Don't Kill That Caterpillar!

Know those lime plants that are so popular during Chinese New Year? Well, they are a favourite with caterpillars too. When I was a kid, I used to look out for these little critters and kill them off for chewing up my mom's limes. I look back with regret because they would have eventually become beautiful butterflies.

When I got a bit older and wiser, I collected the caterpillars in bottles and fed them with lime leaves until the larvae morphed into pupae and later emerged as beautiful flying insects. I don't think anything comes closer to perfection than a newly-born butterfly.





















[Image by LC Goh.]

Remember that song by Joni Mitchell called Big Yellow Taxi? Here's part of the lyrics:

They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot
With a pink hotel, a boutique
And a swinging hot spot

They took all the trees
Put em in a tree museum
And they charged the people
A dollar and a half just to see em

Hey farmer farmer
Put away that DDT now
Give me spots on my apples
But leave me the birds and the bees
Please!

Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got
Till it's gone
They paved paradise
To put up a parking lot

They say that what man does not understand, man destroys. Ain't that the truth? We take paradise and turn it into a parking lot - for our convenience. And then worry about pollution and getting fat.

By paving every inch of ground, rain water runs straight into drains resulting in flash floods and massive traffic jams. Aren't we too clever for our own good?

When we see a field full of lalang grass, we worry about snakes and mosquitoes. Again we get it cleared and the rain washes the top soil away turning the land barren. I recently watched a documentary about rich black soil in northeast China. Apparently the soil is actually dead grass! So maybe we should just leave that lalang alone to rejuvenate the land!

Trees and vegetation hold a lot of carbon. They call the Amazon forest a giant "carbon sink". When jungles are cleared, the carbon is released into the air, causing global warming. The carbon is also absorbed by the seas, turning them acidic and killing off the coral. Our oceans are slowly becoming underwater deserts and garbage dumps!

These days, everybody is running around trying to reduce their "carbon footprint"! Well, one sure way to do that is to plant a tree! Why don't we go out and do just that? Instead of chopping everything down in the name of civilisation? The leaves will also filter out a lot of the dust from our polluted air and help our over-worked lungs.

It's really time we stopped treating nature as our enemy!

And I should go back to rearing those wonderful butterflies.

The Fairer Sex

Once upon a time, when I was a mere laddie and tv was black-and-white, there was this almost-typical story about some peasant Chinese girl having to borrow money to save an ailing dad. She had to sign a contract she barely understood and, as a result, got trapped into slavery. I was young and innocent and I told myself that when I grew up I would use my money to save these girls, or some silly nonsense like that.

I'm a little odd in that way. Maybe it's because I don't have a sister. I often preferred chatting with women rather than go hang out with the boys. I found boys boring. Girls are more stimulating. (Heehee!) Maybe opposites attract. Maybe I found guys threatening as we are always competing over something. Maybe girls are more forgiving of my shortcomings.

Girls always give you things to eat. Girls always have things like toothpicks, tissue paper and nail-clippers handy. Girls think "Isn't he pitiful? Better comfort him," and I end up getting freebies. (Hahaha!)

I'm not gay, in case you are wondering. Once I wept for a week over some girl after attending her wedding dinner!

When I visited Shenzhen, someone took me to these "barber" shops where there were rows and rows of girls sitting there waiting for clients. I felt so sorry for them I could not look them in the eyes. So I looked up at the ceiling! I must have been the oddest guy they have ever seen!

Another time, I found myself alone in the bedroom of a young lady, also in Shenzhen. She said I could look at her CD collection. To be honest, it was totally intoxicating. If she had stood at the doorway, I wouldn't have had the strength to get pass her. But she didn't. And I stepped out. Today she is married to a German and we are the best of friends.

I saw both my sons coming into this world. I cut the umbilical cord for my first son and got blood all over my clothes. I saw the blood pouring out like a waterfall. Call me mystical if you like, but to me the woman's private area is a sacred place. It's the doorway between two worlds. I believe there is a long line of babies queuing up in heaven to get into this world through that doorway. So I prefer not to mess about with it.

I wasn't thinking about moms when I wrote this, but it's relevant. So Happy Mother's Day to all you mothers out there!

[From a young lady in Zhangjiagang (9 May 2009):

to be honest, i sometimes feel it is difficult to find a man who respects women, so your post is a refreshing read :) thanks!]

[From a gentleman in Kuala Lumpur (9 May 2009):

Good article - your writings show earnestness, mostly joy. That's important - enjoying what you do.]

[From a young lady in Jakarta (10 May 2009):

I love your blog about Mother's Day! especially what you wrote about how you see the woman's private area as a doorway of two worlds....that's the coolest words I've ever read or hear from a MAN! ^___^
Tell you the truth...its difficult nowadays to find a man who can respect a woman the way you do! Most of them only see a woman as a wife who has to cook, deliver baby, take are the kids, do laundry, ironing, and other stuff that most housewives do!
Very very few (or perhaps only YOU?) who could respect women like that, I admire your thought ^___^
I wished my husband could be like you a bit...hahahaha!! *joking!*]

Reversal of Roles

Back in 1988, an American guy called David Henry Hwang (probably a long lost cousin of mine, hehe!) produced a play called M. Butterfly, based on the true story of a French diplomat (Bernard Boursicot) who fell in love with a Chinese opera singer (Shi Pei-Pu) only to discover 20 years later that the latter was a man!

And that seems to be a delusion the entire western world has been indulging in for a long time - the idea that the East is coy and submissive, and therefore feminine, while the West is brash and aggressive, and therefore masculine. Well, the mirage is fading and the roles reversing even as I write.

If you ask me, the process started during the Second World War when the Yanks had their Asian baptism of fire fighting the ferocious Japanese who contested every inch of ground with banzai and kamikaze attacks.

A few years later, lightly-armed Chinese troops pushed American forces half-way down the Korean peninsula, resulting in the longest retreat in US military history.

The final blow came when the US army was kicked out of Vietnam after losing the longest war they had ever fought. This is after a merciless genocidal campaign to bomb Vietnam "back to the stone age".

By the end of the Vietnam War, the U.S. military had dropped more than 7 million tons of bombs-- more than twice the total tonnage dropped on Europe and Asia during all of World War 2--on a country roughly the size of New Mexico. This is almost one 500 pound bomb for every man, woman, and child in the country. Twenty million bomb craters are all over Vietnam. (http://rwor.org/)

Have a look at this image from Google Earth. This is just one area in Laos. Each point represents one US air attack, meaning 20 to 40 bombs. The stacks represent multiple attacks.

The US often used B52s ...

and napalm.

This is a famous photo of a Vietnamese girl who had to tear off all her burning clothes after she was hit by napalm.

And this is the same person, many years later. Her name is Kim Phuc. She cannot perspire through the damaged skin on her back.

I really have to take my hat off to the Vietnamese people. How many countries can absorb such punishment from the USA and still stand up?

Yet after inflicting all that inhuman savagery on a poor developing nation, the US still managed to lose the war. If I were them, I would quickly conclude there is no way to win another land war in East Asia. The meek and gentle Oriental is not what he seems when you push him too far.

With China's peaceful rising and the West's financial self-destruction, the traditional roles played by East and West are reversing. We are watching history unfolding before our eyes.

[From a gentleman in Kuala Lumpur (5 May 2009):

The US probably knows that too. That is why they have coined the term 'smart power'. That points to a more comprehensive and coordinated usage of all resources, including asymmetric warfare strategies, in their arsenal in the future. No longer will they just use manned huey helicopters or strato-fortresses and phantoms. And carrier groups are just open targets for capitation torpedoes in the high seas. Only the unseen offer new grounds. Man-less drones and cruise missiles such as used in Afghanistan and Lebanon, as well as the future of nanobot military technologies coupled to virtual reality throw-off camouflage and high frequency laser satellite guns .... these are the future possibilities. They are predicated on what they think their adversaries will be thinking..namely the less technology, the more the need to concentrate manpower. So that when manpower is concentrated, the target is magnified, and the use of manless destroy technologies become more efficient on kill ratios besides being more politically acceptable back home while shoring up the military-industrial complex that has been the cause of worldwide destabilisation over the last century.]

Naked on the Battlefield

How many of you have actually read a book about the Vietnam War, fiction or non-fiction? Very few, I’ll bet. Well, I’ve read plenty. On my bookshelf alone, I have seven:

• Bloods by Wallace Terry


• Chickenhawk by Robert Mason


• Citadel by Dale A Dye


• Nam by Mark Baker


• The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien


• The 13th Valley by John M Del Vecchio


• The Tunnels of Cu Chi by Tom Mangold and John Penycate

But before you go pick up one of these books, be warned - it can be a shocking experience. Here’s a sample from the book The 13th Valley:

“Shee-it, Egan,” a voice boomed out. “I don’t know how you kin smoke them gook cigarettes. They smell like they come outa the asshole of a dyin gook whore.”

And another:

“All right,” Egan boomed from over beside the dead soldier, “who’s got the mothafucker’s ear? You fucken pig.” Egan charged toward Denhardt. “You mothafucker. You low life cunt fuck. Put that ear back on that man’s head.” Denhardt tried to protest. Egan raged more furiously. “BULLSHIT!” He yelled. “Either you put that fucken ear back on that fucken dink’s head or I’m gonna cut yers off en nail em on him. You fucken savage.” Egan spat. He grabbed Denhardt by the shoulders of his shirt, yanked him forward and threw him toward the body. “Bury that fucker before the stench makes me vomit in your mouth.”

In case you didn’t know, a “gook” or a “dink” is slang for anyone racially Asian.

This is from the book Citadel:

‘This man was hit by three rounds of an AK burst at close range. One round apparently got under his helmet and took the top of his skull off causing massive brain damage.’

Corpsman pulled back the battle dressing covering the top of the grunt’s head. Brain was a pulsing, red-tinged mass, spurting frothy blood where cranial arteries had ruptured. Entire top of his skull had been taken off by the enemy round. More diagnosis.

‘A second round entered the chest area under one arm and exited here.’ Doc pulled another battle dressing away from the left side of the man’s heaving chest. Heart and lung, both bravely pumping through a churned and torn mass of rib bone and gristle. As he inhaled, a putrid foam spurted from the exit wound. Corpsman replaced the battle dressing to keep him from losing any more blood.

‘Finally, the third round caught him almost full in the navel. Look at this shit.’ Peeled away a large bandage covering the grunt’s lower abdomen. Shiny intestine surged up like bloated blood sausage through a huge rent in the man’s belly. Nauseating smell. Similar to human shit but much stronger. Smell of waste, decay. Smell of violent death.

Take a look at the following pictures of American soldiers in East Asian wars. Look into the eyes. Do you see something eerily familiar in all of them?

Pacific Campaign, Second World War

Korean War


















Korean War





















Vietnam War

























Vietnam War

A bit like looking into the eyes of insanity, no? The soldiers appear to be stunned by the ferocity of the fighting. Yet the warmongers in Washington DC just keep on sending these boys out to die on foreign soil.

My experience in Australia (see previous blog entry) distorted my perception of the white man (and woman) and it took me a while before I could accept him for what he truly is - a mere human being with fears, insecurities, weaknesses, irrationalities, etc, -just like everyone else. In the war zone, I saw the white man stripped of aura, bravado, pretense, nicety, hype and hubris, often confused, bewildered and helpless, sometimes in great pain, sorrow or terror. In short, I began to empathise with him. I could see through his eyes. I could think like him without being like him. We could connect at a totally different level.

Racism

Once in a while, I come across some white boy in China complaining that the Chinese are racist because he is forbidden to date someone's pretty daughter. I thought if all you have in your horny little head is sex, sex and more sex, I'm not letting you near my daughter either!

Amazing what gets labeled as racism these days. In contrast, here is something I experienced back in my university days in Sydney.

I used to live very near the University of New South Wales and one night, a friend and I were cycling home after some Christian fellowship activity. It was very close to midnight and the streets in the Eastern Suburbs were fairly empty. My friend is a Chinese Malaysian, just like me. As we rounded a corner, we encountered a car full of skinheads. If you don't know what a skinhead is, the photo (from the Aussie movie Romper Stomper) will give you a good idea. They trailed our bicycles, screaming and hurling abuse and hate at us all the way. The main university gates were locked but fortunately we found one of those little pedestrian entrances that our bicycles could get through and we managed to slip into campus.

Whatever the skinheads set out to do, they achieved it. I was truly traumatized. I was in shock for a week and didn’t want to step out of the house. (Fortunately, it was the holidays and I didn’t have to.)

I don’t know if I was in Oz at the wrong time, but that was even before Pauline Hanson came along. Already there was hate graffiti all over the place: ASIAN INVASION! TWO WONGS DON’T MAKE A WRIGHT! People tell me Australia is such a nice friendly country. Sad to say, I didn’t leave with such a rosy impression.

In fact, I have never experienced anything remotely similar in Malaysia even though I’ve lived most of my life here. The Malays really are a generous people by nature and I am grateful for that. I say that even though my dad came close to dying in a race riot back in 1969.

To me, racism is when someone tries to harm you or deliberately cause you to fall because you are of a different culture, race or religion. So be careful who you call a racist.

[From young lady in Zhangjiagang (14 Apr 2009):

Just read ur latest entry. I totally agree with what you've said. I was fortunate though that i didn't have a similar experience to yours when i was in Oz. Ppl in Melbourne are generally nice and more accepting. And you know, I've never been in a more race/culture-tolerant country than Malaysia, and I'm grateful, proud even, to be a Malaysian. Even more so now that I've been to other countries and seen more of the world.

I wish I had more time to blog. Been bz lately. Well, do keep blogging. Your posts are always thought-provoking. I like your writing. You really should try and get yourself published. As for me, I'm still struggling to get just one piece of short story together. Wish I had your flair for writing.]

[From a young man in Fuzhou (16 Apr 2009):

I had quick look at your blog "Racism". That impressed me a lot, let me say this: I will feel safe in China, because I stay in an place that I belong to. If I want to live in America, I will be judged as invader because I may hurt or take off their interest, I mean something about culture, economy, politics, religion or something else. I beleive that when God creat human being, we are destined to be called a family that each human being need to recognize this point. We learn to respect each lives on the earth.. Racism will make human being ruined from this earth. In my personal opinion, love make peace, hatred cause war. when this world come to being full of hatred, we won't feel safe. each country has its nuclear weapon aimed at another countries, each people point gun to another people. We will call the time the end of the world, wouldn't we?]