Reviewing in Sin

For those of you who watched Mr Bean, the ultimate disaster movie (the first one, not the crap close to child abduction second one - a literal disaster), you may well recall that at some point seeing one of the world's great paintaings - Whistler's Mother (or at least a copy thereof) defaced, with a horendous cartoon face inserted instead. An image all the more jarring combining the best of art, with the pure awfulness of Mr Bean's attempted fix.

It was, alas, this very image that came to mind whilst listening to Brahms' second piano concerto, with Viktoria Postinikova as soloist, and her aging husband (Gennady Rozhdestvensky) as conductor. You see the trouble with classical music is that it can be completely ruined when in the wrong hands, and leave mental scarring due to the nature of the abuse.

Splitting a note in the opening horn solo could have been an omen, but even that was nothing to prepare what was to come. Extended to a monstrous hour long effort (sometimes a 33% bonus of time really is not beneficial) this performance was slow. The music that can skip along became clumsy. Actually, it was all rather clumsy come to that - split notes all over, with the pedalling seemingly chosen primarily to disguise pianistic innacuracy rather than for musical purpose. Oh my.

The second half of Brahms' Second Symphony was also ponderous, if not as offensively slow as the concerto, and there were some nice patches with the strings making a good rich tone. Overall though. Oh my oh my.

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I don't really love Jakarta. In fact, many Indonesians don't really love Jakarta - I sit next to one in Singapore, and she refuses to go anywhere near her capital city - but then she is from Bali. Although I've never actually been, I think most places would probably come in a second preference against Bali.

The troubles are multiple. I find the traffic a tad frustrating - Jakarta in particular is constantly jammed up - in fact they don't report traffic jams on the traffic news, but rather areas where there is little. Whilst I accept that I've not really looked around Jakarta (it's hard when it takes a long time to get, oh I don't know, 2 miles) what I've seen is not all that endearing - a lot of modern buildings with very limited character. the old ones, similarly uninspiring. The poverty is still pretty open.

The last two trips have been dire. The first one I worked all day in Jakarta, then stayed in the grottiest hotel I've ever not had to pay for (probably joint with a Premier inn a stone's throw from the Forth Bridge in Scotland). Then woke up at 5am to make Bandung, meetings there all day, then a 3 hour delay to my flight home. Bad would be better.

The second one I decided to get to Bandung the night before, but still worked in Jarkarta for the whole day after a 6am flight. Then the car taking me to Bandung left with someone else. The traffic meant it was 2 hours before a replacement reached me. we then got lost in Bandung. I hit the sack at midnight after a 19 hour day, with a meeting at 730 the next morning. I'm sure that eventually I will get around to seeing some of the nicer parts, and I do like the Hyatt in Bandung, which itself seems less claustrophobic and nuts than Jakarta.

We'll find out more soon - am back there from Sunday.

Back, after a break

I remember when I was at university, towards the end of term, as the workloads increased, I would feel worn out. Beleaguered by late nights working on design projects/dissertations that had to be finished before the holidays. Come the end of term I concuss for a few days, either in Birmingham, or quite often in Cambridge where I could be pampered by parents.

Oh were that I could just drive two hours, get pampered, and be de-concussed within a few days like I used to. It feels like I’ve been at the end of term for the past 3 months. It all started with a project bidding for a new rail link between Singapore a JB. A mad, under-resourced effort. We’ll have to see what comes of it. Since then we’ve won some work in Indonesia. I’ve been going to and from a little like a yoyo (or just starting to do so), and have also been in Vietnam. I doubt that there have been many American passports that have only seen immigration in Singapore, Ho Chi Minh, Hanoi, Jakarta and Bandung in their lives (I should add, I got a new passport in December).

In addition we’ve had an external quality audit which I managed – successfully J, and now are attending of an external Environmental System audit. Going from nothing to audit in 6 weeks is a challenge I wouldn’t really wish to repeat.

My family came for a second visit to Singapore (well, all except for an elder brother). That was very nice. We went running around Singapore a little bit. It was good. I hope they come back. I had actually not seen them in over a year. I’ll see them again in July when I go for a younger brother’s wedding. (I’ll also see the elder one then – only 18 months since last sight – you think that we’ll remember what each other looks like?). Today is mother’s day – so I did the filial thing and rang (ok – absolute minimum, but then over here Mother’s Day is on a completely different day, so I think that I’m a little bit excused).

The rest of this year includes a Beethoven Piano Concerto set – I’ve played a couple of them already, but it will be nice to complete the cycle. This follows from one of the most nerve-wracking, but spectacular concerts I’ve played on New Year’s Eve. Amazingly, it worked. I’ll let you know more in another post, which I promise will be sooner.

Chiang Mai

So, another year has come and gone, and whilst it is tempting to write a post about what I have done, and what I’m going to do next year, frankly, I’ve not really had a chance to think about it so far.

So instead I’ll talk about another mini-break. This time we went to Thailand; Chiang Mai to be precise. If you listen to the locals, they’ll tell you that Chiang Mai is Thailand’s second city, so a sort of Thai version of Birmingham then. Possibly, on paper, but in reality, it is a very different sort of place, so far unaffected by the hussle and bussle that usually afflicts large cities.

Chiang Mai was a place to do new stuff. The Dodgess and I went for a spa afternoon. A whole afternoon of being looked after by a gang of masseurs. We had foot massage, body massage, body scrucb, steam, a milk bath, a facial. All sorts frankly. It was all very nice and is a really nice way to spend an afternoon.

Not the spa, but our hotel, which was quite idyllic.

The other speciality of Chiang Mai is night markets. They go around from location to location, and sell all sorts from food to musical instruments, via Asian trinkets and clothes. The Dodgess, built on our collection of textile art by buying lots of weaving and silk; sadly some of them will end up on her classroom walls rather than ours, but they are nice! There is also an awesome set of markets, with all sort of fruit and veg, and other nick nacks. 

The indoor market – our favourite probably

One of the night markets

Chiang Mai would, I daresay, be very interesting to Buddhists, with a plethora of temples, all coated in gold, and very impressive, if that sort of thing impresses, but for us – not so much. Equally, somewhat disappointing was a dinner with Asian dance – the costumes were amazing, but we were a bit far from the action, and the food was a bit...

Inside one of the temples

A couple of the fancy costumes

And a mad dancer with swords – rather him than me!

Happy New Year to anyone who may still read this!

Third Time Lucky

Hong Kong and I have a mixed history. The first time I went, it spat exams at me, and when I wasn’t cramming, or in the exams, it just spat at me (rain and more rain). The next time, for a work conference it didn’t spit at me. But, by being a work conference, I was trapped in a Gold Coast Hotel, with just the briefest glances of the warm sunshine outside.

So, I guess, that last month’s trip was Third Time lucky. I finally managed to get out and do something. OK, it was planned that way – not for exams, not for a work conference, just the Dodgess and I going out and having some fun time together.

In many ways I had always thought Hong Kong to be a strange place to go to from Singapore – after all, it is all about a big built-up City, with food and shopping malls with A/C. As opposed to Singapore, which is all about a big, built-up city, with food and shopping malls with A/C.  Before we went we were given a whole list of restaurants to go to, and shopping malls to visit. To which we paid no attention whatsoever.

 

Instead, we headed off to a little arts and craft building, the sort of place they make Chinese instruments. Then off rambling around the islands, which gave us some nice, cool, un-humid fresh air, and some great views. We went exploring around Lantau Island, and a village without a single car – they get around by boats. We took a tour on a boat, which worked well, then went on a self-guided tour which left us with very wet feet, and a 5 minute confrontation with two dogs, who eventually lost interest and we sprinted back. 

Lantau Island has the world's biggest Buddha!

 Main Street - or River in Tai-O

 And we had a nice display from some friendly pink dolphins alongside!

Another day we went up Dragon’s back. This is a brilliant walk, if somewhat obscure – you get dropped off by a bus in the middle of nowhere, and end up at a beach. Then wonder how you are supposed to get back. There are buses, but only a few a day – I think we were lucky to only wait a few minutes.

 A trick of our fancy camera is to take these panoramic shots (not so good for the hard disk space)

For some reason I quite like these 'port-hole' shots.
 

Big Wave Beach. Wonder where it gets its name from??

It was third time lucky for getting up Victoria’s Peak as well. I had tried the first time, but I couldn’t see the Peak (buried in the clouds). Then the second time I didn’t really have the time (ok – I didn’t have it at all). Getting up on the tram is what I imagine getting onto the subway in Tokyo to be like. Unpleasant. The top also feels like a place designed solely to separate one from the contents of a wallet/purse. It need not be, there are some brilliant vantage points that are free, but why do I have to be pushed past those I have to pay for? Still – the views are very good! But, unlike our other travails on this trip, this is one place that you really do not escape the whole madness of HK. 

It all sounds very busy - and it was. We spent very little time in our hotel. I sometimes find it ironic that often when the Dodgess and I stay in nice hotels, we actually spend very little time in the room. So it was here. Our view out over the harbour was a hotel room I could have stayed in for a long time without getting bored (albeit, they don't really compare with the ones from the Peak). We could also have watched the ‘Round the Island’ race as it progressed, and only missed a little bit.

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I remember as a child my father observing that the family opposite had become a two car family. This past week, I’ve observed that the Dodgess and I have become a 4 laptop married couple, both having a work, and a personal laptop.

My work one is the latest addition to the group – given to me in theory because I do a lot of travelling (or at least more than 2 weeks per year) and that I have had to liaise with the USA, and need to do that on their time. This included being awake to respond to any early emails from CA (around midnight here) and also being able to respond to any evening emails from New York (around 6am here). Joyous indeed, as you can imagine.

For the past 6 months or so, I have done rather little other than bidding and Quality Management stuff, other than a tiny little project that took up perhaps 25% of my time over 6 weeks. The last two weeks in particular have been manic: 4 bids in Indonesia, including 450km of coal railways, an airport rail link, and a signalling upgrade study for their whole country. In Singapore, I have managed the design for a D&C contract, and I was also involved in the bid for a feasibility study in Vietnam, and 1000km (?!) of railway in Oman. Interesting stuff... just a challenge to push it out. The next one is a link from Singapore to Johor Bahru in Malaysia... at least that one is not back until next year! (Hang on – that’s not all that long away now!!)

Disorienting Seasons

I don’t like October. When I was at school, it was a long way since the Summer holidays, and a long way until Christmas. At work, it’s a long way between bank holidays, and near the end of the leave year, so you have no spare time to take off. Back in the UK the weather is just meh. By that I mean that it is not a nice Autumn generally, and nor do you get the advantages of Winter, those being the nice crisp mornings, with frost or snow, and a very pretty scene out of the window. Generally, October is grey, in the UK, literally, in more southern places metaphorically.

 Ambivalent grey weather is not something that is a problem here. There is no doubt what the weather is feeling over here. Take the last two days – both started nicely, but by mid-Afternoon there were the most epic thunderstorms, combined with biblical rain. By the evening, it was back to the clear skies and balmy evenings.

Of course, now it isn’t actually October anymore. And the shops over here are somewhat similar to those in the UK. Now that Halloween is over, they fill the space vacated by the witches outfits, by Christmas stuff.

Now this is really quite disorienting for me. So, in the UK, I would feel a little Christmasy by dint of being cold. Having been cold we can warm up by doing Christmasy things, like drinking mulled wine, sitting by open fires, eating roasted meats. Over here, I’m still wearing shorts whenever I can.

Tired......

You’ll have to forgive the tardiness of this post. The reason is primarily due to work – and the manicness of the past few weeks. Take last week – I was on a training course Monday and Tuesday, on Wednesday I had a full day quality management review, which continued into Thursday morning, then I had three meetings and a presentation on Thursday afternoon and Friday. I also prepared a tender in overtime. In the past month I have worked on two projects in Vietnam, three in Singapore, and one in Jakarta, and worked on proposals in Nepal, Oman and the rest of Indonesia. I think we can all agree that I’ve been busy. The Dodgess, has equally been busy, if not more so trying to cram a lot of music administration support into what time exists around what is a rather full time job. 

The result is that I have almost nothing of real excitement to talk about. Or perhaps I’m just too tired to think about writing anything much.

We are still in the process of sorting out our flat. We have made some progress – we have a bit more furniture after this afternoon, including some seats, and some more countertop in the kitchen. We still have one disgraceful room that I daresay we will try and sort out before the family arrive in a couple of months time. We may even have somewhere for them to sleep!

One of the things that needs to be sorted in the disgrace room are CDs. Friends of mine have recently spoke lovingly about combining her CD collection with her husband’s – about how fun it was to see what had become a joint collection get built from the individual versions.

Whilst it is exciting to think about a joint collection, organising and sorting it, is not such a prospect. Yes - we have loads of CDs. But they are in a mess. Mine have no boxes (ok – they do, but they are in the UK). The Dodgess’ have boxes, well some of them do. Other boxes exist without the CD. A result of trailing the box-free around the world as a student. I have already spent a few hours sorting them, with only some success, and I guess a few more hours is required. This is before I perhaps think about getting the boxes for my CD over, and reuniting some of them.

We have a few days in Hong Kong coming up – hopefully that we re-charge our batteries. We decided that we should go there because although I’ve been twice, I’ve never really been outside of hotels. I think I ought to get out!