Can you remember memorising the multiplication tables? I once had this square game with pop-up tiles. The sums would be printed on top of the tiles ("2X7, 3X3..."), & I would make a guess before popping up the tile to show the answer printed on its side. Most of the time I end up making patterns by popping up the tiles rather than learning my multiplication. Then came the rooftop of division. We were required to write down every step of the problem solving process in primary school, so if we got the final answer wrong, we would get the "method marks". So these division workings would stretch for half a page or more, dividing & carrying forward each step. Somehow divisions seem more difficult than multiplications, although they are the reverse of each other (multiplication requires sums, while divisions subtractions). Probably because divisions start with big numbers while multiplications start small.
We all start our life with a small number, 0. Our age is a few hours old, & our wisdom none. But surprisingly, our heart of understanding & acceptance is infinitely rich. I can still remember how my mum always says that when I was young, I enjoy being carried by others, even our Sikh neighbours. Babies do not discriminate between smell, colour or race. But as we grow up, we start to have differentiating thoughts about others & learn to categorise people. As we approach adulthood, we have discriminating mindsets which we thought were existent for a long time (possibly since young?), & thought them to be natural. By the time we grow old, we become grumpy old men unsatisfied & unfavourable against possibly everyone else in the world.
I wonder if Santa is one of them, because I haven't receive any Christmas present for years. He may be wise enough to pick the good ones out of the bad, but can never be understanding enough to accept all races & religion. "Azceltranism? Bad!" Ok I have to fake a religion name here beacuse adults nowadays are just not mature enough to use their heart. There's a little tense atmosphere in the world now regarding religious issues. Somehow there were some translation errors because these people who eavesdropped on God mis-intepreted his message. You know how when you eavesdrop on people, you tend to hear the things you want them to say? It's a sort of delusion that happens when you are desperate. So they go around saying Heaven has too many free parking lots & are waiting for people to fill them up. There are so many tour guides from Hell nowadays, bringing people on a one-way trip to Neverland.
We can never blame ourselves for being discriminating. Most of the time, they are just cases of coincidence. Your own fart will always smell good to yourself & smell like - well, shitty - to others. So if you are a Chinese & grew up smelling burning temple incense, you'll not get used to other smells like Indian types of incense. The Hindus would not like our musky incense smell either. Or the smell of rubbish. It is just a matter of familiarity, not discrimination.
But you should scold yourself should you blurt out crude social jokes like "I can't see them in the dark..." or "That banana man...". Unless you have allergic response to the visual reception of certain range of visible electromagnetic spectrum (means colour), there is just no excuse to discriminate skin colour.
Although we come from different origins, we drank from the same source of water, & grew up in the same kampongs. To reap the benefits of our homeland, we have to be part of the family. This identity of being Singaporean is still standing strong against the fight against terrorism & religious discrimination. However, to say just this would be doing the world a great injustice. What good is keeping Singapore strong & united while the rest of the world falls apart? We need a common global identity that will bind humanity together once more, before it was shaken apart by the fall of the Giants.
& this common identity we are finding soon, as globalisation brings along the intricate fabrication of interdependence among countries & people, races & religions. Violence has rocked this underlying tripping stone of globalisation to the surface, and it is the only, & also possibly opportune time, to solve it once & for all. Only have we resolve this long outstanding issue can we evolve to the next level of wisdom in humanity's lifeline.
& then can we truly experience the coming of the 2nd Space Age, where African astronauts will fly with Japanese astronauts on a space capsule, controlled by U.S. ground command, to our finally completed space station, where Black & Australian astronauts are having a good meal of freeze-dried pasta, & the British on standby on deck to welcome them. They will then greet the alien's welcoming message with much enthusiasm & truthfulness, "Greetings, Earthlings (regardless of race, creed & religion)".
