argh......

man, there sure r times when u feel like u've been living a life thats completely different frm wat u've been wanting..... when everything u did recently that comes to mind seem like mistakes and/or failures......

guess this is juz another phase. of adjustment, growing up, i dunno....

relly hv 2 start picking up the pieces of my life b4 they get buried too deeply in the mess im making for myself.....

i want to.....no, im meant to be here to make a difference....better start working towards that end instead of...getting sidetracked.....

im still here

ok, so i havent blogged for a long time. will update u guys on my er....recent escapades shortly.....mebbe in a month or two haha.

meanwhile, a bunch of international students here in osaka uni (me included of course) went on a trip to Shiga prefecture, sponsored by the sch as part of the effort 2 promote understanding n appreciation of japan's historically n culturally significant tourism spots....bllablabla....so here r the pictures:

http://picasaweb.google.com/handairyugakusei/

p.s. the site was set up by a fren. pics taken by me r posted on the 'shao thing' album.....obviously im too lazy 2 hv set up a site like this by myself hahaha

wtf....serious dota addicts out there......

now this is wat i call creativity in advertisement hehehe....

too bad those dat dun play dota will neva understand......

mai kuraki

man.......会いたいぜ！！！！

juz a little note

他に気づいてならなかったことは、ビデオの内容はほとんどアメリカにおけるものであることです。例えばTV　Newsでのニュースもアメリカで放送されたものです。しかもビデオで出る話はほとんどアメリカ英語のアクセントを使っているようです。確かに日本で教えられているのはアメリカ英語で、そのアクセントなどに早めになれたほうがいいのですが、ほかの「風」の英語も少し入れて聞かせておいたほうが全面的だと思います。全面的というのは、英語のいろいろな発音のしかたに馴染んで、聞き取れるようになることです。世界の国ごとに英語の発音には訛りが異なっているので、もっぱら正統アメリカのアクセントしか聞き取れないとほとんどの場合はその英語が使えなくて、聞き取れないのです。例としてヨーロッパの外国人に出会ったとき、ヨーロッパの英語の訛りはアメリカのとかなりの違いがあるから、困るかもしれません。

a temporary note juz in case the mail i sent to myself fucks up the encoding again...hehehe

so i cant sleep again....big deal

damnit, ever since the 1 week of hols last week, ive been having trouble sleeping on time. 'on time' as in, before 3am (i do hv classes in da morning so hv 2 get up at 9.30 latest n catch d damned bus ya noe...!)

n 2 top it off da stupid weather's been nothing but rain these days.....n u guys out there, trust me when i say u wun wan 2 b in osaka during rainy summer days....its so fxxking humid dat even if d temp drops 1 or 2 degrees, u get all sweaty n sticky da moment u step out of d protective 'cone' of a fan......argh.....not 2 mention wet slippery ground n dat drowsy, lazy semi-nostalgic feeling dat pops up at d most inopportune times n takes away ur will 2 study.....

n 2 top things off, yesterday i committed a serious error in karate. punched my senior whack in the face. 4 those who duno karate sparring rules, face-punching is a no-no; tho it does detract from d 'realism' of sparring, thus raising a few questions about d effectiveness of sparring as training 4 real combat.... anyway i juz shot out my arm in a purely reflex action n apparently hit da senior hard enuf 2 give him a nose-bleed serious enuf 2 warrant a trip 2 da sch clinic. argh, i feel so foolish now.... hopefully its not gonna affect my future in da club.....


anyway. lately been wasting a lot of time. watching anime, watching movies, playing starcraft. getting a little sick of pushing myself so hard i guess. yeah, no 1 ever sed attending uni in japan after only 1 year of jap language edu is gonna b easy, esp when theres already such a big difference in standard between msia n japan, at least in d maths field. but when i came here i was determined 2 fight. now, sumting feels drained out of me....dun feel so motivated anymore sumhow......even tho i keep telling myself theres only 1 month left 2 go so i MUST push on....

blame it on d weather i guess. n according 2 forecast, still 1 whole week of fxxking rainy weather ahead. duno y i'd always been so sensitive 2 d weather anyway. n yeah, i wasnt affected by rain during spring, autumn or winter. guess its becuz only rain in summer gives d same kind of gloomy oppressive feeling dat rain used 2 give me back in msia.


neways. nothing of particular interest but....1 of d movies i watched recently was 'love actually'. its actually quite old n ive had quite a few recommendations 2 watch it b4, tho i only recently acquired it (thru d 'usual' malaysian way of course :P). u guys noe how i hate romantic movies after all. anyway it was my 1st time watching it (i neva watch movies twice 4 dat matter) n yet it was oddly tinged wif...hazy nostalgia. made me think of stuff dat happened long ago. n i cant help but marvel at d way time passes n ppl change, yet d past remains so firmly anchored in memories......

damn, anyway, note 2 self: avoid romantic stories like the plague. at best they're a waste of time n at worse they're demoralizing n sets u thinking bout stuff dat dun hv relevance anymore. n u cant hv dat when u'r trying so hard 2 live in d present.

two farmers

lately i've been worried by a certain change. after living in an environment where u'r surrounded by japanese-speaking ppl all day, having to speak, write, LIVE in japanese, i've found that my ability in other languages hv degraded to the point of being physical. yesh, im actually losing the ability to speak clearly in english n chinese...!

not saying dat i was ever a bestowed wif crsytal clear speech, but im sure no 1 ever had trouble understanding me unless i was spouting gaming jargon. nowadays, my speech is so seriously slurred n full of mangled syllables dat sumtimes i pause n repeat myself juz 2 assure myself dat i can actually pronounce those syllables right. n sumtimes indeed i cant!

its all the fault of the pronounciation structure of the japanese language. they hv so few syllables dat if u speak almost exclusively japanese for days on end, muscles used in pronounciation of other sounds will eventually deteriorate. at least, thats my hypothesis (Shao Thing's Rule)

well anyway, gotta sleep soon. so, the mean topic of the post as follows:

2 farmers, Ah Seng n Ah Beng. Ah Seng is hardworking, Ah Beng is seen by some as a slacker. Ah Seng works hard on his plot of land, consistently watering the crops, weeding, taking care of his crops from morning till night. however, the crops seem sickly n do not flourish as expected, despite Ah Seng's best efforts. meanwhile Ah Beng doesnt do anything wif his plot of land. then one day, Ah Seng gets fed up wif all the hard work and abandons his crops. Ah Beng, seeing an opportunity, comes in n takes over the plot of land. within a few weeks, the crops matured n Ah Beng had a good harvest, despite only taking care of the crops for a few weeks compared to Ah Seng's months of sweat n toil.

now, a smart aleck wans 2 noe, does Ah Seng or Ah Beng deserve the harvest? Ah Seng DID put in tons of hard work, but gave up the crops in the end (understandably he wudnt b too happy if he found out dat Ah Beng took his harvest tho). Ah Beng was lazy n slacked off on his own crops but it was his intervention that prevented the crops from dying after Ah Seng abandoned them. n perhaps he had better agricultural talent as he managed 2 achieve good harvest in a short period.

oh, one last thing: apparently the crops kenot b 'split equally' or indeed, split in any way. they must b ALL harvested by one person only.


now, its a lame metaphor for sum stuff (read: drama) dats been going on here in japan, but im not d one who came up wif this story/riddle, n im not endorsing it or anything. juz feel like hearing d opinions of d masses....heheh. opinions, comments, questions etc welcome (adds sum life 2 my blog too :P )

customer service in japan

is extremely good. as some of u might hv heard, i was quite pissed off at my camera a few months back becuz of sum dirt that has sumhow made its way into the lens (no amount of blowing wud remove it). so for a while (quite a long while in relation to the period of time since i bought it) i had speckles showing up on the screen whenever i zoomed in wif my cam.

to cut a long story short i finally decided i had enuf of it. i mean com'on, i paid 38000 yen for this camera (it was top of the line when i got it), n i was taking inferior pictures....no, not juz inferior, totally SPOILT pictures....cuz of the disgusting black splotches that faithfully popped up whenever i used optical magnification. so i took it to the Canon Service Center in umeda (thats the osaka equivalent of shinjuku btw) a few weeks back (i was in umeda attending a dinner at which our prime minister...yeah, the big Pak Lah! was present...hehe...actually he held that function for all of us malaysian students in the kansai region of japan).

(desire to blog fades off....)

so i left it at the service center....din dare 2 ask how much it wud cost, although it was still within the 1-year warranty period.....n today went there again 2 pick up the camera, n hey presto! good as new. most importantly, the repairs din cost me A SINGLE YEN! well, considering i had to travel to n fro by train, it cost me about 500 yen....way less than the repair shud! according to the repair description, they actually replaced the entire optical unit, which wud explain y the scratches on the outer lens i made when attempting to fix the problem myself were absent. btw, it turned out that there was nothing wrong wif the lenses, but rather the dirt got itself stuck to the CCD unit inside the camera.

funny thing was, such repairs were explicitly stated as NOT being covered by warranty as they involve (usually) carelessness on the customer's part.

duno if this is related or not, but i remember dat even shortly after i got the cam, it was already showing odd splotches whenever i took pictures of distant objects at night wif flash. as in, the flash doesnt quite reach the object so its not illuminated, but instead the dirt on the lens/ccd shows up bright as day. juz a random thought, move on.

anyway, kudos to canon customer service, n in fact customer service in japan in general. malaysia has lots to catch up in this regard....

another random sketch

tada......computer art at its finest

created wif: mspaint, logitech g5 gaming mouse n lots of talent ;-)
suggest a title, any1?

Spell: Resurrection

2000 mana and 40000 gold later.......i managed to get my hero - no, blog - resurrected at last!

rejoice ye ppl, ravenlord's back to pwn, uh, blog! now, onwards to the world tree!

shao thing hates kids

damned kids!

last night i went to a party n took two shots of vodka with sprite.....turns out dat was enuf to temporarily mess up my system, even tho i managed to cycle home in one piece. reached home at 1.30, by the time i fell asleep it was over 3.30am......duno how time juz flies when u'r sleepy n yet not willing to sleep -.-

note to self: if tired, dun go browsing wikipedia for useless information such as the differences between a machinegun n a minigun. juz SLEEP! uni is no place to wake up tired n sleepy.

n this morning, the kids frm neighbouring houses HAD to come out n play n scream n such!!! darn it, kids r d same d world over, whether msia or japan. i JUZ DETEST KIDS.

so i was woken up at 10, one hr before my designated wake-up time (by careful analysis of past experiences, ive determined dat the optimal sleep-duration is 7 1/2 hrs). by the time i managed to fall asleep again (after shutting the window n cutting off my supply of fresh air) it was 10.30. consequently i woke at 11.30, n wif enough of the so-called 'sleep inertia' dat i totally cant remember anything i was thinking juz a while ago. fark.

(INFO-SCIENCE: when a person's normal sleep pattern is interrupted and he is made to wake, a phenomenon known as sleep inertia manifests in which a person may be physically wide awake n alert, hence being unable to go back to sleep, but his mind is in a total state of unreadiness and he has difficulty focusing, recalling or utilizing short-term memory, among other temporary mental disorders)

all becuz of the kids! n probably in part to the alcohol i consumed last night, however.

on a side note, the management at osaka university of international studies shud really fix that stupid old clavinova in their lounge. the pedals WONT WORK!

music? martial arts?

something occurred to me today.

in learning to play a musical instrument, for example piano, there are two ways to go about it. the first is to learn it the 'classical' way, as i hv done - learn everything from the ground up, spending years building a solid 'foundation' while slowly improving one's skills. thats the traditional way of learning.

the other way is to learn the 'popular music' way. in a much shorter amount of time, one learns only the essentials needed to listen to or read popular music n play it on the keyboard. by focusing on the 'useful' things, in this case the ability to play music that is pleasing to the ears, n omitting everything else that r not directly required for playing popular music, such as musical theory n overly technical finger exercises, one dramatically shortens the time it takes to 'achieve' a certain level of piano-playing skill.

in my case, i learned to play the piano the 'classical way'. no complaints about it....while i cant exactly label myself a 'pro', im at least able to play moderately difficult pieces quite satisfactorily, n hv even tried my hand at some difficult pieces with some level of success. but i noe of ppl who, despite never formally learned piano the classical way, r able to play popular music quite impressively. thus proving that we do not necessarily

so why did i suddenly bring up this topic? actually, this post is not about music at all. its about martial arts.

ive started learning martial arts at too old an age. as such, i'll never be able to hv 'martial arts flowing thru my limbs' the same way piano works for me....no matter how i train from now on, martial arts will never be a 'part' of me the same way music is. not to mention time and energy contraints that increase as a person grows older and finds himself loaded with more and more academic responsibilities, inevitably followed by even greater work responsibilities. which makes achieving a high level of martial arts proficiency thru the 'classical way' impossible.

however, as in the world of music, there r faster ways to learn martial arts. one can take only the bare 'essentials' of combat n focus on those. basic, efficient n effective techniques, physical fitness. these r obtainable in a shorter period of time than the complicated, 'deep' philosophies of traditional martial arts. n while it can be argued that the deep foundations laid down by years of repetitive practice of traditional arts can give an edge in certain ways, learning systematically saves time n allows late-starters to catch up to a limited extent i guess....

so, onwards to glory!!

disclaimer: please do not read if you are allergic to nonsense.

not quite

okay, i suppose i'll put one more post here b4 i go. sumhow sumting inside is screaming at me to at least go thru the past year n put up some stuff so that someday i can look back at my first year in japan n smile in reminiscence. n ive got lots of photos that, notwithstanding having cost great effort in their taking, have not been looked thru even by myself! (to future self: probably no one's ever gonna read this post, well no one i noe anyway, but still, feels good to put down my thoughts on paper. even if the paper is electronic...heheh)

well anyway, this 'one more post' is not THIS post, cuz theres no time for it tonight. heck im already 45 mins past my self-fixed bedtime.

n shit, has my english degraded to the level of fish. or shit. or watever.

the End

well, i suppose u all saw it coming. i was toying with the idea for a long time but juz cudnt put my foot down n do it. anyway, its over. this blog i mean.

there had been good times, i suppose, but the maintaining of a blog juz weighs a little too much on my mind. i mean, everytime i encounter something blog-worthy, i feel obliged to blog about it, but other things get in the way (blame it on my laziness if u will...), n i almost always end up blogging about last month's events, or even further back.

this has been going on too long n reading my last few entries, i realise this can hardly be called a blog anymore. its no longer serving its purpose of informing anyone who might be interest about wats happening here in my life, n instead has 'forced obligation' n 'false resposibility' practically printed between the dreary, monotonous, vague lines.

i had been considering starting over, but if i do so, it wun be wif this address anymore i guess. mebbe i'll do as dan does...2 blogs, one for photos n coverage of events, n another to write my rubbish on. we'll see...

anyhow, its been a while! looking at the early pages i find memories of who i was a few years back, n man hv i changed! for the better i hope. THAT is wat a blog is for...THAT is why i created this blog in the 1st place. n thats what its ceased to be. before it rots anymore with pages filled wif meaningless narrations, i should say sayonara.

いてくれて、ありがとう


p.s. oh nevermind, theres too many things to add should i begin...so i'd rather not

p.s.s. juz cant resist doing this, last homage to my old posts