jBlog

Black Eyed Beans?

jason — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 02:00:33 +0000

Lyn (my boo) and I were walking along a street near Le Yuan and came across this bubble tea shop. I quickly snapped a photo and we made our way hurriedly. The guy at the door looked like he wants to kick my ass. Really, I mean look at him…

So my initial thought was, “Wah so creative, I wonder where they get their inspiration from….hmm..”

Still can’t put my finger on it…can you? Oh by the way, I wonder if they monkey they featured are related… More interesting experiences from Shenzhen coming soon.

Seafood in Shenzhen

jason — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 15:31:57 +0000

In a bid to get some pampering after a hectic but oh so lovely wedding this year, Lyn (my boo) and I took a short trip to Shenzhen and Macau in early January. Shenzhen is one of our favourite destination with affordable (cheap more like it) massages and seafood. Nevermind that Lyn has only been there three times and me twice, but we somehow have always seem to discover hidden gems as we venture deeper into the charming city.

If you so happen to pop by Shenzhen for work or leisure, do plan to have one of your meals in a street called Le(4) Yuan(2) (please excuse the pinyin, I’m not too familiar writing it in Mandarin). To us, Le Yuan is a bustling street with seafood restaurants at both sides with tanks upon tanks of live fish and long rows of shell fish. Having visited Le Yuan about 10 times during the course of our visits, we could easily brush aside touts looking out for tourists like us and make our way to one of the many preferred restaurants in our list.

Left: Take your time to select your seafood outside the restaurant | Right: We are not great fans of how animals are kept there, but yeah there are loads to choose from ranging from pigeons to rabbits and snakes

Great variety aside, Lyn and I are constantly amazed at how affordable seafood can be in comparison to Singapore. For a mere $35 per couple, we could order a few dishes including bamboo clams (my favourite), oysters, braised pork, vegetables, king prawns and even some beer. Here’s some of what we happily devoured during our trip there:

Left: Some herbal soup | Right: braise pork belly and intestines

Left: Salt and pepper prawn | Right: Spinach with century egg

Left: Bamboo Clams (yums) | Right: Scallops

Left: Steamed fish | Right: Conch

Left: Sea urchin | right: Steamed prawns

Kingway beer..not bad actually

More photos in my Flickr album here.

A strategically located john in Dhaka

jason — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 04:33:24 +0000

I was going through some old photos in my Macbook a couple of days back and noticed this:

Of course my initial though was that it is one of those misfired photos and I probably didn’t noticed or had the time to conduct a quality check. So I was about to delete it and it hit me, the photo was actually shot intentionally. It was sometime late last year when I headed to Dhaka, Bangladesh for a very much sleep deprived touch and go business trip (yeah, choice destination I tell you). My colleagues managing the Bangladesh account put me up in a really posh and secured Raddison Hotel that comes with all the bells and whistles one would want to have in a place like Dhaka.

So after about a five or so hour flight with a significant portion going into reading proposals under this tiny yet effective airplane light (not too sure what you call it), I arrived at the Raddison at about one in the morning pretty much stoned and looking forward to rush straight to the throne upon checking into my room (yeah I know, the details). The room was not shared and being a boy, I didn’t bother closing the bathroom door and just sat there. And there it was, the close to perfect view of the TV. It dawned on me that I can actually rotate the TV console watch cable programmes while going about my business. I was close to tears.

That is a view I never thought would be possible for poor people like me. I mean sure the rich can easily afford to customise an experience like that but me? Not in the next few years perhaps. Needless to say, I spent quite a while in my favourite place while in the hotel. Good times…good times…

Chingay 2010

jason — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 07:45:55 +0000

Thanks to a colleague of mine (or rather ex-colleague), I scored a two-day photographer pass to last week’s Chingay at the Pit Building. While I personally felt last year’s performances (photos here and here) were staged better terms of photography ease (its a lighting thing), this year’s parade seemed to have captivated me differently with no backdrop and the parade route flanked by spectator stands.

Prior to the event and given that I had a little more than an hour and a half to the parade, I popped over the back of the parade route where the performers were standing by. Amid the busy atmosphere with last minute tweaks to the floats and final preparations is a carnival with performers from various associations hanging out with one another. I must admit it is really heartening to see people of all ages, races and countries dancing, taking photos and talking to each other. A scene I have always felt embodies the very essence of what our country works every hard to succeed in. Thank God we are culturally and racially tolerant.. .

Left: One of the many big tents housing the performers | Right: Japanese performers dancing to the tunes by Filipino musicians

Left: Performers from everywhere with a little photo opportunity | Right: One of the many scenes as performers prepare for the parade

Left and right: Animal floats

The pre-parade started on time with performers entering from the left (if facing the Pit Building). Led by the 501st Legion, Singapore Garrison, we were treated to a formation of Star Wars fans in Stormtrooper uniforms. This was followed by some Brazilian dancers shaking their way to the other end of the Pit Building with accompanying fire breathers, my favourite in every Chingay.

Left: The 501st Legion getting ready to march | Right: Brazilians dancing their way through

Left and right: A little close up

Left: There are musicians… | Right: …and fire breathers

The parade then continued but from the right this time with over 8,000 performers from various associations and countries dancing their way through. The Pit Building was split to three sectors where they are required to perform at every one of them. Of course this excludes the other areas following that. Hats off to them for their efforts. It was hot and humid but alot of fun. Here are some of the moments captured:

Opps, think I might have gone all “posting-happy” and inundated you with a floodgate of photos. My apologies if they take forever to load. But I guess you can see where I’m going, there were loads happening that night. I look forward to shooting again at next year’s Chingay. Until then, happy last day of the CNY .

More photos in my Flickr album here and here.

Last game of the season for the Slingers

jason — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 11:36:52 +0000

I was supposed to do a little write up on the final Asean Basketball League (ABL) Playoff game between the Singapore Slingers and Satria Muda BritAma early this month. But given the time constraints and not forgetting the usual bit of slacking off all mixed together in a bag that already included frustration over how our local team performed, let’s say I apologise for the tardiness. In fact, I was so late that the ABL Finals ended today with a best-of-five-games sweep over the Indonesian team (hands them the broom) by the formidable Philippine Patriots. Congratulations guys, you truly are the better team for the season.

Coming back to early February, if you don’t already know, the Slingers were sent packing and out of this year’s ABL season after the loss to the Indonesian team 86-76. I won’t go into the details of the game given that you can find out more about it here, here, here and here (by the way, did I said I was late?). But what I can do is to leave you with some photos of the final playoff game.

With a few months to regroup, rethink and perhaps restructure before the next season, I believe the Slingers have alot on their hands. This is especially after coach Frank Arsego has announced his decision on not returning to the team due to family reasons a couple of days back. Thanks to coach Frank for sticking with the team despite a number really rough experiences that transpired throughout the two years of his tenure. You will be sorely missed.

Until the next season, which I hope will be better managed (I am referring to the home team) – Gooooo Slingers!!

More photos in my Flickr album here.

So the Tiger begins…

jason — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 17:10:32 +0000

This year’s Chinese New Year weekend started off pretty well for me. Not only was the NBA All-Star 2010 scheduled during the holidays (meaning that I don’t need to take leave to watch) with Paul Pierce taking the Three-Point Contest (Goooo Celtics!!) and the East beating the West by a tiny margin the following day, my favourite band Angels & Airwaves released their new album for free.

Corniness aside, 2010 is going to be a really exciting, yet uncertain year for me. Not only did I get married but was successfully transferred to another department giving me an opportunity to learn more about the functions of what we call a line unit. Earlier this year, Lyn (my boo now wife) and I penned down on a nice flat at a central area. Yes, we are about to join the ranks of thousands of other newly wed couples and become home owners (well at least for us, the next 84 years).

Looking at HDB’s letter on my first appointment mailed to me a few days back, I can’t help but wonder how far I have come. As much as I feel thrilled, there is a sense of fear that only ‘growing up’ will resolve. During the reunion dinner I had with my relatives, I told my cousin how growing up sucks. There goes the usual reliance on close ones, long-term financial commitments (we aren’t that rich unfortunately) and that sense of no turning back.

Don’t get me wrong, I know I have grown up and have been one for years. Its just that it hasn’t really set in until recently. I guess I have been so busy doing what grown ups have been doing all the while that it hasn’t hit me mentally. Now as I look back, I breath a sigh of thankfulness seeing that the decisions I made in my life until now was not something I would have considered more than ten year back. Moving on, there are many decisions this year that I will need to make and I hope they are for improvements.

The start of 2010 was rather bumpy for Lyn and I. After getting married, I seem to encounter a number of odd experiences that seldom, and in some cases never happen to the both of us (nothing unnatural). Thankfully, I am not the superstitious sort and blame carelessness and ignorance. Let’s just call it teething issues, never mind that we have been living together for over three years prior to tying the knot. I will never entertain any thoughts on superstition and would rather give it the finger than let it take over my life.

Now as I stare in the face of the year of the Tiger, I know that I have to be careful with the decisions I make. Life unfortunately is not as forgiving as back in my younger days. With that, I end this somewhat “emo entry” (hey, you should be thankful, I don’t normally go in that direction) and wish all my readers (if there are any) a stellar year of a Tiger. Let’s stop whining and take every negativity as challenges and opportunities. And should there be changes in self, let it be a change for the better, the world is already as messed up as it is…

Happy New Year all!! Let’s do something this good year…

LOVE today!!

jason — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 05:36:32 +0000

Following my previous post on Angels and Airwave’s new album, my favourite rock band finally released LOVE to the anticipation of their fans (including me). I have just downloaded the free album via their website (yes its free, not the illegal free..but rather the free ‘free’ if you don’t already get it ), and am looking forward to some quiet time to absorb and unravel (I normally fail at that) their mystical’ish lyrics coupled with the band’s endless guitar tease, something that captured my attention since their first album, We don’t need to whisper.

I won’t go into the details of the band, the album or how LOVE came about for the fear of not being able to fully sync their frame of thought, their passion or ideals with yours (I’m usually not good with that). However, I figured that the below article will somewhat do a much better job than I ever can.

LOVE!!

Photo taken from LA Times

Angels & Airwaves venture into ‘LOVE’ – taken from LA Times

The new album is available as a free download, but the group also offers plenty to purchase.

By August Brown
February 15, 2010

On a rainy Tuesday evening in Angels & Airwaves’ suburban Carlsbad recording studio, singer Tom DeLonge pondered ice cubes. Specifically, the ice cubes made famous by the Japanese writer-mystic Masaru Emoto, who claimed that projecting positive vibes into water could make it freeze into more beautiful crystals.

“This guy taped pieces of paper with words like ‘Love’ and ‘Hate’ to cups of water and froze them. When he looked at them under a microscope, the ones with ‘Hate’ looked chaotic, but words like ‘Love’ made them perfectly symmetrical,” DeLonge said. “So we thought, what if we could use our album to do that to people, who are made up of mostly water?”

Hence the epic, electronica-infused emo band’s new album, “LOVE.” Angels & Airwaves released it independently as a free download on Sunday, the latest in a string of multiplatinum rock bands — including Radiohead and Nine Inch Nails — to use new, free albums to build their brand and fans’ loyalty, instead of seeing them as profit-makers.

The album is just one facet of a larger business experiment for the band, which hopes to seamlessly incorporate pervasive social media and corporate sponsorships in ways that might make Naomi Klein shudder. But their approach could be a new avenue for self-sufficiency amid rock music’s commercial swan dive.

As appropriate for a band obsessed with science fiction, it’s all about trusting the Force. In this case, it’s the force of branding coupled with the allure of free content.

“We created this whole world around the band as a deep and philosophical adventure and immersed ourselves in it,” DeLonge said. “We personally went $500,000 in the hole on this album. But I believe music should be free. If I have to, I’ll go sell blood and sperm to make that happen.”

As the longtime singer and guitarist of recently reunited ’90s pop-punk titans Blink-182, DeLonge probably won’t have to hock his plasma any time soon. But it’s clear that Angels & Airwaves, founded after Blink’s breakup in 2005 in part as a healthful escape from DeLonge’s drug and personal problems at the time, holds his interest in different ways than his easygoing, frequently naked punk act.

“LOVE” is clearly a labor of such, where the planetarium-sized synthesizers of M83 bolster chiming arena-rock in the spirit of U2. The band members, including guitarist David Kennedy, bassist Matt Wachter and drummer Adam Willard, wear jackets emblazoned with the band’s logo while working in the studio. Lyrics like “Do you believe in hallucinations? Silly dreams and imagination?” purposefully invite the group’s young audience to join Angels & Airwaves in their stylized fantasy land.

But a walk around the band’s vast recording complex — which also houses the offices of DeLonge’s skate-shoe company Macbeth, and ModLife, a new social-media interface he co-founded — suggests Angels’ earnest music is balanced by a cool-eyed capitalist instinct. Once hooked, fans can invest in the band’s output at a variety of price points — from the free download of the album to pay-per-view concert streams to copies of their forthcoming feature-length film, a kind of “Event Horizon”-meets-”Avatar” CGI epic also called “LOVE.”

“I’m a businessman and I want this to be as big as it can be,” DeLonge said. “I felt we could do the business end of this better ourselves with new partnerships. We could strike a deal with Ford where they put a copy of the record in every new car and they use one of our songs in an ad. We can do anything we want, and I have no problem approaching this band as a venture capitalist.”

“Does a musician end up looking like a NASCAR driver at the end of all this?” DeLonge asked. “It’s up to them. I have no problem with corporations — I own two of them. It’s about letting the musician choose what’s best.”

august.brown@latimes.com

Guide to buying HDB flowchart

jason — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 12:54:32 +0000

I got this from an ex-colleague of mine this morning. While some may be sensationalised, a significant majority of the thinking process behind purchasing a HDB flat speaks nothing but the truth. Here is a guide to buying HDB flowchart from Heartland Bunnies. Now if only I had that flowchart prior to getting my flat..tsk…

You can read more about the flowchart here.

Judge Dredd…and kids are getting smarter

Hartman broke my lens…broke my heart

jason — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 17:10:42 +0000

It was a double heart breaker for me yesterday afternoon at the Singapore Indoor Stadium. Not only did Satria Muda Britama take the Singapore Slingers down in the third and deciding semi-final game of the ASEAN Basketball League (ABL), the visiting team’s star player Alex Hartman was responsible for breaking my AF-S DX NIKKOR 18-105mm f/3.5-5.6G ED VR lens.

I have always considered the photographers’ zone at any basketball game as some sort of a war zone. With stray basketballs flying at any direction at top speed and players crashing into you (these guys are big), photographers require quick reflexes to pull their cameras away from their face and either stop what’s coming towards them or brace themselves for some heavy contact. While I have been rather quick and fortunate all these years sitting at the Slingers’ court with a fantastic view, I guess I wasn’t quick enough on Sunday.

Nevermind that I caught a number of really interesting shots during the first two quarters, it was during the middle of the third quarter when the incident happened and everything went downhill from there. It all started when Slingers’ import Marcus “Dude you are really killing me with your reckless drives and turnovers” Ng drove into the paint for a very contested layup and drew a foul. Hartman in the heat of the moment, caught the stray basketball and threw it at the photographers’ direction with his right hand in frustration. That was when the ball went straight towards me, hit my lens and sent it flying towards another photographer.

My last shot before the incident

With that, my lens was pretty much busted and all attempts to self repair was unsuccessful. A small but significant piece of the lens broke off. Hartman in an unsportsmanlike conduct pulled off one heck of a dumb-ass move. While I was able to mount my lens on the camera, it was extremely loose and the photos captured were completely dark and off. Well done Hartman…well done!! You broke my heart!! Honestly I don’t really care if that was unintentional. Everything is on tape and I’m pretty sure at least half the spectators saw what happened (does anyone have a copy?). Thankfully, a fellow media photographer passed me his fish eye lens and I continued shooting knowing that I could have gotten better results if my lens wasn’t broken.

Left: The busted area | Right: The piece that broke off

Moving on, I’m probably going to write to the ABL and Satria Muda Britama about the incident. These teams are normally insured and I hope to get the team to either replace a new lens or bear the full cost of the repair. More of that soon ~cross fingers~

Slingers one win away from ABL Finals

jason — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 15:57:54 +0000

In a series where the stakes are high and bragging rights prevalent, the Singapore Slingers edged forward and took game one of the best of three in the Asean Basketball League Playoffs against the Satria Muda BritAma, 87 – 68. Playing with confidence despite trading basket at both ends, the Slingers put up with tough defence from the visiting team before starting to pull away as the final 10 minutes began ticking.

Tip off!!

Top scorers for the home team went to our American imports #31 Kyle Jeffers and #35 Michael LeBlanc who collectively made 43 points, almost half the team’s final score. Both players also made double-double pulling down 10 rebounds each and were perfect at the charity stripe.

Left: Jeffers making a hook | Right: Jeffers hitting a buzzer beater

Left: Michael going the other way | Right: Making a trey

Our other imports also contributed significantly with Philippine sensation #19 Al Vegara together with #21 Marcus Ng contributing 10 points each. Al also made four assists and three steals while Marcus got six rebounds.

Left: Al can drive… | Right: Al can shoot

Left: Marcus going to the other side | Right: Finishing a perfect alley-oop

Local Slinger boy #10 Hong Wei Jian did us proud again putting up 11 points, two assists and three steals. While, most of his points were taken from the free throw line, he almost had a perfect night missing only just one. Most notably is his constant fearless drives to the bucket in the face of big defenders resulting in a number of clashes and hack-downs. Let’s just say not only did he really take it for the team, he made the visitors pay with his free throws.

Left: Wei Jian goes for a contested lay up | Right: Taking one for the team before going to the charity stripe

Our visitors although put up a good fight were unfortunately not able to respond to the Slingers’ arsenal. Their only main scorers were #43 Nakiea Miller and #8 Alexander Gordon Hartman who walked way with 18 and 21 points respectively. Only Miller had a double-double night with 13 rebounds. The rest of the squad were unable to respond.

Left and Right: Miller going in

Left: Hartman completes an alley-oop emphatically | Right: Heading to the rim

The two teams will meet for game two on Wednesday in Jakarta, Indonesia. I’m pretty sure Satria Muda BritAma has a score to settle and will give the Slingers a run for their money. Game three if necessary will be held in Singapore this Sunday. Honestly, as much as I would like to see the Slingers play live (with a fantastic view), I’m rooting for a sweep ~starts waving a broom~. Gooooo Slingers.

You can read more of the game at the Slingers’ website, Redsports and Len’s blog.

More photos available in my Flickr album here.