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.