GOOD FRIDAY. Is it really 'good'? 4:08 pm

"It's as if the weather knew, knew that it is Good Friday. When they nailed him back then on Calvary it rained, when we planted the Easter cross today it rained. It's really as if the weather knew and did the crying for us."

After nearly 5 weeks of Lent, I cannot believe how fast Easter has crept up on me yet again. Each Lent, rather similar to every New Year, I am filled with inspiration and desire to meet my Lenten sacrifices as I similarly try to meet New Year resolutions. How true that Jesus mentions: the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. Perhaps that is the curse on mankind, the cross we have to bear.

A crowd watching the planting of the Easter cross on Good Friday | Abbey Hill, Kenilworth

Perhaps not all of us are like me, inspired and desiring to do things, but ultimately not achieve all of it because the flesh is weak. I pray the better lot of us out there are better at keeping Lenten promises and New Year resolutions. But perhaps it is a common human condition to always want to do something but never do; Harold Pinter captures this pitiful reality in his plays, in particular in "The Caretaker". The only 2 characters in the play sit in a room and talk about all their plans, mundane plans, and errands they want to do, but ultimately not leave the room right till the end of the play. Sounds vaguely familiar? For me, I can only hear the echoes of guilt and exasperation in my room.

Yaoen and Oliver at the planting of the Easter cross | Abbey Hill, Kenilworth

Good Friday often strikes a somber, guilty discordant chord in me. But somehow, this discordance has its own beauty; the realisation that I am only human awash with shortcomings and yet this pinnacle of imperfection still has a place in the presence of perfection. Palm Sunday, the Sunday before Easter celebrates the welcoming of Jesus into the community of Jews some 2,000 years ago; riding on a humble donkey, Jesus was welcomed at the city gates with people waving palm leaves. After my trip to Morocco, one better understands the reverance the Arabs and the people in Arabia give to the palm tree. So this was a welcome fit for a king.

Yet, it is the very same people who welcomed Him that condemned Him to His death just a week later on Good Friday. Perhaps you better understand the guilt now; like the Jews centuries ago who codemn Jesus to His death, I do the same today each time I sin. But it takes a fall for the rising to be beautiful isn't it? And so it is the same for this Easter triduum; the fall on Good Friday, the rising of hope on Easter Sunday.

The Easter cross planted on Good Friday | Abbey Hill, Kenilworth

Easter never fails to be a poignant event of every year. Each year, it fills me with new hope and inspiration once more to live life and live it well. Knowing only a fraction of this inspiration will be turned into deed, I look forward once more to Easter next year. After all, I am but a human that needs constant hope to embrace the reality that "the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak".

Happy Easter everyone, with or without the bunnies and eggs. Even if Easter was not a religious occasion for you, its a compelling story to reflect upon, won't you think so?

"Hope of Easter" | Tulip about to bloom | Outside Social Science Building, University of Warwick

Uncle T

photos of the day (yesterday) 4:46 pm

3 x Dog-earred political philosophy books borrowed from the University of Warwick, stacked on top of each other, placed on top a regular lacquered wooden desk with random stains on it, taken in the room of Flat 25 Hurst accomodation on university campus.

Where does knowledge come from? From within or from the outside? Which knowledge to retain, which to abandon; there is only so much we can take.

1 x Lamy Calligraphy Pen bought at an airport in London, 1 x Black Nike digital watch bought in Singapore, 1 x used Yellow Post-it with writing in black ink; all on top of notes compiled over 2.5 weeks for an essay on the legitimacy of exemption from the law based on cultural and religious claims. This was taken during the time of day where there was still sunlight streaming into the room.

There is just so much information to consider; discernment is key. That is the same for life, the same for the essay. Discernment, that is the key.

Light painting in an artificially darkened room by drawing its curtains. The source of light is from a 19" computer screen on top of a regular lacquered wooden desk. The movement of the camera was random. This was inspired after seeing Picasso's own light drawing.

If you look around, you will find. Possibly that's what's the difference between the great and good; the great spend more time looking around than finding.

Uncle T

photo of the day (yesterday) 4:01 pm

This is an Assisi cross on a wooden rosary on a white Mac keyboard, at 02:15 in the wee small hours of a Tuesday morning.

Faith and intellect. Hoping that that is enough to get through the essays and the anxieties of the examinations.

Uncle T

"Oh stop being so naive, please. Stop wasting your time. This always happens to you; it happened before and its happening now. Don't you ever learn? What must it take for you to learn?! Grow up. Fairy tales are for fairy tales; you ain't no fairy. So please, get real buddy. Stop it."

Uncle T

colours of london. 8:15 am

This was a post written sometime back but got never published. Inspired by my current stay in London, here it is.

The bus drove by the greyish brown walls and tree-claws of Grosvenor Place. Somehow, the greyness of London brings out the colour of the people that throng this city. The colour of the foreign faces against those walls made me smile. I miss London.

We snaked through the busy streets of London, fighting to get into the centre whilst others fought to get out at the end of the working day. Primark came into view on the left. I smiled again. We soon pulled into Victoria Coach station, the place of many adventures. No, misadventures I do recall; of missing coaches and sad farewells.

There it was all over again. The faint stench of London’s sidewalks, immigrant cab drivers urging you to take the most expensive cab-ride of your life. That is no different from when you first arrive at JFK in New York; just that its yellow there and black here. I turn the corner and there was the familiar Starbucks at the t-junction before heading into the train station.

The moment you enter the train station, its like you hit the ground running. Faces, tailcoats, chattering mouths rush past you, into you. The high ceilings of Victoria do not make up for the scores of people scurrying below in all directions. I caught glimpses of the familiar yellow luminous jackets of London policemen. Tall, fine young men with no guns; somewhat castrated, don’t you think?

And with many others, we struggle down the steps from the train station to the Underground; so many memories here of helping struggling old ladies, black women, young children carry their luggage down that flight. There was no one to help me today. Or yesterday. Chatters rush by you as arms and legs fight to get into the rush-hour Tube trains. Funny how they mind the gap but not the people around them.

a strip of london | london

amongst the crowd | holborn, london

Uncle T

Swan Street, London 7:50 am

I'm right back in the room I stayed in for 2 months last summer. Same desk, same sink, same kitchen, same hamster; this reminds me of getting up early in the morning, wearing a nicely pressed shirt, putting on my tie, making my shirt and pants had no creases, grabbing available breakfast, rushing out to join the throngs heading across London Bridge, picking up the City AM newspapers talking about the optimism of the financial market, heading into my life as a banker...

Now, the same desk, same sink, same kitchen, same hamster, only remind me that the bank that hired me has gotten into terrible financial trouble, the markets are only on the frontpages for the wrong reasons, and that sense of optimism heading to a day of adventure at asset management and debt structuring is replaced by dread of looming essay deadlines. Same, but different.

I will miss this place, I will miss London. I was looking forward to New York last summer. Now, its time to look ahead towards heading home, Singapore. Let's hope its as good, or better, than New York.

'godzilla's playground' | manhattan, new york



'come on...' | brooklyn, new york

'this is nyc.' | brooklyn, new york



'stop.' | manhattan, new york



'finishing as champions' | bronx, new york

Uncle T