La Casa

Its been a month since I moved here to La Casa.. And I've noticed a few things.. First of all, is that of the wealth profile of people here. There's the indisputably rich as usual. But the crucial observation is that there is also a significant number of families with slightly above average income, like me, living here. Shows that housing and standard of living has come a long way since the days when HDB was first established with the goal of providing affordable housing for all. Invariably higher standard of living in a country means that consumers enjoy a greater variety of goods and services. With rising incomes, there is sure to be some kind of demand inflation,with things getting pricier.

People seems to be using the swimming pool a lot, from amateurs learning to swim, to pros, to people who just want to chill and relax. Maybe some of them are genuine people wanting to relax or exercise. Maybe some of them are just people wanting to get the feeling of being able to swim in a private swimming pool, or want to make the full use of their monthly maintenance fees. I've seen people who looked like they never played tennis, playing at the private tennis courts... You can tell that by how unfit they look from the outside. People who play tennis frequently certainly do not have large thighs. They have powerful arms from swinging the racket. And they are definitely more tanned. Well well, it seems we have quite aways to becoming a cultured state..

Being cultured is something that Singapore still have to work on.. Being a gentleman(or a lady) is an art by itself. Acquiring refined tastes and mature thinking is not on the immediate priority list for a person struggling to make ends meet, but should be on the agenda once the nation acquires a higher standard of living overall. Appreciation of art and design, which by itself serves no physical purpose in the genetic lives of organisms, is the mark of being cultured. Definitely one has to pay money for being able to appreciate art and design. Therefore, the appearance of services with luxurious settings, or goods with appealing designs, should therefore be more expensive than other alternatives that sports the bare minimum. This is the mark of the rich, but also the mark of a more cultured society, one that is more appreciative of art and less concerned about matters of money. In terms of mannerisms, S'poreans could do away with the kiasu, kiasi, and kiamsiap attitudes. Being less selfish would do some good too, while impossible to eliminate totally.

Being a nice guy isn't that hard, as long as you're consciously aware of the people around you.

I guess I'm kinda perfectionist, because I'm so unwilling to see decay and tarnish happen to things so perfect. Like the new condo I'm living in now. Walls of bright new whitewash. New pavements. Etc. Sometimes perfectionists like us try too hard, but the world can never be perfect. For me? I seek perfectness in the equations and models of science, in the work I do, in the projects that I engage in, in the music and art around, in the games I play. Of course sometimes, looking for perfectness takes too long, in the rush, I always make careless mistakes that I hate and regret.

Means or the ends? Maybe both for me.

I want more quality time..

Think I'm getting obsessed with trying to make my life meaningful for myself. Do I suppose that I am afraid the there's too little time to do so many things? Maybe its because I'm wasting time right now by having to serve 2 years in the army doing absolutely pointless stuff. Or maybe because there's alot of things I want to do. Like completing games, reading books on different interesting subjects, thinking about several puzzles in science and math, chess theory too, making I get my weekly dose of TV and cartoons.., badminton workout in reflexes, hanging out with friends, need to spend a lot of computer time downloading so many things( for my psp), just thinking about life, the list goes on. And I want to do all this preferably within 1 day, so which means I am terribly shortchanged on time..


Oh man, after I've booked out, I really want to sleep, like 12 hrs one go. But then, if I sleep so much, I would be further wasting time, which I could do all sorts of useful things like anyone of the items mentioned above. So I end up usually sleeping later than I like on a weekend, and waking up earlier than I like. That's the obsession in trying to make my life more meaninful for you. Kinda makes me think what if I start having the burden having to go out with a gf..which by right should not be a burden if I've found Ms. Right, but unfortunately I dun think most girls are that sensitive. Its usually the other way around, cos guys gotta do the comforting and time investing to maintain the relationship thingy.. Ihave seen ugly sights of bunkmates who called to tell their gf that they couldn't meet up over the weekend because they were confined.. only to hear their gf shout back them for attempting to neglect them.. Nice guys would wimper quietly in silence, not so nice guys would shout back. Which then would illicit the classic response from the girl: cue the tears and the soft sobbing. Makes your heart melt instantly, and you end up comforting the girl, when it should be the other way around, cos you're the one who is confined in the camp..

Sigh, makes me wonder when the right time would ever come. So little time, so much time. Little to do what I want, too much, for what I don't want to do.

What are charges really?

When a positron and an electron collide and annihilate, a photon of light is produced. It just dawned upon me that the significance of this statement is that mass is being converted into oscillations in the electric field and magnetic field.

For awhile, I've been puzzling over the fact the mass and charge seemed like 2 different and separate properties that an object that you can possess. The equations that describe electric and gravitational phenomena looked similar, but the strength differs. And that mass as a property appeared to be more fundamental that charges, because when you talk about an object, you automatically talk about something that has mass. While charges need not be present. And it would be really weird to find charges without mass. Equations of energy freely interchange charges and masses. And then there's , which is really just . Thus relating mass with constants of in electric and magnetic forces.

Somehow, mass and charge must be interconvertible. Its almost as if 2 stones colliding are converted into pure sound waves after the collision. Since mass is energy.. We must really think over what is energy really.

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And now, for a little showcasing of some random doodling of a bored guy on a saturday evening. We will manipulate the equations involved in the case of 2 objects involved in elastic collision.

The required equations are:

------(1)
--(2)

We let which is essentially .
Then (2) can be reexpressed as:

Expanding out and simplifying..

2 Solutions here, with trivial solution x=0, which is not a really possible scenario as no particle can pass through each other like ghosts without change of velocity.

Which leaves us..


Remembering that ..

which is an extremely useful expression to remember in an exam.. because you've got no time to go through all those steps of solving equations simultaneously..

Armored warfare

Not sure what those people up there are planning, but I'm pretty sure they've got it mixed up and wrong.. What are they thinking, using armoured vehicles for slow tactical strikes? Slowly observing and moving.. What a mistake. Ah well, guess those tactical geniuses did not read enough on the theory, nor do they have alot of common sense.

Well, common sense tells you that you have a loud, noisy and prominent piece of technology that is able to move rapidly. So..? You would use it to attack agressively and swiftly. That is how traditional calvary charges are carried out. Through speed and instant action, leaving enemy troops with no time to reorganise or even have the opportunity to start an attack.

Therefore, the natural style of attacking with armoured vehicles, is blitzkreig. When fighting in closed spaces, divide up and move rapidly through several open paths, to reach the objective and then concentrate fire and take down that particular point rapidly. It is ideal if that objective is some important choke point with which the enemy got to move through that particular point. Penetrate swiftly through enemy defenses. Rush. In panicky situations, the enemy would be left breathless and unable to think clearly about how to counterattack. Moving swiftly means you are not sitting duck to anti-tank attacks.

Tanks are vulnerable to rocket propelled grenades, and thus when encountering one, you can't just rush straight at it. Lousy enemy would of course panic and run, but what about more proficient ones? They would keep their cool and reason out that if you're going to die no matter how since the tank is rushing your location and can shoot you down faster than you can run, why dont you just blast the tank anyway. It is coming at you in a straight line. Just aim and shoot. Aim for in front of the tank. Then blast consecutive shots. Complete annihilation. The tank should instead rush in a slightly zig-zag pattern.

Thus, I am more than baffled to find people practicing slow moving patterns, the kind where you observe and move, observe and move. Understood that we are trying to be wary of airstrike, but rapid movement is likely to achieve more in shorter time, besides the casualty rate would probably be as high anyway, even in slow tactical movement.

Ah well, all these is ultimately pointless anyway..

Dark Knight- World without Rules

Finally watched Batman: The Dark Knight today. I must say.. I'm extremely impressed with the movie. Some very deep themes and ideas runs through the core of movie, making it a real good food for afterthoughts.

Sad to say.. some of the Joker's ideas are damn right indeed, if not a little warped. You've got people trying to shape the entire world with their bare hands, be it through raw power or in nowadays terms- through policies. Well, the intention may be good, to rid the world of some perceived evil. The problem is that, nature does not like that. You gotta take a lot of extra energy to push against the natural flow. Where is this extra power going to come from? Of course, you got to consolidate energies, power and influence around you. Concentrate power in your hands. Which in today's context, means people like the government, the military. Concentration of power is never good, because the person using it is never in a infallible position. Too much power is a bad thing so they say, for people are easily corrupted by it. Even in the hands of a really do-gooder person, you cannot guarantee that the person makes the right decision forever. And if he ever makes the wrong decisions, the results are going to be catastrophic.

Secondary, is the idea of world with too much rules. Such a world is restrictive. Bogged down by all the bureaucratic red tape. To get anything done at all, or sometimes to achieve in breakthrough, one needs to break the rules. But if everyone is breaking rules, then the world would be in complete chaos, in full anarchy. Clearly, the answer to this lies somewhere in between. Where exactly is uncertain and fuzzy. But we are sure we need a mix of people who break rules, and people who follow rules. Rules are not so much rigidly carved in stone, but should be treated more like flexible guidelines, to be changed when circumstances change.

Thirdly is the idea of whether the ends justifies the means. If in trying all out to root out wrong-doing, you end up breaking so much rules and doing so much wrong-doing yourself.. is your end still justified? In trying to track down a murderer, you kill several people along the way to reach the guy, is it worth it? Is it even right? We dunno.. and may probably never really know.

Lastly, people will always only see decisions that makes things go right for themselves favourably. Painful decisions even if right, are never seen favorably. A person making decisions for the rest need to take into mind that you are hero if your right decisions goes well with them, but an unwanted outcast if you make a painful decision even if its the right one. Who will guard the guards? Only one that is infallible and incorruptible, one who can always be counted upon to take the right decision even if its the painful one, one who has no personal vested interests concerned in making particular decisions. Does such a guard exist? Perhaps only in Marvel's comic books.

When I was in Burma, a long time ago, my friends and I were working for the local Government. They were trying to buy the loyalty of tribal leaders, bribing them with precious stones. But their caravans were being raided in a forest north of Rangoon by a bandit. We were asked to take care of the problem, so we started looking for the stones. But after six months, we couldn't find anyone who had traded with him. One day I found a child playing with a ruby as big as a tangerine. The bandit had been throwing the stones away.

Then why steal them?

Because he thought it was good sport. Because some men aren't looking for anything logical, like money. They can't be bought, bullied, reasoned or negotiated with. Some men just want to watch the world burn.

...

Did you ever catch that bandit in Burma?

Eventually, yes.

How?

...we burned the forest down.

Path shared by none other

It would be nice for once, just to be able to lie back on the grass, look upwards at the clouds roll by. Observe a silent moment contemplating, just enjoying the special moment. Appreciate all the things around, and wonder how come things are like that. Point out to her a special something, share a little laugh together, and forget the ugly realities of the rest of the world.

In such a world, you don't complain, about higher living costs, about low wages, about lousy governments, about the stupid muddy ground, or the flapping of those persistent mosquito wings. Nor do you complain what a selfish guy that person is, or what a clueless idiot the other guy was, or throw a temper over a some guy with bad attitude.

Sigh, just want a special eternal moment of silent understanding. What's life coming to anyway. Where are you anyway? Out in the vastness of ocean filled with organisms of mundane worries, and showing their embarrassing stupidity. Starting to have my doubts now about your existence. Sighs, here I was hoping that you would walk right into my life. Do I really have to go out and look? Kinda lazy for that.

Why cant we leave behind that knowledge and bring away with us understanding? Why cant we be a bit less hasty to judge others?

Are their priorities correct? Or is it mine that is all wrong.. Guess its only going to be a dream..except it seems to be within reach. Teasing me eh?

Its so vast.. where do I seek for you? Mind if I stand here waiting for you? Lets have a dance together? Where would you want to see the stars? Or the fireflies? Or just the keen breeze picking up your hair?

All those material achievements.. they are nothing at all.. in the end, they will all be dust.

Guess got I've 9 days more to emo outfield.. alone probably with all those people who worry about mundane stuff.. Why dont you, my dear visitor, listen to the Melodies of Life while reading this, kindly located at the sidebar, in case you are wondering where is it.