Free will – to choose good or evil
As a writer, you write about the good things of beings (be they humans or otherwise), but there is also the bad, and the evil, that steers the plot of the story. I have watched documentaries about the history of the rise of Nazi Germany and the Holocaust for this reason, to research that dark aspect in the psyche of man that drives man to commit unspeakable crimes, or is there some abstract outside force that compels the inhumanity of man against man? Recently I watched the documentary of the Goebbels-Experiment. For me it becomes disturbingly clear, from one maddened oratory to the next, from images of deliriously cheering crowds to the images of burning synagogues. Not only in Nazi Germany but in China as well during the Cultural Revolution. The people beaten to death in high school basements, all to follow Mao Tze Tong’s Thoughts and cleanse society of anti-revolutionary elements.
The people had allowed it to happen; they had endorsed the burning and the killing. They had cheered on the evil in their leaders.
From direct personal experience, from one being that we are providing a roof over its head freely in Canada, from the series of drunken rants, the racist outbursts against immigrants, comes this dark picture. What if there should appear an orator like Goebbels dispensing inflammatory speeches blaming the ills of society on ethnic minorities. Will the people protest, or will the people cheer him on and do his evil bidding of ethnic cleansing?
Make Death Wait?
Make
Death
Wait.
The motto of HeartandStrokeFoundation.ca to entice people to donate money to hold Death at bay. This appeal commercial portrays Death as a predator preying on your mothers, fathers, in short your family members, your loved ones. So, people, open your wallets and be generous, How farly facetious can one go? The predators are among the LIVING, those who cannot wait for their elderly to kick the bucket soon enough. Those who decide whose plug to pull, whose feeding tube to yank out and whom to morphine to oblivion. Death will wait, and it doesn’t have to wait long. The living will do the job for it.
Today is January 11
What is so special about today? Well, for instance, this is the date when I, like so many other, am being reminded that I came into this world. As a kid, I was chafing for this day to come, for presents and parties. Now, today, I spent about an hour in a dentist’s chair. Why I chose this day to undergo the torment of teeth cleaning is lost in the fog of fading memory. Maybe just an excuse to get a half day off work to plunge into that other world, worlds of conflict and drama and lots more exciting things. And I am chafing for the proof of ENGELINKYN: THE WINGED HEMISPHERE to come. But wait, party we shall! In August, SF World Convention in Chicago. In 2012? “It is the end of the world, but we feel fine.”
Home for the holidays
My last day at the office is today. I don’t have to get up early, like 6 am in the morning tomorrow, and doggies and me can have a long lie-in, wallowing in dog hair and the like (Jessie is shedding). Long lie-in? What am I thinking! I still have to finish DEMES OF THE WREATH. At the moment, the flow is stalled at the point when heroes and villains are about to infiltrate the insidious MetaCortex. How insidious I still have to map out. And I still have to mesh all scenarios in one coherent whole. Adventure on, my heroes! Hopefully, I will dream of you tonight.
Thoughts on the Season
National Writing Month is behind us. After this “adventure” of squeezing so many words per day, while at work 5 days a week, while at home dealing with variables of duties to household, to dogs–50,000 words in 30 days. Yes, it was achieved but the adventure is not over, the story not yet told fully. I am still working towards writing “The End” to this adventure, but not as driven of course as in Nanowrimo month. Maybe taking a week off for Christmas will give me time to finish, maybe, hopefully, but there is ENGELINKYN: THE WINGED HEMISPHERE yet to see the light of publishing day. Hopefully, soon.
In Memoriam Dr. Wu Jieping
Professor Dr. Wu passed away on Wednesday, March 2, 2011 in Beijing. Our meetings had been brief. A couple of handshakes, nothing more, when he came to Jakarta, Indonesia, in the 1960s, as the head of the Chinese medical team to treat President Sukarno. I was a bystander looking on from the sidelines, or more precisely from behind my Dad, who was a member of the Indonesian medical team. Yet he left a lasting impression. And more profoundly so, when my sister and I were in Beijing, on our own, during the violent times of the Cultural Revolution, he came on his bike to visit us (no cars for private citizens at that time) to render words of caring and encouragement. We lost touch after we left for Hong Kong. But he was never far from my thoughts. Not having had the chance to say to you, Dr. Wu, in your life time, I say it now: You are a giant among men, for your kindness and friendship, for your faith in your country despite the years of turmoil. I Wish we kept in touch and became closer friends but even so few our meetings, you proved to be the best of all friends.
Man of Distinction
I’ve finished reading The Complete Short SF of Fedric Brown FROM THESE ASHES. His insightful stories and stories of dire warning are still timely and still relevant, even today, and too numerous to mention and some of them too satirically funny. One comes to mind–Man of Distinction–a hopeless drunk. Alcoholics of the Earth, at last you have a worthwhile vocation. On Earth you are a drunkard, but on the planet Dar you are a fascinating zoological specimen in a glass cage, Alcoholicus Anonymous, keeping Earthlings from being abducted en masse, since the Darians are of the opinion (and hopefully still are) that Earthlings are too addicted to C2H5OH, alcohol, to be useful slave labourers!
Site and Unsite, the Sightly and Unsightly
The Sightly:
Here I am again, checking out my site. It is still there, and there, and everywhere, and wonderful and amazing, and a springboard to other worlds in the deep space of imagination.
The Unsightly:
While in the dysfunctional hypothetical domestic situation, there is drunkennes and drug addiction and verbal abuse, and abuses of all kinds that you can imagine, upon which I train my hypothetical flame thrower and turn these fiends into ashes.
The Very First And my Very own
My new revamped site is nearly complete. A BIG THANK YOU to Ceejay! This is really fantastic! Now I have my Blog, my very own. Personally, I just went through the grueling experience of Nanowrimo, grueling because the only time I can find time to write is in the evenings, evenings meaning past 11 pm to 2 or 3 am. At 6 am the alarm clock will start to jingle and off to work, grappling with legal terms where journeys to distant stars, to impossible worlds get crunched to a corner of your mind. Now this is over and I passed the 50,000 word mark, time for some relaxation and entertainment. I went to see Harry Potter, the Deathly Hallows Part 1 , in IMAX no less. For those who haven’t read the book, it takes a bit of time to follow events and places. Who is Bill and Fleur and what?! there is a wedding in the midst of death and chaos. Even I have to refresh my mind, so I am reading the last chapters of the Deathly Hallows!
Battlestar New York
Other Worlds Cafe