Shiva's and Metta's Mother's Sutra

One of the first things which i stopped loving was a country. This love for a country, patriotism, is an insane conceit. You can love your friends, your family, your lovers, your children (of course), an idea, a forest, a plant, a community, beauty, a piece of land even.... but a COUNTRY? What does a country consists of that i should love it and what does loving a country mean? And also love - apart from the love of innocent things, like children and animals - is something which needs to be earned in order to be kept. If my values do not coincide with the values of a place or a community, i can respect it, or maybe not respect it, if the community happens to be a community of slave owners, there is nothing in the world which says that i must love it. Why am i writing crazy? It is because it is the 50th anniversary of Singapore's 'Independence' and there is a lot of crazy making going round. Most notably, how Singapore is the best place in the world and we must all lov...

The Thinker in the OUE building Yesterday i attended a talk which was organised by some environmentalists here. It was held in the NTUC building which was in the middle of the business district. It has been years since i have been here, so i set out early to walk about the place. Everything is very very large  I arrived during rush hour and people were simply pouring out of the MRT. The crowds were swarming down escalators and out of offices - but they were not overground. No, they were underground, at the MRT. In fact thee was no one above ground. For the business district at rush hour, above ground was eerily quiet! There must be dozen of buildings which look like these To think that hundreds of thousands of people work in places like this. I used to work in a place like this. Admittedly these buildings are far more swishy and very sleek. It was like being in some espionage film set in the future. There were rehearsals for the National Day Parade and Sarah...

Hopefully we will be here in a week's time There are only two places you can get a real nature experience in Singapore. One is Macritchie Reservoir, the other is Sungei Buloh. Both are not QUITE pure nature, but it is as close to nature as it gets. I can tell you that after three weeks, i have having nature withdrawal symptoms. This is a really strange feeling of WANTING to be in nature, thinking of the destination - or non-destination - and then going, nah, because it is not really nature. It is like a grief in my heart, it is as if a part of me has died. Please don't think i am being ungrateful. I am not. I love the sunshine, the poolside, the wonderful cultural places we can go to, the warmth of family and friends, but i also yearn for nature. I am now helping my mom with her garden, and that is ok, but it isn't wild nature right? I wouldn't even mind Cairn or Redburn Woods, which are not very high on the list of natural places, but at least it is nature. And...

My skin feels awesome after three weeks here! I have spent the last three weeks, more or less running. I love running. I don't know why. You could say the dopamine, the adrenaline, the seratonin, but there is something about running which make me very happy. Especially if it is in a really hot place, like Singapore - where i sweat and sweat and sweat. I am now running about 6 km everyday, maybe 5.5 km and i am now doing 65 sit ups. I plan to be doing 100 sit ups by the time i leave and be on 10 km. Running now is also different. I don't really think very much about coming to the end. I just enjoy the run for what it is. Because i am on holiday, there are non real time constraints beyond the heat of the sun. I run at 6.30 am and i finish around 7 am. Then i do my sit ups. To this i will now add gardening till around 9 am, when it is too hot to garden any more. And then, a late breakfast. I feel better and fitter than i have felt in years. I wasn't really running no...

The AG's Chambers, which is next to this giant hotel Yesterday i walked away from the crowds in Chinatown to Eu Tong Sen  Street, then down to South Bridge Road. I never have a chance to randomly walk around Singapore... and i took my chance yesterday. So you won't see pictures of the Chineseness of Chinatown. Instead, you will see the city side of it. Here his a giant hotel which has come up in it. Behind it, Hong Leong Complex. The complexes were built in the 70s and 80s. They are mixed development in the middle of the business district of houses and shopping and food. And as such they are completely unaffordable for the people who now live in them, if they were to buy them now. However they are a government development and were completely affordable then. I think they are the stand out things which show that at one point, the government did work for the people, ALL the people. Not a hall of mirrors, but a corridor of waterfeatures, frangipanis and pillars ...

Getting ready to head to Hougang Fanta grape at the hawker centre Dim sum Cheng pi quat Walking around Hougang centre Flats Bins for burning the paper money Moneylender Coffee shop

The carpark at the Geylang market Yesterday we went to the Geylang market. It is one of the few real places left in Singapore. But it is still very overcrowded, although it was market day - Saturday - and therefore it was bound to be crowded. We went there cos i was meeting a cousin later on and it was in the ballpark area - the East. A very sleepy Oisin The festivities for Eid were over and everything looked very bare. But i love Geylang. The noise, the smells, the people. Geylang is a whisper of the Singapore that i once knew. It is a Singapore where anything could still happen. Maybe it still does. The new market - done up in the traditional Malay building style From just about here, you can smell the place. It first smells of curry powders - particularly coriander. Then the smell changes to fish and dried prawns. The fish and dried prawns smell can be hard to take if you have never smelt it before, but to me, it is the smell of home. People cycle about - it has ...