Prost!

I don't know why it's taken me so long, but finally finally I have come to my senses. There is no future for me in wine. I'm going over to beer. Yes, I'm going to learn to appreciate beer.

For the longest time, I was trying to taste the differences in wine, unsuccessfully. Sure you can tell the difference between the $10 bottle and the $40 bottle. But the differences are so minute -- is it really a $30 difference?

You may call me a boor, but I can't appreciate wine. And if truth be told, it seems that no one really knows what a good wine is. And for all that jazz about flavor and batch of crops, you really can just improve the quality of your wine by adding sugar or what not to it. As far as wine is concerned, I think it's an artificial distinction between bottles. Leave me out of it.

Now beer, oh beer. There is a real difference. There is the Belgium White, and the dark stout and you have to be pretty taste-challenged to not be able to tell the difference. It can be smooth, or metallic, or sour. And you can say what you taste and everyone will know what you're talking about. A well-rounded flavor? Whatever.

There is no such thing as the bumper crop of 2001. Beer is good fresh, not sitting around in a bottle for years. There is quality control -- you get as good a beer as you paid for all year round, all decade long.

It's taken me the longest time to come around though, no thanks to my childhood experiences. The only people who drank beer were the men in the family. They were older, and mostly out of shape. Their wives may steal a sip from their mugs, but I never met a woman who enjoyed a good beer. But the smell, oh the smell! I've always liked the way beer smells. Yet it was sour, and bubbly, and grating to the tongue. An acquired taste. Well, maybe the lack of exposure -- they drank about 3 different brands of beer when I was growing up and none of them were that great. And maybe it just wasn't a female thing.

In college, beer was something the frat boys do. Drunken and loud. Just for the sake of getting drunk. No one really cared about the taste. It was cheap and plentiful. That was enough.

Thankfully I recently met people who are serious about their beers. They tend to be rather traditional in their tastes -- blueberry flavored beer? No thanks. Yes, they are Germans. They've been brewing beers for hundreds of years, and they know how to enjoy a good cold beer.

I don't know about you but I used to think of beer in terms of percentage alcohol. Today I change my mind: that's so very wrong. Whatever the alcohol content, I now think of it as a warning label. The point is the taste -- do you like the way it tastes?

My beer tonight supposedly comes with tinges of orange peel and coriander. Whatever. I'll call it Belgium White.

PS. When you toast your friends, be sure to look them in the eye. That's how they do it in Deutchland.

What I learnt from Nicholas

I've learnt to talk without conviction, to argue for the sake of argument because no one ever takes the other side so that we can all be entertained. So you start with an idea, then you link to another idea and you try to position things across from each other so that your audience's minds are stretched. But really, it's all rhetoric.

The ideas are there as your mental medicine balls, tossing from person to person as we engage in this group activity. But no one really sees that it's a medicine ball. They think we're playing a game with a score. There is no score. Perhaps there is some sort of an acknowledgment of how gracefully one throws, but we get better. We should. The scores are not permanent. Your score today means nothing. It's a series of battles, each one strengthening. There is no war -- why care about the battles? We're not even fighting. I just happen to be on the other side for now.

Stream of consciousness. We are not judging. Let flow.

Perhaps perhaps perhaps

Someone asked me today what that one (or two) thing in life I want to accomplish is. It sounds like a typical enough question, but I don't think I've given much thought to it. I've thought about whether I'll regret my entire life if I didn't do something, but not what that one thing I really want to accomplish is. Anyway, it didn't take too long for me to figure out what I want to leave as my legacy -- a good book.

It doesn't have to be a great book, just decent and semi-insightful enough such that someone somewhere down the road will think that it makes a decent read. I would actually rather have this good book than be a famous scientist.

I could get lucky with my first book, but I wouldn't count on it. I read an article a couple of years ago that said that with the number of books being published today, the easiest way to become a published writer is to make your mark somewhere else first. I usually link articles, but I have no idea where this particular one comes from. I agreed with that opinion, but it somehow feels unsatisfactory tonight. If you can get what you want directly, why are you going on a detour that may lead you there? I'm sure it's hard to take the direct route, but the indirect route is just as improbable. I don't want to be a famous person with a book. I want to be a person with a good book, and part of that probably comes from having writing experience.

For now, I can't even write on a regular enough basis. I did think that I would attempt short stories, fables, existential anecdotes. Maybe they'll build up to a book. Murakami actually thinks that short stories are more challenging (read the intro to one of his recent short story collections, or maybe an interview about it). I like how short stories can be like haikus -- a scene that implies more than what is being described.

Let's try it again, another resolution. Maybe I will write.

In phases

No thanks to certain books, I've grown to mistrust best sellers list. I've learnt that just because something sells doesn't mean that it's any good. Thanks to this notion, I totally missed out on the Alchemist by Paulo Coelho when it came out. Fortunately, I read about Paulo Coelho in the New Yorker (yes, I seem to keep refering to the New Yorker these days), and I decided to check him out. For the first time in a long while, I sat down and finished a book from cover to cover. Sure, it wasn't a long book. It was a good book -- I think that's my point.

I tend to read in waves, by authors. The last author I checked out was Calvin Trillin. Before that, Haruki Murakami. I'll be reading Paulo Coelho for as long as I can find an unread book in the library.

I'm not sure if its wise to read only a certain author. But that's how I function, by obsessing over one person, one idea, one thing, and never really coming back again. Literally, the phases of my life.

P day, part II

I've decided to post more stories about Paul. Don't get me wrong. I don't intend to make fun of him. I really like him actually, and he's just awful about expressing himself.

Paul gets a complete post in my blog today coz he's really a pretty great guy. One of the first things Paul said to me when I saw him this afternoon was "You don't smell anymore." Thanks, Paul.

Later this evening, I tried to get a new bottle of water onto the water dispenser. Those bottles of water are huge and I was going to ask for help but the guys were having a work-related conversation. The postdoc stopped and suggested that Paul should help me, and I said that it was fine and the worst I could do would be to spill some water. Paul kindly told me that he envisions me twisting or breaking my back and being out for a few months. Funny thing was that I started laughing even though he was deadpanning. Oh, Paul.

Earlier this week, Paul caught me skipping dinner.
P: Have you had dinner yet?
me: No, I'm not hungry yet.
P: You're going to grow fat.

A fellow labmate agrees that Paul really knows how to talk to girls.

To be fair, I left out the mundane parts of the conversations when Paul tried to defend himself (I usually point out that he's being mean). But hey, those were the mundane parts. How else am I supposed to tell a story?

P day, part I

Not to be mean or biased about action stars, but I never thought that Bruce Lee was quotable. I was reading an article in the New Yorker about parkour, and one of the guys interviewed cited inspiration from Bruce Lee.

"There are no limits. There are plateaus, but you must not stay there, you must go beyond them. A man must constantly exceed his level."

It doesn't sound that fantastically cool, but in the context of the article and in light of some advice I received from Paul the Sage, it makes a lot of sense.

What these guys believe in is that we can't remain stagnant -- we must challenge ourselves. Yes, it's a platitude. But to see people taking such advice to the physical realm makes this idea extra amazing. Parkour, if you didn't read the article, is what that man at the start of Casino Royale was doing: free running through a concrete jungle, leaping off the sides of walls, cranes, running over obstacles. Here's a video of David Belle, founder of parkour.

Parkour is like martial arts -- you practise in little steps and maybe one day you'll finally get to use it. But the discipline and courage it takes to practice parkour..ah...the folly of youth. Parkour is a sport only for the young. It's probably too late for me.

In any case, Paul does not do parkour. No, I was refering to what he said to me one day when he caught me reading stacks of papers.
P: So what did you learn?
me: not much
P: You have to learn something everyday, otherwise it's not worth doing anything.

Maybe I didn't capture it right.

I have this strange feeling that I could probably fill this blog with Paul stories. So much for funny ducks.

the PBJ difference

As a sort of follow up to the entry on organic eggs, here's a site explaining why we should all have peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for lunch. 16 PBJs=1 chicken!

my latest muse

I think Karl Lagerfeld is a fascinating man -- erratic, whimiscal, in denial, in the current, charismatic.

Sticking to what's right

I sometimes think that I would lead a better life if I weren't the one making all the decisions. Choose exercise, a healthy diet, good work ethics, real friends, nice guys. It's so much easier to enforce such decisions if all you can do is carry them out. Instead we make excuses.

I chose a pack of organic eggs last week at the grocery store. I didn't really care if they were healthier coz the chickens were fed a vegetarian diet, or whatever they did to make them give healthier eggs with omega-3 oils. I just wanted a cage-free bird, a bird that didn't have its feet trimmed so that it would fit better in a cage. Organic eggs cost twice as much as regular eggs, and they don't taste any different. But an extra $1.50 doesn't really make a difference either does it? It all depends on how you choose to think of that $1.50 -- twice the usual price, or just $1.50? I told myself it was just $1.50, and bought the pack. My true view of things though is that they are expensive eggs. But will I continue buying organic eggs? Yes, I think I will. I don't consume eggs very much, so it's not much of a cost difference. But that leads to the next questions: how about organic milk? Or vegetables? Or meat?

I guess a little research is in order: I just read an article on organic milk and I don't think it makes a difference to me. I do think that it will make a difference when I have children that I don't want to feed growth hormones to. I might head over to Whole Foods for vegetables when it's warmer. I knew someone whose family owned a farm. She buys organic coz it's better for the farmers -- no pesticides and such. I recall some people saying that organic things taste better, but I doubt I'll be able to tell the difference.

I have sorta made a decision, but will I stick to it?

Can I really make a difference?

I was playing this game online last night, and it was rather addictive. It's about managing the cost of living of a family of 5 from Haiti. You want to keep them healthy, give them education and a way of of the cycle of poverty. Noble causes that are exactly up my alley. I can't seem to find a solution. They get sick so easily (perhaps it's the poor working conditions), healthcare is so expensive, and they keep starving. I've killed the parents twice, and I've completed the game once as of this morning. Even then, it wasn't ideal. Sure they are surviving, but things aren't great. If not by some stroke of luck (no hurricanes, free reading programs, bumper crop and such), they probably would have died. Family fortunes fluctuate a lot: one year they are saving lots, and the next year they are in the hole. By the time I was done with the 4 years I had to care for them, I wished I could have continued the game to make everyone finish their education, and see what happens to the stall they just bought. Then again, it is only just a game.

I'm reminded of how I wanted to do international aid work before I started college. Then I got sidetracked into science and kind of decided that there were better and more devoted people out there doing good. I didn't really think about it much till over a year ago when I saw The Constant Gardener, and realized that I may just be on the other side of where I want to be. Aid workers versus big pharma. I wasn't exactly with the big pharma, but I am in the same part of the world, in the same town. I don't believe that they are doing bad things, but I sure don't think that they are making things easy. Looking from my side, I do realize that discovering new medicines and all that manufacturing stuff are expensive endeavors. Yet I feel like we aren't serving everyone as well as we can.

Not that I am in a position to do much international aid work right now. I do know that I could be doing more for my community in general. I should. It'll be good for me. I don't know if I am going to make a difference. I don't know if it's enough to know that I seem to be doing something, goodness knows how effective or useful I may be. Perhaps I should ignore these doubts. There is no point in examining things too closely.

That book on happiness I'm reading? There is a story inside about someone who was shot by an arrow. Instead of examining the arrow and seeing the details of every splint, the more important thing is to get treatment and remove the arrow. The details and introspection don't matter. But it's so hard to keep that in mind.

The paradox

Sometimes you're alone and you feel lonely. Because of conventional wisdom, you know the right thing to do is to call up your friends and go out. And you do that and often enough it works.

Sometimes you're perfectly happy with yourself, and you're alone. And you join a group of people and hang out with them and you feel terribly alone, during, after, at some point, sometimes.

Your friends are that group of people. Why do they make you feel lonely?

People who read self-help books are people who have taken the first step in the right direction, admiting that they have a problem. I am currently reading a book on happiness. Am I lacking something in my life? I've been told that I either look really happy, or I look really sad. Laugh because you'll cry when you stop smiling. How extreme.

No, I'm not in the darkest of abysses. But gloomy thoughts permeate me always. Is my life half-empty or half-full?

About words and sounds

I would like to see Chasing Amy again. I saw that movie years ago and I remember that I didn't like it. But I would like to see it again.

I first heard of the movie when driving with friends on a dark sky observation trip. One of the songs from the soundtrack, Kiss the Rain, was playing on the car stereo, and it had the most heartfelt love confession I've ever heard, complete with pouring rain and slamming car doors. Pardon me for being female. In any case, my curiosity was piqued and I wanted to know what the movie was about. Amy said that we could watch it some time, and the guys joked about her wanting to see it coz it was Chasing Amy. We somehow ended up concluding that it wouldn't have worked as well if my name was in the title. We did end up seeing the movie -- a messed up love story about a guy and a lesbian that didn't work out. It was sad, and confusing.

I saw Big Daddy last night and it's an okay film. It was playing on tv, and I didn't have much going on. Then I heard the voice of the girl playing Layla, Adam Sandler's love interest, and I was intrigued -- who's that girl? I suspected that it was the same girl from Chasing Amy, except I couldn't remember her face. But her voice was unique, special, and very alluring. I wish I had a voice like that. Thought about her voice all night, and decided that I had to watch Chasing Amy again.

Words and sounds are all very powerful, but I usually remember scenes from movies visually or emotionally. The few exceptions are Chasing Amy, Mulholland Drive, and Chungking Express. Mulholland Drive is a mess of visuals in my head, but Llorando plays clearly. Chungking Express is unique in that I remember both sounds and visuals -- the "I like pineapple" scene, and California Dreaming. I should write about Chungking Express someday. And you should see it someday if you haven't already done so.

Carpe diem, so they say

Ever wondered why you've never been able to "seize the day" despite having watched Dead Poets Society about half a dozen times? Well, tonight, I found out why. Instead of watching DPS, try Zorba the Greek. Watch it once, and never again.

Zorba gives the good man, Basil, some good advice. Says Zorba the wise, "God gave you hands...so that you can grab." "Grab what?" you say? Precisely. You aren't desperate enough. You don't know what you want. How then can you grab?

It's not hard knowing what you want when you need it. Fast forward to somewhere near the end of Zorba the Greek. See those poor Cretans? They know what they want.

Youth is wasted on the young, precisely because they have youth. You'll never be younger than now. So go out, and find something to grab. No, don't seize the day. The day is already yours. Find something real. And forget that silly bit of Latin.

a new word!

I learnt a cool new word today.

Anatidaephobia: The fear that somewhere, somehow, a duck is watching you.

thoughts about friendship

I was thinking about fatherhood recently. Yes, fatherhood. Not parenthood. But this post is not about parenting as the title already tells you. I am thinking about friendship tonight.

My question is who makes a better friend? The person who respects your views, or the person who actively looks out for you? That is how I am stating my question for now. Perhaps it requires some restatement, but for now it works.

Both people do care for you of course, but they show their concern in different ways. Would you prefer the girl friend who tells you that she doesn't like your boyfriend, or the girl friend who doesn't say much and still says nothing when you break up? Perhaps it is hard to decide.

Would you prefer the friend who tells you that you're heading down the wrong path, or the friend whose opinion you can sense but who doesn't say a thing? I think it's hard to decide. What if you are not headed down the wrong path? What if something good did come out of it?

I never figured out how to deal with such situations, but if you know me, I'm the one who says nothing. Most of the time, I hate to jinx anything in case it does work out. I trust my friends to take care of themselves as best as they can. I hope my trust is not misplaced.

Smells like Teen Spirit

I finally saw the MTV for Smells Like Teen Spirit today. I've always liked the song, but I heard it years after it came out and I've never been an MTV person. And I discovered another thing that makes me smile. Not the attractive face of Kurt Cobain (it's okay), but the very slow-moving janitor swaying to his music. Whoever casted that old man, that was genius!

I'm sorry

I was hanging around the exam room today in case the kids had any questions, and there she was: smart, blonde, black-framed glasses and pink ear plugs, writing.

I don't mean to use stereotypes. It's rather unfair to be blonde and have people take you less seriously. It's unfair when anyone has to go the extra mile to prove anything. But I couldn't help it when I noticed the bright pink ear plugs in her ears. An excellent exam strategy.

I looked back down to my copy of the New Yorker, and smiled.

Filing a Link

I can't help but notice that a certain article has remained in the top 10 most frequently e-mailed on the New York Times. You know which one I'm talking about -- Questions Couples Should Ask (Or Wish They Had) Before Marrying. It was first published Dec 17, 2006. 3 weeks is a really long time for an article to stay on that list. I am tempted to read more into why such an article stays on the list for so long but it would be inherently misleading -- news about events and happenings have a limited amount of time before they turn stale. There is little chance of those articles staying on for a long time.

There are also lists for the most blogged and the most searched items on the site. The most blogged articles this morning are recent news, mostly relating to the president. The most searched list is a mix of current and perennial topics, ranging from Iraq to college. Saddam's name comes up twice on this list.

It's all well and good to have most popular lists, but do they tell us anything? Before this morning when I committed my thoughts to paper (and in the process thought about it more), I was inclined to make something about the most popular e-mailed article list. I usually read the articles featured on that list first, because they are likely to be the more interesting articles. I was tempted to read more into what people find important and interesting to them, until I finally saw the most blogged list. Why don't the lists coincide at all?

I've seen at least one opinion about talking about politics, how it's becoming harder to talk about it with family and friends. I guess by extension, you wouldn't want to e-mail such an article. And since news is news, one also assumes that people have access to the same news whatever newspaper they read. Editorials, fashion and health articles don't usually show up simultaneously on all major newspapers.

Yay. I've spent my morning pondering the most popular lists on the New York Times. Time to get out and do some actual thinking that matters.

growing up

I've known him for quite a few years, but it was only today that I noticed how alive his eyes were. Eyes that are seeing the world, and eagerly drinking it all up. His posture was relaxed, and his facial features were composed. But his eyes, those eyes were alert and thinking. He's lost the naivete. Or perhaps I finally see him for who he is.

"It's not about how smart you are. You'll meet someone who is half as smart, but way more cunning."
"So you've become more cunning?"
"No, you just learn to watch out."

And I could picture him watching and waiting. He won't attack you because the ones who do move out of incompetence. He will do what his job requires of him. After all, it's just business. Watching and waiting.

The Unicorn Code

“If you go to Yves Saint Laurent or Prada or Tod’s or Chanel or Hermès this season, there are three different versions of the same bag: mini, regular and oversize.”

She said the last word as if she were describing seeing a unicorn — magical, beautiful, altogether perfect.

The New York Times carried an article almost 2 weeks ago about oversized bags and how they are all the rage and oh-so-bad for you. I like reading fashion news, but this little bit in particular jumped out at me because of the unicorn.

I've been trying to describe a unicorn for a while but I can't really find anything with google. I mean, what is a unicorn supposed to symobolize? What are the search terms that I need to use? Or does a unicorn not symbolize anything? Then one morning reading about how bad oversized bags are for you, I found a somewhat-description of a unicorn. Good enough for now. A fourth word to describe the unicorn, as implied in the context of the article, is "elusive". To me, that might be the most important word.

Why am I currently fascinated with unicorns? Someone once mentioned a unicorn for reasons unknown, and I promptly forgot about it. Months later, I was trying to find a birthday present, and I stumbled across a toy unicorn. It was a rather violent toy -- a unicorn impaling a human. The avenging unicorn. You get to choose the human and even the horn. I considered getting it for my friend, but didn't figure that he would like it. I ended up giving him a button that said "Unicorns are pretty sweet". I was also considering a "unicorns are real dammit" magnet from David and Goliath (they seem to have rather cool stuff), but figured that it was too in-your-face annoying. And while I was trying to buy a unicorn, I wondered about what it actually symbolized. I have no idea still.

Anyway, if you didn't click on the link above, there is a unicorn code. It's pretty simple:

1. Unicorns never lie.
2. Unicorns always lend a helping hand.
3. Unicorns are loyal.
4. Unicorns can keep a secret.
5. Unicorns don't use drugs.

I quite like it. I feel like I may know a unicorn. I want to know a unicorn. I want to be a unicorn. I'm currently fascinated by unicorns.