On being Asian and eating alone

I'm Chinese-Malaysian, which means that for as long as I can remember, the words "eating" and "socialising" have been pretty much synonymous. You're considered to be very strange indeed if you do one without doing the other! None of this "we'll meet up for a measly coffee" type thing that Western people tend to be into, no, Asian friends will meet at a restaurant to partake in a banquet, then spend 15 minutes arguing loudly about who gets to pay the bill (I've seen many of these fights during my childhood and they're pretty funny in a 'they-would-be-more-funny-if-I-wasn't-actually-sitting-on-the-same-table-as-these-people' kind of way).

Anyway, today (after my exam finished and I had a couple of hours to kill by myself at a shopping centre before my partner finished work) I realised that I had to have lunch. So I spent a few minutes indulging myself in my favourite past-time, which is imagining all the lovely things I would eat (much more fun than actually eating those things, because my physical stomach has a limit, but my mental stomach is bottomless!)

I could go for sushi? Or maybe Indian? Or eat at a fancy cafe? Or Noodle Hut? Or just get something cheap at the food court?

Then I realised that all this imagining was actually making me pretty sad. Because I'd be eating lovely things, sure, but I'd be eating them all alone, and I kept picturing myself as a lonesome figure at a table for one, just generally being lonely. But why shouldn't it be considered acceptable to eat alone? I gave a little thought to this then concluded; it's because eating is embarrassing, and when you're doing something embarrassing, you generally don't want to be the only one doing that embarrassing thing. And believe me, the way I eat is pretty embarrassing because it generally involves spilling a lot of food onto my clothes, and getting sauce all over my face and even sometimes in my hair.

But yes, in the end I ate alone. I finished Good Omens while nomming on a chicken wrap with spicy sauce, and it was generally an okay experience, except the wrap was pretty spicy indeed (once I ate a whole birds eye chilli, but that story doesn't belong here...). So I concluded that, contrary to popular belief and conventional wisdom and Asian sensibilities, it's cool to take up a whole table meant for four people with your little lonesome self.

Nintendogs review!

People who used to follow my blog back in 2009-2010 (I believe this is a grand total of three people, including my boyfriend, who only read my blog because I made him), would remember that I reviewed the Nintendo DS game Scribblenauts. (I would put in some cool hyperlink over the word "Scribblenauts" that would take you to the relevant blog post, but I'm frankly not tech-savvy enough for that kind of thing yet.)

Today I'm reviewing another Nintendo DS game... Nintendogs!

The version I have is "Labrador and Friends" and the breeds of puppy available include the Toy Poodle, Schnauzer, German Shepherd, Shiba Inu, Corgi, and some other breeds that I can't remember because I didn't find them particularly cute, at least not in pixelated version (in real life all puppies are cute). I've included an image of the game's cover to the right so you can have a look at other breeds available.

If you get lots of "trainer points" (for being nice to your puppy and remembering to feed it and take it on walks and enter it into competitions), the "kennel" will get in "new breeds of puppy". So far I have unlocked two new breeds, the Pug and the Shih Tzu. Both breeds are pretty cute.

I believe you can have a total of three puppies in your house at a time, and there is always the "Dog Hotel" you can send your puppies to if you find that they are too much to handle. See, Nintendogs operate in real-time, meaning that if you feed your puppy, turn off your DS, then don't play again until two days later, your puppy will be starving. This real-time aspect kind of turned me off at first; I had a bit of an "I don't have time to be playing this every day!" sort of attitude. But really, nothing too drastic happens if you leave your puppy alone for like months on end, as I have done. (It's not like the Tamagotchis we all had in primary school, which got banned from schools because if you left them alone for like six hours, they would die.)

The game advises you that if your puppy feels neglected they will run away, but this has not happened to me yet, so I suspect it's just an empty threat. Anyway the aforementioned "Dog Hotel" is a handy way of effectively 'freezing' your puppy's hunger and thirst statuses if you need to take a break from your DS for a long time.

I currently have three Nintendogs, and at the risk of sounding like a boring mother who won't talk about anything except her children, I'll give you a quick summary of my puppies:

• Henry is a tan coloured Shiba Inu (I actually want a Shiba Inu in real life!) who is very good at Agility Competitions, fairly good at Disc Competitions and pretty bad at Obedience Competitions because under all that agility he is actually a pretty naughty and hard to train puppy.
• Lucy is a white Toy Poodle who is pretty good at everything. She is also quite friendly.
• Batman is a black Pug who annoyed me from the very beginning because of his refusal to wear his ribbon as a bow tie. Ribbons are "Accessories" you can purchase to pimp up your puppy, and generally speaking, boy dogs wear their ribbons as a bow tie, and girl dogs wear their ribbons on their head. The whole point of purchasing Batman the pug was so that he could actually look like Batman the superhero (I had a vision that he would be entirely black, then wear this yellow bow tie, geddit?) But Batman the pug had other ideas in mind and preferred to wear his ribbons on his head. I have absolutely no problem with this subversion of puppy-gender roles, but, you know, he doesn't look like Batman the superhero.

None of my puppies are particularly good at Obedience because I find obedience training incredibly banal and boring because it's so repetitive! Even teaching the puppies their name is painful. Not to mention embarrassing, if you happen to be doing this in earshot of anyone.

Competing is the only real way of earning money in Nintendogs, which you need in order to buy puppy food, water, milk, treats, shampoo, brushes, and other puppy essentials. However if you're no good with the competitions there is another way to not-starve, and that is by taking your puppy on frequent walks (they can go on as many walks in a day as long as they take a 30 minute break between each one) and selling the items that puppy will find along the way. Preeeety cheap-ass.

Hmm, that's really all I have to say on Nintendogs, so I'll just end this game review with a bunch of random ratings of arbitrary salient points...

• "Gameplay" (not really sure what this means except perhaps the degree to which actually playing the game is fun and challenging) - 8/10
• "Visuals" - 7/10 (it's pretty pixelated and the competition commentators always look like Bill Gates)
• "Sound" - 5/10 (the music played in the competitions is pretty boring... until you get to the Championship level! Then it plays cowboy music. Other than that the constant yapping of the digitalised puppies gets a bit grating sometimes)
• "Plot" - 2/10 (there is no real plot to this game because it's meant to be a "slice of life" kind of storyline... just going through the daily motions of walking and feeding your puppy, bathing it, and entering it into competitions)
• "Replayability" (my gamer boyfriend tells me this refers to the ability to replay the game and still find it interesting after you've finished it the first time) - 10/10. Nintendogs does not really end because you can always start fresh with new puppies. Also, there are always new items and accessories to collect, and surprisingly, the other characters in the game have not yet run out of stock things to say to me when we meet whilst taking our respective puppies for walks.

In conclusion, Nintendogs is a very entertaining and even addictive game for anyone who likes basic gameplay and a proliferation of puppies. It's a tiny bit Tamagotchi but with the added bonus that your Nintendog cannot die. Highly recommend!

On allergies

Hello everyone, and welcome back to my blog. It has certainly been awhile since I've updated! I hope you have all had lovely New Year celebrations and are looking forward to 2011 as much as I am!

I have not been blogging for awhile, having mistakenly believed that my Blogger account had been inactivated because I signed up for it using my old work email address. However, something-or-other happened and it turns out that I can still use my blog! Perhaps my old self foresaw that one day I would leave my place of work and therefore not be able to use that email address anymore, and cleverly linked this blog to my personal address. Or perhaps the whole signing-up-for-this-blog-with-my-work-address memory was a false one and I'd used my personal email address all along. But I digress. Sorry to bore you with my computer-ineptitude!

The topic ripe for discussion today is allergies. Do you have any allergies? For the past 20 years of my life I had believed I was some kind of supergirl who had absolutely no allergies except for a slight intolerance to lactose (being Azn, yo). Allergies were just another thing I thought could happen to other people, but never to me, no! I am very thankful that I can eat peanuts and gluten and other things that I often take for granted but could make other people incredibly ill. (I do love cheese, but cheese, being a dairy food, does not love me back, stupid cheese, I hate you! No just kidding, srsly, I love cheese).

I think that if you are allergic or intolerant to something your body should automatically develop an aversion to it, but alas, that doesn't often seem to be the case. Life would be a tiny bit easier if I didn't love cheese so much. My partner's dog is allergic to chicken but loves to sneak a small piece. My father used to break out in hives every time he ate seafood but loved it anyway and kept eating it until the allergic reaction surfaced no more. But there are other allergies which actually worsen after repeated exposures; I've heard that allergies to bee stings get worse with each progressive one (and I am also very thankful that so far no bee has ever stung me).

Anyway in the short space of about a week I discovered that perhaps I have two allergies. Neither allergy has to do with foodstuffs, so that's good at least (I would hate to be allergic to blueberries, or tea!). I had always considered it normal for mosquito bites to flare up into huge blisters since that has always been my experience, but apparently that's not the case... Apparently mosquito bites are only supposed to be small lumps. Well, how about that. After having a lovely night in Leura last weekend, watching a professional production of Romeo and Juliet in the park at night, I emerged covered with mosquito bites which I suppose I deserved, having worn a dress and not bothered with mosquito repellent and all. And then it was suggested to me that perhaps I had an allergy. The things you learn.

On the same weekend as this mosquito attack, I somehow developed an inability to wear my earrings because my earlobe piercings were a bit painful and perhaps bleeding a little, despite the fact that I've had my ears pierced for about ten years now. They are in the habit of bleeding every now and again which I just considered normal, perhaps I wasn't disinfecting my earrings as carefully as I should be. But then my partner suggested to me that this was not normal and perhaps I was allergic to a certain metal in earrings? I recalled an incident from my childhood which involved my drinking from a can of Coke (I'm no longer in the habit of drinking soft drinks), and getting a rash all over my hand from where I was holding the Coke can. I recall that my father may have said something about having an allergy to aluminium.

But sometimes it's just easier to live in denial. Even though my ears are still painful and my mosquito bites still blistery, I'd still like to think of myself as allergy-free, at least until it's confirmed in a medical setting or something. And while there isn't much I can do about my love for cheese, perhaps I can express said love in a different way, for example, by participating in those races where you roll a wheel of cheese down a hill? That would probably cause fewer problems for me than if I actually ingested the cheese.

Anyway I will leave you all for today, with that final thought of cheese-wheel races.

Bedtime Story #6

Once upon a time there lived a handsome Yeti (who also went by the moniker 'the Abominable Snowman'). He developed a close relationship with a beautiful lady Yeti ('the Abominable Snowlady'), and they spent much time together terrorizing the humans living in the nearby snow village.

I am sad to say that these Yetis were not very responsible when it came to contraception and practicing safe sexual intercourse. One day the female Yeti discovered that she was expecting, but did not want to keep the baby as she had no maternal inclinations whatsoever, and felt that she was not ready for such a responsibility.

When the baby Yeti was born, the Yeti couple left it at the foot of a snow-covered mountain, so that a pack of wolves might come and raise it (like Romulus and Remus, or Princess Mononoke or something).

At around this same point in time, a group of young women went for a skiing holiday. One of the women found the abandoned baby Yeti and immediately felt such a bond with it that she could not bear to leave it out in the harsh elements. She legally adopted the baby, and raised it as her own.

As the baby Yeti grew, she took him on many nature outings such as bug-catching expeditions. However, the Yeti developed a strong passion for fishing, so the young woman took him fishing every weekend. The Yeti became so adept at fishing (in freshwater, saltwater, rivers, the deep sea, you name it...) that the woman decided to open up a fish market so that they could sell the fish they had caught.

The fish market became an instant success for it was located within a geographic niche free from competing businesses, met the needs of consumers effectively through the utilization of the leading consumer behaviour and market research theories, and raised a high profile through social media marketing and public relations.

The young woman and the Yeti fished for the rest of their lives, and made a decent living from the profits of their enterprise.

Bedtime Story #5

Once upon a time there lived a large pink rabbit. He was called George Michael, though was in no way affiliated with the Wham! singer or the Arrested Development character.

He was the single father of six baby rabbits, as his wife had been involved in a rather unfortunate incident shortly after the birth of their litter. She had been stealing radishes from a farm, when the farmer had caught her and cooked her in a delicious pie with fluffy pastry and creamy red wine sauce.

George Michael didn't have many employable skills at all, and found it very difficult to single-handedly support his large family. He spent quite some time working in a menial and unfulfilling day job before applying for a casual job at a luxury hotel as a parking valet.

This hotel attracted the very richest patrons, all of whom drove expensive cars loaded with the latest technology and gadgets. He discovered that it was very easy to steal the gadgets (e.g. CDs, stereo systems, iPods, TomToms, those in-car DVD player things, expensive cashmere steering wheel covers, leather seat covers, floor mats... anything!) and then sell them on eBay.

Whenever the distressed holidaymakers discovered their possessions had been stolen they lodged complaints against the valet with the hotel, however there was never any evidence to substantiate their claims (besides evidence of the circumstantial variety). Because he was never caught out, he didn't have a criminal record.

In this way, George Michael the pink rabbit was able to make a lot of money with which to support his six little pink rabbit babies. He sent all six rabbits to college. One of the rabbits grew up to be a successful criminal lawyer, another one became a pediatrician, another became a marketing executive, another became an orthodontist, one became a small business owner, and another became a full-time stay-at-home father to eight baby rabbits.

Now that all his offspring had embarked on successful careers and life partnerships, George Michael decided to retire. He signed himself up for a rabbit retirement village, unaware that the village was actually the soft toy section of a department store.

One day, a dashing young man walked into the store and bought George Michael as an Easter present for his special lady friend. George Michael started a new life living with the young lady, and continued his thieving ways, as he had developed something akin to kleptomania. He lived happily ever after and maintains a 100% rating on eBay. The end.

Bedtime Story #4

Once upon a time there lived a very handsome bear, who lived with his loving bear girlfriend, who fed him honey all day long. The two bears lived in a den full of cushions, overlooking a leafy rainforest.

One day, the lady bear went out to pick some berries so she could make all manner of tasty baked goods, such as pies and cupcakes. She took her basket and was gone for about one hour, selecting the juiciest, purplest berries she could find.

While the lady bear was out, the handsome bear stayed at home and did other important things. He had little to no inkling of the tragedy that would soon befall him. Unbeknownst to him, a scorpion slid into the den, through the crack under the door, and stealthily made its way to the bear's foot.

When the lady bear was back from her berry-gathering expedition, she found the den empty! Her handsome bear was nowhere to be seen. She stored the berries in their refrigerator and set off to look for him, for although they had only been separated for a short while, she already missed him dearly.

The lady bear noticed how a path in the forest showed signs of a struggle, such as claw marks in tree trunks, and broken branches and the like. She followed this path until she came to the lair of the scorpion.

The scorpion hissed (or rattled, or whatever sound scorpions make) at the lady bear, and said "I bit the handsome bear, he is mine now!" But the lady bear would obviously not have any of this, and since she was considerably larger than the scorpion, she simply lifted her foot up and squashed the scorpion. It helped that she had been wearing sensible shoes with thick soles.

One the way home from the scorpion's lair, the two bears came across a dying dog. The lady bear told her handsome bear partner of how she had seen an episode of Bear Grylls, and learnt that if you had sustained a scorpion sting, you only had to insert the stung limb into the stomach of a dying dog, so the stomach acids could neutralise the harmful alkilinity in the scorpion venom.

The handsome bear did as the lady bear suggested, for he knew she was always right about such things, even if she had initially not recognised the scorpion in the first place as she had a slightly misguided belief in how scorpions looked. (She had assumed the scorpion would have a pincer on it's tail, which is an understandable enough error to make.)

Once the handsome bear had been relieved of the burdensome scorpion venom, the two bears headed home, arm in arm. The handsome bear expressed much admiration for how the lady bear squashed the scorpion so efficiently.

When they arrived home, the lady bear baked all the berries she had collected into tasty desserts. She baked a batch of blueberry cupcakes, a blueberry pie, and a blueberry cheesecake, and served these tasty deserts with lots of custard and cream.

The handsome bear partook in these delicacies heartily, and then took a nap. He awoke from the nap an hour later, in a happy mood.

Bedtime Story #3

Once upon a time, in a swamp polluted with radioactive matter, lived a bunyip. The bunyip, due to this environment, sustained a few developmental deformities. Because of his odd appearance, he could never get a date with any girl bunyips, and all the boy bunyips mocked him and chose him last to be on their sports teams.

The bunyip had another, not as immediately identifiable, deformity. Instead of the nasty behaviours normally indulged in by other bunyips, such as eating children, scaring old people, and generally wreaking havoc among the human population, this bunyip preferred to be gentle and kind. For this reason, primarily, he was a pariah.

One day, as the bunyip was strolling along in the public gardens, picking flowers, he met a beautiful girl with long black hair. She was so pretty, he tried to talk to her, and give her the flowers he had picked. But because he was a scary-looking bunyip, she freaked out, and ran away. He threw the flowers to the ground and walked home despondently.

The following day, he was picking flowers as usual. The pretty girl with black hair came strolling along the path. This time, he gave the flowers to her first, then proceeded to strike up a conversation.

As the two of them talked, they realised they had very much in common. The girl realised that her preconceptions about bunyips were false generalisations. She would have liked to stay longer to talk to him, but she was meeting a few friends for coffee. She asked if the bunyip would like to join them, and he nervously agreed.

As her friends approached, his heart beat faster and faster. The humans immediately assumed the bunyip was attacking the girl, and converged upon him, bashing him relentlessly.

"Stop! STOP!" screamed the girl. "He's nice! He's a nice bunyip!"

The humans did not believe that a bunyip could be nice, so they continued to beat the crap out of him. The girl ran into the fray and pulled the humans off her new friend. She explained that the bunyip was kind and gentle, and her friends came to believe this.

As they were walking towards the cafe, a group of nasty bunyips confronted them. The nasty bunyips taunted the kind and gentle bunyip for associating with human beings. The nasty bunyips gave the kind and gentle bunyip a further beating.

The bunyip, fortunately, survived the beatings with very few lasting injuries. Over coffee, the bunyip told his new human friends about how he could never ask a lady bunyip out on a date, because he was too kind and gentle, and never did things like scaring old people and eating babies.

One of the pretty girl's friends informed the bunyip that he had recently met a kind and gentle lady bunyip, who was not nasty because she had been dropped on her head as a baby. The friend introduced the two kind and gentle bunyips to each other.

After a series of dates, the two bunyips realised that they were really rather fond of each other. They moved into a non-radioactive swamp so their babies would not have developmental disorders. They had twelve babies, and raised them all to be kind and gentle.