"The male is a domestic animal which, if treated with firmness, can be trained to do most things." - Jilly Cooper

***

A short review of Fight Night! (Eusoff Pageant Preview Bash), which I went to on invitation and on the understanding that someone else was too - see 6)

1) Quality >> Dare 21 (Science bash, early 2006)

2) There were a lot of jeans, more than you see in Arts normally. It must be a hall inmate thing.

3) Indian guys look better than other Singaporean males, which is why there were 2 of them among the 5 pageant contestants (noted by one emcee: "this year pageant got a lot of indians"). This ties into my theory of relativity (Frigid Girl claims that she notices aesthetics, and she noticed more girls in the UK than here, but for guys it was about the same. This confirms my theory of relativity - on a global scale Singaporean men fare better relatively than their opposite-gender counterparts).

4) One pageant contestant brought her mother

5) All the female pageant contestants looked the same, having a SACSAL look. It was unlikely that they were all SACSALs, since one was from Medicine. The skankiness was probably due to the makeup, hair and clothes ("too much makeup and the combo of red and black can do that to anyone. hard to look classy if you're dressed like a hooker" - Someone who was there).

And, yes, people (pageant contestants at least) do have the freaky look you see at the bash promotions you see in school.

Me: Do they all look freaky {at bashes, like how people promoting bashes look?}

Friend: It's okay to look freaky, but you must look freaky in a good way. They look freaky in a bad way. Like they just fell into a dumpster and came out blue-black.

Also, I think many of the attendees looked better than the pageant contestants, so possible corollaries:

1) I have weird tastes. Or people like the skanky look
2) No one wanted to join the pageant
3) Too much makeup and weird hair does that to you

6) I got pang seh-ed by Johnny Malkavian. Bah.

7) There is a picture of me looking very suspicious on Whosgoing.sg

8) I only saw groping among people who already seemed intimately familiar with each other. This is because they could go back and grope in hall, and because everyone already knew everyone - normally the point of clubbing is to hook up with people you don't know, which is why we have Gay and Lesbian nightspots, viz., nightspots revolve around clients' sexual orientations

Having missed STRIP last semester, I was curious to find out what a Science bash was like, and so I went down with a trusted associate to have a look at Dare 21". In short, it was disappointing (and not just by my standards).

While waiting to go in, I noticed that there were lots of JC girls milling around Orchard Road. Maybe they wanted to try their luck, but were underaged and anyway probably measured 42 inches from top to bottom and so didn't qualify for free admission.

I was speculating about how much they'd have to jack up the ticket price by to cover the cost of free entry for girls who wore 21 inches or less, but figured so few would qualify that the effect on ticket prices would be negligible.

Along Orchard Road, there were walking billboards advertising the bash, but what I found more intriguing was that there was a girl hanging around and helping out one of the walking billboards who was presumably part of the organising committee. Although she was wearing a flared tube top, she was also wearing jeans, which struck me as curious, since she was not even making a token attempt to hit the 21" target.

After some dillying and dallying, I managed to persuade my trusted associate to help me take a picture as photographic evidence of this curious juxtaposition while I queried the lot of them on it (more on the lack of said photographic evidence in this entry later). In response to my queries, the people milling around admitted that it was a gimmick. I said they couldn't jolly well expect people going for the bash to Dare to wear less than 21 inches if they didn't either, showing that they didn't believe in their own gimmick, and they replied that "we choose not to" participate in their own gimmick.

On entering China Black, I noticed that almost everyone, even the girls, was in jeans. I asked my trusted associate, "Why is everyone in jeans? They don't even make an attempt," and he replied, "Welcome to Science". I also didn't see any girls with freaky hair, but then I don't think Science bashes are promoted that way.

I am given to believe that most bashes have some sort of program, which helps to move the night along instead of letting participants mill around, get wasted and pick each other up at their convenience. Dare 21" did not have one, however, so I was left to my own devices as to how to entertain myself.

At 10:25pm, I surveyed the scene and found that the club was mostly filled with guys, and not that fully at that (those who came later were probably coming to club rather than for the bash itself). At 10:40pm, I did another survey and counted perhaps 3 girls who might pass the 21" test (one of which was wearing a jacket so I wasn't sure, but my educated guess was that she stood a good chance of qualifying, sans jacket). I'd actually brought a secret weapon - a length of measuring tape, and was contemplating when and how to use it. However, all the girls who seemed to stand a chance of qualifying were escorted by possessive-looking males, and lacking a gang of groupies to shield me (my trusted associate, though loyal, would not be sufficient to guard against the fury of an oversexed boyfriend and is a self-declared pacifist to boot), I decided not to test the power of male jealousy when amplified by loud music, a dark environment, booze and a strange request. This phenomenon also puzzled me, because I thought (and have and had been told) that people went clubbing to pick people up and to be picked up, so going with a significant other would defeat the point.

Some people then started squeezing onto an incredibly small platform ("sticking together like goldfish defecation") and gyrating their hips. How this was supposed to be a form of dancing I couldn't tell, since there was no space for them to do anything except shake their arms in the air and grope each other. My trusted associate then proclaimed that: "Science people wouldn't hit the dance floor... Those that we saw just now are probably not Science students."

At about 11pm, I took another round around the place and counted 7 girls who might meet the 21" criterion. However, half of them didn't look like they were from NUS students, let alone from Science. I also ran into a familiar face who suggested, when I lamented my lack of skill at discretely taking photographs in clubs, that I wait till everyone was drunk before pretending to know people and aking photographs of them, but unfortunately I judged that having 2 trusted associates would not be sufficient protection against a club full of irate Science guys.

A while later, I was sitting on a couch passively observing the scene, which wasn't changing much save for the number of participants increasing, when the boyfriend of the girl in the flared top whom my trusted associate had taken a picture of stormed up to me and started shouting. He said that "a building is public property. My girlfriend is not public property", and so he was very upset and demanded that I delete the photograph. Recognising that argument with him would be futile, as with a SAF regular, I deleted the photograph, despite the lack of local laws against taking photographs of people for non-profit purposes in public without their permission (only France, I'm told, mandates that one ask for permission before snapping). So I suppose the moral of the story is either to set up CCTV cameras in the name of "security" or to disappear after taking your photographs, at least if you are outnumbered by the irate parties demanding deletion of your snapshots. I hope that recollections of events are not private property as well; I don't think I've been so indignant since Slavery. His friend was quite apologetic though, to his credit (the friend, not him).

After this incident, my mood was understandably soured, and anyway the normal club crowd was filtering in, distorting my observations, so when my trusted associate got bored and suggested that we scoot, I barely hesitated before leaving the denizens of the club to their "fun". I mused about what he should do the next time I came up with a stupid idea such as this, and he said he would hit me in the ass, and I heartily agreed.

[Addendum: When I left at almost 12, the organisers were downstairs. A friend who left at 2:30am said he saw them sitting downstairs at that time, and someone who left at 1am saw them doing accounts. So even the organisers didn't believe in their own bash.]

(I actually have a few photos from this ill-advised expedition, but to prevent my trusted associate's corpse from appearing in a gutter in Science on Monday, as well as more irate people complaining that they/their significant others aren't public property, I won't post them)

Someone: this should interest you

Presenting to you, DARE 21”, the sexiest, most outrageous party event of the new year. This bash is like no other, because we promise an enjoyable evening for you, with cheap drinks on the go, and good friends to be with. What more can you ask for? If you need an incentive to go, let me tell you a good news! For ladies, if you dress less than 21 inches from top to bottom, you will get free entry and a free drink! Therefore. for gentlemen, you know what the incentive is right?

science bash
they get better ideas every year
next it'll be free entry in the buff

i thought i'd seen it all, this one drives me speechessl
i'd feel insulted and objectified if i were a girl

Me: get short girls

HGWT

25. Beautification - real or psychological (exfoliating scrub, toner, blue tracing paper [aka blotting paper], face/skin lightening cream, facials, nail polish, bust enhancement/implants, eyebrow shaping, revealing clothes, various other varieties of snake oil) and then feeling offended and objectified when men look at them admiringly. Either that or trying to look like a guy

Someone: they prob figured that was the least they could ask for without getting sued for promoting indecency or smthg

hahah short girls, good one
let's rustle up a posse of ugly midgets

post it up so one and all can marvel at the increasing stupidity of science students

Me: this beats STRIP

Someone: i'd like to know who comes up with these ideas
clearly a bunch of horny science guys

i mean, don't the girls have any say in this
what's the incentive for them. to be ogled at?
that happens whatever the case

Me: free drinks?

Someone: aiyah. i think skimpily dressed girls are de facto in any case
it's just to bait the guys

evolution gave us the short end of the stick
if only more guys realised that

Me: where there're girls, there're guys

women like women
men like women
nobody likes men


Someone else: that's not sexy. that's complete prostitution

After 4 scans and some finger work in Paint Sho Pro...



Benjy: you always send me stuff that makes my ears bleed

"Some names of NUS student events: Indulgence, Decadence, Ecstasy, Harem, Tease, Legal-disiac, Barely Legal, Bare, Naughty by Nature, E XXX othermic, Forplay, Tryst, Compulsion, Envy: Sin or Sense?, Temptations (All bashes except for the last, a bazaar)

What's next? Brothel and Sleaze? (As suggested by Ban Xiong)" (excerpt from a post in January)


The Science Club ("Unity through participation" - with a motto like this, they might as well not have one) is holding a bash called S.T.R.I.P. - "The party by friends for friends" (I'm assuming friends strip S.T.R.I.P for each other). The poster features 6 people (3 guys, 3 girls) in bed, with the bedsheet pulled up to the same suitable length for all of them. I know that sex sells, but bad sex (both in their overly-blatant approach and the poster not featuring models who are attractive enough - though one was wearing hoop earrings) doesn't; indeed it puts people off. I predict that their marketing will backfire on them when people think of stripping and NUS Science at the same time.

At least I like the fact that at least they're not trying to pretend that S.T.R.I.P stands for anything, but just go straight to selling their bash with sexual innuendo. Of course, at the bottom they have to state: "Come fully clothed and NO STRIPPING PLEASE". (...)

Oh, and this bash is sponsored by, among others, MCYS. How unwholesome.


"Even porn has more class than that"

"precisel, thats the draw isnt it? haha.. i would wanna c if sci pp r really tt wild.. ha.. either way, iwill get a good laugh.. lol.."

"Haha...... a failed attempt of sexual appeal"

"Eh. Science guys suck but the girls not THAT bad what. heh. Its made to entice those desperate for a lay. I bet the gender ratio will be 70m : 30 f"

"Really?science ppl have appalling dress sense.maybe it might be better if they strip. Haha."

"Great. More distasteful marketing. Sex sells, but this sucks."

"Send a letter to ST under the veil of 'concerned parent'. The poster and perhaps the bash will disappear in a couple of days"

One of the reasons I uncharacteristically went to Zouk on Saturday night for Absolute Reality was that I wanted to show off my hair, and indeed I did get some reactions ("I used to think very highly of you", "I only knew that it was you because someone told me - 'that's Gabriel'"). Of course, I also went because the head honcho himself pimped it to me, and I wanted to see if my reasons for not clubbing (I don't drink, smoke, dance, listen to modern music, pick people up or get picked up) held true. It was an... interesting experience, albeit one which I would not care to repeat in the near future (if at all).

At the entrance, we found that ticket prices had been lowered to $15 (as opposed to the originally advertised prices of $16 for a pre-ordered ticket and $18 at the door). Apparently Zouk had decided to undercut them, so they had no choice but to follow the market leader. The incompetent doormen took my whole ticket without returning me my ticket stub. This was needed for the lucky draw, most of which I missed anyway because my two lovely companions decided to drag me through the Heeren's Annex doing window shopping because it was "too early".

Though Absolute Reality supposedly had a reality show theme, the program was an unsatisfactory exposition of it. Granted, there were 5 contestants, but they were whittled down in a mere 3 rounds of games. Hardly "the search for absolute hunk & babe!" which the promotional poster promised (and which I've just noticed is grammatically suspect). Furthermore, both starting late and ending early, we got a lot less bang for our buck than was advertised. Hell, more time was spent promoting and showcasing US university life and an upcoming event [Beauty World, April 2006 at Chicago] than with letting the audience "witness American reality TV brought to life". But then that was probably the putative point of the evening anyway - apart from watching people you know be humiliated, partying and all the usual visceral action that goes on where the sun don't shine, so.

With the official program over, Calvin was chased from the DJ booth and the evening's festivities began in earnest. UV lights started to flash through the chamber, lending people's white clothes an eerie purple tinge reminiscent of the purple uniform and increasing everyone's chances of getting skin cancer. Better yet, at some points the UV lights started flashing in a poor attempt to imitate the Pokemon cartoon. Curiously, everyone seemed to be immune to its effects: perhaps prolonged exposure makes one immune to such stimulation.

A sip of Screwed Up Girl's vodka lime almost sent me into a paroxysm, something DXO's drinks conspicuously failed to do. After recovering from my fit, I gave each of my 2 companions one of my drink coupons (Screwed Up Girl proceeded not to use it. Argh!)

Saturday was trance night, and through the night the music grew steadily louder, until it was almost impossible to hear myself think. First one of my trouser legs started moving along with the beat, and later I felt my thoraxic cavity resonate; with such a powerful sound system, I doubt they need to keep a defibrillator on the premises. A friend started bouncing along to the beat, and others began to fall into the trance the music was presumably meant to induce, but with my mastery of Tantric Zen meditation, I managed to keep myself grounded and centred and thus immune to its debilitating effects.

During the event proper, sublimated dry ice with a slight edge to its smell had been emitted into the air at intervals, but as the night wore on, either due to increased emission or poor ventilation the visibility and PSI of the compound moved in opposite directions. Coupled with the poor lighting and ceaseless racket, I felt as if I had been transported to a World War I French trench during a round of chemical artillery shelling by the Germans. Through the smoke, I glimpsed some people on the dance floor to whom the nerve gas had got. Staying by the edge of the dance floor in groups, they were all spasming periodically, unable to move even to the centre of the dance floor, incapacitated as they were. I really felt for those poor souls.

Surprisingly early, at 10:40, some people overcame the effects of the nerve agent and got onto blocks placed in the middle of the dance floor to shake their booty. Unfortunately, not everyone had such a robust constitution, and I think I still glimpsed some people still spasming at the side. Even more unfortunately, I did not observe what some in my Sociology tutorial group did:

"Intimacy: In such a close, confined environment as a club, you have more feasible contact than you ever bargained for... You're sending a message to the guys: 'just touch me'"

"There are people who tarch, and there are people who want to be tarched. (touch, touched)"

I speculate that this was due to a combination of reasons: the early hour of my presence, the aforementioned reduced visibility and the fact that many or most people knew each other already. I am confirmed in my speculations by intelligence reports that someone was later seen snogging many females.

When I finally decided that I had had enough, I exited the enclosed compound... to find that a lot of people were outside talking (at least half and maybe even up to two thirds of the number who were inside). A pity I didn't think of that sooner.

"If you never encounter anything in your community that offends you, you are not living in a free society." - Kim Campbell

***

(A graphical version of the following advertisement can be found here)


The University of Chicago & University of Pennsylvania present...

ABSOLUTE: REALITY

Witness American reality TV brought to life. Join the search for absolute hunk & babe!

Are you ready?

Sat 6 Aug 05 8pm@Zouk
Entry for 18 & above only
$16 for pre-order, $18 at the door
with 2 free drinks

Entry before 1030pm only. Management reserves the right to refuse entry.
for more information, contact Andrew Tan: patch@uchicago.edu, for tickets, contact Yihan: chrisfyh@uchicago.edu


Extra-poster information: There will be a competition adapted from various reality TV shows, and the winners will get to take home attractive prizes

My spin: Join all the Singaporean students studying in overseas universities, scholars or otherwise. A good opportunity to meet old JC and Secondary School friends you haven't seen in a while. Which is the only reason why I'm considering going, though I might be damn bored since I don't drink, dance, listen to modern music, smoke, pick people up, get picked up (Given that everyone knows everyone else, I doubt this will happen) etc

***

Jon Ronson meets hacker Gary McKinnon

"What Gary was hunting for, as he snooped around Nasa, and the Pentagon's network, was evidence of a UFO cover-up...

"What was the most exciting thing you saw?" I ask.

"I found a list of officers' names," he claims, "under the heading 'Non-Terrestrial Officers'."

"Non-Terrestrial Officers?" I say.

"Yeah, I looked it up," says Gary, "and it's nowhere. It doesn't mean little green men. What I think it means is not earth-based. I found a list of 'fleet-to-fleet transfers', and a list of ship names. I looked them up. They weren't US navy ships. What I saw made me believe they have some kind of spaceship, off-planet."

"The Americans have a secret spaceship?" I ask.

"That's what this trickle of evidence has led me to believe."

"Some kind of other Mir that nobody knows about?"

"I guess so," says Gary.

"What were the ship names?"

"I can't remember," says Gary. "I was smoking a lot of dope at the time. Not good for the intellect."

... Yes, he was hacking in the immediate aftermath of September 11, but only because he wanted to see if there was a conspiracy afoot. "Why did the building fall like a controlled series of explosions? " he says. "I hate conspiracy theories, so I thought I'd find out for myself."

"And did you find a conspiracy?" I ask.

"No," he says."


This just shows you how powerful and iniquitous the conspiracy is! Even though thousands of people must be involved in them, they've somehow gotten all of them to keep mum, even though the British royals can't even silence a single nanny. And heading the New World Order will be the King himself - Elvis Presley! (No, he's not dead. He made a secret pact with Xenu to extend his life unnaturally to 616 years!)

"There's so much pollution in the air now that if it weren't for our lungs there'd be no place to put it all." - Robert Orben

***

DXO is a most curious place. Part of the outside is 'decorated' with many fluffy white protrusions. On closer inspection, though, one finds that these protrusions are actually cable ties - white plastic strips which are used to secure wires together. Right. The notice at the entrance makes a pretense at humour, but it comes across as being forced and un-funny (eg "Pets are not allowed. Party animals are welcome", or words to that effect). They also have a sexist admission policy which is unfortunately not unique to them; males need to be 23 to enter, but females only 18.

The toilets at DXO suck. To be more precise, those on the ground level suck. Firstly, the mirrored area and the washbasin are shared between the male and female parts of the toilet. The toilet's open concept mean that no partition separates the gender-specific areas from the general area; the icons that denote which gender goes to which side are indistinct, blurred and placed below eye level. To cut a long story short, this means that I walked into the female section of the toilet at first, not noticing that there were 2 areas beyond the common one; Kok Heng theorises that this is done on purpose, so guys and girls will run into each other in the toilet, accidentally or otherwise. I saw a whole row of cubicles, and wondered if the lack of partitions and apparent lack of signage meant it was a unisex toilet. I went into one cubicle and noticed the little bin beside the toilet bowl. With this clue, I went back into the common area and entered the male area, finally noticing the small, indistinct signs pointing each gender in the right direction, as well as the curious mirror placed at eye level above the common urinal.

The attempt of my No 1 fan, She with formerly rebonded and dyed mid-back length hair which is now dyed black and soft straightened, is fond of black dominatrix-style pumps, and has a serious attitude problem, yet who disavows the title of ah lian (tamade to you too), to humiliate me with the “Clip Gabriel’s Rebonded Hair” meme failed, unfortunately. 2 clips were donated by her, and 1 from my No 2 fan, She with D cup breasts, a military uniform fetish and used to have a thing for Calmone, though she took it back quickly after taking a photo. Apparently I looked horny in them though. Oh, and 1 brown hair tie was given to me by some random girl at the entrance when I was pimping T-shirts before the Gates to Hell opened, so kudos are due to her.

A lot of reporters asked for group photos of all the Tomorrow.sg editors. Unfortunately, they walked away unsatiated. We were saying that instead, we should've gotten a group photo of all the reporters. We didn't manage that, but we did snap shots of most of them in a role reversal.

There was a plot to get me drunk, so I went to hide in the VIP room where I knew my No 1 and No 2 fans couldn't get (unfortunately, some bright spark gave the VIP room glass walls, so everyone could peer in and see what we were doing). However, I was not safe from Tym machinations. I asked her to get me a drink, and she came back with a glass of safe-looking Coke-like liquid which unfortunately tasted unpleasant, being both bitter and sour - some Vodka- Rum-Coke combination. I trusted to her discretion, but she managed to outdo herself by ordering a Whiskey Tonic next, which was truly awful. Her third attempt was better - a Vodka Orange. The drinks were horribly diluted. I hope they don't serve up this concentration when the drinks aren't free flow, or they're going to go out of business pretty soon (so much for the nice plaque commemorating their opening on 25th May 2005). Then again, it might've been a way to stop underaged youth who sneaked in (yes, we know you were in there) from getting too drunk.

[Addendum: Critic 1 reports: My colleague went into DXO at 1030pm. Not part of the blogging community. the drinks were still diluted. that's why the place is so empty]

A very amusing photo should be coming up on kennysia.com within the day. Well, if it doesn't, go bug Kenny! It has since been removed due to cries of outrage. Oh well.

Only one stranger came up to take a photo with me, though 2-3 people touched my hair (IIRC). Aww. Though one more wanted to, and incidentally delivered the most amusing (at least to me) line of the day:

Are you the guy who wrote “Why People Think My Chemistry Teacher is Gay?”

Uhh.

***





[Addendum: Lancerlord informs us that girls really *do* throw stones at boys. Tsk tsk, looks likes the T-shirt is inciting violence!]

***

Someone: are men always like this?

Me: hmm. I wouldn't know. haven't been with any men, you see
what do your female friends say?

Someone: i didnt ask them
they're all reading HBP [Ed: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince]

Me: ... women


Someone else: oh dear
why is it always the '82 batch
bunch of psychos, the whole lot of them


Someone else (2): go do the evol psych class and hope the fundamentalist idiots don't wreck that too... "morality is god's gift to humanity"... bull***t


Someone else (3): in seattle, it is USD2.40 per gallon. singapore oil/gas price is alot cheaper.

Me: You must be kidding. 1 gallon = 3.785 litres. So USD2.40 per gallon works out to USD2.40 for 3.785 litres.

At the current conversion rate of 1:1.687, that's S$4.05 per gallon, or S$1.07 per litre. Singapore oil is a lot cheaper huh.

***

Subject: Anorexia Post

Message: I really appreciate the pics you posted of the anorexic women. The sad thing is, those women believe still that they are beautiful and perfect because they have been glamourized. [well not all of them, because a few pics werent like that] but you get my drift.
I'm a survivor of the "disease" and i think it is important that society sees exactly what it is doing. I like being thin and petite now, I like my women thin and petite, but I dont want to see their ribs and hips, and I'm glad mine donot protrude any more.

Yeah. I'm done now :)

***

World Cup Organizers Seek Heavier Fines For Streakers - "Wolfgang Niersbach, vice president of the World Cup organizing committee, said Friday, "You can't assume these so-called streakers will always have peaceful intent. We don't want to imagine,for example, what would happen if one had a knife.""
How long do these people expect to fool the masses by bandying around the word "security" everytime they want to railroad some silly non-security related measure through?