*Warning … plenty of Last Samurai spoilers.

Watched the Last Samurai last night. I don’t know, I just don’t seem to be able to enjoy that movie. I think it was very cheesy. Comparing to great battle themed movies like Braveheart .. The Messenger … Saving Private Ryan … or maybe The Patriot, … the Last Samurai looked like Sesame Street to me.

It was frivolously produced. The fake blood looked fake. The bullet ricocheted like catapult marbles. The battle scene looked very superimposed, which to my opinion, is far more cheesy than an Ultraman battle scene. The storyline is lame too. Goddamn it … avoid this movie if you plan to watch it.

I particularly felt miserable about the last part … where Tom Cruise were hit by a 400 rounds per minute crank operated minigun, fell down from a full speed running horse, … and yet, he’s still able to perform harakiri for his pervert-looking samurai leader buddy (i forgot his name). I bet he would even have enough strength to perform a round of macarena. HE SHOULD HAVE BEEN DEAD LIKE THE REST !! If he’s meant to live … then DON’T MAKE HIM GOT SHOT AND FELL FROM THE HORSE !!! Damn goofy.

And after all the drama in the battle scene, and lost real hard at the battle, I thought the enemy would actually kill Tommy straight in capture … or perhaps torture the daylights out of him for being such pain in the ass. But no. Instead, we would witness the entire platoon of carrot heads bowing to those infidels (this is what they think) in deep respect … as if the samurais’ deaths have smacked the conscience out of them … that killing is a bad thing to do. Baahhhh !! What kind of stupid shit is this ?

As if all these are not bad enough, the enemies would groom Tom Cruise back to his captain uniform (after he has betrayed the emperor by becoming a samurai), allow him to meet the emperor … impress the emperor with his pretentious bushido spirit .. and finally foil the evil tyrant’s plan to make Japan a country ‘that forgot who they are’. And with that, our Tom Cruise will become a hero in his own way … where he will forget himself, and rode back to the remote village to screw the Japanese girl who used to hate him so much (coz Tom killed her husband in a battle).

Plenty of craps in there I think. Like I said, avoid this movie at all cost.

Emily’s father - my father in law - is a very nice guy. I am a very nice guy too. But … i don’t know why, I don’t seem to be able to get along with him. Theoretically, we’re both nice guys … and getting along should be an easy matter.

Everytime I went back to Emily’s hometown to meet her father, our conversation would just be limited to 3 topics - each would be sub-limited to only 1 or 2 sentences. 3 the most.

1) standard greetings
2) work schedule
3) weather report

Let me walk through a typical conversation situation between me and him.

F.I.L : “Hey mike. Just arrived ?”
[this is his trademark standard greeting]

Me : “yeah.. just arrived. Traffic jam.”
[this is my trademark reply]

F.I.L : “Not working today ?”
[apparently, he had an impression that i'm a busy guy]

Me : “No. I only work till Friday. Usually off on Saturday”
[I have been telling him the same thing for the past few years]

F.I.L : “Oh .. work only 5 days a week ?”
[he acknowledge that fact .. but he will ask again if we meet in future]

Me : “yeah… I don’t work on weekends”
[again... my trademark reply]

This will be followed by an approximate 20 second pause - out of topic. I will then make a futile attempt to re-live the whole conversation

Me : “Hot weather… not much rain lately ?”

F.I.L : “Yeah. How bout Penang ?”

Me : “Just occasionally. It’s also hot there”

And that weather report marks the end of our conversation. It’s pathetic I know. And this has been the same for the past few years. I just do not know how to chat with him like the rest of my buddies. Maybe I’m not that good with old people.

Last night when I went back to Emily’s hometown (for Jade Emperor festival celebration), marked the very first time we did not use the same boring and pathetic routine of conversation anymore. Instead of giving me the usual standard greeting, he just greeted me with a smile … and said “welcome home”.

And I know, the problem is with me. Maybe I’m not that nice after all. Maybe I should try how to get myself used to talking with old people … because I am turning old myself. *cough cough*

I walked from the crowded carpark towards the restaurant building. There were no stars up on the sky that night. The only thing the shone brightly that night were the lonely street lights .. and the blinking bunch of 100 watt bulbs of the restaurant’s neon board.

I promptly took out my handkerchief to wipe off the sweat accumulated on my forehead — the long sleeved D&G shirt was too hot for me. Then, I suddenly stopped. Right before the carpet with a big “Welcome” word on it.

My leg went numb. Paralyzed. Vegetabled. I can’t bring myself to walk pass that evil looking piece of carpet. I stood there … felt like shit. Do I really want to go in there ? Do I really want to make myself look like a fool ? And for the 5th millionth time, my heart assured me that it would be just another banquet that I’ve attended many times before.

I took a deep breath, and waltzed towards the banquet, with the envelope in my hand. There’s a female reception right at the entrance, registering guests and collecting gifts. I recognized that face. It’s her moron cousin, Chu-La. Other than her Sophia Loren tits, there’s nothing impressive about that Chu-La. I passed her the envelope and a big red packet with a congratulatory wish on it.

But I did not put money in the red packet as I always did on a typical chinese wedding banquet. Instead, I put in some pamphlets, brochures & leaftlets alike .. that had been spamming my letterbox for the past 2 weeks. Serves her right for leaving me anyway.

I slowly walked through the happy guests at her wedding banquet. My emotion was mingled with both hatred and nostalgia as I walked. I felt as if I’ve lost my ground to stand on … as if I’ve lost a reason to live. I felt like I’ve been robbed of my trust .. dignity .. and the precious feelings that I’ve generously shared.

In the midst of my melancholic drift … I stumbled onto a folded carpet which sent me airborne. I landed hard onto the floor but luckily, no complications of any sort, albeit some pain on my collarbone.

The embarassing situation attracted some attention from the main table - to which, I saw someone very beautiful walked over to me. It was her.

“Are you alright.. mike ?”
“I’m ok … physically. But mentally, I’m scarred for life”
“Oh… don’t say that mike. It’s fate.”
“Fate your bucket head. You left me”
“Ok … I left you .. but you should have move on already”
“U brought it up first.”
“Ok .. [smacks head]. I’m glad that you came to my wedding tonight”
“…..”
“And you looked good in this D&G shirt I bought u ..”
“Yeah.. I felt cool in it…” [wipes sweat from forehead again]

I don’t know why I did not berate her out of my emotional breakdown at that very moment. Maybe she looked too drop dead gorgeous in her evening gown — and deceived me from treating her like a tramp. I then stretch out my hand and offered her a congratulatory wish and left the banquet, without settling down for the banquet dinner …. because……
……. the food looked really lousy and cheesy. I lost my appetite by just looking at the food.

I proceeded to the nearby 24 hours curry rice stall for some serious hoovering … and start my life anew.

THE END

*I’ve been very free in the office this afternoon … as my company is preparing for it’s quarter end this week. So, I tried to look busy in front of my PC by writing something out of nothing at all. Again, this is a fiction.*

*This is one of the stories of my working experience in an advertising firm called Libra during my school holidays circa 1992. I was 15 then.*

The workshop that I worked in Libra was situated at the very top of the building and had 2 staircases leading up to it. One being the main staircase, and another secret staircase (which was off-limit to everyone) directly linked from the boss’ office.

The boss and his first wife (Miss Wong) would use that secret staircase to pay us surprise visits from time to time. And we would be damned if caught shirking inside the workshop. Of course, that never happened ..that was because we had eyeeeesss around the premise. Alright, that was the introduction of the secret staircase. Here comes the main plot.

The boss also have a son and 2 younger daughters. His son, was a very cool guy. He would sneak up to the workshop every now and then, and romp around with us. No issue with him. But we had problems with the boss’ elder daughter.

The elder daughter (let’s call her Denise), was about 1 - 2 years my junior (about 13 yrs old), while the younger one, ….. let’s not bother about her. You see, Denise was a fat and fugly creature, with a bad attitude to boot with. She’s as evil as a homicidal plastic demon doll. If she sees us shirking, she will go all out to complain to her mongoloid father … the boss. That was why, our ring of cronies inside that workshop never actually liked anyone from that Wong family (except the son).

After I started work at Libra for about 2 weeks, my fat cousin brother - Kelv - joined the company. Just like myself, he worked as an apprentice in that workshop and we had a great time working together.

One day, the weather turned very hot all of a sudden and it was unbelievably stuffy inside the workshop. So, all of us decided to take off our shirts to bear with the impending heat. The idea was unfavorable to Kelv as he didn’t really like the idea of showing too much of his doughy physique overtly like that. But he was left with no choice, as it was freaking hot in there … After about a while, coupled with the abusing taunts from Johnson (the guy who ‘introduce’ me to Miss Wong) and myself … he finally stripped. Alright .. took off his shirt.

Kelv was kinda worried about the idea of Denise storming into the workshop to find him half naked like that, so he kinda asked us to be on the lookout for her… and woot him if she ever appears within the range of sight. We’re like, alright man, don’t worry about it, go do your work or something.

Fast forward a few moments later, while myself and Johnson were busy checking out each other’s abs and packs (boys always does that), we heard some footsteps coming up from that secret staircase. Johnson peeked over from the top and saw Denise was working her way up from below. Kelv was busy doing his work and was completely unaware about her impending appearance.

The rest of us conspired to keep quiet about it and were determined to see how would he react when Denise set her eyes on his Michelin man figure and his corpulent 34C lard filled tits. The anticipation grew as Denise ascended near where Kelv was happily working on his stuff… and some of us already started to build enough pressure to rupture our colons from stifling not to laugh.

It wasn’t long before Denise finally made an entrance to the workshop, and was wondering where did everyone go. She did not see us because we’re hiding behind one of the big ass benches… scoping the entire incident from vantage point. Then it happened, Denise walked over to Kelv to ask him where are the rest of us. Kelv shrieked (he actually did it like “Eeeeiiaaaaiii !!”) and bolted into a nearby storeroom… slammed the door shut and locked it like he was being chased by a gay werewolf. Surprised, Denise then ambled to the storeroom door, knocked and asked him what the hell was wrong with him. With a terrified voice, Kelv bleated “go away ! go away !” from inside.

The entire episode triggered a massive laughing fit from the rest of us. Cramps, tears, drools, phlegm,.. you name it. It was a day that Kelv will remember for the rest of his life … and I haven’t seen him take off his shirt in public ever again.

Had my breakfast with Blackie and Doug this morning. Again, Blackie flexed his stupidity by debating about the recent chicken flu panic. First, he claimed that the chicken flu virus/bacteria (or whatever micro-organism that causes the epidemic) would not survive temperature over 70 deg C.

Well, I told him that there are very few people in this world who are willing to eat their chicken raw … with exceptional a few cases of misjudgment during a barbeque party - where one might accidentally eat a not thoroughly barbequed chicken. So, theoretically, the risk should be quite minimal.

Then, I further quoted - if we cook our food properly everytime, any micro-organism that dwells in our food .. will surely die and we’ll have lesser chances of contracting diseases. This was where the interesting part came — Blackie vehemently protested my claim. He said that he ‘knew’ of a kind of bacteria that only can be killed at 110 deg C … which means … if we cook our food … it will not die - because our food cooks at 100 deg C.

I had to lambaste that undeveloped brain of his. I challenged him …

“what makes you think our food cooks at only 100 deg C ?”
“because water boils at 100.”
“water boils at 100 and our food also cook at that temp ?”
“yes. And that bacteria i’m talking about won’t die.”
“and you only cook your food with water ? nothing else ? salt ? soy sauce ? sugar ?”
“…..”
“did u know that the boiling temperature increases when there are impurities in your water ?”
“huh ?”
“damn it .. did u study science ?”
*furious* “ok … maybe more than 100 deg C .. but definitely not over 110 deg C..”

Fuck him. I gave up the debate - coz if he claimed he ‘knew’ the bacteria - that bacteria is probably his good friend. He won’t give up and admit his mistakes. What a loser.

I wondered what’s the panic all about. 8 deaths and they are making it an international headline. Fuck. There are thousands of cancer deaths related to smoking each year … and it’s ironic why they did not create a commotion of such magnitude.