359 - 18.10.26 - Don't be so Negative Mum!
Oisin told me that I was being very negative yesterday when I laughed at Elon Musk's stupid flipping car. I was like why do you need a car like that? He said, cos its fun. I said, is it fun to spend money on doing stupid things when the world is on fire? And he gave me a sarcastic nodding head... I said, are you patronising me? He said, you've been very negative lately. I said, have you see the state of the world lately? Apart from the planet being on fire, the corruption and the greed, the mass stupidity, the ...
Anyway... Singaporeans are generally stupid people. This I have decided. They cannot process anything that's not in front of their faces nor if they have not been steeped in it. Independent thinking is beaten out of you, one year at a time. By the time you have reached 16, you are either someone who is a true believer, and will go on to 'do well' but be utterly miserable, or you will end up leaving, or if you stay - you will just believe that this is your lot in life and there's nothing you can do about it.
Try and do anything about it and you will be FUCKED. If you choose to be a politician, generally seen as the most peaceable way to go about changing things, you will be harassed and harangued. If you are in NGO and want to change things, also the second most peaceable way of going about things, you will be also harassed and harangued. Woe betide if you want to be a writer or filmmaker who wants to say something - dear god. You will be also, you guessed it harassed and harangued. So people don't do anything. The only way you can 'make a difference' is to work with community and charity. It is an insipid way of doing things and it does not address the structural problems which have led to the existence of poverty in a country with the world's highest GDP, as we are often told.
If I did want to do things now, I cannot give my mother who is 80 years old a heart attack. So I just keep my head down and I write in my blog and my FB page which reaches no one.
The truth is - the truth is, I have had a crazy number of amazing experiences. Yesterday, I was recalling the stories about Bali to Oisin. I have been through it really, all of life itself. So I'm not going to be upset that Singapore is mostly shite now. As I have said to myself many many times, if you don't like something, just wait, it will change. If you do like it, just enjoy it as much as you can, because, it too will change.
So the highlight reel of my life is... so crazy packed that I'm not going to complain - all the highs and the lows. But also all the in betweens.
I can no longer be upset about the haze and the stupidity of Singaporeans. We cannot fault people for being afraid if the government is an authoritarian one. We live in a police state - we have lived in one for decades. Since the coming of the PAP. So, today I am going to recall one good thing in my life.
I mean there are too many.
From childhood, I would say, picking saga seeds in what is now Hort Park.
Somewhere, there are photos of us picking the seeds. My recollection of it was us, as a family, driving, for a long time, almost to the countryside, which it was then, and climbing the hill. There a cluster of saga seed trees would leave their treasure for us. How my dad knew they were there I don't know. But running around, on top of the hill, rooting about for these little red seeds - they were so magical. Magic beans. The hard red coats with the markings of a single ring - the looked like tiny hard ang ku kuehs.
Time did stop and we were in a kind of heaven. We would often ask to go and pick the saga seeds - Singapore back then was indeed full of nature, although I never understood that because we did not spend a lot of time in it.
For years after that, we kept the saga seeds in a box - every session we had - and the hoard grew larger and larger. Finally, we ended up throwing it away. Why did we do that? Such a fabulous colour they were too. But that is my happy memory. All my happy memories have nothing to do with what money can buy - but there are memories too of those happy memories. Even now, as I take Ma out in the car, that is also a happy memory - and that money did buy.
The sky is a weird yellow colour today. I have no idea if it will rain. But there is a day to be getting on with and I am free to do with it what I will.
Walking forward, pushing through the molasses. That's what needs to happen for me. Today is a good day.
Today is my day. And today I will live without fear.
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