Got yesterday off at work, so I played bball late into the night at downtown Sydney the night before. (The guys I played against sucked at bball. They were a bunch of “hongers” playing their own style of bball, which I could only describe with one word – elementary) Slept in on Thursday morning before heading into a local mall to buy a bicycle and accessories. Applied to a few more jobs while I was at it and then headed back towards home. On the way back home, I stopped by a small shopping village, about a 30 minutes walk from the house, and applied to a few more jobs there. I will keep you guys updated once I have heard back from them; that is if I hear back from them.
Got to work today and did the usual. The time went by quick as usual since I was constantly busy with a variety of different tasks. Didn’t have the hear to tell my boss that I want to quit. Got to talk to him on the phone today about it. He was busy so I guess we’ll talk more in details on Monday.
Random stuff about my time in Sydney:
1) have I mentioned about the terrible hair cut all the Lebanese guys have here in Sydney? They all have the same look and it is terrible. Can you say cookie cutters with bad hairdo?
2) I learned that Ned Kelly, an Australia folk hero whom robbed from the rich and helped the pour. He was referred as a “bush ranger” by the locals. To me, it sounds funny……..”bush ranger”. Sounds like a park ranger, but it really means a pirate, a robber, a thug in the jungle.
3) I learned from my boss that “feltch” means to put a hamster up someone’s bum in order to “excite” and increase a man’s sexual appetite. He warned me that if I was invited to a “feltch party”, do not go! Hahah…..as if men really need to be excited any further for sexual appetite. Last time I checked, men don’t need a rat up their bum, but just a few simple erotic pictures.
4) They have stopped using pennies (1 cents) over 20 years, however, all the prices are still displayed with $99.99 instead of $100. Once the 10% sales tax is added to the selling price, it is then rounded up. I have not gotten used to it yet. I guess perhaps Canada is a bit backwards with the pennies, but it’s just part of living in Canada, ain’t it?
Friday, November 30, 2007
Monday, November 26, 2007
Day 2 at the Meatshop
Started working again at 7:30 this morning. Swept and mopped the floors before restocking and replenishing the display cooler with all sorts of marinated and cuts of meats. This includes changing the food trays and re-wrapping them with saran wraps while garnishing them with fresh parsley and onion strips.
By the time I was done all that, it was time to see what’s running out and what needs to be prepared for the day. I went on to prepare some beef kebabs marinated in a red wine garlic sauce and the Indian style lamb rogan josh. I had to dice up the beef and lamb prior to marinating them. Even before the dicing, the usable part of the meats must be free of any fat or connective tissues. This means that I had to trim the meat down to just the muscle fibers. Fat’s pretty easy to trim off, but the connective tissues are a pain because it’s just like a layer of silver skin attached tightly to the fibers.
I remember learning at Guelph that veal has the highest percentage of connective tissues out of all meats because younger cows have less muscle tissues in comparison to adult cows. It is no wonder that all the veal cutlets I have ever seen or eaten had always been tenderized with a meat beater (and marinated). It’s amusing to know that most people doesn’t know that marinade (which usually contains some form of acid….eg lemon juice, vinegar, red wine…etc) is usually added not only for flavoring but also used to tenderize meat tissues. What the acid does essentially is to denature the proteins inside the meats by breaking the chemical bonds between the protein chain (another thing I learned while studying during Biology 12 and my food courses at university. Who said I didn’t learn shit at university! Haha).
Anyways, that was prettymuch it. Only worked for 5 hours today.
Don’t you find this crap I am posting amusing? It is so much more interesting now that I am working…….NOT! back to the grind, baby!
Ps. I still think Canada is better than Australia to live in. Doesn’t what piece of shit town it is in Canada……it’d still be my piece of shit town! : )
By the time I was done all that, it was time to see what’s running out and what needs to be prepared for the day. I went on to prepare some beef kebabs marinated in a red wine garlic sauce and the Indian style lamb rogan josh. I had to dice up the beef and lamb prior to marinating them. Even before the dicing, the usable part of the meats must be free of any fat or connective tissues. This means that I had to trim the meat down to just the muscle fibers. Fat’s pretty easy to trim off, but the connective tissues are a pain because it’s just like a layer of silver skin attached tightly to the fibers.
I remember learning at Guelph that veal has the highest percentage of connective tissues out of all meats because younger cows have less muscle tissues in comparison to adult cows. It is no wonder that all the veal cutlets I have ever seen or eaten had always been tenderized with a meat beater (and marinated). It’s amusing to know that most people doesn’t know that marinade (which usually contains some form of acid….eg lemon juice, vinegar, red wine…etc) is usually added not only for flavoring but also used to tenderize meat tissues. What the acid does essentially is to denature the proteins inside the meats by breaking the chemical bonds between the protein chain (another thing I learned while studying during Biology 12 and my food courses at university. Who said I didn’t learn shit at university! Haha).
Anyways, that was prettymuch it. Only worked for 5 hours today.
Don’t you find this crap I am posting amusing? It is so much more interesting now that I am working…….NOT! back to the grind, baby!
Ps. I still think Canada is better than Australia to live in. Doesn’t what piece of shit town it is in Canada……it’d still be my piece of shit town! : )
Bringing Home the Bacon......literally!
Day 1 at Butcher's Delight:
Got a ride from the bossman at 7am and checked out some animal carcasses first thing in the morning inside the walk-in fridge. Very nice!
I helpped setting up the display cabinet in the front and rotated the stocks. Since the poultry side is my section, I did some preparation of the marinated chicken kebabs before moving on to make some meat pastries such as chicken, lamb, and sausage rolls. Sliced and diced the meat like a pro.
Had some "butcher's breakfast" this morning which included some hamburger patties, beef and chicken sasauges as well as some bacon rashers ( I have no idea what rashers mean) with some toast on the side. Honestly, I used to be able to wolf that down when I was younger, now I just don't have the appetite nor do I want something that greasy that early. It's free.....and loaded with cholestrol. Yummy! hahah.
The time went by fast. The only time I checked my clock was at 2pm. It seemed that it was just 10am 1 hour ago. I had a lot of fun chatting up with the main butcher, Mike. He's from the UK, moved to Oz 37 years ago. He must be in his late 60's now. Mike's got a pretty abrasive sense of humor consider that he's made a joke about Asians' slanty eyes the first time he met me. (Great success for him!). But I wasn't offended.
Mike wanted to move to South Africa before, but he hated the "comfortable-in-the-open" racism down there so he applied to move to Canada. He got turned down by Canada because there were too many brits already at the time, therefore he moved to Australia.
The other guy I was working with today was the Japanese dude. 2 years older than me. He's been in Oz for 18 months now, but is going back to Japan next month for his surgery (may or may not come back to Oz, although he loves Oz). I am basically taking over his job and he was training me all day, so we got to talk a lot about different things (my travels, his questions about Canada...etc). But his english really isn't that good so it was hard for him to understand me at times. It's kinda funny that I couldn't really understand Mike's uk/ozzie accent, but the Japanese guy could.
So picture this: I can't understand the Brit. The Japanese guy can't understand me and the Brit was hearing impaired. Sounds like a party and everybody's invited.
My boss was hardly there today. He had to run some errands.
Other than that, I learned that green onions are called shallots here, which is very strange because shallots are like small red onions in Canada.
Oh, 7 hours of the raw meat smell is a bit much for my enjoyment. I am gonna have to acquire a taste for it.
Got a ride from the bossman at 7am and checked out some animal carcasses first thing in the morning inside the walk-in fridge. Very nice!
I helpped setting up the display cabinet in the front and rotated the stocks. Since the poultry side is my section, I did some preparation of the marinated chicken kebabs before moving on to make some meat pastries such as chicken, lamb, and sausage rolls. Sliced and diced the meat like a pro.
Had some "butcher's breakfast" this morning which included some hamburger patties, beef and chicken sasauges as well as some bacon rashers ( I have no idea what rashers mean) with some toast on the side. Honestly, I used to be able to wolf that down when I was younger, now I just don't have the appetite nor do I want something that greasy that early. It's free.....and loaded with cholestrol. Yummy! hahah.
The time went by fast. The only time I checked my clock was at 2pm. It seemed that it was just 10am 1 hour ago. I had a lot of fun chatting up with the main butcher, Mike. He's from the UK, moved to Oz 37 years ago. He must be in his late 60's now. Mike's got a pretty abrasive sense of humor consider that he's made a joke about Asians' slanty eyes the first time he met me. (Great success for him!). But I wasn't offended.
Mike wanted to move to South Africa before, but he hated the "comfortable-in-the-open" racism down there so he applied to move to Canada. He got turned down by Canada because there were too many brits already at the time, therefore he moved to Australia.
The other guy I was working with today was the Japanese dude. 2 years older than me. He's been in Oz for 18 months now, but is going back to Japan next month for his surgery (may or may not come back to Oz, although he loves Oz). I am basically taking over his job and he was training me all day, so we got to talk a lot about different things (my travels, his questions about Canada...etc). But his english really isn't that good so it was hard for him to understand me at times. It's kinda funny that I couldn't really understand Mike's uk/ozzie accent, but the Japanese guy could.
So picture this: I can't understand the Brit. The Japanese guy can't understand me and the Brit was hearing impaired. Sounds like a party and everybody's invited.
My boss was hardly there today. He had to run some errands.
Other than that, I learned that green onions are called shallots here, which is very strange because shallots are like small red onions in Canada.
Oh, 7 hours of the raw meat smell is a bit much for my enjoyment. I am gonna have to acquire a taste for it.
Sunday, November 25, 2007
Random stuff about Sydney part 3
Alright, it’s been a few days since I posted anything. This would be some random thoughts again. I really should get a pocketsize notepad to write all my thoughts down any time I noticed/realized something interesting. This is not even 50% of what I got. I am forgetting the other half faster than an eager groom on wedding night. No success!
1) Let’s talk about NBL basketball in the Oceana – nz breakers vs the cairns tapans was on tv the other night. I noticed right away that the game was shot like ice hockey (far away!). *Actually, to do hockey justice, some of the games are shot better than this NBL stuff. Anytime when you can see the upperbowl while watching the game on tv, u know it’s too far. Next chanel was the lakers vs the bucks and I could actually see the players’ last names on the back of their jerseys. NBL uniforms: all the corporate sponsors were on them where the last names are….company/brand names. It’s kinda weird to see, but I guess similar things can be observed in cycling, racing, soccer and other international pro-sports leagues. Perhaps they don’t earn enough in game revenue to pay the players? (Nick, shed some lights would u?)
2) In speaking with my aunt, I learned that there has been a serious problem with illegal immigrants in Australia. The Aussie gov’t can’t really do much about it since these illegals come from all directions onto to Australia. I guess the gov’t couldn’t really build a great wall around the entire continent eh? Some of these illegals come from Indonesia, Malaysia, China ..etc. They usually work at farms or restaurants getting paid 7 or 9 dollars when they should’ve been paid 15 (minimum wage/hour). They work and save up before going home after 3 years where they can pretty much live happily ever after so I am told. Pretty much a Cinderella story.
3) I will be starting my first job in Australia at a meat shop in the suburb tomorrow. The shop is in some small shopping village and is a family owned business. The plaza only has a few stores including a chemist/pharmacy, chiropractor, fruit stand, and a café. I will be helping out with the daily preparations of fresh meats, marinated, and making sausages/rolls. No meat products at the shop are frozen.
It takes about 40 minutes from my aunt’s place to the shop. In order for me to get there, I’d have to take a bus first then a train then another bus ride to the shop costing a total of 14 dollars a day. To my pleasant surprise, the owner has offered to pick me up in the morning from his house on the way to his shop. (the catch is that I gota be up by 6:30am for the ride) Now I just have to worry about getting myself back in the afternoon. Pretty sweet deal. Even when I met up with the owner 3 days ago, he offered to pick me up at the train station. From the train station, it’s about a 3 minutes drive to his shop (noticed that I use the word, shop, a lot? I find that they don’t say store much here, but they say shop a lot. Very English! In addition, the shopping carts are called trolleys here.) Anyways, I will start off at 12 Aus dollars/hour during training then I will move up to 15/hour. Sounds like a lot eh for a “hamburger-helper”, but I find the living expense/standards are higher here than in Vancouver (for example, just see how much it cost me for transportation here). I learned that the average income here is about $60,000 Aus dollars or $53,570 cdn. Not too shabby eh? That’s about $30/hour. College/uni graduates can make about that much 2 years after graduation.
As of now, there’s a Japanese international student working at the shop. He’s in Sydney studying film and making documentary. However, he’s gotta go back to Japan in a month because he’s got a surgery for some kinda disease. It’d cost him over 2000 bucks just to get a consultation here.
4) Watched a movie on tv the other night “Ladies in Lavender”. The setting takes place at a small town England: Cornwall). 2 of the starring actresses are Judi Dench & Maggie smith (notes on a scandal & sister act) 2 old ladies..in their 60’s or 70’s vying for the attentions of a shipwrecked Polish guy named Andrea.
Interesting scenes: A pie with many whole fish in it. Kinda weird eh?
- peeling potatoes…..they were talking in different languages, since either could speak the other’s language. “Potatoes…….spud in one, skins in the other”…...the guy thought the old fat women “look like a potato. In fact, a sack of potatoes.” Then he carved a happy face onto one of the potatoes…..the old women said to him“don’t get artistic now”. I laughed out loud after seeing that scent. Anyways, this reminded me of my time traveling where some of the strangers helped me out for no reason. This guy I met on the train in China bought me a beer and some peanuts. But I was not able to say goodbye to him since I fell asleep and he left the train without waking me up. I wish I had the chance to say goodbye to him.
5) Watched a FIBA game briefly and saw an American player – lynn greer playing for an Italian team. I thought that was pretty cool. I give props to these guys who were stars on their college bball team, but were never able to make it into the nba. Their experience in other parts of the world must have been an interesting experience. Something that the nba guys wouldn’t be able to relate (ie, there’s a world outside of the US and A). During the commercial break, there was an ad for the Aussie Rule Football League draft. I thought it was pretty funny that they take it so seriously here, but I guess that’s like our version of the NFL/NBA/NHL draft.
6) saw Dat Phan’s stand up show again last night on the comedy network(a Vietnamese American comedian) he said that he knew comedy was for him when he was the only Asian who failed math in school. The thing is that when he did fail a math test, all 8 other white guys around him also failed. Hahaha….
thinking to myself..........i def don't live up to the stereotype...........ie. i can drive darn well, but i suck at math. if u thought living up to the stereotype sucks......try being in my boat.......it's even tougher not to live up to it. Because ppl expect me to be good at math and suck at driving........haha (for all the Asians reading my blog…..sorry…that was just for shits and giggles.)
7) I can’t help not to dis the Aussie police uniforms (at least the ones in Sydney). They look like shit…light blue short-sleeve shirts with navy blue pants and army boots on. No hat at all. Actually they look like rent-a-cop/security guards. Even the transit security guards for the trains have better uniforms than they do. That’s sad!
*Oh, I learned from some guy last week that COP stands for Constable on Patrol. Pretty neat. I had no idea that it meant something.
8) I am likng the new addidas nba warm up shirt. Very nice! And what’s up with the Suns scoring 47 pts in the first quarter and 80 by the end of the first half. That’s crazy, son!
9) My cousin who won a car (Suzuki Swift) after entering a contest from buy some Scott toilet paper won something else again yesterday. Earlier this year, she won a year’s supply of instant noodles from the famous Japanese brand, Nissin (although all of the noodles were made in Hong Kong aka the center of the universe according to some.) Anyways, she won a pair of pre-screen tix to this movie directed by Steve Buscemi starring himself and Sienna Miller. The movie was called “Interview”, a tribute/remake to Vincent Van Gogh’s grandnephew’s original (Theo Van Gogh). Theo was killed after he made a short film called “Submission Part 2” by some Islamic extremists (EXTREME!!! Like the white dudes in Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle). Anyways, the movie was quite interesting. I don’t think many typical movie goers would enjoy it as much as I did, but I still think it’s worth the full ticket price, as it was done in a pun-filled, yet clever way. Throughout the movie on a number of occasions, tribute to Theo Van Gogh was visible. For example, one of the Katya’s fans’ (Sienna M’s character name onscreen) name was Theodore and this moving company’s name was Van Gogh. I think some of the paintings on the walls inside Katya’s apartment may have been Van Gogh’s, too. Anyways, if one enjoys the Before Sunset/Sunrise series, then he/she would enjoy this one as well because it simply tells a story of a conversation/interaction between 2 people. While the conversation might be nothing out of the ordinary, but nevertheless interesting to observe. Conclusion after seeing the movie: women aren’t to be trusted. Hahaha
10) Played bball with a highschool friend today at the city. Good times. He’s just done his dentistry degree and is planning on finding work in Aus (which isn’t an issue. He’s already got 8 job offers and all he has to do is pick one). As for “Aussie Rule” street basketball, they don’t do 3-pointers here. How gay is that? Everything counts as 1, therefore everybody just crowds up the key. Doesn’t help me since I am tiny. Played with some Indonesians, some mainland Chinese ppl and quite a few Chinese-Canadians. (I could not recall ever played against an Indonesian in Vancouver. I have played against some thai guy, but never Indonesians) Playing for the first time in 3 months, I was thoroughly rusted like a iron pot in the rain. I would like to attribute to my shit performance to turning 26 last weekend. I am an old goat. Mehhhh! Who doesn’t like to take the easy way out?
11) I got really frustrated with some aussie baller on the court today because he kept setting moving picks on me (very retarded like Borat’s retardation brother Beelo!) so i told him off......he said something in some aussie gibberish which i could not understand at all (even more f'ing retarded!) so i said something to the effect that "he was probably a descendant of some criminals". I don’t think he understood that was an insult, perhaps I spoke too clearly for him. I might have to dumb it down and slur (no pun-intended) it next time like how they speak with the back of their mouth here.
(was that "racialist"? ........perhaps a wee bit.)
fucking guy thought i was american. i think i might have to piss on him like r kelly next time.....canadian style.....i will do it with class and elegance. drip drip drip with some of my finest canadian maple syrup on him and give him a wiff of my hersey stains (big ups to chappelle) i think i just officially committed hate-crime by even talking about this. Haha Sorry, that was very aggressive.
peace. i am out like England at the 2007 world rugby championship game vs South Africa. (I think I just dissed the UK…….well, it’s ok…the UK is probably run by little girls, as Borat would suggest)
ps. The Australian Labour Party won the election last night ending the Liberals’ 8 year reign.
I went to a house-warming party for a friend of mine here. He just moved into the Newtown part of the city. Pretty interesting area. Very happening at night. Brought him a bottle of Aussie’s own Cabernet Sauvignon. Met a bunch of different people, both local and from other countries. Most of the ppl were still in university so they were around 20 to 23 years old. Some were from England and others were from Italy. I was the only Canadian and Chinese person. There was an Aussie Indonesian…..pretty cool guy.
1) Let’s talk about NBL basketball in the Oceana – nz breakers vs the cairns tapans was on tv the other night. I noticed right away that the game was shot like ice hockey (far away!). *Actually, to do hockey justice, some of the games are shot better than this NBL stuff. Anytime when you can see the upperbowl while watching the game on tv, u know it’s too far. Next chanel was the lakers vs the bucks and I could actually see the players’ last names on the back of their jerseys. NBL uniforms: all the corporate sponsors were on them where the last names are….company/brand names. It’s kinda weird to see, but I guess similar things can be observed in cycling, racing, soccer and other international pro-sports leagues. Perhaps they don’t earn enough in game revenue to pay the players? (Nick, shed some lights would u?)
2) In speaking with my aunt, I learned that there has been a serious problem with illegal immigrants in Australia. The Aussie gov’t can’t really do much about it since these illegals come from all directions onto to Australia. I guess the gov’t couldn’t really build a great wall around the entire continent eh? Some of these illegals come from Indonesia, Malaysia, China ..etc. They usually work at farms or restaurants getting paid 7 or 9 dollars when they should’ve been paid 15 (minimum wage/hour). They work and save up before going home after 3 years where they can pretty much live happily ever after so I am told. Pretty much a Cinderella story.
3) I will be starting my first job in Australia at a meat shop in the suburb tomorrow. The shop is in some small shopping village and is a family owned business. The plaza only has a few stores including a chemist/pharmacy, chiropractor, fruit stand, and a café. I will be helping out with the daily preparations of fresh meats, marinated, and making sausages/rolls. No meat products at the shop are frozen.
It takes about 40 minutes from my aunt’s place to the shop. In order for me to get there, I’d have to take a bus first then a train then another bus ride to the shop costing a total of 14 dollars a day. To my pleasant surprise, the owner has offered to pick me up in the morning from his house on the way to his shop. (the catch is that I gota be up by 6:30am for the ride) Now I just have to worry about getting myself back in the afternoon. Pretty sweet deal. Even when I met up with the owner 3 days ago, he offered to pick me up at the train station. From the train station, it’s about a 3 minutes drive to his shop (noticed that I use the word, shop, a lot? I find that they don’t say store much here, but they say shop a lot. Very English! In addition, the shopping carts are called trolleys here.) Anyways, I will start off at 12 Aus dollars/hour during training then I will move up to 15/hour. Sounds like a lot eh for a “hamburger-helper”, but I find the living expense/standards are higher here than in Vancouver (for example, just see how much it cost me for transportation here). I learned that the average income here is about $60,000 Aus dollars or $53,570 cdn. Not too shabby eh? That’s about $30/hour. College/uni graduates can make about that much 2 years after graduation.
As of now, there’s a Japanese international student working at the shop. He’s in Sydney studying film and making documentary. However, he’s gotta go back to Japan in a month because he’s got a surgery for some kinda disease. It’d cost him over 2000 bucks just to get a consultation here.
4) Watched a movie on tv the other night “Ladies in Lavender”. The setting takes place at a small town England: Cornwall). 2 of the starring actresses are Judi Dench & Maggie smith (notes on a scandal & sister act) 2 old ladies..in their 60’s or 70’s vying for the attentions of a shipwrecked Polish guy named Andrea.
Interesting scenes: A pie with many whole fish in it. Kinda weird eh?
- peeling potatoes…..they were talking in different languages, since either could speak the other’s language. “Potatoes…….spud in one, skins in the other”…...the guy thought the old fat women “look like a potato. In fact, a sack of potatoes.” Then he carved a happy face onto one of the potatoes…..the old women said to him“don’t get artistic now”. I laughed out loud after seeing that scent. Anyways, this reminded me of my time traveling where some of the strangers helped me out for no reason. This guy I met on the train in China bought me a beer and some peanuts. But I was not able to say goodbye to him since I fell asleep and he left the train without waking me up. I wish I had the chance to say goodbye to him.
5) Watched a FIBA game briefly and saw an American player – lynn greer playing for an Italian team. I thought that was pretty cool. I give props to these guys who were stars on their college bball team, but were never able to make it into the nba. Their experience in other parts of the world must have been an interesting experience. Something that the nba guys wouldn’t be able to relate (ie, there’s a world outside of the US and A). During the commercial break, there was an ad for the Aussie Rule Football League draft. I thought it was pretty funny that they take it so seriously here, but I guess that’s like our version of the NFL/NBA/NHL draft.
6) saw Dat Phan’s stand up show again last night on the comedy network(a Vietnamese American comedian) he said that he knew comedy was for him when he was the only Asian who failed math in school. The thing is that when he did fail a math test, all 8 other white guys around him also failed. Hahaha….
thinking to myself..........i def don't live up to the stereotype...........ie. i can drive darn well, but i suck at math. if u thought living up to the stereotype sucks......try being in my boat.......it's even tougher not to live up to it. Because ppl expect me to be good at math and suck at driving........haha (for all the Asians reading my blog…..sorry…that was just for shits and giggles.)
7) I can’t help not to dis the Aussie police uniforms (at least the ones in Sydney). They look like shit…light blue short-sleeve shirts with navy blue pants and army boots on. No hat at all. Actually they look like rent-a-cop/security guards. Even the transit security guards for the trains have better uniforms than they do. That’s sad!
*Oh, I learned from some guy last week that COP stands for Constable on Patrol. Pretty neat. I had no idea that it meant something.
8) I am likng the new addidas nba warm up shirt. Very nice! And what’s up with the Suns scoring 47 pts in the first quarter and 80 by the end of the first half. That’s crazy, son!
9) My cousin who won a car (Suzuki Swift) after entering a contest from buy some Scott toilet paper won something else again yesterday. Earlier this year, she won a year’s supply of instant noodles from the famous Japanese brand, Nissin (although all of the noodles were made in Hong Kong aka the center of the universe according to some.) Anyways, she won a pair of pre-screen tix to this movie directed by Steve Buscemi starring himself and Sienna Miller. The movie was called “Interview”, a tribute/remake to Vincent Van Gogh’s grandnephew’s original (Theo Van Gogh). Theo was killed after he made a short film called “Submission Part 2” by some Islamic extremists (EXTREME!!! Like the white dudes in Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle). Anyways, the movie was quite interesting. I don’t think many typical movie goers would enjoy it as much as I did, but I still think it’s worth the full ticket price, as it was done in a pun-filled, yet clever way. Throughout the movie on a number of occasions, tribute to Theo Van Gogh was visible. For example, one of the Katya’s fans’ (Sienna M’s character name onscreen) name was Theodore and this moving company’s name was Van Gogh. I think some of the paintings on the walls inside Katya’s apartment may have been Van Gogh’s, too. Anyways, if one enjoys the Before Sunset/Sunrise series, then he/she would enjoy this one as well because it simply tells a story of a conversation/interaction between 2 people. While the conversation might be nothing out of the ordinary, but nevertheless interesting to observe. Conclusion after seeing the movie: women aren’t to be trusted. Hahaha
10) Played bball with a highschool friend today at the city. Good times. He’s just done his dentistry degree and is planning on finding work in Aus (which isn’t an issue. He’s already got 8 job offers and all he has to do is pick one). As for “Aussie Rule” street basketball, they don’t do 3-pointers here. How gay is that? Everything counts as 1, therefore everybody just crowds up the key. Doesn’t help me since I am tiny. Played with some Indonesians, some mainland Chinese ppl and quite a few Chinese-Canadians. (I could not recall ever played against an Indonesian in Vancouver. I have played against some thai guy, but never Indonesians) Playing for the first time in 3 months, I was thoroughly rusted like a iron pot in the rain. I would like to attribute to my shit performance to turning 26 last weekend. I am an old goat. Mehhhh! Who doesn’t like to take the easy way out?
11) I got really frustrated with some aussie baller on the court today because he kept setting moving picks on me (very retarded like Borat’s retardation brother Beelo!) so i told him off......he said something in some aussie gibberish which i could not understand at all (even more f'ing retarded!) so i said something to the effect that "he was probably a descendant of some criminals". I don’t think he understood that was an insult, perhaps I spoke too clearly for him. I might have to dumb it down and slur (no pun-intended) it next time like how they speak with the back of their mouth here.
(was that "racialist"? ........perhaps a wee bit.)
fucking guy thought i was american. i think i might have to piss on him like r kelly next time.....canadian style.....i will do it with class and elegance. drip drip drip with some of my finest canadian maple syrup on him and give him a wiff of my hersey stains (big ups to chappelle) i think i just officially committed hate-crime by even talking about this. Haha Sorry, that was very aggressive.
peace. i am out like England at the 2007 world rugby championship game vs South Africa. (I think I just dissed the UK…….well, it’s ok…the UK is probably run by little girls, as Borat would suggest)
ps. The Australian Labour Party won the election last night ending the Liberals’ 8 year reign.
I went to a house-warming party for a friend of mine here. He just moved into the Newtown part of the city. Pretty interesting area. Very happening at night. Brought him a bottle of Aussie’s own Cabernet Sauvignon. Met a bunch of different people, both local and from other countries. Most of the ppl were still in university so they were around 20 to 23 years old. Some were from England and others were from Italy. I was the only Canadian and Chinese person. There was an Aussie Indonesian…..pretty cool guy.
Tuesday, November 20, 2007
China - Never Enough
I was about to go to bed at midnight, only to find another great film on tv - Balzac & the little Chinese Seamstress (2002).
The movie takes place at the 3 gorges of the Yangtze River. About 2 boys' stories living in a mountain village for 3 years (71 to 74) during the cultural revolutionary time. The story was mainly about their time with this little seamstress together. How they read Balzac together. Long story short....."a story of courage and the power of magical storytelling."
This film was just too pretty to ignore. It reminded me a lot of The Painted Veil. It makes me want to go back to China again. However, the ending was quite corny. Reminded me of "Big Trouble in Little China". Now THAT was corny, nevertheless I loved it. hahaha......I can vividly remember watching that movie when I was a kid in Taiwan. I grouped it with Ninja Turtles.
After being to so many places and seen so many slogans for each countries' tourism campaign, I have come up with my own for China.
For example, India's slogan is: Incredible India. Ontario's slogan: Yours to Discover.
Mine for China would be: China - Never Enough
Mine for Thailand would be: Thailand - There's Something for Everyone
I think the slogan is true in more than 1 way; it is especially true in a socioeconomic sense today.
I wish I had taken the boat tour on the Yangtze River. Too bad in a few more years, it will be completely covered up by the water.
Ps. I love a lot of foreign films, some of them might not be popular in the sense that.....it's not widely viewed. But the stories themselves are timeless........the plots and the themes are just universal.......and crosscultural. it's what bounds us humans together.
movies as such.....one can watch even with the language barrier. they are that powerful.
i miss china a lot. both the good and the bad, though i remember more of the good than bad.
it is true that when we do leave this world, the only thing we can take with us are the memories of a lifetime. nothing else matters. not that mp3 player, not the fast cars or the bling blings. Just the images in our heads and experience in our hearts. cliche? perhaps, but perhaps not!
The movie takes place at the 3 gorges of the Yangtze River. About 2 boys' stories living in a mountain village for 3 years (71 to 74) during the cultural revolutionary time. The story was mainly about their time with this little seamstress together. How they read Balzac together. Long story short....."a story of courage and the power of magical storytelling."
This film was just too pretty to ignore. It reminded me a lot of The Painted Veil. It makes me want to go back to China again. However, the ending was quite corny. Reminded me of "Big Trouble in Little China". Now THAT was corny, nevertheless I loved it. hahaha......I can vividly remember watching that movie when I was a kid in Taiwan. I grouped it with Ninja Turtles.
After being to so many places and seen so many slogans for each countries' tourism campaign, I have come up with my own for China.
For example, India's slogan is: Incredible India. Ontario's slogan: Yours to Discover.
Mine for China would be: China - Never Enough
Mine for Thailand would be: Thailand - There's Something for Everyone
I think the slogan is true in more than 1 way; it is especially true in a socioeconomic sense today.
I wish I had taken the boat tour on the Yangtze River. Too bad in a few more years, it will be completely covered up by the water.
Ps. I love a lot of foreign films, some of them might not be popular in the sense that.....it's not widely viewed. But the stories themselves are timeless........the plots and the themes are just universal.......and crosscultural. it's what bounds us humans together.
movies as such.....one can watch even with the language barrier. they are that powerful.
i miss china a lot. both the good and the bad, though i remember more of the good than bad.
it is true that when we do leave this world, the only thing we can take with us are the memories of a lifetime. nothing else matters. not that mp3 player, not the fast cars or the bling blings. Just the images in our heads and experience in our hearts. cliche? perhaps, but perhaps not!
What's the Difference Between.....
A picture of Queen Mary's crown (a duplicate) displayed at Australia's oldest mall - Queen Victoria Building on George Street.
This is what rich people's bling bling looks like.
I wonder what's the difference between the royal family and rappers. They both loaded in more than 1 way. Both buy or have stuff that are iced out. Both have ridiculous blings for no good reason. Both have huge lots and big houses. Both live like kings and order people around. When both of them are wrong, they'd just carry on as if nothing happened. Both are insecure about themselves and put up a front. Both probably have Chrystel's in their liquor collection. Both have a lot of women. Royal family ones are called "concubines". Rapppers have "bitches n ho's".
Both of them want you to know that they are the top dog and don't mess with them. Both of them travel with their entrouage and body guards.
Seriously, what are the blings really good for? They pretty much serve no purpose other than being paraded around in public.
It's funny how we, tourists, pay to visit royal palaces around different countries and see how the royalties "pimp their cribs". How's that different from visiting a rapper's crib?
How's a scepter from the royal family different from a pimp's cane?
My conclusion on Royal Family VS. Rappers: SAME SAME BUT DIFFERENT.
random info about Australia:
1) their A4 size paper is about half an inch longer in length than North American's. When I saw the paper for the first time, I thought it was legal size paper, but shorter.
2) I can't stand it when they acknowledge each other by saying "How you going?" It sounds retarded.
3) I am now orange under the sun. and I still have my aggressive farmer's tan.
Monday, November 19, 2007
NAKED TRUTH
I went to this bible study thing last week with my cousin (not by choice). At the end, I got to talk to the pastor. He asked me to consider Jesus as a way of life. I nodded my head, though my body language said no to Jesus.
*something I noticed during the bible study. Many of the people including the pastor himself seem tired and perhaps lost their interest an hour into the session. By 9:45pm (1 hr and 45 minutes later), everyone seemed to want to go home already. Judging from their body language, they looked like as if they didn’t want to be there, but had to because Jesus wants them, too. They started the night out wanting to be there, but their behaviours appeared to be more of an obligation than an actual desire of wanting to be there.
To me, it (the bible study group) was more of a form of masturbation than anything. That is, like-minded people gathering together and feel good about themselves for a while and they go back to what they were doing before. Another week goes by, same time same place; they do it all over again. If that’s not the definition of masturbation, I don’t know what is.
I got nothing on jesus, religion in general just ain't my thing. It's important that u know that this is not an open letter for war. I guess i only felt a certain way because I was getting a bit defensive after the bible group asked me to consider jesus. (my exact thought was: WTF?)
(To me: the concept of considering any religion is just not even a option. I think that we, humans, all want to belong to a certain group.....just human nature....so we can identify ourselves with something or someone. I am still searching for my own, but I know religion isn't the direction for me. Faith (in a non-religious way) is mos def important. Just the concept of believing in something that's larger than life is probably what most people (religious or not) want. And it is understandable.
On a different note, this old lady from malaysia was trying to convince me that only believing in jesus will i go to heaven after i die. all i could think in my head at the time was: BS.
I can really care less about life after death. my MO is the present and future, not life after death. i will worry about it when i get there.
heaven or hell........same shit different pile. (i think i just rhymed hell with pile).
this may seem like a random thing to write about or even strange. that's because it is. it is probably just as weird as the german girls i met at this hostel whom were adding ketchup to their instant noodles. NOW, that's weird!
Anyways, I have never ever come close to telling anybody this, not sure why I told the pastor that night. We were talking about life and what my plans are for now and the future and I just had all this to share with him.
Basically, I don’t really know what I want to do with my life (at least not for when I go back to Canada). I am pretty much only concerned about the present at the moment (which is a lot unlike me).
After my time in China, India, Cambodia and Thailand, I have this strong urge to join the NGO’s and just help people. However, I also dislike bureaucracy in the NGO’s. Everything is political and I can’t be bothered. I have always maintained that if you wanted to help somebody, get up and go help them physically. None of that donating money shit to the Red Cross…etc. Buy the supplies and fly over there to help them. I do not want my dollar paying some guy’s salary. Seriously, out of every dollar, how many cents actually reach the people whom actually need help? Fuck the red tape, too.
This brings me to this next point. As much as I’d like to do something that actually means something and makes a difference in the world, I don’t think I am quite ready for it yet. Honestly, I am not ready to give up the material side of life yet. It doesn’t take much to satisfy my needs and wants, but if I were to help people, I’d feel guilty enjoying my own life. I’d feel bad every time I’d want to live a little and splurge on something because I think that every dollar saved could be used to help others; they need that dollar more than I do.
To summarize it all, I want to be selfless, but I am not ready yet. Selflessness is a tough biz.
The other part of me (the commercial/corporate part – though I am pretty much the fartherest thing from being corporate) want to be financially successful so I can take care of not just myself, but my parents. I know I have an obligation towards them. There are no other ways.
As you can see, I am pretty confused, but at least I can admit it. I am not offering any solutions. I am really just venting. I realized that this is not constructive. So what?
I am back to where I started…..level zero. Tomorrow, I go back to live the same way I’ve been living and keep pondering away the same question I ask myself today.
The light is on, but there ain’t nobody home.
ps. thanks to eric and jenn......I understand balance it all is important. peace
*something I noticed during the bible study. Many of the people including the pastor himself seem tired and perhaps lost their interest an hour into the session. By 9:45pm (1 hr and 45 minutes later), everyone seemed to want to go home already. Judging from their body language, they looked like as if they didn’t want to be there, but had to because Jesus wants them, too. They started the night out wanting to be there, but their behaviours appeared to be more of an obligation than an actual desire of wanting to be there.
To me, it (the bible study group) was more of a form of masturbation than anything. That is, like-minded people gathering together and feel good about themselves for a while and they go back to what they were doing before. Another week goes by, same time same place; they do it all over again. If that’s not the definition of masturbation, I don’t know what is.
I got nothing on jesus, religion in general just ain't my thing. It's important that u know that this is not an open letter for war. I guess i only felt a certain way because I was getting a bit defensive after the bible group asked me to consider jesus. (my exact thought was: WTF?)
(To me: the concept of considering any religion is just not even a option. I think that we, humans, all want to belong to a certain group.....just human nature....so we can identify ourselves with something or someone. I am still searching for my own, but I know religion isn't the direction for me. Faith (in a non-religious way) is mos def important. Just the concept of believing in something that's larger than life is probably what most people (religious or not) want. And it is understandable.
On a different note, this old lady from malaysia was trying to convince me that only believing in jesus will i go to heaven after i die. all i could think in my head at the time was: BS.
I can really care less about life after death. my MO is the present and future, not life after death. i will worry about it when i get there.
heaven or hell........same shit different pile. (i think i just rhymed hell with pile).
this may seem like a random thing to write about or even strange. that's because it is. it is probably just as weird as the german girls i met at this hostel whom were adding ketchup to their instant noodles. NOW, that's weird!
Anyways, I have never ever come close to telling anybody this, not sure why I told the pastor that night. We were talking about life and what my plans are for now and the future and I just had all this to share with him.
Basically, I don’t really know what I want to do with my life (at least not for when I go back to Canada). I am pretty much only concerned about the present at the moment (which is a lot unlike me).
After my time in China, India, Cambodia and Thailand, I have this strong urge to join the NGO’s and just help people. However, I also dislike bureaucracy in the NGO’s. Everything is political and I can’t be bothered. I have always maintained that if you wanted to help somebody, get up and go help them physically. None of that donating money shit to the Red Cross…etc. Buy the supplies and fly over there to help them. I do not want my dollar paying some guy’s salary. Seriously, out of every dollar, how many cents actually reach the people whom actually need help? Fuck the red tape, too.
This brings me to this next point. As much as I’d like to do something that actually means something and makes a difference in the world, I don’t think I am quite ready for it yet. Honestly, I am not ready to give up the material side of life yet. It doesn’t take much to satisfy my needs and wants, but if I were to help people, I’d feel guilty enjoying my own life. I’d feel bad every time I’d want to live a little and splurge on something because I think that every dollar saved could be used to help others; they need that dollar more than I do.
To summarize it all, I want to be selfless, but I am not ready yet. Selflessness is a tough biz.
The other part of me (the commercial/corporate part – though I am pretty much the fartherest thing from being corporate) want to be financially successful so I can take care of not just myself, but my parents. I know I have an obligation towards them. There are no other ways.
As you can see, I am pretty confused, but at least I can admit it. I am not offering any solutions. I am really just venting. I realized that this is not constructive. So what?
I am back to where I started…..level zero. Tomorrow, I go back to live the same way I’ve been living and keep pondering away the same question I ask myself today.
The light is on, but there ain’t nobody home.
ps. thanks to eric and jenn......I understand balance it all is important. peace
Down, but not out……yet
I spent pretty much the whole day on Saturday applying for a few jobs online at home. Even applied to this job washing cars (driving and detailing). If I couldn’t even get that job, I think my ego would be greatly bruised. Went “bushwalking” (aka hiking) with my aunt that evening and enjoyed some Japanese ramen afterwards. I was too tired to go into town to meet up with some friends for my bday drinks, so I just stayed home.
Woke up early on my bday and headed out for Bondi beach in the south. Met up with my cousin and 3 friends. Spent the entire day at the beach. Checked out some of the art pieces displayed on rock cliffs next to the beach. They were alright. The beach was nice.....but I don't think it really lives up to its hype. People always talk about how great it is, but it really is just a nice beach. That's that! I think I prefer mountains.
I was pretty surprised to see the number of girls tanning without their tops on at the beach. Just never really seen that before.
While at the beach, there were a large number of Lebanese. I noticed all the Lebanese guys have the same haircut. A mini Beckham in the front with a mullet in the back. It is just terrible. What’s up with Australians and mullets? They’d fit right in with the hicks in the US.
Oh, and what’s up with the urinals in Sydney? Over half of the urinals are just a metal surface installed into the wall. I thought that’s only in China. I guess this is how they do it in the “outback”. *You know, for a western place, Australia is more Asian than its counterparts in North America.
Went around town today and dropped 5 copies of my resume at various hotels and random places. After all that, watched a movie at Circular Quay called “Tell No One” – a French thriller. Not too shabby.
Australians have way more freckles than Canadians.
Woke up early on my bday and headed out for Bondi beach in the south. Met up with my cousin and 3 friends. Spent the entire day at the beach. Checked out some of the art pieces displayed on rock cliffs next to the beach. They were alright. The beach was nice.....but I don't think it really lives up to its hype. People always talk about how great it is, but it really is just a nice beach. That's that! I think I prefer mountains.
I was pretty surprised to see the number of girls tanning without their tops on at the beach. Just never really seen that before.
While at the beach, there were a large number of Lebanese. I noticed all the Lebanese guys have the same haircut. A mini Beckham in the front with a mullet in the back. It is just terrible. What’s up with Australians and mullets? They’d fit right in with the hicks in the US.
Oh, and what’s up with the urinals in Sydney? Over half of the urinals are just a metal surface installed into the wall. I thought that’s only in China. I guess this is how they do it in the “outback”. *You know, for a western place, Australia is more Asian than its counterparts in North America.
Went around town today and dropped 5 copies of my resume at various hotels and random places. After all that, watched a movie at Circular Quay called “Tell No One” – a French thriller. Not too shabby.
Australians have way more freckles than Canadians.
Saturday, November 17, 2007
Random stuff about Sydney part 2
Picture of an Australian Magpie.1) On my second day in Sydney last week, I went to this sport goods store called Rebel Sports here in the North Shore. Just for fun, I asked them for hockey sticks only to get FIELD hockey sticks. When requesting for ICE hockey sticks, they were unavailable. The person assisting me was an Asian guy; he asked me if I was from America or Canada. I said yes, Canada.
2) Speaking of America, my other Cdn friend, Geoff, and I kept being asked if we were Americans because of our accent. It is quite annoying being mistaken as Americans. Aussies really should learn something from SE Asians, since they usually ask if I were from Canada. (They know that Americans like to be mistaken as Cdns, but not the vice versa.) All fairness to the Aussies, they usually use the term “Americas” when asking where I am from. I don’t think they differentiate Canada from USA, instead only calling the 2 as a whole (ie. North America or the Americas).
3) According to Geoff, at the revolving restaurant he works at, the Aussies said with a confused look, “But you look Asian” after he told them that he’s from Canada. (You can’t be serious. That’s like me thinking that all Aussies are white.)
4) Went bushwalking with my aunt today in the Kirribilli part of the town. Apparently that area has the highest real estate value in all of Sydney just because it has a view of the Sydney Bridge and Opera House from the North Shore. Got to this lookout point (can’t recall what’s it called, but it’s around Neutral Bay and the Sirius Cove area.), and saw this couple out for a stroll. The man had a New England Patriots shirt on while the girl had some University shirt with the words – law school on it. I immediately recalled that the Pats are playing today against the Bills in Buffalo, NY. So without any hesitation, I just said, “hey, they are playing today eh? (in a good old Cdn fashion, of course!). The man replied, “yeh, you know the score?” We then got to chat for a minute and it turns out that they just moved here from Boston for work. I am assuming they were lawyers.
5) The big election is happening in all of Oz next weekend. The winning party’s leader will become the next Oz Prime Minister. The current party in power is the Liberals while the Labour Party is the opposition. Apparently, the Liberals have already cut income tax last year, therefore they could stay in power. I guess that’s the same way all around the world eh?!
6) I can’t tell if a kid is from a private or a public school based on his/her uniform. It’s bugging me.
7) My big Two-6 bday is tomorrow. (holy fuck, I thought turning 20 was a shock and then turning 25 wasn’t cool either. But turn 26 is like the beginning of my late 20’s. I feel like I have accomplished nothing. Where the doctor at? I am experiencing my quarter life crisis again, but only this time it is much worse than last year.) Funny that I am spending my bday in the different hemisphere this year. Didn’t go out tonight since I am pretty tired from sitting in front of the computer all day applying for work online. However, I am looking forward to my bday at Bondi Beach tomorrow with my cousin and my friend Geoff. Let the good times roll.
8) Drinking age is 18 year, no wonder why the girls at the pubs look so bloody young. All I could hear in my head is Snow’s “Legal”. (“She’s legal tender and fine. She picked my pocket, but committed no crime. She knows she’s a dime.”)
9) Apparently all the Lebanese live in the same community in Paramatta. There’s a large South African community in my aunt’s neighborhood. They are, of course, white and speak Afrikan.
2) Speaking of America, my other Cdn friend, Geoff, and I kept being asked if we were Americans because of our accent. It is quite annoying being mistaken as Americans. Aussies really should learn something from SE Asians, since they usually ask if I were from Canada. (They know that Americans like to be mistaken as Cdns, but not the vice versa.) All fairness to the Aussies, they usually use the term “Americas” when asking where I am from. I don’t think they differentiate Canada from USA, instead only calling the 2 as a whole (ie. North America or the Americas).
3) According to Geoff, at the revolving restaurant he works at, the Aussies said with a confused look, “But you look Asian” after he told them that he’s from Canada. (You can’t be serious. That’s like me thinking that all Aussies are white.)
4) Went bushwalking with my aunt today in the Kirribilli part of the town. Apparently that area has the highest real estate value in all of Sydney just because it has a view of the Sydney Bridge and Opera House from the North Shore. Got to this lookout point (can’t recall what’s it called, but it’s around Neutral Bay and the Sirius Cove area.), and saw this couple out for a stroll. The man had a New England Patriots shirt on while the girl had some University shirt with the words – law school on it. I immediately recalled that the Pats are playing today against the Bills in Buffalo, NY. So without any hesitation, I just said, “hey, they are playing today eh? (in a good old Cdn fashion, of course!). The man replied, “yeh, you know the score?” We then got to chat for a minute and it turns out that they just moved here from Boston for work. I am assuming they were lawyers.
5) The big election is happening in all of Oz next weekend. The winning party’s leader will become the next Oz Prime Minister. The current party in power is the Liberals while the Labour Party is the opposition. Apparently, the Liberals have already cut income tax last year, therefore they could stay in power. I guess that’s the same way all around the world eh?!
6) I can’t tell if a kid is from a private or a public school based on his/her uniform. It’s bugging me.
7) My big Two-6 bday is tomorrow. (holy fuck, I thought turning 20 was a shock and then turning 25 wasn’t cool either. But turn 26 is like the beginning of my late 20’s. I feel like I have accomplished nothing. Where the doctor at? I am experiencing my quarter life crisis again, but only this time it is much worse than last year.) Funny that I am spending my bday in the different hemisphere this year. Didn’t go out tonight since I am pretty tired from sitting in front of the computer all day applying for work online. However, I am looking forward to my bday at Bondi Beach tomorrow with my cousin and my friend Geoff. Let the good times roll.
8) Drinking age is 18 year, no wonder why the girls at the pubs look so bloody young. All I could hear in my head is Snow’s “Legal”. (“She’s legal tender and fine. She picked my pocket, but committed no crime. She knows she’s a dime.”)
9) Apparently all the Lebanese live in the same community in Paramatta. There’s a large South African community in my aunt’s neighborhood. They are, of course, white and speak Afrikan.
10) There are a shit load of flies here, even in the city. They are some slow fuckers, but they love going onto people's faces. I actually prefer mosquitos now.
11) I have seen bats flying around near my aunt's house in the evening just before it gets dark. They are massive. (I think I already wrote about this.)
Thursday, November 15, 2007
Movies, Studies, and Books
I have watched some interesting movies lately:
1) The beautiful country – about a Vietnamese man’s journey overseas to Texas to find his American GI father.
2) Mean Creek – one of the Caulkin brothers starred in this about a day trip to the river that went terribly wrong.
3) Freedomland (Samuel l Jackson) – Only watched part of it, but Mr. Jackson kept yelling like he does in all of his movies. (that’s how he talks)
4) Jarhead – saw it only for the 2nd time, but it was much better. The anti-climatic ending was pretty symbolic of the life of a typical American solider. All of this buildup and glorious brainwashing about wars during training only leads to a unsettling feeling once they have returned home (for those lucky enough).
5) Dirty – about some of the LA’s finest yet corrupted. The movie has got many recognizable faces, but none of them really A-listers. Cuba Gooding Jr, this Mexican dude whom always plays the Chicano gangsta. Taboo from the Black Eyed Peas. This movie reminds me a lot of Training Day.
6) Saw a funny commercial with Ricky bobby promoting the “jackoff 9000” power drill.
On a side note, while bored, I looked up the world cities ranking for 2007 on the net. A study published in April this year by Mercer Consulting indicated that Vancouver is still #3 in the world for quality of life after 2 cities from Switzerland. A few German cities were ranked in the top 10, while Sydney was the highest ranking Australian city at #9. Toronto and Ottawa were the 2nd and 3rd highest ranking Canadian cities at #15 and 18 respectively. The highest ranking US city was Honolulu at #27 after two other Canadian cities (Montreal and Calgary).
So far, I think I prefer Vancouver over Sydney, except for the crappy weather in Vancouver.
For some interesting Urban Stastics, go to http://www.citymayors.com/sections/rankings_content.html
On a different study in 2005, Vancouver, Melbourne and Vienna were the top 3 cities in terms of livability according to http://www.citymayors.com/environment/eiu_bestcities.html. “Other than Canada, Australia has some of the most livable places in the world. Melbourne is ranked joint second overall. Perth, Adelaide and Sydney join Zurich, Toronto and Calgary in joint 5th place. Just below this is Brisbane in joint 11th place. Elsewhere in the region cities in Japan, New Zealand, Hong Kong, South Korea, Singapore and Taiwan all offer a good standard of living, with a humid climate bringing scores down slightly.”
Random stuff:
While looking up a book for my cousin, “The Geography of Thought: How Asians and Westerners Think Differently and Why”, I found this other one -
“Can Asians Think? Understanding the Divide Between East and West”
Funny title eh?
1) The beautiful country – about a Vietnamese man’s journey overseas to Texas to find his American GI father.
2) Mean Creek – one of the Caulkin brothers starred in this about a day trip to the river that went terribly wrong.
3) Freedomland (Samuel l Jackson) – Only watched part of it, but Mr. Jackson kept yelling like he does in all of his movies. (that’s how he talks)
4) Jarhead – saw it only for the 2nd time, but it was much better. The anti-climatic ending was pretty symbolic of the life of a typical American solider. All of this buildup and glorious brainwashing about wars during training only leads to a unsettling feeling once they have returned home (for those lucky enough).
5) Dirty – about some of the LA’s finest yet corrupted. The movie has got many recognizable faces, but none of them really A-listers. Cuba Gooding Jr, this Mexican dude whom always plays the Chicano gangsta. Taboo from the Black Eyed Peas. This movie reminds me a lot of Training Day.
6) Saw a funny commercial with Ricky bobby promoting the “jackoff 9000” power drill.
On a side note, while bored, I looked up the world cities ranking for 2007 on the net. A study published in April this year by Mercer Consulting indicated that Vancouver is still #3 in the world for quality of life after 2 cities from Switzerland. A few German cities were ranked in the top 10, while Sydney was the highest ranking Australian city at #9. Toronto and Ottawa were the 2nd and 3rd highest ranking Canadian cities at #15 and 18 respectively. The highest ranking US city was Honolulu at #27 after two other Canadian cities (Montreal and Calgary).
So far, I think I prefer Vancouver over Sydney, except for the crappy weather in Vancouver.
For some interesting Urban Stastics, go to http://www.citymayors.com/sections/rankings_content.html
On a different study in 2005, Vancouver, Melbourne and Vienna were the top 3 cities in terms of livability according to http://www.citymayors.com/environment/eiu_bestcities.html. “Other than Canada, Australia has some of the most livable places in the world. Melbourne is ranked joint second overall. Perth, Adelaide and Sydney join Zurich, Toronto and Calgary in joint 5th place. Just below this is Brisbane in joint 11th place. Elsewhere in the region cities in Japan, New Zealand, Hong Kong, South Korea, Singapore and Taiwan all offer a good standard of living, with a humid climate bringing scores down slightly.”
Random stuff:
While looking up a book for my cousin, “The Geography of Thought: How Asians and Westerners Think Differently and Why”, I found this other one -
“Can Asians Think? Understanding the Divide Between East and West”
Funny title eh?
A Road Trip to Hell............and back.
Grab a cup of tea and sit down to read this. Boy, do I have a story for you or DO I HAVE A STORY FOR YOU?! You should know by now that I tend to write lengthy entries.
My cousin’s wife invited me on her day trip to Canberra last week. So I was pumped about going to Canberra yesterday. (why were we going to Canberra, other than that she used to go to an university there? I am saving the best for last. The irony is killing me inside.) Didn’t sleep until 2:30am the night before and got up at 4:30am so we could leave by 5am for a 3.5 hour drive there. To my dismay, (my cousin’s wife whom I will refer to as “Maya” from now on for the sake of storytelling. Her name has been changed for this story.) Maya took my cousin’s car instead of her own car. The problem with my cousin’s car is that the rear passenger window was smashed up 2 weeks ago, therefore, as one can imagine, it is quite noisy and annoying to have the wind coming at your face when traveling at high speed. *Looking back, I think she only took this car over her own car because this was a smaller car, therefore a lot more fuel efficient than her car with a 3 L engine.
Picked up 2 elder Chinese ladies in their 60’s on the way out of Sydney, since Maya invited them onto this day trip (they go to the same church). We were out of the Greater Sydney area by 6am. Here’s a sub-story for some extra juicy details, there was a navigation system inside the car, but Maya didn’t know how to use it properly. As her passenger, she asked me to give her directions on how to get to the 2 women’s places using a Sydney map she had in the car. Fortunately, I have a good sense of direction and am pretty good at reading maps. Afterall, I have navigated myself half way around the world and have not gotten lost. I guess this would’ve been the first sign (oh! Foreshadowing 101 part 2) of how the rest of the day would pan out. You know things are going down the doo doo pot when a local resident need somebody else from the Northern hemisphere to navigate them around their hometown.
Once we were on the highway (or the road I thought was a highway) for about 1 more hour, I switched seats with one of the older Chinese grandma since the cold drift from the broken window in the rear seat has really started to bother her. From there, I noticed that the car was weaving back and forth across the lane and I could see through the rear view mirror that Maya was falling asleep. Fearing for my life, I offered to drive the car even though that I have never driven on the left-side of the road. I wasn’t even sure if I could drive legally in Australia with my Canadian license, but I was ready to be deported if it meant that I might just be able to survive the road trip unharmed.
So I drove for about 2 hours not knowing where I was going. The only instructions I got from Maya was to follow the navigation system before she napped for a bit in the backseat. Finally after 2 hours, I stopped for a bathroom break and asked for some directions to Canberra. I pleasantly found out………….NOT…..that I was heading in the wrong direction. Maya took over driving again. We drove for another 40 minutes only to recognize some of the stores we had driven by an hour earlier. I was sure we were going around in circles. Great success……….not!
So this must have been around 10:30am, Maya drove for another 2 hours while I napped in the back since I was just so exhausted from the night before and just the whole fiasco since 5am. Maya didn’t seem to be tired while driving, as I was paranoid about her falling asleep at the wheel. I kept waking up to see if she was falling asleep and if she wanted me to drive. The more I watch her drive, the more I was paranoid. So I decided that it was probably for the better that I just fall asleep and stop watching the road. My strategy seemed to be working until the road started to wind around the hills. My seatbelt did not work because the broken glass pieces were jammed inside the seatbelt buckle holder. So I couldn’t put on my seatbelt the whole time in the backseat. Oh, did I mention that Maya wasn’t a bad driver; she was just terrible. That’s a step beyond bad. For example, she doesn’t slow down before entering the round about or when she makes a turn. When she’s making a turn, she always cut corners and sometimes drives onto the oncoming traffic lane. Pretty dangerous and reckless if you ask me. I had to ask her to slow down at least 20 times throughout the day. And if this was scaring me, I can’t imagine what it was like for the 2 elderly women. (It really annoyed me when the 2 elderly women wanted me to do something about Maya’s driving or the lack of. What was I suppose to do? I did everything I could: I asked for directions, I drove, I navigated and I am from the other hemisphere! I really about had it when they kept asking me where we were. I told them that I didn’t know. I have been in this side of the world for 7 days.)
Anyways, we got to some small town called Braidwood at 1pm and had lunch at this pie store (very aussie). Then we drove for another hour to Canberra and stayed there for about 30 minutes before leaving town because the 2 elder women had to be home by 5pm to make dinner for their families. Now, here’s the climax of the story: Why were we going to Canberra (ACT – Australian Capital Territory) in the first place? (You are not gonna believe this. I swear I can’t make this shit up.) Maya took me because she had to renew her ACT license (when she’s already got one from New South Wales). She’s getting her 2nd one from a different state, therefore when she’s getting demerits, she could use either one of the 2 licenses to lessen the impact. Oh the irony has just killed me, if the reckless driving haven’t already done so. Somebody issue me an official death certificate! (Sorry for the over-dramatic and sarcastic tone…….not!)
We got back into town at 7pm and Maya had to go straight to work. My cousin picked me up then, but he had to go to some bible study thing at somebody’s house. So I couldn’t go home right away, instead I went and studied some Jesus with him. Met some interesting bible thumpers there and they wanted me to consider Jesus in my life. Because according to them, I can go to heaven after death if I only believed in Jesus. (This sounds ridiculous. Who cares where I go after I die. I am only concerned about the presence and the future before I die.) On a side note, did you know that more people recognize McDonald’s golden arches than the Christian cross? That’s pretty sad when you think that more people know about a clown than Jesus.
Random stuff about Sydney:
1) In the previous post, they weren’t crows, but Magpies (pronounced as Magpees). My bad. I have had 4 different people correct me on that one. It seems that I am the only know who doesn’t know about Magpies?!
2) All public school kids wear uniforms.
3) The Australians say “Tomaatoes”, but not “Potaatoes”. Make up your mind, peeps!
4) This is unrelated to Australia, but did you know that it’s illegal to be mentally ill in Nepal?
5) Instead of saying “fucking”, they say “rooting”. As in “don’t come into the room, John, I am rooting”. Hiking is called “Bushwalking” (so literal and sounds pretty barbaric)
6) Near my aunt’s house, a group of bats come flying out of this valley just before the night gets completely dark. They are freaking huge. Can you say rabies?
My cousin’s wife invited me on her day trip to Canberra last week. So I was pumped about going to Canberra yesterday. (why were we going to Canberra, other than that she used to go to an university there? I am saving the best for last. The irony is killing me inside.) Didn’t sleep until 2:30am the night before and got up at 4:30am so we could leave by 5am for a 3.5 hour drive there. To my dismay, (my cousin’s wife whom I will refer to as “Maya” from now on for the sake of storytelling. Her name has been changed for this story.) Maya took my cousin’s car instead of her own car. The problem with my cousin’s car is that the rear passenger window was smashed up 2 weeks ago, therefore, as one can imagine, it is quite noisy and annoying to have the wind coming at your face when traveling at high speed. *Looking back, I think she only took this car over her own car because this was a smaller car, therefore a lot more fuel efficient than her car with a 3 L engine.
Picked up 2 elder Chinese ladies in their 60’s on the way out of Sydney, since Maya invited them onto this day trip (they go to the same church). We were out of the Greater Sydney area by 6am. Here’s a sub-story for some extra juicy details, there was a navigation system inside the car, but Maya didn’t know how to use it properly. As her passenger, she asked me to give her directions on how to get to the 2 women’s places using a Sydney map she had in the car. Fortunately, I have a good sense of direction and am pretty good at reading maps. Afterall, I have navigated myself half way around the world and have not gotten lost. I guess this would’ve been the first sign (oh! Foreshadowing 101 part 2) of how the rest of the day would pan out. You know things are going down the doo doo pot when a local resident need somebody else from the Northern hemisphere to navigate them around their hometown.
Once we were on the highway (or the road I thought was a highway) for about 1 more hour, I switched seats with one of the older Chinese grandma since the cold drift from the broken window in the rear seat has really started to bother her. From there, I noticed that the car was weaving back and forth across the lane and I could see through the rear view mirror that Maya was falling asleep. Fearing for my life, I offered to drive the car even though that I have never driven on the left-side of the road. I wasn’t even sure if I could drive legally in Australia with my Canadian license, but I was ready to be deported if it meant that I might just be able to survive the road trip unharmed.
So I drove for about 2 hours not knowing where I was going. The only instructions I got from Maya was to follow the navigation system before she napped for a bit in the backseat. Finally after 2 hours, I stopped for a bathroom break and asked for some directions to Canberra. I pleasantly found out………….NOT…..that I was heading in the wrong direction. Maya took over driving again. We drove for another 40 minutes only to recognize some of the stores we had driven by an hour earlier. I was sure we were going around in circles. Great success……….not!
So this must have been around 10:30am, Maya drove for another 2 hours while I napped in the back since I was just so exhausted from the night before and just the whole fiasco since 5am. Maya didn’t seem to be tired while driving, as I was paranoid about her falling asleep at the wheel. I kept waking up to see if she was falling asleep and if she wanted me to drive. The more I watch her drive, the more I was paranoid. So I decided that it was probably for the better that I just fall asleep and stop watching the road. My strategy seemed to be working until the road started to wind around the hills. My seatbelt did not work because the broken glass pieces were jammed inside the seatbelt buckle holder. So I couldn’t put on my seatbelt the whole time in the backseat. Oh, did I mention that Maya wasn’t a bad driver; she was just terrible. That’s a step beyond bad. For example, she doesn’t slow down before entering the round about or when she makes a turn. When she’s making a turn, she always cut corners and sometimes drives onto the oncoming traffic lane. Pretty dangerous and reckless if you ask me. I had to ask her to slow down at least 20 times throughout the day. And if this was scaring me, I can’t imagine what it was like for the 2 elderly women. (It really annoyed me when the 2 elderly women wanted me to do something about Maya’s driving or the lack of. What was I suppose to do? I did everything I could: I asked for directions, I drove, I navigated and I am from the other hemisphere! I really about had it when they kept asking me where we were. I told them that I didn’t know. I have been in this side of the world for 7 days.)
Anyways, we got to some small town called Braidwood at 1pm and had lunch at this pie store (very aussie). Then we drove for another hour to Canberra and stayed there for about 30 minutes before leaving town because the 2 elder women had to be home by 5pm to make dinner for their families. Now, here’s the climax of the story: Why were we going to Canberra (ACT – Australian Capital Territory) in the first place? (You are not gonna believe this. I swear I can’t make this shit up.) Maya took me because she had to renew her ACT license (when she’s already got one from New South Wales). She’s getting her 2nd one from a different state, therefore when she’s getting demerits, she could use either one of the 2 licenses to lessen the impact. Oh the irony has just killed me, if the reckless driving haven’t already done so. Somebody issue me an official death certificate! (Sorry for the over-dramatic and sarcastic tone…….not!)
We got back into town at 7pm and Maya had to go straight to work. My cousin picked me up then, but he had to go to some bible study thing at somebody’s house. So I couldn’t go home right away, instead I went and studied some Jesus with him. Met some interesting bible thumpers there and they wanted me to consider Jesus in my life. Because according to them, I can go to heaven after death if I only believed in Jesus. (This sounds ridiculous. Who cares where I go after I die. I am only concerned about the presence and the future before I die.) On a side note, did you know that more people recognize McDonald’s golden arches than the Christian cross? That’s pretty sad when you think that more people know about a clown than Jesus.
Random stuff about Sydney:
1) In the previous post, they weren’t crows, but Magpies (pronounced as Magpees). My bad. I have had 4 different people correct me on that one. It seems that I am the only know who doesn’t know about Magpies?!
2) All public school kids wear uniforms.
3) The Australians say “Tomaatoes”, but not “Potaatoes”. Make up your mind, peeps!
4) This is unrelated to Australia, but did you know that it’s illegal to be mentally ill in Nepal?
5) Instead of saying “fucking”, they say “rooting”. As in “don’t come into the room, John, I am rooting”. Hiking is called “Bushwalking” (so literal and sounds pretty barbaric)
6) Near my aunt’s house, a group of bats come flying out of this valley just before the night gets completely dark. They are freaking huge. Can you say rabies?
Sunday, November 11, 2007
Random stuff about Sydney
So yeh, woke up and headed for the clinic today to get my cough checked out. $35 and 2 minutes later, I was healthy as an ox. The doc said there's nothing wrong with me after making me say ahhh and listening to my chest with her aparatus. Probably just a sensitive thing from when I was in India.
When the temperature drops in the morning and evening, I usually cough my lungs out. I guess Chris Rock was right. There's nothing Robitussin can't cure. You break your leg, pour some Robitussin on it. You run out of Robitussin, add more water into the bottle and shake it a bit.......more Robitussin.
Didn't do much after. Came home and cleaned my room before cleaning the washroom for the next 2 hours. Washed the place mats on the floor and got ready for vaccuming the floors. However, the vaccum machine broke. I guess that is a sign that I shall not clean the floors.
Heading to Canberra tomorrow for a day with my cousin's wife. However, I am not a fan of the 5am start time. Gotta make the 3.5 hour drive there. I am thinking that it'd be like the same distance from Calgary to Edmonton.
Random Facts:
1) The crows here have a white ring around their necks and they sound different, too. They actually sound like a baby yelling. Kinda weird coming from being woken up by the roosters in Thailand to being woken up by the crows. The similarity is that both birds chirp all night as well. Fun times.
2) The grass on the lawns look different from the grass on the lawns back home. These are more like the ones you can find on a playground field. The more sturdy/hardy ones. Trees are a lot bigger than back home and they are mostly non-conifers (I can't think of the word for the opposite type....the ones that shed the leaves in the fall and doesn't bear pine cones.)
3) People sun-tan a lot in the parks. For example, there were some people sun-tanning at Hyde Park in the middle of downtown. Kinda weird.
When the temperature drops in the morning and evening, I usually cough my lungs out. I guess Chris Rock was right. There's nothing Robitussin can't cure. You break your leg, pour some Robitussin on it. You run out of Robitussin, add more water into the bottle and shake it a bit.......more Robitussin.
Didn't do much after. Came home and cleaned my room before cleaning the washroom for the next 2 hours. Washed the place mats on the floor and got ready for vaccuming the floors. However, the vaccum machine broke. I guess that is a sign that I shall not clean the floors.
Heading to Canberra tomorrow for a day with my cousin's wife. However, I am not a fan of the 5am start time. Gotta make the 3.5 hour drive there. I am thinking that it'd be like the same distance from Calgary to Edmonton.
Random Facts:
1) The crows here have a white ring around their necks and they sound different, too. They actually sound like a baby yelling. Kinda weird coming from being woken up by the roosters in Thailand to being woken up by the crows. The similarity is that both birds chirp all night as well. Fun times.
2) The grass on the lawns look different from the grass on the lawns back home. These are more like the ones you can find on a playground field. The more sturdy/hardy ones. Trees are a lot bigger than back home and they are mostly non-conifers (I can't think of the word for the opposite type....the ones that shed the leaves in the fall and doesn't bear pine cones.)
3) People sun-tan a lot in the parks. For example, there were some people sun-tanning at Hyde Park in the middle of downtown. Kinda weird.
What You Know About.....
Day 5 in Sydney. Bought a hoodie for $2 from K-mart. (I am class all the way!) Some kinda super sales (I don't think the sweatshirt was made in a sweatshop though).
Went out to meet a friend for dinner in Chinatown and then made our way to meet up with this Irish girl I met online from the Lonely Planet throntree forum. We had a drink with her and her 2 friends from Scotland and the UK. It was a funny combination. We had 3 white girls from the UK, Scotland, Ireland and 2 Chinese boys from Canada.
It was about 10:30pm and I realized that it was too late to have my aunt pick me up from the suburbs, since no bus runs at that time. I decided to crash at my highschool friend's place for the night. Haven't seen the guy for 6 years. He's doing well finishing up his last exam before becoming a dentist.
Anyways, I met up with him about 1am and he wanted to go out for a drink then.....knowing that I was crashing at this place, I couldn't really have said no. So off I went drinking with him. He introduced me to his friends whom he's been hanging with for the last 3 years. I was surprised to learn that there were a fair number of canadians either doing their grad school or studying medicine here.
We spent the next 3 hours inside this night club called Cheers (interestingly enough, there's also a club with the same name near my house in canada). Once in the club, the place was just littered with Koreans and Thai, not mentioning all the other Asian groups.
The Koreans/Thai's in Sydney are as the Brits in Thailand. (although I am sure that the thai's here must be pretty well off compare to their counterpart backhome.)
Throughout the entertainment/bar district of Sydney, the streets were filled with young Asian party goers. Once inside the club, I got to see an interesting side of the young Asian international students. The guys and gals mingled well and the girls didn't seem to be bothered by guys hitting on them. I guess the venues and places might be different, but the young people are the same.
On a different note, a Korean girl approached me and started speaking Korean to me, thinking that I was Korean. It was quite funny.
It was 5am, we finally got back to my friend's place downtown. Caught up a bit more from the past 6 years when we didn't really communicate with each other. My friend seemed to be a pretty smart and nice guy. As a matter of fact, he even offered me some advice on some dental care. haha. However, one thing he said that really bug me, though I didn't confront him about it. We were talking about girls and he mentioned that he only cares about a girl's appearance. She's gotta be pretty. If she wasn't pretty, then whatelse would she be good for?
I asked my friend what he meant by that and he just said, "I meant exactly what I said." He then answered my question with another question......"If a girl wasn't pretty, whatelse is she gonna do? You expect her to provide for the family?!"
I couldn't really believe what I heard. Though I think he was joking, but he probably wasn't. Earlier that night, he also said something to the effect of ...."Don't ever let a woman make you who you are" (almost the same phrase from Borat).
Anyways, that was it. I went to bed and met up with my cousin today at noon. She showed me around the campus where she goes to school, UNSW. It was a nice day out, there were some festivities at Hyde Park in the city center. One of the major events was the African Festival, where people sat in the sun, ate up some African food, and just hung out. There were some African singers, but they were not very good at all (trust me, i am no good, but when i tell you somebody else was no good, they are no good.)
* ps. I went out to dinner with my aunt a couple of nights ago for her golf team's awards night. I only realized that what it's like to lead as a member of overseas high society Taiwanese. They are a different type of breed. Everybody's got some kinda business back home in Taiwan. All very financially successful people. Funny thing is that I was able to spot out the best golfer at the dinner table because the best golfers are usually the ones that drink the most. (see John Daly)
Random facts about Sydney:
1) They have Corolla hatchbacks here, but no Honda Fit. Instead, they have Honda Jazz.
2) Entrees are appitizers here unlike the Entrees being the main course in North America.
3) Slot machines here are called Poker Machine or Pokeys. Called Fruit Machine in the UK.
4) People often say "Chuesday" instead of Tuesday or "Jue" instead of "Due".
5) Perth is pronounced like "Perrr F". Australia is pronounced as "Oztraylia".
6) Bus drivers gives out changes for the fare.
7) Paydays are on Thursdays instead of Fridays in NA.
8) Beer is Piss (ie. What kinda "piss" are you drinking, mate?)
Went out to meet a friend for dinner in Chinatown and then made our way to meet up with this Irish girl I met online from the Lonely Planet throntree forum. We had a drink with her and her 2 friends from Scotland and the UK. It was a funny combination. We had 3 white girls from the UK, Scotland, Ireland and 2 Chinese boys from Canada.
It was about 10:30pm and I realized that it was too late to have my aunt pick me up from the suburbs, since no bus runs at that time. I decided to crash at my highschool friend's place for the night. Haven't seen the guy for 6 years. He's doing well finishing up his last exam before becoming a dentist.
Anyways, I met up with him about 1am and he wanted to go out for a drink then.....knowing that I was crashing at this place, I couldn't really have said no. So off I went drinking with him. He introduced me to his friends whom he's been hanging with for the last 3 years. I was surprised to learn that there were a fair number of canadians either doing their grad school or studying medicine here.
We spent the next 3 hours inside this night club called Cheers (interestingly enough, there's also a club with the same name near my house in canada). Once in the club, the place was just littered with Koreans and Thai, not mentioning all the other Asian groups.
The Koreans/Thai's in Sydney are as the Brits in Thailand. (although I am sure that the thai's here must be pretty well off compare to their counterpart backhome.)
Throughout the entertainment/bar district of Sydney, the streets were filled with young Asian party goers. Once inside the club, I got to see an interesting side of the young Asian international students. The guys and gals mingled well and the girls didn't seem to be bothered by guys hitting on them. I guess the venues and places might be different, but the young people are the same.
On a different note, a Korean girl approached me and started speaking Korean to me, thinking that I was Korean. It was quite funny.
It was 5am, we finally got back to my friend's place downtown. Caught up a bit more from the past 6 years when we didn't really communicate with each other. My friend seemed to be a pretty smart and nice guy. As a matter of fact, he even offered me some advice on some dental care. haha. However, one thing he said that really bug me, though I didn't confront him about it. We were talking about girls and he mentioned that he only cares about a girl's appearance. She's gotta be pretty. If she wasn't pretty, then whatelse would she be good for?
I asked my friend what he meant by that and he just said, "I meant exactly what I said." He then answered my question with another question......"If a girl wasn't pretty, whatelse is she gonna do? You expect her to provide for the family?!"
I couldn't really believe what I heard. Though I think he was joking, but he probably wasn't. Earlier that night, he also said something to the effect of ...."Don't ever let a woman make you who you are" (almost the same phrase from Borat).
Anyways, that was it. I went to bed and met up with my cousin today at noon. She showed me around the campus where she goes to school, UNSW. It was a nice day out, there were some festivities at Hyde Park in the city center. One of the major events was the African Festival, where people sat in the sun, ate up some African food, and just hung out. There were some African singers, but they were not very good at all (trust me, i am no good, but when i tell you somebody else was no good, they are no good.)
* ps. I went out to dinner with my aunt a couple of nights ago for her golf team's awards night. I only realized that what it's like to lead as a member of overseas high society Taiwanese. They are a different type of breed. Everybody's got some kinda business back home in Taiwan. All very financially successful people. Funny thing is that I was able to spot out the best golfer at the dinner table because the best golfers are usually the ones that drink the most. (see John Daly)
Random facts about Sydney:
1) They have Corolla hatchbacks here, but no Honda Fit. Instead, they have Honda Jazz.
2) Entrees are appitizers here unlike the Entrees being the main course in North America.
3) Slot machines here are called Poker Machine or Pokeys. Called Fruit Machine in the UK.
4) People often say "Chuesday" instead of Tuesday or "Jue" instead of "Due".
5) Perth is pronounced like "Perrr F". Australia is pronounced as "Oztraylia".
6) Bus drivers gives out changes for the fare.
7) Paydays are on Thursdays instead of Fridays in NA.
8) Beer is Piss (ie. What kinda "piss" are you drinking, mate?)
Friday, November 9, 2007
Mood
Sitting here listening to this song at 2:45am Sydney time, I just finished posting half of my pictures from Thailand/Cambodia/India on facebook.
No gangsta rap for me today! Yes! But what I really wanted to hear was Daddy Yankee's "Rompe" remix.
I sort of miss home and this shocks me a bit because I haven't been homesick at all for the last 2.5 months travelling around. Perhaps it's because that Sydney is soo similar to Vancouver, but yet soo different from what I am used to back home.
I have come to face the fact that my new life has started with or without me. I better get my act together and go with the flow. I heard some wise guy once said, "the only thing that's ever constant is change."
smart dude.
Thursday, November 8, 2007
Day 2 in Syd
Had to buy some clothes for any potential job interviews, so I can be at least somewhat presentable.
You know you got class when you shop at Target! : )
Met up with my boy, Johnson and his bro tonight for dinner. Haven't seen the guy for 6 plus years. We went to highschool together back home. Met up with another friend whom's also from Vancouver. Chilled out at the Sydney Casino before taking some photos of the night view of Darling Harbour. Good times.
Gotta start looking for work soon.
Random thoughts on Sydney:
1) It's like Vancouver on steroids. Picture Vancouver's scenery with Toronto's sheer size.
2) I feel like I am in Vancouver for the sheer number of Asians. There are a lot of Koreans and Chinese people.
3) What's up with the "Car Park" thing? Parking Lot is fine!
4) One can't pay for gas at the pump. A station visit inside is a must. The lowest octane of gas is 92 (then 95 and 97). Canada's lowest is 89 then 92 and 95. I always only used 89, good enough for my corolla.
5) My vodaphone sim card (in my no-frills nokia phone) tells me where I am all the time (not GPS, but pretty darn close. For example, if I were in the Fleetwood part of Surrey, it'd display Fleetwood on my screen. Once I have moved to another area in a car or train, then another location's name is then displayed. Cool!
6) I guess Sydney could have a large train network because it's a big city and also the the weather permits, as it never gets that cold. Subways/skytrains are probably easier to maintain in colder climate.
7) I noticed that the white people here are more fair looking and slightly bigger than north americans. Def more people with blonde hair/blue eyes.
8) Learned that the undesirable neighbourhood is around the west side. Apparently, there's a large Vietnamese and Lebanese population in the west.
You know you got class when you shop at Target! : )
Met up with my boy, Johnson and his bro tonight for dinner. Haven't seen the guy for 6 plus years. We went to highschool together back home. Met up with another friend whom's also from Vancouver. Chilled out at the Sydney Casino before taking some photos of the night view of Darling Harbour. Good times.
Gotta start looking for work soon.
Random thoughts on Sydney:
1) It's like Vancouver on steroids. Picture Vancouver's scenery with Toronto's sheer size.
2) I feel like I am in Vancouver for the sheer number of Asians. There are a lot of Koreans and Chinese people.
3) What's up with the "Car Park" thing? Parking Lot is fine!
4) One can't pay for gas at the pump. A station visit inside is a must. The lowest octane of gas is 92 (then 95 and 97). Canada's lowest is 89 then 92 and 95. I always only used 89, good enough for my corolla.
5) My vodaphone sim card (in my no-frills nokia phone) tells me where I am all the time (not GPS, but pretty darn close. For example, if I were in the Fleetwood part of Surrey, it'd display Fleetwood on my screen. Once I have moved to another area in a car or train, then another location's name is then displayed. Cool!
6) I guess Sydney could have a large train network because it's a big city and also the the weather permits, as it never gets that cold. Subways/skytrains are probably easier to maintain in colder climate.
7) I noticed that the white people here are more fair looking and slightly bigger than north americans. Def more people with blonde hair/blue eyes.
8) Learned that the undesirable neighbourhood is around the west side. Apparently, there's a large Vietnamese and Lebanese population in the west.
Tuesday, November 6, 2007
First the Cause then the Oz
Some random things I noticed about Sydney so far. I have been here for about 1.5 days now.So I got picked up by my aunt, whom I haven't seen in over 14 years, at the airport yesterday. Staying at her place in the burbs just north of downtown.
1) The hwy system here is pretty good. A lot similar to American's from what I have seen (Washington, Oregon, Connecticut, NY). Big wide hwys with a lot of over/under passes. I have never seen that in Vancouver.
2) .....judging from point 1 above, I guess this is because of the population in the greater Sydney area doubles that of Vancouver's (2.2 mil) at 4.2 million. A city this size has gotta have something better than Vancity's hwy 91. haha
It's funny to read Vancouver's population projection is only about 50% over the next 15 years. And even by the year 2036, the projection (3.1 mil) for the GVRD is still less than Sydney's present population.
3) Saw this fastfood chain that's a lot like Burger King, but it's called Hungry Jack's. It's got Whoppers on the menu.
4) Krispy Kreme is available here.
5) Saw the Sydney Bridge yesterday on the way to my aunt's house. What's the big deal about climbing the damn thing anyways? I think I prefer the Alex Fraser Bridge.
6) Dim Sum here is called Dim Sim. Surprising? not really, since dim sum (Cantonese) is pronounced dim sim in Mandarin.
7) Lucky number seven eh?
6) Dim Sum here is called Dim Sim. Surprising? not really, since dim sum (Cantonese) is pronounced dim sim in Mandarin.
7) Lucky number seven eh?
Not soo much. I was nearly strip-searched at the Melbourne airport upon arrival after they found traces of Ecstasy on one of my 2 backpacks. They had me in a separate room from the public and took everything out of my backpacks. Looked through my receipts and even checked out the photos in my camera. Questioned about my other passport (I have dual citizenship).
All of this because I checked off 2 things on the customs declaration form - brought dried fruits (dried mango slices I bought as a gift from Thailand for my aunt) and had been in near/contact with farm animals the last 30 days (in Thailand/India).
After all the fun times with the customs officers (all 50 minutes of it), they finally let me go because out of the 4 swipes they took, 2 were negative for Ecstasy. They switched to a second machine from the first one, which proved that I don't have the good stuff, E, on me. They asked me if I did any narcotics along the way. All I said was that, "I did smoke a hookah in India." One of the officers asked me, "what's that?" I explained to him that a hookah is just tobacco. They asked me what kind of medicines I had been taking while travelling. I just told them I only had some anti-biotics for upset stomach, malaria pills, and some other pills for flu/cold. They concluded that it might have been some chemical in the drugs which was similar to that found in E.
I guess it was a glorious day for the Australian customs! Great Success for Homeland Security! No, I am not being sarcastic AT ALL!
8) I don't understand why most of the malls/stores closes so freaking early (around 5 to 6pm) in a city that doubles Vancouver in size.
9) And what's up with the money? All the bills have this piece of see-thru plastic (0.5" x 0.5") at the lower left hand corner. And as for the coins, the bigger the denomination, the smaller the size. For example, a $2 coin is smaller than a $1 one, and is way smaller than the 20 cent coin. Pretty funny stuff.
10) I found the food is pretty expensive when dining out. This is probably because the minimum wage is about 15 to 16 dollars. An average university grad makes about 50 to 60k after 2 to 3 years in the workforce.
11) So is the public transport system...pricy! I thought Vancouver was bad. This is also the first city I have been to where normal trains (not sky train or a metro system is in place) are used from the suburbs (ranging from 13 to 25 kms away from the city center) to downtown.
12) One interesting thing that I found out was that some of the 9-5ers (which ironic enough aren't really nine to five working people) have a flexible schedule where they can choose to go to work whenever they want as long as they put in 8 hours that very day. This was done partly to relief the traffic during peak hours. *I guess this is the southern hemisphere afterall.
*you probably know this already. the water drains in clockwise direction when flushing the toilet, unlike the northern hemisphere where the water drains counter-clockwise.
Last Day in Bangkok 05.11.2007
*side note: loving this song right now. just randomly found it on youtube. big ups, mos def. (Ghetto Rock)
the count down had started without my permission. my time in SE Asia was up, at least for 2007.
took advantage of the relatively cheap standard of living in thailand and ran a few errands instead of going to the river front to watch the royal barge (idiot move? perhaps....not an idiot since i didn't know about it until afterwards)
got a case for my mobile (1.10 cdn) . got a hair cut (2.25). got my pearly whites cleaned up (19). ate some more rice noodles and enjoyed a cheap 40 minute 7 thai baht bus ride (20 cents) to the mall for a singaporean movie (2.75).
i guess the most interesting part about my 25th hour was the movie - Pleasure Factory aka Kuaile Gongchang (in mandarin). filmed in singapore. the movie didn't have much dialague and sometimes felt more like a documentary. i enjoyed it simply because of the cliche - picture speak a thousand words. the movie was shot on actual location - the red light district of lion city. i was particularly moved by the 2 famous mandarin oldies in the movie: Gei Wo Yige Wen ("Give Me A Kiss") by Chang Loo. and "Yue Ling Dai Biao Wo De Xin" ("The Moon Reflects My Heart").
i first heard about this movie when watching another thai movie called Bangkok Love Story a few weeks back.
for more info on this movie:
http://imdb.com/title/tt1018902/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pleasure_Factory
http://www.pleasurefactory-movie.com/
Sunday, November 4, 2007
Random thoughts about India
The Indians are pretty aggressive people in terms of getting you to buy their products. I will use an extreme example from Goa.
After dinner at the resort, a waiter comes over and offers some dessert. Out of the 3 of us, only 2 of us wanted some sweets. Nick and I went ahead and ordered some traditional Indian sweets. Charles opted out.......very uncharacteristic of him.
The waiter returns with 3 plates of 3 different types of desserts, while only one was the correct order. I didn't get what I ordered and Charles got something when he ordered nothing. The waiter insisted that Charles must try this famous Goan dessert.
Charles got a bit annonyed since he's a no-nonsense type of guy. While I was day dreaming in my own world, Charles had been taking it all in from when we put in the dessert order. According to Charles, the waiter looked funny when we were ordering the desserts. He looked over at the restaurant manager nervously while taking our orders (suspicious sign 1. Little does the waiter know, Charles also made eye-contact with the manager after he smelled something fishy). Once he brought the 2 dishes we didn't want (sign 2), it was evident that he did what he wanted - increasing the check and therefore his tips as well.
At this point, Charles got up and had a talk with the manager outside the restaurant. We could not hear what the conversation was about, but it was funny that once he did that.....all the staff ran into the kitchen........"somebody's gonna get a hurt real bad!".
Charles came back and confirmed that the manager also sensed something fishy when his staff looked over sheeply while taking our dessert orders. The conversation with Charles only reassured his doubt. According to Charles, the manager promised that he will deal with the staff accordingly (whatever that means). Apparently, the waiter has only been working at this resort for 15 days according the manager, unlike the 2 months period the waiter told us. fishy fishy!
I was actually hoping that the waiter would not be fired because I think everybody deserves a second chance. No word on what the final result was.
*According to Charles, the Indians are much more effective at reading people's emotions and reactions than most North Americans. It's funny that when we treated the working class (employees at the hotels) with respect, they feel very uncomfortable, aside from the fact that it appears they think we are way above them in terms of social class. that really bothered me.
When treating an average indian male with respect, they think that you are afraid of them. They then come around and boss you around. What's up with that?
My trip to India has made me realized a lot of things.....learned a lot as well. I can't possibily write everything down. What a shame.
ps. saw this interesting program on the flight back to bkk........
www.worldnomads.com
After dinner at the resort, a waiter comes over and offers some dessert. Out of the 3 of us, only 2 of us wanted some sweets. Nick and I went ahead and ordered some traditional Indian sweets. Charles opted out.......very uncharacteristic of him.
The waiter returns with 3 plates of 3 different types of desserts, while only one was the correct order. I didn't get what I ordered and Charles got something when he ordered nothing. The waiter insisted that Charles must try this famous Goan dessert.
Charles got a bit annonyed since he's a no-nonsense type of guy. While I was day dreaming in my own world, Charles had been taking it all in from when we put in the dessert order. According to Charles, the waiter looked funny when we were ordering the desserts. He looked over at the restaurant manager nervously while taking our orders (suspicious sign 1. Little does the waiter know, Charles also made eye-contact with the manager after he smelled something fishy). Once he brought the 2 dishes we didn't want (sign 2), it was evident that he did what he wanted - increasing the check and therefore his tips as well.
At this point, Charles got up and had a talk with the manager outside the restaurant. We could not hear what the conversation was about, but it was funny that once he did that.....all the staff ran into the kitchen........"somebody's gonna get a hurt real bad!".
Charles came back and confirmed that the manager also sensed something fishy when his staff looked over sheeply while taking our dessert orders. The conversation with Charles only reassured his doubt. According to Charles, the manager promised that he will deal with the staff accordingly (whatever that means). Apparently, the waiter has only been working at this resort for 15 days according the manager, unlike the 2 months period the waiter told us. fishy fishy!
I was actually hoping that the waiter would not be fired because I think everybody deserves a second chance. No word on what the final result was.
*According to Charles, the Indians are much more effective at reading people's emotions and reactions than most North Americans. It's funny that when we treated the working class (employees at the hotels) with respect, they feel very uncomfortable, aside from the fact that it appears they think we are way above them in terms of social class. that really bothered me.
When treating an average indian male with respect, they think that you are afraid of them. They then come around and boss you around. What's up with that?
My trip to India has made me realized a lot of things.....learned a lot as well. I can't possibily write everything down. What a shame.
ps. saw this interesting program on the flight back to bkk........
www.worldnomads.com
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
