69 posts tagged “ranting”
I was a fool to believe . . .
A fool to believe. . .
It all ends today. . .
Yes, it all ends today
Today's the day when dreaming ends
enough of shipping!!!!!
I hate Firefox 3-point-who-the-hell-cares.
It has a lot of glitches.
When I go to a previously visited page, it does not refresh.
I don't know why it keeps reflecting what's on the cache.
And funny thing is, I have cleaned my cache.
A million times.
But it's giving me the same BS.
What's a good browser anyway?
I use the new Google browser at work.
But it's also full of glitches and there are sites I can't open simply because they're not supported.
I use Firefox for Mac.
But I wish there was something else that would give me less headaches.
And just let me surf and blog in peace.
Arrrggghhhh technology!
You know those people who are 50 or something but they never grew up? There's a difference between being young at heart and just simply petty and childish and annoying. I have never met a creature like this before. Ibang klase.
at least 100,000 stranded tourists that can double in the next few days if Suvarnabhumi remains closed
about 30,000 travelers miss their flights per day
48 flights per day only at Bangkok's temporary airport, U-Tapao
in comparison, Suvarnabhumi handles up to 700 flights per day
10 billion baht losses per day just for undelivered cargo
500 million baht losses per day in tourism revenues
this People's Alliance for Destruction (NOT Democracy) should be made to pay for the damages
in this day of globalisation, even China is putting the economy first
I know that's not a good comparison...
but what is democracy if a country's economy is in shambles?
For six months now, this country's parliament has been besieged by those very bad PAD (People'sAllianceforDemocracy) protesters virtually making their leaders inutile. Every day I see them on TV, I couldn't understand anything they're saying but I tolerate because after all, it's not my country and it's not my politics. But tonight, I heard that they're planning to surround Suvarnabhumi tomorrow to prevent their PM's plane from landing.
That's it!
The last time they besieged airports in this country, tourists stayed away. This country's tourism industry accounts for a large pie of its revenues. They have lost at least $3 billion baht that month when their airports were attacked by these protesters. And now they want to do it to their international airport?! As a resident of this country, I am glad its democracy is very much alive. But when some people's agenda (Thaksin, PAD, hari, reyna etc) threaten the economy that has made this country an inspiration--even a model for surviving the 1997 financial crash--in Asia...
THAT'S IT!
I strongly disagree that these factions turn the country's robust economy into collateral damage for the kind of "democracy" and "governance" that these forces want. I may not belong to this country but as a resident who pays my taxes here, I deserve to voice out my opposition to all these craziness!
That's it!
I left my motherland because the politics there sickened me. But even thousands of miles away, the stench from there still reaches me. I was of the philosophy that we respect the democratic process and allow those who are in power now to finish their term because after all, we can't keep on going back to the streets and change our leaders through a mob rule everytime we are unhappy with them. But for an unpopular leader to be delusional and believe she is the only one who can save my country by serving beyond her term is unacceptable.
That's it!
Shame on Gloria. Shame on everyone in her evil empire. Shame on PAD. Shame on Thaksin. Shame even on the hari and reyna for letting these things happen. I've had it with politics. Here and in my county.
Give me a pop star anytime, at least if I spend money on them, I do it willingly; if I regret later, I only have myself to blame. But politicians, they take my tax money and spend it for their own agenda; I am not even allowed to regret it because I don't really have a choice but pay my tax (highway robbery!) anyway.
Pop stars sell you dreams and fantasies but they don't promise you anything. Politicians, they make you buy the moon and the stars and the entire universe with it and give you hell afterwards.
I have unfinished business in Hanoi.
I wasn't able to go on a Halong Bay tour (that everyone from BB to the man on the street advised). I wasn't able to have a jade necklace made for me (because the next time I returned to the shop that made me the bracelet, it was closed). I wasn't able to find that formal silk jacket I once saw a Vietnamese colleague wearing. I need to go back.
A friend was right when she said that shopping in Hanoi is "exquisite". But more than the shopping, I was fascinated with how traditional life has remained. Despite the modernisation that the city is going through, what with industries being set up left and right, you can still see people like this lady in the picture riding her bike wearing their usual work clothes and the defining conical hat. There were women balancing their baskets on their shoulders plying the streets selling everything from French bread to fruits. People still go to their nearest sidestreet foodstall to eat noodles while sitting on low chairs.
There's a lovely mix of the old and the modern, like a woman in conical hat riding the motorbike. Speaking of the motorbikes, they are an entirely different story altogether. They fill the streets and the moment the traffic light turns to green, you just have to step aside otherwise they'd all come careening down on you. But even if the traffic light tells you that it's okay to walk, motorbikes would still come at you from all sides. On my first day, I was at the old quarter and stood frozen at the corner of a street as I watched in a mixture of horror and confusion as the motorbikes continued to pass even if it was time for pedestrians to cross. If not for a local man who took pity on me, I wouldn't have been able to make it to the other side of the road.
Then there's the architecture. I was just so fascinated with it that I forgot to take photos. I'd spend time in the taxi looking out for those buildings that were remnants of their French colonial past and they were just everywhere. It was both beautiful and fascinating.
Now, the people unfortunately can be tuso. My Chinese colleague and I once took a taxi and we noticed that the meter was running fast. Lonely Planet does warn about unscrupulous taxi drivers with magical meters. I also noticed that people in general tend to still be old school in their thinking. Men before women. If you're dressed in casual clothes even if it's an out-of-town trip and not a gala dinner, you don't get much respect (probably they expect you to be sweltering in the heat in your suit). And Westerners are more superior than everybody else, which makes me angry because a lot of these stupid tourists from the West think that they are better than everybody else and treat even the locals--who are supposed to be their hosts as they are visiting/ touring their country--shabbily. I witnessed at how a group of young people (I couldn't place whether they were from Eastern Europe or Ireland) descended on a cafe where I was having dinner and they were rude, acting like they own the place when all they did was order ice cream (probably the only thing on the menu they could afford). The poor Vietnamese girl (in an ao dai no less as it's like de rigueur for these restaurants to have their female wait staff wear the traditional dress) who was attending to them cowered in fear. I'm sure not all Westerners behave this way but incidents like this only perpetuate the stereotype on how brash and ill-mannered they are.
I also learned a lesson in booking a hotel recommended by Lonely Planet. Loud Americans are sure to go to them too. The two nights I spent in this lovely hotel (with teakwood floors in the rooms etc) had me screaming inwardly as loud voices sounded down the hallway at all times of the day: Where's my zen?!
I am a fan girl, but I don't use it as a license or an excuse to misbehave in public. I am a fan girl, but it does not mean I am inconsiderate of the other people around me. I don't exist in a vacuum and the following is a result of spending an afternoon at the theatre surrounded by fan girls who misbehave.
How to behave at the cinema, a guide for fan girls:
1. Do not point at the screen whenever your idol appears as if you're looking at a bloody landmark like the Eiffel Tower.
2. Do not conduct your fan girl discussions inside the theatre; if you absolutely must, step out and do it somewhere else where your noise and running commentaries won't distract your neighbours.
3. If you absolutely must swoon as sometimes it cannot be avoided, then do it with the least noise. Otherwise, just buy the DVD and swoon, scream or whatever it is you need to do in the confines of your own room.
Just three simple things, ain't that hard? I'm not saying fan girls have to be Miss Manners but before being a fan girl, we are all civilised individuals first, aren't we?
I got an email from a friend who's planning to vacation here soon. Is it safe to proceed with her plans to come to Bangkok given the political mess going on? It doesn't help I guess that Nicolas Cage has a movie called Bangkok Dangerous.
Unfortunately, a lot of people think it is not safe. Many tourists have canceled their trips and it's been obvious with the absence of the backpackers crowd at Khao San for instance. And today, I noticed in Siam Paragon that I could actually see the shops and appreciate them, unlike before when it's so crowded with tourists. I actually loved it. So if there's anything that I'm happy about, it's that there are no troublesome tourists in the city who look like an eyesore in their beach wear (uh hello, this is Bangkok, not Phuket or Krabi). Not the usual many anyway.
It's not just cyber myth.
I used to hear stories about friends of friends getting frantic emails from their friend who supposedly got into trouble while traveling somewhere and needs money. I felt ambiguous over those stories. It may happen, it may not happen. But tonight... I got an email from a friend of mine who is in Japan but in her email, she says she is in Holland and something terrible happened along the way and she needs money now. I got scared reading the email. So it really happens. And it's scary. Three days ago, my office PC crashed because of a virus which I suspected I got from MSN. I had to send a frantic message to all my MSN contacts in case they get strange messages from me too. You never know.
So to all my friends out there... in case you get a frantic email from me... I am doing fine. You know where I am right now, my status in life (including civil status), what I'm doing, my hobbies etc. If I need help, I won't email, I will SMS. Or I will call if the help I need is urgent. The bottom line is... scammers are everywhere these days!
Now that terminal 3 of NAIA has opened, it gives us hope that the Philippines' aviation industry would finally soar and visitors arriving in the country for the first time won't think they've stumbled into the '70s. But arriving in Jakarta, I realised there is a sadder airport than the old international airport in Manila. Jakarta's international is in far worse condition than the domestic in Tacloban. And at 10 in the evening, I wasn't really in the best mood so maybe my perception was already clouded. Apart from the luggage that took forever to arrive, I couldn't understand why customs officials would insist that your bags go through the x-ray machine when you're going through the "nothing to declare" lane? As a result, there was a build-up of people at the customs lane and there was only one bloody lane open because they wanted each and every bloody passenger to have their bags pass through the machine. Bloody bloody third world hell.
I already miss my life in Bangkok. For my one-week Internet access here at the hotel, I am already paying an equivalent of three months in BKK. In this modern world, shouldn't Internet access be part of the services of a hotel, much the same as cable TV? This is highway robbery! And after settling the Internet matter, I got thirsty and checked out the complimentary bottles. It needs to be pried by a bottle opener and I am really close to dehydration. Do I sacrifice $3 of mineral water in the bar for my well-being? Hell, no. And this is just the first day.
