AraiGordai in Thailand

tuk tuk

2006-05-13T10:19:00.000+07:00

tuk tuk
Originally uploaded by AraiGordai.

took the tuk tuk to town tonight

Got off the sky train and the usual motorcycle taxi took the night off and the bus stop was a distance away - and there was a tuk tuk. i hardly take tuk tuk, it's one of those transport mode that doesn't make sense when you've gone through the novelty stage. motorcycle taxi is small enough to speed you through the congested traffic, taxi you get some comfort of a/c chamber. tuk tuk is pricy, stuck in traffic like any other car only you get to suck up the pollution.

logically i don't get these 'fee base' drivers. they don't get pay more than before if they drive fast. i mean i like speed, but in traffi filled street, driving fast only to break even harder don't make sense. Instead of getting tuned with the traffic rythm, so they would get the most milage for the o-so-expensive gas (and break pad). afterall gas price is directly effecting their bread and butter you know.

that said, i must admit that the only fun part about tuk tuk is the zig-zack-zoom-zoom-i-got-attitude driving style.

Flickr-ing

2006-05-06T09:40:00.000+07:00

I started off using Flickr for its slide show facilities. This is one of the few photo sites that detects ‘taken date” from camera’s EXIF data and with their coolie slide show facilities, I gave it a try. It is more seductive than I thought.

I wanted to use flickr to do slideshow of the wine bar’s construction process without the hassle of arranging them. They have tools to organize and display by taken dates. I love construction photos set. There are there for a short moment and you won’t see them ever again in that stage. They are only cool to look at when you see them in sequence when there is beginning and end. Slide show was perfect tool to show them.

While I was trying out other features, i explored the community a bit more. The users and image pool is huge, and some of their pictures are amazing. There so many talented photographer out there. Some photographs they took made me want to travel and take more pictures. I thought this will be fun, I can learn a lot from these folks. Below are some fav' i picked up browsing around.

Now, I thought I would never spend on an online subscription anywhere! I’ve been around in the net business for a decade, there are many interesting sites, but none that i find absolutely worth spending membership fee.. until now. Maybe its because I like taking pictures. And I have tons of it. To load them all up, and arange them in multi sets, i'd need to upgrade. I thought i do have the patience to load 20meg per month, or put up with 3 maximum picture set, but i don't.

Photography was my 'thing' when I was a kid in middle and highschool. A small lil boy carrying this bulky SLR with my ‘so proud’ 28-200mm zoom lens. I practically took it everywhere I go. That was eight grade. I used to join up the photo club, did my art class on it, and was part of the school’s paper’s photographer. That was all fun. Playing with the prints in the dark room – stinky but fun. Then when you start being busy with college and working, playing with photo and prints can take up too much resources. My 2 slr is now busted (one stolen, one droped). After that I didn't really bother with film photography that much.

Then comes digicam. No more film! Better resolution, no more print lab cost! I can play around again. The past few years, i've used a couple of digicams but again, one stolen (Oly 3040c - man i luv that cam), then this oly C40 which is now half the time working. It was time to upgrade and went for the Olympus E1 digital SLR- although not totally happy with it, i'll stick to it for the time being.

Then another thing hits you, how do you display them to your family and friends? You still have to print and then go through the trouble of searching for the darn album you’ve miss placed somewhere in your book shelves. What a hassle. No more of that with this online photo sharing thing. Upload, organize and so many ways to display them. As millions others have found, it is great. And there goes my first payment to upgrade to a pro account. Not only that, I paid for 2 years account, since the baht is going strong at 37/1usd, why not.

So now I’m spending more time uploading and organizing my photos online. I like the privacy protection thing but I wish they have more setting not just private, family, friends.. It should be able to focus right on who is able to view. I know, there’s a lot of database crunching overhead but hey, it’ll be nice to do that. It should also let users chooses how to display their public photo-stream, not just by upload date. It gets cumbersome having to change upload date to organize the sequence of photos you wanted to display.

I have gigs of photos, stored in some CD somewhere, As I find time I’ll upload them up. It will probably take a while, but there’s no space limit. But the 2gig upload limit per month do bothers me even if i might not use that much.

So now with this flickr pro account starting May 1, I’ll be taking more pix and organizing them online. There’s a lot of things to experiment around. I still have not mastered the controls in the E1. The low light noise is still very annoying. How could a cam that used to cost more than 100 grand has this kind of problem. same 'ol complaint.

steak

2006-04-30T12:35:00.000+07:00

i had my usual weekly salad buffet at sizzler last night. when i got home i had this crave for stake. maybe because i just worked out and my body wants for more meat i don't know. i browsed around for my picture pool and found this picture. oh my it is so yummy.

although i do love meat i try not to have too much of it. but if i do have it, please let it be good. i mean not the grocery store type of beef. the things they fed and injected these cow with are just too nasty. when i think about it, i can't wait to start the organic food plantation. anyhow, as i browse through old picture, i found this lemon cake picture too. it was so nicely decorated i had to take a shot. many times when have these visual treat on a plate, i want to take a picture, cuz in less than a minute all that will be gone. indeed, one of the fastest disapearing art is food decoration.

i so do envy my client, the owner of this giusto restaurants. they get to have superb dishes made with fresh ingredients from all around the world - every day. aside from having to put up with the headaches in running the place, when it comes to meal time, thats where it all pays off. the chef likes to have some thai dish once in a while though, but the mr G, no way.

missing the water fight

2006-04-27T22:38:00.000+07:00

i probably will participate in sonkran water festival even if i'm old n grey, as long as i have strength to squirt a water gun i would.

since the first year i've been back to thailand i would get very excited about songkran just as i did when i was a little kid. there's so much fun and i loved it then, still do now. but this is the first year that i didn't get to participate in water fight during songkran festival.

i went to samet island to do photo shoot and web update for the client's resort. this seems to be the only time i can find to do this as the interior construction work stop during this time. i thought i could just go to samet for 2 days, take the pictures then go to Klung for songkran, then later do the web stuff. but i end up loosing my phone which makes it difficult to contact my family in klung, and the update work is a bit more than i antipipated. anyhow, i end up speding 4 days in samet. I also had my computer gear with me, i certainly don't want to get it wet. so this year, i didn't get to play, but i did get to talk to a lot of the people who didn't care so much for it.

Some girls said they just don't like songkran, and they think it is dirty and degrading to woman. It is one of those time that men takes advantages of woman by touching them.. this is in many ways true, and there are also woman who do enjoys getting that kind of attention and do like the fact that they feel sexually desired by men around them. for me, i think it is mainly how you positioned yourself in the scene and the message you are sending out. It maybe wise to use common sense to evaluate 'where', and 'what' choice of cloth to be in ( there's different type of message advertised when you wear skin-tight white thin t-shirt compared to a darker or multi color loose clothing) more importantly, the 'who' you are there with. i know one of the point of going out is to also meet with new people, but it would be safe to go with somone you know that you can run to if shit happens.

Now if you don't have friends and just walk on skimpy wet t-shirt heading towards a bunch of drunk boys with loud music on, it is most likely you will be greeted with aggressive sexual approaches. During our crazy water fight days, we took the girl friends on the truck rides and they simply had one heck of a good time. i know that men have much more flexibility during songkran, but i think there are just as many woman who brought along the right attitude to have fun. and there are also those who will enjoy staying home and enjoy more quite time with the family.

the sad part is the bitter people that hates songkran and feel like they are trapped at home and not able to go out. i just think maybe they don't have a group of friends to tag along for a good time. That being said, there are always sad, nasty, scary side to everything. so it depends on which situation you want to pick to make such impression, but for me, i will take the best of what has songkran water festival has to offered - instant ego wash, the wide non pretentious smile and laughter.

Last year, i went back to my mom's hometown to join the festival. Like most small town, songkran water fight only goes on one day, and people from all around the region would come in to play. The days for klung was on the 15th of august. the 16th and 17th would be for the next province down south.. So caravan of water warriors would hop on a pickup truck and play until they are sick of it.

I went to klung last year to both play and take picture of the scene. To see men, woman young and old from all types of work splashing water at each other is just priceless. Because I do know some of these townies as i did do part of the growing up here, I also know that some of these neighbors don't have much reason to interact. To see them spraying water at each other and giggling is something. In a normal circumstances, each has got their own lives to attend, and what, in any other day would triggered such joyful interaction. there are simply no reason to. many of us even think that we can do just fine without having to deal with each other. one probably had to evaluate the potential benefit and risk of getting to know more people before doing so. All that careful, thoughtful, fearful (paranoid?) precaution simply gets washed down the drain together with the bulk of water that lands spashed on their body. for that miraculous day, everyone in town is friendly. when is that possible without songkran? how could i miss witnessing something like this.

all the seven years that i've been back to thailand i always had so much fun with the water fight. riding the back of pickup trucks, hanging on to your big tank of water - and ice of course. we go round and round till water goes out then continue on at night (if we are in bangkok) to clubs that allow water fight. this goes round and round for a few days and even with the ruetinal "vitamin c Dope", some of us would still cath a flue, and just call it a day. i mean a holiday.

Prime nesting ground for rent

2006-04-26T10:52:00.000+07:00

in the past four months, my balcony has been a hot spot for home maker birdies. they like my dead tree. they do because they picked the dead one instead of the -almost dead one right next to it. that sort of disclosed my misdeeds doesn't it. yes, i didn't do a good job on feeding the tree, see, last year i'm away from the condo a lot.. and there's no rain. and it is not easy to get out there and i was too busy to notice it dieing.. and it kinda look artzie being dead.. and it's a good symbolic statement to helps remind me of my own motality and.. ok. sorry tree, i am so careless with the watering reutine. that's not the point.

the birds digg my dead tree. plus the fact that my unit is right at the end of the building. the adjacent condo is unoccupied and i'm hardly in the condo. that spells 'good security' in bird language. i consulted dr. doolittle. so birdies do learn about marketing framework. there's the product (dead tree good strong branch), price (free), place(perfect), privacy(they sure don't want to promote this), people(the less the better). anyhow, my balcony definately qualify for as a prime nesting ground.

there has been two birdie families so far that has occupied this nest. they were so cute, i enjoyed watching them built, hatching and feeding the lil one. what i didn't see is when the little one learn how to fly. it seems like they just took off. now they all have left and nest is all torned up by other birds taking the material for their new home. maybe cuz i'm home much more frequent, the last "p" didn't fit.

many bird came to check out the spot, but recently, the pigeons also came. Call me a bird racist, but i don't like pigeon, they leave nasty shit everywhere and when they fly up i feel like they farted out large volume of air - fume full of nasty germs. so i've been chasing them away. although i must say i am a bit amazed to see that these pigeon actually made effort to fly up here. most bangkok pigeon i see they just walk on the street. i mean they prefer walking than flying. they actually think they can out walk homosapians that have legs 20 times longer than them. they look like chicken that (unless really, truely, necessary) can fly.

today i have potential customer. this one in the photo was here for a good ten minutes, inspecting the future property. plenty of time for me to take a few shots. i was less than a meter from it. see, it doesn't know, i'm on the darker side of glass door and there's this bamboo screen in between. so during the day, they can only see the bamboo and their reflection. that's how i can i do my national geographic moment. i should have had this e1 sooner. i couldn't take picture of the feeding process from the previous family because my point and shoot cam will only focus on the bamboo screen, no manual focus like the dSLR.

the above image is not the same type of bird that built this nest, the builder are much smaller type with longer beek. the picture below is with the mommy inside the nest. tough to see it but you can spot the long black beek. darn i miss'em.

laundry day no more

2006-04-25T21:45:00.000+07:00

laundry day, it doesn't come that often. it is a must when i'm having underwear crisis. this is one of those days.

underwear no more.

i was ready to dry them off and there it is.. out on my balcony.. the thick rain cloud creeping in. no dry underwear but a good time for a photo shoot. see, rain clouds plays interesting lighting effect on both land and the sky; the contrast, the shadow, it is unique each and every time. with a bit of photoshop curving, i know it'll have a nice effect.

today's late morning storm isn't all that exciting. usually the quick blowing, thick heavy rain storm cloud display more dramatic visual effect on the sky. the good one is when there are blistering thunder ( yes i used to read tin tin), boy, you can hear nature rawl. she's showing 'i'm da man'. (she da man?) anyway, awesome power. i always wanted to take picture of heavy thunderstorm, but all my older cams are afraid of water. but with this E1 weatherproof built, i am looking forward to it. So, with some luck, i should get a cool lighting shot. - and a nasty flue?

one of the good thing i do apreciate living in a condo is the view of the sky. i like the sky seems like nature's showing off its art on the grand canvas. same sky, but all so unique to everyone who's watching it, depending where, when and how it is looked. anyway, bla bla too much. the view i have is not all that specatular but at least it doesn't get blocked by surrounding buildings. i get to see the tiny lives living around me. peekaboo.

o wel, tonight, there'll be no rain.

pano goes to work

2006-04-23T18:57:00.001+07:00

Since i'm still on the 7 days testing the replacement e1, i took the camera to the work site and did more panorama shooting, as if i haven't done enough already. I've taken over 90 panoramas in samet.. i've gone panoramically mad. hey, why not when you can shoot tons of shots in a burst - at no cost. so here are more of them.

above: this one was taken at the BTS prakanong station. A short walk from here would get me to the construction site. i've always liked the bts's roof design, it is way cool.. and i do like the effect of the glowy effect of the afternoon sun behind it.

below: and here's the condo site, yup, ficuslane, 5 months delay, and still not done. it is coming along though.

and finally here's one of the four units i'm working on. you can't imagine the amount of dust and stuff that flys around in the air at these site. won't be too surprise if lung cancer is creeping in. so why do i bothered with this construction monitoring thing when i could end it at design stage. because i couldn't 'end' it there. i mean even though the design is done, there's always some new issues that comes up during construction, maybe some problems that requires design modifications. No doubt the challenges and the fun of problem solving on the spot is there, but only in short moment, the rest is dealing with the noise, dust and nose jamming smell. having to eal with some bitchy worker can definately spoiled any of the remaining creative mood.

The real reason for doing it is that i do feel responsible for the design work. i mean there's a lot of effort from both me and the client along the design process, and we all would like to see it come out nice. not to mentioned the cost involved. one of these unit cost 14 million, for just the bare shell! so for this kind of investment, these clients would like to make sure things does goes the way it was intended. for that kind of money i would build a house. although for single foreigners like these clients, they don't have that choice. in a lot of ways, the luxury and there's all the benefits and conveniency of living in a fancy condominium. let's just hope it is that fancy when everything is done.

after this, i should retire. wait, i still have to do mom/dad's house.. then quit this space design/construction stuff. don't ge me wrong, i do love the design, its the stress of dealing with unreliable constructors that turns me off. sometimes it seems like it is out of your control. so for the past months, i've been declining new project offers and trying to finish this condo. although i feel it is the right thing to do but not sure about the financial side of it all. but unless i declined, i'll never get to seriously do my folk's housing project.

mom has been so nice and patience, saying, oh.. her house can wait. i know she's been waiting too long for her house. dad also have been complaining that he needs a place of his own that he can stay and relax. this should be my piority. the giusto winebar project already put her house one year behind, and now these condos. not that i haven't done the design, i did over 14 houses. the more time i had, the houses just multiplies!

one and a half more month let's survive this. i just took my lungs for a clean up at samet... so c'mon lungs. puff puff.

e1 still hot

2006-04-23T18:47:00.000+07:00

yes, it is hot alright. the new e1 the shop replaced me is still full of hot pixel. at 2 seconds you can already spot these hot spots. imagine using it for many seconds, taking night shots of the stars. oh my, i'll be a famous astronomer, discovering the sky full of new star. here's a lil crop of the 6 seconds shot.

there's a way to fix this, by turning on noise reduction and noise filter, but the draw back is that it takes about 10 seconds to run these software through before it saves to a file. now, if i see a shooting star in between, i'll miss it. i won't be doing much night or star shots, but still a camera that used to worth more than 100,000 baht should not have these problems. The store person said that the olympus thailand said most of the cam would have this effect. maybe these lot are the rejected lot like i expected. i might just go to them and select one by one until i find a good one.

i tested out canon 350D, no such hot pixel problems, but it feels much more flimpy. i like the handling and the built of the e1 very much. oh. i know i said that already. it just sounds comforting to say it again.

e1 camera defects.

2006-04-21T13:19:00.000+07:00

after taking more than a thousand shots on the e1 during the work trip in samet, i've found a few problems with the camera. the first thing is the poor color evaluation and the second is the hot pixels on CCD sensor when taking night shots.

The auto white balance has been known to e1 and was mentioned in the user review, but what i didn't know is that the effect of changing color, or color bleed. below are some images that shows the bleeding of greenish tone. The bunglalo picture, if you look at the white paint, you will see a shade of light green, influenced by surrounding green. this happens when green is the dominant color.

it gets more obvious when you look at these two picture of the same tree at slightly different angle. the color of the green leaves changes between the two shots.

check the color of the green in the 2 pictures above and below. the changes in the lighting causes the change in the tonal color of the green. the yellowish green doesn't reflect the reality.

if you look at the one with blue sky or with the red flower below, the green behaves correctly. so overall, i think there's some problem with the color interpretational logic. seems like it works well when there are a 'balance' of color variation in the scene.

this green color variation became so evident when composed in a panoromic shot when the tree leaves virtually changes color as the camera tries to adjust its balance(which changes the color). as i'm returning the camera, i wonder if all E1 has this behavior and is actually not considered as a defect, I will try using a fixed outdoor white balance set instead of relying on its inaccurate auto white balancing, i hope it help out with the color. the panorama shot below shows the yellowish green color which is not like the real thing but as the green plant gets nearer to the beach and the sky, the color becomes more accurate

i think many of the pictures, especially scenic one, my lil point and shoot can do a better job than the E1. this is my forth olympus digicam, most of them has great realistic color, but the e1 being the most fancy and expensive, doesn't do well in auto mode.

the other problem is hot pixel in the ccd sensor. this is a classic, all of the oly cam i had has this problem, some i spot right away and exchange it for another model. the last point and shoot i changed it four times. the sensor is the heart of it all. there's no point to use good camera with a bad film. anyway, this e1 also has hot pixel problem. so i'm returning it, hopefully i get a defect free one.

i have am a bit suspcious of how they are able to offer lower pricing than e1 in states. i hope thai merchant didn't buy the 'minor defective' in bulk and sell it here. there are many cams that have been returned, exchanged by the customer because of some problems, and ccd hot pixel is the classic problem. now, they just replace to the user with a new one. the defective one can go back to fix as refurbished, or it might have been sold at lower price for another grade of consumer. a none picky consumer type. a thailand consumer type. i hope its just my 'fear' and not reality. from all the time and experience of using products here in thailand, anything is possible.

i'll go pickup a new one today after sending it in for a few days. cross my fingers.. and toes.

cellfone twillight zone

2006-04-19T23:25:00.000+07:00

this must be a record breakin event. I've managed to lost my cell phone again. The third one in the last 10 days. I mean this bad duang has just got to stop, either that or i'll use telegraph. Just when i started to get the hang of using that phone, the love affair ended with a theif. whats up with that.

here's whats up.

i went to koh samet 13th of aug. although i left the condo early but the bus was all full- no surprise there, it is afterall, songkran festival. had to waited 4 hours for the 1pm bus. the bus took 3.5 hours to arrived at ban peh, then another 40 mins boat ride to reach ao vongduern. got there close to 5pm. the client's resort had expanded, they took over another resort that was renting out from them. now they basically run half of vongduern's beach. that means i've got alot of updates and plenty of pictures to take. i looked around the new area, and it says 'panorama'. in a scenic place like this, only panoramic view would does the place some justic. the new area is well integrated -- blend in with the rocky shore and the tien-taleh trees (it was made by the previous owner) and with the new lighting, the place looks great. i wasted no time to test out my new E1. here are some panorama stictched up result.

it is songkran, that means full moon, a great chance to test run the night shot. in between these two locations, my cell phone left me without proper good bye. i know this because i was using the phone to light up the buttons on the camera. this e1 has so many little control buttons and i'm not used to it yet. now, when i moved to the third location, i realized i must have droped the phone. i back tracked my 10 meter path, and must have inspect every sand granules in between. the sand is smooth and silky but no phone. i borrowed one of the guest phone to call so that it would light up. it ranged alright only to be hanged up after about 3 rings. yes, within 20 minutes, some bum has already picked it up with no intention to return it. who would, it is a nice phone. - 'was'

history suppose to teach you not to make the same mistake. but in my case, it's a life time lesson, and the teacher is very persistent. my auntie say thats where all my money go; i work hard to feed the theives. i guess i haven't been tum-boon for too long and this is a reminder. please, no need to remind me that often.

i had to bitch this in before i forget. as i've just bought a new phone yesterday. this time i buy a much cheaper one. imobile630. externally it doesn't look too bad. it has good features, especially that flpping 1.3mb cam. but.. make that a BIG bold BUT the menu is rediculously ugly with all those moving animation. oh how i hate that. but they've opened the new box, and i have to take it. mabunklong's policy. the other thing that truely sucks is i can't sync this phone up my outlook contact address that i've painstakingly re-organized to work with yahoo's address and my nokia6680(used to be) . ok i'm pissed.

now i feel justify to buy a stolen phone. i wonder why.

wet wet samet

2006-04-12T22:12:00.000+07:00

songkran holiday is here. this month is the most none productive month for most business. there's probably more off days than work days. the construction work stoped since yesterday until the 18th. everyone is looking forward to this long break. but not me, i work. then again, not really, its both work and vacationing.

i'm going to samet island. during 2003, i was staying in the island more than i was home. i had a few design related projects with the folks there. its a bit too lengthy to put down here. anywayz, i'm going back there to update a client's website. they have renovated most of their rooms and expanded even more. they wanted to have this update for a while now but i just can't find the time. now is that time. i'll be there until the update is done, so i'll bring my gear there. also a good chance for me to put new dslr to work. yea.

usually you would need to book a room in samet way ahead of time if you want to go there during the weekend or public holiday. per area, samet is the most popular white-sand-tropical-island in thailand. so you will be pushing your luck to go in group w/o reservation. if you find a spot, the price won't be friendly. this is why i'm going there solo on this trip, i need flexibility, and the resort folks should be able to find me a place to stay.

i hope this will be as fun as it was.. working and playing around on the beach. i miss tossing the fire stick, taking pictures of their k9 crew, hangin around around the bar till late. songkran at samet should also add something extra to the fun. i also hope istill find the familiar face of their friendly staff. its been almost 3 years, so who knows what has changed. we'll see.

well, i'm excited.. be off first thing in the morning.

evolution for the same ol hole

2006-04-12T11:48:00.000+07:00

i was just chatting with a techno-geeko freind about key-less entrance door that wouldn't let me down. see, i have this problems of forgeting key and looking myself out, loosing keys, etc. it goes from thumb scanner, dog tag chip, retina scan, bluetooth, contactless smart card, rf id to vibrator. whuh?!?

what brought that up was a concern over the growing popularity of RFid technology, where you can pretty much tag or embeded every product with them. The advantages from the production side is obvious, it would increase overall supply chain efficiencies; faster cataloging, better quality control, stocking, shipping, wholesale and retailing procedures, product security, etc. did i mention what a powerful marketing tool this is, as you can can practially scanned who bought what in and out of the mall. So that raised a concern as to how much privacy do you have over the purchased product? Imgine the embarasment of buying a rf-id embeded dildo.

then a friend mentioned about the new bluetooth vibrator. yup, now you can send pleasure to your partner from the opposite side of the globe through sms and bluetooth. we cirtainly came a long way from stoned polished dildo some 28,000 years ago.. only to fall back to the same ol hole. a good indication of a matured technology that has reached the mass market is when it is being applied for sexual purposes.

electronic junk yard

2006-04-12T09:28:00.000+07:00

i look around around my condo and i do realized that i spend way too much on electronic gadgets.. and as time passes, they are turning into historical items which were "cool stuff" in their glory days -- translation, presently almost junk. i mean not too far in the future, i'll probably would have to pay thieves to take some of them away. maybe i just need a dedicated room for electronic museum. still have those old quadras and 486machines.. this zip drive for instance, they were THE storage media to have, now 100mb disk is almost nothing. then there's those modems. got the whole collection from 14k baud, 36k to 56k modem, replaced by the adsl modem and wireless router which was again, made obsolete by the all-in-one wireless router adsl modem box. then these computers, dated back since who knows when. i wanted to donated them but i got so lazy. there's this lil greedy-voice saying i may need them in the future. the reality is: the coming of the future only further diminish their functional values, leaving them with just sentimental value for the owner. they are in the electronic twilight zone, not old enough to be antique, and not new enough to be useful.

i do want to replace my bulky 4 CRT monitors.. love to have flat screen, but i would have to sell these away-- just thinking about moving them makes me tired. i'll probably integrated them into a media wall on the nontaburi house design. oh and this moody samsung tv which only works after it has 2 days rest. lazy tv..whats up with that. fortunately i am not a fans on any thai tv show. actually i hardly watch tv. i mean surely the broadcaster wants to keep the thai mass uneducated by pouring so much junk on air. maybe with today's information connectivity there are just too much interesting content flying around they have a tough time deciding what to present. come to think of it i think i enjoy watching the commercial more than the show, seems like they are alot more creative. ok, enough complaint for the day. that's right, my BLOG does stand for Bitching LOG.

splashy proof DSLR

2006-04-11T21:21:00.000+07:00

it took me a while before i finally decided on buying this new toy. i mean the price range for these digital slr has just recently become affordable. i've been using digicam for a while now, use three of them, and always been lurking at the (D)SLR version. i mean the point and shoot simply can't beat speed and all the glamourous effect of SLR. so after shopping and comparing for a month, i've finally went for the Oly E1. This was one of the top SLR a few years back, and even now, the users still loving it. The 5.6mp resolution isn't something to brag about, but in most case, I don't need a very large poster size prints.

I like way it feels on the hand, the sensor dust cleaning feature, the overall use of material and built quality is top notch. Earlier was heavily persuaded by the newer, much lighter, higher resolution, more features, E500 but in the end, the weatherproof functionality of E1 over rule all these advantages. i do like the outdoor and i don't want to worry if the heavy rain will get inside my backpack and mess up the camera. now i can take the camera everywhere, to beaches, waterfall, speed boat ride, even during the wet songkran festival without worrying that its going to break the cam. the only other with weatherproof SLR is nikon's very top end, which cost way too much. This E1 with the 14-54mm zuiko weather proof lense sets me back 34,000 baht. The cheaper lens set is the 14-45mm, which sells for only 24,000 but whats the use of having weather proof camera w/o weather proof lens? btw, this E1 is one of the rare model that in thailand is cheaper than in states.

now with this new toy, taking picture should be fun again, taking picture that cost close to nothing, until you want to print them out. the issue for is storage space, which is no longer a problem since i just bought the dvd burner.

With this new toy, i should be enjoying taking pictures again shouldn't i? i mean i can shoot creative shots without worrying about the costs of negatives or prints. I also have a dvd burner to handle the storage space issue. The only issue that seems to be a downer on my enthusiasm for taking this baby out is not just dealing with the bulky size, but worrying if i someone has an eye on taking away this fancy looking toy - with or without my conscious presence. who saids luxury goods gives you freedom - its the other way around. shouldn't i be getting used to it by now since i've been carrying these bulky SLR since 8th grade?. no, after getting robbed twice, the brutal reality of this ecconomically, morally imbalanced society is closer to me than you think.

The Olympus E-1 Key Features

Magnesium-alloy body with environmental sealing (splash proof)
Five megapixel 4/3" Kodak Full Frame Transfer CCD (4/3 System compliant)
4/3 System lens mount
Range of four ZUIKO DIGITAL lenses initially available (smaller and lighter than 35 mm)
TTL viewfinder with removable focusing screen
"Supersonic Wave Filter" cleans CCD at each camera start-up (dust is shaken from CCD)
Dual USB 2.0 (full 480 Mb/s speed) and IEEE 1394 (Firewire) connectivity
3-point TTL phase difference AF
Focus-by-wire manual focus
Manual focus after AF lock available (switchable)
3 bulb AF assist lamp
3-zone multi-pattern metering
Program Shift in Program AE mode
Shutter speed range of 60 to 1/4000 sec (up to 8 minutes in Bulb mode)
Custom delay 'Anti-Shock' feature (similar to mirror lock-up on other SLR's)
Continuous shooting 3 frames per second up to 12 frames
Sensitivity range of ISO 100 - 800 plus 1600 and 3200 with 'ISO BOOST'
Exposure steps of 1/3, 1/2 or 1 stop (EV)
Exposure compensation -5.0 to +5.0 EV
Selectable color space; sRGB or Adobe RGB
Wide range of white balance options, four manual presets, fine tuning
Hybrid white balance sensor (on external surface of camera and using CCD)
Customizable image parameters (saturation, sharpness, contrast)
Noise reduction for ISO noise and long exposure noise (both can be disabled)
RAW format and RAW+JPEG support
In-camera RAW Data Edit
Compact Flash Type I & II storage including IBM Microdrive and FAT32
User upgradeable firmware
1.8" 134,000 pixel LCD monitor with anti-reflective coating
Control Panel LCD display with backlight (panel also has anti-reflective coating)
Flash hot-shoe and PC Sync flash terminal
Shading compensation (removes potential vignetting)

strange diner

2006-04-07T23:38:00.000+07:00

what happens when you put a spa & hospitality consultant, a beauty queen, a head of a political party, a designer, a dive shop owner, a gay student of interior design, on the same dining table, and most have not met each other before? erm... good food and nice wine.

to cheng meng or not to cheng meng

2006-04-02T22:52:00.000+07:00

I was meant to go to chengmeng. By the end of the day I thought I couldn’t’ make it. It was just a long day with the clients. All day in and out between freezing AC and blasting Bangkok heat. That doesn't help my cold-fever recovery. You know how the BTS(sky train) loves to preserve our youth by dropping their cart temperatures down. A few sensors and a more user responsive temperature response would help, i mean you don't need to put the ac to full blast when only half the bogey is filled up. Anyhow, by night fall I didn’t feel so good, so I called up my relative and told them I couldn't make it. I know they are a bit disappointed as I suppose to represent my mom and sister (since they r still in states). but they and I know that another 4 hours ride on the bus to Klung would not be a good idea this time.

Back at the condo, I didn't give up on the idea of attending cheng meng yet, as it is the biggest get together event of the year for my mom's side of the family. Last year they've renovate the tomb, and it was quite grand, many hundreds joined the event. This year i heard they made more decorative garden around the area. I tried to participated every year when I can. I slept early so I can wake up at 3am and head out to Akamai eastern seaboard bus station to catch the first bus to Klung. This was all fine, I arrived 3:40, the cab only took ten minutes to get there from my condo. Don’t you just love Bangkok when there’s no traffic? Everything seems much nearer and more accessible. There should be more business open on Sunday 3am.

Got to the Akamai station, and this ass-sistance bus driver asked me where I want to go and I said Klung, and he insisted to take me to his bus as he said his is the only bus leaving at 4am. I wanted to purchase ticket from the terminal ( I should listened to my instinct) I asked if this bus will stop and pick up customer along the way. I had that experience once during songkran and it was not pleasant. He said, there are only a few drop points they stop and they have to be on time as well. I believed him. Oops. I did it again.

So the whole trip this big ass tour bus behaves like the BMTA bus, pick up speed, stop, pick up new customers, pickup and stop. By 6am there were passengers all over the walk space, fighting for breathing room. Woman, stinking children, factory workers, or even robbers if they call on the bus they can get it. By 8am I couldn’t stand it anymore because my head was getting dizzy from all the stop and go motion. I asked to leave.

This pickup passenger along the way is clearly messed up and probably illega. It is a known cooperation between the akamai station people and the bus operators. I don’t mind if they haven’t packed up the seat and wants to earn extra, but here they are, packed the bus with no walking space in between. It is dangerous to run the bus on overload capacity, and if there were accident, the people who stand will really suffers. I took some pictures and vdo just incase I will find time to report to the authorities, right now I just spill it here on the blog site.

So there I was in the middle of .. sataheap (spell?) I actually didn’t know where I was, I just wanted to get out and throw up. After a bit of a walk, and boy, I thought I never love the sight of 7/11. it sends out a message ‘availability’ any time. Bought the throw up gear (water and tissue) then find my resting ground. What do you know, I saw this small church with nice tree shade and a bench.

As I stepped in, the hyperactive super licking dog jumped on like I’m his long lost master (or show off to other dog that he was more loved) I would appreciate his jubilation if I was not a motion-ill dude who needs a place to lie down. The church person calmed the dog down but only after the dog was already giving me a wrestling lesson.

I rest until my head stop moving, pleasantly awaken by bunch of kids being taught how to draw by the church lady. I then tried to find my way back to Bangkok. I asked the locals where I can find a tour bus to Bkk that don’t stop along the way to pickup passengers. The local said I should take a ‘song – taw’, which is a converted truck to carry passenger to this place call ‘hong yen’(freezer room) and then take the ‘sawadee karn’ bus.

The song taew took me to Sataheep naval base. I was pleasantly greeted by a nice view of the sea and a few scattered islands. The beach was dirty and run down. Sataheep is the royal thai naval base. They’ve got such a nice area here, but they should at least help clean up the public beach right in front of their entrance. Despite the the dirty beach scene, I did enjoy my short stay there… good view, good breeze. Played with the cell phone camera (still a new toy you know).

Sawadikarn bus is a full size, AC tour bus run by the naval base as a service for the military staff and their family. It runs to and from sataheep to Bangkok every hour, and the public can book the empty seats - five days ahead of time. I only found this out this info from the motorcycle taxi – after I spent an hour and a half waiting for the bus and found that everything is full. The local said, I can just buy the ticket and get on. – yes, sure, if i had done this five days ago.

So I had to take this song taew truck into pattaya and catch the bus back to Bangkok. By the time I got to Bangkok it was 4pm, too late for the election.

The time when I was at that small town I listen to them converse about the election. These locals seems to be very supportive of the square head pm. “vote for him so the tour business can pick up again’, said the lady selling somtum and the o-so-yummy-thai-style- roasted chicken. I mean for people who just wants to make ends meet, day by day, what would they care. They can barely make enough for their family, how is it possible for them to think about how financially impractical the cute goverment slogan program are. It is equally unrealistic to expect them to consider about the long term economic future of Thailand should this government continues to be in power.

All they know is that the sign of economical improvement is good for their business. They don't care or want to bother if this is a real sustainable ecconomical improvement or simply a grand marketing illusion. The impact of PM’s media infiltration and his desires into taking control of the government energy business (or selling them off to foreign investors), would be beyond them. As long as there are more foreigners, there's more money coming in, and they sell more of their som tum and kai-yang.

The " The People's Alliance for Democracy" protester’s message didn’t really get through to the grassroots people. They have a lot to learn to fight the marketing power of this PM. Through these massive lower income simpleton, and their ignorance, he will get their support and power. Hooray for democracy.

Hospitalized

2006-04-01T02:41:00.000+07:00

What can be worse catching a cab in Bangkok on a stormy rainy night? Catching a Bangkok cab on such night and then found out that the driver is a newbie who couldn’t even speak Thai properly and you had to tell direction on how to get to the nearest hospital while your head is trying to figure out which is the ceiling and where’s the floor.

I didn’t know I was that sick. I mean I thought I had a flue, and a flu I can always handle. By night fall my head was pounding and I was throwing up, sweating like a pig. I tried sleeping it off but the pain just wouldn’t go away. After an hour of trying all sort of sitting position and sniffing those ‘ya mong’ they don’t help. I realized I had to get my ass to the hospital before I couldn’t walk. Luckily, or unluckily as I found out later, I found a cab right below my condo as he was dropping off another passenger.

The not so capable cab driver finally able to drop me off at the hospital, but not before I threw up all over his back seat. Sorry. If he didn’t get so lost, I wasn’t so sick, wasn’t raining hard, oh well.

There I was throwing up and spinning head, barely able to function, instead of taking me to ER room right away to find out the cause, they ask me for my hospital card or my insurance. How comforting to know that they care for patience before money. Even while the ER doctor was inspecting this finance officer keeps asking for my insurance card. Then the ER doc said I just had normal flue, no fever and headache, and I can choose to stay at the hospital or leave and told me about the room prize (perhaps just to scare me away as I didn’t dress so ‘well’ into the hospital so he probably think I have no money to pay for the bill) Anyway, I know my condition isn’t able to leave, so I stay.

When I got to the room.. I was shaking pretty bad even with three blankets. The local doc came to check up and I have high fever. Imagine if I had gone home by taken that ER doc’s other option. That night was not pleasant; I was cold and hot, when I was conscious again my cloths were all wet from the sweat. First thing in the morning that officer girl comes to ask about my insurance, which I said I gave my ID for you to check with the company last night. I gave the ID again for her to check. (She’s starting to piss me off.) After the insurance checking pass, the girl didn't even come up, just send an ID back, and you can feel the different treatment, my god they were towel cleaning me, serving break fast, running more blood test, urine sample, etc. When I request for some magazine to read they gave me a stack full – most of the brand new out of plastic bag. It seems like they don’t want me to leave. Having insurance does make a difference.
Its funny, the cleaning lady who broght up the magazine was being nice, tearing off the plastic bag for me, and open and arrange the magazine to me, but all that time she was trying to take the freeby booklets and sweepstake tickets! oh my. You see, they were fancy new magazines they probably bought just for me. Not one, but more than 10! Someone probably felt bad for treating me like i've got no money. Well, i only work a tank top and shorts.

I felt better and ready to leave by early afternoon. I have a meeting at four pm. After her morning inspection the doc said she’ll come in the afternoon, so I waited, the whole afternoon the doc didn’t come. I am sure to miss the meeting but since I didn’t bring my cell phone (had to leave it at home cuz it was the first time usage and had to be recharge for 10 hours) I had to contact the ‘easily annoyed’ client. Luckily I back up my contact info into yahoo address, so at the risk of looking like desperate net addict, using internet while in wheel chair and saline line hooking up to your veins, I went down and got the number.

Finally when I insisted that I must leave, the doc came. Faster than the doc was the billing person, request that I pay the bill first as insurance company closes at 5pm. I asked them to check for sure. You know if I didn’t request the doc now, they would have let me stay for one more night as they have already ordered 2 more sac of saline that afternoon. They found out that insurance company opens till 8pm (I think they knew this since this insurance company is well known) The bill was ridiculously high, they charge for every single little thing to maximize what they can get out of the insurance company for my ‘flu’ case. It was close to 7000 baht for that one night. Maybe they can invest that money in training ER docs to be more careful with their inspection. Oh well, at least they gave me good magazines to read.

When I got out, the heavy rain had just ceased. And you know what that means. Nasty traffic. I observed for 10 minutes, just to see what I should do. That line of traffic hardly move at all. I decided to walk until it starts moving and catch a near by cab or bus. Nope, they don’t move much. I walked all the way home from the hospital! Not bad for a fresh out of hospital bed patient. The fresh air after thunderstorm makes the walk much more pleasant than I thought.

The whole time when i was walking back I can't stop but thinking if I had no insurance or i was poor what kind of treatment i would recieved, and how would i have to deal with that much charges in just over one night. The business of private hospital makes me ....sick.

- Not so smart ID card

2006-04-01T02:05:00.001+07:00

The process of making the new Thai national ID so call " smart card" was anything but smart.

I'm pretty much an expert into this remaking wallet content process, as this must be the 6th time i lost a wallet here in thailand. i know my step. First thing was to make new ATM card, then make police report to make the other cards. The monther of all cards that allows me to make the rest of the cards is the national ID card.

During the past six years, I actually apreciate the speed it took to make the national ID card. It doesn't take more than an hour and I can walk out with the new card even with other cues ahead of me. I think that was rather fast and effiecient for a governmental service. so there I was, at the jatujak government office around 11am, the reception said sorry the cue is full. I asked her for the meaning of 'full' as there's more than five working hours left. She said we can only handle some 100 plus customers per day with the new smart card system and they are already maxed out. . You are joking, 100 per day for 300,000 plus residence in this area? what can i do but be back another day.

The morning i arrived at 8:30am I thought i was the early bird but I found that i'm already the 70th cue! Why would people come so early to make this card. the answer became obvious as I sat and waited for 2 hours. I asked a person who sat next to me, she said she was here before 8, and her cue was 24, and she said she had to come early because she also came in yesterday but couldn't wait long enough to get the card. I looked at my 70th cue and wonder when I'll be served.

three hours, i was still at the office, and i was already very annoyed. I sat and observed and time each person had to go through this process and it was clear why we had to waited this long. Everyone has to go through four process 1) make a request form and copy your residential paper as evident submit to the officers takes 10 minutes per person. no cue needed. 2) wait till they pull up your documents ask you to signed for verification. 5-10 minutes per person- multiply by number of cues. 3) send the document to another officer and they'll call you to sign more paper and they'll lined up your documents for photo session-5 minutes (multiply by cues) 4) the data entry, picture taking, thumb scanning, printing, more finger standing, 20-30 minutes per person! multiply that by number of people waiting. There was only one of those vdo capture camera, one monitor and key for data entry, one printer. The whole process was bottle neck to a halt by last event.

I was almost three hours, i was frustrated and had to do something. i went to the officers and ask to see the chief of operation, so that i can give some suggestion how to improve this process. the head lady was this old officer, she was very defensive of her work. i tried to make it clear that this is a valid complaint and the suggestion can speed this process. she said i have to write to the head of officer in the defense department. since i have to wait for my cue anyway, i filled up the suggestion feedback form and ask seven other frustrated customer to sign them as well. i must have created a bit of commotion at that office, but you can see that they were much more alert.

i then ask her to signed up my suggestion paper along with the rest of the reviews submited by other user as i want to get this deliver to people who makes decision not just some paper shredder. i made the copies of all reviews, one set i gave to her and the real one I keep to send to the officer in charge. all the time i was polite and she was cooperative but clearly patronized by my action. when i saw her position, she didn't state she was the head of the office, she said i have to go see another person in the back office. i went.

after the five hours process, i did recieved my card and i went to see the head guy. i knocked and he let me in. there i found out the root of the problems. he said he didn't agree with this smart card idea as the government was trying to push it into the system but there is no other system to support its usage yet, cost per card is 200 baht to make but charges 20 baht, takes much longer to produce. Yet, another classic case of this 'image' conscious goverment. They wanted the high-tech, smart image. much like giving computers to place with no computer. Had they waited for the appropriate timing, they would have save alot of cost and be more effective.

There's no use to stop it as it is already a nation wide implemented rules. but there is obviously ways to make the process much faster. so i explained the quick, low cost improvement concept to him, he listen well and agrees with it. he signed the document and requested some contact number. i told him that to do this properly, the whole card making process should have be evaluate (user tested and analyze into hard data to convince all stake holders of the problems) and redesign to make it more efficient (then compare the time to existing scenarios), before making the public suffer, and they can request the university i helped teach do it, if the company who design the system can't.

i did my deed.

it felt good. but i felt bad - fever is eating me up.

Got Robbed

2006-04-01T02:05:00.000+07:00

a wonderful topic to start up a blog.

i was robbed the other day. again. i fell asleep in the condo, forgot the lock the door(again) and the theive(s) just walked right in and snatch my 2 cellphones, a wallet and my watch. i only found this out the moment i was about to leave home, and found those items missing. in a way, i felt pissed but didn't feel all that bad maybe because the thing that matters most to me they didn't take is my laptop. i know the headache of the next few days is going to be trying to cancel and remake the cards in your wallet and buy a new cellphones. its still better than the laptop disapears.

see, i'm not a good keeper of things. i loose things all the time. i'm very forgetful. my mom often tease me, if i have a gf, i'll probably forget her somewhere. actually that might have happened.. i forgot.

Anyway, something about the wallet. This wallet has been with me for more than 10 years. I was actually proud of it because it's been with me that long. I actually saw the edges turned off, the extra shine on the leather gave that old classic feel to it. It was only three days ago when I was admiring how long I manage to keep it. Now that I think about it... that wallet lasted this long only because i had many other wallets in its place. see i don't like this wallet that much, it has this metal tag thing that protrude out, well, made never fall off... that thing is such a pain when i try to pull the wallet out of my pants. This is very cumbersome especially in jeans or tighter pants. .. the thing just get stuck. how annoying. so when i see some other wallet, i would buy it and put this one to rest as my backup wallet. So that’s how its been with me for so long.

just for curiousity, i wonder if event like this has anthing to do with horoscope, so I put in my data and the approximate time that the event probably took place, the 28th of march, around 4am. this is what came up.

ดาวจรทับกันในเกณฑ์ 1 องศา

ดาวเสาร์จรทับลัคนา จะมีความทุกข์เศร้าหมอง จะเสียทรัพย์และสิ่งของ จะเกิดเหตุใหญ่ขึ้น มีความทุกข์ต้องออกจากที่อยู่อาศัย

ดาวราหูจรทับอาทิตย์ จะต้องโคจร พลัดจากที่อยู่ ไปยังที่แปลกๆ พบเหตุอันตกใจ ระวังสุขภาพ และเรื่องร้ายแรงต่างให้ระวังเกิดโรคทางตา รับข่าวร้ายเกิดขึ้นแก่ผู้ใหญ่ ระวังอุบัติเหตุเสียเงิน

ดาวจรทับกันในเกณฑ์ 5 องศา

ดาวอาทิตย์จรทับอาทิตย์ จะโคจรไปยังแปลกถิ่น หรือต้องไปยังที่ต่างๆ อย่างกระทันหัน ได้ไปยังที่แปลกตา หรือไปไหนมาไหนยามวิกาล ถ้าไม่ได้ไปไหนก็จะมีคนมาสู่หา

ดาวพุธจรทับอังคาร ต้องทำงานหนักเหน็ดเหนื่อย ธุรกิจยุ่งเหยิง ไม่มีเวลาว่าง บางต้องต้องไปแบหหามของหนักซึ่งปกติไม่ได้ทำ

ดาวราหูจรทับพุธ ระวังอุบัติเหตุ เจ็บตัว เลือดตกยางออก จากความประมาท เกิดเคล็ดขัดยอกขึ้นมาปัจจุบันทันด่วน มีเหตุเสียทรัพย์

ดาวจรทับกันในเกณฑ์ 10 องศา

ดาวอาทิตย์จรทับพุธ จะได้ลาภเป็นของถูกใจ จะมีเกียรติยศ ได้รับรางวัลในการแก้ไขปัญหา ผู้ใหญ่ให้ลาภ จะได้รับชัยชนะจากการโต้เถียง จากการประชุม เหมาะในการทวงหนี้ หรือเจรจาเรื่องต่าง ๆ

ดาวมฤตยูจรทับอังคาร ระวังอุบัติเหตุ สุขภาพทรุดโทรมอย่างหนัก จะมีเหตุเดือดร้อนเกี่ยวกับบริวาร และลูกเมีย มีเรื่องกระทบใจอย่างแรง ระวังฟืนไฟ ไฟจะไหม้ มีเรื่องตื่นเต้น มีเหตุตกใจ

check out the 1 degree prediction. amazing.