"There's a difference between a philosophy and a bumper sticker." - Charles M. Schulz

Or, indeed, pithy quotes, one might add

Random Playlist Song: Bach - Magnificat BWV 243 - Quia respexit humilitatem

Quia respexit humilitatem ancillae suae; ecce enim ex hoc beatam me dicent.

***

D&D Play By Email (PBEM) is starting again. Yay!

I'm probably going to be a Human Ranger. I wanted to be a hermaphrodite, but the evil DM refused my request :(


I've finally found one more thing I like about M$N Instant Messenger!

There's no such thing as a 'visible list', so people can't spend all their time online hiding from most of their contact list, negating the benefits and point of instant messaging and gaining a false sense of security and control over their otherwise wretched and pathetic lives (M$N has 'block user', but the point is, if you don't want people to see you, just put them on ignore. It's really silly to hide in invisible mode all the time)

So now my MSN IM hate page has 4 entries in the "things I like about MSN IM" list.


Zhiming finally cut his hair because it was starting to curl, so I have no more companions in spirit in pursuit of a shared dream. He says that he wants to grow it out again - good luck to him.

On the upside, I saw an advertisement for a hair salon in Cineleisure which charges $150 for hair extensions (with a 30% discount for student pass holders). So in the unlikely event that I am called back by the slavemasters, I know where to go to save a year of hard work.


Ever since A&W Restaurants pulled out of Singapore, it has been impossible to find curly fries here, even in the freezers of supermarkets (I more than welcome corrections). Recently, McDonalds has come up with "Twister" fries that look like curly fries. I sampled them and found them sadly lacking.

Twister fries are not fluffy enough. They retain too much body, so there is too much resistance when you bite them. The seasoning, besides not being spicy enough (NB: Spiciness is distinct from hot-ness, or how much chili you add), does not permeate through to the centre of the twister fries. These problems are probably due to the fries being too thickly cut, and the spirals of the fries being too cramped together.

In the final analysis, this is still the best (only) type of curly fries we have , so.

At least the cups they give plain water in are a decent size now. Previously they were wimpily small.


The posh looking building of the "grassroots club" in Yio Chu Kang belies its putative status as a grassroots club

***

Short notes because I can't be bothered to transcribe them into paragraph form:

- RI boys on orientation still smell
- More and more teachers have left, especially since the last pure GEP batch graduated last year. Now just about the only ones who taught me who remain are Mr Ong, Mrs Low, Ms Kuang, Mdm Wei Ling, Mrs Tamilselvan
- Apparently half of RI's GEP is now made up of PRCs. So in more ways than one, I was part of something that will never be again
- Staff Room 1 is now so full that the pigeon holes are now outside, and students also have to call their teachers from outside. Bleah.

- The new RJ is too clean, too empty and too lacking in character
- They migrated over the worst chicken rice in Singapore. Bad move, really bad move
- The Ice Lemon Tea is now in a Nestea dispenser, but is still made to the same recipe. But it is now 40 cents. Ah well, inflation.
- Screwed Up Girl and Christie were idiots and went back in uniform. And they got caught by Ng E Ching
- There'll be exercise and free leg toning aplenty for students (though I didn't see the lifts, I doubt a whole class could fit inside one. That's what you get for squeezing so much into a small plot of land)
- Now the staffroom is like a prison. You can't even call the teachers directly like in RI; the receptionist has to do it for you. So if you don't know who to ask for, it's impossible to look teachers up; even if you do, you won't know if they're around, so it's harder to look for people. At least in RI you could peek in and see if the teacher was around
- Mrs Lee transferred to ACJC since she lives nearby. At least I'm better off than Gilbert, who only has one teacher who still teaches there

- If you want to take photos in Northpoint Shopping Centre you need permission from the management. !@#$%^&*()


The chairman of Hissoc this year is from S03J. Hahahhahaha.

"it'd be great if you or any of the previous batches wld wanna help or advise lah" [with RMUN]

Hahahhahaha.

Help or advise?

Hahahhahaha.

Okay, that's enough laughter for a blog post section.

***

Enrol more full-fee foreign students, varsities told

Since someone has already done the analysis for me, I shall just paste it here verbatim:

"outrage outrage '1 in 5 undergrad here is a subsidised FOREIGN TALENT'
firstly, 20%? that figure is just the number who pay 10% more than locals. how about those fully subsidised one??
i dont think 20% includes them.. there are already so many malaysians indians viets do u think they make up only 20% of it? science a lot, practically the whole of computing is FT. 20% seems too little considering indonesians, malaysians, prc, viet, indians and the odd philipino etc
in any case arh, even if 20% its a hell lot lor.
[Ed: I'm not sure that the '1 in 5' figure doesn't include those who are fully subsidised. But, yes, 20% is still a lot.]

Secondly, foreign talent? So that makes locals that get in local talents?

thirdly, that figure does not include FULLY subsidised ft.

Fourthly, subsidised ones only pay 10% more? And also gov urge uni to take in more full paying foreigners-- my ass. More like subsidised.

Also, news from jc principal, they are gonna cut down local places to give to ft, so its gonna be very competitive. and the principal was telling his students the min to even step in would probably be bbb. Ridiculous. Make it harder for locals to get degree to give ft?!

and note how st kisses foreigners ass by calling them foreign talent. Bleah"

Besides the issue of scholarships for foreign talent, one must consider that:

- Many (most?) PRC/foreign scholars are older than the Singaporeans they study with. Just as it would not be fair to compare Primary 1 and Primary 3 students, it is not fair to put 19 year old Singaporeans and 21 year old PRCs in the same course, especially for maths/science courses where language is less of a barrier, and the standard of maths in the PRC is very high
- It seems some PRC scholars have graduated from universities whose degrees are not recognised in Singapore. So they actually know everything and can waltz through their classes when they come to Singapore

Level playing field? What level playing field?

I recall that in Malaysia, due to the bumi putra policy, many deserving non-Malay students cannot get into universities, so some of them are sent overseas on government money. Maybe we need something like that over here :)

***

Guess the movie character:

This curly-haired character spends 90% of the movie staring into space with a blank-eyed, vacuous gaze. The character looks constipated, preoccupied and troubled all the time.

Elijah Wood as Frodo or Emmy Rossum as Christine?

***

I was looking for a quote from Confucius that has been framed up on posters in MRT stations in the past, about memory and understanding. The closest I found was this: "Learning without thought is labor lost; thought without learning is perilous."

I'm quite sure the version slathered on MRT station walls here was something more like: "Memorisation without understanding is a waste of time; Understanding without memorisation leads to disaster". A dubious translation to imbue a questionable Asian Value in the populace, perhaps?


AcidFlask on the "we are a young society so we cannot implement modern democracy" fallacy:

"The 'age of society' reasoning seems fallacious to me. First, a society need not become more open with time. Just look at Greece, at how it has been credited with the birth of democracy, and how it degenerated into fascism in the early twentieth century.

Second, nobody's going to give Singapore the benefit of the doubt just because it's only 39 years old. I cannot recall a single episode in my (admittedly limited) knowledge of world history in which some political or economic benefit resulted directly from being younger or older than other states. Our leaders have eschewed ideology for pragmatism because they feel that in this time and age, all that matters is economic competitiveness, which requires stability. And just because Singapore is a young nation doesn't mean anything if it allows itself to calcify quickly, as it seems to be doing."

***

The hoo-hah people have raised about piffling Tsunami donations is grating. Some people seem to miss the point that making donations obligatory kind of misses the point. Companies and nations trumpet how much they are donating, in contrast to the Japanese (Japan offers major aid in low-key fashion - "Just because you do not see tsunami news and big donations splashed all over the Japanese media, it does not mean that the Japanese do not care.") Is it really so laudable if entities donate a large sum just for Public Relations purposes?

I am reminded of this most appropriate paragraph from Christian Mythology:

"And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward." (Matthew 6:5)

Of course, this contradicts 1 Timothy 2:8:

"I will therefore that men pray every where, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting."

But I digress. (Sorry)

***

I was actually going to take a break from posting stuff about religion, but my LJ comments thread looks set to be filled with another debate, so.

""Logocide," refers the killing of words, or rather, the meanings of words. As the Red Queen stated in Alice in Wonderland, words were to mean what she chose them to mean. Christian logocide concentrates on words like life, death, truth, wisdom, and, of course, love, none of which carry the accepted, consensual meaning as they issue out of the mouths of god-talkers. Life and deathmean life in Christ or death to Christ, and are simply terms denoting belief or unbelief in the risen Lord. Wisdom has nothing to do with human wisdom but rather refers to the level of commitment to the Christian system of beliefs. With the word love being used so freely in god-talking commercials, it is no wonder that confused, frightened, and friendless people would be attracted to an institution promising love; as they understand or imagine love, it is something they have been deprived of and yearned for all their lives. However, it soon becomes apparent that the human love they seek is not the love of the god-talker; those worthies use the
word "love" to refer to an unquestioning obedience to God in return for the promise of everlasting life. In addition to this, the kind of human love originally sought by the initiate, is gradually undermined as being inferior, untrustworthy, not to mention unsatisfying when compared to the love of God." (The Mind of the Bible-Believer)

***

Legal threats against The Pirate Bay

Reply to Dreamworks:

"As you may or may not be aware, Sweden is not a state in the United States of America. Sweden is a country in northern Europe. Unless you figured it out by now, US law does not apply here. For your information, no Swedish law is being violated.

Please be assured that any further contact with us, regardless of medium, will result in

a) a suit being filed for harassment
b) a formal complaint lodged with the bar of your legal counsel, for sending frivolous legal threats."

***

Sleep loss may equal weight gain - "Scientists have found that sleep deprivation increases levels of a hunger hormone and decreases levels of a hormone that makes you feel full. The effects may lead to overeating and weight gain."

E-Shrooms - Electronic 80s-esque music and rapidly flashing EGA colours. Designed to give you a headache, I'd think. Or induce Pokemon-style fits.

One breast for baby and one for pup, says mom - "A New Zealand mother has begun breastfeeding her staffordshire terrier pup, saying she did not want to waste the milk after her own daughter switched to being bottle fed."

justdumped.com - Neuroses to a T(ee) - "Liz Vassey and Kristin Bauer, two comely Hollywood actresses, have teamed up to provide you with a fashion outlet for your deepest neuroses. T-shirts that stick to your chests and speak to your screwed up little minds. And where better to air your dirty little shorts than on your breasts?"