A puppy named Got- Tail

This afternoon after returning from the fields in the Western reaches of my lands. I found Got-tail hiding in a tub. The pack has been bullying him. As his zero maternal instinct mother Rita has decided to disown him.

It is pointless for me to ask why this has happened. Why when it comes to puppies like Got-tail and literally irresponsible bitches like Rita is an understanding that I have long learnt to live with under -it is what it is terms. There’s really no mileage in trying to figure out the why’s.

Got-tail is very different from the stock Doberman breed. He isn’t jet black, loud and assertive. That’s why I’ve decided to keep his tail. I need a feed back, a cue that allows me to read his mind and I can’t go snip it off just for the sake of style.

Instead of cutting it off to abide by the classical streamline form of the Doberman breed. I have decided to keep his tail.

Hence the name Got-tail which is pronounced as one word, gordtail.

Beside I suspect Got-tail suffers from a delayed speech impediment and this perculiarity has rendered him unusual to disturb the pack. They don’t want him around. Neither does his mother it seems. Rita seems content to watch by as the rest of pack take turns to bite him as he’s tossed around like a rag doll.

Dogs that are breed in plantations are different from canines in Singapore. Here in frontier, they seem to intuit life will always be hard and so in the politics of doghood – ragging seems the norm. But I am not so sure Got-tail will survive this cruel process of winnowing the weak from the strong.

So I have decided to take Got-tail into the inner sanctum of my safe house. The place that has always been out of bounds for dogs – even to the close protection breeds who guard me when I sleep and rest. Here in this place where I live like an astronaut with no windows cocooned in a fortress of steel and concrete armor where even the air is scrubbed and the water is filtered to prevent the possibility of assassination is where Got-tail will grow big and strong.

I have made the decision. It’s as simple as that. I have the power over life and death. And I have decided. I will not let the same thing happen to Ping Piang again. Never!

How will we cope….love will find a way….of that I am sure.

We use to be so close

 
( Click on the pic to enlarge image)

Some things in life. You never ever want them to ever change. Never. But everything changes. You change. So do the things and people around you. They’re changing all the time like you change. You just don’t notice it. But they do and so do you….change that is.

And all you are left with are the precious photographs of the things and people in this room somewhere in your head that you never ever want to ever change…..that’s all you will ever have in an ever changing world. This little room that only you have the key that opens the door somewhere in the darkened corridors your head -there everything is the way it has always been. Nothing ever seems to change in that place
– like the eye in the storm where there is no time or space…just pure emptiness while everything else around is a whirl changing all the time.

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‘I don’t suppose you’ve heard of that rare disease of solitude called Piblokto. What about hysteria siberiana? No I don’t suppose you have heard of such an illness either.

The symptoms are quite benign at first. You start to hear your phone ringing only to realize you’re too deep in the wilderness to ever get a cell line. You may try at first to push the idea out from your head by telling one side of your brain that you’re just imagine all this…it’s just a figment of your imagination. But it rings again and this time you take the call, but there is no one there.

There never is….

This goes on for days on end in that infinite sea of solitude.

You’re a farmer, living all alone in a place so desolate that whole days, weeks and months can go right by and you don’t even see a single soul. A solitary tongue of light in pitch darkness.

Day after day you plow your fields. As far as the eye can see, nothing except the emerald sea of ever swaying palms. They all look exactly the same. To the north, the horizon, to the east, more horizon, to the south, to the west, more of the same as well. From time to time, you catch sight of a jet penning a pristine white trail across the paraffin blue of the skies. You watch it for so long. Your eyes hurt.

Meanwhile the phone in your head keeps ringing. But you’ve learnt to ignore it by then.

You wake up every morning and put on only khaki – khaki you tell yourself protects you against that evil illness brought forth by prolonged isolation….Piblokto…did I even spell it right. I don’t know.

Everyday a facsimile of yesterday. Yesterday exactly the same as today. An endless repetition. The only thing that ever changes is the diminishing size of your toothpaste or that it’s time to take the long drive to town to get more sundries. But it’s all the same. By now you have cannibalized so much of yourself to keep it all together while ignoring the imaginary phone that it’s taken a toll on you.

You take a blade. Cut yourself. Ever so slowly like a steak. You make it deep. As you’re not quite sure you can feel anything by this stage of the illness – hot blood runs down your arms. You say to yourself, fool! That was not necessary. You just made a mess and hurriedly put on your khaki’s and hit the field.

One day. Unexpectedly, the phone just stops ringing in your head. It just falls silent. You smile. You do a jig and sing a happy song. Eat that bacon you been saving up in your fridge. You cry tears of joy.

As you believe this is the turning point – you’ve beaten the illness – but that’s the first sign something inside you has curled up and died. From that day onwards day after day you go and plough the fields as you do every other day leaving a bit of yourself like camphor giving itself slowly to atmosphere….you can feel yourself disappearing…bit by bit.

Then one day for no reason you wonder to yourself why the imaginary phone calls have stopped. You take your phone up ten times a day. Matters little whether there is no cell coverage where you are. You go through the motions none the less.

Then you just sit there utterly resigned to the finality of the ravaging effects of the illness as it begins to scissor across the waste land that was once your soul. You look out across the vast expanse of the horizon that curls ever so slightly to the edges like a crooked picture frame and wonder to yourself how did it creep up on you without you ever realizing it.

You just sit there like a Lingham….a stone…tracking the shadows of the sun as it rises from the east and sets in the west. You do this everyday. Like someone, possessed, you just sit there, day and night like a human sundial, not eating or drinking with just this one thought in your head…why doesn’t the phone ring any longer… until you collapse from sheer exhaustion and die. That’s Piblokto. No….I am sure you’ve never heard of this illness of solitude….I hope, I spelt it right.’

El Niño no show 2014 and what this means for me

There’s an adage that is known by heart by all huntsmen – without the element of surprise a death blow can never be delivered to secure a decisive victory.

There is an embargo on me…a boycott…a conspiracy…a tacit agreement perpetrated by the rest of the landowners to stop me from buying up more land. As many of them believe I either harbor hidden imperialistic tendencies or that I happen to have the Adolf Hitler gene.

Truth is they’re all wary as I represent a new breed of farmer who can outstrip their yield which I have been doing consistently for the last two years. I been whooping the shit outa of them. As since I deploy high tech space age scientific farming methods and not their agaration kampung mumbo jumbo.

If there is a oil palm Olympiad I would probably garner all the gold based on my stellar yield records. It would be a open and shut slam dunk case!

To break this embargo at its spine, which is not an easy thing to do. As it comprises of a series of intricate social networks – I was relying on El Niño to show up and supply the shock and awe. The kaboom! The necessary component for a decisive victory.

Surprise!

I hatched this meisterstuck sometime back ago when the chatter about a possible El Niño for the 2014 season reached its peak earlier in April this year. This was the time was I was secretly installing all sorts of water catchment devices on my land to best ride out the expected drought.

By all accounts, all the evidence then and even as recently as early August suggested – a pronounce and strong Kelvin wave that had traveled east across the equatorial Pacific was already well in place. This one phenomenon presages the formation of an El Niño event and many weather experts by then started issuing out intercontinental alerts of an impending monster El Niño, but the expected failure of the trade winds that blows around Mid August this time of the year needed to turn this into a full blown El Niño, failed to materialize.

The trade winds blew like they normally did.

Since then meteorologist have shelved all talk of a super El Niño. It’s confirmed…El Nino is a no show for this year.

This throws a giant spanner into the works. As I was hoping the advent of El Niño would translate into prolonged drought or cause the monsoon to fail partially and depress crop yield and since the percipition will be significantly higher in the West coast of America and the Amazonia during every El Niño event – soya bean yields would be bumped up.

The combined effects of this would result in the collapse of the crude palm oil market thereby sending shock waves throughout many badly managed estates forcing them to either sell part or all of their estates to enable them to weather this calamity.

When that happens I would just stroll right in like the Shah of Iran and buy up all the land at rock bottom prices.

As it is, that’s not going to happen lah. Not this year – and when I consider how much effort, planning and attention to detail has been put into this one grand strategy and how it all now amounts to a big fat zero. I can’t help but wonder what’s it all for – it’s like bloody pouring water into a kettle with a hole.

But maybe it’s not entirely wasted. Because life is a funny business after all as when a door closes a window can always be counted to open.

At least the effort one puts in to understand and gain mastery over a complicated thing from the inside out endures. As when I look back. I have learnt a lot from spending so much time and effort hatching this diabolically evil plan – pushed the envelop of experimental and scientific farming to its limits and even retrofitted space age irrigation techniques to mitigate the debilitating effects of prolonged drought that I can easily adapt one day should I decide to venture into vertical farming in land and water scarce countries like Dubai or The Emirates – all that knowledge I am sure will one day translate into opportunity to engineer my much needed break out.

One day….all these pirates will all just line up in a straight line like bowling pins…the day will come when that siaow charbor Mother Nature will just show up and give me the one thing I need most…surprise!

Making peace the best I can with the vampiress in the ghost month

The ghost month is usually the liveliest period in the kampung. Since it coincidences with the mythical harvest season in the farmer’s almanac stretching all the way back to the old country along with ten other celebrations that are unique to only the kampung social scenery – not a night goes by when there is not either a dinner or some celebration that involves the entire village.

I am wary of these events as since they involve loads of ‘yam seng’ style drinking where the only goal seems to be how to destroy one’s liver in sixty seconds flat! The prospects of a painful liver transplant is not exactly something I consider fun – it’s really only something I see in terms of national service to renew business ties and to sell my enemies the illusion that I am not really a threat or an evil person, when I am really one lah.

Besides I haven’t really recovered fully from the debilitating effects of dengue…not just yet. There’s still the lingering feebleness that makes any form of physical exertion just that harder than usual as if I walking in lead shoes.

But that’s not the real reason why I am keeping my head low during the ghost month.

The problem has to do with a marauding band of big breasted girls who usually descend on the kampung’s like vampiress this time of the year. These girls sell fertilizers and farm related products. They are appealing in a Cheena big bone sort of way that caters to the crude taste of kampung men. Which to my understanding usually involves exaggerated breast and ass augmentation – any thing else in between is negotiable after two cases of tiger beers. Usually when these vampiress see me, they just zoom right to my table for the proverbial kill.

If there are just interested to sell fertilizer that would hardly be problem. As I can always manage the profit motive by throwing them a bone based on the understanding – leave me be lah.

But the problem seems to be much more complicated. As from what I am able to observe – they’re just interested in disturbing me. It’s as if these vampiress can all see right thru my uncle power no nonsense bush jacket, square rim dark glasses and plastic pipe disguise.

Unlike most kampung folk who harbor a deep fear and respect for the image of the constant frontier man – these girls have zero respect for that other man. As I suspect they probably know it to be a well crafted paper mâché front – hence it’s not unusual for them to spend so much time on my table disturbing me that the village pineapple eyed auntie brigade begins to start frowning and this usually sends tongues wagging like a rippling shockwave thru out the kampung grapevine – its complications that I don’t need. As the last thing I want to do is diminish my image as a serious businessman. I am already struggling with that idea as since I am the youngest landowner it’s hard for the business community to take me seriously and it certainly doesn’t help when this sort of scandals circulate around.

It all started last year when I chanced upon one these vampires in the city at a gala event. I was decked in my G2000 attire. The super tight variety that highlights my 5% only and no more, frame, stepping right out from a Maserati.

I guess the image was so different from my stern man from uncle image that something just clicked in her head – this guy is just putting on an elaborate Chinese opera. I am going to expose his double life!

That was when she whipped out her camera phone and started machine gunning away and soon all those images of a boyish me found their way into the kampung Cheena Facebook grapevine.

Since then it’s become virtually impossible for me to live down the image of the man who lives a double life.

Impossible.

It’s best to keep a low profile….to run deep and silent…..in the ghost month like Casper the ghost wooooooooooooooo!

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‘The image of the frontier man or man of action will always be a very powerful figure in the rural psyche. If he did not exist. He would probably have to be fashioned into existence. As life in the frontier will always be bare and stripped of all outward affectations and pretensions where the idea of government may be so distant that it may well be on the surface of the moon – and for some semblance of life to reliably continue. For one to even be assured that the center has not given out and the sun will rise as certain as it did yesterday and the day before it and so on….x there will always be a need for this frontier figure. He’s Stalin, Mandela, Oprah Winfrey, Gandhi, Bruce Wayne, Wyatt Earp all rolled into a package of the man who is always there in the background.

He’s always there….so whenever there are disputes, he is usually to be found beneath the tree listening to both sides of the argument. If there are infractions, he is the magistrate and if the enemy stands at the gates, he will probably be the one who is riding the white horse and if children misbehave parents will usually invoke his name to set them straight.

But this character as appealing as he may be to so many who turn the wheel of life where life will always be at best a myth. A necessary illusion like how so many women continue to spend their money on anti ageing cream where the only active ingredient happens to be water. Or how so many people continue to put their faith in mumbo jumbo.

As in my opinion, no one man can possibly encapsulate the full range of ideals that this one figure is supposed too – it’s really too big a geography for one man to wrap his head around without the risk of exploding like a hand grenade. Nor can such a figure fulfill the multitude of roles that is so often expected of him and this should prompt us to ask, why then does this myth continue to endure?

What really accounts for its persistence and insistence to even be able to encrust itself so deeply into the psyche of those who turn the wheel of life in the frontier.

This is the question that has always enthrall me no end. Man’s predilection to fashion delusions and myths just to make an unbearable life that much more bearable.’

To work or to degree then work – which will take you further in life?

A very close business associate who is in his sixties once complained privately to me on an out station drive to another plantation – he had every reason to believe his son is a first class bloody fool. When I asked why. This man went on to elaborate. He could not possibly understand how his son was ever going to recoup the cost of pursuing an expensive degree overseas. My friend went on to lament…after all it’s not even a renowned university…just one of those unknown ones that no one has ever heard of were his words or to that effect.

My friend went on to add…Furthermore, it is in a discipline that would add very little value of increasing his prospects of seeking employment. This man went on to confide to me, he was quite sure whatever his son could squeeze into his head would all amount to a great nothing when he returned home to work.

He kept on murmuring under his breath, ‘that fool of a son of mine….fool…fool.’

Somewhere along the drive. I asked my troubled friend. Why is it whenever we visit a plantation together. He has to always insist on bringing along his old double barrel antique shotgun. I went on to share with him, it’s not even a pump action that can spit out lead at a decent rate when one considers even criminal syndicates these days are carrying far better shotguns with more fire power to rob banks. I went to add rather dismissively, it’s just an unnecessary hassle that hardly adds any value to our trip. It’s dead weight. Useless! Besides most of the plantations we visit already have armed guards. So what the hell are you trying to prove!

My friend became visibly agitated and was quite forceful in informing me curtly, it’s none of my business what he decides to lug around when he goes on his field trips….he went on to add, besides he feels safer walking around the desolation of the field armed. I jested with him by pointing out, it’s not even loaded most of the time. He replied, that’s hardly the point. What matters is carrying this old and useless blunderbuss around makes me feel secured and assured, it’s able to give me the sense of confidence, that allows me to dedicate myself to the task at hand whenever I am out in the field – without ever having to be distracted by the fear of getting held up by brigands….and just when the conversation was about to get very ugly.

I laughed and apologized for winding him up and after a very long pause my friend laughed aloud as well. After a while, he settled into deep reflection and when we arrived, he turned to me and said,

‘Maybe you have a point….maybe my son is not such a fool after all.’

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‘The mind will always be a very curious organ like that other unmentionable body part between your torso and limbs. As where you believe power resides, is where power will actually reside in.

By the same vein, if you are internally persuaded a thing is worthless and useless, then it too will actually be quite useless and worthless to you and can never ever acquire the agency of power. Never.

Thru the power of your mind in the shape and form of your beliefs that you choose to buy into or chuck out – you can either infuse a thing with power or disable it so completely whether you have it with you through out the long journey of life can either be a matter of profound indifference or importance.

Even should you happen to believe that a degree from a tin pot university holds the skeleton key to the door where power resides in, then even that as improbable as it seems will be so very powerful to the extent of being able to transform your life for the better.

But whatever your decision. It must be yours and yours alone to make and not to just listen blindly to some funny man who you saw on TV telling you to stand up, turn right, sit down. Because if one goes down that road of perdition, then the next thing you will end doing is putting up your hands for urination breaks – that also just happens to be the only life lesson a degree ever imparts to the perceptive student…the confidence to think independently without fear or favor.’

The paradox of a simple life

This morning during breakfast I met a young man who is a son of a business associate. Mid way into our Bak Kut Teh meal. He shared with me his philosophy in life – all he desires out of life, is to live simply….free from the mindless pursuits of materialism, power and influence.

This young man even shared with me a secret.

I have always been his role model in life. Naturally, I was flattered though I expressed reservations concerning his choice of selection.

Eventually we got around to the details of how he might set about living this simple life.

When he told me all he wanted to do was to live off the land. I told him, he would need to buy land to do that. Furthermore not any piece of land was good to go! It would have to be a large enough parcel and just not a veggie plot. As to turn the wheel of life from the land sustainably requires critical mass to enable one to leverage on economies of scale. Only then can one be in a position to reliably materialize a good return on investment by being able to smooth out the vagaries of high peaks and valleys of the free market. Without this one strategic capability, farming is simply not an economically viable proposition – one will always be forced to live under the yoke of the caprice of falling and rising commodity prices.

To put it another way. To do all this requires millions of dollars! As since arable land is a finite resource, land prices can only go up and up and never down.

The young man kept quiet…..

Later on. He turned to me and asked, but you seem to live off the land quite well…you don’t even need to shop for provisions in the supermarket….your cost of living must be near zero or nothing….. Since it is well known to all in the village you are an accomplished hunter. Surely, I can learn to do that as well! I will live off the land!

Again I said to him. But you first need millions of dollars before you can do that! As when you are out hunting. It’s opportunity cost! Who then is going to work on your estate? Who is going to do what needs doing to materialize a profit? Surely, you don’t expect the fruits to magically find their way to the market without ever once having to invest in the whole idea of managing an estate professionally like any other enterprise. After all farming is the only business in the world, where the farmer buys everything at retail and sells only at wholesale, so again you need millions of dollars before you can even aspire to lead a simple life.

At the end of the conversation the young man turned to be with a dejected expression and murmured – life is not so simple after all is it?

I told him in my humble opinion – only the rich and wealthy can afford to live a simple life. For the rest of us, life will always be a grind.

The young man was not happy….he walked away huffing and puffing. That’s only to be expected when delusions are shattered. But once he takes the time to think it thru, he will be back again. Of that I am 100% sure!

As I watched him strut off abruptly. I wondered, ‘am I still his role model?’

Maybe not. But in this case that is not such a bad thing.

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‘Some years back ago. I was asked to perused through an academic paper slotted for an agronomy conference (till today I have absolutely no idea why anyone with half a brain would ever ask me to help them). Nonetheless, I obliged as the paper related specifically to the field of oil palm which required some subject matter expert inputs.

After reading thru. I highlighted to the author to replace a genre of words (which I had considerable difficulty wrapping my head around. I am not kidding. I just don’t understand them! I don’t even know what they really mean.) such as ‘right sizing’ which is word that I have always believed should rightly remain only,’down sizing.’ As that’s a far more accurate description since it connotes the absence of choice and is a situation forced upon one.

The whole paper was riven by such ambigiuous and disingenuous terms. I can’t remember all of them, there were really too many, but this one stood out.

When this learned man e-mailed me and asked why I had taken such a unusual degree of exception to his choice of vocabulary.

I told him quite plainly, it’s a bullshit word that’s commonly used by bullshit artist to sell bullshit products. I went on to add, if he was really serious about the whole business of influencing the farming community to place a purchase order for his firms brand of fertilizer, he would do well to cultivate the good habit of restricting his vocabulary to a variety where a spade is called nothing other than a spade.

After a few heated exchanges of e-mails, this academic ended calling me an ‘incorrigible recalcitrant.’ I for my part shot back a barbed repartee by calling him, a’glorified carpetbagger.’

At the end of the day, this chap did what he felt was right…justified….and wise Result: he crashed and burnt to a cinder lah! The planters gave him a royal thumbs down en masse and soon his reputation was in tatters which I considered regrettable because the blend of formulation for this variety of fertilizer was very effective based on my field test.

I guess what I am trying to convey from this story is how at times it’s best for one to just be plain and forthright even if the truth stings. Especially if you’re engaging people who have no patience to put up with sugar coated nonsense and all they really want is the low down.

Because let me tell you why! No amount of spin doctoring is going to alter the reality that a dog is a dog! You can certainly try to sell that idea as the next best thing since sliced bread. But the danger is if one goes too far, then what it reflects is a crafty and manipulative mind that’s out to pull the wool over everyone’s eyes and that’s certainly going to do you more damage than good in the long run.

It is. What it is! And nothing can ever change that and doing otherwise would be akin to calling a spade anything but a spade.’

The reincarnation of Ping Piang

About four months back ago. One of my most promising puppies Ping Piang was killed by a monitor lizard. Recently Rita gave birth to a litter of puppies and one of them looks and has the same temperament as the deceased Ping Piang.

He even responds to Ping Piang’s favorite toy, a baby rattler and has a mole like Ping Piang on the inside of his left ear.

Apart from the difference in color. Ping Piang was jet black. While Ping Piang 2 is a tanned Doberman. But I am certain they are the same dog.

I wonder do dogs get reincarnated?

How is this possible?

Can it be that love has returned to me?

Can this really be so?
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‘When we speak about the idea of reincarnation. It is usually associated with the supernatural. At one level of understanding I can well comprehend, why it’s almost obligatory to treat the subject as one belonging to the genre of religion.

But at a personal level – the idea of reincarnation isn’t really so mystical after all. Not to me, at least – as to suggest this is a subject that belongs exclusively to the realm of the spiritual crèche.

Not when you consider even in the single lifetime of a man. There may well be so many other men in this one man. That’s to say, although this man lives only one lifespan, there is a multitude of lives in this one life. Each capable of standing up as the story of the life of a single man. So can we not say this man has experienced multiple reincarnations of the self?

Think about it.

And when one considers the idea of reincarnation further, beyond the ambit of its religious meaning – it could well be when a man losses his limbs. Or for that matter any other thing or person that he is attached too or derives strength, meaning and nourishment form – be it his job, loved one, memory or even a dog.

Then in his new state where he has to do without. That man experiences a sort of reincarnated state. The idea of ‘loss’ in this case gives rise to rebirth.

It’s still the same man, but when one considers how his attitude, perspective and even what he can and cannot do has been so radically transformed by the loss, it could well be, we are really talking about two distinctive individuals the man who was and the man who is.

This strange perspective of life and death could well explain why these days. I tend to be quite philosophical about the whole idea of loss. I am not saying I am sanguine or cavalier about the whole idea of loss. I am not. I am still very much affected by it.

Only my perspective on the whole idea of loss these days doesn’t include the adjunct of finality any longer. It used to be, the whole idea of losing something that I was once attached too filled me with such a profound sense of loss that I was even consumed by grief.

But when I stand back and juxtapose the idea of loss against the larger canvas of how life is really just an endless series of life and death and lost and found cycles. Then it’s far easier for me to come into terms with so many of the things that I once held firmly in my hands only to lose them forever.

The pain is still there. But it’s greatly diminished or palliated at least by understanding of how nothing can ever be fixed or permanent, it’s always changing. And since life and death has to feature in that chastening process of change – loss is really inevitable. With understanding hopefully although one may never be able to be free from the pain of loss, at least suffering remains optional.

A woman for example can love you passionately. But once she discovers motherhood, that love shifts to the children and in a sense, she’s reincarnated as another woman and so are you. You can certainly mourn that loss that you once shared with her, but since she is now reincarnated as a mother who directs her love to her children. You too are reincarnated as a man who understands, why this has to be the case. That to me is maturity and perhaps even intelligence of a sort that may allow one to gainfully lead a purpose driven life.

My point is the whole idea of how I see reincarnation is really just a process (for lack of a better word) to explain why the things and people we cherish will all eventually slip right out of our lives. But it is never the end as it is a new beginning.

I am no saying I no longer feel the blues these days whenever I experience loss. Neither am I implying I have become so jaded of late that I can even manage to regard the whole idea of ‘loss’ and ‘found’ as the same face of the coin. No! Only these days I understand and like I said while pain is inevitable, suffering is always optional….and by this I mean, I have come to terms with an idea which I have always struggled with every since the moment of my youth – every thing that I love, I will eventually lose, but in the end, love will return in a different form….love will find a way to return…to come back thru the ocean of time….reincarnation.’

Teaching Kee Kee how to hunt

Every dog has his day. Eventually, they all learn to discard their childish ways and learn the life skills needed to earn their keep. This is especially so for plantation dogs. As the idea of keeping casual pets is really a non existent idea, it’s like talking about snakes in Norway. The bloody thing doesn’t exist!

In a plantation. Dogs are no different from workers. They all have a role to play in adding value to the estate of the farmer.

Even a troubled teenager tan Doberman called Kee Kee cannot escape his karma.

Today I taught Kee Kee his first syllable that he needs to master if he is to accompany me for the hunt, it is shssssss!

Shsssss….is one of sixteen instructions a hunting dog learns in his life time. It is like the alphabet ‘A’ or the number zero.

Shsssss…..also means the days of running around carefree and rolling around the grass as if the world is one giant sandbox that stretches out into eternity is well and truly over for Kee Kee.

As when a dog comes to the full breadth of Shsssss……it is not so different from a boy who walks through the portal into manhood.

When mastered well, it will unlock the mysteries of the wonder weapon of invisibility. As since a decisive death blow can only be delivered under the cloak of surprise…..without the power to move unseen and unheard in the thicket of the jungle, it is really quite impossible to hunt. One is likely to go hungry. As to bring down a prey in the jungle, both man and dog must be reduced to the power of only one.

They need to move as one unit. To complement each other instead of spoiling the rhythm of the hunt.

Shsssss to a dog is I imagine what Halleluyah or Om is to probably man….it is a power syllable…one that may carry infinite meanings depending on the time and situation, it can mean…be quiet….settle down….be still….be like a rock. But whatever meaning shsss may convey, it is like crossing a line somewhere in the head. Not just any line, but a mythical line that divides what was once from what must and will be from now onwards.

For Kee Kee the excitable puppy that has only know play 24/7, Shsssss is the most difficult syllable to master. For now when he hears this hunting instruction, he much prefers to lick my fingers to keep quiet….it is a good start. As he seems to know or intuit this is what Shssssss means….the child must die for the man to be born.

Small steps….the smaller the better….we will get there soon.
———————————————————————————-

‘If you want to really know the mind of a man. All you have to do is observe his pets very carefully. If his dog is always nervous and spinning around like a top and jumping up and down all the time. Then the chances are – this man is also nervous and somewhere in his brain a top is spinning full toss and in another corner of that same brain, he’s too is jumping up and down like a Jack in the box with a faulty spring.

The same goes for his workers, subordinates and charges. If they are always nervous, uncertain and fearful. Then the chances are the leader is also a very nervous, uncertain and fearful character who has absolutely no idea what he’s doing.

You can even apply this same rule of thumb to the timeless relationship between a man and a woman without incurring much violence to the idea of the truth. It is very robust.

Nervous women and men who do very little except talk and talk like a runaway train without ever once thinking thru their words or actions are usually paired with men or women who do very much the same. It is as if they are both feeding on each other’s fear’s, manias and anxieties.

From my years of observation, the most successful relationship is when a man and woman, leader and follower or for that matter even a master and dog both know deep in their bones why they need each other to be complete – to enable them to accomplish their life mission. They don’t just know it as a fuzzy abstraction like the whole idea of God, which I consider to be highly optional and at best just dead weight. Rather they know it from the inside out as since they can both feel and witness this miraculous power being unleashed to better their life’s – they feel healthier, livelier, happier and that can all be intensely edifying. So they both make an effort to look good to please the other and behave themselves in ways that can only endear themselves further to those who they love and respect.

This should prompt us all to ask why? And that is a question that I shall leave to you.’

To be taken completely

Todo te lo tragaste, como la lejanía.
Como el mar, como el tiempo. En todo lo que se hundió!

———————————————————————————-

‘City folk don’t consciously think about the rain, wind and clouds. They don’t. To them it all just belongs to the realm of the invisible. Like perhaps that mysterious dimension where pens and paper clips always seem to disappear into…never to be found again. The stuff of its there, but not really there just like fire extinguishers, elevator music and everything that probably exist only in the blur of the peripheral.

But farmers are very different I reckon. As they’re always consciously of everything that’s happening around them. To them no two rains are ever the same. Each is different. Each is to it’s own.

And if one should decide one day to step right out of the gyre of the perpetual. To just stop and remain so very still and watch it all unfold. To even be so incredibly present of the moment as to be able to sense the gentle caress of wind and how it curls around the legs like the brush of a cat. Suddenly, that which was once invisible begins to take shape and form.

Yes…..You’ve have been swallowed whole by a whale. You’re in a swirl. A driftwood bobbing in the infinity of something so immensely big and powerful.

And soon the sudden realization hits you….I’ve been swallowed!’

Daybreak high above the hill in the plantation

SI TÚ ME OLVIDAS

QUIERO que sepas
una cosa.

Tú sabes cómo es esto:
si miro
la luna de cristal, la rama roja
del lento otoño en mi ventana,
si toco
junto al fuego
la impalpable ceniza
o el arrugado cuerpo de la leña,
todo me lleva a ti,
como si todo lo que existe,
aromas, luz, metales,
fueran pequeños barcos que navegan
hacia las islas tuyas que me aguardan.

Ahora bien,
si poco a poco dejas de quererme
dejaré de quererte poco a poco.

Si de pronto
me olvidas
no me busques,
que ya te habré olvidado.

Si consideras largo y loco
el viento de banderas
que pasa por mi vida
y te decides
a dejarme a la orilla
del corazón en que tengo raíces,
piensa
que en ese día,
a esa hora
levantaré los brazos
y saldrán mis raíces
a buscar otra tierra.

Pero
si cada día,
cada hora
sientes que a mí estás destinada
con dulzura implacable.
Si cada día sube
una flor a tus labios a buscarme,
ay amor mío, ay mía,
en mí todo ese fuego se repite,
en mí nada se apaga ni se olvida,
mi amor se nutre de tu amor, amada,
y mientras vivas estará en tus brazos
sin salir de los míos.

Field Inspection

It’s not worth it to say anything bad about the PAP any longer

It’s just not worth it to hold a critical point of view against the PAP. After all, I still have my wife and kids in Singapore – and my wife is concerned. If it was just me and me alone, it would probably be different. But if my social political views and airing them in my blog causes any of my loved ones anxieties (real or imagined).

Then I will just stop what I am doing. It’s really a two second decision.

I am shutting down my blog.

They win. I lose.

———————————————————————————–

‘Somewhere in the long journey of life. We are all brought up to believe in the idea of being true to ourselves. Now the funny thing is, if you asked when precisely this notion seeped into my brain – I can’t for the life of me tell you exactly.

I am serious!

Maybe it was just an idea that managed to latch on to my brain like how seaweed clings to a man who swims in the sea and doesn’t even bother to ask any longer what’s that thing trailing in his wake.

I know this sounds immature. But that’s how it’s always been with me…if you ever get to ask me about this whole idea of being true to one’s self – somewhere at the tail end of the conversation I would probably tell you, the idea has to be highly overrated and at best crumbly as for one to be true to one’s self requires – commitment – a streak of selfishness….and I just don’t have it in me to be selfish. I’ve never been selfish person. Not the sort who even buys expensive stuff for myself even when I can afford it without feeling a wave of guilt that I couldn’t at least share it with the people who I love and cherish.

Perhaps what I am trying to say is I am not the sort of man who ever wants to live in a way that causes pain to those who I love and so I must probably suffer from a deficit of conviction. Either that or I am just one of those people who just doesn’t mind betraying himself. No. It’s not that hard really. Betrayal. Not at all. You should try it! It’s really like walking into a strange room for the very first time. At first, the idea of being in unfamiliar sorroundings may rub you the wrong way, but as you sit there long enough and take it all in bit by bit, it’s surprising how even the idea of betrayal can grow on you…and soon you’re even comfortable with that idea that you were once uncomfortable with – trust me, even you could get used to it. I reckon every man has a soft spot, it’s really like interrogation, you only think, you can hold out. But as the pressure ratchets up, you will break.

You know I am going to move on to another subject that has always bothered me and probably has absolutely nothing with what I have been writing about – it’s the cryptic ending in the George Orwell’s novel 1984. It’s always bothered me because I could never grasp it.

You know the part where the main protagonist, Winston sits in a bar all by himself – it’s mid day and there’s hardly anyone there and all he’s doing is staring into space. In the background there’s the perpetual drone of propaganda from Big Brother and Co. Then suddenly, his previous lover walks in. Now if it was me, I would probably go whoopee! let’s shag! But that doesn’t happen. They talk about stuff. Daily stuff like the weather along how the trains are running these days. The mood is somber, distant and strangely detached as if everything that this two people once experienced never ever happened before….poof! It’s gone and to me it’s always been a very strange way to end a novel…it’s a strange, strange thing. Eventually she leaves. And Winston’s is staring into space again as if…..life goes right on.

Yes….as if life just has that unreserved delectable quality to go on like a top that can spin forever and ever. And that’s really how I see it when I put this writing instrument down…life just goes right on.’

Ten years of Lee Shien Long…..

catastrophic success!

——————————————————————————-

‘To say Mini Lee disappointed would not be entirely right. Besides, I don’t particularly like the word disappoint. As it’s a lovers word. I believe in these ten years – there were certainly many winners as there were probably losers.

My feel is most pundits don’t really understand the truth is self selecting – as how you would decide to fill his report card as PM will pivot entirely on whether you’re a winner or loser in his new order of Singapore.

I came across a blog recently that was aggregated by Singapore’s premier Potemkin site, the Singaporedaily. You know those fucks who aren’t allowed to aggregate whatever we and our channel partners produce….and in one of these blogs, the author wrote,

‘Yes, life in Singapore is tough but there are pros and cons everywhere in this world. Blame yourself if u cannot succeed, not the government. No one owes you a bed of roses, so stop acting so entitled!’

I don’t agree with the author entirely. As why should hard working people have to blame themselves if they failed under Mini Lee. In truth, he made the wheel of life so bloody difficult for the middle class to turn under his watch that even the best dropped out and failed – let’s face it, if one has to compete with the whole wide world, it’s really like you asking me as a farmer to compete with the likes of ADM, Bundee and Cargill – I mean, if I had to compete with those big guns who just rode into my kampung like some prized gunfighter. I wouldn’t even try to do something as silly as compete – as I know I don’t stand a chance in hell!

No way man! Can’t do it! Just pack my teddy bear in a box, put up a for sale sign and that’s it.

But if you said to me. Look here! Hello farmer! Bad ass mothers are coming to whip your sorry ass so you better lay off surfing porn and whiling your time playing online Soduku and if you can give me a commitment that you’re serious for a good fight – I am going to give you the resources and opportunities to improve your lot so that you can hold your own against them. I would probably sign on the dotted line and work darn hard to build critical mass and core competencies in scientific farming so that I would be able to hold my own even against those big boys.

My feel is that was what he should have done. Empower people to compete and hold their own against foreign competition, rather than leaving it all to the caprice of the free market. Because when you strip down globalization to its bare chassis, as an economic theory, often it’s dehumanizing, feral, downright vicious and often it’s closer to perdition than salvation – it’s a lousy purveyor of the la dolce vita.

My point is change needs to be intelligent managed at the point of inception and not when things get so bad that mini lee even has to get eight ball Tharman and tin pot soldier Chuan Jin to talk to the banks about giving locals an opportunity. I mean what kinda of balance of power are you even talking when you have to go to those sharks with the begging bowl. You go figure that part out lah!

Because at that stage, it’s game over…finished….poof it’s gone!

So when we talk about losers and winners, very often, we don’t appreciate the scale or for that matter even understand basic questions like – who the hell are we competing with?

The tendency is to take the course of least mental resistance and impute blame on those who failed, by saying, well if others can do it and you can’t hack it, then it has to be your fault!

I don’t think it’s reasonable to do that. Not if you want an intelligent conversation where you might see the world slightly differently from the way you have always seen it.

So coming back to the topic of Mini Lee’s ten years – All I am willing to say is I think it’s pretty impossible to find a more polarizing, divisive and controversial prime minister in the history of Singapore.

And if you think about it that’s not any casual statement, but a mother of all statements that could possibly stand by itself as a whole disquisition. That is basically how I would sum up his innings.

If there is any benchmark mini lee has successfully set in this last ten years – it is really being able to take the whole meaning of ‘divide’ beyond its dictionary meaning to call his own – and I have a feeling his record is good to stand for at least as long as Singapore’s natural life cycle. I for one cannot imagine a more controversial figure.

But that is not really my point – the crux is we are already living in a very divided society as it is – and these divisions are so deep and entrenched philosophically, ideologically and conceptually that it’s hard to see how there can be any basis for common ground – you know very recently one of my colleagues threw a Singapore day bash as he does every year to celebrate the NDP. The turn up was quite good. But these days, you will find two distinct groups who just want to do their own thing as they have absolutely nothing in common with the other group. They don’t talk. They much prefer to be in their respective groups, as I suspect, they seem to all know or intuit – that’s the best way these days to get by without ending up in the ICU – as what divides them is so great, if they ever got together, they would probably be so divisive as to produce no good for each side. And this should prompt one to ask why? Along with was it all worth it?

I mean at the end of ten years and all you have to show for is two groups who don’t want to have anything to do with each other then any reasonable person would have to ask – was it worth it to chase all out economic growth in the first place! Any reasonable man would question the goal along the means to the end. My feel is these people who choose to do so should not be treated as subversives or the fringe of the lunatic wing.

So there they were, two groups separated like oil and water -terminally divided – so close yet so far and that’s really how I see Singapore society these days under Mini Lee watch.

A divided nation split right down the middle where the differences between the winners and losers are so monumentally great that you can even have one side throwing out hurtful statements like,

‘Blame yourself if u cannot succeed, not the government. No one owes you a bed of roses, so stop acting so entitled!’

I really don’t think mere vignettes, happy soundbites and trinket cosmetic features such as getting the Singaporedaily to feature daily pics of Mini Lee is ever going to change his image or how so many people see him, as when one scales the magnitude of the divide along with all its multi hydra implications. All I can really say is that’s a really big problem that requires real and serious solutions not the panacea of spin doctoring.

The problem as I see it, while the winners seem to be winning at every turn and opportunity. All that the losers can do is to suck it all in and hope that they don’t lose too big. It wouldn’t be such a travesty, if you told me, these people who lose deserve to lose, as they were lazy and didn’t study hard or cut their teeth as diligent and responsible model workers. Many of the losers in my opinion did everything they should have done, they went to the right universities, they cut their teeth at work, but somehow the system just left them high and dry thru no fault of their own and that to me will always be travesty.

That I feel is his legacy, broken hopes and dreams amid the exuberance life is great. Like I said, it really depends on your vantage, did you win or lose?

That’s the question that in this unusual case just happens to be the answer as well.

I call a spade a spade. That’s what farmers do!’

Recovery

Location: PG 1/SK Plantation.

Exact shoot location: Category 8 Armored Safe house deep in the jungle.

Duration of sickness: 9 days 22 hours and 3 min.

Physical Condition: loss 5.6 Kg / swollen eyes and face / Nominal gum bleeding stopped / muscle soreness, lack of focus and blurred vision still persistent / appetite fair. Will try to take a light walk today in the afternoon.

Life support in safe house: 100% / air filtration and scrubber needs a new change of filters / starting to sound noisy. Electrical supply stable at 50 MHz. Water filtration good.

Mental Health: Paranoia and hallucinations subsided. Dreams of walking in the Sahara stopped yesterday. Acute sensation of mouth dryness and thirst still persistent despite consuming recommended quantities of water.

—————————————————————————

He has always been there. Not just there in the way a man sits some distance away. But there….burrowed deep within the me, like some rash that if one succumbs to the temptation to scratch in the hope of relief would certainly get itchier – there…. like some invisible vapor that emanates from me, lingering somewhere amid the terminal childishness that I’ve always hidden from the world. The child who regularly loses battles with a box of chocolates, who binges on TV, steal stares at cleavages and bums. And behaves as if he’s going to live forever.

He is always there….

I’ve known all my life he’s a part of me. As I am a part of him, residing deep within the darkened folds of who I claim to be. I use the word ‘claim’ only because it’s an illusion that I require like a prosthetic to fashion the necessary lie that he’s no longer part of me. For most of the time, it works well enough to supply the raw material to fashion, belief – that he’s well and truly dead and never a part of me….but he’s there…..that other side of me that is me and yet apart from who I claim to be me.

I wish I could say with some measure of conviction that I truly own enough of myself. But I have always know deep down – this belief is at best a necessary lie.

For what you might ask. To get by.

For the dearly unfortunate who subscribe wholeheartedly to the idea of ‘getting by.’ It’s almost nearly mandatory for them to believe in the idea of redemption. Hence the adjunct – ‘to get by….the best we can.’

I don’t doubt those who claim self deception is akin to some character flaw like perpetual masturbation see the world clearer than everyone else. But just like folk who have only known off shelf suits and don’t ever know how a tailored one can make one feel like a million dollars. These erudite lot are the same people who probably don’t know how necessary a crutch is to those who suffer from my affliction – as it enables a incomplete man to gainfully lead a whole life or one that at least fulfills the illusion the affliction of incompleteness he suffers from approximates completeness to some degree of fidelity.

As to suffer from a affliction of incompleteness – is akin to a sick man who can feel the oppressing weight of his suit bearing down on his shoulders. Only the privileged who belong to the ranks of the incomplete can be privy to such sensations. It’s a vampire thing. Hardly a sensation that the whole or those who believe they might be whole can ever feel or even be aware of.

Only the man who knows only too well there will always be a duality that resides within him can aspire to the ideal of the necessary lie. As the prospects of doing otherwise would probably require this man who can only be described as damaged goods to confront the completeness of the terrible truth…and the though, the truth for what it’s worth is often touted as the whole as the prescriptive cure of our times that holds out the promise to set one free can only be the anti thesis of what this man who truly aspires to be – free of that other man who resides in this man….who is me.

I don’t doubt for one moment it would be far easier to deny this one other man who resides within me – if only I could entertain the idea I could do without him or somehow manage the refrain of forever catching the breath of my own surprising emotions that I had accomplished so much by myself…without him.

Just around the period when I first ventured into commercial farming and all seemed to be going quite well. I felt it was time to assassinate him – assassination as the term implies: betrayal. But in his case, his demise was longed for, wanted…desired in his usual mocking way.

It was though, he could read every aspect of my intent and was even willing to be complicit – this had the curious effect of transforming me from an adversary, to his accomplice. You could even say he fueled my resolve supplying not only the motivation, but in his way, cajoled and invited it. As if he knew through his demise. He would be resurrected to claim a larger part of me.

He knew….he would be reincarnated.

How could he not know – as ever since I could recall. He always knew I secretly hero worshipped him. He even encourage it – the relationship was somewhere between fandom and embarrassing teenage infatuation. One where I fetishistically mimicked his gestures, touched the things he touched and stole his lines to call my own.

He knew…he would be reincarnated.

He was reborn four years ago on a moonless night. The night, they came for me. Ten gangsters possibly more. It’s hard to say, it was dark. I was scared. So scared that I buried my face in the mud and hid as I watched them set fire to my camp and dogs. So scared that I wanted to just run back home and that had brought him out from the abyss of darkness.

He did not fear them. He had seen worst in Africa and South America – and as he looked on mockingly at them. I could smell death in his breath; I could see the flecks of red hot amber in his flickering eyes and above all…the relish of being alive…being in his element, it was as though he was willfully prolonging the inevitable….relishing every moment like a sex starved man banging away at a whore holding back the moment – only because he knew, he could.

And when holding back was no longer possible. He was loosed like an arrow that hissed to its mark. That night he hunted all of them…right down to the very last man. I could hear the prey’s heart beating in my head like some hypnotic drum beat, watching helplessly as he gave all of himself to the primeval like some mad man, shredding the flesh, drinking his victim’s fear – for as long as that fateful night lasted, there was no past, no future, no sympathy, no soul, no civilization….nothing except maybe the blur of the wilding night that seemed to stretch on for eternity.

All I could do was cover my eyes in horror….the horror…the horror.’

Tribal Dengue Potion

When dengue strikes. The body will be fevered and covered with rashes. I am too deep in the plantation and faraway from civilization to check into a medical outpost. Besides I’ve never been a fan of hospitals. Never trusted physicians and their quackery either.

I will just have to take my chances. A tribal cure for dengue is to consume the extract of young papaya leafs. Let’s see how it goes.

Life I am reminded is very fragile in the frontier. Some years back ago while preparing poison darts with a few braves deep in the jungle, one of them accidentally pricked himself – everyone fell dead silent, as they all knew what was going to happen and soon the elders of the tribe began to sing songs and assure this young brave his passage to the other side would be smooth and safe. Within the hour, he had past on to the other side.

I don’t expect many people back home to understand this attitude towards death – but then again, it is, what it is….to me.

I will not be blogging for a while.

Darkness signing off.

———————————————————————-

To most people. The subject of death is by no means a pleasant subject. Definitely not a topic that I would recommend if you’re trying to impress your date (that could possibly explain why I wasn’t very hot with girls during my averagely miserable university days).

Death. The subject. Will I imagine be something always morbid and macabre to most humans. Understandably so. As since the main preoccupation of the average person really only involves marinating in his own self importance – ever seeking pleasures, excitement and gratification – there is really no impetus for man or any man to pause and ponder seriously about when his life will end.

But in the frontier – death is omnipresent. One is always mindful of the crumbly nature of mortality and how inept and ill prepared modern man to fend of death.

As a consequence for the man who turns the wheel of life in the frontier – death. Far from being a subject to be shunned, is the skeleton key that unlocks the seeming mystery of life. As it is only thru the understanding of death that one can begin to truly understand life and why we were put on this planet in this timeline – for death will always be part of the cycle of life. At another level of understanding – one may perhaps posit both life and death are really one of the same reality. Hence, by understanding the purpose of death we also understand the purpose of life.

It is only in the contemplation of death that we really begin to understand and appreciate our relative importance and scale of things, we so often take for granted – our relationship with our loved ones – in the shadow of death, suddenly, we realize they too are fleeting – our health, good looks, vigor, élan, panache – all these things we regularly take for granted will all…come to past – they will all shrivel up, die, turn to dust and return to the earth whence they came from.

I once spoke to a soldier who boasted he was trained to fight in dark with special goggles – he showed the gizmo to me and wondered why I was not impressed. When I told him a mosquito hardly the size of pin head could snuff out his life like blowing out a candle – this boy suddenly fell silent deep in meditative thought…he understand how small he was in the greater scheme of things – he was touched by the cold hand of death.

Not long ago in a formal dinner when a old wealthy planter threatened me. I leaned close to him when no one was looking and whispered. You speak at great lengths about power, but you can’t even control your bladder. Suddenly, the old planter shifted uneasily and soon he was lost in his own thoughts. At the end of the dinner he apologized to me and introduced me to his son as a man who can be trusted and relied on when his time comes – death had given him wisdom – he too was touched by the cold hand of death.

Yes death it seems is life’s greatest invention – if it did not exist, mankind would probably have to invent it – as only in shadow of death does life acquire the full meaning of what it truly hold.

Death….it even softens the hardest of hearts, restores one to another with cords of love, destroys differences and nourishes the idea of brotherhood – as though so many things my differ from one man to another – we are all without exception subject to the common destiny of death.

This is wisdom.’