Eleven To Twenty

Eleven to Twenty

11. There are three ways, in my not so humble opinion, a human "knows" about "something": 

a. Being taught by his elders (parents and teachers), say, for example, the existence of a God that has power over him, and would punish or reward him in accordance to his behaviors.

b. Empirical facts and the principles of verification and duplication

c. Logic, reasoning, and common sense.

At the age of 11, I determined that there was no Personal God as told to me by my parents and "conventional wisdom". From that moment on, I have regarded myself as a special human, endowed with a metaphysical precocity, at least with regard to the existence of God, especially after I learned that not until they were 15, 16 years of age that Bertrand Russell, Ludwig Wittgenstein, and Friedrich Nietzsche arrived at the same conclusion as I did. I have a firm conviction that those who believe in God willingly practice a game of self-delusion. And that invites contempt and derision, unspoken mostly, from me. Man is the only animal that lies to himself. But not all humans do so. The ones who really respect themselves and take delight in facts and truths and knowledge and logic don't do so. 

12. Unlike Nietzsche who claimed that his blood flowed slowly, mine always races through my veins. I do everything quickly, including falling in love. I am a creature of contradictions. Inside me are warring opposites. I don't have integration. I vacillate from one extreme to the next. I don't forgive easily but I am always touched tremendously by acts of forgiveness. I never initiate attacks, but always counter-attack fiercely. I can take all valid criticisms, no matter how severe, but if the criticisms are laced with lies and dishonesty, the motherfuckers and bitches who make those criticisms had better look over their shoulders the rest of their fucking lives. I hate liars. It has been my observation that I often trigger the most stupid and extreme cases of self-projections from liars and losers. 

13. But perhaps I shouldn't be too hard on my inferiors--- the assholes and the scumbags. Perhaps I should adopt the attitude of Anais Nin, "What kills life is the absence of mystery." I would like to add that, besides mystery, life's meaning and flavor get deepened if there is an element of danger. Man is an animal, I would maintain, that does not like to live in peace for so long a period. He craves excitement, challenge, and danger. He thus loves conquests and wars. But unlike the human animals I detest, I first wage war on myself and then on everybody. I wage war on my body and my wallet. I feel alive when I put myself in danger. I want to know what I am really made of. I just re-read the headings of my posts of the last few months. They were all about musings about realities. I could be delusional but I have been trying to have peace with myself before I die. I have been slowly recognizing that I need to work on my temper, otherwise I feel I am superior in values and knowledge than most humans I have come into contact with. They are just into living like animals without developing qualities that set humans apart from subhumans. 

14. In Nietzsche's later works, Dionysus is no longer the spirit of unrestrained passion, but the symbol of the affirmation of life with all of its suffering and terror. "The tragic man affirms even the harshest suffering." One becomes what one is. We are bigger than the circumstances. We are more than just the sum of our experiences and choices. It's very easy to quit. Everybody can do that. It's much harder to say yes to life, no matter what happens to us. To do so, our lives must have a clear purpose and a deep meaning. Superficialities and frivolities are for hollow, straw men. I am not a hollow, straw man. I am water. I am fire. I am a solid rock. I have a clear vision of what my life is. It's no accident that I am an atheist, irresistible to smart, sensitive women, and excellent in debate. I read philosophy, literature, psychology, and just about anything that deals with humans and their make-up and conditions. On top of that, I make it fun to write and study languages. I am rare and I am arrogant. Very few humans impress me. Those who do are/were remarkably great and unusual whose outlook and conduct were something I need to emulate. They have/had a bigger heart or greater mind or commanding charisma. 

 

15. I used to digest and then contest, protest, and detest all the claims, reports, stories, myths, legends, reminiscences, yarns, and anecdotes about me. I don't do so anymore. I ration my precious resources. I don't have much time left on this planet. I am listening to my friend, the infamous assassin, Omar Sabat. He told me, "Roberto, mi querido amigo, just be true to yourself. Fuck public opinions. What are exactly public opinions anyway? Public is comprised mostly of folks that are uninformed, unintelligent, unkind, and unwise. So fuck the opinions these folks have. Shit, they believe in the "miracles" performed by an untutored, unlettered, uneducated, wandering, self-proclaimed prophet. They called him "Son of God" (sic!). Shit, they believe in the physical locales of heaven and hell. So, what they think about you don't mean shit because they already show they don't know how to think."

16. Okay, let's talk about love and sex and the complexities of the human heart.

First, everybody knows that sex is brush fire, quick and flashy and eventually petered out, until lightening strikes again. Love is a slow burn, an earthquake, and a tsunami of many interrelated factors. Love lasts much longer, sometimes a life time.

Second, love includes sex; that means sex cannot be more than a subset of love.

Third, having made clear the nature of sex (which is bigger than mere lust) and love, let me talk about the complexities of my human heart. After many, many ventures and adventures, incursions and excursions, into the arenas of love and sex, I have found out the following:

a) Women are sexually attracted to me, but only a few (2, maybe 3 so far) do truly love me. Love takes giving, sacrifice, understanding, and forgiveness. Love is tied with childhood memories and aspirations.

b) I am now interested in true loves, not a quick jump into the hay. I do love and care about my wife, but I still need to be loved by other women. I, however, am not looking for love anymore. I have become jaded,  cynical, and much wiser. Also, I am too busy to improve my body, my mind, and my wallet to dally around anymore. 

17. Now, read every word in the following article by David Brooks. The article's heading is Mental Virtues. Everything I have written, done, or said stemmed from the points raised in the article. Having a college degree does not necessarily mean one is intellectually honest or brave. I have met many college graduates who are intellectual weaklings or cowards. 

"We all know what makes for good character in soldiers. We’ve seen the movies about heroes who display courage, loyalty and coolness under fire. But what about somebody who sits in front of a keyboard all day? Is it possible to display and cultivate character if you are just an information age office jockey, alone with a memo or your computer?

Of course it is. Even if you are alone in your office, you are thinking. Thinking well under a barrage of information may be a different sort of moral challenge than fighting well under a hail of bullets, but it’s a character challenge nonetheless.

In their 2007 book, “Intellectual Virtues,” Robert C. Roberts of Baylor University and W. Jay Wood of Wheaton College list some of the cerebral virtues. We can all grade ourselves on how good we are at each of them.

First, there is love of learning. Some people are just more ardently curious than others, either by cultivation or by nature. 

Second, there is courage. The obvious form of intellectual courage is the willingness to hold unpopular views. But the subtler form is knowing how much risk to take in jumping to conclusions. The reckless thinker takes a few pieces of information and leaps to some faraway conspiracy theory. The perfectionist, on the other hand, is unwilling to put anything out there except under ideal conditions for fear that she could be wrong. Intellectual courage is self-regulation, Roberts and Wood argue, knowing when to be daring and when to be cautious. The philosopher Thomas Kuhn pointed out that scientists often simply ignore facts that don’t fit with their existing paradigms, but an intellectually courageous person is willing to look at things that are surprisingly hard to look at.

Third, there is firmness. You don’t want to be a person who surrenders his beliefs at the slightest whiff of opposition. On the other hand, you don’t want to hold dogmatically to a belief against all evidence. The median point between flaccidity and rigidity is the virtue of firmness. The firm believer can build a steady worldview on solid timbers but still delight in new information. She can gracefully adjust the strength of her conviction to the strength of the evidence. Firmness is a quality of mental agility. 

Fourth, there is humility, which is not letting your own desire for status get in the way of accuracy. The humble person fights against vanity and self-importance. He’s not writing those sentences people write to make themselves seem smart; he’s not thinking of himself much at all. The humble researcher doesn’t become arrogant toward his subject, assuming he has mastered it. Such a person is open to learning from anyone at any stage in life.

Fifth, there is autonomy. You don’t want to be a person who slavishly adopts whatever opinion your teacher or some author gives you. On the other hand, you don’t want to reject all guidance from people who know what they are talking about. Autonomy is the median of knowing when to bow to authority and when not to, when to follow a role model and when not to, when to adhere to tradition and when not to.

Finally, there is generosity. This virtue starts with the willingness to share knowledge and give others credit. But it also means hearing others as they would like to be heard, looking for what each person has to teach and not looking to triumphantly pounce upon their errors. 

We all probably excel at some of these virtues and are deficient in others. But I’m struck by how much of the mainstream literature on decision-making treats the mind as some disembodied organ that can be programed like a computer. 

In fact, the mind is embedded in human nature, and very often thinking well means pushing against the grain of our nature — against vanity, against laziness, against the desire for certainty, against the desire to avoid painful truths. Good thinking isn’t just adopting the right technique. It’s a moral enterprise and requires good character, the ability to go against our lesser impulses for the sake of our higher ones.

Montaigne once wrote that “We can be knowledgeable with other men’s knowledge, but we can’t be wise with other men’s wisdom.” That’s because wisdom isn’t a body of information. It’s the moral quality of knowing how to handle your own limitations. Warren Buffett made a similar point in his own sphere, “Investing is not a game where the guy with the 160 I.Q. beats the guy with the 130 I.Q. Once you have ordinary intelligence, what you need is the temperament to control the urges that get other people into trouble.” 

Character tests are pervasive even in modern everyday life. It’s possible to be heroic if you’re just sitting alone in your office. It just doesn’t make for a good movie. "

18. Lao-Tsu had a point about the paradox of Nature and Man. The most yielding and flexible are the strongest and the most durable. We don't know the character and true nature of a human until he is tested on money, sex, power, fame, and attitude about knowledge (honesty about his knowledge or plain insecurity).

Most humans are fearful of appearing stupid and ignorant. However, instead of using that fear to work on their mind and expand their knowledge, most human animals would just lie, pretend, and bullshit their ways through life. In trying to be knowledgeable when they open their mouths, they invite contempt from folks like me who are in the know. I don't know what's wrong with being honest and say, "sorry, I don't have a fucking clue about the topic/subject, so I can't really comment on that." Instead, the assholes and scumbags would open their mouths and start pontificating. The spectacle is so fucking absurd and ridiculous that it even becomes funny. I run into animals like that all the time. I lose respect for them right away and start looking at them like a pile of shit by the roadside just recently deposited by a roaming mongrel. A warning: any motherfucker who talks to me must be prepared to back up, support, and substantiate their comments and observations with facts and logic, otherwise I will lower my formidable knowledge and logic on him like a crushing, wrecking ball. Actually, I usually just walk away to the nearest toilet and take a leak or a dump. There's no point of correcting ignorant, stupid, unread assholes. If I had real power, I would line them up against the wall and shoot each motherfucker right between the eyes. I swear I would. They don't deserve to live at all. They just waste resources on this planet. This planet is for real humans who respect facts and logic, who are generous with money, gentle and caring during sex, who are not crazy about power or fame. This planet is for gentle, caring humans who have morals and patience to work for a better planet free of unnecessary contamination and exploitation. This planet is not for animals which shit where they sleep and eat. 

19. I keep saying over and over again that one must know his place in society, especially how he is viewed----rightly or wrongly---by others. After the two physically vertically challenged and intellectual midget bitches made gratuitous and false comments about me, I have been meditating on intelligence (really knowing oneself and others), silence as opposed to lashing out in anger and spite, nature of love (forgiveness, forbearance, not vengeance), and appearance and reality. If a person does not love you or stops loving you, you must confront a sad but plausible possibility that maybe deep down you are shit and are not worthy to be loved and cared for because nobody would walk away from something/someone that is good and precious. So instead of saying things that belittled the man who had just dumped you, you must rise to the occasion and use the event to better yourself. But the two bitches were too lazy and stupid to do that. That's why they are being stuck at being stupid, ignorant, and poor. They fall back on excuses and insults instead of hard work to better themselves. They don't the will power and the intellectual resources. 

I am not saying I was never spurned or dumped by women. I was, and very much so, especially in my stupid, lonely, salad days. But after each time I struck out, I tried to find out the reasons for my failure so I could learn from them. I wanted to grow. I didn't let failures define and constrict me. I used failures to enrich and to wise me up. Then one day I hit upon a formula of success, but I didn't forget my dried up, barren, awkward, clumsy years. I am now a cool, urbane, better-dressed, financially secure (no woman in her right mind would go out with a perceived financially unstable man), pleasant, witty man. No wonder women have flocked to me and found me a pleasant company. I just met a woman. We interacted for about an hour. But she let it known through two intermediaries that she likes me tremendously. Well, I like her, too, for she is a good, kind woman. But I am not chasing her. I love my wife and am mindful of my responsibilities. At my age, taking things lightly is what I must do. I am much more at peace with myself now. I don't need to jump into bed with a woman to prove my attractiveness. 

20. I recently read two posts by two women and I was struck how fragile the human mind was.  Then I read the comments on the posts of the two women. That set me think about human ignorance and frailty. In the end, salvation and help come from within. Yes, we need help, but we can still survive without help if we are strong and don't give up in our struggles, especially when they are non-physical in nature. Life is full of selfish, self-righteous, loud-mouthed, power-hungry assholes. I am proud to say that I didn't seek help from therapists or anybody. I saw from early on human cruelty and indifference. I helped myself by reading, thinking, and going to the gym. Nowadays, I could tell the level of a person's emotional strength and intellectual integrity by the way they handle money, view love, and deal with the issues of fame and power. 

The following is what my friend wrote about therapy. His words hit home with me. When one has a lot of aha moments, one gains self-confidence and one knows that ultimate salvation comes from within. Wisdom has a price. It varies with the individuals and the circumstances. Truth is the mountain top. There are many ways to get there.

"To look into the mystery of the next moment without fear is emotional courage. It is one of the most useful tools a person can possess. 

IMO  Self-improvement ultimately comes from within, just like happiness. It comes from that inner voice, but often a third party influence/avenue is needed to help that voice gain confidence.  Everyone has the capacity for this emotional confidence, but it is harder to call upon for some. 

Confidence = Self Trust

Self-discovery is the real learning we do in life and it is something we mostly attain in solitude. Someone does not hand you an "aha" moment.  It happens inside.  They can trigger it, but it is you that puts the pieces together.

Personally, I have chosen meditative self-coaching, for lack of a better description. The most magnificent "aha" moments for me have come in moments of the purest stillness.  I do seek out and absorb tons of outside material, but I generally rely on my own self-reflection regarding any topic. 

 "Aha" moments don't approach you from some particular place or direction. They sort of envelope you in what feels like a warm ball of comfort. It is almost like it was there all along and you finally noticed it. It didn't come from outside.  The best way to understand it, is trying it!  But, I will warn you that it is a lot like poker. Meditation is long periods of nothing happening, sprinkled with moments of pure rush.

I personally, like the idea of all the ants trying everything in the forest and reporting back to head-quarters. Perhaps that is what is really going on at a grander level we cannot understand.

Oh yes... the poker part so I don't have to put a silly OT in the subject line. :) 

Confidence makes you a better poker player and it is OK to fake it, until you can make it.

The warrior that survives, carrying the many scars from battle, will exude the greatest of confidences."

Ecce Homo---Modern Version

ECCE HOMO-MODERN VERSION

"Preamble and Introduction"

I would maintain and argue that Man is the only animal on this planet which cares about the meaning of life. Other organisms would just struggle to eat, sleep, mate, get sick or eaten, and then die. They make no impact and leave no legacy; they simply and inexorably follow biological imperatives. I would also maintain and argue that most humans live just like that, yet because consciousness of the existence of higher values (truth, beauty, ethics, altruism, self-actualization) is inherent in being human, these human animals are self-conflicted. They are too animalistic to attain higher values, and yet are not impervious to them. In order to achieve a semblance of psychic balance so they would not experience undue anxiety and persistent unhappiness, they resort to playing a game of delusions and self-delusions: they believe in a Personal God Who would "save" them and guarantee them a place in "Heaven" or at least a reincarnation; they think they are "good", "normal", "reasonably intelligent', and full of "common sense", despite all the facts and evidence to the contrary. In other words, they live a life of a lie. So when they encounter a human being like me, they are in for a shock. Let me tell you something that is dear and near to my heart: if I had power, I would not hesitate to exterminate all of these human animals for I view them a disgrace to the human race and an impediment to human progress. 

If anybody who deserved to claim a possession of common sense, that would be Confucius. If the human animals live a life as recommended by Confucius, they would be okay. At the very least, they must adopt a bedrock principle: be as you are, don't pretend who you are not. They must know their true place in life. They must know where they are, where they stand in relation to others.

I've been accused of being "crazy" or  "mentally sick", but I know I am just "different" and "uncompromising". I also know I am not "gifted" and "clever" like the rare humans for whom I have a lot of respect, but I am convinced that the difference between those geniuses and me lies in the degrees, not in kind. The more I know about music, math, languages, and poetry, the more I am convinced of my place in the hierarchy of human brain power. 

Nói lớn lên, đừng thì thầm bẽn lẽn
Nói yêu anh khi đêm vẫn còn đen
Trăng còn sáng nên không cần mị mộng
Nói yêu anh để vơi nhớ chờ trông

Khi yêu nhau hai ta cùng sáng tạo
Để đời không chỉ là giấc chiêm bao
Ta sống nhau trong cuộc đời trong sáng
Và giã từ một thuở kiếp đi hoang

Wissai
August 23, 2014

TÂM THỨC NẮNG

em chợt đến trời nghiêng lòng đất ngả
gió bỗng ngưng khi hơi thở em xa
hồn siêu thực chỉ là tâm thức nắng
gọi tên em để lưu luyến ngàn năm

con đường dài hoàng hôn chưa kịp tối
những đêm sâu đợi sáng cũng chưa vơi
mùa hoa tới mà ngọn ngành trơ trụi
và dòng sông còn cách quãng ngậm ngùi

tiềm thức vực hiền nhân bên đắm đuối
cả đam mê vạt cỏ úa rừng xuôi
ngọn đồi vắng chỉ dấu chân muông dại
tìm nhau thân giữa tuyết trắng hoàng mai

em ở lại để ta về đất hẹn 
nối tình thương vào mảnh biếc hom hem
không đau nữa và không hề tiếc nghẹn
khi lòng ta đã tràn ngập hồn em

Lưu Nguyễn Đạt

SOUL OF SUNSHINE 

When you suddenly appeared, heaven and earth shook
Winds ceased blowing when your breathing faded away
Surrealism is another game for this sunshine of mine
Calling for your name in thousands of years

Sunset has not yet arrived in this long lonely road
Unrelieved sleepless nights that await the sun 
Flowering season is here, but all flora barren 
The separating river still have sighs of tears 

I'm sinking in the abyss of my subconscious 
Drowning in the jungle of withered weeds that flow
The barren hills still bear traces of my footsteps
I'm now looking for you in the vast expanse of white snow

You stayed behind while I'm heading to the promised land 
Linking my love with a body that is worn and gaunt
I'm no longer in pain and choked up in regrets
When my heart still overflows with memories of your soul 

Loose and quickie translation
August 22, 2014
Wissai

TẠO 
SÁNG

nhạc day dứt cho tình yêu tạo sáng
màu sắc khơi trên vạt nắng vừa tan 
tiếng nói khác mà sao như quen thuộc 
hoa héo thơm tận ngây ngất ngàn hoang

từ vô hạn nẩy mầm bao đọt sống 
ngửa tay nâng cả mộng ước hư không 
nhặt sỏi đá giữa biển khô muối mặn
xé mây khuya nhóm lửa đốt mênh mông

ta khao khát quay về nguồn sáng tạo 
đường thật xa chỉ hồi nhớ vọng dao
em đâu đó mùa đông nay tới muộn
lạnh dòng sông và lạnh cả hồn sao

Lưu Nguyễn Đạt

ÉTINCELLE 
DE VIE

ta musique s’illumine d’amour 
à l’instant où le soleil disparaît
telle une image autre et pourtant familière
une fleur agonise dans son propre parfum

de l’infini sans fond une étincelle de vie 
soulève le rêve du néant entier
et le grain de sable dans l’océan desséché
perce le ciel pour allumer l’espace immense

mon retour passionné à la source d’inspiration
prendra le long parcours de la mémoire à peine vivace
tu arrives tard mon amour dans le coeur de l’hiver
glaçant la rivière nocturne et l’étoile éphémère

Luu Nguyen Dat

CREATIVITY OR LIGHT OF LIFE 

Music lingers on so love can shine
Colors explode on the disappearing light
Different voice but sounds familiar
Flowers fading yet fragrance stays forever in the wild

From infinity born countless waves of life
Sustaining dreams and dreams of nothing
Giving rise to pebbles in drying salty seas
Tearing apart night clouds to light up the sky

I'm coming back to the passion of creation
Along the endless road of recollections
Winter comes late to where you arrive
The river is cold and so is the soul of stars

Quickie Translation by 
Wissai
August 23, 2014

Now, my friends, especially the Vietnamese-Americans ones, ask yourself a question and answer it truthfully: After wading through my words thus far, can you write and or translate as I do? 

Now, let me "share" with you (more of this will come later in greater detail) my conception of certain "realities" and "notions" and "facts":

1. There is no Personal God. Those who believe so are stupid or emotionally and intellectually childish.
2. Polygamy is good and healthy for the genetic pool.
3. Current criminalization of prostitution and marijuana while booze and nicotine are freely available to adults are stupid. Sex cannot be bad, even excessive sex. Actually, there is no such thing as excessive sex. Unlike food, booze, nicotine, and drugs, you cannot overdose on sex, especially if you are a male.
4. Love is a game, like all human activities.
5. Power is everywhere, and not just in politics. It's in love, sex, religion, and all human relationships. To live is to deal with power. 
6. Hate solves very little, if any. In fact, it adds to the problem. Love is stronger than Hate, but harder to cultivate. 
7. Arrogance is annoying, but it's more "beautiful" than false and phony modesty. "All" thinkers and artists are arrogant, some are just more overt than others. You can always learn from others, but you are allowed to have feelings of arrogance. These feelings spur you on, keep you hard at work, otherwise you will fall behind and become a joke. Don't be shackled by conventions, by social sanctions. Be free. Yes, you can have feelings of lust, too. Just, be careful and don't hurt your loved ones and your wallet in the process. Be free, but be responsible at the same time. Life is a balancing act. 

Main Text

Main Text

First, I want---yes, really want---to solemnly declare that a person's essence is laid bare by what and how he writes. Writing is the last and highest skill in language acquisition. Most of what my "peers" write are stupid, childish, uninformed, and poorly reasoned. They make me laugh at their stupidity and ignorance; they make me feel much better about myself. I wonder how they can be that stupid and ignorant in the first place. You see, if a person has nothing striking or good to say, he must keep his mouth shut. Opening his mouth and pontificating about things he dies not have a fucking idea just reveals that the ignoramus is empty-headed but loves to make noise. Maybe you're thinking the same way about me, but frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn and a fuck of what you think about me. You should know that by now.

Now, having got off my chest about the quality of the "writings" of my "peers", I'm disclosing that from here on, the rest of this "book" is a shameless plagiaristic take-off, "inspiration", and "improvement" of the "Ecce Homo" of my long-dead twin brother. Many coincidences in here and there are deliberate. Writing this "book" is going to be fun in the sun and therapeutic. It surely beats picking up the gun and blowing the heads of many assholes and scumbags on my black list. 

1. I am no mere man. I am a phenomenon and a destiny of my own creation. 

2. My words are spoken from the highest mountains of solitude. Reading them requires a strong constitution, otherwise you will get pneumonia and die.

3. I am tired of hearing that there is no single truth. It's a hackneyed cliché. Truth is One, but it's the mountain top. There are several paths to get there. Now, isn't that a better way of expressing about "Truth"?  I'm telling you, a person's level of thinking can always be seen by how he expresses himself. 

4. Do not read me too quickly, otherwise you would mistake me for somebody else. 

5. Ask yourself, are you really like me? How much truth can you endure? How much truth can you dare? In other words, are you intellectually brave?

6. My words sound like preachings, but they are not because no faith is required. You can stop reading them at any time. You can run away from them and I am not in the least offended. I write for myself, rather than for you. There is an organic growth in my words, my thinking. They all reflect a struggle, a wrestle with a perennial concern: to find meaning of life, to look for reasons to live and not to kill myself. I don't mind at all you turn against me, disagree with me, as long as the reasons you put up are sound.

7. My father died when I was 19, of cancer. He was a flawed saint. He wanted to kill himself when he was in his 20's. He didn't share that awful and awe-inspiring wish with me. He shared it with my brother who is 12 years my senior, who in turn out of the blue told me that when I was 44. Assholes and scumbags like to pontificate that suicide is an act of weak will. I beg to differ. It's a momentous decision, much more important than believing in God or falling in love. Yes, it has a lot to do with depression which triggers a lot of unhealthy thoughts. When you are in a depression, you feel like you are sucked into a a downward spiral and vortex of pain and misery. The therapy involves a lot of physical exercises and actions that put you in mortal physical danger. Most ISIS fighters are depressives. Yes, I am a doctor of depressions and other ailments of the mind. If you are never depressed, you would not know what depression is like, and you would pontificate glibly and smugly about it. But all you do is to show that you are an ignorant asshole. 

8. Everyday now, I am struggling to learn Chinese and German. It is an act of will and ego and pride and a journey into how the human mind copes with patterns and memory, and a fight against brain entropy. 

9. You cannot live if you are not proud of who you are, of your worth, of your place in this world.

10. A lot of women like to go to bed with me. My defense is telling them that I am a lousy lay. All I want to do is to talk, not to fuck. Talking is more fun to me. Humans talk. Animals fuck. But they all say to me that hearing me talk makes them horny like hell, "so why don't we take off our clothes and jump into the hay". 

I routinely reply, "Yes, we may, but please be prepared to accept my view that a naked human body should be a work of art and a thing of beauty. If I cannot perform well in bed, you must have yourself to blame. So are you sure you want to go through with that?". Most of the time, the women just back off and say, "Roberto, you're a strange bird. You just made my desire disappear." Those who are willing to take a risk, however, have a night "to remember".

Life's Meaning

Life's Meaning

I would maintain and argue that Man is the only animal on this planet which cares about the meaning of life. Other organisms would just struggle to eat, sleep, mate, get sick or eaten, and then die. They make no impact and leave no legacy; they simply and inexorably follow biological imperatives. I would also maintain and argue that most humans live just like that, yet because consciousness of the existence of higher values (truth, beauty, ethics, altruism, self-actualization) is inherent in being human, these human animals are self-conflicted. They are too animalistic to attain higher values, and yet are not impervious to them. In order to achieve a semblance of psychic balance so they would not experience undue anxiety and persistent unhappiness, they resort to playing a game of delusions and self-delusions: they believe in a Personal God Who would "save" them and guarantee them a place in "Heaven" or at least a reincarnation; they think they are "good", "normal",  "reasonably intelligent', and full of "common sense", despite all the facts and evidence to the contrary. In other words, they live a life of a lie. So when they encounter a human being like me, they are in for a shock. Let me tell you something that is dear and near to my heart: if I had power, I would not hesitate to exterminate all of these human animals for I view them a disgrace to the human race and an impediment to human progress. 

If anybody who deserved to claim a possession of common sense, that would be Confucius. If the human animals live a life as recommended by Confucius, they would be okay. At the very least, they must adopt a bedrock principle: be as you are, don't pretend who you are not. 

I've been accused of being "crazy" or  "mentally sick", but I know I am just "different" and "uncompromising". I also know I am not "gifted" and "clever" as the rare humans for whom I have a lot of respect, but I am convinced that the difference between those geniuses and me lies in the degrees, not in kind. The more I know about music, math, languages, and poetry, the more I am convinced of my place in the hierarchy of human brain power. 

What's Life

What's Life?

A friend asked me about the death of a photo journalist who was beheaded by the ISIS. Here was my answer. It had little to do with the initial inquiry. As usual, I went off the tangent.

Life is not how long you live it but how intensely you savor it. Many human animals long for death's arrival so they can be relieved of boredom and misery. Don't feel sorry for the photojournalist. His death was not in vain. It would hasten the demise of ISIS. 

I have lived life to the fullest that I know how, to the utmost of my abilities. I have stared into the abyss of life and I have not yielded to the temptation to jump. I have known poverty, wealth, frontiers-bursting sex, good food, exotic love, kindness, evil, and the highs of literature and knowledge. And I know I am superior to most humans that I have met, for I have emotional and intellectual honesty and courage. Unlike them, I never pretend who I am not. Unlike them, I don't hanker after fame or power. If anything, I want to master myself, to drive me to greater heights. Each day, for me, must be greater than the day before because I have gained experience. My life is a sum of my experiences and choices. 

Case Studies of Ignorance and Stupidities

Many human animals are stupid and ignorant and emotionally and intellectually cowardly.  They cannot accept facts. They lie to themselves to make them feel good. They assassinate character of others so they can feel that they are not inferior. All these motherfuckers and scumbags deserve to be exterminated because they are just filthy human animals. They cannot reason. They are fearful of facts and truths. I look at them and feel sick for they are repulsive in character and thus in appearance. Let's examine some animals. 

1. Take a motherfucker who is ignorant but competitive as hell. He can't write worth a damn in English despite living in an English-speaking environment for over 45 years. All that have come out of his pen are "recollections" and jejune "essays" about this and that. Tragedies have befallen his family, but the asshole has not noticed of the "divine" interventions and punishments despite being a converted "Christian". I am getting "on my knees" every night "praying" to my "God" who is a personal friend of mine that more calamities will happen to him, like his dick will shrivel and eventually fall off or his asshole will get plugged up. I view him no more than an ugly, stupid, ignorant, loud-mouthed animal. If an event like a meteorite hitting his house in the middle of the night, I will go out celebrating in a bar and laughing my head off. "God" just spoke to me last night and assured me He is orchestrating such an event and He told me to have patience, as such a phenomenon takes "fine calibrations and those things take time." But I told him, "Dude, aren't Thou "God" and omnipotent? Surely, Thou can speed things up." "No", He said, "concepts like omniscience and omnipotence are just what theologians and snake-oil salesman feed the stupid masses. I just set a motion in process and hopefully things work our right as I think they will." 

-"But dude, I am not getting any younger. I can't wait too long."

-"Sorry, but that's all you can do. Meanwhile, if you really want to hasten things up, you can do them yourself by looking up in the Net or asking ISIS personnel for help."

-"Nah, ISIS jihadists are too extreme to my taste. Thou art no help either. All Thou did was to tell me to have patience and wait. I'm really disappointed in Thee."

Apparently "God" was pissed off at my whining, because the special line of communication suddenly went dead. 

2. There was a bitch midget who fancied that she was a lady and could have married into high places if she got lucky. She didn't know that no man in his right mind would hang around her for long because she was cheap, ignorant, stupid, and delusional. I didn't. After I took off, she called me up and swore and cursed at me, telling that she would ask "God" to punish me and my son. Of course, she didn't know "God" was a personal friend of mine and He would not betray me. How did I know that? Because "God" called me up and told me so. Meanwhile, "God" assured me that He would do everything in his power to keep her short, stupid, ignorant, and unhappy.

(To be continued) 

Indifference and Self-Restraint and Cynicism

Indifference and Self-Restraint and Cynicism

The heading of this Sunday's musing captured my current outlook on and attitude towards the human animals. Yesterday, a young woman with the most shapely legs I have ever seen walked in front of me. Ordinarily, I would come to her and pay her the compliment (more than three years ago, in the summer of 2011, I wrote a pretty poem and a mini short story about similar encounter, in English of course), but I restrained myself. I took a turn and walked away from her and felt liberated. We open ourselves to the world, but we selectively take in what the world offers. For a few minutes, I took in the aesthetic beauty of her legs, but then I decided that a few minutes were enough. To dwell further on the beauty of her legs was a form of undue attachment. It's not wise to form lasting attachments to transitoriness. Beauty is transitory. Love is not; neither is kindness. 

Not too long ago, I wrote the following to a friend: "Life is a sum of experiences and choices. From what I've been through, I would say you were very lucky that he paid you back. Run, don't walk, away from him. Please don't play poker in home  games. If you have an itch, spend a weekend at a casino. But you're an adult. Do whatever you want to do. I gave you a piece of advice because I cared. I just don't want you to get hurt as I did. Remember, unless one's life depends on it, a self-respecting person must not borrow money or beg for hand-outs. One must not lower oneself in the eyes of others. I think it is dishonorable to borrow money for gambling. To lend money for such an enterprise is a sign of weakness, an inability to say no. In life, one must give a firm No answer when the situation warrants it." Yes, I am getting harder and more cynical. The assholes in this world have made me to adapt and become wiser. Human animals are the creatures deserving to be killed and exterminated so only the good and kind humans are left. Now you know why extremists behave the way they do and why the good folks have no choice but to band together in defeating them. From my unlearned, layman's view about evolution of life, at least on this planet anyway, life is a struggle/fight/development/evolvement from chaos to order, simplicity to complexity, malignancy to goodness. Along the way there are occasional interruptions/reversals, but the direction appears to be the one-way street. Of course, logic dictates that the linear development is not tenable. At some point, complete breakdown occurs and the process starts all over again, from the "beginning" of simplicity. That is, from "singularity" to complexity and back to "singularity" again. But that prospect  is so far away that I don't really worry about it. There's nothing I can do to slow down or speed up the process. My pressing and present prerogative is to deal with the human animals which lurk in bushes or hide behind phony smiles. 

(To be continued)

Life, Death, Honor and Suicide

PLife, Death, Honor and Suicide

Friday night. What's the fuck you're spending your time on? On yourself? To feel sorry for yourself? To stuff yourself with food or to numb your "mind " with booze? To pass the time in front of a TV or a cheap romance novel or a "friend" to gossip? Or to seriously improve your body and your mind? Or are you the type that would go to a club to get some guy or chick to have a mindless fuck later? Or you would do something to improve your neighborhood, the society, and the world? Are you living for yourself or others? 

Have you thought life is so boring and meaningless that you want to kill yourself, but you don't have the guts to do so? So from day to day time hangs heavy on you. Late at night and the damned dog next door barks again and you want to poison the stupid animal? 

For many human animals, life is a burden, that's why they say and do stupid things just to feel alive. 

I know I am different from and superior to most humans on this planet. Everyday I do things to improve my body, my mind, and my finance. 

It has been my observation that the more stupid, ignorant, and unaccomplished a person, the more likely he would say or do the most ridiculous things just to make himself feel smart or important. Frankly, I am tired of dealing with animals like that. Now I understand why cruelties and atrocities occur. Most humans are just so fucked up that they don't deserve to live. Things would be better if they would keep their fucking mouths shut and their "opinions" to themselves. 

If you want to see how fucked up humans are, spend a week in Vegas. If you want to see how precious life is, spend 5 minutes in a war zone or an emergency operating room in a hospital. Life is what you make of it. It has no meaning by itself. It's just there. It's a process of which you are a tiny, insignificant part and over which you have no control. What you can do is to cultivate a Buddhist cum Samurai spirit: go with the flow, doing your best, hoping for the best and accepting the worst outcome while fearlessly facing life and taking whatever it throws at you. A man's character shows in how he deals with the circumstances because he knows his life is the sum of his experiences and choices. Having pontificated all the above shit, it all boils down to a simple fact that you must find within yourself a reason to get up in the morning and face life. You must have a purpose to live. You must have something to look forward to every single day. A bitch recently called me "dense" and "a failure". That led me to a thorough soul searching to see if the bitch's characterization of me rested on firm, sound, irrefutable facts and evidence or it was based on a case of self-projection because the bitch herself was a complete nobody. In the process of evaluating my life, I took note of the following:

-4 university degrees (could have been 6, but that was another story. That is why I am having a restless intellectual program of mind-improvement).

-IQ of 135.

-3 wives and 19 girlfriends (could have 28 if I did not get tired of women's bullshit). Right now I could easily go to bed with at least 4 women, other than my wife, if I want to.

-financially comfortable.

-conversant in 4 languages, familiar with 4 more.

-write poems, stories, and essays in English, an acquired, non-native language. My English is better than that of at least 90% of the native speakers of the language.

-well-read and well-reasoning and excellent at debate.

-sexy, virile, and youthful-looking despite being 65 years of age.

So I suppose the facts about me speak plenty about whether I am "dense" and "a failure". I walk tall and view most humans with pity and disdain because I know I am superior to them. In fact, nowadays I don't open my heart and soul to humans anymore because they are too stupid and insensitive and ignorant to understand a phenomenon like me. However, I do make everyday small talk in order to blend in and to measure how wise or stupid a person is. Let me tell you something: the more stupid and ignorant the person is, the more he tries to cover up his deficiencies. Very few are comfortable with who they are, warts and all, like I am.

When I disclosed that there were many women in my life, stupid and jilted bitches issued vituperations of me, saying that I was a womanizer. Little did they know I was a hopelessly romantic fellow in search of true love. I could tell you this with a straight face: out of that many women, one loved me for sure, maybe two others did as well; the rest were just cheap, conniving bitches. Now any bitch comes near me and hints about the needs for money, I run like hell from them. I am not stupid anymore. And I don't give a shit if they threaten to kill themselves over me. I wouldn't be fooled again. I am not that lovable or important. At my age, love is a four-letter word.  I have seen so many of my friends and acquaintances get sucked into the vortex and trap of pussyland. They are adamant they are in love and their love objects love them back. I told them, "Guys, haven't you heard of nothing is sadder and more pathetic than being an old fool? Have you ever asked yourself that the young woman you're shacking up with or, heavens forbid, married to, would she be with you if you have no money? Be real, my friends. Be a bit cynical. Your wallet will thank you." Shit, even my flesh and blood, my closest kinsmen, are selfish. I cared about them and helped them plenty when they needed help, but they all left me dry and high by myself when it was my turn to need help. Fuck, this world is a cruel one. I am no longer surprised by human cruelty and callousness. I am the loneliest man alive, but I am okay now. I used to be naive, but nothing and nobody is fazing me nowadays. A kind, caring, loving, trustworthy woman is hard to find. Still, I know what love really is. I am not a greedy man. When I die, I won't feel lonely because I have experienced at one time or another, there is a woman who loves me as I am, warts and all. It takes maturity to really love somebody. However, when I was young and green, I really loved two girls, but they thought I was too childish and too unaccomplished for their taste. It took me a long time to be okay with their perceptions of me. Thanks to them and their perceptions and treatments of me, I have learned to be all I can be. I am not like a man they wanted me to be. I just wanted to be the man I could be. 

So, my friends, time is getting short, we have to be ready to die at any time, to let go of all attachments, and close our eyes for good, and realize life is truly a dream. It's our job to make it a beautiful dream, and not a long nightmare. When I recall some stupid, self-righteous assholes said that I was childish, I have a sardonic and bemused smile on my face. A true adult would not have that remark straight to anybody's face. Silence, instead of unnecessary contempt, is a much wiser choice. Silence is strength. To call somebody childish is to rape and rob that person of respect and dignity, and to incur unnecessary and lasting enmity. A true adult would never do that. In fact, to do so is a case of self-projection. To disrespect people is to seek self-destruction. To call somebody childish is to commit a grave insult on the same level of calling him a stupid failure or a mother-fucking asshole. Words reflect the level of emotional, social, intellectual development of the speaker. 

(To be continued) 

Hate Must Be Personal

Hate Must Be Personal 

My abiding and principal principles in life are few and simple: facts, logic, and justice (punishment cannot exceed the crime). From these principles, it's "natural" that I dislike liars, stupid and ignorant assholes talking and acting as if they were smart and knowledgeable, and greedy, envious scumbags who have no sense of proportion and justice. I dislike these human animals but do not necessarily hate them unless and until they do me harm, I don't really care if they are psychopaths and sociopaths as long as they don't touch me. I tolerate imperfections as long as my well-being is not affected. 

That's why I think the intolerance and genocidal tendencies of the ISIS are not acceptable and must be dealt with in a decisive manner. Hate must be personal, not ideological. I look at those who believe in a Personal God, Judgment Day, reincarnations, miracles (the kinds involving converting water to wine, making the crippled walk, walking on water, rising to "heaven" and sitting on the right side of "God" the Father [or was it the Godfather?] after being nailed on the cross alongside two thieves on the hills of Golgotha)  and similar shit, with amusement, bemusement, and barely disguised contempt, but I don't hate them. I only hate them if they try to do me harm. I think one must be fucked up in the head to believe in such nonsense. One must have no sense of self-respect or confidence in the powers of his brain and he thus decided to abdicate his common sense and logic that is inherent in any functioning human. When some human tells me with a straight face that he is a literal (as opposed to metaphorical) believer in all the shit mentioned above, I look at him and see not a human being in front of me but a stupid, fucked-up subhuman. Subhumans like them have made me feel good about myself. 

Let's face the facts and apply logic to them, shall we? The guy called Jesus of Nazareth was at best a delusional rabble rouser who couldn't even save himself, how then he could save anybody? He died because of his brave but stupid political acts. He didn't die for anybody's sins. And he was no Son of God, born of a virgin. Don't believe in any nonsense theologians told you. They all have an agenda. At least Siddartha and Muhammad had the decency of not claiming any divinity. Christianity, as a religion, is full of nonsensical claims of which only fools and simpletons would believe. 

Thus Spoke Wissai

August 14, 2014

The Dark Side of Laughter

The Dark Side of Laughter

Maybe you already guessed it. I tried to put on a nonchalant, insouciant front upon receiving the news of Robin Willians' demise at his own hands, but the fact remains I have been very much affected by his death. I admired him. I read a lot of myself into him, just as I have been doing with Nietzsche. To live is to find ways not to die. I read Nietzsche the same way as I read Camus, Sartre, and several others: to find strength; to learn; to seek self-acceptance. Camus began "The Myth of Sisyphus" with a declaration that there is only one philosophical question, and that's suicide. To Camus, whether there is a God or not is not important. That's an idle speculation. Death by suicide is not an idle speculation. It is a way to say No to Life. 

As humans, we must learn to say No to scumbags and assholes end hypocrites and dumb asses, but we must always say Yes to Life. We must learn to like and love ourselves, thinking and really believing that we are worthwhile and lovable. I just sang out loud various songs in three languages. I sang out loud, with abandonment and unrestraint, with joy and freedom. I liked my own voice. The lyrics and the melodies were good. Outside the thermometer on the porch showed the temperature not in the 100s as it would usually be. Trees are swaying with the wind. Last night much needed rain arrived in town. I felt alive and blessed and good. Life is worth living. To be able to have that attitude about life, one must be a bit arrogant, cocksure, combative, truculent, optimistic, and resilient. I wonder how many of us would put our lives on the line, to skate to near the mouth of the abyss, and took a look into the abyss and feel its reckoning, but are strong enough not to jump? How many of us would act like a financial warrior by putting large sums of money at risk and feel the surge of the excitement caused the adrenaline? To know the meaning of life, one must taste death by going to war, over oneself, with neighbors and the world. To play safe with life is to experience boredom, cowardice, and a slow death. We all die anyway. At my age, ten or twenty more years on this planet make very little difference to me. What counts is everyday could be my last day on earth. Having that kind of attitude makes my getting up in the morning when dawn breaks a thrilling experience, food taste better, humor ready and laughter irresistible, love an unforgettable experience, and sex a true adventure. 

It's hard for me to fake humility and modesty when I have to interact with animals who are much dumber and less informed about the world than I am. I just cannot stand idiots who believe in a Personal God, watch Fox News religiously, are poorly read and are plainly incurious about the affairs of the world, and yet they gamely put on a show of being knowledgeable and logical. Many humans are no better than barnyard animals. And their leaders regard them as such. To be weak is to invite attack. To be stupid and uneducated is to be easily enslaved. I am positively, absolutely sure that none of them could ever express themselves in writing as I did in this mini-essay and elsewhere. Their stupidity is shown in their incoherence and jejune, juvenile way of "thinking" and "reasoning". They totally lack self-awareness and self-honesty.

Suicide

Robin Williams and Frederick Nietzsche and Roberto Wissai

Writing the way as I've been doing prevents me from doing what Robin Williams just did to himself. If you start thinking of taking your own life, get a dog, adopt an orphan, or volunteer to help war refugees. Do whatever to bring peace to your tortured soul. But don't ever, ever think of killing yourself. Nietzsche didn't do it even though he had to live with pains for decades  brought on by syphilis. He eventually went mad because of the disease. He couldn't read or write anymore though occasionally he poignantly remarked to whoever who would listen that he did write books. Maybe the sufferings helped him have so many insights about humans. Freud himself said he learned a lot from Nietzsche. So did so many others. Only a stupid and ignorant pontificator chided me for admiring Nietzsche when he didn't know a thing about N. He pontificated that I must blaze my own path! He obviously didn't know that in thinking and the arts, influences are galore. Very rarely does any thinker or artist do anything in a vacuum. The whole human enterprises and cultural and scientific advances are built on what went before. I lost all respect for the pathetic pontificator because of his sheer ignorance and yet he loved to pontificate on just about anything. In terms of book knowledge, he is a twit and a nitwit and is not fit to hold my sandals and something else while I take a leak. 

Nietzsche had several penetrating remarks about suicide:

1. The thought of suicide has helped many pass through difficult nights.
2. If you could think of the why, you would come up with the how.
3. If you look into the abyss long enough, the abyss will look back at you.

In case you don't know about it yet, there is a gene in the brain that's directly connected with stress. If the stress is overwhelming, and the gene does not function well, the thought of suicide becomes a torturous obsession. And only suicide would bring the sufferer peace. That's why certain drugs have warnings that if thoughts of suicide arise as a consequence of taking the drugs, the patients must stop using the drugs at once and consult a doctor. Suicide has nothing to do with weak will, but everything with gene and stress. 

I know the subject and issue of suicide very well. It runs in the family (Hemingway and Wittgenstein, for example)  which is another proof that it is gene related. Most of the shock troops of ISIS have death wish and suicidal tendencies, making them fierce fighters. That's my own unsupported hypothesis. I dare not conduct a field research. I am not brave enough. 

If I am not mistaken, only Man knowingly embraces suicide. Mass drownings or falling off the cliff by lemmings or beachings by whales are a consequence of neurological disorders, not a conscious act of choice. But you could argue that when we conclude gene and severe stress are  responsible for human acts of suicide, then there must also be neurological disorder involved, and not an act of choice. But then I could argue back what about high risk behaviors like sky diving, cliff diving, bare hands rock climbing, race car driving, binge drinking, and drug taking, they cannot be all related to stress and gene. Aren't these conscious acts of choice and death wish behaviors?

By the way, contrary to what the suicide takers think, family members and close friends may grieve over your death for a while (months at most), but they will go on living as if nothing happened. Life is for the living, not the dead. It's stupid to commit suicide in order to punish the loved ones. Remember, the life you save must be your own. Nobody else would value your life as much as you do. That is a fact of life, and death. Nobody says living is easy, but then it takes wisdom to make it fun and worthwhile. It takes all of my 65 years of going through pain to arrive at these insights all by myself. Likewise, it takes wisdom and an understanding of ethology to realize that polygamy is good for society. That's why it has been practiced, sometimes openly, sometimes covertly for tens of thousands of years, if not longer. There are sound economic and biological reasons why human females are attracted to men of power and money (power and money tend to go hand in hand), just like in some mammal groupings (lions, wolves), dominant males have exclusive mating rights. Subordinate males would have to do so on the sly, otherwise they would risk severe punishments. Those humans who decry against the practice of polygamy in the name of equal rights and feminism are just plainly ignorant and don't know they are ignorant. 

Thus Spoke Wissai

Thoughts on War, Refugees, PTSD, and Human Animals

Thoughts on War, Refugees, PTSD, and Human Animals

The news coming out of Syria and now Iraq is causing me having sleepless nights. The ferocious barbarity of the ISIS jihadists is shaking me to the core. The Middle East could be where the Apocalypse started, as "predicted" and "foretold" in some books, written by the scribes who believed in the End of Days. After a thousand years of sleeping, the Arabs and their fellow Muslims are waking up. The status quo is intolerable. The oppressed are finally rising. Death is no longer feared. Excesses are committed in the names of liberation and justice. Nationhood is being thrown out of the window. What count are the family, clan/tribe/, sects and ideologies. 

I'm not saying the ISIS jihadists are  going to triumph. No, they are going to be vanquished as all extremists (Huns, Crusaders, Mongols, Nazis, Khmer Rouge, and Communists. There was a very good reason why the Roman Empire and the Ottoman Empire lasted a long time. The Romans and the Turks knew about accommodation) before them. For any regime to last and prosper, inclusiveness and compromise, not extremism and maximalism, are the names of the rule. Fear is effective only in a short term. After a while, humans, true humans anyway, instinctively choose dignity and death over survival. It's far better to fight and die as real men than to live in shame and humiliation like ordinary animals. Ironically that's what the jihadists and suicide bombers (unless they were brainwashed) believe. Humans knows they really have a choice. Animals do not. Incidentally, Nietzsche once remarked that the Jews cling to life, no matter what. Their behavior at Masada was an exception. 

The news reports of the plight of the Christians and the Yazidis in Iraq brought back to my mind the memories of the sufferings of the Vietnamese refugees who fled from the advancing North Vietnamese troops in the waning weeks of the Vietnam War. War is cruel and dehumanizing. It's even more so and self-destructive if it is a civil war with foreign support and manipulation. 

It was always disheartening and stupid for a people who speak the same language and share the same blood or culture killed one another not with reluctance, but with ferocity. 

War was no stranger to us Vietnamese. It has been with us for thousands of years as we have tried to fend off the rapacious and cruel Chinese. War became real and personal for me around 1959 when the Vietcong started a campaign of assassinations of local officials and bombings to destabilize the South Vietnamese government. My idyllic childhood came to an abrupt end. I could no longer visit my maternal grandmother in the countryside during the summer as I used to. Newspapers started covering the war. Mobilization was initiated. Even before 1959, memories of the fires from the fighting in Saigon in 1955 between  Binh Xuyen faction and the South Vietnamese troops simmered not far from my consciousness which was already burdened by my mother's  (strangely, never by my father's ) narrations of the atrocities of the French Legionnaires and the fascist Japanese troops in the 1940s. My teenage and college years, like those of my contemporaries, were devoted to survival via doing well scholastically in order to obtain the draft deferment.

 I would say most surviving Vietnamese males my age have some kind of PTSD whether they were drafted or not. This reflects on their strange, odd, weird--- but barely confronted and recognized---behavior even though some of us now reside in peace and comfort in the United States and other developed nations. We tend to be unduly self-righteous, aggressive, vain, and fearful of unpleasant truths. We outwardly seemed educated with college degrees but didn't bother to read serious books and improve our minds, and thus fell victim to pathetic ignorance but we would walk around with a ridiculous swagger. We would not hesitate to pontificate on anything although we don't know what the heck we are talking about. We don't have a proper sense of self-respect and intellectual honesty. Some of us in the U.S. even stupidly became Republicans and were inordinately proud of that. So when I accused these contemporaries of mine of being no different from ignorant human animals, they jumped up and down like damned, berserk monkeys. Very few of them admitted their ignorance. They brazenly, blithely, and defiantly defended themselves, but the more they did so, the more glaring their ignorance showed. They found faults in others, but were blind of their own. They have lived in ignorance and stupidity, and are likely to get stuck in those conditions when they die. Incidentally, these lousy traits are not confined to my Vietnamese contemporaries. I found them in Americans, too, especially in those who take delight and refuge in Fox News and Rush Limbaugh. There is nothing more pathetic than for a human to be both stupid and ignorant and not to be aware of that. I should know. I was pathetically stupid and ignorant for a long time until I met Nietzsche and Freud. 

A true, real, authentic human must be honest with himself and must have the courage to confront himself day in and day out. In the end we cannot lie to ourselves, even if we try. And we cannot lie to others either. The truths always have a way to make themselves known via pain.

Thus spoke Wissai

August 11, 2014

canngon.blogspot.com

Another Manifesto

Why I Am Acting The Way I Am. A Rambling Discourse (revised and expanded) 

Life is an endless, conflicting series of demands and needs between Self and Other(s). That statement is a self-evident fact and a truism. Those who disagree with the statement should read no further. You're too dumb and ignorant to understand me. The world is divided into two perpetual groups: majority and minority, just like the state of human affairs and most of the conditions in the physical world: the rule/average and the exceptions. One must know to which category one belongs. The exalted and sublime or the common and humbug. The Soaring Eagle or The Barnyard Chicken.

Unlike Nietzsche who fearlessly wrote a book ("Ecce Homo") in which the chapters bear headings Why I Am So Wise, Why I Am So Clever, Why I Write Such Good Books, Why I Am a Destiny. I cannot brag of similar attributes and accomplishments. Humans long for possessing talents and accomplishments that set them apart from the rest. It's sad and depressing and damaging to one's ego and conception of oneself if one cannot find a single thing/attribute/ability that makes one feel good about oneself. It's a tough job to resign oneself to the fact that one is a plain Joe, boring, average, undistinguished, unnoticeable, just like a pebble on the beach or a grain of sand in the desert. That's why most average, common, untalented folks lie, exaggerate, make up stories about themselves, and slander others so they could feel better about themselves or bring others down to their level. Very few of them are happy with the way they are and their lot in life. I maintain that in order to be happy we must know who we are and where we stand in relation to others. Reality is what it is, not what we say it is or what we wish it were. 

In the realm of ideas, Nietzsche had at least one original idea about morality; Wittgenstein had at least two about language; Descartes elevated the common sense about dualism into a cogent system of thought while Buddhism exposed the nonsense of dualism, with increasing support by modern theoretical physics; Freud had something to say about the conflicting nature of man, especially the Death Wish side of it. He might also be on the right track about the roots of human sexuality and love. I have wrecked my brain to see if I have any original idea/exceptional talent, and I have found none. It's very unlikely I will find one before I die. However, I must say this: I have more self-honesty and intellectual honesty than most folks. A mediocre asshole who cannot bear seeing others outshine him loves to gratuitously and blithely dish out insults but has no courage or fair play to take any insults in the return. A flunkie bitch brazenly accused others of being stupid flunkies. We hate others for what we hate inside us. 

Anyway, while I have not published any poems, stories and essays---and it's unlikely I ever will. I lack true vanity and self-confidence---I have a nagging idea that among Vietnamese-Americans, very few could rival me in translating Vietnamese poems into English. I sometimes wonder how far I could go with English if I have not spread myself too thin. I don't have to be curious about languages other than English. And I must not waste my time interacting or debating with assholes and scumbags and flunkies. Still, I must admit that I am fascinated by the behavior of those who are infected with degeneracy and morbidity. The more I look at these human animals, the more I feel better about myself, and the more I understand why acts of atrocity are possible. Anyway, I always maintain that to live a reasonably solid and happy life, a human must come to terms with who he is and his place in society and the world. To be able to do he must thoroughly have a firm grasp of the concepts/facts/phenomena of sex, love, power, and knowledge. 

Who Am I?

There are so many people who have remarked that I am unusual, different, and not like the common, ordinary folks that there must be some truth in that. I didn't set myself to be that way. I am just my own man. I don't follow crowds. I think fashions and trends are stupid, adopted by weak-willed, insecure people. They feel that they must fit in and be accepted. Look at the current stupid, childish explosion of tattooing. Because presently so many athletes have tattoos, we see young people ape that kind of behavior. The same thing about a belief in a Personal God that has an active interest in the well-being of the believers and to Whom the believers can pray for help. I think that kind of belief is a crock of shit, eagerly embraced by stupid, insecure, delusional, easily brainwashed folks who fucking do not how to think and reason. 

Having established that I don't adopt stupid behaviors and beliefs of the masses, I think I must also disclose that I am reasonably intelligent, and excellent in reasoning and debating. My command of facts and logic is awesome. Only truly educated and intellectual folks are grudgingly ok with that. Stupid and ignorant interlocutors have been put to shame and humiliation by me. 

My Place in Society and the World 

I live because I still find life interesting in the abstract and I am curious what the next 30 years will be like: the global warming, the Middle East, the ascent of China and the concomitant decline of the U.S, the fate of Vietnam.

I don't look warmly at humans. Based on my experiences, they are mostly ungrateful, insecure, conniving, uninformed and ignorant but stupidly and pathetically vain (i.e., without basis, just wishful thinking. I am vain, but my vanity rests on a firm foundation of verifiable facts and "achievements"), delusional, and treacherous. I have only a few friends with whom I am comfortable enough to shoot the breeze. But frankly, I would rather spend time with a dog than with an "average", "unenlightened" human. 

Sex

Sex is dirty, messy, and generally not that great as it is cracked up to be. It is usually animal-like, and only meaningful and sublime when the partners are genuinely in love. I have had sex with all kinds of women. Guys, you don't know if a woman really loves you or not, until she has sex with you and the way she conducts herself before, during, and after the sex act. You can tell, can't you? Come on, let's be honest now. 

Love

Sex is easy (animals and even insects can do it); Love is infinitely much harder. Only true humans high on the evolutionary emotional development can have it. Human animals don't have it. They only have lustful feelings and longings for security. They are incapable of giving and of sacrifices which are the hallmarks of love. I am much wiser now in this field. Many women in the past told me they loved me, and I stupidly believed what they said. Now I am cool and careful when women make overtures to me. I think I know now when a woman really loves me and when she just plays around. When I was young and green, I stupidly fell in love, twice. I think I know what love is. True Love is forgiveness over and over again. Past rejections and my own disappointments made me wiser and more practical. I am now not bitter at all with the so-called "loves" that ended up as farces. A man's love life is the sum of his amorous experiences. I must say I have had a rich romantic life. I can write a book about it, but I won't. I am not a kiss-and-tell type. Not really. 

Power

I understand almost all human activities involve power in some form or another. Humans love power because of ego. They don't know power is a live grenade. It must be handled with care, otherwise it will blow up in their faces. Those who love power constantly live in fear. You don't gain true friends and love from being powerful. You incur enemies and enmity. I fucking laugh at those assholes who try to exert power over me. They don't know what the fuck they get themselves into.

Knowledge 

Knowledge is what sets humans apart from non-humans. Look at how far humans have arrived because of cumulative knowledge. So those humans who don't respect knowledge and don't try to improve their minds are no better than sub-humans. I look at these ignorant human animals with barely disguised contempt. 

Conclusion:

You could say I am not socially smart for holding the above views and have the stupidity to post them in a public setting. But I don't  really give a fuck as to what and how you think about me. I just want you to know what and how I think. Yes, you may say I am burdened with narcissism, and not uplifted by grace. And you could be right. But I am who I am and I am very comfortable with that.

Wissai

August 10, 2014 

Like Ashes in the Wind

Like Ashes in the Wind

How many times we have met?

Three, four, or is it five?

Have you taken the count?

Have you wondered why?

The radiant smiles, the furtive glances,

The body's unspoken desires,

The heart's sweet murmurs

Were they for real? I often wonder

Or were they only in my mind?

Be that as they may

One of these lonely days,

I'll summon my courage

And spell out in clear detail

The last secret of my heart

So when I have to die,

The secret won't heave its inaudible last sigh

Yes, yes, yes, I do wish so very much

That you'd be a very special friend of mine

Maybe I'll print this "poem" out

So when we meet again once more 

I'll press it in your hand 

Baby, I do want my feelings soar

Hitherto unknown and unspoken,

Like cold gray ashes in the wind

Wissai

August 8, 2014

Narcissistic or Introspective? An article by David Brooks of NY Times

Introduction by Wissai:

Why is that so many assholes and scumbags and blowhards and we all know who they are, are so good at seeing faults in others but are so pathetic at seeing faults in themselves? Is it because they are emotionally cowardly or what?  Yes, I am talking about the motherfuckers who love to insult others but jump up and down like fucking monkeys when receiving insults in return. Yes, I am talking about ugly, stupid, impecunious, untalented, lonely assholes who "opined" that I was a "stupid flunkie" while the fact of the matter is that I am financially independent, conversant in 4 languages and can read 4 more, well-read and well-reasoning, and wildly popular with women because of my looks, magnetic physical presence and personality, not to mention that very few individuals, including native-born Americans, can rival me in the handling of the English language. Of course, I don't regard myself as a "stupid flunkie" at all (those who said so were merely projecting themselves). On the contrary, I regard myself superior to at least 95% of the human race. Like Nietzsche, I am no mere man. I am rare, beautiful, and an unspoken envy of so many assholes. I am confident of my worth and the significance of my presence on this planet. 

Article by David Brroks:

Some people like to keep a journal. Some people think it’s a bad idea. 

People who keep a journal often see it as part of the process of self-understanding and personal growth. They don’t want insights and events to slip through their minds. They think with their fingers and have to write to process experiences and become aware of their feelings. 

People who oppose journal-keeping fear it contributes to self-absorption and narcissism. C.S. Lewis, who kept a journal at times, feared that it just aggravated sadness and reinforced neurosis. Gen. George Marshall did not keep a diary during World War II because he thought it would lead to “self-deception or hesitation in reaching decisions.”

The question is: How do you succeed in being introspective without being self-absorbed?

Psychologists and others have given some thought to this question. The upshot of their work is that there seems to be a paradox at the heart of introspection. The self is something that can be seen more accurately from a distance than from close up. The more you can yank yourself away from your own intimacy with yourself, the more reliable your self-awareness is likely to be. 

The problem is that the mind is vastly deep, complex and variable. As Immanuel Kant famously put it, “We can never, even by the strictest examination, get completely behind the secret springs of action.” At the same time, your self-worth and identity are at stake in every judgment you make about yourself.

This combination of unfathomability and “at stakeness” is a perfect breeding ground for self-deception, rationalization and motivated reasoning. 

When people examine themselves from too close, they often end up ruminating or oversimplifying. Rumination is like that middle-of-the-night thinking — when the rest of the world is hidden by darkness and the mind descends into a spiral of endless reaction to itself. People have repetitive thoughts, but don’t take action. Depressed ruminators end up making themselves more depressed.

Oversimplifiers don’t really understand themselves, so they just invent an explanation to describe their own desires. People make checklists of what they want in a spouse and then usually marry a person who is nothing like their abstract criteria. Realtors know that the house many people buy often has nothing in common with the house they thought they wanted when they started shopping. 

We are better self-perceivers if we can create distance and see the general contours of our emergent system selves — rather than trying to unpack constituent parts. This can be done in several ways.

First, you can distance yourself by time. A program called Critical Incident Stress Debriefing had victims of trauma write down their emotions right after the event. (The idea was they shouldn’t bottle up their feelings.) But people who did so suffered more post-traumatic stress and were more depressed in the ensuing weeks. Their intimate reflections impeded healing and froze the pain. But people who write about trauma later on can place a broader perspective on things. Their lives are improved by the exercise. 

Second, we can achieve distance from self through language. We’re better at giving other people good advice than at giving ourselves good advice, so it’s smart, when trying to counsel yourself, to pretend you are somebody else. This can be done a bit even by thinking of yourself in the third person. Work by Ozlem Ayduk and Ethan Kross finds that people who view themselves from a self-distanced perspective are better at adaptive self-reflection than people who view themselves from a self-immersed perspective.

Finally, there is narrative. Timothy Wilson of the University of Virginia suggests in his book “Strangers to Ourselves” that we shouldn’t see ourselves as archaeologists, minutely studying each feeling and trying to dig deep into the unconscious. We should see ourselves as literary critics, putting each incident in the perspective of a longer life story. The narrative form is a more supple way of understanding human processes, even unconscious ones, than rationalistic analysis.

Wilson writes, “The point is that we should not analyze the information [about our feelings] in an overly deliberate, conscious manner, constantly making explicit lists of pluses and minuses. We should let our adaptive unconscious do the job of finding reliable feelings and then trust those feelings, even if we cannot explain them entirely.”

Think of one of those Chuck Close self-portraits. The face takes up the entire image. You can see every pore. Some people try to introspect like that. But others see themselves in broader landscapes, in the context of longer narratives about forgiveness, or redemption or setback and ascent. Maturity is moving from the close-up to the landscape, focusing less on your own supposed strengths and weaknesses and more on the sea of empathy in which you swim, which is the medium necessary for understanding others, one’s self, and survival. 

The Dark Side of Life

The Dark Side of Life

Almost everything in life is like the moon. It has a dark side. I've been thinking about the dark, seamy side of life, the side almost nobody likes to talk about. Anyway, I've been thinking about the young poker professional player who was only 23 years old when he won $15.406,688 in a tournament where each player put up $1 million. Forty-two players on this planet came up with the money. About half are well-known successful players, one is a billionaire who runs a hedge fund. At least another participant, the owner of Cirque Du Soleil, is a billionaire. Neither of them progressed to the final table. They were among the 34 players who didn't recoup a single red cent from their $1 million "investment". The top eight players got paid, ranging from $1,306,667 to $15,406,688. Please understand that this is the only tournament in the world where the stakes are this big. It inaugurated in 2011. In 2013, the entry fee dropped to $111,111. In 2014, the fee went back up to $1 million and the maximum field size was set at 56, but the sellout looked unlikely when many well-known and supposedly rich players didn't enter the tournament. But I didn't blame them. You must be supremely confident and very good on top of being very wealthy to risk $1 million in a game where luck does play a role (around 20% in a long run. Higher in a few hours). Now, imagine you are only 23 years of age. You must be extremely good for you to have that kind of money or for the people who backed you up and put up the money for you. Based on the following info from Wikipedia, Colman must be very, very good. 

"Colman is primarily an online player under the names "mrGR33N13" and "riyyc225". In 2013 he became the first player in history to win $1,000,000 in hyper-turbo tournaments in a calendar year, accomplishing the feat in only 9 months.[2] In April 2014 he won the €100,000 Super HIgh Roller at the European Poker Tour Grand Final in Monte Carlo, earning €1,539,300. At the 2014 WSOP, he finished in 3rd place in the $10,000 Heads-Up event before winning The Big One for One Drop.

As of 2014, his total live winnings exceed $17,988,000."

His unusual, unconventional, and unexpected behavior after winning the championship generated a controversy. The following is an article written by a writer (James McManus) who gained fame for writing about poker.:

"Is Daniel Colman, poker's new heavyweight champion, an adolescent narcissist, happy to take people's money on the felt but unwilling to help improve poker's image as a game of skill or a vehicle for philanthropy? Or is he an anti-huckster hero amid a swarm of endorsement-happy pros, greedy tournament presenters and the journalists who fawn over them?

After refusing almost all interview requests after winning the $15.3 million first prize of the Big One for One Drop -- a tournament that benefits the One Drop Foundation, which provides water-management systems in drought-stricken countries -- the 23-year-old Colman became even more hostile and self-contradictory on the online poker forum Two Plus Two:

'First off, I don't owe poker a single thing. I've been fortunate enough to benefit financially from this game, but I have played it long enough to see the ugly side of this world. It is not a game where the pros are always happy and living a fulfilling life. To have a job where you are at the mercy of variance can be insanely stressful and can lead to a lot of unhealthy habits. I would never in a million years recommend for someone to try and make it as a poker pro../ In a perfect world, markets are based on informed consumers making rational transactions. In reality sadly that's not the case, markets are based on advertising trying to play on peoples impulses and targeting their weaknesses in order for them to make irrational decisions. I get it if someone wants to go and play poker on their own free will, but I don't agree with gambling being advertised just like I don't agree with cigarettes and alcohol being advertised.

It bothers me that people care so much about poker's well-being. As poker is a game that has such a net negative effect on the people playing it. Both financial and emotionally. 

As for promoting myself, I feel that individual achievements should rarely be celebrated. I am not going to take part in it for others and I wouldn't want it for myself. If you wonder why our society is so infatuated by individuals and their success, and being a baller, it is not that way for no reason. It is their because it serves a clear purpose. If you get people to look up to someone and adhere to the "gain wealth, forget all but self" motto, then you can get them to ignore the social contract which is very good for power systems. Also it serves as a means of distraction to get people to not pay attention to the things that matter. 

These are just my personal views. And yes, I realize I am conflicted. I capitalize off this game that targets peoples weaknesses. I do enjoy it, I love the strategy part of it, but I do see it as a very dark game.

Happy to read anyones opinions that could convince me otherwise of my views."

(Wissai's note: I was very impressed with Colman's words, minor grammatical errors notwithstanding. To me, he exhibited depth for such a young man. I am 65 years old, but I didn't view poker in such a penetrating manner as he did) 

The reaction was polarized. As one poker fan, known as @djm182, wrote on Twitter: "For the record, if I won a poker tourney and claimed $15.3M for doing so, I'd take 15 minutes and talk to the media. #colman #child."

Poker pro David Peat had the opposite take, saying "hats off" to Colman for following his decision and   Can we pick up radio code I'll be able to click on the trunk on my app is looking to worry about you adding that they don't owe the Rio anything. "They are predators taking enough from poker."

Aaron Brown, the author of "The Poker Face of Wall Street," agreed, but for a different reason. "Not only do I fully support Dan Colman in refusing to play the desired part, his actions are what make Dan Negreanu's graciousness meaningful," he told me, referring to the wildly popular star who came in second to Colman in the tournament and was much more affable in defeat. "Poker champions have a choice, unlike Misses America or NFL players with PR contract clauses and commissioners to obey. Poker is still an honest game, to the annoyance of the people who prefer pretty hypocrisy. Poker is real and will be around long after sportainment conglomerates have fallen."

Negreanu himself also weighed in on the controversy. "I respect Daniel Colman for having empathy for those people that may be jaded into thinking they can easily become a poker superstar and make millions," he wrote, adding that "it's difficult to take the position he does, and actually still profit from the game, and the weaker players he exploits."

Presumably Colman doesn't alert his online adversaries that he's a professional and they're likely to lose, Negreanu continued. And the One Drop tournament, after all, is about something larger: It raised $4.6 million for a good cause.

As for Colman saying "I don't owe poker anything," the man long known as Kid Poker wrote:

You don't owe poker anything, sure, but poker has given you a lot. The camera crew filming the event, the dealers, floor staff, Caesars, the WSOP, ESPN, PokerStars.com for giving you an opportunity to support yourself, the players that came before you and did spend time promoting a game you would have likely never heard about. You don't owe poker, or me personally anything, much like when a waitress brings your order, you don't owe her a tip or even a thank you. It's just a gracious custom, much like doing a winner's interview.

Negreanu also noted that if Colman has an issue with the morality of being a poker pro, he needs to make a choice: "If I may make a suggestion, why not continue to do what you love, empower others, educate others about the dangers of this lifestyle, and use the money your talents allow you to earn, to make a difference in the world?"

A fair question.

Charitable poker tournaments have long been a highly effective means of raising money to help the unfortunate, but their general cause isn't helped if the winner of the biggest one uses the occasion to emphasize that people lose money playing poker. Grownups lose money in a thousand different kinds of investments. Understanding that going in is part of being a grownup.

Online poker, the version Colman has thrived in, is under relentless attack in legislatures across the U.S., nowhere more so than in Washington. The forces aligned against it are now led by Sheldon Adelson, the Las Vegas Sands chairman who has reaped many billions from skill-free casino games in which the house is guaranteed to win in the long run. Much of Colman's statement will be music to his ears.

Young Mr. Colman has the luxury of being able to leave the country (he has lived in Canada and Brazil) to play his favorite game of skill. Most Americans aren't so lucky.'

I (Wissai) play poker quite seriously. I have made some money off the game. I must say that I have learned a lot about human nature from the game. The game can be very dark. I personally know quite a few players (about two dozens) who went broke and had to quit the game. Incidentally, about 90% of players lose money. Only 5% make enough money to live comfortably. So I hugely admire Colman for his rare achievements and his courage to speak about the dark side of the game. The poker rooms personnel (management, dealers, cocktail waitresses, massage therapists) live off the untalented, not so bright, fun-seeking players. One poker room supervisor at a prestigious casino in Vegas once talked to me and derisively and disparagingly talked about the players who mistakenly thought they could come to a poker room and make some money. I just looked at him in silence, but from that moment on, I have looked at him worse than a dog because he showed to me he was just an asshole who laughed at the hand that fed him. There is an unspoken contempt dealers and their bosses have for losing players. They mock and laugh at these poor souls behind their backs. So not only the poker game is dark, quite a few individuals who sponsor and keep the game going are dark also. In fact, casino is a very dark place. A great deal of people lose money there. They are enticed and lured by the bright lights and the "fun" and the cheap "give-away" promotions. But Las Vegas is recovering nicely. Casinos are packed again. Throngs of visitors crowd the Las Vegas Boulevard every night. The traffic jams on the boulevard are horrendous in the evenings. Like moths to the flame, gamblers and "fun-seeking" visitors squander their money on the local businesses. Not only the casinos benefit from this dark side of human nature, the local retail businesses including those that cater to the sensual pleasures of the flesh (sex, drugs, foods, shows) are thriving. I have had young women (8 so far) accosting me for paid sex. I turned all of them down. I have had female dealers and fellow poker players (6 so far) flirt with me. They know I am a winning player, hence I have money. I have said no to their hints of dates and sexual invitations. I know enough about the dark side of sex and of love, so it has been easy for me to say no. 

The last time I wrote so admiringly of Colman, a bitch commented that the dark world of poker in which I navigated would not be good for my soul. This was the same bitch who "opined"

that I was a stupid flunkie! Look who was talking! The bitch was barely educated, ugly (a Quasimodo look-alike) impecunious, untalented, and lonely as hell. The bitch's gratuitous and ignorant comments were typical of those who don't know what the fuck they're talking about, but they feel they must say something. They think they are clever and smart by having an opinion on just about anything. I view these pretentious and ignorant motherfuckers with undisguised contempt. 

It is not really easy to understand me for I have a dark side and plenty of dark moments. But to really understand me is to love me because I am rare and have a beautiful mind. I am not as as good as Colman in the poker arena, but I am confident of my worth and my place in this dark world. I know I am lovable. Many women (22 so far) have told me so and said they loved me, but I think only 3 really do. And why do I think they love me? They didn't ask me for money. The way humans conduct themselves regarding the issue of money say a great deal about themselves. Ditto for power and sex and facts . Yes, humans reveal their dark side by how they handle money, power, sex, and facts, in that descending order. I may be wrong in my reading of humans, but I don't think so. I am brash and abrasive, but I can be sensitive and perceptive. I have a soul of a poet and an inquiring mind. That's why I feel so fucking proud of myself and view most humans I have come into contact as cheap animals and assholes who lack true pride and intellectual honesty. The motherfucker who loves insulting people by comparing them with horses and water buffaloes is such an animal and an ignorant and stupid and cowardly asshole. He cries like a goddamned, self-righteous, whining baby if somebody returns the insults. Yes, I am the one who wrote publicly that the reason why the asshole was fond of the imagery of horses and water buffaloes was that his forefathers must have lived closely among horses and water buffaloes or perhaps even committed acts of bestiality with these poor animals. No wonder nowadays he looks and conducts himself like an ass. Fuck, he'd better pray that I am still lucid and rational. 

(To be continued)