What A Day
I began planning to write a blog after I received a few posts from a trusted friend based on Tik Tok. There were three in particular that I found worth mentioning. The first concerned Republican Senator Michael McCaul’s questionable activities. This is the guy who wrote in March 2024 the Bill to ban Tik Tok in America for which he voted yes subsequently, but not before he had invested US$1.15 million on META, the ostensible competitor of Tik Tok, which would sky-rocket if the Bill became law. Such activities would generally be considered suspicious, but would be criminal if viewed in context. The second was a post based on Yonden Lhatoo’s Just Saying video on the insufferable hypocrisy of Western governments hell-bent on destroying Julian Assange. Lhatoo is the Manager Editor for contents at the SCMP. This particular post was somewhat dated and went back to his 2022 New Year’s message in which he demanded Western governments to free the Wikileaks founder before preaching press freedom to everyone else. In the video, Lhatoo quoted Chris Hedges (Christopher Lynn Hedges) an American journalist, author, commentator and Presbyterian minister, who writes a weekly column at Scheerpost and hosts the Chris Hedges Report on The Real News Network, but who was reportedly to be suicidal sometime before, that Assange’s crime was having exposed America’s criminal entreprise. Hong Kong was also mentioned and highlighted for the wrong reasons. The third was a more topical one from Shahid King Bolsen following the arrest of students and professors at the Columbia University in NYC, where he concluded that America is in a crisis right now. He asserted that these university students are the precious assets of the country and ought not to have been arrested and treated as common criminals. All three videos were rather interesting and informative. Of course, one needs to read about the CVs and backgrounds of the commentators to form a view, but on balance, it points to a singular and irrefutable situation that the world we find ourselves in right now is not as simple as it used to be and that there is a lot more than meets the eyes. One needs to take a view and form a view on almost any issue, be it local, regional, or international, and one can never be sure what the right view is, if there is one. I have been fascinated, for example, reading commentaries surrounding the trials of Donald Trump and his audacity to use every opportunity between his court appearances to campaign for his candidacy for the next presidency. It does seem that it wouldn’t matter whether Trump would be found guilty of the many counts of felony or whatever he was being charged; and more importantly, it wouldn’t matter if at the end of the day he wins the White House residency. But let’s ponder on it some other day and in another context.
In the midst of all the kafuffle, and against the threat that the black rainstorm warning could be up anytime, Su and I went for our regular lunch meeting at CRC, but not before we stopped by Tsing Fung Street to pick up some furniture which we bought two days before. I was surprise, and somewhat pleased that my rather small EV could comfortably accommodate all the items.
A rather unexpected and unpleasant news awaited us at lunch. One of our regular lunch companions became very ill after a recent surgical operation which did not go well. We went to see him after lunch to expect the worst. He was not well indeed. It happened so quickly. He had a regular checkup in March after which he was advised to have an operation mid-April that was meant to be a routine. Apparently, the operation revealed something bad, very bad. When we left him around 4 pm, he wasn’t too well. We learnt shortly after we were back home that he had passed away shortly after we left amongst his dear and near. I took a stiff drink in his name, and began to think about what had gone through between us and our friends. Life is short indeed in this world of impermanence.
