I had never seen grammar and tenses, thus language in such a way - a way to empathize others and get empathized. Not until I watched this video and the series that follow. And I have to add that, sometimes talking just isn't enough to communicate with somebody about something which is way too complex to be explained and understood. I did finish the crashcourse literature series, and I did read two of four books discussed in the series. And the reward is overwhelming, so overwhelming that I really want to share the series to more people.
To convey my thoughts and so that is exactly what I have been doing - writing. And that's basically one of the reasons of the existence of this blog. I write and write. Some are posted here and some aren't, simply because not everything is meant to have audiences. And then I start to realize as I read back my writing, I am empathizing with myself in a way. Reading and writing are totally different experience. When I write, I have to be personally involved. But when reading, I feel myself as an outsider, read my own writing as if looking back at myself from another person's point of view. And I stand as this outsider empathizing with myself. It does sound like I have a split personality, but aren't all the authors too have split personality, even personalities.
There is a scene in the recent Great Gatsby movie, where the Nick's doctor asks him to write his thoughts down if he has difficulty saying them out. At the end, the doctor adds, those thoughts written down don't have to be read, probably don't mean to be read, and tells Nick that he can burn them afterwards if he wants to. And that idea of writing down those thoughts that trouble you and burning them, please me. It seems to me fire always has a mystical spiritual effect on human. I have never tried that idea before. May be I should.
I just realized, I have so much to talk about The Great Gatsby. Some argue that the recent film adaptation is sort of porn for all the Gatsby's fans. Yes I have to admit that the movie can be over-hyped in some way. Personally, I think the movie isn't that good. It is good but I just feel it lacks of something. Watching the movie after reading the book, now I can finally understand why readers always say, book is better than the movie, especially it is a book you love.
So over-anticipation is really a thing. Whenever the characters say the famous lines, such as Daisy's "I hope she'll be a fool..." and Gatsby's "Can't repeat the past, why of course you can!" etc., it's just doesn't feel right. It is just like the characters are quoting a book and not truly come from themselves. I mean I really don't mind spoilers or whatever, but it just doesn't feel right.
I guess those famous lines are so powerful that they feel alive to me, and nobody can say them as if they own them anymore. They should nowhere be found but to exist solely in the book. Throughout the movie, I had this excitement, expecting when the next famous line would come, and when the moment hit, it just bummed me out. So, my feeling about the movie kept fluctuating, up and down. And I was a bit frustrated.
Anyway, one undeniable positive side of the movie is its soundtrack. It is just perfect for the story. Recently I keep playing and replaying the soundtrack, again and again. I mean there are Lana, Gotye, The XX, Beyoncé, Fergie and Florence, plus Kanye West's No Church In The Wild! All the songs are very powerful, and I love them all. For the first time, I have to say, thank you, Jay Z and the Bullitts, and also the director Baz Luhrmann, for creating such a good film score in a whole.
All the songs are good. But if to pick only one song among all, I would pick Florence + The Machine's Over The Love. And I just found out a mind-blowing fact recently. The song is based on an unsignificant paragraph in the book,
"One of the girls in yellow was playing the piano, and beside her stood a tall, red haired young lady from a famous chorus, engaged in song. She had drunk a quantity of champagne, and during the course of her song she had decided, ineptly, that everything was very, very sad - she was not only singing, she was weeping too. Whenever there was a pause in the song she filled it with gasping, broken sobs, and then took up the lyrics again in a quivering soprano..."
Mind-blown indeed.
There is also the song titled Together by The XX. The XX is an English band I discovered recently, and immediately fell in love to. They actually have a song named The Intro which is featured in the movie Project X. Their songs are often too short, I would say, which make you unsatisfied and you want more, so you click the replay button again and again. I am not sure whether the shortness is intentional, but one doesn't simply listen to their songs without replaying.
So in the end, my opinion about the movie is : for those who had read the book, don't go for the movie, just re-read the book again while listening to the soundtrack of the movie; for those who haven't, the movie is not bad at all. But I guess I am in no position to talk about the movie from the point of view of someone who haven't read the book, for I am officially a Gatsby's fan. A fan of the book, not the movie.
After watching the movie and re-reading the book, I said I hated Gatsby, and now I hate and envy him at the same time. Nick said that he had an extraordinary gift for hope, but it is not so extraordinary for me. Hope is meant to be untouchable, and always far away from our reach like the green light opposite the bay. That's why Gatsby could keep his hope for Daisy alive for so long, because his hope is still far away. And when he finally met Daisy again after five years, his wish finally came true, and "his count of enchanted objects had diminished by one", to quote Nick.
He must be feeling so lost when he met his enchanted moment, all the anticipation has reduced down a grounded reality. We all can feel his lost because fantasy is always better than the reality. As a human, we don't seem to know when to be satisfied, just as Gatsby. So once Gatsby got back together with Daisy in an under-radar way, Gatsby became greedy and wanted more. He became so pushy to Daisy and wanted her to tell Tom that she had never loved him. But I guess I would say, who wouldn't do like Gatsby. Just that Gatsby was a fool to really believe that Daisy never loved Tom at all, not even a slight moment. He didn't know that his move had pushed Daisy further away from himself.
Back to my starting point. I envy Gatsby, in the sense that he never have to witness his hope shattered into pieces, to realize that his believe about Daisy never loved Tom and she would get back together with him forever was not true and wouldn't become true either. At his final moment, he still believed that Daisy would call. He was too blinded to see the truth, and beyond saving. I agree with Nick, about death is not a sad ending at all, at least not for Gatsby, as Nick said,
"Gatsby turned out all right at the end; it is what preyed on Gatsby, what foul dust floated in the wake of his dreams that temporarily closed out my interest in the sorrows and short winded elations of men."
So I guess there is only one end for chasing a dying hope - death. And death is the only way can Gatsby keep his hope alive.
Just watched Warm Bodies. It is a solid movie, that's what I would say. It basically has every essential part of a typical storyline. there is an intro, build-up, a climax and a happy ending. On the plus side, there is humour too. But throughout the movie, I just can't shake off the tendency to compare it with twilight, especially the lead actress looks so much like Bella.
After some recherche, the lead actress is Teresa Palmer. She is like the younger sister of Kristen Stewart, a more joyful, prettier version of Kristen Stewart. The funny thing is that Teresa is actually older than Kristen. I am just glad that Teresa instead of Kristen got the role in this "better than Twilight" movie. And yes, if the world is divided into either hating or loving the movie Twilight, I would certainly be on the hating side. Not like the six packs or sparkling body challenges my masculinity thus makes me dislike the movie, it is just because of the shitty storyline. It is so unfair to many other good writers, that Stephenie Meyer gets so much fame because of such a low quality romance storyline. Personally I haven't read the books, so I have no idea how her style of writing and how good she did in the book. But the movies are just bad, bad enough to kill my desire to hit the books. Especially after the recent movie, The Host, it completely shuts down all my hope for her books, and I automatically assume her books are just as bad as the movies.
Another good side of the movie is that it evokes the question of how to define a human in my mind. I don't know whether it is intentional in movie or not. It just reminds me of a class discussion about that through another movie, I Robot. The class discussion just brought me a perspective to the movie and also introduced me to Isaac Asimov. Throughout the human history, we have been enlarging the definition of human being, like fighting against slavery, that slaves should be considered as human too and deserves basic human rights, that slave is not a commodity. I am glad to live in this moment of history, when the majority has the idea of that everybody is equal regardless races and skin colour. But majority means there is some form of slavery still exist somewhere in our world.
As technology is getting more and more advanced, the robots we create also getting more and more sophisticated, how if one day robots are so human like, and able to simulate human feelings and all other stuffs that previously we thought only humans are able to do? Should robots be considered human too? If human is created by God, we create these robots and consider them to human too, does that mean we are God too? What if we humans are just some lab experiments, created not by God but by some aliens with more advanced technology than us, like what the movie Prometheus suggested? All these questions are indeed very deep and philosophical. In this movie, Warm Bodies, it actually gave us a few criteria of human though, like heartbeat and ability to feel pain and dream.
The movie also gave people a very optimistic view about the ability of human beings to accept changes and differences. In the movie, it seems like all the good zombies are accepted into human society in literally overnight. The reality is, in our real world, we humans don't like changes because changes are sometimes very scary. From historical point of view, this kind of changes with such a huge amplitude, like the change of mindset, often come with violence. Just take the example of slavery and discrimination, it takes ages and countless bloodshed to change people's mindset. Sadly even until now, discrimination and slavery is still going on somewhere in our world.
If there is one thing I would like to do in US, it won't be visiting the Empire State building, it won't be Hollywood either, it would be driving through the entire Route 66, from the Windy City to the Pacific coast.
I always want to do an epic long road trip. Not necessarily Route 66, but why not a longer road trip like from Atlantic coast to Pacific coast. I always want get the feeling of just jump onto a car and drive and drive, as long as the fuel isn't running low. While the scenery both sides of you doesn't change much, you keep driving on the straight, seemingly endless road. While everything starts to seem indifferent to you, you slowly notice your own life becoming somehow purposeless and absurd. Just drive and drive. Have to admit that, I kinda like that feeling very much.
I did manage to gasp a little bit of that feeling once before. It was when I was sitting at the back of a car, while my Tunisian friend, Issam driving on the barren land not far from Tozeur. That time I had no idea where I was heading, and not even sure whether I was kidnapped or what because I hitchhiked into Issam's car. The car window was opened and by the rolling wheels, the dust was stirred together with the air I breathed. The hazy dust wasn't the choking kind, it was just enough to make you feel like a road warrior, like Mel Gibson. You might wanna wash your face afterwards though because of the dust. Well, despite the insecurity I had with me in this total alien landscape, I strangely felt serenity at that moment.
This following video matches my feeling about road trip perfectly. With the right music, and the drive goes on...
Damn! This is a really good book! I feeling like swearing a little bit just to express my love to this book. This could probably be the best book I have ever read! Thank you, J. D. Salinger, for writing such a good book. And why I had never heard this great book before? This is unbelievable!
I am not going to do phony review about the book here. I just wanna express my feeling about this book. I had never so emotionally involved in a novel before. I could see myself, when I look at Holden. It is true that nothing really happened in the story, but I can feel Holden as if he is a real person talking in front of me. I was at the verge of crying like a baby, twice! TWICE! Once was when he broke the record disc he bought for his little sister, Phoebe, in the middle of New York Central Park, and the second time when Phoebe putting the red hunting cap on Holden's head at the very end of the story.
After finishing the book, I can see it is a dividing novel. For people who finish the novel, either they hate it or they love it, either they see Holden as a whining bitch or an interesting person, or even a hero. And those who have an average feeling about the book surely drop the book half way through. For those who can't connect with the book, congratulation to you, because you have been living a happy life and this book is not meant for you. For me, I feel like I wanna be Holden's friend, go out to a random bar together, order some drinks and talk nonsense.
I feel like this book is becoming my "Bible", in a way. Just like a priest carrying a copy of Bible to wherever he goes, I carry a copy of "The Catcher In The Rye" with me, to wherever I go nowadays. As the red hunting cap to Holden, this book is my "red hunting cap". And just like a faithful Christian (or Muslim, or whatever religion it is), I feel like quoting the book everyday, to people I know, to people I don't know, yet. This is a book I wanna carry around and show people, as if saying : " Hell yeah! I read this amazing book! If you haven't read it, you should!" No religious intention or what so ever though, just that I couldn't find a better way to express how much I love the novel.
And to Holden, you shouldn't be feeling alone anymore, because many people are listening to your story now, and I don't feel so lonely anymore because I met you. Just wanna say, I know that feel bro!
Yesterday, I had my first uphill climb on bicycle in my life. The original plan was to do a to and fro trip from Grenoble, Flandrin Valmy tram stop to Uriage les Bains, passing by Venon and Gière, which would be around 40km in total. But the uphill climb in between Venon and Uriage les Bains was way too difficult than I imagine. I managed only to do a 3km uphill climb, which is only the very beginning of the climb. 3km might seems short, but the road seemed forever endless for me. I cycle everyday at least 10km (on flat land). Even that I had to give up the climb.
May be I am too ambitious, to pick a hard climb on my first try. My bike is good enough for the climb but I am not. Now I really respect those professional cyclists. After the biking session, I watched some clips about some famous climb in Tour de France. And I landed on this video, a climb of Lance Armstrong,
After some recherche, I found out that Mt. Ventoux climb is categorized as "hors catégorie" climb. In fact, it is a system to categorized mountains. There are category 1 (hardest) to 4 (easiest). And "hors catégorie" means beyond category, is the hardest of all, even harder than category 1. And Mt. Ventoux is one of the kind.
I watched Tour de France a few times before. But it never got me interested. To watch the competition more than 5 mins is rare. Now I realized how difficult to be a pro cyclist. It is indeed a really tough sport. Don't even mention Tour de France, which is most probably the hardest among all cycling competitions.
How much I accentuate how hard a bike climb is, I must say that the descent is a pure adrenaline rush. With full equipment and a good bike, one can reach very high speed during a bike descent. The video below shows exactly how fast can it be during a normal Tour de France descent,
The descent I did was fun, but also very dangerous. I don't think I reached a speed faster than 50km/h but for a beginner like me, it was very scary. You panic, but you must suppress the fear, because you know one slight mistake and you could be off the cliff. The road condition also my main concern. Luckily the road was well paved and there was very few cars on that day.
What an occasion to have Liang Wen Dao (梁文道) coming to Penang to give a talk about the current political situation in Malaysia. However the discussion was in Mandarin. I feel obliged to make a little more effort, rather than a simple share on Facebook, to spread the ideas and thoughts discussed in this session. So here I am doing my best to summarize the talk in English, in the hope of other Malaysians, who don't know Mandarin, can also know a little something about the talk.
Background
He was born in Hong Kong, and was raised in Taiwan though. So, he get to witness the whole process of change of government in Taiwan, from Guo Min Dang to Min Jing Dang, around 90's. He is now living in Hong Kong, writing lots of articles about many things, including politics, and makes appearances in a few talk shows in Feng Huang TV channel. I firstly knew him from the show discussing about books on this same TV channel, in which he is the host.
His own initiative
First of all, the talk isn't sided to any side, even it seems to be sided to PR. The talk is more about democracy, and its development and tendency. From the video, there was a member of PKR, named Lee Kai Lun (李凯伦). In fact Liang came to Malaysia to support his friend, Lee Kai Lun, and certainly not because Lee invited him. He did mention that, he also feels a little inappropriate to talk about Malaysian Politics, as an outsider. But he also said, he cares about the current situation, as he has many Malaysian friends.
Changing atmosphere
He visited Malaysia many times, but this time he felt very different indeed. During his stay in Penang, he saw many people so enthusiastic about the election and all. It reminded him of the time in Taiwan, when Guo Min Dang was just about to fall. He also said, he heard about same stories, same atmosphere, from his Korean friends, when Korea was undergoing the change of government.
Examples from Taiwan and Korea
He himself also admitted, changes will certainly cause some degree of troubles, such as commotion, confusion, bribery, etc. But without changes, these problems are gonna surface, sooner or later. Both Taiwan and Korea have gone through hard times, when their political structure was drastically changed. Changes may be hard, and sometimes blood will shed in the worst case scenario. But this time, Malaysia can be different from all the other countries that had gone through the similar changes. By learning from the history, changes can be done faster, but certainly not instantly.
Shouldn't be too optimistic
People shouldn't be too optimistic about PKR. Change won't be perfect, and takes time. Just like bribing a cop instead of getting a summon. People in Malaysia are still very used to bribe the cop. It is a habit, and hard to get rid of. But the point is not getting rid of the habit right away, but to realize that it is a bad habit. And PR isn't perfect either. There are PAS, DAP, PKR, ex-BN members, ex-NGO etc. in PR. There are so many different voices within, and different views about their own ideal government. To work in harmony, there is still so much to do.
People's worries
There are still many people worry about what will happen after the election. Violence? Will the army give respect to the new government, if PR is the new government? As the majority of the audiences are Chinese, a concern about Chinese becoming minority and having less and less influence was also raised. Liang's answer is we shouldn't worry about it. Liang is particularly furious about Malaysia current government using the fear of other ethnics taking over the country, against each other, such as talking shit about Malays in front of Chinese, and talking shit of Chinese in front of Malays, etc.., building unnecessary sense of threat among Malaysians. It is just not right.
The fear of becoming an Islamic country
Apart of the fear of other ethnics, there is also a fear of Malaysia becoming an Islamic country among Chinese. I think Liang's answer on this issue is brilliant. He said, the fear is non sense. What do we mean by Islamic country? Turkey's model of Islamic country? Or Iran's model? Or Indonesia? Or Kelantan's model? There are so many different forms of Islamic country. We shouldn't look solely at the states governed by PAS. And becoming an Islamic country isn't necessarily a bad thing. What BN said about religion and all is yet again, to create fear among us. Exactly what I think too. I think Islam as a religion, is distorted in the mind of many Chinese. Chinese tends to relate many negative things with Islam and all. We really need to get rid of all these misconceptions about each other.
What if PR loses the election?
Many might notice too, that many opposition leaders are old already. It seems like this is the only shot we have to change government, like the famous slogan, "Ini Kali Lah!". But even if BN wins again, they will no longer be a powerful one-sided government anymore, and they gonna have to make many future policies together with the opposition. He said we shouldn't be angry and all, if BN wins. Many people do have high hope on PR, but even if losing, we are on the right path towards democracy. To quote him,
In democracy, minority must obey majority, but majority must also respect minority.
I have to admit, Liang is my idol. My thoughts are heavily influenced by him. So what he said or I said here might be bias. Judging by his shows I watched and whatever he said in his shows, and judging by all the books he read, I really think he is wise man, and his point of view, his thoughts are well formulated, hence trustworthy. But on the safe side, we must always be skeptical.
In the end, I just hope I didn't distort whatever he really said or meant during the talk.
Car chase in movies, most people would probably think of Fast and Furious series first. But not me. I would say, the car chase scene in the Bad Boys 2 is the best I have ever seen. A scene of good guys chasing bad guys chasing a good guy. The scene is so intense, just like what the characters said in the scene, "Jesus Christ!", "This is some sick shit!". In fact, it is so intense that one simply can't watch it without at least some amount of swearing.
The filming technic is also very innovative, because I don't remember seeing any of this kind of sick shit before this movie. Michael Bay also made the scene very realistic too, unlike those in Fast and Furious series. I think Fast and Furious series are overhyped. Come on! This is what we should call a good car chase sequence!
Michael Bay used to make good action movies. I would really prefer Transformers 1, 2 and 3 never happened. Many of us probably have never seen some of his good movies, like Armageddon, Pearl Harbor, The Island, and of course Bad Boys 1 and 2. Bad Boys 2 needs some particular attention though, because many new filming technics introduced in this movie was then reused again in his other movies afterwards. For example, the car chase sequence above was reused again in The Island in 2005. Instead of dropping cars from a truck, train wheels are used.
Side note :
My father also loves this scene in Bad Boys 2. Almost everytimes he got tensed out from work, he would come back home, put the Bad Boys 2 DVD in, and play this scene in particular with his home theater surround system at high volume. He says he needs to release some stress! Lol, what a way of relieving stress. The funny part is, my mom always hates it whenever he does this, and they always have some little fight over this issue. Nothing serious though, it is just the way my parents interact with each other.
