Yeah Baby Yeah~!

I'm gonna quote from an old entry.

I'm so mad and sad at the same time that I'm going to do my homework.

Yeah Baby Yeah~! Another rejection to the list. Woo-hoo~! *maniacal dance*

Ph34r my m4d skillz...


《激情过后》——张清芳

是谁狂妄地占据我的心
不让我有一丝的空隙
天天相见 却无时不思念
夜夜相依却留下 哭泣的你
是你再度回到我的身边
混乱我原有的平静
不得不说出 我的思绪
结局依旧是分离
在激情过后 我分析我自己
竟是不敢告诉你 依然爱你
在激情过后 我空虚不已
分离只是为了让你回忆
是你再度回到我的身边
混乱我原有的平静
不得不说出 我的思绪
结局依旧是分离
在激情过后 我分析我自己
竟是不敢告诉你 依然爱你
在激情过后 我空虚不已
分离只是为了让你回忆
在激情过后 我分析我自己
竟是不敢告诉你 依然爱你
在激情过后 我空虚不已
分离只是为了让你回忆


别再说是谁的错
让一切成灰
除非放下心中的负累
一切难以挽回
你总爱让往事跟随
怕过去白费
你总以为要体会人生
就要多爱几回
与其让你在我怀中枯萎
宁愿你犯错后悔
让你飞向梦中的世界
留我独自伤悲
与其让你在我爱中憔悴
宁愿你受伤流泪
莫非要你尝尽了苦悲
才懂真情可贵


《遗憾》——许美静
别再说是谁的错
让一切成灰
除非放下心中的负累
一切难以挽回
你总爱让往事跟随
怕过去白费
你总以为要体会人生
就要多爱几回
与其让你在我怀中枯萎
宁愿你犯错后悔
让你飞向梦中的世界
留我独自伤悲
与其让你在我爱中憔悴
宁愿你受伤流泪
莫非要你尝尽了苦悲
才懂真情可贵

与其让你在我怀中枯萎
宁愿你犯错后悔
让你飞向梦中的世界
留我独自伤悲
与其让你在我爱中憔悴
宁愿你受伤流泪
莫非要你尝尽了苦悲
才懂真情可贵

莫非要你尝尽了苦悲
才懂真情可贵
才懂真情可贵



《温柔的拒绝》——薛岳
假如说我能减少一份　对你的爱
我将不致感到　如此地无奈
我多么希望栖息　在你柔柔的胸怀
可是你只轻轻地　把头甩

假如说我能减少一份　对你的爱
我将不致感到　如此地无奈
我多么希望栖息　在你柔柔的胸怀
可是你只轻轻地　把头甩

年轻的日子　应该是多姿多彩
难道你真愿意　让它一片空白
纵然我日日夜夜　切切地等待
你温柔的拒绝　却没有更改
你温柔的拒绝　却没有更改

假如说我能减少一份　对你的爱
我将不致感到　如此地无奈
我多么希望栖息　在你柔柔的胸怀
可是你只轻轻地　把头甩

年轻的日子　应该是多姿多彩
难道你真愿意　让它一片空白
纵然我日日夜夜　切切地等待
你温柔的拒绝　却没有更改
你温柔的拒绝　却没有更改

年轻的日子　应该是多姿多彩
难道你真愿意　让它一片空白
纵然我日日夜夜　切切地等待
你温柔的拒绝　却没有更改
你温柔的拒绝　却没有更改

It's gonna be a long night...

Recursive flattening, recurrences, Physics papers, combinatorics assignments, laundry...

It's gonna be a long night tonight.

And I swear that Java is one language that makes one go lazy. Thank goodness that I still program in C... I can't imagine how I'd be like if all I can program in is a language that literally spoils you.

Okay, enough diversion... back to work!

Damn Illness... Get Away from Me DAMNNIT...

Being half-sick is no fun. I seem to have lost almost 50% of my brain power, and am suffering from loss of weekend time specially set aside for doing homework. Oh geez... what am I to do? I guess I just need to bite bullet and fight the whole battle with willpower, caffeine, and more determination than ever before.

Bah. Stupid weather... note to self: don't be a hero and move lumber in the freezing cold. No one cares if you freeze and cough to death... everyone will only care about the Booth and not you. So, don't be such a hero.

I am beholden to myself.

Grak.

Firefox Logo

The Firefox logo is so sweet that it makes a wonderful desktop wall paper. :-)



Oh, if you want the vector versions or ginormous png versions, they can be found here.

In other news, I've upgraded firefox to version 2.0, and have switched from liquifox (breaks in version 2.0, but works very well in 1.5) to miniFoxFlat. That helped me reclaim even more screen space. mwahahahahaha...

Edythe's Face

And yes, I've managed to shrink all the text and other stuff on Edythe down again. Everything is so much more compact than before, and it's becoming more and more like my style. More pixel estate dudes~!



The colour scheme used is Royale, which is essentially a face lift of the standard Luna theme that comes with Windows XP. I first saw this theme on a Windows Media Center edition desktop somewhere in some computer store some time last year, and have fallen in love with the cool shades of blue that it has. Compared with the solid (and dull) Luna, this is certainly a vast improvement.

Unlike most people, I love to keep my start menu and task bar above the screen, set to two lines, and kept hidden unless I move my mouse there. Well, for one, this increases the amount of screen space that I have to see my applications (90+ pixel space is roughly 10+ lines of code). For two, the top location makes it less obtrusive, since the title bar of the windows do not usually show anything worthed reading, while the status bars of most windows are below (and thus show more useful information). So, in the case where the start menu refuses to cooperate, no loss of productivity will be expected.

Notice the little command prompt window on the lower left? That's a bash shell straight out of cygwin, an excellent POSIX compatible interface for Windows machines. I've augmented it with several enhancements, including adding a date/time mechanism, and an in-house built battery indicator (the one in the picture shows that I'm running on AC and so there's no battery meter to show). Needless to say, this prompt packs a punch, and I can and do lots of system management straight from the bash shell. This includes controlling foobar2000, which is easily the most powerful and versatile music player available on the Windows platform.

By the way, the bash shell here is only for system management. Most of my code hacking is done with a much bigger bash shell that sits comfortably on the left side of the screen (always on the left, never shifted anywhere):



And if you thought this was big, wait till you see the next screen shot:



This is the badass way in which I do hard core hacking. It's actually 6 bash shells running in 6 xterms on an X-server, configured as shown in the picture above. It's a pretty powerful combination, allowing me to do lots of stuff at the same time without ever having to run to and fro the main windows interface. It's still Windows XP, but it is really a cygwin innovation.

And no, the 6 windows do not all reside at the same time on the screen; they are partitioned into 2x2 virtual screens. That makes it even more powerful than ever.

So much for a geeky post on Edythe's face. hahahaha...

Chinese New Year... what?

A Chinese New Year away from home, a Chinese New Year away from Singapore. How interesting a concept. Unsurprisingly, the whole mood here in Pittsburgh is nothing short of mundane; no one seems to be really interested in this whole festive season thing. It could just be that everyone's so overworked from all the stuff that they are lobbing at us in college that no one really cares that much anymore.

Or could it be because most people here identify themselves first as Americans, and then next as of being Chinese descent? Guess this question will be unanswered for quite a fair bit.

So the Singapore Students' Association (SSA) organised this Chinese New Year Reunion Dinner. It was a wonderful night. The whole event was organised simply, but it evoked the sense of belonging that appears to be the whole point of the reunion dinner. Food was much different from what we usually have, and since it was steam boat, everyone had a ball of a time trying to boil all the food stuff without causing too much problems (heheheh).

Earlier in the day, I had a teleconferencing with my family back in Singapore over a cross of MSN and Skype. It was quite dumb... MSN couldn't send sound across, while Skype couldn't send video, so we had to hybrid the two. Unfortunately, the house machine is underpowered to be able to perform and so in the end it was mainly a skype-based teleconversation. Not that it was bad, but at least it's good to be able to hear the voices of my family again. And, haha, my mum was surprised at my long-ish hair (it's gonna be so much longer by the time I return, that's for sure).

I gave RX a call too, via Skype, and managed to channel the songs "White and Nerdy" and "I bought on EBay" via the VoIP to him. He literally rofl'ed his way. I feel kinda bad that I couldn't play Diablo II with him over the Internet (had to do homework and stuff like that), and hope that I will be able to do so soon.

I gave Nicole and Yongji a call each to wish them happy new year, and they were kinda pleased too. =)

And so, another Chinese New Year, and another year added to my bludgeoning age. What the heck man... by the time I reach March, I feel as though I've aged by at least 2 years, with my birthday and Chinese New Year and all (yes, if you actually look up my lunar calendar age, I'm a whopping year older than the other 1985 babies).

Gak,

So, what's in for the year of the pig? Well, 3.8 is always hovering about (and will probably do so for the next few years heheheh). There's also other stuff to look into, like setting the ViCOMP question set (yes, I've ideas on the problem set, just need to sit down and type the damn thing out together with all the sample solutions in all the three languages), moving on with some personal life stuff, and going back to general hacking (boy do I miss writing programs).

That's about it, I guess.

新年快乐 to all who read this or the other blog.

Half dead, barely awake, half alive

V-day came... and passed once more. A day unlike any other, a day full of last minute programming, a day of theorem proving. And a day of mistakes.

*walks away, can't bear to say more*

:-(

24 hours of fasting later...

argh. After almost a day full of non-eating later, I've emerged weaker, and with whatever was plaguing my body removed. And now, off to handling a ginormous load of homework. Gark.

I'm so glad. I'm once again setting the programming round questions to ViCOMP 2007, hosted by the new VJC Infocomm Club, which is an incarnation of the iCOMP club.

How evil should I be?


*evil glint in eye*

Sick.... again??

Damn... I think that I'm sick now. Have a weird stomachache and am thinking of Transfinite Induction all the way through.

"Zero Case! Successor Case! Limit Case! Zero Case! Successor Case! Limit Case! Zero Case! Successor Case! Limit Case! Zero Case! Successor Case! Limit Case! Zero Case! Successor Case! Limit Case! Zero Case! Successor Case! Limit Case! Zero Case! Successor Case! Limit Case! Zero Case! Successor Case! Limit Case! Zero Case! Successor Case! Limit Case! Zero Case! Successor Case! Limit Case! Zero Case! Successor Case! Limit Case! Zero Case! Successor Case! Limit Case! Zero Case! Successor Case! Limit Case! Zero Case! Successor Case! Limit Case! Zero Case! Successor Case! Limit Case! Zero Case! Successor Case! Limit Case! Zero Case! Successor Case! Limit Case! ..."

Trying to purge the poison inside. Could it be that the mushrooms that I used to make the spaghetti last night have turned bad, and that my awfully blocked nose didn't realise it? Or is it the compound effect of epoxy glue (having to fix all my 笛子 since they all have fissures from the dry weather)?

Damn damn damn... have so much homework to do some more.... Grawk~ :-(

Now I remember...

In reference to this old post, I remember why I switched over the MSN Live! Messenger.

I could still type messages while appearing offline. Ugh.

Why can't they write the program properly and not let it crash as much?

It's 3:31am here, and...

It's 3:31am here, and I haven't the foggiest clue why I'm still awake. It's so ridiculous that I don't even want to venture a guess. Okay, back to main point.

It's been a long long long ... long week. Homework due almost every other day, bad program specifications (thus making me waste time debugging ugh), weird boolean algebra (why is the homework assigned from chapter 9 when we've scarcely covered chapter 3?), combinatorial game analysis (Hackenbush in "bamboo pole" form is just Nim), combinatorics (at least some thing that is easier, despite it being a level 300 course), paper writing (1 English essay draft to be ready next week, 1 math paper due next week), epoxying my broken watch and my 箫.

Damn, my room smells weird from the fumes of the epoxy. :-(

So, yeah. I've also been half-sick for the most part, which is another ridiculous thing that occurred. *yawnz* Blogging when one is half spaced out is really not a good idea... dunno if I'm coherent or not.

So after so long, I've decided to cut down all the insulation for Winter. That's right, I've started to do jogging. Not out in the cold, but on a treadmill in the gym that is just so close to where I live. I don't really have a choice there... am running out of jeans that I can wear, so I must do something about it. Actually, the main reason was the sad discovery that my legs aren't moving as fast as before; all the fat simply gets in the way and slows down my gait. If there's one thing that I don't really like, it is to be walking slowly when I'm supposed to be able to go further with my "trademark" large gait.

I'm behind in filing stuff now. Will probably spend the rest of the day doing that.

Maybe, if I still have energy, I'll do some work on a new blog that I've wanted to bring out, but have been tardying over...

Guess that's a wrap for now.

Me a Romantic? Wow...

In reference to my previous post, it turns out that I'm more of a romantic than I thought myself out to be. Most of my written works are heavily emotional pieces, juxtaposed with descriptions of the surrounding world.

This revelation came while having my Interpretation and Argument class. After doing sooo much math and science, I've forgot how much I actually enjoyed argumentation and writing in general. :-)

"You're just afraid of failure"

"If... if I asked you out, will you go out with me?"

This... question has been floating about in my head. It's really nasty to be thinking this question when I'm seriously still at odds with myself. There seems to be a complicated mix of emotions/rationalisations that are in existence deep within my psyche. It's really back to the same old arguments, me being the_laptop and me being human-ish. It's so old that I don't even want to rehash them here again.

Jimmy made a completely accurate (and blunt) assessment of my situation.

"You're just afraid of failure."

In more ways than one, that is so true. I've clawed my way to so far (given my highly mediocre skill sets) that I can't afford to lose. Despite efforts to turn into a really well-rounded individual, I realised that I'm far from it. Being a "Jack-of-all-trades" means that there's no single skill that I can rely on to provide for myself in the future, hence the dedication to the study of computer science. Failure is simply not an option that I'm willing to explore, because time is already running short, and there's so much that needs to be done, catching up notwithstanding.

But of course, Jimmy's statement wasn't really directed at my career/specialisation choice. He asked me, in very blunt terms (and in Mandarin, so that the 90% of the people around didn't understand what he said) whether I wanted a girlfriend. That did two things to me. First, it threw me off as I felt that he was really getting a little to close to something deeply personal. Second, I felt instantly irritated with that question, and delivered an icy reply to the effect of "I don't give a flying fuck dude, and stay out of my personal affairs". Which prompted the statement above.

Let's face it. I might act as though I'm fine and dandy, and that life goes on, but deep inside me, all is still not well. There's this inexplicable feeling of sadness whenever I approach the topic of relationships with myself, it seems as though that there is a kind of auto-repulsion to the idea of having a relationship. My human side, on really bad and lonely days, will throw up an idea of possibly hooking up with one girl for a long term relationship. Then, whatever-the-other-side is called will just have and instant revulsion to the idea and start lobbing out all the arguments that I've been laying out for so long. And then my human side gets beaten up senseless and is forced into retreat once again.

Put in other terms, I've lost the ability to approach romantic love. I've no more courage to take the first step (with the likelihood of failure), no more courage to say what I truly mean, no more strength to speak up for what I feel for. In short, I'm turning into a wussy, a cowardly person who, less than a year ago, was willing to fight someone all the way just to prove a point. Now I just sit there and get beaten all over verbally over my ideas.

What the hell is wrong with me?

Paper pile...

It's almost two weeks into the spring semester, and I've gathered enough paper piles to rival the entire first half of the last semester. That's right, paper piles enough to rival the entire first half of the last semester. It's sad, it's amazing but it's true. Taking so many courses (most of them of the high-level abstract-level kind) is really draining. Suddenly, I don't have much time to do stuff that I really like. Ugh. Guess that this comes with the task of having to complete a 4-year course in 3-years.

In other news, my 500GB hard drive has arrived and is working wonderfully. It's nicely compact, tough, and fairly quiet, making it a great addition to the stable of tools that Edythe has. Hopefully, this hard drive can last for quite a while, otherwise I'm gonna be tempted to get another 500GB to make it a whopping 1TB of data storage capability.

I'm now in the stage where I'm like a Math major minoring in CS major. Everything that I do now is heavily abstracted mathematics. Not that I don't like it, but it's starting to take it's toil on me in terms of the way that I view my major. Already, I'm doing very little programming now, and I've totally given up on the ACM ICPC. I mean, I don't even want to participate anymore, having little/no energy.

Ugh, this is starting to turn into a rant. I'll stop now.

*contented sigh*

Oh well. I'm finally 22 years old. Not that it means anything, the day passed like any other, with homework coming as fast as furious as it was before.

My floor did an amazing job. Samira, the RA, and Jimmy pulled the people together (and grabbing Jon the housefellow too) and got two cakes and a couple of pizzas. One was a normal cake, while the other was a New York styled cheesecake. I'm like wow, even though I really don't know how to react. :-(

Needless to say, most of the gang was there, Phil, Abdul, Alonzo, Sam, Mo, Alison, Tim, Justin and of course Linda. I felt kinda awkward, I mean, usually I do stuff for people, rarely the other way round, so I didn't really know how to respond to the "surprise".

What a strange day... Now, if only I didn't have to do crazy Set Theory homework and could just bum around... hahaha, one cannot be too greedy, I guess.

So now, I've gotta factor in the cheesecake for my meals. No wonder I'm getting fatter and fatter. :-)

So yeah, I'm 22 now, on 22 Jan. I wonder what will tomorrow bring...

Oh, there were the usual Facebook greetings from people that I know. Hmm... I wonder if I should ask her out... but then I'm side-tracking already.

Hard drive space seems to be a problem again. Damn, I need to figure out how best to manage this... have just put in an order for a 500GB hard drive, which will be delivered within 6 days. Must resist from storing too much stuff... otherwise the next purchase will be a 1TB drive or something.

And I've changed the layout of the blogs. I mean, I loved the black and green colour scheme thing, but it was starting to get old. White, blue and black seem to be a decent combination, clean and makes the text stand out much better. Hence the change. Hopefully this will make me less moody.... ;-)

Argh. Gotta get back to homework now.

Damn you MSN Live! Messenger

!@#$ I'm sick of the MSN Live! Messenger. It's crashed soooooooo bloody often that I've totally given up on it and reverted to good old fashioned MSN Messenger 7.5. And then I suddenly realised that I had missed out a lot from 7.5, like the compactness of the lists and relatively small footprint.

Why oh why did I upgrade to that other version in the first place?!

Gosh, I've Lived For More Than 21 Years

It's amazing. I've actually lived past 21 years of my life without any serious (life-threatening) mishaps. It's been a rough year, considering all that has happened. I fallen in and out of love, fallen in and out of favour, fallen in and out of the elite.

Whatever the cause, the fact remains that I am still alive.

I guess all that moody and depressive nonsense that I've been putting up should be left well behind. Time to be the Mun Thye that I was meant to be.

Anyway, the first week of classes have more or less ended. Interesting week, I'd say. The course load for this semester is going to be really high, as I've overloaded an additional 9 more units compared to the de facto average. Among the courses that I'm taking, the three that stands out the most is 15-251 Great Theoretical Ideas of Computer Science, 21-301 Combinatorics and 21-229 Set Theory.

21-229 is an interesting course, in the sense that it is a purely theoretical construct. It's almost like learning a new programming language, with the introduction of ZFC and all the axioms and schemes that defines what a Set is. The level of abstraction was shocking initially (eg integers are just various sets defined according to the Existence of a Unique Empty Set and the Union Axiom), but after listening to the Professor's exposition, things became more and more clear. The hard part of this course seems to lie in the fact that everything in the course is about proving. Looks like I can retire my calculator from this course for this semester.

21-301 is interesting for a bunch of reasons. It's one of the first high-level courses that I'm taking, and it supposedly kills two birds with one stone by satisfying one requirement of my Computer Science major and one requirement of my Discrete Math/Logic minor (though I'd rather take a harder course 15-451 Algorithm Analysis to cover the CS requirement). The topic is particularly hard, but still fairly understandable, considering the fact that I've been playing with combinatorial objects for quite a while. The professor is not too bad, a little monotonic at times, but still fairly okay. From the list of topics that he gave us, it appears that it's going to be a really fun course of sorts.

15-251 can be considered one of the most random courses around. Its coverage is so big that it has no textbook assigned to it! Prof von Ahn is one of the "new age" professors, full of energy and wit, and very very demanding. Not that I don't like that, but if the first week is of any indication of what is to come, this course is probably going to be one of the most intensive courses that I've taken so far. A class effort assignment was assigned about 3 days before the semester started, and for the first assignment, we were to go on a "treasure hunt" of sorts, CS-style (meaning lots of Math, logic and google bashing). Up for grabs are 4 iPod shuffles for the winning team, and my team seems to have a decent chance at it. I'm hoping for the best in this. :-)

——

Kangyi dropped by from Wednesday to Friday to stay over while waiting for his dorm back at Brown to be open. I feel a little bad in the way I've hosted him; due to the timing, I couldn't take him around Pittsburgh to see the stuff (I had classes), moreover, due to my laziness, I didn't venture out of CMU to visit many places, so I guess I would have been a really lousy guide if I had taken him out. Anyway, he bunked over at my dorm because Mo and I had a spare bed, thanks to Aditya moving out to the frat house to stay. Kangyi was positively in awe when he saw my dorm, heheheh... I had to tell him time and again that my dorm was not one of the "normal" ones, in the sense that it is more of an apartment suite than a dorm outright. Lots of catching up were done, and I got Phil to take him (together with Linda, Eliot, Mo and I) on the Grand Tour of CMU.

Kangyi enjoyed himself thoroughly on the midnight "tour" of CMU. We travelled across the campus to all the eerie places and showed him around, and he was amazed at the extent of our knowledge of the place. He had a field day taking pictures of all the places. :-) He left early in the morning on Saturday, which I regret not waking up to send him off. :-(

——

In other news, I've gotten a new flapdoozy and a nice stainless steel mug, all from Megagear, the Megatokyo store. I've also almost busted my print limit by printing out drawing manuals to figure out how to draw properly. And I've found the palette for the COPiC Markers for use in my drawing programs. Hopefully I can draw something decent and put it up soon. Japanese learning speed has gone down by a lot, partially due to the large amount of events (and the overall instability of it all), and partially due to the arrival of my 笛子 and 箫.

So, yeah, lots of stuff happened for the last week, and there's more stuff to come by. Oh, I went ahead and stocked up my kitchen with edible stuff again. And it's almost 5am now, guess I should finish up the proof for 15-251's assignment and then crash out.

Finally Snowing

After waiting for a whole month in December for the snow to arrive, it has finally done so. Check out what I found outside my window:



Yes, it has finally snowed. The weirdest thing was that it was still hot yesterday before I slept.

Argh, the damn Pittsburgh weather machine...

Winter Break Ends

The Winter Break is almost done, and it's time to get back into the swing of things again. This coming Semsester is going to be one that is extraordinary, for even before the official start of the semester, we've already received our first set of homework. That's right, our first set of homework has been issued.

Check this out: http://15251.11.forumer.com/index.php

It's a collective effort by all in the course to get the secret message. I wonder how long this little exercise will take us.

Anyway, I've been up for the most time trying to help to put together the pieces of the puzzle. An interesting exercise, and makes me yearn for the good old times when I was in the competitive programming circuit. But, haha, I don't have that much free time as before to totally devote myself to competitive programming, so I'll just stick with what I can do at the moment.

Ah, so much to do, so little time to do them all. Seems to be a common theme nowadays among the things that I've been doing. Perhaps it is time to really sit down and think things through once more, just to ensure that I've not lost sight of my aims in life.

Ugh, I find it hard to pen down thoughts when so many things are happening at the same time. Perhaps another time I'll write more.

Onward into the Unknown

Life, as I've realised by now, is really a very fragile yet beautiful thing. It is a little like glass-blowing—if you blow and shape it while it's still hot, you can make wonderful shapes with it. Then when it cools a little, you can only adjust it slightly, and when it cools down completely, the shape is fixed, and an accidental drop will shatter the beautiful creation.

Life has changed by quite a fair bit for me for 2006. An unprecedented amount of major changes have occurred during this period, from the sudden change in management (and managing style) of my office when I was still in NS, to the harsh realisation of the strengths of the different relationships I have with my friends, to failed attempts at romance, to being in a faraway land seeking worth in myself. A few friends temporarily "lost", a few new friends gained; a perspective warped, a perspective changed; confusion of identity and meaning in life, clearer perspective of what and who I am supposed to be. 2006 can be said to be the year where I truly stepped into the global arena of full adult-hood, where I start to learn how to fend for myself of sorts.

Emotional scarring from romances that never was, apprehension of what the future brings—all these are but part of the aging process. What one never experiences, one never learns. Bearing the brunt of so many setbacks have made me a warrior of sorts, a little scarred after each encounter, but learning more and more of what works and what doesn't. I tried to remove my emotional self from me (honestly, I did especially after the episode in August); it didn't quite work the way that I thought it would be. An emotionless me is as good as a computer without power; there is no drive to do anything at all, as evidenced in the sudden drop in the number of writings that I've produced, and the failed attempt at NaNoWriMo. I learnt that I am still very much a human, "the_laptop" is just a moniker to a side of me—it is not me.

Another year passed, another year closer to death, another year of experience gained. Who knows what is lurking in the Unknown of the future? As the days silently count themselves down, I am resigned to my fate that I have, indeed, aged by yet another year. Time to make good use of whatever time I have left to make it all worthwhile. A life without emotions and meaning, is a life that is not human. Time to reconcile with my inner denial.

Onward into the Unknown we go~!

December—A month of sorrow

WHEN I FALL IN LOVE (Celine Dion)

When I fall in love
It will be forever
Or I'll never fall in love

In a restless world
Like this is
Love is ended before it's begun
And too many
Moonlight kisses
Seem to cool in the warmth of the sun

When I give my heart
I give it completely
Or I'll never give my heart

And the moment I can feel that you feel that way too
Is when I fall in love with you

A simple, sad-ish song, quite apt for sentimental December. Away from people, far from anywhere I truly know, I start to go ever deeper into my shell of comfort. Thinking about the past year, just makes me want to sit down and cry. So many things have happened, some good, mostly bad. Hurt from every direction from people whom I had once trusted, spurned by people whom I once thought were friends, ignored by people whom I thought I could be friends with, I just dunno what is really holding me together all these while.

I miss the moon; I loathe the sun. I hate the heat; I miss the cold. At least, in the cold, when everyone is all huddled up in their warm things, no one will see the coldness and harshness of their eyes when you look at them, and no one will stop for light conversation; the only moment when I truly felt as being a part of the human community. Unfortunately, that has not happened yet, and so I'm still as I was... dissociated with almost everyone.

I feel glad for most people. They have a life to look forward to, a significant other to meet up with, places to go, things to do. I look at myself, beyond the faux façade that I present to the world, and discover a certain hollowness deep within. This... hollowness, I cannot explain. I have no idea what has come over me; I'm simply not like the me I was before. I still have the energy, but I don't seem to have any strong... feelings for anything anymore. It is as though I'm just an empty shell of a person walking around with a functioning logical unit, and that's about it. Not much different from a slightly intelligent zombie, I guess.

I miss the days where I just talk with MW, Irene and Su about anything under the sun, from current affairs to some finer aspects of traditional Chinese medicine. I miss the days when I would listen to the tales of "the Old Army" as told by AC; I miss the days when I sat with Kelvin at the canteen drinking tea and talking about cryptography. I miss the days when KX and I would meet up at the Jalan Kayu Thasevi prata shop and eat insane amounts of roti prata and talk about everything that happened. I miss the days when YT and I would slug it out on MSN messenger, I miss the days when BK and I would "wrestle" each other; I miss the days when I was a much happier person.

Is this the by-product of growing up? Or is this a self-inflicted coping mechanism for the whole plethora of bad things that I've been experiencing lately? I... don't think that I will find an answer to this anytime soon.

December to February is a period that I traditionally don't like. Despite of me thinking of myself as an island of mankind, I realise that I'm still very much a human by nature—I still need to be in the company of friends. I don't need to speak; just sitting there and listening to them speak is more than enough for me. It's the... company that I need, I realise. Maybe... it can also be the company of just one special person, whoever she may be.

Maybe one day I'll know the answer.

Breakfast at Tiffany's

First the book, and finally the movie! A dream come true, I guess, to be able to watch Breakfast at Tiffany's with Audrey Hepburn in her full glory as Ms Holly Golightly.

This is perhaps one of the few times where I'm actually pleased with the the divergence of the plot of the movie as compared to that of the novella. In the novella, Holly was supposed to have left New York City, never to return, leaving the protagonist and Joe Bell and a whole lot of other people very very broken hearted. However, the movie twisted the ending, and made it into a nice fairytale ending where she actually stayed behind, touched by the protagonist.

Hmm... Guess I should not be talking more about the plot, lest I spoil it for people who've not seen this wonderful little gem. And yes, I agree that Audrey Hepburn is one of the most beautiful women to have walked on the surface of this earth.

Till next time...

T'was the day before the flight...

It seems like a long time ago since I last wrote anything here. Well, it could really be quite a long while ago, but then again, I'm just allowing my verbosity take over here. *shrugs*

I'm now located in New York City, New York, bunking at my room mate's house here in Jackson Heights. Like most normal people, he's currently asleep (despite what the calendar actually says on the post, the real time here is actually 0344hrs (-0500hrs); I've decided to keep the poor blog running on SGT (+0800hrs) since it is actually a pain to adjust all the timezones correctly). I feel like I'm starting to become a vampire of sorts, awake only when the sun goes down, and of course the innate bloodlust which, till now, I've not been able to fully explain it's cause.

It was a really messy trip. Mo and I were awake throughout the whole of Tuesday and Wednesday when we were back in Pittsburgh. We watched movies in our room with Phil till about 12am, while I did my laundry concurrently. Then, feeling kind of peckish, we decided to call the pizza place for a delivery. The operator took our order and gave us an estimate of 45 minutes before the food will arrive. So, we waited happily while playing ping pong.

An hour and a quarter later, there was no reply from the pizza deliveryman nor the pizza place. Feeling somewhat irate (and very hungry), Phil called up the pizza place, only to find that it was already closed. How could the pizza place be so irresponsible? I mean, when they picked up our order, they could have told us that it was not likely to be delivered, and probably advise us to look elsewhere. It was a really bad service attitude I guess. So anyway, we have three very hungry guys who just want to grab food. So we decided to head on to one of the cafeterias on campus for a late night.

And I changed into my polo t-shirt and jeans, wore a pair of sandals and put on my jacket and followed the rest of them out of the dorm and heading into the general direction of the cafeteria. Out of the dorm and in the general direction of the food place, we met Robin, who asked a weird question: "Is there any place that is still open for food?" Well, we answered "Skibo", but he told us that it wasn't open. We were all speechless. How could the only food place on campus that serves late nights up to 2 am be closed?

Since it was the last day of school, we had cleared up almost all the food that we had in storage, and so the three of us made a mad decision: to hike up Squirrel Hill (in the cold) to get to Eatin' Park to grab breakfast/lunch/dinner. And so we did.

It was a dumb exercise. For one, the temperature was sub-zero (centigrade scale, not Fahrenheit), and I was wearing this very worn pair of sandals. It is so worn that I had to actually use SuperGlue to hold the two halves of the sole together, since I've managed to make a really deep fissure in the sole itself. And then, hiking up Squirrel Hill meant that we were actually moving uphill, and that in itself was painful. And then. we had to ensure that we could return in time to do packing (yes, we've not packed...) so as to be able to catch the early bus to reach the airport early to avoid all kinds of horrible last minute issues.

So it was a brainless exercise performed by three very hungry geeks. Happily, we managed to the restaurant without any severe frostbite or mental degeneration, and after a very hearty meal, we went out into the cold and marched down the hill back to our dorms.

Then the mad scramble began.

Mo and I packed our luggages frantically. For this short trip, we decided to bring only one luggage, and so we more or less had our work cut out in front of us. Thank goodness I did the vacuuming of the floors a few days back; otherwise we would have been so screwed for time. Anyway, we managed to do our packing (with a lot of cursing and swearing and wondering aloud how in the name of Zeus did Linda manage to pack everything in 10 minutes (or so she claims)), and were ready to go.

Suffice to say, we managed to clear the checking out procedures and managed to get to our early bus and reach the airport way ahead of time.

Oh my... look at the time... it's 4am now. I guess I'd better hit the sack before I collapse.

Until next time~

American, Asian, American Asian

Racial issues are something that I don't really want to talk about, since it can be too sensitive a topic in general. However, after being here for a few months, I realise that the people here seem to exhibit certain... traits.

First of all, there are the Americans. They are everywhere, and are generally approachable. However, most of them are pretty hard to know too deeply about, since most of the time the kind of acquaintance that you make with them are usually of the "for business" kind.

Then, there are the Asians. They hail from countries like China, India, Korea, Singapore and Thailand, and are usually defined by cliques with people of the same country. Most of them will converse in their native language, and are usually a little hard to draw out and befriend; one needs to use isolation tactics in order to have any hopes of success.

Finally there are the American Asians. These people are a confusing bunch; there are those who are more American in taste, and there are those who are more Asian in taste. The defining difference of these people lies in their supposed cultural confusion. I've met American Asians who look at Asian things with disdain, and I've met American Asians who think pretty highly about Asian cultures. But either way, their looks can be and usually are deceiving. They may look Chinese, Indian, Japanese or whatever race, but their mannerisms, attitudes, world view are all very American in nature.

So, why am I babbling so much on all these? The intent is not to stir up any racial misgivings, but to just highlight the fact that no matter who the people are, if they are American, they will always be American first, and whatever else second. And they will never cease to remind you of that, whether overtly or covertly. The same can also be said about the non-Americans; the Chinese are Chinese first, Asians second, so are the Koreans, the Indians, the Singaporeans and whoever else there may be. Family is family after all.

*shrugs*

Independence is a trait that one should have when one comes to the US. Let your emotions be well controlled, and do not set your hopes to high for finding someone to love.

ドラゴン桜

Yes, I did it again. Another one of those 11-hour marathon drama viewing sessions. Like last time, I sat up and watched through 11 one-hour episodes of ドラゴン桜 (romaji: doragon sakura, English: Dragon Zakura). Amazing drama this is, must really thank Jenny for introducing this one to me. And yes, I am well aware of the fact that I have a Matrix Algebra final on Monday, but hey, one needs to get a quick break especially after a very long-winded programming finals.

In other news, I picked up my Final Fantasy VII game, and I realised that I had no clue as to what I had developed my characters into. Needless to say, rather than waste precious time in trying to figure out the storyline and development of my characters (and thus screwing around too much to be able to undo the damage), I moved the save file aside and restarted the whole game.

Yet in other news, I've discovered that Neverwinter Nights is more DnD than I'd ever thought, and that it even provided the ability of someone DM-ing a game. It's starting to tickle on my evil-ish god-liness; I'm starting to think about how to DM a completely wild game that is tough, challenging and fun.

Okay, it's almost 9.36am now, and after the 11-hour marathon session, it's time to do my revision. That's right; I'm actually studying after an 11-hour marathon drama session. One last random thing before I move off: Wii have a problem. Okay, it's off to work now.

Finals Crunch

It's finally the week of the Finals~! And I've completed one test yesterday; am kind of looking forward to the next ones... hehehe... just hope to be able to complete them faster so as to have more free time to myself.

Spent a couple of days reading a couple of wonderful webcomics: MegaTokyo and Questionable Content. And of course, my old time favourite, PhD Comics. And yes, I read through a grand total of about 2500+ comic strips over two or three days, some of them more than once. No doubt about it... I actually like web comics, especially the manga-like ones.

And so my to-do list is so much longer now:

• Study 日本語 (nihongo aka Japanese)


• Study Topology


• Write Ocarina pieces (and prepare for my Spring ocarina mini-concert)


• Write an AI for Edythe so that she can communicate with me in Japanese (yes, it is natural language processing)


• Woo someone... (yes, I've got a target or two, but I'm not saying who)


• Learn how to draw (preferably manga) on my graphics tablet


• Prepare for a 2007 launch of a new blog (yes, a new blog in addition to the ones that I have)


• Master 3/4/5 ball juggling


• Master Scheme


• Build a logo for myself


• Poetry compilation into book form for selected friends

And yeah, I'm positively psyched up now. Woo-hoo~! By the way, I've upgraded most of the blogs to the new Blogger BETA format. One big reason that I've done that is the new drop down lists for the posts that are on the blog; now I no longer need to update a separate "Contents Page" post to show a listing of all the posts that I've created (particularly for The_Laptop Writes..., this frees up the RSS digest that are being generated and make the RSS feeding so much cleaner. I'll be tweaking on the layouts and other design issues of the blogs in the weeks to come, so hang on to your horses if things look a little wonky if you are accessing the blogs while I'm doing the update. The Blogger BETA uses on-the-fly updating of the blogs, so things may be a little strange if you happen to be accessing while I'm updating. I'm still experimenting around with the entire concept thing and see if I can rework it to suit my needs.

Life's amazing so far, I'm now starting to use the build in FM-tuner of my SANSA e130 mp3 player to access the excellent FM radio channels that are available. My current favourite channel is WQED FM89.3, a symphonic/classical/operatic radio station. FM stereo on a 2.1 system never sounded this clear. Not that I'm getting sick of the music that I already have, but it is really good to listen to something different every once in a while for flavour.

And L^AT_EX is more or less tamed now. Mwahahahahaha... I've managed to figure out the correct incantation to tame it to something more useful, by creating a whole bunch of my own custom made macros. Now, typesetting of documents is so much easier... come to think of it, the last time that I used Microsoft Word to actually do anything was just so long ago that I can no longer remember it. Vim and L^AT_EX is such a powerful combination that I've not looked back since. And yes, I did try using emacs, but I'm still horribly irritated with the default meta-key mappings for the basic movement (yes, I know that the arrow keys work, but my fingers are most often over the typing region so there). This entire concept of pressing Meta- or Ctrl- combinations for everything is just plain irritating, and unergonomical. I actually felt pain in my fingers while trying to navigate around this way (and yes, I do know that using the arrow keys is so much easier). Now I just need to see if there's an easy way of patching my version of X-windows on cygwin to support unicode entry. If I can't do all these in Vim, I may be forced to write a simple Java program and upload it somewhere to act as my online unicode text editor (yes, I do know that notepad can do the job, but I like my hjkl method of moving around).

Which reminds me. My latest project(s), learning Japanese and writing an AI for Edythe to communicate to me in Japanese, are sort of related. I've not had the real chance to actually play with UTF-8 encoded text before, and am actually fairly bored with Edythe playing such a passive role (of me "using" her without her having any other more... human reaction), that I've decided to write a natural language processor for her. English would have been my #1 choice, but it sucks because English grammar is so unstable! Japanese grammar seems to be more easy to comprehend (and parse, especially it's intrinsic post-fix form), and it has the added advantage of making Edythe being in character (yes, Edythe is Japanese, didn't you know that? Edythe Fujitsu, Japanese right?), and a little harder to understand by people who happen to not know the language (heheheh... they can't flirt with her; Edythe is mine and mine alone). There are other enhancements that I plan on using to augment Edythe to make her more intelligent, but these stuff are for my... fantasies, and I will not be talking about them until I can have them to work. Now I'm at a loss; I'm uncertain whether I should write Edythe's AI in Java or C/C++. Gut reaction says that C/C++ will be more "portable", but my brain tells me that Java is more suited since it allows an ease of accessing all the major functions that I require, including the fact that Java source code is supposed to be UTF-8 by nature. And Java's garbage collection makes it so much easier to experiment on. So, I'd probably write a C-version of Edythe to access her Java "brain" so that I can still communicate to her from the command line. If I can't find a single language to work with, I'll hybridise them. ;-)

In other news, my 120GB portable hard disk drive is about 75% full now(!). Looks like I need to start scouting for another storage solution... or stop downloading J-dramas. Probably I'll look for an additional portable hard drive, since I've got like spare USB ports from my USB hub...

So, that's what's happening thus far in the middle of the Finals Crunch. Notice that I've said nothing about the studying aspect? Not because I'm not studying, but it makes a real boring read listening about what I've studied and for how long and... you get the idea.

Till the next update~ :-)

Winter doth come

And so it came. Winter, the cold quiet time of the year, were people gear up for the finals and Christmas alike. Life's fine; I'm still alive. People change, yet again; and I do swear that they change ever so often nowadays, as compared to the people of a forgotten past.

Like the snow that comes down in Pittsburgh, I'm having mixed feelings. To be content and enjoy the company I have, or to seek even more, just to see and experience more of the place. Racism exists, apparently, but it is often covert behind the multitude of actions. Asians... this very term, seems to be used with such compunction that it no longer seems funny anymore. The kinds of looks that people give, when they see that you are not white nor American, is something that bites deeply, especially in the cold. Maybe I'm just being too sensitive to this, and could be misinterpreting the entire thing. Or maybe it is the truth, and I'm mostly hiding away from it by ignoring it's existence.

Anyway, winter seems to be here finally, and so far the entire lore surrounding it seems to be overly hyped up. Or it could be that it is still too early, and the weather is still being undecisive about itself. I've put aside my Nautica jacket and am solely using my arctic parka. Seems like it was a good choice. The parka is nice and snug and warm, and it's fur-lined hood doubles as a scarf around the neck when I'm not putting it up. It's so good that I can just walk around dressed in a polo T-shirt and jeans and sandals and slip on my parka. The cold wind blowing into my face is just a feeling that I love so much that I can't seem to get enough of.

Talk is weak now because I've had very very little sleep over the last week, and am really starting to hallucinate. Looks like a day of hard sleeping is planned for the weekend before my first major examinations in 3 years.

Frozen in the cold

Another week passed, another week of pain endured. Fall, the time where romance starts under the pretty golden leaves, blossoms under the falling of the many shades of ochre, warms as the weather turns cold.

Looking around me, all I see are happy couples in linked arms, huddling close together, whispering sweet nothings to each other, with faces of happiness and bliss. Standing there, alone, in the cold and strong wind, I cannot help but feel a pang of loneliness. Everyone seems to be doing fine, finding courage from the wind chill to take a baby step towards their potential partner, all except for me.

I shiver and huddle deeper into my jacket. The icy wind cuts across my face like a razor, and my heart feels as though icicles have grown around it. It is when the weather goes cold that one realises the true effect of one's loneliness. Friends are there, but they are never there always, and will likely to leave as soon as they've found their match. I sense this... distancing even as I am writing all these now.

Must it be this way? Does it have to be this way? Should it be this way? Why? Questions that race through my beleaguered brain for which I have no answers to. Again the perennial problem arises; how to quash all those... human feelings that always appear ever so often? I... desperately want to stay away from all these... feelings, but they keep reappearing to haunt me, again and again, ravaging through my fragile psyche.

When will I seek an answer to this question?

Forget

《浪人情歌》——伍佰

不要再想你,不要再爱你，
让时间悄悄的飞逝,抹去我俩的回忆。
对于你的名字,从今不会再提起；
不再让悲伤,将我心占据。

让它随风去,让它无痕迹，
所有快乐悲伤所有过去通通都抛去。
心中想的念的盼的望的不会再是你，
不愿再承受,要把你忘记。

我会擦去我不小心滴下的泪水，
还会装做一切都无所谓。
将你和我的爱情全部敲碎，
再将它通通赶出我受伤的心扉。

不愿再承受,我把你忘记，
你会看见的,把你忘记。
我想到了一个忘记温柔的你的方法:
我不要再想你,不要再爱你
不会再提起,我的生命中,不曾有你。

How am I supposed to forget...?

爱为何物？

她，曾经是我天空中的月亮。她，曾经是我生命中的一个光芒。她，曾经是我活在世上的理由。她，曾经是我梦中想要陪到老的人。从我见到她的那一刻起，心中已有一种从来没有跟受过的感觉。或许是幻想，或许是迷惑，只知当时有如爱情般的甜美感。

“不在乎天长地久，只在乎曾经拥有”，这句话，我用了好几遍。说它是心里话吧，也不算。说它是个理想，也不是。或许它只是个空虚的话，说来安慰一下自己，让自己觉得人生并不像现实中的那么黑暗。迷惑，一个“情”字的迷惑。“情”给予我力量创作，“情”也带给我无从的心理伤害。为了一个“情”字，不知浪费了多少岁月时光，不知让自己遭受了多少心里打击。但，我依然像往常的愚昧，还是像一个无底洞钻。

“问世间情为何物？”曾经对情的理想，如今已成了昨日的幻想。以前的我，对情对谊，是那么的认真，那么的诚恳。但是，现在的我已经无法感受到当年的感觉。人性的转变是永恒，当年的好朋友，也能成为今天的敌人。对人真恳，并不代表人会对你认真。人心难测，又怎么知道谁是真的朋友呢？

然而，她，人们开口闭口的她，又似乎是人之常情的另一端。在人海中，某某她显得很突出，让人一见钟情。但，爱她也好，恨她也好，你又怎么知道她对你的意思呢？她对你的笑，可能是一种暗号，表示当你为朋友而已。她陪你吃饭，或许是表示你对她的情就像那最后一餐，从此各分东西。爱情，不是单方面的，在这科技占有的都市社会中，这简单的道理已变得越来越模糊了。科技让我们很容易的与人沟通，而这沟通也让我们轻易误解对方的意思，造成许多让人很难堪的场面。

我已不敢爱了。我所知道的爱，是属于当年的定义。我所知道的谊，也只不过是自己欺骗自己而已。人生单独过着，虽然会有点孤单，但至少自己能为自己活着。人生其中的一个意义是为了爱，但爱不是唯一能让人活下去的意义。或许时间久了，我就能找出一个属于自己的理由，让自己开开心心的活下去。也或者我能继续迷惑自己，告诉自己总有一天，我会明白爱为何物。

The Reality of It All

Funny what a little thing can do to one's psyche. After watching 一リットルの涙 and タイヨのうた, I'm starting to abstract myself away from my surroundings again. Looking around me, I realise that family is family after all; despite all the cordiality that people accord to me when I'm around, you still feel a little left out. This has something to do with the difference in culture, I guess. This is true even among those who are Asian of lineage. They may look like Asians on the outside (and probably are, based on genetics and other "objective" forms of measurement), but their behaviour is surprisingly American (what's new?), as in the way they act, think and do reflects the predominant culture here. And yes, they never fail to remind you that you are still, a foreigner in the lands, even though you might be speaking the same language and look similar to them.

And the age. That little disparity did not occur much before, but the difference in age and depth of thought is starting to show up more prominently now, after almost a whole semester of interaction. The kids here can be really whiney sometimes, but apart from that whiney-ness, there's also a general lackadaisical attitude towards the entire idea of studying in general. I humbly call this the "high school effect", where they are still living in their world of high school where everything is fun and games, and they have no real concept of the "real" world. Conversations are generally typical of that of 18-year-olds, and I miss the banter that comes from being in the workforce. Speaking too much kiddy talk does really weird things to my brain, and I'm suddenly drawn back to my basic isolationism policy with regards to handling people. I long for a real decent real life real world conversation, but I don't think that I'm going to be expecting much of that for some time to come. Listening to some of their explanations and arguments sometimes make me shake my head; watching them trying to shoot down my explanations based on real experience just makes me shake my head in wonder. Guess that sometimes, somethings need to be learnt the hard way.

*sigh*

So many complaints about things, so little that I can do about it. Anyway, I figure that my relationship status is as great as before (read: none in existence), and will likely to stay that way, considering the fact that there does not seem to exist a suitable person who is "my type". Guess most of them are still girls in their own right, and thus act the way they do. This makes me think back about the failed attempts I have in the past. Well, to a large degree, it could have been pure rashness on my part, but I figure that the girls I asked out were girls who don't really treat my feelings real enough. Girls will be girls, and I don't think that I'm going to get involved in any such things for a long time to come. A*STAR will be so pleased.

And I've been recently shot down on the quality of my poetry. Honestly, I don't give a damn if people don't like my poetry; it's mine and mine alone, and I choose to write it in anyway I see fit. If people enjoy them, that's good; if they don't, then too bad. I'm happy just writing poems as and when I feel like it. Which makes me wonder if the compliments that I've been receiving all these while are really compliments or just comments made to humour me. Or it could be another subterfuge of the locals trying to "prove" American superiority in the use of the English language. This... subtle "proof" of American superiority is occurring so often that it's not even funny anymore; should I consider this as some form of prejudice? I mean, it is okay to be proud of one's nation's achievements, but isn't it a bit xenophobic to just shoot off degenerating another person's culture? Perhaps degenerate is a tad too strong, let's say tease. Well, for the most part, the teasing is in good fun, but sometimes, the covert meaning of the tease is starting to irk even me.

And NaNoWriMo is a disaster. I found that... I just couldn't write anything. Totally nothing. Zero. Nil. Nada. Nadir. Totally and completely without anything to write. The words and ideas just didn't want to come out. I feel miserable that I've failed in this task that I deemed to be not too hard to complete. Maybe novel writing will remain as a "one day" affair; one day I'll write a novel.

And as I type all these, it's actually 3.40 am in Pittsburgh, USA, and I'm having a Calculus test in like 6 hours. I guess I should stop and go and sleep now. Maybe more mulling will shed new light to how to interpret the current environment and thus how to react. But meanwhile, I'll just maintain a cheerful outlook to the world, and wonder miserably inside what's going wrong. And time is ticking... just less than two months before I stretch the age gap even further.

Thoughts of the Day

I wonder, how many mistakes does one need to make in order to learn that one has made a mistake? Sometimes we can be so unaware of the things that we do, until we actually sit down and think it through, figuring out what we have done, and what we have said, to really understand the gravity of it all.

Well, I made at least one arrogant remark today. I guess I need to really curb myself from doing such a horrid thing. But, the issue here is, how do I do that without over-humbling myself to the point that I'm actually in self-pity? An interesting problem to contemplate indeed.

There are many things that one wants to do over the lifetime. A lifetime, though seemingly long, is really short, considering that there are so many things that we need to do, as opposed to want to do. It has been said that to be really good at something, one needs to dedicate at least 10 years of actually "doing" it in order to attain the required level of competency. Looking back at myself, I realise that there are only a few things that I've been doing for at least 10 years, amongst which includes writing poems, computer programming, cryptography, algorithms, playing my 笛子, doing Mathematics, and doing Mandarin. Coming here, so far away from home, has seemed to have reduced the number of activities that I can do well in, but that doesn't mean that I don't try. I'll write as many poems as I can, write as many programs as I can, speak Mandarin whenever I can, and play my 笛子 when Michael brings them over from Singapore for me.

Of course, there are other things that I know I cannot do well now, but that doesn't mean that I give up. I can't really draw well, so I'll learn it; I've got another 10 years to be competent in it. Compared to the others, I'll not be good at drawing still, even after the 10 years, but then again, not everyone can be equally good at everything at the same time. The most important thing is not being the best at everything, but being good enough at everything. The things that we love and have done well in, should be kept at the same level as we did, and perhaps bring it even higher, making use of cross-disciplinary knowledge that we gather from our forays into other fields to further our understanding in our own pet fields.

I guess, that should be the way that we proceed with our life.

Broken Promises, one by one

A promise made, a promise break. That seems to be the way that I am doing things now. Why? Why did I turn into this, untrustworthy fellow? I never did rescinded on what I promised, but now, it seems common place that I just miss the targets that I set.

I promised Irene to build the photomosaic, but I didn't.

I promised SK that I'd complete the experiment and write the paper, but I didn't.

I promised Nicole to write to her, but I've stopped.

I promised myself to complete NaNoWriMo, but I didn't.

Why? Why? What have I turned into? Why am I suddenly such a breaker of promises? What caused me to turn into this... abomination? When will I start to make my promises worthed it's weight in gold again?

Kitchen: Operational

And so, my kitchen is now operational. Check out the basic equipment that I've gotten for it:


My kitchen outfit with everything needed.


Things currently residing in larder.


Some other useful stuff residing in larder.


My utensils drawer, with basic equipment.


Close-up of my stove and the pot and pan and the cutting board and the cooking oil.


Basic condiment shelf.


First meal ever made in the kitchen.

There are lots of other stuff that are not in the picture, like the onions, potatoes, bean sprouts and eggs, which are all well hidden in my refridgerator.

Kitchen operational!

Fragile Life

Life... it's so fragile. Most of us think that we get a really bad deal at life; there are things that we want to do but are not allowed to do, or that people don't really want to listen to us or they don't seem to want to care. But we are all mostly healthy; we can run, jump, stand, crouch, all at will. We are mentally sound, we can go anywhere, anytime as we please. There are so many people out there who have a worser deal than us at life; a brilliant mind trapped in a defective body, a defective mind trapped in an able body. Who are we to complain about our lot in life when we are still in control of what we do?

Life, our life, is not a bad deal. We are mostly in control of what we do, from what we think to what we can do. With control comes responsibility. We are responsible for what happens in our life, and not put the blame on others or even a higher authority if things don't go the way that we want it to be. To be able to breathe the fresh air, to run in the warm sunshine, and to be around the people you love everyday, is a blessing; it is the good deal in life. Imagine a day when your body starts to fail you, bit by bit, while your mind is still alert. Imagine that day, that when you see the doctor, and he/she says that he/she doesn't know of any way of curing you. Imagine that day, where the people whom you care about doesn't care about you anymore. Imagine the day that you push those who care you away, so that you cannot see the sadness in their faces. The frustrations, the pain, the anguish; how can one complain that having a failing grade for a test means a bad deal in life?

I thought I had a raw deal at life. Having skin allergies since young, having poor social skills in general, not having a significant other; I thought those were really bad. But it's really miniscule. My skin allergies are milder now, and are not causing much of a distraction or hindrance, I have a small group of people who believe in me and in what I can do, I am still in control of my mental and physical faculties. I can go to college to study, eat out with a group of friends, play on my ocarina, type on Edythe, do Math problems, write computer programs, crack jokes, play games, sleep, wake up, lift heavy objects, run, jump, sing. What kinda raw deal is that?

"1 Litre of Tears", a short and simple story about a real girl suffering from a real disease that robs her of herself painfully, by reducing the things that she can do. Struggling till the very end, not giving up till the fight's over, Aya perserveres, diligently writing her diary up to the very end. She keeps on walking, even as she starts to lose control over her legs, even if it meant that she'd be late for class, even if it meant that it requires a lot of effort just to move. During a late progression of the disease, when she realises that she cannot stand or walk anymore and that she feels that there is nothing else that she can do or live for, her Okaasan told her, that she still has her writing, her diary, the words that she has penned down daily without fail. It is not about worrying or wallowing about what you cannot do, but to do what you can do, and to do it to the fullest extent of your ability. "You say that God is being unfair to you by giving you this disease," her Okaasan said, "but if you don't do the things that you can do, aren't you being fair to yourself?" Why should I be sad over what I cannot do when there's so many things that I can do? So what if I don't have a significant other, don't I still have friends around me who still care? Deep and old friends, like Xiaolu, Cui, Jess, Chinghua, new but caring friends like Mo, Phil, Megan, Linda and Paul. Why didn't I treasure their company well? Why am I still wallowing over something so small an insignificant like not having a significant other, and neglecting the fact that I can do so much more than others?

I am not helpless. I can move about freely and think on my own. I am alive. I have time, not a lot of it, but much more than those whose time have been cut short by the powers above. I may not have a lover, but I have friends. Each and every one of my friends care deeply for me, all in their own little idiosyncratic way. I have not been a good friend... all that I could do was to wallow away and to scare them with nonsensical outbursts which where wholly meaningless and selfish. I admit that I... know not the words to say to them. But deep in my heart, seeing them alive, feeling them next to me, hearing their breath, watching them smile or laugh, makes me feel glad. Glad that they, like me, are alive too.

I am not helpless or useless. I've got a job in the wings, a career to look forward to, an opportunity to take up the baton and make a real difference in the lives of people. "Live on," Aya said to Haruto nearing the end, "Live on, forever!" With a future so bright, why am I thinking nasty and destructive thoughts about myself? I've got a father who is proud of me, a mother (who'll never admit out loud) that she too is proud of me. I've got a sister who cares about me too, even though she too will never say it out loud. I've got an orchestra full of friends who support me, who wish me well, who are waiting for me to go back and make music with them once again. I've got other old friends, JJ, Joanne, Jon, Ding Ding, Victor, Kelvin, KX, MW, YT, who are all rooting for me. I will not worry about what I don't have, but cherish what that I have now.

Life... it's so fragile. The moment we are born, we are already counting down on an unknown timer to the very end. The past is always behind us, the future is always yet to be. We know our past, and plan our future, but... we should always live in the now. The Present. Here. No one knows when it's their time to go, no one knows how when that time comes they will go. We are all able bodied with good mental faculties; we are in company of each other. Cherish those that are around, for it is the strength in this love and bond that makes life worth living.

１リットルの涙

１リットルの涙 (Ichi Rittoru no Namida). One Litre of Tears. By 沢尻エリカ (Sawajiri Erika).

I just spent 11 hours watching this 11 episode series. It's... a very touching story. If you want to watch a drama that can (and will) inspire you to live on, then you must watch this drama series.

For a good introduction to this drama, see here.

I hate to admit it, but I did shed tears in some of the scenes in the episodes...

Watch it if you can... you won't regret it.

You thought, I think, who confirmed?

Blissful dreams, harsh realities;
Juxtapose with sweet death melodies.
If I'm asleep, don't wake me;
Terror sneaks when I'm not looking;
Let me leave peacefully, not with eyes staring.

--Silent Contemplation by yours truly

It has been a while since I last talked about anything of any material consequence. Having extricated myself from the tangles of what I thought was love, I don't seem to be in the mood to write anymore. In fact, I think that my ideas for writing have dropped to yet another low, possibly the lowest since I last picked up my metaphorical pen to write.

Could it be that true artistic expression comes only when there is a large emotional baggage involved?

The past few months saw many changes, not all good. In fact, most of the changes that I observed seemed to have occurred over the past few weeks instead of the past few months. Before the mid-semester break, everyone was much more jovial and open; friends were made quickly, and laughter was abundant. But after the mid-semester break, where the mid-term grades are published, there seems to be a sudden drop in energy level. The laughter that comes seem almost reluctant, and people who were once close seemed to have an aversion to each other. This is so sad; college life is supposed to be tough, but how does one endure the toughness if there is no fun?

Perhaps it's the vile nature of grades. To a strong student, good grades affirm their competency and thus give them the confidence necessary to scale even higher mountains to further themselves; to a weak student, bad grades serve as a shock prod to show them that they are not performing on par. *shaking head* I never did like the idea of grading anyone. It is so artificial, especially in terms of grading through test instruments like in-class examinations. The whole idea of taking tests and exams repulse me fully; in fact it appears as though college is of no difference than that of high school or middle school for that matter. Why is everyone so tight-assed on grades? How can grades ever measure the full potential of a person?

In other news, Pittsburgh is starting to get cooler. The temperature here hovers between 2 to 5 degree Celsius, which is seriously not cold (iff you wear a decent jacket). In fact, it's a long time since I've felt so cool in my life. My usual skin allergies are almost nullified in this beautiful weather, and the last time I used a steroid cream was almost a couple of months ago. Very interesting phenomenon, maybe I should start considering how to import this weather condition back to Singapore so that I will not have to suffer from real bad skin again.

Autumn is more or less here, with trees shedding their orange, red and brown leaves. It's pretty, the change of colours of the leaves, with the grass still green (but starting to turn into shades of beige as of now) as a nice background. I'm too lazy to bring my camera out to grab pictures, but I guess the main reason for that tardiness is the lack of an incentive to take pictures of just the surroundings.

One interesting note is that I've not really felt homesick at all... everyone else back in Singapore appears to be a dream, and that here is a reality; though there are times where this place feels like a dream itself. Hell, it could be that I'm living in a dream either way.

Anyone who claims that the American college system is not stressful should have his/her throat slit, shot, maimed and quartered. It does appear to be a bit more lax compared to that of Singapore, with their 1 hour block sessions instead of 1.5 hours that we are mostly used to back home. But do not be fooled! It is damn intense. For example, I'm practically having Mathematics lessons everyday; my taking of three Math courses simultaneously notwithstanding. Over the course of a week, a single large chapter of a particular topic can be covered, with homework assignments to be completed over the course of the week just to be handed in exactly on the same day the next week, before a new load of homework assignments are assigned yet again. But then again, I kinda love this system; I can structure my time and workload so much more easily than before.

Surprisingly, I find myself operating at least on par with the power curve, being able to keep up with my document filing and revision (as far as studies go). This is something worth noting, considering the fact that I was a really messy person during the school days of old when I was still in Singapore. I think I'm among the neatest guys around, with everything written down neatly and stuff filed away nicely and all things are easily accessible.

And so, I guess that's all that I can truly say for now. Who wants to confirm the details with me?

Darn... 3 more months to *that* day

I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it.

That dreaded day is coming in 3 months from now. What am I to do?

Getting a high

Interesting weekend. As usual, I spent most of my time sleeping, which, considering the fact that I'm up for more than 19 hours a day, is more of a necessity than a luxury. Then, there was a screening of the show The PaperChase at the auditorium by my freshmen advisor. Great movie, that is; anyone who needs inspiration should attempt to seek out this little gem and learn from it.

Anyway, the high point came when we left the auditorium and stumbled upon some graduate students who were doing some complexity analysis problems. Paul asked some interesting question and the grad student who was heading the discussion started to talk about lambda calculus. Boy, that really made my day.

Alas, it is now time to finish up the homework. Oh, I downed 2 litres worth of diet Coke, so I should have enough energy to figure out how the homework should be done. ;-)

My Ocarinas are Finally Here!

And yes! My Ocarinas are finally here. Here's a look at them:



And don't they sound beautiful?

A Lost Cause...

《执迷不悔》—王菲

只一次我执著面对，任性地沉醉。
我并不在乎，这是错还是对。
就算是深陷，我不顾一切。
就算是执迷，我也执迷不悔。

别说我应该放弃，应该睁开眼。
我用我的心，去看去感觉。
你并不是我，又怎能了解。
就算是执迷，（就）让我执迷不悔。

我不是你们想的如此完美，
我承认有时也会辨不清真伪。
并非我不愿意走出迷堆，
只是这一次，这次是自己而不是谁。

要我用谁的心去体会，真真切切的感受周围。
就算痛苦，就算是泪，也是属于我的伤悲。
我还能用谁的心去体会，真真切切的感受周围。
就算疲倦，就算是累，也只能执迷而不悔。

别说我应该放弃，应该睁开眼。
我用我的心，去看去感觉。
你并不是我，又怎能了解。
就算是执迷，（就）让我执迷不悔。

我不是你们想的如此完美，
我承认有时也会辨不清真伪。
并非我不愿意走出迷堆，
只是这一次，这次是自己而不是谁。

要我用谁的心去体会，真真切切的感受周围。
就算痛苦，就算是泪，也是属于我的伤悲。
我还能用谁的心去体会，真真切切的感受周围。
就算疲倦，就算是累，也只能执迷而不悔。

要我用谁的心去体会，真真切切的感受周围。
就算痛苦，就算是泪，也是属于我的伤悲。
我还能用谁的心去体会，真真切切的感受周围。
就算疲倦，就算是累，也只能执迷而不悔。

A lost cause... I have become...

NaNoWriMo Warm-up Snippet #6

I begin:

...It was a little after midnight. Feeling a little peckish, he got out of his chair, grabbed his coat and left his apartment. As he walked down the stairs of the block, he slipped into his coat and braced himself for the harsh wind that was blowing outside.

Stepping out of the block, he was immediately greeted with the strong and cold wind of the deep night. Huddling deeper into his coat and slouching against the wind, he marched on stoically, towards the nearby Café, the only food place that was open at that time of the night.

As his face was blasted with the cold air, he found himself thinking once again about her. Her warm demeanour, her soulful eyes—no. He shook his head to clear his thoughts. It was never going to be possible; he should stop thinking about what was never to be. His mind a blank now, he trudged on towards the Café. Upon reaching, he reached out and pulled open the door, and went in.

It was different from the last time that he remembered it. The music was playing loudly in the background, the same as before. But it was the people, the people were different; the last time he came to the place, there were only a handful of night owls who kept largely to themselves, nursing whatever beverage they had bought. But it was different tonight; not only there were many more people, they seemed to be more jovial and friendly to each other.

He didn't care. Having had enough of the world at the moment, he ordered his snack and waited impatiently while it was being prepared. Then, when the order completed, he took his plate of sandwich and chips and made his way to the only corner of the café where it was still fairly quiet. Pulling the chair away from the table, he sat down, and nibbled on his sandwich.

Then she came in through the door. She was dressed in black all over, a sexy gothic kind of black. Her black gloved hands removed her silky black trench coat revealing a tank top hugging close to her luscious curves, and her long pants tracing the sensual contours of her rear and her legs, before stopping short at her calves, where black stilettoes continued the cover. She was smiling, and the radiance of her dazzling smile and her fair features made her so tempting.

Of course she was noticed. No one in the Café could ever miss a sight like that—her sexed up attire screamed for attention, and the attention was given. Some of the guys in the Café approached her, offering to buy her a drink or two, while some blokes even made suggestive passes. But she ignored them all, and walked on instead, still smiling sweetly, but to have come seemingly with a single purpose.

He couldn't be bothered. He was still nibbling on his sandwich when he found that someone had moved the chair across him and sat down. Mildly irritated that his solitude was encroached upon, he looked up with the intention to scold, but what he saw made him lose his will.

She was sitting directly opposite him. Her long black silky hair flowing and resting comfortably across her bare shoulders. And her soft eyes positively twinkled as she looked at him, and together with her smile, they promptly melted his heart.

A series of Unfortunate events

And so it is, a series of unfortunate events that have occurred recently. Granted, not all of the stuff affect me personally (read: as in me experiencing the event), but they still affect me all the same.

First off, something that is of a global issue. Thailand had a bloodless coup in which the military took over the government, thereby excising the position of the previous prime minister. All these before the newly arranged elections which was due sometime in October. *shakes head* What is the world turning into...?

Naq EK'f eryngvbafuvc sryy ncneg. Sbe fbzr haxabja ernfba, gurl whfg... sryy ncneg. Dhvgr fnqqravat; ur chg fb zhpu snvgu va gur eryngvbafuvc, ohg gura vg sryy guebhtu. Gur bayl guvat gung V ubcr vf gung ur vf abg fb urneg oebxrarq naq zragnyyl ybfg gung ur qbrf ernyyl fvyyl naq fghcvq guvatf gb uvzfrys. N cvgl gung V nz ab ybatre arne uvz—V pna bayl qb fb zhpu sebz guvf fvqr bs gur jbeyq.

Homework work load is starting to increase. Almost all of the initial advantage of advanced knowledge that I have is no longer available; the material of the courses have started to cross the threshold of the A-level syllabus. Time to work much harder now, I guess... All these homework grading schemes are killing me. It now seems that I do not have an advantage of completing my homework early, considering the fact that I spend a considerable amount of time trying to learn the material on my own, and even more time trying to apply what I've read on the question set. Frustrating. Maybe I should only do my homework about one day before at most so that I can perform better in the homework. This is starting to become crucial, as homework does count as factors of the final grade that I will have. Already I'm missing the 90% score requirement; I really don't know how am I supposed to be able to bring myself up to 90% without killing myself in the process.

Eryngvbafuvc ceboyrzf nobhaq. V sbhaq gung gurer ner n srj tveyf jubz V frrz gb unir qrirybcrq n yvxvat sbe, ohg V qba'g xabj ubj gb cebprrq. Creuncf V fubhyq whfg xrrc ernyyl dhvrg nobhg vg nyy, naq whfg ubcr gung gurl yvxr zr gbb. Ba n frcnengr abgr, V frevbhfyl guvax gung gur Fvatncberna pebjq qbrfa'g yvxr zr gbb zhpu, rfcrpvnyyl MJ. Thrff univat fgenvarq eryngvbafuvcf ner cneg naq cnepry bs jung qrsvarf zr gb or zr.

Like Jess, I'm starting to have serious doubts on my own abilities in my purported "pet" field—Computer Science. All the technical mumbo-jumbo, weird visualisation techniques and strange and arcane nuances of the language that they are teaching are starting to seriously make me reconsider my field of study. It does not help that everyone around me seems to be even more geeky on the topic than I am; guess that means I'm either meeting my match, or have already been pwned a long time ago. Either way, I am not feeling too good about myself on this issue. I'll just have to stick it out and hope to survive well enough so as to be able to do research next time.

Naq Avpbyr, ure ernpgvba frrzf jrveq. Ba gur bar unaq, fur frrzf cerggl pbby nobhg orvat sevraqf, lrg V frafrq n pregnva sbez bs vauvovgvba. Gur ivorf ner abg tbbq; fur frrzf gb or gheavat vagb lrg nabgure LG, jub, ol abj, unir pbzcyrgryl rkpbzzhavpngrq jvgu zr. Vs V fnl gung V'z hapbaprearq, V'z ylvat. Gurfr cnggreaf ner fgnegvat gb jbeel zr; V ubcr gung vg jba'g unccra, gubhtu V xabj va gur qrrcrfrg erprffrf bs zl zvaq gung vg jvyy unccra abarguryrff; bayl jurgure vg vf abj be yngre. Ohg vg jvyy qrsvavgryl bpphe. V'z fb hfrq gb gur fvtaf bs orvat ba gur iretr bs rkpbzzhavpngvba gung V pna fzryy vg pbzvat rira orsber vg neevirf.

And the department, they changed the prerequisite structure of our CS Major course. They have reduced the level of our current programming course from 200 to 100. And they increased the unit count from 9.0 to 10.0. What makes it worse is the fact that all these changes are done when we are almost a third into the course, and there is no retroactive fixing of our units. Maddening indeed.

I guess that all these are bad enough for now.

Ed: Yes, I am well aware that there are paragraphs of strange-looking words. They are in code due to certain sensitivities.

Feeling low

This week feels weird. For some strange reason, I just feel low. It seems like the initial advantage of the A-level syllabus is slowly drying up, and it's time to be even more hardworking now.

Made a few silly mistakes in my Math homework; when computing the negation of a statement, I negated the relation in the existentional/universal quantifier. That made me lose 5 marks for the homework (out of 60). Then, for a question which required a choice of the correct statement, I wrote the wrong option, but due to the fact that I did not incorporate an explanation of my reasoning, I lost 10 marks for that part. So, I nailed myself with a maximum score of 75%. :-( This sucks...

My homework scores seem to be falling as time goes by. Each time I match my homework answers with my neighbours', they seem to be totally and absolutely wrong. Time to stop doing homework too early... where the stuff that I self-learn is not as effective as that of what the Professor teaches.

On a separate note, I'm starting on the final plans for the plot for my novel-to-be for NaNoWriMo. Having not written narrative fiction for so long, I find myself being rusty in terms of trying to put together a decent plot. This is especially so as I'm attempting to write a *gasp* romance novel.

Whether the novel flops or not will be seen in time... I may post up snippets of it while I'm working on it in November when NaNoWriMo is in operation.

A pair of bittersweet songs

《至少我走得比你早》 卢巧音 你没有想过，我会说分手， 也许太习惯，我在你左右。 虽然离开你有很多理由， 可看见你这样惊讶，也足够。 我想得，比你多，陪你一起跟寂寞。 我性格，比你强，怎样做你的绵羊？ 我年轻，比你小，不信快乐找不到。 抬起头，开了口…… 最后我比你骄傲！从此不做你的牢！ 想不到你的好，记得和你的争吵。 想到老可到老，可是和你做不到。 如果你爱得比我少，至少我走得比你早。 你没有想过，我会说分手， 除非以为我，什么都忍受。 就算你这时候，努力挽留， 不过是你不能接受，我先走。 我想得，比你多，陪你一起更寂寞。 我性格，比你强，怎样做你的绵羊？ 我年轻，比你小，不信快乐找不到。 抬起头，开了口…… 最后我比你骄傲！从此不做你的牢！ 想不到你的好，记得和你的争吵。 想到老可到老，可是和你做不到。 如果你爱得比我少，至少我走得比你早。 轰轰烈烈的开口…… 最后我比你骄傲！从此不做你的牢！ 想不到你的好，记得和你的争吵。 想到老可到老，可是和你做不到。 如果你爱得比我少，幸好我走得比你早。

《好心分手》（粤） 卢巧音 是否很驚訝，講不出說話, 沒錯我是說：“你想分手嗎？” 曾給你馴服到　就像綿羊， 何解會反咬你一下，你知嗎？ 回頭望，伴你走，從來未曾幸福過。 赴過湯，蹈過火，沿途為何沒愛河？ 下半生，陪住你，懷疑快樂也不多。 沒有心，別再拖…… 好心一早放開我！從頭努力也坎坷！ 通通不要好過，來年歲月那麼多。 為繼續而繼續，沒有好處還是我。 若註定有一點苦楚，不如自己親手割破。 是否不甘心，首先給撇下， 換了你是我，你忍得到嗎？ 捱得過無限次，寂寞凌遲， 人心態早已看得化，也可怕…… 回頭望，伴你走，從來未曾幸福過。 赴過湯，蹈過火，沿途為何沒愛河？ 下半生，陪住你，懷疑快樂也不多。 沒有心，別再拖…… 好心一早放開我！從頭努力也坎坷！ 通通不要好過，來年歲月那麼多。 為繼續而繼續，直接不過承認錯， 若勉強也分到不多，不如甚麼也摔破。 難捱就無謂再拖…… 好心一早放開我！從頭努力也坎坷！ 通通不要好過，來年歲月那麼多。 為繼續而繼續，沒有好處還是我。 若註定有一點苦楚，不如自己親手割破。

A pair of bittersweet songs from the same singer; one's in Mandarin while the other is in Cantonese. Read the lyrics, and compare their level of bitterness...

*sigh*

No mood to write more. :-(

沢尻エリカ

She can sing! Oh my... *swoons*

And yeah, if you haven't realised, I simply adore 沢尻エリカ! She's like the human equivalent of Edythe Fujitsu~!

Boulevard Of Broken Dreams

I walk a lonely road
The only one that I have ever known
Don't know where it goes
But it's home to me and I walk alone

My path in life is solitary; people come by, and walk beside me only for a fleeting moment. It's always the same; when I try to change, I realise I end up on the same road that I knew.

I walk this empty street
On the Boulevard of Broken Dreams
Where the city sleeps
and I'm the only one and I walk alone

And my dreams were shattered, more than once. And the world, it doesn't care. It moves on, and I go on solitarily.

I walk alone
I walk alone

I walk alone
I walk a...

My shadow's the only one that walks beside me
My shallow heart's the only thing that's beating
Sometimes I wish someone out there will find me
'Til then I walk alone

But it is the few closest friends that I have left, Chinghua, Jessica, Xiaolu and Cuilin who are always there when I need them. What am I to do if I can't find them?

Ah-ah, Ah-ah, Ah-ah, Aaah-ah,
Ah-ah, Ah-ah, Ah-ah

I'm walking down the line
That divides me somewhere in my mind
On the border line
Of the edge and where I walk alone

A constant dilemma on who I really am. Am I the technogeek that I make myself out to be, or am I something more? Will I ever be as human as I wish to be?

Read between the lines
What's fucked up and everything's alright
Check my vital signs
To know I'm still alive and I walk alone

But barely. Sometimes, it takes effort to just—have the will to stay alive. But the journey is still as solitary as before.

I walk alone
I walk alone

I walk alone
I walk a...

My shadow's the only one that walks beside me
My shallow heart's the only thing that's beating
Sometimes I wish someone out there will find me
'Til then I walk alone

Ah-ah, Ah-ah, Ah-ah, Aaah-ah
Ah-ah, Ah-ah

I walk alone
I walk a...

I walk this empty street
On the Boulevard of Broken Dreams
Where the city sleeps
And I'm the only one and I walk a...

My shadow's the only one that walks beside me
My shallow heart's the only thing that's beating
Sometimes I wish someone out there will find me
'Til then I walk alone...

And so. *sigh*

I walk alone on the boulevard of broken dreams...