Seasonal Weather

Everywhere wet, commented Noi, with pithy accuracy, as we wended our evening way south to Melaka. It's rained every day we've been in Malaysia, and often rained hard, as it did in occasional patches on the highway just now. But this is the rainy season, so there's nothing untoward here. Indeed, our repairing of the roof to Maison KL in November was predicated on the notion that it needed to be done before the leaks that were appearing were tested again. So we've been mildly congratulating ourselves on our timing - though the workmanship has yet to be thoroughly tested.

And this is not the chilly, soggy, rain of Manchester or Edinburgh. No matter how melancholy it gets, we never really quite enter Lear on the blasted heath territory. For which relief much thanks, as someone in another of the Bard's more melancholy efforts put it.

Not Quite Resolved

Looking back on the declaration of my New Year's Resolution for 2018 I'm agreeably surprised at how sane and apposite it was: When the bad times come, keep a sense of proportion, and remember all the good ones. For once I seem to have been thinking clearly.

The problem lies, I'm afraid, in several failures in the course of the year to live up to my own good sense. The last few days, for example, have been somewhat tarnished by my irritation with Astro, the so-called service providers for satellite television in this nation. The on-going saga of my unfortunate relations with them uncannily parallels the on-going saga of my equally unfortunate relations with Singtel Ltd in another Far Place.

Now you may be thinking at this point that since I've been having an equally fraught time with companies operating either side of the Causeway that there must be some fault in how I've been conducting myself. But all I can say is that I'm only too ready to pay what it takes to get the various channels both companies seek to provide their viewers - and this despite the fact that I'm not all that bothered about watching the telly. The problem is that I'm just not designed for modernity. Or perhaps it's the other way around.

However, none of this provides any kind of good reason for getting hot under the collar. So I won't. Or at least I'll try not to.

Another Country

Made our way to a somewhat out of the way kampong in the Gombak area this afternoon to attend a wedding. Our GPS didn't recognise the address so we needed directions from Noi's brother Yazzir to get there. Slightly to my surprise we managed quite well, getting a bit lost, but nothing overly traumatic. The final leg of the journey featured narrow winding roads in what felt like the middle of nowhere, but quite a well-populated nowhere with all sorts of fascinating houses and a wonderful lack of uniformity. And, as ever, once we arrived we enjoyed the typical unforced hospitality native to these parts.

In contrast to our comfortable little adventure we were vaguely aware of some kind of political rally taking place in the centre of KL. We caught wind of this when we heard a travel advisory for Singaporean citizens to avoid heading for the capital over the weekend, ironically as we were crossing into Malaysia. We took it that there were some worries that things might turn violent - the word 'skirmishes' was used in the warning. Happily we were heading in a completely different direction, and even more happily it turned out that the demonstration was peaceful and went off without incident.

We're still not entirely sure what prompted it, though, despite me buying a newspaper yesterday that featured some coverage. Another example of just how little I really understand these parts, fascinating as they are. But I suppose that's true of anywhere in this strange world into which we find ourselves thrown.

Not So Obvious

Read Shakespeare's Pericles over the last few days. It's got some good publicity of late and is reckoned by those who know about these things to work well in the theatre. Impossible to tell from the page, though the Act 4 brothel scenes are obviously excellent. The problem lies in the early acts, though nobody seems to think these actually come from Shakespeare himself. Very wooden stuff. I'm not convinced by those who rate Pericles as some kind of masterpiece, but I'd love to see a production to get a better sense of the impact of the drama as a whole.

What Dreams May Come

I've had occasion to make note here in the past of the mundane quality of my dreams - those that I recall, that is. I suppose that in some vague way I consider myself an imaginative sort of cove. After all, I teach Literature which if it's about anything is concerned with the workings of imagination, and I sometimes direct plays, an activity which would seem to demand some kind of imaginative output. Yet my infrequent dreams are pretty much uniformly ordinary to the point that they can seem like tepid replays of a rather tepid life.

With one exception, which I experienced in the early hours of this morning: around 09.00. I woke up genuinely shaken from a dream featuring at least two massive aircraft crashing in the distance ahead of me, followed by various rocks, or blocks of something like concrete rather, hurtling down from the sky with me below skipping around hoping to avoid them. It was all very apocalyptic and even as it was happening I had an awareness that I've experienced this before in dreamland.

I suppose it's a kind of anxiety dream, though I'm not exactly sure why I feel anxious about aircraft landing on my head. And it's really quite spectacular. But I'm also aware it's very derivative of disaster movies and the like, so even in this respect I seem cursed with a lack of individually creative imagination. The most worrying feature of all is just how much of a coward I am in these dreams. I never feel the slightest concern for anyone around me, though there are others with me, in the sense of an anonymous crowd. I'm entirely focused on self-preservation. So it's all very down-heartening, despite the special effects.

Much The Same

Spent a not unpleasant evening in the new mall at Melawati, coincidentally named Melawati Mall. It's much like any other mall, which makes it a huge improvement in terms of basic hygiene on the streets outside. The downside is that whereas the streets evoke some sense of identity the mall has none, being, as noted previously, much like any other mall.

I am conflicted. In some ways this represents progress. And there's a lot to be said for cleanliness. But it's a progress towards a kind of wasteful uniformity. And cleanliness can easily become a sterile blandness.

Weighing It Up

Now resident in Maison KL, and set to be so for the week ahead.

And the journey? The negatives: Slow-moving traffic in the capitol, whence we arrived just in time for the evening rush hour, so to be expected, even if irritating. And more than a few aches and pains driving, just from the five and a half hours of it all. The positives: Excellent tea and toast at the Arab Café, and a scrumptious Noi-baked chocolate muffin just after getting through Malaysian Immigration. Plus music from The Strawbs, Van Morrison, Bill Frisell and Walter Becker. So, on balance, an excellent journey!

Left Wanting

It's that time of year when I set about doing a bit of cleaning - essentially involving books on various shelves, and other inter-connected bits and pieces. This is quite hard work, but curiously satisfying, helping create the useful illusion that I'm in control of things. The only problem is that as a soon as I pick up a book for vacuuming (that's how it's done, Gentle Reader) I find myself wanting to read it, and since I vacuum every book that's a lot of wanting.

Another One

 

 

We celebrated another birthday for the Missus today in reasonable style. The strange thing is that no matter how many birthdays she has, she remains enviously younger than myself.

A Very Good Dinner

Was reading an article on Casanova's memoirs in the late September issue of The New York Review of Books (print edition) and discovered he writes about no fewer than 200 meals he ate as well the 122 - 136 women he is estimated to have slept with. It struck me that I'd much rather read about the dinners than the women. Not sure what this says about me, but I think it says a lot about the Great Lover that he valued his dinners so highly. Makes him a lot more human somehow.

You may be wondering why I'm still reading an obviously out-dated NYRB and so am I. I've actually only managed to read 3 print editions in the whole of the year. In some ways I'm pleased that I'm holding to the discipline of not buying another copy until I've read the on-going issue from cover to cover. But I'm also uneasily aware of how reading stuff on-line seems to be taking up more and more of my time. For reasons I can't quite articulate such reading seems shallow somehow.

You also may be wondering what I had for dinner myself this evening - though most likely you're not. But sticking to the food theme I'll tell you anyway. The meal went by the somewhat improvisational title Crème Salmon a la Yati and it was sensationally good. Better than anything Casanova ever set about, I reckon, and definitely eaten in better company.