YOU MAY QUOTE ME (AGAIN)!

Over the past decades I have learnt to accept occasional bouts of depression and spiritual paralysis as a way of compensating for my arrogant and megalomanic tendencies during periods when I'm functioning at peak. I'm glad to report that in the last 10 years or so I've been able to minimize my downtime to no more than a few minutes - or a few hours under extreme circumstances - whenever that ancient sense of futility rears its world-weary head and threatens to derail me from fulfilling my true destiny and potential – which is to reclaim the throne of my personal Ithaca by drawing the magical bow of Odysseus or the Pendragon’s sword from the stone, thereby restoring the balance and harmony of all worlds.


I define heaven as limitless abundance and infinite possibilities for all beings - which is why I accept all viewpoints and terminologies without feeling the need to intervene or censor.


One-third of humanity constitutes what Drunvalo Melchizedek calls "the moderns" - a mutation of the Adamic human especially in the last 500 years into skin-encapsulated, ego-driven "individuals" with acute cosmological myopia and an insatiable lust for the trappings of material success. These are the anthropocentric apologists and defenders of the status quo, who have internalized Darwinian them-or-us notions of survival, and haven't yet released primordial trauma loops or scarcity conditioning in their genetic encoding. But they'll get "there" - sooner or later. Everyone does, eventually. There are no "losers" in the cosmic dance of eternal transmutation. Each of us is Brahma, Shiva, and Vishnu all rolled into one. And we’re all Buddha and Jesus too.


The Educated Mind is, essentially, a self-exploring alphanumeric symbol processing system - a software program that took on a life of its own, like Pinocchio. How real is it? Real enough, so that a heap of words strung together in sentences, and edited into a book, can shift your entire life around - or at least make you smile, frown, weep, laugh, seethe with rage, whoop with joy, look at everything with new eyes. The Book, indeed, can fuck up an entire species - make people dumber than sheep, mistrust their neighbors, question their own worthiness, discourage them from thinking beyond the confines of dogma, even justify genocide as in pogroms, crusades and jihads.


The REAL action is going on INSIDE of us, on the molecular and genetic levels. The whole story is about bloodlines and how the original divine DNA was literally stolen and mucked around with by a renegade bunch of reptoids with aberrant notions of dominion over other lifeforms. This has led to such a confusion and profusion of genetics coming into the planetary mix, not a single species now has any of its primordial genetics intact.

However, the original Golden Thread Prime Genetic of Immortality is hidden within all the other programs and when you locate it and allow it to reactivate and reinstate itself as sovereign and supreme, as it actually is, since it derives directly from Prime Creator Source, then your multiple selves begin to line up correctly and can be wholly reintegrated on the atomic, molecular, cellular, AND soulular levels - and that's what is meant by the word INTEGRITY.

And only with Molecular Integrity restored can we experience REALITY/ROYALTY beyond the holographic hell loosely called The Matrix. Freedom IS the destination, as Martin Luther King declared, so let freedom ring clear as a bell - but clarity comes from purity of feeling, beyond the distortion of fear and hate programming.


Institutionalized education is definitely among the biggest scams of all - but every state deems it NECESSARY, in fact COMPELS ATTENDANCE by introducing Truancy Acts, thereby coercing all children of a certain age to turn themselves in for social formatting, so they can grow up as Happy Slaves.


A great deal of confusion stems from using the word EGO to define the unique sense of identity we call INDIVIDUALITY. It was fairly inevitable for the Self to experiment with self-fragmentation so that it could explore the myriad possibilities presented by INDIVIDUALIZATION. Up to a certain point, the acute sense of INDIVIDUALITY can pose new problems: alienation, isolation, anomie, which ultimately results in the overly individualistic self becoming carcinogenic (antisocial, vandalistic, competitive, criminal).

However, now that we have nifty new concepts like the Hologram Universe and FRACTALS to play around with, it's possible for us to view self as a perfect microcosm of Self ("My Father and I are One"). This way we can restore the integrity of the EGO's sense of purpose - and its awareness of the Whole, the Original Core Self, so that it consciously and willingly cooperates with Macrocosmic Self as it continues to explore, experiment, and experience the infinite permutations of its Divine Selfhood.

Ego, ergo sum.

May each day be immensely fulfilling for all of us!

[First posted on 20 February 2009; reposted 1 January 2011, 23 August 2016 & 22 August 2023]

Two Leo birthdays I'm celebrating today... (updated)

Best Selfie Ever! 💖

My rainbow crystal child in August 2009 (taken on a miniature Sony)

The first, of course, is my #2 daughter Belle's. She's a proud mother of three gorgeous kids, Max Alexander Lüer (24), Reiya Sunshine Lüer (18) and Ryder Lee Lankhorst (10).

When Belle was 13 she and I went on 3-nation trip together - Thailand, Burma and Nepal - and we became more like buddies than father and daughter.

On that vacation Belle had a great deal more fun than her Daddyums, who spent a lot of time wondering where she had disappeared to and with whom. After all these years that still holds true!

I "pinched" the photo of Belle at right from her facebook album. It was taken after a makeover for an Estée Lauder modeling contest she participated in when she turned 40. Too bad she lost out to a 24-year-old!

Belle has a broad range of innate talents (cartooning, acting, photography, filmmaking, painting, cooking, martial arts and selfie-taking, to name a few) - but she opted to focus on producing and nurturing three astoundingly beautiful and brainy kids. She also has a wacko sense of humor (not to mention a predilection for fart jokes).

With Hot Granny Lily in 2022

Chinese New Year 2020 (with Reiya Sunshine missing)

Fooling around with Reiya Sunshine

Belle & her brood in 2017

The second happens to be Anwar Ibrahim's - my favorite candidate for Malaysia's next prime minister. Anwar has been prime-minister-in-waiting for too long. Why? Simply because he's our best bet and nobody else in Malaysian politics can come close to playing the all-important role of unifier and reformer.

After decades of parasitic misgovernance by a succession of UMNO prime,  I mean, crime ministers, the task ahead of the Pakatan Rakyat cabinet is nothing less than Herculean. Fortunately, from all four parties in the Pakatan Harapan coalition, experienced, courageous and honest administrators can be found in abundance. They simply haven't been given a chance to prove their mettle. But we the people are determined to give them that opportunity as soon as possible. [Well, it finally happened in 2022!]

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BELOVED BELLE & ANWAR, MY STEADFAST CHOICE FOR 8TH... OKAY, 10TH MALAYSIAN PRIME MINISTER! HERE'S TO A TRULY AMAZING FUTURE!!!

[First posted 10 August 2011. Reposted 10 August 2018]

BLUES FOR ALLAH ~ The Grateful Dead (revisited)

Blues for Allah is the eighth studio album by The Grateful Dead.
It was recorded between February 27 and May 7, 1975,
and originally released on September 1, 1975.

Published on 11 Oct 2013

Side one "Help on the Way" (Jerry Garcia and Robert Hunter) -- 0:00 / "Slipknot!" (Garcia, Keith Godchaux, Bill Kreutzmann, Phil Lesh, and Bob Weir) "Franklin's Tower" (Garcia, Hunter, and Kreutzmann) -- 7:21 "King Solomon's Marbles" (Lesh)"Stronger Than Dirt or Milkin' the Turkey" (Mickey Hart, Kreutzmann, and Lesh) -- 11:55 "The Music Never Stopped" (John Perry Barlow and Weir) -- 17:11

Side two "Crazy Fingers" (Garcia and Hunter) -- 21:47 "Sage & Spirit" (instrumental) (Weir) -- 28:29 "Blues for Allah" (Garcia and Hunter) -- 31:40 "Sand Castles and Glass Camels" (Garcia, Donna Godchaux, Keith Godchaux,Hart, Kreutzmann, Lesh, and Weir) "Unusual Occurrences in the Desert" (Garcia and Hunter) "Groove #1" (Instrumental Studio Outtake) 44:20 "Groove #2" (Instrumental Studio Outtake) 50:07 "Hollywood Cantana" (Studio Outtake) 57:41

Grateful Dead Jerry Garcia -- guitar, vocals, production Donna Jean Godchaux -- vocals, production Keith Godchaux -- keyboards, vocals, production Mickey Hart -- drums, production Phil Lesh -- bass guitar, production Bill Kreutzmann -- drums, production Bob Weir -- guitar, vocals, production

Additional musicians Steven Schuster -- flute, reeds

[First posted 19 May 2014, reposted 19 June 2016]

Hypocrisy keeps the Status Quo static... (reprise)

A few years ago I received an invitation to what was billed as "a global conference on Enhancing the Role of Philanthropy in Challenging Times." Hmmm.... that's intriguing, I thought. The idea of encouraging corporations to give back more to the community during a financial meltdown is certainly refreshing...


Then I read in the next line that the conference would be officially launched by the Crime Minister of Malaysia.

The third line boasted "a host of international speakers, including the wife of the PM."

Pukimak! That did it. I almost retched on my keyboard!

As if that wasn't sickening enough, the conference was going to be officially closed by the spineless minister of national unity, Koh Tsu Koon!

I immediately shot off a response to the perfectly respectable gentleman who had sent me the invite:

"No collaboration with the Irredeemably Corrupt, Greedy & Murderously Wicked!"

Almost instantly I received a reply: "Thanks for your frank and realistic comments. The challenge is how to manage the wicked to do some good... can we con them too or get caught by them?"

Well, at least my friend didn't attempt to deny or dispute the fact that the conference had invited, for the sake of political correctness and expediency, some notably wicked people to officiate. In any case, I felt it was my moral duty to elaborate on my visceral response to receiving such an invitation to participate in the philantrophic conference (for only RM900), so I wrote the following clarification, which I post here for the public record:

Anyone who publicly or privately endorses the crime ministership of Najib Tun Razak and Rosmah Mansor is tacitly expressing complicity with Umno/BN's abysmal track record on issues of justice, human rights and abuse of power.

Just as lending support to tyrants like Robert Mugabe, Dick Cheney, George W. Bush is tantamount to acquiescing with oppressive laws that allow the state to detain dissidents without due process, inflict torture on those suspected of political or religious heresy, and manipulate the mass media so that the public remains unaware of the colossal crimes committed by those in high office.

Corporations "play footsie" with such degenerate entities because they themselves are degenerate and hypocritical and are almost indistinguishable from their counterparts in politics. That's why there is a revolving door that facilitates a smooth exchange of personnel between big business and government; and that's exactly what keeps the nightmare carousel of human suffering going around and around seemingly without end.

However, the end is undoubtedly nigh for this despicable kind of self-serving "pragmatism" - all for the sake of an extra buck. This kind of cynical self-justification is what characterized the Pharisees and Sadducees in Judea. We seem to have learned nothing and made no spiritual progress after 2,000 years!


Nevertheless, the moment these archcriminals resign from office or publicly demonstrate remorse for their gross transgressions, I am of the opinion that they be should be offered the opportunity to restore their "good standing" in society by returning at least 80% of their ill-gotten gains to the national treasury and accepting that they are henceforth disqualified from wielding political power. No need for lynch mobs and lifelong incarceration.

I absolutely do not agree that you can cooperate with them in any positive or wholesome way - just as it would be suicidal for PAS or Pakatan Rakyat to form a political alliance with the ravenous and morally depraved Umno which deserves to exist henceforth only in cultural museums as an instructive relic of the Kali yuga.

Those of you who profess to be Christians: quit playing the role of Pharisees, Sadducees and Scribes for whom the Bottom Line is all that matters!

Whose side are you on anyway? Yeshua the Reformer... or The Corrupt and Evil Establishment?

How will things ever improve if you keep smiling for the camera and shaking the Sheriff of Nottingham's pudgy hand to clinch a couple of lucrative contracts... while secretly applauding and rooting for Robin Hood?


[First published 19 June 2009, reposted 3 August 2012]

Mythicopolitical surrealism redefined ~ "I, Pet Goat" by Heliofant

I, PET GOAT (2012) 

 ABOUT HELIOFANT: Based in the beautiful Laurentian mountains just north of Montreal, Canada, Heliofant is a nascent independent computer animation studio focused on creating experimental and challenging content. Bringing together artists from the fields of dance, music, computer animation and visual arts, the company is very interested in exploring the common ground that underlies many spiritual and philosophical traditions in a lyrical form.

[First posted 31 July 2012]

The Return of the Son of Monster Magnet: ZAPPA PLAYS ZAPPA! (Turn it up all the way, folks :-)

"And he said unto them, How is it that ye sought me? Knew ye not that I must be about my Father's business?" ~ Luke 2:49















BONUS VIDEOS: Dweezil's Dad in action


27 August 1974


BBC studio recording @ 1968

I had the great good fortune to catch Frank Zappa & The Mothers of Invention in concert at the Fillmore East, New York, in the summer of 1968. It was the only "rock concert" I attended during my year in the U.S. as an exchange student - but it totally changed my life.

Perhaps listening to Zappa today will have the same effect on those of you who haven't yet been introduced to this wizardly maestro, whose extraordinary music lives on through his enormously talented son, Dweezil.

ACE PERCUSSIONIST RUTH UNDERWOOD TALKS ABOUT FRANK ZAPPA

[First posted 13 August 2011]

Meltdown at Madame Tussaud’s (reprise)

For generations we have pissed on people with impunity.

Our power was brokered with brute force – it was literally “Off with his head!” whenever anyone dared to openly disagree with or criticize the order of things.

Our authority - more correctly spelt “awe-thority” - issued from our ability to shock and awe the illiterate masses with displays of superior physical and psychic firepower. As Barry Long postulates in his seminal work, The Origins of Man and the Universe (The Myth That Came To Life): the earliest gods consisted of an elite cabal of magicians and sorcerers who activated their third eyes ahead of the pack, learned the use of psychic force by utilizing their brains as holographic projectors, and thus were able to control the collective unconscious of their subjects through mediumistic shamanism and the inculcation of tribal totems and taboos.

We established the first monarchic dynasties and schooled our heirs in the divine right of kings. Our people were implanted with genetically hardwired control mechanisms that took the form of ignorant superstition masquerading as religious faith.

To question the moral behavior of the gods was labeled blasphemy; any word spoken against a king or queen was labeled sedition. Complaints against high-ranking priests, courtiers and ministers were considered defamation.

We outlawed mystical experience and replaced it with solemn ceremony and pompous ritual. Inspired insights and revelations were systematically reduced to dogma and doctrine; turned into an academic priesthood to jealously police the orthodoxy of the status quo.


Over the millennia, we created what young people today recognize as The Matrix – an ingenious machine to harvest the vitality of all living things, generation after generation, to support in grand style the privileges and insatiable appetites of a well-connected white-collar criminal upper class.

But it’s all breaking down now from the sheer weight of its own accumulation of misdeeds and miscreations. The long-enslaved masses have begun to awaken from their cultural trance. They realize that the punitive deity installed in their operating systems to rule them through fear is no more than a scarecrow, a being of straw, literally a stuffed shirt.

All the gods have feet of clay and will never dismount from their pedestals. The institutions created to uphold the edifice of business-as-usual are mostly infested with maggots in human guise – time-serving functionaries of the state, who can see no further than the next paycheck and who dream only of the retirement benefits they have been promised in exchange for loyal, unthinking service.

Long disconnected from their own internal moral compasses, the minions who continue to uphold the hierarchy of conformity and mediocrity may – on rare occasions – experience momentary confusion and doubt.

Does the monotheistic, judgmental, punitive, vengeful god to whom some of us pray actually exist? Or is He just a virulent meme implanted in our tribal memories?

And does He (of course it must be a Heavenly Father, for no order-obeying, rank-saluting stormtrooper would deign to take orders from a mere woman) take offense whenever we think an unwholesome thought, or utter an unsavory word? And will our offspring, if left uncircumcised or unbaptized, be forever barred from paradise?

And if we spend the better part of our time in church or at the mosque gossiping about other people’s sex lives – instead of paying heed to the wisdom of our own inner voices – would that ruin our prospects for a happy afterlife?

We have become compulsive liars and hypocrites to avoid punishment. At some level we know the knack of twisting truth is a survival mechanism that has long outlived its purpose. But do we still remember what it means to be honest and candid - regardless of the consequences, real or imagined?

Can we deny the feeling, buried deep within our subconscious memories and long suppressed, that our entire life has been but a meaningless charade, a colorful and noisy parade that camouflages the endless procession of sorrow and subterfuge our existence has been reduced to?



Behind the glossy façade of our public personas are we proud of and at peace with our true selves? How long can we fool ourselves with our own hype – even if it’s the most expensive grade of hype, paid for by hapless citizens?

Like everybody else with a broadband connection (that actually works) I have been monitoring - with fascination, disgust, horror and far-too-frequent outbursts of outrage - the social and political metamorphosis we are undergoing as a young nation with an ethnically heterogeneous population of 27 million.

The aftershocks of the electoral earthquake and psychological tsunami that occurred on 8 March 2008 continue to be felt on all levels.

Fear grips the cold hearts and poisoned psyches of the power elite - while hope flaps its fragile wings as it attempts its first tentative flight within the souls of all who truly love this land.

We have seen all the evidence we need that the pouting, pink-lipped overaged brat who (in April 2009) seized the post of prime minister is, in fact, more accurately described as a crime minister. The catalog of his misdeeds is legend, as only to be expected of somebody born into a political dynasty with blood on its hands and groomed from young for power.

His second wife, who could well be niece to the murderous witch Mona Fandey, has attracted massive scorn and ridicule - but carefully shields herself from the anger and resentment of the masses by engaging a retinue of professional fawners and sycophants to administer to her overweening vanity.

Constantly plotting intrigue behind their opulent backs is a gigantic can of writhing worms that represents a political party (now parties) created expressly by a megalomaniacal former leader to enrich his family and supporters through colossal infrastructure expenditure and secret contracts. A political party with no tangible philosophy, no remaining ideals, no sense of evolutionary inevitability.

All it can boast is a reptilian kill-or-be-killed survival program that manifests through diverse forms of thuggery, uniformed or plainclothes, disguised as various law enforcement agencies and fake NGOs.

And yet there are courageous individuals in our midst who battle valiantly on for the restoration of justice, freedom and accountability in government. They do so at the costly sacrifice of their own personal careers and at great risk to their own lives. Some are forced to endure neverending litigation; others risk incarceration, exile, and even assassination (though we are fortunately a nation that has never as yet resorted to “termination with extreme prejudice”... or have we?).

Those of us who admire and applaud these magnificent individuals for fighting the good fight on our behalf must bear in mind that we cannot achieve salvation and redemption by proxy (forget what religious orthodoxy says about Jesus dying for your sins, that’s utter crap!) Each of us has to gain entry to the promised land through our own hard-won integrity and impeccability as spiritual warriors and agents of illumination. If you can’t learn to ride a horse vicariously, what makes you think you can qualify for heaven on earth through other people’s virtue?

In effect, we really have no option but to consciously embody all the ideals and values we desire to see prevail in the world around us.

If you object to secrecy in government, then divest your own life of dark and dire secrets and do whatever you do openly, without fear and without apology. If your behavior impinges negatively on others, you will immediately be alerted to their distress. In which case, the mature response is to adjust your behavior so that it no longer poses problems for others. If you feel a stinky fart coming, just walk a few steps downwind of the crowd.

If you cherish freedom of expression and the free flow of information, then allow others to express their own thoughts and feelings without getting offended and retaliating violently. Even if they insult your pet beliefs and laugh at your fashion sense, learn to shrug, grin and walk away without making a major issue of it.

If you wish to be recognized and appreciated for your contributions, begin to freely give those around you generous amounts of positive feedback (when they deserve it, of course, for we do not condone hypocrisy in the New Dawn).

And if you truly value your glorious evolutionary destiny as conscious, volitional, sensing-thinking-and-feeling beings, then take time out from your daily routine to reassess what you’re doing with your life and what are your authentic goals.

When enough of us acquire the necessary self-discipline to regulate our own public behavior, there will no longer be any requirement for an external police force. Perhaps we will only need to maintain a token force – simply because some folks look so sexy in uniform.

[First posted 19 August 2010, reposted 8 September 2020, 19 July 2021 & 12 June 2023]

Sharing Water with Robert Heinlein (repost)

A few hours ago I finished re-reading - perhaps for the fourth or fifth time since I first stumbled upon it in 1970 - Robert A. Heinlein's cult classic of reasonably epic proportions, Stranger in a Strange Land. [Click on the link for a synopsis and if you're keen to read the book, I suggest you look for the uncensored 1991 edition.]

As often happens with vast intelligences that have played a significant role in my mental upbringing, I just discovered that July 7th happens to be Heinlein's birthday. If he hadn't died in his sleep on 8 May 1988, Robert Anson Heinlein would be celebrating his 103rd birthday today.

I don't really know where to begin when it comes to defining the ways I have been influenced and inspired by a consummate storyteller like Heinlein. I'm tempted to describe him as a speculative anthropologist; an ardent observer of humanity who couldn't resist imagining all the different ways being human could be a much more joyous and fulfilling condition - shorn of all the idiocy and hypocrisy implied by the words "polite society."

Among Heinlein's various prescriptions, as dispensed through his prolific output of long and short works - loosely categorized as "science fiction and fantasy" - his obvious delight in satirizing organized religions was matched only by another scintillating intelligence named Samuel Langhorne Clemens, better known as Mark Twain.

In honor of a great soul, a free spirit and a boundless imagination that has impacted on at least three generations of readers, here's a selection of wry quotes from Robert Heinlein collected from various novels (Stranger in a Strange Land, Time Enough For Love, and The Moon is a Harsh Mistress) by a fellow admirer...

One man's theology is another man's belly laugh.

History does not record anywhere a religion that has any rational basis. Religion is a crutch for people not strong enough to stand up to the unknown without help.

The human race divides politically into those who want people to be controlled and those who have no such desire.

One man’s 'magic' is another man’s engineering. 'Supernatural' is a null word.

Men rarely (if ever) manage to dream up a god superior to themselves. Most gods have the manners and morals of a spoiled child.

I’ve never understood how God could expect His creatures to pick the one true religion by faith - it strikes me as a sloppy way to run a universe.

Sin lies only in hurting others unnecessarily. All other “sins” are invented nonsense.

A monarch’s neck should always have a noose around it. It keeps him upright.

Taxes are not levied for the benefit of the taxed.

There is no worse tyranny than to force a man to pay for what he does not want

It is a truism that almost any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so, and will follow it by suppressing opposition, subverting all education to seize early the minds of the young, and by killing, locking up, or driving underground all heretics.

The supreme irony of life is that no one gets out of it alive.

Being intelligent is not a felony. But most societies evaluate it as at least a misdemeanor.

Learning isn’t a means to an end; it’s an end in and of itself.

Specialization is for insects.

Courage is the complement of fear. A man who is fearless cannot be courageous. (He is also a fool.)

“Love” is the condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own.

The most preposterous notion that H. sapiens has ever dreamed up is that the Lord God of Creation, Shaper and Ruler of all the Universes, wants the saccharine adoration of His creatures, can be swayed by their prayers, and becomes petulant if He does not receive this flattery. Yet this absurd fantasy, without a shred of evidence to bolster it, pays all the expenses of the oldest, largest, and least productive industry in all history.

Does history record any case in which the majority was right?

[First posted 7 July 2010, reposted 20 April 2016, 4 June 2017 & 28 July 2019]

If I were a secret policeman... (repost)

After a few of my friends got thrown into Kamunting during Dr M's infamous Operation Lalang in October 1987, I became rather paranoid about the Malaysian police, especially the Special Branch or Malaysian secret police. Every time I heard a crackle or mysterious whir while talking on the phone I immediately suspected my line was tapped.

It wasn't a healthy state of mind, to be living under a dark cloud of Orwellian fear.

My clearest memory of the Mahathir era is how afraid people were to talk politics in public places. Every time the name "Mahathir" was mentioned, everyone would quickly look around to see if there were suspicious SB types in the vicinity. That was Dr M's greatest contribution to the nation - he turned it into a police state akin to East Germany during the Cold War period.

Talk to Dr Munawar Anees about this, if you think I exaggerate.

Don't point with cretinous pride at the KLCC Twin Towers or the colossal architecture of Putrajaya. Any tyrant with unlimited access to the public purse can build any number of monuments to their own pharaonic megalomania.

I love elephants - but not when they're painted white! Do we really need an "official residence" for our top civil servant that costs the public RM9 million a year to rent and maintain? What an atrocious scam that is!

Anyway, I decided it was stupid to live in constant anxiety about the secret police. It's true the army and police ultimately exist to protect the privileged few from the wrath of the exploited multitudes whose toil and drudgery support the system; and so long as the masses remain asleep, the status quo remains unthreatened. However, the situation dramatically changes when a few leaders become enlightened and realize the unsustainability and inherent instability of any top-heavy feudalistic social hierarchy.

One day I stumbled upon a small shop in the Chow Kit area selling trophies, medals, military insignia, and police paraphernalia. I bought a PVC wallet emblazoned with the PDRM logo and began pretending I was an undercover cop. It was astounding how swiftly that altered my perception of the police force. Each time I spotted a cop on the street or driving around in a patrol car, I experienced the pleasant buzz of bumping into someone from your hometown when you're traveling abroad. Soon, I began to harbor friendly feelings towards the police, rather than hostility.

This simple game had far-reaching consequences. I began to relive my childhood fantasies of being an undercover cop (I had been deeply impressed as a 9-year old by the Hollywood glamorization of the FBI in a movie called The FBI Story, starring James Stewart).


As a teenager I relished a long-running series of vivid dreams in which I featured as a top-ranking Bond-style secret agent and death-defying commando, narrowly escaping the most harrowing situations and invariably getting to kiss the leading lady.

Never underestimate the power of the imagination. I experienced a major shift in my attitude towards security personnel. Now, each time I was on the phone and heard some static, I'd simply assume my colleagues in Bukit Aman were on the job, recording my wit and wisdom for posterity.

It's been some years since I played this little game, but I can snap into this mode of consciousness anytime I want. It allows me some insight into the mind of the secret policeman and an empathetic glimpse of the policeman's intrinsic humanity.

In any case, as I grew older I began to see through the façade of the power structure and realized that there was no government on earth worth killing and dying for - they were all fronts for an invisible network of demented and bedeviled plutocrats. If I were a true-life James Bond, I'd opt to join the rebel forces or drop out completely.

Around that period, I had an unexpected encounter with a Special Branch officer planted in the middle-class audience at a British Council screening of Terry Gilliam's cult classic, Brazil. As the lights went on after the show, my companion expressed a bit of confusion about the whole point of the movie. I told her it illustrated the stupidity of governments. As we filed out of the British Council (which was then located near Bukit Aman), a mild-mannered Indian gentleman tapped me on the shoulder and asked if he could have a quick word with me.

"Sure," I said, and told my companion to wait in the car for me. My suspicions were confirmed when the guy introduced himself as a Special Branch officer. Our conversation lasted no more than 15 minutes but what he essentially wanted to communicate to me was that I ought to be more careful what opinions I expressed in public.

"Walls have ears," the SB guy said, which elicited a sermon from me about the questionable morality of serving an immoral government. I could sense that this guy was actually a decent bloke, just a bit jaded from having been a copper almost his entire life. He was due for retirement in a couple of years. Finally, the guy confessed to me that he was utterly demoralized by the dirty politics he had seen in the line of duty. "Sometimes I wish somebody would just press the red button and blow up the whole world. It's already too rotten to save!"

"It's sad to see you've become such a nihilist," I said. "I can understand your viewpoint, but I believe change is the only constant, and that the status quo is really not quite as static as most people believe."

We parted with a friendly handshake but our little unscheduled chat left me with much food for thought. I could see myself in his predicament. A decent bloke stuck for years in an indecent job, carrying out stupid orders from superiors he had no real respect for. The only way he could deal with his disillusionment was to become a crusty old cynic.

Of course, he could have quit - like my friend Johnny Goh, a former SB officer who told me he was due for a promotion in 1998, but he felt so sickened by the manner in which the police were being used against Anwar Ibrahim, he decided to resign and start a stationery business. Not everyone has the wherewithal to begin anew after decades in a particular job.

And not too many have the balls to blow the whistle on the evils inherent in the system. Nevertheless, the few that do have the clarity of mind, the courage, and the strength of their conscience to do so may well be Malaysia's only hope at this point.

I know that for every crooked cop in the PDRM, there must be at least 500 who are still straight; who still believe that the police ought to be a force for the public good, not a bunch of uniformed thugs serving a handful of white-collar gangsters. Indeed, there would be absolutely no way out of our present mess if there weren't ultimately a lot more honest citizens than criminals in our country.

Call me a perpetual fool, if you will, but I remain convinced that there will always be an inner core of decency to be found in any institution - even one that has been corrupted and twisted by years of despotic misrule. Most times, the decent chaps choose to earn their wages and keep a low profile, convinced it's beyond their power to reform their workplace, safer to simply serve out their time and collect a comfortable pension.

So let me dedicate this blogpost to my friends and fellow warriors in the Special Branch, some of whom have been diligently monitoring what I say and occasionally leaving cryptic comments on my blog. I'm sure many of you love this country as much as I do. I'm sure many of you would like to see real change happen - especially regime change, even if you may be a bit uncertain as to what these changes mean in terms of special privileges for the Malays and whatnot.

May I suggest you pause for a moment and look at the situation from a purely HUMAN perspective - forget about bangsa dan agama for a minute. I bet most of you have enough intelligence to know that sort of talk is complete hogwash anyway. Your big bosses aren't particularly religious people - they only believe in the unholy power that money buys - the money stolen from all of us.

You guys (and gals) are merely pawns in their evil game. Same as anybody else. Think on that, please, and act on what your heart prompts you to do.

Remember how the Marcos regime finally ended in the Philippines? Ferdinand's downfall was triggered by a small group of women hired by the Election Commission to monitor the vote-counting process. Realizing someone had tampered with the computers, they decided to blow the whistle by fleeing the Election Commission headquarters and running across the street to seek sanctuary in a church - where they were greeted by the international media who were only too happy to broadcast abroad the news of gross electoral fraud. Within days, Marcos had to flee Manila with whatever he and his acquisitive wife Imelda could carry by hand.

[First published 15 April 2009 as part of an essay series titled "Where Malaysia Is Headed..."

Reposted 5 August 2013]