BLOGGER



Youngest kid of six with an inferiority and black sheep complex, but determined that God saves not just his soul to heaven but the remainder of his manic-depressive life, so others won't say he became a Christian and remained a jerk.


MAIN THEMES

On identity
i won't be transparent before i'm opaque. and you'll get to know me starting from the small things: who my favourite bands are. what kind of movies i like. who are my heroes.

On Christianity
I’m convinced that when confronted with sincere, real love, the Jesus factor will become obvious. But let’s not plant the cross before we carry it. I’m not trying to con you.

On dreams
Some dreams are meant to be achieved. I know that. But maybe other dreams are meant to drive us, privately. Never known to anyone but ourselves.


OTHER THEMES

On melancholy
It is a sadness that, when choosing between crying and sighing, will choose sighing. I'd almost say that melancholy is being sad about sadness itself.

On memory and nostalgia
It saddens me when life moves forward and people decide that certain things are worth forgetting.

On language
I've learnt that the word irregardless is filed as a non-standard word in the English language. That's a lexicographer's way of saying it's not a real word.

On politics
Crowds are fickle things. So when we stand in the thousands and cry against the present government, do we know who we're actually crying for?

On society
People always want the best for themselves. But I want to sometimes take second or third or fourth best, just so that the loser down the road doesn't always have to come in last. It must feel like shit to always come in last.

On growing old
Leasehold property make me feel sad. It doesn't matter how old the family photos are that you put on your wall. It's your family but it's not really your wall.

On philosophy
I ask you, if God loves everyone, and if God is also incapable of loving evil, how can there be such a thing as an evil man?

On a daily basis
One line quips, like this.


CHAT





Saturday, October 30, 2004
ALLEGIANCES AND A MATTER OF SPLITTING

ernest and i were just noting over dinner that audrey is a flavour of the month girl (haha! she won't object to it). you know, one day it's roberto baggio, then it's leonardo dicaprio, then it's ronaldo, another day it's i dunno... every few years she changes a new man. so that got me thinking about the whole idea of allegiances, firstly about football, and then about other larger things.

what makes people support certain teams? well, if they come from that place it's understandable. but for malaysians like me, what makes me supporting liverpool more sincere or silly than, say, steven's undying support for man utd? neither club has done anything personally special for us, save some good moments in front of a telly. most of the time, it's because these teams pricked our senses at one particular instance, and because of it, we started following.

i know cases of people following 'teams'. in the early 90s, i passionately supported the ac milan team that had van basten, gullit, riijkaard, baresi, donadoni, lentini, etc. but that was just a 'team' thing. it never went on to become a long-lasting love affair. when papin, boban, baggio and the rest came in to replace the old guard, i stopped liking them. today, i can say i love liverpool fc the 'club', not jus the team. i've been with them from the spice boys years through to the boring houllier years and now the spanish laced rafa benitez season. three managers and the heroes have gone from fowler to owen to luis garcia. there's no shaking my loyalty now.

so this is where the other things come in. from where i come from, there are few things that can spark a heated debate as football and religion. i'm sure it's the same across the world. what makes people put this kind of allegiance on any one thing? for me, a sold-out christian, i can tell you that i got all my faith in the Jesus basket because he has turned my life around, promises me a future and i can see that he has kept his word whenever he's spoken. but a football club? and what about the things that don't come near rivalling?

like nationalism! i know a time and a place where nationalism was top drawer when it came to allegiances. world war germany and japan, for instance. and what about politics? america seems so divided right now about allegiance to political figureheads. and what about economics? hey, don't laugh. the entire maoist era of china's history was one big case study on a people completely sold out, not to country or to persons or even politics, but to an economic policy that said private property was evil!

now, i would like to think i love malaysia more than liverpool fc. i probably never would have but for some choice words handed down by vernon some years ago about love for malaysia, so now i think i have allegiance to malaysia. i have allegiance to SIB, my church. i will defend our culture, pastors, leaders and beliefs fiercely. but my highest allegiance is and can only be that to my God, creator, savior, Jesus Christ.

and if i have all my eggs in his basket, then what are some eggs doing in the liverpool fc basket? can a person have his allegiances divided between different subjects matter and still consider all their eggs in one basket each time? i skip my matches to be in church... that's why i'm divided on this question.

what say you?

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Genusfrog [ 6:36 pm ]

1 Comments:

  • hmm ... that's an interesting question. but seeing as you skip matches to be in church. isn't it fair to say your alegiance clearly belong to the church, God? I mean. There hardly seems to be a struggle? God never said we cannot love any other other thing. He just requires us not to love any other thing more than Him. He requires us to put Him first. You've clearly done that, no?

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 1:33 pm  

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