Zoom Out, Bro

I've been back in Malaysia about two weeks, and I'm getting the feeling that my trips back - two years when I lived in Thailand, two years when I lived in the States, and now when I'm living in New Zealand - are all about reminding myself of the big picture. Not the least in that I've made some really close friends in New Zealand in a rather short amount of time - still, with friends and family here in Malaysia. Sweet as.

I remember back in Indiana when a new acquaintance showed me the local mall, as if this poor thing from the Third World country had never seen one in his life, and in that spirit asked me what I thought (read: how impressed you must be!). I recall saying something along the lines of, "Well, I guess if you take this mall, double its width and add three floors, you'd get one wing of one of the malls back in Malaysia where I used to shop until it became yesterday's news when something bigger came along."

Thankfully no one in Wellington shows off Lambton Quay like it's heaven sent, which makes me appreciate its rather quaint setting. And yet Malaysia never ceases to surprise me, most recently with Straits Quay - not really for its size (when you have a mall in KL which houses within it a theme park including a seven-storey high roller coaster, it gets hard to beat), but rather that when it advertises a picture of yachts with the words "fun by the sea", it doesn't tell you that the last time you were in this area, it was the sea. Yup, we reclaim land so quickly that as my sister pointed out, at this rate, the second link from the island to the mainland will be made redundant when we run out of ocean.

On one hand, we now have a "Penang Philharmonic", which is basically the Penang Symphony Orchestra for whatever reason not being able to hold on to the name of the orchestra it sought - and was successful at - overrunning through the less-than-subtle wheeling and dealings of state politics. And you have the Chairman's message shooting itself in the foot in the first paragraph, and then acting like Barney the purple dinosaur in the last. It's almost like having Dakota Fanning in a M. Night Shyamalan movie. That is, the screaming Dakota Fanning of War of the Worlds rather than that of Charlotte's Web, and the Shyamalan of The Village rather than The Sixth Sense, if you get what I mean. On the other hand, it reminds you that music is it's own judge in the end, no matter what name you'd like to call yourself.

I get reminded that in preparation for seminars here to really keep things basic - the problem with doctoral research is that you spend that much time with a magnifying glass that you sort of lose the bigger picture. In a sense it's an unusual place that there are particularly talented music students who can't recall who wrote the Eine Kleine, and yet you can get a random gigs paying you 200 bucks for half-an-hour's worth of music. I'm not sure what it means for long-term prospects - how long I'd like to keep painting in broad-strokes in sessions on music history and music appreciation. On one hand it's fun, and it's more affective and effective (not to mention potentially lucrative) for the gigantic pool of music students who have this as a significant missing link in their education, and on the other it would take away somewhat from producing niche research which would contribute to the field, but a field that's fields away from here. Who knows, I may be able to find an interesting balance in the end, and for now, it's just nice to zoom out, bro, and have a look at the gift of possibilities.

University Life, and the Life of the University

Sometimes I think I've been entirely developed in a university Petri dish. Or rather, not one in a university, but one of universities. From growing up on the campus of Michigan State to studying in a school here in New Zealand owned and placed on two different universities, it's been an interesting time.

I seem to have this ideal of what a campus is, as a place where all ideas are welcome and the life of a university thrives around social meeting places where all great thoughts converge, then float back to lecture halls. Which happens at times, but the ideal seems to break when you get young aspiring academics defending positions not because the position is stronger but because they've spent time preparing that position. When you have students with potential and intelligence - but are just to lazy to apply it. And when you have a bunch of graduate students who are bury themselves in offices, and after a period of enculturation they're convinced that while knowledge may be infinite, the universe extends but to the four walls which surround them.

And if I'm totally honest, after living, working, and studying on half a dozen campuses, I suppose I've been guilty of all three charges at some point in my life. And I'm fairly sure I have a tendency to slip into one or more of them on occasion. It's probably a good thing that it happens too, so that when you have right sense to get back on track you're reminded that you're human, and in doing so you better appreciate the humanness in others. Maybe.

Speaking of humanness, gosh man, it's been one of those times when you just wish you knew what people were saying beyond what they actually say, ya know? Or if there really is anything between the lines. I should see if there's any definitive research on mixed messages. Ironic it would be, if there were.

I spent the first semester of this year getting all these crazy, wonderful ideas. Some of them worked, some of them didn't - the ones that did are pretty cool. Topping the list is finding a way to recreate the sound of a viola da gamba with basically what violists already have in their hands. And in doing so, also finding a way of making cheap instruments sound twice as good as they usually do, if only you could teach people to read music in more than one way. Then I've spent this semester doing all the other things that doctoral students do - preparing papers that fit the requirements of a successful conference paper submission (but don't really fit your own research), preparing a piece for its technical components rather than its musical ones (which makes me feel more like a trained monkey than a musician or a researcher). I have a neat folder of related literature for an article on Bach that actually does fit in with my overall research - a crystallization of all the important bits from dozens of sources, notes from personal acoustical experiments and after devouring a whole pile of books. With all the other things ongoing, its been on the backburner so long that it looks like I have to go back and read it again for the third time. And I swear every day it looks at me as if saying in Gollum's voice, "Master is tricksy, Master is false, Master has neglected... his... PRECIOUS!"

University mascot? Who would have guessed, eh.

Source: www.luisprada.com

Today I ended up late because I checked the bus schedule and thought it was a Sunday. Welcome to your Ph.D. work, where you may have cool ideas but you don't know what day of the week it is, and where your research slowly calls you back to Bach, the one and only Lord of the Strings.

Met a Four

Sometimes it's true that it's easy to find metaphors where none were meant to be. But at other times it's hard not to notice the juxtapositions that life puts in front of you. Like a Hong Kong sampan - right in the district of millionaire yachts:


It makes it sink in a little more when the tour guide tells you one of them (I think the one covered up) is used by the head of our Malaysian-based Public Bank:


But in the spirit of Cuti-Cuti Malaysia, we should search for meaning in our own land, but at the risk of being cynical, I do have to wonder whether when out of the holiday season, we have to be careful that our Merdeka spirit - and the Malaysian unity behind it - isn't hidden in scaffolding as well.

Say Cheese

I heard a while back that dentists say that the amount of toothpaste you actually need is substantially less than the advertising pics you usually see about a good glob covering your toothbrush. Around half or even less is apparently all you need - and the way that toothpaste companies try to increase their revenue is to build a perception that you need more to keep your teeth in tip-top condition to reflect the sun's rays, be friends with polar bears, and wear top hats with that little touch of debonair.

Speaking of advertising, I saw this on a website:


And all this while I might have had infidel paste in my mouth? Who would have guessed that's where my occasionally foul tongue may have originated.

I've recently had the interesting experience to test out certain, well, myths or assumptions or whatever you want to call them. Last year while attending a university conference in Evansville, Indiana, I actually tested the theory that I could sleep through an earthquake. Scalding my left hand yesterday isn't exactly the height of my career as a poster boy for the accident prone (that one I think goes to having a lightbulb blow up in my right hand a couple of years back, or perhaps accidentally ironing myself) but let me announce proudly that smearing toothpaste over the area affected actually does work.

Apparently you can also swallow an inch of toothpaste you can fake a fever long enough to get an MC. But with my record of accidents I think that's one myth I shouldn't test; chances are it'll give me a real reason to have an MC.

Words, words, words

Oh, they matter, they do.

I was playing badminton today, and as always thought it rather odd that the word "love" is used for the guy who well, doesn't score. It gets a bit ironic when its, say, 17-love coz love is the last thing on that guy's mind.

Then there's "all". As in 17-17 is said to be "17-all". The thing is there are only two people on the court, which makes me wonder why it isn't "17-both".

Then there's your salad, with, what's that you say? "Thousand Island". (Though somehow when I think of how my old Jamaican roommate would say it, "Yo man, pass me some Thousand Island man", it doesn't really sound that wrong.)

There's this group on Facebook called "I judge you when you use poor grammar". Which in a strictly grammatical sense is fine, but semantics is another thing entirely. I always thought that grammar was either correct or incorrect, while "poor" suggests that grammar lies on a scale of quality.

Jebat posted something rather interesting on the history of the Titanic (and, while I'm on the subject, check this out), and I noted for the first time that the tagline of the Leo Dicaprio/Kate Winslet movie poster reads: "NOTHING ON EARTH COULD SEPARATE THEM".

Nothing on earth? As in, on land? Really? From soppy to ironic? Heh heh.

Oh, they matter, they do.

Words, words, words.

Old Stomping Grounds

It's been a while since I've spent some proper time in USM where I did my first degree. Back then I was more commonly stomping out of the grounds than spending more time on them, but going back as an alumnus felt different. A lot of things have changed since I was my frustrated younger self - or rather a lot of things are the same but I just see them somewhat differently. In a sense somewhat dispassionately, which is also what helps me not puke when I look at the yellow stripes they've painted across the Penang Free School building. Too much love, too much frustration, it all waters down to a nice porridge if you give it enough time I guess - I certainly hope so anyway, I think we need that to survive eventually.

I actually had a fairly pleasant time at the library:


...chatting up the librarians and the lady at the photocopying center on the second floor. An ability provided with two years being both a librarian and ad hoc photocopy machine technician in Indiana University South Bend. Been there, done that, and yes, people just don't realize that if you try and rip out jammed paper of section B7 without being careful, that darn toner is gonna burn your hand off. And the paper will remain gleefully jammed.

Was relieved to know that they had the New Grove, which is going to be particularly helpful in moving along a research proposal I'm working on. The journal selection for music was a little woeful, though it was a bit of a surprise that they had an online connection to the Strad, to which I noted an article on Kim Kashkashian's mention of the viola as the Cinderella of the strings. Title? "You Will Go to the Ball". Clever.

In other cleverness, a couple of us are thinking of getting together to try out Schubert's "Trout" Quintet, which not too surprisingly, is musically inspired by the freshwater inhabitant. If it works, we'll probably meet on Saturdays, in a project we've dubbed "Weekend Fishing".

Back to campus. As I was leaving the library, I noted what Mei Ying was mentioning earlier on - that local elections were ongoing. The thing about large campuses is getting the publicity out. A common theme now looks like this:


Which I imagine is useful in getting name recognition going. The problem is that paper has a way of getting its own way (remember what I said about jammed paper?):


...which can ironically look like you just toilet-papered your school.

Scattered Pit Stop Thoughts

It's been the most positive and productive starts to a new year as far as I can remember. Which isn't necessarily saying much since stock in my memory aren't exactly selling at blue-chip levels. The final stage of soundpost setting arrived with the acquisition of a setter today, which means that the next time thunder roars, you may hear me screaming, "IGOR! It's... ALIVE!"

One must be careful with momentum though - with the intensity of university applications, the YouTube Symphony Orchestra project, finishing American Gods and moving the Mozart biography and getting back to practicing, sometimes it's good to take a bit of a pit stop break before I fall over. (Which I've been suspecting is where I've been headed in the past couple of days, in a slight overdrive to make sure I don't stagnate while waiting for the next stage.) Time to breathe.

While we're breathing, here behold are some scattered thoughts.

1. We used to worry so much about the magnetism of mobile phones. An old friend (thanks to Facebook, just reconnected after 12 years), used to pick up coins with her phone, and reassured her classmates that, "I switch from one ear to the next, to ensure that I fry my brain evenly." If magnetism really is so bad, it makes me wonder why we stick magnets all over our fridge... where we store the stuff we later stuff into our mouths.

2. OK the Maxis ads are really cute. The ones with the paper cut-outs. What I don't get is the line, "and you get to surf the whole Internet!" I mean, are there really deals where you only surf half the internet? (No seriously, coz in Thailand there used to be Internet cafes which would only get Thai websites, much like an intra-net.)

3. I noted with some interest Oprah's "Best Life Week" which was apparently based on her current weight crisis. Being overweight is an issue yes, but when someone who is as accomplished as Oprah - her own personal stardom and success not only financially but in breaking the race barrier, starting that school in South Africa, helping get her candidate elected President - places her weight problem on that level... I don't know if that's the best thing for a role model to do. I get a feeling there's a fat kid somewhere who is a great person to others and brilliant in all sorts of ways, who would be better off knowing that yes, he'd like to lose a couple of pounds, but while he's still on the path and on the treadmill he'd like not to let it entirely determine his self-esteem and run his life. That's my opinion anyway.

End-Year Cadence, New Year’s Resolution

Technically, in a musical sense that would work better as an end-year suspension, but somehow that just sounds like someone sitting on the pot or changing his underwear when the clock strikes twelve.

New year resolutions have this uncanny ability of magnetically attracting procrastination. The year ahead always seems full of possibility, which somehow also means that there’s enough time to leave it for tomorrow.

So this year I’m doing two things. I’m going on month-by-month goals, or if you will, resolutions. January’s is to get my university applications all in order, read a Mozart biography given to me by Orshi and Gergely, and – possibly a February goal, as you can see, I’m already ahead of myself in my procrastination – taking a couple of lessons on adjusting a soundpost. Wonder if I can recruit some people in the endeavour. Hmm.

On a “big-picture” scale though, I have a new year’s attitude. Or a new-year’s motto. It’s come in several forms, I haven’t yet settled on one yet. So far I’ve been inclined to “There’s nothing to lose in trying.”

Another, however, is “Why the heck not?”

It could very well be: “Crap, here goes nothing.”

The only thing against it would be the little Yoda in my head saying, “Try? Do. Or do not. There is no try.” But then I’ve really been more of a Star Trek sort of guy, final frontier, going where no one has gone before, that sort of thing.

Basically it’s about not discounting possibilities, and to leave all my options open. A resolution for 2009 is not just discarding the old year, it’s about learning from it, and that’s what I’ve learned best from two-oh-oh-eight. It’s everything from looking at shoes (“that’d never fit me”) to university applications and even – or perhaps especially – personal relationships. But part of having nothing to lose in trying also involves keeping expectations in check, be wary of trusting to investing too much in something or someone which or who may not turn out to be worthwhile in the end. There’s a lot to lose otherwise. That, along with a necessary optimism needed in leaving all options open and trying everything out without prejudice – will be a tightrope more challenging than any of my previous resolutions. It may indeed be a tough line to walk.

But what the heck. It’s worth a shot. I like how that sounds.

Happy new year, everyone.

Primordial Bingo

Sometimes I wonder if there’s a little distribution center right before we get born. And there’s this bingo-like lottery where we get these various coupons. Like a cross between a horoscope and the Chance cards you pick up on a Monopoly board and an old-fashioned role-playing game – or for those of you who might remember, the Choose Your Own Adventure books.

These coupons on one hand involve a certain complicated kind of luck, like, “You’re gonna end up – or rather, start off – in a poor African country where you’ll have a tough time getting an education. On the other hand here, you’ll have a starting advantage in physical strength, somewhat less problems in ever getting fat, and 25 points you can claim at Counter 2.”

And then you go, hmm and proceed to the next stop and here you get a little choice about how you’d spend your points. Spend it all on Endurance/Stamina might be the way to go, and bingo, next thing you know you’re the next marathon king of Ethiopia. Cash it in Dexterity and Coordination might have been smarter if you were in a place where you could end up playing table tennis, but still if you have some points left for Entrepreneurial Spirit, you might make it starting up a custom-made furniture store.

Some people seem to get more points than others though, so there has to be a logic to that too. Like “Bingo! You start off with Shelf 1 DNA – tall, dark, and handsome. With cash to boot. You’ll find things and people tend to come your way but you might find they don’t always seem to be the ones which provide true constancy. Choose between an additional 10 points in Focus which you can pick up at Counter 2, Humility at Counter 3, or decide instead to bank on your strengths and head for the Dumb Jocks Corner on the lower basement level.”

I’m pretty sure that there ought to be a Rare Gifts Shoppe, which you get to visit if you get the pre-life equivilent of one of Willy Wonka’s Golden Tickets. Most of our gifts just seem almost magical to those who don’t have them – it’s different somehow watching Sarah Chang and knowing in a ballpark approximation what she does to get the sound she gets, than being a music-loving say, accountant. Sometimes the magic is good to have, which is all the motivation not to know everything, in a sense. It’d be even more interesting to have a particularly rare gift, like photographic memory, or really knowing when it’s going to rain, or having a particular dexterity with your left big toe. With some of them, it would be harder to build a life around such a gift, but it would be interesting to have.

I know our decisions decide where we head in this life. But I wonder if we made decisions before this life, somehow. The question, I guess, is whether it’s like octagenarians’ rounds of bingo… or a rather more lively primordial casino. Round and round me goes, whether it be luck, chance or karma bestows.

A Field of Snippets

There’s a field right outside my house in PJ, and there’s much to bask in terms of people watching. Snippets give glimpses into people’s lives.

There’s an old lady who doesn’t move particularly fast. But when she walks she really keeps going, outrunning both me and the Energizer Bunny in terms of keeping it going.

Her T-shirt has a logo you can’t quite make out in the front, and “Pusat Perkhidmatan Chew Mei Fun” (Chew Mei Fun’s Service Center) on the back. The “Chew Mei Fun” is a lot bigger than “Pusat Perkhidmatan,” which I’m hoping is not symbolic of the size of the political ambition over the weight of the service.

There’s a young man still in his office clothes, except for sandals, pushing around his toddler in a stroller. He’s had a full day at work and knew that he had to make the most of the remaining daylight with his young child. I sometimes think it odd that we value sunlight but spend most of it indoors. Would we be happier on the night shift?

A bunch of teenagers play basketball in their school uniforms. It’s not a full-fledged game, just going around one half of the court. Out of habit and instinct, these groups always seem to end up on the side of the court closest to the street. Which also is the side of the court closest to a big muddy puddle where the ball often ends up after missing the basket entirely. Ten plops into the mud and the necessitated use of a stick to get their ball out doesn’t seem to suggest to the teens that they might try the opposite side of the court.
But then, they do call this place “Kuala Lumpur”. Which for our non-Malaysian readers, means that our capitol city is called “Delta of Mud”. Not exactly in the same linguistic intention as Los Angeles, let me tell ya.

Some of the older generation of Indian ladies don’t view walking around a park as any less fashionable dignified as any other activity. Thus the full-length evening dress, gold necklaces, and scarves. They look surprisingly more natural in that garb than in a tracksuit.

Another bunch of youngsters kick a volleyball around, aiming to hit a tree. The tree wins.

In the morning, there’s usually a Mercedes Benz with a “P” sticker, indicating that there’s a new “Probation” driver using his or her parents’ car. But it’s usually there before nine, next to the line dancing and tai chi. Something tells me it’s the mom or dad, not the new license holder that’s parking the car. Which is a pity, coz those tai chi people really have some style.

There’s a specific bunch that only comes out when it rains cats and dogs. They play a game in the middle of the basketball court that involves being in a circle and laughing like hyenas when the ball hits someone’s head. I keep thinking that the next morning half of them are gonna get sick and learn their lesson. But they’re a resilient bunch, and someone upstairs takes more pleasure in their enjoyment of life than their lack of concern for health or common sense.

Two friends meet, walking in different directions. They stop for a moment to catch up. They would have stopped for two moments, except that one of them has three dogs who have an entirely different idea. Who’s walking who?

I pop in a set of headphones and do my thing around the field. You know how people like to hum along or sing along to music? Well, some classical musicians have an inclination to conduct what they hear. The problem is of course that other people think you’re downright weird if you do that outside. So the question really is whether your satisfaction at connecting to music by waving your arms about is overweighed by people thinking you’re nuts. And if it is, then you subscribe to the tenet that the assumptions that people create based on what they don’t know, are valid. Rather than (an albeit idealistic) perspective that diversity is not limited to understanding other people but accepting them even if you don’t understand them. Perhaps the reason why we don’t do things like wave our arms about if that totally works for us… is that we protect our own inclination to judge people who do things we don’t understand. So in a sense, not waving your arms about is as dangerous as people staring at you for waving your arms about.

I think that sort of balances things out in a lose-lose sort of situation. I figured today that if that’s the case, then I may as well have some fun in the process. Today’s joggers got a silent demo of the conducting of selections of Evita. And surprisingly enough, not many seemed to care one way or another.

Life in the Aisle

I’ve always found it somewhat interesting to go grocery shopping, and I’ve never thought about why that is until today. There’s a certain representation of society right down the aisles, which intrigues those who like to observe people – those who were, perhaps, sociologists and anthropologists in some other life.

In one sense, there’s a certain shared identity. You look in a person’s grocery cart and you get a glimpse of that person’s life. Microwavables, Twisties, beer. Diapers, toilet rolls, talcum powder. Curtains, pillow covers, mugs. Plus, you’re automatically in a anonymous community once you spend more time in one aisle than the next. Take a moment to look at badminton rackets… or tap fixtures, and you have a connection to the person who is picking out shuttlecocks or a water heater. You don’t have to say hello, you don’t have to sign up for a match, which would be particularly weird with the taps and all, but you know where you are. And if there is ever a need reinforce your identity as a Malaysian, you know that just about everyone in the store is going to stop by the Maggi and Milo sections before the day is over.

You put something in your grocery cart and though you haven’t purchased it yet, you’ve marked it as your own. Someone can’t exactly decide that his watermelon is not as good as the one in your cart and trade, now can he? And yet in that sense you can leave your cart and walk around to get something else, and know that no one is going to do that behind your back – well, not here anyway. Different sort of deal if you have the last Wii in a BestBuy, but then that’s the charm of it – no one is out to sell you something they can’t afford themselves. Shopping complexes on the other hand have assistants who are promoting products they wouldn't get themselves. I'd prefer to trust the fish monger who looks like he may have eaten a fish recently.

Even the way you get around a supermarket says something. There are the meticulous who systematically go aisle by aisle - who also have a scheduled time and day for shopping. Then there are people like me, who jump, skip and hop and don't even pretend they have a plan.

Of course they'll be a return to reality as the various shopping carts race for the finish line, cut queue and with a flick of a card illustrate how capitalism still thrives. But while we're still rolling down the aisles instead of waiting in them, there's a glimpse of the parts of society we might do well to breathe in, and hold for a moment in time.

Stubborn Streak

But not stubborn enough not to admit it.

Something in me defies logic. Those who know me will guffaw, saying that I defy logic on a frequently philosophical scale. And they may be right. But I've managed to sneak the word 'guffaw' into this post - twice - which makes it all worthwhile.

Unlike Jeffrey Archer, whose book "False Impression" I am currently perusing. Actually, the more accurate term is that I'm reading it, but 'perusing' has that somewhat Anglophile aftertaste, and I like to polish my Welsh roots from time to time. There are some words, when repeated, don't necessarily go lau hong, and I say this because like everyone else, I do have genes. Unfortunately, Archer's use of the word "limpet" is not one of them. Wind gone out already, mate. And now you're downright linguistically confused. Or you should be, in any case. Dash it if you're not.

The other little habit that Archer has - well, other than an overfocus on his time in prison - is his decision to leave details of physical descriptions a little late. So, fifty pages in, you're told that the bad guy who you figured to be an Antonio Banderas-in-Assassins type turns out to be closer to be sans hair in toto. Or the classy heroine who you figured to be the Who Framed Roger Rabbit type -


- turns out to be blond. Go back and get out your DVD of Secondhand Lions and take a gander at the deleted scenes; there's a perfect example of having to rewind and change your whole perception of things. Sounds superficial, but then I've been told I have a one-track mind.

Let's sidetrack here to a little musical joke told to me by one of the faculty back in Indiana. Silly Babbitt, serials are for kids! Get it?

Back on track. Lucky Archer still knows how to tell a story, or his suddenly blonds and his multiple limpets - plus the fact that I actually had to check up "limpet" in a dictionary and realized how long it's been since I've used something other than Wiktionary or dictionary.com - would have had me put down the book a while ago. I'm stubborn that way, which brings us back to the beginning. I tend to be hard to please as far as books are concerned (and I hear people mumbling that I'm hard to please as far as life is concerned). In recent times, I've put down just as many books read halfway as I've completed. I ditched An Equal Music, the emo-strong must-read, about three-quarters of the way through because the protaganist is a wimp and even I can't imagine thinking that the issue of arranging a chamber music concert chronologically or via the stress of changing keys is somehow life-changing. More like Bridezilla at one of the many wedding functions musicians end up in.

I'm also stubborn in sieves. I paraded the white flag of surrender at 5:30 in the morning and went to cook Maggi Mee - the mee goreng (asli!) which I oddly think is better than the real mee goreng. Which relates to reading too, because I just can't help thinking of food if the characters on the pages are chomp chomping. And I couldn't find the sieve and the water was about to boil which gave me about a countdown of four minutes to find the darn thing. The stubborn streak reared its head, which happens just about every time I look for something. I'll pick out three likely places, and when I can't find what I'm looking for the logical thing is of course to check elsewhere. But instead, I end up convinced that those three places are the most likely and I must have missed something and I end up on the merry go round rechecking the three places which are by now the three most unlikely places where the darn sieve is located. Once in a while the thing I'm looking for will actually be there hidden in the back of one of those three places, which will provide affirmation to my merry go round... instead of all those times when the darn sieve has run away like a rabbit from a gun. And while we're on this topic, "merry go round" is better said as "carousel" which Wikipedia notes "originates from the Italian garosello and Spanish carosella ("little war"), used by crusaders to describe a combat preparation exercise and game played by Turkish and Arabian horsemen in the 1100s."

Anyway that's why I'm stubborn... and random. Though I don't go streaking.

But not stubborn enough not to admit it. But just random enough to repeat it.

Words, Part 2

A few of us went out on Friday night, and I noted that T.G.I. Friday's must get some benefits from name recognition. There must be some people who go, gee I'm so glad it's Friday... let's go to Friday's. It's not like you have to pay someone to use a day of the week.

But I think they haven't taken it far enough. I think that as much as people are happy the work week is over, there's a huge untapped market from the stress during the work week. There's nothing like comfort food. In fact, I think they should start a new chain.

And I've got the perfect name for it.

O.M.G. Monday's.

Words Part 1

A couple of weeks ago, I was with two friends from orchestra.

Kate said, "I really want a Land Rover."

I replied, "I really want a life."

Pause.

And Fay said, "Really? A Land Rover?"

Articulated Light

It's been an incredibly, unbelievably busy time. 14-hour days on the inside, 18-hour days on the outside. And getting to the dashboard the brain cells tend to be a little fried, and thus my little haitus.

Nevetheless, here's a little sample from the musical world: Ligeti's Artikulation. It's electronic, and contemporary - two things are interesting about this. First is the use of a visual instead of notated music score, and second is a little hint of R2-D2 (towards the end) some thirty years before the advent of Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader.




I've been thinking of the computer screen as a pretty remarkable device - if you think about it, we moved pretty quickly from light as an indicator in the dark, to light as a conduit of information. Albeit of course, the TV, which I view as a halfway house especially in the light of how all the major TV programs are online, and equally affected by the writers' strike.

Imagine for a moment having a flashlight that could feed you lunch. And while we're here, you might find flashlights as a hobby interesting.

Essentially though, both Edison's light bulb and the laptop screen are the same thing: an illuminating source to simply show us where everything is.

What we've changed is what we consider to be "everything".

Meow Friend The Apostrophe, Apostrophe Meow Friend Is

The apostrophe is fairly complex animal. As an instrument of contractions, it serves the cause of brevity, but it is a conditional contract...

Consider:

"She's a curious cat, as curious as cats can be, she is."

Which, despite the license to end as it does, cannot be:

"She's a curious cat, as curious as cats can be, she's."

There's also tension with tenses, with different educators differing on whether "She's" could be a contraction for "She was". Academically, I tend to side with the restricted sense, based on a phonological viewpoint:

Let's assume that "she's" could be "she is" or "she was". This rings true, literally, because the "s" sound from each of the verbs-to-be lends itself to the contractions they serve.

However, consider "they're" as "they are" or "they were" - unless we pronounce the past tense version as "they-er" instead of "they-ar", there seems to be a contradiction. Har har.

On the other hand, the apostrophe may not want to be past-ed over; after all, "I will" = "I'll" but "I would" = "I'd", unless one considers that the true past tense would be "I would have", which would then be "I would've".

Then there's the function of the apostrophe as an indicator of possession, as in "Harry's car is a piece of junk, a piece of junk Harry's car is." Which Harry Potter fans will turn temporarily dyslexic and read as "Harry's scar is oh so funk, so funky Harry's scar is."

Now in this respect, the apostrophe can work for others too:

"The cat's long tail swished and swaggered,
a sign of a significant end."

And yet, not without the use of the... what's the word... determinant (I think), in this case "the". Consider why this is borderline in the arena of grammatical correctness:

"Cats' tails, even when they flail, still win, cats' tails do."

Though I do think I'd get away with it. Not to mention that when used for possession, the apostrophe is indispensable, as contrasted to contractions. Seen another way, there is no other way to write without the application of the apostrophe, and its arranged marriage to the letter S. And here the more perceptive - or the most nitpicky - may have noted the use of the one exception to possession: "its".

Then there's my golden question, which no university professor has been able to answer:

If "The cats of KFC" = "KFC's cats"
Then is "The cats of McDonald's" = "McDonald's's cats"?

I like the apostrophe, I do. It's brief, aesthetically somehow somewhat more elegant than the comma, especially when handwritten or in san serif fonts not yet available on Blogger. It also has a sense of mystery, of ambiguity, or carefully determined undecidedness that make some people interesting.

Like cats, they don't sell their loyalty easily, and more importantly, send a philosophical message: even the essence of possession comes with a certain agreed, comfortable, reliable... dependency.

Some Things Are Literal

Over the past couple of days I've learned that "under the weather" can be a literal thing i.e. getting itsy bitsy sickie wickie from the changing climate.... or climate change, depending on your politics. I've also learned that "ending on a good note" can be literal as well - musicians have this tendency to practice without thinking of the law of diminishing returns or whatever it's called, and end up beating a dead horse (if that indeed is the phrase, I tend to get confused when euphemisms use seemingly randomly chosen farm animals).

You know how a baby cries really loudly and people joke, "What great voice projection!" The voice professor here tells me there's more truth to that than one would think - because babies can cry for as long as they do, and not wear out as much as the typical adult tends to after shouting a while. Natural voice projection. You get it at birth, and two decades later you spend quite a bit of time and effort to get it back and make it into a career. How about that.

The new conductor of the school orchestra is British, so when I ask him a question I can actually include the vocabulary of crotchet, minim, semiquaver, and other members of our quaint musical community. To which he'll tell the orchestra, don't worry, he's correct even though you have no idea what he's talking about, which is just fine. And then he coins the words "crisper", "pitchier" and "chalugernought". I always thought the first was supposed to be "crispier" but I suppose that would have entailed a food substance in eat-me range. The second I think was just cheeky. The final was a amalgam of the chuga-chuga of a train and the juggernaut bow intensity required then.

No man can be an island, but Britain is one anyway. Or one and then some, if you include the Falklands and Northern Ireland. I have no regrets coming here instead of going to the Birmingham Conservatory because of the scholarship situation, but some days I wish I had assimilated a proper accent. And I'm aiming to go to Australia after this - if that works out I'll barely be speaking the English language after a couple of years.

Moving from the literal to the literary, I think I may just apply for a writing competition here on campus. I've had a couple of unrealized ideas, and though writing what you know is the maxim of choice, I think sometimes it's good to let your alter ego take charge. I'm thinking of a dark piece of a disgruntled, jaded musician who looks at the music world with utter cynicism, and ending off with a moment of truth where he resists the hope of the young in music and the magic of sound. In verse. Maybe in a time signature too, who knows. I meant that symbolically - as in a specific kind of meter... but what the heck, why not actually throw in the time signatures, literally. Maybe stave lines too.

More on the literary, so apparently Dumbledore's gay, how about that. Which made me think about what Dumbledore would say about calling gay people names.

"Before you call a gay Muggle a Guggle, think about
how it would be if someone called you a Gizzard."
(Now read it again with the best British accent you can muster.)

Yes, I think that would be just about right. Go diphthongs! Now, I'm all supportive of having some real diversity in popular literature, and I think it's absolutely great that books like Mark Haddon's The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time get prizes and attention these days. And the whole Lemony Snicket deal, which makes it cool to be a bookworm, an inventor... and a biter. Ok the last one was a bit weird.

Makes me think that what my housemate says it right - whatever other ills American society has, public policy actively and successfully places people with disabilities with opportunities to work, and access to facilities. Asian cultures - note the plural - tend to have better respect for the fellow man on the whole, true, but that's mostly on the presumption that the fellow man is very much alike to you. We also tend to do quietly dispose of those who are different in some way or form. Sometimes people do it to themselves, sadly - I once met a perfectly able Thalassaemia carrier who doesn't question why Singapore Airlines won't give him a job. Idiot.

Anyhoo. So, Albus is gay. I think that will be particularly interesting in a socially more conservative society like that in Malaysia - especially since everyone's already read the books. I'm all supportive, but at the same time, when I read in the article this little section:

A spokesman for gay rights group Stonewall added: "It's great that JK has said this. It shows that there's no limit to what gay and lesbian people can do, even being a wizard headmaster."

I went, I'm sorry dear, but that's just not quite accurate. Truth is, there's no limit to what gay and lesbian people can do... even being a popular fictional character.

And that's why some things are literal.

Four Minor Meanderings

I think Alex Yoong, our one and only F-1 driver, should showcase to the world the qualities of Malaysian drivers. He should swerve in and out of lanes with a cigarette out the window, bang people from behind, stop in the middle of the track and then step out with a parang. Then we can do a Merdeka video with the theme, “50 Years of I Kid You Not Driving”. Malaysia Boleh!

Citibank has this couple of shelves which house an impressive array of awards. I went up close to examine them, and the first thing which caught my eye was “First place – Three-legged race”. Which is of course exactly what you expect your bankers to be capable of when push comes to shove.

I passed by a al-Rajhi Bank the other day and saw the theme, “Truth, honor, respect. Just values.” In Malaysia of course, that would be a little bit different when read aloud. You see, when the bank cheats you of all your money, and you go to complain by quoting their motto, they can say, “Just values-mah. This is business.”

The new VFS system for applying for US visas is a total scam. When at the embassy, people are asked at the counter to help fill out questionairres on the new system. Nothing said it better than the Malaysian who responded, “Can I be honest?” The American was a little surprised and asked, “Um, what?” to which he repeated at a dynamic which anyone in the hall could hear, “CAN – I - BE – HONEST?”

The Return from Oz

I'm still kind of recovering from the travel to Australia, which was interesting, but unfortunately did not include as much free wireless as I hoped, thus explaining my little haitus from blogging. For now I've uploaded some of my pics to my Flickr, and will blog some thoughts gathered during the trip.

People are oftentimes translucent, and sometimes that’s a literal thing. When you were a little kid, did you, like me, find it facinating to place a strong torchlight to your hand and somewhat see the bones underneath? If you didn’t, don’t bother trying now. Age has a tendency to build up finger fat, among other things. Good for viola playing, but not much else, like, say in the arena of carpal spectralization.

When I was on the plane, I came across this rather interesting selection of comedy audio files by Victor Borgin of some decades past. Amusing, but the position of the microphone and presumably the recording technology of the time made the applause rather deafening, to which I hd to move the headphones. Being the lazy ass that I sometimes can be, I decided that all I had to do was push the headphones up, like a bandana, perm machine, or Rayban sunglasses. Then, having my neat little flashback of childhood translucency, I thought, heck, if I push them down instead, as in with the headphones over my cheeks, would applause then come out of my mouth? It was an interesting idea, the only setback being I could not hear out of my nostrils and thus could not confirm my hypothesis without waking up people who likely were only willing to be woken up by the question of “Chicken or beef?” and not “Hey, mate, could you tell me if applause is coming out of my mouth?”

People are kind of transparent… or opaque, that way. I’m not really sure which.

What's in a Name?

More than one would think.

A decade or so ago when the whole Anwar Ibrahim political upheaval created a new political party, the choice of name was rather important, and it was no surprise when there was a legal battle on whether the People's Justice Party could shorten its name to just Justice. I mean, imagine, you're either for Justice or you're not.

The only problem is that it only works when it's a novelty and when people quite frankly don't know anything about you, and this symbolism fills a nice empty hole. Think about it - in the United States one doesn't really think of one as being more democratic or more republican in the sense of whether one prefers democracy or the republic. Partially because at one point in time the two meant about the same thing, since power to the people meant taking it from the King. When that symbolism is gone, there come far more pressing matters. Like whether you prefer donkeys or elephants.

Sometimes there's a certain subtlety in it too. Like calling yourself Tony, when you're British and your name really is Anthony Charles Lynton Blair. Or Little John when you're about the size of Sherwood Forest. But sometimes it can backfire, especially when you're from the Republican party and a magazine calls you Emperor George W. Bush II.

There are times I don't entire get it though. Like how the idea of Uncle Sam is encouraging, but Big Brother isn't - I mean, who decided on the family hierarchy? And I'm still wondering about when Lina Joy lost her appeal to declare herself a non-Muslim, whether the people who wrote the headline "No to Joy" really knew about the double entendre.

YouTube practically runs on names, since you have to "name" your videos in ways that would make it easy for people to search. How reassuring then, that the most popular video for the name "Malaysia" is one offering proof of Bigfoot.

Symbolism is central to our culture today. Take linguistics, a field of study which could be studied from, I daresay, a simple and practical perspective, owing which scores of second-language English users could feel a sense of social unity by being just as clueless as native speakers when it comes to using the word "whom". (The benefit would be that no one would feel guilty about it).

The problem with that is that it would be far too useful to be considered a proper academic area and poor linguists would be out on the streets, eventually losing their minds, and begging on sidewalks while correcting the grammar of passers-by.

To avoid this, the field of linguistics produces complicated lingo to create a symbolism of grandeur. Like a "voiceless labiodental fricative".

Don't tell anybody, but between you and me, that's really just the sound "f". Imagine the words you wouldn't be able to make without your voiceless labiodental fricatives. When you're done swearing, let's get back to reading my blog.

Yes, a name carries a big significance. And so when BBC News announces that Anwar Ibrahim's case of defamation against former Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamed was thrown out, there are a few things to think about. First, which of these is worse: when someone considered intelligent can go about saying, "Imagine having a gay prime minister. Nobody would be safe"... or when someone else, also considered intelligent considers that not, say, slander, but defamation of character.

Second, and far more important when one chooses sides in the never-ending Anwar versus Mahathir bruhawhaw: are you strong enough for war, or do you like hats?