Calico is one of the common colorations for domestic cats. It's also the name of our newest kitten who happens to be of that coloration. My older brother found her a few weeks ago outside a 7/11. She followed him to his car and he decided that he had to take her home.
Our other cat, Mercy and her son, Faith didn’t take kindly to new arrival. We put the three of them together in the guest room to see if they would get along, and after a lot of hissing, growling, and a few warning swipes on the head, the new kitten had learned who was in charge and gained a wee bit of respect for their personal space.
Cali, as we had taken to calling her, was still a little rascal, though. She was extremely playful and would attack anything that moved, including her own tail. Sometimes she would scuffle with the other cats, but mostly they would just have a long, tense standoff followed by a quick chase between the furniture. Other times they would approach, sniff each others’ noses cautiously, and then carry on their own direction.
A few days ago we noticed that Cali was missing. It was a bit sad, but not really a surprise. Despite the fact that we live on the 20th floor of a condominium, we’ve lost cats before. Faith’s sisters, Grace and Joy, went missing many years ago, and Hope, another kitten that we’d taken in, had also vanished one day a while back.
Then yesterday our neighbors from seventeen floors beneath us came up for a game of poker and told us that they’d found a dirty kitten that looked exactly like Cali on their balcony about a half hour before they came over. They had given us a call, but we were all sleeping and couldn’t pick up the phone, so they called one of the guards who took the kitten away for them. I went down and asked where the guard where he had put the kitten. He showed me to a place near the outside parking, but Cali wasn’t there. I was a bit relieved because it meant that wherever she was, she was still in good enough condition to walk, but also quite disappointed because we had lost her again. I looked around for a bit before getting a drink and going home.
When I got home my sister suggested we go look for her one more time, so I did. My sister found Cali sitting underneath a parked car. She was all dirty and she stank really bad. She also had some shallow wounds on her limbs. We carried her back home, washed her, dried her, and got a box to take her to the vet in. Unfortunately, all the vets were closed on Sunday, but I took down their phone numbers and decided to check again the next day to see if they would be open.
After that I put Cali in the guest bathroom with the box, a towel, and some food and water. She wasn’t interested in the food. When I came back to check on her there was blood around her nose, so I was a bit concerned about internal bleeding, but there was nothing that could be done about that at that time so I just said a prayer and hoped for the best. When I made my last check-up with her before bed, Mercy popper her head around the doorframe. I guess she heard the mewing and her maternal instinct kicked in. Well, either that or her natural feline curiosity. Either way, I thought that her concern for the kitten was quite sweet.
When the next day rolled around we went to check if the vets were opened, but they weren’t. I guess that even though their signs said that they were open on public holidays, Merdeka Day was special.
So now she’s still in her little box in the bathroom. She hasn’t eaten or drank anything, but aside from being very tired and a bit cut up, she seems okay. We’re taking her to the vet tomorrow, hopefully she’ll be fixed up then.
Monday, August 31, 2009
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Excercising the Ol' Grey Matter
Lately I've been trying out new ways to stay awake in church. Coffee and Red Bull haven't helped, and standing up at the back gets tiring for a while, plus when I do that I have to fight the urge to start pacing. I used to read the Bible during sermons, but when I finished Esther and Nehemiah for the second time without coming across any better books I decided to give that up for a while, too.
Last week my sister was told by my dad to memorise the Beatitudes. I decided to see if I could memorize them before her. I could, but that was because my sister didn't even bother to begin memorizing them. Anyway, it kept me awake, so I decided to try and do the same thing with a different bit of the Bible this week. I picked 1 Corinthians 13 (the chapter that talks all about what love (or charity, for those of you with the King James Version) is) because I thought it might come in handy at a wedding, plus it was a very poetic piece of Paul's prose and thus easy to remember. Once again I managed to memorize it and once again it was a nice way to keep from falling asleep.
Next up I'll either do the Ten Commandments, Philemon (So I can say that I have memorized an entire book of the Bible), or that badass made-up verse that Samuel L. Jackson quoted before he killed dudes in Pulp Fiction. Should be fun.
Last week my sister was told by my dad to memorise the Beatitudes. I decided to see if I could memorize them before her. I could, but that was because my sister didn't even bother to begin memorizing them. Anyway, it kept me awake, so I decided to try and do the same thing with a different bit of the Bible this week. I picked 1 Corinthians 13 (the chapter that talks all about what love (or charity, for those of you with the King James Version) is) because I thought it might come in handy at a wedding, plus it was a very poetic piece of Paul's prose and thus easy to remember. Once again I managed to memorize it and once again it was a nice way to keep from falling asleep.
Next up I'll either do the Ten Commandments, Philemon (So I can say that I have memorized an entire book of the Bible), or that badass made-up verse that Samuel L. Jackson quoted before he killed dudes in Pulp Fiction. Should be fun.
Friday, August 28, 2009
A Rocky Start to the Second Semester
I woke up at 1pm today. Last night I stayed up late karaoke-ing and playing cards with my brother's friends while they waited for Mars to do something. In the end the cloud cover was too heavy but we had a good time anyway. The night ended for me at 2am, and so I got a sweet 11 hours of sleep. I'll miss that about semester break.
Anyway, the internet was still broken when I woke up. It had been down at my house for a day or so, and we were all just waiting for it to turn back on again. You see, the internet connection at my place is wonderfully shit. Every so often it will stop working. We can find nothing that causes it to die, it just dies. Then, a few days later, it will come back online for no reason. So it stops and starts without warning or cause and all we can do is endure it. Anyway, as of today I have been enduring it.
At around three o'clock I went to college to see if my results were out and to use the internet connection in the computer lab. I saw quite a few people in the hallway and met one of my friends who told me that the results were out. Before the words had even finished leaving his mouth I was sprinting down the hallway and hoping that I would see good things once I got to a computer.
When I sat down and logged in I saw that I got a Pass in Calculus, a High Distinction in Study Skill and Intermediate English, a Credit in Computing Principles, and a Credit in Malaysian Studies. I called my parents to tell them my results but I got voice mail both times. I also checked with some friends to see what results they got and what subjects and groups they were joining for the second semester.
I decided to postpone signing up for my subjects and groups until I knew what my friends were doing and what my dad wanted me to take. Just when I had navigated from my results to Facebook, my shoulder was smacked by a friend from last semester.
Joanna apparently thought that physical abuse was an appropriate way to greet a friend, so I ignored the hit and said hi. Then I noticed a few more friends around. We chatted for a bit, talked about our semester break and what we were going to do next semester, and then everyone had to go. Our first reunion was five minutes long, but it was okay.
My mum called me about my results and I told them to her, but she was talking to someone else and she did not sound suitably impressed so I am not sure if she heard me. I wonder if she knows that a High Distinction is better than a Credit. Eh, whatever.
I offered to drive Joanna home since I was always looking for excuses to practice my driving and I am hoping that all this nice guy cred I'm building up now will be useful at a later date if she is ever asked by other girls about me. =D
Anyway, I drove to a petrol station to fill up and then to KL Sentral to drop her off. On the way she was asking questions about a secret I was keeping, but I'm pretty sure that if you are only honestly answering yes/no questions then it is not breaking a promise to keep a secret. I hope so, at least. When that subject was dropped we talked about movies, and I discovered that she has a terrible taste in cinema. So now I know two pretty girls with almost identically shitty opinions on movies (Joanna, there is absolutely no way that GI Joe is a smarter movie than District 9, and I have no idea what would make you say that. Also, Pixar is amazing and their movies are not just for kids). I will have to do some asking around, maybe all attractive girls like crap films.
After I had dropped her off I got stuck in a jam for a while. Luckily I had bought a newspaper at the petrol station, so I read a bit about this statue in Senegal while I listened to the radio and waited for the cars to inch along. My suffering was finally ended when some traffic cops were deployed, and it was the first time I was happy to see those guys. I wrote a little poem for them actually. It took me about seven seconds, and it is terrible:
I am happy, happy as can be
Traffic police ended this dumb traffic jam for me
You actually have to sing it a little to make it work, but whatever. My point is the jam was over and that was nice.
When I got back home my dad called, and aside for some disappointment in the fact that I only just barely passed calculus instead of super-dominating in calculus and getting an über-distinction or something, he was really glad. I reminded him that he promised to reward me with either RM20 or RM50 for each High Distinction that I got, so I ended up RM100 richer. He said that I earned it. I love my dad. =D
Anyway the internet was still broken so after a nap I went downstairs to my friend's house to pay off a gambling debt and register for my subjects and groups. My dad said I could choose whatever subjects I wanted, so I signed up for Advanced English, Critical Thinking Skills, Economic Principles, and Engineering Mathematics Applications. My schedule is a mess, though, because everyone else had managed to sign up for all the good groups with wonderful class times thanks to their non-shit internet connections at home that totally worked. Lucky buggers.
So now all that's left to do is to go to college early tomorrow to see if I screwed anything up when I was registering and, after fixing whatever mistakes I made, pay the fees. When that's done I'll be all ready for the second semester. Should be fun.
Update: The night went on to be a lot of fun. I lost several hundred million (pretend) dollars in poker and generally had a great time. I also recently changed one of my electives from Economics Principles to Physics I. Physics is gonna be harder, but I'm also more interested in it and it pairs better with my Engineering. I just hope Physics isn't too hard, otherwise I might end up resitting next semester and costing my parents RM1400.
Also, what the heck is this?
Anyway, the internet was still broken when I woke up. It had been down at my house for a day or so, and we were all just waiting for it to turn back on again. You see, the internet connection at my place is wonderfully shit. Every so often it will stop working. We can find nothing that causes it to die, it just dies. Then, a few days later, it will come back online for no reason. So it stops and starts without warning or cause and all we can do is endure it. Anyway, as of today I have been enduring it.
At around three o'clock I went to college to see if my results were out and to use the internet connection in the computer lab. I saw quite a few people in the hallway and met one of my friends who told me that the results were out. Before the words had even finished leaving his mouth I was sprinting down the hallway and hoping that I would see good things once I got to a computer.
When I sat down and logged in I saw that I got a Pass in Calculus, a High Distinction in Study Skill and Intermediate English, a Credit in Computing Principles, and a Credit in Malaysian Studies. I called my parents to tell them my results but I got voice mail both times. I also checked with some friends to see what results they got and what subjects and groups they were joining for the second semester.
I decided to postpone signing up for my subjects and groups until I knew what my friends were doing and what my dad wanted me to take. Just when I had navigated from my results to Facebook, my shoulder was smacked by a friend from last semester.
Joanna apparently thought that physical abuse was an appropriate way to greet a friend, so I ignored the hit and said hi. Then I noticed a few more friends around. We chatted for a bit, talked about our semester break and what we were going to do next semester, and then everyone had to go. Our first reunion was five minutes long, but it was okay.
My mum called me about my results and I told them to her, but she was talking to someone else and she did not sound suitably impressed so I am not sure if she heard me. I wonder if she knows that a High Distinction is better than a Credit. Eh, whatever.
I offered to drive Joanna home since I was always looking for excuses to practice my driving and I am hoping that all this nice guy cred I'm building up now will be useful at a later date if she is ever asked by other girls about me. =D
Anyway, I drove to a petrol station to fill up and then to KL Sentral to drop her off. On the way she was asking questions about a secret I was keeping, but I'm pretty sure that if you are only honestly answering yes/no questions then it is not breaking a promise to keep a secret. I hope so, at least. When that subject was dropped we talked about movies, and I discovered that she has a terrible taste in cinema. So now I know two pretty girls with almost identically shitty opinions on movies (Joanna, there is absolutely no way that GI Joe is a smarter movie than District 9, and I have no idea what would make you say that. Also, Pixar is amazing and their movies are not just for kids). I will have to do some asking around, maybe all attractive girls like crap films.
After I had dropped her off I got stuck in a jam for a while. Luckily I had bought a newspaper at the petrol station, so I read a bit about this statue in Senegal while I listened to the radio and waited for the cars to inch along. My suffering was finally ended when some traffic cops were deployed, and it was the first time I was happy to see those guys. I wrote a little poem for them actually. It took me about seven seconds, and it is terrible:
I am happy, happy as can be
Traffic police ended this dumb traffic jam for me
You actually have to sing it a little to make it work, but whatever. My point is the jam was over and that was nice.
When I got back home my dad called, and aside for some disappointment in the fact that I only just barely passed calculus instead of super-dominating in calculus and getting an über-distinction or something, he was really glad. I reminded him that he promised to reward me with either RM20 or RM50 for each High Distinction that I got, so I ended up RM100 richer. He said that I earned it. I love my dad. =D
Anyway the internet was still broken so after a nap I went downstairs to my friend's house to pay off a gambling debt and register for my subjects and groups. My dad said I could choose whatever subjects I wanted, so I signed up for Advanced English, Critical Thinking Skills, Economic Principles, and Engineering Mathematics Applications. My schedule is a mess, though, because everyone else had managed to sign up for all the good groups with wonderful class times thanks to their non-shit internet connections at home that totally worked. Lucky buggers.
So now all that's left to do is to go to college early tomorrow to see if I screwed anything up when I was registering and, after fixing whatever mistakes I made, pay the fees. When that's done I'll be all ready for the second semester. Should be fun.
Update: The night went on to be a lot of fun. I lost several hundred million (pretend) dollars in poker and generally had a great time. I also recently changed one of my electives from Economics Principles to Physics I. Physics is gonna be harder, but I'm also more interested in it and it pairs better with my Engineering. I just hope Physics isn't too hard, otherwise I might end up resitting next semester and costing my parents RM1400.
Also, what the heck is this?
Man of the House
My older brother, Ian, is at a camp this weekend, and my parents will be in Singapore. On Sunday it will just be me and my younger siblings, Jan and Hannah. My mum gave me RM100 for food. My dad's also going to be giving me RM100, because I got two High Distinctions (and also because I didn't give up on walking the stairs three days a week even when my brothers did plus I spent RM35 refilling my maid's car). So far I've spent RM10 paying off a gambling debt, but hopefully that'll be the most irresponsible thing I do this weekend.
It's gonna be cool being the head of the household for a while.
It's gonna be cool being the head of the household for a while.
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Up, Sky Lounge, and Horses
I'm going to put some actual content in this blog sometime. Maybe some opinions or perhaps my feelings about something or someone, or an open letter, or a review or something. But for now here's another post about a day that I found slightly interesting.
So I was woken up at around noon today by my sister, Hannah, reminding me that I was taking her and her friend, Audrey, to see a movie today. After I had used too much styling gel to fix a case of bed hair, we climbed into my maid's Kancil and set off.
The first thing we did when we got to the mall was get the tickets. We were supposed to see I Love You Beth Cooper, but my brother told me that it sucked, so we decided to watch Up. Because Audrey had already seen Up before, we were going to watch it in 3D this time.
After we had the tickets, we went down for lunch at Burger King. The girls didn't really want to eat there, but I was pretty much broke except for the Touch n' Go credit in my MyKad, which could fortunately be used at Burger King, so that was where we went to eat. They were against the idea at first, but then I offered to buy them ice cream and that was how a decision was made.
We all ordered and ate too much at lunch, but it was awesome. We all affirmed our belief that Burger King was the best fast food restaurant, and Audrey was proved wrong about McDonald's having the best ice cream.
When we were done with lunch we went up to watch Up. The guys at the front barely glanced at the tickets and so the girls managed to get it for six bucks less with children's tickets. We took some 3D glasses and found our seats. The rest of the time until the movie started was spent examining the glasses trying not to break them and cause a RM200 fee.
The movie was great. When it was done I had decided that it was the best movie of the year. District 9 was awesome and perhaps more fun, but Up was better in different ways that were completely unrelated to people-exploding lightning guns, South African accents and flying death pigs.
After the movie we decided to follow the advice of one of the cinema ads and go check out the Vertigo Sky Lounge in Mont Kiara. The girls were a little surprised that they let us in, but once we were up there we saw one heck of an amazing place. Seriously, they had a jacuzzi in the freaking toilet. They had beanbags on the roof. They had a vending machine and a pool table and roughly a hundred comfy chairs. It was pretty rad.
When we were done touring a place too expensive to ever consider living in we went to the last stop, which was the place where Hannah and Audrey had their horse riding lessons. They wanted to see their favorite horse, and I wanted to see if there were any good looking riders that day. Well, at least they got what they hoped for.
Anyway, I almost got lost on the way home but instead I found a shortcut. Being able to drive is awesome.
So now that this post is done I am realizing that it is pretty boring. I guess it's a good thing then that I'm the only one reading these.
So I was woken up at around noon today by my sister, Hannah, reminding me that I was taking her and her friend, Audrey, to see a movie today. After I had used too much styling gel to fix a case of bed hair, we climbed into my maid's Kancil and set off.
The first thing we did when we got to the mall was get the tickets. We were supposed to see I Love You Beth Cooper, but my brother told me that it sucked, so we decided to watch Up. Because Audrey had already seen Up before, we were going to watch it in 3D this time.
After we had the tickets, we went down for lunch at Burger King. The girls didn't really want to eat there, but I was pretty much broke except for the Touch n' Go credit in my MyKad, which could fortunately be used at Burger King, so that was where we went to eat. They were against the idea at first, but then I offered to buy them ice cream and that was how a decision was made.
We all ordered and ate too much at lunch, but it was awesome. We all affirmed our belief that Burger King was the best fast food restaurant, and Audrey was proved wrong about McDonald's having the best ice cream.
When we were done with lunch we went up to watch Up. The guys at the front barely glanced at the tickets and so the girls managed to get it for six bucks less with children's tickets. We took some 3D glasses and found our seats. The rest of the time until the movie started was spent examining the glasses trying not to break them and cause a RM200 fee.
The movie was great. When it was done I had decided that it was the best movie of the year. District 9 was awesome and perhaps more fun, but Up was better in different ways that were completely unrelated to people-exploding lightning guns, South African accents and flying death pigs.
After the movie we decided to follow the advice of one of the cinema ads and go check out the Vertigo Sky Lounge in Mont Kiara. The girls were a little surprised that they let us in, but once we were up there we saw one heck of an amazing place. Seriously, they had a jacuzzi in the freaking toilet. They had beanbags on the roof. They had a vending machine and a pool table and roughly a hundred comfy chairs. It was pretty rad.
When we were done touring a place too expensive to ever consider living in we went to the last stop, which was the place where Hannah and Audrey had their horse riding lessons. They wanted to see their favorite horse, and I wanted to see if there were any good looking riders that day. Well, at least they got what they hoped for.
Anyway, I almost got lost on the way home but instead I found a shortcut. Being able to drive is awesome.
So now that this post is done I am realizing that it is pretty boring. I guess it's a good thing then that I'm the only one reading these.
Friday, August 21, 2009
HELP Orientation Night
So this post is not going to be as long as I pictured it would be. Oh well.
Anyway, in the early weeks of my first semester at HELP University College, I heard that there was going to be an orientation night. Apparently there would be food and games. The entry fee wasn't that steep, so I decided to go. I had a few friends coming along as well. The theme had something to do with the Middle East, but aside from minorly affecting the decorations, it had no effect on the rest of the night.
There were games (I did not win but I had a good time), performances (the dancing was amazing, the music was pretty good, too. Loved Creep and Push.), and food. I didn't eat any of the food, but I did overindulge in the drinks. I think it was orange cordial.
The highlight of the night was dancing. I kind of wanted to dance, but I wasn't really ready to get to the floor until I was egged on by a pair of pretty ladies (thank you Ashley and Juria). I had a lot of fun dancing, although I'm pretty sure that the entire time I looked like a total idiot. There was a tiny part of me that thought I was cool and people were cheering because my dancing was awesome, but mostly I knew they were cheering because it had been a while since someone had made such a shameless fool of themselves. It was really tiring stuff, and I tried to leave the dance floor a few times but Ashley and Juria kept calling me back in. The highlight of the night was when Ashley asked me if I had ever danced with a girl before and invited me to do so with her and Juria, so that was nice, even if it did only last ten seconds and I had no idea what I was doing the whole time.
When the night was over me and my friends went to McDonald's for dinner. I was parched and famished, so I was very very glad for french fries and a drink and a nice ice cream.
After the meal and saying goodnight to my friends, I went back down to college on the way to my motorcycle. The party was midway being cleaned up and I chatted with some of the organizers. The Orientation Night was mostly planned by our seniors, Ashley and Juria among them. I look forward to planning such a night during my second semester.
I went to my motorcycle with Ashley tagging along to have a look. I forget whether that was my idea or hers. Anyway, her description of it was "cute", which caught me by surprise. I was hoping for "awesome" or "badass", but yeah, it is a pretty small motorcycle. I drove it up to the front where Ashley called Juria to have a look, and my motorcycle was described as looking like "a puppy trying to be a bulldog". A wee bit emasculating, but I'd rather have them be impressed with its cuteness than have them not be impressed at all. I lent the motorcycle to a guy to have a ride around while I chatted with Juria. I found out that she was half-Dutch, too, which was awesome. Her dad's Dutch, my mum's Dutch. Her mum's a Malay, my dad's a Malaysian Chinese. Apparently a Dutch mixed parentage leads to very good looking children. After some more small talk I drove back home, and thus ended the night.
Oh yeah, at some point I was sitting down and I spilt my drink on someone. In the unlikely (haha, unlikely is an understatement) event that you, reading this, are the person I split my drink on, sorry. But yeah, that was the only downside of the night. Well, that and the video on my friend's phone of me spazzing out on the dance floor.
Anyway, in the early weeks of my first semester at HELP University College, I heard that there was going to be an orientation night. Apparently there would be food and games. The entry fee wasn't that steep, so I decided to go. I had a few friends coming along as well. The theme had something to do with the Middle East, but aside from minorly affecting the decorations, it had no effect on the rest of the night.
There were games (I did not win but I had a good time), performances (the dancing was amazing, the music was pretty good, too. Loved Creep and Push.), and food. I didn't eat any of the food, but I did overindulge in the drinks. I think it was orange cordial.
The highlight of the night was dancing. I kind of wanted to dance, but I wasn't really ready to get to the floor until I was egged on by a pair of pretty ladies (thank you Ashley and Juria). I had a lot of fun dancing, although I'm pretty sure that the entire time I looked like a total idiot. There was a tiny part of me that thought I was cool and people were cheering because my dancing was awesome, but mostly I knew they were cheering because it had been a while since someone had made such a shameless fool of themselves. It was really tiring stuff, and I tried to leave the dance floor a few times but Ashley and Juria kept calling me back in. The highlight of the night was when Ashley asked me if I had ever danced with a girl before and invited me to do so with her and Juria, so that was nice, even if it did only last ten seconds and I had no idea what I was doing the whole time.
When the night was over me and my friends went to McDonald's for dinner. I was parched and famished, so I was very very glad for french fries and a drink and a nice ice cream.
After the meal and saying goodnight to my friends, I went back down to college on the way to my motorcycle. The party was midway being cleaned up and I chatted with some of the organizers. The Orientation Night was mostly planned by our seniors, Ashley and Juria among them. I look forward to planning such a night during my second semester.
I went to my motorcycle with Ashley tagging along to have a look. I forget whether that was my idea or hers. Anyway, her description of it was "cute", which caught me by surprise. I was hoping for "awesome" or "badass", but yeah, it is a pretty small motorcycle. I drove it up to the front where Ashley called Juria to have a look, and my motorcycle was described as looking like "a puppy trying to be a bulldog". A wee bit emasculating, but I'd rather have them be impressed with its cuteness than have them not be impressed at all. I lent the motorcycle to a guy to have a ride around while I chatted with Juria. I found out that she was half-Dutch, too, which was awesome. Her dad's Dutch, my mum's Dutch. Her mum's a Malay, my dad's a Malaysian Chinese. Apparently a Dutch mixed parentage leads to very good looking children. After some more small talk I drove back home, and thus ended the night.
Oh yeah, at some point I was sitting down and I spilt my drink on someone. In the unlikely (haha, unlikely is an understatement) event that you, reading this, are the person I split my drink on, sorry. But yeah, that was the only downside of the night. Well, that and the video on my friend's phone of me spazzing out on the dance floor.
Thursday, August 20, 2009
Huh
So turns out I don't have a post about Orientation Night at college because I never wrote anything on the internet about it. I guess I know what my next post will be about then.
Not much else to write in this post, though I guess I can actually detail what happened today. Met up with some friends to watch a movie today. I invited 17 people, 2 showed up, 1 brought another friend, and I brought my brother. We got some tickets, I paid for my brother, we got some lunch, my brother paid for himself, I got some ice cream, I ended up sneaking it in the cinema in my coke, we thoroughly enjoyed the movie (seriously you guys District 9 is awesome, go watch it), we hung out a bit, and one of our friends dropped us home. Also I started a blog. So far it's okay.
Oh yeah, all the posts before this were copy-and-pasted directly from my Facebook notes, so some of them are out of order and they are referring to the wrong relative times and stuff. I guess I'll go back and fix that sometime.
Not much else to write in this post, though I guess I can actually detail what happened today. Met up with some friends to watch a movie today. I invited 17 people, 2 showed up, 1 brought another friend, and I brought my brother. We got some tickets, I paid for my brother, we got some lunch, my brother paid for himself, I got some ice cream, I ended up sneaking it in the cinema in my coke, we thoroughly enjoyed the movie (seriously you guys District 9 is awesome, go watch it), we hung out a bit, and one of our friends dropped us home. Also I started a blog. So far it's okay.
Oh yeah, all the posts before this were copy-and-pasted directly from my Facebook notes, so some of them are out of order and they are referring to the wrong relative times and stuff. I guess I'll go back and fix that sometime.
Poolside Monopoly
(Originally written on July 15th, 2009)
Today I took my bike home after college to pick up some books so I could do my homework at college. I worked in front of the class where the biology lecture was supposed to be held and there wasn't anybody there except the lecturer. He was an okay dude. In one and a half hours I managed to solve one calculus problem. When the class ended, two girls walked out. Apparently this was Biology 2. I did not know that the number at the back was the student count, but now I do. The more you know, eh?
The day was still salvagable, however. A bunch of friends were still hanging around and trying to think of somewhere to go to chill. After going through a list of malls and such we settled on my house because it was nearby and had a pool and I would buy a plate a fries from the restaurant we got by the pool.
We got to my house, enjoyed the view for a bit, took Monopoly down to the poolside and played for a while. Nobody wanted to sell anything to me even when I offered everything I had so I was the first guy who went bankrupt. After that I settled into my role as banker and gave advice to a girl who went on to win the game. I also bought everyone fries, but they were gone in a matter of minutes. We ended the game a bit early because there was a pretty clear winner already. At the start of the game I had said that the loser would get thrown into the pool, and they wanted me to follow through on that, so I took out my cell phone, keys, and wallet and stripped to my jeans. I did not manage to drag anyone in with me, but I did manage to soak someone with a hug.
Today I took my bike home after college to pick up some books so I could do my homework at college. I worked in front of the class where the biology lecture was supposed to be held and there wasn't anybody there except the lecturer. He was an okay dude. In one and a half hours I managed to solve one calculus problem. When the class ended, two girls walked out. Apparently this was Biology 2. I did not know that the number at the back was the student count, but now I do. The more you know, eh?
The day was still salvagable, however. A bunch of friends were still hanging around and trying to think of somewhere to go to chill. After going through a list of malls and such we settled on my house because it was nearby and had a pool and I would buy a plate a fries from the restaurant we got by the pool.
We got to my house, enjoyed the view for a bit, took Monopoly down to the poolside and played for a while. Nobody wanted to sell anything to me even when I offered everything I had so I was the first guy who went bankrupt. After that I settled into my role as banker and gave advice to a girl who went on to win the game. I also bought everyone fries, but they were gone in a matter of minutes. We ended the game a bit early because there was a pretty clear winner already. At the start of the game I had said that the loser would get thrown into the pool, and they wanted me to follow through on that, so I took out my cell phone, keys, and wallet and stripped to my jeans. I did not manage to drag anyone in with me, but I did manage to soak someone with a hug.
Movie Night
(This one's not from Facebook so it is out of order from the rest of them. It was originally written on July 17th, 2009)
So tonight there was a movie night/pajama party at college to raise funds for something or other. I went because my crush had convinced me to buy a ticket and because she was going to be there. Most people had pretty loose definitions of pajamas, but I wore the exact stuff I sleep in: clothes that are light, comfortable, and rather hideous. When the movie started, I managed to get a set next to her. She had brought along a girl from high school who was one of her old friends. The movie was Quarantine, and she spent more than half of the movie with her hands in front of her face or her fingers in her ears. I honestly didn't find it that scary. It was predictable enough that nothing shocked me, and I saw all the twists coming (I knew the CDC had snipers outside the windows and would shoot the first guy that tried to use that to get out, I knew that the infection was mutated rabies when the dude started describing the symptoms, I knew that there was some lab up in the building rented by that Boston guy who only dropped by every few months that was probably the cause of the infection, etc, etc) but the girls and the dude in front of me were pretty scared. At one point I leaned in front to tell the dude that the virus was pretty much exactly like Left 4 Dead and he practically jumped out of his seat. That was great. Unfortunately the girls huddled with each other so I did not get my hand grabbed during a scary part or anything like that.
After the movie was over we played Taboo. The night went downhill a bit after that. I got "Booby trap", "Bill Clinton", and "Kiss-and-tell", and the descriptions I used were hardly PG. One of my guesses ("When your phone is in silent mode it..." "Vibrates?! Vibrations?! Vibrator?!") was pretty lewd, too. So yeah, now most of the people who went that night think that I am some kind of pervert.
Anyway when everyone else went home I went with the L4D dude to get some McDonald's. Apparently he recognized me from this public speaking thing I went to ages ago when I was still homeschooling, and he asked about a dude we know whose brother (a friend of my brother) was staying over at my place for the last week or so. That was a bit of a coincidence.
All in all it was an okay night. I could've done with less provocative cards, honestly, but whatever.
So tonight there was a movie night/pajama party at college to raise funds for something or other. I went because my crush had convinced me to buy a ticket and because she was going to be there. Most people had pretty loose definitions of pajamas, but I wore the exact stuff I sleep in: clothes that are light, comfortable, and rather hideous. When the movie started, I managed to get a set next to her. She had brought along a girl from high school who was one of her old friends. The movie was Quarantine, and she spent more than half of the movie with her hands in front of her face or her fingers in her ears. I honestly didn't find it that scary. It was predictable enough that nothing shocked me, and I saw all the twists coming (I knew the CDC had snipers outside the windows and would shoot the first guy that tried to use that to get out, I knew that the infection was mutated rabies when the dude started describing the symptoms, I knew that there was some lab up in the building rented by that Boston guy who only dropped by every few months that was probably the cause of the infection, etc, etc) but the girls and the dude in front of me were pretty scared. At one point I leaned in front to tell the dude that the virus was pretty much exactly like Left 4 Dead and he practically jumped out of his seat. That was great. Unfortunately the girls huddled with each other so I did not get my hand grabbed during a scary part or anything like that.
After the movie was over we played Taboo. The night went downhill a bit after that. I got "Booby trap", "Bill Clinton", and "Kiss-and-tell", and the descriptions I used were hardly PG. One of my guesses ("When your phone is in silent mode it..." "Vibrates?! Vibrations?! Vibrator?!") was pretty lewd, too. So yeah, now most of the people who went that night think that I am some kind of pervert.
Anyway when everyone else went home I went with the L4D dude to get some McDonald's. Apparently he recognized me from this public speaking thing I went to ages ago when I was still homeschooling, and he asked about a dude we know whose brother (a friend of my brother) was staying over at my place for the last week or so. That was a bit of a coincidence.
All in all it was an okay night. I could've done with less provocative cards, honestly, but whatever.
MTV World Stage Live in Malaysia '09
(Originally written on the 16th of August, 2009)
So yesterday (and the first few hours of today) was pretty awesome. I started out waking up at 6am and getting ready for BB. Putting on my contact lenses (that I had got a few days ago specifically for this occasion) went quite quick. Once my uniform was in order and I had everything packed, I took my maid's Kancil and drove all the way to Cheras. BB was alright, although I got a little tired of explaining my sunburn to people who asked why I was so red.
After leaving early and skipping a planning meeting (what a tragedy, eh?), I drove myself all the way back to Bangsar to get ready for the concert. Took a shower, shaved, changed into some nice clothes, used the mouth wash I got for free from a McDonald's breakfast meal, packed some clothes for the afterparty, and put some gel in my hair (with my mum's help. Fashion is not my strong point). After that I had some brunch. Mmm, bacon and eggs. When that was done it was time to drive all the way to Sunway, but not before stopping by at college to get a hundred bucks spending money and a quick internet fix (the 'net at my house broke a couple days ago and none of us felt like going through the headache of fixing it), but the computer lab was closed on Saturdays so I had to just settle for the ATM money.
When I got to Sunway it was around one o'clock. I got myself some outdoor parking (of which there was plenty, surprisingly) and then proceeded to the nearest internet cafe. An hour later I went to check the line for the mosh pit tickets. Only one group of people was waiting and nobody was manning the counters, so I decided to go for a walk around. I wandered around the hotel to get a look at the concert area, had lunch at Popeyes (better than KFC, worse than Hartz Chicken Buffet), and tried to find some books at Popular and MPH (Neither have Watchmen OR the Zombie Survival Guide. For some reason the last book they had in stock for the latter was classified in the Junior Readers area of Popular). When all that was done I returned to the line and found Nadia and Effie, my friends from college, already had a place in the now-long line, and so I joined them. We chatted for a while and they went off to the toilet. While they were gone, the drummer from Boys Like Girls showed up with some people from MTV Korea. The crowd was pretty enthusiastic. I called the girls, but they came too late. They were around to see me get interviewed by MTV Korea, so that was nice. I hope that clip shows up on YouTube, even if I don't understand it.
We waited in line some more and made a new friend, Pajol. We were all wondering when the line would start to move because each of our letters had different opening times listed for the mosh pit registration. Nadia and Effie's letter said 4:30, mine said 4:00, and Pajol's ticket said 3:30. In the meanwhile we saw a senior from our college outside the line. I asked if she wanted to join us in our spot near-ish to the front, but she was okay where she was. Some other guy behind us claimed to be from HELP, too, but I didn't recognize any of the lecturers he named, so he stayed where he was. The line finally started moving at around 3:45 and I ran off quickly to get some drinks. Red Bull for the girls, Pepsi for myself. We reached the counter before we could finish the drinks and were forced to leave a can of Red Bull behind as no food or drinks were allowed. They gave us our wet weather wear, wrist band slash entry ticket, and a fan, and on we went.
On our way to the pit we met another friend from college, JiaYin. She had the red pass, though, so she was outside the pit in the main audience area. We managed to scream a bit of conversation back and forth for a bit before heading on into the pit. The whole surf pool in Sunway had been drained for the event, and the mosh pit was right at the start of the pool near the stage. It was pretty huge. The stage was separated from the pit by about a sidewalk's width, so there wasn't a chance of reaching out and touching the band. The whole front was filled with people up against the barrier anyway, so we decided to just hang back, take pictures, and enjoy the music videos from the bands that they were looping on the screens on either side of the stage. Michael Jackson got played a little, too, but aside from that the screen was only showing commercials and songs from the bands who would be performing later on. It started drizzling at one point, but I decided not to wear the wet weather wear because I had a spare change of clothes in the car and I look sexier wet anyway. A little before the show started we met my Study Skills lecturer, Miss Selena, and her boyfriend, who apparently had the connections to get them tickets to the mosh pit. Cool guy. We also met up with our senior from HELP again, and I recognized her as Ashley. I'm a bit surprised I didn't recognize her earlier, since she and Juria had been the ones to convince me to dance on Orientation Night at college. She'd also got me to join a dance competition. I also saw the guy from Fly.fm who had given me and Elo our mosh pit tickets and I made sure to thank him.
The show started right when I was taking Miss Selena to see JiaYin, so as far as I know those two didn't see each other that night. The opening act was this local guy who was without a backing band although he had some pretty sweet MJ-esque dance moves. When we pushed our way to the front we could see that the crowd was more focused on Boys Like Girls, who were standing backstage. When the opening act was over there was a long break of nothing as Nadia, Effie, Pajol and I tried to get closer to the front without much success and the crew prepared the stage for the bands. A DJ came out and got the crowd pumped with a mix that started with "Smells Like Teen Spirit", which I felt quite awesome for recognizing. Some more stuff happened with the VJs and stuff but I have either forgotten about it or I can't be arsed to write about it.
The first band up was a local band, Estranged. Their bassist wore a kimono and what could be described as a mime mask. That was pretty cool. It was loud, their songs were powerful enough to keep the crowd pumping. I managed to inch a wee bit closer to the front.
After some more VJ silliness and some T-shirt giveaways it was time for Boys Like Girls. The crowd was very excited when they came on stage, and their performance was great. They started off by graciously calling for the crowd to cheer for all the other bands. They were pretty smart about that, because so far Boys Like Girls seemed to be the only band on the crowd's mind, so it was nice of them to acknowledge that there were other bands there too. I liked how they played the intro to Move Along when they mentioned the All-American Rejects. That solidified their awesomeness to me. When they started playing their songs it was amazing. I had a great time pumping my arm in the air and attempting to jump around and such. The band was throwing guitar picks out like candy, and every time one landed the people nearest would try and go for it and the people near them would use the distraction to squeeze closer to the front. They also threw out their towels, water bottles, and water inside said bottles for the crowd to enjoy. I managed to grab a bottle cap when I had bent down to look for a thrown pick, so that was okay. The band closed their performance with The Great Escape, and they really saved the best for last. The lead singer climbed the scaffolding on the side of the stage to sing the chorus, and the lead guitarist climbed right down to the front of the mosh pit barrier to get up close with the audience. Nadia and Effie weren't quite close enough to touch him, but it was great anyway. The only downside was when someone at the back threw a fan forward and it hit me on the head. I don't care if it was made of paper, it still hurt. People kept throwing things forward the rest of the concert. Not really sure why, probably because they're idiots.
When Boys Like Girls left the stage they announced a short break. We went out and bought some overpriced drinks. We decided to sit down 'till the next performance as we were pretty tired out. The rain had stopped a while back, so we found a place on the right side of the mosh pit to spread out some wet weather gear to sit down on and chillaxed. I massaged the girls' backs and Pajol took a few more pictures while we waited. Next up was Raygun, a pretty awesome British band. I decided to stand up when I saw some actual moshing taking place. It was pretty mild, just a dozen or so dudes running into each other and doing some crazy dancing and having a great time, but it was still nice to see some moshing in the mosh pit instead of the normal concert stuff that everyone else was doing. Effie and I danced near them for a while, but we didn't join in. I was tempted to a couple of times, but ultimately I decided against it. Raygun's performance was a nice surprise. It was very energetic so I didn't have a hard time getting pumped up to dance to it.
After that was Pixie Lott and Hoobastank. Pixie Lott was okay, but I was seated for most of her time on stage. Effie went to the front during their performance, and we caught up with her during the break when the VJs were throwing out free stuff. We were quite close to the front again, even if we were a bit off-center. Hoobastank was really good. They got some great audience participation during their songs, and I guess I had the most fun during their time on stage. When it was about time for them to end, the lead singer told everyone that he was gonna "test how well you know your music". Since all the other bands had been saving up their most famous hits for last, everyone was ready for The Reason, so it was even more awesome when they surprised us with Ghostbusters. When that was done they had everyone join in together for The Reason.
When that was done it was time for the band that most of the people had come to see. The All-American Rejects made an impressive entrance with Dirty Little Secret. The lead singer wore a green singlet and he was covered in body glitter, which was just insane enough to be awesome. Once again, picks and water bottles were liberally distributed among the crowd. Their songs were incredible and everyone had a great time. They closed with Gives You Hell, and the lead singer climbed the scaffolding on the other side of the stage from the one that Boys Like Girls had climbed. The only strange thing was that they didn't play Move Along, which meant that anyone who went for that song had to be satisfied with what they got from Boys Like Girls, which I find a bit ironic.
After the All-American Rejects, most of the crowd left and the rest sat down. I can't imagine that Kasabian, the next band, were too happy about that. They played for a really long time, and then they came back for an encore. They were okay, I guess, but it was a bit upsetting that when I finally got to the front all I did was fan myself and lean against the barrier because of how unenthusiastic I was. The crowd was also getting rowdy, and some stuff got thrown on stage. Security moved in to the barrier between the stage and the crowd, which was kind of pointless because they were still cut off from both the musicians and the crowd. A couple of people managed to break the rules and crowd surf and the security was helpless to do anything except wave their flashlights in their general direction.
When the show was finally over, we headed up to see about going to the afterparty. The girls and Pajol went to 7-11 to top up their credit and I went to my car to get changed. After I was nice and fresh I met up with them and we went to wait in line. I told Nadia to give me ten minutes in line and if no significant progress had been made then I would give up and we could just go get something to eat. The ten minutes expired and I only moved a few steps in front. I pleaded for one more minute and got it. Sure enough, the line surged forward. At the new rate we would be at the front in ten minutes. Nadia reluctantly joined me. After a while of waiting I went to the front of the line to see if they were checking ID. Apparently it was just a quick pat-down and a check that you had the concert ticket/wristband thing. I got back in line and soon we were near the door. Just then someone at the counter asked for our invitations. I hadn't noticed that you needed to have an invitation from the sponsors before going in. We left the line and wandered about looking for something to eat before saying our goodbyes to Effie and Pajol.
I was driving Nadia home, so we walked to the car and tried to figure out how to leave the parking lot. I found the autopay machines, rejoiced at the low low ticket price of RM3, got back into the car, and reversed into another Kancil. Fortunately it was full of friendly dudes who assessed that no major damage had been done and I shouldn't worry about it. I was very very relieved and thanked them as I left. My pattern of only having car accidents at slow speeds when parking and leaving parking areas remained unbroken.
Nadia and I talked along the way back and got lost a few times, but eventually we made it to a McDonald's near her house. I was shafted with some half-hour old fries while she got a nice fresh batch. We lost our appetites somewhere near the end of the meal and made our way back to the car. I had forgotten to turn the lights off, but the battery still worked. We passed a police roadblock one the way to her house, but apparently I was too white to be checked and they let me pass without any hassle.
After I dropped Nadia off I tried to navigate my way back while singing off-key to myself. I ended up taking a five-ringgit shortcut through the empty KLCC parking lot and popping out in a totally unfamiliar part of town. After driving around a bit I was just about to admit I was totally lost when I looked to the right and saw the tallest buildings in the country staring me in the face. From there it wasn't too hard to find my way back.
So yesterday (and the first few hours of today) was pretty awesome. I started out waking up at 6am and getting ready for BB. Putting on my contact lenses (that I had got a few days ago specifically for this occasion) went quite quick. Once my uniform was in order and I had everything packed, I took my maid's Kancil and drove all the way to Cheras. BB was alright, although I got a little tired of explaining my sunburn to people who asked why I was so red.
After leaving early and skipping a planning meeting (what a tragedy, eh?), I drove myself all the way back to Bangsar to get ready for the concert. Took a shower, shaved, changed into some nice clothes, used the mouth wash I got for free from a McDonald's breakfast meal, packed some clothes for the afterparty, and put some gel in my hair (with my mum's help. Fashion is not my strong point). After that I had some brunch. Mmm, bacon and eggs. When that was done it was time to drive all the way to Sunway, but not before stopping by at college to get a hundred bucks spending money and a quick internet fix (the 'net at my house broke a couple days ago and none of us felt like going through the headache of fixing it), but the computer lab was closed on Saturdays so I had to just settle for the ATM money.
When I got to Sunway it was around one o'clock. I got myself some outdoor parking (of which there was plenty, surprisingly) and then proceeded to the nearest internet cafe. An hour later I went to check the line for the mosh pit tickets. Only one group of people was waiting and nobody was manning the counters, so I decided to go for a walk around. I wandered around the hotel to get a look at the concert area, had lunch at Popeyes (better than KFC, worse than Hartz Chicken Buffet), and tried to find some books at Popular and MPH (Neither have Watchmen OR the Zombie Survival Guide. For some reason the last book they had in stock for the latter was classified in the Junior Readers area of Popular). When all that was done I returned to the line and found Nadia and Effie, my friends from college, already had a place in the now-long line, and so I joined them. We chatted for a while and they went off to the toilet. While they were gone, the drummer from Boys Like Girls showed up with some people from MTV Korea. The crowd was pretty enthusiastic. I called the girls, but they came too late. They were around to see me get interviewed by MTV Korea, so that was nice. I hope that clip shows up on YouTube, even if I don't understand it.
We waited in line some more and made a new friend, Pajol. We were all wondering when the line would start to move because each of our letters had different opening times listed for the mosh pit registration. Nadia and Effie's letter said 4:30, mine said 4:00, and Pajol's ticket said 3:30. In the meanwhile we saw a senior from our college outside the line. I asked if she wanted to join us in our spot near-ish to the front, but she was okay where she was. Some other guy behind us claimed to be from HELP, too, but I didn't recognize any of the lecturers he named, so he stayed where he was. The line finally started moving at around 3:45 and I ran off quickly to get some drinks. Red Bull for the girls, Pepsi for myself. We reached the counter before we could finish the drinks and were forced to leave a can of Red Bull behind as no food or drinks were allowed. They gave us our wet weather wear, wrist band slash entry ticket, and a fan, and on we went.
On our way to the pit we met another friend from college, JiaYin. She had the red pass, though, so she was outside the pit in the main audience area. We managed to scream a bit of conversation back and forth for a bit before heading on into the pit. The whole surf pool in Sunway had been drained for the event, and the mosh pit was right at the start of the pool near the stage. It was pretty huge. The stage was separated from the pit by about a sidewalk's width, so there wasn't a chance of reaching out and touching the band. The whole front was filled with people up against the barrier anyway, so we decided to just hang back, take pictures, and enjoy the music videos from the bands that they were looping on the screens on either side of the stage. Michael Jackson got played a little, too, but aside from that the screen was only showing commercials and songs from the bands who would be performing later on. It started drizzling at one point, but I decided not to wear the wet weather wear because I had a spare change of clothes in the car and I look sexier wet anyway. A little before the show started we met my Study Skills lecturer, Miss Selena, and her boyfriend, who apparently had the connections to get them tickets to the mosh pit. Cool guy. We also met up with our senior from HELP again, and I recognized her as Ashley. I'm a bit surprised I didn't recognize her earlier, since she and Juria had been the ones to convince me to dance on Orientation Night at college. She'd also got me to join a dance competition. I also saw the guy from Fly.fm who had given me and Elo our mosh pit tickets and I made sure to thank him.
The show started right when I was taking Miss Selena to see JiaYin, so as far as I know those two didn't see each other that night. The opening act was this local guy who was without a backing band although he had some pretty sweet MJ-esque dance moves. When we pushed our way to the front we could see that the crowd was more focused on Boys Like Girls, who were standing backstage. When the opening act was over there was a long break of nothing as Nadia, Effie, Pajol and I tried to get closer to the front without much success and the crew prepared the stage for the bands. A DJ came out and got the crowd pumped with a mix that started with "Smells Like Teen Spirit", which I felt quite awesome for recognizing. Some more stuff happened with the VJs and stuff but I have either forgotten about it or I can't be arsed to write about it.
The first band up was a local band, Estranged. Their bassist wore a kimono and what could be described as a mime mask. That was pretty cool. It was loud, their songs were powerful enough to keep the crowd pumping. I managed to inch a wee bit closer to the front.
After some more VJ silliness and some T-shirt giveaways it was time for Boys Like Girls. The crowd was very excited when they came on stage, and their performance was great. They started off by graciously calling for the crowd to cheer for all the other bands. They were pretty smart about that, because so far Boys Like Girls seemed to be the only band on the crowd's mind, so it was nice of them to acknowledge that there were other bands there too. I liked how they played the intro to Move Along when they mentioned the All-American Rejects. That solidified their awesomeness to me. When they started playing their songs it was amazing. I had a great time pumping my arm in the air and attempting to jump around and such. The band was throwing guitar picks out like candy, and every time one landed the people nearest would try and go for it and the people near them would use the distraction to squeeze closer to the front. They also threw out their towels, water bottles, and water inside said bottles for the crowd to enjoy. I managed to grab a bottle cap when I had bent down to look for a thrown pick, so that was okay. The band closed their performance with The Great Escape, and they really saved the best for last. The lead singer climbed the scaffolding on the side of the stage to sing the chorus, and the lead guitarist climbed right down to the front of the mosh pit barrier to get up close with the audience. Nadia and Effie weren't quite close enough to touch him, but it was great anyway. The only downside was when someone at the back threw a fan forward and it hit me on the head. I don't care if it was made of paper, it still hurt. People kept throwing things forward the rest of the concert. Not really sure why, probably because they're idiots.
When Boys Like Girls left the stage they announced a short break. We went out and bought some overpriced drinks. We decided to sit down 'till the next performance as we were pretty tired out. The rain had stopped a while back, so we found a place on the right side of the mosh pit to spread out some wet weather gear to sit down on and chillaxed. I massaged the girls' backs and Pajol took a few more pictures while we waited. Next up was Raygun, a pretty awesome British band. I decided to stand up when I saw some actual moshing taking place. It was pretty mild, just a dozen or so dudes running into each other and doing some crazy dancing and having a great time, but it was still nice to see some moshing in the mosh pit instead of the normal concert stuff that everyone else was doing. Effie and I danced near them for a while, but we didn't join in. I was tempted to a couple of times, but ultimately I decided against it. Raygun's performance was a nice surprise. It was very energetic so I didn't have a hard time getting pumped up to dance to it.
After that was Pixie Lott and Hoobastank. Pixie Lott was okay, but I was seated for most of her time on stage. Effie went to the front during their performance, and we caught up with her during the break when the VJs were throwing out free stuff. We were quite close to the front again, even if we were a bit off-center. Hoobastank was really good. They got some great audience participation during their songs, and I guess I had the most fun during their time on stage. When it was about time for them to end, the lead singer told everyone that he was gonna "test how well you know your music". Since all the other bands had been saving up their most famous hits for last, everyone was ready for The Reason, so it was even more awesome when they surprised us with Ghostbusters. When that was done they had everyone join in together for The Reason.
When that was done it was time for the band that most of the people had come to see. The All-American Rejects made an impressive entrance with Dirty Little Secret. The lead singer wore a green singlet and he was covered in body glitter, which was just insane enough to be awesome. Once again, picks and water bottles were liberally distributed among the crowd. Their songs were incredible and everyone had a great time. They closed with Gives You Hell, and the lead singer climbed the scaffolding on the other side of the stage from the one that Boys Like Girls had climbed. The only strange thing was that they didn't play Move Along, which meant that anyone who went for that song had to be satisfied with what they got from Boys Like Girls, which I find a bit ironic.
After the All-American Rejects, most of the crowd left and the rest sat down. I can't imagine that Kasabian, the next band, were too happy about that. They played for a really long time, and then they came back for an encore. They were okay, I guess, but it was a bit upsetting that when I finally got to the front all I did was fan myself and lean against the barrier because of how unenthusiastic I was. The crowd was also getting rowdy, and some stuff got thrown on stage. Security moved in to the barrier between the stage and the crowd, which was kind of pointless because they were still cut off from both the musicians and the crowd. A couple of people managed to break the rules and crowd surf and the security was helpless to do anything except wave their flashlights in their general direction.
When the show was finally over, we headed up to see about going to the afterparty. The girls and Pajol went to 7-11 to top up their credit and I went to my car to get changed. After I was nice and fresh I met up with them and we went to wait in line. I told Nadia to give me ten minutes in line and if no significant progress had been made then I would give up and we could just go get something to eat. The ten minutes expired and I only moved a few steps in front. I pleaded for one more minute and got it. Sure enough, the line surged forward. At the new rate we would be at the front in ten minutes. Nadia reluctantly joined me. After a while of waiting I went to the front of the line to see if they were checking ID. Apparently it was just a quick pat-down and a check that you had the concert ticket/wristband thing. I got back in line and soon we were near the door. Just then someone at the counter asked for our invitations. I hadn't noticed that you needed to have an invitation from the sponsors before going in. We left the line and wandered about looking for something to eat before saying our goodbyes to Effie and Pajol.
I was driving Nadia home, so we walked to the car and tried to figure out how to leave the parking lot. I found the autopay machines, rejoiced at the low low ticket price of RM3, got back into the car, and reversed into another Kancil. Fortunately it was full of friendly dudes who assessed that no major damage had been done and I shouldn't worry about it. I was very very relieved and thanked them as I left. My pattern of only having car accidents at slow speeds when parking and leaving parking areas remained unbroken.
Nadia and I talked along the way back and got lost a few times, but eventually we made it to a McDonald's near her house. I was shafted with some half-hour old fries while she got a nice fresh batch. We lost our appetites somewhere near the end of the meal and made our way back to the car. I had forgotten to turn the lights off, but the battery still worked. We passed a police roadblock one the way to her house, but apparently I was too white to be checked and they let me pass without any hassle.
After I dropped Nadia off I tried to navigate my way back while singing off-key to myself. I ended up taking a five-ringgit shortcut through the empty KLCC parking lot and popping out in a totally unfamiliar part of town. After driving around a bit I was just about to admit I was totally lost when I looked to the right and saw the tallest buildings in the country staring me in the face. From there it wasn't too hard to find my way back.
Accident
(Originally written on the 28th of July, 2009. Also apparently tags are sorted alphabetically, not in the order you wrote them. That kinda spoils the joke I had in mind. Oh well.)
I got into my first major accident today. Previously I had just scraped a couple cars against stationary objects with barely noticeable results. Today, however, I was on my motorcycle, so the accident potential was a lot higher and the results were potentially a lot worse.
I had pulled out of the college parking lot and was waiting for a break in traffic when this girl pulled up next to me in a car that was blocking my view of most of the road. When I saw that the road was clear, I looked to my left to see if anyone was coming along the other side of the road. The car prevented me from seeing anything, but the driver was nodding towards the road with her head, so I assumed she meant that it was clear for me to go. In retrospect, she was probably just indicating she wanted me to go first after the traffic cleared.
A couple seconds later I was lying on the road with cars beeping and rushing past. My shoulder ached a bit, but I was still alright enough to stand and push my motorcycle to the side of the road, shift the gear back to neutral, turn off the engine and kick down the stand. The guy who had hit me (or who I had hit) was lying underneath his motorcycle, and before I could hobble over to help him up a taxi had stopped and carried him to the curb. My motorcycle's stand was being a bit wobbly and my shoulder was starting to get more sore as the adrenaline wore off, and soon I was sitting on the curb with my motorcycle on top of me. Another person who had stopped to help came to my aid and moved the motorcycle further down the road and put it on its stand properly.
After that, I called up my friend to tell her I couldn't drop her off anymore as I had been in an accident. I filled in some contact details for the other guy's coworker and asked how he was doing. Then I called up my dad told him what had happened. He said that he was coming over soon with my brother.
My injuries weren't so bad. I had a hole in my pants near my pocket, some road rash on my left arm, a scraped knee, and a sore shoulder. The other guy's knee was hurt pretty bad and his arm wasn't so great either. He also had a gash on his calf, but it was all scarred up and thus quite obviously an old injury. I was relieved. If I had caused something like that I would have a hard time forgiving myself. I took out a chocolate bar from my bag and offered it to him, but he wasn't interested so I ate it instead. He was much more occupied with telling passers-by that it was "Salahnya", which I admitted to in English every time since it obviously was my fault for rushing blindly into traffic. His friend asked me if I "boleh faham Bahasa Melayu" and I responded in the affirmative, but I added that I don't really speak it that well, I can just understand what's being said. After his friend relayed this information to him he turned to me and said "Bodoh". After a few moments of consideration he added "Cibai". I told him I was sorry and that it was totally my fault. We didn't say anything after that.
I had time to do some thinking before my dad arrived. I was able to reflect on how I should've inched forward and checked the road before driving, or how I perhaps should've waited for the car to go before going myself, or how great my day was going to be if I had made it home safely. The last point in particular stung quite badly, since I would've swapped my motorcycle for a car, returned to college to pick up my friend, and enjoyed the company of an intelligent and pretty girl all the way to Sentul and the latest hits on the radio all the way back. Oh well, shit happens.
When my dad came, he gave the other guy his contact number. My brother got the motorcycle working again and drove it off to get repaired. The guy was loaded into a car and driven off to the hospital while his coworker took his motorcycle away. I went with my dad to the clinic to get cleaned up.
The doctor cleaned my wounds and gave me a tetanus jab while chatting with my dad, and added that my shoulder should probably be x-rayed because it wasn't bruised or anything externally even though it hurt whenever I moved it.
So after stopping off at home for a quick bite and some show-and-tell with my siblings, my brother and my dad took me to the hospital for an x-ray. Unfortunately, the x-ray machine is only open during office hours, and so we decided to visit my mum instead. She was quite concerned and I had to reassure her a few times that I wasn't any paler than usual and the only thing that actually hurt was my shoulder, and even that only when I moved it.
Now that I'm home I've had time to go through the whole thing and see what can be learnt. I guess all I can say is that you should really look all the way down the road before heading off. It was a painful lesson, but you can be damn sure that I'll be looking twice from now on.
I got into my first major accident today. Previously I had just scraped a couple cars against stationary objects with barely noticeable results. Today, however, I was on my motorcycle, so the accident potential was a lot higher and the results were potentially a lot worse.
I had pulled out of the college parking lot and was waiting for a break in traffic when this girl pulled up next to me in a car that was blocking my view of most of the road. When I saw that the road was clear, I looked to my left to see if anyone was coming along the other side of the road. The car prevented me from seeing anything, but the driver was nodding towards the road with her head, so I assumed she meant that it was clear for me to go. In retrospect, she was probably just indicating she wanted me to go first after the traffic cleared.
A couple seconds later I was lying on the road with cars beeping and rushing past. My shoulder ached a bit, but I was still alright enough to stand and push my motorcycle to the side of the road, shift the gear back to neutral, turn off the engine and kick down the stand. The guy who had hit me (or who I had hit) was lying underneath his motorcycle, and before I could hobble over to help him up a taxi had stopped and carried him to the curb. My motorcycle's stand was being a bit wobbly and my shoulder was starting to get more sore as the adrenaline wore off, and soon I was sitting on the curb with my motorcycle on top of me. Another person who had stopped to help came to my aid and moved the motorcycle further down the road and put it on its stand properly.
After that, I called up my friend to tell her I couldn't drop her off anymore as I had been in an accident. I filled in some contact details for the other guy's coworker and asked how he was doing. Then I called up my dad told him what had happened. He said that he was coming over soon with my brother.
My injuries weren't so bad. I had a hole in my pants near my pocket, some road rash on my left arm, a scraped knee, and a sore shoulder. The other guy's knee was hurt pretty bad and his arm wasn't so great either. He also had a gash on his calf, but it was all scarred up and thus quite obviously an old injury. I was relieved. If I had caused something like that I would have a hard time forgiving myself. I took out a chocolate bar from my bag and offered it to him, but he wasn't interested so I ate it instead. He was much more occupied with telling passers-by that it was "Salahnya", which I admitted to in English every time since it obviously was my fault for rushing blindly into traffic. His friend asked me if I "boleh faham Bahasa Melayu" and I responded in the affirmative, but I added that I don't really speak it that well, I can just understand what's being said. After his friend relayed this information to him he turned to me and said "Bodoh". After a few moments of consideration he added "Cibai". I told him I was sorry and that it was totally my fault. We didn't say anything after that.
I had time to do some thinking before my dad arrived. I was able to reflect on how I should've inched forward and checked the road before driving, or how I perhaps should've waited for the car to go before going myself, or how great my day was going to be if I had made it home safely. The last point in particular stung quite badly, since I would've swapped my motorcycle for a car, returned to college to pick up my friend, and enjoyed the company of an intelligent and pretty girl all the way to Sentul and the latest hits on the radio all the way back. Oh well, shit happens.
When my dad came, he gave the other guy his contact number. My brother got the motorcycle working again and drove it off to get repaired. The guy was loaded into a car and driven off to the hospital while his coworker took his motorcycle away. I went with my dad to the clinic to get cleaned up.
The doctor cleaned my wounds and gave me a tetanus jab while chatting with my dad, and added that my shoulder should probably be x-rayed because it wasn't bruised or anything externally even though it hurt whenever I moved it.
So after stopping off at home for a quick bite and some show-and-tell with my siblings, my brother and my dad took me to the hospital for an x-ray. Unfortunately, the x-ray machine is only open during office hours, and so we decided to visit my mum instead. She was quite concerned and I had to reassure her a few times that I wasn't any paler than usual and the only thing that actually hurt was my shoulder, and even that only when I moved it.
Now that I'm home I've had time to go through the whole thing and see what can be learnt. I guess all I can say is that you should really look all the way down the road before heading off. It was a painful lesson, but you can be damn sure that I'll be looking twice from now on.
Suits and Tickets
(Originally written on the 9th of August, 2009)
I recently had an awesome day. I started it off by getting a haircut and taking a nice shower. After that I borrowed my dad's >RM5000 suit and shoes to use in an oral presentation for my English class. Went to college, had people comment on the suit and its awesomeness, went to calculus class (The second last one in the whole semester). I got 31/40 on my latest quiz, which is 7.75% of my total grade, which made me pretty sure I was going to be able to pass the subject. When calculus was over I got to watch some other people do their English presentations before it was my turn. My speech went quite well although I went 16 seconds overtime and I was told I said "and all that" quite a bit.
When college was finished, my friend got a text that a radio station's street crew was in the area, so a bunch of us went up to check it out. Sure enough, there was a car full of goodies and some dudes handing them out. I lost a contest to text a phone real quick for a hundred bucks or an iPod, but then I was told we would have a chance to dance for some tickets to this concert that's coming up in a couple of weeks. I took off my blazer, unbuttoned the top of my shirt, wrapped by tie around my head and got ready to rock. After some headbanging, air guitar, and general wild flailing, I snagged myself a pass to the mosh pit for the concert. I'll be seeing the All-American Rejects and Boys Like Girls. When I was told I had won, I asked them for a second chance so my friends could try and win a ticket, too. They decided that was a good idea, so I backed up my friend by dancing a bit while she won herself a ticket to the mosh pit, too. That was pretty great.
After that I drove another friend to the train station. While I was in the car I was trying to find the radio station that had given me the pass, but my brother's radio can only tune into odd-numbered stations. Oh well.
I recently had an awesome day. I started it off by getting a haircut and taking a nice shower. After that I borrowed my dad's >RM5000 suit and shoes to use in an oral presentation for my English class. Went to college, had people comment on the suit and its awesomeness, went to calculus class (The second last one in the whole semester). I got 31/40 on my latest quiz, which is 7.75% of my total grade, which made me pretty sure I was going to be able to pass the subject. When calculus was over I got to watch some other people do their English presentations before it was my turn. My speech went quite well although I went 16 seconds overtime and I was told I said "and all that" quite a bit.
When college was finished, my friend got a text that a radio station's street crew was in the area, so a bunch of us went up to check it out. Sure enough, there was a car full of goodies and some dudes handing them out. I lost a contest to text a phone real quick for a hundred bucks or an iPod, but then I was told we would have a chance to dance for some tickets to this concert that's coming up in a couple of weeks. I took off my blazer, unbuttoned the top of my shirt, wrapped by tie around my head and got ready to rock. After some headbanging, air guitar, and general wild flailing, I snagged myself a pass to the mosh pit for the concert. I'll be seeing the All-American Rejects and Boys Like Girls. When I was told I had won, I asked them for a second chance so my friends could try and win a ticket, too. They decided that was a good idea, so I backed up my friend by dancing a bit while she won herself a ticket to the mosh pit, too. That was pretty great.
After that I drove another friend to the train station. While I was in the car I was trying to find the radio station that had given me the pass, but my brother's radio can only tune into odd-numbered stations. Oh well.
Courage
(Originally written on the 18th of July, 2009)
"I like you and I would like to take you out for a meal."
Maaaaan, how come it's so hard for me to just go up to her and say that?
"I like you and I would like to take you out for a meal."
Maaaaan, how come it's so hard for me to just go up to her and say that?
Malaysia's Reaction to Operation Cast Lead
(lolpolitics)
(Originally written on the 6th of January, 2009)
(Originally written on the 6th of January, 2009)
Today both The Star and the New Straits Times used the same picture for the front page. It's a picture of a Palestinian man (Google Magdi al-Samuli if you wanna see the picture) grieving in front of the corpses of three children (Two toddlers and a child, really), while two other guys are kinda supporting him in his grief. The Star's caption is entitled "Father's Agony" and just describes what's happening in the picture (Father grieving over three children killed by an Israeli tank shell). This is a rather gruesome picture for the front page, but its use and caption are reasonable. However, the NST threw a black box with the words "BABY KILLERS: An Israeli tank did this..." right onto the middle of the picture.
The Star's headline was Push for Gaza with the subtitle "Malaysia seeks special UN session on Invasion". The New Straits times headline reads: "Malaysia to the United Nations: STOP THE CARNAGE" and has the subtitles "PM calls for emergency session on Gaza..." and "Authorizes US$1 million in humanitarian aid...”
The Star's quote from our Prime Minister was "We cannot accept the cruelty that is happening in the Middle East". The quote that the NST used was "The United Nations Security Council has a moral duty to stop the atrocities committed by Israel and demand a ceasefire by all sides. I urge that an emergency session be convened to adopt a 'Uniting for Peace' resolution."
Also, the New Straits times has a box that takes up about a fourth of the front page calling for donations to "Help the Palestinians" as the title so helpfully reads. It's called the NSTP Fund for Gaza and has uses a crying Palestinian child in front of a column of smoke as its article image. It's calling for donations to provide medicine and emergency supplies and tells everyone in the first paragraph that "Even body bags for victims of Israel's aggression are in short supply."
Thankfully, my family subscribes to the Star.
Our former prime minister (who my grandfather's friend calls senile) is calling for a boycott of US goods among Malaysians and the citizens of other countries across the world. His reasoning is that a boycott of US goods will force the US to intervene. His exact words were "The people have the capacity to act. For instance, they don't have to drink Coca Cola and the government can't force them to drink it. If we need to buy weapons, we can always buy them from Russia instead of the US. The boycott will be a universal effort. If confined to Malaysia alone, it is not going to be effective but Malaysians must also play their part. We must not allow ourselves to be cowed. Even if we do little things, I think we can achieve quite a lot." Fuck that shit, I'll drink as much coke as I damn well please.
Also, in the NST they quoted him as saying "The US dollar has got nothing to back it... and the only reason that it is still being used is because people still accept the dollar as legal tender. If people stop using the US dollar, the US cannot make any money. It will then be very poor and it will have to stop its production of more and more weapons to kill people. That is how the US uses it money and people who use the dollar are actually contributing towards the manufacture, invention and production of weapons to kill." The day he said that our current prime minister sent one million US dollars of aid to Gaza, so that sure shows what he thinks about all this nonsense.
Our country's likeliest choice for next prime minister, when referring to the current situation in Gaza said that "This would not have happened if the Palestinians were allowed to lead normal lives. They were denied jobs, economic aid, and infrastructure development. This is also why Hamas began firing rockets into Israeli territory." Well, I don't have a job, I don't see any money from the government on its way to my doorstep, and there hasn't been a new ministry in this area in ages. According to his logic, it would be acceptable for me to start bombing my neighbors right now. What an ass.
So yeah, the New Straits Times has a major bias and our former and next prime ministers are probably mentally handicapped.
The Star's headline was Push for Gaza with the subtitle "Malaysia seeks special UN session on Invasion". The New Straits times headline reads: "Malaysia to the United Nations: STOP THE CARNAGE" and has the subtitles "PM calls for emergency session on Gaza..." and "Authorizes US$1 million in humanitarian aid...”
The Star's quote from our Prime Minister was "We cannot accept the cruelty that is happening in the Middle East". The quote that the NST used was "The United Nations Security Council has a moral duty to stop the atrocities committed by Israel and demand a ceasefire by all sides. I urge that an emergency session be convened to adopt a 'Uniting for Peace' resolution."
Also, the New Straits times has a box that takes up about a fourth of the front page calling for donations to "Help the Palestinians" as the title so helpfully reads. It's called the NSTP Fund for Gaza and has uses a crying Palestinian child in front of a column of smoke as its article image. It's calling for donations to provide medicine and emergency supplies and tells everyone in the first paragraph that "Even body bags for victims of Israel's aggression are in short supply."
Thankfully, my family subscribes to the Star.
Our former prime minister (who my grandfather's friend calls senile) is calling for a boycott of US goods among Malaysians and the citizens of other countries across the world. His reasoning is that a boycott of US goods will force the US to intervene. His exact words were "The people have the capacity to act. For instance, they don't have to drink Coca Cola and the government can't force them to drink it. If we need to buy weapons, we can always buy them from Russia instead of the US. The boycott will be a universal effort. If confined to Malaysia alone, it is not going to be effective but Malaysians must also play their part. We must not allow ourselves to be cowed. Even if we do little things, I think we can achieve quite a lot." Fuck that shit, I'll drink as much coke as I damn well please.
Also, in the NST they quoted him as saying "The US dollar has got nothing to back it... and the only reason that it is still being used is because people still accept the dollar as legal tender. If people stop using the US dollar, the US cannot make any money. It will then be very poor and it will have to stop its production of more and more weapons to kill people. That is how the US uses it money and people who use the dollar are actually contributing towards the manufacture, invention and production of weapons to kill." The day he said that our current prime minister sent one million US dollars of aid to Gaza, so that sure shows what he thinks about all this nonsense.
Our country's likeliest choice for next prime minister, when referring to the current situation in Gaza said that "This would not have happened if the Palestinians were allowed to lead normal lives. They were denied jobs, economic aid, and infrastructure development. This is also why Hamas began firing rockets into Israeli territory." Well, I don't have a job, I don't see any money from the government on its way to my doorstep, and there hasn't been a new ministry in this area in ages. According to his logic, it would be acceptable for me to start bombing my neighbors right now. What an ass.
So yeah, the New Straits Times has a major bias and our former and next prime ministers are probably mentally handicapped.
An Afternoon Ride
(Originally written on the 2nd of January, 2009)
I went out for a ride on my brother's motorbike this afternoon. My dad lead the way on another bike. It was loads of fun. I especially enjoyed riding around a housing estate we went to, since there weren't any cars on the road and the views were spectacular. I was almost inspired enough to start taking pictures again. Maybe next time.
The only bad part was when we had to cross the more crowded roads to get home. I think I almost made a car me crash when I changed lanes without looking behind me. That had me pretty scared.
While riding around the areas without traffic, I kept myself amused by singing. I was muffled by my helmet and any sound that made it out would've been drowned out by the engine, so I could indulge myself in off-key renditions of Hey Julie and Addicted. I also sang Que Sera Sera with an Irish accent for some reason. It turned out better than you would think.
So yeah, motorcycles are fun and maybe I'll start taking pictures again.
I went out for a ride on my brother's motorbike this afternoon. My dad lead the way on another bike. It was loads of fun. I especially enjoyed riding around a housing estate we went to, since there weren't any cars on the road and the views were spectacular. I was almost inspired enough to start taking pictures again. Maybe next time.
The only bad part was when we had to cross the more crowded roads to get home. I think I almost made a car me crash when I changed lanes without looking behind me. That had me pretty scared.
While riding around the areas without traffic, I kept myself amused by singing. I was muffled by my helmet and any sound that made it out would've been drowned out by the engine, so I could indulge myself in off-key renditions of Hey Julie and Addicted. I also sang Que Sera Sera with an Irish accent for some reason. It turned out better than you would think.
So yeah, motorcycles are fun and maybe I'll start taking pictures again.
Fuck Censorship
(This old post is an angry old post, and I don't think I make much sense in it. I like the title, though. It was originally written on the 31st of December, 2008.)
Fuck censorship. Government censorship especially, because although the other types are pretty stupid, you're allowed to go somewhere else to say what you want or find another read what you want or such, but government censorship is unavoidable without breaking the law.
I'll cover censorship that's stupid but tolerable since it's within the rights of the people doing the censoring. Places that censor what they sell like bookstores, video stores, or music stores by not selling content they disagree with are fine. It's their store, they can do what they want. By limiting their inventory, they're just reducing potential sales. Other places, like internet forums, networking websites or private property in real life are also okay to have rules on what can and can't be said. The owners of the sites or property have the right to tell people what can and can't be said since they own the place anyway.
But the government is different. The government doesn't own the people. If anything, the people own the government. We shouldn't be told what we can and can't read, listen to or watch. If a person wants to go watch a movie, they should be able to watch the whole freaking movie, not just the bits that the censorship board deems acceptable.
Imagine you go to a restaurant. You order some soft drinks, but the waiter serves you water. When you ask why, he tells you he thinks you don't need the extra sugar. In this analogy, the restaurant is the cinema, the drinks and the movies and the waiter is the censorship board. The waiter has basically taken all the flavour out of the product you paid for and given you bland, tasteless stuff that is not worth anything near what you paid for. The censorship board cuts dialogue and scenes from movies that it feels people would not benefit from seeing. They're basically acting as a nanny for every moviegoer in the country. The thing is, most moviegoers are mature enough to handle the content that the censorship board is afraid will negatively influence/traumatize/offend certain groups.
Back to the restaurant analogy, imagine you order the steak, but when your meal arrives all that's on the plate are your mashed potatoes and corn, with the main item nowhere in sight. You ask the waiter where your steak is, and he tells you that the couple sitting in the table over there are vegetarians, so he removed your steak lest it offend them. Once again, the waiter is the censorship board and the steak is the juicy, juicy material that's been censored. You've paid full price, but they're giving you a crappy product that’s less than what you wanted and screws up the whole experience because of the missing material. I have got so many examples of this that it’s hardly funny. In Hancock, the word asshole was actually a plot point. Every instance of its usage was removed by the censorship board, though. However, there’s one point in the movie where Will Smith gets away with saying “fuck” because he says it so fast that the old farts on the censorship board couldn’t catch it. An even better example of the hypocrisy of the censorship board was Snakes on a Plane. This movie got a restricted or 18+ rating overseas, but here in Malaysia it somehow managed to get a U or PG13 rating, so everyone was allowed to watch it. The movie almost literally uses swearwords like punctuation, but the only scenes that were censored was a scene where a couple has sex in a bathroom and the famous “Enough is enough” scene. Apparently watching a plane full of innocent people get attacked and killed by snakes is less traumatizing for children than watching a couple getting intimate or hearing the word “Motherfucking”. Another brilliant example is the censoring of titles. Hellboy became Super Sapiens. It’s worse with songs. I Kissed a Girl became I Kissed because the board decided that removing “Girl” from the song would make everyone forget what the song was about even though they had been playing it uncensored for two weeks before that. The Best Damn Thing became The Best (Mute for a split second) Thing.
The methods of censorship are annoying, too. They’ll delete an entire scene in the movie and leave you wondering what the hell is going on. They’ll take words out of songs without even the courtesy of a beep, destroying the beat or flow of the song. It’s enough to make you wish you didn’t start watching in the first place.
Anyway, I’ll end this rant now. I had planned something much more coherent and bitter, but then New Year Celebrations got in the way. I’ll revise this sometime, maybe. But for now this is all I have to say.
I'll cover censorship that's stupid but tolerable since it's within the rights of the people doing the censoring. Places that censor what they sell like bookstores, video stores, or music stores by not selling content they disagree with are fine. It's their store, they can do what they want. By limiting their inventory, they're just reducing potential sales. Other places, like internet forums, networking websites or private property in real life are also okay to have rules on what can and can't be said. The owners of the sites or property have the right to tell people what can and can't be said since they own the place anyway.
But the government is different. The government doesn't own the people. If anything, the people own the government. We shouldn't be told what we can and can't read, listen to or watch. If a person wants to go watch a movie, they should be able to watch the whole freaking movie, not just the bits that the censorship board deems acceptable.
Imagine you go to a restaurant. You order some soft drinks, but the waiter serves you water. When you ask why, he tells you he thinks you don't need the extra sugar. In this analogy, the restaurant is the cinema, the drinks and the movies and the waiter is the censorship board. The waiter has basically taken all the flavour out of the product you paid for and given you bland, tasteless stuff that is not worth anything near what you paid for. The censorship board cuts dialogue and scenes from movies that it feels people would not benefit from seeing. They're basically acting as a nanny for every moviegoer in the country. The thing is, most moviegoers are mature enough to handle the content that the censorship board is afraid will negatively influence/traumatize/offen
Back to the restaurant analogy, imagine you order the steak, but when your meal arrives all that's on the plate are your mashed potatoes and corn, with the main item nowhere in sight. You ask the waiter where your steak is, and he tells you that the couple sitting in the table over there are vegetarians, so he removed your steak lest it offend them. Once again, the waiter is the censorship board and the steak is the juicy, juicy material that's been censored. You've paid full price, but they're giving you a crappy product that’s less than what you wanted and screws up the whole experience because of the missing material. I have got so many examples of this that it’s hardly funny. In Hancock, the word asshole was actually a plot point. Every instance of its usage was removed by the censorship board, though. However, there’s one point in the movie where Will Smith gets away with saying “fuck” because he says it so fast that the old farts on the censorship board couldn’t catch it. An even better example of the hypocrisy of the censorship board was Snakes on a Plane. This movie got a restricted or 18+ rating overseas, but here in Malaysia it somehow managed to get a U or PG13 rating, so everyone was allowed to watch it. The movie almost literally uses swearwords like punctuation, but the only scenes that were censored was a scene where a couple has sex in a bathroom and the famous “Enough is enough” scene. Apparently watching a plane full of innocent people get attacked and killed by snakes is less traumatizing for children than watching a couple getting intimate or hearing the word “Motherfucking”. Another brilliant example is the censoring of titles. Hellboy became Super Sapiens. It’s worse with songs. I Kissed a Girl became I Kissed because the board decided that removing “Girl” from the song would make everyone forget what the song was about even though they had been playing it uncensored for two weeks before that. The Best Damn Thing became The Best (Mute for a split second) Thing.
The methods of censorship are annoying, too. They’ll delete an entire scene in the movie and leave you wondering what the hell is going on. They’ll take words out of songs without even the courtesy of a beep, destroying the beat or flow of the song. It’s enough to make you wish you didn’t start watching in the first place.
Anyway, I’ll end this rant now. I had planned something much more coherent and bitter, but then New Year Celebrations got in the way. I’ll revise this sometime, maybe. But for now this is all I have to say.
Coincidences
(Originally written on the 31st of January, 2009)
I was recently wondering which unplanned meeting was most unlikely: Germaine standing right outside a clinic I was walking past, Ian running into Huey Sing at the airport, or Aron sitting behind a girl on a bus that he had kissed the night before.
One day my brothers and I were wandering a mall when my dad called us and told us to meet him at the entrance. When we got down there, he told us we were going out for lunch at some chicken rice place that I had never to before in a part of the city that I rarely visit. When we got there, lunch was okay, but my dad ordered water for us instead of soft drinks. So after the meal I decided to get up and roam the shoplots and see if I could get a coke and a newspaper or something. Anyway, while I was walking around, I saw someone get out of a car. It took me about half a second to recognize her face, but she had saw me first and beat me to the greeting. The conversation went something like this.
"Hey!"
"Hey! Um, what are you doing here?"
"I live around here!"
"Oh. That makes sense"
"What are you doing here?"
"I was, um, eating lunch. And then I went for a walk."
"Oh. Bye!"
"Bye!"
When I got back to the table I told my brothers to guess who I'd seen. They through every BB name they could think of at me until I stopped them at Germaine. Jan didn't believe me at first, but then I asked him if I would make this kind of thing up, and he said "Maybe" and that was the end of that conversation.
Ian ran into Huey Sing when he was either coming back or going to Sabah after or before climbing Mount Kinabalu. Huey Sing was also on some sort of trip. Ian spotted her across the airport and went up to her and was all "Oh hi!" It is completely possible that this isn't how it happened at all, I wasn't paying much attention when he told me this story. Anyway, the main facts are that they were both in an airport, so that means that they were both in a huge place with a limited window of time to run into each other before one of them left. So I'm thinking this one is the second most unlikely.
The night before Aron, Ian and I had gotten our scuba diving certification, Aron decided to celebrate the end of our holiday on Redang by wandering around the clubs and resorts on the island while Ian and I watched "Dude, Where's My Car?" on his laptop. When he got back, he told us a story we could hardly believe. Apparently he'd had tremendous success during his clubbing and had ended up making out with a tourist. He said the kiss "Tasted like alchohol and cigarettes". The next day, after a speedboat ride back to the mainland and a van ride to outside the bus station, we got on the bus back to KL. After taking our seats, some ladies got on board and sat in front of us. Aron nudged us and told that these were the girls he had met the night before. The one he kissed was sitting directly in front of me. The back of her head was nice. Didn't see much else of her. Anyway, I’m thinking this is the biggest coincidence because of all the factors involved: Aron had to pick the right club, find the right girl, somehow convince her to kiss him (Although with his good looks and charisma he probably stood a better chance than anyone else I know =D), and then she’d have to have tickets for the exact same bus leaving at the exact same time as us, and if she had gotten on the bus before us and sat at the back we may have never seen her.
So I guess what I’m saying is if you’re gonna buy a lottery ticket, get Aron Tan to pick out the numbers for you. =D
I was recently wondering which unplanned meeting was most unlikely: Germaine standing right outside a clinic I was walking past, Ian running into Huey Sing at the airport, or Aron sitting behind a girl on a bus that he had kissed the night before.
One day my brothers and I were wandering a mall when my dad called us and told us to meet him at the entrance. When we got down there, he told us we were going out for lunch at some chicken rice place that I had never to before in a part of the city that I rarely visit. When we got there, lunch was okay, but my dad ordered water for us instead of soft drinks. So after the meal I decided to get up and roam the shoplots and see if I could get a coke and a newspaper or something. Anyway, while I was walking around, I saw someone get out of a car. It took me about half a second to recognize her face, but she had saw me first and beat me to the greeting. The conversation went something like this.
"Hey!"
"Hey! Um, what are you doing here?"
"I live around here!"
"Oh. That makes sense"
"What are you doing here?"
"I was, um, eating lunch. And then I went for a walk."
"Oh. Bye!"
"Bye!"
When I got back to the table I told my brothers to guess who I'd seen. They through every BB name they could think of at me until I stopped them at Germaine. Jan didn't believe me at first, but then I asked him if I would make this kind of thing up, and he said "Maybe" and that was the end of that conversation.
Ian ran into Huey Sing when he was either coming back or going to Sabah after or before climbing Mount Kinabalu. Huey Sing was also on some sort of trip. Ian spotted her across the airport and went up to her and was all "Oh hi!" It is completely possible that this isn't how it happened at all, I wasn't paying much attention when he told me this story. Anyway, the main facts are that they were both in an airport, so that means that they were both in a huge place with a limited window of time to run into each other before one of them left. So I'm thinking this one is the second most unlikely.
The night before Aron, Ian and I had gotten our scuba diving certification, Aron decided to celebrate the end of our holiday on Redang by wandering around the clubs and resorts on the island while Ian and I watched "Dude, Where's My Car?" on his laptop. When he got back, he told us a story we could hardly believe. Apparently he'd had tremendous success during his clubbing and had ended up making out with a tourist. He said the kiss "Tasted like alchohol and cigarettes". The next day, after a speedboat ride back to the mainland and a van ride to outside the bus station, we got on the bus back to KL. After taking our seats, some ladies got on board and sat in front of us. Aron nudged us and told that these were the girls he had met the night before. The one he kissed was sitting directly in front of me. The back of her head was nice. Didn't see much else of her. Anyway, I’m thinking this is the biggest coincidence because of all the factors involved: Aron had to pick the right club, find the right girl, somehow convince her to kiss him (Although with his good looks and charisma he probably stood a better chance than anyone else I know =D), and then she’d have to have tickets for the exact same bus leaving at the exact same time as us, and if she had gotten on the bus before us and sat at the back we may have never seen her.
So I guess what I’m saying is if you’re gonna buy a lottery ticket, get Aron Tan to pick out the numbers for you. =D
This One Time I Killed A Cockroach That Saw Me Naked
(Originally written on the 13th of May, 2008)
I hate cockroaches.
I'm terrified of them. It's only roaches, not any other insect. It may have something to do with their slimy bodies or their hairy sharp-looking legs, but the most disturbing thing about cockroaches is knowing that for every cockroach you see there are always dozens more hiding away. They’re like ninjas in that way.
To a normal person with a fairly clean house this fear would not be much of a problem. However, although I have a fairly clean house I am apparently not a normal person. Normal people don't have cockroaches appear on them at random times for no reason.
I've had a cockroach suddenly appear on my arm while I was taking a whiz in the jungle which resulted in frantic brushing off of the area for the next few hours every time I felt a movement, I've had one crawl up my thigh towards my manparts which resulted in frenzied slapping and more brushing, and I've had one drop on my shoulder while I was changing my shirt which has led me to conclude that there is something about me that cockroaches seem to find irresistible.
One night as I was exiting the shower I saw something scuttling across the bathroom floor. Without my glasses I could only just make out that it was a cockroach, and a pretty big one at that. I was absolutely mortified when I realized what I was looking at since these things have a history of crawling on me and now I am totally naked.
Panic took hold of me. The roach was too close to my glasses for me to risk grabbing them, so I sprang for the nearest weapon, which happened to be a bottle of heavy duty toilet bowl cleaner. I decided that it would be easier for me to poison the bastard than crush him with the bottle, so I unscrewed the cap and squirted the cleaning fluid with as much precision as I could manage without my glasses (which is not much precision at all). The roach ran from one side to the other and I traced its path with a blue trail of cleaning fluid across the tiles. The roach then scuttled under the door and out into the bedroom.
I had lost. The roach had escaped to terrify me another day, and I was left with a whole bunch of cleaning fluid to mop up. I put on my glasses and was about to start cleaning up the mess I made when I heard a meow.
My cat is the best cat that a guy who hates cockroaches could want. I’ll wake up some mornings and find hairy sharp-looking legs strewn across the living room floor and a limbless, chewed-up cockroach corpse under a chair or table. He likes to bat them around a bit before he tries to eat them, you see. It’s not just cockroaches that he hunts down and kills; one time I came home to find a dead pigeon in my bed and my cat next to it. He was pretty pleased with himself after that one.
Anyway, I looked in the direction of the meow and sure enough my cat was batting at the now belly-up roach. So I did manage to poison the bastard. Usually I’d leave the roach to suffer and die but my cat was in the room and I didn’t want him to start chewing on the toxic carcass so I decided that I had to get rid of it soon.
I shooed my cat away and threw some toilet paper on the writhing roach. Its flailing legs moved the paper around a bit, but it didn’t manage to uncover itself. I smacked the bottle of cleaning fluid on top of the paper and heard a crunch and a stain appeared on the paper. I kept hammering the paper with the bottle long after the roach would’ve been dead and then hammered some more. I picked up what was now nothing more than guts and crushed bits of exoskeleton in yet more toilet paper and flushed it away.
After washing my hands and putting on my jammies I climbed into bed and pulled the covers tight over myself while my cat kept watch on the bedside to ensure no cockroaches would be crawling over me at night.
I hate cockroaches.
I'm terrified of them. It's only roaches, not any other insect. It may have something to do with their slimy bodies or their hairy sharp-looking legs, but the most disturbing thing about cockroaches is knowing that for every cockroach you see there are always dozens more hiding away. They’re like ninjas in that way.
To a normal person with a fairly clean house this fear would not be much of a problem. However, although I have a fairly clean house I am apparently not a normal person. Normal people don't have cockroaches appear on them at random times for no reason.
I've had a cockroach suddenly appear on my arm while I was taking a whiz in the jungle which resulted in frantic brushing off of the area for the next few hours every time I felt a movement, I've had one crawl up my thigh towards my manparts which resulted in frenzied slapping and more brushing, and I've had one drop on my shoulder while I was changing my shirt which has led me to conclude that there is something about me that cockroaches seem to find irresistible.
One night as I was exiting the shower I saw something scuttling across the bathroom floor. Without my glasses I could only just make out that it was a cockroach, and a pretty big one at that. I was absolutely mortified when I realized what I was looking at since these things have a history of crawling on me and now I am totally naked.
Panic took hold of me. The roach was too close to my glasses for me to risk grabbing them, so I sprang for the nearest weapon, which happened to be a bottle of heavy duty toilet bowl cleaner. I decided that it would be easier for me to poison the bastard than crush him with the bottle, so I unscrewed the cap and squirted the cleaning fluid with as much precision as I could manage without my glasses (which is not much precision at all). The roach ran from one side to the other and I traced its path with a blue trail of cleaning fluid across the tiles. The roach then scuttled under the door and out into the bedroom.
I had lost. The roach had escaped to terrify me another day, and I was left with a whole bunch of cleaning fluid to mop up. I put on my glasses and was about to start cleaning up the mess I made when I heard a meow.
My cat is the best cat that a guy who hates cockroaches could want. I’ll wake up some mornings and find hairy sharp-looking legs strewn across the living room floor and a limbless, chewed-up cockroach corpse under a chair or table. He likes to bat them around a bit before he tries to eat them, you see. It’s not just cockroaches that he hunts down and kills; one time I came home to find a dead pigeon in my bed and my cat next to it. He was pretty pleased with himself after that one.
Anyway, I looked in the direction of the meow and sure enough my cat was batting at the now belly-up roach. So I did manage to poison the bastard. Usually I’d leave the roach to suffer and die but my cat was in the room and I didn’t want him to start chewing on the toxic carcass so I decided that I had to get rid of it soon.
I shooed my cat away and threw some toilet paper on the writhing roach. Its flailing legs moved the paper around a bit, but it didn’t manage to uncover itself. I smacked the bottle of cleaning fluid on top of the paper and heard a crunch and a stain appeared on the paper. I kept hammering the paper with the bottle long after the roach would’ve been dead and then hammered some more. I picked up what was now nothing more than guts and crushed bits of exoskeleton in yet more toilet paper and flushed it away.
After washing my hands and putting on my jammies I climbed into bed and pulled the covers tight over myself while my cat kept watch on the bedside to ensure no cockroaches would be crawling over me at night.
Hi
People have been telling me I should write a blog for ages. Can't really remember why I never did. Well, now I'm doing it, and it's okay so far. Gonna post up some old stories that I've posted on Facebook and around the internet and maybe continue updating after that. That's pretty much it, so yeah.
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