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.

Environment

I suppose that it never occured to us as we plan our holidays domestically or to exotic places abroad, we might be aiding in the destruction of the eco-system, what contributing to non-sustainable economy.
Articles on environment have of course come up again and again in various newspapers in Malaysia. Unfortunately, they never seem to occupy the same importance as what some minister or another has to say about something (like the recent brouhaha (a joke, if you ask me) on the National Service issue-for those who not in the know, Malaysia has tried to implement a national service system like Israel, Singapore and various strategically (or imagined to be) threatened countries.
I find it interesting that an article about how the indiscriminate building of holiday resorts in Port Dickson is juxtaposed next to an ad to the reader about booking a holiday with a resort in Terengganu. See Crowded Beachfront. What would be an academic or lay person's take on this? A way to forget about the gravity of the issue by immersing yourself in the epicurean pleasures of a decadent holiday in the yearly holiday plans?

Also, check out this Notification on Further work on the effects on forest biological diversity of insufficient forest law enforcement Thematic area: Forest Biological Diversity. Perhaps you might want to check if your respective countries participant to this proposition. To know where all this is coming from check out the website for the Convention for Biological Diversity

Tired

I seem to be perpetually tired every afternoon after lunch time, no matter how much sleep I have had. This does not only happen on weekdays but also on weekends. I think it is time to review my eating habits. Or it could have been the heat stroke (apparently 2 ppl I know are now suffering from that). It has been rather warm lately, followed by thunderstorm and shower.

I now realised how hard it is to find works of Malay classics in Malaysia, strangely enough. After going to a few bookstores known for selling more local works, I have yet to find any of the books I want. This reminds me of reading a particular comic strip by Lat, where there was this guy going around trying to get HIkayat Abdullah Munshi, canvassing areas from big bookshops to our august Dewan Bahasa and Pustaka and finally finding the book he wants at a local indian newsagent. Though I wasn't so lucky. If anyone out there reading this blog knows a good place to find these books, please let me know!

I attended a study session (well, the final hour of it) and realised now that many of the issues plaguing the religions of the Book are similar (I know people who would choose to disagree with me on this), as various factions and believers wrestle with multitudinous interpretations, problems caused by uninspired/dogmatics writers by certain theologians/religious scholars, and narrow worldviews that refuse to observe one's own short comings. I am making a study on this end whenever I could, though I have been rather lax in doing so of late. (:

Another problem that I had experienced over the weekend is realising how complex a poet I had picked to study for my dissertation. While many good poets are complex, this particular poet's complexity has so many layers to pick that one does not know where to start. She is not simple in anyway. Period. I realise that it would be a long while before I could reach such standards in my quest to write poetry, but then I will drill myself at it.

On a lighter note, I had the most delicious French dinner last Sat, though I was tired out when the final course was eaten and the bill was paid.

When my car gave me grief again over a traffic jam, I contemplated not driving in this notoriously bad public transport country of Malaysia but I shudder at the thought. Maybe I will just drive less and take public transport where possible.

I realise that I did not quite do everything that I set out to do over the weekend, but it was a good one nevertheless.

Hullaboo

It has been almost a week since I last blogged. In fact, it is a week. Many things have happened since, including one of the most relaxing weekend ever, which means not having to run errands or do work, other than picking up some stuff on the way out, renewing some library books and doing some grocery shopping ( ok, a bit of errands but nothing tough). It is also one weekend spent on loading up the calories so I am going to spend this week, and the followings ones, unloading them. Through regular exercise of course.

Due to my heavy work load last week, I wasn't able to go anywhere really much. However, I succeeded in reading through some essays by a group of Englightenment scholars, talking about subjects as wide ranging and as familiar today as civil liberties, governments, rights of (wo)men, politics etc. One realises from reading ppl like Rousseau, Voltaire, Herder, Priestley et al, that ideas and ideals haven't changed much (though Voltaire made boo boos when talking bout the science of anatomy by saying that a negro (black be the PC word) innards differ from that of the white men. However, the gaffe was more funny than insulting, and basically, he was trying, in that particular essay (title I have forgotten since I returned the book) that all men are as good and as bad as the next person and that it is mostly the system they live in that render them bad.

Best way to begin reading these people is to begin by looking at anthologies compiled by scholars of today. That way, you get a feel of each writer before endeavouring to explore them further. I wish I have had the time to finish up that particular anthology (it was from the Cambridge Series) and write a longer critique on the essays by doing a comparison with some of today's political systems. I will do that in due course, but I am too busy with work and various projects right now.

This particular anthology (called keyword search "Enlightenment", sorry, forgot the full title) was targetted at introductory courses in political thought, history and all related fields. It is by reading works like this that I realise how "uneducated" I am, despite spending 4 years doing undergraduate in university , taking my sweet time to learn as many subjects inside and outside my field (which was Physics) as I possibly could, while having the time to absorb everything. Of course, 3 years was not enough for a person as unfocussed as I was, though a majority of my coursemates who went in together with me (from Physics) had graduated by then. Maybe I am a slow learner. Even then, despite doing my MA now and having completed all my coursework, I still feel like I am lacking in the liberal Arts education. Could it be that the way "higher education" is structured today leave many students feeling inadequate and half-educated? Was the old system better?
I guess in this age of specialisation, people know more and more about less and less. But then, I seem to encounter people who seem to know less and less about more and more.

What say you?