Savages

August 30, 2010

I had a real Lord of the Flies moment the other day. I was walking home from work and saw a mob of people gather around the adjacent bicycle lane, spilling onto the road and courting passers-by stopping to enjoy the spectacle. There had seemingly been a traffic accident between a lady in a car and a lady in on a bicycle, not that it was of much interest to the people. One of the ladies, the lady on the bicycle; the poorer of the two as noted by her wrangled hair and lack of front teeth, was hurling obscenities at the other, launching for her arms and clawing at her silk dress. The other lady, tried vigorously to defend herself, but was visibly beaten down by the summer’s heat. Supposedly the poorer lady had stolen money from the lady in the dress, yet the latter lacked the aggressiveness at hand to wrestle it back. Chaos had erupted and the mob had swarmed in to observe the festivities of man’s primal tendencies.

This scene is not uncommon in China. Every time a road accident occurs or people find themselves in physical confrontations, the surrounding patrons simply become immobile in the their walk and flock to watch—not to aid, but to watch.

The crowd surrounding this debarkle had obscured much of the traffic on the narrow pavement and bicycle lane by now, only contributing to the growing number of observers. As the people grew, the tension mounted, the women became visibly more distressed and eventually the lady in the car had to flee for the cotton strap on her dress had been torn, leaving only the plastic support. The poorer lady walked slowly in the opposite direction, breathing deeply through her chest as if to offset a potential anxiety attack. On this confirmation, the crowd dissipated and returned to their regular commute.

I would like to say that such a common event is a symbol of the primitive state of the Chinese mindset, but doing so would be both unfair and incorrect, since I don’t think that such acts are absent or less common in other places of the world either. Perhaps in other countries, like Australia, they are less of a public display, but still prevalent in places, particularly those of squalor. In any case, what sickens me is the silent mob of passers-by who come to observe, lacking basic humanity and accountability in their inaction. Their presence alone asserts that such confrontations are normal and thereby acceptable. It worries me, but I guess such instinctive behaviour is an urge we sometimes can’t resist, after all, it’s not like to tried to break the fight, is it?

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Saturday Come Slow

August 28, 2010

Recently this clip made for the Massive Attack song, Saturday Come Slow, really grabbed my attention. Please watch it below:

The image at the end of the clip of the milk-like substance flinching to the bass of the speaker is a powerfully abstract metaphor for the cause against using music as torture. In fact, I was so compelled by this video that I followed the link to the site and will at some stage place a donation to respective organisation, ZeroDB. There is a video you can watch on the site about a documentary on the use of music as torture, currently it doesn’t appear to be released.

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The Future

On the way to my potato and beef noodle dinner, I was thinking about the future. I kind of surprised myself too, after all, lately I haven’t had the time nor head space to think past the next few days in front of me, let alone my long term prospects.

Maybe this is extremely naïve of me, but I feel all set for the future. I mean, I can’t see myself wanting to change my current scenario very much. Given it’s a bit rough now, the following 10 months ought to be rather comfortable. I live well on my own, I have a comfortable salary and a great relationship with my girlfriend, I love my apartment, and I have more than enough time to continue playing and writing about games as well as maintaining my other hobbies. I find that this environment and my job is very challenging and satisfying, but at the same time I can also limit that challenge if I wish. Otherwise, as I become more acclimatised to China and my work, day-to-day life will only become progressively easier. Also, I haven’t even began to scratch the surface of what this place has to offer. Lately, I’ve remained focused on my writing, since going out is too tiresome after more than 8hrs of straight labour, but soon enough I’ll have time to practice my Chinese out of class and with people my own age.

When I was a teenager, I concluded that if in the future I could work a satisfying, but not overly demanding job and have sufficient time to maintain my enthusiast interests, then there would be nothing else in life that I need. I am more or less on the road to realising this future and I’m only 21. Theoretically, I could keep this job going until I retire, become a senior teacher or whatever, have my hours reduced and my pay increased. Not a bad deal.

Besides rounding up some more games and seeing the family, I also don’t think much of a reason to go home either. A quick glance on Facebook always verifies the reasons why I didn’t want to stick around. If I was in Australia, I figure that everything would be more difficult. Living costs would be expensive, I’d have to drive a car everywhere, cook my own food and I’d have a smaller net of potential jobs. I’d have less interesting friends, be speaking English all the time and be wallowing in regressional modern society.

So long as I continue my relationship with 女神, I know that it will be roughly another 2 years before I can leave and come back. Assuming, that is, I am still with her and want to move back to Shanghai. I guess I’m pretty fortunate then that I’m so relaxed here.

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