Deathbed Tour
Arthur Rimbeaud was the quinessential French romantic poet, young and somewhat handsome, yet despondent and cholic, which towards the end of his life, was to prove a fatal 
combination. The young poet had caught the eye of Verlaine, his mentor of sorts and fled him to the wastelands of Egypt, Abyssine, as it was called in those Napoleonic heydays. There, he was to be a journalist of sorts, fall seriously ill and continue with his poetry while carried about in his deathbed. Among his anthology which we are bequeathed, "La Saisons des E'nfer", or the Seasons in Hell gained him fame. I think I first got acquainted with his poetry when reading the English Romantics, and chanced upon a comment on him, and when I read up, found myself remembering numb references from the days I read the whole Britannica. Definitely one of the best things to do for any young mind, is to pursue reading the encylopedia from bookend to bookend, or at least browse it.
The other definite benefit I was to enjoy later on when I was frequently travelling for work, was to visit the very places described into old, yellowed pages, and touch, smell, hear and swallow the minute of the experience of being actually there.
But as I myself crawl towards the inevitable death that awaits, in these good moments when drug or hormone, lisping voices of the past or sobering calls to awake from stupour, I do find myself venturing to those great places.
New Delhi is complete irony, and what I really liked best was being there in Spring, which is ideal and cool, with the misty light creating an atmospheric feel about those long tree-lined 
boulevards where the diplomatic houses are, and getting into one of the consulates for Mass in English. The roads, and its distinct pungent spicy odour almost reminds me of my childhood, except that the strength of the fould stench was never so thick. But there was a sense of familiarity about the scent, honestly. Singapore did not always smell like Hong Kong - the fragrant harbour!
It took me 4 and a half hours to get to New Delhi, and precise another 4 and a half hours by a rickety tour bus to Agra, just to visit the Red Fort, and the ethereal Taj Mahal. Walking around on the grounds, the fountains, and to enter into the cool shade of the white marble shrine, was incredible. I think that the commercial aspect of the guides and entry fee collectors robbed the grandeur and prime significance of the place from the experience of visiting and marvelling there. Even as I got into the tomb chamber, there is a sense that you are entering into some attraction concocted for the Disney tourist, or some prop backyard. The spirituality of a sacred resting place is "gone", perhaps because it was not a religious shrine but a monumental mausoleum.
Comparatively, the resting place of Saint Catherine Laboure of the Sisters of Charity at Rue 
du Bac in Paris, was by far less majestic, but because of the presence of her incorrupt body, you immediately sense the Divine. In the same chapel where her reliquary rests beneath a side altar, is the famed location where the Virgin Mary appeared to her in a series of apparitions and sat on the chair of the Mother Superior as they spoke, like Mother and Child. That 
splendid wooden chair is preserved at the corner of the chapel. It took me some effort to locate this small street, which despite the fame of the apparition that led to the popular "Miraculous Medal" being struck and used by many Catholics to honour the Immaculate Conception of the virgin Mary, the location is hardly known to most Parisians.
But once you have found the large wooden door and pushed it open, you immediately enter into a large space which leads to the chapel. The chapel itself is very, very splendid, baroque in flavour, but restrained somewhat because of the simplicity of the story of the apparitions. But to be in that same space where the heart of Saint Vincent de Paul is preserved and honoured, and in the actual location where this event took place was already the fulfilment of one lifetime's dream, honestly. I think I can happily accept the dread human fate more easily from having had the chance to touch the gold of the place which seems to be the foretaste of the better world.
In the same respect, I found myself very lucky. Cancer, asthma, diabetes, heart palpitations, the frame of a weakling, and all the vagaries of being so human and imperfect, is just a mind trap. I think the strangest thing is that all human being die, and it is weird that so many actually think they won't. If we were to understand that we all die, no matter when, surely then the way we care for others, and the way we relate with others, should matter much, much more?
What does it say about the myth that now pervades modern civilisation? The same it did with the Hellenists and Romans of lore, like all flatulent wealthy peoples, that Life is meant for merry-making, drunkeness and debauchery, simply because we will die. So despite the imminent death that looms over my head, what am I peacably managing my life and spiritual presence here in this liminal world for? I guess the physical effort is to give my own physiology a favourable chemical balance, and the reading and study is to steady the intellect, while the heart retreats in to the hermitage of poverty so that in the emptiness and absence it learns to be open to possibilities, the greatest of which, is love?
combination. The young poet had caught the eye of Verlaine, his mentor of sorts and fled him to the wastelands of Egypt, Abyssine, as it was called in those Napoleonic heydays. There, he was to be a journalist of sorts, fall seriously ill and continue with his poetry while carried about in his deathbed. Among his anthology which we are bequeathed, "La Saisons des E'nfer", or the Seasons in Hell gained him fame. I think I first got acquainted with his poetry when reading the English Romantics, and chanced upon a comment on him, and when I read up, found myself remembering numb references from the days I read the whole Britannica. Definitely one of the best things to do for any young mind, is to pursue reading the encylopedia from bookend to bookend, or at least browse it.
The other definite benefit I was to enjoy later on when I was frequently travelling for work, was to visit the very places described into old, yellowed pages, and touch, smell, hear and swallow the minute of the experience of being actually there.
But as I myself crawl towards the inevitable death that awaits, in these good moments when drug or hormone, lisping voices of the past or sobering calls to awake from stupour, I do find myself venturing to those great places.
New Delhi is complete irony, and what I really liked best was being there in Spring, which is ideal and cool, with the misty light creating an atmospheric feel about those long tree-lined 
boulevards where the diplomatic houses are, and getting into one of the consulates for Mass in English. The roads, and its distinct pungent spicy odour almost reminds me of my childhood, except that the strength of the fould stench was never so thick. But there was a sense of familiarity about the scent, honestly. Singapore did not always smell like Hong Kong - the fragrant harbour!
It took me 4 and a half hours to get to New Delhi, and precise another 4 and a half hours by a rickety tour bus to Agra, just to visit the Red Fort, and the ethereal Taj Mahal. Walking around on the grounds, the fountains, and to enter into the cool shade of the white marble shrine, was incredible. I think that the commercial aspect of the guides and entry fee collectors robbed the grandeur and prime significance of the place from the experience of visiting and marvelling there. Even as I got into the tomb chamber, there is a sense that you are entering into some attraction concocted for the Disney tourist, or some prop backyard. The spirituality of a sacred resting place is "gone", perhaps because it was not a religious shrine but a monumental mausoleum.
Comparatively, the resting place of Saint Catherine Laboure of the Sisters of Charity at Rue 
du Bac in Paris, was by far less majestic, but because of the presence of her incorrupt body, you immediately sense the Divine. In the same chapel where her reliquary rests beneath a side altar, is the famed location where the Virgin Mary appeared to her in a series of apparitions and sat on the chair of the Mother Superior as they spoke, like Mother and Child. That 
splendid wooden chair is preserved at the corner of the chapel. It took me some effort to locate this small street, which despite the fame of the apparition that led to the popular "Miraculous Medal" being struck and used by many Catholics to honour the Immaculate Conception of the virgin Mary, the location is hardly known to most Parisians.
But once you have found the large wooden door and pushed it open, you immediately enter into a large space which leads to the chapel. The chapel itself is very, very splendid, baroque in flavour, but restrained somewhat because of the simplicity of the story of the apparitions. But to be in that same space where the heart of Saint Vincent de Paul is preserved and honoured, and in the actual location where this event took place was already the fulfilment of one lifetime's dream, honestly. I think I can happily accept the dread human fate more easily from having had the chance to touch the gold of the place which seems to be the foretaste of the better world.
In the same respect, I found myself very lucky. Cancer, asthma, diabetes, heart palpitations, the frame of a weakling, and all the vagaries of being so human and imperfect, is just a mind trap. I think the strangest thing is that all human being die, and it is weird that so many actually think they won't. If we were to understand that we all die, no matter when, surely then the way we care for others, and the way we relate with others, should matter much, much more?
What does it say about the myth that now pervades modern civilisation? The same it did with the Hellenists and Romans of lore, like all flatulent wealthy peoples, that Life is meant for merry-making, drunkeness and debauchery, simply because we will die. So despite the imminent death that looms over my head, what am I peacably managing my life and spiritual presence here in this liminal world for? I guess the physical effort is to give my own physiology a favourable chemical balance, and the reading and study is to steady the intellect, while the heart retreats in to the hermitage of poverty so that in the emptiness and absence it learns to be open to possibilities, the greatest of which, is love?
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