Truths of Old

I just swept into (okay, chugged. slowly, on a Greyhound bus) SF this evening.

First impressions.

Holy momma, this place is BIG.
And pretty.

And those were just the suburbs.

And then there were more suburbs. They're all set on hills, and they're brightly coloured and lovely to look at. Even the slummy bits are pretty.

After an eternity of suburbs the city proper began. And that is where I am now. It's not huge - probably slightly larger than Singapore's city centre, but it sure is tall, and... pretty. And everything's set on crazy slopes that could probably kill you if you missed your footing. Okay I exagerrate. You'd probably roll around for a bit before getting run over at a T junction by a police car.

Anyhow this place is amazing. Except for the fact that there is only ONE internet cafe in the entire city (growl) which I've spent all evening looking for. Okay, so I took a small detour to have some very good sukiyaki for dinner, and then I...

cough.

anyway.

LA is so not a place I would ever choose to live. But SF is without a doubt one of the bestest places (next to Sydney) that I have seen so far. Course I've only been here half an evening thus far... it's love at first sight I suppose.

LA memoirs - I stepped out of the train at Universal city, took one look at the shiny, forboding, ugly ugly ugly buildings and got back onto the train.

Managed to find my way to Santa Monica for a bit of sun (wow those beaches go on forever) contemplated wandering up to Malibu... but didn't (sorry Andrew) since time was ticking on, and wandered down the Santa Monica pier instead (wow. big. pathetic rides, but nice) then walked down the infinite beach to Venice, and Muscle beach, and marvelled at all the perfect brunettes (where have all the blondes gone??? whine) showing all their perfect curves on the beach. And there was some women there too. heh.

Man these people must make a life out of shaping themselves, men and women both. They have eight-packs. Women too.

I then wandered the canal network at Venice and was really disappointed. I mean sure they were pretty, but there was so little of them to see.

Today was spent on a greyhound bus marvelling at the terrain we crossed... so many different types. Dominated by rolling stonecut hills and valleys and gorges and gauches... i'm sure they don't compare to the grand canyon but they're beautiful nonetheless. And flying by high up on the cliffs in my bus, I could even make out (me, amateur geologist) all the "fresher" areas where the glaciers had carved out from the stone, over the ages.

Amazing.

And now I need to run. SF may be beautiful, but she sure goes to bed early. :( That's how it always is with women, innit. heh heh heh.

Six dollars for an hour's worth of internet. Sputter. I wouldn't pay more than a pound back home, if I could help it.

Oh yeah. It's not my home anymore. doh.

Anyway, perhaps I should have been more explicit in my last post.

Hollywood is not a dump. It's clean, and the buildings have fresh coats of paint. Well most of them, anyhow. It has the edge on London there.

The thing about Hollywood, and Sunset blvd which I find incredibly depressing is summed up neatly in the visitors guide to California which I cleverly purchased before flying here (yay me) - "faded glory". I can't put a finger on it, but the whole of Hollywood, despite being a huge tourist trap and all is... tired. Perhaps it's just all the expectations I built up in my head of somewhere brand new, and teeming with vivacity and life. And so it should feel, what with the vociferous (raucous) Lucille Balle impersonators and the very credible Batman wandering the street. (Zorro with his plastic rapiers was a tad tacky, and the strange black-bedecked kid (only his eyes showing) pretending to be a ninja was downright sad. I had an impulse to wrench the wooden swords out of his hands and give him a right drubbing just to show him how it was really done, but there were too many coppers around bugger it. Yet, despite all the... actors wandering the streets, the place feels distinctly like a has-been. Still, I shoulda got a room here dammit. Safety first. Back in Alvadaro... well actually for some reason I'm not sticking out that much. People keep trying to talk to me in spanish. I suppose with my new and still darkening tan I have a... ? slight mexican look to me? Shrug.

The endless walk of fame doesn't really... work for me. It's just a lot of names stuck in a black ? marble sidewalk with white flecks in it. Maybe there's too many of them, or maybe it's not done quite right... maybe there should be gold-leaf on the ground, and lining the buildings... heh. Or maybe it's because it's the height of summer and all the palm trees are wilting and burnt to a crisp. Somehow it reminds me of a woman slightly past her prime, wearing a faded dress that must have been quite glamourous once. And that, I suppose, is truly the story of Hollywood.

Reading the "historical stop" signs put up by the municipality (first bank in hollywood! first printing press! First public toilet!!!) I can't help but laugh at their choices of words... words like... glamourous facade... imposing... extravagent... impressive... art deco etc. To me, they all look "nice." I've probably gone all posh, mebbe I've just lived in london for too long... but Hollywood is so NOT the place to go to appreciate architecture. Mind you, it is quaint enough. lots of stuff that looks like it came off a film-noir set, and paramount pictures has some very impressive stuff somewhere in their studio, judging from the roofs I can make out peeking over the heavy security walls they've erected all around their massive twenty acre compound.

So right now I've got an hour to kill before my trip to disneyland (yay me) and having walked all of hollywood and most of the sunset blvd I've decided to plop myself down in front of a computer and ramble. That and the rather unpleasant mist that's draped over most of LA this morning - you know how when it's just chilly enough to make you want to put on a jacket, but just warm enough to make you regret it almost immediately when you break into a gentle sweat? Yeah, that's LA today.

The trolley tour of Hollywood was a bit of an eye-opener, the second the driver swerved off the main street into residential areas to give us dang tourists a chance at a decent shot of the Hollywood Sign. A little bit of peace away from the madding crowd. They were nice enough little houses, neat and clean (and apparently very expensive) and some of the houses I really fancied seeing close up were set high on the hillside, probably cost a mini fortune, and were extremely off limits to the public.

One thing that's struck me about the board that governs LA is that they have no real concept of capitalising on tourists. I suppose the celebrity residents must put up a fair fight against intrusions into their privacy, but in another country that sign would be accessible (Although extremely secure, with handrails, electrified fences, and snipers poised to take out would-be jumpers, starlets or otherwise), and there would be trains to beverly hills, and the beaches at Malibu and Santa Monica. Increased commuter transport would make for bigger revenues, and more teeming waterfronts. I suppose that's the reason they don't do it.

Bus services are impossible to fathom, for the simple reason that they all go along the same roads but stop at different points. What's with that?? Why even have a different bus number if the only difference is which stops the bus makes. Why not just have a single bus that stops at all the stops, running more frequently? Probably something to do with journey time.

I forgot to mention the boston leg of my trip, which was fabulous. Lobster appears to be the new wheat in Boston, and I must say it was extremely enjoyable. Boston was also filled with roadside history... the sort you wander by and wonder about, and if you're really feeling rich (ie not skint like me) you ask someone, or buy a guide and learn all about it. I hate museums for the simple reason that it's all cooped in and stuffy, but I suppose the truth is that I quite enjoy history. And scenary. Boston was very much the place for that, strange as it sounds. During my two days of wandering on foot I covered pretty much all of it except the north-west side where Mass Gen (and not much else) was. Didn't really feel inclined to mix work with pleasure. Places visited (quickly fading from mind now) were :

1) freedom trail (duh) including a view of the USS constitution (no real interest in stepping aboard) and some stupid WW2 destroyer moored at the docks. Apparently once the flagship of the US navy. Hate to say this but the HMS wossname moored on the thames is a helluva lot bigger and more heavily armed. Belfast I think it was.
2) southside - chinatown ($2.99 noodles, priced at $3.99 and increasing to a still very credible $4.20 after tax, and absolutely scrumptious), floating children's hospital (couldn't help myself), the site of the tea party ship (now conspicuously missing) where ? Bush's motorcade passed and completely ruined my pedestrian experience (I'm sorry sir, you cannot pass - instant images of Gandalf dressed as a traffic cop. Then, because i didn't comply the microsecond he said it - BACK OFF SIR. STEP BACK. Geez louise, I need some time for the thoughts to get from my brain to my legs okay??) And some chinese ghetto village... bugger it the name escapes me at the moment... Tung Fung village? Tung Lao? Something like that. Very quaint and quite nice really, in an oppressed, underpriviledged kind of way.
3) central - Boston common (watched some guy either teaching his girlfriend how to fence poorly with a baseball bat, or how to use a baseball bat as a... baseball bat... badly) and the memorial park immediately adjacent to that. Nice.
4) West side. Err. Buildings. More buildings. Borders!! (chai yum. Same as Borders chai anywhere in the world. My five minutes of heaven) Yet more buildings. En route to the North side there's a few extremely nice open-air mall thingummies teeming with very good buskers and restaurants, a cheers! bar thingie (franchised?) and.. lotsa stuff. Got quizzed by someone in Mcdonald's if I was from the UK - that was impressive, all I'd said was "thanks" when he held a door for me. I mean, how the hell do you pick up an accent from a single word??
5) North side - Little (big) Italy, authentic wine shops. Moscato Asti on sale!! Fantastic little restaurants scattered every two feet. Food, food and more food, and Italiano waitors scattered all through it looking suspiciously like characters from The Godfather.
6) More North side - by the waterfront there's a nice little skating rink overlooking the water which I would have killed to skate in, except that it was summer and not in service. Tennis courts by the water, nice.
And that was pretty much it for me.

I'll skip the bits K and his wifey brought me to see (Salem, gimmicky witch tourist- trap country. quaint enough, I guess. Kinda cute. And some of the T shirt slogans were hilarious... but slip my mind now as well. Damn BSE) and "fine dining" at the numero uno restaurant in Boston, which... well I suppose was good enough. I'd give it a rating of rather good back hom... err back in London.

Tomorrow's my last day in LA. Torn between a stroll down malibu / santa monica / venice (yeah andrew, was already considering that) and going to universal studios, which according to T, I have to go to. tough call.

Los Angeles is A DUMP. so is hollywood, and sunset blvd isn't much better.

thanks to the evils of internet pricing, i have a total of 3 min more to complete this post.

am most disappointed with public transport in LA, or lack thereof, and also with the seedy budget digs i have secured myself, remind me not to get back after dark.

otherwise am enjoying USA, and my early wonders in Boston how people could possibly finish 1.3 L big gulps are being rapidly answered.

more later when i rustle up the cash to pay for insanely expensive internet cafes.

Starts today.

I'm leaving, on a jet plane, don't know when I'll be back again.

Hello, Boston, SF, LA and then Singapore, for the indefinite future.
Packing all my stuff last night for possibly the last time, I felt : afraid. It's a strange feeling, rising from your gut into your throat.

I didn't finish packing it all up - one day I will return, possibly to put everything into DHL boxes and arrange a viewing of my flat.

For now, it all starts with one short trip to Heathrow.

I hope to God this isn't the last time I ever write in here either.

If it is, well, the smell of fear and strawberries.
Same old, same old.

Fate conspires against us in the strangest ways.
I've just discovered the most disturbing things about the Holy City, and the Holy Father.

and I'm not talking about the vatican, or the pope.

Remind me... sigh. Nevermind.

*****
I do this thing whenever I walk on the sidewalk (or, as they call it here, the pavement. Never got used to that one) - I put each foot into the centre of each paving stone. I don't have to so I know I'm not completely mental yet.
And I'm not always conscious that I'm doing it each time.
It brings me back to a night once upon a very long time ago now - dappled shadows cast by treeleaves making intricate shifting, speckled patterns on the ground by soft orange lamplight; the faint sounds of a fountain and the scent of humidity to our left. The air heavy in anticipation, tinged with the sweetness of summer. Foot in flagstone, foot in flagstone, as we matched stride to stride. A presence out the corner of my eye, and a warmth by my shoulder.

A question.
Silence.

Foot in flagstone.

This is a public post of an email exchange I've recently had.

It isn't intended to make the writers feel bad in any way, but simply to be an assurance to me... to assauge my paranoia.

I forgot to say this in the email, but thanks for asking for permission first.

*****
On Mon, 20 Sep 2004 23:59:20 +0800, wrote:

> Hello,
>
> We are NUS students from the Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences and are currently doing a research paper on blogging in Singapore. We came across your blog through a random search and was wondering if we could quote or use references from your blog entries, especially this particular entry: http://re-minisce.blogspot.com/2004/07/continental-drift.html
>
> We are looking for how Singapore youths, in their blogs, offer an alternative opinion rather than the standard newspaper reports.
>
> We would really appreciate your help and swift response. :)
>
> (names removed)

*********

(From me)

hello,

i'm sorry but

1) I'm too old to be a youth

and

2) I'm averse to any form of exposure.

please do NOT quote my blog or reference it in any form of written publication.

there are various reasons for this, some of which are extremely personal to myself, and some involve another person. I hope you understand.

many thanks.

*******
Once again, thanks in advance for not quoting me in your paper. I wish you both all the best in your research.

# posted by Re-minisce @ 4:09 am

Thus speaks a brave man.

I envy his courage.

Me, I'll just go have a think about Stars and Moon, the story. After I go to the gym, and clean my flat - gotta be practical about these things, you know. It's in my blood.

Now this is pretty much the last thing I thought I'd ever write about. But I seem to be getting deeper and deeper embroiled in religion. Me... ordinary joe, with the irreverent and very often blasphemous mouth. :|

Sasky wrote this comment recently : "There is a difference between the Catholic Church and the Roman Catholic church. And the difference. Techinically, the Catholic church is the grouping of christianity. Roman catholicism, is actually where they believe that pp have to pray through the saints, and the virgin mary. Christians (all other protestant denominations) do not share the same beliefs, because it has to do with the signifiance of the Huge curtain at the Holy of Holies, being rent into two when Jesus died on the cross, symbolising that with Jesus's death, we no longer have to go through someone else, to bring our prayers. (Previously, the holy of holies was only admissable by sanctified priests.)

Therefore, the crucifying of Jesus on the cross, bridged the gap between God and man. hence why in Christianity, you will notice that there are no cruxifixes. Cos it is believved that Jesus died and rose again. Why should he still be on a cross, when he is alive and risen. The cross in itself, is a reminder of him being cruxified. Which is enough."

And I can respect what she's saying, because I used to think the same things about Roman Catholics. (I was Anglican once...)

I too once believed that Catholics (lay use, catholic = roman catholic) prayed to the saints, and to Mary, and not to God. It all seemed very much like idolatry to me. I thought God was some distant figure to Catholics that you had to cross countless tiers of sub-administrators before being granted an audience with. Sorta like opening a bank account in the UK as a foreigner, only proabably just a bit easier.

But after attending a few Anglican high-church sessions, and then a few Catholic masses, I was puzzled. Almost all the prayers during mass are addressed to God, and to Jesus. The illusion of compulsory intervention by a Saint or by Mother Mary wasn't present at all.

I read around the topic a little to try to understand more - since I hate not understanding stuff (whether or not I remember is a whole different kettle of fish) and I found stuff very much like this and this which made things fall into context.

A short excerpt from one of the above websites : "Having others praying for us thus is a good thing, not something to be despised or set aside. Of course, we should pray directly to Christ with every pressing need we have (cf. John 14:13–14). That’s something the Catholic Church strongly encourages. In fact, the prayers of the Mass, the central act of Catholic worship, are directed to God and Jesus, not the saints. But this does not mean that we should not also ask our fellow Christians, including those in heaven, to pray with us."

It also explains why a slightly crumbly Catholic prayer-guide once owned by my father recommends simple prayers like this one to Jesus : "Oh my Lord, I give thee my heart, grant me the Grace to pass this day in Thy holy love, and without offending Thee" - no saint there either.

There is no decree in Roman Catholicism against praying directly to God, or to Jesus Christ. There is instead an option of praying "to" a saint, to ask him to intercede on your behalf to God, ie to pray with and for you, to God. This sort of makes sense to me...

"Therefore confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man has great power in its effects." (James 5:16)

...but I'm not the type of person who would even ask another living person to pray for me, or with me. (It's just me...) And so I don't really visit the shrines to various Patron Saints after mass, like many other Catholics do. It's probably part of my Anglican heritage.

I think the fundamental difference today between the Catholic and protestant churches is that the former believe in a church of the living - and the dead, whereas the protestants believe in a church on this world, only.

Many of the misconceptions we harbour today about the Catholic church stem from ignorance, and also I suspect, partly from deliberate misinformation amongst certain protestants. Many of the "justifications" for the differences between the churches stem from attempts to rationalise a divide more political and social than theological. (although justifications at the time were very much theological)

Regarding the word "Catholic" - from www.transporter.com :

Christ left the adoption of a name for His Church to those whom he commissioned to teach all nations. Christ called the spiritual society He established, "My Church" (Mt. xvi, 18), "the Church" (Mt. xviii, 17). In order to have a distinction between the Church and the Synagogue and to have a distinguishing name from those embracing Judaic and Gnostic errors we find St. Ignatius (50-107 A.D.) using the Greek word "Katholicos" (universal) to describe the universality of the Church established by Christ. St. Ignatius was appointed Bishop of Antioch by St. Peter, the Bishop of Rome. It is in his writtings that we find the word Catholic used for the first time. St. Augustine, when speaking about the Church of Christ, calls it the Catholic Church 240 times in his writings.

The thing is, while Catholics repeat the Apostle's creed ("I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting.") in faith, and encompass the Universal church of Christians as well - Christians, when they employ the term Universal church, or "catholic" in it's universal guise -- more often than not don't include the Roman Catholic church in this group.

(I've been there... I do sort of know what I'm talking about.)

I was moved once or twice at St Andrews Christmas services when they actually took the trouble to include churches of all denominations including Roman Catholicism in their prayers. And it seems almost taken for granted now when I attend mass that prayers for the Catholic church - and quite often they use the term "Christians" - include all Christians.

From my understanding of things, the beginnings of the protestant church stemmed not so much from differences in the Word - because it was still the same bible at the time, previous to the removal of select books from the bible by the Reformers, because they did not fit with their opinions about what Christianity should be - but from the perceived (and quite probably, real) corruption which had permeated the church, as detailed in the following :

catholic encyclopaedia. rather biased against protestants

relatively neutral site, which details Martin Luther's original 95 theses of reformation)

historical account, predating the reformation

I find it... interesting that Martin Luther believed so strongly in the fallibility of his own church (he was an Augustine monk and professor of philosophy) that he was excommunicated from his own church for refusing to recant his beliefs in "the doctrine of justification by divine grace through faith" (alone).

Apparently where an entire church was fallible, a single man was infallible.

I just can't help but wonder if surely there was... a better way of doing things than to fracture the church, for the sake of unconventional beliefs?

One of the theses refuse to acknowledge the pope's role in absolution (and by extension all priests. I suspect he was being dramatic when he named the pope in that thesis) - "6. The pope himself cannot remit guilt, but only declare and confirm that it has been remitted by God; or, at most, he can remit it in cases reserved to his discretion. Except for these cases, the guilt remains untouched."

Yet : "He breathed upon His disciples saying, 'Receive ye the Holy Ghost. Whose sins you shall forgive, they are forgiven them, and whose sins you shall retain, they are retained" (John 20:21-23)

Jesus bestowed upon his disciples the power to absolve sin (via the Holy Ghost) according to the scripture common to all churches, and then set them loose on the world.

"Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you..." Matthew 28:19-20

Unless we are to believe that the Holy Spirit expired with the death of the apostles (which is a pretty bleak message) apostolic succession should surely enable the succesors of the original disciples to absolve sin as well? (amongst the protestant churches, I'm uncertain if any other denomination aside from the Anglicans believe in apostolic succession. Apparently to some churches Christ's choosing of his twelve apostles defined them as apostles, therefore there were no successors, only men taught by the apostles; or, in another interpretation, we are all apostles in a sense.

from http://www.fact-index.com/a/ap/apostolic_succession.html -
"They (Protestants) generally hold that one important qualification of the apostles was that they were chosen directly by Jesus Christ, and the work of these twelve, together with the prophets of the twelve tribes of Israel, provide a foundation for the whole church of subsequent history through the Scriptures which we have from them. To share with the apostles the same faith, to believe their word in the Scriptures, to receive the same Holy Spirit, is the only meaningful sense of apostolic succession"

I suppose then that the appointment of a twelth apostle (detailed in scripture references here) by the laying on of hands... was merely a formality then. A sort of sub-apostle who wasn't infused with the same holy spirit, or the same powers given unto his other disciples by Jesus Christ. I guess it's possible. Which raises the question of why Christ "charged" his disciples with the holy spirit in the first place? Why not just name them his teachers and administrators - his technicians to perpetuate his memory.

Here I'm wading into waters that are far too deep for myself.

Lastly, regarding the cross, and crucifix.

The cross actually predates the crucifix, and was the symbol when Christianity became the official religion of the Roman empire in the fourth century AD. The crucifix made its appearance in the fifth.

This person has written a rather rabid article about.. Christians crosses and Catholic crucifixes, which does have some small merit in parts.

This email exchange adds poignancy to the argument for the crucifix rather than the cross.

The thing is, there are catholic crosses too.

Catholics aren't bound to the crucifix. They prefer to depict Jesus on the cross, as an act of remembrance.

Protestants however exclude Christ from the cross. (And in fact, today in All Soul's I realised they've taken down their cross altogether. There used to be one, a long time ago on an altar up against the wall, prior to the Renovation.)

Symbolism is well and fine I suppose, but the thing about people is we're incredibly superficial, and the more we exclude, the more we forget. Will there come a day when we forget why we take communion? Will it just be our spiritual drink, "just because", after everything gets too dumbed down? It does take considerable effort and time to track down references and the history of the churches. I've just taken well over two hours to compile this rather measely skeleton of events. I can't imagine why, but without that motivation I'd have been happy to flounder on in my ignorance.

Oh yes, and about that veil...

That piece scripture predates the formal Catholic church. There are so many interpretations of it around it's mind boggling.

Other popular theories include a marker of a severence (rending) with the old covenant, and a beginning of the new. Or perhaps with the old (judaic) church, and a new church founded in Christ.

"this rending of the veil has been interpreted to signal that the crime of the priests is so grievous that God abandons the holy of holies--tearing through the temple veil as he exits"

"The traditional interpretation of this -- one found all the way back to the Fathers of the Church -- was as a sign that the sacrifices of the Old Testament and its particular form of worship had come to an end with the perfect Sacrifice of Christ. The rending of the sacred veil becomes, then, the first step in a process that will lead to the destruction of the Temple itself by the future emperor Titus in AD 70 (or as late as 73, by some reckonings). Et antiquum documentum novo cedat ritui."

I think the reality is that God works in mysterious ways. What does it mean? Who knows? We can interpret the event howsoever we may wish, to support whatever stances we want to argue. But then that beggars the question - is turning God's Word to our own ends right?

Something that puzzles me about the Lutherian / Presbytarian / Protestant interpretation is this - if the rending of the veil symoblised communication with God - in what way does this detract from the Catholic church? Because Catholics do not pray to God via their priest - the priest leads the prayers; sometimes a member of the congregation leads them. In the same way, when a protestant preacher leads prayers - he is not, surely, being the conduit to God for his congregation. In the sanctity of our own homes - we all pray alone, to God.

2.4km - down to 10:57! It's amazing what a difference a measely two seconds can make - now I feel like I'm dying.

Attended my last ever mass at St Borromeo's, and asked the priest after the sermon if it was wrong if a person to gambled constantly, and then donated the money to the church - did that mitigate the act?

He said that it was a sickness, and in no way mitigated the act. Of course not.
That would be too convenient.

So now I know.

I then went on to All Soul's where they'd imported a preacher from Lebanon. He was brilliant, said all the "wrong" things, fired the crowd, even mentioned Mary once or twice (earning a few arched eyebrows). His constant refrains about the things HE had done in this life were annoying, but his core message was so, so blunt, and so undeniably true.

Revival begins in us.

He also mentioned in passing how the Word of God is not amenable to change, and how it must not be shaped to meet our own ends. Which took me full circle back to the words of the priest at St Borromeo's.

Last Sunday in England.

Things I forgot to mention in the last post :

The girl with the wandery music - would be the girl sitting down left-centre at the keyboard. Not the girl in the foreground. heh.

Someone mentioned once that she detected a slightly lost, wandering quality to my writing. I wasn't aware I was doing it, but she hit her head on the nail. Or was it the nail on the head? Can never be sure with that one.

Why that should be so... I have no idea.

In the picture of the unusual street performer - a closer look (click to enlarge) will reveal that everyone else is impeccable. There wasn't even the faintest breeze. That tie... giggle.

I watched "charlie chaplin the second" doing his routine and he was good. Really, really good. And engaging - kept the audience guessing what he would do next. He involved his audience a lot too, and had a random young woman and man wind up doing bizarre gymnastic balancing feats on each other's bodies... which goes to show with the right teaching anything is possible. Poor guy though, he was trembling towards the end of the human pyramid thing, supporting the weight of a beautiful blonde (who did try to her credit to flee the second charlie chaplin's eye caught hers - alas, too slowly) as well as Charlie himself. The show was completely stolen by some kids he asked up to volunteer to help him stack bricks. These guys were natural comics and started harrassing him and nicking his cane and hat...

I stuck around for an hour watching his routine, and so did the fiftysomething people watching him, almost hypnotised. At one point it even began to drizzle... and nobody budged.

Yesterday, in pictures :


The tail end of the horseguards parade. Riding in utter silence, and looking extremely knackered.


What you can't tell is that horses stroll at andantissimo - they look like they're slouching along in slow motion but they're still pretty quick.


what you don't see is the sergeant bringing up the rear, who is a mountain of a man. Brought Terry Pratchett's Sergeant Colon of Ankh Morpork to mind.


The actual changing of the guard...




is a song and dance routine. Okay, maybe no dance, but a lot of music. Honestly, I think they could have done better than "Dancing Queen". Oh, and they're (the Irish Guards) actually pretty good musicians too - not quite the MDC.


Afterwards I blundered into the Thames Festival. Another advantage of not owning a TV - being pleasantly surprised. This girl couldn't speak English for nuts, and with her accent I figured (correctly) that she had to be greek. She sent shivers up my spine... her music was self-composed, and had a slightly lost, wandering, haunting air to it. Almost like the stuff I make up, but ten times better (at least).
It's funny when a wanderer recognises another wanderer. It doesn't mean that much, and you can't really empathise since the journey will have been completely different. But it feels good to know there's someone else like you out there, and that you're not quite alone.
I sat down on the grass for an hour, listening, entranced. And then I noticed...


these two Big Blue People. There was something decidedly...


...fishy about them.


A typical London street performer, shiny, glitzy, a tribute in human concentration and extremely attractive to pigeons. Humans (like myself, here I apply the term loosely) find them a little boring.


Not your run-of-the-mill street performer. This guy apparently decided to take the mick of other Londonites, and perhaps even of other street performers. While they concentrate on looking cool, he concentrated on looking... like he was concentrating. Battling the crowds and the elements en route to work. He earned heaps of giggles, and not a few coins either.


A military wedding. You have to look hard at this one (click to enlarge) but the boys and girls in grey are forming a steeple of swords. Swoon. How romantic. :)

*****
A different kind of Changing of the Guard (clickable link)

Reads a fair bit differently to the local newspieces doesn't it?

I find it fascinating that when the international media interviews people for their political opinions, they gun for professional political professorial-types, in stark contrast to the Straits Times, which in their infinite wisdom prefer to select experts like Ah Seng the Coffeeshop Man, and JimBob Beng, 17, student. Sometimes they even (ooh) choose Mr BengalBombayman*, columnist of the NewIndia Times*, this article first appeared in the NewIndia Times* (but what they don't mention, interestingly enough is that the NewIndia Times* is actually based in Singapore).
It's sorta like their medical articles which are all written by a blatant amatuer - I don't care if he has an MBBS, his writing betrays him. He's a medical student posing as a clinical associate professor - some kid who barely completed his internship and moved on to reporting who turns overnight authority on every and anything medical. (Can you hear my axe grinding... growl)

Ah, but back to the CNN article. Does it make you feel hot-blooded and indignant? (Out of Bounds! Sue! Sue! Sue!) Or quietly contemplative....

* - fictional names, made up by re-minisce.

On my way back to Singapore, I'm hoping to swing by the US of A to visit K, my best (male) buddy in Boston, then jet to California and wander around Los Angeles and San Francisco for a bit before returning to the security and sanity of South East Asia. I dunno, I just want to turn them from names of places, to images of real cities in my head. Just once, before I die. And heaven knows its hard to get time off as a doctor back home, let alone enough time off for a holiday.

I've discovered we get half as much annual leave in Singapore than as in the UK. frown. why am I doing this again.

Anyway, surprisingly the airfare isn't a killer but accomodation IS. Man 180 dollars a night for a hotel in california. Strangely enough, for nice and reasonable UK rates (£40) I can get a 4 bed shared hovel hostel, which I might well end up doing. Sigh.

A minor but I suppose predictable hitch has been the involvement of my dear parents (why does it surprise me every time?) who're trying to throw spanners and other assorted helpful tools into the works. GRRRRRRRRRRRROOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWLLLLLLL.

I want my holiday. Before I settle down. Hell I sound like I'm having a stag night, I'm not, I just want a nice holiday somewhere I've never been. whimper.

Today's papers are awash with articles about the bloody police putdown of the protests against Blair's ban on hunting. It's probably a uniquely English thing... rolls eyes. Blair is as always trying to curry favour, this time amongst his own Labour party at the expense of the "layman". Strangely enough, it's the common person protesting against the ban on Hunting, because it's the common person who hunts, and whose mouth is fed by the hunt. (It's a big industry. Fox, horse. Gun. Horse vans. Camera?)

Most accounts of the pseudo-riot carried pictures of the protestors, battered and bloodied, ostensibly brutally put down by heavy-handed riot police who even swept old ladies to the floor and thumped beautiful blondes in the face. (There's a picture to boot, poor girl had a cut to the lip - some A&E doctor's really gonna enjoy repairing that one) Comments like "I was just moving out of the way when he caught my eye, and then he hit me very deliberately" adorn most of the articles expressing their shock at how the police dealt with the "peaceful" protests.

The fine print does admit that protestors threw smoke bombs, then stones, then cans and water bottles. And if you look really hard, one or two of the scores of casualties with head injuries are policemen. The official figure had 19 people injured.

I dunno. Putting two and two together, some yob probably downed a riot police officer and elicited the combined wrath of testosterone-driven bobbies catalysed by their riot helmets, batons and shields. It's very much an Us versus Them scenario, and when one of your own gets hurt retribution is often swift and excessive.

Often's the time people have told me "I could never do what you do", "all that blood", "poor pay long hours" etcetc. I just shrug it off with a smile, these're just people who don't actually know how mundane the job really is. Then of course you get the select people who maintain that they could have done it if they'd wanted to, but they chose not to. Shrug that off too - we'll never know, will we?

One thing I do know is I could never hold a weapon to a civilian. It's funny - I passed through all of NS mutilating cardboard cutouts at 400m : but I never once pointed my weapon at another human being. It's hard when thought leads one to realise that the consequences of ruthlessness are pain, severe injury and potentially even death. But in war, it's do or die - self defence. Your life or his... I wouldn't want to be there, but I'd pull the trigger - out of blind fear if nothing else. War is not patriotic, ladies and gentlemen : especially those of you (read: someonewhoshallnotbenamed) of the patriotic bent. And deserting would quite probably be the sensible option, if it didn't involve the obligatory court martial and execution. (damned if you do, damned if you don't) Did anyone read Catch-22?

But gunning down - or even just thumping - grannies and women. Well. I couldn't. I'm just glad I wasn't born China-chinese : the soldiers of Tiannenmen - what kind of counselling did they get after the event, one wonders? What about that tank commander who ran down the kneeling bloke. Now THAT was a peaceful protest.

I guess in mitigation, there were women riot officers too, heh. Nothing like a catfight eh. Nonono that's not what I meant to say. cough. I mean, in today's f*cked up world, even granny might have a firebomb in her purse, and what with boxercise, and martial gymnastics, beautiful blondes might pack quite a punch.

The people whinging about police brutality should realise something. Only 19 people were reported injured. And they're riot police - it's their job to contain crowds, whatever it takes. I suppose it requires them to become quite detached and mathematical about it all - sorta like being a surgeon. Riot police with a soft touch would be as ludicrous as the security staff of Parliament, who weren't. (They let 10 people slip into parliament building, and 5 actually made it into the sitting)
It must be pretty scary being a riot policeman, at times. Always on the brink of snapping - but snap too early and you suffer the consequences. Snap too late and one of your own gets badly injured. That's a pretty thankless job if you ask me.

One thing I couldn't help wondering was how the five made it in. The newspaper reports mention that only "officials" guard the chambers - police are strictly not involved in "internal security". The officials - stitched up in the press today as poncy, useless gits in their tights with tailcoats and ceremonal tailcoats - did manage to take five of the ten down. Obviously not good enough, because if they'd been terrorists one alone would have been one too many - but what gets me is if they were door guards, and they were (as the papers put it) "rushed" by the ten unarmed protestors (one of whom is a close friend of William and Harry, and the other the son of a prominent rock star...) how on earth did even two of them allow five to slip by?

It's probably because I'm a fencer, but all it would have taken to stop them dead in their tracks would've been for them to unsheath their swords, and maybe taken a chunk out of someone's arm. I bet that would've poured cold water on the lads' high spirits instantly - and it would have been precisely the one instant they'd have been justified in doing it : not just self-defence, but defence of someone else as well. I have little doubt the police would have raised their weapons, and possibly even fired - you can't be too sure when ten men are charging at you that they aren't about to explode suddenly and nastily, surely?

Now they just look - and quite probably are - incompetent. Especially the bloke sprawled on the floor with his hand on his sword in today's papers. Pah, they probably don't even know how to use their weapons.

*****
oh yeah. in breaking (ha, pun) news : 2.4 km - 10.59!!

it's not much, but it's a start.

now to gun for 10.45.... blast it. i wish i was young again. sometimes.

Dinner with T and her friend L last night at Gordon Ramsay's, and the night before at The Fat Duck in Bray - that's 6 Michelin Stars in two nights. I think they'll have to coin a whole new term for this level of extravagence... but sod it, just once in a lifetime, before I leave this country, I'd like to see what all the hype's about.

Well, I went, I saw and I was overwhelmed.

You know all that poncy stuff they write about in review guides, and try to show on telly? It's all real. I've never eaten food that carefully presented, by waiting staff that precisely observant and attentive before. It isn't like being on telly at all - it's a whole lot more overwhelming (which is strange, for me.)

To say that the food melted on the palate would be to do the food a grave injustice. I simply don't have the words to describe it, and the wines (with the exception of the last dessert wine, which was a trifle too... upmarket for a simple bloke of my tastes, ie sweet tooth) were in a calibre of their own. I wonder what would have happened if we'd risked one of the £2000 pound bottles. laughs.

Major confession - I'm not a foodie. Generally, I couldn't give a toss what I eat, and sometimes I don't, entirely. 's far as alcoholic drinks go, I know what I like, which is precious little... and I know precious little about anything else. Wine lists are an exercise in sheer ignorance, and half-remembered names. (Memory of a slightly impaired sotong, I suspect)

Last two nights, well - even an ignoramus like myself could taste, see, smell and hear the difference. Putting down my emptied wineglass elicited an almost instantaneous refill by the sommelier, who veered mid-course away from the table he was about to attend to, to quietly refill my glass.

So now I'm a whole lot more broke, but a whole lot more educated. Eating will never be the same.

Don't tell my parents. Cough. Half a month's salary blown in two days. (well, okay, a quarter. plus plus.)

Oh, and Gordon Ramsay is a whole lot taller, bigger, scarier and scruffier in the flesh than on television.

Notables :

2.4 km - 11:00 STILL! Doh... but I started my "sprint" a full 100 m earlier.. stupid machines... lying...

Looks like that's the boundary to cross then. 11:00... its getting progressively harder to whittle down my time :( Growing old.

Last weekend I went to churches. Yeah, two churches, catholic mass and then sermon at All Soul's (Anglican, multidenominational)

I do that occasionally, since I like to hear the readings and interpretations at All Soul's, and the music, oh the music.

I've written this before, but Catholic masses don't really help you interpret the Word. They read the word to you - yes. But they then contextualise it in today's world... and they don't really bother to explain it in lay english. It's almost as it they expect you to know already. The brunt of the catholic sermon isn't in the meaning of the Word, but the application of that Word in your life.

Anglican sermons are usually more pedantic... individual words explained (sometimes repeatedly, roll eyes) and sometimes if you're really lucky they even set the scene (ie in those days...) for the sermon, thus helping you understand why it was written the way it was.

Listening to the sermon at All Soul's this weekend however, I couldn't help but be taken aback when the young, handsome, fiery preacher went slightly off course and started slagging off the Catholic church (which he described as descending in a tide of darkness across europe?) It was unusual, and surprising, since usually the Anglican refrain is to pray for all churches around the world, regardless of denomination - and at a "multidenominational" Anglican church like All Soul's, which purpotedly welcomes you to take communion regardless of creed or religion even - this struck me as very, very misplaced.

Funny that - the position of the papalcy has been inclined towards reunification. During mass sometimes we even pray for healing of the rift between Christianity and Judaism. Yet here we have one brand of Christianity set against the rest...

According to him, the whole service is in Latin, making a mockery of the Word, because it is not being explained, and that these are signs of the Word falling into disuse (cleverly tied in to a reading from Luke, I think) like "the old days".

He also slagged off other protestant churches, since they have lost the focus of the Word (this I agreed with somewhat) - that it's not just all happy clappy good news and salvation - we mustn't forget Christ's death on the cross and that salvation is only through Him. He said that "King" Jesus is lost to the churches of the rest of europe, and to the Catholics especially. He was essentially ranting at an act of perceived omission - at a truth only half-told.

I looked around me and saw hordes of Anglicans nodding sagely - probably because they didn't know better - or perhaps they did but wanted to stay in their darkness? And couldn't help but feel sad.

It's ironic that a church that champions the Truth of the Word as staunchly as All Soul's also falls prone to misrepresenting that same truth, in order to gain its own ends.

I should have liked to call that speaker to task for his slightly misinformed comments - because he was misinforming the congregation, and his role is that of the Teacher.

If King Jesus is lost to the Catholics, what is he doing nailed to the crucifixes that adorn the inside and outside of every church and cathedral? Usually complete with little replicas of the wound in his side, and his crown of thorns. That same Jesus has been removed from the cross that represents modern day Christianity - why is that?

And even in High masses, the sermon is read in English - at least it is in the UK. Presumably, in europe, they're read in the lingua franca of the country.

It is the Liturgy itself is occasionally in Latin - and you can attend a lower mass if that is off-putting to yourself, and if you can't actually be bothered to find out what it means.

I suppose to a long-suffering Catholic, even if it was performed in swahili you'd still get the drift, since the liturgy is standardised across the world. The sermon might be a bit of a bugger though. In which case it isn't anyone's fault, surely? You just... don't understand. Find somewhere that does it in a language that you do.

The Liturgy itself is a thing of beauty, which perhaps "born again" Christians cannot see. It actually contains the Word - it reminds us precisely what it was Jesus Christ asked us to do, in memory of him. Communion is taken at every mass, and not just once a month.

The story of Christ is actually contained within the order of the Catholic mass, which the priest faithfully reads, and the people recite.

It may seem like a tired ritual to the uninitiated, and heaven knows I haven't been initiated that long, myself. But I still listen to the words, and marvel.

Jesus Christ not apparent in the Catholic Church?

from The Gloria :
"Glory to God in the highest,
and peace to his people on earth.
Lord God, heavenly King, almighty God and Father,
we worship you, we give you thanks, we praise you for your glory.
Lord Jesus Christ, only Son of the Father,
Lord God, Lamb of God,
you take away the sin of the world: have mercy on us;
you are seated at the right hand of the Father: receive our prayer.
For you alone are the Holy One, you alone are the Lord,
You alone are the Most High, Jesus Christ,
with the Holy Spirit, in the glory of God the Father. Amen."

from The Apostle's Creed :
"I believe in God, the Father almighty,
creator of heaven and earth.

I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord.
He was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit
and born of the Virgin Mary.
He suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, died, and was buried.
He descended to the dead.
On the third day he rose again.
He ascended into heaven,
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come to judge the living and the dead.

I believe in the Holy Spirit,
the holy catholic Church,
the communion of saints,
the forgiveness of sins,
the resurrection of the body,
and the life everlasting.

Amen"

Funny. It does sound like the same Lord Jesus Christ that All Soul's sings about, doesn't it? In fact, many of the hymns are based around the gloria and the creed (or about psalms)... and the same gloria and creed are actually present in the order of service for many protestant churches, only they've been reworded, and some might argue - had specific words removed from them (like the word "catholic", for instance - changed to "universal")

Baptisms are remarkably similar - attending both churches makes one realise that the intentions are the same, and the words are slightly different, but mirror one another.

I believe there are strengths to both churches - Catholic and Anglican. (and by extension, protestant in general) I see strength in the Word of the Catholic liturgy (sung / spoken) - and I also see strength in the sheer uplifting motivational power of the music I hear at All Soul's. Not just the usual boring Christian songs

(You are... Lord, you are... you do... you this, you that, you obviously don't remember so we're just singing to remind you that we are your children, and you will save us?)

but proper songs telling the story, focusing on Christ, rather than ourselves today. Beautiful melodies. Perfect tempos. Perfectly performed by a smooth instrumental group, and a sombre choir (with notable exception of oriental girl who is desperately trying to be noticed by the congregation, by making really exaggerated arm and mouth and head movements? cynical me... my bad)
It saddens me that while our church leaders strive to bridge the gaps between them (this is apparent occasionally during service at St Paul's, when the sermon actually contains prayers for the catholic church, or for healing of the rifts between the churches) it is the people on the ground who seem to want to hold high their banners of war and intolerance - and ignorance.

I watched the Anglican church fragment (homosexual priests, etcetc) with some sadness, and it was very apparent that the Anglican church today is not a single body anymore. The Archbishop of Canterbury has little sway over the little factions scattered across the world ("cell groups". heh heh). There is no longer any standardisation - and the same is true with many of the other denominations.

How can anyone claim to be a "universal" church when in truth every denomination prides itself for its uniqueness... and every church, within that denomination strives to be something remarkable? Who for that matter are we trying to impress by being different? God? Or are we giving ourselves choices - is that what Christianity is? A brand to be tailored to the wants of the people - like Coca Cola is tailored per country's taste test? (ha. bet you didn't know that. That's why US coke tastes different to UK coke tastes different to Singaporean coke.)

It doesn't matter to the layman like you and I. We go to our little churches, and we take part in our little services. Hear the words and go away happy, and hopefully slightly repentent.

But if the words are changed, or the message is perverted - we will be none the wiser. We are truly sheep... where do we go when our shepard is misguided himself?

Sometimes I just wish that the churches could learn from each other. And that the common humanity and pride of man would stop interfering with the workings of the Church. Sometimes I rue the day when the church was broken.

Listening to the preacher rant (and taking note of all his good points, of which there were a fair few) it struck me that it is fear of the unknown that leads many Christians to berate Catholicism. (and vice versa) I was one once, myself - afraid of idol worship, afraid of ritualistic masses, afraid of Latin and feeling left out in the dark. I sat in on masses and felt sad that I couldn't partake of communion - now I sit in on services and feel the same.

The Catholic church does not always explain its meaning to you - you have to go out and look for it. Perhaps that is the lure of Contemporary Christianity - it's all packaged neatly for you, just sit back and enjoy the ride. And that's a good thing, to be sure. Another strength of the protestant movement, and probably why they're better at recruiting.

However I couldn't help but notice sometimes, while I was Anglican and visiting various counties through the course of med school - that there were saints pictured in the windows. That nearly every Anglican church is named for a saint. That many speak the Apostle's creed in its original form. That some even spoke the Hail Mary.

{Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with you” (Luke 1:28);
“Blest are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb” (Luke 1:42; cf. Deut 7:12-13; 28:4)}

And I couldn't help but wonder... the truths we heard - perhaps they were only half-told? Perhaps there were things which had been removed... for various reasons.

Today, I wonder - what became of the shrines within those cathedrals to the saints that stood in their windows? There are bays for them, filled instead with statues of dead medieval commanders and war heroes. And that strikes me as just a little bit odd.

To the preacher at All Soul's last sunday : The Catholic church is not your enemy. Don't strike out simply because you don't understand. That was not the way of our Lord, but of his enemies. We are brothers in Christ... can you not see?

If there's one constant I can count on when I dine with T, it's a faint sensation of nausea afterwards. It's a good kind of nausea, mind you. Associated with a superlative sense of satiety - I'll never need to eat another meal again, for the rest of my life. Until tomorrow morning that is.

Last night was no different after an evening out that even Timeout would describe as exorbitant - but as always well worth it, thanks (cough) in part to my discerning tastes, and T's backbreaking research. Zuma, ladies and gents, takes Japanese fine cuisine to a whole different level. (and £40 is a rather low estimate)

Many's the time I feel a tightening in my stomach at the thought of going home - all this that I have now - given up in favour of the low-security prison I call "home." I try to console myself by thinking thoughts like "I might move out from under my parent's roof" - but when push comes to shove I have a funny feeling I won't - because it would break their hearts. In property-scarce Singapore, oft-times the only "excuse" to move out is the Big M (and we're not talking masturbation) - anything else would be a slap in the face to long-suffering parents who have toiled and laboured to provide you with an existence on this earth.

I'll concede that I've probably turned into the proverbial (and much maligned) "banana" (how often have I recoiled from the thought of a race that would coin a term simply to exclude others of their kin from membership, simply because they don't conform) having spent a third of my life here... but it just feels wrong the parents never to push their fledgelings out of the nests to help them find their wings.

Perhaps I'm not lamenting Singaporean society as a whole, and just my own folks. Or perhaps somewhere in here I actually have a point?

Anyhow, last night in a random bar in Knightsbridge as the alcohol coursed through my veins and eroded through my gastric lining (four doubles on an breakfast-and-lunch bereft stomach is bad for your sobriety) I looked around me at the London I knew, and also, I must admit, the gorgeous blonde sitting across from me with her friend (who turned out to be one of the waitresses about to start-shift at Zuma later that evening - how coincidental is that?) and I felt the usual misgivings and fears, and wondered how much I would miss all this when I leave - and whether, like some of my friends who made the big leap home, I'll somehow transform in a couple (or six) months into a compliant, happy sheep content with chewing his cud and baaing placidly in moon-eyed approval at Big Brother's whims and decrees.

I'm going to miss you, London. Ugly and fucked-up as you are.

*****
Dessert was a course of (? alcohol enhanced?) "The Terminal" on bigscreen - well for T it was a fruit chawanmushi, which was an exquisitely smooth blend of ? cocounut, ? custard, and a lot of other query contents.

The Terminal wasn't half bad. I'd been expecting a full-on soppy romantic comedy between Tom Hanks, and much coveted Catherine ZJ, but it turned out Spielberg had other things on his mind (Jazz, jazz, jazz) and his tongue firmly in cheek, and strangely the way C. ZJ left Hanks hanging seemed, to this cynic at least, very much like real-life rather than reel-life.

These thoughts earned me an almost lambasting from T, so go easy on me, as much of an MCP as I'm going to make myself out to be.

My disclaimer as always is - of course I know that stereotypes don't hold true 100% of the time - any fool knows that. The difference between a cynical fool and an ordinary fool is that we hold the percentages slightly skewed in favour of the less favourable outcome.

I'd give it 90-10 in most instances, that women are fickle creatures. They tout, laud (and ultimately tease) the faithful, dependable stalwart as appealing and desirable - yet when push comes to shove Mr International Man of Misery Mystery, the serial abuser with flair, panache, and above all that damnably undefinable thing termed "chemistry" as The One - destiny - one chosen by a higher calling. The One who sets their nerves a tingle, their spines on fire, does amazing things during sex, and cooks exotic meals - nevermind if he's not always there for them, nevermind if he shits (sorry inside movie joke) cheats. Destiny is calling, goodbye Mr Second Best.

Nice guys never win.

And you know what?

Who can blame them? I mean, men are fickle too. We want the hot babe who'll set our souls afire (and do it in every room of the house?) who has The Way, of - flicking her hair back, looking devastating just by smiling, who makes the blood rush to our heads (depending on type of male, different anatomical locations or a not-so clever pun may be in order) and turns our knees to jelly, or at least pate. And dependable, faithful plain-jane naturally takes second-seat to stunning, sassy... err... InsertgenericcoolnamebeginningwithS.

The difference (and this is where T and I almost had ugly words with the cutlery as verbal aids) is that at least us men aren't hypocrites about it - if you're not prepared to give it, then don't talk the talk. If you can't be faithful, then don't go pretending to everyone that that's what you're out for - stability, and dependability. Don't perpetuate the stereotype - just spit it out, plain and straight. Mystery, mastery and hormones is what it's all about.

I think it all boils down to personality types. If you're a romantic (read - thrillseeker / adrenaline junkie) then dependability and loyalty are nice enough. And ultimately one day, boring. And then cue "absence makes the heart go wander", leading to many a mundane tale of domestic woe.

The irony is (well I believe, anyhow) if you don't go looking for it - even the thrillseekers - when they find the "right one" - become prepared to stay, for a happy lifetime. Here the cynic rebutts : likelihood is abysmally poor, and statistically insignificant in frequency.

Ah well.

Me, call me whatever names you will. I'm a thrillseeker.

Lingualnerve's been doing a short spiel on military types.

It brings back my own memories of National Service, ie National Liability, aka UtterWasteOfThreeYears.

Quite probably the most fun I had was during my Combat Medic course. It was an intriguing mix of geekdom (Physiology and Anatomy for Dummies! How to reduce dislocations and Bandaging 101!) and testosterone (CASEVAC - casualty evacuation, setting up IV lines lying down in twilight...) Our mantra was "Seek Save Serve! Combat Medics!!"

I particularly enjoyed the River Crossing drill. I don't know why... I just found it really relaxing, like a soak in the tub, only fully clothed, with a hapless buddy strapped to you to provide banal conversation if the need arose. Arm over arm... splish. splash. look at the sky, it's so beautiful and blue! (I'm spending my tim... oops sorry. Blasted Roxette)

It's funny how sometimes you miss the bad old days - when at the time, all I could think of was getting out, and getting on with my life and becoming a true-blue doctor.

(Seek Save Serve! ORD LOH!)

Doh.

me and my big mouth.

remind me never to ask provocative questions about the weather ever again...

oh no!

no, nonono.

it looks like belle's going all soppy and romantic and reminiscent-prone.

nono.

"This is the projectionist's nightmare:
A bird finds its way into the cinema,
finds the beam, flies down it,
smashes into a screen depicting a garden,
a sunset and two people being nice to each other.
Real blood, real intestines, slither down the likeness of a tree.
'This is no good,' screams the audience,
'This is not what we came to see."

sniff. how depressing... when even belle, who's good for a laugh turns nostalgic and piney over her past.

It must be autumn. Yeah, let's peg it to the change in season.

*****
Impressions of Reading.

Today, I went to Reading. Oh, haha, and writing too, old joke.

Reading is a place by the way, for those not in the know.

It looks a lot like london in parts (big, grey, concrete), and in parts, like Sydney. (victorian houses, green, and today, sunny)

If not for the abysmal English weather (ie rainy and overcast 60% of the time) it might even be a nice place to stay.

I could never stay there. It's a nowhere land to me, somewhere that looks like other places I'd rather be...

*****
I tried to go to Reading yesterday, but some inconsiderate twit hurled himself in front of the train and resulted in hundreds of trains being held up at Paddington and Waterloo stations so police could complete their investigations.

I know it sounds harsh and all, considering that the bloke died, but... honestly. That has to be the most terminal case of attention seeking behaviour possible. I swear, if he hadn't done it right the first time he'd probably have been hunted down by several thousand angry commuters and killed again...

*****
In other news - just how long is this abnormally warm and sunny weather going to hold?

Announcing the removal of my calander from the bottom of this page. With the age of unemployment I now find myself freed from the chains of organised oppression. Viva a resistance! Viva anarchy!

Err. Whatever. Also, the sun is shining today. In a big way. Autumn has officially been put on hold by the Weather services. Looks at self. But I'm so dark already... but... but... the sun is out :( whine.

*****
Thought of the day. They should call "Singapore Idol" "popiah idol". give it some local flavour.

Random comment tonight while dining with T and moaning (her) about local boys not having enough flair -

Re-minisce : Well, you know. Do not judge a man by the size of his panache.

I've just been funked.

Ouch.

In the aftermath of a spectacularly less than successful exam (thank you Royal College of Surgeons, not just for sending me late notification of acceptal for exam, but also for changing the syllabus without telling us, whoohoo...) I decided to get my hair cut.

Well no actually I've been dying for a haircut since a week ago when my fringe began to overgrow my ears. It really bugs me when it does that and I wind up obsessively gelling it back and looking like something out of the Godfather.

So it's down to Covent Garden for my nice predictable haircut at Hair by Fairy, stylists are queer as folk but pretty good, normally.

Today I draw The Italian.

Same's always. "number four on the back and side please"

Settle down into chair. Close eyes.

"Ah, and you like a little messy on the top yes?"

Eh? How did he know. That's how I always look anyhow.

"yeah, sure."

Oww. Argh. Ouch. Wha. Why's he pulling on my hair.

Slice. AArg. This guy isn't so much cutting my hair as ripping it out with the scissors, in a rather... surprisingly painless way.

open eyes. Oof.

Err. Ri-ight. I think this guy has something for Angelus from Buffy....

good thing I'm not working anymore at the moment. I'd never live this one down...

I'll be the first to admit that I haven't watched Singapore Idol, and to be absolutely honest, having read what I have about it I doubt I'd be inclined to even bother.

This article about it says it all.

I'm sorry, but aren't we missing the point?

Isn't the point of Singapore Idol - as it is with Pop idol - to try to weed out the talent and turn them into the next Will Young (ugh)?

Actually, no. Channelnewsasia hits it on the head - it's all about entertainment. Without any awful performers to hold the show... it's left to the judges to hold the fort, who now become the centerpiece of the show, with Dickhead and Wannabe getting too big for their already overinflated boots.

Err. I take it there isn't anything else worth watching on the show... like the contestants? No chance of even being wowed by one of them with the super voice and the killer looks? Or at least a lot of jiggy action and thigh? (Read : Will Young. heh heh.)

MrBrown as always delivers us a pertinent, alternative view to the official hype surrounding Bog Idol, by way of an irate Hans Ebert. (I wish he'd titled it Singapore Idol Judges get Hanged...)

More worryingly, if in a fit of ego-masturbation one of the judges scathingly whittles away our next Dido or Enrico's dreams of stardom and actually producing something remotely resembling talent from the little isle we call home... will it have been worth it? Just for a laugh?

*****

Dick Lee's crack about someone being husky, like a dog... was cruel. And also stupid. Dido's got a unique voice, slightly husky. Lots of famous singers have husky voices... makes them sexy even. And they get shot down for their voice - yes, quite.

I can't help but notice that amateurism is beginning to pervade this world... as the day of the professional wanes, shortcuts to stardom (including pop idol) are cropping up like nobody's business.

It troubles me, truly. Talent is well and fine, but I'd rather back talent that has been nurtured, and supported by industry and persistence - and finely honed into an artistry unmatched --- than support a rags to riches story, with a star too busy preening in the media spotlight he/she's been thrust into (as is usually the case) to continue to refine their abilities. Or churning out an endless stream of bland mediocrity. (cough. looks at local "artistes".)

And surely it trivialises the effort, blood and sweat of the true craftsmen out there who actually toil for the sake of their arts, and not (merely) for their shots in the spotlight. Who probably wouldn't be the sort to give a toss, or speak up about it.

Today, singers and writers. Tomorrow... who knows?

Politician Idol, anybody? Or Lawyer Idolatry? Howabout Medi-doll?

*****

Another thing that's struck me is the sheer unharnessed potential of Pop-Idol Singapore.

The now infamous bananaguy was apparently allowed to go up on stage and sing some silly ditty that he composed.

Pause.

Pop idol UK is all about singing a song they choose for you. Meaning, quite possibly that if someone out there in Singapore composed something truly remarkable, he/she could step onto the stage and blow away the crowd with something original. And step into the world arena tomorrow.

Now that would be really special...

Only it's not going to happen.

I don't have enough faith in the people I guess. And I don't have enough faith in the blown-up stooges they picked to play-act their preordained roles as dickhead, and sweetiepie to actually notice real talent when they see it.

Can't they just get on with the show... and play backup for once? Just be judges. Intelligent, impartial - and above all, competent. The story isn't about you. Centrestage belongs to the singers. Start Judge Idol if you want... just for once give the country a shot at something truly remarkable, rather than plain mediocre - yet again.

I'd just as soon have four complete unknowns doing their jobs well, with the occasional heartfelt and sincerely funny comment than four puppets mouthing rehearsed lines.

Singapore Idol is never going to turn out a chart-topper, I don't think. Not in it's current form.

Hmm.

This it seems was released by Talkingcock the day before they suffered a massive server crash and what appears to be a hacking attempt.

Interesting innit?

In other news, I appear to be a born prime minister. 487 points. Top that! Hah!! Wah lau eh. Bastard!

*****
Rehashed

Incidentally does anyone remember these?

http://re-minisce.blogspot.com/2003/12/flying-chair-awards-are-all-buzz-at.html

http://re-minisce.blogspot.com/2003/12/good-bad-and-aesthetically-challenged.html

I've been giving it some thought and tweaked the idea a little so that even a commitment-phobe like myself will be able to manage it with minimal input (heh. much like the ideal girlfriend eh?)

So here's what I'd like to do : start a site that blogrolls Singaporean authors who write stories. Only stories - ordinary blogs about daily life are out. Too many, and not my cup of tea.

Authors will be able to add their own links to a "general" section, and I (and hopefully my team if anyone ever joins me) will sift through the stories and categorise them... possibly by topic, or by recommendation (funny / thrilling etc)

no scores, and no direct comparisons... just a central repository of links to stories. With subtle encouragement to writers to create purpose-built blogs to host their stories the way i (preen) did for starsandmoon. But if they can't be arsed that's okay too.

As long as they collate their stories into suitable containers so that I don't have to create additional sublinks.

yeah, anyhow. That's it. The NotTheFlyingChairUnAwards site. heh heh.

So far I reckon automatic qualifiers into the "advanced" category are :

alfian, nicholas, xena, and mebbe K (http://www.antisteotype.net/teflon) if only she'd write stories as well.

Lucian, you still with me on running this thing?

The weather this weekend has been simply remarkable - clear blue skies, blood red sunsets, and air you can actually inhale without anaesthetising half the cilia in your respiratory tract. Hmm, must've been less Londoners in over the weekend too. heh.

Naturally I spent my day baking in the park (am now at distinct danger of developing a skin malignancy) and studying for the Big Day tuesday, which from the looks of it is going to be a huge flop. Anyhow, I was riding my on own little cloud of sunsickness and euphoria till I went to church, and found out about this. One of the major disadvantages of not owning a telly or radio is not being plugged into the loop. I'd been wondering what the headlines meant all weekend : "school under siege".

Sigh.

It's a sad, cynical, selfish world we live in when hundreds of innocent people are injured and hundreds die, so that people can make a point.

It's not about what you say anymore, but about how loudly you say it.

Somewhere in the sermon the priest said "Christians are the shock-absorbers of society. We are called not to strike back."

And so we are - turn the other cheek. It's just... so hard to, when one cheek has been blown into tiny pieces of charred flesh.

God rest them all.

One of the few benefits of attending the interviews I did was getting up to speed on current events, something someone in my current situation (studying for exam) doesn't do a great deal. My daily routine involves waking up in my hovel, playing a little with the computer while trying to persuade myself to work, and eventually going somewhere warm (eg park) and pretending to study for a bit. Needless to say I am far behind, and in 48 hours I am going to pay the price. (Ah, but after that, grand dreams of visiting Reading, the United States, and maybe even the moon)

Anyhow this is me fiddling with my computer.

The Brit dunderheads politicians, ie Tony Blair and stooges have been pushing the European Working-Time Directive into effect. The British Medical Association, once the paragon of common sense (for doctors, by doctors and all that crap) appears to have taken a chapter out of the SMA's books and bravely parroted the idea, lauding it as a Good Thing - safer doctors! Safer patients! Happy people!

For those not in the know, the EWD stipulates a maximum working time of workers (doctors included) of 48 hours a week.

Initially as a med student I was grateful that the system here doesn't flog house officers as badly as the system back home (100 hour working weeks or more, etcetc) and that I was having it pretty easy in comparison. (although with this damn sense of responsibility, and some of the more obsessive urological registrars it was my displeasure to serve under, I wound up doing 100 hour weeks for 3 months anyhow)

The EWD is being implemented in stages since Labour hasn't got enough Indian doctors from the subcontinent to staff all the rapidly vacating posts (poor pay is only part of the problem...) and an overnight implementation of shorter working hours for all doctors obviously results in doctors having to work more often to cover the deficits... only we haven't got enough doctors. It's a little bit of a catch-22. At considerable inconvenience, hospitals are implementing shift-based work for all doctors in order to satisfy these new stipulations. At present there is a 58 hour target, which will fall to 56 hours in 2007, and ostensibly to 48 hours in 2009. (I think. figures may differ)

Another talking point has been the err. Wossname thingie. The judicial-type blokes in Spain ruled that any hours spent on-site in hospital - even if it was in the residences - be considered part of the above working hours. Meaning if a doctor is on-call and sleeping in his room, it still counts to his 48 hours.

Interestingly, the feeling on the ground is one of foreboding. Not because of the potentially increased frequency of shifts, since the mass exodus of Asian doctors trained in India is increasing at an apparently exponential rate, but because of the limited training we receive here in the UK.

Doctors here only train for a measely five years, before being unleashed unto the world. Training beyond this continues during the house-years under "supervision" by senior doctors (but legion are the stories of the new SHOs who are told to watch 1 central line, and then go off and do one unsupervised... and winding up with their fingers plugging the dams they've created in the carotid artery) and for some bizarre reason studying for membership exams is supposed to make you even cleverer and safer...

Amongst the surgeons, and the surgeon-wannabes however the thought is that surgery's gonna be a whole new ball game - with next to no prior experience in surgery, new candidates will face operating less frequently due to the shorter shifts and have fewer opportunities to actually learn.

Naturally, Labour the GMC in its wisdom has addressed the issue by coining a new term, which it seems particularly adept at. Enter "Modernising Medical Careers" or "MMC". (England seems to be fast-catching the TLA - Three Letter Abbreviation - sickness that has pervaded the United States and Singapore)

The MMC is supposed to ensure more intensive, focused teaching that achieves superior results in a quicker time, by examing all aspects of teaching. So far it has come up with Problem Based Learning, or PBLs which one "official" website appeared to be quite proud of.

I was a product of the Old System, but recall the PBL pilots they tried on us with some amusement. It mostly involved students sitting around looking bored. Someone would be appointed scribe, a scenario would be read, and then we'd just wait for The Brain (there's always one...) to answer all the questions. After five minutes of twiddling our thumbs thereafter (and for the more conscientious students, writing down quotes from The Brain) we'd adjourn for coffee. Sure beats lectures - oh that coffee buzz. Tenth cup today... bzzzzthowsatlookittheprettytablesandchairsifeelslightlyfunnynow.

The other thing the MMC makes a mockery of is the fact that medicine has been around for several centuries now...
my take on it is that if they can't get teaching right within this time, they will never be able to, regardless of how often they go back and re-examine their teaching processes. And believe me, clinical teaching in the central London hospitals is by and large best described as "shite". Firsthand experience here. Proud smile.

Knowing how Labour works, I suspect they'll appoint a committee for overseeing the overseeing of MMC and the GMC, and the EWD after the systems fail to produce any beneficial outcome (and instead begin, as they always do, to flounder).

The system is perfect, it's the implementation of it that's wrong.....

Sound familiar? Only the tune we're accustomed to dancing to is more upon the lines of "The System is perfect. It's you sheep who are at fault, but don't worry, listen to us, reproduce on demand, and we'll get through all this together!"

Eheheehehe.

I just found this URL (I also rediscovered the hot chicks series of links but lost it again shortly after. bugger.) which describes the life and times of a copper in (I'm almost certain of this) London.

Naturally since policing is dead boring work (much the way medicine is, really) he throws in a fair amount of dry, scathing political sideswipes (I won't go so far as to call it commentary) and you probably won't get any of them if you're not living in the UK.

Damn, I'm going to miss this crazy place.

"No understand." Heh.

Confesssion : I've been stopped once by the Metropolitan police. I'd just bought my sabre from Leon Paul, which is situated in Camden Town (scenic Camden! Two thousand ways to lose your wallet. I've never seen McDonald's staff looking less cheerful in my life, cowering behind their smashed up cash-registers. No chirpy "Can I help you Sir?" But instead you get "What do you want" - with hand kept subtly under the counter keeping their sawed-off sixteen-guage resolutely trained on your crotch) when a police car drifted by dreamily.

Digression : the police in London drive cars the approximate size and shape of (American) post boxes. Considering the policemen are generally built like pro-wrestlers who've ah let it go a little, and policewomen are only a little shorter - it's really quite comical to watch them get out of their modified Volkswagon Beetles. Okay so they look more like Honda Civics. Artistic licence and all that.

Digression #2 : I'm convinced after watching some mounted policemen that coppers on patrol just wander the streets aimlessly till they get called. (Hmm. Parameds at least make confidently decisive runs between McDonald's and Starbucks.) I've watched these guys and they don't even bother pulling on the reigns. Their horses appear to choose where to go next. It's a wonder they don't all end up congregated on Hyde Park.

Anyhow, some two hundred yards up the slope (presumably when one of them remarked to the other "blimey, I think that bloke's carrying sword" the postbox on wheels screeches to a halt, doors fly open dramatically, and two very tall policepeople (one male, one female) charge me down - quite funny really, since they had to run all that distance back towards me - mental image : charging rhinocerii. Keep the image in mind... two seconds... three... a little longer now. There. - and tower over little old five-foot seven (and eight on a good, well-hydrated day) me menacingly.

"Wassat."

"Err. It's a sabre."

"Why you carrying a sabre."

"I just bought it."

pause. Oh. I'm in Camden. Even if I am oriental (for the uninformed, we use guns here in the UK, rather than Swords. I think it's a hongkie thing.) and rather slight of build. Better explain.

"It's for fencing with."

Ominous silence. Eyebrows furrow.

"You know? The sport? It's not sharp, see..."

Starts drawing sword. Tension increases dramatically. Can't help noticing police stepping back a fraction of an inch and hands coming away from belts.

Stops drawing sword.

"Look, it's got electronic sensors and all, over here, and here." (Points earnestly)

Pause. Woman officer draws man officer aside by the elbow. Mumblemumble... have seen before... mumble.

Officers return and tower menacingly.

"Well, don't carry it around in public."

"Err. I just bought it."

"Put it in a plastic bag or something."

AAhahahahaha. If I was a braver man, I'd have laughed out loud. Where on earth does one find a two-foot plastic bag. Aside from the mortuary.

At this moment, the blasted wit within is compelled to say something like "Look, someone's driving off with your car." (they left the doors open) or "Sure, I'll just nip around to tescos shall I?" but I wisely choose to hold my tongue.

Damn, I coulda tried "No speak English." Hahahahahaha.

Policepersons fold themselves back into car and drive off with satisfied smiles on their faces. Another job well done.

*****
Oh, as an afterthought I figured that since I've slagged off the ambulance call centre, I'd better do the same with the police. Don't wanna get accused of meritocracy or nuffin.

I tried to call in an assault once, since I wasn't brave enough to go up against two men twice my height. Well, to be honest I was thinking about it, but the only way a five seven guy beats two six two guys is by doing something unexpected like slinging them into a road full of traffic. Which would have been easy to do, actually (element of surprise, plus strong legs) but potentially bad for my rep as an NHS professional so I called the police instead.

"Hello, I'm watching two men beating another man up in public. They're kicking him in the head."

"Oh, please hold."

(music. or was it just silence. I can't remember now)

I decided to hang up and try again, but Scotland Yard called back immediately. Ah, so the old pretend to put him on hold while we trace his number routine hey.

"Yes sir, I understand you made a call to us from this number."

Um. Why do I feel like apologising suddenly. Or saying "no english."

"Yes, I'm witnessing an assault as we speak."

"Okay, where are you."

"I don't know the name of the street name, but I'm on Blackfriar's bridge on the South bank, next to (name of pub)."

"I'm sorry sir, but I need the street name or I can't help you."

"..." (There's only one Blackfrair's bridge in london right? Or am I just being a bloody ignorant foreigner again.)

Men finish beating up third man and wander off chuckling to themselves, leaving him in a pool of blood. Another bloke runs out to him (a whole restaurant full of elderly people watched the assault while they continued staidly eating their fish and chips. honest.) and whips out his mobile.

"Look, just forget it. Someone else is going to log this in a second anyway."

(walks over to check on the guy, and story continues as per the link.)

Damn. I had so many thoughts in my head today. where did they vanish to. Sting's in the background obliterating my brain.

I know that diamonds mean money for this art, but that's not the shape of my heart.

- some would do well to learn that.

Lessee. Where were we.

Oh yeah. Summer's back! for a while anyway.

Today in the park, getting a tan (yes! really!!) and studying for my MRCS i saw :

Two kids in the grass. Bloke and bird. Being friendly.

Eh. Did he just put his hand down her trouse... avert eyes. At least they weren't making much noise.

The lucky bastard... she's so blondddde. And beautiful too. dammit.

Nice old grandmotherly woman doddered past and suddenly they were all prim and proper again. hee.

Shortly after,

two chinese blokes in the grass. Sing/malaysian from the sounds of it. Holding hands.
Avert eyes. don'tstaredon'tstaredon'tstare. Eh. he's carressing his... avert eyes.

Random Question : Do any of you guys have this problem with midges? They seem to like me. Big cloud of em kept following me around the park :\ Not the biting kind. The irritating buzz in the air aimlessly in a great cloud kind. pissed the heck outta me so I killed them all with one fell sweep of my jacket. Then had to clean em off my jacket :(

Oh yeah.
Someone asked in a comment sometime back what the criteria for brain death are. Seeing as I just revised them today, here they are :

*****
(this is really gonna be boring. sorry in advance.)
Brain Stem Death

-tests must be done by two doctors, both 5 years post registration, one of whom must be a consultant. Neither should be members of a transplant team. At least 6 hours should have elapsed between onset of coma and the first set of diagnostic tests.

-preconditions (ie these must exist before the diagnosis is made)
1) apnoeic coma requiring ventilation (ie not breathing spontaneously)
2) known cause of (potentially) "irreversible" brain damage eg head injury or bleed into the brain

-exclusions (ie these must not exist at time of diagnosis since they mimic brainstem death)
1) hypothermia, which is body temperature < 35 degrees
2) hasn't had a (nervous sytem) depressant drug, including sedatives, morphine or other opiate, or a muscle relaxant
3) no metabolic derangements, including electrolytes, sodium, liver problems

-tests (these centre about central nervous function)
1) no pupillary reflexes to light (direct / indirect)
2) no corneal reflex (ie touching the eye with cotton wool doesn't cause blinking)
3) no response to pain to the face, which is a reflex involving certain cranial nerves
4) no "normal" eye movements in response to cold water injected into the ear, which should cause physiological nystagmus (eyes jerk)
5) no gag reflex
6) doesn't breathe for 10 min after being disconnected from the ventilator (oxygen is run via a tube into the trachea to keep the patient alive) - duration shortened if the patient becomes unstable before this (and put back on the ventilator)

if these criteria are all met, the patient is legally "braindead" (ie brainstem)

a second set of tests has to be done to confirm.

yeah, so to whoever asked me - there's your answer. it was too long to fit in a comment and you didn't leave an email address... so there you go.

*****
Oh, have I mentioned? I'm no longer part of the NHS. Time to invest in a tin mug. Preparations for homecoming are... in progress.

This is going to be... interesting.

Anyhow, after several hours in the sun dehydration began to set in, so I went to the gym. I love my gym, it has free drinks and newspapers, and cable TV. Uh, not that I visit expressly for the purpose of the facilities of course. oh nono.

At the gym, I had several slightly-less-boring-than-usual thoughts :

1) 2.4 km in 11:04, again. tomorrow, we'll crank the speed up a little... The strange thing today is I didn't break a sweat. Eh? Not at all. Don't get me wrong, it was still exhilarating agony as always... I love sprinting the last 200m just to get that slight buzz from the adrenaline, although I could do without the lungs-on-fire-head-exploding crap that follows after. But... no sweat. I must have been more dehydrated than I thought.

So 3L of rapid rehydration later (honest. I drank all the cola in the machines up. A lot of people were pissed off with me. giggle) I hit the weights. Which led to thought number

2) I think I must live near a modelling centre. Or a porn studio.
I haven't really mentioned this before, but the women who go to my gym are all like 6 feet tall with bodies that would make lara-croft turn a ghastly shade of green. And they have Good English features. I mean proper features. Cheekbones and noses. Not the slightly flattened features that predominate across the continent and probably result from years of darwinian selection and mebbe something to do with centuries of war and being clubbed in the faces by horny frenchman prior to rapacious ravishing. Going to the gym is like being in an issue of FHM except the models move. and bounce. Um, not that I'm staring or anything, you just can't help noticing. Also hard to ignore is that

3) the men don't look at the women. They look in the mirrors. Sometimes they look at each other. This has led me to conclude that they're all gay. They must be. I mean for chrissakes these women are Nordic Goddesses with bodies made for sin. okay, the majority of them are. And the closest the men get to chatting them up is the occasional "yawright?" before staring at their images and preening, before going back to lifting their puny weights.

4) That's right. The musclebound hunks at my gym either lift miserable little 5kg weights (what is THAT about???!?!) and preen, or else they do the manly 800kg thing and go UNNNNNNNNNNHHHHH while they do it, with all their veins popping out of their... everywhere... while the preeners goggle at them.

Note to world : You ogle, or you goggle. You do not oogle. I suppose you can google. heh. Sorry, I, pedant.

5) I wonder if Fitness First Singapore attracts the same crowd. Anyone?

So that was my boring day for y'all. I've gotta go hit the books tonight. Neoplasia and surgery. ug.

*****
Addendum

Oh I found this while doing the evading-study routine.

All I can say is : wimp.

There are girlies out there in this country with more street smarts than you.

It strikes me that while he's busy patting himself on the back for the life of luxury he lives in Singapore, he's wholly unable to function in the Rest of the World. Is that what we've created? A nation of spoilt brats who shudder in horror everytime they leave the country at how everywhere else is so.... eeeeyer... dirty, and smelly... and they have.... eeeeeeee... beggars.

's funny. I walk the streets everyday now, and I see the beggars. I ignore em. I've spoken to a few of them on the wards, a few hard luck cases of barristers reduced to homelessness by drugs, sure. And the vast majority I have no respect for - many do it because. They get welfare. They spend it on drink and drugs. They get money from dumb folks. They spend it on drink and drugs. They get mcdonald's surplus for supper. Or BK. Or sometimes even Pret. This is harsh, but many of them could break out of the rut if they really wanted to. But many of them... don't want to.

I see the crime. If you walk the right side of the street, keep your stuff deep in pockets that are hard to pick and your hands right in there with them, you're relatively safe. Maybe I've just led a charmed life so far. shrug.

I quote : "Westerners are unaware of the extent of their deprivation. On learning that I had flown in from Singapore, a taxi driver in rural England once asked what it was like there.

Anxious to steer clear of political controversy, I replied 'Very clean.' Swivelling round, the man demanded challengingly, 'Cleaner than London?'

Now I love London, its grace, dignity, noble buildings and hallowed traditions, but there is no denying that parts of this great city could learn a thing or two from Singapore in tidiness."

Laughs. He sees deprivation, I see diversity. I see deprivation in the artificial state we've created back home. The grand illusion of crimelessness, and racial harmony, and complete and utter cleanliness. Have any of you ever seen the cleaning squad that sweeps the streets at four in the morning? That's how it's done. That and the law, which threatens public humiliation and huge fines.

Don't get me wrong. It works for many people, and it even works for me sometimes. I like that Singapore's clean and green, although sometimes it bugs me that all the trees... lie... in exactly... the right place. You can almost imagine the blueprints sometimes, walking down the street - they include the trees and shrubs.
The thing is every city is like a person. It has it's own character, it's own beauty and it's own ugliness. Singapore's beauty is skin deep - and sometimes when I go home at look at it through my deprived eyes, it's so, so beautiful. It's a place to grow old, after having seen the world, when all the angst of youth and desires for freedom and expression have given way to the contented satisfaction of dying in your partner's arms. I don't think it's a very good place to grow up in though. They fuck with your mind. Singapore is a place for family and friends.
Every city has its upsides and downsides. Leaving Singapore and whinging about how everywhere else isn't Singapore-ish enough for you is like going out and meeting people and whining that they're not enough like your ex-girlfriend. Or in Mr Datta-Ray's case, probably Lee Kuan Yew. Laugh. Too tall. Not bald enough. Too soft spoken. Not sen... oops. freudian slip. hee hee.
You just gotta learn to accept the differences, and drink in the beauty of the individual. I mean it'd be like going to Rome and saying there aren't enough skyscrapers like Singapore. And failing to notice the beauties hidden in a city that existed millenia before your own. It'd be like travelling to Bruges and saying there are too many canals and bridges for your liking, unlike good old Singapore.

He loves london for it's grace and dignity? Fuck. I must not be living in the same london. Noble buildings? err. Dirty and grubby more like. I love the way they restore the buildings so they look just as dirty afterwards. Honest, they even replace bricks with dirty-looking bricks. I seen it.

Hallowed traditions. err. yeah. right.

Well, I'll say this : London's appeal is in it's diversity. In it's... everything. There is SO MUCH here. And to be honest, so much more. Part of the charm is the dirt. And part of it is the unexpected shininess of Canary Wharf. And part of it is the humanity, that involves everyone from prostitutes to paramedics. And not just ministers and celebrities. These people are really Alive. Fucked up, sure. A little bit sad, sure. But oh, so alive.

I pity Mr Sunanda K. Datta-Ray. He sees with his eyes wide shut.

But who can blame him. He's a product of the system. He either doesn't know better - or he's keeping his eyes closed on purpose. I guess everybody needs a ricebowl.

I love this bit : "The writer is a senior research fellow at the Institute of South-east Asian Studies. The views expressed here are his own. This article first appeared in Business Standard, a New Delhi newspaper."

Can anyone spell insular arse licker?
(paraphrased from http://singabloodypore.blogspot.com/)The views expressed herein are not my own. The writer is an unemployed bum lying on his bed. This article first appeared in a blog unworthy of note.