finale 2005

so here's my last post of 2005.

iraq's conquered, saddam's on trial, chelsea's gonna win the EPL, Lennon's No.1 again in British charts, and the year's gonna come to an end with everyone save me partying at Sentosa/Fort Canning/Ministry of Sound/Zouk/and who knows where else. so where do i fit in this grand scale of events over the soon-to-be past year?

let me recount...my memory's as good as how many sticks i smoked for the past 5minutes, so this could take a while.

2005's been a pretty bad year, not personally though. (personally, every year's a bad year unless its the year i die) not much happy tidings throughout the year, but at least its over. for now. sometimes, i wonder if its possible to kill oneself with his own pessimism. thought through my year, and it seems the only points of note were the NDP and leaving the service.

NDP, celebration of the nation's biggest day and the culmination of 1year's worth of preparation. i dont know how much vulgarities i spewed and how many cigerettes i smoked doing the thankless and un-noticeable jobs i do to keep the EXCO running, but it sure as hell was a lot more than last year(2004). personally, the NDPs have grown distinctively less exciting after i entered poly. its just another public holiday for me to stay at home. but after this year's NDP, i can safely say that, "to hell with all the big hoo-ha". those who had been with me throughout the whole shennanigan would know what i meant. waste of time, waste of money(a few thousand? tax payers' money burning up in the night sky), waste of food, what more can be said about it?

recieving back my pink IC. taken away upon entering the service, and replaced with a green replacement. well, at least the green card saves time and breathe whenever i go buy cigerettes at the local 7-11. all throughout the 2yrs and 4mnths in service, i had been looking towards the day i get my pink IC back. every torturous climb through the taiwan mountains, every cold night in Brunei, every snide remarks and backstabbing comments from supposed peers and 'friends', i just kept saying to myself 'once i get that card, it'll all be over'. how true, it turned out. all over, no more army talks, no more argueing with the stupid OC and the other senior officers, no more looking out for my boys. and just as sad, no more fuel for my bile, no more drive to prove someone wrong, and no more targets to meet. i've been taking it easy for the past 2months ever since getting that pink IC back. hell, i haven't even seen it ever since i put it inside my wallet after recieving it back. somehow, whenever i'm asked for identification, i always pull out the green card. dont ask me, dont know why.

so that sums up my year, pretty 'dramatic' isnt it? if only every year was like that, i could really kill myself with the bile and pessimism that was built up during the whole year.

and so, here's to 2005. what doesnt kill you makes you stronger, it's said. well, i'm still alive and kicking, so there's something. onto 2006 then...

Oasis
Live Forever
from Definately Maybe

Maybe I don't really want to know
How your garden grows
I just want to fly
Lately did you ever feel the pain
In the morning rain
As it soaks it to the bone

Maybe I just want to fly
I want to live I don't want to die
Maybe I just want to breath
Maybe I just don't believe
Maybe you're the same as me
We see things they'll never see
You and I are gonna live forever

Maybe I don't really want to know
How your garden grows
I just want to fly
Lately did you ever feel the pain
In the morning rain
As it soaks it to the bone

Maybe I will never be
All the things that I want to be
But now is not the time to cry
Now's the time to find out why
I think you're the same as me
We see things they'll never see
You and I are gonna live forever
We're gonna live forever
Gonna live forever
Live forever
Forever

imagine..

imagine there's no heaven....

if there was 1 song that could symbolise the hope for the future, that would be it. i dont really like listening to radios nowadays, especially during festive periods. just a simple equation could sum up my reason.

radio nowadays = hip hop/rap + commercials + mindless banter to fill the dead air time

festive period = more air time for commercials + more songs about the festival (xmas songs, new year songs)

radio nowadays + festive period = complete waste of time

but i digress, as usual. that always happens when my thoughts are scattered all over the place, which is usually all the time. back to what i intend to write then.

now i know it's a universal feeling, everyone knows it, but i'd just have to say it here. John Lennon really writes beautiful lyrics. i mean, sure, theres the macca vs ono side show saga that went on, but it just detracts everything from the genius of his writings. up until now, i dont think anyone have seriously came close to equalling the emotions that can be derived from the man's lyrics. beatles? most of it is usual pop/rock sounds, and macca's songs are mostly coming from the same mixer. when the Beatles splitted and Lennon moved onto his experimentations, thats when the world had the smoke lifted from their eyes.

but enough with the fanboy yakking, if you dont believe me, go listen to his songs.

story

"i've never felt alone, till i met you..."

"hey there, remember me?"

a startled stella looked up. "oh, hi terry."

terry was surprised to see that stella's eyes were red. "something wrong?"

"no....everything's fine, just..er...just...something just flew into my eyes, thats all."

"ok, so how have you been around lately? didnt hear from you for quite some time, you know."

"nothing much...just finished with the final paper of the exams..."

"you're not gonna celebrate with your friends?" stella shook her head. "by the way, where's your boyfriend?"

"he...he's out with his friends..."

sensing stella's discomfort, terry decided not to pursue that matter. it was obvious that stella wasn't feeling happy that she had finished her exams, and something's definitely wrong with her being alone. the rest of the afternoon was mostly spent by terry trying to cheer up the downcast stella. when it started to get dark, terry walked stella home, biding her farewell at the playground near her block.

after that, terry hanged around at a nearby coffeeshop, wasting the time away before packing up and going home at around his customary time. it was around 1am when he logged onto the internet. as usual, he didnt bother to log into the irc chatrooms, and proceeded to surf the sports web pages. it was to his surprise then, that he suddenly got an icq message. he didnt think that anyone besides him would be up at around this time. he checked who it was, and to his surprise, it was stella.

story: after the hiatus

its been quite some time since terry last heard from stella, about 2months to be more precise. he didnt stay at home often due to his parent's constant fighting. during his final term project period, he'd often stay back late in school to do his project or hang around the neighbourhood void decks smoking and drinking with his friends. by the time he got home, it would usually be around 1 to 2 am on the next day. he didnt log on to the chatrooms, as people he knew were usually asleep at that time.


one day, there was nothing left to do after school, and none of his friends were free to hook up with him. so terry decided to go to the nearby community library to hang around and waste the rest of the day away. the library was just newly renovated, and the whole layout was kind of confusing for terry. in the end, exhausted(mentally) from spending almost 30minutes to search for the history section, terry decided to take a rest at the coffeeshop next to the library.


he was just smoking away and watching the tv in the coffeeshop when terry thought he saw someone familiar at the other end of the coffeeshop. upon a second look, he realized it was stella. so he picked up his stuff, stubbed his cig and proceed to walk towards her table.

just the 4 of us

out of the blue, my buddies from the army camp called me for a mini gathering at night. nothing in particular, just a meet up session between the 4 of us, my upperstudy; who's a year younger than me, and 2 other MTOs. just a late night talk cock session, which stretched from 10pm to 4am in the morning at a nearby coffeeshop. the 4 of us used to share the same bunk in camp, and back then, we used to have this talk cock session almost every night, usually started off by me and one of the MTO; Freddy, talking while lighting up our last stick before we turn in for the night. i'm not usually a talkative person, i'm more of a listener. but whenever the 4 of us are together, hijinks and hilarity ensues. usually, my upperstudy is always the butt of our jokes, and nothing is spared in our endless torment of him.

up until now, i didnt realised how much i've missed about the times we all had back then when we're in the army. its buddies like this that makes all the bad things tolerable, and all the effort worthwhile. even though we knew each other for only more than a year, we hit it off like old long lost longtime buddies. i cant say the same for most of my other long time friends. i'm not sure why, but a year of staying together sure brings the bond between us closer.

view from the top

how many tears had been shed
how much blood have been bled
just to climb up the ladder?

you could beg, steal or borrow
not that it would bring about a better tomorrow
but does it make the world any better?

now all thats been said and done
after all the work and all the fun
through all those sweat and tears
blood mixed among dreams and fears
and here's the key to the lock
so go on and enjoy the view from the top

how many tears had been shed
how much blood have been bled
just to climb up the ladder?

now all thats been said and done
after all the work and all the fun
through all those sweat and tears
blood mixed among dreams and fears
and here's the key to the lock
so go on and enjoy the view from the top

how far we went

hope you wont mind my intrusion
but from what i see in my position
it seems that we're all destined for some great fall

lured into this mess by your sweet lull
or maybe i'm just blinded by your smile
it seems that we're all gonna suffer some great fall

perhaps the time has come for us to stop
and take a breather
and see how far we are from the top

perhaps the time has come for us to stop
and look around us
and see how much have we've done so far
and see how much more still we've yet to do
'cos we aint there yet
but we aren't that far away too


hope you wont mind my intrusion
but from what i see in our condition
it seems that we're all destined for some great fall

flippin' through all those thick stacks of files
going on for who knows countless miles
it seems that we're all gonna suffer some great fall

perhaps the time has come for us to stop
and take a breather
and see how far we are from the top

perhaps the time has come for us to stop
and look around us
and see how much have we've done so far
and see how much more still we've yet to do
'cos we aint there yet
but we aren't that far away too

hope you wont mind my intrusion
but from what i see in my position
it seems that we're all destined for some great fall

we're all destined for some great fall
we're all destined for some great fall
we're all gonna suffer some great fall...

mistake

i made a mistake. so it was five thousand dollars. it was in fact, THREE FUCKING THOUSAND DOLLARS.


its so comforting, the fact that its only three, not five, thousand dollars that the guy got fined for being a deserter. that not only cheapens the sacrifices everyone else who went through NS made, it must also make all those who have genuine cases and did time in DB feel that a great injustice done to them. so 2years plus of my life can just be bought with three thousand dollars. that roughly equates to 23bucks a week, which in turn is roughly 3 dollars a day. so my life, and all those who served their NS are worth only 3bucks a day to the government. thats cheaper than what MacDonald's pay their part time workers an hour. so we serve the nation with our lives, and we get paid dirt for giving 2 years of our lives to answering the call of duty.


screw that, and all those who feel its worth their lives to serve the nation. maybe for you, but not for me. seeing those regulars in the army, most of whom are fat and doing nothing but delegating their work to the NS boys, you'd call that worthwhile? those people find the first opportunity to disappear, punish the same boys who does their work without a second glance, accept all the glory for work not done by them, and only push the blame to his subordinates. maybe those in the combat side dont get to see this, or those who are in the sub units. but having gone through my tour of duty within the HQ of a division, i can only say that those examples that i've highlighted have been only too much within it. so think again, how cheap are we suppose to feel right now?

one country's laws

so today this morning, the australian guy who had attempted to traffick heroin into Singapore was hanged. cue public outcry over the so called harsh sentence of capital punishment from Down Under.

except, it seems, the only noise coming out against his sentence in the past few weeks have only originated from some politicians who obviously view this as an excellent opportunity to raise their profile. because of our strict stand on drugs, and the usage of capital punishment, we have been labelled as a "rogue chinese port city". i'm amused by the politician who called Singapore that. obviously, he doesnt hold a high regard for his neighbouring countries. and i'm thinking that there may be a racist context in his outburst. ok, that was just a figment of my imagination.

anyone in this region that we live in will know that, while the chinese account for more than half of the population in Singapore, this country's native race is actually the malays. and it struck me somewhat, that ever since China's prominent rise in economic levels, there has been a frequent usage of the terms "rogue chinese". you read about it in Tom Clancy's novels. you hear about it whenever China refuses to bend over to the US. but i'm getting a little off topic here.


back to where i started. there has been a lot of letters published in newspapers from normal ordinary Aussies, stating the exact opposite from what those politicians have been saying. a survey done also showed that Aussies stand by Singapore's decision to hang the drug trafficker. so anyone catching something here? i'll leave it at that.


and since when does any country have any right to interfere in another country's internal affairs? i'm not counting USA here, 'cos they think because of their economic and military powers, they are above judgement. i may be a bit harsh on americans here, but i'm only directing my comments about USA at the chimp who's sitting in the White House now. but back to the topic here. so an Aussie is about to be hanged for trafficking drugs. so Australia apparently does not like the death penalty. but the crime happened in Singapore, thus the guy's under our jurisdiction. the political reaction is akin to one of a over protective mother trying to protect and deflect the blame from her spoiled child who's a bit too old to be mommy's boy and ought to know better. the child did wrong, he knew what he did, he knew it was wrong, yet he did it. now the mom's trying to say it isnt his fault, he doesnt know what he was doing, he had no choice, blah blah blah. weak argument isnt it?


so now, just because we are small, apparently insignificant, we are deemed to be easily bullied. thus, we get insults and threats thrown at us everytime some other country's citizen breaks a law here and is punished by our laws. anyone remember Micheal Fay in the mid-90s about his vandalism case? huge outroar over in the States, with insults of being "barbarians", "unciviliased", etc thrown in our direction. in the end, the guy still got caned, but he was embraced back in his homeland. years down the line, USA thanks and praises Singapore for its aid to various disasters.


so we get insulted, threatened, and worse, and yet whenever others need help, we're the first ones there. frankly, i'm sick of this policy. for all the good work we do, it just takes one stupid case like this and suddenly, everyone forgets what good we've done and we become another barbaric/rogue state.

thankfully though, at least normal people think differently from politicians MOST of the time. in my opinion, there is no good politicians. politicians lack three things; common sense, honesty and integrity.

Five Fucking K

got it back up and running. dont know how it happened though. sent an email to the blogger help, all i received were links to the FAQs. like, duh, didnt i bother to read through all available FAQs to see if i could sort the problem out before emailing the help.

some of the recent hot topics gripping the country these days, i'm not sure, been living like a hermit(albeit one with internet connections) for the past few days/weeks/months*(where *=delete where applicable), include how one guy("world-renowned" pianist Melvyn Tan) was fined $5k for not doing his National Service, how Australian officials are ranting against our justice system, and in case anyone doesnt really notice it much(like me), its the SEA games period now.

first off, wow. $5k. Five Fucking Thousand dollars. thats how much my 2yrs 4months are worth to Singapore, or specifically the Army. i'm still in a kind of disbelief, repeating myself. Five Fucking Thousand Dollars. man, i feel cheap. 2years 4months of blood, sweat, tears, and countless hours travelling and spent away from loved ones(2yrs++ spent in the other part of this island), all that and more can just be bought and made insignificant with Five Fucking Thousand dollars. all the toil and sacrifices that us, people who HAVE answered the call of National Service(some willingly, most against their will), can just be vapourize into thin air with Five Fucking Thousand dollars. that is just so fucking cool. too bad my parents werent rich enough at the time when i received my enlistment orders. i could have been a "world renowned" CG GAMER or even "world renowned" designer now.(sarcasm, in case any of you think otherwise)

and what's the deal with the tag of "world renowned"? pardon my english, but doesnt "world-renowned" means acknowledged by the world as good, or to a certain extent known to the whole world? if thats the case, why the hell did i not hear of this so called, fucking "world renowned" pianist before? i read the papers, i surf the net for news, i watch news channels, art shows, and not one fucking second did i glance or hear about this "world renowned" pianist until news was published of him paying Five Fucking Thousand dollars for not doing his NS, and coming back to Singapore to perform.

so now, this "world renowned" pianist gets to come back, smirk in the faces of all of us who have done our NS, collect the money earned from all those stupid enough to pay for his performance at the Esplanade, and then fly back to wherever he calls home now. people who didnt go for their enlistment orders are stripped of their citienzenship, and are jailed once they return to Singapore. servicemen who go AWOL are sent to Detention Barracks, shaved their head, treated like dirt, aren't even allowed sandals, face 4 fucking walls in a cramp and cold quarters. this guy can just pay Five Fucking Thousand dollars; so insignificant a sum to him that he doesnt even recall paying it, and come back and perform and not be punished according to the rules. hooray. fair judgement from the government, or Mindef, or whatever ruling authority. i bet those people in prison or detention barracks must be cheering.

this had got to be one of the biggest, of not THE biggest, blunder Mindef/the government has made. so now, the Government is so desperate for the world to acknowledge that the country does produce artistic talents, that it bends the rules it has enforced on "lesser" people. so take note. if you can tinker a decent tune out of a piano, violin, cello, or whatever classical instrument, show you can turn on your toes in leotards, scream or shout and call it music,or have the ability to splash paints onto paper and call it art, and is below the age of 18(19 if you're in poly) quick! pester your parents to send you overseas to hone your "talents" and cough up Five Fucking Thousand dollars so you wont have to serve NS and thus can dedicate the time to train your "talents".

this is turning out to be a long post....couldnt help the rant above, maybe i'll post the rant about the 2nd topic later on.