Ideal Reality....

I live in two conflicting worlds, and when I stand looking out the balcony I see two scenes. The concrete buildings of the condominiums around me, and the far away hills that roll its way around the country, reflective of its own true beauty. The country I live in is full of conflicts, and as it goes ahead towards ambition and development, it forgets its identity, stripping itself into a state of insecurity, going back and forth fighting within herself for a sense of who she is. She runs in circles...sadly.

The way she has to go, she thinks, is to allow herself to be adorned with architecture, some statelier than others, some disgraceful, and allow herself to be tricked into thinking she wants, so badly, a certain sense of recognition, for what - her economic success, or transformation? She runs, she chases, she hopes for a sense of place. She makes brash statements, reflective of her eagerness to put up a face. In reality, she is but a confused girl, caught between two conflicting worlds, the world of the far away hills, and the concrete.

Her brains are scattered, with confused leaders and no transparent intentions, or clear ambitions. Policies are not concrete, do they exist? She is not aware, of her own purpose, her own missions, her own strengths, her own self. So she floats, reacting, towards all around her, her mother, now old and yet she is always trying to prove herself to her, her sister, smaller yet stronger, disciplined to whom she tries to show a sense of strength over yet fails. Her faraway friend down below she aspires to, for she is beautiful and quiet in her own ways, yet unwavering in what she is in the world for.

The bullies around her, often wrapping their own agendas in sugar, and dressed in pretense of goodwill but in fact they are just trying to get their way and move forward. Often boasting their achievements which after some years prove to be but nothing. The selfish ones, they move forward in their own agenda, without caring. And her body, her body threatens to fail those who live within her.  Her people are beautiful, with their own strengths, yet caught up, to fall into the depths of...shallowness, those who are not are lost in an identity crisis.

I live in two conflicting worlds. In the mornings I feel closer to something other than the concrete. Dreams are realities, and I feel I can skip, fly, jump to heaven which is but a step away. The sun is bright and shining, and I can do just about anything, people are loving, empowering, and I am free. But I get into my car, and walk on the streets towards work, and hear the steel doors roll down shut. And I am stuck inside in the cold, and unable to fly. Caught within webs of someone else's agenda. I am caught between my ideals and my reality. So daily I fight. And hopefully one day, my ideals, get closer to becoming a reality.

I look out at her rather attractive face, and want to tell her she is beautiful. I wish she would embrace with a quiet confidence her own true beauty, and grow, the way she will, forward, with strength. I hope her brains wake up and recognise the very beauty of her and move her the right way. Until then, we all live daily, with a bit of heartache, a bit of discomfort for we are all caught between her reality, and her ideals.

How can they be reconciled?

Yellow Knight

She looked him in the eye and smiled as she curtsied and addressed him, pronouncing clearly the word Sir. Her first yellow knight. The title sir is not one any man can simply receive. We all know half the story of how knights are chosen, the queens handpicks them, but those are the knights of the world. How many have heard of the Order of the Knight Seekers? She was one of them seekers, but to be sought by her was an honour, for she was the head seeker of the knighthood of the yellow.

We have all heard of the white knights, and the dark ones. White knights were easy to spot, a rarity, but easy to spot. Any amateur seeker would be able to spot white knights, that is why there is a plethora of them. They are the harvard, oxford going developmental academics, the high fliers, the ones that ooze with nobleness and goodness. The ones that are slightly boring, the churchgoing civil servants. She grew bored of being the white seeker as quickly as a week and turned in the easy living to be a seeker of the knighthood of the dark.

Oh that position took her places, for it was not easy seeking out a dark knight. They are so often wrapped in layers of deceitful bad behaviour that it is hard to discern. The dark places needed their knights and so she worked hard. But it was the dark knights that caused her to be burnt out as much as she loved that job. The places she would go in search of the dark knight, for the dark knight loomed in dark places and could only be found out if one can see through souls. She grew tired in time for those quests were long and hard, often jaded by the deceitful dark knight wannabes.

She was summoned one rainy night to be given a new task. Have you heard of the yellow knight, her mistress asked her. She nodded. The yellow knight were the rarest for the were so often hidden among the ordinary. But the high and low places has knights enough for the ladies, it was this in-between world, the ordinary one that is hungry for its knights and where there are no knights, the ladies retire into being normal. 

It had been a long quest, seeking out yellow knights, she had begun to lose heart, for maybe the ordinary world had no knights. No one worthy of being called sir. No one, yellow.  It was that particular night, when the rain poured down heavy that fear began to shoot up within her heart for the females who lived in the world. They are doomed to decripitude, and to slide down the slippery slope of eroded values. No knights, no ladies. The ordinary world is doomed.

They had stolen her shoes, and it was pouring down heavy. She glided across town drenched hiding her shoeless feet beneath her long white skirt. She slipped into the dimly lit restaurant where the jazz band had begun playing and wrapped her scarf tightly around herself. She popped into the bathroom and dried out a little using some toilet paper as she stood under the hand dryer.

She slowly emerged and scanned the place but it was hard to see, not only was it dimly lit but it was smoky. The bassist, eyes-closed moved his body to the beat of his own music and his shoulders rocked forward and back while the drummer, young, she could tell, was skillful, yes but lacked the character of a seasoned musician. He was a little too loud, too keen to show off. The pianist, she sighed, his enthusiasm took personality out of the band, too brash. They were too brash. 

She tiptoed between the tables, it was a full-house that night. She looked at each face as closely as she can while she walked past. How many of these she wondered actually appreciated this music? The couple seated in the centre was full of it, both dressed in black, he had his head cocked to the right and hands folded, it was hard to get the word pretentious out of her mind as she examined his face. She passed him by. And then there was he with the sunglasses, in the middle of a stormy night, in a smoky dimly lit restaurant. She chuckled, the restaurant was not the only thing that was dim, the brightness of his wit was questionable.

She huddled up in the corner and greeted the waitress who served her a cup of hot chocolate, just because she looked awfully cold. Her toes were beginning to turn purple, she tucked them in under her skirt as she slid onto a stool. 

Her white skirt grew crisp as it dried under the air conditioning and her body warmed up and she yawned, tired. She slid off the stool and out the door back into the rainy night and walked back to her the flat in yellowtown reflecting along the way on all the faces she had seen and wondering if she had missed a yellow knight. She sighed, for she had not seen a heart of quality that night, and wondered how rare it is in this world for a bright yellow heart.

She hummed a tune and tiptoed home noting to herself she was in need of new shoes. The gravel underneath her feet begins to hurt it but the mist and cold had brought a certain different to the place. A rider rode pass in a white horse and she lifted her brow. It was cliche really, so she dismissed it and slipped into the back alley and followed the road back to the flat.

She turned back into the main road as the rider rode past again and this time she caught the rider's eye. He bowed slightly as he lifted his hat to greet her, and he smiled a smile that warmed her heart. She curtsied and turned to unlock her door thinking that it could not be, for it was cliche really, maybe this is why she never forgot her first yellow knight.

She slipped out of her wet clothes and into the hot shower she pondered upon the rider in yellow and blue. That was easy, for it was her mistress' instructions that a yellow knight is distinguished by his warmth and ability to make the heart smile. She took out her note book and wrote down his name.

She took out her red dress and dialed her mistress' number for it had been a while before she pronounced clearly the title only a deserving man could bear, Sir. She sighed a sigh of relief and smiled, for this ordinary world was not so knight-less after all. Bless the ladies.

Barter Trade

He was a small man, and his eccentricity was often laughed at by the masses, but he lived in a world of his own, mainly because he had the opportunity of acquiring much enlightenment that the masses hadn't and that set him apart. Being set apart however is a lonely thing indeed.

I, sadly, was very much with the masses during my early years, and have not until now appreciated the little Nigel Jamieson. I would often snigger or laugh when he makes a blunder, and I would often find myself lost in thought in the middle of Jamieson's legal history lectures because I was not quite at the level of intelligence to understand his rants. So I often tried very hard to capture the gist of what he is saying as he paced up and down the front of the lecture theatre going on about speluncean explorers and such.

There is something about being eccentric like that, because rumours so far fetched such as "he drafted the russian constitution" can go around and still be believed. After a couple of years at law school I have come to unconsciously aspire to be Jamieson myself. But alas I am not quite as eccentric. All I had was my Asianess, and so I went around as that Asian girl who never said a word at tutorials, and yet still passes.

Jamieson popped to mind today though funny enough in the light of the principle of competition. While hashing out in my mind what the implications of a merger between MAS and Air Asia would be, while troubled over the niggling question of how to make my business plan slightly more commercially viable one of his lectures, yes the man's obscure's lectures, came to mind. You see Jamieson adored the principle of barter, and being a legal history professor I guess he would adore any principle ancient, but the little elfish man seemed to think that the creation of money somewhat took out the magic out of commerce.

I often think I was born in the wrong century, but the skills which I have to offer crossed my mind. Would my skill be, how should I say, barter-able? What do I have to give that would ensure I will not starve to death? Will I be writing stories to the rich in exchange for board, or I could write in exchange for some land, which I could then use to barter for my groceries, I mean how much can a girl eat, right? But of course then there would be days I would be frustrated, you know during bad times where reading is only for those with the luxury of time, and then what?

May I be so inclined to display the weakness of a woman then, and be oh so Austen-ian. After all, I have something else to barter, my child-bearing abilities as a woman, no? Or my beauty, if any would appreciate? Or my qualities as the noble woman, as a wife and mother. And then maybe I would be so inclined to travel out towards the suburbs where Mr.Farmer lives and just bat my eyelashes at his dashing son in whom lies the promises of days without starvation. Of course unless there is drought. Then woe to me.

Rest assured, that was just a thought, the modernist in me is appalled at that idea. But what is the difference really between then and now. With dollars or not, it is really about offering something that might appeal, no? Of course nowadays we have marketeers, beings that find themselves with the job of telling you what is desirable to you. Roll your eyes, yes.

Try this for a while, in the tune of Lennon's song, sing this to yourself, imagine there are no dollars. No money. No money. Let your thoughts run wild a little and fantasise what it is like, despite your busyness, if we were all still trading in the barter system. What is it of yours that I would find desirable enough to trade something of mine with. Who then would be the poor men? Not the farmers definitely.