Can You Tell These Two Apart?

China has been in the news a lot yesterday. Simple Girl and I were watching TV last night. It was the news and a story came on about the historic meeting between chairman of Taiwans leading party and the President of China, Hu Jin Tao. Simple Girl asked me if this is the same guy who went to Sichuan for the earthquake. I said no, that was a different guy, but I noted to her that they do look very simular. The guy that went to Sichuan was the Premier, Wen Jai Bao.

So in China, the President is the most powerful and the Premier is the 2nd most powerful. And they look like they could be brothers. Hmmmmm.

Mom, Dad. I Am Converting To Buddhism

I saw a new clip today about Sharon Stone which caused me to think.

What does the Myramar Cyclone and the China Earthquake have in common? Both countries had a Buddhist Monk protest which were both brutally put down by the government a few months before these natural disasters occurred.

Which makes me think. Don't pick on Buddhist Monks. God will strike back at you.

Here's the clip of Sharon Stone. She is in hot water in suggestiong that the quake was due to bad karma for the put down of the Buddhist Monks. Good thing, I am not famous or least "was" famous. I can voice my opinions freely.

Is That The Olympic Torch?

This picture appeared in an article about the resumption of the Olympic Torch Relay in China. Could they have chosen a better picture? Maybe all of the propane is being used for the relief effort and so they now have cigarettes as the torch instead?

I'm Turning Singaporean. I'm Turning Singaporean. I Really Think So.

Last night I did something that when I came to Singapore, I thought that I would never do.

I stayed up in the middle of the night to watch a soccer match. Soccer or as Singaporeans call it football is really big here with the Singaporean men. The league that they follow is in Europe and so the games are often played in the middle of the night.

So after almost four years with little American sports on TV, I have been slowly converted to sports that Singaporeans follow, Football and F1 racing. Granted the game that I stayed up for was the biggest game of the year, but I really never thought this day would come.

The funny thing is that I even had a conversation with Simple Girl about this topic when we first met. I am not sure if she remembers, but I said to her that I am not like other Singaporean guys who would go out to bars and watch soccer in the middle of the night. At least still partly true. I stayed home and watched in bed.

Still a bit strange though to watch sports in the middle of the night. In the US, watching football on the weekends, I usually have a bag of chips, salsa and beer and when someone scores, which is quite often, I can jump up and cheer. Drinking beer and yelling alone in the middle of the night seems a bit odd.

So for those who care. The game was the champion league final between Manchester United and Chelsea. It was a great game which ended up being decided on penalty kicks. Manu won.

However, I am exhausted now. Maybe, I will go home and take a nap.

Steal From Junichi's Site

This is pretty cool that I saw from Junichi's site. I do have a different comment than he does though, actually questions.

Where is the Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Singlish accents?

I Would Like To Thank The Members of the Academy

This just in. My sister(unnamed) has just been promoted. She is now in charge of the award process for a major American Award Show. I would say that this award is one of the big three without naming them, being movies, TV and music.

So today starts my lobbying campaign to become a voting member.

To my Sis.

I think I have demonstrated in this blog that I do keep up with my current events. Also from my extensive Itunes collection, I have demonstrated that I have a passion for this with the present that I gave to you for Xmas 2 years ago. I have updated my collection since then. I therefore nominate myself to be a voting member of your prestigious award. So Sis. Please make it so. I know you have the power.

To Boldly Go Where No Man Has Gone Befoe

Saw something in the news today that made me think back and say, Yeah, I can see that.

George Takei also know as Lt. Sulu declared that he is engaged to his lifetime partner. Guess he came out a few years ago and I just missed it. Really not surprised by this. In fact this got me thinking about the other Star Trek caracters and I think a lot of them have the possibility to be gay. So much so in fact that I did a search on the internet but found nothing.

My possibilities.

Captain Kirk - He wears a lot of eye liner and he loved being shirtless. I once mistakenly stepped into a bar in Singapore where it was gay night. It was really hot and I just wanted to get a cold bear. I v-line straight for the bar and ordered a beer. Than I looked around and noticed, ahhh, there are a lot of musculiar guys dancing with their shirts off. I quickly figured out that it was gay night. I quickly down my beer and high tailed out of there.

Spock - When it for time for him to direct the Star Trek IV, he based it in San Francisco. Coincedance? I don't think so.

Scotty - He is the one that wears red all the time. Maybe a signal.

Picard - He must be guy. That so called French accent and he never go on away missions.

Jordy - He of coarse took after Scotty being the chief engineer.

These Shortages May Cause Riots

I am very nervous today. Just been made aware of a global shortage that may cause major instability throughout the world. This may cause mass riots and the seriousness of this shortage can topple many of the words governments. Already we are seeing panic buying and hording. We are told that we won't see any relief in sight until June 9th which is nearly 3 weeks away. I am not sure the world can last that long.


No, I am not talking about cooking oil, Oil or even rice. This is more serious. So I make a plea to Steve Jobs. Please release the 3G Iphone earlier.

"From This Moment" "You Are NOT The One"

Shania Twain the singer with hits "From This Moment" and "You Are Still The One" has announced that she is seperating from her husband of six years.

This is normally not a topic that I would blog on but I could not resist the headline.



Correction from Helen 14 years: Their son is 6 years old.

What's the Exit Strategy?

Today Senator John Edwards has endorsed Obama as the Democratic nominee.




This pretty much mean the following for the Clinton Campaign



Eventhough Obama now have enough Superdelegates to win the nonimation, Hilary still will not quite the race. So goes to proof that US has no exit strategy in Iraq and nor does Hilary for this campaign which is now a money losing train wreck.



To be fair, this is a edited picture. Below is the original.

Tech: Apple To Do Games/Facebook Won't Limit Your Freinds

I saw two separate articles on CNET today.

The first one suggested that Apple should come out with a gaming console to compete with Wii, XBOX and Playstation. I didn't remember this but it said that Apple had tried before in the 90's with a console named Pippen. It was ugly just like the basketball player. It also states that Apple already dominate computers, Cell Phones, MP3 Players and so they do have aspirations of controlling the home and so a gaming console would make perfect sense.

In a separate and completely unrelated article, it has been revealed that Apple has put in a patent for a Wii-like remote control for the Apple TV. Hmmmm. The Apple TV is already connected to a television. It is pretty much a computer just like the Xbox. All you need is a remote and wholla, you have games.

In other news, Facebook will be announcing soon that they have lifted the limits on the number of friends that you can have. Before, they limited you to only 5000 friends. I just wanted to thank Facebook for this move because I was getting pretty worried that I might exceed this limit soon.

Is China Inversely Proportional to the US?

This is my memory of China when I vacationed there with my mom and dad in the early 90's.



Just saw an article that the bike business in the US is booming because of the high oil prices. So will the above picture be a picture of the US in a few years time? Is this God working in mysterious ways again? Making fat Americans lose weight by riding bikes?

This is China as I know it today.

Indian Food Makes You Fat

I saw an article recently that blames Indian Obesity on genetics. This is another one of those great studies that I love to hear about. The last time I heard, there was some stat saying that over 50% of America's are clinically obese. Since I grew up in Handford where there are a lot of Mexicans, I know that this is the same for them. And when is the last time you seen a picture of an African American Mother who is not obese? Now that I am in Asia, same is true for for Australians. Than think about all of the fat British and Russians. So why are Indian's so special? I think the world has an obesity problem regardless of race.

Now I will completely go against the statement above. I have always said that I can have Indian food only once a month, because I feel Indian food is so heavy. Lately, Simple Girl and myself has been keeping track of our weights. Simple Girl and I had lost some weight previously and so she was happy and I was sad since she wants to lose and I want to gain. We don't have Indian food all that often, but we had it about 2 weeks ago and almost instantly we gain about 2Kgs that just will not go off. I asked Simple Girl if she wanted Indian food last week and she said "NO WAY!"

Lastly, sort of related to food and obesity. Maybe their is a higher power after all. God sees that all his children is stuffing their faces and turning his beautiful work of art into big blobs of fat. So to balance this? He creates natural disasters and global warming to increase food prices and food shortages to make the world go on a forced diet. Wow! God indeed do work in mysterious ways.

QOTW Myanmar

Here is my Question of the week.

I have been following the events of Myanmar for a long time now. This weekend a cyclone it killing 150,000 people and counting. 1.5 Million people are at risk. The military junta in charge of Myanmar being so afraid of outsiders has not been allowing foreign aid to flow in. They have announced today that they are not ready for foreign aid and have today started to deport foreign aid workers.

I know most of the world is against the US invading Iraq to get cheaper oil, but would you be in favor of invading a country to save the lives of 1.5 million people?

May 7th Funny Headlines Singapore/Malaysia

I have only one story about Singapore and many about Malaysia today.

In today's paper, a man was acquitted of molesting his own daughter. His defense? He was sleep walking. This just in. I have killed, I have raped, I have stolen, but OK, What? I was Sleep Walking la.

Now on to Malaysia.

A Blogger in Malaysia has been sent to prison for Sedition. He implied that a top government official was linked to the murder of a Mongolia model last year. Good thing I live in the free city state of Singapore where I can freely express my opinions without fear.

Customs in most countries has a tough job. They have to screen for drugs, pornography, weapons, and endangered species. Now in Malaysia, add rice to the list. You are now prohibited from taking rice out of the country. You will also need an ID to buy rice. Since they are subsidizing the rice, they fear that foreigners getting this advantage.

If you are a women, you are not allowed to travel alone. This legislation was recently rejected, however it amazes me that this was even brought up. So now the rule is if you are under 18 and your a women, you can't go outside without a male adult guardian. So my question is, are they scared for the women or are they scared for the men? If they are scared for the men, should they have this rule for the men to protect the women?

Lastly, Malaysian Government officials want to pass a bill on Malay Supremacy and Malay Rights. The ruling party in Malaysia had just taken a beating in the most recent election. They lost a 2/3 majority that they have enjoyed since the 60's. One of the main reasons for this lose was that they angered the ethnic Chinese and India minority which makes up 40% of Malaysia's population. So to appease these two groups, the ruling party is looking to make some concessions to appease these two groups, which has now made the ethnic Malay's very nervous. Ethnic Malay's already enjoy preferential hiring for government jobs of which 90% are Malay. Preferential treatment in collage admission and also in awarding of government contracts. Here's my question. If Malay's are the Supreme Race, why do you need a bill to protect Malay rights?

Role Reversal?

First of all two two things.

1. During one of my daily observations that I made to Simple Girl, she commented that, you have to put this observation down on your blog. So, it is Simple Girls idea and not mine.

2. I already know that my two sisters will have lots of comments on this one.

History,

After six months of staying in our new apartment, we finally decided to go out and get a doorbell. It is not as easy as you think, the house is pre-wired for a doorbell and so you can't get one of those wireless ones at the home fix store. In Singapore, you have to go to a special shop. The only one that I know is quite out of the way. So pretty much for the past 6 months, every time I expect a delivery, I have to go wait by the door since with the pre-wiring, there is an actual door bell button, but just no bell on the other side.

In My Defense

I did successfully install and wire up the new door bell and it worked great. I couldn't wait for a delivery and so I ordered pizza that very weekend. When the Pizza man arrived, I buzzed him into the complex and waited in anticipation for him to ring the bell. Well, he did ring. After the very 1st ring, the entire bell came crashing down, shattering the bell into a few pieces.

What a Tao Does

At this point, I do what a Tao always do. Considered the unit a loss and have my mind set to go out and buy a new one.

Simple Girls Thoughts

Simple Girl having little faith in me since she already know that it took me six months to buy the first unit decided that she will fix the broken one.

The Rest Is History

So while Simple Girl was tinkering with the bell like a mad scientist, I receive a SMS from our part time maid asking if she could come tomorrow. Crap! Our laundry is not done, it needs to be ready for her so she can do the ironing. So I rush to do the laundry. So while I am on my hands and knees sorting the laundry, I look over at that mad scientist and released what a role reversal. She is fixing electronic parts and I am doing the laundry.

In my defense, Simple Girl does have an Engineer Background.

May Movie Comments

I just saw Iron Man this weekend. It is a decent movie, worth your buck. For my sisters, maybe OK for them to catch it on Netflicks later. For my Brother, he should see it in the theater, however, I don't think he will. Think some company will come out soon with a rated X movie called Iron Man, haha.

Saw the trailer for Speed Racer. Even though I followed the cartoon as I kid, I must admit that this movie looks pretty lame. It looks like a modern day version of Tron. Don't know if they will have Racer X in the movie, but I always thought that Racer X was the most interesting plot line. Anyways, this movie will be guaranteed to be bad for a few reasons. They have Rain in the movie who is a Korean popstar who barely speaks English. Secondly and the most important. They left out the Monkey.



Indiana Jones - This and Star Trek are the two movies that I have to see this year. Indiana Jones is coming out this month. I pretty much remember the 3 previous movies by heart, however I will be renting them to get Simple Girl reacquainted with this series. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade was the best one by the way.

James Bond - I have recently discovered the amazing voice of Amy Winehouse. She was signed up to do the next James Bond song which I thought would be a perfect fit, but sad to say due to her recent problems she had to say "No, No, No"

Lastly, if you do go to the movie theater please note the following news just released. Movie theaters will no longer be serving popcorn.




All of the corn will instead be used to make Bio Fuels.

Bulgarian Idol

Saw this on the Buzz Report today.