Unbelievable
11 November 2004 9:53 pm
There's a tiger and a Malayan sun bear somewhere in Sixth Avenue, which is a 10-minute jog (read: walk, gym bunnies among you) from where I live. (That would be Sixth Avenue, Singapore. Not New York.)
Which idiots would keep these animals as pets? How come they're not clawed or mauled to bits by now?
I'm disturbed. Human beings can be the ugliest, sickest living things on the planet. It's bad enough that they inflict cruelty on one another. Spare the animals, please. How humane can you be if you keep a wild animal in your basement, even if it's a huge basement? (Note: many palatial houses in that neighbourhood.) Apparently the bear doesn't even get a basement. It's caged.
I hope they find the animals. I feel for them. And if they ever escape, I expect them to be pissed off. I don't want them scootching over to my neighbourhood. They won't be dropping by just to say what's up.
For the full article, click here.
Not-quite smooth segue now to my daylog: This afternoon K and I went downtown to catch a Thai horror movie, Shutter. It scared the shit out of me. I wasn't alone in this. Everyone in the theater basically lost all self-respect and was squirming, cowering, cursing and screaming throughout the show. The men's verbal responses were limited to "Shit" and the colourful Hokkien interjection "Wah lau eh" (approximate meaning: "Damn!". For variations click here and look under W). The women just screamed or squealed in terror (I did the latter).
I'm trying to figure out now what makes the movie so scary. It delivers shocks in scenes so often featured in horror movies: a scene in a public bathroom, a shower scene (with misted mirror), a bedroom scene, a long lonely road scene, even a long corridor scene. It just does it so unrelentingly, I suppose, making for an intense viewing experience. You barely get to relax and peel your fingers off your face. The supernatural figure (trying hard not to be a spoiler here) is one creepy, malevolent thing. Ugh. I'm glad I had my face covered 90% of the time (missed a few shockers and had to ask K to fill me in quickly). If I had seen IT full-on the image would be scorched on my retina and would haunt me for days. I am a masochistic scaredy-cat.
So the movie scares, but I wouldn't say that it is disturbing. There is a prevailing morality, which is comforting to the viewer. It's not like Japanese horror movies, where there is no moral framework at all. In a Japanese horror movie, whether you're a good person or not doesn't mean shit. You're screwed just because you're in the wrong place at the wrong time. Just because. Now that's disturbing. Makes you feel paranoid afterwards.
I don't know whether the North Americans reading my diary are chuckling (are you, serena, hmm?). K's always telling me that I'm superstitious. He doesn't really believe in ghosts. He might get scared watching a horror movie (and he WAS when we saw Shutter), but when it's over, it's over. It's just a story. I wish I had his cultural DNA sometimes. We Asians are deeply superstitious, too superstitious for our own good.
Older entries
Ramadan - 08 October 2006
Where I Have Been - 03 October 2006
Baby Talk - 10 August 2006
6 Weeks of Separation - 16 July 2006
Unacceptable Rudeness - 21 June 2006