A Song To Match Your Mood
20th May 2013
Stole this topic off a list on Pinterest because I have temporarily
run out of creative juices to think of new themes. Hmmm I love music
and am open to all kinds of genres (except maybe those that are so
loud and noisy I can't hear the lyrics 99% of the time.. defeats the
purpose of a song don't you think?). And I think it's safe to say that
most of us have different songs for different occasions like
sometimes when you hear a particular song on the radio and you are
immediately transported back through time and feel this rush of
nostalgia flooding your inner being? I think it's really fascinating
how I see songs as indications for different seasons in my life, and
they serve so effectively as time markers as well, don't they?
I actually really love Chinese songs (and I - surprise!- listen to them more than English songs). Somehow they tend to sound more meaningful and relatable, and
that's what I think a song should be able to capture. I thought long
and hard about what song matches what I am feeling now, and it was
really kind of difficult. Most of the time, I feel a myriad of
emotions all jumbled together, instead of just one. And there's
probably only one song I can think of that is capable of sounding
nostalgic and optimistic at the same time. One of my absolutely favorite songs from my favorite Chinese singer, Jay Zhou! ^^
稻香
(Dao Xiang) a.k.a Fragrant Rice.
This song has a strong
country feel to it, and is mainly about not being pre-occupied with
trying to satisfy everyone's demands of you until you forget everything else. I love it not only
because it sounds really catchy, but also hits back home to what
should be a priority for everybody.
請你打開電視看看多少人為生命在努力勇敢的走下去
我們是不是該知足,
珍惜一切 就算沒有擁有
(Please
turn on the television now and see for yourself, so many people
bravely fighting for their lives
Shouldn't
we be content and cherish what we have, even if we don't possess
them?)
Many
a time, we are so concerned with meeting deadlines and trying to
chase a certain goal, that we minimize our peripheral vision and
cloud out what is happening around us. My mother likes to start a
conversation by asking me whether I know what is going on in the
World currently, and most of the time, I find that I don't know. Then
I try to justify myself by claiming that the reason for my lack of
awareness of current affairs is because of the too-many commitments I
have on hand. Which hardly counts for a valid reason, because in my
mind, I know what's ultimately more important.
Something
goes wrong at work and we feel that we are the most wronged people on
earth. We complain, we ask ourselves why we do not receive
appreciation in return for our hard work, and we turn into bitter
people as a result. But maybe if we all opened our eyes more, then we
would see that the troubles we are facing aren't so big after all. In
the context of natural disasters and people in Third World Countries
who do not have roofs over their head and wonder whether they'll live
to survive just one more day, I'd say we are pretty fortunate and
blessed people. But yet we fail to take this comparison into
consideration even though it's staring at us straight in the face
from what we read on the new media everyday. Are #firstworldproblems
really problems at all?
不要哭讓螢火蟲帶著你逃跑,
鄉間的歌謠永遠的依靠
回家吧 回到最初的美好
(Don't
cry, let the fireflies take you away, you will always find serenity
in folk songs
Go
home, return to the sweet and carefree past)
Simplicity.
Modern society has inevitably made everything complicated by nature,
and sometimes complexity is good because it means that we are
challenging ourselves to become better people. But what if complexity
reached a whole new level and it has turned us into competitive,
selfish empty vessels who find it difficult to judge right from
wrong? Sometimes, all we need is a poke to remind ourselves that we
need to make our lives more straightforward. Remember the days when
we were kids and the ice-cream man on a scooter would park his
vehicle below our HDB blocks and ring a bell? In 5 minutes, all the
kids in the neighborhood would be queuing up to buy $1 ice-cream (I
like chocolate flavor on rainbow bread) and then compete on who
would be the first to finish? Or when we follow our parents to the
market and there used to be those gachapon machines lined up in a row in front
of the herbal medicine shops? We would exchange coins with the shop
owner and then camp in front of those 'turn-turn machines', leaving
with small toys (rubber balls, sweets, those Pokemon figurines that
everybody hoped to get for 10 cents) and we would be happy for the
entire week. We don't need the past to reconstruct itself in order to
experience what it was like to be carefree when we were children.
Simplicity can be recreated by anyone, and is reflected in the things
you choose to do. Get off the computer and take a break from all that
crazy essay writing, go take a walk at the reservoir at sunset, buy
those 20 cents ice-pops and eat 3 at one go, create a playlist of
your favorite most embarrassing songs, pretend you're in the Kbox
room and sing your hearts out, sleep at 10pm just for the fun of it,
and set aside a day to do absolutely nothing. Simplicity has always
been there, why not start embracing it again?
不要這麼容易就想放棄 就像我說的
追不到的夢想 換個夢不就得了
(Don't
give up so easily, just like what I said,
If
the dream can't be reached, then just follow another dream)
We
read on the newspaper about that occasional kid who throws his whole
life away just because he has failed one test in elementary school.
Failure hurts, and it hurts a lot. I've found myself many a time
crying over lousy grades, feeling like I'm not good enough and always
tempting myself to give up everything I have worked for because it's
just 'not worth it', but where has that gotten me? Nowhere. Instead
of throwing ourselves constant self-pity parties, why not do
something with all that energy, pick yourself up and go at it doubly
hard? I know it's easier said than done, but if we don't try, then
the chances of grasping success is 0 anyway. We all have dreams, some
of us even have ridiculously absurd dreams that we feel are
impossible to achieve. But as many famous people say, nothing is
impossible, impossible is nothing. (:
One
song can be translated into so many lessons for us to bring back
home, and that's the beauty of music. It speaks to the heart more
honestly and more directly than any advice can ever do so.
For some strange reason, I really liked this topic a lot. It was easy to write about, and I was really happy by the time I completed it. Gonna take a break today because I'm really exhausted from moving boxes after boxes of books at work, but I'll be back soon! :D
No comments:
Post a Comment