cyber crooks - macritchie reservoir

cyber preachers - suddenly these preachers appears from nowhere, after they thot that they have made it to the other side. they forward what they consider as good advices from the internet.... spreading the good news, the good advices, the good practices, the goodies are what they think that others should know, like reminding people to feel blessed with whatever they are having, not to strive for more... like telling people how to be conscious of green efforts.....there's two sides of the internet that both as loathful, one is cyberpreaching, the other is cyberfighting. so this afternoon, marathon man was having a good time quarrelling with one so-called mister goreng pisang in one of the forums about singapore gahmen..... he has forwarded an article written by a canada angmoh on the straits times, preaching the singaporeans to be appreciative of what the gahmen has done... marathon man told goreng pisang off, scolding him ^%$#@^*qp qp db, bd, (!) (!) (!)...... we singaporeans do not need angmoh preacher.....

after the fight, he felt very depressed.... why must cyber preaching be put down with cyber fighting??? was it the only way to handle case like that? could he talk nicely and convince goreng pisang? to forget about the incident and to get his mind cleared up, though it was still raining, he headed to the tree-top walk.along the way not far from the venus road car-park, he met an angmoh family, a couple with 2 kid's; one carried on the shoulder of the father, the other in the trolley psuhed by the mother. the path was very tracherous, the terrain very rugged. they were having quite a hard time to traverse such route in the tropical jungle, with such loads. raining in the rain forest made the surroundings very fresh and cooling, though. birds still chirping sparingly in the forest, monkeys still swinging from branch to branch, small streams and drain were filled with moving water. drops of water dripping down from leaves, branches, and tweeks onto marathon man's body, cooling off his heated self instantly. he met another jogger heading to tree top walk.

he arrived in tree top walk entrance at 4.40pm. when he landed his first step onto the hanging bridge - the feet felt the soft bouncing of the span, though he could not see the movement of suspension hanging wires. at one point of the bridge, he could see that he was surrounded by all trees whichever angle he looked to, no sign of civilization, like buildings, constructions, or any man-made structures except the bridge. walking further on to the mid span, he could see the macritchie reservoir, further on, he saw some high-rise buildings towards the north. he spent sometime relishing the scene around him, abovehim and under him and touching the leaves of some tall trees that were within his reach. he stepped out of the bridge before 5pm.

he met a yound couple at the exit, eating their fast-food dinner. imagine, it's a nice place to make out when nobody is going to come by. after 5, the one-way bridge closes, they could bring the sheet, and cleaning liquid, condums.... and it's a perfect place for an outrageuos rendervouz.

descending the countless step, and boadwalk, needed extra care, as his soles were worn out falt. slipperiness made him slow down his steps to walking pace. he stopped by to read the info-boards.... passing by jelutong tower, heading onto golf link boardwalk, very curious to see people still playing golf under the rain, also curious how it felt to look into the golf course from the outside.

he arrived at the uphill dirt path, where the steps were higher in size after all these years of pounding by the countless foot-steps from the joggers and walkers. the he came to another section of boardwalk, punctuated by short dirt paths. then into the short-distance jungle path before arricving at the dike, which opened for people to walk. he went down to the new pavilion where a fast food and drink stall sold drinks and some fast food, and washroom facilities were very neatly laid out. there was big news on the opening of these new facilities on the newspapers and tv just the other day. though he was not that impressed by what he saw on these upgrades, macricthie is still his refuge whenever he needs somewhere to purify his worn-out soul.

animal instinct

random act of kindness is like a fit of temper, but it occurs far fewer that bad temper flashes up. why? why are we so easily worked up and lose our minds, yet we do not feel like doing good, even if we are feeling happy, as often. it does not mean that when you are happy, you will do good. when was the last time you did a good deed? good in a sense of helping others, just for the sake of helping others, not that you did it out of vested interest like, you were helping your friend to pass the exam, not done on purpose of friendship, but you wanted to show to your friend you were cleverer than he.

husnan, marathon man's fren was a firebrand - he flared up for something as small as his shoes not put in the usual place when he was to put them on for work every morning. he would throw his tantrum on his wife.... until she could not stand him.... she left him for her mother's place.... and relationship between them went so bad that, he had to quit his job just to stay home to take care of the kids and the household himself. yet he still thot that he's a down-to-earth, just-speaking-his-mind kind of frank and honest folk, and that people should appreciate him and the world owed him everything.

one day, he joggedwith marathon man along the barrage, in the evening. the lights of the city shimmered like jewels in the bay water, the breeze had a special cooling effect on the sweating torsoes of the joggers.

"you know, my wife left me for her mother already 4 months... i asked her to come back many times, but she wouldn't.... what can i do?"

"husnan, why your wife so angry with you?"

"she said, i scolded her for nothing, she could not tahan any more.... but i just let her know what she did wrong... maybe a bit loud, but i
just couldn't tahan people who didn't learn from their mistakes... and changed..... my blood boils whenever..."

"well, husnan.... take it easy. don't get worked up over small things."

"but if you want to do big things, you must make sure small things are done well. are you saying that i'm wrong or what?" he was visibily and audibly worked up, with the veins on his temples bloated up, and his voice raised many decibels.

"come on. i'm just trying to help you."

"i don't need no help, if all you do is telling me i'm wrong."

"ok.... i didn't judge. i just assessed your situation - why you landed yourself in where you are now.... you think you want this?"

"no... of course." his voice hardly could be heard.

"then, you have to change."

"how? i cannot control myself.... i'm just like an animal, when the hormones hit me, i just succumb. i'm like a lone wolf living in the jungle lurking iwth dangers all around. i have to be alert all the time, ever battle ready so my enemies would not take advantage of me."

"do you think by shouting and be fierce will get you what you want?

"yes. else nobdoy would pay any attention to you."

"well, you must suffer from inferiority complex. did you see a shrink? or counsellor?"

"yes, but they asked me to breathe deep when i wanted to get angry..... i breathe and breathe deep, but my mind just couldn't cool down....i cannot help to react when somebody pokes my ego."

"what do you mean?"

"i have a very delicate ego. maybe, i have been trying to exert myself all these years, but nobody takes me as anything.... now i'm married, at least my wife has to show her repsect to me. when i sensed that she doesn't , i got very angry."

"ha, you have a low threshold of anger trigger. it's as biological as much as it's psychological..... meaning you have to seek help to control your high-blood pressure, your hyper tension, and also seek help from religious leaders to give you some direction where you can hold yourself together."

"how do you know i have high blood pressure and hyper tension?"

"i don't have to know, i just equate these with your short-fuse temperament."

"so you know what you to do to hold them down?"

"i don't know. if i do, i would not have to be on the track day in and day out...."

"what do you mean? you have high blood pressure and hyper tension also?"

"not when i'm on the road."

gambler's luck

marathon man took dimsum as his breakfast in taitung, china town. service was no good. he ordered a plate of 3-mixed-roast, waited for half an hour, no serving. he told the head waiter to expedite. one minute later, he came with the plate, but instead of roasted duck, it was substitued with oiled-chicken. he rejected the order, and canclled it. 5 minutes later, he came with another plate, this time with roasted duck and said, "sorry, we just got the duck roasted." marathon man said, "sorry, i have finsihed my food, and cancelled the order. i thot i saw two whole roasted ducks hung up when i came in. how could you finish those in 10 minutes time?" he rejected the order again.

he went house viewing in river gate, block 99, #3313. the unit had very nice view, and also quite a good floor layout, only the bathrooms looked quite stiffled, with no obvious oepnings for windows or air ventitlations. and the project layout is spacious with all the facilities, and with a sky gym at 34th floor. asking price $1800 psf! that stopped marathon man from asking further. but the agent said, "you want cheap house ha, wait lah, wait next year if ir cannot earn money, then house may go cheaper."

"why?"

"becau ir fail, then people confident also low lah, then share market will be down, housing will be down also."

"hmm... i can wait."

"but i think it won't fail lah."

"why?"

"gohmen cannot let it fail. if no gambler from oversea, they will let local gamble there, no entrance charge."

"how? they already said want to charge local $100?"

"but they did not say the ir cannot give back the money to them when they already inside. so want to buy now or not. price will increase, i tell you."

"how to buy? so ex."

"no ex lah..... people already line up for new projects... the psf even higher, still people grab."

"why you think it's like that?"

"i'm no economist, but i think, people still have alot of money lah, and also more people into the gambling mindset..... before the recession, pple got rich, very fast. though recession come, pple think good time to go in the market low..... to get easy money..... like my fren, last time he manager of his own company, but loose money. now go into share market, want to make back the money."

"oh.... like that ah, then who needs the ir?"

after the interesting conversion with the bubbly agent, he stpped out of rivergate and started to jog along sinagpore river, to delta road, jervois rd, cable rd, chatsworth rd, tangling rd.looking at the number of tall and not-so-tall, condos and landed, high-class buildings along these places, he couldn't stop thinking..... are these the result of a gambler's luck?

short-cut writer

writing is not his cup of tea. he cannot just sit down and let words and sentences come to his mind. he has to squeeze hard to put down the thots, and most often than not, laying down the thots into words and sentences that can be understood takes a tremendous effort. even so, when he reads what he has written, he can always find mistakes, either in spelling, in the way the sentence is constructed, in missing out ideas he wants to put across...... in short, he doesn't know how to articulate his ideas into words and sentences to impress the readers. sometimes trying to express too much into one sentence, and in end, the meaning does not come out as intended. worst, it doesn't make any sense. but not for this writer marathon man met yesterday when he was jogging in the botanic gardens.

once he entered the garden thru the side entrance along bukit timah road, the surrounding abruptly changed from the noisy and hustling buzzles of the busy bukit timah road to the refreshing, enchanting, invigorating tranquility of the greenaries. new york has central park, singapore has the bontanic gardens, the lungs that pumps fresh air into the singaporeans wasted bodies, the sanctuary for the wretched souls.

just by looking at the 3 white swans in the pond, moving gever so racefully in the water made one feel like jumping into the pond for a good swim with these majestic fowls. all the big kois in the food court pond did not fail to pull marathon man's heart nearer to the core of that something he's always being yearning to achive in life - peace of mind. star gardens was new to him. the planked-floor was very slippery, and there's too much of artificial decoratings, like painted flower base, to match with the meticulously arranged flowers and plants. in the water lilly pond, the seasonal flowers bloomed, scatteringly in brilliant colors of white and purple.

then he bumped into into this lady. she was taking pictures of the glorious blooms. she asked marathon man to take a picture of her next to one of the flowers. after that, she said, "i am a travel magazine writer, writing an article about singapore. other than the normal tourist places like botanic garden, the zoo, nite safari, bird park, merlion, china town, litlle india, geylang...... what else that's good to write on, yet not known to the normal tourist?"

marathon man said, "write about me, marathon man."

"what's that to write about you? you think foreign tourists would be interested in knowing who you are?"

"why not? i'm marathon man, i know all the beautiful places in singapore. why not you spend today with me, i will show you the a few places that you would like to visit as a tourist, but not well published as torurist location.but you must mention me in your article."

"hm... ok, deal. but i must finish the article by tonite. so do it within 3 hours. then i will have one hour to write my article."

"wow, one hour? you can write an article? how you do it?"

"how, just write whatever comes to mind."

"no need to arrange your thots, phrase the sentences properly, put down some bombastic words, make some drama out of the story?"

"i don't go for all these technique, just plain simple writing."

"like how?"

"like, if i want to write about botanic garden, i would start with, let me see.... if you like clean air, alot of green, there's no better place to go than the singapore botanic garden.... then how to get there, then what i see, then what i feel, then what's so nice about the place, then finish off with a sentence like, for a place like the botanic garden to have existed in this little island, it must be the very intention of GOD to make this impossible nation into a brilliant jewel that He's proud to show the human race what Eden would be like long time ago."

"hmm.... the ending sounds flowery though."

"to you, it does. but to me, an english-speaking person, every minute we talk and think like that."

"so.... i have to change my way of thinking if i want to be an english writer?"

"you want to be a writer?"

"yap. but i'm no good at writing."

"let me tell you a secret. if you want to write good stories, be it travel stories, novels, or plain articles... just pretend you are so stupid, write down only the things that comes to your. forget about gramma, making long senstences, flowery language. just write plain stupid phrases, like some shorthand minutes... then you can take your time to develop these ideas into something more sophisticated.... no hurry, just write and re-write until you are satisfied with what you write."

"hmmm. no short cut."

"this is the short cut. you start with cutting a long story short, then lengthen it as you like. remember a writer is an idea organizer, that means, you have to be receptive to ideas, ie when an ideas pings the mind, write it down immediately in criptic form then, collect your ideas, then you can sit down and take all the time to organize them. and in doing so, you will find your own style."

obscession

jog from queensway, along the lokang parallel to commonwealth road, into stirling road, meet a chinese lady carrying a baby with her mother who carries a floating tube. she asks marathon man, "may i know where's the swimming pool?"

"i 'm sorry, i don't know. i don't live here."

there's a man approaching, i said, "ask him, he may know.... hello, you know where's the swimming pool?"

"there. go straight..turn.."

come to queens the 40-story condo. very nice. go into angora close, some landed houses. go into sherpherd's dr, barbaury walk, merino cresent, a pleasantly surprise find of a mossel of landed housing estate, with both sides of the road planted heavily with trees and palms, within a realm of tranquility that likens to a cul-desac surroundings.

the mrt line is not far away, but you would not hear the noises from the wheels brushing against the rails. then he goes into alexander road, stops over in dawson place, a small mall, with an ntuc supermart and some common shops. he takes a leak in the loo, continues on from dawosn road to margaret drive, then down to tangling road. before he can decide where to head to, the sky opens up, and he has to dash to the nearest bus-stop to take shelter....

the pouring rain sweeps across the road, blowing up dusts and debris from the road, bringing in a gust of warm and moist air. marathon man sweats, the lady beside him is obviously affected by his sweaty look and scent. she says, "you, sweat alot, very good."

"i'm just too hot a person to handle."

"no sweat for me... i am a hot gal myself. when i look at hot stuff, my juice will flow, like you would sweat."

"ah... so you are. can i have your number?"

"well, i didn't mean what you think i meant."

"what actually you meant, then?"

"i know, you thot i meant that i'm an outgoing kind of sarong party gal..... do i look one?"

"ah... at least you sound one."

"oh... you mean the way i am talking to you, a stranger?"

"well... you should know better."

"ok. i agree i'm a loose mouth. but not loose in conduct. in fact when i said i'm a hot gal, i just meant i like spicy hot stuff...."

"then why juice flowing?"

"salivating lah. where's your mind into?"

"hmmm.... i must be too obscessed into that thing."

"well.... i don't blame you. which man wouldn't when a well-build lady stranger like myself takes the lead to talk to him?"

"tell me, you think life is some kind of an obscession? like some men, like myself obscessed with beautiful ladies.... you obscessed with hot spicy stuff?"

"i don't know frankly. i am not obscessed with knowing what life is all about. i only know spicy hot stuff gives me a kick. that's all i need out of my life."

live forever

hainan men are lucky. you see tham laze around in coffee shops in the suburbs, while their women toil like a cow; selling vegie's along the road, tilling the land, mending the fences, taking care of the kids.....

"i want to be a man in hainan." ys said.

"but look, the women work so hard, they hardly look anything like a woman. you think you would be happy with having a wife looking like your plumber?"

"no problem, just go to haikou for some fun, you can get all the women you want."

they had a good round of golf in tongshan lake golf and country club. the weather was hot and humid, hotter than singapore and wetter then sentosa.

at nite they had huainan food, and did some massage in a 'registered' masssage parlor. marathon man asked for extra service, the gal from hupei said, no. simple and straight.

ys and david were keen in the helicopter style love making, which the guide said, the private club's ladies can offer - the buffet style, 100 styles for you to try.

marathon man had the itch but stopped putting up his hand when asked who wanted to try.

for the rest of their trip, they play golf in may flower, west coast, moonbay, taida. they also went down to boau, a small town where the asian economic forum is held every year, where the bund at the mouth of the 3 rivers and the sea presented a very unqiue geographical feature to the tourists, by the hordes, mainly from inland china, some of whom had never seen the sea in their lives. in sanya, they visited the yalong bay, a 13-km beach with pristine, flour-fine white beach, the tienya-haizhiao, a stretch of beach, nearby sanya, the nanshan cultural zone, where they marvelled at a taller-then-the-statue-of-liberty kuanyin statue, in luhuitou where a beautiful legend of ahhei(the li tribe's young hero) and the fairy-like damsel wove their love story, and the tonghai beach where the locals went chilling out.

back in haikou, marathon man witness a weird thing in wanlue park, a group of people throwing wide-neck bottles with white powder, tied to some strings into the sea, then hawling up small fishes inside the bottles.... how many ways you think you can catch a fish???

in wanlue park, the people take their time to enjoy the place though it's not a weekend, and though it's still office hour. a father bringing his only kid, to skate. the only boy of the family demanding to have the kite held up high for him to fly....

marathon man asked the father, "your son is a very cute, how old is he?"

"15."

to marathon man he looks big but very childish the way he demands things from his father.

"is he your only child."

"yes."

"what's your plan for him?"

"simple - everything i have, i give to him."

"no plan for him?"

"the plan is simple as i said - he can do whatever he wants, but i only do whatever that's pleasing to him."

"ah.... great father!"

"don't try to be sarcastic. you are young, are you married? have kids?"

"no."

"you don't know how precious kid to a family. now that we are allowed to have one only, he's more precious than my life."

"is life for procreation only?"

"you bet. else, what for?"

"then you might as well clone yourself, why get married?"

"clone? oh ya. i would go for that. but wonder whether my clone will be having the same mind as i?"

"probably same."

"oh... good. then why forbid it?"

"same body, same mind.... human individuals just hang on to life forever.... imagine, you will be so free to do anything, without the worry of vanishing from the world..."

"is that what GOD is all about?"

"may be, with experience as old as the age of the universe, HE should know all that's to be known, and do all that's imaginable!"

"my son - can do whatever he likes..... is like GOD also."