Life in the month of March and April
Ah unpretentious writing, reflection and recollection can be such a therapeutic experience, and with that let me put my conciousness in the form of black against white in 0s and 1s regarding these recent months of spring and impending winter;
As you all might have known, i have been working independently as a soccer coordinator for a good buddy of mine called Lance, and the business has blossomed quite abit since February, and currently i earn enough to pay for my rent, and living plus a little extra for some nice clothes and accessories which is totally awesome.
What i do is i have a team of 3 people under me whom i assign matches for them to report on. They'd go to these matches and traders from the philippines will call them, whom with which they would then report the matches to. So every week i'd have to produce some invoices, pay my aides and update match tables in addition to going to some of these matches myself.
Which makes me a self employed manager cum architecture student (which is freaking awesome because), I belong to the income earning group now with a disposable income !
Its a liberating experience now that i dont have to skimp on food during them low financial tides (when i'd have to pullback on rent) and can now afford to eat a decent meal with a peace of mind everyday. Thinking of food reminds me of the muchines i used to have. Ah, unfortunately nowadays i've not been into the green stuff much which is definitely a pity. I'd have to remind myself to get some more during the holidays.
Apart from that, i've been busy with schoolwork as usual. But have decided to take an extended break chilling out at home on non school days and indulging in food and my inexhaustible anime/movie/manga/hentai/av collection. Afforded such luxury by the completion of midsemester dues, and a hardworking partner (not that i'am abusing him, i work as hard if not more as well : >).
Having said that, i'am compelled to digress and have a little discourse on that. In the past perhaps month and intensively during the past week, i've been watching some animes;
Ergo Proxy (23 eps)
Blood + (50 eps)
Trinity Blood (24 + eps)
Twelve Kingdoms (45 eps)
Full Metal Panic, second raid (13 eps)
Ghost in the Shell - Solid State Society, which is fucking awesome
... some movies;
Mothman Prophecies
Matrix Trilogy
The Prestige, which is a fucking awesome movie
Tim Burtons' The Nightmare Before Christmas, a favourite i've always wanted to watch and finally got to,
Visitor Q, Takashi Miike's weird Japanese movie.
the Da Vinci Code, boring, predictable and lame.
Bernado Bertuluccis' the Dreamers, staring Eva Green, lots of nudity : D
Stephen Chow's God of Cookery
The Protege, typical unrealistic and biased asian portrayal of drugs
Tokyo Trials
Election 1 and 2
Babel
Battle of Wits
After this our Exile, shitty
.. and a manga called Haru yo Koi and Jean Paul Sartres' existentialist manifesto Being and Nothingness, which i find rather dense and indecipherable compared to the other bunch of philosophy books i read.
I've also gotten Radiohead's OK computer and Hail to the Thief, albums that i used to own but have lost and that i now miss. Thom Yorke's new album called The Eraser is also quite good feauturing the track Analyze played during the closing credits in the Prestige.
.. and within my digressions i digress but again.
Two years ago, i would have thought that my psychological consumption of films and movies and 'stuff' in general was perhaps extensive. But now having lived in australia for the second year, it seems to me that instead of extensive, the word that would describe the programmings i take in is varied in the extreme sense of the word, and it seems to occur in realization to me that it is uncommon to the point of abnormality to watch something like the nightmare before christmas, visitor Q, the dreamers and then stephen chows god of cookery in succession. To be able to understand and then appreciate the genres and director's intention, namely tim burton, takashi miike, bertolucci and stephen chow is definitely something that springs to my mind now as an oddity that might not be necessarily an appreciable quality. Ideas that i have long since been exposed to and then subsequently cultivated as a child.
Now before i continue let me add the disclaimer that if you might want to start faulting me for what you would maybe perceive as an inflated sense of modesty and perhaps too much of a leaning on cultures, backgrounds, races and origins. Then i'd like to ambivalently add that people are different and that makes us unique and interesting. It is also natural and becoming of the diversity of the human race that creates what is strongest in us. This idea is distinct and antagonized by antiracism or anti-cultural bias, which directs us to believe that all people are all similiar regardless of their cultural leanings and backgrounds, and this downplays the uniqueness that is related with human conciousness itself. While this is a legitimate political movement. Most of the generation of our times have been deluded into believing that such a notion would apply on a social level. Sushi is sushi, we will make it out of rice instead of pasta. Ultimately the most ferocious anti racists, are in actuality racists themselves, and he who butchers monsters have turned into one himself, the abyss having gazed back.
He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you. Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil, Aphorism 146Having digressed in my digression of digresses, let me continue with the digress of my digressions.
My fucked up multicultural leanings with my command of the east asian culture and language coupled with my strong base in the english language and understanding of the western philosophy in general has generated an unstable concoction of a personality - that composes and perhaps is ultimately detrimental - to my psyche. In a sense, i feel as though i've lost a purist understanding of the world and an in essence have been diluted by the ideas and thoughts of antagonizing cultures. As if man was not intended to have more than one tongue in the biblical babel sense. This confundment is distinguished from biculturalism where the two cultures a person is exposed to is dissociative - having a primary base for fundamental thought and essence and a secondary function for cross culture dealings. Graphically, this can be illustrated with two circles, both distinct and dissociated from one another - i.e not touching each other; perhaps one larger than the other and this would apply to a caucasian who speaks say Japanese and an asian who speaks english. Their secondary languages and by extension cultural exposures are additions ontop of their primary ones. A bowl stacked on a plate. Allegorialy in extension, i believe an australian or american born chinese or asian is but a person who adopts the cultural leanings of their host countries with the physical appearance of whatever genepool they are from, but with mental and psychological backgrounds of generally, caucasians perhaps but merely tinged with whatever is left. The negotiation and dialogue between the two circles might sometimes come to meet and perhaps even intersect to a slighter bit and amount. The conundrum comes when these circles have intersected to the point of eclipsing each another and the intersected area greatly overshadows the remaining bits resulting in a half a bowl immersed in half a plate, making the resulting object absurd. The purity of essence is lost and the result is an apparition of what would be its former purist self that is neither of its original beings.
Coming from somewhere like Brunei is also a source of such a confoundment. Having lived the formulative years of my life in this small idealistic place with an unrelated history and growing up in an environment with similar disporas like myself. and then subsequently superimposing east asian culture and western worldview culturally neutral place feels like a psychological lobotomy now that i reflect upon it.
So in terms of both Jus Sanguinis and Jus Solis. I am fucked. A further irony is that Thom Yorke's track 4 in his album The Eraser, is singing 'this is fucked up, fucked up' . Befitting indeed.
Perhaps this quote that i came across means something.
You need chaos in your soul to give birth to a dancing star. Friedrich Nietzsche
I should write a book someday in my life. Back to my carefree spiels about my indulgent and extended chilling out break from my usual hectic studies~!
It is 9am now on a Saturday morning. Gotta clean up my room which is currently reminiscent of some form of alien infestation from a ridley scott film, do the laundry and get some breakfast with a buddy from brunei.
After that, I'd be looking forward to getting some more Nietzsche books from Borders today, and maybe get myself a proper bag to keep my folders and whatnot as well as needing to do some stuff at the post office. Also the highlight of the day would be getting a new handphone since its been a year and abit since my contract started, and maybe some yummy japanese or cantonese food, and checking out some art galle.ries and museums.
I'd probably have to pick up the slack tomorrow for next week to make up for this weeks indulgence. Which is fine and dandy, i enjoy doing my work. I should probably get another bottle of Jack Daniels, those things are awesome to have everynight before you sleep.
Ooh yeah. Lifes good.
.