Chinese New Year Wet Blanket

There is no such thing as a celebration without good food. Good food, by commonsense definition, is food that is neither good for your heart (or for that matter, all your organs, except for taste) nor waistline. So here is what the newspaper supplement has to tell us about the goodies that we stuff our faces with during Chinese New Year. Of course, I'll tell you what I think!

Fried battered nian gao (55 g) - 224 Cal, 5.4 g fat.
Nian gao, the gooey, glutinous mass of sugared flour cake, is a must have for Chinese New Year. It signifies "progress with every step". If you love to eat it, go ahead and eat it. Otherwise, do what I do - I buy it, display it, mould it and dump it.

Roast duck 3 (paper thin) slices (60 g) - 143 Cal, 10 g fat.
I think this is a conspiracy. All other times, I bet you the whole roast duck is 143 Cal! Unfortunately, roast duck is a perennial favourite year round and if your waistline doesn't seem to be shrinking despite your trillion crunches a day, perhaps it is time to reconsider to duck the duck.

Braised dried oysters with mixed vegetables and fatt choy (60 g) - 50 Cal, 4 g fat.
Dietiticians of the world ought to be shot! And then shot and shot and shot and shot... you get the message. Can you imagine how small a 60 g portion of this delicacy is? I cannot imagine that this is... ok, 50 Cal. It's not as bad a 3 paper thin slices of roast duck. But still!

Tossed fish salad (100 g) - 145 Cal, 11 g fat.
The tossed fish salad represents brisk business and many people go through at least a good handful of meals featuring this Cantonese favourite. One way of reducing the fat and calorie content is to avoid adding all the oil into the salad. Ask for half or a third of the bowl of oil to be added. Each gram of fat less could help reduce the calorie count a little. Trust me, it ain't that bad with less oil.

Chicken curry with coconut milk (220 g) - 342 Cal, 28 g fat.
I have yet to figure why anyone would eat chicken curry (a dish typically served to visitors at wakes) during Chinese New Year. It is as though the "heat" and the overly rich foods aren't enough to overload your poor stomach that you need to add to its burden by drinking copious coconut milk! I mean, aren't we happier eating pineapple tarts, bak kwa, kueh lapis, love letters and other artery clogging items?

Pineapple tarts (20 g) - 82 Cal, 4 g fat.
Kueh lapis (50 g) - 247 Cal, 19 g fat.
Bak kwa aka jerky 3 coin pieces (45 g) - 180 Cal, 6 g fat.
Love letters 3 pieces (40 g) - 172 Cal, 5 g fat.
One cannot help but need to place these four items together because almost each household one visits during the Chinese New Year will bombard guests with versions of these. It is hard to accept that a pop a mouthful goodies can be so chockful of calories. 82 calories for a pineapple tart! My goodness you tart! What hedonistic abandon! A slice of two bite kueh lapis makes you go for another and before you know it, you probably have eaten three slices. That's about the calorific equivalent of a place of wanton noodles! The other culprit for the grow in your hips moment is bak kwa aka jerky. Trust me - there is absolutely no f**king way to stop at 45 g. I confess I could polish off five times of that without breaking into a sweat! Melt in your mouth love letters are another of your worst enemies. Many friends can easily clean out half a tin - that's a whopping 30 pieces! Now, with these wonderful food friends, who needs enemies?

Other food items to add more dampener to your already dripping wet blanket:
Peanuts (20 g, about 15 or a handful) - 120 Cal, 10 g fat.
Melon seeds (8 g, about 1 tbs) - 30 Cal, 3 g fat.
Mandarin orange (116 g, 1 whole) - 51 Cal, 0.3 g fat.
Kueh bangkit (18 g or 3 pieces) - 69 Cal, 2 g fat.
Sharksfin with crabmeat (295 g, half a bowl or better known as two mouthfuls) - 162 Cal, 7 g fat.

I wonder why our bodies NEVER adapt to the better world we are in and learn to burn more energy with less activity. I am sure there must be a genetic flaw.

Meanwhile, Happy Chinese New Year. I hear the new wardrobe calling.

We can forget

Long before I switched over to my new touchpad laptop, I stopped synching my brick of a cellphone with my Microsoft Outlook.

The only problem I have now is that my GPS is not updated as I was unable to get the phone to establish an internet connection via my new PC.

Then he spent the entire afternoon and a good part of the evening first synching the phone against an empty slate and losing all my information, restoring it from a grossly outdated database - I'm still missing lots and worse I don't know what's missing, and then successfully updated the GPS program.

But meanwhile, I lost so much time to do things that would otherwise have put me in a better mood than I am now. I am in a terribly foul mood because I now need to re-input all my appointments, if I know where to find the info, and I didn't manage to get the use of the computer.

The short of the long story is this: We are able to actually live without updates or reminders from things we had in the past and we don't even know what we have lost.

We can forget. It's just whether physically, we are as ready to lose our useless tangible baggage as easily as our minds lost their mental burdens.

I shall continue to strive to streamline my physical belongings.

Everyone has an opinion

On politics that is.

The Taiwanese are about the most politically sensitive people on earth and it is no wonder. There is a vocal group who fights for independence and there is a more moderate group who is happy with status quo. The independent, nationalistic sentiments for the former is very strong while the latter group is more concerned about materialistic enjoyment and staying rich.

There is no correct or wrong in this little island province. Everyone just speaks of the need for an identity, each manifestation different from the other.

May is almost over

Hard to believe but May 2008 is almost over. I've left my job for more than a season already.

And the euphoria of not being held back by the unreasonable demands of a job still invigorates me tremendously.

Freedom Air... it's something I wish I would never have to give up!

Did We Get It Wrong?

She had to pass her N level examinations before she could be promoted to Secondary 5 to complete her O level examinations. Or, with the N level passes, she could have gone over to the Institute of Technical Education, where she could get some form of "tertiary" education. In any case, she had completed her 10 years of mandatory education, stipluated by Singapore law.

Yet, since she had decided to attend Secondary 5, an almost inordinately tough additional year to obtain her O level certificate. One of the reasons for the difficulty is in the difference between the syllabi to be tested at the two years. Another reason, which might or might not be true, is that while the O level certificate has international recognition, the N level certificate has none.

What's my point?

I was invigilating a paper where this student placed her head on her table and dozed off less than 30 minutes into a 75 minutes Physics paper. She was not alone sleeping in the middle of the paper.

Being a responsible invigilator, I went round waking people up. There was no way the 75 minute paper is going to be completed in 30 minutes. I couldn't even do it myself. And when I tried waking this thing up, she lost her temper and threw a tantrum.

I begin to wonder if we have gotten it wrong. If so, what went wrong? And finally, what are we going to do about it?

How is life now?

Very simple question. Very complex answer.

Two possible versions. I'll give the short one.

LIFE IS GOOD! In fact, as good as it gets.

Busy but fulfilling. Work is piling up and in shambles - just like everything else now - but there is a clear direction where things are heading. And best of all, I can turn down work that I don't want to do without fear of any repurcussions. This is important for me.

I so ain't going to be held hostage by months of bonuses now. I get paid a fair value for what I do. Or if the value is not what I ask for, I can decide if I still want to do it. Or I may do something for much less, if I like it or I feel for it or I want to do it. There is nothing more powerful than having a say in the work you do. Having the passion makes a big difference in your work. Mediocrity results otherwise.

The power to choose now resides with me. I choose joy, passion, happiness and love. The joy of living, the passion in doing what you love, the happiness that comes from the fruits of your labour and loving whatever that comes your way.

Life. You only live once. Decide wisely.

Don't Forget to Smell the Flowers!

Amazing what it means to become ordinary again.

This idea of becoming ordinary can be explored a little more in another entry but it is about having the life back in my life.

Purpose. Value. Honesty.

These are hallmark of the work I do these days. And despite doing three jobs to replace one, I have found time to smell the flowers.

The busy-ness is a fruitful one and it comes with happiness. And I now know why I am rushing and if I should be. One thing that I have been most relentless in doing is to gulp in breaths of air and marvel at the abundance of freedom, joy and lightness of being now that my loads are removed.

Indeed,

"There is more to life than increasing its speed." - Mohandas Gandhi

Man of semi-leisure

That's my new profession.

And I'm loving it.

I'm no longer chasing after rainbows or thirsting for power.

Instead, I guard my free time with my life and resist doing anything not worth doing.

I am still gainfully employed, albeit I dictate my terms of employment. I still get a decent amount of bread and butter. But I am no longer interested in cheap picnic ham in disgusting quantities. I prefer high class applewood smoked leg of ham.

In short, quality - and not quantity - has become the pursuit du jour.

I have time to do what I like to do and I have time to rest. To take a walk down a path and smell the flowers along the way.

I consider myself retired at this moment and what I am doing is really post-retirement stuff. Of course, I do not rule out beginning a second career, something on a higher plateau of human existence.

Power is addictive. But clinging on to power is like clutching at moonbeams. You cannot but be dictated to if you want to stay on your high perch.

Freedom and life, however, are very different but yet equally powerful things. Once you get them, you would never want to cede them. And they are yours to keep because you know how you can work things around to keep them.

Suharto's tenacity

I suddenly realise Pak Harto cannot allow himself to die. Not yet.

He needed to protect his family and perhaps the stashed away cash.

For that, he hopes his plight would move the people to pardon and forgive him. He hopes any debts will be written off before he go.

Or, he wants his innocence to be returned to him.

The obstacles that keep people from the last breath.

Sigh.