Happy 2011

Happy 2011!

Well my goals are still the same: Reach my goal of 10K per month!

I need to exercise too. I should start training for a healthier life since there's no more exam stress.

This year should be a good year for "tao hua" for rats. Hopefully I'm able to meet the one.

The cat which bit me

Dreams somehow hint about things that are going to happen. It's really mystical. I still remember how painful it was years after that.

This time I dreamt that my wallet was stolen. I checked and it said: "To dream that your wallet has been stolen, indicates that someone may be trying to take advantage of you. Perhaps someone has "stolen" your heart away."

I have to be careful.

A direction

The last few months, I was pondering what direction to take to success. Do I really want to do research in Sciences? I pondered and pondered. So to confirm my passion, I took an internship in a R&D company. And this time I had made my choice. I do not want to do research anymore. It is not a job that gives me satisfaction and monetary rewards. Hence I finally had my direction. A direction that must make me at least $10,000 a month consistently. I wrote this down to remind me to take this direction no matter how tough it is in the process towards my financial freedom.

I don't want to suffer like the rest of 80% of the people in the World.

I want to be able to travel whereever and whenever I want.

I want to give my parents happiness.

I want to give unfortunate children happiness.

I will make my $10,000 per month.

Gay club

It was my first time into a gay club with some of my friends. Man, it was really an eye opening experience! Singapore is really a heaven for gays! First off, I have nothing discriminating about gays. They want to lead the life that way, it's their choice. It's their happiness. Anyway, I noticed that they really look like any other normal guys in Singapore. Truly they don't look gay at all if you just see them on the streets. Also I noticed a very strong particular dress code they have: Shorts with a shirt or a colourful T-shirt! In Singapore, I think that style is a very common sight!

Are nice guys taken for granted?

I was waiting for a friend yesterday at the MRT station when I bumped into one of my seniors. We had a short chat and he told me that he just had a quarrel with his girlfriend. His girlfriend apparently wanted to focus studying for her exams but seems like she took it too far by refusing to do anything but study cause it breaks her focus even just talking to someone. Furthermore she seems very rude and cold when she replied back to my friend. So now he's trying to ignore her for 2 days. The funny thing is that he was afraid that the temptation to message her was too great, he actually left his phone at home to stop himself from messaging her. He thought that maybe he's been too nice to her that he has been taken for granted for being so attentive to his girlfriend.

He's a really nice person who always get good results in school and has a nice heart.

This has got me thinking, girls wanted attention from us, but when we give our 101% attention to them and being so nice to them, they just take us for granted. It can be vice versa. Just that I observed that these guys tend to be at the losing end of the stick. So are nice guys just desperate last chip for girls who had all the fun already and then when they want to settle down, they go for these types?

"Nice guys finish last". Does it sound good or bad? How come there's no nice girls finish last? What about nice girls? Is it because nice girls are always snapped up really fast or nice girls never finish at all? They just fade away?

50個女生想男生知道的心事

Been reading some of the books I had in the past. This book was a gift to me by a friend. Every time I read it, it brings to me chuckles as the writings and cute drawings in it are just so funny!

Let go... let go.... let's go!

My DNA

Something inspirational

Written by Adrian Tan, author of The Teenage Textbook (1988), was the
guest-of-honour at a recent NTU convocation ceremony. This was his
speech to the graduating class of 2008.
-----

I must say thank you to the faculty and staff of the Wee Kim Wee
School of Communication and Information for inviting me to give your
convocation address. It’s a wonderful honour and a privilege for me to
speak here for ten minutes without fear of contradiction, defamation
or retaliation. I say this as a Singaporean and more so as a husband.

My wife is a wonderful person and perfect in every way except one. She
is the editor of a magazine. She corrects people for a living. She has
honed her expert skills over a quarter of a century, mostly by
practising at home during conversations between her and me.

On the other hand, I am a litigator. Essentially, I spend my day
telling people how wrong they are. I make my living being
disagreeable.

Nevertheless, there is perfect harmony in our matrimonial home. That
is because when an editor and a litigator have an argument, the one
who triumphs is always the wife.

And so I want to start by giving one piece of advice to the men: when
you’ve already won her heart, you don’t need to win every argument.

Marriage is considered one milestone of life. Some of you may already
be married. Some of you may never be married. Some of you will be
married. Some of you will enjoy the experience so much, you will be
married many, many times. Good for you.

The next big milestone in your life is today: your graduation. The end
of education. You’re done learning.

You’ve probably been told the big lie that “Learning is a lifelong
process” and that therefore you will continue studying and taking
masters’ degrees and doctorates and professorships and so on. You know
the sort of people who tell you that? Teachers. Don’t you think there
is some measure of conflict of interest? They are in the business of
learning, after all. Where would they be without you? They need you to
be repeat customers.

The good news is that they’re wrong.

The bad news is that you don’t need further education because your
entire life is over. It is gone. That may come as a shock to some of
you. You’re in your teens or early twenties. People may tell you that
you will live to be 70, 80, 90 years old. That is your life
expectancy.

I love that term: life expectancy. We all understand the term to mean
the average life span of a group of people. But I’m here to talk about
a bigger idea, which is what you expect from your life.

You may be very happy to know that Singapore is currently ranked as
the country with the third highest life expectancy. We are behind
Andorra and Japan, and tied with San Marino. It seems quite clear why
people in those countries, and ours, live so long. We share one thing
in common: our football teams are all hopeless. There’s very little
danger of any of our citizens having their pulses raised by watching
us play in the World Cup. Spectators are more likely to be lulled into
a gentle and restful nap.

Singaporeans have a life expectancy of 81.8 years. Singapore men live
to an average of 79.21 years, while Singapore women live more than
five years longer, probably to take into account the additional time
they need to spend in the bathroom.

So here you are, in your twenties, thinking that you’ll have another
40 years to go. Four decades in which to live long and prosper.

Bad news. Read the papers. There are people dropping dead when they’re
50, 40, 30 years old. Or quite possibly just after finishing their
convocation. They would be very disappointed that they didn’t meet
their life expectancy.

I’m here to tell you this. Forget about your life expectancy.

After all, it’s calculated based on an average. And you never, ever
want to expect being average.

Revisit those expectations. You might be looking forward to working,
falling in love, marrying, raising a family. You are told that, as
graduates, you should expect to find a job paying so much, where your
hours are so much, where your responsibilities are so much.

That is what is expected of you. And if you live up to it, it will be
an awful waste.

If you expect that, you will be limiting yourself. You will be living
your life according to boundaries set by average people. I have
nothing against average people. But no one should aspire to be them.
And you don’t need years of education by the best minds in Singapore
to prepare you to be average.

What you should prepare for is mess. Life’s a mess. You are not
entitled to expect anything from it. Life is not fair. Everything does
not balance out in the end. Life happens, and you have no control over
it. Good and bad things happen to you day by day, hour by hour, moment
by moment. Your degree is a poor armour against fate.

Don’t expect anything. Erase all life expectancies. Just live. Your
life is over as of today. At this point in time, you have grown as
tall as you will ever be, you are physically the fittest you will ever
be in your entire life and you are probably looking the best that you
will ever look. This is as good as it gets. It is all downhill from
here. Or up. No one knows.

What does this mean for you? It is good that your life is over.

Since your life is over, you are free. Let me tell you the many
wonderful things that you can do when you are free.

The most important is this: do not work.

Work is anything that you are compelled to do. By its very nature, it
is undesirable.

Work kills. The Japanese have a term “Karoshi”, which means death from
overwork. That’s the most dramatic form of how work can kill. But it
can also kill you in more subtle ways. If you work, then day by day,
bit by bit, your soul is chipped away, disintegrating until there’s
nothing left. A rock has been ground into sand and dust.

There’s a common misconception that work is necessary. You will meet
people working at miserable jobs. They tell you they are “making a
living”. No, they’re not. They’re dying, frittering away their
fast-extinguishing lives doing things which are, at best, meaningless
and, at worst, harmful.

People will tell you that work ennobles you, that work lends you a
certain dignity. Work makes you free. The slogan “Arbeit macht frei”
was placed at the entrances to a number of Nazi concentration camps.
Utter nonsense.

Do not waste the vast majority of your life doing something you hate
so that you can spend the small remainder sliver of your life in
modest comfort. You may never reach that end anyway.

Resist the temptation to get a job. Instead, play. Find something you
enjoy doing. Do it. Over and over again. You will become good at it
for two reasons: you like it, and you do it often. Soon, that will
have value in itself.

I like arguing, and I love language. So, I became a litigator. I enjoy
it and I would do it for free. If I didn’t do that, I would’ve been in
some other type of work that still involved writing fiction – probably
a sports journalist.

So what should you do? You will find your own niche. I don’t imagine
you will need to look very hard. By this time in your life, you will
have a very good idea of what you will want to do. In fact, I’ll go
further and say the ideal situation would be that you will not be able
to stop yourself pursuing your passions. By this time you should know
what your obsessions are. If you enjoy showing off your knowledge and
feeling superior, you might become a teacher.

Find that pursuit that will energise you, consume you, become an
obsession. Each day, you must rise with a restless enthusiasm. If you
don’t, you are working.

Most of you will end up in activities which involve communication. To
those of you I have a second message: be wary of the truth. I’m not
asking you to speak it, or write it, for there are times when it is
dangerous or impossible to do those things. The truth has a great
capacity to offend and injure, and you will find that the closer you
are to someone, the more care you must take to disguise or even
conceal the truth. Often, there is great virtue in being evasive, or
equivocating. There is also great skill. Any child can blurt out the
truth, without thought to the consequences. It takes great maturity to
appreciate the value of silence.

In order to be wary of the truth, you must first know it. That
requires great frankness to yourself. Never fool the person in the
mirror.



I have told you that your life is over, that you should not work, and
that you should avoid telling the truth. I now say this to you: be
hated.

It’s not as easy as it sounds. Do you know anyone who hates you? Yet
every great figure who has contributed to the human race has been
hated, not just by one person, but often by a great many. That hatred
is so strong it has caused those great figures to be shunned, abused,
murdered and in one famous instance, nailed to a cross.

One does not have to be evil to be hated. In fact, it’s often the case
that one is hated precisely because one is trying to do right by one’s
own convictions. It is far too easy to be liked, one merely has to be
accommodating and hold no strong convictions. Then one will gravitate
towards the centre and settle into the average. That cannot be your
role. There are a great many bad people in the world, and if you are
not offending them, you must be bad yourself. Popularity is a sure
sign that you are doing something wrong.

The other side of the coin is this: fall in love.

I didn’t say “be loved”. That requires too much compromise. If one
changes one’s looks, personality and values, one can be loved by
anyone.

Rather, I exhort you to love another human being. It may seem odd for
me to tell you this. You may expect it to happen naturally, without
deliberation. That is false. Modern society is anti-love. We’ve taken
a microscope to everyone to bring out their flaws and shortcomings. It
far easier to find a reason not to love someone, than otherwise.
Rejection requires only one reason. Love requires complete acceptance.
It is hard work – the only kind of work that I find palatable.

Loving someone has great benefits. There is admiration, learning,
attraction and something which, for the want of a better word, we call
happiness. In loving someone, we become inspired to better ourselves
in every way. We learn the truth worthlessness of material things. We
celebrate being human. Loving is good for the soul.

Loving someone is therefore very important, and it is also important
to choose the right person. Despite popular culture, love doesn’t
happen by chance, at first sight, across a crowded dance floor. It
grows slowly, sinking roots first before branching and blossoming. It
is not a silly weed, but a mighty tree that weathers every storm.
You will find, that when you have someone to love, that the face is
less important than the brain, and the body is less important than the
heart.

You will also find that it is no great tragedy if your love is not
reciprocated. You are not doing it to be loved back. Its value is to
inspire you.

Finally, you will find that there is no half-measure when it comes to
loving someone. You either don’t, or you do with every cell in your
body, completely and utterly, without reservation or apology. It
consumes you, and you are reborn, all the better for it.

Don’t work. Avoid telling the truth. Be hated. Love someone.

What's my passion?

When I was young, I wanted to be a scientist/inventor so I can come up with many wonderful ideas and inventions. I was inspired by historical scientist and inventors like Graham Bell, Alexander Fleming, Edison, Einstein etc. It was amazing to read about how they came up with such ideas. It seemed so fun!

But as I grew up, when I realized the real world of science isn't as glorious as it was written in the books. Stories heard from friends who are working now in the field were all horror stories of slave drivers whipping their slaves to work. Just when you thought that PhD is a very big thing, PhD is just nothing in the Science field. You are just a higher end factory worker, forever in the lab churning out data.

Then it just dawn on you that future seems very bleak. As you grow older, money starts to become the number one priority. Whenever you are looking for a job, we will see which one pays the highest. Unfortunately, being a researcher does not pay well in most company judging by the long hours to pay ratio. Likelyhood of promotions are low. Another horror story is that a local WORLD class institute gave increment that didn't even beat the inflation rate!

The world is unfair too. You do not really get recognized by your hard work, but rubbing shoulders with the big bosses gets you up the rank. This may be a fact for all corporate worlds. That's one lesson I learnt from a director who came to give a talk and I spoke to him to understand his career path.

In the end, I still have to ask myself. What is my passion? I don't know really now if I want to continue down the rabbit hole. Somehow the passion is diluted. I now hunger for something else. But that one can't be a full time job, but a ongoing sideline full of risks that gives either extra income or losses.

On the crossroads again.

Orgo at the Esplanade

As an adventurer, I was thinking of what new bar to try out. I suddenly remembered hearing a new bar at the roof terrace at the Esplanade.

Orgo.

The bar had a very nice ambiance, classy, opened air. At first I was seated at the back of the bar where the Esplanade's exhausts are. It was too hot and I requested immediately to change seats. We got our change of seats to the front which was much better! Cooling and nice. What I was interested in were their cocktails. Looking at their menu I found the cocktails are very unique and so I ordered a apple and shiso martini cocktail. They had a mixologist to mix your unique blend of cocktail. Presentation of the cocktails were very nice. And I found my drink very smooth and fruity.

Doesn't this look like a work of art?

Other than drinks I tried one of their food menu, Potato a la Dauphinoise, which is slow-baked slices of potatoes with cream & cheese.

I liked the cheesy flavour which goes well with the potatoes. It's nice as a snack when feeling peckish.

The price is on the high side, $18 for a cocktail. But I feel that it's worth the experience and it's a place to bring a girl for a chat.

Orgo
8 Raffles Avenue, #04-01, Esplanade-Theaters on the Bay, Roof Terrace,
Singapore 038982
http://www.orgo.sg/

What hurts the most?

Words that hurt the most, is when your loved ones lied to you.

26

26. Past a quarter of a century. Kinda fast when you have grown up. When I was 16, 26 seemed so far away. Now I'm 26. Wow time flies.

Thanks to my dear friends who wished me happy birthday.

I'm happy, yet I feel empty. Being sentimental has its weakness. I remembered my birthday wish last year. It never came true.

How to move on?

I thought I've moved on, but all that memories came back to hunt me again............
Why happy memories can be so regretful?

Happy Tiger Year

Happy Chinese New Year! Wish all a happy and prosperous new year!

Charlie's Corner

Had dinner at Charlie's Corner yesterday night. It is located at Changi Village hawker center. Basically it serves western food and beers. The food was ok but what interest me was the wide variety of foreign beers and alcohols they hold. They had beers from many parts of the world!
This is page 1

Two pages of beers! And that's not all, some beers are not even on the menu. Just talk with the bartender, there are more surprises.

My friend ordered a Japanese liquor that kinda interest me. It's very light and sweet tasting. Very suitable for ladies. It can be served in many different ways: shot, on the rocks, with many ice or warm. Nice, though it's expensive at $29 per bottle.

A Tiger Year

4th of February is the start of the Tiger year. According to the Chinese calender, the new year doesn't start on Chinese New Year. In fact it's always earlier. Now in the tiger year, what is to be expected of the rest of the horoscope. Well, since many of my readers are born in the year of the rat, I'll talk about what's the luck of the rat in 2010.

Rat
This year is going to be a tough year for the rat cause there is no positive stars for us. Hence there will be no helpful people to help us in times of need this year. We are on our own. Rats this year will spend a lot too on either needs or wants, so have to control spending excessively. So this year is going to be tough, as we need to work extra hard just to achieve the same results compared to others.

Sapporo Snow Festival

Sapporo Snow Festival 2010 is going to start soon from 5 Feb to 11 Feb. I have never been to Japan yet but this Sapporo snow festival sure caught my eye. Some tourists went for the 2009 festival and they posted really really nice and pictures. Oh it looks so romantic at night!

The website can be found here.

Hmm Happy juice

Had a tze char dinner with some friends at the HK cafe in Balestier. Liked the pork liver sausage. Very different from the lup cheung. And also satisfying my craving for some happy juice.

Got to taste the chocolate wine. This one is flavoured with orange so it got a "gum" kind of taste. When you sip it, it has a smooth separation of 3 different taste, first the alcohol, then the chocolate and finally a smooth orangy taste. Careful though, it has 25% alcohol content!

The New iPad

Apple just announced their newest product in the line - the iPad. Last night, everyone was anticipating what new product Apple is going to produce. At 2 am (Singapore time), the iPad was announced by Steve Jobs. It's a tablet book, designed for surfing and reading ebooks. Basically it looks like a enlarged version of iPhone. Somehow, it was a disappointment for many as the iPad had less features than the iPhone. Apple is gonna sell it cheap for US$499, which I think is to penetrate the market and get users to buy. I wonder will it sell like hotcakes?

The first thing that comes to my mind - the iPad. Sounds like a new sanitary pad product from Apple.

Woman looking for nonexistent love (Part II)

What do women want?
According to a survey by the Singapore Development Unit (SDU) of 200 single women, over 80% of the women expected the following of men:

- Pay for dates
- Escort them home
- Take initiative in celebrating special occasions like birthdays
- Dress up for special occasions

Nearly a quarter expected men to carry their bags for them, and half consider gentlemanly gestures like opening doors necessary.

What do men want?
A poll of what 85 men expected of their ladies was carried out by Straits Times Urban news supplement revealed the following:

- 78% ranked looks as an important feature they look out for in their date
- A girlfriend must not stop the man from socialising with his girl friends
- A girlfriend must also enjoy going out with his male friends