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christmas was a nonevent, same as the last. except that sitting in my wallet is my beloved pink ic.

as the year draws to a close i count my lucky stars and thank providence. i ord-ed without much trouble. my surgery seems to have gone fine and i enjoyed my mc really hard. and when i returned i got a benevolent boss who did not bother me with much work. i got lucky with the mo, got excused outfield, and then excused sunlight. i am still on that status, until friday 31st. i spent much of the time outside camp. i booked out for physios, took full day offs when i went for medical appointments, and booked out early for my french lessons. and my french lessons were on busy nights. sweet coincidence. whenever i was in camp i was playing pool or puzzlefighter or reading or using the gym. because everyones outfield, a place i cannot go. and in the end i took 6 weeks of off and leave to study for my exams. and then my benevolent boss gave me 2 very goods on my cos. and i cannot ask for more. because the only thing outstanding about me was that i was hardly ever in camp.

i passed my dalf c1 and my delf b2. i received my lowest and highest absolute scores respectively. 63,5 75,5. they are embarrassing, but i take pride that i passed on the first attempt and i owned my french classmates who started out way way ahead of me. i remember they were using all the big words and acting pro the first few lessons i felt like a complete noob like i was going to have to pay back the monies to the ministry and call it a day. and the teacher was picking on me because i was the only guy and we know how frenchmen chase women muchly. anyways the fact that they were from fass and doing some trashy eurostudies thingy does not discount my achievement. lol. now i will be working harder on my french. need to get started on listening to the radio again. 11/25 for my listening was a real joke. but everyone agreed that it was too tough. disappointing.

2 weeks of post ord post delfdalf life have passed, and ive been spending the time wandering the shopping malls of singapore and looking at plans at bca and visiting contractors and architects and their projects as my house is finally going to be rebuilt and im going to make sure it turns out right this time. 1 week from now i will be starting work at the middleeastern directorate. i hope to do well and leave a good impression on them. and not waste time doing rubbish and walking round the nearby shopping mall as i did in jc1 with ies. lol.

ok lifes sweet, for now. but i live on a sinusoidal curve, so i dont know whats going to happen next.

ord loh.

it's been a week since my ord. and everyday's been sunday. have completely lost track of time. but now no-french week is over, and i should be back to learning my french. or at least i should be listening to the silly broadcasts on rfi. with my very good conduct and performance in ns i am much closer to going to menton next year.

and my iphone. it is sucking the life out of me. i just cant get it to work and i dont know why i need to give my credit card info to register the phone to get my phone to sync with the itunes on my comp so i cant load shit onto it. i am dying.

i hope i passed my dalf c1, and i hope i can start work next january. or else this period of hunting for contractors or lazing around will drain me. completely. i already dont feel too well. drowning in guilt. everyones doing something, earning some money. i am doing nothing productive or excessively fun. i am just passing time. one sunday after another.

but at the same time there is an inertia that is preventing me from committing to anything. its painful.

it is december

tomorrow is the day.

bonne chance! LOL.

todays the last day of november

and tomorrows the first day of a december i will truly remember

but exams first, ord later, which is a satisfying order of things. that way i wont be celebrating freedom before i truly become so free i become mildly deranged.

two mornings from now my dalf will commence and my productionorale is still real poor. i am foaming.

Help me God

this thursday just come

since i am going to get screwed anyway i would rather get screwed now. no more waiting.
oh my god my oral is so fail and my listening is quite fail. good game already la.

what i have been thinking about when i should be studying for my exam on this thursday

whether to help your relative selamat to hide from the authorities isnt an issue that can be solved morally or ethically. or even religiously. according to the imam there is some koranic reference that forbids aiding the escape of a criminal. but the koran is a voluminous tome that is not always crystal clear, so there probably exists some passages that can be used to claim aid for this relative selamat. the fact that there are so many terrorists who all claim some reference from somewhere is testament to this fact. and what they say about the bible, another abrahamic religion, that the devil can quote passages for his own ends, also holds true for the koran. just as the hardliners like to read it their way, the imam is also reading it his way.

it is hard to not assist a relative. even if the relative might have done something that society at large considers reprehensible. it is hard when the responsibility to the greater good and the responsibility to the family comes into conflict. and just as one cannot be sure that selamat is right or wrong, one cannot be sure if what society does is right or wrong. to use a lame example, whites used to enslave the blacks, something that we have come to consider as inhumane. at the time of nazi germany, probably some thought that it was morally just and ethically sound to gas the jews. i am quite sure there were at least as many true nazi collaborators as there were resistance fighters.

and socrates was put to death by his people, for what was considered some sort of poisoning of the minds of the athenian youths. which does not seem to make much sense today. of course i wont draw parallels between socrates and him, but it is difficult for an individual, especially relatives or close associates, like plato for the former and the niece of the latter, to completely accept the rightness of the society. and society isnt always right too.

of course some will point to the fact that it is unacceptable that we tolerate in our society people who are intolerant of others, of people who are willing to kill others for the cause of their warped utopia. that is true too. but what if it is utilitarian that some must die so the others may live better? dont we always force this logic of sacrifice down the throats of our soldiers who have died on flanders fields, on the marne and elsewhere all over? that some morally reprehensible monsters must die?

an ethical answer is hard to arrive at. instead all that they should do to prevent others from harboring their relatives is to dole out draconic penalties. as long as the moral payoff of harboring a wanted relative is lower than the material payoff of not harboring the relative, the chance of a similar occurence will be diminished. i am quite sure that just as the imam and the other religious leaders have moral authority, these terrorists might also be effective ethicists so it becomes difficult. tough life.

life's like that

so why fk it?

my cos is still not done, im afraid of foaming at it.

and im foaminghard at french.