BLOGGER



Youngest kid of six with an inferiority and black sheep complex, but determined that God saves not just his soul to heaven but the remainder of his manic-depressive life, so others won't say he became a Christian and remained a jerk.


MAIN THEMES

On identity
i won't be transparent before i'm opaque. and you'll get to know me starting from the small things: who my favourite bands are. what kind of movies i like. who are my heroes.

On Christianity
I’m convinced that when confronted with sincere, real love, the Jesus factor will become obvious. But let’s not plant the cross before we carry it. I’m not trying to con you.

On dreams
Some dreams are meant to be achieved. I know that. But maybe other dreams are meant to drive us, privately. Never known to anyone but ourselves.


OTHER THEMES

On melancholy
It is a sadness that, when choosing between crying and sighing, will choose sighing. I'd almost say that melancholy is being sad about sadness itself.

On memory and nostalgia
It saddens me when life moves forward and people decide that certain things are worth forgetting.

On language
I've learnt that the word irregardless is filed as a non-standard word in the English language. That's a lexicographer's way of saying it's not a real word.

On politics
Crowds are fickle things. So when we stand in the thousands and cry against the present government, do we know who we're actually crying for?

On society
People always want the best for themselves. But I want to sometimes take second or third or fourth best, just so that the loser down the road doesn't always have to come in last. It must feel like shit to always come in last.

On growing old
Leasehold property make me feel sad. It doesn't matter how old the family photos are that you put on your wall. It's your family but it's not really your wall.

On philosophy
I ask you, if God loves everyone, and if God is also incapable of loving evil, how can there be such a thing as an evil man?

On a daily basis
One line quips, like this.


CHAT





Thursday, April 26, 2007
MAN BY CHOICE

No, i've never been an auto show kinda guy. nor an auto show models kinda guy. nor a gadgets kinda guy. nor a klse kinda guy.

how man am i?

based on an index generated by fictitious gender-neutral scientists in labcoats via transposition of westernised urban south-east asian cultural stereotypes over my self-examined valuations, i am 43% man.

these scientists shortlist the top ten man categories and you are rated on each of them. the list is as follows:

cars
computer games
drinking
busty girls
finance
sports
gadgets
politics
property
rock music

my list looks like this, with individual ratings out of ten, totalling to a percentage.

cars 3
computer games 3
drinking 2
busty girls 1
finance 0
sports 10
gadgets 4
politics 7
property 4
rock music 9
total man index 43

so as you can see, i'm quite a fair way behind what one might describe as the ordinary man on the street.

a guy called leonard said, "male by birth, man by choice". i'm still trying to get my head around that. if i'm 43% man according to the fictitious gender-neutral scientists in labcoats, then maybe i'm male by birth, unman by choice.

oh no. i'm unman!

Labels: ,



Genusfrog [ 10:59 am ] | 0 comments

Wednesday, April 25, 2007
THE SENTIMENTAL CHINAMAN

i'm a poor consumer by any stretch of the imagination. i use almost all my belongings until they're completely worn out, torn, tattered or digitally rested in the terminal way.

which is why when vernon asked me when i was planning to change my car, i had no answer for him. "When it stops going from A to B" is probably the best answer i can give him or my dad or any second-hand car conman who so happens to be bypassing my front yard. i just don't see the point in dumping a clock that still tells time, knowwhatimean? that kind of consumerism - what i unnervingly feel is luxury - doesn't make sense to me.

i think it's the chinaman in me. there is one. seriously, one big scrooge of a chinaman waiting on the sidelines, anticipating a major leap into the 21st century, and i suspect that day will come when i land my first microwave instant baby child thingymagicky. on that day, i think i will fully reproduce my dad's dna and i'll kick into ultra conservatism and deem everything that is remotely excessive as surplus to requirements.

that's scary. i don't wanna be a chinaman. you see that one ringgit note up there? that's from 1967. that one ringgit used to buy a whole ton of things. when i think of how chinaman i am sometimes, i wonder why i've not been alive since the 60s, when that one ringgit was king of the road. now, i hate it whenever i feel scroogy. i hate it more that i'll very reasonably defend all my decisions. like how i'm defending my lack of need for a new car by stating obvious truths, like how my car still does an able job of joining the dots between two destinations. or maybe it's my mum.

my mum is a real sentimentalist. attach some vague form of sentimental value to anything in the house and you can count on it remaining untouched, maybe even undusted, for the next twenty years. so maybe i'm not a chinaman. maybe i'm just sentimental, and i don't like the idea of parting with things that i've grown attached to.

or maybe i'm both. perhaps my inability to part with some of my belongings till they absolutely disintegrate is due to a two-pronged attack of frugal practicality and weepy nostalgia.

habis lah, like that. i'll never change anything for, like, forever.

Labels:



Genusfrog [ 2:08 pm ] | 0 comments

Monday, April 23, 2007
THE WEEKEND OF PARTICULAR GLUTTONY

Every once in sometime, i end up going on a gluttonneous spree. like an uncontrollable spate of eating frenzy. it would therefore have been befitting that somewhere in the middle of this weekend of liberal eating, that i sat around with some good friends and watched mr creosote of monty python's meaning of life stuff down everything and a wafer thin mint, exceeding the point of explosion, as he would.

but unlike mr creosote, i am not a fictitious character in a black comedy, and so while he gets away with obesity, the only comedy facing me at the end of the day is the sheer ridiculous amount of food i eat that i don't need to. take this, for example, for a weekend's menu.

Thursday dinner: The Rib Shop. Three hunks of barbequeued pork ribs, mashed potatoes and wine.
Friday dinner: Seafood restaurant. Steamed fish, fried sotong, crabs, buttered prawns, and la la.
Friday supper: Over a movie. Raisins.
Saturday brunch: Breakfast cookout at vernon's. About 5 rashes of bacon, 3 sausages, scrambled eggs, mushrooms and toast.
Saturday tea: Cell harvest tea. Scones, jelly, chicken wing (singular), english breakfast tea.
Saturday dinner: Carnaval, Brazillian buffet. Tons and tons and tons of beef and lamb cuts, chicken ham, fish, prawns and one bite of gizzard.
Sunday lunch: Chinese hawker in Seapark. Har min, chee cheong fun.
Sunday dinner: Restoran OK, taman tun. Guiness pork, fish curry and two bowls of rice.
Sunday supper: Wow Wow Cafe, plaza damas. Earl grey tea.

if nothing else, such indiscriminate gorging is gonna leave me fat and broke with a hospital situation to stare at well before i turn 35. and don't count on me being thick-skinned enough to go for healing rallies then. i know my limits.

so tonight, adrian and i are gonna cash out and plonk our moneys into gym memberships.

god bless us all.

Labels:



Genusfrog [ 2:18 pm ] | 0 comments

Saturday, April 21, 2007
THE WRONG SONG

Waiters should be banned from touching cd players.

or at least, mood-deaf, atmosphere-ignorant, ambiencically challenged waiters, should be banned from touching cd players. because there are few things worse than having a good setting jarred by contextually inappropriate music.

take this thursday evening for example. mel and i are in Rib Shop in damansara heights, scooping in swine ribs and what should have been at least decent red wine. there was no occasion, except perhaps the occasion of the surprise out of the blue. so they got the warm lights right. the food is alright. but something's amiss... that something that's amiss is reggae music in a rib joint.

WHO LISTENS TO REGGAE MUSIC IN A RIB JOINT?

it's just counterintuitive! it's absurd. it's... preposterous! reggae music is for beaches and eating fish while watching the sunset. reggae music is for drinking in the outdoors at night as the seabreeze swoops in. reggae music is not for 48 ringgit per bang dim light western restaurants that adjoin wineries. what's wrong with these people? haven't they grasped some sort of basic constraints, that they can't just play their favourite music anywhere they go just because they like it?

vernon was telling me about how Chef And Brew, this western eatery - also in damansara heights - plays thai music during dinner time. that's pretty bad too. how do you eat expensive steak while listening to thai songs? and there's more. my cell brought fuyee out for his birthday lunch at Modesto's in hartamas. i had rissotto, the rest were digging on some really fine pasta and there were a few pizzas to share. all the waiters were indian and so you won't win a prize for guessing who popped on the bollywood soundtrack.

i mean, can you dig that? bollywood music at an italian restaurant? granted i'm a fan of bollywood and that its sudden appearance didn't jar me as it might someone more culturally puristic. still, i swear, waiters who do not display the least bit of ability to determine the suitability of some musics in relation to the house in which they work should have restraining orders slapped over their heads over the cd player.

because it absolutely doesn't add up. say all you want about globalisation and the cross-cultural experience. i say that when i go to a western joint, just play me something that somewhat locates me within the appropriate context of the goob i'm chucking into my mouth. it's only fair. especially when we pay skips of money to embed ourselves in a conducive, meaningful atmosphere. yeah, so this reads like a rant. actually, it's not. it's just my way of saying that sometimes, in some restaurants, i wish i had one of these:

Labels: ,



Genusfrog [ 10:28 am ] | 0 comments

Tuesday, April 17, 2007
NEW SHOES

New shoes are nice. i just bought a couple pairs of new shoes because the older two were falling apart. apparently, everything's getting replaced nowadays.

that's the thing about new shoes... they feel really nice in the shop. they look spanking cool and they're quiet, like german cars quiet. but maybe it's this universal prank that the yellow lighting, screwey mirrors and mall air-cond play in unisive cohesion, conspiring so that two days after you walk out with your funky new footwear, they start to shed their original splendour.

take my new adidas shoes, for instance. little did i know that new adidas rubber has this squeaky thing going on so that the more i walk, the more i sound like a four-year-old in one of those shoes that go bip-bip-bip everytime they set their foot down. and it's not even a stepping down thing. when i raise my foot and twist it around inside, it makes that sound. bip-bip-bip.

and my new working shoes - the most comfortable hush puppy in the world - i swore in the store that i could walk forever with this puppy. the left heel... something... what's wrong? it's not like the right heel. it's stiff... and clunky. maybe the leather needs to be worn out. or worn in. maybe i need to give these two shoes more time. be more patient with them and eventually, they'll be as glorious as i originally saw them to be.

i wish friendships weren't so much like new shoes. i wish i could spend forever with my friends in the friends store, deluded forever by the warm lights, wonky mirrors and cool air. we could all be happy trying each other on, fun with the mirror and mounds of shoes. we would always feel nice, look good and sound just right. safe in the comfort of relational commerce, we can put away our insecurities in the name of good humour and a fresh new look. and last year's shoe of the year will forever be the shoe of the year.

my shoes are my shoes. i've bought them. and i love them.

Labels: ,



Genusfrog [ 5:17 pm ] | 2 comments

Thursday, April 12, 2007
THERE'S MAYA EVERYWHERE

jan.han
: hello. i am really pleased with myself today
Fergus: hello! why? tell
jan.han: i went hunting for some software in the faculty. not all computers in the faculty has it and i found it :)
Fergus: wah. what software was this?
jan.han: rhino. 3D program. the hunt was like a treasure hunt. ask here. check the computers. ask again at the information. get some names. look for them. email. no reply. get more names. go look for them. get an affirmative answer - 7th floor. pleased as 2 peas in the pod
Fergus: waaahhh. seriously, that's one hard puppy to find
jan.han: its not installed on all computers
Fergus: yala... is it really rare or rarely used or just poorly distributed?
jan.han: there's maya everywhere
Fergus: man, what you just said is so hindu, it's not funny
jan.han: wats hindu
Fergus: your comment that there's maya everywhere
jan.han: there is, the program.

Labels: ,



Genusfrog [ 9:25 am ] | 3 comments

Tuesday, April 10, 2007
ESSENTIAL READING



I recently had the pleasure of meeting a guy with a bookcase full of essential reading: darwin's origin of species, i-ching's book of changes, hitler's mein kampf, the KJV bible, the mahabharata, and all four vedas. we talked about the hindu epics, the bible, aliens and angels and truth. a few days later, he asks me if i had mein kampf in my library. i said no. he said he had an extra copy and wanted to find an appreciative owner. I accepted the gift.

and so, that night, i began wanting to collect all these books... these books with bold, sometimes brash, sometimes absurd, and almost always compelling claims to truth. these books that in a bygone day, attempted to explain the world as it was then, and on this day, accounts for the world as it is now. cover them and you probably understand the mind of three-quarters of the people you'll ever meet. so essential are these texts that perhaps the entirety of world's history of ideas lie between the pages of no more than twenty books.

the eight books above are the ones that interest me the most. and so, on top of my recent gift, i'm gonna aspire towards owning a copy of each of these classics: sigmund freud's studies on hysteria, karl marx's das kapital, the mahabharata, plato's republic, darwin's origin of species, mao tse tung's little red book, and nietszche's thus spoke zarathustra.

but will i really read these things? some of them are really huge. i found a pdf of das kapital online and it was massive. when i saw how big it was i felt the same crestfalling feeling that i felt the day i realised how big crime and punishment was. man, how am i ever gonna plough through these things? add to that fact, i'm a slow reader. it's preposterous to think i should own them.

i was talking about this recently, and athalia said that i should get books that digest all these primary sources and sort of spit them back out in a more concise way. it makes sense. i think i would benefit more from reading some oxford companion to freud than ploughing through his seminal works. i'd get my head around it faster. someone learned would have helped me chew on the spongy meat and it sure as all would go down faster. i've flicked through those oxford companions - they're really nicely put together.

but there's still something wrong about that. for all its appeal, reading the essential thinkers through some second-hand guide is like discovering the beatles through the red and blue albums. i discovered the beatles through the anthologies, and while that was a bit closer to the actual, organic thing, i always envy the folks from the sixties who bought their albums one by one, fully digesting rubber soul before moving on to revolver. you can't digest rubber soul over three number 1s on a compilation. so maybe the same thing is at work here.

there's something quaint, something poignant about reading the words as the thinker thought. something pure about that indivisible connection between the original speaker and the eventual listener. something unadulterated, immediate and precious about the primary piece. sure, it's fodder for pretentious poseur pop-philosophers, still i'd risk of looking like a wannabe if it means hearing some of these guys speak for themselves.

and so, i will begin my little adventure in itty bitty steps. i'm not sure which to get first, but it's exciting. maybe i'll start with nietszche.

Labels:



Genusfrog [ 5:17 pm ] | 3 comments

Monday, April 09, 2007
HAIKU

Today, we were writing haiku. it was fun. here is my lion haiku. i like it very much.

lion eat duck rice
say i will not pay the price
lion walk away

and then i wrote an adrian haiku.

adrian yap is cool
when i grow up i want to
be like adrian yap

and then i wrote a beyonce haiku.

beyonce is hot
but she is very one kind
so i don't like her

and before that i wrote a church elders haiku.

church elders are fun
they make daggy jokes until
all the aunties puke

in the end, i only like the lion haiku. :(

Labels: ,



Genusfrog [ 4:44 pm ] | 0 comments

Friday, April 06, 2007
WORK DA MACHINE

Fergus
: you wanna help me tonight with worship?
jazzyching: NO! HHAHAAHAHHAHAAHAH
Fergus: no, behind da scenes wan
jazzyching: do wat? projector? i can help
Fergus: work da machine. yeah
jazzyching: can can can! who's playing guitar neway?
Fergus: the edge
jazzyching: stupiak

Labels:



Genusfrog [ 4:27 pm ] | 0 comments

FISH AND THE BOOK

One day, while Fish was busy working, Aardvark lent him a book.

"What a nice book!", exclaimed Fish. Actually he didn't exclaim. He just said "Hey, this is pretty cool". So Fish thanked Aardvark and brought it home. While waiting for his dinner to arrive, Fish thought, "I'll pull out the book and read". And so he did. And he read half of it. Then he thought, "I better keep it back in my bag, so tomorrow I can return it to Aardvark." And so he kept it in his bag.

Later, while waiting for his work to render, Fish thought, "I'll pull out the book to read". And so he did. And he read the other half of it. Then he thought, "I better keep it back in my bag, so tomorrow I can return it to Aardvark". But his work finished rendering. And his bag was at least five swims away.

"I'll put it in my bag tomorrow!", thought Fish.

Fish forgot.

Moral of the story: Fish forget.

Labels:



Genusfrog [ 9:02 am ] | 0 comments

Thursday, April 05, 2007
IF I WERE FERGUSON

I've always wanted to be a football journalist. and one of the kicks of being a footie journo is that you get to interview all the top men of the game. especially the managers. but i'm not a football journalist. far from it. but that's not gonna stop me. and if alex ferguson isn't about to sit down with me and a scottish translator over a few beers, i'll take the next best thing: an alex ferguson fan whom i can understand perfectly clear. in a strange twist of fate, GCB - a liverpool fan - talks to manchester united's diehard son, my friend, Roger Ti.

Fergus:
Roger, what do you say to claims that united are a spent force by this time of the season?
Roger: I don't think so. just a bad run of injuries that unsettled them. but not fatigue.
Fergus: What if i said that the injuries are a culmination of a thin squad?
Roger: Looking at how the injuries occurred, it looked just like plain bad luck
Fergus: Do you think your squad has the depth to survive this last month and a half?
Roger: I have high expectations i guess. we should do more than survive. but yea, i have faith in them to pull through. looking at how they've played this season, they have the spirit of champions... hmmm... awesome attacking football at times
Fergus: You might have done enough to stave off chelsea in the premiership, but how do you rate your chances in the european cup, considering that you have another game with roma, followed by two more against either milan or bayern before a final?
Roger: Our chances in the euro cup are slim lar, i admit, but i do believe that the chance is there to be taken and it will be approached that way. I sense a real hunger in the team to win europe as well. giggs, scholes and rooney we just need neville back to drive that passion. if we had a roy keane at this point of time...
Fergus: Is that the missing ingredient? keane's leadership?
Roger: Nah. In keane's last season he was gettting too old and crickety. but we do need a younger leader like him to step up soon. but neville has done admirably leading by example rather than force of personality this season
Fergus: Do you see that kind of youthful prosect in leadership among your ranks? or will that have to be brought in?
Roger: Hmmm, i don't see it currently.
Fergus: How do you see yourselves setting up, strategically, against roma next week?
Roger: We'll play our strongest fit team lar... set up to attack. if we have saha healthy, two strikers. giggs, ronaldo, carrick, fletcher are the only fit midfielders. think giggs is more effect attacking middle than on the wing. he's lost his pace for the wing and his passes down the middle are very astute
Fergus: Where would you spend your transfer money?
Roger: To be honest, i kinda prefer spending less on a player that could fit into man u's system well... than 20 million on a carrick. I'd spend the transfer money on a really good central midfielder and a really good striker. if we could get fabregas, that'd be really interesting. haha. i'd make a bid if i were ferguson.

Yes, "if i were ferguson"... every man united fan's wish. well, maybe i can keep interviewing roger and we can do press conferences and stuff. he gets to be a world class manager and i get to be the journo who gets all the big stories. then we can sell all our interviews to rtm 1 and they can change all the names. after all, who da heck's gonna tell the difference?

Labels:



Genusfrog [ 3:15 pm ] | 0 comments