11 June 2011, Saturday

Life in London - Take Two - Touching Down


Reaching the house, we were pleasantly surprised. 

Front of the house

It was a huge house, with 4 bedrooms on the second floor, and an attic that spans the whole top floor. Each floor has a washroom, with bathtubs on the 2nd and 3rd floor. 

On the ground floor, there is a kitchen, and a washing area extending behind the kitchen. There are 2 other rooms on the ground floor -- a huge carpetted living-room that's empty except for a couch, and another dining room with a dining table and 5 chairs. The dining room extends into a back yard. The backyard is almost as big as the house. There are 2 wooden sheds behind.

Common area at the main entrance

Standing at the staircase landing

Looking up from the staircase landing

Lousy under-exposed photograph cannot adequately convey the excitement expressed by the guys

Two of the bedrooms on the second floor

Francis taking a look at the second floor toilet

Dining area on the ground floor

Same dining area on the ground floor

Kitchen on the ground floor

Washing area housing the heating tank (a side door on the left opens up to the side of the house)

The living room on the ground floor

The couch is the only furniture in the living room

My room on the second floor. Windows overlooks the back yard

YC's room on the second floor. Window overlooks neighbour's house across the road

Francis' room on the second floor. The room is L-shaped -- there is a recessed space on the right where a working table stands

Washroom on the second floor

Mengdi's room on the second floor

Raymond standing at the second floor landing

Looking up into the attic on the third floor

Looking down from the attic's entrance

Toilet on the third floor attic

Half of the third floor attic

A view out of the attic's window

The same view, but I managed to capture a rainbow!

It was almost 7pm, can you believe it??

The exact same view with a lower exposure, check out the rays from the clouds! :)

The street our house is on

While we were still happily engrossed in photo-taking and unpacking, YC had to chase us out of the house because it was almost 7pm (althought it looked like 4pm).

Mailbox by the junction

Yes, it was raining, and while we were risking our DSLR, Francis is happily using his new digital compact camera

YC tying his laces. Doesn't he look hip?

The Streatham common just beside our estate

We wanted to head to Double Negative's office at Shaftesbury, but the ticketing machine at our national rail station had closed, leaving a ticket dispensing machine. That promptly broke down after we tried to operate it (it wasn't a user error, I promise!). We had no tickets to go into central London, so we ended up finding a place to eat at a Chinese restaurant. 

After eating, we went back home to unpack our stuff.

11 June 2011, Saturday

Life in London - Take Two - Departing from Singapore

After rushing to pack, and prepare my house to be empty for 3 months, I only got 1.5 hours of sleep. I woke up 6am and had to head to the airport.

My wife went with me, packed with her stuff too. The sad thing was, that she wasn't flying with me. We were both sad because we were going to be parted for the rest of the 3 months.

Christina, not too happy about my departure

Here she's pretending to be the one flying off :)

After having the last breakfast at a food court I went in and Christina left for her mom's house.

Going through the security checks, I found the guys at the area waiting to board.

YC didn't have lots of sleep

But Francis was excited

Plane came shortly:

Food on the plane

Second meal on the plane

When we arrived, we were held up for about an hour by immigration who needed to confirm our visa status. When we finally came out of immigration, I made a silly mistake. I spent almost half an hour trying to find my luggage. I didn't recognise my luggage! That was because my father let me use his, just few days ago. 

When we went out of arrivals, it was already close to 5pm. We were scheduled to be picked up by a car at 4pm. The driver was about to leave when we called him. He turned around and took us to the car.

Battersea power plant

Streatham common. Parks that are enclosed plots of land, for people to stroll. But commons are not enclosed. 

4 June 2011, Saturday


A few days ago I came across this verse from a daily verse app on my Galaxy Tab. 


Proverbs 16:8
"Better a little with righteousness than much gain with injustice."


Sometimes we must keep reminding ourselves of God's perspective and His truths from His Word in the Bible. We are weak and so prone to thinking thoughts from the worldly point of view, not from God's value system.


This speaks to my heart because like many of people out there, I've seen my fair share of people in situations where they seem to get ahead or get away with things they do not deserve. When we see unfair things happen, we tend to ask "Why?".


This verse teaches me that God uses another scale to measure success, and that goes against the worldly system. 


God I pray that I will always be reminded of Your Goodness and Your word. Help me, even though I sin. Teach me to constantly, to walk in the path of Your righteousness, and do not give up on me, I pray. Amen.

I had a honeymoon trip to Hongkong! 

Unfortunately I don't have time to post pictures from that trip. I promise I will post it as soon as I am free. My work is quite hectic right now, so I don't have much time to post pictures. 

But I promise to catch up with the blogging :)

Today I happened to come across a topic about people who put up a front, or present a false image of themselves to others, misleading people around you to think that you are someone you are not.

Some people would tend to become affected when they have put their trust in that person, and would then feel their trust betrayed, when that person does not turn out to be the same person they were led to believe he/she is.

Someone asked me how I would react. It is of course justified to take it personally, especially when you've invest emotions, care, concern for that person who has put up a front. You would feel betrayed, all those genuine emotions and effort you have taken to nurture that friendship.

Here was my reply, in an instant messaging chat session:

Its ok

i won't take it seariously

You know how hard it is to be fake?

you have to PRETEND,

and you have to KEEP IT UP,

and you know that every false front you put forward

you are fighting your own conscience

it is TIRING

to keep it up

if you were fake

i would smile sadly at you in understanding

of the things you put yourself through

for some mysterious reasons

that i am sure you yourself have justified

that these mysterious reasons

are worth

all that trouble

that you take

to put up that front

and try to keep it up

over people's eyes

to make them believe

what you want them to

and knowing that

people who like you or are attracted to you

are for the wrong reasons

-- those exact reasons that you made up

for them to believe

in the fake you

See?

The person is doing himself/herself a disfavour.

I dont need to spend my energy to pile up the hate

or dislike for him/her

If i really did treat the person nice

and the person fooled me as to who he/she is, and turns out to be a fake

Its still ok.

At least I've found out

and i will be thankful that I found out

With that, I will suffer no further damage because I've found out.

I move on.

But the person,

if he/she keeps up his/her fake identity,

he/she gotta keep playing that game

fooling people.

That's detrimental to himself/herself, and to their friends around them.

To each his own.

When I see people do that, I'll  feel tired for them

so i'll sympathise with them more than hate them

This was written from the top of my mind, in a very short span of time, but I think I manage to say something profound. That's why I decided to put it here. :)

Going to sleep now.

Good night all.

12 March 2011, Saturday

WeiKurk's Wedding!

He had his solemnisation at Grace 1, Tanglin Road, and I was playing keybaards for his Worship, together with Pastor, Jennhui, Boonheng (I cant really remember who else, because I am finishing this post 5 June 2011).

His dinner was at Oriental Hotel. It was a lovely wedding and many friends from church were there. I also saw Lau and his wife.

A Sickly Day

11 March 2011 (Friday)


Sick Today!


I woke up this morning at 8.30am to find that I had not recovered. My throbbing headache has become a dull pain in the head. So I decided to go see the doctor. 


Doctor gave me a day off, and diagnosed it as the beginning of flu. I just hope that the rest I give myself today will prevent the flu from breaking out in its full intensity.


On my way to see the doctor, I passed by City Square mall, kitchener road, Verdun road and Jalan Berseh Road. I discovered new places and shops around the neighbourhood that I didn't know were there.

The Motorcycle Trade Association. Never knew such an association existed! :)

Just across the Motor Cycle Trade Association was a modern looking bar

Further down that small street, an old building, residential on top, and shop-houses facing  Jalan Berseh Road in front.

Rowell Clinic viewed from Jalan Berseh Road

Rowell Clinic from the waiting area.

Didn't realise that There were lots of apartments in construction in the direction of KK Hospital and Novena. Taken from the open field beside my block.

Taken with my Samsung Galaxy Tab.


Ok I'm going off to rest. Doctor's orders :)

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Sickness brewing & lift breaking down

10 March 2011 (Thursday)


Today was a struggling day for me. I felt weak and cold at work, at about 11am. From there it went downhill. By 5pm, I was wondering if I could survive the trip home. Christina had project to do at work, so I ate with Janson, Francis, Helga, Bryan, Thom and Jerly. We ate at the basement foodcourt at Fusionopolis until about 8.15pm, then we went home. Thom and Jerly live at Potong Pasir, along the North East Line, so we took the same train. 


I dragged myself home to the bottom of my flat to find that the Lift at my block was faulty. There was already a family of 3 waiting for the lift when I approached. I tried to hit the button to call for a lift, and it did not light up. On a closer inspection, I realised that out of 3 lifts, one had a power failure error, the other one looks like it was going up and stopping at every floor. 


The 3rd lift came, and going up, it stopped at all the even numbered levels. very strange indeed. I messaged Christina to tell her about the lift malfunction, so she wouldn't go up by herself and get trapped inside.


Once home, I slept from 10pm all the way to 8.30am the next morning.

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How my screen protector got destroyed

How My Screen Protector Got Destroyed 

(10 March 2011, Wednesday)

Today is the day where I had to rip away my matte screen protector from my Samsung Galaxy Tab.

I was standing on the bus on my way to work, at the rear door. I was not holding on to anything, and I was listening to music on my Galaxy Tab through ear-phones. The bus was rounding the bend and suddenly it did a very hard brake. 

The force was all right at first. I could handle it. But the braking force was applied for more than 4 seconds, my balance was thrown off and I knocked into the passenger in front of me. A malay or Indian chap. 

Turned out that the bus had to stop at the last moment, for a fast travelling vehicle going along the main road.

Shortly after I reached work, I realised there was a deep scratch on the surface of my screen protector. I must have held the Galaxy Tab close to the front of my body. That's where my access card was hanging. There was a metal clip where the card joins the lanyard. The screen must have scratched against it when the bus was doing the sudden brake.

YC, sitting beside me, told me to tear the protector off and throw it away. He is a hardcore Android fan, and he has seen the Samsung Galaxy S in all its graphics glory, showing off its sharp display and scratch resistant glass display. He told me it was gorilla-glass (I don't actually know what that means, but I take it to mean "very tough glass"). 

Finally I tore of the matte protector (cost me $19, costlier than average screen protectors because of the 7" display of the Galaxy Tab was larger than most mobile devices). To my pleasant surprise, the display became much more crisp, and vibrant in colour. Without the matte surface, my fingers feel much smoother and more comfortable when sliding across the display. YC has made a good suggestion after all! 


Now that the screen protector has come off, I somehow feel that the screen has become larger. I am still worried about the screen getting scratched, so I might still decide to go get a clear protector after all. Haha. 

That's how stubborn I am!

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2011 Feb 26, Saturday

Today is a sad day. My grandfather passed away.

It was the first day I went to hospital to see him. He was admitted on the 20th, about a week ago. He died at the age of 97 years old. He had swollen feet and water in the lungs, if I've got my facts right. This led him to be hospitalised. He could not consume solid food, so he was on drip and liquid food.

When I visited him at 7.15pm, his condition was stable but his blood pressure was very low, lower than 50. His heart beat was about 85 per minute. Which was quite alright. I left the hospital about 7.30pm - 7.45pm.

I did not know anything about measurement, so I did a quick search on Wikipedia. Here's the link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_pressure.

Here's a brief summary from Wikipedia:

Average blood pressure in (mmHg):

1 year	6 - 9 years	adults
95/65	100/65	110/65 - 140/90

Originally, I was invited to Chingnee (Ruby) birthday's dinner where she was going to treat Christina and myself. Because Christina wasn't feeling well, we told Ching that we won't be attending. Christina was at the ground floor of the hospital while I went up to see the grandfather.

After visiting at Tan Tock Seng Hospital , I went to Novena Square to have dinner with Christina. Halfway through the dinner, I got a text message from my father at 8.35pm saying that the grandfather has passed away at 8.15pm.

The relatives had all visited him. Except for 3rd uncle which was out of country and was making his way back. Grandfather was already in there for almost a week, and the doctor was telling them since morning, that he could pass away any time. When I went there, I felt that the relatives were quite prepared for what was going to happen.

2011-02-16 Wednesday

An article was published today in Digital Life that included an interview I had with Straits Times Digital Life journalist Hellen Tan.

The article talks about local artists / graduates' expectations of salary in the industry. It interviewed Melvin Tan from Blue Sky Studios, David Kwok from Tiny Island Productions, and myself from Double Negative.

The last line from my interview mentioned Cosmas Lee our Operations Manager at Dneg SG. He says we have to "pay our dues" when starting off in the visual effects industry, before we can climb up and play bigger roles in the pipeline.

Prior to this article, I also had the good fortune to be interviewed for another article about Double Negative, written by Sherwin Loh my Anderson secondary school & Outram institute classmate. This was in 2009 if memory serves me right.

Both articles referred to visual effects as special effects. This is an inaccurate term for the visual effects industry. Special effects refers to physically created effects (outside of the CGI-computer generated imagery- realm). Examples are the use of, special make-up, prosthetics, robotics, animatronics, miniature, pyrotechnics, specially manufactured and rigged props and/or coordinated stunt-work.

2011-02-16 Valentine's Day Gift

I am still on reservist from 08 March 2011 till 28 March 2011. I've been helping Film Unit do 3D models for their Airforce Workplan.

Back at work at Double Negative, our STRAT 1 batch of people have been moved up to do TD environment work just before the Chinese New Year. They are undergoing training on the job even as I am doing reservist now. The timing honestly isn't very good. I am missing out on the training while doing my reservist. Bummer.

Today Christina and I went down to People's Park Complex to get our airfare for our tour. I bumped into Jason Ang Nicodemus Hoe Kiat (former Double Negative employee, until the Chinese New Year holidays).

After that we went to Bugis Junction for dinner. Ate at Basement 1 at the open airconditioned stall called "Eat.". I find the service staff quite bad. Not really paying attention. I just handed the lady $50, she opened up the cash register, and 15 seconds later while putting together my change, she asked me "How much did you give me again?"

After dinner we went to 2 jewelery shops. Citigems and Lee Hwa. Christina was looking for a cross to hang on a chain. We've already seen the Citigem collection in Novena Square the Sunday before. The shop at Bugis seems smaller than the on at Novena, and had a more limited range. So we moved on to Lee Hwa. Here we spotted a few designs that she liked.

After narrowing down her choices, she decided to get one at 50% discount. It was about $700, but it was a Valentine's day promotion, so it's now selling at $328. I bought this for her as a present.

After this I went to EpiCentre (a shop that sells Apple computers, devices and accessories). I asked around for earphones with a mic. My 3 months old Samsung Galaxy Tab is giving me a hard time making phone calls because of the less-than-ideal in-built mic. During the call, the other party would have difficulty hearing my voice because the mic would pick up background sounds instead of my voice. The sales staff recommended me a Klipsch ear-phone. It was not made for Apple devices (I told him mine was an Android device). Its a Klipsch ProMedia in-ear earphones with microphone. This cost $159.

At the same time there was some RBS credit card people trying to sell the card. There's a tie-up with Epi Centre, where there's a $50 voucher to redeem after you sign up for the card. I already have that card and Christina signed up for it as well!