Transmillennial

We all have those light and momentary crushes, those fleeting moments in which you thought you might just possibly have almost but not quite fallen for someone, but in which it was somehow decided that this was not the best and not to be. For a very short time this morning, I was reminded of that.

As most great stories begin, there was a boy, and there was a girl. She was really beautiful when she was 18, and continues to be. It's her birthday today, and suddenly we are all much older and I have realised that we never really got to know each other. Which is a fine thing, and probably a good thing. But of course, we will never know, having never really known.

The point really is that the large majority of our lives was lived in the last millennium. So far, seven years in this one (or eight by the count of some people) have passed, and that is not a lot; 20% or less of the lifetime we have lived so far. Somehow, it is easier to look at the arc of time, the span of years, the bridge already crossed – and say, hey, it was all in the last millennium. All is forgiven, mostly forgotten, the changing of 19xx to 20xx has washed things away.

And although in one's quieter and more melancholic moments one might think not, most of the time it is good, it is pleasant that things have worked out the way they have. In the past, as it is today, the best is yet to be.

Things To Do

The tumult and the shouting dies,
The captains and the kings depart;
Still stands Thine ancient sacrifice:
An humble and a contrite heart.

Kipling wrote these line a very long time ago, it seems, in his masterly poem Recessional. But as I walked out of the venerable hallways (a mere one-sixth the age of the Old Home itself) I realised that this is one of the foundation stones of the whole edifice. We as an institution have done well, but there are still areas for improvement.

Here are a few notes buzzing inside my head.

1. Surely we need not be so wasteful and inefficient in terms of time management. The effectiveness is there, but the pontificating should not take a week. (Etymological note: Latin pontifex, modern 'pontiff', means 'bridge-builder'.) In fact, the more we approach the 'just in time' paradigm, the more we will become like Toyota and other successful and intelligent corporations, where there is little unnecessary make-work.

2. The skills need to be taught more effectively. It cannot be true that extremely close and detailed supervision is something that is a sign of the self-directed learner. And it isn't always successful either. Sometimes, you need to have more experience as a supervisor and the student needs to require less supervision. Idle bums.

3. Knowledge can be over-compartmentalised. And also spammed. It is ridiculous for humans to chew up food, digest it, make it into neat lumps, and then feed it to others to eat. But this is what happens in most academic classes worldwide. Need it be that way here as well? I hope not.

4. Knowledge is a vast net, a great tapestry. But what happens is that people are making snapshots and passing them off as the real thing. The idea of weaving a large tapestry appears too daunting simply because the likely instructors are limited to hand-waving and knitting of small baby items, it can appear. Thank goodness this is not always true.

5. I am very optimistic about the future. I have great respect for the past. What presents itself as the truth tends to require both these perspectives in order for people to understand it and to feel secure about it. Only insecure people seek to control information without spending the necessary time to teach people about information in the first place. If anything, that is the one thing I am not so optimistic about.

Towards the end of Kipling's poem, he writes:

If, drunk with sight of power, we loose
Wild tongues that have not Thee in awe –
Such boastings as the Gentiles use,
Or lesser breeds without the Law –

Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget – lest we forget!

Amen.

Recessional

I remember mentioning Kipling's Recessional once before. My father, a scholar of Anglo-Indian history, first introduced me to Kipling as a child-care agent: he would leave me with a volume of Kipling in his office while he went off to teach on days when nobody was around to look after me.

One day, I encountered the lyrical words of this grand hymn to decolonisation. It is a little dated now, but some of its lines have got that chill of fallen grandeur and fading sunsets. I remembered it today because I was in a fin de siecle sort of mood. And so was Gnomus.

Well, here it is, this relic of a bygone age. Perhaps we look back to a better age, not realising that the best is yet to be.

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Recessional

God of our fathers, known of old,
Lord of our far-flung battle-line,
Beneath whose awful Hand we hold
Dominion over palm and pine
Lord God of Hosts be with us yet,
Lest we forget - lest we forget!

The tumult and the shouting dies;
The Captains and the Kings depart:
Still stands Thine ancient sacrifice,
An humble and a contrite heart.
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget - lest we forget!

Far-called, our navies melt away;
On dune and headland sinks the fire:
Lo, all our pomp of yesterday
Is one with Nineveh and Tyre!
Judge of the Nations, spare us yet,
Lest we forget - lest we forget!

If, drunk with sight of power, we loose
Wild tongues that have not Thee in awe,
Such boastings as the Gentiles use,
Or lesser breeds without the Law
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget - lest we forget!

For heathen heart that puts her trust
In reeking tube and iron shard,
All valiant dust that builds on dust,
And guarding, calls not Thee to guard,
For frantic boast and foolish word
Thy mercy on Thy People, Lord!