It was Christmas and New Year holidays of 2009 when my friends and I visited northern India. I’ve postponed blogging about this trip for quite a long time because it would take me lots of time to write something about it. Eventually, I decided to divide the post into 2 parts; the first of which will cover Jaipur and Agra.
Jaipur, aka the pink city, is the capital of Rajasthan State in the northwest of India. The city boasts its richness in culture, arts and traditions despite it being in the arid region covered by desert. Jaipur was built and ruled by Rajputs (Sanskrit word means the king’s descendants. Similarly, the state name, Rajasthan, means the land of the King.)
With the help of Rajputs, Jaipur had seen the construction of fortresses and palaces over the years. Some of them have been turned into hotels called palace hotels and you can see this kind of hotels all over Jaipur. While some luxurious places are extremely expensive, some lower-end hotels are real bargains. We stayed at Diggi Palace, which was a small palace hotel. The rooms were pretty large and cozy but not so private for couples 
. Like ryokans in Japan, palace hotels in India, no matter how much they cost, will give you really exotic yet charming experience of the oriental world. Anyone who comes to Jaipur should try it!
Room of Hotel Diggi Palace
Let’s move on to the tourist attractions in Jaipur. Since we didn’t have much time there (only 2 days), we had to rush to a lot of places within this limited time. The good news was we had our own van, which really helped to minimize the travelling time and so we could spend more time doing sightseeing around the city. The bad news was that we went to Jaipur on the Christmas holidays and the entire city was flooded with people. My friend, Prannoy, informed me that the number of tourists in Jaipur during that period set the record (no doubt about that).
One of the most famous scenes in Jaipur is Hawa Mahal or the palace of wind. The actual beauty lies in its façade with nearly 1000 intricate windows forming the shape similar to beehive. If you have a DSLR camera, it’s recommended to bring a wide lens here as the road in front is not so wide and often full of people and cars. This makes taking a nice snapshot of the façade a little tough. Because it was very crowded and we couldn’t get the parking space in front of Hawa Mahal so we only saw it from inside our van.
Inside the City Palace Complex
Next, we moved to ‘City Palace’, which was a palace complex comprising gardens, courtyards and different buildings. Some of us including me got the audio guide with the purchase of entry tickets for foreigners. With the audio guide, map and numbers marked on different spots, we could understand the brief history of Jaipur and the state of Rajasthan better (it’s really nice if you are into Indian history and culture). In the center of the complex, there are 2 big silver urns in display. They are recorded in the Guinness World Record as the biggest silver vessels in the world. The interesting point is its raison d’être; that is to store the water from Ganga River (considered holy in Hinduism) for drinking by Maharaja Sawai Madho Singh II during his trip to England. Inside the complex, there is also a nice-looking café (quite popular among tourists) but we didn’t go there because the price was a little high.
At Jantar Mantar
Jantar Mantar was our next destination. This place was used (and is still used by some) as an astronomical observatory and is the biggest one in India (there’s also one in Delhi). In my view, the structure is not only useful as its original purpose but also represents some stylistic and unique structural design of that time. It also showcases the mathematical zenith in Indian civilization making it extremely exciting and intriguing for some of my nerdy friends 
.
On the first night in Jaipur, we went to Chokhi Dhani, which was more like a cultural village, for dinner. The place had an open-air buffet and also a restaurant in a traditional house, both of which served Rajasthani foods. It was too crowded on the night we went there (Christmas holiday in India) and we had no choice but to eat buffet in chilling outdoor ambience. Rajasthani foods are quite unique and different from general Indian foods I’ve tried so far. I found the foods a little bland (I guess the taste might be adapted to suit foreign tourists’ taste). Apart from the foods, we also saw a few traditional dances and tried a 3-min head and shoulder massage which was ‘harsh and rough’ (the masseur will hit/chop/smack your head and shoulder abruptly) and this might leave you in a daze for a while. If you are keen to try traditional dances, there are a couple of dance stages with small band of music around the place. Note that dancers might ask for tips after dancing with you but it is not compulsory to do so (A dancer whispered to me to give her tip while we were dancing).
Elephant Ride up to Amber Fort
The next day we visited a lot of forts. The first fort we went was Amber Fort. Here we took an elephant ride up to the top. On the way, there would be a lot of local people trying to sell you cloth paintings (most of which were roughly painted by local people depicting the Rajasthani Rajputs on a parade, elephants and variations of Krishna and Radha.) Even though they make perfect souvenirs from Rajasthan, don’t buy them here. I was conned to buy 10 pieces for 1000 rupees which was around 30 SGD (initially I was asked for 50 USD). Actually, I thought they were already cheap but I found out later that the same kind of drawings could be got for only 30 rupees per piece in Dehli. In the town of Jaipur, there are a lot of handicraft shops. These shops will sell goods at higher price (but of course with higher quality as well). You don’t have to worry that you will get conned here. I bought a small miniature painting of Buddha for 1500 rupees and it is truly an impressive piece of art.
Show inside Amber Fort
At the top of the Amber fort, there was a Kali temple. Kali is the major goddess of the Bengalis and well-known for her fierceness and scary appearance. Opposite to her look, the temple which is made of marble was tranquil and cool and was worth the time entering. Note that most temples in India do not allow shoes inside so you need to take off your shoes and keep them somewhere outside for a while. In addition to walking around the fort (or palace), you can also enjoy a snake show. I was watching it when one boy was getting closer to the snake and it almost bit him.
Next, we visited Jaigarh Fort, which was just above the Amber Fort. Situated on the top of the mountain, you can also see Jaigarh fort from the Amber Fort (I thought it was just the same fort the first time I saw it). The ridiculous thing was that you had to pay in order to take some pictures on the top of the fort. Although it was not expensive to get the ticket, the view was not that great that you needed to pay for it. And if you have a lot of forts to visit in India, you may choose to omit this one in my view.
Building inside Nahargarh Fort
The last fort we visited was Nahargarh Fort. Sadly, this last place was not well-maintained at all. You can see garbage everywhere and the structure was also dilapidated. (My friends told me it was used as the scene in one Bollywood movie.) The magic of this place will be exposed when you climb up to the mansion of the top. It was being revamped when we reached there but I can tell you that the place will look awesome once the renovation is done. There are also a lot of monkeys here. You can find the Hanuman shrine (stone painted in orange color) devoted to the popular monkey god from the epic ‘Ramayana’. We stayed one more night in Jaipur and moved on to Agra on the next day.
Very few people who come to north India will miss Agra. That is because of the world-renowned Taj Mahal, which is in Agra. The first place we visited in Agra was ‘Fatehpur Sikri’, also a world-heritage site. The palace was built by Akbar for his 3 wives of different religions; Hinduism, Islam and Christianity. There are so many tales about the place but the most intriguing one I found was in the locally-made guide. In the guide, it says that the Salim (a Sufi sage) killed his own son and did some rituals to reanimate the boy’s soul into the womb of Akbar’s wife. After visiting the palace, you’ll be led to the mosque and the tomb of the Saint. Not only the myth about the place attracted me but also the beauty of the palace complex. It was really worth the time visiting here. Thanks to the local guide we hired, who made the tour of Fatehpur Sikri more interesting (although he was trying to make money later by convincing us to get the cloths and garlands to worship the Saint’s tomb).
Fatehpur Sikri
We later arrived the city of Agra quite late in the evening. After checking in at the hotel, we rushed to the Taj for the sunset. Unfortunately, we were a little late and couldn’t enter it anymore. It should be noted that Taj Mahal is only open from sunrise (6 AM) to sunset (6 PM) and so we walked toward the back side of the Taj (along the river) to take some night shots. Too bad the river behind the great Taj was full of garbage and the smell was not so pleasant. Considering the expensive entry fee of the Taj for foreigners, I feel the authorities in Agra do not work hard enough to make the vicinity clean and tourist-friendly. We also dropped by one small Hindu shrine beside the river to see local people worshiping the gods. At night we went to Peshawari Restaurant at Sheraton Hotel for the nicest kebab in town. I have to admit that Mughal-style kebab here tasted very good. The meat was soft and succulent and you could also get vegetarian kebab here as well. Overall, it was a great meal and if you love kebab, this is the place not to be missed.
Having kebab at Peshawari Restaurant
On the following day, we got up pretty early for the sunrise at the Taj (some of us even got up earlier and went out first for the tickets). When we reached there, we saw a very long queue of crowds waiting to enter Taj Mahal. Men and women have to queue separately as you will have to be checked before entering the place by the guards. After going through a few layers of gates, the grandeur of Taj Mahal stood in front of our eyes. Despite a lot of fog in the morning, I could feel its unbelievably gigantic existence from afar. We took some photos outside with the Taj before moving in. Taking photos inside was not allowed and you should not do it in order to respect the place (still a lot of people, both Indians and foreigners, couldn’t help taking a few shots). It was a little dark inside and after walking around the mausoleum, we headed to the other section. I was truly impressed by the white marble and the perfect symmetric shape of the dome. The view of the Taj was absolutely breathtaking and I was very glad that I had seen it with my own eyes. It was too bad that we had to rush for the train to Amritsar and so we had to leave the wonderful Taj behind us. (The post will be continued as part 2 for Amritsar and Delhi. Special thanks for Prannoy for guiding us around Jaipur and his parents for taking us to Chokhi Dhani.)
Taj Mahal
I posted a mini-review about UE Superfi.3 Studio as my first blog post here and a couple of months later, I found one side of the earphone producing intermittent sound and had to send it in for repair. Unfortunately and fortunately at the same time, the service center in Singapore informed me that UE had stopped the production of Superfi.3 so mine would be replaced with the newer model ‘Superfi.4’.
I was actually excited to get the newer and more expensive model but also worried that the sound of Superfi.4 might not be the same as Superfi.3, which I like a lot. Waiting for 5 weeks, I got a phone call on one Saturday asking to come and collect the new Superfi.4. I have to thank my friend, Saurabh, for collecting it on my behalf. I was given only the earphone without any box or eartips but luckily I kept all my old accessories of Superfi.3 and I can use them with my new Superfi.4.
My first impression on Superfi.4 is that it looks classier than Superfi.3. The earbud has the metallic look, which is different from plastic material in Superfi.3. However, I found myself missing the over-the-ear style of Superfi.3 and the other Superfi earphones, which in my view gives the earphone more professional look. I used to not like this over-the-ear before when I first used Superfi.3 because I thought it was so inconvenient and difficult to wear. But my thoughts changed over time as I became more and more addicted to the comfort of Superfi.3 and its uniqueness.
UE Superfi.4 with the metallic look
I find the physical look of Superfi.4 pretty decent considering its price. It may not stand out in the crowds but it will not make you feel embarrassed wearing it in public. The metallic look and black cord is pretty simple yet elegant and you can wear it with any kinds of clothes. Overall, I am quite happy with the look of Superfi.4. I guess UE feels that in the high-end consumer earphones market the over-the-ear style does not please the crowds and that’s why Superfi.4 was introduced as the only earphone in the Superfi Series, which is not over-the-ear style.
Superfi.4 is noise-isolating and with the same eartip I took from my Superfi.3 it wouldn’t fit my ears well. The same eartip which used to fit my ears nicely with Superfi.3 became too big and I couldn’t get the right fit for my ears with Superfi.4. I later changed the eartip to the smaller size and it just perfectly slipped into my ears with ease. The noise isolating worked quite well. Of course not all the external noise can be isolated but it does help to reduce unwanted sound to a pleasant level. Wearing it for a few hours is still comfortable but I also fear that using it continuously may damage my ears so I try to play music at the lowest volume as possible for long hours of listening.
I am personally impressed by UE’s signature sound style. I remember the first time I tested Superfi.3 with Eva Cassidy’s Live Album. I felt like I was really immersed in Eva’s concert. The vocal was crisply clear and mids were very detailed and warm. I truly appreciate UE for its daring to make such earphones that will only please specific customers, who care for small sound details and are willing to sacrifice some bass on some genres of music like rock. This drawback is due to the only one balanced armature driver inside the Superfi.3 and if you want to experience greater bass, you will have to invest more on the higher-end models like Superfi.5 EB, etc. which house more armature drivers.
Superfi.4 is a little different from its younger brother though. While Superfi.4 doesn’t fail me for its superb sound quality, I can feel that UE has modified it a bit to make it more all-rounded than Superfi,3, which is suitable for jazz and vocals listeners. I find the mid-range from Superfi.4 crisp and impressively detailed for its price point while high-range is truly outstanding (this may not be everyone’s cup of tea though). The bass is a little improved from Superfi.3 but it still is not the right choice for rock listeners. Trying the earphone with the album ‘Love Never Dies (Andrew Llyod Webber’s)’ was pretty much of great experience. It is still a good choice for jazz and live concerts just like Superfi.3 and does a pretty good job on pop too (lacking bass somewhat reduces the fun in the music and detailed sound makes it too strict an earphone for fun listeners in some cases).
I recently tried Metrofi.220vi, which also shares similar classy look to Superfi.4. Whereas both earphones share similar good looks, their sound styles are quite different. It’s not quite fair to compare the Metrofi with Superfi Series as they use different kinds of drivers and are targeted at different groups of customers. Metrofi.220vi delivers nice sound and in my view is more of an all-round casual earphone. Good amount of bass is present on Mertofi.220vi and it’s really a fun earphone for pop and dance music. However, I find its price a little high for just the microphone addition.
I have used Superfi.4 for a few months and I am very satisfied with it. The bottom line is this earphone is not the all-round type and rock listeners will turn it down for its lack of bass. But if you look for a nice earphone with good mids and highs while having sufficient bass for some genres of music, then look no further.
At the beginning, it was supposed to be a trip for my colleagues (12 people including me) to Bangkok and Pattaya. Unfortunately, the bloody incident in Bangkok in April scared most of them (and also their parents). I confirmed with them that it would be fine because we would not go near to the protest site. However, they were still afraid that anything unpredictable could happen as some in our group commented about the seizure of the airport in the past, which, if happened again, could have delayed our flight back and might have affected our work. Consequently, we decided to call the trip off but I still headed back alone to the city of angel last weekend.
It was a right decision that they didn’t come with me not because of the safety issue but because Bangkok being captured by the protesters is not lively and cheerful as it was in the past. The main shopping centers from Siam Discovery, Siam Center, Siam Paragon and Central World were closed. BTS or the sky train also was not in full operation. Siam Square, where Thai teenagers usually come and hang out, was very quiet and some of the shops were also closed. I was very curious to know how the protest site was like and did actually walked past the area near Siam Square. The road was blocked so no traffic was there were a number of stalls selling red-shirts, headbands and some other accessories for the protesters and red-shirt supporters.
I don’t want to criticize any side on my blog as I respect that everyone has his/her own reasons for doing or following what he/she thinks is right. What I would like to see now is all the Thai people turning to one another and all the colors are blended together as one. I’d like to see Thailand united as one country as it was because I love Thailand and I miss my mother land I came from.
I will end today’s post with the two songs which I would like to dedicate to all the Thai people. It reminds me of the present situation in Thailand and how bad I feel toward the incidents. The first one is a ballad from Westlife called ‘Talk Me down’. It’s one of my favorite from their latest album, ‘Where We Are’.
The second song is from Gary Go called ‘Engine’. Like the lyrics say:
“I don’t know why we’re fighting when we’re on the same side.
Stuck here, we’re stalling, I can’t keep looking backwards,
Gotta Live for now not there, so engines can start again…”
Last month my friends and I went to Kambodscha or Cambodia. Despite a lot of news about the feud between Thailand and Cambodia over Phreah Vihar Temple, I feared nothing but the extreme heat in summer time like this.
We had only 3 days there and since we didn’t want to waste time traveling back and forth between Siem Reap and Phnom Penh so we decided to stay around Siem Reap only. Once our plane landed at the unique airport of Siem Reap, I was treated differently from the other friends of mine by the customs officers. I was asked for the flight back to Singapore, the date and time I would leave; and all this information was noted down by the officer on the back of my arrival card. I was a little worried at the beginning that I might have been bullied by the officer due to my nationality and because I also heard a lot of bad rumors about the customs officers in Cambodia. Fortunately, that was the only first and last time I experienced something like that. The rest of the trip went smoothly and interestingly, which I will talk about later.
After everyone passed the customs gate, we gathered in front of the airport and met our trip organizer, Mr Phansy. He arranged the van for us and also planned the rough itinerary for us as well. Click here for his contact info.
We stayed in Green Garden Home Guesthouse as recommended by our friends who came here a few months before us. The guesthouse was nicely designed, clean and reasonably priced. It also had a small swimming pool but we had no time to use as we spent most of the time outside the guesthouse.
On the first day after we had dropped our luggage, we went to Angkor Thom, in which the very famous Bayon is located. The most striking feature of this temple is its gigantic face sculptures. It is recommended by a lot of people as one of not-to-be-missed temples in Siem Reap. The feeling of being watched by different faces from above no matter where you are in the temple makes the place so distinct and memorable.
We walked around small ruins in Angkor Thom and went back to rest at the guesthouse until late afternoon. The driver later took us to Ton Le Sap for a boat ride to see the sunset at the floating village. The weather was a little cooler with breeze hitting our face and hair when we were riding the boat. The floating village was not that fantastic and there was nothing much to do at the village except taking photos. We came back to a restaurant near to our guesthouse for dinner and a traditional performance. Before I came to Cambodia, I had watched a lot of commercials about the country and realized that both Cambodia and Thailand had a lot of things in common. One of these include the traditional dances and literature. Ramayana from India is also being played in the much similar act and costumes; so similarly that I even thought myself in Thailand at the moment.
On the second day, we hired a guide and this actually made our second day a very informative and intriguing trip. I suggest that anyone coming to Siem Reap to get a guide while you visit the temples. This is because some of the intricate and pristine bas-reliefs can be hidden in some spots that you need to spend lots of time searching for them. Also, westerners who have very little knowledge about Hinduism, Buddhism and oriental literature will enjoy more with the explanation from the guide. We started very early for a sunrise at Angkor Wat, at which the crowd had already flocked when we reached the two ponds for sunrise photographs.
The temple complex is so grand that you have to spend at least half a day to browse around. There are a lot of bas-reliefs depicting the story of Ramayana, Mahabharata, some of Hindu mythology and the epic of the Great Suriyavaraman II. The Angkor Wat complex astonished me for how Khmer people in the past devoted themselves to the religion and their perseverance to construct such a large structure for what they believed in.
We also visited Banteay Srei, which is very famous for its delicately detailed high-reliefs. In spite of its far-away location (37 km away from the city), the temple is very well maintained and has good facilities for tourists. On the way back, we dropped by the land mine museum run by the Cambodian deminer, Akira. The museum is a small museum exhibiting the deactivated mines and explosive materials collected from the actual work of Akira. His story is so interesting that you shouldn’t miss reading it. We visited a few small temples and ended the second night with a foot massage, which was cheap and very relaxing.
We planned to go slowly on our last day by visiting the main temples that we missed like Ta Promh and Phreah Khan. In Ta Promh, you will see a lot of trees growing inside which looks like the nature invasion in my view. Actually, the temple is being maintained in order to keep the trees and the temple together because that is what the temple is famous for. Phreah Khan, which means sacred sword, is a very large temple complex. We were lucky to meet a local man who offered to guide us around the temple for 4 USD. He led us to a lot of hidden spots which had very beautiful reliefs and carvings and I really liked the place.
After completing almost 90 percent of the temples, the driver took us to the cultural village, which had the exhibitions about Cambodian history and long schedule of performances all day long. This is a must-see place in case you get so sick of temples in Siem Reap. The performances despite in Khmer language are very easy to understand and never boring. The grand finale shows the Khmer history from the time the Angkors were built and shouldn’t be missed.
Cambodia trip went very well for me and I had wonderful experience there. Siem Reap is a very tourist-friendly city. People here can speak English very well (even better than some Chinese Singaporeans). In my opinion, Siem Reap people speak the best English compared to people in other countries of which the mother tongue language is not English. I strongly suggest that everyone should come and witness the great Angkors at least once in a lifetime!
It was not surprising for me to hear that Apple had announced the iPad, the name of which sounds funny to me though. This is because there were tons of rumors spreading on the internet before the actual event and it’s not too difficult to see why Apple would want to sell this kind of product after the huge success of Kindle.
Spec-wise, Apple’s iPad is a true leader of its kind. It’s equipped with Apple’s custom 1GHz CPU called A4, which boasts its truly fast speed on the Keynote presentation. It also comes with the vividly clear LED capacitive touchscreen which looks totally awesome in the product introduction video. And together with Apple’s existing App Store, users can be sure to enjoy using it the same way they enjoy using iPhone and iPod Touch. Look-wise, iPad wins hands down just like the other Apple products. The casing material looks sturdy and sleek. And just like the other Apple’s gadgets, you can be sure to be astounded by a plethora of iPad accessories from various makers.
There are a few problems with this product though. One of them is its high price. Everybody knows that Apple’s products are never cheap. iPad is no exception either. While some of the people I know think that iPad is not expensive compared to smartphones in the market including the iPhone. They actually fail to compare it with the other netbooks some of which are priced quite lower than the iPad. When compared with the other E-book readers (say Kindle for example) iPad also doubles the price. With the starting price of 499 USD (for 16 GB and lack of 3G), iPad is placed to compete with high-end netbooks which are packed with more complete features. This makes a tough decision for consumers whether or not they should buy a netbook or an iPad.
The other severe drawback that most people grumble about is that iPad lacks Flash support just like its siblings do and it doesn’t have the front camera for video chat! This is by far the biggest flaw on a big screen device like iPad. I don’t mind not having Flash on my iPhone due to its tiny screen but I can’t accept when a big screen device like the iPad has a web browser that doesn’t have full Flash support. (Of course, if Apple can make Flash available, iPhone will be a much better device than it is now.) It also lacks multi-tasking, which I think Apple will be forced to make available in the future in order to tackle with the other mobile platforms or else it cannot sustain. I also would love to have a front camera for doing video chat with my friends and family. All of these make me think twice whether I should buy a first generation iPad. And the answer for this time being is NO.
Theoretically, iPad is another really innovative product from Apple. It will be successful despite a lot of flaws just like iPods. It’ll also create a trend that students put a lot of e-books onto the iPad to school. Playing games on a large screen iPad will be definitely amazingly fun. And I admit that I love iPad but I just need some more time to see the future updates from Apple that I believe will make iPad a much better device. I’d end today’s post with a video showing Hitler whining about iPad. Love the last part where he mentioned HP’s Slate. Enjoy…
Competition in mobile phone market is very fierce nowadays. The most intriguing for me is that the war doesn’t only happen between mobile phone companies but also between mobile phone users. If you follow the tech-blogs or websites, you will often see people arguing about the products which are sometimes not out yet in the market. It’s also a war of hypes and ads as well because only making good phone is insufficient to sustain in the market. ‘Branding’ through campaigns and ads is essential in order to create loyal customer base that will fight for the products. It’s like phone companies are competing to build their army of consumers. The more consumers it has, the more likely it will win in the war. No matter who the winner is, it will eventually benefit the consumers because the competition always leads to improvement. So it’s best to keep this war rage for good.
Let me talk about the Finnish Giant, Nokia. I still remember the first time I played with my friend’s Nokia 7650. Such phone stood out in the market and impressed me with its smartness that no other phones could offer at that moment. Nokia was very successful at introducing the concept of smart phones into the market and by gradually launching a couple of legendary phones like N-Gage, 6600, 6630 and 7610; its smart phone saga had prevailed over the other manufacturers and actually conquered its main rival like Siemens, which withdrew from mobile phone business after the launch of the full-featured SX-1.
Inspite of emerging platforms like Windows Mobile, which evolved from Pocket PC OS into phone OS, Symbian still held a very strong position in smart phone lovers’ market. This was because of Symbian’s ease of use and abundant applications in the market.
Nothing can flourish forever though. After the rise of iPhone OS from Apple and Android Platform from Google (not to mention Blackberry OS, which is popular among email addicts), Nokia seemed to walk behind the others for quite a distance. Its launch of flagship model like N97 couldn’t catch up with its rivals. The interface and the functionality totally disappoint me. In my view, Symbian is now outdated and needs a grand revamp from Nokia ASAP. One of the big issues that mars its success is that Symbian was not originally developed for touch screen phones and porting it from non-touch screen to touch screen phones is too tough to make it a crowd-pleasing form factor. (The same problem also happened with Blackberry Storm.)
Why am I so critical about Nokia? I’m not a hater of Nokia though (nor a fanboy of its rival trying to attack Nokia as you may think). Considering the phone leader in the market, Nokia is very late in making a counter-attack on its rivals. (Maemo is a very competent contender from Nokia but its availability in only limited parts of the world while the competition is heating up doesn’t justify Nokia’s move.) Also, I don’t like Nokia’s uncertain stance on which platform it will promote as the next big thing. With the announcement of the Symbian makeover next year; if I were a software developer, I would rather wait and see which platform (Maemo or the new Symbian) will be more popular and worth spending time and resources developing applications on. As a consumer, I’d better wait and see the new Symbian as well before making a decision on which phone to get. Maemo is like an experimental device from Nokia. I view Maemo as a tool to buy the time from Nokia and to show that as a mobile phone leader, it can make a very powerful and sophisticated (yet immature) platform (similar move on Windows Mobile 6.5 is made by Microsoft but at least Mictosoft makes it clearer on the future of its platforms). Having played with N900 for a short time, I have to say that the phone works wonderfully as a mobile internet device but still needs some fine tunes from Nokia in terms of phone functions. While the N900 is packed with top-notch hardware, it still needs more nice applications in order to capture the vast consumers. That means Nokia has to try hard to attract software developers to Maemo platform and this task also takes time.
Let’s move from Nokia to Apple’s most loved/hated phone. While a lot of people still keep attacking iPhone for its lack in basic features like Bluetooth or multitasking, Apple’s iPhone has still not yet lost its popularity. It’s noteworthy that iPod has held its strong position as the most popular music player for years despite a lot of flaws. And now Apple is taking the similar path with iPhone. Is iPhone a perfect phone? No, it isn’t. iPhone still lacks a lot of essential phone functions and its closed and restricted system stops a lot of people from getting it. What makes iPhone distinct from the other phones is the large software library available. And I think its rivals still needs much more time before they can catch up with Apple.
With Samsung announcing the new platform, Bada; Mircosoft announcing Windows Mobile 7; army of Android phones from various manufacturers; and Palm webOS; the competition is really tough for both Nokia and Apple. It’s very interesting to see how Apple will overcome its design limitation and how it will improve its iPhone OS in the next update. For Nokia, the major tasks are re-designing its Ovi Store so that it is more attractive to use and reviving its Symbian platform to tackle its competitors. As I said, no matter who wins ultimately; we, consumers will benefit from this war.
This week I was so busy that I didn’t have time to write a blog. I think it’s also a good idea to post pictures I drew instead (the original artwork from the Internet). Any comments are welcome.
Usagi chan from Sailor Moon
Sasuke kun from Naruto
Britney Spears just launched her singles collection this month. For a decade in music industry, Britney has proved herself to the public that she is capable of being a great pop star despite her poor voice and tons of bad rumors. Her carefree behavior and unsuccessful love life both have added up to make her music even more fascinating and electrifying.
Becoming famous at the same time as boy bands and girl groups most of which are now extinct, Britney survived the crises of her personal life and thrives in the highly competitive industry with her pop music that still can capture the interests of young generations. She was named ‘princess of pop’ in the past and I’d say calling her ‘queen of pop’ at present is not an exaggeration at all.
The album includes the latest single ’3′, of which the lyric is explicitly about threesome sex. The song is an uptempo dance pop which despite its similar style to the other songs from ‘Blackout’ and ‘Circus’ is still full of energy and will surely be a hit. It is then followed by ‘Baby One More Time’, one of the greatest pop songs of a decade. I still remember the music video of young Britney dancing in a school outfit with two pony tails. That she sang and danced (with the innocent look) was so powerful and influential that it made her become a pop star over night. The other hit tracks like ‘Oops I Did It Again’, ‘Boys’, ‘Me against the Music’, ‘Stronger’ and ‘Toxic’ are also included.
In the standard version, there are totally 18 tracks arranged in chronological order. A couple of her popular ballads such as ‘Sometimes’, ‘From the Bottom of My Broken Heart’ and ‘Don’t Let Me Be the Last to Know’ are missing in the standard edition so I’d suggest the fans who want to get the complete set of her works to get the deluxe version instead. However, some may find that the standard edition with addition of her recent singles from ‘Blackout’ and ‘Circus’ are sufficient to define Britney’s pop music culture.
Currently there are so many pop singers in the market but only a few are able to sustain. With the rise of the phenomenal Lady Gaga and the attack of hip-hop music, it’s very interesting to see how Britney will tackle all these and come back in the next album.
I came to know of Scrabble for the first time when I was in mattayom 1 (equivalent to grade 7 in western system). My English teacher at that time, Acharn Supit, was searching for school players to attend the regional and national competition. I was very lucky to be selected and so I had a chance to know more about the game.
Scrabble may look easy and can be played by anyone who speaks English but in fact requires a lot of practice in order to be a competent player. To play Scrabble well you’ll firstly need to remember the whole set of 2-alphabet words. This includes a lot of weird words that you may not be aware of but actually they are accepted in the official Scrabble dictionary and allowed to be played in the game.
For example, aa means the hardened form of lava. I still remember the time I was traveling on a train from Suratthani to Bangkok and was playing Scrabble with my friend; one English native speaker passed by my seat and stopped to see us playing. When I played the word ‘aa’ on the board, he told me that such word didn’t exist and wanted me to take it out. we showed him the dictionary that we had but unfortunately the definition was written in Thai language and he didn’t seem to accept our explanation. He still argued more on the words like ae or ai. Eventually my friend and I had to neglect him and after a while he just left. Besides the 2-alphabet set, there are also 3- and 4-alphabet word sets that are very useful but not neccessay to remember all.
In Scrabble when you can play the word of 7 alphabets (all tiles on a rack) in one time, you’ll be given extra 50 points. Consequently, it’s very helpful to know some of the common bingo formulas. To illustrate, if I have 6 letters of s, a, t, i, n, and e, this is called ‘satine’ set. Whatever the 7th tile I get, I can form a variety of words easily and that means extra 50 points for me. For instance, I get the alphabet ‘r’ as the 7th tile, I can play the bingo words like retinas, stainer, or retains. It’s obvious that the more words you know, the higher chance you will win in Scrabble.
However, that’s not all about strategies of Scrabble. Serious players who’d like to join the competition need to learn how to count and check the alphabets. This will be help to predict what alphabets the opponent is having and thus you can plan your game and words in advance. Also, eventually when there are not many tiles left in bag, knowing the tiles that opponent has can even turn the game around.
Taken by iPhone's Camera
Although I don’t actually play the Scrabble on the real board anymore, I still play it once in a while on my Nintendo DS. (It’s very difficult to find very good players to play with. If your friends don’t know all the 2-alphabet words, they will feel very bored and cannot play any interesting words onto the board.) Recently I just got Scrabble on my iPhone and it’s become my favorite game of this month.
The iPhone version has better graphics and nicer interface than the NDS’s. I absolutely love the fast pace of the game and the new ‘best word’ function in which the game will play the word of the highest score for you. This helps me to play a lot of nice bingo words that I never know before. So far it is the best version of Scrabble video game I have tried. The only flaw of this game is just the limitation of iPhone being unable to do multitasking. I am very annoyed to have to quit the game to reply to my friend’s message or answer the call and have to load the game again from time to time. Overall, Scrabble on iPhone is truly a game that all Scrabble fans should give a try and I’m sure that most will love it. Another great game from EA!
(Warning: Parts of this post contain may contain some spoilers and people who haven’t watched the movie should take your own risk reading it! – like you would not be able to guess the story anyway )
The first time I saw the trailer of 2012 with my friends, I was very excited and eager to watch it in theater. It was wholly because of the great special effects that attracted me. I watched it with my friends on the first week it was launched in Singapore and our feelings about the movie differed to a great extent. Most of us enjoyed it except me.
In my view, 2012 is another repetition of disaster movies just like the Day after Tomorrow of the same director. The computer graphics are no doubt amazing and as grand as the animation studios at this moment can make. The action scenes are fast, startling but totally impossible to believe!
If enjoyment from loads of stunt scenes is the only thing you look for in a movie, 2012 will definitely be your favorite movie of the year. The director, Roland Emmerich, seems to enjoy putting the audience on the roller coaster and seeing us scream. The movie does succeed in that aspect because it is actually full of blasts and excitement. However, it fails sadly in terms of delivering convincing story and reasonable plot. There are so many flaws in the storyline that weakens the movie and they are very obvious to notice.
Screen Capture from the Movie Trailer
For instance, while the world is being devastated, how can a guy in India (who doesn’t know how to speak Hindi properly) use his cellphone to call the other guy on the other side of the world? Ain’t it supposed to have any signal? 2012 also delivers super cheesy and predictable dialogues which we have seen in so many Hollywood action movies. Heroism of the protagonist played by Cusack, who looked really tired and too old to survive in that kind of situation, is blatantly presented. As a formula, all the annoying or bad-guy characters get eliminated at the end.
All these kinds of absurdity has sadly made 2012 just another action blockbuster which will leave no trace in the audience’s memory after a week. However, looking at its huge success in the box office I am quite sure that we will see other apocalyptic movies like this coming out in the future. Personally I did feel exhausted after 2012 ended and didn’t want to hop on the same kind of ride again.
P.S. ‘The Road’ is another end-of-the-world movie that I plan to see. It is based on the book of the same name by Cormac McCarthy. The book is pretty dark and focuses on the aftereffect of the apocalypse and how mankind become. I love the book and would like to see how Viggo Mortensen (who impressed me a lot with his performance in ‘A History of Violence’) interprets the Father role in the movie.
