Micro mini umbrella from the US

I've just been back from a two-week holiday in New York. Apart from reunion with my sister whom I haven't seen for a year, there was a great discovery: not everything in the States is necessarily big.

I suppose most people have the impression that in the US everything is big, extremely big, so unnecessarily big that sometimes we feel we were in Brobdingnag, the land occupied by giants in Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels. It seems that the Americans have a penchant for supersizing things. They have offers such as ‘supersize your hamburger or coke for just an extra ¢1’, super-overweight people and therefore clothes in size XⁿL. But, returning from the holiday, I twigged that not everything in the States is necessarily big.

I brought a tin of M&S shortbread for Marcia as a birthday gift. I also received a ‘wee’ gift from her because, just as in our undergraduate days in Taiwan, she always remembered that my birthday came ten days later after hers and always gave me something unusual that, in her words, fitted my image, for example, duplicated contemporary paintings or sweetcorn facial masks.

This year Marcia gives me a totes umbrella. Obviously, her memory serves her pretty well so that she remembers that I had a brolly with me all the time when I was an undergrad at the National Taiwan University because I commuted between the University and my hometown Keelung, the harbour of rain (read this for more about my childhood memory of rain). However, she apparently has slightly unsatisfactory meteorological knowledge of the weather in the British Isles as she doesn’t realise that I simply can’t hold firmly a brolly when a Scottish gust of wind blows.

This umbrella, according to the tag, 'folds really small to fit most anywhere' and 'opens full size', but it's indeed so super-small that it hardly sheltered me and Marcia from a sudden shower when we were walking on the campus of Rutgers where she completed her master degree.


Look, this umbrella is realy a bit smaller than an ordinary one. Ergo, I can assure you that not everything in the States is necessarily big.

My first-ever musical experience

I passed the audition to be accepted into the Stirling and Bridge of Allan Operatic Society last September and was then cast as the Interpreter for its 2007 show The King and I presented at MacRobert Arts Centre from 12th to 17th March, including 3 matinées and 6 evening performances.

I'd done some Chinese operas before I came to Scotland but I had no experience with musicals. It's really my debut on Western musical stage. I took great delight in presenting such a persona although I had only a few lines. In addition to the Interpreter, I also played other walk-on parts, a slave and a priest, and therefore at one point I had to change from one character to another within 30 seconds. It's good fun to run off-satge and on-stage while changing.

In the original script at Act 1 Scene 1 the Interpreter was kicked by the Kralahome (sort of 'Prime Minister, the King's right-hand man) and sent sprawling. However, our director Alan C Jones just wanted a more dramatic effect so the Kralahome was asked to punch my tummy and then kick my bum. Me and Jim Howson, who played the Kralahome, really enjoyed this modification.

As the Interpreter should be kind of middleman who puts on airs and thinks he is an important figure, I just showed a funny expression on my face. This was a successful deed; the audience loved it.

I don't know which show the committee will choose for our 2008 show but I'm sure I will get a part and create a new expression on my face.

IQ test: Pick the odd one out

An IQ test is a set of problems, usually including items from different domains such as short-term memory, spatial visualisation, perceptual speed and verbal knowledge, designed and used to measure intelligence. So many different forms of IQ tests have been designed and revised since 1905 when a French psychologist, Alfred Binet, together with his colleague Theodore Simon, devised the first intelligence test, the Binet-Simon intelligence scale, in modern times.

There is always criticism that IQ tests may be biased, especially when the same set of questions are used on people from different cultures or of different races.

I'm not particularly interested in seeking evidence produced by any academic research regarding the validity of IQ testing. I still remembered my IQ was 62 according to a test in 1990 and 135 according to another test in 1997. I don't think I could make such progress in seven years' time and thus never believe this issue is worth exploring.

However, if my memory serves me, it seems that there are always 'pick-the-odd-one-out' questions in whatever form of IQ tests. From the following examples, you will understand why these tests are so biased.

Pick the odd one out:

1. Asphalt, delight, leave and uncle
   
2. Sun, moon, earth and lemon
   
3. Da Vinci, Einstein, Kennedy and Marco Polo

And the answers:

1. Asphalt, because it is the only one that cannot form an idiom with a national adjective. (You can have Turkish delight, French leave and Dutch uncle, but can you have XXX asphalt?)
   
2. Earth, because when you were a wee boy or girl you usually coloured sun, moon and lemon 'yellow' with your crayon. (Earth is usually coloured blue or sometimes green.)
   
3. Einstein, because he is the only one who doesn't have an airport named after him. (Da Vinci serves Rome, JFK serves New York and Marco Polo serves Venice.)

Bloody heck, are we supposed to know these when doing an IQ test if

1. we've never heard any of these three English idioms?
   
2. we've never done any colouring with crayons in childhood?
   
3. we've never visited Rome, New York or Venice?

Advertising song commission

I was commissioned by a friend last year to write an advertising song for his biotechnology company, Springsbio. However, as I had been busy finishing my thesis, I didn't even lay down one note on my Sibelius until Chinese New Year, let alone arrangement and instrumentation.

This friend made a very strange request. The song has to be pentatonic but not too Chinese, easy to sing along but not too clichéd and similar to other existing successful advertising songs but not lacking originality. Goodness gracious, what will it be?

For some years, I've written music for theatre, advertising jingles and arrangement for church hymns and worship songs, but none of my 'patrons' has ever made such challenging specifications. Spending all day Tuesday, I put theories, concepts and his requirements together and carved out this quasi-scherzo, playful tune.

Lighthearted as it sounds, the motive is absolutely heavily serious. He and his colleagues are all satisfied with this short piece. Thanks to this challenging commission, all the symptoms of PSS (post-submission syndrome), which have been making me disoriented since I submitted, were drastically alleviated. Nevertheless, I wonder how this song would match the image of a biotech company.

Come on, give me more exacting musical tasks!

Year of Pig

Chinese New Year has just arrived and I'm so glad that I submitted my thesis the day before New Year's Eve. As a matter of the Chinese tradition, all work should be done by the New Year's Eve so that we can have a brand new start.

It used to be a custom that a creditor had to collect debts by the end day of the year, otherwise all the debts would be written off automatically when New Year came.

2007 is Year of Pig according to the Chinese zodiac. I've found a series of pigs in some different languages. Have a look and see how many of them you read.

豬, ブタ, 돼지, cerdo, maiale, pig, porc, porco, porcus, Schwein, varken, свинья, χοίρος

Year of Pig reminds me of an unforgettable holiday with my fiancée in 2002, the year I finished national service. We visited East Grinstead (in Sussex) and spent a day in Hartfiled Village where A.A.Milne created the most celebrated Winnie-the-Pooh in the 1920s.

In the High Street of the village, I found The Pooh Corner Shop, which housed the world's largest selection of Winnie-the-Pooh products. Since one of my fiancée's nicknames was piggy, I bought her a piglet soft toy, the classic one not the awful Disney spin-off.

According to the colour illustrations by Ernest H. Shepard in the Winnie-the-Pooh books, Piglet had white skin and wore a green jumper. However, it was turned into a pink piggy in a darker-pink jumper in Disney cartoon. I don't like it.

Anyway, hope Year of Pig is a prosperous year.

PS. It didn't snow at all in Stirling when I was away in Taiwan, but strangely enough, it snowed a couple of days later after I came back. Since a Chinese phrase goes that 'heavy snow anticipates a prosperous year' (Ruixue zhao fengnian 瑞雪兆豐年), the snowfall which welcomed my return to Scotland seems to be a good omen.

Recipe of Braised Lionhead

(The image is borrowed from here as I don't think I've got the time at the moment for cooking such as dish and taking a photo of it)

In response to Pedro's comment on my previous post, I'm now offering more details on Braised Lionhead, one of my speciality dishes.

Lionhead (shizitou 獅子頭) is a Chinese Huaiyang (淮揚) dish consisting of jumbo meatballs stewed with vegetables and originating from the native cooking styles of the region surrounding the lower reaches of the Huai and Yangtze Rivers. There are actually two varieties of this dish, the steamed and the braised. In the former the meatballs are usually steamed with Chinese cabbage and in the later cooked with Chinese cabbage and bamboo shoots in soya sauce.

Being named so is because the look of a meatball surrounded by a Chinese cabbage leaf really resembles to a lion's head. (Pedro, use your imagination!)

I don't really know how to prepare the steamed, but I shall contribute my recipe of the braised.

1. Mix pork mince with chopped spring onions and water chestnuts, cornstarch, soya sauce and an egg. (If by any chance you practice Kosher or follow the Muslim food restrictions, use Kosher or Halal minced meat perspectively)
   
2. Shape the mixture into meatballs and throw them between your hands or onto a chopping board several times to make them firm but bouncy.
   
3. Coat the meatballs with cornstarch and then fry them lightly until golden brown.
   
4. Stew the fried meatballs with Chinese cabbage and sliced bamboo shoots in soya sauce and your own choice of stock. (Chilli powder, grounded pepper or sesame oil can also be added according to your taste)

Right, Pedro, now you can cook one of Wei's specialities for yourself.

Submitted

After working for three days without sleeping a wink, I went to the University this morning and submitted the bloody thesis. Finally, it's finished.

Nevertheless, I don't think I'm going to sleep well tonight nor tomorrow nor in the future. It's probably a post-submission syndrome and only can be cured after I pass the viva and get the degree.

Right, as Pedro suggested, I shall have a bus-load, no, probably lorry-load, of braised lionheads.

Japanese enka

The term enka (演歌, literally 'performed song') originated in Meiji (明治) Japan (1868–1912) and historically speaking refers to a traditional type of music from both the Meiji and the Taisho (大正) (1912-1926) periods. Today it is perceived as a quaint and nostalgic genre of Japanese popular music.

Enka is characterised by the use of melismatic progressions and long draw-out notes with vibrato in performance to emphasise the emotional lyrical contents, usually the sad aspects of life such as the pang of pain of separated young couples, the sorrow of unrequited love or lovesickness, nostalgia for the homeland during endless wanderings, the desire for affection in this transitory life and suicide or death.

Fairly enough, it doesn't really tell what enka is because it is hard to describe music in words. Nevertheless, with the aid of our music experience and some imagination, we can always draw an analogy. Just as how I tell my Western colleagues when asked what Shanghai popular song is. It sounds like when Bing Crosby met Bejing opera – just imagine a female singer singing in a high-pitched, nasal voice to the accompaniment of an American big band.

There is a classic interpretation from Barbara's Enka Site, so realistic that I can't resist citing, i.e. copying and pasting:

Team up a songwriter who writes old-fashioned Gypsy music with a romantic lyricist of an American blues or country music background. Then translate the lyrics into poetic but old-fashioned Japanese and arrange the music for a band made of half Japanese musicians and half European classical musicians, plus a harmonica and electric guitar.

Is it any clearer? If not, watch this clip, a performance of 'Kawa no nagare no you ni' (川の流れのように, 'As the river flows') by the queen of enka Hibari Misora (美空 ひばり).

Done

Thank God. I've done the final draft of my thesis and there is only a little editing work to finish off.

Haven't slept a wink for two days nor eaten anything for 20 hours. It's time to have a rest.

So, what happened to me?

During my short stay in Taiwan last December, I not only found the historical recording of my childhood singing but also retrieved quite a few passport-sized photos taken at different ages of my life. I have posted the six-year-old Wei in the previous entry and also made it the display picture of my MSN account.

Hong-Lin asked me the other day after seeing the lovable, innocent six-year-old Wei on MSN, 'So, what happened to you later?' Well, I don't know. Blame the hot humid climate and overburdened life in Taiwan, or just blame myself for being an ever-worrying thinker.

Certainly, our appearances change while we grow up, yet in my case, it seems to be a series of metamorphoses rather than a gradual change. Although not as drastic as a tadpole transforming into a frog, the striking contrast between the first and the last is self-evident.

1. 6 years old, first day of primary school
   
2. 10 years old, shot for my first passport
   
3. 11 years old, graduating from primary school
   
4. 12 years old, butch haircut for junior high school
   
5. 15 years old, graduating from junior high school
   
6. 16 years old, first year of senior high school
   
7. 18 years old, graduating from senior high school
   
8. 21 years old, fourth year in the university
   
9. 22 years old, awarded a bachelor degree of science
   
10. 24 years old, awarded a master degree of business administration
    
11. 24 years old, shot before my first visit to China
    
12. 25 years old, serving as a military police officer in national service

Do you see what I mean by metamorphosis?