Glory days have come - Part II

Public transport in Sri Lanka is (or used to be) plagued with sexually repressed predators who lay in wait to feel up unsuspecting women in crowded buses and trains. They take their chances - at the risk of getting beaten up, humiliated in public or worse reprimanded by the authorities (which rarely happens though) - in hopes of getting away with an anti-climatic sexual experience at the expense of hurting another human being. My thoughts often get tangled in twists trying to understand the psychology behind such acts.

Singapore, thankfully, is a more civilised and safe society. The general attitude is that you cant take what is not yours to take and if you do, there will be serious consequences. It also appears to be a fairly open and indifferent society, where consensual sex is not viewed as something taboo, evil or sinful (unless it is a case of being unfaithful). The government has strategically made it legal for sex workers to carry out "the world's oldest profession" as safely as possible under the law. I found this rather shocking when I first arrived here, but my opinions on the matter have since changed. The bigger picture is that when safe and legal sexual services are available freely for those who need it and it comes without a society's damnation, a lot of innocent and unwilling women and children will be safe from sexual harassment. It won't solve all the problems in that category out there, but it will certainly help.

That bit of serious talk was the build up to relate a rather amusing story. My mother who hails from a family of cops is the polar opposite of my dad and me. Her sense of self preservation and diplomacy is quite numb compared to ours. Where we would stop to analyse the most peaceful and dignified solution, her first reaction to injustice is spontaneous action involving verbal abuse and even violence. And that's a good thing sometimes, which I admire with envy because I find it hard to fly into a fit of rage even when my life depends on it. Once a sexual predator (half her age) did the grave mistake of trying to touch her in a bus. In the events that followed, he was badly beaten up by her and kicked out of the bus. He didn't even stop to pick up the ring he was wearing, which he dropped in the scuffle. She is my hero for this and for many other battles she has gladly fought for me!

I hope I have not turned off potential tourists from visiting the beautiful and culturally rich country that is Sri Lanka. It is definitely a place worth visiting and with appropriate precautions, it can be a pleasant experience.

Singapore has banned chewing gum (except in rare cases where a doctor can prescribe it as a dental aid). Eating chewing gum in public can even carry a fine. It may seem rather extreme but with a "remarkably clean city" reputation to maintain, it does not come as a big surprise. I miss chewing gum and the other day while putting up some posters at work, I caught myself looking longingly at a wad of blu tack.

Lately, my clothes have been shouting out telling me that I'm getting bigger and that my metabolism is not as fast as it once used to be. As I found out playing on Dance Central, it is so much harder to lose fifty kilocalories than to gain it by eating something nice. Also fat does not accumulate evenly like a nice layer of blubber in whales and seals, instead, it collects unevenly in places that are hard to miss. Maybe that's a good warning sign. I don't think whales and seals ever realise it is time to do something about obesity. Then again, they lead active lifestyles, unlike me.

Speaking of fatties, some time ago, I watched a Japanese animated movie called My Neighbour Totoro with English dubs. Ryuu and I had initial doubts over whether I'll be able to appreciate Japanese animation, which is strikingly different in its art, style, dialogue and feel from the English ones I am more accustomed to and the intended audience being children. The story felt a bit slow initially but it picked up once the background was established. I enjoyed it for its thoughtfulness and the story being portrayed from the refreshing point of view of a child, which also felt vaguely familiar.

Totoro turns out to be a cute and enormously loved character in Japan and a lot of us didn't know this until the re-released movie of 2006

And speaking of more fatties, we end this post with an honourable mention of the Suzuran High website that Ryuu, who is self-taught in Kanji, single handedly designed and came up with (I had to say honourable mention of the site and not Ryuu, or she might bite my head off). She passionately maintains and moderates the site voluntarily and in a little over an year, the forum for fans of the Crows and Worst series of manga has grown to have about 450 registered members from all over the world (not forgetting the unregistered lurkers) who have collectively posted over 9000 posts! I think that's really impressive.

Glory days have come - Part I

Katy Kat asked me if I had a blogger's block the other day. I think the question itself pushed me to attempt to break out of it. So this blog consists of bits and pieces which were typed out and saved on my phone while commuting, emailed to self later and then copied and edited on Blogger. My struggles with work life balance led to what I suspect a temporary mental aversion to blogging. To make matters worse, my computer started acting up - the keyboard in particular. It works on some days and not on others, with no explainable patterns. A keyboard is like a pen to any blogger. So the frustration of not having a pen when you want to write something down badly (assuming in both cases that no phones were available) is understandable.

In my search for a solution, I read up and tried various fixtures. Frustrations aside, one learns new tech-related things going through a crisis like this. The "one before the last" attempt was to restore the computer to factory settings. That didn't make the problem go away completely, but it seems to have improved the situation by extending the time that the keyboard remains functional. The last attempt is of course to replace this computer which I bought over 2.5 years ago with a new one, but this is not an option for another 6-10 weeks.

Sometimes when I can't recall dates of special events in my life (like the purchase of a new computer, for example), I often search my blog. Just now while referring back, I found this amusing line in a post I made in January 2011: 

No Shuri, you CAN'T have the X-box Kinect. But your glory days with Dance Central will come, be patient now.

Shuri is immensely patient. She waited two years to make it happen. Perhaps I'll blog about my secret dancing sessions on another day.

My boss gave me some chocolates after his return from his home town in South Africa. He tells me that the ripe Marula fruit in the wild attracts a lot of wildlife. When the fruit is overly ripe, it has a slightly elevated alcohol level making some of its consumers (like the monkeys) slightly tipsy!

Earlier this month, Katy and I went to a two-day camp organised by the Singapore Zoo. It was a lot of fun! We spotted nocturnal animals during a night walk (I learnt that Katy has well developed vision for spotting animals even in low light conditions! And projecting these observations skills of hers a little further, I don't think her kids will ever get away with any sneaky business without their mama knowing!), got VIP tours of the animal hospital and central kitchen and got to sleep inside sleeping bags. The zoo feels like an entirely different place after all the visitors have left and it closes for the night.

There were also awkward ice-breakers and an alpha male participant who volunteered to take the lead ALL the time. At times we were happy to sit back and observe him with amusement and at times I wanted to hit him over the head. 

This was the list distributed to the camp participants. Katy and I pondered a lot on what "1 set of undergarment" meant. Did it mean a two-pieced set for the girls? Then, what about the boys? Or was it one piece, like the confusing term "a pair of shorts" which actually means one piece? And do they still call them "undergarments" these days?

 

This is what "undergarments" initially brought to mind. I can't fathom why women of the 1960's wore cone bras, except maybe for self defence. I'm happy about the evolutionary path that underwear has taken since. Well, somewhat. It would be good if it can stop evolving right about now.

   

Our packed bags, waiting in swollen anticipation to go to the camp

A little frog used to for educating purposes which was duly returned to its resting place afterwards

 

The Animal Hospital. (left) X-ray room and (right) Operating Theatre 

 

Large food store feeding a majority of the 10,000+ specimens distributed at the Singapore Zoo, Night Safari and the River Safari

Food in various forms, catering to specialised diets. These are carrots and yams to be boiled.

The sleepover at the zoo included watching "Despicable Me" just before bedtime. It was an excellent choice for a movie! After a restless night sleeping in noisy, unfamiliar sleeping bags and with back pains from sleeping on safari beds, the next day, we left the zoo feeling extremely thrilled about the wild experience that Wildlife Reserves Singapore gave us.

Cake and other random bits

It's July! We turned late twenty last week.

Growing up is not all bad, actually. The turbulence of the younger years seems to have subsided. The workings of the world makes more sense.

Some extremely thoughtful presents given by Shu's dear friends. Thanks guys, for these and the cake! 

A beautiful Royal Python introduced to us by one of the Keepers after zoo duty last Sunday

A photo taken at Harbourfront, Singapore. 

And finally, a one of Pitbull's songs guaranteed to lift the spirits: