The Musings Of An Opinionated Sod [Help Me Grow!]

The World’s Gone Abit Mental …

So here are some things I’ve encountered recently that have left me confused …

However, before we get into all that, check out this little movie of my Malaysian Taxi Driver from a few days ago.

See, I told you the buggers were bloody dangerous drivers!!!

Infact, when the cabbie realised I was ‘filming’, he decided to increase his speed to 140mph because he thought it made him look ‘good’.

Jesus Christ – I thought I was going to be sick – especially when the car hit a massive hole in the road [about half way into the clip] and we bounced up and down for a few hundred feet.

Infact it makes me feel sick just thinking about it so lets change subjects …

So I was walking around a clients office, when I spotted this ‘SEX MANIAC ON BOARD’ sign on the cubicle window of a male worker.

Three things struck me …

1 What a tosser. [Probably quite literally!]

2 What would happen if a woman had this on her office cubicle?

3 The Singaporean National Service really makes the local guys immature around women … because at a time where most 18 year old blokes are interacting with the opposite sex – the Singaporean kid is whisked away to spend time with even more immature Singaporean kids resulting in them ending up with all the social graces of an Aussie man [ha!]

Mind you, when I saw the state of the bloke who actually sat there, I couldn’t help but think the sign should say “Potential Rapist On Board” – but maybe that’s something I shouldn’t actually say out loud.  Oops.

Keeping on the subject of Singapore …

So for reasons best kept to myself for the time-being, I applied for Singaporean Permanent Residency today.

Now as the World knows, Singapore can put Germany to shame when we talk about efficiency but I have to say they can’t half be a bunch of pedantic fuckers.

I’d filled in my forms ever-so-carefully, got all the paperwork [including photocopies of my SECONDARY SCHOOL EXAM RESULTS] and waited in the queue to get a ticket so I could wait in another queue.

Because Singapore is Singapore, it didn’t take too long to see an ‘Immigration Assistant’ however imagine my surprise when I was told that I’d filled in the forms in incorrectly.

“What do you mean?” I asked all confused …

To which they pointed at questions like ‘RELIGION’ and ‘CHILDREN’ and said they were wrong.

And do you know what was actually wrong? 

I’d put a line through the boxes because I practice no religious beliefs and have no children but infact I should have written ‘NONE’. 

It’s this sort of red tape that drives me mad – but then I should have known because when Jill and I first moved here, we were subjected to the most pointless questions in the Universe simply because the officer HAD to ask them – even they were of no relevance to our situation. 

I’ve talked about the Singaporean mentality of ‘only following orders’ [which leads to a distinct lack of ingenuity] before, and I really think this could become a major issue in the countries on-going success.

Right enough of all that … lets get back to the subject of communication.

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls – I’d like to introduce you to the World’s LEAST creative direct marketing piece … an ‘ad’ for the Asian ‘Music Matters’ conference.

So I got this envelope through my letterbox today and to be fair, it’s all colourful and graphic equaliser-like so it has some relevance to ‘music’.

Anyway, when I looked abit closer, I spotted that there was a green tag at the top of the envelope with an arrow pointing ‘up’. Being as sharp as a tack, I quickly concluded something might happen if I pulled it and you know what … I was right!

Now given this was for a cool music conference, I was expecting to be surprised and delighted with what was going to happen ….

Could it be an orgy scene?

Could it be a drug taking party?

Could it be a Mariah Carey being savaged by dogs?

Well it could of been any one of those things, but in the end it was this …

Yep … all that stupid green thing ‘revealed’ was the astoundingly pathetic “ENCORE” … oh, and it changed a few of the colours on the poxy graphic equaliser.

Seriously, it was about as anti-climatic as ‘The Last King Of Scotland’ – and for me, that’s saying something.

Apart from the fact it just is so uninspiring, can someone tell me why they used the word “ENCORE” … I mean that’s hardly the language of the young and cool is it???  Come on, when was the last time you heard people shouting that after a System Of A Down / Red Hot Chilli Peppers / Killers / Muse gig?

Either this was created by 50 year old, wealthy opera lovers or people who don’t deserve the job title, ‘creative’. [And there’s a lot of them I can tell you!]

I have quite a downer on DM … I do respect what it can do when done right … but the problem is, it so rarely IS done right and yet the practitioners of it, all act high and mighty like there discipline is less ridiculous than the rest of the industry.

“Yes, but we can measure how successful we are” they cry with their patronising voice.

“That’s true” … I shout, ” … and you can see you’re not very successful at all!”So there you have it, mini-proof that the World is going abit mental – and if any of you have any additional bits of ‘proof’, I would be very, very happy to see them.

N E W S F L A S H !

Oh hang on, we have a late news story courtesy of Hari regarding this very subject.  The best thing to do is go here and see how blandom [also known by the medical term ‘TOTO songs’] can brainwash you into a vegative state. 

Spare a thought for poor Fredrik, he is but an innocent victim!

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