20/13c. Home, Sweetly Waiting

I think the best thing about being in CS is meeting people. Basically, you get all sorts of people, ranging from the sentimentalist to the idealist and down right to the pragmatist. It’s probably too narrow to fit each person solely into a stereotype, as 101 has taught us, but basically they serve as a good gauge and a starting point for knowing how to deal with a person.

Let’s take exchange for example. Basically, there are some people who can’t wait to go home, and there are people who’d rather wait than to go home. Wait, wait, don’t jump to conclusions. It’s a matter of perceptions and priorities again. For some they like the serenity of the new environment that they have been pushed into, and for some, the comfort of home is just so irresistible. Comfort not only entailing one’s house, but the whole home country that we’ve been so familiar and grew to love and take comfort in.

So basically, I’m like one of those, chilling out at a local Toast Box (thank God for Toast Box), needing my daily dose of kopi-o, immersing myself in the hollow papers and watching people carry out meetings, sharing canards with one another, and whining about tired feets. The occasional stroll around town aimlessly and dropping by my favourite riverside jaunt every now makes me happy too. Kayaking in that kallang drain, seriously, which country can match the convenience of taking a public bus to go kayaking? Basically, I just enjoy my island life on the sunny dot, complete with the security, convenience and cosiness, even if it means that some other things (like the hand-leading politics and some pathetic souls herded like sheep) are way too screwed up in their own rights.

Don’t get me wrong. I love this place at Elon, but being detached altogether and having to restart the entire social ecology process all over again is just too painful to bear. I’m way past the age of meeting a horde of new people, especially when they are significantly different on all counts. The readjustment of social standings – race, language, nationality – made me painfully aware of my surroundings, when I actually prefer to live in blissful ignorance in the safety of my own country. I am not advocating a life of ignorance and self-centered thinking, because being aware of such differences puts one in a global perspective, and realizing that our world doesn’t end at the Woodlands Checkpoint nor Changi Airport. This, is one thing that i’m thankful for being in Singapore. The classic joke of how many (or how few) Americans can actually pin US on a world map.

With all that has been said, basically, I can’t wait to get home, back to my kopi-o at Toast Box, my steamboat with Jason and the rest, my mj and banters with Samuel and gang, and at the end of the day, the intricate design of the Singaporean neighbourhood that I’ve grown up in and acquaint myself so dearly with. I’m counting down!

(P.S. Some time ago, I was rapped for using the word ‘basically’ way too often. =))

20/13b. 23 49 more days.

Pretty slow day today, mom’s friend Judith came over to bring us out for a Vietnamese lunch and a movie afternoon at Four Seasons. She had one of her chinese CDs on the car, so this song just somehow got stuck with me for the rest of the day.

王力宏－落叶归根

举头望无尽灰云
那季节叫做寂寞
背包塞满了家用
路就这样开始走
日不见太阳的暖
夜不见月光的蓝
不得不选择寒冷的开始
留下只拥有遗憾

命运的安排
遵守自然的逻辑
谁都无法揭谜底
喔～

远离家乡不甚唏嘘
幻化成秋夜
而我却像落叶归根
坠在你心间
几分忧郁几分孤单
都心甘情愿
我的爱像落叶归根
家唯独在你身边

Lots of things just run through my mind again. I know that it’s no use thinking through them, since a broken favourite pencil cannot be replaced with any other for sentimental reasons. Sometimes, it’s just the sentimentalism in us that wants to look back at the pieces and cry, even though our minds tell us to move on and we seem to be moving on.

20/13a. Bill Visits Elon

The front lawn of Elon University’s oldest building saw a crowd never seen in the last decade, all gathering in anticipation of a special guest.

William Jefferson Clinton dropped by this small town with a population of 5000 to rally for the Clinton campaign.

The sight in front Alamance building was akin to a circus. The road was cordoned off, broadcasting vehicles were parked along the road, with satellite dishes all set up and ready to beam the glory of Elon to around the country.

The last time Elon saw such a crowd was in 1992, when Clinton came along with Al Gore to jostle for votes against George Bush Sr. Not many who has witnessed that sight were here today, less for faculty, staff members and nearby residents who affiliated with the college since long ago.

I was telling someone, that I almost forgot how a crowd looked like until today. It seemed like the whole town was here to hear this man talk, regardless of their party affiliations. Obama supporters were clearly on site, with a handful of “Vote for Obama” placards visible above the crowd.

A woman beside be was shocked when she spotted a student waving an Obama poster from a neighbouring building. “I don’t want any protest at all. It’s my chance of a lifetime to see the President, and no one is going to spoil it for me,” she said.

Back to the circus. With Clinton projected to arrive at 3.45pm, the crowd swelled since two hours before, with hopefuls gathering near the front of the podium to assure themselves of the best view of the charismatic ex-President, and a chance to shake his hand and speak a few words with him.

‘Guns’ of all sizes – compact cameras, DSLRs, video cameras, mobile phone cameras – were all whipped out to capture the rare opportunity that’s occurring on their home ground. Photographers and cameramen without media access were scampering all over the event site, scouting for the best vantage point for a clear view of where the man would speak from. The die-hard ones elbowed their way to the front.

3.45 arrived, and there was no sign of Mr Clinton. Instead, an unknown man walked out onto the stage and took the crowd in a bid to sooth the crowd and rouse the atmosphere. In a futile attempt to spur the people on, the organiser tried to lead a cheer of “H-I-L-L-A-R-Y”, that met with a lukewarm response from the crowd.

The organiser asked “Who will be your next president?”. To further embarrassment, a portion of the crowd, including the bunch of friends that was with me, screamed in reply: “OBAMA!”

Knowing that this inspiriting doesn’t work, the organizer took off from the stage and left the crowd to wait.

Finally, the charming man walked out of the building, much to the cheering of the masses. Shutters began working at full speed, tracking the man from the sidewalk all the way up to the podium. The moment he started talking, the crowd seemed to forget all that impatience and tiredness, and cheered endlessly.

Bill went on the elaborate on the experience of his wife, and demonstrating how sound her policies were and why they stood out amongst the other candidates. Believing in the personal touch, he recounted several anecdotes about his wife’s and his own encounters with the the man on the street, and how they affected their policies.

The Clinton machines just captured everyone’s attention for the full hour as he rattled on the economy, energy policies, employment, the war, education affordability, and health care. Every point that he made was met with a resounding applause from the crowd, even from those who was booting for the other teams.

When Clinton finally ended his hour-long endorsement, the crowd cheered on him for a last time as he made his way down from the podium. While most of the crowd start dispersing from the lawn, there were people who were gathered up front reaching out hands in hope of sharing a handshake with the former Chief, almost like asking for a priest to bless them with his touch. I left the action and headed back to my room, and missed out on the chance. A few of my friends got their handshake with him, after waiting by the side of the building where he headed back to.

The Clinton machine has worked its magic once again yesterday, and at least when I go home, i can say, “Hey, i saw Bill Clinton in person!”

20/12b. The Work Done Because Of Procrastination.

It’s the wrong kind of work done. Yesterday was pretty eventful for a Sunday actually, with a reception in the afternoon and chilling out at the International Pavilion in the evening.

I planned to get some work done yesterday, namely:

1. Presentation slides for tomorrow’s presentation on Singapore & NTU.
2. Presentation slides for Thursday’s presentation on calcium for chemistry class. Don’t ask me why I have to do it. I’m learning new things everyday, and i’m enjoying it immensely.
3. Finish up my case studies for media ethics that was due last Wednesday.
4. Study Start studying for media law exam on Wednesday. I’m about five chapters, which is about 120 pages, behind my reading.
5. Think about my radio advertisement spot, due Thursday.

Instead, I headed out in the morning to church, had lunch with the church peeps; headed back to room and lazed for an hour; head to the international office for a little reception for ‘Local Friends’ (which I swear I have not met ever before) who had apparently done a lot for the international community at Elon; edited the NTU corporate video for tomorrow’s presentation; went to the International Pavilion (essentially a hall) with Weishan to join Kimberly, David & Christian for an evening of tea, ice-cream and soup.

Oh oh first I have to talk about the editing suites. For those who have been to the ADM editing suites rooms and thought those were cool enough, you haven’t been to Elon. The editing suites, well hidden in the basement, were as comfortable as anything you could imagine. Every suite was equipped with two regular large-screens (i think 17″) monitors, with an additional widescreen LCD panel stretching across the length two regular screens, right above the monitors. Quality speakers accompany those darned displays. Not to mention nice swivel chairs, and a few of the larger editing suites, one of which we used, had sofas in them. SOFAS!! And we’re not talking about a 2-man couch. It’s a full length sofas that can easier fit 6 or 7 people. The rooms were soundproofed methinks, and each room had a large glass sliding door. In the middle of all the suites in the common area was a sofa with another huge LCD TV, apparently for playback or reviewing.

The entire set of suites were dimly lit, and any communication student could just walk in and use the suites. No nonsense as drawing of keys, etc etc etc. And most important of all? They are available 24-hour everyday, including sundays. HOW COOL IS THAT?

Seriously. Now we know why Elon students pay 30 grand US bucks each year.

And I was commenting, the entire communication building alone probably has more macs than the whole of NTU. We counted approximately 7-8 classrooms fully equipped with about 20-25 macs each, you do the math yourself.

Enough gripping about school facilities. The equipment loan system here is something that I consider inferior to CS, though, but that warrants another post by itself.

On a lighter note, I cooked my first kimchee fried rice last night! We didn’t intend to have dinner last night, because they served a full buffet dinner at the reception, so we were pretty full by 4pm. Having planned a ice-cream, tea and soup evening instead, one of the guys who was living at the IP was saying that he was hungry. So given the stuffs they had in the fridge, we decided to make some kimchee fried rice. It was a pity, that they didn’t had leftover rice, and we had to cook rice from scratch. Cooking rice was scratch is not the best way to make fried rice, as the rice wouldn’t be dry enough to fry. Indeed, the rice was a little too moist, and it became lumps of the rice instead. The kimchee and the korean pepper paste greatly added to the taste, and together with some eggs and garlic, it made a fantastic meal!

And that was my first time frying rice. =p Don’t tell anyone else about that.

The five of us downed about 2 tubs of ice-cream while watching the last bits of Star Wars, and we left the tea and soup untouched. So that’s about the whole day. And now you see, how effective i am exactly, in this land where I’m supposed to have all the time in the world.

20/12a. Adventure in the Grocery Store

This is something that Jessie forwarded me. It is DAMN HILARIOUS i swear. I’m reposting the entire post here, but the original post can be found here.

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Adventures in Grocery Shopping

I’m reprinting the auction here before Ebay takes it down.

I’m selling a bunch of Pokemon cards. Why? Because my kids sneaked them into my shopping cart while at the grocery store and I ended up buying them because I didn’t notice they were there until we got home. How could I have possibly not noticed they were in my cart, you ask? Let me explain.

You haven’t lived until you’ve gone grocery shopping with six kids in tow. I would rather swim, covered in bait, through the English Channel, be a contestant on Fear Factor when they’re having pig brains for lunch, or do fourth grade math than to take my six kids to the grocery store. Because I absolutely detest grocery shopping, I tend to put it off as long as possible. There comes a time, however, when you’re peering into your fridge and thinking, ‘Hmmm, what can I make with ketchup, Italian dressing, and half an onion,’ that you decide you cannot avoid going to the grocery store any longer. Before beginning this most treacherous mission, I gather all the kids together and give them “The Lecture“.

“The Lecture“ goes like this…
MOM: “We have to go to the grocery store.”
KIDS: “Whine whine whine whine whine.“
MOM: “Hey, I don’t want to go either, but it’s either that or we’re eating cream of onion-ketchup soup and drinking Italian dressing for dinner tonight.”
KIDS: “Whine whine whine whine whine.“
MOM: “Now here are the rules: do not ask me for anything, do not poke the packages of meat in the butcher section, do not test the laws of physics and try to take out the bottom can in the pyramid shaped display, do not play baseball with oranges in the produce section, and most importantly, do not try to leave your brother at the store. Again.”

OK, the kids have been briefed. Time to go.

Once at the store, we grab not one, but two shopping carts. I wear the baby in a sling and the two little children sit in the carts while I push one cart and my oldest son pushes the other one. My oldest daughter is not allowed to push a cart. Ever. Why? Because the last time I let her push the cart, she smashed into my ankles so many times, my feet had to be amputated by the end of our shopping trip. This is not a good thing. You try running after a toddler with no feet sometime.

At this point, a woman looks at our two carts and asks me, “Are they all yours?” I answer good naturedly, “Yep!

“Oh my, you have your hands full.”

“Yes, I do, but it‘s fun!” I say smiling. I’ve heard all this before. In fact, I hear it every time I go anywhere with my brood.

We begin in the produce section where all these wonderfully, artistically arranged pyramids of fruit stand. There is something so irresistibly appealing about the apple on the bottom of the pile, that a child cannot help but try to touch it. Much like a bug to a zapper, the child is drawn to this piece of fruit. I turn around to the sounds of apples cascading down the display and onto the floor. Like Indiana Jones, there stands my son holding the all-consuming treasure that he just HAD to get and gazing at me with this dumbfounded look as if to say, “Did you see that??? Wow! I never thought that would happen!”

I give the offending child an exasperated sigh and say, “Didn’t I tell you, before we left, that I didn’t want you taking stuff from the bottom of the pile???”

“No. You said that you didn’t want us to take a can from the bottom of the pile. You didn’t say anything about apples.”

With superhuman effort, I resist the urge to send my child to the moon and instead focus on the positive – my child actually listened to me and remembered what I said!!! I make a mental note to be a little more specific the next time I give the kids The Grocery Store Lecture.

A little old man looks at all of us and says, “Are all of those your kids?”

Thinking about the apple incident, I reply, “Nope. They just started following me. I’ve never seen them before in my life.”

OK, now onto the bakery section where everything smells so good, I’m tempted to fill my cart with cookies and call it a day. Being on a perpetual diet, I try to hurry past the assortment of pies, cakes, breads, and pastries that have my children drooling. At this point the chorus of “Can we gets” begins.

“Can we get donuts?”
“No.”
“Can we get cupcakes?”
“No.”
“Can we get muffins?”
“No.”
“Can we get pie?”
“No.”

You’d think they’d catch on by this point, but no, they’re just getting started.

In the bakery, they’re giving away free samples of coffee cake and of course, my kids all take one. The toddler decides he doesn’t like it and proceeds to spit it out in my hand. (That’s what moms do. We put our hands in front of our children’s mouths so they can spit stuff into them. We’d rather carry around a handful of chewed up coffee cake, than to have the child spit it out onto the floor. I’m not sure why this is, but ask any mom and she’ll tell you the same.) Of course, there’s no garbage can around, so I continue shopping one-handed while searching for someplace to dispose of the regurgitated mess in my hand.

In the meat department, a mother with one small baby asks me, “Wow! Are all six yours?”
I answer her, “Yes, but I’m thinking of selling a couple of them.”

(Still searching for a garbage can at this point.)

Ok, after the meat department, my kids’ attention spans are spent. They’re done shopping at this point, but we aren’t even halfway through the store. This is about the time they like to start having shopping cart races. And who may I thank for teaching them this fun pastime? My seventh “child”, also known as my husband. While I’m picking out loaves of bread, the kids are running down the aisle behind the carts in an effort to get us kicked out of the store. I put to stop to that just as my son is about to crash head on into a giant cardboard cut-out of a Keebler elf stacked with packages of cookies.

Ah! Yes! I find a small trash can by the coffee machine in the cereal aisle and finally dump out the squishy contents of my hand. After standing in the cereal aisle for an hour and a half while the kids perused the various cereals, comparing the marshmallow and cheap, plastic toy content of each box, I broke down and let them each pick out a box. At any given time, we have twenty open boxes of cereal in my house.

As this is going on, my toddler is playing Houdini and maneuvering his little body out of the seat belt in an attempt to stand up in the cart. I’m amazed the kid made it to his second birthday without suffering a brain damaging head injury. In between trying to flip himself out of the cart, he sucks on the metal bars of the shopping cart. Mmmm, can you say “influenza”?

The shopping trip continues much like this. I break up fights between the kids now and then and stoop down to pick up items that the toddler has flung out of the cart. I desperately try to get everything on my list without adding too many other goodies to the carts.

Somehow I manage to complete my shopping in under four hours and head for the check-outs where my kids start in on a chorus of, “Can we have candy?” What evil minded person decided it would be a good idea to put a display of candy in the check-out lanes, right at a child’s eye level? Obviously someone who has never been shopping with children.

As I unload the carts, I notice many extra items that my kids have sneaked in the carts unbeknownst to me. I remove a box of Twinkies, a package of cupcakes, a bag of candy, and a can of cat food (we don’t even have a cat!). I somehow missed the box of Pokemon cards however and ended up purchasing them unbeknownst to me. As I pay for my purchases, the clerk looks at me, indicates my kids, and asks, “Are they all yours?”

Frustrated, exhausted from my trip, sick to my stomach from writing out a check for $289.53, dreading unloading all the groceries and putting them away and tired of hearing that question, I look at the clerk and answer her in my most sarcastic voice, “No. They’re not mine. I just go around the neighborhood gathering up kids to take to the grocery store because it’s so much more fun that way.”

So, up for auction is an opened (they ripped open the box on the way home from the store) package of Pokemon cards. There are 44 cards total. They’re in perfect condition, as I took them away from the kiddos as soon as we got home from the store. Many of them say “Energy”. I tried carrying them around with me, but they didn’t work. I definitely didn’t have any more energy than usual. One of them is shiny. There are a few creature-like things on many of them. One is called Pupitar. Hee hee hee Pupitar! (Oh no! My kids’ sense of humor is rubbing off on me!) Anyway, I don’t think there’s anything special about any of these cards, but I’m very much not an authority on Pokemon cards. I just know that I’m not letting my kids keep these as a reward for their sneakiness.

Shipping is FREE on this item. Insurance is optional, but once I drop the package at the post office, it is no longer my responsibility. For example, if my son decides to pour a bottle of glue into the envelope, or my daughter spills a glass of juice on the package, that’s my responsibility and I will fully refund your money. If, however, I take the envelope to the post office and a disgruntled mail carrier sets fire to it, a pack of wild dogs rip into it, or a mail sorting machine shreds it, it’s out of my hands, so you may want to add insurance. I will leave feedback for you as soon as I’ve received your payment. I will be happy to combine shipping on multiple items won within three days. This comes from a smoke-free, pet-free, child-filled home. Please ask me any questions before placing your bid. Happy bidding!

20/11b. Turtle Song

Hello, this is my turtle song.

If you take a chicken
Put it in a shell
What you have is chicken turtle looking very well
If you take a pig
Put it in there too
What you have is pig and chick in very tiny zoo

Keyboard. I’m now dancing.

If a little gator
Whose name was Gator Ted
Climbed inside a turtle shell and ate a loaf of bread
The shell would make him snappy
He would need to eat some more
Alligator snapping turtles can eat a grocery store

Turtles come from Amazon
Asia and the Western Pond
Stink Pot is another one
Turtles are my friends

To meet a friendly turtle
They not too far from you
Only half an hour there,then another two
Come down to Aquarium
On the Oregon Coast
You can visit every day at the very most

They’re so happy to see you.

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The Oregon Coast Aquarium Turtle Song! Listen to the song here.

20/11a. The New York Chronicles: Day 1.

Apologies for the long overdue account of the New York adventures. Procrastination got the better of me, and with some time to spare while waiting for a lift to Greensboro, I think I should devote some time to start making an account of the going-ons.

Being on a super budget trip, ZL and I opted for a Greyhound ride up to NYC instead of flying there. The bus ticket cost us $63 bucks, compared to the $120 odd dollars we would have to fork out for a flight. The trade-off? 14 hours of butt-numbing experience, coupled with the uncertainty of the service reliability of Greyhound. After all, it’s notorious for schedule delays.

ZL’s neighbour Gini kindly got us to the bus station in Graham. It was just a stand-alone office, which was closing for the day when we got there. The man locking up the office kindly informed us that the bus was running late by an hour, so we had to hang around that quiet part of town. As we were talking, ZL told me that he didn’t bring his passport, and I went, “What?!” I made him go back to take his passport, and we had to trouble Gini to come along again for the errand. Thankfully the bus arrived just as he came back.

We got onto the bus, which was heading to Raleigh for our transfer to Richmond, and finally to NYC. The first thing you’d realize upon getting onto the bus was that most of the passengers were non-whites. Not blacks only, but hispanics and asians as well. The few whites that you’ll see are largely military guys and the handful of college students. Perhaps this was the ‘real’ America that we didn’t see in the Elon bubble.

Arriving in Raleigh shortly, the bus driver advised half the bus to wait for the express bus to NYC at Raleigh, and most of us complied without question. ZL and I made ourselves comfortable within the bus station, reading newspapers and watching whatever TV programs that was on. We noticed a ruckus going on at the ticketing counter involving some of the same passengers from our bus, and I heard some mentions of New York, so I went up to check it out. Turns out that the express bus that we were supposed to wait for is apparently full, and we shouldn’t have alighted from the previous bus. The other passengers were so furious, especially after finding out that the next available bus was only arriving nearly 11pm, about two hours later than the planned ride. And even with that, we had to make a transfer in Richmond.

So there we waited for yet another two hours before we finally got onto the bus.

Transfer at Richmond was relatively smooth, and by then we were running behind our schedule by nearly three hours, and that means we were supposed to reach NYC by 11am instead of the original 8am. I texted Jessie, whom we were to meet in NYC, of our impending delay. Amazingly, the 7-hour ride from Richmond to NYC was amazingly shortened to 5.5-hour, thanks to a wonderful bus driver who almost scared me to death when he was venturing 5 inches away from the truck next to me in the Lincoln Tunnel leading to Manhattan island.

So we arrived NYC at 8.30am on 22nd March, 2008.

Jessie was due to arrive at about 9am, so the first place ZL and I hit was MacDonalds. Being deprived of familiar fastfood for 8 weeks, we went straight for the Mac for breakfast. It was comforting to bask in familiarity for the first time, although the biscuit instead of muffin that we had sort of spoilt the moment.

We finally linked-up with Jessie at the Penn Bus Station, and took the subway to our hostel on 106th Street. The subway system was amazing in itself. In a modern city like NYC, you would have expected a contemporary and clean subway system. Instead, what greeted us was a minimalist run-down façade of the rail system in New York. The platforms were mostly narrow, with no dividing doors between the tracks and the platforms. The cement floor was covered with puddles and litter, and the walls were plastered with advertisements and graffiti.

We took our maiden subway trip right up to 103rd St, with half our faith in the confusing subway map and half our faith in our own intelligence in reading those darned maps. There were at least five colours and ten lines running all over Manhattan, and with local and express train systems full of service changes that very weekend that we arrived in NYC, taking the subway wasn’t exactly a walk in the park. We got to 103rd St anyway, and found our way to the spunky hostel, only to find out that we weren’t allowed to check in till 3pm. So we got left our luggage there, and got out for the day.

We headed down towards Times Square to begin our New York adventures. I mean, where can be a better place to start except for the heart of the city center? We slowly strolled towards Times Square, while taking in all the lights and displays that went on even in bright daylight.

Times Square was one of those amazing places where you can spend like three hours looking at the lights, billboards, scrolling texts and the advertisements all around. There is a little traffic island in the middle of road dividing the bidirectional traffic, and we spent a good ten to fifteen minutes taking in the sights from all around us, while releasing several tens of shutters as well. There was a huge Reuters sign hanging from one building, Hershey’s billboard some distance off, CNBC news bulletin running off an electronic scroll box, among many other attention grabbing fixations. There was a giant M&M sitting atop yet another building, and right near it was Toys R’us. So into that shop we went.

The first people that greeted us stopped us with an outstretched hand and armed with a large DSLR. It’s apparently Toys R Us employees taking photos of customers, and selling them for an obscene amount (think it’s about 15 bucks) for a set of photos. Being ‘camera-shy’ Singaporeans we naturally declined immediately, having our 5-second celebrity-trying-to-siam-paparazzi moment.

It was one of the megastores in NYC, panning four stories selling toys and other gadgets. They even had a mini ferris wheel within the store itself, with a long snaking line of parents with children in tow, waiting for a ride on that.

The lego models on the 2nd storey was pretty impressive, with King Kong on Empire State Building, the Statue of Liberty and some other things that I can’t remember built out of lego bricks. I remember being a big fan of lego blocks when I was younger, until I realized how costly they were. A small pack for a simple design cost something like 20 over dollars back home, and it was then I stopped playing with lego since. Lego is still expensive now, anyway! Someone should outlaw expensive kids toys. tsk.

Jessie and I got a little caught up with the board games, when we saw that they were going for a discount. Monopoly sets were going for something like 20 bucks, and some other Mattel board games were going at a low price too. We were like hunting high and low for games we couldn’t find in Singapore, but sadly there were none of those niche games to be found.

We stepped out into the cold again after warming up in the giant toyland. M&Ms was just next door, so naturally we headed next. I saw a similar one in Las Vegas before, so I was expecting this one to be equally huge. Huge it was, a three-level shop space it contained, and there was a gigantic wall of M&Ms that runs across a good section of the shop, dispensing different colours of M&Ms and some popular mixes of different colours. The M&Ms were expensive though, at about 10 bucks a pound. M&Ms weren’t supposed to be so expensive! There was this cute statue of M&M emulating the Statue of Liberty as well, with an entire shelf of smaller ones that were for sale. Jessie contemplated getting one, but decided against it after all because she knew she won’t eat the chocolates within at all.

We went on to Hershey’s, which was disappointingly small. We went in, walked one round, and came out, spending all of three minutes within the place.

Not knowing where else to go, we walked on the 55th to visit World of Disney. We actually walked past the Rockefeller Center without knowing that it was the Rockefeller center, and happily took photos of the Atlas statue right outside the center. We only realized it was the Rockefeller Center a few days later when we walked past the same place again, and bothered reading the obscure sign on the building.

World of Disney was one of the other megastores similar to Toys R Us, although there’s no ferris wheel to be found in this one. It wasn’t as exciting as Toys R Us, I mean, how exciting damn Disney toys? Most the toys were plush toys or merchandise popularised by Disney characters, which are so old that they are all running the risk of losing their trademarks soon. There was a series of expensive caricatures of Disney characters on the third storey that were all exquisitely crafted. You can often tell by the workmanship on the faces of the characters, like the set of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, each dwarf wasn’t a duplicate of each other, all seven were actually distinct from one another, wearing different expressions. Such figurines, of course, commanded a high buying price. *gulp*

I went in search of the Eeyore mug that I broke earlier this year, but there didn’t seem to be many Winnie the Pooh & friends merchandise. How sad, so we left shortly after.

By this time we were hungry, so we went in search of lunch. We came across White Castle in the morning, so we decided to head back for lunch. White Castle serves these cute little bite-size burgers, and most burgers are actually bought in pairs. A single hamburger, for example, measures probably 2 inches by 2 inches and costs 79 cents each, served in a cute little holder that look suspiciously like the baby size fries pod. Among the three of us we shared 6 mini burgers and some chicken strips, along with fries and drinks. The burgers were delicious, partially from the state of famish, but I swear that wasn’t enough and was contemplating to get more burgers. We eventually decided otherwise, as we were put off by the long waiting time.

I couldn’t exactly remember what else exactly we did for the rest of the day, but I’m sure we went down to the Penn Station to collect ZL’s return train ticket, and just wandered around the area, checking out several places such as the Empire State Building. The queue for the ESB observatory tower was pretty disgusting, with waits averaging an hour. We did a little shopping around the ESB area, through Macy’s, H&M, Zara and others. Oh, we did try to visit this A&F shop near the World of Disney, but when we saw that there was actually a line of people waiting to get into the store (think LV at takashimaya), we just turned around and walked away. And speaking of Takashimaya, we saw one along 5th Avenue! It was an upscale departmental store however, and we could only take a glimpse within since it was closed by the time we walked past the place.

The end of the day is actually pretty hazy to me by now. I remembered heading back to the hostel to check in, which was a cumbersome process by itself, enough to warrant a separate post, so I shall save myself the agony of reliving that process. ZL’s and my room were located in another building on a separate street, so we lugged out backpacks and dumped our stuff in the room before heading back to Times Square with Jessie again for dinner.

We couldn’t decide what to have for dinner, so we went to Yoshinoya. It was the best Asian food we had so far, I swear. Reminiscence of home, Yoshinoya brought with the sliced beef, boiled vegetables and soft and sticky rice. The portions were at least one-and-a-half times of those back home, but extra comfort of familiarity was definitely the order of the day.

With Cold Stone just next door, of course we couldn’t resist the temptation despite the cold weather, ironically. Three Singaporeans hiding in the warmth of an ice-cream shop, tucking into a large cup of chocolate and vanilla ice cream topped with roasted almonds, while chatting heartily in colloquial English was definitely the best way to top off a full meal.

As it was Easter Sunday the next day, Times Square was exceptionally crowded that Saturday evening. The place was a totally different creature at night. Despite the lack of street lamps in the city, the lights that blared from the billboards all around was enough to illuminate and dazzle people all around. In contrast to the darkness of the night, the fanciful lights just bring a life of its on in this city center. Hordes of people simply stand on the street with their heads and eyes up looking everywhere at the various digital screens and neon signs. Even the New York City Police signage was neon.

With nothing else to do at night, we concluded the night and headed back to the hostel, where Jessie & I discuss our summer plans, leaving ZL to entertain himself with his shots of the day. Jessie was to be picked up by her Cornell friends later that night, so we bade her farewell, and continued our little adventure on our own.

Until the next time I bother to update on this adventure, stay tuned.

20/10c. Best for the Masses

John Stuart Mill’s Principle of Utility states that the greatest happiness for the greatest number should be seeked. Utilitarianism is touted as one more of the most widespread ethical view in the North American society.

History has it that utilitarianism simply means that the more people that are ‘happy’ at the end of the day, the better it is. The question that raised a couple of eyebrows was what entailed ‘happiness’? That led to the later modification of utilitarianism’s goal: an achievement of values with intrinsic worth, such as friendship, self-fulfillment, knowledge and health. And subsequently, the notion of right and wrong is then derived from the sum of these values generated for the masses.

The norm of utility guides society on two counts: first to produce the greatest possible balance of good versus evil, and to distribute this balance as widely as possible, hence giving you the sum notion of ‘greatest good for greatest number of people.’

However, there was one interesting thing I noted in my ethics textbook. In pointing out issues with the principle of utilitarianism, the author mentioned that happiness is ‘an end that few wishes to contradict.’ As an example, the author raised this: in a society of ten people, nine sadists cannot justly persecute the tenth person even though it yields the greatest happiness.

Isn’t such a statement presupposing a certain moral standard in the society already? And on what basis is this moral standard founded upon? In the true spirit of utilitarianism, how does one define ‘good’ when talking about the greatest ‘goodness’ for the masses? Is this ‘goodness’ an absolute term, or is it just a relative measure to what our conscience can live with?

20/10b. Clinton Woes

It seems tougher and tougher for Clinton to win the Democratic elections as we sail through each primary. Ever since Super Tuesday, the cry for her to drop out of the race has been ringing louder and louder with each passing vote, and the ballots seem to cast that way too. The gap between her and Obama never came close, and she’s losing more superdelegates by the day. By AP’s count, Clinton has 250 superdelegates endorsement while Obama trails at 218. Despite this, Obama leads by well over 100 delegates on the overall, approximately 3-4% of total delegates committed.

There has been talks by the local media on how Clinton has to close up the gaps in order to remain in the race. Prior to the mini-tuesday last month, speculations and analysts said that Clinton had to win major states like Texas & Ohio in order to stay in the race. She did win, but didn’t win ‘big’ enough to catch up. She won a mere 13 more delegates collectively than Obama in both states, a margin that’s barely worth mentioning.

So now, the media still maintain their age-old forecasting methods: Clinton has to win ‘big’ (once again) in both Pennsylvania and North Carolina, both relatively delegate-rich states, or depend on an Obama-trip-up to help herself. Of course, only if she doesn’t sabotage herself by attacking the trip-up shamelessly.

Realistically speaking, I think the only way that Clinton may get into office is to hold a joint ticket with someone else. She has effectively canceled out the possibility of an Obama-Clinton ticket with all the aggressive and divisive campaign tactics since Feb 5th, and speculations of how an Obama-Al Gore ticket would prove winner for the Dems. With the charisma of Obama and the track record of Al Gore, McCain would have to search hard for an assistant that could match up to that prowess and debunking the damn-you-GOP mentality, no thanks to Bush.

With people rallying around the Obama joint ticket with anyone else but Clinton, it’s no wonder that Clinton may feel like the odd one out, like a girl without a dance partner at a prom. And somehow, Clinton seems pretty in limbo at the moment, being too late in the game to withdraw, and too far behind to actually have a decent possibility of victory. In retrospect I feel like at least Huckabee may have felt better at his loss – at least he was sticking around to the end as a matter of principle. But for Clinton, it seems like fate’s playing an evil trick on her, by keeping her so near and yet so far from being the first Mdm President.

20/10a. NYC Photos

Being the ever lazy blogger that I am, especially in uploading photos, here’s two places where you can look up NYC photos.

Either in Facebook, or in visual introspections, which will have a severe lack of photos.

Enjoy. Msn me if you want a running commentary on NYC.