Today there won�t be fencing training cos our beloved MPSH6 will be closed until 29th July for QET, and MPSH2 will be closed until then also for QET, and after that till 5th September for YOG � I went to check the NUS website for this. Fortunately it means we still have our MPSH during the YOG season. Now I need to find a chance to pass one of the people doing the booth deco the material they need that I bought yesterday in the break between the two shifts Chewy and I did for commencement to give out the engin annual. We ate lunch with Aerene at Ji Hyun�s mum�s new canteen stall selling Korean food. It was quite nice and at $4.50 for that kind of portion, quite value-for-money :D Y2 had his free lunch at UCC instead.

Before I go on to talk about that world famous mollusk, I must say that yesterday�s job of transporting the many heavy bales of annuals from club room to UCC in the hot sun, down the steep engin carpark slope in front of UCC, through the back of the UCC carpark, was very tiring and sweaty for the both of us. The trolley was so heavy it had so much inertia that we needed one of us to power the trolley forward (or prevent it from rolling too fast) and one to steer the front of the trolley. We still had quite a few annuals left over to push back to the club room in the same way, but heng ah we gave out most of them.

Last night was the first time I made effort to stay up and watch the world cup match this season. Previously I would only watch the 10pm matches and sleep through the 2.30am matches and wait for the results to be told to me. But since the last 2 nights were held only at that timing, I chose to tape the Netherlands one instead and watch the match last night to support the team I felt more allegiance too. Yesterday in the early afternoon Chewy told me his friend told him the octopus�s prediction. It was something I, and many others, did not want to hear. It chose Spain over Germany.

During the match that I was fighting against my sleepiness to watch, I kept saying �stuPid octoPus�. The goal by the header was a proper goal. The 2 Spaniards jumped higher than the only German defender jumping with them to score that sole goal of the match. The first half�s game was a beautiful one, with smooth passes and well-controlled dribbling and passing of the ball. The players had a lot of stamina running up and down the field. But in the second half, it seemed the traditional 4-1-2-3 (or 4-1-3-2) formation preferred by the coach Loew, who was told to wear that blue sweater now sold-out in Germany that fans had to go to neighbouring Luxembourg to buy it, had disintegrated into an attacking formation with players scattered everywhere in the Spanish half of the field, leaving only 2 defenders inside the German half. Neuer travelled so many times out of his goal box, it looked so risky, but Friedrich and Meatesacker are two very competent defenders who kept counterattacking David Villa and the other guy who didn�t pass the ball to the threat of Torres from having a chance of scoring by getting the ball away from them. Die Mannschaft did not have a single successful, if any, materialization of the counterattacking move that so far was able to give them their goals. The Spaniards liked their short passes and kept the ball strongly in their possession and managed to intercept the balls that were passed between the Deutsch (my Dad kept saying Boateng lost a lot of the balls that he was passing). Why didn�t the Deutsch use a high long pass that they were good at to get over the thick barrier of Spanish players so that they can get into a goal-scoring position? They were running all over, they were desperate; they were unwound and undone, to the agony of many around the world who started thinking of all the octopus dishes they could eat. I think today the sales of takoyaki, ika sushi, seafood horfun, sambal sotong or whatever octopi dish you could have would go up, so you should have considered buying stocks in these food establishments today, but now it�s too late since it�s already past lunch time.

I kept hoping that the white wall of tall German players would be formidable to bounce off any free goal-directed kick from the Spanish, and I was thinking of a name for it. The first thing that came into my mind was �Berlin Wall�, but MT quickly pointed out to me (she�s a German fan too) that the Berlin Wall fell. Ouch.

I was so awake and saddened by the loss I turned on the internet on my phone (for a short while or else I would have to pay a lot of data charges) and posted about that octopus. I already saw online there were some postings from happy Spanish fans, and even more postings from German fans flaming Paul. I was one of those people too. But in the stillness of the night (it�s so much quieter than in the day that I do a lot of work at night without realizing how much time has flown by. It�s very good for thinking, reflecting, writing) a thought got into my head.

Paul the octopus only predicts the results of the game (supposedly), or at most only foretells the truth. The only possible way for that squishy thing in an aquarium to actually write the future is to destroy the morale of the German fans and most importantly, Die Mannschaft if they heard the results. I do not know if they heard the sotong�s predictions. Maybe the students at a certain university, who had been tasked to analyse the matches of their opponents and pass the information to the team (it was credited to them for the note in Neuer�s shin-socks that told him to dive right to stop Messi�s goal shot) failed in their task. Maybe it was M�ller�s unfortunate absence that left the team without one of their 3 star strikers to create goal-scoring chances (he, Klose, Podolski). I remember that for one of the goals against Brazil (is it Brazil?) 3 attackers did a counter attack into an almost empty opponent�s half of the field. One of them was in a good position such that the attacker on the left who had the ball, passed it to him in a cross that was converted into a score. The third guy was to act as back up to increase the chances of a successful cross. This was the classic move that was not seen from the white shirts last night.

I was rooting for the Germans; I wanted them to defy the octopus, but somehow my gut feeling kept telling me that Spain would win. It kept niggin� at me since I heard the octopus prediction, and when I watched the match. It was just a painful reminder for one lesson I learnt � always trust my gut feelings. Ouch.

Well, next match I will be watching is the 3rd place playoffs. Deutschland will win. I want them to play their hearts out and ignore the sotong. And M�ller will be back, so the full team will be there to trash Uruguay who did that handball.

Thinking on some more, what if Paul was a human, instead of a mollusc? What if it were a human telling us things we don�t want to hear, but may be the truth? There are many cases of this in this world. Of course we don�t go killing and eating the human, but people don�t like being hated for things they say, so many try to just say the nice things and hide the not-nice-to-hear-but-actually-quite-truthful-or-important things. I hear stories of Churches that preach only �happy� things but not teach the church goers about the pains and struggles that they would have to make if they wanted to be Christians in full dimension. Jesus suffered so much, Paul the Apostle (not octopus) suffered so much, and so did many others, to keep the faith strong and pure. We aren�t living in a world with no threats; we are facing temptations and other threats too even if they aren�t the same as in the past. Even non-Christians have some idea of preserving their own moralities. So how can we be living so carefree, lah-dee-daa? It�s not possible. It�s not feasible to go church-hopping or reject something you once believed in because �I don�t like what I am hearing�, but that�s the case for some. In a more loose sense, it also reflects on the �Sunday-Christians� who are only �serious� on Sunday then do all the carefree wild-child stuff on the rest of the days.

It�s funny because it is just like covering your eyes and pretending it�s not there (whatever it is). It will get to ya in time.

And I�m an escapist that likes to run away into a dream-world. But maybe I just escape so that I can have a respite as I strengthen myself up to face the pains. I have already gained much courage to do things I told myself I would not. But I need more courage to choose the right decisions when it seems so easy to go the other way. I�m 21 but I�m still growing up, because now I have to make the choices that I didn�t need to make in the past.

Therefore,

I forgive that little squishy creature (I was about to say �brainless� but octopuses have brains and are actually quite clever, though not to say psychic) but all I am gonna say is: the aquarium that owns it better take out a lot of insurance for Paul and arm his tank with lots of bodyguards.