dotesgee - day 3

Day three in dotesgee, and day two of the seminars. I have had some serious conversations and many non-serious ones. Distributed a few of my cards and many people seemed most impressed by the fact that I had "Professional Geek" as my job title.

One of the conversations I had was with a Singaporean about how come the people seem so content in such a restrictive environment. How come people don't riot or go crazy. His response was that when people are well fed, clothed and safe they won't try to rock the boat. Something to think about. That people are willing to give up freedoms and all that for safety of some kind. But then there is the other side that now Singapore's birth rate is below sustainability. Which means that people are having a certain level of psychological dissonance with this system which manifests in a reduced desire for children.

After the seminar, I managed to convince some of the guys to come to Sim Lim Square to check out some hardware/electronics/other geekery. SLS is impressive. I am sure that many of you guys have been to dotesgee and know what SLS is like. But for those of whom who don't - imagine unity plaza, only bigger, more diverse and cleaner. Then double or triple what's in your head. that woul d give you a rough idea what it's like.

There are many bargains to be found in SLS, and you should go there early if you want to buy anything. Be ready to bargain your heart out. Even more than in UP. They have already jacked the prices up by about 50-100%, so remember to bargain hard. Try to walk away once in a while and you'll get a better deal. I checked out a few camera's with a view to buying one soon, so there were a few preliminary bargaining sessions

After the run at SLS I decided that I wanted to see SoAP. After all, it's available here in dotesgee, and will never be shown in dotelkay. And something like this is best seen on a big screen. After checking online to find when and where they were showing the movie, I decided to take a walk. Yes, you at the back.. how did I get online? Didn't I tell you? Ok.. listen up. Everyone please take note: dotesgee is possibly the most wifi connected place in the world. Take a small island (660km2) add cheap broadband, mix with lots of apartment complexes, and you have lots and lots of wifi nodes. It is almost ubiquitous. And there ware enough people who have their APs turned on without any encryption or security whatesoever. A notebook is good, something like a PSP is better. So off I went, armed with a map of dotesgee and my natural charm. It took me a bit of a walk, and I saw some really gorgeous parts of dotesgeee before I got to Marina Square, where I got in for the 2130 show.

I'll do a review of SoAP later, but suffice to say it was a great movie. The kind of thing where you sit down, and put your brain on neutral and just let it flow over you.

The movie finished at around 2300 and I decided to walk back to my hotel. It was a longish walk, but the night was fine. And the fact that there were lots of cops around, and they were quite polite, was quite refreshing. I'm so used to our local buggers that I found it impossible to stifle my normal paranoia