Connie's Blabber

Florida 2009: Some Notes

2009-04-16T18:46:00.004-04:00

Photos

One thing that doesn't go wrong in Tampa this time of the year is the weather. It rained twice during our six weeks there. Otherwise, it was sunny and 27-29 degrees everyday.

Over the years, I've come to the conclusion that, for a city to have decent Chinese food, there must exist a significant Cantonese population. The Tampa area has lots of Asian people, but only a small percentage of them are Cantonese. Consequently, the Chinese food there is lousy. Almost every Chinese restaurant does buffet, and the one across the street from us even sells dishes by weight. Not a good sign.

We bought the whole package of Blue Jays Spring Training games this year, and ended up attending most of them. Unlike regular season games at the Sky Dome, Spring Training games in Dunedin are very loosey-goosey. It was fun watching the players warm up before the games. Some of the friendlier ones would come over to sign autographs for fans. Having no use for an autograph, Jeff usually shook their hands and wished them "good luck" instead. One day, he decided to ask Aaron Hill, the second baseman, for a photo together. The affable Mr Hill gladly agreed. So I quickly whipped out my iPhone. The result was a nice picture of the two of them.

The World Baseball Classic was taking place while we were in Florida. The games were very exciting, but judging by the empty stadiums, not too many Americans thought so. It seems that the concept of countries going head to head for national glory is not an attractive one to Americans. I felt badly for the Cuban team. The draw was obviously rigged so that they were grouped with the Japanese and the Koreans, fighting for one of only two spots in the final round. Those three teams were in fact the three best teams in the tourney. The double-elimination format is also unfair when the pool is small because the team that gets to play a weak team first has a big advantage over the rest of the field. Evidently, nobody cares about fairness in this whole business.

We also watched many hours of March Madness. One thing I love about the college game is that the college kids make mistakes that NBA players never make. The other day, one player stepped on the line while trying to inbound the ball when there were only a few seconds left in the game. Oh, the look on the coach's face! You just don't see that in the NBA.

Aside from playing lots of tennis as we always do in Florida, I played what is for me a great deal of golf. This is a game that has tormented me for years. I first started swinging a club in my early twenties, and over the years, I've said many times that I give up --- the game is too tough, and I'm not having any fun. Jeff kept on telling me that I only needed to play more regularly to get better, but I was convinced that I'd never get anywhere. This time, we managed to play twice a week. Amazingly, I got noticeably better. As a result, the game became much more enjoyable. The courses in Florida are very flat, so they may well be fell-good courses. Let's see what happens when I go back to play in Toronto.

The Tampa area at the time bore many visible scars of the recession. Everywhere one sees for-sale signs on front lawns and for-lease signs on shop windows. Restaurants which required reservations last year were half empty. In the bright sunshine, everything still looks cheery and carefree. Surrounded by the blue ocean and tall palms, one would be hard-pressed to have gloomy thoughts.

The condo we rented is inside a gated complex. There is a lovely big swimming pool which we never used, but we did take advantage of the indoor basket court. I'd never played basketball, so Jeff had to teach me the basic rules and techniques. Shooting a hoop is quite addictive, and I longed to hear the nice swish sound. I have no gift though. When we played one-on-one, I couldn't even get a shot off.

Portnoy's Complaint by Philip Roth

2009-04-15T18:37:00.000-04:00

This book, even now, forty years after it was first published, is still hilarious. I thought Mordecai Richler was funny; Philip Roth is funnier. There is no story in this novel, only a ceaseless stream of complaints by the protagonist. Hence the title. So the book reads like a one-man stand-up comedy routine. Mr Roth is merciless. Ouch. No wonder Jeff says some people were quite offended by the book.

A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare: 1599 by James Shapiro

2009-03-30T18:35:00.001-04:00

This is an interesting concept: focusing on one year of Shakespeare's life. After all, books written on Shakespeare can fill up several rooms, so one has to find a new angle. 1599 isn't just any year. It was during this time Shakespeare supposedly wrote Henry the Fifth, Julius Caesar, As You Like It, and Hamlet.

I say "supposedly" because the fact is, we don't know exactly when Shakespeare wrote his plays. Mr Shapiro needs to write with confidence that Hamlet was written in 1599, otherwise his book would appear to have been built on sand. In reality, it's a whole lot of guesswork when it comes to dating Shakespeare's plays.

If that's all there is in terms of shaky facts, I would have loved the book still. It is full of rich historical details, and scholarly insights. I've read Julius Caesar, and studied As You Like It, and Hamlet in high school (in Toronto), so it's quite interesting to learn what was behind their creation. Unfortunately, there are a few other problems which prevented me from fully enjoying the book.

One is that, reading the analysis on Shakespeare's text, I was reminded of all that I hated about literature classes in school. While reading is a pure pleasure, the exercise of finding double, triple meanings in a particular choice of words, meanings that the author himself mostly likely never dreamt of, is ridiculous. In the case of Shakespeare, it is even more absurd to dwell and dig since his plays were published years later by people who worked with him; who knows how accurate the final result was.

Another problem is I came upon a small mistake made by Mr Shapiro regarding English history. On page 90 (Harper Perennial Edition 2006), second paragraph, the part about Cambridge being unfairly passed over is all wrong. Now, one can argue that Mr Shapiro specializes in literature, not history. Fine. I'm not saying that the whole book is worthless because of one mistake. It's just that if I noticed this mistake because I happen to have an interest in English history, how many other inaccuracies are there in areas that I'm ignorant of?

Ah well. I know it's foolish of me to use maths standards on an arts book. I'm not, actually. The fact is, the arts world has no standards at all, which brings me back to John Carey's book What Good Are the Arts?...

The Elementary Particles by Michel Houellebecq

2009-03-17T18:34:00.001-04:00

I believe I came across the name Michel Houellebecq in a book review somewhere, but it wasn't even M. Houellebecq's book the reviewer was talking about, so it's somewhat of a mystery how I ended up with this novel.

The book was apparently highly popular in France. I read the English translation, of course. Unless a great deal was lost in the translation process, which I don't think is the case, I yet again find the French incomprehensible. Put it simply, this is the most unpleasant book I've ever read in my life. Repetitive pornographic descriptions of sex and violence take up most of the book. Three female characters in the story end up committing suicide and we are supposed to think this is what happens to all women: loss of youth and beauty leads to disease and death by one's own hand. What is the point of the Bruno character? Or Michel? Or the whole book? I see printed on the jacket glowing praises, and I say to myself, It's the Emperor's New Clothes again. There are no ideas here, only total nonsense.

Well, I felt somewhat vindicated when I read later that M. Houellebecq had spent time in a mental institution. Hey, the dude is crazy! I knew it! There were also two negative reviews of the book in the New York Times. Now, it is not impossible that someone boring like me can never understand how twisted or messed up some people are, especially if they are a product of the '60s. But this book, far from providing analysis, is a piece of junk.

Atonement by Ian McEwan

2009-03-10T18:28:00.000-04:00

I didn't see the movie so I thought I'd read the book. As always, Mr McEwan writes with a gorgeous style that seems to come entirely effortlessly to him. He also manages to rattle me like no other writer. This time, perhaps in his attempt to write from a female --- and a novelist's --- perspective, he spends much of the book on minute detail descriptions instead of discussions on ideas. The book is beautifully crafted, yet it's also a suffocating read. I wonder what the movie is like...

Cary Grant: A Class Apart, by Graham McCann

2009-03-01T11:05:00.002-05:00

Biographies are not usually my thing. While history is always a fun topic, I find personal details surrounding a famous figure uninteresting and unreliable. Basically, I'm far more interested in what someone did with respect to history than that person's background, temperament, marriages, children, etc. This book on Cary Grant came highly recommended, and Mr Grant was in several of my favourite movies (The Philadelphia Story, North by Northwest, and Charade), so I thought I'd give the biography a try.

I'm afraid I don't change enough: I still don't really like biographies for the same old reasons. A book on the film industry from the 30's to the 60's would have been far more interesting to me. Instead, I got too much about Mr Grant outside of his film career. Worse yet, this not very thick book is one third filmography, notes and index. Oh, it's an enjoyable book. I had no difficulty finishing it. It's just that now I know --- biographies are still not for me.

Riviera Maya, Mexico

2009-02-16T21:42:00.004-05:00

January, 2009

We had a perfect holiday (photos).

It was two weeks of heaven at a resort on Riviera Maya in the Yucatan in Mexico. The resort was laid out on a property the size of a small town, amidst dense jungles and the ocean. The food was terrific and the service, first-rate. Beautifully landscaped gardens surrounded winding corridors and footpaths. Low-rise guest rooms scattered inconspicuously apart. Our suite had a "swim-up" pool in front of it. Jeff wet his feet in there once or twice. He preferred the giant main pool and the beach.

Each morning we woke up to the sound of birds chirping. After showering and dressing at a leisurely pace, we walked to one of the main dining rooms for a drawn out breakfast. Sauntering back to the room to put on bathing suits, and it was time for the beach. Everyday at 11, I joined other players in a game of beach volleyball, hoping that an hour of running in the sand would make it easier to justify my eating so much good food.

Now that I was dead tired, I ran over to join Jeff for a little quiet reading on the beach. From time to time, a waiter came over to take orders for drinks. They made a wonderful fruit punch, my favourite. As I read my book, I kept an eye on the Hobies sailing from the beach out into the ocean. I thought I'd be able to sail the catamaran, but was a little nervous about taking Jeff with me. Maybe next year.

At some point, we rose from our beach chairs and walked over to the restaurant off the beach for a slow lunch. The turquoise water sparkled in the bright hot sun. Iguanas crawled out of their caves to soak in the heat, their little heads turning this way and that. Sometimes we would decide to move to the side of the main pool. More reading. More fruit punch. A swim. Maybe a little nap.

When the air cooled off somewhat in the late afternoon, we changed into our tennis clothes and played tennis. After the game and a quick shower, it was time to put on something respectable and go to dinner. There were seven excellent restaurants severing different styles of cuisine, each one decorated in the most tasteful way. At night, different shows were staged, but too often by then, I was too exhausted to stay up, and only wanted to read and fall asleep.

The next morning, we would do it all over again.

The only disruptions to our routine were the days when we went outside of the resort. Once, we spent half a day in Playa del Carmen. Another time, we hired a driver to take us to Tulum and Coba, two Mayan ruins in the area. Tulum was beautiful but completely swamped with tourists. Coba, being mostly unrestored and physically much larger, was blissfully deserted. We rented two bikes and went from pyramid to ball court to ceremonial hall. I climbed the tallest pyramid, feeling my legs shaking from exhaustion and fear, but the view from the top, of jungles stretching as far as the eye could see, made it all worthwhile. On the way back, we stopped at a "cenote" where I snorkeled in the fresh water running through the caves. Yet another time, I went on a snorkeling trip to Isla Maujeres. While the fish and the reef were wonderful, it was slightly annoying that most of the day was wasted getting to the spot.

So it was with much regret that we left our tropical paradise. I hope it won't be long before we return.

Skellig, by David Almond

2009-02-15T19:40:00.001-05:00

This is a kids' book. It's about kids and for kids. The little story contained in the slim volume of under 200 pages (counting the large font and the generous spacing) could have been summed up in one page. However, it is really a poem. A moving poem full of imagination and tenderness. So even though I haven't been a kid for a very long time, I was mesmerized by the story, and will recommend it to anyone of any age.

The Reader, by Bernhard Schlink

2009-02-10T19:25:00.001-05:00

I picked up this book because the movie based on it has garnered several film award nominations. But I did it in the wrong order, of course; I should have gone to see the movie first. Once I've read the book, the film adaptation is bound to disappoint.

Since Bernhard Schlink's novel was written in German, I was faced with yet another translated book. The prose was rather dreamy. Was it the author's intention, or was it because the translator was a woman? What else is missing in the translated version? I couldn't get these nagging thoughts out of my mind.

[Spoiler warning!]

In the meantime, the story conjures up a sense of surreality. In fact, which part of the story is even remotely realistic? A deeply felt relationship between a 15-year-old boy and a 36-year-old woman? Someone who would rather be exposed as a heartless murderer of defenceless women than an illiterate? I suppose I am to take things as metaphors and allegories, not as absurdity and contrivance. When I did manage to do that, the novel became absolutely beautiful.

Snowboarding at Blue Mountain

2009-02-05T20:33:00.000-05:00

Once a year, I go snowboarding for a week in the mountains somewhere in western US. This winter, with us spending less than a month at home, and many social engagements during that month, my usual week of snowboarding got squeezed out. Seeing that I only had a couple of days to spare, I decided to just go to Blue Mountain up in Collingwood.

Blue Mountain is not what they would call a mountain in Colorado. It is the largest ski resort in Ontario, which only emphasizes the utter state of flatness in Ontario. However, since Intrawest took over a few years ago, Blue Mountain has undergone a transformation which made the hills ski a lot "bigger." A pretty "village", modelled after Swiss and Austrian ski towns, like all those others that Intrawest had built at Whistler and Mt Tremblant, was added at the foot of the main chair lift. The village has three main lodges and many shops and restaurants. It was in one of the lodges that I spent the night.

The two days of riding was actually surprisingly good. It was a treat to stay only steps away from the chair lift. The snow was very good this season because of the many major snow storms. The first day was particularly fine: clear blue skies, brilliant sunshine, and Georgian Bay sparkling down below. Every year, I harbour this fear that I'd forgotten all about how to snowboard. And when I first go down a trail, even a gentle green one, my body needs a few minutes before it remembers how to move. After that, it was relief followed by the sheer joy of coming down the hills.

One annoying thing about Blue Mountain is that, being the biggest fish in a tiny pond, it attracts skiers from all over Ontario and parts of the US. Consequently, one never gets the kind of deserted slopes one enjoys in the Rockies. My second day there was overcast with a few flurries. The crowd thinned noticeably, which made everything much better. I went down just about every trail, even going into the glades a few times. At one point, as I sat in the lift chair alone, my face mask pulled up to keep out the cold wind, I suddenly became aware of the blanket of silence all around me. Three snowboarders were sitting in the chair just ahead of me, their snowboards dangling on an angle, their bodies crouched low. Everything was truly frozen in space. For that brief moment, I felt a surge of that wonderful feeling of solitude. That is the state I crave, and what I love most about snowboarding.

The Ancient Ship, by Zhang Wei

2009-02-04T19:05:00.001-05:00

I saw this book at our local Costco. Someone had placed it on top of laundry detergents. The description on the back cover intrigued me. Although I'm fluent in Chinese, over the years, having read no Chinese books, I have left myself at a point where I can no longer absorb literary Chinese writing. My eyes would glaze over "fancy" words and expressions, while my brain registered no meaning. Perhaps, I thought, I could give an English translation a try.

So far, the experiment has been a failure. The main reason is actually an old problem of mine. Due to my lack of imagination, I tend to have a difficult time relating to people with whom I have nothing in common. When I was young, I loved novels about high school students or university life, that was the environment familiar to me. As for stories about the countryside, they might as well have taken place on Jupiter. I thought I had grown out of this limitation, now that I was older and more worldly. Unfortunately, no, I'm as uninterested in peasant life as ever. And The Ancient Ship is all about the countryside.

The second problem is to be expected: too much is lost in the translation. The names, when not in their native Chinese form, are awkward and impossible to remember. The sentences are stiff. The story line seems to jump around in a semi-random fashion. I soldiered on for about a hundred pages, but found myself exhausted. Maybe I'll go back to it later when I'm desperate for reading material...

Persepolis: The Story Of A Childhood, by Marjane Strapi

2009-01-20T16:58:00.002-05:00

I brought this book with me to Mexico along with the other three, but when I was stretched out on a white sandy beach, I asked myself, Do I want to open a book about life in Iran during the Islamic Revolution? Why did I even bring such a book to this paradise? So Marjane Strapi's memoir in the form of a graphics novel flew from Toronto to Cancun and back untouched.

Once I was home and thrown back into snow storms and temperatures at below -15 degrees Celsius, I had no problems finishing the book. It's very funny, very sad, and very interesting. Iran is not a country that I know much about, so I'm happy to learn new things. Their Islamic Revolution reminds me of China's Cultural Revolution, yet they are also quite different. Such a strange and fascinating land.

Shakespeare: The World as Stage, by Bill Bryson

2009-01-18T16:38:00.002-05:00

This is yet another book I brought with me to Mexico. As it stands, I'll read anything written by Bill Bryson; and if he happens to write about something of interest to me, all the better. Such is the case with this slim book.

Really, what's there left to say about William Shakespeare that hasn't been said already? Nevertheless, it's still fun to have everything put together by Mr Bryson who can breathe humour into a restaurant menu. The book is slim because we know scarcely anything about the greatest writer in English literature. The verifiable facts on Shakespeare will probably amount to fewer than ten pages, so Mr Bryson's volume also includes stories on Shakespearean scholars, experiences of Shakespeare's contemporaries, and the theatre life in Elizabethan days. It's a highly enjoyable and informative read.

There are those among us who wish they had been born to a different era, one filled with romance, adventure and creativity, unlike the dreary materialistic one in which we find ourselves. Perhaps a reality check is in order from time to time. When a talented playwright such as Christopher Marlowe could be charged of being "a blasphemer and atheist" and faced, "at the very least, having his ears cut off---that was if things went well", I'm afraid it wasn't all romance and adventure in the old days. Not to mention that the Elizabethan era is generally considered to be the golden age in English history...

A Prisoner of Birth, by Jeffrey Archer

2009-01-12T16:01:00.002-05:00

This was another book I read in Mexico. A perfect book for the beach. About a quarter of the way through, I said to Jeff that Jeffrey Archer's novel is a copycat of Alexandre Dumas, père's The Count of Monte Cristo. Sure enough, soon afterward, references to Dumas's count appeared in Mr Archer's story. Let's say the imitation is even less plausible than the original, but just as much fun. I'd hate to believe that class still matters so much in today's Britain though...

Slam, by Nick Hornby

2009-01-07T15:41:00.001-05:00

Nick Hornby is one of my favourite writers, even though his characters are typically so outrageous in my eyes that I have a hard time believing such people actually exist in real life. Slam is along those lines.

Note: spoilers coming up!

The story is simple. A regular 16-year-old boy finds out that his ex-girlfriend is pregnant with his child. We get to see how he deals with this news before, during and after the pregnancy.

Now, you can see why I find such characters outrageous. Things like teen pregnancy plainly don't happen in my world. Granted, Mr Hornby quoted the stat that says Britain has the highest teen pregnancy rate among rich countries. Still, high school kids who want to become parents are as strange to me as junkies who stick needles into their own veins. So, while sitting on a white sandy beach in the Riviera Maya in Mexico, I read Mr Hornby's usual humorous writing with many a chuckle and an occasional head shake, firm in my belief that the story is too outlandish to be plausible.

Well, guess what. Truth is indeed stranger than Fiction. I saw on the news ticker yesterday (Feb 15, 2009) a story in Britain where a 13-year-old boy is claiming to be the father of a baby born to a 15-year-old girl. His joy may be short-lived, as eight other teens are considered possible fathers to the baby. I think I owe Mr Hornby an apology.

Outliers, by Malcolm Gladwell

2008-12-30T15:13:00.002-05:00

Malcolm Gladwell's third book is all the rage at the moment, especially among young mothers. It proclaims to unveil the secrets behind extraordinarily successful people, the likes of Bill Gates and the Beatles. Well, who wouldn't want to know that?!

Alas, such secrets do not exist. As he usually does, Mr Gladwell offers marvellous insights, and challenges conventional wisdom, but ultimately, I'm afraid he's stating the obvious. Nonetheless, Mr Gladwell is a very clever writer, and his book is easy to read and highly entertaining.

A World Without End, by Ken Follett

2008-12-20T14:28:00.002-05:00

Sometime in the mid-90's, I read Ken Follett's thoroughly engrossing novel Pillars of the Earth. Then out of the blue in 2007, Oprah picked it for her Book Club. As luck would have it, Mr Follett had a sequel coming out just at that time. I wasn't going to buy the hardcover edition of the sequel at the height of its popularity. Even if it's as good as the original, it's not worth keeping around. So I waited until a few months ago when the paperback version of A World Without End come to our local bookstore.

In the meantime, words came out that this sequel is more like "a book without end." In my case, I had no difficulty finishing it, but I must say, it was a lame story, an almost exact copy of the original except this time around, the freshness is gone. There is a close to one-to-one correspondence of characters, except that instead of trying to build a cathedral, our hero is building a bridge. However, a bridge is not nearly as exciting as a cathedral, so other things are thrown in there as fillers.

Mr Follett had said he wrote Pillars because he had a keen interest in medieval England and its magnificent cathedrals. I can completely understand, as I find the topic fascinating myself, hence my enjoyment of his novel. However, the sequel seems more an attempt at capitalizing on the success of the original than a worthwhile story on its own.

Europe 2008

2008-12-05T16:41:00.006-05:00

Trip Photos:
- Part 1
- Part 2

In late September and early October, Jeff and I spent three weeks in Zurich, Budapest, Prague and parts of Austria. Instead of writing a tedious log detailing in chronological order all the things we did, I'll just jot down some notes and impressions.

The Flights

I don't have a fear of flying, but it seems that as I get older, I dread more and more the cramped space on a plane. As a result, we've been taking business class for long-haul flights the last few years. It's still miserable to be stuck in a seat for hours, but what can you do.

This year, our transatlantic flight took the route of Toronto-Newark-Zurich-Vienna, with a one-day layover in Zurich both on the way there and back. The Newark landscape and airport were both unattractive, but I wasn't surprised---it is New Jersey, after all. One small thing left an impression on me. At the Newark airport checkpoints, there were more than a dozen security members standing around two open lines. Four or five of them were actually doing some work---how diligently I didn't know, while the rest talked loudly with each other, telling jokes, horsing around---in other words, being completely unprofessional. I understand it's not the most stimulating job in the world, that men of quality are not drawn to such positions. However, you would think they'd at least put up the appearance of taking what they do seriously.

On the way back, when I again saw these jokers play-acting as security personnel at the Newark airport, I compared them to the serious and professional guards and customs officers in Switzerland and Austria. The contrast was stark to say the least.

The flight from Newark to Zurich was an interesting one. It was listed under Swiss International Air, but was in fact operated by Private Air, and the entire plane had only business class seats, about sixty altogether. With so few passengers, boarding took very little time. The polite and efficient attendants buzzed around in constant motion, and in less than ten minutes, the plane was moving out of the gate. The whole flight was impressively run. The return trip was the same story. Swiss efficiency on full display, I suppose.

Zurich

The main reason for our detour to Zurich---we could have flown directly to Vienna---was to see Stefan and his wife Claudia. Stefan and I became friends in our undergraduate days. Since then, we've both moved around, so it's not easy to meet up. In Zurich, Stefan and Claudia took Jeff and me to dinner on top of Uetliberg. The restaurant offered a splendid view of the city, especially after dark. Three weeks later, on our way back to Toronto, we saw them again and had dinner at their flat. Claudia was expecting twins very soon, and we celebrated by drinking an old bottle of wine Jeff selected from his wine cellar. (The babies were born shortly afterwards, two adorable little girls.) It was wonderful to see old friends and discuss everything under the sun.

Zurich the city is beautiful and clean. We stayed in a hotel in Hirschenplatz in Altstadt, on the west bank of the Limmat River. Boutique shops and small restaurants lined the cobbled narrow streets. People were nicely dressed in conservative styles. Expensive cars zoomed around. Everything was orderly. Everyone was polite. Prices were double those at home. But that's Switzerland.

Bratislava

We had a little more than half a day in Bratislava. My friend Peter and his wife Klaudia are from there, and Peter had warned me that Bratislava is small compared to Vienna and Prague. It was most certainly the case, but the old part of the city was delightful. We strolled around, taking in pretty old buildings and churches. It had been drizzling all morning, and when it suddenly started to rain heavily, we rushed into the first nice-looking restaurant we saw, Caffe Ristorante KOGO on Hviezdoslavovo nam. It turned out to be a pricey place that catered mainly to people working in the foreign embassies nearby. After sitting down, I noticed we were surrounded by men and women in expensive suits wining and dining on other people's money. Our tourist garb definitely didn't fit. Jeff was particularly envious of the four gentlemen next to us who had a "very good bottle" (Jeff's words) of red wine brought to their table in a decanter. Lunch turned out to be a lot fancier than planned, but we did avoid the rain.

Budapest

My friend Isabel had told me that she liked Budapest more than Prague, and I must say, it is a beautiful city. The Pest side, where we stayed, was more built-up and more commercial. It was delightful walking on Andrassy utca, a tree-lined boulevard guarded by grandiose buildings. On the Buda side is the imposing castle area. In this corner of Europe, every city had a castle because the people were constantly warring on each other. Sadly for Hungary (and the Czech Republic), which has not been on too many winning sides in recent history, its castles have been stripped bare, and lesser paintings hung on the walls of the galleries. When the harsh wind blew, I shivered at the thought of how much blood must have been shed on these lands, how cruelty used to rule almost every part of the world.

The Hungarians are a proud people. Considering how many world-class mathematicians, musicians, artists, etc. have emerged out of this relatively small population, they have a reason to be. The citizens of Budapest appeared polite and fashionable. Their language though, is downright impossible. I dared not pronounce the words because they never sound the way they look. Fortunately, most people, especially the young ones, spoke English rather well.

Prague

Prague is a city on a different scale. It was absolutely gorgeous, of course. Strangely, it was filled with regular people as well as suspicious-looking riffraff. Jeff says Prague is popular with backpackers. Maybe too popular. The city was also brimming with tourists: Asians who travelled in packs, Europeans in shabby clothes, the whole world has come to Prague. Consequently, prices were much higher than elsewhere, and every touristy place---churches, synagogues, castles---cost a considerable amount, with additional charges for a photo permit, the washroom, etc. Even the washroom at McDonald's cost money, albeit a trivial amount. People spoke English very well---another sign of their having had to deal with too many visitors. One notable thing was the phenomenon of old grannies in museums. In every room of every museum, grumpy old women stood on guard, eyes throwing daggers at visitors who dared to trespass onto their territory. I suppose they were there to make sure nobody put his paws on the precious exhibits, but they certainly made my time in the museums very uncomfortable.

The city tells too many sad stories, from Jan Hus who was burnt at the stake, to the Jews who were mistreated throughout the years, to King Wenceslas who was murdered by his brother---the list goes on, not to mention all the local saints who met their end in gruesome ways. Alfons Mucha, whose lovely murals adorned the walls and ceilings of the Mayor's Hall in the Municipal House, died shortly after being interrogated by the Gestapo. He was only a painter, for crying out loud! But that's the way history goes in Europe. And in all other parts of the world, really.

Driving in Austria

When possible, Jeff and I prefer the freedom of driving our own car. In crowded big cities, there is no point; a car is more a pain than a convenience. Outside the cities, driving is much more fun. In Austria, it was a no-brainer: we must rent a car to fully enjoy the country.

We had booked a modest little Opel, but the Avis people surprised us by giving us a Mercedes B150. (A few years back in England, we'd booked a Mercedes but ended up with a Saab. Maybe if we asked for a Fiat next time, we'd get a Maserati---or vice versa.) However, this being a European Mercedes, the car had no luxury features, nor any acceleration. I kept wanting to rub at the Mercedes logo, wondering if it would come off and reveal a Ford logo underneath. The car did have a big trunk for our suitcases, and on the autobahn, once it reached 130km or 140, it didn't struggle much. (And everybody else was doing at least 150, which drove Jeff crazy since he's usually the one leaving other cars behind.)

I had brought with me digital European maps for my Garmin GPS device. It worked out amazingly well. How did we manage in the dark ages before all these digital toys?

The Austrian roads are clearly signed and in excellent condition. My limited German came in handy a few times, but any English speaker can get by without any problem. The drivers are competent and law-abiding. Sure, they speed, but no one sits in the left lane unless he is passing. All in all, driving in Austria was a sheer joy.

Salzburg

Jeff had been to Salzburg once before when he was still an undergrad. He has vague recollections of going to a concert in a church but nothing else. I was in Salzburg in the summer of 1991. That was the bicentennial death anniversary year for Mozart. There were open-air concerts in every city square. My mum and I had driven in from Vienna for a day trip, and found so much to do in the city that we wanted to stay for another day. However, not a single room was available at the height of the tourist season in a special year. Having stopped at every inn and hotel without success, we gave up after reaching Linz. This time, I decided to do it right by staying for three days.

People say in Austria, time stands still. It is true. Salzburg looked exactly the same as I remembered it. Oh sure, a few small things have changed here and there. One sees a few more immigrant faces among the lily-white populace. Tourist sights offer audio guides, a gadget they didn't have seventeen years ago. People yap on cellphones. Many of the independent local shops on Getreidegasse have been replaced by boring international chains such as Zara. But the essence of the city hasn't changed a bit. As we sat at a café table outside Mozart's birthplace, surrounded by mountains, the Salzach River, and the ancient fortress atop the hill, I was glad to find the city as lovely as ever.

The Austrian Alps

From Salzburg, we took one day to drive to the Alpine ski towns of Bad Gastein and Bad Hofgastein. The scenery was breathtaking. Majestic mountains covered in snow, pretty chalets with neatly arranged flowers at every window, narrow streets lined with boutique shops, folks in capes and Alpine hats zipping by on bicycles; it was straight out of a postcard. We walked around town, and also took a few hikes along rivers and waterfalls. There were hikers everywhere, serious ones with hiking sticks and boots. They all looked like they'd live to a hundred.

At lunch time, we found a small restaurant attached to a hotel in Bad Hofgastein. A funny thing happened: for the first time on the trip, we ran into someone in the hospitality industry who could not speak any English---the waitress, a friendly lady in her fifties. After much guessing, I managed to order the food. It was amusing, and actually added to the charm of the place. I thought I would have no difficulty spending a month in this area, hiking, biking and playing tennis. And wouldn't it be nice to come here to ski! I had picked up a ski trail map from the tourism office. Jeff didn't want me to see the map for fear that I'd feel bad about not being able to ski here. I didn't listen to him. Now, in the brilliant Alpine sunshine, I spread the map out in front of me, and started to visualize myself shredding the slopes...

From Salzburg to Vienna

We took a leisurely drive back to Vienna. Along the way, we made stops at several towns: Hallstatt (a quaint village set in the mountains on Hallstätter See), Steyr (where we managed to get a parking ticket that cost us 25 euro---very stupid), Krems, etc. As much as possible, we drove on the more scenic north bank of the Danube. Pretty towns and villages flashed by. Every few minutes, a glorious castle or palace or church high in the hills would emerge into view. Austria obviously has too many of them. Maybe they could share a few with us poor folks in North America...

In Bad Ischl, we had lunch at Café Zaunder, a pastry shop made famous by the Emperor Franz Josef's daily visit when he summered in Ischl every year. Here we encountered more waitresses who didn't speak English. Luckily, finger-pointing is a universal language.

Sankt Florian and Melk became a bit mixed up in my mind. Both have an astonishingly lavish palace referred to as an "abbey" (yeah, right). Both "abbeys" have gruesome stories associated with their patron saints. Both abbeys have precious paintings by famous artists who were skilled in depicting blood and gore. Not for the first time, I found myself speechless at the opulence.

The two hours at Mauthausen Concentration Camp was depressing to say the least. At the time of the trip, I was reading Ian McEwan's novel Black Dogs, in which he discussed the topic of visiting a concentration camp. It is one of those things that one must do once, but many of us don't have the heart to face too many reminders of such human depravity.

Dürnstein was my favourite stop along the way. We arrived in the early evening. I happened to be the one at the wheel, and let's just say that driving in streets barely wider than the width of our car with legions of tourists looking on was no cakewalk. We didn't have a choice though as our inn was smack in the middle of the town. After putting down our suitcases, we went out for a walk along the Danube, through the vines laden with grapes, and in the old streets. By that time, all the tourists had left for the day. The entire town became suddenly quiet and peaceful. At the top of the hill loomed the ruins of the castle where Richard the Lionheart was imprisoned in the 12th Century. Dürnstein has its majestic abbey too. Had we not seen Melk and St Florian earlier, we would have found it extremely impressive. Instead, we yawned and said, Oh well, just another extravagant old church.

The next morning, we got up early to climb to the castle ruins. It was a steep and arduous walk, but we were rewarded with a fine view from the top, and no one else in sight. Down below, a river cruise was gliding on the Danube. One shudders at the thought of all the history that has taken place here. Our moment of peace and quiet didn't last. By the time we came down, the town was once again thumping with groups of tourists being herded around by their guides.

Vienna

There is no need for me to describe how glorious Vienna is. It is simply impossible for anyone not to love the city. Like the rest of Austria, Vienna lives in the past. To my eyes, nothing seemed to have changed in seventeen years, and I would have been disappointed if anything did. We had chosen a hotel in the centre of the city near Schwedenplatz, within walking distance to Stephansdom. For the next few days, we had a fabulous time ambling around this old European jewel. The museums were first-rate. The food was marvellous. It was too bad that we had to leave.

Concerts

Because our trip included several major music capitals in Europe, we had the opportunity to attend a few concerts.

In Budapest, we were lured into buying tickets to the Danube Concert from a young lady---a music student from further east, perhaps? I believe Jeff felt sorry for her and couldn't bring himself to say "no." The concert was held in a small theatre decorated with ornate statues and wall paintings. The program was exclusively designed for tourists; it was a best-of list of popular pieces by famous composers. The familiar upbeat tunes were infectious. The problem was, as soon as I got into a piece, the orchestra hopped onto something else, which left me quite unsatisfied.

In Prague we went to two entirely different kinds of concerts. The first was a chamber ensemble in an old 12th century church, called the Church of St Martin in the Wall (kostel sv. Martina ve zdi). The inside of the church was bare and grim; simple folding chairs were placed in rows in front of a stage; the whole atmosphere was casual and intimate, and the music, warm and enchanting. It was a string quartet: two violins, a viola and a cello. The program included beloved pieces by Bach, Pachelbel, Vivaldi, Schuber, et al---who wouldn't enjoy that? It was a rare occasion for me to sit only a few feet away from the musicians. Their concentration and nimble fingers were mesmerizing.

Our other concert in Prague was at the stately Dvorak Hall inside the glittering Rudolfinum. The Czech Philharmonic Orchestra performed Rachmaninov's Concerto No. 3 for piano and orchestra, with Alexander Toradze at the piano. He was a heavyset man who would breathe audibly when he really got into the music. It was a strangely moving sight. In the second half, the orchestra performed Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 3. It is not a favourite of mine, but nothing by Tchaikovsky is unbearable. Both the concerto and the symphony have a deeply sorrowful feel to them, a very Eastern, melancholy sound, accentuated by the fact that both were written in D minor. Being dumb tourists, we managed to throw on something other than jeans, but around us, many people showed up in tuxedos and formal dresses. There were no empty seats in sight.

When I was in Vienna in 1991, the famous opera house was closed due to renovation. This time, I made sure of things by getting tickets to the Staatsoper in advance on the Internet. I would have preferred to see an opera, but didn't find the opera on offer enticing. As a result, we went there for the ballet Onegin. I must confess I'm not a ballet fan as I find dancing repetitive and therefore boring. However, if the music is good, I'm willing to put up with the frivolity of moving legs and spinning bodies. The music for Onegin was arranged from various pieces by Tchaikovsky. One can't go wrong with good ol' Peter Ilyich.

The façade of the Opera House is as grand as any fine European theatre house. The inside, described as "simple" by the guide books because of the bombings during the war and the hasty repairs afterwards when Austria was short on funds, would not be called simple in North America. In fact, we should be so lucky to have such a "simple" opera house.

There were five levels of private boxes surrounding the floor seats. Our tickets placed us in one of those boxes that they call "loges" above the ground level to the left of the stage. Eight red satin chairs stood in our loge, with the front four occupied by respectable-looking ladies, and Jeff and me, two impostors who must have appeared to have stumbled upon the place by a huge mistake, sitting behind. During the intermissions, I noticed many people in tuxedos, even tails, and floor-length gowns. The Viennese take a trip to the Oper seriously.

Our tickets were actually ridiculously cheap because the seats were "partially obstructed." That was an understatement; I'd say our view was mostly obstructed. I stretched my neck as far out as I could without infringing upon the elderly lady in front of me, but half the time I couldn't see the dancers. The upside was that we were sitting directly above the orchestra. I would rather watch them anyway. It was very entertaining observing the conductor's every move. At the climatic moment of the story, his face was full of emotions as he waved his baton dreamily, urging on his musicians. I became rather touched myself because of him, not because of the dance. It was the most memorable night of our trip.

Churches and Museums

Going to Europe means an endless parade of old churches and museums. Especially in predominantly Catholic cities, church spires crowd the city skylines. I often wonder about the relative cost of constructing such incredibly extravagant structures at a time when most common folks were poor beyond belief. When a whole family of eight or ten starved and lived in a one-room hovel with straws covering the mud floor, gold-gilded statues and brilliant stained-glass windows adorned the walls of cathedrals whose soaring ceilings reached for the heavens. On the one hand, it was a grotesquely twisted sense of priorities. On the other, such religious devotion left us with some of the finest examples of human ingenuity in the form of architecture, art and music.

Budapest and Prague also have quite a few synagogues remaining. While they don't compare in scale to the churches and cathedrals, they draw tourist hordes nowadays like nothing else, even though the insides are usually plain, and most have been turned into museums.

I like museums of all sorts. In Zurich, we went to the Landesmuseum which gave the history of the city and of Switzerland; and the Kunsthaus Zurich, a small but rich museum of fine arts. In Budapest, we visited the House of Terror which was where the Nazis and the communist secret police set up their headquarters. The castle area housed several museums, one of them the Budapest History Museum, which we walked through. In Prague, we went to the slightly tacky but informative Museum of Communism. Several galleries are located in the Castle District. However, this is not the part of world where one finds too many master pieces.

In Salzburg, we toured the Baroque Museum and the Salzburg Museum, but Vienna is where the finest museums and art galleries are. Belvedere Palace focuses mainly on Austrian paintings. At the time of our visit, a special Gustav Klimt exhibit was on at Lower Belvedere. My mum is a Klimt fan. I personally find his style unique but unattractive. Nevertheless, it was interesting to see so many of his works in one exhibit. The Albertina houses many Impressionist paintings. There, we saw the special Van Gogh exhibit which was terribly crowded. The main gallery is titled "Monet to Picasso." Anyone can see the beauty in a Monet painting. But Picasso? I must profess a total lack of joy or understanding upon seeing most of his paintings.

The highlight in Vienna was the Kunsthistorischmuseum. Besides the fantastic collection, the museum itself is a marvel. It was an absolute pleasure to stroll through the exhibit halls. Even the café must be one of the most resplendent in a museum anywhere in the world. When I got tired, I took a seat in one of the antique chairs. There were no grim old grannies here to bother me. The only annoyance was the occasional noisy tour group which congregated in front of the more famous paintings, thus blocking them from the rest of us. I personally prefer the more secular pieces as I find too many of the religious ones, with their penchant for violence, disturbing. The pictures from the Flemish school are my favourite. To me, their subject matter and their more sophisticated use of light and colour, make the pictures far more attractive.

Hotels and Inns

We stayed at different types of hotels on the trip. Aside from the fact that almost all of them were a tad too enthusiastic at turning up the heaters, which, combined with the heavy comforters that the Europeans use, made the rooms too hot at night, there was nothing to complain about. In Switzerland, we got Swiss cleanness and efficiency. In Budapest, we got a suite big enough to hold a party for twenty but provided little shelf space for our things. The hotel in Prague was decorated like a palace, and offered embarrassingly attentive service. More of the same was in Vienna.

However, two places stood out. First was the Bloberger Hof in Salzburg. It was a little inn run by Frau Inge and her daughter Silvia, who were polite, pleasant, efficient and professional in the most perfect way. The breakfast was incredible, and we had dinner at the inn twice in three nights because the food was so good. From the bedroom window, I could see snow-capped mountains and dairy cows grazing in the green fields. Normally not the sociable type, I nevertheless found myself having light conversations with the other guests at the inn. There was an American family of three generations; the grandparents from Oregon were visiting the son and his family in Stuttgart. We also chatted with an English couple who were working in Germany, but had lived outside of Toronto for years, and wanted very much to return to Canada with their two little kids. The inn exuded a relaxing and neighbourly atmosphere that made everyone mellow.

The second memorable place, the Gasthof Sänger Blondel in Dürnstein, was in fact very similar to the Bloberger Hof. This time, a couple and their grown son were behind the smooth-running machine. The inn was right next to the abbey, in the centre of the town. It was named after Richard the Lionheart's faithful minstrel Blondel, who, legend has it, searched around Europe singing a love song that he and his lord composed together (huh?), eventually finding the foolish king at Dürnstein castle. (Sänger is "singer" in German. Blondel was the troubadour's name which apparently came from his long blond hair. Gentlemen prefer blonds, indeed.)

Later, when we got back to Zurich, Stefan and Claudia told me that the inns in Austria are considered to be of such high quality that even the Swiss go there for the incomparable service. This is a compliment indeed.

Food

One thing we don't need to worry about food-wise in continental Europe is the breakfast. I remember vividly the ones we had ten years ago in Rome, Florence, Sitges, ... The same goes for this part of Europe. Cold meats, cheeses, smoked salmon, homemade yogurt, a variety of fruits and juices, bread and rolls fresh out of the oven, local jams, eggs in different styles, honey, cereal, nuts, ... and at some places, crepes and omelets of your design. (On our return trip when we had to spend a night in Newark, the lousy breakfast the next morning, and the lousier service that went with it, made it clear that I was not in Europe anymore.)

Hungarian food is hearty and uncomplicated: goulash, potatoes, more goulash and more potatoes. Since I'm a simple Chinese peasant, I can eat that stuff everyday. But Jeff, a foodie, got bored quickly, and longed for something other than overcooked meat. In Prague, we saw pizzerias in every street, offering simple Italian fare. There were also many fancy places. Our most memorable dinner in Prague was in a restaurant at the top of Petřín Hill. As well as fine food, it offered a magnificent night view of Prague Castle bathing in a flood of light.

In Austria, outside of Vienna, we stayed with local fare---in other words, schnitzel, schnitzel and schnitzel. There was the Wiener variety, the Salzburger variety, and everything in between. I enjoyed them all. The sound of the chef beating the meat in the kitchen provided such an old comfort.

Vienna is the most sophisticated culinary city on the trip. Everything we had there was excellent. They also love their pastries here. I have no idea how the Viennese stay so thin when they consume desserts so decadent. We paid our respects at Demel, the city's famous pastry shop. If I lived in Vienna, I'd balloon to 300 pounds in no time.

I also tried to have bratwurst as much as I could. I know it's silly, but I love bratwurst!

Many times, we found ourselves walking under old chestnut trees, stepping over nuts fallen to the ground. Every once a while, a vendor roasted chestnuts on the street, attracting small children and me. They call them "maroni" in Austria. I gobbled down mine in no time. Delicious!

According to our in-house wine connoisseur Jeff, the red wines in the whole area, including those from the established Wachau wine region in Austria, are not too exciting. After trying reds once or twice in each city, he usually stuck to whites which are much more pleasant in his opinion. In Hungary, we looked inside a wine store, and saw some expensive Tokaji bottles. Not being a fan of dessert wines, Jeff didn't go out of his way to try a Tokaji. He did once make the mistake of trying a "hot wine" in Prague, and hated it so much that he didn't finish it. I think he was betraying his wine-snob nature. I've had hot wine before; it's not Chateau Haut-Brion, but nor is it as awful as Jeff made it sound.

There is one cute food story to tell. On our way from Salzburg to Vienna, we arrived in town late one evening, and ended up driving blindly in a suburb of Linz searching for a place to eat. When we saw a pub, we went in. The front section of the place was packed with customers, while the large back section was empty but for a table of four young men and a second table of nine middle-aged fellows. After we sat down, the waiter came to warn us in German that the back section was for non-smokers only. It took me a few seconds to understand what he said, at which point I assured him that we didn't smoke.

Trying to decipher the German menu and place the order required some effort, but we managed. Judging from the surprised looks we drew, the place was not used to having outsiders. As we ate our meal, the middle-aged guys left at the end of their happy drinking session, and the four young men also left at some point to move to the front section so they could smoke. It was amusing. Over the years, Europe has adopted tougher anti-smoking laws, but it appeared that they still had a lot more smokers that we do in Canada.

At the end of our dinner, the friendly waiter came with the bill. Jeff gave him some money, gesturing for him to keep the change as a tip. The chap shook his head vigorously, and insisted on giving Jeff back two euro---he thought the tip was too much!

To Summarize... We had a wonderful three weeks. I wish we had time for Poland, Croatia, southern Austria, Slovenia, ... but the world is too big. Maybe on another trip.

This Boy's Life, by Tobias Wolff

2008-11-30T18:59:00.002-05:00

I am torn over Tobias Wolff. He writes so beautifully, and the stories are enthralling, but duplicity seems to be the main feature shared by his characters. Of course, everyone lies, in ways big and small. I just find it difficult to sympathize with those who are habitual liars. Then again, what some call lies, others call imagination. This is probably why Mr Wolff is a first-rate writer while I've never exhibited any creativity in a literary sense.

This Boy's Life is a memoir of Mr Wolff's boyhood in the 1950's. His family is dysfunctional to say the least. As I turned the pages, I was filled at once with admiration for his survival skills, and with abhorrence for his natural-born dishonest ways. How on earth could the boy in the book someday become one of the best writers of his generation? How much of the book, even if called a memoir, is true? We're talking about someone with an off-the-charts amount of imagination here. It wouldn't be the first time a writer embellishes a supposedly true story.

Ultimately, the book is still fantastic, well worth reading irrespective of how much it stretches the truth.

Playing for Pizza, by John Grisham

2008-11-20T18:07:00.002-05:00

Years ago when John Grisham took the top seller list by storm, I read and enjoyed a few of his books like everyone else. However, it wasn't long before I got bored with his formula. Jeff had to convince me that Playing for Pizza is not the usual product of the Grisham factory.

There are no lawyers, southern cities or conspiracies in this book. It's about a washed-out NFL quarterback's experience of playing a season of semi-pro American football in Parma, Italy. Mr Grisham captures the lovable naivete of the American, and presents it in a humorous light. The detailed descriptions of football games grew tedious, but the overall story is light-hearted and not entirely unbelievable.

What Good Are the Arts? by John Carey

2008-11-10T17:48:00.000-05:00

In Part One of his book, John Carey attempts to answer the following questions: What is a work of art? Is 'high' art superior? Can science help (in defining art)? Do the arts make us better? and Can Art be a religion?

Most of us have been brought up to think that the arts hold a special place in our society. We put artists, musicians and writers on a pedestal. We protest if the government cuts funding to the arts. We gladly make donations to the museums and the symphony. I do all of these things, yet over the years, I've often wondered, What is the point?

Mr Carey argues convincingly that a work of art is anything that is considered art by anybody. This is actually rather depressing. Talks of the timelessness of a painting, or the universal attraction of a piece of music, are nonsense. Just look at how unappreciated so many of the artists and musicians were in their lifetime.

The other answers provided by Mr Carey are equally dispiriting. Some of the greatest artists and writers are the least charitable among us. Adolf Hitler was one of the fiercest champions of fine art and classical music. Totalitarian regimes the world over have been the strongest supporters of the arts, far more so than democracies. The conclusion is, not only do the arts not make us better beings, they turn us into elitists who over time can lose all humanity.

Part Two of the book is rather odd. In it, Mr Carey argues that literature is the highest form of art. To me, it make no sense to rank art forms. They appeal to our different senses. Of course, if I were forced to, I'd choose books over paintings and music, but we need all of them.

Four Seasons Harp Quartet

2008-10-25T18:33:00.001-04:00

Howard and Susan's daughter Jennifer is in town to do a concert at the Royal Conservatory of Music. Jennifer is Principal Harpist with the Montreal Symphony. We have attended her concerts before -- they are always wonderful. Tonight's program highlights Vivaldi's The Four Seasons. It is a well-known piece that all of us have heard countless times, but I have never heard it done in the form of a harp quartet. Naturally, I was curious.

The performance started with Mozart's Quartet in Bb, K.589, transcribed by Caroline Lizotte, one of the harpists performing with Jennifer. It is a typical Mozart piece, joyful, delicate, and a bit on the fluffy side. I particularly liked the second movement (Larghetto). Next, before the intermission, we heard a short and lovely piece from Lecuona's Spanish Suite.

Finally, it was Vivaldi's The Four Seasons. Everybody loves this violin concerto; I personally also have a special fondness for Baroque music because of its complexity. But if I close my eyes and think of The Four Seasons, I hear the sound of a violin, not a harp. Can the harp, a gentle instrument, convey the energy and vivacity of the music? Astonishingly, the answer is Yes. The range of the sound from the harp is incredible, going from forceful to whispery, perfect for this expressive piece of music. In an orchestra, the harp can be easily overwhelmed by other more powerful instruments; but here in an intimate setting, every small sound is heard clearly. The effect was simply beautiful, almost magical.

Black Dogs, by Ian McEwan

2008-10-08T14:08:00.003-04:00

I brought four books with me to Europe, but managed to finish only two: Melissa Bank's The Wonder Spot and Ian McEwan's Black Dogs -- we had a busy trip that left little time for reading.

Black Dogs is not one of the more acclaimed works from this literary master of our time. Nor does it contain one of his extremely disturbing tales. Nevertheless, this being a McEwan novel, it left me unsettled in the end. One would be hard-pressed to find a central plot. Instead, we are presented with a series of loosely connected stories and a whole lot of philosophical musings on Communism, Fascism, the roles that parents and children play, ... It may sound boring, but it is not at all. In fact, it is terribly thought-provoking, perhaps too much so. McEwan's well-wrought prose is also a joy to behold. It has been a long time since a novel has left such an impression on me.

The Wonder Spot, by Melissa Bank

2008-09-30T13:32:00.002-04:00

A few years back, I had read Bank's top seller debut, The Girs' Guide to Hunting and Fishing. It has a thin plot but is very funny; Bank has a wonderful sense of humour. The Wonder Spot is in essence a remake of, not even a sequel to, Bank's first novel. Consequently, while it still has numerous hilarious lines, I found it frustrating to read something that exhibits no growth from an obviously talented writer. We are back to the topic of relationships, of a young woman who is, well, out of it when it comes to just about every relationship in her life: with her parents, with her friends, with her boss, with her co-workers, and most of all, with the men in her life. Just as The Girs' Guide, The Wonder Spot is obviously autobiographical. It is almost impossible to believe someone with Bank's talent could have been such a loser (there is no nicer way of putting it) in life. I did finish the book, but Bank's style and subject matter have lost their freshness and attraction.

Devil May Care, by Sebastian Faulks

2008-09-12T17:21:00.004-04:00

Devil May Care, The New James Bond Novel by Sebastian Faulks

I took advantage of the couple of days of free time to read a light book before the trip to Europe. Like most people, I am a fan of the 007 movies. When it comes to the novels, I've only read, many years ago, Goldfinger by Ian Fleming.

One can see that Sebastian Faulks wants to maintain Fleming's style of simple writing and exciting story-telling. The absurdity of the main villain seems more pronounced in a book than in a movie: somehow, one can easily treat a Bond movie as science fiction or a cartoon, but it's harder to gloss over the belief-defying plot when it is written down on paper. I remember enjoying the book while reading it, but now, five weeks later, I have only the vaguest recollection of the story, which means I can safely read the book again in a few months and enjoy it all over.

The Logic of Life, by Tim Harford

2008-09-11T23:36:00.003-04:00

The Logic of Life by Tim Harford

Tim Harford's first book, The Undercover Economist, was the sort of book on economics that I like: precise, logical, and full of sharp observations backed up by facts. So when I read a positive review in the Economist on Mr. Harford's latest work, I bought it promptly.

I'm afraid I'm not quite as enthusiastic as the Economist about The Logic of Life. In fact, I'm contemplating on writing Mr. Harford a long letter arguing about some of the points he made which are, in my humble opinion, illogical. After reading The Undercover Economist, I learnt many useful and eye-opening things in everyday life. While reading The Logic of Life, I found myself saying either, Hey, this is not true, or, Well, tell me something I didn't know. Also, it is unsatisfying to read that, Situation A and Situation B are different because A is caused by X while B is caused by Y, but the author has no explanation on why one group arrived at X while another arrived at Y. I know it is not easy to explain human beings. One would have to write a separate book for each of the topics touched by Mr. Harford. That is the biggest problem with The Logic of Life. It is supposed to be on economics, but it strays too far into social issues, a minefield best left untouched by anyone who really wants to use scientific methods and logic.

Battle Creek, by Scott Lasser

2008-09-05T17:02:00.002-04:00

Battle Creek by Scott Lasser

Years ago when I was living in San Francisco, my friend Paolo loaned me this book. I enjoyed it so much that I had to get my own copy, even if all I could find was a paperback, nothing like Paolo's hardcover -- even autographed by the author.

While playing couch potato the last few weeks, watching first the Olympics, then the US Open tennis, I thought I'd read an easy book during all those commercial breaks. It also seemed appropriate to read one related to sports, in this case, baseball.

Lasser's book is about the coaches and players on an amateur baseball team trying to win the national championship. I'm a baseball junkie, but when it comes to playing, baseball is one of the few sports that I'm hopeless at. However, I've played organized tennis for nearly twenty years, including the years in California when friends of mine were on teams that made it to the nationals, so I'm familiar with how seriously some people take amateur sports. It can get silly, really; Jeff jokes all the time about writing a TV series called Desperate Tennis Players. Winning -- or perhaps more important, not losing -- seems to mean so much to some people.

If Lasser's book were only about how people can become obsessed with winning even at amateur levels, it would be a boring story. Battle Creek is really about life -- not in the hopelessly sentimental way that the likes of Kinsella usually bring into baseball-themed novels, no, not at all. This is a very sad story whose on-field happy ending was achieved at tragically high prices. In the end, it was about choices that all of us have had to make at some point in life. Baseball is but a backdrop to the real story of life.

Ciao America! by Beppe Severgnini

2008-08-11T16:04:00.002-04:00

Ciao America! An Italian Discovers the U.S. by Beppe Severgnini

According to its cover, this book is "a delightful look at America through the eyes of a fiercely funny guest -- one of Italy's favorite authors who spent a year in Washington, D.C." It captured my attention because I myself was once a "guest" in the U.S. Perhaps Signore Severgnini's experiences bear some resemblance to mine. Years ago, while still living in San Francisco, I'd read Bill Bryson's I'm a Stranger Here Myself, which described his returning to America after twenty years away in England. I found it a hilarious read, even though it was mystifying to me why I should find much in common with Mr. Bryson. After all, I was not returning home to America; rather the opposite. Nevertheless, the way he looked at the U.S. from a quasi-outsider's point of view resonated with my own feelings.

Signore Severgnini is very funny in his own right. My guess is that he's even funnier in his native tongue. Unfortunately, I can't read Italian, so I have to settle for a translated version, which always leaves me with a sense of having been cheated somehow. In fact, considering that Signore Severgnini lived in England before crossing the Pond, I'm sure he could have written his book in English. Presumably, he didn't because his main target audience is in Italy.

The various stories are believable, and the little comments interesting. The overall tone is good-natured. One year is an awfully short time to really get to know a country though, especially one as large and diverse as the United States. Too often, I find Signore Severgnini drawing conclusions based on too small a sample space. Oh well, that's the way it goes with this genre. Even if one were to extend one's stay to, say, ten years, would one know everything? Even a native-born American only knows what his little world allows him to know about his own country and fellow countrymen.

My personal American Experience was filled with some interesting discoveries, too. Here is one small example. Somewhere along my stay in California, I noticed that I could name all of the U.S. Supreme Court justices. I never consciously tried to memorize the names, but American news items focus so much on the Supreme Court that one would have to bury one's head in the sand to not learn something. It's a unique country that can effortlessly draw a non-political visitor into its web.

Multiple Wi-Fi Routers

2008-08-08T16:46:00.005-04:00

When I moved back to Toronto in 2003, the first thing I did was to set up a wireless network at home. It was out of necessity: the house is too big; we have too many computers; it would be an ugly mess to pull wires across hallways and down the stairs. Wi-Fi was the perfect solution.

Since then, more devices have been added to the network without any problems. That was until the arrival of the Nintendo Wii. It appears that when the Wii has been in use for a while, it takes over the wireless router, and will not allow any new device to join the network, at which point the only solution is to reboot the wireless router. This, to me, is unacceptable.

A quick search on-line shows that other people are having similar problems, and Nintendo has not provided a fix. I could get a new wireless router and hope that it can handle the Wii, but I then remembered that I had a spare wireless router sitting in storage doing nothing. It was replaced a couple of years back by a more powerful one, but there is nothing wrong with it otherwise. I could make this second Wi-Fi router a dedicated one for the Wii. This way, the Wii's bully behaviour will not affect the other devices.

Our house, like most homes, has one high-speed service. How do I create two (or more) wireless networks? I looked around on-line, but couldn't find any useful help. So I closed my eyes and thought about it. Well, it really isn't that complicated. Here's what I did:

Using the same daisy-chain setup, one can easily insert a third wireless router, a fourth, etc. The only constraint is that all the routers must be within close proximity to each other.

In theory, this new setup should fix the problem caused by the Nintendo Wii.

One last note of interest is I need to connect a computer to each wireless router to configure it. There are a number of ways to establish the connection. In the above diagram, I already have a device connected to Router #1 via an Ethernet cable, so I used that device to configure the router. For Router #2, I took an Ethernet cable, plugged one end into one of the router's LAN ports, and the other end into my laptop, and configured the router using the laptop. Alternately, as I know the default factory-set Wi-Fi SSID of Router #2, I can also connect my laptop wirelessly to Router #2. Once a connection to the router is established, I can configure the router from the web browser of the device, and set up the usual functions (e.g. SSID, encryption methods, firewall, passwords, etc.).

Free iPhone Ringtones

2008-08-07T16:51:00.003-04:00

One very cool thing I figured out recently is a way to make free ringtones for my iPhone from any song I own.

Currently, to get a ringtone for the iPhone, you need to first check if the song of your choice exists in Apple's iTunes Store in the ringtone format. Most songs don't, so that's problem number one. Also, even if the song you want is there, you don't get to choose which part of the song you'd like to have as your ringtone. Finally, if the song is indeed available as a ringtone, you must purchase the song for 99 cents, and then, pay another 99 cents for the ringtone.

I know some of you may say, Gee, she's really counting pennies. Jeff couldn't stop laughing when he heard I worked hard for a couple of hours just to save $1.98 plus taxes. It's not the money, people; it's the principle involved. Why should I pay for a song I already own legally, and then pay extra just to make a segment of it into a ringtone? This is robbery.

So here's how it's done on Mac OS X Leopard, using iTunes Version 7.7.1 (11), for iPhone G3.

Part I: Splice Your MP3 File

First of all, you need to splice your legally obtained song so that you will have ready the segment you want as your ringtone. If you already know how to do this, skip ahead to Part II.

There are sound file editor programs out there that do splicing, e.g. cdparanoia on Linux. Because applications on the Mac are not nearly as abundant and free as on Linux, we're better off using existing programs. iTunes can accomplish the goal. Go ahead and start iTunes. Go to Preferences / Advanced / Importing, and change format to AAC.

Outside of iTunes, using Finder, locate your song file in the iTunes Music Library. Ctrl-click on the file and choose Duplicate. A new file is created in the same directory.

Back in iTunes, you'll see a duplicate of your chosen song in the iTunes Library. Ctrl-click on the duplicate and choose Get Info. In the new window, under Options, change the Start Time and Stop Time values so as to retain the segment you want to use as your ringtone. Make sure the segment is less than 40 seconds in length. Close the window. Next, ctrl-click on the MP3 file again, and choose Convert into AAC this time. As only the segment from Start Time to Stop Time will be converted, your duplicate copy of the song will become a segment in AAC format.

Part II: Rename File to m4r

The newly created AAC file has extension m4a. You need to change it to m4r.

Go back to the Finder program where you're already inside the directory where the new AAC file is. Ctrl-click on the AAC file and choose Get Info. In the new window, under the section Name & extension, change the extension to m4r. Close the window. A dialog box will pop up, asking you if that's what you really want to do. Choose "Use m4r".

Part III: Import File into iTunes

Go back to your iTunes program. Ctrl-click on the segment song, and choose Delete. When the dialogue box pops up, choose "Keep the file". This is very important because, while you want to delete the song from iTunes Library, you do not want to delete the physical file. Next, go to File / Import... and select the m4r file for importing. You'll notice in Finder that the physical file is removed, but in iTunes, the song appears under Library / Ringtones.

When you next sync your iPhone, you'll see that inside the sync page Ringtones, the new ringtone is listed there, ready to be synced. Unfortunately, the iPhone holds only one custom ringtone at a time. Nevertheless, now you've got your ringtone made out of your favourite song for free!

Unknown Quantity, by John Derbyshire

2008-08-04T20:04:00.002-04:00

Unknown Quantity, A Real and Imaginary History of Algebra, by John Derbyshire

I haven't submitted a book entry in nearly a month because it's taken me this long to finish this book even though it has a mere 320 pages.

Derbyshire's book is about the history of algebra, and also the stories of algebraists. The first few chapters are easy: how systems of expressing numbers evolved over the centuries; how Diophantus and al-Khwarizmi paved the roads for the development of algebra; etc. I remember in my childhood working on Diophantus's famous riddle (it's really just a simple one equation with one unknown that any Grade Six kid can do). What's interesting is how concepts that small children nowadays take for granted were completely rejected by the most learned men in ancient days. Zero came into being long after the natural numbers. Negative numbers were discarded because they didn't make any sense. Imaginary numbers were again ignored for as long as possible. It's so intuitive now to use letters, in particular, the letter x, to represent unknowns, but the ancients had to use cumbersome language to refer to any unknown quantity. Simplicity and clarity of presentation are paramount in mathematics. Imagine having to do arithmetic using Roman numerals, or calculus using Newton's notations. Ugly!

The rest of Part I of the book describes the quest to find general solutions to quadratic, cubic and quartic equations. Everyone knows the importance of quadratic equations. The cubic, a reluctant nod. But the quartic? Really, who cares about formulas for solving the quartic? For higher degree polynomial equations, numerical methods are sufficient in most cases. However, as an intellectual exercise, it is still something challenging to work on.

Part II of the book deals with more advanced topics in algebra developed from the late 16th century to the early 18th. The Fundamental Theorem of Algebra was stated by Descartes, and proven by Gauss. Euler worked on the problem of the general quintic, and Abel proved its unsolvability. The study of n-dimensional spaces was developed. Now we're into first- and second-year university algebra. Since I remember my vector spaces, basis, and matrices well, I'm still doing OK.

The last part of the book gets really hairy. Some of the topics are taught in first-year algebra classes: rings, fields, groups, and modular arithmetic. I remember finding those things a challenge back then. Reading about them again has clarified things. Also, since my first year in university, I've read a lot more on rings and fields, so it's natural that I should understand them better. Same with non-Euclidean geometry. When I took a third-year course on non-Euclidean geometry, I could do the problems but my mind rebelled against the concepts. Over the years, the theorems of non-Euclidean geometry started to make more sense in my head. However, when it comes to Galois Theory, Noetherian Rings, and topology, I'm as lost as I've always been. This, I've come to realize, is my personal limit of understanding abstract mathematical ideas.

At the end of the book, there is a nice little summary on the distance between algebra and the practical world:

"The very earliest algebra arose ... from practical problems of measurement, timekeeping, and land surveying.

"From the invention of modern literal symbolism in the decades around 1600 to the late 18th-century assault on the general quintic equation, the new symbolism was widely used to tackle practical problems.

"The growth of pure algebra in the 19th century, however, was so abundant that the subject raced ahead of any practical applications to dwell almost alone in a realm of perfect uselessness.

"The 20th century, for all its trend to yet higher abstraction, saw the gap close somewhat. All the new mathematical objects discovered in the 19th century have found some scientific application, if only in speculative theories."

iPhone 3G

2008-07-19T19:20:00.002-04:00

When Apple released the original iPhone last June, I was disappointed to hear that we wouldn't be getting one in Canada. Since then, rumours had it that we'd get it at Christmas time, then spring time, but all turned out to be false. Some of the more hardcore Canadian geeks, like my friend Mel, went over to Buffalo to buy the iPhone, and then have the phone unlocked, therefrom losing the warranty. Being a conservative kind of person, I wasn't about to do that.

Now I'm rather glad at the delay because the new iPhone 3G is better and cheaper. Friday, July 11 was the release date. Some geeks camped outside Rogers and Fido stores at 2 a.m. the night before. Well, I wasn't about to do that, either. So I waited out the weekend, and ordered my 16GB White iPhone on Monday, the 14th. The Fido salesperson said that, due to high demand, the iPhone wouldn't be delivered "until August 1" -- a two-and-half-week wait. Oh well.

So imagine my surprise when a UPS guy knocked on the door yesterday (Friday, the 19th), with my shiny new iPhone. It took only four days. I'm wondering whether all this "out of stock", "high demand" talk is just hype.

I carefully unpacked My Precious and spent the next few hours setting it up. It was straightforward. I took out the SIM card from my cellphone, and inserted it into the iPhone. Syncing is done through iTunes, which is fine. I had to first export my addresses and date book from the Palm OS Desktop, and then import them into the corresponding Mac OS X programs, which are Contacts and iCal. There was a small glitch when iCal entries were synced to the iPhone Calendar due to the fact that the factory default timezone is set to US West. Once I changed my timezone to East, everything was good. Getting Wi-Fi to work was a breeze. One other crucial program I needed was SplashID, which I purchased from Apple Apps Store, installed on the iPhone and on the iMac, and synced without any problems.

Today when we were out, I tried out the iPhone Maps program which uses GPS, Wi-Fi Hotspots and cell towers to locate the current position. It worked very well. The initial triangulation process is much faster than my Garmin GPS, and the graphics much better too.

So far, the iPhone has lived up to my high expectations. I do, however, have a few small complaints.

One is that the soft-keyboard is rather small for typing with thumbs. Maybe I'll get more used to it down the road.

A more serious problem has to do with the Notes program on the iPhone -- it does not offer the sync functionality. What is the point of a PIM program that doesn't sync? Also, a todo program is missing on the iPhone. These tools are not mere bells and whistles. They are the heart and soul of a PDA. I noticed in the Apple Apps Store a slew of Todo- and Notes- clones are out there. I suppose I can always write my own.

Finally, a major grievance: where is the string search tool, like the one offered by every Palm Pilot, which allows one to search for a calendar entry or a contact by supplying a string? Without this functionality, the Calendar program is next to useless, and the Contact program a pain to use.

A Death in Vienna, by Frank Tallis

2008-07-07T16:29:00.003-04:00

A Death in Vienna by Frank Tallis

This is a whodunit murder mystery written by a real-life psychiatrist. In the story, a detective and his doctor friend try to solve a seemingly impossible murder using psycho analysis as well as old-fashion detective methods. The story took place in Vienna in 1902, so predictably, Sigmund Freud made a few appearances.

I spent a week in Vienna in the summer of 1991, and have vivid memories of that gorgeous city. Jeff and I will be there this coming fall. That was how this Vienna-based novel caught my eye. Tallis writes in a pleasant prose; the story is absorbing; and I was happy to read about the familiar places in Vienna. However, I have never been one to have a great deal of faith in the psychiatry profession. Some of the described symptoms in the book, such as multiple personalities, repressed memories, are so passé. And am I to believe that hypnosis can be used to solve crimes? Please. Nevertheless, it was a fun read, and a harmless diversion.

Hard Rain, by Tony Hoagland

2008-07-03T16:02:00.003-04:00

Hard Rain by Tony Hoagland

I loved the poems in What Narcissism Means to Me, Tony Hoagland's last collection of poetry. Recently, I bought his latest one, Hard Rain.

What hasn't changed is Hoagland's sharp wit, keen observation, and fearlessness. The poems in Hard Rain are as biting and dark as ever, except that, compared to those in What Narcissism Mean to Me, the language is more, hmm, profane?, and these poems have taken on a more political tone, presumably because they were written after 9/11. While reading, I was in turn laughing, fidgeting and shaking my head. Ultimately, I am deeply envious of a man who has such a way with words. Here is a snippet from the mildest of the bunch, Forty-Year Old Wine -- naturally, I'm not keen on quoting profanity here:

On tv a guy named Franklin Meriwether is opening
a bottle of two-hundred dollar, forty-year old Bordeaux
to see if it's still good.
[...]
"How much did it cost?" asks Ryan,
who just came into the room.
"Three hundred dollars," says Shiela, and Mike says, "Be quiet,"
as if there was something to hear
as the camera zooms in and we all grow silent
to watch the smallest muscles of Franklin's face
flicker with joy or disapproval
at the moment the wine steps onto his tongue
like a pilgrim entering the holy city
where the story ends
and the judgment begins.

Android SDK

2008-07-02T16:52:00.000-04:00

Having just installed Apple's iPhone SDK, I thought I'd get Google's Android, which is "an Open Handset Alliance project" and branded to be "the first complete, open, and free mobile platform." Here is a log of what I had to do to install the Android SDK version m5-rc15 on Linux (kernel 2.6.24-19, Ubuntu Hardy 8.04).

I used the installation instructions at http://code.google.com/android/intro/installing.html as my main reference. Downloading the SDK from the Google site was a breeze. I unzipped the ZIP file into /opt, and added /opt/$AndroidDir/tools to my PATH environment variable.

First, I tried to run the Android Emulator on its own, and got a nasty error about the program not being able to read some file. It turned out that two files in /opt/$AndroidDir/tools/lib/images, system.img & userdata.img, needed to have read-access-for-others added. After that, the emulator program started successfully. (What an ugly-looking device though. Oh well, not the most important thing...)

Although an IDE is not necessary, and I personally prefer the terminal window and the command line, it's not a bad idea to have an IDE around for GUI programming. Google recommends Eclipse. Why not? I went to Ubuntu's Synaptic Package Manager, and installed Eclipse 3.2 from there. Afterwards, with some difficulty, I installed the Android Development Tools plugin in Eclipse.

Next, I created a test program by following the instructions at http://code.google.com/android/intro/hello-android.html. No problem with the files, etc., but when I tried to run the test program, I got an error in Eclipse: "Could not find /bin/HelloAndroid.apk!".

After much digging on the Net, I learnt that I must (1) install Sun's Java JDK first; and (2) install Eclipse from www.eclipse.org because the one from Ubuntu is no good. There is a nice little Howto at http://flurdy.com/docs/eclipse/install.html. Note that the part about installing Apache Tomcat can be ignored. I ended up installing Sun's Java JDK 6, and the latest version of Eclipse, Ganymede 3.4. As an aside, for some strange reason, the Eclipse installation package does not contain an icon file, so I found one on Google Images, and used it during the Ubuntu application menu setup.

After all this, I tried to run my test program HelloAndroid, again. This time, everything worked!

iPhone SDK

2008-07-01T19:00:00.003-04:00

The iPhone will be released on July 11 in Canada. I'm getting one, of course. In the meantime, I thought I'd get the iPhone SDK first.

Downloading the latest iPhone SDK beta was straightforward. Installing the package appeared to be easy too, except that the installation program would not allow me to install the iPhone components, without which nothing works. This is because the SDK ostensibly only supports Intel-based Macs whereas mine runs on a PowerPC processor. There is no reason for the restriction from the technical angle. My only guess is that Apple wants to force people to buy new Macs.

Fortunately, clever people on the Net have discovered ways to get around this evil hurdle. Thanks to tips by Mike Rundle at http://3by9.com/85/, I was able to install the iPhone-related tools manually from the installation package. Now, all the useful things: header files, lib files, compiler, linker, the iPhone Emulator, etc., are all in place for Xcode.

Next, when I tried to compile a test program, I got this error: "No architectures to compile for (ARCHS=ppc, VALID_ARCHS=i386)." To fix this nasty bit -- another hurdle thrown at PowerPC-based Macs, I must do the following (thanks to Tom Bradford's instructions at http://www.tbradford.org/2008/03/iphone-sdk-beta-2-possible-ppc-fix.html):

- Go to /Developer/Platforms/iPhoneSimulator.platform/Developer/Library/Xcode/Specifications/.

- Find a file called "iPhone Simulator Architectures.xcspec"; make a backup of it and open the original.

- Notice in this file that the 'RealArchitectures' variable only defines i386 as a valid architecture; change that to "(i386, ppc)".

- Add the following just before the Intel section:

// G3
{ Type = Architecture;
Identifier = ppc;
Name = "Minimal (32-bit PowerPC only)";
Description = "32-bit PowerPC";
PerArchBuildSettingName = "PowerPC";
ByteOrder= big;
ListInEnum = No;
SortNumber = 201;
},

// G4
{ Type = Architecture;
Identifier = ppc7400;
Name = "PowerPC G4";
Description = "32-bit PowerPC for G4 processor";
ByteOrder= big;
ListInEnum = NO;
SortNumber = 202;
},

// G5 32-bit
{ Type = Architecture;
Identifier = ppc970;
Name = "PowerPC G5 32-bit";
Description = "32-bit PowerPC for G5 processor";
ByteOrder= big;
ListInEnum = NO;
SortNumber = 203;
},

- Restart Xcode.

Now I've got Xcode on my iMac to compile programs to run on the iPhone SDK. All I need next is an actual program that does something useful or fun!

Summer of Sports

2008-06-26T21:27:00.001-04:00

I don't know too many people who are bigger sports fanatics than me. It's weird, I know, my being a Chinese female and all. Part of it is that I grew up with sports: my mum did gymnastics all through high school, university and grad school, I dabbled in volleyball, track and field, and shooting (not at humans) in high school, and played on the varsity tennis team in university. At IBM and Oracle, I did softball, ultimate Frisbee, volleyball, beach volleyball, and tennis. Nowadays, I stick to individual sports such as tennis, golf, and snowboarding. There is nothing special here. Loads of women, maybe even Chinese women, participate in sports, some more involved than me. However, I personally know none who loves to watch sports as much as I do. If not for live sports, I wouldn't own a TV. Baseball, tennis, basketball, golf, soccer, Formula One, hockey, football, downhill skiing, cycling, track and field, cricket, ... You name it (just don't bring up figure skating). Come Olympics time, Winter or Summer, I'm glued to the TV.

So this summer is a bonanza for a sport junkie like me. Since May, we've had Roland Garros (French Open tennis where Nadal won, again), the NBA finals, and the US Open of golf (where Tiger won, again). Currently, the European soccer championship is about to culminate in an exciting final between Germany and Spain. It was a sad day when my beloved Team Oranje lost inexplicably in the quarter-finals; they've been my team since my undergrad days. But, I'm afraid they do that every time: looking so good only to falter when it counts.

Coming up, Wimbledon is about to kick into a higher gear. Tour de France starts in early July -- if they have any riders left. My Blue Jays will continue to torment me with their lacklustre offence. And in August, of course, the biggest event of them all, the Olympics. In recent years, the trend in Olympics coverage drives me up the wall. I don't give a hoot about how some poor sod, overcoming unimaginable hardship, wins gold. Just show me the action, please! Alas, NBC or CBC -- it really doesn't matter which North American network it is -- is bent on appealing to casual fans who haven't a clue about steeple chases or luge runs. Now, I'm not a snob. Once upon a time, I was clueless too. However, I was lucky enough to be watching Chinese TV where the commentators explained things: the techniques involved in running a curve on the track, what to watch in a gymnastics or diving competition, how the different styles of high jump compare, not stories about so-and-so not having shoes as a child, or such-and-such dated everybody on her skating team. If you want mush, please tune to Desperate Housewives or The Young and the Restless. Sports is for people who only care about results!

Phew! Now I feel better. Anyway, last but not least, this time, we actually have an Olympian in the family -- the extended family anyway. My step-brother's wife (my step-sister-in-law?) is on the Canadian Olympics team. She's the reigning World Champion in her discipline, has already qualified for the Olympics, and has a great chance of making it onto the podium. Go Karen!!

Hopes and Fears, by Keane

2008-06-22T22:30:00.002-04:00

Hopes and Fears by Keane

I bought this first album of Keane's a few weeks ago. It's pleasant enough. After listening to it a few times, I find my self humming with the music. There is nothing offensive, that's for sure. There is also nothing particularly moving, either. The lyrics are forgettable. The music seems to be lacking in some way. Is it because it's the piano, rather than the guitar, that dominants? Tom Chaplin's voice is full of emotions, but it sounds forced since I detect no emotions in the music or the lyrics. I don't hate the album by any means. I just don't love it.

Gödel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid, by Douglas R. Hofstadter

2008-06-15T21:25:00.005-04:00

Gödel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid by Douglas R. Hofstadter

On the surface, this book contains all the topics in which I have a strong interest: mathematical logic, theories of computation, artificial intelligence, programming, music, art, etc. As an undergraduate student, some of my favourite courses were in those fields. Strangely, I found this Pulitzer Prize-winning book hard to take. I am so used to reading theorems and proofs in the form of a technical paper that I found metaphors tedious. Why not state facts in the plain and concise language of mathematics, instead of using characters and stories?

The discussions on artificial intelligence seem rather dated. The sad fact is, the whole field of AI has made very little progress in terms of algorithm design; whatever advances we have seen in the last few decades are a result of improvements in hardware. The concept of a Turing Test, which once seemed so reasonable to me, now appears so inadequate. In fact, what is the point, even, of building machines that imitate humans? What kind of humans do we try to imitate?

It turned out that my mistake was in making the assumption that Hofstadter was a computer scientist. But he's not. His interest has always been in cognitive science. Coming from that angle, one does not look at the biological or mechanical functioning of the brain, or attempt to create algorithms to imitate human thinking patterns. One studies how humans think purely in a theoretical way. No wonder nothing comes out of it -- the whole point about being human is that each one of us is utterly impossible to predict!

Hiroshige: The 53 Stations of the Tokaido

2008-05-26T18:04:00.006-04:00

Hiroshige: The 53 Stations of the Tokaido by Muneshige Narazaki

The Tokaido is featured prominently in both of James Clavell's novels on Japan, Shogun and Gai-Jin. When Jeff and I were in the Hakone area of Japan in 2007, we had come upon a stretch of tree-lined road that was supposed to be a section of the old Tokaido. At the Edo Tokyo Museum, I had read about the extravagant daimyo processions on the Tokaido in feudal times. Countless books, poems and art work have been produced about the Tokaido, with the most famous being Hiroshige's "The 53 Stations of the Tokaido" in woodblock prints. As I have no knowledge of Japanese, these prints are the only ones that I can appreciate.

A third of the book is an introduction, with the rest being full-colour reproductions of the prints. A brief description is provided for each picture. Some of the familiar names that I encountered in Japan made me smile: Nihonbashi, Shinagawa, Odawara, Hakone, ...

While classical Japanese paintings were chiefly influenced by Tang dynasty Chinese painting techniques and subject matters, the woodblock prints of the nineteenth century were entirely original. Hiroshige's pictures leap off the pages with their vibrant colours, elegant composition, and lively human figures. The understanding of perspective being a uniquely European invention, Hiroshige's representation of buildings, trees and mountains often appears a bit awkward. However, he excelled at drawing marvellously natural, realistic, and creative human figures. Another strength of Hiroshige's was his ability to convey emotions. His pictures effortlessly exude loneliness, joy, melancholy, humour, sadness, fear, ... It is fascinating to think about the lives depicted, of that bygone era...

The distance between Tokyo and Kyoto is just over 500 kilometres. In the olden days, a trip from Edo to Kyoto on the Tokaido required two weeks on average, twice as long when the weather did not cooperate. Today, our train ride on the Shinkansen Hikari took a mere two hours and forty-five minutes without any worries about the elements. The Nozomi covers the distance in an even shorter interval of two hours and twenty minutes. Times have definitely changed.

iMac Memory Upgrade

2008-05-21T17:35:00.004-04:00

We run all three of the major operating systems at home: Mac OS X on the iMac, Windows (XP) on the laptop, and Linux on my computer. There was another PC running Windows, but I recently took that one apart, so it's no longer in service. Someday I'd like to get another Mac desktop and a Macbook. In the meantime, these machines keep me busy enough.

A little while back, I upgraded the memory on my Linux box. The improvement on performance was astounding. When Jeff started whining about the iMac being slow, I thought I'd try the same trick.

I ordered the memory cards on-line late yesterday afternoon. The stuff was shipped yesterday evening and delivered this morning! It took all of five minutes to put the new memory cards into the iMac, including the two minutes I used to admire the inner workings of this impossibly slim machine. Jeff was distraught at the sight of his precious computer upside down, opened up and inert, but breathed a sign of relief when the computer booted up successfully after the mistreatment. I verified system information, and performed a few tasks. There was no discernable change. Maybe I'll notice the benefits later.

Gulliver's Travels, by Jonathan Swift

2008-05-19T23:01:00.008-04:00

Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift

Jeff used the word "Lilliputian" the other day, which led us to a discussion of Gulliver's Travels. I said that although I'd heard about the book since childhood, I never read it because I was told that it was a satire on the politics of Swift's time, which I didn't think I would understand. Jeff said he believed I'd enjoy the book even if I didn't know about the politics of the 1700's -- how many people do? So I bought the book.

First off, it took me a while to get used to Swift's style. Needless to say, the English language has changed in three hundred years. Some of the expressions are puzzling, such as using "mine eyes" to mean "my eyes", which I assume is because "eyes" starts with a vowel sound; some are old-fashioned, such as "six and thirty" instead of "thirty-six"; and some, such as "above an hundred thousand inhabitants", suggest that the "h" at the beginning of many words was silent in the old days. Many words were also spelt differently: chuse (choose), croud (crowd), œconomy, phænomenon, phœnix, politick, sate (sat), shew (show), shoar (shore), stroak (stroke), taylor (tailor), etc. It is interesting to observe that while the old style "œ" became just "e" in most cases, "phoenix" escaped the change, which is why I've always found its pronunciation odd. A persisting suspicion of mine, that the surname "Taylor" came from "tailor", was also validated.

Once I became familiar with the writing, I thoroughly enjoyed the stories. Anyone in computer science would smile at the story of the Big Endians vs. the Little Endians. Some of Gulliver's antics are hilarious. While it's true that a little background on the politics of the day would be helpful, one doesn't need much knowledge on history to recognize the satirical tone throughout the book. Many of Swift's commentaries on society and politics are loud and clear, and are still very much applicable today. It is a testament to the depth of the author's thinking that while his writing style is dated, the essence of the book is not.

Sony Clié on Mac

2008-05-18T21:58:00.003-04:00

I've had a Palm Pilot since 2001, and can't live without it. However, the two devices I've owned are both Sony Cliés, rather than actual products by Palm, from where the name Palm Pilot came. The Sony devices always felt much more refined to me, and I've never regretted choosing them over other similar choices. My first Clié, a PEG-S320, was running strong when it "retired" to make room for a better model, a PEG-TJ37. I still use my little TJ37 everyday. It will be replaced for sure, as soon as the Apple iPhone becomes available in Canada. In the meantime, it's served me well.

To perform the most important function of a Palm Pilot, HotSync, one needs to install the Palm Desktop on one's computer. Sony provides their clone of a Palm Desktop, which works fine, except that it is only for Windows. Sony has never been keen on Mac or Linux, and, as the Clié line was discontinued a few years ago, never will be.

On Linux, there exist a few clones of the Palm Desktop, with my favourite being J-Pilot. It isn't quite powerful enough, and used to require tinkering and additional kernel modules before it would work with a Sony Clié. Nevertheless, it is always fun playing with programs on Linux. Even though I could only do a HotSync via USB, not Wi-Fi, for years, I relied on J-Pilot to back up my Clié.

A few days ago, when I upgraded to Ubuntu 8.04 Hardy, I discovered, to my consternation, that J-Pilot stopped working because of a kernel bug. While I can still back up the Clié on my Win XP-based laptop, I was annoyed.

It then occurred to me, Why hadn't I thought about HotSyncing on our iMac? A little research on-line (mainly from the Wiki entry on Clié) shows that it is entirely possible. There is a product out there by Mark/Space called "The Missing Sync" which offers a desktop HotSync tool between Palm OS and Mac OS X. However, I could save myself the $40 charged by The Missing Sync by using the free Palm Desktop if I'm willing to do some delicate work. The only negative is that HotSync via Wi-Fi is not supported in Palm Desktop for Mac. This is an inconvenience, but not one worth spending $40 on, especially considering that my Clié's days are numbered.

I downloaded Palm Desktop for Mac and installed it on the iMac. After carefully following the instructions described by lensovet, I successfully performed the first HotSync between the Clié and the iMac.

An added advantage of HotSyncing on the Mac is that many applications, such as SplashID, offer a version for Mac OS X, but not one for Linux. Now I can backup not only the basic PIM data but also application data, something that I couldn't do on Linux before.

Ubuntu 8.04 Again

2008-05-09T21:54:00.004-04:00

Today when I booted up the PC, my wireless connection established successfully on the first try. I'll keep my fingers crossed that it will remain the case.

A new bug has popped up. When I hooked up my Sony Clie Palm Pilot to the USB port, and tried to do a HotSync using J-Pilot, the USB connection could not be made. The following message showed up in the system log file:

kernel: [37147.023105] visor: probe of 2-1:1.0 failed with error -5

It turns out that this is a bug (#10118) introduced in kernel 2.6.24 and fixed in kernel 2.6.25. Luckily, so far, it appears to affect only the "visor" module. Ubuntu 8.10 "Intrepid Ibex," scheduled for release in Oct, 2008, will include the new kernel. As there isn't a kernel patch available (I would have liked the opportunity to compile the kernel, something that I haven't done in a few years), I'll wait for Intrepid. In the meantime, I'll HotSync using my laptop while trying to see if there is another way to HotSync on Linux.

Ubuntu 8.04

2008-05-08T18:25:00.006-04:00

I've been running Ubuntu (version 7.10 "Gutsy Gibbon") since the start of the year. As I've mentioned before, I'm extremely satisfied with the Ubuntu distribution. It's getting closer in appearance and usability to Windows and Mac OS X, while someone like me still gets to enjoy the flexibility that comes with a Linux system. Best of all, everything is free!

The beta version of a new release of Ubuntu, version 8.04 LTS "Hardy Heron," came out last month. Yesterday, after hesitating for a few minutes, I decided to go ahead and upgrade. The downloading took over four hours -- ouch! The upgrading another hour or so. The good news is afterwards, my system rebooted successfully, and at least superficially, everything looked to be in order. An immediate improvement showed up when I issued the command to shut down the system: my PC turned off automatically. You may ask, What's so special about that? Well, this power management feature is taken for granted by Windows and Mac users. Once upon a time, it also worked on my PC with an older distribution of Linux. Unfortunately, since Fedora Core 2, my computer would go through all the steps of the shut-down process except the very last one, which is turning off the power; I had to manually push the power button. It was not a big deal, just a minor pain. With this new Ubuntu distribution, I no longer need to push the button. Hooray!

My happiness was short-lived. Today, I tried to take advantage of the newly functional power management feature by configuring the computer to enter power saver mode after a certain idle period. The machine did go into the saver mode, however, it would not wake up no matter how much I screamed and yelled, and I was forced to do a hard reboot. Dreadful. I had to disable the power saver function.

Two other problems surfaced also.

One involved swapping the Ctrl and Caps Lock keys. Being a UNIX devotee, every time I come upon a new environment, I swap the left Ctrl key and the Caps Lock key. It was easily accomplished in Ubuntu Gutsy by going through the Gnome system configuration. In Hardy, the same steps swap the functionality of the keys, but every time the Caps Lock key is pressed, the Caps Lock LED light on the keyboard is turned on even though the Caps Lock key now acts as the Ctrl key. Some may say this is not a big deal, but it is. Aside from the annoyance of sensing the light going on from the corner of my eye each time I press Ctrl, I don't want to be confused by the LED light into thinking that I've got my caps locked. A search on the web shows many angry users in the same boat as me. A few workarounds were proposed. My own solution came from Ubuntu bug173350: I must combine the suggestions of MountainX and Jay Finger, but ignore those offered by Taylor Venable and Robert Lange.

The second problem is more serious; I've yet to figure out the condition under which it occurs. Yesterday, after my initial upgrade to Hardy and a reboot, my wireless connection was established automatically without a hitch. This morning, after turning on my computer, the wireless connection couldn't be established by NetworkManager. I know my wireless modem firmware is up-to-date, so I rebooted the system. This time, the wireless connection came up without a problem. Later, when my machine entered power saver mode, but had to be unplugged and restarted, the wireless connection failed to establish yet again. Once more, a reboot led to success. What does this mean? That I have to boot up twice each time? Nobody else seems to have run into this problem yet. I'll have to try a few more times to see exactly when this behaviour occurs.

The Magic Mirror of Escher, by Bruno Ernst

2008-05-05T17:56:00.006-04:00

The Magic Mirror of Escher by Bruno Ernst (Taschen)

Anyone who loves mathematics would be fascinated by M.C. Escher's prints. I am drawn to them yet am also disturbed by them -- actually, all surrealist work rattles me. (Even though Escher is not considered a surrealist artist, he has often been linked to surrealists.) I can't imagine having a Magritte or a Dali painting in the house -- not that I can afford one anyway -- because it would bother me instead of giving me pleasure. This is not to say I don't find surrealism interesting. It is indeed. I just don't want that weirdness to be part of my life. I wonder if it's because I haven't enough anger in me. It seems to me that one has to be very angry to be a modern artist. I'm afraid I'm too happy with life.

Anyway, Escher's prints are in fact nothing like the typical modern art rubbish. His pictures were carefully planned, and meticulously executed. There is no vagueness to his message, only boundless imagination. Incidentally, although mathematicians find advanced mathematics embedded everywhere in Escher's work, Escher himself claimed no understanding of mathematics as he had no grasp of abstract concepts unless they were expressed with concrete drawings or objects. The book analyses most of Escher's pictures in detail, which actually took the fun out of one's private enjoyment.

As a side note, the book was published by TASCHEN. I happen to own another TASCHEN book, one on the Flemish painter Jan Vermeer, so it was interesting for me to read the story on the inside of the dusk cover of the Escher book. It was stated there that, "TASCHEN's Great Adventure began back in 1980, when eighteen-year-old Benedikt Taschen opened a shop in his native Cologne, Germany, to market his massive comics collection." More than twenty-five years later, "TASCHEN has grown into one of the most successful and unique publishers in the global market..."

A Boy with No Name, by Travis

2008-04-29T16:32:00.003-04:00

I've been listening to Travis's latest album, A Boy with No Name, the last few weeks. Before I say anything else, I must complain about the practice of having a bonus track. In this age of digital music, it is a major pain to have a nine-, ten-minute long unit containing the last official song, several minutes of nothing, and then the bonus track. My CD player in the car isn't smart enough to jump to the bonus track, so either I have to keep one finger on the fast-forward button while driving, or I'm stuck listening to several minutes of blank. To make matters worse, a typical commercial program such as iTunes cannot easily separate the two tracks, so I end up having to use cdparanoia on Linux to rip select segments. But tracks obtained this way contain no album information. Yes, I know I'm nitpicking, however, I just don't see the point of bonus tracks. In the case of some albums, the bonus tracks are just a few simple lines that are best ignored. Travis's bonus tracks though have always been bona fide songs, often of higher quality than some of the listed tracks. What is the point of continuing this archaic practice?

Meanwhile, back at the ranch... I find this album to be much better than their previous album, 12 Memories. My favourite songs are 3 Times and You Lose, Closer, My Eyes, and the bonus track. 3 Times and You Lose has the haunting style reminiscent of As You Are from their second album, The Man Who. Closer and My Eyes are more energetic and at the same time full of emotions. The bonus track is a classical Travis affair, a lovely melody supported by quick beats. A number of other songs in the album are highly likeable also. It's one of their best work to date.

IM on Linux

2008-04-27T15:27:00.001-04:00

I've been playing with MSN Messenger clones the last little while. In the old days when I was an undergrad, the "talk" program on UNIX was popular among CS students. Since leaving university, I stopped using "talk". Sure, I know that lots of people use IM, and text-messaging is all the rage in certain parts of the world, but the phone has always been much more convenient.

Recently, after re-establishing contact with old high school friends back in China, I found out that many of them are enthusiastic IM users. All methods considered, it's a neat way of chatting with people in faraway places. I decided to join the rest of the world. First, I started with MSN Messenger on my Windows-based laptop -- no problem. Next, I downloaded Microsoft's Mac version, and installed it on the iMac -- not as good as the Windows version, but it works. Finally, Linux. I'm now using Ubuntu (it's the best Linux distribution I've ever had). A little on-line research suggested AMSN, an MSN clone. No troubles with installing it, and it appeared to work well until I tried to input Chinese characters: some characters won't show up. Turns out AMSN doesn't offer Asian languages support. All right, let's try the other MSN clone mentioned by Linux users, Pidgin. Well, this one is great, even better than MSN. It can combine several IM accounts (e.g. MSN, GoogleTalk, Yahoo), and it displays Chinese characters without a glitch. Excellent!

Another thing I did on my Linux box was to add Input Method support so I can switch easily between English and Chinese. It took some work, but I got it going. Later, I got the same working on the iMac and the laptop.

Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman! by Richard Feynman

2008-04-24T17:02:00.004-04:00

Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman! by Richard Feynman

My mum bought me this terrific book. I could do without the few chapters on Feynman's adventures with the ladies, but the rest is fun stuff. I discovered that I share many of his views. The very last chapter of the book, which is very serious, should be a must-read for all those who aspire to become a scientist, and all who wish to understand how scientific research should be done.

Bizet's Carmen

2008-04-19T14:40:00.004-04:00

When I was growing up, my mum listened to classical music at home all the time. By osmosis, I became familiar with the likes of Beethoven, Bach, et al. The story my mum likes to tell to this day is, once, I proclaimed Carmen to be a "bad woman." Why? Because if she's already with somebody, she shouldn't go off with someone else. Clearly, I was quite a prude even at a young age.

Since then, I've seen the Canadian Opera Company's production of Carmen, listened to the opera on my CD many times, and come to realize that Carmen isn't a "bad woman." Besides, who cares about stories in operas? They're all hokey anyway. The music is where the magic is. A few days ago when I found out that the Empire Theatres were showing the Royal Opera's production of Carmen, I convinced Jeff to go.

Well, it wasn't bad. Every song is as familiar and energetic as ever, yet when I looked around the almost packed cinema, I had to wonder about the future of opera because everywhere I turned, I saw people with grey hair, with walkers, with oxygen tanks! And I can't blame young people for not wanting to take part. At times, the music is dull, and the story silly. Even though I still love classical music, I'm not one who believes that the arts must be rescued at all costs. It's the way it is: some things survive, others fade away.

The Blue Nowhere, by Jeffery Deaver

2008-04-12T15:14:00.002-04:00

The Blue Nowhere by Jeffery Deaver

My mum gave me this book as a birthday present. The story is interesting but technically flawed. I hate it when people who don't really understand computers attribute human-like characteristics and god-like powers to machines. Get a theory of computation book first for crying out loud!

Florida

2008-03-31T17:52:00.003-04:00

Trip Photos

The first half of March, we were in Palm Beach, Fort Lauderdale, Miami, the Florida Keys, and the Everglades National Park. I went on a snorkelling trip at John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park in Key Largo. Everyone had to wear a wetsuit because the water was very cold. There were plenty of fish in the corals. The novelty was seeing conch lying on the seabed. Key West was a big-time party town. One could drink and dance all night for weeks on end if so desired. The Everglades is not like the national parks in the West that I'm used to. It is completely flat. Its unique attraction is its wildlife. The park is teeming with birds, alligators, crocodiles, small cats, ... We did a number of hikes, and were mesmerized by the creatures we saw along the way.

After the sightseeing, the serious part of our trip began as we arrived in the Tampa Bay Area to supervise the Spring Training of the Toronto Blue Jays. Well, it's true that the Jays are not aware of the fact that Jeff and I are in charge of the team. Nonetheless, we went to a baseball game almost everyday, sometimes driving a good distance to see them play in other cities. When he found out that J.P. Riccardi had decided to keep Shannon Stewart and release Reed Johnson, Jeff almost exploded. We watched the rest of the training in deep gloom. This team didn't look to have enough offensive power.

While keeping a watchful eye on our baseball duties, we managed to play lots of tennis. This year, for the first time, we rented a condo instead of staying at a hotel. Dealing with the condo owner turned out to be an ordeal. The condo experience itself was rather positive.

James Clavell's Asian Saga

2008-03-30T17:07:00.002-04:00

James Clavell's Asian Saga

My trip to Japan, China and Hong Kong reminded me of the books I read years ago by James Clavell: Shogun, Tai-pan and Noble House. They were highly entertaining stories, but it was so long ago that I can't remember much any more; besides, now that I've been to those places in the books, everything will take on a fresher meaning, which turned out to be precisely the case! I must admit that Clavell had a deep understanding of the Asian psyche. He exaggerated, of course, as all good story-tellers do, but he wasn't off by much. I then got Clavell's last book, Gai-jin, which took place in late nineteenth century Japan. However, by this point, I was getting Clavell'ed out, and the book seemed repetitive and boring. Three months of the same author was definitely too much.

Steamboat

2008-02-21T17:44:00.003-05:00

Last autumn, when I mentioned that I didn't know where to go snowboarding next winter, Susan said to me, Go to Steamboat. I thought, Why not? I'd been to Salt Lake City four out of the last five years. I loved the two times riding in Colorado. Steamboat it would be.

As luck would have it, 2008 was a record-setting year in Colorado. By early February, the snow accumulation in Steamboat was already closing in on the highest recorded in history. To make it even better, fresh power fell just about every night while I was there.

Steamboat Resort is huge. Try as I might, I couldn't sample all the trails in a week. Like all large ski resorts in Colorado, it is in a beautiful setting. Before starting a run, I love to sit at the top taking in the fresh air and the view. Snow-covered mountains as far as the eye can see are laid in front of me, gleaming in the sunshine. Then it is time to go down the mountain. Turn, turn turn. Maybe make a detour into the glades if the trees are not too dense. Take a breather at the next stop. Go again. Feel the sensation of floating on air. Glide into the entrance to the chair-lift. Admire the view and watch the other skiers and riders from atop. And start all over again. There is nothing like it in this world.

Barbados

2008-01-31T17:30:00.006-05:00

Trip Photos

Our annual escape to the Caribbean brought us to Barbados for two weeks this year. Barbados is nicknamed "Little England," and one can't argue. Our resort served afternoon tea everyday. Cricket matches took place around the island (we attended one). People were polite without being too friendly. A large percentage of the residents are of British background. Mix in the thousands of tourists from the UK, it really felt like England except for the endless sun, the heat, the tall palms and the tanned bodies everywhere.

Barbados is favoured by hawksbill sea turtles. On one of my snorkelling trips, we were taken to a turtle hotspot, but I had a suspicion that those turtles were not wild because they had tags on their front legs. One day, while boogie-boarding off our hotel beach, I saw a sea turtle swimming close to shore. It almost looked like he was playing in the waves as the tide came in the evening. I ran back to the room to fetch my snorkelling gear, and jumped into the water after him. Because the waves were strong, the sand was kicked up, making it difficult to see underwater. To my surprise, there were schools of fish drifting patiently in shallow water, only metres away from the edge. Did this mean that when I was swimming or boogie-boarding in the water, these fish were only inches away from my toes? They were translucent, not colourful like the typical tropical fish. I swam around for a while, and suddenly, there he was, relaxing at the bottom, my friend the turtle! He was huge, about four feet long, three feet wide. After a while, his cute little legs started moving, and he swam this way and that. From time to time, he'd come up for air, and let himself be picked up by a big wave. I followed him a foot or two behind for twenty minutes, then out of the blue, he made an abrupt 180 turn. So there I was, face to face with a sea turtle whose beady eyes were staring straight at me. It was so funny! For almost a week until we left, I stalked my turtle friend in the evening. Unless he was feeding on invisible fish, I gather he was just there to play in the waves.

Our resort being on the south edge of the island means fairly high waves, which in turn means good conditions for surfing but lousy ones for snorkelling. The west side of the island has good snorkelling spots, including one only a short swim away from shore. I boogie-boarded everyday, but it was not as easy as it looked. Occasionally, I'd catch a good wave, but most of the time, it was much waiting followed by furious kicking of the legs only to end on a whimper with no excitement. Nevertheless, surfing must be a highly addictive activity. I was not discouraged by my failures. Hour after hour, I paddled on the board, measuring the waves, always hoping: the next one is going to be the perfect one...

For three days, we rented a little car to explore the other parts of the island. The east side is prettier because of the rough tides and rugged cliffs and rocks. It's also quieter as it has only a few hotels and resorts. The west side is the ritzy part. Tiger Woods got married at one of the top establishments there. Driving was on the "wrong side" again, which was fine because in the last few years, we had had to drive on the left several times (in St. Lucia, Australia, New Zealand, and England). The roads in Barbados are in much better shape than those on the other Caribbean islands that we've been to, but once in the mountains, everyone gets lost sooner or later. Fortunately, it doesn't take long before one finds one's way again.

We played tennis lots. Like on all islands, there is a strong breeze to contend with. The heat and humidity also sapped energy out of me so quickly that I found myself huffing and puffing in no time. Once as we walked onto the court, we discovered a green monkey sitting near the net. He was rather frightened by us, and very carefully took a roundabout route to leave the court. In all my years of playing tennis, I'd never had a monkey spectator before.

I'd imagined it boring to spend two weeks at a beach resort. To my surprise, the days went by, and before I knew it, it was time to pack for home. Barbados is really a very nice place, certainly the most prosperous and sophisticated compared to the Caribbean islands from our previous trips. I'd love to return someday.

Ubuntu

2008-01-09T22:06:00.001-05:00

I've been using UNIX since 1990. A few years later, I joined the Red Hat Linux world. Over time, I've played with other Linux distributions: SuSE, Mandrake, etc., but Red Hat, which later morphed into Fedora, was my distro of choice.

A few days ago, in the process of upgrading my existing Fedora set, I ran into some problems, and decided to give Ubuntu a try. Am I glad I did. Everything is nicer about Ubuntu. The Wireless Network Manager is a particularly useful addition. All went well, and I had myself a spanking new Linux OS all set up -- except for the display. For some reason, even though my monitor is capable of up to 1280x1024, I was stuck with the painfully low resolution of 800x600.

After much poking around on the Net looking for answers, and trying nVidia's own driver for Linux (which didn't work at all as the driver causes the whole system to freeze), I noticed some entries in /var/log/Xorg.0.log:

(II) NV(0): VG800-2: Using default hsync range of 31.50-37.90 kHz
(II) NV(0): VG800-2: Using default vrefresh range of 50.00-70.00 Hz
(II) NV(0): Clock range: 12.00 to 350.00 MHz
[...]
(II) NV(0): Not using default mode "640x350" (vrefresh out of range)
[...]
(II) NV(0): Not using default mode "1024x768" (bad mode
clock/interlace/doublescan)
[...]
(II) NV(0): Not using default mode "1024x768" (hsync out of range)
[...]
(**) NV(0): *Default mode "800x600": 40.0 MHz, 37.9 kHz, 60.3 Hz

I know my monitor supports an hsync range of 30-82 kHz, and a vrefresh range of 50-75 Hz. It turns out that sometimes, the built-in driver for the video card has trouble obtaining these hardware values. One solution is to feed the values to the driver by adding in Xorg.conf these lines:

Option "HorizSync" "30-82"
Option "VertRefresh" "50-75"

A Ctrl-Alt-Backspace to restart X, but still, I got the 800x600 low resolution. This time, Xorg.0.log contained:

(WW) NV(0): Option "HorizSync" is not used
(WW) NV(0): Option "VertRefresh" is not used

Why not?! More searching on the web pointed out that in xorg.conf, I must use:

HorizSync 30-82
VertRefresh 50-75

I.e. without "Option" and the quotes. Now I did a Ctrl-Alt-Backspace to restart X, and voila! high resolution!!

Pillars of the Earth, by Ken Follet

2007-12-15T19:04:00.001-05:00

Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follet

I read this book years ago because I've always had an interest in English history. Apparently, Follet has written a sequel that, thanks to endorsement from Oprah, has climbed to the top of the best-sellers list. Before getting it, I'd like to re-read the first one. It is still a good read, especially now that I've learnt more on English history, and have been to England.

China

2007-12-06T17:08:00.004-05:00

Trip Photos

I'd been to Beijing twice as a kid, so most of the touristy spots were not new to me. For the Great Wall, we picked a quieter section called Mu Tian Yu, to visit, and it was a good choice because it was down right deserted by Chinese standards. We had a nice hike there for a couple of hours. The traffic was congested everywhere in the city. Taxis were cheap and so plentiful that they came looking for you, but in the afternoon rush hour, no cars got anywhere fast. The drivers had a total disregard for traffic rules. Jeff, himself an aggressive driver by Canadian standards, was on the verge of a heart attack a few too many times. We tried the subway, which was fine when it wasn't crowded, but utterly impossible during rush hour unless you wanted your lungs crushed.

In Xi'an, we admired the Terracotta Warriors, browsed through the impressive collection at the provincial museum, walked in the interesting Muslim Quarter, and had a fun bicycle ride on top of the old city wall.

Nanjing turned out to be Jeff's favourite city because it has mountains, a big lake, tree-lined boulevards, an authentic old city wall, and an excellent French restaurant in our hotel. (A foodie, Jeff judges cities by their food.)

Next, we took the high-speed train to Shanghai. Since it was my first return trip to China after nearly twenty years, there were lots of relations and friends to visit. Naturally, Shanghai had changed beyond belief. To my delight, my grandparents' old apartment building in the old French Concession was still standing, and the old neighbourhood was still quiet and tree-lined, the way I remembered it. It was great for me to see everyone again although Jeff, being unable to speak or understand a word of Chinese, was bored to tears. November happened to be hairy crab season. At our hotel, we had a wonderful dinner done in the Japanese Kaiseki style where every course, including dessert, had a crab theme. It was a very clever idea.

While in Shanghai, we took two day-trips, one to Hangzhou, and one to Wuzhen. Hangzhou is an ancient city famous for its scenery and history. Wuzhen is a tiny water village built along the Grand Canal six hundred years ago, a picturesque town and very Oriental-looking. I got a couple of potentially award-winning photos simply by closing my eyes and pushing the camera button.

Our last stop on the Mainland was four days in Yangshuo, near Guilin. That part of China is entirely different from the big cities. We stayed at a mountain retreat on the banks of the Yu Long River, amidst dreamlike fields and karsts. We went boating and rafting on the beautiful Li River, hiked and biked along the riverbanks, going in and out of the karsts. It was my favourite part of the time in China.

Finally, we arrived in Hong Kong. It's impossible not to like vibrant Hong Kong because one has so much fun walking the trail on the Peak, taking the Star Ferry, having high tea at the Peninsula, shopping on Nathan Road, eating dim-sum in a bustling Chinese restaurant, and doing a million other things. Our seven days there were not nearly enough.

Japan

2007-12-05T16:26:00.005-05:00

Trip Photos from Japan

Our much anticipated trip to the Orient started in Japan.

Tokyo is mostly modern, but like all of Japan, it has managed to blend its traditional side with ultra-modern settings. Our five days in the city took us to different districts with different characteristics: Asakusa's old Edo feel, Palette Town's international stores, Akihabara's (Electric Town) tech toys, Shinjuku's funkiness, Ginza's sophistication, Roppongi's foreign flavour, ... Two other places of note are the Edo Tokyo Museum which is extremely informative although I do wish they had more signs in English; and the Mitsukoshi department store, which is nothing like the department stores in North America. Where else would you see salesman and customer bowing deeply to each other, have a beautiful young lady operate the elevator, order a small cake only to receive a package in return that is too perfect to touch?

In the Hakone region, we took various modes of transportation in the mountains and on the lake. I didn't have high hopes of seeing Mt. Fuji since sightings of the famed mountain was fleeting even in the ancient days. At one point while we were on the tram, I thought I saw good ol' Mt. Fuji peeking out from the clouds, but the image was too faint to be captured on camera. The highlight of the day was the Open Air Museum in Miyanoshita. It was a large park set against mountains, and dotted with sculptures by world-famous artists. What a brilliant idea.

No trip to Japan is complete without seeing Kyoto, the ancient capital. In three days, we saw enough temples there to last a life time: Kinkakuji, Ryoanji, Kiyomizu, Sanjusangenko, and Koryuji and Todaiji in Nara. (Jeff got yelled at in Nijojo for not following proper protocol in taking off his shoes.) A walk through Gion turned up no geisha sightings. Apparently, it's exceedingly rare for a dumb tourist to stumble upon an elusive geisha.

The legendary Japanese train system went beyond my expectations. The transportation lines in Tokyo covered every part of the city. The Shinkansen (the bullet train) was mind-boggling: punctual, super fast, quiet, clean, comfortable, its conductors bow upon entering and leaving each car. One could get spoiled rather easily.

Eating in Japan was an eye-opener. Here in North America, we think of Japanese food as basically sushi and teriyaki. Over there, I was confronted with so many more selections. Most restaurants focused on one specialty, so we had tempura at Asakusa, fresh sushi at the Tsukiji Fish Market, teppanyaki at Ginza, ramen at Shinjuku, yakitori at Roppongi, traditional Kaiseki at Ginza, Unagi (eel) in Kyoto, and French food in Kaiseki style on the Pontocho in Kyoto. In addition, Kyoto has its famous Kyo-style cuisine which is supposed to be more delicate. We tried and loved them all. Two particularly noteworthy meals were at the Fujiya Hotel in Chokoku-no-Mori in the Hakone region. In its glory days past, the hotel housed the Japanese royal family several times. Today, it still held a formal air. Dinner was a multi-course French fare with white-gloved waiters rushing around in silent efficiency. Breakfast was more of the same. I was more amazed by the whole presentation than the food itself. To the Japanese tourists (who made up most of the clientele) it must have been an exotic experience.

There was so much to see that our nine days barely scratched the surface. Of course, I know that things are not all they appear to be. Japan is not without its problems and worries. Because I happen to value many of the same qualities held in high regard in Japanese society, I enjoyed my time in Japan immensely.

The Mother Tongue, by Bill Bryson

2007-12-04T21:57:00.003-05:00

The Mother Tongue by Bill Bryson

I took four books with me for the trip to the Orient. The other three were not so memorable, but the Bryson book is a keeper. The back-cover states that, "with dazzling wit and astonishing insight, bestselling author Bill Bryson brilliantly explores the remarkable history, eccentricities, resilience, and sheer fun of the English language." The book is all of those things. It was a particularly absorbing read for me because I have a general interest in languages, both of the natural kind and of the formal kind (such as programming languages). As a student of English, I've wondered often about many of the idiosyncrasies of the language; and I was relieved to learn that English words really are difficult to spell, and English pronunciations highly irregular. How Bryson managed to turn such a dry topic into something both humorous and informative is a true testament of his skills as a writer.

Warren Buffett

2007-10-11T22:51:00.002-04:00

Marita got Jeff and me tickets to the Warren Buffett charity dinner tonight at the Royal Ontario Museum. Apparently such tickets cost a ridiculous amount, and even then, are hard to come by. When I heard this, I felt rather guilty about not having enough enthusiasm for such a costly and rare occasion. When I offered to give up my ticket to someone more deserving or appreciative, Jeff wouldn't have any of it, telling me that it would be a good learning experience for me.

Mr. Buffett himself was affable, intelligent, and likeable. The talk he gave was informative, and I was extremely impressed at the frank and thoughtful way with which he answered questions. Nevertheless, it was strange to see the biggest names in the Toronto business community elbowing each other for a better chance at a photo op with The Man.

I know people want to learn Mr. Buffett's "secrets," but the simple truth is, it is no more likely for the average investor to copy him as it is for an undergraduate student to imitate Albert Einstein. Plainly put, some people are geniuses who only come around once in a generation. Ask yourself this question: would you still live in the same house from decades ago, and drive your old car after becoming one of the richest men in the world? Obviously, the challenge for Mr. Buffett is in playing the game, not in purchasing material comforts. He is not made of the same stuff as the rest of us.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, by J.K. Rowling

2007-07-31T17:01:00.002-04:00

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling

I spent the early part of the month re-reading the first six Harry Potter books in anticipation of the last one. (I noticed that I bought the first Potter book in October 1999 in San Mateo.) When the new book finally arrived, I had tennis matches several days in a row which prevented me from reading the book in one go. Instead, it took me four days to finish. Without giving anything away, I'll say that the writing of the last book is more sophisticated, although the story line is messier. I have jotted down what I consider are inconsistencies in the plot, but I have to wait for everyone else to finish reading before I can discuss with them. Hurry up, Jeff!

The Economist

2007-06-28T15:58:00.002-04:00

I spent most of the month reading back issues of The Economist. Each week a new issue arrives, and each issue is equivalent to a small book. Most of the articles are worth reading, and I'm glad to learn about events that took place in Africa, South America and Asia, since one doesn't normally find out much in Canadian newspapers about such far-flung places. The only problem is I'm always falling behind with my magazine reading. Perhaps we should subscribe to fewer of them.

Renoir Exhibit in Ottawa

2007-06-26T22:41:00.003-04:00

Now that the weather was nicer, we drove to Ottawa to see Len and Louise again. Upon hearing from Louise about the Renoir landscape paintings exhibit at the National Gallery of Art, we went the next morning.

I must confess that I'm not a fan of the National Gallery. In 1990, while taking Grade 13 Fine Arts, my classmates and I had to write an essay defending the National Gallery's purchase of Barnett Newman's Voice of Fire for $1.76 million. While I did my best to conjure up meaning from the boring stripes in Newman's so-called painting, I disliked this sort of stuff with a passion. In my opinion, art represents either beautiful things or interesting things. Of course, what's considered beautiful or interesting is entirely in the eyes of the beholder. As far as I'm concerned, most of modern art is hideous and absurd. To this day, I view abstract art as the emperor's new clothes, daubed by fakes who have no more talent than you and me. For a national art institution to accumulate piles of this rubbish is pathetic; a look around the Gallery is enough to make one sick at most of the stuff hanging on the wall. To be fair, the whole world has been showering praises on the emperor's new clothes for decades.

Renoir, on the other hand, was not a faker. His paintings were both beautiful and interesting. My favourite was The Garden in the Rue Cortot, Montmartre. It is incredible to me how he used seemingly simple brush strokes to bring to the foreground the dazzling flowers and bland into the far side of the painting two people having a leisurely chat. Simply beautiful.

Las Vegas

2007-06-13T21:56:00.003-04:00

Our friend Ron decided to celebrate his birthday in Las Vegas this year. About a dozen of us joined him and Marita at the party. It had been a long while since Jeff and I were last in Vegas. Despite being a full-blooded Chinese, I dislike gambling tremendously. There is, however, more to Vegas than gambling, and I usually enjoy my time there.

Marita was her usual generous and mothering self, constantly making sure everyone was fed and entertained. Consequently, every meal was a production, and every evening an event. We went to two shows, one of which the famous Phantom. This being Vegas, the staging of the show is out-of-this-world extravagant. Everything was lavishing to the extreme. I've always loved the songs in Phantom, and for weeks afterwards, couldn't get the tunes out of my head.

After days of gourmet food, fine wine, and ceaseless lights and sound, we stumbled out of the city dazed and fatigued. What a crazy place!

A Short History of Nearly Everything, by Bill Bryson

2007-05-25T15:55:00.001-04:00

A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson

Bryson is one of my favourite writers. This book though, is not a typical Bryson book. The "everything" in the title refers to all physical objects on our planet: from the inner earth core to the highest of mountains, from the smallest known particles to the largest creatures. In other words, Bryson gives an overview on the development of all physical sciences: physics, chemistry, biology, and geology. He tells many interesting stories about the strange and fascinating personalities throughout history who have had major discoveries that led to Man's better understanding of Earth. It's a wonderful read albeit not an easy one (which is why it took me the better part of May to finish it). The stories also confirm what I've always known, that science isn't mathematics. What was at one point held as unassailable truth by all of the most learned men of the era often turned out to be completely false when more advanced instruments were invented to offer better insights into nature. This is why I view anyone who claims a debate on a complex scientific topic to be "over" as one who knows nothing about science.

Playing Hard Ball, by Ed Smith

2007-04-30T18:53:00.002-04:00

Playing Hard Ball by Ed Smith

Earlier this year, while reading Ed Smith's On and Off the Field, I saw on the dust cover that Smith had written a book comparing baseball and cricket. I immediately ordered it on Amazon. It's taken two months for the book to arrive.

Because Smith is such a good writer, the book doesn't disappoint. He is also quite a serious thinker. The only knock, if anyone can believe it, is that I found the analysis to be not thorough enough. I would have liked to see a comparison on the differences in scoring, and therefore in strategies, in the two sports. I could do with less emotional stuff. Why is it that writers, even the likes of Smith who are not otherwise sentimental, get so touchy-feely as soon as they start talking about baseball? I love the game, but it's still just a game...

Pompeii, by Robert Harris

2007-04-15T16:50:00.001-04:00

Pompeii by Robert Harris

While it is always fascinating to read historical novels, I can't help but wonder just how much of it is accurate and how much of it is fabrication. Of course, even if someone had been present at the time doesn't mean the person's account is dependable.

As for this book, it is full of details which Harris must have done painstaking research to obtain. Here is a good quote at the end of the book regarding the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius:

"Men mistook measurement for understanding. And they always had to put themselves at the center of everything. That was their greatest conceit. The earth is becoming warmer -- it must be our fault! The mountain is destroying us -- we have not propitiated the gods! It rains too much, it rains too little -- a comfort to think that these things are somehow connected to our behaviour, that if only we lived a little better, a little more frugally, our virtue would be rewarded. But here was nature, sweeping toward him -- unknowable, all-conquering, indifferent -- and he saw in her fires the futility of human pretensions."

State of Fear, by Michael Crichton

2007-03-30T21:47:00.001-04:00

State of Fear by Michael Crichton

This is my first Michael Crichton book. It's really not a novel, but a platform upon which Crichton presents a debate over environmental issues. As a result, the story line is contrived, and the characters poorly developed. On the other hand, the discussions are thought-provoking, and well-referenced, unlike so many articles and books out there on similar topics that make claims without references. Crichton's point on the dangers of mixing politics with science is particularly relevant.

Agatha Christie An Autobiography

2007-03-15T18:46:00.001-04:00

Agatha Christie An Autobiography by Agatha Christie

Every once a while, I go down to the basement to take a book off the bookshelves. This one caught my attention because I loved Agatha Christie's books when I was a child, and I've always wanted to know how one writes detective novels. Unfortunately, most of the autobiography deals with her personal life, travels and relationships, which are only mildly interesting. She gave some vague descriptions on her writing process, but, to my disappointment, mentioned very few of her (many) books.

The Undercover Economist, by Tim Harford

2007-02-21T17:44:00.001-05:00

The Undercover Economist by Tim Harford

This is a terrific book. It's so easy for people to bemoan the cost of things from gasoline to hotel rooms to a cup of coffee at Starbucks, but few ever pause to ask themselves: why are things priced this way? Does a conspiracy theory make any sense? How does a market-based economy operate? Is government intervention necessarily the best solution? Taking a step back and looking at the bigger picture, Harford also brings up questions such as, why are rich countries rich and poor countries poor? How is it that some countries have managed to change their situation dramatically in a short time while others haven't? What is the most efficient way to deal with pollution? What does fairness mean in an economic sense?

I have never taken an econ course (thought they were bird courses, a waste of my tuition fee and my time), but I had no difficulty in understanding every concept described in the book. It's so well written and presented that anyone who is willing to apply logic, not emotions, will find it a joy to read. Of course, when it comes to our wallets or human lives, how many of us can keep our emotions completely out of it?

On and Off the Field, by Ed Smith

2007-02-11T17:20:00.002-05:00

On and Off the Field by Ed Smith

I'm reading a cricket book! Must confess that I'm not all clear on the lingo, but having watched lots of cricket on TV plus one live match during our Down Under trip, I at least do know about test matches v. one-day ones, wickets, stumps, bails, overs, batsmen, bowlers, centuries, etc. Besides, I love baseball. If I could find an analytical, unsentimental, introspective account of a Major League season written by an educated baseball player who is also introspective, erudite and witty, I'd be the first one to read it. Ed Smith happens to be the cricket-equivalent of such a person. Reading the book makes me wish that we'd get some cricket coverage on TV here. The World Cup is coming up in March. Unfortunately, the Canadian team is so weak...

Snowboarding in Utah

2007-02-09T21:22:00.004-05:00

It was time for my annual snowboarding pilgrimage. Stella and Scott were spending a few days at Snowbird Ski Resort, outside of Salt Lake City, so we arranged a while back to meet up in Utah.

I'd been to Salt Lake City many times, mostly for snowboarding. In Utah, they brag about having "the greatest snow on earth" as if the words came straight out of the Bible. The reality is not too far off (although the locals don't usually mention that the mountains are not quite the greatest even in the West). The westerly wind picks up moister from the Great Salt Lake, and dumps champagne power in the mountains. On a fresh power day, riding down the slopes gives one the sensation of floating on air.

I arrived two days earlier than Stella and Scott, and went boarding at Brighton and Park City. That's one nice feature of the Salt Lake City area. One can base oneself in the city, and decide each morning where one would like to ski because most of the resorts are only an hour's drive away. Over the years, I'd been to almost all of the resorts except for Snowbird, Deer Valley and Alta, the last two being nasty places that to this day don't allow snowboarders. I got rather excited thinking about going to Snowbird for the first time.

Thanks to modern communication, I found Stella and Scott at the bottom of the gondola. In the next two days, we had a fantastic time together. While there hadn't been any fresh snow recently, the conditions were still excellent. From time to time, we went into the trees. While coming down a trail, I had a picture taken by an on-site photographer. As it was the only "action shot" I had of me snowboarding, I paid the exorbitant charge and got the digital file. Now, it's one of my most treasured photos.

The Code of the Woosters, by P.G. Wodehouse

2007-02-01T17:00:00.001-05:00

The Code of the Woosters by P.G. Wodehouse

I loved the last Wooster story so much that I got myself another one of these. It's more of the same --- and more of the same fun. I know I'm not gaining anything by reading this, but I can't help myself.

How to Breathe Under Water, by Julie Orringer

2007-01-30T17:40:00.001-05:00

How to Breathe Under Water by Julie Orringer

This is a collection of short stories on teenage girls' growing pains. Orringer writes well, but I personally just can't relate to her characters. Must be the result of my having been a tomboy living through a vastly different sort of childhood...

Old School, by Tobias Wolff

2007-01-24T17:38:00.001-05:00

Old School by Tobias Wolff

Tobias Wolff writes beautifully, and the story is absorbing even if predictable, but I must protest his bias against those who are more math- or science-oriented. The part about Ayn Rand is most amusing --- did it actually happen? The last chapter is very odd though: it came out of nowhere and is tenuously connected to the rest of the plot. What can one say about the lack of logical reasoning on the part of some artsy types...

Curaçao

2007-01-23T20:45:00.006-05:00

Trip Photos

We've been going to the Caribbean every winter for a few years. Usually, we try to see a different island each time. This year's destination was Curaçao of the Netherlands Antilles.

By chance, our hotel sat on a stretch of the beach that offered ideal snorkelling conditions. I first got hooked on this activity in the Great Barrier Reef in Australia. Even though having one's first snorkelling experience in the Great Barrier Reef is akin to having Brad Pitt for a first boyfriend, I'm still enthusiastic whenever there is a chance to snorkel. Last year, on a snorkelling trip in Sint Maarten, I came upon a little sea turtle in the water, swimming happily towards the bottom. My attempt at following him ended in vain because he was too good a swimmer. This time, with coral reefs right along the hotel property, I ended up spending hours in the water almost everyday. It was mesmerizing to watch the colourful tropical fish zooming around silently, individually or in schools, in and out of the corals, close enough to touch. One day, I went with a boat to a coral reef area off the north-west coast of the island. The waves were stronger out there, but the fish were more abundant. I wished I had a book on Caribbean fish so I'd know better about what I was seeing. Snorkelling fun came with a price though: I carried home a horrible sunburn, and was in agony for weeks afterwards. On top of the long periods of sun exposure, I forgot that Curaçao is almost at the Equator. Those of us from the north tend to underestimate the strength of the sun at that latitude.

Willemstad is the capital of Curaçao. It's a beautiful little town. Along the waterfront, a row of houses painted in the most brilliant colours stood against the blue sky and the sparkling water. A lively market, a bustling commercial area, historical old buildings and delightful restaurants and cafés made up the rest of the city.

On Saturday, we joined a jeep tour of the island. Curaçao is actually more desert than tropical. The beaches on the island are not quite as nice as on the other Caribbean islands, but the corals along the shore and the layered seabed make Curaçao a snorkellers' paradise. I would like to come back someday for sure.

On Being John McEnroe, by Tim Adams

2007-01-18T21:36:00.002-05:00

On Being John McEnroe by Tim Adams

I've read John McEnroe's autobiography, You Cannot Be Serious. Tim Adams's book is not about McEnroe's life, but about his temperament, his approach to playing tennis, and what it was like to watch McEnroe play. It's a tiny little booklet, and takes no time to finish, but it's rare to come upon a book on sports that is philosophical without being sentimental.

Bertie Wooster Sees It Through, by P.G. Wodehouse

2007-01-12T18:35:00.001-05:00

Bertie Wooster Sees It Through by P.G. Wodehouse

This one is pure "fluff" but also outrageously funny. Although it was written in the 30's, already, the "fashionable" set was concerned with carbohydrates. Why is it that no one talks about this Wodehouse fellow? He is so funny!

The Heart of a Goof, by P.G. Wodehouse

2007-01-06T15:32:00.002-05:00

The Heart of a Goof by P.G. Wodehouse

Danijela lent me this book along with Bertie Wooster Sees It Through, both by P.G. Wodehouse. This one contains nine golf stories (note the significance of the number nine). Wodehouse has such a distinctive style and an out-of-this-world sense of humour. I can't believe how much fun I'm having reading the book. The stories are made all the more enjoyable because of my own sad attempts at the frustrating game of golf. (I refuse to call golf a sport; it's a game, and a challenging one at that, but it's not a sport.)

Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures, by Vincent Lam

2006-12-30T19:29:00.001-05:00

Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures by Vincent Lam

Janet lent me this Giller Prize-winning book. It is a collection of short stories written by a medical doctor on medical-related themes. I found the stories interesting and well-written but the medical details tedious. Well, that's just me, as I find all things related to medicine boring, and have never once in my life entertained the thought of becoming a doctor. After reading this book, I'm rather glad that I stayed away from that profession.

What Narcissism Means to Me, by Tony Hoagland

2006-12-20T17:24:00.002-05:00

What Narcissism Means to Me by Tony Hoagland

The last time I touched poetry was ten years ago when I re-read Pushkin's Eugene Onegin. And before that, high school. This Hoagland fellow though, has a way with words and thoughts. I've read the whole book twice already, and have left it next to the bed to read again later. Here are a few verses from "Rap Music":

Twenty-six men trapped in a submarine
are pounding on the walls with a metal pipe,
shouting what they'll do when they get out.
Or they are rolled up in a rug in the back
of a rug truck that has wrecked.

No, it's the car pulled up next to mine in traffic
with the windows rolled down and the sound turned up
so loud it puts everything in italics: enough to make the asphalt thump
and the little leaves of shrubbery
in front of the nice brick houses quake.

I don't know what's going on inside that portable torture chamber,
but I have a bad suspicion
there's a lot of dead white people in there

...

But that's what art is for, isn't it?
It's about giving expression to the indignation---
it's for taking the in out of inhibitchin;
so maybe my ears are just a little hysterical
or maybe my fear is a little historical

...

and there's this pounding noise
like a heartbeat full of steroids,
like a thousand schizophrenic Shakespeares
killing themselves at high volume---

this tangled roar
that has to be shut up or blown away or sealed off
or actually mentioned and entered.

The Ruby in the Smoke, by Philip Pullman

2006-12-10T15:01:00.001-05:00

The Ruby in the Smoke by Philip Pullman

Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy was terrific. Thought I'd check out his other books. This one isn't bad, but it's really meant for kids --- unlike the trilogy which is really meant for adults.

Digital Fortress, by Dan Brown

2006-11-30T20:12:00.001-05:00

Digital Fortress by Dan Brown

Bought this book because I'm curious about Dan Brown's other books. It's all right: no better or worse than a typical novel by other writers who have discovered their own success formula, such as Ken Follet, John Grisham. Perfect for the beach or the air plane.

Ansel Adams at the AGO

2006-11-16T17:44:00.001-05:00

This evening, Jeff and I met up with Danijela to see the Ansel Adams exhibit at the Art Gallery of Ontario. Anyone who has ever lived in Northern California knows about Ansel Adams. My almost five years in the San Francisco Bay Area and several trips to Yosemite during that time ensured frequent encounters of the photographer's work. For some strange reason, Adams's photos of Yosemite always leave me unsatisfied. Is it because they are mostly black-and-white, which creates an eerie style but also loses much content? Is it because I foolishly believe that my pictures would look just as wonderful if they were enlarged to absurd sizes? Most likely, I just don't get it.

An Instance of the Fingerpost, by Iain Pears

2006-11-15T16:52:00.001-05:00

An Instance of the Fingerpost by Iain Pears

Since we were just in England, this story about events that took place in London and Cambridge in 1663 grabbed my attention. The story-telling format imitates Kurosawa's Rushomon, which is always interesting. The historical background is fascinating --- and grim, and depressing, and makes one glad that one isn't living in the 17th Century.

Petra Exhibit in Ottawa

2006-10-22T17:26:00.002-04:00

We drove to Ottawa over the weekend to see Len and Louise. When there was a half day to ourselves, we went to the Museum of Civilisation. The main attraction was the special exhibit on Petra, one of the places in the world I'd dearly love to visit. Many of us saw it in Steven Spielberg's Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: it was where the Holy Grail was housed. I only want to spend a few days hiking and riding camels in Petra. It conjures up such a romantic image in my mind, a world of the days past, so completely different from my own...

Southwestern England

2006-10-19T17:12:00.005-04:00

Trip Photos

I'd wanted to go to England forever. To find myself finally at Heathrow was quite a thrill, even if the airport was old, crowded and stuffy. In London, we went to the touristy sights, visited the museums, browsed through Fortnum & Mason, had afternoon tea at Harrod's, saw a show on the Strand, and made a side-trip to Wimbledon. The highlight was seeing the Rosetta Stone at the British Museum -- I know the story only too well. It was also fascinating going through the National Portrait Gallery. Many countries boast first-rate art museums, but only Britain has produced so many famous subjects whose portraits will amaze any lover of history.

London lived up to all my expectations, including its high prices. I could easily have stayed for another week, month, year, ... Nevertheless, one week was all we had. After picking up our rental car, we headed out of the city. The car was a Saab 9-3. Over the next two weeks, we grew rather fond of the little vehicle. It's compact yet roomy, powerful yet nimble. Driving in the English countryside under clear autumn skies is pure joy -- and driving on the "wrong side" required no more than ten minutes to adjust. The notorious rain bothered us on only two occasions.

In the next fortnight (note my use of the English lingo), we paid our respects at impressive sites (Hampton Court, Salisbury Cathedral, Stonehenge, Exeter Cathedral, Gloucester Cathedral, Blenheim Palace, and Warwick Castle); drove through the Moors and along tall hedges; walked in quaint little towns the likes of Looe, St. Ives, Port Issac, Clovelly, Lynton, Lynmouth, Glastonbury, and Stratford; took hidden roads in the otherworldly Cottswalds; and admired the majestic cities of Bath, Cambridge and Oxford. So many familiar names and places from books. So much history. Believe it or not, we had the full-fledged English Breakfast most mornings! And in the afternoons, I often indulged in a scone (with jam and clotted cream, of course) and tea in cozy shops. One couldn't possibly ask for more.

Jeff had seen and done all this before, but he humoured me by appearing to like everything all over again. It was such a wonderful holiday. At the end, we talked about going to Northern England, Scotland, or Ireland next. As usual, too many places still to see in the world...