first morning in istanbul.

feels pretty surreal the whole experience. one might think that its oooo and aaaahhhh… and everything wow… but not really so.

It’s more like, shite I’ve got to make my own bed. hrm should i wear my new shoes? should i wear jacket or the hoodie? where the hell is the radiator? oooo can i steal my roomate’s hot water kettle? when is my roomate coming back in? damn its quiet in here. itunes. need to buy mineral water. wtf the air is damn dry! wah the air is damn refreshing! damn need to buy another electric plug converter. etc etc.

i think its part of the whole experience.

haven’t even been out on the istanbul streets since we landed yesterday. everything has been dormitory. housing. etc etc.

exciting times ahead.

planning for the future

is ever so interesting.

so far, this chinese new year, i’ve had the relatively common question thrown at me, “so, what do you want to do when you graduate?” I then go into the particularly long story about applying into a phd programme. about the long application process. about the need to get a job in between graduating and the application process. about getting a private or a public sector job.

then, it turns out that my young cousin is in Primary 6, PSLE year. And my other older cousins and I immediately launch into giving advice to my uncle on what schools are good or bad. about how its the school culture, not so much the grades. about how to aim for the schools that one wants. all at the young age of 12.

i am 1 full cycle ahead of my young cousin. i’m 24, he’s 12. our lives are somewhat forever linked together, because when he was born, my uncle asked my parents what to name him for his chinese name, and they suggested that cousins in the same generation level should have the same middle character. Hence, he became Jia Yi. I’m Jia Yun.

both of us are quite apart, yet quite together, because we’re both facing the test of the year, to have a glimpse, just a glimpse, of how the future will pan out for us at least within the next few years. me – hopefully doing a senior thesis paper, him – doing his PSLE.

i wonder what the world will be like when he’s 24 and I’m 36. still 12 years apart.

why i like politics.

the questions below are from sentill’s professor. he emailed me to ask me for my opinions. my replies are as follows:

• If politics is essentially social, why is not all social activity political?

Q1 is a fallacy. You should know that. If all cats are essentially mammals, why is not all mammals cats?

• Why has politics so often carried negative associations?

Q2. I believe politics have often carried negative associations simply because people often associate politics with government, only thus only have a narrow view of what politics is. The rough and tumble of ugly politics is often “exposed” in mainstream media.

The larger picture of politics is about power relations between individuals or groups of people, the processes that define such relationships and its consequences and effects. A very easy example is the election process, where people vote to empower individuals or groups of people to act on their behalf, hence the transfer of power, and how voting will what consequences and effects.  Similarly, there’s also “office politics” where people in an organization jostle with each other to define their powers, exercise their powers and accumulate their powers. Furthermore, power is not merely one-dimensional, but multi-dimensional and can exist on different levels. There are also different currencies of power, such as money, guns, numbers, authority, title, religion, ideology, control amongst others.

Hence, if one uses this above very broad definition, then almost anything and everything is political. A pen. A piece of blank paper. The interaction between you and me. A bottle of wine. Zouk. A mouse. SMU Library. National Library. A restaurant. A box. A road sign. Traffic lights. A zebra crossing. A construction site. A screwdriver. Anything and everything.

• How would you defend politics as a worthwhile and ennobling activity?

Q3. The study of politics allows a person to have a different toolbox, with various tools (theories) in this toolbox to help us view society and human relationships in the environment around us. The study of politics can help us to define terms often misused by people, to understand phenomena when they happen, to learn with an open mind, to prescribe solutions to problems, to predict into the future what certain actions entail. It is immensely empowering.

• Is politics inevitable? Could politics ever be brought to an end?

Q4. Yes politics is inevitable if the definition above is used because inherently, individuals and groups of people possess and have access to different forms of power. All are seeking to influence each other in some way or another to achieve their own or the group’s own purpose/objectives. No, politics cannot be brought to an end if human continue to exist socially in interaction.

• Why is the idea of a science of politics been so attractive?

Q5. The idea of the science of politics is so attractive simply because the art of science provides us with rigorous paradigms and a healthy attitude towards studying politics. The scientific method of generating hypothesis, hypothesis testing, evidence collection, theory testing, investigation of causal mechanisms, a mindset of healthy skepticism allows us to study the complex layers of politics.

• Is it possible to study politics objectively without bias?

Q6. Yes. One must be clear when one is using and creating objective data and facts, which is separate from normative opinions and views which are infused with one’s beliefs and ethical standards.

• How do political scientists differ from one another?

Q7. Political scientists differ from one another in the theories that they employ to study politics and the subsequent interpretations that result from such study. For example, for a single event that occurs in international relations, I can recollect studying at least four, FOUR, different theories in the study of international relations, which can give four different interpretations for that same single event. It is important as a student of politics to know all.

sadness

I sincerely feel very sad at the way things have turned out. So that is how it feels like when one is utterly powerless to change mindsets and perceptions. To feel let down. To be utterly disappointed. Excuses? Hidden agendas? Perhaps. Maybe. But finding the causal mechanisms is still unsatisfying in this case because ultimately the result is… zero.

It is only at this point in time, when I really appreciate the heart-to-heart talks with the people whom I believe in and believe in me. With ZH. With Des. With Hui. With Thash. It’s amazing what they can say about me and what I say to them.

The heart. And the soul. Of connection. Trust. In each other. In fellow human beings. Is so difficult. So fragile.

thankful.

ever since i came back from Cebu in May, I guess for most of the time, at the back of my head, on most days, I have been thankful. Not that I wasn’t thankful before the trip. But that I became more thankful, more appreciative of what I had materially and the relationships that I had with people.

taking time to be reflective. to contemplate and re-contemplate. to not make sweeping statements and judgements and to “nuance” one’s views and opinions.

to be thankful that I have water to drink. curry chicken to eat. a laptop to type my thoughts to post out to the world. to have the voice to communicate. to have the teachers to bring foresight to me. to have the access to internet to increase my awareness to the world.

having read three-quarters way through Barack Obama’s book and having seen his speech countless of times, one can’t help but agree with him – that we share a common faith, a common destiny and a common dignity – that human beings all have stakes in each others lives. That my heart doesn’t fully belong to me, but also to the hungry child going to bed without food, to the man who holds a gun, to the woman with a bleeding knee.

i am thankful. thanks.

4 weeks

into the internship and I’m starting to think about the 2 possible paths that I can take in life. OK, may be life is too big a word. As a career, as an initial job, you get the gist.

(1) phd or masters-phd researcher/professor. political science.

(2) food/wine writer/marketer/manager.

utterly different one would like to think? quite different eh?

i’m now thinking of the possibility of marrying the (1) and (2). and also actively exploring options in both.

buttons.

everyone has them. you push them and people explode. EXPLODE. mother-fucking EXPLODE like everything in your face shite.

So my button is this.

When you attempt to put a rule/regulation/guideline/policy on me, to restrict/prevent/shutdown my action/thought/proposal, my simple question is “Why.”

Now, the question is not a chance for you to repeat the same sentence to me again or to do it again in with a nastier face. i am not deaf and wipe that shite off your face. Nor is the question an attempt at “defying authority” or “questioning you” or for you to respond by giving me “that look”. I can’t give 2 hoots about authority and what shit you are.

The question is a chance for you to justify, to convince me, the said-rule/regulation/guideline/policy and to make me shut up.

But more often than not, the respond IS the same sentence, a reiteration of the same said-rule/regulation/guideline/policy. And hence, I respond the same way again, “Why.”

ooooooooohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh…. now you get it. only at the 2nd attempt then you get that i’m not trying to “play punk with you” but to actually ask you a decent question to make you use a couple of those nearly dead brain cells of yours. Then you realise that SHIT. Those brain cells really are dead. I have no idea what’s the justification for said-rule/regulation/guideline/policy. Erm. OK, I shall say what I know. Go ask the people who made the rule lor.

Now that is quite funny. You have been hired to impose the said-rule/regulation/guideline/policy, yet you have no FUCKING idea WHY you have to enforce it. Or what is the justification for it.

Hence to me, at the end of the day, the rule is illegitimate and YOU have no FUCKING authority to enforce something which you STUPIDLY follow.

Thank you.

2 more days

to the series of 5 consecutive final exams. gentlemen. start. your. engines. eh. tomorrow.

if trust is the basis of the capitalist society, and it underpins the transactions between people, then why do the many people whom i see around today have so little trust in others?

pam lim (my prof) obviously has VERY little trust of people and their intentions. my dad has very little trust in other people to even touch “his” things. “friends” not trusting each other.

and on the other hand, friday’s sharing session with half the DUP class on how to tackle donaldson’s very difficult essay questions was quite miraculous i think. social capital at work. everyone shares their best ideas. builds on everyone else’s ideas. everyone takes a chunk and contributes his or her part. everyone trusts each other not to keep anything from each other. to advise each other.

maybe when we grow up, we start to lose trust in people. maybe.

start.

2 days to write a term paper. record. ok, granted that I already knew a lot of what I was writing and research was a minimum, but still. and I hope the topic is interesting enough for Angela Leung.

Today, start to tinker with studying for 5 exams in a row. IO and DUP need a lot of work. Ethics, TWC and RMSS can collapse into 1 day. Thankfully, no mathematical concepts like last time.

I hope the grades for this sem will be good. very very good. Because they’re what I like to study. They’re what I KNOW how to study. They’re what I THINK I can do well in.

surprisingly, employers DO look at grades. After going for the internship interviews, it was always mentioned. But I think they’re also looking for the whole package. but I guess grades is one of the many indicators of your intelligence level.

i think i’ll start with IO. then do the 3 chunkies. then DUP, then IO again to prep for next tuesday.

let’s start now.

erased. anew.

3 years of memory. Erased at the click of a button. It’s amazing the shite they put you through just to delete all the posts and even the whole blog. It’s as if they just want you to hang in there forever and ever until you garner enough courage to just click those buttons.

reason for deleting blog? reasons? it just wasn’t me any more.

and also you want to erase something, so that you can write something new.

a blog, I think, is more than just emo shite, for bouncy interesting stuff, or must even have a specific purpose. the fact that one wants to write on it, to express what they want to express in words, not in voice, or video, or pictures. everything is about expression. the innate expressive-ness tendency of human beings. people need an outlet. usually.

this is one of mine.

i don’t think I would ever want to post those posts that I have had in my previous blog ever again. bad emo shite. happy emo shite. rantings etc etc. all… too… juvenile? naive? perhaps maybe we always always all are.

the trigger, or motivation, or flashpoint, whatever, was you. perhaps I was just a pawn in the game. shit i don’t even like chess. hrm… perhaps I was the “shoe” in the monopoly game. being moved around the board. by you. going to places. interesting. but at the end of the day, back at the same place, “GO”.

As much as I was insignificant probably in your life, I wish to say that you were significant in mine. As much as I was and am hurt by it, I wish to say that it was the happiest days of my life. As much as it is now so long, so long, so long ago, I wish to say that to me, it seemed like yesterday when I held your soft fingers in mine. As much as you didn’t seem very honest with me, I wish to say I was truthful to you.

i don’t think I would ever want to say goodbye. Or don’t even think saying goodbye would be any useful or of any help.

i think I will wrap up all the memories in an A4 piece of paper, tuck it away in the corner of my drawer. and. let it be.

thank you.