The Butterfly in Hot Tub Time Machine

I recently watched 'Hot Tub Time Machine'. It's a 2010 American comedy film about four men who were bored with their adult lives and travel back to their 1980s teen-hood, courtesy of a time-shifting hot tub. As they went back in time, they had to try to re-enact their activities back then, or else they would face dire consequences back in present time. For e.g., Jacob, the geeky nephew of Adam, might not exist if his mother did not had sexual intercourse by accident.

'Butterfly Effect' is the sensitive dependence on initial conditions; where a small change at one place in a nonlinear system can result in large differences to a later state. On the positive note, the actors made little changes before traveling back to the present. But due to the butterfly effect, they experienced a change of fortunes. For e.g, Adam impressed his random date, April, then. Hence, rather than suffer yet another fall out with another of his girlfriend, the butterfly effect meant that April became his current wife.

The power of the butterfly is small yet significant. Little actions today could be the deal-breaker 10 years down the road. Whilst I might not be conscious of what greatness it might lead to, it does gives me food-for-thought to be careful in my little ways.

Newton's 1st Law in Exercise

Newton's First Law stated that 'An object continues to be at rest or moving at a constant speed unless acted upon by an external force'. Issac Newton had a reason for making it the first - it is to establish frames of reference for which the other laws are applicable. The first law postulates the existence of the inertial reference frame, and I believe it is applicable in every aspect of life, even in exercise.

One of my 2012 resolutions is to keep fit and be healthy. In achieving this resolution, I have targeted to exercise at least once a week. That is a relatively easy goal to achieve. But 4 weeks have passed and I have yet to start. It was only 2 days again that I managed to drag myself to the kickboxing class so that I can force myself to have a workout. Even dragging myself to the class wasn't an easy task - I did not look forward to it, I was engrossed with other work & I contemplated skipping it.

Indeed, Newton's First Law stands true. An object will continue to be at rest unless acted upon by an external force. The longer the object is at rest, the more difficult it is to move the object. I have not been exercising for more than 30 weeks. Even getting myself to exercise for once a week - seems like an insurmountable mountain to scale.

I am glad my resolution was that external force that moved this object from the state of rest. This object moved. Hopefully, it might be easier to move the next time round.

Ang Baos & my reversal in roles

I used to collect anybaos for as long as I could remember. This routine has transformed into a pleasurable activity that I look forward to every year. I would be easily thrilled from peeking at the amounts given, tabulating my 'earnings', picking the fanciful ang baos, etc.

This year, I entered in my first year of marriage. Instead of receving ang baos, I had to give them away instead. Tradition has it that married couples are exempted from giving ang baos in their 1st year of marriage. That could have helped me manage my role transition as I take a year of break. But the practice of such a tradition is weak & there was no rule book to keep this in check. My Mum resorted to practising the safer method of giving ang baos, probably as a means to prevent a 'lose-face' scenario. As a result, I have to unwillingly drag myself to practise the art of giving ang baos.

As I continue to dwell in my 1st ever financial loss this CNY, I learnt 3 valuable pieces of advice in the art of Ang Bao Giving:

1. Give too little; or else you could be termed a miser,

2. Give too much; or else you could be making unnecessary losses,

3. Make it right the 1st time; or else you could be viewed differently next year.

Law of Primacy

Yesterday, I had yet another educational & enegertic chapter meeting. This time round, it was at BATMC. I am beginning to find more reasons to attend other clubs' chapter meetings. For e.g., I was introduced to powerful speakers in a packed room & was invited to evaluated an advanced speech by an unknown speaker.

Interestingly, there was the 'Law of Primacy' which I learnt yesterday & I found it lacking and yet applicable in our everyday's lives. The law of primacy refers to the principle of being first in learning. It often creates a strong impression. For e.g., we always remember the first few minutes of a speaker's speech, the first few numbers from a long string of digits. Hence it is important to start right by teaching the important things and “unteaching” wrong first impressions is harder than teaching them right the first time.

We might not know that it's called 'Law of Primacy', but we are aware of its presence & effects in learning. However, how often do we apply this to our daily lives? We wake up each morning - unintentionally exposed to this law. But we start our days either in a grouchy mood or in a hurried manner. For the busier souls, we start our days checking our mails. Is this what we want to remember our days for? That we are either boring people with no enthusiasm to start our days or busy people who look forward to being spammed by mails.

I asked if I could make a change to how I start my day. I want to start the day positively, i.e. to plan how I intend to make 3 differences to my day and to look forward at how I can value-add to myself & the people around. And I know I can.

2012 Resolutions

As I breezed into 2012, I know it wasn't the best start I have into a new year. This is because 2011 has been a busy year for me & I haven't figured what I should expect for 2012. But I know I should get my act together so that I can look forward to the days ahead with more purpose.

For a start, here are my 4 resolutions for 2012:

1. Keep Fit & Be Healthy
2. Improve my Critical Thinking Skills & Increase my Knowledge
3. Relax & Spend Quality Time
4. Be Financially-savvy

It's never too late to start. Goal setting is the first step to achieving a more meaningful 2012 & I am glad to have done that so as to orientate how my year would turn out to be. Now, the next step is to work on them.

Difference between Florence & Singapore

We stayed in Florence for 2 days. It was a beautiful city in which we did not manage to fully experience. Afterall, Florence has been recently ranked as one of the top 5 most beautiful cities in the world by Forbes, whilst Singapore is unplaced. Singapore tops the world in other ranking boards. For e.g. in 2011, Singapore was the number 8th most expensive city in the world. On the other hand, Rome, the metropolitian city cloest to Florence, was given a ranking of only #34. So, yes, Florence is indeed not only beautiful, but also inexpensive. The only exception though was my 8 euro gelato.

Florence is a city noted for its history, culture, Renaissance art and architecture, and monuments. An Italian told us that 60% of the world's art pieces are found in Florence. Florence's Duomo was completed way back in 1436 after 150 years of construction and was the world's largest cathedral then. Today it is still standing. From then till the present day, only 3 churches have beaten the size of this Duono. Personally, I liked how the exterior walls were presented, i.e. in alternate vertical and horizontal bands of polychrome marble in white, green and red.

Ponte Vecchio (the Old Bridge) was also worth some Kodak moments. It was built in 1345 & remains standing strong today. The view of the bridge and the view off the bridges were spectucular.

Indeed, whilst Singapore deletes the old & brings on the new, Florence contains the old amidst the new. That's a tough order, but Florence has brought aesthetics & preservation of the ancient arts together. That itself is a city art.

Ask Thoroughly Before Buying

After checking into our hotel, we took a short break before heading out to explore the city of Florence. Being in Italy meant we had to fill our taste buds with original Italian food. That thought re-entered our mind when we walked past a gelato shop. The shop front was filled with ice-cream tubs - each overflowing with rich colours. We decided to share a gelato cone - so as to re-live the delicious gelato that we had earlier tasted in Milan.

However, the lady gave her replies in Italian as we made our enquiries. We did not understand her, but assumed she understood us - that we wanted to just one medium cone consisting of 2 flavours. She willingly took out a cone & once again left us in the lurch in trying to decipher the Italian words that were scribed in front of each ice-cream tub.

After we made our decisions, we proceeded to pay for this ice-cream cone. To our astonishment, she said, '8 €' in English. I was taken aback. EITHER she deliberately refused to have a proper earlier conversation with us OR we chose not to understand her.

Nevertheless, it was a lovely gelato cone filled with cherry bits, though I wouldn't have paid  €8 (S$13.80) if I have known the price earlier. She had given us a BIG cone instead of a medium one. If only I had confirmed the cone size & made known the final price before making my selection...

Details within Basilica di San Macro

Saint Mark's Basilica was an 11th Century piece of architecture that was modelled upon the church of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople. This basilica lies in the heart of the city of Venice. All streets in Venice lead to Piazza San Macro, where many tourists hang out to take shots against the backdrop of this grand basilica.

Basilica di San Marco was big in every way. In the small city of Venice, the 5 Byzantine domes of San Macro form the silhouette against the sky. And yet every detail of the church was looked into. Even the facade of the basilica is articulated vertically by dividing the width into five bays. It opened at ground level into porches and the icons of the 17th Century mosiacs speaks volume of the details that have been put into each arch design.

For the 3rd arch, which is the central archway,  the mosiacs are of Christ in Glory and the Last Judgement. They are enclosed in an arch populated with figures among foliage. Below the mosiacs are three archivolts (inner arches) which are illustrated with Romanesque-Byzantine carvings representing the Three Kingdoms: Land, Ocean and Animal, the Labours of the Months and the Signs of the Zodiac, the Virtues and Beatitudes. Running along the the intrados of the main arch are depictions of the typical Venetian trades.

The above is just 1 example of the amount of details that have went into planning for only one section of this gigantic basilica. I am filled with awe at the amount of efforts in building this structure during ancient times.

Upon personal reflection, maybe I should give details into planning the legacy that I want to leave in future...

Rialto Market's Colours brightens up my Day

We started the day a little late, but nevertheless, we headed for Rialto Market in the late morning. I am glad that we perserved with the plan because this is one market that I enjoyed going to. I do not carry out marketing tasks, but having a look at how Italians do it is as intriguing as it can be.

Maybe it was the way the food were being displayed, maybe it was the colours of the tomatos & vegetables, maybe it was the feeling of being on holidays. Whatever it is, colours do brighten my day. Understanding how Venetians start their day was another interesting learning point. It was felt like I have entered into another world within Venice on the less-well-known side of Rialto Bridge.

Maybe I should switch to brighter colours for myself. Maybe I should start off earlier every day. And maybe I should attempt to explore something new every day.