general youtubing

The iPhone really is a wonderous device: for all its supposed flaws and lack of high end tech features everyone else is cramming into their phones these days, it does the one thing it's supposed to do very simply and very nicely: it squeezes in my laptop, iPod and handphone into one device and just works. True, I won't be spreadsheeting or photoshopping or dreamweaving or garagebanding with it, but I can IM, check email, surf the web and even youtube

While I was stuck in Manila recuperating after my surgery, my trusty iPhone saved the day against boredom.

Some notable youtube things I saw:

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Very cool very hot pair of contestants from this reality show Britain's Got Talent. I'd be darn happy if I can be half as good as them.

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Manila's got talent too!

This is their take on promoting Kung Fu Panda. shown on local Manila TV after every show. I quite like his rendition of the song. In terms of effectiveness, I risked sepsis and certain reprimanding when I sneaked out of recuperating on the last day to catch the movie. I also bought the soundtrack [limited Manila edition for 350 pesos or $10SGD].

I just saw the Singaporean attempt at promoting the show: Gurmit Singh [yet again] attempting to appear witty as he interviews the voice actors of the show. Singapore's only got gurmit singh? And what's with the Ch 5 is the official channel for Kung Fu Panda. Is there any chance Vasantham Central could be the official channel?

I'm particularly reminded by something my doctor in Manila said: that the Philippines is simply teaming with talent and it's very very sad the government is not able to harness it. As if on cue, the waiter who was serving us broke into a rapacious song and dance item; his performance easily can win any one of our [un]talent shows here.

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Very catchy lyrics:
There's a hole in the world like a great black pit
And the vermin of the world inhabit it
And its morals aren't worth what a pig could spit
And it goes by the name of London

At the top of the hole sit a privileged few
Making mock of the vermin in the lower zoo
Turning beauty into filth and greed

I find this stuck in my head and repeating itself quite constantly, with the word 'London' replaced with 'Singapore', usually during morning rush hour, and reaching a climax in a meeting with employees of NCSS [note that I don't see people who work for NCSS or any government organization as dignified human beings; these top few who turn beauty into filth].

horrible govt stuff

On the train earlier today, a troupe of kids trooped into the MRT and duly occupied the whole portion of empty walkway between any 2 doors on the train. They then proceeded to do what kids do best: make lots of noise, laugh loudly, and generally attract gawking stares from everyone around which they so effortlessly ignore.


A few minutes later, these 2 police ger ger come by and stopped about 3 poles away from the kids and they stayed in the area the whole time the kids were there. I'm not sure what they were doing, but they looked very awkward and sheepish about it; they occasionally glanced kids-side.


At this point the Mas Selamat bad joke machine starts working: seriously if our guards were watching the kids half as hard as they did Mas, he wouldn't have escaped.

Seriously also, I'm not sure what kind of security risk a whole bunch of kids can pose: possibly they might be explosive considering how energetic they all, but that's about all.

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A sms conversation with a friend reminded me of something that happened about last year.

Apparently South West CDC and Akira teamed up to introduce this program where Akira provided households identified by SWCDC with a plethora of household appliances that were low in resource consumption. This Akira team-up was part of SWCDC's holistic client approach; it was just one of many programs that SWCDC tied up with, eg. house keeping from us, financial help from them and so forth.

So there was a launch planned at the open area infront of Blk 45 Henderson Road. They erected a tentage, set up a stage, and invited elderly residents from around the area, as well as elderly inmates from various homes. I'm not sure how long everyone started waiting, but I know most of the elderly folks were already there at around 1 pm, sitting under the tentage in the sweltering sun waiting for the launch to happen.

I reached at around 1:45 being the petulant anti-establishment person that I am, and I and my manager, together with all sorts of other grassroots people, other SWCDC people, Akira people, and various other people went to the multi-storey carpark to await the Guest of Honor, the SW mayor, Amy Khor.

She arrived at about 2 pm and I remember how she looked that day. She looked pristine, resplendent even, with that immaculate make-up and wearing that purple-onyx-ish flowy dress. She stopped her car infront of us, her too big car that is obviously not designed for HDB carparks, made a bad joke about how she will take forever to park if she had to do it herself, had a grassroots fella do the parking for her, and we proceeded.

She bypassed the tentage and went straight for Blk 45, where certain units had been earmarked for her to visit, to illustrate the holistic approach SWCDC takes towards clients. I remember there was this fat SWCDC fella, some kind of sycophant, who was some sort of harbinger, informing the people ahead of Amy Khor's impending arrival, and their respective duties.

3 or so flats were selected in that block. At the first flat, before Amy Khor arrived, our housekeepers were instructed to pretend to be doing some housekeeping. After Amy Khor arrived for awhile, they were redeployed to the next unit to await her visit. The ironic thing is, 2 out of the 3 units earmarked were not even our clients.

The event was also for Akira, so at each unit, the members of the household demonstrated to Amy Khor how they were putting the appliances to good use, while she expressed interest. I liked the part where she begun stirring this curry in the Akira electric cooker.

At 3 pm, she was finally done home-visiting. The sun did not let up all this while, and all the elderly folks were still waiting under the tentage. I remembered what was particularly ironic: they were playing the Hokkien songs from 881, and the one about dying and SGH kept repeating alot.

Amy Khor came, and gave the usual speech. It was a mostly good PR speech, made the Akira people happy and so forth other than the small fact that the audience, the elderly residents, probably did not understand half a word that was said. She did attempt the same speech in Chinese though. Let's just say she makes me look good.

At the end of it all, after waiting more than 2 hours in the sun listening to morbid songs, all the elderly residents got was a meal. What irks more is to many of them, this was a chance to get out of the Home; to the CDC and Amy Khor, they were used to fill up the seats and make themselves look good.

general flaming for the week

I don't generally comment on political/media stuff [yeah, right] because people generally only comment when things get really stupid [looking at you PAP] and I don't feel like posting 10 times a day. Besides my lecturer always says 'flame the argument, not the person' but you know how it is with me and fire; always out of hand.

Apparently, NUS magazine Ridge covers some silly political forum in their online portal about 2 months ago. At this point, we should all have already moved on and focus on bigger issues like blaming ourselves for Mas Selamat's escape and if there's leftover time, maybe fighting global warming. Apparently dengue this year is gonna be meaner so we should also be doing something about it since LKY says we shouldn't trust the government to get things done.

But no. Cuz 2 months later, SDP accuses the Ridge of censorship because apparently one of the Ridge's reporter had requested an interview with Chee Soon Juan, but the transcript of that interview was not published at all so that must be censorship because everyone else does it in Singapore. So maybe now we could all get a good laugh and move on since actually the interview was just to get a better understanding of the silly political forum which was what the article was about.

The Ridge replies recently and says so too. Mostly it was a good reply other than the very lack of expletives and vulgarities.

Of course the SDP must have the last say [as of now] and the plot thickens: the Ridge reporter who had asked for the interview promised it would be published, only for his editor to not want to use it. I particularly liked the reporter's email apology that the SDP produced saying that he was sorry to '...Mr Chee for having spent some of his personal time for an unpublished interview'. I'm sure Mr Chee has lots of personal time actually, when he is not behind bars.

Ok. Editors are always gonna have a final say in what appears and what doesn't, and when something doesn't appear, it doesn't necessarily mean censorship. I can think of so many reasons for an editor not to want to use an article, in this case, Chee's interview: the reporter did extra work, no more space le, not newsworthy, not auspicious etc etc. In this case, I think it was a matter of taste [has anyone read the interview? i can't believe the dude is a phd].

And like. Chee is so last century opposition? Now everyone is talking about JBJ lor.

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And here's the bit my flames get really out of hand: this really is like a playground squabble: the bigger kid from the broken home with all his issues picking on the tiny tot happily minding his own business in the sand pit. Like all broken kids, they do their best work only in the playground.

the woman in the street

Decomposition by Tulfikar Ghose

I have a picture I took in Bombay
of a beggar asleep on the pavement;
grey-haired, wearing shorts and a dirty shirt,
his shadow thrown aside like a blanket.

His arms and legs could be cracks in the stone,
routes for the ants' journeys, the flies' descents.
Brain-washed by the sun into exhaustion,
he lies veined into stone, a fossil man.

Behind him there is a crowd passingly
bemused by a pavement trickster and quite
indifferent to this very common sight
of an old man asleep on the pavement.

I thought it then a good composition
and glibly called it 'The Man in the Street',
remarking how typical it was of
India that the man in the street lived there.

His head in the posture of one weeping
into a pillow chides me now for my
presumption at attempting to compose
art out of his hunger and solitude.

the sg police: the vigilant force

Videos of Chee Siok Chin and John Tan trying to walk towards Shangri-La recently. Basically the video goes something like this:

- CSC and JT wants to walk to Shangri-La.

- The police 'advises them to leave' because it is a protected area or they will be removed.

- CSC asks for a reason. She is just going to Shangri-La for a meal.

- Police says because the area is protected.

- CSC asks why is no-one else stopped.

- The police 'advises them to leave' because it is a protected area or they will be removed.

- CSC asks for a reason. She is just going to Shangri-La for a meal.

Seriously all CSC wants is a reason. Give her lor. Tell her that with all the lawsuits the PAP have and will slap on her, she's bankrupt liao or will be bankrupt liao so she obviously can't and shouldn't be eating at Shangri-La. Every cent counts.


Part 1


Part 2


Other interesting things:

• John Tan is my stats lecturer. He taught me all I knew about statistics and I would not be half the empiricist I was without him. He taught me that He taught me to see through all the lies that evil people in the country tell by abusing stats.

• 'You are advised to leave the area or you will be removed'. Apparently, 'advised' means different things to the police from Uncle Oxford. 'Removed' has a nice sound to it though: nicely threatening and sounds like a vaporizer will be involved.

• 'You are advised to leave the area or you will be removed'. Somehow it sounds better with an American accent. Or at least an accent which doesn't sound like you're really married to Chinese and English is the distant relative in the family you don't want to acknowledge because he's done some shameful things. The same applies to raising your voice.

• Police can't touch you if you haven't done anything wrong. But they do anyways.

• The higher you go, the smaller your balls. Must be the increased air pressure.

• CSC's HQ is in Sengkang. The food there is definitely alot cheaper than Shangri-La's. My HQ is in Woodlands. The food sucks here.

st forum

I always start my day with the Straits Times Online forum. As depressed, twisty and damaged I am, I always feel alot better after reading the forum. If only life was one big ST forum.

Today, in addition to said emotional states, I didn't get any sleep the whole night, started to work too early in the morning, got drenched twice and one of my clients whom I am particularly attached to requires major surgery. Not a good day.

But this letter is a classic:

University lecturers who upload class notes at 11th hour inconvenience students

I WOULD like to share my experience of the use of e-mail to relay important information. What I encountered is not widespread but it is not an isolated case.

I have a friend who studies in a local university that requires the lecturer to upload class notes and assignments for students. This is a good idea as it reduces not only time but also paper the lecturer would need to photocopy. And most times, there would be extra copies that might go to waste.

However, of late, I have learnt that certain lecturers upload their notes at the 11th hour, that is, at night when the class is first thing the next morning. Although most students have computers at home, some do not have printers. They therefore have to race to school to print their notes before class.

On another occasion, the lecturer sent an e-mail message to my friend that a lesson was scheduled the next day (a last-minute addition to the fixed timetable). The message also asked my friend to tell the other students. Fortunately, my friend knew some of the students and managed to tell them. I am interested to know what would have happened if my friend did not check his e-mail that day. Would the lecturer have marked them all absent?

Although I am not a student in this university, I felt the frustration as if I were in my friend's shoes. I am disappointed we are paying for people who are so unprofessional.

Teo Cheng Nam

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I'm really ashamed of myself leh.

Here I am worrying about my non-existent love life, moping about my this month's pay with increment and backpay that is late, trying to figure out how to make a blerdy mysql webby already, and being concerned for my second favorite client's life.

But here we have Mr Teo who is able to transcend such earthly woes and forge his transcendental concerns through the unforgiving fires of public discourse.

I'm really ashamed.

So ashamed I'm inspired to write in also. Here:

"Universities have a part to play in fighting global warming"

I would like to share my experience when I was a student at a top local university at Kent Ridge Crescent.

Every room and lecture theatre is air-conditioned, and freezingly so. I spent lectures and tutorials shivering even with a jacket and a heat pack in the form of my laptop charger. I think if you look around the lecture theatre, it is a common phenomenon [if you don't count of the hot hunks and chicks of course who are by definition hot and therefore can get by in a skimpy singlet or bra]. I suspect this is also a phenomenon experienced in other universities.

I wonder how much of the earth's valuable resources and yong siew toh's money the school is wasting for the singular purpose of freezing the rooms.

Everyday in the papers, we come across the very real and increasing threat of global warming. Even though I am probably not going to be around when that happens, I feel gaea's pain. Ouch.

I hope the universities in Singapore can work together and play their part in fighting this threat.

I suggest opening all the doors at the universities of all the rooms, libraries, offices, lecture theatres and so on and so forth. We can let some of the cold air out to cool the environment down so that the coldness is not just wasted on freezing students.

Chen Lingshen