no one would be so discerning to know, I assured myself. If they looked good in a Boss shirt, I’d go buy one too, in a different colour. If long hair was in, I would be even happier. No need to pay the Korean barber anymore. I never did like her garlic breath hissing down my nape. If they excitedly shared their free sample of SKII facial cream, I’d rush out and get a Jurlique cream, the best local equivalent. When Zara came to town, they all got excited. Who’s Zara, I asked. She must be pretty. I even got myself a Zara V-neck white shirt which I wore to Penang for my recent holiday. My friends wouldn’t know it’s five years old.

I blame Murray for my stye. I knew I did a no-no as soon as I rubbed my eyes on the weekend. Murray had licked my hands earlier. Murray! Bad dog!! No teeth, no licking from now on. Alpha males don’t lick. Especially hands. Despite the science blaming Staphylococcus bacteria for giving us styes, some still say voyeurism causes it. The last time my left eye spied a stye was when I was a little boy growing up in Penang. That was a long time ago, did I peep at the next door’s daughter? My memory fails me, sigh. I still don’t understand the science behind it but my Ma knew exactly how to cure it. First, you wipe your eyes clean with mild soap and warm water. There is no need for antibiotics for now, Ma is averse to unnecessary antibiotics. There is no need to visit a doctor either. Ma is averse to doctors too, they generally will prescribe some costly medication, unnecessary or otherwise. Just get the needle box out, pull a black cotton thread, a length enough to tie it around your middle finger. Count, make sure you tie seven knots, behind a door. Left eye, left finger. Hey presto! The stye will disappear within three weeks. I might just give that a try, even though Mr Google informs me a stye generally will go away by itself in about three weeks. I am anxious to drop my stye as it is starting to cramp my style. I couldn’t even look at the pretty salesgirl straight in the eye today; she furrowed her eyebrows and asked if my “pimple” was contagious. I pretended to mishear her and said I don’t have a dimple. Urghhling.

Poms At The Proms

Summer in London? Go to the Proms, of course! A family friend, Daniel Kidane will open this year’s Last Night at the Proms with his world premiere Woke, a nine minute composition to be performed by the BBC Symphony Orchestra. No doubt the audience will be wide awake for that. Prom is short for Promenade Concert, it’s origin was concerts held outdoors in London’s pleasure gardens. Today, promming means the use of the 1,000 standing places inside the Royal Albert Hall, for which ticket prices are considerably cheaper, at £6. It’s a great way to attend otherwise sold-out concerts, but you’ll need to queue on the morning of the concert, tickets on sale from 9am. It would be a dream of course to be invited to sit in the BBC Radio 3 box, a ticket would easily fetch £6,000. Can you imagine the sound clarity being right there? The Proms is the world’s greatest and oldest classical music festival, held over eight weeks in central London every summer since 1895, yes, even during the two Great Wars. Music lifts our spirits, you have to have great music to win the great wars.

I once went on a holiday with Daniel, in Paris in fact. All expenses paid for him, why not, he is a celebrity. It is rather rare for me to spend my holiday with one, as rare as hen’s teeth you could say. We had a great time, even though it was on a tight budget. I was brought up by my Ningbonese mother in Penang, sorry about that, Daniel. You see, Ningbo people (of Wu Han ethnicity) are also known as the Mingzhou; Ningbo being once the capital of the Ming Prefecture. Ningbo people are also “fondly” known as the Chinese youtai (Jews). The Chinese like being Jewish. Jewishness is short and sweet for a person who values education, is tight-pursed, and has business acumen. Penangites aka Penang-lang have gained an unshakeable reputation as tight-fisted. Someone I know only recently gave up the practice of BYO eggs to the Char Koay Teow street vendor to save 10 sen. What? Why use a 30W globe? 5W will do nicely. Just yesterday, a Penang-lang refused to pay 20 sen for a bag at a food stall, but let’s say he was being environmentally friendly. Another thing, foods past their expiry date do not mean they are inedible, e.g. chinese tea, salted fish, kiam-chai and dried fruits. A lifelong discipline honed in Penang coupled with her Ningbo dna, meant my mother bore the great traits of the two cities, Appreciating Bargains. Thriftiness was a necessary way of life for anyone who lived through the 2nd Sino-Japanese War in China and the Japanese occupation of Penang during WW2. At 96, she naturally still appreciates bargains. I am grateful she imparted such a sensible habit to me. I described Ma as thrifty, it is right not to be wasteful; but perhaps as an admission of guilt, my Penang-lang friend said he was frugal. Frugality requires a person to use everything as little as possible, that to me is wasteful of life. So, Daniel, I hope you understand that it is not how much we spend on our holiday but how we spend it. It is magnanimous of you after our holiday to want to compose a piano trio for me or was it a cello duet? You know I love the cello. Daniel, if you don’t mind, can the theme be based on 432? My father’s favourite number at the bookies. He won a tidy sum of $20,000 with that number just before I was born, a very good omen. 432, or D,C, B will be the recurring theme. Pa passed away in 2007, I want to dedicate your music to him. His ashes are interred in a niche, his memorial tablet is in column 4, row 32. I think he is still smiling.

Robbing Robin

It was five years go today that Robin Williams took his life. He was 63, an age when most of us would be enjoying retirement or at least thinking about when. He suicided in Paradise Cay, I reckon the enclave falsely marketed its name for that was where he ended his life. His last movie was Absolutely Anything, should have been Absolutely Anything But Suicide. He’s gone. I still miss him, he was one of a handful of people who could make me laugh. A bloke who made the whole world laugh by seeing the lighter side of life couldn’t make himself see the lighter side of his life. He couldn’t, so what chance do we have? The autopsy’s findings was that he had Lewy Body dementia. I had not heard of Lewy Body disease until now; the early symptoms would have been difficult to live with, sudden spikes in fear and anxiety, insomnia, constipation and urinary problems. In the end, it was so debilitating that the paranoia, delusions, memory loss, and acute depression took their toll on him.

Losing Robin was devastating for me five years ago, it was then that I had my own demons to deal with, to exorcise. My demons were just small ones to chase away, which may explain why I never did anything great. Like Robin, Sergei Rachmaninov too suffered from severe depression all through his life, noticeably after the death of his idol, Tchaikovsky. His aunt suggested he try a new treatment from Sigmund Freud called psychoanalysis. Sergei took her advice and underwent hypnotherapy and psychotherapy. He was lucky that professional help was availed to him. When he finished his Piano Concerto No. 2 , one year after starting therapy, he dedicated it to his doctor, Nikolai Dahl. We are lucky, actually. Sergei never recovered from depression, all through his life, he continued to struggle with periods of delusions in his mind contrasted with periods of intense creativity, leaving great works for all of posterity to enjoy. Other great artists that left us huge legacies despite their severe depression include Robert Schumann and Vincent Van Gogh. Vincent severed his ear and suicided at a young age of 37, after a manic life of psychotic delusions. He shot himself with a revolver, and died a failure and a madman. It took the world decades after his death to realise the genius in the madman, a tortured soul somehow brings the best out of us. The tortured soul brought out the best from Robert too. He is widely regarded as one of the best composers of the Romantic Era. A failed attempt to suicide meant his consignment to an asylum for the remaining two years of his life. He never recovered from his mental illness. Robin, Sergei, Robert and Vincent, I am on first name basis with them. Why not, they helped me immensely when I was at my lowest. They are welcomed in my home and in my mind, unconditionally. After all, I feel indebted to them. Not only for the gifts they have left behind, the laughter, the great music, the paintings, they also guided me to safety. Yes, they are constant companions of mine, a reminder that although life can be bleak and dark, and when it seems there is no point to carry on, we must carry on. Yes, I must carry on, unlike them, I have achieved nothing that can be left for posterity. Unlike them, I don’t deserve to rest yet.

Gold, But I’m Old

Can’t wait for them to go to school, The Mrs used to harp daily when our three boys were not yet ready for kindy. Kindergarten was painted as a place of paradise, not for the kids, but for their mother. Her theory was once they are there, she would be free to “do her own thing”. Motherhood was a shock to her system, it robbed her of herself. No matter how she tried to make her life about her, it was really about them. Once we had them, she lived for them. As for me, I thought I was striving to climb the corporate ladder for me, but in truth, I was working for them. I never saw my take home pay, I never checked our bank account, I was the accountant but The Mrs managed the home budget better than I ever could. Collecting cheap antiques was my hobby, it was better I didn’t touch the little money that we had. Yeah, now that I’m 60, I can admit that the foolishness wasn’t in appreciating antiques but in collecting cheap ones. The thrill was always in finding a bargain, such as the bloke who paid peanuts for an Imperial Faberge egg which once belonged to the Romanovs, in a garage sale in America’s Midwest. And so the legend lives on, the cheap antique isn’t a cheap fake story.

A few years after my boys went to school, I could hear The Mrs chanting Can’t wait for them to go to uni. I thought I was showing my wisdom when I reasoned with her. Don’t you see? We would be a lot older once they are in uni. Do you really wish to age so fast? Looking back, those were my most productive years. It was my golden period of accumulation; a 10oz gold bar, a couple of cottages and a river front villa, franchises, blue chip shares that despite the hot tips turned into junk. For years whenever I used toilet paper, I couldn’t help but be reminded they were worth more than the paper shares in my drawer.

Can’t wait for them to finish uni, soon echoed at home. Don’t you see, I asked The Mrs. Once they finished uni, we would become empty nesters. Is that really what you wish for? What would we do with all our precious collections at home? The bookcases of books, the cassettes from the 70’s when pop music ruled our airwaves, the TEAC and TDK VHS tapes, the Collectors Edition CDs, the boxes and boxes of THX Digitally Mastered DVDs? Who will watch those classics with us? Who will find the Jacqueline Du Pre CD for us to play?

I’m now 60. For 17 years, The Mrs and I have been empty nesters. The boys have become young men, I can’t even imagine their footsteps coming down the stairs anymore. Their rushed heavy footsteps were a reminder of some exciting moments in our lives. Someone’s here! Oh, a delivery man, what’s the parcel?! Ahya and Ahnia are here! What a warm welcome for their grandparents. Everyone has left, their grandpa, forever. The collections of cheap antiques are still here, collecting dust. An unintended collection on my collections. I know one day I have to let go, those that have not gone, unlike the franchises and villas that went up in smoke after the GFC (global financial crisis of 2008). Go with the flow. In the Tao Te Ching, we learn about the softness of water, and at the same time admire its ability to break the hardest rock. Go with the flow, let it bifurcate if it chooses to. I may once be the master of the house but surely it’s time to abdicate? But what about the gold bullion? Should we still hide it? What if we forget where its hiding place is? As The Mrs said, let’s not even buy green bananas. Who knows if we have the time to wait for them to ripen? Aaahh, there is wisdom after all. It won’t be long before I tell her to finish the desserts before our meal. Let’s not wait that long.

White Bread For The White Bred

Grafton, NSW. A town with less than 20,000, some 600 km NNE of Sydney is famous for its Jacaranda trees and country music singers. A claim to fame made infamous now by one of their white sons, the lone killer in what is now known as the Christchurch Massacre. I shall call him The Loner, will not grace him with his name. According to a recent article about him in the Sydney Morning Herald, those around him in his formative years described him as just a harmless, quiet boy who was more comfortable playing by himself in the park. A little odd and shy too. I could easily fit that description too. He didn’t elicit any dislike for non-whites publicly or privately, he wasn’t a back-stabber. White-bred doesn’t mean his upbringing was necessarily filled with white supremacist teachings. He wasn’t taught hatred, no homegrown anti Muslim ideology to make someone turn evil. He was such a dear little boy, his Nanna said.

But, The Loner grew up to be evil, a lone killer of 51 believers of Islam, and let us not forget to remember the 49 wounded. Is a white town like Grafton complicit in their horror, and deaths? I think we can shrink the geography much more, and pinpoint his bedroom as the oven of his evil. There with his computer and internet connection, was where he mixed the seeds of far right extremism from hate sites like 4chan and 8chan, with the dough he inherited from his dad, who died of mesothelioma after years of chucking building scraps (asbestos) onto his truck.

4chan and 8chan. They sound Asian, don’t they? Ironically, they are the melting pots for white neo-Nazis and modern day white KKKs and skinheads to foment their vile hatred against all that don’t look like them. The chans are online forums created by young New Yorkers where testosterone charged young blokes share and encourage racist and misogynistic views, which eventually hardened into child pornography and hard-lined neo-Nazi propaganda. Their posts are anonymous and they vanish after a short time, leaving no trace except in the emboldened minds and attitudes of their readers. They spilled over to the rest of the Internet after amassing social media power through their ability to mass hack and troll any one or institution that they detest, especially those guilty of political correctness.

“These guys, these rootless white males, had monster power…..You can activate that army…..get (them) turned on to politics and Trump.” Quote from Steve Bannon, election campaign chief for Trump who later became White House strategist. He was one of the early ones to recognise the power of this online mob. Who will say he did not harness that power?

A new wave of extremism coincided with the wave of “illegal” Muslim migrants who swamped Europe in recent years. These refugees were economic migrants seeking greener pastures and asylum seekers fleeing their war-torn countries such as Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya. The sheer numbers that crossed The Mediterranean Sea to Italy and Spain were a worrying sight for all of Europe, its peak was 1.8 million in 2015. This gave birth to the Identitarians, those who believe Europe is under attack by Muslims who seek to displace them in their traditional white lands via “outbreeding” the locals and mass immigration.

The vile and vitriolic online world he was visiting converged with his real-life travels to countries that experienced bitter wars between the white populace and Muslim “transgressors”. In his manifesto, The Loner wrote that the “invasion” of France by “non-whites” espoused online had been “profoundly understated”. Whilst leaving a French town, his emotions were “swinging between fuming rage and suffocating despair”.

The Loner should spend the rest of his life in a prison cell, preferably served nothing but white bread. Why, white bread?

Before the Agricultural Revolution, humans never died of obesity. And then we discovered white bread. Highly-processed carbohydrates are digested quickly, without providing us with much nutrients except a quick surge of energy. They cause blood sugar to spike soon after eating, and, because they lack fiber, The Loner will not feel full. He will crave more food again soon after, especially when the blood sugar drops. In a prison cell, The Loner will not have much freedom to exercise, inevitably the white bread he consumes will lead to weight gain, chronic diabetes and heart diseases. Feed white bread to the white bred. Urghhling.

Vedanta, A Vendetta?

Darth Vader, the Dark Lord of the Sith loomed large over me when I first watched Star Wars in 1977. Hissing and seething inside his helmet, he scared me, maybe even scarred me for life, when he clutched at Captain Antilles’ throat, lifted him off the floor and flung him like a unwanted rag doll after throttling him to death. Darth Vader sounds very much like death, invader. The Sith Order is depicted as an ancient monastic force with supernatural fighting abilities, hell bent on intergalactic domination. They would have to stamp out the Jedi Order to achieve supremacy over the galaxies. Lately though, Veda haunts me. The Veda, for orthodox Indian theologians, are revered revelations seen by ancient sages after long periods of intense meditation. Was Vader named after Veda? Could George Lucas have been well versed with the Vedas from the beginning of Star Wars? Could the tragic palpable demise of Vader, consigned to the deepest abyss of despair by Palpatine, the Sith Master, Emperor of the Empire be a warning to all humanity not to ignore the teachings of the Vedas? The Vedas are religious texts from ancient India, they form the oldest scriptures of Hinduism, not of a man, and authorless.

Bikash, is this a vendetta? Did we fight like Vader and Kenobi when we were kids? I have been restless, wrecking my mind, ever since you informed me about Vedanta. It is a concept too big and way too deep for me to grasp. Wikipedia for once, sounded unbelievable to me. Vedanta literally means “end of the Vedas“, reflecting ideas that emerged from the philosophies contained in the Upanishads, ancient texts in Sanskrit, sitting next to the teacher, receiving spiritual knowledge. The end of the Vedas? The Vedas cannot succumb to a higher force! Schools of Indian philosophy that treat the Vedas as their source of scriptural authority are classified as orthodox. Irrespective of whether they are orthodox or not, the texts in The Vedas discuss the same concepts and form the spiritual core of Hinduism. Bikash makes more sense. Rather than “end of the Vedas”, Vedanta is actually Veda (knowledge) and anta (at the end), meaning complete knowledge or the absence of ignorance. “When we discover our true self, we will discover the purpose of our existence.”

Earlier, I wrote that the physical throttling of a soldier to death in Star Wars scared me. It was the display of utter evil and power that troubled me. Where was the loyalty to his men? The compassion? The forgiveness for failure? The unnecessary execution of a soldier? That the Lord of the Sith would carry out a personal vendetta against his own captain? That he had the compulsion to physically crush his victim’s throat? This was not as frightening as a scene in a later sequel, where he demonstrated the vengeful and wrathful power of a Sith lord. The ability to force choke a soldier, in this case Admiral Ozzel, who had failed to crush the rebels from space. Darth Vader simply opened a channel known as a holoscreen and force choked the admiral to death from a great distance whilst looking at him through the view screen. That was a display of awesome power previously unknown to the universe. Things can be better explained when we have true knowledge of them. That is the theory of perception of the Vedanta. Bikash encourages me to sharpen my intellect and mind, our great instruments that allow thinking, knowing, feeling and understanding. “Vedanta nurtures one to develop a strong intellect so that it can be a strict supervisor on the wanton mind.” Only then can you find the truth about what’s happening not only outside yourself but also within. Suddenly, it all made sense to me why George Lucas named the Dark Lord, Vader. Vader knew all along his loyalty to Emperor Palpatine was a lost cause. End of the Veda, Vedanta. The force choke was not a vendetta after all. It was just a senseless act of a defeated evil force. May the force be with you.

Ashtray Gone Astray

“The Gun” was our pride in school, our champion. He represented Penang in a national swimming meet in ’74. I didn’t ask if he won gold but anyone will tell you he’s still a champ with a heart of gold. I think he is known as The Gun because of his affinity to water, we all loved the water gun at school, it was one toy which only the rich kids could afford. He still goes to the pool most days, I assume he means the swimming pool and not the pool lounge. It came as a big shock today to learn that he wants to quit smoking. Our swimmer has been a smoker?! Where is the smoking gun? Can you imagine what his big lungs look like after decades of abuse? For his sake, I do wish he will quit, immediately. But, old cobbers have a stubborn streak, we tend not to care about ourselves. A recent returnee from London echoed exactly that when asked to join the quitters. Nah, Thanks bro 🙏🏼🙏🏼

I’m sorta waiting to contract some serious degenerative disease or pulmonary condition, before considering.., kinda.

Haven’t really given it much thought… 😔

Well, let us focus on one at a time. There is hope for The Gun. He has successfully negotiated the day without weakening his resolve, so far. As long as he reminds himself of his daughter’s wish, whispered to him recently, he has a good chance to quit and remain a quitter. “She wishes that I’ll still be around to take her down the aisle. That’s pretty touching.”

What should we do first, to quit? It’s obvious, I said! Throw away your ashtray. A smoker would never throw away their cigarettes, I reasoned. Strangely, on my way to the office today, a sister asked if our father ever smoked in front of me when I was little. She asked me because I was very much glued to Pa when I was a young lad. Pa was sunshine in my eyes and I was his shadow. Of course he never! My auto-protect-Pa instincts kicked in. He never smoked in front of me. He never. But, I didn’t tell her I loved to follow Pa to his favourite haunt, a club he helped formed. He would take me there for his mahjong sessions, every weekend and even the occasional week night. San Kiang Association was a club for migrants from the three Jiang’s in China, Jiangsu, Jiangxi and Chejiang. The club’s building is in Macalister Lane, diagonally across the quiet dark lane was a dimly lit stall manned by a craggy old woman. To call hers a stall is a courteous exaggeration, all her stock was displayed on a wooden stand 2 ft wide x 3 ft high, on the Ngo ka-ki. The Ngo ka-ki or five foot way is a unique Strait Settlement feature, first introduced by Thomas Stamford Raffles who learned it from the Dutch East Indies. The roofed continuous public walkways connecting long stretches of link commercial houses offer ample relief from severe heat and heavy tropical downpour. I looked forward to being sent to the old vendor on the Ngo ka-ki, if Pa’s drawer was filled with chips, especially big blue ones, then Pa would surely add a roll of Haw flakes for me, to his packet of Camel. The club room was air conditioned, it was the norm that all six mahjong tables were occupied, which equates to 24 smokers and more. The “more” are those who hang around hoping losers would vacate their seats. Yes, I admit I was a passive smoker for much of my boyhood years. Ashtrays were a bane to me even then. Filthy and stinky, enough to deter me from smoking.

When I decided to do a commerce degree in accounting at the UNSW, it never crossed my mind that it meant I would continue to be a passive smoker, in my profession. In the 80’s and early 90’s in Australia, the work place was not a safe haven against passive smoking. As a non smoker, even my office was equipped with a dirty ashtray. It was good manners to provide one for the smokers who may enter my office. It is revolting now to think back of those days. I can still see clearly life after work at home. My little sons would hide under the sheets as soon as they hear my car entering the driveway. Pretending not to know where they are, I would call out their names and search high and low for them, leaving their room till last. As soon as I stepped into their room, they would “attack” me and I would fall like a detonated tower. They would then smother me all over. Only now I realise how badly I would have smelt of cigarettes to them.

When I had my first retail shop, I traded my suit and ties for a broom and mop. My first day as a shopkeeper is unforgettable. Having swept and mopped the floor, I was just about to admire the good work I had done when a customer walked in with a lit cigarette. He left a trail of dirty cigarette ash, flicking his cigarette as he browsed meaninglessly. Hey, why are you following me with that stupid ashtray, he asked.

I am glad the ashtray is gone, for good. Iranian airlines’ orders for 200 commercial jets with Boeing and Airbus have been jeopardised because of Trump’s unilateral decision to tear up their nuclear pact. This means we will continue to see ashtrays on the seats of Iran Air’s planes. The ashtray has gone astray, but that’s not exactly the truth. Although smoking has been banned in airplanes for over thirty years, the ashtray in the plane toilet is still a legal requirement. Only because the FAA does not trust us not to smoke in the toilet. We can’t risk the quitter from secretly smoking inside the plane’s toilet, the ashtray is the only safe way to dispose of a lit cigarette. Urghhlings.