The Bush

So, Kerry did not manage to chop down the Bush!

Personally, I would prefer John Kerry to have become the President instead of our dear George W Bush, but I'm not American, so I can only just rant here how and why so. I mean I can't even vote in our next elections.

Like most Asians polled by various media, I prefer Kerry to Bush mainly because I believe that it would be to our regional advantage if Kerry came to power as he seems less hard on our region than Bush. Not only that, I think Bush has a ridiculous stance on Iraq and his methods against terrorism seems rather debatable, and basically, Bush just looks like a pathetic president. The latter reason being purely a personal judgement and you can blast me for it, but I don't care.

Okay, now thinking a little bit more in depth, all my reasons are personal judgements. Personally, I'm against war and American occupation in Iraq, thus I think the Bush is ridiculous. My dear European Studies lecturer has labelled me as "revisionist" liao, so I don't think I can be any more radical by my next couple of remarks. I don't think Osama really has that close links with Iraq, so I'm really skeptical about the Bush using that reason for his occupation of Iraq, and I think it is stupid of Americans to just because of that Osama video change stance from Kerry to Bush at the very last minute. Well, actually, other than Osama driving the plane crashes, I don't think he is that of a terror. Yes, many people lost their lives in the 911 incident, but more people died in Iraq than at WTC, so I don't think Bush really validated his point of curbing terrorism. Cos, there I think there isn't much difference between war and terrorism, both kills people by hordes, it's just that war SEEMS more jusified than terrorism, yup, the keyword is SEEMS, cos I dont agree with it.

I don't see a difference between Osama and Bush (okay, so shoot me! I've already been shot my that lecturer who called me REVISIONIST, so...), they both make use of other people's lives to achieve their own utopia. Not saying that I'm for Osama, it's just that I'm against Bush and I think that Osama is just like Hitler, misguided about their ideals. It a way, I think that it is the same for Bush. Yup, for those who don't know, I was labelled revisionist due to my comments on Hitler...

On another note, this US election result is interesting in that we can see that Asians really see things in different perspectives from Americans. For Kerry, even though he lost, he can take pride in that he is more popular in Asia than the Bush. Okay, so my point is that why are Asians different from Americans? Maybe to Asians, Islam isn't that foreign and scary to us that we need not the radical methods of the Bush to counter against it. Really, I think that Osama video really did skew the election results just like the bullet incident skew up the Taiwanese election results.

Another could be that, the polls done were before the Osama video was shown, so the Asians did not see the need for more Bush security even though they are really scared of Osama.

On a very personal note against Bush is that I really can't stand his daughter. I mean who in a right mind would wear a dress that would go transparent under flashlights to a function knowing that she would be photographed without wearing a bra? Her brainlessness can only be accorded that she has bad genes. Man... Don't Bush know how to teach his children?

But then again, US presidents, or presidential candidates, all seems to have rather screwed up personal lives. Remember the Bill Clinton uproar when he did his intern? If our dear Lee Hsien Loong ever do a Bill, or his daughter do a Bush, they can forget about continuing their lives in Singapore much less remain our dear Prime Minister. It was already scandalous enough that his first wife commited suicide (remember, it's against the law to commit suicide in Singapore?) and that he actually got himself a second wife. At least his second wife was clean and not someone whose first husband died and left her with a huge business empire (think: Kerry, ha!).

Ending the gossips on a nicer tone, here, via the vast Internet, I'd like to extend my congradulations to Mr Bush for winning a second term to serve his people just as long as he maintain current relations with Singapore. Cos other than that, I don't think he will actually affect me that much, so whoever it is who wins, by all means I will accept you (like what else can I do?). Serve you people well, Bush, and try not to do anything stupid, little Joan here wishing you best of luck in the next couple of years and hopefully after that, Kerry can succeed you much against your wishes.

Ever notice that after every elections in whatever country, Singapore will try her best to send out letters of congradulations as soon as she can to the winning party? And she would state that she is very pleased that [insert name of winning party] came out as victors and would wish that party all the best. I bet the letter is saved and reused every time a party wins elections with just alterations to the part after "dear".

That is what I'd call, politically correct.

The Champion

The Champion, Channel 8 9pm on Monday-Fridays

This is what one can consider as a typical idol drama. It has a stupid girl, a slow guy, a vindictive girl, a single-minded guy, a dashing guy, a commitment-phobic girl, a married guy with kid in tow, and the ku3 qing2 girl with cripple sis in tow. What more would one need in a drama?

I hate it so much that I think I actually love it. So far I've only missed half and hour of the show since it started running. Maybe it's because I've got nothing better to do so I squat by my little tv screen waiting for that show to screen like almost every day.

Okay, there are some pretty good eye candy in the show that compiled me to start watching it. There's Yan Xingshu. Tall, athletic, decent features, and a damn good bod. hehe... He isn't a national basketballer for nothing, but putting him in a swimming drama seems a bit wasteful of talent. Then there's Toro who I just can't seem to get myself to like his character. If I ever get to know a guy like his character, I'd probably hate him man. Okay, ya, some people say I'm SM, I like the chauvinistic kind of guys, but, that's me, so don't shoot me.

Actually, I think I can't stand like all of the characters. They all seem to be flawed in some way or another, especially so that I can't stand. I hate wishy-washy people, I hate women who steals other people's boyfriend, especially when the guy doesn't even like her, I hate girls who think that they are superior to guys, I hate guys who won't admit their own feelings, I hate girls who have nothing better to do than worrying about who like or don't like them, and I hate girls who keep guys at their beck and calls. So basically, I don't like any one of the characters in the show.

What's worse is the quality of the actors and actresses. Fiona Xie! I mean, her voice is so pathetic, just looking at her pitiful face and hearing her that voice, I know I won't like her. Okay, she fits her character very well. And when compared to Xiaoqiao's character, she is an angel, but still, I think I just got something against Fiona Xie. Jeanette Aw! Another person who can't speak well. She speaks in so broken up pieces that I just feel like calling her to shut up and just act nice. Ya, and put her voice beside Fiona Xie, she's just great. But what's worse is the horrendous mix of different accents in the show. How can you explain a family who speaks totally different from each other? A father who speaks Singapore accented Mandarin, an elder sister who speaks Singapore English accented Mandarin, a brother who speaks Taiwanese accent Chinese, and a younger sister who speaks jiang3 hua2 yu3 campaign Mandarin.

To a prerenially deprived girl here, the highlights of the show seems to be the better qualitied guys. Yup... Yan Xingshu, Qi Yuwu... Qi Yuwu too has a good bod, but his hair is so terrible that he seems to be having bad hair days every day, and although he has a good bod, what's up with not giving him any shirts to wear?! I think he's like 40% of the time topless, 40% of the time in an unbuttoned shirt and the rest more decently dressed. Yan Xingshu is in much better taste. A nice haircut, nice shirts, and only going topless once in a while. The Chinese have a saying, wu4 yi3 xi1 wei2 gui4 meaning the lesser quantity of a commodity, the more precious it is, I think the same would apply to these guys bods.

The other two imported guys, Toro and Huaien are so ... The pale pathetically compared to Yan Xingshu. Toro is like so scrawny, and short, and well, diminished in stature and that doesn't go well on screen with Fiona Xie. Not saying she is fat cos she isn't, but she is big on her top half of her body and that makes Toro look much smaller beside her. Huaien, well, if you remember what I wrote about Zhang Ziyi in 2046, then that would be Huaien's problem. Apparently Singapore's tropical climate didn't really do well with his complexion. But, giving him some credit, aren't there like good make up artists in TCS? Close up scenes of Huaien's character see his concealler in a different shade as his foundation. And any girl would know that this is a big big no no.

Although I can't think of any good thing to say about the show, I don't know why I'm so addicted to it. Maybe I just have nothing better to do. hehe...

Russian Literature

Russian Literature

I just finished reading this book of abridged collection of Russian short stories by celebrated writers. And from my previous knowledge of Russian tales, I must say that Russian writing is certainly not my cup of tea.

My only previous knowledge of Russian writing before reading that collection was the tale of Ivan and the Firebird. I don't know if any has heard it before cos I'd mentioned it to a group of people before but they never heard of it even though I thought that that was quite a classic.

Well, the story goes that once upon a time in Russia, there lived a Tsar with three sons, Ivan (apparantly, in Russian it's pronounced as "ee-farn") being the youngest and his favourite. This Tsar had a prized apple tree which grew golden apples in his large picturesque garden. However, one day, the Tsar found out that one of his golden apples was stolen. Someone had entered into his garden and picked the golden apple from his prized tree!

The Tsar was so angry that he summoned his eldest son to guard the tree the next night hoping to catch the thief if he returns. That night, his eldest son fell asleep in the middle of the night and when he awoke, another golden apple was missing. The Tsar was so angry with his eldest son that he dismissed him and ordered his second son to guard the tree the next night. That night, his second son too fell asleep while guarding the tree and when he awoke, another apple was missing. On seeing this, Ivan stepped up and volunteered himself to guard the tree the next night. The Tsar was pleased that his favourite son was son anxious for him and granted his wish.

Night came, Ivan sat by the tree forcing himself to stay awake to catch the thief for his father, but he found his eyelids getting heavier as time passed on. Ivan went over to the pond by the tree to wash his face and chase away his urge to sleep. Just as he arrived at the pond, a huge, bright bird flew past Ivan towards his father's prized tree and plucked off an apple with his beak. Ivan ran after the bird, but the bird soared high into the dark sky leaving Ivan grasping of of its tail feathers.

The next day, Ivan reported the matter to his father. The Tsar was very amazed with Ivan's tale and when he saw the feather that the bird left behind, the Tsar thought of a Firebird that a neighbouring King owned. He wanted the Firebird for himself.

Immediately, the Tsar called for his three sons and told them that whoever catches the Firebird and presented it to him would become his successor. With that, he dismissed his sons in search for the bird.

Ivan took his best horse and rode in the direction of the neighbouring land where it was rumoured that the king there owned an extraordinary bird called the Firebird. As night fell, Ivan found himself deep in the woods and right in front of three paths, one turning left, one turning right, and the last one heading up front. Besing the crossroads, lay a sign that read: "To the left, you will lose your horse; to the right, you will go hungry; to the front, you will die."

After thinking for a moment, our dear Ivan decided to turn left and hurried down the path. Not long later, a grey wolf pounced out onto Ivan causing him to fall off his horse. Sure indeed, his horse cantered deep into the woods and disappeared. Ivan was left without his horse.

The Grey Wolf came up to Ivan and apologised to him for scaring off his horse and offered to carry Ivan on his back to his destination. He brought Ivan to the land where the Firebird came from and advised Ivan when stealing the Firebird, touch not its cage. Ivan promised to do so.

However, after Ivan stole the bird, he caught sight of a beautiful gold cage by the side of the bird. Forgetting the Grey Wolf's advice, Ivan reached out for the cage, thinking that only such a fine cage was fit for such a fine bird. The moment Ivan's hand touched the cage, he heard loud ringing of bells sounding. Then out rushed the guards and the king himself. The King on seeing Ivan threatened to send his troops to invade Russia unless Ivan promised him something in return. For the sake of his reputation and his country, Ivan agreed to the King's threats. The King wanted Ivan to get for him the fine horse that could travel a thousand miles in a day for him from another neighbouring country. In return, the King would let Ivan have the Firebird.

Upon learning about Ivan's failure, the Grey Wolf brought Ivan to the land of the fine horse and advised Ivan when stealing the horse touch not its briddle. Again, Ivan promised to remember the words of the Grey Wolf. However, after stealing the horse, Ivan noticed the golden briddle with many precious stones set around its sides. Without thinking, Ivan reached out for it thinking only such a fine briddle was fit for such a fine horse. Once his hand touched the briddle, the King and his men came rushing out to the stable seeing Ivan with the fine horse. The King agreed to let Ivan have his horse if he could win the hand in marriage of the beautiful Princess in the next country for him.

Ivan went in search for the Princess with the Grey Wolf's aid and finnally found her. This time, the Grey Wolf went in to steal the Princess instead. And the three of them continued their journey backto the land of the fine horse.

However, on the way back, Ivan fell for the Princess and upon reaching the land, he refused to let the Princess go. Seeing this, the Grey Wolf decided to masquerade himself with his magical powers as the Princess and present himself to the King in return for the horse. He told Ivan to leave as fast as possible and when the next time he thought of the Grey Wolf, it will return back to Ivan's side.

The plan worked well and Ivan took the horse back to the land of the Firebird, but Ivan liked the horse too much that he didn't bear to exchange it for the Firebird. On seeing this, the Grey Wolf agreed to masquerade himself another time as the horse in exchange for the bird. Similarly, the Grey Wolf promised to return to Ivan's side when he thought of him.

With the beautiful Prinecss, the fine horse, and the Firebird with him, Ivan made his way back home. Along the way, Ivan decided to take a nap. While Ivan was alseep, Ivan teo elder brothers passed by and saw him with a Princess, a horse and the Firebird. Immediately they felt jealous of Ivan and plotted to kill Ivan and sieze his stuff. Their plan worked and they headed straight back home leaving Ivan dead.

When Ivan did not think about the Grey Wolf again, the Grey Wolf felt something amiss and came after Ivan. When he saw Ivan dead, he summoned a passing crow to bring him some water from the end of the world to revive Ivan.

Together, the Grey Wolf and the revived Ivan quickly headed back home. Upon reaching home, Ivan heard of news that his eldest brother was next to be the Tsar while his second brother was getting married.

Ivan quickly went to the Tsar and related his account of events to his father.

Thereafter, Ivan lived happily ever after as the Tsar with his bride, horse and the Firebird.

Well, I never liked Ivan. And I think that he's not worthy of all the glory, everything was given to him by the Grey Wolf. This sort of anti-Hero, I think, applies to most Russian writing,from what I've read. It seems like all Russian protagonists are all of dubious character. Even the celebrated Pushkin whom I've heard so much about when reading Angles of Russia [look back in my previous book revie] writes about such pathetic protagonists.

I don't know, but I don't like these kind of characters. It makes me wonder though, are all Russians as such? So anti-heroic...

Then again, the only Russian that I know is probably Roman Abramovich who is well, you can see him as anti-heroic the moment he bought Chelsea as though it was a commodity and the way he buys his players.

Okay... I'm exaggerating. He's not the only Russian I know. I know lots of other Russians, like, ya, Stalin and I must say, he seems very Russian. We can see a little shadowof Ivan in him.

I have nothing against Russians, in fact, I like Russia, but I just don't like the anti-feelings I get after reading a Russian character. I think I'll just stick to my usual stuff...

Try reading some Russian translated pieces if have the time. Russian pieces are rather thought-provoking, especially in terms of human character although it is rather biased, but can still try it and let me know if you liked it.

Parkway Parade

Parkway Parade

From a list of suburban malls' ranking done by The Straits Times, my dearest favourite mall came out 4th. The top mall was Causeway Point, then United Square, followed by Tampines Mall. Seeing these so called top malls, I'm like come on, I'm pretty sure Parkway can beat them flat any man! And Parkway came out 4th?! Oh my god! Do the judges know how to shop?! Like where the heck is United Square? So shoot me! I've never heard of that mall, so does it derserve to come out 2nd? And Causeway Point, I'd been there once and hated it. The moment I stepped into that mall, I felt as though I went to a mall in Malaysia. The whole decor of Causeway Point is so JB! And Tampines Mall is just so bland. Parkway would beat them flat any time any how!

So, for an in depth analysis of Parkway, and yours truly slamming of the scores given to Parkway, this follows...

Family oriented, Parkway was graded 4 out of 5 which is just pathetic! From baby stores to granny shopping, Parkway has it all. For babies, there's Mothercare, growing children Learning Fun, housewives the two supermarket and hypermarts, for men there's like all the electrical appliances shops Best Denki blah, bargain shops for the grannies and gramps, shops that were there since the opening of Parkway long before the three top malls. Parkway is indeed a place for families to go to chill and get together.

Child friendly, the blind judges gave Parkway a 3! Parkway has children toilets okay... And the store that allows children to do handicrafts. And the arcades. And before its removal, there was Parkway's trademark Octopus. Pity it now lies beside NTUC, out in the open. I missed those days when I would go to the Octopus to play, and there were also other little sea animals around, but my favourite was still the big Octopus. But they do have the Waterfall area for kids to play now. Oh yah, and Parkway has those Children Cab or something like that which parents can rent to push their kids around. Always thought that that was fun. I mean with Kinderland just around the corner, Parkway has to be child friendly.

Baby friendly, Parkway also scored an atrociously low grade of 3. Yup, there's the changing table for babies in the toilet though there isn's a nursing room, but those judges shouldnt give Parkway such a low grade what.

Handicap friendly, another low grade of 3.5. I mean, there are adequate lifts around Parkway and there isn't any steps in Parkway to stumble the wheelchaired. The Waterfall area has also been renovated to allow wheelchaired people to get around the area easily, so why the low grade, blind folks?

Accessibility. I'd think that this grade of 4 is pretty fair. Parkway is not the most accessible place around. There isn't any MRT stations but this isn't the problem of Parkway, it's the problem of Marine Parade. It seems quite ironic that during the 11 years ex-PM Goh was in office, he never once lobbied Marine Parade to get an MRT station. But then again, Marine Parade is the most dense estate, the will never be space to build a station. Then thinking again, Marine Parade does have a very varied range of bus services, just not the buses that come by my house. Sad...

Carpark facilities, Parkway too got 3 which is totally uncalled for. What's wrong with the carpark?! There will always be space for cars to park as the 7th level carpark is always empty. Aren't all carparks the same? From the longest time ago, Parkway's carpark already have those electronic signs that tells you the number of lots available at each level. And the stairs are near cos the carpark is small, so what's up with the judges?!

Food courts, a 5 for Parkway. No other mall can come close to Parkway with 2 food courts, one very very large extended one and one halah food court with an open air barbeque annex. It beats any other mall flat flat!

Restaurants, a pathetic 4. Okay, we all know that the judges were blind when they went into Parkway and hence did not see Crystal Jade, that Thai restuarant I never knew the name but has been there ages, that Indonesian restuarant too Khartini or something like that, and Jack's Place, Swensons, Sakae Sushi with Teppanyaki(!), yup the judges are sure blind. And to give a little more credit to Parkway, with a big name Sin Leong, now called Roland's, the is indeed lots of competition in that area.

Cafes, another pathetic 4. The blind judges maybe forgot that Parkway includes the open air cafes of Water-something selling pancakes, Gelera, Starbucks, Swensons cafe, Delifrance, the little coffeehouse inside MPH, yup... Blind judges...

Snack outlets, a good old 5. I mean with Anderson's Ice Cream, Famous Amos' Cookies, that other ice cream shop, Aunt Anne's Pretzels, my favourite Cold Storage stall that sells cooked meat and dounuts, and the chocolate stall that sells chocolate and chocolate dipped strawberries... Yummy... Makes me feel hungry...

Entertainment options, an decent for 4 since that there's no cinemas in Parkway, there's that lod lao pok dao bi one around the corner. hehe... There's no Karaoke facilites since K-box is situated across the road, so it makes no sense for another chain to open one in Parkway. There's an arcade though...

Ambience, a low low 3.5. The unfeeling judges seemed not to like waterfalls since there the most beautiful glass waterfall in Parkway. Savvy Parkway Mall rats know that there is this verenda where you can look out of the top of the waterfall. A definite romantic site where lots of uniform-cladded students like to make out. And the lovely view of a large grass patch now sadly turned to a lovely view of construction site, but nonetheless lovely place to chill. And the overall feeling when you step into Parkway is one of friendly and long-established. I bet it's like one of the oldest mall in the list man. Give me any day, I'd tell you I prefer the ambience of Parkway to that of the JB-feel Causeway Point or that unfeeling TM.

Ease of navigation, Parkway scored a deserving 5. Need I say any more? I can go around parkway blindfolded and still know where I am.

Financial facilities, the blind judges gave Parkway a 4. With DBS, UOB and OUB branches along with POSB and OCBC ATMs around, what more do you want to ask for? Maybank, POSB and Standard Chartered are across the street, so you can't expect Parkway to have those as well, can you?

Speciality retailers, a 4.5. Umm... What do they mean by speciality retailers? So, John Little, Marks and Spensers, Isetan, Cold Storage, Giant, Courts, Best Denki, Esprit, Levis, Americaya, Bata, insurance agencies, slimming and beauty centres, Addidas, OP, 7th Heaven, medical centres, tuition centres, all these can't give Parkway a perfect 5?

Mobile phone services, a well-deserving 5 for Parkway with Singtel, M1 and Starhub all having stores there.

Information counter, Parkway was given a 4. So they think 2 -3 people manning the counter is not enough? The Kiddy Cab is not enough? Sistic outlet there is not enough too?

And the last comments by the judges, "... Unfortunately, it's toilets are either too packed or under repair." So the judges think that spoilt toilets are better?! And the number of people in the toilets are a good gauge of the popularity of the mall. An empty toilet would mean that the mall is empty and pathetic! Parkway can't help itself that its shoppers have weak bladders can it?

I just love Parkway. Since primary 4, I've been visiting it regularly after schools and during weekends with my friends. It used to be a 1-2 days a week average till secondary school. It's the best place for a student to hang out after school to just chat and chill and stone. During my first 3 months, I was at Parkway 5 times a week and even after that a 2-3 times a week average. Even though I'm now staying in NUS, I will still visit Parkway once a week when I return home. There is just no other place for me to go.

Even before primary 4, Parkway was my favourite place to go for say Saturday dinners with my family. I loved the Octopus there. Sadly, the Octopus has moved its resting position, but I still love Parkway.

I'll never forget the secondary school days with the dance people. We would have lunch there after our tiring dance practice and talk about school, about dance, about our lives, about our future, about everything possible. Our favourite hangout, the place outside Learning Fun, facing what was a green patch of grass, on the benches there, or at the benches outside the verenda of the waterfall, I remember once we sat around to benches and someone commented that we looked like we were having a cult session, or Long John's, the only place where we were assured of seats in crowded Parkway, that's the reason why it's gone now, occupied by Crystal Jade which is totally the opposite. hehe...

Parkway holds beautiful memories for me. And as long as I'm still living, I'll always visit Parkway on a regular basis. To me, you will always be the best mall ever! Even Orchard can't be compared to you...

hehe...

I must be neurotic to say this, but Parkway, I love you!

2046

2046

There is something wrong about it but I cant exactly pinpoint what is wrong. Yes, the story is thought-provoking, the acting is perfect, the atmosphere is there, but what went wrong?

Unlike other Wong Kar Wai's movies, 2046 attempts to tie in three central stories and spawning another two more stories instead of his usual one-two central theme. 2046 is also unusually long at 2 hours with Wong saying that his version of 2046 was actually 5 hours long. Maybe what went wrong was that he was working with such a long time frame that he needed it to be as short as possible. Paradoxical? Wong is not used to making such long and complex movies that to him, 2 hours is not enough to fit everything properly.

The editing was also rather unlike most other Christopher Doyle's works. Doyle and Wong are both sticklers for smoothness and flow which seemed to be almost non-existent in this piece, but I suspect that the jarringness of this piece can be attributed to the censors and not them though it really didnt do them any justice.

But this film depicts William Chang at his best. Im so in awe with him, his charaters all seemed to have become another person with a life of themselves and I must give him due credit. He was blasted in In the Mood for Love for the overdressing of Maggie Cheung, but in 2046, his characters were supposed to be very well dressed and he really did a good job. Still, one thing that didnt really go well with the visuals was the haircut of the female characters. It made Tony Leung look pathetically short. This is in context that the female leads arent Taiwanese (show hosts, ha!)(can you get the joke? ie. short).

Tony Leung really became Zhou, his character. I didnt see any trace of Leung in the film, he was all of Zhou. The making out scenes were also well shot, he was all natural that I really wonder how he could actually shoot that scene without reacting. hehe... But there was one thing lacking. Height. Stage presence. His female counterparts were not only tall and had high hairs that he was made dwarfed by comparison. Big pity...

I was amazed by Takuya Kimura's performance. What I can say to him is that, all the years waiting and all the time spent on shooting the scenes were all worthed it man! I never knew he could act from his heart. All along I thought that he was some pretty faced Japanese actor/singer/entertainer/money-making-machine/female-attracting-magnet, but he is more than that. Wong really squeezed Kimura dry emotionally! If only Kimura could act just like how he did in 2046, he would not only sell shows he can also start winning acting awards. He also had great chemistry with Faye Wong that, well, I really hope I can see more of them collaborating in other projects in the future.

Faye Wong. We all know she cant act. She can only stand around and be herself. Her character is just like her and perhaps that was the reason Wong wrote her in. But I liked her better as the robot. There is a sad feeling that she emits out from her eyes and that gave the robot some sort of an emotional edge. In comparison with Carina Lau, the other robot, Faye Wong the robot seemed much sadder and more of a character.

Zhang Ziyi was rather disappointing. She looked really professional in all the making out scenes with Leung, but there was something very distracting about her. As we all know, Wong likes to shoot his actors close up so as to capture the slightest change in their facial expression, but he didnt take into account that pimples can be very distracting. That was so for Zhang. I spent more time thinking that her pimples were damn ugly than thinking that she had acted well. And the funny thing was that shots from different time periods show different pimples.

And the whole idea of the elarborate dressing did not do any justice to Gong Li either. She and Zhang looked pretty much the same as they shared the same types of flat Chinese face. And the use of this sort of white makeup only flattened their faces even more. And without the distinction of other features, they dont look much different from each other which might not spell out good for Zhang as she was made to look much older as she should be.

The only person in the whole show that looked really good was Chang Chen who sadly had very little screen time no thanks to the censor who made a mess out of the montage. If it werent the fault of the censors then I shall conclude that Doyle just dont know how to do a good montage. Sadly disappointing...

Another very bad thing about the film was the pathetic Mandrain dubbing. Why cant we just watch the film as it is instead of having to endure some other person delivering Leung's lines?!

Still, there are many subjects to ponder over in this Wong outing...

What is it up with the reference of Singapore? And when in Singapore watching the film, the reference just seemed rather funny too us and drew quite a bit of laughter, but I strongly suspect that there is a deeper undertone to the meaning of Singapore in the film. Especially when we realise that 2046 is not the future but a place. Could Singapore be the opposite of 2046. Leung's character goes to Singapore in search of Su Lizhen but goes to 2046 to forget her... And while Faye Wong's Huang Jingwen want to go to 2046, Zhang's Bai Ling want to go to Singapore... Think about it...

On the whole, maybe it was because I had too high hopes on 2046 that I cant help feeling disappointed with this piece, but its nonetheless a fresh piece of Wong Kar Wai trying to be innovative yet true to himself. I would disagree with all those saying that Wong is pretentious and his movies are all made with the Western art house critics in mind cos it is so NOT true! Just watch all of Wong's movies and you can see that he is being himself and really wants to do what he wants to do!

Id take a leaf from here and go back in thoughts of 2046, I still think that there is something up with Singapore...

The height of procrastination

I cant seem to start doing anything.

The height of procrastination.

Okay... This is sad. I cant make up my mind which of the two above statements I wanted to use as the heading, so I put them both down. And now there seems to be something wrong with my sentence structuring. I dont know, but I dont really mind if a person writes in broken English with pathetic spelling, but I really cant stand it if I read a passage with wrong grammar usage. Especially if the tense is wrong. Haiz...

Okay... Im digressing. Back to my main point, I cant seem to start doing anything due to my extreme procrastinating habit. Usually things can get going once started, but if I cant start, I can never get my stuff going.

Ignore my disjointed writing. Im not thinking straight today. Im not even thinking.

How am I to write my essay if I cant even write my blog properly?!

And this blog entry was supposed to be a photo blog entry. I just spent $88 on a Nokia data cable supposedly to transfer my photos from my handphone over to my computer. And then I could upload my photos online and post it on my blog. yup... But the thing is that with Joan's extremely limited knowledge of computer technology, I can only put up that pix by the side, I cant put it up here! Help me... I kept getting error messages which were basically incomprehensible to me. Help...

And the funniest thing that can happen to my pathetic pathetic computer, it refused to allow to to access the internet from the lounge today, but I can use it from my room! Okay, if you dont understand this, well, its a very long story. For the past couple of weeks, my computer just refused to allow me to use the internet from my dighy liitle room, but I could use it in my residence lounge, but today, its the opposite, I dont know why...

Anyone can help me?

Eternal Happiness

Eternal Happiness
chU 9pm

Main storyline is about Meng Lijun running away from the guy she was supposed to marry, Huangfu Shaohua, and later falls in love with him. A Mongolian prince, Tiemuer, and a couple of baddies and the daughter of the baddie, Liu Yanyu, seriously complicated matters.

Why I started watching the show?
Because it features two of my favourite TVB actors, Lin Feng and Ma Dezhong. (My other favs include Jiang Hua, Lin Wenlong, Lin Jiadong, hehe...) So the plot goes, Meng Lijun was betrothed to Huangfu Shaohua much against her wishes, but by a quirk of fate, she disguised as a man became sworn brothers with him, Tiemuer and Marco Polo. She had started falling for Tiemuer in the early days but as Tiemuer had to conceal the fact that he was a Mongolian prince, many a times she failed in letting him know of her real identity (that she is a female in disguise). Fate has it that she had to fail in getting together with him.

And by another quirk in fate, Tiemuer's absence let to her falling for the so deeply in love with Meng Lijun Huangfu Shaohua. Huangfu Shaohua is the dumb but loyal kinda character which didnt go too well with Meng Lijun at first, also because he was Huangfu Shaohua, but later deeply touched by his love for the person he thought he had never met (Meng Lijun). Some comic relief in the show of Huangfu Shaohua show of him deeply disturbed that he thought that he was gay (Meng Lijun was supposed to be a guy in his eyes and he was so attracted to him/her/whatever).

But things complicated when Tiemuer had suspected that Meng Lijun was a female and too fell in love with her/him/whatever and that he bacame the Emperor. By then, Meng Lijun had taken the imperial examinations and became the top scholar. As she had became well aware of her love for Huangfu Shaohua and Tiemuer and made it known to her that he strongly suspected (but Meng Lijun denied it flatly, though) that she was a female and wanted h/h/w to share his riches (he IS after all the Emperor).

So, our dear Meng Lijun is faced with the toughest choice of any women's life, is it the dumb but loyal who will stick to you forever or the strong and powerful who can provide you with anything you want (but Tiemuer does have an Empress whom he doesnt really like)? As Tiemuer put it to Meng Lijun, "Do you want to spend the rest of your life with Huangfu Shaohua as a boring commoner or do you want to share half the world with me?" I would so melt if smeone asks me that question, not that it is a question of marriage but the words of sharing half the world is so so strong by itself. (Tiemuer IS after all the Emperor)

Who do I want Meng Lijun to choose?
As we all know, Meng Lijun will end up with Huangfu Shaohua and this remake of the story of Meng Lijun wont change history, but still, it is something good to choose... hehe...

Side track a bit...
Stupidity Symptoms 8
During the first few episodes of Eternal Happiness, Joan found that the character Meng Lijun was so familiar, so she asked her younger sister where she heard her from. The reply, "You have a book about her, dont you remember?" This is in the context that Joan is supposed to be better read than her YOUNGER sister and is supposed to be smarter, but well...

Back to Tiemuer and Huangfu Shaohua,
Tiemuer IS after all the Emperor, he IS the most powerful man on earth and Meng Lijun did fell for him first, but he has a wife. It is interesting to note that he fell for Meng Lijun even though he didnt know for sure that she is a she and when he had to marry against his wishes, he had many a times tried to wriggle his way out from spending the night at his Empress place. And there is this other sorta funny scene (funny only if you do remember that Meng Lijun is supposed to be a male) where Tiemuer forced himself on Meng Lijun and then the Empress suddenly appeared, greatly disturbed by what she saw. Then the next scene showes her and Tiemuer in the same bed facing opposite directions and she tearing. I do want to feel sympathetic for her, but my heart went all out wanting Meng Lijun to be with Tiemuer. Haiz... You all know Joan, the person who thinks that power is aphrodisiac.

But then there is Huangfu Shaohua the big blockhead who was so distrubed that he might be gay that he ran away and got himself entangled with Liu Yanyu whom I think is just too good a person. Another thing about Joan, she doesnt like people who are just way too good. One absolutely disgusting thing about her that Joan and her sister thought was this line which Liu Yanyu harboured "I want Huangfu Shaohua to be reunited with the Meng Lijun he loves so dearly, and I dont mind staying by him on an equal basis as Meng Lijun." Hello, do you know where you stand, Liu Yanyu?! And you still want to share an equal status with Meng Lijun??! But like all diehard loyals, he is so hard to resist after a long period of time being with him. He may be dumb, but dumb people are easier to get along with.

Basically, Joan likes both Tiemuer and Huangfu Shaohua very much and will support whoever who appears on TV together with Meng Lijun. As an observer, a person like Tiemuer is great for romancing, he is the pinnacle for a perfect boyfriend, but never would one want to marry an Emperor, they just have too many wives and life as an imperial concubine or even as an Empress really sucks. In a later episode, I found out from magazines that Tiemuer would use to status as Empress to entice Meng Lijun, "Just one word from you and I can immediately depose the present Empress and make you the Empress." Oh, man, I would just MELT!!! Okay, so NOW you all know that Joan is a stickler for male chauvinism. (someone commeted that Im SM, but, well...) The other side of the story is not very pleasant to the Empress who happened to hear what Tiemuer said to Meng Lijun, especially that she just found out that she was pregnant and wanted to bring that news to Tiemuer (and for the ten tousandth time, Meng Lijun IS supposed to be a man!).

But Huangfu Shaohua is indeed damn cute. Actually, I think its just Lin Feng. Maybe if someone else acted as Huangfu Shaohua, I wont support him that strongly as I do now... This brings me back to another period drama by TVB. Luo Shen... Cant remember the English translation of the title... In it, a smart woman (note the similarity with the smart Meng Lijun) is torn between two men, one holds power, one holds the gift of literature. Right from the start I was on the camp for the guy holding power and when he turned out to be not so good by means of, well, history, I gave up watching that show. My heart pained for him man... So, it seems like TVB scriptwriters dont like men with power... Well...

You know what, now that Im thinking of it I think that if Huangfu Shaohua wasnt acted by Lin Feng, I would have boycotted this show just like how I boycotted Luo Shen.

With Eternal Happiness coming to an end liao, Id grade this drama series with 4-stars. One to Lin Feng, one to Ma Dezhong, one to the soundtrack (esp the dizi and qin music, and the title and ending songs), and one to power. Yup... Do try and catch the last few episodes of it!

Procrastination vs Pathetism

There is a link between the two P-words that I always use, using them both in theory and in practice.

Procrastination

I procrastinate anything and everything, to those who have yet know. Procrastinating studying and doing my work is like waking up everyday, so natural and innate. But that are not the only things I procrastinate, more often than not, I procrastinate the most everyday things, like waking up, bathing, eating, sleeping. I cant wake up as in opening my eyes and getting out of bed immediately, I will have to hit the snooze button a couple of time, laze around for some time before I can actually pull myself out of bed fully refreshed.

As most people would know by now, Im not a person who likes to bathe. I only bathe when I have to go out, so that would translate to procrastinate bathing until I almost run late.

How can one procrastinate eating? Well, apparantly I can. When Im running late, I would forget that Im hungry and only eat only at the end of the day, after Im done with all my stuff and before I sleep. Sometimes, I can go without eating anything the whole day, but not very often. That is why when I eat, I make good use of eating and stuff myself with lots of food.

At night, even when Im dead tired, I surprise myself by finding excuses not to sleep. I can hang around on my bed, reading magazines that Ive read 20 times over or flipping channels on the tv without actually watching anything or I can just stone. Oh man...

Pathetism

Joan is pathetic.

How so? She can well up in misery, thinking that she is the saddest person on earth, provoking her tears to be at her beck and call but not allowing them to flow freely so that her hurt is accentuated. She likes being emotionally pained. By thinking that she is worthless and that nobody likes her, everybody hates her and she should in return hate everybody on earth.

Joan is lonely. Pathetically lonely. Nobody understands her, nobody can understand her, nobody will understand her. She is like vines on a tree, looking, seaching, finding a support, but everybody just looks down on her cos she is so dependent. But then again, is she really that dependent? Sometimes, she just isolates herself and shuts herself out from the rest of the world so that she can feel lonely, so that she can look for support, like asnake who has a home at a particular tree but not wanting to go there, but wanting something he doesnt know what.

So, am I lonely cos my friends cant make time for me or do it avoid my friends so that I can be lonely and so that I can wallow in my misery that my friends cant make time for me?

I havent noticed this, but everytime I feel pathetic is when I have lots to do but dont want to do anything, in short, when I procrastinate, I feel pathetic. Or it is the other way round? When I feel pathetic, I will tend to procrastinate doing my stuff...

I dont know...

I just read the screenplay for Lost in Translation. Images of the two lonely characters anve resurfaced in my mind. I feel like both of them, in somewhere foreign. NUS is foreign to me, going for classes, writing essays are not what I want, I dont want to be at where I am now, squatting at the lounge of my hostel, tying on my laptop all by myself, with a window of my essay minimised at my toolbar and me not wanting to open it, and worse, with my msn set at online status but nobody wanting to talk to me. I feel like both Bob and Charlotte. And so unlike them who have each other for company, I have just my blog.

Sucks...

And the pathetic thing about me is that i know that I will feel even worse reading the screenplay for Lost in Translation but I still went ahead and read it cos I felt like feeling bad, and sad, and pathetic...

Arent I just so pathetic?

I Need More Time

I need more time. And friends who have time.

I need more time and less procrastination to actually start writing drafts for my 4 essays/term papers/whatever you call them. I also need time to actually go shopping. Not shopping for things I do not want but shopping for things I need. Then there is that great movie coming up The Motorcycle Diaries that I really feel like watching. Well, even if I do manage to squeeze out some time, my friends, loads busier than this poor girl, would not be accompanying me anywhere. Sucks man...

So where have I spent my time on?

Really, I have absolutely no idea. Tests? Maybe. I had EU test which totally sucked. I had never come across a worsely written test paper, never in my 19 years of life. There was my Deutschsemestertest. Yes, those Germans really just put all the words together to form a longer word. All I can say about that test is that learning a new language from scratch is definitely not easy. But we all remember those times memorising is was been; come came come; has had had had; lie lay lay; lay laid lain; go went gone; blah blah blah from our that Primary English book. Then there are those time wasted on that chU 9pm show which Im hooked. And football. Waking up at unearthly hours disrupting my already spoilt bio-system, luckily those matches were not what I consider disappointing performances. I actually enjoyed it comprimising some more important stuff.

Im losing more weight and emotionally wrecked.

Im not eating properly due to the fact that I dont seem to have common breaks with my friends so I dont bother eating. Im like subsistencing on sandwiches from Coffee Club Express and Fuzion every night, and when Im really hungry it will be hot dogs from the snack stall. I had 4 hot dogs on Monday, and another 4 on Tuesday, Wednesday I didnt have any but I had 3 both yesterday and today, so that makes it 14 in a week, not counting that I have a bbq tmr and I probably wont be eating chicken, just stuffing myself with loads and loads of hot dogs. Funny to think that with all the hot dogs down me Im still losing weight.

With no one to go out with me and me being cooped up in my room 24/7, its no wonder that my Stupidity Symptoms seems to have closed down for good. And without me doing stupid stuff, I feel quite sad. Not the boohoo kinda sad, but more on the sad kinda sad. Sad of life; sad of studying; sad of not getting what I want; sad that I got what I want... Geddit? Sinking lower into pathetism... Ya, Im sad, the pathetic kinda sad...

Then there is my pathetic infatuation with a certain German footballer. Pushing the parameters of Joan's emotional limits to saturation.

Blah Blah Blah

Miroslav Klose

Internet surfing used to be a leisurely hobby of mine, but recently I have taken to surfing the net with a dictionary on hand. My dear German-English dictionary. For whom did I slog for? The above mentioned fussballer.

From my meagre knowledge of German and my inadequate dictionary, and English webbies from Yahoo!, I found out that he had just did a hat-trick in 20 min after coming on as a substitute in the second half.

My fettishes (is it supposed to be -es or just -s?)

By now, all my dear friends should know about my fettish for Aryans.
The blond-haired blue eyed defined facial features kinda guys.
This stemmed from some neo-Nazi sentiments... Ya, BUT THEN AGAIN, I must reiterate this point, I AM NO NEO-NAZI!!! many people think Im neo-Nazi, but I cant be one due to my Communist beliefs. Ya, hard to think that this girl is pro-Stalin, right? But I am... I still love Bismarck though, but Im drifting further and further from my original point. The blondes. Owen (and NOT Luke) Wilson, Brad Pitt, Leonardo DiCaprio. All Americans, probably of English descent, but I still like them. If you want an example of an SS kinda Aryan, that will be Oliver Kahn, German (to-be-retired) national goalkeeper. Now you know the reason for my soft spot for him.

Another fettish, the height.
1.82m or 6ft0.
I dont know why but I always thought that an ideal guy should be 1.82, no more no less. Anything more than 1.82 would be too tall, lanky, blah, and anything lesser than that made the person plain short. Maybe it is because 1.82 translate directly to a clear 6 feet and I like round numbers so that became a sorta fettish. Okay, after so much, the main topic, Miro is just nice standing tall at 1.82m. Okay, I liked him even before I found out that he was exactly 1.82, but anw...

Authoritarians.
Joan just has this thing for dictators!
From ancient Chinese emperors to dear Hitler, Joan does have a soft spot for them. Maybe its because power is aphrodisiac. Bismarck was also an authoritarian figure. The father of Deutschland, domineering even the Kaiser then. Stalin. Napoleon Bonaparte. Recently, I have also taken a liking to Robspeirre. Another thing about the authoritarians that make me like them even more, they are all dead. hehe...

The Eternally Depressed (or rather, Repressed)
Think Tony Leung in Wong Kar Wai movies. Those sad eyes and moody feel, that are all knee-droppers to little old Joan.
2046

All of Joan's fettishes, it is of no wonder she doesnt have a boyfriend...

5 Year Egg Plans

The price of chicken burgers in Fong Seng has risen by $0.50. No thanks to eggs...

As we all know (if you dont, 1-you are not Singaporean, 2-you have been living in a hole, 3-you are a strict vegan), we are currently facing an egg crisis. The prices of eggs has risen to such an exorbident amount that you might as well be eating sharks fin, okay, that is an exaggeration, but I think it really comes close. Not only eggs have become so expensive, even with money, you might also not be able to purchase them. Families are hoarding them; hawkers are snapping them up; big players in the food industry have their regular suppliers to count on, so where can little Joan get her daily dosage of 2 eggs?!

And it is not just any egg that I want, although I am getting more desperate by the day, I want to eat Seng Choon eggs! Or Chew's eggs! I want to eat Singapore eggs. I dont want to eat that tasteless Farmer Brown's eggs or whatever New Zealandic weird eggs, nor do I want to eat those disgusting Malaysian eggs, so poisoned with bird flu or Dr M disease. Okay, I am supposed to give Malaysia more face on the account of Badawi, but nothing can stop my passionate hatred for what is across the causeway... lagila...

In light of this crisis, this little egghead drew up a series of five-year plans to build up an egg-pire in Singapore, and if it's highly successful, I can export my eggs and one day replace all the egg farms there distributing eggs in Badawi's territory! hahaha! I will be Queen Mother Hen!

1. Accumulate capital
In the first of my five-year plans, I will be concentrating on the accumulation of capital for the start up of my egg farm and the scouting of interested parties to joint-venture with me. In these first five years, friends, dont be too upset with me if my mind is only on money, money and more money. It is actually quite expensive to start an egg farm. An egg farm is not really a high cost business, but start up costs is much higher than other businesses, just think that later costs would then be at a minimum.

Of course, there is an alternative to this five-year plan. The alternative version is to spend this five years snagging a rich rich husband who can provide me with the capital to start my Mother Hen Egg Farm. That way, the egg farm can wholly be mine and I need not worry about being cheated by unscruplous business partners.

2. Infant care for my dear Mother Hen Egg Farm
In this following five years, my dear egg farm would be at its most precarcious position and special care must be undertaken to ensure the survival and expansion of the farm. With the capital earned from the previous five years, I will open that farm. But I am prepared to to stay in red for these five years. Revenue earned from the selling of whatever eggs I produced will be channelled to research and development. I will be experimenting to produce the cheapest, healthiest, virus-immuned hens and eggs. And by the end of this five years, I shall be successful and finally be able to break even.

3. Aggressive expansion of my farm
This five years will be devoted solely to the expansion of my egg farm. Instead of a little egg farm, at the end of this five years, there will in place be a multi-storeyed high-rised egg farm built. This farm will house 5 million hens, produce more than 4 million eggs a day, enough to feed an egg to each Singaporean every day. This egg farm will be quite unlike other normal egg farms. My hens will be living in clusters of 150-200 in a cubicle, so I will be having 50 000 cubicles spread over 60-over floors. Maybe I can build it to say 80-90 floors with the ceilings to be lower than our normal ceilings since hens are much much shorter than humans. The hens will be allowed to roam freely in their clusters so that they can remain as healthy as possible. For the reproduction of little chicklings, I will have put aside another set of hens and cocks to do the job, they will probably be housed in another wing of the building and not be counted with the 5 million hens.

4. Crossing the seas and oceans
The next of my five-year plans will see me expanding my farm overseas. I will not only be exporting my locally-produced 4 million eggs a day, I will also be setting up egg farms all over the world, or maybe, just currently in the region. In the meantime, I will also be investing on further research and development to stay at the top of the egg industry. By this time, anyway, my net revenue would be billions a year, considering that eggs are an important aspect in our diets.

My eggs would not be affected by regional viruses and diseases as they are all quarrantined in their own clusters hence free from other birds either from the region or from the other clusters. Even if my hens developed some kind of virus or disease, I can just have that whole cluster of hens destroyed and thus eliminate the spread of virus to other hens in my farm.

Singapore will never have another egg crisis ever again!

I will never go without my 2-eggs-a-day ever again!

Hail to all egg-lovers in the world! May all egg-lovers in the world unite!

That Handphone in Your Pocket

Handphones as part of our lives

Do you think handphones have become an integral part of our lives? Or do you think we have become over reliant on them?

Im sure many times, we are all guilty of whipping out our phones to check the time even though we are wearing watches because we also want to check if we have any new messages or missed calls. And when the friends we are meeting are late for 30 seconds, we would without hesitating pull that trusty Nokia or Samsung out to text a whr r u message; and if they are late for like 2 minutes, it would be a verbal where are you question.

This evening I stood at the entrance of City Link Mall and counted the number of people who were using their handphones as they entered or exited the mall. In 15 minutes, I counted 176 people. And this number is excluding the people who were using their handphones around the MRT station but did not enter the mall, and it also excludes those people who held their handphones in their hands but did not use it. Use it as in either talking on the phone or messaging or reading a message.

Actually, Im also guilty of doing so. My handphone not only connects me with all my friends, its my alarm clock and watch; it also provides me with entertainment via radio and games, and when I figure how to use it better, it will also be my camera, video cam and mp3 player. Sometimes, I would also blog short messages of my feelings, my sights ot my emotions to later transfer over to my diary cos I can carry my handphone everywhere which I cant do that to my diary.

But to speak up for those 176 people I counted, the place where I stood could also be considered as an MRT station and there were many people waiting there. It is only natural for those people to call up their friends to rush them.

I didnt expect there would be this many people in city hall this evening. The steps were all occupied and the pillars and walls all had people leaning against them. I had a hard time finding a spot on the wall to lean.

Soci people, many you would like to do a project on handphones among teens? I cant do it cos IM NOT DOING SOCI!!! haha... I dont know why but everybody seems to be thinking that Im doing soci. So Im making it clear that Im not doing it and dont think that I will ever be doing it. haha...

Updates

Updates in Joan's life...

I havent been doing anything that I can include in Stupidity Symptoms.
I havent been able to access the internet from my room in PGP.
Wubai has a new album.
Wubai is staging a series of concerts in Taiwan. Someone fly me there!
Im back at home doing homework for my sis.
My sis lost her Samsung E700.
I have fallen in love with Lin Feng, a rich Hong Kong actor. He didnt get rich from acting, he got rich from his father. Like how envying... My dad says that since he couldnt provide me with luxury, I will have to find it myself via a husband. That is very sad... Cant I achieve success with my own hands? I dont know...
I love Dicky even more. He is better than even the little pink pill.
I have taken to eating sanwiches every day. Goumet sandwiches I mean, and its taking a toll on my little purse.
Champions League is back.

Shall We Dance?

Shall We Dance?

I just watched the trailer for the aboved mentioned film, starring Richard Gere and Jennifer Lopez. It seems like a really good movie, but will I spend $8.50 to watch the film in cinema?

Shall We Dance is a remake of the Japanese show of the same title, I can't remember who acted in it, but that show touched me deeply. The script was good; the acting was good; the dance was good; the soundtrack was good, so much that I can hardly find fault in it.

The story tells of a middle-aged, middle-class, white collar, mid-ranking average man who lives his days in a routine until one day while on the train home, he noticed a pretty, young girl dancing by a window. From there, this man developed a hugh curiosity of that dancing girl and would notice her everytime his train passes by that window. One day, he finally summed up courage to check what lay behind the window and the identity of the dancing girl. It turned out that behind that window was a dancing school, the girl was the instructor there and she taught ballroom dancing. In a mist of confusion, the man signed up for ballroom dancing lessons and learnt dancing without letting his wife know. There was actually nothing going on between the man and the girl, but well, most human thoughts are corrupted and we would always tend to think in a negative way.

In the Hollywood remake, Richard Gere plays the man and Jennifer Lopez plays the girl.

From the trailer I watched, it seemed that this remake was trying to follow as closely to the original as possible, but somehow, I didnt experience the feeling of being touched by the show, there was something seriously lacking in this remake.

Yes, Richard Gere's acting was stoic and I could feel his lonliness and craving for something new and different, Jennifer Lopez was as pretty as the original actress and I could feel her passion for ballroom dancing, so what went wrong?

After much thought, I think fault lies with Hollywood. As Shall We Dance is a show focusing mainly on ballroom dancing, it has a limited appeal among the audience. And we all know what a money-minded practical world it is like out there in America, so to widen the audience range, they pulled in big stars to act in the show and they will sell it as the show starring Richard Gere and JLo.

I am not condemning Richard Gere and Jennifer Lopez, to give them credit, they are good actors, but are they really suited to act in the show? The male protagonist in Shall We Dance is supposed to be a very very average Japanese middle-aged guy, so he should have equally average looks and my dear Richard Gere is just too stunning to take on that role convincingly. I mean who would believe that Richard Gere is lonely?! As for Jennifer Lopez, she is a great dancer, but she doesnt have the body of a ballroom dancer. No offense to her body, its great, really attractive, but too curvy for a ballroom dancer. Or maybe its because the original actress looked like a ballet dancer that I think that Jennifer Lopez is too big to take on that role...

I havent got the chance to hear the soundtrack for this remake, and for this show, the soundtrack really plays a very important role in dertermining its success, so I shall not say it straight out if this show well-worthed the $8.50.

But if you have yet watched the original version, I would go all out and recommend this film to you. Not for Richard Gere, not for JLo, not for anything other than a really good script.

So, Shall We Dance?

A Thank You and an Apology

Ummm...

Little old Joan forgot something really important... And that is to thank the person who created my problem and tried to solve it, spending much time burning little grey cells. Luckily, its solved for now! Thanks, Zhangting!!!

Another thing, I just realised that some people missed out on my public apology to Eugene in the gaedus yahoo group. So, Joan will make another public, this even more public than the one in the yahoo group, apology.

Joan Ang hereby sends out her deepest apologies to Eugene Leong for all the hurt and ridicule that she unsensibly caused upon him. She is now in deepest regret.

Ummm...

Netscape

Here is Joan posting for her first time from a netscape browser.

Before this, I have never even heard of Netscape, so I guess that is how ignorant I am.

So, what was the problem Joan encountered? Really, Joan still dont even know that answer. She only knew that there were some websites that she couldnt read, namely chinese ones, but the funny thing is that she could read some other chinese websites, so where did things went wrong? Ummm... Point to ponder. And there was the problem where Joan couldnt post her messages on her blog using trusty old Internet Explorer, so here she is at Netscape...

I hate computers.

I thought they were some objects that were made to make our lives easier, but after getting this laptop, I seem to be encountering more problems than before. But Im not saying that the trusty old PC I have at home is free from giving me trouble. That obsolete machine cannot connect to my wireless at home! It's like so amazing. I have a computer that cannot access the internet. And my sis com is not XP, so there was this whole lot problem that occurred ytd when I wanted her to send me a word document.

Note: It is just a WORD DOCUMENT

Basically, my sis couldnt transfer the file over to me via msn or email, then she realised that she couldnt even open the file on her outdated ME since my old com was also an XP. Enter dad who did something, I dont know what, and he managed to open that file. But he still couldnt sent the file to me via email. He even tried to copy the words from the doc and paste in his composed email, but poor me only received a blank email. Then he found out this ingenious but tedious way to send me the doc.

My dad made my sis copy and paste my word doc one paragraph by one paragraph on to msn to me. So I received my doc in conversation form, one para by one para. This is so absolutely pathetic!

Joan's plan for the rest of the month: (contact me if interested in joining me)
The Terminal (after a few months of agony, but Yanling, you still onz, right?!)
Raising Helen(a Kate Hudson show, nice and light-hearted, anyone???)
Kitaro (that musical genius is coming to Singapore!!! Anyone interested in going down to catch him in Suntec Convention Hall??? Tix $68, $108, $128, $148)

Somebody please save this girl from becoming a no-life entity!

TJ Revisited

I went back to TJ today.

I went back supposedly to get my stuff from my dear junior, but in fact it was to say hi to all those teachers I missed and wish them a happy teachers day, although its like rather belated, but anw... I met up with Chen Laoshi, Yan Laoshi, Mr Hasim, Ms Lim, Mr Thompsom, and Xu Laoshi. Missing from the list was Ms Leong. I just couldnt find her! How sad...

Security has been beefed up in TJ. The teachers room is now out of bounds to all except the teachers. There is this auto lock system in the door that can only be activated by a programme pre-programmed into the teachers ezlink cards. This makes me wonder, what about the teachers who drive? Anw, now in TJ all the teachers are carrying a card holder either around their neck or somewhere on their body.

Back to the teachers, Im pretty sure most of you are more interested in thow are the teachers rather than the degrading of the school. (apparently the new security system was proposed by the least favourite person in TJ, OM Chan, sorry Sheena) Well, let me start in order of time I met the teachers.

Chen Laoshi
She becoming prettier, cuter, and younger. I look older than her, makes me feel quite sad... Whoahahaha... She has this new hairstyle with bangs enhancing the brightness of her eyes and framing her small face, so cute, like a hamster... haha...

Yan Laoshi
I really dont feel like commenting about him. I mean, would you if you went to sch and this guy says hi and oh ya have you signed in?! Like come on?!!!

Mr Hasim
He is still as slack as ever. He was making his way away when I went to sign in at 1230, like how slack?! Apparently our dear Hasim is now relegated to teaching GP, but he says that it will only for this period of time, he would be back to teaching History soon (like in about 2 years time). And he is involved in planning of social studies and the history programme for the Temasek Integrated Programme. Well, wish him all the best in trying to worm his way around his apparent busy schedule... haha...

Ms Lim
She changed her specs again. It is now red and as eye catching as ever. Chatted with her about the dress code in uni and apparently, I failed her test. haha...

Mr Thompsom
Actually I was quite shocked when I first saw Mr Thompsom. He had a lot more lines around his eyes and on his forehead, and he seemed to have less hair than I remembered. He looked aged. Quite sad to think of it as so as it was only like 10 months since the last time I saw him and he looked a good say 3 years older. Anw, it seems like his history paper will be scraped in 2006, so its still an open ended question if he will still be around after that. Well, according to him, there is still other stuff he can teach, especially with the new integrated programme and such.

Xu Laoshi
Like all other Chinese teachers, after the revised Chinese language requirement, she has fewer and fewer students now... haha...

Really missing the school and all the teachers there...

The Angels of Russia

The Angels of Russia
by Patricia le Roy

From the blurb: On a study trip to Leningrad, literature student Stephanie meets Sergei, an enigmatic young dissident. Stephanie had fallen in love with a fairy tale image of Russia -- full of palaces and aristocrats; Sergei offers to show her how different the reality is. Even in the supposedly enlightened days of Gorbachev, Sergei is in constant danger because of his political beliefs. So when he asks Stephanie to agree to a marriage of convenience so that he can leave the country she is unable to refuse him.

Despite the platonic nature of their relationship, Stephanie finds herself increasingly attracted to her mysterious new husband. But when Stephanie introduces Sergei to her Aunt Marina, a Russian defected to Paris whilst accompanying her father on a political mission, he appears to know more about Marina's past than Stephanie. Could Marina be the real reason why he has come to Paris? As it becomes increasingly clear that Sergei is harbouring more than one secret, Stephanie is forced to question whether their first meeting was as accidental as it seemed...

Although the blurb focused on the mystery of Sergei as the book's selling point, what got me so hooked on this book was not about Sergei and Marina, but more of Stephanie and Sergei. Stephanie had a fiance back in Paris before she went to Leningrad, but her relationship with her fiance did not seem to be very close. She was increasingly attracted to Sergei. And Sergei, even with his mission on hand, found himself increasingly attracted to Stephanie.

Two people, knowing their love for each other and knowing of the other's love for them, but not being able to be together because of their personal reasons, that damn sad. From Stephanie's point of view, she knew that even if Sergei loves her as much as she loved him she could not openly express her love for him as she had a fiance and he knew that too. Although she did not have any love left for her fiance, because of family and peer pressure, she could not break of the engagement. As she couldnt commit herself to Sergei as much as she wanted to, she tried to control her rising emotions. From Sergei's point of view, not only Stephanie's fiance stood in his way, he had a big secret that he kept from Stephanie and he knew that this secret had to be kept from her. He also knew that the eventual outcome of his secret would harm her emotionally.

For a slight moment, the outcome of the story reminded me of the usual Andy Lau/Aaron Kwok/Ekin Cheng Hong Kong triad movies of the 90s, but in this setting of 80s Leningrad and Paris, both places of romantism, love, and regret, somehow the impact was much stronger than what Hong Kong can ever produce.

The author also made use of much literature and history weaved into the story. I mean, Stephanie was after all a Literature Masters student doing her thesis on Pushkin and the effects of the Decembrists on his Literature and Sergei was very much interested in the Decembrists which became the main topic of their long platonic conversations. But what struck me most was the author weaving in the ancient tale of Ivan and the Firebird as the opening of a chapter in the middle of her story.

The tale of Ivan and the Firebird by itself is a story that puts one into a long heavy thinking mode. Its presence in this story made me think harder on the effect it had in shaping our thoughts of Stephanie and Sergei.

Im starting to feel drawn to Russia... For more on Russia, you can look into my archives on the review I did for Russian movie The Return. Try look for this book if you feel drawn into my review. Joan Ang gives it 5-stars and 2 thumbs up!

Buying a Piece of Hope

I tried to buy a piece of hope, but apparently, it was sold out when I went all the way down to look for it. Rmb the bottle of anti-stretch mark essence that I broke (for those who dont, there is the archives), I bought another bottle. Maybe I just like deluding myself, submering myself in own-created fantasies, like finally one day being able to remove all my stretch marks, ya ya, haha... I realy tried to search for my own piece of hope, but, well, the word there is but.

In the English language, a pull stop can never come straight after the word 'but', or 'and', ya, but, ya, but...

It has been three weeks into my uni life proper but it seems like ages. Im busy every day, but dont know what Im doing. Wake up, rush for lectures, tutorials, go for ecas, do readings, sleep, then its the next day liao. In between all that, I tried to find some eye candy hoping to spice up my pathetic life, and the result, sinking deeper into pathetism. What a sad life...

Usually, for the past eight years, whenever the end of August arrives, Id prepare to send a card to a certain someone, but this year, things have changed, on my part. I wonder if that person would notice the change... But for now, Ive got Jakob Walters and German vocab to fill up my time and before that, Ive to bathe and get ready for Union Ball.

Union Ball is in about three hours time and here I am typing away on this thing thinking about my pathetic life with a face of oil and a body of grime and a head of hair that stinks when Union Ball in in like three hours time. Staying in school really screwed up my biosystem. I dont eat unless people ask me out to eat; I don't bathe unless Ive got to leave my room for lectures or stuff; I dont sleep unless I need to wake up early the next day. I just visited my dentist on Wed, basically, I didnt have a very good time with him cos I don't usually brush my teeth unless I eat, so on times I dont eat, I left my teeth to rot. The height of pathetism!

Okay, maybe I should stop myself from sinking into further pathetism... Hey! It will be Union Ball soon! Ya, and I will be missing out on Arts Bash at the same time, so even though I cant go and show my support to you guys, all the best! To Xinyi, Ken and Slyvia... I would really have went for Arts Bash if not for the fact that Ive already spent $50 on tix and $102.60 on a dress... That brings me back to depression, Im broke. Uni life is expensive; Joan is a spenthrift, somehow uni and Joan dont seem to look like a very good combination. But then again, to think about where all my money went? It cant have gone into food cos I havent been eating much, maybe they all went to support my pathetism...

2 Stupidity Symptoms

Stupidity Symptoms 7
One day, Joan accompanied Friend A to look at laptops as Friend A wanted to buy one. But before Friend A could actually make the order, Joan had to leave. The next day, Joan woke up and was still worried about her friend getting a laptop, so she decided to message her friend, but for unknown reasons, Joan messaged Friend B asking if she had bought the laptop. A very confused Friend B replied Joan “no”. Joan did not take much notice of this until the next day she woke up and with unknown reasons, she realised that she had messaged the wrong person!

Stupidity Symptoms 7
With her political science lecture the next day, Joan decided to visit the computer lab and print out the notes beforehand. But that that time, there wasnt any new lecture slides on the IVLE, so Joan decided to do some other stuff before checking the IVLE again. After 2 ½ hours, Joan went up onto the IVLE to check again and spotted something new. Without hesitation, Joan quickly printed out the notes seeing that they looked vaguely familiar. That night, after retreating to her room, Joan wanted to read through the notes before her lecture so that she wont get lost the next day. Holding up the notes reading them, she saw it becoming more and more familiar, then she realised that this wasnt the political science set of notes but notes for her another module, Politics of Southeast Asia. And the dumb thing is that she had already printed out that set of notes and had her lecture the day before!

blog hopping

Recently, I’ve been doing quite a bit of blog browsing in my free time. I would blog hop via links on my friends blogs, even visiting blogs of people I dont know and I wld browse through the recently updated blogs on the link on blogger main.

What different people put up on their blogs tell a lot about them. Some blogs have no links of other blogs in them and the blogowner conceals his identity, these blogs mostly contain vented up, frustrations. Some blogs are brightly coloured, with avant-garde designs and a whole long list of links of friends, these blogowners usually pen happy thoughts or some mundane everyday happenings. But of course, Im stereotyping...

Ive realised that there are lots of Singaporean bloggers out there, or rather, its an unusually high ratio of population to bloggers. But sad to say, Im generalising again, that most of those Singaporean bloggers I came acrossed are young Secondary school girls who are so madly in love with 5566. I was browsing through the blogs the day after their performance here and came across no less than 10 blog entries of descriptions of handsome 5566 all attached with feelings of euphoria and those who didnt go that close to the stage, feelings of envy and some jealousy. I mean, dont these girls have a life?! Then again, what am I preaching when me myself dont have a life to speak of when I can sit in front of the computer for hours reading abt other people pathetic life?!

I also came across a friend’s blog who had an entry of a story titled Castle in the Clouds. Look on top of this window and spot the similarity. I dont like his story, mainly because its sad and pessimistic. As most friends wld know, Im a pessimist trying to act like an optimist, hence Id want not to like pessimistic ideas. Anyway, back to Castle in the Clouds, where did I get this title? Les Miserables. Why did I choose this as my title? Look through my archives, I think Id mentioned before, or look through my archives there is a certain trend of my entries.

Another interesting blog I came across is one of a New Zealander living in Taiwan and married a Taiwanese there. He talks mainly about socio-political issues in Taiwan and relates it to other parts of the world. I like his writings and some of his ideas although I oppose him on one big major issue of Taiwanese independence, but its only that. The blogging world is big, for other no-life people who like reading blogs, one advise would be not to continue reading blogs by sex-starved teenage girls and just browse through the big big world of blogs and experience another kind of culture.

I like my blog. I like my Stupidity Symptoms. I like my movie reviews. I like building castles in the clouds. Please let me save the complete image of the castles in my memories.

*sudden wave of sadness floods me* am I trying too hard to be an optimist when all I can be is only a pessimist?

*another wave of uncertainty breezes by me* will I have to suffer a same sad ending as the story I read off my friend’s blog?

*with an unnatural pang of resolute* blog-hopping is detrimental to one’s emotional being. Getting upset over someone else’s feeling is pathetic. Getting angry over someone else’s different opinions is pathetic. Getting worked up realising that Singapore’s teenaged girls are shallow is pathetic. In short, Im just pathetic.

*slumps back on my rickety computer chair*

Arts Orientation Week

Arts Orientation Week is finally over!

I now can have the time to do stuff I didnt have the time for during the past week. After almost one and a half months of solid procrastination, I went down to collect a reserved book from Marine Parade. One and a half months, really, Im amazed that the shopowner still recognised me. Also collected a pink top from Esprit which I bought about a month ago, but my size was only available about a week ago. Well, the top wasnt as impressive as I thought I had seen, the colour of this top seems a bit dull quite unlike the one I set my eyes upon. Anw, it was on 50% discount so I shouldnt complain.

I had also found time to change the skin of my blog to welcome a new page in my life, my university life! My previous blog I thought was a bit too depressing, but then again, this blogskin isnt very cheerful either, so never mind me Im just talking nonsense.

Speaking of nonsense, maybe this is a good time to add in more Stupidity Symptoms...

Stupidity Symptoms 4
Friend A and Friend B were chatting about Friend B’s very funny and lame jokes. Friend A wanted to hear more lame jokes from Friend B but Friend B was too tired to tell any jokes and instead asked Friend A to tell a joke for a change. When Friend A couldnt think of any jokes to tell, Joan came by and announced that she had a joke to tell. Joan went, “I give you a J; I give you an O; I give you a K; and here you go an E!” Friend A and B immediately turned their heads away from poor Joan.

Stupidity Symptoms 5
How long would it take for a person to get from Lt11 in Arts Faculty to Prince George’s Park in NUS? Especially when that person drives... Well, it took Friend to an hour to get from Lt 11 back too Lt11 when the intended destination was PGP. And, yes, dear Joan was the one giving directions to friend. After an hour reaching back to point zero, both Joan and Friend took a 5 min shuttle bus ride down to PGP.

On a more serious note, I think I really need to apologise to that poor friend who tried to drive down to PGP. Wilson, to boost your inflated ego a bit more, Im really very sorry, the whole fiasco was my entire fault, okay? So blame me, shoot me, eat me up! But of course, as we all know although Joan doesnt like to use her brain, she is actually quite smart, so was in entirely Joan’s fault?

To dear friends who want to be updated on Joan’s uni life, well, I will be staying at PGP blk 26, level 6, so feel free to drop by and bunk in if you have any early lessons the next day. Btw, just to add some salt to the above mentioned group of people, Joan’s earliest lecture is at 10am, the rest are all aftn lectures.

I will be doing History, European Studies and Political Science exposure modules, and German language, and a Singapore Studies module Politics of Southeast Asia. On this note, Id like to make used of this opportunity to thank Yingling for helping me monitor my bidding and helping me to secure my SS mod as I was practically in school the whole day. A big thank you, Yingling!!! Hugs and kisses and flowers all for you!

I would also like to thank my OG mates for being so sporting and fun! And also to give them credit for being able to endure my endless nonsense, think the JOKE joke, and I also have a CHEER cheer and a JOAN cheer. All of you are just so cute!!! You are so cute that I want to grab your head and kiss you! Haha... But I havent actually done that yet, Id only grabbed some people’s head and shook them when I got so exasperated with them, it wasnt really a good thing though.

I really hope that we Gaedians can remain in close contact even though we all have different timetables.

race, religion and political direction

History repeats itself. Within the period of one blog entry, I find myself right in an almost similar position.

And this was after I promised Victoria that this would be an interesting blog entry. Sorry Vic, you will have to listen to my grouses again, but this would be slight different.

The following words might offend some people, so if you think you will get offended, well, I guess that will be it. Today, the Gaedians played Truth and Truth and I ended up pondering over one particular question even though it was not directed to me. Thinking abt it, I guess, I wont dare to say the truth in front of them knowing that I will definitely offend some people.

The question was what of a guy turns you off.

The politically correct answer would be some bad habits like smoking, or some character flaws like arrogance or something along the lines.

Joan’s offending answer, three aspects of a person can turn me off and that was the reason I steered away from this during lunch and dinner today with the Gaedians. The three aspects are race, religion and political direction. Just mentioning this any of these three things alone in public can have me detained by the ISC. The following things I am saying can see me as Chia Thye Poh number 2.

Im anti-Semitic, anti-Muslim, anti-Christ, anti-Malay, anti-Indian, anti-Malaysia, anti-America, anti-bananas (both figuratively and literarily), anti-Bush, anti-Japanese. Some people also call me a neo-Nazi which Im not, but Im definitely a Nazi-symphatist. Im also a Communist-symphatist. I support great war leaders such as Bismarck, Stalin, Hitler, and closer to home, Chin Peng. A small paradox here, Im pro-Lee Kuan Yew, but anti-PAP; Im pro-MCP, but anti-BS and Lim Chin Siong.

So, shoot me if anyone is not happy! Send for the ISC to capture me and imprison me in some barrack in Sentosa!

Himalayas to the Marianas

Remember my imagery, from Himalayas to the Marianas?
Hehe... That was what I felt in the last 24hr...

I started out at Himalayas with a very blissful dream, a dream in which I felt peace, comfort and serenity. But the day evolved into one which brought me right smack in the centre of cold, harsh reality. Then it pushed me right down into the Marianas. Only that this time I knew it wasnt pms.

Its amazing how little control one have over self. One may think that he seems to be controlling his own fate but is he really controlling it? Or is fate controlling him?

From an ancient Chinese tale:
There was once a flag in the middle of a large field. A gust of wind blew across the field and the flag swayed with the breeze. A sage asked his disciples which was causing the other to move. The first disciple answered that it was the wind causing the flag to move. Upon hearing that, the second disciple blurted out that it was not true as it was actually the flag causing the wind to move. The sage answered that in fact neither moved, rather, it was their minds that moved the wind and the flag.

Well, to me, I think that all the answers can be true. What really moved is what you want it to be moved. If you want the flag to move the wind, then so be it; if you want the wind to move the flag, then so be it; if you want neither to move, then so be it; if you want both to move, then so be it. No one can stop you from thinking so.

The moral of the story? Fate and self runs parallel to each other, pessimists will let themselves be controlled by fate and the optimists will try and control fate. I’m a pessimist trying to act like an optimist. I know I can control fate, but I dont want to, I don’t know why, I just don’t want to.

I wanted to feel happy before I slept last night, so I had that nice dream and woke up feeling happy, after some occurred events, I let myself sink deeply into decadence, hence my sad feelings now. I know I can always stop these bad thoughts by keeping my mind clear, but I dont want to do so, I want to let my mind explore the range of my feelings.

Pathetic...

The Return

I went to watch The Return.
And lo and behold, it was screened in cinema 6 of Cathay Cineleisure. In my last entry I described it as small 100-seater cinema, but ytd I counted the number of seats inside, 100 was a very rough estimate! There were only 68 seats inside that tiny room!

The outline of The Return is rather similar to Japanese Story, only more enigmatic, more engaging, and more sad. Sad as in it really invites your heart to bleed for the characters. My heart bled for the father, for the two sons, and also for the mother. The only regret that I have is not being able to speak the language. I felt rather short-changed by the translation. I dont know why, its just a feeling I felt while watching the characters talk.

I caught the trailer of In Terminal.
I think that will be the next movie I will be watching. Anybody wants to join me? It seems to be about Tom Hanks as this foreigner whose flight is delayed at this American airport. His passport was also held in custody of the officials rendering Hanks to have to stay confined in the airport. Seems like a funny film and Catherine Zeta-Jones and Steven Spielberg both add to the watch factor. This film seems to be in the same category as Catch Me If You Can, Steven Spielberg’s previous film and I think that the legend is quite suited for these kinds of films!

After reading Jasmine’s regular Additions and Acquisitions, Joan is prompted to start a personal regular on her blog.

Welcome to Stupidity Symptoms!

Stupidity Symptoms 1
Joan and Friend were on board an MRT. Joan suddenly develops a craving for ToriQ’s yakitori. Joan turned to Friend saying, “I want to eat chicken! Chickee chickee chickee ckickee-en! Quack quack quack quack...” Then Joan stopped suddenly as a wave of thought swept past her and she burst out laughing. “Wrong wrong wrong wrong!” After laughing for another short moment, Joan turned back to Friend and said, “Let me start again. I want to eat chicken! Chickee chickee chickee ckickee-en! Cock-cock-cock-cock-kay...”

Stupidity Symptoms 2
Joan and Friend were at Taka’s Kinokuniya. Joan went over to the shelf carrying Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle (its a Jap comic) 1-5. Joan disappointedly said to Friend, “Hai... Number 6 not out yet.” Friend walked over to the outer shelves and spotted Tsubasa 6 and called Joan over. Joan proceeded to the shelf and upon seeing the filled shelf of Tsubasa 6, exclaimed, “Whoa so many 6 arh?!” Then as Joan left the shelves, she spotted a trolley of comics, all new arrivals. She went over and took a closer look and saw a pile of Tsubasa 6, exclaimed, “Whoa! Even more 6 leh!” Then moving her eyes to another ple on the trolley, she spotted yet another pile of Tsubasa 6, exclaimed, “Whoa! Really a lot of 6 leh!” Walking away from the trolley Joan noticed that the whole of the next shelf of the trolley was filled with Tsubasa 6, exclaimed, “Whoa! So many 6s!”

Stupidity Symptoms 3
I dont know if anyone noticed this but outside the library in Takashimaya there is a frame circling the escalators. And on that frame, there is a door. The door isnt locked and anyone can open the door. This day, Friend pointed out the door to Joan. Utterly amazed, Joan stretched out her right hand and placed it on the knob. Turning it, she opened the door as if she were Alice opening that little door to a whole new world, only Joan opened it to what she could see from the sides cos the door was standing in the middle of nowhere. Walking through the door, Joan bore a totally amazed look and allowed the door to slam behind her.

That will be it for the brand new Stupidity Symptoms. All acts will be fresh. If they are not freshly done, then it wont be included, so you guys need not find the over-told glass door stories here!

I want to watch a movie.

I want to watch a movie.
The last movie I watched was Around the world in 80 Days, a purely feel-good movie which I didnt think was very well worth that $6.50 I paid for, but I was feeling pretty bad when I watched it so it sort of helped me regain my emotional balance.

I wanted to watch King Arthur.
Ever since I saw that trailer like 3 months ago, I was waiting for that show to be released. The trailer was pretty decent, I must admit, so even though the cast was pathetic, okay not really pathetic but there isnt well, a cute guy, I was looking forward to the show. However, it seemed like King Arthur garnered rather bad reviews. If the show isnt going to be good, I dont think it will be worth it to watch it. I was supposed to watch it with the girls on Fri but it turned out that no one other than Yingling was interested so the girls decided not to watch the movie after all. Well, now I sian jit buah liao... Might not watch the movie. Well, Yingling, if you want watch it, give me a call, if you also sian jit buah then suan lor.

Presently, there are two well reviewed movies, Taegukgi or Brotherhood which ST Life! gave it 4 stars and Vozvrashcheniye or The Return which ST Life! gave it 5 stars.
Hmm... One Korean and one Russian. Does this measure the pathetic quality of Hollywood films?

Brotherhood
I swore not to watch it after watching the trailer for the like 1001st time. The trailers were everywhere, on tv, on tv mobile, and worse still in K-ster when after every hour or show there would be a pause for the trailer to be shown twice!
But I like war movies. And I like Jang Dong Gun. So, well, if anybody wants to go and watch can call me along, but only on a $6.50 day. Im not very inclined to let the advertisers have the misconception that over-exposure can lead to increased box office takings.

The Return
I caught the trailer when watching Japanese Story. I like the pace, the emotional intensity and the cut of the trailer which I guess speaks volumes for the actual show. This show will be exclusively showcased in Cathay Cineleisure. Cathay Cineleisure really brings in lots of pretty decent movies like, ya, Japanese Story, Zatoichi some time back and earlier this year there was Last Life in the Universe and so many more alternative films. I just hope that The Return wont be screened at that pathetic cinema hall where I went to watch Japanese Story. Cinema 6, I think, a small cinema at the back of some hidden stairwell and with like only 8 rows seating about 100 or so people. Anyone wants to watch this show can also ring me up!

busy busy week

Ive reached the height of procrastination. And much higher in contradictions.

Ive got a couple of outings with friends lined up this week and a whole lot of other stuff Ive got to do too. In chronological order,
wed morning go down NUS to register for some German Language course
wed aftn visit the library
wed aftn help Huijing play a prank on her friend
wed night chiong session with psycho ppl
fri aftn movie and shopping session with the girls clique
fri night dinner and chiong session with velut ppl
sat pool party with psycho ppl

According to schedule, there doesnt seem to be any clashes, but I dont think my pysical self can take that. In fact, other than the outing with the girls, I have yet cfm my attendance in any of the outings though I have to go down NUS on wed or thu by hook or by crook to register. Reason for my procrastination? The battle between the heart and mind. Heart says go, mind says dont go. Its getting like real bad that now my mind is even telling me not to go out with the girls this fri.

I need sleep.

I havent been sleeping much since I came back from union camp. I cant sleep at night, I dont know why; I tried sleeping in the day but the lure of tv is just too great; when I attempt to watch tv, I start to feel drowsy. My bio clock has gone all wrong.

Scanning down the list again, if I only visited NUS tmr morning and go mia for the rest of the activities, would I be able to fully adjust my bio clock and end my dumb procrastinations? Well, I did promised Huijing that Id help her even though I dont support what ahe and her friends are doing. It will be nice to meet up with the psycho people either on wed or on sat though both would just probably reduce me to a panda. Its been ages since Ive last seen the girls, but movies on a fri? That I dont think is very worth it even though Shuhui let me chose my fav cinema. Velut ppl... I thought we had just met up like ytd, but still chilling out on a fri night would prob ease my nerves.

By now most of my friends shd know that Im claustrophobic, I dont like to be in places where there are a lot of ppl. Even though aft going to arts camp and union camp have eased my nerves a little in crowds, I still feel a tinge of unhappiness in crowds and esp strong pangs of rising tempers aft leaving the crowed place. Is that a legitimate psychological disorder? I dont know...

Right now I just want to curl up behind a good book and enjoy, but procrastination kept me away from the lib, I prob not go to the lib too tmr but I need to return books. Seems like I will need to have to pay fines again. Am I such a loser?

Union Camp

For the past 5 days, I checked myself into torture camp. I got a place into union camp as a replacement. The news came very suddenly, only the day before, and I seriously was considering not joining it, but, well but, I didnt know why I went for it in the end.

Met many familiar faces there. Chong Han, Xuzi, Pam were also there though none in the same group as me and hence we didnt get to talk, except for Chong Han who ended up as one of the 10 guys whom I speed-dated. Yes, dont laugh! More on that dumb thing later cos that was really dumb. There were also many other arts campers back there including my sp replacement from arts camp who was a councillor in union camp. But the most familiar face in union camp was that of my cousin. Yes, my cousin. As how he put it, I was his mother’s brother’s daughter, so he is my father’s sister’s son. And he happened to be a councillor in my group.

Union camp was quite similar to arts camp, and I am not going to compare them as they both have their pluses and minuses. Though my sp replacement, from a councillor point of view, thought that this year’s union camp, unlike last year’s, was better than arts camp. All I can say is, well... I preferred arts Sentosa activities, or was it that it was with Velut that I preferred it. But union camp had this pool games which took place in the swimming pool where we went to different stations to play water games. I thought that that was my favourite game in union camp.

But then again, union camp had quite a number of sponsor activities and the dumbest of all was SDU-sponsored speed-dating where 10 girls sat in a row and 10 guys rotated to speak to each of the girls for 2 min. Yes, 2 min!!! Like, what can we know abt a person in 2 min?! One thing Id learnt from this is that never to join SDU and even if I join, never will I join its speed-dating activities.

The funny thing was that I seemed to become hyper on the last day of camp and when I left for home I wasnt inclined to sleep immediately, only slept at 1 last night but spent most of today sleeping. Haha...

Procrastinated so much today. It was as if I was paying back my procrastinating debts today just like I was paying back my sleeping debts. Haiz... Was supposed to do so many things to day, but... After 5 days of not doing any procrastination, I felt compiled, or rather, I felt the privilege of finally being able, to procrastinate. Sad...

Going Up the Roller Coaster

Im on an emotional roller coaster ride.

After dropped down into the Marianas Trench and was starting to dig, I suddenly find myself thrust up onto the Himalayas.

Possible reasons for the change?
* end of pms?
* acquisitions? One OP pouch, one OP Kids tee, one Happy House tee, one Giordano Dry-Tech bra top
* learning a new skill? Rollerblading
* 2 karaoke sessions in 4 days? Esp the second one, 6 ½ hr of singing, like, wow.
* good meals?
* watched a feel-good movie for a change? Around the World in 80 Days, mindless, senseless, funny, and a cute Luke Wilson and a cuter Owen Wilson. Really, Jackie Chan, who is he?
* mindless soccer? After dear dear Germany crashing out, and me getting over that tragedy, Ive seemed to feel less stressed and nervous over the Euros
* Dicky Cheung? He is my Panadol when I feel terrible, so with me back on track, being able to watch endless repeats of his shows and my on my vcd collection, I naturally feel better.
A packed schedule to keep my thoughts from running wild?