As an Asian, as you may have gathered, I yearn for a time when Asians will grow into the vast human potential that awaits them. That sounds patronising, but isn’t. Even with Asian countries that can trace their history back centuries or even millennia, the modern picture of such countries have been ones of poverty, social strife and warfare.  If we use the concept of a country, such as the sort you or I would prefer to live in, as inclusion of the populace in the decision-making of a particular government, then it’s sad to realise that India has the claim of being “the oldest democracy in Asia” at only about 60+ years and counting. Not very long at all.

I’ve spoken before about the economic might (and rising ascendancy) of the continent, and that is something of which there is no doubt. However, when it comes to creativity and innovation (a “culture of iconoclasm”, if you will) then I suffer nothing but abject depression over Asia’s trenchant rejection of the one thing that can actually propel itself into the kind of envy-producing prominence that has been the hallmark of Western civilisations for centuries. Absolute, sheer-to-goodness, original, satirical, self-reflective creativity.

I’ve started this series of blogs because this is something that I feel has to be confronted and discussed by Asians. I’m not saying that everything is going to be well thought out because I’m only groping for understanding myself. And, who knows, I may even end up reversing my own position on some things down the track. What I think will remain inviolate, though, is the central premise that the Culture of Iconoclasm is stifled throughout Asia and that, more than foreign investment, more than manufacturing figures, such repression will lead to Asia being a second-rate continent for as long as it clings to its outdated concepts of not rocking the boat.

I’m trying to get permission from someone to include some of their work into a future blog on this line of thinking, so stay tuned.

The Asia Times online tells me that, in an effort to keep the engines of their economy firing, the Chinese government is encouraging its citizens to “buy Chinese”. But it appears that the Chinese themselves are starting to suffer what the rest of us have been for the past few years. If you will, allow me to elucidate.

Televisions and white goods? Manufacturers use circuitry from second-hand machines and — surprise! surprise! — logos that mimic famous brands. Wow, who could have seen that one coming? Because the components are worn out to begin with, they can (and have) cause(d) fire, injury or death.

Clothing? Just 31 of 60 tested children’s garments passed Chinese safety standards. (There are Chinese safety standards?) Problems included falsifying raw materials information and excessive formaldehyde content (which can cause skin or respiratory infection).

Children’s toys? Excessive amounts of lead, choking hazards, no robustness, and I believe past news articles have also pointed out the existence of PCBs in baby pacifiers ….

Children’s furniture? How about excessive amounts of lead, cadmium, chromium and other heavy metals?

Milk powder? Don’t get me started!

Fruits and vegetables? Mel.a.mine

Pet food? Say no more.

Fresh pork? Chemical additives (clenobuterol hydrochloride has been mentioned). In case you were wondering what clenobuterol hydrochloride actually is, Now Public helpfully informs us that:

[T]he public brand name for this chemical is Spriropent.  The article advises that the drug stays in your system for days. Not only that, it accelerates your heart rate.

It’s used in some Chinese pig farms to fatten the animals for sale, which translates into higher profits, since each pig gains 1 kilogram of weight per day. The higher profits come to around  275% !

So we’re left with tales such as that of mother, Wang Ting, who has to travel to Hong Kong to buy US-branded baby milk formula because she has “no confidence” in domestic brands. I don’t blame her. How long will it take, I wonder, for the global tide to turn against China on this? It isn’t just one thing that they manufacture badly; it’s a whole range of goods and food across the entire spectrum of life. The Chinese have always had a reputation for being the money-hungry hustlers of Asia — loan sharks in Malaysia, for example, are called by the nickname “Ah Long” from the Cantonese — interested more in profit than quality, and the unbroken stream of horror stories about modern Chinese goods and foods doesn’t help in countering such a stereotypic image.

The problem is, citizen reluctance to one side, while China finds ready markets for its frankly dangerous goods, nothing is going to change. So I’m just going to have to read those labels, and question the sources, a bit more carefully when I shop. And you’d do well to do the same.

Remember, gentle reader, when I told you that I see this economic crisis as being a boon for smaller countries who — as I put it — “were considered too immature a market to be let in on the “big boy” deals“? Because those “less developed” economies didn’t couple so closely with the United States’ shadow banking system, I postulated that they would be/were exempt from most of the resultant disembowelling?

Well, it’s nice to be vindicated, and even nicer when the story involves two Western countries. Behold, I bring you Der Spiegel :

The former East Germany has long been eclipsed economically by the richer and more industrialized West. Yet ironically the eastern part of the country is now actually better equipped to deal with the ongoing economic crisis.

The “ironically” is just another way for the West Germans to still put the superior boot into East Germany while they roll around in the dirt, pretending they’re not choking on it.

[West Germany snapshot: largest contraction in 39 years; predictions of negative growth (why not just say 'decline'? Oh well, them's the vocabulary) of up to 4% this year; Philipp Holzmann construction (a little nudge was all that was needed), Kirch (media) Group, Opel car-makers, Arcandor retail group, BenQ Mobile, Berlin (yes, the city!), etc., all declaring bankruptcy. Now that's an economic eclipse you can believe in.]

If I’m sick of the constant moral superiority that’s been shown by West Germany to East Germany all these long, lonely years, I can only imagine what it feels like to be East German! One (West) Berliner even had the gall to tell me that litter, petty crime, racist attacks on migrants, and property damage never ever occurred in Germany before Reunification!! In all our conversations, all the ills of Germany were laid at the feet of the East Germans. Our friendship ended soon after I pointed out to her that that, in fact, was often not the case. (Yep, how to win friends and influence people, that’s me.)

Anyway, back to Der Spiegel. According to the paper’s reading of the government report, the East is doing so much better because:

1. They have more small- and medium-sized companies which are “thought to be able to react more flexibly to the challenges posed by the economic downturn.”

2. They are “far less dependent on exports”.

While this may be part of the story, the entire mood of the piece is — as Colonel Sherman T Potter used to put it — horse hockey. No mention at all is made of the tremor event that precipitated the tsunami, which was the massive, unregulated leveraging of securities in a highly secretive, highly coupled worldwide banking environment that was run like a congregation of male toddlers who’d just discovered their penises.

There is a caveat to East Germany’s mirth, however:

[T]he government expects the former East to have caught up with the weaker western regions, such as Lower Saxony and North Rhine-Westphalia, within the next 10 years.

Wolfgang Tiefensee, the government minister with responsibility for the “new federal states,” as the former East Germany is officially known, told the Berliner Zeitung that this would be a “considerable success.”

Ooooo, if I was East Germany, considering how the last eighteen months have panned out, I don’t think I’d be too happy about Wolfy’s words. Under current circumstances, it appears there’s only so much “success” West Germany can take.

I keep on wanting to leave behind my 3-part series on Australia’s xenophobia (one, two, three), but reality just won’t let me.

What I hadn’t mentioned in my original posts was the recent addition of an Indian element to the equation because — believe it or not — I didn’t want this to turn into a hate-fest of Australia, but more a measured (albeit brutal) assessment of a country I once used to call home. However, in a recent article in The Age, we learn that:

[Indian] groups have been gathering at St Albans and Thomastown railway stations after a spate of assaults on Indians in the area, the latest on Kamal Jit, 23, who was bashed unconscious while walking home from the St Albans railway station on the weekend.

There has been a beating on a train, assaults, stabbings. And then the Indians retaliated:

[A police spokeswoman] refused to confirm whether two men who stabbed a 20-year-old man in St Albans yesterday were Indians lashing out after being racially abused by the victim. [although, the article tells me a bit further on, police "want to speak to [two men] over the attack … aged between 23 and 29 years old and dark-skinned.” — ed.]

No one has yet been charged over the incident.

The victim allegedly said: “You are black. You don’t belong here. Go away from our country”.

(Now, remember, according to Australian migrant author Alice Pung, this is not racism with any “long term adverse effect[s]“, but merely “casual name-calling”. But I digress.)

You know what. I can sympathise with the Indian students. If there’s anything that pushes my buttons, it’s being called names by the truly ignorant. The problem is, the nanosecond you physically retaliate, you give the ignorant exactly the kind of positive affirmation they’re looking for. You prove that you can be as barbaric as them, and give them physical badges of honour that they can then use to sway other ignorant gits to their side. (What’s that you say? No, I’m not talking about US foreign policy, although there is a parallel here, now that you mention it. Let’s just stick to Indian students in Melbourne for the time being, okay?)

I know that the Indians think they’re sticking up for themselves. After all, by walking away, they’re just going to be called cowards, and that’s a tough one to swallow. But beating up some white isn’t going to solve the situation either, is it?

My solution? Leave. It’s what I did. The reality is this. There are enough ignorant gits around for you not to make a blind bit of difference. Plus, any negative publicity about any migrant anywhere is going to get headline focus. There’s another reason I say ‘leave’:

One man, who did not want his name published, said [the students] took the action “in self-defence” after police failed to respond to their call for protection in the wake of attacks on fellow Indian students … “The police don’t care. In this suburb everyone is a migrant,” he said.

His claims were verified by another person who witnessed the attacks but did not want his name published.

and

In other incidents on the same night, a group of Indians were abused by a group of males and one Indian was punched but when the police arrived, “they did not do anything”,  The Age was told.

Here’s a truism. The police are not there for your protection. They are there to protect the system. In communism, they were/are there to protect the State apparatus. In capitalism, they’re there to protect the ruling financial class. And, as Cronulla, Melbourne, and dozens of Aboriginal communities in Queensland have proven, in Australia they’re there to protect the whites. What are you, coloured student, going to do about it? You can’t win. Just leave.

But isn’t this playing right into the hands of those xenophobic bastards, you ask? Yes and no. Yes, in the short-term. Victory for Real Australians™ everywhere! But in the long term?

What if every coloured family who could afford to send their beloved child overseas for an education refused to send them to Australia? Who do you think make up the bulk of Australia’s foreign students? Whites or coloureds? And where do you think the majority of university funding comes from? Local or foreign student fees? While it may not seem obvious on the surface, it’s actually the coloured parents that hold the direction of Australian public policy in their hands, thanks to the strangling of Australian federal funds to higher institutions for more than a decade now. The problem is, those coloured parents are all in such different countries, with different perspectives and motivations, that it’s impossible to mould them into one effective public action group, if you will. But news will out. I find the locals here in Malaysia, for example, to be gratifyingly well-informed on the policies of a frightening array of countries.

And so I say to you again. You can’t change them. And do you want your child taunted or injured? If you’re there, leave. At least you’ll still have your dignity, instead of sinking to the level of people you know you shouldn’t have anything to do with.

POSTSCRIPT: For contrast, look at the furore between (white Australian) Tracy Grimshaw and (white British) celebrity chef, Gordon Ramsey. Three comments on three days and Grimshaw is already talking about it being “not a joke to me, or to anyone who cares about me”, “I wonder how many people would laugh if they were described as an ‘old, ugly pig’”, and how horrible it was when her mother found out about it.

Of course, Grimshaw has it right. There is no, no, NO excuse for the kind of inane comments Ramsey came out with. But, you know what? If it had been me in that situation, I wouldn’t have given it a second thought beyond an opportunity for some perhaps delicious verbal sparring, just because I’ve had decades more than three days to get used to it.

In the current excitement around the house, I almost forgot that Guarding His Body is being released by Total-E-Bound today!

If you like assured, European men and capable yet vulnerable women in a topsy-turvy situation, be sure to give it a go. Remember, you can read the entire first chapter on my site here or you can download the Sampler to read first chapters of all my releases. But just to whet your appetite, here’s a short excerpt, detailing the first real interaction between Helen and Yves:

“Okay, why not pretend you have a knife?” she suggested. “Take a stab at me.”

He didn’t believe she was ready. She couldn’t be ready, not when she had not adopted any traditional stance that he knew. Her feet were a little apart, but she had not even raised her hands. Maybe this femme didn’t know anything, and this whole episode was some kind of sick dare aimed at an unsuspecting foreign dupe. Well, she would soon find out what it meant to waste the time of Yves de Saint Nerin!

Despite his irritation, Yves didn’t want to hurt her so, imaginary knife in hand, he made a relatively slow overhand lunge at her with his right hand. He didn’t know what happened next, although Guy told him later that she moved the instant he started his downward arm movement. There was a stinging pain in his arm, then across his chest, then he felt a hard wall slam into his back. The breath whooshed out of him.

Helen Collier stepped up and glared at him. “Only villains in television dramas try to knife someone in an overhand attack,” she told him. “How about attempting something a bit sneakier?”

Yves grimaced and tried hard not to look too flustered. He stepped forward, away from the wall, and she stepped back to give him more room. He glanced over at Guy, who looked like he was trying to hold back spasms of laughter.

He was distracted, that was all. Distracted by that revealing figure-hugging vest item she was wearing, and a fragrance that reminded him of a summer’s breeze blowing across French fields. He would not make that same mistake again.

He frowned at Guy, to show that he was not happy to be the butt of someone’s joke, and asked for the pen that lay on a table next to his assistant. Guy threw it to him, and he caught it with one hand. That felt better. Now he could better visualise what it would be like to be holding a weapon, instead of just pretending to. That was another thing that probably threw him off, simulating a knife attack without a knife. Feeling more confident, Yves widened his stance and opened his arms, beckoning her to fall into his embrace. This was certainly something different for him, enfolding a woman in a way that was not at all affectionate.

Helen didn’t move. She just stood there, waiting, looking at him with those huge, stormy eyes until he eventually took a step forward, determined to try for a slash across her body this time. Again, she moved faster than he could track. He felt something hard contact his hand, sending the pen spinning across the room, then a sharp elbow in his gut, driving the air from his body. This time, he felt himself stagger back, hitting the wall once again. Dimly, he heard Guy spluttering in the distance, but he shook his head. In front of him, Helen Collier stood, as cool and unruffled as before.

Bien, so the chit knew something after all. But Yves was still not willing to put his safety in her delicate looking hands.

“That was an impressive demonstration, Madame Collier,” Guy said, obviously thinking that Yves had had enough of being slammed into a wall. “I think perhaps we have seen–”

“Non,” Yves interrupted loudly. “Let’s clear some space and try one more time. And not with a pretend, or otherwise, knife this time.”

Something flickered across her face—it couldn’t possibly be amusement—and then she was helping Guy move the furniture to the other side of the room. The conference table was rather large, but they turned it sideways and shoved it against the wall, leaving a large open space near the door for Yves’ last experiment. Despite himself, he liked that about her. There was no hesitation in helping Guy, even when it involved moving heavy objects around the room. The usual women of his acquaintance would have shrieked horribly lest they chip one of their perfectly manicured fingernails but, after slanting that one sly look at him, she had pitched in without complaint. It was—disconcertingly attractive.

You can buy Guarding His Body by following this link. And thank you. (And remember, for a chance to win this one for free — or A Pirate’s Passion, my May release — just leave a comment. Anything said till the end of the month is in the draw.)

Shiok Guy has posted a blog on how he was conned out of his money. This one is quite sophisticated in how it operates:

1. You get a call regarding a charge that you did not make on a card you do not have.

2. When you try to straighten things out on the phone, you’re told the National Bank of Malaysia (Bank Negara) will intervene and initiate the process of filing a fraud case.

3. Someone else calls you a little later, claiming to be from Bank Negara, and tells you a specific series of steps to carry out at an ATM. These steps actually translate into you transferring money from your account to someone else’s.

Shiok Guy’s full story is here. His first two rules bear repeating, and his third is rather interesting:

1. Always call back the the BANK, Never allow the bank to call you.
2. Always call the Bank’s Number, not the one given bu[sic] the Conman.
3. The Mobile Number that was calling me is 014-6108451, can mobile company try to do location scan? and nap this conman?

A comment from blogger SJDisimon is also instructive:

I have also received a similar call to inquire whether I have applied for a credit card from a certain bank, but I ignored the question. Instead I ask for her identification and her office telephone. The caller hung up.

I know I have readers outside Malaysia as well, so please be on the lookout for this one in your locality.

I regret I’m so late with this but, if you’d like to see some kick-ass contemporary art, head to the Danga City Mall @ Johor Bahru from now till the 14 June. J and I were strolling the shopping centre yesterday, noticed the posters for the exhibition (admission is free) and headed on up to Level 4 to see the show.

It was stunning. As the brochure put it: 80,000 square feet, 90 days, 100 artists, over 1,000 artworks. And did I mention it’s all for free!

The last time J and I were at a contemporary exhibtion was at San Francisco MOMA many years ago. We weren’t impressed, although more artistic types may accuse us of not having the kind of sensitivity to appreciate the subtle characteristics of what was on offer. :^

Both of us, however, found the Iskandar Malaysia Art Show exhibits to be lively, thoughtful and breathtaking. It was obvious that the artists all had a high level of technical skill, and I’ll be looking for some smaller works from several artists to perhaps add to our home environment. We dragged the kids along with us as well and The Wast is now putting together several (small) diorama art pieces (“Snake God and the Hunter” is my current favourite) after pondering the art. It makes a change from his flash fiction, which he also indulges in on a regular basis. I mean, I don’t mean to say it’s genius work or anything — he still has to learn to spell correctly and his grammar is atrocious — but we’re happy to see him explore his creative side.

But I’m really getting side-tracked. Get along to the Art Show if you can. A catalogue of the show is available at Office 4-72 for RM75, along with other interesting catalogues and some small works for sale. It’s a wonderful show and we look forward to future exhibits at the venue.

How could I possibly disappoint you, gentle reader! I took a deep breath and threw myself into the maelstrom that is my website. (I love my theme, Wynton Magazine, to bits, but it does require more than your usual dose of focus to navigate successfully.) And I’m now happy to say that my site has now been updated with the full first chapter of Guarding His Body, my latest release from Total-E-Bound.

In a fit of productivity that astounds even myself, I also updated my Sampler, that PDF of all my first chapters. It now clocks in at 799KB and is available here for download.

I do have a grab-bag of other writing news coming up next month, so stay tuned.

And remember, leave a comment any time from now till the end of the month (June) to win a copy of either A Pirate’s Passion or Guarding His Body. Your choice.

Had you noticed that a lot of the characters in my books are coloured? There are three reasons for this. One, I’m coloured. Two, the majority of the world’s population is coloured, so it makes sense that the majority of the galaxy’s human population would be too. And three, I just like to mix things up a little.

But, just to show there are no hard feelings, both major protagonists in my latest book from Total-E-Bound (out next week!) are white. Here’s the cover, another winner from Lyn Taylor:

Guarding His Body is a departure for me on many levels. For a start, it’s neither science-fiction nor fantasy but, instead, is my first foray into contemporary. It’s also an action adventure and — gulp! — is the first in a planned 3-book His Bodyguard series.

Now, some people may say that that’s exactly the reason why I should put coloured people in. Because it’s a contemporary. And, I have to admit, that has to be done by someone with more experience than me. Because I am, sad to say, so assimilated into Anglo Western culture that I am a banana (yellow/brown on the outside, white on the inside). I am totally not the person to bring the wonderful and myriad textures of other cultures to the table because, quite frankly, I’m as ignorant as the next white boob.

But that’s getting off the track. Guarding His Body. What’s it about? The obligatory blurb:

Yves de Saint Nerin is a man in trouble. Hounded by a vengeful business associate who has no qualms about attacking his family, he visits Australia in a bid to escape Leonid Alexandrov’s ruthless tactics. But, not leaving things to chance, he also hires a bodyguard and gets more than he bargains for in the form of accomplished martial artist, Helen Collier.

Of course I couldn’t resist turning things upside down a bit. This time the bodyguard is female and the body she’s guarding is male. Helen Collier is competent, attractive but has problems settling into a worthwhile relationship because men are intimidated by her and usually end up trying to dominate her. She has resigned herself to a life alone. In Yves, she finds someone supremely confident of himself who feels neither threatened nor intimidated by his ever-so-efficient and proficient bodyguard.

I chose a continental European hero because J is continental European and I could use him as a sounding board. “How would you feel if the woman…?” I also find that European men are, in general, a bit more comfortable in their own skins (sometimes to the point of arrogance, but hey, them’s the breaks) and a lot more comfortable around strong women than either Anglo or Asian men. But that’s just my opinion.

So, a contemporary action/adventure novel is born, and it’s due out next Monday. (Still have to go and update my website, so don’t go there for the first chapter just yet. I’d appreciate it if you could wait till release day, 8 June.)

POSTSCRIPT: I’ve been told that prospective commentators have had to run the gamut of a WordPress login page in order to disseminate their words of wisdom. I’m really sorry about that. I don’t know how it happened and it took a bit of digging to get things back to the way they were. So, comment away! You’re given 15 minutes to edit your comment. And every entry between now and the end of June goes into the draw to win a copy of either A Pirate’s Passion or Guarding His Body. Your choice. Sorry for the screw up, people.

It’s a fact of life that it’s the simple things we miss the most. There was a time in my life, for example, for quite a few months, when my definition of heaven was a quiet bedroom to sleep in at night and a hot shower in the morning. I wasn’t worried about a car, or a wine collection, or owning several laptops. Silence and hot water were it for me.

For the past two years, J and I have had a similar need for something basic yet essential. Bread. That’s not to say there isn’t bread in south-east Asia but — damn it all to hell! — 99% of the loaves and rolls you buy here are sweet! There doesn’t seem to be a wheat flour product around that doesn’t have copious amounts of sugar added. (I keep wondering about the level of diabetes in this part of the world. Maybe I’ll follow it up for a later blog.) And so that makes a supper of bread with cheese and fresh tomatoes with herbs a bit difficult. Not to mention to accompany soup. Or with chicken salad. Or even a nice fish curry.

We ordered a 25kg bag of Finnish organic flour from a bakery in Kuala Lumpur last year, but that was expensive, inconvenient to collect and we couldn’t really get the hang of the flour. It had a personality that we somehow couldn’t work with. (Bread-making, as any bread-maker will tell you, is as much art as science.) I mentioned our need to my friend, Parvathy, and she asked whether I’d made enquiries at the spice shop I had visited recently with her mother. Well, to be honest, the woman at the front counter of that shop scared me. To say she was unhelpful to the point of sullen muteness would be an accurate summation of the situation. When I relayed this to Parvathy, she laughed.

“Oh, that’s just the wife,” she told me. “She hates working in the shop.”
“I can tell!”
“The problem is, her husband and both sons work the shop, so she doesn’t really have a choice. The result is, she takes it out on the customers. But you just ignore her, lah, and ask one of the sons. They’re very helpful.”

O-kay. But before I could work up the courage to go back, Parvathy beat me to it and, the next thing I knew, there was a 25kg bag of high-protein flour shedding white powder on the back seat of her car. It seems the shop didn’t do any lesser quantities. After collecting it, J and I stared at the sack with lingering doubt.

“It comes from the Johor Flour Mill in Pasir Gudang,” I told him, having read it off the label.
“Uh huh.”
“At least it’s not Finnish.”
“Uh huh.”
“And it’s not as expensive as the Finnish stuff.”
“Uh huh.”
“Care to make a loaf?”
“I’m … not sure. I think this is something I have to work up to.”

But time was getting away from us and I knew I’d have to make a loaf before Parvathy’s visit, when she was bound to ask how the flour was. So I did. And, gentle reader, the bread came out brilliantly. It rose to the occasion, baked with a lovely medium-brown crust, and smelt divine. There is nothing like the smell of a loaf of bread baking in the oven wafting through your home to make you feel, well, at home.

There’s only one problem. It’s sweet. The damn flour is sweet! Though thankfully not as sweet as the stuff you buy in the shops, which has sweet added to it and is then baked and glazed with sweet before having a decoration of sweet on top. * sigh * So, we have 25kg of (sweet-ish) flour to get through. Oh well, could’ve been worse. Could’ve been Finnish.