Keynes and Wernher von Braun

When my lecturer, G was a student in Cambridge, one of his lecturers was a disciple of Keynes, who worked with him in developing 'The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money'. Thought that was pretty cool. There is a sense of 'tradition' for lack of a better word.

Even cooler, he occasionally quotes random song lyrics. Today it was "Once the rockets are up, who cares where they come down. That's not my department, says Wernher von Braun."

Oh and he used to be a hippie back in the days of Flower Power.

God help us all

Some Malaysians think that getting rid of UMNO and Barisan Nasional will be the panacea to all our problems. They think that it is the magic bullet that will solve everything, removing all that ails and troubles us. That it will somehow pull us out of the quagmire we're nearly drowning in.

Hah, not a chance! Things won't change overnight. It all boils down to a problem of attitude. Replacing one self-interested group with another just means the same shit. Replacing chauvinistic group A with chauvinistic group B may solve some problems but will create new, possibly even worse ones.

There needs to be a Malaysian Third Way. I can't possibly imagine any current party in its existing state fulfilling this role. Perhaps if Gerakan leaves BN and reinvents itself, going back to the original ideals on which the party was founded... The likelihood of that is, well, we'd sooner see Mahathir and Anwar kiss and make up. But then again, Mahathir and Soros kinda did.

~

We need a Prime Minister who can represent us globally, one whom all Malaysians can be proud of and say "Hey, look at out leader. He is going to forge a new path, and transform us into a country to be reckoned with. Very soon, other countries will look towards us with respect and admiration and seek to emulate our success."

Who can this PM be? Najib? Anwar? Muhyiddin? Nik Aziz? Raja Petra? Tony Fernandes? Jimmy Choo?

Sadly, the only person I can think of who has the most potential to successfully fulfill this role (at least from his rhetoric) would be Khairy.

Definition of foreign aid: Transfer of wealth from poor people in rich countries to rich people in poor countries?

Perspective.

The other day I came across one of those charity flyers that fell out from a magazine I was reading.

It was from WaterAid and the flyer piqued my curiousity so I went to the website and learned a few interesting things.

There's this section where you can buy 'gifts' - donations such as a village water hand pump, a rainwater harvesting tank or a soap-making business for two people. What surprised me the most was that you can give a gift of "nail cutting for 20 children".

It gives you a sense of perspective that the simple act of cutting nails can achieve such wonders. We take it for granted that dirty nails are unhygienic yet many there are still parts of the world where such ignorance literally kills. There are places where simply finding a way to stay alive to wake up the next morning seems like a mighty task.

And then you think about all the petty things that we argue and worry about, the many pointless luxuries that we covet.

Then the next day there are other things that are shouting at you for your attention, and you forget and get annoyed at the Internet speed and moan that you've got it bad.

Elephant and Castle I

he dances round and round her

prances, fighting,

playful boxing stance, he answers

her question mouthed, unheard

"give it back", it could have been

"where's my nicotine?!"

perhaps it was a row over the weekly dole,

(as always)

the job, the change, the drugs, the drinking, the kids, the dog, the marriage

overweight, unemployed, white, working class,

Gordie's forgotten us, failed us,

we did vote for the BNP.

he laughs and mocks and skips around her

the lights turn green

and the bus keeps on moving

(500) Days of Summer

"Roses are red, violets are blue... Fuck you, whore!"

~

Tom: In college they called me perfectly adequate Hansen.

Summer: They used to call me anal girl.

[Tom spits out his drink]

Summer: I was very neat and organised.

The following quote is from the epigraph of 'Systems Thinking, Systems Practice' by Peter Checkland, a classic text on systems thinking. It is a book I should have opened when I first borrowed it, because it seems so helpful for my assignment, and not a day before it's due back in the library.

"It is very nice to have feet on the ground if you are a feet-on-the-ground person. I have nothing against feet-on-the-ground people at all. And it is very nice to have feet off the ground if you are a feet-off-the-ground person. I have nothing against feet-off-the-ground people. They are all aspects of the truth, or motes in the coloured rays that come from the coloured glass that stains the white radiance of eternity."

Stevie Smith

When I changed the title of this blog to Coming Up for Air and added the subtitle Keep the Aspidistra Flying, I was in despair and resigned to fate. I didn't realise that things would actually turn out the way I hoped for and it is indeed ironic that I'm now studying in a place that's strongly linked to George O.

Just by attending lectures, I somehow feel that I'm now smarter than I was before I started term. Perhaps the months of doing nothing atrophied my brain. Or perhaps knowledge transfer by osmosis actually works!