Mewwy Cwismas

OK... So I'm a few days late. So what?

Been to Adelaide, and yes, while I got back a few days ago, I've been too darned lazy to post. Not that I haven't had the time. I can't recall being this bored since I was at uni in the times between semesters.

So how was Adelaide? It was everything I thought it would be. It was empty and quiet. The shops were mostly closed. Their definition of a high rise building is about 20 levels. We did the usual touristy things one does when going to Adelaide - wineries (got myself a decent supply of wine to last a while now), beaches as well as the occasional chocolate factory.

Was nice and relaxing though. Can't say I'd voluntarily go back there, but it was relaxing.

Archery

Hey all,

Dunno if many of you knew that I did archery once upon a time. Well, I've taken the sport back up again after a 15 year absence, mainly as a result of the largest Archery club in the state being nearby.

Anyway, I got a bow on the weekend, and went down to the club on tuesday night to try it out. Its only supposed to be 32lbs when at full draw, but I can definately say that was enough for me. Its a recurve bow, which of course makes it all a bit harder than it is with a compound bow. I only managed 3 ends before I was struggling to pull the darn thing back. Thankfully, the light was also fading, so I used that as an excuse to call it a night. I guess I need to start building up some strength in my back to pull this thing back. (For those who have never done archery, its your back muscles that are used to pull the bow back, not your arms. Its the same group of muscles you use when swimming)

Casino Royale

Saw the new James Bond movie on the weekend. I gotta say, this new James Bond is a little nastier than the previous ones. Daniel Craig plays James Bond in this one. I gotta admit I don't mind him. Its seemingly more about the smacking out of bad guys than the romancing the ladies for him. Which I guess is preferable, because I can't say any of the female "romantic interests" in this film were overly interesting. So I guess it helps to have a little bit of a body count.

This film is based on the original book of the same name, but has been updated a bit to include the usual Bond technological requirements. Having never read the book, I have no idea how close it is to the original, but it didn't really matter to me.

My only real complaint is that the film is a bit long. The ending did drag a little, but mostly you didn't notice. The ending was a fairly predictable, which may be why I found it to be a little slow.

I reserve the right to whinge

Hi all,

As of late last week, I'm officially a pom. Well, dual citizen pom and aussie. Hows that for an evil mix? I'm now culturally obliged to whinge at anything I feel like. Got my British passport. Don't actually need it - I don't plan on going to the UK for a while...

Ah well... So long as I don't have to drink warm beer.

BIrthdays, etc...

Hi guys,

Was Mayumi's (our home stay student) birthday last week, so on tuesday we had a birthday party. Was fun, seeing people celebrate birthdays from other places. Heres a photo....


Its kinda weird, but in Japan, you still sing happy birthday in English. Was kinda more fun than the usual Australian parties... I learnt a few new Japanese words, like "itekimas" (I'm sure I spelt that wrong, but it means something along the lines of "lets eat")

The BBQ got a good work out too, at last. I need to fire that thing up more often...

Its been a while...

Hi all!

Sorry its been a while since I posted... Lots been happening... I now have a new job (again). 6 month contract, so we will see how that goes.

We also have a Japanese student staying with us, which has been an interesting and fun thing. Its kinda like having a sister. Except that her native language isn't the same as yours and has different cultural views to you. But she's great, even if she is a little shy when talking with us.

I've finally gotten to putting up all the photos from our Korean trip on picasa. Have a look here if you are interested...

OK... Will try and post more... Hope everyone is good...

Films for Saturday, 29th

A few films for saturday. Here they are:

9 square meters for two - This film is a documentary about prison life in France. This was quite interesting, as the inmates did their own filming, of stuff they wanted to film. It makes you not want to go to prison. The thought of doing what those guys do for years on end is probably enough to turn anyone insane. Sitting in a square box as much as they do would drive me nuts...

Tokyo Express '06 - This is, of course, Madman's oppertunity to show off its main anime wares for the next year. Now, its fair to say that Madman probably has distribution rights to a lot of the films at MIFF each year (I don't begrudge them that, Tim works his ass of and deserves the success he has gotten), but if this years Tokyo Express is anything to go by, its going to be a fairly quiet year as far as anime is concerned. The only one I was vaguely interested in was Naruto, which is a hugely popular anime about a ninja boy who is supposedly really talented, but is a smartass.. The rest weren't that good...

Sa-Kwa - Well, its fair to say I'm seeing a lot of South Korean cinema this year (don't I always?) so its no suprise I went to see this one. Its a story about a Korean woman who is trying to make her way through life. Her boyfriend dumps her, and at the behest of her mother and sister, starts dating a guy who tries really hard for her attention. She eventually marries him and the story follows her as she gradually becomes quite disallusioned with the whole life thing. She doesn't top herself or anything, but she does struggle to deal with some of the issues about her family, including her husbands drinking habits, his desire to work in a crappy small town, which of course forces her to move with him and give up everything she has. Its an OK film, but it kind of dragged on a bit.

Invisible Waves - Andrew couldn't see this one... Its done by the same director as the last life in the universe, a guy by the name Pen-Ek. Its a film set in Thailand, spoken in a mix of Japanese and English with a few other wierd karaoke moments thrown in for good measure. The story centers around a Japanese guy who is sent to Thailand to lay low for a while. He goes on a boat trip there to I guess be less conspicuous. And things of course inevitably go wrong for him with both humerous and serious consequences. Basically, Pen-Ek (who apparently has being at work drunk being written into his contracts) creates a fairly odd film (but then again, he does tend to do that). Its a bit slow in points, but its quite good.

Films for Friday, 28th

Saw a couple more films on friday. Here they are:

Animation Shorts Programme 1 - This programme consisted of about 10 shorts, I think. Most were actually quite good. There is the usual Australian primary school effort that seems to find its way in each year (well, at least the last couple anyway), a really cool Japanese animation from the guys who did Garakuta last year or the year before... (The new one is called Funny Pets and is worth a look in itself)

Bubble - This film is about a group of low-wage workers in a doll factory. Well, 3 of them mainly and the complex love triangle that develops between them. A fairly slow film, its well shot, and the actors do a really good job of their parts. A shame it was such a slow moving film, otherwise I would have really liked it... (I didn't mind it, though...)

2:37 - This film is the opening night film at MIFF. They didn't announce the film until it started running, as an attempt to get people to watch it with an open mind, I guess. The other possibility is that I think maybe a lot of people wouldn't have gone if they knew what it was. Its the kind of film though that requires you to leave your preconceptions at the door, because its a wonderfully strong film, which is a real suprise for an Austalian film. Its kind of about teenage suicide, but not really. Its more about I guess self-imposed social isolation and the effects that it can have. All of the major cast have issues that they are trying to deal with (and in most cases, I guess making a really big mess of them) all the while unable to see that any of the others are going through their own issues - which of course only serves to make matters worse. A brilliant film worth seeing if you possibly can.

Catching up on films...

Hey guys,

Sorry, has been a few busy days watching films. Heres what I've seen so far and a bit of what I thought about it:

Thursday 27th:
Election 2 - Fairly brutal Hong Kong gangster film. Was quite well done, for a change. I have seen the original one, and actually prefer this one. The first film focused more on the aftermath of the election, where are this one focuses more on the "campaigning" for an election. It also hints to an interesting (and quite scary) connection between the Chinese government and the triads. Now I have no doubt that they have an influence in parts, but if its along the lines of this film, it would have quite an impact.

This film is not yet rated - This is a documentary on the MPAA. Basically, noone knows who rates the films you see, at least not in the US. Ratings, a voluntary system in the US, were brought about by a desire to keep the US government out of it. The result is, of course, a system designed to keep everyone from being able to put any measure of accountability to it. This film attempted to locate and identify exactly what goes on, who makes the decisions and how those decisions are made. The result essentially proves that whilst not outrightly defined as censorship, its sufficiently similar to have the same effect.

Melbourne Film Festival

Hey all,

Its Melbourne Film Festival time again, which means noone sees me for 2 1/2 weeks while I go seeing lots of films ;)

I have a list of 40 films... Heres the first few days worth:

Thursday 27th: 7pm - Election, 9pm - This film is not yet rated
Friday 28th: 5pm - Animation shorts, 7pm - Bubble, 9pm - screening of opening night film
Saturday 29th: 11am - 9 square meters for two, 1pm - Tokyo Express 06, 3pm - A scanner darkly, 5pm - Sa-Kwa, 7pm - Invisible Waves, 9pm - Thankyou for Smoking, 11pm - McDull the alumni
Sunday 30th: 1pm - The Goddess, 3pm - A hero's journey, 5pm TV Junkie

More to come...

...Coz I'm a lazy bugger.

Hey all,

I haven't posted in nearly 2 months... Sorry 'bout that.

Haven't been doing much... Its mainly coz of my new job maintaining chat software. Its kinda interesting.

Anyway, for those of you overseas, be thankful, its cold here now. Its a fairly cool Melbourne winter at the moment...

Ah well... Will write something more when I can actually think of something to write about...

8 more work days to go...

...'till I'm changing jobs! YAY!

I know, I should have posted this 2 weeks ago when I told my boss I'm leavin', but I haven't had the time. Ah well...

The amusing part of leaving is watching how people deal with losing an employee. Some are fine, saying "OK... See ya later", some take it personally that you are leaving. I mean, its not like I haven't left this place before, so why is it such a personal thing?

Oh, I highly recommend the whole concept of giving notice right before easter. That's 2 days less of listening to people complain about how much extra work they will have to do when you leave. ;)

As promised...

'nuff said...

A new design...

In the tradition of having a more garish (hence the name Blurrrrgh) design, I've changed to something green... Nothing quite says hurl like a mixture of greens... Tho I can't see any carrot in here... Maybe I need to modify the template.

Film: Lord of War

Saw an interesting film last night, Lord of War. Starring Nicolas Cage, it opens with the interesting story of the life of a bullet, starting from when its pressed out of a chunk of metal and ending when it splats a kid in the middle of Africa.

Cage makes a number of great points about the arms trade in the film. His character is apparently an amalgamation of 5 real life arms dealers, I was never in any doubt that his portrayal was anything short of the mark for those guys.

At the start of the film, he says that there are enough guns for "1 in 12 people on the planet" and that it was his job to figure out how to "arm the other 11".

The film has gotten interesting reviews around the place, mostly 3 - 3 1/2 stars. I figured it to be at
least a 4, mostly because it delivers on the shock value so well.

I highly recommend this film. It doesn't pull any punches, and from all reports (including Amnesty Intl.) a good representation of what goes on in those circles.

Sad news: Passing of Andreas Katsulas

Hi all,

This one is for the Sci-Fi geeks around. Andreas Katsulas, probably best known for playing the part of G'Kar in Babylon 5, but also for playing Frederick Sykes in The Fugitive remake in 1993, passed away on monday of lung cancer.

Wedderburn Today

heh. My dad's been talked into starting up a blog about his local town after he complained that "nothing ever happens there". He was told to make something happen and now has a blog. Have a look at Wedderburn Today for images of nothing ever happening in Wedderburn.

Film: Memoirs of a Geisha

Went and saw Memoirs of a Geisha the other night. Was not a bad film, actually. Zhang Zi Yi is always good, though she does seem to have a limited number of different characters that she can play. They all blend together to me. Ken Watanabe was the standout character for me, but he has such amazing presence on the screen. He was the one saving grace for me when he was in The Last Samurai, and he certainly added a great deal to this film.

Anyway, the most annoying thing about this film wasn't the film itself, it was the annoying little sh*ts sitting behind us when we saw it. I have never had to do this before, but halfway through the film I had to turn around and ask them (and I quote) "would you shut up?". I dunno. I must be getting too old if that kind of thing is annoying me.

Oh yeah... We're back...

Hi all,

Sorry for being a slack ass and not posting for 2 weeks.

Last couple of days in Korea consisted of searching for lots of nifty things to buy to take back home with us... Shopping can be such fun when you can't communicate with the person you want to buy something from. We were attempting to buy some bags from a Korean guy who knew less English than we did of Korean (and believe me when I say I know very little Korean). Thankfully, he had a friend who spoke English. 2 hours we sat in the store trying to get them to supply what we wanted at an acceptable price. All the while trying to getting them to give us the stock that wasn't run over by a steam train or shagged by a walrus. This was not what I had in mind for how to spend my time.

Oh, and in Jack's tradition of "It's the little things". Heres the Korean version:

• Koreans (especially kids) eat bugs. They are actually silkworm lavae or something like that. When we first arrived, we could smell it and thought "what is that smell?". We eventually got the courage up to try it - Its DISGUSTING. Apparently the kids love the stuff...
• Westerners put Chinese or Japanese characters onto T-shirts that they have no knowledge of what it means. Koreans (and I believe other Asians) put English words on their T-Shirts that they have no idea what it means. Unfortunately, it usually comes out to be gibberish.
• Some of you may be aware with South Koreas' fascination with computer games, treating the people who play it professionally like pop idols, etc. Watching the grand final of some Starcraft competition, some of the kids in the audience had keyboards for their "idols" to sign.
• Watching same show, some of the audience held up signs for their computer game playing idols. I assume they said something like "I love " and so on. But where as an Australian would hold these signs up high where everyone can see them, these Korean girls (yes, you heard me, girls idolising computer game players... Crazy) put them in front of their faces so that the camera won't show that it's them there.
• Think for a moment. It's -5 as a maximum temperature. You're a Korean girl deciding what to wear. What do you choose? Of course, it's obvious, you wear the shortest mini-skirt you have in your wardrobe! Bear as much flesh as possible, nevermind the possibility that you will cause damage to yourself by exposing that much bare flesh to rather cold weather.
  
  There was a news broadcast about this, as well. So they know it's stupid. Oh, and the kicker on this one was the news reporter - a male - got out the tape measure to measure how short the skirts were. I wouldn't have wanted to be him when he got home to his wife that night...

Anyway, this probably draws to a close my comments on our holiday... Back to ye olde grind. Yay!

National War Museum

Hi all,

Went to the national war museum yesterday. That was increadible. Took us about 2-3 hours to explore it properly. Heres a photo of the outside:
This place was massive. Around the outside is a list of name of those who have died in service of the Korean army. There are a lot of names there. Not sure exactly how many, but I'm not sure
I want to know...
This is a monument out the front of the place. Again, this place was huge. They had a whole bunch of planes, tanks, artillery, etc. on display both inside and outside. Well worth a look if you are in the neigbourhood.

The view from North Korea

Hi all,

We went to Padmunjom today, which is the Joint Security Area where South Korean officials and North Korean officials meet. Its a very interesting and intimidating place. We had a military escort for the trip and had some strict rules about what we can and can't do while in the area.

A couple of photos:
I'm standing in North Korea when I'm taking this photo. See those microphones on the table? That's the border. Tanti is back in the relative safety of South Korea at this point.

This guy is a South Korean army guy. It's his job to stand there and look menacing. He does a very good job. :-)

Sigh! We are back in Melbourne soon. Will try to post more photos before we leave of stuff... Not sure what we have planned for our last 2 days...

Photos part 3

Part 3: Last one for now!

Busan train station. Our hotel was nearby. This is how Spencer st. shouldbe done. See? Its actually finished...

This was the view from our hotel in Sokcho. Actually, the hotel was about 10km out of Sokcho near Seoraksan national park. Not a bad view to wakeup to, is it?

This is actually North Korea. Photo taken from the Unification observatory about 40km north of Sokcho. Its the northern-most point of South Korea. Very weird place, really. Noone around except military and tourists. Interesting mix, no? Also, the beaches are gorgeous if you ignore the barbed wire, after all noone goes on them (you get shot at if you do...)

Now this is an interesting one. Its a wine from North Korea. Assuming I'm able to get this through customs, this will be an interesting thing to try. I believe its made from Bilberries and 'tis about 16% alcohol, if the label is to be believed. I will wait 'til a few of you guys are back from your European jaunts before opening this.

So that's it. Sorry for the long post. I've been building up some photos for a week or so. We are in Seoul now until the end of our trip, so I shouldpost a little more regularly... Anyway, catch you all later!

Photos part 2

And now for part 2!
This is Gyeongbokgong palace, which was up until recently inhabited by the Korean royal family. I'm not sure why they don't still live there, but apparently the princess lived there until a few years back. Absolutely massive place. Story goes that the North Koreans were going to loot the place during the Korean war until the princess came outscreaming at them to stop. It sounded to me that they stopped more out of confusion about what they should be doing than anything else.

This is some of the many seafood restaurants in Jeju island. If you likeseafood, come here. Lots of seafood, quite cheap. Jeju island is also a honeymooners favourite, which brings me to the next photo...
Apparently honeymooners all come to this spot for a photo oppertunity. There is nothing here except some rocks, but hey. I think the tour group we were with thought we were honeymooning... Ah well, maybe next time. ;-)

This was the first falling snow we saw. It was in Jeju, and it fell for about 2 days straight. We didn't get much at our hotel, as it was close to the water, I think. Much more fell inland, where there is a mountain and is a lot cooler.

Part 3 coming shortly!

Photo time (Part 1)

Hey guys!
Spent the last couple of days in a remote area up in the northeast corner of South Korea, which is why I haven't updated. There was internet access, but it was a bit expensive, so I figured I would wait until back in Seoul.

Anyway, as promised: Photos from South Korea!

This one is from Itaewon in Seoul. Apparently the steps behind me are used in lots of Korean films. Usually involving chases (I belive often using motorcycles and other entertaining stunts)

This one is of a weird concoction the Koreans eat. Take a hot dog, skewer it onto a stick, then some bread-like substance. Fairly standard so far? Well, then the fries are stuck to the edge and its all held together with batter before being deep fried. Do you feel your arteries hardening just thinking about it?
This was where a lot of Koreans were new years eve. There is a bell on the second level that rings 33 times. 33 apparently beinga lucky number. They got 33 different people to ring the bell.Unfortunately, we didn't get there for new years, but was stillgood to see it...
Koreans take Christmas quite seriously. This thing was about 10 metres tall and was about 40 metres in diameter. Around Christmasthere was a whole mass of stuff like this that makes the Australian decorations look positively pathetic.

More in part 2!

Jeju - Somewhat warmer than Seoul

Hey guys,

We arrived in Jeju yesterday... Was considerably warmer than Seoul... 1 hour flight
costs 70,000 won (~720 won to the $A1) , so quite cheap to get around here.

I know I promised photos, but there is no USB connection on this PC (deliberate, they
don't want people like me using the PC for useful things. ;-) I will find one that allows this
tomorrow if I can... Then we will get some photos... ;-) That is assuming I can figure out
how to get this blogger interface to read in English, rather than the Korean it currently
displays... Makes like entertaining when the delete button is as unreadable as the submit
button. ;-)

Anyway, we went around to a few places today in a Korean-only speaking tour group.
Oh that was fun. The tour guide was quite entertaining, I believe. I'm sure if I was able
to understand more than 2 words of Korean that I would have found her entertaining.
Ah well.... We went to some bunch of rocks that apparently all Korean couples on their
honeymoons come to have their photos taken. Then to a Chinese circus thingie. I have a
couple of short quicktime movies of that. Very cool. Those guys are crazy. Then to a
minature world kinda thing, with scale models of buildings, etc. Not bad. Then on to a couple
of other bits and pieces, none that exciting.

Tomorrow is more of the same, but in eastern Jeju (today was all on the western side...)
Then over to Busan... Not sure how long we will be there yet... Might only be overnight...
We want to head back to Seoul to shop more. ;-)

Anyway, catch you all later!