Off to New England

Wednesday, September 30, 2009

I will be away for a week. Where am I headed? Well, this is a complicated matter. First, for today, I am headed to New York City. I have a flight this morning, taking me to LaGuardia Airport, where shortly after I will be meeting my sister. Then, in the evening, I will have dinner with the whole family. This is the first time in four years (4 years!) that the four of us will be in one roof again.

Then, when evening comes, I will be heading to Long Island to crash in my Israeli friend's parents' place. My Israeli friend is in the country on vacation, and I was fortunate to make possible the alignment of the proper stars, so that we could catch up on things.

The next day (October 1), I will be heading back to New York City to meet my parents, and the three of us will take a train to head over to New England. Boston will be our destination, and for the next 5 days, we will try to see as much of the city as we can. I will be bringing some work with me, hoping to accomplish some work as I play, but the jury is still out on that one.

And finally, on October 6, I will head back to Buffalo, where I will go back to the routine.

With this trip up ahead, I have a few scheduled posts for this blog. Given the fact that there are times that I have too much intellectual vomit in my head and that I don't want to write them multiple times in a day, I am using this opportunity to catch up.

So, I might or might not be answering your replies while I am gone, but I will definitely be back in a week. Oh, finally, you may have noticed I have a new series of photos, starting from the previous post. It's still a series of photographs I took from my December 2007 trip to Washington DC. Don't worry, there's plenty of these in store. I know, I am two years behind.

(Native American Hall, from my Lafayette Square Series)

Book Review: Shogun by James Clavell

Tuesday, September 29, 2009

Wow. I didn't realize that the last time I wrote a book review was a month ago. Yes, it took me a month to read and finish this grand epic. I remember buying this book from a bookstore in Seattle, and was captivated by it. So, how do I begin?

This book is about the story of a bold English adventurer who found his way to Japan, and his adventures with Japanese feudal society back in 1600. He encounters an invincible Japanese warlord, and a beautiful woman that becomes his interpreter, and later on, lover. It details many aspects of historical Japan, including the trade between the Portuguese and the Chinese, aspects of Japanese society such as the courtesans and the geisha, samurai methods and customs, sex practices in historical Japan, among others. It is a very meaty book in my opinion.

So, what did I like about this novel? I like the fact that James Clavell seems to be a very successful storyteller. He captivated my attention during the whole book: I never had a moment where I thought that the book was boring. I remember reading Les Miserables by Victor Hugo and though I have respect for that book, there were times in which it felt more like a history textbook than a novel. This book, on the other hand, even though it is historical fiction, is full of action among the characters of the book.

With a book this thick, Clavell made the choice of developing multiple main characters. It is not just John Blackthorne who is the main character, but also Yoshi Toranaga and Toda Mariko. This book also provided me with the insight to Japanese politeness and the theory of face. The characters were crafted in a way that their actions always preserved or destroyed the face of their interlocutors, depending on their intentions. In this way, I admire the amount of research that the author must have put into when writing this book.

Another aspect of this book that I liked is the intricate descriptions of war theory and espionage. There might be actions that are not explained at the outset when they are described, but every loose knot is always explained later on. The last 20 pages in fact are very crucial, because all of the unexplained scenes are finally revealed, such as the sabotage of Blackthorne's ship, the arrangement between Mariko and the rest of the shogunate, and so on.

The book does not provide a very conclusive ending. It is not a fairy-tale story, where the ending is that everyone lives happily ever after. Instead, it provides a road for further exploration, which is indeed the intent of the author. In fact, this is the first of six books in his Asian Saga, a collection of books that talk about the Far East. In fact, I liked this book very much that I already have the copy of the second book, Tai-Pan. I won't pick that up for the time being though, since Clavell's books tend to be long, and I want a break from the Far East.

All in all, this is a very recommendable book. It will totally engage you. Pick it up and be immersed in a dynasty 400 years ago.

(Melted and Broken Glass Exhibit, from my Lafayette Square Series)

Losing Hope

Monday, September 28, 2009

This past weekend, the Philippines, especially Metro Manila, was pummeled with record rainfall from a tropical storm. There were dead everywhere, and thousands were displaced, with flood waters rising to heights that were never ever recorded, toppling record rainfall since 1967. News coverage can be found here and here, saying that this tropical storm has dumped more rain than Katrina did in New Orleans.

Upon hearing the news, I stayed online as much as I can, and whenever I have friends who would get online, I would ask them how they are. So far, everyone I know are safe, although I have some friends whose houses were damaged, and cars who got floated by the torrents.

So, one thing that I realized when conversing with my friends is the presence or absence of hope with respect to survival and rising up. In Facebook, many of my friends were "praying" for the immediate recovery and reconstruction of the damage that was done by this storm. I on the other hand cannot bring myself to tell my friends who got stranded by this storm that I am going to "pray" for their well-being, because I do not believe in prayer. After all, who am I supposed to pray to, if I do not believe in the existence of God?

Then I recalled a conversation I had with my sister a year ago. Last year, I had a spiritual breakdown, in which a brain dissection I had in class triggered a whole slew of dilemmas to the point that I rejected religion and God altogether. My sister told me that my decision to reject religion will mean that I will give up hope, that I would let go of the hope that there is something else more beautiful and better than the present condition. I told her that I am fine with that.

Now with respect to the current condition, of the condition that Filipinos are suffering from the damage done by this tropical storm, I realized that religion has a emotional function. It gives people hope, a hope that there will be a better tomorrow, that even if today sucks badly, and that even if it seems that today is the worst day that one can have, tomorrow can be better, and that people who are around can even pray for the welfare of the sufferers, and that will do the trick.

But does that really happen? Is there really hope? Or is it just a mental trick that we are doing to ourselves? Is it the case that we are just fooling ourselves to alleviate the suffering? Does prayer really speed the recovery, or does it simply paint an illusion of hope? Does the rescue operations really get faster if people pray?

I suppose my answer to these questions is obvious by now. Yes, I felt bad that I cannot do what everyone else is doing, that I cannot tell my friends who were wading in the floodwaters, or were stuck in their office buildings, that I will pray for them. No, I couldn't bring myself to say that. All I can do is hope that recovery will be swift. That is simply a desire for an optimal situation, but I won't invoke the supernatural to aid in this. Id' rather face what is real and deal with it.

Yes, I lost my hope, at least for the artificial kind. The game of life involves many tricks and loops, plus the factor of chaos. Why would I fool or trick myself that there is something better after my designated lifespan? If it is time for me to die, then so be it. If I die by a plane crash, a knife stabbing, by flood waters, or by any other means, then so be it. Why do I need a false glimmer of hope, when the state of the matter is that it is simply game over?

(The Air and Space Museum Building, from my Air and Space Museum Series)

4 Down 11 to Go

Sunday, September 27, 2009

The semester is moving fast. Four weeks of the semester has just flew by, just like that. And surprisingly, things are being accomplished.

So, four weeks into the semester, what has happened so far? Well, my two IRB proposals have been approved, and one of the studies have been running since this week. I have been scheduling and conducting participant sessions since yesterday. The other one is in the works, and hopefully is ready to run in a couple of weeks or so.

My dissertation is moving as well. I have started regular meetings with my other committee members, and I have been synthesizing their ideas to generate the perfect hypothesis. Hopefully, that gets moving and that the proposal gets defended by this semester.

I will be out of town again for a week, starting this Wednesday. Whew. Somehow, I feel like I have a hectic schedule even though I only have one class that I am taking. I am working extra hard this week and the week after so that the missed days will be covered.

Anyway, the good thing is that my geek tendencies will be satisfied somewhat with this trip. I am adding two new airports to the list of total airports that I have visited. This trip will introduce New York City's LaGuardia Airport and Boston's Logan International Airport to my list, bringing the total airports I have passed to 42. This also means that I can maintain activity in my United Air Line's Mileage Plus account.

So what is this trip for? Well, my parents are in town. A family reunion is in store. I suppose since the last time the four of us has been in one room, it was back in May 2005, it is time to reset the clock. So yeah, there's a few family activities in store for the next week. I'll be armed with my camera and plan to shoot away.

(Old AA, from my Air and Space Museum Series)

Peeving my Pets

Thursday, September 24, 2009

Yesterday, there were two instances in which my pets were peeved. And the fact that they both were witnessed within 10 minutes of each other makes it a little worse.

The first one has something to do with elevators. Given the fact that I have an office in the 6th floor of a 6-floor building, I use the elevators most of the time, especially when going up. Now, if you need an elevator, you better call the elevator by pushing the CORRECT button, depending on where you are headed. If you are in the 2nd floor, if you are heading up, then just press the UP button. Pressing the DOWN button will not do you any good. Yes, it will arrive as well, but it will head down and down alone if you press the DOWN button and you are actually heading UP. So yeah, before you decide to use an elevator, learn your spatial facts right first.

The second one has something to do with make-up and where to apply it. See, there's lockers in schools and universities, like my university as well. There are lockers in the locker rooms, and sometimes there are also lockers in the corridors of classrooms. Of course, people can put anything in the lockers, such as a small mirror. But the thing I find weird is that there are appropriate and inappropriate lockers to put a mirror and use that to apply make-up. If the locker is in a locker room in a gym, then sure, every person there is in a state of disarray and undress, so it is more or less okay to put make-up in front of one's locker in a locker room. However, if the locker is positioned in a public place, like in between classrooms, in front of offices in a university department, then is it okay to apply make-up while there are other people walking around, professionals, professors, and other people? I don't think so. Heck, there's a restroom just few paces away, so just take your make-up there and apply it there.

Sure, I usually say that I don't care what other people think, so if this person applies my thinking, then this person shouldn't really care. But, do you really want your professor to see how you put make-up?

(American Airlines Cabin, from my Air and Space Museum Series)

Stephen Manes Piano Recital

Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Yesterday night, there was a faculty recital in the Music Department. That was good, since it was a long day for me, and the concert was free for UB students. The person giving the recital was Stephen Manes, a pianist in the Music Department. When I saw his program a week ago, I wanted to go, since his program only involved music by Chopin and Debussy.

So, how did it go? I think that it was a great recital overall, and I like the fact that he chose the pieces that he played. I remember him playing Beethoven's Appassionata sonata last year, and that was a little disappointing. I wanted Beethoven to be more rigid, but I think he played it with too much rubato. This time, however, since it was Chopin and Debussy, his use of rubato was well-tempered. It was Romantic and Impressionist music at its best.

Some highlights of the program included Debussy's La Cathedrale engloutie and the whole series of Estampes. I loved how he performed both pieces, successfully evoking the scenes and pictures that the pieces were supposed to evoke. Also, the performances of Chopin's Berceuse and Barcarolle was amazing as well. I am not familiar with the Barcarolle but I knew the Berceuse, and I loved the way how he handled the multiple variations of that piece, which is centered on just two chords.

He gave two encores, both Chopin pieces: a mazurka in F minor, and the Revolutionary Etude. Of course he is a professional, so he hid his wrong notes quite well. If people didn't know the piece, then they might not have realized that there was a wrong note a couple of times in the program. Aside from that, it was a wonderful evening. I am glad I had my fix of classical music again.

(Huge Jet Engine, from my Air and Space Museum Series)

Validation

Tuesday, September 22, 2009

A friend of mine and I had this discussion quite recently, about how people take photos and then post them on social networking sites such as Myspace and Facebook.

So, if you're a typical teenager, young adult, or a twenty-something like me, chances are you have an account with a social networking site, such as Myspace or Facebook. These sites allow you to do certain things in cyberspace, and one such activity that I would like to talk about is the fact that people can post their photos online for their friends to see.

Now, if one just takes a random person's account and look at the pictures, there are multiple types of pictures that people post in there. There usually is the travel photo addict, such as me, where all my pictures are pictures of places that I have been to. There are also the select memories picture person, who only posts pictures of events in their lives that are deemed memorable, such as milestones of their children, updated family photos, and such. There is a different group, however, that has a different picture posting activity, and this is what I do not understand. There are people who post pictures of parties they attended, and this includes pictures of them getting drunk together with their friends, partying like there is no tomorrow. Of course, there are multitudes of variations from this theme.

Which brings me to think, why do people post pictures online for their friends to see? First, I would like to answer that question myself, and for me, the motive for posting my travel pictures online serves several purposes. One, it can serve as a memory link, and browsing it later would evoke good (and bad) memories of travel. That however, is a personal reason, which does not justify posting it online for others to see. Two, it can be a way of letting my friends see where I have been to, and to at least let them experience vicariously the experiences that I had. But maybe that is too altruistic a reason, so here's the selfish one. Three, it is a way of proving that one's claims to fame is indeed true. Pictures of exotic places can be proof of one's bragging rights. It's basically saying that I have been to Machu Picchu and I have the pictures to prove it. As far as I am concerned, there is nothing wrong with that.

So what I do not understand is that other people post other types of pictures, like what I described above. Is it a bragging right to let the world know that one has been drunk at a given party? Probably not, given the fact that there are multitudes of technology articles out there warning people against making their photos public, since it can be detrimental to one's life later, such as if one's boss finds out one's indiscretions.

So, what exactly is the reason why people post these photos? One hypothesis that my friend has put forward is the fact that we seek validation from others. By posting pictures online for other people to see, this allows us to prove to others that we are having fun. If being drunk is one's definition of having fun, then showing it to others thus validates the fact that at one point in the past, we had fun. If there are no pictures to prove it, our friends would not know that we had fun.

This somehow boils down to the existentialist question of the falling tree in the forest. If a tree falls down in the forest and nobody was there to see it, does it make a sound? Thus, does one exist if there is nobody out there to verify it? Existence and reality is two-fold in a way. As much as the concept of an absolute reality may seem to be very favorable and ideal, it is not always the case. Simulacra and other types of constructions are very much part of the reality of human beings. Thus, even though we would want to think that there is an absolute reality out there, the human behavior shows that most of the time, this is not what people think. People construct their own reality all the time. People project a certain persona to others. People feed other people information that would then become building blocks of the reality that they want to create, either deliberately, or inadvertently.

(Polar Star, from my Air and Space Museum Series)

Weapons of Mass Destruction

Monday, September 21, 2009

So today finally was the day in which a day that I have been waiting for almost a monh now have finally occurred. Yes, I know, the previous sentence was a run-on sentence, but what the heck.

Anyway, the back story is that during the summer, the downstairs neighbors left food in the house which then triggered a pest control problem. So, sure enough my roommates and I noticed the weird number of bugs and other insects in the house. That sucks. So, we complained to the landlord and so the landlord contracted an exterminating company to deal with it.

So one day, we were told that the exterminator would come at such a day. Before that, we had to empty our kitchen and bathroom of its contents. The kitchen equipment was then relocated to the extra room that we had, and the bathroom stuff is in the dining area.

The day came and went. No exterminator. Then we were told that the exterminator would come at a second date. And a third date. I cannot even keep track of how many missed appointments he had. Either he didn't show up or that he showed up late, or he showed up and nobody was downstairs. Indeed, trying to coordinate the schedule of the upstairs apartment, the downstairs apartment, and the exterminator was hard.

Anyway, today, it was my turn to wait. The exterminator was scheduled to arrive at noon. 12:30 and he still was not there, although I talked to the downstairs neighbors and they were given a call that the exterminator would arrive in twenty minutes. In the end, he showed up a full hour late. For me, that was unprofessional, but heck, might as well get this over with. I had to skip a lab meeting due to that. But then, hopefully I won't have this problem later.

So yeah, after the weapons of mass destruction were released in my apartment, I had to leave and not enter for the next four hours. Hopefully, the bugs are all dead and massacred by now.

(Shiny Yellow Plane, from my Air and Space Museum Series)

The Garbage Plate

Saturday, September 19, 2009

This is a garbage-plate-inspired post. This is also a scheduled post, since I am away from Buffalo, out of town, and in Pittsburgh for the weekend.

Anyway, what is the garbage plate? Apparently, there is this restaurant in Rochester, NY which serves this dish. In fact, even Wikipedia has an article about it. You can check out the restaurant's website here. I haven't been here myself, but I have seen variants here in Buffalo. Basically, it is a high-calorie and high-cholesterol dish, but perfect for the very hungry person. And there is just plenty of stuff that are unrelated to each other in there.

So, why is this a garbage plate? Because there are random topics in.

Topic 1: I just had another IRB protocol approved. I think I am becoming an expert in writing these study protocols. I just had my fourth protocol approved this afternoon, and a fifth one is currently being reviewed. Boy, I think I am good at this. Which makes me think that I am really glad that I discovered psycholinguistics. I like working at the lab setting. I like devising experiments that are carefully controlled and running them on people. It reminded me of the time when I was interviewed by someone from the Pi Gamma Mu Honor Society, back in 2005. I graduated magna cum laude and therefore was nominated to be part of this honor society before I left college. This lady asked me what I wanted to do next. I do remember mentioning my desire to head over to South Africa in order to study less-documented languages, and also to satisfy my fascination for Zulu. Come to think of it now, really? Me, a fieldworker? No, I don't think so.

Topic 2: I need a new routine for exercise. The weather is starting to be uncooperative with my early morning runs. Last Thursday, I wanted to go, but decided against it, since when I called the weather station, the current temperature was 49 degrees Fahrenheit. Very chilly. I need to rearrange my schedule so that I can go to the gym and exercise there. We'll see if that will actually happen.

Topic 3: The other day, I was able to meet a prominent scholar in my field. He was in town to give a cognitive science talk. While I was in the office of one of my committee members discussing the experiments that I am proposing in my study, he came in, because due to scheduling mishaps, different meetings overlapped with others. So he became part of the meeting I had with my committee member, and I ended up giving him a spiel of what I am doing. It turned out to be a good marketing practice. You know, the ability to talk about your work in 30 seconds, and later elaborating about it if necessary. And the good thing is, he thought that my study would be cool.

Topic 4: This coming Tuesday, there will be a Faculty Recital in campus, where a pianist who is a faculty member in the Music Department will be performing. The recital is free to UB students, and when I checked the program, it will feature works by Debussy (my favorite composer) and Chopin (my other favorite composer). I am looking forward to these works being performed because I used to play them myself back in the days, during a different lifetime.

Ok, garbage plate over. I will be back in Buffalo tomorrow.

(681NP, from my Air and Space Museum Series)

Cognitive Taxation

Thursday, September 17, 2009

Yesterday evening, I went to attend a lecture given by Kofi Annan. Yeah, the university seems to be good at inviting high-profile names in order for them to give a lecture to the university and to the large Buffalo community as a whole. Three years ago, they invited the Dalai Lama, and the big UB Stadium which seats 29,000 people was filled, plus they also televised the event to be broadcast to the Alumni Arena and the Center for the Arts auditoriums next door as well. So yeah, the university has a history of inviting prominent people. Just so you know, Tony Blair is coming to town in October, and I would like to get a chance to attend that too.

Anyway, so yesterday was Kofi Annan's turn to talk. He talked about the lessons he learned while being the Secretary-General of the United Nations, and other political things like that. He was a rather candid and warm person, judging from the way he spoke. If one is a firm believer of the UN, then I suppose one could say that his talk was inspirational, although he wasn't hesitant to admit its flaws, like for example, the case of Rwanda.

Anyway, due to the fact that politics isn't really my cup of tea, I can't say more about the content. Instead, my mind was analyzing the way he spoke. It seems that politicians have this genre of talking. They talk really slow. They talk as if it takes them a full minute to fully pronounce the whole sentence, regardless if it is a short or a long one. I noticed this in the speeches of the Philippine President Gloria Arroyo as well.

So, what is the side effect of listening to a slow talker? Yes, he has an accent, but that was not my problem. I could easily fix it in my head and understand the pronunciation. What was hard however, is the fact that I had to consciously retain in my working memory the beginning of the sentences in order to fully understand the whole sentence. The thing is, due to the fact that he talks so slow, when he reaches the end of the sentence, chances are I already forgot the beginning of the sentence, so I had to consciously force the beginning of the sentence to be activated, instead of letting it decay in the regular rate that I have. It was rather cognitively taxing.

Anyway, I still was glad that I went. There were plenty of famous people that visited the campus during the four years that I have been here, but this is actually the first time that I went to listen to what they had to say. No, even the Dalai Lama didn't urge me to go, even though the whole university halted its activities for that day. Classes were canceled, traffic was stopped, even Philip Glass came and performed for the Dalai Lama. But I didn't go. I wonder why I changed my mind with Kofi Annan.

Oh well.

(Will It Run?, from my Air and Space Museum Series)

LP No. 9

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

While I was in the lab yesterday, conducting experiments on undergrads needing to fulfill an experiment requirement, I got an email from the department secretary, telling me that I had a package waiting for me.

I know what it was, and I was happy. So when I got back to my office, I saw it lying on my desk, and I immediately opened it. I smelled it as I was flipping the pages, and it smelled good. The ink, the paper, everything. I suppose that's my ritual whenever I get a book, regardless if it is new or old. But yeah, I smelled it.

So what book is this? Well, this is none other than the ninth Lonely Planet book that I own. Yay! I have been collecting all of my Lonely Planet guidebooks ever since I started buying them. It provides me daydreaming fodder whenever I needed to daydream. It takes me back to the sights and smells and sounds that I have previously experienced, while on the road. It can bring me back to the Ecuadorian public market, the Peruvian Inca ruins, the most awesome fried oysters I had in Washington DC, the herring buffet in Copenhagen, among others.

So far, in purchase order, I have the guidebooks for Ecuador and the Galapagos Islands; New York City; Washington DC; Peru; Denmark; Hungary; Toronto; and Washington, Oregon, and the Pacific Northwest. Eight so far, until yesterday. So I welcome my ninth, the newest edition of Boston City Guide, into the bunch. I read through it yesterday, and I think I now have an idea of how the city is laid out.

So, anybody wanna go and see a 1700s warship? How about visiting the Stata Center in MIT?

(Two Airplanes, from my Air and Space Museum Series)

Linguistic Factoid No. 13: Hypernegation

Tuesday, September 15, 2009

So I was cleaning my office shelf yesterday, and while I was doing that, I found a very interesting piece of paper. It actually turned out to be the handout that I got for a talk that I attended in Berkeley, CA earlier this year. I was attending the 35th Annual Berkeley Linguistics Society and one of their guest speakers was Laurence Horn, who delivered a very interesting, and not to mention entertaining talk on negation, or rather, hypernegation. Thus, all the linguistic tidbits that I will be presenting in this entry are all courtesy of his handouts. And I should say right at the outset, that wow, he cites all of his sources, from Illinois politician Blagojevich to Mick Jagger.

Anyway, remember math? When you get a negative number, and multiply it with another negative number, the sign becomes positive? One would think that language would behave similarly, but in fact, that is not the case. Surprise surprise. Hypernegation refers to the fact in which there appears more than one negative marker in a certain proposition, such as a clause or a sentence. So, if language behaved like math, then this is what Horn calls duplex negatio affirmat, where the presence of two negatives cancel each other. He however does not cite any examples at least, which suggests that this indeed does not happen in language.

What is more common is duplex negatio negat, illustrated by the Mick Jagger song "I Can't Get No Satisfaction". Jagger surely did not mean that he gets satisfaction.

There's also the cases called duplex negatio not-so-affirmat, illustrated by people saying "not uncommon" which doesn't mean "common" or "not infrequent" which does not mean "frequent". He cites a 2000 episode of The Simpsons which featured an exchange between Bart and Homer, which went like this.

Bart: Dad, are you licking toads?
Homer: I'm not NOT licking toads. (with a stress on the second "not")

Homer's statement is usually interpreted as that he is doing something with toads, but not exactly licking them.

What are the other types of hypernegation? Well, one of the interesting ones is what Horn calls triplex negatio confundit, and examples include the following snippets.

"No detail was too small to overlook."
"There's nothing I don't ever wish I didn't say."
"I can't say I don't blame him."

So these examples, do you guys understand these? Or did it just confuse the heck out of you?

So what does this tell us? Language, no matter how systematic it may be, still has plenty of seemingly illogical nooks and crannies. Plenty of people have attempted to formalize language, and I have to say, I have been one of them, at least, I have attempted to do a formalistic description of certain linguistic phenomena in the past. But still, language can be bizarre, which draws the line between formal and natural languages.

(Red Engine, from my Air and Space Museum Series)

Knowing One's Own

Monday, September 14, 2009

So, I visit Sidney Snoeck's photoblog, and somehow, I came to realize that I still have a lot of things to know about the Philippines. Sidney is an amazing photographer who is from Belgium who somehow found his way to the Philippines. He takes pictures that are very realistic of Filipino culture, to the point that sometimes I think that he is more Filipino than I am. After all, he has seen and photographer the Ifugao tattoos (which until now, I had no clue of) and the Pahiyas festival in Quezon.

Which brings me to the thought that most of the time, regardless of where we are from and what our citizenship is, we usually forget to explore our own turf. We are so eager to get out and collect border crossing stamps and brag that we have been to places that our friends haven't been to yet, and increase the number of countries that we have visited, and yet sometimes we forget to look back where we came from.

The same thing applies to myself. So far, I have been to 18 different countries and territories, and have taken photographs of my escapades and adventures in these countries. However, I cannot really say that I have traveled the Philippines up and down. There are plenty of things to see in the country, and yet the only places I have been to in the Philippines are countable by just the digits of my left hand.

I would like to change that. It would be great to just get a one-way airline ticket to the northernmost part of the country, say Laoag, and fly there. From there, one could just work one's way heading south by ground transportation, passing through the mountains and the rice terraces, and seeing the native ethnic groups. I could imagine a trip of at least 2-3 weeks following this route. And this isn't even touching the numerous islands found in the central part of the country.

Now if only I have the time to actually do this.

(Eastern Air Lines, from my Air and Space Museum Series)

Slumdog Millionaire: A Review

Saturday, September 12, 2009

I don't have a movie review series, and I do not plan to start one (but who knows, I might change my mind), but this film just provoked me to write a review simply because it is significant enough to have caused some processing difficulties in my head.

So, let me begin by saying that Slumdog Millionaire is a movie that for the most part, touched plenty of people. When it was released a year ago, I had plenty of friends raving about it in Facebook, about how it was very good, and very touching. And only recently have I had the chance to find out about it, since I usually do not do something simply because everybody else is doing it.

So what is this story about? It is the story of an 18-year old chai wallah (from what I can tell, the term refers to the tea deliverer in an office setting, reminding me of the function of the entry-level Japanese secretary) who became a contestant in the Indian version of Who Wants to be a Millionaire. The thing is, he got every answer correct, and he is one question away from the grand prize. The show went overtime, and so he had to play the last question the next day, but in the meantime, he was arrested and tortured because everyone thought that he was cheating. The film later shows that he knew the answers because of his previous life experiences as a slum dweller.

The film had plenty of scenes intended to pull heart strings: the young Jamal diving into the shit pit just to get an autograph from a famous film star; the Hindu-perpetrated Muslim genocide; the deliberate blinding of a beggar boy by a gangster just because he sings well and that blind beggars earn more; and the various scenes that occur between Jamal's love interest Latika ranging from when they were toddlers until the present. Of course, if the viewer is bombarded by these scenes that were designed to induce pity, then sure, the viewers are just going to swoon and fall over.

The movie is trying to be cinema verite: I have not been to India at all so I do not know the state of their slums, but I can picture the Philippine equivalent to it. Heck, when I was an undergrad, I rode a bus and every morning, we would pass by the railway tracks which is parallel to the highway that the bus took, and the whole railroad is a slum complex, since people build squatting tenements next to it, and poverty is just everywhere. This part of the movie I actually liked: it did not try to season the portrayals to be vanilla, as they say.

What is unrealistic, however, is the whole story. From rags to riches, and he gets the girl at the very end, what is this? An Indian version of Cinderella? I also did not like the whole premise. The movie asked a question at the very beginning, in the form of the game show. An Indian slum dweller contestant in a game show gets all the answers correct. How did he do it? The choices were whether he cheated, he had an accomplice, or whatnot, and the final and supposedly correct choice was that it was written. Written where? Destiny is a focal point in the movie. The movie pushes the idea that it was written somewhere, in the stars maybe, that this person would progress from rags to riches, and get the girl that he wants. This is the most disturbing part of the movie for me.

I do not believe in fate. I may use the metaphor the stars aligned well from time to time, but I do not believe that my future is controlled by the stars. I control my future. In fact, I modify that metaphor by saying sometimes that I am making sure that my stars align right if I have a task to do and arranging things can be complicated. I like to believe that I control my future. In the game that is called life, nothing is pre-determined. Players like me have some control over what can happen in my future. Of course, there are unknown factors and chance and chaos, and for all that is said, I might be dead tomorrow. Who knows? But nothing is ever written somewhere, because if it were, then all I am doing right now is moot. I might as well sit back and relax, since if it is written somewhere, it will happen one way or another.

Overall, I was not impressed with the movie. I want movies that would make me use my head, and that would make me think. This one purely appealed to the emotion, hoping that the viewers will take pity and fall over. I think I am more rational than that.

Oh, and I suppose I won't even comment about the corny abrupt mood-changing dance sequence at the very end, which I suppose is in there, otherwise, it would not be an Indian movie.

(Northwest 747, from my Air and Space Museum Series)

Arrival Rituals

Friday, September 11, 2009

So I saw this article from Lonely Planet about how different famous personalities and travelers have a weird ritual when it comes to arriving in a new place. I learned that Libyan leader Gaddafi always erects a tent in the lawn, that John Paul II used to kiss the earth of the place he visited, and so on.

Which made me think, what about me? I've never traveled much alone (well, at least I don't consider myself to be traveling much) so I don't think I have had enough travel experiences to have a ritual whenever I would visit a place I haven't been before. So in this entry, what I am going to do is to recount the travel experiences involving the very first touchdown moments in a foreign place. I wouldn't count the times in which I landed in an airport and expected to see my parents there, there ain't a ritual there aside from smiling at my dad and hugging my mom. This means I won't talk about Czech Republic and Hungary. I am also not talking about Washington DC, since a friend of mine met me at the airport.

So, the very first time in which I traveled alone, and landed in a foreign place alone, was when I flew to Taiwan back in 2005. I still remember the impression I had when landing in Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport: wow, this is real, I am actually doing this, and this is just 2 hours from Manila. There was a lot of green, and a person met me in the airport, and he whisked me to the hotel. I flew to Taiwan to give a talk in a conference. It wasn't a trip for pleasure.

Second time was Quito, Ecuador. Summer of 2007, and my flight came from Miami, and arrived around 9:00 PM. Given the equatorial location of the country, this was already dark. Given the fact that I was arriving late, I arranged for the hotel to pick me up from the airport. There were two choices, a personal pick-up (which means that I am the only passenger to be picked up and that upon arriving, I would immediately be taken to the hotel) or a group pick-up (which means that I will be waiting until other passengers who may be from other flights arrive, and together we will head to the hotel). I chose group pick-up, since it was a bit cheaper, but when I found my name, and followed the guy with it, and boarded the minivan, I thought I was going to wait for a little while, but we immediately left. Shoot. I clearly remember my dad telling me a year before, Don't go to South America. You'll get kidnapped. I immediately took notice of my surroundings, what roads the driver was taking, oh, there's a major road there, another major road, we seemed to just be heading in one direction, he took a few turns here and there, and still I was able to recognize the direction he was taking, which was the same (hopefully it was south, because my prior research told me that my hotel was south of the airport), et cetera. Eventually, we got to the hotel, and things were fine, but the fact that my expectations and what actually happened did not match was a little disconcerting that my survival skills kicked in.

Next trip was Chapel Hill, North Carolina. I flew to Raleigh, and caught a cab. Boring arrival scene. Nothing special.

Then comes Peru. I connected in Bogota, and since I had 8 hours to burn, I decided to actually get out of the airport and head to the city, since I didn't need a visa to enter Colombia anyway. I didn't understand what the customs officer told me, she looked dismayed that here's this stupid backpacker telling her sorry multiple times, so she just waved me by. There were lots of people offering me a taxi, but I went to the real taxi stand. I had a money problem: there were so many zeros in their bills, and so I had a hard time figuring out what to give the taxi driver. Good thing the driver was patient, and actually gave me a crash course in Colombian pesos. He pointed out which was which, and so that was helpful. I was also offered drugs by a random person in the street. They were little green pills.

I landed in Lima, but didn't get out, since my final destination in Peru was Cuzco. I landed in Cuzco very early, and took a cab. I told the driver the name of my hotel, and this trip was well-researched, that I actually recognized the layout of the city as he was driving. I was better prepared this time than in Quito. Upon getting to the hotel, I had a taste of coca leaf tea, the same plant where they can derive cocaine. The leaves are actually banned in the United States, so don't even think of buying unprocessed leaves from Peru to bring them back.

I also flew to Copenhagen in July 2008. This was easy. The immigration officer was this large smiling guy, who was too lazy to find my visa in my passport (which actually was two booklets stapled to each other) so he asked me to find it for him. I then immediately found the train station and bought my ticket to my first destination, Helsingor.

I also flew to San Francisco early this year, to give a conference talk. That was easy, since all it took was taking the BART train from the airport to downtown, where my hotel was. And when I flew to Seattle last month, I just took the bus from the airport until I reached downtown as well. Nothing much to write about.

So overall, I supposed, the more developed the country is, the more boring arrival procedures are. Of course, for most people, having a very streamlined arrival is a good thing, so I am not complaining. But hey, arriving in a foreign land with totally different customs can be fun too. The trick is to not forget one's senses and watch one's back at all times.

(Spirit of St. Louis, from my Air and Space Museum Series)

Indian Ax Murderer Part II

Thursday, September 10, 2009

So, the Indian Ax Murderer is back in town again, concluding his trip this side of the border. But before he went to cross the border, we met again, for a slightly longer period this time.

Wow, that was fun.

So somehow, my other friends here in Buffalo are curious, again revolving around the concept of how can I carry on a conversation, let alone a conversation that lasted until the late hours, with a person I only just met in person once, that is, last week?

I agree, that it is a rather different way of enlarging my social circle. However, given the fact that we've carried on online conversations, sharing travel experiences, sharing travel plans for some time in the future, sharing pictures of exotic locales, all these shared instances created common ground that was enough to sustain a lovely and wonderful evening.

My throat was parched when I got back home. We talked about lots of things, including how the vocal folds work (nope, I am not converting to be a phonetician), how Tamil linguists think that the sound "oum" is the universal sound in the whole planet, about how Canada rocks, about how Buffalo's downtown is a ghost town, how much beer you can carry across the border, future career plans, future ideas of traveling together, things like that.

And I find it funny that my other friends here in Buffalo, who I have met through traditional means, are so lost in that concept, that they ask me whether I am still alive or if the ax murderer has already hacked me to pieces.

Anyway, I should say that was a great evening I had yesterday. Thank you. It's my turn to pick up the wine tab next time.

(Prototype Aircraft, from my Air and Space Museum Series)

Intellectual Cowardice

Tuesday, September 08, 2009

I came upon a disturbing news article earlier today. It had something to do with Yale University, and how it is under criticism for a certain decision that its publisher, Yale University Press, has decided to take.

It had something to do with the Danish cartoon controversy.

Remember back in 2005? When a Danish newspaper published a series of cartoons caricaturing the Islamic prophet Muhammad? And because of that, diplomatic tensions rose, with embassies being burned and protests being held all over the Islamic world? This has something to do with the Muslim tenet of not portraying the prophet for fear of idolatry.

I suppose this is a classical case of the clash between the East and the West. Of course, one would expect that there are multitudes of people that will not be happy with it, since after all, people can see this as a grave violation of their beliefs and faith.

It also is fanaticism.

What I do not get with religion and its followers is that for the most part, everyone thinks that they are right and that they believe the right religion, sometimes to the extent that they think they have the right to dictate to others what to do and what not to do. Numerous occurrences in history prove this. The Inquisition, for example, when Christianity tried taking over the whole European continent, and people would be punished if they do not convert. The same thing with the cartoon controversy.

Humans have the right brain to think. I would really wish that everybody use their brains accordingly, instead of simply following the crowd, and acting irrationally. Yale University Press is publishing a book about the incident that occurred back in 2005. For all intents and purposes, this is a scientific endeavor, so why would Yale back down and remove the cartoons from the book? The official answer that is given is because they fear violence. Wow. This somehow reminds me of Copernicus and Galileo. I didn't expect that a member of the Ivy League would be the first to lead us back to the Dark Ages.

(Weird Vehicle, from my Air and Space Museum Series)

American Spending

Monday, September 07, 2009

So, I found this news article about the changing habits of Americans when it comes to spending. It had something to do with the current recession and how the spending habits have changed. This article points out how different the behavior is of Americans coming out of the recession this time around compared to previous recessions.

What I find interesting is the fact that the article implies that Americans, until now, have been spending freaks. That they have all this stuff that they buy, simply because they want it, not because they need it. It gives me the impression that Americans as a whole do not know how to budget their resources, that they do not have a clear idea of what they can and cannot afford, and instead, just throw everything to the wind when it comes to the word "credit".

Really? Is that what it really is? No wonder there are plenty of American families who got hit with this recession and got traumatized, because they had to tighten their belts and change their spending habits drastically. I am no economist, nor a sociologist, but I find it hard to understand how people think when it comes to money. Do they save it, or do they spend it? Do they simply buy what they can afford, or do they think that money will come later so it is okay to buy something on credit?

I suppose there is the reasoning that when one has a little money right now, it would be wiser to buy what one wants at the moment, since this chance may not come up later in the future. But is that the right reasoning? What happened to thinking that the available money right now is better saved because there may not be enough money later?

(Dark Rocket Engine, from my Air and Space Museum Series)

Freshmen

Sunday, September 06, 2009

So, the semester has started and one week has passed. There are plenty of people here again. Again, this is the time for the types of thoughts in which I see people who are younger than me, and sometimes I cannot help but feel weird because of it.

So, the incoming freshman body is what? 18 years old? These guys are born in 1991. Wow. I on the other hand was born in 1982, so there's a nine-year difference between the largest contingent in the university (assuming that there are more freshmen than seniors, and more seniors than graduate students) and me.

Sometimes, when I see these young people, I feel like they come from a different planet. Their constraints are different, their preferences are different, everything that is about them seem to be different. I suppose this is reflected perfectly by Asher Roth's song I Love College. If you are curious, find the lyrics online and see what I am talking about.

Don't get me wrong, a part of me actually enjoys that song, even though it is just a small part of me. But the thing is, I do not get why it seems to be the case that for the average American college student, being in college is equivalent to having fun. Not that I condemn having fun, but having fun isn't all there is.

I live in the part of town where there is easy access to transportation to/from downtown and the university. It is the part of town that one doesn't need a car to go to campus, since the South Campus is just across the street, and all one needs to do to head to the North Campus is to ride the shuttle. There is also a metro station, so when one needs to go downtown, then one just hops into that. I don't have a car so this place is very convenient, but it also is party city. There are plenty of youngsters walking at night during the weekends, and they usually are drunk. I suppose this is just another added motivation for me to finish my work here and graduate as soon as I can.

Is it the fact that college here in the United States is the first opportunity for most people to be away from the eyes of their parents? Is it because that college years overlap with being 21, and with that, the legal ability to drink? I don't know the answer to that yet. Somehow, I find it bizarre that in this country, one can legally go to war and kill someone but one is not allowed to drink yet if one is not 21. But I suppose that's a topic for a different post.

Anyway, not that I disdain the freshmen and the undergraduate population. I once was an undergraduate. And not that I disdain having fun once in a while, since I do that myself every now and then, when the stars align properly. But what I do not understand is that it seems that for most undergraduates, having fun, getting drunk, and getting laid is all that matters. Wow. How epicurean, if that is what it really is.

(Star Wars, from my Air and Space Museum Series)

Prolific First Week

Friday, September 04, 2009

So it is Friday, and it is the end of the first week of this semester. It has been a whirlwind first week, with plenty of happenings and occurrences, but I am glad that it is over, and that it was productive.

Of course, not every happening is good, one such example is the fact that my roommates and I have been told that the apartment will be fumigated, and originally it was scheduled to happen last Monday, which got moved to last Wednesday, which got moved to today. And so far, it still hasn't happened yet. Talk about efficiency. In the meantime, our kitchen stuff are in the extra room, and our bathroom stuff are in the dining room. I am starting to get pissed.

Anyway, other occurrences have been good. One such occurrence was a meeting with a friend who I haven't met in person before, as blogged earlier. With respect to academia however, the good thing is that within the span of one week, I submitted two study protocols to the IRB for review. Isn't that great? I submitted one protocol to the IRB last Monday, and another yesterday. These are two study protocols for two different projects that I am involved with, and we need IRB permission and clearance to conduct these studies beforehand because they deal with human subjects. So hopefully those get cleared by next week, and so we can run our studies in time for the next abstract deadline for a conference.

I also had a few meetings with people here and there, plus met deadlines of stuff that people want from me, such as a list of experiments that I am proposing for my dissertation. I also read a dissertation proposal of a colleague of mine, and she did the same with mine. Finally, since this is a Friday, I had my very first class meeting of the only class I am taking this semester.

So yes, it was a prolific first week, I myself am surprised. That's why I am taking tomorrow off, my good friend and I are heading south to climb over boulders and rocks. We figured that tomorrow would be a good day to do it, since tomorrow is the Fallfest here in the university, where hip-hop artists come over and perform, and the undergraduates and the rest of the people who dig those sort of things will be on campus. We'd rather avoid the crowds, if you know what I mean.

(Rocket Engine, from my Air and Space Museum Series)

Indian Ax Murderer

Wednesday, September 02, 2009

So today was one of those days in which I wished I had a clone so that I could do all the things that I wanted to do. However, in a surprisingly miraculous manner, everything seemed to have fallen into place.

Anyway, so today was a day for a first occurrence. Today was a day in which I met someone in person, someone who I haven't met before, someone in which the interaction I had with this person until this point consisted of messages and conversations online. Yes, I met with a stranger in person. And I haven't really done that before.

Well, to qualify, it's not really the case that I met a stranger. No, actually, I knew more about this person and have been interacting with this person since December of last year. And it's just today that the stars have aligned so that I can put a body to the personality that I know in cyberspace.

So, who is it? Well, if you are a regular reader, it might be you! Ah yes, this person is a regular reader, and I am a reader of his blog as well. He is none other than the face behind Final Transit, since he was in town for a few hours on his way to an adventure.

I suppose I would rather blog about the whole thought about meeting strangers and unknown people in this entry than give the details of what occurred during the two hours us bloggers spent. I'd rather keep that for myself, since it's not just my own privacy that is at stake here.

Anyway, why is this entry titled this way? Because my good friend told me before whether I feel comfortable meeting a stranger for the first time. She told me that for all I know, he might turn up to be an ax murderer.

I do not say that her worry was unwarranted. Yes, there are plenty of people out there that have predatory activities, victimizing plenty of other innocent and naive people. And it is so easy to say that no, this is different, this is not like that. Nothing like that is going to happen to me.

However, I suppose I will go back to the way how I construct my social world. I once blogged about it here. People can be categorized in three groups, the close group, the neutral group, and the danger group. One's interaction with another person depends on where they fall into this tier system.

So, I have known Final Transit for a while now. Yes, in the beginning, as with every beginnings, people are strangers, and they start in the danger group. I assume that they are dangerous, that they do not have my best interests in mind, and that they are out there to "get me". That's just how I think. However, as time passes, that changes, as with every type of social interaction. One gets more familiar with the person, that the person becomes less of a stranger and more of a friend, little by little. That's just how friends are formed, simple as that.

Now enter the factor of cyberspace. A few years ago, the Internet never existed. So, there was no such thing as a cyberspace. Now, it is in full swing, and people can have interactions with other people even though one hasn't physically met yet. Heck, there even is this thing called cybersex. Facebook exists as well, and my actions in social networking sites such as that become extensions of my personality. What I do in cyberspace is what I am, and people who see my actions become familiar with my personality as well. This blog is another example, people can read this and learn things about me. Thus, just because one hasn't met physically does not mean that one is a stranger to another person.

Anyway, I am glad to report that I am still alive, that I have not met an ax murderer. Besides, if one assumes that every stranger is an ax murderer, then what reason can one have to leave one's house? I am just glad that I was able to put a face and body to an online persona, a blog, a voice. An ax demurrer perhaps, but not an ax murderer.

(Aluminum?, from my Air and Space Museum Series)

Linguistic Factoid No. 12: R

Tuesday, September 01, 2009

In many languages of the world, there is a sound that is usually represented by the Roman letter R. However, it is not the case that all sounds that are represented by this letter are all the same. Of the languages that I speak, there are at least three different types of sounds that are all represented by this letter.

Well, it is not accidental that various different sounds are represented by this letter. There are commonalities, and yet they still come out as different. Let me discuss each of them here.

There is the easiest one to produce, the so-called “tap”. This is a sound that is produced by simply hitting one’s alveolar ridge (the hard horizontal part one has behind the upper teeth) with the tip of the tongue. The Japanese R is like this. This is a very quick sound, and it cannot be prolonged, unlike M where you can vocalize it until you run out of breath. The Tagalog R is also the same. English also has this, but in different environments. English actually replaces other sounds with this sound, for example, the words “ladder” and “latter” are pronounced the same, with the middle consonant utilizing this sound, and so is “Adam” and “atom”.

Now what happens if you do this multiple times? Then you get a trill. This is a rather hard sound to make, and not all languages have these. This is hard due to the motor control that is needed to accomplish it, by having sufficient control on the tongue to make it vibrate up and down in a fast rate. I do not really know the exact motor process that is involved from the top of my head, since after all, I am not a phonetician. But yes, there are languages that use this sound, such as Spanish. In fact, Spanish has both the tap R and the alveolar trill R.

Not every trill is an alveolar trill. There are two more speech organs that can be trilled, and one of them still produces what is orthographically represented as an R. One can also trill the uvula, and this is the small flesh that hangs at the back of one’s throat. When this is trilled, it produces what is called a uvular trill, and this is also represented in various languages as R. French and Portuguese has this for example. I know this for a fact since both names of my adviser (who is French) and a co-author (who is Portuguese) has this sound.

There is one other R sound that I haven’t discussed. This is one of the mos rare sounds in the planet, and is very different from the ones discussed above. This is the retroflex R, which is done mainly by curling or bunching one’s tongue so that it forms a retracted position inside one’s mouth, accompanied by lip-rounding. Not a lot of languages do this, but it is featured in one language that is commonly spoken. This is also known as the English R. One other language that features this is Tamil. In fact, this sound makes a social distinction across the population, since apparently, only the educated can master this sound, and the laypeople will substitute this instead with an alveolar lateral sound, also known as L.

(Rocket Heads, from my Air and Space Museum Series)