Surprise and No Surprise

The relief effort for Christchurch by some former students in New Zealznd has brought forth some surprises, at least to me. Rats stay rats, but some perfumes have lost much, if not all of the fragrance. As I often say, a person's true color is only revealed when he is tested. Anyway, onward to more pleasant contemplation. One has to have control over one's words. Be pleasant at all times. Be humble and modest. And be calm and self-possessed.

Words, Music, Philosophy, and Politics

Deep thoughts rarely arrive like thunderbolts. Instead, they percolate and simmer until they demand outward expressions, either orally or in written form. They bear signs of rumination and repetition and slow digestion. They sometimes ferment and give off strange odors; they could also emit delightful fragrances. A man is about to die. All he will behind are his thoughts. That's why most literate men want to write.

You looked at the raucous, tumultuous, cacophonous scenes of demonstrations against tyrants and dictators in North Africa and the Middle East and you felt alive and privileged. You are living in exciting times. Revolutions of all stripes are taking place. Technological revolutions are transforming modes of communication and information diffusion; cultural revolutions in music (rap), club dancing (lascivious and openly sexually suggestive gyrations while wearing tight, body-hugging attires), recreational drug use, widespread tattooing and body piercings; economic revolutions ( rise of China, India, Brazil, and Turkey, and relative decline of Europe and the U.S., not to mention China's audacious challenge to the U.S. as a military and world power); and political revolutions (disintegration of the Soviet Union, collapse of communism in Eastern Europe, and now the overdue collapse of autocratic Arab regimes).

You imagine you are part of the freedom-loving, democracy-seeking Arab standing in a downtown square, shouting slogans and expressing deep-seated human longings for fairness and dignity. And there they are, brave men and women jump to the platform, arms waving to the crowd, exhorting it to repeat to repeat the slogans and whipping the crowd into the frenzy and enthusiasm because they know a quiet and unemotional gathering of demonstrators would be likely to fizzle out. These brave men and women on the platform are the leaders, who stick their necks out in this moment of history, in this decisive moment, to lead the revolution to its triumphant outcome. It is not the moment to be cautious, to hide among the anonymous crowd for the sake of safety. This is the moment for the brave and the bold, those who believe in themselves and in the rightness of their cause, and in their fellow men who will follow them to the right and correct destiny.

This is also the moment you discover the true dynamics of life, which in its most naked form, is the pursuit of power because power drives everything else, including food, shelter, and sex. Without power, one's existence becomes precarious. Politics is the drive for power, for the ability to allocate resources for survival. Once the allocation of resources becomes grossly unfair, humans will rebel and will fight for fairness and justice. But with humans, a complex and restless species, things are never simple. To humans, power is more than just the economic allcation of resources, as with lower and simpler forms of life. Power takes on the ability to determine and sometimes to legislate what others think, say, and believe. In other words, humans go for total domination. Thus, we see a fierce fight among humans over what is right or wrong (values/ethics), whose version of God or lack thereof is correct (religion) and even what is acceptable or not (definition of madness/sanity). Human history is thus a history about power: power over oneself, over one's neighbors, and over nature.

Those philosophers who are sensitive to the notion of power begin paying attention to history: Hegel, Nietzsche, Marx, and the risk-taking son of a physician, Foucault who had unprotected homosexual encounters in the bathhouses of San Francisco and died of AIDS as a consequence.

Talking about history is visiting the raging conflict of the two opposing views about the nature of society: one, mainly embraced by the fiercely individualistic British and American--and decidedly quaint and ludicrous notion, in your estimation---that argues the individual and the individual self-interest form the basis of society, and that society itself, is simply an artificial concept or idea. (This attitude is the core philosophy of the curiosity that calls itself the Tea Party Wing of the Republican Party); the other insists that there is indeed society/tribalism where the members are bound and tied together by blood lines or moral, cultural, and even religious beliefs.

The will to truth is indeed the will to power, at least with men who are attracted to knowledge and thus truth. Yet at the same time those men recognize for each human as well as for each society, and of course for each religion, there is a "general politics of truth" (Foucault's phrase) where only a certain discourse is accepted as true. Meanwhile these men seek refuge from the tumultuous nonsense and meaningless noise made by ignoramuses or self-declared scholars, in the power of evocative and harmonious sound called music.

Roberto Wissai

Peacefulness and Truth

Pleasant childhood memories and other nostalgic recollections are what make living a worthwhile experience. Gaining knowledge and wisdom should only be an incidental byproducts. You must learn to forgive yourself and others if you want to have peace. Be careful out there. Don't indulge in excesses.

Fear and Revolution

Fear is an instinct valuable for survival. We are born with fear built within us, but humans are the only beings routinely learn to override instincts. So we can learn to overcome fear for higher values such as freedom, dignity, liberty, independence, and patriotism. A life perpetually lived in fear is not much of a life because it robs us of dignity; it takes away our self-esteem; it confers the tyrant's undeserving power over us; it validates the tyrant's control over us; and it confirms we are no better than slaves. 

It's time to rise up and assert our worth and demand our place in the sun. Time spent in fear and darkness was long past. It's time to bring the tyrants and dictators down. They are no better than us. They have used fear as a weapon to rule us. Once we show we have no fear---even the ultimate fear of death since everybody dies and everybody only dies once--- the tyrants and dictators cannot keep us down because there are more of us than of them. Strength is in the number. When the people are united and stand shoulder to shoulder and demand freedom, fairness, and dignity restored, the tyrants and dictators all will be swept away by the wave of the will of the people. 

True men only die once. Cowards die time and time again. Cowards are no different from animals. They have no sense of shame nor of dignity. All they want is to prolong their useless, meaningless, and undignified lives.

The time for the revolution is now. 

Long live Vietnam!

Long live the Vietnamese people!

Madness and Brilliance

How do we know that we are going mad, that our thoughts are no longer lucid and connected with reality? Are we capable of truly objective about ourselves, especially about the workings of our minds? How do we know if we are suffering from delusions and denials? I submit that we don't. Maybe at the beginning we are conscious of our eccentricities and oddities, but once we cross the point of no return into the realm of madness, self-awareness is losing its potency with each passing day unless the brain somehow gets healed by some internal regeneration either spontaneously through meditation, change of diet or introduction of therapeutic chemicals (drugs).

I knew Hitler was mad when he ordered the burning of Paris in the face of the advancing forces of the Allies. Fortunately his generals bravely refused to follow his order. Additionally, I knew Hitler was mad when he conscripted teenage boys to defend Germany. The picture of the rapidly aging Hitler shaking hands of the young teenagers of the brigade to "defend" Berlin showed the "The Führer" was in advanced stages of madness. Madness aside, there was evidence that Hitler was brilliant and full of vitality in his prime. And he did have leadership qualities and did inspire fierce loyalty almost to the very end.

Quaddafi was not as brilliant as Hitler, but his madness was almost up to par. Eccentricity is often the sign of madness or brilliance or the combination of the two. Quaddafi has been odd a long time. His long tenure of autocratic rule reflected his brilliance. But when he gave a speech about fighting to the last drop of his blood and his willingness of being a martyr, I sensed that he was mad, not just determined. My suspicion was confirmed when he showed no love for his countrymen by ordering aerial bombardment of civilians and merciless revenge killings.

My interest in madness has a long history, both for personal and scientific reasons. The reason for today's reflection on this subject was two-fold. I just came across another book on cognitive science. And I just had lunch with a brillliant but clearly delusional Russian immigrant. He is kind-hearted and well-read, but his head is full of conspiracy theories and he could not help making fantastic stories about his accomplishments which clearly defied statistical odds. Today he predicted there would be no 2012 election and that Obama was a communist plant sent to destroy America. He also accused me of being a communist. When I replied that I was only a socialist and deftly supplied reasons for my self-regard, he became quiet and changed the subject. When the lunch was over, he shook hands and said he was sorry if he had offended me in any way. So, he still has moments of lucidity and self-awareness. I have a distinct impression that at least two Viet expatriates I know are very odd and do indeed exhibit patterns of behavior that reflects madness. But they could be saying the same thing about me.

Roberto Wissai

Myths and Journey to Light

Humans are myth-makers. Myths are designed to explain the unexplainable (yet) and to justify one's actions or views of oneself and others. Some humans are comfortable with myths foisted upon them; others are born to question and wonder.

Myths have many types: religious (most bizarre and yet most enduring, a testament of the paradox of Man), scientific (usually in the form of assumptions and hypotheses, and most susceptible to changes and revisions),  political/social ("White Man's burden, the inability of non-white and non-Europeans in Asia to govern themselves, concept of nationalism is foreign to peoples in Asia and Africa, superiority of social and economic developments of Protestant Christian societies over Catholic counterparts, the "fatalism" and "passivity" of Hindu culture and Buddhist culture were responsible for the stagnation of India and China, the "endurance" of the "monolithic" Communism, and the lethargy of the "Arab Street", to cite the examples of political/social myths which were bandied around for the last two hundred years).

One by one the aforementioned myths fell to the wayside. The myth concerning the lethargy of the Arab Street is being shattered right now. The Arabs are rising up against autocratic regimes which have long suppressed them. They are no longer lethargic. They are no longer fearful. They are becoming a fearsome force.

There are several myths concerning the Viet people. They are of exalting origin (descendants of the union between a dragon and a fairy). They are brave and intelligent and hard-working. They are an assertive and aggressive race (they conquered the Champa kingdom, took lands from the Khmer, and were in fact colonizing Cambodia and Laos when the French invaded their country under the pretext of protecting Christian converts ).They value independence. They have fought against and defeated the Chinese, the French, and the Americans in the name of freedom and democracy. Let us see if years (since 1954 in North Vietnam and since 1975 in the South) of living under the oppressive, repressive, shamelessly lying and corrupt (and thus lacking legitimacy and support) VC regime, the once-valiant, freedom-loving, and self-respecting Viet people would rise up against their oppressors or will they continue being content with basic animal needs, especially those related to survival, and continue "accepting" the red capitalists of the name Viet Cong as their masters?

Meditations

Other bloggers write about everyday events. You dwell on the fighting, conflicting forces in you. This morning upon waking up, you were amused with the ultra-violent thoughts you had concerning a scumbag. That led to an insight that it is important for you to be pleasant at all times because you would never know what kind of dark thoughts you could arouse in the minds of monkeys and dogs and pigs. You have interacted with them and you already know what kind of trashy thoughts and ideas that they hold as "true". In fact, they have made you feel much better about yourself. You realize that you are not stupid after all. Also, the insolence and undeserving haughtiness of the ugly and stupid bitch amused and pissed you off at the same time. Every dog thinks it is some kind of special dog, meriting respect and esteem, while in fact, it is only a miserable runt, roaming the streets of life and feeding on human shit and garbage in order to survive. The moment it opens its mouth and starts barking, you know exactly what kind of shit-eating dog it is. That's the funny thing about humans and dogs. Prolonged inferiority complex leads to undeserving feelings of grandeur. Too often ignoramuses try to pass themselves off as scholars. Sick and pathetic! Don't think the irony is lost on you. You are learning to be sensitive to all manifestations of transference and projection. Unlike most scumbags and assholes, you are very honest with yourself. Ignorance is not a crime. Nor is it a permanent condition. All you need to know is to realize you don't know shit about a certain subject. Then you start learning about it. That honest attitude is far better than to open your stinking mouth pontificating or mouthing off as if you did actually know what you are talking about. The stupid thing about humans and dogs is that they don't want to appear that they are ignorant, so they pretend to speak as if they knew something. That's when you look at them and feel amused and nauseous at the same time.

Faith and Truth

Faith without basis is not faith at all. It's called capitulation to the dark forces of the distant, distinct past when Man barely learned about bipedalism. Faith must be based on sound facts and solid reasoning, not on wishful thinking. There are two types of people: one relies on soothing, unsubstantiated fairy tales as a crutch to cope with the terrors of living. The other, somehow always in the minority, makes full use of their faculty of ressoning, looks at life squarely and tackles all of its problems by their own efforts without going through the farce of prayers and invocations of a fictional being.

Recent postulation was made concerning the surviving communist regimes in China, Vietnam, North Korea, and Cuba that they are wily and stubborn and that they would not voluntarily institute reforms to head off the kind of revolts and uprisings which are raging across Norrh Africa and the Middle East. While this reasoning had some merit, it wasnot irrefutable because nothing is impossible and beyond reach as far as human affairs are concerned. That's the beauty of being human. We are not merely physical objects which are subject to immutable physical laws. We are beings with free will. Once we are determined to bring changes no matter what the costs are, changes will occur. Until 1989, nobody would imagine the Soviet Union would swiftly disintegrate and Eastern European states would become democratic societies in our life time. Humans are beings of momentum and imitation. Revolutionary winds of change are blowing across North Africa and the Middle East. If Saudi Arabia undergoes a regime change, after Bahrain and Yemen, the winds of change will reach China and Vietnam. The fates of Vietnam and China are intertwined. It is inconceivable that a regime change in Vietnam takes place without having a similar process in China, and vice versa. For the sake of our country, we prefer the change takes place in China first in order to minimize the loss of lives and properties in Vietnam. In the mean time, we must be ready for the change and use it to propel our country to much needed progress and modernity, and not for internal squabbling for the spoils of power. Vietnam and the Vietnamese people have to be above all parties and individuals.

Wissai

Grief and Peace

Death comes to all of us. Death has many forms. Too often we only think of one form: the day the heart stops beating in us or in the person who is dear to us. We rarely think the end of a romance, a love, a marriage as death in disguise, but it is and sometimes it gives rise to more intense grief than the loss of a life. You once grieved and you grieved for an awfully long time for a romanticized love and then an infatuation. Now looking back, the grieving process was your way of saying goodbye to a long adolescence and idealism. You don't love them anymore. They now seem too small, too common, too predictable. They are not like you at all. So you stop loving them and the grieving period is over.

Are You on Fire?

 
Self Portrait
 
It doesn't interest me if there is one God
Or many gods.
I want to know if you belong -- or feel abandoned;
If you know despair
Or can see it in others.
I want to know
If you are prepared to live in the world
With its harsh need to change you;
If you can look back with firm eyes
Saying "this is where I stand."
I want to know if you know how to melt
Into that fierce heat of living
Falling toward the center of your longing.
I want to know if you are willing
To live day by day
With the consequence of love
And the bitter unwanted passion
Of your sure defeat.
I have been told
In that fierce embrace
Even the gods
Speak of God.

~ David Whyte ~

It does not matter to me if
You believe in God.
No, not anymore.
What matters is whether
You're on fire
With your beliefs,
And the relief such a fire would bring
To your soul;
Whether it has burned away all your impurities
And all you have left is love
In your heart.

It does not matter whether
You continue loving me,
But whether your love
Has changed you and me
For the better.

Roberto Wissai

 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Magic of Words

To read his words is to see how he thinks, to watch his mind at work. The rage and the loneliness are the fuel, the restless mind is the talent, but the sentences he taught himself to construct, by trial and error, by repetition and borrowing, they are the magic in print and they are the sword that he uses to cut through ignorance and phoniness.

He read last night about Mike Tyson and a gorgeous-looking female porn star. They both read philosophy and adore Nietzsche. All suffering souls discover Nietzsche sooner or later. Like him, they were attracted to the abyss and self-destruction. Like him, they didn't give in to nihilism. They eventually said yes to life, to the will to transcend and transform. And like him, there's a certain narcissism in everything they do. The truth of the matter is the first love and infatuation one must have is oneself. It's far healthier than self-loathing.

Wissai

Rivalry and Maturity

No, you are not going to comment and prove the other is a despicable fake. You will walk away and concentrate on your mission of self-improvement. You have the free will to be morally what you want to be. You must keep your contempt in check, even with despicable cowards and phonies. They should not occupy your mind. After all, they are scums and dregs of society, rubbish and filth and garbage that inevitably appear after an event of human mass gathering.

Remember, there is strength in silence. Silence is the conservation of energy. Speech is the dissipation of energy. What you need to do is to stay connected with the master in you. Through him, you learn about the mastery of the art of living. A man must be the master of himself, of his emotions, of his feelings, of his desires and aversions. Silence, even under provocations, is the first step of self-mastery. After all, you have read the trash presented as "thoughts" of others. Every dog wants to bark. Every rooster wants to crow. Every human wants to say something, no matter what is said makes sense or not. The impulse to make one's presence known;to leave a mark, a scent; to assert oneself; to claim one's territory; to jostle for a place in the sun, is strong. However, stronger men of will turn their backs on all that and keep their mouths shut, first with a smile on their faces, but as time goes by, the smile fades away and slowly is replaced with impassivity and then serenity. Their mind is not rippled by behavior of lesser men, of monkeys and dogs. Their mind is flat and smooth like a lake in a windless early dawn when the sun just barely appears on the horizon. A pontificator who pontificates on everything is an ignoramus who carries a deep inferiority complex inside him. Speak only of what you really know. And only sparingly.

Wissai

Incipient Feelings of Love

He looked at her eyes. She shyly averted his gaze. He said softly, so what do you think of what I just said. She kept looking down at the ground, blushing, and breathing hard. Finally, she said, I don't know, I am confused, I am not sure, I need to go home now. Sure, he said, I'll escort you home.

So that was how it happened. He remembered the scene. It never left his mind. It has stayed on after all these years, after the war, after the divorces, after all the recurrent dreams, simply because it was so beautiful a scene, despite all the mistakes he has made, all the relationships he has gone through. Yes, he no longer loves her. He would not come over and say hello if he happens to run into her, but memories about her have a way to live on. Everything he does now, every effort he makes to improve himself, gets its impetus from her, from the pains, the sorrows brought on by her betrayal after a wonderful three-year odyssey of first love, at least on his part. Love is short. Memory is forever.

The Sounds of Flute, Violin, Saxophone, and Piano

You are no musician. You wish you were. You keep telling yourself you would learn music before you die so you could set some of your words to music. Anyway, here are your impressions or rather, your vibrations when you hear the sounds made by the following musical instruments

Flute:

A wind instrument. In the right hand, we have a sound that is haunting, lingering, and floating forever in the air till your soul transformed by the sound.

Violin:

A string instrument, similar in effects to the flute, but more varied and intense due to the stronger vvibrations of the sound.

Saxophone:

Another wind instrument, and the most passionate and intense sound of all. The best time to hear it is at night. That's when we know Man is an emotional being and he communicates his emotions more than just through verbal language. Contrary to the staccato sounds produced by instruments of percussion or simple, primitive pattern of rhythms produced by drums, he somehow finds ways how he feels by blowing air into a brass instrument that magnifies the sounds and carries far into a distance in the stillness of the night. It's difficult not to have all the molecules of our beings stirred up when we hear the wailings of a saxophone.

Piano:

The granddaddy of all musical instruments, capable of evoking feelings of serenity, sadness, light-hearted joys, and unrestrained flow of ecstasy. It is a complete instrument thanks to simultaneous production of different notes.

All societies make music, just like all humans are endowed with language. While language is a barrier from one narion to another, music transcends human barriers and unites us and reminds us that we are all related and can understand one another and that indeed of all creatures and beings on this planet, we are an epitome and an exception.

Wissai

Stupidity Aplenty

You looked at what some assholes and scumbags wrote and you would not believe how stupid and uninformed they could be. Then it got worse if they got angry. They became incoherently sarcastic and resorted to cheap, trite, worn out cliches and expressions of insult.

You glanced at her exposed breasts in the low cut dress. She didn't bother to cover them with a bra. They were a bit droopy but rather big and not in bad shape. The skin tone on her chest was good. You looked up at her face. The slightly simian features with cunning eyes made him him feel wary. He was not interested in jumping into the hay with her, he decided. Her cheap, predictable mode of seduction depressed him and made him think of Laura. He was going to show her he was not all hormones. And then his thoughts turned to the leper. Her skepticism of his past wealth amused him. The sarcastic, strong words from the bitch strengthened his resolutions. He then felt a wave of lasstitude and cynicism washing over him. And he felt numb and dead inside as far as the hormones were concerned. You could take a monkey from the jungle, but you can't take the jungle out of the monkey. Once born a monkey, stays a monkey. Stupid humans are no different, you can try to educate them, teaching them to read and write, but you cannot really remove the stupidity from them. They would continually say and do the most stupid, outrageous things. Stupidity, not wisdom, is in their DNA. Stupid is as stupid does. He only speaks when he has no other choice. That's why a wise man keeps his mouth shut most of the times. He becomes laconic and taciturn and reticent. He knows the value of scarcity and mystery.

Taciturnity

You got to be taciturn. Your new persona must be that of a strong silent type. The less you talk, the more mysterious you come across because nobody would no longer know what you think.

Vietnam is on fire and yet scumbags and assholes are amusing themselves with sex-related riddles. The coward conveniently forgot that he once professed indignation at a curse word used in a work of fiction. Now he is enjoying posting emails with double entendres about sex. A few weeks ago, he obliquely talked about vaginas while pretending to talk about the size of portholes of cruise cabins. What a disgusting hypocrite!

Today is Valentine's Day. Instead of receiving tender, loving words, you got expressions of ungracious sentiments which were better left ignored. You are going to relate a true story. An American man in late 30's, tall, smart, and quirky, met an illegal immigrant from Dominican Republic. He fell in love with her and put up a lot of money to fight the INS so she could stay. He had no success. She was deported. She tried to cross the border the second time. She was caught in Arizona, with a broken leg, dehydrated, and almost died. She spent two months in an Anerican hospital in Arizona. Her hospital bills were footed by Homeland Security. She was sent home after her recovery. She crossed the border the third rime and finally made it. She has been living with him for nine months in his house. I know he loves her. And I think she loves him. I am not so sure, but I am not going to be crass and tell him to be careful. I am going to be taciturn and mind my own business. Tonight, I am going to read a story about infiltration and deception which has nothing to do with love. Love is an overused word, especially on Valentine's Day.

Inner Transformations

I don't pretend to be a self-proclaimed scholar on anything, least of all on the subject of Inner Transformations, but that does not deter me from putting forth my views on it. Shyness is not in my DNA.

Unlike lower forms of life whose behavior is largely governed by instincts and little by learning, humans have a wondrous ability to be morally what they want to be, barring any organic injuries to or abnormal formations of their brains. In other words, humans don't have a fixed nature (essence). We are what we want to be. We can transcend instincts. We can consciously choose to be celibate or vegetarian. Likewise, we can choose to transform ourselves from evil and greedy individuals to kind and unselfish citizens. 

History was replete with such transformations. Emperor Asoka in India and Saul on the road to Damascus are well-known examples. Buddhist folklore has a story about a repentant robber who offered literally his own heart to a passing monk who promised to take it with him to some kind of destination where the robber's sins would be forgiven. After a few day of travel, the heart putrefied and attracted flies, causing severe discomfort to the monk. The monk didn't keep his promise. He threw the heart away. The result was that the soul of the robber was saved while the monk's was not. Buddhist teachings stress forgiveness and love as antidotes to hate in order to break the vicious cycle of hate generating hate. As far as I know (and I could be wrong) there are no Buddhist doctrines associated with revenge and "justice". Christian and Islamist doctrines talk about God of Wrath, besides God of Love and Allah the Merciful. 

Inner Transformations could be expedited if the "sinners" and evil doers are not confronted by people with hate in their own hearts. We all know the VC, especially the leaders. are evil-hearted and selfish people. I submit that the VC themselves are aware of their own unsalutary character. But I refuse to believe that every single VC is incapable of change for the better, especially if they are exposed to love, kindness, and forgiveness. If the anti-VC groups cling to an unyielding, rabid, revenge-minded, and self-righteous attitude, they are not in fact any better than the VC. They would put the VC on the defensive and for their own survival, the VC would fight the anti-VC groups to death, thus weakening Vietnam forever. Fratricidal conflicts were what weakened Khmer people, causing loss of territory to Thailand and Vietnam. We must regard the VC as our wayward brothers, and not implacable foe. Our true enemies are and always have been the Chinese from the North.

Hate is an impetus to actions. But Love and Forgiveness can accomplish much more. My views are not an empty exercise in rhetoric. They come from personal experiences. Up until recently, I subscribed to the philosophy of seeking justice and settling scores. But I came to realize such a philosophy didn't elevate me. While I will continue exposing lies, ignorance, and falsehoods, I will not allow myself to be mired in the misery of hate. 

Wissai 

Meaningless Sound and Empty Fury

You woke up this morning and reached for your iPhone. Surely enough, as expected, various emails were awaiting you with their usual meaningless sound and empty fury. The thoughts contained therein were vapid and full of trite, worn-out stock phrases. There was not a singular originality displayed, a coherence assembled, or honesty detected. That reminded you of the time you showed your massive effort of writing a memoir to a friend. She got back to you after four days. Here was what she said:

"Roberto, the last four days were the most painful days of my life. I promised you I would read carefully of what you had written since you asked me to, and I am your friend. But I've got to tell you I suffered. Your words made me suffer. First, you should not call it a memoir. Just call it a novel and people would assume you were writing about yourself. Besides, by calling it a novel, your family and your friends wouldn't get upset or angry. Second, tell me what your purpose was in writing what you just did? To get a catharsis so you wouldn't go out and start shooting? To prove you could string words together in a foreign language? Or to leave an indelible mark, an unforgettable statement in this noisy world? If your aim was the last one, then you had failed, and you had failed miserably because I was not moved or transformed after reading your piece. Rather, boredom reigned supreme throughout my reading it. What you should have aimed for was to create a susurrant but persistent sound, a voice so fresh and haunting that the reader couldn't put it down. Also, the language employed had to be such that it read like poetry in prose, and magic in print, where words flowed, cascaded, and carried the reader from one wondrous moment to the next, without end until it was really over, and then he came back and read it all over again, savoring every sentence, every word on the page. He then wondered what you would look like and he wanted to know everything about you and what had driven you to write the way you did."

Tone and Choice of Words

You thought she no longer touched you, no matter what her tone and choice of words would be, but you were wrong. Then it hit you that the insolence came about because of the discrepancy of you knew what. And a shudden ran through you. You wondered if you really should retire early. You should not be that stupid and altruistic.

You then had another thought about survival and real honesty about yourself. It's time to cast aside the farce and the folly and be really in touch with the real existential situation. You thought about silence, your current silence, and the insulting silence of a bloke whom you have friendily extended an invitation to join your club. You are not angry, not yet, just annoyed and perplexed for now. You are thinking of the necessity of prudence and moderation and of the ignorance, false pride, crudity of some animalistic humans and you are telling yourself that you should not be like them, even in anger. Your words must reflect your basic honesty in a dignified manner. You have expressed express contempt for sophistical cowards. Don't be like one of them. Respect truth and civility. You can continue showing contempt, but you must do so in a civil manner.

Fear, Truth, Dignity, and Survival

The above words keep flying into and out of your mind. You struggle to stay sane and relevant in an insane and meaningless world where scumbags lie in order to look good, where cowards hanker and hunger for power. One douche bag told you he wanted to be a writer when he was through with earning his daily bread as if the disclosure of that grandiose wet dream would somehow impress you. Shit, one writes because one has to, not waiting for the moment when one has the time. We make time. Writing is a necessity like breathing. There are so many phonies and assholes in this world, motherfuckers with average intelligence and talent yet fancy that they are all geniuses. There are so many ignoramuses pretending to be scholars, mouthing off nonsense in a vain effort to gain respect.

You read a story about a prostitute being blackmailed by one of her clients. The story was good until the author, a woman, tried to be fanciful and went for a complicated ending whereas the simpler ending hinted at earlier would be a dynamite. You felt cheated. Why the fuck she was not content with simplicity? She had a good plot. The language was controlled. Everything was heading towards a rare satisfying conclusion, then bam, she changed her mind and opted for an unrealistic, pedagogical phony ending. The author was no better than a whore herself, all fake and fanciful, instead of simple and direct and enduring like Hemingway when he was at his best. In any story, the ending must make sense, not far-fetched or contrived. The hardest part of the narrative is the ending, as any story-teller would attest. Say, you were young and came from a poor family. You met a plain-looking, but smart and rich girl in college. She approached you. You, fresh from getting no where with having a crush over another smart but not so rich girl, went out with this girl. Lo and behold, you found yourself liking her more and more as time went on. She one day said she liked you, too, but she and you woukd have no chance to have a future together because her mother would not accept you because of your humble background. You said, fine, no problem and you bid her farewell. But the next day, she came to look for you, saying you misunderstood her, and she cried. Then she and you went out for three years. Meanwhile there were other girls who were interested in you, but you were faithful with her. Then one day, she met somebody new and she dumped you like a sack of rotten potatoes. Now, as a story-teller, how are you going to proceed? Are you going to tell the truth, the farce, and the folly of the adolescent love cruelly violated and betrayed, the hurt and disappointment that almost destroyed you and in the end turned you into a poet and a philosopher who refused to let go of the bittersweet memories? Or are you making up some nonsensical, artificial ending of the story? No, you are opting for unfulfilled love and eternally sad recollections whenever a certain song, a certain phrase, a certain desire that comes from nowhere and reminds you of her. So, that's what love is all about. The memories, the anger, the hurts, and the inability to forget because you wouldn't want to get hurt ever again. There is a certain part of you shut off from others.

Poetry and Performance of Politics in Cairo

CAIRO — It was a few minutes after midnight on Sunday, when an unaccustomed rain washed Cairo’s somnolent streets, as Ahmed Abdel-Moneim walked with friends across a bridge that was a passageway to a parallel capital in Tahrir Square, an idea as much as a place.
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“My vision goes a lot farther than what my eyes can see,” he said.

Egypt’s revolution is a contest of ultimatums — chaos and revolution, freedom and submission — but its arena of Tahrir Square becomes quieter at night, the cacophony of rebellion giving way to a stage of poetry, performance and politics.

Be it the canteen that prepares cheese sandwiches, the volunteers who ferry tea to guards at the barricades, the pharmacies that are overstocked with Betadine or the artists who bring their aesthetic to the asphalt, their Cairo begins as the city sleeps. The weary collapse in exhaustion, but no one else seems willing to surrender a moment that feels imbued with the idealism of defiance.

“Everyone here is awake,” Mr. Abdel-Moneim said as he passed an army checkpoint where a soldier urinated on his tank. “I might be weary, but when the morning comes, I can breathe freedom. What I’ve seen here is what I’ve never seen in my life.”

Or, as graffiti on a tank put it, “The revolution is in Tahrir, no sleeping in bed.”

On any day, the Arab world’s greatest city staggers, its 18 million people joined by a million more from the countryside. Staccato horns bring a cadence to a rush hour that lasts all day, overwhelmed only by the din of one of the world’s most crowded cities. The assault on the senses that the city represents has long given rise to a nostalgia, the glimpses of an older, more rarefied capital captured in black-and-white Egyptian movies.

Tahrir is that, longing and novelty.

As the night unfolded, vendors ambled through peaceful streets, past couples holding hands and men still wearing bandages from their fight with government supporters trying to overrun the square. “Tea for an Egyptian pound!” one cried. Volunteers handed out bread sticks. “My man, eat it!” shouted Ahmed Khater, to a gesture of polite reluctance. “Just take one. We came for you.”

Down the street, men took their seats on the wet pavement, to a performance of colloquial poetry by a man in a wheelchair, speeches by a brawler draped in an Egyptian flag and slogans led by Mohammed Mahmoud, a 16-year-old with a knack for words.

“God reigns over the crisis, and that guy has the mind of a shoe,” he cried of President Hosni Mubarak as he stood under a drizzle. (It rhymes in Arabic.) “Oh Mubarak, you coward, we’re the people in the square” went another. (It rhymes, too.)

A speech followed. “Finally the decision is in our hand,” it ended.

“After we get rid of him, we’ll clean the square, we’ll cherish the square,” said Azza Khalil, an oncologist who has worked around the clock at a pharmacy set up near a line of tanks. “It will be a symbol of making something new.”

She walked by box after box of bandages, lotions, disinfectant, inhalers, intravenous solution and even insulin — what she called “nearly a pharmacy” — provided by donations and organized by Dr. Khalil, who is a secular Muslim, as well as her veiled counterpart and a young Christian. Men healing from the clashes slept under lean-tos next to the tents the women used. In two days, Dr. Khalil had left for only a few hours.

“Some people go but come back quickly because it’s so ugly outside,” she said.

Protesters have called this “the Week of Steadfastness,” and there is plenty here. But there is a sense of siege, too, with a lurking fear that the optimism of the people here may eventually succumb to grimmer realities. Near fires offering more smoke than flame, men debated whether Mr. Mubarak would leave tomorrow or the day after. Neither is probably the answer, as the government begins to gain its footing in the face of a 13-day uprising.

“Who knows what life will be like after Tahrir,” said Mohammed Ali, one of the protesters. “I don’t know if we can win or not. They have power, but we’re not weak.”
“The words of people,” he added, “are stronger than guns.”

At 3 a.m., words infused the square, in the form of songs from the 1960s and 1970s. “Oh Egypt, our numbers are still great, don’t be scared of others’ might” goes one song. Mohi Salah strummed the oud and sang another to the crowd. “If I die, mother, don’t cry,” his song went, “I’ll have died so that my country can live.”

Political debates raged, as a gaggle of hundreds deliberated, by microphone, whether Egyptian television should be banned from Tahrir and effigies should be taken down from traffic lights. (Both proposals were rejected, by a show of hands.)

Everywhere there was humor, for which Egyptians are famous. “Mubarak, please leave” went one man’s placard. “I’ve been married for 20 days, and I miss my wife.” Someone else joked that Mr. Mubarak immolated himself in protest over his people.

“Where can I find the Facebook youth?” a peasant from southern Egypt asked.

As dawn approached, youths typed away on computers, perusing Twitter and Web sites of Arabic satellite channels by way of Internet connections unlocked from apartments surrounding the square. Men waited for two hours in lines to the square’s sole bathroom in the Omar Makram mosque. Two tents were set up for lost and found. Other tents housed artists, one of whom declared that Tahrir was the Revolution of Light. There was something fitting in the description, an idea of the ephemeral and fleeting.

“God has cured my ailments here,” said Ali Seif, 52, a photographer who has been here since the uprising began, and who said he had diabetes and heart problems.

“That’s what freedom feels like,” said Ibrahim Hamid, standing next to him.

A little after 5 a.m., as the softest glow filtered across the sky, the call to prayer rang out. “Prayer is better than sleep,” the muezzin cried. Men and women awoke, joining their community, as the call intersected with a medley rising across a capital known as the City of a Thousand Minarets. For a moment, Tahrir was tied to Cairo again.

Mohamed Farouq stood at the entrance to the Kasr el-Nil Bridge, the passageway to Tahrir.

“You feel like this is the society you want to live in,” he said.

Written by Anthony Shadid in New York Rimes, February 06, 2011.

It is ironic that Egypt originally was not an Arab state. It only became Arab after being invaded by the Arabs from the Arabian Peninsula. Now Egypt, because of its big population size where the the majority speak Arabic and its centers of learning, commerce, music and filmmaking, it is considered the heart and soul of the Arab world, supplanting Saudi Arabia where the population is much smaller and the people seem to be governed by rulers of medieval mindset.

It appears that where Egypt is heading, the rest of the Arab world (Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Jordan, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Yemen, Qatar, Libya, Tunisia, Algeria, and Northern Sudan. There are other Arab states, but the above are what I can recall on top of my head) will follow. That's why what's going on in Egypt is very important for the region. Reading about how the demonstrators regard their trend-setting, revolutionary ways is very moving to me. To live fully is to seize the historic moment, without fear. History and Future belong to the bold and the brave and the ones with heart. Meanwhile those with crippled hearts in their chests and safety on their minds limp along for a free ride while congratulating themselves for being smart and practical.

I know nothing about the Arabic language, but I have heard that its poetry is exceptionally moving. Arab poetry had its roots in the early days of the nomads reciting poetry around campfires at night.

Vietnamese poetry has been uncommonly good since 1920's (French influence finally bore fruit in the 1920's in Vietnam with the emergence of romantic poetry tinged with French romanticism happened a century prior). Let's hope our people will survive and continue speaking Vietnamese and produce Viet poetry and music. It would be a tragedy for the Viet people and for world heritage if 100 years from now, nobody speaks Vietnamese in the land with the shape of the letter S.

I read again the NYT report and was blown away by the poetry itself of the article, a very fitting vehicle to describe the poetry and performance of politics in Tahrir Square.

To be able to write like that, the author must first feel deeply and then he must search for the right words in his memory bank to capture what he has felt.

After a man dies, what he leaves behind worth remembering are his deeds and his words. His deeds could recede to the retreating recesses of failing memories of those who remember him, but his words live forever if they resonate.

Wissai

Which Path Awaits Vietnam?

WHICH PATH AWAITS THE PEOPLE OF VIETNAM ?

For the past few weeks, the world has witnessed revolutionary winds of change blowing across North Africa . People in these countries are rising up and demanding an end to the autocratic and corrupt regimes which have been oppressing them for decades. People are asking for the fundamental rights of democracy and freedom through free and fair elections. The revolution in Tunisia was a success. The President of Tunisia was forced to leave the country and the Tunisians are working towards an election of a government that reflects the wishes of the majority of the people. The Egyptians have been on the streets non-stop for the past two weeks demanding the departure of Mubarak and free elections. Similar protests are taking place in Algeria, Sudan, and Yemen.

The technological advances in telecommunications have empowered the heretofore oppressed people in these countries and enabled them to organize mass-protests demanding dictatorships be replaced by a plural party system where the rulers are  democratically elected by the ruled. The on-going revolutions and mass protests are sending a shudder to one-party systems, autocracies, and military dictatorships. The "Deluge of Democracy" threatens to sink and obliterate various manifestations of dictatorship despite their being burnished with deceitful slogans because these regimes are against the wishes of the governed and against  human advances in science and technology.

The path of true democracy is lined up with fundamental rights such as the rights of assembly, free press, plural party system, and unrestricted voting.  Such path is being marched on by people in democratic societies. Other people currently living in  oppressed conditions are yearning to be on that path. And they are saying that no authoritarian rule reinforced with secret police and practice of torture can stop them from setting foot on that path of democracy.

Vietnam is one of four communist regimes left in the entire world. Communism has been denounced and got rid of elsewhere because it has proven to be an anti-human and oppressive political system. It was also a proven impediment to economic progress.  This retarded and retarding political system has been faithfully applied in Vietnam for over 50 years. And it has brought immense sufferings to our undeserving people. Nowadays, not only ordinary Viet dissidents but also former communist cadres and military officers are denouncing and decrying the political system and demanding the regime return to the Viet people their fundamental human rights and stop emulating the anachronistic and obscene transfer of political power through bloodlines as it is being practiced in the economically stagnant North Korea.  

Our beloved Vietnam went through horrific destruction and suffering because of the fratricidal civil war brought on by ideological differences. Even after peace was restored, the suffering has continued because of the ruling elite's intolerance of dissension, practice of authoritarianism, and embedded corruption in all strata of society. 
 
It's time the Viet people rise up and exercise the right of self-determination and ask for basic, fundamental human rights be restored. It's time for the Viet people to conquer their fear of arrest, imprisonment, and torture as the Egyptians have conquered theirs. Freedom is never free. It has to be fought for.
 
Will the Viet people follow the revolutionary winds of change and take to the streets and stay in the streets until their rightful demands are met as the Egyptians are doing? Or will the rulers in Hanoi recognize the necessity of adaptation as the monarch in Jordan is doing, and start instituting democratic reforms? 
 
Hopefully, when the Viet people take to the streets, they do so in  celebration  because the Hanoi regime has proven to be wily and wise and is responding to the needs of the people, and no longer to its  own needs. For this scenario to happen, the new Secretary General of the Viet Communist Party needs to have the mindset of a Mandela or Gorbachev, and not the ossified mindset of a Stalin or Mao.
 
The first day of The Year Of The Cat
03 February 2011
 
 
     
Le Quang Long, Nguyen Hung, and Ngo Khoa Ba
 

Self and Other, Man and Chimp

Humans have consciousness (awareness) of themselves and others. They know they are different from their fellow humans by degrees, not kind. Then they look at the chimps and start wondering ever since Darwin burst on the scene if their closest cousin differs from them also by degrees, and not in kind. You've finished reading a book about chips. And you learned various things. You always have an interest in chimps, besides the human animal. The camp you seem to gravitate to is the one which says humans differ from chimps in kind. You are persuaded by the following words

"The profound biological continuity between human and nonhuman animals masks an equally profound functional discontinuity between the human and nonhuman mind. Human animals---and no ther---build fires and wheels, diagnose each others' illnesses, communicate using symbols, navigate with maps, risk their lives for ideals, collaborate with each other, explain the world in terms of hypothetical causes, punish transgressors for breaking rules, imagine impossible scenarios, and teach each other how to do all the above.

Chimps perceive what they can observe, and nothing else. They have no concepts of ghosts, gravity, and God. Unlike chimps, humans interpret and reinterpret the world."

Religion is nothing but Man's interpretation and construct of the world. It had its usefulness in ancient times when Science was in its infancy. Today it still retains its usefulness and relevance with most people, but not with individuals like you. You prefer Science's interpretation of the world because of the principle of verifiability.

As you engage in debates with others, you find yourself, unlike most of your opponents, behave like a scientist---curious, skeptical, intellectually honest, welcoming of criticism, and bound by data and facts.

You read about language development and are immensely gratified to learn about the process. Everything's about genes and brain development. You feel lucky. You won a lottery.

Bravery and Bravado

"Let bravery be thy guy, but not bravado". I ran into this quote today. And I must confess that my life so far has been largely filled with bravado, not bravery. No wonder I feel a dislocation and a floating anger. After today, things will be different. I

It's time to say goobeye to demons

The following are words (modified and condensed by me) of Sam Chauhan, a motivator, aka mind coach, known within a limited circle. He enjoys success and respect. For what they're worth, I am sharing his words with you. I realize you, like me, are too old and too blasé for trite and pop sayings, but enlightenment has no age or statutes of limitation. Thoughts could take possession of us and drive us to success or ruin. It's up to us to pick the thoughts that govern our lives. Buddha himself was known for uttering the immortal words: we are what we think (actually what he said was a tad longer. I just condensed his saying):

1. I attract positive people and positive things in my life.
2. Good things happen to me everyday.
3. I trust myself.
4. I do things according to the best of my ability, but I am not hung up on the outcomes.
5. My thoughts are powerful. They have an effect on my body, my mind, and how I feel.
6. Today is going to be a day filled with learning experiences.

Farces and Follies

You talked about Laura with strangers, baring your soul. You claimed you had stopped loving her. And then you added that you still felt angry at her for the way she brutally walked out on you. Invariably, after every talk, you felt a rise of bile and bitterness from deep inside you and you wondered what a farce and a folly your love for her truly was. You wonder where you would go when the skin no longer can contain you. You must decide either to get on the fast moving train or to leave the platform altogether. You cannot have one foot on the train and one on the platform. You just related a story in print. Writing it down gave you temporary peace because the story was an investigation into the nature of honesty, truth, and acting. You think most humans engage in dishonesty in everything they do. Only what they feel is real, and not what they say, think, or do. Feelings are the mirrors and the drumbeats of truth, no matter how inchoate or faint they may be. Most of what people say or commit in writing are merely public postures designed to make them look or even feel good about themselves or to score a point in arguing. Most people are not equipped to deal with facts and truths. Most people prefer to live a life with half-truths and inauthencity. They think just because they have intelligence and education, they can handle facts and truths. No, they can't if they don't have courage and self-respect. A self-respecting man would not lie consciously, especially in arguments. Using pseudo arguments and employing sophistry are forms of lying. Lying is also a manifestation of cowardice, a lack of social and emotional courage.

Wissai

Monkey and Jungle

A disclosure of the recent tasteless exchange of emails confirmed the long standing view that you can take a monkey out of the jungle, but you cannot take the jungle out of a monkey. Once born a monkey, stays a monkey. Certain humans are like that. They have the appearance of a human, but their conduct and words are definitely of the simian variety. You take a look at them, and you cannot help but think of filth and feces. To be born as a human is to be born only of potential and possibilities. It's up to the individual to decide to become human or to be stuck as a disgusting, self-mocking monkey. Man is not Essence. He is Possibility and Self-Determination.

Unfelt Smiles

I find inspirations and sources from everything around me. And I use them to enhance and feed my feverish but not original enough imagination. I only know I am driven and possessed with a desire to write, to tell stories so I don't have to kill myself. My telling stories is like an enacting of the drama from The Arabian Nights. I tell stories in order to postpone the termination of my own life. 

I am not unhappy or filled with anguish. Not really. I just find life quite absurd, devoid of meaning. And I am sometimes tired of trying to inject meaning into a meaningless existence. But I am getting ahead of myself. 

On the other hand I do think I am luckier than most. And as I get older, I even realize that I am not that stupid after all, not when compared with poorly reasoning, uninformed, selfish, lying, and cowardly blokes and blockheads I have met. Occasionally, however, I am pleased to run into somebody of similar intelligence and range of intellect as mine. Like yesterday, I met an ex-military intelligence officer who is now a lawyer. We had a lively, mutually satisfying conversation. I was pleased when he expressed admiration for my using a metaphor of "economic Frankensteins" to describe modern multi-national corporations. He said he had not heard of the term before. He queried about my vocation. I answered him and then talked about my avocation which is of course telling stories. Upon saying goodbye, he gave me his email address and told me to send him my latest story. So here it is. I pilfered, borrowed, and enhanced it from a story that I couldn't stop going back over and over again. A dumb and insensitive reader once asked me why I didn't write about my life experiences and why I didn't postulate about my own insights instead of copying somebody else's life experiences and insights. I heaved a heavy sigh and tried to stifle a yawn. I impatiently explained to the ignoramus that deep down human life experiences have universal application and relevance since humans are not really islands; we are all related and connected. Your joys and sorrows are mine also. I understand your pain and I share your celebration. Literature is the conduit  to bring us closer and to remind us that we are all the same, no matter how different and extreme some of us appear to be. Don't we all have flashes of extremity and irrationality going through our heads, but, unlike Jordan Delerian in the story below, we are strong enough to pull ourselves back from the edge of the abyss, instead of plunging head long into the vortex of destruction and self-destruction? We read literature so we could understand and perhaps identify and realize we are not really that alone in this world and life at the core is the struggle for survival against both external and internal forces. The realization that we all have to die someday throws us into an anguish because our finite existence highlights both the absurdity (lack of inherent meaning) of that existence and the need to justify why we go on living despite the fact we know our life will come to an end. I think the more sensitive and honest individuals among us grapple with that tension all their lives. In so doing, they eventually reach a conclusion that life has only meaning if they can overcome instinctive concerns and preoccupation with Self and pay more attention to the Other. In other words, Hell is not necessarily the Other, as Sartre asserted. We can reach Paradise here on earth if we truly love the Other, as we should. But enough of this extraneous lecturing and philosophizing bullshit, let's get to the story. But hey, lecture man, aren't our very lives stories in and of themselves? The way we walk, the words we use, the lies we try to foist on others, aren't they stories, too? Aren't they telling something about ourselves, unwittingly or not?

Two days ago, while Jordan Delerian was bludgeoning to death his two young children (a boy and a girl) after cutting the throat of his wife, I was sitting in Dr. Freuden's Sunny Side Geriatric Clinic in southern Florida with my father, who was just then temporarily at a loss for words. He had been trying to explain to the good doctor why he no longer felt comfortable being in the same room with his shadow. He'd said, If light can pass through the universe, why can't it pass through me? Dad's contention, as far as I could figure it out, was that light had a mind of its own and had taken to behaving arbitrarily in the last six months or so. After Dr. Freuden (German for joys, and has nothing to do with Sigmund Freud. The explanation is necessary as some dumb shit who read the draft of the story ignorantly made the false connection in a triumphant manner) clicked off his desk lamp, Dad took off his eyeshade, rubbed his rheumy eyes, and asked who I was. Freuden leaned back in his squeaky chair, cast me a glance, then gave me a wink. His wink annoyed me.

Freuden had diagnosed Dad with Alzheimer's. But Dad said he was merely closing shop. Still, he had his lucid moments. He was in and out, and he was hard to read. His expressions were often without nuance or blend. He was extremely angry, happy, or vacant. He could remember what he did on August 6, 1945, the day the bomb fell on Hiroshima (in bed with your Mom, busy making children), but not that he just turned on the gas without lighting the pilot light; which was why I had to move him into an all-electric, assisted-living facility. 

Jordan lifted the lifeless bodies of the children out of the bathtub and dried them off. He tucked them both into bed, pulled the sheets to their chins, covered their battered faces with the lace doilies from his daughter's vanity. He nestled cuddly toys next to their bodies. He choked back tears. Jordan decided to drive to the beach, stare at the ocean, clear his head. And then maybe surprise his parents by showing up early. He'd drive by Whole Foods and pick up lunch. He cleared the table, started the dishwasher, went up to the master bath, and hopped in the shower. 

I told Dad I was still Roberto, the same old Roberto. 
-Well, you look a little like my boy Roger.
-Roger was your bulldog.
-Like Rolando, I mean.
-Rolando is dead. So is Maria. I'm all you got.

Freuden had Dad take off his shirt---easier said than done---and climb up on the examining table. I turned the script toward the window light and read Willis's next speech. "It's like you're in ninth grade, and you die and go into high school. That's all death is." I was playing Willis Harris in the Gold Coast Theatre's production of Trailerville. Willis is a true believer. I'm not. It was one week till dress rehearsal. "Or maybe you're humming along in a big rig, and you see a long straightaway up ahead and you shift gears and jam that pedal, and just like that the hum of the engine's an octave higher. Dying's like that, like shifting into a higher gear." That was bullshit and baloney. When I first read the script about three weeks ago, I called my sister's former schoolmate back in the days when they were children. I knew her, too. I went to the same school. She is dying of some kind of woman cancer. I apologized to her for being nosy but I explained to her that I was going to be in a play and the character I was going to play was saying that Death was like the hum of a truck-tractor's going at a high gear and I wondered if that was she was feeling. Fuck, no, she said. Not at all. I am in fucking pain all the time and have to take high dosage of painkiller. I want to go right now. But I have no guts to kill myself. My children want me to go, too. I can see in their eyes. They are tired. Plus, they're looking forward to getting my money. And the son of a bitch that is my husband hardly talks to me. Dying is a drag. No fun at all. Let me tell you. Don't let anybody tell you differently. Make the most of your life while you're still healthy. Live. Have real sex. Don't masturbate. You've got to live life with a gusto, fill it to the brim. You should not masturbate your life away. Understand?

My cell phone vibrated. I looked at the number. It was from my friend, Detective Carlos Soledad of Miami Police Department. I excused myself and stepped out into the hall. 

Carlos had a situation in the Lakes subdivision. Three bodies, two weapons, one missing suspect, much blood. "I need you here. Roberto. Now."
-I'll have to take my Dad along.
-How's he doing?
-He's not himself.
-Ten minutes. 

I left Dad in the car. I opened the window and gave him a Fifteen Puzzle. I told him to slide the numbers around until they were in order.
-In order of importance?
-In numerical order.

I'm not a police officer. That morning I was a forensic consultant. Sometimes I work for lawyers who are trying to empanel the appropriate jury for their clients. Sometimes I sit in my office and help my own clients shape their lives into stories, so the lives finally make some sense. A lack of narrative structure, as you know, will cause anxiety. And that's when I call myself a therapist. And that's what it says on my business card: Roberto Wissai, MSW, Family and Individual Counseling. Carlos uses me, however, because I read minds, even if those minds are not present. I say I read minds, but that's not it really. I read faces and furniture. I look at a person, at his expressions, his gestures, his clothing, his home, and his possessions, and I can tell you what he is thinking. I've been always able to do it. Carlos calls me an intuitionist. Dr. Culebra at UM's Cognitive Thinking Lab tells me I have robust mirror neurons. I just look, I stare, I gaze, and I pay attention to what I see. I don't go to strip joints. Nothing to look there but loneliness and depression and unbridled commercialism.

Carlos showed me the framed wedding photo found on the slain wife's body. No, I said, I'd prefer not to see the victims. The photographer had posed the couple with Jordan's cheek applied to Carol's temple, and he'd canted the shot at a thirty-degree angle. I wondered what he saw that suggested the pressure and the slant. Jordan's smile was thin, yet wide, as wide as he knew was appropriate for the occasion and pleasing to the photographer. Adequate was unfelt. His eyes were eager, but slightly squinted. I guessed that the obvious accompanying brow lines had been Photoshopped out. You can't trust photos to tell you the truth anymore. Carol wore a diamond stud in her left ear and a thin silver necklace. She had a dimple on her right cheek, like she was used to smiling out of one side of her face. This ingrained unevenness suggested a lifetime of feigned emotion.

Jordan River Delerian was a thirty-five-year-old graduate of Florida State's College of Business Administration and the CEO of, and the creative force behind, Succeedingly Wealthy, Inc., a company that produced and sold motivational artwork. Like this photo of crashing waves on a rocky, forested coast, and beneath it, in case you think this is just an empty, if dramatic landscape, are Jordan's words: Sometimes amidst the waves of change, we find our true direction. Above his desk in his office at the back of the house hung his company's best-selling framed photo, a shot of a golf green in the brilliant light of early morning, dew still on the grass. The photo is titled Success, and beneath the photo, Jordan's inspiring words: Some people only dream of success...other folks get up early and work at it.

You can lie with your possessions, of course. I suppose we all do that a bit, leave thick books of Western Art on the coffee table, and hang a painting of Paris on the wall even if we have never set foot in the City of Lights. Jordan had lined his office bookshelf with the hundred-volume set from the Franklin Library of The Collected Works of the World's Greatest Writers, from Aesop to Thomas Wolfe. Each book has a gold decor on leather boards, gilt page edges, and a ribbon bookmark. None of the spines had been spoken; none of the pages in those volumes I checked had been thumbed.

The neatness of the office, the precise arrangements of items on Jordan's desk told me that he was a man with a firm handshake, a pumper, not a wrist grabber, a man who numbered his arguments, asked and answered his own questions, and was given to proverbial expression. Tucked inside the side rail of his mocha desk pad, a note on pink "while-you-were-out" message paper, presumably to himself: Stumbling isn't falling. I took a business card from the leather card holder. The S in Succeedingly was a dollar sign. 

Carlos handed me a sheet of lime-green stationery. "He left a note."

Jordan's writing was half print, half cursive. His words began with a flourish and ended with a flat line.

I killed the children. Five minutes of pain for a lifetime of suffering. I know that Jehovah will take care of my little ones in the next life. And if Jehovah is willing, I would love to see them again in the resurrection, to have my second chance. I don't plan to live much longer myself, not on this earth. I have come to hate this life and this unreasonable system of things. I have come to have no hope. I give you my wife, Carol, my honey, my precious love. Please take good care of her.

I told Carlos that no person who has ever tried to be honest for one second of his life could think like this.
Carlos said, He is deacon in his church.
-Of course he is. And he's probably a scoutmaster.
-Soccer coach.
-There you go.
-So you think the volunteer work is pretense? You don't think he's sincere?

I shook my head. "I think sincerity is his honesty. And I think you'd better find Mr. Delerian soon. He's not finished. The family was just a flourish. He'll kill again. My guess is he's killed before."

Back at the car, I nudged Dad awake, strapped him in his seat belt, cranked up the AC, and drove toward Federal Highway. I told Dad about the victims, omitting the gruesome details. He shrugged. "Life is nothing," said he.

-But it's all we have.
-Nothing's plenty for me.
-Did you finish your puzzle?
-The zero was missing.
-So what did you do?
-Killed some time. 

He picked up my script, fanned the pages, found a highlighted speech, and fed me my cue. "You want to lose her too?"
-"A man belongs with his family, Arliss. Where we came from, the elderly are not discarded like old rags."
-Are you listening to yourself?
-That's not in the script, Dad
-What was her name?
-Who?
-Your ex-wife.
-Laura. What about her?
-On my mind is all. You lost her. 
-She found someone else.
-So she's dead to you.

I dropped Dad at Clover House in North Miami, told him I'd pick him up on Sunday for the Marlins game.

On the way to rehearsal I took a chance. I took out Delerian's business card and called his cell. I told him who I was and said I was hoping he could design me a piece of art I could hang in my office. What I had in mind was one of those Hubble shots of distant space, maybe the one of the eagle nebula or some radiant spiral galaxy, and it'll say, I love the light for it shows me the way. I endure the dark for it shows me the stars. Something like that.

Jordan told his parents that the kid were swell, fit as the fiddle, never been better. He asked his mother to pass the tabouli. She told him to leave room for dessert, Carol's busy with the scrapbook project, he said. He told them when he was at the beach earlier he saw this cloud that looked like an angel. Did they see it, too? Like Michael the archangel. They hadn't seen it. What do you think it means? he said.
Rain, his father said.
Jordan said, He maketh the sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sendeth rain on the just and the unjust.
Amen, his mother said.

Emotions don't lie, but you can lie about them. Of course, lying about them's not so easy. You're angry, but you say, I'm not angry, but then just for a moment, you draw your eyebrows down and together, flash those vertical wrinkles on your forehead, and press your lips together. Or maybe it's your body that leaks the truth. Your natural-born liar understands that everyone is watching his transpicuous face, and he knows an easy smile is the cleverest mask. Gestures, however, may belie that smile. He brushes a nonexistent piece of lint from his slacks, drum his fingers, leans forward. Lying is an art, like acting. It takes practice and talent to do it well. Like acting, some people should not even try lying because they are not good at it. It is downright embarrassing to see them at it. 

You can't command emotions to appear, but you can coax them, summon them. I learned that in acting class. Stanislavsky said if you move your hand in a tender way, you'll begin to experience tenderness. Change your expression and you change your nervous system. And you can use your life experiences and your remembered feelings to help you understand your character. Work from an aroused emotion back to the source of it. In other words, to lie on stage, you need to be honest with yourself.

Jordan Delerian asked his father Calbert to tie him on the cyclone fence in the backyard. Calbert smiled and turned on the TV. Let's Make a Deal was on. Jordan added that would be the best thing for all of us. Calbert told the contestant, a man in a hoop skirt and red baloney curls, to take just the cash and be happy with it. Cripes, he said, people don't know when they have it good. Jordan said, I have no way to control my stress. Jordan's mother said that she'd like to serve the dessert by the pool. Calbert said, Put on your sunscreen, Vernal. Jordan said, That way I won't fly away. Calbert said, What way? Tied to the fence with baling wire, Jordan said. And you'd better do it now.

While they ate, Jordan brought up the time his father caught him jacking off into a tube sock while he was watching Bewitched. His mother said now what she had said then. About Onan spilling his seed. And the thing which he did, displeased the Lord: wherefore He slew him also. Calbert said he couldn't remember what happened after he caught Jordan abusing himself, so Jordan reminded him. You took the TV cord off the old Motorola, plug and all, wet it, ran it through the sandbox, and put it in the freezer. Bringing back any memories, Dad? Then Mom filled a tub  with ice-cold water and had me sit in it. Then you had me stand naked in the kitchen; you took out the cord and whipped me with it. I've still got all the scars. Calbert said he wasn't proud, but it had to be done. You were committing an abominable sin, son. You were no better than a viper. And look how you've turned out. A success. A God-fearing, law-abiding man, a solid citizen, and a pillar of the community. You should thank me! Jordan poured his parents two glasses of sweet iced tea and proposed a toast to the discipline. Calbert said, You might want to try a little tough love with your own kids, Jordan. That grandson of mine has a sassy mouth on him.

Jordan talked while his parents dozed off. He'd dissolved six Ambien in their tea. He told them about how if you wanted to get away with killing anybody, you should kill them in a pool. Not that he was trying to get away with anything, you understand. Too late for that. Drowning is a diagnosis of exclusion, he said. It cannot be proven in an autopsy, cannot be disproved. 

Jordan explained to me how he had a crew in his office tearing up the place. So could we meet at your place? he said. That way he could take some measurements, note the color scheme, kill two birds with one stone. I gave him my address. That's over by the Fetish Box, isn't it? Yes, it is. Twenty minutes. 

Jordan pushed the office door open with his shoulder, and poked his grinning face into tge room. He held his iPhone to his ear, rolled his eyes, smiled at me, and told whomever he was speaking with or pretending to speak with that he'd get back to them with the figures ASAP. He scratched his nose. Okey-dokey. He nodded. Ciao!

He holstered his iPhone, clapped his hands, and stepped toward the desk where I sat. He said, "I pictured you bald, slight, with maybe a pitiful little mustache. Funny how a voice can fool you." He admired my autographed Marlins baseball, gripped it like he was pitching a curve. "Well, here we are, Mr. Wissai."

-Call me Roberto. All my friends do.
-I pegged you for a sociable guy.
-Except Carlos. He calls me Wisdom.
-And you call him the Jackal, I suppose.
-Have a seat, Mr. Delerian.

He pointed to the wall above the sofa. "We'll hang it there." He put his fists on his hips, swiveled and looked left, then right, looked at me, and shrugged. "No photos of the wife and the kiddies."
-No wife and kiddies, I'm afraid.
-Fag?
-Excuse me?
-Are you a faggot?
-That's an inappropriate question, Mr. Delerian.
-If you say so.
-But a revealing one.

He sat, crossed his legs, folded his hands behind his head, smiled, and I knew that he knew that I knew. "No kids." He clicked his tongue and shook his head. "Fruitless." He raised an eyebrow, stuck out his lower lip, and cocked his head. "No regrets, Wisdom?"
-Plenty.
He picked up the photo of Dad and me squinting into the sun at the News Cafe. "They fucked you up, didn't they?"
-Who?
-Your mom and dad.
-They did their best.
He smiled and aligned my Post-it note dispenser with my saucer of paper clips. Ordering his thoughts. He leaned back in his chair. I leaned back in mine.
He said, "I see what you're doing."
-You're a perceptive man
-Why didn't you call the cops?
-Who says I didn't?
-Your need makes you transparent. 
He steepled his fingers, brought them to his lips. "So what do we do now?"
-You tell me your story.
-And you process my behavior and feed it back to me.
-I listen.
-Why should I tell you my story?
-Why did you kill your family?
-Why not?
-Because it's barbaric, illegal, immoral..
-Insane?
-Did you think you'd get away with it?
-I already did, dipshit. 
He laughed. "They're dead." He put his face in his hands. "My parents had outlived their usefulness. They disgusted me. They smelled like rancid milk."
-How do you feel right now?
-Like I'm wasting my time. If you're looking for credible motivation, Wissai, you won't find it here.
-Every lie is a victory for you, isn't it?
-You want to make sense of this so badly, you'll believe anything I tell you so long as there's an element of horror and remorse. Am I right? You want the world to make sense, but it doesn't.
-It does if you bother.
-Most times nobody knows why they do anything.
-Most times they don't want to know.
-Don't you go to the movies? This is the twenty-first century, Roberto, the Age of Unreason. Kill someone in the morning; go to the theater at night. No reason, no resistance. Action is its own motivation. It's kind of funny if you think about it.

Delerian pulled a snub-nosed revolver out of a shoulder holster, said he bet I wasn't planning on this, and I told him he was right about that, and he told me he had nothing to lose, and I told him that I did. How on earth had I missed the signals? Had his lips narrowed while I blinked?  Did the pitch of his voice rise, not in deceit, but in anger? 

He said, "You know what's easy, Roberto? Lying to someone who wants to be lied to." He aimed the pistol at my heart and asked me if I was a religious man. I told him I was not. He said, "Too bad for you. You don't get saved."
-There's no salvation for you either, Delerian. Every child knows that this is our only life. Every pig knows it. Every snake. Just people like you who don't.
-People like me?
-People who feel the world has let them down, who can't imagine existence without their own presence.  Dishonest and essentially stupid people.
-The only honesty is a lie well acted.

I told him to put the gun down and let's talk. I said it like I was soothing a feisty dog.

Delerian picked up the Marlins baseball, lobbed it across the room, fired the pistol at it, and put a bullet through the window. "I suspect we don't have much time now." He pointed the gun at my face. I squeezed my eyes shut. I tried to breathe deeply to keep my heart from exploding out of my chest. I trembled and held onto my chair. I thought about my father waiting for me on Sunday, sitting with the cigarette-smoking attendants on the shady bench outside the Clover House lobby, tapping his foot, chewing his lip, trying to remember why the hell he was sitting there, and I understand without me around to fight for him, the health-care system would swallow him up, strap him to a bed in some some shadowy ward, and let him waste away. When they told him I was dead, would he know who they were talking about?

Delerian said, "Cat got your tongue?"
I thought if I could talk, maybe I could save my life, but in order to talk I'd have to think; only I couldn't think; I could only remember. I saw my brother Rolando and me, and we're six and shooting marbles with the neighborhood kids. One was cheating and grabbed Rolando's marbles and tried to run away and Rolando screaming "Roberto!" and I plunged forward, grabbed the thief by the waist and flung him down on the ground. 
 
Delerian said, "I called this game Meet Your Maker." He laughed. "Ten Mississippi,"' he said. "Nine..."
Rolando and I both clung to our mother. Dad was at work. Sister was at school. The neighborhood was on fire. We both cried. 
"Five Mississippi."

And I remember Mom and her temper and salty language. When she thought I was lying, she'd wash my mouth with soap and then put cayenne pepper in my mouth. Rolando called her The Beast. Rolando, who was my twin, who looked exactly like me, people said, but to me he was more handsome, who always knew how to make me laugh at the drop of a hat, who sadly fell into a life of drug addiction and robbed my parents blind, died in room 201 at the Pirate's Inn in Dania, beaten to death by his playmates with a studded mace and a stone war club. He was twenty-four.

I realized Delerian had stopped counting, and I waited and thought maybe I was dead already, that this dark stillness was life after life, that I'd been shot, that I'd been wrong about death too, and Willis had been right after all; there is no pain, no past, no present, no future, just the everything all at once, just a fleeting toward a resplendent and cleansing light, so I opened my eyes to see it, to let it wash over me, and I saw Delerian, who must have been waiting for this moment, with the muzzle of the gun in his mouth, saw him smile and wink. I reached for his arm, and he squeezed the trigger.


--------------------------------------------------------------------
 Afterword:

Most of the above words are taken from John Dufresne's The Timing of Unfelt Smiles. I added a few paragraphs here and there to spice things up, as if there wasn't enough spice and melodrama to choke up a horse. The story addresses a lot of issues that interest me:

1. Lying, acting, and the truth, including religious "truths" and assertions.
2. Child abuse and corporal punishment.
3. Meanings of life.
4. Violence.
5. Death.

The author might or might not quite have pulled it off in meshing all these themes into a cohesive, single, unitary message. But I felt he had a lot of perceptive observations. The conclusion was a bit predictable, though not unsatisfactory. I liked his minimalist style which was further enhanced by my condensing the narrative. In addition, I felt there was not a single false note in the story. To me, the author wrote it from the heart, trying to come to terms with the tension inside him. In real life, unfortunately, for the past two years there has seen a surge in false notes when certain people whom I happened to run into tried to rationalize their less than desirable personal traits as well as their political beliefs. I cannot help but compare myself with others in order to gauge where I stand. I hereby report in full recognition of the potential lack of objectivity, that the more people argue/debate with me, the more their dishonesty and propensity to strike false notes get more and more pronounced. I suppose in their zeal to prove their worth to the Other and to look for respect from the Other, certain individuals feel that they are always in the right even if hard evidence is brought to bear upon them, right in front of their eyes. Faced with presented evidence, the individuals turn a blind eye to them, and merrily continue their path of persistent disregard for truth and logic. Their attitude is very much like the adolescent  "reasoning ": "'I don't care what you say, I know I am right." They fall for the emotional trap that despite having no sense of honor nor a respect for truth and logic, they ironically crave for acceptance and respect from the Other. Ironically enough, instead earning respect, they earn mistrust and contempt. One cannot argue against facts. One can make assertions all day long, but if those assertions are not founded on facts and logic, they only invite contempt and dismay from the Other. And eventually the Other gives up reasoning with such individuals and walks away in complete contempt and silence. Silence is not necessarily synonymous with consent. It could be a realization of the futility of having a discussion with those who essentially have no respect for truth, for others, and even for themselves. The Vietnamese have a saying that it is fruitless to argue with those having an attitude of a garrulous old whore (ddi ~ gia mo^m). You can get a monkey out of the jungle, but you cannot get the jungle out of the monkey. Lack of self-respect has a myriad way to manifest itself, including an excessive chest-thumping of self-worth. A man who truly respects himself tends to be more quietly assertive and does respects facts and admits he is wrong if and when presented with evidence and reasoning to that effect. There is nothing wrong per se to admit one is erroneous in holding a certain view. It is the persistent clinging to an untenable view, despite all the contrary evidence, that tells the Other who one truly is and that deep down one suffers from feelings of insecurity and perhaps even self-contempt and hatred. Sadly, for those individuals afflicted with the malady, they fancy that they are "profound" and endowed with "original" thinking. 

Roberto Wissai