Saturday, February 20, 2010
The Culling Season
Prior to the Chinese Lunar new year, people traditionally like to do a spring clean to welcome the arrival of spring. So they go about uncluttering their space, chuck out the old stuff and do a big clean out.
It occurs to me that this is what seems to be happening TO me in the facebook sphere. In the span of one week during this Chinese new year festive season, I did my sporadic click to see where my list of 200+ friends are at in their lives. I have 2 people who have dropped me. God knows how many more have done so since I don't keep count of the number of facebook "friends" I keep.
Thanks to internet technology, I no longer have to REALLY keep in touch with anyone to keep in touch with them. Which suits me fine. As you readers probably figure by now, I am mostly a recluse(in my own self absorbed world- as DL would comment resentfully at times since it's all about ME)in my day to day life with no desire to socialise unless I absolutely have to. Well, of course barring a few selected friends that I get on well with, which I meet on a routinely schedule, like on late night shopping Fridays. You see, I am a creature of habit here in Sad Town who hate to be disrupted in how I organise my time and schedule do do my OWN things, except when it comes to business matters which I have no control over my diary as things often pick up within 48 hours with little notice.
Yeah, so Faceboook was a dream come true for a mapper like me, connections upon connections. I am never too faraway from keeping on top of social news back home and dropping the occasional "how's it going" wall messages to keep in touch. The best thing is I don't really have to keep in touch but am still keeping in touch, watching fro a distance, like a voyeur...;)
In a span of a week, as I was doing my routine check on what's happening in people's lives back home (versus my non-existent sedated life in Sad Town so living vicariously off others become quite an enjoyment for someone with a massive social inertia like me), I noticed that 2 "friends" on my list have taken me off their list.
Hmm, tis the culling season.
Maybe I am not too cool for these people since I have long been missing in action on the local social scene. Or maybe one of them HATES me!;(
One particular person who dropped me had the privilege of being on my msn list (I keep a VERY lean list) is one prominent socialite who made the effort to keep in touch and invite me out to events when I was back home. Strange though, when I first met her at a party, she came up and chatted to me and as I am rather "foreign", I didn't know she was a prominent so and so's daughter (though I knew of the father from my years of following society and Tatler news so I was more familiar with the names of the older generation.) I actually found this girl to be rather trying- there was something about her that I didn't trust or take a particular fondness for (although I am one who can be quick to make fast girly friends with people). But she was so nice along the way, sincere to meet up the next time I was back home that I figured she wasn't so bad after all.
One particular incident never fails to leave my memory on the last time we met. As with such outings, these people never stop getting photographed or getting trigger happy with their slim cameras of themselves and their entourage. This particular socialite and I were posed together for a number of pictures. She whispered to me to lean forward because she had "a big head" and didn't want the camera to take her full front face. But truth is, despite her tall and slender legs and body, she has a big face. For that very instant, I found her extremely vain and self centered for the lack of a better word.
I don't even know why I mention this but there was something funny in this above episode. I don't paricularly like the shape of my face either (my main gripe about my looks though I am not complaining about my facial features). It made me realise these people was really a different breed altogether. They do take themselves and how they look on the photos quite seriously. And she is not even the only one I have met. There are always socialites and wannabes who take photos at a particular angle without fail with such deliberate efforts.
Again, I am somewhat amused. Perhaps that is what distincts my attitude from theirs. Apart from my prissy dressing when I hit the town up to my nines, I haven't got what they have in me. Well, I guess I don't take myself too seriously. Even the pics tagged onto my facebook are as they are. No photo shop, hardly any cool and flattering angles. They were captured in the moment as P being the way P is. That's what I love about them....;)
OK, I have just disgressed.
So what I meant to say was I should never have mistrusted my first instinct because I always learn to be sorry if I let my guard down with all creatures, big and small. In life and business as we all learn- ignore your awareness at your own peril.
I should probably start culling some people myself.
New year, new life and drop the old acquaintainces...;)
Happy Chinese New Year to all!:D
Prior to the Chinese Lunar new year, people traditionally like to do a spring clean to welcome the arrival of spring. So they go about uncluttering their space, chuck out the old stuff and do a big clean out.
It occurs to me that this is what seems to be happening TO me in the facebook sphere. In the span of one week during this Chinese new year festive season, I did my sporadic click to see where my list of 200+ friends are at in their lives. I have 2 people who have dropped me. God knows how many more have done so since I don't keep count of the number of facebook "friends" I keep.
Thanks to internet technology, I no longer have to REALLY keep in touch with anyone to keep in touch with them. Which suits me fine. As you readers probably figure by now, I am mostly a recluse(in my own self absorbed world- as DL would comment resentfully at times since it's all about ME)in my day to day life with no desire to socialise unless I absolutely have to. Well, of course barring a few selected friends that I get on well with, which I meet on a routinely schedule, like on late night shopping Fridays. You see, I am a creature of habit here in Sad Town who hate to be disrupted in how I organise my time and schedule do do my OWN things, except when it comes to business matters which I have no control over my diary as things often pick up within 48 hours with little notice.
Yeah, so Faceboook was a dream come true for a mapper like me, connections upon connections. I am never too faraway from keeping on top of social news back home and dropping the occasional "how's it going" wall messages to keep in touch. The best thing is I don't really have to keep in touch but am still keeping in touch, watching fro a distance, like a voyeur...;)
In a span of a week, as I was doing my routine check on what's happening in people's lives back home (versus my non-existent sedated life in Sad Town so living vicariously off others become quite an enjoyment for someone with a massive social inertia like me), I noticed that 2 "friends" on my list have taken me off their list.
Hmm, tis the culling season.
Maybe I am not too cool for these people since I have long been missing in action on the local social scene. Or maybe one of them HATES me!;(
One particular person who dropped me had the privilege of being on my msn list (I keep a VERY lean list) is one prominent socialite who made the effort to keep in touch and invite me out to events when I was back home. Strange though, when I first met her at a party, she came up and chatted to me and as I am rather "foreign", I didn't know she was a prominent so and so's daughter (though I knew of the father from my years of following society and Tatler news so I was more familiar with the names of the older generation.) I actually found this girl to be rather trying- there was something about her that I didn't trust or take a particular fondness for (although I am one who can be quick to make fast girly friends with people). But she was so nice along the way, sincere to meet up the next time I was back home that I figured she wasn't so bad after all.
One particular incident never fails to leave my memory on the last time we met. As with such outings, these people never stop getting photographed or getting trigger happy with their slim cameras of themselves and their entourage. This particular socialite and I were posed together for a number of pictures. She whispered to me to lean forward because she had "a big head" and didn't want the camera to take her full front face. But truth is, despite her tall and slender legs and body, she has a big face. For that very instant, I found her extremely vain and self centered for the lack of a better word.
I don't even know why I mention this but there was something funny in this above episode. I don't paricularly like the shape of my face either (my main gripe about my looks though I am not complaining about my facial features). It made me realise these people was really a different breed altogether. They do take themselves and how they look on the photos quite seriously. And she is not even the only one I have met. There are always socialites and wannabes who take photos at a particular angle without fail with such deliberate efforts.
Again, I am somewhat amused. Perhaps that is what distincts my attitude from theirs. Apart from my prissy dressing when I hit the town up to my nines, I haven't got what they have in me. Well, I guess I don't take myself too seriously. Even the pics tagged onto my facebook are as they are. No photo shop, hardly any cool and flattering angles. They were captured in the moment as P being the way P is. That's what I love about them....;)
OK, I have just disgressed.
So what I meant to say was I should never have mistrusted my first instinct because I always learn to be sorry if I let my guard down with all creatures, big and small. In life and business as we all learn- ignore your awareness at your own peril.
I should probably start culling some people myself.
New year, new life and drop the old acquaintainces...;)
Happy Chinese New Year to all!:D
Friday, February 12, 2010
Legend
Nothing saddens me more than learning that yet another legend departs from the world.
So I got an email from my old school in Paris today informing me that Alexander McQueen is dead. He is only 40. Cause of death appears to be unnatural.
At one stage, he lectured at our school. I didn't have the privilege to be taught by him when I was there.
The news that most saddened me was when Yves St Laurent passed away. That year, when I went to Paris, he had retired from Rive Gauche. I had the privilege to visit his museum and archives not accessible to the general public. It was an eyeful for a budding design student like me to be able to witness the years of years of couture and milinery collection one sees on the runway on TV. I was a few millimetres close to these items, only we were not allow to touch them as we walk through the narrow aisles of wadrobes with hanging outfits in chronological order from the time they first made their appearance on the fashion runway. I stuck out my index finger and secretly swept it past the sights of my outfit to re-affirm that my experience there was real. I was in Paris and this close to these outfits adorned by supermodels and designed by this fashion legend. Then my teacher, a talented man who used to work in one of the legendary French couture house before being headhunted by JPG noticed me and shook his tsk tsk finger at me to refrain from me from my action...
*****
Amidst a significant crisis in my life due to my not-seem-to-be-working-well business, I find myself gaining solace and contentment from designing, sewing and creating new garments.
Coincidentally, the other day I received an out of the blue email from a fashion recruiter. He got my contact from my school in Paris and wrote to see if I was interested to apply for a product developer/ designer job in Shanghai for a high end Swedish knitwear company with presence throughout Europe.
I love knitwear and most importantly, I am equally serious about the quality of the knitwear that I used to wear and by. So in that sense, I do know something about knitwear. I was in fashion retail for awhile and we sold knitwear so I do know what sells.
It's a bit like the law of attraction. The stars are trying to get aligned in my interest.
No one from the old school ever write to me officially. Well, apart from old friends who write the occasional personal email to see how things are going on my end and vice versa.
But it's strange.
Two emails from my school in 3 days.
My Parisian experience is eons ago, like some 5.5 years. I almost need to pinch myself to confirm that it was real- me organising a magazine event at Maxim's, drink moet champagne and rubbing shoulders with fabulously tall and beautiful people... then those thankless days working quietly (mostly alone) in the atelier listening to "It's a lovely day" as the rain pitter patter out of my window on Rue Remur and those hapless one night stands, affairs, drunken, weed high nights...
I almost think I have been dreaming...
Feels like I had lived another lifetime.
Nothing saddens me more than learning that yet another legend departs from the world.
So I got an email from my old school in Paris today informing me that Alexander McQueen is dead. He is only 40. Cause of death appears to be unnatural.
At one stage, he lectured at our school. I didn't have the privilege to be taught by him when I was there.
The news that most saddened me was when Yves St Laurent passed away. That year, when I went to Paris, he had retired from Rive Gauche. I had the privilege to visit his museum and archives not accessible to the general public. It was an eyeful for a budding design student like me to be able to witness the years of years of couture and milinery collection one sees on the runway on TV. I was a few millimetres close to these items, only we were not allow to touch them as we walk through the narrow aisles of wadrobes with hanging outfits in chronological order from the time they first made their appearance on the fashion runway. I stuck out my index finger and secretly swept it past the sights of my outfit to re-affirm that my experience there was real. I was in Paris and this close to these outfits adorned by supermodels and designed by this fashion legend. Then my teacher, a talented man who used to work in one of the legendary French couture house before being headhunted by JPG noticed me and shook his tsk tsk finger at me to refrain from me from my action...
*****
Amidst a significant crisis in my life due to my not-seem-to-be-working-well business, I find myself gaining solace and contentment from designing, sewing and creating new garments.
Coincidentally, the other day I received an out of the blue email from a fashion recruiter. He got my contact from my school in Paris and wrote to see if I was interested to apply for a product developer/ designer job in Shanghai for a high end Swedish knitwear company with presence throughout Europe.
I love knitwear and most importantly, I am equally serious about the quality of the knitwear that I used to wear and by. So in that sense, I do know something about knitwear. I was in fashion retail for awhile and we sold knitwear so I do know what sells.
It's a bit like the law of attraction. The stars are trying to get aligned in my interest.
No one from the old school ever write to me officially. Well, apart from old friends who write the occasional personal email to see how things are going on my end and vice versa.
But it's strange.
Two emails from my school in 3 days.
My Parisian experience is eons ago, like some 5.5 years. I almost need to pinch myself to confirm that it was real- me organising a magazine event at Maxim's, drink moet champagne and rubbing shoulders with fabulously tall and beautiful people... then those thankless days working quietly (mostly alone) in the atelier listening to "It's a lovely day" as the rain pitter patter out of my window on Rue Remur and those hapless one night stands, affairs, drunken, weed high nights...
I almost think I have been dreaming...
Feels like I had lived another lifetime.
