Where have I been… part II

PREVIOUSLY ON ‘WHERE HAVE I BEEN’

Touchdown in Brunei…good to be home….wait…what’s this? a black van appeared out nowhere at the airport parking…three masked men rushed out..put a bag over my head and took me to an unknown location…WTF?!

***

Hello there! Haven’t heard from you for awhile

*wakes up* wtf?… WTF! Where am I?! Who are you?!

I’m just an interviewer

An interviewer? What kind of interviewer are you huh? Kidnapped me…

Don’t worry, everything is going to be fine…

and tied me to this freakin chair! And put me in this dark room?! WTF!

Don’t worry…we just want a chat with you. So how’s everything?

Fine fine..just finished my exams and..by the way, I passed, well, not that you care…

Congratulations..

..and I’m back home and..oh yeah, and I’m now tied to a chair being forced to do an interviewer with you..whoever you are, so yeah, everything is FINE~

So now that you have nothing to do, I guess you’re returning to blogging right?

I don’t know and why should you care?

So you’re busy with other things then?

Not really..aside from being tied up!

..but you’re doing things other than blogging right? I mean..If I remember correctly, you started the blog because you were in a long holiday..

Yeah, school ended and I was waiting for to get to Uni  and..

And you were bored out of your mind and so you created the blog..

Yeah exactly..

..Trylobyte’s Corner on wordpress

..boredom leads to creativity, that’s what I like to say..I think I’ve wrote that somewhere in my blog or maybe it was in the old blog..

You are referring to the old MSN space page right?

Yeah..this one…’Boredom leads to creativity’ one of those stupid random quotes I like to say..wait how the hell do you know that? How the hell do you know a lot of things about my blog?

Because I’ve followed your blog for a long time, you could say I’m the biggest fan of your blog

Biggest fan? Hahaha..you? A fan?

What? You don’t appreciate your readers?

I do but a fan? A fan of this blog? THAT IS JUST SAD

You don’t believe that there is someone who is fan of your blog?

nop…People search, they stumble upon posts I’ve made, they read it, they enjoyed it..well, i hope they did..and then they leave AND THAT is how things go with this place…no fans

I’m sorry to hear your pessimistic view

Well good for you, so~ mr.’Fanboy’..why don’t you untie me and let me go

I can’t do that

why not?

because I have few things to ask you…you know…catching up on things…

***

Click more to see the rest of this odd interview as Trylobyte touches on various topics such as Twitter, Facebook, TV and other random stuff. AND find out the shocking end of the interview that you just have to read it yourself to believe!!!

Web update

Hello! Just want to say that I’ve finally updated the ‘Top Post’ page. Now known as ‘Essential posts’, it’s where I’ve compiled posts that I think showcases what I’ve been blogging about for the past year. I think it might help those who might want to read through the blog but couldn’t be bothered to browse through all the archives. The posts are categorised into 4:

• Milestones – include any posts related to any milestones achieved (eg. visit counts, anniversary, etc)
• Personal – posts that are heavy with my opinions and ideas.
• Movies – movie related posts
• Episodic posts – Series of inter-related posts that I made
• Others

Click here to go to the page

or you can find the link at the menu bar above

The page is still under contruction

A post about the lack of posts :-P

It has been almost a month since I posted in this blog. The reasons?

Essays
Self explanatory.

Too many ideas
Make that too many ideas that go nowhere. Usually I have an idea for a post and start writing but quickly got bored of it.

LOST
‘Lost’ is back in its fifth season!! and that means going back to my routine of spending 50% of my internet time with things related to LOST. The six episodes have been aired so far were amazing.

Facebook
yup…I’m in Facebook. Just started few months ago when my friends forced me to open an account. Hey you know what? maybe I should make a post about Facebook…

Lazyness
Perhaps the underlying reason for the lack of posts. Hell, you can even cross out all the other reasons mentioned above.

Happy Holidays :-)

Sorry for the lack of update lately. I’ve been busy with assignments/essays and I thought ‘maybe I should start writing some posts again when my term holiday starts‘ yet when holiday started, blogging was the last thing on my mind hehe. Just want to say that I don’t think I’ll make any post till the New Year because I’ll be in London doing…well…things besides blogging that is.

Anyway, Merry Christmas to everyone (everybody celebrates Christmas…the commercialized version of it at least) and enjoy your holiday!

One year Odyssey…

I just realized that few days ago (November 15) marks the first year anniversary of this blog! Holy F***! It has been one year? A year ago I was bored and sitting in front of my computer while starting this blog. Now…I’m still bored and sitting in front of my computer writing this post…some shit never change

Anyway, thank you to all those who viewed this blog (all 126,214 of them) and those who left comments, I appreciate it, it kept me ‘blogger sane’ because then I know somebody actually read what I wrote (especially during the early months of blogging).

When I started this blog, it wasn’t my intention to make it a big thing or anything….wasn’t really all that into the so called blogging community….but I have softened a little bit…..I like to thank those who, to my surprise, actually bothered to link this blog - my family, my friends, some people that I’m not that close with but actually come here once in a while, some I’ve exchanged comments online with and some that I don’t even know…..ok, maybe the last one got bored and removed the link to my page but yeah I remember his URL pops up once in a while in my referrers stats :-P

The story so far…

I was planning to write an overview on the posts I made since last year but I remember that I pretty much wrote about it in my previous post. So I’m just gonna copy and paste it here:

Some of my earlier post were more personal like the one I wrote about my story idea or the recurring dreams. Even the post about Battlefield and WWE were also personal. I think I should do those personal posts more often rather than being preoccupied by movies. My friend even called my site a movie blog. WTF

I also remember how at the beginning, I said to myself that I’m not going to talk about politics. Blah! I guess I failed in keeping up with that promise. Another promise that I sort of broke was the one that I stated in my About page.

…post about things that interest me…..anything that’s part of the Pop culture that I find necessary to post about (no I’m not going to talk about Paris Hilton and Britney Spears, you can find that somewhere else)

On second thought, I did not break that promise because I did not talk about them. I just posted their pictures

Recently, I made few posts on my country Brunei. I just thought that I needed to write something related to Brunei or maybe it’s just another way to balance out all those movie related post.

I’ve also noticed how I began to write more episodic posts (eg Part 1, part 2). Several reasons; either the original idea of the post was too long or I was just lazy to finish the post and hold it off for later. Examples of this can be found here, here and here.

Oh and one more thing, I realized that I have only reviewed one book. Man, I haven’t read any novels for a long time. I’ll try posting a review of books that I have read. (fiction or non fiction).

I wrote that back in March and I have little to add to it except for few things I did since March like:

• I made several pranks on this blog like my april fools joke and rick rolling people
• Made some education related post like this one about the Arts and another about studying
• ‘Live blogging’: for both the opening and closing ceremony of the Beijing Olympics
• And of course, my journey to UK and the random things goin there

In a way, I think I’ve pretty much made a wide range of posts (from a serious one to a really totally random post).

So what’s coming up?

This is what I’m planning and hopefully get done.

• Finish my ‘Trylobyte Odyssey Portal’ page that I was planning to finish by November 15 lol (more on this later)
• Restructure my ‘Top Post’ page. It’s outdated now.
• Publish this post that I’ve been thinking about in the past few days
• Hopefully adding more links in my links bar/blogroll.

If you’re interested in some random statistic facts about my blog then click ‘More’ at the bottom of this post. In the meantime I’ll leave you with Coldplay’s ‘Lovers in Japan’. No reason….just felt like putting up a video at the end of this post hehe

Beijing Olympic Closing Ceremony – random live thoughts

Update 25/08/08: Photos courtesy of ChicagoTribune.com

Just like what I did with the Opening Ceremony, I’m going to post some random thoughts as I’m watching the live telecast of the Closing Ceremony. I would be lying if I said that I’ve been following every events from this year’s Olympic games in last few weeks. All I know is that the Singapore Table Tennis team won Silver, Rafael Nadal won Gold for Tennis, Malaysia got Silver for Men’s Single Badminton, Jamaicans breaking records and China taking the rest of the Gold medals (except those that were obtained by Michael Phelps of course ). Anyway, the closing ceremony will start in about half and hour (BTW, I’m in Brunei so the Timezone is pretty much the same).

8:01pm: Here we go!! The raising of the Chinese Flag accompanied by the national anthem. A presentation on the big screen. A group of drummers wearing bicycle helmets (ok???!!). They get surrounded a larger group of girls forming a circular formation looking like the Sun. WOah two giant floating drums. FIREWORKS! CGI? hehe

8:12pm: Stupid commercial! A group of guys ‘cycling’ in a circular wheel enters the arena. The helmet guys are gone and out comes 200 bouncing men!! They seem to be wearing those special artificial leg that were always used for runners with disability. WTF Commercial again!

8:16pm: Flags of the participating countries arrive. I see East Timor, I see Spain, I see Trinidad, I see Swaziland. Since I was 5, I’ve always been fascinated with the world maps and countries so I’m familiar with the flags and the location of most of the countries in the world. Commercial….

8:25pm: The athletes comes out accompanied by a group of Chinese ladies in red drumming. And there’s also a young kid in the middle with a drum set. There’s also a little girl too…I think that’s the same one with the fake singing from the Opening ceremony.

8.36pm: Victory ceremony for the Marathon event. Kenya get a Gold,Morocco get a Silver and Ethiopia get a Bronze. It’s followed by a presentation for the athletes volunteers and children volunteers.

8.49pm:the raising of the Greek flag. Greece hosted the previous Olympic games in 2004. Speech by president of the Chinese Olympic committee and the President of the IOC.

8:59pm: Raising the UK flag accompanied by the familiar British national anthem, God Save the Queen.

9:03pm:The Olympic flag is lowered and the Chinese choir is singing the Olympic anthem. Out comes the Mayor of London. Mayor of Beijing is handing the Olympic flag to the Mayor of London. That’s a big flag…they carefully try not to aggressively wave it .

9:10pm:Haha The familiar double Decker London bus is here! Hmmm..I think this is a just a taste of what o expect for the opening ceremony at London in 2012; more of an Urban performance than the more traditional Chinese performance. The Double Decker bus transforms and out comes Leona Lewis and Led Zeppelin’s guitarist performing. Again, I think this is just a taste of what to expect from the opening ceremony of 2012 London games; a ceremony that is more like an ultra mega concert with various mega stars. Not saying that would be bad thing. OOOH DAVID BECKHAM!!! HAHA He kicked the ball and one lucky Chinese guy (one of the volunteers) catches it.

9:20pm What’s this? Three people climbing up the staircase like those that you see for aircrafts. They stopped and look at the giant torch. You see highlights from the games on the upper walls of the bird’s nest stadium. There’s also two half naked guys (painted in gray) in the middle of the arena doing some expressive body movement. Cue dramatic music followed with a Capella by Chinese girl and the flames from the torch disappears.

9:25pm: A large Babel tower like structure in the  middle of the arena covered with people dancing. A group of guys just ‘walked’ vertically up the tower and WOAH!! The guys hanging on the tower forms a red rose. Nice! The guys creates a human spiral thing around the tower. The tower is then covered with red sheets and…wow! umm…wow! those stripes of red sheet starts to float creating….wait wow Fireworks!!!…anyway, where was I? Oh yeah, those stripes of red sheet starts to float creating this web-like/spider-like formation around the tower…Ok maybe that’s not the best description. I will update this post with photos

9:32pm:Performance by various Chinese artists. Beijing, Beijing! Wo Ai Beijing! The song goes something like that. Is That RAIN?! The Korean singer who’s recently finding some fame in the US with a role in the movie Speed Racer and his “dance off” with Stephen Colbert.

9:36pm:a group of Chinese girls comes out and looks like they are lip synching a song but I don’t care about that :LOL: . Commercial again.

9.40pm:back from commercial and BAM! I see a George Lucas look like on screen! Haha This George Lucas look a like is singing an Opera song with a Chinese lady. Ok, a quick search and I found out that the George Lucas look a like is Placido Domingo, Spanish-Mexican Opera singer.

(Photo by Julian Finney/Getty Images AsiaPac)

Another performance by various international artists with a group of performers floating in the air. Is that Gong Li?? Ok it’s not Hehe WTF Haha! Astro (Malaysian Cable Tv) keeps showing a lot of commercial. If I remember correctly, there weren’t that many commercial during he opening ceremony. Back to the ceremony and the arena is now suddenly crowded…see that’s why I hate commercial coz you miss stuff. The mascots are there; the guys are hanging around the tower; the different ethnic groups are there; …woah  wait…fireworks!!! MASSIVE!! Is this the fireworks to end all fireworks?

9.54pm: The ceremony officially ends but there are still fireworks. See ya in London

9:58pm: Wait, I heard that Jackie Chan was there…I didn’t see him! Oh well, that is what happen when you’re watching and typing at the same time or when there were commercials every minute So I guess that’s it! Time to change the channel…hmm…ooo, Apocalypto on StarMovies and it just started! Haven’t seen the movie so..yeah, I’m watching it now. Good night!

You may be interested in my post about the Opening Ceremony

Update 25/08/08: Photos courtesy of ChicagoTribune.com

Beijing Olympic 2008 – random live thoughts

Update 9/08/08: Photos courtesy of Boston.com

I have nothing else to do but watch the live telecast of the opening ceremony of the Olympics in Beijing on TV. I’m a bit late though because I was enjoying myself watching, out of all movie, Home Alone in another channel BTW, I’m in Brunei so the Timezone is pretty much the same therefore the time that I put are the same as the time in Beijing.

8.07 pm: Wow..the Olympics rings made of lights starts ‘floating’ in the air.

8.08 pm: A brave 9 year old girl in red singing (is that the national Anthem?) while kids dressed representing the 56 chinese ethnic group carrying the large flag of China. Kinda nice to see the costume of the different ethni groups. Flag raising ceremony. Ok nvm..this is the real national anthem of China. This is my first time hearing it..kinda short. Massive fireworks!

(update 13/8/08: There’s a big fuss about how it wasn’t the lil girl in red’s voice that’s singing but some other girl. Turned out this girl got replaced by the one we saw during the opening because she was much more cuter. I had two reaction when I read this piece 1) Duh!! I remember how it looked really obvious that the lil girl was lypsynching 2) So? It’s understandable, they needed the ceremony to be perfect. To achieve that, they not only just needed a perfect voice but also a perfect look (as in bleeding our eyes with the cuteness of little chinese girl)

8.13 pm: Massive glowing scroll in the middle of the stadium. Wow, ninja looking guys painting the scrolls while dancing/making expressive body movement. Really Graceful. This must be a pain in the ass to choreograph!

8.20 pm: Hundreds of Confucius look alikes carrying bamboos. A wave of blocks with Chinese characters. BTW, those blocks are being handled by humans not a machine which makes it more impressive. The blocks are now forming the famous Great Wall of China, easily the most recognizable landmarks in China. Haha! The guys who’ve been handling the blocks just revealed themselves and wave to the crowds and smiling. I just find it funny They seem to be enjoying themselves (What am I saying, of course they would be enjoying it, it’s the opening ceremony of the Olympics) .This is followed by a Peking Opera performance, if I’m not mistaken that’s what you call it. All dressed in Orange.

8.31pm: A lady dancing on top of a giant scroll being carried by a lot of people. Yes, she dance on top of a giant scroll! According to the commentator, the performance is about the history of the silk Road, a famous overland trade route across Eurasia. The tale of Marco Polo popularize the Silk Road. Now it’s about the maritime exploration. Pictures of Chinese pottery, majestic ships (like the one used by the famous chinese Muslim explorer, Cheng Ho) and there’s a man holding an ancient compass just one of the few amazing things that the Chinese civilization gave to the world. It’s kinda cool seeing how the wonders of Chinese civilzationor history have gained appreciation in recent decades. The world is beginning to recognize the richness of Chinese History.

8.40pm: Poles decorated withgolden dragon rise up from the floor with each pole having a lady on top of it. Add some epic music and..OMG Fireworks!! WOohoo!! Epic!

A guy and cute girl playing the piano in the middle of arena. Man, that girl is f***ing lucky! People dressed all green doing the wave. Wait, their clothes changed colours. Their glowing too and forming a white dove that changes colours. Again, a pain in the ass choreography especially since their doing this in the dark and onl relying on their glowing shirts.

There’s a kite being flown by a little girl flowing in the air. It’s the same red girl that sang in the beginning of the ceremony…Oh sorry, it’s not Haha

8.50pm: Yes! Martial arts time!! The lady is doing Tai Chi I think. Oh wait, we’re back to the kids, ok??…oh wait back to Martial arts Yeah!! All dressed in white and doing Tai Chi. School kids in the middle of the arena paintingthe floor while surrounded by men in white doing Tai Chi. Kinda cool, like these tough ass guys are protecting these cute Innocent kids. Nice, the lights are now orange making these martial art guys glowing like the sun.  Colourful animation of birds flying on the big screen as the school kids jump around in excitement.

9.00pm: Astronaut!!! Is that the Chinese astronaut himself? Anyway, a giant dome like structure rises up from the floor. Wait, not a dome but a giant blue ball!! hmm.the music souds like ET music? Steven Spielberg? I remember Steven Spielberg was involved in the opening ceremony right? But he pulled out because of Darfur or something. Who cares…Anyway, the ball turns into planet Earth with bunch of guys ’skating’ on the surface Really cool!

 

A female and a male singer singing on top the giant ball. A chinese guy and a..sorry, didn’t catch her name Sarah something. I’m sorry if she’s well known and I don’t know about her. Pictures of kids from different race and nationalities from around the world. Fireworks!!! Woohooo!!! Spectacular! leave it to the Chinese when it comes to spectacular fireworks.

WOW, people from differrent ethnic groups dancing at the arena. I see Tibetans! Yeah! You know with all the recent HooHar! about the Tibet issue and how some of them want to boycott the Olympics, it’s kinda cool to see the Tibetans here.

9.10pm: What’s that about Brunei? Anyway, Greece comes first because they hosted the games before this. Guinea is next, so it’s not in alphabetical order, probably start with G then H then so on. Oh wait, I’m wrong, Turkey comes next so there is no particular order.

(Update 11.31pm: It’s in alphabetical order but following the order of Chinese characters instead of the English alphabet)

9.16pm: Malawi Hehe..I remember one of the house that I lived in back when I was in Japan used to be the embassy of Malawi. Just some small random thing that’s all. Bhutan!! I remember how the king recently agree to abdicate when after a general election. Belgium….ummm…French fries actually came from Belgium not France Hehe I know, random info. WTF commercial!!! Good it was short and we’re back with Israel and Shimone Perez is here. Japan!! Japan and China have an ‘interesting’ relationship over the years. TAIWAN!! No wait, CHINESE TAIPEI!! Boy, where should I start with the history of these two nations. Commercial again!! Must change channel from Astro to the local channel if it’s even showing.

9.20pm: Oh I just found out that Brunei didn’t register in time. That sucks…Oh well…Ukraine looks cool with the blue jacket and all.

9.34pm: Palestine! Timor Leste! Yeah for underdogs

9.40pm: India and Indonesia! Taufik Hidayat! Badminton

9.55pm: Iraq and Iran back to back

10.01pm:Angola.. I knew this kid from Angola. He was new to the school at that time so I didn’t know his name at that time. So during his first PE, I was in the same Basketball team as him and I stupidly call him black guy as in..”hey, where’s the black guy” Of course, it wasn’t intentional but you know, I just sort of blurted it out by accident and I realized how stupid I was shortly after I said it. Luckily, he didn’t get that mad so later I decided to make up for my mistake by getting to know him. He told me his name and that he came Angola. Just for the sake of having a conversation, I started asking him about the Angolan Civil War because that’s the only thing I know about his country. Very Awkward Haha!

10.05pm: Libya has the best flag. Just plain Green and it’s my favourite colour.

10.21pm:I see Bush with binoculars. I hope he knows how to use it this time Hehe

10.27pm:U! S! A! U! S! A! Bush with his wife. Speaking of Bush, I’m really curious about the new Oliver Stone movie about Bush that’s coming out later this year titled ‘W’. It looks stupid yet interesting. The actors don’t even look like their counterparts yet who cares coz the most important thing is the acting.

10.52pm: North Korea. How come they don’t walk together with South Korea like they did in the last game That was cool.

10.56pm: Singapore. Yup I knew it, the flag is carried by that famous Singaporean Table Tennis player, Li Jiawei. I was in Singapore during the Athens 2004 Olympic Games and was cheering for her to win. But unfortunately she got 4th place which is not bad anyway.

(Update 10/08/08: I found out that she’s getting some heat due to way she carried the Singapore Flag.)

11.01pm:It’s interesting how the Chinese have a different way in calling the name of the participating countries. For example, just now the Chinese announced Mexico with something that sounds like “woh chi ngo” or Tajikistan where he call it something that doesn’t resemble the original name. It’s similar to Malay, we have different names for countries like Greece (Yunani), Spain (Sepanyol), Egypt (Mesir) or United States (Amerika Syarikat)

11.08pm:CHINA!! YAO MING!! and a little kid who survived the recent great earthquake. Nice! I bet China will win this year! Very Proud of China.

11.21pm: Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer…I see Kobe Bryant

11.26pm: Speech by the President of Beijing Organizing Committee. Subtitles? Welcome to Beijing, I only understand that.

11.36pm:President Hu Jintao officially opening the games. FIREWORKS!

11.42pm: The Olympic flag carried by veteran athletes from China. The five Olympic rings represent the five continents of the world: Africa, Asia, Europe, Australia and Americas (combining North and South). By the way, the colours of the Olympic rings doesn’t correspond with any particular continent (no, black doesn’t represent Africa )

11.53pm:The Olympic torch finally arrives. Running up the stairs now. Wait, is this guy going to fly..Hahaha Yup! Like Superman!! That’s f***ing high! I would’ve piss on my pants and it would be dripping on the audience hehe…what…too graphic for you guys? ok, sorry Nice, he’s walking around the upper walls of the Bird’s nest stadium. Oh shit, it’s close….oh boy…..woah! HAhAHhaha *cue dramatic music* The flame is on!! FIREWORKS!!! Nice shot of the stadium. It’s like a warzone down there!

12.09pm: Just as I heard the name Jackie Chan, they have to cut to the commercial Haiya!! Oh he’s singing and Karen Mok is there too. For those who find it weird that Jackie Chan sings, he actually contributed to the soundtrack of many of his Hong Kong films like City Hunter and Police Story. Click here for more

12.19pm: I guess that’s the end. Good night (at least in East Asia that is). Will probably put some official photos of the opening ceremony in this post tomorrow to make it look nice. And about Brunei not being included in the Olympics…well…it sucks I guess. Expect it to be a major topic here tomorrow.

(Update 10/08/08: The local Olympic commitee released a press release and later the Ministry of Culture, Youth and Sports released theirs on the local papers. There’s also a possibility of a sanction or fine for Brunei. Oh well, a wake up call is what we need anyway.) 

Update 9/08/08: Photos courtesy of Boston.com

Unrated edition

I just found this site where you can find out the rating of your blog (R, Pg-13 or G). I decided to test it out and got this:

OnePlusYou Quizzes and Widgets

Haha!! And how did I get the rating? According to the site, I wrote (well at least on the first page of this blog):

shit (4x)

ass (3x)

dick (2x)

crap (1x)

ROFL!! OK~  What can I say..I guess that’s how I talk and it makes me laugh that the test gave me a R Rating for words like ‘Shit’ and ‘Crap‘. Yeah, those words are inappropriate, I agree but it’s not bad as ‘F***‘. See, I always censor the F word in my blog. I know some people don’t apply any type of levels for these words and for them Shit and F*** are treated equally (as in “they’re all bad words, not one is more worse than the other!”).

You know what, I want to talk about offensive/inappropriate language. Not going to be a balanced essay type of thing showcasing the bright side and downside of such language. No no no, screw that! If you want to read those type of stuff, you can find it elsewhere. This is just my random thoughts on personal experience with using this type of language.

Click more for the rest of the post. Some people might not want to read stuff filled with swear words so I hid it. At least it’s not password protected (Pfft~ password protected post~ I hate those things. Why bother posting if you don’t want to share it).

Random short post

I’ve only posted 5 posts on the month of May. I’ve been busy last month with few things such as…my brother’s wedding!! So yeah, big stuff with lots of ceremonies and events. Any wedding photos?? I’ll try to put it up here later.

Anyway, the thing is that hopefully I’ll be able to post more this month.

I support the Arts :-)

Several things that led me into writing this post:

• I watched a recent episode of LOST and it showed, through flashbacks, how one character, John Locke, struggled with an identity crisis when he was young. He wanted to be a hunter and loves sports, cars and boxing. But what he didn’t realize was that he was trying to be someone he’s not. The idea of “who you are” vs “who you want to be” intrigued me.
• I listened to a news over my local radio about a musical performance by school band held recently in one of the local college. Kinda cool to see how nowadays students in my country are getting more opportunity with doing music in schools.
• A conversation I had with an old friend about school. Actually, it was more like listening (reading actually, it’s a chat through MSN) to him releasing feelings he hid had during high school. It was all ’this sucked and that sucked, that girl was hot and that guy was an asshole, that subjects sucked but that one was good, etc 

All that led me here; writing about Arts education (music, arts, drama, etc). My stance? I strongly support the Arts being part of the education. First of all, I want to make it clear that I’m not what people consider the Artsy guy. If you were to place me in one of those cliche student type, it would be the more academic inclined group (or a nerd lol).

So if you’re more of an academic person then why the hell would you give a damn about Arts programs in school.

The obvious reason is that I pity those who have talents in the Arts but feel wasted when they are forced to face academic subjects. I have a lot of friends who just give up with studying and take pride when they fail a test. One of my academic leaning friend called them ‘gila’ or ‘palui’ (crazy or stupid respectively) but I see them as simply expressing their frustration (or maybe I’m wrong and they really are bunch of dumbasses). But that very same group of people are musically talented and funny as hell (they could be great actors). Another friend of mine told me once how his mom wanted him to go to the local university but he didn’t want to. His reason? “Blajar lagi tu!!” (I’ll have to study again!!). What he really wants to do is take a course in cooking and become a chef (he’s actually good at cooking). So I think a greater emphasis on the Arts education could help these students. Although I don’t expect to see subjects like music be compulsory in local schools in the next few years, I like how schools are opening up to it with students having more opportunity in showcasing their musical talents.

So is that your only reason Trylobyte? Don’t tell me you support Arts because you feel sorry for the other people who didn’t get good grades as you?

Ok, that is not my only reason. My other reason, more of a personal reason, is that I have a soft spot for the Arts. Like I already mentioned, I would be categorised in the the more academic inclined group aka nerd. But i don’t believe in those lame labelling type. I believe we all have that nerdy, artsy and more ‘physical active’ side within ourself but it’s just that some sides are more dominant than the other. This brings back to that scene from the latest episode of LOST that I mentioned in the beginning where Locke refused to believe that he has that nerdy ’science camp’ side to him.

I have a soft spot for the Arts because I sorta admit that, not trying to brag myself, I do have some talents or interest in  the Arts rather than the usual academic stuff. I don’t know how to read musical notes but I like of musical scores (especially movie soundtrack scores). I’m not a great artist but I do enjoy drawing comics (i used to do that a lot in school. I remember planning to scan and upload those comics here but some of them are offensive so nevermind hehe). I’m not an actor yet I don’t realize that I do ‘acting’ when I make jokes to people.

Let’s start with visual art. I like drawing when I was a kid because it had something to do with the way you can create your own world. If you want a whale with dragon wings then you get a whale with dragon wings!! I remember decorating the walls at my bedroom by pasting the drawings I made. I won a bronze medal for an artwork back in kindergarten in Japan (although I can’t remember exactly what I drew lol). I remember finding my Elementary school art class to be fun. That’s right, just because I like studying doesn’t mean that I find academic classes to be fun! Haha! Music classes that I took at some schools I’ve been to were fun as well. Although I didn’t really prioritize music class over geography or science but I never detest it. I remember knowing how to play recorder and showed off to my friends by playing the Star Wars theme song on the keyboard hehe. Sadly, I forgot how to play those instruments

Then there was the Drama class. I remember when I first arrived at that international school in Singapore, I was terrified with sight of ‘Drama’ as a compulsory subject. WTF! I’m cool with music and art but Drama?! That’s gay. Yeah, that’s what I thought, “that’s gay!”. But it turned out to be probably the most fun class I ever had. Middle school drama class was what I called ‘the only time in school where you can get silly’ . It’s escapism at its best as you get to act in different characters. I’ve played roles ranging from Batman to an evil drug dealer I didn’t continue taking Drama at High School because by that level it gets more serious and stuff. I never intended to pursue an acting career or anything LOL. My english teacher asked me once after my friend and I acted as Arthur and Zaphod respectively from Hitchhiker’s Guide to Galaxy, “Have you ever consider a career on television” I answered ‘no’ ofcourse

So you want more schools to adapt or at least opening up to Arts education because you had fun with it. Not everyone will have as much fun as you with these types of classes. Some students are just academic type and nothing more. I guess you’re just bragging yourself.

Some students are seen to be just academic types and nothing more because they were never given a chance to do something else. They may not try to pursue a career in the Arts but I think it’s good if they could try to tap another side of themselves. That’s like saying Physical education shouldn’t be taught because some people are just ‘not the PE type’. Again, referring back to that episode of Lost, the idea of ‘who you are’ and ‘who you want to be’

You know, if you didn’t go to schools that provide Arts classes, you wouldn’t be saying these stuff on your blog

Yeah, I know hehe. But the fact is that I’ve experienced it and enjoyed it. I assume that others would enjoy it too and probably discover that they have some hidden talents or interest in it. Hell, they could find it a life changing experience, who knows!!

But public schools are already crowded with subjects

Then incorporate elements of Arts into available subject if it’s possible. I mean, I had dancing as part of module in my elementary school PE class. How’s that! Geography and art? of course! Where did you think I got my excellent colour shading skills hehe (inside joke, sorry). Some can be easy like drama and English class while some can be difficult like incorporating History and Music Imagine learning about Napoleon’s retreat from Russia while the 1812 Overture playing full blast volume.  Maths and music?? Maths and Art could work I think.

But..But…

But what?! ok enough questions. Just go home.

I can’t

Why not?

I’m your subconscious. You’re not really talking to anybody.

Oh…I need friends don’t I

No shit!