The Soldier

Under the grey October sky, war loomed menacingly over the horizon, casting its long shadow over our island republic. The stench of gunpowder clung to the air and every so often a boom permeated the haze of smoke and dust, bass notes in the cacophony that enveloped the city. In the distance, one can see the familiar sight from over fifty years ago as the oil refineries belched out a long stream of darkness that led endlessly into the heavens. Up on Bukit Timah Hill, I, Private M.H. Chen, was keeping my eyes trained on the battered landscape, scouring the impenetratable jungle for the unknown enemy. Alone in the wilderness, my mind wandered from Plato and his allegory of the cave to the words of Voltaire (I may not believe in what you say but I will defend to the death for your right to say it) before finally settling on the meretricious arguments of Gen. Silhouette (26).

The screech of an aircraft overhead had barely passed when suddenly a rapid patter of reports caught me unawares. I had been isolated without cover and for a moment fear seized my heart as I sought desperately to retreat to the established perimeter. I reeled off a dozen rounds mindlessly before I saw a trench, dug deep, which was being covered by friendly fire. I swung myself in, rifle, knapsack and all and had hardly managed to take a breather when I noticed a certain something sailing thorugh the air, propelled by allied forces. It was a grenade and its parabolic flight brought it against the giant trunk of a tree from whence it rolled and dropped, soft as a pin, into the very cavity in which I had just ensconced myself. Terror possessed me, and cognizant of the burden on my shoulders, I leapt out of the foxhole with all the strength my legs could muster. My transcient joy soon evaporated, however, giving way to a temporal belief that the grenade had indeed claimed its victim, as I laid concussed on the ground .

Then I looked up and found myself 2 meters away from my bed, my head resting against a cupboard door, a door from which a loud bang had emanated seconds before. My brother, awoken from his slumber at that unearthly hour, sat up with his eyes wide in fright, convinced that war has at last come to paradise.

Yes I know. This is becoming something of a quarterly, but given the varied claims on my time such is the ineluctable fate of this blog. Anyway precedent is on my side - the Far Eastern Economic Review is doing very well as a monthly publication. So, back to business. I have a habit of spelling out my personal goals on this page, and this practice will not stop. After the recently concluded Common Tests, I took some time out to consider my options for the future. (For the sceptics out there, though I doubt anyone would be reading this, I still haven't gotten an 'F' in any subject yet). Basically, the consensus which my head and my heart came to after hours of rumination is that

a) I will not sign on with the SAF
b) I want to be an employee of NKF.

I would have thought the above statements self-evident, but nevertheless I shall attempt to justify to the neutral observer, sans prolixity, the soundness of my position. The heart, which gets to speak first, says that working in a charity allows me the opportunity to return to society what it has given me, and that the scope of my job would lead directly to the benefit of 2000-3000 patients who need dialysis. So much for that. Now for the head bit. El Dorado, as described at some length by Voltaire in Candide, is not a place bound by the human construct of three dimensional space. It is a rather fluid concept that evolves with the times, and in our day and age it would seem that the NKF is the true embodiment of this abstract ideal. I am dearly looking forward to the day when I get to be chauffeured around in a Benz, fly first-class on Air Emirates and collect a hefty 12 month bonus at the end of the year (which, of course, has 12 months). Oh yes, before I forget, my invitation to use the bathroom still stands.

No-brainer

No prizes for guessing where I posted this from.

scribbles

It is a very lazy Monday afternoon, and despite the spectre of Common Test hanging heavy in the air, I am still comfortably ensconced in front of the computer terminal trawling the net. Barcelona had cruised to an easy 2-0 win over Bilbao earlier in the day, and while the performance of both teams would win few plaudits from the neutral spectator, the commentator as usual has to steal the limelight with remarks like this - "The referee has to do something ...the game is being repeatedly stopped...by non-stop free kicks". Wickedly witty don't you think?

Anyway I am considering the idea of putting in a cameo appearance at the RINCC camp later today or maybe tomorrow morning. Then again, it would be much easier for me to stay indoors and give myself a break from the rest of humanity. Perhaps I should commence my revision for the upcoming tests but that has been slated for the coming Saturday and Sunday, which will be spent in Christchurch Secondary running yet another NCC camp. This time though, I will have my books and notes at hand, and the cadets will get to see a more scholarly side of me.

Some gurus say it is always important to start with the end in mind, so here are my targets for Common Test.

General Paper - Anything between A1 and B4
Literature - B to E
Economics - B to E
History - B to E
Mathematics - C to O

Robert Frost admits few equals when it comes to ambiguity, but any more vagueness on my part and the master poet would be given a run for his money.

Work and more work

I have sunken into a depression so deep that no amount of Prozac will lift me out of my gloomy spirits. In my ignorant haste to demonstrate my academic promise, I took two Special Papers, never for once suspecting that I had bitten more than I could chew. Presently, I am paying the ultimate price by having to reconcile my scholarly pursuits with a non-negotiable slacking schedule - a feat I am confident will be accomplished in the near future. In the meantime, a few well-intentioned words of advice: Please do not go around begging for poison which your executioners are loath to dispense.

For Crying Out Loud

The pernicious thought lingered all night, not unlike the nagging scent of a cheap bazaar perfume haunting the air even after its wearer had long left. In a spartan room lit by a single fluorescent lamp, a man, back hunched, toiled over an assortment of writings. A wry smile had flashed across his handsome features when he had spotted the dotted 'i's and crossed 't's littered primly over a familiar script but the gratification was ephemeral, and as he scribbled vague comments of encouragement, ink oozed out of his pen as though it were the very blood being drawn from his veins. The distraction was acute, and was accompanied by a surge that rose within his chest, almost causing him to expectorate but he held back the flood and slumped in his chair, spent and unappeased. He allowed himself several moments of salubrious inactivity, hearing the solemn tick of the quartz clock echo in the dimness. With each minute, desire waxed and resolution waned - in a display of uncharacteristic haste, the papers were shuffled into a neat stack and banished to the outskirts of the work desk. A glow doubled in the beads of perspiration that clung on to and glistened on his forehead, and for a fleeting moment his visage took on the outline of a four-paned window, each pane coloured richly as though it were the very work of the ancient Italian masters through which, even to this day, the light shines into the vaulted halls of St Peter's Basilica. Then, for the fifth time in twenty-four hours, he consumed the irreverent words and devoured the apocryphal tales that fed his rancor.

January 2005

Settling into the routine of school life has been a breeze, and the transition from South Korea to Raffles Junior College has been eased by the purchase of a new football by Mr Kenneth Loh, as well as the presentation of fresh opportunities to cut classes and spend the better part of my time languishing in the canteen of a spanking new campus. What has not been so easy to swallow, however, is the successive reprimands I have received from teachers, who while claiming in one breath that it is not the amount of work done that matters, warn me of dire consequences if I persist in turning up unprepared for tutorials. The humorous side of this otherwise grave affair is, as always, in the delivery. Nothing pleases me more than interesting diction, and a threat to "marginalise" me in class should I not get on task seems to me the spoonful of sugar that helps the medicine go down. The better news is that I, along with certain individuals in my class, are due for a treat at Swensen's as a result of our perfect scores for an Economics MCQ test - the ineluctable fate of the smart and/or scheming.

Tiger Cup

The Lions are up 2-0 against the Cambodians on the stroke of half-time. I am unequivocal in my assertion that Casmir is in the pay of the opposition. The Cambodians have substituted their keeper whose middle name must either be "buttered-fingers" or "greased palms". I need three more goals from the second half if I am to get any returns on my sizeable investment.