The one about Valentine's...

A lot has been said about how commercialised Valentine's Day has become. I just wanna defend it a little.

First a tad of boring history on who this bloke Valentine was...

One legend contends that Valentine was a priest who served during the third century in Rome. When Emperor Claudius II decided that single men made better soldiers than those with wives and families, he outlawed marriage for young men -- his crop of potential soldiers. Valentine, realizing the injustice of the decree, defied Claudius and continued to perform marriages for young lovers in secret. When Valentine's actions were discovered, Claudius ordered that he be put to death.

His memory is celebrated every February 14th by "lovers" all over the world. Many allege that businesses (florists, chocolatiers, giftshops and restaurants to name a few) take advantage of this need to express one's love and make a killing on sale of their sought-after goods or services.

If we just take a step back and see the simple romantism of the day; we can see that the significance is symbolic but the logic is inescapable. With most men still unable to outwardly express themselves to their women, its the one chance in a year that the girls get to "force" some kind of emotional projection from their significant other. True, the age of the metrosexual male is upon us and we do see many emulating the suave sensitivity of present day gentlemen but there exists in the very corners of our concrete jungles, the "real man". The guy who knows what he wants, is assured and ruthless in nature yet crumble like hot apple pie when confronted with the prospect of a mushy moment with someone he desires.

So we have Valentine's Day - the time when I see tough, no nonsense guys clutching life-size teddy bears and pretty bow-tied boxes stuffed into "Lovely Lace" paper bags; the regular clueless straight guy dressed (albeit a little "jinjang"ly) to the nines, holding his companion's arm walking along the most happening places in town and even some who are so hopelessly in love that would even consent to the idea of wearing matching clothes or T-shirts! And why not! if there's even the slightest reason to celebrate the whole concept of love, then so be it. Victor Hugo said, "What a grand thing, to be loved! What a grander thing still, to love!".

We celebrated our Valentine's at Rama's new "Spice & Rice" Restaurant along with Jinny & KH. We met Pam & Wei Lin there too with some other friends. It was a good good meal which we enjoyed thoroughly. Later we braved the jam to get to Gurney Plaza and met up with the others - Stacy, Mel & Naomi and Sue Khoon & Yan too.

Jo & I


Jinny & KH