Break resolutions into smaller ones in this 2008

The last day of 2007 has gone by, and we tuck another year of life experience under our belt. Behold, people: you are one year older than you were on 1 Jan 2007, and ahead of you is a fresh new slate, just waiting to be carved on. The slate officially starts on 2 January though (we all know the 1st is the day where people are nursing their hangovers from the count-down party).

The New Year is also a time for everybody to make resolutions. But since not many people actually meet their targets and are right now regretting their deflated willpower, how about restricting your resolutions for this year to the Small Little Things that would help make your life better. How do you do it?

Say for example, that you have been wishing that you could wake up at 4am daily for your morning run for the 6th year. Obviously, if you are going to be making that resolution again this year, I’m not wrong to guess that you haven’t succeeded. So instead of making that resolution again, how about you try resolving to make a slightly different one?

For instance, you could resolve to set your alarm clock to 4am every evening before bedtime, and place it on the table at the far away from your bed. Then, resolve to fold your running singlet and shorts neatly beside the alarm clock. Place your running shoe neatly on top of the pile (remember to place a plastic bag underneath so that you don’t dirty your clothes. That way, when your alarm clock rings in the morning, you have no choice but to get out of bed to silence the clock. But wait! What do you see when you reach the alarm clock?

Yes! Your running attire neatly folded next to the alarm clock! That was what you had resolved to do for the past 6 years, and hadn’t gotten around to doing at all!

There are times when we have problems accomplishing certain things, because the entire project looms in front of you like Goliath. Doing little steps like what I’ve mentioned just now helps you to start dismantling the machine by little edible parts that won’t seem like much at the beginning - but eventually will reduce the Goliath into nothing more than screws and metal plates. As historians like to mention, “Rome wasn’t built in ONE day!”

Take a close look at your past resolutions: are they bigger tasks that you can make easier to accomplish by breaking them down? Once you have done that, list these little tasks as your resolutions for the new year, and pledge yourself to follow through them. If you run into trouble following up on these smaller objectives, you might need some motivation (http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2006/02/whats-your-motivation-threshold/).

Have a Happy New Year!

2008 Resolutions

It’s that time of the year again and, being a list freak like I am, one of my greatest joys at this time of the year has always been to do up resolutions lists. While I might not actually end up fulfilling most of the lists, at least they’re a guideline right? In any case, it’s pretty fun to come up with them so here’s my 2008 NSF Resolutions, catered specifically for my army side.

1. Pass my IPPT – right now I just have to work on my pull-ups and maybe my SBJ and that should be settled.
2. Subsequently, be promoted to CPL – only if I can pass my IPPT, though. Right now, I’m just looking forward to my promotion to LCP rank, if only for the bit of extra salary each month.
3. Get a silver for IPPT – this seems a pretty distant dream as of yet (the gold award is, realistically speaking, pretty much out of my reach forever) but I’m hoping to clear it by the end of my first year in June because a. there’s a monetary incentive and b. it really sucks to be unfit in the army.
4. Pass my SOC – this seems to be wishful thinking for now but hey, one can dream right?
5. To be able to comprehensively understand my vehicle, including all the major (and most of the minor) components, how it operates and how to troubleshoot any potential problems – Didn’t really pay that much attention during my training period so I just managed to chalk a pass but if I’m going to be using that vehicle from now on I need to make sure I know everything about it.
6. To complete my ACCT – ICCT was fun but I screwed up during the final test, barely passing. Hope that won’t happen again.
7. Get a marksman for shoots – Again, being the bobo soldier I am, I barely passed my ATP but hey, anything can happen right?

That’s about it for now. I think I’ll be pretty happy if I can complete some of these resolutions in the coming year, the first being the most important. What are some of your resolutions?

2007 In Retrospect

2007 has been a pretty eventful (and wonderful) year for me. I went from a polytechnic student struggling to finish his final year assignments in time, to becoming an official diploma graduate, to being a bum for a few months slacking at home to being a full-time national serviceman.

And, within that period of becoming a full-time national serviceman, I have gone from a (almost) hairless recruit adapting to army life in Orion company in BMTC (“cause we are the best, in the SAF”) to a trainee at Keat Hong Camp learning to drive a vehicle and maintain it to become an official AFV operator and admin assistant in my camp’s battalion HQ.

If anything, the year has been a pretty exciting one full of change.

As you might have read from my very first few posts here several months back, I was filled with trepidation at the thought of entering national service, unaware of what to expect and not being sure I really wanted to know.

Fast forward six months (as it only been six months? Feels like forever) and life has more or less settled, or so I hope. I’ve finally gotten used to the regimented life that being an NSF represents and have even gotten to partially enjoy my PT, being mindful of all the benefits that constant and consistent exercise brings with it.

While I have gone through a few rough patches here and there in NS (seriously, who hasn’t? It’s what I’d think the whole experience would be, and should be, about.), I have to say that my experience so far has been pretty pleasant. A fantastic company (and great friends) in my BMT phase, an exciting trainee phase in my new camp and now a pretty decent vocation and job scope in my new company. Plus, I even get nights out (once I can finally pass my IPPT. Darn those pull ups!)

2007 has been a pretty good year for me as an NSF. Here’s hoping 2008 will be even better!

Boogeyman 2

The Boogeyman 2 is a typical horror movie designed to scare one silly, with the extra bonus of violence, including way too much blood and gore to appeal to the masses, dark figures popping out from the shadows to give anyone a fright, and of course to catch up with the modern kind of movies, a small sex scene.

What exactly is the movie about?

Laura Porter checks into a mental hospital after her brother persuades her to, as she has an irrational fear of the boogeyman (Bogyphobia). All the other patients in the hospital each have their own distinct fears as well, ranging from Lygophobia to Mysophobia. After a set period of time, every patient and staff, except Laura end up dying (horribly), with their manner of death connected with their fears. For example (a slight spoiler), Niki, a woman afraid of gaining weight (Pocrescophobia), ends up being hooked to a machine which continually pumps air into her, until she explodes, albeit messily. Like almost all horror movies, Laura eventually ends up being the only one left alive, as the rest of the inmates in the hospital forget the cardinal rule of not splitting up in a horror movie (and end up dying), and she eventually manages to escape the Boogeyman, with a surprising double twist at the end of the movie.

If you ignore the inconsistencies in the movie, and the lack of a direct plot, it’s quite an okay movie to watch to kill some time, if you’re above 18 years old. Again, something which limits the audience, as the scene that warrants the M18 rating does not contribute at all to the movie.

Otherwise, it’d be better to skip the movie and watch something else instead.

If you do decide to watch this movie, just note that it’s not for people that suffer from Hemophobia and Bogyphobia. For this Boogeyman doesn’t disappear when you put a blanket over its head.

Taxi Hikes

Phew! Anybody who’s in a similar situation will definitely get a rude shock. At least, Roy got one. If Roy’s grandmother were one of the few sporty grandmas, we would have just walked down to the eatery. The cost would have been a staggering $0.00.

Ok, that we took the cab during the evening rush hour was a definite money leecher, add to that the heavy traffic at our area that actually backed us up at each traffic light for at least 2 rounds per junction - however, it was still too expensive for a 10-minute stew in start-stop traffic. As we inched up another spot at the right-turn lane, the numbers jumped merrily. My phone rang. I pushed the answer button. There it goes again. Mum asked where we were (she was supposed to come over directly from her workplace). Wait, was that another 20 cents into the meter? I told Mum that we were stuck in a wallet-bleeding 4-wheeled box. When I put down my phone, I thought I saw the meter jump by another 20 cents. I came to the conclusion that taking a taxi is way more expensive than calling someone from your mobile phone.

So, all in all: a trip of around 2 kilometres costs $4.60. That is, if you are travelling during the new off-peak period. As taxis are being re-branded as a premium form of transport, we were charged a nice surcharge of 35% on the original fare, which brings up the whole bill to $6.20.

The landscape has changed. It is now more expensive to take a trip on a whim. I don’t mind having to take trains or buses, but my heart goes to the elderly with limited mobility; they would have to spend more to get around the island.  At least this time round the taxi companies aren’t jacking up the cab rentals to profit off drivers. This is one sad situation where the country allows the taxi oligopolies to do as they wish, only to seek solace in the fact that we were not taken advantage of more (I am trying to write without resorting to the sexual connotations along the lines of being abused in a certain area. I know, it is hard, but you do catch my drift).

Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree

Christmas, other than being a time of blessed thanksgiving and remembrance for some and a commercialized gift-exchanging festival for others, has almost always been synonymous with a musical period.

As anyone who has ever stepped into a mall near the Christmas period would know, Christmas carols and hymns constitute a big part of the festive spirit (although one would wonder if playing the music ad nauseum a la any Singaporean mall actually helps). As a Christian, these hymns and carols hold an even bigger, religious, significance for me and I’ve loved to sing along to the songs since I was young.

So, in keeping with the Christmas mood and its spirit of sharing, I would like to share my three favourite Christmas songs, along with some online videos of renditions I love.

#3 – Happy Xmas (War Is Over)
http://youtube.com/watch?v=v3XAlDj3e3g&feature=related

John Lennon of the Beatles fame wrote this with his wife, Yoko Ono, in 1971 as an anti war anthem. Nonetheless, it has become quite a Christmas standard thanks to its festive, uplifting melody, optimistic lyrics and inspirational vocals, garnering cover versions by a large number of singers including the Corrs, Delta Goodrem, Maroon 5 as well as the contestants from the second season of Britain’s Pop Idol (which was where I first heard the song).

#2 – What Child Is This
http://youtube.com/watch?v=hcGQqzvRqhI

Written in the late 1800s, I’ve always been mystified by the haunting melody and poignant lyrics of this song. The song has a slightly Scottish (Irish?) lilt to it and conjures up imageries of Biblical times. This version by Third Day, one of my favourite bands, is one of the best-arranged, most contemporary sounding versions that I’ve heard.

#1 – O Holy Night
http://youtube.com/watch?v=cZ-8jYpa1-o
http://youtube.com/watch?v=UHE4X7HFmTM

A beautiful and very popular hymn during this time of the year, O Holy Night is another 19th century hymn that, like the song above, speaks about the birth of Jesus Christ and has enchanted the world with a simple yet incredibly beautiful melody and a spirit-lifting, climatic chorus that is much harder to sing than it sounds. This song, one of the most famous of the Christmas carols, has been covered more times than anybody can keep track of and I’ve included two versions here. The first is from a group of angel-voiced songstresses and the second is from a similarly (and disconcertingly) angel-voiced dude.

So, those are my three favourite Christmas songs. What are yours?

Singnet vs. Starhub

I have always been one of those poor techno-idiots who have been plagued with internet connection problems for most of their internet-surfing lives.

Be it ridiculously low speeds (way below the advertised technical speed) or dropping connections, I’ve had terrible internet woes since lower sec, a problem which I thought would be solved, but did not, when I moved to a new place with, presumably, a new cable connection.

In fact, in recent years (and most especially in recent weeks), my connection was so terrible that simple, basic webpages took ages to load and I had to reset the connection every few minutes or so because it would just suddenly drop, leaving me unable to download any large file stably or even carry on coherent instant messaging conversations since half the messages I sent are either not transmitted or I’ll be logged out halfway through talking.

So, exasperated (and lured by the prospect of a free Nintendo Wii), I decided that enough was enough and, starting from two weeks ago, I officially cancelled my internet subscription (Starhub’s 6mbps cable connection) of more than eight years to switch to Singnet’s 6mbps broadband connection. Despite the much higher monthly rate (the loss of my Hub Club discount, the addition of a landline which I did not have prior to this as well as an almost S$10 higher subscription rate) and some occasional glitches in connection here and there, my internet surfing has now taken a much much much better turn.

Perhaps thanks to the fact that the Singnet connection runs through a dedicated line and I don’t have to share a cable connection with what seems like my entire estate, my speeds are much higher (downloading huge files and having instant message conversations are now much more pleasant) and my internet connection is stable. I don’t have to worry about the connection randomly cutting off while I’m getting into the thick of a conversation with a friend.

Strangely, though, I find that, sometimes when I’m downloading large files at high speeds, I’m unable to surf the internet properly, with many pages not loading or displaying error messages. The problem seems to lessen, however, once I stopped all my downloading so perhaps it’s just a matter of overloading my connection or something (I wouldn’t know, being the utterly clueless ignoramus about IT that I am) but it’s still rather annoying. Hopefully it is a teething problem that will somehow be solved as time goes by.

Still, despite all the little problems that I might encounter with it as well as the horror stories I’ve heard from some of my friends who use the same plan, so far my connection with Singnet has been much more stable and dependable. Hopefully this will remain true for the rest of the next two years under my contract. 

Ebooks

I like to read. When I was young, whenever I had free time, I could be seen sticking my nose in a book, greedily absorbing the words on the pages in front of me. Even until now, I still try to find some time in the day to read.

Of course, with such an interest in reading, naturally I came to know about ebooks when I was in secondary school. eBooks are the digital media equivalent of a conventional printed book. They can be read on computers or e-book readers. They take up less space physically than traditional books (usually a few hundred kilobytes), and are easily
copied and spread.

I became hooked on Project Gutenberg, which offered free texts of books written over some years back (due to copyright issues), and had fun reading the classics, as well as fiction in the early 1900s. Of course, Project Gutenberg wasn’t the only place where ebooks could be downloaded from, there were others out there in the world wide web.

There were other sites, those offering free downloads of modern and recent books being sold noawdays. All the famous authors, and the slightly obscure ones had their ebooks floating around in cyberspace, waiting to be downloaded. Unfortunately, downloading these ebooks are illegal, due to copyright issues.

So I was wondering, why are these ebooks illegal, and why borrowing from libraries are not?

Look at it this way. I go to the library, borrow a book, read it, return it, and well, that’s it. I don’t pay any money for the book I borrow.

Compare this to those who download an ebook. They go to the websites, presumably download the text file of the book, read it, and forget about it. What exactly is the difference?

The definition of a library on Wikipedia states: A library is a collection of information, sources, resources, and services: it is organized for use and maintained by a public body, an institution, or a private individual. In the more traditional sense, a library is a collection of books.

This collection and services are used by people who choose not to — or cannot afford to — purchase an extensive collection themselves, who need material no individual can reasonably be expected to have, or who require professional assistance with their research.

And strangely, this definition also fits the ebook sites that offer free ebook downloads.

I am guessing the libraries do buy the books, and then lend them out, but surely so do those offering current ebooks for download? It’s not like for every new book released in the market, they will steal it, scan it into text form, and then upload it for people to download.

Apart from these sites offering free downloads of books, there are other sites offering paid downloads of ebooks and claim to be legal. These sites however, appear rather dubious to me.

Two such sites, which I shall not name (but can easily be found out through google), offers ebooks available from Project Gutenberg, at a price. It seems to me that they are ripping off the fruits of the labour for what the volunteers at Project Gutenberg do for free. To be entirely sure, I searched that site for all instances of a particular series (Arsene Lupin, by Maurice Leblanc), and it had *exactly* what Project Gutenberg offered. No more, no less. To further prove these sites’ duplicity, it was offering downloads of 2 ebooks, A and B. B however, was a short story inside A (A was a compendium of short stories). But A and B were being sold at the same price. Horrors! Because of this small discovery, I wonder if these sites, who ‘sell’ current day ebooks for money, get these ebooks from the publishers themselves, or rip
them off from those that make illegal copies of ebooks. In the latter case, these sites are then somewhat *worse* than ebook pirates, because the ebook pirates at least let others download free ebooks (which is of course, still morally wrong).

I remember when Book 7 of Harry Potter came out, and after I bought the book after queuing up at Popular, there was this article in the news about this man selling the ebook on Ebay for money. I believe that man probably downloaded a copy of HP7 for free, and tried to con others into buying from him. It is exactly these kind of people I detest most. Ebook pirates, while being on the shadier side of the law, at least do not charge for the ebooks. 

So what now? Well, luckily Borders just opened up in an outlet near my house a month ago, and they allow shoppers to read books in their store. Therefore, in the meantime I’m just contentedly reading books..though sometimes I do want to download such ebooks. After all, downloading them is probably less than a minute, while walking to Borders / library is a fifteen minute walk.

If you haven’t realized by now, I’m a bit of a cheapskate, and have actually been reading books at the library, MPH, Popular, Kinokuniya and Borders instead of buying them. Well..except maybe for Terry Pratchett. I kind of buy his books when they come out

The Silly Things You Can Do With Your Mobile To Keep Your Love Growing

What can you do to be on your girlfriend’s mind constantly when you are in camp?

You can write letters or postcards, of course. But seriously, who will resort to such methods now when you know you can get instant response at the click of your fingertips?

Yes, mobile phones are almost indispensable in this era now. Especially in the realm of dating and relationship.

Let’s explore what are some of the interesting and refreshing things we can do with our mobile to keep the sparks flaming between you and your girl!

1. Add cute and special emoticons in your sms. Or even better, create some unique ones. My favourite? ^o^
2. Take some funny faces photos of yourself and send it to your girl via MMS. (I understand that camera phones aren’t allowed in camps. So you might have to do this once you book out!)
3. Build a story of your relationship around the phone. In this way, it is no longer just a phone but one with sentimental value.
4. Replace the usual ringing tone with something special to the both of you. One that will help your girlfriend to remember those loving feelings she shares with you.
5. Pre-record love messages, love songs or anything that goes to make your girlfriend’s heart skip a few beats when she play them during the time when you’re probably somewhere in the jungle and out of action.

How are these 5 tips for a start? As the number of features increase with modern technology, there really is no limit to what you can do with a gadget that was primarily invented to ease communication.

Check out what your friends are doing, and you can start modifying to give her some little surprises. Better still, do some research and ask your gal friends what will bring cheers to them through the mobile phone.

In a nutshell, you just need to make your presence felt, even if you are absent. 

Saving Private Electricity

I know that these are really crunch times: taxi fares go up, bus fares go up, the price of food goes up, the sky-high price of oil brings the cost of just about everything up. What’s not on the news is that wages for many people just aren’t going up. That makes it very important for us to save money as and when possible.

With the price of oil driven northwards by the powers of speculative trading (http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=4045), the price of everything else crawls along like rats to the Pied Piper. If you drive cars, you now have to pay more for petrol. Everything that depends on electricity gets more expensive as the oil burnt to produce it costs more.

Now with that many portraits of Yusof Ishaks being bled from your wallet, it would probably be wise to cut the expenses by saving electricity. It doesn’t have to mean going without lights for half of the evening (though the guys whom have been in the army would probably be able to live with a torchlight), nor the sacrifice of that warm shower during these drafty months of December. Heck, you can save quite a few Yusof Ishaks by doing the major number one tip in the hit list:

1. Turn off the mains switch, don’t leave your devices on standby

Probably the least followed advice, yet the most important one: according to Good Magazine (http://awesome.goodmagazine.com/transparency/008/trans008vampireenergy.html), just turning off the mains switch to your computer after you shut it down every night will save you approximately US$34 a year.

I don’t know about you, but US$34 can pay for a month’s electricity bill in my household! Plasma televisions are the worst power suckers, leeching around US$160 per year if you just leave it on stand-by after you are done watching it. Think of the many things you could do with saving one month’s utilities charges! Roy’s power draining devices are connected to the mains, which he turns off before bed each evening. Though he has to bend his body down, and crawl into the little space underneath his desk to reach the power strip, the money saved is worth the trouble.

2. Optimise your gadgets

This is quite vague, but taking care of those little electricity vampires in your house can save you electricity. That means cleaning the air-conditioning filters, washing the fans and oiling the ball bearings frequently, placing the heat outlet of your devices in well-ventilated areas (that’s your fridge I’m talking about here), as well as getting a multi-function gadget whenever possible, instead of a few separate entities that come with its own power plugs.

3. Turn it off

Last on the list is the old adage: turn it off when you don’t need it. Do you seriously need the air-conditioning to be switched on from 4 - 6 am in the morning, when the temperature is at its lowest in the day? Though Roy’s house does not have air-conditioning, his friends set the timers on the air-conditioners to switch off after 4am in the morning. Besides that, any night that you are cowering under the thick blankets is a night when the coolers can be switched off. Better yet, save that money in the first place and instead get a powerful ceiling fan to blast the room during the warm months of July.

The same logic goes for water heaters. Roy has a cousin who likes to take warm baths even if the sun is turning the house into a furnace. All that power to heat the water is not needed. It would also save you from Roy’s mother’s nagging about how taking a hot bath during hot days would hurt your body constitution.

So you see, if we all just took the effort to do these little things, the savings do add up to quite a bit. We can’t control the price of electricity, but we sure can influence how we adapt our lives around these circumstances.

Sixth Month Soldier

Today officially marks the end of my sixth month as an NSF and, boy, what a six months it has been. Oxymoronic as it might sound, the journey so far has felt both long and short at the same time. While six months is only a quarter of my NS journey (there’s still a long way to go), I feel like I’ve been in the army forever. And yet, enlistment felt like just yesterday.

Looking back just those short few months ago, it seemed like I was quite a different person. Freshly graduated from poly and armed with my diploma (it’s hard to believe that, at the start of the year I was still busy rushing out projects and NS seemed such a distant concept at that time), I joined hundreds of others on that faithful bus ride to Tekong, the day when I would cut my hair, don the green and brown uniform (well, for the first day it was just the brown admin tee and black shorts) and begin my life of daily PT, water parades (amongst other parades), cookhouse meals and having to share my bunk (and toilet) with several other people at the same time.

I remember that, at that time, I was terrified at the prospect, my heart filled with trepidation and fear inculcated from an entire childhood weaned on horror stories from those who have gone through this phase. Would I be able to survive what seemed like a grueling time to come? Or would I crumble like a cookie as I seem apt to do in situations that I’m not comfortable in.

Thankfully, PTP/BMT proved to be a much more enjoyable experience than I expected. Sure there were some moments where I felt like giving up and there were some moments where I thought I would never be able to make it (heck, the first two weeks of confinement felt like an eternity as it was) but I guess I couldn’t have asked for anything better.

Strict yet understanding (and encouraging) commanders; a more comfortable training schedule (coming from the three months PTP batch really helped me, in hindsight); pretty decent food; and of course, a wonderful platoon and great bunkmates; it was better than anything I could have hoped for.

Pretty soon though (those last few weeks of BMT seemed to really fly past), I had to leave Tekong just as I was getting settled down again and be uprooted to my new unit, where I am to serve my next two years. Whilst friends and platoon mates opted to go to command school, I decided to eschew the trend and chose to serve as a man instead, a decision that I still am undecided about even today (of course, it’s not like I would have made it through the selection process for command school anyway).

I got posted to an armour unit, one of the fabled “shiong” vocations. Still, I was (and still am) quite determined to see the best in every situation and I have to say that, so far, it hasn’t been all that bad in my camp.

True, the training is much tougher than those I had as a recruit, both physically and mentally but still, it’s all a learning experience right? And, while I haven’t made as many or as close a number of friends as I had in Tekong, I’m getting along pretty fine with the people I have to meet and interact with everyday. Plus, on some days, the food at the cookhouse is really good. So, it’s not all that bad yeah?

Still, despite all that has happened in the past few months (I’ve sure had to adapt quite a lot more than I’m usually comfortable but that’s all part of growing up eh?), I’ve still got a long way to go before I ORD so here’s looking forward to an eventful (but in a positive way) next 1.5 years!

Want to fight?

In Roy’s opinion, anybody who feels offended whenever somebody stares at you most likely has a serious case of inadequacy. There’s no other reason why you won’t feel comfortable with people looking at you in public, unless you happen to not have your clothes on. (In your own dream, perhaps.) The above syndrome is what my secondary school discipline master affectionately describes as an “staring incident”.

Image Courtesy LOLcat.com

Yesterday evening, Roy was having a serious discussion with his friends on WarBook game tactics at a McDonalds outlet in the city. With our eyes mesmerised by the impressive number of soldiers in my kingdom, we didn’t notice a manager and two store employees walk past us. A few moments later, our attention was rudely diverted to a corner of the fast food restaurant, where two girls dressed in provocatively wild colours started hurling verbal abuses at the two store employees (you are right, the two of them are guys) for staring at them.

Apparently, the girls had thought that the staff was staring at her, and she went to the cashier’s to stare back at him with her friend. (How she knew is really debatable, because she had to be staring at him to know that he was staring at her...) Anyway, to make a long story short, the girls threatened to bring her gang into the outlet and stare at the two guys. Having problems controlling the hormones raging within them too, the two staff members shouted back, “ask them come lar! I not scared of you!” before showing them the universal hand-sign (no, not the one from ET. The one that involves the third appendage on your hand).

The lady manager, hard pressed to control the situation, asked the girls to leave the store, which they did, a diarrhoea of curses following in their wake. My friends were extremely disappointed that nothing came out of the episode. I sure wasn’t expecting anything out of this.

You see, though the girls had threatened violence on the employees’ family members, she had not physically touched him in any way. A real person who really wants to carry out the threat wouldn’t just stand there and tell you what he’d do to you - he’ll just whack you immediately.

So there ends the typical staring incident that my secondary school disciplinary master talked about. Having passed adolescence without getting into one is probably due to my good luck, but my friends do have some tips for fellow humans who find themselves in the thick of the action:

* Ignore the aggressor. They will just make themselves look foolish with their screaming.
* Lean over to a stranger and ask them if they know the aggressor. This reinforces the notion that you don’t know the screaming adolescent in front of you, and probably brings in a third party witness in case you plan to bring in the authorities.
* If the two tips above don’t help, relate your complaint of harassment to the store manager. Humans tend to believe whomever is calmer, so give your most dignified look of indignation as the adolescent gets dragged away, screaming and kicking, by the store security.
* Last but not least, stop staring at the inadequate little kittens! The moronic irony of why somebody would dress provocatively if they do not want you to stare at them comes up immediately, though we all learn to stop questioning the messy hormones raging in these people at some point in time. Trust me, it helps immensely for your sanity.

In the Valley of Elah

**Spoilers**

From the outset, “In the Valley of Elah” seems like a detective movie. The premise is simple: A soldier named Mike, who recently returned from Iraq has gone missing, and found to be murdered later in the movie. His father, Hank Deerfield, together with a detective, Emily Sanders, work together to find out who did it.

The movie is filled with a multitude of themes, ranging from the aspect of overcoming one’s fear, to the topic of desensitization and psychological damage experienced by soldiers in war, as well as the past versus the present conduct of American soldiers (and to a slight degree, the rest of the public).

Midway into the film, Hank tells Emily’s son a story about David and Goliath, held in the Valley of Elah. He later goes on to say that David was courageous ; he faced his own fear in Goliath, and emerged triumphant. It is interesting to note that after he said this, Emily’s son asked for the door to be left just slightly open, rather than wide open just as he went to sleep, facing his fear of the dark.

But this Valley of Elah / facing one’s fear motif appears many times in the movie. The most prominent (and main) one is when Hank Deerfield faces his fears in which he realizes that his son may not be the upright and model soldier as he envisioned, but actually far more inhumane, by watching the videos on his mobile phone. To a lesser extent, this can be seen as well with the soldiers guilty of murdering Mike as they eventually confess to Hank and Emily, and one even admits that it could have been him that was murdered instead, if it happened on a different day. Yet again this motif crops up when Emily goes to a crime scene where a woman has been murdered by her husband. This woman had been to see Emily a few days ago, worried about her husband becoming dangerously violent, but was ignored by Emily and the rest of of her colleagues. Emily, at this stage, knows that her colleagues treats her condescendingly and belittles her due to her gender, is afraid that her (in)action(s) one day may cause harm to someone. But she squeezes the victim’s hand, apparently realizing that while she failed her, she can still do more by helping Hank, and then proceeds to do so in the movie.

Hank Deerfield’s actions in the movie show what Hank believes to be a model soldier. We see him kiwi (polish) his boots, make his bed in the morning, shave, and tells off a person who hangs the American flag upside down. Also, when he received a call stating that his son had went AWOL, he immediately tried to contact his son. However, when Hank retrieves some numbers in his son’s handphone, he sees that the numbers range from Pizza, Chicken, to the local bar. As Hank travels to these places, finding out more about his son, he realizes that the bar is actually a pole dancing joint, and most of the female staff there go about topless. Hank’s son isn’t the only soldier that frequents the place ; as the movie goes on, it shows that many soldiers frequent the bar, as well as go drink driving, and some even deal with drugs, a sharp contrast shown compared to Hank’s own actions. Near the end of the movie, even the base CO appears to condone and cover up the murderers’ actions, until Emily threatens to arrest soldiers caught for drink driving. 

The theme of desensitization is also evident in this movie. Mike is first introduced as a soldier eager to serve, later on someone quotes that “We shouldn’t send heroes out there”, referring to Mike (as a hero) going to Iraq. But as the movie progresses, the video clips unearthed from Mike’s mobile phone slowly shows him becoming more and more desensitized to the atrocities of war. Mike progresses from running over a small boy to torturing a captive Iraqi prisoner. When Mike’s murderers were interrogated, one of them said that “Mike was playing as a medic, poking his finger into his (the captured prisoner) wound and asking “Does it hurt”, before asking and poking it into the wound again.” Mike isn’t the only soldier desensitized to the atrocities of war, one of the soldiers readily admitted that “It could have been Mike stabbing me instead of him getting stabbed that night.”

This movie really makes one think ; about the impact of war to combatants and civilians alike, to how the American soldiers behave. At the end of the movie, we see Hank raising the American Flag upside down, and duct-taping it there to the spot, a contrast from his actions in the beginning of the movie. I believe that Hank is disillusioned at this point with America and its soldiers, and hangs the flag upside down not so much as to spite America, but as a warning, an international distress signal.

Overall, this is definitely a movie to watch.

Distraction Central

Have you ever been on the pedestal side of a meeting, and be speaking to a wall? People concentrating on their laptops, mobile phone screens, or asleep on the table usually force you to conclude that either they are simply not interested in whatever you are talking about, and are most likely have been forced to listen to you; or the influx of modern devices have distracted the audience from what matters most.

Tod Wilkens blogged about his experience with the devices, calling it his ”personal war on Crackberry”. He makes a point of banning any instrument that allows you to go online during his meetings - be it mobiles, laptops, or even the most talked about addictive device in the corporate world: The Blackberry.

So far, there have been some interesting opinions left behind by visitors in the comments. Some bemoan the huge number of meetings where they sit in to listen on project updates that would have been been better done through email; others made arguments for the devices to stay switched on during meetings.

They all raise valid points. Where devices are concerned, their invention was born out of a demand for immediate attention: employees who work in mission critical industries need their attention drawn at the soonest possible moment when things go wrong at work - that is why companies commission mobile phones, Blackberries for their staff. However, along with the invention of new devices, corporations in non-mission-critical industries saw how they can retain more control over their employees, and similarly decided to do the same for their staff.

You see, that is how so many of us find ourselves suddenly bound by these fateful chains. Consultants probably pooh-poohed at the time when people still managed to get things done without these devices in the same breath as they promote the latest model of the BlackBerry (now with GPS tracking! Don’t worry about your sales executives getting lost in the concrete jungle!). Wilkens has made a good point about how the situation is getting absurd. While the employee is on company time, is it really right to demand his 100% attention right now when you need something?

Imagine… a few years from now - your teacher is expounding on a very complex theory, and her BlackBerry chirps from har handbag. She apologises for the interruption, but picks up the device, and spends a few minutes to thumb a reply to the email from the principal. After that is done, she puts the device down, and continues explaining the theory. A few seconds later, the device rings again. Repeat that a few times, and the school would have more dust bunnies on the tables than there are students.

While that might seem to be an extreme scenario, I believe that it reflects a growing trend in the corporate world: employees whose work are being interrupted by incoming phone calls and emails that beep for your attention. It breaks the chain of thought - and in the case of Wilkens, interrupt his carefully planned meetings.

I won’t join his call to have these devices banned from meetings and presentations, though. Regardless of the distraction they pose to meetings and presentations, mobile phones are an indispensable part of our lives - and they enable us to be reached in real emergencies. People should have the right to disrupt a meeting if, for instance, something bad had happened (I’m sorry for the disruption, but the maid just called. My son had a bad fall, and hurt his head. I have to go.)

What then? I believe these devices can still play an important role during meetings. The solution I am proposing, is to apply a profile to the devices, such that only phone calls from certain contacts will cause the phone to vibrate. Place in this list very important people, like your parents, the caretaker, and your direct superior. Leave the rest on “no notification”, and let them drop into your voicemail, where you can record a message to indicate that you are currently in a meeting, and will only take their call after it is over. They will leave you a message if they do have something urgent to tell you; but more often than not, the people who are calling you for more trivial things would simply just hang up their phone. Crackberries should be set to total silent mode; if people are emailing you, they can afford to wait. Only tend to the missed calls and emails after the meeting - or during breaks in the marathons.

If we do it right, mobile phones and BlackBerries can play out their part to help make our lives more fruitful; however, the management of expectations with these devices is crucial to ensure that you remain sanely productive during office hours. Just a tip: turn off that Crackberry after work. You shouldn’t have to spend your personal time pandering to a fellow colleague who happened to work into 12am in the morning and was just emailing you to ask you where to find the project files. Get a life.

Overprotectiveness

Imagine a life where everything you need is provided for. Food, lodgings, medicine, education, money are all taken care of. You don’t need to lift a finger to do anything, like plan for investments or map out a journey through life - all will be done for you.

Would most people want to live their lives like that? Maybe. All I know is that I would not.

A life where everything is freely given makes one apathetic. Why strive for anything when whatever you want is within your grasp? There won’t be the fighting spirit, the will to perform well, to do whatever it takes to (frankly speaking), survive in the world. And if one isn’t pushed to his limits, will there ever be progress?

But are imagining such situations just thought experiments, since unless one is royalty or at least belonging to the elite elites there are no such situations?

Not really. I think there exist a certain number of parents in today’s society that are rather overprotective of their children. True, they cannot take care of their offspring forever, but the very act of being overprotective denies their sons or daughters a chance to experience what the real world is like, at least until they stop being overprotective.

They are willing to provide everything for their child. Tuition, decent allowances, best hospital for any illnesses, at perhaps the small cost of limiting his / her freedom and growth. Go out and play? No, it’s too dangerous. You might catch a cold / fall sick / get asthma. Do something new? No, it’s too dangerous. You might lose your money / waste time. So on and so forth. The parents are right. There is a small chance of what they mentioned occuring. But the gains far outweigh the risks.

For a young child perhaps the parents are right. They know better. But for a young adult, I think that it is better for the parents to take the backseat, and trust them not to make the wrong decisions.

It is far better to try and make mistakes, learning from them, rather than just not try at all. For that is, after all, the very basis of overprotectiveness. There is just simply no chance at all to try.

War Between The Dots, Words and Armies

I know. The guys must be jumping for joy when we got the topic for this week. I received this news with mixed feelings. How so?

Well, when I got the email from Florence, the subject title gave me cause for joy, since I don’t have to fret about what to write this week.

The joy was very short-lived, for after I read the contents, my first thoughts were “Very good. Gaming? I don’t play any! How am I supposed to write?” The knee-jerk reaction was to hit “Reply” key and to let her know I’ll probably be having lots of trouble doing this week’s assignment and ask if I could be exempted.

Then, something stopped me.

“Am I saying no to a challenge? Am I going to just quit this game without even starting it?”

My inner voice has begun to talk to me again.

As quick as I clicked the “Reply” button, I closed the window. Yes. No emails were sent. But learning about gaming and making myself play one became what I had in mind then. I had accepted the challenge.

Let me show you the level of “expertness” I am in gaming for a start so that you could probably remotely experience the “pain” I have to play games online.

I grew up playing ‘’five stones’’ and ‘’zero point’’ – if you know what they are, then you’re probably from my generation. Cyber games were non-existent then.

My first encounter with computer games was playing Solitaire. Moving and clearing columns and columns of poker was the rage then. Then we slowly moved to the TV games Nintendo. But still, compared to the gamers, I wasn’t even qualified to be known as an “amateur gamer”.

Now, the gaming industry had become one of the fastest expanding one. I’ve heard of some horror stories about men heavily addicted to games that their relationships with their partners soured. Breakups caused by virtual third parties, once unheard of, had become reality.

So, is gaming a healthy activity? It all depends, really.

For the purpose of this challenge, I decided to take the plunge and install the game Warbook in Facebook. Yeah, I mean, though I am game enough to start cyber-gaming, but to ask me to spend hundreds of moolah to purchase one? Well, let’s just say I need some time to warm up first.

But before I installed Warbook, a friend had invited me to play two other games on Facebook – Scrabble and Pacman. Pacman! Oh, what a more than familiar name! I used to play that on the PC and TV! Yes, I can handle Pacman, I thought. No problem!

Blame it on my arrogance. Due to the rustiness, I lost my first game.

Scrabble was, among the three games, my top-most favourite. Because I not only get to be entertained, I get to improve my English vocabulary as well. Nothing beats the satisfaction of killing two birds with one stone.

Warbook. My, what a game. You know, from this game, I’ve realized a very important lesson. 

Have you heard of the saying “How you do anything is how you do everything”?

This is so true.

Warbook is well, like the name implies, a war game. So we build our own army, expand our kingdom and basically attack as many people as you can to claim their territories. So we got to watch out for our defense line, form alliances etc.

When I first went in, without a clue on what’s happening (I still am now, in fact ), I was given the whole spectrum of things I could do. Should I form alliance? Should I buy more soldiers, or upgrade them to wizards and knights? Should I attack someone right away? Should I buy more acres of land?

My mind was – to foster strong relationships with my neighbouring kingdoms so that I reduce the chances of being attacked while boosting my own strength and therefore upping my defense line as well.

Well, everything comes at a price. In order to form an alliance, as there weren’t any existing ones for me to join, I need to pay 1,000,000 pieces of gold. Wow, too much money to pay, I thought. So I gave up the idea.

You see, for some people, they may just go ahead without a thought. But for me, because I’m so new to the game, I would like to have the money as a form of security! At least I know I have some to spare when emergencies crop up, like if I’m suddenly being surrounded by enemies!

From here, I can see how my value, which is security, actually comes into play! And the fact that I wanted to first build alliance also means I place importance in people relations.

Well, for the sake of writing this article, I went to attack someone yesterday. Very sadly, I lost.

So did I continue to attack? I didn’t. I stopped playing that day, gave myself some rest so that I could “strategise” and play differently on the next go.

Life is like a game.

There are rules to every game. And if you choose not to obey, you must be prepared to face whatever consequence that comes along the way. Are you?

What is your spirit in playing the games? Is it to learn something new each time? Is it to kill time? Is it to win every time? Or is it to enjoy the process and not necessarily to be the last man standing?

All these show how you live your life. For like I said, life is like a game, and how you play anything is how you play everything.

Your character, personality, beliefs and values will surely be reflected in your games, and affect the results. Have you paid attention to any of these? Do you know yourself better after gaming?

What are the areas you can mark for improvement? Where are your strengths? What are your weaknesses?

Think about it my friends.

Now, maybe I should hire a war strategist to assist me in fighting this online battle…
Well, I have learnt to look for help when I need to do something that isn’t right up my alley. It didn’t come naturally to me. I learnt this the hard way while running my own business. I hope you don’t have to make the same mistakes I did.

What are some lessons you have learnt through gaming, and in your life?

Creative Zen (and my history with mp3 players)

The very first mp3 player I had was a Creative. At that time, I was in upper sec and, wowed by the wide list of extra features it boasted (FM radio, microphone etc.) as well as the promise of superior sound quality (since the company was famous for its audio equipment), I got the Creative Muvo FM instead of the (even-at-that-time) more popular Apple iPod.

The device served me well over the next few years and, despite experiencing cognitive dissonance a few times just because the iPod was so much more popular and I was a conformist by nature, it was my constant companion. Although I did never did get to use those extra features much, it was always a comfort to know that they were there.

Then, one day, the player just decided to hang on me. Out of the blue, it refused to start up, choosing to display a weird error message every time I tried the “on” button. Feeling rather disconcerted by the sudden spoilage but also knowing that it was time to move on (like most other teenagers, gadgets seem to have a very short shelf life for me and the two years I had with this one already seemed a lifetime), I decided to go with the popular choice and got an iPod Video to replace my demised player.

Despite the fact that it was pretty bare-bones on features (the extra FM transmitter cost a whopping S$80, as did the external microphone), the iPod was (as most people would know) a looker and packed a hell of a punch in the interface department. Its user interface was intuitive and simple while iTunes, with its autosynchronization feature that synced it with any attached Apple player as well as its ease of use and in-depth management system, provided an unparalleled usage for an obsessive compulsive neat freak like me. Sadly, though, the sound quality was, while adequate, simply sub-par compared to my previous player as well as some others on the market that I’ve tried.

After another couple of years with it, however, I felt it was about time for a change again and, when a friend offered to buy the iPod Video from me at a pretty decent price, I handed it over to him and, after a grueling comparison, I decided to try Creative again, this time getting the new centerpiece of their current catalog, the Creative Zen. Having used it for a few weeks now, I think I have a pretty good idea of how it stacks up to previous experiences.

Looks-wise I think the Zen actually holds up pretty well against the (by-now) rather antiquated look of the iPod Classic series (although the new iPod Touch is a whole different matter). While its landscape orientation and placement of its button might give it an impression of being, at first glance, the back of a consumer digital camera instead of being an mp3 player, the black, rounded and smooth exterior, along with the glossy finishing, gives it a pretty sleek feel.

In terms of sound quality (as well as the quality of the pre-packaged earphones), this player, like my very first one, beats the iPod flat. While I’m no expert audiophile, I’d say that the sound is fuller, much more in-depth and actually provides a truly stereo experience when it says it does, unlike the iPod, on which even the most high-quality mp3 tracks end up sounding pretty mono and muffled to me.

Features-wise, the Zen serves it up as usual, coming packed with FM radio (although its rather lousy auto-scan feature, without any option of manual scanning available, means that I can’t listen to some of my most beloved stations that the scan doesn’t seem to sense), microphone, video-playing, in-line recording and even comes with an expansion slot for a memory card which, in accordance to the rules in my army unit, I can’t utilize.

The one thing that the Zen majorly loses points on, though, is its interface with the PC. While its in-system interface is on par with the iPod’s (sometimes, the super intuitive interface and song search options make it even better than Apple’s player), the programmes it comes packaged with for the PC leave much to be desired. The media explorer’s synchronization system seems to be patchy (instead of making sure the songs are exactly the same as my music folder, it just adds whatever is lacking onto the Zen, neglecting to remove any files that I might have decided to delete off my computer, resulting in a lack of storage space on the player) and the playback programme it comes with (Audible) isn’t anywhere near as feature-packed nor even as aesthetically pleasing as iTunes. Plus, creating playlists is a headache, what with having to go through all my folders manually to add the songs in one-by-one.

Still, even with this one major flaw, the Creative Zen still gives a bang for its buck and is perfect for anyone who is more concerned about features and sound quality than looks although, like I mentioned earlier, it doesn’t look too bad itself.