From New York City...

Blogging from New York City. Tomorrow is my last day here and I'll be flying off on Monday afternoon, New York Time.

The trip has been a mixed bag so far. It's been a while since I led a tour overseas so I guess I'm a little rusty.

One highlight was a visit to Salem, the place where the famous Salem Witch Trials were held. One of my all-time favourite plays is THE CRUCIBLE by Arthur Miller. And it was awesome to visit the place where it all began. We visited the Witch Dungeon Museum where there was a short re-enactment of the trial from actual transcripts. It was really good. Below is a pic of the stage. The mannequins look a little cheesy but believe me, once the two actors took the stage, I was just so drawn into the scene.


Tonight, the coach driver brought us to Hamilton Park in New Jersey to take a night photo of the New York City skyline. I've been to New York City a few times, but never had a chance to take a proper night pic. Must say the city looks very beautiful at night. The tallest building in the pic with the green/red top is the famous Empire State Building.

Ok, I'll probably talk more about the trip when I get home. Am looking forward to laksa as usual! lolz.

June holidays... time to get busy!

Sorry for the lack of posts in the last week or so. No excuse, just plain lazy to post. lolz. Well, here's a bumper crop of reviews of some movies I've caught. Actually there's one more I watched but I don't think I'll bother putting up a review... NEXT... it's quite a silly movie with Nicholas Cage trying so hard to NOT act his age. Getting quite tired of him trying to be young. heh.

Anyway, I'm gonna be travelling over the next few weeks. I'm freelancing with a travel company and I'll be helping to lead two tours over the June holidays. The first one is to New York and Boston next week and the next one is to Japan sometime in the middle of the June holidays. Yep, the two countries I like best! It's been a while since I last led a tour... specifically, almost 6 years coz that's when I left Ken-Air and joined RI. I'm kinda looking forward to it, but as with all new experiences, there is some apprehension with leading a group again after so long.

Yeah, some of you are gonna say it sounds so lucky that I get to travel. Truth is, it's a mixed bag of feelings. While it's lucky to be able to travel to work, it's also quite a huge responsibility coz I've gotta take care of the group and make sure nothing goes too wrong. lolz. Of course, I won't deny that it will be fun to visit these places again, even if I won't be able to do my own things like when I travel on my own for leisure. Will probably be bringing my laptop, so I'll be able to blog while I'm away. Gonna miss the opening of Shrek... who knows, maybe I'll catch it in the US. heh.

Pirates of the Caribbean 3: At World's End

OK, I admit it, having a fictictious Singapore play a small role in a major blockbuster movie was a big kick in itself. It was fun to see Singapore portrayed as an irreverant pirates den, though I believe this might not be totally untruthful of Singapore's ancient past.

I didn't really expect much from POTC3. Frankly, I didn't think POTC2 was very good. I felt the story was getting too complicated for its own good. Well, I think POTC3 is a little better than 2 but the first movie is still the best.

Johnny Depp goes back to being a little more fun in this movie, not trying to be too serious like in POTC2. Of course, all eyes are on Chow Yun Fatt to see how he can carry his role in a Hollywood blockbuster. Well, here is a case where I thought Chow spoke too well. haha.. I know I shouldn't be subscribing to hollywood stereotypes, but to see an ancient chinese pirate speaking in almost perfect american english with little accent just feels wrong.

Story wise, it's also a little better with some cool ship battle scenes thrown in. The effects for the movie are pretty good. Quite awesome to see the sea waters swirling around.

I'm guessing this is one movie which will do well regardless of the reviews. So, go watch it and enjoy it. Just don't expect too much from it.

Blades of Glory

This is one heck of a funny movie.

I really enjoyed it coz it doesn't really pretend to be anything more than it really is... a simple campy look at the world of competitive ice-skating. Of course, it's totally politically incorrect as it plays up all the stereotypes of ice-skaters. Hence, expect scenes of effeminate guys and macho women. lolz.

There are some drop dead funny scenes. Some of the skating routines alone are worth the ticket price! Take my advice, don't be late for the movie. The first two routines which show the difference between the skating styles of the two leads is hilarious. Will Ferrell is pretty ok in the movie, he hasn't reached my irritation levels so far.

So, if you're looking for some good laughs, don't miss out on this. Probably one of the funnier movies in recent months.

Hula Girls

Last Week, I was invited to go for a special preview screening of HULA GIRLS by the Japan Tourist Board. I must admit that I wasn't too keen on going coz (1) there were some outstanding work which I was rushing and (2) with a title like HULA GIRLS, it doesn't exactly sound like a very interesting movie. I'm glad to say that in end, I was very wrong.

The movie is basically about a small mining city in 1965 Japan and how they struggled to come to terms with how their economy was dying and how they need to move on with the times when someone comes into town to start a Hawaiian tourist resort in the city. The movie boasts some really strong performances by the leads, especially the two girls who struggle to be more than what they were expected to be.... simple daughters of coal miners. Of course, there are the usual gags of how the girls from the city struggle with learning to dance and worse still, dancing in bikinis. lolz... But these were handled very well and never become campy.

The music is also really good. I've been looking for the CD since watching the movie but no luck yet. It's by this fella, Jake Shimabukuro. Anyone knows where to get his CD in Singapore?

HULA GIRLS is one of those shows I think will never last in the cinemas. It's due to be released on 31 May only at The Cathay and many people will probably just skip it. Well, if you are interested in a heartwarming story about people overcoming their traditions, don't miss out on this. I'm almost sure you won't regret it.

Check out the official site here.

More 8-bit pics

Heh, managed to do two more lego mosaic designs. The one on the left is Rockman. Anyone wanna guess who is the one on the right? Prize is a pat on the back!

New Lego Mosaic

The new Lego Mosaic was just released a couple of days ago in Singapore. It's basically a collection of lego 1x1 pieces which are arranged on a transparent 16x16 grid lego plate to form designs. Of course, the included designs are kinda kiddish as you can see below. Not too expensive, $29.90 for a large box and $14.90 for a small one.

I have some strange attraction to this 16x16 pixel art coz the old arcade/video games like Pacman and Mario were designed to fit a 16x16 grid. I think they call them 8-bit graphics. Anyway, I looked up some pics on the net and put together a blue pacman ghost and a pretty nice mario mushroom. Whaddya think?

Favourite Singapore Adverts

Was at Forum Galleria yesterday morning when I saw this poster for those Children Learning Centre. I'm a little curious why anyone would want to give their child a chance to excel in Hyperactivity, Clumsiness and Learning Disability.... lolz....

PURE TEMPTATION

OMG! OMG! OMG! Just look at this special edition Simpsons Movie Xbox360! I want to sell mine to get this new one!

Lucky me! - LUCKY YOU

On Monday, I was invited by Golden Village to go for a preview screening of Lucky You, a new movie starring Eric Bana (of Hulk fame) and Drew Barrymore (my favouritest actress).

As I did with my previous reviews on movies starring Drew Barrymore, I would like to warn you that I tend to be biased with any movie starring my dahling. lolz.

So, how was Lucky You? It was quite nice actually. Not as fun as MUSIC & LYRICS but it's quite watchable. It's basically a movie about playing Texas Poker (I think) and how a sweet innocent girl (Drew at her sweetest and innocenest) is able to change the cold logical heart of a professional gambler (Eric Bana).

Frankly, this movie is pretty by the book, so don't expect any twists and turns. I did get a simple lesson on Texas Poker and I think I at least understand how to play it a little. Heh. I'm sure the Las Vegas casinos must have invested in the film. I can imagine many non-gamblers thinking about trying it out after learning it from the movie.

This is the kind of movie you go to if you are a gambling addict or in the mood for a chick flick. For me, it's neither. I went coz it starred my dear drew. lolz. (i noe i sound like an idiot but I dun care).

So go watch it when it's released! Support Drew!

Spiderman 3

Was really looking forward to this movie. Actually, I was looking forward to the months of May, June and July. Other than Spiderman 3, there's Shrek 3, Pirates of the Carribean 3, Harry Potter 5 & Transformers, just to name a few! So Spiderman 3 kinda starts the entire summer movie craze.

With expectations running high, I guess you could say that it would be very hard for Spidey3 to meet them. And I think Spidey3 falls short in some areas but does meet up to the expected standards in others.

Marvel decided to give the fanboys everything. And nowadays, I am coming to the realization that more doesn't always mean better. In this case, I don't know how wise it was to have three villains in the story: Sandman, Venom & Green Goblin's son. While attempts were made to flesh out the backgrounds/characters, it was quite a rush job and you never really feel for the poor Sandman and his conflicts. Venom is supposed to be quite terrifying. But other than a few cheap shocks (you know, the sudden face grabs-jump out at you moments) and the snarly teeth pics, venom doesn't really do much more. And Green Goblin's son? Well, nothing new and interesting here. He puts on his father's costume and tries to kill Spidey for killing his dad.

The story also tries too hard to be dramatic. So much so that at times, it almost feels like watching a soap opera. It has too many coincidental moments. You know, spidey is happy, wants to propose, girl gets into bad luck, wants to tell spidey, spidey is overly excited, doesn't hear, girl gets upset, spidey gets bad news, girl comes over, spidey brushes her off, AWWWWW.... heartbreak. And the director/writer does this pretty often in this movie. So after a while, it just felt poorly directed.

OK, I'm not saying Spidey3 is a bad movie. Actually, despite the above, I still enjoyed the movie. I guess I just wished it was even better. I liked some of the action sequences. Pretty well choreographed. Effects were very good too. The scene where Sandman is born and how he tries to take his first step is very well done. (Unfortunately, after that, the effects crew decided to emulate the sand storms in Mummy Returns, so it got kinda cheesy). Venom also looked pretty good. There were some nice lighthearted moments in the movie. Peter Parker turning to the bad side (when he wore the black costume) was quite hilarious. But the thing is, it almost felt out of place coz it stared feeling very b-gradey at that point.

I think I liked Spidey 2 best. But it would be a tough fight between spidey 1 and 3. Spidey 1 had a sucky villain but it had the privilege of introducing spiderman to us. Spidey 3 had much much more action and 3 villains, but the whole movie didn't seem to gel as well.

Haha, but regardless of wat I say, I'm pretty sure half (if not all) of Singapore would probably go watch it. Have fun!

Daiso Rocks

I discovered Daiso a long time ago when I visited IMM a long time ago. Thought it had excellent variety for the $2 price tag. Of course, considering that in Japan, this would be like the local 'Hyaku-en shop' (or 100 yen shop) which converts to only S$1.35 nowadays, Daiso must be earning heaps thanks to the exchange rate!

Anyway, due to the Rhythm of Kyushu event, I've been visiting Daiso a little more, but it was only yesterday when I discovered they had these mini 130-piece puzzles. Quite nice quality for $2. I've been thinking of doing a puzzle of The Tower of Babel by Pieter Brueghel d. for a long time. Since this was only 2 bucks, heh, I thought why not. Took me about 15mins to finish this I think. Quite nice, no?

The Rhythm of Kyushu - Reflections

It's taken about 2 days and I can't say I've recovered but at least I'm functioning more normally. Lolz.

The Rhythm of Kyushu (RoK) has been a pretty interesting experience for me. I think the most significant thing for me is that it's the first time I've ever planned a public event. In the past, it has always been in fairly controlled conditions. I know who are the audience, where it'll be held, what time we are gonna do what, how everything is coming into place, etc, etc. This time, it's been almost the opposite. I don't know how many people will come (or even if people will come at all!), I had to go find a venue for it to be held, I was held ransom by the weather and I didn't noe how to do many of the things. And I think because of this, it's been fairly stressful (especially towards the end) but also very educational for me. And I think that's something I've craved coz one of the reasons why I left RI was to pick up new skills and learn new things.

It was interesting to learn how to arrange with contractors to put up canvas backdrops, exhibition stands, tie up with sponsors (who of course wanted their brand name to be advertised), design and print posters, and the list goes on and on. Another big difference was that in RI, I had an army of students to work on the project. I pretty much worked on RoK with a core team of .... 4 persons. So each person really had to do much more. But I'm glad it turned out well.

I think I'm personally proud of two things in particular: (1) the Taiko Drum Competition and (2) the exhibition.

It was really a godsend to find Namiko Sensei who worked with us to conduct the Taiko Drum workshops and Competition. I am very impressed with what the students were able to put up after about only 7 hours of workshop! And the crowds at the two group rounds was really quite good. I thought it was extrememly successful! Wouldn't mind organizing more of such competitions.

The exhibition was the other thing I was quite happy with. Although it might not seem like much, but I learned quite a bit in terms of using the graphics editing software and preparing stuff for printers. Also thought the poster boards turned out well. Must say that I am extremely thankful for one of the staff members for working on the small pics which went onto the boards. We had to review the boards via the phone until like 5am so that it could be sent to the printers in time! Lolz. Talk about stress!

Of course, it wasn't a perfect event and some things went wrong, but I think on the whole I definitely learnt quite a bit. It's my first time doing a public event (hopefully not the last....) and I think on the whole, it should be a pass grade. :D

So glad the event is over! Glad coz it's the culmination of over 3 mths of planning. And glad coz I think it went on quite well. Gonna sleep first. Will blog abt it another day.

Shiokz. BEDTIME!

American Idol - COP OUT!

I'm really busy with some work but I can't help but log in to rant that this week's result show is such a COP OUT!

They keep announcing through the night that tonite's elimination will be a shocker. So we watch and wait and wait and watch. What happens at the end? NO ONE GETS SENT HOME!??!

Votes can rolled over to next week and they add up the votes for two weeks.

That's such a cop out!!! I am really disappointed at such a lousy conclusion.

I hope someone in America sues American Idol for this. Come on... you make people spend time and money to vote to support their favourite, then at the end, say, hey, it doesn't matter?!! Another way of looking at it could be, possibly, Haley was lowest and supposed to go back. But they don't want to let her go, so they say combine two weeks of votes instead. Come on man... Haley's fans noe she is in bottom and might call like siao next week. Where got fair?

Dunno why I'm so upset by this. Maybe work too sianz rite now. heh. okok... enough ranting. Back to work.

But before that, one more time... AMERICAN IDOL IS SUCH A COP OUT!

The Rhythm of Kyushu!

It's almost here, so now I am gonna make some shameless advertising!

Sorry for the lack of updates the last few weeks. It's partly due to WoW, but it's also because the first major public event I am organizing is fast approaching!

Yepz, this Sunday, I'll actually be organizing a promotion fair for Kumamoto Prefectural Governement & Minamata City at Junction 8. You can see the poster below. It's been a really rough but enriching ride. Similar to the events I've organized in the past in RI but also very different coz of the scale and the target audience (this time being the public!).

The last two weeks has seen a build in the intensity of preparations. This week is pretty much when the proverbial s#!% hits the roof. :P. Quite normal I guess, since it's expected that there will be plenty of stuff to tie up as the event approaches. Two weeks ago, we started the Taiko Drum workshops and my arms were pretty much dead for the 3 days following the workshop. I don't think they've moved that much in a very long time. Last week saw the completion of the Japanese Calligraphy Competition.

It's quite fun getting busy again. Of course on one hand, there's this inertia after slacking for quite a while, but on the other hand, it's nice to feel the rush and anticipation of see an event coming together.

The event is this Sunday. There'll be the Taiko Drum finals (quite exciting I think) and other stuff happening. Take a look at the poster below. So, if you're free, come support me by dropping by Junction 8 from 12noon to 8pm... and oh yes, there's free Uzumaki ice cream too! (that's if you take part in some activities lar... nothing's really free you know. :P).

PC Frustrations Again

Had a horrible scare on Sunday evening.

I'd finally decided to get a new colour inkjet printer coz I needed to do colour prints for a project I'm handling. I'd been using my trusty Samsung laser printer for a couple of years coz I could do my colour prints in school previously.

Anyway, after some consideration, I went for the Canon Pixma IP4200. Nice little printer that isn't too expensive. Actually, I thought for the prints it produced, it was pretty reasonably priced. And what I liked were the separate ink tanks. So, I bought the printer and decided to rearrange my desk so that I could put the printer there as well. I happily unplugged all the connections from my CPU, cleaned up the table and wires and reconnected everything. Then I eagerly hit the power button on my CPU and..... nothing happened. SIANZ. I tried a couple of times, reconnected the cables, switched cables, etc, but the CPU refused to power up.

For those of you who have tinkered with your PCs, I think you know how frustrating it is when a PC dies. And troubleshooting is a painful and slow process coz a million things could have gone wrong. I remember once when I spent hours trying to get a router to work only to find that the only thing I did wrong was not upgrade the firmware. :S

So, yesterday (ie. Monday), I carried my PC to Sim Lim, found a little repair shop at the corner of the second floor and asked the repair guy desperately for help. After some poking around, he suggested that one obvious problem (which may or may not be the actual problem) is that I had a power supply which could not support my PC. Since I bought it 3 years ago, I had added RAM, a second harddisk and upgraded by graphics card. And my dell's power supply wasn't built to support the extra parts. So, this could be a possible problem. What to do? Change power supply lor. Ended up spending about 300 bucks for a new power supply. Tested everything, seemed to work. So I happily brought my PC home.

Bet you can guess what happened next.

I plugged in everything and happily hit the power switch. The PC powered up, but nothing came out on the screen. SIGH. I opened the casing, checked every connection I could see in case I had shaken it loose during the transportation. Then I closed it and hit the power switch. Nothing again. I opened the casing AGAIN. Hit the power switch. It worked! Yay! So I powered down. Closed the casing. Powered up. Nothing came on the screen and to make matters worse, the CPU's fan started going haywire! I was really gonna cry. This went on a couple more times, then finally, when I tried the power button, my PC started up properly.

I have no idea what went wrong and how the problem was solved.

My pc has been working find since yesterday and I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it'll stay fine for a long time. Really not looking to buy a new motherboard/CPU anytime soon coz I'm pretty satisfied with the processing power of my current PC.

PCs. Sigh.

My new printer and my old power supply.

Irritations - Justifying Ministers' Pay Increase

Actually I had another irritation which I'd wanted to blog about for a while but I decided to leave that for another day and do this one since it's the hot topic right now in good ole SG.

Personally, I have no qualms about the need to pay for good people. I mean, after all, we are supposed to be a meritocratic society right? So basically, if you are an excellent worker, you deserve to be paid more based upon your merit. The thing that irritates me through the whole scenario is how the Ministers are the ones who are trying to justify their pay increase. Heh. It's like I'm the paymaster, and now I'm the one who wants to propose to myself that I want a pay increase. Cheez.

Go to almost any worker and ask if he/she is being paid enough for what they are doing and if they would like a pay increase. I'm pretty sure most, if not all, will say they deserve/want more money. Now, do you think their bosses will say 'Sure! You certainly deserve as much as your friend is being paid in ABC company. Since you suggested it, you'll get it!'. I don't think so. Do you think there will ever be a case where you ask the person if he/she is being paid enough and the reply is 'Oh no... I think I'm overpaid. Please pay me less!'.

So in a similar way, you have these ministers trying so hard to justify why they should get a pay increase. I mean, come on lar, will they ever come out and say that they are being paid too much? And i guess that's whats irritating me. I mean, if you're gonna implement a pay increase, give it an explanation (not a long drawn publicity blah) and do it lar.

The interesting question is, who can say no?

If the paymasters are the one implementing their own pay increase, they obviously won't say no to themselves. So... who says no? Of course, in the bigger picture, the citizens are the ones who 'employ' the ministers. So I guess, the only way we can ever say no is through the next elections. Since that is a couple of years away... our ministers would have pretty decent savings after the pay increases are implemented before the next elections.

Anyway, like I said, I'm not exactly against the pay increase. I admit I haven't thought much abou the ramnifications of the whole thing. The thing that irritates me is all the justifications being made right now. Yawn.

Sunshine

Ah.. it's so nice to have a decent sci-fi flick. Sunshine is a deceptively cheerful name for a fairly dark movie. Basic storyline: ship departs earth and travels to the sun in order to reignite it. Ship runs into an earlier ship which went MIA on the previous mission. Creepy things happen to ship. Bloodfest. Ship completes/fails her mission (heh, I wouldn't want to spoil your fun by telling you the ending.

The director, Danny Boyle, did other dark sci-fi-ish movies like '28 Days Later'. He handles this movie pretty well. Although it's not blockbuster material, the acting is credible and the sci-fi effects dun suck. I liked the design of the space craft and the huge sunshield thingy really feels... huge. Somewhere after abotu 2/3s into the movie, it starts to become somewhat of a survival flick. You know, the run-for-your-lives-type of movie. Of course, that's when you start guessing who is gonna live/die next.

Of course, being chinese, it's only natural to pay attention to the two asian actors in the movie. First is Hiroyuki Sanada acting as the Captain, Kaneda and second is the trying-so-hard-to-make-it-in-Hollywood Michelle Yeoh as a botanist. heh. yeah, a botanist. The two of them do a pretty good job. Hiroyuki does well as the leader of the team and Michelle Yeoh doesn't do any kicking or punching in this movie.

One way to have even more fun through this movie is to start by discussing with your friend who in the movie will live or die. Make a friendly bet and you might get a free dinner or lose one. heh.

I liked this movie and would consider going for it again. Give it a try if you are looking for a decent sci-fi movie (but dun expect big space battles and weird aliens with bulging eyes).

The Number 23

Today, I used my VIP card for the first time! I kinda felt like a VIP as I handed my card over to the ticketing staff but that feeling quickly disappeared coz the girl appeared to not know what to do when my card appeared to get rejected by the computer. But oh well, they sorted it out and I was happily issued my first (of many) free ticket!

The Number 23 is a show that kinda tries too hard. When I saw the beginning credits, I saw that it was a Joel Schumacher movie - the same guy who did stuff like the previous Batman movies and Phone Booth (which wasn't too bad actually) - so I thought the show might not be too bad.

Jim Carey tries his hand at another serious role and this time, I think it was fairly believable. Of course I half expected some weird contorted facial expressions from him but I was pleasantly disappointed coz it never came.

The story revolved around the number 23 and how there are people in the world who are 'cursed' by the number. Everything in their lives (like Jim Carey's character) is ruled by the number 23. Like how he is born on February the 3rd (2-3) and how the letters in his name add up to the number 23 after doing some division, etc. It's an interesting take on the paranoia of these people but I thought the director just doesn't really exploit this enough. I never really felt sorry for the character and at times, felt kinda bored.

This was quite a ho-hum movie which I think could have been a pretty manic ride if the subject matter was handled with more intensity. Here, it ends up more like a thriller as Jim Carey tries to solve a murder which seems to be connected to the number 23.


An interesting bit of info... look at the ticket stub. I was in seat 18 in cinema 5.... 18+5=.....

I watched the 2.40pm show on 3 April 2007. 2 + 4 + 3 + 4 + 2 + 7 + 1 (1 person.. me) = ....23!!!

AAARRRRGGGHHHH!!! (:P)