Hi everyone (well, no one's reading this anyway, more like - hi Li'az!) I'm currently on a hiatus for my Seoul research (the travel date is coming real soon and I'm short on info!), but there are updates every now and then:
Because I'm such a lazy blogger, I shall jot things down in point form:
1. On Seoul:
I forgot to post, but I did manage to book a hostel for my trip! Check it out (Hongdae JK House) on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/HongdaeJKHouse, it's really marvelous + it is new and probably sparkling clean. The owner seems pretty friendly as well, no advance payment, just a word of promise and I nailed the deal :)
Hongdae JK House is pretty near Hong Dae's 3D art house too Trickeye Museum (Seogyo Plaza B2, 357-1, Seogyo-dong, Mapo-gu, Seoul 121-838, South Korea) - that means I don't have to fly all the way to Jeju island for its 3D Art Museum!
These are some reviews of Trickeye:
http://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Attraction_Review-g294197-d2203080-Reviews-Trickeye_Museum-Seoul.html
2. On college and work:
Well, this is supposedly my 3-month holiday but I'm splurging all the time on mugging for my placement test (a pain in the ass, really). I received last semesters' results today via sms- and my CAP sort of improved by a few decimal points. As for my Korean grade, it was a little disappointing but I'm glad it wasn't a C. Enough of school, let's talk about work! I'm grabbing all the opportunities for exotic jobs and I'm currently holding two :) The first is a part time at Intercruises for the Royal Carribean and coming up this Thursday I have a job at Sarang, the Korean restaurant at Orchard Central. Hope all would be well, I'm keeping my fingers crossed.
3. On BOOKS and WRITING!:
I've been reading A Song of Ice and Fire in my free time (on the bus and train while hopping from place to place, Singapore is really overcrowded.) and while listening to awesome soundtracks, I write when I should be sleeping. I'm still trying to revise a few tricky chapters! Words are flying everywhere.
Advice for myself: clear that block like a plumber and let the words flow.
The annual book fair at Suntec City Convention Hall just gets smaller and smaller every year. I'm utterly disappointed by the amount of books they have (an the number of major book stores collapsing)! Back in the good old days the place would be a paradise filled with screaming kids hugging books (not assessment books). And now, the place just gives you goosebumps because there just isn't enough human to warm the place up. Geez. The booth for Times was like a lighthouse. I managed to buy a good book and thanks to my lovely cousin, I ordered even more books online (free shipping) from NOQ store.
I'll be getting my hands on Diana Wynne Jones' Howl's Moving Castle and Alexander Lloyd's Chronicles of Prydain soon, finally! Eeeeek!!! *dancing around the house* Gosh, I've been looking all over Singapore for Howl's Moving Castle, and they only appear in libraries.
4. On movies:
Dark Shadows was very-Tim-Burton-ish and of course, I watched it because it's a Johnny Depp + Tim Burton film.
Nothing beats Hunger Games though, haha (unless you are watching Hunger Games for the second time or third time.)(You'll most likely watch it objectively until the muttations part).
Snow White and the Huntsman's coming out on May 31st! I've been waiting so long for it - I mean, I can't wait to watch the Queen, just look at the mirror and the milk bath...I'm not a Stewart fan, I shall not comment, but I do love the suit and amour (and probably the plaits).
And the best is saved for the last, I've been waiting for years for The Hobbit! ( I re-watch LOTR every year and yes, I tear every time.) Peter Jackson is back again! :D *fireworks* (I saw Peter Jackson's production video a year ago) I was hoping Orlando and Elijah Wood's coming back but I'm not sure---are they? But from the trailer, Ian Mckellen, Cate Blanchett and Andy Serkis' definitely back on set, cheers for the crew! I was that into LOTR - even my mom know's what "my precious" mean. She didn't watch a single movie haha.
Anyway, the ranting's over! Have a lovely day ahead dear readers. (If you happen to stumble over my blog, that is.)
Quote of the day: "To invent, you need a good imagination and a pile of junk." - Thomas Alva Edison
I guess this applies to writing as well.
May 15, 2012
Cryptex II
Editor's Note: This blog has been moved.
I really made a Cryptex! If you're a fan of Leonardo Da Vinci, or Dan Brown, or the film << The Da Vinci Code>>- so to speak- then you'll understand how excited I was when I discovered it is possible to make one at home!
I really made a Cryptex! If you're a fan of Leonardo Da Vinci, or Dan Brown, or the film << The Da Vinci Code>>- so to speak- then you'll understand how excited I was when I discovered it is possible to make one at home!
My origami cryptex didn't turn out as fantastic as I'd wanted it to be, because the paper card that I used was kinda flimsy.
If I have the machines, PVC pipes or copper pipes I would have tried making better cryptexes...(just Google or Youtube "How to Make a Cryptex", I'm sure those are nicer than mine.)
So after long nights of pondering and digging through my 9-years-worth of junks and gears, I finally picked up the guts to make one myself - I needed guts because I really detest super glue, it lines the bottom of my list. (My faves are glue guns, diamond glaze, pvc glue, glue stick, uhu glue, AB glue...I don't really adore contact glue though :)
And here's the finished product! I didn't exactly follow the steps most people used...( I used parts from correction tapes, key chain rings and plastic containers...) but if you figured out how a cryptex actually works before starting, it makes the assembly and gear-hunt easier. Enjoy!
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P.s: Mona Lisa is not the real code haha <3 |
May 9, 2012
Cryptex
Setting the hostel stuff aside...I WANT TO BUILD A CRYPTEX!!!
Gosh, look at these:
May 6, 2012
Minds are Like Parachutes
Anonymous: ''Minds are like parachutes, they only function when they are open.''
The Wandering Quill *scratches the paper*: "Minds are like wings too, we only Fly when they soar."
-oO0Oo-
Li'az peered over the edge of her balloon, a surge of vertigo welling up in her...
And then she fell. Free falling, her center of gravity rolling all over her insides as she tumbled through the clouds...The wind was a beast, it was roaring into her ears, so loud ...
It has been a while since I wrote, I'm three quarters done with Book I and half-way through it's revision. Well, it's in need of a huge revision because I've been experiencing a switch of world view ever since I entered college. Perhaps this is the ultimate price I have to pay for Knowledge - because the world I've created is more than half as complicated as this one, yet this world I'm living in is less than half as action packed and magickal as the one I'm creating.
The Price of Knowledge - as I often call - means my world, including the worlds I've created will no longer be the same again.
For as a writer, I don't think I'll ever be the same again. It's not a sad thing, really, because I've finally found something that I believed I didn't have so many years ago when I started thinking about writing- a perspective on the workings of a real world, a world with people who don't just sit on rainbows and chew on cotton candies.
How in the world did George Orwell imagined Animal Farm? What about the discrimination the Muggles and Muggle-born folks faced in the world of J.K. Rowling? Why about the history of Hunger Games?
It's not hard to imagine why, because this is how our world works too - but it doesn't mean it's not wrong. Are there instances when you are not happy? If you are not happy, does that mean something is wrong?
If I keep searching for happiness, does that mean I'm individualistic and self-absorbed? But what if Individualism is a term painted by the Reductionists - by condemning individuals for all the sins in the world, "It is the individuals that are greedy, it is the individuals who lack self-control, it is the individuals who are lazy - that is why they have no right to protest about their state of poverty.", by blaming individuals, and self-absorbing the blame - are we ignoring the wrong things that lie in the workings of our world?
Well, this is nothing against anyone. I'm just trying to say if you are looking for something that you can't find in yourself, while trying to work on a novel, look around you for inspirations.
Writers do not add in these imperfections for fun - yes, these imperfections serve as fuel for plots to run smoothly with twists, but writers certainly do not write to drag their readers in and leave them stranded in the cruel twists. Writers write best when they incorporate their lives in what they write, and certainly they (some or most?) hope that despite all the cruel twists, there's still a hope for readers to invest in.
You can imagine a world full of rainbows and cotton candies.
But these are boring (depends on your audience :)
RUN HOTEL RUN
First Quarter*
(*Hunger Games hangover)
All right, I figured out this won't do, so I'm really determined to kill that lazy bug in me and start doing some serious research. Well, but there are more pressing matters at hand --- I'm in need of a hotel or hostel!
***not mentioning I need to start mugging for my statistics placement test in June? (I'll be thrown into a huge, GARGANTUAN dilemma when term results are out on 28th May 2012 ---to major or not to major --- beats me.)
With intelligence reports from my lovely mom, I've obtained possible candidates ...
Vision Hotel Seoul:
http://www.agoda.com/asia/south_korea/seoul/vision_hotel.html
***the best candidate so far, it's near 동대문 (Dong Dae Mum)!
City Palace Hotel:
http://www.agoda.com/asia/south_korea/seoul/city_palace_hotel.html
*Not as grand as Vision Hotel but near 동대문 as well
Yoo's Family Guest House:
http://www.agoda.com/asia/south_korea/seoul/yoo_s_family_guest_house_byeolhadang.html
*new guesthouse - but just look at the traditional layout! (public bath though)
HAHA House:
http://www.agoda.com/asia/south_korea/seoul/haha_house.html
*pretty faraway from metro station, but the kind owner fetches his travellers personally from the metro station!
City Guest House1:
http://www.agoda.com/asia/south_korea/seoul/city_guesthouse_1.html
*Location is a little tough to find...but reviews are pretty good!
Seoul Tower Ville
http://www.seoultowerville.com/english.html
*** At Myeong Dong, with view of Nan Sam Tower, interesting keepers :)
-oO0Oo-
Second Quarter
Well, this would be my first time travelling so far away from the sunny island of Singapore without my family, and I'm really really really nervous that it won't turn out right!!! Because I'm a dorky writer I shall list out a few grandiloquent plans that may well be here just for the fluff. Teehee (It's 2.53am so I'm a bit high?)1. Organise my own Running Man: Globe Trotters in SEOUL CITY!!!
(Image from: http://www.kshownow.net/)
HAHA, that sounds a bit far-fetched doesn't it? Well, but it doesn't hurt to dream!
I can:
- Make a really nice itinerary with a theme. (With all the travel essentials, packing lists and maps for good measure...)
- Print mission cards! (On really cool nice papers)(Or compensate with nice fonts haha)(with maps and addresses for a blur student like me) (Food to hunt, deals to nail, interesting places to explore and kick-ass stuff to do in Seoul...)
- Well, sounds like fun - and that means I need to kick start that rusty engine of mine and turn it to full throttle...
- bind everything into a book (A5 size), with all the info. maps, with an envelope at the back of the book for all the receipts and what nots...
2. Hmm, I guess there isn't a plan number 2 because this Running Man idea will be keeping me busy for a while?
3. Sighs, that means I need lots of time, money and resources...gonna sleep now, I've been chasing the Werglock for an entire day, now it's chasing me to sleep. zZZZzZZ
