hong pao river - dengmi

hongpao river - looks like becoming smaller and a non-event - not that the people attending the event were lesser, but the stalls were lesser and the area it covered was much smaller.

but the dengmi corner still very much attended.

chinese dengmi is very presumptuous, meaning it presumes that you are familiar with a lot of things around you, ie you are "in context" with the riddle - just like 文言文 chinese; you admire how clever the old scholars were, they do not have to be explicit in what they said, everything they said, wrote was implicit, implied and summarised, using much less expressions and qualifying words. perhaps as the scholars pointed, spoken language evolved from the need to communicate, but written language was mainly for recording. the earliest recordings were done in simple systems of knots, strokes.... human, ancient or modern by nature is lazy; would like to do any task in the shortest way. so instead of tying many knots, or carving many strikes for an event, they would go for the fewest. just to record down the important points of the event, and ignore all the bells and whistles - eg, when the king won a war - just record down king won war - when, and where, against who...

but arts is difference, art was engaged to magnifying certain aspects of the event, or glorify certain aspect of the event - for the above example, the artist(s) would have drawn the battle, with details of the army, of both sides, elaborately...

here a riddle waiting to be solved : since the stone ages, human's capacity for thots and ingenuity to take control of his own life has not change much - ie ancient people were as smart as us - how come we have the impression that we are smarter than our ancestors?

mood - it's there since

feelings
as if there's
a lot of
nonsensical
irrelevant
thots
racing across
the
little skull

and
trying to make
sense
of the whole thing
of
being

life - brushing teeth

every morning and evening, he brushes his teeth, every so often, he has the thot that he just did it moments ago. life ticks by ever so fast. day in, day out, the only event that he remembers he has ever done is brushing the teeth. other activties do not register.

indian food - $ up

he ordered one mutton, one egg and one bitterguord, the indian lady seller said, "$4."
"$4? should be $3.50."
"no, $4. the mutton increase $0.50 to $2.50 now. the other indian shop already selling at #3.00."

tradition - the gamblers

played mahjong. not big, just 10-20 cents. 4 rounds, already very tired. with the family, the tradition goes on.

sengkang-punggol lrt - the kids

	happy for who they are what they do how they think.... like travelling on the rail the route is set stations are fixed timings are planned life may be so boring but like white paper they soak up whatever along the way soon they will venture out to the world little do they know it's only their transit to another world

if - a gambler's mindset

the thunder clapped, and the rain began to fall, first like needles, then thicker and thicker. somewhere in the island was going to accumulate more water than it could hold, and be inundated. he walked from the barrage building end across the barrage, along the bank of the yet-to-complete garden next to the marina gold course, to tanjung rhu...

he climbed up the benjamin-sheare bridge and the view was so much different from that of 15 years ago, where there's no flyer and no sands... now the flyer is grounded firm in bay area, the sands sucks in all bucks from those gamblers from near and far...

if, one day singapore island disappear from the face of the earth, with the rise of sea level, you may not see the flyer, but the sands standing tall above the sea level...

- symbolizing, that gambling pays, only if you own a casino.

two rainbows - two mindsets

place : sin ming ave, singapore
time : 6.58pm 21 jan 2012
camera : pentax K-x
lens: DAL 18-55mm

after a shower, when the sky was still gloomy, two rainbows appeared out of heavy air. he had just wound down his day of picture taking from the barrage, and was nicely surprise to have spotted the golden-hour scene with the 2 colorful bridges across the sky.

he bumped into a lady. she smiled at him and said, " i wish i am as lucky as you, with a dslr at hand.... not one but two rainbows..."

"sure you are, use your handphone camera."

"no, it wouldn't capture the beauty of the moment."

"so which camera would? you think mine could?"

"surely better than mine."

"don't judge a camera by its brand. you have one, use it."

"no. i rather don't disappoint myself."

- and the rainbows faded away one by one....

morris chang - an ordinary folk that succeeded

sort of finished reading the auto biography of morris chang, the tsmc chairman and ceo.

the book is telling straight forward story just like that summarised in the wikipedia page. no juicy details or things not expected of an apparently straight man.

but life has been good to him so far. he could have persisted in his earlier ambition of becoming a literary writer, and achieved fame, though not that common. if he did, that will be a story of persistence or perseverance winning over pragmatism or expediency. but his father told him otherwise, and he followed.

so life is whatever you make it to be. and along the way, as long as you strike hard at it whether tracking on whichever course, you should make it with luck.

man propose, God dispose

mandai camp - book in/out

oafter commission, and a couple of days of off, he booked into the mandai in mandai road in the morning. and booked out the same day.

causeway point - lohei

another year, another lohei. this time in dianxiaoer, causeway point. the mall's renovation still not completed. looks ugly and no mood to shop. but the makan place was fullhouse. still could not figure out how the set dinner could cost $498? ok, they had abalones, fish, sea cucumber, but dishes like duck, fried rice, vegi, mushrooms, prawns, venison, spring rolls shld cost less than $200.

but since it's their pre-new year feast, he did not ask.

new year here, eat and eat... bakwa, mandrins, cuttle-fish, pistacio, prawn rolls..... too much carbo, too much sugar...

cannot sleep well.

birthdays - simple and happy

small celebration for 2 birthdays falling on the same day. ate misua, tiramisu cake, and receiving presents.

MAY GOD BLESS ALL!

zhang tachien - the master's life

finished reading book briefly talking about his life, not in details, just like his "spraying ink" art, impressionistic and to the point.

the point is to be master - have to start from the very basic.

ocs commissioning parade - why not?

the dinner was so-so, but sltc hwang was doing his best to be the host of the table; letting the commissioned cadets and their parents have their turns first to every dish, answering every questions the commissioned cadets threw at him, and keeping the parents feel at home with full military courteousness and honor. the commissioning of the the 83rd batch of officer cadet officers started at military time 1741, when the sun was at its full power throwing myriads of singeing rays more and more directly to the face as the minutes ticked by. the marching, the president inspection, the sword of honor presentation, the presidential speech, the march pass-by and the throwing of caps.... it was a climax of an experience for the cadets. culminating from 9 months of tough and taxing training. when the parents of other cadet officers yikedee-yadeed of their army times when striking up conversations with sltc hwang in the dinner table, he could only shut up and listen, never being an army boy himself. the army demands discipline and order - does that choke off the the young minds of its creativity. but military service in isreal and taiwan is compulsory, they produce the world's most entrepreneur and start-ups.... so why not singapore?