I am feeling sick and I have got nothing really to say. I am nearly 30 pages in completing the longest fiction novel (Actually made up of 2 books in one) of about 900 pages. Quicksilver - by Neal Stephenson, which will bring to read the next 500 pages in the next sequel of late 17th century, early 18th century novel rich in history, adventure, science & absurdity. In some ways I think I need a month off sitting on some Indonesian Island reading this and perhaps remote working from the office (should there be wifi?)

No skateboarding for me as I feeling pretty sick as a dog. I blame it for the lack of sleep I have had and the long hours at hour. I would like to change that habit very soon! I did manage to buy a really nice tune EP today at rough trade with much thanks to my newly arrived friend from Singapore for recommending !

I was having a youtube session after work, looking through some live clips of some of my favorite hardcore punk bands such as Planemistakenforstars & Orchid etc when I am across this band call "I Wrote Haikus About Cannibalism In Your Yearbook". Damm what a crazy name for band but then again if I started some post hardcore band I probably have a name of a band like "stolen bikes goes faster" or something ha ha.

I was yhinking about S'pore.. I remember when I was last living there I somehow had the need to be with like minded people. It is difficult as S'pore been such a fast moving city, there seems to always be a question about the quality of time spent & what the majority of people do with it in such a small space. light hearted conversion at about 4.00am in Paris with a french dude (who had been there) about life in Sg which made me even wonder more of the times I was there.

Pianos Become the Teeth

And they will be playing in the UK soon!!!

Democracy, The West & The Arab World

Some extraordinary events that is unfolding in this Arabic part of North Africa with the Tunisian president escaping his own country. Its strange that for years Zine Ben Ali was seen by the West as some benevolent dictator (Far from been a LKY in S'pore) who rightly stood up to hardline Islamist but was such corrupt dictator to his own people. however, Its funny that in the West whenever we read about elections in the Arab world, we desire for a fair & democratic process so long as its leaders that favor the West. Think of all that Oil concessions that are out there in the Arab world. Sadly from about the Mediterranean world(Club Med) to the Borders of India there appears to be some sort of endless disaster with Iraq, Sudan elections, Lebanon(they have no Government it seems??), Egypt(another recent fake election) & Algeria a country that for some reason should be as rich as Saudi Arabia but has the worst unemployment in the region with no social pensions or security but somehow the wealth is sitting in some Swiss bank account.

With the internet been readily available to many young Arabs, a need need for a sudden change in the region without the absolute rule of Princes of the Gulf state. Lets hope it will be the best.

I was listening to Shelter as I was typing this ha ha

Cricket Australia

Yeah over the past few weeks I have been spending late hours watching the current ashes series in Australia to which England was the better side to win the series. This first in the last 24 years or so. It was very entertaining but and the right team won even though my heart still goes out to Australia to have won. Its very difficult to explain why I support Australia despite the fact that I have lived out here on English soil for just less than 10 years. I suppose when I grew up in Singapore/Australia there was something instilled in me to just support Australia. Who knows? Anyway I just hope Cricket Australia will learn from this series just in order to get to where they were for years!!!

Ashes Cricket WACA

Australia V England, its now 2 for 17 runs for Australia. Definitely not looking good for Australia! Right, its nearly 3.00am. I think I ought to sleep!!

A classic Hardcore band - Reason to Believe.



That became Sense Field



Yeah i just find it remarkable & interesting how much bands can change over time. Both bands (which are pretty much the same band members) were both great for its time. Sense Field been the band with Hardcore kids gone mature men with cool jobs playing at nice wine bars etc etc!! Ok bad joke!! But yeah Hardcore kids do know how to Rock!!!

Tune!!!

Well I just a lovely week and a half in France with my mum. I spent of the time studying for my CIMA exam to which I struggled terribly but I really enjoyed the moments I had with my mum walking through the forest near Versailles. It definitively does feel a little timeless when you are walking through a forest in the cold winter in paths which were made some hundred years ago. I sometimes wonder which vagabond souls must have wondered through?

As it has been Cricket Ashes down in Australia, to which I am still a fierce supporter to Australia Cricket. Once you played under conditions in West Australia with Australians who will only understand as to why this is the case. Anyway in the last few days I have made contact with some of my old cricket mates back in Singapore. Really good to see a lot of them getting on well. One has become the national coach of Botswana!!! Wow there we were at one time messing about marine parade in S'pore playing cricket chilling late at night at east coast beach, only to play more cricket only that we were slightly drunk and it was dark!!!

As for the last few days in London. Well its been cold, i have managed to go for a skate during the weekend around southbank and camden but I will try and battle the cold this weekend again!

Bless!

The making of a Skate music Video

Yeah not to long ago in Hackney Wick, a couple of guys spent the whole weekend filming a zero budget music video for an official Techno-Dubstep tune which will come out something at the end of the year.




Some B grading acting on my part. The Ollie down on a green mat was strange as well



The Skateboarding Comedy Club.

A few days after filming all of this which would need a lot of editing, one of these guys went to India to do some charity work with homeless street kids in India before flying on to Tokyo. Yeah most guys probably want to fly and travel around Europe but I thought it was quite noble to spend whatever was saved towards doing some good.

Bless Up!

Life.Love.Regret

This evening I will be seeing X unbroken X, and later at night DJ Krush & Prefuse 73!!! I am terribly excited by this! I am trying to study at the moment with some difficulty as I am just too excited by this evening. As one of my Japanese mates said, Just too much! (Not to forget there is a metalheadz night as well!!)

As know the weekend could not have better ended with seeing Ramadanman set with his minimal techno to 2 step dubstep ending with a Calibre tune. This week was London Design week which for the most of it I did not attend much of the events due to work commitments and what not but I did get to see the opening of some Norwegian avant garde gallery, mainly of fashion. Although the one I did particularly enjoy was Anti Design which was mainly held around Red Church Street in Shoreditch.. I firmly believe now that I am attracted to anything that has the word " anti". ha ha. I managed to get a quick 20 min skate on my board today but as it was raining and windy I decided to go home! I was too please to play my Teebs/Daedelus split 10" I bought at Rough Trade!!! Yeah you got to love this LA sound!!!

Of some distinction

"Whenever serious & competent people need to get things done in the real world, all considerations of tradition & protocol fly out of the window" an extract in Quicksilver - Neal Stephenson

The past few weeks has been pretty crazy in terms of work which has been in overdrive as I have been covering for 2 members of staff as well as occasional help this older lady with her work. Yeah an Interesting character who as a Young English girl in her 20s lived before & after the Iran Revolution during the late 70s & early 80s as well as Belgium so we always never fail to strike an interesting conversation. Sounds like the Bond girl of the 70s ehh!! ha ha. I have also been very busy helping y dearest Amus with some of her work, which has nothing to do with Fashion but bits & pieces which are related. I have enjoyed the work and has gave me some great insight into the fashion world. She has a few projects she is doing on hand, one of which is a collaboration with a dutch artist & academic so I will be watching out as to how that turns out!

I have not been going out or partying although I sense that this week will be a busy one! There is this really cool minimal techno dubstep party around Angel which I look forward plus this stag do which I am going in the middle of the week which involves late night skateboarding & paint balling!! ha ha Speaking of Skateboarding! I still enjoy it despite my age and all but fuck it! I know a few guys who are in same league. Its my quick get away from reality, although just last week I had ago at my friends drums whilst doing their HC band practice along Charing Cross Rd. Probably the oddest scene of a guy in pin strips suits walking into a "LBU" London HC jam session!! ha ha Anyway this is what I love about Hardcore Punk! You can be just anyone! Speaking of which UNBROKEN will be playing soon!

Life.Love.Regret

Here is some good UK sounding 2-step techno dubstep!!!

What is it about Japanese Skateboarding !!!

Know this fact that you dont know.

Every few days or so I would buy a copy of the Herald Tribune so as to get a full summary of the world's affair for the week. The weekend issue made me a little disappointed to read about how Brittany is facing a lot of toxic seaweed which have killed much of the wild life. The problem been due to the waste from a lot of surrounding farms mainly from Pig farms which if you ever been to one in Brittany stinks as fuck!!! For reasons for the other these waste from the pig farms are not disposed properly and consequently are dumped in the sea. Very sad since the foreshores of Brittany is at the heart of it's soul.

Its interesting whenever you flick through the business section of any newspaper these days all reporting of the world economic crisis & the future of the world markets that will somehow save our society from chaos, all of which we must thank our over the paid bankers, finance minsters & politicians who are defenders all economic policies. What makes it very curious are who actually are the policy elite society of the developed world? Who ever they were, weren't they suppose to predict what would the Lehman Brothers, housing market crash, banking crisis & the near bankruptcy of Greece? Maybe it was the magnitude of over confidence which betrayed their judgment of things that were to come? Perhaps there is real simple reason why this occurs in individuals where reading Tony Robbins will probably make you feel better than average but really we are also miscalibrated. That is to say that are sense of probability of events does not line up with reality. i.e we are only right half of the time when we say that we are certain of a certain fact. Perhaps the bond vigilantes will agree to this fact when it comes to economic policy elite of this world where decisions and brief discussions are made after a game of tennis game at a private city club when really, the real sign of trade & business affairs are reflected in your docks, the fruits markets of Kowloon etc. Then again if one's lifework were reading figures & statistical facts to bring about a judgment then yeah carry on, but if bad forecasting continues then it will only lead to something worse? The unusually uncertain economic outlook??? Perhaps they need a different method?

Funny that today I was going through my variance analysis notes for CIMA. The idea of variances is to identify favorable or adverse factors in a business's general production or sales based on budgets. Fairly scientific & theoretical which does best tries to cover all aspects of the modern business world but there are always the unknown and exceptions to the rule. Anyway after spending the morning & afternoon reading through these notes I decided to go to Southbank yet again for more escapism.. yeah I had a good skate despite the rain coming from the side.

Monday today. lets hope its a good week!

In the last few months my father has been commissioned by the Singapore Cricket Association to write the history of Singapore/Malaysian Cricket. This itself can be quite a task as there is at least well over 100 years of cricket that has been played in that region which is full of many interesting facts. He is under a bit of pressure as there is a similar book written in Hong Kong which had a lot of research to it as well. It is a Monmouth but I think my dad is doing ok with it. As for me, I am just concentrating of my CIMA studies to which I have enjoyed, but it has been a struggle! My father & I have decided to come up with a new family motto as a result. It is family motto of a mixture of unholy French, East End English & Aquinian Latin.


QUI BASHERE SANS CONSIDERER TOUJOURS VINCIT.

The meaning of this bee, "He who bashes away regardless conquers". Yeah quite appropriate I think. In fact I do like our new family motto. Its has certain tone of weight & seriousness yet witty. Probably what defines the Male side of the family. I think my grandfather would agree to this!!! ha ha.

Just been skating this evening with a mate of mine around Southbank after a hard day at work . Yeah slightly injured my ankle but it should be OK. That's Skateboarding init!

Anyway I would like to share this amazing tune. I think UK Hip Hop is amazingly on a different level!!!

Work work work & work

It's been quite mad with what has been happening with the Fires in Russia & the various floods in Pakistan & China. It is just disturbing to read & see images of members of families loosing loved one amongst the Chaos. My prayers go out to all the lost one.

Yeah when my boss is not around, it was made official that I was to be in charge of a whole section of staff within the Finance department. As much as I do like been given the responsibly I do find the pressure can be a little overwhelming for areas that I have not grasps fully from my Boss. Still I do love the nature of the work. Lately I have been given the task of investigating transactions based on deposits on commercial leases that go back as far as 2005 or 1996 as well as vast sums of monies from an unknown sources relating to joint venture partnerships to calculating various interest charges at certain periods going back as far as 3-4 years. I was telling my colleague that we should change our roles to "Consulting Finance Detective" Lately I have been quite intrigued by these bunch of software engineers working in the Marine department who have developed this Geographic Information System covering areas of the UK coast. Its interesting as it is creating a visual tool based on various consolidated data collected of everything based on a particular area of coast line. Ok enough of work!!! I need to get back to my studies!!!

Singapore

Sherlock Holmes

I have glued to watching the new Sherlock Holmes that is currently on BBC. The new Sherlock Holmes is surprisingly set in modern London which made it even more interesting as there are many scenes of London which are all too recognisable such as Soho, Southbank & parts of Southwark. Too bad that there has only been 3 series so far but I am glad to hear that they have continued filming, so expect more! The conversations between Holmes & Watson are witty & quintessentially English, making it quite funny at times! I can't wait for more!