over :)

I sent my thesis for binding today. Was a bit disturbed for a while later in the day, cos I realized that I made 5 typo errors in my 10200 words. Prof reuben called me later in the day to find out how is everything. He told me he saw me crossing the road to queensway last saturday. He figured out I was trying to find out the cost of binding the thesis, which was true. Anyway I told him I exceeded 200 words, which means an automatic deduction of 2 marks. Argh, oh well, i figure out if my thesis is fine, then 2 marks is not going to be a big deal. Reuben says it is worth a 'risk'. Interesting, my thesis talks a bit about 'risk' towards the end. An entirely different kind of risk perhaps.

So all the aftermath of thesis mania was plaguing my brain for a while, the typo errors, the extra 200 words, the thesis title wch i still think sounds a bit weird. It is called "Analyzing EU's cosmopolitan power over China: Human rights and the politicization of human security". I think it makes more sense to reverse the title "Human Rights and the Politicization of Human Security: Analyzing EU's cosmopolitan power over China". Again, that happened only after I sent it to bind.

Thesis writing can be quite a rite of passage, whether you do well or not. Honestly, these past few days, I feel that I don't really have the flair to write academic stuff. But then again, writing is probably the only thing I do sufficiently well in life. And at the same time, writing how the EU has sought to defend global justice for the past 3 months has made me realize that there is something quite wrong in how this world behaves; how people are suffering unnecessarily because of the way the world systems are structured. But at the same time, the Bible says that this is the way the world is since the Fall. Maybe it is better to 'go out there' and do some meaningful stuff in NGOs or mission fields, rather than staying in a research institute to theorize everything under the sun. I dunno. As much as I do think about wad meaningful stuff I can do as a human being in the future, it is always quite a blurry image.

Anyway, i still got some minor stuff to clear, one short essay, one cyber art project (which should be fun), and 2 silly exams.

Time to pack my room, say a bit of prayer, and get on with Life.

Hero of the Month: Ulrich Beck

This guys basically lumps social sciences, sciences and ecology into one big juggernaut call the risk society. I'm not reading too much of him though. I just need to squeeze one paragraph out of him for the last 500 words or so. Maybe I'll write more of him next time, meanwhile you can check him out at

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ulrich_Beck

Typing never seems to end for jimmy...

3 to 4 more days (!)

Okie, 10 more pages, and 3 more days to go. Just a few more sleepless nights and I'll see a bit of sunshine at the end of the tunnel. Took a short dinner break at imm yesterday; the only time I had a better dinner in close to a month! Went for a jog just now too, ran all the way to labrador park and then walked slowly home, while trying to formulate my last 10 pages. I'm not sure how it will turn out but I think now is the time to just 'get on with it' and complete the thesis. Wish me well!

thinking through...

16 more hours and I will have to produce one essay and one thesis draft in school. as i was getting schizo and dedicating each hemisphere of my brain to one essay each, i decided to check out pastor ian's blog (see 'dierden tribe!' on the right). it was a really sobering, sad, and yet strangely God-inspiring blog post by ian, with regards to the life of kahmeng. i can't really put things in words, though it certainly put my own myopic life in perspectives. i'm too tunnel-visioned in my worldview. may God use pastor ian and his family to bring forth light to laos.

***
The splendor of the King,
Clothed in majesty
Let all the earth rejoice,
All the earth rejoice
He wraps himself in light,
And darkness tries to hide
And trembles at his voice,
And trembles at his voice

How great is our God,
Sing with me
How great is our God,
and all will see
How great, How great
Is our God

Age to age he stands
And time is in His Hands
Beginning and the End,
Beginning and the End
The Godhead, Three in one
Father, Spirit, Son
The Lion and the Lamb,
The Lion and the Lamb

How great is our God,
Sing with me
How great is our God,
and all will see
How great, How great
Is our God

Morning break

Pieter Bruegel the Elder, The Towel of Babel, 1563

I slept more than I ought to last night. Woke up in the morning, and decided to listen to john piper's podcast. Actually I find it easier to listen than to read sometimes, because it forces me to focus on the message; half my brain usually goes somewhere else when I'm reading. So anyway, today's bedtime/quiet-time story was on missions. Was quite inspired by the last part of his 1996 sermon. Can check out the rest of the message in this link:

http://www.desiringgod.org/ResourceLibrary/Sermons/ByDate/1996/974_A_Passion_for_the_Supremacy_of_ChristWhere_He_Is_Not_Named/


***
Conviction #7: God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him; and our satisfaction in him is greatest when it expands to embrace others.

It is amazing how those who have suffered most in the missionary cause speak in the most lavish terms of the blessing and the joy of it all. Start with Jesus: "If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it; and whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel's will save it" (Mark 8:34-35). We save our lives by giving them away in the cause of the gospel. This is what Paul meant when he said, "This slight momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison" (2 Corinthians 4:17). And: "I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us" (Romans 8:18).

Samuel Zwemer—after fifty years of missions labor (including the loss of two young children in North Africa)—said, "The sheer joy of it all comes back. Gladly would I do it all over again." And both Hudson Taylor and David Livingston, after lives of extraordinary hardship and loss said, "I never made a sacrifice."

When people who have suffered much speak like this, their God is magnified. If God can so satisfy their souls that even their sufferings are experienced as steps into deeper joy with him, then he must be far more wonderful than all that the earth has to offer. Psalm 63:3 must really be true: "The steadfast love of the Lord is better than life."

These are our driving missions convictions at Bethlehem. If God opens your heart, you will see that there is no better way to live than in the wartime lifestyle that maximizes all you are and all you have for the sake of finishing the great commission. Because in this way God is magnified; we are satisfied; and the nations are loved.

***

Life is a footnote

The funny thing about writing a thesis that is neither exactly long nor exactly short, is that you tend to relegate very well-written, important but nonetheless unrelevant works of others into footnotes. So I was talking a bit about Asian Values and soft power in one sentence, and then I realize that there is a whole smorgasbord of literature out there, and indeed one of the PS profs (whom I presume would be my 2nd marker) has written an excellent article about it. But there is no time and space for his wonderful erudition, so I've relegated him to one paragraph in my footnotes. Sigh, if I ever become a professor one day, I'll make sure my students would never put my works into footnotes. Otherwise, its a C+ straight away for them.

Hero of the Month: Herbert Marcuse

In between writing thesis on a pre-service sunday morning, I've decided to give a bit of thought to my other mini essay. KT wants us to critic two films and analyze its political significance. I've decided to look at Eric Khoo's Be With Me and Royston Tan's 4:30, and see how their narratives critic the 'one-dimensional society' of Singapore. The 'one-dimensional society' concept was conjured by Herbert Marcuse in the 1960s, when he says that the overt mechanization of society, and the sanitization of American politics by business lobby groups have led to the 'one-dimensional man', a person who is only capable of linear thinking in the so-called 'American dream', where

True Love = a complete family with a son and a daughter
Intelligence = excellent academic grades in the sciences and social sciences
Success = money and promotion in the corporate world
Leisure = watching tv after a hard day of pursuing success

The myth of those virtues kinda went through a bit of tension in the midst of the vietnam wars, the civil rights movements, the JFKs, the Martin Luthers, the CIA, the de Gaulles, and to some extent the 1968 May revolutions in Paris (which is probably the year which ended the reign of communism, and not 1989... I think ). Consequently, he urges everyone to take a stand in the Great Refusal, lest we become incapable of alternative societies. I'm not sure how his Great Refusal works, but maybe it means it is possible to define success in terms of failure? Or maybe love and care for someone without ever getting married? I think the photo above shows him in UC Berkeley giving a lecture in the 60s! Can you imagine students flocking to you because of how your lecture has impacted so much in their lives? Chan Heng Chee wrote her 1975 book "Politics in an administrative state: where has the politics gone?" based on Marcuse's idea of the one-dimensional society. Funny how she is now Singapore's ambassador to US! Resistance and co-option - I guess that is how our singapore version of one-dimensional society works eh? But I think singapore films are offering a platform for singaporeans to have critical thinking of our own little garden city. Anyway, I think I'm getting a bit incapable of any critical thinking these days; I'm a bit tired of school/life.

the vagaries of post-grad plans

"Congratulations! We are very happy to inform you that you have been selected for admission with Research Scholarship to the graduate research programme of the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences for the August 2007 intake... You can let us know of your decision by completing the Offer of Acceptance that will be enclosed with our offer package"

Hmmmm... think I'll think and pray about it after my thesis submission. Want to thank God meanwhile for seeing me through for the past 3 years. I would have been a funan salesman now, if I have stayed in school of computing back then. Need to put God's blessings in the past few years into perspectives...

Captain America dies...

Heh, this is interesting, Marvel Comics has decided to kill off Captain America. It is interesting how the pop/sub culture industry tries to mirror pax americana from time to time.

"He fought and triumphed over Hitler, Tojo, international Communism and a host of supervillains, but he could not dodge a sniper's bullet....Comic book hero Captain America is dead...".

Read more at:
http://edition.cnn.com/2007/SHOWBIZ/books/03/07/captain.america/index.html

公教!!!

Thanks to chris' blog, I've decided to wiki my old secondary school, and discovered new things that really tickled me!

Here are some of them:

1) "Catholic High School also has a very effective TAF club. In 2006, about 80% of the TAF club members had lost enough weight to be out of TAF club. This was due to the gruelling training sessions, during which TAF club members had to run consistently on the track, walking being prohibited. Also, TAF members also had strictly enforced diets during the school recess breaks".

Jimmy's footnotes: Must be a really tough club to make an entrance in wiki eh? Thank God for blessing me with good BMI back then (somewhat weak and skinny now...).

2) "The students first gather in class to relax and prepare their books while popular chart songs are played over the loudspeakers, supposedly in an attempt to perk the students up...".

Jimmy's footnotes:Its true... and I ...ermm....was even a DJ once for that stupid cathigh station, got Mavis Hee's autograph on my bio textbook in the process. Teacher sacked me after saying my voice was too bass. Darn...

3) (After morning assembly) "a student comes up to give the 'Morning Devotion'. This is an inspirational speech aimed at educating the students to improve their lives".

Jimmy's footnotes: Oh yesh yesh... how we all need God in our lives. Twice in my 4 years, someone called the police saying there is a bomb in the school. Police and dogs came in, and exams get postponed. Principle will make a speech following day over morning assembly to tell us to improve our lives.

4) "Periodic hair checks are carried out to ensure that the student's hair is neat and tidy by the discipline teachers. Those who fail the hair check are severely punished - also by the discipline teachers".

Jimmy's footnotes: There was once a student who wears a wig to conceal his long hair. Small Bobby (our discipline master back then) was smart enough to discover the wig though.

5) "The school has put extremely intense emphasis on the People's Republic of China, saying that China is expanding and modernizing and with time to come, will emerge as a world superpower....the school is organising a trip to China's 东北 province, for the Sec 2 students to gain a better insight into China's situation and econnomy. However, only a minor fraction of the secondary 2 students decide to go. The school had to hence dismiss the project"

Jimmy's footnotes: I totally cracked after reading that part! Didn't know my school had leftist inclinations...

6) "In 2004, the Edward Becheras choir won the top prize (Laureate of the Festival) in the 14th International Festival of Advent and Christmas Music with Petr Eben Award in Prague, which led to an invitation to perform in Guangzhou, China the following year".

Jimmy's footnotes: My choir teacher, whom I call him Panda Leong, always thought that I (I was vice-pres) and willie (he was pres) help resurrected our highly unmotivated school choir back in the late 1990s. Maybe that explains the international award years later..ha. *Pat on my own back*.

7) "Catholic High School is the only remaining secondary school in Singapore that make students from Primary 1 to Secondary 4 wear shorts as a preservation of the culture in previously Chinese-medium schools"

Jimmy's footnotes: Cultural preservation my &*#%! More like dignity undue!


For more information, click.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catholic_High_School_(Singapore)#Clubs_and_Societies

chronicles of nardin

Reviewing this guy's book, "Law, Morality and the Relations of States", is making me think twice about getting his supervision for masters. Really a bit hard to understand his philosophy. And its the real type of philosophy, the kind of stuff that probably made socrates drink poison for his conviction, not those shallow IR stuff that I'm comfortable with. Am I turning into a real philosopher? Ha...Oh well... he's my key to a better tomorrow though. Better understand the man and his ideas now...

More friends!

From left: Roland (Finland), Anna (Philippines), Abram (my roommate, Holland), Leen (belgium), Luis (Philippines)


Jimmy (Queenstown) and Filipe (Portugal)

Really looking forward to go Europe in may. Been in touch with my ASEF friends and the plan is to meet Leen, Filipe and Anna in Brussels, make a detour to Paris to join chelsea, dawn and shaun for a few days, and then ryan air to Eastern Europe to backpack with Daniel and my JC bud, Chun Chia. The Ultimate plan is to land our hands on those champions' league final tickets come 23 May in Athens. UEFA is allocating half of the stadium's tickets to each club finalist. So the plan is to go online IMMEDIATELY when the the semi-finals are over. This is not some asean tiger cup final you see.. Hope the plan will work out, keeping fingers crossed.

Ha, Filipe is a really cool portuguese guy who tried to take me down during the shot above, realized i got that bit of remaining abs, and then proclaimed out loud "you know kuuung-fu!!!". hahaha.... talk about stereotyping asians. Oh! And I must add that Roland was a lieutenant officer during his national service days, in charge of an 'Artic mountain' platoon to stand guard against the Russians in times of a war. I felt like a mouse when I told him I was in the military police doing investigation, and singapore fight over stupid issues with malaysia like water and expanding pulau tekong into their land. Tried to hype up my national service a bit by saying we do CSI sort of stuff - minus the gadgets of course. They are really a bunch of extraordinary folks, and it will be really great to drink beer and banter with them again, albeit for only a few days. Thesis deadline is a month away, but I need to think 3 months ahead in order to make any meaningful sense out of these few tiring weeks. Met my thesis supervisor earlier on friday noon, and it doesn't sound so good for now, for the conceptualization, and trying to bring an abstract stuff like cosmopolitan citizenship onto earth.

You see, I'm writing a paper on how the European Union is able to uncouple citizenship from state sovereignty and distribute it across multiple sites of sovereignty through the various EU institutions, and through their own country. So I'm trying to see how they are exporting that model of lifestyle into the extra-european world through human rights foreign policy, with EU-China as a specific case study. ALL the dots are just unconnected for now. Felt a bit discouraged after discussing with my supervisor, who has to battle his own monsters with reservist next week, and a tonne of arrows that the dpt head has thrown at him. But I think the dpt head thinks highly of him, so i guess i'm in the right faction. He told me he is trying to escape from Singapore too and take a four month sabbatical somewhere in uk. Gee, my third paragraph is so miserable compared to the first. I think Singapore is way too stress.

I have friends!

Ha.. I just finished chapter 1 of my thesis, and taking a short break. Been super anti-social for the past week. Decide to (finally) upload photos from my new camera to remind myself that I have friends! Quite looking forward to the summer holidays, when I can have time to practice photography again.


Daniel and Vicky at jumbo coffee shop


Pastor Ian and friends at Changi Airport (The photo is blur because Bart didn't set the lense on auto, I think)


Shengwei, Boon and Ainsley at Prayer Loft in church. Boon is serving NS, while Shengwei and Ainsley serve me.


June and her XY chromosomes


The 2 Js


My anti-social hideout cum essay churning room

speedy slug

haha, okie, shall put that up as my all-inspiring slug for the next few days.

my chapter 1 is turning into a 'best of jimmy's cliche one-liners in essay writing' - 'apostles of human security', 'within and without', 'sovereignty and its discontents', 'sui generis', 'qua', 'sine qua non', 'inter se', 'per se', 'complexities and contradictions' and my favourite 'vis-a-vis' and 'raison d'etre'... hope i'm not over killing it =p


*after 5 minutes*
hmmmmmm.....somehow i can't get the full version of the slug uploaded into the blog, although i can see the full version on my own mac. sigh.

*after 12 hours*
the slug works! and i'm going to sleep now....