I always knew that there were people like you
Always thinking of yourself and never others
You think you're platinum, you're just so damn VIP
We all gotta bow down to your greatness and all.

In reality you're an ignorant little bastard
Who couldn't tell A from Z
You probably can't put one and one together
Or to tell black from white from grey.

Your friends think you're the bee's knees
But in reality you treat everyone else like shit.
You treat them with contempt as if they were tools
Pieces of crap that can be tossed away

Listen to me good before I hang up on you
But I know my words will fall on deaf ears
We probably know better than you do
So don't try to play know-it-all with us

There is actually a person on the other side
Not a machine in India as you think it is
We're actually closer to home than you think
And for fuck's sake my name is not "buddy"

So you think you've never been charged an annual fee
Or that transaction you didn't "recognize"
Maybe you can't count how many cash advances
You took when you were floored.

Trust me honey we can smell bullshit a mile away
It needs to be pretty early to pull a fast one over us
But regardless thanks for calling
And please have a fantastic day!

It's been a full 26 weeks since I last posted here, and good lord have things changed!

For one I'm no longer working in the same dead end job that I was originally at -- I'm working at another one, controlling other peoples' MasterCards, getting yelled at because they've maxed out their cards, and being castigated by poor people with bad credit who don't understand the basics of credit. Well, I'm sorry if I don't sound particularly sympathetic if you're not making minimum payments -- that's your own damn fault. From being yelled at people who can't keep money from going down the drain, to people draining money that's not even theirs to start off with.

In whatever case, the job has turned so insane that my bosses think I've finally dived off the deep end, and have told me to see a shrink. Great, now they think I'm bloody nuts. That and I lost the Concordia spot -- I was so hoping to get in, but nope: dream denied. So I'm back to square one, stuck at where I still am, working for slightly better pay, but essentially the same job as before. It's enough to make someone go a little loopy, and reach for a stiff drink (not a stiff member, I wish I could get more of that but no dice so far on that one -- and sadly, no initiative to work on that either) more often than I used to.

It's a scary trend, and I don't know what to do. Rest assured I'm not going to drink everything away, nor am I going to suddenly develop a gambling addiction -- that would take a hell of a lot of work -- but I've got mild shopaholism, especially now that I've got some cash in the pocket. The job may make me insane, but as long as it pays the money I need to keep the good stuff coming (I mean, I'm going down to LA in October for two days for a soccer match -- hello David Beckham -- and staying at a hotel. A HOTEL, FOR CRYING OUT LOUD!) I'm okay with ruining my mental health for it all. It's a sacrifice that I think we've all got to make!

Either way, life isn't too bad. My poor Macbook is still devoid of anything useful. I'm still debating if I should spring for Photoshop and maybe some language software (thinking of learning some Spanish or Japanese or something), and maybe something else...but what? I'm sorta broke from paying for the trip, and a few other online shopping splurges...!

As for my journalism career...why do I have a feeling it's dead?

Well, its been a busy couple of days. Work, sleep, cricket...its really been quite dizzying! Well, at least being up until all hours of the night is anyway!

But today during my break at work, I got a bit of surprisingly good news, rather soon: Concordia sent me an email saying that they found my application good enough that they were willing to give me a grad admissions interview!

So...one step closer to J-school, and Montreal. How great is that on a lazy hazy Sunday night!

More later...
Sent from my BlackBerry device on the Rogers Wireless Network

Been busy with work, haven't been much around sadly...just nothing too much to say interesting, not yet anyway. Either that or I've been a touch lazy. Either way, pardon my absense...I'll be back very, very soon!

Well, I'm back from Seattle and San Francisco...and I've managed to max out my credit card with all the books and the manga and the DVDs I've bought stateside. I don't know how much they all turned up to be, but at least they were under the $750 limit allowed by Customs.

My brain has been asking for sleep a lot, so that's what I've been doing...I don't go back to work until Thursday, which is probably for the better, I wouldn't have been able to go straight back to work less than 48 hours from landing back home -- I reckon I just need a bit more time to destress from the time zones or whatever, even if it is only a single time zone back of Mountain Time.

I also discovered this amazing lime-cilantro flavoured linguine at Seattle's Pike Place Market, and have brought 3 pounds of it home -- I'll do more experimentation, especially with the flavoured canned tuna we can get at the store, and will post some recipes soon. It'll be good to get back into the kitchen and then posting more recipes again...I'm assuming some of you have tried some of those that I had previous posted...right? Has anyone died from it? (Please say no...)

I'll probably write some more later, and get back to reading some of my friends entries soon. But for now I'm enjoying the down time. But I sure am not looking forward to going back...hell, who does?

Well I'm still here in Seattle now, and lordy the adventures I've had so far has been rather interesting to say the least...I'm getting a bit tired, so I'm going to do some bullet points here:

- Finding Kinokuniya Bookstore in the International District a block away from King Street Station. First day after getting up relatively late (around 10am or so), I went to do a little walkabout in the drifty flurries, all along the coast, took the ferry to Bainbridge Island and back, and then walked to International District to see what was there...little did I know that forty-five minutes later I had raided the shelves of the last two copies of Read Or Dream vol. 3 and 4. Passed on the food court though; will go back. This would lead to a splurge trip to Borders, where more R.O.D. goodies were purchased.

- If you know me, you know about my addiction to Iron Chef, and to some extent, Iron Chef America. One of my favourite challengers is Seattle's own Tom Douglas, and I had been wanting to taste the food at restaurants of chefs who have beaten Iron Chefs -- Tom Douglas being one of them, Traci des Jardins in San Fran was the others (I'll do that next year). So I went over to the Dahlia Lounge on 4th and Virginia, and let's just say every penny of the $53 bill was worth it. The food was fantastic, and now I know why Douglas won. Next time, it'll be San Francisco, and then maybe Wellesley, MA (for Ming Tsai's place, for the food created by a man who beat the egomaniac extraordinare, Bobby Flay)

- After coming back from the Dahlia Lounge, I met up with a Norwegian, two Englishmen and a pair of Vancouverites to head up to Capital Hall bar district for a few Saturday night bevvies -- let's just say Englishmen can really drink, and I can't. The walk home, which I remember some of, was sort of funny. I think Seattle was not ready for a drunken Canadian-and-Englishman pair stumbling through downtown saying how great we are and how much the rest of the world sucks.

- But oh no, the night did not end like that! At around 3:30am this morning I got a new roommate in my room, which had been empty since a bunch of Koreans(?) left the morning I arrived. Apparently the German gentleman who is now living in Dublin, Ireland and in town for a librarian's convention had found one of the Vancouverites who I was drinking with was having sex with a guy from San Diego who was also staying at the hostel (it was a larger group of us along with us from the hostel at the watering place), and they just moved him...well, let's just say I did not sleep until 4:30am. Again.

- The next morning, I got up late for the Seattle v Chicago divisional playoff game (which I had told someone I would go, but I was drunk and tired so I slept in), and made my way to Pioneer Square after a lunch of seared tuna and lime-cilantro pasta (cooked in the kitchen) to catch the last section of the game in a rather antique looking bar. When it ended though, there were a fair number of sad Seahawks fans around town for the rest of the day.

- I did the Monorail and Space Needle after the game. Worst $18 I spent so far on this trip...now I can say I've been there and hated it. I only spent 10 minutes on the top of the Needle and only five more minutes at the Centre waiting for the Monorail to get me out of there. Suncoast Video at the basement level of Westlake Centre, which carried even MORE R.O.D. goodies, was the star attraction of the day. And it was buy-one-get-one, so even better...!

- And I learned that Outback Steakhouse is the only place that carries my favourite beer, Tooheys New. Damn you, causality, for making my favourite Australian beer available in one of the worst places to eat in the world...worst meal so far in this trip. DAMN YOU!!!!

But tomorrow night I go home, but not before hitting the University District and perhaps the REI store and maybe even the Sounder train...but there's a happy ending this trip - I won't be in Calgary Prison for much longer hopefully, Singapore and Hong Kong await in April, and I can not wait one bit for then!

It always amazes me how many times when I tell someone about a rather ordinary travel experience they are so fascinated. I have repeated my Los Angeles horror story many a time, and every time there are a few inaccuracies (including how many blocks from Union Station did that 33X...or was it the 33A?...left me from the Station itself in the stick-ish part of Downtown LA), but many a time so many wish they could go, but they never do.

Always somehow an excuse comes up -- there are always bills to pay, and people to see, overtime to work, kids to feed, all these excuses simply pile up, and leave us completely unsatisfied. We eat at places that we are used to, and it does get boring but it also becomes comfortable as well -- sometimes, too comfortable. I am guilty of that with a few Chinese places back in Calgary, but when I go out of town, I get to see and taste other things, even if it is, say, for just a week.

But not to the popular tourist traps, no sir -- this morning I rose and went over to the first ever location of Starbucks, which was only about three blocks from my hostel. I saw the fish stand where they do the fish tossing (and admired the fresh seafood -- anyone in Seattle with a kitchen, if you want me to cook a seafood meal, send me an e-mail!), and saw some of the stuff, but it left me somewhat unsatisfied, it wasn't "local" in a sense.

But now the ferry, that's something different. Sitting with the folks sailing the bay to Bainbridge Island. It's not much, but it's rather local to me. But we travel to see something different, a little different, living how Seattleites live, not how we would live but just in a new location. And for crying out loud, if you want to do it, just do it! Take a holiday, we all deserve one at times.

The skies are foggy, but the view is spectacular on the ferry boat. Wish you were here...

I am barely awake this morning; I had got in on the train after being awoken somewhere south of King Street Station by the train staff after I had drifted off to sleep north of Portland...after a wonderful trip (albeit ending up almost 7 hours late -- original arrival time 8:45pm), I made my way off the train at 3:30am, tried to get a taxi driver to get me to the right location for 25 minutes before finally being able to check in and getting some sleep at 4:30am.

For this grave injustice I blame Union Pacific. One passenger train heading north and one heading south per day, and perhaps 30-40 freights a day, and we had to be shuttled down the pecking order, what with frozen switches in Oregon and switchbacks for multiple freight trains operating on the same stretch of track and adding to that suburban sprawl (ooh can't wake the Joneses on Maple Street!) -- 100% on time rate, Union Pacific? What about human cargo? Don't we count as well?

So enough of my ranting -- the trip was fantastic, the food was great (and so far I'm feeling okay), the people I've met were incredible (I will never forget the two ladies from the Olympic Peninsula and the lady from San Francisco heading to Portland...oh, the travails we talked about in the Sightseer Car during those long delays) but as much as I should sleep in, there's a city to see...

Catch you all later, Pike Place is across the street and I'm not going to sleep in when it's calling to me!

It has been an eventful night…and waking up in your own private room on the train is truly one of life’s greatest travel pleasures. I had only previously heard about it from others (coupled with one of my own shared with six people when I was 17 in France, but that’s another story altogether which I will share in a second), but now I know for myself.

With my boarding of the northbound Coast Starlight at Emeryville Station at around 1:05am (a little over 3 hours behind the schedule), my (well, it’s one of my 2007 resolutions anyway to do a) yearly sojourn to San Francisco was completed for this calendar year (along with doing more traveling but that’s a whole another story), the train having defeated poor Mark who had to leave the East Bay for San Francisco before the BART left him stranded on the wrong coast (literally)

So after another quickie shot at retail therapy in San Francisco followed by a second round at Macworld after an extremely charmed meeting with Eric/sierra_nevada at a dim sum place near Moscone Centre, my San Francisco visit ended at Emeryville Station. As the train’s estimated arrival time got later and later, it, as mentioned before, forced Mark to leave before it arrived…I bid him farewell, and the night of waiting began in earnest.

10:02 turned into 10:52, then 11:16, then 11:42, then 12:02, and then 12:50, but finally without even the ticket clerks noticing, it pulled in at 1:05 am…many a glad passenger heading to Eugene, Portland and Seattle were mighty relieved at the sight of the 14 pulling in. I for one was glad – the reputation of sleeping cars, regardless of Amtrak, Via, whatever…was legendary. And after a quick chat with the conductor, and just as a woman and a baby was plopped next to me at Martinez I was sent seven cars ahead to a sleeper named Pennsylvania, to waters uncharted.

Needless to say, I was excited! First time I wouldn’t be traveling long-distance in coach, but first! I’ve done East Rail in Hong Kong in First, but this was much different…a comfortable bed, with my name on it…it took a few tries to fall asleep, but I think about 3:30 I finally did, and got a good four hours before the sun woke me. Needless to say, it was worth the $145, and plus pretty good food (notable exception being the possible food poisoning last year on the southbound from Jack London Square to LAX, but all is forgiven)

Morning brought a shower (thank god), and breakfast of a tasty Tuscan omelet with a small group of an extended family from Vancouver heading home from LA-LA Land and a relatively good looking boy about my age from Sacramento heading to Eugene to pick up a car left for him there. Much conversation was exchanged about our travels, especially the story about a drag queen at 6:00am outside the Disneyland Hotel…don’t know what’s so strange, them being from Vancouver and all, but I digress!

…as for conversation during a brief stay in the Sleeper Class lounge? Let’s just say it was vapid and rather uninteresting. I did find out about a drunken passenger who was booted off south of Salinas, but the snootiness did me in…I reckon I’m still rather plebian in a semi-patrician environment – as Jon Stewart may say, “uncomfortable…!” But a pair of sisters I met at Emeryville provided much better conversation – we were all a bit more plebian than the patricians, what with them being retirees, and me being still a semi-student.

The train is about to exit California at last, and I am still on my way…it may be late but at least I’ll get there in grand style. Under the Seattle sky, what will my next adventure be? Stay tuned…

Day Two of San Francisco...

So after a full day and part of one night, it was the second day of my 2007 soujourn in the City by the Bay. A pretty quiet day...too much wrangling with Emeryville mass transit after getting my Amtrak ticket and a fantastic dish of Pad Thai washed down with a disappointing bowl of tom yam goong at a Thai cafe on Shattuck Street in rather disappointingly white-bread Berkeley (perhaps I made a wrong turn leaving the downtown BART stop?) But Emeryville was enough of a drain that the elusive Telegraph Avenue would have to wait until 2008, as I hightailed off East Bay and back into the City.

Recharging my batteries, I attempted to return to Ocean Beach to repeat last year's ritual on the N-Judah after guiding a pair of lost travelers heading to Haight-Ashbury from Embarcadero station. Sadly, the wind was far too nippy and was blowing the equivalent to the Sahara Desert in my mouth to make any attempts any further than moving more than 5 metres off the Great Highway. A haste retreat came a fellow downtown bound traveler in town from Germany on a Fulbright scholarship, and we mused about America and American life in general.

Seeing that it was early for our earlier set time to meet John and Christian, I decided for some retail therapy. Sadly my first choice of item was unavailable, and since shoes wasn't that high on the table; the Stockton Virgin Megastore and the Powell Borders were hit, followed by a quick detour to Macy's for some toiletry essentials...hey, a girl needs to feel beautiful, you know!...before catching the outbound MUNI back to the guest house to prepare for dinner.

At dinner, we were once again joined by Kernan, as well as a fellow guest at mine and Mark's guest house, another German by the name of Steffan. Conversation over pasta and pizza and cocktails at the Coffin (also known as Twin Peaks) were pleasant, albeit a little be liquefied with a few Sidecars and French Connections. But regardless, we parted for the evening...and here we are.

Three quarters of a day left in San Francisco on the 11th now; what adventures will come before my Coast Starlight comes to whisk me away to Seattle? Stay tuned...

So I am now in San Francisco, having spent my first day back in the City. And to be honest it feels great...a few jitters here and there from being closed up in boom town Calgary for so long, but nothing too major so far. And being with a good friend like Mark (pitamakan ), it makes the trip that much more pleasant.

The day started off with a trip to the stuff Mac fanatics dream of -- oh yes folks, I forgot to tell you (for Windows/PC afficiados cover your eyes and ears...actually wait, if you're reading out loud just...well, skip this part!) that I have now switched over to a brand new Macbook...and it is luverly to the hilt! And with this cathartic personal computing experience included (well, I threw it in there) a trip to Macworld with the original Mac freak in my life, Mark (well, I think you all know that one was coming, right?) in 'Frisco

And to be honest, it was a Mac lover's paradise...we got there just to discover the keynotes speech had ended, and Mark's prediction that Steve Jobs' big announcement was the iPizza was revealed to be a bust (sorry Mark...but it is a delicious idea, I'll take my with spinach and anchovies), and it was revealed that it would be the iPhone (Mac PDA-mobile) and the Apple TV box. After a browse or two in the exhibits and getting a hard shell case to trick out and protect my new toy, it was time to lunch...there was only so much that a recent Mac convert can take of the Mac-ness (is that even a word?) in one sitting!

After a lunch in Chinatown with Kern/kernando  and Mark, they headed off to Haight-Ashbury (the home of the 1969 Summer of Love) while I made a quick detour back to the guest house to drop off a few items. When the N-Judah dropped me off at West Portal and when Haight-Ashbury came to view, it was...well, disappointing to say the least. The love wasn't there, more commercial rather than loving...maybe I missed something, or maybe I was expecting the Sunset Tunnel to be a time portal? Either way, we met back up with John and Christian, friends of ours from last year at Village House. It was a grand reunion, albeit on the streetside...

The night ended with another great adventure -- parting from Mark and Kern after dinner, I made a trip to the Niketown in Union Square to bring my red Jarome Iginla 2:40s full circle (in a sense) via K-Embarcadero, picked up some socks (boring), then L-Taraval'd it to 4th and King...I couldn't resist, but the CalTrain called to me, and the test trip to Milbrae turned out to be a good choice as the 25-minute journey was spent talking no-bullshit, no crap Canadian Politics 101 with a recent grad of Yale. Needless to say, it was rewarding...bad part was waiting for the K-Ingleside at Balboa Park for 15 minutes while the driver finished his smoke break.

So that's day 1 in San Francisco, day 2 and sorta-3 is coming up...what ever adventures will remain...? And will I somehow score a hot Aussie man that lives two rooms down to root? (Trust me, if you know, you know what I'm talkin' about!)

Stardate...wait a second, what the hell...?

Never mind, minor brain malfunction. Well, it's been quite a while since I've been back. The whole move thing over to Blogger was a complete bust; too many new systems to learn, and with so much going on in my life so far, my frustration simply boiled over and I quit. I simply couldn't do it...and if you know me, you know I'm extremely obsessive-compulsive when it comes to getting done properly and correctly (blame my upbringing, it's the root of it I'm afraid) and with colours and themes, if it ain't lookng perfect, it ain't worth jack.

So, I moved on, sailing the seas of life. After the soujourn to No- and SoCal, I took no more trips out of the country...I spent most of the time moping, and finally quit that cashier job and bummed for a while before landing a call centre job downtown for a bank answering calls for all their branches. And with that, came bigger paycheques (hallelujah!), more savings and for the first time, my own evil, evil staff Mastercard (which I have kept fully paid so far...I've used it with impunity! I know…hypocrisy…!)

Life was good; but it was hectic. Dealing with customers face to face was one thing, but dealing with them over the phone and have them either a) whine or b) cry or c) cuss at me because I'm on the other end of the line led to a fair share of nervous breakdowns at work. One thing, I don't suffer fools gladly and I am not easily guilt tripped into looking the other way, especially when either the customer had a) no foresight, b) no money (NSFs galore), c) no brains or d) all of the above. And when those collide...hello, big bang!

That, and adding on hour after hour of overtimes during times when the call centre was completely short-staffed, led to more headaches and other pains that I dare not mention any more lest I get more stress. Meanwhile, my love life has still seemingly gone nowhere...it's one of those things where you go one step forward, and then six steps back and then six more back. I fell in a "love" with a coworker which turned out to be a bust, and ended up with awkward glances at a cafe. Needlessly suffice to say, it didn't pan out.

Christmas was spent alone. Again. Presents were bought, candies were eaten, turkey was baked and consumed, but once again...alone. But as a coworker of mine told me, maybe it is for the best, or perhaps that is what is in the grand scheme of things. But now I'm on the road again, back to San Francisco followed by a road swing northbound to Seattle. It should get my mind off work before Horror Season at work, also known as the annual RSP cram-a-thon, also known as RSP season, comes rolling around. Either way, life still hasn't changed much for me. Crossing my fingers though, that an acceptance letter from either Concordia, UBC, Ryerson or Carleton will come to me soon.

So...how was everyone else's last ten or eleven months or so?

It seems I am back to where I started all over again...it seems like I've never left, always somehow buzzing, but never really having much more than that to start back.

But now I'm back. Curse/blessing? I'll let you be the judge of that!

It's been a slice, but it was time for me to go.

After apprroximately four years (net) here at LiveJournal, it has become time for me to move on...the readership here on LiveJournal, while steady, is still restricted by LiveJournal's reputation of being Drama-dy Central, which is helped by a healthy tween population with a pool of angst deeper than the Marianas Trench. So in order to expand my readership to larger circles, I felt that it was time for me to move to a new location, and that location (after a bit of work and research) was Blogger.

Yes, I know it's a little bit more impersonal and slightly less user-friendly, but it is still quite a formidable tool to showcase my writings. So I invite you to join me in my new online digs -- The Twisted Chinaman @ Blogger. Or if you would prefer it to be brought to your LJ Friends Page or a friendly news aggregator, visit here (LJ feed), or visit here (FeedBurner). So don't forget to update your bookmarks!

Thanks for all the wonderful times, and I look forward to sharing more in the coming years...I hope you will be able to join me!

(Attention folks! This will be the LAST post I will crosspost to LiveJournal before I switch to purely updating The Twisted Chinaman @ Blogger. So get your feeds ready for your LJ friends page here, or you can get it in your My Yahoo! or another news aggregator with my FeedBurner account. So here goes...the final post!)


You hear it all the time, and you wonder...what is with the obsession over who the hell celebrities sleep with and who they're married to or what colour of hair their new baby is?

It's all over the news...heck, it's all over the news media (don't laugh Fox News, you're pretty damned guilty of that yourself). Celebrities getting hitched, getting unhitched, getting booked for DUIs and DOAs, getting onto the elevator heading six feet under. The popular refrain goes that there are more people voting for the next American Idol rather than their next president...and no, it wasn't first said in that movie American Dreamz, it was said long, long before that movie came out.

But why? It doesn't seem to make much sense. Why is one person who appears in a movie or plays a very popular song so damn interesting all of a sudden? What makes them so special other than the fact that they are well-known? I mean...look at Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie. Sure he's sorta hot and she's played Lara Croft in that movie Tomb Raider, but what makes their first baby together so unique? I mean, babies are born every day without much fanfare, but why does Shiloh get so much more?

Maybe it is because of our innate need to pull celebrities into the wide open glare of the public eye. I mean, they may be human, but yet they are big names...heck, bigger names than most of us could ever hope to be anyway...so even if they were, say, some F-list celebrity from the second round of the "rejects pile" on the latest season of So You Think You Can Dance or some other reality show, they're still somewhat more interesting than the average Joe or Jane Salaryman.




But yet what really truly sets even the minute F-listers with Joe and Jane Salaryman? Is it that maybe one media appearance that makes them more appealing for prying? More likely, yes. And the higher the class of the celebrity (from E to A), the more fascinating they will be. I mean sure, who doesn't wonder what the A-listers do with all that money that they are raking in while living in those posh Hollywood mansions or New Yok apartments? It keeps us focused on them.

...and of course, it helps sell magazines and tabloids, which in turn fattens the wallets of the entertainment industry. Not only will they earn their legitimate bling from regular interviews, but they can double charge us double for the "extra coverage" via different medium, all while probably cashing in on that same celebrity. It's a double-shaft for both sides in a sense, not only getting their value from the work, but also from prying into their secret lives to sell a few more glossy photos to pad the coffers!

Of course celebrities on their own haven't helped their own causes: getting defensive is only going to attract more flies like a spilled pot of sugar water. The more they try to struggle against it, the more the paparazzi will try to beat them at their own game. It's really a vicious cycle, a game of keepaway that has already unnecessarily taken a life. But yet nobody seems to learn the lessons that Princess Diana's death taught us, and the cycle continues on and on until somebody gets hurt (or another lawsuit!)

Then again, maybe our obsession with looking at how celebrities live is a direct attempt at navel gazing: we only wish that we had that sort of glamourous life, but until we can achieve it, it's best to see how someone else lives it. Even if we never learn our lessons in not poking into other people's lives...it only makes it all the more juicier.

(Just a reminder: I'm moving my main journal from LiveJournal to a new home on Blogger starting June 10th. If you would like to stay tuned in on your LJ Friends Page, visit here. Or If you have a news aggregator, you can also use the FeedBurner Service as well...)


...so a day after graduation, and I'm still here.

Let me just say it has to be the most nervewracking thing in my life. It may have been the best day of my life so far (but then again I liked my high school grad a lot more...a few more people cheering for me in the audience that time compared to just my folks this time out), but it was surprisingly nervewracking...I got there, picked up the gown and cap, and it felt surprisingly strange. Half wondering how I got this far, and the other half wondering what the heck was going to come next.

Then we were marched from the Olympic Oval through a tunnel to the Jack Simpson Gym, where we were led to our seats. I was in the front half of the second section, which meant I was near the back. Good, I thought, it would allow me to make less of a idiot of myself when I go up there since someone else will make a total ass of themselves before I was likely to! So then came the speeches and the induction into the Order of the University someone I had no idea who it was...thankfully the speech was short.




Then came the honourary degree recipient...some former president of UBC who's worked for post-secondary education, and she made a pretty okay speech about how her mother kept on learning until her 90s, and how we ought to use our "school houses" in our mind to solve the problems that we face, and of the world today. That was pretty short, surprisingly...I was honestly expecting a long drawn out speech that would bore everyone to death...but no! It didn't...and then came the stage cross.

Since we already got our degrees when we picked up our stuff, we just had to open up the cover, pose for the camera with the chancellor of the university, and then walk across to greet the dean of the faculty, and then head off for another photo before it was back to the seat. I remembered very little of what happened in that 45 seconds that it all occurred, since I was shaking with nerves for some odd reason...what it was, I'll never really know, but it blazed by so fast, and without a hitch too.

So...that was convocation in a nutshell. Of course the worst part was that when I saw that I knew twelve people in the same list of people who were supposed to be in attendance...only ONE showed up. How embarrassing was that? I mean, of twelve people I knew, only one I knew was actually there...and he was an old high school classmate of mine who graduated a year after I did! Talk about not knowing anyone in the same ceremony...(except for that one...)

...later after another leafing through the comprehensive programme did I find that today's morning ceremony would feature Atom Egoyan...Atom-freakin'-Egoyan! But then again what can you do...oh well. Still, a good day nevertheless even if most of it was marked by complete nervousness. But I've got to say...it's a lot more different being there in the audience than the one getting that degree. For one, the person in the audience doesn't have to worry about messing up that picture!

(Just a reminder: I'm moving my main journal from LiveJournal to a new home on Blogger starting June 10th. If you would like to stay tuned in on your LJ Friends Page, visit here. Or If you have a news aggregator, you can also use the FeedBurner Service as well...)


It's graduation season, and for the second time in my life today (t-minus 8 h 3 min as I write this), I'll be walking across a stage in front of a packed auditorium (okay, so the Jack Simpson is a gymnasium, sue me) to get a piece of paper to signify that I've spent x amount of time in some educational institution doing things that allows me to be knowlifed in some aspect of something. It's a monumental achievement, that's for sure.

Four years ago, the mountain looked impenetrable: fresh from high school, all I saw was a whole bunch of books and a ton of papers and a lot of other shit to do. But then I also saw the good stuff -- the real deal stuff that you could actually do and actually mean something. For some it meant going into student government, others it meant volunteering, and for me, it meant working as an amateur news/sports writer/entertainment/political pundit on the campus newspaper.

Of course, I've been on countless adventures both near and far, not only taking me to other places around the country and the world, but closer to home as well. For one, who knew that there can be someone who can drink from sunup to sundown and back to sunup again without even ONCE falling over in a comical way? I mean, where else in the world where you can watch a bunch of idiots drink until they're puking their guts out in between cram sessions for that midterm you totally forgot about?



Young, stupid...and ready to step into the world! Oh wait, that includes me...

Ah yes, the thing that we like to call college, where dreams are made and then promptly broken the moment you step out of it. Some may call it a foster home for an active imagination, others a cauldron for political ideals, still others a safe haven to breed stinking liberal philosophies that corrupt the minds of the young (but that's just the crazy whacko neo-conservatives who everyone ignores who think that way...right?), but still...it's a house of dreams regardless.

So what's out there waiting for us when we finally step out of the house of dreams? Sure, it may be a house of cards...but for some, those cards become solid reality. For others, that house collapses as soon as they realize that the degree that they got was going to put them in some dead-end office job that they desperately wanted to avoid but it's too late because that accounting degree only allows you to work in the financial sector, and you had wanted to get a BA in...something.

Yet regardless, college is a time when we all can remember one crazy-assed memory that will be with us forever, whethere it be bad or good. And when we look back, we'll remember how good we still looked when we were in college...and we can only sigh and wish we had a time machine, and we can go back to it whenever we wanted...it's a safe haven yes, but sooner or later...we all have to leave, so the next generation can experience the joy that we were able to enjoy.

...ah, to reminice, perchance to dream of the days of yore once more. But nah, I've got something else to do...after I get that piece of paper, of course!

High school was good to me, and university was even better...maybe it was karma's way of paying me back for screwing me up during junior high! But now that I've done over 18 years of schooling, it's time to work (and hopefully, travel) before I head off to the inevitable next destination on the journey of life...

...Grad School. Hey, it is inevitable...right?

(Just a reminder: I'm moving my main journal from LiveJournal to a new home on Blogger starting June 10th. If you would like to stay tuned in on your LJ Friends Page, visit here. Or If you have a news aggregator, you can also use the FeedBurner Service as well...)


Ah, rolled cakes...it brings back memories. Be it the chocolate Yule Log of your Christmases past, or just three days ago when you were at the vending machine fishing out that sweet chocolate cake roll in the cellophane packaging (ah Hostess, how do you do it? You must be asking...) or for me, it's the bakery styles of my home Hong Kong. Maxim's at the subway station concourse always had them in the counter-refrigerator, besides the heavenly Checkerboard Cakes (and that's another story...)

In my cooking experiences, I have only been privy to a chance to make a Swiss Roll once, and it was shocking the amount of sugar that was used to make it! Sugar was in the cake, the filling (naturally), but also powdered sugar in the rolling of the cake...it was all too much (and I think my partner and I passed on making a Swiss Roll either way...I'm not sure) from the way that I had the Swiss Roll: fresh dairy cream inside soft cake. It's the same ones that you may be able to find at a Hongkie bakery at your local Chinatown...

My mother has made this a few times at home, but since I have no way to find the recipe she has, I translated one from this recipe at Leisure-Cat.com that was similar to what I remember. It's not much, but give it a try! It has no frosting, and much less sugar than the traditional method. Try adding some flavours to it, like a shot of vanilla or orange...trust me, the results are worth it!



Swiss Roll

Swiss Roll
Ingredients:
- 1 cup/90 g cake flour
- 3 eggs
- 1/4 cup/60 g sugar
- 3 tablespoons melted butter
- Prepared dessert topping or sweetened whipped cream or jam of your choice
- Fresh fruit, diced into small cubes
Directions:
1. Using a sieve, sieve cake flour twice over. (I recommend sieving over a piece of waxed paper)
2. In a double boiler (or a bowl over barely simmering water), beat eggs and sugar together for about 8-10 minutes on medium speed with electric hand mixer.
3. Slowly add in flour in two doses (best to use a whisk now), and mix well
4. Drizzle in melted butter, and mix well to form the cake batter.
5. Pour batter into a non-stick 9"x11" pan, and bake in a 375-degree oven for 10 minutes.
6. On a large sheet of waxed paper or parchment, invert cake onto it.
7. Do a "test" roll: with the waxed paper, roll the cake, and let it cool in that shape.
8. Prepare filling: be it dessert topping, whipped cream or jam. If you want to add a bit of fresh fruit, mix about 1/2 cup into your filling.
9. Unroll the cake, remove waxed paper/parchment, spread filling, and then roll it back up. Serve fresh, or ch


In this form, I highly recommend it with vanilla ice cream (or any flavour of your choice). For an elegant but simple dessert, slice cake into medium slices, and spread ice cream on the top of one slice. Top with another slice of cake, and then ice cream, until you feel it is good (or if you run out of cake/ice cream). Drizzle the ice cream cake towers with chocolate sauce, and dust with icing sugar or chocolate shavings.

Simple, sinful and delicious...

(Just a note: for those of you not aware...I am moving my main journal from LiveJournal to a new home on Blogger starting June 10th. If you would like to add a feed that will allow you to keep tuned in on your LJ Friends Page, visit here. If you have a news aggregator, you can also use the FeedBurner Service as well.

So until June 10, I will continue to cross-post all entries to both journals, but once June 10th rolls around LJ will no longer be updated. But there are so many easy ways to keep tuned in...please stay tuned! please?)


When I was a kid, I was a nerd. Nobody paid attention to the nerds, with their thick glasses and their stupid looks. The jocks were popular, the geeks and nerds were outcasts, and the normals...well, they floated like the clouds. Of course if you were smart like a Nerdlinger, you may get a few of the popular kids copy off you for a while, pretending to be your friends. And if you were some sort of science fair champ, or a spelling bee champ, or heck, even a geographical trivial contest winner, that was a bonus.

Still, watching all of those kids on the Spelling Bee today made me look back and realize how much I had in common with those kids when I was in junior high school. Oh, how far I have come since those heady days when I still loathed myself for being me...but then things changed when I entered the Canadian equivalent of National Geographic's National Geography Bee, and twice went to Ottawa (it's something that I don't talk about often) and once made it to the final stage (I finished last of the 10th...nerves got to me)

All of a sudden, I got my own page on the yearbook (the year I made it to the final 10 of course), and everyone thought I was the smart kid. Of course I hated the singling out by teachers and my classmates. It put the attention spotlight on me, and it became difficult. All of a sudden, I was expected to be the know-it-all, especially when it came to Social Studies. It was a whole rollercoaster of emotions that even today still feels like a freight train full of anvils and sledgehammers blindsiding me time and time again.



Do you remember this kid?

But in the end, I still remained a nobody at the school...and long after the cameras are gone and the trophies are presented and starting to collect dust in some trophy case (I never did manage to bring one home...), what do those kids that you saw on the ABC tonight become? Nothings. Last I remember the champion in my year was interviewed on CityTV Toronto and that was it...nobody has heard from him ever since. And what about the champ from the National Spelling Bee 15 years ago? Have you heard anything of...well, you get my point.

Nothing, nowhere. They are pieces of memory, shards of history that are relegated to the back pages on a slow news day. After the short bursts of glory, like I did those kids will fade off into the sunset, having had their two-seconds of fame doused as quickly as it was lit. From nobody to nobody in zero to zero. May look nice on a resume someday, but ultimately does little. I mean, sure you can spell ursprache...but can you type up those 75-page reports for the London office tomorrow?

So my advice to those kids is, enjoy whatever fame you get, and soak in any sort of popular bounce you may get from your peers...because it is precious. And if you like being called a smart kid when you've really never been...well, enjoy it anyway. Because look at the photo....do you know who that kid is? I sure don't!