The Rogers Indicator of Multiple Intelligences

I found this test at Waterfall's blog.

Not sure how accurate it would be when I actually did it late at night. But I do agree I have reasonably good spatial and visual intelligences. Maybe I should consider putting these intelligences to better use?

Here's my result for this test:

You scored as Visual/Spatial. You probably feel at home with the visual arts, maps, charts, and diagrams. You tend to think in images and pictures. You learn best by looking at pictures and slides, watching videos or movies, and visualizing. People like you include sculptors, painters, surgeons and engineers.

Visual/Spatial		86%
Musical/Rhythmic		75%
Interpersonal		64%
Verbal/Linguistic		57%
Logical/Mathematical		50%
Intrapersonal		46%
Bodily/Kinesthetic		46%

The Rogers Indicator of Multiple Intelligences
created with QuizFarm.com

Last midnight I had difficulties posting

Due to some technical problems, I had difficulties posting last night.

Anyway, yesterday, I started the day feeling pretty tired. Somehow I felt not too well. I wonder if it has anything to do with the recent earthquake at Northwestern Indonesia? The earthquake occured just past midnight on 30 March.

Thank goodness I managed to survive the work day. I was facilitating a group programme for children at a school yesterday afternoon. It went better than expected, thanks to the children for being more cooperative and participative.

I took time-off after 2.05 p.m. yesterday, so I travelled to the university to prepare for sectional and rehearsal. I feared I may not muster enough energy for sectional, but my worries were unfounded. Possibly, playing music can help recharge a person and heal him/ her from lethargy? I practised on my own before the sectional. I felt better by the time sectional started.

Sectional went well. There were lots of learning points. I sometimes wonder if I should be spending more time practising the double bass. Lately, playing the double bass has been satisfying and enriching.

Rehearsal was fun. Finally, we played the fourth movement of Tchaikovsky's Fifth Symphony. It was challenging for the double bass, but also satisfying to play.

We also played Mendelssohn's Fingals Cave. I felt the orchestra sounded commendable considering that yesterday was the first time that it had rehearsed Fingal's Cave. Alright, I had played Fingal's Cave with the orchestra, but that was at least six years ago.

However, it was as if playing music expended a lot of my energy, I felt pretty tired after rehearsal. Yet, I was not as tired after rehearsal as compared to when I had started my day yesterday morning. I wonder what was wrong with me yesterday morning?

The day started with tiredness

I tried to write a post just a moment ago, but before I could save it, I lost whatever I had written.

The day started with me feeling pretty tired. I suppose I hadn't been sleeping because I was having some abdominal pain while I was in bed trying to catch up on my rest. I find it unusual that I felt pretty tired when I reached my office at about 8.40 a.m. I am usually quite a morning person, so I would usually be more energetic in the morning compared to in the evenings. However, today, I felt pretty drained when I started my day.

Lighten my workload

I am feeling tired after a day of work. There seemed to be a lot of things to be done, but I have only two hands. I wish the pace of work could be slowed down, so that the workload would lighten.

I would rather do a good job, than to achieve a lot but end up with a mess.

Anyway, I look forward to have sectionals with my double bass tutor tomorrow. There is also orchestra rehearsal to look forward to tomorrow.

Night of Baroque Music

This evening, I attended a concert titled A Baroque Celebration. I won myself a pair of tickets to this concert about a fornight ago.

I have the pleasure to have the company of one of my good friends throughout the concert.

Here's the programme for the concert:

• Dietrich Buxtehude - Sonata á 3 in G, BuxWV.271
• Marin Marais - The Bells of St. Genevieve of Paris
• J.S Bach - Brandenburg Concerto no. 6
• Johann Rosenmüller - Sonata 12 á 5
• Antonio Vivaldi - Concerto no.1 from La Stravaganza, RV.383a
• Antonio Vivaldi - Sonata in D minor op.1 no.12 RV.63, 'La Follia'
  

My favourites for this concert were Bach's Brandenburg Concerto no 6., Vivaldi's Concerto no.1 and Vivaldi's Sonata in D minor. I think they were reasonably well-played, and they sounded appealing to my ears.

I shall not be the critique tonight, so I shall not write in too much length about the concert. I could just sum up to say that I enjoyed the concert. Baroque music still rings in my ears.

My dear friend enjoyed the concert too. I am glad that she did.

For me, maybe the best thing that came out from this concert was that I had a chance to catch up a bit with my friend. Finally, here's wishing my friend a night of sound and good rest.

Last Sunday of March 2005

Today, we had orchestra rehearsal. We got to play the fourth movement of the Tchaikovsky's Fifth Symphony. I think it is the most challenging and exciting movement for the double basses for this symphony.

I did not have the pleasure to have Dinah as my stand partner today. MC, our young budding double bassist was my stand partner so that I could better guide him along. I shared with him about how to play certain passages as discretly as possible during the short break that we had, but I ain't sure how much would be assimilated. Anyway, hopefully, he would practise on his own and be able to play the entire symphony with greater ease in the near future. We will be having sectionals with our double bass tutor the coming Wednesday, but unfortunately, MC had to miss it.

Rehearsal ended early today. Dinah, Emily, Qiuhui and myself proceeded to Holland Village after the rehearsals for early dinner. I understand that Holland Village is a place where the expatriates often hang out. This place is also very popular with the yuppies. We had Vietnamese food for dinner. It was considered quite healthy and tasty.

Afterwhich, Qiuhui led us to one of the shopping centres in the area and we ended up window shopping. There were some exquisite items that I saw at the shop, but I was not in the mood for shopping, so I did not get anything at all. Qiuhui went to the supermarket to get some food items for her lunch tomorrow.

Our last stop at Holland Village was Häagen-Dazs, the ice-cream restaurant. I felt my throat was not well for ice-cream, so I ordered a hazelnut cake. It was a little too sweet for my taste.

I was pretty tired by the time we left for the restaurant. Anyway, I was glad that I had played the fourth movement of the Tchaikovsky's Fifth Symphony for today's rehearsal. Somehow, it was replayed in my mind while I was on my way home.

On my way home, I received a message from Mystic via the short-message-system of the mobile phone. I hope she would feel better tomorrow when she wakes up from her night of sleep. Take care Mystic.

Boats go by

Watching the boats go by 

I find the effects of light on the water surface to be quite interesting. Watching the boats go by also made me feel as if some of my worries have left with the boats.

For more photos, please visit the post titled Boats and Singapore River on my other blog, Places.

26 March 2005

For today, I shall not take too much effort to think of a title.

Today, it was the Saturday that I was scheduled to work. I was supposed to conduct three sessions today, but one of my clients did not turn up. That makes two sessions in total at my office. Later, after noon, I had to make to make a homevisit. Apologies, no other detail could be revealed. Confidentiality is to be observed for whatever that had went on during the sessions.

After the homevisit, I left for Somerset, located within the town area. Met Dinah, Emily and Qiuhui at Music Essentials, located within Meridien Shopping Centre. We were trying to look around for good double basses for the orchestra. The boss was pretty helpful, he showed us to the double basses and allowed us to try on a few.

The boss even gave us a list of the quotations for the double basses. I secretly wish someone would be generous enough to sponsor a Wilhelm Klier double bass for me. The description reads: "Wilhelm Klier basses are made of older tonewoods to achieve a warm, rich sound. These professional instruments feature highly flamed European maple back and ribs, excellent German spruce tops, and a deep-coloured antique varnish. top quality German ebony fingerboards, and brass tuning machines ensure playability and reliability. The Wilheml Klier model is truly a prize instrument to own and play." Whoever wrote this description sure knows how to tempt double bassist like myself. If wishes do come true, may this be one.

Later, we went to McNair Road to attempt to look at a double bass, but it had yet to be set-up. Interestingly, we got to see how the interior of the double bass looks like.

After that, we decided we shall give the two music shops, Gramercy and Synwin a miss.

Later, Qiuhui, the connoisseur of good food among us led the rest of us to Chinatown. We settled for Chinese tea at this place called Tea Chapter. Qiuhui demonstrated for us the art of Chinese tea making. We had rice dumplings at the tea house too. I suppose it was an eye-opener for Dinah and Emily. For me, going to the tea house brought about a sense of nostalgia. It reminded me of the times when I had visited the tea house with some of our friends when I was much much younger.


Art of tea-making. Demonstrated by Qiuhui. 


Warming the cups. 


Ready to be drank. The cup on the left is meant for one to smell the frangrance of the tea. I remember that the tea would be poured into the cup on the left. Then one is supposed to transfer the tea from the cup on the left to that on the right. One would drink the tea from the cup on the right. But prior to that, one would hold the mouth of the cup on the left close to one's nose to smell the lingering frangrance of the tea. 


Rice dumplings. 

After the tea house, it was time for dinner. Qiuhui recommended us to try the food at Qun Zhong Eating House which was just very nearby to the Tea Chapter. There was quite a queue outside the Eating House. We waited for about half an hour before we were finally seated. The food was pretty good. We had the minced meat noodles, the Chinese pancake (with lotus paste fillings), the dumplings (commonly referred by the Chinese as "Xiaolong Tangbao") and the fried dumplings (Guotie). Oh, I love the dumplings and the fried dumplings. Very yummy. Try it and you will believe me. Specially thanks to Qiuhui for the recommendations.


Xiaolong Tangbao (Dumplings). Yummy. 


Lifting the dumplings with a pair of chopsticks. One of the personnel from the shop (most likely the owner) taught us the art of lifting the dumplings with chopsticks, and the art of eating the dumplings. 

Here's the details of the eating house if you should wish to visit it one day:
Address: 21 Neil Road, Singapore 088814
Tel: 62213060
Closed on Wednesdays
Operating hours: 1130-1500, 1730-2130

After the dinner, we departed for home. I had wanted to expend the energy contained in the food that I had ate, so I walked from Neil Road to City Hall MRT Station. That was at least a distance of 8 bus-stops apart, but I had no measuring tape to measure exactly how far I had travelled. Why on earth does my friend, Mystic, say that I measure the Esplanade?

Now you see it

To satisfy your curiosity of how a practice mute for the double bass would look like:


Practice Mute (for Double Bass) 

Short trip to Asian Civilisation Museum

Asian Civilisation Museum, Empress Place. Singapore. 

I felt rather stifled being at home. The noise from the television was unbearable in the late afternoon. Too much things have been on my mind, and I have difficulties unloading. With all these physical and mental noises that I was subjected to, I decided that I should go out for a walk. Somehow, my feet led me to the Asian Civilisation Museum, Empress Place.

There is now an exhibition on the kebaya of the Peranakan. The exhibition is titled: Nyonya Kebaya: A Living Art. The term Peranakan is a Malay word for someone who is "born locally". If I have understood well, the word Peranakan refers to people who are descendants of an early Chinese community that settled in the Malay archipelago at least since the 17th century. The kebaya is a term given to a kind of clothing. Several of kebaya on display looked lovely. I like those with the embroidered designs. A pity that photography is strictly forbidded at the exhibition, or else I would have taken some photographs to share with you. Anyway, there is an article on the exhibition taken from AsiaOne Food & Entertainment Section. Happy reading.

Also at the Asian Civilisation Museum (Empress Place), there is a section specially dedicated to the Performing Arts of the Southeast Asia region. Here, one will find the gamelan. The gamelan is a traditional Indonesian instrumental ensemble comprising mainly of percussion such as gongs, metallophones, xylophones, drums and cymbals. I managed to find a site that offers information about the gamelan.

There are more interesting exhibits at this museum, and I shall perhaps come and view the rest of them on another day.


Closed-up view. 


Gamelan.  

What is she up to?

Disclaimer: If my dear friend, Mystic, does read this, this is meant for her sheer entertainment. Please don't take this too seriously, ok?

******

I wonder what my dear friend, Mystic, has up on her mind.

Some weeks ago, she said I have a hobby of "measuring" the Esplanade. Admittedly, I like going to Esplanade - Theatres by the Bay. Then again, I am clueless what she had meant by the term "measure". For goodness sake, I have never went to Esplanade with a measuring tape. Can anyone help tell me what she meant?

Then today, in the phone conversation, she seemed to keep coaxing me to be opened to get to know more male friends? Then she went through a list of my expectations for future partners. Next, she asked me to consider "keeping my doors opened". These are perplexing. Didn't she know that I am married to the double bass?

Practice Mute

Earlier tonight, I practised the double bass parts for Mendelssohn's Fingals Cave.

Are there any double bassist out there who have scores for this? I have a feeling that my set of scores is incomplete. I only have pages one to five. Strangely, I cannot find the double bar-line, meant to denote the end of the music, on my set of scores. Could I have been missing page six?

Anyway, at least I have five pages to start with. Hopefully, I will get to see how the complete set of Fingals Cave would look like when the orchestra's librarian distributes a set of new scores to each and every player.

There are many challenging parts for the double bass in Fingals Cave. I thought to myself that it has been a good thing that my double bass did not have too bad a set-up, and it was able to allow me to play those challenging parts quite with ease. At least, I did not have too much problems with strings crossing and the playing of notes at the higher position.

Towards the end of the practice session, I decided to try out my practice mute. I had acquired it some time ago, but have to use it. The practice mute did help to muffle the sound of the double bass. For one moment, I had thought that my double bass had a blocked nose. It gave a very nasal sound when the practice mute was put on to it. But wait, double basses do not have noses, let alone blocked nose.

The practise mute did help reduce the volume of the double bass, and also minimise the vibrations that came from playing it. I suppose it would come especially handy if I were to practise the double bass during the wee hours. Here is an excuse to play late into the night.

Quiet Time

Complexity. 

One way for me to recharge is to have quiet time, be it alone or with a company who respects my need to have quiet time.

I truly hope quiet time would help.

A little better

The past few days have made me feel rather worn out. Perhaps with poor health, one gets more aware how vulnerable one could be?

It was comforting for me to receive a few well-wishes from readers of this blog. Thank you very much for your concern. I am feeling a little better.

I managed to practise on the double bass a few hours ago. Possibly, this is a good sign that I am not in the worst state of health? I do not usually take initiative to practise on the double bass if I were to be feeling too unwell.

Right now, I am looking forward to this Friday. It happens to be Good Friday, a public holiday. This means I will get an official day off from work that day. I need a break from the work routine.

Too much things on my mind right now. Too much such that I shall end this post with no sense of proper closure.