Margarita & Mojito

Oh, a Monday

2012-02-01T08:40:00.004+08:00

It's been more than eight years since I began blogging. Way back at the start of 2004, my first entry comprised of a reflection on our Secondary Three OBS camp. At that point in time, my blog was called Emotion - Entirely My Own Thoughts, Introspection, Opinions, Nonsense - and I maintained it using the free Tripod webhosting service (later Geocities) and manually input and edited my entries using Microsoft FrontPage. I was perhaps a relatively ardent blogger, a young teenager at a formative age with a lot of thoughts going through my mind. My entries were usually narratives of recent experiences, interlaced with musings and opinions, some of which now appear awfully naive and perhaps trite.

Eight years on, many of the peers who used to blog with me have ceased this archaic habit, and even for myself, the age of blogging is a bygone era, judging by the frequency which I have posted of late. But today I somehow feel the compulsion to indulge in a moment of nostalgia (certainly not a brief moment, for most of my blog posts never took less than half an hour to conjure) and revisit this past habit. It is kind of like taking your first soccer free-kick after a prolonged period of sitting out of the game due to injury, or eating your first onion ring after a month-long detox diet. Actually, I have experienced neither, so I'm just postulating...

But this Spring semester, I have an enviable timetable that grants me most of Mondays and all of Fridays free, and yesterday I had a chance to capitalize on this rare luxury on top of the unusually mild winter weather that has been bestowed upon Philadelphia this season.

Having to wake up early to head downtown for an administrative errand, I decided to sally forth with my trustworthy workhorse - my Specialized bicycle - instead of taking the train. The bicycle was one of my first acquisitions upon coming to Philadelphia; I had a strong affinity with my bike back home in Singapore and getting a bicycle over here was one of numerous attempts to transplant my lifestyle from the sunny island to the American East Coast. The bike has offered me flexibility, affordability and independence in getting around, and there is nothing like cruising down a deserted Locust Walk after no-cycling hours have ended.

Traffic was surprisingly light for a Monday morning. I guess I missed rush hour by leaving the house around 9am, but still the adrenaline kick from weaving among Center City traffic was undiminished. Having completed my errand, I walked over to JFK Plaza ('Love Park', after the iconic sculpture) and sat down to read a chapter of Elijah Anderson's Cosmopolitan Canopy. The morning sun bore down from the southeast, shining out from behind the towering City Hall and illuminating the scarlet LOVE sculpture brilliantly, almost as if I was in a polycolor film. Love Park was relatively deserted, but at the junction closest to City Hall was an entire posse of bicycle-mounted Philadelphia Police, who hung around for the hour that I was there. The bell at City Hall chimed ten times, signalling the passing of ten o'clock, in a manner that was slow to the point of lethargy. It was befitting of the mood of my surroundings: a lone cleaner was clearing up cardboard boxes and other miscellaneous trash presumably leftover from last night's affairs, some couples walked past me in either direction, an Asian guy heading towards the direction of the museum acknowledged me with a nod as he passed by, a solitary cameraman from Fox News came to get some video footage, and a family (presumably foreign visitors) stopped to take a photo with LOVE.

The chapter completed and myself feeling a slight chill, I decided it was time to move on. My original destination was Rittenhouse Square, but along the way I chanced upon Cafe Loftus (I initially read it as Lotus) and hopped in for a hot chocolate and another hour of quiet reading at one of the only three tables that this tiniest of cafes had. A few patrons came in for their morning coffee, evidently regulars. Some sat, most left, and I definitely stayed the longest. Strange alternative music droned from the speakers.

I am what you might term a 'restful reader' so it was not before nearly dozing off reading that I startled awake, packed up and left for Rittenhouse. I parked myself (and my bike) at a bench facing off-south, catching the precious rays of sunlight. I saw people walking their dogs, mothers pushing baby strollers at a leisurely pace (mothers with strollers always appeared in pairs; it seems there is a strong social connection between mothers with infants), men sitting on benches taking a break, and passers-by. As I picked up from where I left off at Cafe Loftus, the amount of activity at this urban park picked up gradually yet minutely enough to be nearly imperceptible. When I finally left Rittenhouse a little after the bell from a nearby church tolled twelve times, signalling noon and doing so at a pace slightly more lively than that of City Hall's rendition earlier (an experiential metaphor that perhaps Philadelphia had indeed stirred from its lethargic Monday morning slumber?), there was still hardly a constant flow of human traffic through the square, in contrast to Elijah Anderson's description of it in his book. I speculate that noon was too early a time; lunch break had yet to come for the majority of workers in offices surrounding Rittenhouse.

From this Rittenhouse sojourn, I proceeded to make my way to Reading Terminal Market, at 12th and Filbert. For a cyclist, the unidirectional nature of most Center City streets presents a double-edged sword. Often I can cross intersections looking out only in one direction, but at the same time, I often have to turn off a block early or late to avoid cycling into oncoming traffic. In this case, I had to turn left off Chestnut St at 11th, and I was promptly reminded of my mental note (made on a previous bike trip) to avoid 11th street. 11th (and 12th) are streets with trolley tracks, and these metal grooves embedded into the road surface are the nastiest things that could confront a cyclist. Okay, an opening door on a parked car you are about to pass is probably worse, but you get the idea. Later on while heading down 12th street and with a parked delivery van on my right, I would be accorded less than a foot of manoeuvre space between the truck and the trolley track for my bike to pass through. Perfectly straight tracking of that imaginary line is critical at such junctures, especially if you consider the traffic following behind you. Getting stuck in a trolley track and falling over is definitely not an option. So hopefully I will remember this and avoid 11th and 12th streets next time.

Visiting Reading Terminal Market before and after reading the relevant chapter in Cosmopolitan Canopy felt rather different. I was now much more aware of the market's role as a canopy of sorts, being culturally, ethnically and-of course-gastronomically, diverse. Inside, there is a feeling of security-the market, the vendors and the patrons exude a certain friendliness that quickly dissipates the moment one steps out into the street. Confrontations with panhandlers and people claiming that they need two dollars to get a Greyhound ticket to get home are to be found in the vicinity, but not within the market. Here, I can casually browse fresh produce, deliberate over my lunch options, and ask to share a table in the common seating area with a complete stranger and expect an amicable response to such a request.

Which is kind of what I did, in a nutshell. A small quantity of deliciously fatty Chilean sea bass, some fruits and veggies, and a lunch of braised oxtail sandwich. On a Monday, the market felt much less hassled that when I had come previously, which was over a weekend. Granted, this was in part due to some of the vendors not being open on Mondays, but overall the feeling was pleasant and leisurely.

Following success at the seemingly impossible task of fitting all my purchases into my small backpack, I left this safe sanctuary and headed back out onto the real streets of Philadelphia-12th, Filbert, Market, Chestnut, Sansom, Walnut. I could have chosen Spruce with its dedicated bike lane, but Walnut as a thoroughfare straight through to University City is often the more appealing option. Before I knew it, I was across the bridge and passing through the campus of the University of Pennsylvania, collecting a blue t-shirt meant for this Monday night's basketball game, that unabashedly proclaimed, "Puck Frinceton".

The Good, the Bad, the Ugly.

2012-01-23T21:20:00.003+08:00

Continuing where I left off back on 7 Dec 2010 (boy, that seems like an eternity ago!) with Zipcar Reviews, I now present the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly of the Zipcars I've driven.

The Good

Mini Cooper

Drove this to run an errand, and the Mini was probably my first proper experience with a continental vehicle. It totally oozes cool with its schweet sunroof, cockpit-like flick switches and great interior feel. Realistically, it's only meant for two adults of course. Harmon/Kardon speakers! This baby can pretty much move (and with a nice acceleration note to boot!), and I'm just tempted to wonder how a Mini Cooper S would be like. This is perfect for the moments when you're feeling just a bit hedonistic...

Volkswagen Golf

This German baby was our ride for a weekend down in Delaware for Punkin Chunkin 2011. Despite taking more than half an hour to find our car in the huge patch of farmland after the event, it was a great experience with the Golf. Everything feels well put together, and I can totally see why drivers dig the Golf and its turbo-charged GTi brethen despite some idiosyncrasies like having a pretty bad blind spot. The incumbent for the Tim Chow land speed record at a cool 101mph, boy can this hatchback kick down the pedal.

Honda CR-V

Move-in 2011 was supposed to be performed with a Scion (see 'The Ugly') but a last-minute change got us a CR-V instead. Not a bad change, if not for the fact that this SUV is definitely more handsome than the box car. A huge amount of trunk space with the seats down, Elton and I nonetheless managed to fill the car to its brim--the 46" TV was partly to blame. The driving position gives good visibility, but somehow it's hard to escape the fact that this buddy is big, and the handling characteristics convey that exactly.

Mazda 3

One of my favourite Zipcars. Japanese car with a very European driving feel. Yes, it has a ridik big smile for a face, and something that resembles a perky ass, but get in the drivers seat and one suddenly feels totally at home. Mazda struck a good balance here, and I am hard-pressed to find a fault with the 3. If anything, why does Zipcar get them in this colour called Velocity Red? Except as a Chinese New Year delivery vehicle, the 3 in red is certainly no Ferrari. Give us neutral silver or the classy blue-green please.

The Bad

Honda Insight Hybrid

Lance Armstrong could probably put out more power than this little hybrid. C'mon, if we really wanted to be green, ride a bicycle, take a walk or shower with your roommate, but an underpowered car is akin to creating a diet beer. This hybrid is marginally cheaper to rent and is really quite stingy on fuel consumption, but I felt that power was sorely lacking. Handling is okay if not a bit bland, and when we took this out to Sheeder Mill Farm for horse-riding, we realized that tall people won't be comfortable in the rear seats because of the sloping roofline. Probably won't rent this one again.

Toyota Matrix

First ever Zipcar rental, driving out to PPO with a full car load of 5. I think the rear is slightly tight but not cramped like the Insight. The Scion probably offers more space overall. Low driving position, typical of many Toyotas, which I didn't really like. Nothing to complain with regards to the drive (once again just like all Toyotas) but nothing remarkable either. Oh, it had cruise control which I figured out how to use after a while.

Nissan Sentra

Ran this out for a short errand to Bristol Pike, around half an hour from school. Until I took time at the wheel of the VW Golf and the Mazda 3 I would have said that the Sentra had decent handling and good acceleration response, but since those two I would not say the Sentra doesn't realy impress. There're a ton of controls on the steering wheel, which does appear a bit intimidating. Better driving position than the Toyota Matrix, which isn't saying much. No comments on the spaciousness in the rear as only a saxophone and my bag sat there.

Ford Focus

Another hour-long errand run, and thank goodness it wasn't a full-day rental. Driving position leaves something to be desired, but for a non-hybrid, wow is this car a powerphobe. In particular, I found the knocky transmission to be very unhelpful for city driving. Braking and acceleration are far from smooth, which (I clearly insist) was no fault of the driver.

The Ugly

Toyota Scion xB

Can there be an uglier car? Well... Three hours waiting in a vehicular line to get to PPO. We saw "Sanatoga exit - 1 mile" and the line was already forming. Thankfully this was a fairly comfortable vehicle, in part due to the boxy design. Responsive but unrefined acceleration, accompanied by a whiny-sounding engine note. Quite a quick sipper of gas also, but probably because of our start-stop motion as we inched along that Black Friday sale line... a journey that took 1 hour with the Matrix took 3 hours that night. Whew! Thank goodness for auto transmission!

Toyota Sienna

Bake a big loaf of bread, and the squeeze it and pinch it at its corners, and voila, you have the Toyota Sienna! Granted, MPVs (they call 'em minivans in America) were never particular handsome, but this one really looks like a loaf of bread that the cashier accidentally put beneath a 3-litre bottle of Coke... The squishy accelerator pedal only serves to further the loaf-of-bread metaphor, and the rest of this baguette is nothing to write home about.

Journey to Land's End

2011-08-07T05:22:00.003+08:00

Almost a year since the last group ride. Digging up my blog archives from some five years ago (yes, 2006!) and reading my own posts about our overnight cycling trips brought back memories of something I don't think I'd ever be able to do in the US. And what a way to kick it off--100km overnight ride right into the deep guts of Tuas, the largest heavy industrial area of Singapore.

This map (as well as the other two photos in this post) is from Guangyan, and depicts his riding route from his house. My start/end points are slightly different, since I live in Bishan, at the centre of the island, but generally the route outline is there. We met at East Coast Park, sliced through the heart of downtown with scenic stops at the Marina Bay Central Promontory and the Marina at Keppel Bay, before tackling with fervour the long (really long) route via West Coast Highway into Tuas.

That's Marina Bay Sands, at S$8 billion in investment, arguably the world's most expensive casino property. MBS and Resorts World Sentosa have galvanized the Singapore tourism scene. Sipping drinks with Xian Bin across at the bay at OverEasy the other night, we let ourselves be awed by the cool green lasers firing out from the top of the three hotel tower blocks that converge at the SkyDeck with an infinity pool that has captured the attention of the hospitality industry with its vertigo-inducing vistas.

But no, Marina Bay Sands was not the plato principal of our night ride. This time, that accolade was reserved for Tuas. Unless you've had to work in Tuas, you probably don't have a good idea of the sheer expansiveness of this area. Deployed on a day assignment in a Tuas-based company once, the taxi ride from the closest MRT station on the East-West Line cost me more than $20. Tuas is not for the faint-hearted, as the following photo of what we call "The Neverending Road" will attest to. Riding westwards along Pioneer Road, you confront this 7 lane-wide monstrosity. The neatly-lined row of sodium streetlamps appear to extend to the horizon, and after a while, the end is just barely in sight. You finally reach the end, make a left turn onto Tuas South Ave 3, only to see another wide thoroughfare even more dauntingly long than the one before. It is a Friday night and traffic is light, but occasionally a huge truck passes by, carrying an oversized load and flanked by security outriders flashing jarring alternations of blue and red. This, is Tuas.

This night, we conquered a frontier. A few years ago, land's end was at Tuas South Ave 3. Today, with the extensive land reclamation that has taken place, we found ourselves all the way out to Tuas South Ave 14, until we ran into a police jeep at the end of a long, straight, unlit road and were told by the officers on duty that we weren't supposed to be there. But the brief couple of minutes looking back towards the mainland, the bright white and yellow lights marking every contour and corner of industrial structures, the lone fire burning atop a smokestack and the strange nirvana-like peace of being amongst all this at 3am, is simply priceless.

We had a couple of encounters with zealot dogs--Asif calls them four-legged devils--including one that completely took us by surprise by squeezing out of the gate the factory compound we were riding past and chasing us for all it was worth. Dogs are probably one of the greatest fears of a rider, the other top ones being drunk drivers, uncovered drains and massive trucks on narrow lanes, but tonight, we all emerged safe. If only just, as Desmond might wish to add.

Our adventure of the night concluded, the difficult part of the journey began. Long stretch of Jalan Ahmad Ibrahim running mostly parallel, and for some part, together with, the Ayer Rajah Expressway. It's 4am, and then suddenly the hunger pangs hit. I realise that my last meal was 9 hours ago--Chicken rice at Wisma Atria with Pallavi. In the midst of all industry at 4am on a Saturday morning, one cannot expect to find food, other than what's to be found at a petrol station. It is one hour later before we finally reach this 24-hour roti prata in Clementi, and tuck into cheese prata and nasi briyani. Well-deserved rewards for a long yet exciting night.

I only have one month in Singapore before I'm off again for at least ten months. The allure of night cycling is intoxicating enough for me to consider, briefly, leading a completely nocturnal life for this month here. I mean, after all, if I need anything I can always go to Mustafa...

Photo credits for this post: Gao Guangyan

Why tears welled up in my eyes flying Continental Airlines from Newark to Tokyo

2011-08-03T03:00:00.002+08:00

I am not the most expressive in terms of emotions. In fact, in primary school, one of my teachers (my English teacher) used the word ‘stoic’ in my report card, alongside other more quotidian adjectives. But like all good men, I am occasionally moved to shed a tear—for example, when watching movies; once recently when watching Sleepless in Seattle for the second time—but on the whole I’m composed, controlled and introspective.

Yet, a couple minutes into my CO9 running EWR-NRT, I was hoping that no one else would notice that my eyes were moist. It happened that the in-flight magazine Hemispheres had a short feature on Singapore, focusing mainly on the (delicious) local cuisine. For those of you familiar with the animated film Ratatouille, I felt as if I was in the scene where the main character tried a sample of ratatouille; the movie cut away to show a swirl of happy memories from Remy’s childhood flushing back to him as he indulged in the amazing flavours of the dish. Reading about chicken rice, carrot cake and teh halia aroused in me the same exalted level of perceptive stimulus, and it made me realize how much I miss home.

Eleven months to the day that I left Singapore, starry-eyed and uncertain, bound for the US, I am going to be back in Singapore after some 10 countries, 10 American states, 18 airports, 22 cities and 25 flights. It feels like a long time. It indeed has been a long journey.

Although the piece by Joe Keohane had some parts that left me slightly flummoxed (on studying law, he says, “It’s the sort of thing one is expected to do in Singapore, a place where sober application is something of state religion.”—I mean, what?!), it also gave me a bit to think about. Through my travels across the United States, Central America and parts of Argentina, I have become acutely aware of just how remarkable the Singapore story is. As this below excerpt illustrates, Singapore is a land of many superlatives for a country of such small physical size:

I am proud of the Little Red Dot, a metaphor christened perhaps somewhat condescendingly by a former head of state of a neighbouring country but subsequently adopted with a certain degree of endearment. As I sit in Tokyo Narita slightly irritated by the never-ending stream of announcements over the PA and an over-zealous gate announcer for the Seattle flight at the adjacent gate who reiterates boarding sequence instructions at least twice each in English and Japanese, I am around seven hours of flight time away from dear old Changi. The 13-hour flight from Newark—my longest stretch in the air ever—has sapped me, but thank god for in-flight entertainment. It came both in the regular form and a bit of flight crew humour. Explaining why we were still on the tarmac when it was past departure time, the crew member explained that some important documentation had been left behind at the terminal building. In fact, he said that “they left it at another gate, and they said it will take about five minutes, which is probably about ten.” Around 15 minutes later, “okay, they’re tossing it up through the window now” and in an effort to placate fears of missed connections in Tokyo, “we will now go Concorde speed toward Narita!” We did eventually land on time despite nearly an hour’s delay in departure, but I guess I dozed off at some part because I didn’t notice the sonic boom.

Due to the lack of free Wi-Fi in Narita, I finish this post from the comfort of my room, which has for the past eleven months been empty. It feels wonderful to be back. The firm pillow, the nice shower, the RI graduation mug that I used to drink from...

It's great to be back, Singapore.

Thought train -- Destination: Unknown

2011-07-20T06:58:00.002+08:00

It's time to open the thought train again, after more than two months of hiatus. The past two months have been a series of non-stop stimuli, and at this point in time, I feel like I just need to sit down and pen down some thoughts. More recently, it has felt taxing that I have so much swirling around in my head, and I haven't had the opportunity (rather, the motivation) to release some of them. The time has come to release the build-up and let the thought train run.

This morning in class Prof Jorge told us that Borders would officially be going bust, leaving 11,000 without a job. Gravity of the situation. The big book store that comes into town, usurps the small family-run bookshop. When it collapses, who fills the void? It won't be easy for the small enterprises driven bust to come back into business again. There is a book about this, no? Too Big To Fail or something.

I would prefer not going the chronological order, because its boring and rather staid. But I shall defer.

Fort Lauderdale. Three days of absolute freedom. A fantastic break after a somewhat frustrating term at school. Alone, when I needed to be so. State law that does not require a helmet when riding a scooter, when it needed to be so. Florida wind in my hair riding down Las Olas Blvd at 30mph. That first dinner of Ahi Tuna at The Floridian, an introduction to a reinvigorating three days. Glacial meals followed at IHOP, Riverside Market cafe. Sushi, frozen yoghurt, craft beer. Hedonism, pure. Riding out to a random park, laying down on the grass and reading Atlas Shrugged. Absolutely carefree, and I loved it.

Semester at Sea. Seven countries in 26 days. The cultural juxtapositions and comparisons. The nuances of each, and the thoughts that lingered in the back of my head ("You're not allowed to go to Tikal, tourists were beheaded there recently"). Meeting tons of like-minded, adventure-seeking people from all over the US, and then realizing that as like-minded as we were, everyone comes from a different 'camp', a different social background. Each and every one of us has a different way of looking at the world. We have different priorities, we support different causes and on any issue, we hold different opinions. I think the best metaphor I can come up to illustrate this is that we each have our own very personal set of "looking glasses".

My looking glasses have been evolving since the day I was born. Born as a citizen of a country that is, by any measure, a miracle in its existence. The FT says we have 15% of the population being millionaires. Melting pot of cultures, races, religions. Law that bans chewing gum, and till recently, casinos. A drive for excellence that sees our two casinos rival the entire Las Vegas strip. A democracy that, till today, has only seen one party in power since the country's independence. Certainly, an environment that is unique. But, as you might then realise, there exists no opposite. There is no 'ordinary' if we look at the world this way. Someone else grows up among roaming wildebeests in the Serengeti. Another person grows up having been born somewhere in Japan the week after the earthquake and nuclear catastrophe. Many are born in environments where statistics dictate that they have half a chance of surviving beyond the next two years--infant mortality. No, there is nothing 'ordinary' for any of us.

Buenos Aires. Actually, Argentina. Could not go to Chile because the border was closed, and for one who likes things planned for (again, a vestige of the influence of NS on my own set of looking glasses and corresponding actions), a big move out of the comfort zone. But it turned out great. Mendoza, Cordoba. A couple of new friends in both places. Lots of experiences. Realising that I was nearly scammed in Mendoza, only after the actual encounter. Because of that, being completely aware that I was being targeted for another scam in Buenos Aires, and feeling just pretty pissed off at the outcome--chocolate ice cream on my jacket. Classes at school, encounters outside, observations all the time, questions arising from these observations. Why do colectivos drive like they own the road? Why is the pedestrian not respected at street crossings in Buenos Aires? New discoveries all the time. They don't call in zebra crossing in the US (crosswalk-Rebecca H). Questions questions questions. Non-stop. Wave after wave of mental assault. No, mental stimulation, depending on which way you look at it.

Getting things done and finding out how to do it. That guide booklet for the colectivo seems awfully archaic, is there a better way? Google maps? No. Oh, found comoviajo.com. Solved. What's the best place for a good vista of the Argentine capital? Not sure yet. Does anyone want to join me for a pricey dinner at Hotel Panamericano? Maybe not, so try Palacio Barolo.

Oh, it was raining just now. Will the ecological reserve be open? Not sure, let's go there to find out. Oh shucks, closed, bummer. But hey, discovered Parrilla Mi Sueno (got the recommendation from someone I met, but I thought it was a snazzy restaurant, how would I know it would turn out to be a street side stall), and what a great bondiola sandwich it was! Terribly dreary day with the most depressing weather in Buenos Aires yet. But hey... that building looks familiar. Oh! The filming scene for Nueve Reinas is the Hilton Buenos Aires. Exactly as it appeared in the movie. Ricardo Darin. Wow, I must have watched quite a handful of his films-- Nueve Reinas, El Secreto de Sus Ojos, Un Cuento Chino. But okay, Penelope Cruz still wins hands down. C'mon, why was watcing POTC4 such a treat? How can Penelope Cruz and Paz Vega (in Spanglish) look so alike and not be the same person, or at least twin sisters!

Seats in Hoyts Abasto were nearly awful. Britton concurred. How could that have passed? Had the person making that decision never watched a movie in a decent cinema? Football. Such a sombre mood following Argentina vs Costa Rica, despite victory. Being a bit too obnoxious ourselves, perhaps. Chance encounter with a nice stranger at the colectivo stop. Agreeing that the road might be closed, walking 10 blocks to find an alternative colectivo. Feeling awash in relief that there was someone trustworthy for company at 1am. Learning from Mercedes that she doesn't take colectivos after 9 or 10. Wondering why. Am I foolish or is she exceptionally cautious? Thinking about all this through my own looking glasses. Singapore, Night Rider bus service.

Thinking, at the same time, what kind of looking glasses each person I encounter possesses. Mechi's looking glasses are definitely different simply because she won't take the colectivo after 10. Clara's looking glasses are different because she was born in Buenos Aires and almost learnt English as a second language. Matt and Ross have pre-college made-in-England looking glasses. Kate has Australian looking glasses, but talks like a Brit and knows it because everyone else, with their looking glasses (if the metaphor could be extended to listening devices) comments that her accent is more Brit than Aussie.

Argentines are extremely quiet on the colectivo. Does anyone else notice that? If you have lived in a boisterous environment and have your looking glasses shaped as such, does that alter your frame of reference enough such that you might not notice it as acutely as I do? What, then, do you notice that I don't? If you're a guy, then you probably would at least agree with me that Argentine women are awfully beautiful. That, I am sure, would not fall outside anyone's frame of reference. But where in the world do they get enough shampoo to keep the country running? And gosh, there has to be some brand of conditioner that I have yet to try...

I have around a week and a half in Argentina, and it all seems to have passed too quickly. I don't want to leave, but at the same time, I think it will be about the right time to finally pull myself off the road. Make no mistake, this has been a fantastic summer. The sheer impressiveness of the Panama Canal, to be a century old in 2014. Travelling with a 74-year old professor from Stanford in a group to Mount Arenal in Costa Rica. Meeting the all-conquering Scotswoman Virginia at the Retiro terminal, and realizing how much I missed the Brit accent. Being lucky enough to sit beside at Argentine architect on a flight on the Brazilian national airline TAM. Figuring out a solution for accommodation that ultimately saw me sleeping at three different airports for three consecutive nights.

My looking glasses are, perhaps, tired. Tired since the day when, setting foot on American soil, I wondered why that Dave's Limo van was so big and yet the driver just drove it like a normal car. Tired since the day when I realised that there was no way I could possibly understand the entire college student attitude towards alcohol consumption, something out of my frame of reference simply because I came as a freshman of 21. Tired since the day in Las Vegas when I noted, with quiet satisfaction, that my odd habit of reverse parking (which, I think, is called backing-up? versus pulling-into? Whatever) helped me find our rental car easily among the huge parking lots (previously I would call them carparks, yes) at Las Vegas Casinos.

Like I told some of my friends, the price of my airfare back to Singapore could have paid for staying an additional month in Buenos Aires. Indeed, the opportunity cost in signifcant. I am barely understanding a scratch of a rich and, to me, previously unfamiliar, Latin American culture. But maybe it's due. Time to go back to what is truly home. Recalibrate my looking glasses, having let them undergone change during this past year. The smell of a wet market (extending further the metaphor to olfactory senses). Night cycling. Tuesday night pub quizzes at Brewerkz.

So there we go. The train has been let loose. It is time to watch Uruguay vs Peru on TV. But you, the reader, probably having read this on Facebook as opposed to my blog, maybe you might want to think a bit about your own special pair of looking glasses too. It probably has changed from since 5 minutes ago, before you took the time to read all this. If you have a chance to, maybe you want to share with me about what you think about your own looking glasses. I am interested to listen. Just don't speak too loudly, because, like the Argentines, I prefer conservations toned-down.

A sampler gives you goods and bads

2011-05-03T13:56:00.002+08:00

As I sip a bottle of rather unpalatable Ommegang Hennepin--leaving the infinitely better Abbey Ales and Three Philosopher variants in the fridge for now, the best for the last--it is perhaps opportune to take a look back, and a glimpse forward.

Finals began today (apparently there was a flash mob dance at Van Pelt last night to commemorate the end of reading days) and I took my first paper this morning. I think Psyc001 will be okay. In similar vein, I hope the rest of the other three finals I have will turn out likewise (and hopefully, better than okay). Motivation has been in short supply, and with essentially a self-imposed travel embargo--after the extremes of Fall 2010--the semester was slightly monochromatic with the exception of Sing, City! 3 and Alternate Spring Break. Courses are lining up well for Fall 2011, and I am much more excited. New apartment to look forward to at 4111 Walnut (you have to admit, a decently swanky address) with the prospective euphoria of new furniture and gizmo acquisition. Until my bank accounts run dry, deciding on which full-size futon to buy will be a pleasant problem.

The next three months look to be quite a whirlwind. A couple of days of Fort Lauderdale sun, followed by 26 days abroad the MV Explorer for the Semester at Sea program, and then a short stint in Chile, followed by a month in Buenos Aires for the Summer Abroad program. It makes me giddy thinking about how much of this unexplored sector of the world I will get a glimpse of, and yet it will probably be all too short. Cotopaxil, Mount Rainier, Alaska, Scandinavia ... all these await. Time (and to a large extent, money) is limited. But if not now, then when?

I really ought to toss this bottle of crappy Hennepin aside and focus on the good stuff. But there are just so many more days that I can keep my fridge running before I finally have to move out. Then reality will hit. Freshman year is OVER.

Pensamientos: A continuum on profound matters

2011-04-15T07:39:00.002+08:00

The weather was beautiful today and I decided to don my ultra-patriotic red-and-white running gear for a short jog down by the Schuykill River. I did not make it to my planned objective of the Falls Bridge (to quote the lady at Student Health Service , "You're 23 (sic)! You're pretty old!") but I turned around at Columbia Bridge instead. With the beautiful sunshine, I decided that I was in no form of a hurry, so I sat down to enjoy the untethered passing of time.

The rowers were training hard, numerous boats passed me, and I observed the militaresque synchronicity of the rowers in 2-, 4- and 8-man boats. Lean, muscular figures planted on impossibly narrow fiberglass or carbon fiber crafts, slicing through water like a knife through warm butter. Energy. Power. Discipline. Having been a canoeist back in high school, I felt the connection once again. But gone are the days of pull-ups, crunches, push-ups, gym sessions and cardio runs. The closest I get to exercise is probably stretching for that hard-to-reach bottle opener in order to open that next bottle of Weyerbacher...

With the sight of oars surfacing, gliding over water and plunging in again for the next stroke mesmerizing me, it suddenly occurred to me that by tradition, all rowing was performed in a backward direction. I found this exceptionally paradoxical, considering that this was a nation with a clear preference for front-in parking. I had previously read a lengthy debate on an online forum (yea, now you know what I spend my free time doing) regarding the pros and cons of front-in and reverse parking. Other than allowing readers such as myself to come to the realization that there are a lot of people with a lot of free time to spend on the web, it was largely inconclusive, save for the fact that yes, the Secret Service doesn't ever park front-in.

As the lead in a fleet of single-person boats called "Heads up!" to the rest of the pack to warn the others that she was slowing down and avert a potential collision, I simply wondered why did rowing evolve to be performed in a backwards direction instead of the (literally) more straightforward option? And I must say, the ability of the coxless boats to track a straight line despite going in reverse motion is pretty impressive. I am sure that it look many hours to train that skill, but I can't see how reverse parking can be actually any more difficult than rowing backwards (there're these things called mirrors in a car). I guess it's just a matter of habit. But the resistance to change, as demonstrated here, can be insurmountable. Sure, by all means keep rowing backwards, but I don't see the hypothetical day when I'll drive on the I-95 in reverse. I'm pretty sure I'd look like a fool if I ran along the Schuykill banks in reverse as well, with ultra-nationalistic running gear or otherwise.

No offence to rowers--hey, I was one too! Plus in my time I had to kneel on my canoe, increasing the centre of gravity, and paddle on just one side and ultimately still try to keep going straight, talk about absurd!--but just my pensamientos for the day.

Holding up heavy eyelids

2011-03-29T16:55:00.002+08:00

At 5am, the returns of sleep have just about completely diminished. My eyes are tired and the 60-watt incandescent hanging 3 feet above my head feels a little too harsh, but I shall press on.

This past weekend was DiaS'pura and Sing, City! 3. Hectic and tiring two preceding weeks culminated in a single day where our efforts showed. The support was fantastic, the crowd essentially packed the Harrison auditorium, and definitely exceeded everyone's expectations.

Suddenly there is a void, because there aren't any 7 to 12 midnight rehearsals any more. Instead, I have to read my PSYC 001 textbook and take notes. Whatever Andrew gave to Mei Zhen, Anita, Barbarella and Chantelle, certainly didn't come my way.

The weekend was well-spent, beginning Friday with Guangyan, Kenneth and Jon arriving. Supper at Jimmy Johns and gelato at Capo Giro's. It was actually my first gelato from CG. The Uva Nera-Turkish Coffee combination was worth relishing. Two prior nights running till 5.30am took their toll, but we still got up early enough to make a trip out to Centre City for breakfast at Reading Terminal Market. Cheesesteak showdown, not the best of ideas--severe food coma ensued. Walked around enjoying the sun before heading back for the conference.

Took photos during the speaker series and interspersed lunch and tea breaks. Had on hand really good equipment from Alvin. Makes my little trove of lenses feel so inadequate. Before long, it was showtime!

Slightly apprehensive as the lights came on, the boisterous crowd soothed my nerves. Everything went well, not without minor glitches but the audience forgave anyway as they rolled in laughter and shared the numerous "Awww!" moments. I don't think I can do justice describing the entire experience, so instead of going on, I shall more or less leave this as an unpretentious nutshell of the musical rather than attempt any further. After-party at BBQ & T was short, but at the same time, I was positively exhausted. Got back and crashed, no kidding.

Sunday, only Kenneth was left as Guangyan had to catch the noon Greyhound. We went to visit Penn Gastronomy's Chocolate Festival. I think the latent foodie in me is slowly stirring to life again. Just get this mealplan out of my way. I might want to write/photograph for Penn Apetit next semester.

We looked at the Penn Museum's much-hyped Silk Road exhibit, but it was perhaps over-hyped. Hungry after 3pm with no lunch, we scooted off to Makiman for a princely feast--sashimi and unagi. Livingsocial coupon. Movie at Pearl Theater, Paul. Another Livingsocial coupon. Paul was, unfortunately, a let-down. But silver lining was discovered, a convenience store within Temple selling take-out beer. Not just the trashy Miller Lites but Chimays and others. Got ourselves a couple of samples, Chimay and Weyerbacher. Envy the Temple kids. Dinner at Kilimandjaro. No, not another Livingsocial one =). Started on 2001: Space Odyssey, but both of us were too winded. Switched to two episodes of Big Bang Theory before Kenneth decided to hit the sack. I followed a while later.

And I am going to do so now. It's about time, 5.30am.

After a hiatus

2011-03-20T13:08:00.005+08:00

It surprises me to find out that I have left my blog stagnant for the past three months. This lacuna is perhaps a result of the lack of interest on my part, as well as being involved in a fair share of other activities. But I realize the value of the blog. The dearth of constant blogging has resulted in a fairly lackadaisical standard of writing, which I hope will be arrested in the near future for the sake of both my academic performance as well as my self-esteem.

Since the last entry on Dec 23rd 2010, much has taken place. A lot of it involved driving--a great road trip in California and Vegas, driving (twice) to Blue Mountain to ski, driving for Alternate Spring Break in West Virginia. But perhaps the most exciting driving experience was on Saturday, March 5, when I was driving a 15-seater Ford van at around 6am in the morning, sending another ASB group to the airport for their Utah-bound flight. This picture alone speaks as a testament to the sheer excitement of the morning.

I had a rear tire blowout while driving along the Platt Bridge. I am probably very lucky that it was a rear tire, that I was the leading vehicle, and that it was 6am in the morning. Consequences may have been much, much worse if any of those attributes had taken on a different value. And there was no spare tire. Sparing you the details, just trust me that it was a long morning.

The US has given me the opportunity to drive in what may have been 50mph crosswinds, in snow (yes, traction control had to kick in, and nonetheless, I could absolutely feel it) and then uphill in snow. Trust me, driving a fully-laden Dodge Grand Caravan up an incline and then getting stuck half-way with wheel-spin is not a situation any driver wants to be in. But somehow, when I was in West Virginia, it worked out without the potential ramifications from sliding downhill in snowy conditions. With barely any snow driving experience (I do occasionally have to explain to people I meet that it doesn't ever snow in Singapore, much to my amusement), I am fairly lucky. I would really like to take some kind of challenging-terrain driving course, so if any readers know of contacts, buzz me. It continues to puzzle me in a funny way that my reverse-parking habits are considered miltary-esque. Regardless, it was certainly an easy way to find one's car in the vast parking lots of Las Vegas!!

Despite my generally calm disposition, it freaks me out that, as I pen this down, I am 7 weeks away from the end of my first year of college life. It is definitely too soon, and I don't feel I've achieved enough. Each day I'm surrounded by overachievers who seem to have inexhaustible sources of energy and motivation. Comparatively, I feel perhaps just a little lacklustre and mediocre. It shouldn't have to be like that. Maybe the draggy courses I have ended up with for this semester have contributed to this state of mind. People who love what they do always talk about having something that they look forward to waking up to. I think having something you love doing lets you both have something to look forward to as well as something to stay up for. I don't really feel it right now.

Let's take our bags and go forward from here / It may be true they say the path isn't clear / But time and tide it waits for no other man / This we all shall treasure in our hands. Sing, City! 3's lyrics, entirely original. One of the few things that I have found joy investing my time. It's 6 days to D-day and everyone's getting in the gear. I am really excited and it reminds me of the days of RIPB and Slackerboy and Teacherman and the Princess Leia buns (William Kwek, lolz to you if you are reading this!). It has been a long time...

I've just been feeling quite unsettled of late, and I can't really pinpoint what's been troubling me. Very strange dreams... a deranged monkey that kept stabbing itself, and on a different night, sitting alone in an MPV (might have been that Dodge Grand Caravan) and getting surrounded by a mob wielding axes. Before I could floor the pedal and speed away, I remember one gang member swinging his axe and shattering my right-side window. At that point, strangely enough, I was lambasting how this was not a Zipcar rental (of which I purchased full insurance coverage for). It is rare that I recall a dream as vividly.

In less than two months, so many friends are graduating and leaving Penn for their careers, their pursuits, their lifelong ambitions. It saddens me that I will most probably be half the world away from them; it frightens me that before I know it, it will be my turn.

For just outside my window, lies proof that it really is the end of winter.

If It's Not Boeing, I'm Not Going

2010-12-23T06:32:00.002+08:00

And so that was the slogan that the factory tour at Everett, north of Seattle left us with. However, it turns out that this slogan translated to bad karma with Airbus equipment the next day when I was leaving Seattle bound for Philadelphia.

My initial itinerary involved a noon departure on UA844 from Seattle to San Francisco, with a quick layover to connect to Philadelphia.

As it turned out, the Airbus 320 coming in from IAD and going on to SFO had some mechanical issues and had to be inspected. With the resulting delay, I was not going to make my connection to Philly. I quickly rang up United Reservations, and the best option they could offer me was a US Airways flight route SEA-CLT-PHL, leaving Seattle at 1.30pm and reaching Philly just before midnight, almost the same time that my United flight out of SFO would have touched down.

I was delighted at the possibility of salvaging the situation (not to mention avoiding a long standby wait at SFO) and promptly went ahead to confirm the change. As my luck would have it the US Airways gate was at the opposite end of the SeaTac airport terminal, and with under an hour to go before US1857's departure, I had to get into slightly more than a brisk pace.

Reaching the US Airways gate A3, I managed to get my boarding passes and was happy and Philly-bound. By 1.30pm we were all on-board and waiting. And wait we did. Apparently the computer system handling refueling was down, and a manual override had to be performed. This would take a while. When they allowed us to disembark at around 3pm to stretch our legs, get some fresh air and maybe a coffee, I knew that my chances of making the connection at Charlotte were all but gone. Oh, US1857 was also an A320.

Calling United Reservations once more, I was told that there was a 5.40pm flight SEA-PHX-PHL and a 10.10pm option direct SEA-PHL. But because this was a US Airways delay, United would not be able to help me with a rebooking. Approaching the US Airways supervisor for assistance, I was told that the 10.10pm direct flight into Philly was full, however she managed to get me into the SEA-PHX-PHL routing, into exit row seating.

By this time, UA844 had probably left for San Francisco, but that was besides the point. When the Phoenix-bound US18 finally boarded, I was dismayed to find that it was yet another A320! Would this be the last straw and might I not make it back to Philly before the houses closed for winter break? My heart skipped a beat when the captain announced that the flight would be delayed for a "couple of minutes" because a computer miscalculation had left the plane with insufficient fuel for the flight to PHX. I had learnt at this point in time that "couple of minutes" could mean anything up to 90. But as it turned out, we were only 10 minutes late on take-off, and reached Phoenix with the same degree of punctuality.

A 2-hour layover awaited me at Phoenix, and I was bored stiff. Kept myself busy watching the news--the situation in Europe seemed really bad--and hoping that the US258 running Phoenix to Philly might be a Boeing. As it turns out, an A321, one of Airbus's newer models. Flight reached Philly slightly early, but not before a landing that led one of the flight attendants to describe the A321 as one of the "newest and noisiest" planes in the US fleet. Those overhead bins rattled like a 20-year old school bus. But I was back in Philly, albeit six hours later, but back in Philly nonetheless.

In a dose of Christmas humour, does anyone want to try out Santa Claus Airlines Flight #1?

Zipcar reviews

2010-12-07T09:09:00.004+08:00

Despite the fact that I probably should be studying for my Spanish exam tomorrow, I feel compelled to spend maybe half an hour on this--my opinions of the four Zipcars that I have rented and driven:

1) Toyota Matrix
Date: Oct 30, 2010
First rental, driving out to PPO with a full car load of 5. I think the rear is slightly tight but not cramped like the Insight. The Scion probably offers more space overall. Low driving position, typical of many Toyotas, which I didn't really like. Nothing to complain with regards to the drive (once again just like all Toyotas) but nothing remarkable either. Oh, it had cruise control which I figured out how to use after a while.

2) Honda Insight Hybrid
Date: Nov 20, 2010
This hybrid is marginally cheaper to rent and is really quite stingy on fuel consumption, but I felt that power was sorely lacking. Handling is okay if not a bit bland, and when we took this out to Sheeder Mill Farm for horse-riding, we realized that tall people won't be comfortable in the rear seats because of the sloping roofline. Probably won't rent this one again.

3) Toyota Scion xB
Date: Nov 25, 2010
Three hours waiting in a vehicular line to get to PPO. We saw "Sanatoga exit - 1 mile" and the line was already forming. Thankfully this was a fairly comfortable vehicle, in part due to the boxy design. Good response to acceleration, but with a whiny-sounding engine note. Quite a quick sipper of gas also, but probably because of our start-stop motion as we inched along that Black Friday sale line... a journey that took 1 hour with the Matrix took 3 hours that night. Whew! Thank goodness for auto transmission!

4) Nissan Sentra
Date: Dec 6, 2010
Ran this out for a short errand to Bristol Pike, around half an hour from school. Decent handling, good acceleration response. There're a ton of controls on the steering wheel, which does appear a bit intimidating. There might be cruise control, didn't have time to figure it out. Better driving position than the Toyota Matrix. No comments on the spaciousness in the rear as only a saxophone and my bag sat there.

5) Mini Cooper
Date: Dec 10, 2010
Another short trip, and ooh such a cool way to do it. I think this might well be my first proper experience with a continental vehicle. The Mini totally oozes cool with its schweet sunroof, cockpit-like flick switches and great interior feel. Realistically, it's only meant for two adults of course. The indicator stalks have two resistance thresholds so to avoid just having a momentarily indicator you have to press it a bit harder. There is cruise control but I did not use it. Harmon/Kardon speakers! This baby can pretty much move (and with a nice acceleration note to boot!), and I'm just tempted to wonder how a Mini Cooper S would be like. This is perfect for the moments when you're feeling just a bit hedonistic...

October - el mes de viajes

2010-10-27T06:00:00.007+08:00

October has been a great month--I have just returned from a seminar in Boston and it marks the fourth consecutive weekend on travel. Actually, fifth, if you count the Hickory Run State Park trip on Sep 26, and so here it goes:

Sep 26 Hickory Run State Park
A day trip out to Hickory Run State Park for a little hike, it was a small group led by Maura and we initially encountered some problems with the PhillyCarShare car. The first one had no ignition key and the replacement that they had us walk to (like 4 blocks away) had low tyre pressure. Anyway, we managed to get to the park in the end and had a nice hike in beautiful weather. We also saw the world's largest boulder field, spanning 1400 by 800 ft and apparently 12 ft deep. The soil underneath all those boulders is really really compact.

Oct 2 & 3 Baltimore
The following weekend was a short trip over to Baltimore, not least of all to visit Shawn Tan! Took the Greyhound over, and in around 2 hours I was in Baltimore. It was quite a walk from the Greyhound terminal over to Federal Hill, but the weather was fabulously sunny and a great change from the wet weather we had been having in Philly.

The previous day I went down to Reading Terminal Market with YW, so perhaps I was expecting too much from Baltimore's Cross St Market, nonetheless, I grabbed lunch there before continuing onwards towards the harbour area. Finally managed to meet Shawn, and we visited the USS Torsk, supposedly the last submarine to sink a ship in WW2, and also the Baltimore World Trade Center observatory. The latter was really great due to clear skies, and we stayed on to see the sunset. Dinner was a lavish affair at Germano's, we had their Starving Artist special. "This offer is extended to artists only--and to those married to an artist--and to those who have ever considered becoming an artist--and to those who have ever known an artist of any kind, or seen one on TV," proclaimed the menu. It was a fabulous dinner, and I thoroughly enjoyed my wild mushroom polenta, and osso bucco. The osso bucco was one elusive dish back when we visited IndoItaliano 4 times during our Kilimanjaro trip, so to finally savor delicious beef gave additional satisfaction!

The next day we walked around the JHU campus, and also visited the BMA, before heading down to Fell's Point. I was very lucky because Fell's Point festival was going on this weekend! We sampled various food including crabcake, freshly prepared! Before long it was time to head back with my long walk to the Greyhound terminal, but not before we stopped by Vaccaro's once again for their famous cannoli. It was a little messy to eat and I actually found the tartufo nicer though.

The next two mornings I woke up at 6.30am to clear my backlog of work! But it was worth it!

Oct 9 to 12 Chicago
It looks like a long trip but actually I only had 2.5 days in Chicago, way too short! Nonetheless, it was great meeting up with CK who was kind enough to host me and also to have visited both the Sears Towers and the John Hancock Center observatories. I think JH is definitely a much prettier building, and their Signature Lounge is a great place for drinks.

I only booked my flight the previous weekend while I was at Shawn's dorm in Baltimore, so this was a pretty rushed one. Nonetheless, it was great and I will definitely return to Chicago next fall; Walter Wong I will see you then. The outbound UA851 was an A320 and it actually arrived 10 minutes early at ORD! However, do not be fooled by early arrivals... the jet way personnel were not ready and we waited the full 10 minutes, if not more, before we could disembark from the plane.

I also went on a sunset lake cruise with CK and his friend Noel, and a architecture river cruise with Pach and her friend Tiff. Both were great, although I think we saw too many Mies van der Rohe buildings. "Less is more," certainly, but this has become more of "Less is more"! Nonetheless, great to see the stuff we talked about in ARCH101 and URBS103 come alive by visiting the city itself. Also had a great lunch at Joe's Seafood with Terence and JX, the cod was deliciously sweet!

I was also lucky enough to be there on the weekend of the Chicago Marathon, there were some inconveniences because of traffic re-routing but overall I was not affected too badly. I got a chance to take some photos of the runners starting off, and also of a relatively undisturbed Cloud Gate, the beautiful Anish Kapoor sculpture that is normally swarmed by tourists and visitors. I guess most people had come to support the marathoners and they had left the Millenium Park area either to catch a few winks or to support their family members or friends at other locations along the route. I think it would be a fantastic place to film a time-lapse, if you could somehow find a long stretch with no-one around.

Brought back Garrett's popcorn on the return flight, United Express 7464 operating on a tiny CRJ700. You kind of know a plane is small when the last row is row 18. The popcorn travelled all of 678 miles back with me, and was quickly finished when I brought it along for dinner with the rest. Please buy Garrett's popcorn when you go to Chicago, if nothing else. Your friends whom you share it with (assuming you even do) will love you for it.

Oct 15 & 16 New York City
This was another last-minute trip as I only received news early that week from URA that a staff delegation would be in town on Friday and would be having dinner with the Columbia people. Hence, I booked my Boltbus and a bed for a night at HI New York pretty late, and made the 2 hour commute into the Big Apple. We had dinner at the Oak Room, a nice place, and before that I managed to squeeze in time to visit the MoMA. The following day, I visited the Top of the Rock (Rockefeller Centre observatory) twice, using the sunrise-sunset pass so that I could see both day and night panoramic views of NYC. In between, I joined a group of Brits for a 7-hour bike tour around NYC. Scottish accents! The bike lanes that Bloomberg has implemented are pretty awesome, and it's so easy to get around on a bike. The photo above shows me with the guides Marc and Nelson, at lunch at the microbrewery. I also walked around Chinatown and had dinner there, before catching my BoltBus back from Penn station. I had less than 30 hours in NYC, but I think I managed to do a fair bit!

Oct 22-24 Boston
And finally this weekend was a trip to Boston. We had a seminar in Boston and it was great catching up with a lot of friends from Singapore whom I hadn't seen in a while. RIPB family photo! We stayed at this fabulous place near MIT called Kendall Hotel, really nice boutique accommodation which isn't expensive once you share the spacious room among 4 guests, and also considering its great location. Flew up with a whole bunch of Singaporeans on a US Airways EMB190. The plane once again landed early, and had no jet way staff! Uggggh.

Besides the seminar itself, I tried the famous Legal Seafood in Boston, on the recommendation of Ben Ang. The Nutty Atlantic Salmon (medium-rare, as I always have it!) was nice and juicy, but the winner was totally the Ommegang Abbey Ale that Tiong and I had. Seriously, the best beer that I've ever tried, sweet traces of caramel such that Tiong described it to be almost like "wine". And I don't think he's exaggerating, it was that good. Later on that Saturday night, a group of us went around 'exploring' and I only ended back at the hotel at 4am. Which was sad because the next day I couldn't get up in time for breakfast, so I missed breakfast for both mornings! If anyone can find two other people to share a 4-person room in Boston, I will go again; I still have that elusive CharlieCard that was left on an obscure location for people to (not) find.

Other than the customary tour of MIT and Harvard by Guangyan and KY respectively, we also had a dim sum lunch at Hei La Moon, which was really yummy. Very popular place in Chinatown, so be prepared to wait. We were too prepared, though, and went on a little walk only to find out our number had been passed. After lunch we just explored a bit, including Quincy Market, before heading back to Logan for the flight back. It was an EMB170 this time, and if you do fly BOS-PHL on a night flight, please choose the starboard-side window seat (i.e. not seat xxA) because that offers you fantastic views of the lights of NYC in the night.

Settling in

2010-09-23T13:08:00.003+08:00

Been a week short of a month since my last post, and that was about Bali. Since then, I've spent a meaningful last week in Singapore, a day in Doha, and around three weeks in Penn. Much has taken place, and perhaps it is the right moment to sit down and gather some thoughts. I'm hoping to finish this by 0130 so that I might have sufficient sleep for tomorrow, but it looks like that's being a little too ambitious. There's a pair recording for Spanish that was supposed to be due tomorrow and I didn't realise it was pair work until like ten minutes ago. Don't think my regular partner realised it either. Guess it'll work out somehow. Perhaps that cycling trip this afternoon came at a greater opportunity cost than I thought it would, but frankly, it was due.

It was interesting observing over the past couple of days as my close friends bound for various British universities related their packing experiences. Shipping over printers and what-nots, I found that quite intriguing. Then it dawned upon me how convenient Amazon Prime was. For college students, 2-day free shipping for an entire year. Pretty darn awesome, my Amazon purchase list comprises fridge, USB cable, phone charger, DSLR, bike lock and cable, course text, daypack, USB hub and continues to expand. Two-days expedited shipping is tolerable, the savings from buying online (not to mention not being subject to the 8% PA sales tax) and the strangely exhilarating experience of receiving an email from Harsmail saying that I have *yet another* package waiting for pickup at the Harrison mail room has made Amazon almost akin to a drug. Can't get enough of it. But no my printer didn't come from Amazon and neither did my 23" Dell monitor. Nor my bicycle. Clearly I have been doing a bit too much shopping.

But honestly, I get all this stuff to make my environment comfortable and to continue the habits that I've been used to. Unimaginable not to have a DSLR when I'm going for hikes. Can't work with the dearth of vertical pixels in my wide-format laptop screen. Can't go on hikes or bike rides without a daypack. Two wheels remain as the preferred mode of transport to discover the various corners of Philly.

The first proper ride on my bike today (not counting riding it back from Darby which was where I met the seller) was not a good one, not 10 minutes from the start and I have incident of actual contact. MPV driving into a parallel parking lot front-in doesn't check his blind spot and squeezes me into the lot. Handlebar gives his C-pillar a good rub, but I am unharmed. Very apprehensive of cars these days ever since the time I got knocked down. Closer to centre city, incident 2, near miss. I switched out of the slow lane to overtake a van that appeared to have stopped. Well, the van stopped, but only because the car in front of it stopped. Van swings out of the slow lane too and I escape by a whisker.

Cycled to 6th and Market, found the Greater Philly Visitor Info Centre but decided I would look really strange stepping in wearing my cycling gear. Hence, decided to head back west to 34th and go to Fairmount Park on the west bank of Schuykill River. East bank is reserved for tomorrow's ride. Pretty nice with light traffic once I got there, stopped for some photos of the Smith Civil War memorial and also the Please Touch Museum, before heading back. Cycled in a loop before realising that I had to return via 34th, no two ways about it, and got back just before dinner. Locked the bike in the outdoor bike rack but today being Mid-Autumn, the sky fulfilled it's responsibility to create rain. Had to dash out to bring the bike in halfway through reading some text for my writing sem.

Everyone's bitching about writing sem, tedious. I feel the same. Don't know which is worse, doing exercise or doing writing sem. Maybe writing sem.

Decided not to be crazy and do 5 cu for the first semester. Currently on 4 + 0.5 for the languages prog. Might want to drop taking the MLP for credit since my Spanish isn't good enough to extract the best value spending 4 hours each work attending coffee hours and dinners comprising largely of native (or pretty fluent) speakers. Simply different level of ability. Maybe twice a week is fine, but 4 times a week is no go. Might just do it for interest and not for credit, the latter which would entail a minimum level of attendance for the sessions.

Need to get an SSN Denial Letter as the first step towards getting a PA driving license.

So much to do. One thing at a time.

Bali

2010-08-30T01:08:00.013+08:00

A long-held desire to take a short trip to Bali was fulfilled when I chanced upon fantastic $255 return economy fares that had travel dates fitting into the already-tight two-week window between my completion of work with a travel firm and my departure to the USA. The fare offered by QR was a steal considering that the SQ economy fare for identical dates were around $550 (which was the price for a QR business class fare to Bali!). Here are some photos from the trip:

Outbound SIN-DPS on QR638. We were lucky enough to get the bulkhead, and biz appeared to be flying empty for this leg. Both the out and in flights landed slightly ahead of schedule, and in a testament to the efficiency of Changi Airport, it was a mere 16 minutes from landing to getting in the taxi bound for home.

Our room at Kuta Paradiso Hotel. Considering the 4-nights stay we booked a Super Deluxe Pool View room. Pretty comfy. The hotel had a glitzy red Ferrari Testarossa parked proudly at its porch that got a group of Aussie tourists extremely excited when the tour transport dropped us off at our hotel before theirs.

White Water Rafting - for me the most exciting activity during the trip. Kudos to mom & pop for being daring enough to try it out. Very picturesque route along the river, and the rapids were not too challenging. It's more than an hour's drive from Kuta though - Bali is much bigger than many of us imagine.

Sunset at Jimbaran Bay. Final dinner in Bali just before our flight. From our spot we could also see the airport runway that extends into the sea, and at just before 7pm I'm pretty sure that I saw the 77W that would've been QR638 making its landing at DPS. Nice atmosphere.

A close shave, too close

2010-07-29T21:42:00.002+08:00

I was walking home yesterday evening from Bishan MRT and along the way, I got knocked down by a car. It was just opposite RJC, at the turn off to Jalan Pemimpin, next to Bosch, at the zebra crossing there. I was crossing the zebra crossing and looked up to see a bus 410, heading towards Bishan in the opposite direction from me. In front of the bus was a pair of headlamps belonging to a car that was turning left into Jalan P. And in that brief moment, the pair of headlamps seemed to be moving relatively fast as they approached the zebra crossing....

And wham! Time seems to stretch forever as the front of the car ploughed into me, with my peripheral vision just managing to take note of the convergence of the headlamps and the distinctive stripes of the zebra crossing, the latter being my exact physical location at that point in time. Based on Pauli's Exclusion Principle (sorry this came off Big Bang Theory), no two solid objects can exist at the same space at the same point in time, and therefore collision of car onto Tim occurred. It was quite an interesting crunching sound and for a brief moment I was sprawled on the floor, but I managed to pick myself up and at that very instance I was just helluva thankful to be still alive.

The driver was an old chap who said he didn't see me (yea, I was wearing black, but I think I was un-resemblant enough of a Black Hole, no excuses for being on the other side of the event horizon) and I think he's lucky that all I got was a really small graze on the knees. On my part, I'm probably more lucky that it was an old chap driving a puny Kia Picanto and not some young punk driving an Audi Q7, otherwise I'd probably be a +1 to road accident statistics today.

And so far I'm still able to cross roads without phobia (no signs of mental scarring), but after two near-death incidents (one on each of my bicycles), one does realise that life is delicate and short.

I am just a one month and two days away from my departure to the States and things are getting exciting. The necessary farewell dinners with my relatives are being arranged and I'm also trying to meet up with friends who I might not see for at least 10 months, if not more. Most of the others going overseas are actually flying off earlier than myself so it's more likely I'll be saying bye to people than people saying bye to me (but it works both ways, really). By a great stroke of luck I've managed to squeeze in four nights in Bali just before I fly off, which will be my last holiday with my parents for quite some time, and I also 10 working days left with my current firm.

Isn't life exciting?

It's Home Run

2010-06-14T00:03:00.002+08:00

Finally, we've come to the week of the big event - CommunicAsia - that my company is handling, and there's a tingle of excitement as the first guest checked into Fairmont, then Merchant Court, then the other hotels that we are handling. Big event, lots of overseas visitors and exhibitors, and lots and lots of man hours put in behind-the-scenes to make it all work.

Having 12-working hour workdays and then some, it's not something you can keep up for a long time, but as the event draws near everyone is a little bit more tense and the experience of trying to keep everything under control is actually fairly thrilling.

Let's see how this week turns out!

As in turns out, end of this month I will be going to Spain and Portugal, not for leisure but on a work assignment. Didn't think that I'd be going overseas between the Kilimanjaro trip and my departure to USA on Sep 1, but the opportunity presented itself and I decided to seize it. It's something quite different from anything I've done before so I hope that it turns out to be quite okay and a good learning experience also.

At the same time, I've drawing up a bucket list of things to do, both in Singapore and once I'm in the States:

Singapore:

- have one more dinner at Sunset Grill & Bar. Don't know if the place will still be around the next time I come back

- find an opportunity also to visit Dempsey and Marina at Keppel Bay. Is it very sad that I've never eaten at Dempsey before? Or is the place really just over-hyped?

- finish that roll of Velvia!

- do an overnight hike from MacRitchie to Bukit Timah nature park

Overseas:

- Road trip in an open-top car!! Crusing down the interstate with the wind in your hair....fwah. Ideal destination for this would be CA, I guess.

- Central and South America - Mexico City, Buenos Aires, Machu Picchu and Choquequirao, Cuba.. the list is endless

- Copenhagen. Icon of city planning

- Barcelona, for Sagrada Familia, if nothing else. And then maybe Valencia plus Seville.

- to be continued...

Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

2010-05-29T13:16:00.003+08:00

Four of us went to watch the open-air screening of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang as part of National Museum's Under the Banyan Tree series. Despite the unpredictable weather, it turned out to be a nice experience overall. Some people even brought their wine and champagne, complete with flute glasses.

This is the old-school film projector. There are two of them because there are multiple reels for one movie (because one reel is around 20 minutes of picture only) and towards the end of one reel, the second projector will kick in with the next reel. We did have a bit of sound problems with one of the projectors so some parts became silent movie, and quite unfortunately it was the exciting part in the candy factory where all the dogs stormed the compound.

Old movies all tend to be quite strange, and have a certain endearing trend about them. Top Secret (1973) is really funny and today might be seen as a little politically incorrect. Still, in its own way it's probably more harmless than recent films like The Onion Movie.

Chitty Chitty Bang Bang dates back to 1968 and Muthu was commenting how it probably influenced the Transformers series, the Iron Man series, James Bond and even Superman. I mean, who could have came up with that whimsical land-sea-air motorcar idea, except for Ian Fleming (James Bond) and Roald Dahl (Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, The BFG).

The weather could have been a bit more forgiving but fun outing and a fun movie at the end of the day.

2010-05-19T22:54:00.001+08:00

Strange little freebie that came as a surprise with my two bars of Kit Kat Chunky today.

The Bull charges again

2010-05-01T17:43:00.002+08:00

After what must have been a very long time, May 1st is the day when I finally take a ride on my Bulls bike again. A short but enjoyable ride, and the scorching 10am sun did no favours leaving a singlet tan on the rider again. Just like the old days...

Decided to check out Sunset Grill & Bar over at Seletar Airport, it's easy to navigate in the day plus they did put up small signages. If you're around my age, you would know that back in our time, Social Studies taught us that Singapore had earmarked four Regional Centres. Today, we have Tampines, Woodlands and Jurong East, what happened to the last one? Yes, it was Seletar, but now it's being converted to become an aerospace hub instead.

That conversion is well underway with lots of construction work going on in the area, and I worry that sooner or later Sunset, hidden like a gem among aircraft hangers and sharing its premise with the Singapore Flying Club, will have to make way for redevelopment. It would be a pity because it's truly a one-of-a-kind place to have dinner and drinks with friends. Should probably visit it for a second time soon.

The Seletar area is also home to a lovely collection of old buildings, with numerous houses designed in the archetypal black-and-white colonial style. I really hope these buildings are preserved. In fact, before the construction work began, this would have been one of the nicest laid-back places to have a home, away from the hustle and characteristic traffic jams of Singapore.

It was a short ride and after getting a taste of the old days again - the crunch of my rubber MTB tires on the asphalt, the wind beating against your chest - it was back home via Yishun Dam, Sembawang Road and Upp Thomson Rd.

Food n Hotel Asia week

2010-04-25T16:33:00.002+08:00

My company is the official travel agent for Food n Hotel Asia 2010, so I got be at Expo on Tuesday and Friday manning the booth. Quite interesting, first time being at a trade fair for myself, and certainly a big one - Halls 2 to 9 of Singapore Expo! In fact, I barely had time to make the brisk-est of rounds to take a look at the exhibitors were displaying.

Also happy to have found someone who has heard of the term 'Mileage Run'. Hello Walter Wong! Haha, for those who might not have heard of it before, mileage runs are basically flights taken when the airfares are discounted or there's a miles multiplier promotion, such that it becomes economically-sensible for frequent fliers to rack up miles, and to fly for no other reason than to rack up miles. Seems absurd? It did to me too, but it's really not all that uncommon, especially in the west.

Was hoping to take the bike out for a long-overdue ride this weekend, but Friday saw the onset of a cough, then fever and then flu. So sadly, I had to forgo my weekly Sunday run with the lads as well as my intended ride out to Sunset Grill & Bar over at Seletar.

I actually got accepted into USC, UC Berkeley and Penn for their respective urban studies programs, but with Penn being my first choice (and ED), waiting out to get replies from USC and Cal were mere formalities. Surprisingly, USC's admissions package is the most comprehensive, with one uni package and one school package, and among the three, Penn has only sent me an admit letter and some college housing and financial info. The rest of the stuff is supposed to come later. I guess it prevents a one-off information overload, which is frankly quite possible considering that complicated US visa application process. That said, I'm greatly looking forward to what I believe will be an awesome few years ahead =) Quakers, yea!

This strange world

2010-04-06T22:21:00.002+08:00

Ordered a vanilla milkshake at Mac's today, and got more than I asked for, literally. The counter staff set the machine in motion and it was happily oozing out the lovely milkshake.... but it would not stop! So in the end there was like a tray full of vanilla milkshake that most unfortunately had to be disposed of.

Dropped by Orchard for some shopping over the weekend, and there were at least three instances of the person in front of me stopping dead in his/her tracks at the start of the escalator to contemplate whether to go up or not. This type of people is the most irritating, and I half felt like 'accidentally' giving them a behind-the-knee jab with my knee. Just for fun. But I am a good citizen so I don't perform such acts. Haha.

A (presumably) foreign group had just completed their dinner at the 313 food court, and they decided it was an opportune moment to take a group photo. Hence, they proceeded to stand around their (finished) dishes on the table, in the process blocking the entire walkway. At this moment, two cleaners came from opposing directions with their cleaning carts, and the ensuing jam of at least six people in each direction proved that the Orchard jam isn't just unique to vehicles.

I was checking airfares today (I think it's a form of OCD, really) and incidentally I found out that JFK-PHL via IAD is around USD150, while IAD-PHL (the second leg of the former flight) is around USD450, on the same day, with the IAD-PHL leg being exactly the same flight! Strange business sense there.

All in a day's work

2010-02-10T00:54:00.005+08:00

9 Feb 2010

0600 - alarm clock rings

0605 - stir from bed, microwave the leftovers from last night's dinner. take a shower

0615 - microwave a cup of milk, try to make hot chocolate using the Hershey's cocoa powder

0620 - eat my breakfast, the hot chocolate is a failure

0645 - wash the dishes

0655 - flip thru the morning's papers

0725 - change up; leave the house

0735 - board the 166, attempt to read Nudge but I keep dozing off. give up and stick to mp3

0825 - reach office

0830 - start of the workday

1255 - leave the office, take the MRT to ICA at Lavender

1315 - reach ICA, collect my new passport, very snappy 5-min affair

1330 - reach Tanjong Pagar, walk to Amoy

1340 - lunch is chicken rice, very oily, very nice, very unhealthy - outcome: see #2250

1820 - end of workday, head downstairs to 3rd storey

1830 - dinner courtesy of the FG meeting

1900 - attend FG meeting

2130 - end of FG meeting, gather a few leftover copies of Rediscover Singapore to give to friends

2135 - leave URA centre, walk to bus stop at pearl's centre

2245 - finally reach home. it takes as long as a peak hour ride. bus driver would be a good tour coach driver, judging by how he slowed to a crawl as we approached every significant (and insignificant) landmark in singapore

2250 - go downstairs for a run, simultaneously mapping a mental outline of this note by running thru the day's events, to expedite the process of writing in; deliberate ridiculously fine details like whether fragments in this post should be followed by full-stops or a semi-colons

2310 - CNY lanterns hanging at The Rafflesia resemble those hanging outside the X-rated places in Geylang...

2322, 2329, 2337 - the only runner I encounter during my run passes me in the opposite direction

2345 - three rounds around RI & RJ, at around 2.7km each round

2347 - another runner passes me as I walk home; roadworks at the junction, contemplate staying to watch for maybe ten minutes, but decide that tonight I'm really busy

2355 - reach home

0005 - hungry; boil water for instant noodles. prepare tmr's breakfast - peel and chop onions, rip a few cabbage leaves, peel and chop carrots and potatoes

0015 - put the veggies on the stove, eat the noodles

0030 - the veggies are done and into the magic pot it goes for tmr morning! wash the dishes

0040 - do theraband exercises for my shoulder

0045 - take a shower. a nice cold one

0055 - get on the com, check email

0135 - finish applying for I-20

0140 - start writing this post

0200 - finish it, duplicate a copy onto my blog (blogging is for oldies?!?!), and finally, off to bed... 4 hours and i'll be awake again!

Did not manage to achieve today

- do my Spanish learning for the day

- plan the route for Friday night's overnight hike

- reading the Kilimanjaro Roof of Africa coffee table book

- doing a bit of doodling and drawing

- cutting the nice pictures from a magazine to safekeep for decor

- writing the 'Life at this juncture'

- getting to pen down thoughts about 2 years in NS **urgent: memories slipping already

- do a bit of TLC for my leather shoes (ie polish and clean)

Blogging is for oldies?

2010-02-07T21:29:00.004+08:00

http://www.straitstimes.com/BreakingNews/TechandScience/Story/STIStory_486236.html

Would never have thought I'd see this day. Okay, would never have thought so three years ago at least, when I was pretty into my former blog Emotion on Geocities, which has now gone the way of the ancient Bo language. But really, this would mean that the lifespan of blogging may be potentially shorter than CD-RWs!

Urban 'green' spaces may contribute to global warming, UCI study finds

2010-02-02T08:26:00.002+08:00

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2010-01/uoc--us011910.php

- I've always wondered if solar panels require more energy to manufacture than they actually generate in their lifetime. I mean, first you have the energy used to build the solar panel plant, then you have the mining of the raw materials required, the assembly of the panel itself, then the transportation and installation of it onto site.

All our rah-rah 'green' projects; might they have actually been more 'green' if they weren't even built in the first place?

Trailwalking I

2010-01-06T19:41:00.001+08:00

Wed, 6 Jan 2010

Just after seven in the morning, I set off from home with little else but three litres of water, some cherry tomatoes, and my camera in my haversack. The plan is simple, to hike from MacRitchie Reservoir to the Bukit Timah Nature Reserve, and to see where I want to go from there.

I start the walk along the wooden boardwalk that snakes around the reservoir’s edge. A man is feeding bread to the fish, and the fish are splashing about in water, clamouring greedily. At the end of the boardwalk, I ascend the steps that bring me back to the gravel trail. I’m wearing hiking boots that I haven’t worn for four years, the last time I used them being way back in 2006 for the Kinabalu climb. I’m hoping that they’re good for my upcoming Kilimanjaro expedition, hence I’m risking looking like the absolutely wannabe by wearing them on today’s trek. Everyone else seems to be in sports shoes, and almost every other person I encounter seems to be wearing some form of knee support. Despite my relative youth, I am overtaken by quite a few walkers. I guess they are seasoned, unlike myself.

I continue on the forest trail and notice something immediately – the discomfort when I am going on a downwards incline. The boots have pretty spacious toeboxes, and my feet slide forward when I’m going down. This causes my toes to push against the toe of the boot, and despite wearing decent socks, the discomfort is definitely enough for me to make a mental note to rectify this before the next time I wear the boots.

I emerge into a clearing and continue along the trail as it runs beside the Singapore Island Country Club. A blue hatchback passes me as I walk along the access road. Probably a PUB staff headed for the waterworks. Passing a lowered red-and-white boom barrier, I break off from the road and continue on trail, heading towards the Ranger Station. The path is rocky, but thankfully, mostly dry. I stop to observe a sizeable column of ants, ferrying some decomposing material across the span of the trail. Like pedestrians, they seem predisposed to choosing the shortest path. Rather than skirting around a fallen leaf, they take a shortcut through a sizeable hole in the middle of the leaf. They appear to resemble little vehicles coming out from a tunnel exit back onto the road. Maybe the bird’s eye view of the Fort Canning Tunnel near Dhoby Ghaut looks this way.

I drop a dry leaf on the ant column, right in the middle of the trail, to see how they react. They scatter instantly, and those closest to the impact site suddenly change their direction of movement. They begin pushing relentlessly against the neverending column of ants now coming head-on towards them. Despite the disparity in numbers, the frontline is pushed back, away from the dropped leaf. It’s chaotic, it resembles a stampede, but before long, there are no ants ferrying the decomposing stuff across the path any more. I wait to see if business resumes, but only a few ‘commuters’ which don’t have any load seem to be following the original route, oblivious. How do ants gauge their sense of time, and who decides when they can start bringing the stuff across again? I do not wait, and leave the scene of my little experiment.

I approach what appears to be a bird on the forest floor. I slow down enough to notice its distinct red breast, but at that instant a runner overtakes me from behind, frightening the little creature away. I carry on and reach the Ranger Station.

I am indifferent as to whether I want to take the Treetops Trail or go by the shorter, straightforward route. I head for the Treetops Trail anyway, until a young Caucasian guy just ahead of me turns around, and asks me for the time. It is 8:30. He says that the Treetops Trail doesn’t open until nine, based on his previous experience. I check the sign, he is right. I head off on the shorter route. He turns back towards where he came from.

The Sime Track heads towards the Jelutong Tower, but 200m before the tower I reach a T-junction where the signage directs those heading to the Bukit Timah Nature Reserve to make a right turn. This new trail is slightly rockier, and I come across some butterflies that I later learn are Horsefield Barons. Where there was previously a sporadic flow of runners and walkers along the Sime Track, it appears that the Rifle Range Link is less frequented. Just when I begin to wonder whether I would reach Bukit Timah without running into a single person, a runner emerges from nowhere and startles me. He is stocky, tanned and outfitted in grey. Despite the rocky terrain, he seems to have no problem keeping both his momentum and balance. In fact, he bears resemblance to a charging bull. I step aside to let him pass.

I come across a small stream. The water is flowing but it is shallow, and I manage to cross without getting my boot uppers significantly wet. The trail then makes an abrupt turn to the right. This puzzles me, because according to my compass, I should be headed in the opposite direction. I follow the trail, and realize that it was alternate route that I used to run along when the segment of Sime Track leading to the T-junction was closed for safety reasons. Something doesn’t feel right, but I keep going. I have time on my hands, and sufficient water. I can afford to explore.

My suspicions are confirmed when I end up at the start of the Treetops Trail, quite close to the Ranger Station. I had just made a big loop, and came back to where I had started! I assess the trail map again, and it seems I was doing everything right, reaching the T-junction and turning right, into Rifle Range Link. I decide to try again.

Some distance down, I notice a distance marker, those posts that appear every half a kilometre. It read ‘4.5km’. I am a bit puzzled. Surely the distance from the start all the way to the Ranger Station was greater than 4.5 clicks? The sun is high in the sky, and the sunlight makes everything look different. I notice brilliantly-colored flowers that I don’t remember seeing just now. Am I on the wrong track? Perhaps I was heading back to where I had come from, just like the Caucasian guy. I decide to retrace my steps to the Ranger Station, to check against the map that I was heading in the right direction. A man holding a pair of binoculars passes me, saying hi.

I ascertain that I had indeed made no mistake, it is the same path, just that I hadn’t noticed the distance marker the first time round, and hadn’t noticed the flowers as well. As I leave the Ranger Station, a man wearing red comes out from the path I’m taking. He walks with a bit of struggle, but seems to be okay and we say hello. I guess that he’s recuperating from some injury or operation.

I turn right at the T-junction again, heading north, which is correct so far. At a shelter I run into the binoculars man, and find out from him that at the abrupt right turn ahead, I should go left, up the slope. He comments that I have a nice hat (it is actually a jungle hat with the old camouflage pattern) and says he doesn’t see people like me (no idea what he meant – did he mean dudes in jungle hats?) around often. I explain that I’m preparing for my Kilimanjaro climb, and he guesses, correctly, after a moment’s hesitation, that Kilimanjaro is in Africa. Bino man laments that he would love to climb Kili, and says that Everest is only for the egotists who aren’t too concerned whether they live or die, but want to brag about it anyway. We both agree that Kili makes much more sense for the person who favours living to tell his tale, but after I part ways with him, I wonder if there isn’t a slight egotist in anyone who aspires to climb the highest mountain in Africa, especially when there are much cheaper (but less prestigious) options in places like Nepal. I guess there is a high likelihood that if I had thrown up a name of a random Nepalese mountain instead of Kilimanjaro, his moment’s hesitation would have been replaced by a blank look, so perhaps that is someway of a raison d’etat for choosing Kili.

I cross the small stream for the second time, but now without having to contend with raging bulls coming at me. I reach the abrupt right turn, and realize why I missed the turning left. There is a signpost present, but unlike normal cases where the 2-metre post is planted at ground level, this post was planted right on top of the slope! So at eye level, you don’t see anything but the base of the signpost, and being brown, you’re in all likelihood going to pass by assuming it’s a tree trunk.

I clamber up the slope and head towards Rifle Range Road. Rifle Range Road is so named because there is a range where national shooters train, located at the start of the road. But Rifle Range Road is 3.5km long, and I find myself at the other end of it, beside the entrance of an ST Kinetics company, Advanced Materials Engineering Pte Ltd. I have no idea what goes on in there. Singapore’s version of Skunk Works, perhaps? I also pass by Singtel’s Earth Satellite station, with its impressive array of satellite dishes.

A little further down the road was the furthest I had previously ventured into Rifle Range Road – the SAF Ammunition Command. The previous time, I had driven in using a borrowed car, and even then, it had seemed like a long and winding road. The prospect of marching all the way out is not too appealing. It is said that taxis are disinclined to take you to SAFAC, because the long drive out makes it quite unprofitable for them.

The distance markers still appear every half a click, and I notice that the coloured bands on the distance markers along the road are much brighter compared to those in the forest. They probably use a different paint compound; you definitely can’t miss the bright pink jumping out at you every 500m, whereas the markers in the forest seem quite content being discreet and oblivious. I guess it’s good this way, I don’t really need neon markings every 500m along a well-trodden forest path, but having bright pink bands along the road is definitely useful.

Next, I pass the School of Ammunition, a place which, on my previous visit here, I had mistaken for my intended SAFAC destination. I see a dead rat lying just beside the road, probably a roadkill. Judging by the state of the carcass, the accident was not more than two days ago. Further down the road is a fenced-up PUB area, and across from that is a sign urging me to follow the road to get on the Kampong Trail that takes me to Bukit Timah Nature Reserve. But just behind this sign is a 20m-wide cleared stretch that goes roughly north. Deducing that this path would probably either take me to Bukit Timah or otherwise to an impassable fence belonging to the School of Ammo, and that both outcomes were rather harmless, I disregard the encouraging sign and ventured down the stretch of clearing.

From the signage, it turns out that I am walking parallel to the Bukit Timah Mountain Biking Trail. The entire stretch – some 1.5km long – has presumably been cleared of trees in order to lay PUB pipelines underground. Where the terrain dips sufficiently, the big white pipes are exposed. I follow the cleared stretch, not certain where I am headed, but at least the outcome of the impassable fence had not been presented to me. Although parallel to the mountain biking trail, there doesn’t seem to be anyone around. Just as the thought that I might not even see a single cyclist during this sojourn crosses my mind, a pair of mountain bikers emerge from nowhere and startle me. One of them is riding a white Specialized. In true mountain bike fashion, both bikes (and riders) are spattered with mud.

I eventually come across a map telling me of the existence of a Wallace Education Centre nearby. I decide to check it out since I have never heard of such this place. The Wallace Education Centre is actually named after Alfred Russel Wallace (not William Wallace, if you were thinking that), a Brit biologist with a fascination for beetles. Conducting his fieldwork in the Bukit Timah area, he braved the tigers that used to roam there. He is quoted as saying, in resplendent language typical of a Raffles-era Brit, “In the midst of this entomological banquet, there is, however, one drawback… the possibility of being eaten up by a tiger! While watching with eager eyes some lovely insect, the thought will occasionally occur that a hungry tiger may be lurking in that dense jungle behind intent upon catching you.” Look past his linguistic idiosyncrasies, and Wallace is actually considered by some the co-discoverer of natural selection, having actually been ahead of Charles Darwin in proposing the theory.

I hang around the centre, which formerly housed the Dairy Farm before being retrofitted for its current function. I read some of the information panels, and glean a few interesting facts here and there. Here’s one: In 1825, the Singapore Chronicle declared that the Bukit Timah terrain was so tough it would be easier to travel to Calcutta from Singapore town than to Bukit Timah Hill. Guess the people at the Chronicle hadn’t been to Brunei. Except for a few passers-by, there isn’t anyone else around. I poke around the building but there is no staff present. The place feels empty, quiet and spacious. Housed in one end of the same building is the Wallace Environmental Learning Laboratory (WELL), established by Raffles Girls’ Secondary School in conjunction with NParks just a little while back in 2009. It doesn’t change the eerie solitude of the whole place. There is simply no one around. A sign above the water fountain proclaims the water not fit for drinking due to ongoing cleaning of the water tank. It doesn’t feel like there’s anything ongoing here, but that is not necessarily a bad thing.

I decide to check out the Wallace Trail, but before that I come across an abandoned building just some distance from the Wallace Centre. It looks enigmatic, a bit spooky. I don’t spend too long; sometimes it’s prudent to be not too curious.

The Wallace Trail is probably one of the less-trodden paths in the Bukit Timah area. The paths are narrower than the MacRitchie trails (they do not cater to joggers and are certainly not for cross-country runs!), the vegetation perceptibly denser. The high canopy enshrouds me; I hear the calls of birds but fail to see them. I encounter two couples as I make the loop; they are probably just like me, appreciating the flora and fauna. It strikes me that there is really a rich biodiversity in these forests. Sure, we don’t have tigers, lions, polar bears or rhinos in the nature reserve, but at the macro level, Singapore’s forests are still very richly populated. With that thought in mind, I head off to discover more.

I end up on a path that runs along Dairy Farm Road, purportedly leading me to the Singapore Quarry. I encounter a few lizards along the way, and from what I see, big lizards are simply too lazy to move unless you approach really close, while smaller ones are fidgety and dart away even before you notice them. I end up at the Singapore Quarry, one of three quarries in the area, the other two being the Hindhede Quarry and the Dairy Farm Quarry. I run into one of the couples that were also on the Wallace Trail. Back at the Wallace Centre, one of the posters mentioned that the Little Grebe, a critically-endangered bird, had settled in to the Singapore Quarry. I don’t see any of them today, it’s probably too hot and they are hiding somewhere in the shade.

I leave the Singapore Quarry and have the dilemma of either heading out to the main road and then walking to the foot of Bukit Timah Hill, or getting to the same destination via the mountain bike trail. Paying no heed to the notice discouraging hikers from using the bike trail, I set off for what was my original destination. This time, there is no mountain biker or heavy-built runner to startle me. I only pass two harmless trekkers going in the opposite direction, before I finally reach the Visitor Centre. There, monkeys are having a field day, gathered in large groups around the carpark. Two workers have left their refuse truck with its engine idling, as they attempt to take some photos of the monkeys. My feet are slightly sore – there’s some sand in my boots, the downhills have been unkind to my toes, and my Achilles’ tendons hurt, probably due to insufficient cushioning at the heel. It is just past midday, and although I have sufficient water, I am hungry and I also don’t have any sunblock. I decide that the morning has been sufficiently rewarding, and that after about 18km, my walk would end here. I head off to Beauty World Centre for lunch.

2009-12-30T23:13:00.003+08:00

Steve Jobs said that after he dropped out of university, he took the opportunity to sit in on classes that would have ordinarily appeared irrelevant to his course of study, but ultimately helped him achieve the success that Apple rides on today. One such course was the study of calligraphy, how fonts, sizes, spacing and typeface design in general affected the viewer.

A good many years back, I came across an interesting book. It about newspaper design, and talked about things like how many columns a newspaper ought to have, the font used, the page layout, everything that we take for granted as we browse the daily paper. I found the book immensely engaging, but with the limited time I had at the bookstore before we had to go home, I had to put it down. I regret not having bought it. It was a clearance item, and it wasn't in perfect condition. Perhaps that's why I didn't bug my parents to buy it for me then. I still remember, it was a bookshop in Parkway Parade, way way back before it was renovated. I think Howard's Storage World was there at that time. I remember because the Howard's Storage World name somehow sticks.

The book had a black-and-white cover that was inspired by newspaper typefaces. It was a hardcover. In today's world, I have Amazon, Project Gutenberg and Google Books, but I can't find the book that I want. Visual design, presentation, appearance - it's important and I think most of us don't give enough emphasis to it in our daily lives. There are extreme cases, and in those we end up with the ugly. But in the normal case, we tend to end up with the mundane and unexciting. That's not how things should be.

Food for thought

2009-12-28T13:39:00.002+08:00

I took a decent breakfast at 7.30 this morning, and it's around 1.30 now, and if not for the pork floss bun I'd be suffering from unbearable hunger. And it's not like I've been doing anything strenuous for the past week. Everything's slow and sedentary.

So how on earth does Stanley McChrystal survive on one meal a day, taking into consideration the amount of running he does?

Life after dark

2009-12-27T01:23:00.002+08:00

Went to Gayatri's for curry fish head on Christmas day, and thereafter we hopped over to Mustafa for late night shopping till midnight. You see a lot of young kids in tow, lively and energetic, at what would have been probably an ungodly hour when I was their age.

On the way home, we pass by the Singapore Khalsa Association along Balestier Road, and there are people playing soccer! At 1am! Quite amazing.

After reading Bicycle Diaries I thought it was quite wow to have family movies like The Lion King screening at 3am at Bueno Aires, but maybe we're not that far off ourselves anyway.

The city never sleeps.

Comfort foods

2009-12-11T20:18:00.002+08:00

At Changi Village this afternoon, I suddenly thought about comfort foods (probably because of the hokkien mee I was having). So let's see, what makes my stomach happy:

Chicken Rice

Okay, this is probably standard across many Singaporeans. The Longhouse one is not bad, while the one at Kim San Leng always gives generous portions. KSL is one of the places I don't mind queueing because they are very efficient. If you observe them working it's really like a well-oiled machine.

Hokkien Mee

This one, I'm not so sure where's the best. But both the Longhouse and the Changi Village ones are okay. I don't usually fancy having it in food courts, because somehow the air-con food court environment takes away the enjoyment.

Pasta

There is so much variety to pasta, and I enjoy experimenting at home, mixing different ingredients for different outcomes. Plus it's arguably easier to cook than rice.

Duck Rice

My favourite is absolutely the Longhouse one, been serving the great same standard ever since I was a small boy.

Kway Chap

The one at a coffeeshop near to Northpoint is very good value for money and yummy too. Again, kway chap is one of those foods better enjoyed out of air-conditioning.

Actually, I tend to enjoy open air food centres better. I don't know if it's psychological, but the fare at food courts tend to be pricey and mediocre. The other day I was at the National Library so I decided to go to Bugis J's Food Junction, was quite enticed by a 番茄姜葱牛肉饭, and it looked good in the picture. Never trust the picture, I paid $5.90 for a very miserable looking lump of rice + beef in some weird reddish sauce. It tasted okay, thankfully, but really not my idea of looking appetizing. The only food that I have so far to be pretty decent at food courts is probably the Indonesian-style BBQ chicken with rice.

For the record

2009-12-03T12:59:00.002+08:00

Clearing out the product invoices for my IT and electronic goods that are out of warranty. Can't imagine how much I paid for some of the stuff back then.

Dell 19" UltraSharp LCD - $750

Nikon CoolPix 5900 - $567, when later I got a Panasonic Lumix FX01 at $199

128MB SD card - $75, today a 8GB thumbdrive can be had for around $25

And of course the 80GB Western Digital hard disk at $215, which today can get you 1.5TB with change to spare.

Very sadly the 80GB hard disk now has bad sectors... and it's out of warranty, and so I need to find a replacement.

The UL30's hard disk was DOA (well, almost), so I had to send it in for repair to. It was a Seagate hard disk.

4am thoughts

2009-12-01T04:12:00.002+08:00

It's 4am and I'm wide awake, that being due to waking up at 2pm today, and that in turn being due to the adjustment of my body clock upon returning from a great holiday in Turkey.

I reached home on Sunday morning, and yet faithfully trooped down to SITEX at Expo. I returned home somewhat poorer but with a lovely black Asus UL30A. Yes, it's the much-better dual-core version and it's really great as I compose this post on it now. Got a good deal bundled with extended warranty and MS Office, a little sad that this means I don't get to try out iWork but you can't have everything, can you :)

There's so much to do and I read somewhere that men are poor multitaskers, and multitaskers are actually less efficient at completing things. No wonder I always end up doing something and getting carried away and forgetting about my original intention totally.

I finished an excellent book, Richard Dawkin's Climbing Mount Improbable, while I was in Turkey. The author is a zoologist and fascinatingly narrates the processes involved in the construction of a spider's web. The book basically details how Darwinian evolution is actually possible if you consider things in piecemeal bits of evolution. He even manages to invoke game theory in his discussion about fig trees and fig wasps. It was a chance pick-up from a library shelf and I'm glad to have come across such a gem. On the other hand, I finished the book with worrying thoughts about the possible consequences of human evolution, or rather how human beings, through innovation, machines and genetic manipulation, are sidestepping what would have been Nature's Order of Things. Are all the great inventions and breakthroughs in habitation, technology, and medical science that have served to build up the aura of human invincibility (or at least superiority) really indomitable, or will Nature know best at the end of the day? Think about cojoined twins for example - by today's social norms it would be considered inhumane to let them perish, and impractical to let them grow up cojoined, yet if a dolphin or bird were to give birth to a cojoined young, the cojoined animal would very likely be bumped out by competition early on in its life. Much to think about...

The next book that I've started on is musician David Bryne's Bicycle Diaries. Interesting accounts of his traverses across cities of the world on his foldable bicycle. In one chapter he describes Singapore (and Hong Kong) as essentially being culturally-devoid, huge shopping malls with 'iconic' skyscrapers. Having spent enough time in Turkey to have gotten a little fatigued towards the end, the juxtaposition of my hometown and a country that has a history stretching to before the Ottoman Empire couldn't have been in greater contrast. I mean, did you know that Troy had 9 layers, each built during a subsequent period and under different rulers?

Oh boy

2009-11-17T23:13:00.002+08:00

Sadly, Singapore doesn't seem to carry the UL30 in dual-core SU7300 guise. Only the single-core (and largely underpowered) SU3500 model is available.

The local shops do have the 14" UL80 with the SU7300, but it's 2kg compared to the UL30 at 1.69kg. The UL80 is still fairly light considering that it has an integrated disc drive, and a pretty good battery life that's been tested to top ten hours.

I don't know if they will bring in the UL30Vt into Singapore, that would be swell and I'd have a more pressing selection problem on my hands than Alex Ferguson when he's got the full Man U squad at his disposal.

13" UL30 - will only get this in dual-core guise, and hopefully there is black
14" UL80 - sweet stuff, sweet price at just $1500
13" MacBook / Pro - you just can't compare, I guess. Everytime I compare, the Macs just look feverishly expensive. Too bad I missed the Back-to-School promo. The current best offer I've found locally is the 2.53 GHz MBP with iWork and AppleCare at just under $2500.

A newcomer to the fray

2009-11-15T00:36:00.002+08:00

The Asus UL30 seems to be what the UX30 wasn't... a staggering 11 hours of battery life and glowing all-round reviews. Okay, not as gorgeous, but still, at its price-point ($1.5k) the MacBook isn't such a clear choice after all. Hm hm.

Finding the right one

2009-11-12T18:41:00.004+08:00

I aim to own a laptop by the end of the year. Reasons being

1) Wireless@SG has been rolled out, and it's really convenient
2) My desktop (AMD Athlon XP 2000+, 80GB hard disk, whatever) is pretty long on the tooth
3) No longer having to be in camp 5 days a week, I think that being at home 7 days a week is very unhealthy

I've looked at a few and here are my thoughts so far

1) Asus U80V
This one comes with a 14" screen, internal DVD burner and is actually a pretty swell package overall with ATI graphics. It has a nice illuminated keyboard and a slightly gimmicky illuminated touch-pad. The only gripes I have - I don't really need an internal burner, and the glossy plastic finish is a really bad fingerprint magnet. Asus gives 2 years international warranty, which can be extended to 5 years at big retailers.

2) MacBook 13"
Whether the aluminium unibody or the recently-refreshed white plastic model, the great finishing quality wins me over. The keyboard is good and the touchpad is huge and wonderful. It again has the unnecessary internal drive, and is a bit weighty. But I love iWork so much more than Microsoft Office, in my short playtime with it. The only gripe here is that Mac's tend to be more pricey than the PC equivalents.

3) Asus UX30
This was love at first sight. Clearly inspired by the MacBook Air but being available in lovely black, it's the classic story of one playing hard to get. It's not available in Singapore and my enquiry with the local Asus sales office told me that it probably will never be (likely that they are focusing on the UL30 instead). It has no internal drive, and is ultralight at 1.39kg. Very sleek design with port covers all over, and in the more powerful option with the C2D SU9400, is actually decently supported by hardware. Sadly, nothing is perfect and battery life for this model falls short at 3 hours. If I want it, I have to get my friend to bring it in from Taiwan. It'll still be covered by Asus International Warranty, but... can I really cope with the battery life? The rest of the package offered by the UX30 is actually what I really want - great portability in a well-designed package. My experience with its keyboard yielded good results, and it has a huge touchpad as big as that of the MacBook Air's. You can't go wrong with a big touchpad.

4) Toshiba T130
This one's a bum. The guy at South Asia Computer remembered me approaching him regarding the UX30 about a month before, and on this second visit he recommended me the Toshiba T130, with also a SU9400 combo, good finishing and a lovely colour palette of red, black or white. I tried the keyboard - it's good, you know sometimes things just feel gam? Yea the keyboard, despite not being a chiclet, was actually pretty accurate when I tried it out. A claimed 11 hours of battery life... what more could I ask for? But today when I tried the touchpad, I realised that perfection hadn't been attained. The touchpad is measly (half the size of the MacBook's, and I'm not exaggerating) and the tactile response is poor. So much for the great keyboard. With the premium price ($1700) it looks like this is the most far-fetched option now, although I was initially open to forking out that little bit extra if the UX30 wasn't avail.

So what now? In a nutshell

Asus U80V: feature-wise an all rounder, but a bit heavy, and high-maintenance finishing. Not sure wrt battery life

MacBook: good features, good keyboard, great touchpad, a bit heavy, and... it's a Mac!

Asus UX30: wonderfully portable, short battery life, have to purchase from Taiwan, but it's gorgeous

Toshiba T130: great keyboard let down by a miserable touchpad. As good as gone, sadly.

I like to go about testing human user interfaces as I believe they are the most important things. When I couldn't get along with my Microsoft Wireless keyboard and mouse, I promptly sold the set and went back to my wired Multimedia keyboard.

If you think about it, the monitor, the keyboard and the mouse/touchpad are the three things that you are going to interact with most as a human user. Since screens are pretty much an industry standard, it's the latter two that make a difference to me as a user, and that's why despite the good price offered by the Samsung R420 and R470, I couldn't even put them up for consideration. Simply buay gam and couldn't type properly. Although you could certainly argue that it can be trained.

I am not a by-the books typist, I type 'Y' with my left hand, and my pointer does most of the work on the right side (in fact it just typed P-O-I-N of that word 'pointer' all by itself). I guess I could use a little more discipline to make myself a better typist, but habits are hard to change and it works for me.

In short, I'm still stuck in the laptop conundrum and can't decide if I want to get Jonny to help me get the UX30 when he goes up to Taiwan. Otherwise, unthinkably 4 years ago when I was in RI with David Chan, the MacBook seems to be the front runner!

PS. The Samsung 20" monitor P2050 is awfully tempting at just $258. Can't reconcile how I paid $750 for my Dell 19" a couple of years back, but I did!

Fix that brok'n shoulder!

2009-11-05T17:16:00.002+08:00

Took the plunge and decided to undergo surgery to repair the damaged left shoulder joint caused by the SOC swing trainer. Luckily still covered by 11B, the total costs works out to be a whopping $7,000. A good five hours spent in the operating theatre, waking up from GA to find my throat ULTRA dry because I hadn't drank for the past 17 hours, and not having any control over the digits of my left hand (they just felt warm, but lifeless)... all over.

Supposed to wear an arm sling for 4 to 6 weeks (omg!) but I don't actually need to because it's not a broken arm. But it helps to support the shoulder in a comfortable position. And it helps to get out of undesirable situations. Like this afternoon, when I went downstairs to take a walk, I thought, heck, leave the sling at home. I happened to run into my neighbour, and uncle neighbour gave me a friendly slap on my left shoulder! Yikes! In fact he gave me three slaps and asked me if I was still in P6. I was bewildered for like 10 seconds (and fearing the worst for the stitching on my shoulder) before I tried to explain to him that I already had completed JC2 and had in fact served nearly 2 years of NS already. Lol.

Lesson learnt - keep that sling on tha' arm!

I can just lift my arm to be parallel to the ground at the moment. It's going to be a long road of physio...

Mr Obama takes a leaf from Barney Stinson

2009-10-31T14:00:00.001+08:00

And describes MM Lee as legen----dary!

S***R London Jimmys

2009-10-24T21:37:00.001+08:00

Very pretty!

Finally a nights out worth talking about

2009-10-23T22:02:00.002+08:00

It was always ironic how, in essence, I planned the nights out for the Battalion, but never got to enjoy much of it myself. In the third nights out that I've gone since coming into Mandai Hell, it was finally time to let the hair down and partehhhhh. Free flow housepours at Butter are a devilish idea, but I must say that popping over with Ben & Mark made it quite more exciting. Nine, ten drinks are probably a bit too much if you're in for work in the following day, but ah, whuteva.

Off to Taiwan on Sunday for sightseeing, food, and hmm, more clubs. Oh no.

2009-10-18T15:50:00.002+08:00

Waking up at 12 noon on a Sunday is a very very sad use of a long weekend. Weekdays are damn tiring and draining and weekends are the only times I can get a break though. But weekends are becoming dreadfully boring as well. I mean, I don't normally blog at 4pm on a Sunday, you know. But I'm home and high and dry and have nothing to do but write uninspired uni application essays. This is mental torture.

2009-10-17T22:14:00.002+08:00

$61,000 can get you a nice Kia Koup... hmm. I would like to have one in electric lime green please.

ORD phone

2009-10-10T21:31:00.002+08:00

Purchased a N6300 in lovely brown as my ORD phone. This is one phone that looks better in the metal than in photos. And yes, it really is metal. Great keypad that is so quiet compared to the awfully noisy one of the 1661. The Nokia 6300 is a legacy model that's still able to hold its own against phones of today

Back in August I had posted under 'E for Exceptional' the Nokia E52. Sadly, online reviews indicate that it's plagued by a couple of bugs. Plus it didn't really look as good in the metal as in did in the photo. Comparing them side-by-side, my N6300 looks much better overall than the somewhat uninspired E52.

Bittersweet to the end

2009-09-25T21:53:00.003+08:00

I nearly thought that I might have had to skip today's 10km run or return to camp afterwards to finish my stuff, but thankfully I managed to finish everything by 2.10pm, run down, settle attendance for HQ coy and shoo them all up the bus by about 2.35pm. Sadly I didn't achieve that without forgetting to bring home my materials for writing my uni essays, which I have yet to begin. This is the last and final time; after two years of writing uni essays, I want to do this once and for all.

Was only in camp for three days this week - Monday was the Hari Raya OIL while I took an OIL on Tuesday because I had to attend a med appt. The MRI result was that I've some ligament damage, and they've referred me to a sports doc. The initial appointment date for next Tues clashed with a L/F brief I've to attend, and the next appointment date clashed with my ORNS brief. So it's around two weeks later before I get to see the sports doc and grasp a better understanding how I can help my shoulder recovery. The ortho doc said that surgery is an option, but wa lao, after ORD you aren't covered by the little green card that so many of us have a love-hate affair with. $$$ =(

But these three days have been quite morale-sapping. Okay, maybe it started with meeting a couple of my friends to watch Man U v Man City on Sunday. It had nothing to do with the result (I'm a Man U supporter) but listening to stories about how they're clearing off and leave from next week till they ORD in mid-Nov makes for one very envious DYS3.

Drove down to PLC on Wednesday to return the keys and camp passes that I had taken over for the preceding week when I was liaison officer for the Aussies. Borrowed Wei Kok's car, told him that cos Tang used to lend me his car sometimes, the Ops Sgt-designate should as well (no, I didn't really, he was just nice enough to lend =p ). Met Ang Tze Siong and Martin, they're also enjoying the good life... Ang was telling me how he spends most of his time in the gym (or bunk) now that he's got an understudy. Ugh. The only time I used the gym was after my shoulder injury recurred, and only to try doing some of the exercises my physio recommended. When Mortar Mark came in during Lancer stayback, he asked me where the gym was... I hadn't a clue. Lol.

Talking to more friends only drives me to further despair. Okay, KY tells me he has no off to clear (but at one time he finished work at like 3pm?!) but he did make the mistake of letting me know that Xueyang had "hadokened his leave+off one week ago to his ord date". Sigh.

Not sure why this week felt so bad, it's probably the build-up of absolute wonderment at how bad your luck can get. Happily get a mail which enclosed the ORD FFI dates of soon-to-ORD personnel, only to find out that my ORD FFI was on morning of the day I ORD!! The initial joy and relief at receiving the signal that you are soon-to-ORD is immediately dashed as one is left wondering what you did to deserve this. Did I chase the medics to clear the IPPT just one time too many? (Na, I'm on good terms with Norazahar.. but this is pure suay)

After sitting thru yet another ZzzZzz safety conference on Wednesday (where the most exciting bit is seeing who starts dozing off first) and making my trip to PLC, spent the rest of the day 1) preparing for the next day's CSB recce at Tekong, 2) trying to solve the great CSB conundrum; the more questions we ask 9Div the more things we are suddenly finding out, it's damn irritating cos the CSB pamphlet is not very clear and 3) doing the safety conference minutes. Open Office is a great PITA and is an absolute bane to efficiency. Okay, we have supercharged vehicles doing 50km/h on Singapore expressways, so Open Office isn't the only bane to efficiency we're familiar with. Oh we also did a bunk inspection... I found a badly cracked mirror in one of the cupboards in the spare bunk, which excited me a lot. (Hey, this is BIG news for safety conference, every time only see the same photo of loose electrical sockets, I sibei sian already. We never had a cracked mirror before!) I removed a pretty dangling piece that was quite precarious, but left the rest as the frame was holding it sufficient intact. I called over the barrack damages I/C DC to inform him, but DC, after promptly informing me that his wasn't under his exact purview, insisted on removing the pieces still held in the frame. I advised him against it and warned him that the shards were pretty sharp. He insisted they were alright and tried to slide it out from the frame. Time 15 seconds from the instant of my warning, and you have DC with a cut to his finger. Sigh, I couldn't help it but lambast to the effect of 'I told you so!'.

Finally packed up from office around 12, and by the time I got to bed it was 1. Dragged myself out at 5 to get some grub in order to be ready to move out with the recce vehicles at 6. As usual, time slipped, partly attributable to a particular PC with a penchant for clubbing. They sure know how to enjoy the nights out that I help put into the training program. I've only been for two, I think. One was the Saturday night when we were confined just before ATEC Stage 2 (I rmb that as being just a very expensive trip home to use the Internet, we were suay enough - again! - that the I-net computer in camp was down JUST BEFORE the ATEC confinement), and the other, I don't really recall. MHC is simply too close to the zoo and night safari and too far from anything else unless you drive. And even if you drive you risk getting your wheel clamped if you park in the loading bay...

Moving out early in the morning is still pretty alright. I'd learnt to bring along a radio to help stay awake as the supercharged Ford Everest crawls at a bulldozer's pace on relatively empty expressways. I should know well, I did that for an entire week when I was liaison, travelling early each morning from MHC to PLC. But during that week, I usually returned when the sun had already set. This time, it was mid-afternoon glare all the way as we crawled back from the SAF ferry terminal to camp. Very migraine-inducing. So I reached camp around 2pm, no lunch and not in the mood for lunch. Lesser so after hearing that lunch had been prawn mee, yuck. Clumpy SFI prawn mee, yuck yuck.

When I was over at Tekong I was trying to look for my friend to settle some stuff about the neutral for CSB. I didn't have his number, but I happened to run into another friend who knew a third friend's number, who was in the same branch as friend #1. Turns out that Friend 3 is Friend 1's understudy. It's around 9.30am and I pop by their office. They ask me if I want to join them for breakfast. Intro to BMTC officer's life, haha. At the canteen I meet a fourth friend Dickson, who was my buddy during OCS. As it turns out, after a bit of negotiating, Dickson's gonna be one of the CSB neutrals. It's good to have many friends, although you have to learn to shut your ears when they start talking about when they start taking off and leave till ORD.

No lunch, hence a voracious appetite towards dinner the mess function. Left early to settle a last-min opening for three CS1 firers to shoot with another unit. You see, three firers can't form a detail, and there are only three guys who have yet to shoot CS1 in our unit. The unit initially turned my request down as they are doing CS2, but suddenly it emerged that an incomplete detail of four, hoping to top up between one to three firers, this Saturday (tomorrow). So trying to pull everything together to make sure that our three guys can make it with such short notice (turns out that one guy is on standby, just so suay) and if transport can be arranged and sending over the details to the conducting unit. Thereafter, Wei Kok and I further attempt to solve the Great CSB Conundrum but we just end up really frustrated with the drips and draps of info we're getting. I knock off slightly earlier tonight, just before 11.

I wake up today to receive news that - horrors of horrors! - the conducting unit found a fifth firer from among themselves, and didn't need any additional firers. In fact, they wouldn't let us attach the remaining two. So, very sadly, the previous night's work had gone to complete waste. This group of three will pose a problem for CS1, and will again pose a problem for CS2. Damn frustrated.

Even more frustrated because of another separate trainfire issue. We had planned it to perfection, and I was quite happy with myself. Three firers had yet to shoot ATP, CS1 and CS2, but were going to ORD soon. Just nice we had 9th, 11th, 15th Sep ranges. 11th was with external unit. We planned it such that one shot clear all three. Damn swee. The only problem was, that CS1 needed details of between 4 to 6 pax. The external conducting unit put our 3 firers together with 2 firers from a third external unit. I requested confirmation that these 2 guys were shooting CS1, because CS1 and CS2 firers cannot mix in the same detail. I was duly given the assurance that they were CS1 firers. Then on 15th Sep, after we had put our 3 firers together with another 3 of our own guys to clear CS2 in a detail of six, it emerges that the supposed CS1 firers from the third unit were actually supposed to be CS2!! I'm fuming mad because it potentially voids the CS1 result, and by that measure, the CS2 result is also void. Not only do the 3 guys have to shoot CS1 and CS2 again, the other 3 guys have to shoot CS2 again as well! Almost wanted to flip, but we said, try to key in first, see if the system rejects. Thing is, the system recently migrated to a new platform, and there are still a lot of teething problems with results entry. Hence, the conducting unit has till now not been able to key in. So we don't know what's going to happen to the 3 CS1 guys, and I'm reluctant to attach them without first trying to key in, because if it's not rejected by the system but I attach them to shoot CS1 again, whoever that is added to their detail to form 4 to 6 will be affected, and it would be grossly unfair to the guy. 进退两难

Really sucks to be doing all this sh*t when people are happily coaching their understudies. Besides CSB we have two major L/F in the month of October. Have 8 days of leave left to clear, probably make some paper losses again. Huan Yong has like 10 even. But I don't think his ORD FFI is on his ORD date, lol.

Super low-morale, that's why I had to just rant all this crap out. Come seek my advice if you want to sign on, hahahaha. Probably kenna the Radar (they do monitor internet chatter you know) but I really don't care. I didn't release any state secrets, hell, even the Aussies know that our Everests are limited to go at 50km/h, and they're like "Huh? We go at 80, and if like on highways around 100."

Only happy thing was actually having been able to go down ECP to run the 10km, get those legs moving once again. Not too convenient for me to get home, but kinda pity the guys who had to wait till 7pm for the military vehicle movement restriction to be lifted, and crawl back to MHC from ECP thereafter. Earliest they'd have got back to camp is 8.30pm, considering the crawl of traffic. It would almost be late enough to visit the Night Safari! Then you don't need to go home, you can simply stay in camp and await Saturday SOC remedial training.

Gosh, reality is stark, isn't it?

2009-09-05T23:05:00.000+08:00

I need..

three buddies, seven handphones, and some popcorn.

POP!

Death & Life of Ice Cream

2009-09-04T17:54:00.000+08:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OxnL9nObckQ

Visually-arresting use of time-lapse photography, with some moments that hinge on the surreal. Nice.

2009-08-27T20:56:00.001+08:00

The Asus UX30 has got me very very excited!!

The Price of Storage

2009-08-23T15:32:00.002+08:00

I still remember how around six or seven years ago I bought a WD800JB 80GB 3.5" Hard Disk for a grandish $215. Yesterday, I bought a Hitachi 500GB 2.5" Portable Hard Disk for a mere $139.

How far we have come. If only the price of physical space followed the price of virtual space. All these new condos have rooms that are pathetically tiny.

Of Astons...

2009-08-23T14:08:00.002+08:00

Had dinner at Aston's Specialties at Sembawang Shopping Centre last night. On the way as we drove past Thomson Plaza, saw a black Aston Martin. Omg.

Anyway this time we ordered both a wagyu and a prime sirlion, so we could actually do a side-by-side comparison. Both were very tender and juicy at medium-rare (my steaks, always medium-rare) but i could discern an extra level of sweetness in the wagyu that made it just that slightly more delectable.

Off to Cameron Highlands till Wednesday, it's not the most adrenaline gush-rush vacation destination but seems like a nice place to relax and chill. Yup, as you've probably figured I've never gone to Cameron before.

Mac It Happen?

2009-08-22T09:08:00.003+08:00

The time has come to start thinking about getting a notebook for studies. And it's a tough call.

The Mac has now emerged as both a desirable and functional alternative to the PC. (Back when I was in the PB Exco, it was a desirable but perhaps not-the-most-functional alternative to the PC.) I've laid my hands on the MacBook Pro and it's lovely. Sweet machined aluminium, great to touch and fantastically fingerprint-resistant. In my hasty research so far, it's between these few options:

- MacBook Pro 13", currently having an education promo that gives you a free iPod Touch. Curious to try iWork and see if I can create stunningly dynamic presentation slides like Steve Jobs. Only download is cost; once you add in the AppleCare Protection Plan for 3-year warranty the price balloons to the top of the list of options here.

- Dell Studio XPS 1340, saw this at Megatex. It's a bit pricey (the priciest among the PC latptops) but comes with 3-year global XPS Premium Service warranty coverage. The keyboard is pretty good, much better than the Studio 1435 that I couldn't get typing properly with.

- Asus U80V, which comes with a 14" screen, illuminated chiclet keyboard and a trackpad with tiny lights (which is really a gimmicky feature). Probably has a feature set that can rival the MBP, but the rest of the design is slightly bland. Price wise it tips in somewhere in the middle and one can expect a substantial amount of freebies if you get it during the upcoming PC show.

- Samsung R420. Cheapest of the lot, running a Pentium rather than Centrino processor. Understated matte black chassis is actually quite classy and timeless (as opposed to the garish design-printed HP dv2's and dv3's) but it seems like very few people use Samsung laptops. Questions regarding the technical support considering the small user base compared to say, Apple.

Okay, the free iPod Touch with the MBP is a definite deal-sweetener and it's for a limited time only. A tough dilemma, certainly.

E as in Exceptional

2009-08-22T00:45:00.000+08:00

The new Nokia E52 seems pretty darn sweet and just the right candidate for post-ORD phone... Lovely metal-finished body and simple, elegant design. Can't wait to get my hands on it!