How Costly Are Our Dreams?

Have been addicted to Downton Abbey since it first came out. Great writing with a great cast really brought this upper class family struggling with reality of the world to life. It is now well into the third season and although it is not on air yet, there is nothing but expectations.

As I watched the latest Christmas special that ties up a lot of loose ends from the second season and sowed seeds for the third season, a recurring theme keeps getting stuck in my head – how costly are our dreams?

We obviously are no longer living in a strict and rigid class society, but class did not disappear. It might have disappeared structurally but certainly not socially. When I was a kid, I was taught that I should chase my dreams. But when we grow up we start to face the truth of the world and start putting price tags on our dreams.

Cost – the highest value option forgone to obtain another item of the same intrinsic value; is a two-edge sword. It can motivate us to overcome difficulties to achieve what we want to achieve, but at the same time, it can also become the invisible wall that turns us back from who we want to be.

In the Christmas special of Downton Abbey, Matthew met up with Mary to pay tribute to the late Lavinia, and returned her father’s ashes to her grave, as he wanted. Isobel was the bystander. After they parted, Isobel pointed out the obvious and pursued Matthew on the matter with Mary. Matthew replied, “I deserved to be unhappy. So did Mary”. Isobel replied, “Nobody deserved to be unhappy. If you think so then the war had taught you nothing.” – very simple but straight to the point.

Matthew and Mary had been through a lot, and the to and fro had built up a price that both understood as too high to be paid. That is similar to our lives from time to time. We chase our dreams but at the same time we need to make a living. And then making a living became such a big part of our lives that, chasing our dreams gradually became irrelevant. But when we took our dreams out again, the cost of chasing it became so high that sometimes they look unsurmountable.

I have never been a person who likes to compromise. However, at times, I did think I have no choice but compromising. What can you do when you have a student loan to pay off? Rent / mortgage to be paid? A family to support? When we arrived at that stage, chasing our dreams seems nothing but a luxurious item with a cost that we cannot bear. So we settled down. Settling down is painful for me and it depresses me. Matthew and Mary thought by settling down, even if they were not happy, they could avoid the cost of pursuing what they wanted and thus be the best solution for everyone. But is that so? Are they really not going to regret their decisions? Is it being unhappy for life less costly than taking a risk and doing a leap of faith? This is a question that I always have in my head.

One may thinking this kind of issue only affect people who are materially worst off as they have to meet their daily needs. I can assure you that this might look like so but it is far from so. I know people who are particularly well off, but they face similar problems. Their problems might not be material but of social. May that be family expectations or simply their dreams were not acceptable in their society. Sybil’s love for the chauffeur is a classic example. It was not socially acceptable and she knows it will cost her a lot to chase this dream. It is a matter of a leap of faith for the dream that she had – not knowing whether you would land on solid ground or fall off the edge of the world.

No one can guarantee the result of this leap, but for me the question is whether it is worth it if I crash and burn with the leap? Dreams, same as everything, are no free lunches.  But then there is always a second question – is regret a higher price to be paid?  As Isobel said, “nobody deserved to be unhappy”. So am I making myself unhappy so that I feel like I got an easier way out now? If the easier way out is just a one-way ticket to regretville, is it all worth it? I think that is a dilemma that us mortals will have to face from time to time during our lives.

The Circle of Life

Was sitting at a shopping mall having KFC. As I was munching through the crunches of the heavily flavoured chicken with oil dripping from my fingers, I couldn’t help but notice that it was Saturday afternoon, and everyone was at the mall. There were families of several generations coming out for a good day out (or in, depends on whether you think going to the mall is going “out”).  Young parents were caring for their babies and toddlers in their prams, and some elderly parents were being taken care of and being wheeled around in their wheelchairs. They seemed to be happy just being together.

As I watched and observed as usual, I started to feel how strange our lives come around in a circle. We were being pushed around in prams at the beginning of our lives and then after decades of living, could end up being pushed around in wheelchairs again. Life is pretty cruel I reckon. When you are back to the stage of being wheeled around again, it is not because you can look forward to walk and move around again but you were unable to do so anymore.

I am never a fan of growing old. I even hate the word old unless it is about wine. But then I prefer to use the word vintage. I certainly understand that growing old is a process nobody can avoid, but why does the process of growing old need to be so painful and depressing in some cases? Watching yourself not being able to perform basic tasks that used to be just something so natural is hard to accept. I have observed my granny’s process of growing old. God bless her cos she is very good for her age, but I can still remember the frustration she had when she found out that certain easy tasks are no longer easy. As family members we helped out but her frustration of losing that autonomy to perform certain tasks really edged inside me. Now seeing my parents growing old and hearing some issues they have, I feel like my sense of security for people around me is being continuously eroded by the waves of time. This frustrates me.

I certainly try to keep myself on the watch, as I cannot escape growing old either. Some friends think that I am over-reacting to the whole growing old thing, but I know what family medical history we have, I read about potential issues, I just want to help myself to minimise the impact of this growing old thing. I have no idea what I would become when I grow old but I always advocate to have myself admitted into a home when the time comes. Some people think that I am too pessimistic about this but I just think I am being pragmatic so I feel less sad when that day arrives.

I always maintain life is cruel and want to get the most out of it instead of just living what most people think is a normal life.  So when the day arrives, I can look back and understand that I did live a life I want (mostly for there will be things that I might not be able to achieve) and reduce the sad factor as much as possible.

I am not afraid of death and in fact death is a relief for me but I just don’t like the process of getting there. My belief does not believe in ending things your way but when life is no longer a life should we be lingering on? That is a question I always have in my head.

This post might sound very grim and depressing, but that is not my purpose. I just want to record my thoughts while they struck me so I know at a certain point of my life, this is me and my mentality. I don’t know whether this would change or not, but at this moment, at this hour, this is part of me in this circle of life.

When the best was not good enough

The Olympics has now been in full swing for 3 weeks. Australian athletes have been battling out with all the other best athletes around the world – China, US, Russia and the list goes on. Stakes are high and competitions are stiff.

Australia’s performance so far has been a constant debate – did our athletes do enough? Why are we having less gold as compared to our last game? What went wrong? Are the athletes good enough?

Whenever I read articles on people criticising our athletes when they failed to score gold I got annoyed. Humans are judgemental creatures, that’s for sure, otherwise I will not be writing this blog. But sometimes when we judge, are we giving people sufficient space for the benefit of the doubt? Olympics is a world class game. These athletes trained all their lives just for the game and a lot of them didn’t even have the financial support to get them through. I find it very unfair when someone sitting in front of a terminal watching the games, then just put their judgemental thoughts into words and threw them out without understanding all the hardships these athletes went through.

Yes, it will be great if they score gold, but when they are doing their best and their best is just not good enough to pull them through, should we judge? Have we forgotten all the sleeps they lost during these years for training, the financial hardship some of them had gone through, the mental breakdowns that were dealt with privately off the screen and the immense pressure they havdswhen they were out their in the fields, in the pool or at the stadium? It is always easy to judge but are we judging fairly? That is the question.

Being a kid brought up in a traditional Asian family environment, we grew up being judged all the time. We were being judged by our cultural behaviours, our academic merits, our music or sports merits if we took up any of these extra-curricula activities and of course our professions when we finished education. Sometimes I found it hard to swallow when my parents will just went through all the subjects I only scored around the 80s and 70s simply because they are not good enough – yes everything needs to be in the 90s. I am used to it although some people do wonder how we can survive, but I managed. For me the hard to swallow part was not the criticism but the focus on the failures instead of appreciating my efforts. And this applies to our Olympians.

I always maintain the view that if you are going to compete you should aim to win. I am never a big fan of participate just for the sake of participating. Sure I don’t want to give myself pressure but I will do whatever it takes (in a legal and ethical manner) to win if I participate. So I am sure our Olympians will have the same attitude. However, as with anything in life, what you put in does not always materialise into the desire outcome. If they won gold, that’s great, but if not, as long as they gave their best, I think we should appreciate their efforts to try and do their best. Writing articles like “Does blah blah blah still has what it takes?”; “What went wrong with blah blah blah”; “A disappointing blah blah blah with disappointing results” are nothing but mean, inconsiderate and heartless.

The only time I think someone warrants such kind of criticisms is when they didn’t try and just give up. That lack of spirit and respect for what you are doing deserves outrageous criticisms. However, when someone gave his / her very best and got out done by even better competitors; or they gave their very best but their bodies had reached their limits given the circumstance, then we should just leave them alone or even give them our full support no matter what the outcomes were.

It is always easy for us to judge when we were not the people who gave the hard yards and put ourselves out there. However, are we doing good to the world or other people when we do that? I think that is the question I want all those people who put in harsh criticising articles in the media to seriously think about.

Capricious Thoughts on 9/11

10 years on. Still not ready. People say that experiencing or witnessing the fall of the Twin Tower on 11 September 2001 is something that one will never forget. Yes that's true. I still remember exactly where I was and what I was doing the moment the first plane crash was reported in the news. Then for the next half an hour, I sat and watched before rushing back to the college to really try to understand what's happening.

Everyone in the college was up. People who had TVs in their rooms were sharing their TVs. Some were in the TV room downstairs but everyone was up and every door was opened. The next day we still couldn't believe that it was a reality. As the reality sank in so was the sadness. We were not there but we were still wounded, hurt by the lack of humanity the what we called human race had exhibited.

Before we knew, it is 10 years from the incident. At that time I thought maybe the world would get better as we re-evaluate our humanity. Did the world get better? I can't really say so. I would not say that I am a pessimist but rather I would classify myself as a reserved optimist who always try to have an optimistic outlook without committing to being overly positive. For I believe, the less you expect the less you would be disappointed.

10 years from that day, I look back and look around - more people were killed in wars, politicians are still about themselves, people who lost their jobs were eventually the people who forked out their tax money to bail the riches out whom were the people who caused that situation, people said harsh things about karma when the tsunami hit Japan, idiots like Alan Jones still dominating the radio waves propagating their idiocy to the general public, some people still care about themselves more than the environment etc.

When I was a kid I was told that we study history because we want to learn from the past avoid making the same mistakes. That doesn't seemed to have helped, at least according to what I observed throughout all these years. In the last few weeks, when I saw all the promos about the 9/11 specials, it really annoys me because thousands of innocent people died on that day and the human race had not improved. Our phone got smarter, our TV got smarter, everything we created got smarter but not our humanity, which is supposed to be the essence that distinguish us from the rest of the living organisms on this planet.

Everyday when I saw idiots like Alan Jones and Tony Abott who are all about themselves saying stupid things and breaking promises while condemning other people committing the same crime, my blood boils and I wonder how did we end up with a world like this? Not only in Australia that politicians continue to increase their own pay while cutting spending on essentials for the society, that's the same thing in the States when the Republicans just want to tear down bills so that the have an excuse to accuse Obama for not being able to fulfill his promises. What kind of mad world are we living in? Did 9/11 actually make us more selfish than opening our eyes to the world?

Maybe being a reserved optimist I am still not being built for this world. Or maybe if I was not trained to think critically when I was a kid, I would be a happier person. But at the end of the day where can humanity go? For me 10 years on, the world hadn't become a better place and it seems to me that the human race will never improve. Is this God's will? If so does that mean we will be seeing the arrival of the Four Horsemen soon? Maybe it's time for me to go and watch Supernatural Season 5 instead.

9/11 is a wound that will never heal. Or maybe I am still getting too sentimental on this day. Or maybe I should just go to sleep and forget about the human race.

No Just a Carbon Copy

The recent outrage about Cate Blanchett speaking up for carbon tax was another indication of sensation reporting in Australia.

The carbon tax issue has been a long standing argument in the recent months with all the pros and cons tossing their woks and pans in the Hell Kitchen known as the Australian Parliament. Both sides have their “points” but who is here to judge? So since we cannot judge on who’s right or who’s wrong we toss the bomb on whoever is the easiest target. In this round, it is Cate Blanchett.

It has been said that actors should restrict themselves to the stage because they are better speaking other people’s words than their own. That is so out dated. Though not everyone transit well from acting to social or political commenting but speaking up for what one believes should not be a crime. Cate Blanchett has been pushing forward the green cause for many years – she has reinvented the Wharf, where Sydney Theatre Company resides as a green complex and never hides the fact that going green for the next generation is high on her priority list. That’s why I was not surprised to hear about her speaking up on this carbon tax. Whether I agree with it is another issue, but if you believe in it what not?

The accusation mainly came from the fact that she is worth 53 million and what would she knows about paying more taxes as a general urban family? That might be true, but that does not stop her from having her own voice and going around rallying for a cause that she believes in. People have to remember that as an actor, she worked hard to build up that 53 million. Most actors started off with a humble career and she definitely did not just become “Cate Blanchett” if she hadn’t worked hard since she graduated from NIDA. So why is she being punished for her cause because of all the hard work she put in in the past decade or so?

What makes Cate Blanchett different is that she is not just an actor who can only speak other people’s work like a carbon copy of the script. She is a person who can speak and articulate her thoughts well and professionally in real life. Anyone who’s watched her interviews and press conferences would have understood where she came from. Since she became the artistic director of Sydney Theatre Company she hasn’t stopped rallying to change the complex into a sustainability powerhouse to show case how to save energy and conserve the environment. So why does she have to stop now? And why is she being the evil queen simply because she believes in what is good for the environment?

Certainly not everybody has several millions at his / her disposal to make his / her residence green and sustainable, but then no matter you believe, support or dislike the carbon tax proposal that should not be used as a weapon against other people who believe in the cause – especially it is about our environment and our future generations. It is very different from people like Tony Abott who earns a lot more than other people, prefer to buy a house he can’t afford and send his kids to expensive private schools and then come back to the Parliament and said he wants higher pay because the current pay level cannot sustain his life style. If Tony Abott can be saved from this kind of stuff it is just hypocrisy to burn Cate at stake because she is supporting something that is close to her heart and good for the environment.

The whole crusade against Cate for me is like a witch hunt. But what disgusts me more is that this is a witch hunt to sell more papers and get higher ratings. Isn’t it great that we can finally find fault for a seemingly “do no wrong” Cate and burn her alive with ink as our fuel and pens as our logs? I personally think media who are fuelling this kind of sensational reporting should be ashamed of themselves but then these are the media with no conscience built in most of the time. I wish the Australian people do have the wit and intelligence to identify the flaws with this latest witch hunt and ditch those media as karma punishment.

From 'SeaChange" to "Rake"

As an Australian actor, it is common knowledge that every one of us wants to be on a TV series or hit the jackpot of a great Australian movie. With the Australian movie industry not really going anywhere locally - considering all the box office bombs of local productions in the last few months - TV series seems to be the prize that everyone is going for.

Local productions are notorious for repeating the same old storyline and basing on previous materials, repackage them and thrown them onto the screen as new products. There were some good ones here and there. I totally enjoyed the first season of "The Secret Life of Us" and the first season of "Love My Way" was pretty good too. However, both of them seemed to have lost their steam after the first season. The following seasons became melodramatic and characters behaved ridiculously out of character. I tried "Tangle" but there was nothing grabbing my attention. In terms of cop shows, the subtleness of "East West 101" won miles against "Cop LAC" anyday. I'm never a fan of the "Underbelly" series because I don't believe in glorifying criminal acts on TV screens. Yes they met their demises in the end but that's because they had to since they were based on "true" stroies.

Up till this point "SeaChange" is still the Australian series that I watched again and again and still find it refreshing. I didn't get to see it when it was first aired but was highly recommended by my agent and friend. I checked it out from the library and BAM I was hooked on to it. I bought the whole series after I a job interview at ABC (a job which I obviously didn't get) and watched it all over again. It is still my favorite show to be put on my TV when I do my weekend ironing (I prefer to iron all the clothes for the week in one go) and I still tune in to Foxtel during its occasional rerun - that is how good "SeaChange" is.

What made "SeaChange" so great is its originality and the embracing of ethnicity with a bunch of colourful characters delivered by a superb cast. Chemisty among characters is just bouncing off the screen in every single scene and there is no one dull moment in the show. This is without a doubt mostly contributed to the superb writing from Andrew Knight and Deborah Cox. They created this imaginative small town and detailed it with one interesting story after another. It was just a work of magic.

After "SeaChange", there was nothing that really grabbed my attention. Writing in most shows were dramatic for sake of being dramatic, characters don't really make sense, the screen has become Anglo-centric again, ethnicity became a pinch of stereotypical comic relief. We got too many cop shows, too many medical shows, too many teenagers sleeping with each other shows and too many reality shows.

"East West 101" was a great production but sometimes far too serious that it inevitably gets you unnecessarily depressed. Life is depressing enough so if I have a choice I prefer to watch something that lightens me up at the end of the day. "Packed to the Rafters" was good but as a single guy whose friends are setting up their own families, I kinda became resistent to overly warm and cosy family dramedies. So there was a void for me for quite some time until my agent (once again thanks to her) mentioned "Rake" to me.

"Rake" is a legal dramedy about a dysfunctional lawyer who knows he is dysfunctioned but did not mourn over it. He instead tries to live the most out of it. He tries to fix problems just to find out that he complicated them more. There is no right solutions for him in life or professionally and he just lives with it. The main cast with Richard Roxburg, Matt Day and Adrienne Pickering delivered a superb performance and once again you really see an ensemble that lives off and bounces of each other. As the 8 part series proceeds, you find out more about these characters - you laugh with them sometimes, you shed a tear with them sometimes or you even despise them a bit sometimes. We used to say that audience loves flawed characters, but completely flawed characters nowadays are so cliche that when you met a bunch of characters who are lovable but flawed, you just get right into it.

"Rake" doesn't only have a great main ensemble cast, it has great guest casts such as Hugo Weaving, a never seen before Lisa McCune, Sam Neil, Rachel Griffiths etc who completely spice up your screen with firey performance that reminds you how many great talents this country has. It also has a lot more variety in ethnicity display. Yes most non-Anglo actors are still in the back e.g. among the jury, but it shows a greater diversity of people in a lot of its frames. It is completely refreshing to see something that great on Australian screen again. Oh one last thing, it is written by Andrew Knight - the guy who delivered "SeaChange" to us some years ago.

So check it out if you have a chance.

Creativity Versus Shock Factor

As an artist I am all in for pushing creativity boundaries. However, nowadays it seems the lines of creativity and shock factor are getting more blurry every day.

We cannot deny that only with creativity that a society can continue to evolve and develop. It also helps to shape the cultural landscape of a community and not to mention it encourage the expression of ideas. However, when we are talking about expression of ideas, do we actually mean there should be no limits whatsoever? Or do artists, who claim to be the beacon holders of cultural development, get free passes to all ideas that are exempted from social scrutiny?

Bill Henson, recently know for a public spat with the authorities over the portrayal of a nude teen, is having a new exhibition opening this week. There is no doubt about his talent and he proved to be a top notch artist. One of the first responses to the exhibition is “if you don’t like about the nude teen thing in the past you will still not like this one and it will offend people”. Now I don’t know about that and can’t make any judgement on this particular exhibition as I have yet to see it. However, this kind of feedback does at times worry me. I am sure most artists, even I, will see things that are beautiful and hard to resist and want to share them with the world from our own point of view. However, we must also agree that, not everything we see is beautiful and socially acceptable for everyone. Does that mean we need to censor ourselves? No. I don’t think so, but I, personally, will think about what kind of impact would there be when these creations go public. Social convention is a complicated thing. As societies are made up by huge variety of people, conventions are developed so that these varieties of people can live together in a “mutually content” manner. There are conventions they I don’t agree and whenever possible get extremely passionate to fight against, but then at the same time I will also consider the impact on others. The issue with Bill Henson’s nude teen photograph is whether it encourages paedophilia in a public arena when people are fighting to protect children from invasive sexual advances. Bill and some other people may find them beautiful and I am sure they have their artistic values, but are they socially responsible? Or in this case, do artists need to be socially responsible?

Another thing that bugs me lately is a new show about brides competing in a reality show to be the top bride and for winning each week’s challenge they receive a plastic surgery to perfect themselves for the day. The catches are, all surgeries can be performed back to back within a few weeks and the groom wouldn’t know what their brides look like until they walk down the aisle on the wedding day. I am sure there are lots of people who are not happy with how they look like and would love to “improve” upon that. I was one of them but I never had the money or courage to do that. However, having back to back plastic surgeries within a short period of time? Even plastic surgeons said that under normal circumstances they will not do that because it is detrimental to health. The producer of the show said it is the creativity and beauty part they emphasise on and the contestants obviously are fine with that. So they don’t see a problem. Yes it may not be a problem if we don’t need to see that play it out on TV. Is this really creativity or it is just a cheap shock factor using creativity as disguise. Also how socially responsible is it to have the groom to wed a bride that could look completely different from the woman he originally proposed. One of the contestants said that she knows she can now be the “perfect” woman she wants to be for her groom. But for me, if my bride shows up at the altar looking completely different and plastic (trust me, so of them look hideous after the surgeries), I will be so shocked that I doubt whether I can marry her.

Some people may think that I am too conservative blah blah blah. But the fact is I don’t really give a damn on how other people see me and as an artists I do think I need to push my own creativity boundaries. However, at the same time I do think that artists have to be socially responsible, have the conscience to protect people who are vulnerable, instead of being so self-inflated to think that under the name of art you can be as shocking and as irresponsible as we wanted to. We may be able to do that if we run our own cult but let’s be honest, that’s not most of us. We can challenge conventions, social ideas, political issues etc. etc. but at the end of the day, we still need to be responsible so that when we push the boundaries, we have credibility under our belt to fight against the “authority”.