The Story of J (Introduction)

Beginnings

It all began with a book.

Robert Kiyosaki's "Rich Dad Poor Dad" and his ideas on how to remove yourself from the "Rat Race". It never occurred to this individual that his ideas applied to real estate and the laws governing this apllies only in USA.
It also never occurred to this individual that life will bring about lots of distractions and problems to hinder his progress to attain "Financial Freedom".

So it was thus that J was recommended to read this book and so it was on this fine day,  his goals in life were established and changed.

And he was happy, inspired and very much excited for what lay before him.

Getting to know J

Simple best describes J.

There is nothing at all interesting about him. He lives a simple and subdued existence and as the beginning of this story, is 23 years old and is serving National Service in Singapore.

His life has been one simple brainless ride all the way up till this point. He's dropped out of polytechnic after 2 years, not able to make it in a course decided by a coin toss between interest and security. Enrolled into National Service soon after and has always sided with the outcasts in school.

He doesn't smoke, drinks a little and at this juncture, is inspired to write a fictional high fantasy novel during his free time in the service. He loves video games and comic books, can live for extended periods of time away from social activities and is currently in his prime in terms of health and weight.

Looks wise, he's also just a regular Joe. You won't notice him in a crowd and you certainly won't want to flirt with him if given a chance. He doesn't have the aptitude to be particularly witty nor the charisma of a well bred noble. He does not have a great singing voice nor particular superiority in sports. He's just J....

His Friends

At this juncture, he has 3 long time friends.

M - A most irritating person who revels in sophistication, philosophy and delights in sounding high bred to the uninformed. In reality, he's a wonderful person who craves companionship and true friendship above all else. Despite meeting J in less then amicable situations and being treated with outright hostility, has somehow decided that J is a worthwhile friend to have. Maybe M's just a sadomasochist but that's difficult to tell. He's recently earned his Masters and will be moving on to greater things.

Al - Absolutely brilliant and smart. Al has been friends with J for the better part of 13 years at this time. Al is an enigma who obviously went through alot during his University life in Australia but came back changed and forever inspiring. The initial years of friendship were tumultuous with plenty animosity to go around but life has a sense of humor. He's always been there for J when it counts and J never forgets. AL is currently in the final stages of getting his PHD and is now officially an Australian.

AN - Another chance encounter that had lasted many years. Essentially from a completely different spectrum from J, AN belonged with the popular crowd in school but fate brought the 2 together and through repeated castings, forged a strong friendship based on many untold similarities. Another unlikely friendship from an unlikely time. AN currently works for a huge company and has a first class honors from a local institute. Great things await this person.

So how does a simple person like J get such high achieving friends?

How does this all play out and what is the purpose of this story?

That will be revealed with the next post for stories on The Story of J  (Revelation and Reality)

Club Med Bintan Pt 1 (Pictures and Captions)

Tanah Merah Ferry Terminal

Melancholy of Travel

Bintan Resort Pool

Bintan Resort Pool View 2

Outstretched Pavilion and Boundless Ocean

Watering Hole (Beers, Cocktails and Mocktails)

Pathway to Room

Our Room!!!

Simple and all encompassing

Seaview Bed

Television, Stereo and a Relax Coach

Coach with Seaview

Balcony

Flying trapeze (Yes, you can do it too)

The charming night view

Pre Buffet Buffet

Buffet with Singaporeans all around

Ocean

Spent hours just lazing around....seriously

Pu Tien Pt 2

I've previously reviewed this restaurant before and you can find my thoughts on it here.  The address and branch visited is exactly the same but i must admit this post is long overdue. The impression it left remains as it was a rather important day that i chose this place for. To be precise, i chose it for my future-in-laws and my family to meet and give their blessings for the marriage to come.

Since i've reviewed this place before, i guess i'll just go right into the food. To be honest, most of the stuff is above average with some just missing the mark. 

Notable positive mentions include the squirrel fish with its sweet and fresh meat which somehow managed to retain its texture despite frying, the sweet and sour pork which had adequate crunch and tenderness of the meat. The downside here is, if you have both dishes in one meal, the sweetness overwhelms so food combination is very important.

The honey glazed pork got great fans that day. Equal parts fat and lean meat, its braised to melt in your mouth tenderness without being overly dry. Again, as this was all in one meal, this sweetness really began to get to the guests.

The shredded pork meat bun retained its previous quality but i do wonder if its overly tenderized due to the rubbery texture. Still, this is a worthwhile dish to try.

The homemade beancurd had a nice soft quivery texture hidden within a thin beancurd covering. Melts in your mouth, not on your chopsticks while the final worthy dish went to the deep fried yam with duck which was a little salty but had a fragrant combination of yam and duck. The yam did overshadow the taste of the duck in this case though.

Seafood fried rice turned out a tad too dry for me. However, some liked it and felt this is how fried rice should be, dryish and lean. I prefer fried rice that doesn't give me the impression it was left overnight though. Personal preference.

The Xinghua bee hoon tasted as good as it had previously but i guess the beauty is lost in my second try with a bigger group of people. Its just one of those things where the first experience is the best with subsequent visits beginning to lose their appeal.

Overall, this place is still worthy of a visit. Enjoy the pictures below.

Deep Fried Squirrel Fish ($32)

Pu Tien's Sweet and Sour Pork ($15)

Seafood Fried Rice ($10)

Shredded Pork Meat Bun ($36)

Fried Pig Trotter with Pepper ($15.20)

Xinghua Bee Hoon ($12)

Pu Tien's Homemade Beancurd ($12)

Deep Fried Duck with Yam ($30)

Honey Glazed Pork ($30)

 Bill

 

Sony Playstation 3 Review

 

 The Playstation 3

I'm sure all of you reading this has some idea of what this system is and what the specs are, if you don't, you can check it out here. http://us.playstation.com/ps3/. For the purpose of this review, please take note that i'm only taking into consideration the following factors: Library, online support (Asia), functionality, durability and overall impression.

Retail price: $380-500 SGD

(Depending on the model and storage space chosen.)

Library:

Exclusive titles: Metal Gear Solid 4,  Unchartered 2,  God of War 3,  Demon's Souls, Infamous, KillZone 2,  Resistance 2, LittleBigPlanet, Yakuza 4 and Valkyrie Chronicles.

The exclusive games above are some of the best games you'll find in this current generation of consoles. All these are positively received by reviewers worldwide and scores are above 8.5 out of 10 for all the above. You may reference IGN.com, videogames.com or gamefaqs for user reviews if you don't trust commercial reviewers.

Third Party Titles:  Grand Theft Auto 4,  Final Fantasy 13, Dead Space, Red Dead Redemption, Nier Gestalt, Need for Speed Shift, Resident Evil 5, Burnout Paradise, Modern Warefare 1 and 2, Borderlands and Fallout 3

The above are the third party non exclusive games which are available for the system. These are cross platform titles so most can also be found on the Xbox 360. Quality of the games and transition between the platforms are now minimal but the Xbox 360 versions are slightly cheaper.

Both list above are games i am playing and still own, most of the rest have been traded in and sold.

Online Support (Asia):

Playstation has the Asian Playstation network while Xbox 360 comes with its Asian Xbox live support with Gold or Silver memberships.

One plus point Playstation 3 used to have is that it had a built in network adapter while Xbox had to purchase a seperate internet adapter to make it work. However, this is changed recently with the new remodeled Xbox 360 so at this point, the hardware is on equal terms.

Online support is still split based on the below:

PS3 - Free to play online with fellow PS3 holders. Updates on the Asian network is pretty terrible with many US online releases either coming in months late or never at all. Case in point, reference Dragon Age Origins. It has 5 story add on packs currently and till now, there's still only 3 on the PS3 Asian network. The US network has no such issues and comes with online video stall as well. Asia support is pretty bad here.

Xbox 360 - Only Gold membership allows you to play online with others. This costs approx SGD 89 bucks for 1 year. Updates and support for this system is better though, however, the online content is also more costly then PS3 when compared apple to apple.

Functionality:

PS3 is positioning itself as a new lifestyle equipment and comes packaged with software for photo viewing, is a blu ray dvd player, has video support, plays music and has online news support.

Xbox has almost the same functionality except blu ray support and thus far, i find the PS3 better for photo viewing and for movies simply because the software allows for better scanning and forwarding capabilities.

Durability: 

PS3 has been out for about 3 years now and i've already had to replace it with a new once because my previous PS3 died on me.  I bought a new one because quite honestly, i really like this system.

Xbox 360 faced the same issues with its 3 red rings of death but the new model is said to eliminate this issue so thats yet to be seen.

Overall Impression:

If i had to choose between the 2 systems, i have to go with the PS3 for its functionality and lifestyle component. Its also a lot more quiet during operation and has blu ray support which is great. The library of games it has is also quite extensive and currently, companies are jumping over to the PS3 for games developement as that makes the most business sense currently. 

Disclaimer: I have both systems at present and i like both of them for different reasons. Feel free to contact me if you have other questions about the systems i did not cover.

A little late but i'm back!

Dearest readers,


Kept you waiting haven't i?

Its nice to know that i'm still getting readers and hits even now when i haven't been writing anything for the past 9 months.

My life has moved on as usual. Things are getting more interesting and i'm actually getting married in a short time.

Time flies and true enough, a lot has transpired, changed and evolved. I'm eating less of the expensive items i used to post. Most of what i do try are just normal restaurants more towards the 20-30 sgd range. I've only been to Taiwan again during this time and that about all that is worth blogging about.

For video game lovers, i believe its time i took on the mantle to write a little about my games and the systems i have. This includes reviews of my Nikon camera and my lenses as well which i'll be posting in the near future.

Finally, i'll be posting shorts of a story i've been working on since 6 years back. Its wholly original to a certain extent and it belongs to either high fantasy or fiction, but its fully and totally owned by myself. For story posts, i'll include small recommendations of music to listen to when you read so if you can find it, good for you. As a rule of thumb, my favorite musicians for my work of fiction is Secret Garden. Their an awesome duo who are making waves now but i discovered them during my NS days when they were relatively quiet in SG and Josh Groban had not brought their song to mainstream. Its been that long.....

Anyway, glad to be back and i hope you guys will come back to read once a week at least. That's about how fast i can post new stuff anyway.

Cheers and happy reading!

Buddy Hoagies (Nice food, simple prices)