Middle East Crisis

It seems that the feeling of injustice has been bugging me of late. As I blog in the comfort of my home, many innocent civilian are dying in Lebanon. Lebanon used to be a very prosperous country unknown to many people. It used to be one of the bigger economies in middle east region with her people enjoying pretty good standard of living. Today, Lebanon is a country under the mercy of other players. For the past 19 days, her people have been held hostage by powers bigger than theirs. The Lebanon government's pleas for international help to broker for a ceasefire has largely fallen on deaf ears.

War mongering US is backing Israel in this occupation, expediting a delivery of previously agreed weapons trade agreement. Rice said that US is "in no hurry to call for a ceasefire". Sure, no hurry till these weapons are delivered over to kill a thousand more civilians. No wonder the Islamic terrorist movements are gaining support. With this kind of injustice going on, one cannot help but sympathise with the weaker.

By the Geneva Convention, I do believe that destruction of civilian structures is actually a war crime. The IDF has destroyed so many key bridges in Lebanon and it is ironic that Israel is asking the civilians to move away from the war when these bridges have been removed. Want to see what other war crimes Isreal has committed since the Gaza incursion and how Israel is living up to international obligations?

Take a look at http://blogcritics.org/archives/2006/07/05/154815.php

Think i'll get my PACE flag back from hall and fly it at home.

Brokeback, King Kong and CRASH

The man of God spoke the weeks ago on the Oscars. He asked why did Crash win the best picture award and not Brokeback nor King Kong. This, he answered that Brokeback is a film about homosexuality, a definate "no-no" whereas King Kong was nothing 'great'. Ironically he said that Crash won because it was about a group of people living in LA who were brought to face the complexities of racial tensions that their prejudices have prevented them from seeing.

My first thought was, since when did he become a film critic? Is he even qualified to make such presumptous statements and infuse the younger ones with his ideologies, his own type of equality and non-discrimination. Giving hate a chance.

Brokeback has a gay theme. No doubts about that. However, it is also a film about prejudice, intolerance, love and hatred. If you look beyond the gay theme, one cannot help but see the same prejudice targetted at various groups of people in our society too. Given a choice, I do not think that anyone chooses to be gay. Who would not want to be like the rest of the population, get married and have kids? Who likes to be constantly hounded and constantly living a lie?

In Ang Lee's words: Wow. I wish I knew how to quit you. First of all, i want to thank two people who don't even exist. Or I should say, they do exist, because of the imagination of Annie Proulx and the artistry of Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana. Their names are Ennis and Jack. And they taught all of us who made "Brokeback Mountain" so much about not just all the gay men and women whose love is denied by society, but just as important, the greatness of love itself. Thank you. Thank you members of the Academy for this tremendous honor. And to everyone at Focus Features, in particular, David Linde, James Schamus, thank you for your love and support. To Bill Pohlad, Tory Metzger, Ira Schreck , Joe Dapello, many thanks, and a special thanks to David Lee. And thanks to my wife, Jane Lin, and my boys, Han and Mason. I love you. On "Brokeback Mountain," I felt you with me every day. I just did this movie after my father passed away. More than any other, I made this for him. And finally, to my mother and family, and everybody in Taiwan, Hong Kong and China. Thank you.

I don't know about his god but my God is one that does not give hate a chance to hurt His people.

Let us not give hate a chance.

What kinda ball...

Just yesterday, an angel in heaven spoke in the morning, asking the dwellers what kind of balls do they what to be. Small hardy golf balls, big bouncy basketball, iron ball where no one wants to move or balls that are so hard to control and bounce everywhere.... so and and so forth. The dwellers were laughing non-stop and it's interesting that the angel had absolutely no idea why they were laughing. Sometimes i really wonder where these angels have been that they do not know why the dwellers were laughing.

I want to be a fishball... small, bouncy and tasty. You?

many firsts...

Today marks the first day where i am left alone in heaven. The other new angels for the experience programme etc have all left. Some on contract came today but I haven't had the chance to mingle with them yet. Was quite productive today as i did plans and presentations. First session today was pretty good in terms of delivery but 3 dwellers had to be given the cane halfway thru my delivery. Quite annoyed at the disruption but i was more than happy to have JA help me discipline them. The 3 of them were not remorseful at all but after session i had a talk with them and felt i sorta won them over.

Been thinking why I haven't been as close to these dwellers as i had been with FTP then realised i had been too impatient and wanted results quick. I remember it took about a month for my to connect with the FTPians and here in heaven, these few days, I'm begining to see results. Guess things are going ok and i'm just overtly anxious.

While at the little nook in the resource room doing my stuff, I was listening to "Highlights from CHESS". This song never fails to open the floodgates of emotions in me. As one of the last songs i played with Dan and friends in NUSWS coupled with a superb storyline, this musical of the 80s is just....amazing. And I seem to have a special relationship with this musical. For those who are interested in the musical, here's the link! Most pple will probably be more familiar with the song "I know him so well" by Sarah Brightman and Elaine Paige.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_(musical)

The straw that broke the camel's back

I made up my mind 7am this morning never to return to heaven after sept. The incompetencies of many angels, always hiding behind this place of long history, what really irks me is the way they treat one another. Nasty.

Arrived early today to print some stuff but the machine ran out of staples so i had to do them on my own. I checked my stapler and found that it was empty. Went to the admin to ask if the admin guy can spare some. He was very kind and did spare me some but this angel standing right beside me just HAD to make the comment "Oh...you have to buy them yourself next time you know? He doesn't supply these stuff". Like DUH?! Of course I know and if you didn't hear me, i said "SPARE me some". In any case, he was more than willing to help so why bother to make that comment? In any case, i explained that yes i know he is not responsible for my staple supply blah blah blah, but this person just went on yakking that i should buy my own next time. Wah kaos...

Angel Y seems pleased with my demo/magic show today. Didn't get any evil eye nor firing sqads today. Angel D will let me take over her dwellers tomorrow for the first time. Gosh...i'm so excited...

*Panic 0800*

0800... Oh no! I'm LATE! What happened to the alarm. Did i set it last night? What happened alst night? oh no ...oh no.... what excuse? ARGH! STUPID ME!!!.... wait a minute....it's saturday. *Grumbles* goes back to sleep.

Guess I've been quite highly strung this week, not in the bad sense. Probably due to the increased amounts of 'stimulants' in my life. One week passed by pretty quickly. Was droppped a bombshell on Thurs to submit 'The Plan' on Friday since Angel Y cannot finish. The dwellers will not be around on monday, which means, I have to let Angel Y vet The Plan by friday, which leaves me with only less than 12 hours to plan, design and test. It's quite an interesting event. Angel J, doing the same topic with another group of dweller told me she'll finish her stuff first before handing over them to me. Wheee...

Besides these, i got my very own personal cell of dwellers yesterday! Turned out to be the same cell of dwellers whom i had a face-off with one of them. Haha... you should have seen his face when he saw me standing beside them in the morning.

All's well this week I suppose. Slowly getting used to the dwellers and they are to me too. Gonna spend the whole weekend looking at the calendar, putting 'The Plans' on them and starting doing some of them cos one of the newly appointed angels did tell me about how he was 'fighting fire' just months before and I can see myself going down the same way if i do not do anything now.

Gosh... i miss my hall mates and friends in school. We're all fighting a war on our own now.