The Reader

Dear Diary,

Happy Chinese New Year! Time really flies, isn’t it? Today was a nice relaxing day after two days of visitations. We had some reunion with our paternal and maternal relatives on separate occasions for the last two days. Although it was nice to see the cousins after such a long while and to get updates on how they are, it is also a sad reality that we have grown more and more distant over the years. Sigh... Had also been eating a lot since that reunion dinner buffet on Chinese New Year eve (Sunday 25 Jan 09)! So this morning, I went for a quick 20-lap swim at the Kallang Basin Swimming Complex to try to ease my guilt for eating too much recently. The tummy is fast becoming visible but fear not, because a horrid 2-week military reservist in-camp training awaits me from next Monday onwards (2 Feb). It will end on Valentine’s Day... not that I have a date on that day though, haha...

Met up with a friend after the swim and I suggested catching the movie “The Reader” starring Kate Winslet as Hanna Schmitz, an illiterate and former SS guard at Auschwitz, a famous German concentration camp during WWII. It is the first R-21 rating film I ever watched at the movies! It has been almost 8 years since I am eligible to watch R-21 movies but I did not feel the need to watch any until this. Separately, I have only caught three M-18 movies; “The Passion of the Christ”, “Apocalypto” and “Rachel Getting Married”. Anyway, “The Reader” movie was tastefully done despite having a couple of sexual scenes between characters played by Kate Winslet and David Kross (Michael Berg) initially. As the plot developed, it was a pretty emotionally-gripping story and at times tear-jerking. It showed a former SS guard as a “victim” rather than a perpetrator and this was augmented when she was so ashamed of her illiteracy that she took up responsibility for the bulk of the crime, letting those with greater share of responsibility escape full accountability.

When Michael watched Hanna get convicted more than her share of crime, it must have struck him so badly emotionally because he was a law student sitting in the court and having full knowledge that she was not guilty of such a role since she was obviously functionally illiterate. How many times have we also in our own lives, remain spectators and not doing what is right? This movie also subtly showed how fornication can scar the lives of individuals and affect their relationships with others in the years ahead. I won’t continue describing the story except to tell you that it is worth catching. I hope Kate Winslet gets an award for this movie.

Had fish-and-chip set lunch at Manhattan Fish Market and it was really affordable! Checked out two business schools in the afternoon and if I pass my job probation (>95% chance I estimate, haha) in February, I should be applying for the part-time Masters. Okay, got to go and sleep now since I have to go for a medical vocation refresher training in the army tomorrow. It will be setting up IV drips and doing CPR again. Hope you have a wonderful day tomorrow. Mine won’t be too wonderful, haha...

God Bless,

Andrew