I LIED, NO ONE DIED

FORENOTE: For the infinity of you minus 2 people (x = infinity - 2, where x is the number of people I'm referring to) who doesn't get the meaning behind my post title, I'm lazy to explain it, go google it or ask Cherilyn)

Okay, first things first, when I said I was going to post daily, I LIED. Haha. So funny. Not. O wells, I hope you loyal followers have been constantly refreshing the page while waiting for my words of wisdom. If you haven't been doing that, you aren't loyal enough, so go away. Okay, I have created a tier list for the readership of this blog, here's how it goes:
1. Overlord Dneo
2. Chief Minion Cherilyn (who assumes my position and does my tasks for me when I'm slacking)
3. Loyal followers since the beginning of the end. (Last Count: 2.5)
4. Loyal followers since somewhere in the middle (Last Count: 3.5 + maybe 1)
5. People who stumble upon this treasure trove of words because a certain 2.Lfstbote (<-- it's an acronym) went about telling a certain shared group of friends about the existence of this place. (Last Count: 2 + 1 + possibly 2 + possibly more)
6. LURKERS (Uncountable)

Now now, I'm sure after looking at the list above, all of you would like to be promoted to level 1, but that's reserved for Overlord Dneo. However, you can attempt to get promoted to a higher level than you currently are, by various means, of which I am too bored/sian/tired (it's 3.30am wtf?) to list, but they may or may not include SPAMMING TAGBOARD (IN CAPS), posting comments in posts by mah fan-ingly logging into blogger and revealling your true identity, donating a huge sum of money (okay, even a measley amount would do) to Dneo's pocket money fund, find means to provide Dneo with 28 hours in a day, etc.

Okay NEXT.

On thursday, I went to watch the anime movie The Sky Crawlers with a group of mahjong kaki. On the note of the mahjong kaki, "it's all pure beginner's luck I tell you". Okay back to the topic, after mahjonging with my kaki for slightly more than 2 winds worth, we decided it was late enough and we had to leave for the 9.15 movie. The pizza was weird looking, but good. Thanks. After arriving at the cinema counter for the movie not 10 mins before the movie started, we managed to get 2nd from back row seats, yay good job. Time skip. It is now 9.25+afewminutes, we got past the bouncer dude at the entrance of the halls, and was directed to the "second cinema on the right". When we got in, we found our seats koped by a couple. O_O. As the brave leader that I was, leading my company of brave men into the dark unknown of the cinema, I bravely approached the couple and enquired about the current placements of their bums on our seats. The return fire was harsh, but I was not afraid of the enemy, and I pressed on, while my men provided little covering fire from behind. My surprise ally came in the form of a dude seating in a single seat (wtf there's single seats in the cinemas? For sad ronery dudes with no gfs and no companies of men?) behind who said "Yes, this is cinema 4". Okay, so the couple was going to cinema 2, but because of the not-really-optimal placing of signs outside the cinemas, they were confused and went into our hall 4 instead. As a sign of gratitude towards my victorious approach towards the couple of enemies, I was given freedom to choose my seating. Well not really, but I would like to think so. Okay so the movie started, and ended around 2 hours later. Okay tiem for movie review:

Hrmm, no spoilers shall be posted here, just my thoughts and spoiler-free review of the movie. Pre-movie thoughts: There was a booth at AFA08 (refer to older post by guest writer) on the art work and inspiration for the movie that was to be shown soon on cinemas. The title of Sky Crawlers was not that catchy, and I believed stuff like Appleseed and Vexille or even Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea were much more appealing titles. And even after watching the show, I can't really say the use of the word Crawlers is fitting, maybe they're crawling through time, but that's not really right. On browsing the booth and reading random parts of the booth, I found out some trivia about the movie, like the usage of nice Polish architecture and stuff. Second thing about the movie was the review I read on Straits Times Life section, which gave it a 3.5/5 rating. Though quite normally a discerning reader, I still had to be reminded by Johnny that Life section reviews on anime movies are not to be trusted and this reinforced my belief that the movie I was going to watch would be extremely good, as 3.5 should be a total underration, and it was. (On a side note, the last three major movies that I excitedly encouraged my friends to watch turned out to be stuff that was either 1. a waste of money, 2. failplot or 3. ARGHHHH. And their acronyms are respectively DoA, QoS and TMG (Ahahahhahah, the mere mention of the title sends shivers down my spine) This movie spoilt my 0% of good movie recommendation rating).

On to the movie itself, hrmm what to say about it without spoiling...
Artwork - Great
Characters - Memorable (we shall all learn how to fold newspapers)
Pace - Very stone, but quite fitting and brings across the message well
Plot - Awesome.
Hrmm individual comments - Beware the eyes!, look out for the awesome dog (whose name shall either be Bolt or Jinroh (spoiler)), the cat (if I remember correctly there was one), the hamster (o wait i'm thinking of the wrong movie, cancel that), the reverse-trap (Omg I got reversed trapped), the rori (yay for roris), the tsun-dere-tsun-yan-dere, and more. Overall a good movie, and it made me think some bit, as in it made me ponder the questions about life that the movie raised. Recommendation - Go watch it if you're a fan of airplanes, animation, little children, thought provoking movies, or if you just want to spend 2 hours of your life watching the hard work of the people that produced this good movie.

Kk, now on to the third matter of the day. On reading today's (Friday's) papers, I found an article that was quite shocking. A 19-year-old boy was arrested and charged on the offence of being indecent to an 8 year old girl and a 9 year old girl. The newspaper reported that the guy sbs-ed the 8 year old girl and overpowered her, but she escaped and complained to her mommy. Some time later, he once again, at a similar setting of a hdb elevator, took out a knife and threatened the 9 year old girl, and forced her to take off her shirt. Apparently he did not do anything more serious or that would have been reported as well. Okay so what are my thoughts on this matter? He is Dumb. In more ways than one. Everything he's doing is wrong: the target (older plz), the place of attack (less public area plz), the motive (what motive?), or lack of it, the lack of paper bag over the head (at least cover face), the lack of social responsibility (comon, you are scarring these little girls for life, if you just HAD to commit such crimes, at least commit on people or things that won't get scarred for life (like you can always threaten a shopfront mannequin to take off his/her/its shirt)), and... I shall not comment further =x

For more accurate information, go read the papers yourself, and disclaimer: everything I write here should not be taken too seriously nor be taken to be the absolute truth.

Next. As you can see, there are 3 vague ideas and topics covered on today's post. These shall be payback for my lack of posting for which I have already explained at the beginning of this post.

And as a parting note, I shall be going overseas to Melbourne, USA (it's just beside Singapore, China on the world map) from the 6th of Dec to the 14th of Dec. I'll be driving around, and hopefully GET ON A HOT AIR BALLOON WOOTZ, and maybe I'll explore around so that if I go back one day, I can fufill my life's quests of trying out:
1. Surfing without getting eaten by a shark (you can read wayy too many shark attack stories on reader's digest over the years)
2. Bungee Jumping (fufill all my suicidal tendencies without paying the cost of 1x Life.)
3. Parachuting (like bungee jumping, but can fly longer)
4. Hang Gliding (like parachuting, but much longer too =) )
5. SPACE TRAVEL (lolwhat?)
6. Kangaroo riding (WHATT?)

Okay, so one or two of the stuff in the list arent exactly accurate, but whatever. Adios Amingoes, Sore Jya.

Holidays!

Yay holidays. And that marks the end of year 5 or IB year 1. Yay. Okay i was thinking of writing some long reflective post about the year, but screw it, if you want to read those go read other blogs.

Question: What's red and green and goes around and around in circles? (and gets redder)
Answer: Frog in a blender.
Or a loli swinging a green lolly/ice cream that is actually red in the sun (answer vaguely similar to JY's (guest poster aka. cherilyn) answer)
Or a parrot nailed onto the end of a spinning stick (don't ask me why or how Mark thought of this).
Or a radioactive bleeding hamster (Thanks to herrick for this, it's actually quite a good answer)

Okay back to business, Why have I not been updating? WHY? Err, dunno, lazy i guess, or maybe just because. O wells. Sorry.

K next thing: In the face of an economic downturn, worldwide recession, high inflation, high rice prices and high fuel prices, there is still a stall in Bedok who sells yong tau foo at $1.50 for a bowl. Can you believe it? Even school food which is meant to cater to poor students costs at least $2 for a decent meal. It's $1.50 for 7 pieces of random items plus noodles... and sauce. And chilli sauce if you like. Which I do. So I bought one packet today. Then after bringing it home and leaving it in the kitchen till dinnertime, I went to eat it. My mum koped some of my food, so I had half a bowl of yong tau foo left. Then when I was eating it, I was counting the items, and I counted only 6. On closer inspection, I realise my meatball was gone. WHERE DID IT GO? I asked my mum, no she did not eat my meatball. Then my dad confessed that he ate my meatball :'( There goes my meatball. Yesterday, my mum said she was at the bak chor mee stall, so I asked her to buy food back, so when I went home I was expecting meatballs, but she did not buy any back for me =( Dammit I want my meatball. Q_Q

Okay on to other matters. Let's see what my guest poster has been posting... Oh Ya! Machine Girl! Okay, here's an advice to my legions of fans who read this blog: Go and watch Machine Girl (2008). You can download it, or ask to get it from me, or stream it or smth. Before November 5 you could have asked Herrick, but ever since we watched it at his house he has deleted it and has promised to never touch it again. That's a testament to how good it is. It is sooo bad it is good.

I'm bored, what should I write about? Okay I shall give real life situations and you tell me what each person should have done. I was taking the bus home one day a long time ago, then on a stop this lady carrying a fat slinging bag and 2 handcarry fat bags decided to board the bus. She told the driver that she was only taking one stop, and asked if she must pay. The driver said no you. So she went down, not before scolding the bus driver and telling him off for being unkind. On another day, I saw this lady again, and she managed to succeed taking a stop without paying, because that driver was a niceguy. So guys, what should you have done in this situation if you were the bus driver?

Oh ya, and on the train one day two to three weeks ago, I saw a public quarrel. It was frankly quite hilarious, and thinking about it makes me laugh. Okay here's the situation: Group 1 consists of a guy and four girls, all young adults. Let's call the guy G, because well, he's gay. Now you would be thinking, a guy having four girls by his side could not possibly be gay, well by gay I mean those effeminate girly guys. Hrmm, who to use as an analogy, okay guys, think of gurren lagann, now think of the gay technician dude, I mean gay technician girly dude, yea that one, that's him alright. Okay, so now that G is well introduced, let's move on. Girl number 1 would hereby be refered to as B, for reasons yet unsaid. Girl number 2 would be E, and Girl number 3 would be X, well, because they are extras in this play. Girl number 4 would be L, cause she's a leaver. Okay so I boarded the train at bugis, lalala, minding my own business. At Lavender or Aljunied Group 1, aka persons G B E X L came in and stood at the center. Then they proceeded to talk fairly loudly in the train. Note that as always, I'm a totally unbiased, and very very objective person when recounting this incident. I was busy reading my book (reader's digest), but they were slightly distracting. Not that I minded alot, cause it was kinda entertaining. From their conversation, I could make out that they just watched Mamma Mia the movie, and were highly inspired by the movie and songs. So girly G and his gang of girly girls proceeded to sing their own renditions of ABBA's songs, which was not bad to say the least. And the conversation proceeded to random songs and stuff, and I could remember one of the girls saying "I know a song!... (insert dramatic pause)... "I'm popeye the sailor mannn...."" at which the group followed along for a very short while, before bursting into laughter. Haha, okay so they are abit childish. Okay so I had to endure this till Kembagan, which was around 5 stops. At Kembagan, someone got up from the seat, the two seater seat beside the train connector, so I koped the seat. Found item: Seat. Oh ya I forgot, before Kembagan, at Eunos, little miss L left the group. Leaver!. But ya, not before giving hugs and kisses all round. All round the group only though, I didnt get a hug nor any kisses =( oh, and G said "Bye, darling..." in the most girly man sort of way you can think of. Ya, back to the story. At Kembagan, Group 2 appeared! Group 2 consists of a guy who shall be refered to as SG for his awesome remark of "So gay", and SG's friend who was mostly silent except for his awesome remark of "Shut up, Bitch", so now he's SuB. So at Kembagan, SG and SuB were leaving the train, and at the train door, SG played the part of an irate commutor who had his 10 minutes of peace disturbed by "Mamamia, here we go again, my my, how could I resist you..." and "I'm Popeye the sailor mannnn....." and told Group 1 off for making alot of noise. This story shall now turn into conversation mode: (note that because of non-perfect memorization ability, the following statements are written to give a gist of the event, and are not word for word correct) [Oh, and my thoughts shall be written in these]

SG (with one foot out of the door, speaks politely): "Hey guys, could you please keep it down, you're are disturbing everyone here." [Wah nice one lah, go you for speaking up for everyone else]

Group 1 is taken aback, they are shocked, flabbergasted by the nerve of SG to make such an aweful remark. They must defend themselves, take up arms against these intruders of their private space.

B (who happens to be closest to the door and to SG and SuB): "Who are you to make such comments? We can do what we like." [spoilt brat]

SG (still polite, in fact, he is calm and polite throughout the quarrel): "I am just speaking for everyone, could you please keep it down?"

Everyone else from Group 1 rallies behind their brave comrade.

Random person from Group 1: "No we shall not keep it down"

Mrt Announcer: "Doors are closing, di di di di di"

B (hautily): "Doors closing already, go away"

As the doors attempt to close and prevent the fateful quarrel, SG makes an important decision, he steps back into the train, and his friend SuB follows. Group 1 is shocked at the amount of committment Group 2 have. [+1 to Group 2, score now is 0:1]

B (pre-emptive strike): "Now, who are you to say such things? You and your friend were just standing there (points at the train connector) the whole time, and as you walk past you have the cheek to say "So gay" at my friend. You have NO RIGHT to say such things about my friend" [wah, I didnt hear the "so gay" phrase, but well, it's true what... he IS gay]

SG: "Wah, your friend can not stand up for himself ar?" [lol, good one there. +1 to group 2, score is 0:2]

At this point, G finally says something in his own defense, but because it is too insignificant, I forgot what he said.

SG: "Now people, let's not be childish here, all I'm asking is for you people to be quieter during the train ride" [that's quite reasonable of him, what a reasonable request]

B: "This is a public area, we can do what we want" [what flawless logic]
E or X: "Look who's being childish" [I'm looking all right, and currently the only childish ppl are you guys in Group 1]

SG: "Exactly, it is a public area, that's why I'm asking you ppl to quieten down abit"

B says something sarcastic, and this causes E and X to burst out laughing. I dunno if G was laughing or not, but if he was, it was too girly so it blended in with E and X's laughter.

SG reiterates his main point, all the while maintaining his cool.

B was going to rebutt with her flawless logic, but...

SuB: "Shut up, Bitch" [YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS. +999 to group 2, score is 0:1001]

Everyone is shocked! Including SG and especially little miss Bitch herself.

G (s/he speaks again! zomgz): "You have NO RIGHT to call my friend a bitch, I shall call the police" [appeal to authority moar, oh noes I scared of police, I'll give you 10 points for that 10:1001]
E or X: "Wallow, you can't go around calling my friend a bitch, why are you SO FUCKING RUDE?" [CONGRATS THERE, you managed to say the F word in public!, do you want a prize? Then again, you get 900 points for this... 910:1001]

SG (still calm O_O, this guy is awesome): "Calm down people"

G or E or X: "We want to know why/how he (referring to SuB) can say such stuff, and we demand an apology."

SG: "That has nothing to do with me, you can deal with my friend on that matter later, but all I'm asking is for you to quieten down" [Nice pang seh there, nice dodge, -11 points... 910:990]

And so the quarrel goes on, but 1 stop is up and Bedok here I come. If you analyse the situation properly, you realise that Group 1 has nothing to base their argument on except for the 'You can't call anyone of us gay or bitch' argument while Group 2 is just asking nicely, in fact, very nicely for them to be less of a public nuisance. Hrmm, who's side are you on?

Monday - Respect

And once again another event happens that generates debate amongst those affected. This'll be my first time joining in, I am after all a new kid on the block. And I'm posting late in fact, due to certain circumstances. Reading my friends' blogs, I feel compelled to add in my view on the matter. Though I may not be blessed with such eloquence and clarity of thought as my fellows, please bear with me.

Was he right? Was he wrong? Well I'll leave that for you to decide by yourself. The facts are that he did it, in a way many would think was uncalled for. He gave his reasons, justified them, and proceeded to impose the appropriate punishment. There's nothing lawfully or logically wrong about that, after all, he acted within the limits. Who can say that he overstepped the boundaries with those actions, and that he should face disciplinary action? Probably no one. So what's wrong then?

Well, the questions are: Are his reasons suitably justified enough? Were the punishment appropriate? Were the punishment given to the appropriate people?

Returning on the topic of this post, respect. This word as a noun has many definitions, and as a reference to a trusted source, dictionary.com gave 8 different definitions, of which two are ones of interest - number 3 and 4. I may be wrong, but I believe that my friends are referring to only one aspect of the word - number 3, and as I have not asked the teacher or plan to ask the teacher, I would not know which meaning of the word he is referring to. As such, we must always take into consideration that he could be referring to the other meaning of the word - number 4, and then all the arguments about the matter will have a chance of being irrelevant.

The definitions hinges on two words - esteem and deference. Esteem refers to how the person gives a value to or regards a matter, while deference is about yielding and giving in or accepting something. The former is more personal than the latter, and by that I mean there is less room for discussion on what is respectable in the deference sense.

As for the well known quote about respect being earned, it applies to both definitions of respect. If a leader or figure of authority shows that he is capable, the people would no doubt hold him in high regard, or respect him, and that respect is earned by him proving his abilities. But on the other hand, if a person is of a higher status or more advance in age, do those attributes make him deserve respect? I would say yes. And why?

Because firstly, the deference is towards his "privileged position". The person has power over you, so you have to respect him. Would you be disrespectful to an incapable dictator, where at his command your life could be forfeit? A rational person would not be disrespectful, as the respect is given towards not the person's abilities but his power. Secondly, the deference is towards his age. Chinese culture dictates that all children should have filial piety. The reason for this, in my opinion, is that deference and respect should be shown to those who have lived in the world longer. We are not taking into account life experience here, though that is one good reason why we should respect the elders. Should a boy genius who has experienced much of the world give respect to a middle-aged cripple who has seen nothing but the four walls of his house? Yes. Because the cripple has managed to survive in the world till middle-age, whereas the boy genius with all the experience in the world has only survived till boyhood. Well, looking at it another way, the middle-age man is closer to his death, assuming that all people die at the average age of 70, and we should respect people that are closer to dying than us. Looking at the world now, we respect the sick, the handicapped, the dying, and most of all, the dead. We may respect the dead, those who have achieved much in their lives, but we also respect the dead, those that have done nothing. Death is a privileged position, as those who have achieved it are beyond us. Immortality is a curse. But I digress.

Returning to the matter at hand, should the speaker deserve respect? Or should we give the speaker some respect? Yes, basic respect would not be too much to ask for. I’m sure one good reason why the speaker is up there speaking is that she knows what she is talking about; the topic is related to her profession.

As for whether people need to give other people of similar age and authoritative positions respect, that is another matter altogether. But I believe that the reason why certain people were let off early, was, firstly the guy meting out the punishment had no authoritative right to punish his colleagues, even if they were disrespectful and in the wrong. Also, the objective of the lecture in the first place was to educate the students, and not the teachers.

To answer the three questions mentioned above at the start: The reason of no respect was given when it should have been given was justified. The punishment was appropriate, as it was not too unreasonable. And it was given to the appropriate people, meaning to all the students (as for those who left earlier, it doesn’t really make a difference).

After so much talk about whether respect should be given, did I give respect to the speaker? No. And for that I am sorry (I’m sure most of you who did not pay attention would feel bad for the speaker, who is there speaking while the intended audience isn’t listening). If given the same scenario again, what would I do? Probably the same thing which I did before. Now what does this signify? A lack of self-control.

P.S. Sorry if I seem incoherent halfway, it was finished at around 4am.