Today, the trend is to have everything keyless. Keyless locks, keyless ignition, keyless homes, keyless cars. Yet, there is one key that many are still looking for, the key to happiness.

From time immemorial, humans have searched for happiness. Maybe not the hunter gatherers…. I figured they had it good, once their hunt was successful, and there would be plenty of animals in the wild to catch, there would be many hours of leisure time left for them to enjoy the vast virgin lands, pristine rivers and fresh unpolluted air. They had a keyless entry to happiness.

Socrates was an early philosopher to decide happiness comes from “self knowledge” or wisdom, not from property, or the use of property. He links happiness to virtue, without being virtuous, one cannot attain happiness. Can we be happy if we do not have good health? Can the wise one laugh if he succumbed to hunger?

Two thousand three hundred years ago, the pursuit of happiness, according to Aristotle, requires a lifetime quest for “complete virtue”, i.e. health, wealth, friends, knowledge, generosity, etc. A ledger that keeps a record of a lifetime of experience to tell us whether we achieved happiness. That requires a perfect memory! Aristotle would have frowned on today’s “instant gratifications” such as drugs, alcohol, gluttony. It is not uncommon to read about earthlings who maim fellow humans, and other animals for sexual gratification, starve them, torture them and slowly kill them. That is their path to happiness. Urghhlings.

The religious amongst us may instead agree with Thomas Aquinas and hold dear the beauty of God as the gateway to happiness. Perhaps, it is love that they mean. Without love, can there be happiness? But, those who love do not always find the right person to love. Look at the divorce rates around the world. Many of those who love will find happy divorce lawyers eventually.

The Hedonist confuses pleasure with happiness. Many derive pleasure from food, unfortunately too much good food will lead to health problems. Today, there is much evidence of diseases from gluttony.

Throw away the key to happiness, it comes with too many unintended consequences.

Above is a painting by The Mrs. I made a small request to have her paint a white butterfly resting on my shoulder. After many bruising requests, she finally compromised by adding a butterfly. She paints it fluttering against the bright sun, above my head; not resting on my shoulder and almost unnoticeable. Well, I shall have to interpret the hidden meaning in her painting; the butterfly is about to rest on my shoulder!

“Happiness is like a butterfly. The more you chase it, the more it eludes you. But if you turn your attention to other things, it comes and sits softly on your shoulder.”
– Henry David Thoreau

As a concerned earthling about the damage plastic is doing to our environment, I religiously collect the very little plastic that comes my way each fortnight and bin them in the one with the yellow lid. Ah yes, I wear my halo and feel good about my small contribution as I watch from my curbside the local council truck disappearing down my street. Smell the freshness of the gum leaves, the world around me is unspoilt and clean.

I tut tut at my Malaysian friends who share their street food photos on Whatsapp. Tsk tsk tsk, I cannot help but annoyingly point out the ubiquitous plastic in their photos. Plastic cups, bowls, plates, chopsticks, even tables and chairs stacked up high like towers ready for the next hordes of hungry patrons. They even shared videos of how plastic rice, eggs and seaweed are served to the eager consumers. Yesterday, they dropped a bombshell. My beautiful imagined world of “do the right thing” turned out to be fake, plastic one could say. They shared reports of 60 Minutes’ expose’ of Australia’s recycling lie. Urghhlings. Since China stopped all imports of plastic waste for recycling in January 2018, other countries have stepped up and bought plastic rubbish from the UK, Australia and New Zealand, in the name of recycling. One such country is Malaysia where dozens of illegal processing sites “recycle” by dumping, burying or burning. My world may still be clean and the gum leaves may still soothe my nostrils, but I am devastated that those in many parts of Malaysia are thrashed by our rubbish. Curbside recycling gave me a clean conscience, I do my little bit to reduce my carbon footprint, the rest I leave to the city council and governments, both state and national, to sort out the mess. I did not realise that plastic recycling to them meant recycling plastic trash from country to country. Now that China and the other Asian countries have figured out sorting out other countries’ rubbish is not worth the damage to their own environment, Australia will have to find other ways of hiding their plastic waste or finding new ways of using their wastes. It seems apparent to me that instead of focusing on recycling, the authorities may be more effective by selling the message of reducing usage, in other words, reducing packaging. Alternatives such as paper bags and cotton bags may not be the solution though. According to a British government study, we have to use a paper bag three times or a cotton bag one hundred and thirty one times, to gain a net benefit of contributing fewer carbon emissions once the effect of producing the bag is taken into account. Why did we change our ways? Why did we not continue to follow our forefathers, they used rattan baskets and wrapped their shopping in old newspapers tied up with string. Let us go back to bringing our own multi-tiered enamel metal food containers rather than the takeaway plastic food cartons used by restaurants. Alternatively, have our food wrapped in banana leaves instead of plastic bags. Olden day methods were so sensible and practical, yet we abandoned such eco-friendly practices. Why? Waitrose in the UK have started a “bring your own container” trial that encourages their customers to buy and refill without plastic packaging. The Waitrose Unpacked trial offers savings of 15% to consumers; the environment may hopefully be the bigger winner.

Hey, there is no ‘s’ in the plural of accommodation, I pointed out to my friend who calls himself Ahpek. He’s a great blogger, very detailed and informative. I do not have his eyes for detail nor memory to recall interesting events. It is from reading his blogs that prodded me to blog.

Ugly people. Annoying are those who give unsolicited corrections to our grammar and spelling mistakes. It is scientifically proven that those who have the compulsion to be grammar police are unpopular and even despised. Urghhlings, yet why did I do it? Why did I not curb the urge to tell him the plural of accommodation is accommodation. No s! Another friend was quick to say I made an ass of myself. How tactful.

Another friend chirped in. As long as the message comes across….don’t worry, be happy and healthy. As if being correct with the use of a language somehow diminishes our happiness and affects our health adversely. Yet another reinforced that idea. Who cares, at our age? Whatever can do….. be merry, be happy. Ok, happiness is obviously the goal here.

Let’s be happy, don’t worry about grammar, who cares if we spell wrongly? Close enough is good enough. But, we need to have our message come across fully and correctly! Words are a source of misunderstandings. Misunderstandings are a source of conflict. True, it is annoying to be corrected, especially when it is over some trivial word.

I can appreciate at our advancing age, we may be more inclined to relax our rules and standards, but should we “let go” and annul all we have learned and strived for throughout our careers? Here, it is merely the vocabulary or grammar, but will it lead to a slippery slide and we become that someone who embraces “close enough is good enough” in everything else?

I have often called myself the local idiotes (old Greek word for a private person). It wouldn’t surprise me if my friends think I meant I’m the local idiot. They wouldn’t be necessarily wrong. Calling myself that gives me the passport to be as honest with myself as I can be. It is liberating. But, I refuse to be one who accepts close enough is good enough. The day that happens is the day I’m too close to my coffin.

A friend in Hong Kong routinely reminds me there is no such thing as a free lunch. As someone who refers to earthlings as urghhlings, I should very readily agree with him. After all, it is a common practice for businesses to buy their clients lunch. The business pays, it is not free! My friend exclaims exuberantly.

It is not free, the client will feel obliged to attend the lunch. Also, obliged to listen to the sales pitch, or worse, obliged to accept the terms of the deal.

There is no free lunch. If true, what can we say about philanthropy? Does the person who donates to a cause encourage, support, contribute, enable, promote, perhaps even ensure the viability of that venture? Is it out of passion, generosity, care, or even charitable leanings?

Philanthropy is of course not charity. The latter alleviates suffering or loss, it does not address the root cause of the problem, the difference between the proverbial gift of a cooked meal versus teaching them how to farm and cook. But, can philanthropy be actually a selfish act? For a tax deduction to reduce their tax burden? For the opportunity to trumpet one’s generosity and status in their society? To absolve one’s sins?

No, I have consistently argued the point to my friend that although Homo Sapiens are generally awful creatures, the most ruthless in the animal kingdom, there is such a thing as a free lunch. I love freebies, the meal is especially tasty, the occasion is especially happy for me! Often I remind myself of the kind Bangladeshi taxi driver in London who drove me from Heathrow to Grove Park. Upon hearing my son was delayed in Japan, and I had no cash on me, he insisted on stopping by a deli to buy me milk and a loaf of bread, in case I went hungry. He refused my offer to reimburse him with my credit card. There is such a thing as a free meal, without obligation, without debt.

It was free and unconditional. My friend would argue it cannot be free, someone paid for it. Precisely. It is basic maths; for him to say someone paid, it must also mean the receiver got it for free. It has to be zero sum equation.

Thanks for joining me!

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton