Last night, for the first time in many years, I went to catch a "getai" at Lorong Lew Lian (even the location sounds so heartland-ish). Anyway, since I've watched 881 2-3 years back, I've been wanting to go catch one, but given that it's a "seasonal" entertainment, if you miss it one year, you'd have to wait another 12 months to catch one. If you're wondering what a getai, I'd suggest you check out the wiki description of a Getai. It's something which I think is Uniquely Singapore - and given the recent saga of food copyrights with Malaysia, I think we should lay stake and apply for copyright protection for the getai scene. ;p

So anyway, last night's getai was amusing to me, cos it was a Getai with a message, which I guess you could liken to product placements in a movie. The getai was sponsored (partly i think) by NCPG, which stands for National Council of Problem Gambling. The name itself sounds like a movie rating though (NC16 + PG?), so a number of the audience members were fanning themselves with a NCPG paper fan (printed in patriotic red and white), and the hosts on stage were hawking the messages from NCPG, somewhat different to what a normal getai would be.

If you're looking to find out where and when the next Getai would be, I bet you didn't know that you could find it on the Stomp website. Amusingly (again), it was my uncle who told me about it. Check it out at Getai A-go-go and click on Getai schedule.....

Labels: Getai, Singapore

I was at the Cathay Picturehouse yesterday for the first time, to catch "A Matter of Size", as part of the Israeli Film Festival. And I was duly impressed that for one of the few times ever, the movie started punctually! (the movie was supposed to start at 9:20pm, and when I looked at my watch when it started - not the trailers mind you, it was 9:20.52pm...) Impressive. In fact, when the movie started, the (small) cinema was only about half-full (or half-empty... ;p), since I think most other patrons were still mingling outside. (Too bad!)


Personally, I kinda like indie films, without the Hollywood glitz. Plus I also like movies which are filmed in exotic places, like in Israel, and not your usual US-based, or Europe-based movies. The movie is about a (fat) man, named Herzl, who was part of a diet club, whom despite his "best efforts", was still putting on weight week after week. Whilst working at a Japanese restaurant (as a dish washer), he comes to know of Sumo, and decides to start his own Sumo club. And guess where he recruits his group members? From the diet club of course. Well, the story goes on to tell how they started a sumo competition, and how Herzl finds love in Ramle, and so on, but I guess in the end, this movie just reminds us that being skinny is simply just a sort of social phenomenon, and there were numerous hilarious moments in the film. It's a pity that there will/are only 3 screenings of the film during this festival (the last show is at 7.15pm tonight, but it's sold out...)

If you know of other upcoming film festivals, do let me know! :)

Labels: Movies

I've been so busy with work lately that I hardly found time to connect with my "spiritual self" - and by spiritual, I don't suppose I mean a kind of God-ly spiritual, but just connecting with my "soul". In fact, I've stopped doing things I used to do for leisure, like watching movies (the last movie I watched was District 9 two days ago, and UP about a month ago prior to that), watching anime (gosh, i can't believe I missed all of those episodes!), listening to music (and the radio), etc...

But anyway, last night I couldn't fall asleep - stupid me decided to drink Teh Halia Ais at 10.30pm, and I was looking through the stuff that I left behind in Cambridge, and only just got shipped back this year, together with Allan's stuff. In the box of forgotten treasures, I found Paulo Coelho's (author of "The Alchemist") "Like the Flowing River", which is a series short stories of his thoughts and reflections. It really good food for the soul btw, cos it gets you thinking about the things around you.

Here's a bit of a Japanese story that he quoted from the chapter "The Importance of the Cat in Meditation".

A great Zen master, in charge of the monastery of Mayu Kagi, owned a cat, who was the real love of his life. During meditation classes, he always kept the cat by his side, in order to enjoy its company as much as possible.

One morning, the master, who was already quite old, was found dead. The oldest disciple took his place.

"What shall we do with the cat?" asked the other monks.

In homage to the memory of his former teacher, the new master decided to allow the cat to continue attending the classes on Zen Buddhism.

Some disciples from neighbouring monasteries, who travelled widely in the region, discovered that, in one of the most famous temples in the area, a cat took part in the meditations. The story began to spread.

Many years passed. The cat died, but the students at the monastery were so used to its presence that they acquired another cat. Meanwhile, other temples began introducing cats into their meditation classes; they believed that the cat was the one actually responsible for Mayu Kagi's fame, and for the quality of its teaching, forgetting what an excellent teacher the former master had been.

A generation passed, and technical treatises on the importance of the cat in Zen meditation began to be published. A university professor developed a thesis, accepted by the academic community, that the cat had the ability to increase human concentration and to eliminate negative energy.

And thus, for a century, the cat was considered an essential part of the study of Zen Buddhism in that region.

Then a master arrived who was allergic to cat hair, and he decided to remove the cat from his daily practices with the students.

Everyone protested, but the master insisted. Since he was a gifted teacher, the students continued to make progress, despite the cat's absence.

Gradually, monasteries - always in search of new ideas, and weary of having to feed so many cats - began to remove cats from the classroom. Over the next twenty years, revolutionary new theses were written, bearing persuasive titles like "The Importance of Meditation Without a Cat" or "Balancing the Zen Universe by the Power of One's Mind Alone and Without the AId of Animals".

Another century passed, and the cat vanished completely from the Zen meditation ritual in that region. But it took two hundred years for everything to return to normal, and all because, during that time, no one thought to ask why the cat was there.

I guess this is somewhat true in the society of today - we simply follow what others have done, and we're simply a society of copycats. :) Of course, if you remember my post some time back, you'd remember what I mentioned about the herd mentality.

For now though, I will read some more chapters of the book. :)

Labels: Life

w00t! So I am one of the geeks in the world who have upgraded his Mac to the new Mac OS X (Snow Leopard)! Though this new OS doesn't boost any major change - (I can't quite spot the diff between the Leopard and Snow Leopard to be honest, other than Expose looking a little different), but for the price of just S$49, I think it's reasonable. Apparently, a reviewer found that it takes just 22 secs to boot up using Snow Leopard, compared to 29 secs for Leopard, so I guess the Snow Leopard does run faster eh? ;p

Speaking of which though, I wonder what the next version of the Mac OS will be called? FYI, the Cheetah was the first of the Mac OS 10 series, and it seems the slower the cat, the faster the Mac. Maybe we will have a Mac OS Pussy Cat? :)

Labels: Mac

A Happy Teacher's Day to one and all of the teaching fraternity out there! (And what a way to mark it with my 400th post - actually it's the 400th and something post, cos i didn't label every post as a chapter).

Anyhow, yesterday was the teacher's day celebrations in school. I think we were one of the few (read: ONLY) school, who had lessons till 12.25pm and then concert afterwards. Not that I'm complaining much, since I didn't have many lessons yesterday. ;p But it's also a rather special day, since it's the first teacher's day that I'm celebrating as a teacher! :) Received some cards and gifts from various students - I must say it's much nicer to receive a handmade card with a note written in it - chicken soup for the soul!

And a break finally today, after slogging it out for the Common Tests (CA2) the last couple of weeks. For now, it's back to work!

Labels: Teaching