Teddy's legend

 “When all else fails, hug your Teddy” the urban legend goes. 

Teddy represents many things all at once. Albeit being lifeless, they consoled us when we faced our first frustrations in life. They were our first friends to hold our first conversations with.

But in another sense Teddy represents our insecurities. It shows, we are vulnerable creatures in need for consolation and friendship.

I like looking at windows of charity establishments like Vinnies Shops. These are like museums, time capsules facing public kerbs. 

Every object behind the window represents something from the past and discarded. 

When I saw “Teddy in a sack” it resonated sadness in me. It recalled perhaps we are ungrateful as much as needy. In that sense the humble Teddy acts as a messenger to remind us our inner conflicts.

Metaverse

Metaverse is not a brand new idea. There was Second Life, an online multimedia platform that came about in 2000s, developed and owned by Linden Lab.

These are virtual reality products designed to capitalise on your time, in return of what they call an “immersive experience”. It is worth to note, unlike video games “there is no manufactured conflict, no set objective” in them.

I watched Mark Zuckerberg’s vision for socialising in the Metaverse video. Under his tight black sweatshirt and denim, a paunch appeared. He seemed to have lost his boyish college dropout edge. With a frozen smile he now looks more like a James Bond villain or a wax model in Madame Tussauds. Something is amiss, loss of spark maybe.

The possibility of meeting your grandchild’s 3d avatar rather than seeing them in a Zoom meeting, or sharing your 3D art in a virtual street corner, may sound attractive to some. But like Elon Musk, I doubt anyone would be willing to wear a TV set on their nose just to play poker with their friends’ avatars.

We have to acknowledge virtual reality hardware technology is still in its infancy. It is too bulky and invasive, setting significant barriers against immersive experience.

But even if we assume technological setbacks are temporary and one day we might wear contact lenses and just whisper to teleport ourselves into the VR world, would you want that?

Metaverse tells us, If you fail to realise your dreams, don’t worry, you can wear your headset and become “who you want to be” in a virtual world. You can create as many avatars you can, Zuckerberg said. It will be entirely in your control whom you want to interact with. 

The chances are, you will go back to your Facebook friends. 

Rest assured once you open your mouth you will be the same person to anybody who knows you or about to know you regardless you wear Genghis Khan, Einstein, Jane Mansfield, or T-Rex avatars.

Maybe you wouldn’t be sweating in a bunny suit but the glorification you will get will not be much different from being in a fancy dress party. The entertainment sensation will wear out in minutes. In the end you will look and feel pathetic, rather than authentic.

Then there is the experience bit. Supposedly you would be able to hang out with your friends in different environments, a street in Milan, a villa in Switzerland and so on.

But would you invite your high school friend whom you haven’t seen for 30 years to a backgammon tournament on the banks of River Seine?

Or would you do or talk about anything different even with your favourite buddy whether you are virtually hiking in Iceland or virtually flying across NYC? What are you going to talk about? Oh, look at this virtual pink volcano?

By the way your “immersive” hiking experience over Iceland may be interrupted with an advertisement tailored for you; environmentally friendly toilet paper packaged in a card box sliding on slopes of black ash. 

Perhaps you should be grateful and think about Mark Zuckerberg when you use that square.

Kirribilli Gothic

 It is rare that I see a low hanging fruit like this and get excited about it. The frame in my mind had all elements of a good story. 

A building with a certain air, mysterious and nonconformist, as if an affluent person lived in 1920s, someone like The Great Gatsby, was looking down on me. There was a Christmas tree thrown on the sidewalk opposite to the entrance.  

The plants on terraces stood with eerie presence. I could not help but thought the Christmas tree was not welcome there, and the plants domineered their owners so that they had no option but get rid of the tree.

Inspirations:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Shining_(novel)
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Gatsby

Gravestones

I had an appointment with a tax accountant in Parramatta, a major commercial hub, on a hot summer day in 2021.

A few heritage buildings were sprinkled here and there in the heart of Parramatta CBD. They look like lost ghosts painfully looking for an exit. The main scene is office workers on a lunch break walking by. Not seeing the ghosts. 

While walking back to the car park, I noticed a low brick wall surrounding a land, about the size of a soccer field, even smaller. The sign outside read “St John’s Cemetery, oldest cemetery in Australia, 1790”.

At the entrance I stood and read pale photocopies of info sheets hung on the cemetery’s billboard behind a glass with fingermarks. Oldest burial was in 1790 when French Revolution was one year old.  

"To the memory of William New. Died May 7th 1839. Aged 11 years he has a fond father and mother and five brothers and sisters."   

Outside, cars and buses were whooshing by. A traffic light mounted above the wall turned red. I heard the loud chirpy sound of pedestrian warning.    

 

Engravings on old dark stones weathered. Oldest ones are not readable anymore. Like in all cemeteries it is not hard to figure out who was rich who was poor, who was hastily piled up reusing the grave once grandpa was buried alone, who was adult, who was child. Tiny gravestones of children who died of famine or pestilence. Lives cut short in a strange country scourged by sun.

Someone threw empty pet bottles and trash on a grave next to the entrance. I turned and walked away.

Further up I saw a dried rose left at the corner of a stone mound, engravings not readable. 

Someone cares. 

A sudden wind shakes the branches of an oak tree. 

Dead whisper, "remember us". 

Listen

When you actively listen you will find a whole new world.

If you can enter the talker’s skin their world will gradually unfold, the depth and expanse of their world will grow illuminated by their story.

The more you eliminate your judgements from this picture the more you will be enlightened.

Like mindfulness meditation, active listening is a faculty you can harness by practicing.