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melgeetaiwan's Journal
Below are the 25 most recent journal entries.
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2007.07.01 17.27
Taipei International Film Festival 2007
Last night I saw 2 movies.
The first one was part of the Taipei Intl Film Festival. It was called Does it hurt? The first Macedonian Dogma. They have a whole section on Dogme films. (FYI Dogme95 was a avant-garde filmmaking movement started in 1995 by Danish director Lars Von Trier and friends. Everything is shot with hand-held cameras, budgets are small (most expensive was $1mil), no additional lighting or sound should be added. )
This film was a mockumentary, I think. Aneta wants to make a Dogma film and lies to her friends that she's already received funding from Zentropa (Lars Von Trier's Production Company) to enlist their participation. At first it's quite mundane but soon she becomes more and more bloodthirsty for drama, going so far as to scathe them emotionally and professionally. The hand-held camera work was quite amateur and headache inducing. Apparently not as good as the Idiots, that I missed on Fri nite, but a good attempt at a exploring an filmmaker's dedication to her work, at the expense of those around her. ***
The other movie I saw was Transformers. Where do I begin? Suddenly the dogme film earned another star. The TC boys all enjoyed it, being fans of the original cartoons. For me, it was The Decepticons and Autobots meet the one of the worst scripts ever written. The geek gets the hot chick, complete with previous jock boyfriend and hidden interesting personality. Bad government guys, some soldiers and code-breakers who were even more unnecessary. There was an Aussie chick who sounded like she'd just walked off the set of Home and Away. Pity no one died. The machines looked great but were too detailed, I seem to remember more solid blocks of color and less metallic looking. When they were fighting, it was just a blur to me. Perhaps I am too harsh. Michael Bay (u remember his classics Pearl Harbor and Armageddon) is not known for well-drawn characters and engaging storylines. Maybe because it was 2.30am, maybe it was just crap. **
Mood:  amused
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2007.06.18 17.01
Pool Party Season!
We are currently in the midst of a wonderful 4 day long weekend for Dragon Boat Festival. Some of the girls actually went to watch the races on Keelung River but they were meeting at 9am, way too early for me, especially after Room 18 on Sat nite.
What is summer without a pool party?
Yesterday we went to the first one of the season. It was held at TK Farm Natural Spring Pools in the mountains up near Danshuei. There were hamburgers, $35NT beer, and blow-up whale boats. We had an awesome time shooting each other with water guns, taking prisoners on board and abandoning ship. It wasn't too crowded- maybe bout 100 pple or so, everyone was very friendly. It's nice like that, before the end of the season when every sleazy foreigner and Taiwanese skank are there and it could be mistaken for the Brass Monkey on Ladies nite.
We topped off the night with a lovely dinner at The Peacock in Shida- smoked salmon salads, chicken tikka and russian meatball pizzas, creamy pumpkin soup and rich risotto. Oh and then the girls managed to fit in some shopping, hehe. Got 2 new bikinis for $199NT each!!! (ie 8 bucks aussie!!!!) I LOVE TAIWAN SHOPPING!
Did I mention there's another pool party on Tuesday?
Meanwhile on Season 2 of Lost now. Just watched 4 episodes today. Left the house for an ice cream run but our local sev (7-11) didn't have any Snickers ice cream. Got a Gaytime like, cookie crusted butterscotch flavour thingy instead but it was really small! Feeling unsatisfied so may have to venture outside again for some real food. Might go see Oceans 13 too- George and Brad, hmmmm....
Mood: relaxed
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2007.06.10 15.36
Rita's Wedding Photos
Went to a my favourite CT's wedding last night.
There were free cigarettes at the door, scantily clad "professional" singers, not to mention the bottles of whiskey on the table. Needless to say, I am making a vow to never drink that stuff again, no matter how free it is.
Mood:  drained
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2007.05.31 23.09
it's been a while. yes I am still here, plodding away in the streets of taipei county. I have really no idea what i've been doing for the last month. Stressing over my kids' Graduation Performance, late dinners, a few parties here and there, not many good movies.
Been watching Prison Break, Season 1 since last Sat. Addictive!
Have started swimming again. Last week could only do 10 laps. Tonite managed 15. Must keep working on it.
Someone broke my Rubik's cube before the genius could show me how to solve it.
All the kids at school are doing tricks with diablos. now i want one.
Well it will be June tomorrow. SUMMER!!
Mood: gloomy
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2007.05.06 14.18
Spiderman 3
Excitement was in the air. Plan of attack was to hit Global Mall after work for some greasy burgers and oversized cocktails at TGI Fridays then hopefully score some tiks to a late session.
A plethora of appetizers were consumed- spicy buffalo wings with blue cheese sauce and celery, chicken nachos (that didn't take an hour to make) and potato twisters covered in a yellow orange sauce with high ambitions of posing as cheese. We couldn't get 6 seats all together so I had the pleasure of sitting with Tom, Suzet and Sam while Jordan and Carl waved to us from across the aisle.
The third instalment in an increasingly successful comic book franchise, Spiderman 3 was worth the hype of all those teaser trailers. Tobey Maguire returns as Peter Parker, in love and basking in the popularity of being your friendly neighbourhood Spiderman. A unidentified crash in the background leaves some black sticky stuff looking for new friends to play with.
(No! that's not how it happens, the nerd says.)
Once the symbiote clings to the host it may be close to impossible to get rid of it.
(readers beware, this also applies to new teachers at your branch)
Spidey has his hands full in this one- Thomas Hayden Church has buffed up as the sandman with some great special effects; James Franco returns as Harry/Green Goblin/the romantic rival; Topher Grace is quite convicing as the despicable Eddie Brock/Venom. With such a large cast of characters, Director Sam Raimi has done a good job of exploring each one without wasting too much screen time. Kirsten Dunst's Mary Jane is as tired and weak as before and outshone by the delectable Gwen Stacy (Bryce Dallas Howard) who looks a lot like the other famous Gwen.
As far as superhero movies go, Spiderman is one of the best, up there with the Batman- it has romance, action, well drawn characters, even a few laffs. The recent disappointment of Superman reminds us that special effects and good actors do not always a good movie make. ****
oh yeah and Venom is wickedsweet. (copyright Sam Inder 2007)
Mood: mellow
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2007.04.25 19.42
Meet the Robinsons
Disney's latest animated feature is made for fans of the Jetsons and Back to the Future. Lewis is a 12 yr old orphan with spiky blonde hair and glasses. He is great at inventing things but they usually end in disaster which do not help his prospects of finding a foster family. One day he meets a cool kid with slick dark hair named Wilbur Robinson who is looking for a villain in a bowler hat. Lewis gets taken "back to the future" with Wilbur and meets his extended eccentric family.
This film is full of those things we love in future movies- cool hair, robots, flying car chases, colourful bulbous buildings, even Space Mountain! There's not many annoying songs and plenty of cute characters such as the evil Bowler Hat,the T-Rex and a singing Brat Pack of frogs. There were probably a few too many members in the family for them to make a lasting impression but like most Disney movies, there is little character development anyway. There are some stunning visuals with my favourite being the hedge garden (Edward Scissorhands would have been proud). I had a fabulous time. ****
David?
Mood: amused
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2007.04.21 15.34
Sunshine
THE best movie I have seen this year. *****
Directed by Danny Boyle (Trainspotting, The Beach), written by Alex Garland (author of The Beach, novel). Stars Aussie favourite Rose Byrne and Michelle Yeoh, one of the coolest asian actresses in Hollywood at the moment.
In the not too distant future, the sun is dying. The earth sends 8 people on Icarus II- mission to reignite the sun. From the first five minutes, you are hooked. The characters are well developed and each have their own faults and graces. The tension is high and you feel like you're actually there on the mission- forming opinions about what they should do, taking sides, soaking up the fear and the hope.
One of those movies that makes you think about how small we really are and how few our days may be. Go smell some roses...
Mood: excited
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2007.04.21 14.09
HK, texas, CS and Liars
So it's been about 2 weeks since I came back from Hong Kong. Was only there for a week but it was like being on another planet.
I stayed with my wonderful sis Sarah and bro-in-law Johnny. We ate lots of yummy food like "dry fried beef noodles", roast goose and pork from Yong Gee, fresh seafood in Sai Kung, mango desserts, sashimi and cold udon.
I shopped like crazy (in retrospect, going to Kenting may have been cheaper despite the super high season rates). I bought a dress, 2 pairs of shoes, Sennheiser headphones, Oliver Peoples sunglasses, a lime clutch, 2 CDs- Jet, Shine On and The Velvet Underground and Nico, Death Note special edition postcards and notebook with a quill pen, lots of Super Mario phone accessories (Goomba, mushroom, the scary ghost called Boo) and sound samplers- the coin and the 1up mushroom. Something exciting I discovered- if you press the coin 100 times it makes the 1up mushroom sound! Just like in the game!
My almost brother Wayland was yet to start work so we hung out heaps. Also caught up with one of my best mates from home, Amanda, late Sat night on Lan Gwai Fong, over some drinks and Haagen Daaz. It was so great to see her and made me really homesick.
We went to Macau and hit the casinos. My aim was to win enough money for a new pair of sunnies but of course it didn't actually happen. Way spent a lot of time at the roulette, Sarah hit the pokies and I went around studying the Sic Bo. Most of the tables started at $HK100 but I guess it's pretty easy to win. My mission was to test the possibility of more than 7 of the same in a row. Yes, we all know the probability of Big or Small is always the same but apparently after that many times, it's less likely to happen. So at the glitzy Wynne, I put down 100 on Small after it had been Big 7 times. And it did change!! Cool, but now what do I do? I kept playing Small and we stayed for a good 10mins. Now I see how gambling is addictive.
It always takes me a few days to adjust to the non-English speaking, polluted, overcast wasteland that is Taipei. Man, I'm harsh. But give me my smiling kids (Teacher your necklace is cool), my mates and some late nights at the pub and I'll be right. We are currently expanding our nightly activities from just drinking beer. Sometimes we have tea at the snazzy 85degrees cafe, complete with outdoor wicker chairs and a wall of cakes.
Last week we played a lot of Texas Hold 'em. People can be funny about money so we started betting dares. I raise you have to say something nice to _____ tomorrow, and escalated to kiss ______, grade ______'s homework, pirouette in the middle of the office and sing "I am the Queen of the Fairies.", grab _____'s ass and rub his sideburns and say something nice (of course).
Another night we played with a $NT5 limit and I lost $20- only high rollers here. I fear that that strip poker may be just around the corner so better cut down on the beer.
For a change, last Tuesday, post usual dinner at subway, we went to an Internet cafe and played Counter Strike (CS). Wasn't that much fun cos I just kept getting shot and knifed. Took me about 5 deaths till I realised who was on my team, maybe 10 more till I learned how to buy a better gun and 50 more till our hour was finally up. Sam and Jordan showed no mercy and even pulled a suicide bomber. Last night we played Liar's Dice, as seen on Pirates of the Carribean 2. Pretty fun and easy to learn, a bit like the card game cheat. I was bluffing in a couple of rounds and beers (and chocolate milk) were getting drunk. The others headed for another round of CS but I went home- had to get up for my newly reinstated 8am class.
Mood: sniffly and bloated
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2007.03.25 12.43
ParadICE
Last night we went to a dance party at the ice rink!
It was COOL as ice.
It was just like those Saturdays in high school when we trekked up to Macquarie ice rink. Just replace the geeky asians with lots of Canadians and add some beer and cigarettes.
The music was cool vintage disco and 80s, 90s dance, none of that hip hop trash.
They even had (home-made?) sleds that Jenny and Tom attempted to pull me around in. It was harder than it looked and went quite slowly. So then some speed skater guy comes along and shows them how it's done- he spun me around so fast I thought I was going to fall out!
Sam entered the Ice Boogie contest with a witch's hat (take a guess what he was doing with it).
Jenn and Lizzie
Jenny
"You are so not cool." (Tom, Sam, Mel)
We stayed till 3am (the party was 11pm-4am). The guys actually gave in to me whining about going to NY bagel but then we decided to head back to the BC. Went to the 24hr tea house for milk teas, mango slushies and fried chicken- with a thai style sweet and sour sauce or on spaghetti- it's Taiwan, go figure.
Mood: cool
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2007.03.15 01.01
The Breakfast Club
We went to Pub Quiz tonite. So 3 tequilas and 2? 3? beers later, I'm not complaining. So what if we came last in the 2nd and 3rd rounds, we got tequila :)
Choice questions for the folks back home:
How many Batman movies has there been? (not including animation)
BONUS POINT: Who was the villain in the first episode?
Who is Eric Arthur Blair better known as?
What country is Sparta now in?
Who did Ali fight in
a) Rumble in the jungle
b) Fight of the Century
c) Thrilla in Manila
WHich actor played Lee Harvey Oswald in JFK? (this one killed me)
In which movie did Tim Robbins invent the hula hoop?
Mood:  drunk
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2007.03.12 02.19
Hangover Insomnia
I'm not normally still up at this time (2.20am) but I didn't get out of bed till 3.30pm today. Had a massive hangover and spent 8-12pm throwing up, every hour, on the hour. My tummy was not happy. I was drinking water but it just kept coming back up, which made me more thirsty and so on. The monster headache did not help either.
Tonite, I had some comforting Mos burger and went over to Salimeh's to watch a video. We sipped cinnamon tea with flower filled honey and ate tasty popcorn, bitter orange Lindt and assorted nuts. Little Miss Sunshine is one of the best movies I have seen. All the characters were so funny and endearing. *****
Sam and Tom were at Day and Night so I dropped by on the way home. Still felt rank and even declined the heineken Tom had already ordered for me. We played some cards but I was tired so came home. In bed I couldn't actually fall asleep, prob cos I got up so late, and here we are now.
Why, I hear you ask, do I end up at these pitiful states, and so regularly too? Well, last night was the usual Sat night in Taipei, with too many good options open to me and Lizzie as we sat in a post-modern cafe. There were leafy plants in cylindrical vases hanging from the ceiling. 300 just opened but all the conveniently timed sessions were sold out. No loss as we considered Room 18 (beautiful people club), The Living Room (local bands) or 9% ($600 all you can drink).
Nic and Robin joined us for dinner. LA cafe has our recommendations. The service was so fast that your soup arrived before you can finish your cigarette. I had the set meal $320 for soup, salad , main (New Orleans Spicy Shrimp Pasta), dessert (taiwanese style cheesecake, ie too much cake, too little cheese) and a beverage. Lizzie had beef tostadas served with a creamy guacamole and saffron rice. Robin had tender grilled short ribs, slightly pink in the middle. Nic had a gargantuan piece of crumbed pork cutlet with crispy potato wedges.
After dinner, we went to the Living Room to see Salimeh's friend's Macedonian band. Very cool. Dreamy vocals with a cemane(?)- small fiddle? Their music was haunting, stifled only briefly by the guy at the next table setting his candle on fire with beer. We stayed for Paparazzi- fast drums, guitars and a violin. Next stop was Ziga Zaga, a sophisticated bar in the Grand Hyatt, where my friend Suzet is a regular. It's funny that even tho this place had a really good live band with real singers, they still played the same mainstream hip hop you hear at all the other cheaper clubs. Suzet, Lizzie and I drank over half a bottle of Absolut with lime and cranberry juice, the culprit for my day in bed.
I also finally watched The Departed.
A good effort by Marty- well shot and scripted. Nicholson was excellent, Leo was strong and charismatic. But really they've copied Infernal Affairs practically scene by scene. As a director of his calibre, I really expected him to do more. You can take a good idea and make it your own, but all he did was add in Mark Wahlberg and save paying another actress by merging the two love interests. He did change the ending a little but actually I heard the China version of Infernal Affairs already had this alternate ending- maybe he saw that one. ****
Mood: still awake
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2007.03.04 20.49
Boracay and Wayland does Taipei
It's been a whirlwind 2 weeks with Chinese New Year vacation in Boracay, Philippines and Way was in town for a visit.
Boracay- check out the pics on Picasa Albums
Boracay was beautiful- crystal green water and clear blue skies. Walked around for a week in my cossie and a yellow sarong. I became so tanned that the locals started speaking to me in Talalog. I got a henna tattoo of a butterfly on my left shoulder. We had massages on the beach. We ate dinner under a blanket of stars and danced barefoot on the sand. The food was amazing. San Miguel is not a bad beer and cheap as hell for 50 pesos. We had american breakfasts of bacon, sunny side up eggs, coffee and fruit. We were regulars at Benito's Crepes. Went swimming every few hours and shopping for mother of pearl jewelry. One day we took a boat trip around the island, snorkellng and stopping at another island with eccentric scupltures- WICKED as described by one of the kids.
Wayland arrived last Monday and left this evening. We had a lovely week of hanging out at the local pubs, drinking Heineken and playing pool, texas hold 'em with sips of beer (I raise you 5 sips!) and snap with minus 1. Wednesday was a public holiday so we went clubbing at Luxy. We roamed through the designer boutiques in 101 and the new Sogo, looking for a nice bag and ipod cases. We did KTV, with ice cream sundaes and dumplings and singing hip hop songs like My Hump and Don't Cha. We went to MOS burger, Japanese BBQ with Asahi Extra Dry (but made in China!!?), TGI Fridays for greasy american food and gigantic cocktails, Din Tai Fung for their delicious soup-filled dumplins and the diner for the best burgers in Taipei (well worth the 1hr wait for a table).
Mood: cheerful
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2007.02.16 19.55
More Snoopy madness!
OK, I suspect there is some dude who calculated the average time required to get the whole set. At that time, they release the new ones. The day after I finished, I saw a poster
9 NEW HISTORICAL THEMED SNOOPY CARDS TO COLLECT! (You bastards!!!)
Valentine's Day from 7.11am get the Limited Edition Valentine's Day card.
Chinese New Year- one special card for each of the first 3 days of the New Year.
Got the V day one myself. Manager at Kindy gave the 3 Chinese New Year ones! :)
Mood: happy
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2007.02.12 23.10
Another 7 11 rort conquered!
I have just completed the latest collection from 7 11. You know the drill- spend $77 and get a sealed pack. This one was 36 Snoopy "3D" cards with scenes from famous places around Taiwan, e.g. The Grand Hotel and Danshuei in Taipei, Taroko Gorge, Sun Moon Lake, Alishan etc. You can put your MRT card in the back and hang it around our neck. They were't really 3D, more like those pictures that change at different angles. Of course, there is also a limited edition ring binder you can buy to store them all in with blurbs about the different places.
Anyway Caroline and Sam had given me heaps as well as trading with one of my CTs Rita. I had about 30 extras but was still missing Card No.2 Jufen. I advertised it to everyone and last night, Tom called me about 12.30am from the night market. There's a stand that sells this sort of stuff there- they have the Hello Kitty Flower/Country badges, the Winnie-the-Pooh calendar magnets,etc. I was half asleep so didn't really know what he was talking about- yeah just get it for me. I know a true collector should keep trying and trade with others but I just wanted the last one! So he and Carl bought it for me. How sweet! Considering this guy usually gets them and waves them in my face before telling me he's giving them to his kids instead.
It cost them $NT200!!!
apparently that was bargined down from $300 and the guy only had 2 of them- a rarity? would not be surprised if they did make less of some so you'd keep trying to finish the set. Click on the photo for a larger version.
Mood: accomplished
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2007.02.06 12.56
The Banquet
The Chinese New Year Banquet was last Sunday,a big improvement on last year's. It consisted of a 2hr long ceremony with performances and awards so we took a trip to the Tavern. The food was also much better this year- chilled lobster salad, shark fin in consomme, sauteed prawns and scallops with snow peas, abalone and stewed pork with sea cucumber. We devoured 2 bottles of hideous Chilean red wine and 4 bottles of beer. Sam was amazing in the KTV competition. However, in the screaming and whistle-blowing excitement, all you can hear on the movie is me singing along badly.
Photos follow below.
The week in review:
Mon- Alleycats and drinks at Indian
home at 2am.
Tues-
could not get up for Kindy so went in the afternoon;
hot pot for dinner and a few beers at 0204
home at 1am.
Wed- Nana 2 ** the second dramatisation of the hugely popular Japanese comics. A goth rocker and JJ beauty queen, both named Nana, become friends. The first movie was about their growing friendship despite their obvious differences and overcoming adversity together. This one is too focused on the cute Nana(replaced by an inferior actress with radar ears) who learns how to lose friends by sleeping with the wrong guy.
home at 10pm.
Thu- Subway's bread machine was broken so we went to 0204 again ;p
Pool Taiwanese/Wanker style where each ball is one point and you can sink anything. Minus points if you scratch. Be wary of muckrakers who play with half a cue- the minicue!-and dodgy team leaders.
home at 12.30ish.
Fri- Japanese BBQ, shared a big bottle of Heineken with Tom.
home at 12ish.
Sat- Party at the Taiwan Beer Bar, not, it was just some restaurant. We got a lovely taxi driver who dropped us off at the other beer bar with cheap beer and wooden picnic benches. Would have like to stay but the party was elsewhere. Had a couple of beers till bout 12 before coming home to BC. The guys were going to the local-Day and Night, post tennis and night market dinner. Went for a couple of card games and a green tea.
home at 2am.
as a result we have started the "Go Home Early Club".
LATEST MUST-SEE MOVIE: Stranger than Fiction *****
Will Farrell starts hearing an English female voice(Emma Thompson) narrating his life. He realises he's a character in her novel, who is going to be killed off soon. Charming and hilarious with Dustin Hoffman and Maggie Gyllenhal.
Mood: sober
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2007.01.14 22.46
melpod2
Last weekend my ipod died.
I have no idea what happened- and still don't, cos the guy at the shop kept speaking Chinese to me even tho I clearly only knew "hard drive" in English. Something about Windows and that he can restore it only on Mac.
So the sad story goes I was walking home, bopping away to "Cold hard bitch" when melpod turns off by itself. Looked at the screen and battery was low. All righty then, let's charge u up. But when I plugged it into the power charger, it froze on the apple screen and then it said:
Connect to your computer.
Use itunes to restore.
(in English, French, German and Japanese- I guess Chinese must be on the Communist/Global threat/3rd world country models)
(for non-ipoders RESTORE = ERASE ALL OF YOUR SONGS AND BELOVED MEMORIES!!)
I spend most of Sunday surfing the net for possible remedies. Learned some interesting stuff like your ipod may get damaged when engaged in physical activity such as running, jogging or heavy light-saber battles. Remember that one Darth. Caroline asked me if it had just committed suicide cos it had seen me eyeing other ipods. In the end, I went crying to my big sister who came up with a brilliant solution, cleverly devised in less than the journey of her train trip to GuangZhou. All my 1000+ songs currently reside in my Sydney computer (hence my hesitation to restore it using this computer). I could email my cousin Guang who promptly went over and burnt them all to a DVD and sent them over to me. Then I could restore my ipod.
So I pressed the dreaded "RESTORE" button.
itunes: itunes can not restore this ipod because the software is missing or deleted.
WHAT????
I reinstall itunes but same thing. So off to the apple shop.
(and The Illusionist- crapola ** This is NOT The Prestige)
A week later, back at Xinyi for another fillum (A Prairie Home Companion **** quirky witty humour that can be lost in translation, e.g. a foreigner and his Taiwanese girlfriend walked out. Maybe she got disappointed cos this wasn't the one with Brad Pitt)
But I digress.
They had a new ipod for me. Plastic cover and everything. melpod is gone.
We had so many good times together.
Thought about getting a skin so melpod2 will not get so scratched but why bother when this one might also die on me in another 3 months. I really wasn't as excited as I should have been.
I had turned bitter, like that melon they serve at kindy lunch.
Mood:  apathetic
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2006.12.24 23.46
Merry Christmas!
| You Are Blitzen | 
Always in good spirits, you're the reindeer who loves to party down with Santa.
Why You're Naughty: You're always blitzed on Christmas Eve, while flying!
Why You're Nice: You mix up a mean eggnog martini. |
Yes, yes, would like to be having a Christmas beer right now but boozed it up a bit too much last night at Lindsay's party. There were way too many bottles of good aussie wine- I was even drinking frigging merlot! As a result, I left my phone there and slept till 4pm today. Went back this arvo to retrieve it before heading to a lovely Christmas dinner at the Hotel Royal Taipei.
Here is the menu, complete with original spelling mistakes:
*Baked Crab Meat in Filloe on Scallops with Orange Salsa
*Pumpkin Chicken Pea(=CHICK PEA) Cream Soup on Start Toast
*Roasted Turkey and Apple, Liver, Rolled with Crisped Green Salad,
Pineapple, Red Currant Dressing
*Lemon Sobert
*Grilled Beef Tenderloin with Truffle Sauce and Deep-Fried Soft Crab
*Fruit and Homemade Dessert- Christmas Pudding
During tea and coffee, we exchanged Secret Santa gifts. I gave Jenn some dangly earrings in turquoise and red. Claire gave me Middlesex, by Jeffrey Eugenides, and a pop-up Hello Kitty xmas card.
Mood: festive
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2006.12.16 15.55
Farewell Nicole! again...?
Last night was my best friend Nicole's last night in Taipei.
Well, not really since she will be back next month AGAIN for a trip to HK. She has decided not to stay in Taiwan but seems to keep returning due to different return tickets.
Farewell/Birthday no.1 was about a month ago at Jogoya Japanese Buffet and People Bar for drinks.
Last night was Farewell no.2- dinner at Kiki(owned by famous tart Shu Qi and 2 other lesser known starlets) and drinks at the Shannon. I missed dinner thanks to the exciting Kindy Xmas Party. (NOT very exciting- normally confident well-spoken children mutate into crying weeing masses of drivel because caring Mommy is there instead of just crazy mean teachers.)I had dinner afterwards with the TC crew at the "Indian" place before heading out the Shannon to meet Nicole and co.
I will miss Nicole more than I can say. She has been my second, my steady, a constant companion at all those insane parties, my coffee and cigarettes buddy and a patient listener to my repetitive woes. We spent afternoons sipping tea at the (now defunct) 3+1 cafe with chessboard Wham! flooring, franchised ikari and mos burger, the groovy cafe more relax with indie music and lonely internet users. We had fast and furious scooter rides from Ban Chiao to Shida and lazed about Shida park late at night with 7 11 drinks, practicing yo-yo tricks. Evenings were filled with red wine, parma ham pizzas and smoking hookahs at Cafe Peacock, beef noodles- taiwanese style in the BC or shaved in Shida, or lasagne at Cafe Bastille. Weekends at the beach or the drunken pool parties. We went on trips with Robert, Kella, Jared, Justin, Peter, Nic, Robin, Toni, and Paul and Julia (how I miss some of them too!). There were movies at Warner and film festivals in Ximen, parties on rooftops, in parks, at Luxy, Barrios, KTV, the Brass Monkey, and that Johnny Walker Black Label party with DJ Jazzy Jeff. The following belated photos only show some of our many great times together.
Mood: cold
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