Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Sucker Punch movie review

Although many people say that Sucker Punch is for guys, being a female audience, I have to say: ''The movie is pure awesomeness!''

Do expect lots of kick-ass fighting scenes with fabulous graphics and cool background music. Do expect hot chicks. Do also expect 'echi' costumes, guys would definitely like it ;D. If you are an otaku, you would also find some mild 'yuri' scenes throughout the movie. Basically I think the movie has a lot of Japanese anime essence in it. If it were to be an anime, one would classify it under 'action', 'mecha', 'echi', and 'psycho'.

However, I would not recommend the movie to those expecting storyline. The story is not well elaborated. There are loose ends here and there and it is hard to make sense out of the movie if you don't read the synopsis beforehand. The character development is also kind of limited. I would give 3.5 out of 5 for the storyline.

But then again, I would say the story is very unique, it is just like what the trailer emphasized, '' you will be unprepared''! And what I like most about this movie is that 'hot chicks fighting in sexy costumes' actually make sense in this movie! *spoiler ahead* Because the fighting scenes are the character's fantasies, so anything unrealistic about the fights automatically becomes acceptable. No one can actually say something like 'It's impossible throw that thing so high!' or 'how can she be so strong she doesn't even have biceps!' and so on... Those are her fantasies after all! And that's what so clever about the whole idea.

Now check out the trailer and one of my favourite songs from the soundtrack :) Enjoy.




Sunday, March 27, 2011

Top 5 LGBT movies

Here goes my top 5 LGBT movies!

No.5: 15 (Singapore)
Fast, frenetic, and furious, 15 is the story of five Singaporian teenagers who, abandoned by the system and estranged from their parents and life in general, build their own world in which gangs, drugs, fighting, piercing, self-harm and suicide are common and brotherhood is important above all else. Presents the chaotic lives of these boys, living in the shadows of a sprawling metropolis and with only each other to rely on.





No.4: Alexander (US)
Alexander, the King of Macedonia, leads his legions against the giant Persian Empire. After defeating the Persians he leads his Army across the then known world venturing further than any Westerner had ever gone all the way to India.




No.3: Eternal Summer (Taiwan)

As a child living in a seaside town in southern Taiwan, studious Jonathan was asked by his concerned teacher to look after rebellious classmate Shane. Ten years later, what was once a good-natured obligation has since blossomed into a warm friendship, with Jonathan still on the academic track and Shane now finding his calling on the basketball court.

Taiwan-born schoolgirl Carrie from Hong Kong befriends Jonathan and convinces him to join her on a secret day-trip to Taipei and in the evening she seduces him in a sleazy hotel but Jonathan backs down clearly distraught. Eventually, her observations of his and Shane's friendship leads her to believe that he is homosexual and in love with his best friend.Carrie then meets Shane through Jonathan after a school day where Shane develops an interest in Carrie. She accepts his offer to become his girlfriend on the condition that he manages to enter university.

Shane does his best to keep his feelings for Carrie secret in order to protect the feelings of his lifelong friend. Despite all their best efforts to keep their personal feelings secret, the truth eventually emerges, forcing all three to view their relationships in an entirely new light. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_Summer)





No.2: Brokeback Mountain (US)
A raw, powerful story of two young men, a Wyoming ranch hand and a rodeo cowboy, who meet in the summer of 1963 sheepherding in the harsh, high grasslands of contemporary Wyoming and form an unorthodox yet life-long bond--by turns ecstatic, bitter and conflicted.




No.1: C.R.A.Z.Y. (Italy)
Born Christmas Day 1960, Zac Beaulieu is the fourth of five sons of Gervais and Laurianne Beaulieu. Zac feels somewhat disconnected to his brothers, all of whom are different from each other. They include the bookworm Christian who is the eldest, the dumb jock Antoine who is third, and the youngest Yvan. But Zac has the most contempt for his second eldest brother, the shiftless druggie Raymond. To his devout Catholic mother, Zac is her miracle son, both for being born the same day as Jesus Christ (a fact which Zac has always hated), and because a Tupperware-selling mystic once told her that he has the power to heal. Laurianne has always coddled Zac, the two who have a special if unspoken bond. But Zac wants more to please his father, who wants more than anything in his sons that they grow up to be man's men and not sissies. As Zac goes through his mid-teens to early twenties, Zac isn't sure if he can live up to the ideals of either his mother or especially his father...

Monday, March 21, 2011

Japanese spirit

Following the catastrophe that hit Japan on 11 March this year, the nuclear plant located at the Fukushima prefecture underwent a series of explosions which led to serious leaking of nuclear radiation. Tens of thousands died and went missing due to the 9.0 magnitude earthquake and tsunami attack. People living within 30km radius from the plant were evacuated. Raw spinach and milk from the vicinity have been tested positive for nuclear radiation. Nuclear crisis has become an international concern now and people could not help but feel helpless and miserable at moment like this. In fact, many wonder if this is the end that we've been reading and hearing all this while.

Nevertheless, it definitely is not the end for Japan. Being a country that created dozens of superhero characters that give so much fantasies and hopes to so many people around the world, Japan never stop giving hope and comfort to us even after experiencing such catastrophe. I was truly astonished by how optimistic and how organised they are while handling the aftermath of the disasters. The video below for example, is enough to show how amazing the Japanese are.



Once again, lets hope Japan recuperates soon.

gosh...

Don't just do for the sack of completing the job please... 3:(

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

Fukushima plant meltdown?

The third explosion has occurred at Fukushima plant early Tuesday morning. Workers are battling to prevent meltdown at one of the reactors. After the second explosion on Monday, workers tried to cool down the reactor using sea water and boric acid, a method that has never been tested before (Al Jazeera 2011). After the third explosion, even the agency spokesman, Shinji Kinjo has admitted that ''a leak of nuclear material is feared''. It is also reported that "The government is sticking to the line that radiation is within safety levels, but it is a fast-changing situation." This has shown how critical the situation really is and how vulnerable the peoples lives are at this moment.


The full story:

''Twenty people have tested positive for radiation exposure and that number looks likely to rise.'' reported Al Jazeera.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said "Now we are talking about levels that can impact human health." (BBC News)
Radiation levels around Fukushima for one hour's exposure rose to eight times the legal limit for exposure in one year, said the plant's operator, the Tokyo Electric Power Co (Tepco)
Now the most concerned question is no other than ''how far will the radiation go?'' or more importantly ''what is the real impact of radioactive exposure?''
This is what the experts have to say.

(CNN) -- Nuclear power has generally proved safe and nondetrimental to human health.

But when something goes wrong, it can result in widespread radioactive exposure and health hazards that turn an average power plant into a notorious name like Chernobyl.

The levels of radiation and potential health consequences were significantly worse at Chernobyl than at Tokyo Electric Power Company's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Japan, which has has suffered numerous problems since Friday's earthquake and tsunami. .

The two accidents are not in the same realm, experts said.

On Monday, a hydrogen blast at at the Fukushima Daiichi plant injured 11 people and caused another reactor to malfunction, triggering new fears of a meltdown that could leak dangerous amounts of nuclear radiation.

As many as 160 people have tested positive for some level of radiation in the area. And 17 U.S. Navy helicopter crew members showed low levels of radioactivity after conducting disaster relief missions in Japan, the military said Monday. But after the crew members washed with soap and water, no further contamination was detected, the Navy said.

Radiation levels at the moment are low, but the next 24 to 48 hours will be critical, said David Brenner, director of the Center for Radiological Research at Columbia University.

As the public remains nervous about what will happen at the plant, it's important to keep in perspective the kinds of radiation that people are exposed to every day, and understand the real risks of too much radiation.

"I'm now concerned that we'll go into another nuclear winter, with public opinion turning against nuclear power," said Dr. James Thrall, president of the American College of Radiology and chief of radiology at Massachusetts General Hospital. "If you look at nuclear power objectively, it actually has fewer health consequences than any energy production with fossil fuels."

Contamination vs. exposure

Radiation is invisible; you cannot taste it, or smell it, or feel it on your fingers, Thrall said.

There are four primary kinds of ionizing radiation, which is light that has enough energy to ionize an atom, i.e. make it into a charged particle. Alpha particles are relatively heavy and, when emitted, cannot penetrate human skin or clothing, but are harmful if they get into the body otherwise. Beta radiation can cause skin injury and are also harmful to the body internally. Gamma and X-rays are high-energy invisible light that can damage tissue and are most hazardous to humans.

It's not possible to directly measure the amount of radiation exposure a person has had. Exposure refers to the energy the body has absorbed from radioactive material, the high-energy invisible light rays that unstable chemicals emit.

US at low risk for radiation exposure

When you see people with Geiger counters checking around a site like Fukushima Daiichi, they're measuring contamination -- which generally refers to actual radioactive particles.

Radiation all around us

A study from the National Council on Radiation Protection and Measurement found that nearly half of the radiation to which the U.S. population is exposed comes from medical sources such as CT scans, X-rays, and nuclear medicine, which is the use of radioactive chemicals in the treatment and diagnosis of health conditions. But there's also radiation coming from the sun, stars and soil.

The average radiation exposure a person gets is about 3,000 microsieverts per year. To give you a sense of what that means, a CT scan is about 3,000 microsieverts, but lasts only a matter of minutes.

The farther away you are from the source of radiation, the less exposure you will have to damaging high-energy light beams such as gamma rays.

Radiation sickness

Generally, the greater exposure you've had, the faster and more intense the symptoms of radiation sickness will be.

Nausea and vomiting are usually the initial symptoms of radiation sickness. A very severe exposure can lead to them within 10 minutes; dizziness, weakness, and low blood pressure may begin immediately. If the radiation exposure is mild, a person might not start experiencing these symptoms for up to six hours. Check out this Mayo Clinic chart, under "symptoms" for more information about how various levels of radiation might affect a person.

The simple removal of clothes and shoes eliminates about 90% of external radiation contamination, according to the Mayo Clinic, and washing with soap and water takes radiation off the skin. This lowers your risk of breathing or ingesting radiation particles, or having them get into open wounds.

There may be damage to bone marrow, which can be treated with a protein called granulocyte colony-stimulating factor. Transfusions of red blood cells or blood platelets may also be necessary.

When there's a possibility of internal organs being damaged from radiation exposure, there are some treatments for specific types of radiation.

Radioactive iodine, which is hazardous to humans, is one of the biproducts of the chemical reaction involving uranium that takes place at the Fukushima Daiichi plant.

Since the thyroid is prone to taking up radioactive iodine, people at risk of this problem can benefit from potassium iodide, which contains the stable component of iodine. Potassium iodide can protect the thyroid from damage. The Japanese government is currently working to distribute potassium iodide to residents near the reactors.

There is also a type of dye called Prussian blue that binds to the radioactive particles of cesium and thalium, reducing the amount of radiation that cells may absorb, according to the Mayo Clinic. A chemical called diethylenetriamine pentaacetic acid binds to radioactive particles of plutonium, americium and curium.

The shadows of Chernobyl and Three Mile Island

In Chernobyl, the world's biggest nuclear accident, which occurred in 1986, 28 workers and firefighters died from radiation sickness months after they helped put out the fire.

Radioactive iodine also allegedly got into the general population through milk, Thrall said. This likely happened when milk-producing cows ate iodine-contaminated grass, he said.

Cancer can take decades to appear as a result of radiation exposure, and epidemiological studies have found an increased risk of cancer in people who were near Chernobyl at the time of the disaster.

The Japan situation probably won't get to the scale of Chernobyl, but it could be bigger than Three Mile Island, said. Three Mile Island is a nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania that, 32 years ago, had the worst nuclear power accident in the United States. But in the U.S. crisis, there was only a partial meltdown, and nuclear fuel never escaped the reactor vessels. There has been no evidence found of resulting long-term cancer risk in that area.

"At the levels that we're seeing in Japan I do not believe we'll see any cancer risk in the population," Thrall said.

How it differs from an atomic bomb

There is a big difference between the effects of the atomic bombs dropped in Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of World War II and possible spread of nuclear radiation from malfunctioning nuclear power plants, said Dr. John D. Boice, a radiation epidemiologist and scientific director of the International Epidemiology Institute.

In 1945, Americans dropped bombs in parachutes, and these detonated above the city -- not on the ground.

"The atomic bomb -- it was whole body exposure that lasted less than a second," he said. The radiation traveled through the body, similarly to how X-rays behave.

"The effects may be different, because it was such an immediate response," Boice said. "For the reactors, it's different. It's a gradual exposure over time. It might include radioactive elements such as iodine and cesium, which may be ingested."

Radioactive iodine can cause thyroid problems and cancers, and cesium can also increase cancer risk. If leaking occurs, the population could breathe or ingest contaminated foods with radioactive elements.

"These are different types of exposure -- they would involve the possibility of ingestion and staying in the body."

The effects of survivors of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings have been followed through the Radiation Effects Research Foundation, a joint U.S.-Japan effort to study the impact. Studies found survivors had higher rates of leukemia and cancers in the breast, thyroid, lung, colon and stomach over time.

And today in Japan

Boice said he was concerned about workers who are having to deal with the emergency and work in a highly volatile situation at Fukushima Daiichi.

"They're dealing with the deaths of friends and families -- then to add on top of that, there is the possibility of a serious nuclear meltdown," Boice said. "How much can one country, one civilization bear?"

http://edition.cnn.com/2011/HEALTH/03/14/japan.radiation.sickness/index.html


Monday, March 14, 2011

Japan earthquake and tsunami

I don't like to sound stupid or senseless...
but I think the end is really coming.
Yes. The end of the world is near.


Earthquake and tsunami that hit Japan last Friday has killed thousands of people and the death toll is increasing day by day. Tens of thousands went missing. Countless people lost their home. Not to mention earthquakes that struck other countries such as New Zealand and China just months or even days before this disaster took away hundreds of lives and caused huge losses. Now that two reactors at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station have exploded, no one can tell for sure how serious the effect on both human health and economic will be. For the time being, interviews in CNN and Japanese government gave positive predictions of the plant condition, but how long can the nuclear station stand? If cooling effort is not sufficient, another explotion may occur yet again.


During period of grief like this, political unrests are still happening around the world. Following the democratic success in Egypt, political turmoil continues to spread all over Middle East. http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2011/03/14/MNJD1IA930.DTL Dozens were killed and hundreds wounded. Gunshots can be heard all over the place.

Fire caused by earthquake, fire triggered by the people...
The world is slowly consumed by hell fire...

Stop being so optimistic, people! After so many disasters that took away so many lives, do you still think human race is able to handle this world? It's time to wake up and get up of your comfortable couch!! We ARE already too late! Start to think how to cling on to life in this violent world! And who cares about Iphone or Lady Gaga? Your pitiful life is in danger!! Learn some surviving skills or build an ark at your backyard or something... Or otherwise... spread gospel to your loved ones. We have to get prepared.



Bless Japan, bless the world.

Wednesday, March 2, 2011

...

There goes the third one......... =.=

I hate...

PARASITES!!!!!!!!

They eat you without you knowing...
chew chew chew
until you're dead
Then they begin to decompose you
until you're left with nothing
Then they devour your soul
until you completely disappear

eh... tat's bacteria..
Bio not good...... =.=
But the point is I hate them...
hate them to the MAX!!!

Parasites increase their fitness by exploiting hosts for resources necessary for the parasite's survival (Source: wikipedia)