Anyway, I was listening to one particular piano concerto composed by Mozart, letting each voice, part, theme, whatever you call it, run through my mind. And seamlessly it went through each note, each harmony, each instrument. Then it hit me, I was hearing a sort of conversation. The melodic theme was the topic, and the harmony is the context or perspective, and the instruments were different persons discussing the topic.

I know that this is not a new revelation. In fact most people who learn music are taught about the concept of conversations in music. For me, this is an insight in retrospect. Instead of learning it and watching out for it, I picked it up and realised that it was connected. More so a reverse engineering situation rather than a search and find situation.

The song Pandalogue (Stupanda) was written with the approach of finding one particular melody, and expanding on it. What eventually happened was that I came up with a very long melody for the oboe, and it was boring. So I repeated the theme with a clarinet at a point where I could and trashed the rest of the oboe melody, letting the clarinet run free, and then only fitting the oboe to it. It was my first time writing in that genre. And although the results were satisfactory (for me it was miraculous), the fact was I wouldn’t be able to replicate it again, simply because I didn’t know how to do it in the first place.

Now with a quarter-bucket full of theory knowledge in my head, I’ve realised that I’ve become inhibited in compositions due to my overwhelming concerns about fitting in the harmonies. With this new insight to the squishy world of composing, perhaps I’ll fare better in my next attempt.

So for the next time I try to compose orchestra music, I’ll let the the instruments talk and flow where they want before attaching the harmonies. Who knows what could result? Just a thought

Fascinating.

Magazines would published articles about the details of such traditions also known as superstition. I would read them. And I found out that we can sweep the floor, only that we cannot sweep the dirt out the door as that would be sweeping luck away.

I held on to those concepts well. I thought that was part of being, erm, Chinese. I understood the concept well. At one point I asked my parents why they did not adhere to those traditions. I tried to enforce it in my own life. But honestly, did that make me any more Chinese? No.

The only reason I can think of that someone would want to enforce such a law is to prevent blur little children from sweeping dust out the door and into the face of visiting guests. Sort of a scare tactic to help them remember. Hence this tradition is arbitrary. If practiced at all, in it’s most sincere form, it is only an re-enactment. Because there are no values in such a tradition.

Then what about being Chinese? Why not be Humans. It’s much better practically, uniting the whole world, and working for the common good. But for some strange reason, the skin color, its language and practices become traditions. Instantaneously. Some of the traditions have good values in them. However many do not. Yet the Chinese boast of those that make sense, and call those that don’t make sense as heritage a.k.a. tradition.

So this whole race and culture thing is nothing more than accepted common practice. And if we keep following these traditions, are we not just mindless drones re-enacting the past?

So we have established that traditions that are meaningless should be done away with. The purist would frown at this. The argument is that tradition is a package, if not taken completely, it’s actually not tradition at all; sort of a modern compromise.

Then I would like to question if there is such a thing as tradition? I don’t think so. Because every time we take something from the past and manifest it in our lives, re-interpretation occurs. We could never do it in the same way as some one did it five hundred years ago. Because our understanding is different, so are our believes, situation and even our personality.

Therefore, we could never really do the same thing twice. Hence tradition doesn’t really exist. It’s just a term for, activities that we’ve been doing for a long time and kinda don’t want to explain the merits of it over and over again, so we give it a name: Tradition.

If being Chinese is about sticking together and excluding other races, having prejudices and being snobbish about our prolific ability to spread throughout the world… then you know what? I don’t want to be Chinese. I don’t want this tradition.

But if being Chinese is about family, knowing that family sticks together no matter what. Then alright. I’ll keep it. In fact the only reason I think most people hold on to their traditions is because they want to feel secure and belong to a community; a family.

And since we are all humans, and we belong to the human race, then I guess being Chinese, Malay, Indian, Iban, Kadazan, etc… Is redundant. And if we quote tradition as the reason, and hold fast to the sincere purpose of having traditions, then all the more we should put away our concepts of racial traditions that divide and hold on to a racial tradition that unites.

Question traditions, if they are good, make it modern by applying them. If they are not good, keep it in the museum where all the other things are dead; meaningful, of sentimental value, but dead.

In Malaysia we question so many traditions, but rarely do I hear any one questioning their own traditions. Even so, those who confess to having arbitrary traditions that cause unnecessary conflict, are often unwilling to change on the account of wanting to be faithful in keeping so-called traditions. Be faithful to people who put meaning in our lives, not to things or acts as they bring no meaning by themselves.

We know who we were, but we don’t know who we are now. And the worst thing is, we are even more clueless about who have the potential to be. So why let traditions bind and chain us down when traditions are to serve the purpose of being a strong foundation so that we will stand tall and strong.

Therefore, whether I am Chinese or not, totally depends on your intention of being Chinese. Not mine. So don’t blame me for being a traitor, blame yourself for being a bad advocate of your own so-called tradition.

I am willing to forgo my traditions to forge a future for the coming generations who will live to experience it, rather than to keep my traditions for the sake of past generations who will not benefit from it because they are dead. Will you?

But what about a haircut. Especially after its been done so many times after a period of so many years. Is it worth celebrating? Hmmm… Is it significant? Hmmm…. Depends…

I had a haircut yesterday. Not just any haircut, but a usual haircut. Confused? haha… don’t be. Many of you know that I’ve been keeping puffy long hairstyles ever since I left for university. Some of you love it, some of you hate it, some of you have grown to like it and some of you don’t have much to say because you have not seen my previous hairstyle.

But my haircut yesterday was different. Because it’s the first I had in almost three years, that’s exactly like the ones through out the rest of my life:

I went to an Indian barber. I used to go to Indian barbers.

I went by myself. As I used to before.

I told him to cut it short. As I’ve always done, cause you can’t cut it long…

And when he asked me what I meant, I said school cut. Just as I’ve always done before.

The result is hair that’s really short, not well cut but looks much neater. Just as it has been before.

In contrast, in the few years of so called accidental experiments, I tried out hair saloons, I would aways have someone with me, I’ll ask my friend to communicate with the stylist because I didn’t know hairstylist language.

So you see, it’s a home coming haircut. It’s one of the few concrete things I’ve reverted back to that I felt a strong sense of familiarity. When God tore my world apart three years back, everything from relationships, world view, career and even my beliefs were turn upside down, inside out and crushed. I didn’t bother to maintain my identity. I was very busy trying to cope. Not wanting to make the same mistakes. Not knowing if it’s better to change or to try and persevere with the old.

The decision to cut my hair in the old style, was done with the backing of experiential knowledge of both old and new. But this time without the fear or pressure of rigid maintenance. It might be a while before m next cut.

We often underestimate the significance of those little little things in life that make us who we are. A haircut is nothing special. But sometimes it can be significant. Not special. Just significant.

But after all things said and done, a haircut is still just a haircut.

Hmmm… interesting.

Went to 1Utama on Friday for an outing with some friends. Funny enough, Roland was having its exhibition in 1U. And funny enough, Esther, Jessica and Japth were murdering time… I mean killing time.. hmm… too morbid. Ok let’s try again.

FRIDAY! 1U! ESTHER, JESSICA, JAPTH! ROLAND EXHIBITION!… then I appeared. Well, actually not really Japth, he was in guitar heaven section. I just browsed around with Est and Jess. Saw a smaller version of the digital piano in percussion piano. Decided to have a little fun. Maybe earn a little cash from people passing by. So I sat down and played some simple contemporary stuff. Trying to explain to Est and Jess that simple stuff can be really cool.

Then came this guy, all dressed up, looking very musician-ish, wanting to past me a flyer. And I thought it was a promoter wanting to convince me to buy the piano. To my surprise he handed me the flyer for Roland Piano Competition and ask me to join. I smiled and said thanks. Cause I was still in the midst of trying to explain something to Est and Jess, erm.. I’ll call them JEst, the abbr. of abbreviation.

And the guy came back again a short while later! He came back to remind me that the competition only allows classical pieces. I was even more surprised. So I nodded and said thanks again. After which he asked if I would join, I replied no. And then he said,:

“Awww, what a waste…”

Erm…. I was a bit shocked by the whole thing. So I didn’t know that this was actually a very flattering situation. A guitarist with keyboard abilities of a sardine, was invited to a prestigious Roland Classical Piano Competition. Didn’t quite sink in, and I’m still a little incredulous. I only began to understand the implications of that situation when SOMEONE said, “…usually when I try out a piano, they’ll come and ask if I would like to sign up for lessons…haha…” She laughed at herself; interesting.

Anyway.. the highlight of the exhibition were these two little beauties:

Well, next came wall climbing. To all the internet addicts out there, wall climbing is not an euphemism for reading people’s facebook wall posts. Anyway, too much happened there. I suppose in a nutshell, I’ve learnt that Esther can be trusted as a belayer; Japth is an awesomely good wall climber; and some of Japth’s friends go by the name of Daniel, Hannah, Danny and Andrew; all of which think SOMEONE is gay. I’m a serial heterosexual, so that SOMEONE is not me. Keep guessing. Oh and I also learnt that belayer is a great word for puns.

Next came Subway. I know, you envy me. Haha… besides the food there were also friends. Interesting friends. Friends who were good listeners. Friends who were on the verge of committing murder, then decided on suicide then was too overwhelmed so they let the new friend continue talking.

Then the group split, and my shoelace got stuck at the escalator, and my safe situation escalated to crisis situation (haha.. pun). By which I am thankful to God for  the Stewed Duck Soup pillar from which I sought refuge from further shame. Although, some faithful friends began looking for me by shouting my name.

A few packets of guitar strings, loosing a bet at Vincci’s (I predicted correctly the event, just not the person involved), a nice long walk, observing SOMEONE try very hard to write her own name at an optical shop, watching SOMEONE write her name with a shaking hand that could barely hold the pen because of wall climbing, another long walk, a few jokes and a goodbye; were some of the other things I did on Friday.

I know this has a lot of inside jokes. For the uninformed, take this as an escapade into randomness and as a lesson about how life is just filled with obscured lunacy and chaos.

Anyway, I woke up this morning, waiting on God. I just don’t know whether what I do now, is really “His Kingdom, His righteousness”. When I started semester last week, I knew, but now I don’t. So I tried to be still before Him, and awaited his answer. I knew I was beginning to do things for the sake of doing things already. And I had to get back to the original intention. If faith without deeds is dead. I suppose the reverse is irrelevant. There has to be a RIGHT starting point when doing something. And I’ve lost it.

Then just now as I was on Facebook, as I was going on the rounds of seeing the going-ons of other people’s life. One photo caught my eye. Then another. Then another one. Then photos in my memory began to pop up. And I thought to myself, “Gosh, I miss them… ooo.. I miss you… and you … and you… and you…”

And I felt God saying that I’ve forgotten the important things in life simply because I don’t see them. For whatever the reason maybe (some may have been good ones!), I have removed the important parts from what I do. Dad becomes another word, so does mom, so does family, so does friends, church and even God. Learning becomes another thing altogether, curiosity, work, life, struggles and many many more, all lose their meaning.

I have missed the point of many things. Then at that moment, I saw my Bible. And I realised that God’s Word has become a thing to me. It’s no longer God’s Word. Much like all of us who wants to finish the work, we get side tracked into a meaningless dimension where we become so detached from reality, that we lose sight of the goal.

Sad thing is that many of us, (I admitted am one of the chronic cases) think that dimension we have stepped into is real. The fact of it is, it’s half real. Because we removed the other half. The squishy, sticky, messy part that complicates things. But makes it all real. The purpose of the work: the person(s) we do it for (it can be family, friend, stranger, God or even, yourself! because God’s wants you to enjoy too!).

The first step to recovery, is to admit there’s something wrong. So, I missed you, and you, and you, and you… oo oo oo.. and her …. and her.. and him.. and her.. and him… AGNES!! hahaha…

Oh and there’s one more! He’s the One we always believe He’s always with us, but a lot of times, we take Him for granted… so I miss You too!!

At his house, I was lying on the sofa, he was playing his newly refurbished piano for all to hear. And I realised something, God has been faithful in providing the strength, the people and the help needed. And today my brother is pretty much settled down.

And I felt grateful that God has answered my prayer. Which is strange, cause I don’t feel positive feelings or feelings that pertain to love, easily. Usually it’s tainted with cynicism and past hurts. But today, I felt a little happy. Happy, that’s something that’s rather unfamiliar.

Something’s changed. I have changed.

Interesting.

ICE CREAM
3:19
fuzzimuzzi

Lyrics:

You said I said that she said
He said that I said that everybody says

you dreamt that I dreamt that she dreamt
that he dreamt, a dream that, caused him to scream

Oh we shouldn’t panic now
Or we’ll seem like silly clowns
Then again, what fun it’ll be
if everybody starts to scream

I scream you scream
everybody scream
You scream and I’ll scream
everybody scream

I scream you scream
everybody screams
You scream and I’ll scream
everybody screams

10. STOP SHOUTING IN YOUR SMS! USE LOWER CASE LETTERS!

9. Downloading is NOT a euphemism for passing motion.

8. “A little bird told me…” is a figure of speech. I’m not asking you to read my tweets.

7. lol is NOT an actual laugh no matter how many times you say it!

6. STOP referring to your siblings as version 1, version 2, etc…

5. Hey! Your brother’s sucking on his.. erm.. thumbdrive again. Those things are FAT32 right? Gosh, he’s gonna be obese if he keeps taking those…

4. Tell you what, I’ll email you the durians.

3. No, you nerd. Wife is spelled as W-I-F-E and not W-I-F-I. Although.. they may be the same thing for you.

2. Please don’t name your daughter h@ppyGAL2010!

1. Hi, my name is Google. Worship me.