Back alive and kicking in HK

Bought my first organizer today. Life is revolving around new meanings these days. It's no longer about shaking the legs and finding the hypes, but rather shouldering the burden and being an adult who lives life carrying out responsibilities and feeling peaceful at the same time.

Plans are starting to fill my schedule already too. A stable relationship at this age mean that I have to seriously set my head down on the road to career and family planning.

Reading a biography on Gandhi these few days. Love his definition of life is about action, both physically and mentally. At its core it's the willingness and natural instincts that lead these actions. A saint like Gandhi is always one I look up to. Chewing his words in my mind alone can make me feel extremely peaceful.

Okay now off to re-vent my room. Time to make my room the perfect place to work.

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In KL

And CNY's busiest season pass by just like that, in a blink of an eye. Now here I am, in KL for my two day visit.

Hopefully I can extract as much fun as possible out of these two days.

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In Penang

Old faces and renewed strength in Penang. What a joy in this Tiger-themed Chinese New Year.

I am always surprised by how you can find the strength in Penang. It might be the fengshui. It might be the people. It might even be the fleeting moment of feeling your old roots once again.

Well seriously I am thinking of altering the way things are arranged in that small room of mine in Hong Kong when I am back. At least for that the fengshui works. And might wanna add a portable lamp in Gok Ling's house too so that I can work there as well too.

Oh yeah...HAPPY CHINESE NEW YEAR!!!

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The Imaginarium

In Hong Kong, 2010 kicks off with the film "The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus". A good start I would say. Heath Ledger's last seen footage saddened me as his bewildering acting and palette of emotions painted the hearts of the audiences, but Jude Law, Colin Farrell and Johnny Depp closed the deal in his stead. I like Depp a lot, and I recognized him straight when he pulled on his 'surprise' look. Still, Ledger performed the best nonetheless.

Dr. Parnassus would have fared way much better. He is a sacred man to start with, but he fell into an endless betting game with a Devil that lured him out of his cave. The Devil whispered: "So you're not a betting man, eh?" and Dr. Parnassus took the challenge, trying to prove what he believes in.

It turns out to be a wrong turn on the road. Dr. Parnassus could not differentiate his ideals from his desires anymore when he was granted immortality after winning the Devil. What follows is his endless betting game that goes ever on with the Devil, and in the end he lost his cool and wits.

"Don't give me choices anymore! I don't want to choose anymore!" Dr. Parnassus cried in despair, hugging the road sign pole in the middle of a snow swept mountain, on which written "To left - High Road"; "To right - Low Road". His tears streamed down his cheeks, and he knelt down, begging. His mind is lost in the imaginarium of desires and dreams.

His greed blinded him, and the thing that is noteworthy is, the greed is nothing but what we deem to be something small in our lives. The mere whim to win a bet; "love at first sight" fancy; the will to save your possession from being owned by others; the slim hope of trying to turn a promise around, you name it.

Once he purified people by telling them what their dreams are, and who they really are. He pointed out to them what is really there, and what actually are they dreaming. He walked them through his Imaginarium which the desires of the people entering there would be magnified in scales and beautified into fantasy. Slowly, Dr. Parnassus lost himself and when he can't see himself anymore, his desires slowly blind him and in the end he does not know what he did wrong anymore.

So what sealed his fate in the end? Seek the answer in your nearby cinemas. You wouldn't want to miss this show. Avatar might teach you a little philosophy in its course but "Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus" took you through the journey of finding answers to questions we always ask in life. "What does choices really mean?"; "What it means to make a choice?" and you might find the portrayal of the different forms of greed which exists in our everyday life both surprising and astonishingly terrifying.

So, when is the last time you really look at yourself and your surrounding while identifying 'what is' and 'what should be'? Try this movie and find out for yourself. And let Heath Ledger amaze you again with his convincing performance. He was a genius too young to die.

(Photo courtesy of the article "The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus" from Wikipedia)

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"I am", I said - Neil Diamond

L.A.'s fine, the sun shines most the time
And the feeling is 'lay back'
Palm trees grow, and rents are low
But you know I keep thinkin' about
Making my way back

Well I'm New York City born and raised
But nowadays, I'm lost between two shores
L.A.'s fine, but it ain't home
New York's home, but it ain't mine no more

"I am," I said
To no one there
An no one heard at all
Not even the chair
"I am," I cried
"I am," said I
And I am lost, and I can't even say why
Leavin' me lonely still

Did you ever read about a frog who dreamed of bein' a king
And then became one
Well except for the names and a few other changes
If you talk about me, the story's the same one

But I got an emptiness deep inside
And I've tried, but it won't let me go
And I'm not a man who likes to swear
But I never cared for the sound of being alone

"I am," I said
To no one there
An no one heard at all
Not even the chair
"I am," I cried
"I am," said I
And I am lost, and I can't even say why
Leavin' me lonely still

What it really means to give...

After a nice and long talk with Shiaun, finally I get down to earth, and it's the first time I feel solid. And Xinch is right too, all the while. The moment you can give yourself fully in a relationship is the moment you are contented with yourself.

Because I am not doing what I am doing, then it turns out I am not giving myself.

Because I think about learning more about the other person and what I can do for her, I lost myself, and when you are lost, you are already in your own world. You don't go around giving what people want, it's just about giving it when you are giving it. Shiaun has a perfect example for this. It's like, I have a lot a lot of sweets, but if they are not with me now, I can't even give you one. That means, if I go around hunting for what the other needs in her life, in the end I will just end up not giving my all. I will just end up giving sweets while she needs chocolate, because the desire of her for sweets already 'expire'.

So what I can do? It's not about what I can do for her actually, now to think of it. It's about me settling my own feelings down, be calm, be contented, and go on with the flow of life and love. I think it's when you are going with the flow of the mixture of feelings and love and life, then when it's time to give sweets then you can give them. If you cannot, then so be it.

Another catch of it is that it's about faith. We don't go tell our mums that, hey, don't do that...if not, I'm not going to acknowledge you as my mum. That's why bah. I don't go around judging my own feelings for her whether it is right or wrong or whatsoever. It's just as easy as she's really really important to me and I want her in my life. That's how easy the faith should go, and I practically don't have to do anything 'extra'. Of course there will be efforts, there will be emotions, but the feeling of losing it doesn't matter anymore. Because in the end she is still the person who is important to me, even she leaves me, she's still important. That's the catch of it bah, and with that, I don't think being in your own world matters anymore. With that, somehow you will just walk towards each other, naturally.

So, the answer to 'What it means to really give in a relationship?' is just like the following for me: Be contented with your own feelings; Believe in the importance of her in my life; Always be conscious of the surrounding situations; and finally, go with the flow.

And I think I am on it now, finally. The time is ripe for me to settle down my feelings, and you are not wrong to think that, yea, finally I understand love more.

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Uchimaki Ryushi

After the death of old me, I am reborn as Uchimaki Ryushi now.

-

Hence a new chapter unveiled...

This not a defeat I am talking about. This is a new leaf, a new chapter. I've finally come to admit that I am but a more than normal person, trying his best to discern the physical phenomena that never stop to awe me.

From today onwards, clarity is what I seek. Calm in the search, with a clear mind and steady legs.

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From Beijing with Love

It's a good time to examine myself again. I found that I am lagging off in the mood of wanting to achieve something big the past month. But this trip to Beijing somehow brings me a message, a subtle one, but I sensed it in time, captured it, and played with it.

I think somehow I am not occupied by alot of things as alot of people and myself would have assumed. Of course there are tonnes of things piling up in front of me waiting for me to settle, but it's the mind that is clogged, not my schedule.

Although Beijing is heavily polluted, I think this trip somehow cleansed a big part of my clogged mind. It seems like, suddenly, I made it to the other side of the sea which I thought that I could not cross before. I am not easily tensed anymore, alot more calm and quit shaking my legs. I got heavily sick in Beijing, and spent most of the time drinking water and sleeping. I can get more focused and I somehow know that things come my way, no matter how difficult they are, I can tackle them with confidence.

It is something very utterly different comparing to my old confident self. And that's why I am writing this, to explore more about how it works.

I think the change has something to do with my illness, people I meet in Beijing, the experience I had, the food I eat, the conversations I had, the sms-es I received and everything else that might slip my mind.

It's inexplicable. Trust me it isn't. Somehow, things changed. My POV changed. I can settle more with myself than before, and I mean a lot more. Before it's the vibes, the adrenaline that push me. I am not saying now it isn't, but the chakra I feed on before suddenly grow a lot more than before. I am starting to feed on the natural energy around me now.

It's indeed very strange and it's a good change. Beijing, the city that changed me.

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Off to Beijing

Looks like it's been a long long time since I updated my blog. Not that I don't want to, but feel sien that's all.

Going Beijing tomorrow. Will be there for one week. Go there for competition so it's not a trip. Wish can win something back.

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發語錄 1

One of my very best friend and also my senior and also my mentor Ah Fatt always tell me great words that sometimes are just bullshit but sometimes they make so much sense that those particular words burn my heart. From now on, I shall jot down those words that burn me and fuel me to go on while those bullshit, well, just go eat grass la Ah Fatt!!

Ah Fatt (21.9.2009, Monday, Malaysia/HK time: 11.20 am), on tonnes of work that make people high, for e.g. "at least I don't have to worry that I will have nothing to do for the coming one month":-


"The most fun thing in this world would be to stand by the edge of the cliff, right? The next step, either you survive or you fall down. If you survive then there you are, still there, waiting anxiously for the next moment that you might fall down. But if you fall down, then bye bye lo, BUT at least, you still can enjoy the fleeting sensation of free falling."


Very sound advice. It made people high didn't it? Let us stand on the edge together from now on, everyday, enjoying the strong wind!! Man it makes me so high!

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One of the Many Truths

I spent my holidays doing some deep soul searching and I found some truths on my own path. I wouldn't say that they are those 'OMG' type of revelation or enlightenment, but I know that I am moving forward, and how far forward it is actually a relative scale. To some, it might sound like leaps and bounds; To some, it might be just those little stuff that you had already come across in the past.

To me, I am just inching forward but I am perfectly happy with my pace. I feel that I am at peace with myself. In the past when I drink beer my mind clouded me with sad and demotivating thoughts and despair in love affairs. These few days I found that when I drink I won't have those thoughts shadowing over me anymore, and I do not have very happy thoughts as well. I am just, me. Peacefully me.

One of the truths that I can put into words is: It's not what you do not know that obstructs you; It is what you think you know that will always be the biggest invisible obstructions.

I believe that would be one of the biggest thing I come to realize this summer. What we don't know, we can always learn. It is the already-built beliefs and 'knowledge' that are the toughest obstacles. You wouldn't skip school because you believe that teachers teach stuff that is not in the syllabus while you were gone. You constipate because you thought the bad toilet environment is affecting your bowel movements. You cannot work because you knew that the conflicting living habit with your roommate is taxing you so much that you feel so freaking tired.

All of these, aren't they something that you thought you knew?

Well I find myself to be able to work real hard even my roommate's conflicting living habit with me is taxing me harshly. Actually, all these while, it's about you yourself, not the others. It's you who reinstates the negative emotions generated in your own self which in turn brings out exactly the same repetitive 'bad ending' that you 'anticipated'. To find peace with others, first you have to dig inside your soul and find peace with yourself. Ask yourself why are you afraid of switching jobs? Ask yourself why are you afraid of confessing your love to the one you really like? Ask yourself why you are afraid of living in an environment that failed you before? Ask yourself why you are so afraid of standing up again to the challenges and instead choose to cry in the dark? Ask yourself why when woman is way older than the man in a relationship, you are scared that the relationship would look bad from the outside when they grow old together?

Is it really the faults of the environment? The people around you? Your family who put the pressure on you? Your friends who tell you that a personal toilet is the best solution to constipation? Or is it just you?

Ask yourself. And think again. The answer is in your soul. And yes this is not a line from the movies, now you should know after reading this post. Like what the Oracle told Neo when he first came into her room:-

Know Thyself.

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Riddikulus!

Days been hectic back in Hong Kong again, but not hectic because I got a lot of things to do, but rather that I have a lot to do but I can't put myself in a good shape and mood to execute them. Room sharing is really taxing, especially when you are doing a tough job that requires a lot of mental concentration and thus when your private space and life is fucked up by your roomie, possibility is high that you will start to feel that you are so easily worn out in a short period of time.

Sometimes when you feel so tired and just want the lights out, the wildman in your room will tell you: "I am sorry that I am sensitive to darkness." WTF? Are you fucking with me? I mean, this just doesn't make sense. But what else I can do? I am a person who will feel guilty if I happen to cause troubles to people. Meeting an insensitive and pukimak roomie will cause communication breakdown in the end, which is the situation I am experiencing now. I remember I can talk to this guy when I shared the same room with him back in year one summer but so much has changed since then. He even washes his legs and left the water basin there for days to weeks now. I tried to talk to him but he will repeat it after a few minutes or a few days. In the end I am so aggravated that I tried things like switching my desktop speakers on when he is talking loudly on the internet phone with his gf. And guess what? He asked me to lower the volume down! I did and later on I will increase the volume again.

Guess Naruto is right. Revenge will only backfire in another form. Soon after that we would even fight over little things like I would switch the ceiling light off while I walk out of the room with him switching it back on moments later for three to four hours straight. Oh yeah speaking of this, this guy will switch the fans off sometimes in the middle of the night. WTF??? It is a freaking hot summer now. I hate the way things became now but when I decided to end this in a peaceful manner, new scenarios happen. When I was back in Hong Kong less than a week ago, I found rubbish all over the place, and I even found an unfinished plum seed in my toiletries basket. Fuck you!

Suddenly I felt so tired of being a good guy anymore.

Now I am back from outside, feeling so tired and wanna rest my mind a while to give things a thought before I dive into work tomorrow, there he is talking with his gf loudly over internet phone.

I am not just tired. I think I give up on him. Whatever shit or racket he is going to make, let him be. I am going to move to my new room soon. I am crossing my fingers, counting days as the clock ticks slowly. Since when I am living with a boggart? Well honestly, I didn't realize it until now. Maybe what I need is just a wand and a shout of "Riddikulus!"

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Back

Days been really good for me in Penang. And as I was about to leave the place, a huge wave of heaviness took me over. I was rather surprised, as I usually am more enthusiastic about coming back to Hong Kong. Guess that a lot of things have changed deep down inside of me from this fruitful holiday.

I come to understand more about myself and more about life. And on the path I found a little confidence and faith in the path that is laid beyond.

Guess it's time.

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Departure

What's coming next? What's there ahead?

Nobody knows. Everything is uncertain. What we can do at our best is, focus.

For now, my focus is to relax. :P

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Weaknesses and Acknowledgment

Looking back, it's been too far a road for me. It's as if I am stretched over the few years in a tangled state of mind.

After so many years, now I come again to the same stage -- admitting my own weaknesses to myself. What exactly does pride mean? While I live in the so-called expectations of the many people surrounding me, I can't stop wondering, are the expectations really there?

Brian May does inspire me on this part. His song 'Too much love will kill you' definitely been ringing around my ears since Form 4, but the lyrics only come to senses lately. A great musician and a physicist, he did make alot of harsh choices laid down on him now and then. The death of Freddie Mercury, his divorce and I will surely bet, his pursue of a doctorate study degree. And then an email from Wei Zhi crossed my mind. I shall paste it here for your reference:-

問題一：如果你知道有一個女人懷孕了，她已經生了八個小孩，其中有三個耳朵聾、兩個眼睛瞎、一個智能不足，
而這女人自己又有梅毒，請問，你會建議她墮胎嗎？

[Translation:-
Question 1: You knew that a woman is pregnant, and she had already given birth to 8 children. Three of the children are deaf, two of them blind and one of them mentally impaired. And at the same time the woman is diagnosed with syphilis. Honestly, will you suggest to her that she should abort her baby?]

問題二：現在要選舉一名領袖，而你這一票很關鍵。
下面是關於這三位候選人的一些事實：

候選人A：
跟一些不誠實的政客有往來，而且會咨詢占星學家。他有婚外情，是一個老煙槍，每天喝8─10杯的馬丁尼。

候選人B：
他過去有兩次被解雇的記錄，睡覺睡到中午才起來，大學時吸過鴉片，而且每天傍晚會喝一夸特的威士忌。

候選人C：
他是一位受勛的戰爭英雄，素食主義者，不抽煙，只偶爾喝一點啤酒。從沒有發生過婚外情。


[Translation:-
Question 2: Your country needs a new leader. And it is made known to you that your vote will decide who is going to be the one. The following is the information gathered about the 3 candidates. Based on the information given, please make your wisest choice:-

Candidate A:
He is known to have stayed in touch with a few dishonest politicians, and he even consults astrologists. He had affairs with woman outside although he is already married. He is addicted to cigarette and consumes 8 to 10 shots of Martini daily.

Candidate B:
He had been fired twice. Everyday he sleeps until noon. He used to be an opium addict when he was studying in university, and he drinks a quart of whiskey every evening.

Candidate C:
He is an honored war hero. He is a vegetarian and he does not smoke. Sometimes he will only drink a little beer and that's all. He never cheated on his wife.]


So from the two questions above, please make your choice. Then the answers are revealed:-

Candidate A is Franklin Roosevelt
Candidate B is Winston Churchill
Candidate C is Adolf Hitler

Have you chosen Hitler over the other two for your own country? So now what is your answer for the pregnant woman?

If you said you would suggest to that woman that she should undergo abortion, then the truth is you would have killed Beethoven. That woman is the mother of Beethoven.

The email concludes that:-

所以不要用既定的價值觀來思考事物。

我抓過朋友手中的報紙，原來真是一個測驗題，題目是《你的決定滅了誰》。
重要的是，不是我們在哪，而是我們要往哪走......
如果你知道往哪走，并且相信自己，世界會為你開出一條路.......

人的一切一切未必在掌控之中～
人是個難以捉摸的東西，就連自己也是一樣

[Translation:-
So, the moral of the story, don't use the social norms and values to judge or think over things.

I grab the newspaper of my friend's, and the two questions are really there. The title of the quiz is called: "Who has been erased by your decisions?"
The issue is, it doesn't matter where we are. What matters is where we are heading.
If you know where you are headed and you believe in yourself, the world will give you a road.

There are a lot of things which are not within the bounds of control of man. Man functions like water. Their thoughts hardly have a shape and it's hard to figure out what's on their mind. Sometimes, we don't even know what we are thinking.]


It's really impossible to choose sometimes. Yes, it's sometimes even harder to live up to everyone's expectations because we ourselves are incapable at the time being. I understand, if I fail you, it's not because of you that I felt deeply despair. Rather, the despair comes from me myself who failed myself.

There are a lot of things that I had been running away from and I wanna run away from. But at this moment, I have the road ahead of them carved on my mind. I guess there's where the senses come into shape and the despair takes its form within the void. Today I understand something, even where there is a road, if one has doubts, he will not complete the journey.

We do not let bygones be bygones. We co-exist with them. By acknowledging them, I know that I am growing weaker and weaker daily. Weaker in the sense of getting stronger. From the two questions above, I understand now that those people do not try hard to earn expectations. I think that, the qualities of those who are really successful do not lie in how much stronger they want to get by each passing day. Rather, they are trying to struggle harder each day to find out what is getting them weaker each day.

Roosevelt experienced WWII in a very unique way. He saw the glory of US ascending in his previous terms, having the notion that US is working its way towards the strongest nation on earth while the image is shattered by the Japanese's swift attack on Pearl Harbor. What makes him a strong leader later on? Personally I think it's his acknowledgment of the incapability of US army and at the same time trying to find out the weaknesses that had been the blind spot of US. If one does ponder about the way US fought WWII, you would find how careful the strategies had been devised. That could not have been possible without a humble mind.

Churchill is probably the star figure of WWII, but we also know that the British had been fighting a losing war since the beginning. Who could have endured on under that kind of situation, especially if you are the leader? If Churchill had been an elite since young, a person who keeps achieving the highest grades in school and is clean of drugs and booze, I don't think he will survive even a month holding that post. His past gives him the perfect chemistry: He knows that he is not doing enough every day. And he knows that he will make mistakes now and then. Therefore he listens. Therefore he shows his true self when he is motivating his people, because he is not God. He is just a normal person like every one of them, and moreover he is conscious that he might not be as good as any one who is fighting under his command.

So what comes next? Yes you know what it is. Just do it.

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You

So who gets to decide what kinda feelings you should have at this very moment?
Answer: You

So who gets to decide who you are in love with?
Answer: You

So who gets to decide who is in love with you?
Answer: You

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Whisper

In the crowd of noise, I couldn't hear you. The only thing I can do is laugh.

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HKUST

In this uni, we are not striving for excellence or whatsoever. We are looking for something, and that something is ourselves.

In a foreign environment we come to realize who we are and how different we are. And when we try to adjust we change. And when things go wrong, we start to see what's churning inside of us and we start to shun away the environment.

Have confidence. Have faith.

Confidence is not something that you build up with each and every passing day. It is something that naturally comes when you start to acknowledge your own strengths and weaknesses. And that comes after you start to discover yourself. This indeed, needs courage. Because naturally one will try to run away from his/her own darkness in him/herself into the comfort zone where there is nothing else to worry or to think about. To grab the strength and confidence to stand up again, you need to brave the waves and endure. Feel the darkness totally, engulf yourself in it and let the merciless needles pierce through every single part of you.

Then you realize something: you are not dead yet.

This is life. I believe in something: when too much good happened, something bad will come along; but when too much bad happened, something good is on the way, surely. It is a cycle. More of the bad things, that means the good things that will entail will be much bigger.

So what happens in the end? Who knows. But I know something for sure. The answer will only reveal itself to those who don't give up. Those who still walk on the path even they know how weak they are. Because this path is their choice. That means: when you made a choice, follow through. Coz what's waiting for you in the end of the horizon will surely be a rising dawn.

Every single effort is worth it. Everything that happened, happens for a reason. And it is you who needs to understand the choice that you've made, not about why you made that choice. Ain't this life? There are so many choices made by ourselves both consciously and subconsciously. And there are so many choices made on us by so many other different people surrounding us. In the end of the day, if you try to disentangle all those knots, you will surely go nuts.

At this stage, what I believe is, believe in those knots. Those knots are there because they are there for a reason, and that reason is surely for good. For example, I got a C in my soil mechanics, and that happened to be my supervisor's subject. But because of that C, I was so eager to learn things that I missed and things that are new to me. I know my weakness and thus I can face myself in a lower stance, not trying to get too snobbish or air-headed. Because of that, I get to ascend to the highest peak.

Know thyself. That is what HKUST taught me in 3 years.

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Smile

Your footsteps echoed in the cinema, although there were noise covering it.

In the midst of the noise, I saw your smile. It's the 'bestest' thing I ever saw in my life. And because of it, I cherish my life.

Whatever that is to come, walk on, without regret, without hesitation. In the end, only those who do not give up are destined to see what God has arranged for them.

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