Sleepy Monday

Bad news. I didn't manage to finish a single post on my holiday again. Yes. Again!

Good news. I managed to hit, and even exceed my subbing target last night. Despite having wasted the whole afternoon away at trying and failing to take a nap. Not too bad. I think this episode is much easier to translate too so that helped a lot. Now to continue the work and finish the episode by Saturday.

Another bad news. I'm so freaking sleepy today. Should have slept earlier but I was trying to hit my target. I'm always back at work on Mondays more sleepy then ever... Instead of feeling refreshed after a good rest during the weekend... Its always the opposite for me? Sigh. I should try and change that ne? Doesn't help that I signed up for an equipment training later on so I need to be awake. Cos I do want to learn how to use that thing. I think I'll wake up later though. Once I have something to occupy my mind. And tmr I'm going for some seminar too. And next month... I signed up for some seminar as well. We'll it's a good thing you get to learn something and it's a good change from just lazing around. Or running around the lab... And it's interesting stuff too, else I wouldn't have bothered signing up.

Back to the equipment training. It's a cryostat that was actually bought by my former group. Apparently they didn't even use it once though lol. I wonder if I'll have chance to use it next time...

Books: Empire of the ants by Bernard Werber

I thought I'll take some time to share the first ebook that I read this year. I came across this book when surfing Quora, a new favourite hangout of mine. It's a great site. People ask questions and others answer. The best thing about this site has to be the wonderful community there. There are rarely any trolls, or troll answers... that and the fact that the system is good and quick enough to remove any of such nonsense. The result is that the site is full of really high quality answers. People answering things from their own experience, or experts giving detailed answers from their own knowledge. You should give it a try if you're free...

So well, the book. It's originally written in French, but since my knowledge of French is non-existent, I could only read the version that's been translated into English. It's actually the first out of three books, but I could not/have not located the other two books in English. I'm not even sure if the other two books have been translated into English...

There's a wikipedia page for the book here, with a little info on the plot... (lazy to summarize, sorry)

Overall what I really like about the books were all the parts describing the behaviour of the ants. The social aspects, the biology, the anatomy of the ants... random biological facts interlaced with an intriguing story. Well as wiki mentioned, the story is about two parallel world - the ants and the humans. I very much preferred the story about the ants rather than the humans, though the human world can't be neglected because it is the humans that provides all the mystery that the ants encounter. I enjoyed the way the ants were portrayed. Fiction based on a good dose of facts. Things are exaggerated of course, but not so much that it would be impossible for you to imagine it happening. All in all it makes a very compelling read. I'd very much love to read the next two books, since the first book did kind of leave things in a cliffhanger. Hopefully the other two books have also been translated to English...

Books/Drama: Murder on the Orient Express

So I've read the book and watched the drama.

Of course this post is full of spoilers, so if you don't want to know, please don't read on!

Well for one... previously when I translated the news article, it was said that on the first night the story would follow the book closely, while the second night would be a twist. (And I swear, the Japanese word used was twist, straightforward, right out of the dictionary.) Of course, when you say twist, I thought it meant that they would be changing the story... maybe changing the tricks they used to commit the murder... or changing the murderer(s)... etc... Well granted, now that I've read the story it is quite hard to actually change the story while still making sure it's as good, or even better as compared to the original. Still... the words used by that news article...

Well it turns out that the second night isn't really what I would call a twist at all. Since it in no way 'twists' the main plot. Inside, the second night drama shows a 'behind the scenes' view of how the entire incident happened. Starting from 5 years ago when the Goriki family (or Armstrong, if you're using the names from the book) was killed. How the servants of the house left etc.... how they came together one by one and decided to carry out the unthinkable - kill the murderer with their own hands. They showed how Nino worked for that Murderer (sorry, I just suck big time with remembering names), how they got the Goriki former bulter to serve as his valet. How Nino got so frustrated at having to work for such an uncouth man and nearly wanted to quit but was persuaded not to... how the less educated servants got so frustrated at the lack of progress with their plans... how last minute changes occurred when the Countess wanted to take part as well - initially the plan was that her husband would take her place, and the wife would stay at home... how Nino made the mistake of burning the letter instead of bringing it back, which eventually led to their whole plan being revealed...

All in all I'd say it was an extremely well thought out drama. I could not spot any loopholes, or logical flaws (granted, they are following the plot of a well established writer after all). I think the behind the scenes story fitted well with the main plot, it was neither dull nor boring, and it was most interesting to see how the 13 of them executed their plans (and changed their plans as they realised Suguro Takeru, the famous detective, was on board) and committed the murder.

The drama was, as you probably already know, localised as taking place in Japan, instead of Europe as set in the book. Still, everything was well considered by the script writer/director and the localisation of the story was done with utmost care. For example, in the book the secretary had let Poirot known that the murdered speaks only English, but he had replied the train conductor in French. In the drama, Suguro asked Nino where the murdered is from, to which Nino replied that he had inferred that the murdered was from a particular locaility in Japan because of his dialect, whereas Nino had replied the train conductor in a different dialect. In the book the passengers were from various countries, but in the drama they were from various parts of Japan. The character names were properly considered too. The name association trick with the governess was reproduced by referring to a place in Japan when the real name of the governess and the fake one made up by the countess was put together. The oil spot trick too. In my opinion erasing a radical off the word worked better than changing a H to an E. You can tell that they had put in a lot of effort to make sure the drama included as much of the things mentioned in the book as possible. Still, as with all drama/movie adaptations there are parts that have been left out. For example, Poirot on Taurus express was completely eliminated, and with that elimination we do not get to see the govorness being distraught at the possiblity of not catching the Orient Express. Well in fact this whole Taurus Express thing was not only omitted, but it was changed, deleted, gone. The governess was shown as departing from the house with several other members of the group of 12, with the group departing at various different times. So no Taurus Express in the drama. Also missing was the writing of names/address when Suguro/Poirot was interviewing the suspects. The collection of passport was missing too, which does make sense because they were not travelling overseas in the drama. Only the count and countness had their passports with them in the drama. And no writing, so we didn't get to see who was left and who was right handed. Those were the two most obvious differences that I can recall at the moment... Ah one more. In the book the dead man's clothes were taken off for the doctor to examine the wounds, but of course they would not do that in the drama so as to make the show more family friendly.

Edit: Just remembered one more difference... In the book another carriage was added onto the train in a the station, and the company director moved to a room on the newly added carriage, freeing up his room for Poirot. In the drama that whole part was neglected, no new carriages were added on. The director merely moved to the 3rd class. As there's no new carriage added on, after the bloody knife was found, the actress wasn't moved to a new room simply because there was no new room to move to.

The acting was also superb. Not just Nino... but everyone else's too. A star studded cast indeed!

All in all I enjoyed both the book and the drama very much. I would certainly say that the drama has done the book justice, and I'd recommend you to watch the drama when you are free (and when subs are out I guess?). I'd definitely like to let my parents watch the drama (since there's Chinese subs) when there's a chance.

Alright! That's all for now! It's really late already and it's high time for me to head home!!!