Average Looking Mat

Is it me or have the people and the world around me grown sadder? Is it me or has depression become the world’s fastest growing illness sensation?

I think I have all the right to claim that I am sad and I am depressed…

… at one point of time or another…

At one point of time I was earning wages so pitiful that I should be inducted into the Hall of Shame and Embarrassment. No… job was fine. It was just that compared to most people next to the people who earn nothing, I have a pitiful salary. Even the dole ‘parasites’ (just to emphasise how pitiful I am, no characterisation intended) earn more than I do.

At one point of time my earning was so pitiful that I walked to and from school to home, and I mean not a 5 min leisurely walk, but a 5-10km walk. But if I took the bus I would not have enough money a cup of vending machine coffee let alone lunch. I mean that will probably be fine if I live with my parents. They will probably provide food and transport and a whole lot of other good stuffs.

Yeah I know, it’s not the worst of situations…

Speaking of which, I did, at one point of time had no roof over my head. For about 2 weeks I stayed with Anuar because we hadn’t found a place to stay. Everything’s borrowed. I felt so out of place. His hospitality (god bless his soul) was excellent. Never met such a great host before. But still I was living on borrowed land, it wasn’t even rented. Man, was that depressing… that was very depressing…

Uprooting certainly didn’t help. True I have made friends, good friends they are but not close or best yet. The ones that you can count on when your chips are down. the people whom help you pick yourself up when you have fallen in whichever means possible. The ones that would give you a good roasting yet keeping that tie intact. Nope. None of that…

So, no money, no friends, no family… depression… not quite…

You see, I have never quite felt depressed… cause I never quite see that way… maybe I am depressed but I have just willed myself out of it… not that I have great will power… far from it… but I’ve not dwelled and drowned in it… not yet. Maybe not yet…

Is it me or have the people and the world around me grown sadder? Is it me or has depression become the world’s fastest growing illness sensation?

I think I have all the right to claim that I am sad and I am depressed…

… at one point of time or another…

At one point of time I was earning wages so pitiful that I should be inducted into the Hall of Shame and Embarrassment. No… job was fine. It was just that compared to most people next to the people who earn nothing, I have a pitiful salary. Even the dole ‘parasites’ (just to emphasise how pitiful I am, no characterisation intended) earn more than I do.

At one point of time my earning was so pitiful that I walked to and from school to home, and I mean not a 5 min leisurely walk, but a 5-10km walk. But if I took the bus I would not have enough money a cup of vending machine coffee let alone lunch. I mean that will probably be fine if I live with my parents. They will probably provide food and transport and a whole lot of other good stuffs.

Yeah I know, it’s not the worst of situations…

Speaking of which, I did, at one point of time had no roof over my head. For about 2 weeks I stayed with Anuar because we hadn’t found a place to stay. Everything’s borrowed. I felt so out of place. His hospitality (god bless his soul) was excellent. Never met such a great host before. But still I was living on borrowed land, it wasn’t even rented. Man, was that depressing… that was very depressing…

Uprooting certainly didn’t help. True I have made friends, good friends they are but not close or best yet. The ones that you can count on when your chips are down. the people whom help you pick yourself up when you have fallen in whichever means possible. The ones that would give you a good roasting yet keeping that tie intact. Nope. None of that…

So, no money, no friends, no family… depression… not quite…

You see, I have never quite felt depressed… cause I never quite see that way… maybe I am depressed but I have just willed myself out of it… not that I have great will power… far from it… but I’ve not dwelled and drowned in it… not yet. Maybe not yet…

For the past few weeks I’ve been stressed about my application for permanent residency. It is not so much on whether I would get a PR or not, that I will worry later but obtaining the right documents fast. And the thing is, nothing is fast in day and age of technological advancement. This is because with civilisation, apart from the advancement of science and technology, comes the bad part about civilisation – bureaucracy.

You know how it is. You ask for something, a document for example and the person whom you are speaking to has no power to say yes or no if it is out of his or her job scope. So that person has to ask to supervisor, who in turn has to ask for his or her supervisor who holds the power to say yes or no but is unable to because of bureaucratic constraints. In any case, the supervisor gives the answer to the first supervisor mentioned without giving a reason who in turns gives the answer to the person whom you talked to in the first place. In turn you will ask for a reason and the person attending to you has to get back to you as soon as the bureaucratic loop completes another circle.

Despite such painful events such as banging the table on the student central on a helpless employee who knows nothing except to do what he is programmed to do and not take initiative, I still have faith in mankind. That is before mankind self-destructs.

O how I long for Jesus’ second coming….

Liverpool just crashed out of the Champions League.

How do I feel? Gutted.

Ah well… have to look forward to next season then. And after all the talk, controversy over their participation in competition, the fairy tale is finally over. Although they have better players this season, I don’t think they were better than last in the competition. The difference is, last year they played with their hearts. This season they are playing with tactical nuance… neither is better than the other… but because of their shortcomings last year, they had to make up for it in passion. On top of that they were seriously horrible in the league, so somehow they have to make up for it in Europe. But this season they play with a purpose but unfortunately that hasn’t been perfected yet. Ah well… there’s always next season and the FA Cup.

Why is everything American bad? Is it truly really that they (the political and economic superpower) are evil? Or have they been demonised by an envious ‘the rest of the world’?

Have they really been bad? At a glance they have not been the big bad wolf we, the rest of the world has made them out to be for the past two hundred years. Edison gave us the thing that was once previously an exclusive realm of the Lord. Bell gave us the telecommunications and license for everyone to go yakking away and eventually talk to ourselves like madman to the voices in our ears. And then Ford gave us the automobile and a reason to look cool. The Wright Brothers gave us wings before Red Bull even thought of it. Well, the long and short of it all is that they made the world more technologically savvy. Not to mention advances in knowledge, in areas of science and literature and the arts in general. Judging from these acts, no one would think that they are ‘bad’ by far.

It was due to these advances, the US rose to prominence in the 20th Century. They rose above all nations and states and became by the end of that century a prosperous nation. And with that power they became the single most powerful economy in the world and hence controlled the economy of the world. Because of that everyone had to follow and imitate them, (which includes their outrageous sense of fashion and music). That is the norm isn’t it? I mean that is not the first time in human history that happens. When the Indians were the most powerful, everyone were into Bollywood. When the Egyptians were in power, everyone danced to the tune of ‘Walk like an Egyptian.’ When Greek were powerful, everyone thought they were a God or Goddess or some smart-ass philosopher. When the Romans ruled, everyone thought the Italian accent was sexy. And when the Chinese came to power, everyone decided on eating noodles and dim sum and did the Kung Fu hustle. Well you get my drift.

But are they bad? My answer is no. Arrogant? Probably. But they have the right to be so simply because they earned it. Furthermore, they did something right. They worked hard and studied hard. That is the simple formula to success. I am not saying that the rest of the world did not but what I am saying is that the rest did not work as hard, and studied as hard. Yes if only we had worked harder.

The long and short of it all is that we, the rest of the world are envious of their success. Envy breeds contempt. And the contempt of it breeds the trouble we have today. Or is it?