My Life Journey's Journal

The Leap (Half) Year

2009-06-26T02:06:00.008+08:00

My last post was in November 2008.

From then, changes have swiped across the entire globe with ever-increasing speed. Stocks crumbled and Wall Street rumbled. Millionaires dug their own graves and committed suicide, while the powerful danced to their own tunes and committed grave mistakes. Bloodshed was again seen in India when terrorists stormed Taj hotel on 26th November 2008 and left 183 dead, a strikingly similar event as what Pakistan experienced in September 2008 when a dump truck filled with explosives detonated in front of Marriott Hotel in Islamabad, killing at least 56. Iraq continued their civilian unrests till this day, with a series of recent attacks leaving nearly 200 people dead ahead of a U.S. military withdrawal next week, while Iran, as of this moment, experienced one of the most vocal and democratic street protests. Afghanistan is currently gearing up for its Presidential election in August, while North Korea defiantly ignored world concerns and protests, and proceeded to conduct its own missile activity.

In the midst of all these, and more, virus H5N1 and H1N1 have silently arrived at humanity's shores. Before we could breathe a gasp of air of tranquility, environmental issues, coupled with the shadows of bacterias and infections, have above all else come to remind us the limitations of human lives, as well as the interconnectedness of our lives with our surrounding.

How timely a well-packaged package, so to speak, would arrive at our doorstep to present to us a present of consciousness and awakening? It could not be a better time, when arrogance and greed, as rightly pointed out by Dr. Daisaku in his Peace Proposal 2009, surfaced as the root causes of this round of the world's financial breakdown. It injects a sense of realisation into us, the almost-almighty beings living on this planet, that beyond the borders of finances and achievements there lies a greater plain of endeavours, namely humility, responsibility and fragility.

Where one is struggling to find a standing spot on the ground to withstand the demoralising winds of restructuring, retrenchment and unemployment, it may well be worthwhile to pause for a moment and assess all events, happened and happening still, the meaning of all these phenomenas. "WHEN it comes to studying the teachings of Buddhism, one must first learn to understand the time" (The Selection of Time, The Writings of Nichiren Daishonin - Page 538), so says Nichiren, the founder of Buddhism that forms the underlying religious foundation of Soka Gakkai International's activities. True to these words, it can be readily seen that in this time of 'worst depression' since 1930, it is in fact the best time for one to reflect the true meaning of our existence and worth.

A man of wealth can never come to grasp the pain of poverty and loss. It is only in the time of recession and depression, marked by financial and material losses that he/ she can come to comprehend mutual sentiments. It is only in such a time that he/ she is compelled to step out of the long-lived shells and be connected with what another person might experience, and what the world-at-large transits through, when losses, separations and even deaths occur. It is perhaps also in such a time that he/ she would come to reflect internally and be enlightened to the truth that what one person is, after all, not much of a different from another when anxiety, sadness, misery and pain are concerned. On this platform of inner cosmos, we are in fact all standing on the same plateau, breathing the same air, facing the same moon, feeling the same wind.

The world has for a moment paused, due to this economic breakdown and recessive motions. Thanks to this moment of stoppage, the visions of humanity can for once be drawn onto the urgently-pressing yet highly-ignored environmental degradations. It is no surprise that one can easily detect the unusual heat and temperature-rise, as Singapore, a country located near the Equator, proceeds into the mid-band of 2009. Singapore is not alone; the whole world IS experiencing a temperature rise, and the fastest and most direct effect on our planet would be a meltdown of icebergs at both our planet's poles. In a matter of decades, if not years, a sea-level rise will be inevitable. Humans will be forced to relocate uphills as our coastal shorelines ascend drastically, savagely consuming large portion of agricultural lands. Resources will be made limited, when a congregation of immensely huge number of people living on a decreasing amount of land, with fresh water, fisheries, forests and other food supplies either controlled by the minority or contaminated by soil erosion and air degradation. The end result, as Homer-Dixon (1994) hypothesized in his theory of 'environmental scarcity', is the generation of 'human acute conflicts', where 'interstate wars for renewable resources, group identity conflicts due to large population movements, and deprivation conflicts such as civil strife and insurgency' would destabilise humanity's very existence.

Dr. Daisaku sets out in his far-sighted proposals the reclamation of humanity's consciousness as a group of beings borned with the capacity to be enlightened and and living together in harmony and peace. He challenged us in building a culture of 'peaceful competitions', borned out of fervent the wish of channeling humanity's unlimited wellspring of energy and creativity into positive undertakings, amongst us and between nations. In it he described the value of 'humanitarian competition', a term first set out by the first president of Soka Gakkai Tsunesaburo Makiguchi in his 1903 work The Geography of Human Life, where he envisioned from nations and nations to civilisation and civilisation competing each other for the purpose of contributing to the positive changes to societies and the world. Makiguchi had observed the changing tides of human history and concluded that as human beings began their civilisation from warring and conquering, which marked a Civilisation of Military, the settlements and tranquility brought on a Civilisation of Politics, where humans proceeded to deal with each other on the platform of rules and laws, rather than on the military's. With the political elements set in placed, humanity began to search again for a greater meaning beyond the frameworks of politics, and thus the Civilisation of Economics came in. It was in his time that Economics, and more so after the two World Wars, became the pillar of humanity's progress and flourishment. From then on we are born into this frantic world of ever-changing and ever-chasing, constantly building our wealth and elevating our statuses, all for the sole purpose of achieving 'happiness'. In a nutshell, and certianly without our realisation, 'happiness' has long been equated with wealth, social standing and certainly financial influentiality.

In his very words, Dr. Daisaku said in his 2009 peace proposal, "I am fully convinced that the time has now arrived, a hundred years after it was originally proposed, for us to turn our attention to humanitarian competition as a guiding principle for the new era." Indeed, as we now witness the unfolding dramatic events of the world, day by day, we may come to realise that it is in the worst of time that the best of all resides. In exact accordance with the Buddhist principle of Law of Causality, it is right in the muddiest pond that the lotus flower blooms the fiercest, and while the flower manifests the glorious beauty and fragrance, the unseen and uninviting seed is already found within it. Life supports life, while birth and death are one single entity. Dr. Daisaku's calling for the seizure of time to act decisively and wisely is in all sense a calling to our own consciousness to reflect and re-direct. From deep within humanity will find her own path of future to walk ahead and out of this forest of confusion and chaos, and into the magnificent garden of humanitarianism and social-volunteerism. It is from there that peace between nations can be forged, and harmony between humans and nature can be achieved.

As we leap into the next half of 2009, may our thoughts go out to all those who are struggling in this turbulent world still.

Reference:

Homer-Dixon, T.F. (1994). Environmental Scarcities and Violent Conflict: Evidence from Cases. Retrieved on 10/01/2008, from the Universtiy of Toronto Libraries website http://www.library.utoronto.ca/pcs/evidence/evid1.htm

The Changing November

2008-11-01T01:12:00.028+08:00

It's the first day of November, 2008

How time flies! In a blink of the eye we are approaching the finishing line of 2008, the second last month of the year, and the period which humanity comes to hold on her breath and welcome the final worldwide festive - Christmas. A day where everyone would greet each other with open arms and warm embrace, wishing one another the best of the person in the coming new year, with just six days short of its arrival.

November thus makes itself almost a preparatory stage for everyone to gather and pause, to collect and reshuffle, to dispose and move on. It is almost like a universal reminder to everyone living and breathing on this planet, a gentle wake-up call, of the urgency to re-collect oneself amidst the hectic and frantic schedules of returning to one's primal objective set in the beginning of the year.

It is a simple yet straightforward push in sounding us the importance of remembering what is truly important to us - a time for our inner spiritual growth - before we are lost in the endless pursuit for career calculations and material desires.

It is with this in mind that my thoughts led me to wander to the current US Presidential election, taking place three days later on 4th November, on the soil of country which expounds and exports the practice of Democracy. It is with my belief that all genuine changes, engineered by great passion and powered by strong conviction, inevitably comes to encounter greater inertia and obstacles. The resistance to change, or adopting any of it, is inherently found in every sentient and insentient being: humans take a long while to propel out of their habitual actions, while motorcars take a longer route to come to a full halt.

Bruce Lee, the world renowned martial-arts actor, was born in the month of November. When he began his learning path on Chinese traditional martial arts he realised he was facing a thousand-year-old school of conservationism, deeply rooted and rock-solid. Contrary to his vision and belief that all humans can learn the art of martial fighting, he had encountered a tidal wave of self-censoring traditions that went against his will - complacency of schools self-absorbed in their own styles and techniques, fear of the teacher imparting the entire set of knowledge to his disciples, and the arrogance of the institutions proclaiming their own styles to be the best.

In his own words, Bruce observed impartially and sharply, "...when clans are formed, the people of a clan will hold their kind of martial art as the only truth, and do not dare to reform or improve it. Thus they are confined in their own tiny little world. Their students become machines which imitate martial art forms."

This, to Bruce, was something entirely against his dream and desire - he had hoped for all martial arts practitioners in coming together, openly sharing and unreservedly exchanging, with full honesty and clear conscience. It was a principle he had lived by, and which he wished strongly others to be of so. In his own philosophical expression, Bruce said, "I have not invented a 'new style,' composite, modified or otherwise that is set within distinct form as apart from 'this' method or 'that' method. On the contrary, I hope to free my followers from clinging to styles, patterns, or molds." True to his lifelong pursuit Bruce had earnestly sought to 'free' the minds of all practitioners from the four walls of rigidity and dogmatism, and be truly self-empowered with the true form of martial art.

It was also in this spirit that Bruce Lee went on to learn one school of art after another, one style after another, and one technique after another. From the Southeast Asian art of Silat to Western boxing and fencing, he studied intensively and deeply. From this single-mindedly desire, and at the young age of 27, his lifelong pursuit for an integrative system, 'Jeet Kune Do' was founded. It was, in a nutshell, an art which broke down all confining walls of rigid traditions and barriers of conservative beliefs, and of which successfully integrated all styles as well as bringing all strengths together.

While many in the world revered Bruce Lee as a great martial art actor, he was in the truest sense, one who stood by his conviction and belief in tearing down the obstacles, one by one, for learning the martial arts, and pushing wide the centuries-old rusted doors in allowing every commoner in the street to enter. He had truly wanted everyone to be strong and able.

In this sense, what Bruce had done is echoed by the current US presidential candidate Barack Obama. Experiencing first-hand the death of his mother and raised by his white grandmother, rising from this humble background, he stood up for the people of America and more importantly, for all regardless of colour or religion. Cherishing the dream of inroducing genuine changes to America, he was ridiculed for being young and inexperienced, and was targeted once and again for being a threat to the survival. To those who had their minds closed and long shut off, youths who hold on to a burning heart and passionate desire are certainly threats to the already-established and deeply rooted traditions and cultures, something these people are comfortably relying on to live their lives by. They would in all aspects choose not to disturb the structures and paradigms; anyone doing so would be regarded as anti establishment and social threat.

Both Bruce and Obama suffered unfounded criticisms. For Bruce he was surrounded by leaders of the various schools, who regarded his new-found style as 'unorthodox' and against traditional foundations. For Obama, he was attacked for his racial lineage to a white grandmother. Throughout the tunnels of time, it had been evidently recorded that great persons of passion, whenever they stood up for great causes, would invite unfounded citicisms and ungrounded lies. Such are the fundamentals lurking in the lives of those who delivered the attacks, resorting to low-handed tactics and viscious, cunning devices with the sole objective of bringing these men of courage down.

Those in power fear those whom are passionate; those who control are wary of those who inspire, while those grounded on traditions detest those who speak of changes. In all ages, rulers seek to divide and hurt while genuine leaders forge to unite and heal. It has been so, and shall still so.

This post has been written over a span of three days. As I approached the end of this post, my laptop's clock rests on 3rd Nov 2008, 2310 hrs. The time has come for America, on the other side of this beautiful planet, to make a choice. Would they choose change over tradition, passion over fear, unity over division, self-reliance over hard-empowerment, and youthfulness over experience? Or would they decide on the contrary?

History shall be written today, while I believed change is already on the way.

Religious Humans & Humanised Religions

2008-07-16T00:43:00.016+08:00

Dr. Daisaku Ikeda presented his annual Peace Proposal titled "Humanizing Religion, Creating Peace" on the founding anniversary of the Soka Gakkai International, 26th January. One can read the entire text here.

While I have not read it through thoroughly, I have certainly taken time off to read the synopsis. It is another monumental effort by Dr. Daisaku to guide the world into perceiving the fundamental element of this human platform - practising religions and their spiritual ideologies, to the correct path of acknowledging 'humans' as the rightful centrality.

Incidentally, six months later, one Buddhist priest, who is the head of several temples here in Singapore, Hongkong and Malaysia, and who is also holding executive positions for five other charities, is charged today for four counts of criminal offences, primarily involving contractual lending of large sums of money supported by purportedly falsified records.

It is a case too many, as the case of former National Kidney Foundation chairman, charged and imprisoned for fabricating false invoices for misleading the multi-million organisation and committing uncharitable acts of extravagance, still linger fresh in the minds of many ordinary Singaporeans. The common folks walking on the streets could not be more heart-wrenched, given the fact that they were the ones who forked out that very precious dollar or cent in donating to the temple for a simplest wish of wishing well for oneself and the world.

Coindentally, echoing this unfolding, dramatic episode from afar is the foreign news of the first visit by Pope Benedict XVI to Australia. Though the fervent heat of welcoming him to this land of migrated Aborigines is strong, the protests against clergical sexual abuses accompanying the cheers are equally rousing and seizing. In a single event of historical significance, both the visitation and confrontation possess unprecendented brilliance in their own rightful manner.

As this post is penned, the Venerable has been charged in court, placed on bail pending trial, while the honorable Pope, in the midst of his religious address, made an abrupt deviation from his prepared script and, on behalf of the many priests who have had abused their statuses and power in abusing their young faithful believers, many whom looked up to them with utmost respect and sincerest trust, offered his long-awaited apology to victims and their families.

It is no doubt a strange union of charity and religions at this instant that one comes to be awed by this strange coincidence. The weakness in the human hearts, for charity and toward religion, is critically magnified and amplified in these simplest two cases of mismanagement and cover-up - it is a soft-spot lied in all of our traditional beliefs and conventional logic, where we come to formulate the most-accepted perspective that a charity leader cannot do wrong, and that a religious leader cannot be fallen. It is in fact a universal, in-born desire to see that kindness will reap goodness, compassion will sow beauty, and justice will bring forth the truth.

From this silent yearning which springs from the depths of our lives since day one comes the actions of donating that very single cent to the charities, and entering and committing whole-heartedly to the religious institutions. In the endless cycles of life and death, human beings actively seek out to fulfill that unseen yet tangible, compelling inner call in doing good to others presently, while seeking out a higher order in wishing their lives to return the goodness to them in future. It is a humanistic river of conscience and consciousness running at the most fundamental level of our lives, connecting us all and relating to us in unity. It is thus of no modified or pretentious presentation in any way, but that of a genuine, outright and straightforward sentiment found in the every sincere donation when the donors brought forth their notes and cents to these organisations. They truly wish for their own, as well as others', lives to rise and shine with brilliance of happiness.

However, in both the context of history and current affairs, they have taught and shown us that it is the leaders living and breathing on this Earth whom will and shall determine the direction, and consequently the fate, of the groups and organisations they are leading. It is ultimately a question of whether the leaders themselves have fought hard against their own devilish forces of greed and lust for power, fame or status, and in furtherance whether they have allowed these forces to seep out of their bodies and slowly mutating into the organisations' organs.

SGI President Ikeda, in his latest Peace Proposal, explicitly and openly pointed out the one single most important primal point for humanity - the revolution of every aspect of our human civilisation around the one single core, which is by and large, humans. As he rightfully pointed out humanity has lost sight of this most important focus point, and in the context of religions, such loss-sightedness is even more blatant as religions, the foremost enlightened platform in the entire human world, has been degraded to be a machinery for corrupted humans to exercise, perform and achieve their own personal agendas and objectives. Humans in these religions are no longer humans; they have lost sight of their own humanity and thus their own identities as well. Instead, humans in these groups become subservience to their organisations, and in the end no longer is 'happiness' the central core of these religions anymore.

Enhancing this vile cycle is the hopelessness and hedonistic principles ravaging humanity's lands. Against this disorderly state, religions with ulterior or personal motives sprout and seize the chance in seizing humans by their thoughts and actions. They successfully created a legion of faithful followers where they would carry out activities not with the aim of achieving human happiness but chaos and suffering. What we are witnessing around the world, as of today, is a testament presented clearly by Dr. Ikeda. It is an urgent call to the whole human race in returning to our inner primal point of re-discovering our humanity. It is from here that all others matter, and all else spring from.

This post has been deferred time and again. On this morning of 08/08/08, where it is by the hands of fate and chance to be once every hundred years, I muster up my courage in facing this long-overdue post and gotten myself determined into completeing it. While the post maybe disengaged in some parts or another, I know I have connected one part of me with another, and traveled deeper into my own being into perceiving and understanding myself a little more.

Walking The Middle Path - Bridging The Gap Of East And West

2008-05-24T02:12:00.017+08:00

I came across an article recently, when I conducted an internet seach for 'Lotus Sutra'.

It was a contributive analysis between the thousand years' old sutra, preached by Shakyamuni, and the modern-day President of Soka Gakkai International. One is able to read the full text here.

The gist of the article made comparisons and drew similarities between the sutra and the man, focusing on the expounded philosophies in the book and the conducted actions of the human, and the manifesting results that illuminate from the every change and progress brought forth by the two vehicles of philosophy and compassion.

If one is to take an extended long perspective into human history, one would be able to see that it was chaos first all around, and then dust settling and finally systems generated, either by nature or by intervened construction. This applies to both the natural and human worlds, where long before our ancestors of Homo Sapiens and/ or Erectus roamed the surface of this planet, meteorites and planetoids were bombarding the face of the Earth. It was believed that after all impacts and instability had receded the Earth began to form the inner core, then proceeding the outer. From there, oceans were formed and lands were gathered. Molecules started their own lives and replicating, evolving, magnifying and multiplying.

Human lives were as such. Long before there were civilisations, our ancestors fought with one another to keep oneself alive. Then was certainly a jungle-warfare, and a survivor to each his own. When the period of civilisations settled in, nations were built, boundaries marked and armies thus maintained. Still, wars rose from the four corners of the world, and occupations, invasions and intrusions kept human lives under an umbrella of constant chaotic sufferings. It was in the midst of this entire set of commotions that humans embarked on the journey of pondering over the most fundamental of their existence: what is one's happiness in this lifetime, and how should one obtain it?

From this primal point of human consciousness, the East and the West thus began a journey of spiritual exploration. While the history of the West was mainly represented by Judaism and Christianity, the East adopted an approach totally different from their monotheistic counterparts - they looked inward and internal, posing questions and seeking answers from where they believe is the origination of everything: their own lives. From Buddhism to Confucianism to Taoism, all are but inward-looking yet far-reaching, peace-promoting yet thought-provocating, material-sanctioning yet all-embracing.

It was against this background that the West came to develop much stronger and of a hastier pace. It was this nature - the hunger for material success and greed for wealth - that they began to build all-invading colonizing power that swept across the Southern hemisphere with ease. With the rise of the West came the humbling of the East at their mercenary mercies. It was then a development of two contrasting routes of human spiritual evolutions - the West began their immersion into the vast accumulation of wealth and materials, and the enjoyment distilled from these sources, while the East silenced herself at the sight of the onslaught of her local people and lands. These expressions signified the totally different approaches of the Eastern and Western peoples to the unfolding, never-ending secular events, and both the outlook of their forward and inward-looking attitudes toward life respectively.

As the Chinese saying goes, "物极必反", all matters in this world will come to reverse once they have reached their ends. The same can certainly be told of these developments: the West came to be caught up with a downward spiral of unending hedonism, resulting a generation of moral decadence of what the world is witnessing now. On the contrary, the East has been tied up in its own invisible yet unbreaking web of theologies and principles, hardened logics and cold calculations, which is found in the detached stances generally displayed in the Eastern cultures and traditions of 'non-invasiveness' or '-intrusiveness'. Herein lies the true cultural and mental models between the Eastern and the Western peoples.

It is in this era, where the world came to witness two world wars, and ended with two activations of atomic bombs, that SGI President Daisaku Ikeda came to bear the brunt of bridging this widening gap. With no other purpose except to see no human to suffer under the spell of continuous merry-making or lifeless preaching, he began a worldwide journey of propagating the theory of 'The Middle Way'. Based on Nichiren's teaching on the Lotus Sutra of the 'Three Truths' - Ku (空 - voidness), Ke (假 - temporal forms) and Chu (中 - middle path), Daisaku Ikeda began to teach the world that there should be no absolute reliance on either on of the two elements - invisible concepts or tangible matters. If one is to attach heavily on either one of the two, he/ she begins to lose the true identity of a human being.

The end result is either one depending too much on the physical body, and all materials around it, to derive happiness and satisfaction, or swinging to the other end of the spectrum to rely solely on practicing and implementing rigid and dogmatic self-righteous theologies. Neither one will lead one out of misery and into the realm of absolute happiness, for these the first attachment drags one into short-lived but certainly empty fulfillment, while the latter pushes one deeper in the whirlpool of anger and dissatisfaction toward society and the world-at-large by discarding every mean and end to be enlightened to one's inner immovable life-condition.

Against all odds, Daisaku Ikeda began his journey of Middle Way forty-years ago. Visiting communist countries Russia and China while paying tribute to the capitalist America, praising the beauties of the East while engaging the virtues of the West, he has taught the world, through his actions and thoughts, that what humanity needs now is not an unrestrained rush into the garden of materialism; neither is humanity requiring a set of suffocating and unbending rules. Instead she must be guided to the enlightening pinnacle of detaching from these two elements, and coming to the rightful path of walking the centre of these forces, falling to neither one and focusing back on the most important yet long-forgotten single element - the human happiness.

Thus, as he has expounded, all worldly structures and institutions mankind has ever created, be it religion, principles, morals, theologies, sciences, finances and education, are to be regarded as "merely means to achieve and obtain human happiness". Any deviation from this path will lead humanity into misery and never-ending conflicts. True to these words, one is able to justifiably witness a disintegration of objectives humanity has set in the beginning, from religions to education, where inceptively noble visions were indeed beautifully and passionately penned down by their founders.

Conclusively humanity has certainly lost the ability to not only enlighten and edcuate herself, but the very instinct of realising her amnesic disorientation in the thick woods of human constructed world. She has forgotten the most basic purpose of arriving in this world: to be truly happy, and to make this world an unshakable eden of happiness. All other objectives would be, and should be, secondary.

In a nutshell, humanity's lives is likened to the lotus flower: to choose to be born in a muddy pond, but oneself be unstained by the surrounding dirt. How to be as simple yet profound as it is perhaps humanity's greatest challenge so far, yet.

The Torch of Flaming

2008-04-21T02:25:00.008+08:00

The world has seen a whirlpool of uncertainties engulfing it in recent times.

Oil prices have risen to a historical high, the Earth's land surface temperature for March has recorded a warmest mark, with the overall (land and ocean) surface tempreatures taking a second spot in the 129-year record book, and food prices rocketing to worrying peaks.
These are issues far from us, yet affecting our very thread of senses and lives, in every single moment passed.

In the midst of all these, humans have joined in the ranks of protesting or supporting the relay of the Olympic torch, which is passed from country to country, continent to continent.

It is suppose to be a celebrative event which unites humanity for the single goal of embracing each other for the pursuit of solidarity and unity, exchange and interaction, understanding and cooperating.However, as all worldly events are, there would be some inflitration of political, social or personal emotional elements, injected by either deliberate or unintentional acts. Complications will arise and sub-episodes will unfold; as the participants of these events come to be carried away, they can no longer see that they are no further from where they have begun - the primal objective and desire have totally been lost in the forested fanaticism and incited excitement.

China has always been in this unique, if not queer, position. From the time of Qing dynasty, the last empire before the formation of the people's government, the world had seized its timely chance in correcting and educating this fragmented country. It is a stance adopted almost with the shadowy hint of a strict parent peering down and lecturing a misbehaved child.

To certain extent, China has discarded what were originally placed on her shoulders - the responsibilities of securing peace and prosperity for her common people. In between every page of China's history, countless innocent lives were lost in the abyssal tides of political instability, social upheaveals and judicial downfalls. Those were the times when bodies were trampled on and lives disposed off, in the most easy and unimaginable way. It was, in a word partially, if not fully, responsible for what had befallen on it in the later half of the dynasty - the invasion of foreign powers in the name of liberation from its own domestic unrests.

While times have progressed and tides have ebbed, memories are evidently imprinted in one's mind and impressions branded in one's heart. What China was once is still largely remembered as unchanged to many. The sins and wrongdoings of the past are brought forward onto today's soil, and before they take root and sprout, poisoning the land and polluting the air and water, the inherent sense of justice brewing in the lives of many springs up to respond to the call of fighting the evil. It is with such audacious fervency that the torch of Olympic has come to scorch the sentiments of the protesters - China is simply unqualified to host a internationally human-centred event when the human-rights records have reflected otherwise.

In the wake of the torch relay, the call for freeing Tibet has never been louder. Flamed by the Western media, the fires of anger and violence rose to a higher height. Where the torch is symbolically regarded as flame of hope and signified as the fire of passion, and the torchbearers as representatives of human solidarity, crossing borders and transcending barriers, the media have seized the opportunity in relaying a wholly different message altogether. What is supposed to be an entirely sporting event has seen political and social interests infiltrating it. The struggles of the torchbearers in passing on the torch undisturbed and unhindered are consequently and significantly shadowed by the fights between the supporters and protesters of the event.

On a hindsight, and true to reality, both parties have mistaken their abilities in shaping the world: torch-relaying can never truly establish barrier-transcendental understanding; likewise, media-flaming can neither come close to altering the political terrain of a country. In a single moment of fixated scene, these two groups of excited and agitated humans can be seen representing two totally different ideologies but sharing one single torch of passionate yet misled belief.

A Breather

2008-03-10T23:45:00.005+08:00

I used to think that I am quite good in writing; in thinking fast and penning down swift.

It was when I encountered setbacks in life that I realised everything had been surreal all the while - I had mistaken all that were generated in my mind to be what reality is. Thus I come to see myself as one who is capable of seeing things through and reading their true nature. Something I take pride in all this while.

It was when I fell and landed harshly on the ground that I began to see the other side of the whole. The side which I thought I have seen and grasped it; the side which I think I have it under my examination and analysis.

So when my life came to a standstill I for once stopped and held everything fixed. Suddenly I came to see that I am not that capable anymore; I am not that efficient anymore; and I am certainly not that correct afterall.

It was an enlightening transition. Everything that was what I thought to be would change and transform in front of my very eyes. I began to suspect that all the while I might have been living in my own illusion. Something I created out of my imbalanced mind to favour my own sore soul and perhaps soothe my inner painful being.

When all dust is settled I began to see that I might not really know who this person, who has my name, face, body and identity, living in my place and doing what I am tasked to do, anymore than I know of him before all these. Suddenly I come to see that I have been wearing a psychological mask which I had painted for myself, in covering my inner feelings up when I step out of my individual realm and into the masses. It is an effective way of dealing with my own inner negativity.

The timing of everything has its own purpose. So is everyone born into this world. When one doesn't move forward, there'll be no resistance from the wind or water. It is only when one determinedly stands up and pushes forward that obstacles come to rise and hinder him. It is the best time, in fact, to confuse his visions and cloud his paths, so as to ensure that success is not for him. For one when succeeds, there'll be victors born, and the circle of happiness would simply expand and widen, embracing those coming into contact with this winner. From there, success breeds success, and happiness gain multifolds.

These negative forces are thus present to see that humans should not be that happy afterall.

After nine months of hectic work-study schedule, including some life-changing episodes, I have finally be able to take a rest from everything and slow all matters down. It is a short breather that I have wanted quite desperately. For all things there must be speed and strength, while at other times there must be gentleness and calmness.

In the coming time I shall gather myself and review all that I have done so far, and where I have arrived at presently. It is in fact the best time for me to rest and re-energise for the next period and stage of my life. While waiting the outcome of my academic study, which will determine the next course of my actions, I shall pick up all loose ends and start afresh.

The rain of March has not been receding; it has in fact gather strength and has been washing and clearing the heat of the tropical sun lately. It is certainly timely for one to embrace this heat and light and embark on a new journey, internally and outwardly, mentally and physically.

16th February 2008

2008-02-16T00:04:00.003+08:00

Benazir Bhutto had died in the ending of 2007, while an ex-President of a 225-million citenzry with 17,000 islands archipelago, Suharto, entered the realm of latent state in the early of this year.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy wedded his high-profiled girlfriend, while the Prime Minister of Australia Kevin Rudd made a historic apology to the Aborigines, which all took place this month.

Against this media-spotlight frenzy, Kenya experienced one of the worst internal, politically-linked post-eletction civil violence since her 1963 independence, which saw more than a thousand killed with another 300,000 displaced from homes. The United States was rocked yet again by another campus shooting which saw seven dead, while rebel gunmen fired shots at East Timor's President and Prime Minister, which left the former, a Nobel Peace Prize-winning Jose Ramos-Horta critically wounded. All these, and more, unfolding and receding in the sphere of the sub-prime crisis, looming overhead on the world's financial front and engulfing every field of every corner of our modern societies.

By festive moods, the few days of a brand new lunar year have passed, while Valentine's Day has come and go in a blink of an eye. The world has entered the mid February of this four-years-once leap year.

What have I done, I asked, that see me deservedly proud of myself, in this fresh two months of a brand new year. Have I forgotten the resolutions I have set for myself, during the transition of 2007 and 2008? Have I misplaced the letter of determination I have sent to my Mentor in the beginning of January, which carried with it my promise to him, and to myself? Or have I let go of the ropes of discipline, which I chose to restraint myself, when I embarked on the path of my acedemic pursuit? What have I exactly done so far?

In the daily chores and exchanges of living my life, I have overlooked the importance of watching the watch, or reading the clock. Time, as many know, has no absolute unit. It all depends on the specific individual, whom if he or she is keen and sensitive, time is flowing and pulsating at a dynamic pace; if he/ she is lazed and dazed, time certainly flows slower, and more meaningless thus.

It is therefore our own perception of space and time that shapes and determines how and what should we do in the span of this limited amount of time given to us. It is from here that we come to decide which path we should take, and which to avoid, in leading us to a place which we called 'destiny'. It is purely of our own makings, or breakings, that see us to our pre-conceived land.

Nichiren, a 13th century buddhist priest, was born on this day -16th Febraury, in the year 1222. His family was in the fishing business, which was considered a low-ranking job by social status. Armed with the shining identity of a commoner, Nichiren went on to leave behind a huge volume of hand-written letters and theses, transforming the land of Japan from one devastated with human sufferings and natural disasters to one of peace and tranquility, as well as restoring the confused minds and corrupted hearts of the people to one with wisdom and compassion.

It is with such an awe for this eternally brilliant determination to not only survive and succeed in fulfilling one's dreams, or missions for that matter, that I come to view this day. It is again a fresh start from within my life, and one which I am penning it down as reminder.

22 days

2008-01-24T22:30:00.000+08:00

22 days have passed since I penned down the first post of this year.

In this span of three weeks and one day, I have certainly experienced a trying struggle of keeping my head lowered and burrowed in the piles of reference sources to complete my overdue academic assignment, as well as coping with the physical outbreak of stress-related symptoms.

It is a period I will never forget.

Incidentally, while swimming through these events in a painfully slow speed, I have kept my head under the emotional breaking point. It certainly had allowed me to observe myself from a detached dimension that I had not been overwhelmed by the flooding mental pressures, which often led me to an outbreak of mental frustration and subsequently defeated over-stretched state.

What had caused me to feel as such? I believe it is the recovered faith I have picked up, in myself, in my faith's practice, in my object of faith's worship. It is ultimately a tranquil sense of inner peace and crystal-light strength that allows me to fall back on, in the face of meeting my external work and study schedules as well as my internal fluctuating turbulent thoughts.

Around this time, I had also another realisation with regard to this seemingly undetectable yet tangible change - I had felt a genuine, concrete sense of relief from the emotional baggage I had carried from last year when I posted the letter coupled with a photo to my Mentor Ikeda Sensei. The letter was sent out on 5th Jan, and I presumed it would reach him three to five days later. It was around that time that I began feeling a sense of gratitude and peace springing forth from within me. I almost instantly knew that my Mentor had offered his prayer for me.

Till this day, I could still travel back in time, in me, and locate that clear, unstained spring of compassionate embrace.

It was also with this realisation and clarity that I embarked on completing the second assignment of my second academic module. To read a matter or issue distant from us is probably never good a choice; to write something that is distant, yet bringing it forth and establishing a link between it and the world takes on a much more difficult and strenuous level - one has to suppress any alternate, intruding thoughts and keep focus on attempting to understand what has this world incorporated for it to become as such.

The pursuit of knowledge and life's wisdom certainly has not been an easy one.

With the submission of the assignment, and a reply from the lecturer that no penalty was administered for my five-day delay, I managed to lower the pressing force that has been dwelling in my chest for weeks.

Coupled with this positive outcome, I prepare myself for the final third assignment of one of the two modules - Nuclear (Non)-Proliferation. It is something I have wrote to Sensei, promising to him that I would do my best in introducing his thoughts and ideals, through my academic work, to my University, which I believe I do owe a living gratitude toward. It is the best I can return to my alma mater, as a student of life.

As the night falls and the moon brilliantly shining, I set forth for the final thrust of this academic finale.

2nd January 2008

2008-01-02T10:39:00.000+08:00

The weather has suddenly turned cooling. It was still heat and sunny before the conclusion of 2007, but once the turn of the year has come, the weather has been milder and softer. Could there be a link between the collected inner temporal calmness and gratitude of humanity, and the outer reflection and projection of the environment? I certainly do not have an answer for it.

New Year's day. It is a day which I have never lost sight of, not only because it returns as a forceful reminder that I am still alive, and living in this world with a cause, it also generates interest in me in observing how people would come to welcome it. The live telecast of the counting down for 2008 at New York Times Square, flashed across my TV screen, showed happy faces of thousands, all gasping in breath as the New Year Eve Ball made its descent by every second ticked. As it finally descended to the back of '2008', the figure lighted up, churning sparks of flash lights and euphoria into the air. Many kissed and more hugged, with even a man on his knee and a ring in his hand. The bride-to-be could not contain her joyful tears any longer.

The world has once more been revived by her annual renewal of calender life.

It is at this point that I would always reflect upon myself: while I can certainly be part of this gigantic throng of happy people, counting down and making merry of this joyous occasion, what has gone in me that allow me to live through the year with a directed sense of clarity? Would I again be lost in the whirlpool of my own weaknesses, and shaping the surrounding, to eventually lead me to where I have promised to depart? Would it again be a 'full circle' and got me into problems which I am suppose to discard? Would I again be committing mistakes and errors that I have resolutely set to dispose, on the eve of this new year's day? My mind wonders as the clock ticks continuously. Time waits for no man.

It is also with such a thought circling in me that I welcomed January the 2nd. It is the birthday of my Mentor, Ikeda Sensei. While the first day of each newly arrived year belongs to the world, including every sentient and non-sentient beings, I deem it fit to see that the second day belongs to humanity. It is a day where humankind would feel joyous in welcoming it, for this day witnessed the arrival of a great human being.

Incidentally, the excitement brought on by celebrating the New Year's Day would seem short-lived and unsettling. After the party and songs, everyone returns to his/ her own usual social and family settings. The celebration of the birthday of a great human, on the other hand, brings on calmness and resolution: it brings forth one's determination to want to be that person, the courage to live that person's dreams, and the conviction to re-ignite that person's unwavering committment to a noble cause, what it may be.

It is, by and large, a celebration of echoing one's own inner fortress of strength and courage with that great human's. It is a celebration of life.

When all dust are settled and the world returns to her norms, what we have will only be the same economic, social, political and envrionmental conditions as the year before. What will be different will be the hearts and souls of those who have gathered a gushing of human spirits and strengths determined to making this brand new year a different one from the last. Perhaps it is here that lies the true meaning of celebrating a new year's day. It is from within that we ought to begin, and end with.

A New Year Begins

2007-12-31T21:51:00.000+08:00

I am beginning this post on the 31st December, 2007 @ 9.52 p.m., Singapore time.

The weather has been well, though there is a little too much of humidity; the night sky is grayish, with clouds pressing down on the atmosphere. There may be rain in the coming hours, or the early morning of a brand new 2008 year.

1st January. What a beautiful day it is! It is a day that holds everyone's breadth and binding every human's attention altogether. It is a day that marks the beginning of a whole new year, a time that signifies the revival of a whole new self, and a moment that speaks of a whole new chapter in the history of humankind.

It is one single event that does not need explanation or elaboration. Everywhere one turns to, every person one meets, and every corner of every city, the first day of the first year always evoke unspeakable and unexplainable sentiments. It is a day which everyone wishes each other the best in the coming year, a time where everyone greets each other with smile and kindness, and everyone prepared to open his or her heart for each other, which may have been shut close all the while in the year.

It is primarily a time where humankind is ready to shed off her old, heavy self in replacement for a fresh, light and new one.

Introspectively, human beings are always attracted to matters that bring and bind them together. From ancient times till this moment, from the heavenly bodies of the Sun, Moon, clouds, lightning, to the natural manifestations like the blossoming of flowers, falling of petals, swaying of trees, descending of snow flakes, all of these mundane phenomenas capture and captivate the outer expressions and inner sentiments of humankind. There is a river in all of our lives, a garden with full blown lilies or roses, a mountain with majestic peak, a reverberation and echo of wings flapping or birds crying, all found and contained in the folded layers of our consciousness.

Similarly in nature, when the first day of a brand new year arrives quietly and serenely, it is of the most natural instinct that one would look up to the night sky, and all around him or her, that the heart beats a little faster, and emotions rushing up to the eyes and the mind. It is a time when one is connected to everyone and all.

It is of this significant moment in time that humans always come to return to their primal core; a centre-spot in their lives that they come to feel and sensitize the every single element around, above, below and inside them. It is a time that they return to their original identity as compassionate creatures of this planet that they are awakened to their own inner Universe - a Universe of Life.

It is with this realisation that one comes to remember and recall of that he or she is indebted to. It is with this wellsforth sense of gratitude that a fresh determination is born, concurrently arriving at one's heart as the day of the new year descends. It is a time when one is fully reborn with the new human year.

The world has not stopped revolving, and I have not stopped observing. From the United Nations to countries of United Kingdom, South Korea and Japan, they have all seen a new leader for themselves. Thailand has ousted their leader to just replace with another unwelcomed one, while the nuclear-held Pakistan came to experience one of their worst and most tragic loss of political leader in the final hours of 2007, with chaos and unsettled, raging hearts ravaging the land still of this moment. What stability one country is enjoying would just be a contrasting reflection to another country's karmic turbulence.

At a time when the world needs more awakened souls and enlightened lives than ever before, I pray tonight that the coming of this brand new year would mark a grand significance for the entire humankind to rise above her old, painful past to fully embrace the golden rays of a brilliant, happiness-filled future.

Praying In The Abyss Of Darkness

2007-12-25T16:49:00.000+08:00

This entire period, from the month of October till the arrival of 2007 Christmas, has been a very testing one.

In the midst of arranging and settling my mind down for preparation of my assignments, toward the goal of my Masters academic level, I experienced my first ever love break-up. From the age of 27, I had met her and, walking side by side, hand-in-hand, we both travelled for four years, through the thick forests and thin trails of human emotions and sentimental memories. At the age of 32, seemingly unbelievable but genuine, my first heart-wrenching break-up occurred.

Ahh...what more could one ask for, where in this tumultuous and turbulent era, one life is dedicated to caring for another.

Retrospectively, I could perhaps now really come to understand why people would end their lives due to love, or the loss of it. It is one element that absorbs wholly the entire living force and consciousness of that person. It is one single huge force that one has to resist and fight it with his or her entire being in order not to be drowned and lost forever in the abyss of hopelessness and miseries.

While preparing my mind for the continuance of my long suspended and semi-completed assignment, I retreated into my aimless internet search for matters that would trigger a slight sense of excitement in me. By my fortune, I came across one article, which I deemed a special dedication to my current weak self.

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Byline: FROM HEART TO HEART By Chieko Robinson For The Register-Guard

My first big dream was to climb Mount Everest. After three years of chanting Nam-myoho-renge-kyo (or daimoku, the core practice of Nichiren Buddhism), my dream came true.

My boyfriend organized an expedition to climb Mount Everest. Just before leaving for Nepal, he confessed that he had another girlfriend, and later I found out he was actually engaged to her. I became desperate and felt deadlocked. All I could do was chant.

The next day, I saw a beautiful sunset. I felt I was absorbed into the vast universe. Then I felt a strong, pure life force arise in me. I felt that the power of Nam-myoho-renge-kyo was limitless. The thought that I was in a deadlock was delusion.

I determined to challenge all obstacles to my life and dream again. I went on the climb, and the night I reached base camp at 17,500 feet, I wrote my boyfriend a letter to say "thank you." Because of him, I was able to realize my dream. I started to chant for his happiness. Appreciation completely purified my life.

On the way back, I got high altitude sickness and almost died. The sherpa, sherpani and kitchen boys took care of me. My ex-boyfriend realized his dream to reach the summit of Mount Everest, but he never came back. He died on the mountain. I chanted that he would attain Buddhahood, and through my agony over his death, I determined to change my karma.

However, after a physical medical examination, I was told I had a diseased ovary and that if I did not have surgery, it could get worse and I might die. I did three 10-hour chanting sessions.

During that time, a longtime friend asked me to go to Japan with him in order to see family. While there, I had another exam, and no illness was found. There would be no surgery! Now I am happily married to that friend and have finished my second dream to get a master's degree from the University of Oregon.

In Nichiren Buddhism, we seek the solution to our problems or sufferings inside ourselves. When we tap our inner wisdom, compassion and courage through chanting Nam-myoho-renge-kyo, we open our unlimited potential and are able to see the truth. Using our innate wisdom, we can correct our negative ways of life to a positive and better direction. We are in harmony with the rhythm of the universe.

After surviving Mount Everest, I shared my Buddhist practice with friends in Nepal. When I saw them become happy through this Buddhist practice, I felt great joy. In Nichiren's writings, he says, "Joy means that oneself and others together experience joy."

Now my dream is world peace. My mentor, Dr. Daisaku Ikeda (the third president of Soka Gakkai), through his tireless dedication and efforts for world peace and happiness for all humanity, opened my eyes. I have great confidence that all my future dreams will be fulfilled and we human beings will achieve world peace.

(Chieko Robinson is a member of Soka Gakkai International, a Buddhist lay organization. She chants with other members at the local SGI Buddhist community center).

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When all is said and done, and at the end of the day, it will just be me and my inner conscience in facing the question of 'how would you move on from here'. The appreciation for life's upheavals and downfalls could not be stronger in saying a 'thank you' to those who have hurt us the most. In that respect, the act of chanting for that single person whole-heartedly would mark the exact compassionate spirit that is so needed for the hurt soul and broken heart to heal and beat again.

It is one act that befits the entire entity of Buddhahood residing in the depth of our existing beings.

Pain of Love and Flight of Freedom

2007-12-22T00:11:00.000+08:00

Love is a four letter word. Yet it carries one of the largest seed of human suffering and pain. It contains unseen limbs and tentacles, reaching far and deep into one's soul and strike a deadly blow of pain and misery when the person is of the most vulnerable, weakest and unguarded.

It is such a seizing sensation that millions of people worldwide, everyday, every moment, come to fall for it: they know fully the negative consequence and outcome, the almost unbearable heaviness of weight and pressure, but still they would step up and forward, ready to commit their whole being into falling in love.

It may be as much the pre-historic adventurous, wild, emotive and animalistic nature as the ancestral tamed, refined, logical and scholastic selves we inherited from our ancient forefathers that we are all spurred and agitated, propelled and compelled, to find that single, matching and eternal-bound life-partner amongst the five billions of human population residing on this beautiful planet.

It is such a journey, in this world, in this lifetime, that millions would come to conclude that with this undying love found, life is thus worth living for, and at times worth dying for.

To fall in love with someone! To be loved by someone! To be cared for and nurtured, like a child in warm, protecting arms! How much of a beautiful entity can one's life be, the moment he/ she is falling in love? In that life-changing and soul-exchanging episode, nothing else matters anymore. In both of their eyes and lives, their union of hearts at that moment contains the entire fleet of human passion and beauty, logic and emotions, beginnings and destinies. For once, they would care for someone not because they are asked to; they would be refined and contained not because they are required to; they are beautiful and joyous not because they are instructed to. From the depths of their lives, everything suddenly has its meaning sprouted; everything has its beauty shines forth; and everything has its happiness illuminated.

Those who have fallen in love are indeed happy people. To love, and be loved. What more would one ask for, in this lifetime?

Against all odds, and however, it is always in the midst of such happiness that suffering and pain seeps in, disrupting all senses and capturing all hearts with disarrayed orientations. It is one moment which is most heart-wrenching, most heart-piercing, most heart-suffocating. It is almost as if the world is coming to an end, and that there is simply no more hope in the next moment. It is one moment that one would consider meeting death in order to release that unbearable, unbreakable, unforgiving pain spiralling in the innermost core of the heart. Certainly, physically shattering the flesh-and-blood heart is surely one way to free all built-up and pent-up tormenting weepings and torturous cryings. It is where one would consider freeing his suffering in order to free his soul.

How magical yet dangerous can love be? It is one ancient question no philosopher can answer.

Dr. Daisaku Ikeda, President of Soka Gakkai International, ever said this:

We can lose ourselves in romantic attachment, but the truth is, the euphoria is unlikely to last for long. Indeed, the likelihood of undergoing suffering and sadness only grows over time. As long as we remain unable to redress our own weaknesses, we will be miserable no matter where or to whom we may take flight. We can never become truly happy unless we ourselves undergo a personal transformation.

True to this words, life is in actual fact like a mirror, a magnet. It attracts what is stored in its own inner realm, reflecting selectively by what is found in its own shell. Thus we see lovers of all sorts of types, coming together happily but yet ending up miserably or even tragically. It is because they would only choose what they wish to see - be it the other person's strengths or weaknesses. It is during occasions of happiness that one's strengths and positive side arise; similarly it is during moments of negative downhill that weaknesses are detected and surfaced.

The illusion and distorted visions of love generated befits exactly the eternal saying, " love is blind". No one can escape this, and no one would disagree it.

To love oneself, to love one's parents, to love one's family, to love one's environment, to love the community, to love mankind, and to finally love the world-at-large. How magnified can one's love be? It will all be depended by the depth and width of one's heart. It is the exact hallmark in determining the fundamental spirit of being a human. It is from there that genuine, undying and life-space penetrative love can be given birth and grown.

Friendship and Memories - an Afterthought.

2007-11-13T22:12:00.000+08:00

One's character can always be seen by the type of friends he mixes with. It is in fact a reflection who he is, what he aspires to be and where he has desired to head for.

In short, it is a direct, symbolic and personified entity of his life.

Thus we would always consciously or unconsciously delve into the comfortable zone of deducing or even judging what kind of person is one from the types of friends he stays close with.

From the types of friendship he forges, or relationships in the context of a wider and more complex setting, we would be able to catch a glimpse of how this person comes to view, weigh or even value friends. It is in fact the heart of this person that we are attempting to read.

In the world of frienships, my mentor Dr. Daisaku Ikeda, President of SGI, has this to say:-

"You cannot judge the quality of another's friendship by superficial appearances, especially when things are going smoothly. It is only when we have experienced the worst, most crushing of times—when we have plumbed the depths of life—that we can experience the joys of genuine friendship. Only a man of principle, a woman of resolve—a person who stays true to their chosen path—can be a trusted and true friend, and have real friends in turn."

While many would request others to be truthful and genuine to them, my mentor single-mindedly pointed out that the truest core of a human friendship lies in the inner resolve one has built and constructed, a towering citadel of hope and strength, that rightfully attracts the same degree of calibre of like-minded people. It is certainly from one's inner depth of life that wells forth the determination and courage so needed in facing any crisis in life that these exact elements are the ones that call forth others of the same soul and nature to come together, lending support and illuminating each other's path toward the uphill battle of victory and happiness.

This, in the eyes of my mentor, would be a true, genuine friend who would not retreat even in the face of a deadliest test. It is a relationship that transcends life and death.

I have met one long-time friend James Ng KY earlier today. He has put on a little weight, and is now a father of a beautiful girl. As of all meetings of long-lost or -time friends, I have always felt that there seems a presence of a mystical pair of hands taking two parties to come together. It is never by coincidence or of meaningless event that two persons, having made friends with each other and departed to their own paths later on, come and meet after a long period of disconnectedness.

James is of the same age as me. However he has gone through and encountered some obstacles in his earlier part of his life. The major test of his faith and life came when he was the captain of the Singapore Navy ship 'RSS Courageous'. On the fateful night of 3rd January 2003, he together with a co-captain, were on board the ship when it collided with a 52,000-tonne Dutch container ship ANL Indonesia. Not only was the Navy ship totally wrecked but three navy officers were killed instantly as a result of the collision, with another body never found.

James was thereafter wrought of guilt and pain. He could not avoid the unspoken verdict of him being the cause of his four fellow subordinates, while at the same time he would not wish to relent to the mounting pressure from all sides to have him placed on the stand for an explanation of what had exactly happen. It was a fearful tug-of-war between the official responsibilities and moral obligations he has held closely to his heart, as a captain as well as a good friend, colleague and supervisor to the officers.

Along that unforgettable path, he has been at times unforgiving, and other times uncompromising, both to himself and others. It was truly a hard-fought battle to pull through, for him and his family, with every ounce of his strength and resources utilised to have the case concluded, and finally leaving everything behind. A bitterest winter storm is over, and the warm light and fresh cooling air of Spring has finally arrived.

In our short conversation we have talked a little of everything about ourselves, but just not this matter. It is a deliberate attempt on my part to not bring up a matter so tragic and unfortunate to him, whom I have lost contact for a long period of time. Our conversation, regardless of the duration, should certainly be allocated for a more joyous and meaningful talk. It is, after all, a happy occasion to meet a long-lost friend.

No one knows how a seed would struggle to survive and whether it blossoms in the end; likewise no one in this world can tell how a friendship would come to evolve, and where it will ultimately lead the two persons to. In this aspect, as many would often remark, "only time can tell," we shall let it pen down every single episode of our living and pulsating friendships we have come to plant and nurture. At the end of the day, when one looks back to all that he has sowed and harvested in his life, the rewards are certainly the unseen yet tangible 'fruits of life' that he can savour on. It is certainly a life filled with splendid flavours and unforgettable memories.

Infinite Space and Eternal Life (Part I)

2007-11-04T22:22:00.000+08:00

I have received a set of pictures via my e-mail sometime ago. They were forwarded from my colleague, where I have come to acknowledge them as 'casual mails' - mails which are not of importance, but are informative and entertaining nevertheless.

In the midst of a hectic or lethargic schedule of the day, receiving such mails do awaken one's senses to read them with interest and attention. Given my curiosity for the wondrous and mystical aspects of astronomy and cosmology, receiving such attachments of pictorial images certainly captured and captivated my whole conscious mind instantly.

The stars are not unfamiliar to me. In my much younger days as a child, I had been fascinated with our galaxy, and with every book that describes the details of these heavenly entities that came along, I had attempted to not only grasp the knowledge of recognizing them but also the inheriting of pure, simple and innocent joy in reading about them. Till this very day that excitement still reverberates in me whenever I come across news about or information of discoveries of our galactic heavens.

In viewing these pictures, however, I was not only fascinated or joyful. I was overwhelmingly awed by the sheer amount of difference between the largest star in our solar system, i.e. the Sun, and Antares, a Red Giant, expanding in its final stage of life and ranked 15th by brightness in our Universe. No one can possibly ever imagine, without the assistance of astronomical knowledge, a planetary entity of such magnitude and mass. As one scrolls down, one picture at a time, Earth shrinks further and further and ultimately, it is lost in sight, in space. In this simplest and most direct presentation, man's existence is faced with a most upfront confrontation of his significance and presence. Till the end, we humans are nowhere to be found.

Buddhism, which was originated from Hinduism, incorporated the latter's time system to substantiate its own Buddhist cosmology. From the period of formation, continuance, declination and disintegration, our Universe is believed to go through these four stages, each lasting 20 small kalpas. Humankind is originally born with a lifespan of 84,000 years, whereupon after every 100 years one year is deducted from it. This cyclical occurrence will repeat itself till mankind reaches the lifespan of 10, where for every 100 years passed, one human year is added back till they reach the age of 84,000 years again. The length of this total incremental and decremental shifts is considered 'one small kalpa'. A rough calculation of this one single shift came to a numerical figure of about 8 million human years. A small kalpa thus is about 16 million human years.

Inclusively a medium kalpa is made up of 20 small kalpas, while a total of four medium kalpas make up one major kalpa.

The concept of kalpa is further elaborated in other sutras with the following similes: a kalpa is longer than the time needed for one to remove all the seeds, one seed per 100 years, that filled a city of one cubic yojana (about 7.4 cubic km). Similarly, it is longer than the required time for one to brush a piece of rock measuring 40 ri (one ri about 450 meters) on each side, once every 100 years, with a piece of soft cloth until the rock is completely worn off. The scale of space and time as expounded by our forefathers of ancient civilisations certainly reveals the deep relationship between the eternal, compassionate wisdom residing in one's life and the infinitely grand, spatial dimensions of the Universe existing in the external realm of our galaxy.

In the sixteenth chapter of the Lotus Sutra, a famous revelation by Shakyamuni of his own enlightenment presented to us a concrete concept of space and time, where thousands of years later, scientist Einstein came to expound his famous space-time relativity theory.

Suppose one is to take five hundred, a thousand, ten thousand, a hundred thousand, a million nayuta (10 to the power of 11) asamkhya (10 to the power of 59) major world systems, with one major world system equivalent to one Universe, and grind them into dust, which are atomic particles by modern definition. Moving eastward, he would drop each particle after passing five hundred, a thousand, ten thousand, a hundred thousand, a million nayuta asamkhya worlds. He would continue this journey until the last particle is dropped, where he would then gather all the worlds he had passed, regardless whether they received the grain of particle or not, and grind them all into dust again. If one is to let each particle be one kalpa, Shakyamuni's enlightenment is five hundred, a thousand, ten thousand, a hundred thousand, a million nayuta asamkhya kalpas more distant than the immeasurable number of kalpas generated.

In detailing this extraordinary simile, Shakyamuni successfully opened the eyes and minds of the assembly to the great, boundless state of the Universe's life, as well as his own free state of joy and will. Not only did they, for the first time, realised that Shakyamuni was not just a Buddha who gained his enlightenment under the Bodhi tree but aeons and aeons far back than anyone's imagination, the great assembly of bodhisattvas and arhats came to be enlightened that beyond the gigantic scales of space and time, there lies an immovable entity grander than the two aspects, and originating moment-by-moment every phenomena in the Universe. For once they could visualise that Shakyamuni's distant enlightenment had originated from a concrete and tangible source.

The Flower and the Seed

2007-10-26T02:51:00.000+08:00

It is 2.52 a.m. by my computer's clock.

In this quiet night of 26/10/2007, I am staying up late in preparation for my exam, which will commence in less than 24 hours.

The feeling of taking any test or exam, for me, has always been an unsettled one. Looking back through my academic years of foundational and tertiary studies, I have certainly come to acknowledge the fact that I am no 'exam-orientated'. While I may do much better in researching and writing textual assignments, I have always grappled with the uncertain mood of anticipating what questions would be asked.

It is a familiar feeling for sure, as I have always experienced it throughout my studying years.

Concurrently, whilst thinking back the years of my struggling growth and pursuits, I have also wandered along the path of wondering where would this paper of my current undertaking lead me to. Would I successfully enter a large corporation, one that recognises the fact that I may not be adequately experienced but pays well nevertheless, or would I be allowed to join the United Nations, a place I desired and dreamt about quietly, and work for the well-being of the humanity's community? At the time when the surrounding is almost entirely asleep, my future is as elusive as the night's starlight.

Incidentally, in the midst of this mind-wandering journey, I came to this enlightenment that the 'desire' I held closely in my chest is none other than my own destiny in this lifetime, my very own mission I have promised to appear in this world, at this time, to fulfill. It is the very primal point of which my existence comes to blossom a whole new, entirely different meaning.

I have heard people asking about the way to understand or realise their 'missions'. I myself have met this wall of resistance before; one that hinders the inquirer from proceeding further in realising what has been 'stored' and planted in his life. Along the way, through struggles and unforgettable episodes of secular changes, I realised that all that I have gone through are directional signs, preparatory lessons and life-guiding events to lead me to where and who I am today, in full order for me to evolve and revolve closer to what I am suppose to be. That futuristic self is no where else but installed right in the depth of my heart.

It is thus so rightful that the lotus flower represents the ultimate truth of life - in a full-grown, fiercely blossoming flower, there already lied a seed right in the middle of it. Standing right in the middle of a muddy pond, it is also ironically that the muddier the pond, the stronger the fragrance and beauty of the flower.

Our lives are exactly as such - we are all born with all the inherent strengths and weaknesses, elements which are essential to nourishing our lives for the revelation of our authentic selves. However, through the course of our temporal appearances in this world, we become accustomed to our inner negativity and, increasingly giving in to these elements, we began to lead a life of superficial, shallow and unmeaningful existences, gradually falling trapped to the inner voices of arrogance or ignorance. In the end like a lotus flower covered with mud, we unknowingly come to dispose and shed off our true, innate identities we have promised to adopt a long long time ago.

This is perhaps also the very reason why my mentor Dr. Daisaku Ikeda has been encouraging the world to stand up and fight all evils that torment the lives of the nameless humanity and faceless victims of karmic winds. It is because right in the middle of that tumultuous storms of injustice and suppression, that life-threatening waves of terrorising violence and fear, and that base and unforgiving sacrifices made to power and greed, that one will find his or her exact role in this world. It is a war waged not only toward the external devils of this world but the inner forces within that the transient self, for once, will come to give way to the true, purposed entities of life. For that matter, it is only one role where he/ she can fulfill.

To arrive at the realisation of one's mission, the only way thus is none other than to conduct an inner journey of examination and reflection. It is from here that one will come to understand how he has walked on the path of growth and development, and what he has become. It is in fact a close observation of one's opened and exposed soul, where everything would be laid before his very eyes. With this understanding, he would then travel even deeper to search for that flame of desire, that torch of hope, that light of truth. It is at that point, in his own life, that he will come to return to his very primal point, the very spot where he stood before his pure self since time immerorial to declare a specific role of objectivity and purpose in the distant future, a unique identity only he can live through and fulfill.

From here one will be able to see that right in the midst of living out the life of a mundane human, he carries within him a supra-mundane identity also; right in a single moment of time, his body of five basic elements contains the present, deluded self as well as revealing the future enlightened one; and right in the place where he stands, the surrounding is both the land of the common mortals as well as the buddha. The only thing that would stop him from fulfilling the dream would be his own, personal struggles. From then on, whether he succeeds or fail will ultimately depend on his own will of courage and perseverance. However, without a doubt, upon reaching that pinnacle of hope and dreams, his life will shine with brilliance, embracing all who are protected by him.

It is then that one's mission, in view of the macrocosmic platform, be truly fulfilled and realised. It is a path my mentor has trail-blazed and offered to the world. While some may regard it as an optional trail, it is in the truest sense a golden track of life-fulfilling and enlightening journey. It is in fact the only way for anyone to live a life through and through, as a human being, for a human being.

Blog Writing - A Visible Flow of the Intangible Mind

2007-10-20T03:43:00.000+08:00

I caught up with a long-time friend in late September last month. He is one whom I have gotten to know through the activities of our Buddhist faith and practice. Along that jubilant path of pure, simple joy, we have had encouraged and supported each other, and memories of these life's episodes have certainly engraved in my mind till this day. Against the current socio-geographical background of our hastened societal-evolutions and calculated deliberations, I conclusively felt that friendship of such nature has become harder to come by. Of all possessions one has in this world, genuine friendship is perhaps the one entity that would mark the depth and magnitude of one's life. In a dark, night sky, it stands out like a blazingly shiny gem, adoring whoever has possession of it.

It is also because of such consideration for the evolvement of time and space that I hesitated for a moment - undeniably I have doubted whether he would still remember who I am, or the memories and struggles we have had before - that whether I should step forward or not. When I decidedly went up and greeted him, I instantly knew I had been overly-suspicious. He is still the same old friend I knew of.

In the course of our interaction, he made a seemingly common yet strikingly significant inquiry - how should one go about writing a blog? Though simple in meaning, its nature nevertheless encompasses a rightful direction one should take when penning down and publishing posts of thought and sight. Factually, in the world of technology and trend, this activity has been a popular hobby amongst the younger generations of our time. Blogging, or as some refer to as 'on-line diary', has been widely regarded as a freewill platform to express one's own thoughts, record events that happened, review actions taken, and/ or relive past, occurred experiences. As one has full ownership of the blog-site, unimaginably large numbers of blogs of different compositions have also emerged daily. Those that shed light on one's own life events to those that speak of societal occurrences; those that delve into personal issues to dealing with matters of the world-at-large; those that are morally-friendly to others that are ethically-repugnant; and those that explicitly express a whole range of human emotions for matters of varying importance.

Just as the sutra expounded, in a single ichinen, or human thought, of a single fleeting moment, it inherently contains three thousand realms in the universe. A whole lot of gigantic arrays of human thoughts and emotions have certainly been flowing fluidly in the enormous technological rivers of internet, manifesting the inner dimensions of the human lives.

Throughout this whole blog-writing period, I have walked on this quiet path alone. Pondering over the significance of it, I realised that whatever one has put onto the site, he has in fact bore a definite vision as to how the world and all those who come across the posts will come to perceive him. It is thus from this point that whatever positive or negative submissions of words or pictorials, the emotions, thoughts, ideas, sentiments or beliefs found within are in fact mirroring images of the inner realms of the latent minds and consciousness.

Simply put across, for those who admire a flower, there must already have a universe of flowers simultaneously springing forth from within the depths of their lives the moment they lay their eyes on it. On the contrary, those who fail to capture the fragrance or beauty are, in actual fact, those whom the universe fail to wells-forth in them. While theory of such seems simple in content and definition, this expounded analogy practically applies to every single matter and phenomena throughout the ten directions of our present world. It is one that speaks of the very relationship of the inner mind and the outer world.

As much as one wishes to vent all frustrations of temporal daily life or trying, painful permanence through their blogs and posts, leaving behind a trail of defeated emotions and negative outlooks not only come to hinder one's inner growth and humanistic development, but enhances and multiply these lower life-conditions in the end as well. When one looks back to all he/ she has written, the writer would inevitably come to be surprised either at all the authored and published posts of wilfulness and ignorance, or the sparkling, crystal-clear appreciation and gratitude for one's past and present undertakings in life.

It is said that a wise doctor could diagnose a patient's illness from the reading of his pulse; similarly the Buddha could know the past, present and future fortune and misfortune of a man just by studying his entire being. Furthering these truths, I would believe that from one's blog, one's views toward his own self, the relationship of him and his family, considerations of and for the society, to the desire for and interpretation of this world, can all be deduced without much discrepancies. As my mentor Dr. Daisaku Ikeda says, "a strong person is also a happy person." Certainly, one who is happy and strong will never come to author and publish posts of self-pitying sadness or wilful arrogance. The theory of 'Oneness of Body and Mind' speaks of a uniformed manifestation of the inner thoughts to the external realm. One who harbours unhappiness in his mind or is ugly at heart would never come to write posts of genuine happiness or beauty. The strict relationship between inner life-functions and outer projection simply doesn't allow permanent fabrication; at some point in time, others would certainly come to detect the facade that attempts to cover up the negativity.

A blog is a reflection - it is a struggle one must wage to overcome all inner devilish functions before penning down any word of thought and action. It should be a living entity born by the conscientious search into one's inner life condition which consequently will come to reflect that particular state of life. While one can and is allowed to publish anything he feels good or right, blog-writing should, in the truest sense, be the invisible struggle between the forces of good and evil. The moment victory eclipses over one's mundane sentient being, every word that follows will come to tangibly reflect that triumphant soul.

At the end of the day, we are our own final reader for what we have written in our blogs. At the end of our lives we would be the very last audience to proof-read what we have committed throughout the course of our journeys in this world. To that end, a blog can be said to be a detailed record of a long chain of incidents that have had happened. It is therefore up to the writer to decide whether it is of a victorious one, or a defeated, sad one.

For The Record VI - Of Turbulent Weathers & Human Events

2007-10-14T01:00:00.000+08:00

I have not been in the right condition recently to read as much as I desired. Some events had occupied my mind and since taken much of my mental strength to delve into other issues and matters.

While one may read secular events of worldly nature without much burden, to press on and reach out for these reports when encountered with resistances requires additional conscientious efforts. I do believe though that it is right at this critical juncture that those who are submerged in their personal worries would come to be separated from those who struggle to keep their life-condition afloat and buoyed. The seed of victory or defeat is planted in a single moment of conscious decision.

15 September, 2007 - Tropical cyclone WIPHA, a woman's name in Thai, of category 4 passed over Ishigaki (Japan) and headed for Taiwan and Shanghai, a city of 35 million. 1.8 million were evacuated thereafter by the Chinese government in preparation for one of the strongest storms seen in years.

16 September, 2007 - Against a weather backdrop of heavy rain, strong wind and dark skies, a Thai passenger plane, operated by budget carrier 'One-Two-Go' (or 'One2Go') and carrying 123 passengers and 7 crew, crashed and burst into flames as it landed on the resort island of Phuket, killing 87 people including foreigners.

18 September, 2007 - more than 300 monks took to the streets of Myanmar's main city Yangon, drawing hundreds of other people, in a rare display of defiance against the ruling government of Junta, which had placed Myanmar under their militaristic ruling since 1962. In the same breadth of courage, the monks were led by one who had his begging bowl upturned, and of which all refused alms from senior military officers, sending a strong dissenting sign of protest to the government.

Termed as <<袈裟革命>> by the media, or 'Buddhist-Robe Revolution' literally, the monks, who are deeply respected as parents and teachers to the lay believers, were armed with nothing but their robes and chanting prayers, some carrying religious flags. Traveling barefooted for almost 10 miles, some 1,500 monks marched through the flooded streets of Yangon, sometimes in knee-deep water, sometimes in raging tropical downpour.

22 September, 2007 - Some 500 monks were given an unexpected allowance in marching past the house of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who has been placed under house-arrest in 11 of her 18 detained years. Appearing 'fit and well', this 62 year-old Nobel peace laureate came to her gate and greeted the Buddhist monks with pressed palms and smiles, while the monks, in response to this serene gesture, offered this indomitable leader with chantings of Buddhist prayers. In a defining moment, the secular heroine and the religious warriors exchanged their heartfelt sentiments through the air, carving out a grand, picturesque scene of humanistic dignity and compassion.

26 September, 2007 - Crackdown was launched, where at least three monks were killed and others badly beaten, including hundreds arrested in Yangon and Mandalay. At least two monasteries were reportedly raided, including one in Yangon's northeastern satellite town of South Okkalapa, where about 100 Buddhist monks were arrested and eight people shot dead after protesting the action. Innocent citizens and other monks were believed to be brutally gunned down or savagely beaten or tortured.

27 September, 2007 - Mr Kenji Nagai, a 50 year-old Japanese video journalist of a video and photo agency based in Tokyo, was reported to be killed in protests in Myanmar by a stray bullet. Video footage and post-mortem however showed otherwise, where he was seen to be shot intentionally point-blank of about one metre, resulting in an instant-death situation. In his final few moments, this heroic champion of journalism attempted to take a few last shots at the crackdown with his camera before slipping away into eternity, displaying an almost super-human strength of courage and spirit.

Friendship and Memories

2007-10-05T00:44:00.000+08:00

I was walking in a mall yesterday when I heard a familiar song. Instantly I knew that it was a popular hit in the early part of 2000, or even earlier. It's titled "The Day You Went Away", by this beautiful group called M2M.

M2M was made up by 'Marion Elise Ravn' and 'Marit Elizabeth Larsen', who are two Norwegian girls. Both were born in a small town of Lørenskog, Norway, where they met each other and, through the passion and love for music, became what they known as, 'best' friends'. In their mid teenage years, they formed a band and began writing and singing songs, enjoying the first fruitful and spiritually rewarding years of their music lives. When they were being approached by music company later, they moved out of their band and created what was known as 'M2M'.

With a strong chemistry between the both of them, a rare musical presentation of playing their own instruments, and all the more a sense of grounded maturity unseen in many teenage girls, these two shy and sweet gals began a world tour when their first and second albums became hits in places like Asia, Australia and even U.S. On stage, behind the scene, on and off camera, and moving or switching roles during performances, their instantaneous eye-contacts revealed and bespoke of an almost perfect synchronisation and understanding, mutually supporting and wishing each other the best. In an unspoken manner, they have shown to the world that above everything else, friendship between two true friends holds no bounds, and certainly no grounds for any tainting. They really sang with their hearts and souls as two best friends.

However, as of all beautiful matters in this world, good things often come to an end too swift, too soon. Upon the release of their second album, their music company Atlantic Records decided to split them up, with an ironical offer to one of the gals - Marion, a one million-dollar contract. She took it up, reportedly with the blessing of Marit, and began her solo career. Till this day, they have both cut their own albums, and was heard to have not contacted each other much.

Ahh..how time and tide swirls and twirls men and women of passion and purity! They were so young when they stepped into the competitive world of music-making, bringing nothing along with them but their friendship and support for each other, and written so many wonderful, memorable songs for so many people from all around the world! In between every line and breadth they made and took they captured thousands of hearts of all those who admired their rare mixture of country simplicity and modern maturity. When the world is just about to be offered a colourful gem of talent and innocent beauty, humans' crafted interventions discarded and aborted it, terminating once and for all a chance for the world to be submerged in their innocence and gentleness.

While listening to M2M's songs, all memories of what I have experienced and felt, seen and heard, remembered and faded, in my early schooling years, came back flooding and overwhelming me. It was then that I realised that when something is so close to your heart, it actually fuses with your soul and life, and remains there undetected for many years. It's like a key to a lock that puts away countless memories for good, temporarily. Along the long course of our river of life the key was buried deep down by forgettable mundanities . We then lost touch with all that are buried in our hearts - the joy and pain of having the first crush, the instability of stepping into a new class, the uncertainty of facing tomorrow, the insecurities of making and meeting new friends...all of them carving deep cuts into one's conscious being in one way or another, leaving indelible markings in the depths of our lives. Finally, we began to close ourselves up and tell our hearts that there could not be beauty and simplicity, joy and harmony, and true friendships and honesty in this world anymore; certainly not since the days we shared all our laughters and tears with our childhood pals or 'best' school friends.

In the voice of M2M, I have found my own treasure case, locked up and chucked aside since many years ago. It was when opening it that I realised, after everything has been said and done, nothing else matters as much as true, simple and pure friendship. It is in fact the hallmark of a human being - to be a true, honest friend to another human being. As I delved into all memorable emotions of my early youthful days, I re-visited an old friend of more than fiftteen years in the evening earlier. This is perhaps the first step of the minimum I can do to answer to my inner urgings to cherish what I have on hand right now. It is a call of my own humanity to blossom and flower, treasuring what I have been endowed with and returning what I have possessed.

Capturing M2M's shy, gentle faces in my mind, I moved on with a renewed dtermination in not allowing my friends to slip past me, and history, again.

Nucelar Proliferation & The Expansion Of Life - Facts & Figures

2007-09-24T03:22:00.000+08:00

Below is a list of summarised facts and figures about this nuclear issue the humanity is facing right now, as copied from SGI Quarterly (July):

Who has nuclear weapons?
- United States* 10,000
- Russia* 16,000
- U.K.* 185
- France* 350
- China* 130
- India 50
- Pakistan 60
- Israel (undeclared) 100-200
- North Korea appears to have tested a nuclear device in October 2006
* The permanent members of the UN Security Council

Countries which had nuclear weapons and chose to give them up:
- South Africa
- Belarus
- Kazakhstan
- Ukraine

Countries which had programs to develop nuclear weapons which they ended:
- Libya
- Argentina
- Brazil

Number of countries that have signed the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty: 177

Number of countries that have signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty: 190

Destructive Force:
- The uranium bomb, nicknamed "Little Boy," that killed an estimated 140,000 people in Hiroshima had a yield of 13 kilotons (one kiloton equals 1,000 tons of TNT). Modern-day hydrogen bombs can have yields measured in megatons (one megaton is 1,000 kilotons). The largest ever thermonuclear bomb was tested by Russia in 1961. It had a yield of 50 megatons.

To picture the amount of TNT needed for a 5-megaton explosion, imagine a 1,000-mile (1,600km) long train filled with TNT.

What happens when a nuclear weapon explodes?
- The temperature of a nuclear explosion is several million degrees centigrade. The explosion creates a fireball of white heat. Intense heat and radiation is released in winds of around 1,500 kmph. The mushroom cloud effect is produced by the powerful updrafts lifting debris from the ground up into the air. The top of the cloud can be several kilometers wide. At Hiroshima, in the vicinity of the hypocenter, all that remained of some of the people caught in the open were their shadows burnt into stone. Under these extreme conditions, the human body is vaporized. Those not in the immediate area of destruction would suffer from non-survivable burns, would be blinded and suffer terrible external and internal injuries. Almost all rescue and medical services would have been destroyed.

Further away from the blast, survivors would soon suffer varying effects of radioactive fallout. High exposure levels would cause bleeding from the mouth and gums, gangrenous ulcers, internal bleeding and hemorrhagic diarrhea, vomiting, fever, delirium and terminal coma and death within days. For a lower level of exposure, the longer-term effects for survivors include: fetuses in the early stages of pregnancy being born with deformities, damage to the immune system, major scars and the risk of developing cancer. The next generation would also be at risk to cancer and birth defects.The amount of fallout depends on whether the bomb was detonated in the air or on the ground. The area covered by fallout will vary according to wind speed and direction.

Accidental Launch Risks
- There have been over 30 accidents, false alarms and malfunctions involving U.S. nuclear weapons. Several of these have almost caused a nuclear war.
- On September 26, 1983, the Soviet nuclear early warning system showed that the U.S. had launched a nuclear attack. With only minutes to react, Lt. Col. Stanislav Petrov, the officer on duty, decided that the system was in error, saving the world from a nuclear holocaust.
- In 1995, Russia mistook a Norwegian meteorological rocket launch for a nuclear attack. President Boris Yeltsin activated his "nuclear briefcase" for a retaliatory attack. Minutes before the launch of Russia's nuclear arsenal, the alarm was determined to be false.
- Thousands of U.S. and Russian nuclear missiles remain on hair-trigger alert today. Once launched, they cannot be recalled.

Other Data:
- It has been estimated that since 1945, 50 nuclear weapons have been lost and remain lost at sea.
- Stockpiles of loosely guarded nuclear weapons materials are scattered around the world, offering inviting targets for theft or sale.
- There were about 1,000 offers to sell nuclear materials in Western Europe and Russia in the period 1991-95. In 1995, German police recorded 35 cases of offers to buy fissile materials.
- The U.S. spends $100 million per day on maintaining its nuclear arsenal.
- In the Marshall Islands, from 1946 until 1958, U.S. military scientists tested 67 nuclear devices with the equivalent explosive yield of 1.6 Hiroshima bombs per day for those 12 years. The testing exposed the people of the Marshall Islands to radioactive fallout and contaminated nearby atolls, rendering them uninhabitable.
- Radioactive waste, produced at every stage of the nuclear cycle, from the mining of uranium to the production of weapons or energy, can be radioactive for periods up to hundreds of thousands of years. Indigenous people have been disproportionately affected by the international nuclear weapons and power industries.
- A 1991 study by the IPPNW predicts that radiation from atmospheric testing will eventually have caused 2.4 million deaths from cancer.

Nuclear Proliferation & The Expansion Of Life - An After Thought

2007-09-24T02:30:00.000+08:00

Humanity has come to a crossroad - either to carry on living his life in a fleetingly shallow and temporal hedonistic way, or to rise above all else and be awakened to the truth.

More often than not, truth is always a bitter pill to swallow, and along the way heaviness and sensibilities seep in, waking the person up and crashing him down to ground from the air of mundane joys and excitement, all in a flash of a moment. For once, he feels a sense of strange sentiment never felt before; something tinkling in his veins, playing tunes in his mind, and setting his gazes on horizons never set on before. This we would presumptuously named it as 'awakening'.

Education since ancient times hold significant positions in societies. From farmers guiding his children in the work of sowing and harvesting to professors imparting knowledge in lecture halls, education epitomises the very light of being compassion. Its very centre core mission would be to lift one unrefined human being out of his own delusions about the external world and his own inner Universe, to a state of being keenly aware and sharply sensitive toward them. It would be an almost noble sanctity of purity and love, for only a human can teach another human; just as only a life can polish another to become a shining gem.

While we were at schools, we were taught the dangers lurking in our surroundings - fire, electricity, flooding waters, deadly poisons, steely knives, they all pose inherent but imminent dangers. We were all taught to stay away from them. And what about strangers? Not to follow them, not to accept their offerings, and not divulge our particulars to them. From the haven of education, we learn how to protect ourselves, and the very important aspect of our presence called 'safety'.

However, and sadly, we stopped short in teaching ourselves the greater, all powerful and an overwhelmingly pressing danger - nuclear weapons. Does it not occur strange to one that while we are instilled with knowledge of safety and danger for ourselves from our very youthful days, reminded constantly of the content, and thereafter impart them into the next generation, we choose to conveniently overlook and ignore the basic yet most important issue facing us all? Does it not occur weird to him that little has been mentioned about this one single, massive and devastating threat, ready to ignite in any second and terminating every single life-form on this planet, including the very existence of this planet itself? Fundamentally, if something should ever happen, no one would even survive to tell the story beyond. Against the background of our uncertain future, this is one thing for certain.

Irony has its own workings amongst us; we have become short-sighted and be overran with concerns only for and of ourselves. Sometimes a little more encompassing and we may robe in and share our friends' joy and sorrows; at other times we have visions only for our own future.

Nuclear weapons and wars are ironically the best and worst element to bring humanity to come together. No other such entity comes close to adopting this role. In the face of this common danger, humanity must be awakened to the dire consequence, should one deluded human being decides to use it and have the launch button pressed. No amount of protection, no depth of underground tunnels, and no distant retreat into the woods, would ensure anyone any rate of survival. It is almost a sure-death situation that humanity faces, in comparison to matchstick fires, electric short-circuitry or traffic disobedience.

In another round of irony, it is perhaps also in this worst situation that hope is found in restoring not only strength in fighting against this gigantic threat, but also the essential lesson about the sanctity of life and the dignity of the human race.

It can almost be likened to one being turned off by the stench and sight of the mud, but captivated by the fragrance and beauty of the lotus flower. They are both mutually exclusive, yet intricately supporting each other.

While nuclear weapons are created by humanity's basest self, it must then be humanity's responsibility to ensure they are returned to that devilish function, unused. In the wake of the 62nd anniversary of the droppings of atomic bombs, humanity is faced with her greatest threat and ironically, the greatest chance for securing a lasting peace and an era of life.

Nuclear Proliferation & The Expansion Of Life

2007-09-11T00:15:00.000+08:00

August is a month I would not forget. For one, it is my birth month. Secondly and ironically, it is the death month of my father.

Incidentally, it is a month that bears witness to the birth of Martin Luther King, Jr's "I have a dream" declaration, but yet also carries the unimaginably heavy load of deaths of the Hiroshima's and Nagasaki's people.

Humans are born short-sighted. Physically we are only capable of seeing a limited distance, usually not further than 500 metres. Given some good weather and environmental conditions, we may see more than we normally do, but that's all about it.

Mentally we are not spared from such an inborn dysfunction - we more often than not fail to grasp and understand matters and issues that are far away from us, though they may be directly affecting our very lives. It is always the eyes that are playing tricks on us, telling us only to believe what we see. When we do not, our minds would comfort us back to the relaxed, carefree joviality.

This is perhaps why we all need education. Not to impart things we are not known of but to merely re-awaken those senses which we have long forgotten, and re-kindled the sensitivity that is found inside us, since time immemorial. Campaigns are one such medium in fulfilling these objectives, for they place matters right before us, our eyes and reflect to us the messages of truth and reason. In one way or another, our lives are directed and/ or re-aligned by those messages.

Till date, there are about 20,000 nuclear weapons held collectively by five nuclear-armed countries: China, Israel, US, Russia, UK and France. While these weapons are more than sufficient to disintegrate Earth more than once, the figure is still expanding. Humanity could not be further from peace and security, and closer to 'total death' and 'pure destruction'. Nothing would survive from the blast.

However, there remains a shield of barrier, constantly obstructing one to be truly awakened to the severity and magnitude of this issue. Why is this so?

The reason, as I suspect, lies in the returning of an awakened life back to the 'microcosmic' self, a more shallower and superficial entity. Overwhelmed by his own personal interests and pursuits, the devilish functions hidden in the mass arrays of nuclear weapons would soon be undetected and unguarded. Unknowingly, we have let this devil slipped past our defences and took root in our hearts. Unconsciously, we have allowed the pain and misery, which had had happened to thousands of humans, and more rightly so to be happening on us anytime, to fall into unawareness and lifeless repetitions. In short, we have lost touch with our innate humanity, the very breadth that propels us to live, think and behave like human beings. Once lost, we are really not much different from those robots or toys manufactured from factories and delivered to racks for display. They too are not endowed with humanistic qualities and consciousness.

When was the last time we feel death around us? Was it when we saw a dying bird, a dead cat or the passing of someone close? When was the last time we feel insecured? Was it when a fight had broken up near our house, or when our safety was threatened? And when was the last time we felt pain and emotional? Was it when we have hurt someone, or when we have hurt ourselves? When everything has been said and done, what is left behind is the underlying message, that for what we do not see or experience, they are all there always, existing around us and residing in all of us, be it the understanding of emotions, the realisation of pain, or the enlightenment to death.

Nuclear weapons are exactly of such: they require every one of us to understand, realise and be enlightened to the fact that there can be no tomorrow, no future and no life to talk about, if we do not care that much of this one single severity.

It has always been there, this issue of imminent threat and danger of highest level. It is just that this matter requries every single human soul to come together, and drawing forth that invisible threads of determination and conviction, to rid this single mortal devil off from this world we live in. Only when this stream of hope and awakening gathers strength and momentum that it would expand to become a substantial force of humanistic energy that humankind would be able to free himself from the long-overdue shackles of fear and instability. It is only when such a force be present in our world that this planet would be safe from total destruction and inescapable disintegration.

For this world really belongs to us, not them.

Roberto Baggio

2007-09-03T02:15:00.000+08:00

I have been doing quite a lot of reading lately, on the topic of 'Roberto Baggio'. For anyone who does not know him, he has been an Italian national footballer ever since he was young, till 16th May 2004, where he hung up his boots forever.

Roberto Baggio is born into a large family of eight on 18th February 1967, in a small town of Caldogno. Ever since he could walk, he had been totally immersed into the activity of 'kicking', whatever he could find and lay his feet on.

This probably laid the very foundation of his life, or perhaps a manifestation of his pure, genuine love for it, that we saw what had become of him in the future - an iconic, unforgettable figure that touches almost every soul that came into contact with him.

Baggio loves soccer. Undeniably, he loved this sport with his whole heart, mind and life. As he fondly recalled, there would not a single day where he did not find something roundish to kick and play. That was how much he had fallen into it. In the many years ahead, he would realise that passion and love have a price to be paid. And the collectors of these 'prices' were nobody else but jealous, scheming coaches who went all the way out to hinder, obstruct and defeat him.

Yet, once and again, he stood up, withstanding the pain of knee injury that tormented and almost crippled him for over three decades, he fought with them head-on, never begrudging his life, never waning a single strand of conviction, and never wavering the slightest in his courage. In the world of money, fame, greed, devices, politics and selfishness, Roberto Baggio's character shines like a brilliant star in the starless, dark, gloomy sky. Anyone who has taken the care to lift up the head, raise the chin and breathe the air would inevitably find that shiny star burning brightly and fiercely, unperturbed by any clouds of pettiness the least, to the point of almost intending to burn up the last ounce of his energy to blaze and light up the paths of those suffered and defeated.

Baggio's heart is as such. Throughout his entire life in the Italian league, he has displayed to the world a true soccer player of the highest class. Not only did he played for gigantic, wealthy and powerful clubs, he was equally at ease in playing for small, unestablished clubs, only to show his superb qualities as a mighty warrior and leader more. However, no matter what honoraries endowed upon him, no matter what decorations given to him, and no matter what awards bestowed upon him, he had but only one wish - to help his beloved country lift up the World Cup trophy.

This and only this permeated his entire being, entire life. Never would he leave this dream, and pursue this dream did he! From a small humble beginning he went on to play in three of the most prominent clubs - Juventus, AC Milan and Inter Milan. However, none of them had treasured him as much as his fans - the ever loyal Fiorentina fans who loved him dearly with their hearts. With their lives and his fused together, they painted a beautiful, touching canvas of 'player' and 'fans', lead actor and supporter, general and soldiers. They would support each other, encourage each other and brace forward with each other, together. It was a magnificently radiating piece of dazzling brilliance of loyalty, understanding and pure love.

Thus when Baggio was heard transferring to Juventus, the eternal arch-rival of Fiorentina, the city was erupted with flames of anger, leaving 50 Fiorentina fans injured. As he recalled in his autobiography, he had not wanted to leave Fiorentina, or at least not to Juventus. His agent had secretly formulated the contract, and he had no way to turn down that offer. Not at that time, not with his ability. There, he was left stranded, in the wilderness of loyalty and betrayal, support and mistrust, love and hatred. Bearing the pain of being mistrusted and called 'the Judas', he left for Juventus, only to be mistrusted by the Juventus fans there - in a match against Fiorentina, he had chosen not to take a penalty kick for Juventus. All the more did he enraged them when he picked up a Fiorentina scarf a fan had dropped to him while leaving the field. Torn in between the two clubs, he showed to the world what would genuinely make of a true soccer player - an almost steel-like determination for winning, but yet an immovable, humane side for beauty, loyalty and life.

Nevermind he is the first Italian who scored in three world cups; nevermind he being the Italian player who was awarded and praised by the Argentina soccer league twice; nevermind he being the one who almost single-handedly carried the Italian team right into the Finals; all it matters to him was to simply fulfill a childhood dream - to enter the World cup, and lift it up in the air. For all one cares, he is just out there to pursue something that has been flying in his mind like a kite since the day he knows about the world. No dreams are too bold for him, no aspiration to high, and no vision too grand. In his boundless heart of mightiness, the world is his stage of passion, love, victories and sorrows.

After all has been said and done, no one in this world could ever, ever be qualified to question his integrity, determination and conviction. In a world filled with craftiness and disgusting ugliness, his existence manifests a charming gracefulness and serenity, like his smile, like his skills. Indeed, he has shown to the world that right in the harsh, cold and unforgiving conditions of competitive sports, there lies life and humanism; right in the middle of the pitch where victories and defeats meant so much to so many, there is but friendship, dreams and beauty. Like a lotus flower blossoming ferociously in the muddy pond, his legacy illuminates fiercely like a shimmering star against a dark, stormy night sky. All in all, he has truly given his all to the world.

Thank you, Roby. Take care, and all the best to you, your family and life.

28.08.2007

2007-08-28T01:08:00.000+08:00

The clock in my computer showed 1.08. Morning, on this day of 28/08/2007.

As I quietly welcomed my birthday, I looked back at this road that I have traveled for the past 32 years.

How time flies, one would often hear another exclaims. Indeed, if I am to roll out my life's past events on a film, everything would seem to be blurrish and faded, some colourless, some fresh with sights and sounds, but mostly they move in slowed speed and fragmented episodes.

Have I become so old that I couldn't recall an incident with full entirety and clarity? Or have I become too involved with my daily rushes and pushes for me to forget something so easily? Between the jagged lines of memories and sentiments, I search quietly for an inner calmness to tame my unsettled heart.

It has been quite a few days, or perhaps weeks, that I ponder the arrival of this day - my birthday. This age of 32 has aroused quite a substantial amount of affection and yearning within me. Shakymuni was said to have attained enlightenment at 32 while Jesus was believed to have passed away in his early thirties. Nichiren Daishonin, the founder of my belief, invoked the phrase to the rising sun on 28th April 1253 "Nam-myoho-renge-kyo" at this age, while my beloved Mentor Dr. Daisaku Ikeda determinedly assumed the role of the third president of Soka Gakkai at the age of 32 as well.

On a different note but of the same date, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, the leader of the American Civil Rights Movement, delivered his historically significant and culturally earth-shattering speech of his dreams and heartfelt desires on 28, August 1963. To a crowd of 200,000, he declared, "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character." These words certainly rang through the tunnels of history and echoed resonantly in the lives of those who received this declaration, until this very day.

Though decades and centuries have passed, and time and space have all shifted and evolved, this almost mystical significance of this date seemed branded in my life.

It was also in the midst of looking back at my own life, against the gigantic canvass of history and life that I asked myself: what have I done in the 32 years of this journey? That question is followed almost in a splitting moment by the very next: what have you done to realise your dreams and fulfill your aspirations, in this world and lifetime, which you have hold so closely and dearly to your heart?

These are questions that certainly drive a pain in my heart, for they all question my innermost being, of who I am, of what I have done, and of where I am going. They call forth my basest and barest emotions in viewing and reviewing myself in securing a concrete answer to these piercing inquiries.

But for what reason do I wish to submerge myself in this seemingly sorrowful emotions? It can only be due to the fact that I have let down too many people too many times. Far too long, I have made mistakes that I shouldn't have, took turns where I was not supposed to, set decisions which I shouldn't have. In short, I have thrown away the fortune that was endowed upon me since birth, time and again, and till this day, this time, I have not secured a triumphant victory that would me look back with pride. All the more so that I have to shamefully admit that I truly have let my Mentor down. Alas! All the promises I have made to him, in my heart, carved in my life; they all seemed to have been washed away. Would I be able to recover and actualise them? I do not know.

I have always cherished the enlightenment that everyone born into this world is of a mission, for a purpose. It is still so in my heart. But what have I done to make this enlightenment a concrete entity in my life, carrying it along as I travel in this world and through my life?

My Mentor is already old. He's now 87 year-old, tirelessly working for the sake of humanity, never resting for even a single day while I, young and able but fixated at the crossroad of 32 years of determination and delusion, struggling to keep my faith and belief ahead of me, disappointed that I have yet to live up to my own inner cries.

"For what purpose should one cultivate wisdom? May you always ask yourself this question." As I proceed to venture into unchartered 32 years, I brace myself in engraving these words into my heart. In fulfilling my own destiny, in showing the correctness of my belief, and in proving the greatness of my Mentor. As the night seeps through the web of darkness, I travelled deeper into my own inner self in search of that pure conviction, joy and light I once possessed.

As the world sleeps soundly, awaiting gently for the the golden rays of a brand new morning, I settled myself in preparing for a fresh embarkment of a brand new history. Like a Lotus flower blossoming fiercely in the muddy pond, I pray to rise from the Earth.

Bullying Reflects Problems in Adult Society

2007-08-08T15:54:00.000+08:00

SGI President Daisaku Ikeda wrote an essay of the above title sometime in February this year. It was first published in The Japan Times, and later re-printed in April in my local mainstream paper.

Three months later in July, the Singapore Children's Society conducted a random, door-to-door survey that targeted children from private and public housing estates with regard to bullying. The survey, carried out in the society's 'Bully Free Week' campaign, collected responses from a total of 519 students, of which 129 responded to having had experienced bullying before. Amongst the 129, 37 were bullies themselves, with 10 of them attributed to their past, victimized experiences as the reason of turning into bullies.

Common tactics excercised by bullies are: vulgar language, name-calling, spreading rumours, insulting victims in front of others, throwing things at victims and making things up to get victims into trouble.

In a world supposed to be filled with friendships, trusts, mutual respect, sunshine-like smiles and joyous laughter, anger, sadness, taking revenge, loss of appetite and concentration on studies, and development of anti-social behaviour took over, as listed out by the survey to be reactions of victims to bullying.

Here is the essay my Mentor has written (copied from SGI's website):

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Disturbing incidents of bullying continue to make the news. We hear daily of the tragedy of children who, unable to endure the harassment and violence inflicted on them by peers and classmates, are driven to suicide.

It is heartbreaking to think of the pain and despair that would cause a child to take his or her life, the devastating grief and regret of their families.

Bullying is not a sickness unique to Japan. But the kinds of extreme bullying that can lead even to suicide have as their background the closed and insular nature of Japanese society. People of strong individuality, who have some quality that shines or stands out, are often the target of jealousy, branded as different and strange.

As such, they may be subjected to an organized effort to ignore and ostracize them, leaving them feeling as if their very existence has been denied. Such isolation can be accompanied by threats, extortion and physical violence. Some children may become active supporters of the bullying while others, fearful that they will be targeted next, remain passive bystanders.

This dynamic reflects a deep-rooted pathology within Japanese society. It is rare for parents and teachers to muster the courage and solidarity to confront such bullying.

What would also appear to be unique to Japan is a particular quickness to blame the victim. There is a widely if unconsciously held notion that the victims of bullying are themselves at least partly responsible for their plight. This way of thinking acts to justify bullying as well as the indifference that allows it to continue.

How could anyone imagine there are people in the world who deserve to be bullied? Bullying is a base and vicious act that can never and must never be legitimated.

People are not bullied because they are weak. Rather, bullying reflects the inner weakness of the perpetrators, their inability to resist their own ugliest impulses. As Mahatma Gandhi pointed out, violence is ultimately born of cowardice.

The first step in dealing with bullying is to transform the cultural attitudes that permit it. This requires that we state clearly that the blame for bullying rests 100 percent with those who bully.

This further requires that adults--whether parents or teachers--who become aware of bullying speak up, demonstrating a model of courage and action to children. Equally crucial is the effort to become the kind of person that a child being victimized by bullying can turn to with confidence. We need to be able to discern the often silent pleas of such children.

Bullying came to light as a serious social problem in Japan in the 1980s. The various forms of violence that had plagued schools in the 1970s had been brought under control but, it has been suggested, the forcefulness of the measures used to achieve this left the underlying issues unresolved, pushing violence underground and inward. The aggression once directed against teachers and the schools themselves was turned against classmates.

The rapid changes in society have left children exposed to intense forms of stress. The cold and unforgiving logic of the adult world is applied unmediated to the lives of children, who are subjected to excessive degrees of competition, selection, ranking and standardization.

The dysfunction so evident in school bullying today thus mirrors the state of adult society, which is replete with insidious forms of bullying--detached cruelty stemming from cynicism and self-involvement, abuses of people's rights by the media, television programs that poke fun at the vulnerable, prejudice and discrimination in its various forms. To surround children with such realities while expecting them to adhere to idealized forms of behavior is hardly fair.

Urbanization and the collapse of the extended family have deprived children of the physical and social spaces where they are affectionately enfolded and can comfortably develop friendships. And parents are often so pressed for time and stressed by work that they cannot fully engage or interact with their children.

Many children who become violent carry a deep-rooted sense of being neglected and ignored. The healthy growth of children requires that they feel accepted and embraced for who they are. When children can feel acceptance, they develop a natural awareness of their own unique and irreplaceable value. They come to treasure and care for themselves. At the same time, this awakens feelings of trust and respect for others.

In the end, children desire but one thing--to be loved. This is why the family must be a haven of security and protection for children.

Rosa Parks once shared with me her mother's words: "There is no law that people have to suffer." Her mother also taught her the value of self-respect, to respect both herself and others. In these childhood lessons I think we can see the deep sources of courage and dignity behind her crucial role in the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott that marked a historic turning point in the American civil rights movement.

Every child has the right to move proudly into the future, head held high. The horror of a society permeated by different forms of bullying is that it tramples children's sense of self-worth, robbing them of the light of future hope.

All young people need to be clearly assured that when we are suffering, although it may feel like the darkness will continue forever, that is absolutely not the case. Night always yields to dawn. Though the cold of winter may seem to last forever, it is always followed by spring. And those who have suffered most are best able to understand people's hearts. They have a unique and vital contribution to make.

Children are our only future, our sole, irreplaceable hope. Children are urging us--literally at the risk and cost of their lives--to become aware of the distortions of the adult world. Our response to their silent cries holds the key to healing the desperate illness of our times. Only by turning to directly engage with children, their feelings and their needs, will we redeem our own humanity.

A View Out The Window

2007-07-26T15:19:00.000+08:00

The weather's been quite mild and soft on us, the people living in the near-Equator island of Singapore.

Usually, in this month of July, the harsh sunlight wouldn't be that kind and gentle, allowing the hazy clouds and occasional breeze to take the limelight and centrestage. Now with a heavy humidity and a grayish skyline pressing down, the weather couldn't be any more unpredictable.

I have gotten myself the precious time to stay at home today, and with no pre-conceived strategy I stepped up to the window and took a view out from my living hall. The view has certainly caught my attention. With a hint of inspirational spark, I took out my handphone and took a shot.

That moment of 'spark', to be more exact, is a thought that whilst I am born in Singapore, and living here in this area for more than twenty-five years, I have not actually taken a good view at my surrounding. True, I may have been familiar with all that are around me, and having seen and heard and know their existence for such a long time, their images would have long been imprinted in my sub-consciousness.

To see everything that is so close to us requires minimum effort and time; more often than not, we might even waive them away, assuring ourselves that they certainly do not deserve such amount of attention. It would probably only be when we travel to another new, fresh and unfamiliar place and territory that we find our curiosity triggered once again. It would probably be then that we begin to really open our eyes and actively search for things and matters which are alien to us, unseen, unheard and unexperienced before.

However, life always inspires us with unexpected twists - it is more often than not that the true meaning of existence lies not some faraway, secluded places, but very much near us, in our families, and definitely close to our heart.

Be it a call from a long-lost friend, the greeting from the hardworking road-sweeper for our neighbourhood, the fragrance of the rain, to even the daily limitless generosity showered by our parents, these elements are definitely true reminders to us of our own purpose in life - to make this world a better and more beautiful place, starting right from where we are.

While this view from my window has been with me for many years, I do believe anyone who sees it for the first time would agree that my living area, while is 'normal-looking' and plain, manifests a sense of grounded tranquility and peacefulness. Something I only got to see it today, after overlooking it for a long time. From here on, I shall be mindful and sensitive of my surrounding even more.

While chanting and offering my prayer, the pressing humidity gave way to thunder and rain, washing away the suffocating heat and pressure in the air. Darkness and gloominess gave way to light and freshness. The whole atmosphere changed in the blink of an eye.

It's certainly a beautiful world out there.

A Time for Ourselves

2007-07-16T02:08:00.000+08:00

Time, something abstract and unseen, yet so powerful and overwhelming. It is practically the pair of hands that move and propel everything forward, toward all destined and decided venues of consequence and fate.

When one ponders over how this element of 'time' comes into play in the human drama of living and evolving, he/ she would certainly come to see that it the beginning, there had in fact not have any mention or inclusion of 'time' in the entire book of human history. Our ancestors, the Homo Erectus, evolved from their forefathers of Homo Sapiens, would not have any notion of what 'time' is. They were engaged in the mundane activities of survival, of birth and death.

It was when the world changed, when our ancestors came to be more acute in their sensitivities toward their surrounding that they began to realise that there seemed to have a fixed pattern, an invisible yet written destiny in everything around, and inside, them. They then realised that everything had to follow a certain rhythm, with nothing falling out of this loop, and no forces to counter it. When the weather turned cooler, leaves began to fall; when the heat retreated, the crops ripened; when the sky turned dark, the moon and countless stars began to appear and radiate. Even amongst themselves, they witnessed a similar pattern - once they were young and youthful, they had begun to experience strain and pain when they lived for long enough. Soon, one by one, they would stopped their activities totally, and slept into permanence.

It was from first hand occurrences that they finally come to formulate what 'time' is - it's something unseen, but yet moving almost everything on a strict rhythm and at a systematic pace, with nothing and nobody left out of this invisible chain of forces.

If 'time' is of that strict and uncompromising, then the furthering implication for anyone to worth spending time pondering over would be: what is the purpose of having a human existing on this planet? What exactly moves in this Universe of ours to have a life generated and, taking the form of a humanoid, comes to appear in this world as a human being?

By the Buddhist perspective, it is 'karma' that propels a life to take the shape of a human and, carrying the baggage of two pools of positive and negative energy, this particular life takes presence on this planet. While the pool of negative energy marks the undesired episodes occurring along the course of that human life, ironically it also turns out to be the exact source of motivation for him/ her to overcome all misfortunes and mishaps, and emerge as a victorious champion of life, securing an unparalleled state of triumphant joy and immovable optimism.

From here, one is able to see that it is because of one's 'mission' that he/ she is born into this world - to reveal all potential and talents, uncovered, untapped and unknown even to the person concerned, and to fulfill the pre-destined purpose inherent in the depth of the one single human life. From here, the ultimate objective of a human's existence is affirmed, declaring the primary and most important goal of all - the completion of one's character for the accomplishment of macro goodness in this world.

In another word, one's 'karma', or misfortunes, carry exactly the seed of insurmountable happiness and unsurpassed victories for that person. It likened perfectly to the silent resilience displayed by the lotus flower, rising from the muddy pond and blossoming fiercely in the air and into the sun. So must Man rise from his own sadness and demeaning whirlpool to construct and erect a fortress of indomitable courage and spiritual strength.

We are all given the same amount of time. 24 hours per day. We are all given the same quantity of sunlight, rain and breeze. We are all endowed with the same capacity to breathe and live. Therefore, it can be deduced that we are also all endowed with the same mission to walk and live on this planet. And it's certainly up to us to come and be enlightened to our own innate call, that faint yet never-ending yearn to break free from our old, fatigue shells and rise to become the genuine heirs to the unspoken lineage of justice and righteousness. Ultimately it is really up to us to uphold that unseen yet blazing flame of truth to fight all evils that plaque and feed on humanity. It's really on our shoulders that the pillars of this world depend on, not anyone else's.

Our time in this world is limited. What we are here for thus becomes evidently clear. It is truly up to each of us to locate our own mission in this lifetime and begin this inner journey of external, active contribution of peace and happiness for humanity all around. After all, what matter would be more worthy, what cause nobler, and what action more honourable, then to offer one's life towards the construction of a grand, towering edifice of true happiness in every single life on this planet?

Against this ever changing world of mundanity, a moment dedicated to ourselves for the awakening is truly a time worth living.

Earth 07.07.07

2007-07-06T22:37:00.000+08:00

I'm beginning this post at the hour of 10.37 p.m. of 06/07/2007, Singapore time.

The whole world is awaiting for the arrival of a once-in-a-lifetime date - 07.07.07. While this unique number will re-appear in every subsequent hundred years, everything would have changed over this long course of period. Once this day of 2007 is passed, most of us here would probably not live that long enough to witness the arrival of such a date, ever again.

Time waits for no man. In the face of this monumental significance, Man becomes ironically small, while the meaning of this phrase becomes unusually large and gigantic.

True to its entirety, no one can never hold 'time' in the hands, grasping and securing it fixed. It just somehow slips away through the finest gap and tiniest hole. This is all the more startling true the moment one's instinct of his/ her own presence is dimmed and blunted, overwhelmed by the thousands of occurrences taking place all around. As we live through our lives, and walk into the ever-changing world, our innate senses of 'time' and 'life' become weaker and weaker, constantly ravaged by the harsh circumstantial elements.

Until one day when these inborn senses finally wither and disintegrate, those who unknowingly went through this transformation would come to see that they are left with nothing but empty shells of humanoid forms that go through the lifeless motions of 'living' and 'breathing', forever unable to locate that primal spot of living consciousness. It is the very spot that allows one to be awakened to the inner ocean of humanism, enlightened to the fact that for every breath one takes, every thought one generates and every move made, the Earth is absorbing and responding to all of them - like a mother watching gently at her own wilful children and experiencing exactly the same sentiments as them.

It is, in a word, that the Earth is in fact sharing that same exact rhythm of which every life on the planet falls on and immerses in.

Therefore, at that most fundamental level of Life, there's no difference between a flower blossoming and a breeze blowing, the flapping of sea waves and a change of seasons, the rise of Venus and the fall of meteors. They all share an identical, unseen yet equal force of rhythm, all-encompassing and permeating.

It is here, in this invisible flow of rhythmic energy that humans come to realise that they aren't an independent herd of species, relying upon their own abilities to survive and prey, or to be preyed and faded away.

From the Egyptians to the Mayans, from the Chinese to the Greeks and to the Indians, these great civilisations had had all realised that they were not alone here, on this planet called Earth. They had all shared an unspoken linkage between themselves and everything around them, including the starry heaven above, and the earthed ground below them.

They drew inspirations from the stars, enlightenment from the formations, and deep understanding from the soil and earth. They realised that there was a constant flow in the seasons, a consistent move for the Earth, a periodic beat for the rise and ebb of tides, and certainly a fixed regularity for their own lives also. In short, they have come to be one with the Earth's rhythm.

It was from then that these enlightened humans formulated the calenders, charts for sowing and harvesting, time tables for sunrise and sunsets, formations and movements of stars, to even birth and death of their people. They certainly have had lived their lives based on this unseen force which had been so intricately and closely woven with the very core of their lives.

It is also with this enlightenment that they come to harbour deep respect and revered attitude toward the environment they lived in. Knowing that whatever they had were all given by the earth, they returned their gratitude by treating it humbly. From the woods to the rivers, from the soil to the fruits, these ancient yet wise beings possessed an almost religious disposition toward their own environments, protecting it from all unnecessary harm and damage, mending it with utmost care.

'Live Earth 07.07.07' is a 24-hour live performance that will be held in 7 continents, 10 countries and beamed across the world and believed to be watched by 2 billion viewers from all over the world, with an underlying message for environmental protection. While the world may be awed and impressed with megastars gracing the event, what they have perhaps failed to realise is that in every human heart there lies a piece of grassland urgently calling for protection and restoration to it's initial purity, and in every human life there lies a decaying spirit desperately yearning for an reawakening and rebirth of that humble soul. It is only with this inner transformation in human lives that Earth would really come to be alive, its soul restored by the fusion of Earth's life and Humanity's spirits.

It's 12.01 a.m. on my computer screen. Welcome 07.07.07, Mother Earth.

Letter To Media

2007-07-03T11:25:00.000+08:00

I have sent a letter of feedback to one of the papers. The issue is about hospitals not releasing and sharing patients' information and data on their past and current medical report. Instead patients are required to produce and declare all of their medications ever issued to them upon admitting into hospitals. Against the background of our current technological advancement, this move certainly looks ancient and out-of-time.

The letter has been published yesterday, with some admendments by the publishers themselves.

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I refer to the report of Alexandra Hospital (AH) adopting this 'medical reconciliation' from the United States, that enable doctors and hospitals to compare the complete list of patients' current or even past home medications issued.

I am certainly perplexed to hear that at this point in time, with our current technological advances, doctors are still requesting patients to bring all of their medications to hospital for the purpose of verification and updating into the "national electronic medical record system". This contrast is even greater given the fact that should AH not adopt this system, "patients would have to be interviewed on their medical history upon admission", and upon AH's initiation, "other healthcare institutions have adopted the system", suggest strongly the weaknesses inherent in our present medical systems.

For all one knows, MOH has launched an Electronic Medical Records Exchange (EMRX) in 2004, linking all restructured hospitals, polyclinics and national centres in the Singapore Health Services (SingHealth) and National Health Group (NGH) clusters.

While AH may not be in the loop of this information-sharing, it is still sad to see that hospitals and health institutions not releasing and sharing information among themselves; information which may be trivial for the doctors but vital for the patients as, in your report revealed, saved on the cost of medications and reduce complications in the course of examination.

While family members coming forward to declare all medications would be a positive move, complications can arise when patients whom are aged or disabled to communicate, or homeless and without family support aren't ready to fulfill this responsibility. Vital information is thus lost along the way, with more time and effort incurred for verification of past medical histories and records. This inevitably pushes the burden back onto the doctors and health institutions concerned.

MOH should step in and ensure that all healthcare institutions have access to patients' database built on a national level, leaving no doctor and hospital out of the loop. Where assessment of patients is concerned, doctors should rely on this database as the primary source of information, complementing with the physical declaration of past medications. This certainly reduces the man-hour required for verification of medicines, duplication of medicines issued and tests conducted, and increases the safety level where drug allergies are involved. At the end of the day, the overall operating costs for the institutions are lowered, with patients benefitting hugely from this simplified system as well.

Histories, Memories, & Sentimental Values

2007-06-30T22:50:00.000+08:00

Today marked the end of the fate of my country's National Stadium.

Built in 1965, it had witnessed many great moments of her country, not just in the sporting arena but, throughout her entire life of service, significant events that are of political, cultural and certainly national interests.

For one, 1965 was the year that Singapore was separated from 'Malaysia', a name adopted in 1963 when the 'Federation of Malaya' was formed. This was with the inclusion of Singapore, Sabah and Sarawak, where there were 14 states altogether. Along the way, politically-charged tension and conflicts unsettled the union, and subsequently the 14-state Federation was reduced to 13 when Singapore was being expelled out abruptly.

On 9 August 1965, 'Independence' was formally thrust into the hands of Singapore, an island of 697 square kilometres. From the lack of natural resources like clean water, (crude) oil, gas, timber, sand, to human supplies like commercial plantations, industrial skilled workers, and military forces, and to hardware infrastructures like power plants and security systems, Singapore is virtually a sovereign state with her gates opened wide. Notwithstanding the fact that in that critical time, those left on the land of Singapore were no more than lowly-educated immigrants of China, India, Malaysia, Indonesia, and several parts of Asia.

The future of Singapore was certainly bleak and hopeless then, with its path ahead dimmed and treacherous.

Against this turbulent background of national unrest, the idea to have a "stadium of our own" was mooted - a gathering ground for all races and identities to engage in not just watching the sports activities, but with one another. The hope for all Singaporeans adopting a common nationality, sharing the torch of a common awareness for their own fate and future, is thus sealed in each and every concrete block used for the construction of it. Singapore has finally gotten her own national icon she can be proud of.

The laying of foundation was completed in 1970, and upon its official opening in 1973, the National Stadium has welcomed many prestigious and prominent figures from all over the world. From 'moon-walking' with Michael Jackson to rocking with Deep Purple, and to swaying with Robbie Williams, from Muhammad Ali 'floating by' and gracing the venue and to Pope praying with his followers, from regional tournaments to pre-Olympic qualifying soccer tournaments, and the unforgettable annual National Day parades that remind us of our country's sudden yet painful birth, the National Stadium certainly has stood testament to a whole two generations of sentiments and emotions throughout these 34 years.

In this prime age of maturity and completeness, she humbly bows out of this memorable journey of fulfillment, lending way for a newer and more sophisticated 'Sports Hub'.

On one hand, it is sad to see something so meaningful and memorable leaving those whom are sentimentally attached to it; on the other hand, it's peculiar to think that an inanimate building could trigger the emotional senses of so many, nameless, faceless, ordinary and common people. Some maybe of prestigious backgrounds, but many more are the ones whom we meet along the way and chatted with, the ones whom we may easily overlook when on the rush.

Yes, a building maybe lifeless; however humans have always been endowed with this unique sense of space and time, where since time immemorial, we have had perhaps learnt to look up to the sky in search of answers to queries for time of weathers, changes of seasons, positions and locations, and ultimately, the meaning of their existences to the graceful lights of gods. Answers which could only be found in the starry heaven of stars and light.

As the world evolves and modernises, humans no longer look up to the sky for that definitive moment of enlightenment. Yet, we may still never be able to move away from the inherent desire to looking out for and up to an awe-inspiring structure, a magnificent building, or simply a defining icon. It is from there that humans return to their primal, natural instinct of accepting a life grander, a presence stronger, and a significance larger, than their very own. It is from here that they would begin to understand that apart from their own microcosmic existence, there lies a greater self than any individual. It is called 'humanity'.

It is only from here and with this understanding, that the true meaning of common identity and co-existence shines. Where once it was a building constructed with bricks, cement and sand, it now radiates with brilliance, memories, sentiments and emotions; where once it was a building planned and drawn up from blue prints and devices, it has risen from the concrete foundation to instilling life and historical values into its admirers; and where humans have stepped in to witness the grandeur of the undying spirits of sportsmanship, it might also be the very spirits that the building became respectable and memorable.

True and indeed, the magnificence of any building or site is only as much as the significance of historical values written by the hands of those humans residing there. Without those who fought, struggled, pained, teared, fallen or risen victorious, there would be no memories to begin with; neither would history be written, nor sentimental values imprinted and treasured.

Life awakens life, and polishes it. In these final hours before the unavoidable disintegration of this monumental structure, there certainly will be thousands who reminisce the beautiful images and unforgettable moments that have appeared in the course of their lives; pictures and scenarios which only they can feel and comprehend fully the significance of those memories.

While others, or even future generations, may not come to grasp the weight of this special relationship shared between this entire generation of Singaporeans and the building itself, the truth remains that there will always be one 'National Stadium' in the heart of every Singaporean who has the opportunity to step in, breathe its air, witness its silent grandeur, and be immersed in her brilliant lights of historical significance. Without a doubt, memories of this stadium will definitely come to stir and pulsate steadily in the lives of many Singaporeans, in the many many years to come.

Witnessing the humble birth and progress of a Third World country to First, the National Stadium has indeed been like a quiet lady guardian for Singapore's past three generations, lovingly overlooking on all those who have given their all. Like an actress crowned with a tiara adorned with colourful gems, she's bowing out gently and majestically for the last time, after countless rounds of applause and encores.

Farewell, National Stadium.

For The Record VI - Of Human Trafficking And Child Abuse

2007-06-23T00:43:00.001+08:00

I have just finished two exams, which I have taken the course in last December and began in March this year. In a short span of three months, four assignments were submitted, and two papers tested on.

In the midst of these intensive activities, I am truly grateful for the good fortune bestowed upon me, which allows me to enjoy good physical and mental conditions through this trying period. I thus managed to keep myself engaged with the world I'm living in still.

Among the many incidents and accidents that have happened in recent weeks, the tragic incidents of human abduction, trafficking and slavery, together with the appalling discovery of child abuse, caught my attention and seized my thoughts. I am compelled to therefore ensure the events are documented here, as a form of record and archive for present and future references, permanently.

7 June 2007 - a group of fathers from Henan province, all whom had lost contact with their children, published a letter on a Chinese on-line forum 'Tianya Club'. Prior to this they had given up their belongings and properties, traveled almost country-wide with the hope of locating their children. Their search led them to confirm that about 2,000 children were being abducted and sold to these kilns at Shanxi province, whom 400 were from Henan. Upon entering the kilns as undercover workers to further their investigation, they saw unkempt, undernourished children being held captive and forced to work from dawn till dusk and with little food and water. Many were slaved and traumatised, some severely punished by beatings and branding with heated bricks when re-captured after found escaping, ultimately leaving a few disabled.

The fathers managed to rescue about 40 children before their efforts were obstructed by the local police - the law enforcers had taken side with the kiln owners. Leaving no alterante venue to seeking out justice, these fathers turned to the virtual site to publish their letter. Their pleading cries was finally heard and responded.

The letter sparked an outcry of public sympathy and support that led to the attention of a CCP (China Communist Party) Politburo member. In addition, journalist Fu Zhenzhong, who is with a television network in Henan province, was the first few to venture deep into the kilns and the syndicate's operations several times, disguising as a father of the lost child and asking for help, shed the light of truth and justice on this issue.

12 June 2007 - after relenting to pressure mounted from all sides, the police and local authorities activated 35,000 police officers to launch a massive raiding on all the 7,500 kilns in Henan province. At the end of the four days' crackdown 120 people were arrested, with 217 people rescued; among them 29 children.

16 June 2007 - in the Shanxi province, 331 people were rescued from the illegal kilns, of which 9 were children. The total number of 'slave workers' rescued thus far to 548 (ref: http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2007-06/16/content_895699.htm)

10 June 2007 - in Baghdad, Iraq, US and Iraqi soldiers made a grisly discovery on an orphanage that housed 24 severely malnourished and abused boys, aged 3 to 15, whom some were tied to their beds while many others were lying naked on the cement floor of a darkened room, without any windows.

Incidentally, the kitchen shelves were packed with canned food. They were not handed out to the children but believed to be sold to local markets
(ref: http://www.cbsnews.com/elements/2007/06/18/iraq/photoessay2942940.shtml).

12 June 2007 - the US Department of State, Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons released its 'Trafficking in Persons' report, citing numerous forms of human trafficking, namely 'Labour Trafficking', 'Bonded Labour', 'Involuntary (Domestic) Servitude', 'Debt Bondage and Involuntary Servitude', 'Forced Child Labours', 'Child Soldiers', 'Sex Trafficking and Prostitution', 'Children Exploited For Commercial Sex' and 'Child Sex Tourism' (ref: http://www.state.gov/g/tip/rls/tiprpt/2007/82809.htm). Unfortunately but yet without doubt, the last two categories manifest and reveal a 'demand-and-supply' predicament the world is still wrestling with.

As Secretary of State Ms Gondolezza Rice defined in her letter to the report, "trafficking in persons is a modern-day form of slavery, a new type of global slave trade. Perpetrators prey on the most weak among us, primarily women and children, for profit and gain. They lure victims into involuntary servitude and sexual slavery". True to these words, humanity in this 21st century is indeed witnessing the barbaric acts of preying and slavery being committed again; deplorable deeds that should have long faded and be gone into the emptiness of human memories and histories.

20 June 2007 - eight days after this report, Australian police arrested four men accused of being part of an international internet paedophile ring. The internet chat room used by this syndicate, ironically, was named 'Kids the Light of Our Lives'. It featured 'real-time' live videos of child sexual abuse. Inclusively, pictures of prepubescent and pubescent victims being subjected to horrific sexual abuses were also uploaded and shared amongst themselves (ref: http://www.thewest.com.au/aapstory.aspx?StoryName=392612).

With four arrested and one convicted in Australia, the Australian Federal Police described the latest incident as the "tip of the iceberg".

Against the report of Trafficking In Persons, these incidents speak of a larger, more complex and deeper issue - on one hand, they revealed the inefficiencies of the laws, and the unhealthy, under-developed legal systems China and Iraq are having, which consequently fail to reach into the depths of the society's rural backyards; on the other, they demonstrated the inabilities of wholesome, legal systems to reaching into the depths of disorientated minds and all the more, gravely distorted lives.

While the starry stars above us may shine brilliantly for the next ten thousand years, displaying an aura of eternal light and dazzle, it is really the moral laws within each and every human that govern and decide the very thought and action of a single being in that moment of definition. On this note, even the grandeur of the Universe may pale in comparison to the mysterious complexities of the human mind. It is perhaps then of humanity's innate mission to, by their own hands, conduct a self-salvation on the platform of lives' inner reformation - possibly the only route for them to revert themsleves from this tragic, repetitive whirlpools to the pre-destined happiness and youthful joy.

In Pursuit Of Correctness & Truths

2007-06-17T03:05:00.001+08:00

I have been engaging e-mail exchanges with one 'cult expert' for several days. He, in his website, has labeled Soka Gakkai International, and particularly my Mentor Daisaku Ikeda as a cult and cult leader respectively.

I highlighted several points to him, and he replied to me with his largely-based on-line resources and news, something people love to read and forward to others. The general mood of this is that the more sensational the news are, the more people being interested in them. Sad to say, however, this is also the face of the common crowd we see of this world today. News of serious nature don't really make a good cup of leisure tea for people to savour; rather they would love to go after emotive tabloid news and entertaining gossips. Such is the mental vacuum of today's humanity.

I replied to him that most, if not all of his information, are from on-line sources. None are seen or heard by himself first-hand. Worse, he would either deliberately or subconsciously go for inaccurate news and reporting, collating them into his database, and comfortably labelling someone or group as of 'cult nature'.

Incidentally, upon browsing through his website, I came to one page of him posting his past history and records. He had committed a few mistakes during his younger days, and along the way, he must have encountered several reservations of his character and integrity by people who do not know him well. He had posted his own records alongside a detailed explanation of what had actually happened, and what has become of him now. He has, in his own view, changed for a better person.

We did an active and lively exchange of mails. He did not come to acknowledge what I have laid down and shown to him, of what the SGI has been doing for the past 30 odd years. He makes no effort in attempting to understand my side of the argument, where I have tried to introduce the ideals of Daisaki Ikeda and SGI to him. Throughout the episode, he had loyally defended his thoughts and perspectives on the credibility and correctness of SGI and Daisaku Ikeda. Painstakingly as it was, I listed out several of his mistakes, namely:

1) ignorant about facts - the members of SGI do nothing less to promote local as well as international Peace, Culture and Education; they do Not engaged in some weird, cult practices that promote self-sacrificing and/ or destructive movements.

2) ignorant about culture - Japanese has one of the highest and strongest tabloid gossiping media culture. Ikeda had been accused of a rape charge, but was filed as a CIVIL suit and not a criminal. At the end of the whole episode, the court dismissed the whole case twice.

3) ignorant about media functioning - all sorts of news go round the world. Papers simply re-publish and re-print them. That's how the 911 or Tsunami can be made known to the world in less than two days. Reporters don't go to the site physically to take the shots and write the news. They merely forward and re-forward the news, print and re-print, and sell their papers. In addition, the episodes of Iraq and Afghanistan showed to the world how the media can be manipulated by people, particularly the politicians.

4) ignorant about history - Ikeda was the first few Japanese to openly declare the importance of normalization of relationship between China and Japan, way back in 1968 when the tension was high and politician killed for upholding that ideal. He held dialogue with Professor Arnold Toynbee in 1975 and have been submitting peace proposal since 1983. His 200th honorary award was from the Beijing Uni, which was awarded to him because of this monumental effort toward peace.

5) inconsistent in analysis - "Soka Gakkai's sordid history" refers to the members doing wrong and Ikeda was held responsible. However, the Pope, with all respect, isn't held responsible for the Catholic priests sexually abusing young boys in the church. A clearly biased analysis here.

While the content may be personal, the underlying issues aren't. Too often, the general masses are being caught up too easily in this invisible web of 'delusion'. They see what they want to see, what trigger their senses and excite their emotions, and take belief in them. While this may not have any grave danger when pursuing entertainment news, ungrounded 'facts' being presented as 'truths' carry devastating harm and severe warping on one's mind and heart - they take root in one's consciousness and sprout from there. Consequently the mind will be distorted and deluded, while the heart corrupted and biased. No longer can the arrow of truth be penetrated into him - he has chosen to live a life based on the sentiments of sensational excitement and superficial presentation. The more the truth is presented to him, the more he'll get disgusted.

Joan of Arc and Galileo are two fine examples in the human history that exposed to us how dark and evil the deluded hearts and minds can be - they both died in the hands of the power-hungered cowards and ignorant religious insanities respectively; those who only took faith in what their minds have told them. In the age of superstitions and fanaticism, both these martyrs sacrificed their own lives when they attempted to forward their own race, immersed in the temporal joy of superstitious divinity and religious means, as well as the ceremonious offering of their souls for a greater mundane, secular power.

"One of the greatest mistake humanity has committed in the 20th century was the mixture of facts and truths, and regarding them as similar," so said Josei Toda, second president of Soka Gakkai. Nothing could be truer than these words. Where the sun rising from the East is a well-known fact, the truth remains that it's the Earth revolving around it. This simple yet universal observation by Josei Toda concluded the repeated tragedies occurred on humanity - superstitious beliefs, upon ignoring scientific analyses and objective observations, became the murderer of truth.

What the world now, as Daisaku Ikeda declared, is a philosophy that awakens the authentic humanism in every single human life. It is only through this flowering of an awakened consciousness that humankind can once more embark on the journey of hope and revitalisation. It is in fact a return to one's own innate nature of pure, innocent joy of knowing another person working for the happiness of others, and not demeaning them.

Without false pretension and make-up, and be basked in the warm light of sharing that joy, happiness, troubles and sadness of another human soul, is truly indeed the actual mission of what we are here for - to live a connected life here in this world, shared by billion others, and making it a joyful place and a meaningful, memorable journey. Without this, all worldly achievements would be like castles built on sand. Fragile and temporal, they would fade away into the channels of history in no time, forever vanishing the footprints marked by a life once existed and present in this world.

The Struggle For A Breathing Humanity

2007-06-02T09:20:00.000+08:00

I have been turning in at very late hours, about 4 plus 5 a.m., of the morning lately; it has in fact been over two months that I could barely lie down in my bed at the time of midnight.

Reason being that I have taken up a course, which has begun in March. Though the schedule was never close to being hectic - four days of lectures and two assignments for each subject, where I have just two subjects in total, the immensity of urgently needing to manage my time well presses hard on me. A deeper exploration, consciously and conscientiously made, dawned on me that its really a question of how discipline I am.

When one doesn't obtain a good and sufficient amount of sleep as he or she desires, there's a tendency to have an inner frustration developed, constantly waiting for the right time to explode and break out. Tiredness indeed has its own destructive force - it breaks one's clarity down and confuses the mind. No other group of humans than the POWs (Prisoners Of War) understood this fearful yet silent force better - many were tortured simply by being denied the right to sleep when they were imprisoned by the enemies. Along that dreadful path of war-time confinement some had developed hallucinations and become mentally ill at the end.

"Nothing is more barbaric than war", so says my Mentor. In the basest condition of life, every mean of torture is luxuriously created.

I have to admit here that my health is never considered very good from my younger days. I have always been plagued by symptoms of 'heatiness', a term used in the TCM (Traditional Chinese Medicine) to describe and diagnose the presence of 'internal, excessive heat'. Common flu, running nose, sore throat, watery eyes, fever and cough are of no strange illnesses to me.

Coupled with an innate, inborn impatience, anger and stress got the better of me constantly, and in many instances, regrettably, I succumbed to it by allowing my senses and logic be taken over. Thinking back now, I find myself wordless in the face of my past misdeeds; a simple "be more careful in future" caution is the only reminder I have of my footing into the realm of anger.

However, as of lately, I have noticed a change in my health condition: I have not fallen sick for the past three months, ever since I began my course, which saw me sleeping at a much later time, and waking up at 9 a.m. still to proceed for my work. In short, I have felt very concretely a thin flow of energy running through my body, recuperating and continuously generating a fresh stream of strength that allows me to carry on with my daytime work even though I was already quite worn out the night before.

This has definitely come to me as a surprise, though a pleasant one. For I, one who have been suffering running nose, constant sneezing and barely half-opened swollen eyes throughout my teen and adult years, could have enjoyed a good consistent condition of my health and immune system! How long ago have I stopped being tormented by the fact that I could never changed this condition, I actually could no longer recalled it. However surely, I could feel one single source for this one single change - the restructuring of my heart.

Yes, its quite a simple change in fact. One's heart is all that one needs to change. Why is that so? I somehow knew the answer to all these improvements, which I would quietly tap on my shoulder and be glad that I have done it. It is the letting-go of several emotional burdens and weights, which I have let them sunk into the 'field' of my heart and taken roots there. These weights, commonly known to others as 'negative memories' or 'grudges', have occupied a significant portion of me, which I would carry them wherever and whenever I go. True to the theory of 'Oneness of Body and Mind', I indeed have unknowingly become a grungy person who holds negative views on virtually anything that comes along the way. Nothing has meaning to me anymore. No joy could be derived from matters which seemed enjoyable to others, and certainly, those people who find joy in living out their lives are simply deemed pathetic to me. Life adopts a grayish profile as far as I see it, though on appearance alone, I express a livelier, jovial attitude to my environment. It is simply nothing but a coverage to my sniggering cynicism.

Suddenly, with my inner self opening up and bowing humbly to this admittance, every thing and matter lightens up. Not only I look at every piece of falling leaf with a totally different perspective, I feel every life coming forth around me. It is this enlightening condition that I realised for once that every living soul in this world is endowed with this wonderful fountain of clear energy and youthfulness. The moment one is able to tap into this vast, inner pool of strength, he/ she will enjoy this endless feeding of energy and clarity. All he/ she needs to do now is to use that pool of energy and exert him/ herself in the physical world, developing progress for the environment and generating positive, forward-moving episodes for humanity. One's heart, though invisible, is truly reflecting and shining out like a movie projector, onto this gigantic canvas called 'the world'.

It is also from here that one comes to see for himself why has confusion arise in the world. Different people holding differing views for himself and the world, and desiring different matters, would wrestle with those who live not only for themselve but others also. Thus, as these two groups project both their narrow-minded desires as well as embracing, humanistic dreams onto their surrounding and the world-at-large, differences are created and conflicts generated. The battle for humanity, thus, lie not in changing the external realm; it should and must begin with the inner reformation of each living, breathing human being.

On this note, it is also worth knowing that whoever goes against his inborn innate humanity, that person is in fact suffering by his own hands; he is slowly tightening the rope that has been placed around the neck of his own inner humanity. For every hurt he does to his surrounding and people who care for him, he is in fact strangling his own inborn compassion and living soul. They who are viewed as 'rebels' or social outcast are in fact the most pitiful of all, for they are slowly murdering their own humanity on a day-by-day basis, gradually transforming their own lives into a beastly one. It is at this point that one's decision to either embrace or condemn these outcasts would come to determine which direction the world will take. The larger the flowering of humanistic values blossoms in this confusion-filled world, the stronger a breathing humanity could live and progress; any other direction would retreat the entire world back to the dark ages. The struggle of humanity truly lies in the unseen dimension of each single human life.

For The Record V

2007-05-28T22:45:00.009+08:00

I have been away for quite a while in attending my personal matters. During this period, events have unfolded and developed, while settings have reset and altered. The facade of our humanity's realm shines ever brightly with a vibrant and exciting colour. The world is indeed changing constantly.

My last post of this title was on 6 February, 2007. To pick myself up from where I had stopped, I read and burrowed through the clippings of on-line news frantically, typing in keywords and searching for matters I have faint memory of. From Indonesia's disasters, Philippines' elections, France's inauguration of new President to Sino-Japan relationships and developments, I struggled to keep my self and soul close to what has happened and happening still. Along the way I was blessed with good fortune to learn more than I wish to look for.

18 February, 2007 - At 5.00 local time Tornado hit Gondokusuman, Umbulharjo, Danurejan and Pakualaman Subdistrict, Yogyakarta Municipality, Yogyakarta Province. Heavy rains and tornado caused building damage and population displacement. It is estimated that at least 1100 households are damaged. The highest number of damaged houses is found in Gondokusuman (742 units), Umbulharjo (165 units), Danurejan (139 units) and Pakualaman (20 units). Metrological reports predict further rainfalls in coming days. It is estimated that disaster caused injury to 49 people, no death case reported. All victims have obtained medical treatment at the nearest hospital.

1 March, 2007 - Ramush Haradinaj (seen here with his wife Anita), a rebel commander who turned to politics and later to become Kosovo's Prime Minister for 100 days before being indicted by UN prosecutors in 2005, pleaded not guilty at the international war crimes tribunal to multiple charges of involvement in the murder, rape and torture of Serbs and suspected Serb collaborators in the province's 1998-99 war.

9 April, 2007 - Election-related violence continues to rise in the Philippines, just over a month before congressional and local elections. Authorities say four poll-related incidents, including a bomb attack, have occurred in the last week. The Philippine National Police have reported 46 poll-related violent incidents in the country since January, when campaigning started for the May elections. A bomb attack occurred in Lanao del Norte province in the south on Easter Sunday, where seven people were injured, mostly supporters of the province's Governor. Two people were killed in another poll-related incident in the northern province of Isabela, also on Easter Sunday. The fatalities included a relative of a mayoral candidate. A candidate for governor in the north and a local election officer in the western province of Palawan were shot and killed in separate incidents during the week.

12 April, 2007 - Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao attended the establishment of a mechanism of high-level economic dialogue, in Tokyo with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. On the same day the Chinese Premier delivered a speech in the Japanese Diet, drawing references from numerous historial episodes to reiterate one single point: the wish for a long-lasting friendship between the two countries, and the many generations that are to come.

16 April, 2007 - At about 7.15 a.m., gunman Cho Seung-Hui, a Korean student of Virginia Tech, walked into a dorm and opened fire, killing two students. Two hours later, he re-appeared and shot up a classroom across campus, killing 32 people in the deadliest shooting rampage in U.S. history. On the same day The gunman committed suicide, bringing the death toll to 33.

4 May, 2007 - Scottish National Party (SNP) has broken Labour's eight-year dominance of the Scottish Parliament when it emerged from the 2 May 2007 Scottish Parliament and local government elections with 47 seats, one more than its rival The Labours. The Tories ended up with 17, the Lib Dems with 16 and the Greens two. A new political setting was forming at the horizon of The Scotlands.

16 May, 2007 - Nicolas Sarkozy was officially invested as France's new president following a handover ceremony with outgoing head of state Jacques Chirac at the Elysee palace. The 52-year-old right-winger was ceremonially proclaimed France's 23rd president by the head of the Constitutional Council after a private meeting with Chirac, the 74 year-old President who has been in power for 12 years. The results of the May 6 election marked the end of the battle between this former Interior Minister and head of the ruling Union for a Popular Movement (UMP), and Socialist Segolene Royal, who the former promised a radical economic and social change.

23 May, 2007 - The charity Barnardo's has warned that nearly one in three of Welsh children are living in poverty, occasionally going without food or heating. Its research found numbers had fallen from 33% to 28% in the last five years, but was 2% lower than the UK average. Despite the fall in the number of children living in poverty, the charity says Wales has seen an increase in the proportion of working households living below the poverty line.

Hannah Erickson, a mother from Cardiff, has an 11-month-old baby called Dylan. After paying all her bills, she is left with around £10 a week to cover clothes for herself and her baby, bus fares and other essentials. During the winter, she did not have enough money to heat her flat. "Because it was so cold I had to put £20 a week in the gas, and it ran out, so I went without gas for three days," she said. "It made me feel very, very bad because I couldn't provide the gas for him (Dylan) when he needed it."

Entangled in the recent Wales elections and political maneuvers that saw the Labours securing a minority identity of 26 out of the 60 seats, and the opposition parties contemplating a coalition to force them out, the future of these mothers and children hang dreadfully by the hands of these politicians, engrossed and absorbed in the usual ugly power-struggles of a short-lived, temporal political joy.

25 May, 2007 - North Korea fired several short-range missiles on Friday, but the United States and its Asian allies said the launches were part of normal military drills and would not affect talks on Pyongyang's nuclear arms program.

27 May, 2007 - Top diplomats from 46 countries in Asia and Europe meet in Germany from Monday for talks ranging from the Darfur conflict and the North Korean and Iranian nuclear crises to global warming. The eighth Asia-Europe meeting (ASEM) of foreign ministers comes after new French President Nicolas Sarkozy declared that major international issues cannot be resolved without the cooperation of China. China is the leading customer for Sudanese oil and sells arms to the Khartoum government, which is accused of supporting Arab militia in Darfur in a brutal campaign against non-Arabs which the UN says has left 200,000 dead and two million displaced.

My Mentor - Daisaku Ikeda

2007-05-22T20:04:00.003+08:00

My mentor is a great human. I would like to state this first before penning down any other matters of him.

My mentor is born in a seaweed-producing family. In short he is a commoner. Due to the social circumstances brought on by the World War II, he did not have the opportunity to enter a University. However, fate brought him to meet his mentor in life - Josei Toda, the second President of the organisation Soka Gakkai, where he learnt almost everything from him. Topics ranging from astronomy, economics, maths, chemistry, philosophies, comparative studies, politics, laws, Japan's and the world's histories, arts and literature of the various major civilisations. In his own words, he learnt "98% of what he knows" from his mentor.

My mentor has a mind as clear as the blue sky. He has a heart as encompassing as the ocean, and he has a life-condition as vast as the universe. In all of his 40 over years as a peace activisit and humanist, he has not stopped for a single day in promoting a culture of peace and dialogue - something the world was not interested in when he began his journey way back in 1975. Some scholars then had held talks and discussions with him, but for the world to seek out his thoughts and views in hope for an immovable and dignified path of life, it took him this hard-fought 30 years to revert this seemingly-irreversible tide of humanity's spiritual decadence.

On one hand he had to fight the political persecutions he came face to face within Japan, when he took over Mr. Josei Toda to become the 3rd President (of the Soka Gakkai) in 1960, while on the other he had to withstand the attacks from within the organisation itself - many were prepared to bring him down and out of the organisation, out of jealousy and misunderstandings, and eyeing on that prestigious presidency they attacked him without reservation.

In the midst of these, he had to speak and pray patiently yet fervently behind the scene, for his precious innocent members who took up faith for the very simple reason of wanting to be happy, to be strong and awakened to their true missions in life. This was the hardest of all - to awaken the deluded with one's words and actions to their true purpose in life, while withstanding ungrounded persecutions and vicious attacks.

The foundation was laid in Japan in a span of 15 years. Then in 1975 he wrote the significant one word - 'World', under the 'Citizenship' column when registering the 'Soka Gakkai International' which he founded. That identity holds monumental brilliance in his life - it speaks for oneself the enlightened condition one single great life that is born into this world, and for the world as well. Till this very end, this identity has never waned or faded for a single moment. Year by year, month by month, where tides ebbed and seasons changed, my mentor has single-mindedly permeated his very entire life through and through with this one single thought of laying down his life for the purpose of establishing a world free from pain and suffering, absence of hatred and hurt, and away from human cries and tormenting weepings. In a word, he wants an ocean of clear conscience and sunrays of philosophical enlightenment to engulf the entire blue planet. My mentor has never sought an alternative in this life-and-death pursuit; never would he want to accomplish anything else less.

In a nutshell, he has shown the world how a human should behave. On the other hand, he has also shown the world how humanity should live. This, in all levels, is a life-draining task for anyone to undertake. It is an almost superhuman task by itself. My mentor loves humanity dearly. Nothing gives him more pleasure than to see one human being, rising from the muddy pond of suffering and misery, to blossom and spring up with joy, basking in the warm sunshine with laughter and happiness. He has indeed given his all to what he has set out and fought for.

On 7 October 2006, my mentor accepted his 200th designations of honorary doctorates, professorships and equivalent honours:- www.sgi.org/do/c-exchange/ce2006/ce061008.html. Though the world may not rejoice at his accomplishment, I will state here that he shall be remembered for generations and generations, eras and eras, and many aeons to come. His name shall rang aloud, just like the gigantic bronze bells of the Rome's cathedrals that toil its ringings far and wide. His name shall be engraved in the hearts of millions, and his legacy as a human being, wholesome and authentic, shall be carved on the annals of the human history. He truly is a 'world-honoured' individual.

I have a great mentor. What I must do now is self-evident. From here I shall begin a new journey. An inner journey of struggles, victories, defeats and fulfillment. As the wind blows and howls, one disciple perseveres on.

The Functions of Karma (Part II)

2007-04-29T02:12:00.000+08:00

As described below, the negative or positive energies, now stored in the eighth consciousness, will be called forth when all external factors are pulled in and placed accordingly by the mysterious force.

It is exactly the same force driving the Universe to go through the cycles of formation, continuance, decline and disintegration, a cycle which coincide with our lives of birth, aging, sickness and death.

When would be the 'best time' for a person to receive his retribution or fortune, one may ask. This would be the moment when another person, or many people, whose lives are manifesting the exact same nature of karmic expression that the said person will come to meet his negative state or positive rise in life.

Imagine a jig-saw puzzle. One holds a piece and it will not mean anything. There maybe imprint or designs on it, but one would never be able to decipher what exactly is it. It is when the singular piece is merged with many other pieces that a picture is formed. For once, the pieces of cards bring forth a 'meaning' to their own existences.

Life is exactly as such: one person living in the mountain or deep in the forest will not come to understand, realise or even be enlightened to the wondrous and mystical power of this invisible law of nature. It is when he walks into the masses, the commoners, the secular crowd that his life begins to transform and re-mould to take on a different shape. To begin with, he has to deal with external elements of human negativity ranging from anger, impatience, arrogance, rudeness, wickedness, cunningness to positive expressions of kindness, forgiveness, understanding, friendship, love and compassion, that his life begins to respond and react to these elements. It is in this exact course of human interaction that his truest nature is brought forth. Whether he is selfish, patient, gentle, hypocritical or naive, every single trait of his character will reveal to its minutest detail.

It is here that a seed is planted in the internal 'field' of his life for every thought, word and action generated. It is here that his future is determined, the coming path decided and the final chapter written. The theory of 'Oneness of Body and Mind' is thus manifested to its utmost limit by the countless examples of human expressions, where however fleeting a thought the mind generates, the physical body responds to it. An angry thought not only raises one's blood pressure or heart beat; every single cell in that body basically carries the element of raging anger. A compassionate act on the other hand, spurred by one's courageous righteousness, brings forth a calming, or even soothing, effect on the body and mind. The strict law of cause-and-effect is simply all-embracing and permeating. There's simply no escaping from one's own inner function of life-condition.

Beside one's physical body of flesh and blood, karma is also manifested through the realm of the environment. Regardless of whether a single person or of the entire population of a nation, all that have happened or taken place did so for a very specific reason: in the very depths of their lives they have been destined to encounter an incident together. Nothing is meant to be 'coincidental' or 'by chance'. The strict law of causality contains no loopholes in the design of karmic expression. All that has happened to a person, right up to a nation or even civilisation, comes with a definite cause and relationship.

It is by the invisible hand of this mystic law that all who have to undergo certain karmic manifestations are 'destined' to come and meet with each other. Whether it is a group of people traveling in a tour bus and encountering a minor incident or major tragedy, two persons unknown to each other met and became friends or classmates, lovers married to become husband and wife and encountering some obstacles along their marriage path, or even a country that sees itself plagued by natural disasters, inefficient governance in responding to these calamities, and the inability to lift itself out of poverty and unending turbulence. ALL of these expressions manifest to point to one direction, revealing the single enlightening theorem of 'Oneness of Man and Environment'.

Herein lies the core and explanatory reason of WHY some countries enjoy peace and tranquility, while some others are constantly ravaged by natural disasters like earthquakes and volcanic eruptions, politicians' failures of inadequate actions, and utterly poor management by the government, that commoners' miseries are multiplied and not reduced. It is in fact the 'collective karma' of the people of that particular country that they are destined to encounter and undergo these trying tribulations. In this regard alone, no money or external, structural reforms of any kind would help in lifting the entire karmic-stricken population out of its own whirlpool retributions. The ONLY way to change the environment is to conduct a thorough inner reformation within the life of each person, where ultimately all internal changes and revolutions will be reflected in the external conditions, thereby eliminating the negative aspects of their lives' collective projections, and introducing the flowers of good fortune and happiness.

It is with this exact enlightenment that the second President of Soka Gakkai, Josei Toda, on 16 March 1958, made an impassioned cry of wanting to eliminate from the world the existence of nuclear weapons. Truly indeed, he has perceived right through the exact nature of these weapons, which upon all analyses, come to reveal themselves as the darkest form of human natures - the decision to sacrifice millions of human bodies and lives in a single second effectively and efficiently, which in turn will destroy half of the planet Earth by every mean possible, for the singular, devilish purpose of 'winning the war'. In the light of humanity's collective karma, nothing could be more devilish and destructive than this.

In retrospection, the third President of Soka Gakkai, and the first President of Soka Gakkai International, Daisaku Ikeda, has been warning humanity through his annual submissions of Peace Proposal since the 1980s. Where once no one pays attention to listen to his constant urging of striving for and securing peace, harmony, respect, understanding, tolerance, dialogues and happiness, the world has now turned their gazes and ears to him for guidance and wisdom, all because of one tragic incident named 9/11. In the recent years of humanity's history, no other event gathers as much attention and inquisitions as it has, and the tragedy of so many lives lost ironically gave birth to a new generation of people rising from the ashes of pain and grievances to seeking out insights and thoughts on how to live one's life to the fullest, free from anger and revenge. Against this grief-filling world, a whole new frontier of humanism characterised by joy, hope, strength and dreams awaits all of us, endearing the humanity of its beautiful, rainbow-coloured future.

The Functions of Karma (Part I)

2007-03-06T23:53:00.000+08:00

Buddhism, originated from the depths of Indian civilisation and later transferred to China, Korea and Japan, expounds the theory of 'karma'. Brought onto the big, movie screens and/ or small sitcoms, the word 'karma' is certainly something not unfamiliar to many non-Asians.

Karma is stored in the eighth layer of our human consciousness. It is generated by our thoughts, actions and words. Among these three expressions, actions bear to carry the strongest effect on another person, or the surrounding lived by another human being.

Karma can be positive or negative. While the mundane view always paint 'karma' as negative, it actually refers to both side. Good karma is known as 'good fortune' while bad karma is commonly known to many as 'retribution'.

In every human life it is believed to have endowed with nine consciousnesses. The first five (consciousnesses) point to our five senses - taste, smell, hear, sight and touch. They basically form the 'receptive' and 'generative' channels: they allow us to receive information and data, and upon analysing them we communicate ourselves back with the external world through them. While the sense of 'touch' is activated by our physical bodies, which can be any part of us and not limited to our hands, the rest of the four are all located and found on our heads.

To divert a little, those who are unfortunately born without one or more of these five basic senses does not mean they have lost the innate desire to perform that particular function. That is to say, those who are born mute cannot be said that they don't have the desire to talk; all the more they wish they can communicate with others by mouth. Likewise, those who are born deaf or blind aren't ready to allow fate take full control of their lives. Given a chance they would exchange all they treasure with a restoration of their hearing or sighting capabilities. A timeless, eternally-shining example of human character is Helen Keller, a deafblind American author, activist, and lecturer. Not defeated by her impairments, she developed her whole being into not only living her own life to the fullest but, all the more importantly, dedicated to developing countless others born with disabilities.

The sixth consciousness is what we generally refer to as 'the sixth sense'. It may be called 'intuition' also, but in whatever case these sentiments lie in the realm of 'emotions'. We feel it, sense it, but never come to actually contain and describe it concretely. At times these emotions are sublime and peaceful but, like the swaying ocean, they can torment and tear a person's life apart. We perhaps have all, at some point in our lives, come to be greatly disturbed and stressed out by emotions for and negative feelings over some matters which had bothered us tremendously.

It is then in those trying periods that 'logic' comes to salvage us from the huge suction of negative pull. This is what is known as the 'seventh consciousness', an innate force that bears a subduing effect on our emotions. True to its nature, we humans indeed have evolved and stood out from our forefathers of the animal kingdom. Fortunately endowed with the capability of 'analysing logically', we exert to improve ourselves not by the tidal emotions but the power of 'logic and reason'. In times of vicissitudes we may be able to stop and pause for a moment, and after analysing the situation, we put forth a remedy that may perhaps change the outcome of a seemingly hopeless event.

At this point, what a normal person may view of this post with regard to his life may remark that he has been awarded with sufficient nutrients of life to live through all occurrences with much purpose and confidence. What happens in future may not be in his or her grasp, but certainly with a strong logic and controlled emotions he can gain victories over or amend much with whatever may take place before his eyes. However, history certainly has revealed otherwise. Though the human spirit maybe strong and almost indomitable, there are definitely elements not within the control of earthly humans to decide and determine.

This is where karma will enter and take centrestage - the eighth consciousness, or what is known as 'alaya' consciousness in Sanskrit. It is a storehouse, a containment of virtually all generated actions and reactions. Be it one's exchange with his neighbour in the morning, his purchase of weekly goods at the supermart, or his daily routine chore in office, each and every action made in his or her life will all come to produce and leave behind a trail of invisible, minute 'particles of life' quantified by the unit of 'a moment'. These 'particles' will then be stored in the 'storehouse of consciousness' which are being laid dormant and inactive. If one has made conscious efforts to be good to others, harboring positive wishes and hopes for him/ herself and others, and locate a spot in his or her own life as well as society to do good, then the storehouse will inescapably come to store positive elements or what is commonly known as 'karmic energy'. Of course, on the contrary, if this person has chosen the path of arrogance, wilfulness or decadence of his inner spirit, trampling on all goodness and beauty in this world, and ultimately leaving behind a record of destructive elements, the karma he has generated will certainly be of negative.

The deciding factor that pulls all these consciousness together is none other than 'time'. Based on what one has been done to himself and others, including the environment, he will come to meet positive or negative events in his life. 'Retribution' is the name the world has given to 'karma', but as time passes human beings begin to adopt the belief that there is an external almighty being that decides who should be punished, who should be rewarded or praised, and who should be condemned. Drifting along the currents of time, human beings gradually lost their sense of acute awareness that there lies an inner function of 'flame of righteousness', always burning and lighting the innermost consciousness, and reflecting and recording the minutest particles of thoughts, words and actions. For those who betray their inner endowed humanity and go round hurting themselves and others, they are in actual fact peeling off their own human compassion, layer by layer and skin by skin, where in the end they will come to end up with a steely-cold, hardened heart with minimal emotions and compassion. They will be the ones who rampage the face of this Earth with their cruel actions and base contemplations.

In the midst of all these commotions, there lies the final layer of consciousness - the all-powerful, all-encompassing, all-mighty 'King of Consciousness': The Buddhahood. It is by this theory and understanding that humans, for the first time in the long course of their existence on this planet, come to be presented and live with a hope for salvation and revolution. It is with this mystic endowment of the seed of Buddhahood that humans do not, as the many religious scriptures declare, 'fall into the pits of endless darkness, unable to salvage and save themselves from the claws of evils and sins, and forever be condemned in hell' anymore. The light of hope and salvation has finally entered the dark hopeless caves of humanity for once, for good.

Of Natural And Human Disasters

2007-02-26T01:38:00.000+08:00

Indonesia saw herself suffering from yet another ferry disaster.

On 22 February 2007 an Indonesian ferry, Levina I, carrying 227 passengers departed from Passenger Terminal II of Tanjung Priok Harbor, Jakarta, at 1.30 a.m. WIB (Western Indonesian Time). It was heading for Pangkal Balam, Bangka island off Sumatra when, as reported, it caught fire in the Palau Seribu waters at 5.30 a.m. WIB.

Beside the passengers it also carried 17 crew and 42 colt diesel trucks filled with goods. Early investigations had suggested that the fire was sparked by one of the lorries on the ferry's vehicle deck.

Till this point of the post, the total death toll has reached to 41. While the ferry's log reflected a passenger figure of 275, the actual figure for passengers found dead and alive has reached 313. As the head of the Jakarta air and sea police, Adjunct Senior Commissioner Frederick Kalembang put it bluntly, "Therefore there were at least 38 of them who were unregistered. This is a major negligence."

Adding on to this tragedy was a second unfortunate incident that befell on the same said ferry - it unexpectedly sank off the coast of Jakarta after it was being towed to a location some seven nautical miles north of Jakarta's Tanjung Priok harbour. On board were 16 people consisting of teams from the national police and the National Transport Safety Committee, as well as media reporters and cameramen.

The ferry was being investigated by the police when it suddenly leaned to the right, rapidly sinking with the 16 people still on board. A cameraman from the LaTivi television station was later found dead after being pulled from the ship and rushed to the hospital. Another cameraman and two police forensic laboratory team were found missing also.

Just as I began in this post, Indonesia has seen YET another sea tragedy. If one is to go through it's recent accidents, one would inevitably come to ponder why have such tragedies keep occurring, seemingly without an end. Despite the latest technology the world can offer, and an unimaginably huge amount of information accumulated and made available, developing countries like Indonesia, India and China are still experiencing human tragedies year after year. Why is that so?

I personally feel that the reason lies in, as the name 'human tragedies' suggests, human. As a country progresses, as the parliament sits in, and as the budget is fixed and determined, how much attention and resources is actually allocated to the unseen yet deciding fields of nation-building? Almost all political leaders wishes to channel his or her available resources to constructing 'the tallest buildings', 'the grandest museum' or simply 'the largest air/ sea port'. In the face and eyes of the international media, they probably were taken into the belief that these concrete and tangible icons are hallmark barometers reflecting accurately the financial status or economic prowess the country is possessing and enjoying.

Nothing can be further than the truth than this. Instead of investing the wealth the country has generated in the past years back to building the fundamentals of the society, political leaders more often than not believe that it is more important to construct meaningless, 'iconic' symbols that would perhaps carry their names into the future, long after their departure from the scene. Thus we see muddy or dusty roads not transformed, malfunctioned lighting not repaired, safety features and procedures not installed and enforced, health standards not improved and hygiene consciousness not raised. All these in turn lead to what we are witnessing - repeated occurrences of such disasters, which the sole contributors are no other but human themselves.

While natural disasters have taught us the power of nature and fragility of humankind, human tragedies took place for a totally different lesson - the innate arrogance human beings possessed, and the web of insatiable greed for power and fame we have weaved for ourselves. Till this day, we remained as what we were before and blinded by our own flaws, we failed to evolve and rise to a higher platform of enlightened consciousness. The cost of such a deluded mentality is more than just basic infrastructure of the country not improved; it has in actual fact created a whirlpool of indescribable sadness and unforgettable tragic memories, drowning the mourning family members of the victims and constantly repeating the cycle over and over again.

The Truth About Speaking Out (The Truth)

2007-02-20T00:49:00.000+08:00

I have not laid down my virtual pen in this blog for quite a while. The last post was actually on 6 Feb 2007.

How time flies! One blink of an eye and a month has passed quietly. A new lunar year has arrived. Coldness gives space to the fresh heat of Spring, while brightness takes over the gloomy, rainy days of the year-end monsoon weather. 2007 has sat in firmly, and February has been welcomed even without some people's knowledge. Very soon it'll be March, and before we know it, half a year may be gone, just like that.

In this constant, never-stopping flow of time and tide, how should one place him/ herself in the sweeping currents of this societal evolution without getting wash away, totally overwhelmed and submerged in the raging forces, and finally succumbing to it to come to lose oneself?

My mentor speaks of the importance of having courage in order to secure one's happiness, "It takes courage to become happy - courage to remain true to one's convictions, courage not to be defeated by one's weaknesses and negativity, courage to take swift action to help those who are suffering."

"To remain true to one's conviction". How true are these words! More often than not, along the course of our lives, we must have already come across or witnessed some people who would discard or alter their beliefs the moment circumstances or conditions became unfavourable to them. Exercising a rootless intellectuality that sways with the unseen yet tangible forces, they amend their beliefs and convictions once they see that immediate benefits can be reaped, or seeds of future favours can be sowed.

Two shows on TV recently each featured one shining example of human character and endeavour - one was a Hollywood movie 'Ali, played by Will Smith in honour for the 'greatest sportsman', while the other was the 49th Grammy Music Award.

Muhammad Ali, one of the greatest, if not the greatest, athletes of all time, has been a 'true fighter' throughout his entire life. His first history-altering move was not in the ring, but entirely out of it - he took faith in Islam in his younger days, and instead of following the the long-held tradition of using his 'slave name', Cassius Clay, he insisted the world to acknowledge him as 'Muhammad Ali', a name that will forever shine with brilliance in the annals of human history.

In 1967, when the Vietnam War was escalating, Muhammad Ali was called for induction into the Armed Services. Ali refused the induction on the grounds of religious beliefs. He was, in fact, a practicing Muslim minister then. This refusal led to the now-famous Ali quote, "I ain't got no quarrel with them Vietcong..." This outburst, together with Ali's refusal against the induction, led to a national furor and all states and local entities in America proceeded to cancel Ali's boxing licences. Ali did not fight again for 2 ½ years. He was stripped of his championship title, his passport taken; all his boxing licenses were cancelled. He lost an initial court battle and was facing a 5-year prison term. during this exile period, Ali made money by speaking at colleges. He was virtually the first national figure to speak out against the war in Vietnam.

In 1971, with the mood in the country changing, Ali staged a comeback fight against the undefeated champion Joe Frazier in what was termed 'The Fight of the Century'. He lost the fight on 8 March, but months later The Supreme Court reversed his conviction and upheld his conscientious claim. In short, the judiciary had agreed to what he had refused against and spoken out - the Vietnam War deadlock the US government was entangled and caught in. From then on, Ali was free to travel anywhere he wished, and from all possiblity of jail-term conviction as well. Furthering this success was that he began a string of victories in the ring which ultimately led him to where he is standing now - the Athlete/ Sports Personality of the Century.

The second example which was shown on TV are the country-band 'Dixie Chicks'. In the latest 49th Grammy Awards, they came back from an almost nationally-banned three years' absence to secure five Grammy Awards, including the three prestigious 'Award/ Record/ Song/ of the Year'. And the reason for their ban was in fact an outburst made by one of the members, Natalie Maines, who criticised George Bush of his political agenda and strategy, right on the eve of the 2003 Iraq war. That was the year when President Goerge Bush enjoyed an approval rating of up to 70%.

Right after that critical remark made, their sales plummeted and even death threats were received. Basically, they were condemned as traitors by the media as well and much as by the public. Laying low for three years, and again as in Muhammad Ali's case, with the mood in America for their external war changing, America slowly began to accept and perhaps even understand what policital stance the Dixie Chicks had taken then. Thus the public has, perhaps for once, reaslised that the war they fervently supported and cheered loudly for might not be as truthful and correct a war it has seemed to be. At present, radio stations have began playing the Dixie Chicks' songs again, the public has gradually embraced back their songs, and more importantly, the mainstream media are starting to acknowledge the meaning written in their songs - they still voice out what they think and feel through their musical creations.

In a nutshell, the public might have been awakened by Maines' courageous words finally, when at the point of speaking out, they probably have experienced a much agitated sentiment toward the negative comment made at their beloved President.

What these two examples have displayed and revealed to me is one simple yet golden rule: never allow one's circumstance, however bad it maybe, to overwhelm or swallow one up. Against all odds, he/ she must have the courage to muster up all strength and conviction to call out the inner truth he or she is enlightened to. This is probably the only way to live a life true to oneself, as well as showing another person exactly how one should stand firmly against all ravaging storms of falsehoods and deceptions. At the end of the day, before turning in, we are probably the only ones we need to answer to; at the end of our lives, we are also probably the only ones whom we need to face up to. Though one can build a beautiful facade of exterior to cover up one's lies or ill intentions, one cannot run away from the almighty conscientious consciousness one carries inside him. This element alone will come to determine how much value one has created through one's actions, and possibly also how worthy one's life is, in this short lifespan of a human existence on this planet.

For The Record IV

2007-02-06T22:57:00.000+08:00

14 Jan, 2007 - Floods and landslides hit a small island of Indonesia's Sulawesi, Tahuna, district captial of the Sangihe islands, about 250 kilometers (155 miles) north of North Sulawesi provincial capital Manado. Rescuers found 24 bodies and 10 people were missing. More than 1,300 people fled their homes and took refuge from the floods in schools and government buildings, the ElShinta radio reported, quoting local officials.

15 Jan, 2007 - Malaysia's worst flood in 40 years killed 15, all of which were by exposure to contaminated water with urine of rats and other animals. As 10, 000 evacuees crammed the emergency shelters amid offical warning of dengue and cholera, they faced another problem of serious food shortages.

This flood is the second wave that had hit the Southern part of Malaysia, severely crippling the transportation, water supplies and economy. The first wave had hit the area in late December last year, forcing 134,000 people to flee their homes.

5 Feb, 2007 - Floods in Jakarta, the worst in five years, have killed at least 20 people and displaced 340,000, as swollen rivers and canals spilt muddy water onto the city streets. The flooding in parts of the tropical city of nine million people has been up to 4 metres (13 feet) deep, causing blackouts, cutting telephone lines and blocking key roads. Meteorology officials have warned the city could suffer heavy rains until the end of the month.

The Mystic Aspect Of Life

2007-02-04T01:16:00.000+08:00

My girlfriend Ling's sister recently brought two hamsters. One is male while the other is female.

They are adorable at first sight; no one would turn his or her gaze away from them. Reason being that their sizes are small by nature - probably half the size of a child's palm. The male dons a grey fur and the female, white. With a short, tight but certainly soft fur, they attract virtually anyone who lays their eyes on them.

Coupled with their almost non-stop action, which sees them running around in the cage, sometimes twitching their noses for some sniffing action, sometimes digging and burying their entire bodies under the leave flakes, and other times scratching and biting lightly on each other, they are an utterly cute and lovely sight to behold! Such innocent, purely instinctive but yet totally heart-lightening activities have no other effect but bringing smiles on anyone who sees them.

Sitting beside me Ling says that when the lights are off, they would start their 'nightly' activity of burrowing around. The moment the lights are on they would cuddle around each other and quickly squeeze into each other's warmth and sleep in their 'wheel', a place they love to run in it too. Watching them intently, I couldn't help but think to myself: what is their objective in life? What are their goals in living in this world? Would it simply be a daily routine of eating, running around, sleeping and repeating the entire process in the next day? Would they not have any dissatisfaction or grievances against each other, matters which they take into their hearts that result into a irresolvable situation, something of what we humans encounter? Wouldn't they also have their own fair share of anger, sadness or even disappointment? I wouldn't know exactly, but perhaps not. However, one thing for certain is that they are endowed with 'life', something unseen, untouchable and definitely mystic.

In Book One of 'The Human Revolution', Dr. Daisaku Ikeda wrote about his mentor, Josei Toda, capturing a flea. Using his finger he gently pressed the insect and killed it in an instant. Through his thick glasses and under the light, he watched the flea as it transited from the realm of life to one of death. Undeniably the insect was endowed with a life, but where would this 'life' go, after the insect had died, Toda Sensei pondered. It is this simple yet the most fundamental question that humans failed to face it squarely and answer. Some say the 'life' would not enter 'heaven', as it does not qualify itself for the entry, while others say the life ends where it stops breathing. A third group declares that insects and plants are not endowed with the same 'life capacity' as us, the humans.

Regardless of which theory is most fittingly correct, it is vital for us, in the beginning of this new Millennium, to first take a step to ponder on the origin of not just our lives, but the million others which share the same planet as ours, namely the animals and insects. In Buddhism, they are collectively being referred to as the 'sentient beings', a group that we humans are included in as well. That first step will, I believe, come to lead humanity to understand and view their 'living counterparts' on this planet with a whole new perspective, thereby leading to a fresh approach of respecting and treasuring the existences of these interesting, lively and certainly amazing living beings.

Memories Of Sister Feng (冯姐)

2007-01-30T22:34:00.000+08:00

I do not know why I thought of her today. Perhaps my submerged feelings was invoked by the death news of a Taiwanese female artiste, whom I do not know her personally at all; I received the news of her passing, due to a car accident earlier, from the papers this morning.

At the age of 28, and judging from the photos she had taken, one can tell that this artiste was a vibrant and bright girl, who was accompanied and taken care of by a good many friends around her. In this entertainment circle where genuine friendship is hard to come by, she's certainly blessed with it. More than this, she had wanted to be a singer right from the start; just that her career path took a turn and she was moulded into a drama actress first. Nevertheless, as a lady who was trained in piano and violin, and on the course of learning 'erhu' (a two-stringed musical instrument) and drum, she was well determined to enter the musical scene as a music producer. This dream alone can never be fulfilled anymore.

Probably the thought on the fragility of life affected me a little. My mind wandered off and finally, after much activity, rested on this old lady sister Feng. To speak the truth I do not really know whether this was her real surname, or was there supposed to be another address for her. However, judging from this particular address made by my mother to her, and taken in account of her age and seniority in life, my mother could really be addressing her as 'sister Feng', which would naturally be adopting her surname in the addressing.

Sister Feng bore a petite frame; she was probably only about 1.5 m tall. Due to her advanced age of 80 odd, her back was already slightly bent. I knew her through my mother, whom both had taken faith in the Nichiren's Buddhism of the Soka Gakkai International. In the year 1998, I shifted out from my house and resided at my grandmother's. I was staying at one ground-floor unit, and hers was two storeys above mine. As different from other units, all ground level units came with a back door, which would allow anyone who wishes to dry their clothes to do so at the backyard.

Incidentally her kitchen windows are also directly above my backdoor, and if I would to step out of it or stand at the backyard, she would have a clear view of me from above.

Though our distance was near, I didn't really seize the chance to talk to her - I was facing quite a load of problems then, or so I thought. Staying by myself then I had in fact wished for a minimal contact with anyone, lest wanting to deal with a 80 year-old woman who was a friend of my mother, though at the back of my mind I was quite certain she would have been very friendly and kind toward me had there been a chance for us to talk.

Thus in the span of two years plus staying there, I had purposely come to avoid her. Staying alone by herself, if she was to hang or collect her clothes at her kitchen windows, I would try not to step out or made any visual contact with her. If I sensed that she was making her way down the stairs I would also make conscious effort not to bump into her.

If one is to ask me why now, and as objectively as I can toward myself, I will say it was because of her kindness and gentleness she had, particularly toward me. As the son of her friend in faith, she would have welcomed me in all possible ways, even though at that time she would probably have heard a little of my tussle with my family. Without bearing any pre-conceived notions and judgment, she would just perceive and receive me the way I am. In a time when you wished to be alone and shut yourself off from the rest of the world, nothing could be more disturbing than a friendly smile. Nothing could be more irritating than a gentle embrace.

It was in that condition that I chose to reject her out of my life, an old lady who was not married, had no children and was staying by herself. As much and far as I portrayed my unwillingness to have contact with her in anyway, she had not even once displayed any sign of displeasure, impatience or even disappointment toward me. For all that I could remember and recall she was always living in her own rightful manner, never belittling, never grumbling. Petite as she could be she was always doing the household chores all by herself.

There were certainly times I failed in avoiding her. In a small vicinity and neighbourhood like ours, one could never really retreated into one's own shell and be totally cut off from the world outside. For every encounter I had with her she would always greet me in a warm and gentle way, followed by a short conversation. Topics from my work, my recent condition, to trivial matters like my food or lodging, she would inquire them all with a genuine concern and open sincerity. In my confused mind then, I had perhaps detected her sincerity and warmth, and appreciation had probably sunk into me as well. However, upon returning back into my old, shallow and petty self, this appreciation would also be swift in dissipating away, leaving only negligible traces behind.

Among the many days I spent there, there was a particular sight which I could never forget. It wasn't of any special incident or nature, but just a very normal scenario that took place in a very normal day - I was hanging my clothes at the backyard, and raising my head I saw her peeping out from her windows at me. I smiled to her and said a few words worthy of a short exchange, and continued with my chore. However, though time and space have all changed, and today I'm no longer staying there, I had not being able to forget her eyes. It was only when I recollect my memories of her that I realised that when I looked up, I was in fact looking straight into her eyes. Looking at me from above and through those glasses I could remember that her eyes were filled with warmth, concern and even with a small tinge of curiosity. She had probably wanted to see if I could manage the chore well, and if not offer to help. Till this day I could never, never forget those eyes.

I did have a conversation with her before, where she invited me to her house. Chatting up with me she slowly began to move from one topic to the next, very much excited about the things she was sharing with me. Matters ranged from current affairs to buddhism, from politicians to her mentor Ikeda Sensei, from her conviction in faith to her optimistic outlook in life. That was one of the days where my spirit was uplifted and strengthened. Her strength in faith and sharpness in sights in fact had raised my life condition, surprising even myself. That was one day which I could not forget either, as far as I am to live.

About a couple of years after I shifted out of my grandmother's house, I received the news of her death. When the funeral was over, I was told that months before her death her house has had been broken into, which had her possession stolen but, as fortunate as it might sound, she was not present then and thus had suffered no physical harm. That loss had affected her in some ways. Coupled with this was that sometime in that same period she had her leg injured also, which hindered her mobility a little. However perhaps the hardest blow would be the departure of her adopted daughter, whom she had taken over from someone else and single-handedly raised her by herself, had decided to get marry and leave her side for good.

What were Sister Feng's final thoughts when she left this world? What had she wanted to say to those she cherished and loved? What were her unfulfilled dreams and unaccomplished aspirations? I will forever not know of them, for the rest of my life and till the last moment I have in this world! How harsh the tricks of fate and life have played and plagued on her! And how strong she must've resisted them all, fighting and fending them off with all her might! In all of my limited span of mind I will never ever forget the petite frame I saw when I walked past her house, with her sitting in front of and chanting toward the Gohonzon. I will never forget her strength of faith, her immovable conviction in the Gohonzon and in her mentor, her optimism, cheerfulness and courage in facing the trying times in life, and her gentle affection she once had for one lost soul, which has now finally gone back on track.

冯姐, I miss you.

Mentor's Life & Disciple's Heart

2007-01-29T02:36:00.000+08:00

A mentor - someone who patiently guides and advises an inexperienced soul. In the realm of 'life', nothing is more precious than to have a 'Mentor of Life'.

It is as good as having a guidebook that teaches one on the subject of 'How to live a life fully as a human being?', just that it's more - it's in the form of flesh and blood, speaking to you directly, without any hesitation or pretension. Watching over the ones who seek out and learn, the mentor gives his all, sometimes training like a strict father and other times embracing like a gentle, benevolent mother. Slowly but surely the mentor moulds the young minds and youthful hearts, wishing them all that one day these young, budding recipients will all be great achievers in life, rising to a height greater than his own.

We all may seem to know where we are heading on this planet, in this world. In the limited scope of our minds we believe we know what we should strife and live for, and using the given amount of time we exhausted on matters we hold dear to our hearts and soul.

From fame, fortune, mundane emotions, secular status, sentimental relationships to trivial attention and petty issues or calculations, these intangible yet existing elements have all influenced or swayed our lives in certain ways and at certain times before, altering the courses of our lives, or even deciding the destination without much of our realisation. Sad to say, for those who have sunk too deep into the muddy pond of earthly desires, their lives have been dominated and controlled by these elements, their souls inevitably enslaved by them.

Nichiren, the thirteen-century Buddhist sage, said in his letter "The Three Kinds of Treasures", "The real meaning of Shakyamuni Buddha’s appearance in this world lay in his behavior as a human being. How profound! The wise may be called humans, but the thoughtless are no more than animals." Indeed, if there is ever a single matter for us mortals to learn from the great saints and sages, it would have to be the topic of 'how to behave and carry out actions that befit our identities as a human being.'

Furthering and extending the significance of this understanding, one must begin to ponder over the question 'what exactly are we here for?' In the novel "Sophie's World", the character Sophie received a mail in her mailbox, carrying the two famous questions "Who are you?" and "Where does the world come from?" In embarking on the journey of searching for the answers she has, unknown to even herself, come to gain an answer for the third, unwritten and the most important question of all - "for what purpose am I here, in this world?", thereby fulfilling the linkage between her own existence and the world.

It is in this dramatic unfolding of a human's journey and life that a mentor of life must appear. He who carries with him a blazing torch of wisdom and justice, walking into the dark channels and alleys of this already-confused world and bringing with him the enlightened rays long yearned by humanity, he stands alone against all evil forces lurking at all corners of this world that constantly feed on the lives of the innocent and deluded.

My mentor, Dr. Daisaku Ikeda, has shown me that to live as a human being through and through, one must begin by polishing his character first. This is foremost in almost all human endeavours of all fields. Without the necessary foundation in one's life, the monuments of perseverance, devotion and commitment can never be built and erected on it.

Upon laying down this foundation, one must then proceed to undertake a more challenging task of developing a sense of courage and justice. "Justice has its own anger, and dignity wears its own crown', so says Victor Hugo. Nothing can be truer than these words. To live courageously, without fear or prejudice! How beautiful can a human life be if he is to carry this flame of justice and courage constantly burning in his chest.

It is only when these humanistic elements are firmly installed in one's heart that one can proceed to turn his gaze from the tangible material to the intangible but more important matters. For the very first time, one will be able to open his eyes to presence of injustice, partiality, discrimination, falsehoods and deceptions that have been locking the throat of humanity for aeons since.

It is only then that one begins to understand that in order to gain the 'happiness' he yearns so deeply and strongly, he must first ultimately rise up to fight for peace in this world, and happiness of all fellow human beings. It is only then that, for the very first time, he establishes a connection between his individual life and the community around him, in the society he lives in, and lastly the world-at-large, something he has never done or felt before. It is in Buddhism that this state is referred to as 'the larger self'.

Embracing this enlightened identity, one will inevitably come to realise that in facing this confused condition, this suffering-filled world, this 'amateur of life' fervently requires a mentor to guide him through. In this unspoken, quiet and yet revolutionising drama of life, a relationship is forged - a Mentor-Disciple relationship. It is as infinite as the Universe, and more encompassing than the ocean.

In short, it surpasses even life and death; it has within itself eternity endowed.

Though the distance is far, and both the mentor and disciple are separated physically, there's not a single day that this disciple does not reached and sought out his mentor's words and thoughts. Through this constant feeding of life's nourishment the disciple begins to understand how one should stand up against all devilish functions that torment the lives of humanity, and how one should confront them, courageously and victoriously. It is in this realm of courage and conviction that the mentor will smile to his disciple, and the disciple smiling and waving back with pride and gratitude. The world of mentor and disciple is truly indeed a grand, beautifully touching and moving drama of a human-to-human emotions and pulsating sentiments.

One who has a mentor is truly a fortunate person!

The Mixture of Reality & Virtual Entertainment

2007-01-21T01:55:00.000+08:00

When one surfs the Internet, one inevitably often comes across undesirable sites, many of which contain pornographic contents.

If he or she is open-minded enough to take a look at them, the alarming thing is not so much of what are performed and shown, but who are the ones involving and participating in them. The 'actors', or 'actresses' to be more specific, are more often than not only of young, teenage years of 18 or 19.

Due to the local laws of the sites being established at, and the international laws set against child porno, many sites declared theirs as 'child prostitution/ abuse free'. Thus their main selling point would have to be those young actresses, whose minimal age of engaging and performing the sexual acts is fixed at 18.

Someone commented that if the 90's is the age of the porn, then the 21st Century is the age of the sexless, where the mixture and fusion of the porn and the general masses have blurred the lines and confused the boundaries altogether.

Indeed, if one is to take a look at the actresses, one would be amazed, if not terrified, by how innocent, plain and simple, or even common-looking, they could be. No longer are the porn actresses, or what some refer as 'porn stars', seem to be what they used to be - heavy make-up pounded onto their faces, disproportional sizes of their anatomical parts, outrageous and out-of-the-sky story lines, and certainly highly exaggerated sexual acts which few humans could engage in. The porn actresses of our modern day speak of and rely on one main factor - fresh, young girls found on the streets, their names unseen and unheard of. Before the porn stars of the yesteryears could retreat from the centrestage with little dignity, this current trend had swept in and flooded the main stream of the world of porn with declarations of the finest, youngest and the sweetest 'Lolita' presented, coupled with their daredevil, daring sexual stunts that would even pale and shame the porn actresses of the past.

Ariel Levy, a female author, recently published a book titled 'Female Chauvinist Pigs - Women & The Rise of Raunch Culture'. In it, she explored the phenomena of how our modern day has evolved from the age of 'male chauvinism' to this current 'female' one. While the female gender, commonly referred to as the 'weaker sex', was used to be subjected to unfair, high-handed and partial treatments from their male counterparts, possibly in all fields of society, the rise of "females' rights" led to and shaped the females' liberation movement of the present day. This in turn influenced the current young female generation, whom are born in and exposed to the era of Internet, to integrate the widely popular 'pop cultures' into their lives, marked significantly by the beliefs and definitions they adopted for issues like 'virginity', 'sex' and 'shame'.

Therefore, just a decade ago, 'virginity' which was highly regarded as sacred is no longer treasured; 'sex', a huge taboo not to be discussed or seen openly is no longer considered as such; and when only the porn stars or street walkers were once dressed provocatively to seduce and titillate for the sake of livelihood, the ladies of our present day dressed even more daringly to just make a point that 'shame' isn't in their vocab dictionary.

As Ariel pointed out, while the porn stars of yesterday led a life only known to themselves and not the public, personalities like 'Jenna Jameson', the 'queen of porn', walked straight into the general masses and created a sensation in the mainstream media. Seizing the attention of the curious onlookers as much as the media reporters, personalities like Jenna are now regarded as 'celebrities', donning the front covers of men's magazines, appearing on the red-carpet of events like VH-1 award ceremony, or even writing a book which sells on Amazon. Something unheard of and unseen in all of porn's history. The age of Porn has certainly arrived at our doorsteps much earlier than we can even imagine.

It is on this platform that innocence is lost, virtues are rewritten and boundaries forgotten. For all one knows, the girl living at one's very next door may, with due respect, be the next porn queen of our modern era.

The Eyes Of Journalist & The Face Of Journalism

2007-01-19T23:15:00.000+08:00

When we wake up in the morning, we open our eyes and face the world. Unknown to all of us, the hands of journalists, though unseen, are actually constantly feeding us with information. In this age of technology, their invisible hands weave a substantial and tangible web of conscience and consciousness.

Regardless of whether one accepts or rejects this 'web', it is very much evident and present around all of us in our daily lives - the video clips of terrorism on TV, the reports of massacres in the papers, the untold sufferings of the war victims aired from the radio, short message news-clips sent to cellphones...and the list goes on. Time passes on and history is written anew everyday.

However, as one receives more and more of these human elements of emotions and living episodes, the lesser one feels and sensitizes about them. As much as he or she tries to be passionate, excited or even compassionate about them, the feelings is somewhat lost along the trail of time and tide. Why is that so?

Dr. Daisaku Ikeda speaks of the problem "moral numbing" in his 2002 peace proposal entitled "The Humanism of the Middle Way: Dawn of Global Civilization". He elaborated by saying this, "I am deeply concerned by the dehumanizing nature of aerial bombardment. While one side experiences virtually no casualties, the other is devastated to an unknown, yet clearly enormous, degree. One cannot but fear the extent to which this approach provokes numbed insensitivity to the human experience of living and dying, pushing the spiritual dimension far out of sight...With modern warfare and state-of-the-art weapons, there is no opportunity to see or even imagine how the Taliban and Al Qaeda fighters, like their Russian counterparts of the past, might have run in a futile effort to escape destruction. Do we still possess enough imagination, enough sensitivity to life, to appreciate in some measure what von Seeckt meant by a 'miserable defeat of the human spirit'?"

True to his words, against this background of terrorism and counter-attack in the name of defence, the world indeed has 'grown alarmingly accustomed' to the news reports made on TV, Internet, radio or even via short messages through cellphones. Instead of possessing the ability to capture the words and translate them into vivid images, outlining the features of the war-worn faces of the men and women, and colouring the emotional snapshots with their inner pool of human sentiments, humans are now lost trying to figure out how they should respond to those traumatic news of war, tragedies of nature or the tumultuous change of events happening in the world, in the blink of an eye. Too fast is the pace of our modern day's society to want to progress, and too many hedonistic indulgences have been erected for the sake of humans' entertainment. In the whirlpool of enjoyments and thrills, human beings somehow have lost touch with their inner conscientious voices, a common language spoken amongst all fellow human beings.

This manifestation of 'moral numbing' is all the more enhanced by the stance journalism took - the objectivity adopted when reporting a piece of news. Thus, as Peace Scholar Randall Forsberg puts it definitively, "The nature of television news, where people report about murders and then turn to the weather, has contributed to this. There's an underlying numbing in the way that we relate to the world every day, even before you get to wartime situations." As pieces of news of all sorts of natures are being jumbled up and presented to the world in a 30 mins' segment, reducing the entire presentation to 'one of the many programmes' the channel or station is offering, all human dramas and episodes of all sentiments are minimised to just mere tell-tales, in the name of viewership and TV ratings. What could be more tragic - the fact about the sufferings of the people living in a war-torn country, or that the world cares less about the sufferings of their fellow human beings?

While a journalist's eyes are supposedly trained to be sharp, sensitive and penetrative, their faces are required by rules to be emotionless and blank. Thus we see a world divided by two elements - one side excercising logic, the other resting on emotions. So long as journalism keeps hiding away their humane, emotional and sensitive side, the world will forever not be in tune with the pain and strain evoked by the sufferings befalling on its own human kind. And the two sides of objectivity and subjectivity, marked by logic and emotion and engaged in a constant struggle with one another, will never come to rest and reconcile, forever unable to complete the face of a human man once torn apart by ideologies and dogmatic differences.

The World of Technology, Sports and Politics

2007-01-13T02:52:00.000+08:00

My office has seen another breaking down of computer.

It's not the first of case, and neither it'll be the last. Reason of my confidence is that there are in fact two types of models in our office 'initially' - the Pentium 3 IBM and the Pentium 4 IBM. The former is white in colour while the latter, a more stylishly-designed black, and till date there are still people using the black-coloured, faulty models. In a word, there certainly will have more reports of breaking down of computers in the near future.

One look and anyone will be able to tell the latter is more desirable in possessing it. Thus when a few of us were allotted with it, we were all of course accepting it with no complaint at all.

The problem began with the stylish black Pentium 4 hanging and stalling halfway through the usage. It's everybody's nightmare when this happens - one literally needs to save any and all documents every half a minute to ensure no important keyed data is lost. Any missing action in saving the file results in losing the entire document. Certainly not a favourable condition to be used at all.

Thus our site technical assistants were alerted and informed. The replies were not as surprising as I thought : these IBM computers indeed were having, and giving, problems. They have received numerous complaints against these nice-looking but thoroughly poor-functioning computers ever since they decided to buy the lot and introduce them into the organisation. Therefore, as mentioned above, the word 'initially' explains why there are two models to begin with, but as time passes, we now in fact have three models - the latest being a more sleek-looking, smaller-sized HP comps. And everyone is certainly more than happy to own a 15" LCD monitor, because one suddenly finds the working desk appearing larger than before - the space taken up by the bulky CRT monitor is finally freed by the thin LCD monitor.

A closer examination, or should I say a further observation, led me to realise why we are facing this problem oddly presented by this international brand IBM, which is one world-acclaimed computer-manufacturing company. 'Lenovo', China's top PC maker, has actually acquired IBM's personal computing division for $1.25 billion in cash and equity in December 2004. With the rising to be one of the fastest growing economies in the world, China is seen by all to be the next most favourable arena for any interested party in expanding their businesses to enter and play. The end result? A drop in the IBM's quality of their products. Ironically, we consumers seem to be ones contributing to this phenomena, demanding for a higher churn-out of the latest products in the ever-shortening period of time. With the progress in technology, we don't seem to ask for quality anymore; rather, we seek a faster evolution of all products we desire - Version I this year, next year probably version III. The following year version VI perhaps, with extra freebies and goodies thrown in? In the ever fiercely-fought market, quality has indeed taken a back seat.

Against this background of the ever evolution, perhaps one should really consider IBM and Lenovo being ultimately wise to increase and expand their production on the expense of the decrement of their quality - any spoiled computer can be replaced with a new one, thus leading on to a fresh sales figure. With such a gigantic market like China, losing one dissatisfied customer is easily overwhelmed and replaced by tens of thousands of innocent, first-time buyers in a blink of an eye. As much as consumers wishing to raise the banner of "Consumers' Rights" higher, we can never offer a concrete rebuttal to the theory of 'replacement of product is better than ever-lasting'. In the business-minded minds of the businessmen, this certainly proves to be a strategy much more worthy of investment than any other.

Moving away from the realm of computing and onto the printed media, one will be able to see two different pieces of news sharing an almost similar size on the front page of the US papers - David Beckham signing a 127 million pounds deal to leave Real Madrid for Los Angeles Galaxy, a soccer team in the US league, and the announcement by President George Bush intending to increase the troops in Iraq by another 21,500 soldiers more.

As distant as these three elements of computers, soccer and politics are, one common ground remains unchanged: the world has evolved into a state where things aren't as what they seemed from external anymore. In this age of fast-food and high-speed, no longer needed is the virtue of long-lasting; no longer yearned is the beauty of human spirit and struggles, and no longer desired is the glowing light of compassion and forgiveness. Manufacturers make calculations based on easy profits and not long-term benefits; sportsmen made headlines with their transfer fees, probably some rumours and possibly some other scandals, and not hardships and victories; and politicians made decisions not by their heart and soul anymore, but by their ego and wilful emotions. In a nutshell, the facades of these mundane manifestations are no longer true by their exteriors - they have been unknowingly distorted by the respective individuals for a larger gain and faster return.

As much as I am disappointed by these trends, I congratulate myself quietly in knowing that I still do care, and yes, I am still able to read through the mundane elements of untrue facts with a clear sound mind, before they flood me over with their skillful yet tricky presentations.

New Year's Gosho

2007-01-12T04:11:00.000+08:00

The following letter (or 'Gosho as it is known) is always read in the beginning of a new year. It's spirit lies in awakening the gratitude that is long covered with the dust and dirt in our lives, and the humanism that is somewhat lost along the journey we undertake in this lifetime, on this planet Earth. May you enjoy reading it too.

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I HAVE received a hundred slabs of steamed rice cake and a basket of fruit. New Year’s Day marks the first day, the first month, the beginning of the year, and the start of spring. A person who celebrates this day will accumulate virtue and be loved by all, just as the moon becomes full gradually, moving from west to east, and as the sun shines more brightly, traveling from east to west.

First of all, as to the question of where exactly hell and the Buddha exist, one sutra states that hell exists underground, and another sutra says that the Buddha is in the west. Closer examination, however, reveals that both exist in our five-foot body. This must be true because hell is in the heart of a person who inwardly despises his father and disregards his mother. It is like the lotus seed, which contains both blossom and fruit. In the same way, the Buddha dwells within our hearts. For example, flint has the potential to produce fire, and gems have intrinsic value. We ordinary people can see neither our own eyelashes, which are so close, nor the heavens in the distance. Likewise, we do not see that the Buddha exists in our own hearts. You may question how it is that the Buddha can reside within us when our bodies, originating from our parents’ sperm and blood, are the source of the three poisons and the seat of carnal desires. But repeated consideration assures us of the truth of this matter. The pure lotus flower blooms out of the muddy pond, the fragrant sandalwood grows from the soil, the graceful cherry blossoms come forth from trees, the beautiful Yang Kuei-fei was born of a woman of low station, and the moon rises from behind the mountains to shed light on them. Misfortune comes from one’s mouth and ruins one, but fortune comes from one’s heart and makes one worthy of respect.

The sincerity of making offerings to the Lotus Sutra at the beginning of the New Year is like cherry blossoms blooming from trees, a lotus unfolding in a pond, sandalwood leaves unfurling on the Snow Mountains, or the moon beginning to rise. Now Japan, in becoming an enemy of the Lotus Sutra, has invited misfortune from a thousand miles away. In light of this, it is clear that those who now believe in the Lotus Sutra will gather fortune from ten thousand miles away. The shadow is cast by the form, and just as the shadow follows the form, misfortune will befall the country whose people are hostile to the Lotus Sutra. The believers in the Lotus Sutra, on the other hand, are like the sandalwood with its fragrance. I will write you again.

Nichiren

The fifth day of the first month
Reply to the wife of Omosu

A New Year's Reflection

2007-01-12T03:24:00.000+08:00

New year's day has gone passed us, unknowingly to many, for eleven days already.

"How time flies!" one would exclaim. True to these words, time slips past our hands like running water or moving sand, constantly sliding and never able to grasp it.

Many people do not list out their resolutions anymore. They have come to realise that either it is too tall an order for them to achieve all or some of those listed out, or simply they are living out their existences on a day-by-day basis, monotonous and sometimes even meaningless. It cannot be denied that it is indeed a sign or symptom of 'mental desertification' for the 21st century humankind, living in this high-speed, fast-paced technological age.

In the spirit of welcoming a new year, I renew my inner determination to strive for the targets I have set forth for earlier on. Targets, something which are always tempting and desirable, are perhaps one main driving force behind the survival of humanity. We are born a 'hunter', not a prey. Even by our physical bearing, where our eyes are ingeniously crafted to be together and high on our head, we are destined to be the hunter since day one to venture out into the wild for targets and kills. It is of this exact ability and driving force that propelled our forefathers to survive in their world of animalism, through the long journey of the natural selection and evolution to arrive at this modern day of science and logic.

Nature returns to it's original breadth, flowers restores it's fragrance for blossoming, and the seasons retraces it's path of cycle. Everything has been given a new lease of life. How wondrous can life on this planet Earth be. With a renewed sense of gratitude, I pray for the world to be a better place.

Saddam's Hanging & The World's Cheering

2007-01-03T02:55:00.000+08:00

The title can be read in two ways: 'Saddam's hanging and the world IS cheering' (for his death), and 'Saddam's hanging & the world'S cheering' (for a brand new year).

Both titles, with one minor difference, tell two totally different stories miles apart from one another - one is the world cheering for a human's death, while the other is for the birth of a new year. In a short time span of two days, life and death met and the world was engulfed in euphoria.

I have spoken on Saddam in my earlier post, and I also have objected on Took Leng How's death penalty.

In the event of Saddam's hanging in the final hours of 2006, I again wish to reiterate my stance - I do not believe taking away another person's life will come to mend, amend or alter any existing or potential conflicts. The emotional wounds of all who have suffered under Mr. Saddam's tyrannical hard handed rulings may, if they ever wish to, sore a little lesser. However, no one can ever confidently declare that their sufferings are really over just with the hanging of this man. In fact, for those who live in rage and hatred toward Saddam, their regret might be added one layer more - they couldn't lay their hands on this man anymore. And so hatred is now mixed and bred with pain of regret.

As the world welcomes a brand new year of 2007 with cheers and wishes, I ponder quietly who would come to remember this man named 'Saddam' and branded a 'tyrant'. A man who, as reported in going all out to crash his enemies, is also the one who did not fudge when facing death. When the time was up, he didn't accept the hood for cover-sake. Instead he faced the invited witnessing group with his face fully uncovered, as he did in facing the world with his entire being, right to his final breath. Regardless of his strengths and weaknesses, his right and wrong doings, he had lived a life according to his wish; he lived by his own conviction. That, to many, is never a simple thing to achieve, and for Saddam he had done it his own way.

The world may now have another reason for cheering out loud: Saddam was hanged. However the people in Iraq are still facing turbulence and confusion, miseries and suffering. Would the cheerful notes the world is singing be translated into concrete actions in alleviating the suffering of the Iraqis? Would the tolling of the Roman bells eliminate the painful memories of the war victims all around the world? And would the snow flakes mankind is spraying on one another be able to rewrite a dark, hopeless episode into a flurry-white, bright future of hope? As we enter a new year, a new chapter in human history, I ponder quietly.

Post Script: I do not agree to Saddam's hanging; all the more I denounce the uploading and sharing of video clip for the unfortunate event. To take away someone's life is one matter; to film and play it, showing the man transiting through the realms of life and death over and over again is totally quite another. That act of filming and uploading it onto the net is as much an atrocity as Saddam's wrongdoings. Two wrongs simply don't make one right.

For The Record III

2007-01-03T02:18:00.000+08:00

The world has entered another new year - 2007. While the final days of 2006 was again met with thunderstorms, floods and earthquakes not unfamilar to mankind, 2007 begins with a mixture of hopeful developments and a few tragic incidents.

Jan 1, 2007 - An Indonesian passenger plane, Adam Air Flight KI-574, carrying 102 people disappeared in stormy weather Monday after sending out two distress signals. The Boeing 737 was carrying 96 passengers and 6 crews, of which 11 were children.

31 Dec, 2006 - 8 bomb blasts hit Bangkok on New Year's Eve, with 2 just before midnight. Three were killed and at least thirty injured.

30 Dec 2006 - Saddam Hussein was hanged for crimes against humanity at dawn on Saturday. A dramatic, violent end for a leader who ruled Iraq by fear for three decades before he was toppled by a U.S. invasion four years ago.

29 Dec, 2006 - A crowded Indonesian ferry, carrying nearly 640 passengers, breaks apart and sinks in the Java Sea during a violent storm. At least 400 are still missing.

23 Dec 2006 - Days of heavy rain touch off floods that kill more than 100 people and displace over 400,000 on northwestern Sumatra island.

'You've Got To Find What You Love,' Jobs Says

2006-12-17T14:09:00.000+08:00

This is the text of Commencement address by Steve Jobs, CEO Of Apple Computer and of Pixar Animation Studios, delivered on June 12, 2005.

The link is copied for personal reference.

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Stanford Report, June 14, 2005

I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I've ever gotten to a college graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That's it. No big deal. Just three stories.

The first story is about connecting the dots.

I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?

It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: "We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?" They said: "Of course." My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.

And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents' savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months, I couldn't see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn't interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.

It wasn't all romantic. I didn't have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends' rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example:

Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn't have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can't capture, and I found it fascinating.

None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, its likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.

Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

My second story is about love and loss.

I was lucky — I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our finest creation — the Macintosh — a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.

I really didn't know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down - that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me — I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.

I didn't see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple's current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.

I'm pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn't been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith. I'm convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You've got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle.

My third story is about death.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: "If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right." It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "No" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn't even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor's code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you'd have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.

I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I'm fine now.

This was the closest I've been to facing death, and I hope its the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960's, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.

Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: "Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish." It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Thank you all very much.

Aceh's Path of Reconstruction

2006-12-16T02:42:00.000+08:00

On 12 December 2006, the world witnessed a new province being born. Aceh, the once tsunami-devastated island, has gone through an unprecendented election that saw it's former rebel leader heading for victory.

"The polls, consolidating a peace accord after nearly three decades of war, were hailed by UN chief Kofi Annan as 'historic' and by the European Union." So the news reported.

While one may not be impressed by what Aceh has now, after the natural disaster has chosen it's path to cross the island, upon pausing and settling down the mind, one cannot help but feel awed by the gigantic hands of nature and aura of historical brilliance when viewing such an event.

It is an event that can be leveled with such events as the return of Hongkong to China, or the birth of a new millienium. To put it simply, one's time in this world is limited, but the significance of one's existence is entirely marked by the events one has gone through.

Though we cannot choose when do we enter this world, or leave, for that matter, we can in our own limited time span, come to experience and feel what the world has for us. To be emotional about them, to feel for fellow humans and to sensitize one's personal issues as well as secular occurences; this is what is all about as a human. Living, and breathing dynamically.

In his famous writing 'Rissho Ankoku Ron' (〈〈立正安國論〉〉), Nichiren Daishonin explained the significance of the relationship between one's individual existence and the world-at-large:

"Emperors and kings have their foundation in the state and bring peace and order to the age; ministers and commoners hold possession of their fields and gardens and supply the needs of the world. But if marauders come from other regions to invade the nation, or if revolt breaks out within the domain and people’s lands are seized and plundered, how can there be anything but terror and confusion? If the nation is destroyed and families are wiped out, then where can one flee for safety? If you care anything about your personal security, you should first of all pray for order and tranquillity throughout the four quarters of the land, should you not?"

One may have a short lifespan in this strife-filled world. However, the true purpose of one's life, or mission as we normally call it, is only found in the midst of one's struggle to fight one's way out for a better living. This series of continuous struggles must be translated into realising a deeper relationship between one's individual presence on this planet Earth, and the environment one lives in. It is only by then can one truly calls forth the innate wealthspring of wisdom and compassion, thereby leading a rewarding and purposeful life as one yearns and desires.

As Aceh moves from a military backdrop, one filled with violence and uncertainties, to one that has order and law, the people there have actually grown and developed over the years the secret desire to want a better life. Interviewed by news reporters, they all unanimously casted their hope on their future leader as one who can lead them out of confusion and poverty, and into stability and prosperity, regardless of their previous backgrounds. A simple desire cherished by nameless masses from all around the world - peace and happiness. They are all born into this world supposed to be endowed with these. However, reality is cruel and they have had to struggle to keep their heads above the raging waves just to enjoy a moment of tranquility and peacefulness.

Tsunesaburo Makiguchi, the first president of Soka Gakkai, expounded the theroy of transition of civilisations - from a militaristic civilisation the world has witnessed, humanity will progress and enter the civilisation of economy, which we are currently living in. However the ideal one will be a civilisation of humanism, where a flowering of human elements take centrestage, and a 'healthy race between the various developed countries in developing and cultivating capable leaders for the betterment of the world', as echoed by Dr. Daisaku Ikeda over the many years till present.

Aceh has a long way to go, and I pray for her people to be strong, wise and blessed with fortune. They have gone through so much and it is their time to enjoy a lasting moment of peace and happiness. It's about time they rise above their tragic ashes and, like a lotus flower, blossoms fiercely under the clear, blue sky.

For The Record II

2006-12-12T01:42:00.000+08:00

10 Dec - Augusto Pinochet died in Santiago's Military Hosptial on this day. The ex-strongman, who evaded years of efforts to bring him to justice in hundreds of cases arising from his 1973-1990 regime, died after suffering a heart attack. Incidentally and ironically, this day also marks the 'International Human Rights Day'.

11 Dec - After three decades of war, polls were finally opened in Indonesia's Aceh province for local elections. The tsunami-ravaged province, after experiencing all human and natural turbulences, is set to take on a more difficult route of heading towards peace. Former separatist rebels of the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) are participating for the first time following a Finnish-brokered peace deal in August last year.

Mao Zedong In Retrospection

2006-12-11T22:45:00.000+08:00

An off today allowed me to make a trip to Hougang community library.

It was located in the Hougang Mall, which has four levels of shopping outlets for one to stroll through the human crowd and make his/ her shopping activites.

As usual, an entry into the library would always compel me to walk toward the 'magazines' section, where I would be inevitably moved to search for the 'Mingpao Monthly' magazine (《明報月刊》). It is a monthly Chinese magazine published by the 'Mingpao Corp', which was almost single-handedly started by the renowned journalist cum author 'Jin Yong' [查良鏞（金庸）]. It's first publication was in 1966, and coming into its 'thirty-eight' anniversary, it has become not only a well-known monthly publication for the Hongkong people; it has evolved and emerged as a 'journalistic conscience' publication for people all around the world to read and be submerged in.

I managed to pick up a few recent edtions, after getting hold only of last year's editions for several times. "It is quite of a good fortune", I thought to myself. In the 'September' edtion, there was an article written by a mainland author. The title, 'Is Mao Zedong a tyrant or a great man?' caught my eyes.

For many times, in my own limited mind, I have thought Mao as 'a man who struggled to uplift China, battling the internal rivals as well as external enemies. Though sometimes he had faltered and slipped, the dire situations and cruel disasters were more of a natural cause and not a calculated human error'. This more or less summed up my initial impression for this man, though in my much younger days I have overheard my late father discussing and perhaps even arguing with my uncles about the achievements and errors of this elusive yet controversial man.

The author in the magzine started out with a direct listing of Mao's doings and deeds. He questioned the conventional trend adopted widely and conveniently by many of Mao's greatness, calling him the 'liberator' of China, which saw him freeing the country from the claws of 'conservative mindsets', 'capitalistic castes' and 'agricultural poverty'. As argued by the many 'adoring fans' of Mao, they have classifed the mistakes and errors made by Mao an 'understanding problem' (認識问题). This simplified explanation for Mao's mistakes, to the author alone, is certainly insufficient to answer to a list of Mao's deliberated actions that led to the deaths of several top government officials, some of them his 'close comrades'. This was in addition to the thousands and millions of deaths he directly and indirectly led or caused, which for his many still surviving supporters they would not accord this piece of historical responsibility onto his shoulders.

However, the author does not think so. In a single question he posed a thought-provocating question for readers to ponder over: even if one has a great ambition, does one think he/ she is entitled to possessing the right and power of sending milions of innocent youths to the ruthless plains of war and suffering? Even if one has some personal dysfunctioned human characteristics, does he/ she need to make thousands and millions of common people his sacrifices for his wrongly ideology? This clear-cut presentation of 'common sense', which is sadly ignored in the tides of human histroy, more often than not carries the torch of truth human kind has yearned and searched for through the thousands of years.

In a nutshell, as Dr.Daisaku Ikeda said, a leader, in all sense, MUST set his eyes on the happiness of the common people. The masses, a.k.a. 'common people', has been the largest group of victims since mankind has known the thrills and enjoyments of controlling, savaging on and even sacrificing nameless, faceless commoners. Time and again, this tragic event has been repeating itself, not just in some remote, separated areas far from our civilised world, but in all around the world, this tragedy has never stopped surfacing and appearing, tormenting and tearing the lives of the countless common masses.

The world has not stopped spinning, from time without beginning, and will not be so till time without ending. Humans born into this Saha world, supposedly the lowest of all world systems as expounded in the Buddhist scriptures, must come to realise that they have the power to stop this repeated cycle of insane suffering, pain and miseries. They must realise that they themselves are endowed with a gigantic fountain of towering enlightenment, totally possessing the full capabilities of overcoming this seemingly insurmountable mountain of tragic hurdle. The day they bring forth this wealth of inner power that exists for millions of aeons, which thereby washing away the deep-seated and firmly-rooted seeds of violence, deception, manipulation and selfish sacrifices, will be the day humankind comes to a full liberation of total freedom and self-commandment. That day, as Dr.Daisaku Ikeda prays fervently to come, is also one which he throws himself totally in creating it. Into that endless fight against all devilish elements that tore the earth of the world apart, Dr. Daisaku knows that day will come.

China, India & The Tripod World System

2006-11-22T00:25:00.000+08:00

President Hu made a landmark visit to India on Nov 20.

China and India - two of the great Spiritual countries which have inherited more than three thousand years of human intellectual and wisdom consciousness, have finally met and shook hands with each other.

For the past 50 years, both sides have been plagued by their own karmic turbulence. Social, economic, political and even environmental unrests have almost torn the two countries, from their own within, apart.

"When the people of the country is wise, the country will prosper", so goes the old wise saying of the ancient peoples.

Against the current political background of our international arena, this is even more true. More so than ever before, humanity urgently yearns for a wise leader to lead them out of the almost-never-ending miseries. Year after year, decade after decade, human kind suffers under the despicable and ruthless handling of the countless leaders, political or religious alike, and give away their most precious possession - their lives - in a simple word 'go'. Soldiers lost their lives in meaningless wars; brainwashed religious followers committed suicides in the name of their god. Such is the insanity of our present human trend - crystal-like wisdom and desire for living on and better gives way to unquenchable hatred and undying wrath.

Undeniably, the names of these leaders go down in history as devilish functions scathing the face of this Earth, and of humanity's.

Dr. Daisaku Ikeda, President of Soka Gakkai International, expounded the theory of the 'three-point world system'. It is based on the novel 'The Romance of the Three Kingdoms', where then there were three kingdoms: Wei (魏), Han (漢), and Wu (吳). The lead character in this great novel, 'Zhu GeLiang' (諸葛亮字孔明), was thrice invited by warlord Liu Bei (劉備) to assist him in conquering the Kingdom of Shu. It was only on the third visit that Zhu agreed to Liu's request. That promise marked the life of Zhu, and the eternally shining example of a disciple's unforgiving gratitude toward his mentor of life.

Incidentally, it was also in that last visit by Liu that Zhu presented a plan for the acomplishment of Liu's desire. A plan that would even be applicable on today's political and socio-economic arenas - in order to secure lasting peace for all worlds under heaven (天下), one must have an alternate and opposing force strong enough to withstand the powers from other external sources. Simply said, a singular force controlling the world would not help in generating well-being and happiness for the people. One must see that there're two or three forces in the world, all strong enough to hold up to each other. Only this will allow the people living under the hands of these forces to be happy and well.

It was with such a macro-cosmic magnitude of world view that Zhu impressed Liu. True to his words, Zhu was never a tyrant or dictator. All he ever wanted was to fulfill his mentor's dreams and desires, and a simple promise he made when Liu was still in his hut. That burning light of a disciple's heart shone to the very last moment of Zhu's life.

The trip of President Hu to India holds such a magnificent significance. The world must never see one single dictating power controlling and deciding which direction humanity should take.

With the uprising of the two gigantic economies of India and China, the world would see an improvement one yearns so long for; a tripod-stand world system which all three powers rely on each other. One falls and all other will fall and fail in their individual missions as well.

With these three pillars, the U.S., China and India, holding up the shelters for humanity, the daily prayer of Dr.Daisaku comes a step closer in taking a concrete image of what 'world peace' comes to be seen. As promised in their joint statements, China and India will work together peacefully, for the sake of humanity and the world.

It is a world system the U.S. may not wish to see, but certainly one beneficial to all human beings on this planet. The echoed fortune brought forth by this system will be unimaginably large, and Dr.Daisaku will, as I firmly believe, witness the coming of age of this humanity's long-yearned desire.

A Mighty Heart

2006-11-19T04:22:00.000+08:00

The title of this post is borrowed from one book of the same title.

It is written by Ms Mariane Pearl, the wife of Daniel Pearl, a Wall Street journalist who was abducted and brutally murdered in Karachi, Pakistan in early 2002.

Daniel Pearl, or better known as 'Danny', was born on 10 October 1963 in Princeton, New Jersey. He was raised in Encino, Los Angeles, by his father working as a Professor in UCLA, and Iraqi Jew mother. The former, who received a B.S. degree in Electrical Engineering from the Technion, Israel, is a Jewish-American scientist, while his wife, who is a Jew also, is on the other hand born in Iraq. The fate of this two persons, with different yet similar background, crossed and interwined, and finally weaved a beautiful web of human conviction and perseverance with the loss of their beloved son.

In 1990 Daniel started his career in the Wall Street Journal's Atlanta bureau, where during one of his assignment in Paris, he met his woman in life, Mariane Pearl, whom herself is a freelance journalist. They got married in 1999.

On 23 January 2002, on his way to an interview with a supposed terrorist leader, Daniel was kidnapped by a militant group calling itself The National Movement for the Restoration of Pakistani Sovereignty. This group claimed that Daniel was a CIA agent and sent the United States a range of demands, including the freeing of all Pakistani terror detainees, and the release of a halted U.S. shipment of F-16 fighter jets to the Pakistani government. The message read:

"We give you one more day if America will not meet our demands we will kill Daniel. Then this cycle will continue and no American journalist could enter Pakistan."

Mariane Pearl, who was nine months pregnant, pleaded the captors to no avail. Nine days later Daniel was decapitated. It was only till 16 May that his body, cut into ten pieces and buried in a shallow grave in the outskirts of Karachi, was recovered.

10 days after this grisly recovery, Adam was born into this grief-filled world, amidst the confusion and his mother's greivances.

In the words of mastermind, Pakistan-born Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh said he had kidnapped Daniel to "strike a blow at the United States and embarrass the Pakistani government.", while another said Daniel was targeted "because he was a Jew working against Islam".

One year later Mariane wrote the book, revealing intimately the life facade of her slain husband unkown to the rest of the world. Always smiling and radiating a glow of quiet strength and inner determination, she stood up silently yet indomitably against all those who planned to topple and demolish her. In order to feel what her husband had gone through during the captive period, and as incredibly strenous as it could be, two days prior to her baby's delivery she unhooked the phone and laid down alone, forcing herself to 'imagine everything that happened; to force to see it all'. As she gained a deeper insight into what Daniel could have felt then durng the captive period, she became physically weak; however at the same time her admiration for him grew and strengthened.

Upon successfully confronting Daniel's pain Mariane came to this conclusion of "nothing more could happen that I did not have the courage to deal with." Armed with this enlightened conviction she stepped into a Paris hospital ward alone, and only with the help of midwives, embraced the birth of Adam with full loving courage.

Watching her son Adam grows and learns his first word and walk, she said "That's when I miss Danny the most. And, of course, that is what Danny misses. He would have been such a great father. It is painful and cruel, because no matter what you do, he's not there. But that is my battle, my war. I am forever making sure that hope wins out, over despair."

From the death of her husband, a new life is born into this world. More so is the life of courage, the life of conviction and the life of mightiness, all rising from the depths of a single entity of life. For anyone who wishes to stand up alone, against all odds and fighting his or her way out, there is no greater force in this world that can deter him or her. While the violence can be ravaging and devastating, the pen is always mightier.

Just as Mariane put it, while journalism can be worthwhile, on occasion "it can be worth dying for."

Letter to Norwegian Nobel Committee

2006-11-15T01:28:00.000+08:00

Attached is a long letter I wrote to the Norwegian Nobel Committe in the early hours of today (15/11/2006) together with a few amendments and additions. Something I have contemplated for a very long time, but didn't take any concrete action in fulfilling it. I pray it is read with open minds and hearts.

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I wish to make some comments regarding the winners of the Nobel prizes for the present and past years, across the board for some of the fields your organisation has looked into, e.g. Literature, Peace, Economics.

While the Peace Prize is awarded to person(s) or institutions with much deserve or breadth in working for the world, the same cannot be said for other prizes, which include the Literature.

Allow me to quote what your good organisation said regarding the works of Orhan Pamuk, winner of this year's Nobel Prize for Literature, "who in the quest for the melancholic soul of his native city has discovered new symbols for the clash and interlacing of cultures." Or perhaps last year's winner Harold Pinter, "who in his plays uncovers the precipice under everyday prattle and forces entry into oppression's closed rooms."

These words, in the very least, do not stir a slightest ripple in any reader's heart. Most to most they cause some reactions within the minds of some intellects, who by and large, live in their own intellectual world, elusive and perhaps even oblivious to what is happening around the world.

What exactly does your good org. means when it says 'discovered new symbols for the clash and interlacing cultures'? Or 'the precipice under everyday prattle and forces entry into oppression's closed room'? How would one be able to grasp the words made by your org's panel if there seems to a hint of 'word-play' here? Something along the line of 'I speak of what I think; regardless of your understanding'.

Perhaps this is what exactly happens to all our fields - the humanity's fields. From Economics to Physics to Literature to Peace, everything is lost in this wilderness and emptiness. No longer can human beings connect themselves with these mundane elements anymore; they have become distant and unfamiliar to them for a long time. Thus we see human beings unable to act and behave peacefully, because peace has left their minds and hearts, and transferred to other mediums like Hollywood shows, fictional books, or at best, news journals reporting faraway genocides and bombings.

We also see human beings unable to derive genuine happiness from books anymore. As much as they would like to emulate their forefathers gaining a deep insight into life, and the realisation of 'How to live as a human being, and living it to the fullest', they find their efforts becoming futile and their paths lost. The reason is identical with the above: no longer can Literature, or books in general, carry the torch of truth, words of courage and the light of enlightenment to lead anyone out of today's miseries anymore. Whatever 'new symbols' or 'precipice' found or discovered certainly hold no value at all in providing the slightest hint of how one should face this turbulent world.

In a nutshell and sad to say, the Nobel Prize for Literature has lost its original spirit and true value. This is simply because not many are, apart from the small group of intellects, able to derive any concrete ideals from within the pages and between the lines and transform these ideals into actual, tangible actions for undertaking the gigantic task of 'living one's life correctly in this incorrect society and confused era.'

May I propose to you one name - Daisaku Ikeda. He is one who fuses his own life-force, together with his unsurpassed wisdom, to weave a monumental web of connectedness with the Eastern and Western intellects for over 30 years. Since the first dialogue with British historian Arnold Toynbee in 1974, he has relentlessly, without resting for even a single day, fought with his might in 1) reverting the trend and tide of humanity, from toward self-destruction to self-mastery; 2) building a just society whereby societal elements like economics, sciences, and all other fields including finances, agricultures and even environmental protection, come under one Single umbrella he calls 'human happiness'. In short, he gives new lives and directions to the seemingly lost societies around the world; 3) giving hope and courage to humanity without ever losing sight of his primal objective - to eliminate sufferings from the face of Earth. With a long visual perspective stretching over the next few centuries, nuclear disarmament and even abolitions of armies are found in his agenda. This bold yet firm determination is coupled with his patient yet all-encompassing wellspring of wisdom and compassion in replacing these negative cultures of violence with positive, dynamic ones such as human-intellect exchanges, cross-cultural collaborations and a rennaissance of education for the sake of human happiness. Such a breadth and scope can't be matched by anyone in this world presently.

Therefore, I urge your good organisation to 1) re-examine the basis and evaluations you have been holding on for the past decades or even century; 2) to re-consider, based on the revised evaluation and requirements for awarding a winner, taking into account the true values one has created and impacted on this world, and more importantly on humanity-at-large. It is only by re-setting one's eyes on the most fundamental objective of our lives - to live life to the fullest by drawing forth one's greatest innate potential for the welfare of fellow human beings, and working with other complimenting elements in building a truly peaceful world, that one's true purpose in this world is fulfilled.

I wish your good organisation's prizes to be a fresh source of hope, courage and direction for the entire humanity for the next millennium to come, with the evey announcement you will be making in all future instances. Thank you for reading this long mail.

Regards,

For The Record

2006-11-13T01:24:00.000+08:00

12 Nov - The UN reports that its humanitarian chief Jan Egeland may be meeting with senior leaders of Uganda's notorious rebel Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), possibly including elusive supremo Joseph Kony, one of the world's most wanted men. Joseph, together with four other top LRA commanders, were wanted by the International Criminal Court for horrific atrocities committed during their brutal two-decades war in northern Uganda.

As above - UN envoy Ibrahim Gambari meets with Myanmar detained democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi. Aung, a Nobel Peace Laureate, is now 61 and has been serving 'house arrest' for the past 17 years. During an election in 1990, she and her National League for Democracy won a landslide victory, with only a refusal of acceptance from the military-run Myanmar government, the junta. Apart from a live-in maid, her only visitor was a doctor who would attend to her medically in a once-a-month session.

One Moment's Decision & The Invisible Hand Of Fate

2006-11-11T22:24:00.000+08:00

It was a day where I am not tied down with many tasks; a time when I can do something which I have not done for quite a while - visiting a library and getting lost in the world of a favourable book.

I was engrossed in reading the book 'A Dialogue on Philosophies of the Orient', a dialgoue compilation between the world-renowned Buddhist scholar Lokesh Chandra and Daisaku Ikeda, a world-honored peace activist and humanist, when rain began to fall.

From about 1 p.m. till 4 p.m., the rain forbade me to leave the Ang Mo Kio library. I took it as a divine encouragement for me to continue this breath-taking journey of walking into this gigantic, boundless and magnificent spiritual palace constructed by these two great men.

The topics were wide-ranging, encompassing and in-depth. From the significance of the Lotus Sutra's title to the history of the flow of Buddhism, from the inner, unseeen yet overflowing struggles of the great Mahatma Gandhi's mind to the very moment of Lord Shakymuni's enlightenment, these two men spoke freely, without hesitation, with no reservation.

It was recorded that when Lord Shakymuni defeated evil and gained his enlightenment, the sky was also receiving it's first streak of light from the sun. In that very moment, the darkest hour from the night, engulfing the entire sky, was dispelled and pushed back by the victorious rays. It was in that historical moment that humanity, for the very first time, understood that they have the power to transform their own fates and lives. It was in that enlightenment that Man, for the very first time, realised that they were endowed with all the possiblities to achieve what had been seen impossbile initially.

That enlightenment marked the first step for all human beings in allowing to empower themselves and elevate their lives out of darkness and miseries.

Upon seeing Lord Shakymuni breaking through his old, deluded self to become an enlightened being, 'Brahma', the Lord of Creation, appeared from the sky and urged Lord Shakymuni to speak out his enlightenment to the world. It was only on the third attempt that Lord Shakymuni agreed to his request. Then, from that moment onwards, his enlightenment was not his own possession anymore. Everything that flowed out from his enlightened consciousness slowly yet steadily formed a gigantic spiritual mountain of what we know today - a world religion for humanity.

The rain poured its heart out with its downpour. At about 5 p.m. plus, it gave way to some light from the grayish sky, and I seized the chance in walking through the rain. "Another thing I haven't done for quite a while too!", I thought to myself. Though the ground was wet and people were mostly going under the shelters, I walked the Ang Mo Kio centre with a sense of lightness - it's been a while since I walked through a crowd and have a good, detailed look at them. Most of the time, I realised I was always on a 'decided' move from a place to another, always going for a specific desinated place. So seldom is the chance for anyone now, against this hasty-paced of economic and social background, to walk freely and unhurriedly through the crowd we call 'the common masses'. "Time stops for no one", or so we say.

By then the rain had completely stopped, and I was enjoying the fresh air of an after-downpour when I decided to take a train. In the train I was struggling between going for the town to have my dinner, or alighting at Bishan station to head for it's library. Underneath that layer of consciouness I knew instinctively I would be tempted to spend my time at town by wandering around. A simpler yet wiser choice would be to step out of the train and head for the library. I was gald I made the right choice. In my heart I congratulated myself for winning a small but important battle.

The significance of this simple decision became instantly clear the moment I stepped out of the station's gate - I saw a friend whom I had known for a long time, but never actually spoken with. I approached her, and as much as with the little memory of me, we began our first conversation right at the bus-stop outside the train station. It was a short contact, but nevertheless I had wanted to learn as much as I wish to share. This, I believe, is in it's minimum a genuine human should do - to be truthful to your friends, and the friendship that binds you both together.

With a fresh sense of happiness, I headed for the library after we departed there. In my heart I wish her all the best in achieving and accomplishing all that she prays and hopes for.

The Blind And The Elephant

2006-11-07T00:15:00.000+08:00

Some people have their 'feathers' ruffled when the list for this year's Mediacorp's Star Award was revealed.

Their idol Chen Wei Lian got one nomination - Top 20 Male artistes.

Others cannot accept the fact that he, a newcomer, or 'no'-comer, can make it into the list.

Chen's supporters immediately retorted, that others who were from the 1st Superstar competition and acted in just one show, could make it into the list as well.

And so it began a war of words, on and off line. On and off print. On and off.

The funny part is: I was vividly reminded of the story of five blind men who went searching for the image of 'elephant'. Each touched on a small part of an elephant, and began describing what they feel and touch. The description got heated up and later developed into a, as one might have known, war of words. Simply because not only they couldn't see the elephant itself, they failed to see where the other four blind men are coming from and talking about. Yes, it's a humour, but certainly a dark one. Or what we normally call it in Mandarin - '黑色幽默'.

These two groups are exactly like these five blind men. Just that the supporters for Chen aren't out searching for the face of 'elephant', but 'justice' for their idol. In their minds, they have firmly believed that Chen is more than capable enough to secure one Star Award this year, regardless his short cameo apperance, and another hotly contested and debated title - Regional Most Outstanding Male Artiste (Singapore) in the just-over Global Chinese Music Award that took place here.

To them, he probably is the trunk of the elephant - cool, smooth and yet sharp.

The other group who disagrees strongly is speaking against his capability - notwithstanding his sight limitation - that he didn't show much of his acting talent, and though he sings well, there has not been many contributions like other artistes as Stephanie Sun, who makes impacts locally as well as internationally with her talents and album sales.

To this group, Chen is probably the tail of the elephant - thin in nature, soft and not much of an impression.

The truth is far from them altogether: they fail to understand one simple formula, which has been used explicitly and never discreetly, in wielding and chalking up viewership, and that is - the media industry, in this case the sole owner or main player otherwise known as 'The Mediacorp', is not concerned with who wins what title. All that matters to them, the planners who present proposals in securing that all-time important revenue mark, is that whoever wins whatever title, he or she must make sure there is a business spin-off. This effect must then be translated and transformed into concrete cash.

And thus behind every plan to come up with every title, there has been long hours of thorough and in-depth discussions and exchanges of ideas. These words of exchange would subsequently be penned down, analysed, formulated and later proposed to the management for the final hammer-pounding. The end result is the list where we see who's there and who's not. Then, with enough media promotion and attention-generation, the public is moulded into thinking they have the power to decide who should be the champion, or the deserving person. This is the first step toward success in spinning that revenue.

The rest is history: whoever wins has a stake in the company called Mediacorp. He/ she has the unwritten privilege in attending any or all important functions hosted by the company, and main time slot given to him/ her in performing for promoting his/ her album. It's a win-win situation, where both parties win in getting their shares of the pie we call 'media'.

The sole loser in this commercial unerstanding is the masses. And a very naive one. They are the ones who unwittingly pour out their monies in every and all ways, thinking they are supporting a 'superstar idol'. They believe that if Jay Chou of Taiwan can reach that height of success, 'Rain' of Korea can surmount that summit of fame, and Italian blind singer Andrea Bocelli can secure international fame with his deep, resounding voice, then Chen Wei Lian can do it too.

Supposedly we have 100 singers being churned out into the music scene every year. Not even half can have their music companies sustain their support in producing a second album. For those who are able and fortunate enough to have a second album produced, their value is being watched and scrutinised closely - with each consecutive album's sales sliding down, the promotion fees is relatively sliced. Therein lies the 'diminishing appearance' we see over the decades - talented singers who cut albums, but slowly fade out of the music scene quietly. This is why.

Of the fewer-than-half group of aspiring artistes, the number is again halved - those who can cut a second album AND venture out into other fields like advertising, hosting, acting...etc, and those who cannot. The rationale behind this analysis is whether this artiste is an 'overall', wholesome one, who beside the company's promotion, is able to generate some media coverage on his/ her own with the innate talents. Naturally, more exposure means more coverage, which in turn will lead to higher sales and profits. Or is he/ she simply someone with a good voice and not much of a talent in other areas, which again means this artiste will rely heavily on the company's promotion, and that in turn means higher promotion fees. This is not a very good piece of news after all.

Thus we now have a group of about 25, from the original hundred, left. Amongst this group who can sing and act/ host/ do adverts/ co-produce album(s), only a handful are leading the trend in the music industry. That is to say, only those few elites are the ones setting the trend in which direction the music will flow to in the coming year. The rest? They are mere followers who try to piggyback, hitchride or bandwagon-jumping in getting that miserable amount of money we call 'profit'. Chen certainly does not belong to the first group of 'elite singers'. In fact, none, apart from Stephanie Sun has that commanding power in establishing where the music will flow, or how to evolve into a singer of the next generation. Jay Chou and Jolin Cai are two artistes, male and female respectively, who have that capability also. Apart from them no other artistes come close in achieving what they have possessed yet. Chen is a million miles from them.

Media plays the masses, like many times before, and in the many times coming. Humanity must awaken and be enlightened in understanding that it is for the masses that media exists. They are present here to serve the common people. They are endowed with the holy torch of fire in lighting up the dark roads ahead. Where they fail to do so, all eyes are shut, and all men blinded. Where the light of fire fails to reach, darkness takes over and men is misled into fantasized lands of misery. Such blindness is far worse than a simple group of die-hard fans supporting blindly a blind singer.

Took Leng How

2006-11-06T23:01:00.000+08:00

I missed out Huang Na's case in my first post.

Took Leng How was executed at dawn, 6 a.m., at Changi Prison on 03/11/2006 (Friday). By and large, this is not a case of 'international interest'. A murderer served with 'due justice' is just another murderer amongst the hundreds or even thousands arrested every day all around the world.

The victim, a six year old girl, is of similar identity: a victim for a murder case, happened everyday in all around the world. If such case is risen on a much larger scale, where we call 'war', there are easily thousands of millions of 'Huang Nas' who lost their lives in those senseless, mindless conflicts, throughout the history of mankind.

Of course, for those who killed one, they are termed a 'murderer'; for others who started a large-scale war, they are 'heros' and 'victors'. The distorted perception of the world is truly a fearful weapon - it's like a miror that bends and breaks up the truth into pieces, and presents it in a totally different appearance to the world.

Took Leng How was born on 16 Dec 1981. He died on 3 Nov 2006. In such a short lifespan of 24 years, he witnessed and experienced first hand all the sentiments found in this world - happiness when marrying his Indonesian-Chinese wife, excitement for welcoming their child, fear in the course of his escape to Malaysia, worry for his arrest during his hiding, emptiness when surrendering himself, sad in seeing his distraught parents and grevious wife; hopelessness when receiving the verdict. All was swelling up in his life in that short timespan, from escape to arrest, ready to swallow up and savour him. It did in the end.

Whether one believes in him or otherwise is no longer an issue. With the hanging of Took Leng How on that fateful day, all was buried with his departure from this sadness-filled world. The question lies in: how do you feel when one is being executed? At the end of the day, who comes or leaves this world is never our concern. The real question one ought to ask oneself is what exactly an emotion are you harbouring when facing birth, and death. That lies the very core we are carrying all this while, living and breathing our very lives on this blue planet we call 'Earth'.

I Do Not Agree.

2006-11-06T00:53:00.000+08:00

I don't agree with Saddam's death penalty. "No one has the power to take away another person's life."

This has been instilled, driven and pounded into me when I was still searching for my direction in life. As a youth, nothing beats stronger in your heart than a passionate cry. All the more so if that is a cry for World Peace and respect for that inner high sanctity of a human life. That, for all I know, has taken the form of a phrase quoted above.

I do not agree with what Saddam has done. However the US has done their part by keeping him alive when he had been captured days, weeks or even months before the announcement to the world. The sun has its dark-spots, and so has politics its very filthy side. The retaining of this war-hardened yet worn-out man, and waiting for the right timing to announce to the world, is nothing short of a shameful way for treating a war criminal.

When all cameras pointed to that one dirt hole where Saddam was so-called 'hurled out alive', the world exclaimed for victory. Of course the US government would want that to be their victory.

When the news for his death sentence was flashed across the CNA channel's news-strip, I couldn't help but felt for the man. What he has done may be condemnable, but to end his life in the name of 'justice' is all but a foolish move. "An eye for an eye would make the world goes blind", so said the great Mahatma Gandhi.

Incidentally I recalled the grevious atrocity committed by Nalini, one of the 26 assassins found guilty of killing Rajiv Gandhi, India's Prime Minister on 28 Jan 1998. It was Sonia Gandhi who strongly endorsed Nalini’s mercy petition to have her death sentence converted to life imprisonment, which amounts to 14 years in prison. Reason? She delivered a daughter Arithra in prison, whose father Murugan was also one of those convicted for the same sentence. Sonia accepted Nalini's petition that by proceeding with the death penalty, she would make Arithra an orphan. In addition she exchanged private letters with the killers, always monitoring what they have learnt in prison, and how was their study progress. How magnanimous that acceptance and action was! To not forget about what had happened, but looking forward and considering for your enemies' welfare, and forgave them for what they have inflicted on you. What greatness lies beneath that gentle Italian body now covered with Indian Sari!

I do not believe in killing someone to seek revenge. It's almost a similar torture for the perpetrator as much as for the victim to struggle to live on - retaining the killer's life and to serve a life imprisonment; to allow the aggressor to live on and come to face with his own guilt and pain. That road less traveled is more worthy in walking on, and coming to terms with one's own devil. Ultimately we all WILL come to realise we don't live forever, and will die someday. That simple thought would revert many many hatred and grudges buried deep in our hearts over the long course of time.

The World Is Changing

2006-11-06T00:14:00.000+08:00

Today (06/11/2006) @ 0010 hrs, I decided to log on into this long-neglected blog site and refresh my determination to start again this inner journey of mine - toward self-fulfillment and realisation of my mission on this planet, in this lifetime.

Thus I decided to pen down recent events that took place and having a significant impact on the invisible flow the World has chosen, and the direction humanity may have desired.

For the sake of future references and restropection here are the events:

Sept 19 (Tues): Thaksin pushed out from his seat in a bloodless coup.

Oct 1 (Sun): Retired army chief Gen. Surayud Chulanont appointed as Thailand's interim President.

Oct 9 (Mon): North Korea's nuclear testing a 'success'; declared to World.

Nov 3 (Thurs): Taiwan President's wife reportedly indicted on corruption and forgery charges.

Nov 6 (Sun): Alleged 'war criminal' Saddam Hussein and half-brother convicted to death sentence. World applauds 'justice' for him.