I have moved

http://nabbycat.wordpress.com/

 

Thanks for the memories.

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Journalism’s from Mars, Social Media’s from Venus

I attended the Open Room session organised by Ogilvy Digital Influence last week, entitled Journalism’s from Mars, Social Media’s from Venus. At first, I didn’t know what to expect, but as the debate became heated with both sides (bloggers/journalists) becoming very defensive, it became clear that the whole Mars/Venus thing was a pretty apt description indeed.

It was an interesting discussion, although I felt that the REAL CONVERSATION was actually in the live tweets from the various people in the room, a pity it could not be integrated into the discussion real-time.

Nonetheless, I have to highlight Daryl’s post on his thoughts post-Open Room (yes, I said post twice). It was mentioned during the talk that mainstream media won’t be going away soon, as many people still enjoy their morning paper with their breakfast/need a good read in the toilet (etc,etc) but what Daryl says about people our generation forming new habits at an amazing speed holds so true (think Facebook/Twitter/DSLR cameras/Mac books etc)

I know many friends who don’t read the paper anymore. Me, I tend to focus on the lifestyle pages, the “real news” pages don’t cut it for me anymore as I can get more timely news on the Internet. Or, as DK put’s it, “So why should I be paying for yesterday’s news when I can get today’s news free?”

Sure, with the internet, newspapers are hard-pressed to deliver breaking-news stories, but of course it’s not impossible. It’s called good journalism – seeking out news exclusives that we readers don’t have time to seek out ourselves. So, in a sense, social media is actually making journalists be better at what they do, which is a good thing, isn’t it?

Straits Times journalists are now on Twitter, that’s a good thing. Bloggers are now increasingly mentioned in the papers or even contributing to traditional media, that’s a good thing too.

I do agree that the two can co-exist, although I also believe both sides view the other with a little animosity sometimes, but hey, that’s natural i guess when you’re competing for the same eyeballs. But I still believe that MSM won’t die out anytime soon, so I guess journalists can heave a small sigh of relief.

As for the defensiveness, especially from the journalism side, I can totally understand. Being told that people prefer reading free news online than pay for a newspaper, that’s pretty hard to swallow when you’re livelihood depends on selling that paper. But I think that the smart journalist should adapt and work with the change, not cling on the old ways with a death-like grip.

As for me, I’ve always had to have my morning newspaper with my breakfast, but lately it’s morphed into having my morning newspaper AND my laptop open in f

I do believe that there is still a market for both, in Singapore at least. But that might change once my generation (gen Y) grows up and have children/grandchildren, etc..Flying cars and moving sidewalks, anyone?

Pardon the rather incoherent post, just thought I’d dash off some points lest I forget about the very interesting discussion hosted by Ogilvy Digital Influence. Looking forward to next session.

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I survived 42.195km!

Unglam photo

Pardon the ugly watermark on the photos, I didn’t feel compelled to buy the photos for S$34.90!

I officially completed my first marathon on Sunday, 28 June 2009. It was the Standard Chartered KL Marathon, and me and Erfen had trained for 4 months for it. I was actually quite nervous before the race as I had not been training for 2 weeks before the event due to work, but somehow, someway, we managed to do the entire 42.195km in 5 hours and 50 minutes. It’s not excellent timing of course, but i had set my target to be under 6 hours, since it’s my first marathon, so I am satisfied with the result!

The race statistics say that I am the 165 position for the women’s full marathon category. Not too shabby for a first-timer, I think 😛 Although, the winner of the women’s full marathon did it in 2 hours 40 minutes! And the men’s winner completed it in 2 hours 17 minutes, despited the fact that it was his first marathon! Craziness!!

I would say that though the idea of running 42.195km seems pretty impossible and daunting at first, I think anyone can do it, given proper training beforehand. Before the marathon itself the furthest I’d ever run was 24km! But luckily me and Erfen followed a running schedule, having proper training really helps.

[warning: running advocacy alert!]

Plus, besides just running you can train in other ways too, like doing circuit training, interval trainings, gym sessions and even swimming and cycling for cross-training. Running is an excellent way of keeping fit! Trust me on this, I eat a lot and exercising is the only way that I don’t weigh a ton now.

Running a marathon also challenges you to be strong both mentally and physically, as you are ultimately racing against yourself. Of course, there were times when it was difficult.

While training, sometimes I’d feel lazy to go for a run, or I’d want to walk halfway through my run, but sometimes I just told myself “You can do it” or  visualise myself running past the next lamppost, and the next, and the next, and before I’d known it, I’d have finished my run.

Team Grand Kenyan

Plus, it’s nice to run with a partner as well. During the marathon me and Erfen listened to music via his phone, and we made sure to load songs we both liked.

When the song “Irreplaceable” by Beyonce started playing, we both instinctively started doing the hand actions for the “To the left, to the left” and then we got carried away and did actions for the whole song. I bet we were one of the few runners who were still laughing and joking while running!  It was really a pleasant experience for me and it was a great feeling crossing the finishing line together. It would have been very different had I run alone.

Also, it’s a great excuse to travel! We decided on going for the KL Marathon because it was a chance for us to get out of Singapore and do something different. It was quite a cool way of exploring the city, plus we had time to do some sightseeing/shopping before we left for Singapore. I think many cities have marathons as well, such as the Vienna Marathon (gonna do that one day!) or the Boston Marathon (one of the world’s oldest annual marathons, although I’d need a timing of at least 3 hours and 40 minutes to qualify!)

Boston Marathon 1910

Next stop, Safra Bay Run and Army Half Marathon in August, and the Singapore Standard Chartered in December. Pretty exciting stuff! I’m hoping to improve my timing to 5 hours next…fingers crossed!

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6.5 million people in Singapore? HALP.

I read this letter in the forum pages today, commenting on a recent article (Pack them in, build them up – March 27 2009) in which a certain Professor Edward Glaeser extolled the benefits in Singapore having a 6.5 million population. I was similarly alarmed. With more crowded trains, buses, shopping centres (with Tampines starting to look like the new Orchard), with more and more land development transforming previously empty spaces into brand spanking new condos and office buildings, with more heritage areas being torn down, spiffed up, renamed and otherwise obliterated, I really wonder what Singapore would look like if it got even more crowded. He may be an academic but his arguments, while being sound academically, just make me balk.

His idea of a perfect candidate to boost our population rate?

My model of a skilled worker is that 42-year-old biotechnology worker who has a husband and two kids and is trying to live a decent life.

On how having a dense city would help the environment?

Crowding more people on less land is fundamentally good for the environment. Partly because people have lower transportation costs, live in smaller homes, and use less energy.

On our street life?

There’s a huge amount of pedestrian traffic but it’s indoors. It’s all in the air- conditioned malls, which is really where the street life is. That means connections between those malls are actually what city planning needs.

Read the article and tell me what you think? I just feel sad at the thought of a Singapore supplemented by an army of biotech workers, living in high-rise buildings that simply get higher and higher as if trying to make an escape, and preferring to walk in underground air-conditioned walkways. (Brings a whole new meaning to ‘rat race’?)

As it is I see the working crowd at Raffles City in the mornings and think ‘Dawn of the Dead’. TOC calls it, the Sardine City. Is it no wonder Ethan Hawke lamented in not having seen Singaporeans really living?

HALP.

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an entry, and a story.

Is it just me or is it harder to find time to blog when you’re working?

Work’s been good..I’m kept busy everyday, which I maintain is much better than having nothing to do. It’s been almost a month already. Which means I’m a third into my internship, and that I should probably go talk to my boss and ask him what I’ve been doing. According to this book I’ve been reading, you should always continually ask for feedback, and treat all feedback as a mechanism to let you know how far off your target you are, adjust your behaviour accordingly, and hopefully it brings you to your intended objectives at the end of it all.

And just for kicks, here are the things I’d like to get out of this internship by August 29 2008:

1) To know whether I like doing PR

2) To seek out opportunities to be more creative in my responsibilities

3) For my work to be respected by my superiors and peers

4) To improve on my work ethic and be more accountable for my work

5) To build lasting relationships with the people around me

6) To be unforgettable.

She took two steps forward, not without fear. It was the loneliest time of the day, that period between hustle and before bustle, when the air was thick and people with their glazed eyes looked without really seeing. She held a balloon in her palm. It was red like the gelatin candies of her youth, a red that was one shade brighter than blood. It gave her a tiny bit of happiness to hold this happy, bouncing thing in her hand. She let the happy, bouncing thing go and watched as it danced further away, and went to partake in a secret happiness she could only guess at. She watched till it disappeared, and then she did too.

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crazy little thing called…

Pardon me, I’m in the mood for Queen today.

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haiku: being lost

marching to drumbeats

that follow no stoccato —

she feels nothing

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Confessions of a frujchaholic

I’ve been a really bad blogger these couple of weeks.I haven’t been updating as much as I’d like, I’m behind on my blog readings (and my RSS feeds look a right mess) and I’ve even been missing in action in the twittersphere too.

Yes, I feel very guilty indeed.

I could offer some excuses as to why I’ve been a neglectful blogger – school work, deadlines etc. But excuses rarely help remove the trangression, so I shan’t.

Another thing I realised is that I’ve seemed to have lost my voice in this blog. Because I keep on focusing on my content and for some reason what usually starts off as a short post usually evolves into a General Paper essay, my personality (or whatever personality that I could claim to possess) has been drowned out.

So today I shall write about something that’s close to my heart.

This is the story of frujch.

It started off in February 2006 as the dream of 4 girls: to open a fruit juice stall near the school gym. In the beginning, it was just an idea in our heads. I mean, what did we know about running a business?

But we won the tender, and suddenly we had a company to call our own. We called it Frujch (an homage to our original intention to set up a fruit juice stall) and decided to include alcohol in the menu. As a result, Frujch became known as the first bar on a university campus. After 4 months of operations, one of our partners left and it became a 3 woman operation (L-R: Sherms, Nab, Shal)

We started introducing some light food like bagels, waffles and salads, hired employees to help us run the bar (we call them frujchaholics) and organised events like acoustic performances and even a beer pong championships. But we weren’t entirely satisfied with what Frujch was, and wanted to expand it even further. This is what we did:

1) Revamp the place

This:

Became this:

2) Expand our menu

So the 3 of us are the worst ever specimens of girls-who-can-cook, so we did the next best thing! (no, not order take-out and pass it off as our own): we asked for expert help.

This is Malcolm (our fourth partner, source of sanity and part-time Voice of Reason):

For anyone who has been to Frujch, this is THE guy to thank for all the yummy sandwiches and salads. (Below: Port O’Bello Melt) And don’t be fooled by his gentle demeanor, this guy runs a very tight ship and wants to be the next Gordon Ramsey.

3) Held signature events

One of which is Beer Pong Championships which we hold every school term. For those who aren’t familiar with it, here’s a video we made. We just had one last week which we called the Last Beer Pong Championships since the 4 of us are graduating real soon. It was also real nice because most of the people that came were regulars (although perhaps they were lured by the prospect of the free beer we promised), and as the pictures below show, they are as crazy as the people that run the place:

I guess I wrote this post to try and figure out how I’m feeling as the end draws closer. In 3 weeks’ time, Frujch will be closed and not long after that we’ll be handing it over to a new management team, who may or may not carry on the Frujch name and business. Not a day goes by that I don’t think about letting Frujch go, and yes, it makes me sad. We’ve really put everything we had into this and along the way forsaken school and social life and family for it. Customers have become fans (“I can’t live without my Chocomint Milkshake every day) and friends.We’ve had good times, bad times and stressful-Oh-my-God-I-dropped-the-sandwich-and-the-customer-looks-really-angry times.
It’ll definitely be hard to let go.

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shmalentine’s day

And so tomorrow’s it. Some couples really look forward to a day of showing their love by exchanging gifts or going for a nice dinner (speaking of which, check out Amelia’s take on the top 3 restaurants to go with your loved one on THE day). Others don’t celebrate it at all, dismissing it either as:

a) A big conspiracy by companies (think of the money florists, candy stores and jewellers stand to make!)

b) A game of one-upsmanship by boyfriends (“OMG look at the bouquet he just gave her” etc etc)

c) An insincere show of love, since it is only expected on one day of the entire year

d) All of the above

We’ve all heard about the negative aspects of Valentine’s Day. However, I was pleasantly surprised the other day by what my friend Jonny said to me:

” Valentine’s Day is also Friendship Day. So this year, me and Shermeen have decided to spend time with our friends instead.”

I really liked what he said. Somehow, I feel that we take our friends for granted more so than our significant other.

So here’s my proposal: This Valentine’s Day, instead of splurging on chocolates, or an expensive dinner, or a freaking $100 giant teddy bear (!), why not spend quality time with your close friends instead?

As for me, I’ll be working tomorrow.

[aside: check out Frujch’s Brown Bag Promotion]

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