A fable

There are things that people don't tell you.

For example, did you know that somewhere, far far away, in a place forgotten and so far away that it has lost its name, there is a building. Who built it, no one knows, just as the name of the building is lost to the knowledge of man. But there it stands still, and inside the building, there is a room.

And in the room, there is a cup. And the cup is different for every person, and there is one for every soul that lives.

And the cup is filled. It is filled with the spilled tears of those you have hurt, the ungratefulness you show to your parents and those who care about you, the cold indifference and callousness you treat your siblings and others with, the held-in howling loneliness that no one else knows of those you have forsaken, the petty angers and jealousies that you inflict, the uncaring selfishness that lie behind your actions, the choked-back, torn and stifled cries buried in pillows of those you have abandoned, the myriad evils of your life.

Oh, the cup brims.

But it can hold more, it can hold all the cruelty and pain you inflict.

And be certain, be very very certain, that one day you will have to drink from the cup. And it will be returned unto you tenfold.

And when it passes to you to do so, drink deep. Drink deep and do not whimper.

Post 59. Horses and Bullfighting

In Hemingway's Death in the Afternoon, he describes the tragedy that is bullfighting. He describes it as not being a sport but rather "a tragedy; the death of the bull, which is played, more or less well, by the bull and the man involved and in which there is danger for the man but certain death for the animal." It's a rather interesting book, 358 pages solely on bull-fighting. Read it, and it may change the way you think of bullfighting.

There are 3 acts in bullfighting. The first act is known as the suerte de varas, the trial of lances, where the bull charges a man on a horse, the picardor, whose aim is to place the pic, a pike pole, into the bull's back to punish him and yet strengthen the bull's resolve at the same time by letting the bull charge successfully and clearing the ring. I will explain more further on.

The second act is the time of the banderillero, men who run the bull with capes to exhaust the bull, and place banderillas, pairs of sharpened sticks into the bull's withers to fatigue the neck muscles so that the matador can kill successfully without the bull being able to raise its head and horns to block the sword.

The final act is the death, where the matador, the only man allowed to kill the bull, dominates the bull with the muleta, a scarlet cape on a stick, and finally kills with the sword.

It takes a team of 5 to 6 men actually to prepare, exhaust the bull before the matador can do his work. But it is the matador alone who faces death.

But the point is not the talk about all that. It's to talk about the horses, the horses the picadors ride to punish the bull. And this is the way they do it.

They allow the bull to charge and impale the horse before sticking in the pic. This usually is fatal.

Sometimes, the bull doesn't kill the horse, and you will see the horse gallop off, trailing its intestines and viscera on the ground, blindly assured by the piacador's knees that all is well. Horses, as you may know, react based on how they are ridden. That is why novice riders and those lacking confidence are more likely to be thrown off, whereas a man who knows what he is doing may convince a gutted horse to continue galloping. And then, sometimes, you will see the same horse being used for the next bull (they kill 6 bulls per fight. 2 bulls per matador.)

How is this possible, you ask, when the horse has been gored before and verily, you saw its guts spill on the ground? Very simple. To reduce the cost of losing two horses where one will do, they stuff the inside of the horse with sawdust and bring it back again. And since each fight is allocated a time span of 15 mins, that is how long the horse can survive with missing organs.

So a horse can survive for a period of time, even though it's insides may be ripped out, gored, torn out and missing. And then it has to go out and perform again.

I think, I, am starting to know what the horses went through.

And in conclusion...

The woman hit the owl over the head.

The woman hit the owl over the head.

The woman hit the owl over the head.

But if the bird wanted to be with you, it would come back to you.

post 58. calling Zhou lao shi

so, was feeling in the shits, which more discerning readers can pick up from the previous posts. and heck, i wanted to talk to him anyway cos i do kinda miss him.

it's kinda lonely practising on my own. we used to talk during our short breaks, and now all i have for company is my water bottle and mobile. not the most communicative of partners.

so i called him cos i missed him and cos i was feeling in the shits too. haha. intention was to talk a bit to him about my problem, but just hearing him talk to me prepped me up lots already, so in the end i didn't talk to him about it.

had a moment of shock though, when he actually called me by name. it was the first time he did so, and i always thought he doesn't remember my name cos he has so many students. when he called my name, had a brainfreeze and was frantically wondering what obscure chinese term he was using before i realised he was saying my name. maybe because i also don't allow many ppl to call me by my full name. (it's a thing with me: i only allow those people i really like to call me by my full name. or you have to be an elder. hah.)

for some obscure reason, i was quite touched.

but yeah, we yakked for almost an hour! thank god for phone cards. lol, he was quite chatty so i was wondering if he misses having someone to talk to. (hehe. my ego at work here). turns out things didn't work out as intended for him too.

but it's okay. we both can take it. (it being our respective problems. lol, in case that wasn't clear) ^^