2008-11-19

Git-tar Hero

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I bumped into my guitar instructor today, she asked me how I was as well as my playing progress. Before I could reply, she suggested that we talk over dinner; which I agreed since myself had been 'running dry' of dates lately.

It's been a while since I did any flashback posts, well today I've decided to reminisce about how I started picking up the guitar.

It all started when I went to my buddy's Vincent's house, I think I was in Secondary One then. He had a guitar in his house and used to play in his church gatherings, which I sometimes attended. The more I saw him play, the more I wanted to learn. There were a lot of benefits, it was a cool living skill, and it impresses girls; actually I was in it for the girls part, lol.

By the time I decided to really commit myself to learning, we were in our college days, and Vincent went to KL to further his studies. So I decided to pick up the guitar by myself, and bought my first 'Kapok' guitar. It was blue in color, and my brother use to chastise me for choosing such an ugly color. I printed chords from the Internet, and even went to an old bookstore to look for the infamous '50-cent chord book'.

I taught myself how to read tabs, and began playing a few simple songs on my own. Later I played with a few of my self-taught friends, we gave tips and pointers to each other while improving our picking/strumming technique. That time we didn't know anything about beats or tempo, we just listened closely to how the song was played and mimicked it. It was all great fun.

Now, my mother attended music school when she was young, she plays the organ; I forgot what grade she was. One day when she heard me play at home she told me, "Your upbeat and downbeat are not parallel, you got the tempo all wrong." I was baffled of course, I've never heard of tempos and beats before. She suggested that I should attend a proper guitar lesson, to help me understand better my playing. I thought I was already good then, but Mother had her way, and I reluctantly went.

On my first day of class I was introduced to Danielle, my guitar instructor. She was pretty, she couldn't have been much older than I was, and had a cute smile to match. It made me a little less reluctant after that. She taught me that a 'beat' was actually a basic time unit of a piece of music; and there were 1/2 beats, 1/4 beats, etc. I was introduced to tempos then, and she advised me to get a metronome, which is a must to help to fine-tune my rhythm. I spent 2 months learning new things, and even got myself my current Yamaha F-210 acoustic.

just waiting for me like a secret friend~

I went on to escalate myself this time in rock music, and met some new friends at the jamming studio. We formed a band called 'days of adolescence', and played a great number of rock songs with the studio owner as our vocalist. Our one time favorite was GN'R's "Sweet child O' Mine", I was good with the riffs and I swear that our vocalist sounds 99% like Axel. We got away with the surcharge fees most of the time, as we used to pretend that we 'forgot the time' while playing.

All that has changed by now, as my former band mates and I are occupied with job responsibilities, and we're residing in different states as well. And I haven't seen Danielle ever since I left music school, which has been 2 years already. She was still the wild and carefree girl I once knew, and she told me a lot about herself over dinner. I was surprised to find out that the organ was the first instrument she learned, before picking up the guitar. When I asked her who was her instructor, she replied, "Oh, my instructor? It was your mother. She was the one who told me you were enrolling and told me to be your teacher."

2008-11-03

The 5 People that I'd have as the Prime Minister of M'sia

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With shiori away on a business trip (to a place so remote where there're no phone lines), I guess it's up to me again to post. Not that I'm reluctant to do so, well I think I am; crap.

I've been tagged by Kav, and the recent events have deemed that this is a suitable post for current times. With Obama's win and Badawi proclaiming that '
Anybody can be PM' (dunno whether the old senile means it or not, maybe he's just looking to gain favors), it seems anyone, yes, anyone can be Prime Minister.

The possibilities are endless, but as the title says '5', take a look at the list of my Fab 5 below.

i. Nathan Petrelli

Oh yes, the former New York congressman can make it big in Malaysia. He could blow up 1/2 of Semenanjung, and then proceed to unite the nation in grief. And maybe blame some Inspector or summat who played too much with C4 while protecting his brother Peter, the real culprit.

ii. Shah Rukh Khan

No big surprise here, he's already received Datuk-ship although no direct contribution to the country. With him being PM, our country will have joy & merry-making all day, singing and dancing ala Bollywood style. I've always wanted to hide behind trees or rolling down a slope while singing.
Tum pass aa'e.....

iii. Chow Yun Fat

Oh, one of my favorite actors. Just think about it, he could legalize gambling (c'mon, he's the God of Gamblers!) , bring crime to its knees (as Detective Tequila Chen), and best of all, do comedy. Now tell me where can you find such a multi-talented PM? Owning!

iv. Chef Wan Ismail

I remember watching his shows when I was a kid, he actually inspired me to become a chef (which I didn't coz... that's another story). He's in touch with his feminine side, and probably is what the nation needs as our country has never had a female PM before. Chef Wan is the yin and yang, two sides in one perfect harmony.
Best of all, he could cook while giving a speech, and never will anybody change the TV channel whilst the PM is wishing everybody Happy Independence Day.

v. The Lady selling fried bihun near my apartment

I'd be branded a sexist if my list were only men, so here's a female candidate. You may wonder why a normal hawker made it to my list, truth is she's more politics-aware than I am. I always get free advice on how to run the country when I get my bihun fix from her; I don't see why she shouldn't try to run the country.



Disclaimer : This catalogue is purely for satire purpose, and for those who can't accept our country to be led by the people I listed above; go fly a kite at the beach.