Fuck you VEVO

If you are a frequent youtuber and you like music, chances are, you will definitely know about VEVO. Now, what is my problem with VEVO?

Nothing much, just that it just about owns the copyright for almost all the good music out there, and proceeds to force people to load their version of the music video. The speed at which the video then loads is simply appalling. I want to cry bloody monkeyape blue murder but I can't because I refuse to let a retarded video engine bend me to its will and hold me by the balls.

Watching the red slider load feels like watching a granny on crutches trying to cross the road. You can't do shit and its fucking annoying. Before you start going all preachy about how I should not be making analogies with grannies, I would like to remind you that there is nothing slower than a granny on crutches, except fucking VEVO.

And you know how youtube tends to screw up when a video loads too slowly? After you leave the video there long enough, the video suddenly loads fully, or so you think. The video slider jumps from the 10 percent mark to the 100 percent mark in half the time it took to reach the 10 percent mark from nothing. You're like holyshit for once VEVO is awesome, and proceed to play the video.

The video then proceeds to stop and hang at the 10 percent mark, leaving you hanging in midair. When you're just about to rock the song, VEVO takes it away from you. And somehow, the video always stops at the best part of the song.

You know how restaurants serve peanuts before a meal? This is exactly like you sitting down to a meal, eating the peanuts anticipating a good dinner, and then the waiter comes out and tells you all the restaurant serves is peanuts. What the fuck. When you demand a refund, the waiter then proceeds to laugh at you, telling you that they currently operate the only restaurant in the area, and then they stop refilling your peanuts, and leave you staring in frustration at the meal that will never be.

But VEVO's crap doesn't stop there. Another pet peeve of mine is when VEVO tells you that the video cannot load because your country does not have the copyright for that song. So now what, I can't watch your stupid video when I could previously do so before you shoved your big commercialised VEVO ass into my mental consciousness.

What's more, you are actively encouraging me to blame my native country for not buying the copyrights to the song, when it was your stupid company that decided to buy us all out of our rights of viewing music videos online for free, so you could make more money at our expense.

So what I find online now are videos without audio, and audio without the video. I proceed to play them both together, and I get the same result, minus the retarded VEVO loading speeds. I also think back to the days when youtube used to be you-tube, and not the ugly commercialised entity it is now.
VEVO. Fucking up lives near you.

I've got a mosquito bite on my face. Bloody hell.

I hate mosquitoes. I mean, everyone does. But this one mosquito has found a way for me to hate it to bits in a way I thought impossible.

Now, what did this offending mosquito do? Well, it bit me in the worst of places. Before you get any weird ideas, I'll tell you where. This mosquito bit me right on the face, right below my left eye. At first I thought it was a zit, but this was one weird zit.

It was painful, and yet itchy at the same time. I spent quite a while looking at it and scratching it before realising what it really was. And boy was I amazed when I realised that of all the places to bite me on, this mosquito had delibrately chosen to bite my face. But hating a mosquito pales in comparison to how disgusted I feel at how cynical some people are they become distrusting of even the most altruistic incidents in life.

Over the last few days, TNP has been abuzz with the news of how a maid sacrificed her life to save one of her employers' young children. A straightforward and touching tale of how love can move in ways that nothing else can, you would think.

However, some people are so twisted they have actually started questioning the intentions of the maid, and whether she was truly capable of saving the child, or whether she just happened to have flung the child out of her hands because of the impact.

Well, it would be really funny if the second was the case considering she had pushed the child out of the way backwards instead of forwards, while putting herself in harm's way. No one "flings" a child backwards, if that's what these morons are suggesting. And just because she's not a local does not automatically mean she's not human. What's up with these people.

If push came to shove, I wonder if they would have anything they were willing to sacrifice everything for. While that seems a little morbid, being able to realise that there are things in life greater than self-preservation and self-interest often leads people into lives that are nothing short of inspiring.

Indian sensation

There's a Bollywood star on our trains. And apparently he's been doing his sing and dance routine for quite a while now.

Check out this video of him.



Or this one



Curry gives you wings. Or flatulence. And a stall near SPH sells really good naan.

There was once an ah neh, who couldn't count to ten, but this joke's really not funny, so-desu-neh.

Okay, I should sleep. I'm jibbering gibberish under the pretence of trying to make a really good Bollywood joke.

Anyway, there are many more ah neh singing videos on youtube where it came from. Just search Indian man, singing, and train.

The revolving carousel.

There is something about the carousel of life that brings people together, and then takes them apart. And life is made out of many of these stages, some long, some very short, and some more meaningful than others.

And in some of them, you meet friends that you keep, and in others, the people you once lived and breathed with on a daily basis become fragments of the past. A familiar face in a crowd of strangers, a voice that triggers a rush of memories, a photo that reminds you of laughter and camaraderie, moments of tenderness that now echo hollow in your memories when you pass by the same places, and find that you can never recreate those moments.

Last weekend, my father drove up to Johor Bahru for a secondary school class gathering, his first in some 40 years. And as he told me about the events that transpired, I couldn't help but think if I would remember my secondary school classmates after 40 years, much less recognise them. There used to be a time when we played soccer together, and laughed and joked about the same teachers, subjects and assignments, and when I realise that those times are almost 10 years past, it makes me realise just how much I have changed since then.

However, some things never change. I looked at my old yearbook, and our class picture was a picture of each of our heads photoshopped to a football player on a football field, and below it was a one liner of our most iconic phrase. Mine was "Sure, why not." It made me laugh, because even now, I still use it. And it also made me realise that perhaps I've always had that cynical sense of humour.

Since then, I have gone through junior college, army, several jobs, university, exchange, and now internship. And through these journeys I have met friends that I know I will keep, and others that I know I cannot, because we all have different lives to lead. In several are cases where our journeys together have long reached a fork, like a river that has run its course and branched off in different directions. Somewhere along that route we might meet again, as the disparate tributaries charting our lives merge paths once more, but by that time we might be none the wiser, long lost friends who are but now trivial acquaintances, and never again more.

And sometime in the future, I will probably look back on the stages of life where I actually looked forward to every day, because the company was great and life was happier then, and wonder if such days will ever come by again. And I will realise that though the times were good while they lasted, we are all different people now, with different hopes, dreams and aspirations, and even if by some luck of the draw life were to place us all along the same course again, nothing else will be the same.

Why Asian women really shouldn't wear European costumes.

Source: http://www.helpfeedthetroll.com

bangkok dangerous.

A few years ago, I used to look forward to going to Bangkok. The place had cheap food, cheap clothes, cheap accommodation, and cheap massages, performed by cheap women who were really men.

The people were really friendly too, as long as you threw out a few hundred baht every time you made a bad joke in Thai. "Sawadeeka, my Thai very bad ka, here's a few hundred baht ka. You won't understand my Thai but my money very nice ka."

Now though, the place is just dangerous. Every day, you read reports trying to convince you that Thailand is a huge mess. A few months back, it was yellow shirted people marching everywhere. Now its the red shirts. Apparently now they're killing each other too, and random cameramen working for Reuters who just enjoy strolling into warzones and getting their asses handed back to them.

What happened to you Thailand? Ate too much tom yum? The diet is fiery, but in the past the people used to be pansies. Even when they were scolding you for being stingy with your baht it sounded like good service.

Now, all the fury has come out from the tom yam into the streets. I bet someone has been tweaking with the recipe, or maybe they started importing inferior grade tom yam paste from China so all the Thais are becoming messed up. Or maybe they are just fed up of having tom yam for every meal.

Well, protest all you want. Keep off my shopping centres and flea markets.

Singapore is no longer my home.

These days, I think it's becoming pretty evident that foreigners are making up a sizeable amount of the local population. Yesterday, when I was in Dhoby Gauht on assignment, I realised that the people in front of me were from China, and the ones behind were from India. I looked around, and I realised that the next nearest Singaporean was three escalator steps down.

And when I was in the MRT, all the people in my immediate vicinity were not locals. I think it is a sure sign that you are in a foreign country when you can be pretty sure that the people around you in the public metro are not of the same nationality. I felt that way all throughout Europe, and now that I'm back, I am very surprised that I am reliving that feeling, only that this is supposedly my home.

I made a passing comment about this to my photographer, who I was on an assignment with. He laughed and said: "Actually, I thought you'd be the last person to say something about it."

Actually, I am. Because honestly, most of the time I don't give a shit until I realise that I'm already in deep shit. So the fact that I'm actually saying something means the situation is really bad. This is what's going to happen. We are importing lots of foreign produce, and we are not producing enough local produce. In a few years, Singapore is going to be taken over by Indian, Bangladeshi and Chinese nationals.

I think it is already very bad that Singaporeans have to fight with all these foreigners for jobs. Granted that the PAP says that these foreigners fill a void of jobs that Singaporeans do not want to do. I would like to ask then, so why give these people PRs and citizenships? So they can breed future generations of road sweepers, toilet cleaners and streetwalkers? Because that is precisely the void that needs to be filled.

I look around at all these "foreign talent", and I am really wondering, I'm sorry but where is the talent? I see bangla workers and chinese farmers imported from the farms of India and China. You might call me elitist, but I believe the foreign talent policy was supposed to introduce high level talent to raise the overall commercial competitiveness of Singapore. High level talent like scientists, professors, and financial experts.

Don't get me started on the ridiculous policy of buying second grade sporting talent and slapping the Singaporean label on them. We are fooling nobody, not even our local population. Or have you stopped caring about us already?

So, why the hell are we importing so many farmers? We have no land for farms!

Vote for Amos!

A friend of mine, Amos, is in a competition now organised by Sony make.believe. The winner of the competition will get to travel the world and document the whole journey, and I really believe that it'll be a great experience for him. According to him, the only beach resort he has visited is Pulau Tekong. Help send him to the beaches in Greece because at least those have babes. Oops, sorry Pamy!

He hopes to visit every continent in the world with the help of Sony's sponsorship. All you need to do is to click on Amos (and another photography entry of your choice).

The link is here
http://makedotbelieve.sony.com.sg/

Amos is on the right side of the page in the bottom right corner.

Now, you might be wondering, what's in it for me?

Well, you stand a chance to watch the FIFA World Cup 2010 in South Africa, be a flag bearer or win $5000 worth of Sony Products. The chance is probably as good as that of you winning Toto, but it's better than nothing.

Amos looks like this, according to his Facebook profile picture.

Okay, that's not very helpful. Actually, he looks like this. Look out for his epic entrance at 0:48. The girl at the start is called Pamy, and she is 21 this year. No, really. She will also be very happy if Amos wins. Okay, more happy than usual if that is possible.



Vote for Amos, because he has never won anything in his life! Not even 4D! Or L4D. Really, everyone loves an underdog! And because really, you don't want to see him look like this.

Thanks Christine for the picture. I have no idea where you dug it up from but this is epic.

Vote for Amos, because he really deserves it.

The perils of being elite.

I read an article in the Straits Times recently where a writer formerly from an elite school system talked about the uneasy relationship between meritocracy and elitism, and how students from elite schools often suffered from a disconnect from reality, the inability to relate to people from non-elite backgrounds.

The article is here, and I would add, it is exceptionally well-written, highlighting in cogent arguments the extent to which an education in elite institutions shelters students within from the realities of the world outside them.

http://www.asiaone.com/News/Education/Story/A1Story20100405-208438.html

This is an oft-cited debate, on the perils of intellectual snobbery, and how it breeds a generation fixated on personal achievement to the detriment of their ability to empathise with the common man.

I think first of all, it is important to realise that the snobbish intellectual elite are in fact, a minority, even within those who have grown up in intellectual systems that "breed" elites. I am a product of that system, and I do not measure my self-worth solely by grades. However, in a throwback to my educational upbringing, I have to admit that I can be cynical when I joke about people who are not as academically oriented.

But I am slowly learning that just as there are many ways to skin a cat, there are also many ways to live a life. Rather than condemn the intellectual elite for being uncaring, or simply narrow-minded and closeted, I choose not to classify such people by such simplistic measures, because people are often at once both ambiguous and fixed in their beliefs, and even at their cores they are often deeply divided.

They may not understand me, but I have to understand them, so I can reach out to them, as it is sometimes part of my job, and being naturally curious, always part of my nature.

The common thread that underpins the intellectual elite is a deep sense of insecurity. They are deeply afraid of failure, because they have never known what failure is. While they do spectacularly well in the fields that they have been born to lead, they do rubbish elsewhere, and as a result they do not even deem fit to venture out, because within their own kind they have already found a comfort zone to be in. They seek security in their personal lives and jobs, because they are deeply insecure, having measured their self-worth all their life against hurdles set by other elites, and having driven satisfaction from the fact that they have cleared every single one.

The ones that do not clear the hurdles fall by the wayside, unable to complete the run, but they soon realise that the crowd cheers for everyone, not just the ones that win and complete the race. But before they do, they lie crushed by their failures, as all their life they have only learnt how to look forward, and not at the world around them. However, when they do look around them, they realise how much more there is to life, and how much they have missed out.

It is a long and painful process though, because for people who have never known what failure is and how to deal with it, the first thing one has to learn is humility. One has to come to terms with the fact that one has become what one used to despise, and that the peers one has known all their lives have left them behind. One has to learn a new language, and a new value system, to survive in a world that was once alien.

When I tell my friends now that I no longer keep in contact much with the peers I once knew, not many will understand why that is so. Not many will understand that it is not because I choose not to, but rather, it is because I am no longer relevant in their lives. It is a club that only accepts purebreds, and perhaps, it is for the better that I am no longer in that privileged league.

Now, I am at the bridge that straddles two worlds. A citizen of both, but belonging to neither. I may not be the smartest, and I may not be the most empathetic, but I can strive to be the best of both.

Dracula came to Singapore

Everyone is probably familiar with a certain fictional villain called Count Dracula. He wakes up at night, lusts after the blood of young women, is rumoured to be able to transform into a bat, and lives in a castle in Transylvania, where he hides during the day. He is also morally grey, as with most villains. However, such accounts of Dracula are by and large, fictional, and very much the creation of Bram Stoker, the writer of the novel.

Sesame Street even had their own version called Count von Count, a purple charmless puppet that could win contests as the most unoriginal and villainous looking soft toy ever, if his place were not taken by Chucky from the horror series "Child's Play", the creation of some guy who grew up watching his sister play with dolls, and secretly wanted to, but could not because he was a guy.

He grew up, and traumatised by the scars of childhood, he created a sick twisted puppy called Chucky, which was really what he did to his sister's dolls after she outgrew them and he finally got his hands on them. He messed them up, and after looking at his brilliant handiwork, he decided to shoot a film.

And you know what? The films became popular, because it turns out that there are many other boy (and girls) who were former doll lovers, but now cannot stand the sight of them.

After this magnificent digression into meaningless prose and verbosity, I have finally come around to the whole point of this post. Which is, I believe I have seen Count Dracula, or the closest modern equivalent.

Strikes at night, check. Hangs out with many women, some of them exotic, check. Hails from Transylvania, check. Has a lust for blood, check. Able to transform into a bat, well, I'm not so sure. Batty? Definite check. Morally grey? Well, if you believe what people have said about him.

However, this modern Dracula has kept up with the times. He has learnt the virtue of why do the flying yourself when vehicles can move for you. Unfortunately, because he is more accustomed to moving himself around, he is a bad driver.

He has also changed his methods. Realising that drinking the blood of young women reduces the supply of women, he has adapted to preying on the blood of men, when he is not using alcohol as a cheap substitute. You know, after all it is really sad. The law protects people these days, and it is no longer easy to hunt without getting caught. Really the kind of stuff that makes Dracula turn to drink.

Count Dracula then had a long think, and he realised that his natural charm as a member of Transylvania's aristocratic elite warranted him a few choice jobs in public service. He found one such job perfect, as it allowed him to hunt, yet absolving him of any possible legal ramifications.

And one night a few months ago, he went on a hunt. He had his fill of drink, women, and even blood. He then tried to make a quick getaway, but he was a lousy driver. However, we all forgot that he can transform into a bat and fly away. Now, he is hiding in his castle in Transylvania, Romania, till another hundred years pass so he can repeat the same old trick again.

Damn you Romania you had us fooled. You sent us your biggest villain as a diplomat, and we never realised it, until he actually had his fill of a blood meal and left.

Here I present you, Count Dracula, alias Dr Silviu Ionescu.

My name is Bolo Santosi

This is from an American videogame, Just Cause 2. What is a Singaporean voiceover doing in there? And what's more, one straight out of Masters of the Sea. Campy, cheesy, simply terrible. A true Singaporean classic.