Month: July 2008

Categories
My Favorite My YouTube

My First v-Blog: A History of Chips (That Matters to Me) – Season 1 Finale

Just how long this video remains public depends on how thick my skin is.  And you will be surprised how thick my skin is not.

PS: It is almost like a little miracle that this video sees the day of light.  This morning, my rather new computer died on me – like any of her predecessors who have a habit to throw a tantrum at me every so often – and there go all the working video files that are now in unknown status.  Fortunately, I have uploaded this video to the Internet during the weekend because I know in the name of technology, things always screw up as we draw nearer to the milestones.

This recorded material was initially made for podcast.  I got carried away, turned it into a video, and added an excerpt of an original song of mine -100% original materials from beginning to end.  Recently upgraded my computer, I was inspired by how technology has advanced since I was a little boy.  I did some research and attempted to match the number of transistors the computer processors that I have owned to the neuron counts of the animals in our planet.  It was no easy task as few scientists find counting the neurons of, say, a cat has is useful, set aside publishing the data on the Internet.

When I told my friends around me that I was making a video blog, most thought that I would be videoing myself talking in front of the camera.  Look, I am a more documentary kind of guy and I prefer to stay behind the camera.  Not all of my blog entries comes with a picture of me.  I merely apply the same mentality here.

Hope this video blog is not too horrible that you have to throw up halfway watching it.  It is helluva tedious journey and boy, I need some time to recuperate.  With this video as the end point, I wonder if this adds more texture to the mini-series blog entries that I have published.  It was meant to be another way round.

Oh well.

My 1st v-Blog Mini-Series:

Categories
Linguistic My Hobbies

¿De Dónde Eres? ¡Singapur! – So I Sotong My Way Through Yet Another Spanish Class

Towards the end of the lesson, as Cynthia was conversing with our teacher Anna in Spanish on the topic of countries and nationalities in a convincing fluency, I was looking at the world map so nicely drawn on my Spanish book and couldn’t help but to imagine a game of RISK with my dwindling troops scattered at four corners of the world.  Soon, in this lost battle of I against me, all I heard was a foreign language that I was clueless about.  As though I was warped into another planet, lost in another reality.

But wait, weren’t Cynthia and I at the same class with supposedly the same progress?

OK.  It was not all hard work.  I like the part about Spanish culture that Anna took some time and shared with us some of the basic demography of España: the ancient Celtric tribes that settled at the north (Galicia), the capital city Barcelona of an autonomous community (Galicia) that borders with France, and the south of Spain (Andalusia) that is just a good swim away from Morocco.  Anna asked us what else we wished to know besides the different peoples in Spain, the Flamenco dance (that is well known as a Spanish dance but in fact only popular in Andalusia at the south), and the 9am to 1pm / 4pm to 8pm working hours (siesta in between), my immediate response was: food.

That got everybody in the classroom feeling hungry, including Anna.  Not my fault!  It was an innocent question!

The hard part was learning the list of countries, nationalities, and the masculino and femenio forms for the males and females.  For example, Spain is España, a Spanish man is Español, and a Spanish woman is Española.  In plural form, we have Españols and Españolas.  The rules that change the nationalities into the two forms are not that hard; the way a nationality is spelled out is.  Some countries are totally unrecognizable.  Who would have thought that the words America and American are Estados Unidos and Estadounidense in Spanish?  I personally wish that the lesson stresses more on the pronunciation of these Spanish words rather than the rigorous exercise of pen-and-paper.

I guess it will take me a long while to memorize and speak what I’ve learned this lesson.  No wonder I spaced out towards the end.  How Cynthia managed to memorize on the spot and speak is totally beyond me.  Perhaps her brain is wired in a different way.

Medic!

Categories
I See I Write

Little Mr. Sunshine: A Blog Is Not a Book Is Not a Movie – My First V-blog (Prelude) Episode 7

Yes, there is a video and you will get to watch how I humiliate myself later this week.  Think “Little Miss Sunshine”.

Ever since I have started this mini-series, the most common questions I have received from the people around me (whom I am grateful for their frankness) are: Is there a video? Where is the video? What is in the video?  And the most common feedback is: I don’t get it.

A Blog Is Not a Book

Recently – after I have started the series – I read somewhere that publishing a book that reads like a blogger’s website just won’t work.  People simply won’t read such a book.  I can’t recall the reasons why and I wonder if the reverse stands too.  My only rationalization is that online readers probably have the habit to sit in front of the computer and spend only a fraction of their time to read a post before they point-and-click onto something else.  Reading a magazine or a book in contrast captures a much dedicated attention and longer attention span from the readers.

And hence, perhaps online readers prefer a more upfront, direct statement (pretty much how this post begins) rather than to bury the answers of what-where-and-is-there somewhere towards the end the 1st episode of this mini-series.

Little Miss Sunshine

Recently – also after I have started the series – I watched “Little Miss Sunshine” on cable.  It’s an awesome film.  I am not saying this just because I am a big fan of the little girl Abigail Breslin.  The film talks to me.  It really does.

Throughout the film, we are all aware that the seven years old girl Olive has a performance to make, for a competition.  But what’s in that performance?  No one knows, until the very end.  For the benefit of those who have not watched “Little Miss Sunshine”, the little girl’s performance at the beauty pageant is borderline awkward, borderline embarrassing, and borderline obscene.  Her stage performance – that has been kept secret to her family till the very end of the movie – is taught by her grandpa who is a borderline pervert.

Imagine only watching that little girl’s performance on stage and not the rest of the movie, I highly doubt if you would think too highly of this critically acclaimed movie.  The important part of the story, I observe, is the journey itself less of the end goal.  “Little Miss Sunshine” is a touching story on how this courageous little girl Olive manages to move and change the people around her who are disillusioned about their lives.  That is the journey I am talking about.

This mini-series is meant to be a journey for me, the various little steps in getting there.  The video itself, much like Oliver’s final stage performance, is less important.  Maybe I ought to be less subtle next time.

Or perhaps I need to remind myself that it is hard to make a blog to read like a movie.

The Closing of a Little Chapter

This episode marks the end of the prelude series and I know I have been confusing the living soul out of you.  My apologies.  Well, it’s absolutely not my intend.  I have a lot of fun writing this series.  Something different, something slightly more serious yet random, something closer to my heart.

PS. This hand drawn whale by me as seen at the beginning of the post carries a subtle message of “Save the Planet” in my upcoming video blog.

My 1st v-Blog Mini-Series:

Categories
Drama Foreign Movie Reviews

Summer Rain – A Spanish Film Directed by Antonio Banderas That May Be Too Abstract Even for the Picture House Fans

Cynthia and I have just started our Spanish class so there is no reason to give this Spanish film a miss.  Before you read on, if you are not a huge fan of the European picture house movies, chances are you may not enjoy this at all.  Simply a fan is not enough, must be a huge one.  It’s slow; it’s random; it’s the seventies.

Now, with that expectation set, “Summer Rain” is Antonio Banderas’s second Spanish movie as a director.  Subtly, he expresses his own ambition and emotion to the Spanish film industry through the movie.  The Spanish title is “Camino de los Ingleses, El”.  That roughly translates to “The English Road” or “The English Way”.  Be it as “Summer Rain” or “The English Road”, both concepts relate directly to the story.  Perhaps the former one is easier for the audience to connect with.

Let’s look at how faithfully “Summer Rain” portrays Spain in the seventies.  The costumes, the sunglasses, the typewriters, the street scenes look authentic.  The attitude towards sex and relationship, I think that is pretty authentic as well.  The filming looks old fashion and so is the music.  And if you pay attention to the scene composition, time and time again, you would see a similar concept composed in different ways.  For instance, the dropping of the kidney into the bucket and the dropping of the same actor who has his kidney removed into the swimming pool filmed from underneath the pool; the sister who comes out from the balcony and steps back into the shadow and then later, the brother who does the same – both linked by a similar emotion; the beginning scene with a flower and a car drives passes by and the ending scene with the same angle but different flower, and with the same car that passes by – if you are into this sort of details, you may find the film an art to admire.  This dualism extends beyond scene composition.  It works its way into the characters as well.  A young boy’s hatred towards his porn star birth mother is in a relationship with a prostitute.  Irony?  Perhaps.  But there is no coincidence.

Another worth noting observation is that the sex scenes are extremely artistic.  Some of the scenes would have been really awkward to watch, borderline gross, but I think the filmmaker has managed to get the ideas across without turning the film into a pornography.  And some sex scenes are extremely seductive.  Just when I thought I have seen it all on big screens.  (Note: Please don’t watch this film purely based on what this paragraph says.)

The flip side, on the other hand, is that the storyboarding of the scenes can be a bit random and the abstractly lengthy narration – artistic to some – may not sit well with the majority of the audience.  The main story is straightforward.  One young boy comes out of the hospital with one less kidney and the book “Divine Comedy” in his hand.  He has decided to be a poet.  One young girl whose passion is to dance and is willing to do whatever it takes to attain that dream.  There are other friends of them whom each has a journey of his own to take.  Together, their fates intertwine and a new destiny is weaved.

But is it only one destiny?  To say more would be to give out the spoilers.  So I shall end my write-up here and let you decide if “Summer Rain” is for you or not.  It is a film with open interpretation.  And I personally am not sure if many of you may find the pain of going through this 2 hours film justifies the joy of a potential interpretation – if there is one for you that is.

*     *     *    SPOILERS BELOW     *     *     *

If you notice, the narrator always seems a bit detached from the movie.  He is physically in the story but he takes no part in how the story develops.  Or does he?  I think he ‘writes’ the story.  And what you see is just one version of the story.  Towards the end, as he says ‘another viewpoint’, the entire story is rewritten from the beginning.  There is a different flower by the road.  Subtle difference that may result in a different story.

Is the beginning scene how the story begins?  Or is there a mixture of concepts here?  Try to recall with me.  There is an image of the ballet dancer in the operation room, with the young boy alone without the doctors.  There is this young boy naked flying on top of the world looking so peaceful.  This young boy wouldn’t have known this dancer prior to the operation, would he?  I can only imagine that beyond the ending scene, he has been taken to the hospital after he is found sitting in a chair at the middle of the road the next morning unconscious.  And he has died and gone to the netherworld.  The opening scene could well be a mix of the opening and the end.

That brings up a good point here on Dante’s “Divine Comedy”.  Inside Dante’s epic poem that he journeys through the three realms of the dead – Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven, Beatrice is the ideal woman who guides him through Heaven.  Although the reference to “Divine Comedy” is limited, I can’t help but to visualize that this group of friends together with the abstract narrator have journeyed through the similar and if the linkage is too far fetched, that could contribute to one of the major weaknesses of this film.

Categories
Diary

Avril Lavigne Live in Singapore!

Avril’s “The Best Damn Tour” is here!  And the 10% early bird discount ends today.  So grab the tickets (S$75-165) now if you so intend to watch.  We are at the 16th row.  See you there!

OK.  I was about to switch off my computer after writing more than one week worth of blog entries.  It suddenly struck me that the early bird discount closes today.  I so love Avril.  A few years ago, I was at the SunTech concert hall when she first visited Singapore.  To say that Cynthia and I felt ridiculous to be surrounded by so many youngsters is a massively super understatement.  But hey hey you you, it is Avril Lavigne and frankly speaking, I care less.

I love her “Best Damn Thing” album despite what others may say.  Now, one crazily embarrassing newsflash is that I have lost her CD.  Yes, I have.  Damn!  Where the heck have I put it?!  I have this bad habit of mixing the CDs into the wrong covers.  To go through the hundreds of CDs of mine to hunt for Avril’s “Best Damn Thing” seems like a daunting task.

Good thing is, I have till September to find it and to memorize the songs!  A piece of cake that is.

Hey hey you you, what are you waiting for?  Go go go and get the tickets now!

Related Posts:

Categories
Country Folk & Jazz Music Reviews

Fredrika Stahl – Tributaries – A Playfully Girlie Pop Jazz Album Now With a Different Sound

Young Swedish pop jazz singer and songwriter Fredrika Stahl’s 2nd album “Tributaries” got me initially disoriented and I couldn’t pinpoint what stands out in this new collection of songs.  There seems to be a departure of style as this new album has a more fresh varied upbeat theatrical sound while her debut is more instrumentally driven in a Jazz way.  To help you refresh on what her previous album sounds like, check out my YouTube video filmed during one of my oil painting sessions.  I used “Game Over” as the soundtrack.  I know I know, it’s not legal … but …

If my translation is correct (and if these are indeed French), “paroles, musiques, écrites, composé” would mean “words, musics, written, composes” in English.  That means, according to the album booklets, Fredrika Stahl composes almost all her songs.  No wonder, the memorable melody hooks and the light and girlie lyrics exist in both albums.

The difference, as I found out later, lies in the band.  In her debut, “Fraction Of You”, she has a more traditional Jazz band set-up while in her 2nd album “Tributaries”, she brings in an array of Parisian horn and string musicians.  Also, with more emphasis on electric guitars and drums, “Tributaries” does tilt toward the pop genre.  Besides musical instruments, sound effects are used to transform some of her songs into something refreshingly different.  Take “Oh Sunny Sunny Day”, it sounds exactly like a song coming out from a gramophone back in the 40’s or 50’s.  Outstanding.  In “One Man Show”, at one part, she sings with a whispering voice.  Very seductive.  Plenty of minor keys and half-notes and unexpected changes in the melody that prompt me to listen to the album again and again.  Sample the slow track “The Damage is Done” if you have the chance and you’ll see what I mean.

Lyrically, it’s girlie, yes.  But girlie with style.  Check out the lyrics of “Irreplaceable”.

I want to be remembered as “one of a kind”
Unique and why not “out of her mind”?
I want to be special, unpredictable and absurd
I want to tell people the most aberrant things they’ve heard
:
None of my partners introduced me to their folks
Afraid that I might pull off some awkward jokes
And once we’ve split up they would alway say
That I’m not a girl to marry anyway

Below is the teaser music video of one of my favorite tracks “So High”.  Don’t you find the lyrics … playful?  The actual song delivery seems different from the album.  A live recording perhaps?

Related Posts and External Site: Fredrika Stahl’s Debut – A Good Pop Jazz Album, My 8th Oil Painting – Battle Of The Ancient, Fredrika Stahl’s MySpace.

Categories
Linguistic My Hobbies

¡Hola! ¿Cómo Te … Erm … What? – Our First Spanish Lesson at Las LiLas School

You didn’t think I was joking when I said Cynthia is going to learn Spanish after Fernando Torres scored the goal that won Spain the UEFA Cup 2008, did you?  So I join her, under one condition.  Stay tuned and you may hear about it in September this year.

To learn Spanish is one of Cynthia’s childhood dreams.  I honestly have no special love for the language, the music, or the food but I do love to fulfill the dreams of others if I can.  Learning a language is absolutely not my strength and it is utterly one of the 10 things I fear most.  I am not exaggerating.

Exactly what I am going to do with this new skill, I have no clue.  However I am a strong believer that whatever you learn today opens up options you may have in the future.  Besides, I have this impression that Spanish is widely spoken in the Americas and I just learned from a Filipino friend of mine that his country was under the Spaniards for 400 years!  If this new experience hasn’t opened up new options for me yet, it has certainly opened up new conversation topics.  Did you know that Spanish is the world’s second most-spoken language by native speakers after Mandarin Chinese?

I told my boss that I have a Wednesday class in town so that any travel plan in the near future can hopefully be scheduled according to my constraint; I told my team that I am learning Spanish so that they know I have a life and won’t expect me to OT on work that never ends.  My boss sounded supportive and he told me that learning a new language is good to give our brain cells a good workout.  Great!  I think my first lesson was more than a workout.  I was exhaustively euphoric.

Anna is an interpreter by day, Spanish teacher by night and she is a fun person full of laughter.  Las LiLas School specializes in teaching Spanish language at various levels and the learning environment is OK.  I wish the classroom could be more colorful.  Having some refreshments inside the room would have been nice.  Next time I shall bring along my bottle of water and some snacks as well.

I guess all good language lessons begin with hi-how-are-you, what’s-your-name, and I’m-so-and-so.  Spanish language seems to have three extra alphabets ll, ch, and ñ, which is pretty funky.  Cynthia’s mother tongue is Bahasa Indonesia – a language with a certain level of Dutch influence – and she didn’t find the i-pronounced-as-e and e-pronounced-as-a confusing.  That alone confuses the heck out of me.  Fortunately, I am trained in pronouncing the tongue rolling ‘R’ sound of the Indonesian and the throat vibrating ‘R’ sound of the French, I am doing OK with the Spanish ‘G’, ‘J’, and ‘R’ that utilize both techniques.  ‘Y’ in Spanish is pronounced as ‘Y Griega’ (literally means letter Y from the Greek).  Some of these alphabets sound almost like a word to me.  When I was asked to spell out my name, I flipped.  The alphabet ‘W’ is pronounced as ‘Uve Doble’.  Although I seem to be able to get the rest of the tough alphabets right, ‘Uve Doble’ is one tough nut for me.  You know the Spanish dance genre Paso Doble?  It is the same ‘Doble’.  Why English calls ‘W’ double-U?  I don’t know.  Spanish calls it double-V.

Ah … all these confusions.  Thanks to the Tower of Babel.

Oops, exceeded 500 word count for this entry.  Stay tuned for more stories on How I Flunk My Spanish Test.

Categories
Music Journal

Stripping My Own Song into Just Four Lines and an Orange Lit Valve That Glows Within – My First V-blog (Prelude) Episode 6

If you still don’t get it, don’t be concerned.  Most don’t.  I am terrible in communication.  Next week the video should be out – baring any unexpected exciting events that may appear from nowhere, that I am compelled to blog about, that push my most-don’t-get-it mini-series schedule to yet another week.

After I finished working on the 3 minutes video, I wanted to make a small video clip of simple end credits that is completely different from the video itself.  And I found just what I wanted – an old song of mine written back in 2004 called “Mind Control”.

You know how it is like when you pour your heart and soul and hundreds of hours into making something – ironically may well be applicable to this mini-series – and you think out loud: This is a genius piece of work!  I picked up my electric guitar one day, trashed out some heavy, raw, original power chords, and I was screaming my heart out, screaming my brain out.  I really thought I was the next Syd Barrett of Pink Floyd.  So full of explosive randomness, so full of chaos, so full of madness.  Did my fingers bleed on that one day recording while home alone?  You bet.

Clicked send and the demo song was digitally finding its way to my lead guitarist’s mailbox.  Holding my breath I was, dying for some form of acknowledgement, and his reply was …

“It’s too intense.”

I don’t think my bassist got it either.

4 years have passed and I am supposed to be wiser.  “Fit for Public Consumption?” should now be part of my vocabulary.  But yet I still have this nostalgic affection towards “Mind Control”.  The Boss Metal Zone pedal sound is out and the sweet sound of my Les Paul guitar is in.  Most of the song is out and the excerpt is left with what I love most – 4 lines.

We want the truth, we want the fact
Overrule the media, destroy the rats
It’s mind control, stripping our rights
It’s mind control, running our lives

I had so much fun recording it.  OK, pain too.  You would have thought how tough it is to record a 1 minute excerpt of just 4 lines?  I spent the first entire night trying to get my 10 years old drums programming equipment to work; I spent the second entire night recording in the wrong key; I spent the third trying to get my new toy working (see picture above … and yes, there is a valve inside my new guitar and amp effect processor); I spent the fourth trying to remember the lyrics (I know, just 4 lines right?).  By the time I got a rather decent take, I couldn’t be bothered any more.

“Fit for Public Consumption?” should now be part of my vocabulary.  But yet I am releasing my video next week.  How ironic that some good things don’t change over time.

Neither are the bad ones.

My 1st v-Blog Mini-Series:

Categories
Fantasy & Sci-fi Movie Reviews

The Dark Knight – Being the Rare One Who Cannot Connect to the New Bat Franchise

Erm.  Yawn?  Zzzz.

OK.  It is hard to write something knowing that over 90% of the population will disagree with.  And if I am to continue my ‘review career’, I have some serious recalibration to do.

Cynthia loves “The Dark Knight”; I had a headache watching it.  So what happens?  I will get to that in just a bit.

Great casting, no doubt.  The acting is rock solid especially from the late Heath Ledger and Aaron Eckhart.  Both I adore and respect a great deal.  Jack Nicholson’s Joker as far as I can remember is comical; Heath Ledger’s Joker is pure creepiness and madness.  Give Ledger his Oscar.  He deserves it.  Did Warner Bros. modify the ending to be sensitive to the circumstances?  I have no clue.  Warner Bros. did change the promotional campaign after Ledger’s death.

Just how much of the success of “The Dark Knight” is contributed by this unfortunate event?  I also have no clue.  What I do know is that I have done some serious reflection on why this film doesn’t quite work for me.

Maybe I am addicted to computer-generated imagery especially after that jaw dropping non-stop special effect of Hellboy II, “The Dark Knight” looks a bit bland to me.  I am not sure how most audience feels about the 153 minutes film.  But isn’t it a bit too, lengthy, with too many gaps of how-you-wish-there-was-more-entertainment-per-minute?

Sure I could overlook the above easily.  I love the Batman franchise.  I really do.  Probably one of my favorite superheroes.  If I close my eyes and think of Batman, I see a strong association to the flying bats, I see the bat cave, I see Batman sleeping upside down like a bat, I see a bat mobile with absolute sleekness, I see fast moving fights, I see a Gotham City so dark so thugs infested that induces fear, I see my heart leaps when Batman appears from nowhere, and I see myself living in a fantasy world captivated by its creator.  As I opened my eyes and watched “The Dark Knight” in a theater, I saw Batman making a rather unglamorous entrance, I saw Batman standing on top of the modern IFC building in my birth town Hong Kong (read: where is the fantasy when I know that the building was officially opened in 2003?) having absolutely no animalistic association to bats or whatsoever throughout the film, my heart sank.  If Batman was to stand on top of the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur, I would have thought of the film “Entrapment”.  In fact, I did think of that film briefly while I was watching “The Dark Knight”.

And maybe I am still an old school when it comes to comic book adaptation.  I want to see frame-by-frame scenes composition; I want to see a rather simple storyline and I want to feel with and for my hero.  Anyways …

Having said all of the above, I can understand why “The Dark Knight” has a mass appeal.  Over 90% of the population loves this film, why wouldn’t you?  Can the gross revenue of “The Dark Knight” overtake the original “Batman” (1989) by Tim Burton?  Only time can tell.

OK.  I am done.  Back to my recalibration process.

Categories
Book Reviews Non-Fiction

Ethics for the Real World by Howard and Korver – Making Better Personal Ethical Decisions for Work and Life

What does ethics mean to you?  I asked this question to the people around me and the responses commonly point to a state of vagueness, and of confusion.  Some are able to observe ethics when lapses occur.  Most think that there are different types of ethics.  Not many are able to articulate and relate to the benefits of being ethical at the personal level.  Is there such a thing as ethically right or wrong?  Some may ask.

Yet, we face ethical decisions in our day-to-day life, at work and out of work.  Maybe we lie to avoid embarrassment.  Maybe we think that white lies are acceptable, especially if lying will lead to a ‘greater good’.  How about making promises that we can’t keep?  Is it wrong to download or copy intellectual properties?  Shall we work for or invest in organizations whose products harm innocent people?  Note that none of these questions that cover the areas of deception, stealing, and harming has a demarcation between work and life.  It is the same person who makes these decisions based on the same ethical code.

Having taught ethics for decades – both in the academic and profession arenas – the authors Ron Howard and Clint Korver have put together a book that clearly defines what ethics is.  In crisp black and white, the authors leave no room for ambiguity.  And because of their extensive training experience, “Ethics for the Real World” is one of the rare books I read that focuses on imparting knowledge via a simple structure, filled with lively easy to relate real life case studies, thought experiments, real life ethical codes that their students have drafted, and a book summary with key learning points, examples, supplemented with the page numbers as a quick reference guide.

I picked this book because I confess that in my life and in my line of work, at times I do find myself trapped in many so-called gray areas where I am tempted to transgress ethics.  And I did in some situations.  “Ethics for the Real World” opens my eyes to perspectives that I have not previously thought of.  I am not a skeptic but I was initially skeptical when I was asked to draft my own ethics code (one generic code for all types of situations).  How is it even possible when the scope is so huge?  Upon reading some of the examples written by the students, I am convinced that it can be done.  In fact, I may draft one and share with you all here in my website.  After I have finished reading the book, I am also convinced that it is possible when faced with situations – personal and professional – I shall be able to create alternatives and look for a quality solution that may even be transformational.  We may regret decisions made that are unrelated to ethics.  But to transgress ethics leads us to remorse.  In as much as possible, I would like to live a life with no remorse.

Related Website: ethics {for the real world}

Book Summary

Kindly note that this book summary is written for my own future reference.  It may read dry without the case studies and illustrations from within the book.

Ethical refers to behavior considered right or wrong according to our own beliefs no matter the culture or society.  We develop our own code for self-improvement, and not to criticize others.  Having good ethics enable us to lower the barrier between others and to enhance relationships.

Ethics is about actions, not thoughts.  It is important to note that there are three dimensions of action: prudential, legal, and ethical.  Prudential dimension pertains to our self-interest and legal dimension pertains to the law in our social system.  These dimensions overlap with one another.  Rarely we encounter ethical dilemmas.  The key is to clearly define our possible actions and to go through a consistent approach in arriving at a quality decision.

There are negative ethics (things that we shall not do) and there are positive ones (things that we shall do).  Confusing the two often leads to fuzziness when making decisions because positive ethics are like aspirations, they are lacking in bright lines of what we shall not do.  We also need to distinguish between action- and consequence-based ethics.  “Thou shall not kill” is a good example of action-based ethics.  But will we kill if killing is for a ‘greater good’?  Misusing consequence-based ethics may lead us to justify our wrongs.  In fact, rationalization often comes in ethical-sounding clothing.

We form our touchstones by consulting our religious legacy, secular legacy, as well as the codes written by our organization and professional bodies.  With our touchstones, we can draft our own ethical code, test them out, and live by it.

Transgressing ethics in any circumstances often result in a lost of opportunities for our own growth.  More often than not, we can create alternatives.  And some of these alternatives can transform our life and work.  When in doubt, put ourselves in other’s shoes.  Start with the ones we love.

Living by our ethical codes is a skill that we need to turn into a habit, into a way of life.  And we shall continue to expand our ethical space as we grow.