15 Malaysia

You may already know of this initiative. Wonderful short films depicting what our home is all about.

Go enjoy yourself: http://15malaysia.com/

Just what my doctor ordered

Here is a Saturday morning pick me up.

Khalil Jibran and the boy

Songs have a knack of tenderly curling and weaving their tendrils around moments in time, so much so that they own the event and capture within its folds, the joys and heartbreaks of THAT one dot on the time space continuum.

And the same with poetry.

And more than one penniless beau have sent forth their affections enveloped by the deep sighs of Yeats and Neruda. But rummaging through a junk bookstore at Masjid India over the weekend, I came across a body of work by Khalil Jibran.

And along with pages came the memory of a gentle boy who used to read to me poetry over the phone. It was a pity that I am not a romantic as c'mon, how many men do you know would read Khalil Jibran to a woman 120 miles aways, every other night before she slept. I was ungrateful as I would often fall asleep half way only to be awoken by a concerned "Hello? Hello?"

And I don't even remember his name. I hang my head in shame.

So this is for the boy with the gentle voice:

When love beckons to you, follow him,
Though his ways are hard and steep.

And when his wings enfold you yield to him,
Though the sword hidden among his pinions may wound you.
And when he speaks to you believe in him,
Though his voice may shatter your dreams
as the north wind lays waste the garden

From icanhascheezeburger.com

And we lose another raconteur

The passing of Yasmin Ahmad is a great loss to the nation.

As the creative force of some of Malaysia's most memorable ads and films, her honest portrayal of a multi-faceted Malaysia in its truest form, (sans the shameless gloss of Tourism Malaysia productions) has endeared her to many.

I will always recall her frustrations in trying to sell her ideas of unity and singular humility to corporate fatcats who in her words, “just don’t get it”.

And I have deep reverence for this formidable lady who has come out publically to say that its really ok for the younger generation to forget the hardship of the entire May 13 episode because its it not their legacy. Theirs is the promise of a better future and not the bogeyman of bloodshed past.

She will be very sorely missed. God bless.

Frank McCourt

I'd like to pay tribute to literary celebrity, Frank McCourt, who died of meningitis at the age of 78.

I first got to know of this man through the valiant efforts of ex-coursemate and dorm mate Adeline, who told me under no uncertain terms, that I must read this funny novel. The book was of course, Angela's Ashes.

Very few writers can successfully weave humour into a heartbreaking biography. It can make you laugh and cry. Both would leave tears in your eyes. The book speaks of the writer's experience growing up in poverty on the streets of Limerick.

I certainly remember how many a resident and relative went to town, defending their town, when the novel and author achieved fame.

Angela's Ashes won McCourt the Pulitzer. Its a book that you will not easily forget.
The literary world has indeed lost another shinning star.

Aduh, Lame-nya

Overheard at William's Kelana Jaya:

"The cheese you used sedap la. What cheese is that?"

"Orang Melayu panggil tu, Cis Bedebah"

Kah Kah Kah

New book

Renewal is fascinating.

Little signifies catharsis as aptly as sweeping away the old to make room for the new.

Of turning new leafs. As many as the pages are numerous. White, pristine and acid-free.

Is it possible to go beyond the turning of a leaf to becoming a completely new tree? To blossom and burst with new found life, to tremble in the sunshine and proclaim to the sky that now, I shall be the Oak and not the sapling, the Raintree and not the senduduk.

Fresh starts are good. False starts are not. False starts are when the intentions are ambitious but one only achieves the grandeurs of a pokok renek. So one starts again and another leaf unfurls.

One only hope a branch would finally touch the clouds and lives out an epic.

Wisful thinking .. and rejection hurts!

I will not write on sadness because there is too much of it in the world already. Antidotes are fabled and medical research is negligible. But I will write on anger.

It is a fury that consumes. In the pyre, the lapping flames further illuminate the injustice, the humiliation, the loss and anguish. What magnificent despair! And it fuels the soul to burn and burn and burn. And reprieve is sought among the smouldering cinders. But there is so little ashes can do, but be carried away by the whispers of the wind.

So that is where broken hearts go. They disappear. Eventually.

If You Forget Me

I want you to know

one thing.

 

You know how this is:

if I look

at the crystal moon, at the red branch

of the slow autumn at my window,

if I touch

near the fire

the impalpable ash

or the wrinkled body of the log,

everything carries me to you,

as if everything that exists,

aromas, light, metals,

were little boats

that sail

toward those isles of yours that wait for me.

 

Well, now,

if little by little you stop loving me

I shall stop loving you little by little.

 

If suddenly

you forget me

do not look for me,

for I shall already have forgotten you.

 

If you think it long and mad,

the wind of banners

that passes through my life,

and you decide

to leave me at the shore

of the heart where I have roots,

remember

that on that day,

at that hour,

I shall lift my arms

and my roots will set off

to seek another land.

 

But

if each day,

each hour,

you feel that you are destined for me

with implacable sweetness,

if each day a flower

climbs up to your lips to seek me,

ah my love, ah my own,

in me all that fire is repeated,

in me nothing is extinguished or forgotten,

my love feeds on your love, beloved,

and as long as you live it will be in your arms

without leaving mine.

 

- Pablo Neruda