Bong Joon-ho's Mother (2009) and Okja (2017)

During this circuit breaker period, we can finally catch up on shows and awesome films! Last week, I watched Okja and this week I watched Mother. Both were so damn good! So I'm going to review them in the same post since they were made by the same director. One left me in tears and one left me feeling mentally exhausted. Even though they are pretty different films, both made me feel that society is rather screwed up.

Okja (2017)

My friend Michelle recommended this movie to me and my friends while we were chatting on Zoom. She warned that after watching this movie, you might not wanna eat pork anymore.

Basically, Okja is the name of a genetically modified super-pig that was created by a company called Mirando Corporation, headed by Lucy Mirando. We are introduced to her in the first scene and she looks like Willy Wonka all dressed in white. She appears in front of press to explain her plans for the super-pigs that are supposedly going to revolutionize the industry. It sounds too good to be true and it is: she's pretending that everything is done naturally but it is all a lie. The pigs are test subjects and they were created in a laboratory. When Okja was recaptured, they attempted to force her to mate (probably weren't successful), tortured her, and got a chunk of meat from her for taste tests. Ugh.

That already says a lot about big businesses, the food industry and capitalism in general. So on the other side, we have the Animal Liberation Front (ALF), which isn't a made up company like Mirando. IRL, they have been criticised for being violent terrorists who break the law in the name of helping animals. I'm not familiar with the work they do, but well, they weren't portrayed as the good guys either. (There's always a lot of grey area in Bong Joon-ho's films, which is why they are so popular)

Anyway, the protagonist of the film is Mija, a girl who lives with her grandfather on a farm, which is situated in the mountains. She's extremely close to Okja and the pig even saved her life instead of letting her fall from a cliff. Then in comes folks from the Mirando Corporation, including a crazy celebrity slash zoologist called Dr. Johnny Wilcox, played by none other than Jake Gyllenhaal. They inspect Okja and whisk her off to New York because she's the biggest pig and therefore the winner of the super-pig competition Lucy came up with ten years ago! When asked about his methods, grandpa said he just let her roam around freely. Free-range pork ftw!

Anyway, Mija leaves home and tries to get Okja back at all costs. As a character, she is portrayed to be an innocent girl who doesn't know what awaits her in the real world. It is easy to root for her because she just wants her pet pig back. It is her best friend and they grew up together! 

When the ALF swoop in to help her, they propose letting Okja get recaptured so that they can plant a camera on her and get videos of what really goes on in Mirando's facility. Jay, the leader, asks for her permission to go ahead with their mission - but she flatly declines and says that Okja should go home with her. This is no surprise. As mentioned earlier, Mija's goal is simple: get the pig and go home! But the Korean dude, K, mistranslates this on purpose and claims that she allows it.

On the other side, Lucy Mirando is pissed that the pig escaped in the first place. Their company would definitely suffer, so it is decided that they fly Mija to New York to see Okja in order to pretend that they actually care about her and her pig. They want to save the company from this PR disaster. Mija has not much of a choice but to go along with both the ALF and Mirando's plans. Even though none of this was surprising, it really irked me to see that all these adults were taking advantage of a young girl's wishes.

Mija and Okja are to meet on stage at a parade organised by Mirando - basically a huge marketing campaign. All hell breaks loose when the ALF reveals their presence by showing everyone a video of Oka being tortured. The members of the ALF try to help recapture Okja but most of them are arrested, except Jay and K. Thankfully, Jay insists on helping Mija and they drive to the slaughterhouse. It is a huge place and we immediately see a huge number of super-pigs kept in fences. Mija and the other two guys search for Okja desperately.

The scariest part of the movie is when Mija, in her search, realises that Okja is in the line of pigs headed up the ramp into the slaughterhouse. She goes in and sees meat hanging from above and blood dripping to the floor. Most of us don't wanna see how our food is being processed. We don't wanna know if it was genetically modified. Like what Nancy Mirando said when she took over from her twin sister Lucy: if it's cheap, they'll eat it. 

Thankfully, the person who is about to kill Okja stops when Mija shows up with a photograph of her and her pig. But Nancy appears too, all Cruella-De-Vil like, with her henchmen holding Jay and K back. She still intends to slaughter the pig because it is her property. Mija only convinces her to let Okja go when she buys Oka using the golden pig that her grandfather had given her as a present. Ugh. Typical.

The walk out of the slaughterhouse is basically the saddest part of the movie. Before this scene, there were plenty of jokes and funny moments in the movie. We met larger-than-life, comical characters like Lucy and Dr Johnny Wilcox (who both seem to have serious mental health issues by the way) and hilarious ALF members, including that one guy who doesn't eat much because he doesn't want to leave a carbon footprint on earth. It is clear that the director is making fun of vegans, animal rights activists, and greedy capitalists who take things to the extreme.

Mija walking Okja out of the slaughterhouse should be considered a victory. She finally got what she wanted. But it is not a victory at all and this was where I started crying. And no, I didn't just tear up. I cried until my nose was red. As she was escorted out, the other pigs were crying out in fear and in pain as they continued the killings. And unlike in other kid-friendly movies where the animals all get busted out of their cages and set free (see Rio 2011), this movie is way more realistic and that doesn't happen even if the evil villains seem one-dimensional and cartoon-ish. 

This scene is made sadder when two pigs, clearly a mother pig and a father pig, push their baby pig towards Okja to save it from its doom. Okja keeps the little one in her mouth and they somehow manage to smuggle the extra pig all the way back to South Korea. The ending may seem like a happy one since Okja is reunited with Mija and they are seen hanging out in the countryside again with the piglet. Yet it is anything but. Mija has been exposed to the cruel world out there but does not have the power to change things. Everything goes on as usual. 

I think having Mija as the young and innocent protagonist makes a lot of sense. Most of us can relate to the love she has for Okja, maybe because we are animal lovers and we have pets of our own. And most of us, at the back of our minds, know that animals are abused but we can't do much about it either. All we can do is to protect our own.

Mother (2009)

This movie is much, much darker than Okja. We are introduced to the main characters: a mother who lives with her intellectually-disabled son. It is never really specified what disability Do-joon has, but he is called a "retard" and an "idiot" throughout the movie, which gets him all riled up. He seems like an innocent boy who is simply slow and forgetful. He listens to his mom but is having a bit of a rebellious teenage phase. They are poor but they get by in their small neighbourhood. But then, a murder takes place and he's blamed for it, so his mother investigates and tries to clear his name.

For most of the film, we are led to believe that Do-joon is innocent. He was drunk when he followed the girl down that empty path and he did not mean to harm her in any way. With this notion of innocence firmly attached in our minds, we root for Do-joon's mother as she conducts her own investigation. At first the mother (and therefore the audience) thinks that the murder was committed by his friend, Jin-tae, who is a bad influence. When she's wrong, she gets a lawyer (an asshole whom she fires later), asks other women about the dead girl (Moon Ah-jung) when she gives them acupuncture, and bribes kids with coins for information as well.

We continue rooting for the mother when she and Jin-tae aggressively question some asshole punks about Ah-jung, who sounded like the village slut because she had sex with many guys and took compromising pictures of them, which she keeps in her precious phone. The boys were out looking for the phone but no one knows where it is. We root for her when she shows the pictures to Do-joon who's in jail, and he finally remembers an old guy whom he saw in the abandoned building who might be the murderer. Then, the movie reaches its climax when the mother enters the old dude's house, pretending to be someone from a charitable organisation who gives free acupuncture services.

This is when the plot twist happens. I did not see it coming at all, which is why I found it so brilliant: the old junk collector (or garung kuni) was hoping that acupuncture would allow him to forget a traumatising scene that he had witnessed. He unwittingly tells the mother what he had seen the night of the murder. The girl, creeped out by Do-joon, throws a rock in his direction and it lands at his feet. She calls him a retard. He throws the rock back and he hits her in the head. She bleeds. He carries her up to the roof and leaves her there to die.

The mother is shocked to learn that her son is actually a murderer. She says that Do-joon might be released, so the old man picks up the phone in order to tell the police what he had witnessed. But it's too late: he gets clobbered to death with a large metal tool and his house gets burned down. The mother has become a murderer. Her goal and intention is still to save her son and get him out of jail, but there is a huge difference between getting an innocent man off death row, and letting a murderer get out of jail scot-free.

As a result of this scene, the audience has to re-evaluate the way they perceive this mother. Looking back, I realise that I was completely wrong about her. We actually don't know much about the mother. Sure, we know what she does for a living and that she sleeps next to her son at night, but apart from that, we don't know who she really is. We don't even know her name!

It can be inferred that the mother is actually someone who is or used to be mentally ill and once had suicidal thoughts. This is evident when it is revealed that she once tried to poison Do-joon and herself with insecticide when he was five. When Do-joon confronts her about it, she goes completely off the rails and screams. She asks if she's allowed to perform acupuncture on him to make him forget about the incident, but obviously she can't. This makes me think that she was responsible for Do-joon's intellectual disability. It is unclear whether or not he was born with a disability, but consuming insecticide might have made it worse. And mum's acupuncture method might have made him the forgetful person he is as well.

Another major theme in the movie is the idea that society and the systems in place have failed us. At first, you'd think that the system has failed because the police had Do-joon, someone with an intellectual disability, sign a confession for a crime he didn't commit because he later told his mother that he didn't do it. However, at the end, the system did fail because Do-joon, the murderer is released and the police captured someone called Crazy JP, who was mentioned by some kids the mother questioned earlier and said to be Ah-jung's boyfriend who escaped from a sanatorium. They arrested him as they found her blood on his shirt or something. Crazy JP said she had a nose bleed, and we know that this is probably true because in a flashback, they showed Ah-jung and her friend entering a printing shop for some photos and when she had a nose bleed, her friend was like, "Not again!"

Apart from the police failing to catch the right criminal, lawyers are seen as jerks who have no time to sit down for a chat but have all the time in the world to drink and have fun with hostesses at a seedy karaoke place. The old junk collector was an asshole too: he told the mother about the murder that he had witnessed but he did not rush to Ah-jung's aid when Do-joon, the creepy drunk dude, was following her. He left out the actual reason why he was in the abandoned house in the first place: to meet Ah-jung and have sex with her like they had planned, which was why his picture was in her phone and why he had brought rice for her as payment. He could have prevented a murder or called an ambulance in time! 

Lastly, society has failed to look out for those who live on the margins. The mother visits Crazy JP and cries out of guilt when she realises that he has no family to look out for him. The system simply swapped someone out with an intellectual disability for another, since it's easy to pin the blame on them. The police concluded that Crazy JP tried to rape Ah-jung because didn't believe that Ah-jung would have consensual sex with him either. It is also clear that the mother is poor but resourceful enough to get enough money for the lawyer, and to pay Jin-tae to help with her investigation. Ah-jung's family lived on the margins too. Ah-jung had to take care of her grandmother, who was described as a "crazy old lady who walked around with rice wine". This also explains why she was known as the "rice cake girl" because she sold her body for rice and brought it home for her grandmother. Instead of helping her family out, society (or in this case men) sexually abused her, which is probably why she kept pictures of them for her own protection. 

Both families lack a father figure as well, which puts them at a disadvantage since we live in a patriarchal society. Do-joon's masculinity is also questioned by Ah-jung, and Do-joon seems rather hung up on the fact that he has not had sex with a girl before.

A scene that was rather strange was when Do-joon went back home to sleep next to his mother, but he placed a hand on her boob and she didn't mind. It was a scene pretty early on and I didn't think much about it but I found it weird. After the movie, I realise that this symbolises their unhealthy relationship. When the mother went off the rails, she screamed, "I was going to kill both of us! You and me are one!" 

This is an incredibly unhealthy way of thinking. You are your own person. Some parents think that what their child does reflects who they are. Sure, sometimes it does, but sometimes it doesn't. But you can't always be responsible for them and protect them forever. In this case, perhaps the mother did teach her son to be violent. She has violent tendencies of her own and her son exhibits those tendencies too. Whenever someone calls him a "retard", he lunges at them and lashes out. He even killed Ah-jung for saying that. When he gets beaten up in jail, she tells him off and he retorts that she was the one who told him to hit people if they bullied him. However, two wrongs don't make a right. He should've realised that name-calling shouldn't warrant attention, but his overprotective mother might have prevented him from learning this lesson earlier in life.

The mother's actions could also be interpreted as self-serving. Perhaps when Do-joon was diagnosed with a disability, people in their small town said that it might be heredity and thus she might have also been labelled as a "retard". She doesn't want an additional stigma: to be seen as the mother of a retard AND a murderer. She doesn't want to others to think that she had not taught him well. She tells everyone that her son wouldn't hurt a fly, because that is also how she wants society to see her: as an innocent old lady who wouldn't harm others. But when the idealistic image that she has of her son is shattered, she couldn't handle the truth and in that moment, decided to stoop to his level and also become a murderer - because they are one. It is an extremely unhealthy symbiotic relationship, and others have pointed out that this is similar to Norman Bates in Hitchcock's Psycho.

Later, Do-joon gets out of jail and his friends pick him up. They stop by the junk collector's blackened and burnt house to see if they'll find anything interesting. Do-joon finds his mother's acupuncture kit and returns it to her. Understandably, she is shocked to see her charred metal box because it is evidence that she was there. Do-joon tells her to "be careful" and I think he doesn't realise that the phrase could mean two things. It could be an innocent reminder to be careful and not leave your stuff lying around, or could be an insidious way of saying that he suspects she killed the old man and she should be careful not to leave evidence behind. Ultimately, it sounds like the former, but the mother still freaks out.

The importance of one's memory features in the film heavily. The characters in the film want to forget about the bad things that have happened as mentioned earlier through the use of acupuncture. But Do-joon's mother has to press her son to remember what he had done the night of the murder. This is a problem right from the start, when his friend kicked down a car's side mirror but claims that Do-joon did it. Do-joon didn't deny it and so his mother had to compensate for the damage caused to the car. In the film, we also see Do-joon walking around drunk but the scene cuts back to how he got home and fell asleep, implying that he had forgotten what had happened in between.

When Do-joon got out of jail and returned home to eat with his mother, he said that perhaps the killer left the body on the roof so that everyone in town would be able to see her and get help. He says this so innocently and doesn't realise that he's justifying his own actions. This was what the police were baffled about as well. But Do-joon doesn't remember committing the crime just like how it took him years for him to remember about his mother poisoning him. These traumatic episodes are blocked out by his brain.

At the end, when the mother boards a bus that is meant take parents out on a trip and relax, she decided to use acupuncture to forget the bad stuff and joins the middle-aged ladies who are dancing in the bus. The film starts with the mother dancing in the field and ends with her dancing in the bus. It is supposed to be a happy dance or maybe even a victory dance. A dance of freedom. But since the audience knows the truth, watching her dance is unsettling.

The film is meant to be dark and disturbing. It can be argued that everything the mother does (poisoning her son, killing a man etc) is all for the sake of her child. She will go to great lengths just to ensure that her son is safely out of jail, whether he committed the crime or not. Do you agree with her methods? Would you do the same if you were in her shoes? Would you clean up after your child's mess like the mother did when she tried to cover up the Do-joon's pee on the floor?

Personally, I wouldn't. I think that the right thing to do would be to bring her own child to justice. You have to let go. You can't protect your child forever. Let him bear the responsibility of his actions, whatever they may be. But then again, I'm no mother, so what do I know? 

5 Reasons Why I Hated PE Lessons

I posted a poll on IG stories and most of you wanted me to blog about why I hated PE lessons so here you go!

1. Male PE Teachers

Looking back, I realise that none of my PE teachers were females. All of them were males! When I was younger I didn't know about gender inequality and didn't realise how many girls are discouraged from sport etc etc, and so I didn't think much about the fact that there aren't many female PE teachers. But now it makes sense. I can only remember one female PE teacher who taught us netball, but she wasn't actually my teacher. She was just conducting a session for us so that we could get our badge (I was in St. John).

And okay, not all of the male PE teachers were bad. In primary school, my favourite teacher was my English teacher who was my PE teacher too. And he allowed us to choose what we wanted to do and he even tried to teach us baseball, which I think all of us sucked at but at least it was something new.

I can only recall 4 PE teachers I've had, and all of them were totally different. There's one who was an awesome teacher (whom I just mentioned in the previous paragraph), and one who was friendly and encouraging. But then there's one who pretty much was just there to do his job and did everything by the book, and then there's one whom I hate and think should not have graduated from NIE in the first place. (See this post)

Male PE teachers also have a bad reputation for being perverts. Just look at the way Coach Carr was depicted in Mean Girls.

But that's not my experience and not the reason why I dislike male PE teachers.

For me, the main reason is basically how awkward it is to tell them that you're on your period. As an awkward teenage girl, how are you supposed to tell your male PE teacher about that? What do you say?

"Erm, sir, I can't do PE today because I just got my period last night and it's a super heavy flow and I have cramps that make me want to curl up and die? If this was the sixth day of my period I would take part in the activities, but I really can't today. It is just so disgusting to bleed and sweat in a large pad, and it's not like we have any time to shower after that."

Thankfully we obviously did not have to go into such detail and we would just say that we have our periods rather briefly and they'd leave us alone. But you can just tell from the looks of some teachers that they are completely judging us and don't believe us 100% that we have their periods because there's no way for them to check. Which is why it is so damn awkward!

This also leads me to my next reason.


2. Anxiety

I always felt anxious and nervous whenever there was a PE lesson coming up. And when I feel anxious, my stomach gets queasy. Like Chidi, from The Good Place.

Anyway, normally, PE lessons take place in the early morning or in the late afternoon.

I think I am a little lactose intolerant or something, but I didn't know this back then. My mother would make me drink some milo before going to school and this would give me a stomachache. I'd end up in the toilet in the morning. If I was lucky, I'd have the urge to go before morning assembly. Sometimes it was after morning assembly and before first period. Once, I had to stop singing the national anthem mid-way and just GO. It was embarrassing.

So sometimes, I might miss the first part of the PE lesson, and when I return from the washroom, the teacher would look at me like I was trying to skip the lesson.

And I didn't just end up in the washroom in the morning. Sometimes, after running for a while, I would feel like going to the washroom as well. And again, when I returned, the teacher would look at me in a judgemental way. But I had no choice right? Did they expect me to poop my pants? Nobody told me that there was such a thing as "runner's stomach". (Just thinking about all of this gives me anxiety wtf)

And obviously, when there's PE, it means that we have to bring our PE attire.

If you knew me when I was in school, you'd know that I'm the kind of student who would avoid getting into trouble. But there's a good reason why I felt anxious about PE lessons to the point that by the time I was in JC, I would sometimes "accidentally" forget to bring my PE attire so that I could just sit the lesson out.

Every PE lesson can be anxiety-inducing and traumatising because it can feel as if every single person in the vicinity is watching your every move. It's not just your classmates, but also other classes nearby having PE, other people walking around the school compound, and other students having lessons upstairs might also look down at you to see what you're doing.

To make matters worse, there are things such as height and weight measurements and NAPFA tests that we have to go through. You basically need to get your weight measured in front of the entire class! I was underweight or had borderline acceptable weight most of the time and I was already feeling anxious. Can you imagine how horrible it is for people who have weight issues?

NAPFA tests are the worst. The class is usually only split into two, girls and boys, because of the different expectations based on gender. But there's only one PE teacher recording all the scores. So basically when you're carrying out the exercises, at least half of the class is watching you because they have nothing else to do. Then if you fail, everybody knows. It's not like your grade is on a piece of paper and you can hide it.

Anyway, this brings me to...


3. NAPFA Tests

Why were annual NAPFA tests even necessary? I just found out that now, students only have to take the NAPFA test once in two years. That's much better, but it still remains a pointless exercise for everyone involved.

Maybe there was a point in making us do these six things, but it was never communicated to us. In the article above, they explained why these exercises will help soldiers to be strong. But what about students and everyday civilians? I tried to rationalise it in my brain but I simply couldn't figure it out.

"Okay, I have to do a standing broad jump. Maybe this would be useful to me in future when I come across river rapids and I have to jump from one rock to another. But if that happened, couldn't I just jump in a more natural way instead of putting my feet together and swinging my arms stupidly? And in the first place, why would I even go to this river if I didn't have a raft and there wasn't a bridge? That's just poor planning isn't it?"

Would soldiers actually do this when they encounter "low walls, drains and ditches"?

There are many things we learn in school that we don't actually need in future, such as advanced trigonometry. The NAPFA test is similar to that. You'd think that we'd learn to keep fit during PE lessons and have fun while we're at it, but nope. NAPFA tests made us stressed out! I don't think that your fitness level is supposed to be partially measured by sitting in a contraption, strapping your legs down and pushing a piece of metal as far as you can. The final number at the end doesn't prove that you're fit at all.

I mean sure, the sit-and-reach test shows that you're flexible, but that's not the same thing as being fit right? And besides, do I really need the ability to touch my toes?

When I was in primary school, I was pretty much good at everything except sit-ups. I scored well at all the stations, including the inclined pull ups. But I just couldn't do sit-ups! It was frustrating because it was supposed to be the easiest station of all and everyone else could do it. I felt humiliated because I couldn't do it. I would have gotten a gold or silver if I could.

Sometimes, I would somehow manage to scrape by. Another method was to cheat. I would tell the person holding down my legs to add a few extra sit-ups to my score even if I didn't do it. As far as I can recall, I was caught cheating twice. The teacher in secondary school made me redo my sit ups in front of him and I think I passed because he left me alone after that. I can't remember. But in JC I still couldn't pass and my PE teacher told me that it was important to do sit ups so that I would be able to sit up on my own when I was older.

First of all, that piece of information didn't help me in any way because he did not actually tell me how I could go about getting better at it, if I should practise doing sit ups every single day, or if I was doing anything wrongly. Secondly, if what he said was to motivate me to practise harder, it didn't work at all. Sure, everyone wanted to do well in primary school at first. But by the time we got to JC, most of us girls didn't care whether we passed the test or not. It was more important to the guys since they were going for National Service.

Thirdly, I tried rationalising this piece of information in my head and it didn't make sense. When I want to sit upright, I can just use my hands to push myself up. Why must I cup the back of my ears with my hands and sit up?

And finally, I was already upset that I haven't been able to do sit ups for years. Getting me to stay behind and talking to me about sit ups, while everyone else gets to take part in other activities, is basically another way to humiliate me. Like I mentioned in the previous point, everyone else can see what you're doing during PE.

I think the worst thing my JC teacher did was to NOT record my 2.4km timing. I remember completing the run and feeling extremely relieved, because this meant that I could head off to the nearest toilet to relieve myself. But when I came back, he thought I had not completed the run. Wow. What a jerk. I sincerely hope that he is no longer in the teaching service.

The next point is something that could make me sound like an anti-feminist (which I'm not by the way) but here goes.


4. Gross Girls

This is linked to the fact that PE teachers are usually male. Due to this phenomenon, there are girls out there who have developed rather annoying tendencies.

If your male PE teacher is fit, young and his looks are above average, these girls generally end up behaving like fan girls at a concert.

Instead of screaming loudly like they would at a concert, they have to contain themselves and would instead let out high-pitched squeals.

Even if the male PE teacher is not so fit, young, or good-looking, some gross girls will still be extra friendly to said PE teacher in order to persuade them to select the activity of their choice.

As if this behaviour isn't disgusting enough, they also tend to wear booty shorts. Most people in Singapore generally wear FBT shorts when they exercise. And there is nothing wrong with this - as long as it isn't indecent exposure.

In case you're not a Singaporean and you've never heard of FBTs before, this is how they look like:

(Please note that the men's FBT shorts on the far right looks less sexy and even comes with pockets!)

Most girls wear FBTs and they look fine but Gross Girls™ do not wear FBTs properly. They pull up their (usually curved cut) FBT shorts such that it is above their waists, making sure that their butt cheeks are exposed. This is quite indecent considering the fact that we're in school. And since they are usually standing up and speaking to the PE teacher in front of everyone else, this means that while we are seated, some of us can ACTUALLY SEE what's underneath EVEN IF WE DO NOT WANT TO.

That is the main difference between regular girl and Gross Girl™.

For this reason, I have refused to wear FBTs. I wore Adidas shorts which looked like this:

(Wow, I can't find similar shorts like this on a female model on Google Images)

My friend wore something like this too and we were practically the only two people in school who did not wear FBTs during PE lessons.

Look, I'm all for people wearing whatever they want to, especially since rape victims are always blamed on police posters for dressing indecently when the blame should be put on the rapists.

But we are in school and the school teachers are always all up in your grill about your uniform isn't it? The point of wearing school uniform is to look professional, isn't it?

This is why I get singled out for folding my skirt above my knee, even when it is too long for me and I look simply ridiculous when the skirt is below my knee. And this is why I still get singled out even if I don't fold my skirt because I suddenly had a growth spurt, which kind of embarrassed the teacher because she realised that I didn't fold my skirt, it was of an appropriate length, and she picked on me for nothing. (It is also presumably why the discipline mistress told me off for wearing dangle earrings instead of studs, even though I had been wearing them under her nose for months because they were tiny! Also, we had to wear school socks!)

If schools are so strict about the lengths of our skirts, why are we allowed to wear FBT shorts during PE? The general rule for skirts is that it should only be four fingers above the knee. The longer the better. But for shorts? It only needs to be a few centimetres longer than your underwear, I guess. This is something I will never understand.


5. The Smell: Sweat, Dirt, Blood and Mud

I think this reason speaks for itself. During PE lessons, everyone stinks. After PE lessons, everyone has to go back to class and we all stink. People start spraying deodorants, which stink as well. If someone has their period and you have a sensitive nose, you can smell their period blood and it's stronger than ever because of their sweat. If you've been playing a game on the field, the classroom becomes muddy. Ugh.

Even the teachers hated coming into class when we just had PE. It's a gagfest, honestly.

The Avengers: Virus Vanguard

I was busy working from home today when the Virus Vanguard made its debut - as well as their disappearance.

However, a quick Google search and I found some pictures of these new superhero group on Mothership, CNA, and TODAY. I thought they looked like characters I already know, so I've decided to share my observations here.

1. Mini Moh and Circuit Breaker... Or should I say Peni Parker and SP//dr?

(images from mothership.sg and wikipedia.com)

Mini Moh and Peni Parker. The clever use of alliteration. Both robots are piloted by highly intelligent young girls. What's more to say?

If you haven't watched Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, then I don't know what you're waiting for. This is probably the best time for you to catch up and watch it on Netflix.

And of course, Mini Moh's robot kinda looks like one of those Transformers but I don't think those movies were any good, were they? My brain feels like rotting whenever one of those movies come on. 

2. Fake News Buster... Or Kuurth possessing the Juggernaut? Or is it a combination of Thor and Iron Man = Iron Hammer? 

(images from mothership.sg and marvel.fandom.com)

I've never read the comic books so I don't know much about these guys, but... Fake News Buster is supposed to be holding the Mallet of Truth. And Kuurth is holding, well, the Hammer of Kuurth. They sound similar enough to me!

The characters also look like circuit boards, get it? You know, because circuit breaker? Funny right? Haha no ah? Okay, sorry.

3. MAWA Man or Cyclops? 

(images from mothership.sg and marvel.fandom.com)

I think this was the most obvious one. I mean, which other superhero has special eye-wear like that? Even their poses are similar.

This is probably the funniest name because in times of crisis, just saying "Help me, MAWA Man!" sounds hilarious. I don't know why. Just try it. 

I'm not a Liverpool fan or anything, but I don't think it's good to make fun of Liverpool's motto especially since it is also a song that provides people with comfort in times of crisis (i.e. now, and not to mention the tragedy known as the Hillsborough disaster of 1989).

4. Dr Disinfector? More like Dr Octopus

 (images from mothership.sg and wikipedia.com)

Once I saw the image, I thought of Dr Octopus from Spiderman. My generation grew up watching Tobey Maguire Spiderman movies, so this didn't need any stretch of my imagination.

But I mean, as y'all know, Dr Octopus is a villain, so why is this hero modelled after him? And is she a token minority in the group? 

5. STORM! Erm, I mean, Care-leh Dee?

(images from mothership.sg and comicvine.gamespot.com)

I love Storm! When I was a kid, I wished that I could control the weather. Storm is cool, which means by extension, this new character could be as well. But I'm sorry... the name Care-leh Dee is just cringe.

Some people were pretty angry and upset about the superhero campaign to combat the coronavirus, but honestly, I just looked at the superheroes and simply wished that I could draw awesome fan art like that. And get paid, too! But I reckon some artists would rather... starve than take up the job. (Starving artist joke. Come on, you must have seen it coming)

Okay, all jokes aside, please stay at home and stop spreading fake news. If not, more cringeworthy MCU-inspired superheroes will be created to annoy us. Maybe try DC next time? These are dark times after all.

"This Is The Fight Of Our Lives. We Are Going To Win. Whatever It Takes." - Steve Rogers aka Captain America, Avengers Endgame (2019)

Female Pleasure (Review)

The documentary #Female Pleasure finally came to Singapore this year even though it was released in 2018. We watched it at The Projector on 15 March and it was just really well put together. When I saw that it was going to be screened there, I wanted to watch it simply because the title suggested that the film was going to be about women and their freedom to express their sexuality. However, the film was actually so much more than just that.

It was eye-opening to find out about the five different stories that these individuals face. These stories are so different since the women are of different backgrounds and come from different countries, yet at the same time, they experience similar struggles due to the oppression of women that is rooted in worldwide patriarchy. 

Religion features quite prominently in the film, and this could be one of the reasons why in Singapore, we'd only get to watch it at The Projector and probably nowhere else. Sensitive topics are censored or avoided in this country because we are afraid that chaos would erupt if discussions lead to heated arguments, causing riots to divide our society. However, it is clear that bringing up the issue of religion is important to further the discussion on gender. It is impossible to steer clear of the topic since like it or not, the role of religion plays an important role in many people's lives. Unfortunately, religion is also bogged down by patriarchal systems. One of the women said in the film that patriarchy is a universal religion, and I agree with that 100%.

Doris Wagner, a former nun whose story was featured in the film, mentioned that the Bible was written by men. When she was a nun, the rules were laid out by men and women were supposed to ensure that the men did not take advantage of them. This rule is most absurd to me because it apportions blame to rape victims. It does not make sense for rape victims to be held responsible for the actions of rapists, but society continues to blame rape victims for dressing provocatively. For Doris Wagner, she told a senior nun what had happened and instead of receiving comfort, the senior nun said, "I forgive you". What on earth?

Something Doris Wagner said struck me: She mentioned that in the Bible, most of the male saints were sinful. However, for female saints, the one that is held up as the best and perfect model for women to follow is Mother Mary. And no woman can ever be like Mary, since she was perfect. She was pure as she was a virgin, and also the mother of Jesus Christ. How can any woman measure up to that?

Deborah Feldman's story revolves around the Hasidic community in New York City that she was born in. She was forced into an arranged marriage at a young age and gave birth to a son. Thankfully, she managed to escape the suffocating life within that community with her son, though she receives death threats. Later in the documentary, they show her working with a gay man who also managed to escape the community. He is an artist and so he captured her wrapping her body in one of those prayer mats that only men are permitted to use. To me this is a clear message that women's bodies should be cherished just as much as men's. Women should be treated equally and respected instead of always giving them a status beneath men, especially in so-called religious contexts. There is nothing moral about being sexist, unfair and unjust.

Leyla Hussein's story about FGM (Female Genital Mutilation) made me cry. Born in Somalia, she describes her experience. She and other little girls, at the age of seven or younger, were held down by adults whom they possibly trusted. These adults take a knife to their private parts and cut off certain areas. The process is so painful and so traumatising that it affects childbirth in later years and of course, anything else that has to do with that part of your body such as peeing and menstruating. She shared that if she had not been cut, the children at the playground would not play with her at school. They would have been ostracised. FGM not only happens in African countries but even in developed ones like the UK, where immigrants could possibly be going to extremes in order to hold on to their roots.

Her fight to end FGM is inspiring and she is so passionate about her work. When she demonstrated to a group of boys the different types of FGM through the use of huge models (made of possibly play-doh or some similar material) and also a huge pair of scissors, the boys squirmed and basically freaked out. She even stitched it back up in front of them, leaving just a tiny hole. Visual imagery is compelling to most of us and I hope that many more people would get to see something similar that shows them how horrific FGM is. That image certainly had an impact on me and I simply couldn't believe what I was seeing. 

The documentary also shows Vithika Yadav, head of Love Matters, whose organisation actively tries to share information about sex and sexuality online and through campaigns on the street. She married someone outside her caste and was lucky enough to marry out of love, but she is fighting against the patriarchy as well. To me, India has unfortunately become known to be the country where men rape and kill women frequently. The film shows her team putting out content that is common-sensical to me, such as the concept of consent and the idea that women wish to feel sexual pleasure as much as men. It is also troubling to hear a conversation between her and a Hindu religious leader going nowhere: when asked about homosexuals and homosexuality, the religious man claims that this is something of a Western culture that does not concern India. 

It is difficult to digest so much horrifying and disgusting information in one seating, so thankfully, the film includes Japanese manga artist Rokudenashiko to lighten up the mood. Although she was charged with breaking the law, to me, she didn't do anything wrong. All she did was create colourful moulds of her vagina and painted them in creative ways. She even depicted the Fukushima disaster using the 3D printing of her vagina, and the film showed her paddling happily in her bright yellow kayak that was made in the shape of her vagina.

She laughed when the police came over to her house to arrest her. Through her interviews, she shows us that Japanese people do not talk about female body parts enough even though they worship the male penis. The documentary then shows us clips of people at the Kanamara festival, or the Kanamara Matsuri, where phallic imagery is everywhere. Large phallic symbols are being carried around in grand-looking shrines or sedan chairs, and children are seen licking dick-shaped popsicles. The vagina is a mystery in comparison, and this distinction can easily be seen when one steps in a shop selling sex toys. 

All in all, this film has got me thinking. I now realise that girls (myself included) have grown up thinking that we should be ashamed of our body parts, especially our vagina. We are taught to cross our legs and dress appropriately from a very young age because if we don't do these things, we are inviting trouble. We have been taught to think that our vaginas are disgusting and dirty, resulting in restrictions that are specifically in place to exclude and blame females, to negate their pleasure, and possibly the worst of them all, horrifying practices like FGM. 

We therefore are not as concerned as we should be about our own sexual pleasure and desire. But why should girls (myself included) be disgusted by our own vaginas when it is simply a part of nature? Ultimately, it is about power and dominance. Somehow, men of the past created traditions that have shaped society and enabled men like themselves to stay in positions of power, and it is up to us to break free from these unhealthy ideas that have been masquerading as traditions. A scene from the documentary showed anti-FGM campaigner Leyla Hussein speaking to tribal women in Africa, elders of that particular tribe or village, and they told her that they wouldn't want FGM performed on their children. If so-called "uncivilised" places are able to change their minds on FGM, surely people in "civilised first-world countries" would be able to do so too, right?

One quote that stuck with me was when Leyla Hussein said something like: Martial rape is just rape, and FGM is just sexual assault. Let's call these things as what they are.

Parasite (Film Review)

Just watched this explosive film and I loved it. I don't even know where to begin, but it definitely deserves all the awards that it has received.

Parasite starts by showing us the main characters of the film: the Kim family. They are immediately depicted to be parasites - Ki-woo and Ki-jeong, the son and daughter in the family, are seen trying to take advantage of their neighbour's WiFi, but they've been locked out. They find another signal near the toilet, which is already humorous in itself. The family complains about the bugs that they have to live with in their semi-basement of an apartment, and tries to take advantage of fumigation to get rid of them since it is free. Essentially, the parasites are trying to get rid of their own parasites. 

As the first half of the film progress, the story gets increasingly comical as well as dark. Ki-woo's friend recommends him for a job as an English tutor - which he gladly accepts. With the help of his sister, they create a forged certificate and he pretends to have the qualifications of a university student. Gradually, the entire Kim family works for the wealthy Park family. Ki-woo recommends Ki-jeong to be their son's art therapist, and the siblings work together to get rid of the family chauffeur so that their dad can be hired. Then, the three of them get rid of the housekeeper and replace her with their mum. All this time, the mother of the Park family doesn't suspect a thing and she is described by Ki-woo's friend as "simple". 

The Kim family works for the Parks and pretends that they are not related to one another. The families form a parasitic relationship since the Kims rely on the Parks to earn a living while the Parks rely on the Kims to run the house, take care of the kids. For instance, they require a housekeeper to carry out household chores such as cooking and cleaning because the father of the Park family claims that his wife is just bad at those things. The way the Kims sneakily get jobs to work for the rich family is so funny.

But everything goes horribly wrong in the second half of the film. When the Park family goes on a camping trip (because it's their son's birthday), the Kims relax in the humongous house, drink alcohol and live it up. However, the ex-housekeeper shows up in the rain all wet, insisting that she left something in the basement of the house because she didn't have time to take it when they dismissed her so suddenly. The other three family members hide as the mom of the Kim family lets her in. 

Then it is revealed that the house hosts an actual parasite - the ex-housekeeper's husband! He has been living in a secret underground bunker this entire time! That explains why the father of the Park family said that she always ate for two people. It later also explains why the son of the Park family saw a ghost in the house. It wasn't a ghost at all since it was the husband sneaking around at night. Apparently, he borrowed money from loan sharks and couldn't repay them, so he has decided to live out his life in hiding.

After a while, both families find out about one another but both sides are antagonistic towards each other. The mother of the Kim family refuses to help feed the "ghost" in the basement and so the ex-housekeeper and her husband threaten to expose the Kim family. Instead of realising that they are all poor and should help one another, they end up fighting to survive. After all, the families are merely trying to protect themselves and they only care about their own interests. This is a recurring theme throughout the entire film - when they Kim family was drinking and chatting in the living room of the huge house, Kim Ki-taek (the father) wondered if the ex-chauffeur was able to find a new job. His son (I think) told him off and said something like, "Don't care about that! Care about us!"

Due to the scuffle between the two poor parasitic families, Moon-gwang (the ex-housekeeper) was hit and she fell down the stairs, suffering a concussion. The Park family returns home early from their camping trip due to the rain so the members of the Kim family quickly clean up the mess they've created and sneak out of the house, but not before hiding under a table and listening to the Park couple make out on the couch. While hiding, they also hear the man of the house complaining about how Ki-taek smells of the underground, maybe because he has to take public transport. 

When the family finally sneaks out, they get drenched and to their horror, their semi-basement apartment is completely flooded, so they have to sleep in a gymnasium with others who have also been affected by the storm. The contrast in the film is absolutely brilliant - first of all, the film juxtaposes the tiny semi-basement apartment with the huge mansion that the Parks live in. They show Ki-woo being in complete awe when he first entered the house for his interview. Next, the film highlights the theme of income inequality even more when they show us the three members of the Kim family rushing down an extremely long flight of stairs to get to their apartment, which again, is a semi-basement. This to me symbolises that the family is looked down on and they are at the bottom of society. They have to work very hard and climb all those steps to get to the top, whereas for the rich family, they just need to put in a little bit of effort and walk up a short flight of stairs to get to their house, i.e. their position in society.

Also, the son of the Park family decided to take his tent (that his parents imported from America) out to the backyard and sleep outside as a show of protest that he didn't want the camping trip to end. He is privileged enough to choose to do so, as this is a stark contrast to all those who have been displaced by the flood who are forced to "camp" outside their houses. In addition, whenever the Park family is shown on screen, they are usually alone or with small groups of people. This is juxtaposed with the Kim family, who is usually seen huddled close together at home or at crowded places such as when they were stuck at the gymnasium with others. 

The rich and poor divide is even more evident when Mrs. Park decides to throw an impromptu birthday party for her son since the trip didn't turn out well. She doesn't realise that her employees have suffered due to the storm, and she's in her own bubble of privilege. She invites them to the party and asks them to help out, but it is at the party where everything comes to a head. Moon-gwang (the ex-housekeeper) had a concussion and her husband had to watch her die in the basement. As he has been living in a basement for four years, he was already unhinged. This was clear when Ki-taek saw him hitting his head against the light switches, tricking the Park family into thinking that the switches were operated by motion sensors. He had pictures of Mr Park in his bunker and worshipped him as if he were a god.

During the party, the Kim family didn't have a proper plan for the first time. Ki-woo planned to murder the two in the basement, while Ki-jeong and her mom felt bad and wanted to bring food downstairs but were interrupted by Mrs Park. So when Ki-woo takes his rock downstairs he gets ambushed by the deranged Geun-sae who bludgeons him in the head with it. Then, he grabs a knife as he walks past the kitchen and makes his way to the backyard.

Since the Park family's son is obsessed with Native American stuff, Mr Park told Ki-taek that the two of them would dress up as Native Americans and pretend to attack Ki-jeong, who would be the cake princess, and then his son can play the hero. It is absolutely tragic that the cake princess really needed to be saved - not because of "Indians" (cultural appropriation) but because of Geun-sae, who notices her holding the cake in the middle of the backyard and stabs her right in the chest.

The whole party descends into chaos and madness. The camera shifts here and there to show us what Ki-taek is witnessing. Mr Park's son collapses and has one of his seizures. In the distance, his son clearly has a head injury and is being carried by the daughter of the Park family (the two of them had a thing for each other. If this movie wasn't a thriller but a romcom, they would be declaring their love publicly and trying to persuade their parents to agree to the match. This self-aware film even joked about this when Ki-woo was imagining getting married to her and having to bring in actors to play his parents, since that is what would probably happen in a cliche k-drama). His daughter has been stabbed and even though it is futile, he's trying to stop the bleeding by pressing his hands against her wound, leaving him with blood red hands. His wife had taken a skewer to protect her family and kills Geun-sae in self-defence. His boss Mr Park is asking him, as the driver, to throw him the car keys so that he can take his son to the hospital. He throws them over at the same time Geun-sae's body hits the ground, so Mr Park has to grab the keys from under the guy who had been living his basement for four years. He manages to get the keys, but he pinches his nose because of the underground smell.

I was appalled by this entire scene because what Mr and Mrs Park did and didn't do disgusted me. At least their daughter had the decency to rescue Ki-woo. Her parents did not care one bit about the fact that two people just died in their yard, and one of them is actually their son's art teacher. He's probably going to be even more traumatised because his art teacher was stabbed to death right in front of him. Instead of doing the humane thing and grabbing both their son and his art teacher, they only fussed over their own son. Sure, they didn't know that Ki-taek was actually Ki-jeong's father, but she was still an employee. She was still a human being. Yet her life clearly didn't matter at all. As I mentioned earlier, these families only care about themselves.

It wasn't surprising when Ki-taek inadvertently snapped and killed Mr Park right there and then. The scenes prior to this murder showed that Ki-taek was angry with him for the comment about his smell. Apparently, all of the Kims smelled like the underground. Mr Park's son noticed that they smelled the same and Mr Park himself mentioned the smell to his wife too. But it isn't just the comment about smell and it isn't just about how Mr Park pinched his nose instead of offering to help Ki-jeong. This comes back to the theme of the divide between the rich and the poor. Ki-taek had conversations with Mr Park and he would say that Mr Park loves his wife. To Mr Park, Ki-taek was about to cross a line when he said that, since Park doesn't think that his employee should be making comments about his personal life.

But to me, I see it as how the rich want to be separated from the poor. They want to maintain this divide because, well, who would they be without it? Mr Park distances himself from Ki-taek not just because Ki-taek is his chauffeur but because he doesn't like the smell of poor people and doesn't want to be reminded of their existence. He would prefer living in his own bubble of wealth and privilege. Even though he possesses the resources to do some charitable work and help those affected by the storm, he doesn't. He would prefer to organise a Native American themed party for his spoiled son instead, because he simply doesn't want to know anything about Ki-taek's life and by extension, how any poor person lives, even though the rich and the poor have more in common than we think: In the film, Mrs Park calls ahead to notify her housekeeper that they are arriving home so that she can cook them a fancy sounding dish - which actually turns out to just be instant noodles. 

Sure, the poor families were fighting each other, but that is because to them, their survival and social mobility depends on the Park family. However, the Park family does not think that their survival is dependent on their servants and the working class and chooses to keep away from them even though they rely on them for almost everything. As what Mrs Kim said, "They are nice because they are rich. Money is an iron - it smooths out the wrinkles." The Park family is nice because they have the privilege and resources to be nice. They can afford to hire help, and they can afford to pay the hired help a little more to help out at their son's party. 

They can afford to hire Ki-woo in the first place to help their daughter with her English, while Ki-woo has taken the university entrance exams four times but still doesn't have a real degree. Because let's face it: the poor can't afford to compete with the rich. They can't hire private tutors. They can't afford to be nice, so they resort to lies and deceit. They resort to pushing other poor families out of the way to take their spot, because rich families can secure spots at the top with ease. We are trapped in a rat race, and in the movie, some of the characters literally get trapped inside an underground bunker because of the rat race.

The soundtrack of the film is amazing. When Ki-taek follows Mrs Park around as she does her shopping for the party and speaks to people over the phone to invite them over, there's happy music playing in the background. Yet at the same time, there's creepy music to show that Ki-taek is about to do something horrible. It's like we as the audience can sense that unhappy thoughts are buzzing about in his mind. I read online somewhere that Ki-taek is the parasite who finally ends up killing his host and I agree with that analysis too - it's tragic.

In the end, Ki-woo has brain surgery and wakes up laughing. He and his mum are convicted of fraud. His sister died from the stab wound and his father is wanted for murder. Ki-taek hides in the secret bunker which no one knows about except for his family, and steals food from the German family who moved into the house. The audience doesn't get to see what happens to the Park family, so it is assumed that they got on just fine, with savings and investments to fall back on despite the death of Mr Park.

Ki-woo lives with his mum and goes up a hill to look at the big house from above. He notices the lights flickering and it is his dad using Morse code. He manages to decipher his dad's message, who reveals that he has buried Moon-gwang's body in the yard and is doing fine. He is seen apologising to the pictures of Mr Park, which is similar to what Geun-sae did, and seems remorseful to have killed his boss. However, he will probably go down the same path as the previous parasite who took shelter in that underground bunker. I think he'll go mad living all by himself and carrying all that guilt. 

In the final scene, Ki-woo writes a letter to his father that he won't be able to send out. He reassures his father that he'll work hard and earn enough money to buy the house so that he can set his father free. We see Ki-woo's vision of this before the film goes back to the reality that Ki-woo still lives in the same semi-underground apartment with his mother.  I read online that the parasite in this movie is hope. The Kims were filled with hope and wanted to break free of poverty, so hope latches on and leaves them in a worse state than before, since Ki-jeong is dead and Ki-taek is wanted for murder. 

This analysis is spot on since the director himself mentioned that he didn't want to give the audience false hope. As the saying goes, "The rich get richer and the poor get poorer". In this capitalist society, we use meritocracy as an excuse not to help the poor, claiming that they are in poverty due to their own laziness. He wanted a film that reflected the honest truth: that social mobility is difficult and sometimes impossible. The filmmakers wanted to call the song at the end of the film "564 years" because they used Ki-woo's salary to do some calculations and estimated that that was the amount of time Ki-woo would need to be able to save up to buy that house. Basically, it is a pipe dream. A Sisyphean task. It is unattainable, it is impossible, and it is a fantasy. Ultimately, hope is a form of entrapment.