Her Fearful Symmetry - A Book Review

*SPOILERS ALERT. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.*

You have a demanding, controlling twin sister and you are sick and tired of her bossing you around. Would you kill yourself, and entrust upon your dead aunt (who is now a ghost haunting you) to resurrect you? Bear in mind that the resurrection is no guarantee to be successful. Worst case scenario, you'll be dead and trapped haunting an apartment for eternity. I don't know about you guys but for me, that is like the last thing I want. Unless Niffenegger is trying to portray her character Valentina as an idiot beyond hope.  I mean, come on, has the option of leaving your twin sister ever occur to you? This itself made the final 100-or-so pages of the book painful to get through.

Next, meet Martin - a poor soul suffering OCD (obsessive compulsive disorder). His wife Marijke left him, tired of his symptoms (which includes excessive cleaning and bleaching, insisting that she enters the bedroom with left foot first, refusing to leave the house etc.) and his refusing to obtain treatment, which is also one of the symptoms. This is all very interesting but WHAT DOES THAT HAVE TO DO WITH THE MAIN STORY? Sure, occasionally Martin crosses path with Julia and Robert but I can't help feeling the events seem forceful and pointless. To me, these two characters are just redundant. In the end Niffenegger had to cure Martin and send him to live happily ever after with Marijke just to get rid of them.

I had to question Niffenegger's creativity and imagination when she described the haunting. Invisible hand? Writings on the dust? Ouija board? How cliche is that. *yawn* Stealing another's body? Ghost kitten? And best of all - the ghost has to leave the apartment only via a person's mouth? Give me a break!

I've heard great reviews on The Time Traveler's Wife also by Niffenegger. I simply couldn't bring myself to read it because the movie was so tragic. But Her Fearful Symmetry was undoubtedly a failure and disappointment.

The Bathtub Cliche

She watched in amazement as the thick liquid drained from her veins
Made a little twirl in the clear water
Then disappeared
Dyeing it red, little by little
It was beautiful in some way
The pain didn't bother her as much now
The reduction of body temperature, however, did a little
She saw the stain on the floor
On the kitchen knife
On her white dress
And wondered how should she clean them up later
She raised her other hand midway
Wanted to tuck the loose hair behind her ear
Only to remember she had cut her long straight hair two days ago
It was boyish-short now
There was no more loose hair to be tucked away
Instead she placed her hand on the edge of the bathtub
And rested her chin on it
She sighed in satisfaction
She had found peace at last

Kyoto - Tofukuji Temple 東福寺

The whole place looked like it was on fire. That was the expression my friend told me, and she was not exaggerating.

This was taken in Kyoto 東福寺.

And this was the price we paid to get a good shot.

It was really crowded in the temple - with the locals as well as the foreigners - despite that we came before its opening time and waited in queue to purchase the tickets. As soon as the gate opened, people rushed into this bridge to the most strategic spot for a picture. But the Japanese are really civilized people. There were limited pushing and shoving despite the crowd. Things will only get ugly when the Chinese (read: from Mainland China) comes in, no offense. :P

Can you believe this? It's blood-red!

Well not everything was red. See! Greenery!

This is called a 枯山水 karesansui. It's supposed to have some religious symbolism to it. Most of the temples in Japan have it. Don't ask me what happens when it rains.

枯山水

Kyoto - 银杏

During fall in Japan, one of the things you simply cannot miss, is this.

 银杏

Google told me it is called ginkgo biloba. It was close to sunset and the light made the leaves looked shiny gold.

 This was how the leaves looked like up close and without sunlight.

 Took us more than 10 times of trial-and-error to get this picture.

This was within walking distance from the Kyoto station, right next to 东本愿寺.

The Big Thing - Proposal

Who - Mr. Chin

What - the proposal

Where - 若草山 奈良 京都 (Nara, Kyoto Prefecture)

When - *checking calender* 20th Nov 2012

Basically the above explains everything. *wink*

 Hiking up.

 Scenery along the way.

 Reached the first level 若草山一重目.

 Finally reached the top.

 若草山三重目 - a mere 342 metre above sea level. It was a pretty easy hike.

 In Nara, deers are like dogs - they're everywhere!

The ring.

The Big Thing - Pre-Wedding Photo Shoot

I'm getting married. Hard to believe, I know. But it's true. Had been doing some research on the pre-wedding photo shoot package. Shortlisted a few that I like. Pricing aside, which one would you choose? Will tell you my decision in the next post.

The Keep Gallery
This wedding studio is like super famous now. Everyone who had done the least bit of wedding research had heard of them. And 3 of my colleagues have gone to them. Mixed reviews though. The Keep Gallery is more like a one-stop wedding studio. Their package (customizable) includes wedding gown (for actual day and photo shoot), photo album, DVD with slide show, car decoration, 4R photos (to be given to guests) and photo frames - most of which I don't want and don't need. Reasonably priced.

Here are some photos I like from the studio, snapshot from my Galaxy S3.

 

Eyeshot Studio
Small wedding studio with only one photographer. More like freelance. Package include wedding gown (for photo shoot only), photo album, DVD with slide show. Slightly pricey if without promotion.

Again some photo snapshot from my Galaxy S3.

71 Studio
Only visited the blog, never went to the studio. Location is a problem - it is in Shah Alam.Very pricey.

Kyoto - 中村藤吉 Green Tea Ice-Cream

Note: After procrastinating for more than 4 months, I finally have enough motivation to start to blog again (hopefully). The motivation came from my colleague, who asked me for help to plan his trip to Kyoto. As I struggle to recall the name of the train I took from Kyoto to Osaka, I told him it has been a year and I've forgotten the details, only to realize immediately that only 4 months had passed. If I don't write now, I'm going to forget everything! I couldn't take the pressure and panicked. But you don't have to write everything, Mr. Chin said, just write whatever you like. So I took his advice, and here goes.

This is something one must eat in Kyoto station - Nakamura Tokichi Honten 中村藤吉 is the name of the shop.

Located on the 2nd floor in Kyoto station.

 This is a must-eat - green tea ice cream topped with fresh red bean and some unknown flour-like balls.

 

Satisfaction.

This was 350 yen (approx. RM11) which was almost the price of a Haagen Dazs. I had Haagen Dazs green tea ice cream once but I thought it was no match for this. This was the soft and creamy type and Haagen Dazs was the hard frozen type. And besides, red bean is the soul mate of green tea flavour. It brings out the taste of green tea yet suppresses its bitterness - perfect! It still makes me drool merely by looking at the pictures!