RIP: my poor iPhone...

Sob...I tried to unlock the phone function with iPhoneSimFree's recently-released software...now my iPhone is dead. Be warned.

On the bright side, now I can get a new one for just US$299 (using the US$100 credit from previous purchase).

Apple Bonkers?

That was the headline that flashed on CNN as I was running on the treadmill this morning. Had I not already seen the news this morning while waiting for BL to arrive, I surely would have fallen off the treadmill -- iPhone 8GB price dropped to US$399 from US$599? An iPod Touch will all the functionality of the iPhone minus phone functions for just US$299?? Truly jaw-dropping news, especially considering I just bought a still-locked iPhone less than 2 months ago for US$599!

As a consumer, I should feel totally jipped (judging from online posts, quite a feel iPhone owners do feel pissed off, but early adaptors always pay a premium for being first to play with the latests gadgets). But I'm actually feeling quite ecstatic. It may have to do with the fact that as an APPL shareholder (or maybe it's the endorphins from my morning run), I am just brimming with excitement over what a big holiday season it's going to be for Apple. The new products and the competitive pricing are just going to kill. APPL shares closed down more than 5% once the news was announced. But as a consumer, even with the iPhone, I still wouldn't mind adding the new (Product) RED nano and Nike+ kit to my collection. I think I've gone bonkers, not Apple. Oh, and did I mention the cool Apple+Starbucks partnership to sell music? It's a brilliant move for both companies and it's creating a whole new way of discovering and buying new music. The only glitch right now is NBC Universal pulling their content from iTunes distribution at the end of this year; am very worried about not being able to keep up with Heroes (Season 2 starts 24 September!).

Now, all I'm waiting for is the flash card drive laptop...

iPhone unlocked!!!

Here's the step-by-step posted yesterday by 17-year-old Geoge Hotz of New Jersey: Finding JTag on the iPhone. Not sure I'm feeling confident enough with my soldering skills to tackle this, but I'm sure a little cottage industry of iPhone-unlock services are popping up around the world as I type. And did I just hear the cash register ring again for Apple?

While I'm at it, just came back from a short morning run, just to the entrance of Stanley Park from Falls Creek and back. My brother and I were arguing over the distance we ran. When we got home, he ended the argument by logging onto MapMyRun and got the distance, just over 5.5km (my guess was around 4km). It's a pretty cool site that uses google maps. I even mapped the Bowen Road run in Hong Kong.

The weather in Vancouver has been absolutely glorious -- cool, clear blue skies. We were walking around Yaletown with Butters, my brother's 7-month-old, yorkie-poodle-schnauzer and came across some really stylish Kwigy-Bo outfits for him at Luv My Dog.

Tokyo Midtown and iPhone update

Was supposed to be in Tokyo this weekend with the yoga gang visiting FS, who is in Tokyo taking Japanese classes for a couple weeks, but work and other obligations have got me grounded in Hong Kong for the next few weeks. Am sure I'll hear all about their bacchanalian weekend though. In the meantime, FS sent picks of her swanky Oakwook serviced apartment in Tokyo Midtown.



On another note, been using the iPhone for a week now and still loving it (sounds like a McDonald's commercial!). I had a scare Saturday evening when I thought iPhone had gone into a coma. Turns out, when you run the battery down to nothing, it takes about 10 minutes for it to become responsive even after putting it into the charging dock. The biggest lesson in preserving the battery time is not to keep wifi on when not in use. With wifi constantly on, I only managed to get 24 hours standby out of the battery with about 4 hours of audio playback time (using the built-in speaker most of the time) and a couple hours of email checking and web browsing. My main complaints so far are its 8GB of memory (you have to be really selective about what music, TV shows and photos you load) and the fact that the Shure headphone jack doesn't fit into the iPhone (Apple's headphones are lousy at blocking outside noise, but the click control on the tiny microphone for pausing songs and forwarding tracks is quite convenient). Other than that, the iPhone works beautifully. Watching videos on it is so much better than iPod video and the great thing is the built-in speaker that lets more than one person watch (or listen to music, which is great when going running with BL so that he can entertain me with his karaoke running) at a time.

OMG! It's Genius!! iPhone AT&T authorization bypassed.

OK, I used the unlock mentioned in the previous post...et voila!...it's worked like a charm! I just finished synching iCal, songs and videos via iTunes and just got connected to office wifi. The interface, web browsing, etc. all work like a charm! Now, if only I could get Skype to work on this...

For techies: iPhone Dev Wiki. Check here for updates on the SIM unlock as well as other cool things for the iPhone.

I am in love with my new 8GB iPhone!!!

Even though it is just sitting on my desktop being charged while I surf the web for hacker solutions to bypass AT&T activation so that I can use all the non-Phone functions including wifi. Thank you soooooo much to DY for bringing it back from Honolulu! Apparently, he showed up at the Apple shop just as they got a new shipment in.

If anyone figures out how to do the SIM card unlock, please let me know!!!!

Goodwill Buys

Instant Karma -- The Campaign to Save Darfur benefits Amnesty International's "Make Some Noise" project. Artists ranging from U2 ("Instant Karma") to Green Day ("Working Class Hero") to Black Eyed Peas ("Power to the People") to Snow Patrol ("Isolation") to Avril Lavigne ("Imagine") reinterpret songs from John Lennon's solo songbook.

Was going through julib.com newsletters and came across their write-up on Social Atelier's conscience-raising and fund-raising for Solar Cooker Project T-shirts. The line of T-shirts with direct messages addressing global warming, warm, body image, genocide, gay marriage, poverty and AIDS, will launch tomorrow (14 June) at Fred Segal in Los Angeles.

Crazy about...

...iPhone. I am wishing Christmas will come on 29 June and my brother will tell me that he can get me an iPhone. I know I'll have to buy into a 2-year AT&T subscription, but as long as I can swap the SIM card, it'll be worth it. I am sick to death of my ultra-basic Nokia phone (even though it's the only phone that never gets left behind in taxis, dropped in the loo, stolen or broken; people actually chase after me if I leave the phone behind!). Only 18 more days in the US. But here in Asia, we've still got months!!



And there's also the July 2007 Vanity Fair Africa Special Section guest edited by Bono. Download Youssou N'Dour's playlist through iTunes; all the proceeds to benefit The Global Fund.

LOVEDAY

If ever a girl needed an excuse to go shopping in Cartier, here's the perfect one. Today is Cartier LOVEDAY and 20% of sales of their LOVECHARITY bracelet (and 10% of the rest of their LOVE line) will go to various charities around the world (in Hong Kong it's UNICEF, in the US it's the Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity). The cord comes in dusty pink as well as a few other colours. It might make for a great Father's Day gift; maybe I can get BL to convert it to a more functional key chain or get two and convert to cuff links.

Ultra-luxe Phuket resort in the making

I know I'm probably not supposed to be blogging (or in this case, blabbing) about this, but the highlight of my Phuket trip was visiting A&K's stunning home (not to mention, being introduced to a beautiful new toy: the Azimut 43S), which is going to be part of a large, ultra-luxe resort project set high up on a hill overlooking the ocean (made me think of Ubud, but with ocean views and only a 10-minute drive from the ocean). It's going to be a residence concept resort; each residence being a compound of separate living and sleeping pavilions with own gardens, pool and magnificent views. Can't wait! But it's still early stages yet; we're talking at least 2-3 years down the pipeline.



If you're ever in need of a good architect, check out Naga Concepts.

Monday Morning Chuckle

AW sent me this link to some clever creative work: www.greatpockets.com.

Chocolate Fondue Fiesta

Every year, around this time, I go ga-ga for fondue. It used to be...well, it sort of still is...a tradition that I have cheese fondue for my birthday. I prefer having it at home, as opposed to stuffy Chesa at Peninsula. There's something about fondue that makes it happy party food, even more so than shabu shabu, Chinese hot pot or other communal-cooking variations. It's probably just because it reminds me of skiing.

I just got Chocolate Unlimited's email flyer about their Fondue au Chocolat range of handy, in-a-microwaveable-jar, chocolate fondues. It's easy:
1. Select from 10 flavours or select them all (I want to try Dark 70% Cocoa, Dark & Rum, Dark & Ginger and Dark & Amaretto)
2. Zap it in the microwave for 2 minutes
3. Voila! Enjoy with fresh strawberries, biscuits, dried fruits, nuts, pretzels, ridged potato chips...whatever you fancy. It stays liquid for 45 minutes, but chances are it'll all be gone before then.

I want to have a chocolate fondue tasting/James Bond card game (DY's designed a brilliant deck of James Bond theme cards, 210 cards in all covering 21 Bond movies and 10 suits ranging from "The Fling", "The Gadget", "The Car" etc. There are different ways to play the cards, one of the ways is to play it like Go Fish!) evening. All that sugar will keep us up playing till morning, I'm sure. Maybe I'll bring it to Cortina over Chinese New Year. Just in case there's no snow. Pleeeaaasse let it snow, let it dump, let it dump!!!

Fondue au Chocolat @ Chocolate Unlimited
2/F Exclusivities
1 Duddell Street
Central, Hong Kong
T: +852 2526 7992

Bunny Talk: Nabaztag

I refrained from posting on this cool little bunny last month so that my brother wouldn't find out prematurely what his Christmas present was. I fell in love with the bunny at Kapok when I was meeting Arnault Castel to see if he would be interested in distributing Little Cream Book in Asia since his company already distributes Moleskine notebooks and soon their city notebooks (more on these cool create-your-own-guidebook notebooks later).


I found Nabaztag, the smartest little bunny, sitting on the shelf at Kapok. At first, I wasn't quite sure what to make of it. But then Arnault elaborated on his (or her, depending on your preference) many talents. Aside from being able to read you your emails, update you on stock prices in your portfolio or tell you the latest scores for your favourite sports teams, what I love about the smart, little bunny is that it's a great way to communicate. I just sent my first message to my brother's bunny yesterday. And then I sent another two. And I was notified that he listened to each of my messages an average of three times. Basically, here's how it works. My brother first has to give his bunny a name and then registers its existence on nabaztag.com. He then tells me the bunny's name. I go to nabaztag.com, look up his bunny and then type in my message. After I click send, half way across the world, the bunny will read out my message in whatever voice my brother has chosen (there's one of a woman speaking in a French accent). I'm waiting for Nabaztag/tag, which has a belly-button that's actually a microphone. With that, you can speak your message into your bunny and it can be played on another bunny. It's super cool! Then there's all this other cute stuff like making bunnies move their ears or flash the same colours on their bellies. But the coolest bit for me is the messaging. It's just a quick and endearing way of telling people elsewhere in the world (could be just next door or on another continent) that you're thinking about them.

In addition to the smart, little bunny, Kapok sells all sorts of cool stuff from young designers from Hong Kong and elsewhere. There's a great selection of music, T-shirts and other gift items and accessories such as candles, jewellry, handbags, stationery etc. It reminds me of the Colette of old.





Nabaztag available @ Kapok
g/f 9 dragon road
tin hau, hong kong
t: +852 2549 9254

Differences skis

I went and picked up a pair of Differences skis, which were recommended to me. They are handmade in Vorarlberg, which is nearby. All I can say is that they really improved my skiing. I am an intermediate skier. These skis allowed me to whiz down slopes with the maximum of confidence. When Philip at SportAlp asked me how good a skier I am and I replied, "Intermediate", he gave me this quizical look as if to say, "Are you sure you want these skis?". Only later, when I was returning them did another guy tell me that they are skis for expert racers. Well, I felt like a racer today. Other skis usually start to rattle a bit when I go fast, which makes me feel insecure so I slow down. But these skis were so still as I raced down slope after slope. Of course, the packed pistes were also the perfect condition for this kind of skiing, but I do believe these skis made all the difference!

I LOVE Apple's iPhone!!!

Woke up this morning to the most AWESOME news (and not just because APPL's share price shot up by more than 8%)! The only thing I'm not happy about is that it won't be in stores until at least June 2007!!! Be sure to check out Steve Job's iPhone intro on Apple's site (here's the link to keynote). Apple's partnered with all the big names on this phone: Yahoo! Mail, Google maps among others to "put the internet in your pocket". I can't believe Jerry Yang of Yahoo and Eric Schmidt of Google shared Apple's stage together. True collaboration!! Thanks Steve! Apple truly makes my life more wonderful.

Saved by Google Translation!

English is a fairly universal language when it comes to the travel business. Even when it comes to making bookings at rural ryokans in Japan, I've managed with emails in English. Finally, I hit the limits of English being the universal business language when I tried to get a confirmation for a hotel booking in Sendai, Japan (home to Toyo Ito's Sendai Mediatheque). And Sendai is a city, not the countryside!

For this particular trip that I was planning for a client, I had corresponded in English with Saryo Souen, a ryokan in the nearby onsen town of Akiu as well as a hotel in Matsushima, all without problems. But when it came to booking Sendai Kokusai Hotel, my emails went unanswered. So I resorted to calling. All seemed to go well in English until I asked for a confirmation by email. That did not happen. So I got FS, one of our Japanese-conversant partners to make the call to no avail. Finally, I caved and turned to online translation tools. I normally use online translation tools to read emails that come in in a different language (for example, the one in Spanish from Ecuador confirming that a transfer had been made). But up to now, I've shied away from using them to send translated versions of my correspondences. Because reading what I see translated for me in English, I figure the recipient at best would be laughing out loud, and at worst would be absolutely puzzled. But I was at my wits' end with Sendai Kokusai so I decided to give Google's Language Tools a whirl (Normally, I use Alta Vista's Babel Fish, but for some strange reason, I decided to give Google a try).

The first email I shot off got a reply within an hour. The reply, oddly enough, came back in English. But the reply had misundertood my request (to change a current booking to a different date. Instead, they thought i wanted to extend the booking to the new date.). So I simplified my email to read (of course, I have no idea what the Japanese really says. I was simply going on blind faith that it said I wanted to book a double room for the night of 19 December):

Subject: 緊急: 2006年の12月19日予約

仙台貴重なKokusaiのホテル、
私は2006年12月19日に1夜の氏のためにXXX 1つの二人部屋を確保することを望む。 電子メールによって確認しなさい。
本当にありがとう、Winnie

The reply came back promptly:

Dear XXX

Thank you for your E-mail.

Your reservation is completion.

On 19,December 2006.

For 1 night,1double room 2people.

Room charge \21945(tax included)

Thank you

Sendai Kokusai Hotel

Reservation Desk

Finally! Success after a week of unanswered emails and long-distance phone calls (thankfully, there's Skype). So two useful lessons learnt:
1. A poorly-translated request in the recipient's language is appreciated and therefore worth the effort.
2. Be careful how the original text is phrased before translation. Keep ideas and sentance structure as simple as possible. Otherwise, meaning can get lost in translation if not totally warped.

Tokyo: Shibuya Granbell Hotel, good things come in red, Tera Teppanyaki

I love Tokyo; it's one of the few cities in the world where I always feel like a lost foreigner despite the number of times I've been here. Diane von Furstenberg was in town last week for the opening of her first boutique in Japan with her whole entourage. MH, who's in town for other work, was guiding/hanging out with them and apparently it was the first time in Japan for some in DvF's group (including her son) and they absolutely loved it (especially the Loveless shop in Aoyama). The thing is, for a gaijin, or foreigner (such as myself), Tokyo will always be fresh and new, no matter how many times you visit. There'll always be that sense of excitement of the new and different, that buzz of not quite knowing what you'll stumble upon, the thrill of a mystery you'll never quite solve.

I arrived into Narita around 1400 and surprisingly the immigration queue was very short and moved quickly. Managed to get my luggage, rent my 3G phone (it's great that these days I can keep my Hong Kong number), grab some Starbucks


(Japan's stores probably have some of the best Starbucks food around and they have these really cool, Starbucks mermaid stirrers that are also stoppers for the lid that I haven't seen anywhere else in the world!) and caught the 1513 Narita Express out to Shinjuku station. It's a great thing these days to be able to get on the internet and show taxi drivers the location maps for where you want to go, because even with the English address for Shibuya Granbell Hotel, he wasn't quite sure where it was.

In terms of location, Shibuya Granbell is really great, a few minutes' walk to Shibuya station, less than 10 minutes to Parco Part One. But the best part is that it's on a quiet street, off the main strip. Downstairs, there's a nice cafe/bar that's open late called Piece of Pie. I booked a Double Room for Single Use (Y16,800, including ++!!). This is one of the very, very few hotels that offers a cheaper rate for single use of a double room. The room is very comfortable with all my necessary amenities. It has free LAN internet access and the cable's in the desk drawer. The bathroom has a tub (which is such a rarity in so-called boutique hotelrooms these days) and I had ample space to maneouver around with my bags laid out. Very good value for money. They have a great penthouse duplex suite with its own rooftop jacuzzi.


Good things come in RED! I got 2 wonderful surprises, both red. MH dropped by my hotel and produced a gift for me. It was a namecard holder from Inden-Ya. I had seen her namecard holder with a wonderful cream-dotted pattern on what she tells me is deer skin (navy blue). I had fallen in love with it and kept harrassing her to tell me where she got it. Unfortunately, it was a gift to her from her father so she didn't really know exactly where to buy it. Between her meetings here this time around, she chanced upon a shop selling Inden-Ya's wares, and got me my very own namecard holder with tan flower-shaped dots on red deer skin (red is my lucky colour). I found their website via google, so hopefully I'll have time to drop by their store.

The next wonderful surprise was that the GAP store near Parco sells their Product (RED) line! I had actually called Singapore's first GAP store, which just opened in Vivo City, but they had no idea what I was talking about. So when I saw the line here, I kind of went crazy and bought a whole bunch of inspi(red), desi(red) and hamme(red) t-shirts to give as gifts.


After a spot of shopping, SM picked us up and took us out for teppanyaki. Tera is a discrete, little teppanyaki restaurant in Nishi-Azabu that probably seats around 10 people at the counter and then another 20-25 people around tables. If you didn't know of its existence, you'd probably overlook its non-descript entrance. Once inside, you walk downstairs and there's a teppanyaki counter and behind it several screened-off tables. We sat at the counter. The first dish that came was uni on top of a small portion of grilled rice on top of crispy, grilled seaweed. It was absolutely delicious, the uni being very fresh and sweet in taste. Next came a Japanese teppanyaki version of raclette -- vegetables with cheese. We also had beef fillet and sirloin, garlic fried rice (which came with a wonderful broth), and vanilla ice-cream topped with grilled strawberries, all were wonderful! I'm so glad that I now know another good teppanyaki place aside from Seryna's Mon Cher Ton Ton.


After dinner, we went to nearby birth for a drink. I had yuzu tea. There's supposed to be a fortune-telling lady that goes around the tables, but when we saw how depressed a couple of girls looked after their readings, we opted not to take our chances.

Edun: Style+Sustainable Development

I was writing an entry on my new-found infatuation with Macau just now (still haven't finished it), but got side-tracked when I received a mail from AC. "I was flipping through a magazine whilst getting my hair done the other day...," starts the email. A write-up about Little Cream Book had caught her eye. She made a mental note, looked up our website, came across my blog and realized we're both INSEADers (she's a soon-to-graduate student)! But what excited me most about her email was a mention of her upcoming internship with Edun. Hmmm...I hadn't heard of Edun, so I clicked through the their website. And lo and behold, it is a really cool, interesting, fashion company with great heart and soul (another serendipitous moment). I wondered why I hadn't heard of them before. Afterall, the company is founded by Bono, Ali Hewson and designer Rogan Gregory. So now I'm thinking it might be fun to research a Little Cream Book on Goodwill Shopping around the world.

Anyway, I really like Edun's designs. Their F/W line for women is stylish and easy to wear. Am planning on doing some shopping for their stuff at Beams when I'm in Tokyo next month. If you can't get to one of the shops to buy their clothes, you can still support them and ONE by buying their Lesotho-made ONE shirt online (US$40 each with US$10 going to the ALAFA fund to fight AIDS).

And a video reminder from ONE to all Americans: VOTE on Tuesday, 7 November 2006!

Seeing (RED)

It's just been one of those humdrum weeks, where life just kind of floats by without you noticing. But then, we got an order for our complete set of Little Cream Book yesterday; all the way from Brazil! That was new for us. Thus far, the majority of our online sales have come from the US with only a smattering from UK/Europe. That's why I am truly enamoured with the internet. Imagine that: a small business like ours sitting in a speck of a city called Hong Kong, planning trips (I've planned a Paris honeymoon for a client in Seoul I've never even met from hotel rooms) and publishing luxury travel address books, somehow finds its way onto the radar screen of a consumer in Rio de Janiero, who then has enough faith in online transactions to use paypal.com to pay for our books, we get the order in our mailbox and we ship our books to the other side of the world. E-commerce is truly a revolution for small businesses.

So it really annoys me when I get an email from (RED) informing me of all the cool (RED) products that one can purchase, where part of the profits go towards eliminating AIDS in Africa, and yet, I can't purchase them! I really wanted to buy GAP's ultra-cool INSPI(RED) t-shirts to give to friends (in fact, had a friend's b-day in NYC coming up), but of course, they don't take credit cards without US addresses and they don't ship outside the US. Also wanted the Motorola (RED) MOTORAZR with (RED) Bluetooth H500 headset, but of course, the phone is only sold buddled with US cellular networks. Fortunately, I can buy the (RED) iPod nano. As always, Apple, with Steve Jobs at its helm, is at least one step ahead of everyone else. The (RED) movement should be a global movement. The power of consumerism isn't just confined to the UK (where this whole thing started; they even have a (RED) AMEX, where 1% of what you spend gets put to good use!! I want that card, but of course, I don't have a UK address) and US; Asians spend tons of money!!! So I really, really hope that we can get in on the (RED) action soon. In the meantime, all those in the US & UK, buy (RED) for Christmas, and those in the UK, should charge it to their (RED) AMEX!! The rest of us will just have to gift lots and lots of (RED) iPod nanos, which is uber-cool.

On another note, those who are looking for a quick bit of beach R&R can now look beyond Bali and Phuket. Koh Samui, which has been cleaning up its act as an up-and-coming stylish beach destination, has made it onto our radar screens with next year's Four Seasons resort opening. Reservations are being taken for bookings starting 1 February 2007, just in time for Chinese New Year sun-seekers. For a ski and snowboard bunny like me though, I'll be warming up with bombardinos in Cortina.

7 October: Mid-Autumn Afternoon Tea Party @ WANLILU Travel Lounge

Am procrasting. Trying to delay the inevitable of having to tidy up our ultra-cluttered, ultra-messy office before tomorrow's Mid-Autumn Afternoon Tea Party/Open House. We'll be hosting four other lifestyle companies. Incidentally, all are started by female entrepreneurs. There must be a good story in-the-making for a women's mag, about the trend for more-and-more ex-professionals quitting their high-paying corporate jobs to pursue their dreams of starting lifestyle businesses. It's not just a chance for us to promote our businesses, but we also hope that we can share our experiences, over mooncake and tea, with other would-be entrepreneurs who have yet to take that leap of faith and jump into doing something they love.

If you're in Hong Kong, feel free to drop by tomorrow, 7 October, between 1-6pm at the WANLILU Travel Lounge (Room 1501, One Hysan Avenue, Causeway Bay. It's above the Starbucks across Lee Theatre and just around the corner from Krispy Kreme! T: +852 3162 3729). In addition to us, Little Cream Book and WANLILU Play, there will be:

Becky Kong Photography
Chocolate Unlimited
Fontaine Accessories
Seasoning Make-up Workshops

Hope to see you!

Phone Envy

I was having dinner at Xi Yan (which, by the way, is a great private kitchen!) on Saturday when my friend AW whipped out his latest acquisition with an envy-inducing grin. It was a dopod 838 (in the US, it's sold as the Cingular 8125). I have been lugging around an HP iPAQ 6365 for almost a year since I accidentally dropped my Treo into the loo (don't ask me how that happened). It is the most inelegant smartphone around, but it has saved my ass many a times. Take for instance the time I was stuck in Bangkok traffic in a taxi on New Year's Day when I get an urgent call from a client honeymooning in South Africa. He had missed the person with their domestic tickets, who was supposed to meet them in the arrivals hall and transfer them to the FedAir flight to Singita. What were they to do? I immediately got on GPRS (yes, connection in Bangkok is quite good!) and looked up the 24-hour emergency hotline for Singita, called them up and asked them to get in touch with my client. I then called client to also give them the emergency number. Crisis averted in a matter of 10-15 minutes and before I even got to my destination!

While the HP iPAQ hw6940 is already out here and costs under HK$5,000 (around US$640 without service plan), I want to switch to the dopod 838. It costs HK$5,830 (around US$750 without service plan), but it is just so much more compact that it actually looks like a regular phone. It has a decent screen and a slide-out keyboard with all the essentials (Quad Band GSM/GPRS/WiFi/Bluetooth among other things). The dopod 900 is just too big, although I do like its flip-top, swivel screen. It is billed as "the world's smallest notebook". While that may be true, it's not the most practical as a notebook. For that, I'd opt for the flybook, much more sexy, especially in red!

Smartphones have changed the way I work, allowing me much greater freedom to work anywhere, anytime. My office is no longer a physical address. Instead, I carry it with me wherever I go (I just have to remember to bring charger and the right adapter! Another gripe: Will someone please unify the world's electrical sockets and the plugs of charge cords for everything from digital cameras to laptops to mobile phones to iPods please??!!). I am now waiting for the day when free wifi connections will be prevalent enough or GPRS connections fast enough so that I can skype instead of pay exorbitant roaming charges on my mobile.

Lost without Lost

I was going to write about how I came to be an Aman junkie, but I'm about to get on a plane tomorrow for Frankfurt and all I can think of is how miserable the 12+ hour plane ride will be without any previously-unwatched episodes of Lost or other shows to keep me entertained. Sure, there's the in-flight entertainment system, but I've pretty much already watched all that I want to watch. Which got me thinking that I might have become an iPod video junkie. I got my 60gb iPod video for my birthday earlier this year, and it has changed my life. No joke! It has proven to be one of my most treasured travel companions; the other being my mobile phone (most of my friends call my HP iPAQ the largest mobile phone around, but I like to think of it as a laptop that fits in my palm).

Since moving to Hong Kong nearly 13 years ago, I stopped watching television, with the exception of CNN or BBC in hotels and Sex and the City and the first season of Six Feet Under on DVDs. It's not that I didn't want to watch TV; I just never had time to sit down in front of a television when the shows were actually on-air. But now, with iTunes Music Shop selling the most recent episodes for just US$1.99 an episode, I've become hooked not only on Lost, but also Desperate Housewives and Commander-In-Chief. I may even start watching Top Chefs, since I've just downloaded their free pilot episode, which I only downloaded because I had run out of fresh episodes of my afore-mentioned fave shows. Now, I look for things to download whenever I travel. I watch my iPod video on 4-hour train rides from Geneva to Zermatt, in long immigration queues at Heathrow and, of course, on the plane. And the best earphones have got to be Shure's E-series. They really do block out all the ambient noise, whether it's the humming of the jet engine or even the wailing baby. For the iPod video's battery life of about 4 full episodes of Lost, I am in another world. So now, my only problem is that I can't fill my iPod with enough content to fill my transit time. So I'm hoping the folks at Apple, iTunes and various studios work out a deal fast, that will allow me to buy and download the latest movies. But first, Apple needs to double the screen size of the iPod and extend the battery life to around 12 hours of video play time. But I have faith, that all this is in the works as I type. In the meantime, I'm...