A Samurai's Death Poem: Hippie vs Yuppie

I hate this transition in life. When you're young you tend to have left wing inclinations, everything is either black or white, and almost imperceptively, with every passing year, you become jaded. People that admired the Che or that fought against corporations and merciless capitalism start to see the advantages of a market economy. It's not so bad to have lower unemployment rates, and a higher GDP per capita and it doesn't hurt to have a Starbucks around or get to shop at Zara.

But it sucks too. I mean, we're still stuck in the preconcieved westernized view of what constitutes happiness. Does this higher GDP per capita make us happier now that we have a higher purchasing power? Anyways, who told economists that the more options you have, the more products available to you, the happier you are? I mean, this is the cornerstone of modern microeconomics, and everyone accepts it, but why should we? Are we really happier by having 190,000 permutations of Starbucks coffee? Does it cater to everyone's needs? Why do we need this endless array of products and services? Do we really need the white picket fence with 2,3 children, a labrador and two volvos?

These thoughts start surfacing when I'm walking in my callus-inducing black leather shoes towards work, instead of my lovely brown adidas that have been falling apart for the past 2 years. I've joined the ranks of the employed, after almost 24 years of avoiding from getting my employment cheery popped.

I hate myself. I was supposed to join greenpeace and become a vegan... what the hell happened? I don't know.... life happened, advertising and pop culture in general kept bombarding my impressionable mind. Now I get excited when I see the iPhone (lets ignore for a second that 75kgs of raw materials are needed to produce a normal 200 gram cellphone, ridiculous). But I'm not the only one that gets excited over small gadgets, and as we all know, gadgets are the yuppie's samurai sword. So there I am, drewling over my weapon of corporate domination.... or maybe I should just perform hara-kiri (seppuku) while I still have my pride.

But lets not be so drastic, I guess I can always donate some money to some NGO, or "adopt" a kid by sending him 25cents every week, or maybe go to a Live 8 concert, you know, cos it's the right thing to do (nevermind that debt relief in developing countries as a final solution is like perfuming a turd). But this is bullshit, seriously, throwing money at a problem will not solve it, especially when there is no such thing as fair trade. This is bullshit being fed to third world countries by France, Sweden, Germany and many others. Believe me, the only people that are buying into this lie are your own citizens. Also, a lot of NGOs, though well intentioned make mistakes when distributing their resources. But alas, the latter is still the lesser of two evils when it comes to international cooperation.

Back at the office, after that internal debate, I think how my fucking tie is choking me, but I kinda like how it looks. It's weird how when you wear certain clothes or accesories, you automatically adopt the mannerisms and movements that you're used to observing in others. I see myself putting my tie over my shoulder when I eat, the way you take out your cellphone from your jacket pocket, or how you pull down your pant legs when you sit down cos they're riding up. I can see how the assimilation has started, it's creeping in.

I don't like to think that I'm gonna turn into a yuppie.... I don't think it fits my definition of "happiness", I don't want to be "successful" or "make it", I don't know where I'm gonna find happiness, all I know is that it'll never be complete unless I have significant other to share "it" with. Whatever "it" is.

I sometimes think that my music and my photography are but futile whimpers before the inevitable death of the hippie inside me. So is this it, am I being asimilated and I've already crossed the event horizon? No hope of fighting back? I wish my 17 year old self could go and visit the 35 year old version of me, and slap him around, scolding him for having learned how to play golf and having bought a time share vacation condo in Aruba. There isn't much advice I can give to my future self that won't fall on deaf ears, but please, whatever you do 35 year old Alfonso, never tie your pastel colored sweater around your neck like some Hilfiger yacht owning wannabe.

Resistance is futile....

General Akashi Gidayu preparing to commit Seppuku after losing a battle for his master in 1582. He had just written his death poem.