Rest in peace, Anita.

It came as such a shock. I had not heard about her cancer, so this was totally unexpected. I spent my early years listening and wiggling my limbs to her hits. I don't think any HK 80's child can forget her magnetic voice in songs like 將冰山劈開, 壞女孩 and 似水流年, or her stellar performances in so many movies like 胭脂扣 Rouge and more recently, 男人四十 July Rhapsody.

How I remember Anita Mui


A nostalgic scene for HK entertainment

Phuket + Bangkok:

Highs - in order of excitibility

1. Chatuchak Weekend Market, Bangkok

Oh man - I've been to more than a few street markets in my life, but this one beats them all!

10,000 stalls selling just about everything under the sun: antiques, clothing, furniture, thai silk, kitchenware, upholsery, plants, snacks, "dai pai dong" type eateries - the amalgate of sights, sound and smells makes it a total sensory overload. The crowds just spoke "ASIA" to me like nothing else - multitudes of people coming towards you, behind you, on your right, on your left. It's a wonder I haven't been smooched. It'll be one of the times in my life when I REMEMBER being awake. Bonus: prices are so cheap you have to wonder how badly you're getting ripped off elsewhere, but of course everyone bargains just for the heck of it.

2. Maya Beach, Phi Phi Island and James Bond Island near Phang Nga

Remember The Beach, that awful movie that Leonardo diCaprio was in? Well, Maya Beach IS The Beach. The movie might not be anything worth remembering, but the Beach is another story. It's truly paradise [if only the hords of tourists weren't there :( ]


the cliff where Richard, Leo's character in The Beach, jumped off
James Bond Island was the setting for a speedboat chase in The Man with the Golden Gun with Roger Moore as 007. (My mum remembers the scene!) The island has fantastic micro-landscapes. We squatted on a mudflat looking at mini one-clawed crabs, where I accidentally tore a claw off a crab when trying to look at it. The claw writhed around with reflex even after it was separated from the crab.... urrrrgh xP. We then crawled around some limestone caves, stalagtites and stalagmites at the base of the island cliffs, edged towards bat caves, then shrank away cos of the stench.

3. Auntie Jane, my bro's funky Thai fairy god mother

She's funny, beautiful, elegant, stylish AND she has purple tinted pepper hair!
Picture this: we were strolling around hawkers' stalls around the Christmassy, all-decked-out entrance of Four Seasons. Auntie Jane spotted a hawker selling those clownish masks with geek glasses + huge nose + mouchestache + paper whistle, and she bought two. Just before returning to the chic hotel lounge for tea and dessert, she puts the mask on, marches right past the posh doormen, the gawking guests, the sniggering pianist and singer, sneaks up behind her husband and BOO!ed him with her whistle!

4. Thai massage

I'm usually totally crap with massages, as am v. ticklish and can't help giggling all over the place when masseuses touch my back. BUT... this one has Thai jasmine + lavender oils. The masseuse was super and I only giggled a few times. I smelled so good after I couldn't help sniffing my skin at lunch!

5. The food court at the Emporium, Bangkok

Bakeries of all types everywhere! Beautiful gourmet pastries and cakes, cutesy colourful birthday cakes, fresh bread at the Mandarin Oriental's bake shop.... just looking at the displays make me hungry. The food at the cafes are super as well - love the light fluffy chocolate cake and the coconut sorbet made from young coconut water and bits of coconut flesh :d

Lows - in order of crappiness

1. Mosquitoes

Totalling 60 bites on my forearm, legs, shoulders, ankles, thighs, back and hips. I must have made a bloodfest buffet.

2. Getting my almost weightless glasses blown off into the sea

I was on a speedboat going from Maya Beach to the bay where lunch was served. We were looking at scenery, I turned my head in the downwind direction. Whoosh! Off my glasses went into the sea. I spent the evening squinting at fuzzy family acquaintances over dinner, and the next day trying to avoid bumping into fat, gross, sunburnt sketchy Westerners on the street next to Patong Beach.


before losing all facial adornments
3. Fighting with bro in Bangkok

And I thought I'm too old for that. Not true. But I'm out-muscled now, and gone all bru-brack on my arms.

4. Bangkok traffic jams

At 3 miles per hour It's comarable to LA highways. Only you're on a shadowy, dusty crowded street with tuk-tuks and their dust-eating passengers, taxis, Lexuses, Mercedes, and the odd bike all around your air-conditioned van.

5. Huge brown birthmark-like tan on back

Shit happens when you try to spread sunblock on your back by yourself.

6. Losing earrings, goggles, snorkelling tubes to the sea

and should this be funny, embarrassing, stupid, or all of the above?....

Accidentally flashing me nipple on a tuk-tuk


Phuket tuk-tuks, being different with their safer seating arrangements, are to blame for this one.
It was hot and humid. I unwisely wore a risque Issey Miyake low back, v-cut halter neck without er, precautionary measures. We were on a tuk-tuk on the way to dinner. Some Harley-Davidson-biker-wannabe Westerner on a motor cycle was behind us. He looked at me, then laughed his head off. In my perplexedness and insecurity, I look down to check my non-existent cleavage. Boobs are in place, nothing is wrong. I returned to my original slanted posture. After another 15 mins, I look down again to double check. Then I saw what the gweilo was laughing at. My right boob slipped out ever so slightly on the side. Argh....... at least I made someone's boxing day.

Faye, live!

Lucked out and got to see Faye Wong's 2003 Christmas concert. Was fantastic because:
1) Faye Wong's my fav Cantopop singer, and my all time second favorite singer. (after Bjork, mother of cutting-edge music and Faye's sound)
2) Last time I went to a Cantopop concert was back in either '98 or '00... also to see Faye.

This time round, she sang almost all of her mid-90's hits, which meant I knew them all by heart and can mouth along like a teenybopper. My 13 yr old cousin knew only one song throughout the whole concert. But it didn't make me feel old. On the contrary, it felt good to be an older teenybopper. Albeit with strange yellow inflatable plastic bats as a clapping aid.

Faye's concert outfits are always a dream for haute-couture savvy fashionistas. The concert opened with 天空 [Sky]. Three-story-high white curtains surrounding the stage dropped, and Faye descended from mid-air on a suspended platform. She looked the part, being the diva that she is, sporting a white, puffy sleeved deconstructed number- think Viktor and Rolf meets Marjan Pejoski (the designer responsible for Bjork's Oscars swan dress). The audience went wild when she took off the outer layer as she stepped off the platform, revealing a skimpy bias-cut Grecian tunic.

Fun little hiccups was the theme of the day. Faye was totally embarrassed when the big white quill from her inverted-stiletto-Philip-Treacy-esque hat fell off. After several unsuccessful attempts at sticking it back on, she waved the feather about and played conductor with the audience. Then the fabric of her tunic came apart at the shoulders and it transformed into a glamourous Jean Harlow-esque gown. Faye, with bright pink cheeks by now, improvised and pulled up a corner, swirling around with hand on dress as she sang 流浪的紅舞鞋 [Wondering red dancing shoes]

A few more costume changes followed, including
- a grey fur Medieval tunic dress thing with dangerously high black patent stilettoes;
- another puffy sleeved black micro-mini dress with blood red Vivienne Westwood platforms, (like the ones Naomi Campbell fell over in) white thigh-high stockings, and a black Treacy-esque Robin Hood hat;
- a Flashdance-y white dress with shredded pink gauze, paired with magenta 80's slouchy boots;
- and a black gothic renne mini dress.

Faye's voice was as lush as ever. Her cover of Dusty Springfield's The Look of Love was total bliss. But that did not stop her from apologising throughout the concert. It's like she couldn't get over the little blunders. I thought as a performer, she should have just played along with them - it's all fun and games. Cousins were bummed that there were no special guest artists. But hey, if you have a voice like that, who needs inferior sidekicks?

Things you learn from your spam:

So I got this all-technicolour-pink Chinese ad in my Junk E-mail folder. Not knowing what the heck it was selling, I read it and picked up some new vocab =P

隨身棒 - literally "carry-everywhere awesomeness", or, carry everywhere stick. The new Taiwanese term for vibrator.
小老二 - lit. "small number 2"; people usually say 老二 for the second eldest sibling in a family. In this context, it refers to a certain part of the male anatomy ^_^;;

Signs of being away from home for too long:

- You yelp "Where am I?" more than 5 times on the way home from the airport
- You find your bedroom taken over by a parent
- You forget central-heating does not exist in HK and didn't pack your wooly jumpers, so you end up hovering around the house wrapped in blankets OR you don't ever leave your bed
- You forget the broadband connection only functions in name, so in reality you can't get work done at home.
- The new dog mistakes you for a stranger and tries to eat you.
- The old dog mistakes you for a stranger and stares at you blankly when you call her name.

Selections from my photography final project:

Anatomic Kung-Fu:

Discovery Channel's Extreme Martial Arts blends video footage with beautiful CG of the human anatomy in action. Animation by Animal Logic, the company that created the CG for The Matrix and Hero.

[via Geisha Asobi]
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Hosting a Dinner Party, Bridget Jones style:

I learnt to make pastry sans rolling pin, but with a Voss water bottle =p and must remember for nx time, baking sheet does not mean baking paper *.*"

Thx much to Jen and Mike for rescuing the dinner, to Jenn for the excellent wine, to Kelly, Yao and Taka for taking on the hellish cleanup. Luv y'all for the sheer bravery of tasting my cooking.

pics from my sculpture class this semester:

Midterm -

Final-











I thought other people's midterms and finals were so much stronger.

You know your final project sucks when:

Passer-by A asks Passer-by B: "What is that?"
Passer-by B: [in dismissive, condescending tone] "Art?"
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Sleeping on ice cold concrete on your side with head lodged on cardboard tube and roll of mirrored mylar doesn't do your back any good.

Holy crap. I think I've just gone on a date. That hasn't happened in.... EONS. Actually, I can't distinguish a date from merely hanging out. So maybe it was my overly-vivid imagination.

Addendum:
Date went OKish. But I found out that the boy in question is in fact, the typical MIT-sketchy-man - i.e. he persistently asked my friend out, even after she turned him down as she already has a boyfriend. He then stopped being nice to her when she gave a final "no".

*sigh* where have all the good men gone?

Masters of the Pillow:

Empowering Yellow Men with all-Asian cast porn -

"Mass media has historically focused on the differences between Asian American men and their Euro-American counterparts. The impetus of this film was to highlight the inherent similarities we all face--sexual desire. Until now, the depiction of Asian American male sexuality has either been virtually non-existent or distorted in mainstream media."

Come again?? Obviously these blokes aren't too familiar with the Japanese AV scene.

[via I could be Madonna]

I hate Boston winters!
So the temperature dropped from 7'C on Sunday nite to -7'C. The wind is howling outside my window, and I'm having yet another thermostat war with my flatmate.
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Monochrome:

First snow > Inky pasta > Black and white photos > Cold, grey winter

dirty fingers:

Note to self - do not eat pasta with squid ink sauce when will be seen by other humans. Ink-stained black teeth and fingers do not a presentible woman make.