Rikaichan

This is a MUST HAVE plug-in if you are using Firefox to read Japanese.
http://rikaichan.mozdev.org/installation.html
It gives you the pronounciation and meaning of the kanji just by moving the mouse over it. Now I can read and learn using half the time!! Very handy!

On a separate note, have you seen these clips? I feel sorry for the guy.
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsmobile/workwherever/default.mspx

Another day to ponder about

whether to go to work or to "work from home" ......
Absolutely no meetings and no people to meet and no lab work that can not wait. Plus there will be a 4-hour company meeting in the morning and my boss won't be coming in to work. Very tempted to just stay home and stay in bed, especially it's very chilly these days early in the morning! Decision, decision, decision.

Frustrations

I have a lot to finish up at work before taking off for vacation so I am "running" at a even higher speed than normal. So instead of being effective, I am actually not getting any cooperation from others which is SO FRUSTRATING!! I can't help but wonder what is going on with everyone? Thanks to a coworker who is like a 先輩 to me and gave me an analysis on the whole situation. Basically, I have everything thought out and laid down in my head and pretty much have the ideas of what to do and the direction to take, so when I present them at the meetings, I go so fast with all the information that I am not giving people a chance to think it over. They might feel I am forcing it down their throats, despite it being a good or right direction. So all I get are endless questions of "Why....?" and "What is the point ...?" and basically an automatic "No". I need to learn to deliver my message at a slower pace. I might even want to learn to throw in a few jokes to lighten up the meetings. Not everyone is as tuned in or as clear about the issues as me, so I need to learn to accommodate everyone by giving them time to understand the issue and the proposal and gradually a buy-in to the idea. I can not expect a "Yes, madam!" at the meeting especially when there are managers from other functional groups present.
Now I understand why I give others an aggressive impression, when all I want is to get things done and cross out from my "to close" list. All my thinking and preparation will go to waste when I don't let people warm up to it. I need to remember to lower my RPM for fuel efficiency.

感謝祭

先週感謝祭から、久しぶりの四連休でした。
それで、毎晩映画と日本のドラマを連続的に観たので、昼ころまで寝ていました。
いままで疲れたけど、一番楽しい時間を過ごせました。
来年もこのお休みを期待しますね 。

ちなみに大沢たかおさんの演技は素晴らしいと思ういます。
彼のドラマ観た後に、本当に感動しましたよね。

Paris, Je T'Aime

予告編はこち:
PARIS Je T'AiME

世界から20人の監督としては、５分ずつ２０の短編物語です。
映画のキャスト、背景、音楽なども素敵だしすっごくおもしろそう!
早く観たいな...

いくつかの監督:
Hong Kong: 杜可風 Christopher Doyle
Japan: 諏訪敦彥 Nobuhiro Suwa (H Story)
Germany: Tom Tykwer (Run Lola Run)
England: Gurinder Chadha (Bend it like Beckham)
France: Gérard Depardieu (Greencard), Olivier Assayas (Clean)

「NANA」

今晩NANAの映画版を観てきました。
観る前に、この人気漫画は全然知りません...だから映画版のすっごく楽しめましたかしら。
物語も曲もとても素敵だった。
中島美嘉さんが大好きになりました!

オススメ度:　★★★★★ (満点)


これは映画の好きな曲中に一つです:

Perhaps Love 如果‧愛

Love this song!

Wonderful movie! But if the cast was different, I would not like this movie as much so:
オススメ度:　★★★★☆

まさに暮らしの知恵

どこでも同じメッセージを見られます。
でも、お茶と野外活動も加えたほうがいいですよ。
Every where you look, the message is the same.
But tea, fresh air and sun ought to be included.

摯愛 Embrace Your Shadow

日本版:『雨音にきみを想う』

The story is weak, incoherent and unconvincing. The movie is full of zoom in shots of the good looking characters, including the little 5-year old girl. Even though I did not fall asleep after watching 2 other movies before, I can not say I like this movie. :-(

オススメ度:　★★ out of ★★★★★

好きだ

でも、この映画は好きじゃありません。
I fell asleep 3 times...
there just weren't much happening at all.
I couldn't tell if there is any love between the characters...
Did he like her or her older sister?
What have they been doing the last 17 years?
Did they never grow out of their shy, uncertain days?
やっぱり全然分かりませんでした。

オススメ度:　★ ☆☆☆☆

Isabella 「イザベラ」

This was a movie I was looking forward to see and I finally saw it as my first movie on this Thanksgiving day. Again, the cinematography is nice, and the story is ok. But I still feel a little disappointed. Don't know what it is, but definitely something crucial is missing...

『伊莎貝拉』
オススメ度:　★★★ ☆☆


**I figured it out. It's not something missing, but rather something pretentious, too man-made (刻意營造) about this movie.

オリバーツイスト (Oliver Twist)

この映画の感想:
さすがです!
めでたし!!
Must see!

オススメ度:　★★★★★ (満点)

山本文緒

The spec. I wrote passed a 5 hour Internal Review with 85 comments. I need to clean it up and submit the next version for External Review next week. After that, I will need to again clean it up for posting and prepare for my certification exam in Decemeber before taking my vacation. Vacation is so hard to come by!! :-(
I have not picked up a fun book to read for a long time and since we moved to this current house, I don't even know where they have gone! But I will definitely buy some good read while I am in Hong Kong, despite the weight I'll have to carry to Japan before heading home. One of the writers I want to check out is Yamamoto Fumio. I want to read up on her book 「ブルーもしくはブルー」 or the translated version 「藍，或另一種藍」.
Recently, I saw a college friend of mine in my dreams 2 days in a row. He has always been tall and conscious about being fit but in my dream he is much slimmer yet still healthy looking. I have not been in touch with him for a very long time. The last time we met, must be 1994 or early 1995! We used to be good friends and would talk for hours but then I came to US and he stayed in HK. That's the pre-Internet age and so that's that. HK is pretty small. It's not hard to bump into someone during rush hours at certain MTR stations. I wonder if I would bump into him? Even though I could get in touch with him easily through my other college friends, but I have no wish to look him up and call him. I will just leave it up to chance.

ウォン・カーワイ

I am so looking forward to see this movie from Wong Kar Wai coming out some time in May next year with Jude Law, Natalie Portman, Rachel Weisz and Norah Jones (the cast might even include Kevin Spacey and Ed Harris)!! Wow.

死ぬ前に見るべき1000の場所

Last Sunday, I went to Borders to check out some travel books in preparation for my trip in December. I came across the book above and flipped through it. There are some good suggestions in there and some surprises as well. I also wrote down a list of all the places I have been and unfortunately, it's not even 100 out of the 1000 places. There are cities I have been but not the places that were mentioned, so definitely some surprises. But on the other hand, it's good to know that there are still plenty of places to visit like Spain which is extensively covered.

I also scanned through these 2 books which update me with the nice places in Hong Kong. Most of them did not exist when I was there in 2000, at least not to my knowledge (except maybe Felix which has been around). So it's a handy book to see where these places are with the map index at the very end of the book.

Blog Reader

After I set up my Google blog reader, life has been so good. No more going through individual bookmark wondering if there are any updates from the sites I like. In fact, I am having a hard time keeping up with the reading. I still have 41 unread updates waiting for me to go through but at least I know those will be enjoyable read. I noticed the ones I will always read first are those with photos follwed by the ones that are relatively short and not updated as frequently. And for now, the order of preferred language seems to be Chinese (Mandarin), English, Japanese, Chinese (Cantonese).
I don't know why there are so few well-written Cantonese blogs out there, but I guess the Chinese level of Cantonese speakers is just no match to the Mandarin speaking world in general. It's true, too, for authors who are Cantonese speaking, not just bloggers. I hardly read any books written by someone from Hong Kong. There are so few good ones, and the majority of them are amateurs who write because they are sort of famous in Hong Kong through TV show or talk show on the radio. Actually I can't think of any good writers from Hong Kong at all... any who don't write cynically or trying to be humorous. But then again, maybe I haven't been to a Hong Kong bookstore for so long... I could be a bit out of touch. I will go find out this time when I visit Hong Kong.
*The picture shows some Daifuku made in Taiwan. I wonder if they taste as good as they look.

上野樹里

Ueno Juri is one of my favorite Japanese young actresses. I like her from watching Fuji ドラマ Engine (エンジン) and the movie Swing Girl. I like her face and the characters she played - always smart, talented, fun and not about looks at all. I found out she can really play the saxophone and piano in real life. And she can sprint, too! I can't believe I can watch のだめカンタービレ on one of those popular video archive websites with subtitle. That's great!!

Too sensitive or 内気な?

We have different types of training at work ranging from hardware, software, project management, public speaking to leadership improvement. These trainings are held either irregularly or regularly like every month or week by different speakers. I signed up a few this year and they turned out to be one of the most popular ones with over 200 attendees. These trainings usually happen during lunch time from 11:30 to 1:30 so our work schedule is minimally impacted.
What struck me most were some of the group exercises we have to do with total strangers in the room. For example, in one exercise, you have to do thumb wrestling with either the person sitting on your left of right. We were asked to thumb wrestle to win as many times as we can. I looked to my right and then to my left... The guy on my left seems more open and ready to get started on the exercise than the guy sitting on my right, so I just stay turned to the guy on my left. But I hestitated. Who is he? Even though we are all from the same company ... geez... do we really have to thumb wrestle...? The guy saw my hestitations and quickly introduced himself. Where are my manners? So I quickly did the same and went along with the exercise. The instruction of the exercise was to win as many times as we can ... and the theme of the training was Win-Win/Teamwork/Trust... so maybe instead of really having to wrestle to win, we should just come up with a win-win strategy on this. That was my thinking. But guess what? That guy was really eager to win so we started a real thumb wrestle... I am not sure about you, but to me, I can't help wondering 1) if thumb wrestle is really something appropriate to do with a total stranger? And 2) how clean is his hand? And 3) shoot, aren't we supposed to be all professionals here instead of being so eager to win some silly exercise? I guess I couldn't stand it anymore and started to blurt out my idea of the win-win strategy. We would win alternatively after every count of 3. Thank God, he agreed and in the end, the speaker said we got the right idea - to work together to achieve win-win. But actually, I just did not want to really wrestle... thumb wrestle.
And then there were other exercises where we have to hold hands and form circles and then form an all-tangled mess and find ways to untangle ourselves. There were a lot of close body contacts and breathing into each other... Again I was not sure about how that exercise could fly if the training was held in an Asian country. Then again, I wonder if it is just me.
Last but not least, there was one exercise about change and accepting changes. I don't remember the details except the fact that someone has to take my seat and I have to take someone else's seat. I dislike sitting on a seat warmed by a stranger. It just feels gross. Even when I was a kid commuting on public transportation, I would just sit on the edge of the seat for a few minutes before sitting on a warmed seat.

Anyway, the ultimate lesson I learned was really about myself. I am probably one of those overly sensitive people.

Eating out & Friends

It's Thursday night. We had completed four long days of work. I was exhausted. Our ex-coworker friend called and invited us out to dinner along with our other ex-coworker M. M has an expense account and is always treating. I being the stubborn-so-wanna-be-righteous gal feel we should not be exploiting M's expense account especially when we are not giving her any business, even though our company does a lot of business with hers. So I alone decided not to go and just headed home to my cats and some peace and relaxation. My husband went and had a blast eating and drinking with them for 2.5 hours for free. Though I enjoyed my time alone thoroughly, I could not help but keep analyzing why I really chose not to go. Is it really because of the dinner on the expense account? Or is it because of the conversations on their life stories I did not want to sit through? Or is it because we see them too often? (No, could not be, I did not go to the last 2-3 invitations...) Or maybe I am just too tired and really did not want to socialize? Or is it because we never do anything else together besides eating out and that's getting old on me? Or is it I treasure my time after work at home ? I could not figure it out. But I think all these possible reasons add up to become a compelling one to say 'No'. Or I am just anti-social in general.

勉強

What's next after the spec. is done? Sit down reviews, and track all comments and provide closures. Lab setup. Plan execution. Reports generating. But before that, I need to get certified on the knowledge I was penning all these times. So some intense study is required between now and my vacation as the certification is going to change on January next year. I have studied the material on and off since May but the retention period of this kind of technical stuff is very short-lived because there's just too much of the technical details. I need to ramp up to memorize all of them and be prepared for the exam at that one moment of time while I am taking the test. It's rather meaningless if you think about it because you can always refer to the spec. if you need any details. But that's life for us. What can you do?

最近読んだ語句:
仕事一筋の女性

選挙日

Nov. 7 was Election Day. Everyone who voted will get a sticker that says "I voted" before leaving the voting booth. My husband and I proudly wore that sticker to work that morning because we studied the materials and did our civil duty. To my surprise, I think only 3 other people out of 16 in my team voted that day. We had a team meeting later and we chatted about election day. Some people were turned off by all the money wasted on campaign and ads. Some people found it hard to pick from the lesser of 2 evils. Some people just felt they don't know enough to make an informative vote and worried that they might end up giving their votes to the wrong people.

So there was a brief discussion on whether it is better to vote based on what we know or not vote at all since we may not fully understand all the issues and possible impacts? While my husband and I spent the Sunday evening reading up all the measures and candidates information, the best we could do was to form an opinion of Yes or No and bring that 'opinion sheet' to cast our votes. But I do believe that if you don't even plan on spending time to understand the election materials, it's better that you don't vote at all. It's ok to vote if you at least care who or which should be a winner. But again, if you have no opinion, just leave it blank. It really should not be that complicated.

But it really sucks when some of the more tricky measures use words like "this measure will be funded with no new taxes" to appeal to voters for a Yes vote, when in fact it will be funded with issuing bonds making us forever more in debts. So not to sound discriminating, maybe setting some educational requirements along with age will be the way to go for future elections, as some discerning abilities are necessary to not sway the outcome towards those special interest groups who funded those props for gains.

数独

I finally finished my spec. after working on it for 6 weeks! I have no wish to write another one even if they pay me a million dollar right now, not even 3 millions!! I am serious. I am having major carpal tunnel pains on my right arm, shoulder and the back of my neck. I will need to go get some ultra strength Bengay to relieve the pain today.
But the interesting thing is, instead of rewarding myself with some good food or some relaxing time at home watching movies, I have been solving Sudoku (数独) non-stop since yesterday evening. I haven't played for so long that I almost completely forgot about it. I was talking to my dad on the phone the other day and he mentioned he would like to try the herbal supplement: Curcumin as a way to prevent the Alzheimer's disease. While I am skeptical about it, I will not deprive his right to experiment with it, meaning I will buy what he wants. But in my opinion, learning and using a new language or solving Sudoku might be better solutions to the same problem. Who knows.

文化遺産

I have not been to a 涼茶鋪 for so long that I could not even recall the different types of 涼茶 one can choose. A blog article I read recently reminded me that maybe I should stop by one of those on the Kowloon side with some amazing historical background. I remember they do serve something hot in the winter so I probably will not go for the actual 涼茶 but maybe something milder like 五花茶. I am glad I am lining up a list of things to do on my trip to minimize any regrets!

最近の映画

Saw 2 movies over the weekends.

The Da Vinci Code (2006)
I did not read the book. I found the movie just ok with a lot of talking, talking and talking to build the story. My husband felt asleep while I stayed awake the whole time. The subject matter is not the most interesting but overall ok. I have watched all Audrey Tautou's movies but this one has to be the most uninteresting of all. I like Jean Reno, too, but seems like he was chosen solely because the movie needed a well-known French face who is convincing playing a detective. I like Tom Hanks, but I don't feel he is the right fit for the role. Suspense and excitement? Not too much of either. 総合的にはまあまあです。
My Rating: C

Click (2006)
The story is a bit slow for the first 30 minutes but the rest of the movie is pretty ok. ちょっと心温まる映画だった。I think we do live with a similar remote control called "tuning out" to skip through life annoyances like comments from your in-laws on things that you have long discussed before or having to deal with things being thrown away or broken without your knowledge or personal space being compromised..etc. And we often times let work priorities take on more importance than our other life priorities as a human being. We feel guilty when we have a doctor's appointment during work hours. We feel guilty when we have to tend to our family needs like dropping or picking them up from the airport during work hours. We don't take time off because of demanding work schedules. In the end, we are the biggest losers and we let our love ones down again and again. This is definitely a good movie to watch with your spouse or any working member of your family so he or she is reminded of the dire consequences. And why not? It's hilarious at some parts and quite touching at point towards the end. This is a movie I will definitely watch again if it's on TV!
My Rating: B

クレープ

Over the weekends, we suddenly wanted to make crepe at home since we have cravings for it but it's already late at night. We must have tried to make crepes 3-4 times before but with no success. The batter is really the key and none of the recipes we tried before were close enough to the real thing. Luckily, this time, we found one that completely works!

Here is the recipe if you would like to try.

Ingredients (for about 8 crepes):
1 cup of Flour
1.25 cup of Whole Milk
2 Eggs
1 tbsp. Butter (melted)
a pinch Salt
2 tbsp. Sugar
Few Drops of Vanilla or Almond Extract (optional)
Vegetable Oil (for the pan)

How to Prepare Batter:
1. Sift flour and mix with salt in a bowl.
2. Make a well and pour in eggs. Add the sugar and stir well.
3. Slowly pour in milk while stirring. Keep stirring batter until small bubbles form on the surface.
4. Stir in Butter.

How to Prepare Crepes:
1. Pour a little vegetable oil on a folded paper towel, and wipe the pan evenly. Keep paper towel at hand while preparing crepes, in case you want to give it another wipe.
2. Pour in 2 - 3 tbsp. of batter using a ladle and quickly move the pan around, so that batter spreads evenly, covering the whole surface with a thin layer.
3. Let it cook for about 1 minute. Then flip and cook the other side for about 30 seconds.
4. Remove from the pan and add banana, strawberry, nutella and fold it to your favorite crepe form. Sprinkle some powdered sugar and add whipped cream and a scoop of vanilla ice cream on the side!

Voilà!

General rule of thumb: if it seems thicker than cream, add a little more water, and/or a little more milk.

Bistro

When it's cold and grey outside, there is nothing better than going to your favorite, delightful and warm cafe or bistro.
Last Thursday morning, after going to the Stanford Medical Center for the second time, going straight to work just did not seem right, in fact may be the word should be 'depressing'. So we stopped by the new bistro we had wanted to try, but was closed for employee training the last time we were there.
This bistro is finally a true French bistro. Not only was everything authentically prepared, the service was most wonderful. It's very difficult to maintain a business on University Ave. and I have looked into it so I know how much they have to make a day to break even. When we were there that hour, there were only 4 other customers. I would really hate to see this place not survive. I was even considering working for them at minimal wage on the weekends at one point. (But I know I am extremely poor at serving others thinking back my past experiences back in college.) I had the banana nutella crepe which was very light and delicious. Just being able to learn how to make it is all worth it!

I plan to do more bistro hopping this time when I travel in December. My dad had been doing that for decades so I will definitely go with or take the master. I need to spend more quality time with my dad, listen to his stories and all. I think it's a universal truth that all daughters love their dads.

Google Reader

For those who have a long list of bookmarks to their favorite sites and blogs to visit everyday, Google Reader is a must! I think I like it much more than my Gmail despite the many bugs it has. It lets you know your favorite sites have been updated when it's in bold face. How convenient is that!? No more going to those websites that are not being updated regularly. :-)

And I like the fact that you can go through all your favorite sites without seeing all the comments which saves a lot of time ... :-P I actually have tons of bookmarks but I am just adding the ones I like for now. Those I visit once a week or even less frequent will not make it to my Google Reader.

Google Reader will also be most useful if I am using a PDA or someone else's computer! I never know how to get to some of my favorite pages otherwise without my bookmarks.

超お勧め。

階段

There is something about me and stairs. I am not sure what it is but I used to always see them in my dreams. I plan to visit a place in Jimbocho (神保町) this time, and while I am there I will look for 男坂（おとこざか）and 女坂（おんなざか).

And of course, I will visit 石板街 in Central, Hong Kong. (See picture). Another staircase will be the one that was near our home in Hong Kong. I really dislike it before when I had to use it almost everyday but now I miss it and want to see how it looks like. That staircase was once used in movie made by a famous Hong Kong movie director, 許冠文, who was also our neighbor. I think that movie may have been 鐵板燒, I can't remember. Oh, another staircase that was near my brother's kindergarten was also near our house ... that one had a lot of memories, too. My mom and I used to do our hike there with her best friend and her dog ... Sometimes when we don't feel like joining them, we can see that staircase from our kitchen windows and we could see them. I had also yelled out to them from our house before when my mom and her were walking up there. The shortest distance between the two points must have been some 250-300 meters... Some really great memories that I almost forgot!!

Oh, gosh. I just remember some more stairs from my childhood. The one between my high school and primary school. The stairs in our high school that lead to the Sisters' Convent. The stairs behind the High School Auditorium that lead to the spooky Art Room and Dark Room. And that really steep one that goes down from Tai Hang Road to Blue Pool Road that I am so scared that I would slip when I used to go to school. I will try to visit all these places again this time and see if they look anything like I remember! Very important!!

夜宴

I said I did not like this movie... but today I read a very good article about the movie and now I am dying to watch it again. Quite a few people in Taiwan can really write well about any movies and really makes me wonder if it's their education system or what? The way they write really makes you think back all the imageries and symbolism used that you probably have completely missed. At work, my co-worker's college friend, who is a Chemist in Taipei, he writes so well about all 3 of the Matrix movies on his blog that he was asked by a magazine if they could pay to have exclusive right to publish his articles.

万聖節

Last night after work, the traffic going home was a nightmare. I did not know Halloween is such an important family day. The traffic reports on the radio were about all highways and roadways going to all directions being plugged up. We had a bucket of chocolates ready at home for the trick-or-treaters but because my mother-in-law is staying with us, she got all the fun answering the door while we were still on the road trying to get home.

So while being stucked at some major slow traffic, we decided to take a detour and fill ourselves with some delicious food at a hole-in-the-wall Indian restaurant before heading home. That place has the greatest aloo nan and chicken masala!! On our way home, we saw a guy dressed as Robin, like Batman & Robin, on a bright yellow Kawasaki bike getting a ticket from the cops. It was quite an interesting scene.

Upon having our car parked at the garage, we heard some weird noises from the house across us. A dummy was hanging from the neighbor's tree with a voice recording of our neighbor's kid playing, "let me down, I wanna go home" and some crazy screaming. We went inside and my mother-in-law informed us that tons of kids came by and all the chocolates are gone and she could not open the door anymore. This year is actually the first year we have candies prepared as we are never home before dark on Halloween night. I wonder what my nephew dressed up as this year for Halloween? I should check.