On Christmas Time

I hope everyone is having a great time during the Christmas period, no matter their culture celebrates Christmas or not. In Chinese culture, we don't. But being so far from home in this fairy land called Great Britain, I couldn't help myself to get some Christmas spirit on. Therefore, it has totally nothing to do with my laziness that I have been almost motionless in my room and living on all kinds of junk food and takeaways.

Chinese doesn't celebrate Christmas, traditionally. But a little bird called ‘Economical Globalisation’ has brought everything about Christmas to China. During Christmas time, every single street in the city is playing this big Christmas extravaganza. Young people find a good reason to go out and drink their head off, most of who have no idea of what Christmas is celebrating. That's why I almost blanked out when I heard a tiny piece of news on six o'clock at the Christmas Eve afternoon on BBC 1: ‘if you are celebrating Christmas this year in China, you can get arrested’. How much have those young people been drinking, or the BBC 1 editors?

I was on the phone with my parents that day and my father reminded me a little Christmas tale. I was only about seven back then. We started to have English class in primary school that time so we read this thing about Christmas and Santa. We knew nothing about it but some nice old man giving out free gifts. I told that to my parents and I got so excited that year's Christmas time. Of course no one in my class believed any thing about Santa but my mother told me that if I put my socks at the head of the bed, I could get gifts from Santa, who would put the gifts in the socks. I put a clean pair of socks there before I went to bed and I found they filled up in the morning I woke up. I can still remember how excited I was. There was a card on the floor as well, written in English with a foreign stamp at the corner. I rushed into my parent's room and woke them all up. They said it must've been Santa. Then I told everybody in my class. No one believed me. I showed them the card and they couldn't care less. But that didn't spoil my exciting mood. And for the following few years, Santa visited me every time. The socks were filled with all kinds of gifts every time, although the only one I can remember is a can of coke because the sock looked so stuffed. A card with foreign stamp came with gifts every time as well.

Of course, it had been my mother. She was in English training herself back then and knew a few friends from states. That must be how she got hold of those stamps. I didn't suspect it at all until I was too old to believe Santa when I was about twelve or so. But even now, I can still remember how happy I was when I opened my eyes and thought Santa just visited. What a nice piece of sweet memory!

Days B4 X'Mas

Only days to go before Christmas and I have become lazier than ever at a time that I am supposed to be more productive than ever. I am trying very hard to get myself in the role of hard working though. However, watching film on TV at half past one in the morning now doesn’t convince anyone, does it? Well, I have got plan in my head already and I shall see how it works out in the next few days.

Christmas is coming and it is so clear that SONY is trying its hardest to do some damage control of PS3. To be fare, PS3 is the game console packed with cutting edge technologies and state-of-art concepts. But also, it comes with a totally failed market perspective. SONY has had totally biased idea of how luxury people would like to go on gaming. Its sky high price has put PS3 on the worst market performance ever. However, it is Christmas and SONY sees a new opportunity coming. Many game companies have new PS3 games published right at this time as well. So, it has been all over TV channels these a few days: ‘Entertainment like you’ve ever seen before’. It is rather tempting, which I have to admit. Isn’t marketing just powerful? And SONY seems to get it right this time.

And, also people tend to be less productive before Christmas and this can give bosses a big headache. This is one of the letters a senior staff sent to his fellow colleges yesterday. Isn't he lovely?

Colleagues,

There has been a noticeable drop in productivity in the School in the past few days. Just because the students have gone does not mean
that we can slow down.

I can only assume that this disgraceful situation is as a result of low blood sugar levels during the day. With this in mind, I have put boxes of chocolate biscuits in the kitchen and in D437. Please take one as a matter of urgency.

Oh, and Merry Christmas,

Someone I Know

It was just a annoying Monday morning. I woke up as planned at about eight and I got up as usual around ten. I went out to send off my visa extension application. Well, the whole process of getting all supporting documents for visa extension had been painful. It wasn't supposed to be but everything just had some extra hassle added. Anyway I was just glad it was over.

I went home after picked three huge bags of supplies for next two weeks. I then just realised that I forgot to buy rice. That meant pasta for tonight. I turned on my laptop. I really should write something in my thesis that I had to finish by the end of February. But before I started, I thought I'd blog a little. It had been over a week since my last post. I let my mind to wander, trying to figure out some easy topic. There were quite a few I could moan about. And right at that time, someone popped up in my MSN. Someone I haven't heard from for three years. We chatted for a while and I wished him a good new year at the end. Then, I couldn't help myself to write something about him.

We never met in person but only on the internet. It was the gay society on the internet. It was early 2003, if I recalled correctly. The awareness of homosexuals were just started back then in China. It was a forum that we hung out a lot. It was great fun. Right before I was about to come to UK. He told me he was about to marry a girl. When I asked why, his reply was just simple and just Chinese: for my mother.

It would an extremely bizarre reason for most of the people in other parts of the world. But for Chinese, that's what we do. Nothing could we put beyond our family, and our parents are one of the most important parts of it. It is impossible to explain this in a few words so I will just leave it here. Anyway, I told him and if I were him I wouldn't but he did anyway. They had a happy wedding, a few months latter.

About another few months latter, I was still struggling to get used to the life in UK, I met him again on MSN. He told me that he didn't use MSN that much. He was happy about everything back there. He was very good to his wife, in the way that any good husband could possibly be. He also told me that he had a boyfriend somewhere else. They met occasionally. He said everything was just working out. I wasn't so convinced though. But that's his life and that's what he wanted.

Then it had been three years. I never heard from him in these three years and I doubted if he would ever appear again. It might just be the Christmas spirit playing tricks and there he was on MSN here. He said hi. He said he just had a baby girl ten days ago. They gave the girl a very beautiful name. He said he was so happy and he was indeed a good husband. He didn't fool around outside anymore, and he had told everything about his homosexual history to his wife. His wife probably got the promise that it was just the past and he was just a family man now. I wouldn't know. We couldn't talk more because it was late in China at the moment we were chatting and his baby girl was crying. But I guessed that somehow his wife accepted it and forgived him. It might be the evidence of true love without border or just a sacrifice for the family made by a woman. I have no intelligence to comment at all. But I could see he was really happy.

Normally I would be judging him now but I decided not to. I did't even want to comment as such. It was just something I thought like to make a note on my journal, if I had one.

It's Late Afterall

It was two days before someone's birthday and I just remembered that I haven't got anything for him yet. I couldn't possibly have any energy back then to figure out a perfect gift for him, so I thought I would just pick up some card on my way home that day. ASDA was way too far for my mood to venture to when I left the university. The nice British sky in winter was all dark by five. I thought I would just go to the CO-OP shop that was only a few extra steps away from my way home.

I went to the shop with a friend of mine, who was leaving to Taiwan for holiday. We walked down to the shop, talking nonsense on the way. To my surprise, I found another friend of mine was working at the checkout in the shop. Well, actually, I am still mad of him now for not going out with the girl I set him up with. Anyway, I went to the card section and was trying to get some card nice. The small shop didn't have a brilliant collection and I was really struggling to get something won't mark down my taste. Finally I picked this card with a lovely teddy bear on the cover. There were not many options in the shop.

I said goodbye for my friend who was going to catch the coach to the airport and went home. That night I wrote down some normal birthday wishes in the card and I noticed the cover which says: Belated Birthday. There was no way I was going to get another card so I just wrote a yellow post-it note on the card says sorry about the cover, etc. I posted it the next morning.

About four days after his birthday, he got the card. I thought I must have forgotten to write down the property number of the address or maybe it was just his flatmates misplaced the card. Either way, the card was late and it became a 'belated birthday' card after all. The card I picked turned out to be quite appropriate. Could you ever possible to argue with life?

I Am Judgmental

I am judgemental. I judge everything I encounter as well as everybody I meet. Many of us think that being judgemental is a bad thing. People often collect judgement to discriminations and prejudices. Judgemental has become a negative term for those hard-headed and short-sighted shallow people.

I can't play deep. It is far too tiresome to bear and emotionally impossible for me. As long as I don’t be shallow when I think I am being deep, it will make me less a clown. I am short-sighted as well. The big pair of glasses on my nose are there for a reason. Hard-head? I am a PhD student on AI and robotics. How soft can you expect my head to be? So, facts have again proven that I am judgmental.

I am judgmental, yet I am respectful still. The judgements that I draw are kept to myself. I won't say my attitude towards people is not influenced by my judgments. But there is little reason to force ourselves to like everybody we met. I actually know such a person who tries to like every single human being he encounters and to not judge at all in any sense. That is barely a positive attitude of existence, being judgmental here if I may.

I judge because I am made of principles. Those principles emerge and change along with my growing-up, my education and my life experiences. My recognition of this world is based on fitting my perceptions to my principles, which forms my process of judging. Hence I read good and bad, right and wrong, though which I interpret the world I am living in. Such interpretation offers me awareness of my own existence.

However, judgment can indeed be shallow and superficial as people say. My big-worded discussion of me being judgmental doesn't me any better in this matter. I am wrong all the time, especially when it comes down to the judgment of a person. There is nothing more exciting and more surprising than a living human being can be. So I always stand corrected. It is rather exciting to update my judgment about a person and refreshing my knowledge of their nature.

So, if you know me, unfortunately, you've been judged. Yet am I judged as well? what will my label be?

Simply No Sleep Tonight

I haven't been doing this for a while, working without sleep. To be honest, I need my sleep. I can't do that much overnights now. This is such a strong evidence of aging. Six years ago, I normally did my exam revision for a few nights, went to the exam directly and had a sleep afterwards. I did my Probability and Statistics exam in that way and still had a mark of 98 out of 100. I was good. A few nights without sleep wouldn’t have any effects on me at all back then. Now, I might as well just call the next day off.

But I have nothing on my schedule tomorrow. The weather is going to be upsetting, says the forecast. Stronger wind and shower give me no initiative to venture to my office tomorrow. I think I will take it easy. I am attempted to go down the city again but probably still have to see what the weather suggests.

I was going to do some work in the evening. As I am moaning here now, I think we all know how that went. A friend online told me he was playing Guild Wars, a good online game, which totally stimulated my desire of gaming. I dare not to start my online gaming again, too addictive. So I spent a few hours playing the arcade simulator. I also wanted to write something comforting for another friend who was a little blue recently. Unfortunately, I found myself totally incompetent to do so and ended up sending him some rubbish. Hopefully, he will get a laugh on my stupidity and take his mind off the troubles for a minute or two. Then, here I am, midnight, works undone.

However, like most of other scholar you might see (is it just fun to call myself a scholar), I actually like to work nights. Nights are quite and offer much less distractions. I do find it much easier to concentrate. Moreover, I have got huge piles of work to finish now. Besides my thesis, I still have 6000 words worth of casual work to finish in ten days.

How could I leave so many works undone till now? I think I have recovered from my ‘low phase’ that is a period of time I feel low for all kinds of ridiculous reasons and use them as the excuses to skip work, exercise and any other things that are supposed to be good to me. I am proudly to say that it is gone for now, though I have no idea when it will return. I might just use tonight as a start to get some work done first seriously.

Coffee is ready.

The picture is taken by Rob, where http://www.flickr.com/photos/robinlondon gives more

On My Way Home

It was raining this afternoon. When I finished my teaching, a lab of which had some music students complaining why they were doing a LAN networking lab, I was really not in the mood of appreciating the walk in a cool and wet winter night. Why did we have music students doing electronic labs anyway? Universities could always mess up the right things they were supposed to be doing in one way or another. I was so thirsty but I couldn't be bothered to walk back to the student union shop. It was a wet night and the drops had no sign to calm down. I searched my wallet hoping to find a pound so I could get something from the vending machine. I was lucky. There was a big fat two pound coin. I put the coin into the machine and press the code for a bottle of coke zero. Nothing happened. The coin was not accepted by the machine. I read the instruction again. Two pound coin was supposed to be working. I tried it once more but ended with disappointment. I thought I could still make it home without the coke.

The weather had not been good for the day at all. Thankfully I was not cold. The cashmere sweater that I was wearing was bought back from China two years ago. My mother bought it for me. So its colour really suited my father well and could make me look 5 years older with no problem. But it was really warm and soft.

I was soaking. The shortcut I normally took was dark and wet, which made it not attractive at all. So I decided to walk home through the shopping mall. It is probably the only thing keeping Hatfield from a dead place. It is not very big but managed to provide some entertainments out of the quietness in this small, not modern and not traditional English town.

As I was walking through, it just hit me that I was sharing with a friend with the books we read and our desire of buying more books. We were talking about visiting Waterstone and the shop was right there on my way home. I thought I would just hop in and see what they had got to offer before Christmas.

'3 for 2', the favourite trick of Waterstone was being played again. It was such a temptation, I had to admit. I thought I should be able to afford three books with no problem at a price of two. After all, the university just gave me my Christmas bonus although I won't share the amount in case you would be laughing too loud. That would be bad for your spleen, an old Chinese saying. It was not to my surprise that then I found my self struggling to keep the goods into my budget because I picked out six books. I was attempted to buy all of them but I was concerned that I still had my grocery shopping undone yet. So I put three down, the trilogy, the fist book of which was filmed as 'The Golden Compass'. A friend of mine told me it was really good though. I got myself a Ian Rankin's book The Naming of The Dead because I saw it’s adverts on my way to Liverpool for a conference four months' ago. I thought this ought to be good. I also got myself another Bill Bryson: The Life and Times of The Thunderbolt Kids. I read his book, A Short History for Everything, before. That was fun. The last book I got was The Shadow of the Wind, for no reason but that I had seen it on the shelf for a long time.

With my proud new entertainments in hand, I walked out after paying. There is a few fast food restaurants towards my home. It was still raining. Kids were trying to hit cars that lined for the fast food take out with garbage, I reckoned. I walked faster in case they turned around to give me some trouble.
……
After dinner, I turned on the radio, got my self a warm cup of tea and opened the page of The Naming of The Dead. It was such a peace and relaxing of mind I haven't had for a while.

Wear A Red Ribbon

1st of December is the world AIDS day, let's just try our slight effort and wear a red ribbon.

The pound that you donate for getting the ribbon does matter. But more importantly, it is the signal of attracting people's awareness of this serious issue that exists in our modern civilised world.

It is more than just asking for people's sympathy for AIDS victims. The awareness of AIDS is for the sake of very singlel one of us and it is the reason for the existence of world AIDS day. A red ribbon that is worn serves as this gentle reminder that fulfils its duty even if only one pedestrian catchs it with their eyes and gets the message.

I am trying to convince as many friends as possible to do it. Strangely, I find it is rather hard. Apparently AIDS still sounds far away from the majority of us. Because it is far away, we don't know it. Because we don't know it, we fear it. Because we fear it, we pretend that it is far away. The number of AIDS victims is rising very year in almost very country. It is actually just right behind our doorway.

So, just for the day, if you see a box of red ribbon, please donate a pound, pick one ribbon, and wear it. Some day, somehow, it will done someone good in one way or another. And that will be YOUR good deed of the day.

Wear a red ribbon.

It is world AIDS day on 1st of December. It's the coming Saturday.

I Let It Go

Finally, I decided to let it go. I thought I would insist but I foresaw a broken heart. At last, I couldn't pursue any more and I decided to pull out before I was hurt. I let it go.

I genuinely thought I had a shot over there and we would just work like a click of fingers. I thought he liked me. I knew he did. I liked him. I never doubted it. But I never expected that the feeling became so strong and my rationality couldn't control it any more.

So one day, I told him.

He said he couldn't go into a relationship. He said that he was through a difficult time and relationship was the last thing he could put his mind on. He said he liked me. He said if he started a relationship, he would hurt someone. He said it was him not me. He said let's see how it went. He was laying there right besides me.

I felt rejected and it tasted bitterly. Things had been tough on him, I knew. I wanted to help but he wouldn't open up. I turned around and looked at him. I was trying to make out of list of why I liked him but I couldn't. Right there, I knew he was what I wanted. I left in the morning. He said it was so nice to see me. I went back home and had some sleep.

I thought if I try harder, it might eventually work. So I tried. He was difficult to get in touch. However I tried I barely succeeded. He liked me, I believed that, yet distant he still was. My friends told me that I should just take the signal and took it like a man. I was about to. However, every time I was about to be the man, he rang me up. His voice never fialed to remind me how sweet he was. He liked to talk cold cars and IBM PCs that I barely understood but I just enjoyed it. My imagination then told me that I still stood a chance. I couldn't possibly let it go just like that. Not yet.

We had a long list of Gmail conversation. It had been running for over a year, although the recent mails only went from me to him but few went back. It was the 100th mail. I wanted to write something brilliant. But little could I put down. Besides all the nonsense, I only wrote: I miss you. Nothing came back and that was the last of our Gmail list. My friend said I should delete the email list. I couldn't do it.

For seven days, he had totally disappeared. I checked my phone every five minutes and the screen remained dead and black. My imagination had been making up stories that scared me. I finally noticed that I needed an answer. Although it appeared to be obvious, I needed to hear it from him. I left a message on his phone without any hope. He phoned back. The talk was as joyful as usual. He didn't give any excuse for his absence. Let's just don't argue it, said he. I didn't.

Two days later, I met him again. We had a lovely evening like always. We had some lovely drink, went to see a dull film, and had a nice KFC meal. That night, I asked him again. I was seeking the answer.

He couldn't go into a relationship, said he. He was through a difficult time and relationship was the last thing he could put his mind on, said he. He liked me, said he. If he started a relationship he would hurt someone, said he. It was him not me, said he. He was laying there right besides me.

This time, I knew there was nothing I could do to change it. I still believed that he liked me. But, as my friends said, it was more like an appreciation for accompany rather than a heart beat. That heart beat wouldn't be me, no matter how long I insisted. I was arguing with my friends but at that moment, I knew it was true. I felt rather relieved, in a strange way. I wasn't hurt but I knew I would be if I didn't stop by then. It was another sleepless night.

In the morning, I kissed him on the cheek, I had touch on his cute belly, I walked him to work and I left. I walked to the Hyde Park. The view was lovely. Walking among the beautiful greens with rays of golden sun shine in the air, I was calm and happy.

I thought he liked me. I knew he did. I liked him. I never doubted it. But finally, I decided to let it go. I thought I would insist but I foresaw a broken heart. At last, I couldn't pursue any more and I decided to pull out before I was hurt. I let it go, willingly.

A Lazy Day

Monday is always hectic for most of us. But as a student I have the privilege to have a lazy Monday. I did. I really shouldn't, considering how much my PhD thesis still needs me to finish. But just for the day, I can't care less. I got up nearly 11 am. I woke up earlier and the lovely sound of the shower hitting my windows soon put me back to sleep again. It was so cold outside. Who would ever want to go out today?

The room was messy. I thought I'd better clean it again. A friend of mine never understands why I am always cleaning my room. Me either. But it is just messy always. I am surprised that I could live in a cave like this for weeks now. I folded up all the clothes that were lying all over the places and those that have been hanging there to dry for a whole week now. I added some water to the pot of flowers near my window. I have got this pot for three years now. It is strange though that it blooms in the winter this year and was struggling to die during summer time.

There was a sound of someone banging on the bed for about 30 minute. Who got lucky in the middle of Monday?

The spicy girls are determined to com back. They've on the radio all day. The only funny thing I heard on the radio is that duck quacks don't echo. Really? The nerdy evil inside me won't like let something funny like this just going away. I looked it up in the internet and apparently, it does echo. How come we get a saying like this anyway?

While I am still wondering what to do for this relaxing day, it was dark outside already. And I just remembered that I have had nothing to eat today at all. But I am still not feeling like cooking. I think I can hold it up for an hour or so. It is about six now and looks like the call I was expecting won't come anyway. I am working in the graduate ceremony for the university over the nearby town tomorrow. It will be boring. On the work specification list sent to us by exam office, after a list of responsibility there is a line: We would suggest you to bring a book with you. You get the idea.

So there will be no thesis writing tomorrow, and probably none on Wednesday either. I will worry about it sometime else and when I fed up by it again, I will write some more rubbish over here. Time to cook.

An Unhealthy Desire

Desire, is always a temping word. I have many desires. Who don't? I desire for career, for money, for a ridiculously big mansion and all the other usual clichés. And I also share the desire with millions of single people, the relationship. But, just all of sudden, I found that my desire of such has become so unhealthy and I am starting to worry about it.

Love experts who write columns at some news paper's 10th or 100th page must have the ability to list out hundreds of reasons for the existence of the desire for relationship, based on all perspectives: science, emotion, horoscope, big fat crystal ball, and so forth. I don't really read columns that often, so I was trying to work out where I got such strong desire of relationship and trying to save me a few pennies for paying news papers. Oh yeah, I am cheap alright.

If you prepare to continue your reading, I have to warn you that the following sound awful, strange, and don't make me good at all. So if you love me, please don't proceed because you will end up feel sorry for me. If you hate me, do not proceed, because that will just make you way too happy.

Well, here goes, the first reason: I think my desire for relationship is because being single is always the thing, which I am blame. Strange, isn't it? I guess every one of us has the period of time that everything is just not working out. We are not saint. We try to find something to blame. My unfortunate bachelorhood is what I can grab. I always thought that were I coupled, my life would’ve been so much easier. Even with my pea-sized brain, I know it is naive. But I just can't stop wandering. Ok, if you are laughing too hard, I will have to ask to you stop drooling for the sake of your keyboard, in case it has run out of warranty.

The second I shall say is jealousy. That's even stranger. This probably contributes to the amplifying of my desire. Simply speaking, most of my friends are either married or coupled. Technically, as a good friend as I am, I should be happy for them. I seriously do. The feeling of jealousy just coming as buy one get one free, something you can't help. Is it just lucky to be my friend? Hopefully, most of them don't read my blog. This feels like that when I was then, very kid was getting their own bike and I then wanted a bike of mine so much. I's like I have turned everything into a competition and I am loosing if I am the one who is single. I know this must have made my brain shrinks even more. Btw, Jyri, I am seriously happy for you.

Now, we come to the third. Well, just for the goodness's sake, I will put down reason as the old rotted saying of looking for love, looking for company and other blahs. The feeling of loneliness does hit me more frequently. Well, I cuddle my pillow and I have survived so far. Sadly, my pillows didn't make it. May those I trashed rest in peace.

I have been trying so hard in the writing of this not to use the word ‘desperate’. I think that really makes me sounds bad. But now, I realise it doesn't make a difference now. I'd go and wipe out the big L O O S E R off my face. You have had enough fun here. Go home!

I Am Legally Responsible...

I am obviously legally responsible for wrongly accusing ASDA, the biggest supermarket chain in UK.

It all started with a shopping at ASDA one day. I passed by the raw meat products section and found a box of lamb mince with a bit funny colour. A small bit of the mince appeared to be grey, a colour of which would make me suspect that bit of meat has been exposed to a high temperature. Then I recalled this programme I watched some time ago in BBC, which took undercover research on supermarket butchery. One of the cases was that a supermarket worker found the machine to mince the meat was broken as the mince came out cooked. Those mince then should be discarded. But they mixed the cooked mince with other mince and sealed to sell. Out of curiosity, I took a picture of the mince with my phone. I was thinking of summoning a staff but decided that I could do the evening without any argument of such. So I left.

Then, it was last night. I didn’t find anything else better to do than hanging around on a forum and I thought it would’ve been fun to ‘show off’ my proud evidence of careless ASDA. So I posted the picture saying that it was a box of mince with cooked meat from ASDA and I was expecting people argue if it indeed looked to be cooked or just a normal colour that can be expected in a box of mince. People did…but…

Soon, the replies started to highlight for my legal liability for making ‘public accusation’ of ASDA without real facts. Experts said that I should only do so if I bought that box and sent them to a place called…EHO (I don’t even know what EHO is, some sort of watchdog is my wild guess -_-0).

When I was trying to defend myself saying that I didn’t think that far as some sort of public accusation but just want to post something fun, my fake make up was soon penetrated by people with shining eyes. Other replies soon reveal my carefully structured conspiracy as I didn’t buy the mince yet I took a picture of it and then posted it on a public website. With all the evidence, legal experts in the following replies soon upgraded my behaviour into an ‘allegation towards ASDA’.

I have to admit that those were such a blow. I know my big mouth can get me trouble, but this is certainly not very testy. Obviously I am foolish, as pointed out by some replies of my thread, of trying to set up ASDA and making public ‘allegation’ against it. I did apologise at the end of the thread telling people that I am still a good boy. I guess I just didn’t think that people would take this post from that perspective. Doesn’t modern world surprise us? I should find out what EHO is.

A New Post

With no surprise, I haven’t touched this little space of mine for ages…big surprise. I actually don’t believe someone will actually read this bit but I was proved wrong yesterday. It then got me thinking of trying to start writing here, once again.

Let’s talk about music. Of course, a man like me can have no deep thoughts about music. It just came to my notice that there was a very nice music on the UK chart a few weeks ago. The song was: Apologize [Timberland Ft. Onerebuplic]. However, I didn’t realise that the original song was much more beautiful without Timberland’s ‘contribution’. This is the video of the original Apologize from YouTube:



However, what is more interesting is that this is not the official music video for the music. Apparently, there was no official music video for un-remixed Apologize (the remixed video was totally rubbish though).The author of the video above appears to be an independent director. So, it all looks like Timberland didn’t do a good thing on this originally beautiful song, or did he? Without famous Timberland to pull this song up the chart, and gets all the radio station play the remixed version, I still don’t know the original one. So, this must be what they call a commercial approach, the proud product of modern entertainment industry.

Neighbour From H.......

It was just a normal morning. I woke up as a normal day and had some cereal as normal. I walked out of the door way and was about to across our backyard as normal. There it was, finally something funny to break off the normality of that morning. See, we had a very narrow entrance way in our backyard through the main rode of the block and the following picture tells you what happened.

Well, if it was the famous England drunken kids in the night, they must've been very drunk to play with those stinky garbage bags. That was a lot of garbage and they are mostly not ours. See, we have this angel like neighbour. They are such thoughtful person. They are always worried that bad persons will one day park their mass-destructive tank in our car park place, so they kindly parked one of their never-been-used cars on it. You know how people nowadays are competitive on everything. It would've been such a shame that you throw much fewer garbage bags out than others on the collecting day. So they always bare the shame themselves and put their garbage bags in front of our doors. They know we are poor international students in the house and can't really afford buying many CDs. Thus they never forgot to share their party music with us, no matter how late it is.

Why don't we go up to thank them and let them know that they really don't need to do those things? Well, they are locals. Do I need to say more?

So, it is actually reasonable for us to have a second thought of if it was the drunken kids or the kind neighbour who just figured out that it would've been nice to add a little flavour into our boring and tough student life here. The answer was never found out.

Isn't our neighbour nice?

By the way, the garbage bags was not the only flavouring, take a look at the top of my housemate's car:

Japanese Style RPGs

Since Forest gave me his old PS2 console, I am trying to get myself addicted on it so I can get my computer free. As some useful backgroup here, I am a crazy Asian game player that is crazy about Asain style Role Playing Game (RPG). Ok, maybe I should extend the backgroup a little bit more.

Asian style RPG probably is not a correct term. The gaming culture of east Asian is largely driven by China, Janpan and Soth Korea. In the case of RPG they all have developed their own uniquenesses. However, having the fact that Japan is the most develpped society there, it gives no surprise that all other Asian RPG styles are in fact a diversion from Japanese RPGs. Thus I prefere the term Japanese style RPG to Asian style RPG.

So, here comes the thing, it is so hard to find any good Japanese style RPG here in UK on PS2. If you are still not clear about what kind of RPG I am talking about, here is a hit: Final Fantacy (FF) serious. So I bought it, FF XII, the big hit from SONY. After 50 hours of playing, I have to admit it is indeed a complete show-off of SONY's technology. They have almost boosted PS's ability to the edge. Stunning computational graphics, movie standard CG, prefessional music. But still I can't help to ask meself one question: what is this game? If you still remeber the first time FF make the biggest hit on PS, or even the FFX on PS2, you will find FF XII is so different. The previous tow are pure and real Japanese style RPG. But even by saying FF XII is a combination of both Japanese and western styles will be flatering it. It's like a Dragon & Dungeon (D&D) such as Baldur's Gate.

I liked Baldur's Gate 1&2. I liked Never Winter Night too. Because by playing those games, you set yourself to be saticfied by the maximum of virtual killing, treasure hunting and it is great fun. But when I am playing Japanese style RPG, I am expecting something else and FF XII ended up disapointing me.

The beauty of Japanese style RPG is that it is like abother form of film or book. It has a very strong story line and the whole game tells you this story. By finishing a good game of such, you end up so touched by the charectors of the game, by the vivid narrative of the story itself. It is like reading a good book or watching a good film but by being actually a part of the story. It is not fair to say FF XII does not have a good story line setting. It has but the story line gets much simpler than before, even than FF X. Maybe it because SONY finally decided that it is the westerners' money it wants. After over 50 hours of playing, I felt nothing but tired, but I am sill shocked by how advance SONY's techonolgies can go. The story was told so pale. Though I am sure it had a big music group, after playing I can't recall a single tune.

So, I will have to stick to my computer for a while because one of the greatest Japanese RPGs will finally be released on its newwst Chinese version on computer. The Legend of Heroes 6: Second Chapter (ED6:SC). ED serious became famous on its third one: ProphercyMoon Light Witch (no idea why the picture I have says it is the second). That was 1996. ED4: A Tear of Vermillion, also became one of the biggest classic (they both have the PSP remake now as shown in the images, but how good are those remakes are? You are the judge). The newest of the family includes two games. The Legend of Heores 6: Sora no Kiseki (literally the trace of time) and Sora no Kiseki: SC. Of course, Falcom, the company, is no competition of SONY. It has no stuningly good CG to tell the story. But the use of its music is so amazing. Compared to SONY, professionals will say Falcom's music is bold, normal and less refined. It is jsut like everyday tune. But it is only because of that, you can sing a little bit to yourself on your home and each piece of its music gives a vivd image of that piece of the story. I think I don't need to comment on the stroy line itself as there are lots on the web but it is just good, and the game play is great fun too. As I have said, it's like reading a great book by being a part of it. Compared to ED6, FF XII is more like a BLOCKBUSTER movie with lots of special effects and big investment but The Legend of Heores is more like something you can really enjoy again and again and again. Even if you stop playing, you will keep telling its story. Now, that is a game I am talking about.

Try again!+Huge electricity bill

It's totally no surprise that on the half way through my Blogging life, I dropped it. That is just so tipical of me. So again, I am trying to pick it up. Well, it is 4:53 in the morning and I am sitting in front of my half-dead laptop typing. Hmm...I am off to a good start. So what can I share with my readers this time.

It has been months that I've been writing this and a lot has happened around and on me. How about something like this, something more recent....like....

1358.60 POUNDS OF ELECTRICITY BILL FROM BRITISH GAS?

Yeah, that's right. 1358.60 pounds on the electricity bill of my house. I was so glad that my heart was strong enough to support me to read through the whole statment. Of course, as eight of the millions of very loyal unsaticified British Gas customers, our house started the famous painful complaining marathon. We e-mail'ed, we wrote and I have spent over two days to hold on the complaining line, listening to some great music in the most terrible quality. I even got a plan if British Gas wouldn't take our complaining seriously. I was thinking of calling BBC Watch Dog. That ought to be fun, I thought.

But, if you read some of my previous posts, you will know that I am always the unlucky guy. Well, the line went through finally and magically. it turned out......the billing was right. Please forgive me that I really can't be bothered to explain why but.....that's a big chunk off my budget now. Lucky me.

Well, I think that's about today. I will share some of my stories in my missing time. Till then, take care.