book- old souls by Tom Shroder

This book just reaffirmed my belief for the existence of past lives. Yet as much as it answers some of my questions (eg: can people know their past lives without going through hypnotic regression/ do past lives really exist/how do you tell/ as much as I want to believe, I still kind of doubt it/ I am still skeptical) , it brought up more questions (eg: does everyone gets reborn/why can some people retain their memories like these kids and why do people like me have absolutely no other memories except maybe some phobia like being afraid of staircases possibly being linked to past lives?/how do one go through this process)

I really respect Ian Stevenson, his dedication to his research and the amount of effort he puts into his fieldwork and yet is so underrated by the public. While this is a free world (we can choose want we want to believe), I think reincarnation can only be a concept that is partially accepted by people. Unless there is really a definite mechanism (say like how you describe the Earth's hydrological cycle with the water evaporating into clouds then condensing and precipitating to Earth as rain), not everyone will accept this theory.

And maybe it's fine like that. just let this be a discussion, a contestation, an unsolved mystery of life.

movie- hotel transylvania

A cute animation movie. The premise is just basically about an overprotective father (Dracula) not allowing her daughter (Mavis) to have contact with humans/the outside world/beyond the hotel because he deemed the humans as dangerous etc. Alas, one human (Jonathan) found his way into the hotel and 'zinged' with Mavis! They fell in love at first sight!

Pretty much a common plot but it was quite well executed in this film. Very funny and entertaining. Though, I wonder what will come out of this human and vampire love. After all, Jonathan can't turn into a vampire (unlike Bella in Twilight series) so how will this love ends? He isn't immortal, unlike Mavis.

There's a hotel transyvania part II I think. They're doing a second series because of the good boxoffice results. I read that from wiki. Hopefully, they'll address that issue and personally I hope he doesn't turn into a vampire. Maybe they can try something new and turn Mavis into a human instead? Something like the little mermaid trading her voice for human legs, maybe Mavis can trade her fangs for normal humans ones.

Just a random thought.

movie-Alex Cross

I used to read the Alex Cross series last time when I was younger. Though, I don't think I finished it and could vaguely remember the storylines, I do knew that Cross's a spy/detective kind of guy that goes around solving crimes.

The movie was not bad. There's a twist at the end though, I didn't expect the person that they had been protecting to be someone that had hired the assassin to kill others but ended up not being able to control the assassin aka getting targeted by the assassin instead.

There were a lot of fight scenes, not my kind of show; I prefer reading fight scenes than watching them I guess.

And the part where Cross's wife died, I think that's a turning point in the movie for him, the part where his character unleashed. Because previously, he won't actively pursue the criminal (mostly he just protects his targets and encounters him) but this time after knowing he killed his wife, he was prepared to go for a final showdown with him. And of course, Cross won.

book- wild by Cheryl Strayed

This is one of the few 'autobiographical' kind of book that I read. I just finished this yesterday. It was a good read, a page turner. 

I think what Cheryl did was something that I'd really like to try once in my lifetime (eg: go hiking alone, backpacking etc) but the thing is she was able to do it because she was able to sort of 'let go' of her current city life in search of something/to recover something that she had lost/made sense of her life through this healing walk with nature. 

For me, I doubt so, asking me to stay a week alone out there in the wild will probably be the death of me. As much as I'll want/like to do this, I know I won't do this (if that even make sense). So yeah, I'm really happy that Cheryl finished her trail and shared her experience with us (maybe people like me can learn through her in this way?)

There was one part that really hit close to home, a part where she met this New age seer called Pat and their conversation went like this:

"The father's job is to teach his children how to be warriors, to give them the confidence to get on the horse and ride into battle when necessary to do so. If you don't get that from your father, you have to teach yourself."

"But- I think I have already," I sputtered. "I'm strong-I face things. I-"

"This isn't about strength," said Pat. "And you may not be able to see this yet, but perhaps there will come a time-it could be years from now-when you'll need to get on your horse and ride into battle and you're going to hesitate. You're going to falter. To heal the wound your father made, you're going to have to get on that horse and ride into battle like a warrior." 

I can really understand that. The importance of parents in one's life and what it means when one of your parent /either of your parent are not present in your life. The impact on you. How you'll be changed. 

Guess that meant self learning's necessary at times. Gotta teach yourself what your parents can't/won't be able to teach you. 

movie- red dawn

Red dawn's the third movie I caught this week. I didn't know it was based on a 1984 film of the same name. Basically, it's about North Koreans attacking the US and the citizens fighting back. I saw this in wikipedia:  "While in post-production, the invading army was changed from Chinese to North Korean in order to maintain access to China's box office". Oh right, like that solves everything? xD I think this plot itself is pretty sensitive already. The 2012 political scene isn't really very peaceful and with movie like these, sometimes I wonder if world peace can really be achieved? Or is fighting between nations something that is inevitable? That we have to be prepared for? 

I didn't expect Chris Hemsworth to die at the end though. Although his death was some sort of matyr (?) like thing because it spurred his brother Matt to takeover the leadership role and lead the resistance. 

movie- breaking dawn part 2 (twilight saga)

I'm glad that the twilight saga had come to an end. I loved the books but somehow the film's portrayal left me a little bit upset because in my opinion, the book's much better. And I think Stephenie Meyer's other work, the host that coming out in cinemas in 2013, is a much better work than the twilight sage but in comparison it's quite underated.

I prefer the host to the twilight sage. The host is really exciting with its concept and execution in the novel. the front part was a bit hard to get into but just hang on, it gets better! And when you reach the end of the novel, you won't want to stop. I can't wait for the movie! And the more I read about spirituality, I think the host is kind of related to that concept too. The similarities are jarring. Maybe Stephenie Meyer's spiritual too?! xD

Anyway, the twilight saga is over. The next big thing will most likely be the hunger games movie franchise. Catching Fire's coming out in Nov 2013! Yay!

book-life of Pi by Yann Martel

This is a heavy book. Be warned. You must be prepared to polish it off in one sitting and yet still feel unsatisfied. You will end up thinking about the story even DAYS after you had finish reading it.

This is how impactful the book is.

Stunningly written, it questions a lot on religion, life, god and the question of necessity, perception and faith.
Pi was a religious man, he believed in many religion. He just wanted to believe in god. That's pluralism and I can identify with that. Since coming into contact with spirituality, I'm becoming closer to thinking that there is no one definite religion, but perhaps just different portrays of one god/source of life (?) to different people through different gods and thus appealing to them to their different cultures and practices.

And yes, Pi has a really strong sense of survival. Surviving 227 days afloat the sea is no mean feat, although in the end we knew how he did. The ending is open to many interpretations. How I interpret it though was that there were no animals on board. I mean the animals were all locked up in their cages and placed in the cargo at the bottom of the ship. Should the ship have sunk, the animals were the first to perish-they can't escape from their cages, much less swim to the surface into lifeboats. So I don't believe that the animals were really there. I'm more inclined to the second story, whereby each animal represents one character- the zebra as the sailor, the orang utan as Pi's mother, the hyena as the cook and Richard Parker as Pi.

With this newfound knowledge (and reading this book after the movie), it was really tough reading it, knowing when the animals injure/kill each other were actually between humans made it harder to stomach. And also the parts on cannibalism, the ethnics-whether it was really justified to do so were also brought up in the story. The drive of necessity, the lack of food made humans resort to animal like behaviours, killing one another and yes of course- only the strongest survive. Isn't that the Darwinian theory that many of us are familiar with? The survival of the fittest. And yes, Pi's very fit. There's the animal side in him, the Bengal Tiger Richard Parker side, that will do anything to survive.

It's kind of like a split personality for Pi. He had to acknowledge the presence of an evil side of him (the tiger) because that's what keeps him alive. The meat eating tiger side. The vegeterian Pi will not be able to survive alone out there. He needed the tiger. And the tiger needed Pi so that he won't go insane.

A very heavy book. I will have a hard time getting this out of my mind.

Some quotes that I like from the book:
"To choose doubt as a philosophy of life is akin to choosing immobility as a means of transportation."

"If you stumble about believability, what are you living for? Love is hard to believe, ask any lover. Life is hard to believe, ask any scientist. God is hard to believe, ask any believer. What is your problem with hard to believe?” 

“You might think I lost all hope at that point. I did. And as a result I perked up and felt much better.” 

“You must take life the way it comes at you and make the best of it.”

“If there's only one nation in the sky, shouldn't all passports be valid for it?” 

movie- life of pi

It's a really awesome movie! Probably one of the few movies with so few casts (less than 20 actors I think) and most of the time it's just Pi on the ocean. It's stunningly filmed. Lee Ang's really a superb director. It's visually appealing and the story moves very nicely- every part is significant to the story.

I kind of knew the ending before watching so it spoiled the twist (?) at the end. I was so into the movie that I went to read the book! I must say the movie really lived up to all its great reviews and it really did justice to the book.

An awesome adaptation from novel to film. A must watch!

movie-Captain America

I've wanted to watch this last year when it first came out but didn't so I've just watched it on DVD. It's cool, I really like the setting of the story-the retro but yet very 'high tech' early 20th century. I found it endearing how Captain America (Steve Rogers) was not someone born a superhero; but someone who was given the chance to by people who believed in him (the scientist) and allowing him to undergo the experiment to make him  a 'super soldier'.

I guess in life it really takes someone who appreciates you (?) to bring out the best in you. Be it Captain America, the Iron Man, Incredible Hulk, etc- no man's an island. They need support and encouragement from others to carry on.

The ending was that he woke up 70 years later after crashing the plane with weapon of destruction into the sea. I'm guessing he's so much injured that he needed 70 years to recover (that's also because he has 4 times the recovering capacity of humans) and not die off. And yeah, the love story's sad too. He missed his date. I would have loved to see Agent Carter together with him.

Hope he'll be fine too in the 21st century. I believe he will- after all he's the Captain America.