brilliant re-done by the glee cast although the oringinal version by kanye west is so much more funny.
i've been really really busy so i haven't really had the chance to do anything here till today.
i haven't been able to play football with some of my best footballing friends far a long time and i jumped at the opportunity to do just that earlier today, and after that, i had lunch with a good friend of mine, one of my best friends a few years ago, but we fell out when he stamped on my ankle a long while ago and refused to apologise.
we were just catching up on what we were doing (he is studying now) while i told him that i'm not really working despite the very substantial amount of money being offered in the optical trade. i explained that i don't fancy the hours and anyway, i've got the rest of my life to work, so i figured that in this half a year or so, i want to learn the things that i've always wanted to, try the things that i've never gotten the chance to, experience the things that i might never again get the chance to.
to my surprise, he immediately understood where i was coming from, about how money is always meant to be a mean to an end, not an end unto itself, about how there are so many more things in life to live for than a mere number.
we went on speaking about this, about how some work so hard for money just so that they can buy a 1.2k louis vuitton bag (it's all good and well if you have the ability to get that, but to toil day and night, just so that you can get a bag to make a statement, now that is something else) when he said that well, some girls choose to go for rich guys for exact same reasons.
he told me about a friend of his who was seeing this rich guy, who according to this friend of his, is very ordinary - apart from his money that is. and when asked about why she chose that guy (apparantly she's quite a looker), she tried to explain how great he is.
in the words of my friend (he was speaking in mandarin), 那些小小的, 哇, 都可以说到很好, which translates to even the littlest things she managed to make them sound great. and when prompted further, this friend of his came up with well, he did alot for me.
and upon further probing, he did alot for me simply meant: he's willing to spend alot of money on me, and that's how materialistic some people can be, concluded my friend with a half shrug.
i couldn't help smirking while he was telling me about his friend.
and i really understand just why we were such good friends in the very first place; we are just so similar, in the way we see things, in our interests - so similiar that we both share this trait of hard-headedness, which was why we fell out and didn't speak to each other for so long.
it was only today, after close to 2 years since that incident that we spoke like that, the way we used to, full of laughter and honesty again.
and so, this is the second person that i've found forgiveness in my heart for, someone who readily forgave me for my part in our falling out since i came back from taiwan.
ok, this is a longer introduction than i had intended to, but this entry was about how people view maturity as financial muscle and how i disagree with such a view. this was also the post which the guy who calls himself the modernsophist commented on.
and here goes.
now that i'm in my final year, words like maturity and grown-up are being thrown about almost ad nauseum. but really, what is maturity? it seems that all that have been suggested is financial independence or security.
i was speaking to a friend in uni, one who i had not seen for some time, and he asked me about what i want to do after i graduate. i said that i'm looking to try my hand at something that i had always enjoyed, but never gave myself a chance to explore. i do not wish to continue my current course of study, in other words.
he asked why.
while i do not dislike optometry, in fact, i'm enjoying year 3 more than ever, experiencing a whole new aspect of optomtry, the social and community part, going overseas to serve and return what i've been blessed with, i really cannot see myself working as an optometrist full-time after i graduate. teaching is an option, but lecturing is a different proposition all together; lecturing is generally more detached and less intimate than teaching.
my friend then asked something that sums up what growing up is to him, his defination of maturiy, something that, i'm sure many of us share too.
he said that as he nears graduation, there begins a need to consider what job that he can take upon graduation, the prospects of that job, the sort of pay to expect, how much to use to support his parents, how much it takes to support a family (he has a serious girlfriend), and that sometimes it matters not what you enjoy, but rather, what you have to do.
but really, is that all there is to maturity? i've got friends who believes themselves to be mature just because they have an idea about what it is that they like to work as after they graduate, the amount of money that they would like to receive, the plans that they have for this money.
call me callow, but i've never considered all these.
maturity to me, is realising that life contains so much more, that life is a process of learning, of exploring, of living and that there is no end unto itself in life. in other words, graudation is merely a milestone of sorts, not a finishing line signifying the end of a part of ourselves. there is so much more to learn, to explore, to live then just toiling day and night for something that has no value without a purpose. let me explain, money, is a mean, not an end, and that for money to have value, there needs to be an avuenue for the exchange of that dollar note into a certain good or service that fulfills a certain desire. while getting a new bag, or new shoes, or new clothes can be extremely gratifying, the pleasure is fleeting at best. and then, you need more.
some argue that maturity means settling down and starting a family, and therefore, as fianancial stability is a requisite for a family, then accordingly, maturity means taking a predominantly financial outlook in our context.
i disgree on 2 counts.
firstly, there is an inherent fault in such thinking because there is an irreparable relationship between money and family. while i agree that one has to work to support a family, i too believe that one cannot focus on the money and enjoy family life. there is an irreconcilable difference in the 2. something's got to give, and for the most of us, it's a choice that we have to make.
secondly, perhaps more controversially, i submit that there is more, much much more to live then to settle down and form a family. ther is such much in life to offer, so many mountains to seek out and conquer, so many books to read, so many places to go, so many things to attempt that it seems to me that children are very much a liability. to me, life can be what you choose it to be, so why pick the option of the arduous and mundane? to work from 9 to 5, or in our case, 11 to 9, have 2 children, go overseas once a year, return home to supervise the children with their homework, to be so - ordinary, so monotonous.
surely maturity can't mean learning to enjoy the dull?