the course of life

There comes a time, I suppose, when you see the people around you, the people you called your friends or acquaintances, entering into relationships, and you found yourself not really surprised anymore. Instead, you acknowledge the couple and congratulate them. And I think for me, that time has long passed. I guess maybe it’s because for a considerable part of my life, I grew up having slightly older friends and I guess gradually I have come to learn that boy-girlfriend relationships and marriages and perhaps even divorces are inevitable phases of life.

With Facebook, we learn about the ‘relationship statuses’ of the people around us even more quickly, perhaps even instantly, which I’m pretty happy about since I can stay updated without taking a more proactive role of trying to stay updated. At least there isn’t the chance of meeting a couple and say ‘hey I didn’t know u guys are together’, only to get a reply, ‘erm… that’s an eternity ago’. There is a lower possibility of calling a friend’s partner by his or her ex’s name. low possibility cos shit happens.

It’s the speed of how lives progress that I must get used too. Pretty soon, it’ll be weddings I’m attending, housewarming parties I’m invited to and baby showers I’m going, though that really depends on how much effort I’m willing to spend in making my social life an existence, as well as how tolerable my people skill actually is.

There’s always a certain fantasy associated with thinking that far ahead. But life from beginning to end generally is about the same. Live, reproduce and die. That’s destiny, although some may skip the second phase. Without a doubt, I’ll get to that point in time, and start to wonder why everything seems to be a déjà vu.
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Libya

The past decade have seen a suddenly spike of violence and political changes. Perhaps the greatest irony, one that no one expects, is that years of resentment in the Middle East towards U.S. for the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan has turned to what seemed to be now a hopeful glance at America for leadership and support.

Indeed, astonishingly, the past few months have seen the uprising of the people after torrid years of corruption under tyrants and irresponsible leaders. What never fail to amaze me is that the desperate desire for democracy spike after a man (Mohamed Bouazizi) lit himself on fire to express his hopelessness with oppression in Tunisia. Eqypt followed after, and thankfully, the leader resigned gracefully. In Libya, it was different too. Col Qaddafi refuses to budge, and wages war on his people. NATO, UN, and the United Arab Emirates, shocked by the use of violence sanction a no-flight zone in the country yesterday, which was received with gratefulness by the rebels. The bombing of yet another Middle Eastern country by America planes have begun. Paradoxically, it is one approved by many countries and even the UN Security Council, but and yet it is one that U.S. is reluctant to enter and eager to get out.

This is no surprise either. This year marks the anniversary of a ten-year occupation Afghanistan and seriously, no can foresee when U.S. can get out of that shithole. That, as well as the military presence on Iraq soil has added shamelessly to the tremendous deficit that U.S. has found no answer to. I suppose today’s wars is different from the wars fought 500 years ago. Then, the losers become slaves. The winners do whatever they like. Today, the winners, no doubt for humanitarian reasons, end up protecting the losers from their own fanatics. War is costly. U.S. learnt that the hard