Context: I understand very basic, spoken colloquial Mandarin but I can’t speak it.
*House phone rings and I go pick it up*
Me: Hello?
Some woman [in Mandarin]: Hello?
Me: … Hello?
Woman [in Mandarin]: Do you understand Chinese?
Me: No.
Woman [in shaky English]: Ah… okay… bye.
Me: Bye.
*five seconds later… facepalm*
A few weeks back I had to go work on a daily basis to the heart of the city by train. On the first day, while I was jostling around with the hundreds of professionals and white-collared workers, it was a startling observation that everyone was clothed in almost entirely monochromatic shades of grey and black, with the occasional coloured scarf or work shirt peeking out (this was more or less in the middle of winter). Even I was decked out to blend with my black coat, white sweater, grey woollen pants and sensible black shoes. Then it hit me; this throng of people and I, riding expressionless on the crowded trains, are the very epitome of the man of the Clapham omnibus!
The man on the Clapham omnibus was one of the first legal analogies that I learnt in law school and forms a significant foundation for the notion of “reasonableness”, a yardstick and standard used in countless legal principles. In no way do I think it’s a perfect way to measure reasonableness, but it certainly is the measure used in law, even though it is probably a little less elitist now.
And here I, and the monochromatic travellers around me, were the modern versions of such a “man”. We were the potential equivalent brought to the minds of judges when picturing the reasonable person. I wondered, would a law student back in the days when such a concept was fresh and newly taught, whom travelled on the Clapham omnibus, would he have felt the excitement that I did, to know that such an important legal concept referred to an activity that he habitually engaged in? Either way, such thoughts certainly brightened my day.
It’s good to know that I’m not the only law student who has wondered about this legal concept.
Argh so hungry now. Must microwave some pizza from last night.
The past two months have been largely uneventful, filled with general malaise, merriment and the usual assignment-anxiety. However, as of two days ago I’ve moved out of home.
Though only for three weeks.
Tim’s PhD supervisor’s off to Poland for three weeks and him and his wife needed someone to take care of their three cats. Hence we’re here in their cute little brick home, trying to take care of ourselves and three animals. As for the moving out process, it was relatively smooth, just a matter of packing up everything I thought I’d need, the most important being my computer.
So what’s the only thing I forget? My power cable to my computer. Genius! Thank goodness that I had to visit home the next day anyway.
Did I mention that the three cats were crazy? They were adopted from animal welfare centres and were all traumatised somehow in their youths. While they’re mostly normal (though quite frightened of us when we first moved in), one of them left a nasty surprise for us in the morning. Poop, pee and vomit all over the kitchen floor. Unpleasant, to say the least. Thank goodness that was just a one-off occurrence (the litter box apparently was left too full) but one of the cats, we’re told, is kinda bulimic, as was demonstrated by more vomit on the floor in the evening. Other than that, the cats are pretty nice and are slowly warming up to us.
We’re also restricted to 2GB of bandwidth usage every month (Tim’s supervisor and his wife are apparently are really light net users) which sucks much balls. Even just doing routine things like checking my RSS feeds and frequenting my usual favourite sites puts us close to the daily allotment of bandwidth.
Complaints aside, I’m definitely enjoying the very peaceful living here with Tim. The only real stress I have is the Family Law assignment I have due on Monday (which I’m supposed to be writing but here I am, writing this instead). Oh yeah, and we’re currently subsisting off pancakes, instant noodles and toast and jam. While that’s relatively filling and delicious, we really should start looking into cooking proper food.
So if anyone can recommend simple, easy recipes for dinner, I’d really appreciate it! Recipes for any meal really. Please, nothing fancy involving herbs and spices, just wholesome, healthy and preferably delicious foods. We eat everything that’s not hot.
Oh yeah. And the cutlery here is to die for. Finally, metallic forks and spoons that are polished enough that I don’t get that awful, awful metallic-y taste in my mouth that I usually get when I have to eat off metallic cutlery.
One more thing. I watched Scarface yesterday. Great movie, awesome acting but man, talk about depressing. It hurted my nose seeing how much cocaine was snorted in that movie.
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