Well I just saw Dark Knight. It was so awesome. But, like most of those kind of really AWESOME movies do, it set me to thinking. First, about how much more I've always liked Batman than the other super heroes. He's only a man, after all. He's got to get by with his ingenuity. And Batman is so driven. Sometimes days go by when all I think about is work and figuring out a problem, and the whole day goes by in an instant because my mind is so completely engaged. Batman is like that all the time. I can't imagine that Batman daydreams very often.

But Batman is also a fictional character. Surely Christian Bale daydreams.
Rambo is another of my heroes. If you haven't seen Rambo 4 yet, you have missed something fundamental. Rambo 4 was possibly the most powerful movie I have ever seen. The feelings it stirred in me were not new feelings, but they were overpowering to the point that I couldn't sleep.

But Rambo is also a fictional character.

So in this blog I would like to talk about my friend Justin. Justin is not a fictional character. Justin and I have been friends since 7th grade. He asked for my email address one day in the hallway and then dropped all of his books all over the floor. We were in the same history class that year and I remember one day when our teacher asked the class who would die for their country. Three of us raised our hands: me, Justin, and totally unexpectedly, a popular blonde named Whitney. The teacher asked us if we would still die for our country if we felt that the country was fighting a war that most people didn't support, or we thought we were going to lose. I said that if that were the case then my country would need all the help that it could get.
Justin is an incredibly complicated human being, and even more complicated is the fact that he's always striving to change himself, to better himself. He's always trying to identify his weaknesses, and to fix them. He seems tireless.

But what I most admire about Justin is that he is in the Army, training to be a helicopter pilot. What he desires is to finish his training and go to Iraq. He is delivering on the statement he made in 7th grade, that he would support his country all the way. He is putting his money where his mouth is, since he's always believed in the mission. For a while he worked for a think-tank in Washington studying tactics and troop movements in Iraq. I remember when he became so passionate about what he was discovering that he wrote an email to the President recommending the surge shortly before it was announced. Perhaps the President took his advice.

Justin says he likes to think of his friends as soldiers of fortune, having adventures all over the globe. He once said I fit his image and so remain his friend. I do a fair amount of adventuring. But while the world has given me everything, my return contribution to the world has been scant. The image of Justin over there in a war zone, going on sorties, patrolling cities, giving out supplies, ferrying out wounded soldiers- that seems like a life well lived. I haven't really told him, but I am fiercely proud of him, and I admire him very greatly. Soldiers like him daily defend the weak and bring stability and security to places long chained by fear and oppression. Like the fictional characters I like to watch, they must face difficult decisions. Sometimes the violence gets worse before it gets better.
Many struggle with the people they need to become and the things they need to do in order to do what must be done. They are true heroes.

I need to do something: to build something, to fix something. There is a contingent of American and British geologists who are stationed in Afghanistan where they map the seismic hazards of the rather seismically active country and train Afghanis to read the language of the rocks and thus mitigate the toll of earthquake disasters like the one that happened several years ago. These people change lives, even if their efforts go largely unnoticed. I've been reading a book about the political and diplomatic history of the US and southeast asia from 1899 to 1973: these diplomats also change peoples' lives, and their actions spread outwards like ripples in a pond.

One always worries about one's safety. Sure, I could go somewhere and be piling sandbags or giving malaria injections- but then again I have been obtaining certain skills: would I serve better here, researching new forms of energy, searching for new oil fields, sending much needed money to the people who are piling sandbags by a river?

How best to use one's life?

There are a great many causes for which I feel I would give my life. But how to choose which is best?

I regret that I have but one life to give for my country.

Zanzibar!
Long time no see...I'm travelling to Cape Town, South Africa for the World Championships in jump rope :D Then we're travelling to a township whose name I don't know (I really should know my agenda) to teach kids how to jump rope...it'll be great fun, all the malaria and yellow fever stuff aside.

I scanned over your entry and must say that the Dark Knight was indeed an amazing movie...but I feel that this entry would be quite inspiring if I actually had the time to read it. So I'm gonna bookmark it and when I return to Nutang sometime in August I will also return here....

So long for a while :)
» The-Muffin-Man on 2008-07-20 03:03:40

Eh, Batman. I don't know why they have to make all of the villains in the new movies look so... horror-movie-like.

There always seems to be at least one person who has lived their life more fully than you... :|
» randomjunk on 2008-07-20 03:39:37

I was just thinking about the same thing. I mean... art?

It really is a shame that we only have one life to live. If I had extras I would surely screw off with one and then do something really important in another.

R:C- Yup, Tulip the computer and my wacom bamboo tablet.
» jinyu on 2008-07-20 10:43:12

i have also thought of giving back to my country. that's why i studied environmental studies and want to be an expert in environmental politics.
» renaye on 2008-07-20 11:13:17

How best to use one's life?
Ah, quite a thought provoking question. Whenever I think of the answer, knowing that I have had a vast number of choices. I've wanted to be a doctor, to be an artist, to be an athlete, a combat tactician, to be an ambassador. And now, I want to be a psychiatrist. And I honestly believe I could have been any of those people but I realized that I did not want to simply be another (insert profession). I want to be what no one or few people are. Because the worlds needs the weird people, the highly unique even if in doing so they become an outcast of society. Just as Gotham needs a Batman, the world needs idealists and those who break the norm. The world needs its strange denizens just as it needs doctors, soldiers, and police men.
I'll find my own "cup of tea" in the world. :3
» yourcupoftea on 2008-07-20 03:09:26

Re. your comment: Probably, yes. But they clearly already have my email. heh.

Re. Post: Yea. I'm not actually a supporter of the war in Iraq but I still admire what those guys are doing. All the more so because I feel like they're over there for the wrong reasons. It's rough. Especially when we really don't support them the way we should. (IE... stop-losses, not getting the proper armor and vehicles, etc).

For your part though, I'm sure whatever you decide to do to help will be good. In the meantime though, if you want to help, there are tons of charities that send phone cards and gifts and stuff to the soldiers over seas.
» Praetorian on 2008-07-21 06:18:01

My parents got tickets from an airline company that went out of business so our flights got changed and now we have to fly to Denver, then back home to San Jose. It sucketh.
» randomjunk on 2008-07-21 08:57:49

R:C
Lol, I don't know if she likes Phantom of the Opera or not!
» jinyu on 2008-07-21 10:49:11

yes. a very nice doctor. u want me to intro u to him? hehehe.
» renaye on 2008-07-22 10:03:17

I know how you're feeling.

I used to think that I wanted to do something with my life that will help --- AAH WTF IS THE CROC. HUNTER CARRYING? IT'S CREEPY
GO WAY


I CAN'T COMMENT AND LOOK AT IT AT THE SAM ETIME
KELAKRLEA
Okay, okay.. I'll hold a hand up.

That won't help.

Damn you animal thing.
.

I have no idea what I was going to say..
» Dilated on 2008-07-23 01:49:35

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