No matter the class, race, or culture. No matter the place, time, or situation. The capacity to feel loss, to fear death - perhaps not in itself, or that of oneself, but that of others, and other things - and to love. These are central to what it means to be human.

Sitting there in the heavy silence, the eyes uncomfortable in settling on anything else but the floor, the ears picking up the wails and low murmuring of relatives - not mine, but a friend’s, the heart wanted to cry out not only in sympathy, but in realisation of a lesson learnt. That the human body is a fragile thing, that we are all living in a false sense of security that we are immune to the random nature of fate, and that we are, after all, human.

I don’t think I’ve managed to clock so many working hours across consecutive days, including over the weekends, since I started working. Not complaining, for I rather enjoy it, but there is only so much I can sustain before feeling burnt out. I hope I can be forgiven for having a 臭脾氣 in the only place I dare let my emotions show and snappiness get the better of me.

There’s been this wave of depressing news and occurrences lately that you wonder if the antepenultimate apocalypse isn’t coming. Listening to Requiems seem entirely apt. They lend a feeling of solemnity and yet also a spiritual uplifting that can’t be found anywhere else…

The flesh surrenders itself, he thought. Eternity takes back its own. Our bodies stirred these waters briefly, danced with a certain intoxication before the love of life and self, dealt with a few strange ideas, then submitted to the instruments of time. What can we say of this? I occurred. I am not… yet, I occurred.

~ Frank Herbert’s Dune Messiah, book II of the Dune Chronicles

It’s kind of redunculous that they’ve completely dug up the roads running through the front porch and driveway of our office. Impassable, unwalkable, for there’s no road left. Heck, there’s no ground left. It’s like a waterless moat. Or a ladderless trench. The only way to get to work these days is to slip through a gap in the hoarding into what feels like a construction site, briskwalk down a newly-paved fire engine access road (don’t really like having Bangladeshi workers watching me from both sides…), and leave the path to traverse this unlevelled grass patch to the right of the house. Then there’s a choice of either going in through the backdoor, or through the front after hopping over the four-language DANGER — KEEP OUT signboard thoughtfully placed a few steps away from the mini-abyss that separates the adjacent narrow concrete flooring from what’s left of our front steps.

I can imagine giving directions to our office: “When you see the side of a colonial house with with pots of plants and many booties hanging on the grilles - that’s us! PS. It is not advisable to come during or after a rain; umbrellas aren’t sufficient - you will need WelliesPhua Chu Kang boots. PPS. Heels are not recommended, no matter the weather. PPPS. Please bring torch if leaving after dark.”

Now… let’s zoom into the office, where my colleagues and I have embarked on a late-night regime, as is usually the case during preparation for conferences. We can get quite, quite busy. Call me a masochist, but… I like.

Quote of the day: “I miss running around like a headless chicken and talking to big people.”

… give me a proper melody that’s been written by one of our great composers any day. A song by Schubert or a nocturne by Chopin, something that will make the hairs of your head stand on end! The function of music is to liberate in the soul those feelings which normally we keep locked up in the heart. The great composers of the past were able to do this, but the musicians of today are satisfied with four notes in a line you can sell on a song-sheet at the street corner.

~ Sebastian Faulks, Birdsong

Left: 4th June; Right: 17 June

Perhaps as an effect of its fall onto the car, or perhaps as a result of having recklessly swallowed one too many mealworms, the bulbul’s left side is a little quirky and it has developed an unsightly kink in the neck. “Is the bird ok?” – everyone would ask. In its default state, it is hunched over like an old vulturous hag with the head perpetually tilted at a curious angle. While at rest or asleep, the head just sinks lower. The body posture reminds me of a certain leaning tower. Surprisingly, defying the prophecies of the pessimists, it has made it through not only the first, but the third weekend with us.

New names for it have been proposed by friends and colleagues (‘Toffee/Walnut’ didn’t quite catch on, except among a few of us): Fluffy, Humpy, Flumpfy, and the tongue-in-cheek Quasimododo(do).

At this age, I believe, the young bulbul should be capable of finding, or picking up its own food. But no – it’s still quite ignorant if I may admit it to be so, and it may be my fault for being incapable of teaching it the ways of the aves. It still gapes, quivers, and chirps babyishly and loudly for attention. And it knows no fear. I near-lobbed a large black hole-puncher at it, and instead of ducking and cowering away, it stretched its neck out towards the supposedly-intimidating object and opened its mouth, expecting food! A colleague suggested that I try dressing up as a big brown motherbird, peck at worms, and flap my arms. Failing which, I should at least costume my hand as such. And for good measure, I should also get a cat outfit…

The dicey moment when you should introduce two people but can’t remember one of their names: whomnesia, persona non data, notworking, mumbleduction, introducking

The realization of the perfect riposte three hours after the argument: hindser, retrotort, afterism

The momentary confusion experienced by everyone in the vicinity when a phone rings and no one is sure if it is his/hers or not: conphonesion, phonundrum, ringxiety, fauxallarm

sarchasm n. The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn’t get it

~ Steven Pinker, The Stuff of Thought: Language as a Window into Human Nature