halfwaymag.com

Goodbye

Argee — Thu, 01 Sep 2005 14:47:57 +0000

A few weeks ago, I entertained the idea of giving my graduation speech. I thought that it may come in handy in case I get requested (more like forced) by my classmates to give a few words. Yes, an impromptu speech. So I imagined the scene: Me on stage, facing the graduating class, the parents, my teachers and the rest of the audience. I’m silent for a minute or two, moving my eyes slowly across the room as silence fills the space after some initial applause. Starting the speech is the problem.

I thought about starting with a controversial statement such as, “Degrees are useless!” But it was immediately scrapped knowing how much my parents value formal education. I then considered congratulating everyone and greeting everyone who came to grace the occasion, especially the parents. But then I thought, isn’t that boring? So I switched gears. I decided to start off by saying goodbye. In my imaginary speech, I made a public goodbye to my friends. I mentioned things I was going to miss: friends and anything that had made university life memorable. Forcing a smile while cracking some well placed insider jokes, it worked like magic. I saw tears trickling down the faces of the audience. Just then, the bus came and I snapped back to reality.

I’ve never liked endings. Saying goodbyes to friends brings me this sense of emptiness. I treasure the friendships that I have developed over the years so it’s natural that I dread that moment when it’s time to say goodbye. We’ll all be moving on with our lives, focusing on our careers and forming new relationships. Who knows, some might even marry and enter family life early. Others will return to their home countries while several of us may emigrate to other nations. As for me, time can only tell where I’ll end up.

Sure, we’ll all try to keep in contact with whatever means possible but it’ll never be the same again. Soon gone are the days of mindless chatters during lunch, last minute group study sessions and just plain chilling out with friends, whether it be playing pool in the game room or impromptu after class movie outings. I’m also going to miss group work and the ‘group meetings,’ where more often than not, the discussions quickly deviated from the subject matter at hand. We might not have been productive during those instances but the bonds formed during these moments are priceless.

Though I’ve lived in a house with other, I’ve never lived with a roommate, so I don’t have any roommate tales to share. But I did have housemates. And those were good times. I’m going to miss the laughs, the mindless conversations, cooking escapades and the movie marathons during those boring weekends. During those sleepless nights, I could always count on them for a quick midnight snack and then rattle on till the wee hours of the morning. Amusingly my housemates were not from my division. As such I got to learn a lot of interesting things about the other divisions. They were my ears to their respective divisions while I tried to do my part as their ear for my division. I also felt right at home in other flats where some of my course mates stayed. Until it was bedtime or unless they were out, they never really locked the door so I could just feel free to visit them. Their place was a hangout for food, to watch TV and I also had a good friend who gave me free internet access. Life was good. During exam periods, having study sessions with them reassured me to some extent that I’d do decently on the papers.

Though I will miss these moments, graduating will be a milestone for my parents. As their first experiment, they’ll be thrilled to see me graduate. They’ll be like ‘one down, two to go.’ My parents always believed that the best gift they can give their children is a good formal education and for that gift, I’m extremely thankful.

As I reflect at what I’ve written I’m now actually quite excited for my final year. Yup, it’s time to make it truly count for one last time.

Argee is a Halfway Contributor

Book Review: What God Wants

Argee — Mon, 01 Aug 2005 00:37:55 +0000

Author: Neale Donald Walsch
Format: Hardcover, 240 pages
Pub. Date: March 2005

Publisher: Atria Books

Humanity does not understand what God wants and, according to Neale Donald Walsch, author of the phenomenal bestselling series, Conversations with God, this is the cause of the suffering and violence in our world today.

He asserts that our ideas about God and God’s desires have produced our ideas of life and about people. This includes aspects of life like homosexuality, marriage and sex.

He presents the case of the killing of Matthew Shepard, an openly gay freshman at the University of Wyoming who was dragged out of a bar by two young men, driven to a deserted road outside of town, tied to a cow fence, and beaten so severely that he lapsed into a coma and died five days later. His assailants were given life sentences but Reverend Fred Phelps, Pastor of the Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kansas was not satisfied with the death. Every year for five consecutive years, he traveled to Matthew’s birthplace to ‘celebrate’ his death, bringing with him a granite monument with these words chiseled in stone:

Matthew Shepard entered Hell October 12, 1998, at age 21 in defiance of God’s warning: “Thou shall not lie with mankind as with womankind; it is abomination.”

-Leviticus 18:32

Like his earlier works, Walsch appears critical of any actions committed ‘in the name of God’ by major organized religions which resulted in death and suffering.

He refers to historical crusades and jihads as well as modern acts of terrorism. All these actions were done ‘in the name of God’ and the beliefs behind these acts have proven to be strong motivations. At the same time, he presents recent news articles that highlight the intolerance organized religions have regarding what constitutes ‘the word of God’ and how it is to be interpreted.

In reality, Walsch believes that the adoption of new ideas regarding God and Life is not about the rejection or abandonment of traditional religious teaching, but an expansion. His call is to refresh and reinvigorate religion. He points out an example of a spiritual movement within Islam which has already happened. It’s called the Sufi movement and in Sufism the declaration, There is no god but God, has now changed to, There is nothing but God, which is a neat one sentence summary about the new spirituality.

Change has never been easy for mankind. We have this need to cling to old ideas about God and Life and according to Walsch, this is dangerous since our beliefs produce our behaviors. In this book he quotes Former U.S. vice president Al Gore in an interview with the New Yorker:

“In a world of disconcerting change, when large and complex forces threaten familiar and comfortable guideposts, the natural impulse is to grab hold of the tree trunk that seems to have the deepest roots and hold on for dear life and never question the possibility that it’s not going to be the source of your salvation. And the deepest roots are in philosophical and religious traditions that go way back”

(New Yorker, September 2004)

In that chapter, he provides the surprising yet simple answer to what is perhaps Humanity’s biggest question: What does God Want? It will spark different reactions depending on your beliefs about God and Life. Some may laugh, others may be confused. It may even elicit anger or frustration. For those in tune with the new spirituality, they’ll smile and nod in agreement.

The second part of the book gives a good introduction to the new spirituality Walsch offers to us. Walsch generally disagrees with the big organized religions like Islam and Christianity, particularly Catholicism. Both of these religions insist that they are the one true religion. Over the centuries through the crusades and jihads they have ventured far and beyond seeking the conversion of everyone to their religions. According to Walsch, this is not the way peace can be attained.

The new spirituality is a doctrine of Oneness, the awareness that God and Life are One, that everything in life is part of a unified whole, and that our different religions are simply divergent paths to the same destination, which in Walsch’s words is the everlasting embrace of God.

What God Wants is nowhere as comprehensive as his previous works, particularly Tomorrow’s God and The New Revelations, but it provides a good introduction to people who have not read his earlier works.

It’s an easy read, brief and concise, and just like in his previous writings, it provides a message of hope for humanity that we can still turn things around for a much better future. It all begins with admitting and exploring the idea that the information we have with regards to God and Life is incomplete and some may no longer be working.

Argee is a Halfway Contributor

Race and Religion

Argee — Sun, 01 May 2005 00:06:36 +0000

She referred to him as the ‘evil pope.’ I didn’t like it. Others didn’t either. She created a poem declaring ‘the evil pope has died.’ I told her she can remove herself from the group (a tribute site for the pope) but she didn’t. She prided herself in that she was an atheist and mankind was going downhill because they believed in God. She equated religion as ignorance. It seems her hatred for the pope was mainly due to his conservative stance regarding homosexuality and birth control. All this led to a mainly Theist versus Atheist argument with regards to God and religion. It didn’t get ugly (without swearing or personal insults), but you could feel the tension as you read along. Occasionally the discussion would stray, leading to some amusing side-topics like gnomes, fairy tales and Santa Claus. Eventually the discussion led her to create another discussion group: Does God exist? This started a whole new load of discussions and the responses were similar to that of the previous group. I myself got told off for giving my view: that God exists. It seems the group mind-set was already made up: that God doesn’t exist and it was up to us (the believers) to prove that God existed. Every inch of my statements got scrutinized, and I was challenged to show some paranormal proof that God existed and was even told that I probably watched too much Star Trek. I did, however, learn quite a few things about logic and argumentative approaches which was, in a way, a positive aspect.

What she and a few others lacked, myself included, was Respect. That’s how I understand Halfway. Halfway means respect. It tells me to be open minded and to understand that my views are not those of the rest of the world, and that I can’t impose my beliefs. We may disagree on concepts, but we don’t let that lead to violence. It was initially hard for me to take that some people feel very strongly that God doesn’t exist, and that Science was the answer to everything. I probably would have strangled people if those in the discussion group were speaking about it in a room. She and the rest had better thank God for the internet. Yeah, I myself get so stirred up by my own beliefs that it blinds me to the fact that others do not share the same views. Emotions take over respect. In the end I had to realize that people have different views and to keep things from getting out of hand or perhaps getting banned from the group. I had to respect their views and maintain proper decorum.

With the forces of globalization in place creating a smaller world, we are bound to be in contact with a more diverse population. We meet people who grew up with mixed heritages and have traveled widely on a daily basis. As a result, it’s important we do not keep things in black and white perspective. Not everything is as simple as that. Discussions are encouraged, but bashing people, whether online or on real life, is just not going to be productive.

Tensions have been warming up in the East, with China, Japan and Taiwan bickering among themselves. This could have a drastic effect on the region, socially and economically. If these nations don’t sit down, talk things over, and compromise over the issues of historical and territorial disputes, there could be very serious outcomes.

Sometimes nationalism takes center stage, forgetting that there are people out there who have different views and beliefs. We live in a fragile world where things get out of hand when emotions do the thinking. The results are possibly not pretty; from demonstrations to violent riots and, God forbid, military action. Racial prejudices also stem from the fact that people can’t accept that there are different people in the world. If we’re going to make the world a better place to live in, it’s not going to be about who’s right or who’s wrong. It will all come down to one question: Are we going to start respecting one another?

A Filipino at heart, the Argee is currently halfway round the world towards to the end of a fascinating exchange program in the UK. His family resides in Singapore and soon he’ll be back in Malaysia for his final year. Argee is a contributing writer.