The Mindscape of S'orlok Reaves

Insider Information

2009-09-25T04:46:00.002-04:00

I have a prediction, and it's about computing. Since there are so few times that I actually have enough information to predict something like this, I'm going to share it all with you:

Web browsers are going to become a lot more important soon.

"Why's that", you say? (Or, maybe, "that's it"?). Well, several things have happened at once, all of which increase the power of programs running on a browser.

First, HTML5 has increased the power of the canvas element. Normally, when you want to see some fancy interactions online, you have to install flash player. The canvas element means any page can display whatever dynamic content it wants to with ease.
Second, a nascent form of support for WebGL was added to Webkit. WebGL allows canvas elements to use hardware-accelerated 3D graphics. In other words, those fancy graphics I mentioned in point 1 can now be 3D. Webkit powers Google Chrome and Safari (for MacOS), which leads us to point 3...
Canvas support for Internet Explorer, sort of. Traditionally, Internet Explorer has always lagged behind in terms of features. Lots of people use IE, so my whole theory would be dead in the water if Microsoft didn't upgrade the world's most popular browser. Surprisingly enough, Google stepped up and wrote a plugin for IE that uses Webkit to render pages inside of IE itself. Besides enabling the canvas element, this also makes IE run ten times faster!

With Google's IE plugin, that means that three major browsers will be running Webkit. Firefox and Opera will almost definitely support HTML5 from day one, if their mission statements and respective histories are any indication. So all major browsers will have the ability to run fancy applications. Now, there's two more things to consider:

Most browsers are platform-independent. In other words, if I view a page in Safari on Windows, it will look the exact same as if I was viewing it on Safari in MacOS --or Chrome on Windows, for that matter. This applies to developers, too --if I develop a plugin for Firefox on Linux, it will require very little additional work to also run in Firefox on Windows. (Chrome promises to run Firefox plugins too, but we'll see...)
Cloud Computing, Ubuntu, cheap hardware, and various other small factors are all adding up to one thing: people are using more computers (and operating systems) than they would have five years ago.

Roll that all together, and you can see where I'm going with this: people want more versatility, more portability, and more compatibility. Their browsers are poised to deliver this. One day soon, one of the major browsers will hit on the bright idea of offering to render a web page without using their own browser frame, and that'll fire off the whole revolution. At that point, you'll be able to download your favorite "Firefox application" --a word processor, a calculator, a music player-- and save it to a flash drive. You'll then be able to plug that flash drive in to any computer running any operating system with Firefox, and it'll run as if you're using it on your own computer. Programmers will start targeting browsers instead of operating systems. All these "miniature Linux" distributions will jump in popularity. It'll be exactly the kind of revolution that Adobe Air tried to start, except this time it'll work --because people will already have all the necessary software installed. By the way, I think Google's trying to get on the bandwagon early with Google Wave. I have no idea if this will work, but it's certainly a good attempt.

So there you have it, the only bit of information I have that you probably don't have. Assuming this prediction of mine isn't totally off, then the only remaining question is which browser to buy stocks in. And that's an easy answer: for now, Firefox. It's the only truly cross-platform, truly pluggable browser. Eventually, Google Chrome will surpass it, or possibly some horrid conglomerate of Internet Explorer and Webkit. But that'll be long after the initial surge.

And then, maybe, finally, I can stop using this terrible web interface to enter blog posts, where hitting "Backspace" to delete a letter occasionally sends me to totally different web page. Here's hoping.

Not Your Grandmother's Karma

2009-07-07T01:48:00.004-04:00

Most of us "lao wai" misunderstand karma. (For that matter, most Chinese misunderstand karma as well.) The flavor of karma that's evolved in the west seems to have a scheming intelligence behind it that ensures:

If you do something, the karma will rebound within this lifetime.
Unless you're really not paying attention, you'll know what act is "paying you back" at the moment. After all, that's the whole point, right?

I guess you could say we think of karma as some kind of externalized conscience, which forces us to pay up for our bad activities by bringing reminiscently similar bad things to bear on us (ditto for good thing). This is far removed from the actual origin of the theory, which served as a solution to an existing problem, not some high-minded philosophizing.

I bring this up because of something recent that resounded rather loudly of western-style karma. When I was a lot younger, I bought a bicycle horn at a Scout flea market, and spent a great deal of time making my younger sister jump by honking the horn when her back was turned. In retrospect, this was a Not Nice Thing To Do.

Since moving to my new first floor flat, I've become the victim of a very Asian practice: various buyers, sellers, and repairmen walk continuously from door to door, blasting a bicycle horn to inform everyone that "I'm here to buy/sell/repair stuff!" It would be quaint if they didn't do it multiple times every day.

Karma or not, I certainly deserve this. The fact that these sellers advertise their presence with a bicycle horn is just a nice touch of another form of justice. And the next time I move, I'll be looking for a 20th floor apartment in a not-so-traditional part of town. With sound-proof walls. Ooh, and a nice balcony, if possible.

Unrelated News of What I'm Doing: Currently studying up on Google Android, the rather revolutionary mobile platform for next-generation phones and maybe laptops too. Problem is, it's very radical. Learning it requires huge amounts of patience, while I read through pages upon pages of documents to understand why they do it this way, that way, etc. In the end, their decisions make sense --problem is, I've only got 3 days left before the competition to master something that I thought I already knew well enough.

An Eponym for an Awesome Family

2009-05-26T08:26:00.004-04:00

So the Hetu family is pretty awesome. We've got a doctor (and a half) a sensible musician, a potential author, a theological savant, an expert pianist, a set of telepathic twins, and the rare psychologist-boxer. (Note: this list includes Hetus who haven't been born yet). I feel that one of us will eventually become super-famous, and the world will be wanting for an eponym. That is to say, the "Hetu-ish Method" or whatever will need to be printed in a textbook.

Now is the time to decide how to press-gang our name into an adjective form. The wiki page on auctorial descriptives is particularly helpful, as is a general search for the word "eponym". Here's a list of existing possibilities, along with that person's accomplishments.

Person/Accomplishments	Conjugation	"Hetu" This Way
René Descartes Major accomplishments in philosophy and mathematics. Created the X/Y co-ordinate system.	Cartesian	Hetusian
Franz Kafka Accomplished German author; wrote the book Metamorphosis.	Kafkaesque	Hetuesque
Eric Blair/George Orwell Famously authored 1984, really good with the dystopia genre..	Orwellian	Hetuian

There are plenty more eponyms to look at, but they're all rather dull-sounding. These three are the top contenders. So... what'll it be? I like the "Hetusian" the best, even though it's probably a misspelling of "Hetuian". (Or, there could be several famous Hetus! Or, we could just ignore pesky spelling details.) The term "Hetuesque" is a bit too cerebral. Hetuian sounds terrible, in my opnion.

Of course, we're not famous yet, so we're still open to suggestions. For now, though, I'm settling temporarily on "Hetusian". And there you have it...

Arcane Wisdom

2009-05-14T16:27:00.010-04:00

A letter-to-the-editor in the Economist claimed that mandatory community service made no sense, since an hour of Person A's time is not equal to an hour of Person B's time if person B is highly educated. I think this is a very priggish thing to say, since the whole benefit to volunteer work (besides actually getting the house built) is a strengthening of character.

Still, his statement has a nugget of truth to it: shouldn't we volunteer some of our time to tasks which target our strengths? With this in mind, I started to volunteer my skills at computer programming. That was a while ago... and one of those projects caught up such a following that I even decided to buy the domain name. I mentioned it in the last post; we're approaching another release.

Or so I though.

The other day, I was using the very same product I'd designed, as part of a routine check. Suddenly, it crashed. Stopped working. Seized up. Let me make it perfectly clear that my programs do not crash. Oh, sure, they've got bugs and glitches and errors and all that. I've spent countless nights staring at my laptop trying to figure out what is wrong with a page of seemingly-correct text. I make lots and lots of mistakes. But when we're mere days before a release, and I've fixed all known bugs, we never, ever get a random, non-reproducible crash. This would be like a veteran bicyclist falling off his bike after twenty years of solid riding. While stopped at a traffic light. With his feet on the ground. This kind of thing simply doesn't happen.

After posting a frantic bug report with nearly every related detail I could think of, I narrowed down the error: it was something that I had never learned about the language I was coding in. To give a brief estimate, I could probably fix this with a week or two of hard work.

I must say, I was legitimately agitated for a few days. Not about the time necessary to fix this mess (I actually enjoy rewriting lots and lots of code; don't ask me why). Rather, I was upset that I'd let ignorance creep in to a project I wholeheartedly cared about. Granted, I was lucky: this error occurred on a side project, with a relatively small user base, on a non-essential feature, and was caught just before release. For my first professional mistake, it could have been much worse.

What brought me out of my gloom was the realization that it was time for my favorite part of being a computer scientist: arcane knowledge! I knew exactly what book I needed, but I couldn't find it in the public library, as the last major update was circa 2000. I knew the quality of the author's knowledge on this subject, though, so I looked in the private collections on campus and found a dusty pre-release dating back to 1997. And there you have it: a single book in a "restricted" (to the public) library contained the Knowledge (capital K) I needed to fix the mess I'd gotten myself into. This is the kind of thing you'd see in a sci-fi/fantasy movie! (Note: I also checked Google Books for the "search inside" option, but it wasn't there.)

I love the feeling of such arcane knowledge, especially as it is so rare for a computer scientist to need anything from pre-2005. Since I'm pretty much going to have to re-write all of the core routines in my program, I thought I'd first brush up on language details by reading the entire book. So far, I've found nothing that surprises me like the previous error did. That is to say, I was tripped up by a tiny technicality that I should have thought about more. I did, however, find a lot of really great new techniques I can put to good use. The new code will be even stronger and more maintainable than before the crash, thanks to the quality of this book.

Well, that's that. Like I said: arcane wisdom FTW! I can't help but love an endearing story, and mystical ancient powers make any tale more exciting.

Speaking of story-telling, I think it's time for a....

Mini Movie Review!
Star Trek: Excellent job, guys! Very entertaining.
Angels & Demons: Very disappointing ending, compared to the book.

No English Equivalent

2009-05-05T14:38:00.010-04:00

So, it's 2AM, and I'm sitting at my (awesome) desk, looking at the (Burmese) dictionary entry for "hsi", which states:

"noun particle showing direction of action to or from a person (no English equiv.)" [1]

Like a Science Fair volcano project, my brain seems to fizzle and steam every time I read that sentence. What -oh, what!- could it ever mean? And, more importantly, how did we get to the point of me studying this language so late at night.

My increased study of Burmese has coincided with a gradual loss of interest in Chinese. There's a variety of fun reasons for this, but the most neutral is this: I just don't think I have room in the ol' noggin to store 6,000 pictographic characters. I shudder to think what gem of knowledge might be jettisoned just to store an arbitrary character like "mao" (defined as: hair, brush, or communist leader, depending on the context). Burmese is alphabetic, so I need only memorize a few hundred letters, pronunciations, and rules.

In fact, the story of how I came to be studying Burmese is pretty interesting: it began with a project to create a typing system, after a discussion with one of my friends (Jake, all the way on the left in the picture). At the time, I thought it best to approach the problem without any knowledge of the language, and that proved very helpful. Later, people started asking for language-specific features, so I had to learn some. And the more I learned, the more I liked.

That picture actually makes me feel a bit nostalgic, since it features a table full of friends that I've lost touch with for one reason or another. Well, except Jake; we still meet up. It's a bit unfortunate that I'm getting nostalgic about Singapore while I'm in Singapore, though. This is fortunate for my readers, however, as it saves you from the original topic of this post. Indeed, the only way I can overcome nostalgia is by covering all things new. Well, let's get started!

We're approaching release version 1.7 of the software I mentioned earlier. Here is a graphic I made for the web page which encourages users to "talk about" this release to their friends; the boy is saying the name of the software (in Burmese, as it's appropriate). At the time, I was overworked, and this was the easiest picture I could throw together to express the concept of "tell your friends". It turned out to be positively adorable. Now that we've actually got real people using the software, releases are a lot more fun! In particular, I have to actually check for bugs these days...

I'm sure I mentioned that we moved a few months ago. I just found out that our new location is in the same zone as that famous author guy you may have heard about if you looked into Singapore literature even just a little bit. I think he's back in Britain now... but his books were pretty good. Besides being very accurate, they snagged you with their simple but endearing passages, a bit like one of my other favorite authors, also British. It seems our friends from the mother land have a real knack for using English effectively, an observation re-enforced from living with one of them years back.

I've fallen a bit out of love with pictures, partly due to the rather true stigma that Asians take lots of photos. Seeing that my latest pictures are from 2008, however, does something to spur my motivation. Plus, webcam conversations have shown me just how far a picture can go to making someone feel like they're right here, enjoying Singapore with me.

For example, this picture -from my phone, hence the graininess- makes it very clear how much fun moving house was. Clearly, I was down not only to my last shirt, but to my last power socket as well. Then again, pictures are limited --I can't recall if I'm moving in or moving out. I think I'm moving out of my old room.

Well, that's all for now, loyal fans. My next goal is more pictures --and also, Star Trek. Ooh, and Japanese food tomorrow! And... more debugging (sigh).

Works Cited
[1] Mesher, G. "Burmese for Beginners". Lesson 6, pp. 158-159

How Long Have These Pictures Been On My Hard Drive?

2009-04-06T03:02:00.013-04:00

It occurred to me recently that I somehow forgot to show my family all the pictures from my trip to Burma. This is a bit odd, as I was with them for a whole month during Christmas! Ah, absentmindedness will get the better of me yet. ;)

I'm in the middle of writing a paper (and collecting Sapphires in-game), so this will be a short update. I'll pick a few of my favorites:

This triple-waterfall was amazing! At the top there's a small pagoda --there's tons of pagodas all over Burma, specifically in Bagan, the ancient city.

I'm going to have to ask Nathan to help me get the spellings right... this was at Pyin Oo Lwin. There were a series of caves nearby that we were walking to, but this waterfall was on the way. As you can see, there's a few bridges you can use to get a closer look.

This picture is from Yangon, taken by Mimi from outside the restaurant we were having dinner at. Most of Nathan's friends were in Yangon, so we had a big group to go around with while we were in the city. This night we had the famous "hot pot" dish that you might have seen on Survivor. The idea is sort of like... making soup... at the table you're eating at. Yes, I'd call it "real-time soup".

This picture is of the famous Shwe Dagon pagoda, which is actually visible from most parts of the city. There were tons of people around the temple area at night, doing various activities from praying to just hanging around. Apparently this area has a large social importance in Yangon.

Here we have three of our four-person travel group. On my left is Mimi, and on my right is Admon, Nathan's friend. We're in Taunggyi (I think), which has a really nice "rolling hills" kind of landscape. The yellow patches in the back are sesame plants, one of Burma's prominent cultivated plants.

This was Pin Tay Ya, I think. Inside of this cave complex there were thousands of Buddha statues. This is just one section of them. Each statues is old beyond remembrance, and has to be re-plated with gold leaf every so many years. The plaques list the names of those who donated the most recent layer of gold. We saw some... rather infamous names on a few of those plaques.

Back when I was teaching Environmental Science, one student described the trees in his study areas as hugemongous. When we were in Taunggyi, I actually saw a tree so big that I was at a loss for words, and hugemongous immediately popped into my head. I've included myself in this picture as a size reference; can you find me?

Inle, the floating city, is just about beyond description. Any of you who've read The Hobbit and were enchanted by the description of Escaroth would be equally enchanted by its equivalent in Burma. Here we are on one of the "streets".

Bagan, the ancient temple-city is about a picturesque as one can get. In fact, the number of Japanese photographers there snapping the sunset nearly outnumbered the Burmese.

And that's the end of your tour. Unfortunately, I don't have any really good mountain pictures. We went to visit an extinct volcano, and the caves were all located at high altitudes. Also, did I mention that we went around Bagan in a horse-drawn carriage? Overall, the trip was fantastic for so many reasons, not the least of which was that everyone had a slightly different way of doing things there. All the new customs, and food, and clothing was just such a breath of fresh air. I can't say I wasn't thrilled when I found a place that served a club sandwich, but that's because club sandwiches are unbeatable! Of all the foreign countries I've been to, this one had both my favorite food and my favorite people. A winning combination, really.

Ok, back to normal blog posts... :)

Quesadilla Madness

2009-03-22T04:02:00.002-04:00

There's always plenty of food at Nathan's house. His mother always prepares extra, his brother is a great cook, and various others in the house often feel the need to prepare some of their own dishes. Every once in a while, I prepare some food too --I'm more than happy to-- and the most recent of these meals was Quesadillas.

The recipe was a huge success, so I'll include a copy of it here. I mostly used this recipe, but with a few modifications. First, I put the smoked salmon inside the quesadilla, instead of on top. Second, I mixed the avocado with an equal amount of spreadable cheese, and lined the inside of the quesadillas with this. Finally, I lightly oiled the quesadilla maker, and cooked the things for about twice as long as normal.

And they were fantastic! It's always a joy when you can find a food that everyone enjoys. I let Nathan's family borrow the quesadilla maker for a week, and they immediately began the process of "adapting" the recipe to the various Burmese ingredients they had lying around. Well, quesadilla translates (I think) to "with cheese", so as long as they kept that, I suppose they can substitute whatever they'd like.

And In Other News...

I've got another blog I've been writing in, as a bit of a hobby. It's rather technical, unfortunately, so I imagine that the posts will be rather un-interesting to those of different hobbies. However, the idea is easily explainable: if you're studying to become a writer, you read the works of other writers, and if you're studying to become a psychologist, you look at the experiments done by other psychologists. However, computer scientists are often encouraged to work on their own, after only a few figureheads are studied. This leads to the unfortunate case where many computer scientists cannot "read the code" written by others in the field. So, with this blog, I attempt to work on game development by avoiding writing "new things" and instead hacking existing games. ("Hacking" in this sense means "fiddling around with". It's a common point of confusion.)

And For More News...
My supervisor is also the head of one of the Halls here at NUS, and his Hall recently put on a production of the play "The Accidental Death of an Anarchist". Although quite a step apart from last year's production ("The Wind in the Willows"), I found the play quite entertaining. Overall, a very enjoyable night.

A List of Asian Qualities

2008-07-31T05:15:00.005-04:00

Another late night, so you guys get an update. Hooray!

Now that I'm familiar with Singapore, I think it's fair for me to start talking about the habits -good and bad- that I've picked up here which are decidedly Asian in nature. This will help you avoid the inevitable that's followed my every return from a foreign country or Boy Scout camp.

Good: Feet, feet feet. It's all about feet here. I probably wash my feet three times a day (excluding showers) and an extra two if I visit Nathan's house. If there is one habit I infect America with, it'd be this one: clean feet and a clean house are like peanut butter and honey (or jelly, for the hoi polloi).

Bad: Cell phones. There seems to be an idea here that text messages can be typed without affecting a conversation, and that answering a phone call is paramount to nearly any other social discourse. The recluse nerd in me bought into this with a swift "woo-hoo!". Texting and carrying on a conversation at the same time is one habit I definitely want to kick.

Debatable: Noodles and sushi, two of the many foods I now eat a lot more than normal. If only they could make a country with sandwiches, pizza, and nga pi fried rice...

Good: Amazingly more tolerant of foreigners. Cultures and languages are one thing, but learning to work with other people is something else entirely. A sure sign that my friends here feel perfectly comfortable around me is that they occasionally address me in the wrong language when we're in a group.

Bad: Conversation pace. Fancy words may speed up conversation, but they trip up the average listener. Using lots of simple words and repeating them is a sure way to get your message across, and it's really necessary if you ever start planning activities here. ("Want to meet at 5? Ok? Then see you at 5? Tonight? Ok, 5pm?"). Unfortunately, it's also a great way to drive native speakers up a wall. You'll have to deal with a general downgrade in the quality of my conversations. I'll try to thumb through my word-a-day calendar on the plane though, for your sake...

Undecided: Waaay too sensitive. You know how you used to love a particular joke about until you actually met someone from ? Suffice it to say that you won't get much laughter out of me at others' expenses. I'm not trying to be a prig; really, it's just a reflex action now.

Good: Socially aware. Actually, I should have learned this one in High School, but it turns out that I am, in fact, not the most important person in the group. Asian culture usually over-specifies group dynamics at the expense of personal interest, and while I haven't gone that far yet, I've found myself far more socially capable than I was in the past.

Good, but Unrelated to Asia: Finally done being a tourist! I was having dinner tonight with some friends, and one of them was happily trying every new dish under the sun. I've tried nearly everything by now, and I'm satisfied enough with having liver/intestines/ears that I can comfortably say "no". What's really great about this bullet point is that it settled with the bar slightly higher than it was before I left --so I can really enjoy quail eggs and roast duck without going all the way to jellyfish.

I realize it's been a while without posting, but I hope to get a few more "structured" articles like this one out before I return home for Christmas. This year, I really want to visit all of you, if time allows. Until then, all the best!

A Silver Lining, of Sorts

2008-07-30T21:47:00.008-04:00

It's rather well-known that I'm irritable in the morning. This is just an unfortunate fact of life, even moreso because it means I often fail to recognize awesomeness when it occurs. Take today for instance...

So, I was at Bread Talk this morning, ordering their amazing new bacon and egg sandwiches. (Bread Talk is a Singaporean store that I love for the food and hate for the service.) Unfortunately, I made the mistake of standing in the sandwich line. When no-one took my order, I realized that -silly me- I was supposed to stand in the general line. Then, when I got to the cashier, she said "have you ordered already?" --wait a minute, wasn't I in the wrong line before? Thinking back a few minutes, I had heard them say something about "that guy who didn't order" (in 华语, of course) whom, it was now painfully obvious, was me.

See, this is what I mean by irritable. Anyways, after ordering, I was now back in the (considerably longer) sandwich line. Fortunately, I had reading materials on hand. More Chinese chatter ensued, and a lady in line was kind enough to translate for me: the toaster wasn't working, and would I care for a sandwich with un-toasted bread? I guess I was kind of rude to her (which is totally unfair, I know) but she took it in stride. And I got my sub-par un-toasted sandwich and then moped my way to campus.

Some time later, I realized that the toaster probably broke because --as the long line also evinced-- the bacon and egg sandwich is a popular item. Which means that one of my greatest aspirations for Asia may be coming true: they may actually have started to like sandwiches!

Oh, it would be beyond amazing if someone could finally convince our Far-East friends that sandwiches are themselves beyond amazing. And if they're selling like hotcakes at Bread Talk, that's a pretty good sign that they're on the way. (The Sandwich Shop, of course, is far too classy to count as mainstream. Sun-dried tomatoes = not pedestrian.)

As always, xkcd has a comic for bacon:

PS: I'm only cranky till 10:30.

It's a Secret

2008-06-05T02:31:00.003-04:00

Well, I've been meaning to post about so many things, but this one in particular is so very overdue. A while ago, a Chinese film came out called "The Secret" (不能说的秘密). I had very low hopes for this one, because it was written/directed/starred in by a pop star (Jay Chou) whose other movies didn't appeal to me at all.

Long story short, the film was amazing. It captures a feeling that's very special --like, a reminiscence of someone else's childhood, which I rarely feel when watching a foreign film. Plus, it's just done with such quality that I sometimes wonder if some other Jay Chou acted in Kung Fu Dunk. And this quality pervades every level, not just the acting. For example, the "science" of the plot's secret is never explained, which makes everything feel much more surreal. And there's reasons for why each character acts the way they do.

Short story shorter, if anyone asks me in the forseeable future to recommend a movie to kind of introduce them to Chinese language films, this will probably always be the one I list first. It's really enjoyable, and very touching.

Also, the lead actress has an amazing smile.

Of Course I Couldn't Find It; It Was Filed Properly

2008-05-26T04:40:00.003-04:00

Spent about half an hour cleaning my desk in an attempt to find a crucial document which was in my files the whole time. Whoops~~

I've been meaning an update, but I want to back it up with pictures (and they've been lacking lately). Just stay tuned.

One of the consequences of starting to use Linux which they don't tell you is that it encourages you to take drastic measures to optimize your Windows installs. Sure, it's helpful; I have a much better understanding of both operating systems now. But I've also re-installed them from scratch five or six times. ("Whoops, corrupted the NTFS partition (again). Format... Whoops, ReiserFS can't store a bootloader. Format...")

I'm making Mom's amazing molasses chicken on Sunday. I'll put up pictures of that event and the candy apple fiasco together. Until then, read the news and stay in school. Or at least keep learning.

Interesting Olympics Video

2008-05-10T22:17:00.003-04:00

You know the feeling: you find something completely obscure on Google. Maybe you're searching for info on Archduke Franz Ferdinand or the Book "The Princess Bride" and you manage to filter out the indie band and the movie respectively. For me, I've gotten really good at Google, so this isn't a source of excitement for me anymore... but finding things in Chinese is!

So here's the video I found (my friend showed me first) --there's English sub-titles of reasonable quality. This video is for the Olympics; it's titled "Beijing welcomes you", and features so many celebrities that it's, like, seven minutes long.

You should watch a few minutes of this video because, like all things Olympics-related, it's a rare chance to glance Chinese trying so earnestly to portray their modern culture to the outside world in a way that they're proud of. For example, they show a little bit of traditional, er, "acting" (the masked characters) and, of course, the old & new wonders (great wall & bird's nest stadium).

FYI, if you're in the mood, let me know and I'll provide a better translation. ("Let's all be brave and hope for a miracle", hehe...)

Edit: The lower-right button is "full-screen", but it opens the original site in a new window... then you have to click the lower-right button again (wait for the ad to go away.)

Hard-drive Meteorite

2008-05-08T14:26:00.003-04:00

I'm finding Slashdot more and more interesting of late; it's got a lot of random computer-related articles. For one thing, a few weeks after I told my parents how much I felt like soldering something, a random computer scientist posted the same question to slashdot, and got some good answers.

And now this article: remember how the Columbia disintegrated upon re-entry? Apparently, their hard drive was found six months later in a dried-up lake bed, completely covered in dirt and with all plastic melted (due to crashing from the ionosphere.)

If Computer World is to be believed, Kroll Ontrack Inc. was able to recover 99% of the data from this wrecked hard-drive. Very, very impressive.

During Exam Week, You All Get Mini-Blog Updates

2008-05-04T23:27:00.003-04:00

"Among other things, this would consolidate market share with the already-dominant... provider in a manner that would reduce competition and choice in the marketplace."

This would just be another boring business quote were it not directly from Microsoft. "Reduce competition and choice"? Wow...

More specifically, it's from their sour-grapes-ridden letter withdrawing their bid for Yahoo. Actually, with all the doom-and-gloom, High School Drama Queenery of that letter, it's more like "poisoned grapes". Ah, Steve Ballmer, I expected much more from the man who invented "Developers".

An Amazing Snack

2008-05-04T05:24:00.001-04:00

Just when you think you've found every food in Singapore worth eating, you stumble upon a gem like this one: green tea flavored pumpkin seeds. The taste is actually out of this world.

Needless to say, my days will be shinier & happier until I run out of pumpkin seeds. Cheerio~

Oh, the Humanity

2008-04-27T10:21:00.004-04:00

I was trying to figure out why the phrase "We will have to agree to disagree" seems so unpleasent to me. I finally arrived at the notion that I don't like platitudes. Wikipedia even lists it on their page of Thought-terminating cliches. Along with a reference to "New Speak" (1984).

But Wikipedia is a notoriously tedious source. So I went on and read Immanuel Kant's "Critique of Pure Reason", and found that logical fallacies have apparently been a problem for many, many years. Now, I myself have on occasion used the "appeal to me being a good guy", or "appeal to messy handwriting" (on exams), so I can empathize with all you fallacious arguers. (That word looks funny.)

These days, though, I'm just getting sick of it. It's just so trendy to be horribly in love with your own private superficial metaphysics, to be consumed with philodoxy --I've had people ask for my opinion on their judgment and then attack my character when I pointed out a flaw. I've even had people offer ad hominem arguments, thinking they were doing me a favor. "Of course you support democracy. You're from America." Do you realize that I took a minor in Philosophy just so I could learn to present myself without bias, and that you insinuate grave insult with that jocular statement?

Kant summed it up perfectly: people let their thoughts run wild without any rigorous control, and such metaphysical euphorias can never be proved dead wrong, scientifically. It would be the same if mathematicians accepted new theorums without the corresponding proof.

But my keys betray me; I'm actually in a very cheery mood tonight. All papers are in, and I'm only left with exams. Hooray! And I'm immeasurably pleased to have finally figured out what it is that piques me so about that stupid phrase. Idle chit-chat is one thing, but when we engage in a debate I expect a clear winner, or the determination that both our views are flawed. I give you the respect of seriously considering your proposal, and you instead insist that we both remain halfway in ignorance.

PS: Pictures in this post are thanks to a suggestion by Pat McDonald. They're mostly unrelated, but I hope you like them. ;)

My Super Power - And Other Stories for the Road

2008-04-16T00:23:00.007-04:00

My Super Power

I have a super power. Did you know? I am capable of forgetting what shirt I have on. Sometime between putting it on in the morning and changing into my jammies, I become unaware of the wearing. (Footnote: There's always a shirt on. I'm not that oblivious...) Perhaps this doesn't sound like much, but it is a power I've learned to put to good use.

You can tell when someone doesn't have this power; it's very obvious. They'll have on some obnoxious shirt, and they'll be smirking when you make eye contact. Perhaps you just like looking at eyes. They think you think they're clever. For me, though, I totally forget. More than once, this has led me to conduct a presentation wearing a T-shirt.

The Refactory

I've mentioned the game engine I'm working on before. It's basically a hobby, and a constant reminder to be disciplined in how I code. For any other project I work on, the quality of code is secondary to the thing actually working. Not here. And so, I've spent the last three months rebuilding the menu system from scratch. It's now amazingly concise, powerful, and low-impact, clocking in at 16% of the original size --an astonishing improvement. I'm quite satisfied.

That's all well and good for me, but I can't imagine how software companies explain to their clients that they spent three months doing essentially nothing. I guess that's why Internet Explorer hogs the memory scene with each new release, whereas Firefox is consistently better managed in this regard.

Not Your Typical Article on the Olympics

We all know the hullabaloo going on right now with the Olympic torch ~~gauntlet~~ relay. I've got ~~so much~~ nothing to say about that. But here's an interesting fact: from what I've read, the torch had a fairly reasonable reception in San Francisco. The trouble spots were mostly in Europe. However, we all get lumped together as "Westerners" whenever the Chinese speak about it. This all-encompassing term applies to everyone white, even if they're from Australia ("Southern"ers?). But why am I complaining? They could be calling us 老外 ... This is really just a public service announcement for y'all: if you manage to get dragged into a debate on this subject, make sure the phrase "Oh, that was Europe. What about America?" slips out early on.

Speaking of "fair's fair", I know a whole bunch of Chinese living in NY who were hassled after the Virginia Tech shootings because, apparently, they "looked Korean". Racism foiled by ignorance!

Thing-what?

Photos are up for the Thingyan celebration. My friend was awesome enough to actually attempt to get pictures while water was being splashed everywhere; kudos for that. These are two of my favorite photos. I am definitely celebrating this festival when I move back to America.

Operation: San Frantastic!

My room's a bit bland these days. So I ask you, my loyal readers, to suggest something for it. I'm adding the stipulation that, if it's not obscenely difficult or expensive (or offensive) to get, I'll add it to my room. Sure, I can decorate my own room. But I'm looking for inspiration here. Even bad suggestions are good: they remind me to get something to replace that hideous _____ that ____ suggested.

Bug or Feature?

There's an interesting aspect to Blogger posts: they're date-stamped with the time you writing them. For example, this article should appear to have been posted about a week or so ago. This will probably make you all frantic that you haven't kept up with my blog, and distract attention from the fact that I haven't been updating. Ah-hahaha!

10 Things You Didn't Know About America/Americans

2008-03-28T06:15:00.001-04:00

10. America is a Free Country
Perhaps you knew, but it's easy to forget just how much freedom you actually get. Remember when the Clinton administration was unable to shut down whitehouse.gov's "sister" site? Ever buy a banned book from the American Library Association? Or notice a non-profit organization receive harsh criticism for requiring its member to have a religion -any religion at all- and think about all the countries that revoke your citizenship if you don't sponsor the state religion?

9. The Pursuit of Happiness...
I heard something about "Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Property" the other day, which reminds me: My third-favorite thing about America is that you can do almost anything that tickles your fancy. Name your child after an apple, join a protest every weekend, or get whatever tattooed wherever. Government officials may doubt the sanity of people who do these things, but they rarely stop you from doing your own thing. And if your state doesn't allow it, just go find one that does!

8. America is Safer (and Less Safe) Than You Think
Living in Singapore, I find people amazed when I describe DC as "really nice, but don't wander through some parts." Are they safety-crazy? Am I really scared when I visit our nation's capitol? Did I spell capitol right? (Always mess that one up...) Students were robbed at my alma mater, I think at knife point, and we were always reading about shootings in the paper. But I never felt unsafe. That being said, coming to Singapore has taught me just how much progress we could make, if we made it our priority. America's a civil place, but (and I say this as a neutral observer) some countries have us totally beat in that regard.

7. America is Brimming with Indie Goodness
American youth have talent, and they have the drive to show others their skills. I'm talking music and movies, specifically, but I'm sure there are other avenues of skill which I'm unaware of. The point is, if you told me to make a playlist of all local stuff, I could get you some really good songs. This is my second-favorite thing about America.

6. Americans are Ignorant
While performing in San Franciso, Eddie Izzard made a joke about General Lafayette, adding "You don't know who he is, do you?" after scattered laughter. "Let's see... was it the Spanish-American war? The French-Bananna war? No! He was a Revolutionary War hero, hung out with Washington... ah, forget it."
Still, I bet a lot of you know about Lafayette. Mostly, Americans are just bad at the foreign stuff. When I said "Singapore" in #8, did you know where that was? Can you name 10 countries in Africa? How about South America? Do you know what the only real communist country left in Asia is? Do you know what Europeans think about the EU Constitution? Do you know what insurgencies the US has funded over the past few decades? (Did you know we funded insurgencies?) Do you remember what Manifest Destiny was from History class, and can you name a few countries that think the same way nowadays as we did then? Do you have any Muslim friends?

5. America is Not Racist
Please, please. Of course you can find racism in America. But you have the option of not being racist. Most Americans would be shocked to learn that racism is a very big part of one's daily life in some countries. Consider Malaysia, a fairly modern place that has laws such as "10% of all jobs must go to natives & Malays." Let me stress that this policy separates citizens into "bumiputra" and "non-bumiputra" --there's no denying it's a racist policy. Now, I know the history & justification behind this law, and a glance at my passport will show you just how much I love Malaysia in spite of it. You can have a great country with racist laws. But sit back every once in a while and appreciate just how far America has come in this regard. Saying "I think we should reserve 10% of jobs for the majority race" just isn't acceptable anymore.

4. Americans Speak a Beautiful Language
I was just reading an article in the GNU archives which complained about people programming:

if (n == 1) printf ("%d file deleted", n);
else printf ("%d files deleted", n);

Basically, they're saying that this doesn't help pluralization if the native language has multiple levels of plural nouns (like in Polish). What I'm getting at, through very round-about means, is that English has a lot of rules and exceptions. It's complex. You might think that's a bad thing (but you already know English, so stop complaining!) but where you see "difficult to learn", I see "expressive". English is a beautiful language to talk in. These rules and exceptions to rules present a high-frequency speech-scape which lets you play word games and have fun. I can imagine that sarcasm started this way. (But no-one ever uses that, of course.)
Forgive me if I'm partial to English; the real reason I prefer it the most is its lack of tones. I'm drowning in tones a bit; they make songs difficult to sing, and make casual conversation sound like an MC is joining your friends on his day off.

3. America Has Good Movies
I say this coming from the twin perspectives of foreign movies and video games. From a VG perspective, I really respect the film industry for occasionally throwing money at an idea that might work. The classic example is Waterworld, which bombed terribly, but at least they tried. Lord of the Rings was a high-budget trilogy that did succeed, even though these kinds of classics-to-film usually fail as well. From the perspective of foreign movies... well, I take it back. I like foreign movies. :)

2. America Is a Good World Leader
People forget this when they criticize what's going on these days. I'm not going to break it down step by step. But I am going to ask you to name a world power that behaved better, at the height of their power, then we are acting now. Rome's a good contender, except that their approach to bettering the world was to conquer it, because "everyone wants to be Roman". Considering that power corrupts, and considering that most politics in America focuses inwards, I'd give us a silver star.

1. Americans Won't Listen to an American not in America
Most of you will disagree with most of this article, and some will eagerly disregard all of it. I feel that it's mostly good, keen observation and reason, but Americans have a tendency to zone out at the phrase "America is...", especially if it's coming from someone who's not in the country. (Hey! Wake up!) This is, surprisingly, my number one favorite thing about Americans. Because I'll say "America's not racist" and you'll all say "What is he talking about! It's terribly racist!" and slowly but surely the country's racism will recede. Some of you will gladly point out the atrocities America has committed internationally, and the spotlight will be on these things, instead of resting on the laurels that we're "not the worst" world power. And this, in my opinion, is what society's all about.

Today's Musings

2008-03-11T03:22:00.007-04:00

So I just hit "compile" on WaitZar 1.1 when I heard a funny sound coming from my computer. Now, I'm no stranger to the "click-click-click" that means your hard drive's about to crash, so I brought it in. Turns on the fan was broken, and the hard drive was, er, trying to break? (Running slowly, some bad sectors, etc.) So I got a new one and a new fan.

The end result was that I sat in McDonalds with an iced latte, waiting for my old data to copy over (it didn't, but that's a different story) and thinking about McDonalds in general. I guess I can give you the intro: for one thing, McDonalds in Singapore (and Burger King) is a place where you won't see primarily Chinese. Because both restaurants are Halal, you tend to get a lot of Muslims showing up. Also, people who eat at McDonalds here are unimaginably thin. I'm not sure why...

But actually, I want to explain something else about McDonalds. For me, it's the perfect place to do work. (Well, my lab is better. I mean, if I need a break from lab.) McDonalds has two things which, to me, are essential for getting work done:

Background noise, optimally provided by people talking in a language I don't understand.
WiFi

Moreover, no-one bothers you. No-one even notices you! Taken from a Buddhist perspective, McDonalds heralds independent arising. Each table is an island. No tables affect other tables. If someone walked into McDonalds and yelled "Excuse me!" no-one would think he was talking to them in particular. Try doing that in a library. Sometimes I feel that I can only "shut off" my senses by surrounding them with static. McDonalds fills this niche perfectly.

On to more esoteric things, the inside of my laptop was beyond dusty --approaching grimy-- and I was dismayed to learn that Singapore doesn't stock compressed air. That's right, almost no-one sells it, and it's almost never in stock. This is air we're talking about, mind you.

Speaking of random things, I recently finished Phoenix Wright, Ace Attorney, a game which commits a dozen game design faux pas, but yet remains amazingly fun. Interestingly enough, I can't imagine it being fun even if it "fixed" these "flaws". Anyways, it's the perfect game for me, because you spend most of your time walking around crime scenes, talking to people, and gathering evidence, ultimately building up a case for your client's innocence. Since I perform this meticulous bookkeeping regardless of the outcome (e.g., while watching TV series), I enjoy putting my filed-away knowledge to the test.

Speaking of games, my next research project involves making a distributed game-based simulation. It's going to be pretty interesting, too; I'm really enjoying making it. We're using the XNA Framework -Microsoft's development kit for the XBOX 360.

Speaking of Microsoft, my feelings these days are mixed. For one thing, all the Win32 programming I'm doing for WaitZar is really refreshing... Microsoft's online documentation is excellent, and when it's not so clear (e.g., "How do I read an embedded file as a byte stream") there's an excellent community who'll gladly answer your questions. Then again, it seems like they take cheap shots whenever possible. For example, it's almost impossible to "clone" your copy of Vista, which is a reasonable thing to want to do if, say, you buy a new hard drive. Secondly, whereas Google will throw out things that don't work, Microsoft just keeps on pushing Visual Source Safe and the J# language... may I remind you that one of these doesn't work and the other will seriously mess up your computer. Dealing with Microsoft requires so much meta-knowledge... I just wish they'd document what's right and what's wrong.

That's all for today, folks. Stay tuned.

Here's a Char-ming Story

2008-02-18T05:00:00.010-05:00

As you know, I have a hobby studying languages -a hobby that recently has received little attention. Getting back "into the swing of things" took a somewhat creative turn that has everything to do with Pokémon.

Pokémon...? You know... that game where you fight and collect cute little monsters? The game that all guys like, but only 10% admit they like? The game with the TV series that I definitely did not watch until the point where Ash evolved a Charizard?

So anyways, Nathan watched me playing Pokémon on the DS, and started naming all the creatures I caught. He picked Burmese names that described the way the monsters looked or acted. There are about 500 Pokémon, and it's common to switch your active party often. So now I'm learning a lot of new words.

The problem is, I'm learning a lot of random words. Like "winter melon" and "alien". Combining that with what I know already, I can now ask for winter melon tea, or ask if your alien was hungry, or ask if you've fired your winter melon lately. Fortunately, I welcome this new esoteric quality. After all, if I still can't understand a culture, they might as well not understand me. :)

There's Only One Boat in Thailand and It's Owned by John Rambo

2008-01-26T22:57:00.000-05:00

This post is dedicated to Yawgoog people, those whom I cannot seem to detach from my life, even 10,000 miles away (not that I'd want to.)

Andy misses regular updates. Poor Andy, for I just saw Garden State & didn't really like it. But I think that it's just not my kind of movie. It captured a whole lot of concepts that are very difficult to catch in film, and it was a great movie. I just found it amazingly boring.

James was completely right when he suggested rum+soursop=good. Also, since I don't trust my own sense of taste, I got others to verify it as well. You've got like a 92% confidence on this one. Point six.

Ben Berry would be very pleased to know that a "Best Friend" of his has its very own store! "Bread Talk" is in the bread -and only bread- business. They do go over the top a little bit sometimes, trying to come up with new breads. My favorite is the sunflower roll.

Mr. Wyckoff would be very disappointed in me for not getting any new good photos. I'm blaming the batteries. Keep your hopes up for Chinese New Year, though. That's a hoppin' good time.

Sam (hey, he worked at a camp) would be happy to know that I successfully assembled a cabinet the other day. It was store-bought, but I managed to turn it from many pieces into one piece despite very confusing directions.

McDonald would be an awesome samurai. Just thought I'd throw that out there. But he'd probably be upset that drinks are not allowed on the subway here. Or food. Or explosive liquids. I agree with them on one of those, but the other two seem a bit extreme.

Take care!

Blogwebs

2007-11-30T03:53:00.000-05:00

What do you mean I haven't updated in a while? Oh, good heavens! There's cobwebs on my blog.... guess I have been a bit in absentia.

Well, I'll update when I'm stateside. For now, here's a picture of what I've been working on:

PHDuh....

2007-11-22T09:48:00.000-05:00

Normally, PHD-comics is somewhat irrelevant to me (FYI: in Singapore). However, this one is perfect:

Tasty Eyeballs

2007-11-15T12:57:00.000-05:00

Two of my favorite blogs have finally, finally become more prodigiously verbose:
James
&
Lou

I'm going to tell you why I like each one.

James, I met again tonight, this time for Fish Head Curry in Little India. Unfortunately for him, I'd just finished a Card book, and, as always, this made me prone to both arguing, and listening. And man, you can't have a real good argument unless you listen.

Now where were we? Oh, why I like the blogs. As he said tonight, James's blog speaks the way James himself speaks. Perhaps this is why, when Nathan met him, his expectations were more or less spot-on. And the way James speaks is authoritarian, irrefutable, and self-assured. But if you have a good argument, he'll listen, and even though he probably won't concede, he'll argue in a way that doesn't leave you both at an impasse. We call this "respecting your point of view".

There's also "being a good leader", which Camp kinda beats into you. It's hard for me to explain to you just how much Camp -being on staff, that is- changed the person I am. James agrees. So for all the careful thought he or I might give on any one subject, we can both set aside the sophistry when a moral dilemma presents itself, and we do our jobs with clean conscience. (My excuse, by the way, is that general staff do more work than MMs, so my net work done for camp increased. But now we're back to sophistry.)

Lou is a similar but different story. I respect him as a leader, and I've worked more with him than I've worked with James. James has worked more with him than with me. It's like a work-triangle. Anyways. His blog is not at all how he speaks naturally. And, since he keeps such humility throughout, you'd never expect by reading it that he's an awesome guy. Like, French Press awesome.

His stories are so very interesting, because they fill me with a sense of purpose. Here is someone who's got some idea of what his life should and should not be. And he will go to great lengths to bring it back on track, just because he feels it should be done. My blog clearly rambles. I still don't really know if my life is random as well, though I suspect it's more like a story. When I read Lou's blog, I feel like they've taken a player in a reality TV show off to the side, and are interviewing him. You can feel the continuity. He also talks slightly too much about sports and 24 for my taste (but that should translate to "a reasonable amount" for anyone else.)
By the way, belated congratulations to the Red Sox. And, as always, the Patriots have my unwavering confidence. And, wow, the Celtics are starting to get noticed.

We've got a trifecta going on here. Althought, I guess I should have said "hat trick".

Edit:
1. We didn't actually eat the eyes. (Although you're supposed to.)
2. Wow, reading that web site, you'd think that women never get to be scoutmaster of a troup. Poor, oppressed..... not at all! I'll have you know that one of these Scout....mistresses? (just say Scoutmasters) gave me hell for five years straight. By the way.

I suppose you can't "hide" being a woman, whereas the other two groups have some horrible "revealing" that causes everyone to doubt their past actions. Like, "I trusted him, and he was Godless?" Which, by the way, is total nonsense. The merits of how YOU act in the past cannot be dependant AT ALL on what I know or don't know about you. Also, the definition of atheists is too strict. Einstein looked at the details of advanced science and saw godliness. Others might call it "order", but they have faith in it. They expect miracles (like being able to cure cancer, which is more a part of our bodies than even bacteria.) Recall that the BSA just requires a religion -not a specific one. Can't we get some modified Deism going here? Because, of the three groups mentioned, "godless" are the ones that no longer stem from a survival need of the BSA.

Another Long Night

2007-10-31T18:09:00.001-04:00

Would you believe that it took me about four months to finally get that little box (pic) to turn "Singapore" into "စကၤာပူ"? And Nathan & I still have about 500 words to enter into our dictionary. (Sigh) But, progress is progress, which deserves celebration! (Yay!)

By the way Turco's blog has some great Singapore entries. Like, he covers things I should have gone over a year ago. Like food! And Durian! And how they speak so fast and so softly. Speaking of James, I'm meeting him tomorrow, for lunch. Should be good times. If only I could find my camera. Ah, there it is.

So things are getting interesting around here. The problem is, I really need a vacation. I can't really think straight, and I'm making silly errors in my coding. Christmas can't come fast enough...

More people should wear this:

戒, 还有。。。什么？

2007-10-20T12:24:00.000-04:00

I know the day's off to a good start when I leave the kitchen and the lights dim. A loud Bzzz! and blue sparks from the microwave confirms it: today is going to be FUN.

Now, I admit that I am foolhardy with the microwave. I've boiled water (in a ceramic cup -even worse!), microwaved metal (because I knew what I was doing!) and stood less than 3 feet from it while it was on. Nothing happened, but I accepted that something might go boom. (Because I was being stupid.)

Today I was microwaving a peanut butter jar, because I needed it dry. There was absolutely none of the metal foil that covers the thing left on it; it's been re-washed many, many time. Because I know that microwaves can be unpredictable when things are almost-dry, I put it in for 15 seconds. But the second the jar rolled a bit and touched the wall, a huge spark blasted a chunk of plastic off it. Now someone, anyone, tell me where I went wrong. And don't give me some propaganda like "You shouldn't microwave things to dry them." I want to know the reason.

It's just something, me and stay-at-home activities. I've successfully blown a fuse ironing. Who's done that?

PS: The title of the post refers to the film 色，戒, which caused me to almost fall asleep. A lot of it was heavily censored, but I don't think the removed material would have added to my enjoyment of the movie. I can't remember the last movie I've seen where I've hated every character.

"Yin Yang Man" might not be QUITE what you want...

2007-10-18T15:02:00.001-04:00

So I was looking up Chinese slang earlier (because I'm that awesome) -first a few words about that in general. In Chinese, a lot of words sound like numbers. (pretenend that most Chinese words are on syllable; there's a lot of collisions.) So, Chinese used to swap the two in order to communicate via pagers, back when a pager was the most sophisticated thing out there.

Actually, I suspect part of it is the love Chinese have of using fewer words. For instance, there are zero portmanteaus in a Chinese research paper. So when instant messaging came around, the phneomenon didn't go away; it compounded. For instance, here are some everyone knows:
88 = "Ba Ba" = Sounds like "Bye bye" in English
B4 = "B Shi" = 鄙视 = "Look down on" (我B4你 = "You're contemptible.")
55 = "Wu Wu" = 呜呜 = the sound made when you cry (in Chinese)

Anyways, there's a lot of these. And, there's a lot of slang. For a country whose citizens love their government, there's still a whole lot of snide comments that get made. For instance the whole propoganda regarding "comrade" backfired in China when the term became associated with... something else.

Which brings us to today's word! I laughed when I read this one; it makes perfect sense if you know what a yin yang actually means. (And most people have some idea.) The word is:

阴阳人 = yin yang ren = Yin Yang "Person"

FYI: "Person" could be translated to "man", just like we say "workman" or "showman".

So what does it mean? Well, we have a word for it in English, one that (I hope) some of you (Andy, Ethan) will be familiar with and others (G-rated audience) will think is a band:

ACDC

Mmmm.... Brains...

2007-10-14T12:20:00.000-04:00

So, it's "the weekend before" and I have about five very very important things due tomorrow. Now, it's not uncommon to see me in lab on the weekend, but I prefer to work on my own projects on my own time. Couldn't be helped this time; I've actually been working rigorously since Friday.

Now, don't get me wrong: there's a certain thrill right before one finishes a big chunk of important work, when you know you need to kick it into high gear or it just won't get done -I love it, really. But I don't love feeling like a zombie. Large amounts of Sentosa will help me recoup.

Which reminds me of two things. First, I saw Resident Evil: Extinction. I'm not sure why I saw it. It seemed inevitable, almost. Like, when Transformers came out and I thought "Yeah, I should probably go see that." Well, the movie was ok. For one thing, I'm glad we've finally accepted that zombies are past salvation. All through RE: Apocalypse, some idiot had to stand up and say "But they're people! (Some name) would never hurt me!" Meanwhile, all of us who'd ever played any of the games were chuckling quietly to ourselves. Nope, that's all gone in Extinction. All zombies, friend or foe, are dealt with summarily. Carlos was particularly good in this regard, but I'll leave that part a surprise. Oh, and my personal pet peeve with Apocalypse (that Nemesis stood up to thousands of bullets, but was outdone by a large metal spike) is also fixed. That's right, the bad guy here goes down in a totally ineffable fashion. He's unquestionably toast -in a high-tech fasion, as well.

Ah, the second thing happened a while ago. Maple Story released a Singapore map in, like, August, but I haven't played in a while. Something about being surrounded by people that, upon questioning, were all twelve years old got to me. Also, the game's somewhat boring around level 40. But the Singapore map is amazing! Clearly designed by someone who's probably only visited the country once, the first two enemies you fight are stop signs and garbage cans. Seriously! But the feel of the city is somehow preserved, you've got to give them credit. It feels like Singapore. See the screenshot. Those white signs and blue cabs are everywhere. And, I do in fact walk down the street wearing a red robe and a captain's hat, and carrying a magic wand. Well, okay, not really. I usually teleport down the street. Much faster.

Clearly, I am a bit overstressed now. But have no fear! If anything, I'm very good at recovering from these things. Oh, and before I forget: I was supposed to tell Nathan (who sometimes reads this blog) my favorite Penny Arcade plot arc. It's The Scion. You should read the first two, their MSN chat, and the last three. It'll make more sense.

Edit: Totally forgot to mention: I gained a level, and decided to do one quest. I got super-lucky, and wound up with the Icarus cape 3. That's +5 to Jump! Which is.... WAYY more exciting than I can possibly make you believe, isn't it? Just... it's awesome, trust me.

EditEdit: Okay, I removed that old post complaining about the QE. I can admit when I'm wrong. (I think I might actually know some of the professors who set the questions, now, too.)

Finally Something You Can Look At

2007-10-05T17:40:00.000-04:00

This is why I hate Java sometimes... it took me about 2 hours to figure out that ImageIO.read() won't work if you're reading:
1) An Image
2) ...from a JAR file
3) ...that's stored remotely (e.g., via JWS)
4) ...and is compressed
5) ...and is being accessed by JRE 1.4
This, my friends is obscure!

Anyways, the upshot is that people back home had only whispered rumors of "game engine" and "Burmese text system" and whatnot, so I decided to put together a simple demo of the former. Try it out!

OHRRGPCE FMF - Live Demo!

Shortcuts keys are the arrow keys, Enter, and Esc. If it runs too slowly, un-check everything.

Mooncakes & Myanmar

2007-09-28T04:51:00.000-04:00

So I'm sure you've all heard the news surrounding Burma. I won't rehash it; check CNN (or Mizzima, if you want more pictures) on your own. Political discussions aside, for me the whole thing boils down to a lot of my friends worried about a lot of their friends' safety. So please do what you can for them, be it a prayer every night, or a few articles to educate yourself about the situation, or a letter to a certain country that keeps abusing their Veto. Ahem.

Samantha sent me this really cute Chinese poem -last Tuesday was the "Mid-Autumn Festival", which is known for MOONCAKES~!

中秋节，爱情到
福气到，财运到
@美和到@
中秋节还没到
但愿我的祝福
第一个到
祝你中秋节快乐!

Happy Mid-Autumn Festival!

"Will It Blend" Conspectus

2007-09-05T00:32:00.000-04:00

So there's this lovely site called "Will It Blend?" and they... well, they blend things. Here's a sample:

Intriguing, isn't it? I certainly spent a portion of last night watching people blend things. My favorites include:

BIC Lighters
Cubic Zirconium
The iPhone

And that's your Conspectus for today.

Post Script: The credit card example is possibly the best visual demonstration of the word "dissintigrate" that I've ever seen.

"Beta" means "It Doesn't Work"

2007-08-26T23:37:00.001-04:00

I've been playing eLan Online lately, mostly because I've never been part of a closed beta before and it's kind of exciting. I'm reminded of the world of .hack//, where players are at the whim of a vengeful superior being who disrupts their world at any opportunity. For example, it took me nearly half an hour to figure out how to form a party.

I'm trying to form a story in my head, something I'm sure you'll enjoy. But right now, I've got a 20-page paper on virtual machines to read, followed by a 150-page paper (youch!) on egress models.

ENTERTAINMENT aught7

2007-08-19T07:21:00.000-04:00

Without further ado, here's a brief summary of the various media with which I pass the time. Note that these are not from 2007; rather, I only saw them in 2007.

Joyce Meyers

I immediately took a liking to this 64-year-old Christian teacher. Unlike others from my country, she opened with a flawlessly executed compliment: "I've got to say, for fashion, you've got it together. Everything matches; all the sparkles -even on the guys!- look great."

Her sermon was also pretty good; very simple, direct, and practical: "You need to love yourself before you can love others."

(This picture of Ms. Meyers was actually taken at the church I go to.)

If you only see one movie from this list, this is the one to see. I've recommended other Korean movies before, but mostly just for the novelty. This one's really good, not as a Korean movie, but as a movie in general.

It's a "classic" love story, with all that this entails. The main actress is really great; she manages to act hopelessly in love without also appearing insane. (Other Korean movies I've seen have really crazy women.)

There are two parallel storylines: the couple in the picture are the modern ones; in addition, the girl in pink is reading through her mother's old love letters to her father, and piecing their relationship together. It starts off a bit slow. Just give it time.

Flawlessly done. You should all see this one.

The Classic
(클래식)

Brave Story

I think I only watched this anime with Nathan because it's current. The story revolves around a boy who finds a doorway to a magical world and has to undergo a fantastic journey. It's a rather stereotypical adventure in this regard.

Overall, not that great, but if you're bored have a look. Some parts are quite funny, and the story's shallow but enjoyable.

"The Promise" is a unique movie in that every Chinese (every last one) that I mention it to dislikes it. But I found the characters very endearing. Nearly every one of them could be understood, even if their actions were a bit fantastical.

Roughly, the plot revolves around a young girl who agrees to a rich lifestyle for the price that she will lose every man she loves. There's also a languishing general, a faithful slave, a ticked-off duke, and a guilt-ridden assassin.

Fortunately, as one IMDB review put it, the movie has "less than the usual far-east theatrics." It's weird, but still accessible to a Western audience.

Ethan should see this one.

The Promise
(无极)

Goof Troop

This game is very old; it was for the now-defunct Super Nintendo. I'd heard about it: a action-puzzle game similar to Zelda but much shorter. But no-one mentioned the best part! It's two player!

They also didn't mention that, due to the unique method of picking up things, you can spend the whole game bonking your partner on the head with barallels. And that's really the best part of the game.

Total garbage, really. It's supposed to be an "Easternized" version of one of Shakespeare's classics, but it ends up just being boring.

I've only listed it here because people keep asking about it. Don't even bother seeing it.

The Banquet
(夜宴)

Priceless
(Hors de Prix)

We've saved the best for last -this French film is amazing! I refuse to mention anything about the story except that it's a Romantic comedy. See it for yourself.

You may remember the lady from Amelie, and (shudder) the DaVinci Code.

I've been told the actor is a stand-up comedian, which would explain his excellent body language throughout the whole film.

Overall, the characters are adorable, and the story is quite charming. And it's funny!

That's all folks! It's a short list, but I can't recall anything else I want to review. Hope you enjoy these movies/games/shows/speakers and enjoy the bad ones. If you're short on time, see Priceless and The Classic (in that order.) Cheers!

The Woman's Point of View

2007-08-02T03:05:00.001-04:00

I had the fortune to talk (rather: instant message) with one of Nathan's co-workers last night -a girl who shares the same name as a song. One of the things we brought up was relationships -something I've been dying to hear about from a female Singaporean's point of view.

Most of the particulars of dating are roughly the same, but there's a small divergence on Expectations. Ana very casually suggested that she wanted someone who could be patient with her, since her mood varies. Considering that this was the second time we've ever talked, I take this to mean that she considers this "not a big deal" or "a reasonable expectation."

I'm still musing over this one; I can't really imagine the same chat happening with an American girl, all other things being equal. A few other things she said struck me a very different from back home, but for the sake of privacy I'll have to leave those out.

I was able to confirm, for about the 10th time, what a notorious Shanghai-based blogger once observed: 9 times out of 10, women are much more interesting to chat with on MSN than guys.

In unrelated news...
If I have anything to say about it (which I do!) the next post will be your long-anticipated movie/tv review, where I cover all those shows that consume my free time and should consume yours too.

To any Chinese out there: I still love 无极, even if you think it's a terrible movie! Duke WuHuan gives it a hearty thumbs up.

Spirulina Tea

2007-07-29T11:13:00.000-04:00

Just had to share this one with you guys (especially Dad.) So... with my nightly purchase of Chrysanthemum tea, I received a promotional bottle of Spirulina Tea. Think about those two words, being used together.

Spirulina is genetically enhanced algae. Tea implies water. Spirulina tea is, essentially, pond water. It looks like pond water, and it tastes -since I never really drank pond water- like Yawgoog Pond*.

Amazing! I can't wait to see if this product takes off, becomes the next big thing in Asia. 'cause, wow...

*Yawgoog Pond is a lake.

Inspired by Something Else

2007-07-27T14:22:00.000-04:00

My opinion of the Swing Survival Guide is that, if Matt Stephens whines and whines about Flash, then Matt Stephens should use Flash. Two words: GOLDEN HAMMER. However! his article is only of concern to us because of this page, which you should click on. For the techies, it's vector-based windows done in Swing. (say-WHAT!?!)

For the rest of you, it's a horrible mess! Really, this is a screen that only a programmer could find beautiful... it's a "technical demo" that bombs in the presentation department.

This reminds me of Lina, who just passed her "verbal QE" (presentation) while her senior classmate failed it. The main difference? Lina spent 2 weeks preparing just the speech, and even (I think) wrote note cards so she could keep her eyes on the audience. Her senior read from the slides.

Phon is well-known for his storytelling. He is also known for his work in the Singapore-MIT alliance. And, back when Singapore was deciding on whether or not to build the Biopolis, he had to give a simple talk to several admins about how bio-tech could benefit Singapore and what exactly it was.

And here is where we arrive at the center of the matter, and you're all sent home with a warm fuzzy feeling of resolution: he had to give a simple talk. We all have to make our fields accessible to the common plebein. (and we're all novices at something)

This brings me down to the Final Simile: this is all a whole lot like the difference between A Short History of Nearly Everything, by Bill Bryson, and The Science of Discworld, by Terry Pratchett. Bryson glorifies the Ivory Tower academics -people like Newton whose works are often inaccessible in their genius. Pratchett's material sometimes overlaps, but focusses on "lies-to-children" such as "the Earth is a sphere" (it's actually a bit squashed.) He presents science by first presenting fiction. Both books bore my right hemisphere to tears, Pratchett's only slighly livening it up in the interleaved fantasy chapters.

I can't even begin to fathom which approach is better.

Inspired by the Jargon Files...

2007-07-16T23:33:00.000-04:00

So, I'm typing this post with my left hand on one keyboard and my right hand on another, something which is easier done than said (surprisingly enough.)

My undergraduate university's team mascot was the Engineer, something I've never really forgiven them for. (My high school certainly wasn't much better, its mascot being a Canadien mounted policeman.) I've always thought a technical school could do better. So, for any up-and-coming institutes, here's some team names and possible slogans.

(Note that I have no idea why blogger pushes them so far down...)

Team Name	Slogan
The Klene Stars	"Victory or nothing! (Or anything in between)"
The Footblasters	"We're the best at what we do~!"
The ELIZA Effect	"Why not? Let's go ahead*!"
The Klene Plusses	"Please, just score at least one point"
The Abstract Classes	"..."

* ELIZA's response to "Do you want to win?"

My ongoing love/hate relationship with Singapore
I love how Chinese & Western society combines so well, cutting out most of the things educated citizens would call "senseless."
I hate that, oh, 6% of those I meet seem incapable of accepting that I have Malay friends. Some* use this as an excuse to "educate" me on the horrible vices of Malay society.

*The one freshest in my mind just today tried to explain that I could hold no educated opinion on this subject, because tourists are treated well in Malaysia and Singaporeans are singled out (to steal from/hurt/rape**, etc.) as the police would take no action. He pointed out that the situation might be reversed if, say, a Westerner & he went to France -at which point the Romanian in our group laughed and said this claim was totally ridiculous.
**(***)His example, not mine. Note that I'm fully aware of what constitutes polite conversation.
*** Yes, that's a footnote on the footnote symbol itself!! This is all in honor of the recent EU summit, which reached a conclusion that appears to have a footnote on every paragraph for every country.

Rushdie's Valentine's Day Card

2007-07-13T23:13:00.000-04:00

Mostly by chance, I just found out today that one of my favorite authors is still under official orders to be killed by any Muslims (under jurisdiction of the Iranian government.) Did you know that, on February 14th, 1989, Salman Rushdie -with no trial whatsoever- was marked for death -in any country, not just Muslim ones? (There's even a small bribe for non-Muslims...) In 2006, the order was confirmed as valid permenantly.

As all authors simply must have wit, Rushdie recently joked that he still receives a "sort of Valentine's card" from Iran each year on February 14th, letting him know the country has not forgotten its vow to kill him. [paraphrased from Wikipedia]

Fortunately, Rushdie was recently knighted by Britain. That should, presumably, give him access to a sword. "Sir Salman" sounds a bit like the name of a superhero, don't you think?

Post-Script
I've always thought that book-burnings didn't make any sense... you have to buy the book to burn it. Were I an author, and you paid money for my book, (even to burn it) I wouldn't be that upset. That said, note this quote from Wikipedia, which says that, probably as a direct result of the fatwa, "Rushdie earned about $2 million within the first year of the book's publication."

Post-Script Double-Prime
Ah, I love Indonesia. While people rioted over Rushdie's knighthood, the largest Muslim nation in the world simply said: "Indonesia needs to reduce (tension) and not to complicate the matter. If Indonesia also gets angry it will contribute nothing."
Ah, what's that lovely sound? The sound of maturity? Fantastic!

Headliners

2007-07-10T23:07:00.000-04:00

Linq It Up

After years of research, Microsoft finally set its sights on the second oldest paradigm in computing: lambda calculus. You could even argue that (mathematical) lambda expressions are older than all of computing. Here's the video, although you can just minimize it and listen to the sound (unless you enjoy watching Anders Hejlsberg wave his hands around while Charlie Calvert smiles slyly.)

In fact, there's a lot of good content there. "The problem with Imperative Programming Languages is that they over-specify their algorithms." Linq looks to be perceptively-driven, and may be what actually divides C# from Java in the near future.

Jade is further Jaded

I am not happy with the Jade website. Reason the first: their link to version 3.5 actually points to version 3.4.1. Reason the second: the package is a zip of zip files which contradict both in content and in path names. Reason the third: They botched the 3.4.1 release, and the poor LEAP developer had to email me the JadeLeap.dll file that I should be able to compile myself. Note that this comes into direct conflict with their license agreement (section 6 of the GPL), although it may not technically violate it.

Way to be professional.

Worth a Second Opinion

I contacted Mr. Paige, presenting him with the menu system for my game engine, cobbled together in moments of my spare time. He'd had some reservations about the new format (too complex) and made some comments about the design.

I expected good comments from him, but after running his ideas through my head, they sounded startlingly like my own. (He suggested arrows on the cursor and a label describing what the current menu component does.) Perhaps, save an insatiable appetite to "refactor", we're not so different after all.

That said, I was most proud that the changes he suggested took only minutes to effect. Like I've said, my goal with this project is to code it "right", so I'm quite happy when evidence to support this arises.

C++ Gets Snubbed

In case you don't want to pick through the MSDN, let me point you to this page, where it says "no plans to support: C++" Although MS C++ isn't terribly relevant to begin with, keeping it un-Linq'ed may totally eschew it from Microsoft's platform and placing it in the category of "archaic."

Don't believe me? C#'s adding functional programming. Ruby already has basic blocks. Java will probably be carried along, although I can guarentee the syntax will be wordier. Lisp developers are saying "what's the big idea?" (while we say "stand up, I can't see you all the way back there.") What is C++'s function now, caught in between C and [all the modern languages]?

Chinese Snacks

Jing Bo (did not*) just get back from China, and as such, we (did not) eat lots of really good Chinese cakes and dried food -to speak nothing of the tea! I'm of the opinion that Chinese snack food is the best in the world, albeit they're also currently blamed for the wheat scandal that killed a whole bunch of American pets just recently.

*He's not allowed to take vacations at the moment. As a good PhD candidate, he abides by this stipulation, of course.

Lo, and strike this Preacher before me a sharp slap on the face... please?

Two weeks ago at church, there was a guest speaker, all the way from the good ol' USA. Unfortunately, he performed the one egregious act that disenchanted Americans occasionally succumb to in Singapore: he said that Singapore is better.

Sure, he was just trying to endear himself to the crowd. I understand that, but he did just fine with "Football players dream of playing in the world cup, and preachers dream of preaching at [this church]." People can believe that. You can say "Singapore does some things much better than America" -you might even be able to tread so far as "Singapore's much better than [New York/San Francisco/Chicago]." But that's the line. You don't cross it.

Because no young Singaporean will believe you. They love their country. (They may never have left it.) And they respect the American culture. They borrow from it, like everyone else. They have a Borders, for goodness' sake. Even with the (Chinese) concept of flattering white lies, they still don't buy it. It's like... a yellow lie which, like yellow snow, just can't be swallowed. You might as well try to convince them that the island is big.

Ruthless Optimization

2007-07-03T05:02:00.000-04:00

There was definitely a point in my life (2001?) when I was hopelessly addicted to video games. The problem was, I didn't know what part of them I was addicted to. I didn't crave victory, and I didn't like "the story" (because games in those days had rather horrid stories. I'm looking at you, Lunar SSC.) I think eventually I figured out that I was addicted to the challenge of finishing these games as fast as possible.

Of course, this drew me to Role Playing Games, which are meant to be finished slowly. But I'd have none of that. Rather, I'd scrutinize the system and identify the key elements. In most games, this was "hit point." If you ran out of HP, you lost. People got all fancy with "counter-attacks" and the like, while I burned through exorbitant amounts of in-game currency buying potions while they power-leveled. And I finished in about half the time it took them.

A few reminiscing moments before we move on. When I played Final Fantasy VIII, I'd heard that the bosses were kept at your level, to prevent power-levelling. My strategy, then, was to keep my level as low as possible, "card" every monster I fought, and then Triple-Triad my way to useful items, etc. It worked. By FFX, they got smarter. I was actually at such a low level when I got to the final boss that I couldn't actually beat him. Whoops. Xenosaga was even more challenging; this is the one game where I expect my party members to be unconscious most of the time. No RPG is difficult after you've been playing Xenosaga for a few hours. I was probably one of the few people who played Dragon Warrior 4 that was aware the last boss was vulnerable to "Sleep."

Ah, those were the days. A few weeks ago, I read in the paper that Singaporean motorists look down on bicyclists, because they don't pay road taxes. Then, it occured to me: Singapore has exactly the same optimizing attitude I did. Road taxes pay for roads, therefore anyone who doesn't pay them has no business being on the road. Condominiums may be fancy, but what really matters is how many people they pack in a small space. So I'm not surprised that, on a monthly basis, perfectly nice condos are torn down to make way for taller ones with "cozier" rooms. Companies benefit when people work there, so the eight-hour day is almost always a nine-hour day. Credit cards don't make sense here because credit doesn't actually exist in Singapore. (Really! You need, like, a $30,000. P.A. income or a $10,000. direct deposit to get any credit card here.)

This is, of course, a winning attitude. It's also the reason I don't bike on roads (full of drivers who hate me.) And therein lies the dilemma. I don't "fondly recall" any of those games I optimized. They're just games. In fact, there's only a few games that I look back on and enjoy. Most of them took me months to finish; I enjoyed them. Nowadays, I debug ruthlessly, and I play games the way they should be played: casually, and for fun.

So, when I tell you that I'm loving it here, but I will definitely return to America, you need not doubt the clarity of my intention. The attitude here meshes so well with my own personality, it's true. But in America, we have the "American Dream", which is to delay your life's gratification to a point. If I want to, I can retire to Oregon to forge swords and raise logs. I probably will. I don't think it'd be that much fun to retire in Singapore.

What exactly is the "Singapore Dream"?

The Debugga

2007-06-24T23:08:00.000-04:00

When you double the size of a digital image, it usually looks blocky. (First Picture) Generally, the best solution is to detect edges in the image, and then "filter" it. (Second Picture) The problem is, I was getting all these green lines when I was doing it. (Third Picture)

The actual code for this was, oh, about 2,000 lines in total. As it happened, the code was completely correct; it just assumed something very obscure about color depth which the original developer had neglected to consider.

Of all the things I've learned in gaining a Computer Science degree, the ability to Debug has proven the most useful. It took me about 30 minutes to validate all 2,000 lines of code, and I did it automatically (using "black box" validation, a clever trick.) More importantly, I went from "There can't possibly be anything wrong with my code" to "It's fixed" in about four hours total.

That last attitude has proven to be the most useful to me in real life. Sherlock Holmes had the ability to throw away what was 100% impossible in favor of that which was 95% improbable, and so often in reality I've done the same thing. In Thailand, I was able to find my way back to the hostel even though I had almost no knowledge of the area. When working for Dan & Alex I was able to get a decent backend working even though I had almost no experience programming. I used to give up installing software if it didn't work with a simple click-through installer. Now I usually get it to work, always via a process of deduction.

The key ability is that of seeing reality, and all Computer Scientists do it. "That won't work" is trumped by "But it does", and "It must work" is trumped by "But it doesn't." Sure, empirical evidence is the weakest acceptable kind, but it's still acceptable, and we're very good at it. When I meet biologists, I don't understand their work, but I understand their method.

Forgive another reference to Dan Brown (I know he's not that good) but the experience of David in Digital Fortress is the perfect mirror to my own. Stranded in Spain, he follows a vanishing, constantly dead-ending trail, always asking himself "what do I have to go on?" and frequently returning "Nothing." But he makes progress, and in the end, he finds what he's looking for.

Sure, what he finds is a red herring, and he's constantly tracked by an assassin who capitalizes on his progress in the hopes of killing him at the moment of victory. But the second most important lesson Computer Science has taught me is how to disarm assassins*.

*kidding

My ongoing love/hate relationship with Singapore
I love the fact that traffic flows smoothly, and no-one "plays traffic cop." (my mother's phrase)
I hate the shop owners who scowl at you when you pay in large bills. Yes, it's a fifty. Get over it. I'm paying you.

Best Disclaimer Ever (from here)
"The owners of this site are not responsible for any damage or loss arising due to the use of this page. This includes, but is not limited to: Everything."

စံုစီနဖာ

2007-06-19T04:48:00.001-04:00

I learned how to say "rojak" in Burmese. :D (See title; you might need Burmese Fonts.) In honor of that, here's a rojak entry.

Sone Si Na Phar
It's very odd to read Nathan's blog (titled "An Assortment of Things") without recalling the Live Journal drama of High School. Sure, I remember when I told him that he needed to stop thinking so much about friendship, and I remember when I told him the deplorable phrase. But I live so much in the present that I don't even re-read my own blog posts. How now, brown cow? The feeling is very spooky.

Hit By a Truck
I woke up yesterday and felt like I'd been banging my head against the wall all night. I also felt hung over. This was odd because (A) my bed is not against a wall and (B) I haven't had a drink in over 2 weeks, and "won't do that for at least another week."
In fact, it turned out that I was sick. Fever, headache, stomach ache, sore throat, yes I had it all. Fortunately, thanks to a certain someone who brought me dinner, hefty doses of Panadol and Strepsils, and the ever-amazing Pepto Bismol, I was able to get the fever, headache, and stomach ache down.
By the way, does anyone know if a fever is considered more serious in Asia? I was never running more than a hundred, but Jing Bo & others were all very worried after feeling my forehead.

TCM
"Traditional Chinese medicine" has always seemed a bit dubious to me, and I don't really trust it. However, I do use it for body temperature problems, as normal fever medicine has a whole bunch of other stuff I don't need. The "heating" and "cooling" teas are particularly useful.

Worms Lives!
We keep saying that "we'll have a LAN party" in our lab, and it keeps falling through. Last time, no-one arrived concurrently, so we watched "Priceless" (which is amazing). Last weekend, I was at Tioman. This weekend... who knows!
As a direct result, we keep changing the game we want to play. First it was Starcraft, then Worms, then Diablo, with Jing Bo always pushing for Counterstrike. As a Computer Scientist with taste, I shall be rooting for Worms. Technically, because I own it in America, downloading it and cracking it is not illegal.

Tioman
We went to Tioman Island last Saturday, as a "quick getaway." In fact, the island is one of the world's 10 most beautiful (apparently) and the water is also clear. After talking to Andreas, it turned out that we had the map upside down the whole time, and actually stayed on the East side of the island. Whoops...

[Edit]
I'm always miffed by the extreme lengths pharmacies go to to keep their products from actually being opened. Then I remembered why. Right, carry on then.

Song? What Song?

2007-06-18T02:07:00.000-04:00

Intro
This is from Russell & Norvig:

Paradoxically, a refusal to "put a monetary value on life" means that life is often undervalued.

Ross Shachter relates an experience with a government agency that commissioned a study on removing asbestos from schools. The study assumed a particular dollar value for the life of a school-age child, and argued that the rational choice under that assumption was to remove the asbestos. The government agency, morally outraged, rejected the report out of hand. It then decided against asbestos removal. (pg. 498, emphasis mine)

Very good point.

Karaoke
Er, yes, so... karaoke went well, but my song was quite terrible. Then consider that on Thursday I'd told Christy "we don't need to practice" and you get another level of "whoops!".

Even though I had practiced, I never actually sat down at a piano with the score. So, while I was practicing in the key of "Seth," the original artist was singing half an octave higher in the key of "Real". And on game day, I found my voice fading away to a whisper on "每一夜我感觉你的存在".

So, the natural thing to do is try again! I'm looking at you, Shen Hua!

Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens

2007-06-14T05:43:00.000-04:00

Every so often, I feel remorseful about this blog, since I do complain a bit and, in the end, it is a purely self-centered endeavor. Usually, I search for some other blog to read that cherishes these vices, and "then I don't feel... so bad."

This particular blog is quite popular in Singapore, which kinda worries me. It's self-indulgent trash. The author seems so endeared to the attitudes of Victorian women that she can't even form a reasonable argument.

Let's take one example: she is astonished that some Singaporean men cheat on their wives vis-a-vis their maids. (Warning: this article features a cute girl swearing. Also, she seems only to know one swear word.)

"How can they love them?" she wonders, which is totally the wrong question to ask! Clearly these adulterous men crave a simple, physical relationship, without all the strings of marriage. Certainly, they are in the wrong, but it's not about love at all!

Then again, the point's been made before. Read this book if you get a chance; it's quite entertaining. Like Ocean's 11, but with trains.

When an Unstopable Force meets an Immobile Object

2007-06-13T04:45:00.001-04:00

You may recall an early complaint that people here abuse the physical space their bodies take up on stairways, sideways, and other narrow areas -especially if they're holding hands with their significant others. This doesn't really bother me any more, but I do attempt to test to what absurd extent this negligence applies.

Once, I was walking on the left (proper) side of the stairwell, and a couple was coming down. Rather than turn sideways and try to slip past them, I decided to just continue walking. After all, they were really taking artistic license with the term "my side of the stairs." What followed was a slightly embaressing collision. Never tried that again.

A month or so ago, I finally happened upon a way of breaking this unbreakable bond! I was exiting the MRT (subway), and not really paying attention to anything. A couple came rushing headlong down the escalator (somehow holding hands) in a mad attempt to catch the train before the doors closed. I was directly in their path to the train, and the doors were beginning to close.

He looked at her. "We have no choice" his eyes seemed to say. "No, don't let go!" she responded. "My, love," he replied (in thought), "wait for me. I will love you always, even if two meters seperates us for five million microseconds." Tears streaming from her face (not actually, but they were in the works), her hand slipped free from his, they parted around me, and then made it into the train just before the doors closed.

"I thought you'd never return!" she exclaimed, looking deep into his eyes. "It seemed like an eternity," he responded, "but I'm here again. Take my hand, and I shall never again let you go." She looked away, tears brimming. "No, you don't understand," she whispered, "in that time, I... I found someone else." The color drained from his face. "But our love... it was so strong! I went through all manner of trial and tribulation to return to you! And you couldn't just sit and remain faithful?!"

Okay, maybe I spiced that up with some hyperbole. But they did exchange worrying glances before letting go. I knew what was going on upstairs.

我太有才了。 :D

PS: You'll get a post about 无极 (the film I "borrowed" that picture from) soon enough.

Ninja in the Office

2007-06-11T00:02:00.000-04:00

What do you do if you want to change clothes in lab, but pesky others are watching? Solutions tried so far include "go behind a desk" and "find the nearest bathroom." Now, with the wonder of modern Burmese technology, we can add to the list "use your longyi!"

Nathan & I bought Jingbo a longyi (again: lawn-jee) for this specific purpose, and taught him how to wear it, too. Here's the wrong way (for girls) and the right way (for guys) side by side:

And, as Nathan then related, in primary school the cool thing to do is pull the longyi up to your eyes and tie it behind your head, thus creating the third style: ninja!

We then spent a large amount of time running around the lab dressed like ninja, until Jingbo got a phone call. Then we were cyber-ninja!

The Most Dangerous Game

2007-06-08T11:20:00.000-04:00

Please read the Thailand post, if you haven't yet. This post is less interesting.

Tonight, I explained to a friend why I post my opinions about people in this blog. The reason is so simple: I believe in honesty. Then why do I post opinions only about the people who don't know about this blog? That's much harder to answer.

Any American guy knows: if you like a girl, don't ask her if she likes you. Ask her friends. Because most intelligent women will realize that they are less sensible when they're in love. Rather than confess their love to a complete stranger (i.e., the guy they like) they confide in their friends, and let their friends decide whether or not to tell the guy, if and when he asks them. This is a very mature way of avoiding careless decisions. Maybe the friends will actually seek the guy out and tell him about the girl's love. This is a mature way of making decisions happen.

For me, the problem is that everyone here knows I'm too egotistical to confide in my friends. So this blog becomes my confidant. If I want to write how sad Andrei made me, or how much I appreciate Lin's (strange, but sincere) offer of good-friendship, I can write it "privately" because I know they don't know about this blog. If one of them told me "Hey, I found your blog", then I would no longer write about him. They would doubt that my words were sincere; maybe I was trying to mislead them?

"That's totally wrong!" you say. No, it's not. It's a question of sincerity. If I write that David profoundly offended me, or that Christy makes my life brighter, then the only way I can be 100% sure they read this is if I tell them myself, or ask a friend to send them a link to it. If I cannot be certain, then I can only hope they stumble upon it. When there's only a slim chance someone will find your words, you don't mess around: you tell the truth. Like a message in a bottle. And my honest thoughts are what's written. And, of course, I have told my friends exactly what I think of them. But this way, they will know I am sincere, if they have any doubts. I have told many lies in my life, but I can say this: I have never used this blog to mislead or incite, except when Ethan and I comment-bashed Brian, and the occasional slight at a certain Camp Staff employee.

It's a bit like preparing all the tools for sculpting a statue, and then pressing them into the hand of your best friend. If he really knows who you are, he will produce the masterpiece you were looking for -even if you had a different idea in mind. If you tell him what you "want", he will only be reflecting your own ego, not your personality.

I have worked so hard for so many months to set up the tools for my own masterpiece -the most beautiful story of my life. I tried once to sculpt it -I gave the tools to Andrei that time. He (wisely) chose not to build anything, as the timing was not yet suitable. Just now, it seems right again, and I have chosen another builder. What will he do? I wonder.

Because, for a friend to choose to reveal someone's secrets can be a disastrous decision. You're playing with people's emotions, and making the wrong choice can destroy friendships. But really, in this, the most dangerous game, the only safe way to do it is to involve your friends. They know you better than you know you. And there are some decisions that you alone cannot make.

Footnote: Sorry if this post does not make sense to you. I'll explain it in a few weeks. If you did understand this post, please re-read it very carefully, and do not talk to me about it. In related news, next week is the karaoke night whence I shall sing my first Chinese song. Please wish me luck; I'm super-nervous!

To the North!

2007-06-07T23:29:00.001-04:00

Thailand

So Thailand was pretty much amazing. For this post, I am testing out a new style of writing, called the "Oreo Cookie" method. Hence, the first and last paragraphs will be both crispy & delicious, while the middle ones will be enjoyable (but skipable) filler.

Va-vroom!
The first time I rode a bike, I hit a (parked) car. The first time I drove a car in the winter, I hit a mailbox. The first time I used rollerblades, I ended up at the bottom of the hill, and I had to walk back up in my booties. Skiing for the first time involved tumbling down a hillside & losing a ski halfway down.

That said, you might be surprised that I thought renting a motor bike in Chiang Mai would be a good idea. In fact, it was necessary; there was no other convenient, cheap way to get around for a day. And, as it turned out, I can ride a motor bike. I can also ride on the left side of the road. Br. Nelson was right: you don't even notice it's backwards.

Also, Thai motorists are amazingly capable of ignoring traffic rules. Yet, the only time I came remotely close to hitting anything, the other driver was foreign. In other words, the Thai are daring, yet attentive.

Nathan's Many Opinions

Chiang Mai, being a northern city, is known for umbrellas and silk. Martin (see below) found an excellent silk-lined suit jacket. I found a green & gold silk shirt that, sadly, I will never have the opportunity to wear at the Three Point staff banquet. Nathan says I look like a waiter in it.

Sidenote: So Thai also wear the longyi (lawn-jee) that Burmese & Indians don, although the style is different. (Nathan, ever appreciative of other cultures, said that mine looked like a tablecloth.) In Burma, High School student uniforms usually include a longyi. And, according to Nathan, pantsing is a HUGE problem. Well, duh!

My Travel Companions

I traveled with two French students: Martin & Florie. This did, in fact, make me a third wheel, but hey.

If you go...

I'm no guide book, but there are two pieces of advice I have for you if you make your way to Thailand, advice you probably won't find in any tour book:

1. It's the Tones... Tonal languages really hurt one's credibility. Chinese tones make everyone sound angry; Thai tones, patronizing. So when someone tells you that this shirt costs 150 "baaaaht", you have to understand that there's no other way to say it; a short "baht" may very well be a totally different word. To avoid thinking less of people, I find it's helpful to look in their eyes when talking to them.
2. The Extra Mile... Theera explained this one to me: the Thai thing to do is to provide "an extra service" in all aspects of business. Keep this in mind, or it won't make sense when fruit vendors eagerly hand you samples, or a CD "salesman" neatens his arrangement when you walk by. Virtually every place where you can spend money will try to make you feel like a worthy individual. (A notable exception are the tuk-tuk drivers, who are notoriously rude.)

A Buddhist-Centric Life

There's a lot of temples in Thailand, and a lot of monks. In fact, many Thai teenagers take 6 years to study as novice monks (and finish High School.) I talked to one of them for a bit; apparently most of these novice monks are "fairly serious" but might still "play soccer and eat 3 meals a day" (instead of 2).

The Green Glass Glows

On the right is a picture of our "trekking" group, riding elephants (taken by yours truly, also riding an elephant.) We hiked up to a villiage to spend the night; our guides wore sandals all the way, despite the slippery terrain.

That night, we had a campfire with the "villagers" (who seemed authentic enough, but also had solar power cells lying around. So draw your own conclusions.) They sang their songs, and then we were supposed to sing songs back. Everyone in our group was a bit uncertain, so I stepped forward and asked our guide to translate "this is going to be a repeat after me song" to them.

"And the green grass grows all around -all around" went over quite well. Ah, 6 years of working at Yawgoog certainly prepared me for this.

Final Thoughts

My own personality meshed really well in Thailand. I had a great time; however, I probably would go crazy living there. As much as people's aloofness here makes me weep, I prefer being able to tell when someone's being sincere. It's a common joke that "yes means no and definitely means maybe" in Asia, but this is far worse in Thailand than in Singapore.

If you have a chance, go. Bring some Pepto Bismol, as "mild curry" means "far too strong for you to handle, but still very tasty."

Curiosity for the Win!

2007-06-05T11:16:00.000-04:00

This title requires another Language Lesson with Mike. I'll get to that later. Also, pics from Thailand should be up tomorrow, with a post. For now, just a chuckle of a story for y'all.

I was riding the MRT (subway) to Tiong Bahru today to see Shrek 3, and I thought I'd give Hui Min a call -her past few SMS's seemed a bit morose. So I called, and said something like: "Hey, what's up? I thought I'd call, you've sounded a bit sad lately."

Immediately, I felt 24 eyes on me. Sure enough, that one sentence brought a dozen sitting Singaporeans to rapt attention -9 of them girls, IAC.

So now I know how to get people's attention here: just say one of those relationship hot potatoes in public, e.g. "We need to talk", "How come I never see you", etc. It might also help to wear a bright green and gold silk shirt. You'll see a picture of that tomorrow, too.

Hit the Phone, Open the Computer

2007-05-29T12:23:00.000-04:00

I was leafing through Culture Shock: Singapore in Borders today, and I found an interesting overview of some Singlish words. Most of them were Hokkien-derived, so the locals here will probably avoid using these in your presence. But a few were from English, and were ones I've seen:

Slippers could be sandals or flip-flops. This is just a harmless misnomer.
Can I follow you? means "Can I come along?" There's a slight difference between these two phrases, so I'm a bit alarmed that I've begun to use the former.
Blur as in "I'm a bit blur right now" means, roughly, that "things are in a blur." I use "I'm a bit blurry", which is also bad English, but, hey, I kinda like this one.

What should have been on this list are the words that those weak in English will often slip up on translating. To say "please call me" in Chinese, you say something like "hit me up a phone call", and you "open" (not "turn on") anything electronic. So when we got our new refrigerator today and the delivery man said "Don't open it for 2 hours", he really meant don't plug it in. Fortunately, I was there to sign for it, not Andrei, so I knew what he meant.

In other news...

Mary Jo wrote an excellent article on Myanmar hero Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, "the world’s only imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize recipient."

Anyone out there learning Malay after Chinese who also finds the phrase "masakan Melayu" really weird?

And now I'm off to Thailand!

Linda

2007-05-27T08:06:00.000-04:00

Boring Stuff

Today was a fascinating weekend for many reasons. However, as this blog is not a laundry list of my daily activities (it's not?!), I'll only cover one minor aspect of it. This morning, I went to a new church.

As always, when I go to church, it is because a girl asks me to go. This is not some astounding fact of life; rather, it just so happens that girls seem to ask more than guys. Not really sure why. Anyways, this was one of those new churches. And it was big.

At the moment, the City Harvest church is building a proper worship center somewhere in the city-center. They were too big for their old place in Jurong, which only seated 2,000 people. At this mass, there were about 8,000. I mention the numbers because many of you wouldn't have liked this church, and I want to prove to you that is is catching on.

You wouldn't like this church because it's what we'd call a "charismatic" church, one like Saint Charles (in Providence) except much more focussed. Their masses were like the ones I used to go to in Leeds: half concert-style singing, half homily. Yes, that's Christian concert style. Fancy lights, LCD projectors, and speaking in tongues.

Normally, I'd rather eat blood than be around people speaking in tongues. However, the preacher made some very clear points, taking a reading from the Sermon on the Mount and getting out that since Christians are the "salt of the earth", and we are useless if we "lose our flavor" than we should try to be flavorful. It seems that Asian churches have done what Vatican 2 tried so hard to accomplish: to make the religion accessible to the youth. Now might also be a good time to mention that the term "Christian", a mere category in Western thought, is actually an entity with extension in Eastern thought. As a Roman Catholic, I was considered not Christian by virtually everyone in that room, pastor included. That's just dandy with me; I'll keep my native religion thank you very much, but I still wonder if this is the direction that Christianity will now take; will it throw off all precepts of organized religion and become something so... general as simply praising Jesus? I would have my doubts, but these people were very much into the service. And, I mean, genuinely so. They are also the first Singaporeans who actually looked hurt when I told them that people here are very kind, but won't take the first step to start a friendship. And yet, just as I cringe when someone uses educated English that's not quite correct, I'm a bit appalled at this possible future for my religion. As Mary-Jo concurred, it feels shallow to those of us attuned with the true power that a mass can bring with it.

Amazing Stuff

Linda was not the girl who asked me to church this morning (that was Rae). Linda was a nice Indonesian girl I used to go to church with in Leeds at the LCCC. And I saw her today, totally randomly, at the City Harvest church. She's doing a course in theology, and she's been better than me about staying in touch with LCCC members. Which means I get to meet more Leeds people again (yay!) from the Alvina days (boo!) but they're still cool people (yay!).

Introducing: Christy

2007-05-25T04:18:00.001-04:00

From left to right: Seth, Mary Jo, Christy

Christy asked me a question today: "What do American cell phones say on the main screen, for the service provider?" Mine says "StarHub", hers says "M1-GSM-SGP". But she needs to know about American phones. This is God's way of telling me to get around to writing an article about her. If you find this description endearing enough, please comment with the answer to her question. :)

To understand Christy (易成), you must keep in mind that she is the only under-25-year-old here that I meet on a scheduled basis. Every Thursday, at 2pm, from now until the end of time, we meet for 2 hours to exchange Chinese & English. This was the impetus of our friendship; it's not like I haven't had language partners before.

Jasmine (张莉) was the first of these, and I was an underqualified student; I knew too little Chinese at that point.
Mingyuan, Yuexi, Xinji, Olivia, & Ethan were the group at RPI. We had really good times together, and I visited the first two last winter.

Christy, however, is the first person who's really forced me to speak in Chinese. Even if it's only a half dozen sentences each week, she asks and expects responses, treating me for all the world like a normal person. This is an amazing insight: why study a language? That comes after. Your parents didn't sit you down with a book on English grammar when you were three. No, they talked to you, and just exptected you to catch on. And, in fact, I have improved tremendously.

Forgive that paragraph for its vanity; I used myself as an example to illustrate that about Christy which I truly admire: she is a citizen of the world, and a sister to everyone. Back when Mike Ruggles was still at large, she suggested we meet for Korean food (the most agreeable Asian food, in my opinion) and it went over well. A few weeks later, we met at Sentosa for volleyball, a sport that anyone can enjoy. She is the first person to convince me to go sing karaoke, without threatening me with excommunication. Colors are brighter when she's around. Life is more fun for everyone.

And then, we move on to the quirky things inherent in any personality. Christy is terrified of cockroaches, terrified of touching them, even if they're dead. (In Singapore, cockroaches are
quite abundant. Perhaps lizards are slightly more invasive, though. We have lizards. It's weird.) She was thrilled to learn that pouring boiling water on them kills them instantly, since, at that time, her roommates were away and she had to deal with the 'roaches herself.

She is one of the few people I know who actually say "La, la la-la-la" when they're feeling idle.

Originally from China, Christy studied at NUS for her college years. As such, her English is quite good, and I asked her if it improved upon arrival. "No," she said, "it just kind of clicked in 8th grade." How this could happen is beyond me, but, to her credit, there is only the mildest trace of Singlish in her speach.

She knows what sarcasm is! Anyone with Chinese friends can appreciate just what a relief this is to me. Recall her joke from before? (Wait a minute... I never posted that! We were at the Chinese Garden Pagoda, and Christy was lost -after living in Singapore for five years. I said "How long have you been here!?" and she responded "I can't remember.... it must have been a great many seconds.")

At our most recent language meeting, she said that, were she to get another life after this one, she'd like to be a (male) drummer in a band. The percussionist in me applauded.

She doesn't consider sleeping in to be a bad thing, necessarily.

I am personally quite grateful to her and Andrei (the latter of which, unfortunately, recently decided that he now likes being rude to me in public. 小安 = 笨蛋...) for remembering and celebrating my birthday.

Re-reading my words, I feel like Ozymandias in the desert. Christy is an amazing friend, and when I try to project this image to you, it comes out all wrong. Fortunately, I had the foresight to write an article on princesses just before this. Christy is a princess of the first order, the kind that captures your heart with her enchanting personality, and makes you feel just as good about yourself at the same time. I hope we never lose touch throughout the years, for I have been blessed to meet someone like her, and am unlikely to meet another in the next 23 years.

Oh, and, er, please answer her question.

Saya buat batik

2007-05-21T04:22:00.000-04:00

Good morning, friends & foes. So whenever I stress out during exams, I generally release that stress as creative energy by doing something. This semester, I decided to make a hugemongous pixel-banner of one of my favorite 8-bit theatres. (This one also has my favorite line: "A lot of damage is done.")

So.... it took about a month longer than expected. But it looks amazing. The material is thin cotton, the ink is just regular batik dye (Nathan figured out, purely by accident, how to make the colors brighter) and the thing's about 1 meter square. I hung it over my desk, with the original panel showing, to give an idea of scale.

There are two super-cool things about this piece:
1) It looks humdrum up close, but if you back away about 12 feet, the pixel boundaries disappear and the image leaps into focus.
2) The "skin" color was not a standard batik color, and I'd tried five or six times to make it before I hit on the idea of using the CMYK value for beige and just mixing those amounts of magenta, yellow, and black. Well, the perceptual color model is pretty darned accurate, because the end result was perfect.

PS: It's now in my room. I think I'll give it a backing, and then hang it somewhere in our flat.
PPS: Lou.... you know. Pictures, please?

A Survey

2007-05-19T02:55:00.000-04:00

Okay, this is a computer-related question you all can answer. When the screensaver is on and you want to use the computer, do you:

A) Shuffle the mouse around a bit.
B) Hit a random key on the keyboard
C) Hit a specific key (which one?)

I expect all of you to comment with your answers, and then I shall provide mine.

sudo halt

2007-05-18T03:51:00.000-04:00

I still prefer Windows over Ubuntu (Linux) by a lot. Still, there's one thing about it that I've come to like very much: for almost anything administrative you'd ever want to do, Linux has a command-line version.

This is a very nice option because you usually have a few terminal windows open whenever you're running Linux. So just grab one, type sudo make-me-a-sandwich and there you go. This also means that, when your computer is grinding along at the speed of molasses, you don't have to wait 10 minutes for Ctrl+Alt+Delete to bring up the Task Manager; just exit out to the shell.

By the way, I went to the Helpdesk today to solve my problem with JADE, and as usual they delivered a stellar performance. However, when the guy helping me asked me to login as the root user, I got to say that line that every Ubuntu user knows by heart:

It's Ubuntu. I can't.

His response was classy:

Fine. Then "sudo bash".

Well played, sir. Well played.

I Installed, Like, 5 Operating Systems Today

2007-05-15T09:55:00.000-04:00

Before we get started, Sinosplice's "John" just posted an awesome article on how he went from "having so-so Chinese" to actually learning it. I highly suggest you check it out; his method is very clever.

Seriously! So Nathan* was kind enough to let me install Windows Vista on his laptop, so that I could test some programs for compatibility. Possibly on a whim, he also said "Can you put Linux on it, too?" Feeling all snazzy, I thought I'd try Xubuntu, 'cause it's simple.
*Of all the people who want a "Western" name, Nyein is the one who really needs one, if he's to introduce himself in any reasonable length of time. He and I decided that, to enforce the name, I'll be calling him this from now on.

So.... Vista took a while, and since I'm not confident shrinking a partition, that deleted the ol' "sure it's legal" version of XP he had. Install 1.

Then, I installed Xubuntu. I had to hack around a bit to get it to recognize Vista, and to get more than 4 partitions on his hard drive, but it more or less worked after a few fearful crashes. Install 2.

Xubuntu is not nearly as fun as Ubuntu, I found out. It's like.... Bland OS. So I re-formatted that partition and installed Ubuntu. Install 3.

Then, of course, there was the matter of re-installing XP. Amazingly enough, the XP installer had the gall to tell me that it "couldn't find any hard drives, sorry." Please tell me, then, what have I been installing operating systems on for the past day? Bologna? Just got that to work... (like, as we speak.) Install 4.

However, Windows just loves to over-write the master boot record. So now Ubuntu has disappeared. I could fiddle around with the Vista boot loader, or I could take 10 minutes and re-install Ubuntu. Install 5 (tomorrow).

The upshot of this is, of course, that Nathan will have no way of locating anything he saves to his computer now, since all these OS's run Firefox (well, Vista will) and partitions are like, inside partitions at the moment.

By the way, is "Nath" a good nickname for "Nathan". You know, not like a "Hello my name is" nickname, but a "Hey, we're good friends, so I'm going to call you something you don't like" nickname.

Just out of curiosity...

2007-05-13T13:50:00.000-04:00

Am I the only one who likes Spider Man 3? Really?

I won't go into an "analysis" here, or anything so trivial. My method of judging movies is not so much "identifying catharsis" as it is "remembering that I didn't ever think, at any point, 'Gee, I wonder how much longer this is going to take...', except, of course, if it's the Lord of the Rings because length is not an issue in this case."

Aside from one "convenient" death, I wouldn't change anything about the movie; why y'all gotta be so mean to it?

PS: I hated X-Men 3, in case you're curious.

The Two Princesses

2007-05-11T10:53:00.000-04:00

The chain of thoughts that led to this post goes something like this:
* I haven't done a post about Chinese in a while.
* Ooh, I should introduce Christy!
* Can't introduce her without talking about the Princess Effect
And here we are.

I'm convinced that people have odd moments of lucid thinking that just pop up with no warning. Crawford, who I've been reading a lot lately, talks about how he looks in the mirror and thinks "I don't recognize that man." Some of us occasionally are struck very poignantly by the thought "I'm going to die eventually." And there's all the minor epiphanies we have after seeing touching movies.

Sometimes we don't even know what these clear, concise, meaningful sentences actually mean.

During my first year at RPI, I had one such moment at, of all places, a fraternity party. Perhaps you (Ethan) recall Bermuda Josh? I remember one time, when his girlfriend entered the room, entouraged by two of her friends, just seeing the way she carried herself and thinking "My word! she's a princess!" Then someone spilled his drink on me or bumped into me or whatever and the moment passed.

Unfortunately, the next year I was about to encounter a different sort of Princess. During my sojourn in England, I first heard about a country called Malaysia, and through a bizarre, cascading effect, I came to know quite a lot of its citizens. Now, all women will have their oddities, but one or two of these girls had an amazingly warped view of the world, something that I hadn't ever seen before. They seemed to want everything done for them. Ah... what? It just didn't make sense. In the past, I've used "princess" as an insult for the self-absorbed, but these few girls took the "self" out of the equation entirely!

Eventually, I started reflecting on these two situations I've just described for you, my loyal readers. I think a "princess" is a girl who, by her very nature, is somehow more than everyone else, and she is gracious and kind to all the people she meets, within reason of course. You can almost picture them stepping down from a stagecoach and acting as if it's the most natural thing in the world.

Little girls are princesses in the eyes of their fathers; some of them graduate and become Princesses in the eyes of the world. Most just become special to a handful of close friends. Some take this personally, as a sort of "fall from grace." For they are princesses in their own eyes alone. They try to act like they think a princess should act, whereas this kind of thought never crosses a real Princess's mind.

To a true Princess, the world is their playground to explore, and the people of this world are intricately more fun to interact with than its static objects. They take ownership of the world, in the taciturn way that royalty takes ownership of their land. And we are always happy to see them and to talk to them. They walk into the middle of our day, and all the colors seem brighter and more radiant.

Huh?

2007-05-11T07:14:00.000-04:00

Er... can someone tell me why I can edit, post to, and configure my blog, but I'm not allowed to view it because my request "looks like it came from a virus"?

Thanks a lot, Google. I don't know a lot of sign language, but I know exactly how to express how I feel about a 403 from my own blog:

Ah, the noble 3-gon

2007-05-09T01:04:00.000-04:00

Again, following the links off of Lou's blog, I'll say that Susan Mernit's tech blog is fully cognizant of the tendency of bloggers to ramble; she keeps it brief, as evinced by this post.

This brings to mind a Crawford article relating how information these days is "cheap and ubiquitous, and our concern is to prioritize it." Mernit's article supports this exact supposition; there are way too many bloggers out there spouting their own opinions because they feel "the world should know how I feel" when really the world just wants less.

Tangent! I'm super-tired today. Yesterday, apparently, was the day that everyone wanted to exercise. I went swimming, jogging, and played football for a few hours to boot! There was also a trip to Ikea, and a quick nap, though I'm not sure what effect those had on my tiredness.

Secant! Now, of course, I ask you: which is better? To have a million people, some of whom harm the literary community by writing, posting their every whim? Or to have a number of key intellects like Descartes detailing amazing insights about monism, but also carelessly lecturing that animals are "harmless furry robots" (paraphrased, of course) and we can do whatever we want to them without moral consequence.

And don't tell me we can have it in the middle, because that just doesn't make sense. In this case, I think we're stuck with either a world of free thinkers, or a world of intellectual slaves. If we reasonably assume that everyone has some intellectual flaws, then the dilemma becomes apparent.

...To the Door of Mystery...

2007-05-07T02:05:00.000-04:00

So Nyein & I watched "Brave Story" yesterday. It's an animated cartoon (a Japanese animated cartoon, if you will) and for some reason, Nyein had really high hopes for it. I thought it was okay. In many ways, it reminded me of Hack Sign (technically: .hack//Sign, but I'm not calling it that.)

Skip the next two sections if you know about both Animes. (Very) minor spoilers dot the remainder of this post.

Brief Overview of Hack Sign
Hack Sign is an animated series about a, er, guy, who's trapped in an online game. It was well-known for getting very little done in each episode, but by the end a lot of stuff had (somehow) happened. The characters were very well thought-out, and the series spawned several games and additional story arcs.

Brief Overview of Brave Story
This movie centers around two children who (independently) find a world they can adventure in to obtain one wish. Both are desperate to get their wish, in hopes of changing the real world, but one of them places no value on the inhabitants of the adventure world in his quest to get what he wants.

And... cut!
So (don't tell Nyein) I didn't really like Brave Story. It was entertaining, sure, but it was waay too predictable. More importantly, the characters were very shallow. The best thing about Hack Sign was that each character in it had severe flaws, either in the real world or the game world (or both.) When they revealed the real-world identity of one character, I was really moved, partly because I didn't see it coming. The creators of that series were very clever in realizing that, when online characters can be vastly different from their real-world counterparts, you can hide certain secrets that are otherwise impossible to conceal.

Plus, whereas the heroes (and villains!) in Brave Story "got it all" in the end, you're left with a whole lot of gray areas in Hack Sign. How exactly did viewers feel when Sora, the 4th grader who torments the entire cast for 24 episodes, gets what's coming to him? I didn't feel very good. Ah, and that poor cat. (Sniff)

Still, Hack Sign is relatively boring at any given point in any given episode. Moreover, all the characters in The World have wacky online names. The leader of the Crimson Nights is "Lady Subaru". The main character is Tsucasa ("Tu casa mi casa?") And one of his friends is BT, who likes bacon lettuce and tomato sandwiches without the lettuce. Roll your eyes... now!

Oh, NOW I get it....

2007-05-02T08:49:00.000-04:00

Player vs. Player is not a comic strip I'd recommend to most people. Some of its jokes are crude, it brings in violence pointlessly, and it's got this aura around it that would push most people's buttons.

Still, in browsing its archives, I found this re-telling of a joke which is possibly the most reflexive joke in history.

http://www.pvponline.com/article/2193/Thu-Dec-02

Hey, what more do you want from me? It's the night before an exam.
~SNH
PS: Thanks for sending me comics, parents! And nice to see Shade in the news.

Two Myths

2007-04-28T14:54:00.000-04:00

For a wide range of topics, there are two myths that I shall spend my entire life crusading to dispel. These are not pet peeves; rather, I merely wish to patiently and politely set the record straight. Forever.

Computer Science Myths
1. Computer Science is Math. Sure, any program can be represented in lambda calculus. We also program on Turing machines, using Floyd-Hoare logic. For better or for worse, (as a recent NUS graduate pointed out in a lecture on game physics) you can get a "good enough" answer through discretization, a word that mathematicians pause before sullying the air with.
2. Computer Science is Easy. My degree required no rocket science, 'tis true. It's unfortunate that after the dot com crash, the "get rich quick" rumors of the CS high school dropout didn't also "drop out." Programming is quick to pick up. Computer Science has, at its core, always followed Dijkstra: "Simple, but not easy."

Myths About Eating Implements
1. Chopsticks fit naturally into your hands. ...after a year of practice and flinging food all over the place.
2. Eating with your hands is easy! Try eating rice. (FYI: eat with your right hand only.)

汉字Myths
1. "Every Chinese character can be broken down into its root characters" (from Yale University's introduction to 五笔.) This is a broadly sweeping generalization. 明，想， and 国 follow this rule perfectly. Others have an easily-identifiable "main" root (是), and still others are a bit harder to break down (爱，餐). When 是 itself is used as a radical for 题, the skepticism sets in.
2. Chinese characters are pictographs. Again, this analogy works really well for some characters, and requires an absurd suspension of disbelief for others.

Coffee Myths
1. Green Mountain Coffee is Terrible. There's a gradient, as I've come to learn. The further south you are, the worse it tastes. In New Hampshire, Green Mountain coffee is actually pretty good.
2. Dunkin Donuts Coffee Is Amazing. My father and I, after intense empirical testing, discovered that the coffee itself is nothing special; it's the creamer which gives it that lofty taste.

Myths About Video Games
1. Older Games are Better. Certainly, the trend points this way. But many new games have excellent gameplay, now that designers have lost their tunnel vision for "more dimensions! Now!"
2. Final Fantasy 6 Was the Best Classic RPG. Well... it was very, very good. But Chrono Trigger was better balanced in terms of length and characters, and more enjoyable when all was said and done. (Live-A-Live bombed in that regard.)

Myths About Me
1. I am Super-Stunningly Handome. Yes, you'd get that impression. But really, I'm just a normal guy.

...okay, I'll stop now. :D

Forgive me, I am running Firefox in Linux

2007-04-28T13:48:00.000-04:00

One certain game developer talks a lot about making games that capture "what it's like." Here's a great example: This Newgrounds Game makes me feel for all the world like I'm playing mini-golf. The controls do not try to mimic mini-golf in any way, but I'm still left with that "Oooh, so close!" feeling.

(I gave up on level 9, for those who are curious.)

Team Two

2007-04-26T11:59:00.000-04:00

I felt fully qualified to take last night's exam; maybe that's because my group had matching uniforms!

Movin' right along. Lou sent me some pictures from last summer that'd been lying around on his hard drive. I've uploaded a few for your enjoyment, with captions! (For the record, this is precisely why I love camp.)

The Sunset

Please

Insert
Brain

The Unfortunate

Producers

Phillistine

Spartan

Fight to the Death

Executives

These are a few of my favorite things...

2007-04-25T07:47:00.001-04:00

There's always a danger, when studying for prolonged periods, that my brain just shuts off, and says "Nope, don't care any more." This might explain why I slept in till 2pm today (last night I went to bed at 2am, so that's a whopping 12 hours.) This used to bother me, until I realized that it's inevitable.

Anyhoo, I find that a good way to stay sane is to simply list the..

Little Things that Make Me Happy

Laser Printers - Being able to print a page that can't ever smudge is one of life's little understated joys.
Swim Breaks - Funny, I used to hate swimming, but nothing makes me happier than taking a break from work to swim laps for an hour.
Family Phone Calls - Just chatting with my mother for an hour is fantastic. Roy falls into this category, too; MSN conversations with him are also super-enjoyable.
French Presses - Making amazing coffee and then drinking it never fails to satisfy.
Inle - I like many, many types of food. It just so happens that the experience of dining at Inle is the pinnacle of dining experience. I've had better food, and I've had better service. Just not combined, and not so consistently. I used to go there every week.
Bagels & Cream Cheese - 'nuff said.
Daytime Napping - Taking a nap when it's light out and waking up when it's still light out makes you feel like you've lived two days, not one.
Face Wash - I may fully sweat (then dry) my clothes twice in the course of a day, but when your face is clean, the rest doesn't bother you. (Tangent: I've come to accept what's known as a "clean sweat". You're certainly welcome to take umbrage at this, though.)
Shaving - This is double-sided, because I hate doing it. But after shaving, you feel like you're ready to take the world by storm.
Random Chats - Some people (*cough* Lou *cough*) and I really only have a professional history together. Some of you (*cough* Christine *cough*) only know me from living together. (Ironically, both of you and I have a coffee history together...) Doesn't matter. If I turn on my computer, the first thing I want to do is say hi, and see what you're up to. It gives me this feeling like... we're all playing the same game, working towards the same goal.
大白兔 - I've been known to eat entire bags of this candy in one sitting. That can only be described as "unhealthy."

It's interesting because, if you look at this list, a lot of the things are very high-tech, or at least "recent." Does this mean that if I lived, say, thirty years ago I'd be miserable? Who knows! I'd probably be an author.

Tuhan Berkati Kamu

2007-04-23T05:54:00.000-04:00

Now covering three of the four official languages in Singapore!

Malay:
"Tuhan Berkati Kamu" is how one says "God bless you" in Bahasa Indonesia (same in Malay). I got this phrase in a text message from Vina (language partner for B.I.) the other day, and...

Well, it's just a bit odd, to hear such a religious and well-wishing blessing in a Muslim language. It really strikes you the first time you hear it, and reminds you that, of all religions, this is probably our closest neighbor. We believe in the same God, for instance, and the same prophets -and Bible.

It's not that I expected anything less (it's no secret that I really like the Malay), but it's more like I didn't expect this at all. The impact of this one simple phrase is still resonating with me today.

Chinese:
When someone asks "Do you have _____?" in Chinese, a correct response is "don't have" (没有). This is one of the phrases I wish I could use all the time, even responding to English speakers. In English, the correct response is "No", which sounds brusque, or "Sorry, no" (apologetic for no reason), "I don't have that" (wordy), or something else lacking the proper substance.

Also, the first character (没) sounds like "pretty" (美), which is possibly why I've always felt that the phrase is very gentle on the ears. (Furthermore, the tones are 2|3, which are pleasing to the ears.)

Can we borrow this word?

English:
Quincunx is still a funny word. The extremely short Hamming distance between the spoken "x" and "ts" makes it so utterly disaster-prone.

[Edit] Computer Science:
I'm fully confident I can pass whatever AI they throw my way. Finite Aumota are also (probably) not going to pose a threat. Finally, I shall crack open the Programming Languages book and get that down pat... oh, look at the first sentence in the book:
"Programming Languages are the medium of expression in the art of computer programming."

It's going to be a loooong day.

Everybody Sleeps

2007-04-22T10:51:00.000-04:00

I'll cool down in, like, 7/4 hour when I go for a swim.

Actually, due to an impromptu dragon boat practice, some thunder, and a horde of pool-struck families, it took more like 14/4 of an hour. But I've recovered. And now, here's what I actually wanted to talk about.

Back in England (whooosh!) I used to spend my homesick days studying in Roy's room. The thing is, there was an unspoken law of mutual exclusion regarding consciousness: both of us were rarely awake at the same time. He'd often take naps at virtually any time of the day, and sometimes when I had nothing to do (but also no inclination to go home) I'd nap while he studied. And thus, my introduction to the sport of "casual napping".

I'm not going to go so far as to claim that it's a cultural thing, but I will say that no-one here would find it odd if you nap when you're idle. Jingbo takes naps continualy at his desk; I tried this once and woke up to find my face numb from the hard faux-wood surface. Reza napped all the time, including when I visited his home. A certain barber naps when there's no customers. I've heard that Threads on at least one of the Indonesian islands sleep (ba-dum, dish! Audience: boo...) And I really can't count how many people trudge into school at 7am just to snooze, head down on the cafeteria tables. (This one's always puzzled me; maybe their parents force them to go to school early?)

The potent philosophical issue is this: Some people view sleeping as the ultimate waste of time, and dilligently regulate it to the nighttime hours. After all, you only get any real benefit out of sleep if you've been doing it for a while. Others' thoughts on the matter have roughly the form "Well, I've got nothing productive to do; might as well grab a few Z's." Physiologically, I don't know which one is "more healthy", but rationally speaking, they're both sound arguments.

Let me add to the discussion that it's very hard for me to avoid seeing someone who's sleeping as lazy. This is definitely a cultural thing (Puritan roots and all), and is certainly illogical. I'll let you think through this one on your own. Just keep in mind that a society which invented the term "power napping" is clearly lying to itself about something.

On the other hand, I am becoming very proficient at just falling asleep when it's appropriate. For instance, the other day, I installed Visual Studio 2005....

RFC 4880 : Seth's Joke

2007-04-20T23:39:00.000-04:00

Text message dump:
--------------------
Seth: "If we leave at noon, we should arrive on time."
Nyein: "You mean 12?"
Seth: "Yes, this isn't a baker's noon."
--------------------end

I realize it's not that funny, but can someone please confirm that they get it?

The Hidden Emotion

2007-04-19T02:14:00.000-04:00

Firstly:
Hello, my name is: Lots of people
I like to: Not stop at crosswalks if they're on a hill.
Come on, people, there are rules. This isn't 'nam. (Well, I guess it's kinda close.... linearly....)

And now:
I'm consistently and pleasently surprised by the "hidden emotion", as I've come to call it. The hidden emotion is something that everyone has, just like everyone is ticklish. These emotions are generally perceived to be personal -but public hints of them often escape- and somewhat jovial in nature. Just like tickles!

Par examplé. Walking with Christy to S16 for our language meeting, we passed a Malay woman on the sky bridge. Christy and I were in the middle of a conversation, but I saw this lady smile out of the corner of my eye. Like, a warm, genuine smile. The kind that one associates with mothers and apple pies. It's important that she was Malay, I, American, and Christy, Chinese, because this means there could be no ulterior motive, no "Way to go!"* or other such nonsense that I sometimes see on the faces of questionable individuals. The two of us were just chatting, and this lady saw it and it made her happy.

Another very common hidden emotion is harmless curiosity. I generally walk anywhere I need to go on campus, and I've learned that if someone avoids my gaze as I'm walking towards them, they will glance over a split second before we pass. And they're always looking at your eyes. And if you can catch their glance by barely shifting your head, their eyes usually light up. "Oh!" is the expression, the thought.

Like I said, everyone in the world, to some extent, hides genuine emotion behind plausible deniability. Possibly, they're even deluding themselves. I only figured out the second trick because I was doing the same thing, unconsciously trying to catch people's eyes, to see what would happen.

[Edit] Footer:
* I should probably explain this. For some reason, the general assumption a lot of people make when seeing a Western guy and an Eastern girl walking together is that they're dating. This is a harmless mistake, except that some people go too far and assume that the guy should receive some form of "congratulation" for... I don't know, really. What they should think is "Oh, they're dating, cool." Or, even better, "Oh look, two people walking together." Usually, this is what people think, esp. if the onlookers are from a different culture than the guy and the girl.

[Edit] For Your Amusement:
Every language partner I've had has wanted to know useful, simple expressions that Americans use in their everyday speech. Of course, it's difficult to come up with these on the spot. During today's meeting, I taught Christy double-entendre, which led immediately into Freudian slip. "Oh," she said, "you just keep coming up with these." "Yep," I said, "I'm on a roll."

[Edit] Almost Heroes:
So, Muslims are allowed to have up to four wives. The wording from the Qur'an is something like "a man can have 1 or 2 or 3 or 4 wives." Hui Min referred me to a recent article in the Straits times about a man who was put on trial for having ten wives. Accordingly, he retorted that the word "or" can ambiguously be exclusive (x)or inclusive, so he merely had "1 and 2 and 3 and 4" = 10 wives. This is an awesome argument; unfortunately, the man had other dealings which might lead one to call him a "slimeball." Ah, well.

I love double-entendres!

2007-04-18T05:34:00.000-04:00

So Roy found this amazing salad dressing in Sweden. I truly wonder what it tastes like... what exactly is the Rhode Island flavor?

Background Info:
In my mind, there's a Rule that you should follow when in a public changing room. Don't sit down to change, unless, of course, disability requires it, or you have to put on shoes. (But who wears anything but sandals to a pool, anyway?) Of course, there is nothing wrong with sitting down, per se, but really what kind of message does it send? Should I give you a bag of popcorn? Are you at a theatre?

On to the Main Event:
I bring this up because, due to a Rule-breaker (who, incidentally, took 12 minutes to change, and had been bothering me the entire time I was swimming), I decided to just shower until he went away and I could change in peace. In the mean time, lots of other athletic-types came in, changed, and carried on their conversations. And, once again, I made an observation: Chinese is a rather jovial language for chatting.

I mean, it's a bit like British. When two British people are talking, and they're happy, the language serves to make it sound like they're having a blast. Go waaay back to High School, and you may remember a Mr. John Guevremont, who once said that he wished he could forget that he knew English so that he could determine its general tone. Was it harsh-sounding, like German, or smooth and romantic like French? He may have cited a Scottish or Irish accent as being rather fun-sounding; I can't quite remember.

Of course, there are other words you might use to describe Chinese, especially if you've heard some of the people who seem to be trying to talk in a nasal voice, crafting sound waves with their vocal chords to reach a frequency that will split your brain asunder. The phrase 你要什么？might be a good litmus test.

But your run-of-the-mill young, happy people having a conversation really build up an atmosphere of gaiety.

Edit:
I've got a tan! When did that happen!

Doubley Edito:
This shirt is amazing. It was used as a retort to the line "I play online RPGs for the social interaction."

Water water, everywhere. In my clothes and in my hair.

2007-04-16T03:21:00.000-04:00

Promo:
The latest VG Cats comic is excellent, if you saw 300 (and like Super Mario Brothers.) Also, Scott Ramsoomair refrained from swearing for the entire panel. Go Scott!

And, now, onto the main event:
The Burmese festival of Thingyan was celebrated on Sunday. Nyein and I went there super-early, and I must say, it's amazing. For those of you who didn't follow the link, Thingyan is the Burmese "Water Festival", and also their new year. (Way to be late, guys.) The idea is that you "throw water" on everyone, to kind of wash away the past year's transgressions, and usher in a new year of new ~~transgressions~~ harmony.

So, I was only mildly surprised when, upon entering the temple grounds at 8am, a random Burmese I'd never seen before just walked up and calmly poured a bowl full of water on my head. Later, the event really kicked off, with people pouring water like crazy. For some reason, it took me a while to get comfortable with the idea of dumping water on a complete stranger, but eventually I got used to it, and it was really quite fun.

The celebration itself had such an odd feeling to it. We were right in front of a temple, and yet there were speakers blaring traditional music, and tons of free food which tasted quite good. And, then, people's reaction to the water was itself amazing. Pretend you are there, holding a bottle of H₂0, and you catch someone's eye as they are about to walk by. Nothing in this person's expression gives you any indication that they want you to pour water on them; in fact, an average Burmese's "default" expression can be a little gruff sometimes. Nonetheless, you do what you've been told to, and then they smile and look genuinely happy. Roughly 80% of the people acted just like this.

Nyein tells me that, in Myanmar, the celebration is four days long, and the water pouring is not really restricted in any way. People just go on with their daily lives, just like you would if it were the handshaking festival. Indeed, at the temple, people were talking on their cell phones whil walking through the veritable gauntlet of splashers. To date, the only one who went to far was a past king who extended the celebration by a month and a half. Apparently, he was ousted by his constituents, who decided that he was crazy.

There is also a Burmese "fire festival", which does not involve throwing fire. Andreas met up with us later, and he told us that Germany has a "rock festival", which does, in fact, involve throwing rocks at things. Apparently, it's a day of organized rioting.

Andrei told me he was going to show up in my lab to celebrate the water festival, and I spontaneously made up a holiday which I threatened him with: the American brick festival. This quip has had amazing success, strangely enough.

There were three other Westerners at the water festival. Two were kids, and they were having a blast. The third was a middle-aged woman, who stayed off to the side. She looked grumpy, and probably hadn't read the banner: "Get wet, be happy!"

Why I Want to Remain Unpopular + The Gratuitous Universal Grievance + Experimentation Event Number 3!

2007-04-13T07:37:00.000-04:00

So, every time I read the posts at Sinosplice, I immediately want to make this a private blog. But then, I stop, breathe in a few times, and say "Your readership will always be in the single digits. Relax." Then, I breathe out a few times, and breathing resumes its normal course.

You see, I don't react well to criticism, because I feel that if I say something which is correct, then I shouldn't be challenged. This is in direct contrast to the way things work in the real world. John@Sinosplice, or, as I'll call him, Captain Reasonable, gets lambasted for saying that a certain pop star is a sellout, or for using the term ABC. The key failing of the world wide web is that it encourages people to talk, even if what they think about a topic is by no means constructive or useful. It also encourages grandstanding. Of course, I'm not guilty of this in the least. Boy, does that kid gab or what?

Segue!

Now that's what I'm talking about. This is why I hate to try speaking to someone in Chinese here. Most of them prefer English. Also, I've had an experience similar to John's where I asked an (elderly) waitress for "one cup of tea" and she went off to get an English-speaking co-worker. Sure, my tones are bad. But they're not that bad.

It's just so frustrating for me, because for each person whose eyes light up when I try to bluster my way through a sentence in Chinese, there's two who (almost visibly) heave a big sigh. "Ugh. Not this again." As always, I shall compare this to Malaysia, where nearly all the Malays' eyes sparkle when I start a sentence in Bahasa, and some actually try to teach me just a little bit when I begin a sentence in English. Is it any wonder that I now have two language notebooks?

Segue!

Last night, I tried to batik with beeswax, which smells nicer and is more "rubbery" in texture. In fact, it's such a thin wax that it just spreads over the entire fabric. I might use it for wide coverage, but it's useless for lining.

Tonight, I'll try using my new tjanting ("brush", kinda) as well as dying the fabric twice. I'm curious to see if this will have the desired effect.

Encore!

I was thrilled today when Christy confirmed that she, too, often has revelations the morning of or evening before a meeting with her supervisor, while showering or falling asleep. Really, Christy should get her own "Introducing" article some day. She's awesome by any standard.

N0w y0u c4n f1ght b4ck 4g41ns+ th31r r0b0t5!

2007-04-10T23:27:00.000-04:00

So, Lou has a Spam Poison link on his page, which I idly followed. This is, in fact, a very, very good idea: spambots are normally employed to find addresses to spam to, so feed them their own email addresses! It's like... Aikido for the internet.

Anyways, the point is, I was following a link from that page, and I came across a very interesting article about a fraudulent businessman whose Gmail account was subpoenaed. Google had to turn over all emails, including deleted ones. As one observer noted, this means that, if you're doing illegal things online, all the government has to do is subpoena Google -which is considerably easier than getting a search warrent to pull the files from your personal computer. This is also something they can do without really informing you.

Of course, this won't apply to any of you law-abiding readers. But what if you're wrongfully accused, and in the process of clearing your name, some embaressing personal information comes to light?

New Topic!
I don't want to end without a picture; here is Martin "grilling" at our BBQ last Sunday. In fact, the fire wouldn't light, and he's just holding the tongs over some smouldering charcoal. Hence the smile.

In totally unrelated news, there's something I keep remembering until just before I post. Ah, that's it: we all know that a haircut only reaches its full potential one week after. My hair now looks ~amazing~. Definitely going back to the guy I went to last time.

These are the Things that keep me up at night

2007-04-10T14:25:00.000-04:00

Finally, oh so finally, I found out where the word "fractactical" comes from. I knew it was an 8-bit theatre reference, but there are, like, one-thousand (±69) 8-bit theatre comics. But, now, finally, we know: a fractal of tactical options makes a fractactical, which can also be used as an adjective (e.g., fractactical genius ~= double genius) .

In other news, I think the cancerific ginormous maple-flavored tooth on the gear of my life finally went "klunk", as I've been able to get back into my rhythm of doing things. Swimming is becoming a habit again. 天天夜夜 is slowly being memorized. The game engine is progressing faster than I expected, which might actually mean that it's coded well. Birds are chirping, or soon will be.

Welcome back to the world wide web, Anday.

If You Caught All That, You Must Be Crazy

2007-04-07T21:41:00.000-04:00

Currently, I'm on the cusp of some very dangerous procedures. For instance, I need to re-write the Message Box code for my game engine. Second, I need to start studying forward chaining via generalized Modus Ponens for the Q.E. Both could end in intellectual disaster. So, in an attempt to be even more rojak than ever thought possible, I shall summarize the past half-hour's browsing of the world wide web, and a few other interesting things.

A link of a link of a friend pointed me towards this lovely page, which vents a common frustration about "gunning." I think instead of complaining myself, from now on I'll just point you towards links of people who are better at complaining than me. By the way, any RPI student reading this will remember Primary Gunner Brian, who was egregious enough in his atrocities to suggest incorporating a discussion of the run-time coplexity of boggle sort into our DSA class.

In an effort to remember how to speak English, I read this rather badly-written philosophy essay on Leibniz's defense of Chinese religious beliefs. Fortunately, the content was quite good, and the author brought up an interesting paradox. We all know Deists, right? They believe that God made the world intricate like a watch; specifically, it needs to be wound every so often. Most people criticize a deist God as imperfect, especially now that we have Omega watches. But a non-interfering God might just as easily be called lazy, or powerless. This is, I feel, a very clever point to raise.

I found a lovely quote on bokane.org. Read this even if you don't care about Chinese.

Another great example of Chinese transliteration, ironically, is Enron., whose name on the Mainland - 安然 Ānrán - means “Securely.” Har har har.

The Leibniz article used a word I'd never seen before: "nullibism". In fact, I think this isn't a proper word; rather, it is a perversion of Henry Moore's nullibist. Presumably, it refers to the belief that the soul has no extension. On a more interesting note, my search to discover the meaning of this word unearthed a few more fun ones. Haecceity is a self-reflexive "this-ness" that is useful in sentences like "My post immediately received fifteen off-topic, insulting, authoritarian responses, but, then, this is the haecceity of the online forum."

The cause was haecceity, and the effect was that I went to Erasmatazz to look up some words that Chris Crawford dug up from an ancient dictionary. The ones I like are below; definitions are provided by Chris Crawford; example sentences by myself.
nullibeity = The state of being nowhere. I am currently commencing the nullibeity phase of my research.
quodlibertarian = One who talks and disputes on any subject. My roomate is good at heart, but I am sometimes exasperated by his being such a quodlibertarian.
quiddit = A subtlety; an equivocation. (This one is useful, because I can say "Oh, quiddit!" and people will hear "Oh, quit it.") He won the argument, but it was only later that I found the quiddit he employed to gain the upper hand.

Also from Erasmatazz are excerpts from Will Durant's book on civilization. My favorite is:

The Athenians are too brilliant to be good, and scorn stupidity more than they abominate vice.

This will become my new insult when playing online games, for people there are positively vicious if you don't know exactly what you're doing. Now, I can just say "Desist, or I shall report you to the GMs as the Athenian scoundrel that you are." I expect this approach to be flawless.

Jingbo recently suggested a new theory as to why Singapore has no mosquitos. Mosquitos breed in standing water, and it's impossible to have standing water if it's raining all the bloody time!

A few weeks ago, I substitute-taught a lab session for a professor who was feeling ill. My inital opinion of him wasn't too flattering (he was a bit quirky in his interactions) but I've slowly learned more about him that I can totally respect. For instance, he assumes that his students, although not computer science students, are still very bright, and he challenges them. This is far better than being patronizing. Also, he takes the stairs! And, his solution for the rumor that the NUS dress code doesn't permit sandals is to wear dress socks and sandals together. Truly, this is the only logical extension to the Bill Cushman philosophy on sandal wearing.

And, that's all!

Edit: Just found this one. Amazing!

Boleh Buat Batik!

2007-04-05T03:42:00.000-04:00

In the spirit of propensity, I'm posting this without any pictures. My camera's on my desk (near Lefty McHand) and its cable is in my lab (top desk drawer). Read it. See the pictures on Monday.

If I were to post a sentence on One Sentence, I'd probably up' this gem: "I spent all of last night dyeing, and now I'm dead tired." (This sentence was true at 11am; now I'm slightly less tired, but confused about what day it is.)

I refer, of course, to batik -that amazing Indonesian artform that's the sheer inverse of silk-screening. The way to batik is super-simpmle:
1) Draw on a piece of cloth with hot wax.
2) Soak the shirt in a sodium carbonate solution. (Note to self: don't wipe your eyes during this phase, you idiot.)
3) Pour dye to fill the areas you waxed. Let dry.
4) Boil in a pot of water to remove the wax.

Batik is the exact physical manifestation of the "Paint Bucket" you see in every computer graphics package. There are finer points, too, like swapping steps 2 & 3 (doesn't work) or "leading" different colored dyes into each other within the same area (looks awesome), but I'm still working on the basics. And, yes, I wore shoes while boiling wax.

So last (fig.) night I made shirts because Mary-Jo (from RPI) was visiting. This morning, she and I met Christy at Clementi for breakfast & bubble tea. And, courtesy of last night's lack of sleep, we had matching shirts! They're the most touristy thing ever: they say "Breakfast @Singapore" and have a drawing of an orchid (with the leaves of a birch) and they feel slightly waxy.

My parents sent Easter candy in the mail. I mention this because it was integral in the batik process, and made the difference between quitting at 12 and going till 2 (at which point coffee made up the rest of the difference.)

In semi-related news, I met Phon (the family friend) for lunch yesterday. You can tell why we get along fine by this snippet from our conversation:
Phon: "How about sushi? Have you ever had sushi?"
Seth: "Oh, I have a mental block against eating raw fish."
Phon: "Want to overcome it today?"
Seth: "Yeah I do!"

In totally related news, sushi is amazing. But everyone who's had it will tell you this. They won't tell you that fish eggs taste funky.

Back to the topic at hand, I really like batik. It has all the expressive power of line drawing (which I can do), but unlike silk-screening, it's cost-effective for each shirt. And there's zero pressure to make more than one shirt. So come visit me in Singapore, and I'll batik you up a shirt. Yeah.

Edit: Andy Rees, if you haven't totally neglected your responsibility to peruse the internet, you should be reading this. I highly recommend this artform for you, as it is 105.6% suitable to your character, bearing the right mix of simple, crisp outlining with potential disaster (parafin fires are impossible to put out.) I can totally picture you boiling wax on the KEEC's accursed hotplate, stretching T-shirts over the geology displays.

There is no "I" in "Ikea"

2007-04-01T03:01:00.000-04:00

In part because I need a break from studying, and also as a slightly late April fool's day tribute, I shall finally give full attention to the differences between computer scientist here (in Singapore) and back home (in the U.S.) Unfortunately, you probably won't find this humorous unless you are a computer scientist with some knowledge about Singapore. Nevertheless, the brave read on!

A common question I receive is "what's it like studying in Singapore?" (Another common question I get is "Have you learned the local language?" I've always liked that one.) As with everything in Singapore, the similarity to the American way of doing things is often surprising. However, subtle deviations require anyone used to programming "on the right-hand side of the road" to take care, lest he commit an embaressing blunder. Consider the following:

Culture
TCP/IP connections in America use a "three-way handshake" to ensure that a network is suitable for communication. Of course, no handshaking mechanism can ever be entirely sure of this. In Singapore, then, TCP connections use the "Kia-Su handshake", which is an eight-way handshake which continues to send handshaking segments for the entirety of the connection's life. All these messages mean that the network never goes out of synch (even during a thunder storm); however, it is also the reason why web pages take so long to load.

Language
A huge problem arose in the past when computers automatically converted the dollar sign ($) to the pound sign (£) , causing an amazing amount of metric confusion. A slightly smaller conversion issue hit Singapore as it jumped into the information age: one naïve post-graduate in the pre-Unicode days replaced all ASCII values 006 with 024. He justified it by refering to their control codes: "I don't know what ACK means, so I just used CAN to accept messages." The mistake only came to light when this man approached his supervisor puzzled over the lack of a "CANNOT" character.

Food
The American cure-all for bland food is salt; the Singaporean palate, however, usually prefers something a bit more fiery. After selling only 300 copies of Windows Vista on opening day at Funan, Microsoft realized that they, too, would have to cater to this propensity for salsa. Recently, they announced a newcomer to their lineup. Expect Windows Vista: Sambal to be packed with features much more appropriate to the average south-east asian constituent.

Climate
Back home, the predominant conifer is the North American B+ Tree. These trees grow to be much wider than they are tall, and are sturdy enough to survive the heavy snows while having enough surface area to survive in direct sunlight. In Singapore, the strong monsoon winds would easily uproot this tree, so the predominant foliage is the Red-Black Palm, wich grows very tall and is always balanced, even in heavy winds. As a result, however, databases in Singapore take longer to search.

Really, though, there's not much difference, and I often feel like I'm right at home here. And there are always friendly people on hand to help me slowly overcome the culture shock, and thanks to twelve years of dedicated study, I have finally become fluent in the official language of Singapore.

Drumroll, Please...

2007-03-28T03:12:00.000-04:00

While Ethan is still paying attention....

Some illustrative examples crop up all the time in Computer Science; one of these is the so-called "Sleeping Barber" problem. The idea is simple: you have one barbershop chair and one barber. If there are no customers waiting, the barber falls asleep in the chair, and the next customer should wake him. The research is in finding ways to efficiently code this without entering equally bad states of deadlock or starvation.

No-one ever considers that you might not want a haircut from someone who just woke up.

As you may have guessed, (my writing style never hides much) I ran into my first real-world example of the sleeping barber problem when I got my hair cut in Malaysia. I couldn't actually wake the guy up; someone else had to pat him on the shoulder and say something in Malay. To his credit, despite constantly dropping things he was holding -a quality I would prefer my barbers not to have- no blood was spilled on my part. Now, if I could just find some philosophers who are unfortunate enough to own one chopstick apiece...

The style is somewhat different from what I'm used to, but a lot of people are giving me compliments. This also goes down on record as being the biggest process of any haircut in my life. It involved: a straight-edge, three different electric shears, two pairs of scissors, some powder, hairspray, water, massage oil (a free massage with a haircut is very common in Malaysia), three brushes, a comb, and a hair dryer. It is also rare in that it looks pretty good with stubble. Also, it caused a "Quest Completed" icon to pop up on my phone; I've now gotten a haircut from each of the three major ethnic groups in S'pore and M'sia.

Oh! The shirt I'm wearing in that picture is also a product of my trip. It was roughly $1.50 USD, and is made of cotton. It is comfortable, quick to air-dry, and light. And it took 3 minutes to pick out, since the average Malaysian is apparently the same size as me.

Towards the Horizon

2007-03-27T02:21:00.000-04:00

So life's all about putting a bright spin on things. For instance, when I woke up absurdly late today, I could have said "Oh noes! I am so late! I must run to lab and study till eleven to make up for this lateness!" Instead, I said, "Huh, well, I can study on the bus to Malaysia, get a haircut, and charge my phone number."

So off I go. I couldn't have planned it better.

Your By-Lines:

The aloe plant was dying, so I moved it back home. It's now quite perky.
My feet scarred much less than expected, probably because I know how to handle blisters (it's not actually what they tell you at Red Cross First Aid classes.)
We've got an awesome Pakistani rug at our entrance. Causing slightly more excitement to yours truly is the puzzle-piece-shaped ice cube tray which produces puzzle-piece-shaped ice cubes. They don't, sadly, fit together, which kills my plan for the 2007 Ice Nature Staffboard.
My friend James should move to Singapore if he wants "I'm wearing headphones" to translate directly to "Don't talk to me if you don't know me."

We are the Crown Princes of Lame

2007-03-23T01:05:00.000-04:00

Cover Story
- by Seth Hetu, Correspondant to S.E. Asia

As you all know, I'm a closet nerd. In other words, I try to be all manly with my swimming and hiking, and my Manchester United, but you can easily trip me up by, say, incorrectly stating some fact from a Star Wars book or Magic card.

So I'm a bit remiss to tell this story, but here goes. Last night, Nyein and I, playing Maple Story from seperate locations, both fell asleep mid-game. Yes, that's right, in the real world. I woke up the next morning with a kind message from the game server telling me that I'd played for 9 hours and should take a break. I guess keeping your avatar in one spot while you snore constitutes playing....

Minor Article
- by Seth Hetu, Correspondant to S.E. Asia

We had a presentation yesterday, and it went well! To give one criticism to me, and one to my peers:

To Me: Stop, for the love of all that is good in this world, running your hands through your hair when you speak.
To My Peers: Good gravy, it's a lapelle mic! Wear it on your @&%#$@ lapelle! Don't shout into it.

It happens to the best of us

2007-03-21T03:47:00.000-04:00

A while back, I mentioned that context switches are the most taxing to non-native speakers. Today (a thunderstormy day), I slipped Lina up by mistake on MSN:

Lina: How are you?
Seth: Doing well.
Seth: A little wet.
Seth: Lots of studying.
Lina: I know. You have the QE (Qualifying Exam)
Lina: "A little wet" means "not good", right?
Seth: Haha, no... it means that I was out in the rain.

Actually, sounds a bit like British slang. "Can you help me on my homework?" "Sorry, I'm a little wet with mine right now."

Cheerio!
Seth

So It Seems I've Been Beginning a lot of Posts with "So" Recently...

2007-03-18T21:35:00.000-04:00

The days that no-one updates their blogs/webcomics are the days that feel the longest to me. These are also the days that I check out the links in Lou's blog. Really a fantastic collection you've got there. Today I browsed to "One Sentence", a site that pretty much explains itself in title alone. A lot of the sentences were contrived, but there are some gems. For instance:

I found that I had to stop going to confession because I was telling the priest too many lies.

...which is the exteme of something we can all relate to: it's difficult to say things you're ashamed of doing, even though that's the whole point.

In other news:
Level 21 in Maple Story, and now taking a break to study for 3 solid weeks for the qualifiers. It'll be easy to focus, as level 21 is a booooooring level to be at.

I'm not a music aficionado, but I wish I'd listened to people when they told me that Guster and Counting Crows were good bands. Actually, I think both of them played at my school (RPI) and I was too indifferent to go.

I'm reading a Chinese Comic book! Well, me and trusty Mr. Dictionary are. And.... technically it's a Chinese translation of a Japanese comic: "Slam Dunk". (Apparently the "#1 Manga of All Time". Impressive.) And it reads top-to-bottom. How cool is that? (FYI: Reading Chinese this way is fairly comfortable for the eyes, 'cause the characters are block-shaped.)

While searching for a picture of Slam Dunk that wasn't all-male, I found this lovely site. Really, guys, I know what you're trying to do, but you can't just take your general subject area ("streaming") and an abvreviation for a common word ("people") and put them together without checking if "PPStream" might give some native English speakers a different idea. I can't imagine what kind of mail webmaster@ppstream.com gets...

I went salsa-dancing on Friday. It reminded me of yoga in that: (a) it was a lot of fun and (b) the "die hards" were just a little bit creepy. Still, I might go back.

The internet's laggy, and I think someone's stealing our signal. However, that would mean he's spoofing one of our MAC address's, which would mean packets would be flying everywhere (i.e., I'd notice.) So I don't know how they're doing it. Maybe Starhub's just punishing me for my customer service complaint. :D

Nyein also plays Maple Story, but he's a swordsman. Fortunately for him, this game was made for button mashers (although I still take waaay less damage then him.) The fact of the matter is that, as a direct result of playing Sword of Mana, I only press a button when it needs to be pressed, and as a result of The Legend of Zelda, I only attack when I'm ready to attack.

Two Points to Mom

2007-03-16T00:44:00.000-04:00

So, I recently doused my foot in hot oil, as a consequence of cooking. And, if you read the comments, you'll know that my mother recommended aloe. Amazingly enough, the easiest place to find aloe here is... in the canned goods aisle. So I bought a can of "aloe in pineapple juice", mashed up some, and applied liberally! Then, I bandaged my foot and played Maple Story for a few hours. I've been repeating this treatment for a few nights, and let me tell you, the results are amazing:

The huge burn marks actually look like skin now.
I've gained four levels and 20,000 gold.

I was only mildly worried that I'd look down after a session and see that my foot was devoured by ants (on account of the pineapple juice), and in the end I did find a nice potted plant, which now resides on my desk. I'm not sure if I'm allowed to have shrubbery in the lab, but, then again, I know I'm not supposed to wear sandals to school.

Just to review:


Name      Points
Dad         +2
Mom         +2
Seth        +3, +50 vocabulary points
Wikipedia   -1

Coke Takes All

2007-03-13T03:26:00.000-04:00

Brian Clevinger is one of the "gamer generation" that Chris Crawford (one of my personal heroes) sleights as uncouth and animalistic; he makes fun of orphans, for goodness' sake. However, he does have two saving graces:
1) Recently, his humor has gotten much more civilized.
2) He occasionally comes up with gems such as these:

But, at least, there would be one final refuge --a glass of Coke to obliterate all evidence of the culinary disaster. Coke is effectively industrial cleaner with a pound of sugar mixed in, so it was more than up to the task.

Mr. Clevinger might be interested to know that Coke in Singapore has even less taste than in America. Last time I was home, the richness of American Coke's flavor actually shocked me.

Also, I have definitely used Coke to clean up "culinary disasters" (i.e., bad food prepared by yours truly.)

Andy to the Rescue!

2007-03-12T02:16:00.000-04:00

So.... I had this written, and it was neither concise nor funny. Not that I try for either of those lofty plateaus, but I figured that in an effort to alleviate these shortcomings and to expand into new and exciting media, I'd transcribe an AIM conversation I had with Andy about the same events. By the way, I've changed a few "comments" I made. AIM brings out the scandalous in me.

Andy: So what do you have for me?
Seth: Did I have something? Really?
Seth: Can I get a general topic....?
Seth: Hey, Chinese people are SCANDALOUS!
Andy: I was hoping for a left handed compliment, or a tid-bit about life lessons...
Andy: ...but that works too.
Seth: Well, you handsome young man.... we had a party.
Seth: (Totally not in the conversation) I prepared some of the Malaysian food that Roy's parents gave me. So I invited Christy, Jingbo, and a few others over. Actually, the food turned out okay; it's always a bit risky to cook Chinese food for Chinese nationals. Oh! and I found out that the Korean pancake everyone seems to like tastes much better if you fry it in twice the normal amount of oil.
Seth: Anyways, one of them saw my room.
Seth: And said "Oh, a Queen-sized bed! Do you share that with anyone?"
Seth: So the next time someone tells you they're very polite, non-intrusive people...
Andy: (presumably laughing out loud) Was this an attractive female chinese person?
Seth: This was the person who I invited because my lab-mate said "Can I bring my girlfriend along?"
Seth: It later came to light that she was NOT aware her boyfriend had bought me red underwear.
Seth: And I also tipped a pan of boiling oil onto my feet.
Seth: So... it was a good party, overall.
Andy: Sounds it.

Addendum

My feet are still splotchy.
Boy, Blogger just eats pre-formatted text! I had to hand-edit the garbage it created for this post in TextPad. Using spans for italics? For shame...
To wit: all of them offered to stay and help clean up; two of them actually insisted.
If you haven't seen "Hoodwinked" (a cartoon; a parody of Little Red Riding Hood; somewhat old) then see it! It's amazing.

Please Don't Take My Picture

2007-03-09T04:30:00.000-05:00

So last night wasn't so good; I couldn't sleep till 3am. Essentially, I was having a "bad day", and like all bad days in Singapore, this one followed a pattern:

1) Stay up really late, complaining online to anyone who'll listen without actually telling them my real problems.
2) Oversleep, then head to breakfast.
3) Sit outside Spinelli's, with a latte and bagel + cream cheese, surrounded by palm trees and purple-flowered bushes, another beautiful day with perfect weather in Singapore.
4) Realize, "Hey, this isn't really so bad" and get over it.

So yeah, it's hard to stay in a bad mood here. :D

Ah, Alexander Hamilton! So Much I Enjoyed Your Peanut Butter Commercial

2007-03-07T03:36:00.000-05:00

Computer scientists have their own writing style; this much is a known fact. People have described it as many things, both good ("refreshing", "witty") and bad ("arrogant", "corny"), so I am always a bit cautious when I pick up anything less formal than a research paper. Here's a classic example, from Andrew Tanenbaum (the king of operating systems and networks).

Under all these conditions, stable storage can be made 100% reliable in the sense of writes either working correctly or leaving the old data in place. Of course, it does not protect against physical disasters, such as an earthquake happening and the computer falling 100 meters into a fissure and landing in a pool of boiling magma. It is tough to recover from this condition in software.

Note that 75% of that paragraph is self-indulgent. Still, it's nice to read this kind of jocular text every few pages.

In related CS news, the game I talked aobut earlier is looking kinda nice. So much so that the developers of the original system happily offered to host the project. Setting up the web space was just a little tedious, so of course I sent some emails out. I got this wonderful response from James Paige, and it made me laugh:

I am awarding you 50 vocabulary points for correctly using the word "bricolage" in the context of a normal conversation.

I just got back from meeting up with Lin, Jake, and Kyaw for dinner. When laughs ensue and dinner lasts two hours, you know something's going right.

In my constant quest to self-affirm my language learning, I've noticed that, if I say something in 中文 and the other person says "what?", I say the same thing slower, and with more pronounced tones. I used to switch immediately to English on the first hint of impending failure.

The new $50. bills (okay, not that new) are crazy, aren't they! I just saw one of them today. Finally, my country has a physical manifestation of the monetary unit of which I can be proud, that which is not so easily confused with another popular currency. Yeah, that's right, I tinyurl'd it! Your status bar is of little use in the land of anonymous urls.

Business As Usual

2007-03-06T13:50:00.000-05:00

We had an earthquake yesterday (well, technically Indonesia had it) and let me be the first to say that I am NOT worried about ensuing tsunamis and that business around Seth's Mindscape will continue as usual. Since none of you responded to the friends article, I sought out my own answers. I was reading a pinoy blog (can I say pinoy if I'm not pinoy? I think so...) which topped its top 10 complaints about the Philippines with something like "Don't ask me to be your friend. I don't want to. Let friendships happen naturally." Amazingly, I disagree with him; sometimes, you need to ask to be "friends" (note: I didn't say "good friends"), especially if the other person's culture leaves it unclear where social courtesy ends and friendship begins.

A recent talk with my mother reminded me of something I've been meaning to talk about: eyes. Apparently my eyes are at a premium here. I've had a large number of women (and some guys -yikes!) tell me that they really like how my eyes sparkle. I can usually return the compliment; the eyes here range from brown to dark black (a color I used to think impossible), the latter being extremely easy to get lost in. Because there's no tiny "flecks" of reflection, you kinda get the same feeling as when looking up into a cloudless sky -you can't focus on anything, and you kind of feel like you're sinking in to something.

I'll have a post up soon with a good Korean movie (the last one was kinda cute, but only because I'm a die-hard subtitle reader); until then, have you seen Borat? Amazingly insulting and coarse, but it utilizes the kind of simple humor I love. "We need an animal that provides good protection", while at the Turtle habitat, is perhaps my favorite line, esp. considering what he ends up buying.

Article of Dichotomy, Attack!

2007-03-06T02:03:00.001-05:00

What happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object? The force stops. Because, the only object I can think of that's immobile is the bond formed by friendship. No, not love. Hand-holding. It is impossible to get two people, holding hands, to give you the right-of-way if you're behind them. Sometimes, if you're walking towards them, they'll still walk on uninterrupted, giving you no headway, and you'll have to either step off the sidewalk or just plow into them (something I'm not brash enough to try.) I must find a way to harness this power.... perhaps positioning couples in front of bank vaults to prevent break-ins (but then how would the bank staff get inside?)

Anyways, we're not talking about that today. Today, I shall detail the strange events that have surrounded my friendship with Lin, who despite his name, is male. The basic history is, we used to talk occasionally, then there was an incident (with food) and we stopped talking, then we started talking again, casually. And then he "proclaimed his friendship." The exact words he used were "Can we [be] good [friends]?"

This is something I'm not terribly used to hearing. It's sorta like couples asking to "go steady", but I've always thought that was needed because you can only have one girlfriend, so it's good to be specific about your intentions. But you can have lots of friends, so why would you ever confirm "ah, we're good friends now." ? I generally would only affirm a friendship if the friend in question was in doubt, or if I really wanted them to know they were special. Roy, for instance, is well aware that he is my best friend, and occasionally reminds me to stop reminding him of this.

I suppose I understand what Lin meant, but I'm still fuzzy about the implications of our friendship. Do I have to celebrate the "anniversary" of our good friendship? Are there new responsibilities of which I am not aware? Should I start asking him about his family when I see him? (This last one, I was shocked to learn, is considered totally normal by Chinese, and totally offensive by Japanese.)

Any thoughts? I really don't know what to make of this.

No Need to Apologize

2007-03-05T01:11:00.000-05:00

In a partial effort to scroll the sup telore picture farther down this page, and also because I enjoyed reading this article, we shall talk a little bit about Singapore today.

Specifically, it's very interesting that every time I read something about China, it applies to Singapore just a little. (For instance: Chinese New Year was crazy, but not so crazy as in that article I posted. Also, newspaper articles explained how crazy it was in Singapore in the past.) So when I read John's article, which is about Chinese people being pointlessly and rudely "me first" in everything, I think back on my time here. In fact, every single example he gives (you're in line: someone rushes ahead of you and orders, you hail a cab: someone else runs up and grabs it) has happened to me. However, this is very very rare in Singapore. Usually, people are polite. The cab-stealers were teenagers, villified world-wide for doing things without regard for others. And the lady who stole my place in line was quite elderly, which makes me wonder if the adoption of polite conduct is a recent development.

I often feel a clash here between the young and the old, although it's not rebellious so much as misunderstanding. The closest comparison I can make is the confusion caused by old racist words in America. More than once I've read about a grand-daugther saying: "Grandma, you can't say that word anymore." Now pretend that, instead, your grandmother's vice is cutting to the front of every line. How can you explain why something so obviously wrong is, well, wrong? You're at an impasse; your brain doesn't work that way; you simply can't do it.

Add to this the problem that, sometimes, the grandmother speaks the native tongue (Hokkien); the mother and father speak half this and half English, and the children prefer English, and then you've got an even greater generation gap. (When I went to Kedah, people had solved this problem by simply learning all the languages. As a computer scientist, I have to respect the bloody-mindedness of this approach.)

But, hey, I'm not complaining. The society John describes, with everyone fighting for their own, to absurd lengths, sounds like a living nightmare. Common courtesy makes a huge difference in everyday life, and I'm quite glad the people here understand this.

A Grandstanding Post of Staggering Genius

2007-02-27T02:50:00.001-05:00

This is a long (loooong) post, so I've tried to make it as interesting as possible. In the end, I re-wrote it three times, and ditched the "laundry list" style. Hope you enjoy.

It is of utmost importance that nowhere in this article do I mention the fact that I ate ox testicles.... Whoops. Well, allow me to explain the context. I went to Malaysia primarily to see my friend Roy, who's been in England for the past two years. One night, I was touring the town with Roy, his brother (Robin), and a friend (Ben). The theme of the night seemed to be "let's see what the American will eat!", and so we tried the usual crazy stuff: jellyfish, pig's ears, and then "sup telur." I should point out that none of them had eaten this before, and that it was quite rare to find something like this, even in Malaysia. Lucky us.

Well, anyways, all I'm going to say is that I'm consistently and continually amazed at the things I'll "have a try" at. Although, there are still a few things of which I patently refuse to partake, even once. Oh, and did I mention that Ben is awesome?

My trip to Malaysia was a welcome relief for many reasons. For one thing, I got to see Keat and Kenny again. Although Roy's house was the locus of my trip, certain topics are best talked about with these two (relationships, for instance, and cafés.) Also, I was finally able to meet Roy's family. They were incredibly accomodating; I felt so much like I was at my own home, and not some home 10,000 miles away. His brother, who looks just a little bit like Matt Abatuno, was eager to talk with me, and his aunt, who spoke little English, tried once or twice to have a conversation in Mandarin. (It was tedious, but we accomplished something, I think.) Also, a lot of the truly "Chinese" elements of the new year which John mentioned in his article -specifically, fireworks, ang pow, and being forced to eat way too much- were present, although to a reasonable extent. It's no secret that I love Malaysia, and this is part of the reason why: its citizens still maintain their own cultural ties, but they're very open-minded about other ideas, and they're reasonable above all else.

Let's focus on the ang pow (红包) for a minute. During Chinese New Year, it is customary for married relatives or friends of the family to give everyone else a red packet (ang=red, pow=packet in Hokkien) when they visit. This is so common that even I -a non-Chinese, unless you ask Roy- was given five. Moreover, I was given one by every mother or father I met for at least 10 minutes, including when we stopped at a random friend's house for tea. I have to stress how embaressing this can be, esp. considering that the amount you receive should roughly corellate with that person's respect for you. It's not something you can refuse, and it's not something you can "give back", since everyone around you's also treating you to meals and drinks as you are the guest. I felt more comfortable eating the sup than I did opening some of these packets.

Malaysia's national language is Malay, which means you get lovely signs like this one. Yes, 7-11 servers your needs 24 "jam" a "hari".

I think I need to be more assertive in my attempts to find friends here. Roy's brother, Aunt, and a friend (Ah Seong) were all very shy when they first met me, but immediately began chatting up a storm once I tried to include them. Come to think of it, even Ben (sup telor boy) was shy when we first met. But after a few questions and jokes, his involvement in a conversation increased tenfold. It's like Andreas said about people in China: if you speak some Mandarin to them, they won't be embaressed to speak English to you.

On an unrelated note, I love the concept of beginning a name with "Ah", which some of the Hokkien people do (Ah Meng, Ah Seong, Ah Hock, Ah Lok.) Hanging on the "Ah" a bit lets you remember their real name, and you get their attention, too, a la: "Ahhhhhh Hock, are you busy tonight?" Actually, Ah Seong is working in Singapore. I hope to become friends with him, partly because he seems so unique. For instance, he's your stereotypical soft-spoken Asian, but he has bleach-blond hair and scars from motorbike accidents. (Update: just got a message from him. Yay!)

I definitely did not sneak into Fort Conwallis without paying, because they left the back door open and I wasn't paying attention (or money -zing!)

Kek Lok Si is a hugemongous temple in Penang; in fact, they just renovated it and added another section. It's located halfway up Penang hill, and during Chinese New Year they string up nearly as many lights as La Salette has. A note to careful observers that the "swastika" on all Buddhist temples are left-facing, whereas the one Nazi Germany vilified is right-facing. (I exist to be your vaccine for the dreaded foot-in-mouth disease.)

The amount of questionables I brought back to Singapore was somewhat scandalous this time around. I brought back some dried sausage and fish, and other food items which are probably allowed, but I'm fairly sure that I exceeded the allowed limit for chewing gum. Although "the bucket stops" at me, I can't help but plead that the Singapore border certainly doesn't make it easy to declare things. In Malaysia, you check a box "Nothing to Declare" and then neglect to stand in the "Goods to Declare" line. Like you should. In Singapore, you hand in no paperwork, there's only one line, and your bags are scanned regardless. No-one asks you if you want to declare anything, and I've never been stopped to have my luggage opened. This, mind, you, is when crossing the border by bus. The airport has a nice customs policy: don't enforce anything. To complete your customs check at the airport, you walk past a guy sitting in a chair at the customs booth, who seems ill-inclined to pester anyone. And yet, Singapore has fairly low levels of contraband; the article I read had numbers, which I can't remember. (I thought I photocopied it, but instead I copied an article on traffic accidents, which have risen in number since 2003.)

I guess that wasn't so long. Thanks for bearing with me! A lot of details about this trip will be with-held until a certain sleeping Malaysian (see: right) mails me a CD. Translation: don't hold your breath. In fact, I left out a lot of details (drinking fresh coconut juice, having congealed blood cubes in my morning bowl of noodles, nearly fainting when someone set of a huge bout of firecrackers inside a covered building... idiotic malcontent.) But these are things I shall reserve for later, when I am relaxing with a cup of coffee and Lou Perseghin, trying to express how it is living here. Until then, adieu!

Website, and More Party Stories

2007-02-19T14:42:00.000-05:00

My website needs a re-design; it still mentions that I go to school at RPI.... however, I've always been a bit unsure just exactly what a site that updates infrequently is supposed to be. Recently, Nyein suggested that I use it as an extended introduction (metaphor? resume?) for people who've just met me. Actually, since the first thing most computing people here do when they hear about someone is check their webspace, this is a reasonable suggestion.

A small incident at Jingbo's house brought me a remarkable amount of self-satisfaction. He'd just begun preparing some fried food, whereupon he realized that he had nothing to stir the sizzling contents of his wok with. "I need some chopsticks!" he cried, and since I happened to be standing right there with a pair, I handed them over. Half a minute later, I realized that he wasn't speaking English when he asked for some 筷子, making this the first time I've responded to a request in Chinese without mentally translating it first.

In slightly related news, I generally hide the fact that I study Chinese when at Chinese parties, since it more or less stagnates conversation. Plus, it amazes the guests even moreso when you pronounce (and remember) their names, and the names of the foods they prepared.

Did I mention we played musical chairs?

Begets, Bespeaks, Belies (Bemoans)

2007-02-18T14:13:00.000-05:00

Fortunately, my Chinese New Year experience was about ~~ten~~ eight times better than John's post made it out to be. I think this was because the host of my party, although very, very traditional, was very much aware of his guests' needs. So we didn't have horrible wine, and were only forced to eat a little too much food. I was still forced not to pay for the taxi home, though... although it's quite difficult to get upset over something like this. ("And then...." *sob* "he paid for dinner. Both of ours!" *bawl*)

And when I arrived back at Block 7, I found another party in full swing. This was your classic , European high-style bash, and I ultimately ended up in a corner with Andreas and a Serbian named Alex discussing the finer points of the Old Testament and Vatican II. Eh, our kind tend to flock together.

Generally, I don't drink a lot, and tonight was no exception (a few glasses of very, very specifically-chosen wine), so I'll often think "Hey, I want to try that!" and then never get around to it. Tonight, I gave the old Brandy-and-coffee a whirl (something I've been curious to try since 2001). It's amenable, no more, no less.

Soon I shall go to bed; until then, I have the game Psychopolitical Drama Phylomortis: Avant-Garde to frustrate me. This game was designed by a madman, and is actually renowned throughout the gaming community for having battles which are too... capricious, and dialogue which is rife with self-indulgent blather that is overly and unnecessarily verbose. I've actually written a paper about how Phylo's complex "wordology" belies the author's poor grasp of English. (Note: There'd be a link for "written a paper", but Statler & Waldorf has decided to become stupid since I left and only provide recent issues on its website... in PDF format, which bespeaks "Lazy~")

Coffee begets me beating games, so while I have half a cup, here we go. In the mean-time, if I can quickly google a screenshot from Phylomortis, you'll be able to understand why I wince every time I go to talk to an NPC. Ah! You're in luck:
Edit: Speaking of needless difficulty... apparently one big labyrinth, followed by an impossible jumping puzzle isn't enough. Now, I'm supposed to navigate a stochastic* garrison blindfolded... what's the big idea? I'm not one to bemoan difficult games (Xenosaga, & Contra Shattered Soldier were fun) but this is ridiculous!
* stochastic in the sense that clearing the map relies mostly on luck, not on skill.

For the normal people who read my blog, a non-game-heavy entry is on the way. In the mean time... I glitched AG. This battle happened in the past~

It's the Most (BOOM!) Day of the Year

2007-02-18T01:23:00.000-05:00

Just in case my uncle hasn't made it to the top entry in my blob yet, here's a link for some interesting reading about Chinese New Year. To quote:

It should come as no surprise that an environment seething with explosions is not particularly safe.

I mean, how can you go wrong with that?

So, yes, it's Chinese New Year, and I've got a party to get to. I'm so excited! My first every second Chinese New Year! Yippe!

Cash is Still Amazing

2007-02-16T02:20:00.000-05:00

For those of you who don't use MSN messenger, know that you're allowed to set a "message", e.g., "out doing laundry" or "I hate o-chem!"

Cash's message, for as long as I've known him, has been "BUCKET STOPS HERE." I asked him what it meant. "Oh, it's a good phrase for business! You know, taking responsibility for things... instead of blaming someone else." Since then, I've been trying to explain to him that it's not a "bucket" that stops here, but he's been amazingly resilient to change it.

Recently, he changed his message to "Bucks stop here!" Almost, Cash, almost.

Looks Fine to Me!

2007-02-15T03:18:00.000-05:00

Sooo... I'm doing simulation research, and so far I like the topic. Just recently, I started to use a fancy new software called RePast. In my opinion, this is a silly name for a software. I appreciate that they were trying to cleverly construct their own acronym, and still make it easy to remember ("we're re-doing the past!") but were they aware that the word already exists? And it means "a light meal"?

In an effort to tinker around with the software, I created a model of the Nature Center operating on Saturday mornings, when hundreds of children rush up to eight teachers demanding bluecards. As you can see, it's not quite right. By 9:29, two teachers have over 20 students in line, and three teachers haven't seen a single student. Yeah, I messed something up.

In other news, I've recently discovered that I spend far too much time doing computer stuff. Besides all this simulation (i.e., my job) I also have the game engine (which displays NPCs now!) and at least one other project which changes as I lose interest in one thing and move on. Add that to the movies Nyein, Andrei, and I watch, and there you have it. Don't get me wrong, I like the feeling of making progress. But one of my goals is NOT to become one of the research students who hides in his lab all day, and can't cope with the outside world.

Fortunately, the pool's re-opened, so I can finally swim again! Yay! Also, tonight I'm meeting Andreas ("that German guy") to chat for a bit. And next week (Chinese New Year) I head to Malaysia to visit my favorite Malaysian-named-Roy in the world.

Powerful Stuff

2007-02-13T03:42:00.000-05:00

There's a commercial for Horlicks* where some guy is doing all sorts of mean things, and one person thinks "I wonder how he can sleep at night." (The answer, presumably, is because he drinks a cup of hot Horlicks every night.) Milo tastes better has the same effect, so I buy that instead.
*It's just a malted drink, not a drug or anything.

My cough syrup bottle has a warning on the label: may cause drowsiness.

I really should have known better than to mix the two*. But the cough syrup doesn't say "don't drink Milo" on it. (It says "don't drink alcohol").
*Drink both in the same sitting. Not actually mix. Sheesh...

So that, sir, is why I slept from 11pm last night until 1pm today.

Wile Away Your Sunday Evening with This Thought Puzzle

2007-02-12T07:40:00.000-05:00

So a while back, John @ Sinosplice posted this interesting dilemma (article: here.) Here's the excerpt:

John's Friend: “Suppose John had two eggs for breakfast. I ask him what he had for breakfast, and he tells me three eggs. Did he lie?”
The Chinese girl, after a few moments’ thought, replied “no.”

The American girl immediately answered, “of course.”

So... I read this in America, and have been dying to find out if it's true. So I asked (everyone),
adding that "John isn't really paying attention when he answers", since I think this is important. But oh is he right! All the Asians (all of them, even Hui Min, whose beliefs are rigorously self-tested) said "No, he's not lying." And all the Westerners said "Yes, he's lying."

John says that in the Asian mind, a lie must have intent. Thomas would agree, but would certainly protest that intent only lessens the degree of sin. It's still a lie! I'm inclined to agree. But then again, I am also strongly opposed to the notion that "appearance is reality," which you sometimes get around here, and always leads to a metaphysical impasse.

Really, I Should Have Expected This

2007-02-09T14:45:00.000-05:00

A few days ago, Nyein came to my lab with a Burmese "snack" that I'd had before: pickled tea leaf salad. This type of snack followed the "explosion of flavors" philosophy usually found in Thai food; also, supposedly, when a decision was reached in the pre-1950's courts of Myanmar, the two sides would share this meal (like, in the courtroom) to show that they were at peace with the decision.

Also, there's the fact that you eat tea leaves. This means that you're wired for the next four or five hours. Today, I had the same snack -this time at a restaurant- and I can't quite sleep. So, I'm doing all those things I'd been meaning to do for a while: ironing, suggesting music to Ethan, cleaning my room, and transferring more music to my phone so I don't go crazy listening to The Mariner's Revenge Song.

Andy Rees is apparently MIA. Any word on this from his peers?

Installing the Burmese language on one's computer is virtually impossible. Okay, it's not that hard. But for goodness' sake, even Windows Vista -just released- doesn't support this language, which has been in the Unicode Standard since version 3.0 and contains only about 100 characters! Way to send the message: "We don't care about your country."

Night!
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