Week 0 Redux

The week is just about done, and things are indeed starting to fall into place somewhat. One silly thing that I keep having problems over is the relative confusion over the dates, since I keep thinking that Sep 01 is on Saturday, as opposed to Monday. That is fast changing however, due to the fact that it is the Labour Day weekend, which pretty much means free food and a day of rest [of sorts].

Homework has started to stream in slowly, and life is starting to look really different now, since my priorities and modes of operations have shifted a little here and there. It's a strange year ahead, and I know it deep within my bones.

I can't seem to be able to write more, so I shall just stop here. Perhaps a cycle through Schenley will help make things a little more palatable.

Lily Was Here

"Lily was here" is a fun song for the alto-sax. Now I want an alto-sax badly... I'll probably buy one when I return to Singapore.

Blurb

Indeed, it just feels so long, since the last time I actually wrote anything here. School has begun, and like all things related to school, there is much to be done before I actually have the chance to just sit down and catch a bit of breath.

The week is almost done, and honestly, the outlook seems alright. Networks does prove to be a more interesting class than Operating Systems, and of course there's the whole thing about Algorithms that makes it literally interesting.

There is much reading/writing to be done, and it will indeed be a most fruitful semester. Will I be stressed out under the onslaught of all that heads my way? That, I cannot forsee, because it is still too early to say. Homework has been released, and with a little advanced planning, I ought to be able to get most of it done before they are actually due. That is of course the more important aspect of things.

So this is my final year in Carnegie Mellon University; there's so much that I like about this place, and yet as time passes the level of alienation just increases slowly but surely. Perhaps it is because of the rapid changes that are occurring in the environment, or it could just be me being not very responsive to the changes and thus feeling the awkwardness. Perhaps I will figure out things as and when they arrive, and that things will be much nicer in the long run.

And yes, SSA has its first chill. I'm glad that I only have to be around for less than 30 minutes, since I have Kiltie Band rehearsal at 1730hrs. I don't want to undergo unnecessary steps just to humour the legions of people who have vastly different views of life than me.

That's all for now, perhaps. I need to grab some food before I collapse from hunger (last meal was at about 0800hrs).

Pressure Mounts

And so, the pressure mounts, really, for it is truly a moment of desperation of sorts. All hopes placed in a single basket, which makes things really uncomfortable and completely frightening. I chose this path myself, and through the various levels of inaction, have now to suffer for my folly.

How am I to cope with this? How am I to be able to handle this problem now?

I know not the answer except to bury my head low and work on this as best as I can.

Academic Year Begins

After a rather odd journey halfway across the world, I'm finally back at where my current journey was left off. So strange, the first time I set foot here was almost two years ago, and I found the place rather different to begin with. Today, when I set foot upon it again after being immersed in my home world for a good 3 months, I find that the old feeling of something being different returning once more.

So the new academic year begins.

Radio Silence Once More

Once more I find myself seated at the airport again, waiting for my flight out of Singapore to return to Pittsburgh, where my current life is located. Transitional locations... things that till this day, never cease to amaze me. It will be a while till I'm able to get connected to anything else, and so meanwhile I shall just declare a moment's radio silence, at least until I've arrived at my final destination for this trip.

This upcoming year promises to be a rather interesting one, considring the fact that there are so many things that I'll need to deal with, among which include the concept of graduation. All things have more or less come to full circle, and this will once more prove to be one of those things that I'll need to learn how to deal with.

That said, it is almost time for boarding. I shall talk more about these at a more convenient time.

Till next time.

2GiB for Edythe-EEE

So I've upgraded the RAM on Edythe-EEE from 512MiB to 2GiB. Overall, she does seem a little more responsive, and this makes me glad.

Now I've really achieved what I perceive to be the best set-up for Edythe-EEE. Code hacking ought to be fun.

Next up ought to be the upgrade of the battery.

sftp, ssh, scp

Just a quick blurb. ssh -X will allow X-forwarding provided you have a running X-server on the host machine (an example for Microsoft Windows would be Xming). sftp allows simple FTP-style manipulations of SSL.

Recursive copies over SSL are performed with scp -r user@hostname:remotepath localpath from the *nix prompt.

Cygwin works well in supporting these.

That's all.

Mild Panic Prior to Party

So, roughly 20+ hours before the annual meet-up amongst the scholars, I'm starting to have my usual dose of misgivings. The reasons are still the same as before—I just don't feel that I might fit in well.

Then why the heck do I still attend such meet-ups? It is indeed a rather interesting problem. Honestly, I don't believe that I have a really good reason why this is so, but one thing that I can think about is the fact that deep inside, I'm still human and maintaining good contacts with these folks helps in the preservation of my humanity (of sorts).

The sad thing of course is that each time after these meet-ups, I tend to become even more morose for a while. Maybe I feel inferior to what they have done; maybe I'm just a plain worrier. I honestly have no idea whatsoever. Perhaps this time round, when the numbers are fewer and made up of people that I sort of know a little more, I can be a little more comfortable with myself. Hmm... on a semi-related note, how crazy ought I to be? My craziness isn't KY-styled, nor is it Ding-styled; mine is notoriously geeky and over-the-top at times. Maybe I ought to bring a couple of machines over with the intention of sitting down and programming should the need arise.

Eww... I think that it defeats the whole purpose of turning up to the gathering/party. I should just be normal; no one else is going to bring a laptop, let alone two. Awww, screw it. I'll just bring along my laptops, and see how it all goes on. Some of these things... just need to be figured out on the spot, and worrying about it before hand is so not going to be useful, at all.

On an unrelated note, I've finished watching Black Lagoon. This is more adult-themed than most of the other animes that I've watched, in the sense that it has much more explicit violence involved in it. Storyline-wise, it wasn't too bad; the art style was less cutesy than the "usual" anime style and a little more realistic in feel [for an anime]. Hellsing, the other anime that I've completed watching some time back, is similar in genre but boasts a more stylised animation technique, which makes it all the more spooky, as compared to Black Lagoon. Both are excellent animes, though their content matter is more suited for a mature audience.

Deus Ex is one computer game that I've recently embarked on. It is an interesting game in its own right, mixing role-playing elements (like skills and inventories) with first-person shooting. The gameplay of Deus Ex is similar to that of Hitman, in the sense that there's a lot of sneaking around involved—it is neigh impossible to play Deus Ex or Hitman using an all-out brute force approach. Firstly, there is a severe lack of availability of heavy weapons and ammunitions, which makes it more tactically sound to rely on stealth and sneaky weapons. Secondly, the areas of combat are really restrictive, unlike in games like Quake, where the expansive landscape and relative abundance of ammunition and weapons makes it much easier to engage in armed combat.

Which style of gameplay do I prefer? I like games like Quake and Unreal Tournament for their no-nonsense frag-fest, but sometimes, all the non-stop action is nasty on the eyes, because when playing these fast-paced games, I actually blink even less than usual (I'm known to blink very little to start with), which makes eye irritation and fatigue to be a real issue. So, sneaking games like Deus Ex is a refreshing change for me for once in a while, though the intricate plot sometimes makes it irritating. Deus Ex doesn't suffer that tremendously as compared to other games in its genre (like Hexen), but it's long narrative does sometime cause some irritation.

So, while Deus Ex is a refreshing change, I doubt I'm going to dump Quake or Unreal Tournament anytime soon. That's about it for now, I think.

Death

Death is interesting, serene, and comforting. To be able to be embraced by Death's loving arms, seems to be the ultimate life that one can ever live.

But like all questions that one asks oneself, how does one seek Death? There are, unfortunately, many ways to die, but they are largely separated into honourable means and dishonourable means, and not by suicide nor homicide, contrary to popular belief.

Should Death be sought as a means of escape, then it is likely to be dishonourable, particularly if the choice of dying is short and painless. Even the path of Death chosen is for escapism can be made honourable if the method in which one is despatched involves the greatest amount of pain that can be inflicted in the longest amount of time. This explains why the act of seppuku is considered honourable, while the act of shooting one's head with a shotgun isn't.

The underlying assumption is that pain is something that one seeks to avoid, and to seek it as the penultimate step to actual Death would entail that one did not choose Death as merely a means of escape, but as a rite of passage towards something that would liberate them. It is the concept of "rite of passage" that separates an honourable death from a dishonourable one.

Legends from around the world have often placed the death of a warrior in battle as the among the most honourable Death that one could get, while those who just died of old age tend to be belittled as being weak and dying dishonourable ones.

Honourable deaths are hard to come by in this time and age—no one is foolish to emabark on a war or battle just to die honourably. However, dishonourable deaths are far too easy to attain. Some examples include leaping off tall buildings, hanging oneself, or even to be knocked down by motor vehicle while crossing the road carelessly.

Perhaps we ought to see Death by old age as an honourable Death in this era, since the number of ways to die dishonourably is much more than that of an honourable Death.

A Failure

I think I'm a failure. Even though I'm designated as the assistant conductor of my Chinese Orchestra, there is much that even I don't really know. While some might say that I have some talent in feeling for the music, I think that this "talent" is still too raw to be of any good use to everyone else.

Guess that means that I need to put more effort into trying to learn more.

Passion

What is it that makes one person to be revered with greatness while others are quickly forgotten? Is it a political ideal? Could it be sheer wealth or scientific ingenuity? Perhaps, considering the fact that till this day we still remember the Rockefellers and the Einsteins of the world with some awe.

What is it that binds these people whom we acknowledge for their greatness? I suspect that the underlying thing that binds them to our consciousness is that of their passion. Passion here can be one of a multitude of things; it could be the compassion that they have for others, or the great eternal love they share with a special someone, or it could even be the strong interest that they have for the field that they are studying.

Passion. Why did I bring up this topic out of the blue? Because that's something that I've been wondering about for quite a while. In my previous post, I was talking a lot about emotions and after watching Ouran High School Host Club again, something inside me seemed to have been awakened. It is this whole concept of passion.

It would seem that among the things that people look out for in others, passion ranks as among the highest attributes that they see. People feel touched when they sense the passion that is within one. All these feelings of passion are what makes people great.

[Ed: I wrote this a bunch of days back, but somehow lost the drive to finish it. I'm going to publish this as is.]

Aimless Wandering of Thoughts

Life can sometimes be like a myope walking around without his/her glasses. The myope can see that in the far side of the road, there are obstacles or people who might be able to provide help, but since he/she is a myope, the views of the far end of the road are just a blur, and all that the myope can see are things that are much closer.

Sometimes, some people can see far very clearly, but can't see clearly things that are close to them. They have lofty aims, and often make it really big professionally due to their foresight, yet when it comes to living in the current time, they seem to be unable to meet the mark.

Yet there are others who cannot see either far or near clearly—they end up banging into a lot of painful obstacles until they learn how to see things using more than just their eyes.

And there are the lucky ones who have near-perfect vision, and can see both near and far well. Some of them become very strong leaders to guide those who can't see near, others as leaders for those who can't see far. Yet there are a few who will just silently walk on the road, knowing full well that their near perfect vision grants them a preternatural ability to avoid all obstacles near and far, and not evangelise to other folks whom they think are not worth the time and effort that they have been using.

But for all those who are not blessed with a pair of perfect eyes, they can rely on their eye glasses to help them see better. In life, these glasses are the opportunities that arise to widen one's reflective equilibrium, the education that we receive, and the experience that we gain whenever we hit an obstacle and fall. We almost never walk the road alone; there are others who share part of the journey with us. Sharing our visions with others, we can learn more about the world, and with the people that walk with us, we can have an almost perfect vision together.

Life is not about walking the road alone. There're always companions to be found along the way. The only thing that makes life difficult sometimes, is that one's companions are not always going to be around forever. The loss of a companion, no matter temporary or permanent, is often a reason why some people just sit down on the road and cry for a bit, unable to proceed. With our companions on the road, we have an intertwined destiny of sorts, and their loss can cause a gaping hole in one's collective consciousness.

——

I never truly liked goodbyes. Goodbyes are one of those moments where the sense of loss can simply overwhelm my rather delicate emotional states. Despite the fact that I know that partings are as much as a part of life as are joinings, I can never seem to reconcile with that fact in my heart of hearts. My biggest discomforts in life are largely stemmed from goodbyes from various people, many of them who are friends at some time or another. To say that I'm just an emotionless logic machine, would be a vast underestimation of my humanity.

I broke down before. It is something that I don't really like to bring up, but there're no secrets, really. The break down was not wholly unexpected, given the circumstances in which it occurred. Don't get me wrong, life is beautiful and all, but life can also be a bitch at times. And it is at those times where if one does not have enough support, one breaks down. As I steadily increase in age, it seems that I am slowly regaining what was my lost humanity. And it shows in the most unlikely of places.

As a musician, I was only a technical player, being able to play the notes as they were annotated on the music score, following with mechanical precision the timing and dynamics. I was not a bad player, but all who were more experienced than me told me that my music was lacking in emotional content; all they heard were just unconnected tones, and not the music that was within. But as I slowly egressed from my self-made shell of isolation, I began to understand what was it they meant when they said that my music was lacking in emotional content. I started to listen to Teresa Teng's music, and from there I slowly learnt how to bring out the emotion that was within the music.

I used to play with only my fingers, now I play with my heart. Any wind instrument that I pick up, as long as I knew how to play notes on it, I could play music now. Emotions... something that I once thought that I would never need, have become something that I am slowly learning to accept as being a part of me.

It is the repressed emotions of many years that caused my break down. It was not a pretty sight, from any perspective. Life was literally being turned upside down through the destructive thoughts of the break down. I couldn't help it then—my rational mind was screaming at me to stop the idiocy that I was displaying, but I couldn't reign in the uncontrollable outburst of emotions. I broke down so hard and so bad, that people got worried, people who truly cared, and people who didn't really care all too much. That night when it happened, it was a dark night indeed.

Today, right here, right now, as I am saying all these, I cannot tell if I've truly gotten over that break down that I had. I think that I am fine, and no one seems to notice anything truly different about me, but this is one of those things where it is really hard to tell. Sometimes I sit alone in the dark and look out the window, like the many nights I had before the break down, thinking about things in the past, present and future, wondering about the things that I could have done, and the things that I have done, and the things that I need to have done. Each time I sit in silent solitude in the dark contemplating, I always wondered what I would have become had I chosen a different path in life.

——

The moon. She lured me, enticed me, then mocked me and spurned me. Now she sits up there in the pretty sky serene and quiet, her rays of light bathing me in a strange silent glow. I used to love the moon, then I hated it; now I just feel sorry for it. For in all the actions of mankind, good or bad, at least we are together as one. The moon just sits there, alone in her heavenly throne, and can only sigh at whatever happens beneath her feet, as her eternal glances upon earth, go on into infinity.

I looked upon the moon's face, and thought, goodbye world.

Environmentally Friendly Mumbo-Jumbo

What exactly does one mean when one says of being "green"? Unfortunately for us all, it would seem that what people think to be "green" really are things that seem to consume less energy when in use, or their overall phenotype just appears to be a more environmentally friendly alternative.

The truth of the matter is often quite different. While I do not disagree that an appliance that consumes less energy during operation is more "green" than one that doesn't, it is surely a folly to think that that is the only factor in which we are considering. The appliance or object that we are looking at often has some sort o manufacturing process behind it, and the fact is that I doubt there's anyone who actually took the opportunity to do a complete calculation on the actual amount of energy and resources that are used in the production of the product.

Here's an example. In the production of consumer electronics, various types of semi-conductors are used. We know that for a large portion of these devices, the purity of silicon is of major concern. The production costs of pure silicon is fairly substantial, if one factors in the need to have a very controlled environment to prevent contamination, or even the fact that silicon itself has a very high melting point and thus requires copious amounts of energy just to smelt it down. Now factor in the act that impure samples of the silicon are not really reused, and there's probably the need to actually reheat and re-purify the silicon die. All these require energy, and at the end of the day, we are still looking at a manufacturing process that requires the same if not more energy to produce the so-called "green" equivalents.

Perhaps one way of actually achieving the whole concept of "greenness" is to look into better energy resources. When I say "better", I do mean that the efficiency of the power generation is much higher than it is now. Even the relatively "clean" nuclear fuel is not exactly very efficient, as considerable amounts of th generated energy is lost when used to heat up water to turn the turbines. If a more direct way of using the energy is discovered, we would be in a better position than before in having clean energy.

But now of the things that we always need to think about is, do we really care what the output is at the end of the day? Are we really that interested in having a "green" world? Have we transcended our own human nature and realise that there's a tomorrow that we can look forward to? Somehow, I sincerely doubt it. Consider the situation nearly 200 years ago. The world was in a much better state environment-wise. This had something to do with the fact that there wasn't any organism that was in a position that can cause a global change to hat was essentially a very "natural" thing. But the creation of modern science and th quest towards world domination has led to inventions that were great then, but were slowly recognised as being detrimental to the environment only decades after it was first discovered. By then, the invention had already proliferated throughout the world in its many forms, and the damage would have been done. Remember the whole CFC fiasco? It was only a couple of decades before folks realised the kind of damage that was happening, and it was only then that science had a means of explaining.

In my opinion, in order to have a more environmentally friendly future, science itself has to be more conscious of its far-reaching effects. Often the discoveries of damages occur only after their effects have been felt—it is very reactionary and highly irresponsible. In the quest of developing new technology, one must not forget the fact that the world today owes its existence to science, be it good or bad. All the "save-the-world" movements in the world will amount to nothing if the creators of the technology themselves do not recognise the problems that each of their solution brings.

Am I being idealistic here? Perhaps a little, but I strongly believe that for any action to actually have a lasting impact, we need to bring about change at the most fundamental aspect of it all, and to nip the problem literally in the bud. Only through this, will we be able to actually do something that can make amends for the drastic changes that we have made to the environment.

Edythe-EEE Xubuntu: Overall Success

So I'm now sitting in one of those places where I can get free wireless broadband access and testing out Edythe-EEE's wireless capabilities. And I'm proud to announce that the wireless LAN works flawlessly even under this Xubuntu installation. This is fairly important, for it means that I now can truly make use of Edythe-EEE as a portable platform when the situation arises. Compared to Elyse, Edythe-EEE's strengths are that it is ultra-portable. This strength, however, comes at a price, since the battery life of Edythe-EEE is much shorter than that of Elyse.

Put in another way, Edythe-EEE's purpose is to provide that extra-portable computing power for me on the move, and is to be deployed under situations where Elyse may be too bulky to get the job done.

That all said and done, I guess it is time to end this post for now.

Edythe-EEE Has Xubuntu Now

And with some effort and plenty of help from online, I've finally managed to get a working Xubuntu operating system working on Edythe-EEE, my ASUS EEE PC. The only caveat here is that it is running Gutsy Gibbon instead of Hardy Heron, which, at the current stage of things, isn't going to be a really big problem right now. Perhaps in the future, I'll need to reconsider this step, but for now, as far as I'm concerned, this set up is already great as it is. Check out how it looks like:Granted, it doesn't really look like much, but with this upgrade of sorts from the original watered-down Xandros version, it is so much better and can thus support my programming and work better.

Oh, need I mention the fact that I'm typing up this post right from Edythe-EEE herself? The one big drawback that everyone seems to bring up is the fact that the keyboard is absolutely tiny. In my opinion, it is not as bad as it seems to be, once you are a decent enough touch-typist of course. The sheer size of the keyboard means also the rather lack of tactile feel of the keys, or rather, the tactile response. Thus, the keys will require a fraction bit of strength more than the usual larger keyboard.

I also realised that the problem that I was facing earlier with regards to the Ethernet port not working on Edythe-EEE was the fact that a cold boot was required. Apparently, a power cycle was necessary to ensure that the network adapter is recognised. This is the only quirk that seems to have occurred during the two times that I did the whole reinstall. Hopefully, this problem will not surface itself again.

Now I have yet another machine that I can use to deploy for the various projects that I might have in mind. Meanwhile, let me see if I can hack out something that is a little more useful to me at the moment.

Also, I'm never going to run Microsoft Windows on Edythe-EEE. It is pointlss; she has only 4GiB of internal storage, so installing that bloated operating system and the whole shebang to make it squeak along is not acceptable at all.

Alright, that's all for now, perhaps. Till next time.

Lurking In The Background + News Media Issues

Yet another day has passed me by, and honestly speaking, with the lack of a direction of what exactly to do, I've slowly lapsed into a state of ire. While on the one hand I am glad to have the chance to actually take a break of sorts from the hustle and bustle, on the other hand I realised that I actually miss the whole shebang of actually being busy.

Perhaps my defining moment about life is that of being in a constant state of business, always having to do one item after another, meeting each deadline as they arrive? That I cannot truly tell, but perhaps a few anecdotes might show the direction that I'm leaning towards.

In general, I tend to like lurking in the background and working on things that way. Once upon a time, I was one who was always glad of the limelight, and would somehow manage to end up in positions where the spotlight would be on me, all in the good sense of the word of course. But as time went on and I starting to see how the world is, I realised that perhaps it was wholly unnecessary of me to try to be in the limelight all the time; lurking in the background and being humble can take my much further, because I can learn more due to my unobtrusive nature. One must be really sure of one's abilities in order to be able to take the limelight, for once one is there, seeking help will become a really difficult thing to do, because of the whole issue of pride and the light in which people sees one.

The spark that I once had while younger, has evolved into a steady flame that burns steadily against the strong winds. I might not have that kind of exuberance like when I was only a child, but I'm pretty certain that the determination and enthusiasm that I had then is still with me, albeit in a different form. Perhaps I had said this before, but I think it'd be good to say it again—I'm not fighting for myself, I'm not travelling through time to see the world for myself, I'm doing it for the people who believe in me. Does this mean that I believe in myself too? Perhaps, but in my mind, that is something that I ask myself only sporadically. Why worry about something that you don't really know how to start answering? Why not look at the things that you know, and figure out some greater truth from there?

[Ed: I just realised that I had written an earlier post lambasting mass media some time back. Talk about a genuine and consistent dislike of this group of folks.]

On a wholly unrelated note, I'm not too fond of the mass media in general. There's something about the concept of a "scoop" that does not sit well with me. In the bid to obtain the best "scoop", madd media companies and freelance folks have resorted to questionable practices, like stalking their targets, or even harassing them through their insistent questioning techniques, and sometimes even haranguing in public just to be able to evoke an emotional outburst to be able to make that "scoop". There is no news media that is exempt from this act, from traditional print media to those based on the Internet. This is all an issue about human psychology and perception.

That's why I refuse to read newspapers nowadays, because I simply do not condone such acts of invasion towards a person's privacy and rights.

We ought to get this straight with ourselves: media companies are not our defenders of rights and liberties; the folks who are going to fight for our rights are those who are willing to go to court to contest the issues that we find to be uncomfortable over. Media companies have only one aim in their existence; it is the same aim as all other companies, and it is to make a profit. Technically, they might have an obligation to report the truth, but practically, there is no real provision towards reporting the truth in a completely unbiased manner, or even to report the truth for that matter. Media companies will report whatever they can get away with, and the more outrageous the report they can provide, the better their sales and thus the better their profits. Which brings us to my original grouse of reporters doing anything to get themselves the "scoop".

I watch with disgust on some of the ways in which reporters carry themselves. Instead of treating their interviewee as a person, they treat them as some kind of prisoner, and end up asking very prying questions or asking in ways that are not polite at all. These forms of treatment extend beyond your average citizen—they are employed even on important people like the leaders of a country, or even celebrities. Another related issue is the reporters' general "know-it-all" attitude. The sad thing about it is that like many things related to news and media in general, misrepresentations of actual information gets used a lot. Some classic examples include the perversion of the word "hacker" and the "Anonymous" hacker group. It's ridiculous to the point of pure disgust. Just watch the video clip that I linked to and observe how the presenters make everything sound legitimate and completely correct, when reality is far more different.

What do these all show? The target of the news media is not to inform the public, but to make the public feel informed. There's a subtle difference there: if the objective is to inform the public, then more can be done in terms of actually obtaining better accuracy and to seek expert opinions on the matters at hand, and not to just blabber about something with that "know-it-all" tone when the fact is that they don't really know what they are talking about. However, through the various techniques that one observes in the presentation of news reports, it can be seen that informing the public is rarely the key objective (unless it is some government sponsored public message), the news media provides just enough truth to gain some legitimacy, and then fudges the rest to make it "sensational".

Oh right, I almost forgot about that word, "sensational". If a story is not "sensational", then it will not be a part of the news. Thus, normal pickpocket cases hardly appears in the news, unless of course if someone really big and famous gets pickpocketted. This is what I think academic circles call "selection bias", i.e. to only select stories that best toe the "official line".

Alright, I'm getting sick of bashing the mass media companies. Hopefully, the audience that they are earning their money off can be educated enough to understand that not all sources of information seek to inform them, and to always seek objectivity as the basis of learning about what is going on in the world. Someone did say, "Comments are free, but facts are sacred." Now, if only those news folks would remember that adage.

Myth Debunking

Contrary to popular belief, I actually do not like the glamour road. I used to be That Guy who was always appearing in very public places, doing lots and lots of things, so much so that people started to get really jealous and stuff about it. Nowadays, I'm just happy to work behind the scenes, and to just appear as and when I need to. I don't feel a need to assert/prove myself through such petty displays of ability, but like all folks, if there is a need to actually step forth to do things of that nature, I can do it; I just make the choice not to for the most part.

Glamour is a very icky thing. In the beginning, it is all nice and fun, because you have this feeling of superiority over other folks, because you feel Special, you feel like you've become the centre of attraction for this side of the world. But as time goes by, people start to alienate you because of your ways, and you end up befriending others who are just as star-struck as you are, and at the end of the day, you would have forgotten how to communicate with the man-on-the-street.

I guess that is a pretty good summary of my early years.

I knew I was different from most folks; I never came from a rich family, nor do I go to those "magnet schools" for the rich and the famous. I'm just a silly neighbourhood kid who managed to make a few breaks here and there due to opportunity and the aid of people who sort of cared. That is probably the reason why I was never really comfortable with my fellow scholars from A*STAR.

Most of them come from rich families. Most of them lead very opulent lifestyles. Could this be some inferiority complex that I'm having? Perhaps it is the case, for I do find it hard to converse with them without feeling rather awkward, in the sense that I keep feeling as though they are better than I am, even though they are just my peers.

Ugh. No one did say that one must be friends with everyone, colleagues-to-be or not. I'll just have to suck it down and see what's going to happen next. I know that I'll never be as sophisticated as these people, but I know that at the end of the day, I'll be proud enough of my own skill to hold out on my own. If I cannot earn money nor friendship, at least I can earn some respect.

Phone in Working Order; Huzzah!

Amazingly, they've managed to re-flash the software of my phone, and so life seems to be moving on dandily with everything that ought to be working, working. The only caveat is that I lost all the data that was not backed up onto the SIM card, but then again that wasn't much data.

While trying to restore the settings on my phone, I realised that I couldn't really connect to it directly from Elyse using Bluetooth—it seems to be a deliberate limitation of the phone. Not an issue though; my US cellphone can accept stuff on the Bluetooth stack, and so I just used it as a proxy to handle the data transfers itself.

——

Not too long ago, I talked a little about how some friends just go cold. I realised that that very description that I wrote could very well be a description of me towards some other folks, I guess. The bottom line is that at the end of the day, we're all rather similar to each other, despite the efforts of some of us in trying to be as unique as we possibly can.

Maybe this is nature's way of regulating relationships between people?

That aside, I'm starting to feel that while on the one hand I'm much more human than I was, on the other hand, I'm starting to be even more detached than before. It's an interesting conundrum, both in the sense of how it got to that stage and why is it even in existence. To both these questions, I don't think that I have a good enough answer.

Sometimes life is infuriating. It throws you so many curve-balls, and you try your darndest to deal with that crap, and you just fail at it. Other times, things are really smooth, and then after a while you get scared, wondering if it is all just a dream and that something really bad will occur just around the corner or something.

But I guess that's what makes us human.

π-approximation day.

First off, happy π-approximation day! On a day like this, it is also interesting to note that I'm roughly 6 months more to turning 24. That is mildly disquieting; to think that I'm fast approaching my quarter-life mark. Scary thought.

——

So right now I'm working on Elyse in the middle of the Starbucks of Plaza Singapura, and from what I see, it seems that the store is under some form of auditing by what seems to be an internal auditor. I'll just sit down and watch the show, I suppose...

That's it for now. Oh wait, not really. I'm really uncontactable by cellphone for the next 3 days or so, so revert to email/facebook/carrier pigeon/IP over Avian Carriers.

Till then.