GRAVE OF THE FIREFLIES

The first spark that led me to become a prepper is not the 'doomsday prepper' documentaries by the Discovery Channel. Yes of course the documentary itself is a huge influence that make me feel normal being a prepper (it turned out there's many 'freaks' like me out there) but the first time I began to think about it is when I watched this depressing movie by Isao Takahata. At first I thought this movie is like the rest of Ghibli Studio's happy ending stuff. Boy, was I wrong.. in a good way.

I strongly suggest you to watch this movie. The story is not about a bunch of preppers storing foods for doomsday so it might not struck a chord with everybody. But if you're a parent with small children to care for.. you'll experience the depressing sadness that only a parent could ever understand.



The most memorable statement I've ever heard from a friend a decade ago was when he said "if my baby girl is standing in the middle of the road with a 7 tonnes truck coming toward her and the only way is to save her is to push her aside and let myself be flatten till my brains spilled all over the road - i'll take it smiling ear to ear".

It's touching to hear statement like that especially when it also reminded me the story I read somewhere about what happened during Einsatzgruppen when the Nazi promised the men that their families would be spared if the men let themselves be killed and the men - hoping that would save their wives and children - were all willingly dug the hole before jumping into it and be shot.

It also reminded me to the true story of how the Columbian Drug Lord Pablo Escobar - while on the run in the jungle - didn't even blink when he throw two millions dollars of cash money into the fire in order to save her daughter from hypothermia.

The love parents has for their children is the only consistent feature that God had given too all human beings (which means that those who abused or tortured their children is worse than Pablo Escobar and ought to be impaled to death). It's stronger than love to spouses and for the weak in faith could even be stronger than love to God. This is particularly true for the vast of marjority of people because whenever their children passed away they always have this tendency to blame God for the death of their children.

In situation like this faith and knowledge is crucial to understand that everything happens for a reason. God would never 'punish' the children as some parent would usually think. If God decides its time for the child to return to Him then it must meant that He was rescuing the child from a very terrible thing that would have happened should the child stay on earth.

I will write about this in later article "Tiada Musibah Dalam Islam".

In the meantime, please consider this after you've watched the movie - the only thing you might suffer as a prepper is being considered a 'freak'. Other than that you won't suffer any other loss because like I said in my previous articles, preparing for the rainy day won't lead to any financial loss whatsoever.

If you as a parent are willing to be flatten by a 7 tonnes truck for the sake of your child.. then why is it so difficult to spend a bit to store food for your children? With a proper technique the food won't go bad for a long time and that means there's no element of waste.

If there's no waste then it's not a sin.. okay!

P/S: This is the perfect movie to 'convert' your wife into supporting your 'prepper' idea. Let her watch the movie until all the tissues in the house were soaked wet before you begin to suggest the prepping idea (for example start with a question "could you imagine our child goes hungry like Setsuko in that movie?". It works for me!! (hopefully my wife wouldn't read this)