Introduction to Christianity

A very funny Dave Allen sketch about his introduction to the church:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpVjBBDMOoA

It is absurd that Christians always proclaim themselves to be morally superior to atheists just because atheists do not subscribe to the superstitious beliefs of Christianity. Christians go around proselytising to all and sundry, claiming that the godless and the non-Christians among us need help to be saved from eternal damnation. To respond to these Christian soldiers, nothing beats this quip from Dan Barker, an evangelical preacher who ultimately became an atheist:

You believe in a book that has talking animals, wizards, witches, demons, sticks turning into snakes, food falling from the sky, people walking on water, and all sorts of magical, absurd and primitive stories, and you say that we are the ones that need help?

- Dan Barker (from Losing Faith in Faith)

Blogging The Bible

It took me several days to finish David Plotz's very funny blog, "The Complete Blogging The Bible":

http://www.slate.com/id/2150150

Plotz's posts summarises the stories from the Jewish Bible (i.e. the Old Testament of the Christian Bible) for modern readers. By reading his posts, you get a pretty good précis of many of the bible's stories without having to trudge through them yourselves. The bible stories are written in an archaic and tedious style that most modern readers do not have the patience with. That is the reason why many so-called Christians do not actually read the bible themselves, but are contend with what their preachers tell them every Sunday during church service - if they attend church service. But this is a problem. The preachers only tell the "good" parts of the bible to their congregation, and never the "bad' parts. It is when people start reading the bible stories for themselves that they realised that they've been hoodwinked. The merciful and benevolent god that answers all their prayers is actually nowhere to be found in many parts of the bible. Instead, one often finds an angry, jealous, vindictive god that is so cruel that you might as well believe and pray to satan, if they both exist.

I was previously uninterested in the goings-on of the religious. My philosophy of life is that if you want to believe and pray to your god, it is fine with me as long as you don't force me to believe and pray to your god too. However, 9/11 change all that. Suddenly, I saw that religion KILLS. And it is not with Islam. A more serious reading of history, such as the Christian Crusades, the Burning of Witches, the persecution of Galileo shows that Christianity was just as bad as Islam, except that the barbarism of Christianity has been tempered with the benevolence of the Enlightenment. It takes knowledge and reason in science to clear the superstition and ignorance of religion.

But the bible is a very interesting book of history and literature. It is important for both religious and non-religious folks to read it, especially in light of modern day fundamentalist Christians who seek to overturn the fruits that the Enlightenment has brought to society, and who want to bring society back to a barbaric world where rules of morality are determined in books written by misogynistic and ignorant shepherd folks from 2500 years ago. It is important that Christians read the bible in its entirety, so that they know exactly why non-Christians do not like the morals written in that holy book. It is important that non-Christians read the bible, so that they will know why it is so important that we cannot allow our society to be ruled by religious fanatics who seem to believe in fairy tales like talking snakes and virgin births.

David Plotz's series reminded me of Isaac Asimov's "Guide to the Bible" which I have also read recently. However, Asimov's tome covered both the Old and New Testaments, whereas Plotz's blog posts only covers the Old Testament (the Jewish bible). Also, Asimov covers the bible from a historical context, whereas Plotz's posts are like Cliff Notes summaries. Most people would prefer Plotz's treatment, and to his new book, the "Good Book", which is a fun and light treatment on the same subject which he compiled from the material he garnered while doing "The Complete Blogging The Bible" posts.

In the promotion of his new book, Plotz made the following blog entry, "What I learned from reading the entire bible", which is also an interesting read:

http://www.slate.com/id/2212616/pagenum/all

If you find this post interesting, you should at least glance through "The Complete Blogging The Bible". Many of the entries are informative, and very very funny.

Waraku Restaurant - Update

Desmond has forwarded the Waraku bill. I have snapped it below for posterity (notice the spelling error of the word "Dining" on the bill) :-)

So what we had were:

Annie : Dream Ramen

Desmond : Gindara Yaki (broiled black cod fish), Rice, and Mango Short Cake

Freddy : Tempura Yamakake (tempura with grated potato)

Kar Yen : Kaisen Nabe (seafood and vegetables in claypot) and Green Tea Tiramisu Short Cake

Myself : Mix Fry Wazen

The Hot Ocha is the Japanese Green Tea which we all had.

As I had mentioned in my earlier post, you can view these food items from the Waraku menu online:

http://www.waraku.com.sg/docs/menu/casual/lnk/index.html

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Corrections :

Desmond has indicated that his IT Security course is held at Nanyang Polytechnic, and not at Nanyang University.

Waraku Restaurant (7 May 2009)

Annie sent an email a few weeks back (23 April) about arranging a dinner meet up. Although we have kept in touch via email, the last time I saw Annie in person was on 6 February 2000 (second day of Chinese New Year), when she invited a few friends including myself to her home at Stratford Court, and that is like almost 9 years ago!

Annie arranged the dinner gathering at the Waraku Japanese Restaurant at Marina Square on 7 May (7 pm). Besides myself, Desmond, Freddy, and Kar Yen also attended. Kee Hai could not make it because he had to look after his children, while Koon Chee is still in Hong Kong.

The word Waraku is transliterated into Japanese characters that look like the Chinese words for 和乐 (or Harmony):

I have not stepped into a Japanese restaurant for many years (although I did try the Japanese Egg Omelette at a Japanese foodcourt called the Ishi Mura in the new Northpoint annex a few weeks back - but that's another story). I normally patronise Chinese and Western restaurants. So I was also looking forward to trying the food in the Waraku. It did not disappoint.

I arrived at the restaurant at exactly 7 pm on Thursday evening. I met Desmond just outside the restaurant, who had himself also just arrived (we were the earliest).

I was quite impressed with the posh surroundings as we were led to our "private" room:

I was quite enamoured when we were shown to our "private" room. This is actually the first time I have ever been inside such a room - characterised by the low table with a distinctive gap under it for putting our legs. When I dined in other Japanese restaurants previously (back in the Conner and IDTECH years), the private rooms we had were like any normal dining room with waist level chairs and tables). The unique furniture arrangement piqued me - having only seen such things in movies and television:

About 1 minute after Desmond and I settled down, Annie and Freddy arrived. Kar Yen joined us about 20 minutes later, and our party was complete.

Annie had asked for a "private" room so that we will we have a quiet surrounding to chit chat. What a joke! There was a doorway sized gap in the partition wall that leads to a passage leading to several other "private" rooms (you can see the gap in the above photo). However, one of these "private" rooms were occupied by a motley group of young ladies celebrating the birthday of one of their lot. These gregarious ladies were squealing with laughter at decibel high ranges, and were drowning out whatever quietness and tranquillity that was promised by a "private" room. They were so loud and deafening at one point that I got up, went to their room, and asked them to please tone down their excitement level. Although they did quieted down a bit, the noise level gradually returned to the highs as the night wore on. You just can't keep a good woman's voice down :-)

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I can't recall exactly the names (my Japanese is pretty bad) of the food we ordered. However, Desmond ordered some kind of steamed fish, and I think Annie, Freddy, and Kar Yen ordered noodles (soba?). As for me, I ordered some kind of Tempura "Wazen". "Wazen" means "Set Meal" in Japanese. Here, you can browse through the Waraku Restaurant's menu from this URL:

http://www.waraku.com.sg/docs/menu/casual/lnk/index.html

The "Wazen" menu is shown on page 12/13 in the above link. However, it does not feature the item I ordered, which comprised of:

- fried prawn fritters (tempura ebi)

- fried calamari (squid - tempura calamari)

- baked potato

- assorted vegetables (carrots and Brussels sprouts - my favourite)

- soba soup ramen (noodle)

- egg custard with pork slices (chawanmushi)

- rice

My Tempura Wazen meal cost $18.80, plus the hot green tea at $1.00, set me back $19.80, which I felt was pretty reasonable. My Wazen meal was absolutely delicious (tempura is always a favourite), and was pretty filling. I give my Tempura Wazen a rating of A+.

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During dinner, conversation revolved around the old standard questions: Where is Goh Kim Siew now? What have we been doing? How is the economy? Etc etc.

Where is Goh Kim Siew now?

Actually, no one knew. It was said that Kim Siew and his wife had divorced a few years back, but other than that, no one really knows where he is at the moment.

However, during dinner, Annie mentioned that she had a Facebook page, while Kar Yen mentioned that Siok Kee also had a very nice one. I commented that I don't personally like Facebook, because I find its default settings to be too invasive of privacy. Things that you might not want to publish can be inadvertently open to the public if you did not set up your Facebook settings appropriately.

Anyway, as I was writing this, I thought that perhaps Kim Siew may have a Facebook page. I did a quick Google search, and found the following link:

http://kimsiew.com

Looks like Kim Siew is doing very well.

What are we doing now?

I am still with a software company (CRISTAL Solutions Pte Ltd) working on logistics software (Warehouse Management Systems). I have been doing the WMS software since 2001.

Annie is currently between jobs. She quit her job with an Air Show company some months ago to look after her dad when he fell seriously ill. Her dad had passed away recently.

Desmond is still with Seagate. He is now working at the "Endpoint Security" department, and is also taking a part-time course on IT Security at Nanyang University.

Freddy is still with UBS. Because of the worldwide financial crisis, banking sector jobs are also perilous in these times. No one really knows what is going to happen next.

Kar Yen is currently working at Yongnam Holdings Limited. She said that she has to make a long commute every day from her home to Tuas.

Physical Appearances

Everyone commented on how much weight Kar Yen has put on. The rest of us didn't seem to have changed much, although I must admit that I now weigh 82 KG (I used to weigh only 75 KG).

Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous

I do not follow fashion news, so I was aghast when I learnt that the handbags that Annie carried (a gift) and that Kar Yen bought (at staff price discount) were so expensive. Annie's bag (COACH) retails at $600+, while Kar Yen's bag (GUCCI) retails at $900+. I commented that the satchel that I carried cost only $25.

You can have a glimpse of the bags from these thumbnails:

Annie's Bag

Kar Yen's Bag (partially clipped)

My bag is propped at the corner behind Desmond

I made the usual joke that many years ago when Koon Chee told me that he bought a pair of branded shoes (Dr Martens?) for $250, I told him that the cost of my shirt, pants, and shoes total to less than $100, which is less than the cost of 1 of his shoe ($125)! Anyway, as I said before, and as my friends know me, I am not really into branded clothes. I usually spend my money on computer stuff and books. I recently spent over $500 on books about science and philosophy. I have also spent equally much on computer gadgets and accessories.

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We decided to call it a night at 10 pm, because many of us have to work the next day (Friday). Originally, Annie wanted to arrange the meet up on either a Friday or Saturday, but Desmond had classes on Friday evenings, and Kee Hai is not free on Saturdays. This was why the meet up was scheduled on a Thursday. It is ironic that the person whom Annie accommodated for this could not make it.

This reminded me of the time back in 1995 when Annie, Desmond, Koon Chee and myself were supposed to go to Hong Kong on a holiday trip. Koon Chee had promised to show us the sights if we went together. We queried Koon Chee whether he really could make it, and he said something to the effect that "even if he was sick, he will drag himself out of bed to join us on our Hong Kong trip". And as it turned out, Koon Chee could not join us on that HK trip :-)

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There was some hoo-hah over the bill because according to our server, customers who paid with a HSBC credit card is entitled to a 10% discount. However, it turns out that the HSBC credit card was associated with two promotions:

a) one-for-one free dessert

b) 10% discount

Because Kar Yen and Desmond both ordered cakes for dessert (the rest of us skipped dessert), the cashier had automatically extended the one-for-one free dessert promotion on the second cake to Desmond's HSBC card. Only when we were calculating the amounts each of us had to pay for dinner was the missing "10% discount" uncovered. We told our server that it is ridiculous to give the "one-for-one free dessert" because that was only worth $2.80, whereas the "10% discount" would cut our bill by at least $10! We asked the server to void the previous bill (which Desmond had already signed), and to issue a new one with the corrected amount. Hopefully, there is no cock-up when the credit card statements are received by Desmond later in the month.

I look forward to the next gathering.

NJ

Links

Photo album: http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/njwong88/DinnerAtWarakuRestaurant

Waraku Website: http://www.waraku.com.sg

12 May 2009 : See updates and corrections in the following post.