In all of SE Asia, where is the woman who has any interests outside of primping if she is single and babies if she is married? My idea of love is that it is bandwidth. The greater the depth and profundity of communication, the greater the love. Great intimate sex is love. Opening in the eyes can be a high bandwidth experience. And there is a lot more of us that yearns to communicate. Music, literature, philosophy, art, poetry, sports, martial arts, meditation. There are so many interesting avenues of growth and exploration. These endeavors change a person, if pursued with passion. Just about any endeavor can change a person, if it is pursued with passion.
So where are the interesting arts in Asia? What hobbies foster the development of personality, culture, and soul? Someone, please, someone, answer me.
Many people of different cultures call each other savages. To the Thais we are savages. To many of us the Thais seem savage. But do we have any gauges that can work cross-culturally? Is there a way to measure development cross-culturally? Many will be surprised, perhaps even shocked, perhaps even histrionically livid to hear that yes, there are many empirically validated means of testing development, along more than 10 cross-cultural lines of human potential. People grow up, and we grow up in a consistent pattern of stages, no matter what culture you are from. We may have all been born equal, but not all of us develop equal.
A very interesting read that goes into lines of development is A Brief History of Everything by Ken Wilber.
For all the egalitarians out there, go ahead and apologize for anyone that is developmentally disabled. They lacked resources. They lacked societal supports. Yup. They very likely did. Then go ahead and take a breath, and look around. At the beginning and end of the day, deep down, under our skin, we are different people. Different levels of testosterone providing different levels of aggression and sexual desire. Different levels of training allowing for different levels of diplomacy. Different averages of IQ of our parents and forefathers allowing for different potential processing speeds of our own gray CPUs. Whatever our theories, we have to test them against what we can experience. We test by measurement, and we don’t all measure equally. Not fair, but that doesn’t mean not true. We all may be equally deserving, but let’s not take that correct and respectable spiritual intuition too far to mean that we are therefore all the same, in a relative sense.
It seems to me that much of what is required to develop as a person to average western standards is not here in the culture of Thailand. The society does not allow what is needed for emotional development. You can’t talk about emotions with others here, so you therefore can not develop from an impulsive individual to a reasonable one. You are your emotions, you are not seeing your emotions. If you are having an emotion, it is because there is an outward cause, so you should fix the outward cause. Self reflexivity is not developed here. Rational thought as well as creativity are also actively stifled here. So even if you wind up with a genius girlfriend of good family and expensive education, her gifts aren’t likely to have been well fostered.
Has anyone met a SE Asian woman who could improvise an interesting fictional story?
Has anyone met a SE Asian woman who can discuss literature – who reads literature – who knows what is or is not literature? In the city I used to live in a good proportion of the women I met had not only read Ken Wilber, but could have an actual discussion about how his ideas related to their life. I have yet to have an actual discussion with a SE Asian woman. I do soliloquies, for my own entertainment. I’ve long ago given up on getting any sort of novel feedback. I’m just happy if they understand the words I’m saying. If the level of conversation requires anything that I would call thinking, they will nod earnestly and look at you in the eyes, as if being a good and agreeable woman was what you were looking to get from the conversation.
Being in Asia, for many of us, is to be frustrated. Or worse yet, to forget why we were once frustrated. Well, that’s going too far. I’m lucky that I have good falang friends to talk to – so those needs for communication are being met. A person can adapt. But I can’t imagine marrying a Thai woman. I want a woman who gets my jokes, and who makes me laugh also. Someone with which I can speak at my own level and not need to translate down to and up from child’s level. I need more than a 56kbps connection. I like to be inspired.
