Manners and Murder

They say manners are a good thing. Manners bring polish and politeness. These in turn bring amiability. And that is useful to lure good fortune and seal favours. People generally like those that possess if not inhabit manners.

But manners prevent me from the sayings the things I need to say. I cannot call you a fucking murderer. I cannot accuse you of being a slimy scum sucking ball licking piece of shit. No. Manners demand that we respectfully dance around the massive gargoyle in the room that whose upper body has crashed through the ceiling and the pieces are raining down on us. It demands that we presume a person so unworthy of humanity to have a good reputation. The more loathsome the person, the higher their presumed reputation. So even though everybody knows what you did, we have to smile and pretend it didn't happen. 1984 in 2009.

Manners demand I politely remark in the words utterly devoid of emotion of your impropriety. We can only accuse you of that when you have betrayed and ruined us and still hold our beating hearts in your hand. Manners demand a considered and reasoned reaction to your intended madness when I want to choke the living shit out of you with my bare hands. Manners forces my mouth when my fingers want to dig into the softness of your neck and rip out your spine by tearing off your head. Manners forces a handshake when my hands wants to murder your entire family in front of you while you lay dying as you have done to so thoughtlessly to many others. So the last thing you are able to comprehend as you fade is your complete annihilation. So that when you are faced with death, you will long for it. And when you finally beg for it, pray for it, long for it like a fresh love denied, I want to keep you alive. But only just enough for you to comprehend you are living death.

And maybe after that, perhaps we can use manners a smidgen more meaningfully.

On the Outside

It's cold and lonely where I am.

On the outside looking in.

In a white out blizzard.

I cannot see.

So I press my face as closely as I can to the window but taking care not to break it.

From what I can make out and guess from what is spared by the web of ice covering the glass, I can see the main door which opens into the living room. There is a warm comfortable glow about the room. Two big and deep cushioned recliner chairs glance at each other in front of what could be a lively cackling fire. A huge tan brown bear rug on the dark brown stained wooden floor lay between the recliners and the fire. Behind the recliners is an oval shaped table with a few chairs around it. On top of it is a black suitcase with what looks like silver or white gold tasteful but understated trimmings. A pair of thin round shaped spectacles rests overturned on top of the suitcase. Then I see a man and a woman walk into the room happily talking to each other as the walk towards the fireplace. After sitting on the recliners and chatting for a while they end up making love on the bear where they fell asleep in each other's arms.

It looks how it has always been. It is pleasant to remember what was.

But I no longer hunger for it now. So I turn away from the scene.

The web of ice quickly creeps over, freezing me out.

As I close my eyes in readiness to welcome and passionately embrace the piercing cold once more, a smile slowly creeps into the opposite edges of my lips.

Thoughts on the Infiniteness of Learning

It is often said that to learn something is to find illumination in that particular area. It is also commonly observed that the only thing one can conclude from a great deal of learning is how little we can eventually learn, retain and apply. The area of the unknown shall always and forever be greater than the known areas. This applies with greater force to an individual as opposed to a society which tends to retain an institutional memory, though it must be admitted that it might not be very accurate or even understandable. Myths are demonstrative of this, but perhaps this as humans we tend to be literal and obvious creatures first and metaphorical ones once we reach a certain intellectual and spiritual plane. We forget that our human illuminations are personal and therefore tend to be singular and that the illumination we train upon an area lights it up as much as it shows how much of the area around it remains in a formidable darkness. These I take as trite propositions in life though I welcome anyone who can demonstrate the contrary evidentially instead of by mere argument, like Xeno's paradoxes. 

I am beginning to realize too that there is an infiniteness to any area of study if we really wished to know any and everything about something. Let's take something as simple as a paperclip. Do we know enough if we know how a paperclip is made? It is made from galvanized steel wire and twisted to an meaningful shape to hold a few sheets of paper together. Let's even say we know what kind of machine makes it. Do we know enough of it if we know what it is used for? It is used to hold paper together, but it can be stretched out and used to poke small holes (resetting your phone or PDA) or it can be used to in other creative ways. Do we know enough if we delve into its history, how it came about, the developments and patents that resulted in most of the standard paperclips around today? Do we know enough if we then know what steel is made of on an atomic level? Should we also not know how they interact at that level as well? And sometimes we also notice that these paperclips turn rusty - so should we also not know something about oxidization? Then if we know of the paperclips impact in terms productivity, economically, spiritually (hey, ya never know!) and in literature, can we be said to know everything about paperclips? 

But all these are a great deal of things to know about just a mere paperclip which we often do not give much thought of. I am starting to think that there is no end to it; that we can never know everything of even one thing. We as humans are ultimately creatures of great practicality - we need not understand everything about something before we are able to use it, even effectively and efficiently. I am certain many people that drive cars don't even know the science of what makes it move - but what does it matter if they know how to manipulate the vehicle to do as they intend? What added benefit or advantage does a person who knows exactly how a car works as opposed to someone who doesn't though we assume for examples sake they are both equally competent drivers with similar skill levels? 

The added benefit is not just in terms of a richer experience when one is undertaking the driving experience, but also the former driver knows how better to modify the vehicle such that his car would be better than that owned by latter driver. It may also perhaps make him a better driver because he knows the exact limitations and advantages of his car. 

What does all this amount to then? That we are born into ignorance. That we shall always be partially ignorant. The lesser one is ignorant of something, the greater the possibility of obtaining a competitive or some sort of advantage over someone more ignorant. To be ignorant is a temporary bliss paid in the long run with significant inferiority. But then to be knowledgeable these days also means a greater chance of being obsolete.

How I Became a Reader of Books

My friends have the impression that I am 'serious' or 'heavy' reader. They think this because my reading list these days tends towards mostly classic or serious literature, terribly boring current affairs books or Sahara dry philosophy or psychology books. What I found interesting about this impression is how they imagined that in all probability I was also an avid reader read those the entirety of Enid Blyton and Ladybird's catalogue of books in my youth. In short, they thought my reading development from young until now was respectable, diligent and therefore no doubt agreeable. Little did they know that my reading origins were quite sordid and my attitude towards books then was quite deplorable.

Until the age of about 12, the only books I really enjoyed were those with lots of pictures. And if they had Donald Duck, Goofy, Pluto and Mickey Mouse in them so much the better. It was still reading right? I mean, if a picture told a thousand words, I was reading lots of words and pretty damn quick too! So the more pictures there were, the better the book. The aesthetic quality of the pictures or cartoons were my primary concern. The present words were merely to assist in making sense of the picture and were entirely optional.

My parents bought me those Enid Blytons and Lady Birds. My dad would extol their virtues to me relishing his anecdotes about how the Famous Five had enthralled him and inspired his reading. I couldn't tell him then, but I felt none of that when I read those books without any pictures. I remember the Famous Five book he brought home for me one day and told me it was his favourite then. So with such high recommendation I set about reading it only to lose interest completely by page 5 before the adventure even started. The damn thing was just too wordy for me. This is probably why I am so impressed with any kid under 12 that doesn't read picture books.

You would think this more ironic if you knew that since my youth, I have always been surrounded by books. In my old house in Damansara Utama, there were a lot of books. My father was and is a book freak and read as much as he bought and he bought a lot. Just outside my room was a tall shelf jam packed with books (the entire Sherlock Holmes collection was stored there with most of the hardcovers) as was the family living room upstairs (that's where the Brittanica Encyclopedia was stored with the other serious fiction) and downstairs in the guest room rounded off the third part of our collection of books. The shelves in my room too had many books but as you would guess by now, they were mostly picture or cartoon books. There was one shelf reserved for those books that I was given but not interested at all. That's where my dad's Famous Five book to me eventually ended up.

My interest in books was awakened by sex. Not that I knew what it was at 12. Back then I still thought people had to get married first before they had a baby. And I must have laboured under the impression that the stork brought me over because I don't recall having any theory about how baby's came about until my literary explorations. All I knew from my sheltered existence then was that people only had babies after they were married. I never troubled my parents with how babies were born or sex. And they never troubled to tell me.

So I'm not quite sure how I came to have this overwhelming curiousity about sex, but possess it in abundance I did at 12. Instead of asking my parent's directly, I thought it best to find this out myself discreetly. I think I did this because even though it was not said outright, I sensed that there was something taboo or forbidden about the topic of sex so asking my parents was out of the question.

I set about educating myself about sex was therefore to turn to our library. I mean if we had so many damn books, there must be something about sex in there. So what I did was to seek out those books in our collection that had a beautiful or sexy lady on the cover with a provocative pose. That image smelled of sex and so I assumed that the book would have something about sex in it. Now as luck would have it, books possessing those covers were authored by Sydney Sheldon, Harold Robbins, Eric van Lustbader, Jackie Collins, and other such writers known for their intensely arousing and completely impossible sex scenes. I still remember one scene from Collin's book 'Lucky' where after the guy brought her to an explosive multi orgasm and ejaculated his spunk into her and then went on to pleasure her some more with a fantastic demonstration of cunnilingus and climaxed with him sucking out his cum from her vagina. Now being a virgin then, I had no comprehension whatsoever about the act but thought it quite impressive all the same because he did not need a straw to get it out. Ah, the ignorance of youth!

Now though I had discovered those books, I did not actually read them in their entirety. I started just flipping pages randomly at first to look for sex. I think it was because I was successful in my first few attempts at finding a scene that I intensified my efforts and slowly became more methodical in my explorations. I would now flip each page of the book and scan each page quickly for words like 'cock', 'breasts', 'fuck' and other such words that would indicate the presence of a sex scene. Once I found it I would dive in like a happy dolphin and swim about for a few paragraphs (or pages if you read Jackie Collins). But the cover method of identifying sex scenes in books though generally successful had its failings as well. Sometimes the damn cover or the title of the book was thoroughly misleading and I would find myself flipping through 300+ pages without even so much as a show of skin. Eventually, I began to realize that sex scenes had to happen by 2/3rds of the book and if there wasn't one by then, there wasn't going to be one nice long multi paged sex scene waiting for me at the end. I refined my methodology with not just my collection but with every book shop I hit and other's people's collections when the opportunity presented itself. I also came to realize that at the bookshops my life was actually made easier because there were other filthy minded bastards like me around who sought out such books and homed in on the sex scene. I don't know whether it happens these days, but if you look at the spine of authors like Jackie Collins, you will notice creases at certain areas. It was those creases that indicated that those particular areas were accessed more and held open longer than others. And voila! that's where the sex scenes generally were.

By this time of course I knew what sex was all about but found myself taking immense pleasure in reading the sex scenes. I even fancied myself a connoisseur and could anticipate the quality of sex scene of the various writers.

My methodology came under severe review one day when I was browsing one of those type of 'perused' books that we also had at home. I forget which it was now, but what I noticed was that the spine crease on the book at the shop indicated 4 sex scenes whereas to my recollection of the book I had at home, I only found 3 sex scenes. Despite my page by page scan I still missed out a sex scene! How could this be? I quickly opened the book to the 4th visible crease and there it was - the 4th sex scene that eluded me. Though it was not terribly memorable or outstanding in quality, this seriously casted doubt on the thoroughness and accuracy of my methodology and left me feeling insecure; insecure because there may be many more sex scenes that I may have left out in my previous explorations.

It was about that time that a cousin of mine who was staying with me lent me Virginia Andrew's 'Flowers in the Attic'. If you don't know what the story was about, it was about 2 brothers and 2 sisters who were kept in the attic by a mean relative and how they coped. Incest was therefore definitely on the agenda. And incest = sex scene. So it was game on.

When I was passed the book, I contemplated trying out my methodology again but with greater focus and concentration. But I think that episode made me cast serious doubt on my abilities that I thought that the best way to make sure I don't miss out on any of the sex scenes was to read the whole damn thing. And that's what I ended up doing and that I think is the first work of fiction that I read in its entirety. And though I wouldn't read any more of her stuff, I thoroughly enjoyed the book then. I went on to devour all of her books after that though I can't remember any of them now. And after I was done with her, my reading development exploded and I just couldn't read enough. However, my genre however was still questionable and limited to the heavily sex scened books. A few years later, I graduated to the classics mostly from the French side with classics by Dumas, Maupassant, Laclos, Rostandt and Flaubert. Dumas' 3 Musketeers was the first book that I finished in double time. I holed myself in my room over a weekend and remember finishing that book at about 3am in the morning. I could not sleep until I had finished the book and after doing so wished I could start it all over again.

Soon after, I moved into contemporary fiction and stayed there for a long time, occasionally dipping into the classics so I could gauge the general quality of the former. I could not read non-fiction then even when I hit University. I could take the boring legal crap but textbooks, current affairs, essays, etc. were all out of the question. Funnily enough, it as only after I came back and worked for a year that I began to take an interest in non-fiction. I think it started with Scott Peck's 'The Road Less Travelled' and carried it on from there.

Nowadays, whilst I usually prefer non-fiction, whether it is a current opinion/affair book, or one about science, or the original texts of the groundbreaking books, to fiction. And the supreme irony now being that I abhor sex scenes in my literature and think them almost embarassing these days (unless it was there for a meaningful purpose and not merely as a masturbatory stop). One of those exceptions to the rule is Cleland's 'Fanny Hill' which I get a huge kick out of reading because of the antiquated language used to describe nasty sex scenes. Careful though, it might give you a boner or wet your panties (or both!).

Having reflected on this, I have concluded that there are many ways to discover the joys of reading and that sordid beginnings need not necessarily continue forever that way. I realize now that for me, if it were not for that curiousity about sex, it is likely that I may have developed an interest much much later or perhaps not even at all, which I think to be the greater tragedy. Jackie Collins was necessary for me to get in touch with Francis Bacon. So for that I thank all those writers of sex scenes both famous and obscure for facilitating my reading development and saucily and sensually ferrying me over to my current stage. And know that books should not be judge by its cover or its introduction or sex scene.

Wasted Juice/Curse of the Four Track

You can probably guess from this blog that I aspire to write. And the phrase 'aspire to write' really means someone pays me cold hard cash (or hot roasted peanuts, at the very least) per word or per article (I don't care dammit, just pay me) about any given topic that catches my fancy - like my love for a particular font or the joys of using a manual toothbrush as opposed to an electric one. This blog thing is what I call 'writing in the trenches'. That's because I feel like I'm writing in this trench and lobbing these literary grenades out of my little hole not knowing whether anybody reads, enjoys, hates, or perhaps even masturbates to them over a quicky dinner (this would be a climatic event for me as a writer, and I strongly believe simultaneously for the reader as well). In fact, there's no explosion or even the sound of a heavy object rolling and thumping along the grassy literary landscape in Malaysia or anything. Sometimes I feel I write mist - it's somewhat tangible and conceivable when I'm writing it but the moment I post it up, it fades away into the warm humid air, as if it were never written, never even thought about.

So if you are interested to know how failed writers go about their craft and why they never write anything worth publishing by a publishing house, read on. In terms of preparedness I think few can rival me. I am, at any time, thoroughly prepared to catch those transient fantasies, those elusive ideas, those potent concepts that would serve as springboard for other better ideas, stray thoughts that would lead to other more fruitful paths, that novel argument that seemed imbued with approval from the divine. That's because I have with me, not just the basic pen and notebook (latter has got to be a credible brand too - nothing but Moleskins for me. This is in keeping with the Melayu creed of Mutu Tada, Gaya Mesti Ada which translates too Quality Don't Have, Style Must Have. The pen doesn't really have to be branded though and in fact, haven't one is equally counterproductive as a very cheap notebook. I like using the Uniball Signo Broad (UM-153) Black Ink Pen. This baby is so smooth I call it smoot).

I also have with me a brand new spanking Dopod 838 Pro which has a very convenient and comfortable slide down QWERTY mini-keyboard which is of course loaded with the stripped down Word program for my word processing fetishes. And if I feel writing is too much of a problem (as it sometimes is because I type so much better and faster than I write and I can't even read my own writing these day. This is one of the side effects of input being made through the keyboards - handwriting suffers), then I can type it. But I don't like using it to type too much because it is tiring for long pieces.

If I don't like that, then the Dopod 838 Pro also has a recording function so I can just talk my ideas into it. That way I don't have to type or write it and can even put down my ideas while I'm on the move or when both my hands are occupied. Brilliant. Except that I'm not comfortable with putting down ideas this way. That superb idea that sounded so great in the confines of my mind immediately turns putrid the moment I speak it using my voice. People commonly talk about things lost in translation, but they miss out on the more important problem in translations - such as bullshit insidiously invading the translation. Some ideas immediately turn into bullshit the moment it hits airspace.

And perhaps if the idea or concept were purely visual, I was lucky that not only did the Dopod 838 Pro also have a camera built in with which I could take not only photos but videos as well. Well, if the resolution was not good enough or I wanted a better quality picture, I could use my highly portable Canon Ixus 850 which I carry around everywhere. Art and inspiration can happen anywhere. This is also in addition to my laptop which I carry around as well so that whenever the inspiration invades me, I can immediately put it down. Strike while its hot, so to speak.

So you see there's really no excuse why I cannot catch this inspiration of mine. I'm hoping for the rain because I've got all my buckets lined up. I may have not counted my chicks before they have hatched but I've already estimated that I would get some and made some preparations. I have all the nets that would be able to catch those little gems of wisdom and pearls of good fiction along with all the attendant bullshit. Sometimes when I walk around with all these equipment on me, I feel invicible - as if no great idea or thought will ever escape me, no matter how fleeting or resistant to record.

And this is the irony that I am confronted with - when I have all these things with me, I am unproductive. I cannot come up with damn thing worth putting down on paper. Everything sounds juvenile, cliched or just plain amateurish. But throw me in a place where there are no recording materials, and my mind, as if suddenly being told of the lack of recording sentries about, goes wild. It comes up with the most exciting fiction ideas, sexy characters, novel plots, those head nodding one liners which you couldn't wait to try out on your friends. It spins off ideas with wild abandon as if that would be its last hurrah. I get business ideas, short story ideas, novel ideas, legal ideas, all sorts of ideas. But all this can only happen when I have absolutely nothing with which to record them.

I call this the 'Curse of the Four Track'. I know it sounds strange that I should name this evil curse using equipment from the music industry, but this curse applies (especially relating to me) where all art is concerned. See I used to be in a band. Our lead guitarist, Justin, had a four-track recorder which we would use on occasion to record our cacophony. He usually kept it but when I felt the mood or was inspired to write some songs I would request for the four track. But after he delivered it, I lost all inspiration. Those songs I had kept in abeyance until the four-track came sounded like shite when I put it down. So it would end up that I would hold it without coming up with anything until somebody else wanted it. And when I delivered it to the house of whichever bandmate wanted it, they too would find themselves similarly creatively paralyzed. Whoever possessed Justin's four-track would also be inflicted with the 'Curse of the Four-Track'.

Beware.