A void:

They took all the trees and put them in a tree museum
And charged the people a dollar and a half to see them

Dont it always seem to go
That you dont know what you've got till its gone...

Big Yellow Taxi :: Counting Crows
Sculpture By The Sea 2007

Hair Harakiri

After months of being totally stingy, I finally cut my hair. It was getting too long and a pain to wash/tie up(on account of being too heavy!) This Before-After picture is for Vijay who will kill me (or sue me? I cant remember) if I didnt do otherwise.

The korean hairdresser goes, "your hair is very straight!" Thinking it would make it easier to cut, I said "thats a good thing right?" She said, "NO! Very Hard!"

"When you make mistake, it is big mistake!" Hahaha.

Good Food Month Noodle Markets

The annual Sydney Good Food Month rolls around again, with their famous noodle markets out for business for 2 weeks. The stooges and I havent got together for ages so we decided to have dinner at the noodle markets at Hyde Park. It was massive! There was heaps of stalls selling a variety of asian foodstuffs (not just noodles). Thai, Malaysian, Fusion, Japanese, Himalayan... all were there. Heaps of seafood stalls (mmm salt and pepper calamari!) as well as a bar which sold your usual alcoholic beverages (wine, beer, premixes).

The four of us went abit crazy buying everything that caught our fancy. We had ginger chicken udon, some noodle and green bean thing, satay chicken noodles, curry puffs, takoyaki, okonomiyaki, a mixed rice dish (from the himalayan shop - it had tandoori chicken...drool!). By then I was feeling quite full, but could have eaten more if I pushed myself. However, the 'Dutch Poffertjes' signboard has caught our eye, and we were unwilling to forgo dessert for more savoury food.

We lined up for ages for the 'Dutch Pofferjtes' (very very fluffy small pancake looking things in a variety of flavours). The only thing not so great about the noodle markets was the fact that they only had 2 dessert stalls. There was the pofferjtes shop and the ice cream parlour. Hence, the lines were incredibly long. However, the pofferjtes were absolutely a.m.a.z.i.n.g. We got 'maple' and 'chocolate strawberry'. The maple pofferjtes was my favourite dish for the night. Having scoffed them down (far too quickly), we lined up once again to indulge in some ice cream. I had chocolate fudge, and very very yummy it was! Complete with a Copenhagen-esque waffle cone. Tasty....

The whole ambiance was really nice. They had strung chinese lanterns and various other balloony lantern things on the trees and stalls. Many of the trees twinkled with fairy lights, or were dramatically lit, bottom up, with rich purple, blue or green hues. They also had some mild chinese acrobatics show mid evening, followed by non-specific upbeat music. The air was warm, the company was great, the smells were enticing and the food was delicious. It all adds up to one of the best evenings Ive had in awhile.

The cherry on top of the icing was the thunderstorm that hit us (suddenly!) as I was walking home. I love thunderstorms! I love the smell of an approaching storm, I love the sound of driving rain, I love the distant rumble of thunder and most of all, I love the sudden intensity of lightening flashing across the sky. I got home soaking wet, but I reckon I wouldn't have it any other way.

oh my deities!

This is another fantastic reason why I sometimes wish I had studied in America.

sob!

Soysperiment

Mang and I got to talking about soy one day and we were going to do this experiment at Mando after church last Sunday but I forgot to bring the English Soy (ES). So I just bought some Chinese Soy (CS) at Miracle Grocery Store (hehe) and conducted the experiment on my own.

I first wanted to see what the overall difference was in terms of taste and texture, so I drank it and observed its opacity etc:

Chinese Soy Drink	English Soy Drink
Milky white with specks of white	Smooth milky white colour
Sweet with strong soy taste Doesn’t taste like milk at all	Milky taste with a hint of musky soy taste Tastes abit dusty
Lighter consistency Does not thicken saliva after consumption	Slightly thicker consistency Thickens saliva after drinking

These two drinks taste completely different. Their processing methods must be worlds apart. On its own, CS tastes better and, in fact, its not appealing to me at all to drink ES on its own. So in this instance, Chinese Soy wins.

Out of curiosity's sake, I also mixed the Chinese and English soy drink. It was definately more palatable. The strong CS flavour is what you taste, but you still have that saliva thickening after-effect found in the ES drink.

Then I thought I would try it with a rather bland cereal, like Weet-Bix:

Chinese Soy Drink	English Soy Drink
Tastes sweet and refreshing, like eating a dessert!	Tastes alright, like normal milk with a dusty soy taste, rather bland
Makes me think of Chinese banquet desserts	Makes me think of business suits

Again, Chinese Soy wins.

Finally, since sweet cereals are also a common foodstuff eaten with milk, I thought I would try it with Honey Stars, a wonderful honey flavoured sweet cereal which I brought back from Malaysia:

Chinese Soy Drink	English Soy Drink
Tastes abit weird! I don’t think the strong soy flavour and the honey flavour of the cereal mixes very well	Tastes alot like normal milk with a soy after taste
Sweet to the point of artificial	Nice and sweet
Makes me think of bright Mattel toys with lead paint on them	Makes me think of… honey stars

On this point, I have to say that English Soy wins. And in fact, I think the strong, sweet CS flavour would prolly not go with alot of flavoured cereals. I would prolly stick with ES when eating these foodstuffs.

Overall, Chinese Soy tastes heaps better than English Soy. However, I suspect that its also because CS has alot more sugar and is prolly not as healthy (think diabetes and added calories!)

I asked SA, who loves tofu and soy, about why some CS drinks are white and some are green. She replied with...

"maybe green soy milk is flavoured with pandan or something..? Or maybe it's just past its use-by date"

Insightful.. Thanks :P

Negative Observations:

I was trying to log into my LJ account, but no luck since I had forgotten the password. So I browsed some of my old blogger entries for a clue (still, no luck!). I have observed that:

1) I am less hyper and random nowadays

2) I have become many of the things I had hoped not to have become

3) I should have got that backup degree like I said I should just in case this degree didn't get me a job (and waddaya know, it hasn't!)

4) I seem to have been more proficient at writing back in those days. Abit more flair for dramatic writing, you could say. Now I just write concise, to-the-point sentences to convey mere facts. Nothing else. How scientific I have become. And yet not scientific enough. I have the worst of both worlds. No wonder I can't get a job. +.+

Also, I have heard much about this video embedding tool which blogspot has recently put up. I will now attempt to use it and test it out:

Peanut Butter & Celery

One day I was talking to some of my Furc friends and the food object "Peanut Butter & Celery" came up. Often recieved as a lunchbox snack, it has become abit of a common snack item for them. Most of these Furc friends are american, but I believe there were aussies who agreed that PB & C were common and tasty. Of course, being the foodie that I am, I just had to try it out!

I got myself some celery (which fortunately was cheap), slathered on some PB and had a go. Hm. I'd have to say its really not that great. The flavours from the celery and the PB did not mix. It was like you chewed and you had pockets of celery taste, then PB taste, repeat cycle... the flavours did not blend at all. And I think the food items did not even physically blend despite extensive mastication either. o.O

My theory for this is that celery is mostly water, and PB is mostly fat/oil. Thus the polar properties of the celery and the non-polar properties of the PB rejected each other, forming sort of macroscale emulsion in my mouth. Very disturbing. I would eat the celery on its own. And the PB on its own. But PB & C . . . i think ill leave that alone. Might have to be abit of a nostalgic thing for them. *shrug*

Rate: 4/10

You know whats awesome...

Lemsip is awesome. It really is. <3

And now, some irony.

Stop being Ridiculous kthx.

I very rarely ever read news about Malaysia but this one happened to be on the Sydney Morning Herald. Its such an emotional pain and drain to read about Malaysia cos nothing good ever comes out of it.

1) Can the government please at least teach the representatives of Malaysia to be grammatically correct? Even if 80% of our population subscribes to bad English, you politicians who represent our stricken country should be able to at least give a good impression of our country

2) Can the government please stop being so racist!? Close the wealth gap?? Thats cos the Malays lack motivation to invest in the endless opportunities and riches you government spoil them with. Mahatir was not a fool when he said that the Malays were being pampered into complacency. The few Malays who are clever enough to rise above that are very rich. How come you still give them unfair opportunities? Why should 'closing the wealth gap' involve how you treat different races as supposed to how you treat individuals with sufficient incomes?

We now have direct access to God!

So I had a chat with iGod today. He's not all that he's cracked up to be. I doubt the person who made this was a Christian. Either that or he was more interested in getting this in than being theologically sound. It's highly entertaining though :) Sorry the picture is bad.

Knowledge

I've always been someone who treasured knowledge. I like knowing things. I like reading about things and retaining that knowledge. This usually only for things that interested me, however. Sometimes I would force myself to read something I didnt like, but I never could retain knowledge for those topics so I found that to be a futile sport.

I was very happy with this arrangement and enjoyed consuming books and books of information. The past 2 months, 2 people have mentioned that knowing for the sake of just knowing isnt a good reason to learn. On both occasions I had nothing to say. Its true that learning for the sake of knowledge doesnt lead anywhere, like the Dead Sea where water only runs in but not out (and hence its incredible saltiness and lack of life forms).

One remark was, "Knowledge puffs up". A well known verse in the Bible and one which I have read the remedy for. Apparently what you need to do is to use that knowledge and live it out. Or teach it. Use it and dont just keep it for the sake of archival interests. The reason I was stuck for words on that occasion is because I was thinking, "does this mean you should stop learning until you have managed to live out what you learnt in that one time?"

I have since come to the conclusion that that would be a rather silly way of getting about for a number of reasons:

1) change happens very slowly and waiting until you have completely changed your ways or applied the bit of wisdom/information would retard your growth. Maybe you would have mastered one deformity of your character by the time you died, but you would have neglected the rest out of ignorance

2) when you allow yourself to slack off, you fall into a habit of laziness and your brain becomes rusty. What a waste of intelligence. And if your character will not allow you that vice, you end up pouring your energy into things that are meaningless and worthless, especially in terms of eternity

3) if going to conferences and talks for the sake of knowledge isnt good enough, then what DO you go to them for? Fellowship - well isnt fellowship in the church sufficient for the reflection of the heavenly ekklesia? Why do you feel like you need to seek more? Why is this reason a better reason than going for knowledge?

I probably could think of more reasons if I thought for long enough but that would be a waste of my time because its essentially finding fault in something which I feel is wrong already anyway. Hence, my opinion is that learning for the sake of learning is perfectly fine because I doubt that all that knowledge will be solely retained for the sake of pride anyway. I do admit that I am a rather proud person, but somehow I doubt that the most of it is due to the little knowledge I own.

I will not stop learning, even if the opinions against it came from good friends of mine. We are all human and subject to folly. For this issue, I stand firm in learning as much as I want and can, even if its for the sake of wanting to know more.

Song lyrics

I was talking to Mandaliet about song lyrics and stuff. About how I place a high importance on lyrics cos I reckon alot of songs sound similiar otherwise, and too few songs would stand out. He reckons he chooses based on music over lyrics cos even in English, alot of lyrics dont make sense anyway. He then mentioned he drew a comic about it once. I think the comic is funny cos its SO TRUE. Those lyrics are real btw. Click on the comic to go to his comic site. Manda is a funny panda :}

isnt it funny how kind a stranger can treat you sometimes. you become completely taken aback and wonder how much of God exactly was placed inside humankind at Creation...

Justified Existance

I was scribbling in my diary last night and had a sudden revelation about achievements and the motives behind it. Pete mentioned in his sermon yesterday that life is not meaningless, that its full of meaning because of what Jesus has done for us. And that our labor now is not in vain because we have a glorious hope that is true and unfading.

With that thought and the pressure to find work swirling in my mind, I lamented about how I had wasted about 8 months of life now, with nothing to show for it. I wondered why I was so obsessed with the 'big'. Why I always wanted to produce something worthwhile and admirable with my time and energy. Then I thought, maybe its because I want to justify my existance. I want people to look at me and confirm that I am an assett and not a waste of space/oxygen/steak.

Thats when the revelation hit me.

My existance doesnt need justification because it was God who ordained it. God created me because He loved me enough to want to be in a relationship with me. So in a sense, because I was made to serve & glorify God, to be in a relationship with Him and to submit to His kingship, I dont have to justify my existance. Its already justified. It was justified the moment God chose me before the creation of the world, and continues to be justified everytime I live the way God wants me to. I dont have to prove my worth to anyone.

However, just because I dont have to justify my existance doesnt mean I dont have live responsibly. Human agency demands that in the 'eschaton' or 'end times', I will have to stand before the rightful and almighty Judge and give an account as to how I've lived and what I've done with the gifts He has given me. Hence I should make sure I do my best to live up to His expectations so I dont dissapoint Him too much, and so that He will be pleased with my life.

At the end of the day, the goal is more or less the same. You want to live life the best you can by remembering the purpose you were made for. Differences are:
(a) Christians know their purpose whereas non-believers have none. To them, life truly is meaningless.
(b) What 'living the best we can' looks like
(c) The motives behind not wanting to 'waste our lives'

Your Inner Color is Blue

Your Personality: Your natural warmth and intuition nurtures those around you. You are accepting and always follow your heart. You in Love: Relationships are your top priority, and this includes love. You are most happy when you are serious with someone. Your Career: You need to help others in your job to feel satistifed. You would be a great nurse, psychologist, or counselor.

What's Your Inner Color?

N.B. Actually, I'm pretty cross grained and don't always follow my heart, otherwise I'd be a vet today. Also, if relationships were my top priority then I'd be desperate but seeing as I'm not, then thats out also. I do like helping others in my job. Nurse and counselor not really. Maybe psychologist. One website said 'Mastermind'. Muahaha.

Remember how I said some people think God is out to make mischief? Check out the ad:



hehehehe. so funny.

a little NERVous...?

This is the logo for the NERV company in Evangelion. I wonder if any of you have ever had a close look at it, and noticed what it says. It says,

" God's in his heaven, All's right with the world".

The company motto seems to be implying that as long as God minds His own business, then everything will be fine. I can see why some people think that. Some people see God as this bored, reclining greek-esque god who is looking down on Earth to see what kind of mischief he can cause for his entertainment.

Although NERV's company motto seem philosophically sound, almost romantic for those pseudo-emo poets, it just simply isn't true. This is basically why:

1) God made everything good and perfect. However, we humans decided that we've had enough of God and want to live our own way. So we reject God, ignore and neglect Him, and run our own lives.

2) As a result, we are a race that does wrong, sinful things. We lie, we cheat, we hurt other people, we give in to temptation, we ultimately seek to honour ourselves over and above everyone, especially God. The world is falling apart.

3) God still loves us and yearns to be in a relationship with us. However, God is perfectly good. He is holy and cannot tolerate wrong doing. So...

4) God decides to do something about this by sending His son, Jesus, to pay the price of our sin (death). By doing this, we appear righteous in God's eyes and we can finally and joyfully fulfill what we were made to do: be in relationship with our Creator and to glorify Him. Btw...

5) Jesus is God Himself, come down to Earth as a man to suffer for us (He is both fully man, and fully God). In this way, He understands our deepest hurts and needs, and satisfied God's wrath against our rebellion by dying on the cross. Oh, Did you know...

6) Jesus is one day going to come back down to Earth again. And when He does, He's going to make everything perfect. As it should be. No more hurts, sadness, anger, misunderstandings, folly, worry. No more death. Except for those who never took the time to accept His gift of eternal life. They're .. well... going to Hell i guess.

If you had followed the arguement up to here, you may see that the only way things will ever be "well with the world" is if God personally does something about the way we are now. We have obviously done a crap job of it despite trying for thousands of years. What God did was to come out of "his heaven" onto our earth and provide a way where we can be right with Him again.

In short, the Absolute Truth pwns NERV. You fail it NERV! Skill is not enough!! >)

Earth Hour 07

The picture on the left is a photo I took of the Sydney CBD skyline during earth hour. The one on the right was taken on a normal night. I guess Earth Hour was a success in the short term, but it hasn't really made any long term improvements on energy usage. It was a cool idea though. :)

Jesus, I'm ready to come home...

Underoath :: Some Will Seek Forgiveness, Others Escape