Mr. Bean's Holiday

On Tuesday, September 25, 2007, I went to see the film Mr. Bean's Holiday, featuring Rowan Atkinson. There were other actors and actresses there, but I didn't really know them. Although, Wilem Dafoe (he played Norman Osbourne, I believe) had this part as an overambitious actor.

This movie is about Mr. Bean, who wins a trip to Cannes, but then when he's on the train, he separates a father and son. And then it's just his adventure, where he was trying to reunite the son with his father. It was a fun movie.

I am not a huge fan of Mr. Bean, but some of the scenes in this movie made me laugh. I personally don't get him, but there are people who love him. Oh well, to each his/her own, I suppose.

I don't know what else I can say, except for this is a Mr. Bean movie.

Death Sentence (the movie)

On Tuesday, September 18, 2007, I went to see the movie Death Sentence, starring Kevin Bacon.

Normally, I don't watch films in this genre, because this is considered as a thriller, and was directed by James Wan, who did the first Saw movie. It is not horror, which is a genre that I do not like to watch anyway, and I rarely watch thrillers.

The premise of the film is that Kevin Bacon's character, who is a victim to a initiation killing. Instead of just grieving with his family and moving on, he takes matters in his own hands, and ends up starting a war between him, his family and a gang.

This is a revenge movie, with lots of action and violence. I went into this movie with low expectations, and I still didn't really enjoy the movie. Though, Kevin Bacon was tolerable as his role, I was amazed.

This movie had some good eye candy in it, and lots of people wearing leather... I cannot believe that this movie was based on a book. I suppose that authors who write smut to get money, and therefore, it sells... Apparently, smut sells... I guess that's why there are so many harlequin romance novels, right?

Red Ruby Chinese Restaurant

Today, I went to Red Ruby Chinese Restaurant for dim sum in Montreal. I have never had dim sum in Montreal, so I thought I would give that restaurant a try.

Dim sum in general is expensive in Montreal, compared to the prices in Toronto. In Toronto, it's three or four different grades, with different prices, and in some restaurants, it's the first three levels, all the same price. Here, some is $2.25, some is $2.50, some is $2.75, some is $3.00, some is $3.25, some is $3.50, some is $3.75 etc., a lot more staggering of price, which means more expensive.

And then, the restaurant we went to, took the exchange rate of American money to Canadian money as 1:1... I know that the American dollar is not strong right now, but it's still 1 American dollar to 1.03 Canadian dollar, you still apply the exchange rate, even though it is not strong. Our bill came to about $38. So, we paid $40 American. We were expecting that it's enough tip with the exchange rate, but the waitress came and said that the American dollar is taken as 1:1, and that the tip is minimum 10%. I dropped an extra $2 coin and left.

I never go back to a restaurant that asks me for tip. I will go back if someone invites me, and I don't have to pay, but for myself, I don't think I will be going back.

It seems to be a common practice in Chinatown to demand tip. That's bad/cheap service for you.

A deeper analysis (or rather, my take) on the situation

I was thinking about the situation that is happening with me and the math department today, and I did a more in-depth analysis... I can't say that I am the expert on why this is happening, but I can only say that this is my hypothesis, and in my opinion, it is a good one.

The reason why the crappy training needs to be given is that there is unrest (in my opinion) in the graduate students. They do the jobs because they need the funding, but the amount of work that is expected of them is too much for the rate that is being paid to them... As I had explained with my situation, for $11/hour (taxed), you have to come up with your solutions and alternate solutions (most profs understand that it is ridiculous for the marker to provide his/her own solutions - but there is no policy that states that the professor must) - even though that the prof will most likely create solutions for his students, that will be available in the copy centre. You also have to come up with your own marking scheme - even if the prof gives you the instruction to grade 10 marks per question, you're supposed to come up with your justification yourself. (That's part of the marker's job, I agree). You also don't charge the department for the number of hours you put in, you get assigned hours based on the number of sections and numbers in your class...

The students who get assigned these jobs, they are not being treated with respect - I mean, look at my e-mail response? They don't care about doing a bad job, they are not motivated enough to do their job. I mean, I like marking, and teaching math, but I am not motivated right now with the profs because I am being treated without respect. Solutions manuals help a bit, but most of them are pretty bad, and in domains like linear algebra, the steps are different to get to the end result, so coming out with alternate solutions are a pain in the butt! Also, the training is all about "control" and "discipline" in the classroom. You must not lose control, your students must tremble in fear when you enter the room, and kiss/worship the ground you walk on. Your students must not use cell phones in class. You must not eat or drink coffee in class. You have the right to move students if they are talking in class. If this is in an exam situation, and they refuse to move, you can call security to eject them from the room. What is this, the 1920s? Why don't we have the TA bring a dunce cap to class, and a cane? If a student is out of line, it's 20 lashes?

Bottom line: Archaic methods + overloading work onto markers + not respecting markers = dissatisfied workers.

The sad thing is that there were people who were at the training who were taking down his notes like it was a field of golden nuggets.

The plot thickens...

So, it's my birthday, and I actually went to this crappy ass useless training on how to be a marker. It was the same one that I went to last year, and it was useless then, and it was useless today. Two hours of my life I'll never get back.

The only reason I went was because the ombudsman whom I sent an e-mail to said it was better to talk about this in person. So, I went through to the training - complete waste of my time, an hour of my life I'll never get back. I finish my training, I go and see the prof, and I was told that apparently it is not the professor's responsibility to provide solutions, and that as markers you should solve the problem yourself. For $11/hour, I am not paid enough to give my own solutions, and to do the assignments myself... Especially since I am only assigned a certain number of hours a week per section. And you know what the killer thing is? The prof whom I'm marking for, who is the course examiner, says that he'll be providing solutions for the students which will be available to purchase at the copy centre for the assignments... Why do you share your solutions with the students and not with your markers?

So now, I believe that the problem was not resolved with the professor, and now it is a departmental issue. I suppose now I'm going to go to the ombuds office, since now the problem is no longer with the professor, it is now with the department. I don't really want to go this route, but apparently, I am not left with no choice.

If I find another job that pays the same or more, I would totally say to the prof "Go f*** yourself" and find someone else to do it... But the sad thing is, there are people who will be willing to be exploited... I don't know if I want to mark again next term... Ridiculous, you have to come up with your own solutions.

The good thing was that I ran into my friend Laura, she was a bit sick, and was a bit stressed, because she needed to hand in her thesis (today was the last day to submit for Fall convocation), and I have been busy, and as has she, so I haven't been able to call her and chat. She told me she dreamt about me two days ago. That's awesome. She made my day, because the idiots in the math department certainly did not.

Wow, I'm a shit prof magnet

So, it appears that I'm just attracting the "good" profs left right and centre.

I am marking for my department, and this term I got assigned two sections of Linear Algebra. However, there has been a change in the course examiner.

I'm marking two sections of the course, and one of them is for the course examiner. Today, I got this bunch of assignments with no instructions on what questions to mark, and solutions to the questions.

So, I sent him/her an e-mail asking about which questions to mark, and if it would be possible to get solutions to the questions. This was the response I got from the professor:

please mark 1.1: 7,11, 1.2: 5(b,c), 10(b,c)
If you do not know how to solve a particular
question please tell me. If you do not know
elementary linear algebra please let me give
this job to another person.

I'm being paid $11/hour, three hours a week per section, so a grand total of six hours, since I am marking two sections. I am not paid enough to mark the assignments, come up with my own marking scheme (although the prof later did give me how he would like the questions marked), do the assignment myself to obtain the solutions. The solutions should not be a requirement of the marker, in my opinion. And for $11/hour I certainly do not have to take verbal abuse, and an insult on my intelligence from a professor in my department.

I have sent an e-mail to the ombudsman professor, the one who tries to resolve conflicts between markers and professors. Let's hope that he can resolve this. If not, then this becomes a problem between me and the department, since the department did not resolve the conflict. Therefore, I would be going to the ombudsman at the University, and if the conflict is not resolved there, then it would become a conflict between me and the university.

Impressions on my first course at UQAM for Fall 2007

My impressions of my profs:

1) The dude who lectured me on e-mail... Fat, little/no personality at all.

2) The other professor, he's more hip and happening. He's kind of cute, well-coiffed, but probably attached/married.

No Reservation

On Tuesday, September 11, 2007, I went to see the movie No Reservation with Catherine Zeta-Jones and Aaron Eckhart. It also had Abigail Breslin, who played the little girl in Little Miss Sunshine.

The story is about Catherine Zeta-Jones' character, who plays the character of a chef in the movie in a high class restaurant. She's a very stern chef, and has very high expectations for her staff... She is also going to therapy, upon the advice to her boss. The story starts off with her sister coming to visit her, and she's bringing her daughter - Zoë. Then, tragedy strikes. Jones' sister dies in a car crash, and all of a sudden, Jones is now a mother.

She is now dealing with the tragedy of losing her sister, and the new reality of being a mother. She's got a lot of stress, especially with the new added stresses. Therefore, she takes some time off of work to grieve. She goes back to the restaurant for something, and she discovers that there's a new chef in the kitchen.

Like all comedies/romantic comedies, she develops a romance with this sous-chef, Aaron Eckhart, and as well, learns to become a better guardian... I'm not going to continue, because that would be spoiling the movie.

This movie has gotten terrible reviews, but it's a light comedy. I would consider this a chick flick.

Abigail Breslin played a brat who lost her mother... OK performance, I guess. I wasn't supremely impressed.

The Return of Passions...

I guess I wished/spoke too soon. I was thinking that the drama between Raoul, Rupert and Haros was over, since Raoul broke up with Rupert. However, I was mistaken. (You could say wishful thinking on my part). It appears that this soap opera only had a week of hiatus, and now things are back into full swing. * Sigh *

I knew it was a problem when I started my slut fund again.

Prof at UQAM, strike 2

It appears that my prof from UQAM, the one who sent me the lectury response, has yet demonstrated his ability to be very orgranized and shown me his knowledge of many things.

He sent the whole class an e-mail about the course packs being available at the UQAM Co-op, and that he said the price for Co-op members would be around $15 - $20, and slightly higher for non-members. I paid $33.67 for mine. That is not "slightly higher" than $20... Even if I undo the price for tax, it comes to $29.54... That is not "slightly" higher than $20. Slightly higher would be in the ballpark figure of $1 - $5, max... He also failed to mention that we needed to get the course pack at the Co-op in the science building. I suppose this is partially my fault, since I should have clued in that science books were sold elsewhere, and I thought that the Co-op bookstore was at another part of the UQAM campus.

And then, we got another e-mail saying that the article that we are supposed to read for Tuesday, a few pages were missing from the course pack, so a .pdf version of it was sent.

I'm being nice, and putting these two things together as one strike. I believe already each individual item should have been one strike, which would have meant that he already had three strikes, and that he would be out. But now, he's got two, because I'm nice. Let's hope he doesn't strike out. But I'm not holding my breath. I think I have better chance of him striking out, than of me winning the Lotto 649.

Well well well, we're off to a good start

So, it looks like the course I'm registered in at UQAM is off to a great start.

The profs didn't send me a course outline until the end of the month, when I asked them for one in the middle of the month of August, so this caused a delay in my registration, since I needed to go through CREPUQ (which is an inter-university registration system that takes about a week), which caused me to miss the first class. (The first class was the 4th of September, and the course registration was approved the 5th of September).

So, being the good student I am, I sent the prof an e-mail asking what they had done in class, so that I could catch up and be there the next week. This is an excerpt the response that I get from one of the profs, that was also cced to another prof: (This is the part I'm pissed about)

Bonjour,
vous êtes en effet une semaine en retard.
Il est de la responsabilité des étudiants de surveiller les dates, et ce n'est
certainement pas aux enseignants à servir de kiosque d'information pour chacun des
étudiants d'un groupe-cours en particulier. Veuillez à l'avenir utiliser le mail en
cas de nécessité raisonnable seulement...

Translation:

Hello,

You are in fact one week late.

It is the responsibility of students to be aware of the dates, and it is certainly not the responsibility of the profs to be information kiosks to students. In the future, please only use the e-mail in reasonable circumstances only.

How am I supposed to find out what you covered in class if I am not a UQAM student, and I wasn't at the first class? Who am I supposed to call? Phantom student? Also, this was the result of the prof(s)'s lack of timing for the course outline.

I believe this course will be very disorganized, and the profs will also. I did not want to send an e-mail to explain myself because they probably wouldn't listen, and I didn't want to start my relationship off with them on the wrong foot, although, they have already done wonders with starting it off on the wrong foot with me. If they don't want me to be in the course, just tell me, and I would gladly drop the course.

Well, if they actually did something more useful...

I just stumbled across this article regarding the decision an inquiry about the Montreal metro security guards.

I personally believe that these security guards are pretty useless, not because they are not scary looking or whatever, but because they spend too much time with crap jobs like harassing people at the turnstiles of Berri-UQAM, and then ticketing them for not their carte privilège.

Let me explain this carte privilège situation to people who may not be familiar with the Montreal transit system. Students who are full-time students at a college (or vocation/trade school) or a university full-time between the ages of 21 - 25 have the right to this card, which they have to pay an amount for at the beginning of the school year. Then for the entire school year, they have the right to use the discount rate on passes (not tickets, just passes). However, if someone is caught using a pass without the privilege card, they will be subject to a fine of $130 + fees or something outrageous like that.

I use the metro pretty frequently, and I always see lots of security guards harassing people at the Berri-UQAM turnstiles for their cards. I myself, have been harassed by one of these people while using my pass (and privilege card). In fact, they spend so much time doing this crap (so what if a student wants to save a bit of money because they are full-time and they really can't afford to pay the full adult pass because they are above the age of 25?), that they neglect the bigger problems... I have seen many people just get into metro stations without paying, I have seen people putting graffiti on metro station property, I have seen people holding metro doors, I have seen people smoking on metro platforms, but of course, the metro security guards and police just happen to not be there. Why? Because they are too busy at Berri-UQAM harassing good citizens. In my opinion, the first four offences are so much more worse than someone not using a carte privilege. Cracking down on graffiti would save the STM a lot of money, they spend about 2 million a year repairing damage from graffiti (like painting over it, or cleaning it). They had an announcement that passengers are on average late by 5 minutes due to people playing with the metro doors and holding the doors. That would be an easy ticket and source of "income" right there, people who hold the doors. I have seen more people being harassed for their privilege card than people being harassed and/or ticketed for holding the metro doors.

I was once at a metro station and saw some homeless person enter the metro system without paying (he just pushed the turn stile so that he could squeeze through). I told the ticket booth operator, and the response I got was "Qu'est-ce que vous voulez que je fasse, monsieur?" or "What do you want me to do about it?" Why weren't the metro security people there to stop him and detain him until the police showed up? Well, I can venture a hypothesis... Maybe they were at Berri-UQAM harassing (or waiting to harass) good citizens...

Stop harassing people about their privilege cards, and get cracking on the bigger problems!

Inflation is everywhere...

Well, I know that inflation is something that happens, and that it's part of our society, our money cannot remain the same "value" forever, and as well, costs increase for transport of food or whatnot, but it's just annoying to see it as a student.

I found out that they raised their prices yesterday at my favourite place downtown for Chinese food - U & Me Restaurant... My favourite dish of beef brisket on rice noodles, normally going for $6.25 is now at $6.75. Another restaurant I like is Kam Ho, and their prices have also raised, but I cannot recall a specific example, since I don't go there often.

That, and then we have my favourite breakfast place, Resto du village, which has had two price increases to "offset inflation" over the past two years... The same breakfast that I had two years ago (3 eggs, one choice of meat, home fries, toast, coffee) used to go for $4.10 (or $4.00 - I don't quite recall). Last year, the price went up to $4.30, and then this year, the price jumped to $4.50.

It's not that I'm annoyed with inflation. What I'm annoyed with is that as a student, they don't index your loans in the same manner that the prices go up. As a student, I already go for cheap eats, and I rarely (if ever) go and have fancy meals at elaborate restaurants, and it's just annoying that the cheap eats are not as cheap as they once were.

I'm also annoyed that the rate the inflation goes up is not the same as the rate that pay goes up. I rarely hear people getting "cost of living adjustment" on their jobs. Some get bonuses, but they are not big ones, or cost of living bonus (or whatever it is called). But it's more rare and rare nowadays... This appears to be the beginning of a big problem.

I suppose this ties into the recent study (maybe three to four months ago), where they found that the rich are getting richer in Canada, and the poor are getting poorer? This is never a good sign... This seems to indicate, at least in my opinion, the beginning of the disappearance of the middle class. And I can just imagine that if this continues, and nothing is done, it'll be a pretty serious consequence when our middle class completely disappears.

Harry Potter and The Order of the Phoenix

On Tuesday, September 4, 2007, I went to see Harry Potter and The Order of the Phoenix. I actually saw this film in IMAX 3D.

The story is pretty close to the book, and it starts off with Harry and his fat cousin being attacked by Dementors, in the muggle world. Since Harry was an underage wizard, this causes him to be expelled from Hogwartz school of Wizardry, because he used magic outside of a school setting. He gets busted out by fellow wizards, bunks with them in Sirius Black's home, also the headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix, and gets ready for his hearing the next day.

Harry Potter gets off the charges, but he starts off his year at Hogwartz, and is ridiculed for his belief that the Dark Lord is back. The ministry of Magic is in denial about what happened to him in the previous adventure, and attributes all the weird occurrences to other possibilities.

I'm not going to explain the whole book/movie here, but it is Harry's fifth year at Hogwartz, and the film is pretty true to the book.

The critiques that I have heard from people about the film are very true... They do not spend much time talking about how the Order was formed, which was done in the book. There was also no quidditch this time around, and if I recall correctly, there was a bit of quidditch in the fifth book.

The difference between the IMAX 3D film and the regular film is at the end of the film, where there is a flying and combat scene... It was definitely worth it, in my opinion, to pay a bit extra and see this part in 3D. Primarily because the 3D technology is not available at home. I cannot rent/buy the DVD, and then expect to get the 3D visions on my screen. However, I believe that this may be soon available!

The other critique that I get is that the wizard fighting scene was like fighting puffs of smoke. This is also true, but it was fun in 3D, and the 3D was not as blurry as Superman Returns.

This film is not the best Harry Potter film, but it was enjoyable, and I again believe that the critics were too harsh about it, like they were for many movies this summer.

It's moments like these where I am proud to be Chinese...

Today, I went to Metro grocery store to get some juice that was on sale. They were offering Oasis juice (960 mL cartons) for $0.99 each, which is a good deal, since they usually go for about $1.49 (or more) a carton.

While I was looking at the juice in the aisle, I noticed a Chinese lady who had juice in her bag (Oasis), and then she proceeded to switch what she had with stuff on the shelf. So, this is what I'm guessing she did: She took three of the juices that were in the $0.99 each special, went to the cash and paid for them. And then she came back after, and switched the juices to the ones that did not qualify in the $0.99/carton special. How typically Chinese or Asian is this? You take the cheap ones, pay for it, and then switch it to the expensive ones... *Sigh*

As you can see, my title is actually sarcastic, which apparently is also not really recognized in Asian culture.