虛幻的意義

「我寫小說的理由，追根究柢只有一個。就是讓個人靈魂的尊嚴浮上來，在那裡打上一道光。為了不讓我們的靈魂被體制套牢、貶低，而經常照亮那裡，鳴響警鐘，那正是故事的任務。




我這樣相信，藉著寫生與死的故事，寫愛的故事，繼續嘗試讓人哭泣，使人畏怯，引人發笑，讓每個靈魂不可替代的珍貴性明確化，這是小說家的工作。




因此我們每天繼續認真地創作各種虛構的故事。」


.........村上春樹，〈牆與蛋：耶路撒冷獎得獎感言〉，《村上春樹雜文集》，賴明珠譯（時報，2012）

adorn your hair with adorn.

the world's not at the last stage yet so let's keep eating and drinking and leading our lives as usual, yeah?

anyway, i just got a new accessory last week!
my hair has been in a mess and i can do with some accessories which can help distract eyes away from the unruliness of my mane.

delivery was fast and my ribbon was wrapped snugly inside bubble wrap.
Just to show you, here's a couple of snaps.

the design is simple and the colour goes with just about anything. and sorry if the picture misleads, the ribbon is actually a clip hoho! so you can actually clip it on without having to tie. or you can style your hair up in different ways and just clip on DA CLIP and you're good to go!

Just like food ready to be taken away, out of the restaurant doors!!!

:D

okay bad joke.

sorry. okay really sorry.
you can roll your eyes, go ahead.

but a ribbon or hairband is really a simple way to add some style or zest to your overall look.

check them out here:
http://adoreadorn.weebly.com/
and search for them on facebook to receive updates!

Doomsday or not

Yup it's 21st december. it's 2.27am as i'm typing this post.

why is the world not ending? everything feels very much the same. come on, give a sign.

alright haha, i'm not that bothered by all these doomsday talk actually. I'll just keep doing what i do as long i manage to see tomorrow. who can predict what really happens in the future?

we do have to save up for rainy days and prepare ourselves for the worst that will arrive. but there's zilch we can do when we're up against the almighty .... the other party however you might call him/her/it (you can capitalise the first alphabet if that make you feel a tad better about addressing that party.



clock is ticking, i'm breathing.
just keep living as long as you can.

ode to joyful life.
or at least in the journey to seek for joy. that makes it enjoyable as well.

Life of Pi: endless stream of possibilities

Truth be told, I don't have an idea how I'm going to talk about this movie.

It's enchanting and surreal. You get absorbed in the way the narrative is told. It's like listening to an experienced story-teller's story. Yann Martel is genius no doubt about that; but Ang Lee is as talented for that matter. Getting something expressed in words into a film is no easy feat. meanings get lost in between, either that or there's no new revelations discovered in the moving picture.

the crux of the story comes to light (maybe not) when the story is coming to a close.
The shipwreck experience was told by Pi to the Japanese freighter company, which needed details of his story to settle the insurance claims. that was when he finally reached the warm shores of Mexico.

Read it here.

thank you wikipedia!

Breath taking scenes throughout the movie. The cinematography is well-executed, good direction, meticulously put-together cast, provoking plot. all these are undeniable and factual about this movie.

But I guess people are heating up the discussion (or argument in some cases) about the true meaning behind this movie.
what is the truth? what really happened? what does something represent? what is right or wrong?

Metaphorically, there are absolutely tons of symbolism you can try to decipher and give meaning to. From there, maybe you can predict what Ang Lee wants to express (if you reckon it to be true, that is).

People say they believe the truth to be the cannibalism story and Pi devoured someone onboard and the animal story is just something out of his imagination, which was to make himself reconcile with the harsh reality that he did something inhumane in the worst circumstances, out in the sea.

Or some say the animal story is the truth, it's the proof that people grew not to believe what they don't see or deem logical.

Others agree that it might be a mix of both, no one including Pi, could differentiate one from the other anymore. altered memory caused by guilt, confusion, threat of survival, fabrication.


Yes this about believing in something. But it doesn't matter which story you choose. like Pi, he chose hinduism, christianity, muslim, even jew. His father said "if you believe in everything, it's like believing in nothing", when talking over a meal at the dinner table. but there's a difference, choosing to believe is an empowerment of yourself. you are actively engaging yourself to understand something outside of you. believing in nothing is when you choose not to believe at all. Passively waiting for time to pass and just becoming numb to everything.

The protagonist was named "Piscine Molitor" at birth, because his uncle said it was the clearest water ever, there's not another one the swimmer uncle had came across and loved so much. Then, he became Pi (π) to avoid schoolmates from making fun of his name which sounded unhygienic. He even went to memorise the tons of recurring decimal places after 3.1417..........

you get what i mean.

I can't help but think about the commonalities across philosophies and religions. I think almost all of them made the start of everything an obsolete state, with nothing at all, like a neutral state. a clean slate. then from there the world started, one then two then four, exponentially growing and dividing. Isn't this like Pi, you can see the universe from the boy. and he sees the world, trying and testing different possibilities. he doesn't offer solutions, he makes people think of solutions. numerous and without attaching moral judgements.

I remembered telling one of my varsity friends, who was a Christian, that i think all the gods are secretly having parties and afternoon teas up there. Unlike warlords, they live together like good neighbours should, more like consultant agencies more than anything else. People need to believe to hold on to life, to keep moving and living. Sometimes life is too arduous to bear, too cruel to watch, too painful to persevere. We need  anything, something to tide us over that rough patch. She didn't say much, she nodded and gave a smile. I guess she believes in Jesus over any other gods. it's a preference, there's no wrong in there.

Because humans have the liberty to express ourselves through words and languages, we develop complex thinking systems, complex living patterns as well. animals can't break out of their cycles much since they are forced to live under our thumbs. But how much do we differ from them exactly. aren't we essentially relatives?
what we see in their eyes aren't just reflections of our emotions, they do possess souls and feelings as well. and humans reverts to their true self when survival becomes the sole motive, so i don't find the cannibalism story gruesome in any way. it's a choice, it's a way of life.

in other ways, we are still cannibalistic. it's even a more bloody scene when no flesh and blood is involved.

maybe it's the seeking journey to believe that matters. not about the result but what you gathered on the road to your destination. and where's the destination, that's another problem.

sometimes, we fear. I fear too.
hold on, breathe, feel yourself and just believe.
believe. just believe that when you open your eyes, you'll see a way, a sign, a light.


watch the movie and believe.

wreck-it ralph

YIPPIEDOOOOOOOOS :D
I WON TICKETS TO WATCH "WRECK-IT RALPH", THANKS TO NUFFNANG (:

thank you darlings!

Wreck-it Ralph revolves around the same big concept as with Toy Story -aha!- which happens that both films are from the same creators. Something about childhood, going back in time, about imagination. Things adults choose to dabble less time in, or in most cases, become oblivious to.

Toys and games all alike.

It's about a kind of life beyond living things and gains energy only when we choose to imagine them. of course with knowledge we know toys are plastics and fabrics; and video games are electrical signals of different wavelengths behind the screen that separates them and us. But above all, they are our creations and they do actually reflect what's happening in all our lives as well. quite aptly.

the different arcade games are just different circles of lives but we do cross over to other peoples' lives, intentionally or not, to help or not to.

Ralph questioned the meaning of his digital life and seeks to find it. He ended up landing in the same way of life but everything changed. Some things can't be changed but the attitude you receive will turn out in an unexpected way. Like Ralph, there needs to be a bad guy for the game to go on, but no one appreciates him until they realised his value. there can be no good without bad. and the thing about life is, shiny trophies and medals are revered by most but they are not a good summary of life in its entirety.

the downside is, big cities with big lights and pragmatism, do these sort of stuff to judge people and gives them value tags.

 ****

That aside.

some ideas in the show are ingenious. the diet coke mountain and the mentos stalactites, the popcorn fans in Sugar Rush game, the BAD-nymous gathering, Fix-it Felix and Calhourn (Jane Lynch is A-MAZ-ING).

ideas so cute and so devilishly brilliant.

i'm sensing a sequel for this!
anyhoos, why doesn't mario appears!

theme drawing- epilogue

life's same old boring so why don't we do something?

(OMG IT RHYMES. forgive me. i've got some inexplicable OCDs.)

i'll draw something every week and do a short write-up about the drawing, might be the feeling i had when i was drawing it, or the thing(s) that inspired me on that particular one, or any other random stuff i want to rope in and talk about.


WARNING: it might be abstract, ridiculous, illogical, childish, or all or part of the abovementioned.

what else? it might not be exclusively in english, might be in chinese as well, depending on the mood at that juncture.

so keep watching.

choices

every morning, we open our eyes to see this world.
for a moment, we can choose to leave the bed we've warmed up with our body heat or we can ignore the alarm ringing, sunlight spilling in, just shut our eyes and head back to sleep.

we get dressed. we choose.
shirts? skirts? stripes? plain? neutral colours or bright palates?

we choose to go to work.
or not to.
one way or the other, we have to eat to stop the stomach rumbling and keep ourselves running.

at the eatery, we look at the food available and think to ourselves, "what should i have?"
steak? hmm too heavy for lunch.
rice? oh no. carbs might make my stomach bloated.
fish? is it fresh?
then maybe your final choice is a steak-/rice-/fish-lunch.

after returning to office, you continue to do what you do.
6 o'clock approaches but your stack is piling up.
you hear the second hand of the clock clicking away.
you need to decide if you should stay or go.


we don't stop making choices.
every little thing we do, we choose.

despite the limited choices we can hold in hand, for most of us, we hope every little choice can make us and our lives a little bit better. the fact is, we are unable to make a huge change in our lives. and for most of the reason, it's because we are all ordinary beings with nothing much to our names (and not much to our parents', or grandparents' names as well).

we try, try to live better, feel better.
try to grab every opportunity that seems to offer what we might pursue in life.
but it requires luck, above everything, to succeed.

sometimes, i feel that people i know are amazing people with amazing abilities.
but they are squeezed and compressed to a level which might not be the best for them.
for some, it's a choice made by themselves which trap themselves within the circumstance.
for the others, it's downright a luckless life.

i'm sad because i try hard too. very hard.
but more often than not, i don't get what i wanted to.

i think i need a big break in life.
i need to find my own life.

Soon.