So, I was awoken this morning by the sound of firecrackers, lots of them.
Today is the second last official day of the Chinese New Year holiday and when stores, shops or restaurants reopen today (those that aren't willing to wait to do business tomorrow or Monday) they will light off a string of firecrackers in front of the building. Every Chinese New Year is considered a new beginning to each business, and so they are lighting firecrackers to celebrate their "grand opening" for the NewYear. Some of them even burn special papers (called "Hell Money") in front of their shops as well, to appease spirits and hope for future success.
Now this is a nice idea, but you have to realize there are probably several hundred thousand businesses in Taipei and a very large majority of them are doing this. The end result is the air is filled with smoke and you'd think there's a war going on. In front of some office buildings there were displays loud enough to wake the dead and so much smoke you'd think the buildings were on fire. And, this isn't the day when most of the fireworks are going off! That will be tomorrow or Monday.
Luckily for me, I leave for Singapore ay 7:40am tomorrow morning, so I will miss most of the mess. Darn. ;)
I have to say that the experience of having Chinese New Year here has been nothing short of amazing. I have been fortunate enough to spend it as part of Connie's family and have met a lot of very kind relatives and eaten a huge amount of good food. After this week, I truly understand why the Chinese love food so much, eating here is an experience I can't even begin to describe. So many tastes and ways of cooking things I had never thought of; you can tell that Chinese cooking has been developing over thousands of years.
One experience I have never had before was going to what I will call an "Iron Chef" restaurant, there you pick a large live fish (carp in this case) or chicken and tell them how many dishes from the list you want them to make it into. They literally turned a single huge carp into 10 completely different fish dishes by combining it with different ingredients. This feast included sweet barbecued fish, battered and fried rolls of fish and banana, a type of fish dumplings, fish head soup, fish stew with tofu, and several other types. The 9 members of the clan (including me) couldn't begin to finish what they gave us, I wish I had thought to take a picture but like the rest of the people, I was too busy eating. *^_^*
I have made a point of trying almost everything that gets put in front of me since I've been here, and I have to say that at least 90% of it I have really liked. They even got me loving vegetables, which speaks for itself.
Well, the plane leaves early.
My best to all of you, and I hope the New Year brings only love and happiness to everyone reading this. ^___^ Xin Nian Kuai Le!
Saturday, February 12, 2005
Thursday, February 10, 2005
Constantine and friends
So, in a weird twist of fate the movie Constantine (which some of you will know as the movie version of the comic Hellblazer) got released here in Taiwan a week and a half before North America. Not sure of his happened, but my GF loves Mr. Reeves so Rob was off to the movies with the Kang family tonight.
Okay, so Keneau saves the world again while playing an acerbic prick who can see the supernatural that exists all around us. That pretty much sums it up, and in the meantime were treated to a visually nice but not very deep movie with a really obvious villain (if you know that it's from a Vertigo comic, you knew which side would be "evil" before you watched it) and a few nifty special effects. About the only thing I can say which is redeeming (in a guilty pleasure sort of way) is the ending, which has a nice satisfying twist to it.
End result: see it in the cheap theatre or on DVD, and if you miss it you're not missing anything important, go read a book instead.
Other recently watched movies:
Mean Girls: A girl who was raised in Africa experiences American High School. Cute, not very good, but cute and has a decent message which most teen girls should probably actually hear. If any of you had teen daughters who hadn't seen it, I'd tell you to rent it, the rest of you can see it on TV.
Jersey Girl: NYC Ad executive finds himself raising daughter alone after his wife dies and having to return to his home town in New Jersery to do it. Kevin Smith's statement on the whole "running off to the big city to chase your dream" thing, I'd honestly say it's him telling the folks back home that they can be happy where they are. Characters and dialogue are cute, but overall the movie is nothing very special. Not bad, not great.
The Forgotten:Woman discovers that she seems to be the only person in the world who remembers the dead son she had who died in a plane crash a year before. Simply put, this is a 2 hour long Outer Limits episode (for those who know what this means, and know the premise/rules to the original Outer Limits, you will know what's going on just from reading that) where we watch her trying to find out why she is the only one who remembers. Kind've creepy in some ways, and overall not bad with a decent ending. Actually, there are TWO endings on the DVD if you rent it, the "alternate ending" (ie the low-key original ending which is both satisfying and subtle) and the "theatrical ending" (ie the big blow out SPFX-filled Hollywood ending they made after the test audiences didn't quite get the original ending). I personally think both endings work, but like the "alternate" one better. If you rent the DVD watch the last four acts of whatever version you didn't seen and compare, it's an interesting contrast.
Rob
Okay, so Keneau saves the world again while playing an acerbic prick who can see the supernatural that exists all around us. That pretty much sums it up, and in the meantime were treated to a visually nice but not very deep movie with a really obvious villain (if you know that it's from a Vertigo comic, you knew which side would be "evil" before you watched it) and a few nifty special effects. About the only thing I can say which is redeeming (in a guilty pleasure sort of way) is the ending, which has a nice satisfying twist to it.
End result: see it in the cheap theatre or on DVD, and if you miss it you're not missing anything important, go read a book instead.
Other recently watched movies:
Mean Girls: A girl who was raised in Africa experiences American High School. Cute, not very good, but cute and has a decent message which most teen girls should probably actually hear. If any of you had teen daughters who hadn't seen it, I'd tell you to rent it, the rest of you can see it on TV.
Jersey Girl: NYC Ad executive finds himself raising daughter alone after his wife dies and having to return to his home town in New Jersery to do it. Kevin Smith's statement on the whole "running off to the big city to chase your dream" thing, I'd honestly say it's him telling the folks back home that they can be happy where they are. Characters and dialogue are cute, but overall the movie is nothing very special. Not bad, not great.
The Forgotten:Woman discovers that she seems to be the only person in the world who remembers the dead son she had who died in a plane crash a year before. Simply put, this is a 2 hour long Outer Limits episode (for those who know what this means, and know the premise/rules to the original Outer Limits, you will know what's going on just from reading that) where we watch her trying to find out why she is the only one who remembers. Kind've creepy in some ways, and overall not bad with a decent ending. Actually, there are TWO endings on the DVD if you rent it, the "alternate ending" (ie the low-key original ending which is both satisfying and subtle) and the "theatrical ending" (ie the big blow out SPFX-filled Hollywood ending they made after the test audiences didn't quite get the original ending). I personally think both endings work, but like the "alternate" one better. If you rent the DVD watch the last four acts of whatever version you didn't seen and compare, it's an interesting contrast.
Rob
Tuesday, February 08, 2005
Well that's it, we're pretty much done for...
http://dsc.discovery.com/news/briefs/20050131/musclebot.html
On the plus side, it won't be long before Don can get that third arm he wanted...
Rob
On the plus side, it won't be long before Don can get that third arm he wanted...
Rob
Romancing the Three Kingdoms
Well, last night I finished what I have to say is one of the best stories I have ever read. Three Kingdoms (aka Romance of the Three Kingdoms) is one of the great classics of Chinese literature, and now I understand why.
At first when I started to read it, I found it a little tedious because there was so much setup and it was about an era of political chaos so there were a lot of players in the politics of the era. Then once the Empire began to shatter, it turned into what I thought was going to be an endless series of fights, and again I though, do I really want to read 100 more Chapters of this? (The novel is 120 chapters long, roughly 900 or so pages.) But, I persevered because it was interesting, and because each chapter ends on a cliffhanger of some kind which really helps to keep you reading.
Needless to say, I became hooked, eventually the number of political players begins to drop like a rock and there are so many cool warriors and characters to root for on every side. In this setting, battles were often decided by a single general whose prowess against an enemy general in a pre-battle duel could even shatter the enemy's whole will to fight. Characters switch sides, intrigues are planned, plots foiled, and the story just gets more and more amazing until...
Well, that would be my only complaint.
Because 3 Kingdoms is (as the translator puts it 7/10ths History and 3/10ths fiction) it runs into the problem that what really happened historically isn't as interesting as what could have happened dramatically. The author is somewhat trapped by history to give the story the ending the real events had, and as such the story ends with something of a whimper, not a bang. The big events occur at the start of the last 3rd of the novel, and everything else is just housekeeping. (Somewhat akin to "scouring the shire" in Lord of the Rings.) That said, it's still interesting, and the ending is not unsatisfying, just a good example of how history and drama don't always quite work well together. Drama gives way to History, and story goes on.
But, what a history! This was an exciting era where a single man could go from plowman to Emperor in a matter of years! Armies consisted of tens and hundreds of thousands of men, and...and...I could go on for pages about how cool this story is, but the best choice would be to read it yourselves if you haven't had the pleasure. You can find an online version at http://www.threekingdoms.com but the best way to read it is to find a good old paper copy of the Moss Roberts translations (there are 2 volumes to it, make sure you get both) entitled "Three Kingdoms: A Historical Novel", which is without a doubt the best translation out there. Not all translations are equal, and Roberts does a beautiful job of turning ancient Chinese into modern English. I learned a lot about Chinese history, thought, and culture from reading this book, and I think my only regret is that I waited so long before reading it.
Happy Chinese New Year!
Robyn Paterson
At first when I started to read it, I found it a little tedious because there was so much setup and it was about an era of political chaos so there were a lot of players in the politics of the era. Then once the Empire began to shatter, it turned into what I thought was going to be an endless series of fights, and again I though, do I really want to read 100 more Chapters of this? (The novel is 120 chapters long, roughly 900 or so pages.) But, I persevered because it was interesting, and because each chapter ends on a cliffhanger of some kind which really helps to keep you reading.
Needless to say, I became hooked, eventually the number of political players begins to drop like a rock and there are so many cool warriors and characters to root for on every side. In this setting, battles were often decided by a single general whose prowess against an enemy general in a pre-battle duel could even shatter the enemy's whole will to fight. Characters switch sides, intrigues are planned, plots foiled, and the story just gets more and more amazing until...
Well, that would be my only complaint.
Because 3 Kingdoms is (as the translator puts it 7/10ths History and 3/10ths fiction) it runs into the problem that what really happened historically isn't as interesting as what could have happened dramatically. The author is somewhat trapped by history to give the story the ending the real events had, and as such the story ends with something of a whimper, not a bang. The big events occur at the start of the last 3rd of the novel, and everything else is just housekeeping. (Somewhat akin to "scouring the shire" in Lord of the Rings.) That said, it's still interesting, and the ending is not unsatisfying, just a good example of how history and drama don't always quite work well together. Drama gives way to History, and story goes on.
But, what a history! This was an exciting era where a single man could go from plowman to Emperor in a matter of years! Armies consisted of tens and hundreds of thousands of men, and...and...I could go on for pages about how cool this story is, but the best choice would be to read it yourselves if you haven't had the pleasure. You can find an online version at http://www.threekingdoms.com but the best way to read it is to find a good old paper copy of the Moss Roberts translations (there are 2 volumes to it, make sure you get both) entitled "Three Kingdoms: A Historical Novel", which is without a doubt the best translation out there. Not all translations are equal, and Roberts does a beautiful job of turning ancient Chinese into modern English. I learned a lot about Chinese history, thought, and culture from reading this book, and I think my only regret is that I waited so long before reading it.
Happy Chinese New Year!
Robyn Paterson
Robyn and Connie Standing in front of the Chiang Kai Shek Memorial Hall. Chiang (whose name I keep spelling wrong) was the general who controlled half of China at one point and then fled to Taiwan when his army was defeated. He set up shop here in Taiwan as a local dictator and turned it into a fortress to hide here from the Maoists.
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