!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"> Past. Present. Future: August 2006

Past. Present. Future

Wednesday, August 30, 2006

tired once again

i realized that i can’t do much else wif coursework on my mind.
exactly 2 years ago, i ponned teacher’s day celebration for coursework. n i’m doing it again.

tommorrow’s thursday. the last day i’m going to give to coursework. give it my best shot.
start by doing what's necessary; then do what's possible; and suddenly you are doing the impossible.
i’ve learnt that nothing is impossible only if we try.

Sunday, August 27, 2006

zzzz

I hope it ends soon. this whole has been seeing me skipping a multitude of unimportant and unproductive – or so i think – lectures and tutorials. free periods unfortunately wasted on this thing called coursework (of COURSE u WORK). one whole week of this has passed. this has taken its toll on dat darn bronchitis as the week drew to a feverish climatic pitch. fri it was to the doctor’s n back to sch to continue painting again.

sat. came to sch. sat down, took my palette n just started working from 8 to 8. came home. n after washing up n stuff, i only rmbered waking up without knowing how i even ended up on the bed. now that we got our prep boards, more that half of sunday was practically devoted to arranging n touching up the prep boards. i practically have spent my entire weekend on art once again. n yet when i look back, i haf no idea how putting together the prep boards took me so long. even now, they remain incomplete, with bits n pieces here n there waiting to be filled in. same thing goes for the actual canvas itself, which needs at least 2 more sessions to wrap up, discounting touch up. this sense of dissatisfaction once again. i have squandered away much of my preparation time for the prelims, although not for nothing i suppose.

monday and thursday its back to coursework once again. it has to end this week.

on a lighter note, fri met the uob pple, who brougth me to the frame shop to see my works for solo exhibition replete wif their splendid and cute frames. my my those babies look good.

Monday, August 21, 2006

some dreams.

just came back from sch. an utterly spent and long day. drained n tired from working on coursework the whole day. no mood to do any h/w or stuff right now, brain has 58% shut downed, so might as well blog.

i’ve been having rather strange dreams lately. i remember the one i had on friday. it was kinda like a nightmare, an emotional roller coaster ride. to put it simply, i dreamt that a close friend of mine’s father passed away. n at the funeral, he said something (after which, right now, i found really strange)...something abt we should all say good things about his father. then another bit i remembered was that we both walked across the road to this kopitiam, the building that looked somewhat like this old colonial structure along victoria street today. n he was in tears... i had no idea if any of the above made any sense. dreams r supposed to b irrational anyway. sadness n melancholy. i guess it all adds to the mystery.the inexplicable r sometimes best explained through irrationalism and random thought i guess.

then yesterday i dreamt i looked out of my study room window n surprise surprise, i saw mars almost as visible and big as the moon. it was a cloudless night sky riddled wif countless stars n the sky also had that purple, mulitcolour cloud kind of thingy u see in those orion nebula photographs. i suddenly realized that an eclipse was happening real fast right b4 my eyes. it lasted only a few seconds. n taking my camera, i managed to only take one photo of it b4 it ended. it was an describable feeling of awe, beauty n serenity looking at this dreamlike, very colourful and eventful night sky i tell u.

u noe, i don't noe why we always wake up forgetting most of our dreams. after all, they r but another product of our brains at work. if we can remember useless stuff like which is the most generous canteen food aunty? or what are the factors affectinf interest rate? then surely, we cannot b deprived of the insights of the subconscious mind? but maybe its coz we r denied of such access that the subconscious serves its function. i don't noe. i'm just realli tired n talking nonsense. better pop to dreamland again b4 i start hallucinating anything funny. this has never happened b4, but oh well, its better to b safe than sorry!

Sunday, August 20, 2006

i see the place, although it is night.

friday i was so tired that i just glided like a sceptre to my bed n pop! i was in dreamland.

sat was novena at 9 then godpa whisked me straight to school after that. the first time i ever came to rice sack on a saturday. painting the whole day from 10 to 7 in the evening. i wd haf liked to continue later into the night, but mr lee was going home n me n karen n him were the last souls left in school by then already. so i just had to leave my work undone, til we meet again. i was hoping to haf accomplished more actually, given that i burnt half on my weekend on coursework. but alas, art making is something u can’t hasten without compromising on the quality, n noeing the perfectionist that i am, it just didn’t work out.

i have 5 more days to finish this massive, laborious n tedious undertaking called coursework. this week its going to b late days (even nights, if the situation calls for it) once again, n striking off some realli useless lectures n tutorials off my timetable.

i see a safe journey. i hope for a safe return.

Monday, August 14, 2006

after the long nat hols


password


took me a hell lot of trouble trying to set up the labtop n stuff to start work on my 2nd canvas. the password part was especially troublesome, but i eventually got round that. n no the comic strip bears no resemblance to any person, living or dead.

haha to b honest here, i still can’t get over gilbert lee’s comment that i was smart. today he shoot us wif some econs graph n tell us to explain why it didn’t make sense. i tried to hantam, n it turned out to b correct! the first time i got an academic brain teaser correct. n i guess he really rubbed it in by saying that it took adrian a longer time to figure the ans out, but hey, i think glee’s just jumping to conclusions. intelligence is relative. doesn’t mean dat i can make a wild guess at some abstract concept that turns out correct means i noe stuff. doesn’t work that way. but anyway just typed this in for posterity’s sake. for the moment, it wd b wiser to put this aside. pride is poison.

today was a long art day. its back to doing coursework in sch, which also has its benefits as compared to staying at home i guess. but that means its back to going for long art lessons, staying in the art room til apollo in his chariot descends beneath the horizon.

the job of the artist is always to deepen the mystery.

i’ve watched 2 really epic movies recently. kundun (a scorsese film abt the life of dalai lama) n gandhi (yes that one wif ben kingsley as the mahatma himself) really takes ur breath away. still working on the gandhi though, its a whopping 3 half hrs long! though the movies r a little dated, that doesn’t make them ‘less better’ than the recent blockbusters. the truly gd movies r those that stand the test of time. they still blow u away wif elaborate sets decribing an exotic land n culture, engage u wif a thoroughly solid plot that has many dimensions to it, n they make their mark on u wif their memorable lines n enduring messages of compassion n courage. gandhi’s memorable line has stuck to my head. “An eye for an eye makes the world go blind.”

other than that, there’s always the prelims n As to look forward to. exams ARE SO FUN! but glee’s tips sound realli helpful. i guess i’ll haf to force myself to try them out. soon.

Thursday, August 10, 2006

corporate opulence

after that morning swim, which is my sole amulet against falling to bronchitis again, it was off to see the uob pple. they wanted to update me on stuff. my entire day gone. they brought me to also see my window painting. its now residing in a sitting room of the millions that exsist in the uob tower plaza 2. so now i’ll noe where it is if i plan to steal it next time.


where window rests peacefully



these r one of the rare moments that u see the central business district so alive wif pple in business suits, ties, dark shiny hair, n for the ladies, slim figures who don the traditional black. (i’m doing this at expense of generalization. but that’s the way it is!) welcome to the business world. as i am guided through the nooks n crannies of the uob complex that only seasoned fits will haf knowledge to, i could haf sworn i walked past an ink painting by lui kang n a still-life by georgette chen gracing its polished marble walls, lost amongst the thousands in the uob collection. corporate opulence. realli.

apparently, the meeting room wasn’t in the main building itself, but in one of the shophouses along boat quay owned by uob. looks like a really pleasant working space. but as june the uob lady assures me, nice describes the workplace itself, but not the environment.

welcome to the real world. all the insights here n there i gathered made me realize that we students still live a relatively sheltered life. as much as i perenially complain abt the rice sack n the aep programme, i can b sure that i will miss school.

njc, despite its many imperfections, still remain a place where i believe i "belong". u can still trust pple around u to help u when u need it, n i guess we've so far never realli experienced the real kind of backstabbing n office politics u so often see in the workplace. out there, i guess its a machiavellian struggle up the corporate ladder.

from now til the prelims, i guess i'll haf to treasure my last days in njc.

Friday, August 04, 2006

friday potpourri of sorts

this week's been kinda hectic. a packed life is realli an understatement here in njc. there's coursework to pia, maths hw to catch up wif, n then theres the econs thing. n seeing how my cts crashed n burnt, i guess i haf to realli buck up.

on another note, i sure do look realli good in lasallian green, man. this was me at syf prize presentation dis yr.

me in blazer


n i recently came across this article, which i think perfectly illustrates why.....

- cj does all his anaylsis abt almost everything under the sun
- or why jonathan always find explanations wrt to perculiar behaviours unique to some teachers
- or why n ESPECIALLY, this qing lun (HA! caught u reading this!!) always have funny theories ready to answer any question u shoot him. qing lun, this article will be self discoverational (hah i just invented a new word). really. do read on.....

“The Male Answer Syndrome”

In the animal kingdom, males exhibit what is known as "display behavior" in order to attract females and to ward off rival males. They thrust out their chests, ruffle their plumage, and generally try to appear more impressive than they really are. On nature shows, this is comic. It appears comic, too, when it shows up among humans: the guy in the Camaro with all the gold chains, say, or Vanilla Ice's haircut. It has been discovered that display behavior is much more common among humans than had been previously believed.

Have you ever wondered why:
Men who have never been west of Kentucky can tell you about the mentality of the Japanese?
Men who can't pay their credit-card bills have a plan for dealing with the national debt?
Men who aren't on speaking terms with their families know how to achieve peace in the Middle East?
Men who flunked high-school physics can explain what went wrong at NASA?
Men who haven't had a date in six months know what women really want?
Try an experiment: Ask my friend Jeff, who spends his weekends fixing up his Harley and watching female mud wrestling, how he thinks political autonomy will affect the economies of the Baltic states.

His brow will furrow; he will purse his lips thoughtfully. "It's interesting that you mention that...," he will begin, and then he will come up with something-probably nothing remotely feasible, but something.

This behavior-the chronic answering of questions regardless of actual knowledge is known as Male Answer Syndrome. The compulsion to answer varies from person to person, but few men are happy saying, "I don't know." They prefer, "That's not what's important here."

They try not to get bogged down by petty considerations, such as, "Do I know anything about this subject?" or "Is what I have to say interesting?" They take a broad view of questions, treating them less as requests for specific pieces of information than as invitations to expand on some theories, air a few prejudices, and tell a couple of jokes. Some men seem to regard life as a talk show on which they are the star guest. If you ask, "What is the capital of Peru?" they hear, "So tell us a bit about your early years, Bob."

Sometimes this expansiveness is appealing. If you ask a woman, "Why did Madonna go on the David Letterman Show?" she will simply shrug helplessly, acknowledging that some things are simply unknowable. A man, on the other hand, will come up with a few theories (she has the same agent? overdose of Prozac?). Men have the courage and inventiveness to try to explain the inexplicable.

But Male Answer Syndrome (MAS) is by no means harmless, as my friend Pauline discovered at the age of 8. She had found that eating ice cream made her teeth hurt and asked her father whether Eskimos had the same problem. "No," he said. "They have rubber teeth." Pauline repeated this information in a geography lesson and found herself the laughing stock of the class. That was how she learned that a man, even if he is your own father, would rather make up an answer than admit to his ignorance.

Later in life women run into the same problem: Men can speak with such conviction that women may be fooled into thinking that they actually know what they're talking about. (EUDORA, THINK QING LUN AGAIN.)

My friend Jeff (he of the Harley) is full of expertise on subjects as diverse as global warming and Elvis' current whereabouts. In reality, however, he is an expert at only one thing: making very little knowledge go a very long way. For him answering is a game, and not knowing what he's talking about just adds to the thrill.

Expressing skepticism can be highly inflammatory. Even mild-mannered Abe Lincoln types may react to, "Are you sure about that?" as a vicious slur on their manhood and find themselves backing up a ludicrous assertion with spurious facts.

Many women actively encourage male answering behavior. There is in the female correlative condition known as the Say What? Complex. Women who behind closed doors expound eloquently on particle physics may be found, in male company, gaping at the news that the earth is round.

MAS tends to be mild until puberty; boys begin to speak with authority on matters of foreign policy at the same time they start to grow facial hair. And how MAS developed: Since killing wooly mammoths and attacking enemies with rocks are now frowned upon, and since shirts open to the navel are not appropriate in every social situation, men prove their masculinity by concocting elaborate theories about football.

Growing awareness of MAS has led some to call for a moratorium on all male-female conversation. This is alarmist. But care should be taken. Women must remind themselves that if a man tells them something particularly interesting there is a good chance that it is particularly untrue.

Tuesday, August 01, 2006

random stuff

well here i am. my conspicuous absence has left this space stagnating alittle, but can’t b helped. nothing to blog abt, no post. don’t want to waste my time.

some random thought: if u try to fail, and succeed, which have u done?

lol. did this rather interesting test. if hell exsists, i guess hell isn’t that bad after all! haha

Fifth Level of Hell

The river Styx runs through this level of Hell, and in it are punished the wrathful and the gloomy. The former are forever lashing out at each other in anger, furious and naked, tearing each other piecemeal with their teeth. The latter are gurgling in the black mud, slothful and sullen, withdrawn from the world. Their lamentations bubble to the surface as they try to repeat a doleful hymn, though with unbroken words they cannot say it. Because you lived a cruel, vindictive and hateful life, you meet your fate in the Styx.


my my, dante sure does have an imagination. n bear in mind in those days he didn't have gundam n cs. just look at this.

"This level is also home to the wood of the suicides- stunted and gnarled trees with twisting branches and poisoned fruit. At the time of final judgement, their bodies will hang from their branches. In those branches the Harpies, foul birdlike creatures with human faces, make their nests. "

n my fav part's this

"Sinners here are frozen deep in the ice, faces out, eyes and mouths frozen shut."

very evocative n atmospheric right? now heres wad i'd call black beauty.

The Dante's Inferno Test has banished you to the Fifth Level of Hell!
Here is how you matched up against all the levels:
LevelScore
Purgatory (Repenting Believers)Low
Level 1 - Limbo (Virtuous Non-Believers)High
Level 2 (Lustful)Low
Level 3 (Gluttonous)Low
Level 4 (Prodigal and Avaricious)Moderate
Level 5 (Wrathful and Gloomy)Very High
Level 6 - The City of Dis (Heretics)Moderate
Level 7 (Violent)High
Level 8- the Malebolge (Fraudulent, Malicious, Panderers)High
Level 9 - Cocytus (Treacherous)Low

Take the Dante's Inferno Hell Test