It’s still life, and still worthy of your commitment

FRIDAY, 13 FEBRUARY 2004

On Saturday, 14 March 1998, I wrote: “I’m afraid to commit to anything where success is not guaranteed. To tell the truth, I am unwilling to commit to anything where failure is even a vague possibility.”

How do I feel about that now?

I have so far spent five years in Taiwan as an English teacher in a city that does not rank as one of the top locations in the world. (I am talking about Fengshan, not the larger area of Kaohsiung, which is the fourth largest container port in the world.)

I would probably not have considered such a life worthy of my commitment on 14 March 1998, and if perhaps such a life, certainly not in this place. Yet, I can categorically state that despite the price one pays and the imperfection of it, it has definitely been worth the time. Or, like a character remarks in the movie Breakfast for Champions, “It’s all life.”

The alternative is to get older year by year, never committing yourself to anything, all the while waiting for the elusive “perfect” project, or “ideal” life. And what will happen? You will realise too late you’ve gotten old, you mean nothing to no one, and you have done nothing with your life.

Get busy with anything remotely to your liking. It is a million times better than to allow your life to expire while you wait for “something better”.

______________________

How does my life in Taiwan compare with my time in Korea?

FRIDAY, 13 FEBRUARY 2004

I went to Korea as someone with nothing to lose – except of course communion with the people I cared about, a particular brand of beer, and perhaps the unique South African landscape. The longer I stayed in Korea, however, the more I began to hold on to things I didn’t have in South Africa before I went to Korea – a job, an income, and a place I could call home, even if it were only temporary.

Of course, these things weren’t enough to keep me in Korea. The people and the things that I had missed in my own country proved to be a much more powerful magnet. In South Africa I could once again enjoy a Black Label, smell barbeque on a Saturday night, and see my family every few weeks. The work, the income and my domestic situation in South Africa did not of course weigh up to what I had gotten used to in Korea.

From the beginning, my situation in Taiwan was similar to what I had had in Korea. I had a decent job, I was making money, and I had a much better residence than I had expected (except for the lack of windows).

What is the difference then between the life I had in Korea and my life in Taiwan? My teaching schedule in Taiwan is better – fewer hours and a wider variety of classes, I have a better domestic situation – especially my current apartment, but the most significant difference is personal projects.

I started doing in Taiwan what I had just talked about in Korea. I do things here to motivate myself, to keep myself going when there isn’t much else to inspire me. I continued making notes about my life when I got here, and this habit picked up a notch when I purchased my first computer in June 1999. Then there were photography, musical instruments, English textbooks, Chinese studies, and for the past year a specific literary project.

My projects and the fact that I have enough free time are more than anything else responsible for my life being better in Taiwan than it had been in Korea.

______________________

A revolution of a different kind

THURSDAY, 12 FEBRUARY 2004

I am the Personal Republic; the Writer is the ruler with an iron fist. The Writer owns the most valuable resource, namely time (although he does allow the Teacher to earn enough funds to keep the Personal Republic afloat).

It has, however, become clear to all, including to the Writer himself, that the General State of Affairs cannot be maintained indefinitely under the current regime. The People have been complaining for too long. Problem is that talk of revolution has become so commonplace that no one raises an eyebrow anymore when someone mentions the possibility. Yet everyone knows that there is no other solution!

Unlike many other revolutions in the history of terrestrial civilizations, the structure is not the problem here. What needs to be changed, are the finances of the Republic. What is needed is neither a Cultural Revolution nor a Political Revolution nor a Spiritual Revolution. What is needed is a Commercial Revolution.

The Writer – clever as he is – is not qualified to set off or direct the course of a Commercial Revolution. No one doubts that the Writer’s Cause is a noble one, but One of Other Competency and Talent must be called in for the vital task ahead.

The People must be saved. The Teacher must be saved. The Student must be saved. And as things currently stand, the Benevolent Dictator must also be saved. It will indeed not be an exaggeration to claim that the Future of the Personal Republic rests on the shoulders of a Competent Commercial Leader.

The Writer knows what needs to be done. He Who Rules with an Iron Fist must do the one thing he fears like a rabid, emaciated hyena: He must abandon the grip he has on the hours that fill his days and nights. He must abandon his Exclusive Possession of Time, at least until things start looking better – on the financial front.

However, because Possession of Time is the key to power and to get anything done in the Personal Republic, this also means that the Writer will have to temporarily relinquish his position as Dominant Role Player. He will still be the Spiritual Leader, but for the sake of the Republic, the People, the Teacher and the Student, and for his own cause, time and with it the ability to do things rather than just talk about them must for a period of no longer than Three Months be handed over to One Who Does Not Write, to someone who will be in mind and spirit … a Commercial Dictator.

This Revolutionary Figure shall enjoy exclusive control of time. (Of course, the Teacher, to his regret, will still be nudged out the door every day to earn money for food and rent.) The New Leader will toil day and night for a Better Economic Order for All Characters. He will be dedicated to the Personal Republic – this everyone expects and knows, and he will do it for the Cause of the Writer.

The Commercial Dictator’s Revolution will be temporary as well as powerful. If he fails, the Republic risk going under. If he succeeds, it will be the beginning of a Golden Age. Measures that will be implemented during this period will serve as an Economic Model for a New Republic – ultimately again under the able leadership of the Long-term Dominant Figure.

The Writer shall assist the Temporary Dictator in the run-up to the New Time with propaganda banners, slogans and short speeches. But once the New Time has arrived, the Writer’s period of Self-imposed Silence shall commence. It will not be easy. The writer knows that he will have to shut his mouth and keep his typing fingers in his pocket. So it must necessarily be. Two dogs cannot nibble on the same bone at the same time. And two dictators can never at the same time rule the same republic with an iron fist. The Writer shall be silent, and his typing fingers shall only move when required to do so by the Commercial Dictator. So it will be for a period of Three Months.

Today is the Fourth Day of the Week, the Twelfth Day of the Second Month of the Year. In Eleven Days it is New Time.

______________________

11 February 2004

It’s a beautiful day.

I stick my head out the kitchen window, look down into the alley, over the roofs of old houses in the adjoining block. The alley, just wide enough for two scooter drivers to pass each other, is filled with the orange glow of the late afternoon sun.

The apartment buildings are grey, but the paint peeling of burglar bars here and there gives the neighbourhood an optimistic colour. The potted plants in the windowsills bear witness of faith in a good life, even if things didn’t always work out as the residents had hoped years ago.

It’s not cold, but something in the air predicts it will be a cool evening. A light breeze starts picking up. An old war veteran emerges to collect his laundry from the balcony.

A perfect day it is not – what day is? – but it’s a nice day. It is Wednesday, 11 February 2004 – a winter’s day in Taiwan.

______________________

Being a character

MONDAY, 9 FEBRUARY 2004

I have become a character in a book.

My options are limited because I have to constantly make sure the options are consistent with what The Book says. It just so happens that I really do want to go back to South Africa, but even to say it in such an ordinary manner is loaded with meaning. Somewhere within me a voice hysterically responds: “Why does he say, want to go back to South Africa? Shouldn’t it rather be, yearns for it with every gram of fat in his body?”

This literary project is still months away from the point where I could walk away from it, to give to others to read. But The Book is already holy. Things have been written, so I can’t change it anymore!

Do you the reader realise that, like an old-school propagandist, I can remove all the instances where I mention going back to South Africa? I can replace it all with “want to establish myself in the wastelands of Patagonia” or “Every ounce of my being yearns to become an evangelist.”

What if I say I’ve already gone through such a process? That the first version of this project rattled on monotonously about my long-time desire to move to North Dakota? Because that is where my wife and two children live – I’m sorry, I wiped out all references to them as well – since my brother (the two sisters were also a fabrication) took them to America to join him on his ranch? Will you believe me when I say that my brother did it because I had embezzled money from … let’s say Standard Bank, and that I came up with the idea of writing a book about “self-imposed exile” during my seven years’ incarceration?

The other possibility is that I’m a creature from outer space.

Am I ready to start writing stories? Clearly not. What is true, is that I’m annoyed with the fact that I am writing myself more and more into a corner, that I feel caged in by my own writing.

And to think I wanted to start this piece with a plain question: What does my ideal life in South Africa look like?

______________________