BWSTW

In this world of acronyms, BWSTW or Beauty Will Save The World, an acronym for a quotation from Dostoevsky's Idiot coined by my dear friend Alastair Hulbert, is likely to be the most powerful one I have ever come across. Yet I have been asking for some time what kind of beauty it will be and at last, it dawned on me when I was looking at Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur.



We relentlessly pursue big things trying to get more, higher, further and beyond to please our ever-growing appetite. That is a nature of learning but beyond a certain point it might turn nothing but a form of escapism from the daily grind of our lives. Being a trainee in Malaysia I can see that from one point of view, working abroad is a challenge which spurs me on to learn and grow enormously. From another point of view, however, it is an escape from my own culture and family and a way to shrug off all the responsibilities I am called on to take.

Therefore, I think it is precisely the all too often unnoticed, subtle beauty of tiny little things, or our capability of perceiving this beauty, which stands a good chance to save this world. True, we must learn how to appreciate bigness in just a modicum of such a beauty and yes, I admit that to learn this we may need to experience the big things first.

Perhaps not surprisingly, Alastair - a Scotsman in his sixties who has travelled and worked around the world - when walking along the flowerbeds in the gardens of Scottish Churches House in Dunblane would stop every now and then, look at a flower and ask with such a deep affection: "Isn't it exquisite?"

Another view: Beauty Will Save the World