Where's my chocolate?

How time flies. It's been exactly ten days since I started this blog and I am ashamed to admit that I have only posted twice during the ten days. Not much for an aspiring blogger. Unfortunately, like many people out there, I am also not immune to the seduction of procrastination. I have ideas popping up constantly but I frequently brush them aside and hope that I will be more enthusiastic to blog them later. I can't figure out why I do that.

Today is Valentine's Day (I started typing on February 14 but only finished on 15). Restaurants and florists will be on overdrive capitalizing on the lovestruck masses. It's the day guys traditionally buy gifts for girls and take them out for dinners. Some cultures like Japan, Korea and even Australia have it the other way around where girls give chocolates and flowers to guys instead. Drive into town tonight and you will see lovers everywhere; driving, sitting, dining, strolling with their partners held tightly in their arms, etc. All thanks to this Valentine fellow.

When I think of how Valentine's Day is being celebrated, I can vaguely classify the lovebirds into three categories. The first would be those who are just newly into relationships. Boy is interested in girl and the girl seems to be getting along fine so he decides to try out his luck by buying her expensive presents and planning candlelight dinners while secretly hoping to get lucky. The prices of things which are double or triple of what they were the day before does not bother them as the rewards that await them should they be successful outweighs the small price they pay. This is the category where most teens fall into as well as some late bloomers. Most of us would have gone through that phase sometime in our lives, whether or not on Valentine's Day. Ah, those were the days.

The other category is those who are already into relationships for a period of time. Those in this category are usually in their mid twenties to late thirties. To them, Valentine's Day is just another burden that comes along every year like birthdays and anniversaries and whatever occasion that their partner might think is important for them to commemorate. Like it or not, they are forced to celebrate Valentine's Day so that their respective partners would not feel left out while their peers are happily celebrating away. I believe it's all in the mind. You think that everyone else is enjoying themselves and you do not want to be left out so despite the cutthroat prices and the overwhelming crowd, you still force yourselves to go out to celebrate. The more creative however, would stay at home and figure something out.

Which brings us to the final category. This are for those who are perpetually in love with their partners and could be of any age group but generally they are the middle aged and older. These people have gone through thick and thin together and they understand their partner and know that their partner will understand even if they don't take them out on Valentine's Day. Well, in short, they love each other. Real love that is different from the love as described in the first category. To these people, everyday is Valentine's Day and they do not have to wait for that particular day to celebrate. Everyday they do something to make their partners happy and it does not have to be big or expensive but over the years it adds up and make their relationship stronger.

Not to forget, there is of course another category of people who do not celebrate Valentine's Day for whatever personal reasons they have. This I have not included in my observation as I am only commenting on those who are celebrating the occasion. As you have guessed, I am one of those who did not celebrate Valentine's Day and that's why I have all the time here to blog when almost everyone out there is getting laid. Sad. But at least I can console myself that I have not gullibly volunteered my hard-earned cash for overpriced goods and services. I don't think I will mention why I am not celebrating as everyone else is. Not today anyway.

I'd like to state that my observation above might be somewhat biased and limited by the environmental factors that have influenced the twenty something years of my life and the fact that I am an Asian and a guy. I have no idea why I am writing on something so mundane. I guess I am just envious of the people out there with their loved ones while I am here with my beloved computer.

Danish cartoons, perhaps?

It's back to work after a long Chinese New Year break. I would have blogged something else unfortunately the Danish-caricatures-of-Muhammad issue is still on the news everyday. All over the world, people are destroying properties, burning flags, rioting etc. Tell me, please, what are all these going to achieve? That the pictures are going to disappear forever? That the artists will redraw Muhammad properly so that the pictures will look like what Muhammad actually looked like? My simple brain just cannot comprehend the Muslim mindset. The drawings of Muhammad that were so vividly imprinted in our minds aren't just going to disappear. The more the issue is being brought up to media attention, the more people are going to remember it. Besides, nobody alive today knows how Muhammad looked like. So, how is anyone supposed to draw a portrait of him? What is happening in the world now, is attracting all attention towards Muslims and their ability in handling problems. Right now, it is not looking too good.

For those who have not seen or those who have no idea what these scandalous caricatures are, here they are below.

Danish pastry, anyone?

Today, I have finally found the courage to blog my thoughts. I have been resisting the urge to put my thoughts online for a long while. Firstly, there was a fear of persecution from the government should I get to vocal with my feelings. Secondly, the world obviously has enough people trying to voice their ideas through blogs and I doubt mine would make any difference. Besides, what I am about to start might not even get any hits. Nevertheless, I am obliged to satisfy my personal curiosity as well as my need to voice out my frustrations. I have always wondered what the chances are of someone stumbling across a blog without the knowledge of its existence. Now we shall see.

There are a lot of issues in the world and in my native country that troubles me. I will attempt to bring them to light in due time. First of all, I would like to state that I am an advocate of free speech and a proponent of ethnic indifference. There are many other ideologies that I support but those two would suffice for now. I began to realise the importance of these two principles while growing up in my country of origin.

I will not specifically state the name of my beloved country. Not now anyway until I am entirely sure that whatever I say on this blog cannot be held against me by the government. Eventhough I am no longer living there but have migrated to Melbourne, there is always a constant fear of the government tracking me down should I visit family members there in the near future. I am not contradicting myself in saying that I love my country and yet migrating elsewhere and writing scathing comments about my country. I do love the country. I just hate the current coalition government that runs it. Nevertheless, references that I make on this blog might drop hints of the country that I am refering to. And, no, I am not talking about the United States.

Recently we have been hearing lots of news all over the world over the furore caused by the publication of caricatures of the prophet Muhammad. First published in the Danish newspaper, Jyllands-Posten, it has been republished in a few other European newspapers. The frenzy caused by this publicity has swept the world like wildfire. The rate of republication of the satirical cartoons is by arithmetic progression but the rate of anger caused is definitely growing by geometric progression. And it is still getting worse day by day. There are calls for the beheading of those who caricatured Muhammad and calls for the severing of the hands of the artists. I believe there are even more death threats and fatwa out there against those seen as insulting Muhammad but are not being covered by the news.

That makes me wonder. What kind of world do we live in today? What kind of religion teaches people to maim, to torture and to kill others? What kind of religion teaches its followers to be easily offended? Are we living in the 21st century or are we still living in the Middle Ages? Pardon the rhetorics. Apparently the world is not as modern as I was led to believe. There are in fact still people with mindsets of the Dark Ages living among the civilised today. Does Islam teach its disciples to be sensitive and vindictive or do sensitive and vindictive people prefer to become Muslims? I mean sensitive in a negative connotation.

I honestly do not understand why Muslims all over the world can be so bitter over a few silly cartoons until the point of demanding the death of the cartoonists. If the Allah that they worship is really what Muhammad taught then He should be powerful and wise enough to properly deal with these perpetrators in the afterlife by Himself. What right have they to apply Islamic laws on those who are not even subscribers of their faith? Do Muslims think that only their faith is being parodied? There are thousands of Christian jokes out there and yet there was never protests up to this proportion. Jesus Christ was portrayed as a rock star in Andrew Lloyd Weber's Jesus Christ Superstar. Jesus was misinterpreted in Mel Gibson's Passion of the Christ. Yet, Christians all around the world are a more well-behaved lot as compared to Muslims when it comes to expressing their displeasures.

On the sidelines, I am in fact being led to believe that Muslims are takers while Christians are givers. I am generalising and I know that there are some Muslims who are givers and some Christians who are takers but I feel that the majority fits into my stereotype. Take a look around the world. Muslims claim that non-Muslims do not respect them but do they give respect to non-Muslims in the first place? All they see is that non-Muslims are constantly persecuting Muslims but what about Muslims killing non-Muslims? Why do they have to take that every action by a non-Muslim that displeases them is against Islam? All I can see in the world today is that Muslims only know how to fight and to kill. How beastlike. This only further reinforces my believe that Islam is flawed.

If Islam is so righteous a religion then should it not be focusing on helping humanity instead of destroying it? Islamic nations are rich because of their oil. They have been blessed with these natural resources unlike many countries. Instead of using their wealth to help others, they chose to use their wealth to fund wars and terrorist activities. When Indonesia was ravaged by the tsunamis, I did not see Islamic countries rushing to help them. When Afghanistan was destroyed by the earthquake, neither were the Islamic countries there. In fact, the Europeans and the Americans were among the earliest to offer help and not to forget, they were also the biggest contributors. Indonesia and Afghanistan are Islamic states and yet none of their Islamic counterparts were there for them in their time of need but their enemies. The western world could have chosen to sit back and ignore the plight of the people suffering. After all, the two countries were known to harbour terrorists detonating bombs that had claimed many American and European lives. Yet, the US and Europe chose to place humanity above religion. Now, that is a faith that I subscribe.

People should stop seeing others as Muslims or Christians or Buddhists or whatever. Nobody has the right to condemn others for their faith. To be a Christian or a Muslim is a matter of personal choice and people who are Muslims or Christians or any other religion have the right to hold on to their faith without the fear of persecution in this world. I do not subscribe to all religion in the world nor do I agree with all of them but I believe that people should be free to choose their own religion regardless of my views on that religion. People should start seeing others as humans, just like themselves, and that they too have the right to live in this world.