Last night at around 8.30pm while I was happily playing Warbook and Battlestations! on Facebook, The Married Soldier called in, saying that he wanted get The Changed Man and myself to chill out together. He drove and picked me up at around 9.30pm and we headed off to The Changed Man's place to choose a movie there.
After much thinking, the three of us decided to watch Lions For Lambs, a movie starring Tom Cruise, about war, politics, ideology and courage. Since there was still some time before the late night movie began, the three of us hung out at The Changed Man's place to look at his Facebook friends and we had quite some fun debating about who are the prettier friends on his friends list.
We then headed out to Bukit Merah's ABC Market because the Changed Man did not have his dinner yet and they ordered some noodles there. I could not find any prata stall still opening at 11pm so I settled to wait for my nachos during the movie.
The movie was quite nice actually, not because there was plenty of fighting and shooting but because of the intense and engaging conversations between the actors as they tried to convince one another who is right or wrong and what is to be done about the war on terror. There was action, of course, and it was quite touching to see how two young American college students (Michael Pena and Derek Luke) decided to enlist into the US Marines Corps to fight for what they believed mattered to them - participating in a war that has a purpose and meaning to themselves. Against all odds in the harsh and bitter cold mountains of Afghanistan, both of them, encircled by Taliban troops, gave everything they could to fight for whatever dignity and pride they had with them.
The interview between a US Senator (Tom Cruise) and a senior reporter (Meryl Streep) was very intense as both of them tried to sniff out the weaknesses and mistakes made by each other in their assessment of the still on-going war on terror. There were many mistakes made on the war on terror but the ideological and humanity reasons to keep trying to win the war were equally compelling.
The meeting between a US Professor (Robert Redford) and a brilliant but disillusioned student was also very good because the former was trying to bring the student to realize that by complaining and escaping from the reality of facing one's potential was a waste of precious life. I like one of his lines in response to "What does it matter if the outcome is most likely to be the same?"--- "At least you did something".
My afterthoughts were: Wars are ugly and nobody likes dying in them either. Nobody can say they have made perfect decisions in wars either and there are always plenty of room for mistakes, regrets and improvements to be made in that very next skirmish or even ideological conflict.
The bottom-line is: What does one do about it? Whine and lament or get something done so that the eventual outcome can be engraved in one's heart and mind and conscience that one had at least tried accomplishing, no matter what happens eventually.
"The only thing necessary for the triumph
of evil is for good men to do nothing."
Card Game at MacCafe: Saboteur
The Married Soldier likes board games and card games alot so after the movie, we went to a MacCafe and ordered more supper - cakes and drinks. We settled down for a new card game that he had brought along last night called Saboteur.
It's a game in which players are dwarven gold-diggers trying to find a gold treasure 8 cards positions away on the table but there is also a possible saboteur trying to stop the gold-diggers from reaching the gold reason. The catch is that the unnamed saboteur is one of the players and everyone else would have to try and second-guess who the saboteur is whilst trying to reach the gold treasure before all the tunneling cards run out or the tunnels were permanently blocked from the gold treasure.
The three of us played two rounds and we had quite a lot of fun (at least I did =P) because for the first round, all three of us were actually gold-diggers, as none of us drawn the saboteur card but I was having fun fooling the two of them because I kept using obstacle cards to block their access to the three possible destinations of gold treasure, frightening them into lots of counter-measuring actions and throughout the entire first round, both of them actually believed I was the saboteur, which to their utter surprise at the end of the round, was not! Hahaha.
The second round was even more fun because I had drawn the saboteur card but I pretended that I was a gold-digger and both The Changed Man and The Married Soldier were so utterly convinced by my front for the second round that they thought each other was the saboteur instead. I was playing very dangerous by actually contributing to the tunneling process and the two guys were trying to play each other out, blocking each other all the way for the entire round until all our cards ran out. I won the second round hands down since the gold treasure belonged to the saboteur if nobody could reach the treasure in time before the cards ran out!
Two expensive but quite sinfully delicious cakes at the MacCafe. I did not order any cakes because I was initially very full but I kept stealing theirs because I am a chocoholic!
We were trying to figure out the obstacles cards (centre), which could prevent a player from tunnelling from starting point (left most card) to the possible gold treasure destinations (the three golden cards on the right most). The rule booklet was pretty hard to understand at first.
3rd Anniversary of Strength and Determination:
Today is a special occasion because I am celebrating an important event, which marked three years of sheer strength and determination over a delicate process of balance, which I am proud to part of.
The process of balance had its ups and downs and etched very powerful and valuable learning lessons and experiences which I will never forget but I am glad all the participants are still going strong and steady. Although I cannot reveal what the celebration is for because it's confidential, I do hope that the readers of my blog can nevertheless share in my delight and joy in celebrating the continued survival of something of great meaning and purpose in my life.
Hope everyone will have a great weekend ahead!
Personally, I think I am a traditionalist in celebrating events and stuff. It's just something within the cake (not forgetting that I like eating cakes) and the candles that I feel magical about - like the candles gave hope and renewed strength in the occasion and the satisfaction enjoying what one has accomplished thus far.
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