news from abroad part 2

Dag Alle,
I know that it has been some time since I have blogged here. A number of reasons, among them; inertia, illness, being out most of the time and plain laziness. I have been feeling all these since I got to The Netherlands from the UK. For some of you who have not experienced flying from London to Amsterdam, a tip for you all at the customs is that there is no such thing as freedom of movement between these two countries, so you have to go through the entire rigamarole at customs again, unless of course you have an indefinite entry pass or something equivalent, or have been in and out of the country often enough without incident.

Weather is usually blustery, and temperature can drop low enough to leave frost lying on leaves, grass and rivers the next morning. I saw hail only once in my two weeks here, but it was enough to keep me indoors the entire time. Hence the lack of blog. Not much to write about when you are stuck at indoors sleeping, reading, reading emails. surfing the net and doing all that one does back home (:

However, since I am currently living in a village at the outskirts of Central Utrecht, I managed to pay the town a visit, as well as Amsterdam and Delft. Unfortunately, I have not been able to go around as much as I like, due to bad weather and transportation prob (I live in a village and have no car). Life would have been simpler if I have rented a car, that would put me back by 300 euros per week, and the fact that everyone drives on a different side of the road would have limited my car-induced mobility. So I make do with freezing walks, buses, cabs(highly expensive) and trains. But since I can't go out as much, it isn't too bad.

Amsterdam is a charming city, interspersing old and new, sleaze and calvinism. Streets are much dirtier than other parts of the Netherlands I have visited, but it is a colourful place, and it has a Chinatown located in the red light district (albeit a tiny one). Trust the Chinese to operate from dodgy parts of European towns. It is also in the red-light district (the map will tell you where it is and the Dutch actually name that part of town Red Light District) that you can get really charming and interesting stuff, especially big second hand bookstores (*drool*). Utrecht and Delft on the otherhand are very Dutch, though one see some Indonesian-Chinese and Surinamese restaurants around, the way one would see HK and Indian/Pakistani restaurants in London. If you know a little German and a lot of English, you might be able to understand a few simple words here and there. Learning Dutch isn't too difficult if you are a German or English speaker, though I am told that it is harder to learn to pronounce in Dutch if you are a native German speaker. Oh yeah, did I mention that this is a place where you can buy cannabis biscuits and marijuana sells rather cheaply? If I ever stay here long enough, I'll invest in a bicycle and cycle around, carrying it on the train whenever I have to move between cities. Oh, clock towers are ubiquitous around here. You know you are at the centraal part of town once you see one. And the lovely canals.

I will write more later. Weather has turned for the better, so am planning for another outdoor excursion.

Tot ziens

New from Abroad Part 1

From the first day I arrived, this has been my sixth day in London, with around six more days to go. Most of the time has been spent getting things done (like posting letters, getting a mobile simcard) and orientating myself around (with a number of misses of course). I am beginning to learn more about this city, being forced to go around on my own since most friends are not availble a majority of the time. I discovered some interesting shops, streets and museums. Some quaint and some look like what you would see in big cities in Asia.

I've also managed to get a British Library reader's pass, which is valid for a year, so that means I can go to the Library anytime I want between now and early Dec next year, subject to possible renewal. Despite the fact that it is now housed in a building quite a distance away from British Museum, it has a nice scholarly ambience, even if it lacks somewhat in history.

In between shopping and sighs-seeing, I am please to say that I managed to get some research work done. Well, four days spent on sightseeing and shopping, and all the other days (except this Sunday and the next Mon when I will be flying off to the continent) will be spent in BL (though I can still go shopping after closing time (:, or maybe take in a museum of two, if they aren't close by then. Most public places tend to close, early, with the exception of libraries.

Cheers

Re-learning a language

I have only around 8 more days, including today, before I depart from Malaysia to another continent where I will be installed for a month. As such, I am busy trying to get everything done and meet as many of my friends as I can before the hiatus begins, well not real hiatus where my dissertation is concern but a hiatus nonetheless when it comes to income generating work and being contactable in Malaysia. (:

Being back to freelance for this period while I try to complete my dissertation requires some adjustments of to finance management and lifestyle, which though not cumbersome, is still thorny. I have to remember not to overspend when I am abroad, as I no longer have a regular income to come back to. At least for this short duration.

Another reason why I have not been posting is that on top of trying to write another chapter of the dissertation, I have also been involved with writing another article, in Malay (my fourth attempt between this year and last, and a longer piece at that), and that has sucked up most of my Eid Fitr holidays (not that I celebrate the occasion personally, though being able to go visiting or on a short cheap holiday somewhere would had been great). I am rusty when it comes to writing in the language, and it somehow lacks the verve and finesse that I have when writing in English (though I am far from being a polished writer of English at this point). The editor pointed out that my piece sometimes lacks coherence and contain too many repetitions and is clumsy. Looks like I would have to work from scratch when it comes to writing in Malay, having left it behind with my school days. And to think I am trying to learn German, and later Chinese. I hope I am not overloading my grey matter and escalating its breakdown. :P Anyway, with regard to the article, it is to come out in a book anthology. I will post more details under the news section when it is out, which would most probably be in December 2004.

I've still got a number of books to review which I will do next year when I get back. I would like to start writing a column somewhere next year, as a way of expanding my publishing career. Not sure where and how, though I know what. That remains to be seen...

Anyway, back to work. I am working from home again. Though I enjoy it, too much of it can get to me. (:

If anyone wants to offer me a job in publishing, advertising or anything related next year, please contact me. (:

Cheers
Clarissa

Dark times or return to the past?

I having been posting for awhile, especially since after leaving my job. The main reason being that I am no longer regularly in front of the computer as I used to be. Another thing is that too many things are happening in my life that needs lots of attention. And I am writing a book. :P

The result of the Nov 2 election left everyone in a shock as the Republicans gained control over America and its millions of citizens, snatching away the Congress and whitehouse from the Democrats. A dejavu comes over me as I see a replay, at a bigger scale, all that happened in my own country in the elections earlier this year. Except that while we had a new leader, America retained its leader, a leader that has been compared to Reagen. The dejavu I am talking about is suspected corruption and mishandling of the electoral system. Has something messed up big time, or have a majority of Americans become fundamentalists overnight? I see this no longer as a struggle between left and right, but a bigger problem of a system going from democratic to semi-totalitarian. Is the Camelot days over? But then, this is just my opinion.

I have posted here some of the debates and links related to the Nov 2 elections. Though we might want to ignore the outcome of the elections, the fact that the American government and foreign policies affect our lives means that we better sit up and stop being ignorant. One does not have to agree with all the views posted below, but it is good to weigh all your options.

It will be interesting to see what the White House has in store for the next year. I wonder if the New Yorker will still be featuring as much stories on US politics after the elections.



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From: Kevin Glynn
Reply-To: Cultural Studies
To: cultstud-l@mailman.acomp.usf.edu
Date: Sat, 06 Nov 2004 13:52:01 +1300
Subject: [cultstud-l] In Diebold Systems Inc. We Trust?

OK – there is for sure a right-wing populist lunatic fringe that spoke very loudly a couple days ago. But the other big populist story of “election” ’04 was the astonishing mobilization of anger from the hip hop generation to the elderly, from Springsteen and Eminem and Chuck D to the Dixie Chicks – anger over Iraq and the estimated 100,000+ killed there already, anger over the wholesale disenfranchisement of African Americans in 2000, anger over an insane Republican theocracy that is off the leash. And frankly I’m with Greg Palast (author of The Best Democracy Money Can Buy) when he says there’s no reason to put any faith in the official election results reported in states with unaccountable and unverifiable “black box” voting machines courtesy of Diebold Systems Inc. Call me a conspiracy theorist, but what better way to respond to a massive mobilization of really pissed-off first-time voters, young voters and other voters-who-don’t-usually-vote, than to get ‘em to stand in line in the rain for 8 hours just to teach them that all their mobilization meant nothing in the end after all. Hell, the Michigan Republican who said several months ago that “we’ve gotta do something to suppress the black vote this year or it’ll be our undoing” (or words to that effect) spoke to a profound sense of threat that was rampant throughout the whole right-wing kleptocracy called “our” government. THIS “president,” “elected” again under these global and domestic circumstances, in a fashion that apparently (and all too conveniently) puts to bed the controversy over the theft of the White House in 2000 and sets the stage for a radical restructuring of state power in the US, as well as potentially nipping in the bud a populist mobilization that just might feel newly emboldened to flex its “dangerous” muscles in future elections? Sorry, I’m just not buying it. It’s all too fishy. Something really stinks here. Here’s this from a computer science prof in the Netherlands (see http://www.electoral-vote.com/, and recall that exit polling is generally considered to be far more accurate than predictive pre-election polling, since it entails asking people who’ve just voted, how they actually voted):“Various people sent me mail saying that it is awfully fishy that the exit polls and final results were substantially different in some places. I hope someone will follow this up and actually do a careful analysis. Does anyone know of a Website containing all the exit poll data? If we go to computerized voting without a paper trail and the machines can be set up to cheat, that is the end of our democracy. Switching 5 votes per machine is probably all it would take to throw an election and nobody would ever see it unless someone compares the computer totals and exit polls. I am still very concerned about the remark of Walden O'Dell a Republican fund raiser and CEO of Diebold, which makes voting machines saying he would deliver Ohio for President Bush. Someone (not me) should look into this carefully. The major newspapers actually recounted all the votes in Florida last time. Maybe this year's project should be looking at the exit polls. If there are descrepancies between the exit polls and the final results in touch-screen counties but not in paper-ballot counties, that would be a signal. At the very least it could be a good masters thesis for a political science student. The Open voting consortium <http://www.openvotingconsortium.org/> is a group addressing the subject of verifiable voting.”Things are just too smelly here. The bill that would have required all states to use verifiable voting machines has been stalled for months in the Republican Congress. Jeb Bush has flatly refused to install the paper trail that would actually benefit him by making the Florida 2004 result appear credible. Ditto in Ohio (for months labeled the “new Florida” of 2004). But don’t look for this story on Fox News! For more on Diebold, point your browsers here:http://www.jewishtimes.com/2435.stmFor Palast's latest account of this year's sequel to the theft of democracy in 2000, see:http://www.tompaine.com/print/kerry_won.phpOn the prospect of Diebold rigged elections forevermore, see:http://www.alternet.org/The theorists of “Election” 2004 are Gramsci and Baudrillard: the declared, official result may well be a simulacrum designed to subvert the formation and mobilization of a progressive bloc. Yes – a simulated election, complete with long queues, record turnouts, a pre-programmed (Diebold), down-to-the-wire outcome, and even a few minor "reported incidents" of voter obstruction, etc. It would be the perfect "model" of democracy in action (as Baudrillard might put it). What more legitimating spectacle could Bush and his despicable cronies wish for?-kevin


From: winna rae
Reply-To: Cultural Studies
To: Cultural Studies
Date: Fri, 5 Nov 2004 21:40:18 -0500
Subject: Re: [cultstud-l] In Diebold Systems Inc. We Trust?

http://www.blackboxvoting.org/There's also the question of the county in Ohio where over 4000 peoplevoted for Bush.One problem.There are only about 600 registered voters there.http://www.dailykos.com/story/2004/11/4/224812/643

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From me-
For a history of the electoral system, check out the government website at http://usinfo.state.gov/products/pubs/election04/

And you can hear views from all sides here
http://www.watchblog.com/

Recap of news in the run-up to the elections.
http://www.worldpress.org/Americas/1865.cfm

Some require subscription, but you can read the free news
http://news.ft.com/indepth/uselections

And my favourite online newspaper for all these news would be
http://www.nytimes.com

And here are some archives of America's brutal domestic past
http://www.jimcrowhistory.org/home.htm
http://americanradioworks.publicradio.org/features/remembering/

hysteric

Sometimes, when we put ourselves in the hands of others, we either experience tender mercies or brutal assaults. Perhaps this is related in some ways to the human capacity for mercy and cruelty, both sides of the same coin (a cliche nonetheless).

When women, who are often typecasted as emotional, hysterical, and insane, fall prey to the straitjacketing of institutions and society bound on forcing them into unmitigating docility, they become easy targets for abuse and maltreatment, just because they have been labelled as unstable or unreliable, hence their voices ignored.

Below is a link to website on how women who seek or are forced into psychiatric treatment have been abused and patronized. You have hear of a various famous women creative types who finally descended into the final abyss of mental darkness, thrust into that role by societal's iron fists. Freud, the pioner of psychoanalysts, could not understand why his female patients complained of sexual abuse, had labelled them as hysterics, thus turning back the clock on psychology.

Here is an account of legendary, beautiful and volatile movie star, Frances Farmer. I am sure the world over would have similar stories to share.
http://www.cchr.org/art/eng/page34.htm

The setting up of institutions to hide away society's unpresentable and outcast, and treating them as less than savages highlights our fear of what Kristeva will call the abject. Frances's case became well known because of her fame and beauty. But what if similar circumstances happened to an uknown person? Women, in the words of the philosopher-semiotician, are abject beings, as are all associated with them.

Tennessee Williams have vowed a dark and horrific vengeance on Blanche in The Streetcar Named Desire when he had her institutionalised for insanity, after being raped by her brother-in-law.

pertinence of cultural studies

Here is something that might be of interest to some of you. It is about cultural studies at a crossroad, and I paste a quote here that is pertinent to as many fields as it is to cultural studies

"But there is another question regarding the "where" of cultural studies. Where might it be found? That is, in one sense, a where (what) is our object of study, our project, that which we want to elucidate or engage and, secondly, where might we find cultural studies being done (and maybe a third question of when ). On what terrain or plateau might we look?ot dig? From many accounts the "where" is a bit of a worn out place. Someplace we've certainly been before and someplace from which bombs have been lofted our direction for years. It's the economy stupid. In this conjuncture junction, where the function is to hook up logics, and peoples, and products, and politics, we're not clear how it is that this time, via an understanding of the new conjuncture, cultural studies will be able to make a difference in a way that it hasn't in the past."

http://info.interactivist.net/print.pl?sid=04/10/02/2021233

Could it be that we are now suffering from the overlapping of fields? Many new-fangled undergraduate and posgraduate courses that have sprung up from the growth of various new fields has led me to think of Hannah Arendt's essays on "Crisis in Education" and "Crisis in Culture" found in her book "Between the past and future", how we often miss the woods for the trees. More on those two later as I will need to revisit them before I can comment further. (:

As I look back...

Dear readers,
I am now a year older. Much has happened, some for the worse some for the better. Each and every experience that comes knocking at my door, and turning my life upside down, have a sweet and bitter aftertastes. I learn to see myself and to know myself better, to question everything that I have let slide or take for granted. Sometimes I bemoan the dullness of my life, yet when excitement comes, I collapse too easily in exhaustion. A bottle of contradiction, I am.

On a different note, I have updated this page with more links from friends (you can check it under Links of Interest, and have decided to link a published poem of mine. Yes, I am pathetic. Only have one measly piece published. I haven't have time to think and write creatively, though I have notes and jottings here and there that could be turned into poetry, given time. I am still new, and a rather unpolished writer. There is too much that I still need to learn and I will need to apprentice myself to a great poet/writer, as what other great poets/writers have done (though I am not considering myself great). While I am sometimes too tired to write, I can't give it up, as it is my life, part of what constitutes me. To not write, is to be crippled. I have a number of unpublished drafts that I will be working on as and when time permits. I have even tried writing in Malay, and I will continue to do so.

This is a busy week, so I shall stop here. Feel free to drop me words of inspiration. (:

Love,
Clarissa.

pr0n

Here is an article on the amount of smut in cyberspace
http://www.sociology.org/content/vol003.001/boeringer.html

Gimme your rubbish and the horror genre

Heh, saw this on Guardian today. If you ask me, it seems as if the recycling industry is either overloaded, understaffed or not properly managed. Can one make a living just recycling stuff?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/waste/story/0,12188,1308278,00.html


Some of you out there might have read series of thrillers, horrors and gothic stories. It wouldn't be very different if I just take a story written since the eighteenth century and transplant that to modern day news on crimes. Better still if they could be serialized in tabloids. Coming to think of it, they USED to be serialised in tabloids. (:

I am so addicted to Dvorak's Symphony in E Minor for some reason. Must be the mood thing again.

Here is an interesting bit in Guardian again about ten year olds in Britain. They aren't too different from the kids in Malaysia, if thou were to read kiddies and teenaged (under 15) weblogs. :D

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,1299466,00.html

I am not that old, but I feel ancient whenever I say that kids have greater access these days, for better or worse. I can't decide as to when I think is the best time to be born, as one can only look to the past, but can't predict the future.

Rape is Rape

To all those still new to the idea of gender relations, to sex and violence, marriage, etc, you will do well to read this http://www3.malaysiakini.com/letters/30115 .

I find it reprehensible that a few pea brains and rotten apples among the Malaysian men are giving Malaysian men in general a bad name for being backwards and chauvinists. And I find it idiotic that there are some who condescend to argue every dot and commas in this idea of marital rape instead of looking at the bigger picture, and finding profitable solutions.

To all the women who are reading this. Do not be afraid to walk it alone if you have to. I am sure you have friends and family members who could lend support of some sort. Leave crap behind and flush it down the toilet where it is due. Unfortunately, never in our training have we ever been taught how to make good choices, and learn to face up to the responsibilities of our actions. We have not been taught how to relate to people, even as we score As in our academic subjects in schools. Hence, it is pretty normal to see a super-achieving woman going out with a complete loser who beats the brains out of her. So if the educated among us are willing to suffer shit, how are you going to get those from more inimical backgrounds to fight for change. As women with choices, we are duty bound to make good ones and set the examples for our less fortunate sisters.

So apt that I am reading about the abject this Sunday afternoon. :D

Cheers all

Church and Sex

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

economics of recycling

Out of a guilty conscience, I have taken into the habit of trying to recycle as many things as I can. That interest took a dive for awhile, and something in my mind just forced me to look into my wasteful habits. One example. I packed food into my room today, with polystyrene packaging. I had to throw one pack away because it was too oily and also because I accidentally broke it, though I kept one to put my other foodstuff in. Guilt rides high prior to that and I googled this out

http://www.polystyrene.org/environment/econ.html

so, how well does recycling help in saving the environment (and in assuaging our guilt conscience)? We need all our chemist, environmental technologists and environmental economists to help us out!

I am hungry still so going to have some crackers.

Letter to the world

The line breaks differ from the original piece I sent it, and some sentences have been edited out. Nevertheless, my voice punctuates it. Some parts of the argument seem hollow and could had been better explicated. But as it was getting late and since this is just a letter, I thought I would leave it at that, since I don't want to risk it getting longer than it already is, or revise the entire thing. (:

Here it is
http://www3.malaysiakini.com/letters/29914

Good night for today.

Get past me

Spent the weekend either talking to friends or reading. I actually managed to read 2 essays of Hannah Arendt, 5 essays of Rosseau, looked through a book my friend wrote, browsed through another for possible review, read 2 books of Aristotle's Physics and actually begun reading a book on conservative Christian theology. I even caught a play (a bit marred by an audience with a fixation of the scatological-perhaps a sign of the repressed?). I did everything except.....work on my dissertation...uh oh. Oh well, I promise to spend today (though I would attend a party in the evening) and tomorrow (a National Day public holiday, not celebrating so would most probably be at home) working on my dissertation. Somehow, I don't feel all that patriotic, knowing that the day that we are celebrating is just another long list of nationalist propaganda and revised historiography.

Looking at this left me with bad taste in my mouth (and mind) . These girls are either so clueless that they have no idea that they are a fodder for burlesque and carnivalesque camp, or they are just desperate enough to do anything for a few seconds of fame and money (if they win). So much for ERA. It seems that a number of them come from the Bible belt part of the USA (go figure. I wonder what would Iran think of their women start taking part in competitions like these). It seems that Stuff has now come to Malaysia. Why is it that only magazines like these ever come to Malaysia? Is it because they think that Malaysians love magazines like these? Or that they have money to branch out to a small country like Malaysia? Or that they are desperate to increase their sale? With so many gadget, sex and lifestyle magazine around, I wonder how would they survive? Or do men never tire of cheap titillation?

Anyway, for something inspiring, I found this blog when looking in my email.
To all Malaysians, enjoy your public holiday. Remember to make it a meaningful one.

To the rest who might not have a holiday, well you will get your turn. (:

Christian Education

Having all these debates and things going on, as shown by the links below, really makes one rethink the aim of education. As a start, I will post some links on religious education in the US, which usually means bible colleges and Christian centric home-schooling. You will find it interesting to note that there is no unanimous voice in how it should be done, but that it should be done.

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0421-09.htm
http://www.google.com.my/search?q=cache:688CqK4CKNsJ:www.pepperdine.edu/provost/Library/Benne-Athens%2520and%2520Jerusalem.pdf+engagement+between+bible+colleges+and+secular+education&hl=en
http://www.homeschooldigest.com/ERodd.htm

It is late and I am tired so I will discourse more another day. Goodnight.

The right to Protest?

I wonder what would happen if someone protests at the UMNO General Assembly. Definitely would not be a pretty picture.

http://www.rncprotestrights.org/rights-bust.html
http://www.villagevoice.com/blogs/kamenetz/

Ealy morning blog

I thought that it would be good, for a change, to start my morning, from home, by making a blog entry.

The good news is, all the journals to whom I have submitted my academic writing have acknowledged receipt of my articles (which is a far cry from what used to be two years ago). I had to resend a number of the articles after not haven't heard back from some of the publications I sent to (despite having received the acknowledgement 2 years to 8 months ago) even after emailing them and giving them a wide space of time to reply. At least one of the other articles were rejected on first attempt and had been revised further (problem with my style, apparently. Damn, I need to learn how to write academic papers properly) so I am sending it in again. There is another article which I have decided to send to a literary as opposed to a scholarly journal, as I felt that it is more of a critical essay than a scholarlyly one (despite having written it for class).

Anyway, if any gets rejected, I think I will just post it on my website as sample of my student work (heh) and to share with you guys, in case any readers here ever have to research any of the topics. At least 2 of my essays are now on two different literary websites and from what I gather, widely read (or at least looked at). I am always glad to know that there are people out there who are interested in my work.

The end of summer is approaching, so that would mean that all those erstwhile academics who have put me on hold while they jetset around the world would finally respond to me. I sometimes wish I have more time and money to do that (not that I haven't been doing that, just that I aint doing that as often as I wish). My travelling here and there explains why I have little savings, that despite working 3 jobs at one point :P. Ok, only one of it paid well (that being my regular job, the others are just freelance).

I finally got my copy of Paris Review, after having to wait for customs to approve it. It is one thick, paperbound, quarto size pack, with loads of poems! And of course some critical essays. I am keeping that at work so that I could read a bit a day. I was supposed to be doing some work yesterday (when I got back after dinner) but as I was down with a bad cold but with no inclination to sleep yet, I decided to look at some blogs and newspaper articles at random. I am not yet back to my old self, but am feeling much better this morning than yesterday night, when I had dinner with a friend and his friends. They are an interesting bunch, except that I wasn't feeling perky.

Anyway, while looking around for websites on modernism, I came across this site that I would like to log here for my own reference and for you to click on :P

Cheers!

psychosis

Working on Plath can sometimes push me into a state of melancholia.

Here is an article that might be of interest to you guys. It is on Evolutionary Psychology .

I am now looking around for more works and articles that have ever been written on Plath. If anyone of you out there reading this knows someone who is or is a Plath scholar, please email me. I would like to pow-wow with you. (:

Health conscious

I have been particularly health conscious, going for health checks for every little sign and symptom that might be a probable diagnosis to a disease. Such meticulous attention has less to do with hypochondria but more to do with the awareness that I am not getting any younger and the world at large is getting unhealthy, due to unnatural and natural courses (from the frenetic modern day lifestyle to mutations of viruses). Hence, when I pricked myself with a needle while sewing yesterday, I decided to go see the doctor and get vaccination againt possible Tetanus. Sure enough, the doctor gave me a dose of the adsorbed tetanus toxoid. For those of you who are not in the know (I wasn't until yesterday), there was a shortage of vaccines due to the discontinuation of its production by one of the pharmacological companies. However, the problem of supply has been resolved, and those who have not had an anti-tetanus injection in years might want to think about getting a booster shot. Find out more about the drugs at
http://www.ashp.org/shortage/tetanus-update.cfm

To look at research done on the impact of postvaccination antibody anti tetanus response, you can go to this article online at
http://iai.asm.org/cgi/content/full/67/11/5951

Going for regular medical examination (at least once a year) is good for your soul. At least it serves as warnings and reminders when you misbehave.

Religion and politics

When religion and politics are merged, does it mean that the underclass(the non-patricians) will suffer from over-zealous, bigoted, narrow minds who think that they have been called to decide what is good or bad for them?

Check it here
Girl got executed for "Sharp Tongue"
To the women:Sleep with the Mullah if you want your rights

I used to naively think that religion can make you a better person. Yeah right. It just allows the unpopular, short, and ugly kid fo exact his or her revenge, in the name of God/Allah/Yah-Weh.

I supposed the reason the People of the Book get so much bad press is because there are more of us to screw around with the other people (both of the Book and not of the Book).

Friday Night in August

Here am I, sitting before a computer on a night when Sylvia Plath would be looking for dates (if she wasn't staying in like me). Yes, I am obssessed with the subject of my study. But it is a healthy obssession, and hopefully would give birth to a new book.

I often wonder, and still do, why do I do what I do. Why do I sit in a table, with three other people that I barely know, and watch them talk, and hear their uncomfortable silences, as they try to make conversation with each other, under my unmoving gaze. Perhaps it is to derive comfort in the company of strangers? Or to discover a different world that I have never inhabited. Why do I crack my head so hard, working on a book (which will begin life as a dissertation), when I could just hav fulfilled minimal requirements and get my Degree. But then, is that the reason why I embarked on that course of study? What is the use of a paper qualification in Literature if one does not have an enriching experience to accompany it?

I would like to share an article by feminist, Katha Politt, that I have googled up. I first read her when one of her opinion essays was published in New Yorker, talking about how she would webstalk her ex-lover by googling and searching online for what tenuous connection there was to him. Strange for a feminist to do that, you say? Well, feminist or no feminist, sometimes the heart and emotions get the better of us. I have been guilty of googling up people, from former lovers to former lovers of lovers. Friends and acquaintances have also been web-checked (or webstalked) by me. So, what can I say ? :P

I have bought another New Yorker (Aug 2 issues, they come late over here in Malaysia) and a collection of short stories by Italo Calvino. It seems that I would forgo all the girly stuff, namely clothes, shoes, bags and make-up just to save up money for books and more books. I wouldn't even buy anything beyond the printed material when I travel abroad to Europe, though I make the exceptions when I go to places like Thailand and Indonesia. As a colleague says, my sense of fashion is often disastrous (due to the fact that I don't really have enough clothes to match for all 5 days of work and so I end up with mismatched items. I tend to have more casuals (Read T-Shirts, pants and shorts) than work or party wear (which can be counted with my toes and fingers, though they look like more when I mix and match with more casual shifts). I only have one unbroken bag (bought at some cheap sale in my hometown up north), 6 pairs of shoes (including two pairs of heels, one an old fashion black strappy pair I got from a sale in London) and a pair of sandals. I do like manicures and pedicures ( I treat myself to them once a month or once in two months, and not always doing both simultaneously), hair treatments for problematic hair and scalp(which I now decide to do myself to save) and even facials when my skin looks stressed up (and this is because I actually have a full-time job for a change). I guess I can save myself from having to do the latter two if I just bloody move out of the city, which is what I would do, once my current contract ends (I need to save money then). It is the cause of my skin and hair problems, and the fact that I live in a hole without a kitchen precludes me from ever being able to cook, hence creating dietary problems as well.

I suppose I should stop here instead of boring you with the more frivolous aspects of my life. Back to New Yorker...

Some technology links

I don't have a lot to say at this point, except that many of the people I know and friends will be flying abroad to further their studies between this month and next. I wish them well and I will miss seeing them around here. I look forward to the day when I could also spread my wings and fly.

On a different note, I would like to share some interesting tehcnologically-related links that I have found via emails and from my compulsive surfing habits.

DNA Programming - Will this trump Moore's Law which says that the number of transistors in the integrated circuits will double annually.

Handheld viruses
http://www.informit.com/articles/printerfriendly.asp?p=327990
http://www.informit.com/articles/article.asp?p=327994

Currently reading the Communist Manifesto and will be reading Julie Kristeva.

Another week has passed

The reason why I haven't been posting for the whole of last week was because I had to mediate between preparing and attending a big conference in Malaysia for three days, and getting chores done, which includes clearing up my room. After a day long event which includes getting up at 6:15-6:30 every morning to travel 60 km down south and back, I am usually too tired to attempt anything useful. The process of sorting out my room included recycling paper, recycling bottles, and recycling some last year's issues of Malaysia's Edition of Marie Claire. I profess to reading women's magazines (well, usually only Marie Claire) to gauge the current conditions of popular culture in this country. While it titillates the eyes with its visuals, its featured products and stories both corny and serious, it is a good way to find out about current trends and the effects of magazine reading. While I would like to stave away every magazine I have for research purpose in the near future, I know that it would take up space, that despite the fact that I have not bought a lifestyle magazine in months (excepting free copies of a men's magazines that I used to get as a writer for them). Hence, I gave at least three copies away and would bring the rest back to my hometown for storage.

Btw, people, when you ever throw anything into recycling of donation bins, please read the labels on top. In one donation bin somewhere in the south of Petaling Jaya, Selangor, Malaysia, a number of people have thrown in old shoes where they are supposed to be throwing in reading materials. Plus a moron or two who threw in their rubbish. Blooming idiots.

Btw, if you are interested to know what conference I have been attending the past week, you can check it out here. Much work is needed to refine and revise the paper that I have presented. I think they will post the papers online later.

I would like to report that my dissertation research is making progress. Now, if only there are more hours in a day.

The week is coming to an end. It has been productive, despite the occasional hiccups here and there. I am proud to announce that my dissertation project is finally underway, and I had shortlisted areas which I would be working on. Now, I just need to get my preliminary report out and chart the framework of my chapters.

I need to prepare myself to moderate for a seminar tomorrow. Drats, that means no late night for me today. And to think that it is Friday ):

Going for a friend's housewarming this Sunday. That promises to be loads of fun. We might even be catching Michael Moore's latest film.

Life is looking up for me as I managed to pull myself out from the rut of never ever starting on my thesis. I need to get it done as soon as I can so that I could get on with life before I become too old.

Maybe I will blog more this coming weekend, if I have anything else to say...

 

We move in different worlds....

I am sure that you would already have read about things like this in the other blogs, about how people are never satisfied with what they have or what others have. I am certain that many of you have seen the bitchings and mud-slingings that go on in other public internet forums and even newsgroups. How we all seem to have a great capacity for passing judgements and make bitchy remarks about others, even those who have not done anything to harm us or anyone else. I know that I can be guilty of this sin.  And I do know that I, and many other people reading this, have a superiority complex when dealing with other people that we deemed inferior to ourselves. In my case, the fact that I am able to contain such feelings is because I have gone to school, university and work in jobs with all sorts of people from all walks of life. I do get to hear about what they do and their lives. And I do know that not everyone always make the choices that they make out of freewill. It is often dictated by a necessity to survive, to live on in a world screwed up by humans. It is always easy for us to think that we are not them, therefore there is no need to empathise but we never realised how fucked up we really can be until we are thrown into similar situations. Perhaps we need to stop being such a navel-grazing generation, ne c'est pas ?

In 1969

Monday night gave a pretty stimulating event, something one seldom find in Malaysia, due the level of intellectual depth of most of its people. Beth Yahp gave a reading of her short story " In 1969". I hope that it could get translated into other languages, so that other people would be able to read it for themselves. Even if you do not identify with the contents of the story (it is about a black part of Malaysian history), you would still enjoy the voice of the narrative, of the narrator of the story. Its use of language and imagery is powerful and poetic, even if Beth does not consider herself a poet (:
 
The reading was followed by a discussion of the invisible or silenced voice. Of whether one should or should not write about something. THe censorship that follows it, whether internal or external. The people who feel that they have to earn a living and maintain a precarious position in the society. People who feel too repressed from talking about black history, race, nationality, ethnicity and sexuality. Even Beth, a Malaysian writer with the full freedom to write whatever she wants abroad, is faced with this dilemma. Would one hurt the people one is closed to? Or is one able to cut of such ties and write with a vengeance, come sorrow or pain. Write in order to tell the truth. But then, many of us in this postmodern age seem to regard the truth as subjective. I beg to differ. History or Herstory is subjective. But not the truth.
 
If none of you have heard of Beth Yahp, just google her. She comes up quite a lot.
 
I take my inspiration from her, and I hope to be as great a writer not too far in the future. I am not growing younger everyday after all.
 
Fictional narrative provides an alternative explanation to the supposed objective history, when everyone now knows that there is no such thing as objective history. History is what we know or choose to remember. But fiction could play a part in reawakening interest in history, a subject badly taught and much magligned by the education system in Malaysia, and most probably elsewhere.
 
 
 

I am an idiot, but so are you..

Oxymoronic quotes overheard

"I love to read but this book has got too many words"

"I am not prejudiced, but I can't stand Malaysians, Indians, Afrikaneers, Thais, Chinese, Indians, (insert whatever other races/nationalities that come into your mind)"

"I am doing a PhD now but I can't stand the subject I am researching on. I will do it anyway, for the PhD. Beats working."

"I love to write poetry, but I don't read poetry."

Best things that people ever said to me (though I didn't like the context in which some were said at that time). Interesting how the same people(some of them, not all) did not take their own advice.

"Don't you ever fall into a rut."
"The world does not owe you a living or respect. You earn it."
"You are too self-centred. Think of those around you for a change."
"Always live your dreams, no matter what. Don't let frustrations and obstacles stop you."
"Capitalise on whatever strengths you have."
"Do you want to be part of a problem or part of a solution?"

Hmm, can't think of more. Let you know when I do *wink*

of cattle shows and beauty pageants

This is quite a lousy day for me, suffering from a stomach flu that reduced me to running to the toilet every 1 to 2 hours. Horrid. Since I can't get in to work today, I thought that I would alternate between sleeping, eating (bread is all I can ingest without too much ado), and surfing the net. Currently at my friend's place, but will be going home soon to mull for the rest of the day.

Here are some interesting things that I had picked up from the NET. It started with me innocently going to other ppl's blog (I read blogs when I am feeling too mashed up to really concentrate on anything heavier). There is this ongoing debate about what is beauty, what is a beauty pageant and who has the right to represent. Thought that I should post it here for my readers to peruse.
http://n1kki.frens.net/archives/2004/06/02/miss_malaysiauniverse.html
http://www.nicsteronline.com/archives/000908.html

One thing that I do agree about, with regard to international competitions, regardless of the principles behind it (be it a showcase of true talent and hardwork or a cattle show of flesh), it has to go by standards. Being optimistic, brave and irrepressible does not make me a suitable candidate to represent my country at whatever it is that I wish to do. That has to be won through true skill and ability. That, my friends, differentiate a solid performer and a wanna-be. I would like to be a good poet someday, and I am brave enough to work towards it. But if I am talentless, all the hardwork and sheer gumption would only give me 15 minutes of fame, and I would most probably be pelted with rotten tomatoes, like Mcgonagall

I am still so not very well ):

Money, money, money

Sometimes, I wonder whether I should work for money or for love. It would be good to combine both and become a millionaire one day. To know that you have all the money in the world to spend without worrying about creditors and debts can be quite exhilarating. It could also lead to one's downfall if one spend indiscreetly. But then, I would definitely like to give it a try in making as much money as I could, without crushing too many people. But then, it is hard to be filthy rich without crushing people in the process, right?

I must say that this is a funny article from express India.
http://www.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=32353#compstory

Talking about money, there has been much speculation about China's supposedly burgeoning economy. Naysayers think that it would burst. I am still trying to understand China's economics, so there is not much that I could add now, but I will provide the links that I feel is useful in the further understanding of China.

postmodern science and some personal tidbits

I have recently finished reading Luce Irigaray's "The Sex Which is Not One", a book that compiles a collection of her writings and interviews that have been translated into English. I will discuss more on it later. Suffice for me to say for now that she refutes many of the attitudes that Freud took with regard to the question of feminity. I found some interesting quotes that I could use for an academic essay that I am working on, and will tell the rest of you once it is published (somewhere *wink*). I also googled for Sandra Harding, a feminist philosopher of science, and will be getting her book from the library later today, the title being, "Is Science Multicultural". Go google out the book yourself, you lazy uns :P. And in my search, I found an essay critiquing her work, which I have not properly read through as I was busy with Irigaray yesterday (stayed late at work just to finish her). Anyway, you can check it out yourself at http://www.uno.edu/~asoble/pages/HARDING.htm .

Also, thought that I should mention that this blog appeared here. Must be due to the fact that I have linking out of me blog to a few urls that you will see on the site. And a search for Clarissa's Blog does rank it quite high, though there are other Clarissas around. Indulge my ego for a bit :D

Anyway, that's all folks. Til later.

Requiem For A Dream

Just a few days ago, I was watching the film, Requiem For A Dream,about addiction (to everything, from tvs to drugs). The underlying motif that run through the entire film is the fact that the characters in them have no hope, felt crushed, unwanted, alone, lonely, bored, self-hatred. They were mostly ordinary people, though one was initially a rich kid who finally had to prostitute herself to feed her habit. It is as much a critique of the American culture (the kind of food that leads to obesity, the repetitive and trancelike television shows, the holier-than-thou attitude, poverty, materialism and self-centredness). This darkly hints on the direction that Malaysia is spiralling into, with rising crime and psychotic people, that not stemming from a lack of morals (after all, they have all these moral and religious education rammed down the kids throats from an early age), but from lack of direction, goals, self-hatred, boredom, complacency, selfishness and everything that we see as happening in many first world countries. Seeing how the world has evolved, be they war-torn countries like many of the countries in the African continents and some in the Middle East, dictatorships in Latin American countries and most parts of Asia, or supposed democracy in the US, my belief in social Darwinism grows stronger everyday. We want and we need values, yes, but why aren't as practising it? Moralising aout all these things, as many institutionalised religions are apt to do, will not solve the issues, especially when many of their own people are the perpetrator of some of the most heinous conducts. It merely skims over things and dissolves us from the responsibilities of thinking further and to look beyond our mini-Pinochio noses. However, while I do not believe totally in the cold objectivity of social Darwinism, I believe that society will become self-destructive deal to its lack of altruism. This brings me to an article I read about anthropology in this magazine called 21st Century Science and Technology , which accuses this discipline of empiricising and othering non-White cultures. While my piece here is not going to go into the epistemological arguments in the article, a particular paragraph caught my attention. Since I do not have the magazine with me now (I am at work after all), I will paraphrase it for my readers. It says that when anthropologists go to certain 'primitive' cultures to study them, they make the empirical and ethnographer assumption that such there is uneven evolution within the human species, hence there are the very developed Aryan race (as the neo-Nazis would be proud to say) and the undeveloped, almost simian-like, Aborigines. What the anthropologists failed to address, the article claimed, is that these so called 'primitive' cultures could have been leftovers, or marginal groups, of a lost civilization, or one that is destroyed. I find this fascinating, as the level of knowledge of the average person of the great civilizations of the past is almost nil. Many can't even name the civilizations, let alone know why they fell. It seems that our education has failed in this regard, when we have postdocs and even some academics who do not know or understand what could have destroyed a supposedly sophisticated society. Perhaps we have doomed ourselves to repeat the mistakes of the past. When people like Darren Arofnosky and other non-mainstream publications (the fact that they are non-mainstream already marginalised them and hamper their ability to reach to the average Joe or Jane) try to rub some form of awareness into us via their art or creation, we often choose to ignore them. The people I know who have watched this film, which is the title of this post, agrees that showing impressionable kids the stuff in all their gory bits (even if it could be traumatic, but that is where the parents and more mature adults-note the use of the word 'mature'-is there to explain things to them) rather than moralising to them, serve as a stronger deterrent. Don't you agree?

Wasted Education

My friend and I were reading through Jeff Ooi's archive and we found a story on LimKokWing. HAving only spent 3 months in a private college (the sum of my private education), I am not able to comment too much, though from what I hear from college students of private institutions, the Education Ministry has failed in regulating the setting up of colleges, accreditation of the institutions and even in checking on the quality of the teaching staff, facilities, internal examinations and course contents. I have attended an interview for a job as a lecturer with a private college. They put me through some role-playing, by having me present a short lecture to a 'class' that consists of my interviewers. They seem impressed enough and I was shortlisted for an interview with the MD. That was where I met my Waterloo. Firstly, he thought my asking price was too high (due to my youth and my lack of consistent full-time work experience. Apparently, my past part time teaching experience and other related work experiences do not count) and from the way the interview went, I had a feeling that he was more interested in how much he could milk out of me for minimal pay. I was pretty appalled that the lecturers who were more senior than me were paid less than my asking price, which I felt was it was in a fair range (=RM2500) based on my past experiences and the amount of responsibilities I have to take on if I was to be given the post.

While waiting for that interview with the college's MD, I chatted with a fellow interviewee, whose idea of teaching college was teaching a tuition class (I wonder if she got the job), but I guess they must be impressed enough (or desperate enough) to pass her on for the second interview.

Anyhow, throughout the final interview, the MD seemed less interested in my teaching capabilities and how I could contribute to the students' and college's educational achievements (as to whether it existed or was I faking it) than how much he could pay me and all the roles that I was to assume as a "team-player" in a "corporate"-like environment. Needless to say, I never got the job.

While I would never deny the fact that many of the lecturers who decided to take up lecturing despite of the bad pay (though if you are some acclaimed professor from a public university, you can go in for a good position and higher pay. It is all about publicity) do it for the love, there are many others who do this job because no one in the industry or anywhere else would hire them. It is the second breed that we should be most concerned with, as there are more of them in private colleges, than the first breed. And also with the money grasping directors of colleges. What can one do when share-holders are more interested in profit margins than quality of education? After all, they see such ventures as a business, regardless of whose lives such ventures would affect.

Media

I am currently finishing up a paper that I would be giving at a conference, and my partner would be adding and revising it further. It is a paper on audience reception and new media and you can get the abstract here and then scroll down to page 37. You will find it. Of course, you are welcomed to look at all the other abstracts. (:

I am currently reading this book called Representing Women: Myths of Feminity in the Popular Media by Myra Macdonald and it has set me thinking as to how not only how the media portray women to be, but how the women like to portray themselves as. One of the easiest thermometer to use is to visit the various weblogs women (as in that we DO KNOW that they are women, and not men masquerading as one) have published, and read the kind of issues that focusses their attention. Or even how they present their more 'private' spheres for public consumption. I have also been surfing through various websites dedicated to women, both the commercial and semi-commercial sites, and it is interesting to note what they perceive as being matters of concern or import to their female audiences. This could be done by comparing with the sites specifically dedicated to men, or the cultural construction of the male persona. I am currently particularly interested in writing a paper, using feminist theories, to construct the media representation of beauty through the image they endorse with all its trappings (beauty paraphernalia or surgical reconstruction). This of course would require me to surf the net, look at women's magazines, watch ads, and look at ads everywhere (:. Since I am now working on a half finished paper, I might work on this later in August, or Sept.

Googolism, online networks (like Friendsters) and blogs provide a playground for the voyeur in us. It is so easy to stalk people nowadays, n'est-ce pas ?

Ugly Malaysian/Me

OK, need to rant here
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Ugly Malaysians
1. Fraudulent
2. DIrty
3. Unethical behaviour in everything that they do
4. Parents who breed more ugly Malaysians
5. Getting themselves banned because they can't be trusted

What do Malaysians have to say about being the capital for fraud, illicit trafficking and endless stupidity? On the third count, I daren't say that I am any better, seeing that I am still around and not doing much about that,

The Naive Malaysians
1. Who think that life should be handed on a platter to them.
2. Who whinge and whine but basically refuse to do anything, even when given the opportunity to do so.
3. Who think that building the biggest roti canai or mooncake or penis (oops, I mean KL Tower) is equivalent to being world class.
3. Who think that Bangsar is the epitome of class and good food (this is targetted only at those who knows whom and who I mean).
4. Who think that the worst thing that can ever happen to them is to not get tickets to a big rave or a Britney Spears concert.
5. Who think that everyone is upper-middle class like themselves.
6. Who think everyone is as pedestrian as themselves.
7. Who think they are people to be reckoned with despite being citizens of a tiny country nobody gives two hoots about.
8. Who believe that Malaysia practises democracy.
9. Who wouldn't understand what am I going on about.


Peace

Can a literary critic be an expert on air safety?

I was looking for some works on Beauty by Elaine Scarry and came across this rather interesting article on how the English don has expended herself and her literary skills to decoding Electromagnetic Interference (EMI) and air crashes. Read on
http://partners.nytimes.com/library/magazine/home/20001119mag-scarry.html

Intellectual Mumbo?

Some of you might be aware of this, but to those who are not. Check it out here at Alan Sokal's webpage

The reason why he managed to pull this stunt of so convincingly could be due to the fact that anything goes, as long as you can explain it well. Sort of like those so-called postmodern-dada art tht you see in the Modern Art Museums in the First World countries. One thing about third world countries like Malaysia, because of the fact that most people still value utilitarian concepts or have a strong desire to see something that need not require too much extrapolation (or 'quantum leap') of the mind, stuff like these wouldn't be popular here. Cept among the more pretentious lot, maybe?

Writing and other things

I need to work very hard on my writing. How to write in a style that denotes brevity, clarity and wit. How to grab your attention from the moment you read the first paragraph, the headlines, the subtitles. How to write enticing prose minus the purple, velvet,and the obtuse (obscure, perhaps?). I am thereby embarking on this journey to learn how to read AND write better. Perhaps teaching young teens how to do the same might be the best lesson for myself.

From today onwards, I am going to dedicate myself to the life of honing and polishing the art of writing good prose and poems. Content, style and technique would be the three areas I will be keeping a sharp eye on. Hence, I am joining a writing workshop.

I was planning to go Brazil next month. I managed to get a bit of money to pay for my trip from the organisers but the management of the place I work in refuse to give me any kind of funding, even though I am representing them, not just as a participant, but as a speaker! Nevermind then, their lost. So, I am not going anymore for this round. Maybe the next time, when I am travelling the world. Decided to spend the next 5 months completing a paper, polishing another, write a few reviews,work on my dissertation and read as much poetry as I could.

I think I will be going to Australia instead. For the upcoming Melbourne Arts Festival.

I think I neeed to go to the gym again. Haven't been at it for a month.

I discovered a useful resource for writers-to-be at PlacesForWriters that I would like to share with all of you. This is also for the more experienced and jaded among you.

Btw, after October 17, I am going to be jobless. So if anyone would like to offer me a job that commensurates with my interest and experience, please email me. I prefer temporary positions, though full time ones are also accepted. I am however, only available for employment, in November.

Weblogs and poetry

Today, while discussing a project with my partner, we spoke of a world that is not created by imaginings, but by solid, tangible bric-a-brac and realism. In that, we branched off our discussion into weblogs (Sparked by a glance at a newspaper with a feature on blogs) and the voyeuer's playground. From my own surfing of blogs, I noticed that blogs with photos, artworks and even personal, pedestrian details of the writer's life generate a huge following from friends and strangers alike. One could of course argue that the blog circles are inbred and revolve around a community of people who specialise in patting each other on the back, or taking turns in writing comments on each other's blog, which is true with at least 70% of the blogs you see around, there are many worthy ones started out by individuals that have attracted the attention of new readers and popular following for their content and aesthetics, as opposed to rantings by kids (and adults) about their life, their activities (which are often repetitiously similar) with friends, their incessant partying, getting laid, shopping, bingeing (on food and alcohol) etc etc. Weblogs have been touted as the latest lifestyle gateway, with thousands of them popping all over cyberspace, started by individuals who often have little idea as to what they want to blog, and thus left blank or abandoned after a few inane postings. The question is, should one blog even when one has nothing new to add other than attracting the attention of would-be-stalkers and voyeurs or bored inviduals who surf through easy-to-read blogs out of lack of things to do (or imagination), or should it be limited to individuals who are empowered and who have something actually worth sharing. But then, who is to determine such lines anyway? Arguably, reading weblogs of these many varied individuals sometimes offer a disturbing insight into the cultural, political and ethical precepts of the global, affluent community (they are the ones with the luxury to blog).

On a different note, I read a rather insightful article (interview actually) on an artistic development of a poet which I would like to share with you. While it might not hit you the same way as it did me, it would still make insightful reads to those wanna-be poets out there like myself.
Interview with James Reidel

I was just looking through two Malaysian books (in between reading up on cognitive science, something which I will discuss in later blogs). One is a bibliography of Malaysian Literature in English compiled by Malachi Edwin Vethamani. Unfortunately, this book merely documents a bibliography of works produced by Malaysians in the last century and hence did not add in new works by younger and newer writers. It is also a sad tribute to the state of publishing in Malaysia, especially of English Language publishing, with very few quality works, and most of which have never reached an international audience, with the exception of a notable few like Shirley Lim. Even then, she was never quite a household name. The other book is Petals of Hibiscus, edited by Mohammad A. Quayam, Rosli Talif, and Noritah Omar. While it considers itself to provide a representative anthology of Malaysian Literature in English, which it did succeed in doing to the fair degree, it suffers almost similar fate as the previous bibliographic compilation, which is a lack of quality writings. Despite a stable of talented writers, something is keeping the Malaysian writers from moving into greater limelight and even maturity in their works. Even the few gems here and there speak of a potential that has never quite been reached.


If anyone (especially Malaysian writers) have any thoughts on these, do post your comments. We could perhaps even start a new thread of discussion.

Am I wasting my time?

Since I don't get much comments of late, either nobody reads this blog, or nobody has any comments to add. Hopefully it is the latter. What if nobody reads the blog? Should I just write for myself? OR should I write for an audience

Was going through some blogs today (was a bit bored) and came across numerous personal blogs of people with photographs of their friends, their shindigs, their active social lives and everything there is to say about their lives. Would people prefer to read things like that? Do they find my jottings so pedantically boring that they aren't worth reading at all?

Only they know...

What intellectual?

I went to a talk on how intellectuals can contribute to the politics in Malaysia last Monday. Was so tired that I took a nap and managed to wake up before the thing ended. While there are interesting aspects of the talk, one of the speakers ramble a bit too much. Nothing particularly new, and I am particularly disappointed with the level of Q&A session. It seems that there are people who can't differentiate between activism and intellectual activities, and how each can feed into the other, instead of trying to make one the other. While it is easy to just attack the system, a system remains a dead thing as long as there are no people to run it. People need to be mobilised and need to achive a sort of maturity for any democratic machine to be mature. As long as constituencies themselves are immature, I doubt any amount of activism will help. People are intellectually lazy by nature. The question is, how do you motivate them to be interested? And how do you keep the level of debate from falling down the pits and remaining at such a low level as to never ever effect change?


Ok, I am rambling too much here

Recently, I have been engaged in some debate on academic publishing online, especially that pertaining to third world nations. Many debates that go on in first world nations often ignore the lack of options of poverty-stricken nations. Albeit, you could argue that poor nations should find means to fend for themselves before engaging in any academic mongering. Well, you aren't too wrong. But this divide will never go away and the playing field levelled as long as we selfishly believe that only we the 'haves' should have the right to engage in cultural or intellectual activities, while poor people shouldn't and just be satisfied with living from day to day.

Here are the two opinions I have posted and you can read others' responses and opinions on the site
http://www.comm.umn.edu/mailman/private/cultstud-l/2004-May/007825.html
http://www.comm.umn.edu/mailman/private/cultstud-l/2004-May/007838.html

I haven't been doing as much work this week as I should. I seem to feel rather restless. Less tired today, which is why I can blog. (:


Going to sound more frivolous now and ask

"How many of you think that manicures and pedicures are a necessity? How often would you do that? Would you do it yourself or pay others to do it?"

"How often do you give your hair a nice and replenishing treatment?"


A word of advice to myself :have more compassion and be nicer

Another day in the life of..

Another review came out while I was away, Voices of Injustice You are allowed to like or hate it. However, do give this book of chance, inspite or despite of my review.

I have been reading various poetic works online. I am excited by the fact that one day, we will actually be reading hypertext of literary works, instead of buying them in paper. Though part of me is of the old fashion school that loves the feel of paper, we have to face the fact the publishing on paper is not viable, unless we are willing to use recycled paper, which technology of today has yet been able to produce a high-quality version. However, more for principles than taste, I would support publications that uses recycled paper. It can be cheaper as well.

Tonight, I am going to meet some young women for a tete-a-tete. Last Wed, I met some young women for a workshop on writing. Being a rather young and raw writer, I definitely need more exposure to polish up my style.

While reading through news of the turmoil surrounding Sonia Gandhi's refusal to take office as prime minister (I am sure all of you are reading that all over), I came across a clipping on the wedding of Crown Prince Frederik of Denmark to the Australian Mary Donaldson. Despite of the Prince Charles-Princess Diana saga, I supposed we who love fairy-tales can't get enough of that. I suppose now that hoards of commoner girls/women are vying for the hand of a few eligible princes left on this planet. I mean human princes. Wonder what is it like dating a prince. Can't be too different, sans bodyguards and high security. I would definitely like to keep my life under wraps. But then, never dated a prince.


Cheers all

Back from Indonesia

The trip to Indonesia was one great breather and a change of scene for me. I learn now to appreciate what I have, after seeing the kind of poverty prevalent around Jakarta and Jogjakarta. However, these provinces have their charms (Jogja is a special province of Indonesia) and the food was good. I managed to visit the various tourist traps (cottage industry crafts) and got myself a really nice set of kebaya, complete with a painstakingly painted silk scarf), a set of Rama and Sita wayang golek dolls and some silverware. Poverty make many of the craftmans and traders occasional mendacious merchants(though not done in a way that actually hurt the victim other than being a few dollars/ringgits poorer). It is easy for us to dismiss these as pure greed when taken out of context. While others grow portlier by ripping people off million of US dollars, these small-time "crooks" only do so to ensure their survival for another day in a society that is cold and cruel to them. While I do not endorse any form of dishonesty, it is better to recognise the root of the problem than to ignore it as just another irritant.

Jakarta has a thriving arts community that publishes books and high to middle brow journals. While they might not be doing anything particularly cutting edge, they are trying to move themselves forward by emulating as much as they could from the far richer West. It is hope that they would do a good and thorough soul-searching to ensure that they are not merely imitating without resolving to develop their own, original brand of products.

First day at work today. Attended a seminar organised in my absence "Religion's Challenge to Secularism in the Contemporary Age". What do you make of this headline? Ng Kam Weng, Khalid Jaafar, Christopher Merrill and Rustom Barucha were the panellists.

Really sleepy today...

Blogging from Jakarta

This is my third day in Jakarta. So far, so good. On the first day, 8th May, I spent most of the day sleeping, having not slept much the day before coming over. The flight was uneventful, and being used to longer flights, I didn't realise when we arrived. The airport is small but cozy looking, and as there were not too many travellers, we managed to get past the immigration in a relatively short time. Within minutes of arriving, I began to feel the humidity in the air striking me full force, and this despite having come from Kuala Lumpur. On the night of the first day, we spent our time eating and exploring the nightlife within Jakarta. On our way back, we passed a pathway that is a popular hangoug for the transvetite prostitutes in Jakarta. One of them actually got in front of our vehicle and attempted to bargain for some sort of work with the driver. Another one was showing off her wares, and she is pre-oped so one can imagine what could be seen. After facing some abuse for our reticence, we managed to drive away. This night, we watched some bits of the documentary "Women Film Desire". And then fell asleep.

Second Day
In the afternoon, we visited the National Museum of Jakarta in Batavia. It has a nice collection of artifacts from the various parts of the Indonesian islands, as well as bilingual write-ups in Bahasa Indonesia and English. There is a model mimbar (where the Bilal calling for prayers in Mosques would stand), a model temple and a model Dutch kerk. There were also beautiful antiques designed mostly in Batavia, made of hardwood. Unfortunately, the museum is not in as great a state it could have been, due to funding problems. For lunch, we went to a a rather high-end cafe with mosstly foreign clientele. However, the food was really good and I had a Flemish tarte with bacon for the first time in my life. THe Batavia punch that I had was actually pineapple punch and was rather refreshing after a very hot day. After lunch, we took a long bus ride to a big bookshop in Jalan Sunda. They have a wide selection of books, though more overpriced than in Malaysia due to the low turnover rate. However, they have some rather interesting selections, especially of Indonesian writers. I bought 3 books (including on on Islam) and the Poets&Writers Magazine which is published in the US but not available in Malaysian bookstores. After that, we went to another branch of the same bookshop in Pondok Indah to catch the rather interesting film on Frida Kahlo, the Mexican woman painter who became famous for her poignant and soul-ripping self-portraits. After that, we had a quick dinner at a small foodcourt in an adjacent mall and went home. After showering, I spend most of my time checking my email as well as reading up a bit more on Kahlo. Before going to bed, I watched the very 1984 type movie "Equilibrium"

For today, we haven't really done too much beyond lazing about at home. Will say more later.

Anyway, staying with a friend now so it is definitely a rather homely atmosphere. Good food and good company. Getting Indonesian home-cooked food everyday. (:

I think I should read my Sylvia Plath today. Haven't made much headway with it.

Latest news on meself

After having disappeared since last Fri, I am back again this Fri. I was and still am in Malaysia, though I am flying off to another land tomorrow morning. Don't worry, you will still be hearing from me, the erstwhile Malaysian.

There are a few things I would like to update all my readers on
1. I went to a celtic dance performance called Dance of Desire last Sunday. It was a long trip up and down from Genting Highlands, one of the most pretentious and garish Las Vegas wannabe in Malaysia. Ok, Genting (the company, not the place itself) is the only company in Malaysia licensed to run a casino. So, now you know where the people, unsatiated by mahjongs, card games, lottery tickets and the share market, would play the Russian roulette. For the information of my international readers non used to Malay, Genting means "steep/urgent". The dance performance is alright, though I could see that the sensuous desire rousing bit would come from the costumes and sexy body movements (though very tame by any standards). Though I got a bit lost during the story-dance-narration, I enjoyed the fluid body movements and resolve to take up tap-dancing (since I doubt I can take up Irish step dancing here). There was also some jazzy modern influence, as the dancers also cakewalked, with a hint of modern ballet (less pointy toe and more contemporary movements beyond the arabesque, pirouettes and gallops). I thought cake-walking is one of the most sensuous bit, and the African American dancers were traditionally known for that.

2. I am now a published poet! Ok, not in such a big way as yet, but hey, I am trying to break into creative writing, instead of always writing measly book reviews, magazine features and interviews. Not that I didn't enjoy those. I did and it has honed my writing skills quite a lot. Not to mention the many press releases I used to have to prepare at work (a practise in nondescript stylistics, an oxymoron I know).
Ok, here is the link http://scholar.library.miami.edu/anthurium/volume_2/issue_1/lee-pointless.htm
You should read some of the other poems published. They are quite insightful and good.

3. I have spent most of my week reading and reading. I am still reading Luce Irigaray's The Sex which is not One I am reading academic papers (for my research purpose), reading online articles and various other stuff. Speaking of which, I think you should check out www.popmatters.com. Good stuff. They try to be as international as they can, though currently constrained and their outlook is still rather American. I suppose you know that I used to do book reviews for them.

I should and will update some of the other parts of the site soon. Maybe when I get back from my trip. Feeling rather lazy at the moment. Today's morning was rather busy for me, as I spent it on a focus group research. Now I need to transcribe tapes...errgh. And, I have got some books to review. Plus a short story and poem to review. And two, three or more unfinished tasks.

Have a nice weekend ya all

Good/Bad week

It has been a long week. Feeling physically tired and am glad for the coming longggggggg weekend.
I will be going to Malaysia's version of Las Vegas, Genting Highlands, (yes this is a highland as opposed to a desert) for a celtic dance performance this coming Sunday. As I grudgingly make my way there, I hope the show is good. Perhaps I will write a review of it here, if someone pays me :D

Anyway, Tues was a meeting with some NGOS talking about politicking within NGO bodies. The topic of discussion, based on Petras's paper, is about NGOS in service of imperialism. It is interesting to see the many reactions that paper elucidated. I hope that they would have another session to discuss the problems and strategies to overcome so that it would not turn into another mud-slinging match like that of the politicians. What can I say. As long as there are humans, politics will never die. Even the animals have their own version of politics.

Wed, went for a haircut (just trimmed my hair a little) and then for dinner and a gig of an Australian band that was having a preview concert. The performance was good, but the sound system was horrible. Not properly tuned and adjusted, I'll say. They are performing again today and the person is called Shane Simmon. Anyone has heard of him?

Thurs. Bloody flash flood everywhere. Took me 1 hour 15 minutes to get to a place that would usually take me 15 minutes. But, had a good meeting with some people. In the course of some discussion and conversation with some people, I realised that while we may accuse the right wing conservatives of many faults, they do have their own axe to grind bout various issues that I am sure even the left-wing people could empathise with. Don't we all want financial security...whatever our beliefs may be. Perhaps practises do not always go hand in hand with theory. It is easy for us to theorise about people's miseries, unfair laws and stuff like that. But when it comes to the crux, do we really believe in helping the weak, especially if it means taking our own hard earn cash from our own pockets. I am not talking about homes, refuges or charity. I am talking about implementing a very good Social Security System. As well as good health care (which could mean higher taxes). While in Malaysia, we say that we do not mind paying higher taxes if the government is more accountable, is this really true? How much is altruism and how much is self-centredness?

Ok, that's all I gotta say, for now at least. Looking forward to my coming hols. Will still need to work but at least in my own time.

Literary (poetic?) Scam

This internet has work wonders and work evils. Scams have moved away from pure money making businesses to those preying on one's pride and vanity, or delusions, whichever way you would have it. Here are some scams that I have come my way, and I have actually tried them out and lo and behold, they are scams. Anyway I have since submitted my poetic aspirations elsewhere and have ignored their cajoling mailers. Yes, I was told that I won some medals (Can't remember what by now) though of course I have to PAY them money to publish or get prizes. I don't recall award winners of legitimate prizes ever paying to win . If I had been that vain and stupid, I might have fallen for it. What rot.
However, despite me not having paid a cent, they still retained the poem I submitted, hmmmm......they must have need to justify themselves.
5.1 million poets. I feel so.....pedestrian. Just type in the search Lee Clarissa



Check this out
International Society of Poets- this of course has morphed into various other names and denominations. I am sure some of your poetic aspirants are aware or www.poetry.com? Well, this is a scam.
Here are a few evidences
http://www.lincolntrudeau.homestead.com/poemconv.html
http://www.complaints.com/january2002/complaintoftheday.january9.12.htm
http://w3.ripoffreport.com/results.asp?q1=ALL&q4=&q6=&q3=&q2=&q7=&searchtype=0&submit2=Search%21&q5=Poetry.com+-+International+Society+Of+Poets&submit=Search
http://www.toad.net/~andrews/scam.html
and finally, an advice to you would-be-writers.
http://www.sfwa.org/beware/contests.html

Many of the poems in there aren't exactly poets. They write well yes (in terms of putting words to paper), but most of the verses are forgettable (which means like 99%) and does not transcend. Some would had been better as song lyrics. Most of my early verses are forgettable and not worth publishing except in my vanity pages (FOC). I have writen a doggerel which I don't see as a poem but as a skeleton for future works.

Aren't we suckers for 2 minutes of fame?

Next week: Scams aiming at models and actors wannabe

Really, someone should write a book on the culture of cyber-scamming (or has someone already done so?)

New links

Do check out my little shrine to the 10th Anniversary of Rwanda Genocide Memorial under News and Updates. On a more boastful side, I have actually been added to someone's list of weekly diversions. Be great if the people who find my site through that site would visit some of the other parts of Archive Of Learning, which seeks to morph and develop with its visitors and its author.

Btw, i have updated the Links and Consciousness pages.
I have removed a dead link and added a new link to something I found on MIT's site as well as a link to a scientist whose first novel on consciousness I am reading now. This is rather exciting in view of the research that I am conducting now, which I hope could link me to the idea of cognition and consciousness further down the road, though it is now marketed as "media research" for now. More on these as I read through and write up my preliminary report.

On a religious front

SOme of you might have heard, read or seen the book Da Vinci's Code by Dan Brown. Well, here are some critical reviews of it, and its 'facts' by Leader University

groom or broom?

Just can't resist doing a bit of announcement saying that a review I wrote of a grooming tips book published in Malaysia has just come out. Caveat : not a very flattering review. Anyway, read it if you have the time. If not, don't bother. I suppose that now Malaysia has its first Malaysian Guess Face, ther would be many ladies of various aspirations and pretensions harbour the secret of getting the "model look" ? What more with today's feature on the new Miss Malaysia/Universe 2004 Review appearing at an apt time, no? I have jumped into the bandwagon of fashion and beauty!

More later.

anthropology of office politics

Best way to find out bout humans at their worst. One thing I like bout working in an institution that impinges into industry is that you get to be a hanger on to corporate office gossips :P

Face and the market

I was reading through the Malaysian Edition of Marie Claire and marvelled at how fashion has not really change much over the decades. Sure, there is always something claimed to be the new look which we all know as just recycled stuff from centuries of fashion developed since the beginning of civilisation. What is of greater interest to me now, beneath all the make up and clothes touted by the magazines to make you look like the hottest mannequin on the runway. The face of the mannequin. What makes them so popular and saleable? What makes them so highly marketeable that they are paid thousands just to pose, to be made up and dressed beautifully and to transform fashion photography into an art from the various pouts? (or as the dadas might call it performance art). A young Malaysian model, Amber Chia, is now touted as a soon to be supermodel, based on her success on being one of the faces for Guest Watch. What was Paul Marciano thinking when he picked her? Flipping through magazines would have various marketing directors of various luxury brands telling you why they pick this or that model (who inevitably has either been taken from winners of beauty pageants, modelling contests or high profile celebrities) to represent their product. But how does one put a face to a product? Is physical beauty now about being able to put a face to a luxury brand? How does a person associate a face with a brand? Why the need for branding using faces of men and women. Do we feel better using products that have for a spokesperson, a highly commodified individual, that is usually unreachable (despite all the rhetoric of being down to earth, simple, girl or guy next door). There are now fansites dedicated to these former clothes horse turned "models" (as opposed to the posthuman ideology that dehumanises human from the humanous to the posthumanous, fashion goes through dehumanising, humanising and dehumanising while humanising)
I am a woman on the street asking this question. I am no model nor do I have a marketable face. However, I am definitely intrigue by the idea of sex, body, face and the market forces.

Do these people live happily ever after, with all the applause that came with such enviable positions? Or do they go the way of expired products, with only an exceptional few breaking out? One can't trust what they tell you via media nowadays. Being in the fringe of the media industry, I do know that there are reporters and writers out there who don't believe in all that they write. There is always a need to emphasise the normal and the glam. Hence articles subterfuging the advertorial. Do luxury brands (like CD, LV,Dunhill products) expire or will they always remain timeless (as their ads like to tout).

This got me thinking of a movie starring Vanessa Redgrave and her sister (forgot the name) about a former child actress who spend most of her middle age thinking back of the glory days and feeling bitter about her current status.

If anyone knows of any studies done on this, let me know so that I can link it to ArchiveofLearning. This might be my next research programme, especially as part of my project on women and media.

sympathy

One things, based on varying interpretations , as to whether a person deserves sympathy for any act or misfortune that befalls. Or perhaps life is that merciless and therefore nobody deserves sympathy of any sort.

What makes art? I am struggling with this idea. I will attempt to recreate my own art, based on the idea of contingency - inspired by a book I read, which I will review for this site soon enough.

could a piece of concept be an art? Would something that causes aesthetic or sensual pleasures running though our very veins be considered art?

would a poem with very good concept and idea but lacking in metaphorical transcendance be considered artistic?

Can't believe that I am thinking all these things in the first half of my workday

Admittedly, I am getting bored with strict hours. My colleague has just gone to Hong Kong to view an art exhibition, courtesy of a sponsor. Sigh...

I could do with junkets like this.