Letting Go
[Most Recent Entries]
[Calendar View]
[Friends]
Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in
la_destinazione's LiveJournal:
[ << Previous 20 ]
| Sunday, November 16th, 2008 | | 5:55 am |
of prop 8 and the human condition
I was chatting with P earlier today and he sent me a link to a segment on MSNBC, when Kieth Olbermann commented on the recent passing of Prop 8 in California. We've all heard enough about it, and to be honest, while I feel devastated about it from a personal point of view, I never did expect the whole issue to be so complex (70% of minorities voted for it, the mormons poured in 20million bucks alone etc). To me, I always thought it was a simple choice of embracing or rejecting something that we might not fully understand (and not understanding tends to leave to fear and hatred), and to me it seems obvious that a "no" is the right answer, but of course that's just the idealistic me speaking. I loaded the video and while I was watching it I started crying and crying and crying. I don't know what got into me. So yeah, here you go: | | Sunday, September 28th, 2008 | | 6:45 am |
of mamma mia
And by mamma mia, I really mean my mom and not the movie. In a bid to spend more time with my family before I head back to the states next fall (I think), I allowed myself to be convinced into getting up at 6 something on a Sunday morning to go with my parents to the botanical gardens. My parents have been crazy over qi gong over the past year (enrolling in many "expensive" classes) and every early Sunday morning they join this shi fu and a group of other qi gong enthusiasts at the botanical gardens. I prefer to get up past noon on weekends, but well, life's not always perfect i guess... =( So when we got there, I was quite impressed by the "new" botanical gardens. It's definitely much nicer than what it used to be after all the work done on it. I liked the "evolution garden" very much, and I thought the landscaping was beautiful and comparable to the golden gate park in SF (though of course i still think our botanical garden is way tooooo small). My parents met up with their qi gong friends and I went running. Now, I couldn't help but notice that at 7 in the morning, the park consists of only 2 types of people: the runner (tends to be younger, or sometimes a super fit-looking older person, all usually in some serious sportswear, except for me of course) and the, I'm gonna call them, the qi gong-er. The qi gong-er tend to be in their 40s to 70s, and for some reason, are all in sweat pants and a white t-shirt. Each group is extremely "territorial" and once they occupy a nice patch, they will aggressively defend it from other qi gong-ers. Each group is also led by one and only one shi fu, who sometimes sounds like a politician when he's demonstrating or giving instructions. A few groups are funkier: they have this huge radio set that's play some crazy beats and they're doing some kind of "techno qi gong". That's something I tell you. When we arrived at the park, I started poking fun at my mom for not putting on sun screen (cuz she's always telling me how i'm gonna get skin cancer from outdoor swimming). My mom then pulled out this bright pink cap that looked like it came from the set of mamma mia. I don't know who on earth designed it, but it has an abnormally dinosauric "front part" (you know the part that protrudes from a cap over your forehead to block off the sunlight) which seriously is a walking hazard cuz i swear you could hit someone in the eye while talking to him/her with it. My mom proudly declared that she got it from china for like 1 buck (i hope she didn't get 1 dollar milk there, cuz kidney stones and brain damage are not cool). When I got done with my run, I got back to where my parents' qi gong group was. The moment their class ended, everyone started making a run for the huge trees in the vicinity! I thought that was kinda weird, and when did my parents become tree-hugging hippies? so I asked my parents why. They quickly told me to snatch a spot by "standing on the buttress roots" of this huge ancient tree they were at. And then all those qi gong-ers started throwing their hands up in the air and started doing some breathing exercises, then suddenly they started hitting their tummies with their bare hands etc etc and I was starting to freak out. I jokingly told my parents "the tree is gonna die if you guys come and trample it every weekend." Now, this is the exciting part. My dad coolly replies "oh yah, we better get its life force before others get it." (my mom nods vigorously by his side) And I'm like "WHAT? what are you talking about?" My dad then goes on to explain how the shi fu had taught them these terrific exercises that allowed them to "extract good life force" from the environment, and by stepping on the roots of these ancient trees, they were "absorbing the life force" of the tree (my mom nodding even more vigorously at this point of time). So I kinda laughed it off and said "yeah right.... yeah yeah i'm sure the tree is dying from you guys absorbing its life force", and then my mom suddenly hit me on the chest and exclaimed "oh my god! look at the little bamboo plant we have in our room! do you know why it's DYING? BECAUSE WE FORGOT ABOUT IT AND PRACTICED OUR QI GONG IN THE ROOM AND SUCKED OUT ALL ITS LIFE FORCE!!!!!!!! AH-KAI THIS IS FOR REAL!!!!! WE SUCKED ITS LIFE FORCE AND IT'S DYING.........!!!!!!!!" sigh, if you treasure your life, don't drink milk from china, or hang around my parents when they're performing qi gong... after all, our bamboo plant at home is dying! | | Friday, September 26th, 2008 | | 5:12 am |
of assholes
McCain is always reminding people of his participation in the vietnam war. Sure, I respect that. But I think we all know that politics are dirty, and just because a politician used to fight in the vietnam war doesn't make him any less dirty. You know how when you have an appointment with a friend, and last minute he/she tells you he/she has to cancel cuz he/she is sick/busy/someone died/etc/etc/etc? well, that's what mccain told david letterman... and you know how sometimes that friends end up going out with someone else AND YOU CATCH HIM/HER? uh-oh... that's what happened, presenting the Republican Presidential Nominee: | | Tuesday, September 16th, 2008 | | 9:03 pm |
where have all the cookies gone?
It's really strange how something that used to be so familiar one day can appear to be totally foreign another day. Like you could talk to your lover everyday, cuddle every time you meet, get dinner every weekend, and then a year after having broken up, that person seems to be the most distant person you've ever known and memories are vague at best and suddenly it feels like your lover could be someone you knew from kindergarten that you can't really recall too much about. Getting a reservist call-up really isn't that bad. Some people think it's the end of civilian life "again" while some just take on a i-don't-care attitude. I don't feel either way; it's just re-visiting a phase of life I used to live. Or so I thought. Until 2 weeks ago, when I had to put on the military uniform again and when I saw the camp facilities, it felt like I was experiencing deja vu of someone else's life. Whenever someone addressed me "lieutenant chan" or "sir", I cringed a little (it's so weird to embrace hierarchy in this era!); and I thought military life was supposed to boost your already artificially-inflated egos! The funniest thing happened when it was lunch break. Since this call-up was to discuss the next exercise, there were mostly officers and warrant officers around, save a few sergeants that had taken on sergeant-major appointments. When I got my food, it suddenly dawned on me that the menu really hasn't changed for like what 6/7 years????? The menu of the day was gardenia bread buns, fried chicken, cream of something soup (you can never tell!), french fries, miserable looking broccoli and some super sweet drink that tasted real artificial. The meal that we all got excited about as recruits just didn't quite do it for me this time (was thinking about dim sum or risotto), probably cuz I hadn't gone rolling in the mud in the jungle for a 5-day-exercise. Being super last minute (and I swear i'm really busy at work, no kidding), I tried putting together some of my equipment last night for my call-up tomorrow. When I took the helmet out, the chain had rusted and it looked like a family of birds had lived in it for a decade. The webbing was moldy, and the boots could ferment a ton of cheese. Worse still, I had to look up something technical for my work, and when I found my old notes and manuals of what I used to do, I could not believe I used to be a soldier (yes yes yes, i know, too much of dim sum you say). And now I feel like the biggest liar in the world: I barely remember anything I used to know (how on earth do we forget so fast?????) and I got my appointment already! Just gotta keep smiling, that always works.... plus i reckon after like 2-3 days, everything about army life is gonna feel familiar and maybe even pleasant again.... My co-worker invited me to join her friends on a sailing competition last weekend. I had so much fun on the keel boat and got a good view of both singapore and malaysia on the straits. I have to admit I went there with a "oh i'm gonna jump into the water and play with the dolphins and then come up the boat for a glass of champagne and some strawberries" kind of attitude, but when the race started, there was so much we had to do to catch the wind and to navigate. I love the excitement when the wind suddenly changes direction or when we have to make a full turn around a checkpoint: suddenly the captain shouts his instructions and we're all scrambling to pull and turn and hoist and whatever. Sigh, if i had the money, i would buy a boat and go sailing every weekend too! Alright... this is ah kai signing off (haha i make it sound like it's the end of the world tomorrow!)... special thanks to pat for getting me most of my last minute requests including range cards and arc of fire sticks... hope everyone has a good weekend! *thinking of bringing some dim sum into camp tomorrow... =P | | Sunday, September 14th, 2008 | | 5:51 am |
SNL - must watch!
Michael Phelps hosts SNL season opening!!! If you have no time, at least watch the first one (Tiny Fey plays Sarah Palin!) and I almost want to say that michael phelps really got talent in acting, but umm, that would be stretching it too far... but yeah, michael phelps michael phelps michael phelps!!! | | Tuesday, September 2nd, 2008 | | 6:26 am |
of futuresex/lovesound
Everyone knows Justin Timberlake's single my love cuz it's on the radio all the time. the one that goes "i can see us holding hands, walking on the beach, our clothes in the sand, i can see us in the countryside, sitting on the grass leaning side by side". Umm hang on... to my horror, I found out that it's not "our clothes in the sand" but "our toes in the sand"! I could have sworn that I heard "clothes" every single time the song came on the radio until I was corrected by my co-worker. I had to replay the song on youtube one million times before I was finally convinced that the clothes never came off. It's just toes in the sand. sigh is it me or is everyone else fooled? and if you walkign on the beach, obviously your toes are in the sand right? (unless you wear sneakers to the beach and don't take them off, in which case you are republican) So apparently sarah palin's 17yo old daughter is like 5-month pregnant, and will be marrying the guy who knocked her up. Seriously, politics is full of dirty games (dirtier than my mind!) but who would think of something as RETARDED as this? I mean, the gal (the older one) just got nominated for VP and the next moment her daughter is keeping the baby out of wedlock AND going into wedlock. The funny thing is, sarah palin advocates abstinence for sex education. Well, obviously she didn't do a good enough job. I find it hilarious that conservatives applaud her and her daughter's decision to keep the baby and marry the guy. Keeping the baby or not is her daughter's decision; it shouldn't be political (i'm not saying she should abort the baby, i'm just saying she ought to consider if she can raise the kid and give the kid a good home when she's 17yo). Marrying the guy who knocked you up at 17yo, well, that just cries RETARD. I'm sure there's a 1-percent chance that it's true love and they are meant for each other and that the decision to marry is not because of the baby alone but due to a future loving and stable and caring relationship. But yeah, i'd give it 1 percent tops. And now conservatives are showering palin and co. (yeah they are a trademark now, a subsidiary brand of McSame) with praise and respect and my tummy tells me I might need to go to the bathroom and puke out my dinner cuz it's fucking double standards that "it's ok" she got knocked up at 17yo out of wedlock just because she will now marry that pubescent guy who did it to her. Great job repubs! Finally found the time to put up pics of my too-adorable nephew! Most of the pics are pre-haircut, and then he got a haircut recently and now he looks like a little shaolin monk!       after the army half marathon  point lobos state reserve, monterey, california most beautiful place on earth And of course, my love (paul oakenfold mix) so you can hear it for yourself (toes or clothes): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YdBr3dNr5w4Sigh, had such a bad day at work today =( *peculiar personality *intellectual arrogance *condescending *not having the right values *no commitment *don't understand the organization's needs | | Sunday, August 31st, 2008 | | 8:22 am |
such great heights
The gramophone's been left unwrapped in the boxes for the past 2 months. Of course I miss the times when I would get home and put on a vinyl and then turn on the christmas lights in the dark. Kinda feels like everyday is christmas and everyday is nice and mellow and life couldn't get simpler. I really miss happier days and simpler times. But it's weird, we all do that don't we? But what exactly are the happier days and simpler times? I really have no idea. I remember walking under a universe of stars one night on skyline ridge. It was all quiet, and then I suddenly saw a deer watching me with caution some distance away. I kept thinking that a mountain lion would get it right in front of me and I would be sad for the rest of my life, but of course no mountain lion came by and I guess we had a moment. I was on the bus the other day and day-dreaming, as usual. And suddenly I looked out of the window to see this motorcycle turn out from a side road and it's almost like time just slowed down to an excruciating pace because I suddenly realized he was gonna swerve into the bus and then his life would end. And then out of nowhere, time suddenly resumed and he turned nicely into his lane without hitting the bus. I don't know what came over me, but I was all in cold sweat and feeling relieved that he "got away". I finished reading East of Eden on the train when I was heading to the airport. I could not believe it, how steinbeck had painted a world so real that injustices and evil felt so overwhelming, yet there was always some hope in spite of all. It was embarrassing: I teared when Adam said the hebrew word for "thou mayest" and this indian guy gave me the hardest stare I ever got in my life. I looked down at the floor and suddenly he turned away and looked out of the window and so many emotions were running through his mind. He must have a story; we all do, but we pretend like we get on fine with our mundane lives everyday. | | Saturday, August 30th, 2008 | | 9:48 am |
of cookies and cream
I'm currently on course and i have to say it's driving me crazy. I have never been so bored my whole life! All the speakers are terrible. The content of their talks is terrible, their largely self-invented English is terrible (ask me about that one, you'll be in for some crazy shit), and the worst part is - THEY THINK THEY'RE REALLY GOOD. Somebody sedate me!!!!!! I know I brought this upon myself, since I chose to attend this course in order to be certified to handle infectious pathogens of higher danger classification. But I received the same training in the states in a few hours and I learned ten times more, and here I have to attend a whole week of full-time classes and listen to really bad speakers toot their horns all day. I really don't know how much longer I can take it, so if I disappear from the face of the earth tomorrow, you know I died a boring death after one too many bad class (you know how the japanese ppl die from overworking, so yeah, it's possible to die from really bad lecturers too). XXX This is me ranting, so bear with me. I don't understand why NUS is such a gloomy place. And by gloomy, I mean the people. For a really long time, NUS has been my "dream school" cuz I've always wanted to be able to complain about modules you don't get after "bidding" or "show-hand-ing" one million points, lecturers who are un-understandable (what a great word!), an extremely insecure administration that has to repeat over and over again "we are a world class university" etc etc etc... But having worked in the vicinity of this university for the past two months, I have to throw in the towel. Umm yeah, no thanks. I still remember some weird survey of american colleges that was done a couple of years back. Since US News college and grad sch rankings have by some stroke of luck become the "definitive" ranking system for schools in the states, this new ranking by another magazine decided to try something more innovative: how happy students in the schools are. Yeah, that's it. Basically they sampled a pool of students from each school and they simply chose how happy they were with their schools in terms of things like classes, social life, career opportunities etc... I think the top school was totally unexpected... Was it NYU? Hmm but I remember NYU has the highest suicide rate, so I might be wrong (lonely lonely new york). Second was Harvard (ok, if you're gonna make 1 million dollars a month right after you graduate, you better be a happy kid!) and so on... Well, my point is that, judging from the perpetual scowl on almost every student's face in NUS (especially when you take the shuttle during rush hours! every single thought of happiness has been beaten to death as you sniff the arm pits of the one hundred people pressing against you in the bus), I don't understand how people can get on with life in NUS. I mean, of course I'm exaggerating, but I think you get what I mean. I have never seen such a weird "unhappy culture" in any college before. Of course there are people laughing over lunch or people playing soccer on the grass fields, but on the whole, the pulse of the place is just crazy bad. It almost makes me feel like I ought to feel unhappy when I'm on campus (so strange!), probably because moods are always infectious (and so is ebola). Initially I thought it was just me, but after 2 months, I really think there is something wrong on this campus. So strange. XXX I applied for a staff pass to use the swimming pool and by some stroke of luck, I am now an official member of the sports facilities on campus! OMG! hehe now I can go swim whenever I feel like it! XXX I really like the cookies marks and spencer makes. Especially the blueberry and oat ones. Whenever I have to work late or overnight, I just bring an obscene amount of cookies to work. Sometimes, cookies are a man's best friend. XXX (ok thank god course is over) Recently I have started questioning what it means to believe in a religion. The reason why I say this is because of the ironies I can't help but notice in our everyday lives. Take my sister's in-laws for example (no offence to p, if you're reading this). My sister's father-in-law used to be an "abusive" husband. He would come home late, yelled at his wife for every single small thing she did, and exert his "head-of-the-family" authority in stupid ways such as mandating that only his clothes could be washed in the washing machine; clothings worn by females (i.e. his wife) had to be hand washed by her separately so her "bad luck" would not be transferred to him. Eventually, he retired due to old age. Then came about the change. Suddenly he was this extremely religious person. He became a devout Buddhist, set up an altar at home to worship the gods and ancestors, volunteered occasionally, and even went to Buddhist temples to read the scriptures regularly. But his wife obviously wasn't impressed. Because he "aged faster" than she did, suddenly he was this older, weaker, slower person in the family, and she became the "matriarch" of the family. She returned him the favors he had been giving her all these years: she would yell at him for doing something wrong, and made him out to be this stupid old man. Of course I kinda sympathize with him, though we all understand that when it comes to vengeance, we humans have exceptionally phenomenal memories (not so for telephone numbers and appointments though). Well, until something happened... the other day, when my sister's father-in-law went out to the temple for his regular scripture session, he found a cell phone on the streets. Right away, he turned it off, took out the sim card, headed to the nearest trash can and disposed of the sim card. Then, he brought the now "laundered" phone with him to the temple as if everything was fine, before bringing it home and giving it to my sister to use (he even proudly recounted his highly intelligent course of action the moment he found it). My sister gave it to my brother-in-law (she didn't want to hurt his dad's feelings) and said there was no way she could use a stolen phone. The next day, my sister lost her cell phone. She called me and said she was "paying for the karma of my father-in-law". And the last time I checked, he was still praying to the gods and reading his scriptures. God bless him. My sister's mother-in-law is even better. She's so buddhist that she cannot "bear" to watch birds go hungry. Yes, you heard me right. She's one of those people that simply have to cook something extra and take it out to feed the birds when they're at a park or something. She thinks that these birds are starving, and cuz they're birds, it means they probably did something bad in their past lives and are not paying for their mistakes by reincarnating as "lower beings", and so her "kind act" of feeding them is gonna give her good karma. Well, from an ecological point of view, I don't know how much good you're doing by feeding wild birds. I'd think they could lose their natural ability to forage and instead starve to death when they don't get fed enough by people. Apart from that, she doesn't cook the rice for the birds personally. She gets her other son's housekeeper to cook the rice, and then hits the housekeeper. Worse still, she "controls" what the housekeeper eats, which is normally food that's been left over in the fridge for many days (just because she's a foreign worker does not make her less than a bird, mother fucker!). After all this "benevolent" acts, one day, she went to the neighbor's place and stole a pair of shoes from their shoerack outside their door! The funny thing is, her neighbor actually saw her in action! So he went up to their door and started knocking and yelling that she returned the shoes. In sheer embarrassment, she started yelling at the housekeeper (so everyone would think the housekeeper stole the shoes) and made her housekeeper return the shoes to the neighbor. By the way, she's addicted to gambling too. I mean, none of this is remotely surprising is it? When did we expect "religious" people to necessarily be good people? The reason why I suddenly brought this up is because today I chanced upon more books by my favorite philosopher Bertrand Russell at the bookstore. Some of you might be familiar with his work, and part of his writings on religion focus on the Christian faith. Taking the "strict" interpretation of the bible, the catholics believe that sex should only be performed with the aim of reproduction (and so our dearest pope banned the use of condoms, i hope he's happy with the hiv epidemic) and part of the christian faith is to reproduce to glorify and worship god. By these standards, if we compare a person who works on the ebola virus and has saved many people but is unmarried and has had sex with a couple of women, with another person who is always lazy and doesn't work, and only wants sex with his wife all the time (we can even say for the sake of reproduction) and has many children; then the Christian is forced to admit the latter is morally superior, whatever else he thinks. None of this is rocket science or shocking and I know this is more ranting coming from me. I'm just saying everyone should do his best with his life and not think that your "right" religion is your ticket to heaven. If that's truly the criteria to heaven (if there's one), I don't know if heaven is a happy place. | | Monday, August 25th, 2008 | | 10:37 pm |
if you want something work for it
Now that the olympics is over, i can finally stop obsessing with michael phelps. NOT! Ok, I know that some people think my mind has finally snapped, with the constant "michael phelps is the best", "oh did you see michael phelps do this do that?" etc etc etc... The other day, my supervisor introduced me to a new post-doctoral fellow in our collaborator's lab. He said "hi i'm alex, I got my PhD from UMich" and so I jumped and said "oh my god did you know michael phelps when you were there? did you see him? did you say hi? is he nice????"... and then alex said "I said University of VIRGINIA, not MICHIGAN", then I realized I must have heard what I wanted to hear so I said sorry.... (see? i'm a pretty sorted guy ok?) My point is, Michael Phelps is really someone we all need to learn from. I really think that too many times we've been told by other people "oh don't even try this it's impossible" or "you're better off staying with what you have" etc.. But it's precisely this kind of self-limiting thoughts that also give rise to self-fulfiling prophecies. If you think you can't do it, of course you won't be able to achieve it. Great people truly understand the need to dream and to aim for the stars. And even if you don't get there, I don't think it makes you any less. We all heard about the dutch guy who had some diseaase and went on to win the gold medal in cycling (or something else, i forget), but who remembered the american guy from tennessee who didn't qualify for the finals in swimming, and went home to combat the cancer he already knew he had? To me, he's a winner already. I think it's really the fighting spirit in olympics that makes a difference. I don't care how many people china send to dance and frolick for the opening ceremony, how tall yao ming is (ok, that much taller than I am!), how cute matthew mitcham is (oh wait a second i do), but I do care how hard we try for something we really believe in. Of course, I have a confession to make. All the olympics-watching led to a total lack of training for the army half marathon 2 days ago, so ummm... yeah... will try harder the next time! (it's ok to find excuses sometimes) | | Saturday, August 9th, 2008 | | 10:09 am |
of mice and men (ad astra per alia porci)
I've finally come to the conclusion that, like Steinbeck, I wanna fly to the stars on the wings of a pig. Which is extremely befitting since I'm born in the year of the pig and I'm kinda like a pig anyways. =P For some reason, I've been feeling disconnected from the "real world" for some time. I don't know why, but I absolutely hate shopping malls, tv, places with huge crowds, and anything that requires me to "socialize" with people I don't care for. Well, not that the "real world" should revolve around these things in the first place (at least to me), but my family seems to think I've gone crazy. Apart from working on dengue virus all the time, I spend the rest of my time swimming/running/going to the seaside and hanging with my sister/nephew. Maybe I'm just getting old I guess. The only "real world" thing that I really wanna do is to go hit the clubs, but given the abysmal night scene and phenomenally bad dance music I've seen here (save paul van dyk that other night, which really rocked my socks off!) I don't know if I wanna pay a ridiculous cover to be in pain the whole night. I've also successfully steered clear of orchard road since I returned, which is quite a record I must say, so don't even ask me out to orchard road i get a massive migraine attack if I go there especially during the weekends when all the malls are just crazy packed. Been reading east of eden by john steinbeck and I have to admit it just blows my mind. I fondly remember the days in middle school when we had to study steinbeck's of mice and men for literature class. My literature teacher had us memorize that "george shot lennie in order to ALLEVIATE his pain" and special emphasis was placed on the at-that-time-out-of-the-world word: alleviate. Not that it's such a hard word for 14-year-olds. But anyways, I've always felt that little kids nowadays face the problem of having to grow up too quickly (think kindergarten kids who go to school with fancy iphones and text their housekeepers/parents/friends) but during my time, we were made to relate to a story that we had absolutely no way of relating to. Who could truly understand the dream of moving west in search for a better life, or the complexities of Salinas with all its rich fertile soil and its strict social strata? When I was at the marine station in Pacific Grove, it suddenly struck me that monterey county was extremely racially segregated. The less affluent, hispanic people lived in the city of salinas, the more well-to-do white people (and a few asians) lived in monterey, and the filthy rich white people were in carmel, 17-mile-drive etc.. The "ghetto" asians and some hispanic people also lived in seaside, as if it were some kind of middle grounds. I wonder what Steinbeck would think if he were still alive and saw steinbeck country in its current state. I'd imagine he would get a second heart attack and rename his book grapes of wrath and choose the more befitting title of watermelons of wrath. I still remember my trip to South Africa many years back. I had read in the textbooks about the famous apartheid system in SA, and how its abolishment was a major victory for human rights and the fight against racism. When I arrived in Johannessburg (ok I must be spelling it wrong) I got the shock of my life. Like your regular american city, blacks lived in the decaying city center while white flight brought the more affluent white people out into the suburbs. White people that ventured out on the streets at night were often the victims of deadly crimes. In effect, the apartheid system was as alive as it could be though it was technically abolished. Cross one street from a black ghetto and you would find yourself surrounded by nice trees and spectacular houses and white people everywhere (you couldn't even tell you were in Africa!). Not that you could blame the white people. When it comes to raising your kids and the safety of your lives, everyone has to make the natural decision of protecting himself. I guess I just wished that things would be better after so many years of "modern civilization". So my neighbors are German, according to my parents. I have a huge passion for baked german pork knuckles and currywursts and hanuta hazzlenut waffles, so I wanted to invite them to our place for dinner last year, which pissed my parents off cuz they "might steal" our precious chinese works of art. Fine. I can "accept" that. When I walked past Ian a few days ago, I decided to introduce myself (I mean, we're neighbors!) and after some words, I told him that I loved german food. And he was like "umm ok"... and then we chatted more (all kinds of stuff... like his work, his cats, what his wife did, why they had all these plants etc), and I was catching a FULL-BLOWN british accent, which sounds amazingly sexy after you've lived in america for some time (i finally understand why the americans go crazy over the british accent now) and suddenly, ian tells me that he and his wife are ENGLISH! I turn scarlet red, and murmur my byes. When I get home, I tell my parents that our neighbors are ENGLISH, not GERMAN, to which my mom vehemently protested (no they're german!) and my dad added "english and german are very close"! So much for racial harmony. I was working overnight in the lab the other night (thanks to my over-zealous supervisor) and it suddenly struck me that I now understand myself a teeny weeny better. Aaaaarrrggghh... gonna steer clear of all shopping malls/crowds for as long as possible! I seem to be the target of umm weirdos for the past year. Can't say too much, but yeah, McCreepies, McStalkers and McShadies are not welcome in my world! I've decided to go to UCSF for my PhD. I recently found out that they do terrific work on HIV, and since my personal wish is to do something meaningful with my infectious diseases training, I think HIV would be great. I'm thinking malaria would be cool too, but Stanford seems to study mostly "affluent" diseases (at yale they do lyme disease! not sure if i wanna work in that area) and I can't bear to move to Harvard/Yale and leave my most beloved Pacific Ocean. So yeah, UCSF it is (keeping my fingers crossed that I'll get in!)... I imagine myself having dim sum on a lazy sunday morning by the sea, and then proceeding to baker beach to do some reading and tanning... Yeah baby! I watched a little of the Olympic swim heats today (felt weird to finally watch tv after so long) and I must say it's just soooooo beautiful to watch them swim! I really hope I can swim like them! Not that I'm a bad swimmer or anything, but i don't know how they do butterfly strokes like they're really flying... So beautiful! Maybe mice and men really aren't that different. It's sad, but it's true. | | Thursday, July 31st, 2008 | | 2:55 pm |
of experimentation
I had a rotten day at work yesterday. Stinky rotten. It's not so much that my experiments didn't work. I just found myself frustrated with the way some people worked I guess. Things that I thought were simply and straightforward were made ten times more complicated by human factors and while I know no one is to be blamed, I still felt like crap after a day's work. After work, I went swimming with KW and his gf E. KW asked me a month ago if I wanted to meet up regularly to swim and play squash and inititally I thought it was too much of a commitment (cuz our schedules did not necessarily fit) and I wasn't even sure if we would end up meeting twice a week, but it turned out great and I enjoy swimming/playing squash with them everytime we meet. So anyway, it happened that E was the target of some old uncle-peeping tom at the pool, who would lower his head into the water to stare at her umm boobs all the time. After having a good laugh, we all decided to go down to Chinatown for dinner. Here comes the long story... So, Chinatown holds a special place in my heart, and that's not just because I'm ethnically chinese. It's also because my grandfather was born in chinatown, and I actually grew up in chinatown (ok, technically I live at the fringe of chinatown cuz I'm slightly closer to tanjong pagar). When I was a kid, everytime my parents wanted to take us out, the first choice would be chinatown. Yeah I know I'm not old enough to claim to have seen "a lot", but honestly speaking, I witnessed the "demise" of Singapore's chinatown. When I was a kid, chinatown was truly bustling with life. I use the word "truly" in the sense that people who lived around the chinatown area and people who came to chinatown made it very much alive. When old folks were done with their dinners, they played chinese chess in the void decks of their flats, while others would play a sad tune on their er-hu by the wet market. Hawkers in the food centre actually made GOOD food and people would come to chinatown just for their meals. But over the years, things changed. Playing chinese chess in public was discouraged for fear of illegal gambling. Many open spaces were "developed" into structures supposedly built to reinforce the authenticity and "chinese-ness" of chinatown, but turned out to be the very culprit for its demise. Take for example the stage they built in the middle of the square right outside kreta ayer hawker centre. After the government built it, they set up signs that "encouraged" people to "go on stage" and, get this, "showcase their authentic chinese cultural performances". The sign even suggested examples like chinese dance, playing chinese musical instruments etc.. As if the killing of true spontaneity wasn't enough, the new structure practically evicted the bunch of chinatown residents that gathered at the square (yes, I know gathering for the purposes of chatting is not exactly the government's idea of "authentic chinese culture", but it sure beats a stupid stage, and part of chinese culture IS about the interactions with people who live close to you) and left the heart of chinatown quiet and void of life every evening. I mean, yes, tourism matters to us, but do we really have to MAKE the residents of chinatown perform their thing on stage? Would you wanna do that? The recent renovation of the hawker centre and wet market didn't seem to fare well for business either. The increase in rent led to skyrocketing prices which in turn spiralled downwards into poor business. The badly designed hawker centre was a sweltering furnace that trapped heat in it even in the evening. Aaarghh... I live in chinatown and I'm not even sure if I want to eat there. Yes, it's unfair to say that all the food there is bad, but surely I'm not the only who thinks that a lot of stuff is pretty bad in chinatown now. Gone are the good old days of a bustling chinatown with the occasional sad tune of an er-hu. We've replaced it with bright orange and green buildings, escalators and glass panels, pseudo-chinese culture, fake roadside food stalls offering overpriced food, glitzy stores selling stuff that no one ever needs and a totally fucked up sky bridge that no one wants to hang out on anyway (do you wanna admire the stinking canal under it?). I can accept all of this; I just mourn for the people who once called this place home, because they've become fugitives of their own homes. You might think that I exaggerate. Plus Singapore is predominantly made up of ethnic-chinese anyway. Why do we even need a chinatown? And we all speak English anyway (or we think we do), so to hell with chinatown. I think there is some middle ground to be found. Yes, we can't expect chinatown to be truly china-chinese, because the chinese people in our country are so many generations away from their chinese roots. But that doesn't mean that chinatown has to perish in the name of progress. I say let chinatown do its thing, by itself. Don't build fake pavillions that look plastic and too brightly coloured. Don't set up some weird stage and expect people to jump on stage to demonstrate their "chinese arts". Don't choose the stores that get to set up the roadside stalls every night (I mean, do we really have to RANK everything?). Just let it be and I think perhaps tourists will find our chinatown more authentic, and we will find our chinatown more amicable. Ok, I don't know why I had that sudden outburst, but that's not the story. I just wanted to make the point that chinatown was slowly degrading into a piece of imitation artwork, and coupled with it is the unfortunate fact that the only remaining cinema there is dying a slow undignified death. Yangtze (chang jiang; long river) theatre has been at pearl centre for a couple of decades. Despite the renovations and construction, it's the only remaining theatre in chinatown (long hua was the first theatre in singapore actually, but now it's become this ugly building that used to house "popular bookshop" with all its dumb assessment books for parents to force their kids to do every weekend, the other theatre at people's association is now defunct, i believe, and the one at oriental has become a kbox karoke centre, with the ubiquitious red K sign on the building). When I was a kid, my parents used to take me there to watch movies. Sometimes they showed a few hollywood movies (aaargggh!), but mostly they offered chinese movies (who remembers jet li's wong fei hong movies? there were a few of them!). In fact, I watched chungking express in Yangtze when I was a kid, and I fell asleep because I couldn't understand it. Funny that it's become my all time favourite movie and I've watched it like 30 times. Over the years, it became "unfashionable" to watch a movie in chinatown. Everyone preferred the posh cinemas at Orchard Road with dolby surround sound and extra-wide screens. Well, Yangtze found its own way to survive. By the time I was in secondary school, they screened sex-oriented movies exclusively, and found its clientale in a bunch of older men (in their 50s and onwards) living in chinatown. The tickets were cheap and they never needed to spruce up the place (guess you don't really need nice seats and big screens to appreciate porno). Now comes the story (FINALLY!)... E said that apparently old men went into Yangtze with umbrellas so that they could jack off as they watched the movie! (i stupidly asked why they needed an umbrella, which turned out to be because they could open the umbrellas and umm... shield their laps, or whatever they were doing on their laps) So KW and I, having talked about "understanding" this dying cinema in chinatown for ages, decided that all 3 of us would go watch a movie in Yangtze! We sheepishly walked into pearl centre and took the lift up to the 4th floor. Then we found this really sketchy corridor that led into Yangtze, and the moment I walked into the lobby of the theatre, memories just flooded my mind. After more than 10 years of not being there, the place looked like a cheap ktv kind of umm whorehouse... bright neon lights and some random chinese food stall made the place look really odd... We looked at the selection of movies (all X-rated, of course) and finally decided on a Japanese movie called "Freeze Me". When we bought the tickets, the cashier (this auntie in her 50s) looked flustered and even carded us all while shouting "HOW OLD ARE YOU GUYS AR??? HOW OLD????". She was completely bewildered and kept confirming the tickets with us (and finally had no choice but to hand the tickets to us) as if only older men were allowed to buy tickets. When we got to the room our movie was gonna be screened, we hit this old green door and we didn't quite know how to respond. Then we realised we were supposed to open the door for ourselves, and when we did, we were greeted with an old musky red curtain and we all laughed our heads off. Just before we stepped in, either KW or E said that the cinema must smell of cum since so many old men had jacked off in it, and suddenly all 3 of us didn't want to go in. Well, went in we did. There were 3 older men (in their 60s probably) and, get this, 2 older women! Now, don't get me wrong. I'm all for female masturbation. Who's to say that only guys need to self-satisfy their urges? It's just that umm I didn't know how these women were gonna "do it" in a cinema. One of them had a huge bag that took up 2 seats and there were all kinds of weird stuff in it, including more plastic bags and bottles. When we sat down, E insisted on putting on an extra layer of clothing and laying her seat with a t-shirt. The room was stark silent and you could hear a drop of water fall. Then a few more guys came in. Suddenly, we heard someone reeling tape at the back, and then we heard the lines of a commercial, but nothing on the screen. By then, we decided that we felt like we were IN an art film. hahaha.... I don't know how to describe it, but if I had a videocam, I would have filmed down everything, and it would have captured feelings of desolation, desires, pain, needs, and maybe loss. The lights went off suddenly and we plunged into complete darkness before the movie came on. The movie was stupid and nowhere as pornographic as I thought (I mean, it's soft porn cuz it's still a movie afterall, with a semi-artistic slant too!). A girl is engaged, and shortly before she marries her fiance', the 3 guys who gang-raped her a few years ago appear at her place one by one. So one by one she's raped by them, and then she kills them and orders a huge freezer to freeze them (that's why the movie's titled "freeze me"). The catch is that at the end of the day, after she kills the 3 bad guys one after another, she ends up killing her fiance' when he discovers their bodies, and then freezes him in a freezer and commits suicide (quite an art film huh). Towards the end, I almost fell asleep cuz the storyline was repetitive (she killed them the same way) and bordering ridiculous. When it ended (of course she had to commit suicide naked, how else should you do it?) and the lights came on, suddenly I realised that almost all the men had left the cinema! It was just the 2 women and another old guy left. I was totally confused, and I realised that I hadn't paid attention to umm any umbrella-opening or people leaving (presumably they left cuz it was bad, or cuz their "business" was done). When we walked out, I didn't know what to feel. Yeah, it wasn't as dramatic as I thought it was gonna be (not like the old men and women were masturbating in there, or at least not that I knew of), but it was still mildly disconcerting, like watching a moth fluttering its wings and dying a slow death in front of you. I'll have to think about this again, not quite sure what to make of it. Quite a day I would say. | | Wednesday, July 16th, 2008 | | 6:18 pm |
| | Friday, July 11th, 2008 | | 3:58 pm |
Yesterday, my co-worker asked me in all seriousness, "can you show me your six-pack please?". In all seriousness, I had no idea if I should take that as a compliment or a sign of peversion (haha!)... my co-worker is in her mid-40s and she's this really nice lab tech auntie that I love to talk to and work with in the lab, so I definitely did not see this coming... After awkwardly murmuring incoherent thoughts on the spot, I finally decided that the best way out of it was to say the truth. "Sorry I don't have a six-pack." Unfortunately, it didn't quite work. Thereafter, my co-worker started rambling that I didn't want to "share" and that I definitely had it.. to which, I walked off feigning work somewhere else but my ears were hot and my face was red red red... Aunties rule the world, I tell you. *** I got back to my desk today and a few of my co-workers were crowded pretty close to my desk. I sat down and started using the computer and because I was listening to music, I was pretty oblivious to what was happening around me. After some time, one of them came up to me and showed me a little post-it on my built-over-the-desk-mini-cabinet which was now closed (i usually can't be bothered to close it cuz it has a heavy door). It read "change your clothes", which totally did not make sense to me. Then my co-worker said "oh, we noticed that you store some clothings in your cabinet (sometimes i run to work and need to shower and change) and we can see your boxers in them so maybe you should change your clothings (???)..." ????????? What on earth is wrong with these people??????? Thereafter, I stacked my towel over all my clothings (underwear included) and then left the cabinet open again. I hope they don't steal my organic scottish shortbread fingers that I bought from marks and spencer. That would break my heart. XXX On a happier note, I had lunch twice with HY and YX and our dearest doctor prescribed me some medication for hair growth, which I know sounds ridiculous to a lot of you, but made me super happy the whole day! Ah, everyone loves a doctor friend! YX told us the funny story of her friend who was on some narcotic drug at the hospital and the goodlooking doctor wanted to check if she was ok so he told her to stretch her arms out and place them on her knees, and she proceeded to stretch them out and placed them on HIS KNEES... This has to be the funniest story I've heard for quite a while! XXX Ok, after all the stupid stories, I'm sure everyone's gonna have a great weekend! My mom's supposedly singing in a concert tonight, but she just called to say that her teacher said the one song she was involved in would be cancelled cuz "they sounded bad", which really breaks my heart, especially cuz students are "forced" to buy at least ten tickets, which my mom couldn't sell a single one (except to me and my dad, and my sis can't make it cuz of the baby) and has to pay for now. Eeeeeeks! I think this calls for a big hug! | | Friday, July 4th, 2008 | | 4:17 pm |
| | Tuesday, July 1st, 2008 | | 5:22 pm |
| | 4:38 pm |
| | 9:02 am |
of god hates fags
This is the God Hates Fags video by Westboro Baptist Church. I got this off the 92.7 website because my 2 favorite DJs had a moment of fame in it (make no mistake, they are laughing their asses off because of this) and decided to put it up on their official website. I mean, this video isn't even that surprising. We've come across enough hate-driven inflammatory stuff from some religious fanatics (some some some, don't jump off your seat!) but this one is noteworthy for a few reasons: 1) My favorite SF DJs are on it! Definitely worth a few brownie points... 2) They have this realy frail looking old lady with white hair talking about the destruction of all these corrupted sinful countries and likened to all these biblical references like the destruction of Sodom, but put together pretty badly. What, christian fanatics can't do good video editing? 3) This has to be the best part: they are so obsessed with their misguided convictions that they even shoot their "own people" down! Hello, the last I checked, George Bush still opposed child abortion unconditionally, even if you were raped at 13 years old by your father or the thud of your hood and had no money at home and got disowned by your mom and were desperately trying to finish middle school. And if Jesus really wanted a Crusade against the Muslim world, Donald Rumsfield sure did a good job of giving those so-called terrorists a very "christian" treatment with no right to a lawyer or public trial but the privilege of a healthy dose of beating up everyday. Christian fanatics, gotta love them huh... | | Wednesday, June 25th, 2008 | | 9:18 pm |
of things that bother me II why aren't we happy?
Everyone seems to give the "holy grail" of life a different spin nowadays. Since young, we are bombarded with different versions of the "ideal way to live life". Some tell us that it's most important to start a family (I have to admit that doesn't appeal very much to me, though I do respect family values), others say that getting into college and a respectable job would seal the deal. A few say that being happy matters the most, but this begs the question: how do you "make yourself" happy? In case you are wondering, I wouldn't call myself "unhappy" right now. I'm facing a little stress from adapting to some conditions right now, but apart from them, I would say I'm pretty happy with what I have. Maybe it's because after years of yearning to sell my car and to take public transportation (save the Earth guys!), I am now faced with the "ordeal" of squeezing with a crowd of super gloomy-looking people in the bus everyday... For some reason, people in fast-moving cities always look like someone in their family just died when they take public transportation... I get dirty looks when I try to squeeze past someone, and I get an angry hiss when someone steps on my toe as if it were my fault... I must be the only one on bus 197 that smiles his way to work (actually the secret is in the shuffle: just program ABBA or something of that sort and it's hard to scowl your way to work. awkward dancing on bus not encouraged though) which I guess makes me some kind of endangered bamboo-shoots-eating panda or UNESCO World Heritage site. So I've been trying to get Ms D to set up my computer terminal for me at work. When I called on Monday, I was surprised to hear a really manly voice on the line. She told me she was busy and that she would come on Tuesday to set up my computer. On Tuesday, no one came down and she didn't pick up my call. On Wednesday, I checked my email and I saw an email dated Monday afternoon "hi, I might be on sick leave on Tuesday and might not come install your computer, in which case I will come on Wednesday to do it", which instantaneously told me that I was dealing with a woman of telepathic powers unknown to Mankind or George Bush. On Wednesday I called her several times to no avail, and she didn't return my voice mails either. So my co-worker said that I needed to "complain" because I just "came back from Stanford", which I thought was the most ridiculous suggestion ever. So I thought I could bear without a computer for longer, and just before I left work today, Ms D showed up at my desk with all the computer parts in a trolley. I have to admit I was a little surprised when I saw her: she had short hair that was gelled up and standing in a spikish way. Her hairline was receding the male way (i.e. at the temples) and she was in a pair of very manly-looking jeans worn at least 5 inches above her waist. Her face was scarred but I couldn't tell if it was a very bad case of acne or if it was some kind of chemical exposure. She was quite short and slightly stocky and she looked like someone had stepped on her tail or something. The moment she came, everyone in my office acted like some abomination was in the room and it was best not to look or worse still make conversation. So I thanked her for bringing up the computer and apologized for all the calls I made, and suddenly she smiled and told me her "story". Apparently, she hurt her ligament more than half a year ago and no doctor would refer her to a specialist, and then her supervisor decided to make her move all the IT equipment in the library to another floor, so she "decided" that she was too sick to come to work on Tuesday. We chatted more and she kept apologizing for the delay and I told her it really wasn't her fault. To be honest, if I had known of her "predicament" I would have gone down to collect the computer myself. In the first place, I wasn't even sure what the right procedure was and had just called the number of the IT department. Then she told me that she left the monitor cable in her office and would deliver it to me later, but I ended up going down to get it myself cuz I didn't want her to make an extra trip up. We chatted a little more and I felt like I understood why people misunderstand her and get the wrong impression that she's some sort of evil person when she's just trying to deal with some issues in her work. When I got back to my office, suddenly everyone came up to "chat" with me. "wow you actually managed to charm her huh?" "omg i've never seen her so nice to anyone before!" "what? she ACTUALLY brought your computer up for you? I waited a year and it never happened!" blah blah blah la la la.. The worst comment was "i think she thinks you are cute that's why she was nice to you but not us" which I felt was downright insulting. The more I think about it, the more I feel that many of us aren't happy because we don't allow ourselves to be. All the wants, all the desires, all the can't-haves... And if we can't be happy, we won't let others be too. We judge others like we're chief justice of the republic of congo, and we measure what we have and how happy we are against others. I don't think I know the greater path to happiness, and who knows it could be an illusion we're made to think is necessary in our lifetimes. But I sure think that I can be happy any day withot it being on anyone's expense. (wow this has to be the most optimistic entry I've written in a long time!) Anyway, I have started work on dengue virus and hopefully work will go well (we all want to be happy don't we?)... I'm running to work tomorrow and I think it will be fun... hope everyone's having a great week! Is It Love | | Thursday, June 19th, 2008 | | 6:38 pm |
happiness is by the sea
 Just couldn't resist posting a picture of me by the pacific ocean (17 mile drive, monterey bay, CA)... I am hoping to go back to visit again soon, anyone interested? | | 10:17 am |
of the return of the ocean trout
 Lone Cypress I believe that at each point in life, we all have a theme song, though we might not even realize it. When I say theme song, I don't mean the way each scene has a certain song in musicals like rent... It's more subtle i feel, like a song that you kinda fall in love with for a while and you can't help but keep humming whenever you get off work and bike under the redwoods back to your house... or the song that you can't help but whistle when your day went well, or sing softly to yourself when someone dear has left...
For me, my days in monterey at the marine station are marked by iron and wine's bird stealing bread... When I first applied to undergrad, I was adamant about moving to the west coast... i wanted to be a part of hopkins marine station, i wanted to go scuba diving in monterey canyon, i wanted to swim with the sea lions and float on my back with the californian seals, i thought i would be the happiest person doing all these things... but as you guys probably know, none of that happened and I moved to the midwest after my application was declined... So when I finally got into the grad program I wanted, I leaped at the opportunity and applied to tony, saying that I had experience in immunology and I was armed with a diving license too. I drove about 3000 miles from the midwest to monterey and along the way I passed the plains, the deserts, the mountains, everything except the sea until one day I suddenly found myself standing by the pacific ocean and watching the waves crash on the tall cliffs with the lonely pine trees growing on them.
It so happened that all my CDs were packed in boxes and I was too lazy to unpack them. So when I moved into Peggy's place (her real name was actually winifred, thanks to her parents honeymooning in a certain place in canada that is probably too easy to guess now), all I had was Iron and Wine's the cradle drank the creek cd in my car, which I hadn't listened to much while driving cuz I was too busy scanning radio stations at every city and town (that's another story worth telling another time). So naturally, I ended up listening to that same cd everywhere I drove. Every morning, I played bird stealing bread on repeat when I drove to work... every evening, I listened to bird stealing bread while I ran along the coast towards carmel and 17-mile drive, while the seagulls soared over lover's point. And every night, I put the cd into my gramophone and played bird stealing bread when I went to bed (ok, by now there's no doubt in your minds that I am probably mentally handicapped). Those were beautiful days, and I definitely met some of the nicest people in my life when I was there (at the marine station, somehow or another, everyone was super warm and friendly and there wasn't any backstabbing or anything, which I attribute to the fact that having lunch together by the ocean everyday makes a person happier and hence nicer) ((yes, another warped theory of mine)). The surfing didn't work out so great, and the diving went worse cuz of the numerous shark attacks when I was there, so I ended up collecting specimens by the beach and mostly at the pier, which meant bending into the most awkward positions to pull a sea squirt off the pier pillar while some super rich millionaire walks past you in bewilderment to his yacht... But everyday turned out to be very fulfiling and I don't think I've ever felt more at peace with myself.
Eventually I moved up north to Palo Alto and naturally, I grew out of the song and the CD was chucked in some unknown corner and forgotten for a long time...
Just before graduation, my parents came to visit me and they suggested joining a chinatown bus tour to monterey cuz they'd heard so much about 17 mile drive. I was very hesitant because of finals and also because I wondered if the chinese tour guide was gonna butcher my impression of this place, but I eventually gave in because I thought it was befitting to say goodbye to monterey. The moment I got on the tour bus, I knew I was in deep shit. The tour guide was, for lack of a better word, an extremely unpolished person. His description of the place ranged from a too painfully detailed analysis of property prices in monterey bay to how to geta bowl of clam chowder at cannery row without paying a single cent (the answer is to go to every single store and take a small sample and by the time you are are done walking down cannery row, you would have the equivalent of a bowl of clam chower in your tummy, which btw, the tour guide accomplished in front of us full of pride at his own ingenuity). When we were finally by the pacific coast, he gave us 10 min to take pictures, and all the tourists clamored to the best spots to take pictures... I couldn't help but wander off and before I knew it, I found myself on a cliffside watching the waves crash and suddenly a flock of herons flew right over my head, so low that I could stretch out my arms to touch them if I tried...
And right then, I found myself humming bird stealing bread to myself....
(ignore the video cuz there's no real music video for this song)
Oprah came for our commencement and this is what she talked about:
http://news-service.stanford.edu/news/2008/june18/com-061808.html If you are wondering, no, we didn't each get a car from her. More to come soon! P.S. I'm back in Singapore after a grueling flight! |
[ << Previous 20 ]
|
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif?v=92.1){kind=small}
la_destinazione's journal
