13 October 2014

fisherman

After a very stressful 2B term, my attitude towards school this term is a lot more lax.

This change might have been triggered by reading the Mexican fisherman story. It made me accept that not enjoying the present for the sake of the future implies that when the said future becomes the present, I'm equally likely to sacrifice it towards some other "better' future I could be having. Like what this quotation says:
If, while washing dishes, we think only of the cup of tea[as reward] that awaits us, thus hurrying to get the dishes out of the way as if they were a nuisance ... we are not alive during the time we are washing the dishes. In fact, we are completely incapable of realizing the miracle of life while standing at the sink. If we can't wash the dishes, chances are we won't be able to drink out tea either. While drinking the cup of tea, we will be thinking of other things, barely aware of the cup in our hands. Thus we are sucked away into the future - and we are incapable of actually living one minute of life
(by Thich Nhat Hanh, a buddhist monk)

In that spirit, I did the minimal amount of schoolwork this long weekend and read Eden, its an endless world until pretty late into the night. David highly recommended it, but I thought the story was a little all over the place. (spoilers follow) The ending also seem to say that everything that happened in the story was totally pointless. This does echo the motivation of the "antagonists", which is to create a alternate universe to our current absurd one where almost everyone dies in meaningless ways. The manga does have a good share of everything: adventure, action, emotional scenes, fan service, etc. Thought Swallowed in the Sea would be a good theme song for this.

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