Tuesday, November 29, 2005

Living on the fringe

So the only comments I got to my rambblings are from an online vendor out of the bay area wherever that is trying to sell me online dating services, how did they know? How do they know I may need a new companion or even a wife now that my wife is in the Nursing home somewhere in Illinois and the chances of my ever seeing her again is very slim? Where are all those friends that I used to communicate with, it is like they just dropped off from the face of the earth or is it me who ceased to exist? Perhaps this is the true meaning of enlightenement, you slowly but surely loose everything that you once has just like unburdenning even of friends and loved ones.
The last few weeks has seen little of improvements where the daily life is concern and I am still haggling at the price of Ferry tickets to Jerejak Island resort with every other guest that arrives.The management decided to shoot the dog that I had come to love having around,simply because it was a dog and I miss it. The Malays has no love for dogs and they blame it on Islam! It is not because they are scared shitless of the animal for some unknown reason. Perhaps it is because even as children they have been warned by their parents that the dog bites and that is all dogs are good at doing and so they stay away from it. The Chinese are smart to pick on this and they keep dogs all over their yard just to keep the Malays out.The bastard who had the poor dog killed could have with one phone call had it taken away by the RSPCA but NO! Shoot the damn thing even if it was not causing any problem. I hope wherever they end up in heaven or hell there will be a big dog waiting for them with a shot gun it will have to be a dog's hell.
This morning I was at the Art muzium in Penang to find out if i could have a solo exhibiton of my works in the near future. It was located at the Dewan Sri Pinang, a public civic center near the esplanade. As I would have expected, I need to write in a formal applicaton tot he Director accompanied with my potfolio and letter of intent. I was also forwarned of the fact that the chances of being accepted is slim as the place is prdominantly catered to the Chinese Artists. As evidenced by the ongoing collective works on display I can say 99 percent of the participants were Chinese, only a handfull were Malay Artists. What can I say, Penang is a Chinese owned island just like Singapore and the Malays and Hindus only play second fiddle at everything that goes on here. Those who are lucky enough to be among the wealthy non-Chinese acts and behaves like they are a part of the oriental majority. The rest acts and talks big like they own the island but in actuality are mostly empty drums that rises the loudest noise out of sheer frustration. One of my cousin told me once that , it will come a day when the Malays will become the caretakers and gardeners to the Chinese bosses on this island.
Patience is the one virtue that is most sorely needed to live a sane life in this city.Even as I am typing this blog I am telling myself to remain cool and not chew the heads off the few kids tthat are yelling and shouting at eachother while playing some video game on the internet.I feel like I am in an insane assylum among Indian Muslim kids as they yell in both Malay and Tamil languages. The times they are a changing, today's kids have very little respect for the elders and that is a fact that I hate to have concur with, sometimes I feel like kicking some of their asses just for the hell of it to remind them that there are adults around in their crummy little world who value a little peace and quiet. Too bad i had just told the kid next to me off that he has a bad breath and to quit shouting across in from of my face or I will fart into his. He got the message at least for now and mine is that this is their domain not mine, I belong in another space and time.
I belong among the Allan Watts and the G.I. Gurdjiefs, the Dalai Lama and the Hulusi's of the world, not that I am as great a thinker as they are but I am more at home reading them. There is no doubt lessone to be learned even as I am grumbbling about the whole predicament of my life today, I am learning about patience, about tolerence, about accepting the inevitable and dancing with this rythm of life. It does me no good to merely succumb to this scene and walk away with my head bowed and my tail between my legs, I will walk away with alot of rambblings thrown out of my cehst, i will walk away feeling lighter, I will walk away enlightened.

Tuesday, November 15, 2005

How much more before its too much?

The past few weeks has been one of my soul searching moments in life that has tossed me between believing and tossing it all to the wind. The fasting month came and went and things are back to normal whatever that may mean. The kids are on vacation and dont know what to do with themselves. My son wants to go back to the east Coast and my daughter is staying with her cousins and I am still selling ferry tickets to see the day through.
The wage barely kept the three of us alive and the school is demanding their share of the take as my children are foreign students. I feel like a foreigner here myself somtimes and when i listen to the foreign workers i work with getting their cards red green or otherwise with no problem I envy them. My application for my children's Malaysian citizenship status has taken six years now and the paper works is now headed for the Prime minister's private secretary's desk for perusal. I am praying hard that something will materialize from this as i cannot think of any higher office that i can submit my application to anymore.
On looking back into the past I realize that all these events that have been manifesting in my life are merely repercartions of what i had or had not done in my past. To the Buddhist it is karmic and to the Muslim it is Cause and Effect. Whichever it is I am sure having a good taste of what living in uncertainties is like. Friends would not let me despair too much by reminding me the fact that I am not living in the Kashmir areas of Pakistan right now where the big earhtquake had just left thousands upon thousands of God's children out in the cold. I am not living along the Gaza satrip where killing is a way of life or the many African countries where malnutrition and human cruelties to one another is rampant.
Allah has His reasons and he is All Knowing, or like the Christians would say God works in mysterious ways. Perhaps He is trying very hard to let us know that like in Pakistan's case fighting and killing eachother along the Pakistan/Indian border is not cool or bombing mosques while the people are in it is also uncool. Juist as in Aceh, Indonesia wher the Tsunami swiped half the population and the town, there too He was perhaps sick of Muslims killing eachother, just as in Sri Lanka which was hit by the same Tsunami, there the Tamils and the Sri Lankans are at eachother's throats like there is no end to it, so why not a little lesson in life and death.
Oh well lets no get carried away and take life a day at a time and see where I can finds the money to pay for kids next years' fees.!!
Hey whatever happened to your oldest boy the American Airline pilot! a friend asked me the other tday. Yeah I said whatever happened to him, Last I heard he got married after that we kinda lost touch even on the internet! Well whatever he is up to i am sure he is still flying up there in God's friendly skies and i hope he is happy and safe wherever he is, God bless him and God Bless America.
As for the Swiss Kid, he is most probably still running around angry at ther world just like his father and mother used to be when they were about his age. I met his mom in Green Gulch farm, in Sausalito California sometime in 1984 and the AlMighty or the Buddhas had to mark the occaision with producing him to testify for the aupicious meeting between a Malaysian Dodo Bird and a Swiss Airhead. The result is what we have living in the Swiss Alps of all places and complaining about life. Oh what a great thing this life is!! I pray daily to the Almighty that he protects all my children wherever they are and so my wife and loved ones wherever they are and that he will find it in His complete Wisdom and Compassion to forgive Us All for all our past, present and future wrongs, It is not easy to be Humans.