Eulogy for Grandmother

Ong Cham Moi, my grandmother, affectionately known as Ama or Ama Tay have gone to be with the Lord on 30 October 2008 at a ripe old age of 95. She had the privilege of witnessing the multiplication of her family from her children, grandchildren, great grandchildren to the 5th generation.

Ama has walked the path of life to its fullest amidst all the trials and tribulations life has thrown in her path. For me, the highlight of her life was when she accepted Christ as her Lord and Saviour. Knowing that as she has left her walk on earth to be with her Maker in heaven has made our hearts rejoice in the midst of our mourning.

As we gather today to bid her farewell, I am reminded of the legacy she leaves behind. A legacy of traits that will hopefully transcend this family’s 5th generation. She embodies so much generosity and graciousness to those around her which naturally makes her so readily accessible to people who walked across her path. There is so many memories of those actions that even today, it brings tears and sorrow knowing that what we have today are only memories from the gracious action of one extraordinary mother, grandmother, great grandmother and great great grandmother. This brings to mind a quote that encompasses everything that we are gathered here today: “Death leaves a heartache no one can heal, love leaves a memory no one can steal”.

One of the many memories of her demonstration of love was 20 years ago, when I was very young and she was 75. She would walk 20-30 minutes from the old Lido Theatre to Tanjung Bendera when there were no transport available. Why did she do that? She wanted to be by her child and grandchildren when they needed comforting. She has always been hopeful, gracious and high-spirited evident by her readiness to greet anyone in her path. If I were a stranger, my day would have been transformed by her display of enthusiasm.

We will miss her dearly, we will miss her calling us to “Sia Ma” (which means eating dinner in her dialect, Hing Hwa). Her daily routine of ensuring her plant stay healthy & blooming enhances the beauty of this home, her daily cycling on the stationary bike and morning stroll in front of our home inspires us to be discipline especially in keeping fit and her daily traverse to my uncle’s shop reminds us to stay active and occupied.

I would like to end this eulogy by reading a poem as a tribute to my beloved grandmother:

Legacy of Love

A wife, a mother, a grandma too,
This is the legacy we have from you.
You taught us love and how to fight,
You gave us strength, you gave us might.
A stronger person would be hard to find,
And in your heart, you were always kind.
You fought for us all in one way or another,
Not just as a wife not just as a mother.
For all of us you gave your best,
Now the time has come for you to rest.
So go in peace, you've earned your sleep,
Your love in our hearts, we'll eternally keep.


Ama, we love you and we miss you.

Interesting Quotes

"The Americans like to borrow and spend, but the Chinese prefer saving to spending. It seems we both have our own problems"

- Premier Wen Jiabao during his visit to the United Nations in September (2008). alluding to China's slow pace of liberalisation, but which has shielded it largely from the global financial crisis.

(Source: The Edge Singapore - 13 October 2008)

Words of Wisdom in Turbulent Times

In a meeting earlier this week a head of unit shared the following quote to remind us to push on especially during this turbulent times.

"Greatness is not in where we stand, but in what direction we are moving. We must sail sometimes with the wind and sometimes against it -- but sail we must and not drift, nor lie at anchor." Oliver Wendell Holmes

Indeed a "storm" is nigh (in fact, it's already here). Nonetheless, let's bravely sail through the "storm" created by greedy financiers.

The Last Lecture

I was reading a book on my honeymoon lately (I only did this when my wife was asleep and I wasn't). It was by a professor (Randy Pausch) from Carnegie Mellon who was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer with 3 - 6 months to live and the book was about his final lecture. As I read the book I was moved by his words of wisdom. His advice were cliché yet it reminded me of Randy's opinion of clichés, "... The reason clichés are repeated so often is because they're so often right on the money". However, it wasn't his words of wisdom that moved me to tears or touched me most.

Devotion for His Children

As I was reading the book, I kept feeling as if Randy was in front of me leading me through life and its challenges. Every advice is supported by experiences he encountered. Very rich experience I might add. I couldn't help but felt that he wanted to share his valuable experiences with his kids when they're older, through his last lecture. I was proven right when in the Final Remarks section of the book, he mentioned that the 2nd "Head Fake" of the lecture was that it was really for his kids. One lesson from Randy's life is his devotion to his kids and the line that moved a hard person like me to tears was "It pains me to think that when they're older, they won't have a father. When I cry in the shower, I'm not usually thinking, 'I won't get to see them do this' or 'I won't get to see them do that'. I'm thinking about the kids not having a father. I'm focused more on what they're going to lose than on what I'm going to lose". Growing up in a single parent home, I would understand some of the questions that will go through his kids' mind although I may not have a full understanding. I know that if my father left me a legacy as Randy did for his kids, it would have been reassuring and a good model.

Devotion for Jai

In his last days of living, he could have chose to be self-focused, seeking sympathy for himself. However, he dedicated his time to his wife, spending quality time with her. That was not all, a lot of planning was put into a life without him and though not explicitly mentioned, I'm sure it involved financial aspects, family support for Jai (hence, their move closer to Jai's family) and dedicated section of the book for Jai.

Selflessness in Helping Others Achieve Their Childhood Dreams

Throughout the book were repetition of the phrase, childhood dreams, though I lost count after reading a quarter of the book, it was already very clear that it was repeated many times because it was his passion. His heart's desire to help people improve is commendable and if only we all thought that way, the world would be a better place. The thought of this reminded me of the "Recovering Jerk" section of his book. Many lives are impacted by this man and many more will benefit, I'm sure.

Emphasis on Fundamentals

There were a lot of times that his emphasis was to go back to the basics. In a section of his book he shared of how he teaches his students on teamwork before commencing his computer science class. I am a strong advocate of this and I remember in those days that I was active in competitive swimming. I started swimming learning strokes that were not quite correct. To correct those basic strokes took a long time. So Randy is spot on about getting the fundamentals right.

The Last Lecture epitomises the devotion of a husband, father, friend and lecturer. It is one of those much needed light in the darkness and violence we faced in the world today. Personally, it got me thinking about how I would lead my life in impacting my wife, family, friends and those around me in a positive way.

Lee Chong Wei is indeed a Malaysian hero

For 12 years, we Malaysians have watched the Olympics without our sons or daughters bringing back a medal. Yesterday, Lee Chong Wei gave us hope and the courage to dream for a first ever gold medal.

To be honest, I was thinking to myself, "It's ok if he didn't win, he would have at least won a silver medal". But it is this mediocre thinking that stifles our potential to succeed. Fortunately, Chong Wei didn't think that way. After winning the semi-final, he said that "I would play with my life" (The Star, 16 August 2008). He definitely made Malaysians proud.

Despite his efforts, it was not Chong Wei or Malaysia's night to see the Jalur Gemilang hoisted and the Negaraku played. Lin Dan has proven why he deserves to be ranked the world's number one (he never dropped a set throughout the tournament). Regardless, I salute the man for his valiant effort and I strongly believe it was timely even when Malaysians are divided at such trying times.

The following is an article written in The Star, 17 August 2008 by Wong Chun Wai before the Beijing 2008 Men's Single Badminton finals which draws example to Chong Wei's success in Beijing 2008 as living proof that Malaysia can compete in the international stage if we only draw on each other's strength and compensate for each other's weaknesses instead of focusing on issues of race and religion raised by some selfish individuals intending to divide the nation for their own gains. My prayer is that Malaysia will emerge a stronger, united and a respected nation.

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Lee is our true Malaysian patriot
By WONG CHUN WAI
The Star, 17 August 2008

Lee Chong Wei and Misbun Sidek are showing how Malaysians can do so much if we put aside race and religion and focus on commonalities instead of differences.

LEE Chong Wei has to be the true Malaysian hero as the nation prays that he will deliver the first Olympics gold medal for the country. That would be the best National Day gift!

At a time when some of our politicians are spewing racist and intolerant religious views, watching our badminton hero keep the national flag flying is so refreshing and motivating.

Our champ: Lee has proven what sheer grit and training can do if we set our hearts and minds to doing something.
On Friday night, the nation cheered as Lee made history by becoming the first Malaysian badminton singles player to reach an Olympics final.

The 26-year-old Penangite is now assured of at least a silver medal following his victory over South Korea’s Lee Hyun-il. The last Olympics medals were a silver and a bronze, won by badminton players Cheah Soon Kit and Yap Kim Hock in the men's doubles and Rashid Sidek in the men's singles respectively at the Atlanta Games in 1996.
But it was the front-page picture yesterday that said it all – a victorious Lee hugging his coach Misbun Sidek.
There is so much Malaysians can do if we put aside race and religion and focus on commonalities instead of differences.

We can talk of being a global player only when we can devote our attention to competitiveness and excellence. The world waits for no one; and on the international stage no one will have the patience to hear any kind of whining.

Like Rashid, Lee has proven what sheer grit and training can do if we set our hearts and minds to doing something. They prove that Malaysians, regardless of their race, can make it at the international stage where the rules are the same.

Lee is now one step away from achieving greater history. Certainly, we all believe that the gold medal is on Lee's mind, not just the RM1mil incentive. When he steps into the court today to face Lin Dan - currently the world's no 1 - he knows the whole of Malaysia is behind him.

For a moment at least, no one would bother to listen to the negativity expounded by some of our politicians.
Lee is our champion - not the self-declared champion of their races, the very same people who extolled the virtues of our education system in the name of nationalism and yet packed off their children overseas, even at primary school level.

Not the ruffians who cannot tolerate a divergence of views and forcibly broke into the Bar Council forum.
Or the self-proclaimed heroes of our respective communities who talk about patriotism but whom we suspect of squandering the nation’s wealth.

Then there are the self-appointed moral guardians who decide for us what we can hear or see from their narrow perspective, and they haven’t even become the government.

If Malaysians are disgusted by our politicians, they have plenty of good reasons for being so, and since Aug 8, many have been seeking refuge by following the Olympics.

From fencing to equestrian, where we have little knowledge of how the scores are awarded, these sports are making more sense to us than the silly antics of some politicians and activists.
Together with my family members and friends, we are ready with our Jalur Gemilang to support Lee and we fervently hope he will beat China’s Lin Dan.

We are Malaysians, and like the rest of ordinary Malaysians, we want him to bring back the best Merdeka gift for all of us.

Let’s set the mood for National Day by celebrating our diversity as an asset for unity and achievements.

Chong Wei, thanks for what you have done. Malaysia is proud of you; you are a true patriot!

17 hours to Men's Single Badminton Finals in Beijing 2008

This is it .... 17 hours from now, Lee Chong Wei will have a shot at the olympic gold medal. The hope of the nation is in his hands. May he be the first Malaysian to win the olympic gold medal!

All the best Chong Wei!!

"Negaraku" played in the Olympics for the first time?

Since it's first appearance in the Olympic Games, Malaysia has won a total of 3 medals. All of which came from badminton (click here for source of info). Out of the 3 medals that Malaysia won, 1 was a silver and 2 bronze. The gold has alluded us for a very long time.

Today, badminton has again provided us with hope to see our very own standing at the top of the podium receiving the coveted Olympics gold and going on to seal a place in Malaysia's history to be the first to win the gold for the country.

Lee Chong Wei (currently world no. 2) defeated Sony Dwi Kuncoro of Indonesia within 34 minutes in straight sets booking a place in the semi-finals against Republic of Korea's Lee Hyunil (click here for source of info). Lee Chong Wei kept Malaysia's hope of winning it's first ever Olympic gold alive by beating Lee Hyunil in 3 high tempo sets.It is a great achievement and one that Malaysians can be proud of.

We can hope and cheer for our hero, Lee Chong Wei, that on 17 August 2008 20:48 (GMT +08:00) he would be the first Malaysian to bring home an Olympics gold and for the first time in Olympics history, "Negaraku" will echo throughout the Beijing University of Technology Gymnasium.

Despite the divide in our political landscape, let's in unison cheer our very own, Lee Chong Wei! Let it be our desire to hear "Negaraku" played in the Olympics and the "Jalur Gemilang" raised on the highest pole.

MALAYSIA BOLEH!

Rest in Peace Maria Sue Chapman ....

Just after my previous post, I was trying to recall one of my favourite songs by Steven Curtis Chapman (SCC). As I was surfing his official site, I just realised that he has just lost one of his adopted daughter of only 5 years old in a terrible accident on 21 May 2008.

To think that months before her death, he wrote the song to remind himself not to rush through moments and to cherish his time with his adopted daughters (Joy and Maria) before they grow up.

Life is short, life is precious, cherish the moment .....

Rest in peace, Maria Sue Chapman. Pray for the Chapmans ...

Cinderella by Steven Curtis Chapman

I came across this video while surfing on one of this blog that I frequent. Made me realise how I've been so caught up with work that I lost touch of beautiful christian songs ...

Not only is the lyric of this song beautiful but the inspiration behind its conception. A loving and responsible father. I wonder what's it like ...

Missed Opportunity ...

I was on the plane on my way to KSA, watching a movie titled "21" about a brilliant university student, Ben Campbell, who's studying in MIT and got accepted into Harvard Medical School. In order to pay for his tuition fees and living expenses, he needed $300,000. He was recruited by fellow MIT students and trained by his MIT lecturer to count cards in order to beat Las Vegas casino system.

I was drawn by a quote from Ben Campbell during his conversation with his best friend after attending a scholarship interview that didn't seem to be successful. He said,

"Ever since I was 16, I crushed exams, I took on extra-curricular, I showed up early, I sat in front, I stayed late. I gave up everything ... It annoys me that the only thing stopping me from getting into Harvard Med is money."

I wonder how many bright students out there never got a chance to attend a prestigous school/university because they didn't have the money? I could think of a few from my batch of friends already.

The Strenuous Life

Here I am on the plane, flying back home after jetsetting (not to mention bus-setting) for a total of 23 hours to 5 airports. I ask myself why do I do this? Maybe, just maybe ..... I can give it all up, sit at home and just take it easy. Be contented with what I have and idle away.

Such thought makes the theme for today "The strenuous life" such a defining title that reflects my life at this stage. Not that it's bad but I believe it is for a very good reason.

When I read what Theodore Roosevelt had to say in his speech "The doctrine of the strenuous life", it was reassuring and refreshing to know that what I am doing may not be of loss.

The opening remarks of his speech outlined the main points of his speech:

"I wish to preach, not the doctrine of ignoble ease, but the doctrine of the strenuous life, the life of toil and effort, of labor and strife; to preach that highest form of success which comes, not to the man who desires mere easy peace, but to the man who does not shrink from danger, from hardship, or from bitter toil, and who out of these wins the splendid ultimate triumph."

According to him, the highest form of success is achieved when a man does not shun from danger, hardwork, challenges, endurance and perseverance. A quote from his speech that I identified most was when he said:

"It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed."

And so as I continue to toil and put in effort into my work and life, I am assured that I am doing the right thing (of course not neglecting those dearest to me).

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(Full Speech)
The Doctrine of a Strenuous Life
Theodore Roosevelt, 10 April 1899

I wish to preach, not the doctrine of ignoble ease, but the doctrine of the strenuous life, the life of toil and effort, of labor and strife; to preach that highest form of success which comes, not to the man who desires mere easy peace, but to the man who does not shrink from danger, from hardship, or from bitter toil, and who out of these wins the splendid ultimate triumph.

A life of slothful ease, a life of that peace which springs merely from lack either of desire or of power to strive after great things, is as little worthy of a nation as of an individual. I ask only that what every self-respecting American demands from himself and from his sons shall be demanded of the American nation as a whole. Who among you would teach you boys that ease, that peace, is to be the first consideration in their eyes -- to be the ultimate goal after which they strive? You men of Chicago have made this city great, you men of Illinois have done your share, and more than your share, in making America great, because you neither preach nor practice such a doctrine. You work yourselves, and you bring up your sons to work. If you are rich and are worth your salt, you will teach your sons that though they may have leisure, it is not to be spent in idleness; for wisely used leisure merely means that those who possess it, being free from the necessity of working for their livelihood, are all the more bound to carry on some kind of non-remunerative work in science, in letters, in art, in exploration, in historical research -- work of the type we most need in this country, the successful carrying out of which reflects most honor upon the nation.

We do not admire the man of timid peace. We admire the man who embodies victorious effort; the man who never wrongs his neighbor, who is prompt to help a friend, but who has those virile qualities necessary to win in the stern strife of actual life. It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed. In this life we get nothing save by effort. Freedom from effort in the present merely means that there has been stored up effort in the past. A man can be freed from the necessity of work only by the fact that he or his fathers before him have worked to good purpose. If the freedom thus purchased is used aright, and the man still does actual work, though of a different kind, whether as a writer or a general, whether in the field of politics or in the field of exploration and adventure, he shows he deserves his good fortune. But if he treats this period of freedom from the need of actual labor as a period, not of preparation, but of mere enjoyment, even though perhaps not of vicious enjoyment, he shows that he is simply a cumberer of the earth's surface, and he surely unfits himself to hold his own with his fellows if the need to do so should again arise. A mere life of ease is not in the end a very satisfactory life, and, above all, it is a life which ultimately unfits those who follow it for serious work in the world.

In the last analysis a healthy state can exist only when the men and women who make it up lead clean, vigorous, healthy lives; when the children are so trained that they shall endeavor, not to shirk difficulties, but to overcome them; not to seek ease, but to know how to wrest triumph from toil and risk. The man must be glad to do a man's work, to dare and endure and to labor; to keep himself, and to keep those dependent upon him. The woman must be the housewife, the helpmeet of the homemaker, the wise and fearless mother of many healthy children. In one of Daudet's powerful and melancholy books he speaks of "the fear of maternity, the haunting terror of the young wife of the present day." When such words can be truthfully written of a nation, that nation is rotten to the heart's core. When men fear work or fear righteous war, when women fear motherhood, they tremble on the brink of doom; and well it is that they should vanish from the earth, where they are fit subjects for the scorn of all men and women who are themselves strong and brave and high-minded.

As it is with the individual, so it is with the nation. It is a base untruth to say that happy is the nation that has no history. Thrice happy is the nation that has a glorious history. Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that knows not victory nor defeat. If in 1861 the men who loved the Union had believed that peace was the end of all things, and war and strife the worst of all things, and had acted up to their belief, we would have saved hundreds of thousands of lives, we would have saved hundreds of millions of dollars. Moreover, besides saving all the blood and treasure we then lavished, we would have prevented the heartbreak of many women, the dissolution of many homes, and we would have spared the country those months of gloom and shame when it seemed as if our armies marched only to defeat. We could have avoided all this suffering simply by shrinking from strife. And if we had thus avoided it, we would have shown that we were weaklings, and that we were unfit to stand among the great nations of the earth. Thank God for the iron in the blood of our fathers, the men who upheld the wisdom of Lincoln, and bore sword or rifle in the armies of Grant! Let us, the children of the men who proved themselves equal to the mighty days, let us, the children of the men who carried the great Civil War to a triumphant conclusion, praise the God of our fathers that the ignoble counsels of peace were rejected; that the suffering and loss, the blackness of sorrow and despair, were unflinchingly faced, and the years of strife endured; for in the end the slave was freed, the Union restored, and the mighty American republic placed once more as a helmeted queen among nations.

We of this generation do not have to face a task such as that our fathers faced, but we have our tasks, and woe to us if we fail to perform them! We cannot, if we would, play the part of China, and be content to rot by inches in ignoble ease within our borders, taking no interest in what goes on beyond them, sunk in a scrambling commercialism; heedless of the higher life, the life of aspiration, of toil and risk, busying ourselves only with the wants of our bodies for the day, until suddenly we should find, beyond a shadow of question, what China has already found, that in this world the nation that has trained itself to a career of unwarlike and isolated ease is bound, in the end, to go down before other nations which have not lost the manly and adventurous qualities. If we are to be a really great people, we must strive in good faith to play a great part in the world. We cannot avoid meeting great issues. All that we can determine for ourselves is whether we shall meet them well or ill. In 1898 we could not help being brought face to face with the problem of war with Spain. All we could decide was whether we should shrink like cowards from the contest, or enter into it as beseemed a brave and high-spirited people; and, once in, whether failure or success should crown our banners. So it is now. We cannot avoid the responsibilities that confront us in Hawaii, Cuba, Porto Rico, and the Philippines. All we can decide is whether we shall meet them in a way that will redound to the national credit, or whether we shall make of our dealings with these new problems a dark and shameful page in our history. To refuse to deal with them at all merely amounts to dealing with them badly. We have a given problem to solve. If we undertake the solution, there is, of course, always danger that we may not solve it aright; but to refuse to undertake the solution simply renders it certain that we cannot possibly solve it aright.

The timid man, the lazy man, the man who distrusts his country, the over-civilized man, who has lost the great fighting, masterful virtues, the ignorant man, and the man of dull mind, whose soul is incapable of feeling the mighty lift that thrills "stern men with empires in their brains" -- all these, of course, shrink from seeing the nation undertake its new duties; shrink from seeing us build a navy and an army adequate to our needs; shrink from seeing us do our share of the world's work, by bringing order out of chaos in the great, fair tropic islands from which the valor of our soldiers and sailors has driven the Spanish flag. These are the men who fear the strenuous life, who fear the only national life which is really worth leading. They believe in that cloistered life which saps the hardy virtues in a nation, as it saps them in the individual; or else they are wedded to that base spirit of gain and greed which recognizes in commercialism the be-all and end-all of national life, instead of realizing that, though an indispensable element, it is, after all, but one of the many elements that go to make up true national greatness. No country can long endure if its foundations are not laid deep in the material prosperity which comes from thrift, from business energy and enterprise, from hard, unsparing effort in the fields of industrial activity; but neither was any nation ever yet truly great if it relied upon material prosperity alone. All honor must be paid to the architects of our material prosperity, to the great captains of industry who have built our factories and our rail- roads, to the strong men who toil for wealth with brain or hand; for great is the debt of the nation to these and their kind. But our debt is yet greater to the men whose highest type is to be found in a statesman like Lincoln, a soldier like Grant. They showed by their lives that they recognized the law of work, the law of strife; they toiled to win a competence for themselves and those dependent upon them; but they recognized that there were yet other and even loftier duties -- duties to the nation and duties to the race.

We cannot sit huddled within our own borders and avow ourselves merely an assemblage of well-to-do hucksters who care nothing for what happens beyond. Such a policy would defeat even its own end; for as the nations grow to have ever wider and wider interests, and are brought into closer and closer contact, if we are to hold our own in the struggle for naval and commercial supremacy, we must build up our power without our own borders. We must build the isthmian canal, and we must grasp the points of vantage which will enable us to have our say in deciding the destiny of the oceans of the East and the West.

So much for the commercial side. From the standpoint of international honor the argument is even stronger. The guns that thundered off Manila and Santiago left us echoes of glory, but they also left us a legacy of duty. If we drove out a medieval tyranny only to make room for savage anarchy, we had better not have begun the task at all. It is worse than idle to say that we have no duty to perform, and can leave to their fates the islands we have conquered. Such a course would be the course of infamy. It would be followed at once by utter chaos in the wretched islands themselves. Some stronger, manlier power would have to step in and do the work, and we would have shown ourselves weaklings, unable to carry to successful completion the labors that great and high-spirited nations are eager to undertake.

The work must be done; we cannot escape our responsibility; and if we are worth our salt, we shall be glad of the chance to do the work -- glad of the chance to show ourselves equal to one of the great tasks set modern civilization. But let us not deceive ourselves as to the importance of the task. Let us not be misled by vainglory into underestimating the strain it will put on our powers. Above all, let us, as we value our own self-respect, face the responsibilities with proper seriousness, courage, and high resolve. We must demand the highest order of integrity and ability in our public men who are to grapple with these new problems. We must hold to a rigid accountability those public servants who show unfaithfulness to the interests of the nation or inability to rise to the high level of the new demands upon our strength and our resources.

Of course we must remember not to judge any public servant by any one act, and especially should we beware of attacking the men who are merely the occasions and not the causes of disaster. Let me illustrate what I mean by the army and the navy. If twenty years ago we had gone to war, we should have found the navy as absolutely unprepared as the army. At that time our ships could not have encountered with success the fleets of Spain any more than nowadays we can put untrained soldiers, no matter how brave, who are armed with archaic black-powder weapons, against well-drilled regulars armed with the highest type of modern repeating rifle. But in the early eighties the attention of the nation became directed to our naval needs. Congress most wisely made a series of appropriations to build up a new navy, and under a succession of able and patriotic secretaries, of both political parties, the navy was gradually built up, until its material became equal to its splendid personnel, with the result that in the summer of 1898 it leaped to its proper place as one of the most brilliant and formidable fighting navies in the entire world. We rightly pay all honor to the men controlling the navy at the time it won these great deeds, honor to Secretary Long and Admiral Dewey, to the captains who handled the ships in action, to the daring lieutenants who braved death in the smaller craft, and to the heads of bureaus at Washington who saw that the ships were so commanded, so armed, so equipped, so well engined, as to insure the best results. But let us also keep ever in mind that all of this would not have availed if it had not been for the wisdom of the men who during the preceding fifteen years had built up the navy. Keep in mind the secretaries of the navy during those years; keep in mind the senators and congressmen who by their votes gave the money necessary to build and to armor the ships, to construct the great guns, and to train the crews; remember also those who actually did build the ships, the armor, and the guns; and remember the admirals and captains who handled battle-ship, cruiser, and torpedo-boat on the high seas, alone and in squadrons, developing the seamanship, the gunnery, and the power of acting together, which their successors utilized so gloriously at Manila and off Santiago. And, gentlemen, remember the converse, too. Remember that justice has two sides. Be just to those who built up the navy, and, for the sake of the future of the country, keep in mind those who opposed its building up. Read the "Congressional Record." Find out the senators and congressmen who opposed the grants for building the new ships; who opposed the purchase of armor, without which the ships were worthless; who opposed any adequate maintenance for the Navy Department, and strove to cut down the number of men necessary to man our fleets. The men who did these things were one and all working to bring disaster on the country. They have no share in the glory of Manila, in the honor of Santiago. They have no cause to feel proud of the valor of our sea- captains, of the renown of our flag. Their motives may or may not have been good, but their acts were heavily fraught with evil. They did ill for the national honor, and we won in spite of their sinister opposition.

Now, apply all this to our public men of to-day. Our army has never been built up as it should be built up. I shall not discuss with an audience like this the puerile suggestion that a nation of seventy millions of freemen is in danger of losing its liberties from the existence of an army of one hundred thousand men, three fourths of whom will be employed in certain foreign islands, in certain coast fortresses, and on Island reservations. No man of good sense and stout heart can take such a proposition seriously. If we are such weaklings as the proposition implies, then we are unworthy of freedom in any event. To no body of men in the United States is the country so much indebted as to the splendid officers and enlisted men of the regular army and navy. There is no body from which the country has less to fear, and none of which it should be prouder, none which it should be more anxious to upbuild.

Our army needs complete reorganization, -- not merely enlarging, -- and the reorganization can only come as the result of legislation. A proper general staff should be established, and the positions of ordinance, commissary, and quartermaster officers should be filled by detail from the line. Above all, the army must be given the chance to exercise in large bodies. Never again should we see, as we saw in the Spanish war, major-generals in command of divisions who had never before commanded three companies together in the field. Yet, incredible to relate, Congress has shown a queer inability to learn some of the lessons of the war. There were large bodies of men in both branches who opposed the declaration of war, who opposed the ratification of peace, who opposed the upbuilding of the army, and who even opposed the purchase of armor at a reasonable price for the battle-ships and cruisers, thereby putting an absolute stop to the building of any new fighting-ships for the navy. If, during the years to come, any disaster should befall our arms, afloat or ashore, and thereby any shame come to the United States, remember that the blame will lie upon the men whose names appear upon the roll-calls of Congress on the wrong side of these great questions. On them will lie the burden of any loss of our soldiers and sailors, of any dishonor to the flag; and upon you and the people of this country will lie the blame if you do not repudiate, in no unmistakable way, what these men have done. The blame will not rest upon the untrained commander of untried troops, upon the civil officers of a department the organization of which has been left utterly inadequate, or upon the admiral with an insufficient number of ships; but upon the public men who have so lamentably failed in forethought as to refuse to remedy these evils long in advance, and upon the nation that stands behind those public men.

So, at the present hour, no small share of the responsibility for the blood shed in the Philippines, the blood of our brothers, and the blood of their wild and ignorant foes, lies at the thresholds of those who so long delayed the adoption of the treaty of peace, and of those who by their worse than foolish words deliberately invited a savage people to plunge into a war fraught with sure disaster for them -- a war, too, in which our own brave men who follow the flag must pay with their blood for the silly, mock humanitarianism of the prattlers who sit at home in peace.

The army and the navy are the sword and the shield which this nation must carry if she is to do her duty among the nations of the earth -- if she is not to stand merely as the China of the western hemisphere. Our proper conduct toward the tropic islands we have wrested from Spain is merely the form which our duty has taken at the moment. Of course we are bound to handle the affairs of our own household well. We must see that there is civic honesty, civic cleanliness, civic good sense in our home administration of city, State, and nation. We must strive for honesty in office, for honesty toward the creditors of the nation and of the individual; for the widest freedom of individual initiative where possible, and for the wisest control of individual initiative where it is hostile to the welfare of the many. But because we set our own household in order we are not thereby excused from playing our part in the great affairs of the world. A man's first duty is to his own home, but he is not thereby excused from doing his duty to the State; for if he fails in this second duty it is under the penalty of ceasing to be a freeman. In the same way, while a nation's first duty is within its own borders, it is not thereby absolved from facing its duties in the world as a whole; and if it refuses to do so, it merely forfeits its right to struggle for a place among the peoples that shape the destiny of mankind.

In the West Indies and the Philippines alike we are confronted by most difficult problems. It is cowardly to shrink from solving them in the proper way; for solved they must be, if not by us, then by some stronger and more manful race. If we are too weak, too selfish, or too foolish to solve them, some bolder and abler people must undertake the solution. Personally, I am far too firm a believer in the greatness of my country and the power of my countrymen to admit for one moment that we shall ever be driven to the ignoble alternative.

The problems are different for the different islands. Porto Rico is not large enough to stand alone. We must govern it wisely and well, primarily in the interest of its own people. Cuba is, in my judgment, entitled ultimately to settle for itself whether it shall be an independent state or an integral portion of the mightiest of republics. But until order and stable liberty are secured, we must remain in the island to insure them, and infinite tact, judgment, moderation, and courage must be shown by our military and civil representatives in keeping the island pacified, in relentlessly stamping out brigandage, in protecting all alike, and yet in showing proper recognition to the men who have fought for Cuban liberty. The Philippines offer a yet graver problem. Their population includes half-caste and native Christians, warlike Moslems, and wild pagans. Many of their people are utterly unfit for self-government, and show no signs of becoming fit. Others may in time become fit but at present can only take part in self- government under a wise supervision, at once firm and beneficent. We have driven Spanish tyranny from the islands. If we now let it be replaced by savage anarchy, our work has been for harm and not for good. I have scant patience with those who fear to undertake the task of governing the Philippines, and who openly avow that they do fear to undertake it, or that they shrink from it because of the expense and trouble; but I have even scanter patience with those who make a pretense of humanitarianism to hide and cover their timidity, and who can about "liberty" and the "consent of the governed," in order to excuse themselves for their unwillingness to play the part of men. Their doctrines, if carried out, would make it incumbent upon us to leave the Apaches of Arizona to work out their own salvation, and to decline to interfere in a single Indian reservation. Their doctrines condemn your forefathers and mine for ever having settled in these United States.

England's rule in India and Egypt has been of great benefit to England, for it has trained up generations of men accustomed to look at the larger and loftier side of public life. It has been of even greater benefit to India and Egypt. And finally, and most of all, it has advanced the cause of civilization. So, if we do our duty aright in the Philippines, we will add to that national renown which is the highest and finest part of national life, will greatly benefit the people of the Philippine Islands, and, above all, we will play our part well in the great work of uplifting mankind. But to do this work, keep ever in mind that we must show in a very high degree the qualities of courage, of honesty, and of good judgment. Resistant must be stamped out. The first and all-important work to be done is to establish the supremacy of our flag. We must put down armed resistance before we can accomplish anything else, and there should be no parleying, no faltering, in dealing with our foe. As for those in our own country who encourage the foe, we can afford contemptuously to disregard them; but it must be remembered that their utterances are not saved from being treasonable merely by the fact that they are despicable.

When once we have put down armed resistance, when once our rule is acknowledged, then an even more difficult task will begin, for then we must see to it that the islands are administered with absolute honesty and with good judgment. If we let the public service of the islands be turned into the prey of the spoils politician, we shall have begun to tread the path which Spain trod to her own destruction. We must send out there only good and able men, chosen for their fitness, and not because of their partizan service, and these men must not only administer impartial justice to the natives and serve their own government with honesty and fidelity, but must show the utmost tact and firmness, remembering that, with such people as those with whom we are to deal, weakness is the greatest of crimes, and that next to weakness comes lack of consideration for their principles and prejudices.

I preach to you, then, my countrymen, that our country calls not for the life of ease but for the life of strenuous endeavor. The twentieth century looms before us big with the fate of many nations. If we stand idly by, if we seek merely swollen, slothful ease and ignoble peace, if we shrink from the hard contests where men must win at hazard of their lives and at the risk of all they hold dear, then the bolder and stronger peoples will pass us by, and will win for themselves the domination of the world. Let us therefore boldly face the life of strife, resolute to do our duty well and manfully; resolute to uphold righteousness by deed and by word; resolute to be both honest and brave, to serve high ideals, yet to use practical methods. Above all, let us shrink from no strife, moral or physical, within or without the nation, provided we are certain that the strife is justified, for it is only through strife, through hard and dangerous endeavor, that we shall ultimately win the goal of true national greatness.

Vision of Education

I remembered very vividly the first day I attended college, a disillusioned, bitter and jaded first year college student. I thought I deserved better, I thought I was meant for better things in better places, I thought I could not gain intelligence and knowledge in the college.

9 years later, I realise it was there that I learnt the most. I didn't just gain knowledge (technical knowledge I mean), I gained much more. I gained friends, I knew my strength, I learnt my weakness, I knew who I was, I knew what I could achieve if I put my mind, heart and soul into it. I basically learnt the importance of character. For it was there that I appreciated the following quote ...

“Intelligence and character is the true goal of education.”

- Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Text of J.K. Rowling's Speech at Harvard Commencement

I read J.K Rowling's commencement speech at Harvard from the harvardmagazine.com and I thought it was fantastic especially sections where I have bolded the fonts.

I see the truth and the depth in the things that she says especially when she mentioned how failure takes us out of our comfort zone only to provide us with the knowledge and confidence that we can emerge victorious. To me it speaks of self-discovery, discovery of one's capability when pushed to the limits.

Read on and I hope that the text of her speech touches you as much as it did for me.
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(Full Speech)
The Fringe Benefits of Failure, and the Importance of Imagination
J.K. Rowling
Copyright June 2008

As prepared for delivery

President Faust, members of the Harvard Corporation and the Board of Overseers, members of the faculty, proud parents, and, above all, graduates,

The first thing I would like to say is 'thank you.' Not only has Harvard given me an extraordinary honour, but the weeks of fear and nausea I've experienced at the thought of giving this commencement address have made me lose weight. A win-win situation! Now all I have to do is take deep breaths, squint at the red banners and fool myself into believing I am at the world's best-educated Harry Potter convention.

Delivering a commencement address is a great responsibility; or so I thought until I cast my mind back to my own graduation. The commencement speaker that day was the distinguished British philosopher Baroness Mary Warnock. Reflecting on her speech has helped me enormously in writing this one, because it turns out that I can't remember a single word she said. This liberating discovery enables me to proceed without any fear that I might inadvertently influence you to abandon promising careers in business, law or politics for the giddy delights of becoming a gay wizard.

You see? If all you remember in years to come is the 'gay wizard' joke, I've still come out ahead of Baroness Mary Warnock. Achievable goals: the first step towards personal improvement.

Actually, I have wracked my mind and heart for what I ought to say to you today. I have asked myself what I wish I had known at my own graduation, and what important lessons I have learned in the 21 years that has expired between that day and this.

I have come up with two answers. On this wonderful day when we are gathered together to celebrate your academic success, I have decided to talk to you about the benefits of failure. And as you stand on the threshold of what is sometimes called 'real life', I want to extol the crucial importance of imagination.
These might seem quixotic or paradoxical choices, but please bear with me.

Looking back at the 21-year-old that I was at graduation, is a slightly uncomfortable experience for the 42-year-old that she has become. Half my lifetime ago, I was striking an uneasy balance between the ambition I had for myself, and what those closest to me expected of me.

I was convinced that the only thing I wanted to do, ever, was to write novels. However, my parents, both of whom came from impoverished backgrounds and neither of whom had been to college, took the view that my overactive imagination was an amusing personal quirk that could never pay a mortgage, or secure a pension.
They had hoped that I would take a vocational degree; I wanted to study English Literature. A compromise was reached that in retrospect satisfied nobody, and I went up to study Modern Languages. Hardly had my parents' car rounded the corner at the end of the road than I ditched German and scuttled off down the Classics corridor.
I cannot remember telling my parents that I was studying Classics; they might well have found out for the first time on graduation day. Of all subjects on this planet, I think they would have been hard put to name one less useful than Greek mythology when it came to securing the keys to an executive bathroom.

I would like to make it clear, in parenthesis, that I do not blame my parents for their point of view. There is an expiry date on blaming your parents for steering you in the wrong direction; the moment you are old enough to take the wheel, responsibility lies with you. What is more, I cannot criticise my parents for hoping that I would never experience poverty. They had been poor themselves, and I have since been poor, and I quite agree with them that it is not an ennobling experience. Poverty entails fear, and stress, and sometimes depression; it means a thousand petty humiliations and hardships. Climbing out of poverty by your own efforts, that is indeed something on which to pride yourself, but poverty itself is romanticised only by fools.

What I feared most for myself at your age was not poverty, but failure.

At your age, in spite of a distinct lack of motivation at university, where I had spent far too long in the coffee bar writing stories, and far too little time at lectures, I had a knack for passing examinations, and that, for years, had been the measure of success in my life and that of my peers.

I am not dull enough to suppose that because you are young, gifted and well-educated, you have never known hardship or heartbreak. Talent and intelligence never yet inoculated anyone against the caprice of the Fates, and I do not for a moment suppose that everyone here has enjoyed an existence of unruffled privilege and contentment.
However, the fact that you are graduating from Harvard suggests that you are not very well-acquainted with failure. You might be driven by a fear of failure quite as much as a desire for success. Indeed, your conception of failure might not be too far from the average person's idea of success, so high have you already flown academically.

Ultimately, we all have to decide for ourselves what constitutes failure, but the world is quite eager to give you a set of criteria if you let it. So I think it fair to say that by any conventional measure, a mere seven years after my graduation day, I had failed on an epic scale. An exceptionally short-lived marriage had imploded, and I was jobless, a lone parent, and as poor as it is possible to be in modern Britain, without being homeless. The fears my parents had had for me, and that I had had for myself, had both come to pass, and by every usual standard, I was the biggest failure I knew.

Now, I am not going to stand here and tell you that failure is fun. That period of my life was a dark one, and I had no idea that there was going to be what the press has since represented as a kind of fairy tale resolution. I had no idea how far the tunnel extended, and for a long time, any light at the end of it was a hope rather than a reality.
So why do I talk about the benefits of failure? Simply because failure meant a stripping away of the inessential. I stopped pretending to myself that I was anything other than what I was, and began to direct all my energy into finishing the only work that mattered to me. Had I really succeeded at anything else, I might never have found the determination to succeed in the one arena I believed I truly belonged. I was set free, because my greatest fear had already been realised, and I was still alive, and I still had a daughter whom I adored, and I had an old typewriter and a big idea. And so rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.
You might never fail on the scale I did, but some failure in life is inevitable. It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all – in which case, you fail by default.

Failure gave me an inner security that I had never attained by passing examinations. Failure taught me things about myself that I could have learned no other way. I discovered that I had a strong will, and more discipline than I had suspected; I also found out that I had friends whose value was truly above rubies.

The knowledge that you have emerged wiser and stronger from setbacks means that you are, ever after, secure in your ability to survive. You will never truly know yourself, or the strength of your relationships, until both have been tested by adversity. Such knowledge is a true gift, for all that it is painfully won, and it has been worth more to me than any qualification I ever earned.

Given a time machine or a Time Turner, I would tell my 21-year-old self that personal happiness lies in knowing that life is not a check-list of acquisition or achievement. Your qualifications, your CV, are not your life, though you will meet many people of my age and older who confuse the two. Life is difficult, and complicated, and beyond anyone's total control, and the humility to know that will enable you to survive its vicissitudes.
You might think that I chose my second theme, the importance of imagination, because of the part it played in rebuilding my life, but that is not wholly so. Though I will defend the value of bedtime stories to my last gasp, I have learned to value imagination in a much broader sense. Imagination is not only the uniquely human capacity to envision that which is not, and therefore the fount of all invention and innovation. In its arguably most transformative and revelatory capacity, it is the power that enables us to empathise with humans whose experiences we have never shared.

One of the greatest formative experiences of my life preceded Harry Potter, though it informed much of what I subsequently wrote in those books. This revelation came in the form of one of my earliest day jobs. Though I was sloping off to write stories during my lunch hours, I paid the rent in my early 20s by working in the research department at Amnesty International's headquarters in London.

There in my little office I read hastily scribbled letters smuggled out of totalitarian regimes by men and women who were risking imprisonment to inform the outside world of what was happening to them. I saw photographs of those who had disappeared without trace, sent to Amnesty by their desperate families and friends. I read the testimony of torture victims and saw pictures of their injuries. I opened handwritten, eye-witness accounts of summary trials and executions, of kidnappings and rapes.

Many of my co-workers were ex-political prisoners, people who had been displaced from their homes, or fled into exile, because they had the temerity to think independently of their government. Visitors to our office included those who had come to give information, or to try and find out what had happened to those they had been forced to leave behind.

I shall never forget the African torture victim, a young man no older than I was at the time, who had become mentally ill after all he had endured in his homeland. He trembled uncontrollably as he spoke into a video camera about the brutality inflicted upon him. He was a foot taller than I was, and seemed as fragile as a child. I was given the job of escorting him to the Underground Station afterwards, and this man whose life had been shattered by cruelty took my hand with exquisite courtesy, and wished me future happiness.

And as long as I live I shall remember walking along an empty corridor and suddenly hearing, from behind a closed door, a scream of pain and horror such as I have never heard since. The door opened, and the researcher poked out her head and told me to run and make a hot drink for the young man sitting with her. She had just given him the news that in retaliation for his own outspokenness against his country's regime, his mother had been seized and executed.

Every day of my working week in my early 20s I was reminded how incredibly fortunate I was, to live in a country with a democratically elected government, where legal representation and a public trial were the rights of everyone.

Every day, I saw more evidence about the evils humankind will inflict on their fellow humans, to gain or maintain power. I began to have nightmares, literal nightmares, about some of the things I saw, heard and read.
And yet I also learned more about human goodness at Amnesty International than I had ever known before.
Amnesty mobilises thousands of people who have never been tortured or imprisoned for their beliefs to act on behalf of those who have. The power of human empathy, leading to collective action, saves lives, and frees prisoners. Ordinary people, whose personal well-being and security are assured, join together in huge numbers to save people they do not know, and will never meet. My small participation in that process was one of the most humbling and inspiring experiences of my life.

Unlike any other creature on this planet, humans can learn and understand, without having experienced. They can think themselves into other people's minds, imagine themselves into other people's places.

Of course, this is a power, like my brand of fictional magic, that is morally neutral. One might use such an ability to manipulate, or control, just as much as to understand or sympathise.

And many prefer not to exercise their imaginations at all. They choose to remain comfortably within the bounds of their own experience, never troubling to wonder how it would feel to have been born other than they are. They can refuse to hear screams or to peer inside cages; they can close their minds and hearts to any suffering that does not touch them personally; they can refuse to know.

I might be tempted to envy people who can live that way, except that I do not think they have any fewer nightmares than I do. Choosing to live in narrow spaces can lead to a form of mental agoraphobia, and that brings its own terrors. I think the wilfully unimaginative see more monsters. They are often more afraid.

What is more, those who choose not to empathise may enable real monsters. For without ever committing an act of outright evil ourselves, we collude with it, through our own apathy.

One of the many things I learned at the end of that Classics corridor down which I ventured at the age of 18, in search of something I could not then define, was this, written by the Greek author Plutarch: What we achieve inwardly will change outer reality.

That is an astonishing statement and yet proven a thousand times every day of our lives. It expresses, in part, our inescapable connection with the outside world, the fact that we touch other people's lives simply by existing.
But how much more are you, Harvard graduates of 2008, likely to touch other people's lives? Your intelligence, your capacity for hard work, the education you have earned and received, give you unique status, and unique responsibilities. Even your nationality sets you apart. The great majority of you belong to the world's only remaining superpower. The way you vote, the way you live, the way you protest, the pressure you bring to bear on your government, has an impact way beyond your borders. That is your privilege, and your burden.

If you choose to use your status and influence to raise your voice on behalf of those who have no voice; if you choose to identify not only with the powerful, but with the powerless; if you retain the ability to imagine yourself into the lives of those who do not have your advantages, then it will not only be your proud families who celebrate your existence, but thousands and millions of people whose reality you have helped transform for the better. We do not need magic to change the world, we carry all the power we need inside ourselves already: we have the power to imagine better.

I am nearly finished. I have one last hope for you, which is something that I already had at 21. The friends with whom I sat on graduation day have been my friends for life. They are my children's godparents, the people to whom I've been able to turn in times of trouble, friends who have been kind enough not to sue me when I've used their names for Death Eaters. At our graduation we were bound by enormous affection, by our shared experience of a time that could never come again, and, of course, by the knowledge that we held certain photographic evidence that would be exceptionally valuable if any of us ran for Prime Minister.

So today, I can wish you nothing better than similar friendships. And tomorrow, I hope that even if you remember not a single word of mine, you remember those of Seneca, another of those old Romans I met when I fled down the Classics corridor, in retreat from career ladders, in search of ancient wisdom:

As is a tale, so is life: not how long it is, but how good it is, is what matters.

I wish you all very good lives.

Thank you very much.