The first card I made for testing purposes.
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Some ancient artefacts were uncovered while cleaning some part of the house. One was a cross, now crusted with green rust. The other was a small plastic package containing a now-unidentifiable piece of paper and a tiny pendant depicting Guan Yin on a lotus flower.
Brings back memories of times when things were less confusing and life was just about getting straight A's so that I can get the promised new computer in December. Make me reconsider whether it is actually good to know more about everything. When you knew little, only your life sucks. When you know more, you can see that everyone's lives suck. How is that better?
It's just like technologies. Most people seem to hold this belief that advanced technologies make our lives easier. That's total bullshit if you think about it. Once you are known to use technology to make tasks easier, people automatically expects you to do more to offset the relative ease. Again, how is that better?
You get more, hence you're forced to spend more. Totally reminiscent of the story about the monkeys and the bananas. I can't remember the story exactly, but I think this is how it goes:
A bunch of monkeys were being fed 3 bananas in the day and 2 at night. One day they got dissatisfied enough to decide to ask the farmer to give them more. So the farmer told them he would give them 2 bananas in the day and 3 at night. The monkeys, upon hearing that they would get 3 at night, thought they were getting more and agreed.
So doesn't this make you wonder where all these is going? This path we walk, where does it lead?
But I digress.
I can't remember how I got the cross. I think I found it somewhere somehow. As for the pendant I bought it from a door-to-door salesman monk. I recall this clearly even though I was still in lower secondary because that was my first encounter with a false Buddhist monk.
He had appeared at my door asking if I would like to donate money in exchange for the charm. I didn't know if I should, but since he was a monk it was probably a good thing to donate some money. So I forked out $2 from my wallet, significantly more than what I give to charity flag-sellers on the streets. He saw that and ask if I could donate more, so I took out the my I had in there - $10.
Now don't take this as a big sign of generosity. I was fully aware that I could ask for however much I donate from my parents since I was not spending it on whatever food or whatever.
But when he asked for more, I thought it was strange. No one I've met asks for more money when begging for donations.
I said no. He then took out a booklet in which apparently everyone who donated signed and stated the amount of donation, and pointed out that all my neighbours were donating about $200 each. The thing was, how was a 13- or 14-year-old kid supposed to scrape up two frickin hundred bucks when his parents weren't around?
My response, as you have guessed, was to inform him that I had no more money to donate. So he quietly handed me the booklet for me to fill in the details and then passed me one of the packets. When I told my parents later about it, they confirmed that he was most likely a swindler. Even if he was a legitimate monk begging for alms, he was definitely not a true Buddhist monk.
"Paradoxes of the human condition" was a topic of a thread that stated quite a number of things I have mentioned before, but in a more concise manner. Here's an excerpt:
1) Human imagination can take them anywhere, dragging their physical bodies along.
2) Humans are capable of the kindest, most noble things, but are also capable of the most horrible and terrifying things.
3) Many humans hope for everlasting life, but are always inventing new ways to destroy each other.
the underdog
everyone cheers for the underdog, but no one wants to be one. To take this one step further, the underground music scene is based around this principle. As soon as a band has a radio hit, a truly trendy underground rocker can no longer listen to them.
unending desire
we can often have a defunct moderation function in our brains. particularly with things such as money. This can more clearly be seen as a contradiction when it pertains to harmful things to the body/mind, ie. drugs, fast food.
suffering for gain
working out hurts but it improves you. etc etc.
Redundant Media
The fact that we start to believe things are true simply by them being repeated over and over. These ideologies are that much harder to change the longer they are in place. GO SEE THE LATEST HOLLYWOOD MOVIE, IT'S THE BEST EVER!!
life and death
for many it scares the hell outta us thinking about existing forever, but then it also scares the hell outta us thinking about ceasing to exist.
The unrelating inevitable
Our willful denial of the inevitable. Our unrelating nature to situations and events that will, if not always, at least often enough become us. Such as the way that when young, though you know you will one day be old(if you continue to live), your mind cannot believe you will be old, or better yet even fathom that you will die one day for that matter. On more of a daily scenario, our ignorance to other people's situations that we know we've been in and will be in, such as getting pissed off at the fast food employee trying to get your order out however a minute too slow for you, when you know you've performed duties that cannot go any faster. Or getting mad when someone forgets something when you yourself forget things.
The last is what I find most frustrating about most people. They behave like certain eventualities will never occur, like some things don't happen to them. Someday, you will die. Someday, something really terrible will happen to you that will make you ask, "Why me?" Someday your parents/grandparents/siblings will die. Someday, your career will be in a most tenuous position, if not ruined. Someday your romantic relationships will end. Someday, if you have children, you will discover a side of your kids that you never thought would exist.
In life, shit happen. That's why I never understood why so many Americans did not have any savings to survive on when the mortgage crisis hit. But I don't mean just financial and physical buffers, but also mental preparation. Think of the one thing/person that you cannot afford to lose. In all likelihood you're probably wrong, since it is natural to take many things for granted these days. But still be prepared to lose it/him/her, just in case.
Not having a backup plan in order to increase motivation to succeed? That idea is utter nonsense. There are always elements in life beyond your control. You can slip and fall and break something in your body. You can suddenly discover you have a slipped disk in the most unpleasant way on a totally ordinary day (one of my officers experienced that during my army days, just collapsed in pain all of a sudden and could only writhe in agony till the ambulance came). Or more commonly, you can get cancer.
Of course you cannot be prepared for everything, but certain things like financial troubles are common enough to be worth the preparedness. Insurance helps. I've heard that some people don't believe in insurance. Well, insurance saved my family when my father passed away and all our money was locked in his bank account (he was something of a male chauvinist). Without the quick response of the insurance agents we would not have been able to pay the hospital and funeral bills till the government was done checking my late father's wealth and taking its share, which took months.
Insurance isn't about having money to offset the pain, it's about making sure that you can survive just in case something goes wrong.
On a somewhat unrelated note, NTUC Income sucks balls compared to AIA. My father had bought policies from both and Income not only gave less, as expected, but also reacted much more slowly. The AIA agent behaved almost like a family friend and did nothing delay the process. I don't care if all your money was being invested and it takes time to get them back, someone just died and we need money to pay the bills.
Anyway, the thing about redundant media is true. If something is repeated enough, it becomes the truth. Ever wondered if what you've been reading in the history books is true? After all, none of us has seen anything that happened over a hundred years ago. Was Hitler really such an monster? He may have the most epic k:d ratio ever, but since when is killing inherently "evil"?
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