Wednesday, December 28, 2011

European Union Film Festival 2011: Of Dictators and Adultery

EUFF 2011
Truth be told, I wasn't expecting this one at all, given the current economic trouble the EU is in. As such, the announcement of the second ever European Union Film Festival (That I've been to- apparently it's the 12th, though I've heard nothing of previous ones) was a pleasant surprise.

The last time I attended the festival  I pretty much went bonkers and tried to go to as many movies as possible- I went for three in one day- burning myself out in the process. I controlled myself better this year- no doubt with help from a healthy dose of sloth, and went for two movies over a period of two weeks.

Friday, December 23, 2011

OL Chronicles… You wish! aka 仕事は迷惑電話を掛ける事ですよ~

「OLになったの。なんちゃって」(画像:Akio-bakoより)
I was going to translate this into English but work has made me lazier than ever.In any case this post is about my first week at work.If you still want to read it, you can always run it through Google Translate… It'll probably be a lot more entertaining (Not to mention nonsensical).

こないだの英語の記事(記事?!偉そうなあ…)を読んだ読者ならもう分かってると思うけど、僕はすでに自由を無くした。平日はもうのんびり出来ぬ。ちょっと悲しい(涙)。いやちょっとじゃなくて、結構だろう?兎に角今は日系の人材紹介会社で働いてる。

Saturday, December 17, 2011

Japanese Film Festival 2011: Happy Flight

Happy Flight
Oh dear. What a movie. 102 minutes of advertising- and it still manages to be good. Advertising, yes. As in commercial, CM, or whatever name you know it by. The ideal length for a TV commercial- for me, at least, is 30 seconds. At 102 minutes this one multiplies that figure by 204 times- but I'd still recommend it. Happy Flight was backed by All Nippon Airways, and is basically a movie about how an airport runs, focusing on three major components: the pilots, cabin crew, and ground crew. Just imagine a movie about the oil industry being sponsored by, say, Exxon-Mobil. You get the picture.

Sunday, December 11, 2011

Wedding Blues in Skyrim

Dohvaakin: "Remember Omerta. Don't you dare tell the wife."
Ah, Skyrim. Who would have known that the stuck-in-my-computer fantasy land of Skyrim would have forced me to confront one of the most befuddling questions a man would ever have to scratch his head over- that is, which charming maiden should I marry- a question which thankfully I have yet no reason to worry over in real life, nor will I ever have to worry about given my lousy track record and groan-inducing fussiness.

Wednesday, December 7, 2011

Of Slightly Spicy Balls, Tiresome Acquisitions, and Face-Cake Coordination

Slightly spicy balls. Best way to start a post.
Nine balls to be split between two guys. They were spicier the last time I had them- or my taste-buds have rotted. Putting shared balls and guys in the same sentence isn't exemplary sentence structuring, not in terms of grammar, but more of gutter nuance.

In any case it was shared with a pal from school days whom I hadn't met in years. It's funny how you'd like to meet someone when they're not available, but when they're there, you get lazy to meet them... at least that's how I felt. Heh.

Sunday, December 4, 2011

Making Berth in Perth, 2011

It's quite noticeable.
On hearing alert signal (beep...beep...beep) JUST RUN. Sound advice from a semi-civic conscious vandal. No, you don't have to run away from Perth Airport, and not this post either- notwithstanding the tragically blurred photos. This will likely be my last travelogue for some time (unless halfway through I decide that it's become too long for one post and split it into two), since I've just graduated from college and have to, sigh, 'focus on my future' (not my words). Bah.


Another thing- my sister extracted the photos from the camera before I could get to it and stuck everything into individual folders- 'food', etc. So now I can't tell what date each photo was taken on and it's a blistering mess which I'm too lazy to sort out. Bah again.


Tuesday, November 29, 2011

It's been a while, no? Oh, and so long, Freedom.

Image by Leuco
Well here I am at last. This will be the last post for this blog... for November. Heh. I've been pretty distracted recently, no thanks to a certain Skyrim... after just a few days of non-stop playing I have a level 39 lycanthropic barbarian Kate Moss. The loss, however, was that I've neglected this place, when I could have been doing other things (Like clearing up my backlog of posts, for one).

Meanwhile, I start work tomorrow- another blow to my freedom, but a necessary step, and now all that remains is to see whether I can break free of it without compromising my comfort- by writing a book, or leading a rebellion (Not the Guevaran kind), that sort of thing.

Thursday, November 17, 2011

Chonmage Purin aka Cross-Temporal Cultural Exchange

Chonmage Purin
Totally unrelated opening statement: Because I am inordinately irritated by bloggers blogging about how to blog, I've decided to blog about how to blog as a blogger blogging a blog. Hmm. I'm sure it'll be a hit, given the inexplicable popularity of the subject that's managed to draw my ire. Look forward to it! Now, on to the movie review:

Despite my oft-declared aversion to so-called 'family films', I found Chonmage Purin (Literally Topknot Pudding) quite enjoyable- and good enough for me to gladly recommend to anyone in search of something to consume 108 minutes of their lives with.

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Doraemonized Espada: Conquering Soul Society with International Childhood Affection

An alternative take on the Espada from Kubo Taito's Bleach. Why? Blame boredom and free time. Which leads to which? Does it really matter? Either way, this is the final product. Could have been better, but what the heck. I got bored while doing it, but stubborn determination to complete what I started helped somewhat. Here's the (slightly edited and jumbled around for increased length, ok, completely rewritten) description from Deviantart:

Thursday, November 10, 2011

Doraemon: Nobita's Dinosaur 2006 aka My Pet will always be Bigger than Yours

Wardrobe malfunction, in the truest sense of the phrase.
This movie is the film adaptation of one of the Doraemon 'long stories'- apparently they come out with one every year or so, and remake older ones during, ah, dry seasons- this one is a remake of the first ever Doraemon film. Expect nothing new if you've read the book it's based on- I have, and found myself making comparisons between the art used in the book and the anime series, while not bothering too much about the story.

Monday, November 7, 2011

My Happiest Moment

c/f depressing photography (for war-zone reporters, etc)
Disclaimer: This post is for a contest. However that shouldn't scare you away as thanks to the terms of the contest, I won't have to wax lyrical about a product that I've never had the chance to use (one reason for entering it). Anyway, the theme of the contest is to post a picture with an accompanying Massive Wall of Text- I mean, story/description. Click this if you'd like to be my competition. Oh, and the post has to be titled 'My Happiest Moment'- too simple for my liking, but what can I do. Without further ado...

Sunday, November 6, 2011

Marida likes it Red: SD Kshatriya

What she looks like under the helmet.
I got bored a few months ago and decided to splurge on something which wouldn't break the bank- the result being the SD Kshatriya, even though I already have the HGUC 1/144 version, and wasn't really all that interested in the kit (simply thinking 'oh doesn't it look cute' does not equal to unfeigned interest). I got it mainly because it was (well, seemed) ridiculously cheap for a gunpla kit, plus it came with a little extra mech... (insert several pages of justifications)

Tuesday, November 1, 2011

Philippines 2011: I can never remember where to put the Ls and the Ps...

Feeleepeen!
Before jetting off to the Philippines, we had to waste some time in Singapore, no thanks to having to transfer to another flight- this was all planned, by the way. Oh, and if you've noticed by now, I said 'we'- I wasn't traveling alone, but with various bits of the extended family, and I'm not going to bother elaborating on that.

Instead, you can content yourselves with knowing that I had a little trouble crossing the border in Singapore- no thanks to having 'lost' my passport there a few months back. I'd made a police report then, and was allowed to leave the country. Once back home I made another police report to the effect that I'd lost- and a week or so later- reunited with the blasted thing. Anyway. They wouldn't let me enter Singapore without some fuss. Technically this was breaking the rules and I was entering the country as an illegal- but it worked out alright in the end.

Thursday, October 27, 2011

「お好み焼き」じゃ無くて、「おっ、この土産!」

Redacted for obvious reasons.
Guess what came in the mail today- air mail, no less- the prize I won in a lucky draw contest from Travel Volunteer (One that I didn't know I'd won, being busy living, not to forget Facebook's tagging system failing on us at the worst possible moment). Oh, and I got to use the word 'redacted' for the first time ever. Pretty good, eh?

Tuesday, October 25, 2011

Contrary to popular belief, chain-mail bikinis don't always work wonders

'Cos nothing says Steamboat Dinner more than a chainmail bikini
Warning: This post will contain some gruesome images, which may or may not affect your appetite. Also, if the sight of a chain-mail bikini causes copious amounts of blood to flow from your nasal cavities, I advise you to stay away. However, the text content of this post is relatively harmless fictional nonsense superimposed on real-life events, and has nothing whatsoever to do with a buxom warrior running around stabbing demons, though that is what I may make it out to be...

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Hudud? Let's just forget everything and join the Sith. Life's easier that way.

Image credit: Nababa
Recent barks from the political side of the world (Look out your window- it's the noisiest, tackiest area in sight) have really managed to hit a certain glossy red button with the words 'IRRITATE ME' embossed on it. The barker in question happens to be one Dr. Siti Mariah Mahmud, Member of Parliament for Kota Raja, which, though not located in my neighborhood, is too close for comfort.

Sunday, October 16, 2011

Gundam AGE, Episode #1 First Impressions: In which I say SAGE to AGE, tear my own logic to bits, and glue it back together

AGE! AGE! AGEgege no *copyright infraction*
First things first- Sunrise, or Bandai, made a monumental mistake in naming their new show Gundam AGE. I suppose it squares with the direction they want to take the franchise in- i.e. a new age. The problem is, it also opens you up to abuse by biased wise-asses (Namely me) who interpret AGE as the Japanese counterpart to the word/function 'bump' found on English forums (Most notably 4chan), which is used to keep an interesting post 'alive', so to speak. So what, you say. Well, never forget an antonym, which for 'age' is 'sage'- to lower/push down. There you have it. Sage to AGE. I wonder why 2chan hasn't noticed it yet.

Friday, October 14, 2011

Ghastly Unadulterated Nomenclature Dislocating Autocidal Nimrods, aka A Meaningless Title Unless You Know What to Look For

Credits for picture to... um. Please tell me if you know.
Back when I was still a wee little kid who thought of dancing little jigs barefoot on hot concrete and climbing defenseless short trees as a passably fun activity, I wrote poetry. Now that may seem rather anti-climatic, or at least vaguely disjointed, I feel for you, but it is the truth, and so there's no going around it.

Thursday, October 13, 2011

何度でもNANDO'S

Heart on a Plate. Where it Belongs.
Yep, yet another overdue post. For the life of me I can't even remember when it happened- though I can say with some confidence that it took place sometime last year (Probably early 2010)- a little lunch outing cum birthday celebration for me.

I never really cared much for birthday parties and the like till recently- I've even forgotten my own birthday once- but it has grown on me a little. I don't ask for it, nor do I expect it- but I've gotta admit, all the attention is rather nice. As thanks of sorts, there shall be no mercy in the composition of this post, that ye who are being written about may enjoy every word. Have a pinch of salt ready if you like- some nonsensical text is on the way.

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Animation-Comic-Game Hong Kong (ACGHK) 2010

Gunpla 30th Anniversary
30 July 2010:
It just so happened that I happened to be in Hong Kong just in time for the Animation-Comic-Game Hong Kong (ACGHK) exhibition. Even better, I'd read about it just a few days before, having had no idea of its existence until I arrived on the island. To add more sugar to the mix, I got to go on the very first day of the exhibition, which also happened to coincide with Bandai's 30th anniversary... ah, joy.
Super Mario Bros. Wii booth.
Before I go further- I have to mention this. Getting into the place was torture. I had to join a queue that stretched forever- around buildings, inside buildings, over streets, before finally reaching the convention center. Every 10th person in the queue was fiddling away on a PSP- none of them bright red, I noticed- which cheered me up somewhat (That was the colour I'd chosen for mine). As a consolation, however, I managed to get a tourist ticket- an excellent move on the part of the organizers

Monday, October 10, 2011

Middle Kingdom 2010 Part VI: Hong Kong

See the dragonfly... helicopter?
26 July 2010:
The journey by ferry from Macau to Hong Kong took about an hour. Passengers weren't allowed up on deck- in any case there wasn't much of a deck, and I doubt there was anything particularly eye-catching on the way, so it really didn't matter. The boat was pretty comfy too- nice big soft seats, spacious, and air-conditioned- perfect for the footsore traveler.

Saturday, October 8, 2011

Middle Kingdom 2010 Part V: Macau

26 July 2010:
Ah, Macau, Macau. A lot like Hong Kong, only a lot more cramped. Yet a million times more interesting and prettier looking than Zhuhai, where I was just minutes ago. Took the border crossing- before I knew it I was in Macau. It's that close. I thought that there would be a bridge, or something... instead I just got my passport stamped and crossed an imaginary line.

MS IGLOO II: The Gravity Front aka Against Incredible Odds, and Failing Miserably as Expected

"Because if you just blew up your vehicle (on purpose), no one's gonna pick you up if you don't pose..."
MS IGLOO II: The Gravity Front is a three part OVA, created mainly for Sunrise to show off their ability to produce amazing CGI. There's barely any story to it- each episode consists of Earth Federation soldiers being sent out on suicide missions against Principality of Zeon Mobile Suits. If you've never watched the original Gundam anime (actually, neither have I- though I've read wikis on it) you probably have no idea what I'm hammering on about. In that case, think of Igloo II as a Japanese Avatar (by James Cameron, not the one by M. Night Shyamalan)- watch it for the pretty pictures.

Thursday, October 6, 2011

Green Bell Pepper: NZ-666 Kshatriya

NZ-666 Nagato
My fourth gunpla purchase, the NZ-666 Kshatriya. This thing's so huge it's box is the same size as my MG Strike Noir- and it's only a 1/144 kit. I wonder if Bandai will ever come out with a MG Kshatriya- just think of how large it would be. Not to mention how frightening the price would be...

Sunday, October 2, 2011

Middle Kingdom 2010 Part IV: Guangzhou and Zhuhai

Pier for the ferry-taxi service.
21 July 2010:
Arrived in Guangzhou around 8.30 in the morning. Hit a spot of trouble- couldn't find the bus that was listed in the guide I compiled back home- a problem easily surmounted by asking around and taking a different bus, though after getting off I walked blindly past my street and had to double back. Not fun at all, especially with the sky threatening to leak on me again.

Finally reached the river- the hostel was somewhere there. I knew I was on the right bank, but had no idea whether to turn left or right. Grabbed hold of a passing lady who offered to walk with me in the right direction- coincidentally the direction she was taking to work. The whole exchange was a lot more peaceful than it sounds, really.

Saturday, October 1, 2011

Utter Randomness: Musical Chairs

Copyright... no idea.
Let me get one thing straight before I go on: I hate chain mail. Not the kind you can wear to deflect otherwise mortal wounds, but the type posited on your doorstep emotionally blackmailing you into posting it again.

Memes, however, are fine, and I don't mind standing back at a safe distance to watch the play unfold. I don't take part, however. That being said, there are exceptions to the rule, this 'playlist shuffle' meme being one of them. I can't remember when I completed it, but the basic premise is this: enable shuffle in your media player, and click next. Each track is the answer to one question. Here we go, then...

Friday, September 30, 2011

Middle Kingdom 2010 Part III: Guilin and Yangshuo

Hostel room window. Still raining.
16-17 July 2010:
One day of torture, sitting in one spot on a cramped, warm train. Never again will I make fun of the KTM train service back home (a resolution soon to be forgotten). That said the journey was made mildly better by the company I had- two college girls sitting opposite me, and one guy beside me- the girls being my age, the guy one year older (for which we made fun of him for a bit, poor thing), an immovable table-like protrusion separating us.

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

One step at a time- forwards or backwards, just don't fall sideways

Art by: Nababa
I should really have posted this the instant I started this blog- this post being the obligatory 'mark my words, I am here to stay' post, a la Captain Cook and his ilk's ritual stabbing of soil with a flagpole or in slightly less sensationalistic imagery, a dog daintily raising one hind leg to piss-mark its territory.

Sunday, September 25, 2011

Kyrie eleison, Kyrios

Gundam Nagato Yuki
My second gunpla kit, and rather shoddily built, to tell the truth. I didn't paint it, panel linings were first done with a 2B pencil, and then with an overly-thick Sharpie... you can probably see the smudges all over it. Ah well. Anyway this is a NG 1/100 Gundam Kyrios. I got it mainly for the 'claw' and the fact that it can transform into a 'jet'-like mode (what they call a Mobile Armor in the series)- 2 for the price of 1, sort.

Saturday, September 24, 2011

Middle Kingdom 2010, Part II: Shanghai

Doesn't seem like it has much going for it at first, but...
10 July 2010:
Arrived around 7.30am, feeling rather perky despite a long night squashed behind someone's seat, vaguely hoping whoever was in it wouldn't lean back too much, crushing me in the process. A light drizzle spoiled the mood a bit, but all was fine. Metro fares vary by distance- after the flat fares of Beijing, this was quite a put-off. As usual, security was tight at the stations- nearly lost my ticket at the x-ray scanner, fumbling with
my luggage.

Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Japanese Film Festival 2010


Just as I was about to get up from my chair and rummage through my drawers for the program booklet to take a photo of for the opening image of this post, I stumbled across the poster for this year's Japanese Film Festival through Google Images. Sure makes life a lot easier, eh? Then again, Google can't do anything for this massive headache that's popping my brain cells one by one. Yet another delay to another late post, bah.

Monday, January 31, 2011

Singapore 2010

Note: All photo links are dead. If I say that I'm too lazy to replace them in Yoda-speak, would you let this slide? "Lazy be I. On you read, go somewhere else if no like." That worked, right?

The above picture doesn't say much about this post- and you should take it as a warning- that for once, I don't intend to be long-winded. Much of this post will be made up of photos, with little bits of text here and there. If that doesn't make much sense, it's because I couldn't decide which photo to use and finally chose one that says pretty much nothing. Unless you find a red teacup dreadfully symbolic.

Thursday, January 13, 2011

Middle Kingdom 2010, Part I: Beijing


Note: All photos are gone, thanks to time, Facebook, and probably my own decision to adjust FB privacy settings. Have fun guessing what I'm talking about while you're read on (i.e. use your imagination).

This one is going to take some time to mash out, especially since it’s my longest trip overseas so far (almost one month), and since I flunked one paper and will have to study for a referral in addition to normal classes, which begin early in September. Better not waste time on this intro, then- on with the travelogue:

Update: It's now 2011, heh. So much for not wasting time. I'm done with my referral (I passed, for the record), but this site has been down since... I don't know. Virus attack, that's all I can say for sure. Anyway, back on point: this post will be long. Much too long. As such, be prepared for future installments, though I can't say for sure when they'll pop up...