Mr. Jack 2

My physical self is slowly getting back into form and i can feel renewed energy building up with all the teltale signs of the fever and cough receding into past tenses. Perhaps it just takes time for the body to response to the mental cum spiritual commands that one sent a few weeks ago for a general overhaul and alignment of the engine and so far all the symptoms, cause and effects seems as it should be. Just a little tiredness but the external responses seems to be gathering momentum towards a more positive healing nature, less attatchment to worries, more letting go.

Had a nice walk with Mr.Jack my elderly Chinese Sifu and discussed the state of human evolution , the effects it has over the planetary evolution, the nature of healing individually as well as collectively and our role as the human specie towards other beings exisiting on this planet. The planet is going through radical changes due to global warming among other causes and just like the body gets feverish from too much heat and it requires alot of readjustments and realignments in order to bring some form of balance back into nature before the scale is tipped too far to one side and irreparable damage is manifested beyond our control and management, it in short becomes a terminal cancer case. The movie 2012 gave a vivid depiction of what can happen in the event of a global meltdown and it is indeed food for thought for those who care a little about the state of our planet and its health. Those who are bound and determined to stay ahead economically and screw thy neighbor will find it less appealing at what insights the movie has to offer and after all it was not the global warming that was the cause for the catastrophy in the movie it was more like the planetary allignment and it had to do with a sudden outburst of solar flare that caused the earth system to break down, and 2012 is just another fiction, a pigment of the collective imagination ala Holywood.

The environment is just an extension of our human form, whatever happens to the environment around us has a direct affect on our physical if not genetical make up albeit in the form of self preservation of self development. We hardly take notice of these changes especially when we are too busy keeping a balanced cheque book or in keeping up with the Jones. Even as we were strolling along buried deep into our conversation I noticed the changes occuring around us from the serene quietitude of an early morning into an rush of traffic from every direction as those headed for their various stations in life drove by each with a sense of urgency and purpose. There is no right or wrong in this daily scenario of commuting workers to and from work or sending their kids to school and picking them up, it is just that it is a routine that even i was just involved in like it or not, but to witness the whole scene from a psychological and emotional distance it makes one feel a sense of futility of existence. Zoom, there went an ego barely missing me by and inch onwards to fulfill some need, to be at an alloted time and place to justify his or her personal existence, to get paid, cant be late got a date. We walk through our lives thus most of us with a sense of purpose for some and with a sense of loss for others not knowing where to or what for but making every effort to accomplish what we deem our personality demands that we accomplish and call it keeping ourselves busy while waiting for something to happen out of the ordinary and consider it an exciting event, a break from our routined life. In the meantime we trudge along each our invdividual path towards some unknown desitnation often oblivious to what is in and around us. Is that which is happening in the world outside different from that which is happening inside? In the world there is violence, extraordinary turmoil, crisis after crisis. There are wars, division of nationalities, religious differences, racial and communal differences, one set of systematized concepts against another. Is that different from what is going on inside us? We are also violent, we are also full of vanity, terribly dishonest, putting on different masks for different occasions.
This out of sync state of exitence that we often find ourselves drifiting into is what causes us to loose touch with what is going on around us especially the environment. As we drift further from our own primordial center where it all originate we become less and less sensitive towards what is in effect really happening or what is reality. The mind becomes myopic and ego takes the form of Me and mine and the hell with the rest, taking care El Numero Uno is the name of the game. Why should I give a damn about what happens to the climate or the starvation going on in the Congo? The family? Hell with the family it is their fault afterall that they are not like us why should we care if they live or die, oh, by the way it is not our fault if our children becomes like us who asked them to? Hee! Hee!, Its strange, strange world we are living in Mr. Jack!
The fact is, one is the world; not as an idea but actually. Do you see the difference between the idea and the actuality? One has heard the statement that one is the world and one makes an idea, an abstraction of it. And then one discusses the idea, whether it is true, or false and one has lost it. But the fact is, one is the world; it is so.
So one is responsible for changing it. That means, one is responsible, completely, for the way one lives one's daily life. Not try to modify the chaos that is going on, decorate it or join this group or that group or institution, but as a human being, who is the world, go through a radical transformation oneself; otherwise there can be no good society.Change is not brought about through compulsion, through reward and punishment. The mind itself sees the absurdity of all this; it sees the necessity of change, not because God or the priest or somebody tells one to change. One sees the chaos around one and that chaos has been created by human beings; I am as these human beings; I have to act, it is my responsibility and a global responsibility

Mr. Jack.

This morning driving my daughter to schoolI discovered that my car brake was not functionning properly. Should have been alerted as the brake light was red for quite sometime now but thought it to be a minor rpoblem with the handbrake cable..bla..bla. MoneY! Just now discovered that the brake fluid was totally dry and so there is a leak somewhere and so with a single dollar in my pocket and my car not functioning and my body still wobbly from the fever I am at the nadir of my resources. I feel like being kicked in my guts by some unknown force to make sure that this time I stay down and possibly out of the picture altogether.

But that is not to be for so long as I have my children still under my care I will stand up and do battle till I can stand no more or die trying. I have been up this shit creek time and again and it has never been fun but i have managed to survived and this time is no different except the rebound is a bit slower which comes with age.

Upon arrving at the campus early this morning I took my morning walk as i usually do before the Museum opens and along the walk I always prayed or Zikr to Allah or simply talk with Him. Am beginning to doubt that he even listens anymore but still do it like and lunatic on the loose. At one of the truns I was taking I was mesmerized by the beauty of the landscape set before me and it stopped me on the spot. Time out! Small voice whispered, your mind is so busy worrying and complaining that you forgot to witness the beauty around you and how can you hear the voice of your Lord when you are so engrossed within and without.

After awhile i continued my slow walk and as I started my way back I stopped more and realized how beautiful this whole campus was in the morning with hardly any traffic. Then an elderly gentleman stepped up quietly behind me and whispered good morning. I was surprised that I did not even noticed his arrival untill he came right up to me. We walked together for awhile and he asked me what i do at the campus I related to him about myself to which he started talking about art, about colors how to choose minimal use of colors, colors that pleases the eyes with healing effects to subjects from landscapes to kitchen walls. He quoted Chinese sayings about paintings and poetries translated them each and everyone had to do with how the Chinese view an art work. He talked of watercolors and how the Chinese has the problem with perpective in depicting their landscapes and insisted that I read all about Chinese painting techniques.

By the time I was getting too tired from being hungry and still feeling sick I had to let him go as much as I enjoyed this early morning lessons in Art from a total stranger who collected posters of original artworks taking the trouble and patience to hunt down a picture till he found it taking many years. His name is Jack and he is sixty five years of age! It was like walking alongside Jedu Krishnamurti while he was taking his walks on the hillslopes of Ojai, California, or Thich Naht Hanh on one of his mindfulness walking along the path to Hope Cottage at Green Gulch Farm. It helped to keep the positive energy glowing for the rest of the morning such that i can transcend the myopic tunnel vision that i have been suffering from my discrepit existence. Whatever happened to, 'Be Here Now?' Whatever happened to, 'This Is It'! Where is the Zen Mind?

For the past two days upon returning from KL I have been bed ridden from some kind of flu that was so intense at one point that i felt like i was having a stroke. My whole body just one solid pain especially at all the joints and I could barely move. What was worse was that my son Karim was having the same thing as i was next to me on the bed. I felt my worse as i could not afford to get both of us to the clinic. So we pretty much suffered in silence bitter tears running down my face as i came to realize how fucked up my life has been and how my children has to bear the consequences of my bungling. Today despite of being still not in good form i have decided to get out of bed and into the car and see how i can generate some income or at least try not to let my kids see how defeated i have become.

The trip to KL was a good break from the Penang scene and hanging out with the Museum boys is always a pleasure as they are always up to something when they travel. It is sad that i am not able to follow them to Kucing in the next few days but I cannot leave my daughter with her finals exam beginning in a week. Also I am so poor I feel like a beggar living off the charity of others.

In Kl we put up at the Dynasty Hotel not your regular five star but for a large crowd like us, it was perfect. On the first evening the stargazing with our dynamic Dr. Chong was hammered by heavy rainfall ans so instead of gazing at the stars in heaven we were gazing at the pinnacle point of the Petronas Twin Towers from the Natinal Art Gallery.

The Museum Gallery Tuanku Fauziah staff members were invited to provide a support entertainment for the Syed Ahmad Jamal Exhibition that was going on at the gallery and on this ocaision it was also for the international participants for the Curatorial Convention that was being held there. Needless to say we ended up entertaining no one in particular was everyone was rushed to the open air food court with live entertainment. Really, who would want to sit and stare throguh a telescope at a raincloud or the Petronas Crystal Ball while there is food and entertainment right around the corner.

For me the highlight of the visit to KL was meeting a few great young artist like ceramist Umibaizurah whose works are presently on exhibit at the Wei-Ling Gallery, in Brickfields. We later visited her home where she and her husband Shukri another excellent artist had renovated two or was it three buildings to combine in one art community. It is an enviable feeling to see how successful some artists has become and i am sure they have earned it every step of the way.

The presentation given by Dato Syed Ahmad Jamal of his works on show at the National Art Gallery was another event that made it worth while for me to have been there. The presentation was done for the benifit of the visiting members of the curatorial convention. I was very impressed by the amount of work this one man has produced in fifty years and be able to recount every episode for each and every one of them. He has captured the Malaysian scene like no other Artist has and deserves all the awards and honors bestowed upon him for his works. Dato Syed Ahmad Jamal is a phenomenon in the Malaysian Art scene and beacon for many young artists to ameliorate.

The anti-climax of the whole visit to the national Art Gallery was being given the brush off by the Director Najib Dawa who played I am now beyond your reach since we last met kind of attitude. I had purposely brought along the one hundred feet long drawing that I did with me to show him as it he who gave me the paper and asked me to do the drawing. Knowing me i would most probably ended up giving the whole thing to him or the Gallery if he had been any nicer. But them are the breaks.

Work hard Boy...and you'll find...

The problem with not having enough cash on hand if and when needed has haunted my life eversince I made my first pay check sometime in 1969 working as a medical field assistant for an American doctor who was doing a research of tropical deseases in Terengganu. I was hired through the Institute of Medical Research (IMR) and we were working out of Kuala Brang doing back then research on cholera and malarial deseases and hordes of otheres that was prevailent then in the jungles of Ulu Trengganu. Most of the kampung areas we had covered back then are now under water after the Kenyir Lake was constructed. Travelling into these areas in the Ford Bronco Land Cruiser back then was the thrill of a lifetime and adventure in itself especially for a teenager just out of high school. Sometimes we were stuck in mud on rainy days in the middel of nowhere and often we had to sit around on the muddy grounds fixing sores and applying bandages to broken legs instead of doing actual research work, but it was all educational and helped build my character for better or worse. I had money back then more than most of my peers.

The I decided to work for Bristow Helicopters, a chopper company servicing Esso Exploration in the oil and gas exploration off the coast of the South China Seas. Out of Surrey, England, the outfit was run predominantly by British pilots and had a German chief engineer. My job was communications, the wireless operator, the radio man, keeping in constant contact with the Drilling Rigs off shore and the Control base in Kuala Lumpur. The drilling vessel 'Discoverer Two' was back then operational doing the exploration and I later left Bristow to work on this Ship as their radio operator.

One of my most unforgetable expereinces working as a radio operator for Bristow Helicopters was receiving a May-Day call from the Discoverer Two in the middle of the night. The call came very soft that i could hardly read what was being said. May-Day! May-Day! This is the Discovere two calling Trengganu, come back!! I almost shit in my pants when I realized that the Ship was in trouble and i had fallen asleep on the job and worse had turned the volume down on the radio! And so there i was strainig my ears to hear the call when I could have just turn the volume back up and had no problem hearing at all. Needlesss to say, the Discovery Ship had a blowout and the impact was strong enought to tilt the whole vessel an an angle, (something like that, I learned later). The Danish captain of the Discoverer 2 had fainted and all hell had broken loose on board...there i was alone in the radio room imagining the worse.

The Bristow Helicopters operations base was located in Seberang Takir inside two bungalow houses that used to belong to the former Mentri Besar, the late Dato' Ibrahim Fikri. In the main building was the operations room as well as the dining and staff lounge. Most of the pilots and engineers were roomed in the next adjacent building and so i had to leave the room and rush over to wake everyone up. I started with the Operations captain who answered the door stark naked and simply told me to wake the whole crew up while he walk back into his room to get dressed.

Back at the radio room the captain asked me to call the Local police department and the Navy and the Airforce and get their permission for the two choppers to fly at night on a rescue mission. What??!! The Airforce?! The Navy?! You got to be kidding right? Nope! Just do it or you will be out of work tomorrow. Try it sometime! Calling the police was not hard but the Airforce? The Navy? in the middle of the night? Not like I had the numbers on the board somewhere to begin with. So i did the next thing that came to my mind and that was to tell the policemna answering my call that it was a matter of life and death od many at sea and that he was to contact the Airforce and the Navy to ask permission for our choppers to fly and unscheduled flight that night., all these done in the Trengganu dialect Malay and the police man was also rudely awaken from his sleep too perhaps. How do i do this he asked me back! Wake up the chief of police for crying out loud i yelled back at him. I have the feeling he did just that for after a while came the permission from all authorities for the helicopters' night rescue flight.

The rest was history. I bought a motorcycle while I was working for this company and in the early seventies it was a big deal to be owning a sports bike and running aroung town like an easy rider.

I was twenty years of age when i worked on board the Discoverer 2, a Seismogrphic Research Ship looking for oil off the coast of Trengganu. It was while working for bristow helicopters that i came to realize for the first time in my life how much i hated the Brisitsh expatriates for their arrogance, aloofness and prejudices toward the locals and how some locals would kiss their asses every inch of it to curry their favors. I liked the German Chief engineer even if he was tough on everyone where work was concern but after office hours he was one of the guys. The British and the French pilots stuck to themselves and frowned upon locals who showed any sense of intelligence or got too friendly, some still do till this day unfortunately!. My lesson about life and careers began after being exposed to these jobs that I did soon after my high school education. I never continued my education into college untill I was in the United States.

Working on the Drilling Ship as a radio operator was boring as hell for me and so I applied to work on the platform or the Derick itself where I thought the action was. I used to watch the guys from my porthole at the radio room handling the hundred feet long pipes in and out of the drilling hole and wondered what it would be like for me to do it and wondered even if i had it in me to do it. I got the job and the first day i was on the jod i busted my hand so bad that I had to have it looked at by the Ship's captain who was also the Medic on board. He wrapped it up tight with a piece of gauze and sent me back to work, I did and found out after awhile the black and blue on the palom of my hand was gone at the end of the day. The Deck Boss, an elderly guy who reminded me of Buffalo Bill in the Western movies kept me going. I learned the job fast and got to be quite good at it. I could handle the long pipes as they slid up from the ship's lower deck pulled up by a whinch line and alter attatched to the top of the revolving pipe that was already in the hole. The whole procedure was as dangerous as it was challenging. The guys working on the deck was constantly covered with hot mud that kept shooting out of the pipe everytime it was uncapped to be joined by the next pipe. The floor was as slippery as one can imagine being covered by the mud and when handling the the hundred feet ling pipes as they swung from the edge of the deck free towards the center one is tested to the max in how to avoid getting knocked off one's feet while clinging on to these pipes. This was how i hurt my hand, I had slipped and placed my hand against the revolving pipe in the hole to stop myself from falling and the pipe i was supposed to hold back from swinging into the center came and smashed my hand. Immediately after the impact i almost passed out when I slipped off my glove and saw the blue black discoloration taking place before my eyes amidst sering pain. I saw the line on the horizon tilted to one side and then the other as I started to fade out of conciousness but I was rudely jerked back into my sense by someone smacking my back hard enough to throw my hard hat to the ground. I looked around me dazed and found the old guy Buffalo Bill standing there smiling at me and told me to get to the Captain's room and had him take a look at my hand.
After my hand being fixed by the captain I returned to the Derick area and reported my conditon to Buffalo Bill, he told me to get bat on the job to my utter dismay. I did not back down but kept at it grabbing the pipes and then the 'Thongs' the best i could and by the end of the day I felt like my hand was all forgotten, no more pain, like nothing happened. Buffalo Bill came over tapped my on my back and asked about my hand. I showed him that it was perfectly ok by gripping and releasing my fist. It was short of a miracle I thought. Then he took off his glove and showed me that his little finger was half missing like some yakuza deal made him cut it off. He pointed at the chain that was used to wrap around the pipes each time the joints were tightened.
Why do i describe this whole scene in such detail? Because there always skeptics who cannot accept that an artist like me could have done what I did somewhere along the way in my life. Not that it mattered to me but to my children it is my way of saying hey, I worked!

My next employment was in Georgetown, Penang it was after I have had enough of the East Coast life and living under my oldest brother's watchful eyes was not exactly what i thought was the coolest thing for me. He was also formerly my highschool teacher and the school's disciplinary teacher to boot. I needed to break loose and carve my own future elsewhere, where i did not have to compete against my twin brother for a spot in the sun. The move was prompted after i was kicked off the Discoverer 2 for challenging the Deck supervisor to a duel which ended up in a standoff. The cause was about learning that I could understand and spoken good English and detested being subjected to filthy and abusive language by my superiors as my fellow workers were subjected to when they could not understand a word of English to understand what 'mother fucker' or 'son of a bitch meant'. If they had known what the expatriates were abusing them with there would have been blood shed alot earlier than before i stepped into the arena. So much for ignorance is bliss as they say. In those days there was no government body to turn to for complaints as Petronas was unheard of.
Hiring and firing of locals in those early days of the petroleum industry in Malaysia was done through a Jew who acted as the middle man and he was assisted by a Malay smooth talker, a shyster and between them they made a killing over the salary earned by the local Malays working on the oil rigs. I was made aware of these by the Americans who i befriended on board the Discoverer 2. These middle men were like parasites that bled the ignorant young fishermen who opted their fishing jobs for a glamorous job which was said to pay well. The injustice done to these pioneers of the oil rigs workers was inhuman and dehumanizing by any international standard but by Malaysian standard "apa apa pun Boleh lah!!" Today looking at the petronas employees strutting around in their fancy gears and sporting high brow lifestyle claimming how much profit and how far they have come, I want to puke! It was the ignorant Trengganu fisherman's sons that got the ball rolling and they deserve better than getting what is righfully theirs taken away from them purely on political grounds alone. The Malays have a saying ' Lembu punya susu, Sapi dapat nama'. How many gave their lives in the early years of the petroleum industry in Malaysia? How much were they or their loved ones compensated with? Does the mighty giants sipping the blood of the people in the ivory towers care to ask or even recognize?
My services with Hagemeyer Trading Company on Leboh Pantai in Penang was what i would consider as my first real job. I was offered the job by a friend who was asked by his Chinese friend to find one or two Malays to work in the company as the malaysian governement back then in 1970 had made it mandatory that there be a percentage of Malays employed in major companies and banks all over the country. On my first day i was placed among the administration department keeping records of sales and anything to do with accounts. For someone who hated maths with a passion the job was like a true grit test and i do not know how I lasted as long as I did but I did, I survived. Then i was transfered to the Matsushita sales department where i was required to make out Delivery Orders and cater to the needs of the salesmen. After being grilled and thrown around by an elderly Chinese lady who ran the department like an Iron Lady I was transfered to yet another department which was involved in sales of Nipon Victor Co. Products. The department was also ran by another Chinese 'Iron lady' but alot younger and not as immaculate as a concubine as the one that ran the Matsushita or then known better as the National products.
All in all there were about five or six seperate departments involved under one roof and they dont really get along between one and another and it was a challenge to be passed around from one department to another while I was undergoing my trainning. Working among the Chinese one has to earn their trust and than their respect and having done this there is no better education one can get than from a group of Chinese who sometimes hated eachothers' guts but have great perserverence in not showing it in the face of day to day work. Like the store keeper will swear all bloody hell about one of the department heads in front of you but you make no mistake of telling it to the person, this was an unwritten law that you learn to observe.
As i progressed in the company I was allowed to become a salesman like hitting the streets with batteries," National Eveready Batteries." I tried every damn stalls and stores there was in the Georgetown area but try as I may it was like I was up against a brick wall of no takers for batteries, or selling was definitely not something I was great at.
I was one day called into the office of the 'Old man', Mr. Van Der Muellen for a pep talk. He said to me that if I could survive these groups of Chinese who bounces me around the various departments, learn all they had to throw at me and succed I would have a great future in the business world. The old man was soon replaced by a younger Dutch by the name of DuBois who was married to a Chinese. This guy was slick and we did not see eye to eye from day one but he kept his temper with me to just dirty looks. Later he was caught for embezzlement and sent packing with his wife to God knows where.
Making money? Work? I did my share, here in this country and overseas. I was not one for staying too long on one job till weeds starts to grow out of my toes but whatever i did i gave my best and did not take any nonsense from my fellow workers whether they be my superiors or those who work under me. I am today not so financially well established not because i was lazy but because i never did beleive in saving for the rainny day. My mother God bless her soul, said to me that I have holes in the palm of my hand when it comes to money, I beleive her so.

The Body is Still in the process of healing..

I have been having this fever and sore throat for the past week or so and it does not seem to abate. Alot of phlem dripping into the back of the throat causing irritation and prompting fits of caughs and expelling globs of thick gooee phlem like eeeyach!!! But hey its all part and parcel of the healing process or realignment of the physical elements of the body. I had put it into motion by deeply suggesting that the body goes through the healing process like telling every single atoms, molecules of photons and electrons, every single cell white and red corpuscles of the blood in the body system, every piece of organ and tissues and bones to heal. To renew, rejuvanate, recharge and renew... to remove and replace all waste or unwanted dead materials, realign and seek the balances of all opposing elements, like hot and cold, dry and wet of the body fluids etc. etc... I did this a few weeks in a row of continuously practicing this 'auto-suggestion' through meditaiton before going to bed and upon waking up and i did this just about every year for as long as i can remember... I learned this while living in Alaska after reading a book on Raja Yoga, got stuck with the practice ever since. Thought not much about it untill I started noticing that I get sick like i am now after a while of doing this practice.
Or perhaps its just a common flu like everyone is experiencing these days hoping the it is nothing more serious like H1N1 or dengue fever. If it is why not? Anything to exit this life as far as I am concern, the legal and natural way any which way but loose! As it is I feel very much like a zombie, a walking dead with my head splitting and my soul screaming to be set free from this so called existence. But it is still alll part and parcel of the healing process for even the spirit has to be realigned and the Soul to be appeased, this splintered soul.
"I am the master of my thoughts and conciousness , I am the master of the body speach and mind" the Raja Yoga had explained this principle many years ago and I adhered to it religously reaffirming this to myself everytime I find my thoughts wandering aimlessly into the darker side of despair. I suffer from 'manic depression' someone worth his salt in psychiary would point out if he or she had been following my blog or 'I am simply a born looser', who never seems to be able to make ends meet despite all the good graces i had been awarded throughout my life. Guilty as charged i would concede to all these prognosis but still maintains that life sucks! Only the historical Buddha had the guts to challenge this and discovered for Himself the road to liberation from the circle of life, death and rebirth and he did it for a humanity trapped in this Mayavic existence and that was some 2600 yeas ago when the Hindu brahmins were offering human sacrifice to their deities.
Today with the decadence of Islam mankind is in the worse state of spitiual ignorance all over the world, its like man has returned to the dark ages or the age of 'jahiliah' as was in the dark days of the Prophet of Allah. The only difference being that in this day and age we are too arrogant to admit that after all that is said and done about our capacity to learn and understand about ourselves we are still no better than our fellow creatures of the animal kingdom or in most cases even worse when it comes down to it. Why? How do we answer this question in such a way that it encompasses all of us, not just the Muslims, the Jews and Christians but All of us, collectively, Universally. How do we collectively step out of this vicious circle that is sucking us into a vortex like sinking into a Blackhole. It has no discrimination to who we are or what what we believe, how rich or how poor, it is pulling us towards the center where like a helpless flotsam we will be sucked down under sooner than later.
We need to sacrifice just like the brahmins of old but Allah had sanction that instead of a human life as in the Story of Abraham and Ismail man can replace it with a sacrificial lamb. Our collective sacrificial lamb is our ability to sacrifice our 'Ego'. That which has been the cause of many a downfall of mankind historically, albeit in statesmanship or sports, in conflict management or an act of mercy, whatever it is man has been led by the AlMighty Ego in making his decisions which is most of all 'self serving' in nature. My, my, mine! Mine is the right choice, the right way, the right deal screw yours! My country has God on its side, my belief system is infalable, mine is the chosen one... and so on we go willing to kill or be killed for this 'Our Way of Life". Collectively we are still in the tribal age with a very highly segregated mentality in just about every aspect of our so called 'pursuit of happiness' if not more so than ever and we claim this a Globalization Age.
There is no easy solution, no Sir, and it will get even harder and nastier as mankind strives for each other's throat in order to stake his tribal claim, his right of supremacy, his God given right as the Khalifah. Behind it all is the ever present ego, (Satan? Mara? Dajal?) just about every religion has identified it collectively this pride and prejudice, the desire to be on top, the number one, bigger and larger than thou kind of attitude. Allah is the only One that in Truth, exist (Mahawujud) and none else. Kind of hard to swallow that I do not exist in actuality even if science has proven beyond doubt that we are mere atoms flikering about in space at a different speed (my simplified version) and when we seize to exist we just fall back to our original natire basically back to the five elements that is combined to to sustain our existence. But hey! who in his or her right mind would like to go around claiming that "I dont exist!', No Sir-ee Bob! They would lodge me into a mental home to have a few screws re adjusted in my head so that i can 'feel' my existence for sure.
In essence 'Islamization of Knowledge', or Christianizing it, as my good friend the Doc. (Pearls & Gem blog) and his fellow 'panel' member a Prof. Wan Mohd Nor are in the process of cooking is only possible if in the spirit of "the Sacrifice" of Abraham and his son Ismail, if mankind as a whole is willing to make that giant leap of faith and scrifice the 'collective ego'. For even the term Islamization of Knowledge in itself stinks of an egotistical claim, (stated with all due respect, Doc.). When Barak Obama can stand and say I am for mankind as a whole not just Americans or Jews, Muslims or Blacks or White, Chinese or Indians, No Sir! I am the champion for mankind as a whole. The impossible dream, yet with all the tools in our possesion, the Internet, the United Nations Organizations and hosts of others, we cannot come to this realization in a million years, we will still sink like rats governed by our individual and tribalistic entrapments. Me, me, my, my mine, mine, and the country I come from has God on its side!

A Proposal- Master's Degree Program.

The Master’s Degree program proposal is a continuation of my acquired Bachelor’s degree program from the University of Wisconsin, Green Bay, Wisconsin. USA. It will be based on the initial idea of the pioneer program called “The University without Walls” as introduced by the University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin in 1979.
The primary idea of this program was to allow qualified students to pursue their own ‘self designed’ program after having fulfilled the requirements for being selected. The selection of students was based on their academic performance which in this case was to have acquired a 3.7 grade point average after their third semester in school and having a proposal written and submitted to four faculty members from different schools to be deliberated. Upon their satisfaction that the proposal was acceptable the student was called before a panel to present his ideas and concepts to his proposal. I was accepted without having to do the interview.

The gist of my written proposal was to be allowed to do my studies out of the studios and campus in essence to be able to travel away from the academic surrounding and live and perform as an artist on the street anywhere in the world. My rational was that as an artist I had done as much as I could and learned as much as I could on the basic studio works and felt that I could understand myself as an artist better if I had the chance to explore the world as an artist. My studio instructors were thrilled with the idea and gave me their full blessing with a few donating art materials and even pocket money for my intended journey.

When I left the University on my first trip as an ‘Independent Student’, I left for England where I did a lot of sketching, drawings, photography and writing. All in all I had carried fifteen credits worth of workload for one semester study. Upon returning from this trip I present my works to the various instructors under whose classes I was registered. My presentation included a slide show lecture of my trip, a sketchbook full of sketches I had done and a written summary of my thoughts and impressions of my personal experiences as an artist traveling in England.




With initial success I planned my second trip which took me to South American countries of Colombia and Ecuador doing similar projects which upon return to the University was well accepted as testified by the straights ‘A’s that I acquired. One of the outcome of my trip to England was my desire to keep an ongoing journal of my trips which included sketches and drawing, writings and pictures an sometimes including scraps of materials I found interesting and reflected my experiences while also acting as documentation in the form of dates and events.

My next trip took me to three States in the South West of the United States, the state of Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona. On this trip I practically lived out of my car which was loaded with canned foods and a tent among other things. My experiences on this journey was unforgettable as along the way I had many great adventures and was able to meet with some very interesting personalities and unique characters. My last rip was done in Malaysia where I was able to return to this country and captured the cultural events that was happening during my stay such as the Thaipusam, a Malay wedding in Penang, a trip up the Rajang River in Sarawak and being a guest at a long house for the Gawai Hantu celebration of the Ibans. Visiting the east Coast State of Terengganu I was able to capture some of the most beautiful pictures of the Redang and Kapas islands which very much captivated the impressions of the Americans in Green Bay not only the University students but the community as well as I was regularly invited to make a presentation by church groups and schools when news got around.

I have had ever since kept the ongoing journal of my travels which till this date has taken the form of a Blog which I called the Ramblings of the Cheeseburger Buddha. My travels in my later life took me to Alaska where I did commercial fishing in the Bering Sea and lived for two years on Sand Point in the Aleutian Isle. I may safely claim to be the first Malaysian to have done so as I have yet to meet a fellow Malaysian who had undertaken such a venture. I later moved to San Francisco Bay Area where I lived and worked for ten years. Working at such vocations as an organic farm hand, a produce buyer, a Supervisor for and Environmental Company among other things I still kept my journals alive with sketches and drawings and whatever else that came in handy.




My life took me to Sendai, Japan for three years after living in San Francisco and there I continued pursuing my art by frequenting the Miyagi Museum of Fine Arts almost on a daily basis. The Museum’s policy of ‘open studios’ allowed me to create some of my best creations and I met some of the most exciting Japanese artists from around the area and shared their ideas and perceptions about art while also having six solo exhibitions in the three year period I was living there. My fascination with Japanese arts and culture had been satisfied to a great extent having lived among the Japanese for three years raising two of my youngest children while at it. The Japanese experience has been culminated in a book I called ‘The Cheeseburger Buddha in Sendai’ (yet to be published.)

It has now been ten years since my return to my hometown of Georgetown Penang and I am still aggressively fulfilling my intended course of study which is based on the original intention of understanding Art in the context of Universal Understanding, Art in the pursuit of the meaning of what it takes to be an artist and exist among your fellow man and benefiting them with your God given talent. To discover what it takes to become a well rounded wholesome character respected by your peers as well as society as a whole for what you are, an Artist.

I have spent almost four years now involving myself with the activities being carried out by the Museum and Galleri Tuanku Fauziah at USM and from this experience I have further been able to have three major solo exhibitions in the City of Georgetown including the Penang State Art Gallery. I believe that success as ‘being an Artist’ is not so much in how well know you are of how many shows and recognition you have had hanging on your belt although these are part and parcel; being a successful artist to me is a realization deep within oneself that it is something special that you are ‘Graced’ with and to honor this ‘Grace’ by being an excellent well rounded wholesome entity existing as an man of ‘Art’.

Most Art student that I have encountered in this country and abroad has found themselves stagnated after having completed their academic studies and lost for what to do with their qualifications out of school. Most ended up abandoning their art degrees opting for a more conventional career with a few lucky ones who persevered ending up being Art teachers. Their original motive for becoming a creative and productive individual giving way to the necessities of eking a living just like everyone else thus sacrificing their God given talent inherent within them. Most ended up making a distinct separation between Art and their daily activities, like geography or history, just another subject to be studied for no apparent reason than to fulfill an academic requirement or merely for general knowledge. Most fail to grasp the essence of what is art in their human development agenda that is propagate, promote and nurture their sense of awareness and creativity throughout their lives. To seek and discover that which is primordial within them and manifest or actualize it in their daily lives while at the same time being able to share this manifestation with the general public regardless of what their vocation may be.

Being an artist in my opinion is synonymous with embarking upon a journey of ‘self discovery’ where a student is led the way to look within and without in order that he may discover who he is and what his uniqueness in being a person has to offer the world at large. He is led to understand where he stands from in making his individualized statement or in manifesting his thoughts or product, this is his original creation, his original thought his originality recognized as such by his peers and public alike. This journey of self discovery will hone and intensify his sense of awareness and intellectual understanding when confronted with the challenges of everyday life albeit at the workplace or on the street, at the dinner table or in the court of law. A mind that has been honed in its creative and expressive development is rarely a victim of mediocrity in words thoughts and deeds nor will it be subjected to easy manipulation or exploitation by others. Such a mind is always on the go seeking, questing looking for ways and means to express it above and beyond what is expected normally.

The artist it is said is the worse critique of his own product, he is the experimenter and the analyzer of his own self development just like a child with an inquisitive mind. Only the artist persevere in his discipline for as long as he is in the process of creating his works or pursuing his objective with the passion of not settling for anything less than ‘Being original’. To arrive at a state where his creative endeavor can be affirmed as ‘His Style ‘ or his ‘Touch’, the artist has to go through a long process of self discovery on who he really is or what it takes to ‘Be an Artist’,
and All these to be accomplished effortlessly without fanfare or exageration like a tree that has finally bore fruits after having survived the trials and tibulations that nature has thrown at it.

An art student who carries the title of 'Master of Fine Arts' in my opinion has to carry under his belt the road map for his rights of passage to having the title. A map the can reveal the roads and path he or she had treaded, slipped and slided, scrambbled and fall, a map that records his or her victories and success no matter how large or small that he can share when the time is right around the academic campfires or at a Solo Exhibition of his works in a prestigious gallery, or even at a coffee shop where art is being discussed and the question is being put to him ...what is your opinion about Art? Or what is 'being an Artist?

Recapping the Ramblings

Its over four years now and some 360 odd entries since I started putting my thoughts and feelings down if not for anything else just simply for lack of better things to do. Today upon looking back at some of my earliest blogs I realize how much have changed and how little change has affected my life in the past four years. Most impotantly it is through the writing of this blog that I am being made aware that I have four children instead of just three and that it is through the writing of this blog that I am able to recount the expereinces i have had in dealing with the Malaysian Immigration and Registery Deaprtment with regard to my children's nationality status. Many things have transpired over the four year period when this blog was set up which was soemtime in March of 2005 and this includes the departure of my late wife Nancy Buss Bahari @ Nur Syamila Bt. Abdullah in her home state of Colombia, Illinois. I never did get to see her till the end of her days something that I feel not so great about.

I am not feeling well myself of late, sore throat,tooth ache , feverish, kind things that is indicative of an oncoming fever of one kind or another which I can ill afford to have right now albeit mentally, physically or financially. But them are the breaks! My mother did tell me that there will be times like these and many of them throughout one's life so learn to roll with the dice she said. Life is like a roller coaster ride ever changing one time you are up then you are down or as the Zen master once said 'Life is like a swinging door, you breath in it swings in and you breath out it swings out, you stop breathing and you are dead", I like this saying better.

One of the changes in my life evesince my return from my sojourn overseas a period of more than 24 years is that I have come to accept the teachings of Islam with more genuine feeling and much thoghts and struggles agains all my demons have been put into this gradual drift back into the religion of my mother and her mother. I fully abmit that islam had very little appeal or as a matter of fact had an adverse effect on my life in my youngwer days especially during those years i was living a hedonistic life of an artist in the United States. I began to realize that I needed to return to my mother's religion only after I was living in Japan and raising my two children who were then two and three years of age and I was the homemaker as my wife was working full time like your average Japanese salary man, out with the birds in the early morning and home with them in the late evening. Living in Japan was not bad, as far as livng standard went but something was not right and it dawn on me when I had an incident with my preschool aged children while putting them to bed.

After all the singing and bedtime stories told my daughter was still whining incessantly in Japanese and it got to me. having lost my temper I yelled at her to shut up and go to sleep. My son who was barely three then said to me in English that all she wanted was some water (mizu). I got her the glass of water after which she fell asleep. I felt small and helpless having lost my temper at her over such a small matter simply because I did not understand her whining in Japanese asking for a drink of water. That night I decided that it was time to make a change for the whole family and decided that I wanted to raise my children where i can undrstand them and at the same time they can get to know their father's cultural past. We made our move to Kuala Terenganu on the east coast where my wife had a job teaching at one of the colleges and i got a job working as a Health and Safety Officer at the Petronas refinery site in Kerteh, Terengganu.

Perhaps it was not the right decision as far as my wife was concern, perhaps i should have remained with them in Japan where we had many good friends and were relatively comfortable with life, but the dye was cast and whether right or wrong these last four years has been a testimony. my wife who was converted to Islam is now no more and my children who has grown up in this country has yet to be recognized as its citizen and i am still living hand to mouth while putting my daughter through her last year in secondary school. What will become of us in the nex few years only Allah knows and I have fully accept my faith in Him anive as it may sound to some. My two children has a taste of what it is like to grow up among their father's kith and kin and consider themselves Muslims in upbringing. Other than these they had also had some great times while growing up in the east coast as my wife and I had always made sure they had the best of what we could afford for them in those years. We spoilt them as some of my family members were eager to point out as part of our failure on how to raise kids.

Over the years there is accusations made towards me over what had happened to my wife especially from my sister in laws who accused me of ill treating her or not taking care of her needs, like wasting her hard earned money on buying art materials and so on. One of these complains has even been written as a comment in my blog which i have kept as a reminder for myself of what can go wrong in life. Unfortunately it was written anonimously in Bahasa Malaysia which means that the writer who i strongly believe is a woman was playing it safe as all cowards do when pointing their fingers at someone. Time and again I have asserted that I am not a model of a father or husband but I loved my wife and respected her for many reasons the least of which was because she was an American or white or caucasian. When I met my wife in San Francisco she was recovering from a broken relationship that had ended with an abortion. I married my wife back then out of compassion more than any other reasons. I wanted to give her a life she had deserved and which she failed to achieve with her former relationships three out of which ended with an abortion for her. I gave my wife her two beautiful children and a taste of being a mother to them even if it was for a short term before death claimed her in the prime of her life.

I have no idea why I am reflecting these events of my life on this particular day but as Ftriday today might as well let it all out. For those who have judged me harshly and frowned upon my wife and children and yes they know who they are and for those who have the idea that they really know me I hope they realize that what I write about how good or how bad I am is beyond their comprehension and my advice is to let sleeping dogs lie. I am answerable only to my Maker, He that created me and He that will take me back to Himself or what is rightfully His that is in me. In the meantime life must go on and there is much to do and so little time left to do it. Right or wrong is a sickness of your mind, the Buddha taught, suffering is and non who suffers he was said to have declared and Nirvana Is none who attains...it. Do you know what the hell He was talking about? Do you care to know? Who untangle the tangle?

At the Friday prayer today the Imam was talking about 'Sacrifice' in view of the cominf of the Aidil Adzha the Haj performing month and he mentioned about Jihad or the struggle. The much distorted and abused and misused term 'Jihad' in islam is a far cry from what is being made to understand by those who are out to see Islam in the gutter laid to rest among the ancient antiquities. Jihad is not about out to kill non Muslims, (unless the prescribed situation is met with according to the injunctions of the law), it is not a carte blanch to declare a holy war against any tribe or nation or any non Muslim, Jihad has a far greater meaning and its meaning is aimed at the individual soul. It is the war or securing one's soul from the temptations of what the Buddha calls this world of Maya, this Illusive material world full of trappings and hidden agendas that one simply cannot imagine how intricately woven these are untill one is caught fully in one of them. Just like a drug addict with his dependance on his fix or a drunk on his liquor or a pervert on his whoring appetites. This is the greater Jihad! The bigger war that one declares within oneself against all the forces of one's egoistic tendencies that has claimed Kings and Emperors, the Pauper and the Fool alike. In Islam this situation is further exerbated by the prescence of the Shaitan and his hordes of mischief makers luring the unwary to their doom, while the Buddha in his teachings called it Mara and his hordes, the Christians their Anti-Christ and his minions who are out to claim the rights over human souls like a gamble between good and EVIL. But off course there are those who can dismiss all these as old folks tales to scare and bring one to conform to some sort of a collective beleif. The Atheist have their holidays from having to deal with the thoughts of heaven and hell... thank God!! they say. Life is here and now and not in the hereafter or heaven and hell and the rest of the doom and gloom laid in store as promised by most devinely inspired religions.
What proof? They ask. Who ever came back and brought the DVDs of this so called after life of heaven and hell? What proof? And if there is a God, why the mess? The killing fields are getting more and more of a fad these day and age, its cropping up everywhere! Attila the Hun today does not have to ride his war horse into battle nor wipe his blade dry of blood to wipe out a village he just sends in his drone and followed by a bomber, the victims knows not what hits them. The threat of Nuclear weapon as a deterrent is every nation's idea of a safety unbrella and the haves will do all it cna to discaurage the have-nots from acquiring such weapon of mass destruction. While some nations faces hunger and starvation others are out doing eachother on who can own the best circuit for an F1 event or build the tallest and grandiose building to fill the skies. Even then thaere are millions if not billions who does not give a hoot about what is happening in this so called Global day and age, life goes on for them like a clockwork.
Who untangle the tangles?

In Memory of James Richardson Logan

James Richardson Logan was a visionary lawyer who devoted his life to the cause of justice and the persuit of knowledge. A champion of the non-European communities, he was responsible for the official recognition accorded local organizations and festivals.

Logan was born on 10 April 1819at harton hall, Berwickshire, Scotland. He studied law in Edinburg and first made his name in Penang in 1840 when he represented and Indian sireh(betel leaf) planter against the East India Company.
In 1842 James and his brother founded the journal of the Indian Archipelago and Eastern Asia (270 volumes) also known as Logan's Journal. In a prophetic article - The probable Effects On the Climate Of Pinang of The Continued Destruction Of Its Hill Jungles - published in 1848, James Logan voiced his concerns about the future ecology and environment of the island.

My dear friend KuSalma who made it all happen, (as always)

James Logan took over the Penang Gazette and played a major role in persuading P&O Liners to call at Penang. His language and Etimology of the Indian Archipelago also promoted better understanding of the peoples of the Nusantara region.

Both the Logan Brothers skilfully used the press to influence the public opinion in the Straits Settlements and encouraged the agitation for the transfer of the Straits Settlements government from the Indian Office to the Colonial Office in Singapore. This much celebrated transfer in 1867 which meant direct rule for the Straits Settlements and more efficient administeration is commemorated by the naming of what is today, Transfer Road.

Unveilling of Plaque by YA Dato' John Louis O'Hara

(High Court Judge, Penang)
James Logan died on 20th,. of October 1869 after a bout of malaria, and is buried in the Old Protestant Cemetery in Georgetown.

Eulogy given by Guest of Honour: Mr. Lim Kean Chye Esq.

(Doyen of the Penang bar)

The Logan Memorial was erected by the ,ocal people who mourned his passing and regarde his death as a 'public calamity'.

The memorial espounds the virtue of Justice, Wisdom, Fortitude and Temperance.

Logan Road in the city of georgetown was also named in his Memory.

The Union Man - Mamu Latiff

Last night having problem falling back to sleep after having taken a long nap in the evening I decided to hang out at Farouk's Coffee shop where another childhood friend of mine has stationed himslef like a fixture to the premises while continuing serving the community in his own way. To most patrons to the establishment(cooffee shop) patron he is known as 'Mamu' a Penang Malay or Mamak way of saying uncle but his real name is Latiff. Looking at him especially riding his bicycle along the road one would never imagine that he was once a Union president for one of the largest industrial firm in Penang, the Eastern Smelting Company or better known among the locals as Kilang Bijeh. Hardly cleared his way across the LCE level of education he had represented the trade Union body for over twenty years and had been invited to participate in Union Meetings in the United States, Australia, Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Indonesia. Looking at him in appearence one would easily mistake him for a drug addict with his long hair and skinny physical appearence.
Latiff or Mamu was at the grave and sat beside me while they were burying our mutual childhood friend Lokan and i had told him of my discourse earlier with the deceased about him turning a new leaf from a drug addict to become a good Muslim who never missed his prayer or fasting during the month of Ramadan. I had told Lokan in jest that he most probably was going to the Hindu temple (To'Kong Hindu) to pray. Lokan was hurt by my jest(in his way) and when expressed like a true anak hantu Sungai Pinang it sounded vulgar but acceptable among close friends. (Hang celaka! Hang boleh kata macma tu kat aku...).
Upon seeing Latiff i asked what was new and in all serious manner he asked me to sit at his 'office table'. Since you asked I would like to tell you that i had a dream of our late friend and he told me in the dream that he saw both of us at the funeral and appreciative. But he also told me to tell me that you have to visi his grave on the fortieth day and perform a special 'Tahlil' for him, which amounted to reading the'Fatihah' forty times. Why? I asked. Well he told me about you saying that he had been praying at a Hindu temple when he had been going to the mosque to perform his 'Solat'. Really?? I was shocked believing him with his dream story. Latiff had a good laugh and told me he had me going.
One intresting character that my friend has is that he has an impeccable memory of everythigng and anything from who is who and what had happened some fifty years ago with fine details, I enjoy this as it helped me to picture my childhood years through his recollections. Latiff's Jihad is through his work as a Union Leader and he dipense free advice to whoever turn up at the coffee shop on matters such as SOCSO claims and KWSP issues. He also plays a role as a spiriutal cum motivational guru for the young adults who frequent the shop and as I sat there shooting the breeze with him just every guy that walked into the coffeeshop would greet him with 'Mamu!' He seems to know all their names and what they do who their parents are and even their grandparents were if you dig deeper into the subject.
He is a talker and his range of subjects covers just about everything under the sun, he once sent Lim Kit Seang a translation of the Q'uran as a gift to enlighten the DAP Leader of the Oppostion Party. He was almost arrested in Australia for demonstrating with the human rights activists on behalf of the Aboriginese there while visiting the country for a different purpose. He is an admirer of Tun Mahathir Mohd. whose leadership he believes had helped to protect the Malay rights and thinks so highly of the former Prime Minister as to claim him to be a 'wali' or saintlike sent to save the Malays and UMNO, the ruling Party componnent of Barisan Nasional. He is a staunch believer in the ISA (Internal Security Act) which he believes helps to keep the country from going anarchic with all the various races taking advantage of a weak rule of law in such Multiracial Country as Malaysia. It is a 'necessary evil' to help keep check and balances. In his performance of duty as a President of one of the largest Union bodies in the country he acted strictly with 'Aqidah" or spirutal principle and commitment and through this principle had overcome many obstacles even when facing the best in the industrial management committees the country had to offer.
Latiff is no doubt another product of the Sungai Pinang gang of old that excelled through sheer brashness and devil may care attitude despite low level of education. He deals with life around him with down to earth no holds barred attitude. he remained single throughout his life till this day and claims free from womanizing. He spends most of his time at the Farouk's at night and goes home to sleep in the day time. To me he is another rare individual whose life has been colorful by its own right. He is respected by his peers, the young and the old and those who stood against him while at conference tables in dealing with union issues and these were some of then no ordinary individuals in the human resources field.

20 Years Ago Today

Introduction
On October 17, 1989, at 5:04:15 p.m. (P.d.t.), a magnitude 6.9 (moment magnitude; surface-wave magnitude, 7.1) earthquake severely shook the San Francisco and Monterey Bay regions. The epicenter was located at 37.04° N. latitude, 121.88° W. longitude near Loma Prieta peak in the Santa Cruz Mountains, approximately 14 km (9 mi) northeast of Santa Cruz and 96 km (60 mi) south-southeast of San Francisco. The earthquake occurred when the crustal rocks comprising the Pacific and North American Plates abruptly slipped as much as 2 meters (7 ft) along their common boundary-the San Andreas fault system. The rupture initiated at a depth of 18 km (11 mi) and extended 35 km (22 mi) along the fault, but it did not break the surface of the Earth .
OAKLAND, Calif. -- On Saturday, the Bay Area marked twenty years since the Loma Prieta earthquake struck, collapsing buildings and freeways, spawning several fires, killing 63 people, and leaving thousands homeless.
Fifteen seconds after the 6.9 earthquake struck along the San Andreas fault, the landscape from Monterey to San Francisco was forever changed.
San Francisco marked the exact moment the massive earthquake hit the region with a ceremony and moment of silence. In the East Bay, emergency sirens sounded in Oakland, Alameda and San Leandro, and on Coast Guard Island to mark the somber occasion.
On October 17, 1989, 42 men, women and children were killed when the Cypress Structure on Interstate 880 in Oakland collapsed.
As aftershocks shook the crumbling freeway, good samaritans and emergency workers rushed in and managed to save scores of people who were trapped in their crushed cars and trucks beneath the pancaked freeway.
The quake also collapsed a 50-foot-long section of the Bay Bridge’s upper deck, sending it crashing onto the deck below and killing 23-year-old Anamafi Moala of Berkeley when her Ford Escort plunged into the gap.
In San Francisco, the Marina District suffered the brunt of the quake. Built on landfill, the ground beneath neighborhoods liquefied, creating cracks in residents’ walls, and causing several homes to collapse and burn. Four people died, including a three-month-old boy.
In addition to remembering the tragedies the earthquake left in its wake, and the many people who helped with rescue efforts, Bay Area cities used the weekend to advocate disaster preparedness.
Organizations from Santa Cruz to San Francisco staged drills and held training sessions on earthquake emergency protocol and preparedness.
On Saturday, volunteers from San Francisco’s Neighborhood Emergency Team – a program founded by the fire department in response to the 1989 quake -- marked the anniversary by practicing freeing trapped earthquake victims at San Francisco's Marina Green.
“What we noticed 20 years ago is that the damage was contained to the Marina District -- and there were citizens who assisted us with the response,” said Erica Arteseros of the San Francisco fire department. “So what we have now are citizens are actually trained to do that. It’s not so impromptu,” she said.

Where was I?
I had just walked into my shared 'apartment' which actually was a huge room that was once used to be a part of the Sears Roebuck Department Store on Market Stree and Army. The building was since converted into the unemployment office on the ground floor facing Market Street.
I remember walking into the huge room and going up to one of the walls that had my artworks hanging along with my roomate's who was also an artist and selecting a piece off the wall to give my friend David Carlson as a birthday present. It was a litho print of a mask of 'Yamantaka', the Tibetan demon I had done while in college in Green Bay, Wisconsin. I took it off the wall and laid it on the floorv leaning against the wall and decided to take a nap.
As i was about to lay on my single bed I was startled by loud popping noises coming fron around the walls like gunshot and i got up quickly as i realized that the whole building was shaking. The loud popping shots were from the dry walls which were erected as makeshift walls to both our rooms, the walls were cracking at the seams! I dashed under the doorjam instinct telling me that I would be safe there and as I stood there a loud shot popped at my feet infront of me and a piece of 'U' shaped metal bounced of the concrete floor leaving a small crack in it, and then another a few feet away and i looked up and saw that the water piping, (or whatever piping it was) was flexing up and down like a wave and everytime it does this a pin holding the pipe to the ceilling would be shot out on to the floor. This was accompanied by a very loud roar outside some where like the rolling of a train that came to an abrupt stop.
The lights went out and i found someone standing beside me in the dark appologizing as she held me in a tight embrace. We stood there for sometime and from a room nextdoor somewhere came the voice of a child crying and then a phone ringing. The lady who was standing with me said it was her phone and took off to answer it. She came back and told me her friend had called from Tokyo and that there had been a major earhtquake and a part of the Oakland bay Bridge had fallen. It was on on TV as it happened as everyone was watching the World Series where The SF Giants were playing against the Oakland 'A's. A game my very close friend the Buddha Ron from Stinson beach was calling the game of the century for San Franciscans as the Oakland'A's were from right across the Bay.
One of the things I remember immediately after the quake was the sound of car alarms going off and dogs barking all around the building below me.I did not realize how bad the damage was to the City untill i took a walk from Army Street down Market Street all the way to the Marina Bay area. (To get a feeling of the size of the damage that took place you can just look it up on the internet, they have great shots of the event). I felt strange walking for awhile as though the road was still undulating under me as I walked. I spent the evening later talking about the quake with my friends at 191, Haight Street Apartment where my friend david lived along with nine other roomates or was it six? I met my late wife Nancy there and later we were married the same year At Green Gulch Farm in a Buddhist ceremony. According to her she was in the dentist's chair with our favorite dentist Dr, Kirkland of the University Berkley Dental School working on her teeth. She was highly sedated she said and could not tell if it was an earthquake or that she was just high. David celebrated his birthday and i handed him his'Face of Yamantaka birthday gift.
Had I been more concientious and thinking I would have carried a camera with me and taken alot of great shots of the things I saw along my walk to the Marina. But instead i did not even carried a sketchbook. Well on looking back today I dont really mind it that much anymore as what i experienced during the Loma Prieta Earthquake will always be in my mind, the fact that mother nature can carry one hell of a wallop when you least expect. To be there in itself and had a close brush with death of being run through by a celling peg that shot to the floor within inches of where i stood was a miracle. Had i taken another step away from the door jam the metal used to hold the pipe to the ceilling would have pierced right through my skull. The Loma Prieta would have been my last earthly experience living in the San francisco Bay Area if i had not followed a simple instruction about being in and earthquake situation, not that the makeshift doorjam was any protection when it comes down to it but it saved my life by instinctively following a simple rule.

The D'Home Charity Event.

The D'Home Charity Event came and went held at the Equatorial Hotel and attended by the Governor and a few other dignitaries like the chief of Police and Mr. Phua Chu Kang my favorite Comedian. I have no idea of how well the Charity event did in terms of collections from the various events presented but i know the Art works did not sell except for one piece. This I can only see as the result of lack of proper promotion of the works which were mostly done by the area's prominent Artists. The event turned into a stage show promoting a lady singer who took center stage with some oldies and thus the time that could have been used to promote an art auction and the time spent with Phua Chu Kang entertaining as it may be it took alot of time from promoting the original intention of having the Fund Raising event.
But then again it could simply be that Artworks are no more high on the agenda of purchasing list like it used to be or there is no more Art collectors worth a charitable heart out there. My friend Lee Khai did his best to put together the works of 8 Artists and the show itself is worth commendation despite being given the brush off by the main organizers, (that's how I see it), if an auction had been held proper as i had understood it the event would have made more through the sales of these Artworks but as it was I doubt that the Governor was even aware that there was an art show going on at the Event. If he had known perhaps he might have bid for any one of the artworks to show his support for the Fund raising. I highly doubt that he would have made a bid for Phua Chu Kang's Yellow Boots! Nothing personal against Gurmit Singh, he is one hell of an entertainer and what a singer! But thye event was to raise funds for the DHome mental Home in Penang not a show biz to promote stage celebraties or fading stars.
The Chinese five or six courses dinner was worth it though and the turnout was very good. I enjoyed meeting all the fammiliar faces who one sees at these kind of events where arts and cultures are involved faces like Dr. Tan Chee Kuan the bonafide art collector and enthusiast, and Cecil Rajendra the famous (infamous depending on who you are) lawyer/poet. All in all it was great to be back at the Hotel Equatorial after having spent two weeks there during the fasting month enjoying the 'Breakfast" with hotel guests. The Good Lord gives in mystertious Ways in this case it was at RM68 a dinner plate if I had to pay.

The Final Cut

My childhood buddy Lokan was laid to rest on friday morning after being in the ICU ward for a week. Never got to see him eventhough I went to the Hospital and had problem parking that i had to walk three long blocks in the rain to get there. But its the thought that counts it is said. The las t time we had coffeee together i saw it coming already, the shallow breathing and the sweat pouring out, death was already stalking him but I did not know when was the right time for him to go. Being buried on Friday is auspicious according to Islam, its the Holy day, the day of days. I am happy for my friend. I stood and watched giving a helping hand whenever needed while they washed his body and later wrapped him up with large cotton swabs and layers white cloth untill both ends were tightly tied up and that was the end of my friend, at least from this physical realm.
Perhaps it is symbolic more than anything else or perhaps having the respect we hold for the dead or it might even be mandated in the religion for the ways and means that a man is buried or given his final rites before being laid into the ground. Most of it, by reason alone would make as little sense as it is alot of waste. In some cases the burial process has become such an extravagant affair that it defies one's resources if not common sense. Islam to my understanding promotes the simplest and fastest means of putting the human physical form into the ground with the emphasis more towrds the spiritual send off than the physical. In some cultures the funeral procedure is very elaborate and not to mention costly not only to those who has to bear the cost but alos to the earth that receives the body. Again the AlMighty Ego plays a big role in making this decissions. In some cases the coffin alone is worth a King's ransom and the procession that follows the casket to the grave site becomes a symbol of wealth of the dead. Burial rites have even been put to the test of religious as well as secular laws where the dead's religious belief is in question and relatives and friends insists upon making sure that the body goes into the 'right hole'. How we cherish the dead much more than the living is apparent in most customs and traditions, perhaps this materialize out of fear more than respect for the dead.
The recent Earthquake disaster that hit Padang in Indonesia buried a whole village so much so that the authorities has decided not to retreive the bodies but the declare the site as a mass grave. Where do they all go to, those dead? Do we care?
Is the end only a beiginning or is it 'The End' of life for each and every one of us? What lies beyond or is there and after- life? Each and every religion has delved into this from the days when man began to inhabit the earth. In the Judeo,Christian and Islamic tradition there is no doubt that the human soul moves on into the next phase of its existence after death and the realm of the 'Grave' ( Alam Barzakh) is the next phase where one is determined one's place in the afterlife with the questioning of one's faith by the two Angels (Ma'laikat). Its an interview where one's understanding of one's practices and faith in life is being put to the test. As a final send off at the cemetary the Imama or any spiritual leader in the group present would lead a specail prayer for the dead and part of it is the special instructions given to assist the dead in crossing over into the next realm. Can the dead hear this? yes, in Islam the dead is present untill the last of the mourners has left the site, the recently dead will obesrve all that is taking place in his of her burial ceremonial proceedings. Excessive mourning such as loud cries and the beating of the chests is prohibited less it confuses or add on tot he fear faced by the spirit of the dead.
Nothing reminds us more than death itself of the impermanence of life, that every living thing will end up in death and that death can happen at any time or place and to anyone unannounced. Thus it is encouraged in islam for man to be a part of the party in sending off his fellow man on his final journey into the unknown so as to remind himself of his final state and to remind him of how fragile we all are. All our hankering over and accumulating of material wealth while we are alive amounts to nothing not even our own children who benifit from them or suffer on account of them can gurantee how we fare on the other side and in some cases they the children cannot even appear at our grave in our final hour on this planet. Death caps it all, it seals man's sum total of his existence in this physical realm into one moment in time and space... with the final cut.
Care to understand a little bit more about Death and Afterlife in other cultures? Read the "Egyptian Book of The Dead" or 'The Tibetan Book of the Dead."

What's Cooking around the Globe...

The Phillipines is almost drowned by a typhoon rage that later continued on to deluge Vietnam and Cambodia with rainstorm unseen before in decades, parts of Australia was covered with dust storm while the Samoan islands was swept over by a sunami, in Indonesis the city of Padang is digging through the debris salvaging lives from an earthquake. Nature is wrecking havoc left and right as climate change began to take its effect, world economy is still in turmoil as the poorer nations slip slide away into even deeper depressions and nations are still at eachother's throats at who can and who cannot own weapons of mass destruction. Can we survie the next millanium? Can we survive the next decade? With all the technical advancements and so called modernisation at out dipossal it seems we are headed for a major shakedown globally.
The spectre of Greed, Hate and Dellussions is looming in the horizon drawing humanity towards its eventual meltdown, a grand finale of Hollywood proportion, only there would be no audiences to celebrate the occasion or receive the awards. We will all be in the same barrel rolling down the hill towards our final destination with a big bang at the bottomless pit somewhere, like sinking into a black hole and to appear on the other end. I and many of my generation will most probably cease to exist by then but woe unto the future generations that of my children and theirs if this trend keeps headed in the same direction. In the Hollywood movie with Keenu Reeve entitled " The day The Earth Stood Still" an alien nation from space came by our planet in an effort to save this planet from us the Humans. In many ways the collective human mind has been preparing itself towards the inevitability of the'End of Days', just as it has been preparing itself , our collective conciousness towards getting used to the coming of weird looking creatures with ectraordinary powers, less we freak out. Movies like the Sinking of Japan, Tsunami, the 'The Day After Tomorrow have been projected into our minds of events that can happen and will happen in the course of time. The question is are we prepared to face the eventuality or what can we do to avoid these from occuring in the very near future? Do we care or are we too busy playing Gods and deities in claiming our rights and territories over others through our rash might and ego ridden insatiable, Greed, Hate and Dellusion?
Whether we look at it globally or locally the scenario is almost the same as eaxh nation and each town and village struggles to exert its existance on this planet. Each and every one assuming as Bob Dylan in one of his song's lyric quoted, "And the country I come from, has God on its side". Spirituality has declined but God has become the cause and the scapegoat of our human frailties and ailments and wherever we turn the Al-Mighty Ego rules instead of our inherent nature of Love and Compassion. As we become more and more globalized we also become less and less charitable towards our neighbors often imposing judgements upon them than lending a helping hand, pointing our fingers at them than taking a closer look at our own. Today "taking care of number one" has become our motto instead of caring for the "well being of the Whole." Our individual survival as a human, as a nation as grouping of nations has become our own stumbling blocks in meeting the challenges being hurled at us collectively albeit man made or natural occurences.
Most of us have failed to understand ourselves and life in all its glory and uniqueness all its impermanence and santience, that nothing last forever especially not the individual exisence. That we are just passing through living on borrowed times and sharing the planet with billions of souls with simmilar charateristics. When our time is up we leave never to return and what we leave behind matters not in the least to ourselves but make a great difference to our children. Leaving the world in a richer and better state is our collective dream but to achieve this we each and everyone of us has to come to understand who we are and our role in implemanting this aspiration for gnerations to come. We have to come to grips with our darker as well as our lighter sides and transcend both to claim our neutral soul states before we can return untainted by the material existence that we were graced with in this short time span we call life.

Mat Lokan

Nothing Lasts,


Nothing is Finished.


Nothing is Perfect.


Sadao Ando, ( Japanese Architect).



As one watches the cherry blossom blooms in spring a feeling of elation fills one's being marvelling at the the magnificience of creation in all its splendor and a few weeks late as we watch the flowers shed their petals to the ground a feeling of sadness and melacholy grips one's heart at the impermanenece of life itself... this the essence of Sabi, Wabi.

"Pared down to its barest essence, wabi-sabi is the Japanese art of finding beauty in imperfection and profundity in nature, of accepting the natural cycle of growth, decay, and death. It's simple, slow, and uncluttered-and it reveres authenticity above all. Wabi-sabi is flea markets, not warehouse stores; aged wood, not Pergo; rice paper, not glass. It celebrates cracks and crevices and all the other marks that time, weather, and loving use leave behind. It reminds us that we are all but transient beings on this planet-that our bodies as well as the material world around us are in the process of returning to the dust from which we came. Through wabi-sabi, we learn to embrace liver spots, rust, and frayed edges, and the march of time they represent."

Yesterday I learned that a childhood friend of mine is lying in a coma at the ICU ward at the Peanang General Hospital. Most of his life was spent in asnd out of jails or rehab centers, he is a drug addict and his name is 'Mat Lokan', (a nick name). To me he has always been the diamond in the rough, a soul so tough and without the least care about what society has to say about him and yet so gentle towards others who he considers weaker than himself or in need more than he. Lokan, (the name of a clamp that is found in areas of mangrove swamps, buried in the mud and can grow up to larger than a fist) was given to him by his peers as we were growing up in the village of Sungai Pinang or better known then as Kampong Selut, (Mud village). Today the village is no more in exisence being replaced by rows of low cost housing and with it came 'outsiders' who married into or simply moved into the area for one reason or another.
I bought Lokan and myself a pair of jeans each for the Hari Raya Celebration and when i gave it to him I Kidded him saying that I know he would sell the jeans rather than wear it, but he was hurt and for the first time i felt his emotion of being genuinely hurt and I apologized immediately saying that he knew i was only kidding him. On the second day of hari raya when we walked towards the nearby soffee warong he proudly pointed out tome that he was wearing the jeans. Ihad noticed that he was in bad shape while we were having our Nescafe tarik and Char Koay Teow, his breathing was shallow and he was sweating profuriously but said nothing of it. Lokan is one of those kids who in their teen years lost their way towards drug addiction which began with the use of Marijuana and later upgraded to heavier stuff like cocaine and heroine. As we grew up I had lost quite a few childhood friends to this demon that took a hold of their lives in bondage.
The Baharul Alam Football Club is the collecting center for most of the young adults from the old Kampong Selut till this day like from fathers to their sons and even grandchildren and it was the hive where marijuana first used among the young. For as long as i could remember those who frequented 'the Club' as it was known, the smoking of marijuana was taken to be a natural thing especially among those who labored at the harbor in Weld Quay. Each day after their hard day's work the men would return to the club where they practically resided as their second home and indugled in smoking ganja, or better known among them then as Dam. As children my friends and i would hang around watching this despite being threatened or chased away by the young adults. We became the second hand smokers as out of frustration the men would blow the smoke into our faces as a 'punishement'. Thus for most of the time we were stoned and not know it. I was even nicknamed ' Mata nishan' or stoned eyes as my eyelids wouls droop to their half way mark like I was the Buddha. I could safely claim the i was exposed to marijuana since i was four or five years old.
I was one of the fortunate ones to be snatched away from becoming an addict when my eldest brother decided to move me to the East Coast,of Kuala Terengganu when i was twelve. Ganja or canabis was the only drug of choice back i my childhood days and most non users thought nothing of it untill the coming of westerners especially those on R&R from the Vietnam war and drug use was a lucrative business cattering to thier needs. Deadlier drugs and booze came with them and demand and supply grew with the abuse. More and more of the younger generation of the sixties and seventies became sucked into the habit immitating the westerners and their Hippy Era of free love and sex which followed later. The resort areas along the Tanjung Bungah, Batu Ferringhi and Telok Bahang became a drug heaven for the vacationing US Soldiers and others from Europe who came to spread the Flower Power. They provided the sex and the money while the local heroes provided the places and the supplies of all forms of stimmulants. It was the death of a culture and the birth of another for most who got involved with drug movement in those years untill the authorities got wise and cracked down on the whole event arresting a deporting most drug abbusers and banning the US Millitary from entering Malaysia for R&R.
But the dye was cast and the damage done. Today the country is still struggling with its waste as more and more young adults and even children are getting their hands on all kinds of drugs that I have idea of what they are anymore. But one thing is for sure the effects it has on the lives of those who have to put up with drug abusers, the parents the brothers and sisters, the neighbors and the society at large is tragic. I know there are those who had even contemplated on putting an end to the miserable lives of their drug addicted ofsprings had it not been considered a murder or against their religious concience. Drug addiction has destroyed homes and marriages, claimed lives of the innocent when they became victims of aggression of an addict whose demands are not met with. Drug addicts have become the total pariahs of society that has no feelings or concience towards it just ike zombies they prey upon the helpless to satisfy the needs and society has very little that can be done as their numbers grow by the day and those fallen victims are getting younger and younger in age. Drug addiction is a blight upon society worse than H1N1 or Aids simply because it is something that will never go away and can claim anyone, young or old and it affects everyone else especially those closest to the Addicted.
Both my elder sisters each has a monkey to carry on the aging shoulders, a rotting albatros hanging from their necks and both has lost their husbands leaving them to carry this filth of a burden to their graves. Each has a son who are addicts and both these poor excuses for being called humans or men perey on both my sisters for their daily fix each has his own modus operandi. Yester evening i sat with one of my sisters who is visiting Penang for a relative wedding and to escape from the hell of living at her own home and having to cater to the needs of her addicted son. She is the parent tree that this parsite has been hanging on to for its dicrepit existence. My sister lost her youngest son to a motor cycle accident, and her eldest son whose legs has been rotting evesince i can rmember is barely making it with his bakery business and her only hope in her daughter making it was shattered when she decided to become a mother before her time. However her saving grace comes in the form of her second son who made it in his career as an engineer. His self discipline and brilliant mind has seen through many a rials and tribulations faced by this family haunted by a drug addict.
Mothers do not deserve to bear this burden especially those who have lived their lives piously and within the bounds of decency. Mothers shold not be allowed to shed a tear over the fact the their sons have become slaves to demons that control their existence to the point that they are capable of stabbing their own mothers for a fix (re: in the news recently). But mothers will always come to the recue of their addicted sons and daughters in their hours of need no matter how hard it may seem for them to do so simply because they are mothers!
Drug addiction is beyond doubt a curse upon nations much worse than any natural causes of death. In dealing with the problem most countries have succumed to defeat and despair and the cost of making a stand against this plague is unbearable to most. It is through the eradication of the availablilty of illicit drugs that can in any way minimise this scurge. Malaysia's mandatory death sentence to those possesing x-amount of drug is a good way to go for starters. But it is mostly up to the drug enforcement agencies to do their best in eradicating the supply of drugs into the country. It is also the hope and prayer of every souls who has experienced the loss of their loved ones to this mental poisonning that drug merchants and pushers would see the light of compassion and mercy to be human and abort their trade in this product of human misery.
My childhood friend is lying on the hospital bed in the ICU ward of the Penang General Hospital waiting for his turn to take the one step beyond, if he is lucky. Throughout his life he has been a drug addict, a drug dealer a drug pusher and a drunk; he was not born that way nor was he raised to become that way for as long as I had known him and his family in childhood. His grandmother (adopted), taught most of us to read the Quran when we were children, what went wrong? Has God anything to do with it? The Government? The society? The village? The elders? The parents? The mothers? What or where did it all began from, is there anyone or anything to blame? Nope! Only ourselves... our human frailties... Greed, Hate and Ignorance.