Playing Tennis in Algiers

I began playing tennis in Algiers at Unite Golf Club at Cheraga.

It was a weekend Friday so there was no work.

I haven't played tennis for years. The last time I picked up a real tennis racket, it was during a physical education during junior college years. Although, I "practiced" some tennis moves on a Wii in my colleague's Beirut apartment occasionally.

In reality, I have no inkling about tennis, other than Sharapova is really eye candy. In the words of one team-mate, Pablo, we pretend to play.

It is an understatement because Pablo is one of the best players among us. Or perhaps the rest of us really sucked?

After several games, I do realize that I'm have a consistent form when it comes to hitting the net, hitting the ball out of court or failing to hit the ball at all.

My failure rate to hit the ball was more pronounced when I was on the receiving end of service from Mike, our number 2 player, who incidently is an excellent badminton player who had done some coaching in Japan, and therefore, doubtlessly, packs a powerful serve.

Then there are our two Japanese team-mates, Terada and Tsuchiya. Terada is reportedly an excellent baseball player, which explained his donning of baseball attire even when he was playing tennis.

Terada also has a real talent for humour. Once, he mimicked the throwing style of famous Japanese players. Unfortunately, I'm clueless when it comes to baseball or the game's famous personalities. But he looked really funny so the humour was not lost.

Tsuchiya san is really a nice team-mate to have. Among the team, he and I had been in Algeria the longest. Super nice guy with a good sense of humour. The Algerians also never forget his name once they were introduce to him, because his family name is similarly sounding to an Algerian traditional musical instrument.

Encouragingly, my gym sessions in Beirut were beginning to pay off. After running after balls that I failed to hit (it happened a lot!), I was able to maintain some level of fitness. Yey, me and gym membership!

Interestingly, the tennis courts at the golf course don't come with electric lighting. As evening approaches, we found that we could not see the ball very well anymore and have to stop the game. No offense but is this really a golf club?!

After tennis, it was a spicy Thai dinner at the newly opened Bangkok Thai branch near Deli Ibrahim.

The following are some pictures:

Pre-Game
I was invited by Mike (Thu san) to his guesthouse for lunch. It was curry chicken and fried eggs, nicely concluded with a delicious melon and Hagen Daaz! I simply right the watermelons in Algeria. The sweetest!


Unite Golf Club @ Cheraga, Algiers

Front entrance
Part of the club house and restaurant

Doing our warmups
Pablo (left) and Terada (right) in his baseball attire
Mike (left) is our badminton expert and Tsuchiya (right) is named after a musical instrument.

*This entry is post-dated to 3 Aug '08, as I didn't have internet access to upload. Incidentally, this is my last visit to Algeria.

Movies: The Forbidden Kingdom & Kung Fu Panda

I'm still in Beirut.

One of the perks for being in Beirut is that I can go to the movies.

Singaporeans are avid movie goers. We have the highest movie-going rate in the world. According to a 2006 source, on average, we watch 8 movies a year.* The national average might be more now. If that is true, then after arriving to the MENA region, my annual movie-going rate had fallen below the 2006 national average at about 6 movies/year. When I was traveling in North Africa, I missed out on a lot of movie releases.

In North Africa, I did not have the opportunities to visit the movie theatres out of reasons of personal choice and time.

In Algiers, I passed by a movie theatre in downtown several times although I had never watched a movie there. The movie played there are probably voiced-over in French so I cannot understand. Also, the movie theatre did not look inviting to me.

I did try watching a movie once in Morocco and it was a big turn-off. I watched the Da Vinci Code in Megarama, a cineplex in Casablanca. As expected, it was entirely in French. Plus the theatre didn't have AC that day and the air got very stuffy.

Anyway, I always go to the movies as often as I can whenever I'm back in Beirut.

=====================================
During the past 2 weeks, I saw two movies in Beirut: The Forbidden Kingdom and Kung Fu Panda. Incidently, both were about kung-fu.

The Fobidden Kingdom



What can I say about a movie that casted Asia's titanic martial arts actors - Jet Li and Jackie Chan?

Suffice to say, I went into the movie with pretty low expectations.

Without a doubt Jackie Chan movies are always awesome in the fight scenes and martial arts choreography but terribly weak in plot. In Chan’s movies, the plot is just an excuse to link all the spectacular fight scenes together.

If you grew up watching his movies like I did, then a time will come when you could not expect anything new.

His roles are always similar (90% of the time, a police hero). Reluctant hero forced to fight by circumstances. There are new death defying stunts every time but his acting never improved. Arguably, his recent stunt scenes had gotten less spectacular when compared to some of the incredible stuff he had done in the '80s.

As for Jet Li, I still think that his best movie role ever was his debut in "Shaolin Temple". He was great in "Once Upon A Time In China" for his portrayal of Wong Fei Hong. It reignited popular interest in the legendary Chinese folk hero and several movie sequels. Then he was again great in his portrayal of another folk hero, Huo Yuan Jia, in "Fearless". In this role, he managed to show another sensitive depth to his acting.

I found his latest role as "Monk/ Monkey god" trite. He looks uninspired, overweight and overage to be monkey god. Forgive me for being bland but his bad complexion showed prominently throughout the movie. If he wants to continue to make it in Hollywood as a leading man, I think he should consider using some of that Hollywood magic, no?

Perhaps now you can understand why I went to the movie without any expectations. And yet I was disappointed even further by the movie.

The story was weak. Basically a coming of age story about an American kung-fu aficionado who got teleported? to ancient China (presumably) on a quest to save the stone encasted monkey god by returning his staff to his statue. During the quest, he found travelling companions in the likes of Drunken Immortal (Jackie Chan), Monk (Jet Li), who taught him Kung-fu 101 and Swallow (Liu Yifei), a potential love interest or to add a feminine aspect. The main antagonist, the Jade Warlord, whose treachery was the reason behind monkey god's imprisonment, is pulling all stops to impede the protagonists.

Beyond the special effects, modern English dialogue, the plot reeks of the stereotypical coming of age and revenge plot elements as popularized in the 70s & 80s kung-fu movies. I get more complex and moving plots when playing Final Fantasy on Playstation!

The names of characters like Drunken Immortal, Golden Swallow and White-hair Assassin are not new. Their characterizations were but pale shadows/ diluted amalgams of iconic heroes/villains in popular Asian movies and novels. In fact, a lot of these characters had so much more depth and backstory that were left undeveloped in the course of the movie due to lack of screen time. It is like putting the Hulk, Spiderman and Batman in a same movie so that you get all the action and nothing of the backstory. Perhaps, spin-offs are in the making? (Think The Mummy Returns and The Scorpion King).

Of course, it can be said that kung-fu movies are all about the action and not the plot. If so, the highlight of the movie would be the extended fight scene between Jet Li's Monk and Jackie Chan's Drunken Immortal. For me, that fight scene didn't work so well. The figh scene between Uma Thurman's character and the Crazy 88s in Kill Bill was more memorable than this one. I was actually waiting for it to be over and get on with the story.

Although the film was not a hit for me, online ratings gave it moderate review ratings.

=====================================
Kung Fu Panda


I had a better time watching this animated movie than the previous movie.

What do I like about this movie?

Firstly, the production quality was great and it showed. According to the wikipedia write-up, the production design, animation and even the music were created after extensive research on Chinese art and culture. Yet, the end result was not a rip-off but a very original movie that pays tribute to its Asian roots.

Secondly, the voice acting was good. Big names like Angelina Jolie and Dustin Hoffman were attached to the voice of the characters. This is hardly new news in the movie industry. What I think worked for the movie was that the voice-actors had a lot of self respect by not spoofing the Asian accent in speaking English.

Thirdly, it was funny. The movie came from the same studio that delivered the Shrek franchise, so I would be sorely disappointed if there were no punch lines in the movie. Granted, it wasn’t hilarious funny but there were some funny moments that helped advancing the plot well. I thought the funniest scene in the movie was the acupuncture scene between panda, tigress and mantis.

I read that sequels are in the pipeline. Yey! =D

* This source, quoting a 2003 Unesco study, put Singapore in 6th place in movie attendance per capita, behind Iceland, US, N. Zealand, Georgia, Australia. Lebanon comes in at 10th place. Morocco in 49th and Algeria in 76th.

Toyota Man Died Of Overwork

Photo credit: Luxomedia

Saw this piece of news on Yahoo Singapore this morning. An engineer working on Camry hybrid has died of "karoshi", which in Japanese means literally, death from fatigue due to overwork.

The victim, whose name, had been witheld by Toyota Motor Corporation (TMC) was said to have clocked 80 hours of overtime per month in the two months leading to his death.

TMC has stated officially that it will improve it's monitoring of it's employees health.

Japanese society which place a lot of emphasis on values like working hard and placing team before self, karoshi has been a growing trend in the official records for the past few decades since early 90s.

I remembered a chat several years ago with a TMC employee from product development. I was told that the company has started then to limit overtime work by monitoring individual employees' working hours.

Employees were required to clock in and out on a daily basis so that their bosses, and sometime corporate HR, could monitor the number of hours worked. Employees who wished to perform overtime work has to get approval from his/her superior!

Being the worker bees that they are, TMC employees were known to circumvent the system. For instance, an employee starting work at 10:30 am under the flexi-hour scheme, would report to work earlier at 8:00am but clock-in at 10:30am. So on paper, it looked as if he/she reported to work on time whereas in fact, this employee has already performed 2.5hrs overtime.

Similarly, employees were also known to clock-off on time but stayed behind to work. As there was simply too much work to do, the bosses tend to be more lenient when it comes to enforcing the overtime limit.

Letting the employees bring the work home to limit overtime work was not a viable option because of the sensitive and confidential work information that the employees were handling.

It blew my mind when I heard this. Throughout my work life, it is usual to know of colleagues who were late but got their colleagues to clock-in on time for them to aviod a pay deduction penalty. In Algeria, truancy was so rampant that the company had to install a fingerprint scanning system for employee clock-in & out!

It is extremely rare to learn of employees who perform more overtime than they should and let it go unreported, considering that working harder is good for performance evaluation. Only in Japan!

The Japanese worker is an epitome of the selfless, dedicated samurai who places his/her team above all else. Stubborn and anal retentive, yes, but nevertheless responsible and dependable. Of course, I do personally know of exceptional cases but it's a valid generalization.

During business trips in Japan, I could experienced several very brief stints of the nerve-wrecking, high pressurizing work culture there. I really hope that major Japanese companies could really review the work environment and work curcumstances in the interest of their employees' health, social and family life.

LABOR BUREAU: JAPANESE MAN, 45, DIED OF
OVERWORK
By JAY ALABASTER, Associated Press WriterWed Jul 9, 4:08
PM ET

A Japanese labor bureau has ruled that one of Toyota's top car
engineers died from working too many hours, the latest in a string of such
findings in a nation where extraordinarily long hours for some employees has
long been the norm.

The man who died was aged 45 and had been under severe
pressure as the lead engineer in developing a hybrid version of Toyota's
blockbuster Camry line, said Mikio Mizuno, the lawyer representing his wife. The
man's identity is being withheld at the request of his family, who continue to
live in Toyota City where the company is based.

In the two months up to his death, the man averaged more than
80 hours of overtime per month, according to Mizuno.

He regularly worked nights and weekends, was frequently sent
abroad and was grappling with shipping a model for the pivotal North American
International Auto Show in Detroit when he died of ischemic heart disease in
January 2006. The man's daughter found his body at their home the day before he
was to leave for the United States.

The ruling was handed down June 30 and will allow his family
to collect benefits from his work insurance, Mizuno said.

An officer at the Aichi Labor Bureau on Wednesday confirmed
the ruling, but declined to comment on the record.

In a statement, Toyota Motor Corp. offered its condolences and
said it would work to improve monitoring of the health of its
workers.

There is an effort in Japan to cut down on deaths from
overwork, known as "karoshi." Such deaths have steadily increased since the
Health Ministry first recognized the phenomenon in 1987.

Last year, a court in central Japan ordered the government to
pay compensation to Hiroko Uchino, the wife of a Toyota employee who collapsed
at work and died at age 30 in 2002. She took the case to court after her
application to the local labor bureau for compensation was
rejected.

Office Humor

If you use MS Excel to generate graphs at work like I do, you may appreciate the creative graphs on this awesome site: Graph Jam: Pop Culture for People in Cubicles

Here's a few personal favourites...=)

Internet Connection in Beirut

This is the internet connection speed in my office on good days. You should see the connection speed at my apartment, the connection speed test screen won't even load sometimes. I heard most of Lebanon is still on dial-up speed. Sigh...

(reference: http://www.internetfrog.com)

Viva Espana

Spain 1:0 Germany; Torres (33)

Fortunately, the power cuts that plagues Beirut for 6 hours daily did not affect the live broadcasting of Euro Cup matches on TV.

Euro Cup ended yesterday with Spain become crowned as champions, ending a 44 year wait. In my opinion, the Spaniards rightly deserved to win with their stylish play and tight ball passing.

In the words of a colleague: "Good bye Euro '08 .... Welcome Olympics 2008!"

Pictures: A Beyrouth 22 June '08

For once, my flight was on time. I was able to arrive in Beirut in time for 2nd half of the Spain vs Italy match in Euro '08 quarter-finals. To my delight, Spain won.

Algerian boy

Cabin

My seat: Air Algerie flights have many damaged seats in the economy class

Close up

Bangkok Thai: Restaurant Thailandais

I kid you not, this was on the menu of Bangkok Thai, the Thai restaurant in Draria, Algiers which I frequent. I think the restaurant is making a huge mistake on it's menu.....like erm...Satay is not Thai food?

Having said that, Bangkok Thai is one of my favourite restaurant in Algiers. It is the only restaurant I know that serves decent Thai food. No surprise here since the entire kitchen crew hails from Thailand.

Catering to local palette, the taste was scaled down so the food is not as spicy as true Thai fare, and also it is a lot saltier. But after dinning there several times, the chef, perhaps, learnt about our preference and tends to be more generous with the chilli and will do away the extra salt or MSG.

The Tom Yum (Mixed seafood soup with coconut milk) must not be missed. I never fail to order it because I felt it combines the best of both worlds: authentic Thai cooking and fresh Algerian squid. I usually give away the prawns to my dinner companions because of my allergy. The fragrantly wok-fried Kao Pad avec Viande (Fried Rice with meat) is another favourite.

Tom Yum Khom with Algerian squid

Appetisers: Satay and fried spring rolls

Main: Fried rice (back); (front): Pa Ka Pow beef (left) & green curry / cari vert (right)

One flip side though, the Pa Ka Pow (Stir fried) beef is not authentic but nevertheless delicious. Everytime I order the dish, it came tasting more Chinese than Thai. This could be due to the miscommunication between the Algerian waiters and the cooks because I think I'm being served another dish on the menu - Stir fried beef with oyster sauce.

But one can hardly fault the kind and gentle Algerian waiters there. By local standards, their customer service standard in Bangkok Thai is one of the best I've seen so far. That's if I go easy on the mandatory long waiting time and the frustrating communication barriers, of course. But these happens everywhere in Algeria.

The interior of the restaurant is decorated with memorabilia that seemed to have come from Bangkok's Chatuchak bazaar. What I like is that the place is kept clean and odorless. As with most restaurants in Algeria, ventilation is bad. Restaurant dining areas are filled with strong smells straight from the kitchens. This is not so obvious in Bangkok Thai.

The restaurant also provide a saloon for customers to relax. During hot months, there are two sheltered tables in the outdoors but there is no view. I'm told that there is a massage palour complete with a Thai masseur on the second floor of the restaurant. The service is provided only for women only (because the masseur cannot touch men?!).

Restaurant Bangkok Thai

Outdoor dinner area

Overall, I like this restaurant despite some drawbacks. Especially, I'm not used to paying such a high price for the kind of Thai food served in the restaurant, which, in Thailand are considered standard fare. (5 000 DA or 72 USD for 3 persons). But anyone in Algeria who enjoys good Thai food, Bangkok Thai is a must try.

Bangkok Thai
Restaurant Thailandais
Lot. "C" No 71 Draria - Alger
Tel: 0221354897 / 0552984940 / 0770925050

Les Les Orange

cava pas

Saw the breathtaking match between Netherlands and France last evening over a BBQ at my colleague's place. Not only did I get BBQ wings, I also got my wish. Les Bleus got their French butts whipped by the Orange Army!

YEYYYYYY!!!!! =D

So now Netherlands can safely proceed into the next round in Euro 2008 after defeating France 4 goals to 1, an incredible feat that well complements the stunning victory over World Cup champions Italy.

France and Italy are now facing possible elimination this early in the games. Both teams now have to fight hard with each other in their next game to gain points. Both teams might get a chance if Romania doesn't beat the Dutch in their match also on the same day.

I can't wait to watch the two matches to see which is the next team, in the group of death, that will qualify.

victory!

Picture source: http://www.dailymail.co.uk

Update (21 June):

And the Dutch are out! =(
Their fitness just weren't able to compare to the energetic Russian side in extra time. The Russians won the game 3:1 to go into semi-finals.

Prague (Part 3)

As promised, I'm going to blog about my European trip. This entry is about my second day (24 Apr '08) in Prague, Czech Republic.

This day in Prague was spent quite leisurely. I didn't have to go for training at the local office until the late afternoon.

So with a map, a camera and a bottle of water in a backpack, I went out walking. My target was to go to Prague Castle on foot.

The weather wasn't as cold as initially forecasted, but at below 15 degrees celsius, a light jacket was necessary to keep the wind out.

Along the way, I was treated to beautiful buildings and scenery reflecting an old central European charm. I also encountered a park along the way that presented some nice photographic moments.

Tram

Street along Mala Strana

Sculptures in park along Mala Strana

Park

Eventually I made my way to St. Nicholas Church at Lesser Town (Mala Strana). Facing the church was a row of pubs and restaurant that looked really appealing. I reminded myself to come this way on the return trip to try one restaurant there.

Observing a concert queue formed outside the church, I vaguely remembered that central Europe was famous for their love of classical philharmonic music (unverified knowledge). It occured to me that it would be a pleasureable experience to enjoy a concert here. However, this time, I didn't have the right company nor the time for it.

St Nicholas Church

St Nicholas Church

Concert goers at St Nicholas Church

Statue near St Nicholas Church

Passing the St. Nicholas Church, up a steep sloping road that eventually led me on a left turn around more restaurants and finally Up the a steep flight of stairs, I arrived to the Prague Castle at last.

By that time, I had already covered about 4 km on foot, including some very steep stair climbing. Forgot to mention that in the morning, I had a 2.4km morning run and some exercise at the hotel gym and the legs were already aching.

So I was quite tired and seriously entertaining the thought of hailing a taxi for the return trip.

Prague Castle - Hradcany
Glimpse of Prague Castle

When I arrived, I was in time to catch the the changing of guard parade. A band was playing on the second floor on the right during the parade.

Changing of the guard parade

It was mentioned in Lonely Planet that the uniform of the guard was designed by the costume designer for the film Amadeus. Nice!

Prague castle is an amazing place! It is the largest castle in the world and has been for a long time, the seat of the country's government, including the current president. Inside the castle is a complex of buildings each reflecting different architectural styles, creating a captivating ambience.

My personal favourite building is the cathedral of St. Vitus. The sight of this gothic church looming over other buildings added a forboding and eerie dimension to the beauty of the place.

Unfortunately, I was not able to enter the church because I didn't have any Czech crowns on me as I didn't want to break my 500 Euro notes. There was also a long queue of waiting tourists outside the cathedral and I didn't have so much time.

Prague Castle entrance displaying statues of clashing titans

St Vitus Cathedral

St Vitus Cathedral

St Vitus Cathedral

St Vitus Cathedral

Street Cafe at Prague Castle

An Idle Noon

Lunch
Pivnice U Glaubicu - Czech Pub

Honoring my promise to self, I made my way back to the row of restaurants near St. Nicholas Church for lunch. I chose one that has a name I cannot even pronounce. From outside, it looked like a traditional pub diner but I realized there were more extensions that housed several more dining chambers inside, making it bigger than I've imagined.

In Singapore, when we dine with our Muslim friends, we try to avoid non-halal food out of respect. Yesterday while dinning with my Algerian colleague, I stuck to ordering halal food, although I had some beer. This time, since I was eating lunch by myself, I had no qualms about ordering anything. I've been dying to try the popular traditional Czech dishes of roasted pork and duck.

Lunch: vegetable soup & Pilsner

Lunch: Roasted Pork Knuckle

I chose roasted pork knuckles over the duck. The serving size of half a duck would be too much for me. The pub's customer service was slow so I had to wait for my lunch. After relieving the mug of half its pilsner, my roasted pork knuckle at last landed in front of me. Weighing almost 1 kg, I ate heartily and sumptuously. The Czechs really know how to prepare their meat and I thought that I could definitely live here comfortably. Food compatibility is important to me.

The heavy lunch was definitely the culprit for making me sleepy during the rest of the day. In addition, I became tired from the walk back to the hotel. In total I covered 10 km in distance by running and walking in just half a day.

During the training, I had to rely on a few cups of coffee to keep myself attentive. I could barely work up an appetite and had little for dinner in the evening, even though it was a amazing restaurant, named Cowboy, with an excellent night view of the city.

To be continued...