Unbalanced Vision

Hi there!

World, meet Mr Wabbit, Mr Wabbit, meet world. *shakes hands* Because my brother is relocating to Pittsburgh, he has to find a new home + loving, responsible owner for the creature. You might wonder if my parents would offer a spare room to the rabbit since my brother is moving out, but no, anything that has too much fur and feathers are not allowed inside the flat. Besides, they are already celebrating the fact that my brother is leaving, and would not want to invite another beast. Bro also found this Taiwanese pet forum, and discovered some pretty mad stories about pet owners. One chap was so clingy that after he sold his rabbit, he would ask the new owner to send pictures of it, and telephoned once in a while to check if his old pet was healthy and happy. Sometimes he wanted to see the rabbit through webcam, and when he went back to Taiwan he even visited the rabbit in person. OK, take it easy, mate. According to my brother, rabbits are not the smartest animals in the world; after years of care, I don't think it knows who my brother is. Here are some wabbit glamour shots; it's not Playboy, but you might die of cuteness overload.

Before I allow myself to moan about research, may I direct you to this witty rhyme I found on a PhD survival forum, and a reflection on a project's process and end: *smile*

1) fairjanet says:

Hi,
I'm an Austrian PhD student writing about poetry in performance in the UK, and it's been a bit lonely so far because I haven't found anyone to discuss my work with. Does anyone know other PhD students who are writing about poetry in English? Or does anyone know how I could find them? Write to every single department in every single UK college?
Cheers,

Julia N
(www.fairjanet.at/phdthesis.htm)

Ann replies:

An Austrian student named Ju
Just didn't know what to do
High and low did she seek
For someone she could speak
To regarding the work that they do

Perhaps write to those in your field
At conferences keep your eyes peeled
And hopefully fate
Will find you a mate
Fellow researchers will be revealed!

[Good luck - please forgive me for the terrible 'poem'!]

2)
'... instead of focusing on intent or outcome per se, I am trying to remind myself that what counts are discernment, flexibility, and completion. Evaluate on a regular basis the state of the project to see where I am and where I can go. Change course as needed and desired (small/big, many/few, diff. ideas to try, etc.), and no matter what, finish it in some way: maybe the idea was a dead end, but be sure to note the lessons and package what I have done so that it can be presented...'
by James

Brecon Beacons

Brief encounter

Into the green

Source

Fromage!

Yes, I am a notorious back-dater--what can I say? It's my creative freedom, my destined mission to write memoirs about the last century. On a weekend last month, some travelled to Brecon Beacons for an early spring trek. The hike was more graft than glory. I mean how proud can one be when a ten year old could easily overtake you, as if this was his daily walk in the park. Well, I still beat the kid to the peak, ha! The thaw had not yet set in, and the gusty winds and icy paths created a desperate atmosphere. At times you pause and take a look at the surrounding views, 'tis beautiful indeed.

OK, these on-line personality tests... they never understand me, or is there something about myself of which I am unaware? Instead of being outgoing and adventurous, oftentimes I just want to hide in a hole and play it safe. By the way, what I would really like to learn is Italian or Latin.

You should learn Hindi You should learn Hindi. You like to be able to speak to people wherever you travel if even just a little bit. You are very versatile and like adventure.

Take this quiz at QuizGalaxy.com

Shakespeare action figure: with my book and quill I can rule the world, Phroarrr!

Master Shakespeare is 442 years old today--have a berry, berry happy birthday! I wonder if you took a time travel machine to 2006, would you participate in our London Marathon, or even write my papers for me (would have to teach you how to type first)? You shall also find that human relationships seem to be more complicated, with much more options at the tip of our fingers. And yet some things never change:

'To me, fair friend, you never can be old,
For as you were when first your eye I eye'd,
Such seems your beauty still'.
Sonnet 104, William Shakespeare

'One of my longings is to have a couple of lusty able bodied
men to take me up, one before and another behind, as the new
fashion is, and carry mee in a Man-litter into the great bed at Ware'.
Richard Brome, The Sparagus Garden (1635), II.ii.39-41

Prudish ones be aware: this quote reads like a 17th-century woman's threesome fantasy. Actually she is hoping to sit in a newfangled sedan chair, where the chair bearers each carry the poles at front and back. Because of its secrecy and comfort, the mode of transport is a favourite with delicate female travellers. It came to be associated with their illicit sexual behaviour, for a lady who isn't at her proper place at home is bound to be up to some dirty business. I was also looking at a broadside ballad, 'News from Hyde Park', which dates from 1670. This time the speaker is a north-country gallant who happily journeyed to Hyde Park, London to marvel at the beautiful spring flowers and fashionable city ladies. The gallant's wooing antics must have worked, for he managed to ride off with one of them in the coach, heading straight to the hot babe's chamber. He waits in her bed as she prepares to undress; the action is about to begin! Out of curiosity, the poor chap peeped through the key hole and discovered that:

'She took off her head-tire, and show'd her bald pate... Her bald-pate did look like an Estritche's egg'.
'She put up her finger, and out dropt her eye'.
'She fetcht a yawn, and out fell her teeth'.
'She washt all the paint from her visage, and then / She look'd just (if you will believe me) / Like a Lancashire Witch of four-score and ten'.

Hehehe, quite weird.

Happy by Rob Ryan

I first saw Rob Ryan's realistically romantic work at the Vertigo Gallery where my friend SR works at. (Oops, dangling preposition...) Even someone who does not see the world through rose-tinted glasses will go 'aww' at those delicately cut out love stories and heart shapes. Paul Smith has an exhibition now at SW3, and hopefully F and I can go during her visit to London.

Jack Bauer sets things 'straight' (HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!) + random JB facts (by way of HY)

Note: PostSecret is an ongoing community art project where people mail in their secrets anonymously on one side of a homemade postcard.

OK, B.A.C.K.T.O.W.O.R.K.

Last night I stumbled across Douban via Book and Sword: Gratitude and Revenge (previously known as Silent Dreams), and what joy! It's a site that you can connect with bookworms + the iPod generation around the world--build up your own connection, click on a book cover and you'd be able to find out who has read it or is in the process of reading the tome. (That's what I would call networking gone mad.) Basically, it's like owning a virtual bookself, without having to sit in Richard and Judy's living room, or going through the pains of assembling a cheap IKEA shelf. I wondered why most readers are based in China, and later found out that this idea was in fact born in Beijing. It would be nice if UK had something similar. The only downside is that some of the book covers are American editions, and do not look like the ones I have bought in England. Oh well. Go and sign up.

'I have the list of mine own faults to know,
Look to, and cure. He's not a man hath none,
But like to be, that every day mends one
And feels it; else he tarries by the beast.
Can I discern how shadows are decreased
Or grown, by height or lowness of the sun,
And can I less of substance? When I run,
Ride, sail, am coached, know I how far I have gone,
And my mind's motion not? Or have I none?
No! he must feel and know that will advance.
Men have been great, but never good by chance
Or on the sudden. It were strange that he
Who was this morning such a one should be
Sidney ere night! Or that did go to bed
Coryate should rise the most sufficient head
Of Christendom! And neither of these know,
Were the rack offered them, how they came so;
'Tis by degrees that men arrive at glad
Profit in aught; each day some little add,
In time 'twill be a heap; this is not true
Alone in money, but in manners too.
Yet we must more than move still, or go on,
We must accomplish: 'tis the keystone
That makes the arch'.
Ben Jonson, "An Epistle to Sir Edward Sackville, now Earl of Dorset" The Underwood 13

Was dwelling on the idea of the paradoxical 'stasis-in-motion' state of sedentary travel, and then found this passage on making progress: every little step forward means a little closer to accomplishment. There's the improvement in mind and in distance, and Jonson is talking about the former. Physical distance can be measured, but how does one calculate the abstract notion of gaining knowledge? 'No!' asserts the diligent poet, 'he must feel and know that will advance'. It's very encouraging and promising and all that, sounding like a 17th-century chicken soup article, but all I'm wondering is when can I actually 'make advancements' by stepping outside my front door and go on a holiday, instead of working on how to improve the mind? Pooh.

PS. But what does Jonson make of the type of instant-noodle wealth and success we have today? Lottery ticket winners and 15 minutes of fame... in this day and age 'some little add, / In time 'twill be a heap' requires too much time and effort. If sweet wealth and fame were offered to me in a day, I shan't refuse, ha.

And if the night runs over
And if the day won't last
And if your way should falter
Along the stony pass
It's just a moment
This time will pass.
U2 'Stuck in a Moment You Can't Get Out Of'

It is fair to say that what has happened in the past few months has been quite a conundrum. Sometimes I simply get bored with the problems and thus put them aside, yet at times I am like a frustrated primary school kid trying to solve a complicated mathematic problem which might only be as easy as subtract and addition. Anyways, recently I find myself slowly, but have not completely, forgotten to do my math homework. Helpful ones have told me in different sentences that time will eventually sort things out, but none can sound as persuasive as my dear friend A. She always manages to cheer me up with her different perspectives. Although it seems like you've been stuck in a pit for a while, one day the things that bothered you will trouble you no more, you don't even have to consciously make an effort to analyse and find solutions. 'Tis good to hear, especially for someone as lazy as me.

A patch of sun

Sugar candy in the sky

Sometimes I feel that spring is not just around the corner, but has really arrived. Days are certainly longer and warmer now. One afternoon in mid-March, as I was working in front of my laptop, a bright ray of sunlight pierced through the window. Though it was temporary, it brought a smile to my face. On Easter Sunday I went for a jog around Russell Square, bought groceries + the Observer at Tesco and then went back home to work--it was just like my first year in London living in the same area, disciplined, stressful and yet very rewarding. Oh, and I thought my window view was gorgeous--look at my friend CY's 'desktop view'.

"As with Cain, an infantile attachment to the visible security of place characterises both those antediluvians who 'practice how to live secure, / Worldly or dissolute, on what thir Lords / Shall leave them to enjoy' and those postdiluvians who build to 'get themselves a name, lest far disperst / In foreign Lands thir memory be lost'. If the one embodies Satan's impulse to 'reign secure' and Belial's counsel to remain 'thus sitting' in 'ignoble ease and peaceful sloth', the other embodies the anxieties of Belial, who fears being 'swallow'd up and lost / In the wide womb of created night', of Adam, who would rear altars 'in memory, / Or monument to Ages', of the latter-day wolves who will 'avail themselves of names, / Places and titles', and of the Milton who in 1659 momentarily despaired that the failure to build 'this goodly tower of a Commonwealth, which the English boasted' would transform the nation into modern Babylonians, who have 'left no memorial of thir work behinde them remaining, but in the common laughter of Europ'. In each case, the sense of identity is bound to its setting, the limits of the latter curbing the expansion of the former".
Lawrence Manley, Literature and Culture in Early Modern London (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995) 577.

In light of the approaching moving season, I quote Manley and Milton. Some time ago I've wondered about the necessity to even struggle to step on the bottom rung of the property ladder. Without the burden of mortgage payments, or other travails associated with owning a plot of land, one should be able to live anywhere, anytime by renting. HY tells me that in a practical sense, would one be able to afford rents after he or she has retired? After coming across this paragraph I am considering the negative side of a nomadic lifestyle; I am even having the strangest fantasy of getting a blue plaque outside my own house: R. Lin (1978 - 2078) Taiwanese girl who makes good breakfasts.

I can sing

I can talk

It's almost two months till the flat's contract expires, and finally our landlord has got back to his senses by buying us a brand new washing machine. Calling a technician every time the old wreckage suffers an emotional breakdown isn't very economical. The machine has been the bane of our lives: every time it whirls away it leaves a puddle on the kitchen floor, and on occasions the moody cow just refuses to spin altogether. In comparison, the new one is mentally and physicall healthy; it's so happy it sings after each task is done. Oh, and a boy called HY bought me a handy phone for Skype users. The speaker gets the same experience as talking on a normal landline phone--quite amazing, eh? Now the sight of me using a phone from HY may be stranger than seeing ET phone home. Mind you, both sets of parents are as confused as ever, as if they were in the crime scene of Tom Stoppard's The Real Inspector Hound, asking who dunnit? I suppose I could quote Hillary Clinton; when asked about her husband she simply said, 'He just makes me laugh'. But there is something more than that. Any comments on the outcomes are hindsight views based on each person's experiences, who knows what will happen? It's an opportunity for both parties to adjust and think. The past three years+ were truely happy and made sense, but...

'Without a little surrealistic humour, life gets boring: if everything makes sense, we don't think', says Phillip Jones Griffiths on the Guardian photo awards reportage winner.

Squares again

Bargain hunt

10 quid each

Failed attempt to open here

The time is ten minutes to ten on a Sunday, and already there are a line of middle-aged gentlemen waiting in a newly refurbished hotel lobby in WC1, with the vulgar coloured lights in the background. There's a certain type of species that is willing to rise up early during the weekend to engage themselves in the 'pursuit of knowledge' (with a price tag). You'd spot them in tweed jackets, jumpers with elbow patches, bright coloured trousers, or shorts (note: it's not that hot, and you're not going on safari); the taste is more M & S than Savile Row. There is, however, a Patrick Stewart lookalike bookseller who I'm quite delighted to talk to. I sat in my usual corner anticipating punters, but without surprise there was very, very little action. By lunch hour I had finished reading the Saturday Guardian, previous weekend newspapers and nicked one bookseller's Sunday Telegraph. Moreover, I had serious discussions about vegetarian food, Essex girls, M & S sandwich packaging, football, relationships and Asian writers with the bookseller sitting next to me. At some point the fire alarm went off, and the appropriate British thing to do is to sit still and carry on with your crossword or Sudoku puzzles. Nobody rushed out the door; you'd be asking for their lives to allow the sprinkler system damage their books. At the end of the day, our books about Jack the Ripper were no longer in stock.

Giant Yorkshire pudding

Reflection of my Belgian waffle

I should tell you that Dame Judi Dench stood me up! Apparently the lady was feeling unwell on Thursday, and had cancelled the performance: she must have caught something more serious than 'hay fever'. Oh, well, I shall keep a window in my diary for the play. However, D may have to find another rare opportunity to travel all the way from Yorkshire to the Smoke. The last time I met up with her was probably a year ago, and it's always nice to see an old, good friend in a foreign city. Her mission this time was to apply for a US visa to attend the country's annual grand medievalist conference: think chivalric knights in shining armors riding white horses, and beautiful damsels sitting by the window. No, it's nothing of that sort. There're assiduous scholars + bright young intellectuals presenting their work on the Middle Ages. She says it's scary enough, as the people you quote in your paper will most likely be sitting amongst the audience. Anyways, that lovely evening I was introduced to the Toad in the Hole (I've only had mini Yorkshire Puddings before), and later settled with the sweetest and yuckiest Belgian waffle known to man--I blame it on Dench.

Just in case you ever need to look up 'sedan chairs' in John Florio's Italian and English dictionary, Queen Anna's New World of Words (1611):

1) Seggietta, a kind of chaire vsed in Italy to carry men and women up and downe in.
2) Seggio, any kinde of seate or sitting-place. Also a closestoole. Also a tribunall or seate of iustice. Vsed also for the heavens, or Gods throne. Also I sit downe. Vsed also for the compasse about the trill or fundament.
3) Seggiola, a little low chaire or stoole.

Look, ladies, Grey's Anatomy has crossed over the pond to cure British souls. I hope I would be able to turn on the telly in time for the show, because tonight Dame Judi Dench is inviting me over for milk and biscuits. I've also had a detailed study of the cast, and discovered that like ER they've included an unstereotypical Asian American woman; it's Ming-Na vs. Sandra Oh. Yet I have no recollection of Ming-Na's doctor portrayal, because I was too busy looking at Noah Wyle during his pre-beard period. Speaking of doctors and medicine, my flatmate B recently suffered from an eye infection, and was ranting on as usual about how lousy Western medicine is. After days of showing no signs of recovery, a Japanese friend offered some of their homegrown ointment, and voila, his eyes are as sparkling as new. B's conclusion is that during WWII Japanese soldiers have been using the Chinese as guinea pigs for medical testing; therefore, their medicine are naturally more effective. At this point, I don't know whether I should thank my poor ancestors or the cruel Japanese soldiers?

Water is good for you

At some car park in Maryland

C4 news was reporting the success story of Skype this evening, on how the idea of on-line 'free speech' was developed in Estonia (surprise, surprise), its rapid popularity and eBay's $4.1 billion+ purchase. I am grateful to that Estonian programmer... Last night I talked to my childhood friend as if she was in my room. Last month I lost count of how many times FY and I took advantage of the green call button, and just a few hours ago one of my three best friends told me her good news. Every now and then my schoolmates are tying the knot, but it feels so much different when this is happening to someone dear to you. (As I am the first friend to know about the decision, hehe!) I asked if there was a ring in the scene. She happily said no, and that it doesn't matter. I asked if there will be a big wedding and bridesmaids. Again, she said only close family members are invited, and I count as family. At that instant I felt very happy, not just because there's a wedding to go to in December, but also she's the down-to-earth and intelligent lady I've always known and admired.