In the midst of Finals

I'm now in the middle of my written Finals, having taken the Surgery and Paediatrics written papers and surviving them. I still have my Psychiatric and Medicine written papers plus my clinical examinations but my mother is always on my back, trying to get me to study twenty four hours per day, seven days per week. At times I am thankful for this push but at times her logic can come across as very irrational. I'll write about my views about parents later.

My revision is not helped by my second flu in the same number of weeks. I've heard there has been a superbug going around Hong Kong but it seems to have affected me now. It has to be airborne since I don't go out of my flat very much, except to go to exams and I don't think any of my class peers have been sneezing or being infectious. You can spot an infectious medical student miles away by their face masks and fifteen layers of clothing.

There are so many news stories I want to comment about - Fidel Castro's resignation, the Democratic presidential nominee race, accusations of cheating within my faculty and Eduardo's fracture. Since I don't have much time, I will comment on one news story that has arisen.

Prince Harry has been forced to pull out of Afghanistan since his presence was leaked by the American website 'The Drudge Report". This is yet another reason why Americans are hated all over the world. They cannot keep the big gob shut. There is a reason why we want a media blackout for Prince Harry's presence - it will make him a target to the Taleban and endanger not only him but those around him. The media and the royal family had a deal - don't report Harry's deployment and we will give you access. Unfortunately the Americans are just not willing to play ball.

This is one of the reasons why I hate USA. They think the rules don't apply to them, whether it is the Kyoto treaty, the declaration of banning landmines or signing an amendment on the Geneva convention. They think they rule the Earth or have special rights since they are the most powerful nation on the Earth. Don't they read Spiderman - 'with great power comes great responsibility.'

I should say something about Prince Harry. For all his antics and status, at least he has done something I and most other people wouldn't do - go represent your country. That is something to praise him for.

"Did you know that David is now going out with his ex-girlfriend's sister and mother at the same time!!!!"

One of the reasons why I am so awkward in social functions and settings is the inability to gossip. I just cannot gossip with people. I find talking about nonsensical matters boring and tedious.

To ensure I was writing about the correct subject, I looked the word up in a dictionary. According to the Merriam-Webster online dictionary, 'gossip' is defined as "a rumour or report of an intimate nature." Gossip usually entails talking about somebody that is of no concern of you, such as a distant work colleague or a celebrity, and is of an event or subject which has no relevance towards you or your daily life. It just feels good to talk about it because the subject matter is scandalous, the subject matter is fascinating as most people's lives are boring and the event usually entails the demise of a particular person or people.

In essence gossip performs no function in human society. People interject comments of matters that are of no concern of them and because gossip is based around rumours, erroneous facts and hearsay, the 'opinions' expressed by people are irrelevant. Gossip is used by people to fill the air because they hate the awkwardness of silence and the gossipers are too boring in the first place to offer something interest in their own mundane lives to talk about it.

It doesn't mean I am not interested in the lives of the people around me. Of course I want to hear if one of my friends is getting engaged or is getting a new job. Of course I do want to hear if one of my friends has just broken up or has been sacked. What I won't do is bask in their misery and talk about things behind their backs.

One of the most irrelevant pieces of gossip on the face of the planet is celebrities' private lives. I DO want to know which films actors are going to act in. What I don't need to know is with whom they are having sex with, the circumstances of their death if it is 'suspicious' or what they do in their private lives. In general it has no relevance to their performances of the silver screen. I don't care if you worship Satan in your spare time. As long as it is not illegal and harm others you can practise whatever weird religion for all I care. Thanks to the great interest of celebrities' private lives by the public, the public are in essence fuelling their demise by buying the tabloids and downloading celebrity gossip. Thanks to the insatiable appetite of the public for celebrity gossip, media outlets and the paparazzi are being encouraged to push the boundaries of privacy even further. Quite literally the public are driving some celebrities to the brink of insanity.

If people used the time to talk about gossip to talk about something else, something more constructive such as how to help the environment, end world poverty or even discuss which films will win the Oscars this year (at least that uses more than two brain cells), think of how much further the human race will be.

P.S. You would have noticed I did not make any particular references or examples in my blog entry. I feel by doing so I would fuel the reader's curiosity to find articles or pictures regarding the matter and further perpetuating the problem.

Not doing well...

- Finals coming up next Monday. Feel that I haven't done enough but I think everybody says that.
- Feel really stressed and dysphoric. Don't know why about the dysphoria.
- Now suffering from headache and muscle ache - the impending signs of flu.

I hate Valentine's Day

There are a few things in life I hate – racism, Dora Tai and right wing businessmen (& women) who hoard their money like squirrels do with their nuts and exploit everything within their sight. One phrase can group those things – extreme conservatives. Add to the list Valentine’s Day and you have my axis of evil.

I just hate today. It defies any sense of logic to put aside a day to express your love for somebody. You are supposed to love your special someone everyday of the year, so why is Valentine’s Day more special? I apply this argument to other special days, like Mothers’ & Fathers’ Day. I support the logic behind the religious festivals and Memorial Day/Remembrance Day to a certain degree. There are counter-arguments saying people don’t have enough time in their lives to express their love, so this is why we need Valentine’s Day. If you are so busy not to tell your significant other you love them, perhaps it is time to put one’s priorities in order.

I am bitter about Valentine’s Day. I have sent numerous Valentine’s cards, messages, flowers and gifts before but never received anything in return. Am I so repulsive? I don’t think I’m ugly enough to repel women like the poles on a magnet. I know I have put on a bit of weight but I think I have other redeeming qualities to attract the opposite sex. So why have I remained single all my life? I just figured most women do not know what to look for in a man, especially when I see hundreds of ladies going out with guys who treat them like shit. I’m not saying I’m better than most males (I know I have flaws) but it seems nice guys do finish last.

I think my problem is the way society perceives romance. Society has stated it must be the man who must do the wooing. Who made that stupid rule? Why cannot it be the other way around? If a girl likes a guy, why can’t she pursue him instead of trying to convince him to pursue her? It is the same questions I raise with the guy’s role in Valentine’s Day. If a guy does nothing for his girl on this day, despite having done a lot for the remaining 364 days of the year, society will judge him as a bad person. On the other hand if a guy does a lot for his partner on this day without having done much for the past year, he will be deemed quite a good boyfriend.

Only one part of society benefits from Valentine's Day - the companies who jack up prices so that we (generally the guys) overpay for items such as flowers, cards, chocolates and dinners. We are just saps to the corporate gimmicks.

I just hate Valentine’s Day. I just hope it will quickly go away as soon as possible.

English Premier League in Hong Kong?

Recently there has been a proposal by the English Premier League to consider playing competitive matches abroad in the near future. As a fan who would benefit from this idea, I think there are too many negative factors to stop this idea getting off the ground. Many of the fans and football websites tend to agree with me that this idea is ludicrous.

There is a good article from Football 365 about the negative factors which if you are interested you should read. It basically covers the arguments I would have mentioned in my blog. The only thing factor it doesn't mention is jet lag. It would be just about acceptable if you went to the Eastern United States or the Middle East but if you went to South East Asia or the West Coast of United States, the fatigue of travelling and different time zones come into play.

I also remember when the Premier League Asia trophy was played here in Hong Kong there was a lot of buzz for Liverpool but not for the other teams such as Fulham and Portsmouth, which is a pity since Portsmouth are a good side - just look at the league table. Unfortunately fans in Asia can switch allegiance quite rapidly, as long as they are supporting successful teams. Would fans in America be going to a game between Derby and Sunderland? I don't think so.

As an Arsenal fan, I'm rather glad my team doesn't go on money making tours in Asia or America, like the rest of the 'Big Four' clubs do. We let our football do the talking and if fans are intrigued, they can come to London to watch the games.

The Year of the Rodent

Kung Hei Fat Choi! Right now in Hong Kong it is the Chinese New Year. I really should say it is the Lunar New Year, since other societies and cultures also celebrate their Lunar New Year at this time of year with different festivities. That's according to Wikipedia, so I don't know how much that is true.

The Lunar New Year is the Chinese equivalent of Christmas or Thanksgiving, whether you are British or American. One spends time with family members one hasn't seen for the past year and after meeting them it is no wonder why one doesn't want to see them for the whole year. You receive presents you don't normally use - in this case it is usually chocolates you don't normally consume or those really bad butter biscuits which they emphasize are from Denmark for some reason.

One aspect I don't like about the Lunar New Year, particularly as a person who is very concerned about the environment, is the amount of paper used at this time of year. For Christmas an extraordinary amount of wrapping paper and Christmas cards are used. For the Chinese New Year, we also wrap our presents of chocolates and butter biscuits in streams of wrapping paper, give 'lai see' (red pockets filled with money) that have been manufactured by chopping down loads of trees and we put up decorations, usually in the forms of signs with seasonal greetings. Already an environmental group has asked people to consider alternatives, such as putting stickers with festive greetings instead of wrapping paper on their presents. Yet I doubt many people would do this. Many people don't want to clash with tradition.

You can tell it is the Lunar New Year by the local news coverage. It is the same standardized news that comes out every year, a bit like the local news coverage in US and UK during Christmas. The channels tell us how people celebrate the holidays, who is the first newborn of the year and what happens at the traditional places of celebration, such as the Wong Tai Sin temple and the Wishing Tree.

On a parting note, why do they have to call this year the Year of the Rat. Unfortunately the rat has a poor reputation, spreader of disease and filth. So when you think of this rodent, it is not in the highest esteem. Maybe they should rename it the Year of the Mouse, since most people think of mice as cute and cuddly?

Dog on dog action

My parents have two dogs - one male & one female. Currently the female one is "in heat" meaning she's fertile and ready to go. This has been the fourth time she has been in heat and seeing our two dogs interact has lead to many conclusions.

Firstly sexual intercourse is natural but possessing the knowledge of how to perform sexual intercourse correctly is not. Thanks to the pheromones in the vaginal secretions of my female dog Nala, my male dog Simba is rather 'stimulated' to put it mildly. Every single moment of the day is basically Simba trying to shag Nala doggy-style. Unfortunately he is not very good at doing so. For those who don't know of how this is done, the male dog grabs the female dog at the neck with his mouth, clambers on top of the female dog whilst both are standing and then the male dog inserts his penis into the female dog's vagina leading to sexual intercourse. Unfortunately for Simba that last step doesn't happen and he usually is shagging thin air.

I often hear this happening with people, that young people don't know how to have sexual intercourse. I often wondered how this can be true since I thought sexual intercourse is 'natural' and everybody would assume how to do it. Clearly looking at my dogs and hearing these stories this is not. Probably I assume everybody has watched porn like me and they would know where to insert the cock (I presume they don't insert it up the arse). Probably it is the lack of foreplay, leading to very bad sex - who knows?

Secondly it seems oral sex is quite natural. Simba tends to like at the vaginal area of Nala, probably due to the pheromones in the pussy juices. I don't know if Nala is turned on by this but it seems part of the natural processes.

Thirdly I'm rather glad this doesn't happen to humans. If we had that kind of smelling power as dogs have, rape would be a rather frequent event.

Anniversaries

I'm glad yesterday, 31st January, passed without incident. So what is so special about that day? It was (I'm rather glad I didn't have to write 'It is') my 27th birthday.

I'm not into celebrating birthdays since I was in my teens. I just find the day as trivial as Valentine's Day, Fathers' Day, Mothers' Day, etc. So what if you are a year older? What is significant about a year - all it is a trip around the sun. Isn't being a year suppose to depress most people, since you are closer to death.

I'm rather glad nobody mentioned the day to me. I would have forgotten about my birthday if I go onto Facebook, who had a nice friendly automated notice on its homepage. Even my mum and dad didn't mention anything about the day to me - either they forgot or intentionally didn't mean to say anything.