Simplicity and greed

2 guys sit at a bar:
- Odd thing how people simply fail how to see this...
- What's that?
- You see, old chum, this is a basic thing in life. Most of our lives is flutter, junk, triviality. And yet we surround ourselves with it, we keep accumulating aimlessly, in pursuit of love, happiness, satisfaction, success, thrills... always looking for more, although that just ends up pulling us further away from living well. 'The human being is insatiable', hah!
- Man you're off again. I don't get you...
- What I'm trying to say is that most people don't know what's important to them. If people only knew what was really important to them, that would be that.
- ... umh, right...
- Okay, let's take an example. Take your daughter. Give her a doll or a teddy to play with. She'll cherish it, take care of it, talk to it, keep it next to her 'forever and ever'. The doll or teddy, doesn't matter what it is, becomes a real companion, something of real value... emotional value that is... Remember when we were kids with our little bags of marbles. None of us had more than 15 marbles... 15 measly, crummy and thoroughly worn and scratched marbles. Yet those marbles were our lives! God, how nice that was.
- I know... I remember..
- Anyway... back to your daughter, suppose we were to give her 100 dolls or teddies. What do you think would happen instead?
- She'd give them 100 names and play with them all equally.
- I don't think so. More likely she'd feel lost. I believe that 100 dolls would give her less happiness than a single one. There'd simply be too many of them to contend with, and too much for one little mind.. no... one little HEART to care for. That's where the term "spoiled" comes from: the complete loss of perspective.
- What are you getting at?
- See, with the one doll, it doesn't matter if the doll is ugly or the teddy's fur has gone dry and rash from one too many washings. The kid will love that doll or teddy like it's the only thing in the universe worth loving. And actually, in the kid's universe, that statement would actually be literally true! The real value of doll, or the teddy, or the bag of marbles lies in the fact that there's something very personal about them. What I'm trying to say is that the more things we own, the more things we accumulate, the more indifferent we become to them. The girl with 100 dolls will keep wanting the latest, most beautiful doll. The girl with 1 doll will never want to replace her doll, no matter how worn old it is. In fact, she'll fight with tooth and nail to keep it!
- Aaaah. I see where you're getting. I never thought about it that way. Get rid of the non-essential things in our life, stop accumulating useless stuff because that just takes our attention things away from what we already do have, and focus on the things that we know we truly love... In other words, Simplicity!
- hmm.. versus greed... But you know, one thing still puzzles me. This same reasoning functions the other way too. Our minds can only handle so much. We can only devote so much energy, care on the good things in life, and the more there is to care for, the less we care. On the OTHER hand... the same is true for the negative things in life. If life all goes well, we panic over the smallest sign of trouble, feel miserable, complain, and, well, it becomes one big drama. But the more hardship we face, the more ugly things we see, the more indifferent we become to it.
- You sayin' we should seek trouble?
- No, but it does help if we've had our fair share of it. I think it was Stalin who once said: 'you kill one person, and it's a tragedy. You kill 1,000,000, it becomes a statistic'. That says a lot about us humans.
- Odd thing the human mind.
- No my friend, odd thing the human heart... hand me a cigarette will you.

What then must we do?

More quotes from "Year of Living Dangerously". Pictures taken from Photographer John Hulme's Website

"Most of us become children again when we enter the slums of Asia. And last night I watched you walk back into childhood, with all its opposite intensities - laughter and misery, the crazy and the grim, toy town and a city of fear..."


"This is a little market for the poor.

(quoting) 'And the people asked Him: 'What shall we do then?'' It's from Luke, Chapter 3, verse 10. ...

...'What then must we do?' Tolstoy asked the SAME question. He wrote a book with that title! He got so upset about the poverty in Moscow that he went one night into the poorest section and just gave away all his money. But then he concluded that it didn't do any good. It was just a drop in the ocean.

I disagree. I support the view that you just don't think about the major issues. You do whatever you can about the misery that's in front of you. Add your light to the sum of light."


(Talking about a poor woman he has been trying to help) "I can't make her understand that the canal which she and her son bathe in and drink from carries disease. In another country she would be a decent woman. Here she begs, and perhaps sells herself. Her tragedy is repeated a million times in this city. 'What then must we do?' ......... 'We must give love to whomever God has placed in our path' "

The human voice is different from other sounds

"THE GUNFIRE AROUND us makes it hard to hear. But the human voice is different from other sounds. It can be heard over noises that bury everything else. Even when it's not shouting. Even when it's just a whisper. Even the lowest whisper can be heard - over armies... when it's telling the truth."

Quote from the movie: "The Interpreter"

Quotes from "Year of Living Dangerously"

"I shuffle like cards the lives I deal with. Their faces stare out at me. People who will become other people. People who will become old, betray their dreams ... become ghosts"


"To understand Java, you must understand the Wayang. The sacred shadow play. The puppet master is a priest. That's why they call Sukarno the Great Puppet Master...
(Playing with a puppet) Their shadows are souls, and the screen is heaven. You must watch their shadows... not the puppets. The right, in constant struggle with the left, the forces of light and darkness in endless balance.
In the West we want answers for everything. Everything is right or wrong or good or bad, but in the Wayang, no such conclusions exist.
Look at Prince Arjuna (picks up a puppet). He's a hero, but he can also be fickle and selfish. Krishna says to him: 'All is clouded by desire, Arjuna, as a fire by smoke, as a mirror by dust. Through these, it blinds the soul.' ... (Picking up a new puppet) This is Princess Srikandi. Noble and proud, but headstrong. Arjuna will fall in love with her. "

Breathe in the lemongrass, taste the ginger

The woven straw mat on the ground feels cool to your touch. Its prickly meshes tickle the flat underside of your fingers. Though your hair is still wet and cool from the shower you just took, round beads of sweat are already forming on your skin... like pearls... like those rain droplets you always find resting on the leaves of banana trees outside.


Odd thing how, here, the rainwater, the moisture in the air, and the sweat that pushes up through your skin all seem like one and the same. Water... All life here seems to come back to it, to bring movement to it and carry its vivid colors. The locals here believe that the unseen is all around us. But you know otherwise: this pure, blessed, water is that unseen.


Ah, the tea's almost ready! Your dark iron teapot is sitting in front of you. A fierce battle is raging in there, between the shy but eloquent lemongrass; the merry but fiery ginger; and the green tea, always the subtle diplomat. You wait patiently as the mixture settles.


Through the large open windows of the bungalow, your gaze wanders into the garden. The image is one of a lush, sensuous green natural world. Dark soil, palm fronds, ripened fruit, exotic flowers, insects and frogs, rain. A soft breeze has made its way in through the windows, caressing the ground and your bare feet. It explores the room, gently pushing the exotic aroma of the tea up against the walls, only to settle back down in its newfound nest of comfort... Through your shirt, the entire surface of your skin breathes in, welcoming the breeze. What a nice afternoon.

Ah, the tea seems ready. Let's add a teaspoon of brown sugar.

Bottoms up!