Love to love

We're all suffering from crappy mood swings.

And I just hope everything will be fine when I open my eyes tomorrow morning.









"It's our God-foresaken right to love, love, love."

Listen to him. He's right.

Tuesdays

What a way to waste away my free Tuesday. So apparently I emptied out Tuesdays on my timetable since I didn't have any lectures, in hope that I'll have more time to crash out at home/study/sleep. I'm taking modules I'm totally unfamiliar with this semester (NM2216 Introduction to Interactive Media Design, NM2208 Principles of Visual Communication, NM3204 E-Learning, NM3215 Advertising Strategies, JS2224 Japan and Singapore), so I'm totally counting on my lucky stars this time. I hope that putting in extra effort will mean a much better grade than I scored last semester.




Oh, and does anyone know that Nohara-san's back in Japan? He was the Japanese tourist who got stranded at the Mexico Airport last September, and became an instant 'star' there, having stayed there for a period of three months. I thought it was pretty cute.

Red Cliff 2 - Couldn't blame the ratings for falling (5.0 for Part I to 3.5 for Part II). For the non-Red Cliff viewer, it's a horribly draggy war movie with gunks of fake blood, Albino pigeons flapping around and a bad actress. To quote Jack's buddy Gordon, it was a “又長又臭的電影”("Long and smelly"). Haha. I felt pretty cheated when the sequel wasn't shown on the proposed September date last year, but the wait was worth it; at least I didn't have as high an expectation for Part II than Part I. For those who'll love to have a piece of the disappointment, go for the GV Red Cliff Movie Marathon. Just get those water cushions ready for the 300-minute ride.

And I feel bad for bangseh-ing the auditions today. One for abandoning the judging panel, and another for giving up on Yuching's song. I just thought it wasn't something I was capable of carrying off today (not even smoking through) with the abhorrent lump in my throat. Plus the lyrics were woven so thickly together, it's impossible to get it done in one breath. Good for recording, bad for 'live' performance. Just my frankest comments.

Live life and love

Before the new term officially starts, let's take some time to read some news here.

Anti-suicide mission - The Straits Times Online

TOJINBO (Japan) - RETIRED policeman Yukio Shige is still on patrol, walking daily along the Tojinbo cliff, one of the best-known suicide spots in Japan where he pursues a private mission to prevent people leaping.
Mr Shige's method of persuading someone to stay alive is quite simple, he said.
When he spots a person standing on the edge of the cliff, he talks to them gently and brings them back to his cafe, where he serves them warm rice cake.
'You can see what the person is here for just by looking at the way they stand on the edge,' he said. 'Most of them look relieved and soon break down in tears when I just say hi.' Mr Shige, 64, said he had no idea until just before his retirement in 2004 how many people jump to their deaths from the sheer rocky cliff of Tojinbo, which faces the crashing waves of the Sea of Japan (East Sea).
'I've seen as many as 10 dead bodies being recovered in one month,' he said.
'I was just stunned by this, but what struck me even more was that people here said it was normal for this place.' Upon retiring, he opened a small cafe near the cliff edge and established a non-profit group to support people coming to Tojinbo in distress.
Since then he has patrolled along some 1.4 kilometres of the rocky cliff almost every day, scouring the precipice with binoculars.
He and his supporters say they have prevented 167 people from leaping in the past four years and eight months.
Now, however, he worries that the number of people wanting to commit suicide will grow as the global economic crisis threatens to hit Japan hard.
Japan has one of the highest suicide rates in the world, with more than 30,000 people killing themselves every year since 1998.
In recent years, one of the main chosen methods has been burning charcoal in cars to die of carbon monoxide poisoning, as well as mixing bath salts and detergent to create a deadly gas, a method widely available on the Internet.
Police data from 2007 show depression was Japan's number one cause for suicide, followed by illness and debt.
In Tojinbo alone, 257 people leapt to their deaths in the decade to 2007, with many others attempting but failing to die, Mr Shige said.
Authorities have long neglected the issue as killing oneself tends to be considered a personal problem.
Nevertheless, in the face of such huge numbers, the Japanese government created a law in 2006 for the first time acknowledging suicide as a social challenge and encouraging local authorities to provide counselling and support to those who attempted to kill themselves.
Still, Mr Shige notes, Tojinbo's city authorities have not put up a single fence or warning sign along the cliff, nor responded to his incessant calls for an official counselling centre near the edge.
- Tourism industry advertising 'suicide spot' - Before retiring to Tojinbo, Mr Shige spent most of his 42-year career as a detective, chasing crimes such as underground gambling and drug violations.
Five years ago, the last before his retirement, he was assigned to a police station covering Tojinbo cliff in central Fukui prefecture.
While shocked to see the place as a chosen suicide spot, he was further distressed by the gruesome realisation that Tojinbo's local economy relies on this fact to support and promote its tourism industry.
'Guides on the ferry would make sure to introduce this place as a big suicide spot while crowds of visitors come here in buses hanging the sign 'The Mystery Tour',' Mr Shige said in disgust.
'I asked tour guides to stop advertising Tojinbo as a suicide spot, but a local town assembly member once told me tourists would never come to a place like this otherwise. 'So why don't you leave it alone,' he said.' Noting that local stores sell T-shirts with slogans reading 'I'm tired of living' or 'I live in hell', Mr Shige said: 'I would say this place has solicited people's suicides.' He fears that without funding for his own non-profit efforts he and his partner, Ms Misako Kawagoe, will find it difficult to continue their mission.
In the first year after they started the group, it went 1.2 million yen into the red. It also posted losses for the next two years.
- Remembering lives lost - Five years ago, while still a policeman, Mr Shige spotted an elderly couple sitting on a bench for hours watching waves breaking on the cliff.
They said they had come to kill themselves because, after shutting down their Tokyo bar, they were left with a debt of two million yen they had no way of paying off.
'I persuaded them to keep trying and promised that the local social security office would take care of them,' Mr Shige said.
But he later heard that after a distressing round of begging trips to various government offices, they had gone elsewhere and hanged themselves.
'Public help is the last resort for people like them,' he said. 'I promised myself I wouldn't stop until the government starts moving.' Mr Shige and Ms Kawagoe often travel home with the people they talk out of suicide. And when people have no home to go to, the pair find them somewhere to live and give them money until they can get by on their own.
While Mr Shige is the frontman in the operation, Ms Kawagoe has her own reasons to help people on the edge.
'I myself lost my parents in suicides when I was 15,' said Ms Kawagoe. 'My father hanged himself and my mother later swallowed pesticide to follow him.
Both times I found their bodies.
'I had never disclosed this to anyone. But when Mr Shige asked me to join his work, I thought I had to face it,' she said.
'I learned many people have their own problems. I just cannot let them go alone,' she said.
- New fears mounting - Mr Shige fears the current economic turmoil could push more people towards suicide, especially with tens of thousands of contract workers being laid off across the country.
Due to the global downturn, Japanese firms including leading automakers have downgraded their earnings, cut jobs and stopped factory lines as demand falls for exports.
'We are concerned that the number of people who try to commit suicide here may rapidly grow,' he said in a petition submitted to the local mayor and the tourism association, urging them to take action.
In November alone, he said, four out of six people he saved from suicide said they wanted to die because they could not find a job.
'To be honest, this is not easy work physically or financially. I could quit even tomorrow,' Mr Shige said with a cynical smile. 'But I will never stop until the government finally does something.' -- AFP

http://www.straitstimes.com/Breaking%2BNews/Asia/Story/STIStory_324836.html

Moral of the story?

There's alot of things worth living for. So why choose to die so soon? Perhaps I'm saying this because I can't put myself in the shoes of the retrenched salaryman, the elderly couple with 20 million yen of debt or someone whose immediate wish is to leave everything behind and seek sanctuary in the arms of death. But one thing that I know of, is that no matter how insignificant I think of myself to be, there's at least one soul out there in the world thinking of me, missing me, loving me, and waiting for me. Everyone's loved by someone on this Earth, so why choose to break their hearts?

I'm living, learning and loving every moment I have to live, and dying will be nothing on my mind. I wouldn't even think about it.

Love is you and me

There's a reason why I fell in love with you.

It's because I know that this love is what my life is lacking.

And it has to be

The little spring in my step which I carried over from 2008 to 2009 seems to be here to stay. While we're one week to the next semester, I'm maximising all the time I can afford to spend time with people I love. The new school semester is always fraught with new challenges and obstacles, so this final week's to recharge my batteries and oil my gears before diving into another stretch of 4 antagonizing months. The gurlies, the JC best mates, the primary school lost-and-found classmates, the uni friends, the family and, of course, Jack. Time spent with them is never enough, and goodbyes often have to end with fighting back tears and the urge to spend another minute with them. But I know the love, no matter the distance, will be here to stay and multiply.

Recounting today, I had a 10-lap lazy swim with Jack, with the dark clouds beckoning at us to get our asses out. Haha. And guess what I had for lunch? Chicken rice! Without the chicken, of course. The nostalgic blend of chicken stock, garlic, ginger, onions and pandan leaves left me craving for more, if not for the fact that I've already busted my tummy's capacity for lunch. Got egg tarts for the family's supper, and bused back to Jack's home. Mythbusters on Youtube, watching Jack playing some shooting game which I refuse to lay my hands on, checking my bidding. Then it was down to Toa Payoh for dinner and Bedtime Stories. They had couple couches! But God knows how many people have sat there and when was the last time the couches were cleaned. Haha. But it was a funny movie and, you know, sometimes, if you'd just dare to dream a little more, what you wish for may really come true. But only if you work for it. So that's lovely 2nd January 2009 with Jack.

Oh God. 12.03am. I'm so dead.