A Slave To Ignorance

 

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Of the many crimes against humanity committed by modern schooling - I don't use "education" because it doesn't exist - is the lack of language study.  This is certainly by design, because buried in the very words we use is the history of civilization, slapping us in the face every time we write, read, speak, or listen.  It is no mistake that the Trivium of true education were the essential skills of grammar, logic and rhetoric, nor is it a mistake that the word for tedious detail is "trivia".

It would be funny, were it not so tragic, that the social justice warriors (SJWs) who bellow themselves blue about systemic racism and the injustice of black slavery are using a term that literally means "white slave".

The word "race" is rather interesting.  There are two parallel origins for the two distinct meanings.  In Old Norse, it meant "current," like the flow of water, and ultimately came to mean a sontest of speed.

More interesting is the meaning of "race" referring to someone's ethnicity.  This sense of the word came to English in the 1600s, from Middle French meaning "origins, lineage, family".  In other words, a "racist" is simply someone who is proud or bullish on their family or lineage.  In the true sense of the word, nearly every human on the planet is racist.  And if every human on the planet is racist, then no one is.  Even in the modern fad of urban tribalism popular among the SJWs, promoting their group or "tribe" is, by definition, racist.

While all of this is fun and fascinating, as real education always is, the word that will blow the dear reader out of his or her chair is "slave".

Slave literally refers to the Slavic people of Eastern Europe.  That's right, the very word "slave" comes from a race of WHITE European people who were valued as excellent slaves as late as the 16th century.  In fact, it seems that the Romans adopted the word "sclavus" from the name of this race of people.

The origin, or etymology, of the word "slave" can be found pretty much anywhere educated people congregate.  There are extensive citations in the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), which is the go-to source for the history of English words.

To quote one online source, etymonline.com:

"The oldest written history of the Slavs can be shortly summarised--myriads of slave hunts and the enthralment of entire peoples. The Slav was the most prized of human goods. With increased strength outside his marshy land of origin, hardened to the utmost against all privation, industrious, content with little, good-humoured, and cheerful, he filled the slave markets of Europe, Asia, and Africa."

What is particularly notable here is that the Slavs were highly prized as slaves across three continents, including Africa.  Thus, white slaves were being traded in Africa BEFORE the first known African slaves were brought to the New World.

It would seem that the vaunted New York Times' 1619 Project is crumbling before our eyes, and all we've done so far is look only at the history of two words, so far.  We haven't even touched the reasons why so many Europeans were escaping to the New World.

The history and, thus, the truth about racism and slavery are buried deep in the English language, and by extension, global history and culture.  We can point to Biblical accounts of the Hebrews enslaved in Egypt, or the 140,000 American and European POWs in Japan in World War 2, or the "coyotes" running humans across the southern US border as you read this.

Slavery is as old as humanity.  Since records have been kept, humans have bought and sold other humans to do the jobs no one else wanted.  As the previous quote shows, certain races were prized for their qualities as slaves (Slavs).  The Irish and Welsh were (are?) valued for their mining experience and as domestic servants.  Mohawks were legendary ironworkers in the constuction of Manhattan.  Even today, Asians are pressed into service for meticulous and repetitive assembly work.

The Barbary pirates were legendary slave traders along the north and west coasts of Africa.  These people, know as the Berbers, were Turkish and Arab Muslims who began trading slaves after the conquests of Libya, Algeria and Morocco in the 1500s (note the date).  These pirates or corsairs captured and sold thousands of African and European slaves, and were likely not only the source of slaves for the New World, but expanded operations to become the (or at least some) pirates of the Caribbean, as well.

A common form of slavery, even today, is indentured servitude.  Think of it as a kind of "voluntary" or contractual slavery, where one sells one's self or a family member into slavery for a period of time, in the hopes of gaining a skill or craft, or transport to a new land.  The modern internship is nothing but a form of contractual slavery, where one works for little or nothing to gain experience and possibly have an inside track to employment.

My uncle Patrick was the only surviving male of his generation, because his indentured servitude as a house boy in Butte, Montana, kept him out of the coal mines, while his brothers all died of black lung.  In a sense, my mother's family survives thanks to slavery.

The foregoing is not to excuse slavery.  It is a horrid and inhumane practice, especially where it is involuntary.  It is not, however, a reason to offer one group of people victim points over another.  The SJWs and various activist groups have no valid claim to slavery as their personal excuse to inflict mayhem and pain on others.  There is hardly a race (family, lineage, tribe) on the planet that has not been enslaved at some point by another race, or even their own.

The very words "race" and "slave" carry with them the amazingly diverse history of their origins.  To call someone a racist is literally saying they are concerned with their family first, over any others.  To claim exclusive victimhood over slavery based on nothing more than skin color defies the root of the word itself - and in fact is racist  Blaming Europeans for slavery is precisely saying Europeans are responsible for "European chattel humans".

The absurdity of the SJW argument and the apologetics for looting and rioting are, prima facie, circular arguments that tie themselves into literal and historical knots.

Ultimately, this ridiculous situation is the fault of schooling and the dearth of education.  Those who spout their slogans in defense of the indefensible have no clue what they are saying, and defeat their own arguments with the very words they choose.

We can never end the barbaric practice (the word "barbaric" itself a slander against men with beards) of slavery until we realize that the word itself is multi-racial.  We also need to reclaim the word "race" as not something evil or vile, but in fact celebrates our individual and collective heritage.  Race is an affirmation of family, not a slur to weaponize in service of ideology.

Next time you welsh on a bet, go dutch treat, get your irish up, complain about an indian giver, or call someone a slave, remember that you are using someone's race as a derogatory term.  And next time someone calls you racist, thank them for acknowledging your family comes first.

We cannot solve problems until we fully admit what the problems are.  If you lance one boil, but leave another to fester, you have done nothing to begin the healing.

What's In A Name?

An issue that seems to keep rising up to the top of the putrid news cycle is the artificial "problem" of gender-neutral pronouns.  A tiny but extremely noisy group of individuals, aided and abetted by a media agenda that seeks to destroy Western culture, demands that we use the pronouns of their preference when speaking to them.

This rubbish is so insane that I feel compelled to address it from a linguistic perspective.

To be clear, "sex" is a biological designation, and "gender" is a linguistic function.  People and animals do not have "genders," only the language we use does.  People and animals have "sexes," and 99% of humans have one or the other of "male" and "female," while the English language uses three "genders": masculine, feminine and neuter.

Of the European languages, English is the least gendered.  They are divided into two primary groups, the Romance and the Germanic.  English is a hybrid of the two, plus ancient Norse, which falls outside the two dominant groups present today.  Both Romance and Germanic languages have gendered nouns, which affects the articles, adjectives and pronouns used with them.  Romance languages have two (masculine and feminine), and Germanic have three (masculine, feminine and neuter).

When I use an adjective with a gendered noun, I must decline it to match the gender of the noun.  In the same way, if I substitute a pronoun for a gendered noun, I must choose the appropriate gender for the noun.  In French, "the war" is "she", while in German, it is "he".  In English, "the war" is "it".  It has no gender at all.  In fact, in English we use the neuter "it" for anything that does not have a sex.

The gender of a noun has little or nothing to do with our perceptions and assumptions of which "sex" the noun is generally associated with.  For instance, "the war" is a feminine noun in Romance languages (la guerra in Spanish), and a masculine noun in German (der Krieg).  "The house" is neuter in German (das Haus) and feminine in French (la maison).  Notice in both cases, the article changes to match the noun's gender, while in English it is always the same: the.

English does not have gendered nouns, although we sometimes assign genders to some objects.  In common usage, a ship is sometimes referred to as "she," and dogs are often referred to as "he" regardless of the actual sex of the animal.  Human babies are generally referred to as "it," a genderless pronoun, until we know the sex of the child, as in, "You're pregnant?! Do you know what it is yet?"

Let's take a moment to review the English pronouns, since many readers probably don't remember their grade school classes, though we use them all the time without thinking about it.

First, we have "singular" and "plural" pronouns - obviously depends on the number of nouns referred to.  Then we have three "persons": first, second and third.  Thus, a matrix of English pronouns looks like this:

The reader will notice that when I address someone directly, I use the pronoun "you".  Strictly speaking, this is the formal variant, but the informal "thou" has fallen into disuse over the last century, and "ye" which is the plural form, also no longer in general use.

In any case, when I address someone directly, any of the pronoun choices I have do not reference any gender - they are completely and totally genderless.  "You," "thou" and "ye" do not imply or connote gender in any way, nor can I infer a gender if I don't know who "you" refers to.  Thus, when I speak to someone and use "you" in my speech, I say nothing about that person's gender or sex, and the only possible option I have is to add "all" to specify a plural object.  The fact that I can use "you" to refer to a group proves that it is all-inclusive and genderless.

When I speak about someone to a third party, I now have a number of options, two of which reference gender, and the other two being completely neutral, or neuter.  I can use "he" when I perceive the subject/object to have masculine gender, and "she" when feminine.  In both cases, it is the perception of the speaker, and the speaker's choice, which gender or none will be used.  When I refer to a baby as "it," I indicate that I do not know the sex of the child.  When I refer to unsexed or inanimate objects, "it" is used to indicate that the thing is not human, or is not living at all.

The underappreciated pronoun "one" indicates a general reference to a human being whose sex is unknown or not important to the predicate.  For example, "When one visits Paris, one must see the Eiffel Tower."

In some English dialects, particularly in Ireland and western England, "your one" is frequently used to reference a third person whose sex is a given (both speaker and listener know it), or is unknown, or is unimportant.

Now, to address the ridiculous assertion by a tiny but vocal group of individuals who wish to change an entire language to suit their political goals.

English, and most European languages are based on the fact that there are only two sexes among human beings - and in fact most higher forms of life on Earth - male and female.  These designations are NOT genders, they are sexes, of which there are only two.  It takes one female and one male to create a third person.  There are no other options.  Any other variants are unable to reproduce.  Thus, there are only two sexes.

In language, I use "he" or "she" to refer to a third person because 99% of all human beings are either male or female.  There is a very tiny number of individuals who are born with both or neither sex, and they are usually unable to reproduce and will often choose a sex to publicly display to others for the purpose of fitting in to the general culture.  These individuals are called hermaphrodites and represent about 0.05%, or about 1 in 2,000 births globally.

As to the argument about which pronoun I should use for an individual, the point is moot.  When I speak directly to you, I use the pronoun "you," which is entirely genderless.  When I speak about you to a third person, which pronoun I use is frankly none of your business.  I will choose a pronoun based on my perceptions and opinions, and which is mutually understood to refer to you.  Since I am not speaking to you, you have no say in which pronoun I choose, since that matter is entirely between me and the one listening to me.  You have no moral right to try to modify my language - it falls solidly under free speech - and I have no moral obligation to use language that you choose for me.

Thus, when I speak to you, I always use non-gendered pronouns, whether you are an individual or group.  When I speak to a third person, the only concern you have is whether my speech is slanderous, but you have no right to modify my speech a priori.  Your only concern is whether my speech has harmed your person or reputation, in which case you are welcome to prove such harm in a court of law and ask for restitution.

If your feelings are hurt by my choice of pronouns to refer to you, this is entirely your problem and does not concern me.  If I start to edit my language to ensure that no one's feelings are hurt, then I quickly reach the point of not being able to communicate at all, since there is always someone who will take offence at just about anything I say.

Furthermore, your feelings are not tangible or quantifiable by any metric.  You can claim your feelings are hurt, but I have no way to objectively verify that statement.  You may be saying such a thing to manipulate me and do not genuinely feel such emotions.  I may choose to modify my language in your presence as a matter of social politeness, but I am under no moral obligation to do so.

The entire argument concerning pronouns flies in the face of thousands of years of linguistic evolution and centuries of legal advancements, primarily free speech.  Any law which attempts to abridge my superseding and unalienable right to free speech is prima facie immoral and untenable.  I choose my pronouns based on grammatical norms, intended meaning, and the right to choose whichever pronoun I want for any given person, place or thing.

The only viable solution in the English language, for those for whom this is a vital concern, is to use "it" or "one" for third-person singular pronouns.    Trying to force change on a language is a Sisyphean task, since language comes from the roots up, not from the branch down.  Furthermore, it violates every moral and legal precedent in Western law.

Referring to another person as "your one" is a viable option.  It is completely gender-neutral and has a long history in the common use of the language.  Additionally, "your one" does not have the emotional and connotative baggage that "it" does, since "it" is sometimes used in a pejorative manner.

"They" is frequently used in common speech when one wishes to hide the number and/or gender of a noun, but it quickly gets confusing in complex sentences.

The primary agenda behind this artificial issue is the destruction of an organic culture.  Language and culture are inextricably linked to each other.  By destroying one, you destroy both.  The issue of gendered pronouns and related attempts to artificially alter language is designed to destroy cohesive culture.  It is one of the fundamental tools posited by George Orwell to erase the past and control minds.

If a culture's language is sufficiently modified, then the people will no longer be able to read and understand literature.  Once the literature is meaningless, then the people have no way to access and understand the lessons our forebears committed to writing to teach us what they learned.

Gendered language is only one of many fronts in the Culture War, but it is a vital one.  If we acquiesce in this battle, then dozens of other fronts will open and a key bit of ground will have been lost.  We must reject this argument with prejudice and never allow any group, no matter what the grievance, to forcefully modify our language.  Language is our bond to the past and our key to the future, and that is precisely what this battle is about: erasing the past and controlling the future.

The War On Words

Perhaps you've never really thought about this, but why is language so important?

There's a lot of noise lately about gender pronouns.  The Swedes added a new gender-less third-person singular pronoun a while back.  The German language has had three genders for centuries.  So has Russian.  Indonesian has a gender-less third-person singular that likely stems from Sanskrit roots.  So what's the big deal?

English has four third-person singular pronouns, two of which are gender-neutral: he, she, it and one.  He, she and one are primarily used for humans, while it can be used for just about anything.  Consider the couple who has just found out they are pregnant.  Folks commonly ask (these days), "Do you know what IT is yet?"

Gender is an exclusively linguistic construct.  Except for a tiny fraction of one percent of the global population, humans come in two sexes: male and female.  We are all genetically XX or XY, with a smattering of folks having XXY or XYY, and the latter two usually suffer medical issues all their lives.  Therefore, "he" and "she" accurately designate the sex of 99.99% of the world's population, and a million dollars' worth of surgery cannot change one's sex.

The stupid part of the whole pronoun argument is not that English (and many other languages) already have gender-neutral pronouns, it's that most humans do not address people in the third-person.  In English, we always address someone as "you", which is appropriate for both formal and informal, as well as male or female.  All of the plural pronouns are gender-neutral, so the point is moot in those cases.  Of course, "I" is the pronoun of self and is appropriate for any gender, sex, race, orientation, or whatever.

Apparently, in all the socio-political bullshit being spread over the pronoun argument, folks have forgotten about "one", which is a very old and gender-neutral pronoun in the English language that is often used in formal conditionals, but could easily be adopted for common language.  It doesn't have the baggage of "it" and even carries a certain formal connotation, thus offering a fine alternative to "he" or "she".  The Irish commonly use "your one" to refer to a singular third person.

So, what is this pronoun dust-up really all about?  Answer: cutting the culture off from its roots.

In Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell made a point of noting the State's efforts to reduce the NewSpeak dictionary down to the most basic vocabulary.  The theory was that if people don't have a word for something, they can't think about it, nor can they convey it to others via speech or text.

This, in a nutshell, is what the pronoun war is all about.  It is one of several efforts to eradicate vocabulary from the language.  As the vocabulary contracts, it becomes harder and harder to access literature.  Within a generation or two, one is unable to make sense of books that are even a century old.  As the effort progresses, they are unable to understand books written even decades ago.

Take a look at this passage from Chaucer's Canterbury Tales:

      Whan that Aprill, with his shoures soote

The droghte of March hath perced to the roote

And bathed every veyne in swich licour,

Of which vertu engendred is the flour;

5 Whan Zephirus eek with his sweete breeth

Inspired hath in every holt and heeth

The tendre croppes, and the yonge sonne

Hath in the Ram his halfe cours yronne...

I doubt many native speakers of English could read most of this, much less speak it accurately, and the language is just 600 years old.  The inability of modern English speakers to read the text is not part of a concerted effort by the Powers That Be to cut off our culture, it is just the natural evolution of language.

Now try Beowulf or Shakespeare in the original language.

Today, folks can barely understand the language of the US Constitution, which is only 200 and some years old, because the sentence structure is beyond the capabilities of most "schooled" readers (I purposely chose "schooled" over "educated").

Under a full onslaught of "language police", how long would it be before we could no longer read last year's New York Times?  How long before the vast majority of people could no longer access information reserved only for the highest levels of society?  Isn't that already happening?

Listen to "Man On The Street" interviews on any given outlet.  Decide for yourself if the vast majority of folks even know about Chaucer, much less have read or even less understood Chaucer, especially in the original texts.  These folks couldn't even compose a thought that included an idea from Canterbury Tales.

Orwell was right.

The effort to change and edit language is not about people's feelings.  Who really cares what a tranny in Berkeley wants to be called?  The point is to cut off access to the masses of vocabulary, grammar and ideas by making history and literature unintelligible to the hordes.

If you don't know something exists, you will likely never look for it.  And if you stumble upon it by accident, you would never be able to comprehend it.  You wouldn't have the tools to even begin to decipher the thoughts contained in the text.

The Catholic Church did this for millennia by printing the Bible in Latin and saying the mass in Latin.  Unless you were highly educated, you had no idea what was contained in those words.  Even more to the point, the church hierarchy could tell you it meant anything they wanted, and you would have no way of challenging them.

The "language police" are not about sparing the feelings of a few, they are about cutting off the many from the vast reservoirs of human experience.  Without literature, the past only exists for a lifetime, and then it dies.  Without language, the past will cease to exist and the State will be everything that is.

If you want to save your culture, and by extension humanity, the only things you need to teach your children and grandchildren are the Trivium and a love of literature.

They are the best and only true weapons we have against Authoritarianism and Totalitarianism.

A Word, If You Will

by Ji Lee (link at end of page)

When the Elohim became alarmed at the doings of Mankind, their response was to scramble His languages.  In other words, they attacked the words.

When a wizard or witch wants to manipulate the medium, they use magic incantations - words of creation or destruction.

Words are the very fabric of our reality.  We perceive what is real to us by which words we use to describe the "out there" to ourselves.  Scarier still, when we listen to others and ascribe to their words some sort of uber-importance, then we allow someone else to create our reality for us.  If you are listening to Flox Gnus right now, then you are allowing the various functionaries within that organization to create your reality for you.

We manipulate picture and symbols as a form of highly condensed words.  If a picture is worth a thousand words, then think how much reality is created within you by simply looking at images.  It is a powerful thing to be the creator of images - to create within many souls the very fabric of their reality.  So what kind of reality must people see when they view vomit as art?

In Nineteen Eighty-Four, Orwell graphically illustrated the concept that people cannot conceive of realities for which they have no words.  By slowly reducing the dictionary of New Speak over generations, eventually people could not imagine whatever things the State wished them to avoid.  How like our current cultural situation is this?  Just look at what passes for language in the average text message.

Words are magical things.  All religions use them, whether it be Ohm, or nam myoho renge kyo, or the Lord's Prayer, or chanting Arabic phrases, those who follow such things are generally unaware that they have been socialized into creating a magical reality that someone else designed.  Why else would preachers preach, except to manipulate the medium of reality?

In most revolutions, the first to be slaughtered are the intelligencia and the artists.  The reason is simple - they people, wittingly or not, know how to use words and they cannot be tolerated in times when control of reality is of the utmost importance to those who seek to control it.


The Chinese culture knows the value of words.  They have a long tradition of meditating on characters and then transferring that essence to canvas in a process where the very language itself becomes art.  People like Wayne White do similar things with English words, while poets like e. e. cummings paint pictures with words (there is a difference).

One reason I have felt compelled to write since I was just a boy is that I have had an instinctive recognition of the power of words.  Like all writers, people who feel this truth seek to harness that power to some degree of success or another.  No one can deny that such men as the one known as Shakespeare mastered the technique.  Modern writers such as Tom Robbins are well aware of the power they wield.

As a child, I learned the old saw, "Stick and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me."  What a sad little saying, since it inculcates a disrespect for the power of words that we all know is true, but which such sayings encourage us to deny.

Thing about it: the most powerful noun can be modified by a deceptively simple article like "a" or "the".  The largest and most active verbs can be completely turned around by nothing more than adding "to" or "for".  If these simple little articles and propositions can control the most powerful things and actions, then how much more power must other words have?  If we can invoke Satan with a word, then can't we do the same with God?

Words are reality.  We know no other reality but that which we can speak.  The more powerful a language, the larger its vocabulary, and the more it comes to dominate the thing we call reality.

In light of these thoughts, doesn't it behoove us to build our vocabulary and to take control of the language we use and that which we allow into our minds?  In fact, knowing these things makes it imperative that we turn off the corporate media and take control of our language and learn the power we have sitting right in front of us.  By taking control of our language, we control our reality, and conversely take away the power of others to create our reality for us.

Words are the core of majick.  They are neither good nor bad, but serve the intent of the speaker.  Take the word "cow".  To a Hindu follower, this is the word of a god.  To an overweight woman, this is the word of insult.  To a person urging action, it the word of blind obedience.  A simple word with so much power.

Consider your next word.  Use it carefully.  And the next after that.  Be aware of how you define your reality.  Control your inner dialogue.  Choose your terms to invoke the world you want.

We are all gods, and the power of that station is within our minds and at our fingers.  The smithing of words is more vital that we often imagine.

Most importantly, actively filter those words which you allow into your mind.  Consider the source that their intention in using the words.  Don't let others define your words, for in so doing, they are controlling your reality.

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The ArtWords of Ji Lee

Word War One

How important is language?

No, the title of this piece is not a typo.  Bear with me.

I recently read a paper by social anthropologist Mary Douglas, published in 1966, called, "Purity and Danger: An Analysis of Concepts of Pollution and Taboo."  It is an absolutely fascinating study of the limits of human thinking and society based on language.  It got me to thinking.

For further context, the aware reader will want to absorb Margaret Wertheim's exceptional piece for Aeon Magazine called, "Physics's Pangolin."

Part of Douglas' thesis is that those things we can not classify in our language get ignored, possibly become taboo and even get relegated to religious objects and subjects.

It is an interesting idea, and certainly one worth exploring.  Having learned all or part of 17 languages, I have become acutely aware of how language and culture go hand-in-hand.  What is especially intriguing are the things which other languages can or can not express compared to English (my mother tongue).  One simple example is my ongoing battle with the gardener at the Far Side Global Headquarters.  In Indonesian, rumput can mean 'weed' and 'grass'.  As a result, he is hell-bent on destroying my lawn (such as it is) because the thing I call 'grass' is nothing more than a nuisance plant to him.  As a consequence, he can not comprehend why I get so hopping mad when he paves over my grass, nor when I jack-hammer it up and replace the grass.

It's a simple example, but a telling one.

German is a fascinating language.  It is classified as 'glutenous' by linguists because it has a limited base vocabulary that is recombined to make new words.  Its grammar leads to a certain amount of clarity and precision in thinking by its native speakers.  For instance, to create the concept of submarine, one need only join the words unter, wasser and boot to create 'under-water-boat'.  Very clear and concise meaning.

To get the same clarity and conciseness from English, you must have a good understanding of Latin, Greek, French, and of course, German (the base language of English).  Only then could you tease out the meaning sub (under), mare (sea), and the suffix -ine meaning "of or related to."  Nowhere in the dissection of the word submarine does one find the meaning "boat", so it is an imprecise word.

Of course, German does have its drawbacks.  One can end up with job titles like "Rhinefarhtsgesellschaftkapitan," but there is no ambiguity about "goes on the Rhine joined vessel captain."

As a consequence of its language, German society is clear and precise.  No one can argue that the country is spotlessly clean, or that the Germans are not precision-driven.  Just take a look at some of their biggest corporations, like Siemens or Zeiss.

On the other hand, English is perfectly adapted to being an international language.  It easily assimilates words and grammar from other languages.  Its syntax is flexible enough to allow a wide variety of dialects.  And English is very good at classifying and categorizing things, which is what Douglas says is the key to the language/culture connection.

It behooves us to expand our language as far as we can to push back the boundaries of fear and superstition.  That which we can categorize can not hurt us and can be dealt with clearly.  Reading and learning a new word every day will dispel darkness.  Learning new languages further expands those horizons and adds concepts not available in our native tongues.  Witness German words like gemuetlicheit or the Indonesian selamat.  You might also learn that the Thai greeting sawasdeekra is the root of swastika, and find old ghosts expelled in such a way.

How important is language?  Imagine someone without a name.  How would you call them?  How would you refer to them?  Recall when the singer (I won't use the word artist) Prince changed his name to a graphic with no sounds attached?  His career quickly tanked and he became irrelevant because no one could talk about him.  There was no hook on which to hang ideas.

In Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-four, people often gloss over one of the most important warnings of the book. The power and control of Big Brother was the manipulation of language.  Words were constantly being redefined or disappeared.  The Newspeak dictionary grew thinner with each edition.  People were incapable of having subversive thoughts because they no longer had names for them, and so feared and reviled those subjects which could not be articulated.

Words bring light to the darkness.

Look at old maps and notice that dire warnings and monsters populated those regions where no one had hung titles.  Look at modern cosmology.  Fear and quasi-religious trappings gird the unknown, such as the first second of time after the supposed Big Bang.  Even the term Big Bang conjures violence and destruction, thus fear, in the very act of creation.  How can we make sense of a Universe in which creation is a violently destructive act?  And what does that say about moral relativism when we can point to the moment of creation and say that good came from bad, so the ends justify the means?

Language is the most vital weapon we have against authoritarianism and fascism.  There is a reason why the ruling class always attack language.  The first casualty of war is truth, and truth is expressed with language.  Without it, we are helplessly ensnared by those who would dominate for personal gain.

They know it.  And so should we.

Look at our current situation.  All the scandals involving leaks and surveillance have one thing in common: the control of language.  Some future historian may well record this time as Word War One.  If the ruling class is so afraid of language, then we must use that fear to our advantage.

The Bible clearly states in the opening lines that all of Creation began with a Word.  If words are so powerful as to create Universes, then take heed!  It is axiomatic that knowledge is power, and knowledge is predicated on language.  Clear, concise and unsullied language is the key to creating the world in which we want to live.  Adam's first act was to name the world.

When we allow others to control the words by which we think, then we allow them to implant templates in our minds, outside of which we can not stray.  Word War One will not be fought with guns and swords, but with words and definitions.  Like they used to say in the 60s (and so readily forgot), question everything.

To that I would add: and guard your answers.

Lagi Apa, Mas?

In Texas, every man is his own king, and every woman, his queen, so we use "sir" and "ma'am" when addressing pretty much anyone but a Yankee or Dallasite. Also, as Thomas Jefferson famously said, "An armed society is a polite society." In Texas, it's safe to assume anyone you meet is armed, so it's wise to be polite to anyone you meet.

Here in Indonesia, there is a very complex system of social address that perplexes most Westerners, at least those who haven't lived here for a while, or commonly, don't learn Indonesian.

Much of the confusion stems from the plethora of cultures and peoples across the archipelago. By most estimates, there are around 300 separate groups, tribes and ethnicities here. There are as many languages and customs, as well. The island of Java tends to dominate national culture in a way that New York tends to dominate American (and Dallas) culture.

Where all of this is leading, is to survey the means of addressing others in social and business situations. By way of explanation, one must keep in mind that Javanese culture was strictly feudalistic for centuries, with two royal sultanates surviving to this day: Yogyakarta and Solo. Of course, the Batak claim that all Batak are of royal blood, since there were ten kings, and every Batak was related to a royal family.

Generally, when one meets someone of obvious greater age or social rank, one addresses them with "Bapak" or "Ibu," which more of less translates as "sir" and "madam," though ibu also means "mother." Bapak also means "father," but in common usage, one uses the Arabic word "ayah." Now, that seems simple enough, except that the language has separate words for addressing older and younger siblings, and these words translate into social discourse. A younger man or one of lesser rank is referred to as "Mas," which really just means "older brother." Younger women are addressed as "Mbak," or sister.

It gets worse. In Sumatra, one generally uses "Amang" and "Kakak," which depending on which source you listen to, mean more of less the same as "older brother and sister." However, in a lot of the Batak dialects (there are ten of them), "amang" means father, while "inang" means mother. There are similar variations across the islands, with most being more egalitarian than Javanese.

The Founding Fathers of the Republic, Soekarno and Hatta, insisted on using "bung," which is a generic term meaning "brother," but without any consideration for age or rank. One thing the revolutionaries wanted was a classless society, much like Texas. The effort was all but abondoned under Soeharto, who wasn't so much a dictator, as he was a revival of the monarchy. Steeped in Javanese culture, he was unable to conceive of any form of leadership that didn't involve social ranking and subservience to the superiors.

The revolution in Indonesia was a protracted one. It began in earnest in the 1920s, with a concomitant effort to unite the islands under a single language: Indonesian. It reached a fever pitch in the 1940s, immediately post-WWII, with leaders such as Soekarno and Hatta. The date is marked as August 17, 1945. However, it is an on-going process. This is not the homogeneous society that appears to those outside.

There is a lot of resentment outside Jakarta and Java, because one perceives that power, resources and culture center here. It's not unlike the resentment of the "fly-over" country in America to the hegemony of New York and Los Angeles (we in Texas couldn't give a damn about the Yankees, Fruits and Nuts, of course...). The primary difference being that American culture is bi-polar, while Indonesia is mono-polar.

It's quite interesting to learn these things as an outsider looking in. Indonesians are aware of these issues, though it is virtually impossible to extract one's self from one's culture and look at it dispassionately. As I have explored before, the Javanese culture has a certain inherent power because it has the benefit of planning and future awareness that is virtually absent from other regional mentalities. Java culture, being historically dependent on rice production, had to plan for the rainy season and storage for the dry season, in much the same way Western cultures had to plan for winter. This one seemingly simple difference gave the Javanese a cultural edge.

Consequently, Javanese culture is exported to the rest of the nation through the media, which is obviously centered in Jakarta, as it is in New York and Los Angeles in the States. For that reason, terms of address like Bapak, Ibu, Mas and Mbak pervade the national culture. This promulgates the class structure, which is very strong here, in a way that many Westerners can't even comprehend.

Because language and culture are inextricably interrelated, it makes sense that hierarchy in one enforces it in the other. It stands to reason that changing one would translate into changes in the other, as well. Perhaps returning to the salutation of "bung" would serve to level society, and subsequently serve to open society to participation by all members, not just the privileged few. Thinking follows vocabulary, and culture follows thinking. Just as Hollywood has coarsened American life with nothing more than movie dialog, a simple change to social titles would open Indonesian society to greater upward mobility.

Of course, that assumes that there is a will within the culture to bring everyone up, rather than, as in the States, to bring everyone down to the lowest common denominator.

The danger lies in the American glorification of coarse, uneducated gang-slang, which is anathema to an educated society seeking to elevate its members. Slavery takes on many forms, and language is a tool for maintaining it.

My upbringing taught me to address all men with "sir" and all women with "ma'am." Thus, my thinking is that all people are worthy of respectful address in a classless worldview. Indonesia would do well to consider the concept of their Founders, would forged their relationships in the common desire for liberty and the struggle for independence. Perhaps it's time to revive the title of "Bung," and to consider what their society and culture holds as its ideals.

A true Republic thrives on egalitarianism and education. Indonesia has taken great strides in the realm of education, with most people seeing education as the stepping stone to wealth and properity, and social mobility. Converting that desire into language would further the cause and install the idea within the thinking of all people.

Know what I mean?

Hidupan, Alam Semesta dan Semuanya

One reason I write a blog is to exchange ideas with other minds out there, whether they see things the same as I do, or not. The mail I get is often inspirational and thanks to my blog, I have made new contacts in various parts of the world. A big note of tanks goes to George Ure, at UrbanSurvival, for giving me a wider audience!

Because of my eyesight (or lack thereof), I am a bit slow on reading and responding to email, but this morning I received an email that really inspired me, to whit:

"My daughter has enrolled her son and daughter in cyberschool. What a difference it makes. It gives them a lot of room for self expression. You are right about doing the same old thing over and over again.My daughter is an artist in mosaics, but when she was in school, if she dared to step out of the teachers way, she got into hot water, never allowed for self expression. It is a different mode now and if more parents did it, there would be more free thinkers. If the USA goes the way it looks like it is going, the schools won't be able to affort to run busses anyway.And I despise the fact that every school has a cop in it. What is wrong with these people. I always say it was created by the "puckerbutt Mamas" who had nothing better to do than go to PTA meetings and harp about a teacher touching their children. Lets face it "we have been had by the PTB and it is up to the free thinkers to change things."

In addition to giving me a wonderful new adjective, 'puckerbutt,' this letter also inspired me. I therefore replied in my usual brief and concise manner:

Please pardon my delay in replying, but WOW what a great letter to receive!

It's gratifying to hear that there are folks out there who are opting out of the system. Freedom of self begins with freedom of thought, and we can't think clearly nor freely if we are sent to cookie cutter schools.

I'm an artist, as well. I spent 40 years of my 50 total (so far) working in theater, film and TV. I had some brilliant, real teachers, beginning with my mother, who not only encouraged free-thinking, but demanded it.

Your letter reached me at an opportune time. I am currently developing a system for teaching English online so that it can reach students in Indonesia who are very remote and don't have access to the resourses available in Jakarta. You see, English is a way for people to move up here. They can use it to get good jobs and expand outside their villages and borders. They can access a much larger world of ideas by learning a single skill. However, when I teach English, I use ten different languages to do it. I show the students that language is simply a way to encode and decode information, just like math, computers and art. I come at the problem from a different angle than the standard rote memory curricula available on the market. Language is an organic, living thing and cannot be taught in a cold, rigid manner, just as plants cannot be raised without water and sunshine and exposure to the environment.

Anyway, I could wax philosophical for hours, as you can see from my blog. I am verygrateful to you for writing me. You inspired me with your ideas. Tha is one rreason I write, so that I can exchange ideas with a wider audience, and not only be inspired, but translate that into inspiration for the next generation.

I wish the best for you and yours. I am overjoyed that someone out there is seeking something different from the same ole same ole. We can win this Thing one mind at a time. It's daunting, but not impossible.

Thank you kindly for your letter, I know that to inspire someone to write back, there must be some ideas in my writings that move and motivate, and that is gratifying. Best of luck to you all, and blessings on you and yours.

Best regards,
Bernard

Education.

That's the key. That's how we defeat the PTB. One mind at a time. It took generations of indoctrination to get to where we are as a civilization, and it will take the same to get out. We just have to have the same resolve to be truly free that the bastards have to enslave.

Great books, such as Fahrenheit 451 and Brave New World, show us where we are heading now. But books such as, Shang-gri La and Stranger In A Strange Land and 2001: A Space Odyssea, show us where we could go.

People such as Richard Hoagland and David Icke, even if they are wrong, show us that thinking bigger can free us of so many constraints. People such as the reader who wrote me above show us that something as simple as art can elevate us above the mundane and propel us to new thoughts, new heights and New Frontiers of Humanity.

And it all begins with Education.

I was a threat to the United States. They castigated me and persecuted me because I did such radical things as forbid vaccinations for my children, filtered their water of things like flouride and chlorine, and homeschooled. I refused to follow the proscribed path and for that, my wife was killed and my children were used as weapons by the State.

the danger of free thought is very real. Trust me.

Ask Galileo. Ask anyone who presents to true and credible challenge to the status quo. If you push against the GAP (Generally Accepted Paradigm), you will be punished severely. People don't like their apple carts upset, especially those who profit from building the carts and growing the apples. They only profit when the apples are neatly stacked in a controlled area. If the apples are rolling down the street, then anybody can pick them up.

It comes down to this: who controls the mids of our children?

I've had some great teachers in my life. They were not famous nor did they want to be. They had one goal, to make me think.

There's Mrs. James and Mrs. Speck. There's Mr. Z and Stan. There's Swilley and my trig tutor, whose name I don't even remember, but who taught me that math can be understood.

But, at the core of it all, after years of education that has yet to stop, there's my mother. She taught me language and art and the most important thing of all: to read.

It's all there in a book somewhere. The collected knowledge of the ages is written down and waiting for discovery. To read is to be free. Because of reading, my teachers include: Newton, Kepler, Galileo, Plato, Aristotle, Ovid, Pythagoras, Nietzsche, Thomas Aquinas, Augustine, Benedict, Lao Tsu, Sun Tsu, Gengis Khan, and scores of others.

Because I learned art, I was trained by Monet, van Gogh, Michaelangelo, da Vinci, Rodan, Orson Welles, and so many more it would take an encyclopaedia.

There were my language teachers for Spanish, Latin and German. There were the incredible cast of characters I have met traveling. There were monks at Christ in the Desert.

All the great thinkers, artisits, writers, and philosophers of all time came to me through one simple skill: reading. Thanks Mom!

So, if you want to teach your children to think, not parrot, you have one job, and only one job...get them to read. Open the doors to the Universe by turning off the TV and the video games, and turn on the books, essays, manifestos, and papers. Give them inspiration, and the rest follows. Stop trying to be you kid's best friend and start thinking for the long term, far beyond your lifetime.

What can you do now that will affect generations?

I don't teach to get rich or even to make a living. I teach because I have a burning desire to open the mind of fresh, young thinkers who can change the world I will never live in. And in the end, that's the thing that must change: what is it that benefits us? Is it what car we drive or what house we live in or the luxuries in our lives? Or is it the world we can build through our children and their children, and the faces we will never know and the world we will never inhabit?

To paraphrase another great thinker, 'Ask not what the world can do for you, but what you can do for the world.'

And for God's sake, stop being a consumer. The real economy is not what we buy, but what we offer. Change your mind and change the world is the simplistic slogan that came out in the 80s. Though the intention was to sign folks up to comsume something, it is never-the-less true.

The difference between freedom and slavery, between wealth and poverty, is nothing more than a point of view.

It's that simple.

Put A Little English On It

"Language! It's a virus!
Language! It's a virus!
Language! It's a virus!

"Well I dreamed there was an island
That rose up from the sea.
And everybody on the island
Was somebody from TV.
And there was a beautiful view
But nobody could see.
Cause everybody on the island
Was saying: Look at me! Look at me!
Look at me! Look at me!"

-Laurie Anderson, "Language is a Virus"

In billiards, you can spin the cue ball left or right to control the angle of deflection of the target ball. That spin is called 'english.'

In English, you can have a house that isn't a home. You can 'take' a shower, when you really leave something. You can 'make' a phone call when you really don't make anything at all. In English, a corporation can be a 'person,' and you can have a dozen different ways to murder (homicide, justifiable homicide, manslaughter, premeditated murder, etc.). You have 15 different ways to describe the past, the present and the future, and show the intricate relationship of one action to another in time.

If language is a virus, then English is the H1N1 of languages.

English has killed so many other languages. There are scores of native American languages that will never be heard again because of English. Gaelic is fighting to stay alive. Latin has died a painful death after centuries of dominance. India has been deeply infected. France had to form a committee to replace English infections with healthy French tissue. German schools were infected after WWII, and now Asian schools are picking up the epidemic.

The the WHO does nothing. Merck and Lily aren't scrambling to create vaccines. Against reason, people are lined up to become infected. The virus has infected even the halls of science, so that studies and research are all published in English. In business, no one takes you seriously unless you have the virus.

English is an amazingly complex virus. It evolves and changes over time to fit into any eco-system. It thrives on education and millions of people have come down with symptoms. It starts slowly but quickly the infection spreads. First, it's words like 'e-mail' and 'computer,' but before you know what's happening, you've got things like 'boring' and 'hangout.' It started on an obscure island off the coast of Europe and now has infected a greater part of the world. Patient Zero was a people called the Angles, who inhabited the central part of an island. They built some ships and began spreading the virus far and wide, and now the virus is indemnic in some areas.

The situation has become so bad now that there has formed an elite group of carriers who call themselves 'native speakers.' They travel around to different countries infecting large numbers of people, while looking down on 'non-native speakers.'

In the movies and on TV, everyone speaks English, no matter where they are from. Even aliens for distant planets speak the language eloquently. Some shows, like Star Trek, invent things like Universal Translators that change any native language into English. And it's getting worse.

In meetings all over the world, people from disparate backgrounds and cultures get together to talk about business, and the only thing that comes out of their mouths is English. If you make a film or write a book, no one will pay attention unless it's in English. Product labels can have anything you want on it, as long as it includes something in English.

Something must be done.

Soon this virus will invade every corner of the Earth. It will displace other beneficial viri until all life on the planet will depend on English. Even now, the French are destroying their country from the inside out trying to fight the English invasion. Before you know it, even simple words like 'thot' will be written like 'thought.' Alphabets will die on the vine. Great words like 'Rheinfahrtsgeselschaftkapiten' will be replaced with colorless phrases such as 'barge captain.' Tenseless languages will be invaded with incredibly precise time statements for no good reason. Even the non-sensical use of present continuous when speaking of future events will sully every tongue.

We must do something now, before it's too late. Already, school kids in remote places are being taught the difference between 'to, too and two' and 'for, fore and four.' You can just see their pained expressions when they learn that to+too=fore. Will we subject our future generations to this horrible fate? Will our progeny cause us for making words like 'ot' spell like 'ought?'

Where is the justice? Where is the WHO? Where are the myriad NGOs who worry endlessly about bird and swine viri, and not this horror that is unleashed upon us?

The only ray of hope is that the British strain of the virus is not as virulent. The American strain at least saves us from such painful spellings as 'colour,' 'programme' and 'centre,' not to mention 'tyre.' Those of us infected with the North American variety can also be thankful we don't have symptoms, such as pronouncing words like 'funny' and 'foo-nay.' Even worse are the effects on vocabulary, such as the British 'boot and bonnet' for the more masculine 'trunk and hood.'

Time is short. Taking action now will save countless lives from English. You can start with a simple process of using Esperanto. There is still hope that an artificial virus such as Esperanto can painlessly replace the English virus using genetic modification of existing languages to form a hybrid. If English is allowed to infect and replace all the other 'wild' viri, then in 50 to 100 years, there will be nothing but dialects left.

And the French will have completely destroyed themselves for nothing.

At The Crossroads

WARNING~

The following post may contain words and/or phrases that offend, anger or upset some people. If you have not read my other posts, then you may not be prepared for the fact that I use language, with all its connotations and permutations, to make points, in the tradition of William Safire or George Carlin. If there is a word or phrase that offends you here, then examine yourself, not my usage. You have been warned...

Having spent the night in the men's room of T2 at Changi Airport in Singapore, I have come up with a couple of revelations, as it were. One is, the restrooms at T2 have a nice shelf area behind the toilet, which if you are carrying your towel like I told you to, makes a rather nice free hotel room. Use the towel as a pillow.

The other is that I live at the crossroads of two very different cultures, complete with separate ideologies and goals. You may think to yourself, "Well, duh, doofus." But the profundity of the realization is startling. Living on the Far Side is 180-degrees from EVERYTHING.

So, there I was in Singapore. I was supposed to meet a long-time acquaintance and spend the day/evening discussing business and pleasure. I sent him a text from the airport at 10am, letting him know I had arrived at the precise time I had predicted, allowing for the fact that I was flying on an Indonesian airline, which meant that I had to give an hour to the posted time. I told him that I would take the MRT down to Orchard Road, which was very near his place. I received his confirmation to meet when I arrived at Orchard, so I boarded the MRT and made my way downtown.

Keep in mind that I am perhaps 80% blind due to MS. This was my third trip to Singapore and my second since becoming blind. I had never used the MRT and I was a bit apprehensive.

The first thing to mention is that Singapore is very friendly to the handicapped. Most stairs have rails and the treads have light-colored strips to highlight the end of level ground. There generally aren't any surprises, although that is not universally true. Outdoors is a bit of a challenge. But for the most part, I was able to get around effortlessly. There is almost always an elevator wherever a set of stairs exist, as well.

Another point is that people are paid to help. They actually look for someone who looks lost and offer assistance, particularly around the public services. Just because I was reading various signs around the MRT station, a woman, God bless her, came up and all but led me by the hand to get a ticket and explain the system to me, and yes, she was a uniformed employee of MRT.

I boarded the train and made my way, fairly effortlessly, to Orchard Road. Unlike someplace like New York, people in Singapore are more than willing to answer questions. Of course, you will want to use your most formal and polite English, just to be sure. English is the default language of Singapore. The locals speak Singaporean, which is a curious creole of Mandarin, Malay and English. Knowing a smattering of Mandarin and Malay/Indonesian will buy you Brownie points and get secret information and additional discounts, if well applied. It's kind of like knowing the secret knock at a speak-easy.

When I arrived at Orchard, I looked for a place to alight. I found an Italian street restaurant just outside of Ann City mall, where I proceeded to order Cajun fries and a Japanese beer (2-for-1 special in the afternoon). I sent Rajan a text and waited for the next five hours for a response. Being a planner, I also had another contact that I had made prior arrangement with, an Indonesian who was staying in S'pore at the same time. As backup, I sent Ivan a text, as well. In all that time, I received no response from either party.

And there you have the set-up for this post. Two very different cultures. Don't see it? Let's review. I spent the night in a toilet and both contacts did not respond to my text messages. If you are a Westerner, your feathers are already ruffled. There are two primary concepts at play here. One is punctuality and the other is frugality.

The first concept is something uniquely Western, in my experience. The idea of setting an appointment and actually being there at the appointed time is part of my British/American culture. If I say I will be at a place at a time, I am there at a minimum of five minutes early. I am bound morally and ethically, and perhaps genetically, to meet that schedule. For some unknown reason, Westerners have a punctuality fetish. For Germans, this rises to the level of obsession. The British invented the use of clocks for navigation and arbitrarily set Greenwich as zero hour. The Swiss are known for their precision in making time-pieces, not to mention cuckoo clocks. Which brings up a great quote from the Orson Welles character in that brilliant film, The Third Man:

In Italy, for thirty years under the Borgias, they had warfare, terror, murder and bloodshed - they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo Da Vinci and the Renaissance. In Switzerland, they had brotherly love and five hundred years of democracy and peace, and what did they produce? The cuckoo clock!

But I digress.

In my experience, people closer to the equator have a distinct "get round-to-it" attitude. This is not a hard and fast rule, as one look at South America and Africa might tend to shoot a hole in the theory. Certainly, northern Europeans have cultures that are focused on time and punctuality. British high society has regulated its life around day parts, what with tea-time being a central part of those rituals. The invention of atomic clocks and alternating current are futher examples of this focus on time. Cettainly, the development of astrology for telling the future, and more recently the work of Clif High and George Ure with web bots displays a cultural focus on time and future.

It is possible to generalize the idea that cultures that focus on time are more successful than those that don't. No one would argue that American, British, German, and even Japanese cultures have been wildly successful in propagating themselves and in amassing wealth. Many American exports involve the concept of repeatability (e.g.-McDonald's, KFC, Holiday Inn), which I see as a function of time, and others about saving time (e.g.-assembly line, appliances, mass transit). Even the Dutch invention of the telescope was not about something so frivolous as looking at stars. They were to give the user a jump on the competition by being able to see arriving ships before anyone else, and thus have information that allowed for beneficial investments. Indeed, the whole idea behind computers was to save computational time for complex mathematical tasks. Ironic, since things like Facebook and games have become some of the greatest wasters of time. Even the medical focus on life-extension is all about having more time.

By contrast, cultures such as Indonesia, Mexico, Italy, and India all have cultures that view time more as a blob with fuzzy edges and certainly less linear. If you set an appointment with an Indonesian, you can almost bet they will be up to an hour late. There is no apology or worry about it, just a fact. If they arrive within the day, that is doing pretty good. These cultures even have expressions for this attitude. Indonesians talk about "jam karet," or flexible time. Mexicans use the expression, "mañana," or tomorrow.

With the obvious exception of Italy, which produced one of the most complex languages on Earth (Latin)and Hindi, many equatorial languages has simple or non-existent tenses. Malay/Indonesian and Mayan languages have very simple tenses which indicate general timing of events in a cause-effect manner, but little else. They really only see time as before now-now-after now, with NOW being the key idea. It's almost as if what is past is not worth talking about and the future doesn't exist. Perhaps that is the origin of Ram Dass' Be Here Now concepts, or the launching point for Buddha's Eternal Present.

The second idea I want to deal with is the lack of concern about the future, which is neatly capsulized with the distinctly American expression, "nigger rich." This goes to the idea that you really have nothing, but you finance the appearance of having something. It also refers to the habit of blowing all your cash on payday for temporary fun and having nothing tomorrow for dinner. This idea is related to the concept of time because the person who is nigger rich does not think about future consequences or needs, only about current looks and comfort.

It has been explained to me that the reason many Indonesians are not successful is that they tend to fling their pay out the window of appearances and never worry about saving for the future. I was told that the reason the Chinese are successful, and universally hated, in Indonesia is that they save their money and plan for the future. Indeed, it could be argued that part of the reason the Chinese culture has survived intact for 5,000 years (with some notable political upsets) is their focus on very long term planning. Surely, the Great Wall is a display of that attitude.

Nigger rich is not limited to equatorial cultures, though certainly the term implies that the practice in American culture comes from people of African origin. One could argue effectively that the collapse of the global banking system is caused by greed and expediency, which are both driven by a lack of long-term vision. Certainly, part of the cause of the fall of Rome, Egypt and Athens was predicated on the devolution of the cultures into immediate gratification.

In Indonesia, the holiday of Idul Fitri is fast approaching. At this time of year, sales of gold and cars soar. People buy flash to take home to the family in the village, to show how successful they are, and then promptly sell it all when they return to the big city. In fact, the best time (for planners) to buy gold and cars is immediately following Idul Fitri, as everyone unloads the flash.

I am told quite often that the reason Indonesians are not more successful on the whole is because of their short-term view. Certainly, I have witnessed similar practices in Central America and among certain demographic groups in America. By contrast, the Dutch have been quite successful over centuries, arguably because they are notoriously cheap (think Dutch treat).

Blowing your wad on payday and saving for a rainy day seem to be competing ideas that separate indemnic poverty from long-term success. Certainly, it appears that cultures that practice nigger rich are not as successful over the long term as cultures that save. I have heard it argued that the turning point for America is when people ceased to save and started hocking themselves to the rafters to buy gee-gaws and bling. Without a doubt, it is a massive debt load that is sinking America, and western civilization with it. The American desire for immediate gratification (i.e.-Halleluia! We found the printing press) has endangered multiple generations, and the same can be said for any group whose guiding principle is "nigger rich."

So, how does all this tie together, you wonder? Well, my frustration at not being able to contact and meet people in a timely manner, and my sleeping in the men's room at the airport are examples of cultural punctuality and saving money. I was extremely put out that just one hour after telling someone that I was in town and ready to meet after a week of preparation, and all of it failed. Also, my desire for immediate comfort was not enough to overcome my desire to save money, thus I found the shelf behind the toilet and my towel to be ample for my needs.

In the end, my delay of immediate gratification paid off by having a little extra jack to buy a bottle of Absolut reward, which this time actually made it all the way home. So I guess this saving thing does pay off.

Yeah, this post is a bit rambling, I know. But I am still jet lagged and a little stiff from my cheap hotel. Hopefully, the next one will be a little more focused.

Oh, and cheers!