Votre Coeur

Hong Kong Causeway Bay street

2010-09-03T22:27:00.000+08:00

Another Set

2010-06-05T16:28:00.000+08:00

When I have enough sleep at 10pm...

2010-05-22T23:53:00.000+08:00

How He Sleeps...

2010-05-15T13:53:00.000+08:00

It's Mine!

2010-05-08T08:14:00.000+08:00

No, it's not mine

2010-03-26T21:29:00.003+08:00

Just trying a new workflow with Lightroom 3 using my niece's photo. Cute right? Good practice for future.. haha

Swenson's

2010-03-22T21:29:00.000+08:00

It's a lunch to celebrate the 'almost' completion of their projects and to usher in the examinations craze that will be taking over them pretty soon!

Award Winning Poster

2010-03-14T14:50:00.000+08:00

On a vertical monitor.. woo hoo!
And lightning caused my internet to reset...

It's Ready!

2010-03-05T22:33:00.000+08:00

Go see facebook

Crunch Time!

2010-02-22T20:55:00.000+08:00

How did I ever get myself into so many things at the same time?! It's crunch time with my thesis due soon... 100 pages to go, really need to get myself started on such stuff!

Really how much can I stretch myself and what is my potential? If only I realise it 12 years ago...

Moral Compass

2010-02-10T21:36:00.001+08:00

Look into your moral compass that governs your actions. Which part of the compass does it fall into? Do you do things because others are doing it? Do you have your own moral compass at all?

Example: Late for lecture after PE, what do you do?

1. Rush in through the main door, don't change attire because you don't want to miss lessons.

Then you base your actions on yourself. You disregard your family (in this case friends/school mates) by disturbing them and set a bad example for the rest. You can justify that your actions are right based on your self needs but it is not and definitely not noble. If everyone learns from your example, the nation and subsequently the world will become a poorer place.

2. Rush in through the back door, don't change attire because you don't want to miss lessons.

Then you base your actions on your own needs but you choose to come in discreetly because you don't want to set a poor example or you do not want to disturb your friends. However, attending lesson in LT after PE is poor hygiene. Some attempts to balance the needs of self and beyond but your actions may not be entirely noble

3. Change into appropriate attire, rush in through the back door and check with your friends/tutors on what you missed out after the lecture.

Where should we place this under the moral compass?

Next time when you find an excuse for your action, see where it stands in the moral compass before deciding whether your action is right or wrong.

Random

2010-02-09T20:28:00.000+08:00

1. That my life will be turned upside down in a few months time

2. That CNY is coming this weekend

3. That I'm setting a record for work hours this week

4. That blogging seemed so old nowadays...

5. That statistics show that 'old' folks like me tends to blog

Solve This

2010-01-23T09:11:00.000+08:00

Frustration!!

2010-01-12T20:21:00.000+08:00

I should be spending time on more constructive matters and not waste them on people who vanishes in thin air.... and I need to do something about it...

Time for a new year

2010-01-10T18:47:00.000+08:00

Merry Christmas!!

2009-12-25T09:41:00.000+08:00

A Walk Down Memory Lane

2009-12-20T21:13:00.000+08:00

Just went to Beauty World area at Bukit Timah.. really felt like walking down memory lane. If you want to know how the shopping complex back in the 80s look like, just visit them. Though now it's full of maid agencies, some shops remained in business there after all the decades.. but I seriously doubt that the place will last another decade. With the circle line coming out, the sleepy mall will most likely be renewed and be made into just another heartland mall with all the same shops. The character of the place will be lost and memories will fade with time. The pace of progress...

Price of Character

2009-12-11T17:45:00.000+08:00

For 10 seconds, would you want to poison someone?

For 10 seconds, would you want to knock over someone?

I have witness researchers opening doors with their gloves on, who knows what kind of chemicals or poison is on it. For 10 seconds of their time, they are willing to poison someone

I have witness many motorists going again the traffic at multi-storey carpark at my house to either get out of the carpark 10 seconds earlier or to get to that empty carpark lots 10 seconds earlier. For 10 seconds of their time, they are willing to risk killing someone.

How much is your character worth?

ISEC 2009

2009-11-25T07:50:00.001+08:00

It's worrying to see so many science educators who will not hesitate to take out their cameras and take pictures of the slides projected on a white screen in the conference. And they do so with flash! What ever happens to basic science knowledge (and manners).

I like this

2009-11-18T18:31:00.001+08:00

From xkcd.com.

Hiatus because I'm really busy recently.... Busy falling sick among other more urgent affairs... What if your supervisor from business is also a computer scientist who understands the impact of your work? I won't know since I'm not in the business and I'm not really in academia either.

CHOPE! - The Subaru Impreza Challenge 2009

2009-11-01T16:42:00.001+08:00

Just came back from supporting this event because someone I know still has a hand (literally) in the competition. Woah... Jiayou! The next break is coming at 7pm and that's the 30 hour mark!

If you can't beat'em, join 'em.

2009-10-27T19:53:00.000+08:00

It's been a long time since I put some serious thoughts about issues related to education. But I have been challenged in some ways to think about such issues once again. So here goes..
--------------------------------
Singlish versus English

There's a lot of debate in the local papers on the issue of Singlish once again. Some see it as a part of culture and national identity, others think of it as an inadequate cousin of proper English who needs to be corrected. Linguists will beg to differ and see it as a natural outcome when languages meet, where 1 + 1 = 3. Regardless of point of view, we should start considering Singlish seriously.

Research on the penetration of Singlish, variants of Singlish and acceptance of Singlish among Singaporeans have to be conducted to devise appropriate strategies to address the issue of competitiveness of Singapore in the long run. We can't pretend that classroom teaching, sending PCK for language courses and an annual campaign will turn things around any time soon. We need to learn more about it. However, by doing so (researching on it), it is equivalent to acknowledging Singlish as a language (or creole or pidgin of English) and some people in power may not be ready to accept this yet.

Singlish is definitely more than just a simple lah or lor or borrowed terms. My brief encounter with English Language back in NUS (to fulfill some requirements) involved a project studying the structure of Singlish. The wikipedia entry does a more detail discussion on this phenomenon. The question is how do we deal with this phenomenon in Singapore such that we can remain competitive in the future (i.e. we do not produce generations of Singlish speaking citizens whom foreigners could not understand)? What can we do if the endless campaigns are not effective at all?

Cantonese is a dialect of Chinese and the spoken variant of Cantonese is very different from Mandarin Chinese. In fact, if you get a magazine written in colloquial Cantonese, I bet that you will find it difficult to understand it without knowing the language, even if the words used are Chinese characters (or looks like Chinese characters). With a few more decades of development, Singlish may become a dialect of English sharing common traits as Cantonese. It may be a matter of time before we have to deal with the Singlish-English divide like how Hong Kong is dealing with Mandarin-Cantonese in education. Perhaps we can recognise and accept Singlish as a creole of English in Singapore and incorporate lessons to highlight the differences between them.

Yes, Singlish is new and only a few decades old, people may reject them and look down upon people speaking Singlish. But the Queen's English that they are embracing started off as a 'bastard' language that is neither German or Latin etc. It's just like Singaporeans who look down upon new citizens, despite the fact that their parents or grand parents were new immigrants decades before.

---------------------------
Research in Education

Like a PW project, I have to apply my case study 1 to case study 2. So for case study 2, I have chosen research in education.

Currently, research is taken as an elective or enrichment for students in the elite schools. Research skills, structured mentorship programmes etc are dominated by tops students in such schools. It has reached a point of saturation where by research mentors in research institutes are stretched in offering such opportunities to the increasing number of such programmes. Such an enrichment programme is usually offered on top of academic subjects and co-curricular activities. This will inevitably increase the pressure and workload of our students and teachers. Very often, programmes like the bicultural studies programme and research programme, are fighting over the same talent pool. To progress, there will be a need to adopt a structured approach to study the best strategy in incorporating research in education. Research can be offered as a H3 subject in 'A' levels but more can be done to start at the secondary level. It is time to end the adhoc matching of teacher mentors to projects and disorganised instructional lessons for students in research. Let's give research the recognition it deserves and provide a comprehensive and conducive environment for our students to learn and experience research.

Tapping onto the Potential of a Playstation 3

2009-10-20T22:06:00.001+08:00

With a new ISP service provider, after more than 12 years, I can finally set up a wireless home network. Together with Windows 7 (evaluation copy), I can now stream my photos directly on a Playstation 3 and use if for photoslide shows on a Full HD TV. How cool is that?! On top of that, there's a possibility to stream videos, musics and other stuff from my PC, surf net using my PS3 and I bought and install a classic PS1 game to play too.

Finally I'm not so behind in terms of technology. Welcome to the future!

Crowd Shot - 12th in dpreview Challenges

2009-10-19T08:47:00.001+08:00

Taken during Super Import Nights 2009 when the import models were making their rounds around the exhibitions. You get to see many dSLR in different flavours, point and shoot cameras and even handphone cameras flashing around the models.

My best ranking image so far (out of 3).

Facebook is slow, Blogger is weird...

2009-10-11T13:39:00.003+08:00