Keeping A Distance

I'm lazily half-following the campaigning for the General Election now on-going in the nation of my birth. Am baffled as to the behaviour of the PM with regard to his early departure from the D Day Anniversary. I mean it's not exactly difficult to grasp that this was just plain wrong. I don't pretend to be a patriot of any sort, and even I know that.

Funnily enough it's quite heartening to pick up on the general outrage that has ensued. Obviously some of it is faked, but I get the impression that most is coming from folk on all sides of the political spectrum with a real sense of decency. It isn't what I feel, though. I'm simply baffled in a disappointed manner, not having the energy to rise to outrage.

One good thing about all this. Apart from the commemorations in themselves, the sour story helpfully reinforces the collective memory as to the extraordinary event of the D Day landings and all that hung upon the courage of those allied troops involved.

Keeping Warm

We were back at our old stomping grounds at Ampang Point this evening, and things were much the same, I'm happy to say. In fact, the car park, which was closed for renovations last time we were in the vicinity, is a lot brighter than it used to be. And I reckon the exterior of the old mall is less messy than it used to look, though it still appears cheerfully run-down. All this in stark contrast to the new mall we were exploring over the weekend. That one goes by the name KL East Mall and it was my first time there, though Noi has been there before with Rohana & chums some months back.

There was nothing exactly wrong with East Mall. It was pretty much like any new mall in KL and I could see why the average muslimah might be drawn there given the number of outlets selling very fashionable head-scarves. But, my goodness me, was it cold! I'm not sure who set the limit on the air-conditioning, but there was no escaping the chill.

My preference is simply stated. I'd rather feel that I'd stepped back to when I first arrived in this part of the world and enjoyed the warmth of buildings that weren't designed to be much other than well-ventilated semi-tropical warehouses than be shivering over my cup of tea, pleasant as that tea might be.

A Bit Shallow

I noticed a fair number of candidates using dive as a verb in the sense of conducting an analysis in the essays I recently marked for IB. I think I've seen this before, but not with this level of frequency. I'm guessing it's been picked up from podcast lingo, when presenters tell their audience they're about to take them on a deep dive into some issue or other. Ironically it usually turns out to be quite a shallow dive in my experience, but that's neither here nor there.

And I've recently picked up on the use of 'showrunner' as the title for whomever it is who's in overall charge of what goes on in a show on television. Picked this one up from nerdy podcasts saying unpleasant things about the latest incarnation of Doctor Who and then noticed it everywhere in relation to people being unhappy about spin-offs from Star Wars.

I'm not sure that my vocabulary has been expanded by these recent discoveries. Possibly it's just acquiring width at the expense of depth. But at least I'm allowed the illusion of being a little more in tune with the times.

Free As A Bird

The news out of Gaza and the West Bank has been difficult to read for decades, and especially so in recent months. But some reason a piece about Palestinian birdwatchers hit me harder than I might have expected it to. I suppose it's because of its very ordinariness amidst the horror. And there's an awful sense of hope about it.

That final paragraph, and the detail of the chiffchaff flying away And the joy of the children. Haunting.

A Tale Well Told

Finished Dune today. Sheer hokum - but of the very classy variety. Herbert does portentousness exceedingly well, I suspect because at some level he sort of believes it. I didn't believe it at any level, but that didn't stop me having a jolly good time.

Out Of Order

We've been in Maison KL now for some twenty-plus years, and there are very distinct signs of deterioration all around the place. Today the karang guni lorry was passing and we took the opportunity to unload two old television sets and our antique printer and computer onto it. Sad, in its way. I remember all of them new and full of promise. A bit like ourselves, I suppose.

Time passes slowly here. But it passes.

Making The Effort

Once I'd finished my stint of marking for the day I went off on an on-line journey (if there really can be such a thing) to find something to listen to that both sounded intelligent and dealt with a controversial issue of the day offering a reasonable range of perspectives. I suppose I wanted to reassure myself that such a combination might exist. And it did, or, rather does.

Actually I've listened in the past to Messers Glenn Loury and John McWhorter conversing in the kind of way I hope I'm capable of (on a good day, when all my faculties are firing.) So the journey didn't take too long. But it felt good to hear these gentlemen saying sensible, measured, reflective and open things about the George Floyd case, in a way that avoided taking sides but was clearly a genuine effort to move towards some kind of truth. I'm not sure they got there, but that's the point. The effort is the only way we have of paying homage to whatever truth there is, and if our thinking is effortless then something's going badly wrong with the way we see the world.

The Art Of The Deal

A generally dissatisfying day on-line. The marking, of which there was plenty, went well enough. But in my breaks from staring at essays on the screen I sort of randomly browsed stuff that had a mildly irritating air about it - like YouTubers I'd never really heard of fiercely disagreeing with each other over matters that didn't seem all important. For some reason I picked up on a debate over the latest incarnation of Dr Who that didn't do me, or anyone else as far as I can see, any good at all.

So it was with some relief that late on in the day I chanced upon an excellent piece about everyone's favourite Irish Modernist novelist and his oddly engaging relationship with the pugilist-cum-writer Ernest Hemingway. I'd heard the tale before and always assumed it was apocryphal and now I know it's not. As is invariably the case with Joyce, a story that on the surface makes him sound a bit of a ninny serves to add to his reputation - first of all because it's very funny and second of all because it's a reminder of his absolute honesty about what a physical coward he was which, in turn, is a reminder of his absolute moral courage.

Nice to think of a world big enough for two such strange characters who just happened to be touched by genius. 

At The Mall

After a day spent paying close attention to the efforts of various students around the world to communicate their ideas about equally various works of literature it was a relief to pay a different kind of attention at Melawati Mall in the evening. Mine centred largely on a charcoaled grilled beefburger which proved to be nicely filling and after that I pretty much zoned out, turning a blind eye and deaf ear to the blandishments of those trying to sell me something, which was almost everybody, other than the other shoppers, this being a mall. Fortunately for the world of capitalism Noi proved a better customer and far more attentive (but in a happily level-headed manner.)

Mind you, we did acquire some rather tasty-looking kerepok, and the packets thereof will be getting my further attention soon.

Sort Of Coping

Got some rest over the weekend, but will soon be on the way to KL, where I'll need to continue to make inroads into my marking for IB with a mid-week deadline looming. Can't remember marking feeling quite as demanding as it seems at the moment, but it probably has always been like this, and I've somehow found ways of coping. Looking for some of those ways now.

I suspect the only useful one is to keep going. And that's what I'm doing.