Tuesday, 21^st June 2005 | 10:30 PM
Leave me my naive hope and my will to live

Dear Molly,

Thank you for signing my guestbook. I think I'm hurt though.

While a lot of things you've just said are true, my heart still feels a bit nicked. I suppose the truth hurts. Kathy was just responding to my one of my previous entries, actually(but maybe Americans react to your words or what I say differently then hyper-sensitive Asians do).

I suppose I'd thought that the purpose of my diary is so that I, insignificant little person in a world of 6 billion people, felt that I could just bring forward something that I've discovered and share it with some people. I really thought I'd do that.

Yes, you're right, the world has always been about wars and fighting since time immemorial, but I thought the purpose of education and evolution was so that mankind can be above all that now. I thought that was what progress should be about. And I realise that there seems to be no end to that, but my constant bringing it up is just me trying to continue hoping that one day it will happen.

Because if we rob people of hope, we rob people of the will to live, so said my one of my former teachers. And I happen to agree with that. Because life is about evolution, change and progress after all, I thought.

The constant griping and whining that you hear from me about the Iraq war is just basically proof my the pain I feel when I see fellow human beings suffer. I can't help not feeling that as much as I can't help not being human.

What am I doing to help ease the whole Middle Eastern conflict? I thought my donations to local NGOs, who were aiding civilian populations there until the situation got too dangerous, helped. I thought I helped with some good American PR amongst my friends, family and people I know by reminding them that not all Americans are like Bush and his cronies or Hollywood stars. That Americans are just like many of my own countrymen. That maybe they're used to expressing themselves brutally without considering how others would take to their opinions, and that manner is what offends us. I thought I'd help by reminding them that there are Americans who are suffering from the war too. The fatalities suffered by the American military. The stupefying cost of war that Americans, up to one or two generations from now, have to bear.

I thought I'd bring the topic up from time to time to remind people that people from all sides who have died didn't do so in vain. That although the American media tries to hide them, we do know they exist and that we honour their sacrifice. And I thought I'd remind people that the scores of people who've died in previous world wars thought they were fighting so that conflicts like this would not happen again. Futile, but as long as someone remembers, there is hope that it might happen, right?

I thought what I did was helping. I suppose I thought if the UN with the power of the world couldn't change what's going on, couldn't stop the American government from embarking on a war on false reasons, I felt nothing I do could stop what's going on. But I have my right to what I feel, and how I should express what I feel, don't I?

I thought by sharing the riverbend's diary link with everyone here, I can reduce the span that's between everyone in the world. That I can remind people the people we see in pictures are real human beings with real lives, real hopes and aspirations. The very things that war, statistics and the language of news reports try to make us forget. Because if we remember this, we remember to care. And the messiness of caring for others is what hawkish war leaders and politicians with things to hide don't want to bother with.

I thought my diary was a place where I should express my anger and frustration at things I cannot change, but I thought should change. I guess I was being idealistic.

But if by remaining idealist is the way I cope with pain, is the way I can console myself, then please let me be. I need to have hope that people are essentially good, that people can change for the better. Futile and stupid, maybe. But I need it. Because if I stop thinking that way, what is there to live for beyond daily survival? If everyone just cared for themselves, where is the enjoyment of life? Utopia doesn't exist, perfection doesn't exist. But people still strive for perfection because in doing that they improve, and then they progress, and generally their lives would be slightly more improved than before. Because if you don't go through life hoping that tomorrow would be better than yesterday, what is the point?

I thought I had the right to say something about it, because my life was changed by something I didn't choose to happen and didn't feel need've happened. If it was Singapore going for war against Malaysia, I would've said something too, as pointless as it might be. If it's not Iraq, I guess it might be some other countries. It would've done nothing, but why fault me for wishing this would all end and expressing that here?

Love,
restlessly

- last entry / next entry -

recent entries:

Monday, 27^th February 2006 - My house of cards finally comes down

Saturday, Feb. 25, 2006 - Books and fitness

Thursday, 23^rd February 2006 - Still fat and sleepless

Monday, 13^th February 2006 - Fat sleepless me

Sunday, 5^th February 2006 - It's more than just cartoons