Love Prison Break
28/10/2006
Michael Scofield can count on me to unlock the infirmary door any day.
Soy What?
28/10/2006
Before I start on Survivor Cook Islands, I gotta tell you about making your own beancurd – tau huay, not tau hoo.
I bought a carton of Sobe Unsweetened Pasturised Soy Milk the other day, and curiously, there was a small package attached to it. I only found out that it was two packs of coagulant to make tau huay.
Excited, I tried it out. Measure out 250ml of soy milk, add one packet of coagulant, stuff in the microwave on low-medium for 6 minutes, leave to stand for 1 minute, and there you go. Well not quite idiotproof, mine came out lumpy as heck!
Fortunately for the wonders of Yahoo! Answers, I found this site, and someone asked about making (drum roll) beancurd, and I found this neat article about making beancurd dessert.
Is that cool or what?
Back to Survivor, Cook Islands. I loved the first episode. I hate that I’m rooting mostly based on racial lines, but I guess it’s pretty much instinct. I wonder if the other races look at the Asian tribe and think the young ones all look the same. It’s a pity there were 2 Koreans, 2 Filipinos, a Vietnamese but no Chinese representation. But I guess the Chinese person would have to top Shii-Ann to be memorable, and that’s tough.
Train ride
26/10/2006
Spent two days stuck in a windowless conference room, as someone stylishly put it. Learning how to do this and that, and how to work things out. Uneventful, but pretty useful.
Before I went into the sessions I was expecting a bunch of management hogwash and I psyched myself to remember that I know what works for me better that some two-bit trainer-scum. Thankfully it wasn’t a blind brainwashing session, and some of the techniques and frameworks were really useful.
It was also quite interesting when everyone had to say something about what they learnt about the lesson at the end of the course. A common theme was that they had a vague idea of how to deal with things but the sessions either validated what they thought was a good course of action. Some said it indicated where they did something wrong.
My guess everyone has pretty good instincts. It’s just a matter of getting the time to think it through carefully and perspective also helps.
The more I look at things the more I’m convinced IQ gets you your first job, and maybe establishes you as competent (or not). Most of the time your career starts to depend more and more on EQ after the junior level.
Because like it or not, when you deal less with work and more with people – bosses, peers, colleagues, and others in the organisation – the job becomes more about handling them than handling code. I’ve seen people climb the corporate ladder on close to 0 IQ but just with EQ. So how’s that for powerful?
Anyway. Things change, but shit seldom does. It’s usually the same things, different angles. How you deal with it, depends on how large your EQ palette is I guess, and the outcome you’re hoping to achieve. That’s what’s fun about life. Free will and variety.
The Marshmallow Man, Daniel Goleman
The newest thing I heard today was the theory of deferred gratification. So far it’s kind of a wild take for me, that deferring gratification (ie strong impulse control) will lead to success is far out even by my standards. Searching for it returned whimsical, practical, nurturing and spiritual arguments that sprung up around the tenet of the experiment. I love trivia, so perhaps I’ll try it on the kids this weekend.
The Prestige
25/10/2006
It’s a good movie. I loved it. I didn’t notice any rules of film-making broken, I was just in for the ride. And it was a great tale. Just had to sit back and be mesmerised.
Christian Bale and Hugh Jackman did remarkable jobs as Borden and Angiers. Lovely. And Christopher Nolan makes lovely movies. I liked Memento, I loved Batman Begins and I adore The Prestige.
The Nolan-Bale partnership seems to be working well, what with the second Batman (The Dark Knight) movie in the works, that’d be three.
Gold Class is really nice too.
Watch it. It’s a good, complicated movie, told simply.
The Prestige
25/10/2006
It’s a good movie. I loved it. I didn’t notice any rules of film-making broken, I was just in for the ride. And it was a great tale. Just had to sit back and be mesmerised.
Christian Bale and Hugh Jackman did remarkable jobs as Borden and Angiers. Lovely. And Christopher Nolan makes lovely movies. I liked Memento, I loved Batman Begins and I adore The Prestige.
The Nolan-Bale partnership seems to be working well, what with the second Batman (The Dark Knight) movie in the works, that’d be three.
Gold Class is really nice too.
Watch it. It’s a good, complicated movie, told simply.
School’s out!
24/10/2006
They’re closing my primary school down, merging it with another nearby (just means the students who are stuck there get absorbed into the other school, but it makes no practical difference to me). My friend Jessie – who incidentally is the friend that dates back the longest – decided that we needed to go back and take photos of where we grew up. So off we went.
The place seems a lot smaller than I remember. The only piece of real estate that has stood the test of time (and proportions) is the school field.
We walked around, hoping to relive some of the times we spent there – I don’t know if it worked for her, but it didn’t quite work for me. I’d be sad to see the buildings go, but at the same time, the school is so different from the way it used to be. I guess we should’ve taken photos when we left, not umpteen years later.
Even my favourite spot in school – the dental clinic – is now a new age, sterile thing with A/C and new fangled tools that my current dentist uses. And I guess this is the thing, I know what it looks like in my head, and I guess it doesn’t live up to those expectations, strangely enough.
Anyway. In other news that won’t stop the world from spinning, I went to Liang Court tonight and spotted Mr Incredible Tales, VJ Utt. He’s a fine looking dude.
While trying hard not to gawk at Utt, I bought a copy of Fragile Things by Neil Gaiman.
I read badly. I’m neither disciplined nor adventurous when it comes to the reading part of life. I read infrequently, irregularly and incompletely, and I invariably end up reading works by the same author. I rotate around a few, just to spice things up, but rarely venture towards a new author unless it came recommended soundly by someone whose taste I trust. In the last 15 years, those have been my cousin Alex, my friend V, and Neil Gaiman (who is oddly enough, the result of reviews by Alex and V).
Tomorrow we’re going to catch The Prestige. Christian Bale and Hugh Jackman – what else can you ask for? It’s going to be a happy holiday.
Light up!
22/10/2006
Another lazy weekend. Managed to catch a few movies, though.
The Departed
I’m definitely disappointed with this remake. I’ve thought about it, and taken into account that the cultural references in the original Hong Kong version won’t translate well, but still the Hollywood version doesn’t cut it. Very disapppointing for a Martin Scorsese film.
Comparing the two films, you can kinda draw your own cultural conclusions – like how in the US division of labour is so intense that you have two American actors filling the role of one Hong Kong character = the Marky Mark + Martin Sheen combination that was Anthony Wong.
My biggest peeve is the exaggeration. How Jack Nicholson has to be the biggest baddest baddie on earth, while Martin Sheen would be the pristine cop, ad nauseum. Just like how everything in the world is black or white, nothing in between. Perhaps them Americans can’t handle nuances.
Well, looks to me if you’ve watched the Hong Kong version of the movie and really liked it, then you don’t want to watch The Departed. But if you’ve not and you’re a big fan of the whole “the long arm of justice is going to get you anyway” and the whole American special formula feel-good movies – you’ll like this.
The Banquet
I kinda liked it a lot better than all the other recent Chinese Colour fests – Hero or House of Flying Daggers. It’s quite complex, and I like how the action is paced like the movie. Floating, floating, floating.
Apart from the fact that Zhang Ziyi and Daniel Wu were in it, it was a pretty good movie. Even ZZY didn’t really annoy so much. It was Daniel Wu who was sticking out like a sore thumb, with his wooden melancholy, and just one expression.
Curse of the Golden Flower might be hotly anticipated by some, but I’m holding my breath since it’s another Zhang Yimou movie. It’s bound to be beautiful, but his last couple of beautiful movies weren’t anything more than that.
Was looking forward to The Prestige – Christian Bale and Hugh Jackman, what’s not to like? – but Andy kinda panned it, so I guess I can shelve that till they show it on tv.
Next up: Casino Royale, then!
Six Years
17/10/2006
Today marked my sixth year with the company. Unfortunately I woke up with a sore throat and my dinner undigested so I called in sick. Draw whatever parallels you may to that, while I wallow in self-pity for the disrepair of my body.
This after a talk yesterday about nutritional immunology is highly amusing.
My throat hurts like hell.
I’m going to sleep.
Friday 13th
14/10/2006
It’s Friday the 13th, though nothing really went awry. Except the email I received in the morning about the postponement of conference I was supposed to attend after the week in Korea. That threw things into a blitz for a bit, as I hurried to get myself real tickets to Seoul (without the extra leg to San Francisco).
But anyway, it’s all settled. My air tickets are confirmed. My hotels are confirmed. My domestic flight is confirmed (thanks to Paul-ssi), and my Cheju hotel is confirmed. We’re all set!
Now I just have to figure out what we’re going to do, and where we’re going to go. But I’m really looking forward to it. Time to step up the Korean language lessons.
Ticket to Ride
13/10/2006
3 Weeks to Korea
We’re going, we’re going, we’re going! It’s going to be a little indulgent, but hey. Try before you die, right?
In other news, yahoo is now being referred to as a stodgy old internet company. Ahh, to think it’s come this far to be referred as thus. And while there is fretting going on over how its viewed on Wall Street and Silicon Valley, there is crap going on in pockets of the world closer to home.
Stuff like Channel News Asia’s Blog TV.
I’ve one word for them, which I’ll repeat a couple of times. And because I’m feeling generous today, I’ll throw in a freebie.
Ha ha ha… plop!
Just when you think the internet can’t get any dumber, a tv station will go in, and redefine stupidity for you.
And that’s why, you gotta love the internet.
