insomniac night ahead! bad idea to sleep at 7pm. now am wide awake.

Addicted to Malcolm X.

I 'stole' his portrait off the stairwell to place in my office.

I spent a long time discussing him, and other much-too-serious-matters with Annica last night, and I may have finally found the right answer to the rickshaw-wallah conundrum.

Meanwhile, am very high on coffee.

How am I going to design a 160-page book in the midst of all this madness?

Deliberately woke up late to miss the slaughter. Not feeling particularly enthusiastic about photographing it this year (unlike last year, when I was practically wading about in blood). Will miss the goat downstairs which was so affectionate it rubbed its head on my hand and rested on my arm as I sat next to it. Am not eating meat today. Will resume carnivorous activities tomorrow.

The most wretched of feelings is that of liaising with the editor of Nat Geo News while looking at my own camera gather dust on the shelf. I am enjoying the organising work for Chobi Mela immensely, but all I can say is this -- I wonder if I would enjoy it more if I were attending it from the other side.

Selective histories

Tonight, hundreds of people are gathering outside a derelict factory to mark the 24th anniversary of the Bhopal Gas Tragedy.

I was first acquainted with the incident in 2005, after viewing the WPP winner for 1984. Later, I learnt about a photographer named Raghu Rai, who did plenty of work covering the aftermath of the disaster.

So, over the last 24 years, plenty of things have been written about the incident. Plenty of photos have been taken. The activists are still out in full force. Thirst for justice doesn't go away, it seems. But, who talks about Bhopal anymore?

My point is simply this: this was the world's worst industrial accident. And yet, I believe more people know about Chernobyl.

I'm not about to start comparing death tolls and such -- we shouldn't remember things based on the number of people who died. We've never really done things that way anyway. If we did, 9/11 (slightly less than 3,000) would barely register on the radar, and the genocide in East Timor (around 300,000) would be a really big deal. What about the Bangladeshi famines? Four million in 1943, slightly over a million in 1974.

Ah hell, its late and I'm rambling. I'm saying all this because I spent the last hour hunting for photos about the Mumbai attacks for the magazine -- and I just know, not including the people who have been directly affected by it, that all this will fade away from our collective memory in a matter of time, because that's just the way we do things.



Magnum Photos: Raghu Rai


INDIA. Bhopal. 2002. Muhammed AZIZ returns to the cemetery where 4.000 people were buried in the first days of the 1984 disaster.



INDIA. Bhopal. 2002. These women have all lost their husbands in the Bhopal tragedy. They now live in one-room tenements in a seperate widows' colony in the outskirts of the city, built by the state government.


INDIA. Bhopal. 2001. Skulls discarded after research at the Hamida Hospital. Medical experts believe that the toxic gas inhaled by the people of Bhopal may have affected the brain.

British children wait in a bomb shelter during Hitler's air raids, 1940. (Photo credit: Library of Congress and The History Place)



Jewish children on their way to Palestine after having been released from the Buchenwald Concentration Camp. The girl on the left is from Poland, the boy in the center from Latvia, and the girl on right from Hungary.(Photo credit: J. E. Myers, June 5, 1945. National Archives)

These photos just took my breath away, for some reason.

My head starting spinning in the middle of class today, and I couldn't quite fathom why -- I had lunch and enough to drink -- and it occurred to me that the double espresso may have been one espresso too many. It kept spinning for the next couple of hours, and I was half hoping to faint just so I'd have that experience under my belt. Well, no such luck. Made it to the Daily Star office in one piece to churn out more pages for December's issue of the Forum.

Got home at midnight. Out of eggs. Fucking hell. Instant noodles by itself. This house needs more food. I haven't had eggs in DAYS. Kirsty, are you reading this? Are you going to buy me a whole crate of eggs before you leave?

Took a peek at my student's mid-term assignments, and I wanted to sing for joy. OH JOY! The detail! The effort! I don't know if they're a particularly talented bunch or if all my bitching paid off. I figure it's somewhere between the two. Joy joy joy.

It's more or less official, I'll be heading the secretariat for the upcoming Chobi Mela V. Of course, its never going to be "official" since there won't be some initiation ceremony or crowning ritual -- I will have a new desk and the load of work will make it official enough.

I missed out on the last two Chobi Melas because of bad timing, so its rather ironic that I'll be thrown right into the midst of this one. I still don't have a clue about how bad its going to get, but everyone else is worried about how I'm not worried -- that should be indication enough.

We're expecting roughly 60 exhibitions, a mixture of digital and print, and I haven't had a good look at the guest list flying in.

What I do know, which is enough to make me piss my pants, if you'll pardon me for being so crude, is that Noam Chomsky and Stuart Hall will be speaking live via internet at the opening ceremony.

I've also somehow managed to take on responsibility for a book -- a beautiful collection of essays. I'm still not quite sure how I'm going to manage it all. I kept muttering to myself as I rushed from office to office today, "I'm fucked. I'm fucked. You're so fucked."

I'm almost resigned to being the sort that takes on too much. Whether or not I manage to deliver -- that's an whole other question unto itself.

Majority World's still on, of course. Progressing slower than I'd like. I guess I'll be in good shape to set up my own photo agency if need be. I'm surrounded with legal text these days as I try to sort out the basic necessities such as licenses, terms & agreements, territorial rights etc etc.

And in case you haven't already guessed, the photography's gone to shit in the midst of all this. I still feel badly about that, although the guilt has gone quite numb because I've felt like this for a while. I suppose when I'm older and wiser, there'll always be time to go back to that.

I finally finished Murakami today. It was a bad idea to rush through it, but I know I wouldn't get anything productive done until I set the book down. I was told this wasn't one of his best, and for that I'm glad. It was a promising book, but it could've been so much better. It seemed as though he was just fucking around with us at the end. I'll gladly read another by him, but I hope the next one has more answers than riddles.

So the consensus on FB (judging by status updates) is that the world's going to shit. I've got nothing much to say about it, only that I think the world's been going to shit for some time now. It's not getting worse, its in the exact same shitty state as it has always been in.

But our memory of past events fade, so that when new ones occur it seems things are beginning on a brand new slate. But before the Mumbai killings, there was the Marriott blast and the New Delhi bombings. Go back further and there was the London bus bombings and the ones in Madrid and Bali. Before the whole Thai thing, there was the Burmese crackdown on monks. Before bird flu, there was the Nipah virus and, of course, SARS.

And let's not forget the hundreds of shitty things that has been going on under the radar, from the events in Orissa to the wars that are still going on in Sri Lanka, Colombia, Sudan, Congo... well the list is here. Does anyone even remember the Abu Sayyaf anymore?

I suppose the only recent event that's relatively unprecedented would be the market meltdown. I know little about the 1997 Asian economic crisis, and I know it doesn't measures up to the shit that's happening now... but I suppose my point is that -- things were never always good. So why are we so surprised when shitty stuff happens?

Bara Khyang

So during my brief trip down to Cox's Bazar, we spent an afternoon visiting a couple of Buddhist temples in the Ramu district, about 15 km inland from the beach itself. Burmese influence in the whole area is palpable, from the traditional handwoven bags being sold on the streets to the children and women walking around with thanaka on their faces.

If I remember the brief history lesson correctly, the area started off with a strong Buddhist influence before Muslim conquerers came and destroyed a lot of the monasteries and temples. With this in mind, I was rather intrigued by the large number of madrasahs we passed en route to the temples.

We wanted to visit Bara Khyang (also known as Lamarpara Khyang), which (according to the outdated Lonely Planet guide we had). The CNG driver took us through narrow village lanes before we stopped in front of a rather nondescript compound.



We found it strange that there were no other visitors abount, and were greeted by a rather glum-looking woman (who is quite beautiful when she smiles, evidently) who told me that photography was NOT allowed (at least for the first 5 minutes anyway).



My friend, who had visited the place about a decade ago, was certain we were in the wrong place. There was indeed a large bronze statue inside, and even though the room was dark and dank, the size and beauty of the statue had us in silence for quite a bit.

Still, the entire place was so rundown that it didn't feel like a place which could house the celebrated "largest bronze statue of Buddha in Bangladesh". It wasn't until we visited another temple later that we found out, from the head monk there, that we had indeed seen Bara Khyang -- stripped of its former glory and beauty.

Bara Khyang's compound, now depressingly bare, was once crowded with visitors and filled with flowers and manicured lawns. The temple's interior housed not one, but three bronze statues -- two of which had since been stolen or sold off by corrupt monks, and only the largest one remained, probably because it was too large to be carried off. Other relics gradually disappeared over time.

So, the destruction over the last 10 years had rendered the place utterly unrecognisable to my friend. He was understandably rather upset over the whole thing.

Purnima

Finally got around to editing some photos of the Purnima festival:



So all the lanterns had to be "approved" by a monk before it was let off into the sky. Was without a translator. Couldn't quite figure out why.



General public cordoned off from the main area where the lanterns were being let off. Too much fire and flammable substances around. Still, when the lanterns floated off into the air, a great number of them dripped burning fuel onto the spectators below. Sounded painful.



Different groups of friends got together to make their own lanterns. Constructed from bamboo strips and pieces of rice paper, it was a delicate contraption - one which could take up to several days to complete, depending on the size.

Needless to say, lots of whooping going on when it was their turn to show off their hard work.

Arjun, who had witnessed Purnima from his village in Bandarban, reported a local artist made a huge, detailed lantern in the shape of an elephant -- trunk, tail, ears and all -- which was beautifully balanced and considered the most "awesome" of all the lanterns he had ever seen.




Oh, and remember what I said about half-naked dancing men?



I know the colours are all over the place, and I'm generally irritated because the colours appear different depending on whether I'm viewing the photos online or offline. What the hell?

Caught myself thinking "Maybe I'll grab some char siew rice for lunch". I guess memory is a habit too?

Culinary Tales

So other than the general malaise, I've been reading quite a bit picking up the random books left in the house. It's a bit of a weird mix, really, the schizophrenic shelves carry Bridget Jones' Diary along with Taslima Nasrin, and then there's Amy Tan next to Khaled Hosseini.

I get a general 'ick' sense from Asian writers, which I know is very obtuse behaviour on my part, but I find their prose to be much too flowery. And for that same reason, I can't stand Paulo Coelho. Picked up Witch of Portobello, got sucked in for half the book, and then halfway through I felt like I had crammed myself full with too much rich tasting food and wanted to throw up.

This just means I avoid most books by Asian writers -- even those that made it to the bestseller list. The rare exception I guess would be Salman Rushdie, but even though I enjoyed his book, it wasn't the effortless magic carpet ride Marquez was.

Surprisingly enough, I thoroughly enjoyed The Kitchen God's Wife. Made it through half of The Kite Runner and even less of The Inheritance of Loss. I've lived with these books for months, before finally trying to give it a go -- no go. Badly want to read more Camus or Banville or some depressing Irish thing to balance out the many many lessons in morality I've consumed thus far.

So Anthony Bourdain's Kitchen Confidential was beautiful change in pace. And it made me very, very hungry.

I'm not a big foodie, and I've never been one of those Singaporeans who would drive from Boon Lay to Geylang just for supper. I suppose Bangladesh isn't exactly the place to be for a Singaporean -- even one who's not a foodie.

I am not a big fan of gulping down my food, but that's the way its done here most of the time. Its hard to savour the spices and curry when I'm cramming my mouth with as much rice it can hold. There's also a habit of pre-mixing everything with the hands, so you essentially get a ball of curry-soaked rice (or rice-soaked curry?) which you shove into your mouth.

And everything is in curry, except the biryani. While I'm a big, big fan of curry -- I wish someone would dunk a whole can of coconut milk into one of those pots and shake things up a little. Or a stick of lemon grass. And don't get me started on the oil. You do realise that chicken fat/skin produces a whole lot of that by itself, don't you?

Oh, and easy on the salt, yeah? Salt is consumed so liberally here you'd think they were shaking black pepper on the dish. My local friends are generally not appreciative if my curries or chilli pastes end up sweet -- which it always does -- and help themselves to insane amounts of salt at every meal to 'balance' out the weird food I make. I made some sambal ikan bilis complete with sugar and lime, and they cringed.

This is the reason why I get upset when I steam fish (traditional Teochew steamed pomfret) and my friends insist on having curry or raw chilli to go along with it. Enjoy the flavour! Smell that damn soup! How are you going to taste anything when your mouth is filled with tumeric and numb from the chilli?

This doesn't mean there's no good food to be had here. God knows I've had my share of fabulous street stall kebabs and roasted chicken, buttery naan and lovely gravy. And the biryani, although a tad bit rich, can be divine. But I can't have this every day of the week. Where's my bak kut teh? Laksa? Mee goreng? Sambal squid? Variety! I need variety!

Did I just write about food and books? Jesus.

Radio Silence

General malaise. Should throw in justification by quoting some Confucian saying about how if the Mountain Is Too High then Maybe You Should Rest Longer Before Attempting To Climb It.

Only blip on the radar was the Obama win, which evoked excitement in the morning - and that's really saying something. Made me think of our own elections, when I was parked at some kopitiam taking (unused) pictures of the "heartlanders" reacting to the results. Old men chugging unprofessional beer with me, cheering loudly for the opposition, lots of Hokkien swearing. 'twas fun.

Local elections around the corner. Will now give out directions by asking people to follow posters and banners. I live around the corner from one of the women which is cool in a way, but if the other woman sends bombs then it'll either be cooler or I'll be fucked. Either way, malaise will end.

Anyway, feeling better now after taking Step 1 on that Mighty Mountain today.

Obama

What a beautiful, beautiful thing.

So apparently hand eczema is severely aggravated when the hand on which the eczema exists comes into contact with detergents, soaps or any other hygiene-inducing products. In fact, frequent immersion in water (especially hot water) should be frowned upon.

This could mean many things, depending on the context:

• [Conservative marriage arrangement]: Inability to do housework means 1 cow instead of 5.
• [Singaporean living arrangments]: Continue to live with Mother.
  
• [Principles regarding hiring of domestic help]: If you'll do all my ironing too, you're hired.
• [Hygiene standards]: No more eating food off the floor, unless the piece of food is picked up by using a fork and not bacteria-laden fingers.
  

Clearly, I was wrong when I said I had masochistic work tendencies because if I truly had masochistic work tendencies I would be an accountant.

=)

"I like rice. Rice is great when you're hungry and you want 2,000 of something."
- Mitch Hedberg

Monty Python could've written this

Best summary of Palin so far, but none other than John Cleese:

What fascinates me though, is how, people watching her on televsion, can they not see that she's basically learned certain speeches? It's like a nice-looking parrot because the parrot speaks beautifully and kind of says, 'aw shucks"'every now and again but doesn't really have any understanding of the meaning of the words that it is producing, even though it is producing them very accurately... and she's running as a partner 72-year-old cancer survivor. I mean, Monty Python could've written this."

Worth watching, if only for the most awesome laugh that Palin's name evokes.

That's Gotta Hurt.

While reading The Economist's obit of JBJ, I was getting increasingly disappointed with each paragraph because it mostly read like an unfeeling, bland report, and I was about to just let it all go with a sigh when I reached the last words:

Certainly Mr Jeyaretnam, most distinguished of that tiny band [of opposition politicians], was never silenced. Lee Kuan Yew may have been infinitely the greater statesman, but some would have judged Mr Jeyaretnam the bigger man.

I'm smiling like an idiot now.

Sky Lights

I could see the specks of light in the sky as the CNG made its way towards the temple, feebly trying to squeeze its way between too-big luxury SUVs, beaten-up cars with broken fenders and motorbikes carrying its female passengers slung across sideways.

Random side note: Why do these women sit like this? I did it once, but only because it I was in a nonnegotiable long skirt, and throughout the journey my center of gravity yelled at me for being utterly stupid, and I'm never doing it again.

Admittedly, I had no idea what the festival was all about, or what it signified. I only knew there were going to be pretty lanterns let off into the sky and that's really all the motivation I needed to get my ass down there. I'd been there a couple of time before, and I like it. Geese and dogs wandering around the place. Its a temple/monastery, after all. Peace and tranquility are to be expected.

Well anyway, I know now its Pravarana Purnima, held on the full moon and marking the end of the Buddhist version of Lent.

The Daily Star reports as such:

THE Holy Pravarana Purnima is one of the greatest Buddhist festivals. The Buddhists of Bangladesh observe the holy day with due solemnity, religious dignity, freedom and fervour ... the festival is observed in the month of Ashwin, and is also known as Ashwini Purnima ... The breaking of the Varshavasa day is called Pravarana Purnima. On that day, the Buddha came down to this world after preaching the Abhidhamma to his mother and other gods in the Tavatimsa Heaven during Varshavasa. The Buddha advised his disciples to propagate the true Dharma on this day.

A whole lotta words. Article gives nice background info on the festival's origins, but fails to mention its highlights -- pretty lanterns in the sky.

And that bit about solemnity and dignity? Dude, have you attended one of these things?

Too late now to edit pics to prove my point more forcefully, but you'll see what I mean soon. There was some serious dancing at the end, dancing involving gyrating, half-naked, sweaty men with abs, grabbing each other and shimmying all over the place. Jessica was not unpleased.

This crowd was (dare I say it) putting on a show more gay than any of the action I've seen in Happy or Taboo. It would've been a lot more pleasant if these guys weren't straight and all that ass-slapping actually meant something (maybe it did, but I'd like to see you try finding one guy to admit as much). The one thing that they do have in common with the crowd in Singapore's awesome gay bars? No one gave a fuck about me.

Half-naked dancing men aside, the main feature of the festival was fabulous. Till now, I have no idea what the lanterns signify. If I had to give a guess -- cleansing, a fresh start, releasing your wishes into the night sky in the hopes that the gods hear you better at a higher altitude?

All religious allow these outlets of hope. Hope that your prayers will be heard, whether or not its by writing your wishes on slips of paper and attaching it to a tree or writing prayers on floating candles. Hope for absolvement, that the past will be forgotten by all, including yourself, when you step into the confession booth or let that lantern of yours float away, away into the night.

At some point, I teared slightly amidst the cheers as the lanterns went up one after another. Don't really know why. Ridiculous, since I still don't know what the whole thing means. Maybe I kinda wish I could attach some of my own stuff to those lanterns and let it all go.




I'll show you what he saw in my next post.

Working from the house never really feels like work, so I still end up feeling un-worked and guilty for slacking even though I'm really sitting here crunching numbers on excel spreadsheets. I guess the guilt comes from the fact that, unlike being in an office, my music's being played at a rather loud level and I have a can of beer to help the numbers go down easier.

I prefer doing work in my house because it's just so that much more enjoyable. Is that so bad?

And the beer is making me say this - you do not schedule a fucking meeting at the very very last minute and then make me feel bad about not going. Made worse by the fact that you can't reschedule it because you're not going to be in town. This lies very much under the "not my problem" part of my brain. Just fucking send me an email about the scintillating meeting. If I'm there, all I'm going to do is nod and agree anyway.

Oh fuck it. When the beer wears off I know I'm going anyway.

Personal Heroes

I just love Dan Savage. Always have, always will.


From his blog entry on The Stranger, commenting on the latest case of horrific child abuse by a "normal" heterosexual couple.

"Maybe this girl’s mother and father saw Ohio Republican state representative John Schlichter’s recent campaign flyer—the one in which he warned that “same sex couples [are] adopting our children”—and pushed that dresser in front of the door to prevent gay men from bursting into their bedroom in the middle of the night and adopting their kids. Or maybe they’re just insanely abusive assholes."

And here's Dan extending his friendship to Sarah Palin because, you know, she said she had gay friends, but no one can find them :

Post-Eid

Slightly belated post on Eid, no thanks to general procrastination and an exploding laptop power adaptor. Actually, it didn't really explode, but then again there's never any smoke without fire, is there?

I woke up early on Eid to go down to Baitul Mukkarram in Gulistan, which I've been told is the biggest mosque in Bangladesh. Don't ask me what it looked like - I couldn't go in, seeing as how I'm challenged, gender-wise.

I put the photos up on Flickr a couple of days ago, and it's always interesting to see which photos get clicked on the most and the least. This one received the least clicks thus far:



I would like to write about this as bluntly as possible, so forgive any remarks that may come across as callous.

Seeing as how I couldn't really enter the mosque, I spent most of my time at the gates where a sizable number of beggars had formed two orderly rows to "channel" people who were entering the mosque, therefore making it impossible for them not to notice the outstretched hands.

As expected, I was left alone as soon as I had made it clear I was not handing out any money whatsoever. Whoever else who approached me was soon told to go away, not by me, but by the other beggars who had previously tried.

While the atmosphere remained friendly for most of the time, it was hard not to become competitive with all this money at stake. It was Eid, the day of goodwill and general giving, and these boys and men coming to the mosque decked out in their new punjabis were obliged to hand out money. It was a buffet, and the money was yours to lose.

So the fastest got the most cash. The hands that reached out first, the one that looked the most needy. It was not a time for a display of strength. Most were either elderly or handicapped. One young and able-bodied youth who tried asking for money received a tongue-lashing about how he should just go get a job.

Several minor arguments broke out as a result, a little pushing and shoving, but nothing serious. Mostly over the question of territory. They didn't take too kindly to someone else honing in on their space.

I've always shyed away from taking pictures of beggars, mainly because I don't know how they feel about it. I feel like it takes the exploitation to a new, higher level, and I haven't quite figured out how to absolve myself in that way. Mostly, I worry that they would not take too kindly to my actions.

The group I photographed that day didn't seem to mind it at all. They smiled for the camera, they smiled at me, they asked me questions. I found their compliance most liberating.

But back to the least-clicked picture above. Its not uncommon to find beggars carrying around medical documents in plastic folders or bags. I usually can't understand what they're saying, but the point is clear.

The child in the photo couldn't speak for herself. She didn't smile at me. In fact, if anything, her eyes barely registered my presence. She remained silent as the others went on chattering around me. When I started to photograph her, the people who were accompanying her (family members, I assume) beckoned me closer, lifted her up and tried to arrange her in a pose that would expose her even more.

I stopped. I also had to stop myself from asking about the contents of those medical documents, stop myself from asking "What's wrong with her?" because, really, I didn't want to know.



I had thought I would've had good news to post on this blog, but an email came this morning that put that to rest. No good news for now, let's see what happens.

JBJ.

"I am afraid again I have not received the justice that I had a right to expect."
- JBJ, 2003.

Damn right.

As a nation, we have treated him most shamefully.

I supposed I should get this out of the way before midnight and before Blogger logs this under a different date.

A particularly unspectacular day, which is a rather apt way to mark what has been a particularly unspectacular year.

What did I do today?

I went to work, not knowing that it was a Muslim holiday and I didn't need to show up for work. Did not realise this until an hour before I was due to knock off. I attributed the strangely empty office to the fact that some folks were flying off today and I figured a lot of people must've gone to the airport to send them off.

I went and had dinner at an expensive Chinese restaurant. Sichuan pork and tofu. The dinner was unintentional and prearranged, meaning it was not because of the date. I did not tell the person I had dinner with that today was my one year anniversary in Bangladesh.

My friend brought up the subject of pity, and I told him that I hadn't really resolved or figured out my views on it yet. My weak summary was as such: its hard to pity people who don't pity themselves.

I told him that it was also it would make my life unbearable. The constant contradictions would kill my head. How could I feel sorry for people because they didn't have enough to eat and then sit down to enjoy an expensive dinner? It was not possible.

I feel a strange sense of annoyance when I hear foreigners talk about "horrible living conditions", "abject poverty", houses in "unthinkably dirty surroundings". You can't imagine having to live like that? Things shouldn't be this way? Yeah, no kidding. Why don't you tell them that?

I shoo-ed away a couple of girls that followed us for a long distance. The beggars in Gulshan are a lot more aggressive and, as I said before, it makes me feel less human every time I tell one of them to go away. I had to say that a lot tonight.

Took a CNG back. Traffic was bad, as expected in the mad pre-Eid shopping rush.

Looked out for the cats. Couldn't find them. Maybe they've wandered off for good.

And that makes it, officially, One Year.