Photography: Elements of Composition

The use of back light coming from the window helps to give radiance while the look of openness gives an expression of innocence to the subject. The clutter in the foreground lends the picture an everyday scene.

The vertical format of the picture putting the subject in the top half and the food in the bottom half brings out a touch of contrast and irony between the bounty of the fare and the ailing look of the subject.

A simple composition in which the two subjects are separated with an intervening space made up of the darkened doorway. The cup of tea in the foreground adds a point of interest.

Nasim

This is Nasim, Ajai's little brother,

They come from the same mother,

But he comes from another father.

Nasim's father met his mother

Upon a chance and a whim.

The chance was the first meeting,

The whim was in the ensuing.

The first meeting was through Ajai's father,

The ensuing whim came from Ajai's mother.

Nasim came into the world with Ajai's father

Flicking the first tile to fall on the next tile

In a domino effect which brought forth the tike.

Shall I end the story now, or add a surprise:

It is nice to play god even if god is only a dice.

Zain Azrai Zaharan

Jai, Jai, his Papa's son,
Comes home at half past one,
In the rain or in the sun,
Straightaway asks for lunch,
Is it ready, is it done.

Jai, Jai, his Papa's son,
Look at the way he runs,
Over a clean pair of heels,
Knocking a pair of buns,
As he disappears into the hills,
That is how fast he runs.

A Land Hog and a Sea Cucumber

Who says a dog and a cat cannot be friends?
Who says a land hog cannot make it with a sea cucumber?
Who says a pedal bike on land
Cannot hitch with a paddle craft on water?
As the Malays say, a rind of tamarind from the tree,
And a pinch of salt from the sea,
End up in the cooking pot,
Or, as in the case of the folder
And the hardshell in the picture above,
In front of the rider's front porch.

Ah huh, ah huh, I like it ...

Body, Mind & Spirit

The body and mind, in mutual care,
Is full of spirit and spare;
Taken for granted or abused,
The spirit becomes canted and confused,
Leaving a vacuum state,
To be vied among a pack
Of impostors, pretenders and fakes:
- casting furtive glances at one's own shadow,
- cat chasing its own tail,
- grasping at straws,
- symbol-literate, significance-illiterate,
- chasing the shadow, overstepping the substance,
- seeing the mercedes, missing the diabetes,
- shallow waders, surface skimmers, depth-scared,
- barking at the wrong tree,
- failing to see the woods, or the trail, for the trees,
- stuffed on scandals, sporting navel-rings, shunning literacy,
- chasing the glitter, throwing the litter,
- muddying the rivers, cutting the trees,
- congesting the streets,
- adding to the clutter;
Of playing to pride, prejudice and ploy - in abundance,
Of harmonizing the body, mind and spirit - in abeyance;
Slowly, slowly weakens the body,
Slowly, slowly declines the mind,
Slowly, slowly shrivels the spirit ...

Then out of the lump,
Unfurls a clump,
Out of the kindling,
Fans a fire flaming,
Out of the detritus,
Grows a lotus,
Out of the matrix,
Rises a phoenix,
Out of the infernal,
Rises hope eternal -
Providing renewal -
A new trajectory
From its unfulfilled category
That was the human spirit,
Mind and body,
Back to its glory.

Late Pilate

I'm late, I'm late, says Late Pilate,
Koyak pisang makan kulit;
Late to bloom,
Late to blog,
Pilate comes lately -
Can't say yet,
But at the rate he's always late
He may even die late!
Now that is one slate
To elate late Pilate.

Al-Maari: Ronin, Rodin, Khayami

A ronin samurai out of kilter
goes in search of a new master
and found one, a Sufi
in the person of Al-Ma'ari
who is ronin, rodin and khayami.

A Woman, A Kayaker, In A Storm

When a storm brews up
In a woman's heart
She seeks an outlet and an entry;
When a paddler senses a storm,
He makes for the coast
Seeking an inlet
To point his kayak and enter.

Sara the Sixie, Bully to the Brontosaury

Sara, year six and a half,
Hold your back straight,
Keep your chin up,
Lock your eyes ahead,
Plant your feet square;
Mind your manners, maid,
Keep them fine and fair.

Of the mess you made,
No cause for fright,
Angels will clear in the night,
But you march off to bed at four,
And wake up past noon to
Make for the bathroom door!
Of the little crab I caught, if it is still alive,
A little brine water it don't deprive;
If it has died, give it a proper burial rite -
Here a stick green, here a petal bright.

Crabbie, can we turn off the tv now?
It is already past midnight -
But ...
Crabbie, can we turn the thingy off now?
It is already past three ...
But ...
Crabbie, last call, it's four!
About time you get it right, Papy!
Cries the bully
To the brontosaury -
Dimming the telly.

The Perfect Religion

God wound the perfect religion into orbit,
Humans then made pirate copies of it,
Even calling it, The Perfect Religion;
Hundreds of copies of the One
Have been made, each claiming
Theirs is the true religion, implying
Others are all homologated!
They may differ in details and deities,
But all essentially saying the same things;
Unbeknownst to one another,
Each and everyone staying within
The shell - coconut shell -
Of their faiths and not bothering,
Or allowed to step out and find out
What's cooking under the other
Shells dotted about on the barren
moonscape of faiths as surrogates
For certainty of knowledge;
Each jealously guarding their individual
Bubble of belief and if you
So much as peek out from under
Your own shell to ask or comment
On the smell coming from the pot
Of another shell, you'll be warned
In no uncertain terms not to interfere
In other people's shell matters!

Over the centuries the copied religions
accrue added beliefs, stories, history, myths
And legends to thicken the plot and
Add bricks to the wall of beliefs,
To become what a religion essentially is today -
A currency made valid by force of advocacy -
Like a coma patient dependent on apparatus:
Remove the props and he will be a different status;
The throne might as well be replaced by a chair
If everyone can be made to declare
The chair is the new symbol, like those
Emperor's new clothes,
Are a pretense to hide hypocrisy,
Or Solomon's dinner to euphemize cow patsy;
Just by giving it a set of vests
To engage humans in their fetish hex;
Just by giving it a set of liturgy,
In a language in which the clergy
Holds an advantage over the laity;
To catch humans at their most impressionable:
The more you understand, the more refutable,
The less you understand, the more inflexible;
Just by giving it a set of rituals
To catch humans in an ineffective gear -
Psychosomatic repetitive behavior.

In any plan grandeur to start
And sustain a conspiracy of beliefs,
A captive crowd is a basic ingredient
Providing the critical mass and lever
From initial resistance to deliver -
One converts, the bandwagon effect takes over,
This was what happened to Parameswara
In the Melakan clover.

Soon, the boundary between brick and belief blurs,
The brick is now the target of the kisser
And the wall the direction of prayer
To be pawed and wept over,
Each ritual act an entreaty for an
Easier entry into the ethereal pantry,
Rather like a student squirming in
An examination hall beseeching his
Subject teacher, the invigilator,
"Sir, tolong Sir!" for a tip or,
Better still, an outright answer!

Over time, if not right at the start,
The perfect religion is forgotten;
In pursuit of the copied religion,
The vestments, the liturgy, the rituals,
The historical experience,
Become an ignored-at-your-own-peril
Imperative all their own, God
Now an accessory after the act,
A footnote to the form and show of religion;
The means making a meal of the end,
The journey obscuring the destination,
The mercedes shoehorned into a collection,
Pasting piety in the skull cappy,
Making a religion out of religiosity.

And what, you may well ask, is the true perfect religion?
The answer, my fellow salikins, pilgrims and, yes,
Naysayers also, is blindingly simple -
An answer which the blind have seen
All along without even making
A song and dance of it,
As in the Blind Watchmaker
As in the footfalls of Al-Maari
Simply because they don't see
The visible copies;
An answer which the sighted
Cannot see because they
Are so hooked on the visible externals.

But before I tell you the answer, here is another story ... blah, blah,
Here is a bottle of my lintah oil ... blah, blah,
And here, and here ...
Alright, the answer:

Radiate the inner light beatific,
Patiently wait the final fix.

Hail the Human Body, Hale the Temple

Hail to thee, temple of the human body -
Like the ugly duckling to the swan,
Like a departure lounge waitress
To the globetrotting stewardess,
Like Cinderella, the Queen-to-be,
The human body is a made-to-wait,
Maid-in-waiting, made-to-order,
Abode of the gods, the true vessel,
playground, machine-shop and temple
Of the stepped, tiered soul's evolution plan -
Instinct, Self and Cosmos;
But pretenders, impostors,
And Petaling Street fakes
Abound - a bmw with low IQ,
- a range rover with manicure-n-coiffer,
- a mercedes raised from felled trees,
- a high-rise apartment
built on ill-gotten gains,
- a walled compound gained
from its feudal past;
a pile of mortar built on
the ruins of a previous pile
marked by a hallowed
halo made hollow
by its hard-to-swallow
Hollered out name -
these are the cow dung
euphemized as Solomon's dinner,
these are the Emperor's
new clothes to cover up
the bonkered-on-belief starkers.

Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood

Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood is the title of a song first sung by Nina Simone, the American Civil Rights Movement singer, in 1964, and by many others since. I consider the versions sung by her, by the Animals and by Yusof Islam as the best three. The music and lyrics have a universal appeal and the potential to touch even the most hardened of hearts. Simone sang it in a slow tempo in her hard-to-categorize trademark style while the version by the Animals is outstanding for its opening and choral guitar riff setting off delectably the lead singer's deep voice. Sung by Yusof Islam with some lyrics changed slightly, the song takes on an added meaning in view of his conversion to Islam and his devotion to the religion. The lyrics:

Baby, do you understand me now
If sometimes you see I’m mad
Don't you know that no one alive can always be an angel?
When everything goes wrong you see some bad

Well I’m just a soul whose intentions are good
Oh lord, please don’t let me be misunderstood

You know sometimes baby I’m so carefree
With a joy that’s hard to hide
Then sometimes it seems again that all I have is worry
And then you burn to see my other side

But I’m just a soul whose intentions are good
Oh lord, please don’t let me be misunderstood

If I seem edgy
I want you to know
I never meant to take it out on you
Life has it’s problems
And I get more than my share
But that’s me one thing I never mean to do

Cos I love you
Oh baby
I’m just human
Don’t you know I have faults like anyone?

Sometimes I find myself alone regretting
Some little foolish thing
Some simple thing that I’ve done

I’m just a soul whose intentions are good
Oh lord, please don’t let me be misunderstood

I try so hard
So don’t let me be misunderstood

God The Big Banger

Like the Big Bang,
God exploded into a
million souls and
has been exploding
and imploding in
a never ending
cycle - souls
scattered forth
souls sucked back in
as with the physical
universe, so
needs be done with
the soul perhaps we
can liken God as
the perpetual
bread-maker kneading dough
into bread, dough into bread
dough into bread
soul the dough
human the bread
man delivers
to earn his deliverance -
via la Delifrance!

The Untold Story

There are many untold stories out there,
buried in the boundless wastes called life,
by the sweeping winds of complacency,
an inability to reflect back on experience,
a failure to see the worth of acts and words;

It is as if a life is meant to be lived only
on the experiential plane unreflected back
by words put to paper, thus passing by
as if it is meant to be lived surreptitously, stealthily,
just like another rain drop same like any other;

Luckily there are also many told stories
through which we can share the lives of others -
to learn from them, be inspired by them,
and to enrich our own;

Here is one story rescued from the blackhole of the untombed untold -
First the reasons why it remained untold for so long - 75 years:

The principal cast of characters preferred it to be a secret,
They were poor and illiterate and had more
pressing priorities to tend to their days;
Ideas such as the pursuit of the afterlife
which unfortunately does not make the three
Rs - reading, 'riting and 'rithmatic - a perquisite,
Were more important than such worldly concerns
which were nothing more than an ego trip, a waste of time,
Excusable perhaps if it pertained
to the lives of society's upper crust,
But unheard of and completely unintelligible
when it came to their own ordinary lives.

The descendants of the principal players,
Marrying out and interlocking with other family sets,
Scattered far and wide in a grid of ever expanding diasporas;

This is a story of a woman who will never know her true roots -
She was born into a family of a particular ethnic group
who was in dire straits; she was given away for adoption
Presumably in her very first year of life to a family
from a different ethnic group.

(tbc)

but the oddity remains for and sundry to see
and dark whispers and even undisguised, raw jeers, ridicule
were the order of the day
she walked the extra mile to be the people who ridiculed her
She neglected her duties
she developed a victim mentality
was no angel
given away to be married off
many similar cases in kemaman
most notorious being the natrah story
Poverty pushed her biological parents
from southern China
Ending up in the Kemaman Bandi
iron ore mine
via Singapore.
She was presumably born in 1932.

Wong Yoke Kwan, an unfinished story

life of ridicule n mental anguish
uncalled for remarks n cold stares
WYK knew odd one out
put up a barave front
her heart cried out in pain
from callous tretment
of tronoh, in ipoh 70
people making fun n could offer no explanation
kept feelings pentup and did not ask parents
91 - got the answer when she attended
a gsthering and people commented
she looked remarkable to a friend in Jelapang
may 12, monday, mother's day
drove bike to jelapang
first stop
chinese lady sweeping
showed pic of anama who look
exactly like her mother
dna
of her pain n suffering

When Uranus Is My Scout Planet

Not that I know for a fact,
But presumably most people
Feel the need to hide behind
The skirts of authority figures,
The hooves of the herd,
Anonimity and conformity,
Mediocrity and piety,
To escape the unsettling -
To say the least - feeling
Of being slapped with a label:
Usually a descriptive tag
That highlights any departure
From the norm, be it physical,
Behavioural, attitudinal
Or concerning one's beliefs.

A label yanks
You out of the ranks,
Putting you in the line of fire
Of society's drill-sargeant-types,
Self-appointed echomen, and
YangDiKerah chorusboys,
For having stepped out of line,
Eating with chopsticks
At a table of fingers,
Speaking out of turn
At a caucus of coca clones.

They pelt you with dollops
Of disapproval, jeers, scowls,
Ruses of ridicule,
In a ritual refusal to look
At their own reflections.

Men will whimper, wilt,
And simply shrivel up,
When cast the hex
Of name calls ...

Or melt into the bagan -
Hitching their persona
Onto the bandwagon
To escape the stigma and stigmata
Of having inherited
A different set of desiderata.

But a few rebels, outcasts,
Survive the baying and shank nipping
And have enough chutzpah
To strike out on their own -
Or snap back.

In my time, I've been called a botak,
A bandit and an eccentric, a number
More than most would consider
A fair share, methinks.
Botak on account of Tun Abdul Razak
Having had more hair than my father,
Bandit on account of the common belief
In the 60's that all slant eyes were communist suspects,
And, yes, I do have slant eyes on account
Of having a Yunnan strain in my veins,
Eccentric on account of my preference to stand
On my head when everyone else is slouching on one foot,
Watching me do the heart turning Yoga asana.

Had I given in to the initial welling
Of emotion upon being thus slapped,
I would have have been cast in irons,
A fallen angel recalled to the ranks;
Mercifully, I had enough reserve in the tank
To recoil from the instinctive impulse,
Instead I stewed in my own juices for a while,
Long enough to scour the terrain of my mind
And resources for a way out and this was
what I found from astrology (There I go again,
Setting myself up for another mudpie in my face):

"Your scout planet is Uranus:
You view the world from an unusual perspective,
You have a link to hidden forces,
Giving you a deeper understanding
Of the mysteries of life.
Unusual things happen to you,
Often very abruptly and unexpectedly,
You have unique ways of getting things done,
Which causes people to think of you
As being eccentric."

Absolute Reality, Relative Reality

to conceal from one another
the unique and lonely world
in which each lives
terribly articulate, foolishly truthful
conventional men agree he is mad
what an extraordinary fella
thrown back on itself,
determined more
by the seer than the seen
instinct for the absolute
thirst for truth
a strictly personal affair
of vision not of argument
escape the stigma of ostracism
by outwardly attaching itself to a tradition
personal religion attach itself to a majority school
abounds in hints of wonder and mystery
of what lies beyond tables and chairs
are not what they seem
from naturalism to idealism to mysticism
naturalism - views the world as nothing
more than concrete things governed by natural laws
idealism - views the world as aggregates of thoughts

My Body Lies

From the top of my head,
To the tip of my toes,
I lie in my bed,
Neither am I dead,
Nor even in comatose.

But fully cognizant,
Of my body's prone position,
Parts and connections.

At the top of my pate
Is a hirsute suite
Just as a palm tree
Is topped off with
A canopy of leaves,
Without which we'd be baldy,
Shorn of our crowning glory.

My head sits atop a neck
As a watch keeps a lookout
From the watchtower,
As light shines from a lighthouse,
Giving reassurance to a returning kayaker.

This is my face,
The focal point of who I am,
By which I am known,
Greeted and graced.

My face is like a hallowed
Church pew, with all its parts
In their proper places -
The eyes, the nose, the mouth
None out of synch, not one askew.

Inside the mouth is a tongue chute
Leading to an antechamber -
An epiglottis, the gullet,
And, recessed out of view,
The larynx.

The neck joins the head to
The chest housing the vital organs -
the heart and lungs,
And below decks,
The tiffin-turning tummy.

The stomach extends
The body's range further south,
To the body's fulcrum - the hips -
Flanking the tender bits,
Before it fans out into the nether kicks.

As a centrepoint in my
Abdomen's washboard expanse,
There is a dry oasis locally known as Bellibuttoo,
It was once well-watered, a conduit of nutrition,
But now converted into a tourist attraction,
A jewel in the Saharan undulation.

Back up, echoing the fork to the
Lower limbs, the shoulders sprout out
The arms, giving balance and harmony,
Getting work done, and for doing workouts.

The arms with its elbows, wrists and hands,
Are for lifting, throwing and manipulating,
While the legs are for walking, kicking,
And complementary balancing.

At the bottom of the back
Is a pair of padding at my disposal;
Between the mounds
Is a hole for waste disposal.

Hidden away inside the body
Is a host of organs hung like
An intricate lattice of lanterns,
Bathed in fluids, charged by calories,
Doing vital work like coolies
In the innards of an East India
Company merchant navy.

Did I forget to mention
The brain enclosed in the skull
Inside the head?

That's funny, the brain
Is for remembering.

Salam the Suluk

TBC

Salam, a Suluk, is darting about
In the byways of the cavernous
Shopping precinct called Putatan Point,
Down here in Putatan town,
On the west coast of Sabah
Where the patent to the words wayward wind
Is being applied by the state government
In a long-drawn effort to fight the machinations,
Sleight-of-speech and machiavellian manoeuverings
By interested parties euphemistically called local politicians
Who wish to advance their interests
By using the illegal immigrants issue
As leverage, as target practice, to take pot shots at,
As a diversion from addressing more urgent needs
Such as education, poverty eradication,
environmental degradation and public sanitation
Which the illegals did nothing to ease the congestion
Adding a few more twists to the complications,
Churning up more froth to the mishmash of the state ethnic pot
In which every Sabahan sits comfortably
Milking the largesse of the blessed land
Fecundating under the long shadow
Of Mount Kinabalu, its high priestess
And godmother rolled into one,
Giving yet another mirror image
To the eclectic, syncretic, polyglot.

Take Salam, down at Putatan Point,
As a case in point:

A Wasteland Of The Mind

Below the high and mighty clouds
Of education reports and master plans,
That have been swirling above
Our heads since Merdeka,
Here I am down on all fours
On the living room floor
In an honest-to-goodness
Staredown with a year six mind
Who cannot write "with," "the,"
Or even "a" during an
English dictation class.

This after millions of ringgit
Have been expended,
Tons of textbooks -
Wooed in January, jilted in December -
Have been churned out,
Scores of teacher-training colleges -
A beehive to no-option jobseekers -
Have been expanded,
And six years of SRK classes -
Which parents who could afford the move
Turn their backs on in preference
To the system across the causeway -
Have been dumped,
All to no apparent valor or avail.

So where is the hitch?
Is it the fault of the lecturers
Of the trainee-teachers who write
Notes for them to copy?

Or is it the doing of the
Trained teacher who sits
At her desk after writing
Notes on the blackboard
For the pupils to copy?

Or maybe it is the pupils -
Who copy the notes from the blackboard
Or the exercise books of other pupils
In order to complete their school
And home work -
Themselves who are at fault?

Or maybe it is the parents who
Went through the same treadmill
Thirty score years ago and are
Now the proud parents of pupils
Whose school exercise books are
Full of copied notes?

Or maybe there is an unseen hand,
Who concertedly and persistently
Frustrate the efforts to get the pupils
To read, 'rite and regurgitate -
Because they are convinced
Mainstream education, for
The same reasons or reversed,
Is a self-serving ploy to secularize
The masses or beat them up
Into submissive footsoldiers
Of the prevailing ethos?

What if this unseen hand
Is right in our midst, nay,
Right in our own hearts?
A succubus, a worm,
A Trojan horse, the enemy
Sharing our mosquito net?
What then?

Does anyone care or dare
To point out that note-taking
And rote-learning, however convenient
A cover-up, a conspiracy,
Is no substitute for real learning,
Nay, it may even be a slayer
Of curiosity and enthusiasm,
The true call of learning?
Do you dare do the unthinkable -
Wrench out your diseased heart -
And replace it with a brand new
Bionic one?

Will the story of Hang Nadim
Be reprised here,
Or does the story of the Emperor's
New Dress ring too close for comfort?
Or is this vain verse of mine
Be the tree that fell in the forest
Which no one uptown could hear?

KL Traffic Junkie

TBC

If you think driving in KL traffic
Is stressful, meet Roby Rose,
She is the latest mutant thrown up
On the wave of KL's rapid rise

I know Kl best from the late 60's
to late 80's, after that I gave up.
Too stressful.

Then in July 2006, I had
Reasons to revisit it for
A month and befriended
This lady who live in Bukit
Antarabangsa, owns another property
In Damansara and works in Bukit Bintang.


In Bukit Bintang

Saddam's Story: From Hell And Back

The sight of Saddam's statue
Falling over was a grim herald
Of his own, and the form that it took -
Falling through the nooseman's trapdoor -
Might not have been on everyone's sighthole
But probably sighted in the minds
Of the thousands of his victims, at least
Those who survive, never mind a leg or two missing,
While in those who had passed on, the sight of Saddam
Falling through the trapdoor
Could still be watched on tv sets
From the divine departure lounge,
With the added bonus, presumably,
Of being able to watch the seamless sequence
Of the sight of Saddam - his soul, that is -
Passing on to the next sequel to his fate -
Entering the portal of hades,
In a souk drama that could easily be
Titled, Saddam's Story: From Hell And Back.

From ProtoMalay to Bumiputraism

wnfc

To raise chicken in a coop
Is for the single purpose
Of putting it in the soup;
To raise children in a box
Is for the single purpose
Of putting then into a convenience socks;
To remove the chicken from its free range
Is to deprive it of experiencing chicken hierarchy;
To forbid children from having a free run
Is to deprive them of learning social skills;
To tame chicken from its original jungle domain
Is to take it away from being nature's model;
To prevent children from being active in sports and games
Is to take away the development of form as nature designed;

Bloggers, Don't Unite!

tbc



When two bloggers got sued for defaming
a rash of bloggers parachuted
from the rafters of false anonimity
calling for unity and starting a fund
in defence of the doggone bloggers.

I say, whatever game you choose to play,
Be it a game of hockey or poker,
there are always basic rules to respect and obey
If one does not want to incur problems.

Having transgressed a rule and aggrieved
Someone who then decides to go by the law book,
You are set. Just count your lucky stars he didn't
Resort to taking the law into his own hands.

As a blogger, I don't like to hear that
Another blogger is asking for help from other bloggers
For a transgression in the name of freedom of expression
for all bloggers.

As a blogger I look askance at another blogger who ask
bloggers to unite in defence of all bloggers.
I begin to question whether he has an axe to grind,
wants to gain mileage, glory, be a hero,
advancing a hidden agenda, riding piggyback,
And other whathaveyous.




one would think blogging is the last bastion
where one may let one's hair down
for independent and free expression,
subject of course to the laws of the land
and the usual norms of decency.

For bloggers to feel the need to unite
and form a union of whatever sort,
that would be the ultimate betrayal.

Issued A Blank Soul

In the end, we all will be delivered
Unfettered and pure as a baby's bottom
To the hand that smites open the seas
Nurses the universe, and
Rocks creation's cradle,
But in this bend of the river of life,
There are gnomes out there
Whose nose is firmly fixed to the grindstone -
Not of an honest day's work -
How could they -
But of being defiant of simple decency -
Compassion even - and insists on and persists in
Ridiculing, bickering, backstabbing,
Bringing down, stepping on, betraying
And cheating fellow humans,
Especially when they know
They won't be hit back
By a mobster or a lawsuit.

Smirching is the order of their day,
Smirking is the end they seek to display;
Of the mind, charlatan; in the heart, nonchalant;
These are the vanity vultures
Perched on bloated carcases,
Of fly-blown cultures,
Committing the ultimate betrayal -
Handing over their mind's wherewithal
To be the handmaiden
In a witches' coven.

Raven-eyed for the slightest sign
Of non-conformity or vulnerability,
They turn on the mongol-eyed puppy
In a litter of doe-eyed brownies -
Driven by the same frenzy
As aquarium fish attack
The same spot of open sore,
To kill off the wounded guppy -
Elemental animals to the core,
Humans only at the door,
Their hearts besmirched,
Their faces besmirked,
In this bend in their river of life.

One wonders if they are not bearers of blank souls -
In the mirror their reflections deflect,
How could they then self-reflect?
Hey, am I not holding up a mirror of self-discovery?
For the things I said of gnomes
May be reverberating off the rafters
In my own home -
If I am not wary.

Jiggling In Interstitial Space

In between the twin fabrics of existence -
The protoplasmic and the cosmic -
Thrown and tossed any which way
By its constant motions
Like clothes on a line
Flapping in the wind.

I jiggle in its interstitial space,
Like a fly caught in a spider's cobweb,
Or a surfer lost on the Web,
A fugitive on the run from life,
Flailing down a time funnel,
Stepping on rolling waves,
Balancing to make my way
To the light at the end
Of the dimmed tunnel,
The toll exit to a waiting
Road which will take me
To my final destination -
The Perfect Form.

Need to say,
The journey takes only
A moment of eternity -
And the eternity in the moment.

And God Created Women

And God created wimmin -
With apologies to Roger Vadim:
And that's when the troubles began
With eulogies to born-every-minute men -
Yes, men, as in male of the species -
For a reason stark and simple,
Pure and precise -
To put him through hell,
And send him to - well - hell.

Hell!

A woman is a vortex of colliding currents,
Driving a man, hilly-billy,
Willy-nilly in as many directions,
While the center of the vortex -
Woman - symbolized as serpent,
Reserves the right to remain silent,
Casting a look defiant,
Her face unsmudged,
Her heart - there isn't any - untouched,
Her posturing calculated,
To lure the man of the house,
Male of the species, master of none,
To do her bidding,
Disguised as her doing his bidding.

Dressed up on the periphery,
To tear the heart of the unwary;
To a woman, a man is a quarry,
Nature's agent to cull the
Sickly, miserly and needy.
Many a man will go through this sifter,
Succumbing to the age-old siren serenader;
Those who survive become strong,
Those who fall will hurtle headlong
Onto the pyre of self-immolating fire.

The Eighth Wonder

The eighth wonder of the world
Has gotta to be the seat of a toilet bowl;
Rodin's Thinker, I tell ya,
Is rightly dressed for the stool session,
But wrongly stooled;
He should have been seated
Yes, you guessed it, on the ample rind
Of the toilet bowl seat;
Then again, I may have my history
Wrong - maybe they hadn't invented
The good news to a man's gluteus yet
During Rodin's time set.

Ah, the tortures man had to sit through
While waiting for the inside sewers
To clear off its load, before
Someone invented the ultimate solution:
A toilet bowl with soul -
A seat on the bowl
To deposit your haunches on
While your internals work out its deposits.

It is perfect as a bicycle is perfect -
You can refine it in any number of ways,
From an automatic sensor to temperature
control to an interactive robotic bowl
Costing a cool million - not yen but sterling -
But the basic design of seat and bowl stays,
Just as a bicycle can be modified in more ways
Than one, the frame-seat rig is always
As was done.

And to think man had to bear
A thousand years of severe posture,
An affront to his posterior;
Why, until only recently,
I'd rather the squat toilet -
Aka Chinese torture - prefer;
Or did it behind the ferns,
Enjoying being close to nature,
When the situation warrants.

And the first man to make a toilet bowl seat?
You tell me!
Just like its inventor was never credited,
Many a gem of an idea, a seminal thought,
A breakthrough to an impasse,
Could have been cracked while its Source
Was seated on the ring of a toilet bowl,
Without even getting a mention, until
This verse - haha - even if
Only generic, not specific.

Who knows if the world would have been
Any different today had Chief Crazy Horse,
Shi Huang Ti, Napoleon, Lenin,
Benefitted from it in their day;
Who knows the extent an easy passage,
Down in the internal sewerage,
Eased by a toilet bowl seat,
Could have influenced it -
Bush's tilt towards the Middle East.

And what if the Sultan of Brunei were
To reinvest the proceeds from the sale
Of his solid gold bowl to revive
The dysfunctional sugar groves
Of Mozambique? Would the Africana
Milling in the streets of Lisboa
Return home in droves?

What if, while encamped on a seat,
Yours truly came up with the germ
Of an idea of writing this poem?
Would you begrudge it?
And to think I discovered
Its use only the other day.

A Spark of Jealousy

Teachers and friends have always
Counseled us not to be jealous -
But how could not we!
As much as jealousy is an unwelcome visitor
Who gatecrashes on us as we
Go about our daily lives
Trying our best not to fall into
The comparison trap,
We are still hard done by
The constant bombardment of things
We want but can't afford or have but
Others have better, bigger, prettier,
More up to the minute, or simply more.

Zap! We are shot by a snot of acidic
Jealousy, burning a hole in our stomach,
Sending a rush of blood into our hearts,
Sucking a breath of air from our lungs,
Drying our tongues.

What am I to do, Counselor?

If you haven't already installed one,
Hook up a hotline to the Damage Control
Department in the Ministry of your Mind,
Call in the Fire Brigade of Your Agama Class
To douse the flame of jealousy
And turn its ashes
Into a seedbed of self-renewal,
A spark of motivation
To fire up the lackadasaical mind,
To reawaken the slumbering heart,
Dusting away the work left undone -
Perhaps the poem/s you wrote ages
Ago but left unfinished?
Your blog looks like an unshaven site
Of shame, rather than of fame?

Well, let the whip of jealousy
Crack you into a gallop
And send you on your way
And, who knows, you just might
Engender the next generation
Of wide-eyed wannabes, who
Moved by the green-eyed monster of jealousy
At what you'll have accomplished,
Start to come into their own,
Perhaps writing poems - with polish.

Skepticism: A Room With A View

In the mansion of life,
Skepticism is just one of
Many rooms, all having their place
and use. Here's a brief rundown
Of skepticism's role in the household:
(You may want to draw up your own)

Skepticism is a hard-nosed room
Who sees the ironies and realities of life
And is unimpressed with the hype
Of larger than life schema
Which, when undressed, are little more than
Hand-me-down self-serving scams.

Skepticism acts as a counterweight
To facile credulity and blind faith
In authority figures, rituals and symbols
Sanctified by tradition and
Street cure-all salesmanship.
Unconcerned and unimpressed
By the hype, hyperbole and heady stuff,
The glitter, the glut and the glitz
In the comings and goings of paraded life,
It draws up a checklist of potential hazards
In the jangle of trees hidden in the distant blue hills;
It keeps a steady hand on the helm,
While the blinkered eye view the world in
One dimensional color,
Seeing either all evil or no evil,
Brushing belief wishes white
And all contrary views, black.

The Unsponsored Malaysian

tbc

If you happen to be lounging on a deck chair
at a tourist facility on Falkland Island or
any scientific station further south, nearer
to the South Pole, and suddenly a bedraggled-looking visitor
hoved into view, bedecked with the Jalur Gemilang
and paraphernalia appropriate to the undertaking -
be it by sea, on land, or dropped from the sky -
it did happen, you know, all three -
rest assured, the Malaysian is fully sponsored.

Safe bet you are too, if a Malaysian,
Otherwise what business you have there?

In all probability, any Malaysian
you run into in the streets
of New York, Berlin or Mecca,
is well-stuffed with a sizeable sponsorship -
a trade mission member, a forum attendee,
an athlete, a footballer, a student,
a Petronas Adventure Team
member, a Matrade or Porim official,
a Lucky Draw winner, an umrah pilgrim -
they are out there all over the globe
cushioned by well-padded payouts,
some, no doubt, more deserving than others
who, in all probability, are just on a junket, while
a few are just plain lucky.

So, can you ever hope to run into
an unsponsored Malaysian on a jaunt abroad?
Or is this species so rare it is yet to be discovered
and brought to public attention?
Surprisingly there are quite a few of them around -
unlike their fat brethren who tend to cruise
in the comfort lane of life,
this leaner variety of Malaysians abroad
can be found in any nook or cranny life can throw at them -
at immigration checkpoints getting their visas renewed,
living in the shadow of a Buddhist temple
after having failed to return home after
the japanese have gone, washing dishes to begin with
and now a member of a rock band or owner of
a Malaysian restaurant,

Verse, The Poor Cousin of Poetry

tbc

Verse is an illegal immigrant's street child
Giving the hard eye to poetry's Kikko-clad Japanese lad
Striding out from the local International School;
Verse is the poor country cousin to Poetry's urbane depth
and reach;
Verse is the manual drive to poetry's Auto Manual Transmission;
Verse is the flat dry plain to poetry's temperate mountains and valleys;
Verse is Mitsubishi's outphased Colt Gallant reproduced and rebadged as Proton's Waja,
While poetry is a OEM, Fully Imported, Limited Edition Mitsubishi Lancer Evo VIII 360;

My versical writing verges on poetry,
Sits on its fringe, in the shadow of its centre stage,
Talented kids perhaps imitating the superstar doing his
routine;

tbc

Home Is Where The Feet Rest

In my life's unwinding,
I've done a fair bit of travelling;
Goaded by travel guides to go forth,
Urged to stride out by word of mouth,
I've gone east, west, north and south,
But I also stay back, a homebody,
Looking after kids in my custody,
Only venturing out into the vicinity,
On a basis daily,
To take the day's done deeds
To the Putatan town rubbish heap,
Ah, bliss domestic;
Having gone east,
I found it to the eye a feast;
Having done west -
I find home still the best,
But home is wherever my feet rest,
And for now it is in the coastal west
Of Sabah state, with a view
Of Gunung Kinabalu
Looking distantly blue,
But close to the heart nevertheless.

Farisa: Studying Stones

Against a backdrop of global trouble,

Often narrowing to a pitting between

East and West, Islam and non-Islam,

It is heartening to see an image

Of Innocence and Friendship,

Between two peoples of contrasting

Looks and Beliefs;

A picture of sangfroid and sanctity,

Of hallowed halls, framed flora and civil society.

Against a backdrop of western onslaught,

From mobile phones to jeans to football

To videos to English, Sir Launcelot - the lot,

It is gratifying to note the differentiating

Muslim girl's headcover sprouting,

All over campuses in western lands,

And not just the deserts of Iraq or Iran.

While a Palestinian youth

Is likely to see a piece of rock as a symbol

Of David's slingshot,

To bring down the Zionist plot,

However futile, ironic, distraught;

Or a rain of meteorites

Dropped by feathered flights,

Relying on repetitive gestures,

Empty rhetoric and hollow symbols,

As a last resort, while

The Palestinian state lie

In shambles; Farisa

Represents an alternative icon,

A lucky Malaysian Muslim girl,

Enabled to see Earth's swirl -

As the Stars and Stripes unfurl -

In sticks and stones,

Maple leaves and deciduous cones.

Farisa Zaffa Razak

Farisa Zaffa Razak is my niece -

She is the one in the black-n-white

Pullover spotting a headcover -

Grew up in Kuantan, Pahang,

Now studying geology,

In Ottawa, Canada;

One of the assignments

In her first semester -

An analysis of The Tempest,

by William Shakespeare;

Hey, what about the effects

Of the weather on surface cover,

Or the drilling for fossil fuel,

On the permafrost,

In the Far North?

And God Is Alone

Even if you are a survivor
Of a separated Siamese twin,
You are essentially alone,
A single person with your own identity;
Even as a member
Of a crowd or fraternity,
Falling in step with them
With words issuing in unity;
In the clutches of pleasure,
Or the grip of pain,
In trial after tribulation,
Flushed with anticipation,
Or cold with fear,
In the groove of life,
Or the nick of death,
You are essentially alone;
The longing of the lonely,
Is only the cry of the illusory;
Aloneness is the essence
Of true Reality;
You are as alone in the universe,
As God is alone,
Reflecting his Quality.

I Dedicate This Blog ...

This blog I dedicate
To the day I vacate
This earthly mandate
And takes on a new date
With the next sequel in my fate.

On Semi Home Exile

Since my retirement,
I've put myself on semi home exile,
The metaphor is a bit loose,
But is still valid;
I banish myself from main stream,
To escape the heat, the traffic jam,
The striving and strutting -
Chasing and being chased;
I put myself out of circulation
From the social circuit and
The climb up the social ladder;
I still go out,
Out of necessity,
But more and more,
I stay home, comfortabilist;
I don't go out to look
for a paying job, but stay indoors
Bending hearts, nurturing minds,
Not for the money
Which is paltry,
But to till a mind-field,
Theirs and mine;
I don't travel as much
As I would like to,
I don't go to a karaoke lounge,
Bowling alley, golf link,
Pub, club or study KK's nightlife;
I hate cinemas, claustrophobic;
I confess I enjoy shopping some,
But there is a neurotic element to it,
So I try to reduce the trips
To the marts and complexes -
Vortice of material and people deluge -
And make my home my shell,
Sanctuary and refuge.

The Pilot Metaphor

The pilot metaphor
For managing one's life -
You know how it is,
An airplane pilot faces a bank
Of instruments telling him
Of current conditions -
The weather outside,
The engine and electrics inside,
Whether another aeroplane
Is anywhere near out there;
The fascia of electronics
Provides the interface
Between the pilot, the aircraft
And the world outside
While he sits in his cockpit,
Encased in a surreal sphere,
In a pool of controlled climate,
No matter the deadly
Temperature outside,
Cocooned in comfort and stability,
Against the rushing speed outside,
Buoyed up in the sky against
The pull of gravity;
A pilot could be forgiven
For dreaming of pleasures
And concerns forbidden;
He can put his mind on auto pilot,
As much as he can put the plane
On the same routine control;
But, as every salty pilot knows,
This surreal security is not guaranteed forever -
Occasionally, an air pocket
And other weather turbulences
Can rock his stately aircraft
And put his state of mind on orange alert -
And, as a pilot is trained
To anticipate and handle,
But dreads all the same,
The possibillity of a red alert,
Is always at the back of his mind;
An impending collision or crash, engine failure,
Poor landing visibility, forced landing,
Being hijacked, miscommunication,
All may burst the bubble of security
With disastrous and fatal results.

As piloting a plane,
So it is with managing life.
Just as you don't blame
And hit out at the array
Of instruments for any
adverse info,
What more at the weather outside,
Every time an air pocket or turbulence
Knock you out your comfort kilter,
So you don't react at the person
Or circumstance which is giving you the jitter.
You don't kill the messenger
However bad the news;
But rather you make choices and decisions
To not make things worse
And keep things on an even keel,
Just as a pilot would make adjustments
To keep his aircraft on a safe course.

ASA - Amanah Saham Akhirat

Each time you handle an adversity
With dignity,
Not blaming anyone,
Least seeking revenge,
Not going off your handle;
Each time you distance yourself,
From a negative feeling or impulse,
Which wells up unbidden from the depths,
Each time you control it from boiling over,
You are crediting your ASA;
The reverse is equally true -
React negatively, and
You're debiting your account;

A positive ASA
Is the very stuff you need
To reclaim the Perfect Form;
An ASA in the red
Means the Perfect Form
Is still in shreds.

Dakar Rally 2007

For about five years now, I've never failed to watch the annual Paris-Dakar Rally on ESPN at Astro. Each time it kindled my dream to take part in the race but I know it will always remain a dream as the entry cost is more than RM150,000. That is the price of a decent double-storey terrace house in KL.

The race is always held in the first week of January, at about the start of the new school year in Malaysia, a busy time for parents with schoolgoing kids.

My main interest is in the bikes category and it is no coincidence that the most dominant bike KTM is my favourite adventure bike as well. The 60 per cent import tax on big bikes put a dampener on my dream to buy one, but last week, it has been reduced to 30 per cent. Hmm, we shall see.

Again, it is no coincidence that my next car purchase, a Mitsubishi Triton pickup truck, is closely related to the winning Mitsubishi cars in the race. In fact, this year, two Tritons are being entered, albeit with the bigger 3.2 lit engine as opposed to the 2.5 I'll be booking tomorrow.

I feel strongly I'm going to "do" Africa one day, but it will most probably be on a push bike rather than a motorbike. Much less hassles, not to mention costs.

Fly And God

It has been said -
Quite on the sly -
God made the fly
To make us figure why;
Well, here's one possible lie:
A fly on the food you are about
To put in your mouth
May at first appear
To have an agenda completely
Incongruent from yours;
No doubt the fly is having its mush,
With utter panache,
While you view the invasion into
Your personal space as
Utterly incongruous;
Similarly the agenda of
A bunch of youngsters,
Out on a joy ride in a rented Kancil,
May be rudely knocked out of kilter
By God's differing agenda;
When the Muar river
Decides to break ranks
With its banks
And pulls the breath of
A few souls going about
Their mundane lives
Into its murky depths -
God, like the fly,
Has a different agenda;
Saddam had a vision of being
the paramount Arab leader,
But God saw otherwise,
Like the desert fly
That settled on the nose
of his videotaped corpse.

Zaharan Razak by Liz Greene

The following is an extract of what the English psychologist-astrologer had to say about me on the subject of relationships:

Intelligence and a capacity to share your thoughts are qualities you value highly in a partner if you are to build a long-term relationship with any woman. No matter how attractive, charming, socially suitable or erotically exciting a lover is, in the end you tend to become bored if you cannot talk to her. And when you become bored, you become critical and even nitpicking, finding fault everywhere and making your dissatisfaction known through chronic flirtations with other people which tell your partner loudly and clearly that you are suffocating.

There is a touch of the intellectual snob about you, but it is not mere posturing; you are a clever and sophisticated person with strong aesthetic sensitivities, and you genuinely love the world of the mind.

Your partner must be able to share in that world, and nothing less will do. You also like to use words a lot, to talk, philosophize, and theorize about love. You may have difficulties with a more taciturn or dour type of woman who cannot play with romantic words and gestures as you can. In part, you love this kind of verbal love-game for its own sake, because it is stylish and graceful and makes love interesting and in part you do it because you tend to protect your feelings with your intellect so that you are less vulnerable.

There is a rather cool and detached side to your love-nature which, however initially smitten you might be, quickly assesses the intelligence of the woman and gives a rating. And you expect your partner to have the same capacity for detachment and reason, for you dislike steamy emotional scenes and rapidly become evasive, aloof and disinterested if your woman starts becoming what you call irrational.

You need and deserve an intellectual match. What you can afford a little less of is your critical tongue, which can reduce anyone to ribbons - and often when she has done nothing to merit it except express needs which you construe as voiced in an inappropriate way. After all, not even the most intelligent partner - not to mention you yourself - can be clever and articulate all the time.

Mitsubishi Triton: A Thirty Year Dalliance

More than thirty years ago,
I saw my first pickup truck,
The Toyota Hilux Single Cab,
Powering past on a road sans tar,
Against a padi landscape far,
On the east coast of the Peninsula;
That's it, enthused I,
This would be my dream car;
Till today I still haven't got da,
Since that first sighting,
My heart flitted on the Isuzu,
The Pajero, the Ford Ranger,
The Mitsubishi Storm,
The Toyota Hilux Double Cab,
The Land Rover Defender,
In the thirty year span;
But still I baulked,
At getting a pickup truck,
Single or Double Cab;
Oh, I bought one car after
Another in that three score years,
But not a pickup truck;
Last week, mid-December 2006,
At the Eon Mitsubishi showroom
In Tanjung Aru, Kota Kinabalu,
I took the new Mitsubishi Triton
For a spin,
That's it, resolved I,
Come the new year,
I'll get myself a pickup truck,
After a thirty year dalliance.

ProtoCosmic Course: Continuation

After the organic equivalent of the physical big bang, we humans are thrown up between two interstices - land and water, the beach and the sea, the blood-sweat-tears life and the Perfect Form.

Life is an Amazing Race, an Ultimate Challenge to break free from the proto mold to the perfect form. That is the name of the game. Simple as that. Look no further. But because we often feel too big to fit our evolutionary footprint, we try to look beyond and come up with revolutionary theories to explain away our human predicament and mystery - the neosophies and pseudologies.

What if you don't make it? Resits! Failure is not an option. You will be made to take as many resits even if it takes a thousand years, and some believe, a thousand lifetimes, until you finally break through the interstitial barrier to claim or reclaim you right of place in the Ethereal Estate.

Meanwhile, you will be staying back in the hostel of life while others who have broken through have all gone home. Some of you will be wandering aimlessly, feeling restless, clueless, or worse, getting into all sorts of difficulties and uncomfortable situations, to say the least.

Don't blame others or yourself for these adversities. It is part of the course. Be thankful. Turn the other cheek, as one tradition says. Just manage them as best as you can - no resentment, no moaning, no lashing out in anger, no revenge, no escapisms ... don't repeat the same mistakes or stock responses. Break out of the old reaction patterns to break the jinx.

What if the above view is wrong? What is the opposite position? Oblivion! When you die, you die. Nothing matters. Nihilism. Life is meaningless, just like a dead frog, nobody cares, no insurance, no ceremony, no litigation, no justice. Less stark is existentialism which concedes that although life is ultimately meaningless, at least you can make it meaningful during its shelf life.

Hey, that's not a fate worse than some I know.

What Do Ashaari Muhammad and Ron Hubbard Have In Common?

At first glance,
The juxtaposition of these two names
Might furrow a brow,
But actually both are cult leaders
In their own rights,
They have been operating
For quite some time now
With large followings;
They have hammered out
Beguiling alternative road maps
To immortality, while thumbing
Their noses at mainstream religions;
In the bargain, they made milllions.
Me? Even members of my own family
Don't agree with me.
Tee hee.

Land Rover: A Grand Delusion

World reknown is the Land Rover,
To many a 4WD vehicle driver;
Launched in 1948 by an English company,
An unashamed copy of the American jeepney,
Though now left in its wake by the Humveed,
It is considered still, by the moneyed,
The best four by four by far,
Which for the course, is par.

Many an adventurer in Africa,
Camel Trophy competitor,
Estate manager, fire fighter,
Whether in Surrey or Sahara,
Agrees and chooses no other.

The list of rivals is long and impressive,
Mitsubishi, Nissan, Toyota, all Japanese,
Volkswagen, Niva, Mercedes;
But the Landy,
From Sungai Siput to Sydney,
From Cameron Highlands cabbage packer,
To National Day salute taker,
Has notched its own market niche,
And became, in the process, cultish.

And so to the LR showroom at Resort Paradise,
I headed to see the best and brightest of the enterprise,
After having done the round of seeing the other merchandise,
It was the Double Crew Cab my eye settled on,
In keeping with the growing trend in the zenre,
There's the Frontier, the Hilux, the Ranger, the Storm,
All decently spec'd and going for under 100K.

A sales ex placed a promo booklet in my hand,
Person and paper share the same narrowband,
Detailing the oft repeated tagline,
That the LR is the best 4 by 4 by far,
I nodded, not wanting to appear
An out of sorts commissar.

And so I turned to the actual tab,
The object of my visit and interest mad,
The Land Rover Double Crew Cab.

I looked hard at the legendary mud plugger,
A workhorse to the world, wildlife protector,
Outside, inside, the truck bed, the seater,
The cockpit, the dashboard, the wiper,
Ah the wipers, wimpy dared I to whisper?
The truck bed, rivet, metal edge, rougher
Than a Frontier's covered with a spray on liner,
The seats, interchangeable with those from a schoolbus,
The cockpit, dashboard - spartan, ordinary,
Looked like they were homologated from a Pahlawan lorry.

The canvas canopy did nothing
To make the impression contrary;
This is no lifestyle statement, being all utility,
Next I peered at the performance sheet -
Well below that of the competition;
Then I took it for a testing,
Nowhere near the driveability
Of the under 100k family.

Finally I peered at the feared -
The price is 160k!
All in all the looks and performance of a 70s Mahindra,
With the price tag of a 2005 Toyota Fortuner.

So, whaddaya think, Sir?
Cried the sales supervisor!
Dared I demur and be wiser?
It's the best 4 by 4, said I, miser,
Not wanting to be original, nihilistic,
Or stick out like a sore dick.
I made my purchase,
It made me sick.

Not long after,
During a LR owners strut,
We passed a posse of Lanun Darat,
Did I imagine a gleam of admiration,
In the eyes of the pirates,
Or did the gleam signify commisseration,
At our collective delusion?

Overheard under the Jolly Roger,
Cost of spare parts for the Land Rover,
Are stratospheric,
Oh dear, that, for me,
Is news catastrophic;
Soon, I can already imagine,
I'll be back to being
Carless, peripatetic.

Boyen Came Lately

Fire in the galley,
Fire down below,
Boyen came lately,
Boyen got aglow;

Boyen said loudly:
If the heat
Had you beat
Take a deck seat.

Mahathir vs Tengku Razaleigh, Musa Hitam, Ghazali Shafie

History shows Mahathir won his rounds
With Tg Razaleigh, Musa Hitam and Ghazali Shafie,
All stalwart Malays three;
However, anyone with a ear to the ground,
Can tell that all four of them will not succeed,
If they try and stage a comeback bid.

Mahathir vs Me

If Sun Tzu's advice,
Know your enemy,
Applies here, I win!
I know him, he doesn't
Know me.
Oh, we met a couple of times
And were even on the same
Helicopter flight once.
He even managed to raise
Laughter at my expense.
Er, one more interesting fact -
Our birthdays differ by a day.
Astrology will have a say,
But I will not give you the reader
An opportunity to smirk,
Or sympathise,
Over our similarities,
Or differences,
By revealing them here.
Tee hee.

Mahathir vs Coomaraswamy

Lost.
Since then everyone avoids
Mentioning it in public
To spare the feelings of Mahadick.

Mahathir vs Australia

Lost 0 - 2.
A former Ozzie PM scored
With the "Recalcitrant" label
Sending Mahathir reeling
Back on his heels;
Then incumbent Howard
Snubbed him by cancelling
A trip to Malaysia
Only to come a-calling
After Mahathir's retirement.
Abdullah's smiling welcome,
I'm sure, is not a double entendre.

Mahathir vs Lee Kuan Yew

Afraid, Dr M never won this one,
All bilateral issues between S'pore
And Malaysia going the Lion City's way.

Even now, both retired, Lee is better placed,
Holding down his Senior Minister's post,
While Dr M is taking enforced bed rest;
Note that Lee is older than Mahadet.

Mahathir vs Abdullah

Though unfolding events and history
May dictate the contrary,
What with dark whispers of more
Embarrassing revelations
Of Abdullah's alleged convolutions,
Mahathir is losing this one,
Viling the very person he picked
To be his number two and replacement.

Bad prescription, Doc.

Mahathir vs Anwar

Just when one thought the worst
Happened in distant times and climes,
Faraway lands and different chimes,
It dawned on Malaysian sensibility,
That a bathos of the lowest order,
Was ascending from the depths,
To shock society at the highest level.

What was this assault
On our smugness?
It can't be!
How could the Number One
From the ruling set,
Be accusing his Number Two
Of kacang putih acts,
Normally scrawled on toilet walls,
And whispered about in
Fully residential halls?
How could this be happening,
To songkok and tudung wearers,
Who pride themselves
As moral standard bearers?
How not courtroom details,
In collusion with thick denials,
Served to rake up forgotten
Historical baggage?
From Hang Tuah to Tun Teja,
From Pahang to Melaka ...
Or its appendage?

Disclosures this sensational,
In recent memory were too risible,
To appear in mainstream media, sensible,
Though standard fare for Bacaria,
Street talk and Bukit Aman cafeteria.

As the sandiwara among the saudara
Unfolded, the line between sleazy street
And prim print turned effete,
Marking a watershed,
Since when the Press
Had not been able to look back
On the good old hack;
Now previously unprintable matter
Has become common media barter,
Rivaling Mastika banter.

The country's highest institutions,
Bystanders and partisans,
Jostled in the corridors of credibility,
Who to believe, who to give sympathy?
Do you believe in the conspiracy theory?
Or do you accept the guilty probability?
Are the courts' hands smirched?
Or are our faces wearing a worrying smirk?

Metaphors To Live By

In attempting to write this topic down, I suddenly come face to face with the dreaded writer's block. My head goes blank. I thought of this topic this morning as I was doing the morning's chores. Then my head was full of ideas, coming out unbidden, but as usual, I did not jot the ideas down and now I cannot remember them. It is a familiar pattern.

Later ...

PRISON as a metaphor of life

If we see life as a prison, then whatever circumstances you are in, it can't be as bad as a real prison unless you are really incarcerated in one! That ought to cheer you up if needed be, and who doesn't from time to time. Think of worse scenarios and count your blessings, however small. This little self-deception always works for me.

Life as an ADVENTURE or OBSTACLE Course

Don't resent the adversities, big or small, laid in your path. Look upon them as tests or challenges to overcome and opportunities for growth and advancement. Then say your thanks.

Evil as Creation's necessary SHADOW or ALTER EGO

Evil is an impersonal accompaniment of nature's work; it takes no sides, it is random, it is not subject to rules of natural or even poetic justice; it is not meted out to the bad and prevented from the good. It is impartial and detached. No need for us to romanticize or use it as a means of persuasion or manipulation. It is a reality written into our read only collective memory.

What to do? Deal with it conscientiously, mindfully, minimize its effects, exercise damage control, don't give in to its urgings. Therein lies your opportunity for maturity and spiritual growth.

The COMPUTER as a Metaphor of the Mind,
The Mind as a Metaphor of God,
The UNIVERSE as the Body of God,
Nature as a Metaphor of God's Work,
Death as a Tunnel underneath the Berlin Wall thru which you wrangle an escape from East to West ...

BUDDHA as a Metaphor for the Found Pool of Calmness and Understanding Within You

The historical Siddharta Gautama is not the only Buddha. There are millions of unnamed buddhas before and now. He or she can be the person you just met. In fact you may be a buddha too, actualized or potential.

Buddhahood is not so much a religion as a state of mind though one tradition has evolved into a religion called Buddhism, the world's third largest after Christianity and Islam. Among eastern religions making inroads in the West, Buddhism is the most popular.

The Doha AG Women Sepaktakraw Final

Did you watch the Doha AG Women Sepaktakraw final match between defending champion Thailand and upstart Vietnam?

I rooted for underdogs Vietnam and when they won and tears flowed, I shared their joy, but felt a tinge of sadness that Malaysia does not even see fit to encourage women to play the game what more participate at this level.

When other civilized nations of the world are falling over one another's heels to be represented in all arenas of human endeavour, we note that a few countries, particularly from deep Africa, central Asia and the Middle East, seem to be too embroiled in regional or domestic politics, holding hardline cultural and religious values, or at war, preventing them from being fully represented in international events.

Malaysia is one of these sidelined countries.

An opportunity for human resource development and a chance to stand up and be counted, goes down the drain, sacrificed at the altar of fundamentalist beliefs.

These beliefs in turn hide rigid and dualistic - us against them - psychological hangups and other assorted delusions which make up our historical baggage.

We are embalmed and fossilized in the backwaters of human development and spiritual growth. In the absence of real progress, we cling to and chant symbols and slogans as a substitute.

How sad.

King Solomon's Saffron Rice As Adult Metaphor

Serendipitously, a news item today
Says you can make a million out of dung
Processing it into organic fertilizer;
This news coincides with my intention
To write this prose verse
About King Solomon's Saffron Rice
Which, as every pupil knows,
Is cow dung in the Sang Kancil
Tiger Escapade serial stories;
But in case you missed out,
The tricky mousedeer told the
Chasing tiger he was not to be eaten
As he was in the midst
Of performing a sacred duty:
Standing guard over King Solomon's saffron rice.

The credulous tiger was so impressed
And jealous of the mousedeer being chosen
By the Lord of All Animals,
That he forgot he was chasing and going to eat the mousedeer,
Instead he begged his quarry
To let him at least try out the role,
If not let him eat the King's dinner as well.

Playing his pretense to perfection,
The mousedeer put on an air of reluctance
Before conceding to the tiger's entreatment,
Invoking the King's wrath,
If he did not abide by the rule -
No eating until the day was done,
Giving him ample time
To make his getaway run.

Well, you write the finish to the episode,
While I deconstruct the children's story
As a metaphor for adults:

The tiger is a metaphor for the unthinking masses
Or individual
Who follow or easily fall for propaganda
Which invokes authority such as religion
And uses threats of dire consequences
Such as excommunication.

The mousedeer is any clever propagandist
Who is out to advance or protect
His own interests - position, power, status,
Beliefs, security and profits.

King Solomom is a symbol of any feared authority, ruler, father figure, -
Often a myth or a post created by tradition or statute,
With an all too human incumbent behind it,
Like a boy king or god.

The saffron rice is a metaphor
For any nice, respectable sounding name
Which is invoked to camouflage, hide
Something which is mundane, substandard,
Or downright bad, a scam,
And make it appear good or worthy.

See also emperor's new dress, euphemism.

Now that you've got this far,
Following the analytical drift,
Why not have a go at dissecting
The cow dung?
Ugh!

Letchumi

This is a story of a Malaysian academician,
Whose name is Letchumi,
She lives in Petaling Jaya,
And teaches at a local university,
She was born in Sentul,
Grew up in Brickfields,
In full view, cool,
Of Keretapi Tanah Melayu,
Her father was a station master,
When Malaya was classed in the colonial cluster.

She lives in a single storey bungalow,
With a large compound in Section 5, PJ,
Bought in a year when the ringgit was $2.50
to the US dollar for RM25K,
Now she won't sell it for a million.

She has many friends and reliatives,
Her three children are all grown up,
Living in Australia and Canada,
Her parents have passed away,
Her husband is a professor at Singapore U,
An old BMW sits idle in the garage,


She prefering to drive her new Suzuki Swift,
The Swift is easier to park and easier to drive, she says,
Her bungalow is full of keepsakes,
Mementoes of a full life,
Half opened gift packages,
Unused electrical gadgets,
Six wardrobes of dresses, shoes and oddments
She doesn't know what to do with them
She is still attached to them to be given or thrown away.

With a degree in anthropology and communication theory,
She understands herself and others
She has a collection of mobile phones and computers,
Bluetoothed and wiredup to the Internet,
But towards the end of her tenureship,
She is turning into a recluse
All wired up but no one she particularly wants to call,
All dressed up and nowhere to go.

Numerology

According to numerology, the name Zaharan Razak gives a Life Path number of 2. My mission in life is to serve. That's fine with me.

Al Arqam

All major religions experience the sprouting of sects, either breaking away to form new denominations or religions or staying within the fold but adding an extra handle to the pan or horn to the head.

Christianity has a rich tradition of breakaway groups but Islam too has its share of the history.

On the basis of there being no compulsion in religion, I say leave Al Arqam well alone. Ayah Pin too.

On an individual level, no two persons practise their religions equally alike in every detail and nuance. There are as many sects/mazhabs/religions as there are souls. We have to accept this dichotomy of public practises, private beliefs as part of the existential tension keeping it taut and tingled with its necessary micro adaptations and adjustments to meet life's surprises, apparent contradictions and ironies.

Lina Joy

Now what can I say about the Lina Joy case in a few sentences?

The Lina Joy case throws up, again, an issue found in many religions which is often swept under the carpet or elicit more obfuscations - ambivalence.

Ambivalence means holding two contrary and opposite views at one time. On one hand you say there is no compulsion in religion, on the other, you are threatened with some sort of dire consequences if you are in breach of a religious edict. The word edict or command itself suggests force.

The only non punitive religion that I know is Buddhism. Buddhism holds that you are entirely responsible for your karma - cause and effect. You commit wrong, you yourself will suffer the consequences. No punishment is imposed by an outside authority.

Religion X will excommunicate or derobe you but you are free to walk out on it. Religion Y says walking out on it is a serious offence for it demeans the religion.

Many religions tell their followers, salvation, redemption lies in seeking the grace and forgiveness from a source outside of you. Buddhism says all that you seek outside are within you. Only you can save yourself.

So how does all that relate to Lina Joy? The answer is obvious.

A Family Having Fun In A Kayak Is Culturally Defined

Sept 06, Kundasang, Sabah: GKinabalu At The Back

Sept 06, Kundasang, Sabah: The View From Here

Sept 06, Kundasang, Sabah

Dec 2003, Cambodia: A Cham Girl At Roussei Chrouy outside Phnom Penh

The Truth

If an individual cell in a living body
Is conscious, aware of its separate identity,
Aware of being a part of the whole,
Of its position, form, function and design,
Can see itself, its adjoining neighbour cells,
Clustered to form separate organs,
Hung together to form the closed body,

If the cell can see the whole individual,
Now going about independently in open space,
As well as other individual creatures,
Some alike, some not alike,
And yet sharing many similarities,
Forming and reforming
Dynamic patterns and static clusters,

If the cell can see the whole universe,
Tiered from the tiniest to the infinitesimal,
Much like its own awareness curve,

If the cell can see the oneness,
The connectedness,
The unity in the diversity,
The small in the big,
The big in the small,
The universe
In a grain of sand,
In a drop of water,
In the molecule,
In itself,

Then, perhaps,
We all
Can Know
The Truth.

Dec 2003: Battambang Market, Cambodia: Beef Soup With French Loaf

Sept 06: On The G Kinabalu Trail

Dec 2003, Cambodia: A Cham Girl

FFD: Dutch Made Delta Trike

2004: Kraburi, Thailand: Kra River Overlooking Myanmar

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Penampang, Sabah, Early 2005: Nina 9, Ajai 7, Sara 3

FormFunctionDesign Go Into This Stitch N Glue Plywood Kayak

July, 2006, Putrajaya: My Take On Being A Tourist

If I Were Blind

If I were blind
I would've seen thru you
But as I could see
I was blinded by what I saw
I could have put my act better
Committed no wrong
But I did not count
You could be other than strong
Your capacity to misconstrue
Recognized no sides of words
I would be asleep when you scream'd
Scream'd when you dreamt
Wasted was the word that befell your ear
Worse was your word that no one could hear
Weary were they who you pulled to your breast
Worse was the love that sought a figure gone to rest.

The Camera Is Too Much Between Us

I lift the camera and veil my face,
The camera is intimidating and suspicious,
Nobody understands or has any use for it;
You reach for your cigarette
Like you clasp your breast in sleep;
I lift it up chary of the world
Who chide me for keeping
A widget in the house.

Down the fallopian barrel of the tele lens
You crouch in prenatal mindlessness
Kuhlick! A magic spell,
Pronouncing you a lilliputian,
A foetal captive
In a little black hell;
But the camera is only an instrument of birth,
I lift it up in an act of love,
I dream the transformation on your face,
When I bring back in a week, a year,
A crisp gloss of your regained loss.

How To Attain Enlightenment In Just A Day, Well

Hey, I don't pretend to know any better than you or anybody. Wiser men have been telling us it takes a life time and even many life times to attain a state of enlightenment - moksha, nirvana, makrifat, atman. Fine. But if there is another proposal which says it can also be achieved in an instant or a day, fine, too. I think I'll subscribe to this view.

Enlightenment. Long word. Not sure what it means. Let us try. It means the absence or cessation of wrong assumptions. The mind is free from delusions. It sees reality as it is rather than as we want it to be or as we are told or led to believe. An enlightened person holds no false hopes or ideas.

It also means the absence of bad intention and action. At the minimum, the enlightened person has the ability to control the shadow side of his human nature and express only the good side.

He knows and understands what ambition, greed, selfishness, envy, jealousy, anger, revenge are but is able to control or subliminate these negative feelings into a neutral or positive state.

The purpose of life is to survive, to achieve a reasonable standard of living, to stay healthy, to mantain needs and to gain enlightenment.

Life is both a means and an end in itself. The ultimate purpose is to transform it into pure awareness which is our ultimate form. It goes by many names - spirit, soul, consciousness.

The body and the mind are the tools.

The world is the workshop.

Running parallel to this purpose continuum is the virtue continuum. While the purpose continuum states that the purpose of life is to gain ennlightenment, the virtue continuum states that the purpose of life is to live it virtuously.

Enlightenment and virtue go together and are the same thing, or two sides of the same coin of existence.

Evil, negativiity is the raw material for us to fashion or hammer out a useful or virtuous effect.

It is part of the developmental process of life's work, transforming itself into a work of art and virtue.

Life is both an art class and a utility workshop as much as it is a philosophy lesson.

Together Apart

Our bodies,
Our lives,
Lie in parallel,
A touch here,
In contact there;
In between, hiatus.
This life,
This world,
Separates us.

Moralist Down

Hoisted a leg onto high ground,
Slipped, slid and fell into a hole;
Shot from below;
But all I saw were flitting birds
Chasing invisible insects
Imitating the sound of my words
Ricochetting off the wall;
Look'd beyond to the sky, knew
Had to get off my butt, up and out.

Class 64: Oink To The Oi

Brayed Oi United to Oink FC:
Oi, Fulsome Cowboy,
Long time no see!
For a daily dorky,
A day awol,
Is cause for worry.

Whassup? No more hawing at the Club?
Whatsa jazz? You running outta gas?
C'mon in, grab some grub!
WAH, YA, SZ and I,
Are worried and wondering why.

Altho the tip of your lance-in-pencil
Is at times sharp, at times limp,
We, members of the Tribal Council,
Are in no trance, being
Neither a zombie, nor a wimp.

We have sensitivities a few, you Fing,
So go easy on the Malay thing-a-ling,
On this, the Net Forum,
Mindful of tribal decorum,
We frown on any hokum-pokum;
We are here primarily to say Hello;
Occasionally warn of non-halal products, Lo!
A virus or two, maybe worms too,
While passe are jokes leached from the loo,
Golf and dinner invites are okay too,
That's all that are comfortable, Yahoo!

So no, we don't have to sit cross-lapped,
Holding a cup to your crap;
What to you are carps and complaints,
Not even profound, just plain profane,
Are to us a yarn, held in disdain;
To the head, heavy; in the butt, a pain.

Ever wonder why JoeK, TA and AI,
And the rest of class 64,
Perched on table high,
Don't dang deign the padang turun,
And with one another interact?
Even if the padang is only the Net?

No, not because they lead busy lives,
Grasshopping down the Green,
Or being Lounge Lizards at a Resort,
But you've turned this once merry hive,
Into a burial site that is barely alive,
With many a sting, many a sigh,
And raised the bar a notch,
The heat a degree, too high.

Not that we engineer, captain, school dean,
Private practitioner, exporter-importer,
Political aspirant and tin-miner,
Mostly ex, some botak, others botox'd,
Are lacking in might and means,
But we find your demeanor,
Obnoxious in the extreme.

Our sacred cows tribal,
You denounced as inconsequential,
Trivial; our Cause Celebre,
The need of the Murid for a Murshid,
You deemed as lacking in merit;
A Taksub Terrible,
Not at all cerebral;
Our best barb pro September Eleven -
Even Steven, contra Americum -
You scoffed off as schoolboy tantrum;
How not to be sore on that score.

So go easy on the cheesy Lizzy,
Cicak, ciplak and cheapo cc,
Spare your old mate, the venom of hate;
Stave off your tirade,
From this Forum, small grade,
On to a bigger parade;
And maybe, fain,
We shall meet again,
Over tehs tarade.

Otherwise we will in chorus,
In unison, vociferous,
Cry Oi to your Oink,
No less.

Neofeudalism, you say?
Oi by a ruler of yesterday?
Reserved for his gundek and gecko?
Recalled here for its cili echo?
Nerd, geek, wacko and cracko,
All melded into one, watcho!

Bluster and bustle,
Hive off to the hustle,
Dorky for the day,
Blather to the bray,
Boy oh boy,
Oink to the Oi.

Bringing Up Sara

My little 'un is no Princess,
For I'm no Yang Di Pertuan;
Of her Dad, she seems to agree,
But of herself, she thinks she's one;
Admittedly, in abetting the case,
I'm guilty;
What can I do,
I have no plea,
Sara is only three.

Between queenie and subject loyal,
Between Dad's attempts futile,
To get the tiker to mend her style,
And give up her ritual,
Of being a little tot feudal,
There develops daily a battle royale.

The battle field is the settee
In front of the tv,
Which she hounds,
Refusing to give ground.

This is where she pitches
Her ensemble of imaginary
Pots, pans and dishes,
Made up of my toiletry,
Stationery and gadgetry.

This is where she scrimps,
Eyes glued to the screen,
Grubby fingers wiggling
To find the mouth;
Half enters, the rest goes south;
Mopping up is Dad's deed
Mashy, messy but necessary.

RC in her free hand,
She commandeers
All the cartoon channels,
Disney, Nickelodean, CN.

In the shadows Dad
Stands back, egad,
His is to nibble,
The dry biscuit Sara swivels,
Signalling his lot
Is not to quibble
Over the stuff from the pot
Or the missed tv news slot.

Gunung Kinabalu Climbathon 2005

The occasion was the 19th Mt Kinabalu Climbathon 2005,
The last event in the annual Sky Runner World Series mountain race,
Prestigious, publicized, offering prize money,
Attracting top names of the world athletic fraternity.

So what right had a crotchety pensioner,
Sea level aspirant, pushing sixty,
To have his name mixed up,
In the international cast of altitude runners?
Even if only in the above forty?
Why, they even required him to have a medical,
Before his name was put on the entry decal.

Well, as much right as the other recreational participants,
Who were runners in need, walkers in deed,
Who not only had no hope of winning a dime,
But might not even make it to the peak,
In the allotted time.

The route is 21.4 km long,
Climbing from 1.8 km to 4 km high;
Touristy trekkers only cover 17 km of the trail,
Done over a two-day round trip;
But for the race you are to complete,
The longer stretch in less than half a day,
With the cut-off time as six hours and a half,
And the record a little under three.

The pensioner, at the back of the straggling line,
Picked his way up,
Step, pause, step;
Step, pause, step.

He saw in awe,
The lead runner,
On his way down,
Bounding from boulder to boulder,
Bridging the intervening space,
As though helped by a bulldozer.

What diferent breed of animal is this?
What separates a runner of under three hours
From one who lurches home in seven?
What lungs, what heart,
What single-mindedness,
What knee ligaments,
What oxygen uptake?
Is it more a gift? Extra gills, Sir?
Or just the training factor?

A race is to the swift won,
And a rescue, rapidly deployed,
Is often successful;
Fortunately, no runner needed rescuing,
The pensioner to the finish line trudging,
One and a quarter past noon,
In a straggling line from the veteran unit
Who failed to reach the summit.

But my hat went to the senior ladies,
Elizabeth, Katie and one more,
Who traipsed behind the runners,
Sometime holding hands,
Often with hands in pockets,
Who made it to the finish line,
Ahead of the pensioner.