human resources (2)

So yes, the conclusion is that we've all been chasing the wrong goal all along -- that the dream of first-world living standards (and by this i really do mean everything about first-world living, even the stuff that looks really good to all intents and purposes, such as higher education) is inherently unsustainable based on the carrying capacity of our available resources, both human and otherwise.
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So the solution to the problem of environmental devastation and societal disintegration (both the result of resources being stretched beyond their limits) is not to learn how to manage and juggle things. It's not about coming up with more "sustainable" technology, or implementing flexible working hours and opening more childcare centres or more welfare for the poor -- even if those things are not bad things in and of themselves. The solution is to change the goal. Cut back, trim down, be contented with a simpler and less sophisticated life.
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Of course, that's not a solution anyone's going to be taking up anytime soon.
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Back to square one.
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human resources

The well-known (and true) narrative in Singaopre is that the only resources we have are our human resources. And so, just like countries that are lucky enough to possess natural resources like oil, metals, timber, etc end up exploiting and using up their resources at unsustainable levels, over here we squeeze our human resources down to the last drop of effort and energy and leave them depleted and exhausted. 

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This is why, beneath the shiny global city that tops the charts on so many world rankings, there is a tired, stressed-out city of people who would be happy if they weren't being stretched beyond their limits in order to maintain their current lifestyles. Yet, if we do slow down, we're going to fall behind and never be able to catch up. We'll become like our neighbours up north and down south.

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It's a terrible conundrum, one that i've been thinking much about the last few years. i think my conclusion is that our current first-world lifestyles are inherently unsustainable -- the toll they exact on our resources, 'human' or 'natural' (aren't humans part of nature?) is just too great. Everything is going to cave in someday if we go on at this rate.

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arete

i've said this before, and inshallah i'll probably say it again and again, many many many times...
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Excellence is so inspiring.
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gold (2)

Still thinking about why i'm not quite sharing in the mass hyster ... oops i mean mass celebrations over Schooling's Olympic gold.
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i think i've just never been the kind of person who gets swept away very easily by mass emotion and 'tribalism'. Maybe that's the reason. i don't understand, or i don't share, this impulse to claim individual successes for nation / race / religion / etc, just because the successful individuals in question happen to belong to that particular community. For better or for worse, i've never quite been able to buy into that notion, except in cases where the community happens to have contributed a lot to the individual's success. And even then, my tendency is to think that the success should really only be claimed by the people who actually did the work. i guess this is why Schooling's win is not exactly whipping me into a patriotic fervour the way it's doing to so many other Singaporeans. As far as i'm concerned, this is his victory, not ours.
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(On a related note, and in all honesty, i find it hard even now to identify with the current hand-wringing over questions like What does it mean to be a Singaporean? What is the Singapore identity? Why this need to fix a label on our selves, to lose our individuality in a category like national identity -- like pinning a dead butterfly into a display case? i actually find it hard to understand.)
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The way i see it, Schooling won the gold mostly because of his own extraordinary effort, talent, and personality, the support of his parents, the talent of his coaches (including his coaches in Singapore), the entire American sports ecosystem, and the goodwill of the government here in allowing him to defer his National Service obligations. i honestly don't see that Singapore played very much of a role in his success -- after all, he left here for the US when he was 13, and it can be argued that it was precisely that very un-Singaporean decision that's allowed him to come so far.
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gold

It's an odd feeling, to have your entire country celebrating its first Olympic gold -- and such a classy victory story, too -- and to be feeling so incredibly detached from it all.
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i'm happy for Jo Schooling, obviously, and the fact that he beat his old hero and 22-gold Olympian Micheal Phelps of all people, and set a new Olympic record, and that Phelps came in joint second with two other swimmers, was just a really sweet finish for everyone. A (relatively) happy ending for Phelps, and a gorgeous new beginning for Schooling. i especially like how the older man so gracefully took on the role of mentor to "this kid" after the race was over, and the way the kid seemed so overwhelmed and still in awe of his childhood idol, even during the post-race press conference. The two were reportedly seen deep in conversation after everything was over. It's a beautiful story, and i couldn't have written a better one myself.
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Still, i can't quite share in the mass jubilation everyone else around me seems to be feeling right now. Perhaps this is what happens when you take yourself off social media -- the things that other people are getting excited about just don't affect you in the same way.
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i remember watching a documentary on Schooling a few years back. It covered his daily schedule at the U of Texas in Austin -- and what i remember from that is how tired Schooling looked, and how punishing his schedule sounded. It's taken an incredible amount of hard work and sacrifice to get to where he is today. It's amazing and i hope he's savouring this moment as deeply as he possibly can.
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In other news. i also like the way the world's best airport celebrated its home country's first Olympic champion. Class act, Changi!
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progress

i didn't understand this the first time i read it. i'm not even sure if i really understand it now. Definitely more than i did 22 years ago, in any case.
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The Cool Web
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Children are dumb to say how hot the day is,
How hot the scent is of the summer rose,
How dreadful the black wastes of evening sky,
How dreadful the tall soldiers drumming by.
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But we have speech, to chill the angry day,
And speech, to dull the rose's cruel scent.
We spell away the overhanging night,
We spell away the soldiers and the fright.
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There's a cool web of language winds us in,
Retreat from too much joy or too much fear:
We grow sea-green at last and coldly die
In brininess and volubility.
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But if we let our tongues lose self-possession,
Throwing off language and its watery clasp
Before our death, instead of when death comes,
Facing the wide glare of the children's day,
Facing the rose, the dark sky and the drums,
We shall go mad no doubt and die that way.
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(Robert Graves)
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commercial break

We now interrupt your regularly-scheduled blog updates with a commercial break aka A Tirade against Singapore's unsustainably unhealthy work culture. And yes, i'm tirading on behalf of others who, unlike me, do not have the privilege of being able to step out of the rat race (mostly because i don't have kids or other dependents) and do more or less my own thing.
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See, what makes me mad is not the fact that there is a lot of work to be done. It's the way employers and bosses are so short-sighted in the way they manage workloads and expectations. Sure, you can work your employees to the bone and still keep them in your thrall because they have nowhere to run -- the whole country is the same. But eventually they will burn out. Anyone who regularly works 13 hour days will burn out -- and that's not even counting the weekends and the work done at home. And once they burn out, they will fall ill -- seriously ill (i've had friends going on medical leave for months because of burnout). And you will lose people.
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(Don't even get me started on what happens when employees die on the job after having given half their life to an institution, and their bosses don't even allow their colleagues a few hours off to attend the funeral -- while giving the entire institution a half-day off to go support the institution team in the final of some prestigious sports tournament on the very same day as the funeral.)
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And eventually, your best people are going to realise, Enough with this shit, and vote with their feet. They will leave the company, leave the workforce, leave the country. And by then it will be too late.
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PS:
True, people have the option of saying No. i've always maintained that if enough people say No, there's nothing The Powers That Be can do to stop them, asides from a mass firing (both literally and figuratively). Sometimes i wonder what would happen if people here were a little less compliant, had a little more, dare i say, courage.
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be thou my vision

Be Thou my Vision, O Lord of my heart;
Naught be all else to me, save that Thou art;
Thou my best Thought, by day or by night,
Waking or sleeping, Thy presence my light.
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Be Thou my Wisdom, and Thou my true Word;
I ever with Thee and Thou with me, Lord;
Thou my great Father, I Thy true son;
Thou in me dwelling, and I with Thee one.
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Be Thou my battle Shield, Sword for the fight;
Be Thou my Dignity, Thou my Delight;
Thou my soul’s Shelter, Thou my high Tow’r:
Raise Thou me heav’nward, O Pow’r of my pow’r.
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Riches I heed not, nor man’s empty praise,
Thou mine Inheritance, now and always:
Thou and Thou only, first in my heart,
High King of Heaven, my Treasure Thou art.
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High King of Heaven, my victory won,
May I reach Heaven’s joys, O bright Heav’n’s Sun!
Heart of my own heart, whate’er befall,
Still be my Vision, O Ruler of all.
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What is it about this old hymn that so many people love so much?
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Perhaps it's got something to do with its being written using (mostly) the pentatonic scale -- i think the few non-pentatonic notes are non-essential and can be discarded. There's something rousing about the tune, strong and rousing and quasi-exotic, i think, that works almost like a call to arms (in a good sense). i'm not sure why music written with the pentatonic scale can sound so powerful -- the other all-time favourite hymn well-beloved by many is Amazing Grace, which is also pentatonic.
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The lyrics, of course, have a great deal to do with it. i love the lyrics. i think it's got something to do with the vision of faith that it presents -- the steadiness, the focus, the loyalty, the burning clarity, the soaring. Perhaps it's because i've personally experienced it before, and i've seen it in others, that light which the lyrics speak of, and so i know why one would seek that light and want it in one's life. Everything just pales beside it.
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The thought of being guided through life by God's wisdom is really pretty attractive. i think one thing about the moral law as seen in the Christian faith is that it makes so much sense, when you really think about it. i think most objections to it really just stem from people being unwilling to see reality for what it is -- 'reality' in the sense of the logical consequences of our choices and actions. Vested interests, as i told a student last week.
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The third verse is often left out in contemporary renditions, probably because it's deemed too militant and war-like -- not politically correct enough, i guess, in these days of jihad and religiously-inspired violence. i like it, though. The word, i think, is 'quest'. i think a faith that doesn't give people something to fight for -- in the spiritual sense of course, which by the way is the meaning of the 'greater' jihad in Islam (as opposed to the 'lesser' jihad which, admittedly, may involve armed conflict ... ), a spiritual struggle against our weakness and evil -- is not much of a faith at all. Even in secular life, we instinctively intuit that things which come too easy, may not quite be worth the having. We apply for good schools, good jobs, set goals that take effort to attain. Even Pokemon Go involves a quest. Why should it be any different in matters of faith? And when it's God Himself who is our strength and our might -- well, then, what is there to fear?
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i think the fourth verse is especially useful for artists. So much of the arts is marred by huge artistic egos -- it's a big reason why arts scenes everywhere can often get so ugly. Imagine what 'Riches i heed not, nor man's empty praise' would do for the arts. No more hissy fits or broken friendships over bad reviews or being passed over for a prize or award. No more ditching of one's artistic vision because one is seeking the approval of one's fellow man. Not on this side of paradise, i guess.
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i guess, finally, it's the idea of 'vision' that captures my heart and mind. i never really knew what it means to have a 'vision' for something until i started writing seriously. Even in life, i never really had a conscious, big-picture goal of how i wanted my life to be. Sure, i may have had subconscious preferences and values, but 'vision' as something burning and all-encompassing, something that drives what you do and that gives you a worthwhile goal to strive towards, no. It was only several years ago, when writing my first big piece, that i first experienced what it feels like, to have this ideal that you strive towards, through the glass, darkly. That sense of incompleteness when you know that what you have is not quite the vision, not quite your Platonic ideal. It's a rare and precious thing, vision. Something to be nurtured and cherished.
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This hymn is such a useful waymarker. i find it always brings me back to my proper path when i start to lose my way -- which is, unfortunately, pretty often. It's my musical 山 重 水 复 疑 无 路 ,  柳 暗 花 明 又 一 村 。
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i think this blog-post is good evidence for the fact that words don't come easy to me when i'm trying to write about stuff i really care about.
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a pitiless gaze

From a review in the FT: " ... the pitiless gaze of our best [British] novelists".
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That would be an interesting writing experiment, i think. i haven't really tried 'pitiless' before. 'Raw brutality', yes; 'poignant', yes; 'scathing' and 'bridge-burning', yes and yes. But i think 'scathing' and 'bridge-burning' are not quite the same as 'pitiless'.

'Pitiless' might just be the right tone to describe the educational arms race here. It might also work for a satire on church community. i think if i were to write about either of those things with a pitiless gaze, and publish it, i just might end up losing half my social circle (or more). i'm not sure if great literature is worth the price of so many friendships.  :)
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In other news. It's been so long since i've read good fiction. Right now i want to read something with a pitiless gaze, something scathing and stinging and savagely, savagely funny.
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originality and reality

Conversation between teacher and student, paraphrased:
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S: But what we have to do for English essays and stuff, we have to be original right? We have to say something different and new?
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T: Weeell ......
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S: Because it looks like that's what we get marks for, being original.
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T: Ok, see, here's the thing. i don't think you should necessarily be aiming to be original. i think what's more important is to say what is true. To say what is real.
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S: But doesn't that mean you're saying what everyone else is saying?
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T: Hmmm. i don't think originality and truthfulness are mutually exclusive. You know, as you go through life, i think you'll probably be quite amazed at how many people simply cannot see reality.
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S: Really? But why?
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T: Well, different reasons. Some people can't see, some people don't want to see. They've got vested interests. So they only see what they want to see, they only see part of what is real.
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S: They're biased?
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T: Yep. So what that means is that if you make the effort to see as much of what is real as you possibly can, to say what is true, to see as many different perspectives and angles like the way we teach you to do, then you probably have a pretty good chance of saying something original too, cos a lot of people can't see what is true. So don't worry about being original. Work on writing what is true.
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skool

Getting an email from a student beginning with the words "I am disappointed ... " is enough, i think, to make even the most conscientious teacher slightly nervous. So when i got that email today, the first thought that crossed my mind was that this was going to turn out to be the most forthright, ruthlessly honest, plain-spoken piece of student feedback i've ever received in all my life.
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Thankfully, it was not.
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The email went on to say, "I am disappointed with my score for the [recent assignment] and would like to find out how I can improve further."
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This is the first time in my entire teaching career a student -- who by the way didn't do that badly, really -- has come up to me asking for extra help after getting a relatively poor (in her view) score on an assignment. i guess that's what makes the difference between students in "top" schools who go on to excel and rule the world, and students in the not-so-top places where i've taught before. It's the difference between excellence and mediocrity (or worse).
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In other news, of all the students i've taught so far in my teaching career, i think i'm liking these kids the most. They're bright, yet humble -- an exceedingly rare combination -- and we get each other's jokes, and sometimes they even win the bantering game. It's the first time i've felt i can actually relate with my students -- which is kinda funny, seeing as the rest of my colleagues seem to think that these kids are slightly weird.
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in memoriam

i heard the news this morning, in class, while my students were working hard on a test. Ah the wonder of mobile phones. E has died of cancer.

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The last i'd heard of E was a few months ago, from M, who had been her housemate back in uni. E was fighting cancer then; she'd had a bout of breast cancer several years ago before going into remission, but the cancer came back, and this time, in the liver. i knew the moment i heard it was the liver that she didn't have long to live. 

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i never really knew E, but i do remember her from my visits up to Oxford way back then, and i remember that of the Marston Street gang, she was the most down-to-earth and approachable. J was just intimidating; A was a bit of an Earth-Mother figure and very maternal even at the age of 20; Ez had a pixie-like fay-ness to her which made you feel like she could never quite sit still long enough for anyone to get to know her properly. E was the friendly, approachable one. She went on to do a PhD in museum studies with a thesis on childrens' perceptions of museum exhibits. How like her, to have done something so eminently practical, usable, and down-to-earth for her postgrad studies. i liked E, or at least, what little i knew of her. 

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This news -- it's what i've been feeling more and more about Life, that inexorable churning of the tides, that swirling and eddying and the onward rush that man can neither stop nor divert. It leaves one feeling quite quite speechless, because, of course, what is there to say when these things happen.

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wannabe fictionist

i've always kinda envied fictionists -- especially novelists -- because it seems to me that so much about life that is actually worth saying, cannot be said in anything except story. Poetry is such a paltry little thing in comparison, good for meditations on beauty and nature and love and the inner state of things, but almost useless for the things that really matter, the choices we make, the twists and turns that life takes, the roads we choose and why, the roads we don't choose, and why. Creative nonfiction may be a close substitute, but its fact-bounded-ness is both a strength and also a terrible weakness: "you can't make this shit up", as they say, but that also puts limits on what can and cannot be written insofar as one wants to remain a decent human being who cares about the people one writes about.
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So yes, i envy the freedom that fictionists enjoy. So often these days, when i talk with friends or listen in on conversations going on around me (okok, i confess, i enjoy eavesdropping ... ), i find myself with so many things i want to say, observations i want to make, insights (do i kid myself?) i want to share -- but none of these will fit into the genres i'm actually good at writing. What i want to say, can only be said in fiction, because it is about life, in all of its wide expanse.
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In other news. Since i cannot put this in a novel. Can i just say. Life moves on, and time moves on. i've learnt over the years that life, like music, has a long line, an arc; i'm learning not to second-guess where that arc will land. i'm grateful for reconciliations, for relationships with friends and loved ones that have been healed against all expectations. There is something miraculous in all of this, i think, something for which the heart wants to give thanks in quiet song.
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