Christmas Gifts

Over the years, I have come to believe that the most efficient, least manic and frankly more meaningful way to go about Christmas gift shopping is to decide on one thing, and find variations of that same thing for everybody.

So for one year it was scarves, another year miniature trees, last year I gave all manner of socks, and this year I had much fun getting what you see above and below for friends and family.

The only question was: how many can I read before I wrap them?

It was an exercise in nostalgia for the most part (reading the Wishing Chair, Malory Towers, and even one or two Nancy Drew mysteries again), and also a discovery process. Although I have been collecting children's literature for some years now, what I own in that section of my library were mainly acquired for their visual illustrations, rather than literary merit. I love the Atwoood and Silverstein poems of course, but it certainly helped that those collections contain beautiful illustrations. I have been curious recently about how the content of children's literature might have evolved since I was a kid, and since it seemed congruent with the spirit of Christmas to get children's books for my adult friends, I decided they shall be the focus of Christmas shopping this year.

So after one delightful morning spent in the children's section of Borders, I brought home the basketful of children's titles, some familiar, some not, and spent the few days leading up to Christmas reading as many of them as I could. There were a number of books which I decided in the end to keep for myself, mainly because the stories were so sad, and not quite appropriate I thought for the merry season. Yes, sad stories, especially those written for the current generation of young readers - underlying the quirky adventures and superhero tales, I was surprised (and yet not) to find the themes of divorce, alienation, mental psychopathy being repeated in different books. I suppose it is a reflection of the times, and these themes play out early enough in contemporary society and family life, that they naturally have become part of the learning experience of children. Generally, I think it is a good thing that children find a voice for their struggles and issues in sensitively written literature. Researching a little into the backgrounds of some of the children's authors, I was full of admiration of those who made it their careful art to write for the new generation growing up in an increasingly complex world.

However, in one corner of my mind, I am also hoping that "classic" children's literature would be preserved and somehow enough fondness would be created for them early enough in this generation of children who are growing up faster than ever before. Yes, I do mean the "Heidi" stories, Pooh tales, Beatrix Potter even. Simple stories about truth and beauty, happiness in doing good, love for others - which may provide (as they did for so many before this generation) a point of reference that they can come back to later in a (morally relativist, skeptical) life for some idea of hope and goodness?

Chasing Cars

I am conveniently blaming the Music Scientist for playing Snow Patrol on repeat in our carpool, now the song is playing on repeat in my head.

To be fair also, it is that time of the year. After several weeks of getting appraisals of oneself and others written, chased up, put into the global cauldron and signed off, all that remains is to see how the grade now closely and privately held in one's own hand would translate into a deposit entry in one's bank account in another few weeks' time.

The Business Times helpfully and unfoundedly inflated expectations further last Friday by running an article that the House of M is the pack leader of investment banks in Singapore with a 300% increase in revenue year-on-year.

It's been an exacting year at work, sure, since the Asian markets went completely ballistic, subprime woes notwithstanding. But then again, I can't really remember a year in which it didn't felt like that towards the end. But by most counts, it has been a good year in the overall aspect. While I worked one or two socks off, I still managed to paint some, read some, and hung out meaningfully with a few good people.

Still, the ordinary human way of judging rightful recompense is somewhat more narrow. It involves lunch time trips to sleek car showrooms with colleagues (and not even the front-line bankers) who are there to assure you (and you them), that upgrading to another newer and better car, is eminently equitable reward for the obnoxious late night phone conferences one has had to endure throughout the year.

The Chase is not specifically about cars of course. (Indeed, the impetus for that specifically is more shortlived that I pretend it is - after only two trips to the showrooms, I was bored. I am only able to appreciate cars for their aesthetics, and there are not that many out there to sustain a focused interest). But still it is inexorably material - a Kolinksky brush set, Le Cruset crockware, a rare vintage map, a Mount Faber apartment.

It was checked only in part by a casual conversation with my part time domestic helper, a study-mama from China, a very honest and hardworking lady who is raising her son here as a single divorced parent. She was lamenting quietly about how rents have skyrocketed in Singapore, and that the room that she lives in with her son is now $500, compared to $300 a year ago. And the old lady landlord that she was renting the room from still did not have a washing machine in their Tanglin Halt one-room flat.

The amount of loss I would incur by selling my current two year old car and buying the one that caught my eye last week, would pay for her rent for 5 years as well as her son's polytechnic education.

It's a complex question, of course, how much guilt one should or should not feel towards money, whether or not in the face of need. But I wonder what will make us stop chasing cars.

Nooma & Culture

In recent times, one topic that has been coming up with increasing frequency during conversations held in upstairs apartments is the contextualization of the gospel to modern (postmodern) culture. My first reaction to the idea, when first thinking about it several years ago, was this.

Being the fundamentalist evangelical snob one was (still am probably), it seemed merely a way for the emergent mega-churches to sell the gospel cheaply to folks who are too lazy to think about much.

Over time, having been progressively enconsed in the worldly working world, and painfully conscious that one would probably never pick up the courage to ask any colleagues (the hard-driving, diversity-proud followers of the Mammon religion) to an evangelical bible study or anything like that, the idea of contextualization started to look really attractive. After all, it's loads easier to ask someone to go watch, for example, "Bourne Ultimatum" (which supposedly was all about the gospel), than to the aforementioned bible study.

And it gets more interesting. For a long time now, I have wondered about how art and culture really could be integrated with faith. Even though the Church has always condoned the use of fine arts to promote Christianity through history, it is actually a much more difficult thing to work out in practice, especially in this age where anything overt and obstrusive would be outrightly rejected by a extreme relativist audience. So it has been terribly interesting to hear Christian think-tanks, including the important Reformists of the evangelical world, paying serious attention to these issues. Tim Keller has been preaching profusely on the needed impact of faith on postmodernist culture, and recognizes clearly the rise of the creative class as offering real-time challenge to gospel workers. There is a whole spectrum of other people who are deeply engaged with this issue, from the irrepressible Mark Driscoll to the weightier D.A. Carson. Like all worthy debates, it is passionate, controversial and sometimes quite discomfiting. But I guess like they say, if you are not confused, you really don't understand the situation.

And so it is rather. During the weekend, I was viewing a few videos produced by Ron Bell in the much talked about Nooma series that I picked up at SKS. Rob Bell is a Christian musician, writer and artist whose less-than-conventional ministry has reached even the New York Times. I was excited when I heard about the series from a friend last week as I thought perhaps this guy may be onto something here, one might pick up some ideas on how to reach out to non-Christian (somewhat thespian) friends? There is certainly good stuff to commend in the Nooma videos, but would I unhesitatingly give them as Christmas presents to seeker friends? Well, it could still be my reformed BP instincts at work, but I do wonder if the message has been so well hidden as to be lost in the beautifully cool modern art and music? For example, in one of the videos "Rhythm" - is saying that one ought to be "in tune" with God the same as saying that sin is completely discordant with life in Him? One might have a problem with the shyness to talk about sin, but the images and sounds of the concert hall are reallystrangely compelling. After all, even C.S. Lewis had used the extended metaphor of the "orchestra" of God, and one could do worse than Lewis in attracting a listening audience.

Looks like this is going to be another one those life-long, practical, and interesting questions to work out. But regardless of how this era of ours will look many years later, hopefully it will at least see the Church watching the "signs of the times" with care, which it is sometimes prone to forget to do.

Practical Criticism

Recently and quite accidentally, I came across a poem written by a contemporary Singapore poet which threw my mind back some 15 years to another poem I was reading then. I had studied the older poem in a strangely intent manner (for various reasons at that time), which was probably why it remained vivid in my mind all these years. The two poems are "churchgoing" and "Love III" respectively, I reproduce them in full here (with legal permission and the usual random clipart):

churchgoing

"and now we see through a glass darkly...." 1 cor 13:10

this morning i reached as far as
the clear glass doors of the sanctuary

and the affably opaque smile of the usher
on the other side, and peering in i saw

that someone had already taken
my favorite seat at the far anonymous

corner - a good seat by all accounts
because one only needs to shake no more

than three other hands when it came to
that part of the service, which had already

started - and i didn't want to interrupt God
who was evidently doing a great job with

the congregation, judging by their steadfast
glassy-eyed unanimity, from my clear glass

perspective anyway, so i turned around and
walked out the main gate, and lit my cigarette,

thinking of the parable of the virgins who
arrived too late and were locked out

(opaquely steadfastly oaken doors no doubt)
of the dinner banquet. then i sat down

for breakfast after that
and said my grace

but it wasn't quite the same at all.

- by Benzie Dio


Love III

Love bade me welcome, yet my soul drew back,

Guilty of dust and sin.
But quick-ey'd Love, observing me grow slack
From my first entrance in,
Drew nearer to me, sweetly questioning
If I lack'd anything.

"A guest," I answer'd, "worthy to be here";
Love said, "You shall be he."
"I, the unkind, the ungrateful?
ah my dear,I cannot look on thee."

Love took my hand and smiling did reply,
"Who made the eyes but I?"
"Truth, Lord, but I have marr'd them;
let my shame
Go where it doth deserve."

"And know you not," says Love,
"who bore the blame?"
"My dear, then I will serve."
"You must sit down," says Love,
"and taste my meat.
"So I did sit and eat.

- from "The Temple", George Herbert (1633)

"churchgoing" caught my attention for the reason that it refreshed some of the sentiments that I felt when I first read "Love III". Also, with the poem's modern and startlingly familiar (albeit intensely private) setting, it put me into a thinking mode about a number of issues that I have been mulling over regarding church life in the last few years - i.e. community, acceptance, and the "funny-shaped sheep" of Christ generally. I had written about these things in past blog entries, but I thought it would be interesting to look at them from a "literary" perspective.

So, purely for the fun of it, for old time's sake (and since one of the poets actually encouraged it), I am going to attempt a little comparative prac crit on the two poems. I am writing on the Blackberry on an airplane, so thoughts shall appear in bullets.

* Each poem is a re-working of a very well-known Bible verse. 1 Cor 13:10 in the case of "churchgoing" and Luke 12:37 for "Love III". In Herbert's work, the personification of God (Christ) is daringly human, tender, cajoling, solicitous even. Careful comparison with the scripture source shows how Herbert has juggled the characters and staging of the scene in his wonderfully witty way, worthy of a true Metaphysical poet. "churchgoing" likewise turns the preamble on its head in an intriguing way - we are used to the idea of the church looking into glass (perhaps darkly at first, if one was a dispensationalist) at the Truth, here someone outside the church looks in through clear glass instead, keenly observing what's going on inside. Who has the truer perspective? - is the question provoked throughout.

* In both poems, distance and space are used to convey the idea of intimacy, or the lack thereof, between deity and follower. At the start of both poems, the protaganist's desire to "draw near" to God is unspoken but palpable. In Love III, God and sinner becomes progressively closer, indeed the image of the eucharist brings about ultimate convergence- God is ingested by the sinner. In churchgoing, the opposite takes place, with the soul drawing back, guilty presumably of [cigarette?] dust and sin. God remains distant and untouched.

* I like the poignant social comedy in both. Who of us have not crashed a party of strangers and felt stupidly awkward at it? And who does not dread Friendship Break at service?!

* Cigarettes & dust. I am constantly amazed at the indictment ability of this. I am not a smoker, but I have a few close (Christian) friends who do (or did). The guilt surrounding the addiction is so real and so powerful, accentuated no doubt by the social stigma present in the community. One friend confided that she learnt to devise intricate strategies to make sure she gets a smoke when hanging out in a church setting without detection. Often it means having to find some place discreet in the middle of a gathering. She would have appreciated the "main gate" detail in "churchgoing".

* Finally, on Communion - it is still that undisputed image for fellowship with God and others. In "Love III", the sinner does sit and eat, which we may take as evidence of redemption. What about in "churchgoing"? In fact, the almost-churchgoer does sit and eat too, after voluntarily saying grace - should that not be taken as communion as well? But it is "not quite the same", he says. Why is that so? Did he feel that he dishonored God by turning up late at church ? (reminds me of the big signboard at my old church containing exactly that message for the latecomers every Sunday) Was it not the same because he would have preferred to eat (fellowship) with the glassy-eyed members of the congregation, and not alone? I am not sure one could tell entirely from this poem. Maybe it had something to do with practical self-criticism.

What the Living Do

What the Living Do

Johnny, the kitchen sink has been clogged for days, some utensil
probably fell down there.
And the Drano won't work but smells dangerous, and the crusty
dishes have piled up

waiting for the plumber I still haven't called. This is the everyday we
spoke of.
It's winter again: the sky's a deep headstrong blue, and the sunlight
pours through

the open living room windows because the heat's on too high in here,
and I can't turn it off.
For weeks now, driving, or dropping a bag of groceries in the street
the bag breaking,

I've been thinking: This is what the living do. And yesterday, hurrying
along those
wobbly bricks in the Cambridge sidewalk, spilling my coffee down my
wrist and sleeve,

I thought it again, and again later, when buying a hairbrush:
This is it.
Parking. Slamming the car door shut in the cold. What you called
that yearning.

What you finally gave up. We want the spring to come and the winter
to pass. We want
whoever to call or not call, a letter, a kiss -- we want more and more
and then more of it.

But there are moments, walking, when I catch a glimpse of myself in
the window glass,
say, the window of the corner video store, and I'm gripped by a
cherishing so deep

for my own blowing hair, chapped face, and unbuttoned coat that I'm
speechless:
I am living, I remember you.

From the book, What the Living Do: Poems, by Marie Howe, W.W. Norton & Company, New York, 1998. Written to chronicle the death of her beloved brother. Painting by Edward Gordon.

Been going to poems and writings about mortality often these days. I guess it may have to do with Grandma's cancer in the last two months. Thankfully, by some certain miracle, the large tumour had not spread to the other organs as originally feared. The doctor was so amazed that she called us in the middle of the operation to tell us that. Seeing my usually super-active and cheery Grandma so ill so suddenly brought life and sickness in juxtaposition in a way that made me look at ordinary things quite differently recently. I am not sure how long this will last, but the "dailiness" of life is now almost savor-able, rather than unsavory and boring. This poem captures it well, because the poet actually took a break from her grief and savored it. It's what we the living don't do.

Boxes

One good way to get familiar with transparent watercolors and figure out how they interact with one another is to practice painting boxes of color. Wrote this poem after one exercise during the weekend.

Boxes and boxes, boxes in boxes
Boxes alone, boxes together
I put you in one, you put me in another.

Which school are you from?
What do you do?
Where do you live?
oh, and how do you do?

Are you married or single?
Children, no, not yet?
I was called in 1998
Which year were you?

Boxes and Boxes,
I have ten pretty boxes
Tell me these things
And I will you too
How many boxes
Do you have in your boxes?

Process

It's not quite finished, but I am glad it won't take a lifetime, after all. I am finally enjoying oils.

For a Friend

Made this "Lego" cake last weekend for a dear friend. I am an "agar-ation" type of cook, and so not a baker at all. But I think she liked it.

Happy Birthday P! =)

Becoming

"I've been an artist since age 5, when I remember drawing an airplane better than my older brother. It was a bi-wing with a propeller, (not that I'm that old... it was 1957 and it was a racing plane), and it was encouraging because up until then, it was the only thing I could remember doing better. I kept at it, and now nearly 50 years later I'm still trying to improve my creative process. Now I realize you never get better than anyone else... just more unique to your own style, and become the best painter you can be." - Mick Mcginty

It's true isn't it? We are often attracted to do something because we think, even momentarily, that we might have been "gifted" to do it well, or perhaps better in some way than other people. But somewhere around childhood, we start to wonder about that. I think those who truly understand a "gift" knows that there is much more out there that is better, and that there is much more to learn for one to become better. Maybe the only "gift" we can possess is the ability to look at a painting, poem, photograph that we made ourselves, and know that you have seen something better.

How to Get Rich

The days are crazy busy, but I keep happily coming across great pieces of writing in unexpected places. Like this one in a sponsored art supplies website.

It's about how to get rich.

"There are many things to see, unwrapped gifts and free surprises. The world is fairly studded and strewn with pennies cast broadside by a generous hand. But- and this is the point- who gets excited by a mere penny? If you follow one arrow, if you crouch motionless on a bank to watch a tremulous ripple thrill on the water and are rewarded by the sight of a muskrat paddling from its den, will you count that sight a chip of copper only, and go on your rueful way? It is dire poverty indeed when a man is so malnourished and fatigued that he won't stoop to pick up a penny. But if you cultivate a healthy poverty and simplicity, so that finding a penny will literally make your day, then, since the world is in fact planted in pennies, you have with your poverty bought a lifetime of days. It is that simple. What you see is what you get."

- Annie Dillard from "Pilgrim at Tinker Creek."

Teaching

This week, I have been thinking quite a bit about the whole idea of teaching. A friend wrote to me again to think about lecturing in our local law school. I led a bible study last week for the first time after a two year break. Certain incidents at art school last weekend also made me think about what is the purpose of teaching, what is a good teacher, and why some people "have it" and others don't.

It might be one of the ironies in life for me. I never felt I had a calling to be a teacher - in fact, as you guys know, I turned down a teaching scholarship to go to Oxford many years ago because I did not think I had the qualities to be a teacher. An academic maybe, but not a teacher. I didn't think I was that comfortable with kids and I also wanted to see the world beyond a school.

But funnily enough after that, I kept getting drawn into teaching positions in other areas. After I became a Christian , I started leading bible studies quite frequently in small groups. To see myself financially through university, I taught a family privately for nearly 6 years, seeing the children through their high school and junior college English and literature classes. Even now, working as counsel in a financial institution, training the bankers is a regular feature of my job.

How do I see teaching? I think of it as a "creative" vocation, not that different from being an artist or a designer. In this regard, I agree very much with my favorite preacher Tim Keller that, every time someone stands in front of a group of people to impart some knowledge or understanding, he or she needs to employ creativity to transfer that knowledge (and often a passion) in a way that catches the attention of the audience and makes them think about the subject matter in a different way.

But then, of course, a teacher is very much more than that as well. He or she is also patient, and takes a genuine interest in the students. Attention is demanded of a teacher on a minute by minute basis that can be extremely enervating. These are not natural aspects for me. I tend to guard my personal space jealously, and am rather impatient to see results in any task I undertake. So at the moment, it is not clear that I should make a career switch, even though I think I do enjoy the creative aspects of teaching quite a lot. Must continue to pray about it.

More Eccentric Art

My other oil assignment in school. Don't ask.

Pigasso

Something a little more lighthearted today.

Like this Pollock-like abstract? Meet the artists below. :)



I hope the paints are watersoluble and of the non-toxic variety!

See story here:

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article-23399385-details/Pigasso:+The+little+oinks+making+a+splash+in+the+art+world/article.do

A Short Life

In the heady rush towards deal launches and closings these days (read: late night calls with bankers who do not appear to have a life), here's something said a little differently about one of my colleagues, who died this week of brain cancer at age 38.

http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/young-wall-street-star-defied/story.aspx?guid=%7B54CD8A9F-EBFF-4664-88DB-C7717C651B87%7D

Life is but a vapor no matter how bright the shining star.

'There are no irreplaceable bankers. But Shane was irreplaceable as a person.'
— Robert Kindler, Morgan Stanley

At Home

I realized that, until last week, I have not had a newspaper subscription for eight years. Most of that time was spent abroad, of course, and I never thought of having a local newspaper subscription during that time (the English SCMP was so lame in Hong Kong that I borrowed my colleague's Chinese papers to read everyday). That period also coincided with the Internet boom, and I found myself having much more news literature to read online than I had time for.

When I got home to Singapore, it wasn't obvious for me to get a print edition either, even though I was living alone. I thought it was easy enough to get the news online. I would also admit , with so many international publications and think tank magazines available in the office and on the internet, I didn't think I would be missing much by not reading our local paper. My interests are in the arts and finance, and clearly there are journals out that offer better commentary and insights.

However, having been back for 18 months, I found myself quite ignorant about local news on not more than just a few occasions. You know, the news about the guy who nearly paid $80,000 in lawyer's fees for a $100 *langa* case. The poor old person who died in her flat. MM Lee's full speeches.

So I decided to order a real print edition at home, if for nothing other than to get the local news which will never be reported in any other paper. In a matter of days, lunch time conversations started to make more sense.

One bonus was that I have found myself waking up earlier just to glance through the papers quickly, and actually eating breakfast (since I don't function at all without breakfast). The day seems more leisurely, you see the world a little differently, and I know I am home at last.

One might notice a lull in posting in this blog. Yes, things are hotting up at work for the relentless run towards year end launches. I am also PAW-ing. ;-)

Inspired

I am very very inspired by the A-Painting-A-Day (PAD) movement that I came across recently on the Internet. The PAD movement was started in 2004 by artist Duane Keiser who has revolutionalized the way art creation is brought to the masses. Essentially, the idea was that artists, (both professional and hobbyists) can make it a discipline to create a painting every single day of their lives. The original story can be found in this USA Today article.

Yep, every day.

It did seem like an impossible thing to do, but it is amazing to see how there are in fact hundreds and thousands of people out there who are actually doing it. Including people with full-time jobs and children, who is making it a point to create small sized paintings (usually no bigger than 6'X8' postcard sized works). It is very exciting to view their blogs and see how their work really did improve over time. More importantly, many of them attest to the fact that it has improved their "seeing" skills tremendously, because in looking for something to paint everyday, they have had to train their perception skills, and pick out interesting subjects in their everyday lives.

Check out these sites.

http://www.dailypaintersguild.com/

http://jeffhayesfinearts.blogspot.com/

http://duanekeiser.blogspot.com/

There are literally hundreds more. It's exciting every morning to open the the guild pages to find out what new wonderful creations these daily painters have made the day before.

I have gone out to buy those mini blank canvases. Maybe one could start with the PAW (a Painting-a-Week) movement. :)

Eccentric Art

They say that artists are eccentric. Well, I have a VERY eccentric art teacher at NAFA. All year long, while students in the other classes are practicing classic still life compositions like cups and vases, we had to draw and paint all sorts of weird things like a plush donkey on a basket of persimmons and dragonfruit with meat dumplings.

Last week, we started on our third piece of oil, and she presented the class with this still-life arrangement:


Her theory was that 上完大学, 幼稚园就很容易。

er...okay. Let's see if it works.

Given how extremely long the drying time for oil glazes is, I think it would be impossible to finish this as scheduled in four weeks. As one of my classmates said," 我看这一副可能要画一辈子!" I tend to agree.

Remembrance of Things Past, and The Future

After the pretty intense concert performance last Saturday, the almost-Friends of the SSO were having late night dinner at Al Dente at the Esplanade, EC posed an interesting question (or rather, made the following declaration):

"I have come to believe that, falling exactly in the lower middle income tier in Singapore, I will NOT be able to afford the Esplanade lifestyle when I retire."

The point she was making was, I think, this - being in that income bracket meant that while one was gainfully employed before retirement, one might well be exposed and start developing an interest in the arts events being offered in Singapore. However, upon retirement, one might not have that much extra disposable cash for the performance tickets, good dining (and may I point out - the ever increasing carpark charges) that comes with continuing that lifestyle. This is in contrast to the upper middle income and the working class tiers. The first group won't feel it and the second won't miss it. So therefore, being in the lower middle income tier would put one in the predicament of not being able to afford a certain standard of living that one was used to when young.

The jury's out on that one I think. I am cautiously optimistic that it would not happen. In any case, I think whether the arts will continue to be accessible and affordable to ordinary folks in the future depends on how interested people eventually become of them over the next 10-20 years. By making it affordable now, more people will have the opportunity to develop an interest in them, and thus provide the "market" for a future arts scene, which can only stay affordable if there is a critical audience mass. Economics 101 mah.

Mental note to self: Go only for male cellist performances. It was so good to watch Wang Jian play Elgar on Saturday - you do need consistent strength and power to play the cello well. Unless you happened to be Jacque Du Pre.

Current music: Dvorak No. 8

God's Wheel

GOD says to me

with a kind of smile,

"Hey how would you like

to be God awhile

And steer the world?"

"Okay," says I,

"I'll give it a try."

"Where do I sit?

How much do I get?

What time is lunch?

When can I quit?"

"Gimme back that wheel," says GOD.

"I don't think you're quite ready YET."

- By Shel Silverstein

Still my favorite children's poet.

It was tough this past week receiving news about Grandma. We have been calling up doctor friends and friends of doctors to see what alternatives there are. Can't help the helpless feeling but am reminded by this little wry poem that God is in the driver's seat.

Drawing Mr Franklin

The fifth and last charcoal assignment of this school year. Time flies.

View from a Bombay Taxi

I think, mostly, I felt puzzled during the trip.

Even though I knew (from watching the news and National Geographic for years) that India was a country with widespread poverty, I did not expect there to be so little respite from it anywhere in the city.

Other than the inside of the hotel that we stayed in, and a couple of restaurants that we went to, Mumbai was completely unlike any developing country that I have been too. If people had not been talking about it so much in the recent years, I would NOT have believed this is one of two of the fastest growing economies in Asia just by visiting the city.

It's not that the business activity isn't there. In fact, one could even say that it is pretty conspicuous - names like Tata, Reliance, HDFC, the same ones that I have dealt with frequently in the last 18 months, are everywhere in billboards. Just talking to the people, you know that there is an enormous amount of activity being carried out here.

BUT, where are the swanky glass buildings that should be rising above the slums? Where are the toll roads leading to the city from the airport? Where is the new airport? Where are the dozens of new apartments and hotels that should be adding glitter to the city?

I have been to a fair number of poor third world countries on business and vacation, so it is not that I am not used to seeing rundown buildings and primitive transport facilities, however in every of those cities, the development is clear and present. There is often massive construction going everywhere and new infrastructure (incongruent as they may be to their surroundings) spreading out from key corners of the cities. I had imagine India to be like China, say 10 years ago I first went there to work. It was nothing like it even then.

In Mumbai, I was hardpressed to find evidence of that development. There was no identifiable financial district. The so-called prestigious office towers were flaking and rusting on the outside, and I can hardly see any new ones being constructed. My boss, whom I was travelling with, commented that the city looked almost exactly like it did 6 years ago when he visited.

On Wednesday morning, my colleagues and I were stunned to find ourselves standing in front of an old complex, with squatters living just outside the driveway that was full of organic and inorganic litter. Stray dogs, many with open wounds and missing limbs hung about outside the compound (docile though they were). We were at Matfatlal Centre, a decrepit office block where my bank, and other many other international financial institutions were located.

Over the next few days, I talked and talked to people. Or rather people talked to me, and I listened to them and learnt more about India than I ever did in my entire life. I realized my knowledge of the place was almost at ground zero, a deeply ironical fact given Singapore is a mulit-racial society and I grew up with Indian classmates and neighbours.

So what do I think of India now? There were things that deeply impressed me - how highly educated and internationally exposed people were, superb service almost everywhere I went. I really enjoyed meeting my colleagues there, who were so wonderfully warm and friendly. But, I have no conclusions, not even a real insight, of the place, to speak of, even after the week's immersion. There is too much that I still need to learn about the place, from its history to the way business is conducted there. I think I will go back there again soon - both to sight-see, as well as to work. And I am telling myself to approach the country more respectfully than I have in the past.

After all, I have merely caught a glimpse of India from inside a Bombay taxi.

India

There is no substitute for travelling to a country and seeing it for yourself. I am on my first trip to India, and catching my first glimpses of it. Incredible.

On Predestination

"If God would have painted a yellow stripe on the backs of the elect I would go around lifting shirts. But since He didn’t I must preach `whosoever will’ and when `whosoever’ believes I know he is one of the elect.”

-Charles Spurgeon

Two Questions

Two questions were asked at DG this week . They led to rather lively discussion during the session, and some alone-time thinking thereafter.

The first was actually the ice-breaker question:

[What is your name]....and what is one thing that you are discontented about?

The "main" question from this week's topical study (we are taking a break from Hosea) was:

Do you think that the gospel should be contextualized to modern culture in order to win more people to the Christian faith?

The two questions were probably not intended to be related. But it did occur to me afterwards they are connected to "needs" at different levels. The first may bring up our (unmet) needs as individuals, and the second has quite a lot to do with the "needs" of modern (and specific) culture and society.

Question 1 : On Discontentment

The answers ranged from the hilarious to the poignant. We were variously discontented about work situations, family pressures, the dismal traffic condition, the lack of storage space at home. We also shared about the more amorphous feelings of discontentment - the lack of previous enthusiasm for things, the "blahness" life on this side of heaven, the loss of the first love of the gospel.

(Sidenote: even though sharing was honest, most were also eager to give thanks at the same time for other things, so the expressions of discontentment did not cause the group to lapse into any sense of despair or disgruntledness. That must be in contrast to many a secularist lunch conversation with colleagues, and a reminder of why it is important to meet God's people regularly.)

But I do think, if we all dared to let our discontentments (trivial or serious) percolate to the bottom of our beings, we would find, as the thinker Pascal says,

"This is our true state.... We sail within a vast sphere, ever drifting in uncertainty, driven from end to end,. When think to attach ourselves to any point and to fasten to it, it wavers and leaves usl and if we follow it, it eludes our grasp, slips past us, and vanishes forever. Nothing stays for us. This is our natural condition, and yet most contrary to our inclination, we burn with desire to find solid ground and an ultimate sure foundation where on to build a tower reaching to the infinite. But our whole groundwork cracks and the earth opens to abysses. (Pascal, Pensee no. 72)"

"Nothing is so insufferable to man as to be completely at rest, without passions, without business, without diversion, without study. He then feels his nothingness, his forlonness, his insufficiency, his dependence, his weakness, his emptiness. There will immediately arise from the depth of his heart weariness, gloom, sadness, fretfulness, vexation and despair. (Pensee no. 131)

This is our condition, no matter how well our circumstances, or how mild a temperament we have developed -i.e. inconstancy, weariness, unrest.

Yet despite this condition, and its attendant miseries, we wish to be happy, and only wish to be happy, and cannot wish not to be so. And we will find the true gems of happiness from time to time - love, beauty, friendship, the good and real things of this world. Our discontentment seldom completely destroys our desire for such things, and yet the discontentment does not go away. Therein lies the paradox of being human.

The truly converted Christian is always the person who must first have known the dreadful existential experience that Pascal describes above. For there is no real "living" without having died this death. It is a critical part of the conversion process that the seeker must feel the dreadfulness of his existential existence and at the same time, the desire and hope to live. Knowledge of the condition, without hope of the other will not get him there. The hope of getting there without the knowledge of his real condition is, according to the bible, futile too. (See Luke 11:44. Ps 41:8-9)

But then, the ten of us sitting around that table on DG are Christians. Why then do we still feel discontent? In fact, it would appear that the Christian might indeed fear the infinite abyss literally more than anything in the world. Why is that so?

I think Soren Kierkegaard's classic essay on "The Sickness Unto Death" explains the real fear, and why we as Christians need not lose hope:

"What the natural man considers horrible -- when he has in this wise enumerated everything and knows nothing more he can mention, this for the Christian is like a jest. Such is the relation between the natural man and the Christian; it is like the relation between a child and a man: what the child shudders at, the man regards as nothing. The child does not know what the dreadful is; this the man knows, and he shudders at it. The child’s imperfection consists, first of all, in not knowing what the dreadful is; and then again, as an implication of this, in shuddering at that which is not dreadful. And so it is also with the natural man, he is ignorant of what the dreadful truly is, yet he is not thereby exempted from shuddering; no, he shudders at that which is not the dreadful: he does not know the true God, but this is not the whole of it, he worships an idol as God. Only the Christian knows what is meant by the sickness unto death. He acquires as a Christian a courage which the natural man does not know -- this courage he acquires by learning fear for the still more dreadful. Such is the way a man always acquires courage; when one fears a greater danger, it is as though the other did not exist. But the dreadful thing the Christian learned to know is "the sickness unto death."

I think what Kierkegaard is saying is that as Christians, we will actually be more and not less conscious of discontentment than the rest of the world, but because of that deep consciousness, it drives us to seek courage in a way and from a source that the world does not know or have. We need not belittle the things in this world that gives us joy, but we also need not feel guilty about feelings of discontentment when these things fail to give us joy. Both the joy and the disappointment is only meant to serve as a driving force to seek the Person who gives real significance to our existence.

The above may then lead us to answer, to quite some extent, the second question of that night.

(to be continued)

Grey's Anatomy (and Pain)

In this week's episode of Grey's Anatomy (which I happily managed to catch by a mad dash to the KL airport to catch the 7 pm flight back), the interns treated a little girl named Megan which had a (not unknown) genetic defect which caused her not to feel pain. Because she was an orphan and was bounced around foster homes most of her life, the condition went undiagnosed. She had wounds all over her (some of which she stapled with iron staples - ouch!) and through an X-ray, the doctors discovered she had serious internal injuries and bleeding. The little girl believed she had superpowers (well, not unusual for a kid to believe) - and would get into fights in school with bullies, asking them to punch her in the stomach repeatedly, since she felt no pain.

Was reminded of the book co-authored by Philip Yancey and Paul Brand, "Where is God when it Hurts", still the very best book on pain and suffering that I have read.

"It is pain that allows me to be free. When I started to study medicine I would probably have said that my purpose was to relieve pain and suffering and to save lives. Today after a lifetime of treating those in pain and those without pain I would say that my purpose is to relieve suffering and to improve the quality of life. The main difference is that then I thought of pain as an enemy, while today I think of it as a help, indeed as an important element in the prevention of suffering.

How often I have heard people complain about God when they have pain. They do not blame God for giving us a signal that tells of disease or injury, but why make it so unpleasant and why not make it easy to switch off? Now I know why. Today there are ways to switch off pain. Pain killing drugs quickly become addictive because the addict seems to be living in a problem free and pain free world."

Ya, too many of my actions and decisions are centred around pain-reduction, , without recognizing the benefit of pain in encouraging spiritual growth, whether for myself or others. Lord, please help me not to reach out for Telenol too quickly, all the time.

Japan Hour III

In recent months, I have been discovering that, for every 3 persons I know, 1.75 of them are serious Japanese anime fans. I am talking about the very non-hentai, non-manga-looking friends that I have known for months in church or at work. I have witnessed, on more than a few occasions, small groups of anime-ists huddled to together after Sunday service, animatedly exchanging silver vinyl discs and the latest anime blog news. Of these people, 0.75 of them are known to have developed a common pattern of rushing home from work and downloading anime series from those mysterious sounding websites, watching them into the wee hours of the night, while husbands are left to tuck themselves to bed, and the rest of us throw anime sheep at one another on Facebook.

Well, I am not exactly in that rapid-growing percentile of the population yet, but I do enjoy a good Miyazake film once in a while. In any case, it seemed like a great excuse to get good folks together for an evening, to use the condiments I brought back from Hokkaido a few weeks ago, and so we had the Episode III of Japan Hour at the Treehouse last weekend.

With the help of skilled tofu chefs, crab declawers and yaki grill experts, it was another cheery evening of hearty but relatively healthful eating. C&H even provided brilliant "real-time" Hello Kitty fireworks displays on their laptop which they video-ed in Uji, Kyoto. We were a tad disappointed with the anime movie chosen to be screened that night - Goro Miyazake (son of Hayao Miyazake) does have some way to go before he captures true Ghibli magic. Generally however, I think people were glad to have found new soulmates in one another and we toasted the happy occasion variously with Choya, Asahi and of course, Yakult. :)

Lunch-time Art Jaunts

(1) Chua Ek Kay's works are on exhibition at the SMU School of Economics Gallery from now till 12 September. I have always loved his contemporary ink work on Singapore street scenes. The SMU is very fortunate indeed to have received such a big endowment of his paintings!




(2) "Oil Painting' Photography" by Charlie Lim, at the SG Private Bank Gallery, Alliance Francais, from now till 31 August. A pretty intriguing marrying of fine visual art and photography!

(3) And finally, what I have been waiting for all year! The Singapore Watercolour Society is having it's 38th exhibition at the Ngee Ann Cultureal Building from 1st -4th September. Managed to get an invitation to the private opening this Friday. woohoo!

Anybody wants to buy a sandwich and join me for a lunch time jaunt at the galleries? :)

Musical: <<天冷就回來 >> If there are Seasons

Surprised. At the number of songs and lyrics Liang Wenfu actually wrote for other singers, outside Xinyao. At the commendable collaboration between the "English" and "Chinese" theatre workers in this musical. And how Liang is still, after all these years, the Singapore Boy wanting to sing Singapore's own songs.

Surprised at how many of the songs were familiar to me, for I have never considered myself much of a Chinese music fan. Surprised at the memories they brought back, yet surprised how the lyrics make so much more sense now, as compared to the teenage years when I listened to them.

I bought the full anthology of Liang's songs today, if not for anything but to read those lyrics again. I think the lyrics could mean different things to different people. One could read them in a romantic way, or they could mean more than the romantic. They could be about a friend, a parent, or even somebody or something more important to the you. I guess all good song-writing has that ability - to evoke our deepest memories and feelings.

雨的氣息是回家的小路
路上有我追著你的腳步
腳下邊保存著昨天的溫度
你抱著我就像溫暖的大樹

雨下了走好路
這句話我記住
風再大吹不走囑咐
雨過了就有路
像那年看日出
你牽著我穿過了霧
叫我看希望就在黑夜的盡處

哭過的眼看歲月更清楚
想一個人閃著淚光是一種幸福
又回到我離開家的小步
你送著我滿天燕子都在飛舞

雨下了走好路
這句話我記住
風再大吹不走囑咐
雨過了就有路
像那年看日出
你牽著我穿過了霧
叫我看希望就在黑夜的盡處

雖然一個人
我並不孤獨
在心中你陪我看每一個日出

The Study of Art

I discovered that you don't have to go to art school to learn about art history seriously. Like never before in the history of art education, there is an incredible amount of resources, both in print and online, for someone who wants to systematically study the evolution of art in history.

ok, so most of you know I am kinda nerdy when it comes to pursuing things that interest me. I like reading about the subject and listening to lectures on it. For a few months now, I have been going through the Taschen series of art books which gives the foundational knowledge of artists spanning over the entire Western civilization history. One day earlier this year, I walked into Page One and swiped all the books from the series that covered the modern period of Art History from (1890s to 1960s). It cost me the price of the very good and enduring top-end Michelin tyres that my colleague said I must get for my car. But I think it actually paid for a college year in art history.

It has been a fascinating reading journey ever since. The cool thing is that with Google Images Search, I can find almost any painting online for viewing. Of course, I would love to see some of the works in their actual galleries one day, but this is something art students a decade ago would not be really able to do. They had to travel to those galleries all over the world or rely on libraries.

Anyway, hope to share some of my favorite paintings and stories about the artists from time to time in this blog. It might be a way to discipline myself to take good notes on what I am reading! :)