Betta Under The Radar
A broken on-line papier machine
Monday, October 16, 2006
The City of Sand
For Is.
In a city of sand
We will dream so deeply
Of water
That even though the body is parched
Until the mind forgets thirst
We will invent new words for moisture
And place them between the particles of dust
That the dream is verdant
Even though the air is dessicate
And we will seep
Supple into the ground
Uncontained
Unconsumed
By the city of sand
In a city of sand
We will dream so deeply
Of water
That even though the body is parched
Until the mind forgets thirst
We will invent new words for moisture
And place them between the particles of dust
That the dream is verdant
Even though the air is dessicate
And we will seep
Supple into the ground
Uncontained
Unconsumed
By the city of sand
Labels: B.A.P.
¶ 12:15 PM 0 comments
Thursday, October 12, 2006
The Minority
The structural mechanism of government found itself seriously undermined by a tribe of cabalistic cannibals who stumbled upon the pow-wow of power one sultry mid-summer's night at the foot of the great mountain THOOM-THOO.
The minority said: let us eat of human flesh, beginning with my son who married his mother who is still my wife. And the great pow-wow was in furore, but decided to put it to a vote, confident in the collective wisdom of the People, watched over by the benovelent spirits of BOOPABOOPA.
The people spoke as one: We Do Not Condone the Eating of Human Flesh, Go You From Here Never To Return, Else Recount And You Shall Be Granted A Place Amongst Us.
Angry whispers from the minority. 'They challenge us, they challenge our right to existence!.' The minority staked their claim upon the land, producing certificates writ upon tablets of stone in the blood of their domestic animals.
The structural mechanism of government found it had made provisions for the rights of minorities, who would be allowed to practice their culture and language freely, subject to the articles of law as enshrined in the Constitution of DEELIDEELEE.
The minority was accepted into the mechanism of government and sent to the Place Across The River, where they established an agricultural trade base and continued with their cannibalistic practices. They lobbied actively for fair representation in government, to be recognized under the great mountain THOOM-THOO, and for the science of eating human flesh to be included in the school curriculum.
Restaurants were established, cookbooks published, however the due to the number of sons marrying their mothers they become severely inbred and in time began to blame the structural mechanism of government for the decimation of their population. So they declared military rule and in an effort to preserve the strength of their army they imposed temporary emergency measures outlawing the eating of human flesh. They staged a blood-drenched coup upon the structural mechanism of government, established a new Constitution which subscribed to universal rules of love and peace, and outlawed the practice of cannabalism. Although a museum was built to house the relics of their glorious past. ¶ 12:50 PM 0 comments
The minority said: let us eat of human flesh, beginning with my son who married his mother who is still my wife. And the great pow-wow was in furore, but decided to put it to a vote, confident in the collective wisdom of the People, watched over by the benovelent spirits of BOOPABOOPA.
The people spoke as one: We Do Not Condone the Eating of Human Flesh, Go You From Here Never To Return, Else Recount And You Shall Be Granted A Place Amongst Us.
Angry whispers from the minority. 'They challenge us, they challenge our right to existence!.' The minority staked their claim upon the land, producing certificates writ upon tablets of stone in the blood of their domestic animals.
The structural mechanism of government found it had made provisions for the rights of minorities, who would be allowed to practice their culture and language freely, subject to the articles of law as enshrined in the Constitution of DEELIDEELEE.
The minority was accepted into the mechanism of government and sent to the Place Across The River, where they established an agricultural trade base and continued with their cannibalistic practices. They lobbied actively for fair representation in government, to be recognized under the great mountain THOOM-THOO, and for the science of eating human flesh to be included in the school curriculum.
Restaurants were established, cookbooks published, however the due to the number of sons marrying their mothers they become severely inbred and in time began to blame the structural mechanism of government for the decimation of their population. So they declared military rule and in an effort to preserve the strength of their army they imposed temporary emergency measures outlawing the eating of human flesh. They staged a blood-drenched coup upon the structural mechanism of government, established a new Constitution which subscribed to universal rules of love and peace, and outlawed the practice of cannabalism. Although a museum was built to house the relics of their glorious past. ¶ 12:50 PM 0 comments
Wednesday, October 11, 2006
Recurring Nightmare
Oh Oh Oh Oh!
I found myself inside the earth, in a large cave with old darkness, and wet and cold. And old old old. It’s old inside the earth, where even gods do not hide. There are animals and inside the lake that is inside the earth there is a very big animal. The water is more volume than you can imagine, if you were to fall in awake it’d stop your puny mortal heart. But I am dreaming and when I fall in, I do not die, but sink deep enough to encounter the very big animal. Oh oh oh! It is a mountain, it is a living breathing mountain and I am alone with it. Soon it will open it’s massive eye and it will perceive me! I must die before that, but the fear does not kill me, nor the cold, nor the water, oh oh oh. !! It is moving it is moving and rising to the surface, the huge mass of it rushing to meet me and suddenly I am touching it, the thing I have feared most and still I do not die, only continue in fear, feeling things, emotions. It has not seen me yet. I cling to its back, my face pressed to it’s oozing hide, the color of green and black, and I sink into it into another nightmare, I am in the water, inside the sea, at the very bottom of the darkness where no light will ever come, floating in ink – silence – fear! Oh oh oh. There are animals here too. I cannot see them, still the fear and still I do not die. What oh?! A torchlight, an ordinary little battery powered torchlight in my hands. Do not switch it on! Then you will see the animals! Oh! What have you done! You foolish foolish person, you have dropt it! ¶ 3:48 PM 3 comments
I found myself inside the earth, in a large cave with old darkness, and wet and cold. And old old old. It’s old inside the earth, where even gods do not hide. There are animals and inside the lake that is inside the earth there is a very big animal. The water is more volume than you can imagine, if you were to fall in awake it’d stop your puny mortal heart. But I am dreaming and when I fall in, I do not die, but sink deep enough to encounter the very big animal. Oh oh oh! It is a mountain, it is a living breathing mountain and I am alone with it. Soon it will open it’s massive eye and it will perceive me! I must die before that, but the fear does not kill me, nor the cold, nor the water, oh oh oh. !! It is moving it is moving and rising to the surface, the huge mass of it rushing to meet me and suddenly I am touching it, the thing I have feared most and still I do not die, only continue in fear, feeling things, emotions. It has not seen me yet. I cling to its back, my face pressed to it’s oozing hide, the color of green and black, and I sink into it into another nightmare, I am in the water, inside the sea, at the very bottom of the darkness where no light will ever come, floating in ink – silence – fear! Oh oh oh. There are animals here too. I cannot see them, still the fear and still I do not die. What oh?! A torchlight, an ordinary little battery powered torchlight in my hands. Do not switch it on! Then you will see the animals! Oh! What have you done! You foolish foolish person, you have dropt it! ¶ 3:48 PM 3 comments
Monday, October 09, 2006
Haze
Finding myself not overtly affected by my grandfather’s death last week, although the 5 day long ceremony took over my life. By rough calculations I performed approximately 80 bows in front of the body. Call me tacky, but I can understand the camp, morbid appeal of professional mourners; although our ‘Gold’ funeral package purchased from Nirvana Memorial Care Sdn. Bhd. ‘Total Peace of Mind’, did not include that service. We did have a band, however, playing such sentimental favorites as ‘Over the Rainbow’, and ‘Yue Liang Dai Biao Wo de Xin’ by Teresa Teng. Also a photographer, catering, bus, three Buddhist nuns and all associated prayer offerings, including paper Mercedes, paper servants, paper bungalow, paper nokia phone and a lot of paper ‘merit’ passports and paper money. All was conducted in the presence of grey haze, which continues on and I find my thoughts are exactly like the air – completely vague and unclear. A sort of ‘next step’ has to come up soon but I’m postponing that reality. I’m thinking about a quote by Goenawan Mohamad, which pierces with a little light:
‘In truth, it is not possible for someone to say: I choose independence, but at the same time I do not choose danger. Independence does not only beckon responsibility. Literature also, as an expression of independence, does not only convey matters that inspire calm, because it also inspires unease. I cannot only choose a creative life, but at the same time not be prepared to, like Adam, be expelled from blissful Paradise into the restless world of creation.’
If you are an artist that seeks to know yourself completely, and in that process you create your work, then if you do not know what is around you, surely that must signify a large gap in the knowing of yourself, hence the creation of your work? Right now I have little confidence in my own intellect, crippled by the sense of not knowing how things work locally. I write and create very uncertainly these days. I know how to speak the language of a global art and a global culture. I know where I can go with this language, and where I can speak it there I will find a home. Really, if I wanted to leave I could leave. Being here is not really about roots. I don’t need to find my origins, not really. I have a pretty good idea of who I am. The idea that one can be relatively successful as an artist and a writer here, without really knowing the socio-political mechanisms upon which the country moves – this scares me. The depth of my own complacency and ignorance, and yet thriving in spite of it, (upon it, even?) – this scares me. All the post-colonial and cultural theory I’ve learnt fails me. It doesn’t help me now. I am looking back to the old text books, Ministry of Education published books on Malaysian history and national policy – eating away at the dry passages and veiled propaganda, searching searching searching. Am I regressing?! I studied these same textbooks nearly 10 years ago! I don’t know why I care, as there is a promising international art career to build. How far could I go, staying here? And time is a-wasting, it’s a-passing me by…
In the meantime life, like time, is flowing on and on. The next step is not clear to me and I worry and worry. All I do is keep afloat. But to move forward to the next step I am trying to know things, and find out things in ways that are not already present. The news helps me to perceive, but perceiving is not knowing.
After the funeral I only had one serious emotional reaction – looking out into the haze, breathing it, feeling totally demoralized by it… thinking about the coffin we left in the deep dark earth, thinking – life is so sweet, I don’t want it to end. ¶ 6:48 PM 0 comments
‘In truth, it is not possible for someone to say: I choose independence, but at the same time I do not choose danger. Independence does not only beckon responsibility. Literature also, as an expression of independence, does not only convey matters that inspire calm, because it also inspires unease. I cannot only choose a creative life, but at the same time not be prepared to, like Adam, be expelled from blissful Paradise into the restless world of creation.’
If you are an artist that seeks to know yourself completely, and in that process you create your work, then if you do not know what is around you, surely that must signify a large gap in the knowing of yourself, hence the creation of your work? Right now I have little confidence in my own intellect, crippled by the sense of not knowing how things work locally. I write and create very uncertainly these days. I know how to speak the language of a global art and a global culture. I know where I can go with this language, and where I can speak it there I will find a home. Really, if I wanted to leave I could leave. Being here is not really about roots. I don’t need to find my origins, not really. I have a pretty good idea of who I am. The idea that one can be relatively successful as an artist and a writer here, without really knowing the socio-political mechanisms upon which the country moves – this scares me. The depth of my own complacency and ignorance, and yet thriving in spite of it, (upon it, even?) – this scares me. All the post-colonial and cultural theory I’ve learnt fails me. It doesn’t help me now. I am looking back to the old text books, Ministry of Education published books on Malaysian history and national policy – eating away at the dry passages and veiled propaganda, searching searching searching. Am I regressing?! I studied these same textbooks nearly 10 years ago! I don’t know why I care, as there is a promising international art career to build. How far could I go, staying here? And time is a-wasting, it’s a-passing me by…
In the meantime life, like time, is flowing on and on. The next step is not clear to me and I worry and worry. All I do is keep afloat. But to move forward to the next step I am trying to know things, and find out things in ways that are not already present. The news helps me to perceive, but perceiving is not knowing.
After the funeral I only had one serious emotional reaction – looking out into the haze, breathing it, feeling totally demoralized by it… thinking about the coffin we left in the deep dark earth, thinking – life is so sweet, I don’t want it to end. ¶ 6:48 PM 0 comments
