V is for...

If you haven't seen V for Vendetta (the movie) or read V for Vendetta (the far better done graphic novel) then you probably wouldn't know what I'm talking about.

In any case, go see the movie - it's great! It's a good hard critical look at fascism and anarchy, and it doesn't make a case for either (in the end). I was not that thrilled with the political ideas expounded by it; I was more intrigued with Alan Moore's clever wordplay.

Speaking of Alan Moore (and here, I digress), I somehow wished that he involves himself with the film creation process of his stories, rather than completely divorce himself from it. Prior to V for Vendetta, there was From Hell (Johnny Depp smoking pot and hunting Jack the Ripper), and there was A League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (Sean Connery leading Victorian-era X-Men in some swashbuckling adventure). Both stories seriously detracted from Moore's script, borrowing the premise, but none of the richness of ideas and philosophy. A pity: part of the beauty in reading an Alan Moore graphic novel is in recognising this guy's genius with wordplay, philosophy, and subtle references. V for Vendetta is much closer to the original story, but (like in Sin City) squeezing 3 stories into a movie makes scenes look rushed and rather badly paced.

V stood for many things in the movie. Besides being the character's chosen namesake, V represents the Roman numeral for 5. And if you analysed V's utterances carefully, he spoke in iambic pentameters, a system of rhyme with 5 beats composed of 2 syllables each. Also, in the original graphic novel, each chapter of the book was titled with a word beginning with V. V also stood for victory, especially so during WWII and the Allies' invasion of Normandy (another interesting fact: Beethoven's 5th symphony starts off with that famous 'da da da DUM', which is also Morse code for the letter 'V').

Anyway, since that book was such a great spelling book, I decided to do my own version of it. Here's my "V is for..." list:

V is for Van Zandt: this man is a faculty at INSEAD (sighs, that's all I can talk about these days). He taught the Singapore folks Prices and Markets, which is really just a fancy name for Microeconomics and some Game Theory. I've never seen a professor that was so dedicated to helping his students learn: he seriously did a lot to help us all understand, so much so that we ended up misunderstanding at times. 10 points for effort though: he's always trying. Wished INSEAD would give him some kind of award.

V is for Vandalism: the 2 front doors of my car have been purposely scratched. I do not understand the penchant for people to go scratch paint off other peoples' property. There is no justice in it, and exactly what kind of a kick comes out of doing such an irresponsible act? Sure, the other guy parked too close for comfort, but that's no reason to vent your frustration in such a manner. Seriously, car drivers in Singapore are a juvenile bunch: they drive like they own the road; they think having a car is a big deal; and they can't deal with having their so-called freedoms infringed upon. Grow up Singapore car drivers (of course this does not apply to all drivers, so don't take this personally).

V is also Roman numeral for 5: 5 is the number of periods I have to go through for this fricking MBA. 5 is the month that I celebrate my birthday in. 5 is a television channel which is always playing catch-up with the local cable provider. 5 is the number of fingers on my hand (ah duh). 5 is the mental age I lower myself to whenever I throw a tantrum (which I don't, anymore). 5 is so many other things I can't finish numbering them off, so I'll stop with 5 of them.

V is for Ventriloquism, a word I had to look up to spell properly: once upon a time, way back when I was a Primary 6 kid in a mission school, a friend of mine and I decided to do a 'Xiang Sheng' (a Chinese comedic performance, click link and check with professor wiki). To 'spice' up our act, we decided to incorporate a puppet into the act. My friend was supposed to do the ventriloquist part and play with the puppet. Faced with a lack of resources, our puppet was a toy koala bear my sister owned. The soft toy was of the kind where you can stick a hand into it and manipulate its head and 2 little arms. Our act got into a little trouble with the Chinese teacher, and it got canned. (and so ends my brief attempt at a showbiz career).

Right, its late and I need to sleep. Thanks for dropping by and today's program was brought to you by the letter V, and the number 5.