Observations & comments from the workshop

13:00 Many problems with giving instructions. The most common question – Where? We need some GPS based maps that both sides can share, more visual input. Constrain: difficulty in hearing the spelling and getting the directions right, could have been easier to use chat or some written based medium for street directions etc. The person giving instruction automatically opened a screen with Google maps next to the SKYPE and was trying to figure out where exactly is the avatar.
13:10
Problem: frozen screen (problems with sound transmission), many problem with sound, we have to use the mobile phone for sound. The video image works surprisingly good before this because it’s not completely fast so the movement of the body does not create dizziness on the side of the viewer…
13:20
Interesting thing that the person giving instructions did: she is moving her head around the screen trying to see more, would be great to map the movement of her head to the camera movement, or use this modality of movement in some way.

13:25
Importance of close ups & details in the interaction between the avatar and the person “operating” the avatar: the close ups serve as conversation triggers, both sides don’t know each other well and they communicate more when the avatar shows some detail of a building to explain the direction where she is going, or any close up that happens by chance.
13:40
Seems like the avatar is not aware of the reactions of the people around her but we see the reaction on the screen
14:00
More food details & close ups, almost obscene, the avatar mounted the camera to the spoon and we see her eating, scary. Video camera connected to objects seems like a good idea, movable video camera does all the trick… a lot of real time comments and discussion on close ups of the meals (What is it? Looks grouse… How does it taste? Do you have that in Vietnam, comparison of chilies in both countries, different meals, Go to another food stall. What they have there? Let me see). Maybe a shopping experience via avatar could be a next step or some feeding game, the movement of spoon is like food porn.
14:20
The person giving instruction is doing an interesting things: she is screen grabbing stills and copying pictures of what the avatar does, the weird perspective and close ups, the Blair Witch aesthetics of these pictures is interesting. She would like to take even videos and save parts of the conversation. Interesting idea to tag different parts of this experience. Voice and movement are the main modalities, any visual modality would be distracting
14:45 “Feels like having a little voice in your head” – response of the avatar when we asked her how does it feel to receive instructions, now aware of the “presence” of the person on the other side of the computer.
My immediate reaction/comments:
This would be a great medium for children and grandchildren to share experiences with parents, grandparents when traveling, there is this instant curiosity on one side and need to share and show on the other that would be ideal for such users… Especially my grandmother always wants to know the details of my travels because she is too old to do this.
Strange visual experience with the camera perspectives and shots: difficult to explain why but it is hypnotic, strong feeling of something immediate almost catastrophic is going to happen in the next moment, I guess we are trained by our TV/reality shows to react to such live images. The angles and perspectives do provoke curiosity and attention.
15:30
My immediate reaction/comments: now it reminds me of sport events on TV, watching sport events when a lot is happening on the screen with minimal effort and activity on my side.
Strange how it works well with conversation on food: what I am eating x what you are eating, need to compare experiences constantly
Wonder now about the function of the group and the group dynamics I perceived, it seems that is was distracting to the avatar to have all these people around but I maybe wrong, they did use the camera when eating and conversing with us, could be interesting to see how would it work with group of avatars on one side and one person giving instructions, avatar was not passive what is a surprise, she was giving ideas to the person on the computer what to see, do, experience more…

My thoughts on Saturday

First thing which occured to me when we started experiencing problems with the microphone was that we should have given it a week for testing and troubleshooting. That would have made the experiment much smoother.

I would like to mention first the constraints with the hardware, althought its just a mock-up, I feel I should just list it down.

1) The netbook overheated when left in the bag. So did the USB wireless dongle. However, it was fine when carried in the hand. No overheating issues, in fact it was pretty cool throughout, even with the system running continuously. Cable tangle from taking everything out of the bag was terrible, I had the dongle and some cable in my front shirt pocket the whole time.

2) The netbook is seriously underpowered. It definitely needs a RAM upgrade. It was hanging repeatedly at the URA City Gallery, even after rebooting the system several times.

3) Voice from the CNM meeting room at times was garbled and not clear. Think a headphone, microphone combination like the team on the ground used might have helped.

4) Voice from the ground back to the CNM meeting room was frustrating. Found out in the end that you needed to speak in a low whisper for the receiving side to hear your voice fairly clearly. Could either be a hardware or Skype issue. It could have been figured out if we had tested the set-up beforehand.

5) If the ‘walker’ was to go it alone with no assistance, I think a small hand-held LCD screen would be great to help focus the camera properly without opening the netbook. Also, he could see who he is talking to which might make the interaction more ‘personal’ somehow? (not saying that we should get it but it would definitely be useful)

What was good was…

1) The battery life. Wonderful. Couldn’t have asked for more. Lasted throughout. No issues.

2) The webcam was pretty easy to mount and use. I would think the picture quality was good? (any feedback from those in the CNM meeting room?). I was thinking an array of cameras mounted on the ‘walker’ would be cool, where the ‘viewer’ can select views at will without asking the ‘walker’ to look around. Maybe a motorised camera, like the Skycam we saw at the URA city gallery.

3) Connectivity was great. There was only one instance of a broken connection (wireless, not Skype), but that was when everything overheated at Kereta Ayer Street or something. The connection was still maintained even in the taxi heading from Maxwell food centre to NUS.

 

As a ‘test’ subject actually using the set-up I suppose I was more used to the idea of sharing the experience with the ‘viewer’, plus that I knew Xiu Fang and Denisa beforehand made it more comfortable to share the experience by moving the camera around and generally being candid with it. So I do agree with the proposed service being between friends or at the very least acquaintances. I don’t think I would have been very comfortable with a complete stranger. Even Thanh’s friend knew that this is a project and that Thanh probably knew who was at the receiving end. Think that may have affected her actions as well. What if it was a strange guy at the other end asking what you were wearing and asking for a top-to bottom view of yourself. Just saying.

I would describe the experience as talking on the phone while allowing whoever it is on the other end of the line to see what you are doing. Sort of taking the video chat away from the desk to the streets. Either that or having a little voice in my head telling me stuff and keeping me company. OR having an invisible imaginary friend. Its a three-in one kinda thing, just that I can’t really decide which. Maybe we need to run through this again?

Saturday Experiment

My Observations & Comments…

… as a Singaporean Giving Instructions

 

Hearing the tourist

• A little frustrated with the audio problems. It was quite tiring trying to catch what the tourist was saying and straining the ear to comprehend the sentences.
• Felt quite uncomfortable to keep asking the tourist to repeat herself. Was a bit worried that the tourist might be unhappy with me which could affect her experience of taking the walk.
• Putting the audio problems aside, I realized that it can be a little difficult to hear the road names properly. Even spelling out the names may not work well. So, later I decided to write down the name “URA Building” on a piece of a paper and placed it in front of the webcam. Seeing is more accurate than hearing.

 

Giving instructions

• Even though I’ve been to Outram Park MRT station and I’m good with my directions, I was totally lost when I have to give instructions to the tourist. I didn’t expect that it would be so difficult to even locate where the tourist was, let alone finding my way to Maxwell. Felt a bit stressed!
• “Seeing through the eyes” of the tourist is very challenging because your view is limited. To make things worse, you can’t even “control” your view. I have to say out very explicitly to the tourist where I want to look and which direction I want to go. These are not natural.
• I actually felt a little bad trying to “control” her, asking her to look this way and that way. Felt rather guilty if I told her to walk in a certain direction just because I want to get a clearer view of the surroundings which may not be the correct route to take at all.
• The experience made me lost confidence in myself (in giving directions to a place I know very well).

 

My conversation with her

• I enjoyed talking to her. Hoped could have more time to chat with her and bring to more interesting places:)
• Even though I wasn’t there at the food centre enjoying the food and atmosphere, I could still imagine how it would feel like – the warm weather but compensated by the rotating fans (could see the fans through the webcam). Probably I’ve been there before.
• It was fun asking her why she ordered the prawn omelette, how she finds it, whether she has eaten it before, whether there are such cuisines in Vietnam. This is a good experience knowing and learning about another country in a more interactive and personal way.
• Felt a little bored waiting for her to finish her food. Not sure whether she felt uncomfortable with me watching her? But it was interesting to see the way she eats – what did she taste first, the prawn or egg? How did she hold the chopsticks? Did she dip her food into the chili sauce? Felt as if I was physically there with her.

 

• If I was overseas that time, I would feel close at home when she “lends” me her eyes to see the surroundings, as if I was there. I would be very happy if she orders the food that I longed for and taste it on my behalf (sounds strange though).
• It was funny to see her expression after I told her to try the “atap seed” in the ice kacang – she didn’t seem to like it. But this was important to me, because I also don’t like the taste of it! It’s a nice feeling to find someone who shares the same taste or view with you.

 

Funny experiment

• I like the idea of having a spoon in front of my view. Looked as if I was “holding” the spoon. Would be fun if I could control the spoon virtually, yet producing real effects physically.
• I had GREAT FUN taking down snapshots of views I want. It’s just like holding a camera and taking photos freely… maybe even more freely as no one will know when you’ve taken a photo and what you’ve taken!
• I like this camera function in Skpe, it allows me to keep the scenes and pictures of things I like e.g the pretty ice kacang, the fabulous nasi bryani. Things looked more delicious on screen, even though I may not even think of eating them in real life.

Lunch @ Chinatown Food Complex

Activity

Before searching for the authentic food, place a packet of tissue paper on the table. Stand at a few tables away and observe the behavior of other people. Find out the meaning of a packet of tissue paper placed on an empty table.

Menu

Main dish:

A)     Singapore’s Yellow noodles – Mee Pok Tah (Dried noodles with minced pork and mushroom)

[Teochew Street Mushroom Minced Meat Noodle #02-023, 12.30pm to 9pm, closed on Mondays and Tuesdays]

   

B)      Beef rice noodles – Beef Kway Teow (Soup-based rice noodles with beef)

[Kee Lin Beef Kway Teow #02-118]

 

C)      A Singapore Must-try – Hainanese chicken rice (white chicken/ roast chicken)

(Hoe Kee Hainanese Chicken Rice #02-041)

 

D)     The Exotic Tonic – Turtle soup

[Kent Thong Turtle Soup #02-008]

 

E)      Local Malay Delight – Nasi Lemak (coconut rice on pandan leaves with chicken wing, fried egg, small fried fish and peanuts)

[Kampung Nasi Lemak #02-029]

 

Side dish:

A)     Healthy yet Tasty –

Rojak (Malay-style salad: cucumber, pineapple, ground peanuts, guava, beancurd etc mixed with a sweet sauce

Popiah (Chinese spring roll: turnip, bean sprouts, ground peanuts, parsley, mashed egg etc. wrapped into a roll)          

[Yom Yom Rojak Popiah #02-98]

Activity → Find the common ingredient used in both snacks (e.g. ground peanuts). Find out the meaning of “Rojak” and “Popiah”. What languages are they?

 

B)       Secret Spices – Ngoh Hiang (Five Fragrance) Fried spring rolls, fried fish cakes, sausages etc. with the five spices added.

[Zhong Zhong Five Spice Stall #02-008]

Activity → Taste the snacks and find out what are the five spices being used.

 

C)       Sticky rice dumpling – Green Bean Zhang (Green bean paste dumpling)/Hokkien Bak Zhang (meat dumpling)/Nonya Zhang (Peranakan flavour dumpling)

[ShangHai Chee Cheong Fun #02-174]

Significance → Rice dumpling is a traditional festive food for the Chinese during the fifth lunar month.

Activity → Find out the difference between Hokkien Bak Zhang and Nonya Zhang (the ingredients used, how they came about). Find out what is the festival associated with rice dumplings.

 

Desserts & Drinks

A)     Fruity Ice Shavings – Ice Kacang (syrupy ice with red beans, agar agar jelly, sweet corn etc.)/Durian Chendol (Durian puree added to the green chendol jelly, red beans, brown sugar and coconut milk)/ Mango Fruit Cocktail

[An Ji Xiang Hua Wen Tou Xue #02-183]

Significance – Ice Kacang is actually evolved from Ice balls which used to be a favourite treat of children in the past.

 

B)      Sweet creamy soups – Walnut paste/ Black sesame and almond paste

[115 Tang Shui #02-206]

                             

C)     Traditional hand-made Glutinous rice balls – 5 flavours (durian paste, peanuts, black sesame, yam paste, red bean paste)

[Hai Sing Ah Balling #02-059, 12pm-9pm]

Activity → Find out why the glutinous balls are called “Ah ballings”.

                   

D)      A simple, common, but nutritious drink – Soya milk: Warm Ginger Soya Milk/Cooling Grass Jelly Soya milk (No preservatives. No gypsum powder added. No GMO soy beans. Freshly made.)

[Bean Junction #02-042]

 

E)     Traditional Cooling Drink – Chinese herbal tea

[Hui Min Chinese Herbal Tea #02-143]

 

F)      Tropical Singapore – Ice-blended fruit juices: ABC juice/Durian juice

[Blenz fruit Juice #02-133]

Activity → Find out what is ABC juice. Why is it called “ABC”?

Breakfast @ Maxwell Food Centre

Menu

Main dish:

A)     Comfort food – Silky Smooth Porridge: Mixed Porridge (pork, fish slices, century eggs)

[Zhen Zhen Porridge Stall 54, 5.30am to 2.30pm, closed on Tuesdays]

Significance →A traditional breakfast for the Chinese

Activity → Find the stall with the longest queue

            

B)      Indian-Muslim – Crispy Roti Prata with egg (Fried Flat Bread) and curry

[Hajmeer Kwaja Muslim Food]

Significance → Popular Indian dish

Activity → Order it using Malay language

 

C)      Cantonese Dim Sum –

Savoury:  Soon Kueh (mini steamed rice cake with turnips)/ Chee Cheong Fun with Char Siew (Rice cake strips with sweet BBQ pork pieces)/ Char Siew Pau (BBQ Pork Buns)/ Siew Mai (Minced pork and shrimps)

Sweet: Crispy crust baked egg tarts/ Ma Lai Koh (Yellow spongy steamed cake)

[Ho Kee Pau Stall 70/80]

 

Finger food:

A)     Sweet – Mee Chian Kuay: Swissroll-style Coconut pancake/ Traditional triangular Peanut pancake

[Pan Cake Stall 26, 7am to 5pm daily, Sundays 7am to 3pm]  

Activity → Find “Fusion of the Swiss and the Chinese”

          

B)      Savoury – Oyster Cake

Activity → Find “Seafood Bakery”

 

Drinks & Soups: 

A)     (Chilled) Refreshingly Exotic SG- Preserved Plum Juice

Significance →A special concoction of local kopi & toasts shops

Activity → Ask the stall owner what is the name of the plum. Remember its name, how it is prepared, where it is from. (A task for the tourist to buy it from the NTUC supermarket)

 

B)      (Warm) Sweet and Wholesome – Red Bean Brown Rice Soup/ Peanut Soup with You Tiao (fried dough)

[Peanuts Soup Stall 57]

                 

C)      Traditional Breakfast Beverage – Kopi – O –Kosong (Coffee without milk and sugar)

Activity → Order it using the Singaporean Food Language “kopi-O-kosong” and find out what it means

Taichi

Taichi is an internal Chinese martial art often practiced for health reasons. It is of hard and soft martial art technique, demonstration competitions, health and longevity. Some of tai chi chuan’s training forms are well known to Westerners as the slow motion routines that groups of people practice together every morning in parks around the world, particularly in China.

Most modern styles of tai chi trace their development to at least one of the five traditional schools: Chen, Yang, Wu/Hao, Wu and Sun.

The study of tai chi primarily involves three aspects:

* Health:Tai chi’s health training concentrates on relieving the physical effects of stress on the body and mind.
* Meditation: in the sense of relieving stress and maintaining homeostasis
* Martial art: The ability to use tai chi as a form of self-defense in combat

the health benefits of tai chi chuan were largely explained through the lens of traditional Chinese medicine, which is based on a view of the body and healing mechanisms not always studied or supported by modern science.

There are many variations in the tools that can be used to practice Taichi, can either use sword (metal or wooden) or fan (metal or paper fan) or a long spear (Chen style):



Visitors walk by the park near Tangjong Pagar arounf 7:30 to 8am can learn Taichi with Master Chan.
Master Chan (Chan Peng Kwong) who is born in Singapore is over 70 years old. He has taught “Wu Shi Tai Chi” (吴式太极) for more than 40 years. On Wednesdays, he will teach the physicians at a nearby Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) Hospital.

“Wu Shi Tai Chi” involves the sword. This form of Tai Chi is the best for health. It divides the human body into Yin & Yang. By performing the different movements, one can balance his Yin & Yang and improve his blood circulation. Having a good blood circulation is important in strengthening the immune system.
“Wu Shi Tai Chi” is suitable for everyone – regardless of gender, age and body size.

The experience is that of enlightenment whereby one can feel gradually through the movements of his/her body under Master Chan’s instruction are making the blood circulation smoother, one’s mind is relaxing yet at the same time more sober than ever. One feels like he/she is now back in the ancient China with the smell of morning air, the warmth welcoming of morning sunlight, with Master Chan’s chanting of the moves…

seng wong beo temple-ghost marriage

the temple was founded in 1905, it has a history of more than 100 years and highest standing of all City God temples in Singapore. It is more popularly known to the older generations in Singapore.

Painted with both strokes of the Chinese brush style on the exposed outside wall of this temple is Du Cheng Huang Gu Miao 都城隍古庙. Cheng Huang is translated as City God in English.

The dragon sculptures were created by craftsmen from China and are still well preserved. you can see the traditional images of the God of Door at the door and the eight immortals at the entrance of the temple, which are indicative of a Taoist temple.
This temple has an interesting history. It was founded by a Buddhist monk although the temple is more Taoist in nature. It can be considered as a syncretic temple, which is quite common in the Chinese temples in the early days of Singapore. The buddhist monk was Master Rui Yu. He was well versed in poetry, a scholar of the former Qing Dynasty in China then he became a monk due to the abolition of imperial examination. He later came to Singapore where he saw many Chinese who sailed in boats from China and settled mainly in the Tanjong Pagar and Telok Ayer areas. They worked mostly as labourers in the harbour and also as rickshaw pullers. Their life was hard. Falling ill and feeling lonely and home-sick were common. Their hardship touched him and made him decide to build the temple. He wanted these people to have a place where they can worship and pray for the well-being of their loved ones back home in China. There is a photo of him at the gate of the temple:

Seng Wong Beo temple originated from China. The god worshiped in the temple is City God. In the past, the Chinese placed every walled city under the protection of a City God. According to Chinese beliefs, the City God guards the city from evil. Devotees come to the temple to pray for the country’s peace and prosperity, for the triumph over evil and for the good health of all. The City God rewards good deeds and punishes the evil ones. He also has the responsibility to guide souls of the dead to the underworld. His temple has ben and continues to be a place of solace for its many devotees. This is the main altar:

To the left of the City God are altars for

-General Tiger god: god for wealth and keep the evil away because the tiger can eat up evil people

-Righteous Dog god: for peace: the story was that a sail was grounded off at a coastal village in ancient China, all 17 people on board were dead except for a dog. the villagers were burying the dead then the dog jumped into the grave to be buried alive with the dead. The people were touched.

- the General Horse God: horses in ancient time were used for sacrifice so horse is place in temple too.

-Justice Pao: a loyal official in Song Dynasty with upright character hence he was named Justice Pao (Pao is his surname)

-Er Ye Bo: guardian of the City God

-Emperor Baosheng: father of Traditional Chinese Medicine

-Qingshui Founder God: master of Taoism

To thee right of the City God are altars of

-Zhusheng niangniang: pray to her for pregnancy. She is the god of procreation, holding the book of procreation with names of children women can give birth to.

-Da Ye Bo: another guardian of the City God

-Emperor Wenchang: god for writings and knowledge. he is widely worshiped by scholars for examinations

Behind the City God altar is Rui Yu Hall where they keep tablets of the deceased and ancestors to honor the temple founder. This hall is also the location for ghost marriages.

visitors come here can buy a worship pack to pray to the gods that include: one pack of food, one pack of paper incense, candles. they will walk 1 round of clockwise to pray to all the gods starting from the main altar, put the food at the altar first, after that light the candles, then pray and lastly burn the incense.
The words ‘Seng Wong’ mean the soil collapsed from the city wall to rebuild the city wall. The earliest Seng Wong Beo temples appeared in the southern and northern dynasties (420-589AD) of China.

Apart from praying for well-being and health, some worshippers would ask the temple to perform ghost marriages for the children who died yong. According to sources, sometimes, a family member of a deceased relative (single who died young) might have a dream about being requested to arrange a marriage for the deceased. Chances are it would be the mother who dreams about it. In about the same time, another family might have a similar request. This temple does “match-making” too, matching them according to the descriptions. Then the temple will perform the marriage for these 2 families.

Ghost marriage (source of photos: SPI Department of Cultural Beliefs) this is what a tourist can see when one attend the wedding:

At the front gate of the temple, there’ll be heaps paper offerings and models which are going to be used for the spirit wedding later. They are paper effigies of a car, bed, bridges, human figurines.






The ceremony will begin with the priest chanting in the main hall, honoring the city god. This part of the ritual is a litany, meaning a ritual conducted in front of the deities for confessing and imploring for forgiveness. Litany rites are conducted to pardon the dead’s guilt and help them to ascend to heaven or to have a good reincarnation. This short ceremony involves the priest reporting to the city deity on the details of the rituals, the people involved and at the same time, also seeking the blessing and assistance of the city deity to oversee the whole ceremony.

After that, the priest will lead the family members to the gates of the temple facing the heaven and start to chant. The family members are to follow immediately and burn the joss paper offerings the priest hold on to throughout the ritual. Subsequently, the priest will lead them to the guardians of the gate to pray and soon after that to the ancestral tablets. This part of the ritual is to invite the spirit come up to the mortal world from hade and the priest’s job here is to lead the spirit pass the door guardian of the temple. If this is not met, the spirit would not be allowed to enter the temple.

The paper effigy will be placed in front of the altar by the priest. Food offerings were prepared in front of the bridal couple paper dolls. It has wine and meats and cakes of all sorts.

These paper boxes will represent the Hell Gate through which the souls would be summoned through by the priest.

This is the deed of land that used to legally certify the ownership of the land belonging to the person of the name written on it.

There are other documents used in the ritual as well. This one here needs to have both the names of the bride and groom written.

after that is the the ritual of crossing the ritual bridges. Taoists believe there are three bridges leading to the underworld. The three bridges are namely the Golden bridge, the Silver bridge and the Naihe bridge. The Golden bridge and the Silver bridge are used by the sages and righteous people, whereas the Naihe bridge is used by the common folks. The Naihe bridge is also known as the river of endless of sorrow bridge because the river underneath is made up of sinful blood of the sinful people and is also filled with snakes and horrible creatures inside. Only the good people can walk pass the Naihe bridge without worries but not for the bad people who will fall through the Naihe bridge to be tortured.

During the ceremony for leading the soul to the underworld, these bridges are known to be placed in a parallel position whereby the Naihe bridge will be placed in the centre with the Golden bridge and the silver bridge by the side of Naihe bridge. The priest will lead the two paper effigies cross the Golden bridge first, followed by the Silver bridge and lastly the Naihe bridge.

After that, the priest will lead the paper effigies to walk around the bridges anti-clockwise for three times. After they had complete their three rounds around the bridges, the family members will bow to the paper effigies and sacrifice wines to the spirits. After the ritual, the paper effigies together with the bridges and the offerings will be burnt in the big burner. according to Taoist beliefs, these rituals are important for the deceased because they will have to wait for at least another 200 years before they can be reincarnated.
The priest will also set a tablet bearing the names of the newlyweds at the ancestral tablet altar. The priest will end the whole wedding ceremony by hitting the drum and bell in the temple nine times each.