Cookies as bait?!

Online Gaming Addiction

Introduction

Many friends of mine have asked me before why people get addicted to online games. Some of these questions are ubiquitous in nature and spring upon many girlfriends caught in the predicament of their boyfriends spending too much time and attention on some “stupid” game and not diverting enough attention to them.

Some of the common complaints I hear are:

“How come Roy spends more time on Dota (Defence of the ancient) than on me?”

“If only there was no stupid Warcraft around”

In extreme cases some relationships even borders on the rocky end or end abruptly because of the presence of these online games. To me, playing online games is alright. I mean you can’t expect your boyfriends to be playing Barbie dolls right? It’s all a matter of control and setting the right priorities.

Since these questions have popped up with increasing frequency during recent periods and with the renaissance and proliferation of online gaming, I have taken a short time to compile the evidence on why online games are so addictive, using science as the basis of explanation.

Before I begin, I would like to declare that I was once a compulsive and addicted online gamer, ever since the release of Starcraft in year 1998. I’ve followed up with BroodWars, the Starcraft expansion pack, Diablo 2 and its subsequent expansion pack, Warcraft ROC (Reign of Chaos) and TFT (The Frozen Throne), and finally settled on Final Fantasy 11 (FF11) Online. Up to now, I can safely say that I am no longer hooked to online gaming and this article will cover the topics how this addiction starts off, its consequences and the methods employable to curb the paroxysm of gaming addiction and assuage the temptation of logging on into your online gaming account.

Why I started playing

It all began in the year 1998 on Starcraft when I was facing my secondary 2 years. For those of you don’t know Starcraft is a real time strategy (RTS) game in which it is designed such that you oversee your colony’s economy, defense and offence and the objective is to secure your victory by destroying your opponent’s base. Initially, when the game was released it was the hot topic my class. Even if you are not interested in online gaming, you would simply buy the game to play for social reasons- to not be left out when people are talking about it. As I played on, I realized that I was pretty good at the game. Who doesn’t like winning right?

It extended to 8 years back and personally, I think that the addiction did not start off at this point since Starcraft’s game design does not call for addiction as much as other Mass Online Role Playing Games (MMORPGs). One typical game ends in around 10-15mins average and once it ends, it ends there. The only thing that can keep you going is for better stats ratio. The real addiction begun with the release of Diablo 2, where you can create a character and get stronger and stronger with the passage of time. Also because, there is never an end for the game, so what construed as beginners interest and the curiosity to go on to find what happens next, becomes an activity which is carried out for the banal sake of carrying it out.

Consequences of playing

It was around JC1 when I started out with Diablo 2. I would categorize it into a semi online RPG unlike the major (MMORPGs) such as FF11 or the current hit World of Warcraft (WOW) since it operates on a much less scale with fewer quests and lesser interactions (up to a maximum of 7 other players at once) as compared to MMORPGs which interact you up to thousands of players at once on a much larger emotional scale.

Now, although the potential for this game to addiction is much less, being hooked into this game has caused me dire consequences on my school grades mainly because of the huge amount of time I spent on it, the lack of sleep, and the psychological distractions I faced in school pertaining to it which resulted in me skipping school a lot to head home or to the lanshop to play the game, heading home to sleep, or sleeping in class because of fatigue both contributed to the lack of sleep and from my CCA involvements.

I’ve read articles in the papers and other sources of addicted gamers who actually skip crucial examinations and other important events because of irrational behavior resultant from gaming addiction, suicide cases because of spurned romantic advances or murders because of online fraud. In South Korea, a 28 year old man reportedly collapsed and died after playing an online game for 50 hours straight! Thankfully my addiction has never mounted to such a great scale. However, it was obvious that my school grades had met a huge decline because of it, from “A”s in my school grade to moderate passes and towards the end of JC1, I was almost retained a year, with 3 “F”s in my preliminary examinations! Also, although my JC2 grades met an improvement after I quit Diablo2, it wasn’t something that makes a person proud of. In the year 2002 of JC2, my MCs hit around 27 for the year, not including the days that I skipped school unofficially, lessons that I escaped from and the days I left school prematurely and such.

Although I’ve mentioned that I managed to quit Diablo 2 effectively by JC2, the thing about online addiction is that once you’ve actually painstakingly, managed to quit a game, it leaves and empty void in your habitual schedule which leaves you seeking to other forms of online addiction. In my case, I simply moved on to Warcraft 3 ROC in which the game design is very similar to Starcraft. Amazingly and also unfortunately, with the release of Warcraft during the middle of my JC2 semester near my preliminary examinations, I played a total of over 2000 games in 3-4 months, in which it timing crossed over to my A levels preparation timetable. That’s about 20 games a day, with an average of 10-15mins a game. Multiply that by 20 and that’s the time I spent on Warcraft 3 a day.

For some Southpark WOW addiction humor, visit, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvy5FJX4z1g

Why Online Games are so addictive

Genetic Makeup

I read in an article in Reader’s Digest that online addictions can be a result of a person’s genetic makeup, which means to say, that person A can be more susceptible to addiction than a person B because they suffer different levels of disturbances naturally occurring brain chemicals called neurotransmitters.

The article states this: “These chemicals influence impulsive feelings and behaviors. The main neurotransmitter involved in all addictions is dopamine”, says Winslow. People with low levels of dopamine are more prone to anxiety and cravings. Advancing to the next stage of an online game gives them a buzz that causes an increase in dopamine and makes them feel better and more motivated. This winning feeling is so reward that its memory takes great intensity and becomes more desirable every time it is recalled.”

Classical Conditioning

Also, the rapid gratification of winning not only helps a player forget their problems but also becomes a powerful trigger, creating an urge to play in the 1^st place. Psychologists describe this trigger response mechanism as classical conditioning which I learnt in school last semester. Basically, an association between the pleasant feeling of winning and the respective game is created. When an individual is not playing online and is experiencing negative feelings such as anxiety and stress, one’s mind will naturally seek more pleasant thoughts and will recall the positive feeling associated with playing the online game. I opine that this is the contributing reason to why people shift from addiction of one online game to another which I mentioned earlier. This is to fill the empty void of negative feelings by a substitute online game.

We know now that online addiction is contributed by 2 factors namely:

1. Personal Genetic Makeup
2. Classical Conditioning

Game Design

The 3^rd factor that contributes to online addiction is a topic that game designers upon interview decline to comment upon. Upon contacted for interview by Reader’s Digest, none of the online game developers would talk about whether or not they are using behavioral psychology to strengthen the emotional appeal of their games, thus making it addictive. However, Liz Wolley, founder of On-line Gamers Anonymous, an organization dedicated to helping people addicted to online games, strongly believes developers use complex psychology to make games addictive, for the sole purpose of increasing profit, since a lot of these MMORPGs like WOW, main income stream is from the continual subscription to the service on a monthly service. The online game market is worth around $1.4 billion in Asia alone and is expected to grow to $3.6 billion by 2010!

Other games like Water Margin Online, which a personal friend of mine plays, has certain items that is only attainable through online purchases and my friend has spent several hundreds of dollars for the purchasing these online pixels.

Liz Wolley commented that “Game designers have said that they were hired simply because they have psychology degrees.” If this is truly the case, certainly the ethical considerations and moral obligations have been bypassed when designing the game. Personally I feel that when designing the game so as to give the player the greatest amount of pleasure is a good thing. However, designing the game, to get a player addicted to it, as the underlying purpose, is abysmal and should be greeted with opprobrium.

Random Reinforcement

One of these methods designed in online games in which I have experienced and influenced into addiction involves a complicated conditioning response as what psychologists refer to as “Variable Ratio of Reinforcement”, in effect random reinforcement. This is very different from Vicarious learning/modeling which involves rewarding or punishment directly to induce or reduce a behavior such as the rewarding of a dog with a biscuit for performing a trick well, or punishing a child for bad behavior. With random reinforcement, the rewards are just that- random and unpredictable. This is how the best games are programmed: to keep the player interested by promising predictable outcomes. For example, in FF11, to get certain rare weaponry, one has to take part Notorious Monsters (NMs) hunt and each time you kill the NM, there will be a chance of the weapon dropping as loot reward. The probability of some of these weapons dropping can be as low as 1%! The thing about random reinforcement is that since this uses a probability chance of obtaining the item, the more and longer you camp an item, the greater your chances of getting it.

Regret Aversion

Random Reinforcement when combined with another psychological behavioral response known as regret aversion which I have studied in the book “The Paradox of Choice”, once you have spent say for example, 3 days of your time camping for a certain weapon, and you did not get your weapon, you are faced with 2 choices. The first choice is to continue camping for the weapon, and the second choice, to stop camping for the weapon.

To avoid feelings of regret, most people will opt to choose to continue camping for the weapon, because to stop would mean to say that you have wasted a whole 3 good days of your time camping the NM for nothing and the possibility of regret. Also you would be susceptible in facing the possibilities of the “What If” and “If Only” scenarios. You say to yourself, “If only I had not started to camp the stupid NM at all” or “What if the NM drops the weapon on the next try but I decide not to stop camping it?”

Flow Theory

This theory was explored and discovered by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi in the 1990s. He coined the now famous idea of “the zone” – the special place between ability and challenge where an activity is not too hard that it causes anxiety and stress but not too easy that it causes people to feel bored. Game developers now use the flow theory in developing games that pull players in and keep them there.

For some games, the artificial intelligence (AI) in-built the game senses the players difficulty in overcoming certain obstacles and automatically reduces the game difficulty without letting the player know of the changes. This is a now known fact in famous games such as Pac-man, in which ability and challenge are balanced to keep a person inside “the-zone”.

Now we know the three psychological behavioral sciences taken into consideration by game designers which keep gamers addicted.

1. Regret aversion
2. Random reinforcements
3. Flow Theory

I don’t study psychology but there are probably a lot more known psychology behaviors which are designed into online games by game designers to keep gamers addicted. Although what I have just covered- biological makeup, classical conditioning and game design by producers which are all external influences and factors influencing addiction, this does not exonerate the gamer of his addiction and leave him defenseless and continually hooked to online gaming. These simply show the correlation between gaming and addiction, which differs significantly from cause and effect.

Social Factors

Social Circle

The social side of multiplayer online games keeps many people playing for long periods of time. They are the type of games that completely engross the player and some of them are not the type of games you can play for 20 minutes and simply decide to stop. To be serious in the game would mean that you have to spend time playing it. Also there exist social handcuffs, because in certain situations, your existence in a gaming event may be paramount for the team’s survivor and because you are dependent upon. For example, in a simple game of Dota, where each team consist of 5 players max, your convenient exit from the game would make the game imbalanced, leaving a 4v5 match up. By leaving the game you would be considered as a “noob” (newbie in short) and also a pariah in which case, you are likely to be blacklisted and banned from participating from future games.

Learned helplessness

Goh Chee Leong, dean of Department of Psychology at Kuala Lumpur’s HELP University College says: “Many people feel powerless in society, but in online games they’re in control of armies, of cities of other people”

In the 1960s, psychologist Martin Seligman and his collaborators performed an experiment that involved teaching three difference groups of animals to jump over a little hurdle from one side of a box to the other to escape or avoid an electric shock.

Group 1: No prior exposure to such experiments.

Group 2: Had already learned to make a different response, in a different setting, to escape from the shock. Seligman expected and found that this second group would learn a bit more quickly than the first, reasoning that some of what they had learned in the first experiment might transfer to the second.

Group 3: Also in a different setting, had been given a series of shocks that could not be escaped by any response.

Remarkably, this third group failed to learn at all. Indeed many of them essentially had no chance to learn because they did not even try to escape from the shocks. These animals became quite passive, lying down to taking the shocks until the researchers mercifully ended the experiment.

Seligman and his colleagues suggested that the animals in this third group had learned from being exposed to inescapable shocks that nothing they did made a difference; that they were essentially helpless when it came to controlling their fate. Like the second group, they had also transferred to the hurdle-jumping situation lessons they had learned before- in this case, learned helplessness.

My point here is that, many people desire to be in control of their situation and also for success. However circumstances often rob people of the necessary choices to meet their need for control and success. The consequences can be dire and consequently, these people may seek alternative forms of control and success, in which exists in a virtual world. You can build your own guild and organize your own raids etc. Also the feeling of “pwning” a “noob” can be an exhilarating experience. Try playing Dota if you don’t believe me.

How to curb and/or prevent the addiction

Choice and Freewill

Ultimately, the main cause of gaming addiction is contributed by the power of choice and freewill.

If you choose NOT to play in the first place, knowing the consequences of playing is online addiction, you are unlikely to get addicted. Even if you did not know that it is possible to get hooked to online gaming, and inevitably get addicted, with freewill, you can “unhook” yourself anytime you want by simply choosing and dedicating yourself to the choice. I can say that confidently because I am a living example of a person who managed to purge myself of this craving.

Awareness

To stop the addiction, one must first be aware that he is addicted to it. Also, he needs to know the severity of the addiction and the consequences that he faces. Low dopamine combined with another brain chemical, serotonin, that normally causes calm and controlled behavior, can give irrational urges even greater free rein. This is why people continue to play online games without regard for future consequences in school grades or social relationships.

Visit http://www.rdasia.com to take an online gaming addiction test.

Seek Help

You can also seek help internally from friends, family or loved ones and also try to build up your social circle. Asking people out more frequently may also help. There’s a known 2 week rule of breaking a habit, in which for most people once you stop a habitual activity for 2 weeks, you have a very high chance of breaking that habit. However, this varies from individual to individual and the 2 week duration may need to be extended. Also, since you are likely to curb one gaming addiction by moving on to a different game, make sure you do not start playing another game!

Personally, when I want to stop using the computer for example during the examination period, I ask my sister to hide my keyboard or if I want to stop playing a game, I ask my sister to hide the CD and instruct her not to return it to me at any circumstances! It works!

If internal help is not sufficient or perhaps you are too shy to ask for help from your internal circle, you can try to seek external help. There are a lot of online addiction help services online such as On-line Gamers Anonymous (http://www.Olganon.org).

Friends or girlfriends, whom you know or feel that a person you care about is addicted to the online gaming predicament, should also be encouraged to help out by asking him/her out more. But please remember to be tactful. I hope this article proves useful!

Seven Types of Ambiguity

I’ve just finished reading Seven Types of Ambiguity by Elliot Perlman. It was really beautifully written, having a surreal verisimilitude. The characters in the story each has a distinct personality and Elliot Perlman takes you through each of these character in 1^st person view, through the same events. I can’t believe I actually teared twice on different occasions as I read the story. No other book has ever had that effect on me. Trust me on this- it is not because I am lachrymose. It has to do with empathy and Elliot Perlman did a fantastic job in defining empathy and being alone which subsequently leads to loneliness.

To empathize is to connect with the individual both intellectually and emotionally. He further suggests that to not be alone, somebody has to really connect with you and you have to connect with them and come with you as you ride the relentless waves of fear and hope, of pain and pleasure, doubt and certainty that inhabit the sea of human experience. Besides receiving, you have to reciprocate the compliment and project yourself into someone else’s pain and, by absorbing, lessen it.

Given such a detailed account of what empathy is, and the pain the characters experienced in the story, the prostitute Angela, the love-sick Simon and his esoteric obsession for Anna, and once you’ve actually begin to empathize with the characters in the story, how can it not be possible for anyone to feel the way I that felt? On reflection, the way Simon carried his obsession and love for Anna, for all those 10 years after his relationship with Anna ended abruptly, and the action of kidnapping Anna’s son to assuage his loneliness, personally, I felt that no wrong had been committed. Even if rationally, a wrong had been committed, it is paradoxically contradicted emotionally by feelings of injustice. In fact, this relentless persistence in the pursuit for the ideal love, shouldn’t it be instead encouraged? However, society views such actions with contempt, as an aberration, a mental illness. For these minorities, as Seligman describes, a state of learned helplessness is experienced. I suspect that this is the cause of many cases of depression- To be absolutely helpless in a given situation, and under the scrutiny of society. Finally, after mustering the courage to take action against this helplessness, as it was for Simon’s case, Simon was placed on trial for a flatulent crime preceded an ambiguous question mark.

I simply love the way Simon was eventually exonerated from all his charges, and not because he did not commit the crime. Simon was acquitted and found not guilty because of 2 beguiling women, who perjured in court for his sake. In a sense, it has a kind of a classic “love conquers all” theme, filled with a melodramatic and an intense quixotic struggle in the pursuit for the idealized love within the conundrums of our quotidian life.

Since I’m dwelling on the topic of love and empathy right now, let me finish with a poem by Shakespeare to ponder on:

Let me not to the marriage of true minds (Sonnet CXVI)

Let me not to the marriage of true minds

Admit impediments. Love is not love

Which alters when it alteration finds,

Or bends with the remover to remove:

O no! it is an ever-fixed mark

That looks on tempests and is never shaken;

It is the star to every wandering bark,

Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks

Within his bending sickle's compass come:

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,

But bears it out even to the edge of doom.

If this be error and upon me proved,

I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

Ruptured

Images of you become increasingly distant,

memories are strange when you are a stranger.

Everything I was, I am now and will be,

is visited on me and threaded together,

ubiquitously from a different vantage point.

You were to me a ludicrous picture and desire,

but for those few precious fleeting moments I had it.

Hopes to live an idyll life was it an unrealistic ideal,

a dichotomy of separation from dreams and reality?

O God, give me back the day that was stolen from me.

I was confronted by something unutterable;

Your impassive nonchalance and idea of euphemism,

your perfunctory ridicule, it was all epiphany to me.

You ruptured a passage and through this imbroglio,

abandoned and left me stranded inside a no man's land.

All fear, uncertainty and despair dissolved;

This feeling embraces me, comforts me and opposes me.

It is determined to keep myself from existentialism,

from spending the remaining years of my life on life-support,

transfused against loneliness and only pretending to be alive.

-Mok

Flashback

I remember the time when we were walking along some old street, and we came across a really creepy looking house with a driveway larger than my house itself and concluded that it was an abandoned "haunted" house.

We decided to have a little adventure and trespassed past the gates to take a look at what was inside. When we almost reached the main door of the house, the house was lighted and there were people inside. There was also a blacked-furred watch dog which noticed us. We tried to sneak out quietly but that overgrown hell-hound of a dog decided to chase the living-shit out of us. That must be the fastest 100m sprint I ever made. When we were out safely and out of hot pursuit we had a good laugh at how retarded we were. Ghost house!? What were we thinking?

I remember the time when it was past midnight, how you snuck over to my place and gave me a call. You said you wanted the both of us to go on some ghost hunting expedition. We went over to the haunted mansion at the top of the hill, climbed over the gates and after that realized we could not see any donkey crap cause we forgot to bring our torch lights. We climbed up to the Level 3 balcony through the stairs that is now broken and and spent the night trying to scare each other with half-assed ghost stories.

Those were good old the days.

Cerulean

I thought about you under the cerulean sky,

The grass rustles as the breeze flows by.

The flowers dances and the cicadas sing,

Heaven smiles at the merriment you bring.

You were standing all alone by the silent sea,

Gazing past the endless horizon, what did you see-

You saw nothing but a vast vacuum of emptiness,

Void of love, you lived a detached life of loneliness.

Winter forces its way in without warning,

The wind-up bird winds up the blissful spring.

My feelings lay dormant, things I wanted to say-

My heart yearns for you, I wish you would stay.

Everything idyll becomes alien when you are gone,

The cicadas weep for you, the withering flowers forlorn.

You were so much more beautiful than you ever knew,

If only you could believe in yourself as I believed in you.

-Mok

I'm bored

Faith

A little girl
All alone in her own world.

She does not see,
nor does she hear
But the pain she does fear.

Faithless and angry
At a God who she blames
for depriving her of many.

The things she does not believe,
From someone who would never leave.

The love he has for her,
The hope he fills her with everyday
The things she wishes she could say,
To the people she wishes away.

-Marianne

Everything I Never Wanted

I don't want to like you
But I do
I don't want to feel this way about you
But I do

I don't want to be with you
But I am
I don't want to be in love with you
But I am
You're just everything I never wanted.

-Melody Nicole

The Light's Shadow

I'm republishing this and deleting the one posted in April because the backward link to this post is broken. In case you are wondering, this was written a really long time ago, and it does not signify anything more besides the fact that it's my favourite piece.

The Light's Shadow

You are a light that shines within me,
illuminating the darkness around.

Your serenity is a beauty surround,

your presence a holy resonance.

Silently, you stole my lingering sadness,

and replaced it with a temporal happiness.

But girl, every light that shines,

casts a shadow upon whoever it shines on.

and baby, in the purity of your innocence,

don't you realize that I am his shadow,

living in the darkness of your light?

Seduced and forgotten,

I can't help but fear the uncertainties of tomorrow,

because I know that I do not belong to your world,

nor are you here to stay in mine.

As always, you leave as cruelly as you came,

and cruelly, you return what's rightfully mine and more -

This melancholy of lingering sadness,

the ever yearning for your return.

In desperation, I've come to realize this:

That destiny can break a man much more than it can bless him,

and I can't stop failing, to remember to forget you.

-Mok

A Little Boy Lost

-William Blake

Nought loves another as itself
Nor venerates another so.
Nor is it possible to Thought
A greater than itself to know:

And Father, how can I love you,
Or any of my brothers more?
I love you like the little bird
That picks up crumbs around the door.

The Priest sat by and heard the child.
In trembling zeal he siez'd his hair:
He led him by his little coat:
And all admir'd the Priestly care.

And standing on the altar high,
Lo what a fiend is here! said he:
One who sets reason up forjudge
Of our most holy Mystery.

The weeping child could not be heard.
The weeping parents wept in vain:
They strip'd him to his little shirt.
And bound him in an iron chain.

And burn'd him in a holy place,
Where many had been burn'd before:
The weeping parents wept in vain.
Are such things done on Albions shore.

I especially like the part of the poem that is highlighted in italics.

I love you like the little bird
That picks up crumbs around the door.

My intepretation is such: Where this little boy is compared to a bird, who loves his father in heaven unconditionally. The boy seeks to express a love that is universal and not self-seeking. The boy's speech about love indicates the child's innocence. The crumbs in essence, represent things that have been bestowed upon him by God.

I find this part of the poem similar is to "God Gave a Loaf to Every Bird" by Emily Dickenson.

"Too happy in my sparrow chance
For ampler coveting."

Emily Dickenson uses a Sparrow, to which I believe is a bird that is perceived to not possess much in terms of worldly wealth but yet, is content with what it has. Similarly, I believe that the boy in the poem above is likened to a Sparrow.

The tragedy of the boy's innocence is that his innocence, has broken the sanctity of the Church. Through the boy's usage of reasoning, he was asserting his right to a mild form of egoism. Yet, the priest regarded his actions as an insult to the religious mystery, God, and was thus burnt as a heretic.

What appears strange to me is that, the people in the church simply sat around and let the murder blatantly take place. Even the boy's parents allowed such a travesty to take place. Was it because the fear the boy's parents held was stronger than the love they had for their him? Or was it because they truly believed that their child was indeed a heretic? Such is the power of influence religion holds to guide the moral and religious values of individuals.

Be nice to me

While being sick the past few days and resting on my bed aimlessly, some random thoughts popped up in my head. It had to do a little about religion. It’s kind of a sensitive issue for some so I’ll lay back a little. 1^st thing that crossed my mind is the concept of Buddhism.

Since young, I’ve been like watching all those Chinese drama like Sun Wu Kong and how when most people die, they go to Hell and wait along some “weird valley of wandering souls” for their turn to reincarnate. It’s like how your life is separated into 2 separate containers, a black jar, and a white one. For every good deed that you do, you put a pebble into the white one, and for every bad deed that you do, a pebble into the black jar. So basically, life is an accumulation of good deeds and bad. If you accumulate a lot pebbles in the black jar you’re going to go into the basement 18^th of hell. If you’re good, you’ll be reincarnated into a good family, and if you’re somewhat bad, maybe a cockroach in the same family household.

What seems a little warped is that ever since a kid, my parents tell me not to talk about religion stuff to others as it is a sensitive subject .15 years later, here I am thinking about the same issue when I was 7.

I was given the liberation of visiting my friends place ever since I was 12 years old. Whenever I’m at a friend’s place, I’ll see their grandma or grandpa and being a well mannered young boy than, I would greet them “Aunty, Uncle, hello.” What really puzzles me is that when I was small and innocent, I would think this: “When Uncle and Aunty die in future, they might reincarnate to become my Son or daughter next time.” Obviously I did not say that to my friends lah. I mean common. How cool is that? Your friend’s grandparents becoming your children. Weren’t they the ones who were telling your friend how he should behave before? And now you get the chance to do the same to them. Haha. How ironic man.

Right now, the same idiotic thought crosses my mind. Imagine this- your Boss whom you totally abhor in office asks you to overtime for no extra pay, you go home in a bad mood, and when your son (who was actually the reincarnation of your boss’s grandma) irritates the shit out of you when you get home, you give him a lashing which he does not really deserve. Maybe that’s what child abuse is about. What comes around goes around man. You can’t really tell who my future child or grandchild really was in his previous life right? So next time you see me on the street, don’t forget to be nice to me. :)

Food for thought

I've been down with the illness for the past 4 days or so. Elaine popped by my place tonight to visit poor o' sickly me. To top it up, she brought me recovery food!


2 boxes of strawberries

Light cheesecake

Deloba Biscuit (My favourite)


I foresee myself getting a sorethroat. and erm seriously speaking.... with food like this and more importantly, a friend like Elaine, I don't mind falling sick all over again.

Guys bleed. Girls do not shit.

So... here's a conversation between Fionn and I this afternoon. I've cut the boring bits and pieces out though. Really funny shit.

Mok says:

where u heading to

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

im going out only at nite

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

so will stay at home for bf

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

U?

Mok says:

i'll be watching a drama series at home a whole day

Mok says:

friend told me i'll cry if i watch this so OK

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

WAT SERIAL

Mok says:

its a japanese serial

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

hahhahahha

Mok says:

called a LITRE of Tears

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

hmm

Mok says:

how apt

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

nv heard of

Mok says:

u should watch too

Mok says:

ok i'll burn for u

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

wow!

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

u tell me if its nice

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

dun waste my time

Mok says:

ya its nice i'm sure

Mok says:

my friend is really picky

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

hmm

Mok says:

and i can't even picture him crying

Mok says:

but he did!@

Mok says:

i mean he teared

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

ok

Mok says:

so ...

Mok says:

if he teared, i thikn u'll dehydrate

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

take a picture wen u're crying n post it to frenster k!

Mok says:

wtf.

Mok says:

NV

Mok says:

guys don't cry

Mok says:

thats a girls job

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

guys bleed

Mok says:

yaaa

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

yes, and btw

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

gals dun shit

Mok says:

wtf

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

even if we do, its pink in colour

Mok says:

hahahhahaa

Mok says:

wtf!

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

and u'll see butterflies instead of black flies

Mok says:

hahahhaa thats the funniest thing

Mok says:

i heard for a long time

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

really?

Mok says:

yeah where did that come from

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

tats how i feel wen u said guys dun cry

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

ha. ha.

Mok says:

ok i'm saving this conversation haha

Fionn and Fianna were brothers says:

wtf!

The View from the Top

I was a New Asia Bar last night, and managed steal a glimpse of the city’s night life from the 70^th floor. The panorama the of outside looked so microscopic from there. Just like tiny ants- moving little by little, without sense or purpose. Looking down from there, I think about the September evening world, where people must be going about their lives. Amidst the paling moon light under a starry sky, they must be walking down streets, shopping for things, boarding trains for home. And they think- if they think at all- that these things are too obvious to think about, just as I used to do.

These are the vaguely defined people, and I used to be a nameless one among them. Accepting and accepted, they live with one another beneath that light, and whether it lasts for a moment, there must be a kind of closeness and longing while they are enveloped in that light. I am no longer one of them, however. They are down there on the face of the Earth; I am up here staring at them with monumental calmness. They possess the light, while I’m in the process of losing it. It is here where I feel that I may never find my way back to that world, and I may never again be able to feel the peace of being enveloped in that light. It is then I feel a dull ache in the chest, as if something inside there is being squeezed to death.

With every sip of my bourbon coke, scenes of the surface of the Earth grow ever more distant. 2 realities co-exist simultaneously and the separation is obvious- a transparent glass panel from the building I am in. The sense of reality of the world below subsides bit by bit. The traffic in the streets becomes unfamiliarly emptier and the city is less brightly lit with each passing moment. My reality however, the reality up on the 70^th floor, seems unchanged, untouched and it surrounds me in its place. The place accepts me, I accept the place and I become increasingly absorbed in its’ presence.

The music switched to a song Nara heard when she 1^st met her ex-boyfriend. I know how it feels. How it brings back memories or essence of you. How it hurts. So it is when something dies; the very inanimate objects the loved one has touched in passing serve to wound us. After a while, I am hit again by a pang of numbness, a certain detachment and I can’t keep myself from smiling. It even feels good in a twisted way. What a tumultuous feeling- A cup that tastes bitter when we are sitting may be sweet indeed when we are standing. I think to myself- Keep smiling, keep laughing and don’t stop dancing. When the clock strikes 1, it will be time to return back to the world below; the world of the living.

Velvet Mornings

Here's a little poem I wrote sometime ago. It was written with a dark finish. The 1st paragraph is an encapsulation of the tragedies of individuals who live within the darker shadows of our very troubled world. I used a drunkard parent, to juxtapose the detrimental effects of his actions on a child, which in this sense, is simply a microcosm of the irresponsibilities and/or inactions of parents in raising a child.

The 2nd paragraph, is the feelings embodied by the innocent child. How he willingly gives into darkness, the devil, in hope of a better tomorrow.


Velvet Mornings

Sleepless nights, eyes wide open;

Entranced and intoxicated, high on drugs.

Forsaken between heaven and hell,

insignificant within the infinities of space and time.

The innocent child, the hopeless drunkard,

hurtful silence and repressed memories.

I find comfort in confusion, peace in chaos.

Bury me in your darkened wings,

Shelter me in your nest of forgotten souls.

Shield me from the eyes of the righteousness,

and their imaginary symphony of angels.

Take me away, and awaken me into another velvet morning.

-Mok

The story of the Monkeys of the Shitty Island

On certain nights, I find it especially hard to pin down my feelings into something concrete. Tonight must be such a night. Today, a whirlpool of emotions swept me by my feet. The feelings felt like a mix of everything that I could have ever experienced. Everything just failed to make sense even after an attempt to sort everything out in a logical and chronological order. It wasn't easy nor was I any successful. The more I searched to understand my feelings, the more complicated it got. Such an attempt proved insufficient and it just left me hanging and feeling overly unsatisfied. I needed a concrete answer for myself.

As I began to unveil the riddles within myself, I seek to explore a distant and foreign territory within myself that I myself have never discovered. In doing so, I realized that I was feeling more confused than before. I recalled events from years back, some with such fine details and that it seemed totally absurd and ridiculous until such a point that it occurred to me of the possibilities, that such memories was incredibly fabricated by myself. Similarly, certain memories I held, seemed so distorted and warped in its details that it paradoxically appeared mesmerizingly surreal.

This is why I am unable to answer any of my questions with any absolute certainty. It is also why a large part of my answers is strictly based on hypothesis, which was fashioned for myself without a solid logical basis. What I can hope, or hope to understand, is to uncover parts of myself that for years I have left neglected. I do however realize now with utmost regret, that I have dire consequences to pay for neglecting certain intrinsic areas within myself.

It is likened to how a monetary debt occurred in the bank has a cumulatively exponential growth rate and how at the end of the year, I realize that the debt in the bank has grown to such a huge figure that I am unable to pay it off. So what do I do next? I shut it out from sight until it grows too big and uncontrollable and it comes back to haunt me every now and than. At the same time, I are so detached from my problems to such an extent, that I forget what it is that thing that is coming back to haunt me. This is the price of detachment.

When I think of this, I am reminded of the story of the Monkeys of the Shitty Island in “The Wind-up Bird Chronicle” and Marukami describes the story as follows:

“Somewhere, far, far away, there’s a shitty island. An island without a name. An island not worth giving a name. A shitty island with a shitty shape. On this shitty island grow palm trees that also have shitty shapes. And the palm trees produce coconuts that give off a shitty smell. Shitty monkeys live in the trees, and they love to eat these shitty-smelling coconuts, after which they shit the world’s foulest shit. The shit falls on the ground and builds up shitty moulds, making the shitty palm trees that grow on them even shittier. It’s an endless cycle.”

Marakami than explains:

“What I’m trying to say is this. A certain kind of shittiness, a certain kind of stagnation, a certain kind of darkness, goes on propagating itself by its own power in its own self-contained cycle. And once it passes a certain point, no one can stop it – even if the person himself wants to stop it.”

This exactly the kind of shittiness I’m facing right now. Fuck.