Introducing Roshni – 22 Years Is a LONG Time!

I am in a particularly bloggy mood this cool, breezy Monday morning and the largest most complicated topic I could think of immediately to talk about was.. ME. Man, War on Terror and Global Warming just lost out…
I am not trying to sound complex here but sometimes, what I say and do are just reflections of the multiple identities I have to appease. So this goes out especially to my native Singaporean friends or to those who are generally kay-poh (curious in Singapore slang). Understanding me.

Disclaimer: Its fucking long. Apologising in advance for the number of braincells that will contemplate harakiri at my pointless writing.

Verbal Catharsis

How’s the new look?

That is a picture I took in Monaco from the Royal Gardens. I love it because I was feeling contemplative and at peace when I was walking around alone over there. Nice, know?

Piecing things together never felt better.

Musing at Midnight

I am a completely selfish, self-absorbed, self-loathing, self-destructive individual.

Isn’t the mind an amazing thing? The things it makes you believe and the things it makes you doubt and fear. I sometimes feel like so many different people reside within me, fighting to have a say in what I (the eventual physical performer of the action) eventually do. How do you appease everybody? I sometimes end up just pandering to the needs of the most selfish person present then.

‘A good day only becomes perfect if you can share it with someone else’

- The Coma, Alex Garland

That little line really struck me last night.

I tend to isolate myself from people, hoping that my morose behaviour might not cloud their sunny outlooks on life. I am a lousy friend and a terrible daughter.

Is there such a thing as needing a lot of space and yet craving that human connection? Isn’t that a problem?

 

SingapuLAH! Why like you so like that?

It’s strange how an absence from this country changes the way I feel about it.

I spent my exchange with a lot of Singaporean Chinese people and ended up finding out that though I was brought up in Singapore and had all my schooling here, Singapore was still foreign to me. In my 18 years (let’s just take schooling), the closest I have gotten to Singaporean culture would be taking the PSLE, Os and the As, being kiasu and smattering my English language with ‘lahs’ and ‘mahs’. I hardly ate at hawker centres and supper is just not in my vocabulary. I almost never watched anything on Singaporean channels. I also never had that completely multi-racial friends circle. I have not dated like my friends after turning 17 and I think going for chalets and playing mahjong is an absolute bore.

But then again, that is their version of Singapore.

When I think of this country, I can’t help but smile. This is the only place I can go out late at night and not be worried about being mugged, raped or killed on my way back. I can travel everywhere I want by public transport and not feel a teensy bit sad that I don’t drive. It has a bit of everything even if those things were put there by some campaign to make our surroundings ‘hipper’. Also, just about any one can have a shot at the good life if they want. Whether the people actually take a stab at the good life is one thing, but the entry barriers to it are pretty low. (Well, I guess in comparison to places like India and China, the gap between haves and have nots is not that big). If we compare like for like, people in Singapore are pretty well off. We may not score on life satisfaction for being a people that seems controlled by the government and there are still quite a few draconian laws that do not seem to gel well with the modernity Singapore potrays. But in the end, this place has become endearing to me.

Then, there are the things that totally rile me up. There is a lot of change taking place in Singapore right now that is exciting but also very upsetting. I think it is too much change and perhaps a sorry compromise for the sake of progress and modernity. Just as someone else mentioned on his blog, Singapore is like Sim City. Things get demolished and built overnight and the city suddenly looks so different. Plus, it happens so seamlessly and quick. For example, the area around my place looks like an en bloc village. Every single plot of land has a sign that says ‘launching soon’ and in a few months time another building of concrete is going to shoot out from the ground. They just cut down this huge saga tree near the plot where my old primary school was located and thinking of that just made me feel so sad. We used to pick saga seeds there and have so much fun as kids. Also, the revamp of Scotts Shopping Centre and Scotts Picnic closing was depressing as that was the place where I hung out in secondary school with cheap pasta. There was this nice uncle who used to make mushroom la mian for me since I was veggie. And then there was the National Library. Now all that is now gone.

All this progress and rebranding is all nice since we get to enjoy the outcomes of it all. Yes, more jobs, more opportunities. Yes, Singapore is opening up and we get to have things that major cities all have (gambling, vice.. woohoo!). Yes, we are like up there with all the big boys! But it is sad that this has to come at a price. Memories, familiarity, certainty are all given up for progress and change. Just when I was starting to like this place a little better. Oh damn…

Anyways, I ran out of steam.

Thoughts for the day:

- I need a man.

- I should stop watching ‘Friends’ and feeling sad about certain things. I’m watching the Ep where Joey tells Rachel he likes her.

- Guys like slim hot girls. I am heading to the gym in 20 minutes.

- Oh fuck I am 22.

Transformers: The Review

To vary my blog posts and to avoid sounding like a pathetic self-absorbed over analytical poop, I decided to add a little something different. So here goes with my first ever movie review.

So on Friday, P and I went to watch Transformers HD at Orchard Cineleisure. It was a 1250pm show so there weren’t many people. I saw the trailers for Ratatouille and I am determined as ever to go watch it when it opens. It’s got my 2 loves, Animation and Paris!

The movie lives up to the expectations of all Transformers fans. There was a lot of action and a lot of transforming. haha. I was completely wowed by the action sequences and the computer graphics. Each time the cars transformed to become the different characters like Optimus Prime and Bumblebee (what?), I was thrilled. The detail that went to creating each autobot, as they call themselves, was awesome. My friend, being the gadget boy that he is, was in love with all the whizzing planes and the destruction wielded by the noisy, metal machines. It’s amazing how much they love seeing things crash and burn.

The story goes that there existed an intelligent robot species on another planet faraway. There was peace there until one of these badass robots got a bit power hungry wanting to invade and conquer decided to go over to take over Earth with the AllSpark, a decorated hieroglyphic cube with the energy to give life to machines. (This was superbly demonstrated late into the movie on a Nokia phone). So something fails and Mecatron, the evil robot crashes into the North Pole in the late 1900s and well, lays there frozen until this interepid explorer Witwicki finds him. Now, there is a race between the evil and good autobots to get to Witwicki Jr (Shia LeBoeuf) to get hold of the pair of spectacles which was his great grandfather’s. It had some coordinates engraved into it and they were important in taking over the world and the whole ‘if it fell into the wrong hands, OH OH!’ bit. [Ok I know the story retelling is getting a bit hazy, but I was getting a bit bored during the movie]

Besides the main plot, the sub-plots are pretty typical. Geeky boy wants hot girl. Boy and his trusty car (usually it would be an animal but I guess in this movie his crippled dog just provides some comic relief). Evil guys at every corner. The hot girl who seems stupid but has a bad past she is trying to keep under wraps. Additional elements to keep people hooked besides the action and the awesome CGI. But I just couldn’t help but feel that the lines in the movie were cringeworthy. Emotional scenes were sappy when they didn’t have to be. The femals in the show were spouting tidbits on car engines and sound wave mechanics without any conviction, it was obvious they had no clue what they were talking about. I guess the hot females (Megan Fox and a good-looking Australian) were there to even out the guy-girl ratio in the movie and make it clear that cars and robots were not some sacred gender biased topic. But I wish they could have made better use of them and brought out the whole ’she is a hot female but she has the brains to tackle us boys’ matter in a less overt way. Possibly by dressing down the female a little. Oh well, who am I to say anything.. the boys are their main audience and flashing some skin and wearing impossible 3 inch stilleto pumps to kick robot ass means nothing to them.

Josh Duhamel was just put there to make the mothers and girlfriends who go to watch this movie happy. Especially with him fawning over his ‘baby girl’ and talking to his loving wife. Shia LeBouef is the gem in the movie. Having seen him on Disney Channel and on other tween movies, I think it’s great that he has bagged such a big role. He is being touted to be the next Tom Hanks and I think he does have the makings if he manages to shrug off the loser roles that he tends to be given. He makes a great Everyman. I hope to see more of his work.

So all in all, it was entertaining and though I wouldn’t have paid 8 bucks to watch the movie, I was glad I got see my friend laugh and enjoy himself. So for that an extra half credit.

My verdict: 3.5/5