why certain presidents press the war button so easily

"If, as is inevitability the case under this constitution, the consent of the citizens is required to decide whether or not war should be declared, it is very natural that they will have a great hesitation in embarking on so dangerous an enterprise.

For this would mean calling down on themselves all the miseries of war, such as doing the fighting themselves, supplying the costs of the war from their own resources, painfully making good the ensuing devastation, and, as the crowning evil, having to take upon themselves a burden of debts which will embitter peace itself and which can never be paid off on account of the constant threat of new wars.

But under a constitution where the subject is not a citizen, and which is therefore not republican, it is the simplest thing in the world to go to war.

For the head of the state is not a fellow citizen, but the owner of the state, and war will not force him to make the slightest sacrifice so far as his banquets, hunts, pleasure palaces and court festivals are concerned.

He can thus decide on war, without any significant reason, as a kind of amusement, and unconcernedly leave it to the diplomatic corps (who are always ready for such purposes) to justify the war for the sake of propriety."

- Immanuel Kant

frats & sororities

once upon a winter time a bunch of frat boys ran stark naked around Lathrope Hall, an all-girls hall, sparking screams and pandemonium. the reason for this is unknown, at least to non-frat or non-sorority members.

personally, i think they were either bloody drunk or bloody brainless. maybe both.

according to my hallmate Wiedad, what you see on American Pie is true. they do have rites and rituals, and once they go through it they'll have the license to live in the frat or sorority houses. which most of the time are really huge because, hey, they're in the business of showing off whose daddy has more money.

i must say that whatever bad image that some frats and sororities conjure in our minds, we must give them some credit for their taste in architecture. and thanks to them, i can honestly say that i've been learning Greek. what with the emblems of Alpha Beta Kappa, Phi Delta Upsilon and all other permutations of Greek letters plastered all over town.

but first, the (dis)Honour Roll of frats and sororities with the stupidest names:

C for Creativity. the lack of.

maybe they teach each other the rites and rituals of farming?

and now, the houses that kind of blew my mind:

a house complete with Doric columns

some houses look very similar. maybe they hired the same architect?

i think this house looks kind of cute. like something out of Polly Pocket.

this house looks almost like the White House. look at the American Flag. how American.

this is the story of a chair

die Nachtigall

i look like a maniac in the Taboo video on Yi Wen's blog. please do not judge me based on this isolated incident.

that said.

yesterday i got reacquainted with an old friend. the moment i sat down on the piano bench in Law's Common Room it's as if i couldn't stand up and leave even if i wanted to. i played for hours, i think, and the funny thing is that more and more people came so we had some sort of a mini-recital where everyone took turn to play.

Yan Hao (China) could play chunks of Beethoven's Sonata Pathetique First Movement even though he has only been playing for four years and had stopped playing for a long time. believe me, even if it's only chunks, it's still extremely difficult.

Hiroshi (Japan) played the Forrest Gump's Theme and a song by Takeshi Kitano.

Kevin (US) played pop songs, like Backstreet Boys' I Want It That Way (it was surprisingly good) and other pieces by Jim Brickman. the amazing thing is that he didn't need to look at scores at all. he could play after watching Youtube.

i taught Ana Maria how to play Bach's Prelude in C major from the Well Tempered Clavier and she did fine.

i played Beethoven's Sonata Pathetique Second Movement and Mozart's K545.

today i went down to play and this guy was sitting at the piano and singing. he has a beautiful voice. i think that the difference between good singers and really good singers is that really good singers like Andrea Bocelli have an extraordinarily solid vocal vibrato. every sound wave is a sine wave, but a vibrato has greater amplitude so the sound has more volume. vibrato is also a technique for stringed instruments.

i asked BJ how he managed to develop the vibrato and he said he was born with it. so tough luck, you either have it or you don't.

BJ is in 2 choirs in Mizzou and he sang this piece:

Die Nachtigall

Music by Felix Mendelssohn
Lyrics taken from a poem by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (the German version of Shakespeare)

Die Nachtigall, sie war entfernt,
The nightingale, she was far away,

Der Frühling lockt sie wieder;
the spring lures her back;

Was neues hat sie nicht gelernt,
she has learned nothing new,

Singt alte liebe Lieder.
she sings the same old love songs

remember Janusz Korczak

"Whoever saves one life saves the world entire."
- Schindler's List

it means that as long as there is one good person in the world, the world is still worth living in.

http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/01/23/africa/letter.php

please read it. it's worth 10 minutes of your time.

portraits & squirrels

Cecile with Truman the Tiger

Anni

Eunice

Melissa with Saori's pink ear muffs

Me, Saori (Japan), Marina (Russia). the Russian government is actually paying for Marina's Food Science & Nutrition education here. i'm guessing that she's some sort of a national asset. maybe she's going to work as Putin's dietary advisor.

this is as far as i can go without alerting it to my presence

work has been piling up and i must admit that i've not been keeping up. i mean, between reading books and meeting people or chasing squirrels it's hardly a contest right? but yeah, i realize i'm not on a vacation here.

so time to hit the books.

i met Megaloman in class

yesterday i got involved in some sort of a verbal tussle with this US-supremist in my International Journ discussion class.

i was telling the class about how i think that the newspapers here tend to be domestic-oriented and even if there is international news more often than not it's related to US's foreign policy. in other words, the news here tends to be US-centric.

i also made a comparison with The Straits Times. i mean, i know it's been criticized to be a government mouthpiece and all that, but look at its international coverage. by any standard, it's extensive and of high quality.

and this guy was sitting there with crossed legs like a Dallas cowboy and saying things peppered with "Does it make sense to you?" (does he think i'm an idiot?). when i told Ana Maria about it she said i should tell him to his face that he's being a "Megaloman", and i kind of like that nickname so from now on i'll refer to him as such. because i also can't remember his name actually.

"Does it make sense to you that i'm being a jerk?"

argument #1: the US is the strongest country in the world and Americans naturally care more about what is happening here than in other countries.

i agree that right now the US is the world's strongest economy and its military strength is about twice that of the next on the list (a point asserted by my Political Science lecturer). by any measure, the US is a great country.

but do these Megalomen really think that the US will remain "great" if it continues to be disconnected from the rest of the world? i told the class that i think the US should listen to other countries more and make the communication process more balanced, and i'm not sure if i've offended anyone. i mean, for sure i've gotten into Megaloman's bad book but i don't really care about him.

i honestly think that this kind of US-supremist mentality is the same force driving the Bushes, the Cheneys and the Rumsfelds to turn a deaf ear to global protest and send thousands of soldiers to Iraq to die meaningless deaths and in turn kill thousands of innocent civilians.

sacrifice is needed to secure global safety? right now the world is in a worse state than before and the Iraq War had fostered even greater extremism, both in terms of scope and intensity. is it a coincidence that the US is hated by nearly all Islamic countries?

and how easy is it for political leaders to demand that their countrymen sacrifice themselves or family members to fight their war? i mean, Bush is not exactly getting his or his loved ones' hands covered with blood right?

Walter Smith was a Marine who suffered from a psychological breakdown because he was part of a division in Iraq who had to open fire at militants who were charging toward them. and these militants had hostages.

"We were opening fire on civilians," Smith said. "We were taking out women and children because it was them or us." - International Herald Tribune

Smith was kicked out of the Marines due to his breakdown and now he had killed his girlfriend, the mother of his two babies, by drowning her. if he had been given early help for his condition, this tragedy might not have happened.

for the full article, read here: http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/01/20/america/vets.php

argument #2: the media gives people what they want. the fact is that people want domestic news.

this is a kind of a circular argument that media practitioners always, always use, and frankly i'm quite sick of it.

sure, the media is in the business of giving people what they ask for, but it's always a two-way process isn't it? if the media keeps on perpetuating something, if it gives people domestic news day in day out, it becomes a way of life for these people and of course they would expect the same kind of news everyday.

--

not a few people had told me that i'm very opinionated, but i'm not going to make any apologies for that. in the movie Good Will Hunting, one of the characters asked this question: "How much do you think your brain is worth?"

i think that having our own (educated) opinions about things is a way of adding value to our brains. if whatever that is in our mind and that comes out from our mouth is a plagiarized version of books, newspaper articles and so on, how much value do you think our brains have? i mean, people can just read these books or articles to get the exact same idea right?

i come to class hoping to learn something from the teacher and the people in class, but i hope they can learn something from me too. learning should not be a vertical transmission of knowledge. if we like that sort of learning, we might as well stay at home and listen to tapes of lectures while sipping a cup of teh si.

but.

Yi Wen had said that i was too aggressive and there is a way of making our points across without being emotionally involved. i must admit that that's a shortcoming of mine. i get emotionally involved too easily. i cannot sit still when someone is sitting with crossed legs, telling teachers who are about 3 times older what to do, saying things like their country is greater than any other, and basically being an asshole.

like how Aristotle had aptly put it:

"Anybody can become angry, that is easy; but to be angry with the right person, and to the right degree, and at the right time, and for the right purpose, and in the right way - that is not within everybody's power, that is not easy."

Museum of Art & Archaeology, Geological Sciences Building

today was a wonderful sunny day so after i went to Brady Commons to buy my books (only managed to get 2 out of 4. will have to wait for 2 weeks) i decided at the spur of the moment to visit the Museum of Art and Archaeology.

i've always been relying on Yi Wen to be my human compass, so i thought it's time to be an independent navigator! so armed with the Mizzou map and flaming spirit i set off to the museum.

10 minutes later i was standing on the side of Rollins Road turning the map left, right, upside-down and downside-up like an idiot tourist. but the people here are really nice. a few stopped by to ask me if i needed help but most of them don't know where the museum is (which shows that Missourians seldom go to the museum?).

there was this girl who was enthusiastically pointing here and there and, i'm guessing, orientating herself with her inner Feng shui. but after about 5 minutes i noticed that she was kind of holding the map upside down so i told her that.

"Oh."

5, 4, 3, 2, 1.

"Oh!! i'm so sorry! i'm really bad at directions!!"

"It's ok. i'm really bad at directions too."

but bless her, she was kind enough to stop to help a stranger. you don't have to be good at directions to be well-liked anyway.

turned out that the museum is really far and i had to walk for about 20 minutes from Brady Commons. but what a sight to behold!

taken from the museum's website because the problem with doing things at the spur of the moment is that i come unprepared for things. so i was without my camera and i felt quite pissed about it.

actually there's nothing to behold. but give me some credit for finding it okay. when i stepped in i felt very excited. there are so many things to see!

there are 7 galleries: Greek, Egyptian, Byzantine, European American, Daumier's lithography, African, and Modern.

i met this really sweet rotund old man in the Greek gallery who was just sitting there and looking at things. he's called Mike and he taught me a few things about Greek art, and he speaks in this really slow and soft voice so i had to listen to him very closely. turned out that he's a retired Art professor and he's obviously very experienced in art history. we also talked a bit about religions and politics and he gave me a free copy of Newsweek (yay). i'll be coming back next Wednesday to find him and i'll make sure i bring my camera then.

i've got it figured out: if i were to visit one gallery every week (most probably on Wednesday because i have no class at all) it'll take me about 7 weeks to finish checking out the museum. well actually i won't be taking that long to visit the Modern art gallery because i don't like Modern art in the first place. so 6 weeks then.

after that i went to the Geological Sciences building because i was hoping to see cool gem stones like the Alexandrite or Cat's Eye Chrysoberyl.

fat hope.

there were mostly ugly stones with hardly appealing names like Moldavites and Dolomites. but i did get to see birth stones. you know, January - Garnet, February - Amethyst and so on. but they exist in their pegmatite or matrix form, which is basically the raw unrefined host rock. either that or they have not been cut and polished, so they don't look that nice.

Amethyst matrix

Raw Peridot (my birth stone). by the way it's not called Peri-dot. it's Peri-dough. just to clear the common mispronunciation.

cut and polished Peridot. see the difference?

anyway different gemstones have different cuts that bring out their best qualities. for Peridot most often than not it's the Step-cut. for diamonds it's the Brilliant cut. this cutting business is really complicated, with specific formulas and what nots.

the ideal cut for diamonds always follows the Tolkowsky formula, which is named after this famous gemmologist, Marcel Tolkowsky. if the diamond is cut either too thin or too thick, the light will leak out of the bottom of the diamond. the ideal cut will allow the light to be reflected back to the eyes of the observer, hence the "brilliance".

isn't gemmology fascinating? or maybe it's just me.

mommy, my books cost more than our entire month's groceries!

i nearly got a heart attack when i saw the price tag on the books at the bookstore.

USD 83.60 for one miserable 400-odds-page book.

is it the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili? no.
is it the long lost manuscript of the Aztec civilization? no.
does it contain the bloody secret of the universe? no.

my first thought was: rotten first-world imperialists. how the hell do you make people pay 83.60 for one bloody book?? especially when most of the profits will go into the pockets of over-paid publishers. i mean, that's more obscene than Amsterdam's red light district.

i have nothing against the writers, really, because we all know they are good people who have put in a lot of effort into the thing that they do. most of them anyway. but i do have a thing against the Routledges and Blackwells of the world.

i may sound like a blithering el cheapo but i honestly think that knowledge or the product of knowledge should be made accessible to more people. what's the point of generating knowledge if it only allows pharmaceutical companies to sell AIDS drugs to third world nations at a price that is 100 per cent more expensive (it's a conservative estimate) than the real cost of manufacturing?

but then again, that's the entire point, isn't it. yeah sure, let someone die than give him cheaper generic drugs, because it means that i'll probably have to drive an uglier Porsche, or that my (fugly) chihuahua won't get to wear pink diamond jewelleries, or that i won't be able to blow 800 bucks on a haircut that i can easily get at a roadside barber for 10 rupees.

nevermind.

i've done my maths. i think i'll have to fork out about 170 bucks for 4 books, and the average re-sell price is about 25 bucks. go figure.

no choice, no choice. at least i don't have to buy that 83.60 book because there was some sort of a screw-up in the class allocation and the professor apparently thinks it's not decent to make someone pay that much for a book. or so i think. either way it doesn't matter. i like the professor already.

and uh, today i saw the weirdest thing ever. the person standing in front of me on this queue at the bookstore actually had chicken bones (if they're not chicken bones i don't want to know what they are) tied to her half-braided half-hanging-out-there hair. and she smelled like something burning and rotting and fermenting all at once and i had to hold my breath the entire time i was on the queue, which was quite a torture. i wanted to take a picture of her but i didn't want my bones to be the ones hanging on her hair. so i left the Bone Collector alone. at least i lived to tell the story.

buying basketball tickets (Mizzou v Nebraska next Wednesday) tomorrow.

good night.

i hate my morning hair

everytime i wake up it looks like i've just touched a thousand volt live wire. maybe because of the static and my tendency to roll around on my bed like a gymnast on steroids. Ana Maria calls it my "psycho-hair" and offers to psychoanalyze it (she's majoring in psychology). gee, i can hardly contain my glee.

anyway yesterday i went to soak in the jacuzzi and the whirlpool with the French girls and some other people. we played Tag in the whirlpool and it was pretty funny. the "shark" just had to stand there and wait for someone to get sucked by the current towards her. people were sacrificing each other to the shark. loyalty - isn't it touching?

all right, school's starting in about an hour. time to be a good nerd.

lunch at Dobbs, Anaise's apartment, the Recreation Centre

i skipped ice skating at Jefferson City yesterday because i had a pulsating headache thanks to the brain freeze. which is probably a good thing because a girl broke her arm at the ice rink and, who knows, it could have been me, considering that i skate with the grace of a hippo. in any case, i'd better take care of my health because school's starting on Tuesday.

anyway i slept and slept yesterday like a hibernating rabbit, partly because i'd also lost my cell phone and when i'm depressed i go to sleep. man, i feel like Hansel and Gretel - only i dont drop bread crumbs, i drop freaking cell phones. darn it, i'll have to find someone to hitch me a ride to Wal-Mart to get a new phone. bye bye, money, my heart aches when i think of you flying away from me.

oh well, the good thing is that i woke up this morning with my headache gone. so i'll count my blessings and, uh, sleep away my troubles.

"ooh...how i wish i could gallop into the warm sunset!"

lunch at Dobbs. i like this woman. anybody who makes good omelettes deserves my respect.

Lindsey introduced this French girl at Laws to the French girls at Lathrope. French conference at Dobbs, yes.

Janos from Hungary. he's disgusting. but you should see how cute he looked when he opened his waffles and saw red jellies inside. "Like magic!" he said.

Eunice the Waffle Woman

"In China if you don't try to make big money, you'll make no money!"

Anaise (France), Kim (South Korea), Yan Ho (i think that's what he's called) (China) and I had a talk about the so-called quality of life. Anaise said what makes her happy is travelling and talking to people. money is important but it's not the biggest thing in her life so she doesn't mind earning about 1,000 euros a month (the minimum wage in France is 700 euros).

but Yan Ho disagreed. his belief is that if you're an average worker, you should strive to be a millionaire, and if you're a millionaire, you should strive to be a billionaire.

honestly, isn't that endless? you can work your butt off till you're a gazillionaire or whatever, but you can bring none of your riches when you're dead. and do you really want to have a tombstone inscribed with "Here lies someone who made gazillions when he was alive"? i mean, let's be practical, money is important, but i don't want it to define me as a person. it's just not the way it should be.

we also talked about democracy. is it really the best system? the common argument is that democracy allows the marketplace of ideas to operate, where gradually the so-called best idea will emerge - like in a competitive market, the price will get lowered and lowered till it remains stable. and according to Amartya Sen, there has never been extreme poverty in a democratic country.

but i personally believe that democracy is only truly meaningful when market practices are fair. i mean, press concentration exists in almost every country. when only a few companies like Time-Warner and Viacom control nearly everything we watch on television, can we really say that democracy exists? isn't it scary how one Rupert Murdoch can shape the mindset of millions of people in the world? controlling people's livelihood through market mechanisms is one thing, controlling how people think is another thing. that's the power of the media.

Anaise teaching me the history of France and some other geo-political stuff

"Understood?" (doesn't she look like a teacher here?)

her room

her living room ( she lives with 2 housemates who happened to be away)

her housemate plays the saxophone

i love the teddy

The Recreation Centre

they freaking watch a wide-screen TV in the jacuzzis and whirlpools

it's always football, football and more football

the lounge

do they actually need 11 televisions, each showing a different channel??

some step-ladder exercise. honestly the guy should just come to Singapore and climb the HDB stairs.

Aurelia running for France

some instructor teaching Melissa how to operate the machine

my first reaction was: "They have a freaking SPA??"

they have a squash room...

...a table tennis room...

...a martial arts room...

...a running track...

...a boulder...

...a rock wall...

...and an olympic-sized swimming pool.

purple hues when we were walking back to Laws after dinner

the track near Laws

Jesse Hall, somekind of a beacon of light. everyone uses it as a starting point for directions because it can be seen anywhere.

some army centre

i can see my hall now...

Laws Hall, my home at Missouri

i need a thicker beanie

the weather has been miserable lately. when i'm walking outside i feel like the cold wind is blowing right through my skull and making a disgraceful exit through the back of my head. it's brain-numbingly cold, i'm not kidding. Yi Wen, Cecile and I braved -14 degree Celsius (6 degree Fahrenheit) to watch Mizzou beat Iowa in gymnastics at the Hearnes Centre. hop over to Yi Wen's blog for D80-quality pictures.

the J-school exchange students went to Wal-Mart today to buy some necessities. i bought a new pair of long johns and i feel happy because only in the US will the sales lady call me "small-sized". hah.

the service here is really different from what we get in Singapore. buying stuff there is like a slam bang buy thing, but here it's really more of a communication. you strike up some small talk with the sales lady and before you know it she'll tell you about her travel trips last year and you've got to cut her short before she starts telling you about her family tree.

i don't really care if people think that Americans are superficially friendly, over the top and yadda yadda yadda. i mean, what makes you think that you yourself are 100 per cent genuine to every single person that you meet? at least the people here make the effort to be nice even when they don't feel like being nice, unlike some people (not just in Singapore) who are so grumpy they look like they just sucked on a pH 1 lemon.

anyway i've registered my courses:
1. International Journalism (J-school)
2. Cross-cultural Journalism (J-school)
3. International Relations (Political Science)
4. European History

i didn't manage to get Basic Photography and Editing and Introduction to Political Theory because the classes are full. and i'm not really interested in Strategic Communication, Advertising and all that because i'm not good at selling things, strategically or otherwise.

International Journ and Cross-cultural Journ may sound similar but they are not. Cross-cultural Journ deals with - what else - cultures, but International Journ has a wider scope - political, social, economic and cultural. International Relations covers the political part, and of course you can't understand a country's culture without understanding its history. so i guess they all complement each other and i'm quite happy with my course list.

and if you detect a certain pattern in my course list, yeah, i do like international politics. i don't know, maybe i'll end up doing something connected to that in the future, but i don't really like to plan too far ahead.

politics is indeed dirtier than the garbage dumps in Italy and sometimes the only difference between politicians and criminals is that only the criminals get thrown to jail. but i guess that there are people who go into politics out of genuine love for their country. i know someone who's going to run for presidency in his country some time in the future and he seems like he genuinely wants to do something for his fellow countrymen. some politicians, like Nelson Mandela and Winston Churchill, really have done a lot of good for their countries, with or without dirty games. and oh, by the way, i like Merkel.

politics is dirty but come to think of it, is there any profession that is absolutely clean? my personal belief is that whenever and wherever there are people, there will be politics. people are politics. some are just standing on a more public stage, that's all.

well okay time to sleep. night everyone.

oh wait, Singapore is 14 hours ahead. afternoon everyone.

blood test, campus tour, Columbia mall, Campus Bar

today was a really packed day. in the morning Yi Wen and i went to take our blood test. i made a mess out of myself. 2 nurses actually had to attend to me - one to half-hug me and say "it's ok, you're doing fine, you're doing great, it's going to be over soon" and the other to poke me. i'm scared of needles, what can i say.

Rachel, Yuko's roomie. doesn't she look cute with those braids? like Heidi or Little Bo-peep.

during campus tour we were split into 2 groups. my tour guide is called Aaron. he's majoring in Maths and minoring in Spanish. a Spanish-speaking American Pythagoras, ha.

Brady Commons, where we buy books, Mizzou sweatshirts, etc etc.

the Art and Science building

Aurelia touching the nose of the ex-Governor of the State for good luck. so many people had touched his nose that the paint on his nose has worn off. so the tip of his nose is actually golden in colour.

what is left from Jesse Hall which was burned down in 1892. the columns are of the Ionic order, which is one of the three orders in classical architecture - the others being Doric and Corinthian. Ionic columns are characterized by... curling ends? looks a bit like rolled up ham at the ends to me.

i forgot what the name of the building is.

the library. i really like some of the architecture here in Columbia. it's more classical than modern. i just think that classical things are much more elegant and warm. i'm not really a fan of glass, metal and all that. feels a bit too robotic and too cold.

the Memorial Union, built in 1927 in memory of Missourians who died in World War I. it looks like a Gothic-style cathedral. Bush should come and take a look here before he starts his bombing mania. some people just never learn.

the fantastic jacuzzi and wading pools at the Rex Centre. they have a state-of-the-art sports facility, i assure you. when i first came here i thought Columbia is a small financially-strapped college-town, but i was wrong. they may be small but they are rolling in money. there is even a college helicopter. will post more pictures when i have more time to walk around the campus.

during break i went with the French girls and this German guy called Jan to the girls' Lathrope Hall. Lathrope is an all-girls hall. well i guess that Jan had more than enough escorts.

somebody actually plastered the entire door with magazine cuttings. sorority member, i'm guessing.

Jan is my German teacher in Mizzou. well not exactly an official teacher. i just try to converse with him and he corrects me when i'm wrong. he's really patient. he's studying Computer Science and he's so fascinated with all kinds of gadgets. he was just standing there and poking the microwave buttons with his pen and God knows what was whizzing around in his head.

Jan the Pizza Man

broccoli-eaters like Aurelia make me feel guilty when eating pizza. she's really nice though and she has a blue belt in judo, which is one brown belt away from black. she's also learnt jujitsu. she said that in those 2 types of martial arts technique is more important than strength, so she can actually take down a much bigger person. seriously, if there's anything i've ever learnt so far, it's never to judge people by their appearance. anyway i've introduced her to Yuko so i'm kind of looking forward to a Japan vs France sparring session.

this is really cute. like that Weasley's grandfather clock in Harry Potter.

Columbia Mall, quite far away.

Anaise doing her Tina Turner impersonation, complete with the deranged look. she always cracks me up.

Campus Bar downtown. (L-R) Aurelia (France), Anni (Finland), Anaise (France), Eunice (UK), me, Kim (South Korea)

and if you're wondering, no, i didn't drink alcohol. i drank freaking Sprite. actually only Anaise, Anni and Kim had alcohol. the rest of us had kiddish drinks like Sprite and lemonade because they're for free. non-alcoholic drinks during happy hours are for free. i mean, why would i say no to free drinks right?

we both look drunk here but trust me, we're not. we were just tired after a whole day out. and yes, i have sausage lips because of the cold.

Anni has a really cute and funny Finnish accent when she speaks English. she can say things like "Where's the toilet?" and it'll still make me want to laugh. she offered me this Finnish liquorice candy called Salmiakki and i just had to spit it out. right in front of her because it tastes so bad. it contains huge amounts of freaking ammonium chloride. i don't know if i'll turn into a mutant soon.

when we were walking home we saw this limousine and Aurelia was really excited, like a small girl. well yeah, the limo does look like something out of Pimp My Ride.

potluck dinner

(L-R) Billy Jivetti from Kenya, studying Community Development; me; Melissa Amelie from Burkina Faso, International Business; Cecile from France, Nutrition; Anise from France, International Business; Anni from Finland, Theology.

i went with Cecile and Anni - both just came to Laws Hall - to potluck dinner at the international centre. there were food made by families from all over the world, and they were great. Cecile couldn't stand kimchi though. she said it's "yeackhhh" (with puking action).

there was this speech by some...international centre director or whatever. he was going on and on about international friendship (note to self: never use the word "microcosm" in any sentence) and sadly nobody was listening to him. i did try to pay attention to him during the first 5 minutes, but my potato gratin gradually became more interesting. oh well.

(L-R) Melissa, Aurelia from France (she wasn't present in the first picture); Anise

after 20 years, i finally discovered that Eveline is a French name and it's supposed to be pronounced as "Ay-ve-leen-ne". yeah i'm still recovering from the identity crisis.

i also got to know that in Finland the day is really short. the sun rises at 6 am and sets at 2 pm. makes you appreciate all-round sunny Singapore doesn't it?

Billy talking about the discrimination in France. his last name, Jivetti, sounds Italian because his parents named him after this Italian F-1 driver. learning about the political situation in Kenya from a real Kenyan beats newspapers hands down. right now there are many riots in the country because the incumbent, Kibeki, blatantly rigged the election and appointed himself President. how can a guy who lost half the parliamentary votes win the entire election? many people i know call Kibeki a "thief", and honestly i think that description suits him very well.

Chris and this Korean boy. they were playing Egyptian Rats (some card game) and the boy was kicking Chris's butt.

the artisan honing her craft

after i went home i popped into Yuko's room. she was making some raviolis. seriously, i have absolutely no doubt that Yuko has the talent to be a Michelin-starred chef if she ever goes that route. anyway we had a nice talk and i got to know more about her.

she made this teapot herself. but the funniest thing is that she made a mistake during the making process and now she has a teapot that can't be opened. the lid is just stuck there.

Yuko has a black belt in Shaolin and she's also a Judo Queen. she's like 151 cm tall and she can lift my entire body up. and i'm not exactly feather-light. my roomie took this picture and apparently she finds it very amusing because she asked me to send this picture to her so she can show it to her Mom.

don't call the ambulance though. she didn't slam me down to the floor. she just suspended me there for about a few seconds. how would i describe the experience? it gave me a quick rush of blood to the head and a newfound fear of Yuko.

i won this shirt while playing Human Bingo at dinner. basically you have to run all over the place and find someone to sign one of the 12 boxes on paper with matching descriptions: "has 6 or more siblings", "plays cricket", "has been to 4 continents or more", etc. i had the hardest time finding someone who has 6 or more siblings. i cheated on that one actually, because Chris pointed me to this African guy.

i also got a free box of pizza because, true to the American culture, there were lots of leftover food. i started with a full round pizza, and now i'm left with one piece. gave them all to different people on the second floor (at the end of it i was actually shocked when i opened my box and saw that one piece). doesn't matter though. i have my food supply covered this entire week because of orientation and stuff.

international orientation and Heidelberg

we had to check in at the international centre yesterday for some sort of an orientation where basically people just go up the stage and tell you stuff. but i think i've got a lot to learn from the American style of presenting. ALL the presenters are so natural, and i mean all. there's no weakest link. well except for this bossy woman who went on and on about academic integrity. isn't it hardly surprising that anyone who listens to her would want to resort to cheating?

we had talks about the Immigration, Health (need to get insurance and stuff), TAXES (i didn't even need to listen to that but i was stuck there) and some other stuff. anyway this Health lady is really cute. she's like roly poly and jolly and she's called Nono Jones.

lunch. this handsome boy here is called Luke, 11. he's part of the Currykorn family band. he tap dances and sings, how cute is that. he was putting on his boots and getting ready for his performance.

they play bluegrass, a genre of traditional American music.

the entire family up there. (L-R) Jordan, 18, on guitar and harmonica (actually he's not part of the family but he's pretty much a member of the family now); Mama Korn on double bass (her maiden name is Korn and her husband's last name is Curry. Currykorn, get it?); John, 13, on mandolin ; Sadie, 15, on violin; Sam, 7; Luke, 11; Meg, 5 (she sings); Papa Curry on guitar and dobro (this really cool horizontal guitar. Yi Wen had to tell me what it's called). sorry about the poor quality of the picture though.

the guy who works at the town bank, Joey.

(L-R) Yi Wen; Yuko; me; Alistair from Uzbekistan; Ibrahim from Saudi Arabia; Chris from the US; Ana Maria

we went to this restaurant called Heidelberg. i got a $5 voucher for answering this trivia question back at the orientation. where's the Golden Gate bridge found? answer: San Francisco. the trivia was a lot of laughs. one of the questions was: who's spending more time in jail - Paris Hilton or Lindsay Lohan? i didn't know the answer to that. anyway it's Paris.

after that we went home and were getting ready to sleep when somehow we ended up having a hot chocolate party in Yuko's room. her roomie, Rachel, is from the US and she's really really nice. and Yuko was like offering everyone hand-made Butterscotch and milk chocolate. how not to get fat I ask you?

good night.

hall life

Laws Hall is somekind of an international hall. there are all kinds of nationalities here. on my floor there's a Romanian, Japanese, Korean, Chinese, American.

see Singapore over there? Yi Wen and I are the third batch of NTU students who came to Mizzou. the first was Derrick, the second was Adeline and Sara.

this Japanese girl called Yuko cooked some dumplings with lamb inside. they're called Gyoza. and yeah, they taste as good as they look. oh man i can't believe my luck. there's a cooking goddess on my floor!

isn't she the cutest thing ever? squatting there and peeling potatoes. while i'm stuffing myself with dumplings.

Yuko's studying art, mostly ceramics. she freaking made this pot herself and she didn't use any machine. it's just hands and coiling and sheer artistic talent. there's this other Jap girl called Yumi on the other side of the floor, and she's doing theatre studies. the Japanese really do have a thing going with the arts. anyway more pictures of the other second floor people later. most of them are busy studying now.

look at the intricate details on the birds. well okay they're not very clear. for better quality pictures hop over to Yi Wen's blog.

room sweet room

my bed is on the right.

the beds here are freaking high. i think they're built for Caucasians or Maria Sharapova. i feel like i'm pole-vaulting to get to my bed every night. and everytime i manage to heave myself up my roomie will clap and cheer. i don't know whether i should feel supported or insulted.

my food stock to last me for one week because it's the holidays and the university's eateries are closed. it's also my first step on a shortcut towards obesity. (L-R) macaroni and cheese, cheez it biscuits, piles of instant soup that landed me in hot soup at the US customs (they had to open my luggage and stuff, but oh well that was the only glitch), grapes, instant noodles, water (the water here tastes quite funny though), krispy kreme donuts and power bars.

my roomie is called Fang Bai or Brita and she's from China. she's really nice. helped me to move the furnitures and stuff because the original arrangement was bloody stupid. which architectural genius is it who placed the desk right in front of the door and the bed right at the back of the desk? anyway, it was morning and i was talking quite loudly with Yi Wen in my room about where to eat and stuff, and i didn't realize Brita was there in the room. all rolled up like popiah.

downtown

Our breakfast at the hotel. The newspapers here are mostly USA Today and The Missourian, which is the town's newspaper. Most of the news content I've read so far are domestic-oriented though. Not much international news. I'll take a wild stab here, but maybe that's part of the reson why 63 percent of Americans aged 18 to 24 failed to correctly locate Iraq on a map of the Middle East?

Our receptionist at the hotel. Going to name her baby Marleanne. I think it's a lovely name.

The town's pretty much deserted though. School's only going to start next week and I guess many people are holidaying.

Stop or I'll slap you.





Yay, for the first time I have long legs!

my new number

573 823 2316

minneapolis to kansas city; kansas city to columbia

cirrocumulus clouds the fish scale clouds. altitude 6,000 to 10,000 metres.

our hotel room. had to stay there for one night because the hall office was already closed. my bed is on the right.

yes, mom.

yeah, indeed. actually the food is not that great. i was just hungry.

i wasn't wearing lipstick okay. the temperature was freaking 0 degree and my lips were smarting. Yi Wen said i looked stoned. yeah, the jet lag was setting in.

Jay Leno before bed. there was a guy who was talking so darned loud he redefined "loudmouth American" outside our room when we were sleeping. jerk. so i went out to ask him to shut up but turned out that he was talking inside his room (i guess the sound insulation is bad). what can i do? barge in and say he is forbidden to talk in his own room? so i licked my wounds and went back to bed. only i had to be caught in a Mr Bean moment and realized i was locked out of the room and i'd forgotten my key. luckily Yi Wen is not a heavy sleeper.

tokyo to minneapolis

3 things to help you survive through an 11-hour flight: The Economist (which i borrow from the passenger next to me called Hillary), headphones, something to chew on. anyway Hillary designs pet apparel, like winter wear and little boots for dogs. actually i don't think dogs care much about fashion; they are more concerned with smelling each other's butt and licking their owner's face afterwards. but of course i didn't tell Hillary that. i did the PR thing to do, which is to smile and say "oh, that's interesting!" anyway she doesn't support the other Hillary and no, she's not an Obama girl. maybe Edwards. i told her in Singapore there are only 2 political orientations: apathetic and anti-PAP. she also did the PR thing to do, which is to say "oh, i see!"

a plane parked just outside.

Yi Wen took this. Of all people, she must snap 2 police officers.

singapore to tokyo

(L-R) my second brother, my mom, my maid, me, my dad

Singapore should take a leaf from Japan. but actually there's not much use either. people who don't look like they're over 60, or injured, or pregnant, or carrying a child were sitting on the so-called priority seats. oh well. seems that selfishness is a priority anywhere in the world.

the gift shop where we bought a small kaleidoscope for Yi Wen's buddy who is kind enough to give us a lift from the hotel to the hall. i don't know where my buddy is. lousy buddy.

when fake things are an art, not a crime

i suspect that Willy Wonka is Japanese

you can call just to say you love me

(+1) 1347 7011 201 (cheaper for me)
(+1) 3104 988 397

but it'll depend on who you are.

and in case you want to Fed-ex me some laksa or chicken rice:

215B Laws Hall
University of Missouri
1005 Maryland Avenue
Columbia, MO 65201-5101

the (not so) brave one

trust my luck that my mom had watched The Brave One (this movie where Jodie Foster goes berserk and shoots the bojangles out of the thugs who killed her fiancee) some time ago and now she has these images varying from me getting shot at the bus stop to me getting clubbed with a baseball bat as i walk round a corner.

actually there's no need to worry because i possess the greatest martial arts skills ever, which is the Thousand Steps Move. it's the pinnacle of the art of running like hell. but seriously, i think i won't even reach ten steps before some killer turns me into Minced Meat Served on White Snow (if i were to be turned into a dish i want to at least sound good okay).

but anyway, que sera sera. if i were really meant to die i could even die from getting hit by a falling flower pot near some HDB. or i can get knocked down by a psycho taxi driver like the one who killed the poor Singaporean guy some time ago.

so no point worrying too much. but of course i'll watch my steps and stay away from thugs or thuggish-looking people or in fact anyone who starts his or her conversation with a "yoyoyo". anyone who does that all the time can't be good. okay maybe i'm prejudiced but it's just a personal dislike, so oh well.

anyway, some pictures i got from the internet. after all i need to have an idea of the place i'll be spending the next five months at.

prologue

i shall just dispense first with the boring introduction.

i'm going to spend 6 months (actually 5 months and a half but let's not be anal) at the University of Missouri-Columbia in the US as part of this exchange program at NTU. before you start betting among yourselves on how long i'm going to survive there, let me tell you that i have a wonderful exchange partner called Tan Yi Wen aka Miss Chunky Monkey aka Fairy Godmother who's going to do all her best to keep me alive. why? because it's written on the stars, that's why.

actually, i suspect that the reason why my parents agreed to let me fly to a miserable sounding place half the globe away is because they want me to be more independent (read: be less of a 20-year-old brat). so i shall. don't snigger.

and uh, the story behind this blog address. mizzou is the so-called affectionate term for the University of Missouri-Columbia. must give them credit for efficiency. i mean, wait till they hear about NTUWKWSCI. and caribou is just something that allows me to express my alliteration syndrome. which just means that it means absolutely nothing apart from the fact that it rhymes with mizzou. well okay caribou actually means 'wild reindeer' but christmas is already over so let's not talk about that.

what else. my family will be reading this so for my own self-preservation i shall try my very best to make it G-rated. it's going to be a happy family blog!

right. so that's all for the boring introduction. i'll be flying northwest airlines this friday, 11th january, from singapore to tokyo to minneapolis to kansas city and finally to missouri via shuttle bus. pray i won't lose any body parts at each stopover.

have a great year ahead,

E.