Boats, BBQ's and Brains

Yet another eventful weekend in the lazy-hazy days of summer in London.

Frank, my landlord, had the brilliant idea of going all out for the Henley Royal Regatta. Dresses, blazers, boat hat, crisps, banana cake, cider and champagne- fully confident of the equipage in tow, off we stumbled to Paddington (not fully awake as it was 7.45a.m.) to catch the train to Henley-On-Thames. Established in 1839, the Royal Regatta(not to be confused with the other Henley races i.e. Henley Women's Regatta, Henley Town Regatta), is a very 'English' thing to do in the summer where one would picnic on the bank of the river all decked-up in your best dresses and hats and have a glass of Pimms with strawberries, cucumber and mint and oh of course watch the boat races.

The festive atmosphere began even in Paddington itself as you could see almost every other person in their best togs and clogs. Train was filled with people all ready to have a good time -it was like a gigantic tea-party procession on it's way out to London all in the name of a boat race...amazing:P

The weather held out and finally turned sunny as we lounged on the bank of the river with champagne and watched the rowers speed by. Felt very posh ...



Then it was off to K's for a BBQ at her home. It was a real feast and great company in her cosy little flat. Lots of sausages, lamb in dijon mustard, chicken, vege-kebabs and such. The real fun began when K brought out the 'Cranium' -a hybrid between Ludo, Trivial Pursuit, Pictionary, Charades and Spelling Bee. I must say it was hilarious especially when it came to 'Cameo' and 'Humdinger' plays where the team had to guess the mystery celebrity or song. The girl's team won of course.

Thank you K and S for the good times:)

(p.s. Sorry I had to add these but they were so funny!)

Farewell to a Legend

Rest in peace now Michael, your work here is done.

Painting by Chagall - The Weepies

Nice summer song...

Father's Day - The Living Years

Mysteriously this song somehow ended up in my MP4 player - don't remember adding it. I first heard it on Radio 4 on the way to school in mom's car - I was Standard 5 then and half awake in the Mini Minor. The dee jay (one of the old schools e.g. Alan Zechariah or someone like that) introduced it in such a way that I still remember it today. But then, the song didn't have much meaning for me - being a kid without a care in the world except for UPSR exams

I listen to the song again and it has become powerful now - now that I've gone through the trials and heartaches of relationships with the people dear to me. Especially since it's Father's Day, this song somehow screamed 'Hear me!'. Life suddenly seemed too short for grudges and resentments.



The Living Years - Mike and the Mechanics

Every generation
Blames the one before
And all of their frustrations
Come beating on your door

I know that I'm a prisoner
To all my father held so dear
I know that I'm a hostage
To all his hopes and fears
I just wish I could have told him in the living years

Crumpled bits of paper
Filled with imperfect thought
Stilted conversations
I'm afraid thats all we've got

You say you just dont see it
He says its perfect sense
You just cant get agreement
In this present tense
We all talk a different language
Talking in defence

Say it loud, say it clear
You can listen as well as you hear
Its too late when we die
To admit we don't see eye to eye

So we open up a quarrel
Between the present and the past
We only sacrifice the future
Its the bitterness that lasts

So don't yield to the fortunes
You sometimes see as fate
It may have a new perspective
On a different day
And if you don't give up, and don't give in
You may just be o.k.

Say it loud, say it clear
You can listen as well as you hear
Its too late when we die
To admit we don't see eye to eye

I wasn't there that morning
When my father passed away
I didn't get to tell him
All the things I had to say

I think I caught his spirit
Later that same year
I'm sure I heard his echo
In my baby's new born tears
I just wish I could have told him in the living years

Say it loud, say it clear
You can listen as well as you hear
Its too late when we die
To admit we don't see eye to eye

If it's very painful for you to criticize your friends - you're safe in doing it. But if you take the slightest pleasure in it, that's the time to hold your tongue. Alice Duer Miller

Nelayan

Kala jala nelayan penuh, di hari-hari cerah nan jarang,
tongkol tampak bermain, mengisar pelangi nan pipih.
Kau lihat matanya: angkuh, namun sesat jua, dalam remang.
Kembalilah, kau ingin berkata. Kembalilah dari sedih

Kala laut gelap gamang, lesat punduk gelombang
mengangkat perahu tinggi, seringan anak panah peri
Kala kau terbang, semua airmatamu 'tuk sekarang,
kecuali beberapa yang, mungkin, untuk esok hari.

The Music's Always There With You

Lately I've rediscovered music in my life. She was an old friend that disappeared for quite awhile till we caught up - it seemed as if we lost no time at all.

It started when my parents (mainly mom) who'd put up with my sulking and put me through piano class at the age of 6. She used to pretend to be able to play a few notes on the piano and fool me into thinking she could (haha she's funny my mom)

I had a great teacher, Miss Diane GK Tan or 'Teacher' as I'd called her who tutored (ahem 'tortured') me all the way till I was 15. We still keep in touch and through her I even met up with an ex-piano classmate in London (whom I re-caught up with after 20 years). In school simultaneously, somehow I got appointed school pianist in the afternoon session and continued on my 'career' in the morning session in upper secondary school. Ask me to play the 'Negaraku', 'Malaysia Berjaya' and the CBN school song and I would mysteriously know how even if I haven't played it for 20 years. The fun times was with my best girl Angie who was leading the school choir at the time and we used to go through the drills of choir competitions. Then there was a short spell with Miss Diane Lee who tutored me through PC but because of the pressure of STPM, I stopped. I went off to uni and it was a long before I even had the desire to touch the piano again.



It was in the autumn in Umea and the cold, dark winter which led me to rediscover music again. The Swedish university I was in had excellent music facilities and it was not long before I found several good pianos to play on. It was a blessing that I was placed in a host programme where my mentor (Lorentz Edberg) was a music teacher at the school. I also had a 'sister' student in Valeria Graffeo, an Italian exchange student who was just as crazy and brilliant in music as Lorentz was.



I also spent an amazing winter/spring semester in the 'Skapande musik'(i.e. Creative Music) course with a group of normal, unassuming Swedish (and a couple of international) students.











Imagine coming to school every day just to play and make music with people who loved exactly that - it was decadent, it was hedonistic and it was too good to be true. Mostly I was impressed with the level of talent they had here - Swedes really do know how to get creative. To allow you to get a taste of how versatile these people are, please see some of their personal pages:

(all genuine music)

Malin Ernestad
Buns and Beans
Kapten Kid
Mates of Mine

And thanks to my fellow course mates, I have discovered the joy of music creation. 100% inspiration and almost all playing by ear - although I knew the chords and the notes, I discovered that one didn't necessarily need theory to create music. It was a new way of learning music which all my years of classical training didn't prepare me for. Now I can truly appreciate music form - which was a result of the complement between inspiring my right brain to create music and my previous left-brained piano training.

The skapande musik programme output from the students can be found here here



London being such a cultural city; I'm happily distracted by all the musical and creative activity going on here. Thanks to G too (whom I work with and who has a blues band of his own), I now own a little keyboard to play on and am slowly picking up the guitar (guitar hero too :P)




So in a way, this post is dedicated to all the musicians in my life, past, present and future - thank you for the music!

If I Ain't Got You - Alicia Keys

More 'English' English

Here's a few more colloquialisms in 'English' English I picked up - there's even some 'kata-kata ganda'

'Hokey-Kokey' = Ok

'Lovely-jobly' = That's good

'Easy-peasy' = That's a piece of cake

'Marks and Sparks' = Marks and Spencer's

'Heigh-ho' = Oh well

'Secret-squirrel' = Top-secret project

London Bridge Fantasia by Peter Marcan

Do not try to understand what this crazy turmoil of a place is all about, as it is quite beyond all understanding. Point of arrival and departure, human society here is so chaotic, so entangled, all on the move that no one can surely make head or tail of it all.

During office hours faces gaze out of a hundred and one office-windows, fists long to smash into smithereens a hundred and one computer screens; caged in during office hours, the home going time stampede of people who have become animals in a zoo let loose. At home going time, it is frightening to behold the savage desperation of so many people on their way out; do not scrutinize these people too closely; the young men may give you a karate chop in the stomach; the young women will cut you down with their withering glances.

You hear the music of Bela Bartok in this place; everything out of synchrony, jangling dissonances and frenzied inner despair; shrieking stumps of humanity, bodies lurching forward, minds crushed into nothingness.

"Promise me you will practice your Bartok," said the artist Mike Challenger when I visited him at his studio home in Park Street; and after our meeting when he played Bach preludes and fugues to me, we went out and heard the squeals of incoming and outgoing trains, felt the abandonment of the market emptied of its traders, yet still full of intangible energy, and saw the desperate gregariousness of people away from their work pouring drink down through their throats in street corner pubs.

In My Ghetto

Six a.m. he ambles down the street
Had too many beers in a row
He's not sure if he's coming or going
Lost his footprints in the snow

Six a.m. she's back from the beat
Some dollars and pennies in her bowl
She's not sure if her child will weep
But it don't matter anymore

Oh it's a cold dark morning
Over in my ghetto
But if I keep on walking
I know I'll come back home

There's a church in the corner of the street
It's lamps are burning low
It's bells are silent, incensed melody
I think there's no one home

Oh it's a cold dark morning
Over in my ghetto
But if I keep on walking
I know I'll come back home

SE1 Drag

V wanted to go for Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. Subsequent a nice lunch, it was happenstance that we came upon La Cage Aux Follies passing through the Golden Jubilee Bridge but J didnt fancy a musical.

We then trawled around SE1 for suitable entertainment i.e.another morsel of live music session at the NT and decided upon a main course of Sam Raimi's 'Drag Me To Hell'. Went through the wrong theatres (BFI and IMAX) and had to 'drag' ourselves to Surrey Quays to finally see it.

Boy, what a funny movie it was. Funnily frightening. Sam Raimi's despotic dark genius resurfaces once again in the vein of his 'Evil Dead' series. I'll never look at a handkerchief the same way again.

People Get Ready

"People Get Ready" was polled by Rolling Stone magazine as the 24th greatest song of all time. The song was included in The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll.

Written and composed by Curtis Mayfield in 1965 for the The Impressions, it has become a standard in blues and rock and roll covered over the years by Bob Marley (as "One Love"),Dionne Warwick, The Everly Brothers, Jeff Beck and Rod Stewart (this version reached #45 in the US), Phil Collins, Jimmy Little, Eva Cassidy, John Denver, Steve Perry, U2, Aretha Franklin, The Walker Brothers, Margaret Becker etc.

The version I include here is Eva Cassidy's which is just as soulful as it is since the 60's.

Daily Billboard - March to May 2009

I think billboards are a great indication on what's on the minds of the British people and what's going on with the UK. Being such a poor newspaper reader, the only bit of news I'd get is the billboard on the walk to and from work. Talk about a 'sound' or in this case a 'sight' bite. In case you wanted to know what made the headlines in a particular newspaper in the UK (i.e. 'The Evening Standard') in the months of March to April 2009, here I present my personal project of 'The Daily Billboard' - self-explanatory

Bank Holiday Weekend

As opposed to the multitude of public holidays Malaysia, the U.K. has merely the 3 Bank Holiday Mondays, Christmas, New Year's Day, Good Friday, Easter Monday.

The 25th May Monday was the Spring Bank Holiday thus the long weekend - spent in London with friends and parks as we were blessed with the sun after prior dreary days.

Friday

Kicked off with a Tudor and Stuart Southwark Walk from Betterbankside Community with A. We were briefed on the locations and history of the Bull baiting arenas and theatres. The highlight of the walk was the archaeologically-significant find of the Rose Theatre - a fascinating look at the entertainment of the Tudors and Stuarts. Apparently Southwark was the 'Soho' of London then.

Not having had enough of walking, A and I decided to have our own DIY walk of London. For some reason, A wanted to do 'Seedy' London i.e. Soho and then to Camden. We wandered around Soho and ended up in a gay bar and had a half-pint. Not far off in Tottenham Court Road while topping off our oyster cards at the Underground, we had a good look of the night-goers in London - a melange of people wandering around in all shapes and sizes. Groups of youngsters; boys and girls mostly drunk, women tottering on heels, dodgy-looking older men standing around and chatting, an odd older couple walking arm-in-arm, a lost and crying barefoot girl on the street. Take away the 20th century clothing and dress them in 16th century Tudor ones, the vibrations of the night would have been the same I think - a sort of chaotic desperation in it.

Saturday

Amy, Bakthier and I went off to Oxford street for the Night at the Museum 2 launch on the streets. It was crowded as usual - one of the reasons I don't really like Oxford Circus. Amidst the carnival-like atmosphere nevertheless, we did a bit of shopping and topped it off with some photographs with some characters from the movie.

Later on, met up with D and friends for a Malay movie called 'Zombi Kampung Pisang'. It wasn't half-bad - 'campily' entertaining despite the fact that Sharon and Roz thought it was rubbish. Surprisingly the cinema had quite a number of people and everyone of them stayed till the end. I wasn't sure if the non-Malaysian audiences appreciated the 'Bintang RTM' and 'Siti Nurhaliza' jokes but I sure had a good laugh. Later on, it was coffee and tiramisu in a cafe on Leicester Square and we had an interesting discussion on Malaysia, race, politics and culture. The couples very kindly dropped me off home on the way back to the south.

Sunday

Had a field day today with Jasmine coming down again for a visit. We did some baking with Jasmine's yummy Pine Nut cake and my Poppy Seed Bread for the afternoon. And being a Sunday as it was bank holiday or not; had a compulsory siesta before heading off to Battersea Park armed with crisps, drinks, cake, bread and fruits. The weather was glorious and we were warmly welcomed by P (who had arrived earlier) at the Bandstand and a blanket on the grass.

The scene: families talked, friends lazed, children frolicked and couples embraced amid the greenery of Battersea. Memories of Parco Sempione were also evoked (one of my fondest) - a blanket, some food, good company and laughs. The bugs were also out with some of them wandering up our nostrils and into the chips but it was all in the picnic package. We then got up for a stroll around the park and Jasmine said "What a luxury it is to walk with friends like this"

With that, we felt that summer had truly arrived.

Monday


What better way to end the bank holiday with a little razzmatazz pop-jazz with Julie Mckee and bassist Andrew Malloy. It was an ear-opener, an education in jazz standards and an inspiration for original piano compositions. Julie was a pro with clear-as-a-bell vocals and snazzy piano riffs. Her repertoire for the evening was carefully chosen with songs with beautiful lyrics i.e. Louisiana 1927, Invitation to the Blues, People Get Ready, Roamin in the Gloamin and her own songs: What a Woman Shouldn't Do,It Just So Happens, Eric Marlow, Mount Vesuvius and a few others. Absolutely mesmerizing

Life in London

Life is London sure is hectic. I came back from Lake District not too long ago and thought I'd have a little respite from the evenings after work but since then I've almost never had some time at home due to some friend coming over or doing this and that.

The team had a dinner yesterday and Jason asked me how I found life in London. My liner for this is "Life from one big city to another is not much too different so it's pretty easy to fit in" Though I'd never believed it would be possible without your own transport but living here has made me realise it is. London's transportation system is one of the most effective and efficient in the world and I'd have no qualms going out and worrying if I'd arrive at the destination wherever that was without wetting my underpants due to the long journey.

Inhabitants are spoilt for choice too with the variety of cultural activities. In the past months I've been to plays, musicals, a book launch, meetup groups, live blues performances, museums, a variety of restaurants - you name it, we've got it. Although the culture-lover might have to rein in or you'd find yourself skint at the end of the month. Information is also well channelled via newspapers, the internet,magazines - which is a contributing factor for I remembered once when some expatriate from Slovakia living in Malaysia once complained to me that nothing cultural ever happens in KL - though personally I felt that was an unjust remark as I myself was actively attending plays, open mics and book readings then. It was just that the information was not disseminated as effectively as they should have i.e. mainly though discussion lists and word of mouth and merely hanging out with the 'right' crowd.

The best bit I love about London is the free library service by the local councils. And the books, DVDs and CDs are top class too - no silverfish eaten pieces of scrap paper (which our National Library serves). The books starting with 'God of Animals' upwards which you can see on my left column on this site have been generously loaned by the Libraries of Ealing and Southwark Council - thus my gratitude to the taxpayers of the land for the opportunity to satiate my literary appetite.

Where No Man has Gone Before

I'm glad I watched the new Star Trek movie. I'm quite a picky movie-goer in a sense that I'd hate slam-bang mindless action and movies with poor script would irritate me no end.

I had high expectations of this one since I've heard so many good reviews from friends who had watched it and I'm happy to say that they were equally met. A cleverly written story plot by Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman(The Island, Transformers) and a very strong and funny script - this pillarizes the new Star Trek into another successful sequel for the franchise. Do not be fooled by it's sci-fi genre; yes, it does have it's CGI moments but it is very much still a character-driven sequel. The nuances and norms of Star Trek would thrill existing Star Trek fans and not side-line the non-vulcanized movie-goers thanks to J.J. Abram's intelligent direction. It's amazing how an old tale could still manage to be 'sexy' and 'cool' with a little thought and effort. If only all sequels were made like this.

A little note on the side:
I can't claim to be a Trekkie i.e. haven't attended a Star Trek Convention, owned a Klingon mask nor have a Federation spandex suit in my cupboard. Nevertheless I've been 'taro'ed left and right for being a 'geek' for wanting to watch it. If something has that much resistance, then it must be that good(has and will - even after 43 years. Star Trek, may you live long and prosper!)

Little Dragon and The Forgotten Circus

More in my ambient music collection


This one is thanks to S again.

Music: Little Dragon
Song: Twice
Clip:Dreams from the Woods
Directed by: Johannes Nyholm





I saw this one at my first patronage to the Shunt and it has stayed in my mind, slinking serpentine in the pool of sub-consciousness


Music: The Irrepressibles
Song: In This Shirt
Clip: The Forgotten Circus
Directed by: Shelly Love

At the Ascot Races

The Hat:
And I thought I was colourful. Sat in the bag for sometime but when my mistress finally took me out, there were others who were more flamboyant than I was.


The Horse:
I like my name - most horses don't really care what their called but it gets my owner bets. I like it too that I'm running with the other horses but I get really disappointed when I end up last. Wish Ed would stop whacking me so hard on the butt too.


The Gambler:
How much do you wanna bet? I think this one's gonna win.



The Bookmaker
Look at these Chinese tourists. Sure get a laugh out of some of em. Asked for 'three way'....'Each way' he meant. Don't mind a 'three way' too ho ho.

Tell Me It's Not Over - Starsailor

p.s. Dear S you can stop harrassing me now - see I've done it already -next one please