IT'S A PANDAN LIFE ...!

You have no idea how hard I've looked for a gift to bring You. Nothing seemed right. What's the point of bringing gold to the gold mine, or water to the ocean. Everything I came up with was like ... taking spices to the Orient. It's no good giving my heart and my soul because you already have these. So I've brought you a mirror. Look at yourself and remember me. This poem was written by Rumi (1207-1273), a remowned Persian poet. I have always loved his poems. I think I have about 3 or 4 books by Rumi. Some I've read and some I haven't. What I love about his poems is the ambiguity, or, the different layers of meaning. Sometimes however, it is not easy to decipher these meanings. Like onions, you have to peel these layers one by one. Known as a Sufi poet, his poems naturally revolve around God, but as can be seen from the poem above, his  poems can also be read as love poems. As in human love *chuckle*. I can ...

If you were going to die soon and had only one phone call you could make, who would you call and what would you say? And why are you waiting? ~Stephen Levine Waiting. Nobody in his or her right mind would want to do this, I’m sure. If it's two or three minutes, it's probably nothing. But 18 years? It's surely exhausting, torturous and nerve-wrecking. Especially if the outcome is a big let-down. But what if it’s the opposite? Is the opposite possible? And if the outcome is positive, is it worth all the heartache and trials and tribulations? These were the questions that I had in mind when I was reading Waiting by Ha Jin. I had seen this book a couple of times in the bookstore but due to other pressing reading engagement, I resisted the urge to buy it. But the blurb really had a brain-itchy effect that eventually I gave in, picked it up from the shelf, went home and straight away started reading it. It was awesome, simply unputdownable! Set in communist China from ...

by Pablo Neruda (1904-1973) I don't love you as if you were a rose of salt, topaz, or arrow of carnations that propagate fire: I love you as one loves certain dark things, secretly, between the shadow and the soul. I love you as the plant that doesn't bloom and carries the light of those flowers, hidden, within itself, and thanks to your love the tight aroma that rose from the earth lives in my body in darkness. I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where I love you directly without problems or pride: I love you like this because I don't know any other way to love except in this form in which I am not nor are you, so close that your hand upon my chest is mine, so close that your eyes close with my dreams. This is a poem by my favourite Chilean poet, Pablo Neruda. Known for his love poems, I like the central idea of this poem that it is just so hard to put into words why you love someone. Irony is at play when the speaker actually describes how, ignoring and oppos...

by Margaret Atwood (b. 1939) I would like to watch you sleeping, which may not happen. I would like to watch you, sleeping. I would like to sleep with you, to enter your sleep as its smooth dark wave slides over my head and walk with you through that lucent wavering forest of bluegreen leaves with its watery sun & three moons towards the cave where you must descend, towards your worst fear I would like to give you the silver branch, the small white flower, the one word that will protect you from the grief at the center of your dream, from the grief at the center I would like to follow you up the long stairway again & become the boat that would row you back carefully, a flame in two cupped hands to where your body lies beside me, and as you enter it as easily as breathing in I would like to be the air that inhabits you for a moment only. I would like to be that unnoticed & that necessary. This is a poem by my favourite author, Margaret Atwood. It speaks of the need to be wit...

by Robert Frost (1874-1963) Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth; Then took the other, as just as fair, And having perhaps the better claim, Because it was grassy and wanted wear; Though as for that the passing there Had worn them really about the same, And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black. Oh, I kept the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back. I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-- I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference. This is one of my favourite poems. Often, we have choices laid in front of us. At some point in time, we have to choose one out of those options, which is not easy and requires careful deliberation. What compounds it is that we know that this ...

Love can consign us to hell or to paradise, but it always takes us somewhere. ~ Paul Coelho After reading Ben Okri’s In Arcadia , I kept on thinking about the writer’s vision of Arcadia. It’s true that the place did exist (as history has proven), and people from all walks of life since antiquity have discussed, imagined, explored, debated, and interpreted this entity called ‘Arcadia’ but ideally, it can only exist in one’s heart. All six characters in this novel have different ideas of what is Arcadia and in the end, the only similarity between these conflicting notions is, Arcadia is just an imaginary idyllic paradise. On earth. You either see it or you don’t. You either feel it or you don’t. Hmm. Nice paradoxes. The minute I finished reading this novel, I began to question: “What is my Arcadia?” I don’t think my definition of Arcadia is any different from Jute’s definition (Jute is one of the characters). Jute thinks that her work is Arcadia. To have work to do, work that you like ...

Trengganu did exist once, as Terengganu does now. ~ Awang Goneng I came across Growing Up in Trengganu by Awang Goneng during one of my trips to UM’s bookshop. There were a few copies left and after reading the impressive blurb on the back cover, I quickly bought it. It took me quite some time to actually start reading it but when I did, it was unputdownable! I haven’t come across a truly captivating account of the East Coast since Che Husna Azhari’s Melor in Perspectives – a remarkable collection of short stories set in Kelantan. Growing Up in Trengganu started off as the blog of freelance writer, Wan A. Hulaimi. Because it was too good to exist only in cyberspace, a good Samaritan somewhere in Singapore decided to publish it. It goes without saying that this book is a collection of Goneng’s fond recollections of the time he grew up in Trengganu. Indeed, his powers of recollection are extraordinary. His accounts of people, places, food, history and Trengganuspeak leave me in awe....

You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them. ~ Mohandas Gandhi Right now I am still amazed by what my job leads me to. Recently, it led me to an apostle of freedom. This man, who has been installed as one of the persons of the 20th century by the Times magazine, is none other than Gandhi. I must admit I had almost zero knowledge about this man. Besides the fact that he walked around in white loincloth, leading India to independence, I had no idea what is it about him that appealed to the Indian nation. What more to the entire world. Since one of the literary texts I covered in class had a lot to do with this skinny frail man’s revolutionary ideas, I had no choice but to read up on him (not that I mind). Much to my delight, I discovered so many interesting facts about him, which rendered me speechless. For he is the apostle of not only freedom but also so many other things that other leaders might have forgotten in the course of their mis...

You can't do anything about the length of your life, but you can do something about its width and depth. ~ Evan Esar After reading Margaret Atwood's "Happy Endings" recently, I can't help but ponder about this topic for quite some time. What is a happy ending, by the way? Is there a definition for it? While flipping through a book that belongs to Ariani last weekend, I came across a writer's ingenious explanation about what is a happy ending. A happy ending is one that satisfies; in terms of fittingness (the ending is earned, through the actions done) and definiteness (the ending is really clear, appropriate and over and done with). For someone who deals with literary works all the time, the ending of the story is not really important to me. Why? Is there such thing as a happy ending in our lives? Isn't death the ending for everyone? Aren't the how's and the why's more fun to look at? If someone dies, wouldn't we want to know why and how t...

Every object, every being, is a jar full of delight. ~ Rumi I came across these quotes while doing a research on O. Henry, an American writer known for crafting tricky twists in his stories: 1. Write what you like; there is no other rule. 2. Inject a few raisins of conversation into the tasteless dough of life. 3. Life is sobs, sniffles, and smiles, with sniffles predominating. 4. If men knew how women pass the time when they are alone, they'd never marry. These quotes are not only funny but they're also true. They made me beam with delight today! It's Monday, you know (obviously not my favourite day...) Originally posted on http://izzyz7.reciter.com on 5 August 2007

God is love, but get it in writing. ~Gypsy Rose Lee Teaching drama is not easy. Especially when you only have the text, and not the performance i.e. theatre, video or film. This is always the case where teaching drama at my place is concerned. Sigh. Unless we deal with Shakespeare's drama. Anyway, a teacher has got to be resourceful. Recently, my kids and I did "The Prodigal Son" by Garrison Keillor. I wasn't really impressed with this drama at first. After all, it is just a comedy. A satirical one. But after doing some research on the Net, I found that it is also a parody - a text which is copied from another text, but written in a humouros way. This drama is actually based on "The Parable of the Prodigal Son", a parable in the Bible. The parable revolves around three main characters, The Father, The Good Son and The Prodigal Son. The Prodigal Son, as his name suggests, asked his father to give him his share of the father's wealth, set off for a dista...

Never judge a book by its movie. ~ J. W. Eagan I reckon life would be pretty dull without writers. Recently I finished reading The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro - a British writer of Japanese descent. The pace of the story is pretty slow but what I find particularly intriguing is the writer's style which, if one didn't look at his name, one would think he's a real British Mat Salleh. Coming from a second generation immigrant background, it's really amazing how he can encapsulate the British way of life just by having a butler as the protagonist. A conversation I had with a colleague shed a light on Ishiguro's style - when he writes about Britain, his work would have one mistake him as a pure British Mat Salleh. When he writes about Japan, his work would have one mistake him as a pure Japanese. I've gotta read that Japanese-setting novel of his soon...What is the title, by the way? Other literary works I've also read recently are Pride and Prejudice by...

We read deeply for varied reasons, most of them familiar, that we cannot know enough people profoundly enough; that we need to know ourselves better; that we require knowledge, not just of self and others, but of the way things are. ~ Harold Bloom Reading is a must for me. Thanks to my parents, this habit was inculcated in me at a very young age. My dad (God bless his soul) would read me books in English and translate them to Malay.My mom would be doing her stuff and listen in and add a thing or two. It was fun, but after a while I got fed up and wanted to read on my own. So in school I would borrow books in English and read them on my own and ask my dad to translate whenever I didn't understand something. My interest in reading heightened when at the age of 14, my mom brought back a Mills & Boon from office and asked if I wanted to read it. I took weeks to finish and actually understand what I was reading but that was like a turning point in my life because I realized that I ...