Still Dreaming

2012-01-25T21:46:00.000-08:00

I overheard a curious couple at Starbucks.

The girl is reading her boyfriend's transcript incredulously, and she rips him apart mercilessly:

'You've been lying to me for two years! You told me you got straight A's. You told me you graduated with a GPA of 3.85!'

Boy says weakly, 'I said I got A's and B's...'

'This transcript says you've got C's and D's. C's and D's!!' She goes on a tirade, and all of Starbucks is her audience. Some words figured prominently in her speech: C's and D's, stupid and dumb, I got an A in history and I hate history.

Boy mutters something unintelligible.

'How did you get into your college? It's a good college! I really want to know.'

Boy gets up from his seat and tries to grab the transcript out of her hands. Boy loses fight. The tirade continues. Eventually the girl leaves in a huff and heads over to the Starbucks counter. It's my turn to leave too, and my last sight is of the boy biting his fingernails furiously, as the girl flirts outrageously with the Starbucks waiter. I am not sure whose behaviour I find more disagreeable.

2011-09-02T12:39:00.000-07:00

For love

Was walking home one day, through the train station in Princeton, where I met a young man blowing forlornly on his bagpipes.

He asked me if I had a quarter for a train ride to New York, and I promptly informed him that the ride will cost him fifteen dollars.

I asked him what his story was. 'It's a long one.' But he quickly gives me the short version anyway, ending it with, 'For love.'

I gave him a dollar. The next day, I find him still there, still blowing.

2011-03-12T00:42:00.000-08:00

Polished silver nipples

Here I was soldering my third sound-to-light for Laetitia. The second one (the one you sent me) failed for no reason I can fathom. The first problem was the solder wouldn't stick to the copper surface. It defied me completely, just absolutely refuses to stick to what it should. I was mystified, I thought it was me, I thought I had reverted to being an apeman fiddling with technology. However, a friend Ilyah pointed out that it was in fact, the solder, and he retrieved another solder with a higher percentage of lead from his laboratory in the basement. The new solder worked like a charm, sticking so well that I felt like a soldering pro. I was quickly becoming efficient at this, this being my third attempt. At the end, I thought, nothing could go wrong, it was the most perfect soldering job I've ever done, each connection looked like a perfectly polished silver nipple. Battery on. Light on. Light responds weakly to sound. Light is on even with zero sound. Third failure. I was in despair, near tears. I couldn't see the problem, I thought the connections were perfect. I left my failure and had dinner, swam forty laps, and thought sadly about going to amazon.com and trying out this amazon prime special for students so I can get another kit shipped to me for free.

Then I thought: hold on, what would Jimmy do? Jimmy wouldn't take this lying down. He's not that kind of guy. Jimmy would retrieve the carcass of the second failed attempt, he would try changing transistors between the two carcasses and somehow he'd coax life into one of them. So I returned to the physics building in the middle of the night, and started removing a transistor. Which transistor to start? I didn't know. They ALL looked good to me. I chose the one closest to the edge first, the easiest to extract. I started remelting the solder on the three legs of it, except, ironically, I was foiled by the solder again. The solder stuck so well to the copper I couldn't scrape it off hardly at all. I succeeded in removing half the solder off the three legs, and tried to pull off the transistor. It's stuck.

I ran out of ideas, I sat down and played Deathly by Aimee Mann on my labtop. Idly I put on the battery again; I've been doing this all evening, staring at it, willing it to work properly, foolishly hoping it would, but it never did. Except this time it began flashing to the rhythm of the song. It worked! I don't even really know why, something about THAT transistor. Whew, I sat down and played more music and watched more flashing lights. I feel alright again, more than that, I feel great. I went down to the basement and looked for a friend to hug, but its 3 am and nobody's here.Today I fly to Singapore and can finally make good my promise.

This one is for you, Jimmy.

2010-08-09T00:29:00.001-07:00

That plane rides cost so much is an accident of our timeline, of when we are born. In our timeline, we employ transportation technologies that are so intensively consumes fossil fuels. That we never have enough fuels is a quirk of this planet. We are lucky enough that planes exist today. When we buy a plane ticket, we ...aren't even paying for the plane ride. We are paying for new experiences, the potential for human connection. If you are convinced you will find them in Europe, Africa, whatever, it seems accidental that you are born in America.

On the other hand, it is no accident that a single driver owning two cars costs twice as much. Some kinds of greed are inexcusable.

2010-08-09T00:12:00.000-07:00

There are a few desires in my life that I would gladly spend a great deal of money on. These desires - I can honestly say I would be a miserable person if I could not obtain them. I think it is well within our rights as human beings to pursue happiness, even happiness that is monetarily heavy, with the caveat that we keep learning, keep expanding our sphere of social awareness and keep trying to empathize.

If, in our continuous search for meaning, we find that our material desires descend into meaninglessness, I think this is natural, even admirable. And then there are desires that are experiential, that derive from our insatiable hunger for new human connection or to maintain the old, whether small-scale (family, friends) or large (Europe, the world). I think these experiential desires affirm our humanity, expand our knowledge and our capacity to empathize. If sometimes there is a price tag to these kinds of desires, I think it is almost an accident of our culture, of where we are born and under what unique circumstances.

2009-03-28T11:51:00.000-07:00

Swallowed

Cirrus clouds layer the sky, like long wispy strips of confetti frozen in the act of falling to earth. The sun skims over the silhouette of nearby buildings, and short trees cast long shadows. I am roused by the howl of an unknown animal. Three cries and no more. Birdsong fills to overflowing in the ravine of Warren Woods. It sounds incoherent, a mess; I cannot grasp the hidden symphonies, the meaning of it all.

I walk.

Under my feet crackles the mournful voice of forgotten branches, strips of bark carelessly shed by trees, and thousands upon thousands of dried-out seed husks, their life essence forever leached away. Light is life. Infinitesimal specks of light in the distance engage in a chaotic dance. It is all very mysterious, like some curvilinear Brownian motion, like drunken dancers careening through a crowd and randomly colliding with faceless strangers. They are nature’s agents and I cannot grasp their agenda, their intent.

I walk.

Catching the whiff of mint, I kneel to inhale a plant’s scent. Each of its leaves is partitioned first by the veins that give it life and then into smaller roundish speckles that resemble scales – just like mint leaves. It is not mint. While kneeling, a hummingbird appears out of the tangled branches and rises up meanderingly to a great height. There it stops, as if uncertain where to go. The hummingbird manages to convey a sense of absolute stillness, despite its near-invisible wings fluttering valiantly at twenty strokes a second, despite its heart pumping at a prodigious rate of up to a thousand beats per minute. As I stare intently, the spell of indecision is broken, and it swoops down, ghostlike, with unerring precision and blistering speed, as if it were a bird of prey intent on prey. Except it is not a bird of prey; the hummingbird lives on nectar. I lose sight of the bird, but I have scant time to register my disappointment, because a second one rises to the sky and performs exactly the same ritual. A third hummingbird appears and dives, and this time my eyes trace the path of the bird in flight as it reverses direction at the end of the dive and returns to where I imagine the previous two birds had emerged. Bewildered, I quickly realize my mistake – there were never three of them.

I walk away.

Much later, I find out that males of this species (Anna’s Hummingbird) perform display dives as a courtship ritual. A male bird accelerates to fifty miles per hour while descending, then unfurls and closes its tail feathers within a twentieth of a second, producing a loud chirp – its mating call. A twentieth of a second is faster than my eye can blink; I understand why I didn’t catch this aerial maneuver with my naked eye.

The trail snakes down the v-shaped slope of the ravine and disappears precariously at the edge of a short vertical fall. Is this trail made by man or carved by surface runoff during sporadic rainstorms?

(Am I making a mistake?)

Over the edge, the slope steepens. Each step I take is another input to a feedback loop that is amplifying my awareness of gravity. All other thoughts flee my consciousness. I crouch down, half walking, half sliding. Soft sedimentary rock crumbles with a sigh under my weight and rolls away and down, down, down…

(Too late.)

I hit rock bottom, the vertex of the V, the convergence of fear and curiosity, the familiar and unknown. Except it’s not rock I am standing on but asphalt. The signature white dashed lines confirm my suspicion. I know what I expected – the last vestige of untouched nature secreted away in urbanized La Jolla. Not this.

X marks the spot. I lay branches on the ground to mark my entry point, and gaze up longingly at the edge of the trail that brought me here. I am not certain that I can climb out of the ravine from X, where the soil is too soft to provide my feet any purchase. The evening light is dying, and the vibrancy of greens is slowly being bleached into night’s grey. A slim crescent in the darkening sky is my sole sliver of comfort. Something else is missing. It takes me a moment to pinpoint – the birds have stopped singing.

(What else can I do?)

I follow the abandoned road, this winding river of asphalt that is slowly dying from age, from neglect, from the encroachment of nature. The river banks are the interlocking vines and shrubbery that grow on a thin mat of soil over the asphalt. I have been a spectator for only a night, but the future of this forgotten road is as clear to me as a movie reel played on fastforward through time. By inches it will shrink, over years, until nothing is left.

I reach a point where the road has bifurcated completely – one semicircular section of the road has sunk four feet lower, while the rest of the road insists on staying level; there is a mutual agreement to separate. I have always been impressed at how utterly a layer of asphalt erases all traces of whatever lies beneath. Nature seemingly has no answer to the clinical efficiency with which roads and highways are transforming the landscape. Extracted from crude petroleum, asphalt is the black, sticky semi-liquid that binds together the crushed stone and gravel that make up our roads. How much asphalt and gravel does it take to drown the world? I hop onto the sunken section and got my answer: four fingers’ breadth – nothing, really. The earth is eight thousand miles in diameter; it will not be erased.

I walk on.

The vegetation becomes denser. The shrubbery has reached my waist; I tiptoe around them when I can and bulldoze across when I can’t. In the dimming light, I pick out the shape of a unique plant whose thorns I have learned painstakingly to avoid. I tussle with small trees and shield my face from branches that swat me with a will. On rare occasions when they get past my defenses, I have had to spit out leaves and twigs in disgust. I stumble onto trees and shrubs that form such an effective barricade that I resort to crawling through small chinks in their armor when I can find them and bludgeoning a swathe of destruction through them with hands and feet when I can’t. Sorry, sorry, sorry, I have to get through.

The road ends. It has been swallowed.

I hesitate. Though itself forgotten, the road is my only connection to the world outside this ravine, the world I desperately wish to return to. I have struggled through so much vegetation to get to where I am that I dread retracing my steps more than I fear what lies ahead. I warily peruse the sloped sides of the ravine and conclude that they are insurmountable. What am I afraid of?

I push forward.

I am swallowed.

2009-03-24T04:56:00.000-07:00

The Hair Comb

I didn’t see it coming. Clinically, I inspect the blood smeared on my fingers. My partner Rubina is mortified and begins apologizing profusely; she tells me she will never do this again. I smile at her and tell her it’s alright, it’s nothing really; she doesn’t look convinced. I excuse myself and find the washroom. In the mirror, I peer morbidly at white teeth now no longer white. My tongue darts across the tiny tear on the inside of my cheek; there is no sting, only a dash of sanguine, on the day of my dance final.

Is it over yet?

My roommate Jake is laughing at me; I must look ridiculous. I am practicing on-the-spot spins on the smooth kitchen floor. My thighs ache from a midnight jog, from one spin too many. My eyes are trained on the teddy bear on the kitchen cabinet – a hand-drawn Christmas gift from my youngest sister. By focusing on a spot in my line of sight and returning to it after each three-sixty rotation, I should be able to maintain posture and balance. The bear blinks in and out of my vision as I whirl and whirl the world away…

Finally, I stagger to a stop; I am dizzy.

One, two, three… Five, six, seven… Always the same beat. The music quickens; it quickens me. There is no space to think, no time to procrastinate; I just listen and move. The flow of my body precedes and shapes my emotions. Move and be moved. There is a girl dancing with me and I do not know her name; I wish I do. There is no time for introductions, no space for chatter.

Something about her smile… Brown hair sways and swishes as she turns under my outstretched arm. While spinning, she crisply twists her neck and the bottom edge of her hair lifts itself as if suddenly weightless and brushes a trail of warmth across my cheek. I have to quench the immediate urge to touch my face; it tingles. I am distracted by her crooked smile. Does she notice?

I wonder what makes a good pairing on the dance floor. She gives I take, I give she takes; our flows meld harmoniously to form a pure, resonant note. This doesn’t happen often enough. I make extended eye contact. This also seldom occurs – physical intimacy in salsa is necessary, but the mind and body are easily and often disconnected. I read in her face the same recognition, the same quickening in spirit. The dance studio and the dancers around us recede into a distant halo, and though the music never stops, I hear more keenly the silence that permeates the space between us and binds us together. Her lips are curved in mysterious satisfaction and my steps are light. Her radiant smile carries me through the dance, this smile that is mine, mine alone.

The song ends. We part hands and I say thank you, because I say thank you to all my dance partners. We will dance again but not today. Today in the Wagner Dance Facility, I will dance with many others because the practice is to exchange partners and never get too comfortable with one. The rationale for social dancing in lessons is simple – you are more likely to expose your own weaknesses by having to dance with a variety of partners who respond differently to the same cues.

I remember when I first learned salsa. My world swelled to bursting with a myriad of new, vibrant colors. It’s seeing a new language through tinted lenses. The bright audacious colors are the energetic, eye-catching stunts that leave me gasping; the subtle hues are the nuances in hip gyration and finger placement that make even the simplest moves look ineffably graceful. I painted from this new-found palette of self-expression; I picked my colors without fear or favor.

I remember also that I was thrust into an alien culture of casual intimacy – the initial shock was at once liberating and disquieting. Like clockwork, I would dance with a stranger, part from her when the song ended and move on immediately to the next partner. The dance floor is my idea of a social anomaly because it provides a respectable setting where everyday touch-me-not constraints are relaxed. Fingers release, seek each other out and intertwine during turns; hips and bodies mold into one another vigorously; while in close-embrace position, my firm hand clasps her back to cue the next move. As a general rule, salsa is sensuous, not intentionally salacious. Yet this distinction is very fine and I wonder…

Sandra is lithe and endearingly nervous. The small of her back is pressed tightly against my right forearm. One. I grasp both her elbows and whirl her outward in a whip-like jerk that is necessarily forceful and almost violent. I imagine she would have kept on spinning, forever, across the blackened floor, if I do not check her. I check her. Five. With my right arm extended and my weight shifted to my left foot for balance, I pull her back in. She spins inward now, mesmerizing; I do not take my eyes off of her. Seven, I catch her. As her left hip meets my right, I soften the impact by kinking my body inward at the hip, so that she sinks into me snugly and the natural curve of her body delineates mine, as mine delineates hers. One. We are one. With her body resting on mine, I clasp her tightly, step out on my left foot and sink downwards. The right side of my body is rigid to support her full weight; my left knee feels the strain, and nearly buckles. We hold. Three. I shift her back to her feet. Five. We separate. It’s your move.

On paper, one of my favorite moves looks simple to perform. It is called, appropriately, the Hair Comb; I raise both her arms in a delicate arc that sweeps over and may lightly touch her hair. This move ends as I gently pin her hands to the back of her neck. If I were pressed to explain why I especially like the Hair Comb, I admit that it closely resembles the classic picture of a lover’s caress and a woman’s vulnerability. The illusion of a lover’s intimacy is potent, so potent that sometimes the spirit quickens and the illusion dissipates, but the intimacy lingers.

Strange.

It never starts out quite like that. Before the dance session begins, we file in, like nervous schoolchildren, making idle talk. Our instructor Maria begins a roll call and we respond obediently. The tremors begin, invisible to everybody else; I feel them. I walk to my favorite corner, set my bags down on the dull black floor, set myself down and retrieve my dance shoes – a black and white classic which I judiciously picked out of a brochure. The black shines with controlled exuberance; the white is pristine. A stubborn crease runs across the vamp of my shoe; it crinkles every time I stand on the ball of my feet. Soothingly I run my fingertips over scars that have suffered the occasional sharp collision. There, tiny flecks of black are missing if one knows where to look. It’s been more than a month since these shoes caught my eye on the brochure; they still look wonderful. I snuggle my feet in and I let my hands take over in a lacing routine that is as comforting as it is familiar. As I methodically pull out the loose loops and tighten the knots, I tie away my apprehension and the tremors subside. I hear Maria’s voice, and the first strains of a Merengue tune. One, two, one, two… I rise to my feet. The tremors are completely gone. I strut to the nearest high-heel and I ask her to dance.

To my bemusement, I find myself in a strange playground where the unspoken rules are bewildering, the air is tinged with a subdued eroticism and I am not sure what to make of it all. Every dance is an extended flirtation, every new partner a temporary obsession. On the dance-floor, I am brazen; off it, I am reticent. Sometimes the music leaves me behind, floundering. Or my hands, slippery with sweat, slip. Or in my inexperience, I twist my partner into knots. Then I imagine I must look like a damn fool. Other times, I complete a complicated movement with panache. Or I perform a simple Hair Comb with the right pressure on her fingers, so that the motion of her arm looks unhurried and graceful, as if she were really combing her hair in front of her mirror. Or I meet a special girl whose hands fit mine like a well-lined glove, whose smile captures my imagination. I feel breathless, charged, confident, sexy, awkward, mortified, ridiculous – and then it starts all over again.

Salsa is a continuous flux of tension. After one studies the basic steps and pairs up with a partner in the neutral position, one then learns about tension. While facing each other with hands clasped together, I maintain a constant, moderate pressure on her hands, and she on mine; our shoulders are connected together as if by a coiled spring. When I push, she feels it immediately and steps back; she pushes back and the flow of energy reverses direction. One communicates on the dance floor essentially through these quick exchanges of energy.

There is yet another kind of tension that flits across the periphery of my consciousness, rarely acknowledged. Nevertheless, its presence feels as tangible as any physical connection. It is this wicked pot that boils with irreconcilable emotions: my feelings of liberation and unease for stepping over everyday social boundaries. It is the implicit and mutual appraisal between dance partners for a different kind of partnership. It is the improbable possibility that the most fleeting of connections made on this unique playground can spark something deeper.

Two years ago. I am a beginner.

A popular salsa bar in Union Square, Singapore.

In the corner a deejay spins a mix of salsa, merengue and bachata to a lively crowd of over forty. The dance floor is so cramped that if I do not identify the song’s beat, grab a partner and claim a spot within ten seconds into each song, I will have to dance in the hallway where the lockers and unused shoes are located. I know this because the process takes me about ten seconds; I am a tad too familiar with the layout of this hallway. My hesitancy at the beginning of every song proves fatal; to my untrained ear, all Latin music begins in the same way – loud, frantic and incoherent. Then one must muster the nerve to approach a girl; I find myself at the bar sipping a drink to fortify myself.

Later that night.

One, two, three… Five, six, seven… Always the same beat. The music quickens; it quickens me. I am dancing with a girl once again. This time, the music is too quick and I resort to calling out the beat and ignoring the song altogether. This time, I know the girl’s name; she is my reason for being there, for learning salsa, for making a fool of myself.

Close embrace. Spin. Open break. Cross-body lead.

I wonder if she knows.

Hammerlock hold. Break out. Spin again. Faster. Faster.

2009-03-24T04:34:00.000-07:00

The Hair Comb

I didn’t see it coming. Clinically, I inspect the blood smeared on my fingers. My partner Rubina is mortified and begins apologizing profusely; she tells me she will never do this again. I smile at her and tell her it’s alright, it’s nothing really; she doesn’t look convinced. I excuse myself and find the washroom. In the mirror, I peer morbidly at white teeth now no longer white. My tongue darts across the tiny tear on the inside of my cheek; there is no sting, only a dash of sanguine, on the day of my dance final.

Is it over yet?

My roommate Jake is laughing at me; I must look ridiculous. I am practicing on-the-spot spins on the smooth kitchen floor. My thighs ache from a midnight jog, from one spin too many. My eyes are trained on the teddy bear on the kitchen cabinet – a hand-drawn Christmas gift from my youngest sister. By focusing on a spot in my line of sight and returning to it after each three-sixty rotation, I should be able to maintain posture and balance. The bear blinks in and out of my vision as I whirl and whirl the world away…

Finally, I stagger to a stop; I am dizzy.

One, two, three… Five, six, seven… Always the same beat, but the music quickens; it quickens me. There is no space to think, no time to procrastinate; I just listen and move. The flow of my body precedes and shapes my emotions. Move and be moved. There is a girl dancing with me and I do not know her name; I wish I do. There is no time for introductions, no space for chatter.
Something about her smile… Brown hair sways and swishes as she turns under my outstretched arm. While spinning, she crisply twists her neck and the bottom edge of her hair lifts itself as if suddenly weightless and brushes a trail of warmth across my cheek. I have to quench the immediate urge to touch my face; it tingles. I am distracted by her crooked smile. Does she notice?

I wonder what makes a good pairing on the dance floor. She gives I take, I give she takes; our flows meld harmoniously to form a pure, resonant note. This doesn’t happen often enough. I make extended eye contact. This also seldom occurs – physical intimacy in salsa is necessary, but the mind and body are easily and often disconnected. I read in her face the same recognition, the same quickening in spirit. The dance studio and the dancers around us recede into a distant halo, and though the music never stops, I hear more keenly the silence that permeates the space between us and binds us together. Her lips are curved in mysterious satisfaction and my steps are light. Her radiant smile carries me through the dance, this smile that is mine, mine alone.

The song ends. We part hands and I say thank you, because I say thank you to all my dance partners. We will dance again but not today. Today in the Wagner Dance Facility, I will dance with many others because the practice is to exchange partners and never get too comfortable with one. The rationale for social dancing in lessons is simple – you are more likely to expose your own weaknesses by having to dance with a variety of partners who have different body shapes and respond differently to the same cues.

I remember when I first learned salsa. My world swelled with a myriad colors I have never experienced. I admired the I learned to identify the subtle hues that I painted from this new-found palette of self-expression; I picked my colors without fear or favor; I was daring, I was invincible.

I remember also that I was thrust into an alien culture of casual intimacy; the initial shock was at once liberating and disquieting. Like clockwork, I would dance with a stranger, part from her when the song ended and move on immediately to the next partner. The dance floor is my idea of a social anomaly because it provides a respectable setting where everyday touch-me-not constraints are relaxed. Fingers release, seek each other out and intertwine during turns; hips and bodies mold into one another vigorously; while in close-embrace position, my firm hand clasps her back to cue the next move. As a general rule, salsa is sensuous, not intentionally salacious. Yet this distinction is very fine and I wonder…

Sandra is lithe and endearingly nervous. The small of her back is pressed tightly against my right forearm. One. I grasp both her elbows and whirl her outward in a whip-like jerk that is necessarily forceful and almost violent. I imagine she would have kept on spinning, forever, across the blackened floor, if I do not check her. I check her. Five. With my right arm extended and my weight shifted to my left foot for balance, I pull her back in. She spins inward now, mesmerizing; I do not take my eyes off of her. Seven, I catch her. As her left hip meets my right, I soften the impact by kinking my body inward at the hip, so that she sinks into me snugly and the natural curve of her body delineates mine, as mine delineates hers. One. We are one. With her body resting on mine, I clasp her tightly, step out on my left foot and sink downwards. The right side of my body is rigid to support her full weight; my left knee feels the strain, and nearly buckles. We hold. Three. I shift her back to her feet. Five. We separate. It’s your move.

On paper, one of my favorite moves looks simple to perform. It is called, appropriately, the Hair Comb; I raise both her arms in a delicate arc that sweeps over and may lightly touch her hair. This move ends as I gently pin her hands to the back of her neck. If I were pressed to explain why I especially like the Hair Comb, I admit that it closely resembles the classic picture of a lover’s caress and a woman’s vulnerability. The illusion of a lover’s intimacy is potent, so potent that sometimes the spirit quickens and the illusion dissipates, but the intimacy lingers.

Strange.

It never starts out quite like that. Before the dance session begins, we file in, like nervous schoolchildren, making idle talk. Our instructor Maria begins a roll call and we respond obediently. The tremors begin, invisible to everybody else; I feel them. I walk to my favorite corner, set my bags down on the dull black floor, set myself down and retrieve my dance shoes – a black and white classic which I judiciously picked out of a brochure. The black shines with controlled exuberance; the white is pristine. A stubborn crease runs across the vamp of my shoe; it crinkles every time I stand on the ball of my feet. Soothingly I run my fingertips over scars that have suffered the occasional sharp collision. There, tiny flecks of black are missing if one knows where to look. It’s been more than a month since these shoes caught my eye on the brochure; they still look wonderful. I snuggle my feet in and I let my hands take over in a lacing routine that is as comforting as it is familiar. As I methodically pull out the loose loops and tighten the knots, I tie away my apprehension and the tremors subside. I hear Maria’s voice, and the first strains of a Merengue tune. One, two, one, two… I rise to my feet. The tremors are completely gone. I strut to the nearest high-heel and I ask her to dance.

To my bemusement, I find myself in a strange playground where the unspoken rules are bewildering, the air is tinged with a subdued eroticism and I am not sure what to make of it all. Every dance is an extended flirtation, every new partner a temporary obsession. On the dance-floor, I am brazen; off it, I am reticent. Sometimes the music leaves me behind, floundering. Or my hands, slippery with sweat, slip. Or in my inexperience, I twist my partner into knots. Then I imagine I must look like a damn fool. Other times, I complete a complicated movement with panache. Or I perform a simple Hair Comb with the right pressure on her fingers, so that the motion of her arm looks unhurried and graceful, as if she were really combing her hair in front of her mirror. Or I meet a special girl whose hands fit mine like a well-lined glove, whose smile captures my imagination. I feel breathless, charged, confident, sexy, awkward, mortified, ridiculous – and then it starts all over again.

Salsa is a continuous flux of tension. After one studies the basic steps and pairs up with a partner in the neutral position, one then learns about tension. While facing each other with hands clasped together, I maintain a constant, moderate pressure on her hands, and she on mine; our shoulders are connected together as if by a coiled spring. When I push, she feels it immediately and steps back; she pushes back and the flow of energy reverses direction. One communicates on the dance floor essentially through these quick exchanges of energy.

There is yet another kind of tension that flits across the periphery of my consciousness, rarely acknowledged. Nevertheless, its presence feels as tangible as any physical connection. It is this wicked pot that boils with irreconcilable emotions: my feelings of liberation and unease for stepping over everyday social boundaries. It is the implicit and mutual appraisal between dance partners for a different kind of partnership. It is the improbable possibility that the most fleeting of connections made on this unique playground can spark something deeper.

Two years ago. I am a beginner.

A popular salsa bar in Union Square, Singapore.

In a dark corner, a deejay spins a mix of salsa, merengue and bachata to a lively crowd of over forty. The dance floor is so cramped that if I do not identify the song’s beat, grab a partner and claim a spot within ten seconds into each song, I will have to dance in the hallway where the lockers and unused shoes are located. I know this because the process takes me about ten seconds; hence, I am a tad too familiar with the layout of this hallway. My weakness is a fatal bout of hesitation at the beginning of every song; to my untrained ear, all Latin music begins in the same way – loud, frantic and incoherent. Then one must muster the nerve to approach a girl; I find myself at the bar buying a drink to fortify my courage.

Later that night. One, two, three… Five, six, seven… Always the same beat. The music quickens; it quickens me. I am dancing with a girl, once again. This time, the music is too quick and I resort to calling out the beat and ignoring the song altogether. This time, I know the girl’s name; she is my reason for being there, for learning salsa, for making a fool of myself.

Close embrace. Spin. Open break. Cross-body lead.

I wonder if she knows.

Hammerlock hold. Break out. Spin again. Faster. Faster.

2009-02-02T06:32:00.000-08:00

Intimacy

One, two, three, pause, five, six, seven, pause… Always the same beat, but the music quickens; it quickens me. There is no space to think, no time to procrastinate; I just listen and move. My outward bodily expression precedes, and shapes, my emotions. Move and be moved. There is a girl dancing with me, and I do not know her name, though I now wish I do. There is no time for introductions, no space for chit-chat.

She has an infectious smile. Her dirty-blonde hair sways and swishes as she turns under my outstretched arm. I sometimes wonder what makes a good match on the dance-floor. She gives, I take, I give, she takes; we respond to each other’s cues with alacrity, grace and prescience. This doesn’t happen often enough. I make extended eye contact. Surprisingly, this also occurs infrequently – physical intimacy in salsa is necessary, but the body and mind are easily disconnected. I read in her face the same recognition, the same quickening in spirit. The dance studio and the dancers around us recede into a distant halo, and though the music never stops, I hear more keenly the silence that permeates the space between us, and binds us together. Her lips are curved in mysterious satisfaction, and I am happy. Her radiant smile carries me through the dance, this smile that is mine, mine alone.
The song ends. We part hands, and I say thank you, because I say thank you to all my dance partners. We will dance again, but not today. Today, in the Wagner Dance Facility, I will dance with many other partners, because the practice is to exchange partners and never get too comfortable with one. The rationale for ‘social dancing’ in lessons is simple: you are more likely to expose your own weaknesses by having to dance with a variety of partners, who have different body shapes and respond differently to the same cues.

When I first began to learn salsa, I was thrust into an alien culture of ‘casual intimacy’, and the initial shock was at once liberating, and disquieting. Like clockwork, I would dance with a stranger, and part from her when the song ends, to move on immediately to the next partner. The dance-floor is my idea of a social anomaly, because it provides a respectable setting where everyday touch-me-not constraints are relaxed. Fingers release, seek each other out, and intertwine during turns; hips and bodies mold into one another vigorously; while in close-embrace position, a firm hand clasps her back to cue the next move. One of my favorite moves is also the simplest to perform. It is called, appropriately, the Hair Comb: I would raise both her arms in a delicate arc that sweeps over and may lightly touch her hair. This move ends as I gently pin her hands to the back of her neck. If I were pressed to explain why I especially like the Hair Comb, I admit that it closely resembles the classic picture of a lover’s caress, and a woman’s vulnerability. The illusion of a lover’s intimacy is potent, so potent that sometimes the spirit quickens, and the illusion dissipates, but the intimacy remains.

Two years ago. A popular salsa bar in Union Square, Singapore. I am a beginner, and I am dancing with a girl, once again. This time, the music is too quick, and I often fail to follow the beat. This time, I know the girl’s name, and she is my reason for being there, for learning salsa, for making a fool of myself.

Close embrance. Spin. Open break. Cross-body lead.

I wonder if she knows.

(She will.)

Hammerhold lock. Break out. Spin again. Faster. Faster.

2009-01-24T04:28:00.000-08:00

How to Beautify the Apartment, Effortlessly

Start with the desire.

With a meticulous eye and the soul of an unforgiving judge, perform a comprehensive survey of your natural habitat. This survey should not take more than a few minutes, and involves making a mental checklist of all aspects of your humble dwelling that need improvement. For those of us who understand what it means to harbor a deep-seated contempt for the less-than-illustrious state of your abode, and have to keep this resentment bottled up interminably because any attempt to ameliorate the situation requires effort, this task is made easier: just sit down comfortably in a private location that is devoid of breakables and identify your frustrations, one by one.

Once this is done, close your eyes, and let your imagination run without restraint. Imagine that every single time you come home from work or school and open your front door, you are greeted by your private vision of utopia on earth. Every single time you take your first step into home-sweet-home, you cannot help yourself: your throat muscles involuntarily contract and your eyes start to water. Nurture this precious fantasy. Let the seed of desire burgeon and take root. Comfort yourself with the maxim: “A motivated soldier has already won half the battle.”

So we’re nearly (half-way) there. The next step is to realize that, like most college students in America, you have the dubious pleasure of living with fellow students, who will have varying levels of motivation with regards to joining this fateful enterprise. The key to the success of this enterprise lies, paradoxically, in its secrecy. Do not attempt to impress upon them the beauty and necessity of your grand vision, because your success is not guaranteed. Rather, get them excited about a huge party that you will throw next Saturday night. Remind them about a friend’s twenty-first birthday that they have not had a chance to celebrate. Tell them about another friend’s momentous decision to return to college. Or tell them it’s everybody’s birthday! Do any of us really need more excuses for celebrations and general mayhem in a confined environment where everyday social constraints are relaxed (or sometimes completely ignored)?

After you have worked your fellow mates up to a frenzy of excitement, play on their vanity. This party is going to be a huge success - something that everybody will remember for months to come. There will be immense public pressure for a sequel. Perhaps your mates’ stuttering social lives could be rejuvenated. Reputations can be made, or broken, at this party.

In order to fulfill the requirements of a “good party,” your modest domicile needs party attractions, in the same way that countries need lavish spectacles to reel in the tourist dollar. Cajole one of your mates, who is an accomplished photographer but has always been reticent about public displays of his work, into finally buying frames at the latest 2-for-1 Aaronbrothers sale and setting up a photo-gallery in the living room. Convince them that the untidy heap of college textbooks strewn all over the living room floor will look majestic, if they are stacked together in an impressive pile that snakes up toward (and touches) the ceiling.

Details matter! Impress upon your mates the necessity of a source of mindless entertainment for party guests – acquire a television, couch, and a PS2 game that preferably inflames passions and intense rivalry (think nail-biting action, think heart-stopping combat, think Soul Calibur III). It would also be a good time to clean those toilets with powerful bleaching agents that erase all odors of the past, like the fading memory of a bad dream come morning light.

Finally, any good party must have a theme, and the theme of the day is: Autographed Art. Enforce a strict no-entrance policy for party guests unless each of them brings along an original piece of art, which will be proudly displayed on the walls. Ensure that the guest-list is long and offer a prize to the winner of the art competition. Expect to be pleasantly surprised by the creativity of friends whom you would not have thought capable of drawing a simple hat. Not only is this choice of theme great for the decor, it is also a natural ice-breaker for party guests who may not have an opinion about the weather, but have something intelligent to say about their artwork.

As the party dies down and the last few stragglers bid their farewell, stand back, take a deep breath and admire what you have accomplished with very little effort at all.

This is a moment, the moment, fantasy turned reality, fulfillment and euphoria, precious, immortal.

Don’t forget to exhale.

2009-01-21T22:53:00.000-08:00

My Vocation

When I write something I usually think it is very important and that I am a very fine writer. I think this happens to everyone. But there is one corner of my mind in which I know very well what I am, which is a small, a very small writer. I swear I know it. But that doesn't matter much to me. Only, I don't want to think about names: I can see that if I asked 'a small writer like who?' it would sadden me to think of the names of other small writers. I prefer to think that no one has ever been like me, however small, however much of a mosquito or a flea of a writer I may be. The important thing is to be convinced that this really is your vocation, your profession, something you will do all your life.
-Natalia Ginzburg, "My Vocation"

2008-07-19T13:23:00.000-07:00

A Misunderstood Word

Regarding our conversation about time, or the lack of it. On thinking
about it, my opinion is that it's a very great trap laid by a culture that
envies geniuses. What a narrow, one-dimensional portrayal of genius, that
he/she has to accomplish everything at a young age! I think we should all
be kinder to ourselves, with regards to time. That means taking things
easy and enjoying life when I can! (That's my plan.)


Ian:
What you wrote seems very reasonable. It does seem likely that my ideas
about age and about what it means to be successful in physics (or life) are
somewhat ingrained in me because of cultural impositions. I've thought about
this a lot since I was in high school. And, actually, this has led me to
think more about what the purpose of all of this really is.

That is, what is the purpose of studying physics? The trivial answer is that
it's interesting, we like to understand nature, and so on. But that doesn't
seem to answer the more fundamental question. We're interested...so what?
What is our purpose, what are we doing this for??
And then, talking with a friend about this, he made me realize that perhaps
the problem wasn't what the purpose of all of this is, but better, what one
understands by purpose. I've thought about this last thing quite a bit. But
I would still like to know what this means to you, what is your feeling
about this.

I love the way you rephrased the question. In so many ways, it is a better question because of it. It is better because I think the original question: what is the purpose of learning physics (which might as well be: what is the purpose of learning sociology, or what is the purpose of life, in general) is a very great hoax. When people search for a standardized answer to the purpose of life, they fall victim to “mind viruses” (not my words, but I thought they fit) such as religion.

This recurrent theme in all major religions (that it has to answer this hoax of a question) reflects a very large void in the masses that has to be filled. Some psychologists believe that people are native teleologists. Teleology is the assignment of purpose to everything. I have not met an intelligent person who has not wondered about his/her purpose. Maybe there is really some truth in the claims of these psychologists.

My feeling is that there is no standardized purpose to life, or learning physics, or physics itself. Even the word ‘purpose’ is misleading. It implies that life could not exist without purpose. But in fact, we know from Darwin that it can. The same word implies that learning physics is impossible without a purpose (obviously wrong). Some people claim that the purpose of law in nature is to allow life (this answer is of course very ego-centric), which brings us back to the first question. These are the unanswerable questions that leave me sick to the stomach when people try to ask me about them. They are just ill-posed questions.

If we discard the word ‘purpose’, I think we should be talking about ‘directions’ in life. Life can exist with or without direction, but a directed person will find fulfillment, whereas one who is aimless will go nowhere. One can learn physics with or without direction, but as you say, intellectual curiosity is a very poor stand-alone reason to commit a lifetime of effort to the study of physics.

My direction in physics has always been simple. I want to help people. This may surprise you, but before I found my intellectual passion for physics, I recognized that I was good in physics, and if there was anything substantial I could do, I thought surely it must be in this field, and the passion came after this decision. Later on, my simplistic view is to take on some hard knocks, but my resolve to stick to my direction is as strong.

I believe it is the search for clarity of this direction that makes each individual person unique. There should be no standardized direction, because we are too different! It’s impossible. Any answer that claims to apply to all is part of that same great hoax.

The search for clarity of direction is not just a very personal voyage. I think it defines who you are, it defines your life, everything about you.

We are aided in our search by external ideas, images, words that resonate through us. We find what is admirable about the life stories of other people and tuck them in the back of our head, to take seed. We create the idea of an ideal person, which could not be a single person that has already existed, because that would be extreme idolatry. Instead this ideal person must be an amalgamation of many, many influences, so that it is impossible to identify one dominant influence. I am left with no choice but to admit that YES this ideal person is unique, because no such other person has ever existed. With experience comes greater wisdom, and the ideal person may evolve in my fertile imagination, but always I strive to reach that ideal which is mine, mine only.

That, in short, is what I understand about purpose (possibly the most misunderstood word in the world).

2008-07-13T20:09:00.000-07:00

Round 2

Broke's Unexplainable Farewell Floorball Extravaganza (TM)

Time: 19th, Saturday, 12pm, latecomers are welcome, but inform me if you intend to come very late, ie after 3pm. Time to leave: anytime you want to.

Food and Drinks: provided. If anybody has an itch to cook or bake, please tell me. But tell me only if you're good of course. Modesty shalt be cast out and ne'er seen again. Interesting drink combination ideas are very welcome.

Place: Mine. 23 Grange Road. Grange Heights. Swimming pool.
If you're driving, enter a small side road called St. Thomas Walk from either River Valley Road or Killiney Road, then drive till you find Grange Heights. Call if lost. There is no shame in being lost.
If you're taking the mrt, go to somerset and give me a call once you're there. I'll pick you up.
If you already know the way to my place, just be there. Don't call me. Unless you get lost.

Activities:
Floorball
Swimming
Skateboarding
Eating and drinking (for non-sports enthusiasts)
(but seriously, give all of the activities a shot, some people may even call them fun)
(actually, I take it back. it would actually be UNACCEPTABLE for you to not have fun.)

Bring:
Sports shoes
Extra change of clothes (you will perspire, profusely)
Soap and towel if you want to shower at my place
Swimming attire
Water for keeping alive

My number: 98778851 (I don't have caller id or voice message, so if I don't pick up, keep calling, or leave an sms.)

If it rains: we wait for it to stop.

As a way for me to keep track of who's seen this blog post and who hasn't, kindly leave a comment under this post, with your name.
I look forward to seeing you then.

2008-07-13T18:19:00.000-07:00

Why Infrared

Dear Mr. Malone

When we met some time back, you asked me why the human body emits infrared radiation. I gave you an answer that was my intelligent guess, and a very unsatisfactory explanation (at least, I thought so). The intelligent guess turned out to be the correct answer. After having spent time leisurely reading in the summer (of which half that time is spent on physics), I have understood more concepts related to this question, and I feel I can attempt a more satisfying explanation. Some parts of the explanation require me to qualitatively explain the mathematics, but this is far from a ‘dumbed-down’ explanation, because in as much as mathematics can be translated to words, I believe that the translation is mostly correct. I am not sure whether it’s possible to try to explain this to your class, but I thought you may be interested intellectually. So here goes.

(In the following, I may use the terms ‘light’ and ‘electromagnetic radiation’ interchangeably.)

First, I will introduce the concept of a blackbody. A blackbody absorbs all light that falls upon it. Once the light is absorbed, it will bounce around inside the blackbody. Light will be continually absorbed and re-emitted by the atoms inside the blackbody. Because the light cannot escape and is eventually absorbed/re-emitted by ALL the atoms, there is a continual exchange of energy between all the atoms. Any net flow of energy stops, on average, when the entire blackbody is in thermal equilibrium, i.e. we can define the blackbody to have an exact temperature.

A perfect blackbody is sure to achieve thermal equilibrium, if we give it some time. But we cannot expect that the human body is a perfect blackbody, because we only absorb some of the light that falls on us. Hence, the human body is not exactly in thermal equilibrium, but we shall make the approximation that in fact, it is! 310K, which is about the normal temperature you see when you use a thermometer on yourself. Of course, we know that the temperature of our liver is probably slightly higher than that of our earlobes, but I make no apologies about the blatant approximation, because we usually need them to make any prediction at all. Most dense, opaque objects can be approximated as blackbodies, because the light interacts strongly with the atoms in this objects, and the exchange of energy through light also results in an approximate thermal equilibrium.

Second, I must introduce the concept of the simple harmonic oscillator (SHO), as applied to electromagnetic fields. The classic example of a SHO is a mass on a spring, or a pendulum. As you probably already know, the energy of the system, which depends on two variables (position and momentum), will oscillate between kinetic and potential energy.

Any electromagnetic field in a cavity/object/blackbody can be described in the following manner: at an infinite set of points (or locations) inside the cavity, we measure the electric (E) and magnetic (B) fields in the x,y,z directions for each point. In a sense, this is the most obvious way to describe the e-m field. However, the mathematics offers us another equivalent way of looking at the problem. The alternative description is that the field is really a sum of an infinite number of standing waves which vibrate at different frequencies. The following may sound familiar to you: a string clamped at both ends, any arbitrary deformation of the string can be alternatively described as a sum of many standing waves of different wavelengths, and vibrating at different frequencies. The technique I have described for the string is called Fourier decomposition, and the mathematics is simpler but not unlike that for the electromagnetic field.

Depending on the nature of the e-m field, standing waves of certain frequencies may have a stronger “presence” or amplitude of oscillation, as compared to other frequencies. We quantify the strength of each standing wave by a number N. Since we have an infinite number of standing waves, we really have an infinite number of N’s. Now it’s pretty amazing, but each N obeys an equation that is identical to that of a simple harmonic oscillator. The same equation that describes how the position of the mass/pendulum evolves with time, also describes N. This means that the e-m field is mathematically equivalent to a set of independent harmonic oscillators. In the case of the mass/pendulum, the total energy oscillates between kinetic and potential energy (at a certain time, the kinetic may be higher than the potential, but at all times the total energy is constant); in the case of the e-m field, the total energy sloshes between energy stored in the electric and the magnetic fields.

We need quantum mechanics to quantize these harmonic oscillators. In effect, we are allowing the energy of each harmonic oscillator to assume only certain values that occur at discretely-spaced levels. No longer do we have a continuous spread of energies.

Now suppose this harmonic oscillator is in thermal equilibrium at temperature 310K. The temperature tells us, on average, what the energy of the oscillator would be. We expect that at higher temperatures, the oscillator has more energy.

After we sum the average energies of all the harmonic oscillators in the human body, we find that the total energy is spread out among all the possible frequencies. Again, at certain frequencies, the electromagnetic energy is “stronger” than at other frequencies. When we actually plot it out (for 310K), the energy spread peaks at the infrared. And that is why the human body emits light in the infrared. It is more accurate to say that it emits light at all frequencies, but mostly in the infrared. Incidentally, using the same analysis on the sun (which has a surface temperature of 5800K), the energy spread peaks nicely in the region of visible light, hence we earthlings see only in the visible spectrum. The most perfect blackbody known to man is the entire universe (during a time, billions of years ago, when it was still opaque), and the Cosmic Microwave Background presents the most exact fit to this blackbody model.

I hope this explanation was more satisfying. It is certainly very mathematical, in the sense that you could not intuit the arguments here by simple physical principles, but that can’t be helped (for now). The math does not lie, and we do our best in interpreting it. Tell me if you want a greater depth of understanding for any of the ideas I wrote about. I wish you well.

2008-06-26T08:59:00.000-07:00

The TheoPrac Spectrum

The manner in which the inner mind perceives the outside world is inextricably linked to our sense of time, which in turn is heavily influenced by the temporal nature of our work. By limiting our roles in society, our culture is encouraging the development of two distinct mindsets: exclusively future- and present-minded. Finding a balanced temporal perspective to life is more than just beneficial to the individual. It is of utmost importance to the survival of our species, because many of the acute problems that we face today may be attributed to tunnel-vision: we are enculturated to see only problems of a specific time-scale and we tune out of our consciousness the problems that should also be salient. To mount an adequate moral response to society’s problems, we must wisely distribute the weight of our effort between short-term measures that alleviate present problems, and long-term projects to better understand the fundamental cause of our oldest, most persistent problems. The failure of the modern artistic media to convey the importance of a multi-temporal approach to life, is ultimately a reflection of the profound difficulty in translating four-dimensional ideas to a largely two-dimensional media. This problem of visualizing information requires urgent attention and redress.

By focusing on our individual sense of time, I wish to address the internal monologue within (I dare say) almost all of us – the monologue that speaks quietly of the conflict between selfish desire and social conscience, the theory of life and its practice. I came to this university with the fire of ambition, and a relentless, overpowering drive to succeed in my chosen field: physics. I thought physics was the be-all-end-all, that what I hoped to accomplish mattered in the grand scheme of everythingness. In many respects, I still do! But that fire is now tempered by a newly-developed caution. The way I perceive science and its relationship with the outside world has been changing gradually, irreversibly. When once I held the simplistic view that all scientific knowledge was intrinsically valuable, now I recognize my naivety. I even welcome the occasional doubt that flits across my mind. I believed that physics was the most direct means through which I could translate my ideas to reality and thus contribute to society. However, in physics, the most intellectually stimulating ideas that have really caught my imagination, are often the most abstract. Frequently, the intended applications of these revolutionary ideas are out-of-this-world, amazing, and yet cannot address the more pressing problems that humanity faces. Inspiration comes in many guises; I had not thought that my intellect and social conscience, from which I derive all my inspiration, would ever conflict. This is the bitter irony. Over the past two years, this conflict has been a source of profound confusion; I suspect that I will continue to grapple with my confusion for the rest of my life.

My inner struggle has led me to an important realization, about the manner in which our inner mind perceives the outside world, and how this perception is colored by a single individual choice. When I chose to become a physicist, I had no idea about the implications of my decision that were beyond the obvious: financial prospects (poor), intellectual stimuli (high), place of work (mobile), ambition (sky-high). What was not obvious to me, should have been: when we make a choice about our professional careers, we are implicitly making a decision about where our desires stand in relationship with our sense of time. The urgency, or lack thereof, with which we regard the fulfillment of our individual wants is of fundamental importance in the way we view the world, because a signficant part of the motivations that drive us are derived from personal satisfaction. Furthermore, I claim that the manner in which modern societies define the roles that different occupations play, perpetuates a mindset that is skewed towards solving either the problems of the now, or the problems of the future, but rarely both in concert. This maladaptive trend is detrimental to the survival of the human species, because the acute problems that the we face today are often of disparate time-scales. The great challenge, then, is to bridge the culturally-constructed gap between the people who are trained by habit to acknowledge only the present, and those who acknowledge only the future.

While the motivations and ambitions that drive a person are exceedingly complex, I believe that most of them can be derived from polar tendencies of the human nature: the need to understand unfamiliar phenomena and theorize about how it works, and the need for action in practical matters, such as making a living. On a temporal scale, our thereotical and practical natures are completely different. The practical person focuses on the urgency of the moment, while the theoretical person gains a broader temporal perspective by keeping oneself detached from the phenomenon that is being observed. Motivated by convenience, I hereby name Theo and Prac as the abstract personifications of our theoretical and practical natures respectively.

Prac is breathless urgency in motion. A typical Prac is Sarah, a medical doctor working in the emergency ward of Thornton Hospital. For Sarah, every moment is focused in sharp relief, and the nature of her work requires that she is constantly living on the ‘edge’. Since Sarah directly utilizes her skills on her patients, she is intimately involved in the process of life-saving. Sarah is proud to be a doctor, and she has good reason to be. The daily confirmation of the validity of her medical knowledge is immediately gratifying at the most basic, somatic level.

Theo is of a different breed, altogether. In studying a natural or social phenomenon with the aim of creating a theory to explain it, one necessarily distances oneself from the urgency of the moment, to gain a broader temporal perspective of the phenomenon. Take the case of Leslie, a virologist who has developed a theory about the mutation pattern of the influenza virus in the case of an epidemic. For Leslie, the definitive test of his theory will not occur unless (or until) this epidemic occurs. Unlike Sarah, Leslie is spatially and temporally disconnected from the gratification of his effort. Leslie must have faith that the truth of his theory will survive the test of time, and while he does not wish an epidemic on the lot of humanity, he nevertheless believes his work is intrinsically valuable as a preparatory measure. For Theo-minded people, the gratification they seek is more intellectual and abstract in nature.

Inherent in these definitions are the disparate time-scales that are the quintessential difference between Theo and Prac. No one person could be purely one, or the other. No one should be. The human being - part Theo, part Prac - is thus conflicted. The push and pull between these opposing tendencies suggest a persistent state of flux and confusion: this is the TheoPrac Spectrum. Where do you stand?

Our position on the Spectrum is a product of individual choice and external influences. Culture, the “webs of significance (that man) himself has spun [Geertz]”, plays a major role. In many modern societies characterized by extensive specialization of labor, the mind-boggling variety of occupations begs for a system of broad categorization. Categorization helps people to make sense of the great number of choices available to them, and allows them to take intermediate steps from broad categories to narrower ones. Ironically, while this categorization effectively aids people to choose their eventual area of specialization, it is also dangerously maladaptive. Through categorization, these societies encourage people to pidgeon-hole themselves in narrowly-defined roles that very often lie on opposite ends of the TheoPrac Spectrum: “Are you a scientist, or an engineer? Academic, or teacher? Theoretical, or applied mathematician? Artist, or humanist? Biologist, or doctor?”

I argue that these labels, with their associated “webs of significance”, are misused by many people to construct a largely superficial self-identity. For Sarah and Leslie, their roles as doctor and virologist, respectively, are clearly delineated. The pride they have for their work is an extension of the pride they have for their self-identities, which, ironically, are largely cultural constructs and devoid of real individualism. From the softest of insinuations to the most direct methods of persuasion, the culture that we live in delivers an immense social pressure to conform to certain molds of the ideal professional. Such was the case in the nineteenth century, when the railway was introduced in the United States. Nye attributed the rapid acceptance of the railway into American culture to the “technological sublime” [Nye, 60]. The sublime is a combination of awe, reverence, and fear; the technological sublime to is a unique kind of sublime. The awe induced by seeing an immense and dynamic technology (such as the railway) has deeper connotations: it has become also a celebration of the triumph of human imagination over nature. Such was the strength of the symbol of the railway, that the American people associated wealth, success and respectability to many professions related to the railway. The railway, then, was the ideal.

This historical case study is instructive to modern America, where the technological sublime has merely shifted to different, subtler technologies. For example, the explosion of research activity in the biological sciences is a testament to the feelings of sublime over several major breakthroughs, such as the decoding of D.N.A. Nature, our oldest enemy is still here, and it wears the face of disease and old age. The old paranoia is now translated to a great social pressure on the younger generation to assume the mantle of biologist and savior. When personal choice has succumbed, unknowingly, to social pressure, there will eventually be deep-seated feelings of resentment and confusion. The trap is laid. Who will recognize it for what it is?

Once one consciously and publicly chooses a culturally-defined label, it is not easy to break out of the mold. Why would anyone want to? There is no confusion, no moral dilemma, only a comforting certitude in one’s ambition and place in society. The lives of great scientists, artists or humanists provide a clear template to which one could live one’s life emulating towards without shame or fear of criticism. These are the culturally-directed passions of our youth. I too have had heroes: physicists whose intellect and personality captivate. We first learn to stand under the shadows of giants. We strive to follow in their footsteps. But when does admiration end and the erosion of self-identity begin? It is so easy to cross this precarious line, and much harder to deconstruct these superficial, culturally-constructed identities that are so deeply ingrained in modern-speak-thought. To make a sensible claim for self-identity, it is necessary to rebuild the individual from first principles. Our building blocks are our own.

There is a danger to never breaking out of the mold and stagnating on the TheoPrac Spectrum. Ehrlich insightfully argues that human beings have adapted, through Darwinian natural selection, to become very adept at tuning a constant stimulus out of their consciousness. This process, called ‘habituation’, developed as a way for our ancestors, who lived in precarious times, to better perceive new threats or opportunities [Ehrlich, 135]. I wish to extend the concept of ‘habituation’ even further. Prac-minded individuals have adapted, through competency selection, to become very good at tuning out phenomena that occur at larger time-scales from their consciousness. By competency selection, I mean that the abilities to focus on the moment and ignore all distractions make Prac an effective worker in Prac’s chosen field. Conversely, Theo-minded individuals thrive by tuning out the urgency of the moment and focusing on the broader temporal perspective. Hence, two kinds of mindsets develop: exclusively present-minded or future-minded.

The survival of the human species hinges upon the ability of individuals to recognize and embrace both their theoretical and practical sides, because the acute problems that humanity faces today have two widely-separated time scales: compare the urgency of the problems of malnutrition, poverty and disease, with the deleterious changes to our environment that are cumulative in effect and hence less salient. To mount a sufficiently robust response to these problems, we need to combine in a new synthesis elements of both Theo and Prac. It will not do to be just one and not the other. Present-minded and future-minded individuals suffer from ‘tunnel-vision’: the inability to see beyond the small temporal dimension that they thrive in. A host of serious problems exist precisely because of this selective ignorance. For example, Prac-minded slash-and-burn farmers in Indonesia destroy large regions of tropical forests, pollute the atmosphere, and in many cases, cannot even sustain the yield of the soil for the next generation of crops. The loss of biodiversity and the deterioration of the natural environment are long-term problems that the farmers selectively ignore. Another case in point is the use of the atom bomb during World War II. Many eminent Theo-minded physicists involved in creating the bomb grapple with the morality of their actions only after the detonations in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Oppenheimer, the figurehead of the Manhattan Project, publicly stated that “… the physicists have known sin; and this is a knowledge which they cannot lose.” So confident were these physicists in the ability of the bomb to affect broad strokes in history, that they were rendered ethically blind! It was only after the deaths that the moral implications became real, pressing and overwhelming.

If our social conscience compels us, individually, to embrace both our theoretical and practical natures, an important question arises: does the individual have any credible hope in making a difference? Will the complexity and the sheer mind-numbing scale of our problems overwhelm our tiny shreds of goodwill? Hopelessness is as much an impediment to humanitarianism as inability. I claim that this bleak outlook is completely unnecessary: human ingenuity will surprise all, once again.

The first objection to developing a social conscience is the problem of scale. Dillard makes a poetic, moving commentary on the statistical insignificance of our efforts (and our very existence). The staggering statistics - numbering the deaths caused by many natural disasters - seemingly diminish the importance of any relief effort. It is easy to dismiss these more Prac-like efforts as noble, but ultimately futile. Relief efforts are a knee-jerk response to the urgency of the moment, and merely alleviate the symptons of an older, scarier problem: will the human race continue to be helpless against the senseless brutality of the natural world? Dillard offers a word of caution: when numbers threaten to overwhelm our grasp of reality, when in our desperation we start to visualize the drowning of thousands as “lots and lots of dots, in blue water, …our minds must not go slack… we agree that we want to think straight” [Dillard, 97]. Statistical insignificance is the immature person’s excuse for inaction. While statistics are useful for giving us a new perspective, any conclusion that is derived purely from numbers is worthy of skepticism. Few things are entirely quantifiable; the consequences of acts of compassion are not one of them. What is needed is a multi-temporal approach to solving large-scale, complex problems: alleviate the symptons now, with the eventual goal of creating a theory that will address the root of the problems.

However, many of these theories will fail. Calvino claims that the modern age is burdened with “a doughy mass of events without form or direction, which surrounds, submerges, crushes all reasoning” [Calvino, 146]. As a consequence, he suggests that our theories have lost all their vaunted predictive powers in the face of such complex social dynamics. The problem is that while we can reasonably predict the individual behavior of components of a system, their aggregate behavior is much harder to predict because of the interactions between each component. This is a major stumbling block in the attempt to understand and propose solutions to complex social problems such as poverty and discrimination. The problem of complexity is evident in virtually all disciplines of the social and physical sciences, and brings into question the intrinsic limitations of our most fundamental scientific theories. Is the Theo-minded individual able to surpass this limitation and make any significant contribution to society?

I do not believe the reductionist approach in science, which involves reducing a complex phenomenon into its components, is intrinsically flawed. It is important that we continually strive to connect together scientific disciplines of different levels of complexity into one coherent whole. There may be large gaps in our current understanding between physics and chemistry, or between consciousness and the science of neurons. These gaps require a leap of faith: we acknowledge our ignorance, and move on. I do not believe that this gaps are insoluble. On the contrary, I am confident that human ingenuity will eventually find surprising answers to our oldest problems. Perhaps the only flaw to the reductionist approach is its grand ambition; we may not find those answers anytime in the near future. Often, these gaps are just too prohibitively large. Consequently, as a practical matter, it also becomes important to study the science of complexity directly, as we are more likely to produce results that we can use today. Even when deciding what fields of research are worth the effort, I emphasize the importance of a balanced, multi-temporal outlook.

The science of complexity is an exciting, vibrant field of research, and much of this intellectual excitement is captured in the early history of chaos theory. When Lorenz tried to model the weather with a set of three non-linear equations that described the way air moves in the atmosphere, he found to his dismay that the model showed wildly unpredictable behavior. The smallest difference in the initial starting conditions of his calculations led to extremely divergent results. Hence the term “chaos” was coined. More than a decade later, Feigenbaum began a revolution in chaos theory by finding patterns in the most improbable of places! From these patterns, he discovered two new universal constants, which are as basic to chaos as the π is to circles. The universality of the Feigenbaum constants is extremely remarkable, in the sense that they could be applied to any and all chaotic systems of a certain type, no matter what the structure of the system is. Consequently, the constants have been confirmed beautifully in a diverse range of experiments, including those on nonlinear electronic circuits and the convection of fluids [Strogatz].

There is growing evidence that suggests a very profound truth: even in the most complex of scientific phenomenon, we are able to find universal patterns that can be described not just qualitatively, but quantitatively. A quantitative description allows scientists to make accurate, verifiable predictions. It is a testament to the versatility of science, that by temporarily ignoring the individual behavior of components and studying the properties of the system as a whole, we are able to better understand complex phenomenon. My optimism is shared by Watts, who believes that the study of the science of networks – systems of interconnected objects that are continuously evolving – will have very broad applications in all the sciences. In particular, the evidence points to the universality of the small-world phenomenon, which was originally a bold sociological hypothesis about the underlying interconnections between anybody in the human society [Watts, 138]. The emergence of the small-world phenomenon in disciplines outside sociology supports, again, the claim of universal patterns in complexity. It is in the search for these universal patterns that a Theo-minded individual can hope to address real problems in society.

My optimism in the versatility of science is tempered by the age-old problem of education. It is not a trivial matter to inculcate, in the young, a multi-temporal perspective to life. Many of the problems in a multi-temporal education can be attributed to the “confusing and unsatisfying state of art in our world” [Dissanayake, 33]. Dissanayake makes an insightful claim about the vital importance of art to the survival of the human species. The purpose of art is to pick out and make salient the institutions in our culture that are essential for the culture’s preservation. However, in many modern societies where luxuries and leisure activities are excessively abundant, there is an illusion - fostered by blind hope - that individual survival can be taken for granted. Art has lost its original purpose, and has maladapted to conform to the short attention span that is characteristic of pop culture, or to the limited notions of high art. Many people have thus been enculturated to a new, narrow definition of art: as a form of entertainment, and no longer an indicator of what we should pay attention to, for our own survival.

More fundamental to the issue at hand is the inability of art to effectively convey multi-temporal ideas to large groups of people. Tufte ends his book on ‘Envisioning Information’ with a very revealing admission: “This profound and informed frustation reflects the essential dilemma of narrative designs – how to reduce the magnificent four-dimensional reality of time and three-space into little marks on paper flatlands [Tufte, 119].” Our education system is heavily dependent on the verbal communication between lecturer and student, and the ‘paper flatlands’ of textbooks. Verbal instruction has many strengths; however, it will always be limited by the linearity of its presentation, and its inability to convey visually-rich information. In trying to convey a four-dimensional idea through a two-dimensional landscape, there have been various successes through creative techniques in visualization. Unfortunately, these successes are limited because they almost invariably rely on the viewer expending an extra amount of effort in the interpretation, and the patience of the masses is unforgivingly short. Tufte expresses the realistic hope that futuristic computer visualizations will boost our capabilities to convey four-dimensional information. We have arrived at a remarkable, and surprising conclusion: the broader conflict between Theo and Prac, and the failure to convey multi-temporal ideas in the education system, are problems that are best approached by improving the methods through which we visualize information.

Let’s get to work.

2007-09-03T14:12:00.000-07:00

Korea and Innocence

I was roaming the backstreets of Seoul alone, not too long ago. They were crowded, noisy, bustling, bewildering, mazy, sweaty, and everything else you would expect from Seoul's shopping underbelly. I didn't come to shop, only to observe lazily, to absorb some atmosphere, to eat some streetfood (delicious).

I came to observe local culture, but found a disquieting lack of it. Everything felt the same: the malls, the brands, the shoppers, the street hawkers. There was nothing distinctly Korean. I came across an interesting shop called UCLA, which really stands for University of California, Los Angeles. I was quite astonished. Coming from UCSD, I recognize immediately that because of the prestige associated with the UC's, they automatically become brands in California. I thought it was a local phenomenon; I did not expect to see this in Seoul.

Seoul, the land of Paris Baguette, UCLA, megamalls, skyscrapers and homogenized theme parks. Ugly Seoul. I really cannot see the point of it all. Rampant urbanization and absorption of western cultures seem to take away the soul of a country, and replace it with cheap ideals and superficial standards. It's the Lexus and the olive tree once again, only this is the first time I'm not reading about it, and I'm actually experiencing it. As a tourist! Ha! I came to find the olive tree; I got the Lexus, to my dismay.

I am reminded of the extrinsic attractiveness and intrinsic values of different national cultures. It is strange that transmission of culture between any two countries is dangerously skewed towards the superficial. For the most parts, only certain cultural elements that are extrinsically very attractive, but often have little (or negative) intrinsic value, bridge the gap. When East meets West (forgive me my crude and very broad generalization), the former giveth away Bruce Lee, kungfu, and exotic imagery, while the latter giveth away diamond rings, MacDonalds and ipods. There's always this continuous cycle of emission and exchange, influx and counter-flux, rigid rejection and rapid acceptance. Once the cycle has started, it gains a momentum derived from public acceptance and hunger. But people never know when to stop, because few like to think of the big picture. Give a farmer in China the choice between his bicycle and a spanking new car, and you know what his choice will be. If every farmer in China were to get his wish, 'the whole world will go to shit'. After all, materialism is so physically attractive, but ultimately devoid of any meaning. Materialistic desires are amoral; some people will even say they're immoral. But there is no question in my mind that materialism has filled the void of ambition in many people, who may spend the rest of their natural lives doing absolutely nothing.

The cultural elements that actually have value are harder or nigh impossible to assimilate, because they are extrinsically less attractive. These are the deep-rooted beliefs (less nationalism, that oldest of lies) that define a nation, the common philosophy (or as common as common can be) that runs through a people and makes them unique. It is so easy to reject a different philosophy, and pretend that it should not exist, that a different way of thinking encroaches and threatens. However, I believe that these cultural elements define a people's humanity. By rejecting a people's deep-rooted beliefs and common philosophy, by calling these people ignorant (even evil), we cannot help but look on them as less than human. Unknowingly, we have uprooted the platform from which we view fellow human beings as equals and hidden from ourselves the common humanity that exists in all of us. We forget that to be human is to be different. Once we have crossed this precarious line, there is no end to the atrocities that we can perpetrate on one another.

I left the backstreets of Seoul, avoided malls conscientiously, and I was walking. Just walking. I followed a road that ran over a bridge, and, remembering the barest sliver of a snippet of conversation about rivers in Seoul (my tour-guide only spoke in Mandarin, and I barely understood two words from her), I walked down a flight of stairs that took me under the bridge. I found my quiet spot, and I was happy.

Rapid urbanization has not taken away the Koreans' love affair with their rivers. Well-maintained walkways stretched alongside the river for as far as my eyes could see. Children tucked up pants and skirts to wade in the clear water and play with the fish, while parents sat down and looked contented. Couples sat dreamily on smoothened rocks under the shadow of the bridge, lost in their private world. Old, wizened security guards, who were stationed along the river, would regularly cast lazy eyes upon the children, and occasionally mumble some unintelligible words into their walkie-talkies. A nearby fountain located under the river spouted six tall columns of water into the air, attracting much attention.

The water was shallow enough that it was possible to cross it by jumping across several large strategically-positioned stones. A group of teenagers, with flashy wardrobe and the brashness of adolescent youth, attempted to do just that. Predictably, the boys jumped fearlessly across first and taunted the girls for their hesitancy and doubt. The girls fretted about their heels, and their expensive outfits. I was greatly amused, because I understood all of these, and I do not even know their language. It seems to me that the global language of teenage inter-gender interactions will always be an intimate part of my vocabulary. Now, I look back on that incident and I think the boys were remarkably naive. After all, there are much more effective ways to impress a girl, and crossing a river together with one can be an act that is more than literal. Soon, they will learn. Or not.

I sat near the fountain and watched, soaking in the warm, communal atmosphere (I like to do that). Memories of the coldly impersonal city melted away; I felt that the river, more than any artificial construct I've seen yet, had the effect of binding the community together and to nature. Laughter, serene calm, romance, the sloshing sound of flowing water, the infinitesimal buzz of city life so far away, the comforting spray of the fountain and a million other sensations that are less definable swirled around me, washed over me, through me.

I noticed a very young girl with a spotted dress and a blue cap arrive with her mother. It was her first time at the fountain. This I deduced from the wonder and awe in her face when she saw the fountain. (Actually, it is not even a large fountain by my standards, but of course, I have been jaded by experience. Oh, to be young again!) Fear crept into her expression and the nervous tension in her body was evident, as she tentatively crept towards the fountain, one tiny step at a time. The poor child was afraid of it! She looked back, to see the encouraging smile of her mother, and pushed on resolutely. The girl (I never knew her name) nearly wavered when the spray of the fountain slapped her with a tangible physical force, and inwardly I was thinking: Don't stop. Not now.

A look of such determination settled on her young face, and she took her final step to the edge of the platform and leaned sideways towards the fountain, pressing her left cheek against the indomitable spray. Her eyes were closed, her hands clasped together as if in prayer, and on her face there lit this beatific, incandescent smile that can only come from obtaining one's heart's desire, if only for a few precious moments.

I was moved, by this little stranger at the fountain. When I left Korea, I left with the image of her nestled comfortably in my mind. I checked my watch, almost reluctantly. It was time to go.

2007-08-28T01:41:00.000-07:00

The Women Don't Geddit

Recently a friend of mine commented on a girl's blog titled 'The Men Don't Geddit'. It occurred to me how little I actually see men express themselves, and when they do, I usually find what they say to be superfluous. I felt I should say something. Anything. I am in a strange mood. So here goes.

Women want their men to be strong, to be able to handle any situation, to catch any curveballs thrown their way, to make light of dark circumstances, to find enough cheer for two persons where there is precious little to nourish even one. These are big shoes to fill, but we willingly take on the role that, presumably, ten thousand years of evolving expectations have laid on our shoulders, or at the very least, we try. Because, we must. However, strength and hardness are two very different faces of the same coin, frequently and fatally mistaken for each other. A strong person bends with the wind; a hard person will break, catastrophically. Push a man over the limit of his strength, and he will become as hard as he has to be, though both parties may never recognize the tragic difference. And nothing will ever be quite the same.

2007-03-29T19:10:00.000-07:00

Feeling Random in Spring

That's me

Sixth College Apartments. I'd be living here next year if I'm staying.

Tanya's room, now mine, over the spring break.

She's gone to visit her boyfriend's parents for the first time.

Flowers blooming

Serenity in my bottle

Revelle College

Look familiar? That's right! Those are people practising Aikido rolls on the lawn!

Library Walk

Center Hall

International Center

I remember dancing here once, during fall. Met a Taiwanese girl. Met a Japanese girl.

Exquisite, I couldn't resist

More bunnies!!
Geisel Library

I was not sure what to expect. A week spent entirely alone, in a friend's apartment, while waiting for the spring quarter to start. I thought I might succumb to boredom, or loneliness, or both. It turned out to be a completely serene, self-revitalising experience. There was no boredom; on the contrary, I had too many tasks to handle. So many that I will not finish them in time, but this, too, I can accept, because I am enjoying myself too much, and nothing can go wrong. Loneliness? Solitude suits me, it seems. It is this delicious, entirely new taste on the tip of my tongue, tantalising and comforting. I want more.

Everyday I wake up, and the day expects nothing of me, and I expect nothing in return.

It is just this weird random feeling in my gut, like anything can happen, or nothing will. Dare I say it? It's almost magical...

2007-03-19T07:15:00.000-07:00

The Forty Five Minute Countdown

7.15 am in the morning. Forty five minutes to the start of finals week. A sleepless night. 6 hours of exams consecutively, beginning when the minute hand strikes twelve.

I feel like writing.

I recently read a book. Its title: Stardust. Quite literally, a boy chases a fallen star to a faerie realm. Eventually he finds the object of his desire, captures it, and, inexplicably, he falls in love with her. Because this is no ordinary world, it is a world where stars are immortal beings shining in the nightsky, and if they are ever unfortunate enough to fall down to the mortal realm, they can never return. Of course, the boy doesn't quite realise that he's fallen in love, until closer to the end of the story, after going through numerous ordeals and adventures with his captive. It could have been a perfect ending. It was almost a perfect ending.

The story goes on, and ends like this: the boy grew into manhood and became king of the faerie realm, and he ruled wisely to his death. The star never aged, and she lived on, alone and, well, lonely.

How strange, that a feel-good story ended not quite the way that I anticipated. In some ways, I understand the author's intentions. This is, after all, a fairy tale, and some fairy tale endings do end with a finality that makes it hard to accept. They end, with a capital E. Death is not a stranger, it is a given. Live forever after? Maybe for another fairy tale, for another time.

I can't help but be saddened when characters in stories I love die. Can't authors understand, that the best ending, is one where the characters don't die? Even when the story ends, the characters live on in my imagination, immortal and free. Never alone. Never lonely.

I started thinking about what would make a really good story. I started thinking about what would happen in today's modern world, if a group of people were to be blessed (cursed?) with immortality. Unable to die, what actions would they take? Would they exploit their status, or use it to achieve something great? Would they, in watching the folly of mankind, as generations and more generations pass, become wiser than anybody else who has ever lived? Can they unravel the secret of God? Can intelligence and knowledge grow without limit, if given enough time and motivation? Will the general populace accept them as living miracles or will they be made to suffer by public condemnation?

My feeling is that, eventually, these people will achieve a status that nobody living can even begin to aspire to achieve. When this happens, it is only a matter of time, before they rule the world.

2007-02-16T17:58:00.000-08:00

The Dangers of Asparagus

Me: Hey Nathan, want some of my asparagus?

Nathan: I would love some. Thank you.

Me: Sure, kill yourself.

Nathan: Kill myself?!

Me: Hmm, that sort of came out wrong. Let me think...

(a protracted, stunned silence)

Jake: Wait, I get it. Did you really mean, 'Knock yourself out?'

Me: THAT'S right! Knock yourself out!

2007-02-13T19:19:00.000-08:00

Exhaustion

There is no time to exhale. No time to inhale. Just an interminable process of self-imposed intellectual discipline and rigour that is almost beyond me. Some weeks, I feel like it's almost beyond human. When a sharp mental alertness honed from trying to learn too much too fast is gradually but surely blunted by the frailty of the human mind. Frailty of the human mind? Such an idea, I have dismissed derisively before, but not now. Not when I am experiencing firsthand what my limits are.

I knew it was going to be challenging. It's hard to see the end, or the big picture, when the next day is imminent, and so pressing in urgency. Homework is always half-done, or done with no finesse or care, or not done at all. Like a regular steak. I've never skipped more classes in my life. I've lost faith with half my TAs, because they can't answer the questions that I ask. The professors are much more helpful, but time with them is always limited, through no fault of their own. The level of my effort and dedication per course has diminished in comparison with last quarter, and I know my grades will suffer.

But that's okay. Everything's okay. More than that. I'm walking a tightrope of built-up intellectual tension, and exhaustion, my shadow, creeps up on me, and I'm half way there and the view is great. It is the decisions we make that shape our worldview, and this is one decision I make that I will have no regrets making. That I will make again, in three heartbeats.

2007-01-08T06:24:00.000-08:00

Home Again

Wow, it's good to be home.

Nina and I, on a rock in the middle of the ocean. We swam.

Snake Temple? Sounds far more exciting than it really was, you can trust me on that. It was so boring, I was reading my book on superconductors, which beats snakes anyday...

Attacked by butterflies

Laetitia

So I'm back in San Diego, sitting in front of my labtop on the first day of school. It's 6.49 in the morning, everyone else is asleep, and the sky is just brightening. Some days are just so ripe with possibilities, you get excited just sitting down and thinking about life.

I feel it.

2006-12-21T01:50:00.000-08:00

Bird Brain

I've been asked what does Superman do on his 21st birthday.

The answer: go to the Bird Park to visit his flying bird friends of course...

Talk about a no-brainer.

While not talking to birds, here's what I've been up to.

Angel of Vengeance

Nimbly he ducks and dodges

Got you

2006-12-18T08:22:00.000-08:00

Sleepless in San Diego

The nights, when the owls come alive, and mice are meekly quiescent

I love how the mist transforms the night, how it sheathes the landscape in a gossamer cloak of shadows and mysteries, captures and scatters the neon glow of street lamps, and imprints a hazy, dream-like texture to a world that suddenly does not seem so familiar after all...

Love the Hat

Esther: locked up and teased

Skateboarding

The owls return to their nest

2006-12-14T08:42:00.000-08:00

Still at it

Paul triumps, Colin loses. It was a foregone conclusion, as far as I was concerned.

After being defeated, Colin is bemused. He must be thinking, What hit me?

I know the feeling.

2006-12-14T07:31:00.000-08:00

Dear Paul

I like Paul.

He's going to be a journalist and I believe it. He belongs to that rare breed of people who choose a profession which fits their personalities and skill sets so well you cannot imagine what they would do if their line of work just didn't exist. I don't think I belong in that breed, because quiet honestly, I'm still groping in the dark, looking for reaffirmation that I made the right choice.

Scientist? Me? I surprised people when I decided to become one. Nothing in my school life suggested I had a special interest in science, and in truth, I didn't. I found school science to be boring, as boring as a dried up prune baking in the summer sun. My interest in science stems from something deeper, something less easier to define, and almost embarrassing to do so, to people whom I don't believe understand me or what it means to dream.

What makes a good journalist? I don't know, but I have some idea now that I met Paul. He offers well-constructed opinions (almost judgements) about the state of human society, and it is obvious he has given a lot of careful consideration about the topics that interest him, which are varied and numerous. He loves writing, and does so professionally. He really listens to people, almost like a rabbit quivering in anticipation of a juicy carrot. All round, he's really a stand-up guy, someone I am proud to call a friend.

Here's to Paul.

Paul challenges Colin to a thumb wrestling duel. And he offers to do it blind. Colin doesn't know what he's getting into. But I do, so I egged Colin to take him on.

Paul never gives up (I know!)

Dancing with Determination

2006-11-15T09:23:00.000-08:00

War Heroes in America

Last friday was Veterans Day, and everybody had an extended weekend :)

I've always thought you can tell a lot about a country's culture by examining the public holidays that the country celebrates. America celebrates, among others, Veterans Day, Martin Luther King Day, Memorial Day, Columbus Day (Christopher Columbus!!!), and Thanksgiving Day, which is just around the corner. War heroes and veterans, great politicians and leaders, pioneers are honoured here: everybody wants to be a hero. On the other hand, Singapore values multi-racial harmony, and multiculturalism, and so we celebrate Deepavali, Chinese New Year, Hari Raya Puasa, all of which are ethnic-specific holidays.

I am reminded of a serious study that compared the purchasing powers of each country's currency by looking at the price of a MacDonald's burger sold in each of these countries. This may seem frivolous, but I can understand the rationale. During my first hour on American soil, I checked the price of a Burger King meal in the San Francisco Airport, and it was reassuring to me that it costs only about 6-7 US dollars. I truly feel some measure of pity for friends who are studying presently in the UK, where a tissue packet can cost as much as 2 Singapore dollars. Which just goes to show how some smart people can make not-so-smart decisions when it comes to choice of country to study.

Right, Cheryl?

Daniel masters the salsa spin, girl-style. It's the only style that suits him.

Colin, my sexy roommate, always the light sleeper. He woke up to the faint 'click' sound of my digital camera, as I was taking this shot. He appeared incredulous, and would have said more, but turned over and fell asleep almost immediately.

Gilman Parking Structure, a place made infamous after a student jumped off from the top floor and killed himself. Personally, I'd pick a building that's higher than 3 storeys, because there's nothing more ill-adviced than failing a suicide attempt and being paralysed from toe-up.

All the way up.

Mee Siam (Yummy)

2006-11-04T12:36:00.000-08:00

Seita and Setsuko

I saw a movie recently, which I am not ever likely to forget.

Unbearably sad, hopelessly uplifting, painfully tragic, quietly moving. It was all of these things, and more. It tells the story of a brother, Seita, and his four-year-old sister, Setsuko, who were orphaned during the second world war in Japan. Together, they faced hunger, malnourishment, sickness, apathy and death from the skies. Through darkness, despair and hardship, their love for each other shines incandescently bright.

I remember a scene where Seita failed in his latest and ever increasingly desperate attempt to provide food for both himself and his sister, and he was so overwhelmed by despair that he broke down emotionally. In a surprising and heartbreaking moment, the role of protector interchanged, and it was Setsuko who tried valiantly to console him.

In the end, they only had each other.

I never imagined a movie can be so powerful and touching. I was moved to tears for half the entire length of the movie. The way Setsuko and Seita were portrayed reminded me so much of Laetitia and I that I cannot help but become emotionally connected with the characters on screen. Memories of the movie were to haunt me for the rest of the week, like phantom touches of a 'ghost in natural colors'. This is the gem hidden in the well, a surprise in a contradiction, a rare movie about death that is so strongly life-reaffirming.

It is a little sad, and just a little strange, that the qualities in ourselves that we, as the human race, admire and venerate are usually only seen in times of great tragedy or hardship: the indefatigable spirit and determination to survive, sacrifice and valour, love that transcends suffering.

Ellen Dissanayake once wrote:

"What is more, in the modern world, as Kaplan has pithily remarked, the interesting is no longer important, and the important is no longer interesting. It seems worth asking whether the confusing and unsatisfying state of art in our world has anything to do with the fact that we no longer care about important things. In our predominatly affluent and hedonistic society survival is no longer paramount for most of us, and spiritual concerns, while perhaps given public lip service, are less and less privately validated. Our experience of the extra-ordinary tends to be an ever-growing involvement with such things as gambling, violent films, and mood-altering drugs. Caring deeply about vital things is out of fashion, and, in cany case, who has the time (or allows the time) to care and to mark one's caring? Human history has demonstrated that people can endure surprising amounts of hardship and suffering - conditions that usually elicit a serious and religious attitude toward life. Whether people are as well equipped to thrive under conditions of unprecedented lesiure, comfort and plenty is a question that is being tested on a large scale in our present circumstances: the answer does not appear to be promising."

The movie is titled 'Grave of the Fireflies'. I've often wondered what defines a very good movie. Lord of the Rings was epic, grand and exhilirating action. The Ring (the original, please) was the only movie that really, really scared me out of my wits. And I cannot remember the last very funny movie I saw. Now, I know what distinguishes a very good movie from the rest: the strength and depth of your emotional response. On that criteria, 'Grave of the Fireflies' is the best movie I have ever seen, period.

2006-10-24T08:49:00.000-07:00

Space Travels

I sketched this for my little sister Laetitia, because currently, she and I are in an art exchange programme and we send each other sketches and drawings and colourings across continents. When I was drawing this, I was thinking about how the image fitted an idea that I am reading about in my Culture, Art and Technology module: how as children, our capacity for wonder is tremendous, but as we grow up, we become more jaded and less impressed by nature's wonders. Then I remember a person I met who never 'grew up', but in a good Peter-Panish way. Maybe not all physicists think like this, but I think physics is beautiful and elegant, and that if we can describe all the world in the language of mathematics, it would be wondrous. So maybe I have 'grown up', but I've not given up looking for wonders; I'm just looking in different places.

I came across an oddity in Warren College. A row of trees on the lawn, all of the same variety, and all perfectly healthy except for the last one in the row, which has lost almost all its leaves. It did seem strange. (Thanks Jimmy, for pointing them out!)

Since I'm studying human evolution and the extinction of so many sub-branches of hominids due to possibly very small factors that caused a differential selection pressure, I was reminded of a model of birth rates and death rates made by anthropologist Ezra Zubrow, who offers an explanation for the extinction of H. neanderthalensis. Zubrow suggests that the disadvantage of having a slightly higher death rate than that of contemporary Homo sapiens could have meant that Neanderthal populations dropped below replacement production levels. "This superiority may be as paltry as a one percent difference in mortality, and the extinction may be as rapid as 30 generations. In other words, Neanderthals could have become extinct in a single millenium." I was thinking about Zubrow when I saw this tree.

I am very interested in anthropology, and I thought for sure I would take a course on anthropology and human evolution for winter, but recently, I have come across and and even more exciting field: cognitive science, the study of the mind, computing, and behaviour. Apparently, cognitive science is HOT in UCSD. So I'm definitely taking cognitive science instead of anthropology, for winter 2007. Sorry, anthropology, maybe in 2008...

Currently for fall, I'm doing 21 credits, when the average student here does between 12 and 16 credits. For winter, I'm going to try 28 credits, to see how it feels. Some people think I'm crazy, but I just want to push myself and learn as much as I can. Anthropology, philosophy, cognitive science, visual art... I'm looking forward to all of them!

A trip to Ralphs, the nearest supermarket

Ben, sitting on what he claims to be culturally unique in America, a bus bench

Ben's a physicist too!

So is Jimmy.

It's a coincidence.

The physics batch in UCSD is actually smaller than I thought, and it's fantastic to have 2 fellow physicists with me on the same level in my hall, which I am sure doesn't happen often at all. Physicists tend to think alike in many ways. The good ones, anyway...

Racoon!

2006-10-18T09:29:00.000-07:00

Fall, and the Leaves are Falling

Ooh, I'm starting to take note of the seasons and its effects now, cause it'll be my first time experiencing any seasonal variation in the weather. So I've noticed that leaves are falling. I've noticed that it gets colder too. But other than that, I haven't really noticed much else. Gotta keep my eyes open! I don't think I'm noticing enough...

I'm having trouble keeping my eyes open too. Literally. Went for my first rock concert on friday and I fell asleep. I blame it on lack of sleep in general and the crappy bands. Then again, I know people who've enjoyed the concert so maybe it's just not my type of music. My FIRST rock concert and I fell asleep!

The anime club I've joined is showing some excellent anime. My top choice would have to be Death Note, and I remember you telling me about this series, Jinx! I was kinda surprised when they showed it, but so far, it has been mind-blowing. For those who don't know what Death Note is about, I'll do a short history: a straight-A, handsome, extremely intelligent college student named Light discovers a Death Note dropped onto the material plane by a bored Death God. He finds out that any name written on this black book will die an almost immediate death. Instead of being afraid of this new-found power, Light embraces it and decides to remake the world in his image, by cleansing the world of people whom he deems 'evil', and eventually becoming a god. Every day after school, he returns home and writes down hundreds of names, systematically exterminating all the known criminals in the world. Light, apparently, has a dark and warped side, which borders on the psychopathic. When hundreds of criminals began to die of unexplained cardiac arrests over a few days, a mysterious and extremely capable investigator, who goes by the name L and heads Interpol, begins to hunt down this mysterious killer, whom people are calling "Kira" (Killer) reverently. L tricks Light into revealing his powers on national TV and what begins is a cat and mouse game of the highest stakes: if Light finds out who L really is, L will die; if L finds out who Light is first, Light will die. Both believe that they are on the path of righteousness. One is destined to die in this battle of wits.

So far, that's it after two episodes. What's really intriguing about this anime is that the classic anti-hero here (Light) may just be plain evil, and yet somehow Light draws you into his twisted perspective of the world and you can almost believe he is the saviour he claims to be. Awesome stuff. The anime is really first-rate and is highly recommended (by me, that is).

A new addition to our suite: yet ANOTHER tv with yet ANOTHER Xbox, so now we can play Halo and actually snipe each other from different screens. It's gaming heaven here.

Hmm?

Dear Eric, happy 18th birthday!

2006-10-17T16:08:00.000-07:00

Great Balls of Pain(t)

I was reminiscing about times past

About paintball, mostly

About pellets that shred and pulverise human skin

Paint my memories with great balls of pain

Left to Right: Yung Chuan, Jinx, Ray, Rodney

Aftershock

Jinx's Lovebite (he's REALLY crying) ( I think I did this to him)

2006-10-09T23:20:00.000-07:00

Anime, Nerds, Speedos, Chopsticks and 18th Birthdays

I'm kinda surprised to say this, but I've joined an Anime club in Sunny San Diego. I've always liked Anime, but I've never pictured myself joining a club for Anime, but that just goes to show how you should never stop surprising yourself. Every Monday night, I head to Price Theatre for my weekly dose of Anime: seven episodes from seven different series. The range of Anime shown is really interesting: from intensely personal human drama (Welcome to NHK) to supernatural horror/mystery (an Anime christened 'Killer Lollies' by my room-mate Colin, who was Prez of his own Anime club in high school and introduced me to the club, thanks Colin!) to mindless chick flicks (The Ouran Host Club). Plus, members of the club randomly get freebies, like this poster I got on my first week as a member. It's now up on my cupboard door...

On a whim, I walked into the study room of our residence hall with my digicamera and shouted out, "Smile for me, nerds!". And so they did. What nerds! Say hello to (from bottom left, clockwise) Jake, Brittney, Minna and Jimmy.

This is Kathy in a compromising position, with Daniel's swimming trunks (or Speedos, as they call it here) forced on her head by, you guessed it, Daniel himself. They're pretty good friends, and this kind of behaviour is not unexpected between good friends...

This is cute. Tasha proudly shows us her virgin mastery of the chopsticks. Quite a momentous occasion.

On a happier note, Kathy (sitting) celebrates her 18th birthday. Daniel lights the candles for her. It sure felt like a long time ago when I celebrated mine. Wow.

2006-10-02T01:01:00.000-07:00

DDR and Laksa Heaven

Grant and Colin doing a pretty good imitation of Dance Dance Revolution in the lounge. Pretty impressive stuff, which requires very nimble feet. I tried it out, and the game gave me a grade of E. I'm just happy I didn't get an F.

Well, finally, I decided to cook my Prima Taste Laksa mix, which was lying quietly in my cupboard gathering dust. After a while, you get tired of sub-standard rice meals and pizza, and you want to eat some noodles. First was a trip to '99 Ranch', an Asian supermarket in Convoy Street, where I bought noodles and all the ingredients I needed for laksa. Actually, I bought a lot more than that. I felt like I was in heaven in that supermarket. FINALLY, real, identifiable food! I even found some of the Korean instant noodles that I have always liked. Hot.

The ingredients were laid out:

Cooking was real fun. I haven't cooked for a while, but most of it is a no-brainer. Just reading the instructions and dumping in all the ingredients. We didn't really have fried tou fu for our laksa, so I just bought some tou fu and Tanya fried them in sesame oil on a pan, and it turned out better than I expected.

My Partner in Crime, Tanya

The end result: the best meal Tanya and I have had since we came to San Diego. Take a look!

2006-09-25T17:38:00.000-07:00

It's NOT a Fish Tank

Look CLOSER! It's not a fish tank, but it's pretty close! Not close enough for a prize though. Sorry, SSATO, Truly Amazing, and Fun Man. What it is is a 24/7 live feed to the Scripps Aquarium at UCSD. It's now a tradition within my dorm to keep the live feed on 24/7 too, so that we can see the fish any time. It's got to the point where my roomie is naming the fish that he recognizes...

Nuts.

2006-09-24T20:39:00.000-07:00

Party!

Saturday night was great! There was a welcome party held at Tanya's (bottom right) apartment to welcome all the Singaporeans and Malaysians in UCSD. I almost didn't go, because I didn't like the idea of an exclusive organisation based on nationality... but what the hell!

Met quite a random mix of people. Only one Malaysian, whom I remember meeting. So many names that I can't remember now, and I always feel bad about this. But I'm so terrible with names and I can't help it. No matter how hard I try, names slip from my head like greased eels.

I remember these few people I met for the first time: Margary (?), Ee Tsin, Don (and I forgot Don's elder sister's name, damn... ), Han Liang, Keira (?), Ivan. Interesting people. I remember meeting two Indonesians (what were they doing there?), a brother and sister pair, named Don and (I forgot). Met an interesting girl who was an exchange student from Melbourne University, doing a double major here, and she had a cute tongue piercing and black stockings. I remember these, but not her name...

The food felt really local, which I miss terribly. Everybody brought food, or brought a joke. The party ended with me telling my giraffe, elephant, aeroplane joke. I should have thought about the joke before hand, because I made a mistake and I said the elephant came before the giraffe, and I had to change the joke quickly while telling it, but I think I pulled it off.

Tanya proclaimed I was a 'flirt' during the party, which I am quick to deny, cause I certainly don't think it's true. She, Keira and I went to the International House after the party for MORE parties. International House is really a vibrant community, as it houses so many international students, mostly exchange students: Germans, Danes, French, Japanese and more. Wow, I was really impressed by the cohesiveness and vibrancy of International House. It felt amazing, just mingling and mixing with representatives from so many countries. It's impossible to replicate this feeling in any other kind of party - this curious mix of intellectual excitement and pride and sense of belonging. Wow.

I met a Dane Christopher (Kristopher?) who proudly proclaimed that the Danes drank the most in Europe. Of course, I HAD to enter a drinking competition with him. We drank his Jack Daniel's while being scrutinized by the group surrounding us. In the end, I got very pleasantly high, but not drunk. Certainly, I impressed people with my alcohol threshold. For the rest of the night, I was walking and talking with this pleasant buzz and feeling of lightness in my being. I loved it. This doesn't happen often enough. THAT has to change.

I feel it. It's starting to happen. I feel like I'm being sucked inexorably into the vortex of college life. Slowly and surely, I'm feeling more and more comfortable with my surroundings. I think it's going to be fine. More than fine, actually.

2006-09-22T12:39:00.000-07:00

B.U.F.F.E.T. Part 3

I was wondering why I didn't have a picture of Cheryl and I in my digicam and NOW I know why. Cause it was in Fun Man's digicam!!

Well, sorry this took so long, Cheryl. It's just scandalous that you don't receive the recognition you deserve until now. After all, you planned and organised B.U.F.F.E.T. with me!

Also Presenting: A Very Proud Moment in Fun Man's Life

2006-09-20T19:59:00.000-07:00

Rabbits!!!

I love this place. Any place that rabbits can co-habitat peacefully must be a good place to live in for anybody.

Geisel Library

Looks can be deceiving. This 'road' is only 1 metre across, and the 'trees' are knee-high.

The Courtyard

X-box, Gamecube, a tonne of games from my room-mate Colin. But take a look at the screen on the bottom left hand corner... What do you think that is? I promise a reward for anybody who can guess what that is. I kid you not.

2006-09-20T13:43:00.000-07:00

Take a Look

My residence hall

A Knight in Shining Armour (a not uncommon sight)...

Welcome to The Castle

2006-09-18T01:27:00.000-07:00

Mist on Campus

Amazing. I walked out of my dorm and found the campus covered by mist. It was my first time seeing anything like this, and as usual, I got pretty excited and went back in to take my digicam. The first two shots couldn't quite capture what the mist looked like, but they do show what my residential area kinda looks at night.

Then, I accidentally left on my flash by mistake, and the results were fantastic! Take a look at this one! It's already on my wallpaper. Something to make even Ray jealous! Tell me if you want it for your wallpaper too, so I can send you the image unresized :)

2006-09-17T10:55:00.000-07:00

B.U.F.F.E.T. Part 2 (read part 1 first)

The coooolest gang from NJC. Cool then. Still as cool as ever. From left, Jun Nan, yours truly, Remus the Man, Peck Teng. Approach the last guy for financial advice. I kid you not.

Wenhao! Thanks for coming! Every member of the Legs deserves a special mention.

Ray, thanks for being a Ray of Light in my life. Wow, you really turned up at the airport to give me a CD of photos and videos that didn't work ahaha

Just kidding, the CD works fine. I think you were just trying to scare me!

Wow, Wendy, I've never had someone skip studying for a Prelim exam to come for my party. Not only did you have two papers on the day of my party, you had a Physics paper the next day! Thanks Wendy! Not to forget Nina, who was there all the way!

That cup I'm holding is the infamous rice pudding made by Super Cheryl. Cheryl, I loved it! That and the 'Ugly on the outside, Beautiful in the inside' chocolate cake you made! Btw, you should totally name it just like that, it's a cool name for a cake. Awesome, Cheryl. I hope it becomes a tradition that any party I have the opportunity to organise will have your stupendous talents to grace, beautify and sweeten the occasion.

Remus the Man mixes Handball with Floorball for explosive effect. Rodney's so scared just looking at him that he shrinks away.

Last words:

I shan't forget the guest appearances of Spiderman and Yunqin, and I'm still looking for pictures of the two of you, but I realise it must be with Fun Man. Hope the two of you had fun! No pun intended.

Fun Man, I still don't have your pics! How how how? (and I'm really sorry some people still don't believe your name when you tell them straight to the face, what's wrong with them? ha ha)

Nicole thanks for coming (though for a really short time) to give me the best (and I have to admit, the ONLY) bouquet of flowers I have ever been given. I still remember the scent of the sunflower :)

Only noticeable absence: Superman (no, not me). Hey tell me about the finale of Mr Vogue Singapore. I'm sure it must have been a blast!

To everybody who came, and everybody who wanted to but couldn't, thank you! I'm over in San Diego now, trying to get used to a life w/o floorball, among other things. B.U.F.F.E.T. is only the beginning. Next up: B.O.N.D.A.G.E.

2006-09-17T06:45:00.000-07:00

Broke's Unexplainable Farewell Floorball Extravaganza

I'd like to give a shout out from sunny, freezing San Diego to all those who came for B.U.F.F.E.T.!!! All of you guys rock! Thanks all, for those who came and those who helped make B.U.F.F.E.T. possible. Many thanks to my incomparable sisters (drum rolls, please: Charme, Nina, Sasha, Marcia, Laetitia) who helped organise this event. What a fantastic evening, and the most amazing way to send someone off!

The action starts! Balls whiz past at 180 km/h. They strike ceilings. They strike goalposts. Rodney's head t0o. Twice. My head. Twice too. A certain person's you-know-what. Once only. Floorball sticks whack balls, and toes, and hands. Ow. But it was damn fun. Action is fast-paced. Goals aplenty. Special mention to Remus, who has a wicked shot with his back to goal. Sneaky. Even sneakier is Super Cheryl, who waits innocently near the goal mouth, looking really useless until you pass her the ball, then she just slots it in like she slots coins into coin machines. Not to mention she plays floorball like she plays her rugby, tackling people and not caring about where the ball is ha ha ha! That's HOT, girl!

I don't know who started the balloon sucking nonsense, but I bet it was YOU Jinx, after getting sucker punched with a floorball in the you-know-what. I won't forget the interesting special effects I heard that day. It's worthy of a cameo in a Star Wars movie.

Check out Guitar God and his fancy moves with his guitar. Thanks Andrew! Really! I love good music, especially if someone I know is playing it for me. "You and me... ... don't need to write one... ..." - AC.

AC, you're not just a fantastic guitar player, you're a good singer too. And I quote this from a girl who listened to you sing: "your friend Andrew has a really nice voice". Ha ha ha! Next time you refuse to sing because you think you can't sing, well forget THAT excuse!

Chua! Why're you always trying to steal my limelight? I hope I answered that strange question of yours about how 'eating whales and eating dogs are different' well. I tried my best :))

2006-09-15T00:35:00.000-07:00

While flying across the Pacific from Tokyo to San Francisco, I saw a breathtakingly beautiful display of cloud formations through my window. It boggles my mind how far into the distance I can see. A vast plain of cotton-candy clouds covering as far as the eye can see. I saw a black speck moving across the clouds in the distance, and I initially thought it to be an insect. Then I realised its movement is too straight, too regular, and it dawned on me that that insect was really a plane.

My first view of San Diego, America's Finest City.

Shiny toy cars glinting in the unwavering sun travel across miniature highways, through a dense network of toy houses and buildings. The people looked like perfect clay micro-models, going about their daily lives. Tiny rivers snake across parched desert-like mountain ranges. It looked like the perfect miniaturised version of the perfect city. Except that everything was real.

I am reminded of that scene in Superman Returns in which Superman brings Louis up through and above the clouds under a moonlit sky.

2006-08-29T14:10:00.000-07:00