August, 2004

Two things:

One: I like songs with good lyrics, because they sound like poetry put to music.

Two: My pet peeve is when people try to justify their achievements by belittling that of others, usually using the ‘I came from a less privileged background than you did, therefore my dic–eh silap, I am greater than you‘ argument. Either you’re good, or you’re not. Period.

So Gavin Degraw’s I Don’t Want To Be fits the bill of the former, and reads like a war cry against the latter. (It is also the theme song of my latest addiction, One Tree Hill, but let’s not go there).

I Don’t Want To Be
by Gavin DeGraw

I don’t need to be anything other
Than a prison guard’s son
I don’t need to be anything other
Than a specialist’s son
I don’t have to be anything other
Than the birth of two souls in one
Part of where I’m going, is knowing where I’m coming from

I don’t want to be
Anything other than what I’ve been trying to be lately
All I have to do
Is think of me and I have peace of mind

I’m tired of looking ’round rooms
Wondering what I’ve got to do
Or who I’m supposed to be
I don’t want to be anything other than me

I’m surrounded by liars everywhere I turn
I’m surrounded by imposters everywhere I turn
I’m surrounded by identity crisis everywhere I turn
Am I the only one who noticed?
I can’t be the only one who’s learned

I don’t want to be
Anything other than what I’ve been trying to be lately
All I have to do
Is think of me and I have peace of mind

I’m tired of looking ’round rooms
Wondering what I’ve got to do
Or who I’m supposed to be
I don’t want to be anything other than me

Can I have everyone’s attention please?
If you’re not like this and that, you’re gonna have to leave
I came from the mountain
The crust of creation
My whole situation-made from clay to stone
And now I’m telling everybody

I don’t want to be
Anything other that what I’ve been trying to be lately
All I have to do
Is think of me and I have peace of mind
I’m tired of looking ’round rooms
Wondering what I’ve got to do
Or who I’m supposed to be
I don’t want to be anything other than me
I don’t want to be

I am, by my own definition nonetheless, a pretty private person. Some may argue that ‘pretty private people’ don’t have blogs, which are effectively tools to reveal more about a person than keep it private, but hey, who’s to say I am who I tell the world I am, and who’s to know what I write is for real?

But no, that aside, what I mean by ‘private person’ is that I like my alone time. Sometimes a bit too much for it to be healthy, but yes, I savour it. I like being able to do things I like doing at my own pace, in my own time. I like having conversations with Idlan B and Idlan C in my head. Not that I shun company, but.. alah, you get the picture lah.

Over the past year, though, alone time has come far and few in between. Especially coupled with running Malaysian Soc last year.. tapi tang tu, saper yang suruh cari pasal la kan? Studying for a degree by research is murder on your free time. There are no exams; there are no tests; there are no lectures. And without these borders between work and play, there are no holidays either.

So when I finished keying in some data this morning (should have done them malam tadi but procrastination is the other specialisation they forgot to transcribe onto my Masters degree); I sat back and thought.. wahhh.. best. Some alone time.

So I read a particular blog from its inception – something I’d been meaning to do for ages, laughing out loud along the way. I shared with a friend my dream to fall for the depressed, broody, tortured artist type – and then, after a few months, I would then wake up and realised that depressed meant self pity, broody meant just plain moody and tortured meant spoilt brat mengada cam nak mampus. I bought the Guardian on Saturday and actually attempted to read it in the morning. And in a while I am going to our pekan-pretending-to-be-a-city to watch ‘The Village’.

Tonight I will cook dinner, read the weekend magazine that comes with the paper, and watch more movies before I watch Match of the Day. And tomorrow I will get up early, go online and geek out with various computing related activities I am actually quite excited about. Yes. I am going to have fun.

I suppose the busier we are, the more we savour these little ‘pockets of time’, as one blogger alluded them to once (I forget who, but the phrase stuck in my mind). And the more rare these moments become, the more we savour them, and the more we make sure we get the most out of them.

I’ve entertained some pretty interesting thoughts (by my standards) for most of today; things that I thought were worth blogging about. Like how yet another foreigner’s observation of Malaysians wearing the hijaab – that it seems to be more like a societal obligation than one which is religious and spiritual – struck a chord with me.

Or how, in the process of helping a friend set up a society, the very person I thought would oppose the inclusion of a certain group of people, was actually very discerning and tolerant; where as he, of all people, had the most reason to be angry, however misguided. The importance of ‘the bigger picture’ rang true once again.

And how, sometimes, when our enemy is winning the war, and we seem to be losing it; we should step back and perhaps look at their modus operandi. And how anger will win less friends than diplomacy; and if you want someone to accept your point of view, phrasing it in a more guarded, careful manner may win more hearts than going on the offensive and attacking them. Humility and humbleness goes a long long way than arrogance, even if you have the paperwork to prove how great you are.

And just because someone exhibits certain characteristics, be it physical, spiritual or just plainly peripheral, we musn’t judge too early. Or risk be proven very very wrong.

Or, having watched the Bourne Supremacy last week, you realise that sometimes soldiers – or operatives, if you will – are only fed information on a need to know basis; and that they may well just be doing what is asked of them, sometimes in the belief that they are working for the right party, when they are actually killing innocents. Think American soldiers, think Vietnam, think Iraq.

And that after watching The Rock, perhaps patriotism is nothing more than an excuse for people to guilt others into doing things in the name of the ‘country’; and then leaving them to suffer with nothing more than a glance backwards after all is said and done. How many countries in the world need a War Veterans Association to make sure their members are well looked after, where as shouldn’t this be an automatic role of the government, as a thank you for their contributions?

Or how the most powerful weapon in this day and age is the media.

And that cricket is really quite boring.

And I will never understand abstract art. Or even proper art, beyond the “Ooohh.. cantiknya dia lukis” stage.

Or why we should never think that the world owes us anything, because when we don’t, we are more grateful for what we have.

But I thought, hey, tonight’s a Friday night, and I should be looking forward to the weekend ahead; filled with R&R, and giving my brains a little pampering with more fiction to feed its creative side and less work to rest its intellectual side. And how I should be looking forward to watching the Scrubs Season 1 eps, and Taking Lives, and My Life Without Me, and Prozac Nation, and the Village. And geeking out on the layout of Chit Chat Bola and figuring out how PhPNuke works.

So I shouldn’t blog about heavy stuff.

Ha ha ha.