Category: Non-Fiction
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why do we love sociopaths?
We are all pawns in a larger, international cosmic game, every one of us simply clinging onto the hope of reaching the other end of the chessboard, climbing the squares one god forsaken step at a time. But sociopaths? They aren’t playing the same game(s) we are…
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chinese new year
The red packets start pouring in by the moment. It is de rigueur that I drop by every table to say hello to our fellow relatives. I do. I allow four-character wishes to escape my mouth one after the other, smile graciously as I shake their hands, and receive the heavenly red envelope…
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metamorphosis ’20
In Metamorphosis, Gregor Samsa wakes up only to realize he is now living as a giant insect, his life immediately overturned without warning or foreboding. I guess these two pieces have more in common than I thought then, since my life—though not as ridiculous as that of Samsa’s—was also thwarted into an unpredictable trajectory this…
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evermore: escapism in the woods
A willow is only a tree, its beauty and sophistication unappreciated until it is cradled by the wind. It just so happens Taylor Swift is that gust of wind…
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the queen’s gambit
The Queen’s Gambit didn’t just breathe life into the fictional Beth Harmon, it breathed life into chess itself…
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the nigerian tipping point
Police brutality and abuse of authoritative power is a tale we are all too familiar with, given the happenings of this year. We have previously discussed how police brutality is a rudimentary problem in the system of the United States, but today, let us pan our attention over to the African country that sits on…
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medusa: victim turned villain
Everyone is apt to classify Medusa as the archetypal scornful creature whose gaze can petrify any mortal into stone. Naturally, people assume that Medusa has done something unforgivable to be cursed as such. She desecrated the temple of Athena, of course she should be punished, right? Wrong.
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folklore: an invitation to ethereality
While there are no party bangers or mistaken lyrical earworms present in this album, Swift has redefined herself as someone more mature and liberated, advancing into her thirties…
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yemen: on the brink of being wiped off the map
Yemen has been thrown headfirst into an abyss of the worst humanitarian crisis the world has ever borne witness to, and we have failed – yet again – to deliver justice…
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“i can’t breathe…”
It has been five days since George Floyd was murdered in the custody of four police officers in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Yes, murdered is the correct term for it and if you’re not comfortable with that, you won’t be for the rest of the article either…
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passing the buck when one becomes two
March 13, 1964. This date means nothing to most of us; some of us weren’t even born yet. Kew Gardens, Queens, New York City. The same goes for this venue, some of us have never been there. Yet for one Catherine “Kitty” Genovese, it was the date and place that ensured her death…
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city of girls
City of Girls isn’t a quick, easy read of a girl who trades her life for alcohol and sex, nor is it a satirical story about a girl who simply accepts life as it is handed to her…
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COVID-19: the surprise guest of 2020
As COVID-19 takes up headlines and Twitter feeds, we see governments implementing quarantines to ‘flatten the curve’, medical professionals working around the clock to save lives, and the public reacting in both acceptably decent and extraordinarily peculiar ways…
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climate change: cause, cost, and cure
If we can adapt to the environment and industrialize, map out routes to space, accommodate 7 billion people and counting, sign treaties to end wars, and go from rotary dials to smartphones, we can delay climate change, but only if everyone does it together…
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hurting in growth ’19
I think when we allow ourselves to hurt freely and fully is when we finally grow. We cannot choose happiness; that awfully overused Tumblr quote doesn’t exist. You can’t know what happiness is until you’ve been at the opposite end of the spectrum…
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the return of Taylor Swift
Lover reminds me of exactly why I fell in love with Swift’s music in the first place – it has lyrics that seem straight out of a diary and just the right melody that has got me dancing stupidly in my room and lip-syncing to the tracks as they shuffle on repeat…
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the writer, the soul
It’s such a question that never rusts, just transferred from generation to generation, like ocean wave after ocean wave. Yet, to this day, I fail to set my foot upon a destined path. It feels as though everyone around me has found their future, grasp who they want to be…
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