Relics

Author: Pip Vaughan-Hughes

I used to make it a point to read at least one book a year. This year, a lot of distractions had made it difficult for me to lie down with one. With only December left, I embarked on one chapter a day regiment of this novel that had been on my table for a long while...

I had yet to come across a story set in the Middle Ages, until now. 1235 was a time in Europe which not many people know or care about except for its churches, knights and crusaders. Hence it's a huge credit to the author for bringing 13th Century to life.

Pip Vaughan-Hughes had painted such vivid pictures of medieval cities and towns that one could smell and hear them. And happening among these cities and towns was a conspiracy that caused a monk to be framed for a murder and ran for his life. Chased by a murderous Templar knight, he was offered an alternative life by Fate.

The young monk, Brother Petroc, had only known the clergy way of life: simple and uneventful. Then a Templar decided to change that, and all in the name of relics. Who would have known that relics could be so valuable in Christendom and their worth was justified only by the corruptness of the churches.

Petroc was wanted by the very people he believed to be holy and rescued by those he had known to be evil. He lost his faith in an instant and slowly found reality. This was pretty much the theme at that time and served as a prelude to the Renaissance.

All in all, this was a captivating read with vivid descriptions and realistic characters. I like the ending as it had a great twist that stopped at just the right point. 3.5 out of 5 stars; could be a 4 if it was a bit more sophisticated but it was exactly this quality that made it an easy read.

Mavericks killed my Wi-Fi?

Cross posted from the Projapps Propaganda

It has been more than two weeks since I upgraded from Mountain Lion to Mavericks on my old MacBook Pro. It is also more than two weeks since the upgrade broke my Wi-Fi. The Wi-Fi actually worked for a while before it went dead. A subsequent reboot resulted in the indicator showing "Wi-Fi: No hardware installed".

I have tried all the advices and solutions I could google. I tried anything from resetting the SMC/NVRAM/PRAM to doing a clean reinstall of the operating systems. Downgrading to Mountain Lion or using a USB network adapter did not help too. These had me thinking whether Mavericks had killed my Wi-Fi or my Wi-Fi is no longer supported with any device driver. Maybe it's the VirtualBox update I did but highly unlikely since I reinstalled...

Hence in comes the TL-WR702N by TP-LINK, a 150Mbps wireless N portable router. My friend happened to have one on hand so we gave its client mode a try. The client mode allows the router to be connected to another device via Ethernet core and acts as an adapter to send/receive the wireless signal from a wireless network.

It worked! Therefore I went out to get myself one for S$34. It is supposed to be a stopgap fix but with no solution in sight, apart from buying a new MacBook, I think I may have to carry the router around with me for good.

Long overdue update

Wow, it has been so...... long since I last updated this blog. My last post is in 9th February! Anyway, there isn't much to write about between then and now, with most of what had happened to me or what I had done recorded in other websites and social networks. So here is a summary of my 20130209 - 20131113 life.

Firstly, I took a trip to Hong Kong for the BlackBerry Jam Asia, courtesy of Research In Motion Limited, the company that gives us the new BlackBerry OS 10 platform to develop on. My friend and I were there as developers hoping to learn more as well as being representatives to an application we were to showcase. So how was the trip? You can read about it here.

Secondly, just for the fun of it, I have also gotten two certifications along the way of self-improvement:

1. YouTube Digital Citizenship
2. Certified Ethical Hacker v8

The plan now is to continue on to getting the ECSA...

Say "No" to an overpopulated Singapore -- Events

The government has passed the white paper on population which is definitely a faux pas. They argued that it is for our own good when every Tom, Dick and Harry can clearly see that it is not and we as Singaporeans are not stupid. We know what we want, we know what we can overcome, and we know we don't need any increase in population. Instead of worrying about how to cope with 6.9 million people in 2030, why don't we just cope with 5.9 million now and change our economic model? There are more successful cities than Singapore relying on a far less population so there is no excuse we can't do it.

So my fellow countrymen, let's hold our destiny in our own hands for once and make ourselves heard. Do the following:

Saturday, 16 February 2013 - Speakers Corner (Hong Lim Park)
Protest against 6.9 million population by 2030

Online Petition - The Petition
https://tklcloud.com/petition/Default.aspx

没有创新，何来传统？

读了一月二十日，由作者罗澜写的《不要创新，要传统》之后，心里有一个问题，不吐不快。

作者说牛车水的新年装饰有一群年轻学生创作，只想推成出新，不顾传统而使得装饰不伦不类。我对这种想法不赞同，觉到作者对年轻人在原有的文化上增加更多的色彩显得不公平。

我想问作者，我们文化里的很多习俗，在当时被创造出来时，是不是也是当时的人的一种创新？我们的某一个传统何尝不是在某个曾经的开始流传而变成传统？

牛车水的新年装饰本来就是一个为了增加气氛，美化环境来“吸睛”的工具。只要学生有估计到审美观，没有触犯到禁忌，创新又有何妨？如果装饰因为传统而一成不变，只会让人有一种死气沉沉的感觉，如何去吸引年轻人。

在现在讲究创意的经济里，我希望人们不要以传统为由，让传统变成我们下一代的包袱。我们的文化需要他们勇敢地去创造新的传统。这样，我们的文化才会更丰富。说不定不久的将来，新加坡会有属于自己的文化，一个融合所有其他文化的传统。

2013 wish for Singapore

2013 is upon on us and given all the happenings in the previous year, my wish for Singapore is for better governance, more transparency and wiser strategies to bring its citizens through an ever increasingly volatile future. I just read this news article and I agree much with the points brought up and hope the leaders take heed.

I left a couple of comments there which I will just place here for reference:

"We didn't really choose to be global but we are definitely told that economic growth would bring happiness. However, we are now sacrificing happiness for economic growth which is much irony. We now do choose to survive but we should do it with more intelligent strategies."

 This one is written with a bit of angst but it is how I felt nonetheless:

"The economists and scholars the govt hired are simply plain lazy to do anything, that's why they keep suggesting the same thing over and over again. It's time they get their butts off their chairs and think of new strategies. Economists around the world wreck their brains to better their peers and gain recognition while ours are simply here to enjoy their high pay. Maybe it's time we pay them the most basic pay and any bonus will have to be based on their performances."