Tuesday, Jun. 26, 2012 12:03 a.m.
It's been a little hard to write anything recently. Perhaps I have been too busy struggling to get things done, too absorbed in 公事 and haven't got anytime for reflection. I am trying to keep my spirit high by keeping on trying and keeping up the curiosity for this city. Our exploration team has discovered lots of nice places at the fringe as well as the city centre, and I have been enjoying Life: a user's manual by Georges Perec on recent tube journeys. It has got 500 pages and I have only finished 138, but it just gets better and better as you read on. Let me quote my favourite lines from the 3rd page: 'From this, one can make a deduction which is quite certainly the ultimate truth of jigsaw puzzles: despite appearances, puzzling is not a solitary game: every move the puzzler makes, the puzzle-maker has made before; every piece the puzzler picks up, and picks up again, and studies and strokes, every combination he tries, and tries a second time, every blunder and every insight, each hope and each discouragement have all been designed, calculated, and decided by the other.' And from this, he would go on to tell a story made up of the fragments of life of the people in each flat of an apartment block. |