dimanche, janvier 31, 2010

310110

gosh how time flies. feeling pensive at the end of jan. 31 days have passed into the new year and what have i been doing / have done thus far in 2010?

hmm..

samedi, janvier 30, 2010

samedi aprem

ça fait un certains temps que j'ai écrit quelque chose en français.. peut-être c'est à cause de la paresse, ou peut-être c'est à cause de l'incomptabilité du clavier mac avec la français! par exemple il n'y a même pas d'une touche pour le ".". haha c'est vachement stupide que je dois utiliser crtl-c ctrl-v pour le faire apparaître.

néanmoins aujourd'hui je vais vous présenter une poème écrit par le grand Charles Baudelaire qui a scandalisé tout la france avec ses poèmes car les images sont trop choquant et perturbant pour les gens de son époque.

voici une de mes favoris:
L'Homme et la mer

Homme libre, toujours tu chériras la mer!
La mer est ton miroir; tu contemples ton âme
Dans le déroulement infini de sa lame,
Et ton esprit n'est pas un gouffre moins amer.

Tu te plais à plonger au sein de ton image;
Tu l'embrasses des yeux et des bras, et ton coeur
Se distrait quelquefois de sa propre rumeur
Au bruit de cette plainte indomptable et sauvage.

Vous êtes tous les deux ténébreux et discrets:
Homme, nul n'a sondé le fond de tes abîmes;
Ô mer, nul ne connaît tes richesses intimes,
Tant vous êtes jaloux de garder vos secrets!

Et cependant voilà des siècles innombrables
Que vous vous combattez sans pitié ni remords,
Tellement vous aimez le carnage et la mort,
Ô lutteurs éternels, ô frères implacables!

dimanche, janvier 24, 2010

goal2010

wow anyone still remember goal2010? then-PM goh chok tong spoke about Singapore getting into the world cup by 2010 on the back of foreign talent during the national day rally of '98.

fast forward 12 years. now it seems that our goal2010 is not to send Singapore to South Africa for the world cup, but rather, to try to bring the world cup from South Africa to Singapore.

yes, thanks to singtel and starhub, Singapore may not be able to broadcast any world cup games live!!!

but heck, why do i care anyway? i will be in germany during the world cup season! =D

mardi, janvier 19, 2010

hurhurhur

why we will never understand each other

samedi, janvier 16, 2010

parking pontianaks

sianness to the maxness..

got 2 parking fines in just as many days! grah. and one of them was even in an erp carpark! reason for fine? parking on double yellow lines - hey, if you cannot provide enough carpark lots for your clients, then dun fault them for parking at the roadside. i even took pains to park at a location where i would not obstruct any traffic; in Europe most cars park on the kerbs at night.

driving is indeed an expensive affair in Singapore! vraiment putain de merde.

dimanche, janvier 10, 2010

avaduh

and so i, like the rest of the human population who have done so before me, have watched james cameron's 10-year masterpiece in the making - avatar.

i do admit, yes, it was that good. in fact, i wouldn't mind shelling out another $13 just to watch it again in its full-3D glory.

i think the success of avatar is in its value for money. just think about it: where else can you watch a movie which has pocahontas meets man vs wild meets an inconvenient truth meets mechwarrior meets aliens vs predator meets dancing with wolves meets the matrix?

and i find that the storyline is strikingly close to the singaporean-expat experience: ang moh comes to a foreign country, initially sent here to exploit the locals, but ends up falling in love with the local culture, and of course, a local girl. meanwhile back home, his company gets frustrated with his dismal quarterly sales figures and threatens to post him elsewhere, which forces him to quit and start his own business. no matter what he does, just because of his skin colour and BBC-accented english, ang moh guy succeeds in his business and decides to live forever in fried rice paradise instead of freezing through yet another european winter. in the meantime, the lovelorn local boy gives all his savings to the local girl and either lives out the rest of his life in abject poverty and loneliness, or he just straight commits suicide after the girl rejects him. in the end, the ang moh becomes an elite MP and lives happily ever after with his singaporean girl in some Bukit Timah home with their 2.1 mixed children and 1 dog.

ta-dah! there you have it; james cameron may have conceptualised and filmed avatar, but sir stamford raffles was the original jake sully.

samedi, janvier 09, 2010

sala salsa

omg today i got told off by my partner at salsa class - apparently for not leading her on enough!

seriously, whoever invented salsa is some sadist. not only do you have to strictly follow certain dance steps and moves, you also have to be able to segregate different parts of your body and still be able to communicate with a partner and the greater environment, all at the same time!

salsa 1B? no thanks! i think that for now, i'll just be content to perfect my basic 3 and simple turn.. =P

vendredi, janvier 08, 2010

dépit

was amused to see the headline of prime in ST today: french elite universities rebuked.

seems like a case of sour grapes to me: i can't get into these schools; therefore there must be something wrong with the selection process.

it has always been a vicious cycle: the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. and by extension of that, the rich have more means to amass even more riches while the path to success continues to get narrower and narrower for the poor. that's a fact of life, a fact of capitalism, and also a fact that we asked for it.

that's the way it is, in life there are too many "what if"s regarding human potential. you could argue that someone could have been the world's greatest musician if he had the means and was exposed to the violin when he was a child, but because he was living in some mumbai slum, he was unable to realise his hidden talent and thus the selection process at the music conservatory is unfair.

the world is inherently unequal; deal with it, or if we want to truly be egalitarian, vote in the communist party instead.

dimanche, janvier 03, 2010

compare and contrast

its the end of the holidays! argh one minute its still all fun laughter peace and joy, and the next moment its work datelines stress and overtime.

i think i am suffering from post-holiday depression.. dreading the commune back to camp again tomorrow - that's why i am still online and hanging onto the last bastion of the new year long weekend! =D