Not a Resolution

Dear Friends,

I know that I have not been blogging as frequently as I should this month. December has always been a busy month for me. The closing of the year, the Christmas festivities and the endless rush of running errands for the coming New Year. Tomorrow is a HISTORIC day. The last day of 2009 before we usher in another year. I know it is going to be another busy day tomorrow, so I decided to pen down my New Year thoughts today.

2009 has been a year that zoomed in and zoomed out for me; in a flash of an eye. It was a year of the impossibles. Just reflecting, it has been a 'coloured' year. A first black President of the United States was inaugurated in January, a much adored black but 'bleached' Michael Jackson died in June and a once respected black golf legend, Tiger Woods who fell from grace because of his many 'holes in one'. I would equate this to a BLACKENED year. The sluggish economy, high inflation, the H1N1 epidemic; has pitched tremendous darkness to our once clear horizons.

Throughout the years, I have not taken long breaks and decided to do so this year. All in all, I would have rested for eleven days before returning to the salt mine again this Monday, in a New Year that is. It was nice waking up in the morning and just sitting serene in my garden. I can't remember the last time I did that. I just realised that I now have squirrels as inhabitants. I never saw them there before. As I was sitting, I realised that LIFE for me has always been a RUSH. I talk fast, I eat fast, I work fast and I like taking the shortest cuts possible; All I cared about was results. I started pondering on what was I grateful and thankful for in 2009.

I am one who do not believe in setting New Year resolutions. Why set them when I am not going to attain them. For me, not having resolutions are fine but what is important is to set aside a time for REFLECTIONS. I believe that if I do not reflect, I am almost sure of repeating the same mistakes in the coming New Year. I have always not planned in making big changes or improvements at any one go. My belief has always been making small improvements monthly and accumulative, a major improvement in twelve months. This will be my New Year's belief and not a RESOLUTION.

For 2010, I am not going to underestimate myself. The way trends are moving, I believe it is going to be an exhilarating year. I am aspiring to make changes albeit RADICAL ones; in both my personal and professional life. I want to BELIEVE big and achieving bigger. My challenge will be paced against Mother Theresa. A poor unknown nun who believed in that change for the impossible. When she died, her native Albania and her home India fought for her body's custody. She made a living impact that led to a bigger impact in her death. Good changes will impact lives better. That is what I would want. In all that I do, I would also do it out of LOVE. By so doing, I believe that I would influence and impact the people and the environment around me. This will be my New Year's belief and not a RESOLUTION.

For 2010, I am going to take time to count my BLESSINGS. I am going to expect less and to appreciate every goodness in people around me. How often in our busy lives, we have learned to make a living but not a life? We have added years to life and not life to years. I am going to learn to wait and not rush.

When 'Auld Lang Syne' is sung tomorrow night, I am no longer going to keep anything for that special occasion because everyday I live will be a special occasion. Life is a chain of moments of enjoyment and not only about survival. Don't save your best perfume for that 'special occasion'; go ahead and spray it on everyday. I challenge all of us to not delay anything that adds laughter and joy to our lives in 2010. FORGIVE that person and FORGET that bad deed. Let's start on a clean slate, as the saying goes. I will sit in my garden more and admire the view without paying much attention to my needs.

THANK YOU for visiting my blog this year. I will continue to write on topics that are dear to me and I will aim to be as prolific as I can. I am grateful for your encouragement and criticism shared.

"CARPE DIEM" Rejoice while you are alive; enjoy the day; and live it to the fullest. On that parting note for 2009, I wish you and your family much blessings for 2010. GOD BLESS!

Tell Tale Signs

Dear Friends,

While reading the newspapers these few weeks, I have concluded that there are more BAD than good news daily. In today's Star headlines, a 'Millionaire' Director of a government agency was arrested for accepting a bribe of more than a hundred thousand ringgit. The trial of the death of political aide Teoh Beng Hock took a new twist; now there is a 80% chance the death could be classified homicide instead of suicide. With the ongoing MCA crisis, President OTK is feeling 'hurt' that his once comrades had now turn their backs on him. The recent strong Padang earthquake has caused mass destruction killing at least a thousand people.

A tell-tale is a sign that clearly signals that something is true or is about to happen. The BIBLE affirms that wars, food shortages, earthquakes, hatred, crime, a lack of love, would all be markings of the time of the end. Are these TELL TALE SIGNS of the end times in comparison to the above headlines?

With age catching up, I respond to the slightest tell tale sign. Call me a hypochondriac if you want. I was at lunch today and for no obvious reason, I felt like blacking out. Could it be the weather, hunger, the 'teh-see' that I drank? I don't know. I am always 'over-reacting' because I had scores of friends who have DIED from various causes. Chris Oh was 44 years old and died in his sleep due to heart failure. Another friend was Ace. We had dinner a night before his death and he was only 29 years old. In my previous 'Scarlet Sheets' blog posting; my gym friend Sam, died cycling next to me in a group exercise class and he was only 47 years old, also due to heart failure.

Back in the year 2000, I was managing a business as a co-partner. It was an Italian restaurant and a bistroteque in Melaka. Food and drinks were in abundance. The hours were long and the daily lifestyle of wining and dining took a TOLL on me. I could still connect with that evening; I had dinner with a friend, DSP Baldev Singh from the district Police. We also had the friendly 'Johnnie Walker' for company. Baldev was alone on secondment in Melaka while his family was in Johor. It was similar in my case with my family in KL. We were accompanying buddies by default. Going into the night with our conversation, I suddenly felt that I had breathing difficulties. There was a tingling feeling from my ankles, later gripping my knees and tightening up at my thighs. My feet became WOBBLY, I felt nausea and I let off a scream amidst Kenny G's Song Bird, saxophonist Din was serenading. Baldev a trained policeman wasted no time and with the help of my staff assisted me to his official vehicle (my first time in a police car with sirens blaring :D) to be sent to the medical center. The feeling was horrendous. I buckled under to a panic attack because I thought it was a heart FAILURE. At Accidents and Emergencies, I was wheel chaired and they hurriedly took my pulse and blood pressure readings. It was a 170/115, remembering vaguely now. Nearly a stroke, I think. They vaccinated me with muscle relaxant and the numbness eased. The attending doctor recommended that I take various tests the following morning. That night, I had my blood pressure monitored every hour by the nurse and I was wondering if it was a tell tale sign. Morning came; I did the ECG, heart scan and some other tests. I met with the cardiologist and he was DUMB STRUCKED that they could not diagnose a cause to my admission. Despite some high readings, there was nothing abnormal. I was discharged after being given a clean bill of health. What actually happened? Clueless.
Since then, it is approaching ten years now. What were the TELL TALE SIGNS telling me then? Was it stress or was it over exhaustion? Was it loneliness or was it sacrifice chasing after my entrepreneurial dreams? CLUELESS again. I guess the body always has a way of telling us enough is enough. There is only so much a worn out body can take. Our human problem is we tend to think that we are smarter than our CREATOR, when we choose to ignore the signs.

My last medical check up in August was reassuring. My heart is strong and I EXCELLED in the stress test. My lungs are at its optimum coupled with a very positive 120/80 blood pressure. Since then, I told myself to be forever GRATEFUL, to APPRECIATE life and to live it HAPPILY. My three times a week to the gym; exercising and releasing endorphins accelerates this happy process.

Please remember to be MINDFUL of how much our body can take. Every part of our body has an 'expiry date'. The more we use it, the earlier it will 'EXPIRE'. Now, when did I lose my virginity?

I came across this video recently. Is this really the end times? Now, you INTERPRET the tell tale signs.

Scarlet Sheets

Dear Friends,

Sacred as it may sound, there is no eluding when death comes a knocking. As a noun, it means the time at which life ends. My colleague, Luan Luan Joey during the recent first year memorial service of her mother in law, mull over how she wanted her wake to be, if she were to pass on before her time. To quote her composition on Facebook - "Not trying to curse myself here either; life and death are unquantifiable abstracts and part and parcel of nature’s course, which we often don’t have control over. This may sound eerie and 'pantang' to some but death shouldn't be a taboo topic because only when we start acknowledging it can we embrace life wholeheartedly - which I’m trying to, besides being grumpy, naggy and full of complaints on certain occasions. Ignorance is definitely not blissful in this matter." - unquote.

The past month has been 'traumatising' for me. Sam, a gym friend I have acquainted recently, in my 'Spinning' cycling class at California Fitness collapsed without regaining consciousness, just 15 minutes into the session. We cycle at least three times a week in a group under the watchful eyes of an instructor. And yet it happened. The night before his death, he was just boasting with me on how he managed to push his heart rate up to 90% of it's maximum. The post mortem revealed that it was heart failure and he was just 47.

As I am blogging this, I see a hype of activities happening at my neighbour's. Later to find out, this 'irritating' neighbour that constantly parks his car at the fringe of the road, has just passed away.

In the news, David Carradine, who became a TV icon in the early 1970s starring as an enigmatic Buddhist monk with a flair for martial arts in "Kung Fu" and more recently played the head of a group of assassins in the "Kill Bill" movies, has been found dead in Bangkok, Thailand. He was 72. Carradine was found hanged in his luxury hotel suite, Thai newspaper - the Nation reported on its website, citing unidentified police sources. They claimed it was suicide.

What constitutes death? It is clear enough that people die when their lives end, but less clear what represents the ending of a person's life. One of the saddest way to initiate that is suicide. Suicide is not chosen; it happens when pain exceeds resources for coping with hurt. Suicide victims are not bad people, or crazy, or weak, or flawed; just because they feel suicidal. It does not even mean that they really want to die - it only means that they have more pain than they can contend with. It was just two weeks ago that I was told of the suicide of a 29 year old Thai lady in a renowned hotel in my vicinity. Married to a Swedish expatriate with a son, she swallowed ninety painkillers with beers, gripping a picture of her son and sliding into the deepest sleep she had ever knew.

I remember a suicide case that I had to deal with in 1996. I was in Jakarta, Indonesia as a hotel expatriate. We were in the midst of an early morning meeting when a panic-stricken front office staff burst into the conference room. “A guest slashed her wrist!” she exclaimed in Bahasa Indonesia.

Blood drained from the faces of those in the room. With a sickening fear creeping up my spine, I hurriedly dialed for Security. Together with the General Manager who was present at the meeting, we made our way to the guest’s room. The 65-year-old General Manager of Dutch descent, Rudy Schouten, was an experienced hotelier and must have seen much in his time, but even he was visibly quaking. The walk down the corridor towards Room 839 was the longest I have ever experienced.

The Security Manager, had arrived there with 2 of his men just moments before us. One of them was trying to calm the hysterical maid sobbing at the doorway. She must have been the one who discovered the guest. We had been forewarned of the sight that awaited us, but the limp body tangled in scarlet-soaked sheets and the smell of blood that permeated the room brought me to the brink of nausea.

We approached the bed cautiously to see a Chinese girl in her late-20s. Her lifeless demeanor led us to presume that we were too late. But suddenly, a twitch of her eye! Pandemonium broke loose. “She’s alive! Call an ambulance!” “Her wrist is still bleeding! We need to stop it!”

Someone grabbed a towel from the toilet and pressed it against her slashed wrist. The blood adamantly soaked through the towel. In desperation, I pulled off my tie and tied it around her wrist. Slowly, the blood ceased to flow.

Calm soon resumed after that. We suddenly realized that she was only clad scantily in a T-shirt and panty. The security personnel spotted a pair of shorts and gently pulled it on her, an attempt to return some measure of dignity. No one spoke much, but the unspoken question that ran through our minds were ‘what could possibly drive a young, pretty woman to such desperation that the only way out was death?’

We decided it was faster for a hotel van to send her to the hospital than an ambulance, so we arranged for one to wait at the back of the hotel. We bundled her up in a clean blanket, and gently led her, semi-conscious, through the service corridors to the van. The official statement would be that she was suffering from acute food poisoning.

Once she was safely en route to the nearest hospital, I began checking our hotel records for her reservation. She had been living in the hotel for six months but the room was booked under a gentleman’s name – Aming. We called him and he rushed over in a panic, claiming she was his friend. We directed him to the hospital to which she had been taken. Before he left the hotel, he paid the bill in full and requested that we throw away all her belongings.

The bloodied room underwent a major cleanup. For many months after, I could not look at our clean white sheets without imagining it decked with dirty scarlet stains.

It was very much later that I found out who Aming really was – a human trafficker who brings in women from China illegally. But Aming fell in love with one of his ‘goods’ and set her up at the hotel, promising her that a better life laid ahead for them. Somehow, she found out that he was already married and she decided to end her life.

Did she do it because she honestly loved him? Because she was in a foreign land, dependent on a man who would eventually sell her on the streets?

No matter what the reason, I pray she is living the better life that she hoped for.