Maui had a month's stay of execution, but it had to happen sooner or later. Doc Kasey deemed him old enough to be 'fixed', and we're looking at the after-effects. This is not a happy cat.

We kinda' felt sorry having to do it to him, but he was already starting to bother Momo, and eventually someone was going to get hurt -- if not emotionally then physically -- if we let him pursue his interest.

It was really sad when we brought him home and watched him stagger groggily around while he refamiliarized himself with our house. He couldn't walk properly probably due to the effect of his anesthesia, and he must be feeling the pain from the op as well. Poor fellow.

His appetite is still good, though. We put him on a fast 12 hours before his appointment as a precaution against choking on his own vomit if the anesthetic made him throw up, so he was quite ravenous by dinnertime.

He's up and about, and more or less walking properly again, now that he's had a chance to recover somewhat from his ordeal. Think he'll pull though ok.

Mas Selamat is on my mind; months, perhaps, after the fact. Golden Boy is S'pore's celebrity escapee who fled detention while he was being held as a suspected terrorist, in case people have already forgotten.

It's because I was previewing "The Road to Guantanamo" on DVD to see how I could use it for class that's when I came to the conclusion that if Goldie was in the custody of the US, he would never have got away. It would have been impossible. He would have been under 24-hour watch in a see-through cage, made to sit all day not talking, not praying, not doing anything except being watched like an animal in a zoo. Just being still and quiet. Did I mention being watched?

No family visits, no lawyer visits. His exercise would have been a five-minute walk once every week. That'll build some muscles. The boredom spending days, weeks, months on end like that is unimaginable. It's almost a relief when the guards drag him out of his cage for his interrogation, daily beating and general abuse, just because at least that's something to DO.

And that kind of treatment is for people the US isn't even sure are actual terrorists. It happened to four guys, Brits of Pakistani descent, who happened to be touring in the wrong part of Afghanistan when the Coalition forces likewise came a-callin'.

No, we were "complacent". We let him out of his cell, allowed him some privacy when he did his toilet, gave him time with his wife and kids. We almost treated him like a human being, despite knowing full well who he was and what he was capable of. We acted like we had nothing to fear from him. We paid a high price when he took advantage of us, but you know what? I'm proud that we did exactly that. That our security personnel are still able to see people as people, not just as the threats they represent.

And that brings us to today's news story: Ingrid Betancourt and fellow hostages escaping the clutches of their captives in a daring, well-planned helicopter rescue by the Columbian army. In a many months' long operation, army infiltrators lulled the rebels into a false sense of security. Hence the FARC-all job of guarding the 15 captives "Cesar" and Co. would otherwise have been watching more closely.

And the one big question that will stick in all our minds is, why couldn't Goldie's escape have been at least as spectacular? But we all know, nothing exciting EVER happens in the S'pore.

The valuation for our current place has finally arrived. We knew we would be selling at a loss, but it turns out the loss isn't as horrific as we thought it might have been. Our neighbour's been eyeing our unit 'cos he'd like some space for his little family and yet not stay too far from his mom, so if we can settle on a price we'll have a sale. Else, it'll be back to our agent and the open market.

Already today, we made a downpayment on a closet set for our new place, with an option for a kitchen set and a feature wall. We went with Closet Design's promotional package, a reasonable price for quite a modern urban designed wardrobe with quiet closing drawers, a finish that won't stain (the designer set a shelf alight with a bit of lighter fluid, yet there was not a mark when the flame died down), and durable sliding doors.

The designer who spoke to us was an easygoing, affable fellow, confident but no pressure. His designs looked fresher and much more flexible than the generic designs we saw at IMM last weekend, so that kinda' decided it.

On our way home, we stopped at Just Anthony. June had her eye on a low, flat Chinese drum she thought would be great to convert into a coffee table. They'd sold out the one in the colour she wanted, so she settled for a smaller drum she thinks would make a great side table, once she can figure out how to acquire an appropriate stand for it.

The new place will be June's dream home.

The person most qualified to lead is the one with the higher test scores. At least, Maxwell Smart (Steve Carell) believes so, as do most of the kids undergoing education in sunny S'pore. This, Smart boldly declares to Agent 99 (Anne Hathaway), an agent with vastly more field experience than him. But it isn't who leads that counts, it's how they are able to partner up, support each other's weaknesses with their own strengths, and ultimately trust each other despite evidence that seems to indicate that they shouldn't, that make them the on-screen pair to watch this summer.

"Get Smart" is one of the funniest movies I've watched this year. The situation is ridiculously improbable, but the moments that kept me laughing were the numerous lines of deadpan dialogue, and caustic one-liners exchanged between the characters. Smart, an analyst and a meticulous office worker gets to face off against violent terrorists, assassins and nameless henchmen in order to save the President (a bit like a George W gone senile) the target of a nuclear detonation in a major US city, as plotted by Siegfried (Terence Stamp).

But Smart is no bumbling Johnny English. Despite his lack of field experience, he is "not totally incompetent". He has the skills, though not quite the finesse of his partner, Agent 99, and lethality of his role model -- the compromised, sidelined and frustrated Agent 23 (Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson"). Smart is smart, able to pick up clues garnered from evesdropped conversations and make informed -- if long-winded -- deductions, but is also quite adept at improvising his way around tight spots in a trial-and-error fashion.

Fortunately, his errors are quite forgiving. If anything, Smart gets into trouble more often with his own secret agent gadgets. His personal nemesis is the Swiss Army Knife with additional attachments created for him by his two geeky lab tech buddies, Bruce and Lloyd. For an inanimate prop, in Smart's hands it almost develops a personality that seems to delight in tormenting him.

Terence Stamp, as the evil Siegfried, is most memorable for his stinging one-line insults that are even more deadly than his genocidal ambitions. At the receiving end is the monstrous, yet vulnerable Dalip "The Great Khali" Singh, Siegfried's personal Swiss Army Knife of sorts.

While there are moments of pure slapstick, "Get Smart" with it's inside look at how ridiculous, improbable and impractical spy flicks are turns out to be as smart as movies of this genre can get.

Edit 01:
A rather dispirited set of recent entries. Mostly half-hearted attempts at getting my brain reacclimatized back to the work routine and social environment I've been rather cut-off from since the summer hols. NBS has a much more interesting take (entitled "Pet') on last night's activities compared to the dry record below.

Celebrated two birthdays with the Batam crew, Sha and Fen making up the full table. We'd heard about the 50% discounted seafood at Ah Yat, Shaw Towers, so that seemed like a great new place to try out.

We opened accounts with a pile of cereal prawns and another of mussels, and a sea-bass steamed in black bean sauce. The mussels were of a freshness I've never experienced before -- the meat sort of burst into mussel juice at the first bite, while I'm more used to the kind that's rubbery and needs a good chewing before it's in any condition to be swallowed.

We also ordered a dish of stir-fried broccoli that turned out to be the most expensive dish of stir-fried broccoli ever, costing more than the even the steamed sea-bass. Did I mention seafood was 50% discounted? Amy thinks they have to make up the difference somewhere.

But the whole point of this jaunt all the way to Beach Road was the crab. We ordered three pairs of crabs in the black pepper, garlic steamed and cream varieties. I dunno. I like my crab steamed, but the steamed crab didn't exactly make me sit up and take notice of it. That didn't stop me from demolishing probably more than my fair share, but if the steamed crab wasn't impressive, I can't say much for the other two varieties either.

Anyway, happy birthday to our two birthday girls!

Tired of eating cheaply so often these days. We decided to indulge ourselves at Charco's which offers chix, ribs and schnitzel. I found this place a couple of weeks back when I was actually looking for the Botak Jones AMK outlet. It seems the Botak guy has moved out and Charco's is happily filling the vacancy.

For a kopitiam stall, Charco's offers an extensive and varied menu. What June and I went for was the daily special: quarter chix with three different side salads x 2 for under $14.

While the chix itself is tender and tasty (they'll do it to a traditional Portuguese recipe as an option), I was more taken by the salad bar featuring eight different kinds of salad from which I could pick any three as side dishes. On the plate in the picture, we're looking at Greek, Caesar and potato salads. Not bad at all.

Warning!
Wild animal on the loose

Wanted for causing:
- Collateral damage to kitchen crockery
- Severe contusion to female owner's right 2nd last toe (due to falling kitchen crockery)

Approach with caution!
- Suspect is armed with extraordinary charm
- Able to extract forgiveness easily from his victims and pursuers alike


No reward offered for suspect's capture and punishment.

Spent the last three days working with the rest of the staff on the College's direction for the next few years. Not going to say too much about that as lots of details are still in the process of being hammered out.

Because we had to review our previous goals and set new ones, it was interesting to hear what the different people involved on campus had to contribute towards the general direction we eventually found some consensus on. As we also included representatives from our student body, their parents and alumni, there were lots of views to consider, and not everything complementary either. So some of the changes we are proposing should be quite timely, though the things that ain't broke we ain't fixin', so there.

Meantime, it's confirmed. June and I have committed to our move up north, having exercised our Option to Purchase now that the bank has approved our loan. We've already engaged someone to envision the interior of our new place, and someone else came over yesterday to appraise the value of our present place. Things are moving so quickly.

Now that the reality of the move has finally sunk in, I guess I am becoming excited about it. Seems like every ten years or so, I acquire a new address. Nomadic lifestyle.

As a further aside, management presented me with my long-service cert during the big meeting today. It was funny, the number of gasps and the buzzing that went on among the gathered staff when VP called out my name. I know just how they felt 'cos I was feeling the exact same thing. Even I can't believe I signed my employment contract a whole decade ago. Must be the reason why I'm behaving a little older and crankier these days.

And as a further, further aside, thanks, Amy, Dee and HP for the lovely souvenirs y'all got me from NY, NY. Considering what I just recently bought, it was just as well that it was a trip I missed.

Questions arise about the effectiveness of mainstream teachers and school programmes due to the high demand for after-curriculum tuition with star tutors who have an apparent knack of turning flunking students around into exam aces. With this kind of success rate, any student who isn't taking some kind of tuition is going to want to add their name to a long waiting list, giving even more credence to the already mystical following that these self-styled academic gurus have built around themselves.

We teachers in the mainstream are our own worst enemies in this game. We think too highly of ourselves and our ability to "make a difference" to the kids under our charge. We've bought in too deeply the tenets of our own industry's recruitment campaigns, holding ourselves more responsible than necessary for our kids' successes. We think that because we "mould the future of our nation in our hands", any mistake we make, any standard we let slide, is going to bring the future crashing down around our ears and it'll be all our fault. And not just us, but everyone else not in the industry will be pointing fingers at us and saying likewise too.

Because we bear this imaginery burden, we take our craft a little too seriously. Every little thing becomes a teaching point for us, and not always in a nice way. Even the tests and examinations we set become "teaching tools" instead of just being assessment milestones. What I mean is, we set questions we don't really expect the kids to answer so that we can teach them after the exam how to answer the question properly. When we mark exams, we strongly penalize every infraction because then we create more opportunities to teach what the "correct" answer should be. It isn't policy, it's more like reflex.

While it's great that we are so dedicated to our work, perhaps the exams aren't the best material to make teaching points out of. It's a pity, but normal, ordinary people see exam scores as a measure of personal competence in a subject, whereas we teachers expect them to make mistakes in the papers; so we seem to be working at cross-purposes here. Poor scores at the tests, exams and continual assessments that we set drive the confidence right out of our kids and drive them straight into the open arms of private tutors who lay out the welcome mats for them. Private tuition has become a most lucrative enterprise in this kind of education environment.

How do tutors and tuition agencies gain that magical aura that seems to make silk purses out of sows' ears? From the results their kids attain from the external exam (i.e., Cambridge) itself, which is ultimately what counts in the job market. The external agency, unlike us in the teaching industry, has no agenda whatsoever in setting and marking its exams. Cambridge has no personal stake in the individual candidates' papers. Cambridge just marks what appears on exam scripts. In other words, Cambridge as an external marker is more likely to give a fairer assessment of the papers they receive than we are when we set and mark our internal exams, anxious as we are to ensure the kids make all the mistakes they can during our assessments so that they don't make the same mistakes during the Cambridge exams.

Private tutors point to the Cambridge marked results and -- voila -- instant success.

This is not to say that private tutors aren't excellent teachers in themselves. They probably are, and it's a lot more motivating when kids are taught by someone they like, but don't be fooled by the numbers game. There's still no substitute for disciplined self-study, for asking questions and clarifying points no matter who is at the head of the classroom.

One thousand dollars buys the Option to Purchase (OTP) a resale flat. We met the seller with our agent, and with a few signatures and a cheque of exactly that amount we have bought ourselves 14 days to secure a bank loan to finance our latest purchase. It's pretty much certain that we're moving out within the year.

I dread the idea of packing up all the stuff we've accumulated since we turned our once pristine, empty apartment into the home I've grown so comfortable in. Today, there's junk everywhere -- it's like a rat's nest, padded all over with debris and detritus that gives a place that "lived-in" look.

But because we have to sell off our current place, we're facing quite the daunting task of bringing sterile order back into the chaos we've allowed our place to settle into. And this has to be done quickly before we start inviting prospective buyers in to appraise our humble abode. No one's gonna be tempted to buy a pig-sty.

Oh well, guess how I'll be occupied this weekend?

We've taken our first steps towards changing our residential address. Just met with our agent who helped us work out our finances and, yes, it looks like our second-choice unit is just barely within our means. But for the forseeable future, we're going to be seriously cash poor 'cos forking out the downpayments and legal fees will just about wipe us out.

But the place we'll be moving to will be much closer to decent public transport, shopping amenities, and M-i-L. By moving up north, the Wong colony will have achieved reunification.

Most of all, we're moving to cut our losses on our current place. That's us and our business logic: buy high, sell low. Somehow, I don't think we've quite got the hang of the property game. But if we delay selling now, our valuation is most likely to dip to a point where we'll never be able to sell and we'll just have to grow old and die here. What a cheery thought.

Anyway, I'll probably keep a record of our transactions here in case anyone wants a blow-by-blow account of the processes involved in both purchasing and selling an HDB unit on the open-market. Who knows? Someone might find this info useful.

Meantime, what have I been doing this past week? Nothing much, really. I cycled about 20 km in a single sitting, having found the park connector from ECP to Changi Beach park. Been bowling a couple of times, and euthanized the effectively brain-dead Boyz once and for all while I was at it. Completed Assassin's Creed and Mass Effect on Cirrus, my new Athlon X2 based workhorse, who has replaced the still-comatose Mr L33t (who for some reson I haven't been able to revive as yet). And I watched Kung Fu Panda which I'd like to comment on if I had the energy.

And I still have a few days of vacation left to enjoy. Yes.

Single guys would rather stay single than make a mistake and have a bad marriage, according to a survey by a guy who is single and curious about his "condition" and that of his fellows. Successful but single, it's not surprising that the one thing they fear making a mistake on is one that will affect them for life. Anyone can recover from financial setback, anyone can claw their way back to the top from a humiliating plummet, but nothing reeks of "loser" more than the emotional trauma of committing to the wrong woman, and paying for it once the alimony judgement weighs in.

We've recently put a lot of pressure on ourselves when it comes to love and pairing up. We look at movie romances and mistake that for love. We can afford better things for ourselves now, so our expectations are much more attainable than ever before. It's no longer an impossible dream to buy our dates candlelight dinners and ocean cruises; to say nothing of champaign, roses and chocolate. Romance is ours to buy, even if on a budget.

But that's just the materiel -- keeping the mood of a romantic atmosphere is a lot of work. Romantic spontaniety is a myth. It takes planning, foresight, being always thoughtful and selfless... and impossible to sustain for long. Especially when married, because spouses are in each other's proximity all the time. Once married, it's like exposing all the behind-the-scenes preparations to the audience who's been marvelling at the show until they get invited backstage and handle the props for themselves. Then they're no longer impressed.

So our modern men do have a legitimate fear. A marriage based on this sort of high-pressure performance cannot last, so for them it's better to be single than suffer the inevitable heart-wrenching, socially-stigmatizing, emotionally overblown divorce proceedings from which there is no profit, only rack and ruin thereafter.

How did our previous generations survive life-long marriages the way they did? How did they put up with each other as they aged and grew less glamorous year after year? As they lost their hearing and yelled at each other (like my grandparents did with frightening frequency)? It's probably because they knew that romance is only love in its infancy. These days, few of us will allow love to mature further than that.

Love isn't roses, or laughter or sunshine all the time. Love is taking crap for each other and from each other and still staying together no matter what. It's probably best summed up by the character of Golde in the Fiddler on the Roof who replies to her husband's query if she loves him:

Do I love him?
For twenty-five years I've lived with him
Fought him, starved with him
Twenty-five years my bed is his
If that's not love, what is?

Can't help those guys who aren't married, and prefer it that way. To those of us who are, none of us married the "wrong" woman. Remember that when we married, we made a life-long committment "for better or worse". Expect the worst, 'cos that's where love shines truest.

Prince Caspian rules! After the disappointment that was Lion, Witch, Wardrobe, the sequel is a much more spirited effort at fleshing out the main characters and their role in the events that follow, rather than just letting a great story tell itself via a different medium.

While "Caspian" doesn't live up to the grandior of LoTR -- the props and set looked very much recycled from LoTR -- the human characters really hold their own in this movie. Five angsty teenagers, each bearing a mighty responsibility; and as a parallel of our world it is a choice that we ourselves have to make soon: to save what we can of our natural resources, or strip the earth bare with our machines and machinations.

Because the deus ex machina, Aslan, only shows up at the end, the famous five are left on their own to muddle through a horribly sticky situation. How to reinstate a deposed Caspian to the throne so that his tree-hugging policies will restore peace and balance to the natural world, a.k.a. Narnia? At odds with them is the environmentally-unfriendly, technologically and logistically superior yet fractious human alliance of Telmarine.

High King Peter's first-strike manouvre reflects his hot-headed tendencies. He lets his fists think for him, as we see in his scuffle at the Strand ending with an adult's admonishment to "act [his] age." Peter learns a hard lesson as he watches his Narnian forces get decimated as a result of his ill-planned assault on the Telmarine keep itself.

The fight sequences in this installment are so much better arranged and are more memorable than LWW. The kids are more gung-ho in combat, going all-out with no quarter, and they look like they are fighting for their lives. Even Susan goes at it with her bow, but in close-quarters combat she uses the shaft and point of her arrows just as effectively as her unerring marksmanship. It's also gratifying that despite his dimunitive nature, Reepicheep's "cute" factor gets played down in favour of his capability as a master fencer. Come to think of it, no one's cute. Not the dwarves, the centaurs, the minotaurs, not even the stupid squirrel. Big grin for that.

The Telmarines themselves, power-hungry backstabbers that they are, think they are in for an easy victory. Their forces vastly outnumber what's left of the Narnians, they have an effective cavalry and artillery complement and their morale is high. But by then the teenagers have figured out how to work together, spelling the end of the Telmarine regent's tyrannical reign.

Peter and Edmund lead the hold-off forces, Susan rides armed escort for Lucy's recce mission, while Caspian brings in the cavalry. And the Telmarines fall victim to natural disaster as Aslan finally makes his appearance. It's no joke being swallowed by a tsunami. Like the Telmarines who blithely mess around with their natural resources, we had best heed that warning as well.

The critical thinking panel discussion I attended today raised an interesting issue: how do we teach critical thinking at secondary school level, and why should we even bother since the 'O' level exam doesn't actually test such an ability?

And suddenly I'm asking myself, "doesn't it?" And then I recalled that in the ten years plus I spent in primary and secondary education, I was simply fed material to memorize and got graded according to how closely I reproduced said material at the exams. Not very well, I'm afraid.

That's a fine and efficient way to ensure the kids do well when their annual results come out. After all, how else could my teachers deal with 40 screaming kids in a classroom apart from making us all sit down and shut up while she delivered the next set of predigested facts from the syllabus to a literally captive audience?

It's the same with the most revered TYS with kids faithfully practicing answering past questions as if the same questions will repeat themselves year after year. Success for them means recalling the answer closest to the answers at the back of the book, and they're satisfied that they've done the work expected of them.

Which is true: that is a lot of work, although not necessarily a lot of thinking, so the learning turns out to be somewhat limited. Then the more successful kids step up to college level and wonder why their scores for GP are scraping borderline when in sec school they were the pride and joy, the creme de la creme of their beloved alma mater. The next level for them is quite a large gap to bridge, and it's hard to convince them that their previous secrets to success were actually bad habits, and they need to trade in the old comfortable ways for new ones that are more difficult to master, but work better in the long term.

There was this couple of independently raised examples from two of our panellists: Prof Mo said that he had once observed a 7 year-old repeatedly jumping as high as he could go because he was testing a theory that his teacher had proposed to him: The Earth rotates around the sun. So, the boy reasoned that if he were to jump high enough, the earth would rotate under him and he would land in a different spot from where he had taken off. While there were certain flaws in his assumptions leading him to conclude that because he landed in the same spot every time, his teacher must be wrong, it shows that even little kids have some critical thinking ability and they already can exercise it in their observations of life around them.

Contrast this example with the one Ken raised: his 16-17 year-old students consider critical thinking and philo classes a waste of time 'cos there's no 'O' level paper on the subject. They don't like to think, they say, 'cos it's too hard. Save them time, just give them the answers and they will gladly memorize the material with the time saved.

So, what happened to turn the curious 7 year-old into the jaded, pragmatic 17 year-old? 10 years of education for the masses, perhaps? Fortunately, the fact that we are having discussions such as this one shows that the industry is making inroads into overhauling the old ways. Soon, I hope.

Oh, btw, the venue for the panel discussion brought back some good memories for me. I wandered those old corridors back then as a student. Even though that old institution has since been replaced by this current one, the campus is still mostly the same. But I wasn't there long as a student -- well, long enough to develop my first serious crushes on my girl classmates but not long enough to do anything about them. As Ben said, c'est la vie.

Finally got my paws on "Mass Effect" for PC. Vista gave problems when I first attempted to start up the game. It simply refused to start. But after a call to EA's helpdesk which advised me to switch off Vista's User Account Control (UAC), I actually got my first taste of this epic space melodrama.

The game space is amazingly huge. I've seen two locations so far, Eden Prime which was a tutorial run for basic game controls, and am currently exploring Citadel, a sprawling complex of districts full of mini quests to accept and fulfill. I still need time to get used to the many keys needed to conduct squad combat properly. Until I figure them out, I'm gonna get killed a lot but that's the learning curve.

Apart from the above two locations, there's a massive galaxy to explore system by system, planet by planet. While I've been only doing grunt fighting so far, there's promise of vehicular combat and space combat as well to look forward to. Death-dealing comes in so many forms!

Despite my excitement, there's still one serious annoyance with the game: It has shut down on me twice already in mid-game, causing the loss of any unsaved content, and forcing replays of certain encounters which I'd already seen, before being unceremoniously dumped back out into the Windows environment so unexpectedly.

Wonder if there'll be a patch soon that will address this problem. Meantime, I'll look around the 'net for a viable solution. Grr...

It's an argument that we in the industry will never win. We're taking flak again, this time for making kids continue classes even though they're supposed to be enjoying their summer break right now. Where is this criticism coming from?

Even in the US, summer school is a legit practice. Kids actually get threatened to be sent to summer school if they are not performing during regular term time. Summer school is also great to attend to gain extra academic credits and makes the study load lighter by a course or two when term resumes. All the more so here then, with parents so anxious about their kids not scoring 'A's, I would think they'd somehow make summer school mandatory without our initiative.

If we didn't hold the kids back, we'd still receive flak anyway for being slack, uncaring, selfish and any other unflattering description because we are not helping the kids to do better at their upcoming exams. After all, we are well-paid civil servants , so we'd better do more to justify our upkeep, some people would say.

Since there's no pleasing anyone on this issue, I'm just going to continue working at whatever needs to be done, whether its admin, lesson planning, materials gathering, assignment marking, course taking, and I'll do it wherever I want, at my own time, without distractions from management or client-base, and I'm going to be happy. I'm on vacation!

Stabbing people in the back is a useful skill to master in "Assassin's Creed". As crack assassin, Altair, who seeks redemption for an earlier botched hit, I have a list of nine very bad men to put paid to. Or rather, my ancestor has to and I'm sharing his memories of his greatest hits via a device that allows me to do so.

Assassins carry out a routine before striking. They infiltrate the target's city of residence; seek out as much information as possible about his whereabouts, activities, strengths and weaknesses; sneak past his guards and finally give him a taste of cold steel in his gut.

That's the theory, anyway. A more skilled player than me might just have the patience and timing to make his kills as smooth as butter and keep the body count to a minimum if he wished to sincerely follow the Creed. But where's the fun in that? Clumsy ol' me just blunders into a hornet's nest bristling with angry men holding pointy objects and having to slay them all. If I manage to poke the right target it's because he was stupid enough to stay and fight with his men. Of course, some targets choose the better part of valour, so those guys need to be timed properly or chased down, apologies to whomever stands in the way.

Fighting is easy to pick up. It's just a matter of timing Altair's attack against his opponents'. Time it right and be rewarded with a cinematic of a deft parry or a brutal finisher. There are lots of variations, and I believe that as Altair unlocks more as he progresses through the levels. Altair often gets surrounded with a mass of enemies, but by methodically picking off each enemy the body count racks up until no one is left to challenge the might of the Assassin. Yes.

But sometimes the fighting can get tiresome, so if there's no one important to kill in the mob another option is to break off and run through the crowd of civillians and climb over the rooftops to find a hiding spot -- a pile of hay or a curtained pavillion. Once the pursuers have lost line of sight, they quit their search (slackers!) and return to their posts.

On the way to the big party, though, there are certain buildings to climb to get a better picture of what's happening in the neighbourhood; hidden flags to collect; civillians to rescue from thugs and bullies; people to pickpocket from; others to intimidate for the information they hold, or just eavesdrop on surreptitious conversations between loose lips. Occasionally, a fellow assassin will point out certain secondary targets to eliminate on the quiet, or initiate a race across the rooftops just for fun.

So there's lots to do in between the big kills, although up to a point, even the variety of activities becomes repetitive after a while. Still, these asides are mostly optional. Completing any two or three per city is enough to unlock access to the big cheese himself, and his cryptic final words that make Altair wonder if he is on the right side of the war after all.

Many people have a problem with the ending sequence to the game. Just when you think there's more to come, the game stops on a cliffhanger. The problem is, you don't know the game's ended. You just keep walking around in a closed room where you can access clues about what's to come, then there's nothing else to do except wander around aimlessly wondering what the heck to do next. There's only one thing left to do: see that little box marked with an 'X' on the top right hand of your game window? Click that then get on with your life.

Currently exploring the Holy Land in the 12th century, during the Crusades. My persona's hands soak in the blood of all who stand in the way of my efforts to restore peace to the region (heh, a side note about the necessity of violence for the sake of peace). I fight for neither Sal-a-hadin nor Richard. My struggle is against those who work in the shadows, who profit by fuelling the fires of the conflict, prolonging the war for the sake of their own private agenda.

Or so I've been told. Lately, I'm not so sure any more...

People get upset when their kids fail tests and exams. They get especially upset when they find out that their kid is just one casualty among many others in the cohort. They question the school practices, the competence of the teachers, they feel the pressure to get the kid some private tuition, everything except tell the kid to go study, or get his life under control or something.

What are parents really expecting when to the vast majority of them, perfection = 100%? They expect their kids to hit a target that high at primary and secondary level, and raise hell when the kid falls short within a 5% margin or so. At college level, how do we convince the same parents that because an 'A' grade describes the band from 75% and above, the pass mark actually works out to 45% and even then that's erring on the conservative.

Speaking from the experience of a foreign education, it certainly encouraged me that my profs never did pressure me for an 'A' performance. We all had the understanding that a 'C' grade was entirely satisfactory. 'C' stood for 'competent', a decent level of proficiency in the subject so that I didn't have to be shackled to my desk and textbooks all day and instead did other things with my life that weren't necessarily academic or even intellectual. I still turned in a "B+" average in the end, which meant I did spend some time studying, but my studies were never my life.

Having said that, things are quite different back here. Here people study to live, and our education experience tells us 'A' or die. We have a very penalizing attitude to our tests and exams, which filters down all the way to our setting of papers and our marking. Our papers are necessarily difficult because we hold our kids to very high performance standards. We often teach beyond their syllabus requirements, making them stretch to grasp our material. And when we mark, we usually have very high expectations of them. When they don't quite live up to our expectations, our marking reflects our disappointment. But we are loath to 'dumb it down' because no one is prepared to accept lower standards, and so the hamster wheel just keeps going faster with every subsequent batch of kids.

Wonder how many (if any) of the kids who, on entering university, suddenly realized that we were already trying to teach them the same stuff a couple of years earlier? Just asking.

Indy's back and it's another fun run. There are thrills galore in "Crystal Skull", though some of the stunts are worth the scrutiny of the Mythbusters guys. How Indy escapes a nuclear blast test is unbelievable -- i.e., cannot be believed even with copious amounts of disbelief suspended; rather than whoa, awesome, dude!

In this fourth installment the action takes place in Indy's backyard: in the US and in South America. It's the 50s at the height of McCarthyism. Paranoia runs rampant against the Communist threat, and apparently with good reason as a whole platoon of KGB goons in US Army uniforms drive freely around the country seeking paranormal artifacts kept in cold storage in Area 51. Indy himself becomes a victim of the witchhunt due to his unwilling involvement with the Area 51 incident, and having previously lost Marcus Brody and Dr Jones Sr., and recently his tenure at the University, decides to start a new life across the Atlantic.

His journey east gets interrupted by Mutt, a young, leather-clad biker and school-dropout, who brings news that an old colleague and friend is in danger, so off they go to a family reunion of sorts in the jungles of South America.

Spielberg ties both modern and ancient mythology in this episode as Indy discovers a link between the ancient culture of the Meso-Americas and the Roswell incident of 1947. Apart from his escapades in fast moving vehicles on the edge of a precipiece, quicksand, army ants and the usual company of heavily-accented gun-totting goons, Indy movies are fun to watch because they invent answers to some of the mysteries left behind by our long-lost and forgotten ancestors whose technological prowess we tend to underestimate.

In Crystal Skull, we glimpse deiety in yet another form, though this time one that is less than traditionally conventional. From this perspective, the story gets quite a bit hokey with lots of plot loopholes. Like for example, what were the crystal skulls doing together for a thousand years before one got stolen; then when the one is finally returned, what's the reason for all the sudden fireworks? Action and adventure get a heavier weightage than a coherent storyline, but that's Indy.

Ultimately, Crystal Skull is commercial fluff. It's addictive, like a bucket of warm popcorn, and offers as much nutritional value.