A Little Story

Last updated: July 31, 2008

Suddenly in a mood of writing a ‘fictitious’ story…

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This is where somebody’s everything started…

It was exactly 45 years after the bombing of Pearl Harbor.

He lives in a flat.

He has been told that he has a knack of memorizing and recalling car’s name when he was very young. It has not been documented, but it left him a feeling that he should become an engineer when he grown up.

He was raised largely by his mother and later, his grandfather. He was obedient when he was really young. Nothing big happened, although he once ‘destroyed’ a clock that his grandpa loved the most. He wishes to extend a sincere apology.

[No photo yet, paiseh]

This is the kindergarten he has attended. His mother said to him that the headmistress was kinda ‘looking down’ people, as they walked to the kindy everyday, and not utilizing the van service. At that time he is too young to understand the feeling :’(

He loved English during his kindy days. He believe that is because English is easier to learn and write. So much that he requested that he should be sent to English school (He has no idea that only Sekolah Kebangsaan existed at the time… Too young for politics).

蝴蝶

But his perception changed because of these two words. His grandpa (and he) strove hard to get him learnt how to write the words. It did come out during the exam, and he passed well. This got him some boost over self-esteem and ceased to resist learning Chinese language.

His grandma passed away in December 1991. He should really punish himself everytime he recalled the moment. How could he perceive relatives weeping as something funny? (He thought that crying is reserved for children…) And worst of all, he played music out loud.

Roughly by that time he suffered from asthma. Apparently the close contact with cats in the kindy caused that. He received treatment from a child specialist clinic, and need to commute daily from his home to KOMTAR and back.

That’s when he first developed his love: on Penang Yellow Bus. (日久生情,正为此也。)

Later he was transferred to the hospital, again. Admitted for three days. After that he was told not to involve himself in active sports. It has an adverse effect on him till this day, not just physically, but also, the shaping of his personality.

Straight up

During his lower primary years he was perceived by others as an arrogant person. He didn’t know why, perhaps it is because of the way he speaks and gives information. He will tell everything he knows unreservedly. Does not sound too good for some people.

Balik Pulau town center, at night (2006)

In 1995, as his collection of designs grew, he formed an organization to serve as the owner of various vehicles and buildings designs. The organization was initially named ZP, after the automated traffic control system on pedestrian crossing. However, the organization did not remain active for long, and had ceased to operate several years later. The ownership of the design was subsequently transferred to the that someone.

He started to get adventurous around that time. After he visited Balik Pulau for the first time in 1995, as his family would need to get the old ICs replaced and brought him along, he decided to revisit there by himself. He did not know what is so attractive about that place but he just wanted to go there.

That’s where the friction starts. His parent would not allow him to go out. To make things worse, he read The Legend of Water Margin at that time. Do you know the theme of the story?

杀去东京，夺了鸟位…

Kids have excellent imagination, mind you.

Blur blur…

That’s not all. He started to suffer from short sight. It’s no big deal actually, but the problem was exacerbated by the refusal of his parents to get him a pair of glasses. So he had been virtually crippled by 1997.

Nevertheless the momentum kept him going. He had his best academic performance in 1997, and won a consolation prize at the state-level general knowledge competition. He did not regard this as meager in view of the circumstances.

The secondary school he attended

But the ballast was too heavy. He simply could not sustain himself with that limited pool of knowledge. Moreover, he did not excel in mathematics. So he slid, from ‘first-tier’, to ‘quasi-first-tier’, and to ’second-tier’.

Out of frustration, he started to vent himself through poems and proses. That’s when a lot of people started to heard of his getting rebellious and written all that not-so-straight thingies. He know it is not good to do so.

《妖三年之少年时代》

But what could he say to the teachers, who were busy writing notes on the whiteboard, while everyone was busy copy notes on note books, and he was sitting there in desperation, keeping a watchful eye with a blunt sight trying to borrow some note books from his friends who were considerate enough?

Sam Seng Hang, literally “Gangster’s Lane”

To add to the insult, he was not asking for tuition whilst everyone did. His parents should have set up some sort of funds for him so as to accumulate the money he did not pay for the tuition. But not only such funds were absent, but they have cut back his spendings on books. Reverse engineering indeed.

This was his survival at stake. It is no surprise to see him admiring such people as Lee Kuan Yew. They have gone through the course called ’survival’. And he needs that lesson.

His trough was in 2002. The year before, he tried to draft a proposal for a crude airplane, hoping to find sponsorship. But not only the teacher was lacking interest but tacitly teased him. He shall never forget that. But he is now thankful that the teacher taught him the importance of finance. Till that moment he still has the attitude that money and wealth is unreal and will fade away as one dies. Engineering was still very much a part of him.

Following this, ZP, the organization that he founded back in 1995,  was revived and assumed the name Advanced Configuration, with an acronym advcongroup representing the revived organization itself as well as its potential affiliates. Having learned the importance of finance, the Advanced Configuration was to provide financial support for potential research and development. The concept of a Central Monetary Reserve (CMR) was mooted to serve as a platform of sustainable long-term financing through all vicissitudes.

“You saved his skin”

He got his glasses finally in 2002. His grandpa paid for it. The damage done to his eyes were quite severe: at the time of prescription his left eye was “575″ and his right eye was “625″. How did he managed to live so many years without a pair of specs under such circumstances? He doesn’t know. But the damage that hurts him most is that of academics and socialization. He was displaced academically and socially by that time, so to speak. And why did his parents insisted that he does not need a pair of specs? Again, he doesn’t know. (But this series of incidents fuel a later series of events.)

Emblem of the Advanced Configuration

Then come the AC-101. It was a concept design of a supersonic airliner. (Guess that he ventured too far that time.) The design never left paper, but it gave him a lot of encouragement. The design remained active until the end of 2005. Special thanks to one of his English language teachers for all the support.

Form Five block

Then come a change in 2003. He was assigned to a class where he had few friends. His destiny was taking a turn. With that, he could focus more on his studies, and his ranking jumped. Of course, he did socialize, but not much.

As his secondary education was nearing an end he was presented a dilemma. Where should he pursue his studies?

You know what freaking answer he said?

This is a painful answer to give, but… that’s what he thought. Goodness, why could he fell in love with a hypothetical design named AC-101 with such a hopeless intensity?

With the family relations already tense, such propositions pushed the limit of both the parties. The situation is exercabated when the existence and intent of the Advanced Configuration was made known. There is a fundamental difference in thinking as well: He believed in entrepreneurship, whereas his family and related parties discouraged him from forming his own enterprises and urged him to work for existing company instead.

He resorted to Balik Pulau. That was the only place where he could find some peace and contemplate. He commuted to his school for the SPM examination every day via Balik Pulau. That’s a 33-km journey through steep and winding mountain road, one-way. And November is a rainy season.

No wonder he fell ill for the last few days of his examination.

He recovered within three weeks. But he could never imagine that signifies the start of another crisis…

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The date was December 21, 2003, a day full of tension and emotion. His limit over the questions of righteousness, conscience and ultimately, his future, was stretched to the limit.

The tension has built up for a few months prior. The party concerned, apart from him, was a powerful family [not his own family]. Traditionally, their relation was cordial and exchanges and visits were frequent. He, being brought up under such environment, naturally shared a close family-like tie with the other party.

Things started to change in 2003. His contemplation, and thoughts of pursuing his studies produced unexpected opposition from the other party. The suggested course was unacceptable: to terminate studies after secondary education. The underlying reason was similarly opined by him. The question of conscience was brought into question. The course of development was too complex to be prescribed in this limited frame.

During the absence of the other party, exchange of words ceased, but the thinking has not. This cease-fire, apparently soothing, was in fact detrimental.

The next meeting between the two parties was December 21. There was a function in the afternoon, so there has been no exchange initially. However the encounter between the two at the lounge after the function ended the state of appeasement.

He argued, with great vigor and humility, for fifty minutes over such topics from the rights to exercise discretion over his grooming, to pursue tertiary education, to determine his future course, to the question of conscience and right-or-wrong.

His hands are still feeling cold when he recalled the event.

In the end of the civilized argument, there were no understanding nor resolutions. He suppressed his mixed feeling of anger and disappointment and left the premise. He was still hopeful of a follow-up that may solve the division of opinions.

The hope was indeed a fiction. The final visit to the premise was particularly bitter. The two encountered each other, in the kitchen, without a word spoken. He left, gaze at the premise for the last time, knowing that they would never meet again. He headed towards Burma Road, boarded the bus, leaving all his philosophy on knowledge, wealth, conscience and friendship behind.

It would take a long time for him to reconstruct the things left and broken.

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To add insult to injury, the bus company, which he admired so much, suddenly ceased operation on January 1, 2004. He calculated the amount of money he needed to just keep the most essential routes going, and arrived at a figure of RM640,000. Somewhat stupidly, he tried to raise the amount, and somewhat as a matter of course it didn’t materialize.

He took another painful finance lesson to his heart. Not to mention that losing something important in life, when so much had been lost, is agonizing.

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After years of friction, the confrontation finally freed someone from the control of the other party. The Central Monetary Reserve, while failed thus far to finance any research and development activities, had sustained him through the tough times relatively unharmed. With over half of the reserves conserved at the stylized end of the confrontation, January 28, 2006, it was indeed an achievement.  However, the position of someone remained weak and he lacked a viable base, so he was quite lost for some time. While he was free from the control of the party, he was still under its shade of influence, and its agents were still overwhelming him.

That someone mitigated the problem by avoiding contacts with the agents while seeking ways of building a base. His progress was fairly rapid, and soon that someone had found an anchor in the form of an idea, as well as a reserve of resources.

Despite lacking close support over his ideas, he nevertheless believes in it, and soon he gained a better understanding of the principles. Since he could not satisfactorily build up two unrelated ideas at the same time, he had to abandon one in favor of the other.

He was fortunate, later, in being found a base that is reasonably close to his location, while offers means of getting his resources elsewhere. He was unfortunate, rather, that the ideas he favor were no longer ‘in vogue’ (perhaps it never had), and conflicts await him there. Nevertheless he managed to maintain a ’stalemate’.

The situation with the party mentioned earlier took a turn not long thereafter, and he found himself in a losing position, having no bargaining power. The constituents were still there, but the parent entity, from which his surname is derived, was apparently heading towards destruction, threatening to drown its constituents along. While the situation seems to be unrecoverable, he attempted to minimize his loss. He had to retreat instead of put up a fight.

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Undoubtedly the most important components in his possession were the books. Those were 12 years of collection, undertaken under the most intense opposition and duress. They never failed to give him knowledge, warmth and comfort during times of crisis. Over the years, despite the numerous threats about the loss of his books, he succeeded in keeping each and everyone of them.

However, he was personally pity of his books. He felt that, as inanimate objects, the books should not have its share of stress and risk in which he was constantly subject to. Rather, they should reside in a secure environment, free from major threats and pollutions, and be able to perform their task gracefully – the medium in which knowledge is preserved. It is no exaggeration that he paid a father-like devotion towards his books.

Therefore, he felt compelled to look for a location which could serve as a reasonably permanent base for the residence of his books, and ultimately of himself. He knew that university residences are transient in nature, and he could not expect to remain there for long; the constant need for moving increases the risk of book damage exponentially, notwithstanding that moving hundreds of books is a laborious task. However, faced with limited information, he would have to remain in the residences for the time being. While the location is strategic and he enjoys close proximity to his friends, he knew something has to be done ultimately.

The first batch of books to arrive in the new location was during July 2006, following his first arrival in the new base he referred to earlier. That trip was almost dangerous; he had to haul two luggage full of books, as well as another medium-sized paper carton. If not for the presence of his friends, he would have been stranded, too powerless to move the books, and his destiny. Nevertheless, the books arrived in good shape, and was duly shelved in his room. The second batch of books was delivered by freight, shortly after his sensation that the institution, from which his surname is derived, is heading towards destruction. However, due to the bulk of the books, he decided to keep the book packed until he could secure a reasonably permanent location.

In the meantime he continued to look for rooms, albeit paying a lower amount of attention that would have been warranted. Finally, thanks to a very good friend, he secured a room that would have met his expectation as reasonably permanent. After all the years of toiling, he finally could settle down, however temporarily, in a new place. The moment he unpacked his books was especially memorable – “everyone arrived safely after all these while,” “reconciliation of a family torn apart by war.”

More in the wardrobe…

(to be continued…)