July Trip
25/7 - Brussels

All the paintings featuring St Anthony's temptations had grotesque creatures straight out of modern art. You've heard of St John predicting helicopters, but St Anthony's predictions of modern art are even more amazing.


Pieter Bruegel I - De Val Van De Opstandige Engelen, 1562


Willem van den Broecke - Het Aards Paradijsaf de Liefde

During lunch time the galleries had staggered opening times. So when I was caught out, I went to walk around and saw this on the menu at the museum cafe - "Club Sandwich: Three Step Fantasy". Uhh.

Finishing all the good stuff, I decided to give 19th century art a chance. I knew the 20th century stuff would be hideous, but perhaps there might be a few pieces worth salvaging in the previous century.


Vogels - La Neige Soir (1883)
"Vogels marked the transition between the Realist aesthetic representation of the landscape and Impressionist subjectivism subjected to the play of light" - In other words, this was my cue to run away
Like many other 19th century paintings, a perfectly good painting/photo was ruined by the application of a blur filter (or some other filter in others). Even I can do that in Photoshop.


Joseph Geefs - La Gerie Du Anal, 1864

Interestingly, Henri Leys did some neo-Medieval paintings of Philip the Good and Mary of Burgundy in 1863.

The 19th century saw the"revival of the triptych" with "secularly sacred character".


Leon Frederic - The Chalise Sellers (Centre Panel) (1882-3)


Fernand Khnopff, Des Caresses (1896)
It must be the French influence.


Writeup on Khnopff
"Woman plays a major role in Belgian Symbolism, since by herself she embodies all the duality and ambiguity of the world. This confrontation of the androgynous being with the female sphinx in an imaginary setting, filled with blue columns and cabbalist inscriptions, is open to many interpretations. Is it a symbolization of power, domination,and seduction, or perhaps rather the image of Khnopff, himself, faced with his reflection, his sister Marguerite, the inaccessible muse? Or, perhaps, it is the eternal vision of Oedipus and the Sphinx?""


Edward Burne-Jones - Psyche's Wedding, 1895
He was proclaimed part of the "2nd generation pre-Raphaelists"

The 20th century section had freehand drawings of deranged madmen which I caught a glimpse of through the entrance, running away screaming forthwith.

Somehow I missed the Death of Marat. Maybe it was in the section under renovation but I doubt such a famous piece would go unexhibited, so I must have been careless.

Another way museums can fleece visitors: charge them for the cloakroom whose use is obligatory.


Place Royale
Behind: St Jacques' church at the Coubenberg


Front of the museum (Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts)


Our Lady of the Sablon church


Sablon alley


Place du petit Sablon


Palais de Justice


War monument outside Palais de Justice

I was following a self-guided Brussels city walk for most of its stretch, but didn't complete it since I got bored; I looked at some historic town wall and it looked pathetic, so I gave up. Either Brussels was not very interesting or I had travel fatigue.


Tassel Townhouse. It took me forever to find this. I almost gave up but luckily I persevered.
There was no UNESCO sign outside, and personally I don't see why it's so special.

A night shop in Brussels was manned by a Turkish looking guy. Gotta love immigrants.


The guy was good. If not for the sign 'Thank you', I wouldn't have known he was a performance artist.

If signs in Brussels are in only one language, that language is French. Bah.

At 4+ I had my third waffle. This was a chocolate covered waffle from Belgaufra. Touted as 'probably the best', it was definitely the worst waffle I had that day (the most soggy, the least light). Which means it was still good, but still. Ah, the perils of mass production (or leaving them out for too long)! This further proves my theory that products with Malaysian marketing have Malaysian quality.


Belgian romance (train conductor and air stewardess)

There was originally going to be some stories about the LDPVTB here, laid out for the court of public opinion to rule on, but said entity has since been cast into the deepest depths of the abyss (the nether abyss) so that case is closed.

I took a late afternoon/evening train to Luxemburg city and had dinner at the youth hostel. I had pizza and it had the most garlic I'd ever had in a pizza. The crust was passable (baked a little too long and so brittle at the edges) but unfortunately not as good as Italian crust (light and having bodyat the same time). Ah well.

Someone told me that Eurolines had double booked a bus from Berlin the night after the World Cup. So they needed to get a new bus and wake another driver. The poor passengers who couldn't get on the first bus had to suffer a 2 hour delay. Gah.

A map of Luxembourg City had a list of 'interesting buildings', one of which was 'Pescatore Fourd' ('Old People's Home'). Wth?! Maybe it was a really boring city. Or they were advertising how well they treated their old folks.


It was just my luck to visit Europe during another heatwave year. It was bad, but not that bad, since Singapore and Slavery had large inured me to heat. One of the few good things you learn in Slavery is to water parade. Other tips for coping with the heat:

- Don't be afraid to be nua (use an umbrella)
- Walk in the shade
- Stay indoors
- Take breaks
- Shorts/skirts are your friend

"I think computer viruses should count as life. I think it says something about human nature that the only form of life we have created so far is purely destructive. We've created life in our own image." - Stephen Hawking

***


Seen on the entrance to a male toilet in Vivocity. I went to the entrance of the female one to look for its counterpart, but unfortunately there was no sign warning of a male cleaner.

Some Mac whores claim their iPods/iTunes can read their minds, since when they shuffle their songs they get all the songs they want coming up. I swear my iPod hates my guts - more than 90% of the time, when I pick up my earphones, my left hand has the earphone meant for the right ear and/or vice versa (and no, this is not proof of bad hand-eye coordination as someone suggested since I don't look before picking up the earphones).


Ikea advertising its "exchange" policy. But it doesn't cover practically everything. If you don't change your mind after assembly, when are you going to change it?

NUS is currently hosting a Nobel Cultures of Creativity exhibition, and at the gifts section almost nothing related to the Nobel prizes - almost everything is a NUS-related souvenir. The proceeds from ticket sales are going to student bursaries (40% of which go to foreigners). I'm not sure about proceeds from souvenir sales.


Kim Dae Jung's cheat sheet. He was only allowed 2 sheets to write to his wife, or something. His is impressive, squeezing >16,000 characters a sheet (IFGRC), but mine is even better, and has awed everyone who has seen it.


"If lift breaks down you may be trapped. Please use staircase to avoid missing your exam."
Not the most encouraging thing to see before a paper.

Someone wore green socks with black shoes. Uhh.


This is the first time I've seen a monitor lizard in the wild.

For the first time, I saw someone doing an exam sideways. He was sitting sideways in his chair at a 225 degree angle (ie the 7:30 position), cross his legs and held his paper up in the air, writing on it at the same time.


In Eusoff Hall dining hall. It's so nice being a hall inmate - you get socially engineered 24/7, even when the rest of us go home.

The final exam for the module where the mid-term was the easiest I'd ever done since Lower Primary also had a final which was even easier than the mid-term. It was the third exam in NUS where I walked out early; when the examiner said we could now leave (we're forbidden to leave in the first hour), 10% of the cohort (~17/170) stood up and left. This is the first time I've seen people leaving in droves.


The worst selling piece of clothing in Singapore ("I ♥♥♥ NUS")


u r wt u wr:

- "Do you believe in love at first sight or should I walk by again?"
- Contribution: 'this t shirt looks better wet' (PS Carrefour, "it was in the children's section i think. god they're sick")


Quotes:

As you come in, remember not to look at the questions in your test book.

[On exam administrative instructions] Pay attention while I read to you from a very large piece of paper.

It is now 12:56. We have to wait for 4 more minutes. *laughs from audience* [Ed: The humour comes from the fact that they usually say 'you may start writing']

On the unlikely chance that anyone wants to take on a mobile plan at a 30% discount to monthly rate, I am currently trying to flog my SIM card:

http://www.starhub.com/mobile/mobileservice/featuresandservices/voiceplans.html - Powertalk II - monthly rate of $92.40, currently going for $65 a month (corporate discount).

Salient points:
-680 free minutes a month
-300 free SMS/MMS
-All Day free incoming

Any interested takers pls leave a comment or email.

(m1 christmas wish project)

A friend of mine is organising a collection of gifts for children for Christmas, and the wishlist is amusing.

Among the items asked for: "power ranger", "box of magic" (little cantrips and gadgets like what POW Magic used to have, eg metal rings that seemingly look whole, but have slits then you can slot the rings together), "Toys with buttons that produce light and sound" and "a girl-friend".

Sadly, as of time of writing, these exotica are still not being provided; I tried to psycho some people into playing the last role, but strangely no one is willing to proffer her services (not even jb).

Someone suggested I dress up as Kimberly, and I commented that I'd be able to fulfill 2 wishes at the same time. He didn't get it.

If a man impregnates a woman and he wants her to abort it against her wishes, he is irresponsible and heartless.

If a man impregnates a woman and he wants her to keep it against her wishes, he is being a male chauvinist pig and treating her body like chattel.

If a woman is impregnated by a man and she wants to abort it against his wishes, she is independent and takes charge of her life.

If a woman is impregnated by a man and she wants to keep it against his wishes, he is responsible and has to pay child support.

Misandry rocks.


Someone: actually a refinement on the last point is that if a man is misled into impregnating a women (oh i'm on the pill!) he is still responsible

the US

"You can only be young once. But you can always be immature." - Dave Barry

***

ORD loh.

But my internship starts tomorrow. Boo hoo.

(p -> q) v [(p • r) -> q]
~p v (q -> s)
s

Testing the validity of this by contradiction is bad enough, let alone truth tables.

"One of the most obvious facts about grownups to a child is that they have forgotten what it is like to be a child." - Randall Jarrell

***

Someone on "Bible Truth Conference - The truth of salvation will be opened Dec 20-23 in Malaysia" (www.LetGodBeTrue.com): if its truth den how come still need conference

i always tot conferences are for debates, contests and resistance

let god be true is even worse! wat u mean by 'let' ?

y 'let'
y cant just be 'godistrue', since that's what their faith is based on, instead of askin themselves to 'let' god 'be' true

but then again, they're always a contradictory bunch
no surprises


Someone else: hej
u are in the news now

XXXX: btw wat's with gabriel and his rebonded Hair
everyone's talking about it you know

did he really go and rebond his haIr? cos it really looks reBonded..his haIr is even silkier and nicer than mine

wah gabriel
girls do notice u
haha


Me: what's it with women and that flavour [green tea ice cream]

Someone: haha
it's nice
very jap

Me: like squid ice cream
http://maisonbisson.com/blog/post/10117/

Someone: eeeew
u like that?

wah kao can u not do that
i just came back from this super long run

that's nauseous enough already without squid icecream
*neauseating
*nauseating


Someone else: u know ar
it's very irritating

myt gf asked me to help her buy something
i waited a long time

u know why
coz the PRC was bargaining and asking for free stuff
and those that are not doing these 2 things are asking to break the euros into smaller notes

what bullshit
i was damn irritated

and when i went with another one of my friends
we keep kenna discriminated
because they think we PRC
and we will do cheapskate things

when u go to LV in paris
wah
they really love the PRCs

u know the tide of change has come, when u see that it's common to have chinese salesgirl
where in the past it's japanese salesgirls


Someone: actaully my class teacher rewards class participation in a very objective way
ok more objective lah

he hands out little coupons w different colors based on the quality of answers
so in that sense it can be counted more properly at the end of the day

i thought that was pretty cool

but he straps an envelope to his belt
kinda cute


Someone else: stupid bell curve. making me damn worried now
it's tat *** paper lar
everything was so easy tat everyone got worried

the worst.academic.in.nus.***.

but nvm at least i noe that nus never do quality control over employment. even prostitutes require some quality


Someone to HWMNBN: if you think the world is so callous, so uncaring, so illogical, so irrational - that your suffering in the face of the obvious fact that you hav elittle reason to be offends all common sense - why not embrace God? an illogical situatio ndemands illogical solutions.

HWMNBN: that's like whitewashing a fence by painting it black

When 1 person kills himself by jumping in, it's a tragedy. When 2 people kill themselves by jumping in, it's sad.

When people are throwing themselves in, it's a public nuisance. Yes, there's something wrong with our society when people kill themselves in this way so often, but if people kill themselves everyday the country's going to come to a standstill.

I suggest these people jump off HDB flats. It'll traumatise people looking but at least it won't hold up thousands of people. Or just legalise euthanasia, goddamnit. If I were to kill myself I'd be more considerate about it.

Then again, if you want to die by being run over by an MRT, at least kill yourself rather than die like a moron (and qualify yourself for a Darwin Award).

"It is believed the man, who was in his 30s and identified only as Azman, fell from the platform at the station.

Relatives said he was with his fiancee at the time, and they told Channel NewsAsia that he had been retrieving his shoe that had fallen on the track when the train pulled into the station." (some case in 2005)

Frigid Girl: the best one yet was a teacher, she was reading as she walked
and she walked into the path of the train

2004?
it was one of the firts
pioneers!


MRT track accident again!!!

www.hardwarezone.com Forums - MRT jump track statistics

"To be a book-collector is to combine the worst characteristics of a dope fiend with those of a miser." - Robertson Davies

***

BBC - Radio 3 - The Choir - Mozart's Requiem - the different versions

"Mozart died leaving his Requiem unfinished but many musicians have tried their hand at completing it.

Aled Jones samples some of the many different attempts made over the last 200 years and talks to Philip Wilby about his involvement with the newest version, which combines historical reconstruction with contemporary music."

"He kept getting things wrong" - Maunder on Sussmayer. Tsk, so mean.


Aled Jones on Lacrimosa: Is your version better?
Maunder: Oh, it's not for me to say.

Maunder (I think): The Agnus Dei is very strange... Every now and then in the Agnus Dei there seem to be some strange mistakes, where Sussmayer has done something wrong. So obviously wrong you wonder how he could possibly have done it... This suggests, but I don't think proves conclusively, that Sussmayer was working from a Mozart sketch for this movement.

Wilby (I think): There's a distinction between the performers and the musicologists. We're musicologists, we're very interested in getting the endings right. The musicologists... get the detail right, but perhaps not the structure.


The transcription's probably a bit off, since the damn BBC radio player only lets me play, pause, fast forward by 5 minutes and fast forward by 15 minutes. !@#$

"Why can I only fast forward in 5 or 15 minute chunks when listening to music shows?

Unfortunately our rights agreements with the record companies mean that we cannot break music programmes up into smaller chunks, or offer a rewind facility. "

Export Fashion is closing down as a company with effect from 10 December, since the owners are retiring. So sad.

But at least there's a closing down sale - $9 shirts!

"Revlelation 17 Reveals
Identity of Next Pope. He Will be The Last Pope. Learn Bible Prophecy"

Stupid fundies can't even spell.

"Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent" - Isaac Asimov

***

Posted on an IVLE forum during reading week:

The Economics Of Prostitution

"The paper was remarkable not only for being accepted by a major journal but also because it considered wives and whores as economic "goods" that can be substituted for each other. Men buy, women sell.

Economists have been equating money and marriage ever since Nobel Prize-winning economist Gary Becker published his seminal paper "A Theory of Marriage" in two parts in 1973 and 1974--also, not coincidentally, in the Journal of Political Economy.

Becker used market analysis to tackle the questions of whom, when and why we marry. His conclusions? Mate selection is a market, and marriages occur only if they are profitable for both parties involved.

Becker allowed nonmonetary elements, like romantic love and companionship, to be entered into courtship's profit and loss statement. And children, in particular, were important. "Sexual gratification, cleaning, feeding and other services can be purchased, but not children"...

Still, the economic analysis of marriage explains one age-old phenomenon: gold digging.

"In particular, does our analysis justify the popular belief that more beautiful, charming and talented women tend to marry wealthier and more successful men?" wrote Becker. His answer: "A positive sorting of nonmarket traits with nonhuman wealth always, and with earnings power, usually, maximizes commodity output over all marriages."

In other words, yes, supermodels do prefer aging billionaires. And Gary Becker proved it mathematically decades before The Donald married Melania."


Naturally, it brought on visceral reactions:

A: I am abhorred by this kind of theory.

Only amoral people will be suitable for their economic analysis in this way. Luckily the majority of human kind are not amoral.

I think that it is absurd to pursue any logic to far in social analysis: economic logic is definitely no exception. Becker has attempted to apply economics to a range of interesting social problems and put forward many excellent explanations for many social phenomenon using economic logics; but this time I think he has applied economic theory too wildly and therefore reached absurdity.

Me: Some might say the same of a market in kidneys.

If you dispute a theory not because of its methodological flaws but because of morals, then you're implicitly admitting that it's right, since you don't want to engage it.

A theory in itself is amoral. Applying the theory is another matter.

A: Yes.Theory is amoral. But the point here is, humans are not amoral. If a theory first assumes that human is amoral and considers every wild possibility of everything, then I really doubt the theory has any value for us to engage it. I am mostly concerned with the abuse of economic logic in social analysis that over-idealize and over-simplify the real world so much that the you can not make much sense out of it,except under extreme and possibly non-existent circumstances.

B: i agree with A that we should not simplify the world to an extent we can use theories to explain the phenomenon. after all, economic analysis is based on assumptions.

real world? no such assumptions.

Me: I wouldn't speak too soon before reading the paper itself. Unfortunately that'll only happen after the exams and by then this Forum would have been shut down.

So I'm afraid I'm gonna have to take a raincheck =D

I suppose those who object to this would also object to Levitt's paper which found that abortion lowers crime rates *shrug*


Unfortunately no one is reading anymore, so the raincheck will have to be extended.

Nonetheless, as with many other cases, people react viscerally, disproportionately and irrationally. Often, advocating morality is just short for "I don't like it, suspect I may be wrong and so will kick up a fuss without actually looking at what they're saying" (just like "God" is code for "I/We don't know").

"I don't know why we are here, but I'm pretty sure that it is not in order to enjoy ourselves." - Ludwig Wittgenstein

***

eBay View About Me for lenovosg

"You are bidding for a Ronaldinho signed Lenovo V100, in aid of The Straits Times School Pocket Money Fund"

Lenovo is going the way of Creative.

Besides a signed laptop ("honestly why would anyone want a laptop signed by ronaldinho"), they're also expanding their product range and flooding the market with models.

Sounds familiar?

MFTTW: wait till they start offering colors

I've also heard complaints about the quality recently (which also sounds familiar).

Someone: all my friends new lenovos break down

I suppose it's alright if they reposition themselves as a Chinese brand, but it's such a pity (and last I checked, the prices were still high). The Thinkpads were such great products.


Someone: do they have a 100million marketing budget to be washed down the drain?

Me: Probably more.

"He wrapped himself in quotations - as a beggar would enfold himself in the purple of Emperors." - Rudyard Kipling

***

MHA Women’s Focus Group Discussion on Penal Code Amendments(Singapore)

I was surprised by the candour of this bit:

"Bernise came up with a radical idea which was floating in my mind, which was to draft an anti-hate speech cum anti-discrimination bill covering people of all social strata. Ms Indranee responded to these comments, typically, that other groups weren’t likely to revolt or cause riots. She said, “If someone says something against women, likely, all the women will be outraged. But they are not going to cause riots.” She explained that the hate speech law was drafted in light of Singapore’s past and multi-ethnic society. Ms Rahayu remarked in addition that the government did not want to be policing too much, and freedom of speech had to be protected."

So it's been officially acknowledged. If you want your rights protected by the constitution, what you need to do is start rioting. Everyone: you know what to do now!

Before you riot you're a troublemaker. After you riot you're a group which needs protection. Well done.

Someone: Talk about legitimizing the heckler's veto. I have to say this makes me ill. There is absolutely no overarching principle behind this but a pandering to the lowest common denominator. And further, this smacks of Stockholm syndrome to me.

"Trying to determine what is going on in the world by reading newspapers is like trying to tell the time by watching the second hand of a clock." - Ben Hecht

***


Someone sent me this. This semester there're signs in the Central Library saying that after 15 mins you may remove belongings from a place if it's unoccupied. And from this sign, they go around removing things that're unattended for too long. The rationale for this, of course, being bastards who put their things at a place and then disappear for a few hours.

I didn't find one of my exams wasn't very hard - it was sufficiently interesting, yet doable, but lots of my coursemates were complaining about its difficulty. I think they found it difficult because although there was nothing we hadn't learnt, enough things were changed that they couldn't go into NUS mode (ie regurgitation) and do exactly the same thing they'd done throughout the semester. In other words we actually had to apply what we learnt. I think it says something that in one of my modules, the lecturer has put "Do not memorise. Just try to understand" at the top of at least 2-3 sets of sets of questions.

I had only the second exam in NUS I've walked out early from (25 minutes early). And I wasn't the first, but only the second.

Every time I tell people I want more essays, they start cursing me. But then I only had 1 essay during term time this year, and 2 half-essays in one module's exam.

When I complained about photocopying costs in Utrecht last semester, someone claimed all zapping in NUS was now 3 cents a page. Yet when I went to AS7 it was still 2.5 cents a page!

Having an IVLE forum component for course grades has some disadvantages. People spam the forum with the most irrelevant/stupid stuff, there's a lot of cutting and pasting of articles (not all of which are relevant), with a token "thought this was interesting" / "what do you think?" at the end and perhaps worst of all, people resurrect threads that have been dead for several months and tack on some inane thing (which usually has already been said); the last is even worse when people make forum runs and simultaneously comment on several dead threads.

Tales of hall inmates: One swigged 90+% ethanol and then smoked a cigarette. His mouth caught fire.

There's now a courtesy phone in the Central Library. Wow.


u r wt u wr:

- "Guys make great accessories"
- "Envious eves"
- "My boyfriend is out of town"
- "This shirt would look even better on your floor"
- "Running Wild. Some No 1 *missing text*"
- "Catch his eye. Smile, wink, flirt, kiss. Live happily ever after"
- "Think smart, think single"
- "FLMP squad to the rescue" (??? - this was in a 'Back to the Future' font and layout)
- Contribution: "The girl with the most boys wins!"


Quotes:

[Me: What does chocolate do to feminine physiology?] It makes us fat... It has [Me: Endorphins] Women are like permanently depressed.

I feel cold. [Student 2: You need a man]

Open book [exams] is just a scam to make you waste time flipping.

[On my wearing of bunny girl's key] I love that key. What is it the key to? Is it the key to your heart? Is it the key to someone else's heart? [SUG: It's the key to his virginity]

There's something fundamentally wrong with Singaporean society. Of all the people I've met, Singaporeans are the unhappiest in the region... It doesn't matter if you're rich or poor. You sit in the coffeeshop... The Filipinos in my church are very happy. I don't know if the Philippines is happy.

[Student on spontaneous human combustion: We wanted to test it on someone.] Find a Year 1. They're noisy, they're everywhere and they're fugly.

[On Starburst fruit chews] It's an ang moh brand, it's gotta be good... [Me: 'Hydrogenated palm oil'. That means it has both saturated fat *and* trans fat.] Did you have to tell me that?

I was a waitress and SDU booked the restaurant. The girls were ok. The guys were... yucks.

Everytime you sit down, my laptop- [Me: Jerks?] Yah. You know it goes into hibernation and then it turns back on again.

[On the Madonna Code] Oh, it's quite nice. [Student: What, like yours?] *sticks finger in air* [Student: You like that? *touches finger*]

I looked at it. It's damn gross... [Me: Did you see Meatspin?]... *points to aborted baby on cigarette pack* I look at this almost every day lor.

July Trip
25/7 - Brussels

The stereotype of Americans is that they're monolingual. Those who decry stereotypes like to point to counterexamples, for example XXX in his dorm who speaks 5 languages fluently, and YYY who speaks 6, and I also met some multilingual ones while traveling, but this is the danger of selection bias - the monolingual ones are less likely to travel or to go to college. Also, I'm not sure how high the level of proficiency is - each language may not be spoken at the level of a first or even second language (as the Great Leader observed, most people can never be truly bilingual in the sense of being able to think or write poetry in 2 languages). There's also the case that whereas some people are too quick to justify stereotypes with a few examples, others are too quick to demolish the same stereotypes using equally few examples. A few bad apples shouldn't taint the barrel, but neither should a few good ones make you pass it off as prime quality.

People also think that Europeans are all multilingual and can speak their neighbors' languages. This isn't really true since nowadays the most popular seocnd language is English, and not everyone learns a third. People also are conversant with foreign languages to varying degrees of proficiency, and most of them certainly can't write poetry in them. Unless you live in screwy countries like Belgium or Switzerland, where even the country as a whole has no one language.

One of the house rules at the back of the hostel room door was that blankets had to be folded before leaving. Disobedience was potentially punishable with being thrown out without a refund. Just for that, I left mine unfolded (especially since I was only staying for a night).

I read somewhere that the giant structure which looked like a molecule I'd seen in April was the Atomium (iron molecule model) from the 1958 World Fair.

I saw a Delifrance in Brussels. I wonder if there were any in Wallonie.

One franchised waffle chain with many branches was 'Belgaufra. Probably the best since 1950'. Since this was accompanied with a figure in an almost Malaysian pose, I was naturally skeptical:


At 9:43, a large group of women were standing outside a C&A which had a 40-60% sale and waiting for it to open. It was supposed to open at 9:30, tsk.

I'd awoken too late for breakfast and when I reached the breakfast room there was little left, so I just had a cup of vile juice. But then complimentary breakfasts are usually unappealing, so I was much happier to have a Belgian Waffle. It wasn't 100% fresh but was still warm, and mostly chewy and flaky. Sugar had been baked into it instead of sprinkled on top.

A pain au chocolat I had was not as good as the pains I had in France. Which is probably why Delifrance can survive in Brussels.

Although Brussels is officially bilingual, I get the sense that French trumps Dutch as a language. In the hostel, signs were in English and French, and Dutch only for a few bits. More people also spoke in French instinctively, rather than Dutch, and talked among themselves in French; they also seemed to warm more to me when I attempted to speak French than Dutch.


This was my second waffle of the day, with Chantilly. It was heavenly, beating the first by leagues. It was crispy, chewy and even a bit flaky. However eating it while walking was a bad idea, since the powdered sugar landed on my black shirt.

I then went to the main thing I came to Brussels to see - the art museum.


Wappers - Episode of the September Days 1830 on the Grand place of Brussels (1835)


Grupello - Diana.
I think he went overboard in doing the folds of the garment

Half the non-modern art collection was closed. Gah.


Meester van de Lucialegende, Virgo Inter Virgines (last quarter of 15th century)


Noord-Franse School (?), Twee luiken van een retabel-rechterluik: The Ascension (1460-70)
This was very funny because you could see his lower body going up into a hole in the sky. Usually it looks majestic but this was comical.


Hieronymus Bosch - Temptations of St Anthony. Replica.
This could pass for modern art, with its grotesque shapes. And what's with the fish?!

In Lucas Cranach the Elder's Venus en Amor (1531), Cupid had ants on him. Wth.


Barroc: - de roeping van de Hl. Petrus & Hl. Andreas. 1586

Almost all Rubens have that irritating blur watercolour effect. Gah.

Why did Eugene Delocroix do a copy of Rubens' "The miracle of St Benedict"? The two are almost the same!


Frans Snijders & Jan Wildens - Damhertejacht


Rubens - Martyrdom of Hl. Livinus


Rubens - Assumption of the Virgin


Pieter Brueghel II - De Goede Herder (1696)


Westerwald - Pal (Pul?). Mid 17th century
It's nice to see something you read about in class

In the Martyrdom of St Apollonia, I don't get why her teeth are being pulled out.


Joos de Momper II - The Ziggurat of Babylon The Tower of Babel


Theodoor Rombouts - Prometheus
Andrew: the liver's on yr right side of yr belly
the left side is, erm, stomach. and spleen
haha


Travel tips:

- Travel in the evening. It's good because you save time traveling when attractions are closed.

"Her virtue was that she said what she thought, her vice that what she thought didn't amount to much." - Peter Ustinov

***

I think the reason why orange juice from concentrate (aka Vile Juice) is always vile is that they throw the whole fruit into the blender to get as much 'juice' as possible. After they've squeezed it, they soak the peels in water and press them again, forcing the bitterness into the liquid extracted.

There was this really dumb Channel 8 drama I was forced to view on TV Mobile. 2 people were locked in a container truck's container by some enemy and were dying of suffocation, since they'd somehow found an airtight container. And then one confessed her love for the other ("我喜欢你"). At which point the door to the container opened - it was a scheme by his friends to get her to admit that she liked him. *facepalm* Who writes such things? And who watches them?!

Marks and Spencer has Cocoa Butter and Vanilla deodorant. Guys should try wearing it, then the girls will all want to eat them.

I'm told a Hong Kong girl introduced herself: "Hi, my name is Vagina". Her name was Virginia.

HGWT: Burying their phones at the bottom of their bags and ensconcing them in pouches so by the time they fish them out incoming calls have been diverted to voicemail, if they can even hear the phones ringing in the first place.

I saw a moustachioed woman. Previously the most I had seen was hair on the upper lip, but this one had a full blown moustache.

There're sanitay napkins with aloe vera and herbs. Wth.

I support criminalising denial of the 1964 race riots!

"No one has ever had an idea in a dress suit." - Sir Frederick G. Banting

***

Me: women are permanently depressed
it's a gender defect

Someone: i'm not permanently depressed now, and i know plenty of women who aren't permanently depressed, so that statement is a bit hard to understand

Me: maybe it's a singaporean thing

I find that girls are depressed more than guys

Someone: how about guys in NS?
guys in NS are always depressed

Me: ah
that's a bit different

that's very different

see. girls vs slaves

Someone: yeah but ......................... aiyah, how to explain to you how shitty and limiting being a girl in singpoare is


Someone on apologists: i'll never understand, are they trying to win arguments with you because of your intellectual reputation, or is it just that they are incredibly obstinate?


Me: jb said I should buy furry ones
but they're out of fashoin gah

Someone: they're SO out of fashion

Me: boo

Someone: most guys i see now just use plain elastic bands... and the girls too.
i think i only see scrunchies on PRC girls nowadays

Me: even non furry scrunchies

Someone: yep

JB: elastic bands are eww

sorry
I don't like them
they leave a bigger kink


Someone: starting to read forums is a bad idea, it's addictive and not very productive

i've tried to read about singapore less generally coz it feels like that too


Someone else: i took sc**** last sem
there was this fundie catholic piece of shit who tried to challenge him abt the first 2 lectures' content which touched on religion in particular catholicism
then he asked the fundie shit to present his argument in the nxt lecture

which the fundie shit did, and then later the lecturer took over, and trashed all his points and we were merely impatient with this whole 'fundie contesting soci lecturer' nonsense

tat fundie shit only presented for 15 minutes, his pathetic slides made no sense becuz he tried to challenge gayle rubin's (an essential reading) points with his own fundamental beliefs
wat nonsense

just talked abt certain points rubin raised in her article, den say no backing up and so on lor
den later the lecturer re-illustrate rubin's argument in lecture and we saw the light
and catholicism became bullshit next to sociology suddenly

Me: ooh offence to religion
put him in jail!

did the fundie see the light
haha

Someone else: i doubt so becuz i met the fundie at someone's birthday gathering in july and he was still lamenting abt the biasedness of sc**** which clashed with his fundamental beliefs

i wanna push him into the pool man (it was at some condo pool area)


Me: oh but apparently a lot of these scholars go overseas
then when they come back they go "oh you should go overseas then you'll know how good singapore is"

Someone: yeah it's coz they don't do jackshit in the way of interacting with people here

i saw this firsthand in cam, people would isolate themselves in their little Singaporean enclaves and then mouth off like they knew anything about the country they were living in


Someone else: I don't know what Pathos is :)­
I'm slightly more familiar with Porthos and Athos


Someone: i remember the sop solo for rutter's requiem, done by stephen layton and the london sinfonia

now, THAT was a lao char bor voice
was quite horrified

because you know everyone has heard the original cambridge recording and rutter got a sweet young voice to sing it

then... imagine the hyperion version. lao char bor.

going.... PIE JESU DOMINE at half the speed and with an entire turkey stuffed down her throat or wattle

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Hallelujah Oratorio Society
Handel's Messiah

The last time I'd been to a Messiah concert was in 2000, but it was only a highlights concert. This isn't actually a bad idea, since the full thing is 2 1/2 hours, and the 2nd half of the oratorio isn't quite as good as the first half (Handel probably ran out of ideas towards the end).

I was seated in the gallery behind the orchestra. The view was bad, but the sound was okay and I got to see things like the orchestra using photocopied scores. Tsk.

The concert was presented by a very cheena group. The announcements and programme were bilingual and the performers list for the Hallelujah Chorus and Chorale was in Chinese (excepting Indonesian names).

The start of the Sinfonia felt very stilted and ponderous. Luckily it got better when it moved into the more legato part of the piece. Overall the interpretation was rather less legato than I liked, and it seemed the orchestration had been modified in some places, with trills cut out and some parts simplified. Perhaps due to my sitting above the division between the sopranos and altos, the lower strings sounded a bit strong.

When I saw there was a harpsichord/organ player listed on the program I was quite intrigued, since I didn't know there were any harpsichords in Singapore. But when it suddenly started producing organ sounds for Comfort Ye I got very pissed off and looked closer. It was in fact a synthesiser, cunningly disguised as a harpsichord: it was mounted where the keyboard of the real thing would be, but built or set into the frame of what looked like a harpsichord (complete with the section where the strings would've been, and a cover for it propped up with a piece of wood). The effect wasn't all that bad, since harpsichords produce a fairly uniform sound, so a synthesiser is less unfaithful to the real thing than it would be for a piano. But still. If nothing else, they should've listed the synthesiser player as playing a synthesiser, not the "harpsichord/organ"!

David Wilcocks had noted that the Tenor had "excellent diction, rhythm, and pitch" and indeed I found him to be the best soloist. One thing about soloists is that they tend to have a thick voice and use a lot of vibrato (maybe it's an opera tradition, it helps one's voice to carry, or it helps distinguish one's voice from that of the chorus/ensemble, but I personally think it sounds hideous). His was very clear.

And the Glory of the Lord saw a return of the ponderousness that characterised the start of the Sinfonia. If I'd closed my eyes I might have though I was listening to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. It put me in the mind of Zombie Jesus lumbering around and trying to eat my brains. The altos were particularly embalmed, and the sopranos busy blasting away.

In Thus saith the Lord, the bass soloist sounded like he was being shaken, and some unpinpointable quality being shaken out of his voice, making him sound a bit hollow. Luckily he recovered after this piece.

The alto soloist was horrible. She had perhaps the most lao char bor (old woman) voice I'd ever heard (too much resonance within the body rather than letting the sound out, due to an overuse of head voice if I remember the theory correctly). If she'd been a soprano she might still have been forgiven since that's a technique sometimes needed to hit high notes, but it was unforgivable in an alto. I was trying to think what was a better description of the singing: muffled or like a dead feathered chicken was stuffed down her throat; usually it comes along with vibrato but I don't think there was much of this today (you can tell my vocal theory is rusty). No one may abide the day of his coming, but with this rendition I'm taking leave a week before D Day. Since the orchestration of the air seemed simplified, there was less to distract me from the horrible sound. Luckily, in some other recitatives and airs, I couldn't hear her over the orchestra.

The chorus came on again, and with the waves of undead the scooping of the sops was added. The orchestra sounded oddly like it was farting though. From this point on though, the chorus and orchestra sounded better. Either they'd warmed up, the stuffiness of the concert hall (or where I was sitting, at least) was making me lose concentration or everyone sounded good after the alto soloist.

For Unto Us was okay musically, except that they managed to top some other choir's "The Prince of Piss" with "The Ever-Lusting Father". This particular mangling hadn't come to my mind before I heard it, so it cannot be the backmasking effect (hearing what you expect to hear). Gotta love Singaporean pronunciation. I don't know why they liked to blast so much in this and other choruses, though (sometimes even shouting, eg 'Surely'). They were very big already as it was, and the slightly mistimed blasts of "Wonderful. Counsellor" were unsettling.

The soprano soloist's pronunciation was a bit off (eg 'shay purds') but otherwise she was alright. Her voice was less thick than the alto soloist's (though how it could be thicker I do not know) and I could actually make out what she was singing.

For some reason, perhaps to make up for lost time, Rejoice was rushed. I was quite disappointed, since those wonderful coloratura passages could not then be demonstrated to good effect.

Listening to Messiah was a good time to ponder divine injustice: 'And the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all'. More like the iniquity of the Lord.

After the intermission, the bass soloist seemed to have been infected by the alto, since it sounded like he had half a feathered chicken stuffed down his throat (this wouldn't have been so bad if it'd been a chicken transfer, but it turned out to be a chicken cloning since the alto was still singing the same way). At first I'd thought that the fact that the alto soloist was the one most easily drowned by the orchestra was due to the disadvantages of the alto range, but once the bass soloist had the same problem he got drowned by the orchestra sometimes as well, so it was the chicken after all; on further consideration I realise that when I'm not sitting behind the performers, although this mode of singing sounds hideous it also projects well, so it's probably a way to project one's voice forward, ensuring that those who buy $15 tickets and sit behind the performers get their money's worth.

Let Us Break was another chance to reflect on divine violence. Breaking the heathens with a rod of iron is fine, and dashing them into pieces like pottery is splendid, but it leaves out my absolute favourite bit: dashing babies on rocks. What was Jennens thinking?!

Hallelujah was the only chorus the soloists sang. I was very annoyed by this person in front of me: just because everyone is standing doesn't mean you should sing along. And badly too. Gah.

The Trumpet Shall Sound is one of my favourite pieces showcasing an instrument. It was okay except when the trumpeter tragically made a small misstep in the introduction. The drowning out of the bass soloist, with his post-intermission chicken, was especially clear in this air.


Elia Diodati's exellent attempt to characterise the sort of voice (feathered chicken in throat) that I am vainly trying to describe: muffled brilliance
if it were vocalized correctly, it would be 'colorful'
but somehow the voice is not aspirated

that kind of voice gives me the image
of swallowed cotton wool or singing into a glove

or perhaps more correctly, cotton wool stuck in the vocal cords
or even the trachea


They did the Magic Flute here this year. Argh.

The timpani guy was very free. He only needed to do work on 2 choruses.

I fully support copyright in perpetuity, since the ticket prices would've doubled and the profits would've gone to some corporation that had bought the rights to Messiah while Handel's relations were living in penury.

"The mood and temper of the public in regard to the treatment of crime and criminals is one of the most unfailing tests of the civilisation of any country. A calm and dispassionate recognition of the rights of the accused against the state and even of convicted criminals against the state, a constant heart-searching by all charged with the duty of punishment, a desire and eagerness to rehabilitate in the world of industry of all those who have paid their dues in the hard coinage of punishment, tireless efforts towards the discovery of curative and regenerating processes and an unfaltering faith that there is a treasure, if only you can find it in the heart of every person – these are the symbols which in the treatment of crime and criminals mark and measure the stored up strength of a nation, and are the sign and proof of the living virtue in it." - Winston Churchill

***

Quotes from Tertullian:

- Plane nihil deo difficile: sed si tam abrupte in praesumptionibus nostris hac sententia utamur, quidvis de deo confingere poterimus quasi fecerit, quia facere potuerit. (Certainly nothing is difficult for God: but if in our assumptions we so rashly make use of this judgement, we shall be able to invent any manner of thing concerning God, as that he has done it, on the ground that he was able to do it.)
- Exigo rationem bonitas, quia nec aliud quid bonum haberi liceat quod non rationaliter bonum sit, nedum ut ipsa bonitas irrationalis deprehendatur. (I demand reason in his [Marcion's god] goodness, because nothing ought to be accounted good which is not rationally good: far less should goodness itself be found irrational.)
- ... facilius est, ut aliquam rationem habeat unum illud capitulum, quae cum ceteris apiat, quam ut apostolus diversa inter se docuisse videatur. (... it is easier (of belief) that that one passage should have some explanation agreeable with the others, than that an apostle should seem to have taught (principles) mutually diverse.)
- Nihil enim mali necessarium. (Nothing that is evil is necessary.)
- Si dii eliguntur ut bulbi, utique ceteri reprobi iudicantur. (If gods are selected like onions, certainly the rest are rejected as bad.)

How excellent. More apologists should follow these principle.

July Trip
24/7 - Bayeux

There were also 3 Scottish boys. One was only 17, in his last year of high school. They brought the Scottish flag down to Bayeux with them and one of them draped himself with it and walked around. Later they asked us to sign on their flag, on the same table used for The Distribution of the Keys.

Breakfast that morning at the youth hostel was very good. Someone averred that it was the best complimentary youth hostel breakfast that one could find. There was baguette sections, Nutella, hard boiled eggs, yoghurt, honey, vile juice, coffee, milk, golden honey balls (like Honey Stars but a different shape), cold cuts and croissants (still quite flaky).

Someone in the hostel said that a week before, it had been 42 degrees in Sorento. Wah.


M4A1 Sherman


M10 tank destroyer.
I like the serial: USA 12345678.


Char Churchill Crocodile
The serial was more imaginative: T17325857

Bayeux was the only town in Normandy to be totally spared from damage in the battle.


Place Charles de Gaulle. Where he re-established the republic.


Alain Chartier, poet

woman: popee. wife of rollo, 1st duke of normandy


I saw this symbol on all the streets and pavements. Maybe it was from the tapestry, I was not sure.

There were funny signs in the TV area in the hostel: 'destred (?) for video casettes', 'don't steal' (someone said the latter probably sounded right in French). This was because the videos shelf had a lot of 80s Schwarzenegger movies.

A sign in the hostel said if you helped clean the kitchen you might get a free bed/lunch. Heh.

I saw what must be the cheapest moules et frites in the world - €9. And this included a drink. A pity I didn't have that much time before my train, or I'd have had it.

If the French don't want to pronounce all the letters in their words, why do they include them in the first place? Gah.

Lay's BBQ in France was labelled 'Saveur Barbeque". The packaging was the same colour, but there was a picture of 2 kebabs on a grill.

bfast, lingual, pommes

When I tried to buy a ticket to Brussels, I found that the 2nd class youth tickets were sold out. I had the choice of getting 2nd class normal tickets for €74,50 or 1st class youth tickets for €59, so I obviously pounced for the latter. In all I think I lost a few Euros on my French rail discount card. Pity.

If Eurostar (Paris-London) return tickets can be cheaper than one way tickets, why would anyone buy the one way ones?

The French using the same word ('pommes') for both apples and potatoes is annoying. I bought a pain aux pommes one time and expected a savoury filling, but bit into a sweet filling. I'm sure there're situations when the context won't tell you what they're called - apple chips might be called 'pommes frites', for example. And if they combine apples and potatoes, do you get 'pommes et pommes'?


On the way to the Gare

The date/time of my journey were printed on my Bayeux-Paris train ticket, but on top the words 'Utilisable du 24/07 au 22/09' were printed. Maybe the date/time was printed just for convenience.

'Welcome to our liberators' - sign on the door of a cafe in Bayeux just outside the Gare. Above were the US, UK, Canadian and German flags. Wth.

Half the French trains I took were 5-10 minutes late. But then after Italy, who cares?


French progress - exhibition in Bayeux Gare

In Paris, while I was travelling between train stations, there was a traffic jam, so I got off the bus and walked. I entered the station with <20 minutes to spare and got ripped off at a concessionaire stand because I needed a drink. And the can wasn't even cold, grr. This also meant I had no leisure to browse the magazine racks and make more snide remarks, but I did notice another men's magazine in a price war (€1,95) with FHM (€1,90). Travelling to Brussels by Thalys First Class was an experience. Each seat had a power socket, newspapers (in English!) were provided and we even got dinner.
'Farmhouse' menu: Roast pork, Turnips carrots & leeks, Lentil salad dressed with Herb Vinaigrette, French cheese, Apple tart, Spa mineral water and coffee/tea. I was offered more bread later, but the best part was probably the cote d'or mini bouches. This is (was) the life. Though I'd rather save the difference and have moules et frites.

Once again, I smelled the piss smell in Brussels. And this was summer time too. Uh oh.

The signboards in the Brussels metro are very smart. They show you not only when the next few trains will arrive but which stations they are currently at. Lights also show you when the trains are in the tunnels between the last 2 stations and the current one.

I was very happy to see that my hostel had a fee for sheets. This was because for the second time, I would get to use the sheets that I brought. Unfortunately the fee for sheets was compulsory (deceptive pricing!). !@#$.

The card reader in the lift was also spoilt, so I had to swipe my doorcard 10 times. Stupid security measures. Even more infuriatingly, the lift was only one way - you could take it up, but not down. Presumably they were trying to coerce us into upgrading to their gold class hostel.

Reviewing my options for the next day, there was an interesting-looking city tour. Unfortunately the English speaking guide was on holiday.

I doubt that, past knee length, short skirts are really that much cooler. Summer heats things up in more ways than one.

I doubt that, past knee length, short skirts are really that much cooler. Summer heats things up in more ways than one.

Someone: and anw, short skirts do get cooler the shorter they get, even past knee length hAhAH
nv tried?

MFTTW: they aren't cooler lah. hello. you wear and try. it's annoying to not have anything absorb the sweat from your thighs.

i think the skirt mat3erial makes more differene