Beijing 2008

I was lucky to get the chance to go to Beijing early this week to see some actions in the Olympics. This was a corporate hospitality program of which I was selected to participate. So I'd like to think it has something to do with the cigar I celebrated last year.

The visit was only three days short, but the schedule was packed. It started with table tennis on the first day, men's beach volleyball and athletics on the second day, and women's diving on the last day.

I brought along my new Sony Alpha SLR camera, and took a lot of pictures. (Yes, some of them were the cheerleaders from the beach volleyball game.)

Here are some of my observations.

Olympic Lane. To anticipate traffic during Olympics, one lane is dedicated as Olympic lane in some streets and highways. Surprisingly (or not?) people are pretty disciplined in keeping this lane only for the Olympic-related vehicles. I was also told that during this period Beijing implements odd-even license plate number to match with the days; that it was quite bad that some offices allow their employees to go to work during the days they can drive. Hey, it's the Olympics after all.

Supporters. When their countries do not play, most supporters will support the better-looking players. At least that's what I observed during the table tennis matches. Tetyana Sorochynska from Ukraine (was playing against Wenling Tan Monfardini from Italy), for example, received full supports from my Indian colleagues.

Chinese-descendant players. Most table tennis players are Chinese-descendant. Whether they represent France, Italy, Canada, Poland, and more.

Men's beach volleyball. My colleagues made fun of me going to see the men's beach volleyball game. Sure, women's beach volleyball would be perfect. But we were definitely entertained by the cheerleaders (the game was of high quality too!) See, men's beach volleyball isn't that bad.

Athletics. Usain Bolt was damn fast, and he really looks enjoying every single moment. That's the way it is!

Foreigners. The city is full of foreigners. Most are corporate guests from the main sponsors, and the athletes and coaches themselves, of course. I met a Texan, quite arrogant, who comes with the U.S. soccer team. He doesn't like to sightsee (though I met him near the Forbidden Palace), only to drink and boom-boom.

English. More people in Beijing, I believe, are able to speak English. Some information booths are trilingual. Cops can clearly explain where to get cabs. Servers can even explain that the yummy Peking duck was cooked with pork oil. (damn it!)

I uploaded some of the pictures to my flickr and facebook.

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Independence day spirit and Dara Torres

Dara Torres is the oldest in the U.S. swimming team - and perhaps among all swimmers in the Olympic - competing in her 5th Olympics. Neither the sexiest nor the prettiest athlete (but she posed on Maxim magazine in 2000).

And, umm, she's got short hair too.

What she recently did in the semifinal was quite a topic, given the competitive nature of the event: helping out a rival swimmer.

"Therese's suit ripped when we were getting ready to walk out," Torres said. "I tried to help her with it, tried to do it up, and it ripped again. So I walked out and was trying to get them to hold the race for her. I was saying, 'Her suit's ripped.' And waving my arms around."

A counter argument on this is that what she did actually threw off other swimmers' concentration. Ridiculous argument. I think what she did was based on fairness, or fair play - one that some soccer players just fail to do.

On how this qualifies as an independence day spirit, I'm not sure. (What is independence day spirit, anyway?)

But for the sake of it - her act is a quality that we, as a nation, must possess to move forward. To accomplish what our predecessors dreamed of, and to correct mistakes we did in the past.

The quality of being fair, unselfish, and mindful of others.

We have been an independent nation for 63 years, and we're still fighting over things because our lack of this quality, for crying out loud.

It's been too long. It's the time now to move on.

Merdeka.

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On In Bruges, Tarantino's movies, Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! and Tera Patrick

I watched In Bruges last week, and enjoyed it. It is said to be a good dark comedy movie - whatever it means - receiving 79% positive reviews in Rotten Tomatoes.

The movie reminds me of Quentin Tarantino's Pulp Fiction or True Romance. In comparison, In Bruges uses the word "fuck" (and its derivatives) 126 times (resulting 1.18 "fucks" per minute). That's still better compared to True Romance's 1.86 and Pulp Fiction's 1.58.

I like most of the movies written or directed by Quentin Tarantino. They're quite unusual. I also enjoy other unusual movies like Blair Witch Project, Memento, or Twelve Monkeys (I adore Madeline Stowe, after Winona Ryder). Don't get me wrong, I also like masterpieces like Forrest Gump, Saving Private Ryan or Band of Brothers. (oh, I, too, like Tom Hanks.)

Speaking about Tarantino, he is rumored to want to remake Russ Meyers’ 1965 exploitation flick Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! Among the stars include Britney Spears, Eva Mendes, and Kim Kardashian. Well, only Eva Mendes has a proven acting experience, but who cares. Throw in Paris Hilton to make it more interesting! I'm sure Tarantino will make something out of them.




Further rumor, however, says that Tarantino wants Tera Patrick in the movie as well. Yes, Tera Patrick the porn star. (doesn't sound too familiar to me though - I know only Asia Carrera, and found out that she has a blog!) Tera was delighted and said: "It would be the hottest remake ever, and I'm honored to be considered."

My opinion remains the same. Tarantino will handle it nicely. Perhaps a role like what Brad Pitt did in True Romance - a cheerful stoner.

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Ana Ivanovic and traffic surge

The page Ana and the queens has suddenly become the number one destination of visit in the past few days. I really admire those people who "finally" got into this blog. They must have gone through hundreds of Google pages before it finally shows up.

Yes, Ana Ivanovic has, again, reached the French Open final for the second year in a row - playing today. This time she's the favorite, and, regardless of the result, will be the world's number one by Monday. finally won her first grand slam title, defeating Dinara Safina... with a few screams of "Hadje!"

I also found several good clips of Ana Ivanovic (there are tons of them) - below.

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The adorable Sampras

Going to two tennis matches of world's first and second never crossed my mind. It happened last week, with two exhibition matches between Rafael Nadal (2) vs. Richard Gasquet (8) and Roger Federer (1) vs. Pete Sampras (former number 1).

Everything was business as usual, i.e. both Federer and Nadal defeated their opponents. But Sampras stood up among the other players as the most entertaining and spectator-friendly. You go, Pete!

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Ana and the queens

Update - For Ana Ivanovic and 2008 French Open, it's on Ana Ivanovic and Traffic Surge.

Update - I guess I got my wish - a perfect final between Henin and Ivanonic. The only thing is, that it wasn't perfect. Justine was way too strong and experienced for Ana in her first grand slam final. Too many unforced errors, too many double faults. Nevertheless, an excellent tournament for Ivanovic, having beaten both the 2nd and 3rd ranks.

Original post June 4, 2007:
There are many reasons why people love tennis. 19-year old Ana Ivanovic is one of them.

(picture from www.anaivanovic.com)

Ana Ivanovic is currently world's number seven. Born in Serbia, she now lives in Basel, Switzerland, unlike many other players who choose Florida.

She hits and serves hard. Her fastest serve in the last game was 201 km/h, compared to Federer's 213 km/h and Nadal's 198 km/h in their respective 4th round matches. The ladies final between her and the one-handed-backhander Justine Henin would be perfect.

The ladies quarter finals itself is almost perfect, with almost all the eight top seeded players, today's queens of tennis, in. The only exception is seeded nine Anna Chakvetadze, taking seeded five Amelie Mauresmo's place. Not bad.

Here are the queens (pictures from Roland Garros website):

#1 Justine Henin vs. #8 Serena Williams
vs.

#4 Jelena Jankovic vs. #6 Nicole Vaidisova
vs.

#7 Ana Ivanovic vs. #3 Svetlana Kuznetsova
vs.

#9 Anna Chakvetadze vs. #2 Maria Sharapova
vs.

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Never gonna give you up

Nah, I'm not being romantic. A bit sentimental, perhaps. Or just don't want to admit it... :)

Anyway, I'm referring to Rick Astley's "never gonna give you up". I think it was in 1988 when the song became a hit in Indonesia. I heard it again today after so many years. Yeah, I'm that old...



Rick's voice is not my favorite, but it's so unique I guess.

I always thought that Rick Astley was an Australian. (I found out today that Rick Astley is an English.) Perhaps because Kylie Minogue was also a big hit at the same time. (She's an Australian, right?)

What's Rick doing now? It seems that he's still doing some music works, but there's rarely any news.

An unofficial Rick Astley website writes: "It's not easy being a Rick Astley fan right now, there seems to be very little news however we are expecting to hear something soon. This quiet period is different from the past, Rick has no intention of hanging up his mic just yet and therefore we do expect Rick to be active in the very near future."

So if there's any Rick Astley fan out there, never give up.

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Mile-high scandal: increase the risk of air accident?

Another air incident, another sea accident in Indonesia.

We all might have heard that the probability of airplane accident, or crash, is much lower than the probability of (fatal) car accident. Steven Johnson's the Risk summarizes a study on this topic:

"...it would seem to be reasonable for those in charge of our safety to inform the public about how many airliners would have to crash before flying becomes as dangerous as driving the same distance in an automobile. It turns out that someone has made that calculation: University of Michigan transportation researchers Michael Sivak and Michael Flannagan, in an article last year in American Scientist, wrote that they determined there would have to be one set of September 11 crashes a month for the risks to balance out. More generally, they calculate that an American’s chance of being killed in one nonstop airline flight is about one in 13 million (even taking the September 11 crashes into account). To reach that same level of risk when driving on America’s safest roads — rural interstate highways — one would have to travel a mere 11.2 miles."

What if one drives in China? It might take only a short 2 miles to equal the risk! What if one flies one of the old aircrafts in Indonesia?

Regardless, is it really that low - one in 13 million? Statistically, perhaps. But for future forecast one must put the intelligence into it.

For example, if we will do some promotions three months from now, we gotta put in our best estimate of sales on that month, and not let statistical history figures forecast the sales. Especially if there hasn't been any regular promotion in that particular month in the past.

Through a friend who was visiting from Jakarta, I met these two Indonesian pilots of MAS and Lion Air (they were in the same company, Adam Air, if I'm not mistaken, before they parted their own way). It was around September 2006. Since these pilots haven't met each other for some time, they shared stories.

Apart from how the airlines industry has changed so much, their conversation was pretty much about flight attendants. Who slept with who. Who got this girl first. Who filmed who in what occasion. One even could persuade a flight attendant to sleep with him despite an approach from an Indonesian celebrity. And so on...

I've heard about this. But I've never heard directly from the one who did it. It was kinda fun at the beginning, but more of sick toward the end. With all my respect - what is wrong with the world?

A more recent one: "British actor caught in sky-high sex scandal." It was Ralph Fiennes in a flight on January 24, with a Qantas flight attendant who said:

"While conversing with Mr Fiennes during my break, I expressed a need to go to the toilet. I went to the nearby toilet and entered it, he followed me and entered the same toilet. I explained to him that this was inappropriate and asked him to leave. Mr Fiennes became amorous towards me and, after a short period of time, I convinced him to leave the toilet, which he did."

We can go into more detail... but I'd stop right here :)

It seems that when we fly, we are surrounded by more people who do adultery: some of the cabin crew and our fellow passengers, for relatively longer time.

Back to the intelligent forecasting. If we assume adultery is sinful and God will punish those who practice it, then won't it increase the chance of an airplane gets punished? If one can quantify the probability of getting punished because of sins, or being in the same place when the punishment happens, perhaps the one-in-13-million figure should be calibrated...

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White house visits wisteria lane

Bush, the old one, had lunch with "Desperate Housewives" star Teri Hatcher. Apparently George Sr. thought that Teri really was desperate, because he ended their lunch date by giving her a couple of slaps on the ass.



Another reason not to be the biggest fan of the Bush family... what Bill Clinton did was more fun!

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Barack Obama to run for president

Philips in his blog touched how Obama can be a friend to Indonesia if he becomes the president of the U.S.

At that time Obama hasn't decided if he would run. Last Saturday, he declared himself a candidate for the White House in 2008. Here's the full text of the announcement speech.

Is this good? If elected, will he turn the U.S. to be a friend to Muslim-majority countries like Indonesia?

I don't know. I don't intend to analyze that. But here's an interesting reaction to his announcement.

Australian leader slams Barack Obama for Iraq policy. John Howard, a staunch Bush ally who has sent troops to Iraq and faces his own re-election bid later this year, said Obama's proposals would spell disaster for the Middle East.

Obama's proposal, by the way, is to end the war in Iraq and to remove U.S. combat forces by March 31, 2008.

"I think that will just encourage those who want to completely destabilize and destroy Iraq, and create chaos and a victory for the terrorists to hang on and hope for an Obama victory," Howard said on Nine Network television.
(-- and what are your motives there? Destabilize, destroy, chaos... specifically, what are you and your buddies doing there?)

He further said: "If I were running al-Qaida in Iraq, I would put a circle around March 2008 and be praying as many times as possible for a victory, not only for Obama but also for the Democrats."
(-- oh, he's a Republican...!!)

"You either rat on the ally or you stay with the ally," he said. "If it's all right for us to go, it's all right for the Americans and the British to go, and if everybody goes, Iraq will descend into total civil war and there'll be a lot of bloodshed."
(-- Mr. Howard, aren't you aware of what's going on there now?)

Apparently, Howard is seeking his fifth term later this year. Recent polls suggest voters are increasingly unhappy about his refusal to set a deadline for withdrawing Australian troops from the Middle East. He currently keeps about 1,400 Australian troops in Iraq despite domestic opposition to the war.

What does really Howard and Blair get from Bush, I wonder...?

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Where is Winona?

Winona Ryder, that is. Perhaps the most beautiful actress ever.

She is still out there, acting. It has been much fewer and less popular movies, however, after the shoplifting incident in 2001. After starring in quite good movies, like Bram Stoker's Dracula, Reality Bites and Alien: Resurrection, the only big movie she did was Mr. Deeds in 2002. In fact, she didn't do any "movies" in 2005.

In 2006 Winona starred in A Scanner Darkly, an animated futuristic movie which I could only find in pirated DVD stores. I didn't even bother to buy despite Keanu Reeves, Robert Downey Jr. and Woody Harrelson also starred the movie.

But I look forward to watching a couple of her new movies in 2007.

The first one is Sex and Death 101, a dark comedy movie about, as the title says, sex and death. The second one is the Ten, a comedy of ten stories, each inspired by one of the ten commandments.

"For a long time I was almost ashamed of being an actress. I felt like it was a shallow occupation. People would be watching my every move." -Winona Ryder

"Winona Ryder is to Hollywood what Superman is to Metropolis. They both live in the shadows, make newspaper headlines once in a while and live a pretty quiet life." -AskMen.com

Some Winona Ryder links:
Winona Online
Winona Ryder News Channel

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Skin color discrimination

A recent study says that skin tone affects earnings in the U.S. The darker the skin is, the higher the chance to get paid less than the counterparts with lighter skin do. The study looks at legal immigrants to the U.S. from around the world.

Several other findings from the study:

-/ Being one shade lighter has about the same effect as having an additional year of education.

-/ Taller immigrants earn more than shorter ones, with an extra inch of height associated with a 1 percent increase in income.

-/ Skin tone still seemed to make a difference in earnings, although other factors that could affect wages (e.g. English-language proficiency, education, occupation, race or country of origin) are taken into consideration.

"... that means that if two similar immigrants from Bangladesh, for example, came to the United States at the same time, with the same occupation and ability to speak English, the lighter-skinned immigrant would make more money on average."

So life's better in the U.S. if your skin color is relatively lighter, or if you're tall. This is sad.

The study also confirms that many cultures show a bias toward lighter skin.

I think Asian cultures strongly show that bias. Bule in Indonesia and Mat Saleh in Malaysia clearly often get preferred treatments over the locals.

They - the foreigners, the white men - probably deserve it, though. Usually, these people are financially better than most locals (except, of course, bules in Jalan Jaksa). And the attitudes too - they typically are more confident and demanding when it comes to service, compare to most locals. They speak English, or a foreign language, for the sake of it. And... perhaps their skins are lighter too...?

Is it the Asian politeness (or dumbness)? Is it that we were colonalized for quite a long time, that we now feel inferior?

What about the Japanese, who, despite of their well-known politeness, are one of the economic and technology 'powerhouses' in the world? But they are already light-colored...

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General Tso's chicken

I got a surprise from my wife today. She cooked general Tso's chicken for lunch. It's been at least one and a half years since the last time I had this dish. I love you, babe.

No, I'm not writing the recipe here.

General Tso's chicken is the first American Chinese food I had, and I love it since. It's deep-fried boneless chicken with thick, sweet-spicy sauce - just perfect. It's one, if not the most, popular Chinese food dish in the U.S.

There are some other chicken dishes similar to general Tso's. Orange chicken and sweet and sour chicken to name a few. They're all boneless. But Tso's chicken is the best.

It also only exists in the U.S. Wikipedia says that the dish is unknown in China and other lands home to the Chinese diapora. The dish was invented in early or mid 70's in NYC.

I never thought to try to find out who General Tso was, and whether this guy is for real or not. He did exist, I found out today. He was a frighteningly gifted military leader during the waning of the Qing dynasty, said Washington Post's article "Who was General Tso and why are We Eating His Chicken?" So Tso did exist and was, indeed, a military general.

I salute you, general. You and your buddy Colonel Sanders.

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The machine

Nemanja Vidic has been one of the instrumental players in Manchester United's excellent defense this season. Here's what I found somewhere on the net:

Guns don't kill people. Nemanja Vidic kills People.

Nemanja Vidic does not sleep. He waits.

The chief export of Nemanja Vidic is Pain.

Nemanja Vidic doesn't read books. He stares them down until he gets the information he wants.

When Nemanja Vidic does a pushup, he isn’t lifting himself up, he’s pushing the Earth down.

In an average living room there are 1,242 objects Nemanja Vidic could use to kill you - including the room itself.

Nemanja Vidic once ate a whole cake before his friends could tell him there was a stripper in it.

There are no races, only countries of people Nemanja Vidic has beaten to different shades of black and blue.

The grass is always greener on the other side, unless Nemanja Vidic has been there. In that case the grass is most likely soaked in blood and tears.

For some, the left testicle is larger than the right one. For Nemanja Vidic, each testicle is larger than the other one.

Nemanja Vidic grinds his coffee with his teeth and boils the water with his own rage.

Nemanja Vidic once ate an entire bottle of sleeping pills. It made him blink.

Nemanja Vidic played Russian Roulette with a fully loaded gun and won.

In a 50-50 challenge, Nemanja Vidic would win 150-nil.

Nemanja Vidic does not "style" his hair. It lays perfectly in place out of sheer terror.

Nemanja Vidic recently had the idea to sell his urine as a canned beverage. We know this beverage as Red Bull.

Nemanja Vidic puts the "laughter" in "manslaughter".

Nemanja Vidic once roundhouse kicked Bruce Lee, breaking him in half. The result was Jet Li and Jackie Chan.

Nemanja Vidic hates The Beatles; two to go.

Nemanja Vidic crossed the road. Nobody has ever dared question his motives.

When Nemanja Vidic exercises, the machine gets stronger.

Nemanja Vidic's tears cure cancer. Too bad he has never cried.

Nemanja Vidic beat the hair off Chuck Norris' chest.

Nemanja Vidic died ten years ago, but the Grim Reaper can't get up the courage to tell him.

Nemanja Vidic doesn't close players down, they are drawn to his legs by the force of gravity.

When Nemanja Vidic Runs he stays still the Earth moves under his feet like a treadmill

One of the new quadrants caught on fire last week after Nemanja fixed it a glare.

Stupid tackles don't break peoples legs, Nemanja Vidic does.

Nemaja Vidic once woke up in a foul mood. The result was the Yugoslav wars.

Fergie didn't drop Darren Fletcher, Nemanja Vidic dropped Darren Fletcher.

Nemanja Vidic doesn't mark players, he permanently stamps them.

Nemanja Vidic once turned up for training late - Fergie fined the rest of the team for being early.

Nemanja Vidic doesn't head the ball away, the ball heads the other way.

Wes Brown isn't injured - Nemanja Vidic mistook him for a jaffa cake.

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Indcoup and Jakartass

I found these two very interesting blogs, Indcoup and Jakartass, most likely through comments and other blogs linked to Tiara Lestari's. I've been their regulars for some time now and enjoy their writings.

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Tiara Lestari

By this time, most of Indonesians should've known Tiara Lestari, her pictures and posing for Playboy. Quite pretty, has Indonesian look, and, surprisingly writes very well in her blog, Tiara Lestari's Personal Journal.

Here's her "About Me" and picture from her blog:
"I am originally from Indonesia. Formerly residing in Singapore, I am now firmly back in my own beloved country. Modeling has been my passion and profession. My journey as a model has taken me to the cover of Playboy Magazine in a far away land and right in the center of a national controversy. It plunged me into depth of humility without prejudice or guilt. It guides me to see through changes, places and faces. Through it all, I understand that life itself is full of surprises that neither reason, nor logic can comprehend. It certainly has been a journey filled with joy and turbulence. It is a journey from sensuality to elegance. Welcome to my life."

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