Tuesday, January 24, 2006

FEATURE: Crossings

I've been pondering this for months, the notion having quietly slipped into my mind one fine evening, when I was on the free shuttle bus service from Clementi to Turf City on the way back to Toa Payoh, and there it has lurked ever since. Every now and then it would peek its cheeky head from the mass (mess?) of grey matter, reminding me of its omnipresence, that attention-seeking little brat. I'm digressing, forgive me. But if there're only 6 degrees of separation among us homosapiens on earth, surely a little digression in thought won't throw us too far off track. And there I go again. Digressing.

So are there really only 6 degrees of separation between 2 people, regardless of location? Word is, if you pick a random name out of nowhere and address a letter to him or her, and then mail the letter to someone you know with instructions to pass it on to the next person this someone knows, the letter will reach the intended recipient in the 5th exchange. Imagine this, he/she is only the 5th link in this seemingly endless chain mail even if he/she lives half way round the world! Although I haven't bothered experimenting, it has reportedly tested TRUE.

Recently, some anthropology think tank came up with the cool idea of creating the GREAT-GRANDMOTHER of family trees. The idea is to map out our genetic origins and so far, the evidence is leaning very much towards all of us being one big giant happy family some gazillion years ago. Osama is your and my cousin/brother, only we are separated by some thousands of years and countless rounds of genetic mutation. So Bush too must have a strand of DNA that also exists in some remote part of you and I. Gasp! Bush and Osama and Saddam must also belong to the same genetic map if not for the myriad millennia that have elapsed, blurring their bloodline in its trail.

DNA test kits costing USD99 each were available for the curious public's purchase. The class geek could make a swab of his cheek, mail the DNA back to the designated lab and eagerly await the result that he was indeed a descendant of Alexander the Great. People from completely different cultures across the globe without the slightest physical likeness have shared the same DNA. I've read of a pure Chinese since as long as she can remember suddenly finding Welsh influence in her genes. Hmm...

With all of us so intricately linked, even if the exact details of our proximity continue to elude most of us, does it come as a surprise that our paths have crossed more than we can ever imagine or know. Many of us must have been on the same bus or train or waiting for the rain to stop under the same shelter, more than once, but have failed to consciously register the face so there, another stranger, although you have probably been by my side more often than my new boyfriend. Many of us are travelers who have met, bumped into or brushed against some people from abroad who are now in Singapore and our paths cross once more on the busy Orchard Road without our ever knowing it.

I guess this kind of explains instances of déjà vu, which can be attributed to our subconscious trying its darnest to record every frame of life as it unfolds. Yet somehow, the data transfer over to our conscious state of mind is lagging so much so that subsequent occurrence of a particular instant is erroneously registered as the first and the mind is overwhelmed by an inexplicable subliminal revelation we term déjà vu.

Along the logic of déjà vu, fate is probably also a mind trick, or rather, a tricked mind. It only seems to come into play when your consciousness finally acknowledges the person who will go on to claim an important place in your heart, although for the longest time, your subconscious has been profiling this incredible character who crosses your path more times than you care to know; every second of his/her previous ephemeral existence in your life a building block of unwavering affection, the zenith of which eventually shoots through your roof of consciousness with effervescent sparks of love and happiness. Voila! You think fate brings him/her to you but you never know, he/she has perhaps always been there.

Wouldn’t it be interesting if we had the power to remember every single person or thing that we encounter everyday of our lives and by the end of it, realize just how many people have repeatedly wandered into it unregistered but how shockingly few have actually touched it in more profound ways, some more than others.

That will bring mankind even closer by several degrees.