Well, I admit, that statement is an exaggeration. But really, just Google the word “how to be famous” and you have millions of websites and spamsites dedicated to “help you grow famous”.

This post is NOT a guide to teach you how to become a famous person, no, I don’t know how to do that because I’m NOT famous. But here’s an exploration of why being famous can be good.

You should know by now there are plenty of stories to hear on this blog. Here’s another one. ;)

Art, or fart?

My last post on Hyperminimalism Writing had gotten some pretty interesting comments. Many commented that it sounds like a Tweet or how things is nicer to be kept short and simple, but here’s one that caught my attention:

Sounds more like a riddle to me…or…well…the author is just too plain lazy. :p

No deny to that, really. We can’t say that he’s wrong, because to everyone of us with the average eye and mind, it does sound like crap and the author is freaking lazy to come up with crap.

But, lets make an assumption that Bill Gates one day say, “I like Hyperminimalism.” One single word will result in speculation across the net with thousands of tweets and retweets every minute scrutinizing the sentence from head to tail.

The Fountain

Almost one hundred year ago, a man submitted a urinal to an arts exhibition and requested for it to be exhibited. He named the urinal as “The Fountain“, and his rationale behind the artwork is on Dadaism philosophy, which disregards traditional notions of art and calling his Fountain “found art”.

It was rejected.

But that doesn’t stop from it launching Marcel Duchamp into fame. His Dada movement peers were angered by the rejection, and instead of making Marcel a fool of the time, he got famous as an avant-garde which made a major contribution in the 20th century arts movment.

The point is, if Duchamp did not have the network of friends and the level of fame he has around his friends at the art scene as a Post-Impressionist artist, he would not have survived the attack as he would be so lack of supporters. With a bit of fame and networking, it’s different.

You know what an editorial said about why Duchamp’s The Fountain is so important?

“Whether Mr Mutt made the fountain with his own hands or not has no importance. He CHOSE it. He took an article of life, placed it so that its useful significance disappeared under the new title and point of view – created a new thought for that object.”

Well, let’s not care about how that contributes to the art scene and how is that affecting the art philosophy today.

Our focus here is Duchamp’s fame: if it wasn’t because of Duchamp’s fame before, nobody could have given a shit about what he did, let alone defend Duchamp’s feats. Enough said.

So, do you want to be famous now?

Or do you already want to be famous? ;)

Today if you have a very famous blog or Tweet, you are pretty much guaranteed a good living from all the advertising offers or endorsements or free iPhones and Nexus One being given out for you to test. Not to mention you’ll probably have a few thousand followers watching your back, tweeting (pun intended) about your good moves and clattering about your bad ones.

Famous Spiderman quote, “With great power comes great responsibility.” But oh, power is something so hard to resist.

With the Internet and today’s development in social networking, being famous is a matter of strategy, time, and of course, luck. But I am not going to teach you how to, because I am not famous neither, and without the fame and authority whatever I said does not weight as much as what the people at Mashable said. ;)

Do you have anything to say about people trying to be famous? Or what’s your take on today’s fight for fame?

We’ve talked about maximizing your strengths on the previous post, now what do we do with your weaknesses?

We all have our bad times. Or perhaps some of us are already born with the certain disadvantages that put us a notch below the others. But actually, who is it that is there to determine what is normal or success? And how do we weight ourselves, is it from your heart, or is it from how others see you?

After watching this talk by Aimee Mullins on TEDs, I guess she gave us a very simple but powerful answer.

“It is not so much about overcoming adversity as it is opening ourselves to it, embracing it. Grappling with it. Maybe even dancing with it. Perhaps as we see adversity as something natural, consistent and useful, we’re less burdened by the presence of it. “

Dancing with adversity, making it your partner. Now that’s some new idea that we all can use.

Aimee Mullins: A Living Miracle

Image courtesy of Rams Sports Performance

Aimee Mullins was born without fibulae in both legs. In other words, she had to amputate both legs off when she was 1 year old, and theoretically she will have to live on a wheelchair for the rest of her life.

That’s what the doctors think.

And of course, as of all stories of all great people in this world, she did not buy that idea and made a miracle out of her adversity. She learned to walk using prosthetic legs by the age of two, and went on to do all what other “normal” kids will do — walk, swim, play, and run.

Oh yes, she can run really well. With her specially designed prosthetic legs she had set World Records on 100 meter, 200 meter and the long jump during the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. No, she did not compete with the other “handicapped” group, she competed with the “normal” bunch who had meat on both sides of the legs, just like you and me.

Oh, instead you’re wondering why she looks so pretty and hot, she did model for Alexander McQueen back in the late 90s. Yep, she’s a model. A hot one at that.

And that is determination. And of course, she did what she preached in this video: to embrace your weaknesses and dance with it.

I am a huge fan of TEDTalks, and this video is another reason why you should watch them.

“The Opportunity Of Adversity”

Accepting And Embracing Your Weaknesses

Well, I’m sure not every one of you are patient enough to sit through the 22 minutes of the video. Let me just summarize the story for you here.

If you have a weakness, or at bad times, accept it to be part of you, embrace it and turn it into an opportunity to do great things.

A lot of us know that we have our own problems. It may be a physical, mental or spiritual problem. And a lot of us chose to just nod our heads at it, and decide to tuck them under the bed or the old dusty chest of the unknown in our hearts and hope we’ll never see them again.

Wrong.

Running away from your problems will not make them go away. They are still there, and they will be back to haunt you no matter how hard you try to hide them.

And if the problems won’t go away, why not just accept and embrace it, and make it a part of you to be proud of?

I personally have problems of my own too. I have been living with the pain of arthritis for the past 15 years, and still counting. I do admit that sometimes I will feel that I can’t achieve what many others can due to my own problems, mostly physically, but I know that I can excel in other parts of life if I work hard (and maybe smart) enough.

Aimee Mullins achieved what many has deemed “impossible” and became a living motivation for all of us. Now, I am passing on the motivation love to you. :)

Turning “Disable” To “Poss-able”

At the end of the video, Aimee shared her version of the word “Disable”, different from that from the dictionary:

Disable, (verb)
To crush a spirit, to withdraw hope, to deflate curiousity, to promote an inability to see beauty, to deprive of imagination. To make abject.

Ant. To make poss-able.

Someone with problems is not disabled until you crush their hope. And you are not disabled until you have lost hope.

The day you accepted yourself as a whole, the day you have gained so much more. Perhaps more than many others in this world will ever find, because everything about you, including your weaknesses and problems, are special to your own. Keep them.

As we all agree, everyone in this world definitely have their ups and downs.

I guess I’m at the verge of my all time low record these days.

Please bear with me buddies, and I thank you all for supporting me through all the hard times. :)

As for why my life sucks, well for the curious, here are some pointers.

Image by Freddy Tan. He took this picture at Hanoi, saw the poor lil kitty tied to the lamp post. And he tagged me on this photo on Facebook. Gah.

Listen to me, for God’s sake!

Well, lets just say that it has something to do with miscommunication. If one party talks, you’ll expect the other party to listen, right? But when the other party talks, by the least of courtesy of course you have to listen too.

And someone in the family just talks and never listen. And that sucks.

Well you know, I guess this happens in many families. Not only in families, but in all companies, organizations or groups in the world. Someone has to be the (self-proclaimed or not) leader with a larger than life ego. But as long as the person is willing to put down the ego a little and listen, for once, he/she can potentially be the best leader among all. :)

So if you’re someone that talks too much and never listen, time to stop a while and listen for once. No matter how bad the thing sounds, no matter how hard it is to accept, if you actually listen, it will definitely be good for you, because whatever people say, they say with their hearts.

Even lies come from the heart. If you can tell that it’s a lie, it shows their heart, no?

So yeah… Please listen up, will ya?

Oh, anyway, the person finally listened up and the problem is solved… for now. At least for now. :/ Lets just hope that it lasts. (From my experience it rarely lasts long :x).

10 Years Sick And Treating It Today

Yep, after 10 years of having this medical condition I’m only starting to see the doctor today.

Juvenile idiopathic arthritis. I got it when I was young, having frequent joint pains everyday late at night or early in the morning or whenever it rains. Everyone called me the young-old-man, hehe. But oh well, I thought it was normal and not something big and thought it will go away when I grow up.

Apparently not. It’s still here and getting worse. When I saw the doctor yesterday she scolded me, “What the hell have you been doing for the past 10 years??”

Ignorance, perhaps?

The doctor said that if I have went to see her any later it might develop into something much worse than what it is now. While there are no cure for arthritis, there are still plenty of things that you can do to prevent it from getting worse.

So kids, if you have any pains or discomfort anywhere for an extended period of time, don’t think, go see the freaking doctor before it gets any worse. Seriously. No, any pain or discomfort is not normal, and yes even if you’re born that way doesn’t mean you have to stay that way for the rest of your life.

Trust the doctors, and trust me. :)

You want more emo stories?

Nah, I’m sure this blog is not meant for emoness. There are plenty of other emo stuffs that I would not like to disclose for now, but one thing for sure, I would love to thank my friends and pals who stood by whenever I needed em. They are really great friends that you can never find, only met and nurtured through time.

I trusted them. And I thank you all for trusting in me. :D

And thank you all for staying with this blog and continue to read even though I have been inactive for the past couple of weeks. I am still trying to settle down and chunk more time for blogging (and read-blogging), and while so, please, yet again, bear with me for my sanity’s sake.

In the meanwhile, if you have missed any previous posts, why not go on and have a look? Apparently, my obsession with male underwears gained the most attention from the search engines, generating 20-30 hits every day, huhu. I wonder why!

Have a great life, everyone!

Lets face it, we all live in an imperfect world. And in an imperfect world nobody’s perfect. When nobody’s perfect, there is no such thing as equality, because we are all too different from one another.

That is, in fact, the beauty of nature.

And lets face it, we all have our strengths and weaknesses. It’s not just our strengths or talents that determine how successful are you. Opportunities come and go, it’s also a matter of how well you can utilize your talents when the opportunities come to you.

There is a Chinese saying, “to be successful you need the right time, the right place, and the right people”. To put it simply, if you want to be good, you need to do the right thing at the right time, right place and with the right people around you.

Here’s the catch. You have your strengths and weaknesses. The trick is to capitalize your strengths and talents to the max, find ways to fix your weaknesses, and when you’ve done your part, you can just leave the rest to fate.

Image by felipebrito on Flickr

Always Be Prepared

As humans we can only control so much. We may try to meet the right people and source for the right place, but the right time is often out of our control. And who knows what Fate can bring you to, perhaps a better or worse state. You will never know when the opportunity will come to you, because fate weaves and interweaves in such manner that some of us manage to catch them on the spot, while some of us missed the opportunity because “we’re not ready yet”.

There’s also a Chinese saying, “you prepare off the stage for 10 years for a 3 minutes performance on stage”. If you don’t want to miss any opportunities because “you’re not ready”, then you have to prepare yourself for the war, for the stage.

There is nothing more important to be prepared mentally and physically when the opportunity comes. You may think that the war or the performance only lasts for a few minutes, but it is always the split second that you make your decisions, that you “do the right thing” that makes the difference.

Image by felipebrito on Flickr

Be Really Good At What You’re Good At

You know what you are good at, and you know what you’re not. If you want to be recognized by what you are good at (and not the other way round), you have to be good at it. As in, really good. You read up books, you go for trainings, you research and learn, you do it again and again until you’re really good at it.

So that when the time comes, when fate presents you with the opportunity, you will not miss it and do a great performance, to fight a great war, so that it can launch you to another level of success.

Of course, if you want it the other way round, you can continue to sulk in what you’re bad at and be really good at what you’re bad at. Then you’re pretty much prepared for failure. :)

Or you can fix your weaknesses and reduce them to affect you as as little as possible. As you know that your weaknesses cannot be removed totally, you can focus on your strengths to make them better, but not let your weaknesses pull you down.

Capitalize your talents, then the time will come

Eventually, your time will come. As long as you keep yourself open to opportunities, and as long as you keep yourself prepared, you know that one day you will do a good show, fight a good war.

One thing God is great at, is that He always give us chances to succeed. It is up to us if we want to grip onto the chances and use it to the max to yield great success.

It doesn’t matter if others are better than you. What matters more is how good you’ve done your part when you’re supposed to be doing it. And that makes a difference between a good person, and a great person.

So, do you think that you’re always prepared for a good war or a good show? :)

As I said, fate weaves and interweaves in a manner out of our grasps. My life has been going up and down pretty much lately, so sorry guys if I haven’t been active on the blogosphere. I will be back on track real soon, I promise!

I don’t know about you, but there are so many people in our lives that it seems that we’ve seen them forever, we’ve known them forever, yet we don’t really know them.

This might sound confusing at first, but take a look around you, it may be that guard that keeps your house and office safe every day, that nasi lemak seller that you buy your breakfast from every day, the bus conductor that gives you your ticket, or even that guy or girl that sits at that corner of the train every day.

They’re like the closest strangers, ever.

Sounds romantic and fictional, but it happens. There are so many people around us that we see every day, you may notice the change of their hairstyle, the new shirt they’re wearing, the new bag she gotten, the new phone he had, yet we don’t know even know their name.

They are the closest strangers, ever.

Image @Daviddesign on Flickr

It’s so hard to say “hi”

A tweet from @Available had illustrated this pretty well,

“at the supermarket, i’m afraid to talk to the person next in-line, yet on twitter…HOW ARE YOU?!”

Yeah, why are we so afraid to talk to the stranger around us in real life, yet we’re so daring to say hi to just virtually anyone on the Net?

Is it because that we’ve grown so accustomed to the notions that strangers may not be good people, so we would rather not take the risk and say hi at all? Instead, over the net you can say “hi” to anyone because they can never harm you, physically?

But then, isn’t that cold? Can you feel the chill now, the chillness of the urban life?

A word is all it takes to spark

If we’ve taken the first step to say “Hi”, we might have not been strangers anymore.

I remember that when I was young, I used to buy these noodles (Pan Mee) from this vendor almost every day. Eventually the aunties there grew to recognize me, and while we ceased to talk other than closing the deal, it felt warm inside that they actually know what I wanted even before I ordered.

Then one day, I said “Hi” when I arrived at the store. The auntie smiled back, and we sparked a conversation about my school, my studies, her work, her life. And what’s interesting is that she seemed to know so much about me, about how I grew up over the years, when I changed my school bag, when I got a new haircut.

We’ve seen each other every day, all it takes is just a plain “hi”, and we’ve grown to know each other a little bit better. Not so much of a stranger anymore, are we?

Customer relations, they say. Humanity, is what I call it.

Let’s not be Strangers, shall we?

Really, the world needs more warmth. It isn’t that difficult, really, just start with a smile in your face, and say “hi” to them. The person in the same lift with you, the janitor at the corridor, the canteen cashier, the uncle at the bus corner, the girl next class, the boy next department.

Who knows what might spark from the simple “hi”. But whatever it is, it’ll not be a bad thing, it rarely will. Ditch the newspapers or the goddamn news, the world has more good people than you think.

Hello, stranger. How are you today?

There’s always some magic about theater plays that you can never catch in the movies.

Perhaps it’s the intimacy of the stage, that you feel so close to the actors and you can relate to them so deeply as the play progresses.

Perhaps it’s the script and plot, that it is so concise to portray a story with the bare minimum, each dialogue is so well written that you get absorbed without the need for close-up cameras.

Perhaps it’s the environment and atmosphere, where the lighting and music are carefully cued and arranged that it makes you feel much deeper than watching people on screen.

Whatever it is, I’m a sucker for theater plays lately, and The Swimming Instructor is sucking me deeper into the whirl of theater arts.

It has everything, great actors, great script, carefully chosen yet minimal props made this intimate play at KLpac’s Pentas 2 a marvelous success.

Hours had passed since the end of the show, and I’m still lingering on each scene, trying to catch the layers of plots and morals embedded in every moment.

The Swimming Instructor

90 Minutes Of Sexuality Crisis

It was stated very clearly at the door notice, that this play is ADULT THEMED lasting 90 minutes without break.

And they really mean it. The 90 minutes flowed seamlessly without any breaks, intervening between our three heroes and heroine on the topics of love, friendship, sex and sexuality. The play is written by Desmond Sim, and he’s a genius to mash everything together into an intimate yet humorous play that explores the values mentioned with a very human touch.

He is a swimming instructor that is an object of affection by many, including this guy and this girl. He is floating in a pool of his past, torn apart and confused by a surprise, a change, a bad decision. And he tries to find an answer to stop floating in the past.

She is an aggressive rich little princess that wants things her way. She is loud and forward, actively pushing and making chances to get near to the swimming instructor that once helped her in the past. She does everything to get him. She wants him oh so badly.

He is a smart and intelligent guy that follows plans and makes decisions systematically. When it comes to love when systems and intelligence doesn’t work, he’s afraid to make a move. He sits and waits, and lets fate decide if the chance will ever fall on him.

Yes, there are homosexual elements involved. Gays, start marching! :P

The Swimming Instructor

Chances And Decisions

“Even if there is one chance…One chance that you can love, you must take it. Because the little chances we waste can change our whole life” -Guan, The Swimming Instructor, taken from Dustyhawk

Some people pray very hard and wait for chances to come on them. Some people fight very hard to get the chances. Some people did not expect the chances to come at all.

But what would you do when you have a chance, and how do you know if you’ve made the right decision?

As humans, we are prone to making bad decisions. And by chance, by vigor or by fate we will eventually be presented with crossroads that we’ll have to pick a route that will change everything. It’s devastating to be forced to make a big decision in a short spur of time, or even in split seconds.

You will never know if you’ve picked the right way, but one thing for sure, if you don’t grab the chances in your hands the moment it falls, the chances are you will regret it later.

What, do you expect to read more about the story here?

Well, fat chance! Go watch the show and find out yourself, hey, there are still 2 more shows coming up, you can still make time to catch them!

The Swimming Instructor
12 December 2009 (Sat) 8.00pm,
13 December 2009 (Sun) 3.00pm
RM38, free seating @ Pentas 2, KLpac

Find out more about the show at the Facebook Event Page here, or read about it directly from one of the actors himself, Niki Cheong over here and here!

If you’re into theater arts, if you love a good show, if you like some sexual innuendos, if you like to see a half-naked hunk on stage, if you love a lot of good laughs… Too many reasons to get your ass there!

Go and be enlightened, like me! :D

P/s: If you really want some spoilers on the plot, here’s the place to go! You’ve been warned! ;)

I have always believed that simple words or quotes, by anyone on the net, shows the zeitgeist of our time.

No matter how funny, how sad, how philosophical, how boring, how exciting, how stupid, how smart these quotes might seem to be, they do mean a thing. It might seem to be meaningless at first glance, they might not mean a thing to you, but when you’re looking at it, closely, how many things are happening around us, all of us, each second, each minute?

“there are many variables to success – reactive, manipulatable and constant. You may not control all, but you control one variable: yourself.” — Aldric Tinker

“Ideal drivers – road etiquette = Malaysian drivers.” — KLue Magazine Oct ’09

“I shit also no time ah… have to shit while I sleep and eat while I shit.” — Edward Chong

“The point is that education doesn’t work by teaching you things, it actually works by giving you the impression that you had a very good education, which gives you insane sense of unwarranted self-confidence, which then makes you very very successful in later life. So welcome to Oxford, ladies and gentlemen.” — Rory Sutherland: Life lessons from an ad man

“Commercial is everywhere because when things grow? they need funds and you and me are not willing to pay for it.” — reptilezsweden, comment found on Rory Sutherland’s video

“i don waNT make up jor~~ the skin will looked older and we will stop producing collagen if the foundation keep on blogging the pores……because the skin cannot breathe….the only solution is to use …* SKIN FOOD BB CREAM*!!!!! wahahhaaha” — Ellie Low

“- These wounds won’t seems to heal, this pain is just too real, there’s just too much that time cannot erase. I’ve tried so hard to tell myself that you’re gone, but though you’re still with me, I’ve been alone all along -” — Desiree Wong

That’s a confession one of my friends made the other day, when he came over to ask me how to burn MP3s into a CD.

I was shocked. How can someone not know how Mona Lisa or to burn a CD at this time of age?

After my initial shock, I was even shocked by my own ignorance.

Initially he came over to ask me to help him burn some MP3s he gotten from his friend into a CD so he can listen to them in a car. A good selection of classic Kenny G, Celine Dion, Jim Brickman, Boyzone.

He asked me, “Can a laptop copy MP3s into a CD?”

“Yes of course! As long as your laptop has a CD burner and the right software.”

“Oh… what’s a burner?”

I was baffled and paused for like 15 seconds before I answered.

As I was burning the CD for him, I showed him the wonders of Facebook and the many funny and interesting videos shared there. He doesn’t have a Facebook account, because he doesn’t know what is it all about.

“Oh, I’ve always wanted to ask…”
“Yea?”
“Who’s that lady in that picture? I’ve always seen here at a lot of places.”

Monalisa

I froze for a second.

“You… don’t know who she is?”
“Uhh… no?”
“She’s Mona Lisa!”
“Who?”
“This the famous painting by Leonardo Da Vinci! Don’t you know who Da Vinci is?”

“Uhh… who?” He was smiling sheepishly as I raised my voice.

“Da Vinci! Didn’t you read the Da Vinci Code book as it was the craze for the past few years?”
“Uhh… I think I’ve seen the movie poster before.”

I spent the next 30 minutes explaining to him who is Da Vinci, what the Mona Lisa is all about, some trivia about the difference of comic, illustration and art, and how to burn a CD.

For a moment, I was really shocked. He’s the same age as me. The computer craze generation. How can there be anyone who doesn’t know how to burn a CD at my age?

Then my conscience hit me. He is the same age as me, but we led very different life. I grew up in the city, he grew up in the country. He came to the city to learn pastry after his high school graduation, as he said, the school was all punks and he has no real good memories from it. He worked in a pastry materials distribution warehouse as a product tester, and turned to direct selling for more income.

He knows everything about spirulina and his vitamins and his cooking wares. He knows how to do facial, how to keep your face and skin good, how to live a healthy living with good food habits and good supplement intake. He knows how to talk and how to sell. He doesn’t know what is Restaurant City or FarmVille. And no, he doesn’t know how to burn a CD. Nor Mona Lisa, because he never read about her. Or anything that involves reading. His language of communication is Chinese, and that’s about it.

That’s the world of my friend. His world Now, who am I to judge him?

We all have to bear in mind, we’re all part of the luckier ones in the world. There’s probably 3/5 of the world’s population that has never touched a mouse before.

Well, on the other hand, they may have lived with mice and see them running around every day, while we squeal and shriek when we see one like every few months.

When he left that day, he thanked me for telling him who is Mona Lisa and teaching him a lot of things with that happy-go-lucky classic smile of his. I smiled back, closed the door, and smacked my head.

I shouldn’t have raised my voice in surprise. Who am I to judge him?

“Being gay” is a joke. Having a gay friend is fun.

Really being a gay, now that’s real fun.

No kidding. There’s a whole YouTube series dedicated to how fun being gay really is. Bring on the gay, babeh!

gay adj
1. Of, relating to, or having a sexual orientation to persons of the same sex.
2. Showing or characterized by cheerfulness and lighthearted excitement; merry.
3. Bright or lively, especially in color: a gay, sunny room.
4. Given to social pleasures.
5. Dissolute; licentious.

Well, the dictionary definition says it even. So being gay must be of real excitement, real cheerfulness, real happy, real gay, isn’t it?

Really, when you make fun of someone being gay, it’s real fun for you as you laugh at their gayness. But when you find out one of your friends being a real gay, there’s where the real fun begins.

Gays will always cheer up even the most depressed.

Gays will gay up even the most boring conversations.

Gays can have the most exquisite, refined, flamboyant or alternative tastes in everything that you can admire or laugh about. And they’re proud of it.

Gays can turn a straight to be gay. Ouch, that isn’t really a fun, is it?

Questionably Gay?

Seriously, I find gay life is fun. The ladies are more open to joke around with the gays, while the lads while might seem reluctant at first, still thinks of you with another guy, sans the man-to-man-naughty-funs or discussion about cars and football, plus the advice seeking in fashion and love life.

It’s not as bad as you think, really. As long as the gay and friends respects limits and understand each other mutually, that’s all that is needed for a happy gay life.

After all, gays can really be the best friends you’ll ever have!