Some of you may remember this plucky Hawaiian lass who was attacked by a great white while surfing and at the tender age of 13, lost her left arm. What made her a revelation is that instead of developing a phobia and swearing off the sport for life (I know I would have!), she returned to hit the waves merely a month after.
Bethany Hamilton
This girl I'm talking about is Bethany Hamilton, AKA, brand ambassador for the new to Singapore brand, OCEAN MINDED. Last heard at the Press Launch of OCEAN MINDED on 25 June 2009 @ Vista Bistro, Playground @ Big Splash, a movie's being made about her story. Here's a little background to her story if you've not yet heard of her (where have you been man?)
Back to the subject of OCEAN MINDED. OCEAN MINDED seeks not only to bring comfortable and fashionable footwear, and subsequently apparels to Singapore. It also wants to inculcate being responsible to Mother Nature and Brother Earth. This goes beyond just using materials that are environmentally friendly, e.g. materials made from recycled plastic, water-based glue that will not harm the oceans etc. OCEAN MINDED also seeks to develop their customers into environmentally responsible people by organizing green activities e.g. beach clean ups.
Their efforts thus far may have gone relatively un-noticed to us busy city-buzzers but it is slowly and surely gaining
foothold (no pun intended).
Sole of Meilani
With its first concept store launched late last year at Vivo City, it has started a trail of flowery prints to a series of store tie-ups and more coming up this year. Look out for the big wave from OCEAN MINDED that is sure to hit you.
For Her: Meilani
For Him: Durbo- Environmentally Conscious
- Quality, Fit and Comfort
- Natural and Sustainable Materials
- "LIVE" the ocean lifestyle, "PROTECT" our environment and "RESPECT" life!
OCEAN MINDED will be launching their products at Isetan Tampines Mall come 4th July 2009. Meanwhile, go grab a pair of OCEAN MINDED footwear at the following outlets:
- Ocean Minded Concept Store (Vivo City #02-62)
- IMM Mall
- Queensway Mall
- CHECK Stores (AMK Hub, Heeren & Westcoast Plaza)
- OG Orchard
The Thunder Asia Mosler Racing Team, featuring Singapore's own Melvin Choo, and Martin Short who was co-driving the Mosler MT900R, had an eventful weekend at the Super GT Round 4, held in Sepang International Circuit in Malaysia from June 19th to 21st, 2009. The debut of the team at the Round 4 race finished at a respectable 13th position despite mechanical failures due to the heat.Prior to the big race, I had the honor of a private tete-a-tete with Melvin Choo, checking out the machine itself and also meeting the Race Queens, Nana-chan and Yu-king.
Here's the 1-on-1 with Melvin Choo:
The Race Queens say their Hellos to Singapore:
And I got to pick up some trivial while chatting with Melvin as well. Did you know that...
There is no air conditioning in the race carsDespite the thick race suits that these race car drivers have to don for the race, there is no airconditioning in the race cars because air-con sucks too much energy from the automobil and adds unnecessary weight to the machine.
Race car drivers lose weight and height after each race.
Due to the intense heat in these speed machine, race car drivers lose alot of water after each race, hence contributing to the weight loss.
Being strapped down so tightly in their seats causes spine compression that result in height loss of up to a couple of inches after each race. Thankfully, the spine resumes it's 'suspension' and the height loss is only temporary.
Anyways, I do hope to be able to be at one of these races some day. Maybe I can go hang out with the boys when they practice as well. Sponsorship anyone? :)
It was a mad rush to get from the Changi Airport (i left at 1023am) to Vivo City's Golden Village to catch the 1045am Monsters VS Aliens. In tow was my 4 year old son who was arguing throughout the whole journey about the fact that I did not keep my promise to let him take the Skytrain. Hello, mommy had like 22 min to travel multiple kilometres and she's not driving a jet plane! Grr...
Anyways, we got to the ticketing counter a few minutes shy of 11am, with bursting bladders (him and mine) and a promise (to pacify sonny from breaking the skytrain promise) that I'd get him popcorn for the movie.
These are the few moments in my life I'm grateful that there is a culture of late startings for movies in theatres that runs tons of movie advertisements.
We got into the theatre past 11am, after clearing our bladders and buying popcorn, and we managed a catch a few more trailers before the movie began.
Let's start with a run down of the characters. Well, there are the MONSTERS:
Ginormica: This is a regular lass who got "zapped by a meteorite" in her own words, on her wedding day and grew to become a giant lass. The substance, we found out later, that she got "zapped" with was Quantonium.
Dr. Cockroach: One mad British scientist who's extreme experiment went awry and he turned himself into a cockroach in the process. The good news - he's now indestructable like a roach. Bad news - he's stuck with ugly looks and unappetizing food choices (this dude eats garbage)
The Missing Link: Some sea creature that is an Ape-Fish with bulging muscles and water-skills only a fish can manage.
BOB: essentially a blob of goo, he was created brainless (LOL) when fused between gelatin and tomato or something.
Insectosaurus: A gigantic bug that is in my opinion, rather adorable. What with huge innocent eyes and soft rounded bug teeth, how can anyone think he's scary?
And there's.. effectively only one ALIEN that went and clone himself into multitudes:
Gallaxhar: This octopus looking dude with an ape-ish face and an over-sized brain-cap is the ultimate bad guy who wants to conquer the universe or something.
So the gist of the story went that these Monsters were gathered by an intelligence in the US force and was volunteered for services in the form of fighting Alien forces that had invaded planet Earth in a bid to retrieve Quantonium - an ultimate source of power.
The ordinary life of Ginormica (before she became a giant, she was about to marry the love of her life, a weatherman on some news channel) got turned topsy turvy and she discovers her incredible strength and ability to save the earth, literally.
Caught and jailed in some unidentified underground facility along with fellow Monsters, they only found freedom when the US President got them to fight the alien force of Gallaxhar.
Amidst the fighting, the movie was interjected with messages of friendship being the ultimate driving force for incredible power, selfish love, female power etc.
Packed with lots of action, my four-year-old jumped on his seats at unexpected loud sounding attacks and gobbled the popcorn with an intensity of a food eating competitor.
For an animation movie, launched during the school hols (so assumingly targeting kids), Monsters VS Aliens had lines and themes that were too complex for a young child's understanding. Hence alot of the humour was lost. However, I'd recommend it for a family bonding time since kiddo will probably enjoy the animatedness and the lines should keep the parents entertained enough not to doze off mid-movie.
My favourite part: when Ginormica AKA Susan Murphy picked ex-fiance up at the end of the movie and flicked him off while LIVE on camera. (Watch the movie to find out why she did that)
My son's favourite part: when Ginormica put on 2 cars and skated around the streets.Rating:
