Heyheyhey!

A peek into the twisted mind of a Natural Born Geek! Learn the shocking truth ! Run away crying in agony ! Gasp at the horror! Showing nationwide in all respectable cinema outlets.

Friday, October 29, 2004

Spring 2005 Fanboy Alert!

Verdammt!

OMG. I can't wait.

I'm going wet with Fanboy pleasure. ;-p

I hope Lucas (The Devil to most of the Original Trilogy fans for his constant 'updating' of Ep. 4-6) DOES NOT fuck up Ep. 3 : Revenge of the Sith.

He turned Ep. 1 into a kiddie road trip movie (with the dumbest scriptwriting EVER ! eg: "Are you an Angel?" 8 yr old Anakin's lame-ass pick up line to a 14 yr old Amidala).

Then proceeded to make Ep. 2 a cross between an episode of Dawson's Creek ("This is ALL Obi Wan's fault, he's holding me back!" as Anakin throws a hissy fit) and a regular Hindustan movie (who's bright idea was it to have Anakin and Amidala 'romantically' roll around a hill on Naboo?!)

LESS political intrigue and machinations please (I know Senator Palpatine, the soon to be Emperor and current Darth Sidious) is a manipulating bastard, but don't spend one hour of every movie showing him setting up his political ascension.

AND MORE bloody lightsaber duels......and use less CGI please Lucas !

Peter Jackson managed to use a blend of real life actors and CGI to make the war scenes in LoTR more believeable. Stop masturbating with the CGI machine and use a good blend of real actors, good ol' Hollywood make-up & special effects and CGI for fuck's sake !

In the mean time, tremble before the pics of the one and true Dark Lord of Sith : Darth Vader.

P.S. Is it just me or is Anakin Skywalker's hairdo starting to resemble Luke Skywalker's from Ep. 4? And Ewan Mcgregor's Obi Wan Kenobi sure does look a lot like Sir Alec Guiness' Obi Wan with that bushy beard action going on.....

Heh heh.

The Soon-to-be Sith Lord, Darth Vader Posted by Hello

Anakin Skywalker & Obi Wan Kenobi Posted by Hello

Summer 2005 Fanboy Alert!

Here's something to look forward to for Summer 2005.

The yummy psycho, Christian Bale (Reign of Fire, American Psycho, Equilibrium ) is playing Bruce Wayne a.k.a. Batman, directed by Christopher Nolan (Memento, Insomnia, One Hour Photo)in what promises to be one of 2005's most anticipated movies : Batman Begins

Forget George Clooney-Batman. Forget Val Kilmer-Batman. Forget all those colourful villains with their gaudily colored costumes and manic expressions( from Jim Carrey's Riddler to Uma Thurman's Poison Ivy). Remember Tim Burton's dark gothic vision in Batman & Batman Returns, for that is the same tone and feel Christopher Nolan is going for. Only with more realistic grit and gritty.

Add one creepy comic book character to a director with an ultra-realistic, dark, creepy-thriller vision and you either have an overanalyzed comic book movie trying to be realistic ala Ang Lee's craptastic the Hulk, or a master piece.

Only time will tell.

For the mean time, enjoy Christian Bale in his Bat-Suit.

I'm just glad they decided to go without the Bat-nipples on the suit. Heh heh

Holy Crap, Batman! Posted by Hello

Friday, October 22, 2004

Fotopages Updated!

Check out my fotopages at http://uunikk.fotopages.com to see what the people I spend most of
my waking days in the office with look like.

The Mod Squad: Me, Fairuz, Ida Posted by Hello

Monday, October 18, 2004

Obsession : Part 3



Well, I've talked about how wacky my parents are and how deranged my brother and sister can be.

I unfortunately can't take the moral high ground and say I'm unaffected by it as well.

I have to admit that I too, have an obsession.

Mine is an addiction to Popular Media.

You could say I'm a geek for all things media from movies, to music to books (comic books and graphic novels in particular).

It all started when I was a young kid ten years of age. I was never a sickly boy you see. Yet I was never out going either.

I guess the fact that I was overseas in the U.K. when I was ten lead to me picking up comic books as a hobby. Being of Asian descent, I never had much friends in U.K. (even at that young an age, racism existed. Sigh, the folly of mankind) so my Ma used to buy me comic books from the local newsstand to tide over my boredom during those days.

When we got back to Malaysia when I was 12, I was still hooked on comics. To me, these four-coloured wonders with their gaudily colored heroes and villains featured a simpler life. Where things are black and white, where there's only good and evil, right and wrong. And it's up to the superheroes to save the day from those dastardly villains to ensure the status quo is upheld: peace and prosperity.

Right through my teens, my love for comics grew as in proportion to my retardation in terms of social skills in the proximity of women. (;-p) Following my bookish behaviour, I stayed indoors more than hang out with the guys. I guess, the current conundrum my bro is in today could be due to him following in the footsteps of his geeky elder brother.

Yup..that's right: I was a GEEK all through out my teens into Uni.

From those simple superhero stories, I graduated to reading much more complex comics (or as the comic reading-adults like to paraphrase it as : Graphic Novels) from quality writers such as Alan Moore, Grant Morrison and Warren Ellis.

Then, when comics started invading the realm of popular media such as movies in the Millenium (I guess a horde of comic book enthusiasts grew up and started dictating what gets made in Hollywood), I became enamored with film-making.

I geek out (o.k. to those non-geeks it mean I go WET with excitement ;-p) when I read websites detailing the latest movie reviews. Heck, my addiction has gotten so bad that I have even resorted to constantly checking out sites featuring movies still in production or the script-writing stages ! (One of them being the uber informational : Ain't It Cool News. com)

I now have transplanted my anti-social behaviour of excessively spending my free time at home (instead of going out and having fun) from reading comics to watching DVDs.

I religously buy DVD after DVD of cult movies and a multitude of genres, plus have even found an appreciation for foreign films (European and Asian) and independently produced films.

However, this obsession is starting to overpower my thoughts and dreams that it even filters into my working life (i.e. I spend more time surfing for the latest movie-in-production info at work than actually working).

So it's time I rein it in a little and only do it during my free time.

AT the end of the day, I love movies wholeheartedly and go giddy with excitement or feel a pang of emotion whenever I find a movie gem that I can't help but support and try to expose to as many friends as possible.

Thanks to Hollywood's studio system (where the Board of Directors of big studios get to dictate over Directors and Writers stifling their creative process) and it's focus on making money, it pumps out movie after movie of Hollywood blockbuster drivel where the plot holes are large and the explosions and women's busts are larger.

However, over the past 3 years, I've been able to find a few movie gems that make me believe again in the film-making industry and some of these really, really talented people make me anxious for more of their work.

I'm gonnae use this blog to introduce u all to my favourite directors / writers / actors / and films. So come back often and I promise u new sights and sounds that'll be worthy of your time and hard-earned money.

Friday, October 15, 2004

Eid Mubarak

To all the Muslim readers,

Have a fruitful Ramadhan and may Allah S.W.T. grant you life to live & enjoy the next one as well !


;-p

Rant & Rave

Verdammt!

Works been a byeatch!

I've had three straight days where I came in at 9 a.m. and left the office around 12+ a.m. in the morning.

Bloody prospectus guidelines to the Bursa listing are a byeatch to follow (all those oh-so interesting fine print to double-check and English to BM translations to amend for consistency purposes).

I'm turning this blog into a bloody place where I bitch and moan about work and that's not what I set out to do when I first started it up.

Damn...I'm so riled up and feel so 'bloated' these days cos I haven't been to the gym for my usual work outs for the past 9 days...I need to feel those endorphins rushing thru my veins again...the body's self-made 'happy drug'. :-)

Oh well, at least I wasn't as unlucky as the exec that had to stay back until 6 a.m. in the morning just to finish the work in time to meet the Bursa deadline.

One plus of being a management trainee I guess.

;-p


I cannae wait for the weekend!

Wednesday, October 13, 2004

unfinished & unedited

sorry ppl,

I'm kinda busy these days, so I left Obsession Part 3 unfinished and unedited.

Will get back to it and finish the post soon after I get this bloody job done.

Might do it during the weekends tho.

C u.

Monday, October 11, 2004

Obsession : Part 2

If you think my parents have it bad, wait til you check out the kids.

My kid sister who is 7 yrs old is a TV addict.

Everyday she wakes up at 6 a.m. and the first thing she does is turn the Astro on to watch the Disney channel(instead of preparing to go to school). Heck, I remember she was 4 when she first picked up the skill to turn on the TV, switch on the cable tv using another remote and channel surf !
At 5, she mastered the intricacy of turning on the DVD player, opening a DVD case, and picking up the DVD gingerly using her little itty bitty fingers (and corretly too with one finger in the hole in the middle of the disc and another at the side) then depositing it into the player.

Damn, when I was 5, I was still eating my own snot !

Nowadays, her mannerisms are beginning to be influenced by the Disney shows she religously follows daily such as That's So Raven, Even Stevens and Lizzie McGuire. I've seen her do the 'Whatever, talk to the hand' line and quote Lizzie's mannerisms numerous times enought to think that my kid sis has turned into a Disney zombie.

Oh gawd...at this rate I hope she doesn't start using make up in order to look older and talk about boys by the time she's 9 yrs old !

-----

Next, there's my kid brotehr who's taking SPM this year.

His addiction is to Eastern comics (or better known as Manga) and Animation (alias Anime).

His bedroom is like a throne to the Gods of Eastern Manga from reams upon reams of Hong Kong comics to little tenkoubons (digest size) of Japanese manga scattered around every possible space.

When he's 'high', he imagines he's one of the heroes he reads about religously and starts playacting kung-fu moves or enormous battle scenes in his brain while walking around the house compound in a circle, sounding out the special effects with his mouth. Just like a madman you'd see, talking to himself in the streets of KL.

I swear, I'm living in a houseful of maniacs!

His affliction has gotten so bad that nowadays, he's learnt how to download manga and anime right from the Net using person-to-person filesharing programs like Bit Torrent and E-mule.

Nowadays, when it's not my Korean drama-loving Ma, hogging the Net surfing her oh-so many fanfiction sites (you won't believe the amount of middle-aged housewives equally addicted to Korean drama these days!), it's my download-crazy brother who's capitalizing on Net time, downloading anime after anime (and disturbingly, some of them turn out to be Hentai i.e. Japanese animated porn. Oh well, boys WILL be boys....) ;-p

Bro, stop living in ur fantasy world and start living in reality!

Go pick up girls, play some kinda sports with the guys, have a hobby that involves going out or summat, be a normal teen for fuck's sake!

------

Obsession : Part 1

Have you ever seen Darren Aranofsky's movie : Requiem for a Dream ?

For the uninitiated, in that movie D.A. focused on people's obsessions in life and how it affects them and the people closest to them. Showcasing a regular american family, their obsession differs from chocolates to dieting to women to etc.

Nowadays, I feel as if I'm living the movie when I look at my family household.

Every member of my family are deeply obsessed by some kind of affliction or other.

My father, an otherwise sound and sane cardiology specialist at an upstanding private medical center in the suburbs of Subang Jaya is MANIACALLY obsessed with horse-riding. He rides horses at least 3-4 hours every 2 days or so and participates in 15-20 hour long endurance races.

Imagine being on a horse for 15-20 hours straight, in the first place !

However, he's been able to channel his obsession to profit by winning multiple endurance events and even representing Malaysia in endurance riding in 2001's Commonwealth Games. Heck, just yesterday, my Da, came back from Kelantan with a total winning of RM 20K for bagging the first prize and best conditioned horse trophy in Kelantan's first 160-km endurance riding race.

Not bad for a 53 year old chap, eh ?

------

Next there's my Ma.

Her 'Poison of Choice' is currently Korean / Japanese movies.

I can't for the life of me understand what an intelligent, gutsy and calculative History & BM teacher like my Ma would find interesting in soppy Korean love stories or zany, wacky Japanese comedies ?

My Ma is the most intelligent woman with the best memory, that I know of. Being a history teacher, she knows the core syllabus like the back of her hand and can quote historical facts as though they're lyrics to the latest hot pop song.

Which makes me even more curious what would she ever find in those Korean / Japanese dramas that are oh-so entertaining.

Let me just signify how DEEP my Ma's obsession is.

You see, despite being a teacher, my Ma is deeply averse to change or new developments. While I was studying overseas, she refrained from learning how to use the internet or learn how to e-mail so she could communicate with me.

Despite my brethren steadfast attempts at teaching her how to log onto the Net and use Hotmail, it was to no avail. She resisted learning something that would benefit her.

Well guess what ppl, after falling madly intoxicatingly in love with Korean dramas, she's picked up the skill of turning on the computer, logging onto the Net, and even learnt how to log onto chatrooms and message groups devoted to Korean dramas and actors !

I know, I know, I should applaud the fact that my mother has finally relented and learnt the exciting wonders of technology.

But when I have to resort to lecturing my mother for hogging the Net for the past 6 hours, isn't that a little too much ?!

Plus my Ma has this deeply disturbing new hobby of doing late night marathons.

She would start watching a whole season / series of a Korean drama around 10 p.m. and resort to spending the whole night and morning watching it until it ends. Have a 2-hour sleep, then wake up to go to work.

Seriously, her obsession is bordering on madness I tell you..sooner or later something has to be done to rein in her mania.

----

Hiatus ?!

I know, I know,
I've been away for quite some time.
I actually did NOTHING at work last week.
I came in for 5 workdays, surfed the net the whole day long, and went back around 8 p.m. It's not that I didn't BEG for a job or any mundane task to do from my Assistant Managers (A.M.), but they said that there was no work to be passed on to me.
So there I was, day in, day out, sitting at my cubicle, surfing entertainment during office hours.
How fuckin mundane and pointless can my existence get any more ?!
I can't even get passed a mundane task to be passed to me at my workplace in an industry I don't even want to be in !
Everytime these kinda things happen to me, I question why I even bother to come to work everyday anyway ?
Why the fuck am I doing this job if I don't enjoy it ?
Is it enough to do this job JUST to make my parents happy ?
Just so they can show off amongst their friends when they 'namedrop' the prestigious name of the company I work for?
What about ME ?
What about what I WANT TO DO for the rest of my fucking life ?!
How long do I have to 'kow-tow' to my parents ?
Is this what I really want to do for the next 30 yrs of my life ?
For fuck's sake I don't know what the correct answer is anymore..... I've lost my sense of being, the reason for living...the nexus to my existence......
I don't even know why I come to work anymore these days ?
To please my parents ?
To learn about the stock market ?
To learn about investment knowledge ?
Etc ?
How do fuck am I supposed to do that if my AM's refuse to give me bloody work ?!!!
Damn do I need to go on holiday!
:-(

Sunday, October 03, 2004

Year : One

Today marks ONE year since I came back from UK.

It seems like only yesterday that I stepped my foot on Malaysian soil, after spending three years of my life overseas; studying in Edinburgh, Scotland.

U see when u're overseas learning for a degree, you NEVER really set down actual roots. Life is just a temporary existence while u're there finishing ur studies.

I think I could pack ALL my important belongings into 2 large suitcases and practically move anywhere I wanted in a moments notice during that 3 year period.

Living away from home also makes you realise how much JUNK you can accumulate in a year.

Every year whenever term ended and Uni closes for the summer hols, I'd have to pack my luggage and other belongings into boxes to be stored on campus while I go off around Europe or home for summer.

You won't believe the amount of crap I managed to buy in a 12-month period!

Everything from sci fi magazines, to comic books, to soft core porn, to pots and pans and crockery. It defies the imagination to think where and when did I accumulate all this junk ?!

Note however, a favourite hobby of most Malaysian students in the first few months that they arrive to the UK is to go hunting for bargains at the weekly car-boot sales set on Saturday or Sunday in most cities in UK.

There's just something exciting about finding that first edition of the Lord of the Rings for 50 pence or buying a 5-piece dish set to serve friends when they come over for one of your weekly dinners (yes I cooked when I was in UK and I liked to entertain people...the cooking was so-so for a guy but hey, it's the thought that counts, non ?)

Anyway, it's now been 12 months since I've been back from UK and I have to say, looking back over that period, I sure have changed a lot by leaps and bounds.

I guess once you're permanently stuck in one place for the forseeable future, you tend to set roots and grow into yourself.

I'd say compared to how I was 12 months ago, I've grown into a better person.
(Heh heh...wishful thinking on my part! ;-p )

There's so many things I've learnt over the year, yet of course there's always space for improvement.

So here's to another 12 months of growth and new experiences!

May the learning never stop...cos when it does, I'll be dead.