it's early evening in HK tho!!!

i'm in SF! well - i've been here for a couple days actually. and now, i'm here jetlagging at 4am with nothing that seems to work in my brain... those that know me know that i'm a horrible flier. rather, i dislike flying most horribly (especially stuck in the back of the cattle section...heheh. so, as i couldn't sleep, and i wasn't in a mood to watch plane-edited movies, i read a book. so for 10 uninterrupted ours (it took 2 hours of fidgeting to figure out what i really wanted to do)...

so yeah - i managed to finish the da vinci code, by dan brown. so many people have read this book - my older bro, christian, alex (who gave me the book)... and more - i just can't think of them. interesting book, this. i can completely understand how people could take it to be truth - more those that really don't know any better. brown makes some wild claims, based on very little factual evidence. there's actually a number of them: (spoiler coming!) the story's bout this family from the merovingian line. this 'line' springs from the marriage of jesus and mary magdelene. he gets this 'proof' from the countless other 'gospels' that were written, that said this pretty explicitly, but were left out by the emperor constantine when he 'manufactured' the bible. of course, such documents don't exist. so countless other docs, such as the dead sea scrolls and such, also point to this 'fact' - and are all gathered together in a pack of documents that is part of the holy grail - which evidently is NOT the cup/chalice that was used in the last supper by jesus. then thruout history, there have been these groups that were sent out to find this 'grail' - which was actually found during the crusades by these templar knights, who were then killed in one go by issue from the pope, which then spawned this 'priory of sion' which was to protect the 'secret' of the docs until the day they want to reveal it to the world. evidently, this secret society been around for centuries, w/notable grand masters such as da vinci (obviously), isaac newton, and this curator of the louvre (in present day). da vinci he says - makes many references to this in his paintings - like instead of john, it was mary m that was next to jesus in the last supper painting... the mona lisa has many references to the feminine - which was the way of the world religion before constantine turned it all masculine (which again, is false). all this despite the fact that this 'priory' has been around only 50 years.

the book's heavy in symbolism that really stretch the imagination - where the olympic rings are said to represent the 5 points of this feminine light (a pentagram- which he purports is a symbol of this feminine, but constantine had the meaning changed to demonic worship). the star of david is surrounded by triangles, which is a symbol of male and female... watevers... so yeah - i can understand how people can begin to question the merits of christianity if they don't know the facts. it's so easy to distort. i've always used the term - 'know enough to be dangerous' - mostly in reference to me being a neurosurgeon (hehe)... but seriously here - a lay person reading this book would be armed with a little bit of info into this sect to be a danger to him/herself if they don't know enough about THE TRUTH.

normally i don't get riled up over books, even christian apologetics or whatever. a good book is a good book, but keep in context that it's another person's writing, and another person's views. but this one's made such headlines, and i've heard from too many people, talking bout the 'truth' of the da vinci code, that i just had to read it myself. i can completely understand now how a person could be misled - and now i know how to respond to those questions. i would encourage whoever has questions to seek the real TRUTH (i mean, other than the glaring obvious - the book is labeled FICTION!!!). as an action/suspense type book, it's not bad, and i can def see a movie out of this - mainly cause it seems like it's written with that in mind. entertaining, but that's bout it....

oh wells.... that was my plane ride. my first day (tues) here i spent walking 2.5 miles over to the dept. of motor vehicles renewing my drivers license, and eating a street dog! yum!!!! i love those things. got to meet up with some good friends here in cali that i haven't seen since this couple's wedding last oct, and another ex-anderson classmate. i gotta say - it's really nice in cali! the weather is gorgeous, but a bit cold a nite. only thing is - great to visit, but don't think i could live n work here. people here are SO SLOW. i think i'm too used to the hustling Hk life. it's tough to pinpoint if you haven't worked and lived in asia in general. but people here are so complacent with life, with work, and i guess just plain being. i dunlo... it's just... slow!

monday nite (in hk time) i couldn't sleep... tues nite was on the plane, which i couldn't even sleep 10 mins!... last nite i managed bout 4 hrs... and well, tonite is 4am and i still can't sleep. *sigh*... went to silicon valley on an intelligent building tour today - pretty interesting stuff! i'm here for this conference... called realcomm - on tech and biz solutions as applied to commercial real estate. so all the top tech co's and vendors are here w/most of the top real estate execs... a big schmooze if u ask me. and they all come together to talk bout the next gen/ intelligent buildings, tech apps to create paperless environments... all that stuff.

i'm so tired it's ridiculous. i can't think straight and it's fun just typing w/out any real purpose.

so things i'm missing in hk:
- brooke just got her part time job, and looks like she won't be deported!!! PRAISE GOD!
- circuit yesterday (grrr...)
- mark nam is in HK and was in my apt!!! arrggghhhh
- emi is getting baptised this sunday which i'm gonna miss!!!! :(
- circuit next tuesday
- alpha weekend!
- nuri vittachi @ 180

but things i get in SF!:
- cable tv in my bedroom!! heheheh
- espn with REAL SPORTS!!!!!
- reality tv on practically EVERY CHANNEL - it's so sad and makes me ashamed to be american
- about a million news channels: cnn, cnn headline news, msnbc, msnbc news, fox news channel, "h"something or other news channel... all talking about bush's follies
(you can see there's a big tv bias here)
- krispy kreme donuts - which i have yet to eat, but have seen stores selling them!
- humidity-free weather

i dunno... can't think of anything else... can't think... falling... asleeep.... zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz