Abit overdue but here's some of the pics I took in Seoul. I start with the 3rd day lar cuz the first 2 days were mostly spent in-processing [very very long stories].
Here's me in my nice plushy new set of winter wear. Despite having been to the States during winter and considering myself a seasoned traveller, I think I must have been undone by my too low body fat composition; longjohn + tshirt + sweater + jacket + scarf failed to repel the Seoul cold and threatened to undermine my holiday. Never skim on the winter clothings folks. So I bought: $80: fleece $300: 2 in 1 jacket with fleece and a windbreaker $30: nice gloves Which really worked wonders. [digression: i used the super uber 2-in-1 jacket in singapore and i now face meetings in air-conditioned government offices and classrooms with confidence.]
We went to the Seodaemun prison after my winter shopping spree. This is the hospital opposite the prison the moment we got out of the train station. SGH. Seoul General Hospital. Seriously speaking the other day I went to our SGH to visit a client. it's like you have to get past the chasm of never ending cars, and walk miles along the road to get to where you want to go. Bad hospital.
Park before the prison.
History lesson: Seodaemun Prison was built by the Japanese last time. So the Japanese and the Chinese were fighting over Korea which resulted in the Sino-Jap war of 1895 which the Japanese won. Apparently unlike the Chinese they were not just satisfied with regular tribute; they made many Koreans unhappy who started rebelling and so the Japanese had to built prisons like these all over the country to house these rebels which they caught. I think there's about 300 such prisons all over the country, most not in use liao, a couple still functions as a prison, and a couple more turned into tourist attractions like these [not really touristy though since local visitors outnumbered foreigners like 100:1].
Anywayz. So the place consists of wax figures re-enacting the torture scenes.
One of the many prison buildings. They all look the same though so take one take all liao. The Japanese built them though and you will note the functional simplicity of the design. Very interestingly hor. Dunnoe how the Japanese design the buildings: inside is way colder than outside. I think that's the most efficient torture ever. 30 minutes and I will confess to whatever you want me to confess liao.
There's a letter in today's ST forum by an Ace Kindred Cheong scolding this guy for locking up the national library from the inside. Besides being wrong, he was wrong because what if the library caught fire?
Ace Kindred is a prolific forum writer. I first came across him when he admonised Steven Spielberg for mixing politics in pulling out of the Beijing Olympics video. I'm sure wherever corner of LA he is in, Spielberg must have seen this letter and felt awful.
I googled 'Ace Kindred' and also this letter condemning a local footballer dude for kicking his opponent, saying he should be in muay thai instead. I think Ace misses a point: Local footballer was unsporting and I can't think of any sport that condones that.
Before I left for Seoul I came across this letter scolding the guy who burned the palace down. I didn't even have to read it to know who wrote it. The next person who wants to burn the Merlion down better think twice or else Ace will scold you.
With such a moral compass like Ace vigorously pointing the way, I can sleep better at night. Even if Mas Selamat is still on the run. I know I can trust Ace to scold him for toying with the feelings of his captors and for willfully evading the efforts of Singapore's finests.
Ace is clearly against people who are unsporting, mixes politics with everything, and who anyhow destroys things. That sounds alot like our ministers. Go Ace go!
When I googled 'Ace Kindred' I was curious whether it was some sort of honorific like Fuhrer or if it was some sort of rank in some organization. I'm still not sure today.
Laksa Chowder. Easily the best dish I had in a long time, and the best dish the place offers.
Royal Lobster Bisque. Finally, lobster bisque in Singapore that's better than the one I used to have almost daily at HK MacDonald's, which was really good.
The main course! Classic palle or something like that. Basically italian short grain [riso] with seafood and chicken. This was the dish that attracted our attention in the first place, and I think expectations were too high: it was quite a disappointment. The rice was too dry for riso, there were not enough peppers, and the tastes were not subtle enough.
Desert! Green Apple Crumple. Well the place is called cheesecake so you know the cheesecake has to be good. And it is.
You should strongly consider majoring (or minoring) in Psychology, Sociology, or related majors (e.g., Counseling, Industrial-Organizational (I-O) Psychology, Social Work, or other social science majors).
It is possible that the best major for you is your 2nd, 3rd, or even 5th listed category, so be sure to consider ALL majors in your OTHER high scoring categories (below). You may score high in a category you didnt think you would--it is possible that a great major for you is something you once dismissed as not for you. The right major for you will be something 1) you love and enjoy and 2) are really great at it.
Consider adding a minor or double majoring to make yourself standout and to combine your interests. Psychology and Sociology are both great minors to add to any major. Please post your results in your myspace/blog/journal.
on the 2nd day of cny. after our car kanna the 'battle of london' amount of bird droppings [huat ar!]. nowadays they don't have the automatic washing thing liao. replaced with 3-4 chinese workers.
Alfie and Meow Meow, in a rare moment of calm where Alfie is not seriously trying to actively puncture any of Meow Meow's arteries, or mounting poor Meow Meow from behind, or pouncing towards Meow Meow like Yokozuna. Only on CNY. Probably the only good CNY is for.
Just had my second hokkien lesson. I have nothing but respect for teacher's linguistic ability. Empirically speaking, it is super hard to acquire more than one language at a coordinate level, and acquiring more than one language at non bi-coordinate levels seriously screws up your mind and here we have a dude who knows English, Chinese, hokkien, Cantonese, Japanese, and Malay and he actually appears intelligent. Amazing.
Midway through the lesson he started giving out postcards proudly in large obtuse type flaunting these gems:
- the way to be happy is to make others happy.
- happiness is a by-product of an effort to make someone else happy.
- one of the deepest secrets of life is that all that is really worth doing is what we do for others.
What utter bullshit.
I think it is supremely irresponsible of him to be going around propagating such truely false falaehoods.
All my life I do nothing but give. If everything I've given could be converted into some common currency, it would probably be enuff to take over citibank more than one time. I've given time, given money, given effort, given love and gotten absolutely nothing back in return, let alone happiness.
Fast forward today and I am seriously out of things to give or even the will to give, or at least the will to struggle to keep what little deficit I have left. So I just wasted a year or so, much of it involving ridiculous trips to redundant lands, and this new year looks to be no different. While people cheerfully and nonchalantly move on I'm left with a lingering phantom pain, that type of indignant pain where you feel you have to rip out an appendage or two, and ownership of said appendages is not an issue.
But maybe hokkien teacher could be right. That must mean the people that I know must be dementers, those things in harry potter that suck you of happiness.
The thing about dementers: they don't let you let go.
Sniffy the Virtual rat is a rat where cohorts of hordes of insincere psych undergrads administer electric shocks or feed food to Sniffy in order to get him to behave in a certain way. No rat deserves such a fate.
People get so many flavors/treats/services/gifts/education from me, favors/treats/services/gifts/education they so don't deserve. No one deserves such a fate.
I should do means-testing on all the stuff I give out. No-one who was mean and callous to me should deserve anything other than a well-aimed, well-timed and well-executed roundhouse kick.
Means testing is really cool because is prevents people who don't deserve anything from getting what they don't deserve.
Alot of my job is means testing, which basically involves finding out how many children my client has, and getting their total income then divide by something which I shouldn't go into too many details about. So clients who have children basically don't deserve any subsidies. Fair enough I think.
I'm not very good at means testing though.
I find it hard when in a stuffy, dark and dank one-room flat where the electrical appliances are as liveless as the occupant, in front of an elderly person, ravaged by age and society, whose todays were just like yesterdays, and the tomorrows are no better, to even consider that this person might not deserve what meagre solace I can provide.
The only way I can find out how many children uncle or auntie has is to -gasp!- ask them.
Sometimes uncle gets so excited because I am the first bit of civilization he comes into contact with in such a long time, and such a fine bit at that, that they forget how many children they have exactly. I'm a social worker, not a FBI lie-detector.
Or I could be fixing the washing machine and as we all know water pipes have a mind of their own and this mind includes deciding to burst and gush out unexpectedly usually when me and my notebook is in the way, and we all know how paper takes to water: so well that the ink smudges and the $200,000/year income uncle's son earns becomes $20.
Generally, half of all my clients speak Hokkien only. The other half are just lying that when they say they know other languages. My Hokkien is totally non-existent. I have this skill where I can tell how many children uncle has by looking at his eyes. It's way cool.
So yeah. I'm not very competent. Good thing in this country, incompetence earns you millions.
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And so as the earth moves mindlessly on, Sniffies will continue to be shocked and stuffed in ignorant pursuit of redundant knowledge and I will continue to give stuff out to those who don't deserve anything more than anything.
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.
If there is an award for figuring Life out, Singaporeans so deserve it.
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So I was buying some shoes yesterday when this auntie came up to the nice salesperson and asked for US Size 3 shoes for her son because he was 3 years old.
Please lor. Americans are bigger than Asians; how can US size 3 be for 3 years old?
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Amongst all the condolences for the 5 unfortunate dragonboaters, a friend came across this guy calling the dragonboaters typical Singaporeans: arrogant bastards who they we are Gods especially when we go overseas.
I am pissed. There is actually someone more offensive than I am.
According to Frederick from Singapore who writes in the condolences book for the millions the Khmer Rouge slaughtered, Cambodia is the abode of Satan, or at least his summer getaway.
I think so too.
How else are these children able to stay afloat in wash-basins in the river that killed 5 able-bodied swimmers in nothing more than a wash basin? This must be the work of the Devil.
Also, the Tonle Sap, the river the dragonboaters died in is the only river in the world that reverses its flow on a regularly basis. Paganic.
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Moral: If you think you are God, don't go to the Devil's country.
"We regret to inform you that we are unable to assist Mr XXX in our meal delivery service.
According to our records, Mr XXX's wife was our client, and the food that the household was previously receiving was stopped upon her unfortunate passing in the June of 2007. The social worker then had also assessed Mr XXX of being in good health.
Upon receipt of your letter, we have extended our service to Mr XXX. I made three attempts to locate Mr XXX at his residence in order to re-assess his condition: on the 21st Nov Wedenesday in the afternoon, and subsequently on the mornings of Thursday and Friday. They were in vain. In addition, during the visit on Wednesday at 3 pm, I found the lunch we delivered still hanging upon his door [the picture is included].
As such, we are unable to assess Mr XXX and ascertain his eligiblity for Home Help Services.
As stipulated by the Home Help service model by the National Council of Social Services, Home Help service is extended only to home-bound in-ambulant elderly having difficulties with the activities of daily living [ADL-dependency]. Many elderly request for Home Help services because it supplements their meagre income but we need to draw such lines because we have limited resources.
We ask for your understanding and look forward to further co-operation with yourself and the Tanjong Pagar GRC."
I'm drafting a letter to turn down one of Indranne's referral for one of her resident. This is the version that won't ever make it to the final letter of course, but it needs to see the light of day:
"To Indranee Thurai Rajah, MP for Tanjong Pagar GRC, or whoever wrote the letter for you:
We regret to inform you that we are unable to assist Mr XXX in our meal delivery service.
Mr XXX's wife was our client, so the food delivery was stopped upon her unfortunate passing in the June of 2007.
We have extended our service to Mr XXX upon receipt of your letter out of goodwill. I made three attempts to locate Mr XXX at his residence: on Wednesday 21st Nov afternoon and Thursday and Friday morning. In addition, on one visit, the Wednesday one at 3 pm, the lunch we delivered to Mr XXX was hanging upon his door [a picture is included in Appendix 2].
As we are unable to assess Mr XXX and ascertain his eligibility for our service, we are unable to assist him.
As stipulated by the Home Help service model by the National Council of Social Services [the relevant pages are attached in Appendix 1], eligible clientele for Home Help extends only to home-bound in-ambulant elderly with difficulties in the activities of daily living. This precludes elderly folks who require our services to cut costs."
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But I am still pissed.
I realized it doesn't matter what I write. Blerdy Indranee probably doesn't care about the outcome of the referral because MPs can't ever say no to their residents. It doesn't matter whether Mr XXX gets the service or not because blerdy Indranee still wins. She wins because she agreed to write the referral for Mr XXX so she looks good in his eyes. If we help the client, blerdy Indranee gets the credit in his eyes because she wrote the referral for him. Now I am turning him down. And the client will say: It's not blerdy Indranee who's turning him down.
Blerdy hell.
There is something disturbingly wrong with this country.
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.
Last week-ish, there was a letter in the ST forum. The writer's grandmother kanna attacked by their schizophrenic neighbour at a very public bus stop and noone helped at all. There were so many sensible things the writer could have lamented about. Probably her grandmother did or had something that triggered off something in their neighbour so she could have talked about the greater need for sensitivity towards mentally sick people. Maybe said neighbour didn't take his medication before leaving home; she could have talked about the challenges of caring for the mentally inept and caregiver's burdens. Or perhaps the neighbour's relapse was caused by the hot weather; she could highlight the challenges faced in combating global warming. Yet, the writer choose to accuse all the people at the bus stop, and by association, all Singaporeans, as apathetic.
In today's ST forum, a Adam Chen Zijian writes:
"I REFER to the letter, 'No one helped when old woman was attacked' (ST, Nov 5) by Ms June Koh Poh Kwan. It is indeed sad and unfortunate to hear that not a single person bothered to help Mdm Tan when her attacker, a young man suffering from schizophrenia, verbally and physically attacked her.
It is common knowledge that the majority of Singaporeans would just stare and keep a distance whenever such situations arise.
Like all Singaporeans, we do not want trouble and, thus, our selfish nature.
This bad habit of ours is definitely one of the traits that make up the 'Ugly Singaporean'.
True, Singapore always gets praised in the international media for being clean and green, for being a safe country, for having the best airport but, when it comes to basic moral values and ethics, Singaporeans really fare badly.
We really should learn from the rest of the world, such as our American and Australian counterparts because chances are if the same scenario happened in either America or Australia, members of the public would get involved and promptly seize the attacker, before handing him over to the police.
Compare that to what happened to Mdm Tan, and you will know that Singaporeans are lagging very far behind and have a lot of catching up to do.
So, being clean and green, having the best airport, honestly, they all count for nothing if we continue to be so selfish and self-centred.
It is only when we learn to be more selfless and self-sacrificing that we can truly consider ourselves to be gracious citizens."
Generally, the stupidity in the ST forum is quite high, but Adam Chen Zijian brings it to PAP politician levels. Personally I like people who are called Adam, and this one shares my surname as well as having a nice Chinese name. Apparently such triply ideal naming goodness can only result in stupidity.
In his letter, Adam's only claim that Singaporeans are selfish is backed only by the previous letter and the 'common knowledge that the majority of Singaporeans would just stare..'. Where is the freakin falsifiability?
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In America, the country which Adam lauds for her unselfish people, a Kitty Genovese was stabbed to death infront of 30 over people over a half hour period, where the attacker left and came back to continue stabbing her. No one lifted a finger. In another case, a woman was unaware she had been stabbed in the back and continued doing her normal marketing. She only realized she had been stabbed after she got home and her daughter pointed out there was a knife protruding from behind her.
As has been researched to death (Berkowitz, Latane & Darley, Bryan & Walbek, Bryan & Test, Grusec, Bastardi & Shafir etc), having other people around makes people alot less likely to help. People generally don't help around strangers cuz they don't wanna pai-seh.They don't generally help aroound strangers cuz they are afraid that the event might not be an emergency, and since noone else is helping, then it probably isn't an emergency. In other words, as clear as being stabbed to the victim might seem, the event is not so clear-cut to us by-standers.
When I was in HK, we came across a crowd.
Odie wastes no time in mingling within the crowd, and chatting up the early birds to find out what is going on. She tells me that this behaviour is not an Odie-thing, and based on observation with this crowd, I concur with her. It seems in HK, it is the culture for by-standers in a crowd to actually communicate with each which generally eliminates the ambiguity of the situation, or eliminates the possibility one will look like a fool for helping because everyone else is also doing so.
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I think the most famous account of America's lack of unselfishness is how Americans, common and professionals alike, risk their lives during the September 11 attacks. I also think that there is nothing ambiguous about buildings collapsing and in flames, or planes being hijacked for suicide runs.
So it's really abit too far, and most unscientific and therefore really stupid, to call Singaporeans selfish and apathetic. Singaporeans are not selfish or apathetic. I think they just have a very generous leeway for what constitutes an emergency, a leeway which is not helped by the general tendency of Singaporeans to keep to themselves I suppose.
A man and woman fighting, never mind how much blood is flowing, is construed as a domestic struggle and therefore private business, albeit in a very public place.
A kid writhing about on the ground, and foaming at the mouth, is simply the playfulness of youth.
An adult savagely abusing a child is nothing more than discipline. Afterall, growing up, who hasn't been caned?
A knife sticking out of someone's back. A bad radio commercial?
As silly as it sounds, but the research shows it. If you want help, just ask for it. CLEARLY. In 4 different languages and 2 different dialects to be sure.
So I made a quicktime slideshow of the yummy food I had in HK. Just click the yellow arrows to navigate [may have to take awhile for the file to load first though].
I can honestly say that food was one of the few things I was looking forward to in HK. We commonly went to Nganlung, situated just below our guesthouse. I went there almost every chance I got.
Having been to quite a bit of countries, I still think that food in Singapore, or at least the food I can generally afford is, is nothing more than supposedly edible foodstuffs ruined in oil. Gross.
Tai-O is a sea-side village on Lantau island. On retrospect, in the cool dryness of my room, and not the pouring coldness I was experiencing then, Tai-O is actually a pretty nice, rustic place, a nice escape from the maddening crowd that characterizes HK and SG [in retro-retrospect, the lack of crowds at Tai-O could possibly be due to the rain].
茶果. A local delicacy. Available in sweet and salty versions.
Social worker going around giving out goodie bags.
Turns out to get to Nam Sang Wai, you walk along Nam Sang Wai road, which is along the Kam Tin and Shan Pui river. The walk there, all 4 km of it, is very easy to describe.
The way ahead and back is road:
There are electric wires once in a while.
Right is the Kam Tin River, with flocks of cranes and ducks.
Left is the fenced up mongrove-y area, Nam Sang Wai proper.
Towards the end is a big empty field where people play with model helicopters:
or with their dogs [Keith and Toby, Keith is the one in the picture]:
