of kipling

long day :) went PD with family and aunt today, we were planning to go melaka but daddy figured it was too far a drive for a sunday afternoon. had a lovely time with my femme, i'm getting to know her more and more, and i think the wait was well worth it...i love femme to bits and tiny little pieces. femme is my camera, btw. she takes awesome pics, i just have to figure out how to squeeze them out of her. she can be contacted here.

i first met kipling in the form of the just-so-stories, in the form of 'how the elephant got his trunk', on the banks of the limpopo river, o best beloved. it was in a book of children's stories, where i vaguely remember also reading 'the jungle book' and various fairy tales beautifully illustrated. aesop's fables too...loved those, because they were only one page and thus, in my mind, easier to read. i called it the elephant book, and that was probably 'how i made my first pun' being that it was an enormous and heavy volume, besides having three stories involving elephants and all of them illustrated differently.

image via britannica.com

next came a tiny little book with the most beautiful digitally painted illustrations made on glossy paper and kipling's own highly detailed illustrations printed on the ordinary paper in black and red ink. daddy gave it to my sister on her birthday. it was really a tiny book, about the size of my palm. i think that may have added to the beauty of the drawings, as it gave them a certain complexity that many lines and colors in a small space have. here i met 'the cat that walked by himself', the beginning of the armadillos', 'the crab that played with the sea', 'how the whale got it's throat' and many many more. after poring over the illustrations, i moved on to enjoying the stories themselves, despite the small print my interest had been piqued enough to pore through them.

image via justsostories

when the stories themselves had been enjoyed to the fullest, i realized that the illustrations had discriptions as well, delightful little remarks like 'the little stute fish is next to the other stute fish, who is his wife, but that is another story' or something to that effect. oh joys! reading was taken to another level...and at the end of the stories was a little poem by kipling.

image via victorian web

i remember being rather bewildered by the connection between the 'six honest serving men' and the story before it, although i cannot remember what the story is (that little book probably lost among the very many we have scattered around the house, perhaps we lost it when we moved three years ago? i want to read it again!). you can read it here. it's a funny little poem. oh! it was after 'the elephant's child' (basically 'how the elephant got it's trunk') and NOW i know why it was printed there! whoa! i'm revisiting my childhood questions and answering them, haha...

i wish i could get hold of this same copy again. it was such a pretty little book, and there was so much inside for such a small tome! the one we had is lost and if i remember right very tattered on the edges, despite it being a hardcover, probably due to over-love. :)

later when life took a more confusing edge, i came across kipling again in my english literature textbook. in the form of the poem If. kipling's name did not jump out at me at the time, as i was impressed to the core that we were learning 'life's brief candle' and 'sonnet 18' by this strange bald man who was so famous. i was rather interested, and took to trying to read 'the merchant of venice' (recommended by mummy) and 'macbeth' (because of 'life's brief candle') and 'romeo and juliet' (famous what) and 'a midsummer's night dream' (dunno why) but needless to say i did not succeed in getting past the 2nd page. i read hamlet abridged though. hahaha. and the tempest really abridged, in the form of a picture book (faust looked awesome scary talking with a skeletal creature) but i never understood the story. but enough of the bald man.

image via victorian web

well, being brought up in a family who spoke english at home and studying in a malay medium school, my english tests were usually aced with not much trouble (while my chinese tests were below c-level with alot of trouble) so in order to pretend i was studying for english i went ahead and memorized all the poems we had to learn (no big deal, i figure the most we had was 16 poems for two years, all less than a page long). i have long forgotten most, but i remember robert frost's 'two roads diverged' quite well...oh let me sidetrack...

Fire and Ice
"some say the world will end in fire,
some say in ice.
from what i've tasted of desire
I hold with those that favour fire
But if i had to perish twice,
I think i know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
and would suffice."
-robert frost

does 'suffice' rhyme with 'ice'? dunnoe leh. but i love this poem leh. i memorized this one but i can't remember where i first read it.

where was i?

Oh! If!

I love this part:

"If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too"

because i need it in my life right now...

and anyway, this entire post was inspired by my visit to PD today. we visited a mangrove swamp and saw loads of crabs and my aunt was saying 'lets ask God why he made crabs walk sideways' and that reminded me of 'the crab that played with the sea'. not to mention last week dad was talking about how whales ate krill and there were people saying a whale couldn't possibly swallow Jonah and that reminded me of 'how the whale got his throat'. and then grace (the aki one) put 'i am the cat who walks by himself, and all places are alike to me' on her fb status...and ditto lah.

i have to go through femme's PD photos of crabs. keep a lookout on femme's blog :)

and here is a link to some of kipling's stories! oh this behappened and became and was, o best beloved!

tis the hair

come have a lookie at my photography blog! please comment, can?

I see a trend:

These are the cutest guys I have ever seen


Hiraoka Yuta


Yoon Ji Hoo from Boys Over Flowers (Kim Hyun Jung)





Prince Caspian (Ben Barnes)



Gambit in Wolverine (Taylor Kitsch)

i higly suspect it is the hair. hahaha

of honor

been a long day and fairly fruitful day. spring cleaned the room, cleaned the porch, washed three cars and bathed three dogs. i may have caught fleas. rambo had a couple on his back and they are ugly little things. funny we call our smallest dog rambo. our largest dog is named sirius black, but he's the mildest of all three. poochie is my dog, his name is actually cappuccino, but it got shortened to poochie. poochie is medium sized and heads our pack. an aggressive little fellow.

oh, not to mention i baked a failed grape cake. i was influenced by food blogs featuring lovely raspberry/strawberry/blueberry cakes as they welcomed summer (in the British isles) and these are kind of expensive here. then daddy came back a few days ago with two large bags of grapes and i figured why not try a grape cake? anyway, it was kind of a failure as the grape juice didn't bleed beautifully into the cake like it ought (it could be i used the wrong type of grapes) and i got weird semi-dissolved grapes on my cake. oh well. my baking and cooking fails 50% of the time, so it doesn't bother me that much. but i am getting quite pro at photographing food. haha. photographs are wonderful deceivers. here's a pretty picture of a failed grape cake:
we visited uncle MK and aunty SK at a condo development somewhere in mont kiara developed by uncle woon later in the evening. uncle woon did architecture at utm, was a top student there, got a scholarship to AA but refused because he met aunty (hehe) and then he worked for some time under geoffrey bawa (i have a great admiration for geoffrey bawa, his floor plans make me swoon) and now he is a developer and designs all the developments he develops (there is something wrong here). his developments are always very successful and i was glad to have an opportunity to visit one. lovely place, and very intelligent use of space. the condo is located on higher ground, and is very cool and breezy.

watched prince caspian there with my little brother isaac. daddy is reading the last battle to him, and well, my brother was convinced that king miraz's soldiers were calormenes. i do like the narnia series. they are good stories. and they are way simpler than c.s.lewis's other books. one day i will graduate and understand the abolition of man (that's a book i was trying to read last holidays, but never finished), at the moment i am very happy with narnia.

just a little reminder of one of the lessons i learned from prince caspian (oh btw, the prince caspian in the movie is SO HANDSOME) (i think i have a thing for wavy hair in guys *thinks Yuta). I'm stil addicted to BF's 'love is waiting' and i realize all over again that (not just in love) i can never force the sun to rise or hasten summer's start. certain things you are meant to have, but if you go about it the wrong way, you will regret it. like sarah and the maidservant. waiting is important. it teaches us patience. it teaches us faith.

i AM glad. i have been feeling so happy and contented lately. so satisfied and fulfilled. it must be family. it must be the love all around. and laugh at me if you will, but God is here. of course, God is everywhere, but God is smiling His blessings on my family. I feel it everytime i return, and i am glad. i was worrying about something recently, and there was this little reassurance that it was going to be alright. and i tell you that was not from me, worry wart that i am.

oh gladness! and of my title, i wonder if i ever mentioned before how i love the word honor? i love when people act with honor, who do the right thing even if it hurts. i hope i may as well. anyway, goodnite. my, this is a long post. oooh, and now i have found another song to be addicted to:



this is my favorite song by regina spektor :) hark the stringed instruments in the background!

of puff pastry and apple pies

my archi blog is a bit difficult to upkeep here in kl. i am a terrible driver for one, and i get lost alot. i was planning to go to putrajaya and give everyone the low down on why it is such a dead place, but when dad gave me the directions i had to admit the likelihood of me finding my way there is less than me finding my way to timbuktoo...

so dad said: why do you want to go to putrajaya? i tell you why it's so dead:

1) not enough chinese. heh.
2) parking is terrible. did you know they want us to park outside putrajaya and take a shuttle inside? stupid lah.
3) there aren't enough covered walkways. and all the concrete makes it really HOT AND UNCOMFORTABLE.

well, there you go. future urban planners, take notice. read jane jacobs.

so i figured my work as such was done (will he remember he was going to take me to the Secret Garden (rooftop garden, oh so sustainable)) and i begun an obsession with this thing called puff pastry. i read food blogs. i looked at pictures. and then one lovely morning i woke up to the sound of the falling rain and the wonderful coolness that comes with it...and puff pastry was calling my name and that was the only thing (at the time) which could get me out of my bed and into the kitchen.

puff pastry is a tricky thing to make. it requires multiple refrigerations, and a good hand with the rolling pin and if my sis failed whence could i succeed? but maybe the heavens were smiling down upon moi...or something...

will you see those layers? *loves
please gasp with wonder and check out the recipe below and gasp with wonder again. this is the most complicated recipe i have ever attempted. it is not perfect, not like the puff pastry of the great patisserie...but i am content.

and puff pastry must not be wasted! neither must tart granny smiths just waiting to be nibbled.

the puff pastry was such a high mantainence thing to work with...it kept getting moist and had to be refrigerated and reworked. so i only managed a pic when the apple pie was done. don't it look pretty?

my puff pastry wasn't the puff-iest...but it did puff just a little! like magic!

yummm

did you know you never need to buy big bags of icing sugar? just put ordinary sugar into the food processor, and then you get gorgeous clouds of the lightest icing sugar...and then you sieve it over your apple pie and just die from the gorgeousness of it.

and naturally, after all the hard work, you take the first slice...

and you admire the puffiness. and then you finally take a taste.

recipe:
puff pastry
from foodbeam, the prettiest bloggie i have ever seen. oh that my puff pastry may look like hers one day!

apple pie
8 inch pie pan
(A) 8 granny smith apples, cored and thinly sliced, 2Tsugar, 1t cinnamon powder
(B) half the puff pastry that you made with the recipe above, separated into two parts.
one egg, beaten, for egg wash

1. place (A) in pan and cook slowly under small flame until it becomes soft and brown and mushy. place in refrigerator and cool. preheat oven to 200C.
2. roll out one part of your puff pastry (do be careful. i didn't plan to have a criss cross design on top, initially hehe) until it is slightly larger than your pie pan. carefully put the rolled pastry on your pie pan and refrigerate for a while. if your pastry looks wettish put it in the refrigerator. it means your butter layers are melting and that is bad.
3. put your apple purree into the pie. roll out the second part of your puff pastry. cut it into even rectangles and criss cross it over your pie. refrigerate at intervals if needed. clean it up until it looks like a pie. egg wash your pie.
4. bake in the oven for 20 min at 200C.

of waiting

i'm higly strung today. if you make a loud noise i am going to snap at you. luckily there's music. if there isn't i'm going to start killing people.

adds a whole new meaning to the phrase: "music calms the savage beast eh?" haha...

computers and sewing machines are the two banes of my life. computers are okay for the basic things, but if they malfunction on me i could probably explode. and the loud noise from the explosion will set off another series of explosions and then i will feel very sorry and glow like a dead star and be very agreeable.

anyways, i was going to complain because i am a computer noob and writing websites is beyond me please get a pro instead okay but i came across this song on youtube, it turned up on that recommended for you part (but doopid youtube wouldn't work, or rather doopid screamyx wouldn't work), so i got frustrated and found the lyrics of the song and hit a button somewhere and now i have a list of very nice songs playing in the background and now i am agreeable without the explosion.

wow. i never knew there was a jango in the world. i didn't even know there was a brooke fraser. she's not entirely my type, i think, but then it's remarkably calming to hear her sing. i should listen to more types of music. hmm, they're playing switchfoot now, long time since i've heard them...i liked stars. only they like to whine. whatever lah. i'm in a complaining mood. thanks jango. complaining mood better than explosive, at least for the people around me.

ok i go back to trying to do that doopid website.

This is an ABBSOOOOLUUUTELY BOOOTIFOOOLLL song, and i'm currently addicted to it. when i am addicted to songs, it means i've listened to it over and over again more than 15 times, decided mention it in my blog, and shall continue listening to it for the next few days over and over until i find another song to be addicted to...
*sighs with absolute contentment and hits the replay button



the lyrics are absolutely beautiful too. love the way it reflects perfectly how i feel about relationships. :)

meanwhile, this pretty food blog has been occupying my attention, in between doing odd jobs for both mom and dad...

reality check

reality check:
2+2=4?

done the maths. double checked, mistakes have been made. and mistakes have to be accounted for, unfortunately. argh, why is reality so hard and cold?

there's something beautiful about this:

image via dezeen

designed by the duo schröder schulte-ladbeck
located in the grounds of grafenagg castle

what interests me is the fact that the keywords for the design concept was based on the musical fugue (form, number, dimension, proportion, material and colorfulness). They have managed to transform the immateriality of music and acoustics into architecture, something i did not manage to complete in p4 last semester, sadly. did not think of materiality :(

this is a bit different from mine, but intriguing nevertheless. i don't like those randomly distributed windows, but that is up to taste, hehe.

hahaha

i am going to read the time traveller's wife. it sounds very interesting. thanks for the intro, folks!

hmm, i share this vid:


isn't it beautiful? pastor shared it today at church. I look at it and i gasp in wonder at it's awesome, breathtaking beauty, and then i gasp again with joy at the realization that our God is a great and mighty and amazing and HUGE God.

of genoise

genoise is an italian sponge cake named after the city of genoa, a seaport in northern italy.

renzo piano is genoese :) he's one of my favorite architects. he designed the pompidou centre with richard rogers in paris, which is beautiful.

this one contains no butter, and all the fat of two eggs spread into 8 cupcakes. i two thirded the recipe, so likely you can get 12 out of this.

(A) 3 large eggs, 1/3 cup sugar, pinch of salt, vanilla essence, cream of tartar
(B) 1.5 cup cake flour

preheat oven to 180C
1. whisk (A) till stiff. meringue-ish.
2. sift (B) in and fold. slowly, don't let too much air go. erm, mine is kinda flat because i fold like a military soldier wielding an m16.
3. pour into paper-lined muffin cups and bake for 15min at 180C.

somewhere over the rainbow

Somewhere, over the rainbow, way up high.
There's a land that I heard of Once in a lullaby.
Somewhere, over the rainbow, skies are blue.
And the dreams that you dare to dream
Really do come true.
Someday I'll wish upon a star and wake up where the clouds are far Behind me.
Where troubles melt like lemon drops, Away above the chimney tops.
That's where you'll find me.
Somewhere, over the rainbow, bluebirds fly. Birds fly over the rainbow,
Why then - oh, why can't I?
If happy little bluebirds fly beyond the rainbow,
Why, oh, why can't I?

this is one of my favorite songs, besides the other one with raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens...

where troubles melt like lemon drops, away above the chimney tops...

the kind of songs one can listen to no matter how you feel...if you're warm and comfortable and happy they only serve to make you warmer and comfortabl-er and happier...when you are miserable they make you feel the world's not such an unhappy place after all and you think of places with lullabies and bluebirds and dreams and feel just kind of happier and homier.

and unrequited love and income tax disappears into oblivion :)

dododo listen to the version by connie talbot as featured on gailgail's blog!

just chatted with bobo online. she's in glasgow now, SCOTLAND! oh how i want to visit scotland...ever since i read dancing peel by lorna hill, and learnt of it's landscape...the mystery and the mist and the lochs and the peaks. i want to be married there leh. or something. haha. anyways. maybe my honeymoon can be there. but i want paris also. strange, isn't it, that i love cities and i love nature as well? both possessive of beauty, but different types...

i bet i'll be dissapointed though. haha. when it's cold it will be too cold, and when hot way too hot...and it'll never be perfect, so the scotland i refer to is this scotland in my mind, which is somewhere between the real scotland this place i think of as heaven, and that knowledge i never will know until i get there.

and won't that be exciting...

:)

i like this

this

specially the last bit:

“There needs to be a clear route for non-academic, non-graduate access, a pathway from other types of qualification, as in Aaron’s case, into full professional status,”says powell, chief executive officer of edge.

i think there should be ways into most professions following non-traditional routes. if the people are qualified and ready to do what it takes. i rather think the asian mentality ought to change. anyway. who am i to talk?

i figure i like this sort of thing because i am the ultimate rooter for underdogs. hahaha.

of central markets and design forums

my food blog will be discontinued. i realize i have a tummy. a very bad big ugly unhealthy tummy. it is appearing all over facebook. argh. i am going to have to cut down on my butter consumption (oh man, but i love butter) and eat lots of yoghurt. so unless you want to see yoghurt everyday on my blog, i think i better move on to something better.

i shall begin my architecture blog. please visit my blog for the latest updates on an aspiring architect's life and inspiration (i realize this will probably cast my blog viewership down to nearly zero, besides a few faithful people who visit my blog no matter how boring it gets). i love you guys. *muahmuah*

the day started with me deciding to visit a popular kl tourist destination near daddy's office. it's called central market. mummy says its a really nice place to visit, and thinks it's a prime example of successful adaptive reuse, but then she didn't use that term lah. haha.

it's very cool!

since 1986. you can check out some of the pics here of the building before it was adapted-re-used.

image via archnet
this was before the renovations

a stage for cultural activities

the walkways are about 7feet wide, very comfortable and you don't feel jammed in even when there are quite a few people on the walkway.

the annexe

i found a place called t-square here which is a bit like art friend but not so big :)

globalisation?

i liked this lift. it's rather an interesting fellow. sticking out of nowhere like that. the architect wanted to break up the space at the central mall with it's glazed skylight and thus he put a deliberately contrasting lift core sticking up like a (sore) thumb there as an architectural focal point.

image via archnet
see the semi-circle thing on top!

these shirts are really funny! i wasn't supposed to take photos though. but i didn't realize until i took this pic. so here you are. blow it up and enjoy.

another illegal one. i didn't take anymore. i am a good citizen.

i took this from the third storey. i think it looks very cute. like polypocket.

um. i realize i didn't take very good photographs. i should have taken one of the roof, and then you could see how it was adapted-re-used properly. but i have limited card space. sorry.

closest i can give for you to compare.

photo via archnet

this is how it used to look. now it is a successful tourist destination, and it's so nice and comfortable to walk around in...great example of how an old building has been re-used. i like also that the original building designed by architect TYLee was designed to enable a third storey. it's good that the architect kept in mind that extensions may have to be made in the future. cool stuff.

later on, i went to the klcc convention centre to attend kldf09. speakers were Neil Thomas of Atelier1, Andrew Grant of Grant Associates, and MeeJin Yoon+Eric Howeler of MY studio. The topic was biomimicry. i wish i signed up for datum now. but it's a bit expensive for me, even the student price is rm260. sigh. i want to see the husband and wife duo of MY studio again. they are, to put it mildly "damn smart lah".

pardon the red thing. i was trying to take photos discreetly. it's the seat in front of me. luckily no one sat there.

but i shall begin with Neil Thomas of Atelier 1, as he was the first speaker. guy came in a white T-shirt and blue jeans, looking really shagged next to the other, better dressed people. but he is also "somewhat damn smart lah". he's an engineer, but an engineer i admire, who goes, yeah hey let me figure out solutions to do that great design...rather than those who say, eh, it can't be done leh...

well, i don't like the esplanade very much (it's not only ugly, the shades have to be manually cleaned leh). but it's an attempt to design in such a way that it harmonizes with nature rather than being a regular i want my building to sit here and if it's hot i put loads of air con and that be it. so attempts are always good, even if it fails, because failure's are stepping stones to success. i guess. they did do alot of research on sunpaths and materials so that they could decrease the airconditioning load by 1/3 that of a normal building. so that is good. if they could make a prettier and less death inducing (i think some cleaner or other must have fallen off the rooftop cleaning before. i betcha, i betcha) building next time using the knowledge gleaned from this project, i forgive the esplanade. (who am i to speak like this nyways, haha) anyway, it was dp architects who designed it, not atelier1.


image via artsauthority
he also mentioned how they helped anish kapoor make his big domed thing...i mean Cloud Gate. you will not believe the structure inside. this one was inspired by a shell's ribbed structure.

then he spoke of some interesting bus shelters also inspired by a shell's ribbed structure, and a weird grasshopper looking thing inspired by the skeletal system of a human being. weird. and and plastiki, which is very nice, because they used recycled (i hope) plastic bottles to make a boat. but you ain'ts seen nothing yet.

image via gardencouk
is this cool or what. leave you to guess what the structure inside looks like. hahaha. I KNOW. and i am evil.

image via aboutbritain

also, atelier1 has worked on these quaint buildings in Haringey. it was inspired by termite mounds. termites can maintain a 30-31C temperature in the centre of their nest by having these holey things which they open and close at appropriate times. ah. you see, termites invented natural ventilation. nay, God did. hah. no wonder wisdom was the architect at His side. i crapping.

they also worked on federation square, which is also kind of ugly, but i can't say, because i have never seen the thing in person. or in building. hahaha. oh dear. but i heard it is a lovely square, and very lively and full of people, which is how a successful square should be like. that is more important than good looks. it's fascinating to learn how they generated the triangles on the facade. it involves fold lines and pinwheel generators and things. they have several materials on the facade: sandstone, glass and two types of zinc. nus is trying to copy them. the nus alumni house looks like a poor imitation.

ah. this one deserves an image. cool stuff. taratantara.


image via dbartmag
no really. it's called taratantara. and it's made of somewhat the same fairy stuff. designed by anish kapoor. we need all sorts in the world. lol, have fun wondering what the internal structure is like. HEH HEH.

loads more images at atelier1


image via andrewgrant
cool lah
second speaker was Andrew Grant of Grant Associates. He's not an architect (i think they save the architects for datum. man, i wish i had loads of money) but a landscape architect. but he's working on the gardens in the singapore marina gardens by the bay. image speaks for itself. plus i'm tired.

and finally my favourite duo, meejin yoon and eric howeler of MY studio.

they speak very well. maybe that is why i like them so much. everything they said spoke of years of research and thinking. at least, that was my impression. and i loved the fact that they were inventing their own things to make their art installations. unfortunately they did not mention much about their architecture during today's talk, cos they were keeping it for datum (sigh).

the first project they mentioned was this weird dress called the defensible dress. it is a response to the increasing encroachment of personal space in everyday life. inspired by the porcupine and the blowfish, the extents of the personal space zone are defined as a numerical distance by the wearer. useless, you say. ah. i kind of think so too. but maybe this research will lead to something else. edison made a gazillion failed prototypes before he got the lightbulb. i'm not sure how this is related.

next came a mobius strip dress. what they did was investigate how one could cut up a mobius strip and the shapes that the mobius strip became after numerous cuts parallel to the strip (this is weird, seeing that this is a single plane in a single dimension and all that). useless, as usual. still, the methamatics they did and the programs they wrote while doing this project could possibly find another usage in the future.

its kind of nice that the difference between designers and scientists is that the designers come up with an art object as a result of their studies (and as a side, books, research papers etc) while scientists come up with a research paper and that is the result (they should keep the side products, beautiful graphics etc). they are really quite the same. i wonder why there is a separation.

MY studio was also hired to design an exhibition space for an aztec empire exhibition at the guggenheim museum. if you are familiar with the guggenheim, you know that the building is a sort of rotunda and that's the space they had to work with. they catalogued the items and found that there was more items than surface. thus, they had to figure out a way to generate more surface space. they thus designed a singular linear element made of black felt of half an inch thick.

loads of interesting stuff on their webbie.