comeback

the comeback is sweet but the payback is a slap in the butt. i have been weaving in and out of work like a snake and finally i get my days off. there is no point in slogging so much, for the money ain’t good. so now that its back to the normal life, i’ve gotta start on the project. for it is due real soon.

lets talk about this thing laziness that inevitably leads to the word procrastination. time is all in our hands. its a currency that we are entitled to have and to spend. how we spend it is wholly up to the spender. lets put an example into context. you have a important project to do, you are given at least a month or more to complete it, when do you exactly start doing it? 2 weeks before the project is due. that is what it is. yes, the formula does not work out. but that is the formula. what about the amount of time spent in between? oh those times are spent on inconsequential events that you thought were consequential when you were doing it. then you fret and grumble at the loss of time.

but i have also learnt that the last minute rushing to complete the project can produce best works. not too shoddy but pleasing. after all that rushing staying late nights downing coffees (not for me though) and puffing ciggs, you deliver the best work of your life. its in all human nature to procrastinate. i write this, and self proclaim myself, a “big time procrastinator”. i’d rather spend time reading then working. though i have subconsciously been “doing” my work. by this i mean doing haphazard research work.

come on now, are you a procrastinator?

for now, the dinner beckons. i needa get my hands on that hollywood issue of vanity fair.

aftermath

to start with the third person.

this writer has nothing to say.

watch this space.

cooped up with work

quirk.

full stop.

family fanfares and once again departures

the occasional weekend, or rather in specific this weekend, i have been attending to alot of family affairs. so, your typical asian family dining with your parent’s close friends would be, sitting at a round table, feasting on chinese delicacies and comparing their children to their own. oh this happens very unknowingly amongst parents.

truth be told i am not a big fan of such family fanfare but at the same time do not have a choice whether or not i must attend. this is so due to the age limit the asian culture has set upon us. is it so wrong for someone of 20years to have a mind of their own? oh it is wrong in the eyes of my ever fluctuating parents. they see it as rebellion and not independence. they would lead you to this confusing maze where they bring you in circles. you give them two cents they want a dollar. i shan’t continue this ranting of an unhappy child.

moving on, the essence of departure is alluring and all the more exciting. the sister has departed to lands farway in pursuit of that filmsy piece of paper that grants her endless wealth. i daresay, i am not a self confessed lover of departures. yea right. i greet departures as opportunities this country has not to offer. i greet departures with the instability that you might die on whatever mode of transport you might be taking. departure is a risk in its own right. but people do it everyday, every minute. this is faith in the system bestowed upon the entire world from a very long time.

what is your take on departure?

ponderings

i am not really a big fan of local publications sans 8days and stuff but i was reading an article on brokeback mountain featured in the latest 8days. and what struck me was ang lee’s profound take while he was directing brokeback mountain. if i remembered the article correctly he said one of the main emotions he wanted to touch on while doing brokeback was sadness. he strongly felt that sadness was an emotion that lasted longer than any other emotion. i remember him saying that sadness was a very provocative emotion. and what he wanted out of brokeback was that it would strike you so hard that the sadness would last a few days. and that he did accomplish. movie-goers were so struck by the movie that they left movie theatres in a reverently stoic mood.

and this mood has certainly struck me too. i still cannot get brokeback out of my head. and its not because of the all famous love scene between two of hollywoods young rising stars but the whole story on the whole, and how it unfolds. yes the visuals of the film were amazingly stunning but it was more so how the actors approached their roles. and this i have to give credit mainly to ang lee’s directions and how heath ledger, jake gyllenhaal, michelle williams and anne hathaway intepreted his direction. i thought the true star of the show however was michelle williams. i think i had already mention this on my previous post but i cannot stop raving about her. her take on the tormented wife of heath ledger is one that is of great cinematic achievements. its one role that is not pretty to act out. and her emotions were right in place and the way she executed her acting skills, were how the french say it “le magnifique!”.

okay maybe i am biased enough to hope that brokeback wins big at this year’s oscars but i have yet to see great films such as transamerica and breakfast on pluto. all deals with transgender issues and is played by felicity huffman of desperate housewives and cilian murphy of red eye fame respectly. for now i am still allowed to reel in the fact that an asian can produce such a incredible take on this short story. brokenback mountain has what the hours done to me a couple of years back. it has moved me so much i am swayed. i will decide again once i have watched transamerica and breakfast on pluto.

out.

going west cos life is emo there.

this post should go without the visuals. this post should be at its bare minimum. sometimes visuals are distraction that sometimes defeat the purpose of blogging. blogging used be just word periodicals for people to state their views. now this whole blogging thing is just over saturated and i have become part of this saturation.

two movies, both long overdue, but have finally come to the “pristine” shores of singapore. both in paticular are brokeback mountain and walk the line. the latter i watched in the comforts of a chair and huge screen whilst the former i watched it through the obtaining of, you know what. it can’t be helped.

both deal with the whole western cowboy culture and is set in a very straight laced era. this straight laced era i am afraid is one that is very american and has poured into today’s asian culture too. let’s zoom in on this “straight-lacedness”: marriage. in that era, the 1930s-1980s, people had only one thing in mind, get married, get kids and obtain funky 80’s-esque gadgets to fill their suburban homes and groom their kids to obtain what they have obtained. in light of walk the line, johnny cash had all that but not with the woman he truly wanted to be with. this was also evident in brokeback mountain. both had almost perfect families but not with the partners they truly wanted to be with. this whole entanglement has given rise to what we view marriage in today’s context. it is no longer just having one partner anymore. its not about getting married once they feel they are meant for each other. marriage these days are half-hearted affairs that would eventually give rise to infidelity. be it with another sex or the same sex.

i remember while watching walk the line, there was this scene where this old-ish woman just spoke into the face of june carter cash (played by reese whitherspoon). she said something about divorce being an admonishment while marriage was a life. i just sat on my sit and gaped. she said it to june carter cash because, before she ended up with johnny cash she was previously divorced. while this could be seen in the time frame in america, it can still can be seen in today’s time frame but not in america but in asian countries. every parent thinks their child would get married one day and have kids. when their kid don’t, it is cause for worry. okay enought about my silly point of views.

let’s talk about performance and nominations. walk the line was surprisingly mediocre. all the hype surrounding its performances just came down to quite shockingly nothing. joaquin phoenix was intensely like johnny cash while reese whitherspoon was just pretty being june carter cash which brings me to question her oscar nom. brokeback on the other had stellar preformances. in paticular michelle williams. i could almost feel her agony playing heath ledger’s suspecting wife. as for heath ledger he really did a good job. heath ledger has always struck me as those jock kinda guy. but with this, he has transformed himself to this uber sensitive and quiet man with a profound history. jake also produced a great performance. so those three oscar noms were justified. which leads me to wanna watch transamerica.

enought of my ramblings.

boo hoo hoo

departure brings to the mind a sense of excitement, to the person not experiencing it. i am speaking in terms of long term absence. that is what it is. that person going away would fear what is ahead. that is why departure excites me so much. i don’t want to live here anymore.

that is one of the reasons why i love working at the airport. yes the pay is low and the people aren’t exactly the intellectual kind. but what gives? there is just that sense of departure everywhere. people going off to places for various reasons. not knowing what might just happen to them. and then there is the planes. how life can still go on in a long tube of materials and cables called the fuselage. how hundreds off people are squeezed into one long fuselage and go to the places they need to go. its just amazing.

okay confusion is not a good thing to deal with. the best solution is decision.

the imposter sage has just spoken.

oddities and commodities

if ever there is a way of defining boredom, it would be to me, a task where one sits all day and fuss and cracks one head over what to do. afterwhich that person does not come up with anything and just scratches the head.

for once i am not plagued by my normal sunday headache that clouds my judgement and dampens my sunday. but i mourn over the fact that there would not be joan of arcadia on sundays anymore. the season ended and has been replaced by the insipid JAG. who watches JAG anyways? so once again we (the people who enjoys good tv) has to suffer the intolerable wait before joan comes back. there is a reason why people resort to online peddling of foreign shows on the internet. cable tv is not working and so is local tv. what are we supposed to watch?

paper doll comes on. elation is the feeling i register when good music comes on. and i am thankful that i have good music. i am also very grateful for the invention that is called the mp3 player. it has made music so much more portable.

to hide is a thing natural to human reactions. sometimes it so embedded in you that you do it even towards the ones close to your heart. to hide usually is a procession of fear. you hide cos you fear. what it is that you fear becomes such a virus in your body that in affects the life that you lead. actors put everything on tv or the movies. kudos to them.

this post is in tatters. one moment this one moment that. its just a big cluttered mess.

i hate cutting into shows at the middle.

my mood currently is a dark kinda low growl, kinda like the voice of rachael yamagata.

picture from the road

who would have thought, the land that is called malaysia could produce such scenic wonders. i am in awe myself. so i spent what they have called the chinese new year abroad in the land that is truly asia. and all i have to pay for it upon returning is an upset tummy, recovering sore throat, running nose and an ach-y body. damn those chinese new year snacks. what’s worst is that i forgot to bring back my charger for the cellphone. so i am disconnected for a few days. the daily struggle it will bring. humans and technology.

the trip was kinda good. a sweet reprieve from life back in singapore. but the crowd was a killer. people all over, clamouring for stuff that i do not know of. maybe its just the chinese new year. long drives on the highway has been a pleasure. but all i can say is that i am glad i am back.

more updates soon. take this as a prequel.