Did I mention that the main, main, main reason I am back is to eat, eat, eat. A girl can only take so much milk, steak and potatoes. In Sydney imagined coming home to good ole home cooking. I must admit such visions helped me stop the tears from flowing at the airport. Dreams shattered as I arrived home and was informed by KF, my mum's maid who has been with us for over 15 years, that she would be going back to Thailand for Raya hols. And she would only be back a day before I left. I was absolutely horrified!! What?? I have to eat out every day?!! I do that everywhere else...but not HOME!!! Lets not talk about the dirty laundry....
But I am a survivor! It helps that we have been visiting every hotel in KL to check out the ballrooms and negotiate terms. I told my Mum at lunch at the Mandarin yesterday that I feel like a foreigner on a real holiday in KL, what with the many buffets I have tried and tested (regardless of the fact that we will not be having raw oysters and sashimi for the wedding...heh). When I go on holiday I eat outside the hotel because we all know that hotel food is unauthentic. My mum is pleased that I am happy with maid-less arrangement. My sis is not happy because every time she calls from work post reccy lunch she finds out that as yet we are undecided and we may have to go to another hotel the next day. As it is we can only do one hotel a day as I wake up late, tennis is on and we have to be back home by 3.30pm because the Philippine soap is on then. We spend 10 minutes looking at ballroom and 2 hours eating lunch. As my sis screams over the phone that the wedding is less than 6 months away and how my mum's indecision is unproductive, I rattle on about how nice my chocolate desert is. I am glad that I am going home soon because I am sure my sis is heading for a nervous breakdown. Through no fault of mine of course.
Other than eating, I have been stocking up on clothes. Can't buy anything in NL because the clothes are too long (or I am not tall enough...heh). Buying cheap T-shirts at the Factory Outlet Store. It goes without saying that if one goes shopping in KL, one is easily reminded how KL salespersons, born in the land of smiles, have the worst people skills in the world. At FOS, I asked if they had the GAP tank tops with built in support in a smaller size as they all seemed to be in XXL. The salesboy said NO, you are too late because the smaller sized ones have all been sold. So there I am looking at a huge pile of spaghetti strapped tank tops in XXL (in Euro size mind you) and asked rather nicely if there is such a huge demand for such tank tops by really fat people in KL (not that there is anything wrong with being fat). And this boy just walked off. Can you imagine? It is to me a valid question because you would think that the salesboy and I could have a discussion about the viability of buying tent like tank tops for a market primarily made up of XXXS Euro sizes in the form of anorexic ah mois (sweet chinese chicks), and S-M Euro size for the more berisi (nice malay term for fleshy, or obviously not anorexic) Malay girls. But he walked off. This is why we are not yet a developed country.
I am running out of clean clothes, and we have no idea how to use the washing machine. I think I will have to look for a laundrette. I miss D. He usually does my laundry.
Wednesday, January 26, 2005
Thursday, January 20, 2005
It is only by coincidence that I am back here with the family to celebrate Raya Haji. I came back here primarily to tell my parents in person (post phone call that informed them of the existence of a boyfriend...heh..) about my intention to get hitched to a man they have never met (they are desperate hence blessings) and to tell my Daddy, again in person, that I have a boyfriend/fiancee (I did not have his mobile number hence no phone call). I have his blessings too. I think. I was eating my mango with pulut desert as he gave his rather long lecture on communication...lalalala...duties of wife..lalalala..importance of something or rather...desert finished...You have my blessings. Cool. Can you pass me the cendol?
I also came back to help my sis plan her wedding. Or rather to provide moral support as she desperately tried to convey her wish of a small intimate ceremony. I coached her on standing her ground, showing no weakness, and maintaining a stand. We are in a war, I told her. I failed. She caved in and agreed to a small bersanding. What started out as a 200 persons guest list with casual wear is in danger of escalating to the 700 ball room affair...just because she compromised on that minute issue. I did my best, but I guess my best wasn't good enough (sung to the tune of Just Once). As my Mum rattles on about cousins of friends who she just hassss to invite..I quietly hum "We've only just begun". I spend my days bugging my sis, and my nights scaring my future brother in law with stories or laser circumcisions gone wrong. How with one small technical error, we may be talking quantity, not quality.
I also came back to help my sis plan her wedding. Or rather to provide moral support as she desperately tried to convey her wish of a small intimate ceremony. I coached her on standing her ground, showing no weakness, and maintaining a stand. We are in a war, I told her. I failed. She caved in and agreed to a small bersanding. What started out as a 200 persons guest list with casual wear is in danger of escalating to the 700 ball room affair...just because she compromised on that minute issue. I did my best, but I guess my best wasn't good enough (sung to the tune of Just Once). As my Mum rattles on about cousins of friends who she just hassss to invite..I quietly hum "We've only just begun". I spend my days bugging my sis, and my nights scaring my future brother in law with stories or laser circumcisions gone wrong. How with one small technical error, we may be talking quantity, not quality.
Wednesday, January 19, 2005
KLite again
I have been munching on Goreng Pisang alllll week. Yup, you guessed it, I am back in KL!! I left Sydney with tears in my eyes, took a flight out to Melbourne, then Bangkok, then KL. Went via Thai airways. Not too bad. Again, no personal screens and bad food (I have a thing about day old omelets) but good service. Sawadikaps galore. I must add that Bangkok Airport is fantabulous and I nearly missed my flight what with being preoccupied at the Jim Thompson store at gate 21, while my plane was at gate 56. I am now a firm believer that all airports should have shops all the way to the departure gate. Must start movement.
I arrived late, only to be greeted by my cheerful aunt and equally cheerful Mum (men had Friday prayers). My first thought was...Oh no..I knew I should have taken the train. Don't get me wrong. I love my Mum to bits. And she is not a bad driver...but lets put it this way, my Dad finds it cheaper to hire a driver. I am pretty sure my Mum inspired his new car replacement programme business (like AAM but you get a replacement car when you have an accident). I was greeted by kisses (bless) and onion breath (they claim they wanted coffee but were to embarrassed to only buy that at Burger King (what will the counter boy think??!!) so they each had to order french fries and onion rings). We spent ages looking for the car..we not only ended up on wrong floor, but the wrong car park! I was blamed for leading them to wrong car park. I reminded them that I was not in the car when they parked it. They filled me in on happenings, with conversation only interrupted when other cars start honking us (Mum and loyal aunt will then have a rant about stupid drivers) and as I secure my seat belt in the back seat. We got home 3 hours later (we HAD to stop at FAM for kuey teow because they decided I should have it for lunch). I should have taken the train.
So far I have been spending quality time with Mum which includes watching some Philippine soap opera and catching up on family goss. 3 aunts are not talking to another aunt because she casually mentioned the ending of same soap opera which she found out herself from surfing the net. I have been getting into the swing of life at home, like taking maid to TMC to do shopping...at 9am..sigh. That sort of thing. I have been catching up with friends I have missed terribly. Just hanging out. Things I missed, and will miss after 1 Feb. Thoughts are a bit disjointed at the moment because maid is frying goreng pisang, and I can smell it. Gotta go.
I arrived late, only to be greeted by my cheerful aunt and equally cheerful Mum (men had Friday prayers). My first thought was...Oh no..I knew I should have taken the train. Don't get me wrong. I love my Mum to bits. And she is not a bad driver...but lets put it this way, my Dad finds it cheaper to hire a driver. I am pretty sure my Mum inspired his new car replacement programme business (like AAM but you get a replacement car when you have an accident). I was greeted by kisses (bless) and onion breath (they claim they wanted coffee but were to embarrassed to only buy that at Burger King (what will the counter boy think??!!) so they each had to order french fries and onion rings). We spent ages looking for the car..we not only ended up on wrong floor, but the wrong car park! I was blamed for leading them to wrong car park. I reminded them that I was not in the car when they parked it. They filled me in on happenings, with conversation only interrupted when other cars start honking us (Mum and loyal aunt will then have a rant about stupid drivers) and as I secure my seat belt in the back seat. We got home 3 hours later (we HAD to stop at FAM for kuey teow because they decided I should have it for lunch). I should have taken the train.
So far I have been spending quality time with Mum which includes watching some Philippine soap opera and catching up on family goss. 3 aunts are not talking to another aunt because she casually mentioned the ending of same soap opera which she found out herself from surfing the net. I have been getting into the swing of life at home, like taking maid to TMC to do shopping...at 9am..sigh. That sort of thing. I have been catching up with friends I have missed terribly. Just hanging out. Things I missed, and will miss after 1 Feb. Thoughts are a bit disjointed at the moment because maid is frying goreng pisang, and I can smell it. Gotta go.
Tuesday, January 04, 2005
A Mother's pride
Over lunch today, D told me that the bed we have in our room was chosen by his mother when he went off to College. I told him that explains why it is a dinky Double instead of a studly King. He added that actually, he complained about the size at first as he had a rather dinky room and he thought it would be better to get a single bed. As a female, presumably with motherly instincts (well, except for those women who drown their kids in bathtubs and cars), I cannot imagine his Mother's reaction. I would be highly disturbed at such apparent lack of foresight.
I told D that when we have a kid, and he goes to college, we will also help him choose a bed. In fact, when we go shopping we will both pretend to test it out. Boy will that put him in therapy for years.
I told D that when we have a kid, and he goes to college, we will also help him choose a bed. In fact, when we go shopping we will both pretend to test it out. Boy will that put him in therapy for years.
Monday, January 03, 2005
Starting to see light...
You would think that with the fantastic weather and free vino in abundance (well, you do have to socialise to get access to the stuff but once you down a few carafes its not really an issue) I would be hitting the sand every afternoon. To be honest, I have been in nerd mode lately and in the flat making the final amendments to the first article I worked on with D and finishing up the second article I have been working on with him. We were even working on Christmas eve and through new years day to get this second article done as we have to meet deadlines to submit them for conferences.
For those of you who are not in on the mysteries of academia, let me try to clue you in. First you do anything and everything to get data. You become a data whore (When D first mentioned this term I shouted (in shock and awe of course) "You dated a whore??!!" rather loudly in a fairly nice restaurant..he was not pleased..) and you do almost anything and everything to get data to analyse. For the second article, I promised a few people to name my firstborn after them...so in a few years be prepared to read a posting on David-Bruno-Azam-Joseph-KeeHong-Hanson-etc-Cumming. D will understand as he will probably add on a few Germanic names to fulfil promises made for data obtained for first article.
So you now have data. You then come up with general hypotheses and hope to god that the data fits to prove you right. If they don't, you change hypotheses so that you are still right. Although your data will sufficiently address 10 hypotheses, you only list out less than 5 for an article as academics have short attention spans. As it is if an article is not relevant to their work they will not read it..ever. Even if it wins a nobel prize. If it is slightly relevant, they will read the abstract, the introduction and the conclusion. All of 3 pages of the 40 page document you spent 6 months working on. Only if the work is extremely relevant to an academic's work will they bother to read it back to front, even then only to enable them to shoot you down like the dog you are. Especially when what you find contradicts their work. They shoot you in the back while you are down.
I digress. So you have data. You have hypotheses. You then write up paper. When you do this note that you do not have to know everything. Have you ever read an academic paper and had a look at the extremely long Biblio/References? Let me tell you a secret..the author (ie me) has not read all those papers/books/articles. You read a few, yes, but alot of them are included as you hope that those writers will be your referee. You choose a name, preferably someone you have met before, and look through his list of published/unpublished working papers to see if any fits into your area. You add in the cite as nothing makes an academic happier than having his existence confirmed by a cite.
Let me now explain why a referee is the bane of an academic's life when she is just starting out. You see, as I have finished the paper, I now have what is called a working paper. I can now submit this working paper to journals. The journals are ranked in that you have really really good journals where anyone published there is elevated to status of BSD on campus (Big Swinging D*%k). You are a God. No questions asked. If I get a paper in any A journal I can just shake legs for the rest of my life as other academics have to kowtow to me. Unfortunately, only 0.002% of new submissions get accepted. My chances are even slimmer as 1) to get an article in I will be peer reviewed and 2) the level of cronyism in academia is one that surprisingly has gone unnoticed by the presidency of a country that shall remain unnamed...maybe because it is in their favour 3) as the top level journals are that same country centric so if data are not biased in their favour your work will not be considered worthy of their attention. As a new academic, I am not worthy of their favour. Even if I cite all of their work. Especially if I actually have something novel to say. So if the referees don’t like you (and they won’t), they will send you what is called a rejection letter aka FOAD letter (F*&k Off And Die). If you are very very lucky, and they somehow like you enough to actually read your paper and comment, the review process could take 2 years. Some unlucky ones take up to 7 years. By then they would have either realised that academia is not for them, or they would have just killed themselves. Same difference.
So there you have it. I have spent the last year working on 2 papers that may never see the light of day. But all is not lost. An unpublished paper can be presented at conferences. Because academics have to put up with the review process and bad pay, conferences are chosen based on venue, not reputation or even topic. Did I tell you that where you work (Boston versus Zimbabwe) and what you earn is totally dependant on your publication record in top journals? [Books don’t count because we all know that book authors are divided into 2 categories, those who are published and just staple all their articles together…sort of a Best Of Compilation (the better author) and the sad ones who have to write a book to publish their altogether unrecognised working papers]. A top tier conference on your specific area of research in Moscow is a possibility, but a so-so conference sort of related to your area in Honolulu is a must go. Funnily enough, papers that are accepted by journals are not entitled to be submitted for presentation at conferences. You can’t have your cake and eat it too.
So now you understand why I worked through the holidays? There are conferences in Ghent Belgium, Milan Italy, Seoul Korea and Georgia. Fingers crossed.
For those of you who are not in on the mysteries of academia, let me try to clue you in. First you do anything and everything to get data. You become a data whore (When D first mentioned this term I shouted (in shock and awe of course) "You dated a whore??!!" rather loudly in a fairly nice restaurant..he was not pleased..) and you do almost anything and everything to get data to analyse. For the second article, I promised a few people to name my firstborn after them...so in a few years be prepared to read a posting on David-Bruno-Azam-Joseph-KeeHong-Hanson-etc-Cumming. D will understand as he will probably add on a few Germanic names to fulfil promises made for data obtained for first article.
So you now have data. You then come up with general hypotheses and hope to god that the data fits to prove you right. If they don't, you change hypotheses so that you are still right. Although your data will sufficiently address 10 hypotheses, you only list out less than 5 for an article as academics have short attention spans. As it is if an article is not relevant to their work they will not read it..ever. Even if it wins a nobel prize. If it is slightly relevant, they will read the abstract, the introduction and the conclusion. All of 3 pages of the 40 page document you spent 6 months working on. Only if the work is extremely relevant to an academic's work will they bother to read it back to front, even then only to enable them to shoot you down like the dog you are. Especially when what you find contradicts their work. They shoot you in the back while you are down.
I digress. So you have data. You have hypotheses. You then write up paper. When you do this note that you do not have to know everything. Have you ever read an academic paper and had a look at the extremely long Biblio/References? Let me tell you a secret..the author (ie me) has not read all those papers/books/articles. You read a few, yes, but alot of them are included as you hope that those writers will be your referee. You choose a name, preferably someone you have met before, and look through his list of published/unpublished working papers to see if any fits into your area. You add in the cite as nothing makes an academic happier than having his existence confirmed by a cite.
Let me now explain why a referee is the bane of an academic's life when she is just starting out. You see, as I have finished the paper, I now have what is called a working paper. I can now submit this working paper to journals. The journals are ranked in that you have really really good journals where anyone published there is elevated to status of BSD on campus (Big Swinging D*%k). You are a God. No questions asked. If I get a paper in any A journal I can just shake legs for the rest of my life as other academics have to kowtow to me. Unfortunately, only 0.002% of new submissions get accepted. My chances are even slimmer as 1) to get an article in I will be peer reviewed and 2) the level of cronyism in academia is one that surprisingly has gone unnoticed by the presidency of a country that shall remain unnamed...maybe because it is in their favour 3) as the top level journals are that same country centric so if data are not biased in their favour your work will not be considered worthy of their attention. As a new academic, I am not worthy of their favour. Even if I cite all of their work. Especially if I actually have something novel to say. So if the referees don’t like you (and they won’t), they will send you what is called a rejection letter aka FOAD letter (F*&k Off And Die). If you are very very lucky, and they somehow like you enough to actually read your paper and comment, the review process could take 2 years. Some unlucky ones take up to 7 years. By then they would have either realised that academia is not for them, or they would have just killed themselves. Same difference.
So there you have it. I have spent the last year working on 2 papers that may never see the light of day. But all is not lost. An unpublished paper can be presented at conferences. Because academics have to put up with the review process and bad pay, conferences are chosen based on venue, not reputation or even topic. Did I tell you that where you work (Boston versus Zimbabwe) and what you earn is totally dependant on your publication record in top journals? [Books don’t count because we all know that book authors are divided into 2 categories, those who are published and just staple all their articles together…sort of a Best Of Compilation (the better author) and the sad ones who have to write a book to publish their altogether unrecognised working papers]. A top tier conference on your specific area of research in Moscow is a possibility, but a so-so conference sort of related to your area in Honolulu is a must go. Funnily enough, papers that are accepted by journals are not entitled to be submitted for presentation at conferences. You can’t have your cake and eat it too.
So now you understand why I worked through the holidays? There are conferences in Ghent Belgium, Milan Italy, Seoul Korea and Georgia. Fingers crossed.
Saturday, January 01, 2005
Happy new year
Starting a new year with a thumping headache is never good.
Starting a new year with a swim at an aussie beach right outside my flat is good. Especially since I have only done this once in my months here.
Starting a new year surrounded by topless sunbathers (I saw more nipples today that a Malaysian customs officer in charge of tearing pages out of Vogue does in a year). Not good.
Starting a new year with D next to me pretending not to look at exposed boobs, but clearly not drooling. Very good.
.....
Our first tiff in 2005: Me: I will not change my name after we get married! People will think I'm a porno star. D: People don't think I'm a porno star. Me: I did.
Starting a new year with a swim at an aussie beach right outside my flat is good. Especially since I have only done this once in my months here.
Starting a new year surrounded by topless sunbathers (I saw more nipples today that a Malaysian customs officer in charge of tearing pages out of Vogue does in a year). Not good.
Starting a new year with D next to me pretending not to look at exposed boobs, but clearly not drooling. Very good.
.....
Our first tiff in 2005: Me: I will not change my name after we get married! People will think I'm a porno star. D: People don't think I'm a porno star. Me: I did.
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