Troy

I can't remember the last time I walked out of a movie disliking every single character. I was so apathetic that I can't even summon up hate for each character- it was that pointless. What a bloody waste of my time.

"If I were Achilles I'd put my foot in a big fuck-off block of concrete!"
- Eddie Izzard (Best imagined in Adam Auton's droll voice)

Penny Arcade was right about the movie.

How it feels to be Fred

From my list of Things to Do Sometime In This Life:

17. Join a dancesport competition. Partner a beautiful girl in a flowing dress. Have lots of fun and do well! ...................

I didn't want to at first, but it was an intramural competition meant for beginners, and one of my friends on the University team was trying to convince me. She didn't succeed at first, until she whispered in my ear, "Don't you want to know how it feels to be Fred Astaire....?"

Next thing I know, I'm rehearsing a quickstep with a girl I've never met before. She was devastatingly gorgeous, heart-stoppingly blonde, and sadly taken. We rehearsed for four hours spread over a week. Come Sunday afternoon, I knotted a knit tie around my waist, slipped on my two-tone shoes, adjusted my tie, and off I went. My partner (who is a competitive dancer) made me look good, and despite my nervousness and fear, stumbling frequently, kicking her in the shins twice, and stepping on her feet once, we somehow made it through four rounds before being eliminated in the semi-finals.

And at my last dance, in the semi-finals, there was a point, just a few seconds, where suddenly everything clicked, and I was gliding along, with my chin up and my back arched and my arms locked around her, a big grin on my face, her dress flowing, her smiling beautifully, the crowd cheering, and we were moving as one-

and I knew, just for a few seconds, what it was like to be Fred Astaire.

And I'll never forget it.

Updated Metaphors

Part of the greatness of the game of baseball is its metaphors with life. It follows its own internal clock, moving through nine innings and each inning ending when the third out has been recorded. Sometimes it takes three hours; sometimes it takes four; and sometimes we go to extra innings and it takes five or more. In the end, someone always wins: like life, you never end up exactly even. And yet, no matter what the result, tomorrow you come back and you play again.

It's not surprising, then, that baseball has supplied the English language with some of its richest metaphors. Three strikes and you're out, for example, is the most common and widely spread. It's even used in countries which have little comprehension for the game. Hitting a home run is another.

It's also supplied some interesting metaphorical stories that mean to impart a moral, lesson or fable. One that I've always enjoyed is, People remember that Babe Ruth hit more home runs than anyone else in his time. What they don't remember is that he was also had more strikeouts than anyone else. If you don't swing at a pitch, you can't hit it. (I've paraphrased it from memory). The lesson is, of course, you can't succeed if you don't try.

Babe Ruth in his time hit more home runs than the rest of the league combined, and created a record that stood for decades. Yet just as his records have fallen, so too must we update our metaphors and motivational writings.

It's well known now that in baseball, batting average and home runs and less valued than how often a person gets on base, because that's the most important thing. It doesn't matter how you get there, whether by walking, getting hit by a pitch, or hitting a single. What matters is that you are getting on base. As such, the Greatest Hitter That Ever Lived, Ted Williams, is revered not just because of his phenomenal hitting, but also because he was so patient and focused at the plate that his career record On-Base Percentage of .482 is the best of all time (It means that everytime Ted went to the plate, 48.2% of the time he would get to first base- which is simply unbelievable).

As such, we should update our metaphor to incorporate patience. Instead of urging our friends to go up and swing for the fences, they should learn also to watch for the pitches that can actually be hit to the fences, and ignore the pitches which are so far out of the strike zone that they are unhittable.

So we end up with a new metaphor of, Ted Williams is remembered at the greatest ever hitter in baseball- but what people don't remember is that he also reached base more often than any other player in history. He patiently waited for a pitch he could hit, and if it didn't come then he ended up walking to first base. Either way, he reached base, which was the important thing. Like life, we need to remember to be patient and to keep in mind the big picture.

As times change, life's lessons must change with them.

The Best Way To Avoid Buying a Carpet

Recently, two good friends of mine (S, a guy, and M, a girl, names concealed to protect the guilty) went to Turkey as part of a trip around Europe. While they were wandering around a bazaar, a merchant came up and tried to sell them some carpets.

Merchant: So, where are you from?
S: Oh, she's from England and I'm from Canada.
Merchant (puzzled): How is this so?? You are from such different places?
S (thinks fast): Oh, she's my English mistress. My wife is back home in Canada, and I keep a mistress in England when I come to Europe.
Merchant: But the English people, they are bad in bed!
S: No, no. English men are bad in bed. That's why the English women, they are up for a good time, you know what I mean *wink* *knudge*
Merchant: Ahaha!! Of course! [The men laugh knowingly at each other] So you buy a carpet from me, yes?
S: No, I can't!
Merchant: Why not?
S: If I buy a carpet from you, I can't take it back because then my wife would know I've been here with my mistress!
Merchant: Ohhhhh... I understand. [They laugh]

M: Okay, we need to go. NOW.

The funny thing is, ten minutes later they were heading back out through the bazaar and pass the carpet shop again, and the merchant spots them, winks and flashed two thumbs up at S....

Dead Ringers

In an old entry I wrote last year (now deleted, so don't bother looking for it), I speculated on which actor I would choose to play me in a movie about my life (These are the things we speculate on in our idle moments here in Oxford. Politics? Sport? Bah! We prefer to indulge in ego-stroking exercises, proposing extremely handsome and rich celebrities as our alter egos.)

The topic came up again last night, and we tossed around names like Matt Damon for Mr. "I'm going to Yale Law School so I must be a superhuman", Edward Norton for Chris, Drew Barrymore for Marina, Eddie Izzard for Chief and Nicole Kidman for Steph. However, given that I'm not terribly familiar with many Chinese actors, I'm still drawing a blank as to who would play me. I can easily identify people to play my family- Ti Lung for my father, Rosamund Kwan for my mother, Leon Lai for Ming.

But who would play me? My first thought, off the top of my head, is that the actor I would love to have play me would Alfonso Ribeiro. His portrayal of Carlton embodies much of the same spirit in which I try to live my life, and at the same time his physicality, his smugness, his elitism, his insecurity and his love of Tom Jones all suggest aspects of myself. He was always my favourite character on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.

But there's the small problem of, he looks nothing like me...

So this is where you come in, readers of Confucius at Oxford. I want to hear your suggestions for who should play yours truly in a movie about his life. Feel free to suggest anyone who comes to mind. I would prefer if you justified your choice, but it's up to you. Let's hear your ideas!

Singapore and UNESCO

Citing mismanagement, corruption and nepotism, the United States, Britain and Singapore left UNESCO in 1985-86. Britain returned in 1997. The United States of America returned in 2003. Of all states that have left UNESCO for various reasons (e.g. South Africa, which left in 1956 but returned in 1994 after the abolition of apartheid), only one country still refuses to return:

Singapore.

Why? This bears further investigation. In the meantime, I would love to hear from anyone who can shed some light on the stubborn persistence of my government to return to UNESCO.

(Incidentally, Singapore's non-membership of UNESCO prevents me for applying for a job there. Thank you for looking after your country's citizens, PAP!)

50 First Dates

Damn, that was a dusty cinema. I had stuff in my eyes throughout the last third of the movie.

Anyway, I have to say that I am a sucker for romantic comedies, but most of the time, the set-up is so preposterous that I find it really hard to summon the requisite suspension of disbelief. It's not often that I watch a movie, particularly a standard four act romance, and not cringe at the ridiculous plot contortions, but this movie easily accomplishes the stretch.

What struck me were the parallels between Adam Sandler and George Peppard in Breakfast at Tiffany's. As I mentioned, I believe the essential blandness of George Peppard contributes to Breakfast at Tiffany's, such that we are able to project ourselves onto the Everyman Peppard. Adam Sandler shares a similar blandness, and his bland physicality also aids. After all, if he were making US$20,000 a year and crashing in his parents' basement, would the Drew Barrymores of the world be falling all over him? I seriously doubt it. It gives hope to us normal average guys.

The difficult thing I find about such movies is that it invariably raises expectations about romance to the point where real life invariably cannot measure. For example, Henry Roth's job doesn't seem to require him to work more than a few hours every morning, and all the things he does works out pretty much perfectly. This movie has a perfect ending, too, hitting all the right notes while sidestepping the difficult issues that were raised. It's hard going back to real life when you have, for two hours and £4.50, been allowed to inhabit a world where everything works out perfectly and the course of true love runs smoothly (apart from the requisite break-up about two-third of the way through a movie, of course).

Still, watching such movies recharges my optimism about life and refreshes my belief that true love awaits us all somewhere out there. And if & when I find it, I have to adjust my life so that I have to have a videotape ready, can never be far from a TV, and have to spend an hour explaining every morning, well, I'll be ready for that too.

Anyway, how could I not enjoy a movie that has a good natured "Red Sox win World Series!" joke?

Karaoke Night

I think the tone of the evening was set early on when I decided to do a breathless, falsetto version of Evanescence's Bring Me To Life, as the subsequent theme of the evening seemed to be 'Men Singing Women's Songs'. For example, Chief did a rollicking version of Like A Virgin, and the guys did group sings of Girls Just Wanna Have Fun and Christina Aguilera's Beautiful.

Can you imagine a group of loud and boozed-up men singing Beautiful?

I think karaoke is not only extremely therapeutic, but is also a great social leveller. It reveals to us two great truths:

1. Almost everyone can't sing...

2. ... but almost everything thinks they can.