The upside of falling sick

A few times a year, I catch the common cold. It's usually during the "sick" season when lots of people catch the pesky virus.

Some people have remarkably strong immune systems and don't easily fall sick. I must have a weak immune system because I catch it so easily.

It sucks to be sick. Your body aches, you have a irritating cough, your nose runs. Sometimes, you even have a fever and sore throat. All really annoying symptoms.

That said, falling sick has its plus points too. It forces you to slow down and take a rest, which is something we probably all need a bit more of in our busy lives.

Someone told me that falling sick is your body's way of telling you to take a breather. Maybe that's true.

But more than that, I think falling sick serves a more important purpose. When you're really knocked out and bedridden, you really feel your mortality.

Of course all of us know that life is fragile and we are susceptible to all kinds of diseases that could literally kill us. But it's one thing to know something intellectually and quite another to actually realize it.

It's when you're down and out, physically, that this hits you right in the face. And it makes you think about things you don't normally bother to ponder about.

Let's face, most of us are so caught up with our day-to-day lives that we seldom sit back and think about all the things that are important in our lives.

When you're sick, you often think of such things. Perhaps because deep down inside, you realize that you could buy the farm anytime.

The sad thing is once we recover and we're up and about again, we tend to forget all those realizations we had when we were laying in bed wallowing in misery.

Next time you fall sick, it's probably a good idea to jot down your thoughts so you can refer to them later. There are things you'll think about when you're sick that you would never do when you're fit and healthy.

Man of Steel is a GOOD movie!

There have been quite a few bad reviews for "Man of Steel" but I've seen the movie and I think it's great. Much of the complaints is that this is a much darker Superman movie than what we're used to.

While that is true -- and it should be noted that Superman movies are not even supposed to be dark in the first place -- the trend for superhero movies has been to go "darker". The recent Spiderman movie starring Andrew Garfield was not dark by any means but darker than Toby Maguire's Spiderman movies, for sure. Even the latest Iron Man movie was a bit darker than the first two. Like I said, it's sort of a trend, started by Christopher Nolan with his Batman trilogy.

Since "Man of Steel" was produced (though not directed) by Nolan, it's not surprising that it would be darker than previous Superman movies. Another thing to be expected is for the movie to have a stronger sense of realism.

Certainly there is an attempt to imbue the movie with a sense of realism but seriously, how real can a Superman movie be? This is a guy who is practically indestructible, he can fly, has x-ray vision, can shoot lasers from his eyes. The nature of the character is just to fantastical for there to be realism ala the Batman movies.

I read somewhere that the Superman in this movie is part of the same cinematic universe as Nolan's Batman. That bridge is briefly established during a scene where Superman and his nemesis, General Zod, are fighting in space and they crash into a satellite that bears the logo of Wayne Industries.

There is clearly a Batman in that universe. The question is whether it's the same Batman as played by Christian Bale. I would say no. If they were trying to establish that I would say they've failed. Yes, this Superman is darker and there's more realism than before, but it's still nowhere close to the darkness and realism of the Batman movies. So, not same universe in my books!

So, it's not very dark. So, it's not very realistic. So what? It's still a very good movie.

The first part of the movie was a bit slow-moving. There's definitely an intention to build up to the finale which was totally action packed to the hilt! In fact, I've never seen a movie that action packed. The finale of "Star Trek -- Into Darkness" was really quite action packed but this one is easily 10 times that! It just blows everything away in terms of action. So much more than even "The Avengers" finale. So, that should give you an indication of how brutal it was.

Sometimes having a slow build up followed by non-stop action doesn't work. I don't think it worked for Peter Jackson's "King Kong" for instance. But in this case, it was fine.

What I liked most about this movie was how likable the characters were. Clark Kent's parents are admirable people. Superman is just an overall decent guy. And Lois Lane is smart, plucky and sincere. All the characters are likable.

I read somewhere that even General Zod is not an out and out bad guy. He's merciless, no doubt but he's just doing what he was designed to do -- to protect and propagate his species.

Most movies have a lot of plot holes but this one doesn't have a whole lot. One thing that is a bit odd though is that Krypton technology from an 18,000 year old ship seems to be compatible with contemporary Krypton technology. How can that even be possible? Imagine trying to insert say, a thumbdrive into some ancient device from 18,000 years ago on earth (weren't humans cavemen then?). It's just crazy.

The movie does break from convention quite a bit. For example, Lois Lane finds out Clark Kent is Superman quite early in the movie. She also has reddish hair whereas the classic Lois Lane is brunette. Speaking of hair, what happened to the trademark "S-shaped" curl that Superman sports? Totally missing. Oh, and Perry White is black. None of these changes affects the movie negatively in any way though.

So, to recap, what I liked about the movie:
a) The characters are all so likeable
b) It's darker and more realistic but not overly so, which is actually a good thing
c) The action in the second half of the movie blows you away. It's awesome

It's not a fun movie in the way that "The Avengers" was but you never get bored. I recommend it highly.

Goodbye GoodBasic Media

Almost exactly a decade ago, together with a friend, I started a small, independent book publishing company called GoodBasic Media Sdn Bhd to publish some interesting books.

We launched the publication with my own book about emerging technologies and how they would affect society . We later signed up several interesting authors and published a handful of books about a diverse range of topics including investment, entrepreneurship, the Internet, and even on treating learning disabilities.

We also did an interesting charity book for an orphanage. These were books we wanted to publish because we thought they were worth publishing.

So, you could say, it was more a labor of love than anything else and we never made much money from it. We didn't lose money though, which is a good thing. And something I'm quite proud of.

In recent years the company has been dormant, and the other day my business partner asked me whether we should go on or wind up the company. We both decided that since we are both so busy with our respective work, we might as well call it a day for our little publishing sideline.

It wasn't a difficult decision to make. For the past year or so, I've been devoting my energies on producing a new series of books for MPH as well as developing its e-book publishing business, which is very gratifying to me. It's something I'll be focusing on for the foreseeable future. 

Friendship & collaboration is easy in M'sia

One of the greatest things about Malaysia is how easy it is to establish friendship and collaboration with people you meet in every day life.

I've been lucky because the nature of my career is such that I'm required to meet a lot of people. And among the many people I've met, usually as business or work acquaintances, several have turned out to become friends and a few, good friends.

Sometimes, it's from the unlikeliest places. One of my friends, Chun, ran a Apple retail store more than a decade ago. I was a customer. We clicked and kept in touch. I found out that his background was actually not in retail but in videography. I encouraged him to get back to that. He didn't for a long time but he's now fully into it and he's established himself as a top-notch cinematographer for local movies. We've collaborated on a few projects including this one for Carif. Who would've thought a customer and store owner would become friends and collaborators?

In Malaysia, this is not unusual.

Another friend is Zan, who is both a journalist and a TV/film producer. When I first met him, he was applying for a job at theSun. I saw some potential in him though he was not so suited for my department, so I referred him to another department and he got hired. In time we both left theSun and I didn't hear from him for a while. He had gone on to further his studies in the UK and came back with a Masters degree in broadcasting. We reconnected a few years back and have since collaborated on a few different film and book projects. This and this was something we did on a whim. Chun helped out with post-production. It turned out to be quite a touching documentary. In recent years, Zan and I even taught journalism at the same college. I never expected this when I interviewed him all those years ago.

But this is Malaysia and it's not unusual.

Yet another good friend is Hou, whom I met when I was consulting for an Internet company that needed some advertising done. He was there to give a pitch and I was there to give my input on the concept. I can't even remember whether he won the pitch but we got along well and kept in touch. In time, we ended up collaborating on book publishing projects as well as some advertising campaigns which have won awards. Did I expect this when I met him at a client's office way back when? Of course not.

This is Malaysia. A great place to establish friendship and collaboration.

Pet fishes are hard to rear

I've never really tried to keep pet fishes before. There were a few aborted attempts in the past where I'd buy a simple plastic tank and keep a few fishes but they'd always die so fast.

Recently, I decided to give rearing pet fish a serious try. I have three types of fish tanks in my home. The first is what I call an "eco-system" tank. This is a fish tank that contains a good mix of fish and freshwater vegetation. They support each other.

When I first got that thing set up, the tank had a mix of small and big fish. Big mistake. The big fish, like Angel Fish, will bite and disturb the smaller fishes like tetras. Sometimes the tetras would even jump out of the tank to literally commit suicide.

I eventually got rid of the Angel fish (gave it to the pet store) and also bought a  better aquarium that comes with a tank cover to prevent any fish from jumping out of the tank. Now, the system is quite stable. I've even got a couple of small prawns in the tank. They live in harmony with the fish.

I also have a saltwater aquarium. This one is a lot harder to maintain. The saltwater fishes are not as hardy. The wrong temperature or salinity will cause the fish to die.

The original set up I had was not very good. I had pump that didn't flow that well and the water got dirty quite easily. I upgraded to a better system -- a better quality tank and much more effectively filter and protein skimmer.

Nevertheless, a lot of fish have died. It takes some time for the water to stabilize. The problem is that with each death, the dead fish add to the contamination of the water. Sometimes, you spot the dead fish and are able to take it of the tank. Other times, you don't notice it and the fish actually starts to rot in the tank. This creates havoc in the tank and a vicious cycle ensues. More fishes die and the water gets even more contaminated.

I recently spent a lot of effort cleaning up the tank, getting rid of debris and scrubbing the walls of the tank. With the tank now looking a lot cleaner, I hope I've broken the vicious cycle, and the few remaining fishes will live long enough for the water to stabilize and thus support more fishes.

The third type of tank I have is not even a tank but a mini-pond with a wooden frame. I started off buying a lot of different fish, including goldfish. Big mistake. The big goldfishes will eat up the smaller fishes.

I have exchanged all my big fishes and am only keeping guppies. I've heard that guppies are hardy fish but many of them seem to die quite easily. They mate quite fast and give birth to lots of small guppies but it seems a lot of the females die after giving birth because of the stress involved.

Apparently having an equal number of males and females is not the way to go. I read somewhere the ratio should be three to one (female to male) so there's less stress of constantly having to give birth. I don't know if this is true but I've recently repopulated my pond with guppies on a three-to-one ratio of females and males. Let's see if this works!