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NOW | 12 May 2026

Think of a Now page as what one would tell a friend they haven't seen in awhile.

Reading: Thoroughly enjoyed C. Thi Nguyen's Games: Agency as Art. Also saved a bunch of reading highlights from bell hook's All About Love. I now seek out books published before 2022-2023 to cleanse my palate and stay sane from reading so much of the ghostwritten generated text that emerged everywhere from 2022 onwards.

Listening: Old Malay songs so my anchor partner can get some language practice matching words to emotions. Think karaoke bangers like Merisik Khabar by Sudirman, Janji Manis Mu by Aishah.

Making: I'm retelling stories from the Qur'ān the way I wish someone would tell them to me in the moment we are in. It was a project I started this Ramadhan to get back into writing stories from the most healing starting point I could think of. First up is the first androgyne and their first hater Satan, then Noah and building a world that loves you back, and then Lut and living in a death cult.

Living: Turns out there's really no good time to leave a full-time job, including wandering out into the world looking for work in 2026 for the first time in 5 years. I am working entirely in learning and evaluation now, and it's work that asks of me to listen, be curious, make new friends, remind older ones of how I've grown since they last heard from me.

Hyperfocusing: I'm in 2 phases: a local / regional history phase, after a few years of sustained attention at the level of global geopolitics; and a phase around different types of warfare and how to recognise which wars we are currently in. On my birthday this year, I chewed on this Tricontinental report (which covers both phases) and has one of the coolest footnotes/endnotes systems I've ever seen. Reading it reminded me of my late grandfather who was born in 1923 and survived both the British and Japanese. Now that I am old enough to piece things together, I wish I could talk to him about it. He would have loved to tell me what he couldn't when I was young.

Some of what I've saved

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This year, I've also started curated my reading highlights from the words of others by theme in the series Full Moon Forage.
  1. All significant concepts in the modern theory of the state are secularised religious concepts, said Carl Schmitt in 1985
  2. We human beings are an effect of the increase of entropy unified by memory from traces of the past, said Carlo Rovelli in 2017
  3. Sufi thinkers like Ibn Arabi believe imagination is a creative faculty, a barzakh that allows us to make the invisible world visible
  4. We must put our energy into active relationships with people whom we refuse to abandon and who refuse to abandon us, said Kelly Hayes and Mariame Kaba in 2023
  5. If you can't love anybody, you're dangerous, because you have no way of learning humility, said James Baldwin in 1978
  6. In 2003, Rachel Corrie told her mother that everyone should drop everything and devote our lives to making genocide stop
  7. Human beings are called to be co-workers in the act of creation, said Pope Leo in 2025

This is a /now page inspired by Al Ibrahim, who was inspired by Derek Sivers, who said to think of a Now page as what one would tell a friend they haven't seen in a year.

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Liy is a tropical cryptid in Southeast Asia foraging for narrative resources from the periphery to prepare for precarious futures. This is an ad-free space outside of the algo. If you're new here (hello!) or need a refresher, start here for house rules. Here is what I am up to now. I spend time thinking out of my zettelkasten notes system and sharing curated playlists from my time travels. Consider subscribing (it's free!) to read more and stay in touch: I only send out letters a few times a year. If you valued something here, say so (if we have access to each other) or I would really appreciate if you buy me a coffee— that sends me a sign to keep going.