found an excerpt wedged in between an old foolscap pad whilst packing my room.
from Dead Poet's Society:
"We don't read and write poetry because it's cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for."
when i read the bolded line, i was reminded of paris. i was reminded of terence and i sprinting from the underground train station like mad people, hoping to reach the LV store on Champs-Elysees before closing, in the hopes of getting an elusive bag.
i was reminded of terence and i trying to emulate the parisians' openness. we had witnessed so many parisian lovers displaying their affections for one another and decided to test it out for ourselves. if no one objected, it meant that it was a way of life. so we stopped to kiss for like, half a minute on the crowded Champs-Elysees. and no one bothered abt us. so we were right =)
i was reminded of the L'arc de Triomphe, the architecture in the photo above, constructed to commemorate Napoleon's victory. it is my idea of THE paris icon, beating the likes of the eiffel tower.
previously beauty only meant superficial, skin-deep beauty to me. that was the only beauty i had understood. but when i travelled to london & paris and beheld Westminster Abbey and the Arc, i was so stunned. that kind of architecture is completely foreign to asia. and you have to really see it for yourself in order to feel the kind of awe that i did. imagine how spectacular they must have been to stun me into silence. i just stood there both times, taking it all in, while Terence snapped away, capturing our precious moments. THIS is the kind of beauty we should be staying alive for. beauty that takes our breath away, beauty that enlarges our minds.
