cakap cakap...a life lived!

If you can banish from your life greed but not kindness, arrogance but not humility,  avarice but not your sense of caring for those less fortunate than you, jealousy but not love for others……I can assure you that life would be better. I have almost banish three of the five that II have just mentioned…which three is for me to know and for you to find out – but even with just those three banished from my life has done me much good.

 A cup of Nescafe enjoyed in the quiet hours of early morning as I reflect upon the day just past and the day to come with “A Whiter Shade of Pale” wafting around my head as the music plays in my head through the headphones ….what bliss. And as my feet taps in time to the music my spirits are lifted and my  heart and mind  is sated with life. And its not yet 8 a.m… what more can life give me today?

As I have said before my needs now are few..my wants even fewer. How have I become so?

I remember a time not too long ago in KL when coffee could only be enjoyed at the Coffee House of a Five Star Hotel with business associates or those well connected politically. You drive up to the main lobby entrance and casually step out of your car as the valet opens your car door and greets you. If there is no parking at the main entrance he will park the car for you. 

As you walk into the Sheng and head for the Coffee House, you glance around to see if there are others whose presence you might want or need to acknowledged. If not you head for the Coffee House and seek those who are waiting for you. What a pompous jerk I must have been in those days!

I remember too the many discussions of projects costing in the millions. Projects about to go to negotiated tenders. Projects that was on the drawing boards. Projects that is about to be budgeted for….and all those you were in discussions with were hanging on to your every word because you have the connections to ‘Number One” …to the Minister, the Pol Sec or whoever they believe will give them the inside road to securing the ‘business opportunity'. 

And to think that I was once part and parcel of all this ……and as I think of those days I smile quietly to myself. It has been one hell of a life….did everything I would have wanted to do and yet never had I come close to the quiet pleasure I now have of having a Nescafe early in the morning in my tiny apartment in Melbourne while my wife sleeps peacefully in our room nearby.

But I thank God that I have seen how the other side live…even lived it myself. I thank God that my late Father was able to provide us with such a life that others can only dream about. And I thank God that I have traveled and lived where I have wanted to. And most of all I thank God that I am still in love with my dear Wife (and I hope she with me!)….that I have my son Zack so close to me. And while my daughter Terrina is far away in Canada I am happy that she is happy with her Emmett and their two girls, Isabel and Sofie.

My cup runneth over….