Listerine & Couples

*Skip to % for music stuff, and @ for the part about couples*

Went out for dinner yesterday, despite it drizzling a bit. But it was fine since the rain stopped. Wouldn't have gone out if I didn't run out of cup noodles.
One stereotypical otaku/hard core gamer characteristic would be locking oneself in the room void of human contact eating cup noodles. I sometimes wonder what's the difference of that and being an art student (can't use the term artist yet... for obvious reasons).

So went to my usual haunt: Min Tien. Some places you can't go alone to eat... for some reason, places like Chola Spice and Face To Face. McD's fine cause they have those loners seats that face Sunway Lagoon. It's as if looking at people enjoying themselves in a water park will help you escape the fact that you're having a meal in McD ALL ALONE. So anyway I ate in Min Tien, ordered my food, finished and left without waiting for my drink cause it was taking so long to arrive.

%
Then went to check out CDs. Spotted Weezer's Raditude, already listened to it, quite some good tracks on it. If You're Wondering If I Want You To (I Want You To) is pretty darn catchy. Music video's funny too. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_A7OruAFESw

Saw Snow Patrol's first compilation album too. There's only one new song on the album. Can't remember the name, cause it didn't strike me as a good song. The singing sounds a lot like the previous songs, just that the music is slightly different - a bit more techno/electronica influence... Snow Patrol is declining... noooo...... Used to listen to nothing but Snow Patrol back in high school days.

Also saw Train's new album Save Me, San Francisco. Checked it out, and it seemed pretty decent. Folky, and soul influence. Hel Soul Sister is quite interesting incorporating a Ukelele. Has that reggae downbeat strumming just like Jason Mraz's extremely overplayed I'm Yours.

Can't seem to find Hujan's latest album Mencari Konklusi. Noticed that they have more incorporated a bit of electronica. Not an album that beats their previous track record, but still all in all a good album. I remember I saw their MV for Mencari Konklusi on an Channel V special. Quality was pretty good, some simple young-couple-eloping storytelling, plus the band in playing in a train.

I got Jack Johnson's Life Album: Jack Johnson En Concert few weeks back. Really awesome stuff, it's refreshing to listen to familiar songs in a different rendition. Realised I knew most of the lyrics of the songs. I was... still am a hard core Jack Johnson fan. I remember among the first few songs that I learnt to play on the bass were Jack Johnson songs - the first being Flake.

Oh BTW the church was broken into and the thieves took off with the bass and electric guitar, and their amps too. Bummer, was gonna highjack the bass back for the holidays. Mess around with it a bit, get fingering right and possibly learn that Flea Tutorial video I downloaded. But alas I guess I have to settle for just the acoustic guitar.

Right super long side track.

So off to restock on cup noodles, and then on the way back I got Listerine - bad breath problem kindly pointed out by my sis and mom.

@
On the way back home, I come to this zebra crossing I had to cross in order to get to the residential area where I stay. Two pairs of couples were already there... Yeah so there were 5 people waiting at for the traffic light to turn red.

I was the only guy.

What went through my head at that time was a mixture of amusement, disappointment, the what-has-the-world-come-to feel, self-assurance, and self pity. While they crossed the road holding hands, I held my umbrella and a plastic bag of cup noodles and another one with listerine.

C'est la vie, my life rocks.

Degenerating language music

I had to give a short presentation today. This is the 3rd presentation (I think) we had to give this semester. Illustration major doesn’t require much presenting, just a lot of painting and drawing. So naturally my presentation skills has diminished, but I’m really surprised by the degree of the degeneration. It’s not as smooth as it was let’s say: last semester. Yes we had to give one presentation last semester and I could tell that I was more fluent than I am now. One vital reason to this degradation lies in the fact that I speak mandarin most of the time now – amongst classmates, cause most of them are more fluent in mandarin; even lecturers.

I realize that it is unfair for those students who can’t or don’t speak mandarin cause – yes classes are conducted in English, it is expected from a college which has reached significant international recognition. Alright sorry that’s an understatement, winning awards left, right and middle and having graduates working for LUCAS FILMS, and also having twinning programs with overseas colleges IS INTERNATIONAL RECOGNITION, oh and having Ubisoft come in to hire people.

So these students who can’t speak or understand mandarin come to this college to find lecturers who have a little difficulty communicating in English. And let’s face it: in an art college, relationship between a lecturers and students is different. It is not so dictatorship-like; it’s more like senior artist giving advice to junior artist. So I realise some lecturers are more liberal in giving advices if they communicate in mandarin rather than in English.

By the way Chinese is the race. Mandarin is the language.
Just like Jew is the race and Hebrew is the language.
So we do not speak Chinese.

But still how much does language have to do with communication skill?



It must be really hard for bands to beat their debut albums, whenever bands come up with their new albums, we usually will start to compare them to their debuts. And most of the time we’ll say their debuts were better. And somehow their debuts will be more memorable. But really why do we say that? Is it because we’ve grown tired of their sound? Or have they worn themselves out? Or is it because their earlier songs were simple and now their just trying too hard?

I read on wikipedia that shoegaze, post-rock, experimental music, indie bands with funny names have their roots in psychedelic rock or just psychedelia in general. Interesting.

I read somewhere that post-rock is a dirty word. Honestly? I agree. I follow this blog called www.thesirenssound.com regularly. They “promote” all these unheard off and underground post-rock bands. At first it was good, and then they all started to sound the same. Post-rock is overrated, to be labeled as post-rock is easy but to make significant progress - I think a post-rock band needs to develop a sound that is unique to them. A sound where when someone listens to it they can tell them apart instantaneously.

I think indie is overated too, there are indie bands popping up everywhere like mushroom after the rain. The rain being the internet and the mushroom of course the bands.

But still indie and post-rock (especially post-rock) is highly experimental. I remember my design class lecturer telling us that experimental stuff has a high chance of failing. I’m not sure if he said sucking, but yes I couldn’t agree more. Yet I suppose through all that motherload of experimenting when you succeed, you really soar.

Funny Phone Tales

My handphone rang and “Pa” (dad) appeared on my screen. I haven’t removed his number from my phone yet. I was a bit spooked yet, I knew it was just my mom using my dad’s phone. Still I was a bit hesitant when I answered the phone, hoping really hard that it wasn’t a man’s voice on the other end. It just so happened that my college was having an early Halloween Celebration. So the mood was set, even though I was actually in my friend’s car when I picked up the phone. Plus I don't celebrate Halloween and we weren't on our way to the "party" in fact going the opposite direction. Anyway it was my mom. She said that my sis made her use my dad’s phone to call me just to see my reaction. She couldn’t stop laughing. As for the fate of my dad’s phone, now my sis is probably using it. His line was a prepaid line, so we just left it as it was.

Monday morning(2nd Nov 2009), while I was on the train, on my way back to Sunway, I got this reminder message from Celcom part of the message was: “Your validity will expire in 5 days”. I had a really good laugh.

Socks

It became a weekend routine – going through the socks in our shoes cabinets on Sunday mornings to see which socks was mine and which was my dad’s. I continued to do this even after my dad was diagnosed with cancer and didn’t need to wear his socks as frequent as he did, but he still wore them on those Sunday mornings when he was well enough to go to church. I continued to do that even towards the end when his feet started to swell and he couldn’t even walk without help. Now I won’t need to sort out the socks, ‘cause where he is now he won’t be needing socks, or even shoes to protect his feet for that matter. Hurt, pain, sorrow, doesn’t exist there.

I remember watching Big Fish and thinking to myself that: this is how dad’s funeral is gonna be like (minus the weird characters and tall tales being uncovered though). I might not have known him well; I might not have known the details of his life. But looking at all the people that came to see him off: there were relatives, old classmates, his teachers, his fellow teachers, his students and of course people from different churches – every one of these people constituted one part of his life, and in a sort of abstract way of looking at it - I was looking at his life. Ironic isn’t it? Being able to “see” his life only at his funeral.

When I was young (around 5-7) I remember dragging my feet up at 6am, brushing my teeth, then gathering in my parents bedroom to read the Bible together. Back then we were young (me and my sis), it was the beginning few years of our lives. 12 years down the road, there we were again as a family, reading the Bible and praying for my dad. But this time it was near the end of his, but we were still praying and hoping that it wasn’t. I wasn’t there when my dad passed away. My mom said she was glad I wasn’t. It wasn’t a pleasant scene and I guess a scene where it was not so easy to forget. I guess that's why I didn't cry as much.

My dad was a righteous man – no cutting corners, no BS, no smoking, no drinking, no swearing. But he wasn’t the type to impose things on you, he wasn’t a perfectionist. He’s not the anal policeman who insists that you follow the law. He just did it, without saying much and it made you think “why the heck not?”

My dad’s not the talkative type, I guess I inherited that part too. So it’s hard to talk to him, harder than my mom that’s for sure. Can’t joke with him cause he might not get it. But still I could always go to him for help.


I’ll never fit my dad’s shoes. He’s a size 9, I’m 10 to 11-ish.

Stand Up Comedians: the Speakers of the Ugly Truth

I had this question thrown to me by this friend of mine: Tim do you follow or watch any comedians?

I was taken aback by this question, I just didn't know how to answer this question. It's a first time that I've ever been thrown such a question . I mean the way she said it made them sound like a TV series or an artist/ band or an informative blog or website of sort. Or worst still a preacher or motivational speaker. But somehow that's the way they are don't you think? What they say is first of all hilarious, but still they are the truth, or the ugly truth. People go to their shows to get tickled and to listen to "The Truth". It's like a cult you know? "Oh I believe in the doctrine of George Carlin."

Anyway she was telling me to watch Eddie Izzard. Why? 'Cause he's funny and he's a Brit. Yeah sure he's funny but I guess it's that accent that is the real selling point. Makes a normal sentence sound funnier, add in foreign adjectives like bloody, bollocks or bugger it (wow 3B's) and it's an instance win formula. I don't think people watch him cause he's a cross dresser, although I can't rule that out, I guess it's just a side bonus then. Look at the Beatles: they produced great music, had funny hairdo and spoke funny. And look at where that got them? They're legendary. Heck since we're at it: let's throw in The Rolling Stones, The Who, Jimi Hendrix Experience, Queen, Radiohead, Oasis, Coldplay.

Rock Band: The Beatles, looks awesome. I won't be getting a PS3 or any of this generation gaming consoles, so I'll just have to make do with drooling at gameplay videos.

Alright I'm out of things to blog about. Check this out:



Going to bum about watching Eddie Izzard and.. stuff. Then tomorrow is a full day of working on the acrylic painting.

Oh and finally: I salute Eddie Izzard for running around on stage while dishing out jokes in heels.

Hullo all.

This is my 3rd blog. I think I had one on myspace, one on friendster (both short-lived) and I guess the journal on deviant art shouldn't count cause it won't appear on search engines and stuff, on top of that people go to deviant to see art and not read some guy's journal. BTW I canceled my friendster account. myspace - can't remember password and ID for that matter.

As this is my first blog on this site I feel pressured to say something smart ................................................. forget it no idea.

Just posting this here to fill up the empty space, and also to see how the layout looks like.