Teardrops on My Qatar

For some reason, Qatar has always sounded like 'guitar' to me. I'm sure it's not just me. It's just no-one else is brave enough to admit to thinking such stupid thoughts.

So yeah. About that Qatar.

Ridiculous. I wouldn't have been that peeved if some other more worthy nation got it. USA or something. Even Japan or Korea.

Apart from revenue and more convenient broadcasting times, I fail to see how Qatar has any advantage over Australia whatsoever. This is assuming that they will actually be able to successfully host the World Cup at all.

Which brings me to my next point. All the other nations, or at least the ones that I'm aware of, have hosted major sporting events. They already have facilities. They also don't have scorching heat, or lack of people and space. For revenue and broadcasting times to have an iota of relevance, the World Cup actually needs to function as an event.

To be honest, this whole voting process stinks. Who are these people, and who are they to decide where it's going to go? The votes are made blatantly without the interests of football as a whole. Even Australia, a nation who commentators have said are unable to be as dirty as other nations, bought pearl necklaces and other such things for officials' partners.

You've got a guy like Beckenbauer who, while he is a great guy, I believe is not exactly qualified to vote on things like these. It's not just him, but he's the most prominent voting member, apart from Sepp "female football players should wear more revealing kits" Blatter.

The problem is the whole process is open to corruption. You've got essentially random voting delegates, who are clearly not voting for the best interests of football, and a nation with almost limitless amounts of money and no defining advantage over the other nations, winning the right to host a World Cup. A little bit suspect, if you ask me.

Also, in English, the word 'Qatar' actually shouldn't exist. Lack of a 'u' and all that. I think that's reason enough to give it to someone else. It's still not too late.

More footballing stuff, to cap off what has been an unbelievable few days. To recap, I passed all my exams, went to the U2/Jay-Z gig, and my grandfather brought me back a brand new Arsenal jersey from Hong Kong. Arsenal being top of the league just seals it. What an amazing turnaround. Who would've predicted it, when we were millions of points behind Chelsea at one stage? Marvelous stuff, football. And Nasri is truly amazing. He reminds me of a ballet dancer. Except more masculine. Watch him here:

I love how he's making a habit of scoring goals from ridiculous angles. Or trying to score from ridiculous angles. I think it was against Sp*rs, where he tried it, but it got cleared off the line. But yes. He's becoming great.

The only downer is a slightly scratched my car yesterday while parking to have lunch with Victor and Meng in Glen Waverley. I still have no idea how it happened. I thought there was acres of space between the pole and my car, but apparently there wasn't, and I heard a sickening 'scraaaaaaaape'. But otherwise, the past few days have been some of the happiest few days in a row I have ever had. Thank-you to all who have been there, not only during these past few days, but the days before that, and before them as well, when I was struggling big time. Cheers.

Word of the Day: Qatar

Choc top bonanza

Just continuing on yesterday's theme/topic, it also annoys me quite a bit that I almost always have to organise stuff to do with other people, and it's hardly ever the other way around. So this lack of contacting other people is kind of my way of protesting against that. If they're fine and dandy without my presence, I'm fine and dandy without theirs too. It just annoys me how it seems as though I'm always wanting to catch up with them, but they don't really want to reciprocate that. Whatever.

Having said all that, last night was a fairly good night with friends, as far as nights with friends go. After having dinner with the James and Yvonne Cheng and family, James and Yvonne Cheng and I went on down to watch The Last Exorcism in Glen Waverley.

Movie was not my choice. Neither was the amount of choc tops we bought. Both decisions, in retrospect, were quite large mistakes. The movie was interesting for the first five minutes, then it was all like, "Why are these people so dumb? Just call the cops!" But it was a slash-and-hacker (a genre of film I detest, by the way), and they never really do make much logical sense. But I guess that's why I don't like them. The funnest part of the whole thing was James and I texting each other during the movie out of sheer boredom.

Also, I spent half the movie wondering where I'd seen the main character girl person. Then it hit me. She looks very similar to Linda Markov. Weird.

Anyway, good times. Hopefully this dinner thing that I'm organising (weird how these things happen, huh) comes off. Doesn't look like it so far, so I'll probably just end up trying to do something constructive instead. Like clean my room. Worst thing is, Sarah, my sister, is leaving for France tomorrow for six weeks, so it'll be like mass boredom when I'm at home and not out doing stuff.

Word of the Day: Dandy

The Irene-y of the situation did not escape me

Irene's 20th last Friday, just for a change of scenery after this massive spate of Twenty-Firsts.

It was quite amusing. She told me to sit next to her, presumably because I didn't know many people there. Then she ended up walking for 99% of the night anyway. It was actually pretty ironically funny. Ironic in a good way.

But it worked out well. Like, not that it was good that she wasn't there most of the time, but I got to talk to people sitting opposite me. Not that I wouldn't have if she'd been there.

The words "digging," "myself" and "hole" come to mind here. For some inexplicable reason.

But yeah, I got to talk to the guy opposite me, and his girlfriend, and we got along fairly well. Jake, his name was. As in, Animorphs. I didn't get his girlfriend's name, but one can't have everything in life. It's a shame I didn't get seated next to that Judy girl. She was quite a looker. But, being the non-shallow person that I am, I do not regret this, because I do not know what she is like as a person. Although it would've been nice to have had the opportunity to find out.

Anyway, I love these situations. It's like a challenge, that I fully intend to meet head-on. See, even when I did get to talk to them, it was always a bit weird, because there were times when they were talking to each other and...let's just say I don't think they wanted to be interrupted. So MTV on the screen behind their heads came to my rescue many times. And my phone. Man, I love my phone. It actually gives me a valid reason for looking at it now.

This situation wasn't my own doing. All the people that I actually knew AND talked to didn't turn up on the night, leaving me isolated and bereft of meaningful and intelligent company.

Just kidding. I just felt like writing a hardcore sentence with big words. But you guys did ditch me a little bit.

But yes, I think I actually excelled at said challenge. And now, like some kind of thrill-seeking addict, I want more. More parties with strangers that I've never talked to before in my life. More MTV. More Glen Waverley food.

I think I'll stop now. Not because I want to, but because I think I'm going to fall asleep at my keyboard in about 5 seconds if I don't. And then, next morning, my parents will be all like "What the hell are you doing there [on your very messy workstation]?" Except in Cantonese. To which I will have no reply. Because I don't know the Cantonese word for blogging, but also because even if I did, it's still not a very good excuse.

So I'm going to go now.

Word of the Day: MTV

Yesterday, when the war didn't began...I'm so funny

So yeah, I was going to talk about my stress, but it's self-inflicted, so I won't. I'll talk about yesterday instead.

Yesterday was a doozy. Managed to watch a movie, finish an assignment, study for a tad, and go to a 21st. Felt almost on top of the world. Almost.

It began like this. I met up with Irene at Glen Waverley Library to do our French culture quiz thing. We got that done in about an hour and a bit, and that was with constant interruptions about my financial woes over the phone as well.

We then had lunch, and studied for a bit. Well, it was more of her teaching me French than actual studying.

Anyway, after that, I went home and got changed into my suit to go see Tomorrow When the War Began.

Just kidding! I actually had James' 21st straight after that. You knew I wouldn't go to the movies in a suit.

Or would I?!

Moving on. Irene kindly came and picked me up at my house (15 mins early too. Silly duffer. Got the time wrong.) We met up with her sister, Elene, and the sort-of surprise guest, her mother (cue How I Met Your Mother pun).

The movie was so-so. The acting was quite forced at times, but the plot was good. My particular gripe was about the Asian guy. Oh my word. Could not act for peanuts, and stereotyped to the max. I mean, the guy has ninja reflexes. Seriously.

So after that, we said our goodbyes, and I moseyed my way on down to James' 21st.

I seriously ate comparatively nothing. I really regret it now. I think it was because I was so intent on talking to people, and doing this and that. The food was quite nice, but for the price, there wasn't a whole lot of variety.

Speeches were good. I didn't end up saying half the things I wanted to, but I'm sure James knows that I value him greatly as a friend, and how great a guy he is. The speech was slightly funny, which is the important thing.

Good night overall. Plenty of friends to catch up with, and good environment. Happy future birthday James.

Rain is falling outside. I was going to use that to do something poetic, but I can't be stuffed. I'm going to go downstairs to get a drink and de-stress myself.

Word of the Day: De-stress

Thanks

And as if just to reinforce the point, Arsenal won against Hull this morning, capping off what turned out to be quite a swell week for me.

If you don't know what I'm talking about, you may recall that I predicted that good week would follow after Arsenal beat Liverpool on the weekend. Read for more information.

By swell, I mean mostly good.

Annual Kris Kringle with A Rotational Roster of People on Thursday night went quite well, except for the timing issues. I have no idea why, on that day, people had to turn up late, leave early, and just generally not fit in with the plan. Must have been a bad day to pick. But apart from that, it all clicked together fairly well. Most things that I plan generally do, I think, except when people mess them up for me.

Anyway, I got a shirt to add to my growing collection (thanks Davy), and Yvonne seemed pleased with what I gave her. I hope. Unless I'm reading the signs wrong again, as I am wont to do. I think everyone else liked the 'things' that I made them, useless and non-functional though they may be, and Linda didn't kill me for defying her direct order not to make her anything, so I guess that worked out alright. All I know is that I've been completely turned off folding stars, at least for a while, and Sicilian salmon with potatoes at Airstream is also getting a bit old. Alas, must find new thrills.

Imesha and Linda bailed halfway through our dinner, so we moseyed on down to the cinema to watch Avatar.

Personally, I didn't like the 3Dness. Apart from the fact that you had to pay an extra dollar to watch 3D (unless you're Yvonne and have five pairs of spare 3D goggles at home), I thought that it actually made most of the movie look worse. I wasn't really feeling the 3D, and when I did, it just looked like one of those dodgy lenticular things you get out of chip packets. It looked less realistic than it would have on a normal screen. Everything just sort of looked stuck on. But it was a good movie. Not that Davy would know. I found out just then that he fell asleep during the film. He's making a habit of this. First New Moon with his girl, then Avatar.

On Friday, nothing much happened, except for Victor coming over and fiddling with my computers, and FIFA 10. Thanks Victor.

Saturday, would've liked to have gone to Kylie's, but no transport/didn't want to trouble other people in giving me a lift/ditched by Victor. Sorry Kylie.

Just then was the NQT Christmas dinner. It was cool. Found out that Catherine is a pretty cool person, and that I'm a pretty terrible person to sit next to at dinner, as I pretty much go quiet. Also, 'Same Girl' is a universally recognised benchmark of an awesome song.

Here's to having more fun-laden and awesome times ahead. It's a shame really, because I have all this free time, and no-one to spend it with. Guess I'll just practice my newly-acquired guitar (thanks for the Christmas present parents) and my grandpa clarinet. Perhaps working out more. But definitely no more folding of stars.

Word of the Day: Thanks