Wednesday, July 26, 2006

Sadly, there's been a drought of interesting issues for me to blog about. When the most interesting part of school is finding out new and interesting things about your tutors you know something's wrong.

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Apparently, VS has started offering PE as an O-level subject! Like I said, a drought of interesting issues. This is the sort of thing the NCC and track people joke among themselves about after getting something like 24697267 points for their mid-years. Now that it's actually happened, it could be true that the world is starting to favour the muscleheads again.

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Looking at the English Language, many of the most powerful words have 3 letters. And I'm not talking about "AAA", "ABB", "OFF" or "FFF", I'm talking actual words this time. And one of the arguably most powerful words is that which is synonymous with the opposite of every MJC student's life right now : "fun".

Examining the word, "fun" started in Middle-age English as a modification on the "fool" or the jester. The noun describes a state of amusement. Fun is most often defined as an activite that brings joy to its participants.

However, much like everything else, the English language has evolved. We can say that "ponning lectures is fun", "Wilfred is a fun person" or "Econs tutorials are fun if you are a shameless masochist", but we've distorted the use of "fun" into an adjective. Now, you'd probably wonder how this is significant, but whoever started this must've had some fun opening up new paths for the English language. Similarly, as we live our lives we tend to try to optimize our enjoyment, participating in fresh history and blazing new trails for human fun. Yup, like it or not, every one of us is contributing to "fun", and probably having a whale of a time while we're at it.

To quote Oasis, "Life is a game we play." Now, the fun factor in life, much like any game, would then be directly related to the people who play. There are people who you laugh with and skip along the proverbial game board happily with, then there are people who seek to slip a hand under the game board and turn your game of life topsy-turvy, upside down and bouncing off the ceiling(Here's looking at you, econs teachers.).......and having fun doing it, probably. Then there are people who have fun competing at the highest level, be it playing poker, smacking a ball across a fairway or trying to become the next Iron Chef; Through the spirit of competition they find fun.

Now, don't be mistaken. A large deal of us will never be able to compete at that level unless the medium on competition is a test of mediocrity. For many of us, our amusement is much more quiet in nature. Now, the term "quiet" in itself spans many ways. It could mean simply screwing around on a daily basis(very evident), or quietly contemplating the truths of the world in your own little corner(not so).

The problem with life, however, is that it splits up into multiple areas. "fun" soon develops into competition, and soon life becomes about showing off your copious amounts of testosterone or estrogen, and soon, the meaning of "fun" is lost, as people have hobbies more associated with things like competition and maintaining a respectable social circle instead. This may be slightly confusing : While competition and winning can be fun, it isn't fun in itself when you get overly caught up with it. Indeed, the line is thin, but in pursuit of happiness as a result of "fun", it needs to be understood through experience first. Games should emphasise the fun factor first ; Save competition for the actual arena. Sure, a little friendly competition is inevitable, but you need to be playful when you're playing. Games should be a delight and a diversion from the actual competition that typically manifests itself in the education system of today. It shouldn't be a death sport for domination.

However, with fun and competition so close together in our lives, a very likely scenario is when the two get mingled, and you feel a deep sense of satisfaction when you hold your AAA certificate while your friend worries whether he'll make it to a university in the first place.

Indeed, fun has evolved not only in application but in realisation as well, which leads me to the fact that the world is slowly but surely degenerating. If a powerful word like "fun" can be distorted, what's protecting the rest of the world?

2 Comments:

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4:17 PM  
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7:23 PM  

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