A programming note...next week is T-giving and we're headed to The Philippines for the long weekend so likely will not post next week.
This goes out to my Seattle pals. I need you to do something for me...read about a restaurant where a review would be appreciated. It's called Pintxo and is billed as a tapas bar and is right in the downtown core. If you have talked to me within the last year have probably preached how transcendent our pintxo experience was and if this place is half as good as we found on the road, it has to be great. Make it a date night and let me know?
Some Taiwan news for you this week. Will go big to small. Taiwan is having elections on November 24th and while my understanding of the issues of the day is not deep, I can base my opinions of the candidates based on the impressions of the advertising strewn about town. Have to assume they advertise on local media but the big thing we notice are all the signs that get plastered on any available space around town. Have taken a few photos and plan to do a recap of what I think of the candidates soon but will share one of them by Candidate # 7 as a teaser.
Babydoll shared an article that details a study where half of all Taiwanese are blessed with the 'weight loss' gene. Lucky...they get to late night snack and not exercise and still be rail thin. Must be nice and help explains why I literally get waved off when I am looking at clothes at the stores here cause they simply don't carry anything that will fit. Of course this explains why I see these skinny ass people eating nothing but oily fatty food.
In other Babydoll news, this week saw their annual school dance production. This year's piece is named a Christmas Carol and it is the classic Scrooge story combined with Devil Wears Prada. Clever mash-up cause the cast is 6:1 girls so the protagonists can all be female. Wish I was more of an art lover as I should go to the school's productions all the time as they are so well done. Talented kids for sure, it is all the behind the scenes work the kids and faculty do that make these events. They are real strict in people not taking photos/videos from the audience for good reason, so cannot share any with you. Babydoll is in several scenes and had a duet where she is onstage with her partner alone for 3+ minutes. Not versed enough in the genre to say if she was good or what, but I admire that anyone can get up in front of hundreds of people and do stuff like this. She looked so mature and commanding up there, especially with all the make-up, that even though I knew it was her, had to ask Betty after to be sure it was.
As an evolved mind from the west coast of the United States, had to click on an article about the local police busting a marijuana factory. Was kinda hoping that there was some underground industry and that these guys got popped by accident, but it turns out it was a couple that was turned in by their neighbors for having a single plant growing in their bedroom closet. The article is sadly funny, but not as sad as the picture of the "factory" itself.
It's A Charlie Brown's Marijuana Factory. I like to tout how progressive this dump is on social issues in relation to their SE Asian neighbors, but this is one area that they are far to the extreme. That said, appears their objection to vaping has finally changed cause I am starting to see locals puffing on them around town and just saw a vape store open up nearby. They love their booze, tobacco products are almost encouraged, and I know that speed is all over cause these kids can't maintain their study schedules without it. But the weed? Korea put out some directive to their citizens to not smoke out when they go to North America or face some kind of repercussion when they got home. If they legalized it here the 7-11's would be so much cooler. As they said in my day and age...mellow out man
Betty and I went to a Diwali party last weekend. Diwali is a Hindu celebration and highlights light over darkness and the attainment of knowledge and consciousness. The usual stuff. Nice time but the only reason I mention it was that we enjoyed a performance of a Japanese guy playing sitar in Taiwan for a Hindu event.
This party was in a space here called The Red Room. Had heard about this space in the first month or so when we arrived in 2012 and that there was cool events going on all the time. The space is in an abandoned Air Force facility in the core of downtown and was said to be really cool, but we had never gone or been invited so it was good to finally see what all the fuss was about. One week later I get invited/told I had to go for a friend to an event they are having called My Tribe, which is a celebration of art and food and music from around the world and how it manifests itself to this time in Taiwan. Obviously artsy fartsy in a way that doesn't fit my normal routine, but I go. The art is quite good, two artists were showing, one Finnish and the other Thai. The music was by a Ugandan dude that lived in Kenya and he was very affable, but I have seen some of the greats perform in a acoustic troubadour setting and not a single time did I not want to but a metal spike in my ear to stop the noise. THe food was by a chef trained in South Africa that was hit and miss, and made me spew up a bit in the middle of the night, but it was one of the desserts that stole the show.
Here is a close-up
Woke up early the other day and as I walk by one of our chatchkies, I see a giant cockroach perched on top of it. The above photo is a recreation with my rubber cockroach friend Charlie standing in for the real thing. Don't see many of these critters in our apartment but when we do, they are the little fellas. Will see the giant flying kind on our balcony from time to time, but if they were living in the apartment, we'd see them right away cause they are loud and proud. I figured the guy I saw this morning must have slipped past the goalie when a door was open or something. After being initially startled, started to look closely at him. He didn't seem to be concerned at my presence at all and just sat there so we watched each other for a while and had this feeling come over me that I wasn't expecting...I saw him for the innocent creature that he is. Almost perfectly designed and has survived unchanged over a period of time that is hard to imagine. Was mesmerized by the movement of his antennae, each well over an inch long, as they probed the world around it. Whether you feel he was the end result of millions of years of evolution or one of God's most perfect creatures, his beauty really couldn't be denied and I wondered which one of us was more evolved.. I then clubbed him with a book and while he was scrambling around unable to move due to the damage inflicted, picked him up with a paper towel and flung him off the 16th floor railing.
When I go out about my business in the neighborhood, I pass by this tree. Kind of an oddball shape with it bending over the sidewalk so you sorta have to duck your head to maneuver around it, so you notice it every time in a way that you wouldn't for most trees. The amount of times I have gone past it and touched it or whatever is in the many thousands.
This week I go past and there is an old lady (60-70) lying on it and humping it like a dog. Vigorously. I watched stunned for a few seconds but felt dirty and had to move on. They didn't teach me that in QiGong class and has to be a treatment for menopause I guessed. One of those unexpected moments in life that will leave an impression forever.
Finally for today, had a T-shirt thought. "I am not anti-social, society is anti-Me." That came out of my head out of the blue and thought I was pretty clever, but a Google search comes up with millions of hits for that saying in Facebook pages, song lyrics and many many t-shirts. A wise man said that there is a fine line between clever and stupid. Being original is awfully difficult. That said, it is likely someone forwarded you this YouTube clip of Simon Sinek on "The Millenial Question" It was in my feeds several different ways and have heard many folks referencing it as well.
I watched it and it struck that aggro nerve in me immediately. Had to watch it again cause the first time became obsessed with this knucklehead saying "right?" at the end of every other sentence. That is one of my most hated verbal ticks cause it is not inert like "like" or "umm" but is a way they subliminally get you to buy what they are pushing.
And what this guy is pushing? Whew... The poor Millennials are victims of parents telling them how great they are and teachers giving them A's. Awwwww...the poor millennials and their suffering. They can't be content in a job cause they don't own the company after two weeks and if they aren't content, then their life is a failure and they go back to mommies basement and eat avocado toast. Simon's solution? Companies need to make them feel more needed and must face the burden of reprogramming them. I made some enemies back in the days when the kiddies were playing youth sports when they came around asking for us to pay for their nutty participation trophies. Flat out told them it was psychotic and can still see the looks on the faces of these moms (it was always moms) that said I was a monster (a benefit was that they never asked me to be a "Team Parent"). Whenever we'd come home with one of these I had a conversation with the kids and asked them if they wanted to put it up in their room or what. They both knew by age 6 it was bullshit and the trophies soon found there way into the garbage (just think of the climate change implications of that you crazy Seattle bubbleites)
These kids know the deal. Kids have always known the deal. These millennials are messed up, perfectly fine, stunningly brilliant in ways all generations before them were and all will be after, This guy says in the video more than once to the Millennials that "it is not their fault" and we (not you) need to once again fix something for you. Doesn't every person in every generation ever come to the realization that not every person is gonna be a star, billionaire or whatever is their dream and that even if you work your ass off, it might not happen? That's life baby, so buying into this guy and making excuses and assigning blame for your self perceived sorry ass state let's you off the hook that nut jobs like Simon Sinek have put on the wall for you in the first place. Prevents you from enjoying life no? Like watching a woman hump a tree or appreciating/destroying a cockroach. I say to you Simon Sinek, knock it the fuck off.
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