anal you

Have you ever wondered..many at times when people use words, they probably understand why they are using the word (or phrase), but more often than not, when you want them to explain it in proper terms, they usually can’t.

Take for example, when you scold hokkien explicitives, and if a foreigner asks you to give a definition to what you’re saying – chances are that you prolly won’t be able to.

Try defining the word – anal. (don’t peek)

Here’s what I found:
It is from an old psychology term, anal retentive. It means not being able to let go of crap. Basically it is about people who are obsessively perfectionist. A good feature in some lines of work but generally a disadvantage. At some point good enough is good enough. People being anal just keep adding details and often never quite finish.

The greatest honour

I looked in disbelief at the second page of the Sunday Times today which I woke up to without even brushing my teeth and having done anything else.

“15-MINUTE STANDING OVATION”

…for Eric Khoo’s screening of “My Magic” in Cannes Film Festival.

The next moment I tilted my head up and panned it across the page, examining the picture on the page, then craned my head and zoomed in to it, adjusted my focus, and saw him with him in a suit, with the crowd behind him in applause.

Awesome. Absolutely amazing.

For one man’s life it was his greatest honour to have stepped foot on the red carpet of Cannes, not even to say, garnering a 15 minute standing ovation when his film is screened in line with many other big foreign names for the Golden Palm Award, which is the top prize at the prestigious festival.

“Wong (the co-writer), who felt ‘quite gratified’ by the reception to the film, added: ‘The very fact that we are even here (in Cannes) is almost too unbelievable to be true. Anything else is a bonus.’ “

And so they say – when something’s too good to be true, it probably is. Now, maybe not.

My Magic will probably retain Eric Khoo’s style, not the kind of Jack Neo movies that would bring in the big bucks because they “cater to the vast majority of locals”. But, being produced at a cost of $200,000, with two unknown first timers at acting, together with it being only 78-minute length movie, many people would give it a miss and lament it being “bo hua” to watch such a production.

However, when someone’s got to this heights of honour, nothing much else matter anymore. After all, an honour like this at Cannes, is already an honour only for few.

Okay, so much for being anti-climatic, it’s time for me to get down to work.

death.

In my world death was like a nameless and incomprehensible hand, a door-to-door salesman who took away mothers, beggars, or ninety-year-old neighbours, like a hellish lottery.

But I couldn’t absorb the idea that death could actually walk by my side, with a human face and a heart that was poisoned with hatred, that death could be dressed in a uniform or a raincoat, queue up at a cinema, laugh in bars, or take his children out for a walk to Ciudadala Park in the morning, and then, in the afternoon, make someone disappear in the dungeons of Montjunic Castle or in a common grave with no name or ceremony.

Going over all this in my mind, it occured to me that perhaps the papier-mache world that I accepted as real was only a stage setting. Much like the arrival of Spanish trains, in those stolen years you never knew when the end of childhood was due.

- Carlos Ruis Zafon, The Shadow of the Wind.

Why soccer’s like infernal affairs.

After 2+ hours of heart throbbing action with eyes focused on footage from a single camera panning uncreatively left and right and with 22 people worth millions of dollars chasing a ball worth just maybe 30 bucks, I am thankful that my heart is still intact and the sausage mcmuffin that just made its way into my tummy isn’t coming out any time soon.

There are always reasons why ladies love dramas and guys love soccer. And I am not being sexist or whatsoever.

I am just saying, that, soccer is the guys’ drama.

When that drama is played out in real live action, the parallel is clearly seen between soccer and Infernal Affairs.

That was the night when John Terry turned from the hero to the villian.
That was the night when the morning paper headlines had the chance to scream “RONALDO RUINED IT ALL” when John Terry ruined it all instead.
That was the night when Christiano Ronaldo’s payback time for all his trickery and clownish acts should have come when his penalty miss could have caused Man U’s title.

But it had to be a drama, complete with its twists, cliffhangers, suspense and action.

When the better team had two unfortunate shots hitting the goalpost and a flying karate kick that ridiculed the pitch to that of Shaolin Soccer with it being let off the hook, the good had lost and the evil had triumphed.

When Drogba was sent off and that proved the turning point of the drama, the ending became clear.

When the better team fought their hearts out, displaying their best in such a long long time, they lost it all in a penalty shootout.

When Andy Lau saved Boss by spilling out the cops’ plans to him, then later turned his back against him and killed him, when Andy Lau had the chance to be a good guy but became the bad, when Tony Leung died and Andy Lau lived, the protagonist turned into the antagonist, and the antagonist turned into the protagonist, we saw all that in the Champions League finals match between Chelsea and Manchester United played out in Moscow.

That, was our drama, with the imperfect ending.

One of the best few!

kenangan terindah

I had those people calling me bruce lee, ah beng, taiwan boyband.
That place I hold dear to in my heart revives memories of tears of joy, sorrow, and pain.
Nevertheless, you won’t really find that happening again anywhere else these days.

Am desperately needing approval for that all-very-important shoot. I’d definitely love to put this on the big screen.

My heroes.

it’s time to…

import some of the not-very-private stuff from my private blog. ha.

Beautiful lines from The Alchemist
As they moved along, the boy tried to listen to his heart.

It was not easy to do; in earlier times, his heart had always been ready to tell its story, but lately that wasn’t true.
There had been times when his heart spent hours telling of its sadness, and at other times it became so emotional over the desert sunrice that the boy had to his his tears.
His heart beat fastest when it spoke to the boy of treasure, and more slowly when the boy stared entranced at the endless horizons of the desert.
But his heart was never quiet, even when the boy and the alchemist had fallen into silence.

“Why do we have to listen to our hearts?” The boy asked.

“Because, whenever your heart is, that is where you’ll find your treasure.”

“But my heart is agitated,” the boy said. It has its dreams, it gets emotional and it’s become passionate over a woman of the desert. It asks things of me, and it keeps me from sleeping many nights, when I’m thinking about her.”

–

“My heart is a traitor,” the boy said to the alchemist, when they had paused to rest the horses. It doesn’t want me to go on.”

“That makes sense,” the alchemist answered. “Naturally, it’s afraid that, in pursuing your dream, you might lose everything you’ve won.”

“Well, then, why should I listen to my heart?”

“Because you will never again be able to keep it quiet. Even if you pretend not to have heart what it tells you, it’ll always be there inside you, repeating to you what you’re thinking about life and about the world.”

“You mean I should listen, even if it’s treasonous?”

“Treason is a blow that comes unexpectedly. If you know your heart well, it will never be able to do that to you. Because you’ll know its dreams and wishes, and will know how to deal with them.
“You will never be able to escape from your heart. So it’s better to listen what it has to say. That way, you’ll never have to fear an unanticipated blow.”

The boy continued to listen to his heart as they crossed the desert. He came to understand its dodges and tricks, and to accept it as it was. He lost his fear, and forgot about his need to go back to the oasis, because, one afternoon, his heart told him that it was happy. “Even though I complain sometimes,” it said. “it’s because I’m the heart of a person, and people’s hearts are that way. People are afraid to pursue their most important dreams, because they feel that they don’t deserve them, or that they’ll be unable to achieve them. We, their hearts, become fearful just thinking of loved ones who go away forever, or of moments that could have been good, but weren’t, or of treasures that might have might have been found but were forever hidden in the sands. Because, when these things happen, we suffer terribly.”

for the moolah

There are certain things you’d do for cash and there are some you won’t.
i) Would you: let out your friend’s darkest secret for an amount, say, $10,000
ii) Would you: sell away something you’re emotionally attached to that reminds you of a certain someone, for an amount say, $100,000
iii) Would you: allow any part of your body to be disabled for a certain sum of say, $10,000

Amount’s arbitrary. The sky’s the limit to the things that one could possibly do in exchange for moolah but items usually involve stuff which other parties might get high seeing you lose your integrity in exchange for that cash.

On another side of the world, people sell their kidneys (one per person) in exchange for money, in order to find some hope for their families. We see desperate people around doing businesses or engaging in stuff they’re totally not interested in just for that money. However, giving away something precious that God has bestowed to you in exchange for some hope is a sad state of humans in equivalent of how the Lord “was sorry that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart” (Genesis 6:7)

We should be thankful of whatever we have, shouldnt we.

And oh by the way, how wonderful has God replicated Adam’s apple in all men such that it’s easily recognisable as an “apple” even to kids 6 years of age. Well then again, maybe it’s the television.

There can be no football without shots. Team Barcelona proved that point precisely when they failed in their campaign against Man U. The team that made it up for that loss of exciting showcase in the semi finals was Chelsea and Liverpool, when long range shots made their way through goalmouths in a 5 goal thriller that lasted too long that resulted in my semi-conscious state of mind, causing my inability to recognise that today was a public holiday and the public libraries were closed.

Meanwhile, there can be no greater joy to be surrounded by kids. Thanks to them, I now have these cute little stickers on my phone.