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finished Hotaru no Haka aka. Grave of e Fireflies last week - yet another anime film by Miyazaki Hayao, but this time a sad one....& a few days later I noticed this on a colleague's desk:

those who have watched it will understand. someone slammed this film as watching it made him depressed, while another hailed it as _the_ war film. e fireflies remind me of those around my room in Naga Hill in Chiang Rai, & that I miss counting shooting stars at night in Ban Apa.

This picture is a reminder of what isn't there. Objects take on a meaning that betray their appearance. Is that window crying or a sign that e things we see are really much bigger than their frames?

once upon a time I loved to write. then there was school, & English & GP teachers. who wanted me to write what they thought examiners wanted to read. except for Miss Sandy (forgot her surname) in sec 2, & Mr YSA in JC, who gave me free rein & as much space as I wanted, & more. for this I am grateful, & they got to mark my best stuff & give e highest grades they'd ever given in their _short_ teaching careers. this, despite e strong mutual dislike Mr YSA & I had for each other. he irked me with his incessant whining & e way he caressed e OHP in front of e class. in turn, he was at a loss whenever I openly defied him time & again in front of e whole class - why should I answer your questions? why do you keep picking on me? why should I waste my time on your assignments?

anyway, e 2 of them weren't enough to counter e rest, nor e weekly common test system that is _the_ much-villified symbol of LPM's VJC. first drafts, second drafts, third drafts of primary school compositions were returned to me with 'advice' to stick to standard plots & 'be careful' of what I write (& this 'advice' was always communicated in private - no guts to say it in front of e whole class or write it down in red ink on my paper?). churning out piece after meaningless piece in response to standard essay questions from past year papers set by people who have never known inspiration was more than draining. they returned with scores higher than those of e Arts sudents, & my sis & I found our names side by side on e GP long2hu2bang3 (ex-VJC students will know what this is), hers on e list for JC1s & mine on e JC2 list. but when I dared to look again at what I had written, I cringed.

this isn't me.

I still keep almost every single one of those essays written between 1989 & 1997, wrinkled sheets of A4 paper resting in chronological order in a ring folder. as a reminder never to let my mind be subjugated, to be true to myself, & that 'mental space' is one of e things that I value & crave most, should I *touch wood* ever lose myself living in a society addicted to conformity. missing from this collection are e very first essays that I wrote, which were in a thin primary 3 workbook with a red & navy blue cover that disappeared (passed on to someone else? discarded?). but perhaps this is for e better, for they were written with an unfettered mind in e more carefree days when e teacher would not hesitate to read out almost every single one to e class, & simply do not belong in that folder.

have had enough. no more writing. & now that laziness & inertia have nestled in comfortably, I content myself with reading e writings of those who can still write from e heart & with soul, & transform into written word e thoughts & feelings that swirl in my mind but I have long lost e desire to articulate myself. BGT, somehow am so glad that you were kicked out of VJC. or (I think) you'll never be where you are today, & writing so many beautiful & soothingly poetic things & taking all those 'feeling feeling' pics that delight so many of your friends =)

Chiang Rai - Chiang Khong - Houay Xai - Oudomxai - Ban Boun Tai - Phongsali - Hat Sa - Nam Ou river - Muang Khoua - Muang Ngoi - Nong Khiaw - Louang Phabang - Mekhong river - Pak Beng - Houay Xai - Chiang Khong - Chiang Rai
(many other wonderful places like Muang Long, Muang Sing, Louang Namtha etc, but no point rushing around to squeeze everything in?)

all by slow songthaew, slow truck, slow boat, slow train (within Thailand) & e even slower 'bus no. 11', & deep into Akha territory =) if detour to Boten, & also out of Muang Khoua towards Dien Bien Phu, will get to look (but not cross) into China & Vietnam respectively, in addition to Burma =P but can't go alone, so who onz? condition: must have at least my level of immunity to motion sickness & extremely long hours of travel on songthaew =P

• Thailand --> green tea milk from any 7-Eleven outlet or Big C or Tops supermarket

• Japan --> milk flavour Qoo from any vending machine/konbini/supermarket

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chiang rai 071204-261204

stayed at:
Ban Apa (U-Lo & Lomi Akha)
Ban Yafu (Lahu Nyi/Red Lahu)

visited:
Ban Huay Khom/Leepa (Akha)
Ban Adu (Akha)
Ban Jalae (Laba Lahu & Akha)
Ban Ruammitr (Karen)
Ban Huay Mae Sai (Mien/Yao)
Ban Du (Thai)

special thanks to Aya Choeamu, Agong Choeamu & family (father, wife, Thanchanok, Jafu & Ban-On), Genevie, Apa Chermeu, Jamu Jakar, Acha, Atee Chermeu, Ata, Chatrii, Akor, Japa, Pi'O, P'Somsak, P'Moo, Yumiko & all at MAG, Kaew, Sutiluk, Vincent, AWE team, Cynthia & SIF =)

[top row L-R] making hierarchy charts for Ban Apa village committees - boys during phototaking for Apa Youth Group; internal mapping of Ban Apa - upper half of e village that still lacks electricity, taken from outside Acha's house; with room mate & one of our guides, Apa Chermue
[2nd row L-R] women's half of Agong Choeamu's house; with room mate & our host Agong & family on first day of e Akha Men's New Year, with his wife in Lomi Akha attire; regional mapping of Huay Mae Sai area trekking trails - morning fog from Ban Yafu-Ban Jator trail
[3rd row L-R] Mae Nam Kok from Huay Mak Liam hotsprings, Lam Nam Kok national park; interior & kitchen of Agong's house with partition on e left separating e men & women's halves of e traditional Akha house; building Ban Apa information centre
[last row L-R] room mate washing dishes; research & documentation - Ata in her U-Lo Akha attire spinning thread at her handicraft stall; Akha swing that can be touched & used only during e Women's New Year - during construction e men must not let their shadows fall across e holes that have been dug for e poles; mud bricks & building work

rest of e families:

Mirror Art Group
Virtual Hilltribe Museum by Jamu, Atee, Lek & gang
Hani & Akha people

e Singapore Idol contest is a form of relief for e pent-up frustration of Singaporeans who have seen many an election come & go & (1) have never had a chance to vote, or (2) felt that voting would never make any difference to the final outcome =P

recent events: International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women (25 Nov) & World AIDS Day (01 Dec). hope people here will stop sticking to e 'ostrich approach' & pretending/assuming that such problems hardly exist here. some 'higher ups' were quoted in e media as saying that they couldn't fathom e thinking behind people who indulge in thoughtless risky behaviour - shows how out of touch they are with e people? maybe they grew up in cocoons or bubbles =P

mixed feelings about compulsory HIV testing for expectant mothers, since e majority are infected by their spouses - why are such measures not targeted at e root of e problem? or are decision-makers only interested in 'minimising collateral damage' to reduce their budgets? & hope that efforts will not stop just at preventing maternal transmission - what about keeping e family intact, support & housing for those thrown out by relatives, care for AIDS orphans etc?

finally got down to searching for answers & here goes:

Using Dermatoglyphics from Down Syndrome & Class Population to Study the Genetics of a Complex Trait
Dermatoglyphics and Development
Dermal ridges originate from fetal volar pads composed of mesenchymal tissue starting at the sixth to seventh week of development. The size and position of the volar pads are largely responsible for ridge patterns observed. In general, small pads produce arches and larger pads produce loops or whorls. Lateral displacement of the volar pad creates asymmetry of the pattern. Ridges become visible at about 3 months and are completed by the sixth month of prenatal development.

It has been postulated (see Schaumann and Alter, 1976) that ridges are influenced by blood vessel-nerve pairs at the border between the dermis and epidermis during prenatal development. Features such as inadequate oxygen supply, abnormal nerve growth, unusual patterning or distribution of sweat glands, alterations of epithelial growth, or other features could influence ridge patterns. Because growth is a dynamic process, one in which many components contribute and can mutually interact, there must be many genes involved.

[rest of it goes on about how e environmental component explains why different fingers on e same hand/person, or twins, have different fingerprint patterns, & how genetic disorders that affect nerve-vessel pairing can affect fingerprint patterns, & ridge aplasia, where there no dermal ridges form on e hands or feet]

Journal of Reproductive Medicine 2001 46(5):467 abstract

Fingerprint Model Makes Impression

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INTJ
Introverted Intuitive Thinking Judging

http://keirsey.com/personality/ntij.html

Of the four aspects of strategic analysis and definition, it is the contingency planning or entailment organizing role that reaches the highest development in Masterminds. Entailing or contingency planning is not an informative activity, rather it is a directive one in which the planner tells others what to do and in what order to do it. As the organizing capabilities the Masterminds increase so does their inclination to take charge of whatever is going on.

It is in their abilities that Masterminds differ from the other Rationals, while in most of their attitudes they are just like the others. However there is one attitude that sets them apart from other Rationals: they tend to be much more self-confident than the rest, having, for obscure reasons, developed a very strong will. They are rather rare, comprising no more than, say, one percent of the population. Being very judicious, decisions come naturally to them; indeed, they can hardly rest until they have things settled, decided, and set. They are the people who are able to formulate coherent and comprehensive contingency plans, hence contingency organizers or "entailers."

Masterminds will adopt ideas only if they are useful, which is to say if they work efficiently toward accomplishing the Mastermind's well-defined goals. Natural leaders, Masterminds are not at all eager to take command of projects or groups, preferring to stay in the background until others demonstrate their inability to lead. Once in charge, however, Masterminds are the supreme pragmatists, seeing reality as a crucible for refining their strategies for goal-directed action. In a sense, Masterminds approach reality as they would a giant chess board, always seeking strategies that have a high payoff, and always devising contingency plans in case of error or adversity. To the Mastermind, organizational structure and operational procedures are never arbitrary, never set in concrete, but are quite malleable and can be changed, improved, streamlined. In their drive for efficient action, Masterminds are the most open-minded of all the types. No idea is too far-fetched to be entertained-if it is useful. Masterminds are natural brainstormers, always open to new concepts and, in fact, aggressively seeking them. They are also alert to the consequences of applying new ideas or positions. Theories which cannot be made to work are quickly discarded by the Masterminds. On the other hand, Masterminds can be quite ruthless in implementing effective ideas, seldom counting personal cost in terms of time and energy.

http://typelogic.com/intj.html

To outsiders, INTJs may appear to project an aura of "definiteness", of self-confidence. This self-confidence, sometimes mistaken for simple arrogance by the less decisive, is actually of a very specific rather than a general nature; its source lies in the specialized knowledge systems that most INTJs start building at an early age. When it comes to their own areas of expertise -- and INTJs can have several -- they will be able to tell you almost immediately whether or not they can help you, and if so, how. INTJs know what they know, and perhaps still more importantly, they know what they don't know. INTJs are perfectionists, with a seemingly endless capacity for improving upon anything that takes their interest. What prevents them from becoming chronically bogged down in this pursuit of perfection is the pragmatism so characteristic of the type: INTJs apply (often ruthlessly) the criterion "Does it work?" to everything from their own research efforts to the prevailing social norms. This in turn produces an unusual independence of mind, freeing the INTJ from the constraints of authority, convention, or sentiment for its own sake.

INTJs are known as the "Systems Builders" of the types, perhaps in part because they possess the unusual trait combination of imagination and reliability. Whatever system an INTJ happens to be working on is for them the equivalent of a moral cause to an INFJ; both perfectionism and disregard for authority may come into play, as INTJs can be unsparing of both themselves and the others on the project. Anyone considered to be "slacking," including superiors, will lose their respect -- and will generally be made aware of this; INTJs have also been known to take it upon themselves to implement critical decisions without consulting their supervisors or co-workers. On the other hand, they do tend to be scrupulous and even-handed about recognizing the individual contributions that have gone into a project, and have a gift for seizing opportunities which others might not even notice.

In the broadest terms, what INTJs "do" tends to be what they "know". Typical INTJ career choices are in the sciences and engineering, but they can be found wherever a combination of intellect and incisiveness are required (e.g., law, some areas of academia). INTJs can rise to management positions when they are willing to invest time in marketing their abilities as well as enhancing them, and (whether for the sake of ambition or the desire for privacy) many also find it useful to learn to simulate some degree of surface conformism in order to mask their inherent unconventionality.

Personal relationships, particularly romantic ones, can be the INTJ's Achilles heel. While they are capable of caring deeply for others (usually a select few), and are willing to spend a great deal of time and effort on a relationship, the knowledge and self-confidence that make them so successful in other areas can suddenly abandon or mislead them in interpersonal situations.

This happens in part because many INTJs do not readily grasp the social rituals; for instance, they tend to have little patience and less understanding of such things as small talk and flirtation (which most types consider half the fun of a relationship). To complicate matters, INTJs are usually extremely private people, and can often be naturally impassive as well, which makes them easy to misread and misunderstand. Perhaps the most fundamental problem, however, is that INTJs really want people to make sense. This sometimes results in a peculiar naivete', paralleling that of many Fs -- only instead of expecting inexhaustible affection and empathy from a romantic relationship, the INTJ will expect inexhaustible reasonability and directness.

Probably the strongest INTJ assets in the interpersonal area are their intuitive abilities and their willingness to "work at" a relationship. Although as Ts they do not always have the kind of natural empathy that many Fs do, the Intuitive function can often act as a good substitute by synthesizing the probable meanings behind such things as tone of voice, turn of phrase, and facial expression. This ability can then be honed and directed by consistent, repeated efforts to understand and support those they care about, and those relationships which ultimately do become established with an INTJ tend to be characterized by their robustness, stability, and good communications.

Introverted iNtuition
INTJs are idea people. Anything is possible; everything is negotiable. Whatever the outer circumstances, INTJs are ever perceiving inner pattern-forms and using real-world materials to operationalize them. Others may see what is and wonder why; INTJs see what might be and say "Why not?!" Paradoxes, antinomies, and other contradictory phenomena aptly express these intuitors' amusement at those whom they feel may be taking a particular view of reality too seriously. INTJs enjoy developing unique solutions to complex problems.

Extraverted Thinking
Thinking in this auxiliary role is a workhorse. Closure is the payoff for efforts expended. Evaluation begs diagnosis; product drives process. As they come to light, Thinking tends, protects, affirms and directs iNtuition's offspring, fully equipping them for fulfilling and useful lives. A faithful pedagogue, Thinking argues not so much on its own behalf, but in defense of its charges. And through this process these impressionable ideas take on the likeness of their master.

Introverted Feeling
Feeling has a modest inner room, two doors down from the Most Imminent iNtuition. It doesn't get out much, but lends its influence on behalf of causes which are Good and Worthy and Humane. We may catch a glimpse of it in the unspoken attitude of good will, or the gracious smile or nod. Some question the existence of Feeling in this type, yet its unseen balance to Thinking is a cardinal dimension in the full measure of the INTJ's soul.

Extraverted Sensing
Sensing serves with a good will, or not at all. As other inferior functions, it has only a rudimentary awareness of context, amount or degree. Thus INTJs sweat the details or, at times, omit them. "I've made up my mind, don't confuse me with the facts" could well have been said by an INTJ on a mission. Sensing's extraverted attitude is evident in this type's bent to savor sensations rather than to merely categorize them. Indiscretions of indulgence are likely an expression of the unconscious vengeance of the inferior.

wah read until eyes crossed. but MBTI seems to know me better than my own mother =P

Bangkok still has:

• 6-9am & 3-9pm rush hour
• 'pay-toll carparks' (standstill traffic jams on 'pay-toll' expressways)
• gigantic sprawl of grey concrete blocks as far as e eye can see, punctuated by dazzling gold+green+brick red temple roofs
• giant billboards
• motorcycle taxis, tuk-tuks, 'van' taxis, canal & river 'taxis'
• khlongs filled with a brownish-greyish-blackish soup of water hyacinth, mineral waterbottles, plastic bags, styrofoam pieces, discarded pieces of vegetables, dead rats & cats
• old faded blue & white street-name signs mostly in Thai only
• school uniforms for university students
• incredible service in shops & restaurants unmatched anywhere else in e world
• limbless beggars pulling themselves along e ground
• mobile food stalls & hawkers congregating under any bit of shade beneath expressway flyovers

Bangkok now has:

• timers that count down e seconds to e next green/red light at major intersections
• 'no hawking' signs at skytrain stations & major overhead bridges
• BTS skytrain & underground subway
• less elephants 'begging' & causing traffic jams along major roads
• Kasikorn Bank (new name of Thai Farmers' Bank)
• air con ATM lobbies
• Suan Lum night bazaar
• clearer street-name signs in both Thai & English
• tight blouses & mid-thigh miniskirts for university student uniforms
• tuition centres offering TOEFL, SAT & GMAT prep courses & Chinese language classes mushrooming all over e place
• local news in English on Radio Thailand 105.5 FM & 107 FM
• signage at e river 'taxi' piers indicating stops along e route, that resemble those found in MRT stations
• a lot more security personnel in public places

• 111104: SIN - BKK - Siam Square Soi 6 - MBK - Telewiz - Siam Discovery Center - Asia Books - Loft - MBK - Siam Square Soi 6 - Sukhumvit Soi 101/1 - Jim's house/Panich 21 factory - River City rooftop - Siam Square Soi 6
• 121104: BTS Siam interchange - Silom line - BTS Saphan Taksin station - Tha Sathorn - Mae Nam Chao Phraya - Tha Chang - Wat Phra Kaew - Thanon Na Phra Lan PO - Lak Muang shrine - Thanon Sanam Chai - Ministry of Defense - Saranrom Park - Territorial Defense Department - back of Wat Chetuphon - Thanon Phra Phiphit - Territorial Defense Department shooting range - Ban Mor - Talaat Phahurat - Thanon Chakrawat - Soi Wanit 1 - Jim's shop (Sirimedh) - Siam Square Soi 6 - Saphaan Hua Chang - Thanon Phaya Thai - Thanon Paholyonthin - Mee's shop & old house (Sanuwong) - Thanon Pradiphat - Mee's new house & Mickey - Thanon Si Phraya - Hanaya Restaurant Honten - Thanon Ti Thong - kaya bread @ Mon Nom Sod - Siam Square Soi 6
• 131104: Thanon Rama I - Soi Kasemsan 2 - Baan Jim Thompson - MBK - Siam Discovery Center - Propaganda - Siam Center - Siam Square Soi 6 - Thanon Surawongse - Somboon Seafood - Siam Square Soi 6 - Siam Square Soi 11 - Hard Rock Cafe Bangkok
• 141104: BTS Siam interchange - Sukhumvit line - Mo Chit station - Talaat Chatuchak - Lad Phrao Soi 35/1 - BTS Mo Chit station - Talaat Chatuchak - BTS Mo Chit station - BTS Siam interchange - Siam Square Soi 6 - Thanon Phaya Thai - Thanon Ratchawithi - Saphaan Krung Thon - Riverside Bangkok - Mae Nam Chao Phraya - Siam Square Soi 6
• 151104: Chula Soi 48 - Don Muang - SIN

next trip to Bangkok:

• no parents
• Wat Suthat
• view from 84th floor of Baiyoke Sky Hotel
• Talaat Phahurat
• Kim's house @ Si Phraya
• Mee's new house @ Pradiphat
• Mee's new shop @ Sampeng
• Tha Tien at sunset
• khaaw phat neua with ketchup =)
• Wat Benchamabophit
• Soi Wanit 1 & Wat Chakkrawat
• Suan Pakkad
• coconut i-tiim
• Khlong San Seb & Ban Krua-Nua

'....similarities between evolved circuits & engineered circuits raise e hope that there are deep laws of nature' that unite living & designed systems....But....there are differences. Physical systems 'just sit there', whereas 'biological systems produce beautiful machines that dance, work perfectly despite cellular noise, & dissolve when they are done.'

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looking down at e road as I walked in e morning sunshine, I saw a bird's shadow fly across mine =)

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http://akhamaeyao.tripod.com/main.html Akha Way Expedition

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music for late night car rides: White Flag by Dido & e main theme from e Overtime soundtrack by Satoshi Takebe =) somehow listening to it in daytime simply isn't e same, like how New Order was just nice in z.d.'s car only when cruising down e ECP at night.

original wording: THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THE EZLINK CARD SYSTEM IS A PERFECT EXAMPLE OF THE GREED THAT HAS TAKEN OVER THE LOCAL BUS SERVICES. LONG LIVE THE FARE CHEATS

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[151004]Rangoli for breakfast:

every morning this Indian neighbour creates a beautiful rangoli pattern outside her gate. always wondered if her handiwork would be erased by e tyres of her car.... now I know better =P

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[250904] boh chup cat @ Chinatown:

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[030904] winter in Singapore: used to stand next to Buona Vista MRT - until it was beheaded to make way for a construction site....

still standing at Rochester Park area - but not sure for how long more....

& not sure for how long more can I enjoy beautiful sunsets on days when I can walk out of Biopolis before nightfall....before they are marred by ugly buildings =|

• Kanas valley, Xinjiang, China
  scroll down to e 'Kanas pictures' section
• Mt Atago & Mt Takao, northwest Kyoto, Japan
• Doi Pha Tang & Phu Chee Fa, Chiang Rai, Thailand
• Doi Inthanon National Park, Thailand
• Fiordland National Park, New Zealand
• Banff & Jasper National Parks, Canada
• Torres del Paine National Park, Chile
• (forgot e names =P) National Parks, Hokkaido, Japan

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755th day of postgrad life (in e eyes of IMCB/CMM/A*STAR), 282nd day of graduate student life (in e eyes of Faculty of Medicine/NUS Registrar)....

e only powerpoint slide (out of 52) that caught my attention for e IMCB Genomics course lecture on 051004:

well I lost track of e lecturer somewhere in those 52 slides =P

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ST Life 21 Sept 2004, pL7, Learning Write From Wrong by Clarissa Oon:
....South Africa's Fugard spent decades battling apartheid & dramatising his country's race wars, or that the ever-provocative British-based Indian writer Rushdie is still facing death threats for his sly opus The Satanic Verses, maybe writers in our air-conditioned nation simply lack such fire in their bellies.

Kuo [Pao Kun], who spent four years in detention in the late 1970s for leftist student activities, & went on to receive Singapore's Cultural Medallion award in 1990, once noted that most artists here take for granted the sense of 'living in a world that will look after us'.

Adding that this system 'is so deeply entrenched that you can fight it today, then tomorrow the system will look after you', he observed that this lulling sense of comfort 'prevents us from thinking subversively'.

He used the word 'subversive', he said, 'with all good intentions. The best artists throughout history are the most subversive thinkers because they tend to make us aware of realities that are not right'....

Why write?

Rushdie submits, in his collection of essays Imaginary Homelands, that 'literature is the one place in any society where, within the secrecy of our own heads, we can hear voices talking about everything in every possible way'.

We all need that space. It is not a sacred space, unlike religion, but it is a space that needs to be cherished & protected.

....you can only falsify your own voice writing things that other people want to hear.

Write about what is close to you, what keeps you awake in the middle of the night.

Write about the people, stories, places and histories that invade your imagination.

Write about the great and small injustices you see in the world around you, instead of looking away.

perhaps even more amazing is how profound e impact can be on a far larger scale when things screw up at e molecular level. one guy at e symposium talked about e role of e lissencephaly protein LIS1 in cell division & migration, & there on e screen was e all-too-familiar diagram of post-mitotic neurons migrating from e ventricular zone to e cortical plate in e developing brain. as an undergrad, 14-3-3 was just yet another signaling protein, & smooth brain disease was some rare developmental defect that had a chim-mer & easier-to-forget name compared to acephaly, hydrocephaly etc. in e first year of postgrad, LIS1 was just yet another protein in yet another lecture, & lissencephaly was e chim name for smooth brain disease that I could now remember. but now when looking at e screen what came to mind was baby Jakob whom I first read about in a Today article & later on in The New Paper.

someone half-jokingly said that molecular biologists & biochemists are like expert witnesses in a court of law, in that their work 'decides' who gets e blame - when it comes to stuff like birth defects, with people wanting to know if it is something congenital (nobody's 'fault') or hereditary (someone's 'fault'), & if hereditary, e pattern of inheritance (mother's or father's 'fault' or both). sickens me when I come across such wrangling & fault-finding & finger-pointing.

from a long long time ago I knew I wanted to do basic (as opposed to applied) research purely out of my fascination about how things work at e most fundamental level. didn't & still don't really give a damn about e application part despite e fact that it can be inextricably tied in - rather leave it to others who are far better at it to take care of that & come up with e therapies & cures & drugs using whatever info that has been gained from a better understanding of e fundamentals. rather concentrate on doing my best at what I'm OK at, although there will always be constant reminders of how labwork can be linked to clinical stuff. wasn't too long ago in 2001 when a relative & I would travel to NUS together early in e morning & while she headed to NUH for treatment for breast cancer, I would be in a nearby building culturing MCF7 human mammary carcinoma cells for experiments. e irony =) fate does have a sense of humour?

talking about things medical, been meeting JC friends who actually have e strange idea that I graduated from NUS medicine, or in one extreme case, a JC-mate who's a fellow PhD student in IMCB & thinks that I quit NUS medicine to do science in IMCB?! LOL =P

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Tonari no Totoro (My Neighbour Totoro)

Majo no Takkyuubin (Kiki's Delivery Service)

Jiji, e funny black cat in Majo no Takkyuubin

strangely e 'Tao Te Ching' spelling of e romanised form of 道德经 is more widely recognised - if I typed e hanyu pinyin version 'Dao De Jing' instead who would catch ball?

hope those who live on a little red dot will learn to believe more in their own ability to make a difference, be more zi3 dong2 & 'see less fairy'....& get off their butts & do something about what they keep whining about!!

e above quote can also be applied to e day-to-day maintenance of e lab - we've all had enough of postdocs & JRFs clearing trash & cleaning up after boh chup princess lab techs =|

• http://www.eart-h.com
• http://www.monkeyisland.org.sg
• Panglao Marine Biodiversity Project 2004
• Ren Ci Hospital & Medicare Centre
• NDP moblog - Ria Tan
• Taylor & Khoo
• Tzu Chi Singapore
• adopt a hornbill
• Mae Fah Luang Foundation - more than 10 years ago I saw e green hills of this region from a bus window streaked with raindrops on my way up north through Chiang Rai province to e Thai-Burmese border. long to go back there again, & also to watch e sun set over e Andaman Sea from Laem Promthep in Phuket once more, to visit all e waterfalls in Doi In near Chiang Mai, to watch e kong3 ming2 deng1 rise up into e sky above e Ayutthaya ruins again, to celebrate Loy Krathong in Sukhothai....neverending list =P

[010604] lab moves to Biopolis, e newest polytechnic in Singapore:

Colleague to taxi driver, 'Biopolis'
Taxi driver to colleague, 'Huh which poly?'

Friend from across e causeway to another friend, 'Huh now Singapore got police to catch people who do experiments wrongly?'

[L-R] view of fishtank from workstation area, inside e fishtank, e cat's bench

[L-R] e cat's place within e fishtank, corridor linking different fishtanks

[120504] Dover cats:

middle photo: cat bashes head into e ground

[090504] cat mama's day:

if Sam gets hungry he'll probably chew it up, but I really dunno where else to put e flower.... my snake, spider & fish can't grip onto anything

[311203] old lab at Medical Drive, NUS:

[L] TC area, [R] main lab

[L] e cat's mess, [R] my Zeiss Stemi2000C =)

looks OK?

wait till you see e disgusting amount of masking tape used =O

e ugly truth covered up =P

Maticora bivirgata flaviceps Blue Malayan Coral Snake, belongs to e cobra family, scarlet head, tail & belly, with a light blue stripe running along its length on both sides, nocturnal, grows up to 1.8m, highly venomous, eats other snakes (literally chi1 she2 =P)

Ben Nevis (1344m) is e highest point in e country that I was born in, & it is one-third of e Three Peaks Challenge, where climbers attempt to summit e highest points in e 3 countries that make up Great Britain - Ben Nevis (Scotland), Scafell Pike (977m, England) & Snowdon (1085m, Wales). however, Singapore is made up just of Singapore, Singapore & Singapore, if you don't count Malaysian Railway land. of e 3 highest points in Singapore, 2 are inaccessible, so e little cat had to try for e highest point & e 4th & 5th highest points instead, & within a morning. interesting fact discovered in planning this: nothing (not just natural hills but man-made buildings included) in Singapore is taller than 280m, which is e maximum height limit e government has imposed to accomodate aviation needs.

more photos later. spotted a racquet-tailed drongo again =)

spotted a pair of little woodpeckers hammering away at a palm tree at e Blk S16 driveway, as humans were having their own version of breakfast a few metres away at e pink tables in Science canteen =)

no. 13 Culvain Ave, Glasgow	non-white baby alien in ang moh land
where e love for nature, hiking & mountains probably started	14 years later, e Chinese lady in e plain white shirt would end up as e baby's sec 2 Geography teacher

e big fat frog appeared again, but died last Friday. saw e floating bloated carcass on my way to work. wonder if e gases produced by decomposition will make it explode?

[050404] e fish have happily gobbled up e frog, leaving behind 4 webbed feet connected by some skin (probably e least tastiest part of a frog, at least to e tastebuds of a fish?), so most of e frog has been 'recycled' & channelled back into e ecosystem. nature doesn't waste, unlike humans. maybe e fish found e frog (& a dead crow that fell into e MD1 'moat' weeks ago) a welcome change from their standard fare of stale bread, algae & dead fish? but wonder if animals do actually tire of eating e same fare everyday, or that only humans are so fussy?

[260404]

http://www.nopuncturesplease.com/blog/index.html: been reading this for e past few months....maybe their blog will inspire Yangchen to cycle further than between Singapore & e Malaysia-Thailand border =P am so glad to have people who are as passionate as them about their dreams & love doing crazy things for e sheer heck of it around me in my life, especially when living in a place like Singapore, where e 'tried & tested' is held up as the ideal.

till now e incident in a house along Salvatierra Walk where this white haired ang moh (white + 'ang' = pink hair? =P) stranger came up to me with a broad smile & offered a big fat handshake, saying, 'Hi, I'm John Glenn' still seems so surreal. was told that he was there at e Haas Center for Public Service @ Stanford to find out more about their work in service learning, which was relevant to e John Glenn Institute for Public Service and Public Policy that he had just set up. so glad that Singapore has something like this in e form of e Singapore International Foundation's Youth Expedition Project & Singapore Volunteers Overseas programmes. think it's a really incredible feeling, when one is able to inspire others to dream, & also to be similarly inspired by others =) maybe one day when I'm 77 years old I'll hop on board a space shuttle & visit space like he did =P

wish I could have e handphone number 94829464 i.e. 9-HUAYING....would save me from cracking my brains whenever I hafta try & recall my own number....

The history of the mankind is made of billions of individual lives that keep on sparking and fading. Born of self-preservation instincts imprinted by evolution, history books paint a picture of a constant string of wars, conflict of interest, loss and gain of influences, lust for power and submission to weaknesses of human nature. On the other hand, the greatest achievement of the evolution, the rational mind, kept on contributing to new findings, discoveries, technologies and philosophies. Progress has always hinged on discovering new truths and preserving them for posterity in form of stories, solutions, tools, books, and other carriers of information. Knowledge is the basis of human power, yet it constantly struggles with two forces that regularly diminish it: death and forgetting. We can preserve knowledge in books and other forms of information storage. However, this knowledge translates to value only then when it is used by the creative power of the human brain....Death poses an ageless challenge of educating new generations. Years of hard work needed to gain knowledge on professorial level are obliterated in a single act of death. - Dr Piotr Wozniak

could MOE & NUS take note of this:
It is possible to store the mind with a million facts and still be entirely uneducated - Alec Bourne

close to midnight on e 8th day of e 1st month of e Lunar calendar (290104): 'bai tii kong' (bai4 tian1 gong1). realised how little I know about this tradition, like what e two candles right at e front are for, & why there has to be entire 'stalks' of sugarcane (leaves & all, which at approx 3m in length makes it kinda hard to carry back from e market) among e offerings
[020204] Tiny e dumb cat, Bugis Junction	[040204] Science canteen kitten: taken when Gaurav & I spent some time cat-watching
[080204] my new curtains (left) & e ugly prison window grilles that they hide (right). decided to get new curtains now that I have a 'permanent' room in this house after living in it for ~9.5 years. 200 free Zo cards collected over e years + ~$2.00 worth of scotchtape + 1 hole puncher later....a BIG FAT SHOCK for my parents *grin* my curtains advertise e following: Nescafe, Absolut Vodka (love their creative ads!!), Apple iPod, Kit Chan's musical production 'Forbidden City', Singapore Art Museum's Rodin sculpture exhibition, Republic of Singapore Navy's contest for naming their new ships, Fruit Tree apple & aloe vera, peach & orange juice, NDP 2002, Mitsubishi cars, some holiday resort in Bintan, tourism in Australia, 'Positive Lives' HIV awareness campaign, The Economist, Volvo cars, Sharp AQUOS LCD TVs, some credit card which I forgot, & lots more =)

>2 years before....	....>2 years later

laoda + wife + few wedding dinner tables' worth of SPSians	SPS 98/99 batch representatives

SPS CNY Chinatown outing 130104	Ai Tong 100104

01. junction of Pasir Panjang Road & Heng Mui Keng Terrace	02. junction of Kampong Bahru Road & Telok Blangah Road	03. junction of Anson Road & Maxwell Road	04. Lau Pa Sat @ junction of Boon Tat Street & Robinson Road
05. Durian + Esplanade Bridge	06. Suntec City @ junction of Bras Basah Road & Nicoll Highway	07. LAN gaming capital of Singapore: Katong Shopping Centre	08. journey's end: full moon over e Caltex gas station near my house

cat spotter = WHY
photographer & victim of staring incident = Jinquan

[L] another of my papercuts; [R] mother cat + 3 kittens by a kerb @ Dover

overnight in SPS: Huegesh, Shruti, Gaurav, Boy, Kamalesh & e cat (Mahesh asleep thus not in either photo)

playing around with night scene mode while waiting for bus @ Kent Ridge terminal

....NOT one of those dodos behind e culling of stray cats, e EZ-link system, e NUS admin, e chopping down of e Changi tree, e withdrawal of bus services running parallel to e North-East Line, primary school streaming exams, e incessant ringing of handphones on buses & trains, e censorship of Royston Tan's 15, e shrinking size of HDB flats, e CPF cuts, e NUS RHAPS system for readmission into campus housing, e anti-dialect (aka. communication breakdown with grandparents) policy, e building of more golf courses in land-scarce Singapore, e x*xxxx human resource policies....

christmas wishes: [1] that e transport minister & LTA bosses be banned from owning cars, but allowed to have as many EZ-link cards as they like to get around on public transport, [2] that e kids of e education minister & MOE policymakers study only in neighbourhood schools & local universities (this could apply to e dons of local unis too!! if they think their uni is world-cRass, why do they send their kids abroad?), & [3] that e MND & HDB bosses be allowed to live only in HDB flats =P

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[111203]
The proud ones do not last forever, but are like the dream of a spring night. Even the mighty will perish, just like dust before the wind.
- quote from National Geographic article on samurai

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[101203] something from e California trip - click on e images:

in e courtyard - Iris & B. Gerald Cantor Center for Visual Arts, Stanford University	in guess where? - Iris & B. Gerald Cantor Center for Visual Arts, Stanford University	sis + cat - Exploratorium, San Francisco	Moscone Convention Center, San Francisco

above [L-R]: banana peel sculpture made to look like a dancer dancing across e courtyard; at e washbasin in e loo; glass panel doors of e Exploratorium entrance; if you can't find me here, I'm in e middle of e top row of glass panels - attracted a LOT of stares while shooting this pic *grin*

inspiration for these pics: an accidental self-portrait (below) taken back in May 2002 while fixing my camera in a ladies powder room in e National Museum for Emerging Science & Innovation, Tokyo =D

anyway so many many people have hit upon this idea before: www.mirrorproject.com

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[091203]
To Treasure Everything (in this moment) as All is Transient;
To be Unattached to Everything (in this moment) as All is Transient
- from Be A Lamp Upon Yourself

....by eliminating e wrong conception[sic] of permanance & e afflictive emotions which arise depending on it....mind becomes clearer & more capable of enjoying things for what they are....live more in e present, appreciating things as they are now, without fantasies about what they are or will be....worry less about small matters....become less ego-sensitive to every action other people do in relation to us
- from I Wonder Why by Thubten Chodron

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[061203] laptop computers: another nice & warm place to snooze apart from e bonnets of parked cars....shut eye after shut down =)

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[021203] from some forum: 'women are nothing but trouble, men are nothing but trouble seekers' - wah can laugh until cry *grin*

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[271103] if a tree falls in e forest & no one hears it, does it make a sound? - esse is percipi

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[271103] when things reach e point where they can't get any worse, they can only get better?

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[241103] MONKEY BAR DANGER WARNING - Straits Times 19 Nov 2003

More than 400 children fell from monkey bars and were taken to two hospitals with children's emergency rooms, in the 12 months ending in January this year. Of the 136 that ended up at the National University Hospital's children's emergency department, two-thirds had broken bones, and one in three had to stay in hospital. One was in intensive care. The KK Women's and Children's Hospital A&E attended to 278 children with monkey bar injuries. They made up more than a quarter of the 1,047 children treated for playground injuries. These numbers were revealed in a recent NUH study that recommended children under 10 avoid playing on monkey bars, a popular feature in many public housing estate playgrounds. One of the NUH doctors behind the study, Dr Toh Teck Hock, explained: 'Children under 10 are not so agile and usually don't know how to break a fall.'

HDB said it was looking into whether the bars should be included in future playgrounds. Playground accidents made up about 10 per cent of the 4,600 accident patients seen by NUH, said the report. But home was the biggest danger area, as that was where roughly half the child accident cases seen at NUH happened, including babies falling from sofas or beds. Of the two children who died from accidents, one was a nine-month-old boy who swallowed a screw. Dr Wong Chin Koon, who was also involved in the study, said common sense could have prevented most of the accidents. Put electrical cords out of reach behind furniture, for instance, and remove loose knobs and buttons on furniture that a child can choke on. Dr Wong added: 'You must start planning once you walk down the aisle. It will be very expensive to start child-proofing only when the baby arrives.'

should have seen e look on my mum's face when she read this article....when she finally stopped laughing, she remarked how Singaporean kids nowadays are brought up to be so hopeless & helpless, that before reaching e ripe old age of 10 years, they can sit for primary 3 streaming exams & conquer virtual worlds in computer games, & yet not be able to learn how to judge for their useless (to quote her exact words: 'lua3 boh3 yong3') selves how high they can (or cannot) climb on e monkey bars, or how far they should keep away from e trajectory of a playground swing (in some other article it was mentioned that swings were disappearing from HDB estate playgrounds cos kids were falling off or getting hit by them). & worst of all, in her opinion, these kids were unable to pick themselves up after a fall, & could only sit there & cry (her exact words again: 'zhei3 bang4 tou3 eh2 hi4 dao1 kiu1 kiu1 jiang4') for e maid. yup & she thinks that all those kids who can't learn to take care of themselves (& their parents who can't teach them or simply won't let them learn) deserve all those trips to e A&E. can just imagine how when e boys in this generation reach enlistment age, their parents will probably petition MPs to pressure SAF into doing away with monkey bars & other playground-associated structures from obstacle courses? that will be another big fat round of laughter for my mum =)

e playgrounds in my life:

• Lagoon View: with monkey bars in e shape of an arch & painted red - my mum would lift me up to cling on for a while long before I dared to try them
• Laguna Park: best swings with e longest chains ever, could swing till almost parallel to e ground
• Tung Ling kindergarten: jungle gym that two boys & I would climb up to sit on top out of e teacher's reach so that we could delay going back to class
• Siglap PCF kindergarten: had chickens & other animals kept by residents of e one-room flats in e same block, hence e stink of chicken poop
• Changkat Changi Secondary School: obstacle course with plenty of mud. also e first school I ever went to in Singapore, even before starting nursery school or kindergarten....bet e new 'through-train' system can't match this =)
• Siglap CC basketball court
• Good Shepherd kindergarten: no challenge & e structures were unstable plastic rather than metal
• Tao Nan school: obstacle course where kindergarten friends Terence, Pieter & Bianca taught me how to sit on top of chin-up bars & hang upside down from parallel bars & monkey bars
• Pasir Ris Park: need more be said about e spider web?
• Bayshore Park: highest-ever monkey bars =) where I learnt to climb low walls & jump from heights, & where e craze for climbing onto rooftops started (inspired e successful hunt for a way to get to e RGS rooftop)
• Sentosa Palawan Beach: game station for one of e SPS newbie orientation camps

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[181103] couldn't be a greater contrast: me telling Dr Ge back in 1999, based on e stuff that I'd been taught in secondary school & JC, that Cell Biology was a big fat BORING *yawn* (can still recall e reaction on her face - if looks could kill I'd have lost all 9 of my lives at one shot in her office)....& me choosing to specialise in Cell Biology for honours & postgrad research, & staying awake for every lecture (so far) of e TLL Cell Biology module....

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[171103] with places disappearing & people passing away & my memory short-circuiting everyday, I wonder for how long more can I remember all this....so here goes:

e SBS 55 route that links Marine Parade & Bishan is like a journey back in time. from e stop near my present home, it passes by, one by one, e places where my relatives were resettled in when e government took back e kampung land in e mid-'80s - paternal grandaunt's former home next to e present day Maha Bodhi primary school in Kampong Ubi, her present home across e road in Kaki Bukit where she lives with my paternal uncles, second maternal aunt's former home (Blk 101) in Hougang South, late maternal grandma's former home (Blk 232) near Kovan, e nursing home where she spent her last days, & e homes of two maternal cousins (Blk 610 & Blk-I-forgot) in Punggol South just next to e primary & secondary schools that my dad attended.

when e bus enters Hougang Ave 2 & passes by Hougang Stadium, on e left will be a turning into Florence Road. this was once a dirt track that ran through e jungle from Serangoon Road all e way to e kampung & e wooden house built by my maternal grandpa, right smack on e very site where my dad's alma mater, Xinmin primary school, is being rebuilt today. e dirt track & jungle have been replaced by HDB blocks 601-632 & Punggol South Park. but Yio Chu Kang primary school (where eldest aunt sold snacks for a living from a little stall under e shade of a tree atop a hill), & Woodbridge Hospital in Buangkok (where an uncle worked) still remain in roughly e same location 20 years later. just that now they are accessible by new roads & buses, instead of e 1+km trudge along dirt paths that tired this preschooler out.

e house that grandpa built was a single-storey wooden structure with an attap roof, bare concrete floors, pale chalk green pillars & walls painted white on e exterior & light blue on e interior. facing e entrance was e altar, & e living area was on e right & all e bedrooms on e left. strangely cannot remember e house having any doors at all, only sheets of cloth that covered e entrance of each bedroom. but in those days nobody in e kampung ever closed e doors of their houses anyway, even at night. dogs simply wandered in & out as they liked. there were snakes & rats around but somehow only snakes were found within e house. probably cos whatever rats that crawled in were eaten by e snakes that slithered in through e gaps in e wooden walls? outside of e main house was e space where e scooters & my eldest maternal uncle's van were parked. right across was a wooden zinc-roofed shed where cooking was done over charcoal stoves. e loo was a shack with a cesspit below a wooden platform, & remember being so scared of losing my footing & falling in. by e time I was born, e government had restricted pig-farming to certain areas to cut down on pollution, & so there were no more pigs in e kampung. but my mum used to have to chop up banana trees & use their trunks to make some kinda mush to feed e pigs before she went to school every morning.

e transition to HDB high-rise living wasn't easy for e older relatives who'd never stepped into a multi-storey anything or taken an elevator ride before. e concept of having e kitchen within e house, suspending laundry poles from outside of e window, even sliding windows, cooker hoods & dustbin chutes confounded a few of them. for many many years to come eldest aunt would persist in setting up her charcoal stove at e staircase landing outside e front door of her flat & cooking up a storm that one could smell from e carpark four stories below. & I recall seeing older folks clinging to e inner walls as they walked along corridors, refusing to go anywhere near e parapet cos of their fear of heights.

[151203]
The Persistence of Memory by Salvador Dali

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[151103] there was this scene in some American show where someone died in a hospital at night, & e camera zoomed out to show e view of e room from outside of e window, & then e building, & then an aerial view of e big fat city with its neon lights, skyscrapers & expressways. struck me how e ward was just a tiny square of light on e building's facade, & how e building was but just a little structure lost somewhere in e mammoth expanse of e city, & how e city was just one of thousands around e world. & thought of how e hundreds of people in e same building were busy doing their own thing, & how e millions of people in e same city were going about their own lives - all anonymous, oblivious & far removed from that tiny square of light that barely registers a blip on e radar screen of e big fat world. & thought of how insignificant our own troubles seem when we take a step back & look at things in a greater context. life goes on, whether you like it or not - e world will not sit down & cry with you. used to imagine how we humans are just little specks on a little planet in a little solar system in a little galaxy in a cluster of galaxies in a supercluster in a big fat universe - makes us insignificant humans seem so ridiculous for e big fat fuss we kick up over anything & everything & e wars we wage. maybe if I were an alien I'd have died from laughing at this silly human race?

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[151103] a few of e J-dorama with great soundtracks:

	Aishiteru no itte kure: e first Japanese dorama that I watched, some time around 1995-6. about a deaf-mute artist & an aspiring actress. apart from sign language, they communicated by fax - like e scene where e artist flooded her fax machine with pages & pages that she joined together with scotch tape to form a drawing of a long snake. brings to mind my big fat cute snake from IKEA =D also remember a scene filmed in a beautiful art museum that first planted e idea of going to Japan in my head. no soundtrack but sis has compilation CDs of Japanese TV serial theme songs that includes e one for this drama, by Dreams Come True
	Over Time: didn't watch this, but sis did & bought e soundtrack. it's now with her in California & I miss listening to it
	Long Vacation: e best one so far, wonderful & hilarious plot & great soundtrack by CAGNET. e dorama where my sis pointed out e Rainbow bridge & other landmarks in Tokyo to me & explained at length e quirks about Japanese society after her month-long stay there.
	Beautiful Life: another one with a great soundtrack, with music that TCS has used for trailers for other shows. 'Night Run' (track 9) makes for damn good listening while in e lab. also have e soundtrack for Kyumei Byoto 24-ji but can't find any pic to post here

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[111103] non-MOE definition of 'mother tongue': e language that your mother scolds you in. seriously think most of my Teochew & Hokkien was learnt by listening to big fat scoldings & arguments. & think e fact that I was always yelled at in perfect grammatically-correct English heavily doused with chim words helped a lot in my learning of e language....how else would I have learnt words like indolent, insolent, incompetent & incorrigible? maybe JC GP tutors should focus more on scolding their students - rather than tearing up their essays - in order to brush up their vocabulary & prepare them for e verbal component of e SAT I exam. & yup this is in reference to a certain video clip =P

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[111103] http://www.eart-h.com/text/deathrow.htm: for all those who have enjoyed e view from e upper deck of e SBS 2 bus on our way to Changi Village & Ubin for Noordin camping & CJ trips.

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[071103] according to one of those "419 scam" e-mails spamming inboxes around e world, this is my long lost ang moh twin sister living in Nigeria.

due to e threat of impending civil war, she is seeking my help to transfer USD25 million from her account with e Central Bank of Nigeria out of e country. she has promised to split e moolah between us (55% to her, 45% to me) if I agree to help her out by sending her, within 10 working days, my contact details, bank account number, & USD150000 to cover legal expenses & other costs that may be incurred during e transfer. this is provided she does not die mysteriously in a highway accident along e Sagamu/Lagos Express Road-To-Nowhere or in a plane crash over Sierra Leone. & yup I am supposed to keep a date free to fly over to London to meet up with an intermediary who will be handling e actual transaction, keep this entire transaction confidential, & not inform any US government official.

by e way, this supposed twin of mine practises witchcraft in Lagos, e former capital of Nigeria (FYI, it has been shifted to Abuja), & her work is shown live on national TV (MediaCorp Channel 5) in Singapore every Wednesday night at 10pm (+0800 GMT) in a drama series entitled 'Charmed' *grin*

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[041103] once upon a time, I envied 4th kor cos he had his own bar of soap. e rest of us in e house of 11 had to share, whereas he had e luxury of having his own bar AND his own soap dish. one day, his half-used bar of soap was fished out from e dustbin. apparently he had used it until it was reduced to e shape of a dog's bone, & then thrown it away. in no time he was dragged to e kitchen & soundly beaten up for having e nerve to waste. more than 15 years later, in this age of liquid creme soaps in dispenser bottles, nothing can beat e satisfaction of having your own bar of soap. still feel happy whenever I get to open a brand new bar when e old one has been used up. & each time I do so, I think of how eldest kor tried to mould together tiny bits of soap into larger pieces so that they could still be used, & this incident comes to mind.

[071103] realised that e blue plastic dustbin that starred in e above episode is still around. over e years it has moved house with us twice. it now sits in my room, still with e Michelin tyre man sticker that 4th kor pasted onto it more than 15 years ago =)

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[311003] redid e travels.html page cos I found a long-lost page on e 1999 Oz trip that was done years ago but forgotten about. last bit of e 2003 California trip photos have yet to be developed....& it's been 1.5 months since I got back!

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[291003] yesterday, this engineer who came to fix e live imaging microscope system walked into e lab & asked me if I had a lighter or matches. showed him a sensor/foot pedal-operated fireboy. told him that it was e only flame source permitted in e labs by safety regulations, & that he could use it if he wanted. should have seen e look on his face when he saw e 10.9 litre BP propane-butane gas cylinder connected to e fireboy. & yup it was only then that I realised e lighter/matches had nothing to do with fixing e microscope - he just wanted to SMOKE....

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[171003] have been fascinated by Thai silk since I was a little girl. e 2003 calendar at http://www.royalthaisilk.net has wonderful pictures of it, especially my favourite yok cloth (pictured in April, July & December). spent my primary school holidays in Bangkok, helping out in a machine embroidery factory in Sukhumvit. it was full of migrant workers from Isaan (northeast Thailand) & e Thai-Burmese border regions, girls who seemed as young as 15 years & kept e factory running around e clock. it was housed in a few shophouses that were linked together & had wooden floors that creaked with each step. all of us lived on e second floor of e shophouses & ate, slept & lived with e constant drumming of e factory machines that made e floorboards vibrate.

also helped out in a shop along an alley in Yaowarat, Bangkok's Chinatown area, that sold machine embroidered iron-on patches produced by e factory. plus another shop near Saphaan Khwaay (Buffalo Bridge?) along Pahonyonthin Road that sold buttons, textiles, lace, wool, thread, pins, thimbles, needles & all sorts of other stuff needed by e seamstresses & tailors that came to us. they would bring along little square pieces of cloth samples & standing on e bales of cloth, we would search for a colour & texture that matched & cut out e desired length. this was where I learnt how to cut & tear cloth, sort buttons into bags of 144 plus 2 extra (to ensure that you never undercut your customers), custom-make cloth buttons & belt buckles, speak rudimentary Bangkok Thai to customers, & count & handle more money than I ever had seen in my life. was about 6+ years old when I first started helping out, & still remember e time when Jiim's mother held up a 1000 baht note & asked me if I'd ever seen a piece of paper worth that much before. at today's rates it is worth around SGD44, but to a 6-year-old, 4 digits was like e biggest number ever =)

[301003] another thing I loved as a kid (& still do): phuang malai are garlands of fresh jasmine flower buds & roses, chrysanthemums & other flowers painstakingly threaded together & used as offerings in temples & spirit houses everywhere in Thailand.

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[161003] e counter on e index page has jumped by hundreds since e guestbook was last signed on Halloween 2002....wonder who are those who have been 'clicking in & out' & yet refusing to leave any trace? some tell me that they have 'tried to help their friends' by referring them to certain quotes or passages on this particular page (thoughts.html)....well would be nice if others have found it of use to their lives?

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[151003] found a pic of e original text after so many years:

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[141003] PhD research can be so much like playing snakes & ladders....except that it feels like one BIG FAT endless ladder with overgrown snakes lurking at almost every single rung, ready to send you right back to e start. what more, these snakes aren't e kind that can be eaten =P there are days when you lose your sense of direction & have no idea if you are climbing upwards or downwards, days when a sense of 'zero displacement' hits you, & days when you wonder if you could ever fall any harder than you already have. & these are e times when you are so glad to know people who will pick you up & help *KA-BISH* a snake or two, especially when e boss seems so clueless when it comes to dealing with reptiles. so grateful to MUI - meeting up on 091003 helped sort out so much stuff cluttering my mind. too bad you have to return to Berlin yet again. & also grateful to e Swiss postdoc in my lab for being e driving force in e lab & her genuine concern for my work. e weekend of 111003 will go down in record as e time when hope was renewed, & monday 131003 shall be remembered as e time when inspiration was again found =)

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[141003] from a conversation this morning: I feel as if I spent my two years in JC helping e principal to achieve e school ranking she wanted for e college....two years of my life wasted, that could have been better spent elsewhere....learnt nothing, only enjoyed my ECAs

sounds so sickeningly familiar. too often people always tend to miss e wood for e trees, & students end up as mere generators of results that e school administration needs so badly to trumpet & win accolades from e 'higher ups'? some people need to be taught how to put e interests of students first. big fat *FISH* to those policymakers who keep chanting e familiar robotic 'it's for your own good' mantra....

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[081003] two damn attitude cats on St John's Island:

[151003]

The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated
~ Mahatma Gandhi

e cats that had names:

• Tommy was Andrea's good-natured & fat ginger & white tom cat that ate chocolate & lazed around e letterboxes of Aquamarine Tower in Bayshore Park before he passed away.
• Kopi-o, Milk Tea & San1 He2 Yi1 are e black, ginger & tricolour black+brown+white kittens that were born in e garden, named by my sis, but have since disappeared.
• Bumpy was e grey & white KE7 tabby cat that hung around B & C blocks of East Wing, came into my room at night & walked all over my notes on my desk, & was fed by Chiew Boon next door.
• Meow meow is e affectionate white tabby cat with a few black & brown patches & blue eyes that was named by my mum & sis, used to sleep on e rug outside e front door, & was adopted & taken away by Jasmine when she moved out of e neighbourhood.

e cats that had no names:

• e fragile ci2 dun4 ginger kitten that was born in e garden, appeared to be deaf & dumb & oblivious to e roar of car engines, runt of e litter that had to be fed milk, that died before dawn & had its tiny stiff body placed (before we rushed off for school) in a Teva shoebox for burial, but was thrown away by e time we got home from school.
• e black & white cat along Telok Kurau Road that followed my sis so closely after she patted it that she freaked out & I had to carry it away.
• e black & white cat along e alley linking Martia Road & Jalan Tamban, that freaked my sis out in e exact same way.
• e black kitten with yellow eyes that hid from e rain by sleeping under my dad's car or on e towel outside e front door.
• e too-cute-for-its-own-good white kitten with sapphire blue eyes that was born in e garden, attracted so much attention from everyone who walked past e house - was kidnapped & never seen again when a car suddenly stopped by e gate & a pair of hands reached out to pick it up before zooming off.
• e friendly brownish-grey mother cat that led me to her 4 kittens in e longkang along Martia Road.
• e grey & white 'bus stop' cat that always crossed East Coast Road using e overhead bridge.
• e grey & white kitten that followed my sis & I home on our way back from e Shell petrol station.
• e quiet Russian Blue cat with yellow eyes that invited herself into e Bayshore house one night as we were preparing dinner & toured e rooms & stopped to admire herself in e mirror.
• e friendly brown & white, black & white, tricolour black+brown+white & ginger kittens that lived along e alley linking Martia Road & Jalan Tamban & in e garden of e corner house & drank Cream of Campbell's oxtail soup.
• e kittens that used to play in e old tables of NUS Science canteen.
• countless other cats & kittens that have come up to me or were spotted from e bus on long bus journeys.

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[071003] from some forum: I cried because I had no shoes - until I saw a man with no feet

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[190903] my black friend used to weigh more than 10 times my weight & tower above me when we first got to know each other. almost 20 years later, this friend now weighs roughly four times my weight & I've finally emerged as e taller-but-still-not-so-tall one. we've grown up together & over e years, its teeth have yellowed & voice has changed. if this friend of mine sounds like a victim of some long-term weight loss program gone wrong, well its a Yamaha upright piano. till this day I still cannot make sense of dried tadpoles stranded across swimming pools lane markers (i.e. read music scores), but this has never stopped my friend & I from spending endless hours together lost in our own world. have spent bits of time with my friend's counterparts in e RGS school hall, VJC LT4 & backstage of e KE7 comm hall, but none of them can share e happy memories of e times when my feet could finally reach e pedals or fingers could stretch an octave or I could finally see my own reflection above e open keyboard lid =)

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[180903] for Rhandeev, Siew Ann, css, LKY, Alex Ling, Chu Wee, Yeong Cherng, Derrick, Samuel, Joyce, Darwin, Jonathan, Xuelin, limgekho, 'uh-oh!', Kelken, Shruti, Huegesh, Gaurav, Hoi Nam & all other SPSians who have helped me (& many others) in one way or another with comp stuff:

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[300803] I lost this guy....so sad. & I didn't get a chance to take a photo of it before it was gone. wonder if people fear loss cos they fear that memory will fade with time, & that they will forget how something looked/felt/smelt/sounded like?

once upon a time I had no clue that this unidentifiable species had a name, or that it was Korean, or that it loves food & lives in a refrigerator munching on watermelon slices, doughnuts & other stuff. just knew that its eyes were e perfect reflection of how I appear during lectures. had a little stuffed toy version of this guy (hugging a pink & white bolster, hence e name 'sleepyhead')....until it disappeared on 270803. resulted in a trip to Heeren to search for a replacement, & that's how I came to discover so much more about it - only after I lost it. ironic. by e way this guy's called Foody.

[081003] discovered that sleepyhead aka. Foody had modeled in two photos of Guanghao's birthday gift - sitting on e tail of a model F-16 fighter jet - & here are e edited pics =)

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[180803] 'I remember everyone who leaves.' - Lilo in Lilo & Stitch

I like airports. departure halls. arrival halls. viewing galleries. transit lounges. glass panels through which people wave to someone as (s)he walks away, until they are left waving to their own reflections. giant overhead boards that display arrival & departure schedules that are constantly updated ever so frequently, banishing away all traces of previous arrivals & departures. baggage claim belts that trundle on endlessly long after the last bag has been picked up. a blurring of time zones, the imperceptible merging of night into day & back into night again. a sense of timelessness, seamlessness. arrivals & departures. comings & goings. meetings & partings. beginnings & endings. somehow airports are like a microcosm of life?

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[010803] was reading a Nature article about a protein named Elmo, & started thinking of Sesame Street, Jim Henson's muppets, & my favourite TV show that I watched as a kid, Fraggle Rock. somehow most people seem to remember Sesame Street but not Fraggle Rock - click on e image below to learn more:

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[230703] going through e worst & living to tell e tale, hitting rock bottom & climbing out of e abyss to see light again, having been right to e edge & back....gives this strange immunity against fear. cos u can seek comfort in e fact that u have faced up to e worst that there can be, made your peace, & lived on. like what they say, what cannot kill you can only make you stronger?

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[140703] The Buddha said, 'Man must be strong enough to know when he is weak, brave enough to encounter fear, dignified and having moral courage in honest defeat, humble and gentle in victory.'

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[080703] finally found this poem that I read some more than 12 years ago, which captures so well e transience of all things good & beautiful in life:

It is not growing like a tree
In bulk doth make men better be;
Or standing long an oak, three hundred year,
To fall a log at last, dry, bald, and sere:
A lily of a day
Is fairer far in May,
Although it fall and die that night;
It was the plant and flower of light.
In small proportions we just beauty see;
And in short measure life may perfect be.
- Ben Johnson

[081203] Lokuttaradhamma (insights into the transcendental nature of all worldly phenomena) is wealth attainable by everyone - Lord Buddha

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[280603] do you have a dream? do you even dream? do you even dare dream in e first place? last September, was looking at e snaking queue of graduands in gowns & mortarboards lining up for e commencement ceremony, & wondered how many among them were actively chasing their own dreams, & how many were just going through e paces & acting out e standard script written jointly by our society & e guys to whom we pay our taxes. no, I did not mention e word 'government', did I? *wink*

[020703] was directed to e NUS Commencement 2002 website where e video of e live webcast interviews inflicted on us has been made available for download. remember e interviewers & cameramen closing in on e front of e queue on e 2nd level of e UCC to pick out victims based on e academic honours they'd won. since when did students matter so much to NUS? now understand what my mum & sis were talking about when they said they rolled with laughter in e UCC hall on watching a larger-than-life Chin Ann ('chim-ing' out his interviewer by talking about his Maths thesis) & me (showing a truly SBS or 'si beh sian' face) on e giant video screen during our interviews =P

[250703] approx 7.5 years since e 3 of us graduated together from secondary school....& e 2 who sat together in class & slept through 2 years worth of O level Bio lessons (& concussed through another 2 years of A level Bio lectures) are now a doctor & a biologist, while e one who conscientiously kept awake is now an electrical engineer =D

[110803] SPS @ Science Honours commencement 230703: more photos to come....

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[160603] why is so much of e education here focused on learning about stuff that already exists, rather than learning how to learn about stuff that may come to exist only tomorrow? it was with an overwhelming sense of relief that I entered university back in July 1998, more than glad to be finally free from e education system. or so I thought. this mindset of learning for e sake of learning seems so deeply ingrained in just about everywhere I look in this graduate mass-production line, & beyond. glad that have ended up as a manufacturing defect, due to:

1. e idea of learning how to learn, planted in my head back in secondary school,
2. e absolute frustration with e system reaching a 12-year peak in JC,
3. e idea of knowing how to access information being far more important than knowing e information itself, pointed out to me by my JC librarian,
4. e (lack of) quality of teaching in most of my undergrad modules, which left independent learning as e most (& only) viable option, &
5. SPS, which provided e environment needed for #3, as well as e idea of taking charge of one's own education, instead of letting others ruin it for you.

perhaps #6 would be e 12 years of e education system itself, for it was that which provided e opportunities to learn several times over how to fail.

It has been said that the primary function of schools is to impart enough facts to make children stop asking questions. Some, with whom the schools do not succeed, become scientists.
- Knut Schmidt-Nielsen, The Camel's Nose: Memoirs of a curious scientist

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[030603] one can be only as happy as one allows oneself to be. as a kid, always wondered why humans seemed so unhappy. does e true source of unhappiness come from within? e inability to look beyond oneself & one's own problems? a distortion of perception whereby one wallows in self-pity & magnifies one's own problems beyond proportion? how far can you see? how far does your 'worldview' (to borrow a Physics term for lack of a better word) extend? no further than your own nose, or far enough to provide a balanced perspective of things? to give yourself a chance at thinking rationally? life can be like shit. but at least like all organic matter, shit decomposes =P

[140703] The Buddha said, 'No enemy can harm one as much as one's own thoughts of craving, thoughts of hate, thoughts of jealousy and so on.' - from 'How To Overcome Your Difficulties' by Ven Dr K. Sri Dhammananda, freely distributed by Kong Meng San Phor Kark See Monastery. other meaningful reading material can be downloaded in PDF format at their website.

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[030603] money is a fickle companion, but it stays longest by e side of those who truly understand & respect its value.

[140703]

Some people have the blessings of sudden wealth through chance or inheritance, but not many are endowed with the wisdom to protect it, conserve it or put it to good use. Anything that is not earned through the sweat of hard work tends to be squandered through abuse.
- Ven Dr K. Sri. Dhammananda

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[130503] for those who talk to me over ICQ/MSN, these 2 guys are who you've actually been chatting with, especially when I'm away getting a drink or doing something else:

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[080503] while waiting for e bus home at Kent Ridge terminal yesterday, saw a pigeon sleeping in, of all places, e middle of e bus bay. a bus came along & hit e startled bird, but though injured, it managed to flap away to a bush by a fence behind e bus shelter. out of nowhere a ginger cat appeared from behind Eusoff Hall, shot through a hole in e fence & got e pigeon by e neck.

e pigeon had to sleep at that time of e day. it had to sleep in e middle of e road. it had to be deaf to e roar of e bus engine & screams from 2 girls waiting at e terminal. it had to fly into that bush. e hole in e fence had to be right next to where e bush was. it had to be big enough for e cat. e cat had to be lying there in wait. just wasn't e bird's day, but definitely e cat's.

[200503] found a tiny green praying mantis (yellow & red eyes, a damaged wing & missing one hindleg) in SPS. on my way to release it at the plants around MD4 (fewer birds there to munch on it), saw a Calotes lizard on a hibiscus branch....with a much smaller lizard between its jaws.

[210703] last Saturday afternoon while waiting for the bus at Dover, watched a Calotes lizard run down from a tree to nab & wolf down a small cockroach. was a bit of a struggle for e lizard cos e roach was kinda big & struggling - by e time my bus came it was still in e middle of e pavement trying to get e roach down its throat.

[091003] on Tuesday evening, came across two mynahs sharing a black & white butterfly for dinner. first time seeing something black & white eating something black & white....zebras don't eat oreo cookies do they? =P

[010304] last Friday night after training, saw a lizard with a wriggling squirming struggling slug-like worm between its jaws trying to drag it up one of e pillars of e internal shuttle bus stop outside e former Kent Ridge Hall. e worm was at least twice e size of e lizard's head....can't imagine trying to drag something twice e size of my own head using just my teeth while climbing up a pillar, much less finish it in a single meal =P

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[040503] another nohohon, but not a cat: nohohon-zoku - this little solar-powered guy sits there holding a fishing rod, nodding away ever so peacefully

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[290403] impermanence, a concept that never fails to fascinate me:

Bare feet tickled by the powdery sand
Pressing footprints along the shore
A vain attempt to leave a testament
That I walked this path before
Will you remember
Will you remember me

My face on the water
Wrinkles with the tide
And vanishes from the ocean's silver screen
Like stars sprinkled in the sky
Forgotten when the sun appears
Will you remember
Will you remember

- excerpt from Will You Remember Me by Corrinne Foo

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[240403] latest 'craze' after my fascination with koi nobori: e little ornaments sewn from kimono cloth that people in Inatori, Japan hang during hina no tsurushi kazari matsuri, their version of the Doll's Festival

[130503] 'kimono cloth' drawstring flower sewn for Mothers' Day: closed configuration (left) & open configuration (right). couldn't find kimono cloth in Singapore, so settled for half-priced cloth remnants from Orchard Point Spotlight. no point buying metres of cloth at full-price unless I intend to sew a giant Rafflesia flower =P flower design pattern is from a Japanese book on traditional kimono cloth handicrafts from Ngee Ann City Kinokuniya. (thanks to Jinquan for his digital camera)

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[230403] have you heard e footsteps (hindpaw-steps?) of a cat? its one thing that never fails to amaze me....how they can come & go like your shadow

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[070403]
Only after the last tree has been cut down
Only after the last river has been poisoned
Only after the last fish has been caught
Only then will you find you cannot eat money

- Cree prophecy

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[050403] Found out at Action City (e Heeren Annex shop selling anime stuffed toys & figurines) that I share e same birthday as e Japanese cartoon character Astro Boy =)

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[300303] happy things:

one day Heidi & I walked into a giftshop at Centrepoint & got addicted to e scent in e air....walked around hunting for e source until we found a big fat scented candle burning near e cashier's till....

thanks to Kayla for introducing me to 'mochi ice cream' at Sushi Tei@China Square Central *grin*

[270403] even better: yuzu (Japanese citrus fruit that looks like small yellow mandarin oranges) ice cream, also from Sushi Tei =) extremely satisfied cat!!

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[250303] e latest cat I've 'adopted': Shima, a stuffed toy cat from e nohohon ('without a care') character series. according to e nohohon website: 'Shima ia a liberal, optimistic cat that expresses her emotion honestly. She is always positive and constructive.'

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[110303] something meaningful that e whole school was made to sing together back in RGS. think this song is from e movie 'The Land Before Time':

Don't lose your way with each passing day
You've come so far don't throw it away
Live believing dreams are for weaving
Wonders are waiting to start
Live your story, faith, hope & glory
Hold to the truth in your heart

If we hold on together
I know our dreams will never die
Dreams see us through to forever
Where clouds roll by
For you and I

Souls in the wind must learn how to bend
Seek out a star hold on to the end
Valley, mountain, there is a fountain
Washes our tears all away
Words are swaying, someone is praying
Please let us come home to stay

If we hold on together
I know our dreams will never die
Dreams see us through to forever
Where clouds roll by
For you and I

When we are out there in the dark
We'll dream about the sun
In the dark we'll feel the light
Warm our hearts, everyone

If we hold on together
I know our dreams will never die
Dreams see us through to forever
As high as souls can fly
The clouds roll by
For you and I

- Diana Ross

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[050203] yesterday was e fourth day of e first lunar month, year of e water goat. I left IMCB at 8pm after reading 15 journal papers on Xenopus & zebrafish early embryogenesis & gastrulation - when I looked up to e sky & saw e crescent moon, e first thing that came to mind was a zebrafish embryo at e end of gastrulation....

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[100103] my current research is on axon guidance, e process by which nerve cells grow in e correct direction to connect e right places: [1] what are e signals that tell e nerve cells to grow, stop, or change direction? & [2] how do e nerve cells receive & interpret these signals?

African clawed frog (Xenopus laevis) embryo, viewed under 40X magnification. actual size is less than 2mm in length, & I have to isolate spinal nerve cells from it.

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[080103]

The scientific explanation of one of Nature’s wonderful phenomena has never left it standing like an unmasked sorcerer who has lost his reputation for magic. The real causes are always grander, more awe-inspiring even than the most beautiful myths.
EKonrad Lorenz

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[311202] IBEN Neural Stem Cell Lab, after clearing up most of e evidence of our secret Christmas party (boss was overseas) *grin*

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[311202] e URA Parks & Waterbodies & Rustic Coasts Plan subject group: my experiment with S'pore civil society. picture taken at House No. 1, Tanjong Chek Jawa during our field visit to Changi Village, Pulau Ubin, Coney Island & Punggol.

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[201102] W.H.Y. crabs/prawns/lobsters turn red when cooked: their shells contain two pigments, blue (crustacyanin) & yellow, which together give e shell a greenish color. both pigments are proteins with e same carotenoid prosthetic group, astaxanthin. interaction of e crustacyanin protein with e red carotenoid causes it to appear blue due to some chemistry that I don't understand =) cooking e crab/prawn/lobster denatures e protein, releasing e red astaxanthin....only if some similar 'indicator' could be incorporated into all sorts of food to make it easier to determine if e food has been thoroughly cooked, much like e way we use pH indicator dyes & autoclave tape in labs?

- inspiration from reading Ann Rev Biochem 1997 vol 67:1-18 just before lunch

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[141102]
....creativity in science, as in the arts, cannot be organised. It arises spontaeneously from individual talent. Well-run laboratories can foster it, but hierarchical organisation, infelxible, bureaucratic rules, and mountains of futile paperwork can kill it. Discoveries cannot be planned; they pop up, like Puck, in unexpected corners.

....scientists are always wrong, yet they always go on. What makes them continue? Often it is addiction to puzzle-solving and ambition to be recognised by their peers.

....the technology needed to fill the mind with untruth, with a resistance to new learning and to anything that might conduce to improvement has been known for 5000 years or more and is known as "education."

- from 'High On Science', in I Wish I'd Made You Angry Earlier: Essays on Science, Scientists, and Humanity by Max F. Perutz

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[311002] what I made for my sis for her 22nd bday on Tue 22nd Oct 2002: she cut e birthday cake at 22:22:22pm =) made it in school & carried it over to Arts fac in a big fat black garbage bag that attracted plenty of stares from people on e internal shuttle bus!!

some childhood photos in Thailand, a place I miss very much

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[291002] bought a scanner on Sunday - something I've been wanting to do for e past 3+ years. some of e papercuts that I've done over e past 10+ years.

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[071002] been having extremely weird dreams. last night I dreamt of thousands & thousands of big fat penguins coming ashore at East Coast Park & charging inland along a canal running next to Siglap Link near Laguna Park & building nests along Marine Parade Rd. My family & I were standing at e Bedok South Ave 1 entrance to Bayshore Park, & my sis & I crossed e road to get to e penguin nests. e first nest we reached was on e grass verge by e pavement opposite Lagoon View, & apart from brown mottled eggs that were cracked & a few small skeletons, there was what looked to me like a yellow adult-sized human brain with blue veins. there was a RMBR (Raffles Museum of Biodiversity Research) guy in a blue T-shirt & jeans explaining something about that nest to another guy....

am not sure if this is e cumulative effect of: (1) reading about e WWII Normandy beach landings in one of e recent issues of National Geographic magazine, (2) seeing e big fat (almost a metre tall) stuffed toy penguin that Darwin brought to e SPS room, (3) reading about dissecting mice to obtain their brains for making primary cultures of hippocampal & cerebellar neurons, (4) celebrating Mid-Autumn Festival at Bedok Jetty along East Coast Park with my family - when we looked across e ECP highway to our old homes in Lagoon View & Bayshore Park, & (5) a recent bus ride that took me along Marine Parade Road & Bedok South Ave 1 - when I noticed e drastic changes along Siglap Link due to e new Victoria School campus construction site....

other weird dreams I had many years ago:
....of eating a single neverending strand of yellow noodle (e type used for fried Hokkien mee & prawn noodles) which flavour changed every 1 metre....flavours included chocolate, strawberry & vanilla....
....of coming across Cadbury chocolate for sale at $1.00 per 1 kilogram bar in a New Zealand Countdown supermarket, only to discover that all bars had expired some 17 years ago....

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[230702] "It was the poet Basho who wrote:

Listen! a frog
Jumping into the silence
Of an ancient pond
- Basho

Yet the phenomenon of a frog jumping into a pond must have been seen by many others. Down through the ages & in the whole world, Watt & Newton cannot have been the only ones to notice the steam from a boiling kettle or observe an apple fall. Having eyes, but not seeing beauty; having ears, but not hearing music; having minds, but not perceiving truth; having hearts that are never moved & therefore never set on fire. These are the things to fear...."

- excerpt from Totto-chan: The Little Girl at the Window by Tetsuko Kuroyanagi

[160703] till this day, Totto-chan still brings tears to e eyes each time it is read. hard to explain, but such is e frustration that remains this fresh - 12 years after leaving primary school, 8 years after leaving secondary school, & 6 years after escaping from JC. perhaps it is a curse to be in possession of a sentient mind, when trapped in such a damning environment. is it any wonder that my favourite periods in e timetable throughout those 12 years were PE & recess?

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[160702] went to Tokyo & Nikko National Park right after my honours exams in May 2002. stuff about e trip's here.

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[140702] earlier part of this page disappeared in a disastrous editing error back around 2000. by some miracle, managed to salvage the [211198] entry, but a good part remains lost on holiday to never-never-land. 'recreated' part of an earlier entry in an email to a friend, abridged version here:

DEATH. more than 4 letters, why is it such a dirty word? spent a great deal of time thinking about death when I was a kid, much to e consternation of certain primary school teachers who marked down my compositions where characters just had to die in e endings. I didn't & still don't believe that all car accidents that occur in primary school essays should have zero fatalities, nor that all murder attempts in that context should be unsuccessful.

death fascinated me as a kid, after seeing relatives & friends die, cos it's one of e few things in which all men seem truly equal. maybe grown-ups simply have a problem confronting & accepting reality. maybe because they are e ones who are closer to having to confront & accept (whether willingly or unwillingly) their own 'realities'? in a secondary school essay I once remarked that family photo albums aren't a true reflection of life - they depict only the happy moments like birthdays & weddings. why e self-imposed 'censorship'? glad that my mum doesn't have such hang-ups. she never hid me from relatives' funerals, & I remember her taking photos at a cousin's funeral.

don't see death as anything bad, but an integral part of life. stories have endings, pets die, snails get crushed underfoot on pavements, speeding cars kiss stray cats e wrong way, leaves fall. life is transient, people come, people go, like actors entering & exiting life's stage.

April - June 2001: with each trip to e NUH RTC, new faces appear, wondering how long or short ahead e road is for them. & at e same time old faces disappear - some faces, having completed their course of treatment, will reappear with gifts to thank e staff & fellow patients & their relatives for e emotional support over e months, & continue on e road ahead of them. others faces, having reached e end of e road, will & can never appear again.

many seem scared of death, be it their own or other people's. is it because we humans are such control freaks (our craze with technology, conquering nature etc), smthg in which we seem to have no control over (eg. death) freaks us out? or because humans are greedy, with our insatiable want for more of everything, be it $$$ or life, & are unhappy when we can't get e limitless amount we wish so hard for? maybe that explains why so many cultures have legends with e recurring theme of e quest for immortality. people always ask for answers, but I wonder, why must there always be an answer?

have you tried to make e most of your life? living without regrets, not waiting till tomorrow to try smthg new tt you have e chance to try today, not passing up chances to 'make memories' cos that's what lasts long after e people are gone, & be happy despite living in a world where there's always unhappiness around us? or have you been so caught up with life you've forgetten how to really live? will you realise this only when it's gonna end?

"Belief in our mortality, the sense that we are eventually going to crack up & be extinguished like the flame of a candle, I say, is a gloriously fine thing. It makes us sober; it makes us a little sad; & many of us it makes poetic. But above all, it makes it possible for us to make up our mind & arrange to live sensibly, truthfully & always with a sense of our own limitations. It gives peace also, because true peace of mind comes from accepting the worst."
- Lin Yutang, The Importance Of Living

first read this passage in Reader's Digest in 1991, when it was still relatively affordable to read. & it has stuck with me ever since. anyway I think it's good to think about death, too many ppl sweep it under e carpet, & conveniently forget about what I think is an important part of their life. when time's up, I want to die happily =)

[151203] In this lifetime, we die only once, so do it well - Phra Paisal Visalo

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[210602] These pictures were taken almost exactly a year ago during my attachment to Dr Peter Lobie's lab in the Institute of Molecular & Cell Biology (IMCB) under their Summer Research Programme.

early morning in the lab

four Moorhuhn 2 addicts - this is e lab where I picked up e game

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[051101] http://habitatnews.nus.edu.sg/news/chekjawa/ 198?-1991:
used to spend Saturday nights at a prawn farm on Pulau Ubin, but stopped going there when I was about 12. 10 years have passed but can still remember the boat rides through the mangroves of Ketam channel and the snakes and giant millipedes in the sea below the toilet (a small hut at the jetty with a large gap in the wooden floorboards). can't remember the exact location of e farm, but if you walked straight out, Yihua quarry would be to e left. on e right would be a giant quarry pool with conveyor belts that loaded rocks onto barges, a house surrounded by mangrove trees, and further on would be a bridge over Sungei Puaka. e house was a wooden one, not unlike e type that my maternal grandpa built in Yio Chu Kang, except tt it was much smaller. this place was e closest thing to e old kampung at Yio Chu Kang that I could find.

1998:
returned to Ubin after 7 years, this time for fieldwork (GE2220), studying hillslope erosion processes: rilling, gullying, earth movements, soil creep, slope angles, vegetation cover, drip tips, drainage etc. *e roads are PAVED?!* e Ubin of my childhood's gone.

2001:
returned to Ubin again with mixed feelings. wanted to see Tanjung Chek Jawa with friends, but after 1998, would rather remember Ubin as it was in e '80s than shock myself further. glad I made e 300901 trip in e end. went there in e late afternoon, found plenty of e same plants that grew wild in e old kampung at Yio Chu Kang, plenty of cats, a few flattened ex-frogs & one ex-flying dragon (Draco volans, & caught a fat toad (Bufo sp.) while waiting for friends at e jetty. walked to house no. 1 in e moonlight & slept on e front porch while waiting for e 4am low tide (0.6m). we waded in barefoot & explored e chek jawa mudflats by torch - there were tonnes & tonnes of sea stars piled up on e sandbank, plenty of tiny fish & shrimp playing hide & seek with us in e seagrass, ball sea cucumbers, sponges, carpet anemones and crabs. enough to make me return again on 201001 & in Nov & Dec 2001 despite e mad rampage.

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[170901] http://www.mpg.de/english/index.html Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Science
combines 2 of my loves - great Science (including entire institutes of e society devoted to 'esoteric' fields like Aeronomy, Extraterrestrial Physics & Chemical Ecology) + great Architecture (of some of e various institutes' facilities)

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[080901]

finally got down to creating links to one of my favourite sports. NO I do not play the game.... started watching matches back in 1995 during e World Cup (won by e Springboks) while doing A Maths homework & got hooked - far more gratifying to watch than soccer, which now seems sedentary by comparison.

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[020401] While waiting for e internal shuttle bus on e steps of e overhead bridge, spotted an abandoned bird nest in e tree above & black-naped orioles (why do my friends ALWAYS think of oreo cookies when I mention this?!) darting amongst e trees =) e last 'memorable' nest I spotted was back in Stanford, along Serra Street, with a bunch of noisy nestlings being fed by a parent.

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[290301] "Those who rely upon e arc, e line, e compass & e square to make correct forms injure e natural constitution of things. Those who seek to satisfy e mind of man by hampering it with ceremonies & music & affecting humanity & justice have lost e original nature of man. There is an original nature in things. Things in their original nature are curved without the help of arcs, straight without lines, round without compasses, & rectangular without squares; they are joined together without glue & held together without cords. In this manner all things grow with abundant life, without knowing how they do so. They all have a place in the scheme of things & ... [e scheme] may not be tampered with."
- transl. by Lin Yutang

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[290301] "A little chicken sitting comfortably in e henhouse without a care in e world was startled by e appearance of a man & ran away. When it came back e man was gone but there was some corn lying on e ground. Having a degree of scientific curiosity e chicken began to watch & it soon noticed that when the man appeared e corn appeared. It did not want to commit itself to any theory in a hurry & watched e sequence 999 times. There were no exceptions to e rule that e appearance of e man meant food, so it swallowed its skepticism & decided that there must be a necessary connection between e man & e corn. In e language of casuality this meant that whenever e man appeared e corn must appear. On e basis of this conclusion it went out to meet e man on his 1000th appearance to thank him for his kindness & had its neck wrung."
- Marcus Long

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[250301] (left) e scrunchie & hairpin holder (fish) & (right) e cat that got e fish! Thanks 2 Xuelin for taking these pics =)

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[041102] KEVII wushu team 041098, Circuit Road

[250301] KEVII wushu @ 3rd National Wushu Display 1999, Singapore Indoor Stadium. Thanks 2 my sis 4 scanning these =)

[130604] more photos from e KEVII wushu performance at e 3rd National Wushu Display on 4th July 1999 from Boy Tanto:

[160702] KEVII wushu exhibition Feb 1999, Far East Square. thanks to Darwin for use of his scanner.

[050403] KEVII wushu @ Parco Bugis Junction on 260103

[260803] members from 6 out of e 10 batches of KEVII wushu, from 97/98 batch all e way to e current 03/04 batch:
[left] @ Bayshore on 090503, & [right] @ KEVII lounge on 140803

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[210301] just found out that there is a 1704m tall Mt. Huaying in a red karst area of the Sichuan Basin, Sichuan province, China.

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[210301] "Observe the cormorant...Why is it that of all the different vertebrates the cormorant has been chosen to slave away day & night for the fisherman? Were the bird not greedy for fish, or not efficient at catching it, or not readily trained, would society have created an industry to exploit the bird? Would the ingenious device of a ring around its neck, and the simple procedure of squeezing the bird's neck to force it to regurgitate the fish have been devised? Of course not"
- Siu, R.G.H.

"We too are prime candidates to be exploited to serve someone else's ends if we are talented, have the ability to learn...& are greedy. Ironically, these are precisely the qualities that our schools, professions, & employers strive to instil in us. Without self-awareness and a clear sense of self-identity, these same qualities will gradually but surely put us on the path to becoming a cormorant, not the path with a heart."
- Hall, D.T. & Mirvis, P.H. (1996) The Career Is Dead - Long Live the Career. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers. p22

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[140201] got frog #9 & #10 today =) makes it a total of 8 stuffed & 2 plastic frogs, including 3 from San Francisco & 1 from Melbourne.

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[031200] finally bought Asterix - the 5-in-1 compilation! & of all places, from e NUS Forum Co-op...

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Got hooked on Russian literature while reading on World War II & the Stalinist era in sec 2. First encountered Pushkin, Solzhenitsyn & Blok in 'Within the Whirlwind' by Eugenia Semyonovna Ginzburg (1896 - 1977), on her life in the Kolyma gulags.

The Flower

A flower shrivelled, lacking fragance,
Forgotten in a book I see,
And instantly my soul awakens,
Filled with a curious reverie:

When did it bloom? Last spring? Or earlier?
And for how long? Where plucked? By whom?
By fingers alien? Familiar?
And why put here, as in a tomb?

To mark a tender meeting by it?
A parting with a precious one?
Or just a walk, alone & quiet,
In forests' shade? In meadows' sun?

Is she alive? Is he still with her?
Where is their haven at this hour?
Or did they both already wither,
Like this unfathomable flower?

- Pushkin

(transl. Genia Gurarie)

I want, I want madly to live
To immortalize all else that lives,
Make human all that is faceless,
Make real again dreams that have faded...

- Aleksandr Blok

Whether I Wander Along Noisy Streets

Whether I wander along noisy streets
Or step into a temple dense with people,
Or sit among fervescent youth,
I give myself over to my fancies.

I say: the years will flash by,
And, as many of us as are to be seen here,
We will descend beneath the eternal vaults -
And someone's hour is already near.

As I gaze upon a solitary oak,
I muse: the patriarch of the woods
Will outlive my forgotten age,
As it outlived my fathers' age.

When I caress a dear young child,
I am already thinking: farewell!
I yield my place to you:
It is time for me to wither, for you to flower.

Each day, each year
I have come to usher out in fancy,
Of my approaching death the anniversary
Intent to guess among them.

And where will fate send me death
In battle, while roving, in the waves?
Or will the neighbouring vale
Receive my dust frown-cold?

And though to the unfeeling body
It is all one where it decays,
Yet near as may be to the dear environs
I would still like to lie at rest.

And at the grave's portals,
May young life play,
And indifferent nature
Shine with everlasting beauty

- Pushkin

e message in e last 4 lines of e last verse, which Ginzburg quoted in her book, was what made me hunt down e full poem -

'life goes on....'

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[130400] Here I go again =) exams soon, & busy with this page. Started on a new link on my trip to California almost a year ago, & guess e focus will be on the architectural aspect of it....something that would never have crossed the minds of the folks at VIA (who organised the Trans-Pacific Exchange programme)?

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[030400] From letters to MUI:

"Humans tend to pay more attention to what they don't have; have rather than what they have. [100200] Just one of e little 'thoughts' that I scribbled down in this exercise book. Decided that I should start recording all e stuff that crosses my mind in moments of boredom, daydreaminess & serendipity. Realised that a fair bit of my thinking is done when on buses or when I'm busy ignoring lecturers."

"...e 3 questions that I keep asking myself: where am I, where I'm going, & where have I come from. It's kinda like taking stock of things, charting my future course, looking back to see what can be learnt from what has been done & e consequences etc; a way of checking to see what direction am heading in, how far I've come, what I've accomplished so far."

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[310300]From The Importance of Living by Lin Yutang (translated):

"There is always plenty in life to enjoy for a man who is determined to enjoy it. If men fail to enjoy this earthly existence we have, it is because they do not love life sufficiently, and allow it to be turned into a humdrum routine existence....I think he [Lao Tze] taught the renunciation of the life of the world exactly because he loved life all too tenderly to allow the art of living to degenerate into a mere business of living."

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[080200] The sequel to TPE....at http://www.geocities.com/gahbay/tpe/.

[150205] VIA (Volunteers in Asia), the people behind TPE are at www.viaprograms.org

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[020100] I am happy because life has been interesting. It has been uproariously funny, & it has been immensely sad; it has been inexplicably strange, & it has been dosed with an entertaining amount of irony & satire. Chance & coincidence have conspired to light things up & keep me from dozing off. I've yet to run out of things to learn, & I guess it'll never happen; there's just an incredible load of stuff out there. I guess I'm satisfied =)

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[260799] participated in e Trans-Pacific Exchange to Stanford in May. had a wonderful time in a place I've always wanted to live in. more details in e webpage that Ying Loong created.

[160702] finally got my pics scanned: https://www.angelfire.com/wi/huaying1/tpe.html

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[090299] been neglecting this place. anyway, just got myself a snake from IKEA. had been eyeing it for quite some time. finally caught (bought) it!! *grinz* been collecting IKEA catalogues for many years, love their ideas & designs.

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[211198] There's this patch of 'xiang si shu' forest facing East Wing, an eerie juxtaposition of life & death with trees struck dead by lightning & bleached white by e sun standing in e midst of their living counterparts. Walk past it along Prince George's Park Rd on my way to Arts fac. My route takes me past e colonial bungalows that line e road, past e Institute of Molecular Agrobiology (IMA), Bizad fac & Hon Sui Sen Memorial Library (HSSML), Guild House, Temasek Hall & Shaw Foundation Building (AS7), ending in GEOLAB on level 2 of AS2, Dept of Geography. Along e way I pass 2 long drains that run down e slope of e ridge. After heavy rain water flows down in torrents & it sounds like a real gurgling stream. Just love e sound of flowing water. e 2 trees mentioned above are old raintrees with spreading bunches covered by thick moss, bird's nest ferns & staghorn ferns. Have spotted squirrels on them, as well as e resident flock of chatty bulbuls. Growing near one of e drains is a patch of heliconia, my favourite =) Often spot a kingfisher there, most probably e one that frequents Cafe 9 too. Many have seen this pair of sulphur-crested cockatoos near KE VII, and watching e sunset from e east wing B3 corridor I usually see e sea eagles flying sorties in e reddish glow.

[071102] e forest has long given way to e by now not-so-new PGP student housing complex; here are pictures from e pre-PGP era:

KE7 west wing, from staircase nearest B301	Pasir Panjang wharves, from other end of B3 corridor

Prince George's Park Road: I love tree-lined winding roads where grass grows right up to e edge, just like in storybooks; people are so obsessed with building & racing along straight 'characterless' roads	my favourite tree: ferns, squirrels, bulbuls & all	perfect picnic spot off Prince George's Park Road

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