The Modern Cavewoman

Recently I had a spate of encounters with technology... or should I say I bought a lot of gadgets. Of course, there is the mp3 player that's still basking on my desk, unused. I also bought a new phone, and yesterday I got a Nokia 3G phone from work, plus a motley crew of cables, connectors and such to boot. And a free Samsung flat screen TV (free cos we signed up a triple package with Starhub) is on the way.

In fact, I was so flabbergasted I decided to take a photo of all my new acquisitions cos I seriously don't remember ever buying so many techie stuff in the same period.

Looks like a junkyard sale... or just junk.



Oh boy, do I now qualify as a bona fide tech-geek? I feel kinda empowered with all this new technology falling at my feet, and yet a part of me was like a kid being given a financial calculator for Christmas - mildly intrigued at the prospect but don't know what on earth I'm supposed to do with them. Most of you would know that I'm antediluvian when it comes to techonology. And truth be told, the following are the decisions that flitted through my vacuous head when I decided to buy them:

Mobile Phone -- It's pretty. It's pink. It's only $48. I'm getting it!!
Mp3 Player -- It's pretty. It's black. It's about as big as my credit card. I'm getting it!!
Flat-Screen TV -- No brainer. It's free. I'm getting it!!

I can't lay claim to the 3G mobile phone though - that was given to me for work and I have to return it thereafter. Not that I relish using such a complex phone anyway; with its confounding myriad of buttons, it looks like a mini air plane cockpit in there.

Buttons buttons, bo buttons, banana fanna fo futtons, fee fie mo muttons... Buttons!



Kinda resembles those 1990s Nintendo controllers, eh?



I do love my new Motorola phone though. It's an old model, but using it is a cinch when compared to the Byzantine and ponderous Siemens S65. In fact, text messaging is now so easy-as-pie, it's truly a brainless endeavour. Kinda like those folks who prefer to spend hours sms-ing each other and having richocheting text conversations instead of calling each other and settling the matter in two minutes flat. But then again, what do I know about the joys of technology?

Although like its precedents, this foray into a new gadget was not without hiccups - I called Starhub yesterday (by the way, I'm a certified Hubber now! Kewl, ain't it gr8!!) to complain that I was unable to send text messages at times, and here was what transpired:

Me: I can't send text messages!
Operator: Turn off your phone and turn it on again.
Me: I dunno how to turn off my phone.
Operator: (!!!)
*awkward silence*
Operator: Ok... then take out the battery and put it back on.
Me: Hmmm... battery... ok.

Actually I didn't know how to take out the battery either but I guess I was embarrassed enough. So I spent the next minute or so fumbling with the phone and finally managed to ply open the cover and remove the battery. I put it back on and then realised that if I didn't know how to turn off the phone, I wouldn't know how to switch it back on. The tech-guru operator had not taught me that!!

And hence, I present to you my five-step idiot-proof method to solving technological woes:

1) Press buttons randomly. Who knows, you may actually hit the right one.
2) Take a sharp pen and poke the all available little holes on the gadget, especially those that look rubbery within. Works for calculators, maybe it'll work for mobile phones too. After all, those holes must be there for a purpose, right?
3) Bang the gadget against the table repeatedly for a few seconds. Works for errant remote controls, mobile phones and the PC mouse, untested on others.
4) Shake gadget violently. If it still doesn't work, at least it is fun listening to the spare parts rattling within like a mini shaker.
5) Shout for brother.

Unfortunately, my brother was in camp yesterday so I was cornered. In fact, I poked the hole located at the back of the phone so hard that it's now got an ugly indentation on it. Barely two weeks old... and my phone is already permanently scarred. =(

I passed Dad the phone when he returned home and he was like Houdini to the rescue. He pressed this big red button and the screen lit up, then the key pads. It was like the beam from a light-house to a shipwrecked sailor. Then came the signature "Hello Moto" jingle by a man with a creepy serial killer voice.

I was so happy; I felt like I had returned to civilisation.

Tags: Motorola Razr, Ipod Nano, Nokia E70, Siemens S65, Technology, Gadgets, 3G Phone

WOMAD 2006

Jon, Taeko and me went to WOMAD on Saturday. Unfortunately my camera battery died on me so I only got a couple of shots that night.

I had met Taeko and Dee for lunch at the Coffee Club (I am now convinced beyond doubt that the food at there ain't much to shout about; that at TCC is much better - try the dory with apricot and toasted crumbs at TCC, it's not bad). Taeko was amused at the mud pie, so we decided we'll go try the mud pie at Prego some day. I like Prego - cuisine notwithstanding, it's got an unadulerated charm about it.

So we trooped off to Fort Canning after church service, and by then the festival was already in full swing. We baulked at the entry price, but after working a sweat ascending the hill we were not about to turn back and head off.

The place was dimly lit, which reminded me of a gypsy's tavern that I had seen in a movie some years ago. There's this smoky, tenebrous affectation about the place. Little stalls flanked the entry pathway, selling accessories, drums, linen and other motley bric-a-brac. I spotted a few clairvoyants plying their trade. If their fortune-telling, hypnotising (or whatever they're trying to do, I watched 'em for a while and couldn't for the life of me figure out) didn't get you into a brain-addled trance, perhaps those colourful joss-sticks, scented oils and other ofactory concoctions would. No, I'm not a fan of aroma-therapy. I think it ranks somewhere on the scales of Stupdenously-Dumb-Ways-To-Waste-Money-ness as buying designer wear for babies and chicken rice and cookies specially tailored for dogs' palettes (see this post). The things people do when they have too much money.

Anyway, we saw a group drumming and dancing away and stopped to watch. I liked that performance, think those were some African beats but they had a nice, energetic vibe going on. Shortly after we made our way to the main stage. The place was very packed, though in true hippy fashion I still managed to find a few folks (pretending) to be sound asleep on their mats, completely oblivious to the blaring music. Yeah yeah, non-conformism... ain't it uber kewl. Though I'd give 'em credit for not flinching even though the incessant stream of crowds were threatening to stomp on them heads.

We met Joel and his friends there. Unfortunately for me, there was this tall lady in front of me obscuring the view and I'm sure I got her hair, gel and spray in my face and mouth when she was dancing in front. But she was really nice and kept apologising for jabbing into me.

Though I thought the crowd was kinda tepid that night; nobody was really dancing - most people were just standing there swaying slightly with a midly distinterested look, but in any case the music was really hard to dance to. I'm not a huge fan of reggae, but the night's music was alright. The highlight was Jimmy Cliff who regaled the audience with his shrill, sonorous delivery. I really liked his slow songs and they got me pretty sad for a while. When Jimmy greeted the audience with a zesty "How are you, Singapore!", most of those responding with a "Phwooaarrr!!" were foreigners - that got me chuckling. But hey, it's all good fun, Singaporean or not.

It's been a while since I'd been to an outdoor concert (the last one I went to was one of those BBC concerts in the park when I was in London), and it was nice to relive the old times. I was hoping to see some stars but the sky was, disappointingly, overcast that night. No stars. Bummer.

It ended at about 1 pm, but not after Jimmy Cliff and his band teased the audience with four en-core appearances, no less. We hung around for about an hour or so more, mostly downing drinks and burgers and checking out some other joints.

One thing really got me though - as I was sipping my Coke, I looked around the sloping field and most of the audience had left by then so the view was much clearer - despite Jimmy Cliff having the whole audience singing Save Our Planet Earth just a few minutes ago, the entire place post-concert was... erm... strewn with litter. Hmmmm.

Tags: WOMAD, WOMAD Singapore, Jimmy Cliff, Fort Canning

Miracle, Me

Something which I read on Irving's blog recently struck a full-toned chord within me. Here're his musings on his baby girl Ashley:

Every time I look at Ashley, to see how innocent and wide-eyed she is, to see how in 9 months two small cells could develop into a healthy human being, to imagine how one day she will grow up and have kids of her own, I see a miracle growing before my own eyes.

When I read that, I was like, wow. In a previous blog entry I described babies as "big, bawling, perpetually lactose deficient bags of pee, poo, puke (note the wonderful alliteration!) and drool". That was tongue-in-cheek, of course (though I gottta admit it made me sound like Cruella de Ville). But me not being a parent yet, I don't think I could ever fully comprehend a parent's love. I know, I've read about it countless times in books, watched it on telly shows and movies and heard doting parents jabber on about their little tots, but if you really think about it, it's quite as esoteric as trigonometry and vector planes are to yours truly.

Not all emotions have to be undergone first-hand for one to comprehend their pith or portent, but I think one can't just understand the gamut and depth of a parent's love by attempting a vicarious import. It simply doesn't quite lend sufficient credence to it, for it's very much an experiential comprehension.

Perhaps I'm just less wont to understanding something quite as fuzzy as parental love, but it's not quite quite beyond my ken either, thanks to the example accorded by my own parents. In fact, when I read Irving describing his child and her growth as a miracle, I wondered if my own parents ever saw me that way, and then I realised it is silly to even ask this question in the first place, really.

And then I thought about my heavenly parent - God. Does God see me as a miracle? I spent a few moments in quiet rumination. I know that as a Christian we ought to have a healthy sense of self-worth, being wonderfully and feafully made and all, but I've not quite ventured a deeper appreciation of it lately. It is an incredibly humbling thought, isn't it, for the Creator of the universe and the most almighty, perspicacious, powerful and chop-sockin' being ever to see me - someone who flees at the sight of lizards, fumbles with a can-opener and who still occasionally bites her fingernails - as a miracle.

Do you really see me as a miracle, God? Do you really? Most people's perception of miracles is like, stupendously out-of-this-world occurrences that'll inspire countless agape jaws and perhaps with a few bolts of lightning thrown in for good measure. But me? Sheesh, what did I ever do to deserve that illustrious accolade??

Absolutely nothing. God simply sees me that way, because He is love. It's a visceral, magnitudinous, infinite - and as Pastor Ben would put it - an "outrageous love."

For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. -- Romans 8:38-39

I can't quite even begin to fathom how wide or deep God's love is, but I know there is absolute assuredness and security in His love. And of course, that He is my - and your - biggest fan. =)

Tags: God's Love, Miracle, Babies

The Hodgepodge We Call Home

The past month easily qualifies as incontrovertibly the worst month I've had since I returned to Singapore. Somehow all the deadlines started converging all at the same time like rays of diffused light all merging into a laser beam focused to kill. And cos I am knackered from morn till dusk, I don't really have much inspiration to write.

And I hardly have time nowadays to watch telly, so my google-box diet comprises football on ESPN, news on BBC and documentaries on National Geographic, Animal Planet and the Discovery Channel, plus the occasional travelogue on Discovery Travel and Living (that sounds like a lot but I'm one of those annoying folks who keep channel-surfing).

Anyway, I was flabbergasted by two documentaries which I watched a few months ago. I journalled these thoughts back then but did not post them on my blog as I couldn't find the pictures I wanted to accompany the post back then. And the matter kinda slipped my mind and I forgot all about this entry until recently. My two favourite programs now are Nat Geo Investigates and Crash Scene Investigation, but I'll blog about these another time if I remember.

So here goes...

1) Scarification

The first was a documentary on human being's bewildering yet fascinating propensity to scarify themselves. I watched in part horror, part enthrallment as tribal folks from Ethiopia endured painful rituals which involved cutting the flesh repeatedly with a sharp object which functions like a scalpel.







Patterns were chiselled into the skin to create an intricate myriad of parallel ridges and grooves. The whole process took about an hour, during which there was a lot of shedding of blood. Not to mention the intense, searing pain as the scalpel lacerates the flesh, all without anesthetic. The tribesmen did this to integrate into their village. The scars they bear on their chest are a hallmark of oneness with the village amd an emblem of fortitude.

Actually, scarification is nothing new even to our modern society. Tonnes of people inflict pain on themselves in the quirky quest for beautification - tattoos, tongue-splitting, belly button piercing, and the like. Personally, I think tattoos are pretty ugly, but to each his own.

There was one scene in the documentary which I found hard to stomach though. A five-year-old boy, whose parents decided to scarify him, was bawling non-stop as the adults placed him on a bed of leaves. It was horribly ominous; I almost couldn't bear to watch. And when they cut his face with the scalpel and the blood oozed, I can still remember his screams, and the pangs of guilt I felt at witnessing the horror of it all, as well as the revulsions at putting a young child through such brutality.

One commentator, however, made a rather sobering comment - We are revulsed by tribal parents putting their children through scarification, but they in turn may baulk at us modern folks leaving the kids at a creche whilst we troop off to work.

That's what I love, this crazy hodgepodge of cultures which we live in.

2) Lioness Adopts Infant Orynx

A lioness named Kamuniak who lives in the Samburu National Reserve in Kenya made headlines when she adopted an infant orynx (a breed of antelope) and nursed it for 16 days. It was mind-boggling, to put it mildly, to watch scenes of the orynx suckling from the mighty lioness, or of the two lying in affectionate proximity, basking under the African sun.

Scientists followed the duo for sixteen days, and never saw Kamuniak eat. Even when one threw a piece of raw meat to her, she remained indifferent. It was baffling to say the least.

Kamuniak and her dinner.



But there were the more sinister moments. At times, she sniffed at the calf as a predator would lick its prey before it kills, with an excruciating slowness that smelt of perverse malevolence and menace. The baby orynx was too weak without its mother's milk to survive merely on grass and water. Yet Kamuniak stubbornly refused to let it return to its herd. Her baleful yet dogged devotion to the baby was slowly snuffing out both their chances of survival.

In the end, the baby orynx was seized by a young male lion while Kamuniak was taking a rest. The scene was heart-rending. Kamuniak, too terrified to go near the male lion, resorted to lurking surreptitiously in the grass, watching as the male lion mauled her calf apart. She reacted, just as a mother would when it lost her cubs.

Kamuniak went on to adopt a few more orynx calves, dismissing postulations that what transpired was merely a freak event. Bewildered scientists offered several conjectures for this phenomenon. Some surmised that Kamuniak may have lost her pride at a young age and hence adopting her dinner was a sign of aberrant behaviour from a psychologically scarred loon. Others attributed it to a case of bad eyesight. And to the villagers of northern Kenya, Kamuniak has already weaved her place into local folklore, deified as a spirit sent from the gods.

Everytime I watch programs like that, I grow more appreciative of the absorbing peculiarities in our world and a little more humble. =)

Tags: Scarification, Kamuniak, Samburu National Reserve, Orynx, Kenya, National Geographic, Discovery Channel, Animal Planet

Anne's Birthday and World Trade Center Trailer

We've tonnes of birthdays in August - Junda, Alvin, Anne, Edmond, Alberto, Singapore... guess we are well fed this month from all the bashes and dinners! And the latest celebration was for Anne's birthday at Fish & Co; some pics:

Our care group... not in its entirety though.



Gene and Me.



Jon flashes his best megawatt smile.



The birthday gal Anne.



On another note, I just watched the trailer of Oliver Stone's World Trade Center (hafta take extra effort to spell "center" the American way... it's so unnatural for me). By the way, Nicolas Cage looks really creepy with his moustache and new gaunt frame.

The best documentary on 9/11 which I've watched was one hosted by Robert de Niro (of all people). It chronicled the internship of a young fireman with the Manhattan fire department and the bravery of the rescuers just left me utterly speechless. That documentary also offered a perspective of going-ons in the two towers on that fateful day, which was rare as most footage I've seen of 9/11 was from the exterior. Agonisingly, the white collar folks were streaming down the stairs in a kind of lesurely way, like it was some sort of perfunctory evacuation exercise (that was before the buildings collapsed, of course). It also captured footage when the buildings were crumbling down as one of the firemen used the light from his camera to guide those fleeing the buildings and unwittingly filmed it all. The images were riveting and horrifying, almost cinema-esque but the fact that it was real made all the more stark. Detritus was hurtling downwards and after the building collapsed all the camera caught was a sea of grey smoke and an eerie silence.

Me being ever the cynic, I'm a tad ambivalent about this movie cos the thought of studio execs getting their grubby hands on the gazillions generated by a film which I feel is made too soon, too hastily and which plays on the sensibilities surrounding 9/11 sounds kinda exploitative. 9/11 has made a profound around the world, and the memories are a little too fresh to stomach. And I hate feel-good movies with a passion; the only way I can "feel good" about some of these dross passing off as movies (think Life Is Beautiful, Patch Adams, Forrest Gump... blah) is if they return me the money I paid to watch 'em.

But the parting shot in the trailer got me thinking - there was indeed something about 9/11 other than evil. I saw the illuminating beauty and kindness of the human soul in the documentary I watched. So methinks I'll try my darndest to squelch the cynic in me and actually go see this one.

World Trade Center trailer



Tags: World Trade Center, Nicolas Cage, Oliver Stone, Michael Pena, 9/11, feel-good movie

Prata Supper

Some pics (courtesy of Junming, who also posted 'em on his blog) from a prata supper last week. I was having a birthday dinner with the guys from care group when How Joo messaged me to join for supper. Kinda late but I haven't met the choir folks for a while so we hopped onto Junming's car and we headed off to the prata shop off NUS.

Myself and Junming - the No Evil pose was completely spontaneous. ;)



How Joo aka Smell No Evil and an Indonesian sister Cece (not sure if spelt right though).



The lard and grease we consumed... hmmm.



Tags: Roti Prata, Supper

National Day 2006

I woke up at 5pm today and got the shock of my life as I've terribly overslept. Yesterday there was a party going on at my house until 6am, so I went to bed late (or do you consider that early). Anyway I was suppose to go to a National Day party at Grace's house, so I hurriedly showered, zipped off to the nearest supermarket to get some Ben & Jerry's ice-cream and took a cab to Lavendar, where Grace stayed. Most of the care group was there, plus some friends from other countries - Rene (South Africa), Mihai (Romania) and Joel (Sweden).

The view from the balcony on the 29th storey was great, and so was the breeze. I didn't catch much of the parade as I was out there chatting most of the time and waiting for the fireworks. We also caught the planes doing their usual acrobatics in the sky. Was a tad disappointed with the fireworks this year though; they seemed kinda paltry when compared to previous years. And after the NDP, we trooped off to Geylang for a durian feast. And I tried Mangosteen for the first time ever... kinda squishy, but nice.

It's strange, but I don't recall ever hearing this year's National Day song. I don't quite fancy the newer NDP songs much cos most of them are very forgettable; guess the golden oldies like Count On Me Singapore, Stand Up For Singapore and We Are Singapore are still the best. My favourite of 'em all is this rather obscure number called It's The Little Things.

Some pics from the night... I'm lazy to resize the pics so you can click on 'em to view it full size:

Tags: National Day, Singapore

The Silent Muse And Some Grubby Drawings

I realise that most of the time I like to yak on and on about writing, but what of reading?

For someone who is terribly verbose, I have a chronically short attention span for reading. My bookshelves are littered with unfinished books - Schindler's List (which is dryer than a bunch of twigs from a forest fire), Lolita (can't really remember anything from it apart that she had downy legs), and the like.

I don't enjoy fiction. In fact the only fictional work I've read of late is The Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis, which I did not enjoy cos... well it's meant for children. There were junctures in the book when I could imagine a child laughing at a punch-line, but which only elicited a disapproving snort of "Ugh, that's corny" from me. Not to mention that the book is replete with lapses in logical deduction, and that I found its pedagogic style immensely tedious.

I'm not slagging off the book; I'm just saying that I can't enjoy children's literature. I had tepid responses after reading other children's classics like Tolkien's The Hobbit and Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's The Little Prince as well. It's a mischance of time - had I read those books when I was a kid, who knows, I may actually like them.

And libraries are anathema to me. When I was in Singapore I used to dread going to libraries cos the sight of children lunging around and draping themselves on bookshelves like monkeys on trees was instant headache fodder. Then when I entered university and libraries bore a greater resemblance to the hallowed halls of wisdom that I imagined them to be, as opposed to a noisome playground, I found the spooky silence mangling. It was as though there was an unnatural duress in the air and one would implode if one did not dart out of there quickly enough. Plus, the sight of students mugging away furiously with their heads buried in copious amounts of notes, files and books made me feel guilty about spending all my time in pubs watching football.

One of the libraries I do love, is my university's Senate House library in London. Just some trivia here - Batman Begins was filmed in the building's cloisters, and methinks the Senate House's stately exterior lend a strong resemblance to the trademark building in Gotham City, especially when it is bathed in a pale, austere light at night. And apparently, Hilter had designs to make the Senate House his headquarters. Meanwhile, the university quadrangle itself masqueraded as the British Musuem in The Mummy Returns, and I actually recognised that as I watched the movie. I, unfortunately, have never met Christian Bale in person =(.

The dignified stone entrance to the Senate House.



The library's interior.



One of the library's cloisters - going by the opulent furnishings, this is perhaps a restricted area.



An evening view of Senate House and its surroudings - it's the white building right smack in the middle.



Anyway, I love the Senate House library not for its book collection, but for its dignified, glowering demeanour and for the charming brown contraptions which made me feel like I was ported to a 19th century post office. Which are altogether the wrong reasons for being fond of a library.

Perhaps I dislike reading in libraries cos they remind me too much of a punctilious enclave. My favourite places to read are gardens. I used to live near Russell Square and lounging on the grass in summer watching the hypnotic squirts of water from the central fountain was a great way to chill. My friend and I would also frequent Alexandra Park, which has a fabulous view of London. We'd bring these colourful mats and sprawl all over them and read or chat for hours. It's funny, I can never yak for long on the phone but when I'm in a park, mthinks I can out-chat Oprah. Over in Stanford, my backyard was my study cos I would read research books there. The wooden tables are flecked with birds' droppings but other than that, they make great recliners. Plus, of course, my personal favourite, Hampstead Heath. I never get bored of that place. Some photos from Google:

I love napping in the thick dry grasses; it's not as bristly as it looks. I also had my first taste of wild berries, freshly plucked, in Hampstead Heath.



The beautiful Kenwood House. During summertime the place is abuzz with park-goers enjoying the jazz concerts by the lake. I imagined myself being an equestrian riding in the vast expanse of grass in front.



Inside Kenwood House. Not the most impressive interiors I've seen but I still love its warm accents.



One of the ponds in the Heath.



The Heath adorned in autum's mellow hues.



I don't lounge around on grass back home in Singapore, and for good reason. A Swedish friend who used to live here once asked me why people don't do that in Singapore, to which I promptly replied, "No thanks, we don't like earthworms in our ears." I'm sure there are earthworms in London's soil, but the dry weather kinda makes you oblivious to them. Blissfully so.

Regarding content, my bookshelves are pretty much an eclectic menu. The bulk of it comprises books on politics, and the rest are economic texts, dusty classics (you know, the type that everybody has heard of and readily offers a hackneyed opinion on, but which nobody has actually read it in full), Christian literature, some post modernist tripe, and other motley crew. One particular book stands out like an ungainly dung beetle amongst a host of resplendent dragonflies, and that is titled The Biotech Century. I won it as a prize whilst in school and have yet to lay hands on it (I don't care much for technology, by the way).

But my proudest possession of 'em all is my Dragonball Z collection. I've got the whole works - most are already beleaguered with their pages having turned grubby and dog-eared from too much re-reading.

Some drawings I did whilst in primary and secondary school:











One of my favourite reads ever is The Paradox of American Power by Jospeh Nye. Apart from its lucid and supreme analysis, another reason I like it is that it's pint-sized. Barely 170 pages and half the size of A4 paper, it's a pithy piece of work with very pointed commentary. I read it on the plane to San Francisco and finished it before touch-down. Perhaps that explains why my most consistent reading diet are newspapers. I don't like to read local newspapers much cos I find them rather shallow, so I just spend some time every week scouring for good news articles (and the occasional sports fodder).

And the books I hate? Self-help books, cos they are kinda wussy (on that note, I find Suze Orman of CNBC one of the most annoying TV personalities ever). Women's airhead magazines. And books on post modernism. I admit I've read only a few, but seriously, there are better ways to waste time.

As much as people tout books as treasure troves of knowledge, I'd rather spend an hour watching the National Geographic channel or the BBC. I'm inveterately impatient. If a book (or music, for that matter) does not hook me immediately then I can never carry on.

Then again, I do get slightly unhinged over books which manage to rouse my attention. I've read Lord of the Rings (which my friend calls "an unreadable book that spends two whole pages describing grass") cover to cover for more than seven times I'm sure. I love Tolkien - I used to post on a literary website for Tolkien fans, and when Peter Jackson's films were first released, we'd spend every piece of tooth, nail and hair bandying over the great Purist VS Revisionist debate. It was a place where cerebral, highbrow literary discourse went hand in hand with toilet humour. Smashing stuff.

So as much as I like to write - and according to some, garrulously so - I'm no bibliophile. I guess you can say I'm a giver, not a receiver. ;)

Tags: senate house, hampstead heath, dragonball z, comics, books, reading, library

Pictures

I have not brought my camera around much; not sure why but I think I've lost an interest to snap away. Anyway, some pictures of late:

Dad's birthday dinner last month at a Hakka restaurant near Maxwell. I'm half-Hakka, and adore Hakka food.



Dad and Mum.



Housewarming at Albert's house.



The couch-slickers.



The chefs hard at work.



And the fruit of their labour - was enough to get us through various rounds of supper whilst watching Germany VS Portugal, the World Cup third place play-off.



Then Alberto whipped out his nifty guitar, we belted out some tunes and there you have it - live karaokae!



The home-owner with his instrument.



Catching up with some old friends from my London days. We went for tea at an Arabic tea joint later and smoked some hookah.

Adopting An Iranian Child

Yesterday I dreamt that I adopted an Iranian child.

He's about two years old, with large liquid eyes, dark hair and cherubic cheeks. The funny thing is, adopting this kid was like buying a life-sized doll off the Toys R Us shelves - it comes complete with a video chronicling the early days of the child. I watched the video on a tiny contraption which appeared to be like a mobile video player and it showed images of the boy's hometown being destroyed by a volcanic eruption. So that's the history of my figmental Iranian boy.

Out of curiosity I did a search on Wikipedia, and turns out there are indeed volcanoes in Iran, though supposedly all dormant.

Mount Damavand, the highest peak in Iran and the Middle East, located near the southern coast of the Caspian Sea.



As to why an Iranian kid - I don't know. I don't speak Persian and have never been to Iran. Though one of my favourite lecturers in university was an Iranian man who taught the political history of Islam. I loved attending his classes for he used to regale us with tales about Iran and Islam, giving us a rare, perceptive window of insight into a world to which most of us are hardly attuned. But back to my Iranian boy.

He did not come with a name, and I never named him. What he did was sleep - a lot - and he took poorly to cushy toddler's bedding, which I somehow manage to unearth in my house, and preferred to sleep on plastic bags instead. Yes, the pink plastic bags which you get when you buy something from the neighbourhood convenience stores. That got me wondering if his early life was spent rummaging in the ruins of his hometown and sleeping in a makeshift bed cobbled together by whatever plastic bags he could find amongst the rubble.

Another idiosyncracy of this Iranian boy is that he has a predilection for wrapping pieces of baby hankies around his head. He seemed to enjoy snuggling within, and I often had to peel off those hankies anxiously to make sure he did not get asphyxiated.

The great thing is that he was as sweet as a lamb - he never bawled. He was unusually quiet and placid for a boy of two, and spent most of his time curling up to snooze. And there's always a somewhat pensive disposition about him. The eyes beheld a hearkening, though to what I didn't know.

And one day, the boy went missing. I searched high and low for him - under the couch, between beds and such - but never found him. That's when I woke up.

It's a weird dream, a hauntingly beautiful one.

The child in this photo somewhat resembles the Iranian boy in my dreams, though this one is a girl. =)

Blight To Vision - Football Kit Shockers

This is United's new jersey to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Munich air crash. Don't quite fancy the chalky red hue to be honest. Looks like a Boro kit... or worse, Liverpool's.



But as usual, Spurs managed to outdo everybody else by launching a third kit (read: shameless profiteering) which is... erm... brown. Undoubtedly the most minging jersey I've seen in recent years by a country mile. Brown and football kits do not go together; simple as.



By the way I was surfing the Spudz website for a picture of the new kit when I came across this enlightening statement, emblazoned proudly at the top of its home page:

"Stylish football has always been expected at White Hart Lane with Barclays Premiership success also high on the agenda for Spurs."

Heheheheheh.

The last time I've seen a brown strip, it was a picture of Coventry's fetching earth-toned number. The ginger bubble perm, the writhing expression, the drawstrings, the frightful white stripes (made doubly worse by the fact that they are symmetrical and hence more conspicuous) - can anyone point out to me anything that is ok about this pic?



But I have seen worse. Those jerseys gorging with sponsorship logos are particularly heinous and make the players look more like F1 drivers than footballers. Try these snippets on for size.



Or check out this shocker from the Aussies way back in 1993. I can't decide which was worse - the mullets or the garish Rambo prints.

Such a blight to vision, it's criminal.



What about Scunthorpe United's best efforts at mimicking a TV screen gone wonky.



Athletico Bilbao takes their cardiovascular fixations a tad too far in this ensemble that looks like bloody splats from the Texas Chainsaw Massacre.



This tarty Hull City kit would be more germane at New Orleans' Mardi Gras parade than on a football pitch.



Mexico's Jorge Campos as a walking advert for soda.



And finally, this kit by Crystal Palace takes the cake by far. I have no words for this, except that it's certain to turn the fashion police into raving gestapo. What kind of mind designed this??



Before you think that this is somewhat frivolous subject matter - football kits are a serious business. Apart from being ready cash cows to be milked for all their unsightly worth, away strips have been used by managers and fans alike as excuses for their teams' lousy performances on the pitch. For instance, Sir Alex famously blamed United's dour grey jersey for a sub-par match against Southampton and huffily insisted that the players change kit during half time.

Interestingly, Juventus adopted their trademark black and white zebra stripes after wongly receiving a kit meant for Notts County about a century ago. Releasing the infamous pink kit in 2003 was a return to their roots for the Italian Barcodes, which wore pink jerseys - with polka dots, no less - for six years when the club first started in 1919 before it switched to its more illustrious zebra stripes in which they have earned (or cheated) their way to over 20 Serie A titles. They have, conversely, won zilch in pink previously.

Now, if you have made it here thus far, time to wash thine eyes with Persil Automatic.

Tags: ugly football jersey