I am born British, Hong Kongese, and Singaporean (by passport at birth, by paternal blood, and by locality of birth, respectively). I am educated by the British style both in Singapore and Canada. I speak Cantonese with family, Mandarin and English with friends. My skin is yellow, my eyes are brown, and my hair is black. I am who I am, you are who you are, but we are who we choose to be.
You would never be able to persuade everyone to believe who you are, nor would you be able to change everyone to follow your preferred ways. What you could do, would be to make the difference within the permitted framework, and if that fails, no one would restrict you from leaving where you ‘used’ to call home, for that new faraway ‘freer’ place you may eventually call home, simply because we know that you would never be able to change your original home to suit yourself, and you choose to leave because you are not able to ‘live with it’, then it only becomes obvious that your ability to adapt is nonexistent, and if it IS indeed nonexistent, then how the hell would you expect yourself to adapt in your ‘future chosen home’?
Ten years on, the two wars that helped create the world’s greatest colonial empire lost her second last colony back to one of our contemporary world’s fastest growing nation, only to lose her last colony to the same nation two years later.
We love freedom, many of us fight for freedom, when it is taken from us, we request for it back, when we feel like we lack it, we demand it. Heroin’s banned, but yet the colonial rule was justified upon that, freedom striped from ancestors based upon the fact that they were weaker, and once the ‘ink dried’, indoctrination of democracy based upon an unjust war was instilled. Over a hundred years has passed, the belief in democracy reeking like any other medium created by man for the sole purpose of power and control over others, while some die for it, others die against it, which ever side it be, the difference is this: nothing.
Don’t fight for what you believe to be right, nor fight those who you believe to be wrong, don’t be “anti-something”, because someone else would be “anti-you”, you look very different from me, but I am very much the same person as you.
The oblivious breeds naivety, for if we reject what and who we are, then our beliefs would be worth ash, but if we could learn to embrace and be proud, then our short mortal life would be worth more than any after-death-promises.
Stand tall, be proud, breath my air while I drink your water, we aren’t many, we are one.
Taiwan, Taiwan, where are you?
1 comment:
Hey Hong. Just a few things.
I think it is rather problematic when you suggest that the idea or rather the belief in democracy amounts to simply "nothing". Agreed, it does trace back to to power, to control, but I will have to say that the basic notion, theory, and belief in democracy is far more than nothingness. We cannot escape the grasp of power and control regardless of what system we are in, but the idea of "by the people, for the people, of the people" resonates with another inherent belief, freedom.
Looking at contemporary politics, whether its here in Singapore, the US, or just the world, could make it seem like there is hardly much difference between say a monarchy, dictatorship and democracy. But the idea and, like you say the, belief are different and cannot even compare to another.
I have yet to see a true democracy in this world. The way it was supposed to be. Just like I feel we have yet to see/feel true freedom as a society. Am I naive? Maybe. Is it possible? Yes. I believe it is.
There is no one holding me down right now. I have no chains around me, yet I am not free. I feel oppression, the clutches of absolute power. I feel exploited, I feel that the power we have bestowed our leaders, so called democratically are being abused and I am helpless.
You know deep within yourself that things are wrong. This is not how it should be, we CAN be better... and therefore we HAVE to fight for it. Fatalism is not the answer. You are right we have but this one mortal life, but to waste it by not doing anything is worse than dying for something better that you know is possible.
Yes, we do love freedom because it is ours. We demand it, because it rightfully belongs to us. And if someone stops us from achieving it, it is our duty to take it back.
If that means I become an "anti-something" then its because I am anti that something. I am forced to be. If I just give up in fear of something else being anti-me then I am afraid of liberation and freedom itself. Why be afraid of freedom if it's truly yours?
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