Merry Christmas, one and all. :)

The only thing which puts a damper on all this is that later, I'll still have to go to work, but on the bright side, it'll be for the last time! Hurrah!

Spent Christmas Eve last night with my baby; my mum let me stay out late last night, so we had dinner together after I was done with work, walked down Orchard Road to look at the lights for a bit, then came back to Plaza Singapura at 11.15 to catch the late-night preview of Death Note 2.

Death Note 2 was slightly confusing, but VERY good. And how is it that only *now* I've realised that the actor playing Light is really pretty good-looking? But never mind, that's just random.

I'll try not to spoil the movie for anyone since it's not officially opened yet (that's on the 28th), but it does give you more to think about.

I suppose it's true that the law isn't perfect, but we do the best we can, as Light's father tells him in the film, but then you'd have to wonder what a system of justice would be like in an ideal world. Because justice doesn't seem like something that we're ever going to be able to agree on anytime soon, and drawing on what I learnt in SC4215D this sem, justice or equality in one sphere only means the lack of it in another.

But hey, I don't think we can fault Light for trying. If we had the time to think about it, who wouldn't believe that our world is rotten in some way?

And if we think of the human spirit as one which constantly strives for improvement and perfection, then who wouldn't try to make the world a better place?

But then my dear Light, what on earth would we do with a perfect world? Would it even be possible for us to be happy in a perfect world? If the world were perfect, there'd be nothing to strive for, nothing to improve, nothing to make perfect. Perhaps the only thing which makes our existence worthwhile is the idea that things can always be better.

What *does* your perfect world look like, Light?

Is it one where there's simply no crime or violence and everyone is happy with what they have? Is it a world where everyone is happy because everyone has what they want? What then becomes the point of living? Do we all live simply because we are happy to do so?

I would think not.

What drives us is not just the idea that things can be better; our motivation is that we want more, we want better, and we want to be better than everyone else. And we want to know that we earned it. We want to know that we struggled and we deserve what we have achieved.

So Light, if everyone could simply have what they wanted, would anything have any meaning? Without struggle, what is anyone's life worth?

Perhaps, as it was said in the "Matrix", this is why the "perfect world" in the "first Matrix" didn't work. People had no purpose. Perhaps Light, even if you were the god of a new world, your new world would be one where nothing had meaning.

So then, would a perfect world really be a good thing? Would it be a good thing because of it's perfection, or would it be a thing of sadness because there is no longer any need for improvement anymore?

Maybe in the end, the point of the movie was simply that most people who try to make the world a better place are more likely to die trying.