Fight me! Erm... No...

i had to write this post after reading all the comments that followed from this YouTube clip.

i have started doing Aikido again. this is after a long long break because of my injury and work.

no... i don't do Aikido so that i can beat people up. i know that i probably never can. because my reaction is too slow. i will almost definitely lose a fight to some one who is somewhat proficient in any martial art. does that therefore mean that Aikido is useless? that it doesn't work?

yes and no.

yes... Aikido is useless as a means to beat the living shit out of someone if i'm the one using it. but if someone else, who's reaction is much faster uses it... then perhaps it is useful.

so. if someone else trained in some other martial art can beat me in a fight, he has not shown that his martial art is better than Aikido. he has only shown that he is better at beating people than i am.

why do i do Aikido then? well... i do think that it can, should i ever need it, be used as some form of self-defence. because most thugs on the street i might meet probably won't be a black belt in Karate/Taekwondo/any other martial art. if he/she is, then this persons martial art instructor ought to stop teaching for being a super lousy judge of character. so... my mediocre skills might still be able to help me get out of somewhat sticky situations. of course, i won't go picking a fight with someone like XH. and i know if i meet him in a dark alley, i probably don't have to fight him (i just have to run fast... i think i can out run him...).

another reason why i do Aikido... well.... i am getting fatter. and it is a form of exercise if one takes it seriously enough.

and also... well... i take it as a form of moving meditation. i like the philosophy behind it. Aikido literally means "The Way of Harmony". the best story where is where this guy, after getting his first grade black belt in Aikdio, boarding a train, saw this drunkard bullying a pregnant lady. so our Aikido black belt guy wanted to give it to the drunkard. old man in the same carriage stopped our brash hero-to-be, then started talking to drunkard nicely. found out that drunkard lost his job, wife ran off with someone else, so super upset. old man comforted drunkard. drunkard stopped being aggressive was apologetic. and old man went on to counsel drunkard. Aikido hero-that-wasn't realised that that is the highest form of Aikido. when you win a conflict without having to use any techniques.

in fact, that is what Sun Tzu said in his Art of War. someone who fights a hundred battles and wins a all of them is not the best general. the best general is one who wins without having to fight. Lao Tzu in his Tao Te Jing also said, if you never fight, you will never lose. Jet Li's character in Fearless had this to say, the greatest victory is the mastery of oneself.

so... my doing Aikido is a cultivation of the self. it is my way to harmony. to peace. something that i've been searching for, but not having great success finding. i have much darkness within me that i have to fight against. to quote Spider-man 3... the greatest struggle is within... and in my case... it is true.

I don't get it...

which is why i think a lot of students think that i am lame... cos they don't get my brand of jokes nor my sarcasm.

and today, i learnt a new phrase to describe that problem. "Sarchasm": a wide gulf between the meaning of the sarcasm and the ability of the person receiving the sarcasm but not understanding it.

on another note, i think i'm becoming Tyler Deurden...

What I need

is a hobby. which i actually did have one. but i kind of stopped because i wasn't sure whether my body could take it.

well... considering that there's a really fun bunch of people to get to know and hang around with. i think that, more than anything, means that it's worth a shot.

:)

A blip of chimness...

it's the institutionalisation of the faith, making it into a religion, that makes it all the more harder for me to accept it.

ARGH!!!

i'm such a noob!

i shall repent and forever carry a stack of my namecards with me wherever i go.

sigh.

Poem? Me? Nah...

A.C. commented about the way i looked, which got me thinking. and on the way home after watching Fantastic Four, i came up with the following:

From morning's eastern blaze,
To sunset's crimson west,
In life's confusing maze,
Seeking that peaceful rest.

no. i am not a poet (see one of my previous posts where i unambiguously stated that i'm not an artist of any form). those are just random words clobbered (heh... clobbered... residual effect from watching Fantastic Four?) together to in a vain attempt to express how i feel.

i'm sure a troop of monkeys fiddling around a large enough collection of fridge magnets can do better.

well... it's late. time for bed... good night my friend.

Rise of the Silver Surfer

watched Fantastic Four. not excellent, but nonetheless entertaining. much better than Spider-man 3 and Pirates of the Carribean 3.

some things that i noticed and thoughts that i have after the show:

1. in the first scene, at the top left corner of the debris of the disintegrating planet, i thought i saw the symbol of Superman (the 'S' in the diamond) being subtly formed and then blown away. i might be seeing things.
2. the movie has a very warped sense of distance. i don't think it's actually possible for the Fantasticar to move from Baxter Building in New York can fly to Siberia in the time it takes our heros to get from the inside of the military facility to the surface. unless of course it was a very long flight of stairs that they had to climb (does anyone know how far Siberia is from Manhattan? perhaps it is possible... hmm...).
3. Sue Storm must have the most fulfilling love life possible. i mean... with someone like Reed Richards, who could... well... be in any shape... you use your imagination...

well... i was attempted to discuss a little about what i think of the title, 'Rise of the Silver Surfer'... but... it's too late to attempt any pretentious chim stuff.

Ancient Wisdom Re-defined?

i think this might mean that the Chinese has to re-define the phrase 对牛弹琴.

In the ST today

was a column about the sacking of Alfin Sa'at. in it, Alfin said something to the extent that it is ironic that while MOE terminated his service as a relief teacher, some schools actually use his poems as text.

that guy just doesn't know what the hell he's saying. all A-level Physics students in Singapore learn Einstein's famous equation as well the photoelectric effect (which Einstein won the Nobel Prize for). but get Einstein to teach our A-level Physics students, and both Einstein and our students would end up killing each other.

put it simpler. if Shakespeare were still alive, do you think he would be able to teach in any and every school in Singapore? perhaps in the Raffles schools, or ACS(I). but put him in some of the second tier schools, and i think he too would quit as a teacher.

in short, a brilliant mind, a genius, while able to come up with things that other people study, might not be a good teacher as well. nothing ironic about that. that's just the way it is.

Why I won't be an artist...

as i followed the saga that is the sacking of Alfin Sa'at, this came to mind:

i think that artists ought to endure starvation before talking about poverty, be imprisoned, caned and tortured before speaking of oppression, have their souls damned for all eternity and go through fire and brimstone before painting hell.

and that's why i don't think i'll ever be an artist. of any form. i'm too soft. and not hypocritical enough.

Late Night Musing...

my muse, fuelled by alcohol consumed earlier, fills me with literary inspiration, commanding me to write.

the club. a modern variant of the tribal dance around the fire. strange convulsions as if in a trance worshipping some unknown heathen god. predators on the prowl, in a 21st century ritual to find fresh meat, driven by some atavastic desire that is awaken by the rythmic beats of the RnB tunes.

it was a fun night out. with a full stomach from Churrascaria at Sixth Avenue, enough drinks to last the night from a good bottle of Merlot, fun music and great company. missed chances aplenty. but one lives and learns.

next up, Mambo. perhaps.

Worthy cause?

no one should be worth this much trouble.

sigh...

Word of the day

is wankered.

its root word is not wank. in fact, wankered has precious little to do with wank. on the contrary, many friends i know will tell you that when they are wankered, wanking is the very last thing that comes to their minds. more likely, they would be seeking the nearest toilet bowl to hug. either that, or it will cause them to pull a girl that is really ming. for being wankered does greatly alter one's perception of beauty. but since one is willing to go for the ming ones when one is wankered, that really opens up one's options, hence making it less likely for one to need to wank.

in case you still don't know what wankered means, its synonyms are sloshed, hammered, dead drunk.

it must be one of the most interesting words that i picked up when i was in the United Kingdom of (not so) Great Britain.

for people who have no idea what wanking means... erm...well... perhaps some dictionaries around might have.

it was a fairly good, if prematurely truncated because i had to fertilise the plants nearby, night out.

next up, we hit Churrascaria. and probably more fermented beverages. :)

Who's your DAADdy?

the Thai Rak Thai and some other parties have formed the Democratic Alliance Against Dictatorship (DAAD). can you imagine if that happened in Singapore? can you imagine what they would say in their election rallies?

"Lim bei ga li gong! tong kim eh zheng hu si bo ho eh! wa nang si si bei ho eh!!!!"

(translated: your father tell you! today gahmen not good. we very damn good!")

nah... don't think that a party like that would appear in Singapore. not least because a party like that would be squashed at its inception by the iron fist of the other paternalistic party: the PAPa.

so. what can we conclude? PAPa is more powerful than DAADdy.