Senang Diri Blog Time-out

Sunrise on Monday 1 June 2020,  the dawn my father never lived to see.

Dear Friends,
The Senang Diri blog will take a time-out of a month or more from today.

My dad died at home on Sunday 31 May 2020 at the age of 85. He left peacefully and with us by his side, which is the way he always wanted. We sent him off yesterday. Father Vaz delivered a beautiful service and his solo rendition of Nearer, My God, to Thee as we bid my dad a last goodbye from this world helped with closure and will ring in my ears till my dying days. As you can imagine, am in uncharted territory as my brother, sister and I have never lost a parent before. So navigating what's required is taking up our time outside of work and I appeal for your understanding as we tie up the many loose ends.

I will still attend to your comments. But by and large, spare time for writing will be spent on another pursuit. Please don't conflate blog time-out with lack of energy on other fronts. Things continue to move, just offline.

This COVID-19 Circuit Breaker has allowed me to see firsthand some fictional events I wrote about in a story. The crush of humanity ahead of the Causeway closure, the emptied out terminals at Changi Airport following the unprecedented reduction of flights to Singapore, panic buying in supermarkets were all described in the Period of Tension chapters. Nothing beats seeing it unfold online and in real life. I made several trips to the supermarket just to experience the madness. What has not happened for real is the impact of a Lloyd's war risk rating on shipping in regional sea lanes. My friends and I relied on our imagination for this part of the story. We hope the story sounds credible as we took some effort to calculate the war risk premiums and imagine its impact on shipping movements rather than pluck figures from thin air. Surface vessel movements affect shipping density, which is a factor that will help the reader understand the nature of the battlespace before he/she flips to the pages where air and sea battles are fought in a congested maritime environment. So when Bruisers are set loose and Magnums fly, you can picture how a small, determined force and even a single SSK can upset the odds. I hope the fight scenes sound real enough to keep readers enthralled. 

On another note, my term with MINDEF's Advisory Council on Community Relations in Defence (ACCORD) comes to an end this August after three renewals over more than six years. I thank NEXUS for its stewardship of ACCORD, and all the men and women from Singapore Armed Forces and Home Team units whom I met during my time with the council.

Thank you for visiting the Senang Diri blog.

Stay strong during this pandemic.