iPhone

This is probably the most hi-tech product I have ever invested in my life.

All along I considered my cell's only purpose as the phone itself (or proably an alarm too), so, despite all the heat around new mobiles, I remained an insulator in changing my old nokia phone.

But these weeks I see the point.

One boring day in paediatric surgery team, we are invited (or you can call it summoned) to join the team surgery in the operation theatre. Well, I myself am never a keen observer in all sorts of surgery, still we need to go for it, and the lucky us picked on a case of laparoscopic partial nephroectomy (cutting half a kidney). We started at 9am, and the time went on and on, though the images were so clear on the TV screen, my legs started to sore. As the surgeons were too busy dealing the heavily bleeding redbean, they were not able to entertain our questions, so we stood.

The only thing I brought with me is a pocket general surgery guide, I tried to flip over and over, wishing to see a page writing about paediatric surgery - and of course there was none. So, despite my raging curiosity over the anatomy, surgical procedures, complications - I could only stand.

But then, Joanne's iphone came into play. It satisfied all our wants, with the additional dessert of facebook and yahoo news.

This is when I started to love this piece of Apple.

P.S. The surgery finally ended at 5:30pm.

Priority

Umm how I wish I could have 48 hours a day.

These days I am so much troubled by the limitation of time. Recalling my chat with my dearest roommate Kaman last year, I found the lesson of prioritizing our jobs seems to be advancing in our final year. Family, girlfriend, friends, churchlife, movies, leisure books, and finally the horrible studies. Mind you, I am not saying any of the above is a burden to me, in fact I love them all (with studying inclusive) - just that the basic rule of economics is so truthfully real - "Resources are scarce, yet human wants are unlimited."

The question is, how could I achieve a balance (or, homeostasis) in it!

I tried to prioritize them like this:
1) Family, girlfriend
2) Friends
3) Churchlife
4) Studies
5) Leisure

But it doesn't even work a bit:
- Doesn't bible says we have to put God at first place?
- Some may blame me being heavy-color-light-friends
- Seems the study time is never enough!
- Gosh I want more leisure time...

Finally, I see the point. It is the limitation in time that makes things valuable. If time is unlimited I would never be pleased to have dinner with my girlfriend, I would not have cherished so much about my family time, and studies would seem so endlessly torturing. So, perhaps more importantly is not to feel regretful for whatever choice I have made (provided that they are reasonably meaningful). Because, based on again the rules of economics, the list option-forgone is endless.

William Hung is right....
"I have already given my best, and I have no regret at all."

The Expendables

In the days without girlfriend, I can only go in the threatre alone. I dare not to watch Going The Distance by myself - so my weekend dessert turned into another extreme - The Expendables by Stallone.

Judging only by the starring cast, the movie starts with a baseline rate of at least 2 stars. From the ever-energetic Stallone, to Jason Statham, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, and my favourite Bruce Willis (also Arnold Schwarzenegger). Indeed, the testosterone level remains skyhigh throughout the two hours - almost blew me away.

Stallone is simply amazing. I wonder how could he bear this muscular body in his age of 64, and kept on running, fighting and combatting as a lead role. Of course, if you pay enough attention, it is quite obvious that much of the filming angles have been suited to minimize his actions. Though it is no way comparable to his fleshy punch in Rocky, credits have to be given for his age and effort.

On the other hand, Jet Li 's performance is way under his ability. Probably due to his poor English, he spoke only for a few lines (words, in fact), and throughout the film he kept being beaten up and teased as an Asian, umm I hate that.

Well, the highlight of the movie is probably the short conversation among the lovely triad -

Schwarzenegger: Hey how about dinner?

Stallone: Yeh, when?

Schwarzenegger: In a thousand years?

Stallone: Too soon.

(Schwarzenegger walks away.)

Willis: What's his fucking problem?

Stallone: He wants to be president.

Frankly, the movie is so much Hollywood and is definitely nothing new, don't expect a twisting story or fascinating fight scenes. But paying just $30 (Golden Harvest Mongkok!) for all these stars, why not?

Rubik

Umm I had a long free week after my first clinical rotation. I really wish to gain some extra-medic skill, but limited by the short time - skiing is out, tennis is out, piano is out. I could only resort to something smaller and easier (yet challenging enough). Finally I found my long-forgotten Rubik's cube in my drawer, and there I go!

My best record was only to finish one single face unaidedly (if you still consider this as a record...). This time I made up my mind and tried go online to learn, only by then I realise there are rules/algorithm for you to solve this thing. Still, it took me almost 5 hours to memorise all the crazy steps and solve one by my own...

Well, fun always disappeared after revealing the solution, but searching in youtube, you will see crazy guys are all over the world.

Blindfolded Rubiks


Rubik's in 10 second

3-years old Chinese solving Rubik's

When I

When I woke up, I think of you.

When I skipped my breakfast, I think of the ham-and-cheese panini you made for me.

When I stood in operation theatre watching the open-heart surgery, I think of how you keep my heart beating.

When the prof fired questions to me, I think of the way you ask my questions - so I smiled and forgot to answer.

When I was answering the questions, I think of you answering mine - so I spoke nonsense - and the prof asked me again.

When I drank Mr.Brown coffee, I think of the color you like.

When I finished the movie alone in theatre, I think of and count how many times have we been holding hands in front of the big screen, and I missed the main plot.

When I watched MV of Lady gaga, I think of your Christina Aguilera.

When I walked pass TimberLand, Lancome, Madico, LeaveLand, Trendyland, I think of you.

When I dropped my pen underneath my bed and I crawled to pick it up, I think of the 趴地熊 on your bed.

When I was poo-pooing in washroom, I think of the 屎Pat熊 on your bed.

When I opened the fridge, I think of how cold your hands were in winter.

When I peeled the California Orange, I think of you in California, and the days we watched Annoying Orange together.


=============================
You see how much these are disturbing my life, so please come back soon, so that I can SEE you and stop thinking about you!
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The Twilight saga - Eclipse

I have done an informal survey, asking quite some twenty friends about their views on the Twilight series, and the post-hoc subgroup analysis (still informal) showed a significant difference between boys and girls. Generally, boys are bored and girls are romanced.

So here I come, from Twilight to NewMoon, to the current Eclipse.

As far as I know, there are three different directors for each of them. If you have seen Twilight, I am sure you as as well tell the difference from the exceedingly slowpaced but detailed plot - it was filmed by a female director. Plus the fact that the original story was written by a gifted lady writer Stephenie Meyer, the entire story actually centred so much on Bella's struggle of love, and her difficult choice between the charmingly protective vampire Edward, and the (very) muscular and amiable werewolf Jacob.

Indeed if I were to classify the film genre, I would rather put it into Romance/Love story. To be fair, after shifting my paradigm and seeing the world in Bella's eyes, I could feel the enchantment of love floating around, in a strong scent.

In particular, I appreciate the shot where Bella was put on a high freezy mountain by Edward, being a cold-blooded species he failed to offer a warm fleshy hug - but the perspiring Jacob could. Seeing his beloved girl holding around skin-to-skin by another boy - you could almost taste the sour in it. Transfering the inner tension into something physical, I love the idea.

P.S.
Boys who used to enjoy action and fantasy may have expected too much of blood or fight from the Twilight series. Haha, if so, I would suggest him going for the Underworld series instead - again story of vampires and werewolves - but dark and thrilling, no more girly love.

P.S. 2
Afterall, Bella is the lucky one, at least she has the chance of entering this dilemma, it is a blessing to be immersed by the polar love of two kinds. For my choice? Look at the poster I chose!

The Fungshui Gamble

Coming back from a day trip to Macau with my friends, what a crazy, fun, appetite-filling and blessed journey.

Calling this city the Republic of Gambling is so politically correct. Jasper is right: the number of casinos there is comparable with the 7-11s here in Hong Kong. Though (luckily) none of us went for gambling, it is hard not to get drown by the sea of chips and poker cards.

Whenever linked to luck, everything become intimately related to fungshui. The traveller's guide on my hand has an entire chapter teaching the gamblers how to battle against the "風水陣" set up by the casinos. I have much fun reading it.

First, I got to appreciate the complex 五行 ideas involved. In the older days where science and maths are yet to be the leading knowledges, our ancestors cleverly attributed the in-harmony natural laws to the beauty of nature. It is a good idea to make decisions in line with our mothernature, and yes, there is so much wisdom in it.

But now back to 2010, where probability has become a major syllabus in HKCEE maths (what is it called in the 3-3-4 system?), do you still seriously think that you can outplay the 買大細 by wearing a shiny green shirt and holding a toad in palm? If you doubt, I don't even need a randomised control trial, try the following and you will see.

1) Go get a sum of money, buy 1000 hands in series, if you still have a considerable edge, I paid you double.
2) I come join you wearing the same shirt and holding the same toad species, when you 買大, I 買細, ummm you guess who would the toad help?
3) Go ask the fungshui master: Why dont you get in the casino and win something big, instead of earning the pity penny from the book publisher?

Phew, afterall, I am not the one who is gambling. If I am, you may actually see me holding a frog in my hand too - umm, it does no harm XD

Determined by butterfly

As our current technology improves explosively, sooner in our future, we may possibly succeed in going back to the past. While if so, at this day, theism (at least Christianity) will collapse. Let me elaborate.

As Christians we have some core beliefs - one of which is the uniqueness of individual creation. We believe that God has created us with intention, given us freewill to make choices, and imposed on us his plan of our lives.

Then, if there is a single person succeeded in travelling back time and changed something, it proved two concepts simutaneously:
1) Determinism is correct.
2) You can reverse - and take the role of - God's creation.

According to the butterfly effect, even a tiny change in the past would lead to a drastic change in future. The further you travel to past, the more different the current world would be. So, if one has travelled back 100 years, he killed someone randomly - the entire family at current time will break down and vanish in no where (if unlucky enough, he may have vanished as well). While at the same time, new individuals will appear due to the change in marriages. So, you utterly cancelled God's creation, and replaced with your own ones.

How about the proof for determinism? Think deeper, the butterfly effect per se has this implication - our life is determined by our past experiences.

In response, I have two choices. Either I believe we human can never travel back to past (which might hold true at least for 100 years I guess), or I believe, even if we can travel back, we cannot change anything.

For either, I need a big leap of faith, gosh.

The Butterfly Effect

"It has been said that something as small as the flutter of a butterfly can ultimately cause a typhoon halfway around the world." - The Chaos Theory

Despite being a low-budget film, this film chills with its brilliant illustration of its name - the butterfly effect. In fact it was a 2004 production, but I missed the opportunity for so many times, now I got it and love it.

From time to time, we human often fascinates the possibility of going back into the past, and change things that we regretted for. It is of our nature to ask the question what if I have/haven't bla bla bla, but we never know - if we change one thing, we changed everything.

Let's put it in this way. Say if somehow I go back to my childhood years, I turn off the light in my bedroom while the younger me was studying for his form 2 biology exam, so I felt asleep. Haven't prepared enough for the test, I performed badly. Then when the result was out, I felt discouraged, and my interest in biology went into a downward spiral, turned out I chose the art stream the next year.

Finally, James Chow never appeared in medical school, maybe, he is now working in a writing firm instead(urgh).

Within this dynamic interconnected world, a small decision at a moment could give a completely different outcome. To complicate, it is not only our decision that guide our future, in fact, every of us are altering each and others' destiny.

Then, I got to ask myself the fundamental question: if things didn't go the way in my past, will I have met her now?

Yes, I believe so. At least for this point, we are destined.

The Butterfly Effect - movie trailer



P.S. For those would like to watch, make sure you finish all the FOUR alternate endings! Personally, I love the director's cut most - stone cold but inspiring.

Blokus, Block us!

Umm I love board games.

In this era of computer video games, between the Starcraft II and Mastermind, the newer generation could pick with zero reaction time. I am not pretending to be old, but indeed when I shop in the current Toy'R'us searching for Abalone (not the edible luxury, it-is-a-chessgame!), I found the shelf for broadgame shrinked - from 4 complete blocks in the past, to currently, 1 single shelf.

Probably the toy-manufacturers have revolutionalised their marketing strategies. They are putting broadgames online. Blokus is a good nice example.

The game is simple and short. You play the blocks from one color, the only rule is that you need to link the blocks at corners. The winner is the one who has the least blocks on hand at last!

Though the platform allows us to play with computers or other online players, I enjoy more playing with friends face-to-face. Haha, I still remember vividly the short play with my dearest groupmates in library last week, sitting in a row, we turned the lib into a cyber-bar. =] It will be perfect if we can sit around the real BOARD game, with cokes at hands: shout, scream, and play!

P.S.
Go and enjoy the game here: http://www.blokus.fr/online-game/
If you love it, make sure you support the game-creater by buying a real set back home!

Ip Man 2

Umm originally my first choice of movie for this weekend is Dear John. But after the exceedingly exhausting OSLER, I need something stronger to cheer my mind up, so finally I resorted to the Ip Man 2. (By the way, I wonder why the inflation is going so mad here, now $9 for renting a VCD? Gosh I would go broke very soon...)

Frankly, films on Chinese kungfu have quite limited themes, and among them, national spirit is definitely the top. This truly gives film-makers a headache, how are they suppose to generate something fresh and new to satisfy the already-desensitized audience?

Right, Ip Man 1 has done quite a great job. Though it is not an innovative idea to play tricks on the hatred between us and the Japanese, the character of such a gentle kungfu master is indeed attractive. And with the skewed portrait of the nasty Jap commander, the contrast of course generated more echoes when we saw the Japs being hit hit and hit until they bled.

Here come to the second episode, knowing the background of Ip Man immigrating to Hong Kong, I have no expectation for an overwhelming atmosphere of national spirit - and I got it right. This time, the actions are still equally amazing (Both DonnieYen and Sammo Hung are my favourite martial artists - no way comparable to Jackie Chan), but the storyline is just too superficial. Comparing to the last film, this time, the reason for going on the final combat with that stupid English fighter appears too far-fetched, the distinguishing point lies on the difference in nature of insult/conflict: nation-to-nation last time, but individual-to-nation here in Ip Man 2.

Another mistake is the fragmented storyline development. It appears odd to me seeing the abrupt unity of all the kungfu masters, only minutes after they fight with each and others. And probably this is why the ending became so artifically educational, even to an unrealistic degree.

Still, taking away the thin plot, it is quite enjoyable to watch an action kungfu movie at the weekend, particularly after I got so much bruises in the clinical exam, it rocks to see others being hit, bang bang bang!

Best purchase!

Recently, I had my best purchase of the month.

Every weekend, I used to buy some drinks back to hostel to sooth my dry boring days. Instead of the usual lemontea, this time I chose the long-forgotten Ribena (it often reminds me of my good old days, when there is a whole large glass bottle of concentrated Ribena at home).

Wellcome was making a promotion, among the every-where-yellow-tags:
$19.6 for TWO 6-in-1 packs of apple-flavored Ribena + a 500ml bottled Ribena original.

At that time, I thought I have already got my best-buy. But the best is yet to come, haha.

When I start trying the new Ribenna - I almost cannot finish it - it is just way too sweet to be swallowed! (Later I found 27.5g of sugar in this tiny 250ml pack, urgh.) So, I start diluting it. From then on, I make a whole 1.2L bottle full from each pack, and trust me, it tastes wonderful.

So, finally, the maths goes like this:
1.2L x 12 = 14.4L
14.4L + 500ml (bottled Ribena) = 15L

Buying 15L of drinks with only $19.6, I should go electing for the smartest consumer of the month, haha.