"The last time somebody said, 'I find I can write much better with a word processor.', I replied, 'They used to say the same thing about drugs.'" - Roy Blount Jr.
***
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Tuesday, June 05, 2007
USP-Stanford Multiculturalism Forum
Day 12 (17/5) - CDI
In the morning we visited the Community Development Institute in East Palo Alto.
One of the community leaders said that gentrification (the influx of rich, white people) was a problem, and they were trying to defend against this because they liked the ethnic mix of their community (95% minority) as it as. How racist. If it were a white guy saying such things, he'd surely be lynched, but coming from him it might even be seen by many of the same people who'd lynch 'racists' as laudable.
You can't discriminate based on language limitations. So if someone cannot speak English (or even Spanish), you must till hire him. Excellent. Next time we won't be able to discriminate against the lazy and the stupid.
There was a sign: "War is not the answer. fcnl.org". It seems FCNL stands for "Friends Committee on National Legislation", a Quaker group founded in 1943. At first I thought that they didn't think war was the answer to British oppression of the 13 colonies, Slavery in the South and Nazism, Fascism and Japanese Imperialism, but now it seems that campaign was against the Iraq war.
In the afternoon some of us went to the Great Mall, a conglomeration of factory outlets. We took a 1 hr 30 min bus ride to Sana Clara and transferred to a tram for about 1 hr. Just before that, I shared a pork taco from a taqueria billed as having "the best tacos and burritos in the whole world". It was the worst I'd ever had (I didn't have time to record its name since the tram came).
There were many bail bonds shops in Santa Clara, eg "Bad Boy's Bail Bonds".
When we finally reached the place at 3, most of us ate at a Cajun place in the food court. That it was run by a Chinese woman was evident just by looking at the sides - 4/7 were Chinese (eg Chow Mein). They were giving out samples of Bourbon Chicken which was good (primarily because it was sweet), so 5 of us had it. Unfortunately not all the sides were as palatable - I had Cajun Fried Potatoes which were okay (not very crispy but well spiced) and Fried Plantains (dismissed by the rest as 'Goreng Pisang'), but someone had black bean rice which was the worst I'd ever tasted - even SMM made better rice. (Aside: recipe for Bourbon Chicken... without any Bourbon in it!)
There was a shop selling a rubber chicken. It made a noise when you squeezed it. Yay.
At the door of one outlet, there was a picture advertising smock tops. I was about to note that the picture made her look fat, then someone remarked that it was an outlet selling maternity dresses.
At one point there were some massage chairs. This being a litigious country, there was a list of safety precautions on them, and one of them was that menstruating women should not use them. Wth. I thought we'd been over supserstitions about menstruating women for at least a century. Maybe they're scared they'll leak and dirty the chairs.
After countless examples of the reverse, I finally saw an Asian man with a White woman! Jabir claimed he'd seen 1-2 before this, but he never pointed it out to me. This one was a bit taller than her, even in her heels which were quite high, and he had a lot of facial stubble (so, yes, Yellow Fever was right - it's the hair). If so many Asian women go with non-Asian men, I wonder what will happen in a generation's time - there'll be no more Asian women for the non-Asians to date. But then again maybe they marry Asian men in the end after having some fun. Later I saw another such pair who were probably together (Huishan said the guy was cute).
I didn't have energy to process all the outlets, so I only did 3/4. Which was still a lot of outlets, though I didn't spend much.
Two of the girls shared Cold Stone Creamery ice cream, which was hideously expensive. The concept is you start with some plain ice cream and toppings are thrown on and spatula-ed into the ice cream on top of a black stone surface (hence, the name).
We left at 8 and took just over 1.5 hrs to return (excluding dinner) since we took a shorter route involving 1km of walking.
There was a nightclub called 'Buddha lounge' in Mountain View. Seditious!
For dinner we ate at a KFC near Mountain View. Using the toilet was really inconvenient - we had to exit the restaurant, go to the back door and request access through it. What made it worse was that while the 2 front counter staff could speak English, all of the back counter staff seemed to understand Spanish only, so they had to call one front counter staff member over to understand my hollering. Indeed, the Latinos have reached a critical mass and can exist (in California at least) without speaking English.
Quotes:
I wanted to turn to my friend and say, 'Lim Yu Beng is damn hot' but just behind us was Tan Kheng Hwa.
Day 12 (17/5) - CDI
In the morning we visited the Community Development Institute in East Palo Alto.
One of the community leaders said that gentrification (the influx of rich, white people) was a problem, and they were trying to defend against this because they liked the ethnic mix of their community (95% minority) as it as. How racist. If it were a white guy saying such things, he'd surely be lynched, but coming from him it might even be seen by many of the same people who'd lynch 'racists' as laudable.
You can't discriminate based on language limitations. So if someone cannot speak English (or even Spanish), you must till hire him. Excellent. Next time we won't be able to discriminate against the lazy and the stupid.
There was a sign: "War is not the answer. fcnl.org". It seems FCNL stands for "Friends Committee on National Legislation", a Quaker group founded in 1943. At first I thought that they didn't think war was the answer to British oppression of the 13 colonies, Slavery in the South and Nazism, Fascism and Japanese Imperialism, but now it seems that campaign was against the Iraq war.
In the afternoon some of us went to the Great Mall, a conglomeration of factory outlets. We took a 1 hr 30 min bus ride to Sana Clara and transferred to a tram for about 1 hr. Just before that, I shared a pork taco from a taqueria billed as having "the best tacos and burritos in the whole world". It was the worst I'd ever had (I didn't have time to record its name since the tram came).
There were many bail bonds shops in Santa Clara, eg "Bad Boy's Bail Bonds".
When we finally reached the place at 3, most of us ate at a Cajun place in the food court. That it was run by a Chinese woman was evident just by looking at the sides - 4/7 were Chinese (eg Chow Mein). They were giving out samples of Bourbon Chicken which was good (primarily because it was sweet), so 5 of us had it. Unfortunately not all the sides were as palatable - I had Cajun Fried Potatoes which were okay (not very crispy but well spiced) and Fried Plantains (dismissed by the rest as 'Goreng Pisang'), but someone had black bean rice which was the worst I'd ever tasted - even SMM made better rice. (Aside: recipe for Bourbon Chicken... without any Bourbon in it!)
There was a shop selling a rubber chicken. It made a noise when you squeezed it. Yay.
At the door of one outlet, there was a picture advertising smock tops. I was about to note that the picture made her look fat, then someone remarked that it was an outlet selling maternity dresses.
At one point there were some massage chairs. This being a litigious country, there was a list of safety precautions on them, and one of them was that menstruating women should not use them. Wth. I thought we'd been over supserstitions about menstruating women for at least a century. Maybe they're scared they'll leak and dirty the chairs.
After countless examples of the reverse, I finally saw an Asian man with a White woman! Jabir claimed he'd seen 1-2 before this, but he never pointed it out to me. This one was a bit taller than her, even in her heels which were quite high, and he had a lot of facial stubble (so, yes, Yellow Fever was right - it's the hair). If so many Asian women go with non-Asian men, I wonder what will happen in a generation's time - there'll be no more Asian women for the non-Asians to date. But then again maybe they marry Asian men in the end after having some fun. Later I saw another such pair who were probably together (Huishan said the guy was cute).
I didn't have energy to process all the outlets, so I only did 3/4. Which was still a lot of outlets, though I didn't spend much.
Two of the girls shared Cold Stone Creamery ice cream, which was hideously expensive. The concept is you start with some plain ice cream and toppings are thrown on and spatula-ed into the ice cream on top of a black stone surface (hence, the name).
We left at 8 and took just over 1.5 hrs to return (excluding dinner) since we took a shorter route involving 1km of walking.
There was a nightclub called 'Buddha lounge' in Mountain View. Seditious!
For dinner we ate at a KFC near Mountain View. Using the toilet was really inconvenient - we had to exit the restaurant, go to the back door and request access through it. What made it worse was that while the 2 front counter staff could speak English, all of the back counter staff seemed to understand Spanish only, so they had to call one front counter staff member over to understand my hollering. Indeed, the Latinos have reached a critical mass and can exist (in California at least) without speaking English.
Quotes:
I wanted to turn to my friend and say, 'Lim Yu Beng is damn hot' but just behind us was Tan Kheng Hwa.
Post ID: 8955467412558374288
USP-Stanford Multiculturalism Forum
Day 11 (16/5) - A Day with Tom Kosnik
Today was dedicated to entrepreneurship (doubtless a sop to the NUS administration), curious given that our program was about multiculturalism. More than once, I asked the Golden Question: "What is the relationship between entrepreneurship and multiculturalism?", but never got a satisfactory reply.
I was wondering if I should buy a Stanford shirt, and my roommates said it was very poser to do so. I asked if it was not then poser to buy a Berkeley shirt, as I had, and they said it was less so.
While we were waiting for the bus, Jaga (who was wearing a Stanford shirt) and I (wearing a Berkeley shirt) engaged in some stupid posing. The photos will be put up together with others from other people once I finish my travelogue (presumably everyone will have uploaded their photos to Facebook by then).
Interestingly, Stanford has engineering societies formed along racial lines - there's one for Chicanos/Latinos, one 'American Indian Engineering and Science Society' and doubtless many more.
I don't know why grass in Singapore is so shitty - lying on the grass was great here, but no one would think of doing likewise in Singapore. Partially it's because the grass in Singapore seems a different species from that in temperate countries, but it's also due to the frequent rain making the ground soggy and muddy and the insects of the tropics.
Huge wall-mounted screen - 'This is not a chalkboard'. If you look closely you can see chalk marks.
One Stanford student thought one big motivation for volunteerism there was CV-building. Sounds familiar.
In Stanford there were quite a few students zipping around on skateboards and there were even more in Berkeley. It must be a Californian thing.
The salt in salt water taffy is surprisingly interesting. It gives it an added dimension of flavour.
Running after Tom Kosnik (reuploaded uploaded onto blip.tv)
NB: This video doesn't seem to be processable by YouTube, unfortunately.
In one entrepreneurship talk, one entrepreneur talked about the importance of finding a local partner in China. I pointed out that they'd steal your technology and violate your contract. The reply was that contracts are violated elsewhere in the world as well, and that the modus operandi of Chinese companies was becoming more sophisticated; technology could be reverse engineered even though the architecture was kept from the Chinese, but they hoped to caputre the market by that time ('a few years'). I was a bit skeptical. If they can do it with cars, why not wireless technology? (I was told that while I was asking this question, the female class instructor turned around and looked at me [since I was the only NUS student to say anything], and her eyes widened on seeing my Berkeley shirt)
Cloth belts are good because they can be adjusted.
There was a noticeboard advertising tuition for maths, physics, chemistry and more besides (basically, everything pakka liao) from a Stanford PhD student. Hah. Another notice asked if you were "interested in learning about neuroscience research and motor learning studies"; I only realised its true nature upon seeing the $20/hr remuneration.
We then went to a seminar ("Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders"), where industry figures came to speak. We were a week too early to catch Mitchell Baker from Mozilla, damn. Instead we got the guy behind Ooma who annoyingly refused to say what the hell Ooma was (at press time it still had not been revealed), and a venture capitalist from DFJ (they bankrolled Hotmail, and pushed through initial opposition from the founder for the little ad at the bottom of each email message, thus innovating viral marketing).
The speakers said that failure was important (not just preferred) on your CV so you'd know what gravity felt like. They also said the problem with letting engineering lead product development was that you'd pour in $300 million over 4 years to make a supercool product no one would buy, because they'd keep changing the specs.
I pointed out to people that if I was a girl being marginalised by guys, the narrative would be very different, and was told to shut up. Bah.
Everyone loves Yoda
Explaining GLEAN - Global Leaders, Entrepreneurs and Altruists Network
When we were going back at night there was a manhole outside the Terman Engineering Building covered by a grille. Below it there was a ladder and a passage leading to an opening from which a light source was shining. Much warmth was also coming out of the manhole. I thought this sort of thing only existed in science fiction movies.
Besides my clapping, my laugh was also imitated. Bah.
Quotes:
In Singapore we are quite ignore'rernt (ignorant)
[On buying prom dresses to return them the next day] How de'speckable they are (despicable)
[On his band on in-head advisers ('what would xxx do?')] Mom, Dad, Mickey Mouse, Robin Hood, Maid Marian, Jimmy Cricket, Yoda.
[Me on a 'Situational Leadership' graph: Business is bullshit. They just pull this shit out of their ass] I agree with you. There's no such thing as learning business.
[Me on a 'Situational Leadership' graph: What do you think of the graph thing?] Bullshit... [Student 2: I am generally skeptical of all business models.]
[Me on a string below the bust line: What's that string for?] For decoration... I feel uncomfortable now.
Day 11 (16/5) - A Day with Tom Kosnik
Today was dedicated to entrepreneurship (doubtless a sop to the NUS administration), curious given that our program was about multiculturalism. More than once, I asked the Golden Question: "What is the relationship between entrepreneurship and multiculturalism?", but never got a satisfactory reply.
I was wondering if I should buy a Stanford shirt, and my roommates said it was very poser to do so. I asked if it was not then poser to buy a Berkeley shirt, as I had, and they said it was less so.
While we were waiting for the bus, Jaga (who was wearing a Stanford shirt) and I (wearing a Berkeley shirt) engaged in some stupid posing. The photos will be put up together with others from other people once I finish my travelogue (presumably everyone will have uploaded their photos to Facebook by then).
Interestingly, Stanford has engineering societies formed along racial lines - there's one for Chicanos/Latinos, one 'American Indian Engineering and Science Society' and doubtless many more.
I don't know why grass in Singapore is so shitty - lying on the grass was great here, but no one would think of doing likewise in Singapore. Partially it's because the grass in Singapore seems a different species from that in temperate countries, but it's also due to the frequent rain making the ground soggy and muddy and the insects of the tropics.
Huge wall-mounted screen - 'This is not a chalkboard'. If you look closely you can see chalk marks.
One Stanford student thought one big motivation for volunteerism there was CV-building. Sounds familiar.
In Stanford there were quite a few students zipping around on skateboards and there were even more in Berkeley. It must be a Californian thing.
The salt in salt water taffy is surprisingly interesting. It gives it an added dimension of flavour.
Running after Tom Kosnik (
In one entrepreneurship talk, one entrepreneur talked about the importance of finding a local partner in China. I pointed out that they'd steal your technology and violate your contract. The reply was that contracts are violated elsewhere in the world as well, and that the modus operandi of Chinese companies was becoming more sophisticated; technology could be reverse engineered even though the architecture was kept from the Chinese, but they hoped to caputre the market by that time ('a few years'). I was a bit skeptical. If they can do it with cars, why not wireless technology? (I was told that while I was asking this question, the female class instructor turned around and looked at me [since I was the only NUS student to say anything], and her eyes widened on seeing my Berkeley shirt)
Cloth belts are good because they can be adjusted.
There was a noticeboard advertising tuition for maths, physics, chemistry and more besides (basically, everything pakka liao) from a Stanford PhD student. Hah. Another notice asked if you were "interested in learning about neuroscience research and motor learning studies"; I only realised its true nature upon seeing the $20/hr remuneration.
We then went to a seminar ("Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders"), where industry figures came to speak. We were a week too early to catch Mitchell Baker from Mozilla, damn. Instead we got the guy behind Ooma who annoyingly refused to say what the hell Ooma was (at press time it still had not been revealed), and a venture capitalist from DFJ (they bankrolled Hotmail, and pushed through initial opposition from the founder for the little ad at the bottom of each email message, thus innovating viral marketing).
The speakers said that failure was important (not just preferred) on your CV so you'd know what gravity felt like. They also said the problem with letting engineering lead product development was that you'd pour in $300 million over 4 years to make a supercool product no one would buy, because they'd keep changing the specs.
I pointed out to people that if I was a girl being marginalised by guys, the narrative would be very different, and was told to shut up. Bah.
Everyone loves Yoda
Explaining GLEAN - Global Leaders, Entrepreneurs and Altruists Network
When we were going back at night there was a manhole outside the Terman Engineering Building covered by a grille. Below it there was a ladder and a passage leading to an opening from which a light source was shining. Much warmth was also coming out of the manhole. I thought this sort of thing only existed in science fiction movies.
Besides my clapping, my laugh was also imitated. Bah.
Quotes:
In Singapore we are quite ignore'rernt (ignorant)
[On buying prom dresses to return them the next day] How de'speckable they are (despicable)
[On his band on in-head advisers ('what would xxx do?')] Mom, Dad, Mickey Mouse, Robin Hood, Maid Marian, Jimmy Cricket, Yoda.
[Me on a 'Situational Leadership' graph: Business is bullshit. They just pull this shit out of their ass] I agree with you. There's no such thing as learning business.
[Me on a 'Situational Leadership' graph: What do you think of the graph thing?] Bullshit... [Student 2: I am generally skeptical of all business models.]
[Me on a string below the bust line: What's that string for?] For decoration... I feel uncomfortable now.
Post ID: 1207517431652818343
Monday, June 04, 2007
USP-Stanford Multiculturalism Forum
Day 10 (15/5) - Stanford
On the BART, Jabir and I were having a discussion on the utility of taxonomy and categorisation, as opposed to embracing the fragmentation of knowledge beyond palpable categories. I was accused of being simplistic, but this was ridiculous really, since cognition is categorization: "The essence of memory organization is classification, relating new experiences to the old." - William Estes; just because we recognise that we live in and interact with the world using categories does not mean that we ignore the subtleties of particular instances. This caused a woman to laugh because, really, philosophy (and epistemology in particular) is not something you discuss in polite company.
In the morning we had a talk at APARC and the afternoon was free.
We took a zero emissions fuel cell bus to the transit center; an interesting thing about many US buses is that they are kneeling - the front of the bus can be lowered to make it easier for people to get on, or wheelchair users to wheel themselves up the ramp.
Unfortunately no girls chose to do a paper on shopping and multiculturalism. Then they could've gone shopping to do 'research'. Though one is doing the touristification of Chinatown.
The US officially has a melting pot policy (homogeneity), but people are very enthusiastic about their heritage and identity. They know where their grandparents are from; Asian-Americans say they want to visit their hometown in China to find their roots. Meanwhile in Singapore we officially have a salad bowl policy (heterogeneity) with CMIO (with PAP as the sauce), but people are blase about their roots, not wanting or liking to talk about their heritage and not knowing where their grandparents were from.
For lunch someone allergic to beef ate a 100% beef hot dog. Luckily she brought her creams and pills.
After lunch, I went for Political Economics (the use of mathematical models to examine politics). The blasted room was so hard to find I walked in 15 minutes late, with Jabir and Guanzheng (who wanted to see what Applied Maths was like) falling out before I found it. The lecture/seminar was 1 hr 50 mins without a break - quite xiong.
The students had read a paper before class and were discussing it semi-enthusiastically. They had no lecture notes (just some paragraphs of discussion blurbs) and the structure of the class was less obvious than I expected.
There were some interesting bits. The poor were modelled as imposing costs on the elite by revolting, and democracy was modelled as a promise of future redistribution (it was claimed that Singapore was a stable autocracy because inequality was low and so there was no benefit from revolution. Wth). Political dynamics were modelled as a game between the rich and the poor about tax rates and the threat revolution, and the conditions for revolution were also modelled. In earlier weeks, there'd been size of government models, public goods and preferred tax rates.
Cute models aside, the maths was just used to come up with fancy expressions where the symbols had no real meaning or relevance to reality and we learnt nothing new we didn't already know before starting the mathematical footwork. What a sham of a discipline.
Indeed, there was extension discussion of the realism of the model, its assumptions and its interaction with reality; one student objected, saying that using rational theory to explain the actions of irrational agents was flawed, and we should use sociological theories instead. It was also said that what should be modelled was not decisions but 'pseudo-evolutionary' models should be used. It was also pointed out that the coordination was suspect - the elites might but the poor were too numerous to coordinate revolution. One girl pointed out that no one sits around calculating probabilities in their heads. I think economics doesn't even explain economics that well, let alone real life.
Later a Singaporean student told me that this was an atypical lesson (weird modelling) of an atypical class. Going through the paper and discussing it was not normal - usually it was more like a lecture, where they'd go through models without papers. Usually the class was more interesting. I replied that it was already more interesting than NUS, hurr hurr.
Stanford has a social dance class carrying 1 credit.
India is a good counterexample to the theory that most people cannot speak more than one language very fluently.
I was feeling masochistic and needed to work my brain cells to burn the basket of cheese fries I had in addition to my other food at lunch (they were weird - a very mild, almost tasteless cheese was melted over them), so I went for a graduate class in 'Multiperson Decision Theory'.
That day, there was a presentation on 'A continuous-time version of the principal-agent problem' (the instructor called it one of the best papers he'd ever seen, but it was rejected by Econometrica). I was doing okay until 'argmax' appeared. Then 'HJB equation', boundary conditions and Ito's Formula overwhelmed me and very soon I felt like gouging out my eyeballs. The presentation was almost all maths, and had very little economics - clear proof that the more economics you learn, the less economics you know; they called some models intractable - I don't want to look at those.
There were 12 students in the class. 11 were guys, and the sole girl looked quite nerdy.
Running out as soon as was polite (when the Q&A started), I decided I needed to walk off my migraine so I walked to Stanford Shopping Center (I considered the hotel but decided it too far). My psyche had been so damaged that loud hysterical laughs were coming from me at irregular intervals for a while after I left.
Palm Drive
Entrance - perhaps the most pretentious part of Stanford
Wth rules for the Shopping Center
The shops were quite expensive, but Stanford kids are rich, so it's okay.
There was a grocer selling exotic fruit like strawberry papaya and cherimoya.
Some Asian noodle joint had a vegetarian option called 'Buddha's Bliss', and a fusion dish called 'Cultural Harmony'.
I walked to the 22 bus stop (there was a free Stanford shuttle down the El Camino Real but it had a confusing route [Guan Zheng and I got on at the wrong stop during the night we watched the movie and had to get off at the transit center and take the public bus] and came only every half hour), but just missed the bus. The next one was taking forever to come, seemingly in violation of the schedule, so I walked in the direction of the next bus stop, hoping it had a seat. Naturally, a bus came when I was too far to run to either the new or old bus stops. When the bus finally came, I realised that not only were the raspberries I'd bought partially squashed by their own weight, I was at the wrong stop - I was on the stretch where the bus came only ever half hour, as opposed to the stretch where it came every 12 minutes. Gah.
Everyone had gone to dinner already, so I ta pao-ed so-called Hawaiian food. Grilled spam musubi (like sushi) sounded disgusting so I went for a seafood set with chicken. I noticed that they'd won a Hawaiian award in 2003 and 2004 (there was also an award for best Chinese food - wth). 2005 onwards was curiously missing and the quality of the food showed why - suffice to say that the 'BBQ chicken' was grilled.
Quotes:
preceed'duh'nce (precedence)
I'm not dying for men. [Student 2: You're dying for a lot of things you will not say.] Yah, like sex. [Student 2: It came from your own mouth] (mention)
Day 10 (15/5) - Stanford
On the BART, Jabir and I were having a discussion on the utility of taxonomy and categorisation, as opposed to embracing the fragmentation of knowledge beyond palpable categories. I was accused of being simplistic, but this was ridiculous really, since cognition is categorization: "The essence of memory organization is classification, relating new experiences to the old." - William Estes; just because we recognise that we live in and interact with the world using categories does not mean that we ignore the subtleties of particular instances. This caused a woman to laugh because, really, philosophy (and epistemology in particular) is not something you discuss in polite company.
In the morning we had a talk at APARC and the afternoon was free.
We took a zero emissions fuel cell bus to the transit center; an interesting thing about many US buses is that they are kneeling - the front of the bus can be lowered to make it easier for people to get on, or wheelchair users to wheel themselves up the ramp.
Unfortunately no girls chose to do a paper on shopping and multiculturalism. Then they could've gone shopping to do 'research'. Though one is doing the touristification of Chinatown.
The US officially has a melting pot policy (homogeneity), but people are very enthusiastic about their heritage and identity. They know where their grandparents are from; Asian-Americans say they want to visit their hometown in China to find their roots. Meanwhile in Singapore we officially have a salad bowl policy (heterogeneity) with CMIO (with PAP as the sauce), but people are blase about their roots, not wanting or liking to talk about their heritage and not knowing where their grandparents were from.
For lunch someone allergic to beef ate a 100% beef hot dog. Luckily she brought her creams and pills.
After lunch, I went for Political Economics (the use of mathematical models to examine politics). The blasted room was so hard to find I walked in 15 minutes late, with Jabir and Guanzheng (who wanted to see what Applied Maths was like) falling out before I found it. The lecture/seminar was 1 hr 50 mins without a break - quite xiong.
The students had read a paper before class and were discussing it semi-enthusiastically. They had no lecture notes (just some paragraphs of discussion blurbs) and the structure of the class was less obvious than I expected.
There were some interesting bits. The poor were modelled as imposing costs on the elite by revolting, and democracy was modelled as a promise of future redistribution (it was claimed that Singapore was a stable autocracy because inequality was low and so there was no benefit from revolution. Wth). Political dynamics were modelled as a game between the rich and the poor about tax rates and the threat revolution, and the conditions for revolution were also modelled. In earlier weeks, there'd been size of government models, public goods and preferred tax rates.
Cute models aside, the maths was just used to come up with fancy expressions where the symbols had no real meaning or relevance to reality and we learnt nothing new we didn't already know before starting the mathematical footwork. What a sham of a discipline.
Indeed, there was extension discussion of the realism of the model, its assumptions and its interaction with reality; one student objected, saying that using rational theory to explain the actions of irrational agents was flawed, and we should use sociological theories instead. It was also said that what should be modelled was not decisions but 'pseudo-evolutionary' models should be used. It was also pointed out that the coordination was suspect - the elites might but the poor were too numerous to coordinate revolution. One girl pointed out that no one sits around calculating probabilities in their heads. I think economics doesn't even explain economics that well, let alone real life.
Later a Singaporean student told me that this was an atypical lesson (weird modelling) of an atypical class. Going through the paper and discussing it was not normal - usually it was more like a lecture, where they'd go through models without papers. Usually the class was more interesting. I replied that it was already more interesting than NUS, hurr hurr.
Stanford has a social dance class carrying 1 credit.
India is a good counterexample to the theory that most people cannot speak more than one language very fluently.
I was feeling masochistic and needed to work my brain cells to burn the basket of cheese fries I had in addition to my other food at lunch (they were weird - a very mild, almost tasteless cheese was melted over them), so I went for a graduate class in 'Multiperson Decision Theory'.
That day, there was a presentation on 'A continuous-time version of the principal-agent problem' (the instructor called it one of the best papers he'd ever seen, but it was rejected by Econometrica). I was doing okay until 'argmax' appeared. Then 'HJB equation', boundary conditions and Ito's Formula overwhelmed me and very soon I felt like gouging out my eyeballs. The presentation was almost all maths, and had very little economics - clear proof that the more economics you learn, the less economics you know; they called some models intractable - I don't want to look at those.
There were 12 students in the class. 11 were guys, and the sole girl looked quite nerdy.
Running out as soon as was polite (when the Q&A started), I decided I needed to walk off my migraine so I walked to Stanford Shopping Center (I considered the hotel but decided it too far). My psyche had been so damaged that loud hysterical laughs were coming from me at irregular intervals for a while after I left.
Palm Drive
Entrance - perhaps the most pretentious part of Stanford
Wth rules for the Shopping Center
The shops were quite expensive, but Stanford kids are rich, so it's okay.
There was a grocer selling exotic fruit like strawberry papaya and cherimoya.
Some Asian noodle joint had a vegetarian option called 'Buddha's Bliss', and a fusion dish called 'Cultural Harmony'.
I walked to the 22 bus stop (there was a free Stanford shuttle down the El Camino Real but it had a confusing route [Guan Zheng and I got on at the wrong stop during the night we watched the movie and had to get off at the transit center and take the public bus] and came only every half hour), but just missed the bus. The next one was taking forever to come, seemingly in violation of the schedule, so I walked in the direction of the next bus stop, hoping it had a seat. Naturally, a bus came when I was too far to run to either the new or old bus stops. When the bus finally came, I realised that not only were the raspberries I'd bought partially squashed by their own weight, I was at the wrong stop - I was on the stretch where the bus came only ever half hour, as opposed to the stretch where it came every 12 minutes. Gah.
Everyone had gone to dinner already, so I ta pao-ed so-called Hawaiian food. Grilled spam musubi (like sushi) sounded disgusting so I went for a seafood set with chicken. I noticed that they'd won a Hawaiian award in 2003 and 2004 (there was also an award for best Chinese food - wth). 2005 onwards was curiously missing and the quality of the food showed why - suffice to say that the 'BBQ chicken' was grilled.
Quotes:
preceed'duh'nce (precedence)
I'm not dying for men. [Student 2: You're dying for a lot of things you will not say.] Yah, like sex. [Student 2: It came from your own mouth] (mention)
Post ID: 3167166617749966693
"My factories may end war sooner than your peace congresses. The day two army corps can destroy each other in one second, all civilised nations will recoil from war and disband their armies." - Alfred Nobel
"The more destructive war becomes, the more fascinating we find it." - Andrew Undershaft (George Bernard Shaw)
***
Steven Lim's latest antic:
Models & Talents
"Our freelance models are available for hire immediately for any events, commercials, all photo shoots including bikini, lingerie & legal artistic nude (for private collections, not for sales & publication), fashion shows, all dancing including bar top, hosting, videos or any acting scenes."
Extracts from the descriptions:
- *All models' shots, videos, poses, acting directed by Steven Lim
- Wgt: 45cm. Linda got the sad sad cute puppy look eyes n demure n pretty
- adorable girl that is quick on poses
- Du Du has a very gorgeous face but rather big but envious body
- Like a Japanese, tall with good figure
- Jennifer got what all women wants for assets, good looks n larger than life female assets, plus good natured character
- A small body compared to her head with 25 inches waist
- Special Note: Ming Quan aspired to become a model very much but some agencies rejected him on the spot. For me, i think he is really special n cute. He can really try comedy n funny bar top dancing. Congrats, Ming Quan, u are model now!
- Willing to do Bikini & All Events including acting (note: she got good female assets)
- Boyish Girl Role. Various events/ acting except wearing skirt roles.
This is very dodgy, and he has jailbait on the payroll too.
At least I now know the weight of someone I know of. Hurr hurr.
Someone: he gave up on his eyebrow business ah? wah liao! some of them are younger than my sister! not yet 18!
sorry lor i think the best among them is only qualified to be PC show girl
Someone else: OH MY GOD
WHY IS SHE [mutual sorta acquaintance] IN THIS
OHHH
the eyebrow man
argh
tts damn stupid
are u sure this is legal?
Someone: cb
Someone else: the description of the first two make them sound like they're willing to do lesbian scenes
Someone: some hor..
........
he anyhow grab ppl off the streets is it
no qc one
if i saw anyone i knew, i'd suan them with NO mercy man
hahahahaha
god.
u have to ask her what possessed her to allow her picthre to be put up there
knea drugged arh
Someone else: uhoh
I tink its a scam
cos I know 1 of the girls there
and I highly doubt she would put herself on the page like that
Someone: haha i see ***
i wonder how's business going for them
Me: ask if she'll do legal artistic nude hahahaha
Someone: i was going to suggest that
"The more destructive war becomes, the more fascinating we find it." - Andrew Undershaft (George Bernard Shaw)
***
Steven Lim's latest antic:
Models & Talents
"Our freelance models are available for hire immediately for any events, commercials, all photo shoots including bikini, lingerie & legal artistic nude (for private collections, not for sales & publication), fashion shows, all dancing including bar top, hosting, videos or any acting scenes."
Extracts from the descriptions:
- *All models' shots, videos, poses, acting directed by Steven Lim
- Wgt: 45cm. Linda got the sad sad cute puppy look eyes n demure n pretty
- adorable girl that is quick on poses
- Du Du has a very gorgeous face but rather big but envious body
- Like a Japanese, tall with good figure
- Jennifer got what all women wants for assets, good looks n larger than life female assets, plus good natured character
- A small body compared to her head with 25 inches waist
- Special Note: Ming Quan aspired to become a model very much but some agencies rejected him on the spot. For me, i think he is really special n cute. He can really try comedy n funny bar top dancing. Congrats, Ming Quan, u are model now!
- Willing to do Bikini & All Events including acting (note: she got good female assets)
- Boyish Girl Role. Various events/ acting except wearing skirt roles.
This is very dodgy, and he has jailbait on the payroll too.
At least I now know the weight of someone I know of. Hurr hurr.
Someone: he gave up on his eyebrow business ah? wah liao! some of them are younger than my sister! not yet 18!
sorry lor i think the best among them is only qualified to be PC show girl
Someone else: OH MY GOD
WHY IS SHE [mutual sorta acquaintance] IN THIS
OHHH
the eyebrow man
argh
tts damn stupid
are u sure this is legal?
Someone: cb
Someone else: the description of the first two make them sound like they're willing to do lesbian scenes
Someone: some hor..
........
he anyhow grab ppl off the streets is it
no qc one
if i saw anyone i knew, i'd suan them with NO mercy man
hahahahaha
god.
u have to ask her what possessed her to allow her picthre to be put up there
knea drugged arh
Someone else: uhoh
I tink its a scam
cos I know 1 of the girls there
and I highly doubt she would put herself on the page like that
Someone: haha i see ***
i wonder how's business going for them
Me: ask if she'll do legal artistic nude hahahaha
Someone: i was going to suggest that
Post ID: 8507218967696242306
USP-Stanford Multiculturalism Forum
Day 9 (14/5) - OICW
Today we left Berkeley and returned to Palo Alto.
The stupid vending machine at the YMCA swallowed my $1.50. I complained to the receptionist, but he said he had no access, and did the next best thing - he helped me to tilt the vending machine (my first time - woo!), so I got a $1 bottle of mineral water (not the $1.50 grape juice I wanted).
Another facet of my marginalisation: sometimes when I laugh I clap. This was seized upon and replicated. The most claps recorded so far are 6 - 4 from one girl and 2 from another - on seeing a picture of Huishan and I reading the book I bought for USP.
Caltrain - "There is Help. 1 800 SUICIDE". We need such signs at MRT stations.
Someone made the mistake of asking me why I grew my hair out. I used to tell people why, but they never believed me so nowadays I just demonstrate the reason why. So I tied my hair up and flipped it in her face. This got me hit many times, with me yelping on each hit.
'This is not a seat'
Housing discrimination bus ad
After returning to the Comfort Inn, we were to go down to the OICW (Opportunities Industrialization Center West) to have a look. To get there we needed to use buses from two companies - the daypass we bought from VTA was supposedly valid only on Samtrans buses in the direction leaving the Palo Alto transit center but not on the way back. Really strange system (later the Samtrans bus driver let us use our daypass to go back to the transit center, hurr hurr).
Darren said I was provoking others into marginalising me. This was a horrible and insensitive observation to make - it is really awful to blame the victim, like claiming that rape victims ask for it when they walk down the street in a bad neighbourhood at 3am, dressed in skimpy clothing, or claiming that someone who got his car stolen should have locked it (even if he didn't use a steering wheel lock).
There are no traffic signals or signs in Phnom Penh even though they have a million people.
Kalamu Chache's poem
I commented that one of the people who spoke to us had a very anecdotal way of answering our questions which didn't answer them and the answers bordered on the irrelevant. I was told that the anecdotes were relevant because she lived through the events. This is like explaining how a Boeing 777 flies by explaining the Navier-Stokes equations - it is related to the question but doesn't answer it at all.
I'd forgotten to bring my belt, but Darren lent me his, making me feel immediately more secure. Yay.
Huishan went to MSN and typed "Google" in the search box. Hehe.
For dinner some of us went to a Mexican restaurant. They had a bottomless glass of watermelon juice for $2.50, so I jumped at it and had 4 glasses. They also served freshly fried nachos with salsa, and I noticed that when we asked for a refill of salsa, the next batch was hotter than the first; my theory was that each refill would be hotter than the last until customers had had enough chips.
2 pork and 1 chicken enchilada, beans and rice
I'd forgotten that we were in America. Shit. After all the nachos and juice, I hardly touched the beans and almost didn't touch the rice, and left just under 1/2 an enchilada behind.
The Americans don't seem to be very fond of the 24 hour clock. Then again I didn't notice this in 2005, so it must be a Californian thing.
Quotes:
People carry guns at church in Texas, like a Western movie.
I think all of my children are beautiful. They're probably not, but I think they are.
Day 9 (14/5) - OICW
Today we left Berkeley and returned to Palo Alto.
The stupid vending machine at the YMCA swallowed my $1.50. I complained to the receptionist, but he said he had no access, and did the next best thing - he helped me to tilt the vending machine (my first time - woo!), so I got a $1 bottle of mineral water (not the $1.50 grape juice I wanted).
Another facet of my marginalisation: sometimes when I laugh I clap. This was seized upon and replicated. The most claps recorded so far are 6 - 4 from one girl and 2 from another - on seeing a picture of Huishan and I reading the book I bought for USP.
Caltrain - "There is Help. 1 800 SUICIDE". We need such signs at MRT stations.
Someone made the mistake of asking me why I grew my hair out. I used to tell people why, but they never believed me so nowadays I just demonstrate the reason why. So I tied my hair up and flipped it in her face. This got me hit many times, with me yelping on each hit.
'This is not a seat'
Housing discrimination bus ad
After returning to the Comfort Inn, we were to go down to the OICW (Opportunities Industrialization Center West) to have a look. To get there we needed to use buses from two companies - the daypass we bought from VTA was supposedly valid only on Samtrans buses in the direction leaving the Palo Alto transit center but not on the way back. Really strange system (later the Samtrans bus driver let us use our daypass to go back to the transit center, hurr hurr).
Darren said I was provoking others into marginalising me. This was a horrible and insensitive observation to make - it is really awful to blame the victim, like claiming that rape victims ask for it when they walk down the street in a bad neighbourhood at 3am, dressed in skimpy clothing, or claiming that someone who got his car stolen should have locked it (even if he didn't use a steering wheel lock).
There are no traffic signals or signs in Phnom Penh even though they have a million people.
Kalamu Chache's poem
I commented that one of the people who spoke to us had a very anecdotal way of answering our questions which didn't answer them and the answers bordered on the irrelevant. I was told that the anecdotes were relevant because she lived through the events. This is like explaining how a Boeing 777 flies by explaining the Navier-Stokes equations - it is related to the question but doesn't answer it at all.
I'd forgotten to bring my belt, but Darren lent me his, making me feel immediately more secure. Yay.
Huishan went to MSN and typed "Google" in the search box. Hehe.
For dinner some of us went to a Mexican restaurant. They had a bottomless glass of watermelon juice for $2.50, so I jumped at it and had 4 glasses. They also served freshly fried nachos with salsa, and I noticed that when we asked for a refill of salsa, the next batch was hotter than the first; my theory was that each refill would be hotter than the last until customers had had enough chips.
2 pork and 1 chicken enchilada, beans and rice
I'd forgotten that we were in America. Shit. After all the nachos and juice, I hardly touched the beans and almost didn't touch the rice, and left just under 1/2 an enchilada behind.
The Americans don't seem to be very fond of the 24 hour clock. Then again I didn't notice this in 2005, so it must be a Californian thing.
Quotes:
People carry guns at church in Texas, like a Western movie.
I think all of my children are beautiful. They're probably not, but I think they are.
Post ID: 4584258352724815700
Sunday, June 03, 2007
"Winning may not be everything, but losing has little to recommend it." - Dianne Feinstein
***
A reader on this post:
"I believe that was "ochazuke" with tonkatsu set.
ochazuke is basically broth with rice, comes in many variations such as salmon ochazuke, plum ochazuke, etc.
you were most probably supposed to put the ingredients from the smaller bowls into the rice and then pour the broth into it.
it is very tasty. try it again if you can :D"
Thanks! I wonder if I can find ochazuke in Singapore...
***
A reader on this post:
"I believe that was "ochazuke" with tonkatsu set.
ochazuke is basically broth with rice, comes in many variations such as salmon ochazuke, plum ochazuke, etc.
you were most probably supposed to put the ingredients from the smaller bowls into the rice and then pour the broth into it.
it is very tasty. try it again if you can :D"
Thanks! I wonder if I can find ochazuke in Singapore...
Post ID: 4988246454166692453
USP-Stanford Multiculturalism Forum
Day 8 (13/5) - San Francisco
This was our first (and technically only) real free day, so 12 of us went to San Francisco, while 4 went to Oakland. This being a huge group, we didn't manage to do much, but it was still fun.
The BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) ticket is so cute. It's a stored value card which you can topup, and the value to add can be gradated in $1 and $0.05 increments.
'Cute at one. Not so cute at 21'
Some of the girls suggested that they redo this ad with me. Boo hoo.
Monument to workers (?) outside the BART station. San Francisco Financial District
Malaysian Mannikins :(
Montgomery Street, very steep stretch in the distance
Entering into Chinatown
The sheer amount of junk on sale was amazing. I paid $2.17 (with tax) for 6 stink bombs.
Phone booth with activist stickers. Note also the Orientalism inherent in the booth.
Chinatown
Where there're Chinese there're bootleg Sentai toys
Unfortunately we lost one of our number in Chinatown, so we were down to 11.
North border of Chinatown with Little Italy
Little Italy didn't look very Italian, except for the Italian cafes and restaurants. Perhaps in overcompensation, every lamppost had a painting of the Italian flag.
We went into a nice candy shop, which was the shit. With Screaming Flying Monkeys (see below), friendly staff and free samples, it's no wonder it was the #1 candy shop.
T-shirts
Taffy shopping with Chris. There was another group of taffey barrels opposite us.
There's a picture of me with my basket looking like an 'oompa-loompa'. Once I finish my travelogue (hopefully before going to Shanghai/Hong Kong) I will post it and thus contribute to my marginalisation.
New Wife Voodoo Doll
My new girlfriend. Someone asked if it grew big enough to be used as a sex doll. !@#$
Fat cats
B Movie Victims
Maybe the best item was the Screaming Flying Monkeys - you launch them using their rubberised arms, like a slingshot, and when they hit their target they scream. Unfortunately my attempts to get a video were unsuccessfully.
Vinod bought some sex cards with positions and methods. These girls are intrigued by it. Purely for academic purposes, of course.
Huishan is happy with Vinod's sex cards from the candy shop
Outside the candy shop
Washington Square
Pullups from a tree in the park. Deforestation. If he does this everyday maybe the tree will break.
Cute car ad
Fisherman's Wharf
Retro car
Seagull
Cat man
Scoma's was way too expensive and we had to wait too, so we went to Tarantino's, also along the Wharf.
While waiting for our food to come, we saw this:
Scaring passers-by by hiding vegetation. This isn't a bad idea for busking.
The best Boston (hurr hurr) Clam Chowder I've ever had. Too bad there were no oyster crackers. The sourdough bread we got was nice but it didn't quite substitute for crackers.
Sauteed scallops and prawns in garlic, lemon butter and white wine sauce. The scallops were huge. Unfortunately this means they weren't seared enough - it didn't go all the way through. Other than that it was good. Most of the rest had Fish and Chips, which cost less than half of this. Hah.
Crabs
Fisherman's Wharf sign.
Other bits of my soles started coming out on this day as well as many other subsequent days of the trip. As the saying goes, when it rains, it pours. Luckily I had my glue already.
Seagull
Alcatraz from shore
We decided to go on a $21 cruise which would bring us past Alcatraz and under the Golden Gate Bridge. There were portable sound units providing narration in 8 (?) different languages. However, English language speakers were marginalised since the channel for English did not work, so we had to listen to the indistinct sound coming out from the loudspeakers.
Port from ship
The wind was painful to the eyes.
Windsurfing
Some of them had parachutes attached to their surfboards and in the air above them catching the wind. I wonder what that's called - parasurfing?
Rainbow in the spray from the boat
Alcatraz
Bay Bridge
Shore. The needle building is the San Francisco pyramid. It is the tallest building in the city, with a narrow top so it wouldn't cast a big shadow on the street. Uhh.
Seals
Fake cigarettes. These are chocolate sticks rolled in paper. Amusingly, it doesn't say 'chocolate' anywhere, since these are made in the Land of Pot, Hookers and Euthanasia which has that rule that anything with fat other than cocoa butter cannot be called 'chocolate' (meaning you can't find Malaysian chocolate anywhere); the second ingredient is 'hardened vegetable oil'.
Breakdancing. The Malay kids at Esplanade need to go for intensive remedial.
I didn't know it was possible to spin on your head with your legs perpendicular to your body so many times.
Unfortunately the breakdancing was evidence of a systematic and racist framework of exclusion - only blacks and Cambodians (not even Asians in general) were taking part, and the latter had to shave their heads and pierce their ears, thus losing their Asian-ness, before they were allowed to take part.
Some passer-by was trying to get the performance artists to laugh/move. She succeeded.
There's Menopause the Musical. Hah.
Sea lions
Bubba Gump, at Fisherman's Wharf
EZ-Link in a tram
We went up the tram to go back to the BART and no one paid. When in Rome, do as the Romans do (I doubt all of them had a valid transfer ticket). So only Vinod paid. The tram was from Milan and so had Italian signs (there's another from Birmingham - with so many trams from around the world, it must've been a bitch to fix them all to run on the same tracks and power lines).
Incidentally, the most retarded argument I've heard for inflexible tram services: ""The street car solution is like a marriage," says Dr. Dave Fritze, a member of a group trying to bring street cars back to Cincinnati. "When you put down rails through a neighborhood you indicate you intend to stay there. A bus can be on one route today and leave the neighborhood behind tomorrow.. The difference is commitment.""
It costs $4.65 to leave the same BART station you entered. They call it 'excursion fare'. If anyone is daft enough to do that, he deserves to pay $4.65.
There was a woman running in a bra and pink shirts with many badges pinned on them. She was wearing gloves, listening to music and moaning as she ran. Uhh. California is such a weird place.
Just before dinner, the one who'd gotten lost in Chinatown reappeared and the other girls went to hug her. I passed a comment about how she wouldn't get any hugs if she were a guy, but one girl disagreed with me. Seeking to illustrate a related point by attempting to shatter another convention got me another scream. Boo hoo.
We had dinner at Jayakarta, a supposedly Halal Singaporean-Indonesian (just about the only Singaporean thing was roti prata, though) place so the Muslim girls could choose to eat meat. Unfortunately it was not really Halal since it served beer (tsk) so one ate a bit of chicken and the other stuck to fish. Maybe I should've ordered loempia since I haven't had it since last June or July. Oh well.
Over dinner, the plan to exploit and marginalise me continued. It was suggested that I be dressed up as Obelix. Gah.
Jayakarta had savory desserts. Wth.
Pranking Daniel with the 'cigarettes'. Their giggling gave the game away.
Free unsold books (thrown away, with the covers torn off; unfortunately sometimes some pages had been ripped off with the covers)
Quotes:
[When surrounded by Chinese people, signs and stuff] Are we in Chinatown?
Day 8 (13/5) - San Francisco
This was our first (and technically only) real free day, so 12 of us went to San Francisco, while 4 went to Oakland. This being a huge group, we didn't manage to do much, but it was still fun.
The BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) ticket is so cute. It's a stored value card which you can topup, and the value to add can be gradated in $1 and $0.05 increments.
'Cute at one. Not so cute at 21'
Some of the girls suggested that they redo this ad with me. Boo hoo.
Monument to workers (?) outside the BART station. San Francisco Financial District
Malaysian Mannikins :(
Montgomery Street, very steep stretch in the distance
Entering into Chinatown
The sheer amount of junk on sale was amazing. I paid $2.17 (with tax) for 6 stink bombs.
Phone booth with activist stickers. Note also the Orientalism inherent in the booth.
Chinatown
Where there're Chinese there're bootleg Sentai toys
Unfortunately we lost one of our number in Chinatown, so we were down to 11.
North border of Chinatown with Little Italy
Little Italy didn't look very Italian, except for the Italian cafes and restaurants. Perhaps in overcompensation, every lamppost had a painting of the Italian flag.
We went into a nice candy shop, which was the shit. With Screaming Flying Monkeys (see below), friendly staff and free samples, it's no wonder it was the #1 candy shop.
T-shirts
Taffy shopping with Chris. There was another group of taffey barrels opposite us.
There's a picture of me with my basket looking like an 'oompa-loompa'. Once I finish my travelogue (hopefully before going to Shanghai/Hong Kong) I will post it and thus contribute to my marginalisation.
New Wife Voodoo Doll
My new girlfriend. Someone asked if it grew big enough to be used as a sex doll. !@#$
Fat cats
B Movie Victims
Maybe the best item was the Screaming Flying Monkeys - you launch them using their rubberised arms, like a slingshot, and when they hit their target they scream. Unfortunately my attempts to get a video were unsuccessfully.
Vinod bought some sex cards with positions and methods. These girls are intrigued by it. Purely for academic purposes, of course.
Huishan is happy with Vinod's sex cards from the candy shop
Outside the candy shop
Washington Square
Cute car ad
Fisherman's Wharf
Retro car
Seagull
Cat man
Scoma's was way too expensive and we had to wait too, so we went to Tarantino's, also along the Wharf.
While waiting for our food to come, we saw this:
Scaring passers-by by hiding vegetation. This isn't a bad idea for busking.
The best Boston (hurr hurr) Clam Chowder I've ever had. Too bad there were no oyster crackers. The sourdough bread we got was nice but it didn't quite substitute for crackers.
Sauteed scallops and prawns in garlic, lemon butter and white wine sauce. The scallops were huge. Unfortunately this means they weren't seared enough - it didn't go all the way through. Other than that it was good. Most of the rest had Fish and Chips, which cost less than half of this. Hah.
Crabs
Fisherman's Wharf sign.
Other bits of my soles started coming out on this day as well as many other subsequent days of the trip. As the saying goes, when it rains, it pours. Luckily I had my glue already.
Seagull
Alcatraz from shore
We decided to go on a $21 cruise which would bring us past Alcatraz and under the Golden Gate Bridge. There were portable sound units providing narration in 8 (?) different languages. However, English language speakers were marginalised since the channel for English did not work, so we had to listen to the indistinct sound coming out from the loudspeakers.
Port from ship
The wind was painful to the eyes.
Windsurfing
Some of them had parachutes attached to their surfboards and in the air above them catching the wind. I wonder what that's called - parasurfing?
Rainbow in the spray from the boat
Alcatraz
Bay Bridge
Shore. The needle building is the San Francisco pyramid. It is the tallest building in the city, with a narrow top so it wouldn't cast a big shadow on the street. Uhh.
Seals
Fake cigarettes. These are chocolate sticks rolled in paper. Amusingly, it doesn't say 'chocolate' anywhere, since these are made in the Land of Pot, Hookers and Euthanasia which has that rule that anything with fat other than cocoa butter cannot be called 'chocolate' (meaning you can't find Malaysian chocolate anywhere); the second ingredient is 'hardened vegetable oil'.
Breakdancing. The Malay kids at Esplanade need to go for intensive remedial.
I didn't know it was possible to spin on your head with your legs perpendicular to your body so many times.
Unfortunately the breakdancing was evidence of a systematic and racist framework of exclusion - only blacks and Cambodians (not even Asians in general) were taking part, and the latter had to shave their heads and pierce their ears, thus losing their Asian-ness, before they were allowed to take part.
Some passer-by was trying to get the performance artists to laugh/move. She succeeded.
There's Menopause the Musical. Hah.
Sea lions
Bubba Gump, at Fisherman's Wharf
EZ-Link in a tram
We went up the tram to go back to the BART and no one paid. When in Rome, do as the Romans do (I doubt all of them had a valid transfer ticket). So only Vinod paid. The tram was from Milan and so had Italian signs (there's another from Birmingham - with so many trams from around the world, it must've been a bitch to fix them all to run on the same tracks and power lines).
Incidentally, the most retarded argument I've heard for inflexible tram services: ""The street car solution is like a marriage," says Dr. Dave Fritze, a member of a group trying to bring street cars back to Cincinnati. "When you put down rails through a neighborhood you indicate you intend to stay there. A bus can be on one route today and leave the neighborhood behind tomorrow.. The difference is commitment.""
It costs $4.65 to leave the same BART station you entered. They call it 'excursion fare'. If anyone is daft enough to do that, he deserves to pay $4.65.
There was a woman running in a bra and pink shirts with many badges pinned on them. She was wearing gloves, listening to music and moaning as she ran. Uhh. California is such a weird place.
Just before dinner, the one who'd gotten lost in Chinatown reappeared and the other girls went to hug her. I passed a comment about how she wouldn't get any hugs if she were a guy, but one girl disagreed with me. Seeking to illustrate a related point by attempting to shatter another convention got me another scream. Boo hoo.
We had dinner at Jayakarta, a supposedly Halal Singaporean-Indonesian (just about the only Singaporean thing was roti prata, though) place so the Muslim girls could choose to eat meat. Unfortunately it was not really Halal since it served beer (tsk) so one ate a bit of chicken and the other stuck to fish. Maybe I should've ordered loempia since I haven't had it since last June or July. Oh well.
Over dinner, the plan to exploit and marginalise me continued. It was suggested that I be dressed up as Obelix. Gah.
Jayakarta had savory desserts. Wth.
Pranking Daniel with the 'cigarettes'. Their giggling gave the game away.
Free unsold books (thrown away, with the covers torn off; unfortunately sometimes some pages had been ripped off with the covers)
Quotes:
[When surrounded by Chinese people, signs and stuff] Are we in Chinatown?
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