mrbrown.com

Twitter Refugees, I am now on Mastodon

I am now on Mastodon as @[email protected].

Use my Invite link below to join this server and follow me.

kopiti.am/invite/6C5wjqMr

Signs you are not in Japan on holiday anymore but back in Singapore

Signs you are not in Japan on holiday anymore but back in Singapore, post-2020/2021 edition:

 

1. You can use dustbins everywhere instead of your pocket.

 

2. You aren’t spraying disinfectant on your hands every time you enter a store or restaurant.

 

3. You aren’t given a “Mask Envelope” to put your mask in, when you’re dining.

 

4. People talking loudly on trains.

 

5. A public bus doesn’t come once every hour in the rural areas. Addendum: There is no such thing as a rural area in Singapore either.

 

6. You get up the bus from the front door where the driver is, instead of the rear door.

 

7. You don’t check the weather before going out anymore.

 

8. A bottle of Shōchū costs five to ten times more.

 

9. There isn’t a vending machine at every corner. 

10. The restaurant staff don’t shout their greetings and don’t shout their thanks when you go in to eat or go out after eating. 

Uncle Brownie and Ah Girls Go Army: a Photo Essay

Behind the scenes of Ah Girls Go Army, shot on my secret film camera.

(Read the full post and see more photographs at https://brown.exposure.co/uncle-brownie-and-ah-girls-go-army or view the embedded version below.)

Uncle Brownie and Ah Girls Go Army by Kin Mun "mrbrown" Lee on Exposure href="https://exposure.co" style="text-transform:uppercase">Exposure

WWDC 2022: Back on the road again

It has been more than two years since my last overseas trip. And my last WWDC was June 2019. So this trip to San Jose was very special. Flights were full and it took some finessing to get me there. My journey to Cupertino involved an SQ flight from SIN to NRT to LAX and then an Alaska Air flight to SJC.

The return leg was easier, SJC to LAX by American Airlines (who delayed my check-in luggage on the way home) and LAX to SIN by SQ. I love my National Airline.

San Jose downtown was quiet and you can see many shops and business closed due to the pandemic. The big Muji store next to my hotel was closed, sadly.

This is my room at the Signia by Hilton, which used to be the Fairmont San Jose (it went bust during the pandemic).

I had my coffee setup nicely in the room, my first time traveling with a drip coffee setup. I packed some Ethiopian Kilenso beans, a MUNIEQ Tetra collapsible flat and compact coffee dripper, some filter papers, a Timemore Black Mirror Nano, and a Timemore Chestnut Nano grinder for this trip, It worked beautifully.

The WWDC badges this year were cute and I pinned them on my Tom Bihn Paragon.

This was the first in-person event Apple held since 2019, I believe. We were very happy to be back after years of online events.

Tim Cook made an appearance after the keynote and he was swarmed. I am glad they enforced mask wearing at the event. Because the rest of the US had already become loosey goosey with the mask wearing since there was mostly no mask mandate anymore.

This is a row of the new 2022 MacBook Air with the M2 chip, obviously the star of the show. I got to play with it a bit, and I think it will sell like hot cakes.

So happy to see the Singapore gang again!

The best part of in-person WWDC is meeting up with my Apple Event BFFs like @Young-cho (서영초이) from South Korea.

This is my first time inside Apple Park. The event is outdoors this time! First time!

It was a sunny day in Cupertino. And a lovely way to spend my time in the US.

I went on to stay till Sunday, and visited friends. No hardcore touring or sightseeing, just good company and good food.

What a great way to ease back to my travels again.

(A rare photo of me, shared by Greg Joswiak SVP of Apple @gregjoz, on his Twitter account. You can also see Evelyn of Channel 8 with me.)

Kim Huat in the hills of San Jose

Kim Huat gives you a look from the top of the world. Ok maybe just a hill in San Jose.

YouTube link: youtu.be/CvfJXa8ZAMs

Kim Huat at WWDC 2022

Kim Huat reports from WWDC 2022 from Cupertino! Check out the new M2 MacBook Air and 13-inch MBP!

YouTube link: youtu.be/BZiDuZHoaN4

mrbrown’s Inflight Movie mini-reviews: June 2022

My journey to and from the US was long. So I watched a TON of movies. Some on the way to San Jose, some on the way back, some in the hotel.

Here is mrbrown’s Inflight Movie mini-reviews:

Blacklight: Liam Neeson should just stop making movies.

The Outfit: Slow burn but so satisfying. A cut above the rest.

Clean: Almost zero story and filled with caricatures, but Adrien Brody is great as an avenging garbage man. The violence is almost poetic.

The Lost City: A surprisingly not-lame rework of Romancing the Stone. Sandra Bullock and Channing Tatum are hilarious together.

The Contractor: I’m a Chris Pine fan but the ending disappointed. Some nice action here and there though.

Everything Everywhere All at Once: Everything Dr Strange 2 tried to be. This is the real Multiverse movie this year. Mind-screwing sci-fi with heart. Michelle Yeoh shows you what a massive star she is.

mrbrown’s Inflight Movie mini-reviews, Japanese edition:

First Gentleman 総理の夫: Cute movie about a guy whose wife becomes the first female PM of Japan. Could have done more with the subject matter. But this is patriarchal Japan so don’t expect feminist ideas.

Time Trip App 幕末高校生: It had Satomi Ishihara in it. That’s it. Teacher and her students time travel to Edo-period Japan and try not to change history.

Masquerade Night: A somewhat convoluted murder mystery movie. Sequel to Masquerade Hotel. Takuya Kimura and Masami Nagasawa reprise their role as detective and concierge in yet another mystery in Hotel Cortesia Tokyo. The two actors are a pleasure to watch.

Kim Huat in Care What You Share

Not say don’t share, but care what you share!

A PSA from the Privacy Awareness Week 2022

To find out more: https://www.pdpc.gov.sg/paw2022

YouTube link: youtu.be/ILa9tmn7f-A

Kim Huat and the Real Thing

Kim Huat says there is only one real thing. Don’t click the wrong links!

A PSA from OCBC.

YouTube link: youtu.be/QS7F648RZqk

Kim Huat in… The Moon Who Loved Me

Kim Huat recaps the slaps, the straps and the licence to thrill.

YouTube link: youtu.be/GDEgEbhnMus

A Birthday Staycation

When it is your wife’s birthday, you take her on a staycation and tell her she can do whatever she wants.

She wanted to play badminton. So we played badminton for two solid hours after breakfast (I won one game, she won two).

Then we swam in the pool for an hour.

Then broke for lunch.

Then we went bowling. Bowled for more than hour, played 6 games each.

Then we walked 25 minutes to the hawker centre for dinner. And walked 25 minutes back.

I didn’t know the Birthday Staycation was going to become The Olympic Games.

But hey, whatever The Wife wants, The Wife gets.

I have a Sporty wife. So I better get with the Sporty Life.

Talk to you later. I am lying down in recovery mode now.

(Side note: I need to add this small detail. My wife, while not a #fitspo gym person, has a very high level of fitness. She does aerobics, and other forms of exercise, at least three times a week and crushes it. I, on the other hand, have just begun my slow and steady fitness journey. So you can imagine how much she runs rings around me. I’m just glad I could keep up with her, barely, during this staycation.)

Kim Huat and the Test Kits

Kim Huat recently went to buy some expensive things.

YouTube link: youtu.be/imoZJrNFBCY

See What Show: The Batman

Wow I did NOT expect The Batman to be THIS good. It is the best Bat-anything since The Dark Knight. I love the focus on the World’s Greatest Detective.

I don’t quite know how this will work since it is outside the DCEU (which might be a good thing). But man, am I glad they made it.

The action was brutally awesome. Gotham looked gritty. The cinematography was breathtaking. And Robert Pattinson is no longer a sparkly vampire in my mind.

The movie is dark. This isn’t quippy and happy Batman. At the same time, it isn’t a rehash of Nolan’s Batman either. It is its own thing. I feel it is larger than Batman. It’s about Gotham and all the mess that exists in it. Batman is just part of the larger Gotham story.

I like how they made The Riddler so disturbing. I always thought he was a joke. I did not recognize Colin Farrell as the Penguin too.

It is really more a mystery movie than a superhero one, and I enjoyed that.

I’m still haunted by that shot of Batman holding the flare. It was like a painting.

I look forward to a follow-up movie.

Warning: Make sure you pee first. It’s a three-hour movie. And go see it in IMAX. Gorgeous.

Kim Huat and the Easing

Kim Huat is excited about the changes to the community safe management measures but wishes there could be more.

YouTube link: youtu.be/a2ZOTD3R7JI

Singapore is best country for adventure in SEA wor

Adventures you can have in Singapore:

1. Scale Mount Faber.

2. Fight for a table at Tiong Bahru Market on a Sunday morning.

3. Queue at the “lucky” Hougang Toto booth for the Hongbao draw.

4. Ballot for a place in a popular primary school. 

5. Try to book a slot to swim at the MBS Infinity Pool on your staycation during the school holidays.

6. Find parking at nex mall on weekends.

7. Be a parent with a child taking PSLE.

8. Take a week of leave to stay home, to rest from Work From Home.

9. Avoiding sales people at MRT stations.

10. Be the first to travel along the newly-opened extended stretch of the Thomson-East Coast Line, from Caldecott to Springleaf.