So this is what 2015 feels like.
You now have another 365 days to put off until next year something you really don’t want to do this year. That feels pretty good, right?
Time flies when you’re trying to procrastinate, but let’s not deflect too many things away from our attention so early into the new calendar. Rockefeller Without Borders recommends that we all make like remorseful fugitives and turn ourselves in.
But you haven’t done anything that warrants turning yourself in? Sure you have.
Fugitive denial belongs to all of us. You don’t have to be a criminal to know that (but it helps). Classic fugitive denial signs include the sudden desire to get away quickly; insisting that photo of you isn’t you; making videos of yourself insisting that that photo of you isn’t you; putting pressure on others to help you convince others that it isn’t you; using your hairdresser as an alibi because you never go outside looking like that.
Additionally, we – i.e. all of us – might want to stop using the words wrong and unreasonable because no proud, self-loving human is ever wrong or unreasonable. Those are 20th century words that most advanced cultures have removed from society anyway – along with the unreasonable need to stop at red lights and the criminalization of speaking on your phone while driving a motorcycle.
As many a sage grandfather says: you’re only cheating yourself. This is the fugitive’s dilemma – indeed our global dilemma – and it seems we spend a lot of time negotiating and lobbying for ways to confirm our innocence, argue a point, substantiate a claim… no matter how big or small that might be. People who love statistics certainly know that.
Take the recent argument that only 35% of tourists who come to Cambodia visit the Angkor Wat temple complex. Opposition lawmakers say that their research points to a number closer to 80%. This claim of revenue underreporting will no doubt fester in 2015. Because we are always on the lookout for a controversy to mediate over (in other words, behave like a responsible NGO), Rockefeller Without Borders went to Angkor Wat and did a bit of research of our own using the only consistently accurate tourist statistic: t-shirt sales.
With the aid of proprietary technology, we took total Cambodia tourist numbers and divided that by t-shirts sold at Angkor Wat in 2014 and got the answer we needed. Simple math. Everyone who goes to Angkor Wat buys a t-shirt. Unfortunately, our official statistician is now a fugitive, and thus we cannot publish the results until he turns himself – and the answer – in (he’s demanding “caramel extra whip organic gluten free soy latte” money, which, of course, as an international NGO we are legally bound not to pay).
One of our favourite fugitive stories from last year also involved Angkor Wat. This was the news that the Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam is planning to auction off an aircraft owned by the wonderfully named Air Dream, a (now) mysterious carrier that made just one journey in May 2007 – Siem Reap (aka Angkor Wat) to Hanoi – before abandoning the aircraft.
Apparently, the Dream’s owner disappeared – but not his airport parking bill in Hanoi, which is now over $600,000 and rising. All attempts to contact the Dream owner have gone unanswered. The Dream is now officially a fugitive.
Was one flight enough to fulfil the Dream? Surely they can keep the Dream alive, no? Never mind the unpaid 600k, this quitter’s behaviour is both wrong and unreasonable and something we don’t want to expose our children to. Running from your dreams: how many of you became fugitives to your 2014 plans? Exactly! Thereby proving my point: fugitive denial is in us all.
Enough is enough. Stop running. Turn yourself in! It’s a new year: fugitive is out, dreams are in. Retweeting a message of hope from a fugitive Oknha: #BringBacktheDream