today was a good day

when i woke up this morning, i was pissed. i didnt get much sleep and was making myself go to the gym. at 9:30, i wish i knew how great of a day today would turn out to be. i went to the gym, got some breakfast (beef omelette with rice @ hk$38) and got ready for school. i went to school and had my favorite teacher for 2 hours and then akiko and I decided to take a walk. at this point, 2 great events took place:

a) we planned on going to the nike sportswear store to catch up with my buddy miles (american name) cause he said they were having a small sale today. we first stopped and picked up these rice noodles that were amazing and only hk$13~us$1.75. delightful. we stopped in the sogo and failed and then went to the onitsuka tiger store which may be top 5 stores in hk. awesome shit and hot girls wearing cool sneakers. damn it. akiko got some sweet velcro silver patent lo's and i kept it together and was able to not buy the black patent sapporo 72's as hard as that was. we did however finally make it to nsw and i did buy these bad boys at a steep discount......





fuck. that means until yesterday i owned nearly 100 pairs of sneakers, none of them being dunk mids. and now within the past 2 days, i've bought 2 pairs. talk about not giving a shit. these are sweet and i can't wait to rock them in hk. and then?

b) on the way home from the nsw store, after parting ways with my classmate, i smelled the sweet odor of street food. typical street food in hk is fish balls or waffles. in this case, sweet potatoes. thats right, my favorite food in the whole world: sweet potatoes. this mobile oven was literally across the street from my apartment, as it has been since i've moved in. sadly, i've been too much of a vag to stop and try it. sometimes i fear people. in this case, i'm furious at myself for waiting this long. so for hk$10~us$1.50 i bought a whole baked sweet potato. it was fucking awesome. that's right. bold letters. i am going to eat these everyday til i leave this place.

what a day! sweet kicks and sweet potatoes. shaboom!

oops

i suppose i forgot to mention how the bus error actually took place. in hong kong there are two sets of buses, public buses, and what we call "mini buses" which are more like mini sized buses. they seat 15 people and only go to very specific destinations. they're shady as shit but pretty useful. many people use them regularly to get to and from places.

anyway, as it turned out, amy was hinting for me to take the mini bus, but as you may have read above, i was on a double decker bus, what a mandarin speaker would call a shang gong gong gong chi che (hong kong public bus). so i was screwed from the beginning. plus the almost-getting-hit-by-the-car incident and the shotgun incident. it was a long night.

and to wish myself off to a pleasant sleep, i just got these.......




bitches!

take the #10 bus

yesterday me and amy met up in TST to check out this totally sweet store which turned out to be called reach. this dude kevin there speaks great english. they have all kinds of cool gear like subcrew and some other shit. anyway after we caught some mango pudding which was amazing, she was like ok, come to divya's house for this dinner party tonight. i was like ok cool but how do i get there? shes like yea just take the #10 bus it goes right in front of her place you'll recognize it. seemed simple enough. then things went slightly awry.

i went onto the world wide web to find out where the bus was gonna be picking me up and it was pretty close to my place, so that was an early sign of inevitable failure. how could it be that easy. while walking to the bus stop, i looked the wrong way crossing the street and some fucking speedster had to swerve to make sure he didn't kill me. i mean who wants to kill people before 10pm? right. so at this point i was like, ok, i'm definitely fucked.

i got on the bus and went upstairs and rode that thing. it was a cool tour of queens road west, which i hadnt spent much time on besides looking at a tiny apt there when i first got here. so, i had my ipod, i jam'd the shit out that thing, and took the ride. it was cool and finally the bus stops and everyone gets off. shit. the bus didn't stop in front of div's apartment. as far as i knew, i hadn't fallen asleep (like that other time i woke up on east 145th street with no money and a dead cell phone) so i was like oh sweet i just took the wrong bus.

i got off the bus and thought i should call amy. no answer. i called div. no answer. i bbm'd div's brother. no answer. big fucking surprise. ok, no worries. i have no idea where the fuck i am and have no cash but whatever. so, i go to an atm and get some money. in the atm were 2 guys who were allegedly fixing one of the machines. however, did they work for the bank? unclear. one was holding a shotgun - no joke. the other was in the machine with a screwdriver. wait, was i witnessing a robbery? why did it take me til now (24 hours later) to think this through. odd. this dude definitely had a shotgun. im glad i made it out of there.

turns out i was in kennedy town, which is an interesting area. i walked around a little while and planned my solo evening with whatever restaurants/bars were within sight and prepared myself. just as i was about to enter some place that didnt have english on the menu, divya called me back. shaboom! she said something along the lines of, 'get in a cab, give the driver the phone, and i'll tell him where i live'. [as most hong kongers say when you get something right,] bingo.

i got in the cab, got to her place, and mingled among her family's friends. i ate some spicy indian food but really liked it! my tongue is getting better with spice, although i wonder what the affect of the earlier enjoyed wine and cocktails had on my tongue last night. whatever, it was awesome.

next time you're in hong kong (or anywhere really) at an atm and you see a dude with a shotgun. don't hesitate - just fucking run!

cao ni, biatch!

this week has been full of all kinds of hangouts with amy and divya. it's been super sweet. i feel like i have a small community of people i know here. it's a distant feeling that i haven't really had since i left ny. pretty awesome.

more good news: i bought another pair of sneakers. check em out here.....



i don't know how often i'm gonna wear these bad boys, nor did i know how easy they were to find on the internet, but either way they're absurd. its amazing there are friends of mine in hk who dont know what monopoly is. i mean they also dont know other things as we learned last week, but thats another story for another day.

last week i went to this vietnamese restaurant with my friend and she convinced me to try this duck egg. i wasn't thrilled. here's the progressional evidence......




and here's my stupid face eating this shit. does it look like i liked it?????



i was hoping at the very least i would get a chance to vomit as i felt like i had eaten something bad earlier in the day anyway. plus it would make more room to drink more pi jou (beers). it tasted like bad brisket. my d-bag friend literally ate the duck eye and loved it. this is the same asshole who ate the pigeon head the other day. either shes underfed at home or just a fucking moron. i'll stick with the latter. talk about some nasty shit. i ate like 15 chewy japanese candies after this. i still have the flavor in my mouth its basically torture.

we went to happy valley and bet on some horses the other day. i guess i didn't take any photos. good work. i managed to trade my nintendo ds (from korea) in for a psp which has worked out amazingly. i can download games for free. i feel like a 13 year old asian kid. i'll probably get bored of it in a week and sell it to someone for double what it ended up costing me.

i ate congee today for the first time. then i was told that in fact i drank it. i used a spoon so maybe there was some confusion. i have however been looking for a good breakfast and this is probably it. it's a watery mix of rice, vegetables, and a meat or fish of your choice. my choice today was chicken and it was delightful.

im really starting to feel like my mandarin is getting somewhere. my tone still sucks but if i speak fast enough, native mandarin speakers kind of get an idea of what the fuck i'm talking about. oh, i learned how to say fuck. cao (tsao).

cao ni = fuck you!

sorry, what?

i guess it's been a few days which i suppose is a good sign of me being busy. ive been slowly finding myself with more and more things to do so that's awesome. it's been a tough few days of going out. i met up with mike and sara (those amazingly generous friends of mine who let me crash when i first got out here) on thursday night and got into a little bit of trouble. i can't say i remember how that night ended. amy got in last night! so we all met up and made it a late one.

before i met up with amy and divya, i was in tsim sha tsui with a few friends at a place called bubbles which i had been to before in july. we played all kinds of games, most of which were new to me, including a multiple person thumb war. these local idiots have some pretty creative/impressive games they play. i wonder if its so they don't have to socialize at bars. unclear. anyway, after a few drinks we decided it was time for me to teach them some english curse words. pretty much exactly what i want to be doing, so i'm psyched. ok so we go through fuck, shit, bitch, asshole, and then some more of the harder ones and i ask my friend jj to tell me something using one of the words. this was me practicing my teaching skills, in case i want to start educating somewhere in asia. ok, so here she goes........ "if you don't drink that, you are a bitch!" great job, jj. you're really understanding me. then thomas......"you're an asshole, i don't like you." ok thomas, also good job. jj says she wants to try one more......"i want to fuck you with my mouth." ummm, what? she continues "i want to fuck you with my mouth." thomas thought she was right. i wasn't totally sure what was happening. so i asked her what she was trying to say and she got more to the point with "i want you to have the feeling of fuck you and i want to use my mouth to say it to you." ok jj, you're getting somewhere here. i tell her "i think you meant, i want to say fuck you to you". she says "YES!" so i say, "fair enough, don't talk about it just say fuck you!" so she screams out "fuck you, asshole!" the lesson was finished.

not having a kitchen in my service apartment brings culinary challenges sometimes. i bought fruit at the shi chang (street market) the other day. i wanted some of those asian pears - which every country claims as their own. they are massive here and massively underpriced. in ny at gracefully i used to pay like 2.50 or $3 for one of those bad boys. the price on the box was $12 which is around us $1.50 so i figured F it i'll live a little. but then the dude handed me a bag of 4 pears. the bag was bigger than my head. ive still only eaten one. too bad i don't have fridge. i guess in-room air conditioning is the same same? or different? unclear to me.

last night i had macanese food for dinner. or is it macaunese? or is it macanasian? or macuguese? it was a sweet mix between chinese and portuguese and i had no idea what i was eating. i did however eat some pigeon. of course i made jj eat the pigeon head first which she didnt hesitate to do whatsover. the place we ate at in tst wasnt the nicest or the cleanest, but the food was decent and i was able to last 2 hours afterwards without vomiting which i would consider a victory (not really, there was no food-induced vomiting.)

hmfk!

my trip to korea was a great success although was of course way too short. i got totally fucked by thai airways because of what was going on in bangkok but ended up on great cathay pacific flights which i can only recommend for your future travel arrangements. free beer, good meals, comfortable seats, and decent movies. i watched hancock on the flight back it was pretty sweet. the beer and wine were both delightful as both myself and my neighbor enjoyed both directions. not the same person, but the same enjoyment.

korea was really cool though. i met up with ace and we kicked it pretty hard for a few days. it would take a while to review everything that happened. ace has his own blog where he's so far reviewed our first 24 hours. my first night there i got in after 9, we went for food, continued to get pretty drunk and ended up at a jjimjil bang. here is where things got interesting. a jjimjil bang is like a man-sauna where people (both men and women) can go to spend the night. you pay something like US$4 and they give you sweats and a key. youre then to take your shoes and put them in a small locker (we were too drunk to do this) and then go on to a bigger locker down the hall where you can change and lock your shit up. here's how that went.....



ok so you get the idea. close enough. we made our way down two floors below to where it really started to heat up. literally. there were people sprawled all over the fuckin place. men and women spooning, people in rows, people in columns, just people like all over the place. it was hot as shit the heat was coming from the floor. a few hours later, ace and i [independently] woke up with no shirt [also independently] and confused. it was too hot to exist. we went up to the mens locker room which is basically an hour long shower with men. a guys afternoon in, if you will. we tried to nap on some kind of clean floor against a wall there but were poked to wake up. not a sexy kind of poke, just a poke. we returned down to the 1st underfloor and went back to sleep. this time, when we woke up, ace had no mat and i had no blanket. some motherfucker took my blanket while i was sleeping. i guess i was tired enough not to notice. but as a sidebar, that's fucked up. please don't ever take my blanket from me while i'm sleeping. it's cruel. and how did someone manage to take ace's mat from underneath him while he was sleeping? some fucked up shit goes on in those jjimjil bangs. to get a somewhat decent idea of what i'm talking about, check this video.



yeah i wouldnt recommend watching that whole video it might fuck with your head. im sure i could go on for a while about this place and the story surrounding it but this shit is already getting long. we did manage to sing karaoke twice (nori bang, i think) which was fun......



this may be the first actual footage of me karaoke-ing. and yes, i kicked the shit out of it. we also ate some bloody sausage at this bar playing dvds of korean pop bands doing concerts which was quite captivating actually.....



i know, i look fuckin psyched. the bloody sausage wasn't necessarily delightful. closer to less than enjoyable. everyone else at the table seemed to like it, so whatever works. i would have preferred some sweet potato caserole or some stuffing but we gave up on thanksgiving way before any of that happened. i also didnt bring the appropriate jacket to korea so now i have thoughts of the entire country being a freeze pot when in fact it's not really that cold.

i also picked up a new sweatshirt today from 8five2. these fuckers are the unofficial mayor and mayoress of hong kong, if you remember that earlier post.



hong motha fuckin kong, bitches!

and then there were two

lots to say, lots to say but i'll try to be somewhat brief. my class is down to two and some exciting news came up after class yesterday. akiko (remember her? 30~ half japanese half ecuadorian girl who lived in ny for 10 years etc) and i are the only ones left in the class and its getting harder. i can now say "where did you go for dinner yesterday?" and "tomorrow i will go to Wan Chai to drink beer". great. anyway, it turns out that akiko is married to this dude jason who grew up in cranston, RI, just like Sandstorm (my mom). they wouldn't know each other but it turns out jason went to cranston east (also like the storm) and had sandstorm's mom as a teacher in the early 80s. lets review: i am in hong kong studying mandarin and in my tiny class of just me and one other person, my classmate's husband had my grandmother as an english teacher 25 years ago. what the fuck are the odds of that one? talk about small worlds and after alls.

the other night i had chicken with steamed rice and veg for dinner......



it was takeout from the restaurant at the ground floor of my building and was HK$33 (~US$4) and it was alright. maxx described this place as "same same" and i dont blame him. i can't remember if i did or didnt get sick but lets not get caught up in any details. its a somewhat healthy cheap as shit dinner option for a monday night. they almost know me downstairs. they still hate me and look at my big round eyes like any other local does but then they smile afterwards.

to follow up on my last post re: kanye's recent failure, please review this article if you have a chance. this self-proclaimed "top black owned tech blog" agreed with me. sidebar - what the fuck is the top black owned tech blog? can't you just be down? anyway, the title sums it up quite well. i can't say the article was written well or even edited but it sounds like the writer is a little bitter betty about not being buds with kanye. however, he agrees with what i said the other day. kanye is a bitch. yo breez, sorry man, but have a good listen and then tell me again. if i wanted to hear some singing, i'd buy mariah carey's xmas greatest hits. like this shit.....

who doesn't love that. jews love that. love actually loves that. whites blacks greens jews mormons all love that. i know tang loves it. thats for sure.

i'm heading to seoul tomorrow to visit ace for a long weekend. there may be turkey involved. there will certainly be a whole lot of hanging out involved. my friend in bangkok always asks me why i like to hang out so much. it's not an unfair question. anyway i was telling ace about this mix i was trying to share and he encouraged me to use maestro. let's see how this goes.

maestro.fm - Playlist 1119

you'll note the aforementioned "tell em i said that" isn't on here. apparently maestro isn't yet ready for itunes tracks. i don't blame them. so take this mix and then go pickup that ti track and you'll get the idea. good shit. lemme know what you think.

i gotta be out - this has become another long one. so sorry! if you're gonna be in seoul this weekend, let me know. we'll hang out.

yum la pok gai!

whoever introduced kanye west to the roger troutman-esque voice synthesizer or whatever you call it thing should be shot. hey kanye, stick to producing, dickhead! he makes me dislike him even more on his new album. fuck that guy. go listen to "lucifer" and then tell me he's better as a rapper than producer. a-hole. so yea i downloaded that new shit and i don't like it. i also got luda's new "theatre of the mind" actually he may have spelled it theater which makes me like it less. i bet he doesnt even pronounce it thee-ate-er like i do. whatever, no worries. i've been working on a mix for the past few days after a brief bbm with brooks re: ti's "tell em i said that." that's a hard one. i hit a mini-mix-block after 9 tracks but hopefully i can pick up where i left off and finish it off soon. i'm not too into imixes on itunes as far as how it works but maybe i can figure out how to publish it or send it or ship it. i'll do something to it.

yesterday after class i had some quality time with my classmates. we had a 45 minute foot massage (hk$108 ~ us$14) which was cool. i'm still chackatee mak maa (learn thai if you wanna know what that means) but it was dope. we tried to practice with our massager people and they thought it was hilarious. my conclusion is i know the right word to say, just dont know the tones yet. i need a whole lot of practice with it. why the fuck couldnt the chinese just use different sounds like someone with a slim bit of logic would. these motherfuckers had to just use the same sound more than once? each sound has 4 tones. not all sounds use all tones. what the fuck you been? (oceans 11) but then when these fuckers talk to each other, they talk so fast there really isn't much tone anyway. tone this, bitches! anyway after our massage experience we went to this meat house that i had gone to with maxx for a quick (20 minute) happy hour. i guess it was like a happy 20 minutes. 2 beers for hk$18. now we're talking. pbr bottles. so good. chris (dutch classmate) was like "this shit tastes like water with a hint of beer." i said something like "excuse me mr high horse chill out and drink up water is good to stay hydrated." everybody knows the value of hydration, especially when attempting the combo on a good friday night. although there are rumors of an even harder combo. youd have to ask eddie or mark. anyway, after the happy 1/3 hour, we met up with one of our teachers named candy for thai food. akiko's husband came and the 5 of us went for japanese food. the point of the dinner was to get thai food but it was "sold out" according to our teacher, candy. shes totally amazing and has more energy than i would after 10 red bulls. its really incredible how happy and outgoing she is all the time. im trying to find her on facebook. updates to follow. dinner was fun since akiko lived in tokyo for 4 years. we learned a few new japanese customs; like appropriate respectful chopstick positioning when not being used. the correct answer there would be left-right, in front of your plate, closer to you. i'll go to that.

after dinner and a brief walk i met up with some friends in TST at what turned out to be the same building i had been in with other friends a few weeks ago. Katherine house. I don't like that name with that spelling. i wonder if any of you know why. its associated with the same reason i dont like white cars. weird, for sure. anyway the night ended up messy but was really fun. hk$300 (~us$40) to drink all you want. they were bringing me pitchers of chivas/coke like it was nobody's business. this dude who worked there named cyrus was wearing a fedora so my first question (naturally) was if he knew sweet sweet ontonee. he didn't. then i asked him if he'd ever been to the poom poom palace. surprisingly, he also hadn't. at this point, i'm like "cyrus, my man, you're gonna go and wear a fedora and a leather jacket and tell me you've not only never met sweet sweet ontonee, but you've also never been to the poom poom palace?" he started laughing really hard as his sign he had no clue what i was talking about (probably like you right now) and then handed me a business card from the bar (called Miss) with his mobile number on it. he said i could call him "any time." I recognized the fact i had just met him 5 minutes earlier and showed great gratitude and accepted the card with 2 hands like a good asian businessman would.

this is really turning into another long post. what the fuck. i go like 3 days and then all of a sudden i have a lot to say. laziness is a bitch.

today i took a walk from cwb to central with the goal of seeing wan chai in a better way than before. mission accomplished. here's a few photos i got on the way.....



these courts were made up of a bunch of 3 on 3 games and it didn't look like anyone could play. i was about to drop some air j-bag on em but then realized it was probably a bad idea. next to these courts is this hardcourt soccer field.



it was a pretty casual game even though both teams wore jerseys and were somewhat organized. then i checked west and it turned out they had fans.....



there were some whites who probably thought they were at some big important soccer game and other people just hanging out and watching. it's nice to see some fields/courts in the middle of a huge city. it's literally just off the main street. you could kick those balls into some serious traffic. like rush hour 2 type traffic.

after many of those personal pitchers of chivas/coke last night, i learned the phrase for which this entry is titled. yum la, pok gai! = drink up, motherfucker! i digg some of this chinese slang. and you'd better believe i got the tone right on that one.

hei se de j-e-l-l-o

week one of school is done and we're starting to move on to numbers and colors. shit is getting very difficult. today we tried to use complete sentences in both the question and answer form and it was really hard. my classmates (your buddies) also struggled. i tried to practice with some cantonese speaking friends who also know mandarin and they were either messing with me really badly or i was way off. apparently dong is not pronounced dang but more like dawng. xi huan means to like, by the way. if you want to say i like yellow, you'd say wo xi huan huang se. huan huang is some hard shit! its pronounced like hwaan hu-ong. back to back is almost like a tongue twister. we asked our teacher if there were any chinese tongue twisters and she was looked at us like we were a bunch of jackasses. i am starting to understand the way things work though. today i learned that when you ask if the book is red, you actually say - is the book a red book? special prizes go to any mandarin speakers who can write how to ask if the book is red. you show offs!

yesterday i was walking around after class with our buds just wandering and we found this place near my apt serving tortoise jelly. what the fuck is tortoise jelly? Here's what it looks like....



grody. that shit is nasty and it tastes as gross as it looks. we added honey and it didn't do shit. it tasted like bad cough medicine. according to some sources it's good for the skin and to get toxins out of the body. i'll keep the toxins as long as i don't have to eat this shit. there was a girl in the restaurant who was drinking some tea (who knows what kind) but she was literally holding her nose while she was chugging it. sweet. she made a face similar to mine when i was tasting this crap so i'm assuming she was drinking something similar. it's like a face/face/same/same rule or something. same same but different, maybe?

a new hong kong brand store opened across the street with all kinds of gear for men and women and decided to have a pre-opening blastoff sale. if you buy 3 items, 40% off everything. that's right bitches. i may or may not have spent an hour in there after my black jello catastrophe. i did pretty well. also met some new employees in the neighborhood. overall it was pretty good. although according to maxx, xmas time is another big 70% off time for hk. in that regard i'm thinking about getting a part time job. what can i do or sell under the table that will bring some quick cash? tutoring is the best idea as of now but i dont know if i can do that without a visa.

ive been downloading like mad these past few days. shows i have on my computer to watch:

• house
• law and order, svu
• chuck
• two and a half men
• big bang theory
• how i met your mother
• worst week
• entourage
• californication
• without a trace
• csi: miami
• csi
• law and order

was i looking for an excuse to use bullet points? maybe. will i watch all of these shows by the time each have another episode? probably. should i be out doing sweet hk stuff and not watching stupid american shows? definitely. whatever, sometimes things are slow. sometimes they aren't. this weekend maxx wants to take me to aberdeen to eat some funky fish and go for a drive. and and his sister phoebe (ni hao lau g!) wants to take me somewhere cool too.

as a final note, i have a long weekend next week (thurs-sun). any recommendations on somewhere to go? tokyo is obvious, bangkok is easy, but i'm open to other suggestions. i'm looking for cheap and easy to see in 4 days or less. shibuya!

zher de dongzi nian yi ma?

took two showers today. had a workout today too. different sequence, thankfully. apparently i get a free orientation with a trainer at this gym im going to. i asked to speak to a trainer and the receptionist got on the loud speaker and said "PT english speaker please!" that was awesome. i couldnt thank her enough.

my friend in bangkok sent me some photos from the loy krathong festival and also samutprekan. she asked if i had heard of them or if i'd been there. i had to say no to both of those. bummer. i have been to sukhumvit soi 4 but thats pretty much it. i also know that mall with the cell phones everywhere but not that festival.

today i also read through ryan mcginley's blog from his summer tour. check it out here. i thought about it today because of the guy who sublet my apartment for the month of may. he is the "chris" mentioned in many of the posts. i think he is ryan's assistant. this is a crazy project that has started to get some pretty serious press. i think some of it is pretty cool. i wonder who made his portfolio. well, not really, no i don't.

still can't stop listening to this new john legend album. i need some new stuff. this is getting bad....

zher de dongzi nian yi ma?..........are the things here cheap?

ni jiao shen me?

i took these photos today in victoria park in causeway bay, a 5 minuter from my apt. sundays in hk are super weird. all the filipinos come out from their busy schedule and hit either this park or central and take up the streets. they literally sit in the streets. heres a photo from last sunday from central.....



yea, pretty different. they just don't give a shit. i can respect that. they work hard those other 6 days making next to nothing - good for them if they want to sit on cement for 15 hours. also, its really only women. youd think thered be guys there trying to pick them up, but i guess i missed the meat market. maybe that's earlier in the day?

school is going well - its frustrating trying to practice with hong kongers since most of them only speak cantonese. mandarin is a funky language but it's still pretty fun. i have these cute little chinese teachers and they all think i'm pretty funny for some reason so class is pretty pleasant. it actually goes by really fast, which is always a good measure of whether or not you enjoy something. when it's good, theres never enough time.

the sales are starting - today i walked around with my boy maxx for a few hours just noticing the 40/50/70% off sales. he said they will really get serious in december before/during xmas season. butterdrums. i'll be here for that. although as an aside, i have the 15th-25th of dec. off without any visitors in town - any recommendations on some travel? i may go see ace in s. korea or yesterday i was being pushed to book a ticket to sydney. 4,566 miles if you're in the technical mood. shit isn't close. tokyo is of course on my mind - although i'd like to get another long weekend there before then if possible. ive been penpal'ing with a new friend there and it would be cool(er) to be shown around by someone my age. not that getting hammered and eating well with a 63 year old isnt cool, but someone in their mid twenties may feel more comfortable taking tequila shots or going to skate shops looking for sb's (in that order, of course.)

i went to the barn last night to check it out per a rec and grab some dinner before heading to my friend's bar. its a small sports bar about 20 steps from my apt. they were playing a man u game on a big screen so i had a salad and had a beer and what happens? chris (yes, the dude from my class) comes and sits down next to me. so, i ran into someone i know in hong kong. only took 3+ weeks. his dutchness really comes out after a couple beers so we discussed netherland-ic real estate values and his triplex apt that he owns. i guess it was something to talk about and pass the time. whatever it was fine, although i was pretty excited to get outta there.

made a couple friends last night. it may have been one of their birthdays, but i'm not totally sure. they gave me a piece of paper with 2 names and 2 phone numbers on it, i just don't remember who is who. this should be fun trying to figure out. i'll just drop a quick ni jiao shen me (what's your name) on em. works every time

ni pang ma?

class started yesterday - 2 days down and i really like it so far. as for learning, i can say hello, how are you, and other very basic conversation points. i can't yet ask for the toilet (apparently that's higher level) nor can I say yes. both japanese and cantonese use "hai" so i'll go with that for now. in my class are 2 other people: chris, a 30 something guy from the netherlands who's decided to take 6 months off his job to teach scuba in the phillipines (and learn a little mandarin in the meantime) and akiko, a 30 something ecuadorian/japanese woman who has recenty moved from new york via tokyo. of course while living in ny, she lived in the wellesley on 72/3rd....know it? chris is only taking the class for 2 weeks while akiko will be there for the long haul with me. a whole 8 weeks. it will go by faster than i can imagine. i'll be able to sleep tonight knowing you are now on a first name basis with my classmates. yippee.

it finally cooled down here. its in the low 20s (c) so its around 70. pretty sweet. it didnt make sense before when people were shopping for sweaters and jackets - still doesn't really - but at least now they'll be able to wear another layer. my buddy here ricky everyday tells me its "fucking cold" even though i consider this weather really enjoyable. he called off his wakeboarding the other day cause the water was gonna be too cold. i called him a bitch and he wasnt sure what that meant so we were all set.

i saw quantum of solace the other day. it was action packed, similar to casino royale. apparently the chileans are furious since they filmed it in chile but claim it takes place in bolivia. i'm not too sure of the politics down there but i guess i'd be pissed if they filmed something in stupid canada and said it was new york. im sure that happens all the time but don't tell me. actually i couldnt give a shit it probably does happen all the time.

the movie theatres here make so much sense. you choose your seat before you walk into the theatre, so you know what you're getting into. there is even a live map online so you can book online and pick your seats. this is fucking genius. if you knew your seat would suck, you wouldnt go to a movie. they also charge different prices depending on the day of the week and the time of day. this is no matinee system. fuck the matinee system. discounts go pretty late in the day as tickets slowly become more and more expensive. the most expensive show is still under US$10 and the theatres are pretty nice. theres supposedly an imax theatre in kowloon. i'll see anything in imax i'm still pissed at myself for not seeing the dark knight in imax. speaking of pissed, i enjoy imax so much, i'd probably watch r. kelly peeing on a girl if it was in imax. maybe i'd watch that anyway. unclear.

i was really proud of myself today. like a jackass, the day i got here, i blew out the power to my iHome ipod player by not converting it appropriately. good work, asshole. i was sure i could find a new power plug and today i did! i went to this bootleg computer centre in wan chai - turns out about 7 buildings away from my class - and went to this random stall where this guy had what i needed. not only did he have what i needed, but it came with the piece so that i can use it when i get back to the states. whenever that may be. for hk$130, i'm amped. its around us$15 which was more than worth it to believe i have a decent brain. i probably got ripped off and probably could have haggled the guy, but i was so psyched to be able to listen to my ipod in my apt that i didnt really care. ballinoff!

all of that joy went away when i left my atm card in the atm machine later today. butterdrums! i guess i was in such a good mood from the power adapter that i didnt give a shit about my atm card. good work. i hope someone found it and withdrew the remaining us$112 in my account. go ahead and have it! i figured it out when i went to this store called IT (sweet hong kong brands) and paid for these 5cm jeans and didnt see my stupid atm card. i was like "fuck!" at the register and the girl behind the counter was like......um, did you think these were cheaper? or are you mad that we can't communicate? the answers, in order, for the record, were no, and definitely! no problem though, i called citibank on skype (skype me! name is dannykirschenbaum) and had them cancel my card and send a new one to another branch in central. not bad at all. could have been much worse.

here is a street level view of my hood......




ladies and gentlemen, i present to you hysan avenue. i know, it's nice. can you see that mercedes dealership in the back? do you think that guy behind me knew i was taking a pic so he jumped to that pose? he looks good. i high fived him immediately after i realized what he was doing. he wasn't into it, but he also wasnt against it. i don't blame him at all.

as a final thought, if you haven't purchased/downloaded/stole john legend's new album, evolver, don't even finish reading this entry and go get it. if you can tell me how to send it to you, i'd be glad to do so. now i can listen to it as much as i want with my ihome ipod player. fuck yes. oh, and in case you don't speak mandarin and are wondering the title of this entry........

ni pang ma........are you fat?

yea and can i get a jew's ear on the side?

the last few days ive spent wandering around looking at all different kinds of things and trying to find cool stuff to take pictures of. i finally got my camera in working condition so no more excuses!! this is the view from my apt...





thats right bitches, water view. thats what i'm paying the big bucks for. yea right. more like water [sliver] view. its ok, i still like it. one of my friends came over yesterday and described it as "cozy". that's all i'm looking for. 15th floor is cool too i get to see some action and the moisture before all 14 floors below me. the benefits keep rolling in on this place. my bed is actually way too firm i need to get one of those mattress pads or memory foam things. my dad used to tell me it was good for a persons back to sleep on the floor or a hard surface but my back fucking kills when i wake up; that one is beyond me.



this photo does a pretty good job describing my experience here so far. a ton of people, and a big blur with me not having any idea where the fuck i am. i took this yesterday while waiting for my [cozy comment] friend at the mong kok mtr stop. she had lost her cell phone so finding her was a super slim (like my water view) chance but somehow we figured it out. we walked around mong kok for a while which i didnt mind whatsoever. theres a place there called sneaker street which is really where i want to be buried when it comes to an end. its exactly as it sounds. like an onomatopeai. well, maybe not exactly. but you get the point. the sneaker shops are endless. i'd guess they all share about 60% of the same shit and from there have their own variation on whats cool. there must be 10 alleged nike stores, god knows which one nike knows about cause they certainly dont. the same nike sportswear which i mentioned a while ago is all over the place, all with really cool options. i easily could have spent hours and hours there but my friend kept me under control. i actually didnt even buy anything - i knew i'd be back. she showed me this mall they have there, its about a year old and is a really weird design. this is from the top.....



there are all these escalators that go everywhere and the walkway goes around the center. it makes you walk around in circles. it was really fun explaining to my friend the difference between an escalator and an elevator and then why in fact they are different. this mall has a movie theatre, 39821 restaurants, and a make-your-own-bobblehead shop. sweet! im not sure how i didnt spend any money but i should get the nobel prize for that.

last night i went to get some food and was a little surprised when i saw this.....



lets focus on this for a second. is this a fucking bartering spot? i have to give up one of my ears in order to get some dinner? or do i eat my own ear? im confused. who can i see for some clarification? the only thing this photo clarifies is my fear of being a j-bag in hk. i've admitted to no one -- and i mean NO ONE -- of my jb status. i hope you can keep a secret too.

im in narita now and internet access doesnt seem to work so im not sure when this will post. probably not until i land back in hk. had a late one last nite with niiyama and his friends. he threw that party which was a hit. id say there were almost 60 people in the room, 4 of whom were white. i spoke to a british guy who lives in tokyo now for a little while but then the drinking began. there is a bar-like area in the gallery and one of niiyamas neighbors was thrilled with the fact that i brought him snacks. so he decided i should get drunk for helping him out. the party lasted until around 10 and the bars afterwards lasted until 4. im told i slept at this karaoke bar from 2-3. no surprise there. it would have been hilarious if they left me there. good thing they didnt. here are some photos from the party......




the night before niiyama took me to a photographers house for some wine. his name is david stetson and he has got some incredible stories. hes another briton but he lived in ny for 11 years and now has been in tokyo for 16. he told me how he got roped into the studio 54 opening party. he said he thought he was going to a photo studio. the other amazing story was about how he was in the building when john lennon was shot. he lived upstairs. he said he heard the gunshots very clearly. and then apparently people sang 'give peace a chance' outside 24 hours a day for the next 7 days. im convinced this wouldnt happen now and no one does any real rioting or acting. it didnt surprise me when there wasn't too much action after the sean bell shooting. if the equivalent had happened in the 70s it would have been a different story. not that im any kind of authority on that. or much of anything really. heres davids website.......


the past two days i spent the afternoons in harajuku looking around and trying to shop. while tokyo clothes are sweet as shit, they are made for japanese people. if you have big feet, this time around, youre fucked. i didnt see any sneakers that i hadnt seen before and the prices are absurd. sneakers i bought in hong kong in july for $65 were $160 in tokyo, now 4 months later. i did the see the donatellos......



these are virtually impossible to find in ny but they didnt have my size and they were 14700 yen (~$150). i did pick up some fucking sweet pants at this tiny shop and a sweater at this store that we call japans next top model. when we came in dec07, there were 20 girls all of whom must have been models. JNTM. wait on that, you'll see me in the background with a huge grin.

time to board. back to hk!

kit kittredge is stalking me

i woke up at 530 this morning to start what turned into a 9 hour journey to tokyo. after a taxi, a train, a plane, [some chilled soba noodles and a large sapporo], a bus, and a taxi, i finally made it. its really cool to be comfortable here and to know where to tell the taxi driver to go and have somewhat of a clue. i did at one point show him the address in english but i cant believe that actually helped.

during the flight [nwa 12] i listened to this playlist i made of the most listened to songs on my computer. i bet you cant guess numero uno. anyway im sitting in the window exit row [bitches!] and i decide to watch the dark knight - which by the way - must have kicked major ass on the imax screen. out of the corner of my eye i see the screen that the rest of the plane is watching and what the fuck comes on but kitt fucking kittredge. the same bitch that drove me crazy on my flight from sfo to hkg. god damn it! fortunately i didnt have to watch [for what would have been the second time, thank you very much] cause i had somehow thought to download movies for the flight. good thinking. that little miss sunshine bitch better not be on any more of my flights or i may flip nuts.

im in my friends office now trying to type on his japanese keyboard. hence the use of brackets and general bad typing. he is dealing with some customers now - he works 7 days a week - so he set me up on the office side. he also turned on the camera in the showroom so i can watch him have his meeting. its awkward, but very awesome. he says i enjoy peeping. there is also a gallery upstairs open 6 days a week that he runs [gallerycosmos.com] which has works for sale now for 3000 yen which is something like $30. good price. the reason i am in tokyo, besides general leisure, is that he is putting on an exhibtion of his fathers work starting this week. hes having a party to kick it off and he invited me. i couldnt say no. everyone will get drunk and nobody will be able to communicate with me. its one thing to be at a halloween party where everyone speaks the same language and you only know 3 people; its another to be in a place where you not only dont know anyone besides the host, but nobody besides him speaks a lick of english. pass the a-sauce, bman!

i have some photos to upload but my phone doesnt get service here so theyll have to wait. the narita airport is really something. so are these gelatonous candies i bought - stef you know what im talking about - theyre delicious, addicting, and deliciously addicting. ill figure out a way to explain better later.

i could have sworn i saw jeff staple on the flight today. im sure hes not reading this and im sure he wasnt on the plane but it was weird. it was also weird when his name came up during my conversation with his majesty himself, the unofficial mayor of hong kong. hot damn! things are happening, im starting to tell.

im sleeping on niiyamas floor tonight on a judo mat. im sure there will be versions of what happens to share. know anyone in tokyo or of anything going on? let a brother know!

yea they did a........pretty.......good...... job

since lanznar hasnt hooked up the slingbox yet (hustle up, a-hole!), i've been downloading episodes of svu to pass the early hours. my clock is still fucked and for some reason going to sleep at 4 last night didn't mean sleeping past 9. shitter. anyway this bit torrent shit is serious. i ended up downloading the following:

• michael jackson thriller 25th edition
• jennifer hudson (is that weird? i felt bad after her family got totally fucked)
• coast 2 coast mixtape number 54 hosted by slim of 112
• batman - the dark knight (still havent seen it)
• plump dj's - shifting gears (per rec from my new hk friend)
• john legend - evolver
• mia - kala

i'm open to any and all suggestions. i have this flight to tokyo coming up and i don't think batman will cover me the entire way.

this afternoon i walked around the ifc mall a little bit and found a balcony that gave a pretty good view of kowloon.....



by pretty good, i actually mean terrible. this photo doesn't give justice to the other side. not even close, actually. it's been really foggy here. the humidity is super high but it hasn't really rained much. it rained a little bit last night but that's about it. this pic wont even compare to the ones i take from the peak. i really need to get up there. the view is really sweet.

this picture did nothing to satisfy my hunger so i crossed the road and found a fast food type chinese restaurant. part of the menu was in english and part wasn't. i ordered a soya sauce chicken and rice (hot sauce/white sauce please) and this is what i got......



actually it didn't look too bad. and for HK$31, it's a bargain. i think that's around 4 bucks. what meal can you get in ny for $4. that's right, bitches. anyway it was neither delicious nor delightful. sandy's brownies dominate this meal 11 out of 10 times. is that even possible? i've had quite the adventure trying to order food here. i need some more time with locals. the best meal i've had was with maxx (whatup gina!). it was a bowl of noodles with shrimp dumplings and it was HK$16. That's something like $2. it was filling, delicious, and delightful. that's right. all three.

not much else today. i made some friends first at the bape store then at the ice cream store. apparently everything is cheaper here since it all comes from here so we'll see what kind of shit i can get into. and i still can't believe the drama this season on svu. whoa.

it's unofficial

i put down a deposit on a place today and i'm pretty excited about it. it's the one that pa-mela showed me yesterday. apparently you can negotiate with these people a bit. i told the pa-mela's boss that my budget was HK$1,000 less than he had quoted and he just accepted it. i didn't even realize it was a negotiable point. who would have thought. i guess he (the boss, mr kai) was psyched i was agreeing to 3 months. so the deal is i'll have a sweet room from nov 1 - dec 15 and then a super sweet room from dec 15 - jan 31. good shit. here's a link of the google map. the super sweet room has a couch in it so if you come to visit, you'll have a legit free place to stay. shibuya!

speaking of shibuya, i just booked a ticket to be in tokyo from this sunday (2 nov) thru weds (5 nov). this fallacy of cheap flights within southeast asia is bullshit. there are cheap flights to bangkok ~US$78 each way. that's a good price. but a flight to tokyo isn't even close to that. hopefully my last boss is reading this and wants to contribute to this effort. we'll see how those negotiations go. anyway, if you find yourself in tokyo over those days let me know and we'll kick it. i'll be doing some work, but hopefully will find some time to hit the omotesando pretty hard.

being that i have my apartment all set up, i figured what better time than to see who i know in hong kong. i did a quick gmail search and came up with something absurd. here's where the story begins....

turns out i bought this ridiculously awesome watch about a year and a half ago......


the wheel on the right side broke on me and i wrote an email to the company - know1edge - asking what to do. after a few emails back and forth, a girl named annie provided amazing custserve and essentially paid for everything to get fedex'd back to her (in what turns out to be hong kong), repair the watch, and fedex it back to me. i was really impressed. anyway, i found our conversations from mid '07 and decided to e-mail her to see if she's even in hong kong and if she had any tips or tricks or pretty much any info for me. what did i have to lose? here's the e-mail i sent her.....
------------------------

from danny kirschenbaum to annie@know1edge.com date Wed, Oct 29, 2008 at 12:26 PM subject Re: broken watch :(

Hi Annie,

My name is Danny and as you can see below, we had e-mailed last year about a watch that you had repaired for me. Do you remember? As it turns out, I have come to Hong Kong to learn Chinese and see the city for the next few months. I'm wondering if there is a know1edge shop I can check out. Also, are there other similar stores or just generally awesome things you can recommend?

I know this is a bit random, but I figured I'd give it a shot. Thanks for your help, I really appreciate it!

Take care,

Danny
------------------------


ok so it's pretty straightforward. i didn't really know what to expect, if anything at all. i mean it's a fuckin ridiculous e-mail to send someone. our relationship was based solely on a few e-mails between us strictly to figure out how to have my watch repaired (which, by the way i had purchased from a canadian website, c-apsule.com). fine, who cares. here's her response......


------------------------

from Annie Lee to danny kirschenbaum date Wed, Oct 29, 2008 at 12:28 PM subject Re: broken watch :(

Hi Danny,

Welcome to Hong Kong! As it turns out, we are the unofficial Mayor & Mayoress of Hong Kong, let me know if you're looking for anything specific.

8FIVE2SHOP: Officially carries the whole line of Know1edge and other brands. Check the map: 8five2.com It's located on Hong Kong Island side in Causeway Bay where there are a lot of other Street fashion shops to check out. Check Superfuture.com

Food for a really local experience:

Tsuih Wah: Chicken Curry (famous with the locals)

Jade Garden: for the best dimsum

Parties & places check: alivenotdead.com

Good luck on your Chinese!

Annie

----------------------------

I'm sorry, what? Let's review that first paragraph........

"As it turns out, we are the unofficial Mayor & Mayoress of Hong Kong, let me know if you're looking for anything specific."

what the fuck is the unofficial mayor & mayoress of hong kong? who had i just e-mailed? i thought you were the girl who was nice enough to help me fix my watch. but holy BALLS you're the unofficial mayoress of hong kong? and who is this mayor you speak of? At this point I wonder if she knows bambi, everyone's favorite mayor of the lower east side. this is one of the few times when i really didn't know what to say to her or how to e-mail her back. i mean how do i respond to the mayoress of hong kong? like with "dear your highness" or something? i did a little bit of research online and found some stuff about her and her husband. turns out they may be local celebrities. i'm not really sure. it seems they are in their own minds, at the very least.

needless to say, i went to the shop and really liked it. there was a dude named brian (who may/may not be her husband/the unofficial mayor of hong kong) but he spoke really good english and was interested in my story and new york. he says he's going to ny on the 8th of november so we covered some basics. they happened to have a really good sale on t's and shorts so i did alright. on my way out he told me to drop by any time so i'll be back to try to enter their unofficial kingdom.

i decided to take the long way back to mike/sara's just to take a look at central. heres the early side of rush hour down by the water....



what happened today? i have no idea. what will come from know1ng the unofficial mayor and mayoress of hong kong? i have even less of an idea. any tips dealing with majesty in general would be fantastic. wantastic.

but you can study mandarin in your country

hot as shit today. went out to look at some apartments in soho and sheung wan in jeans and was forced to come back to put on shorts. it was at least 88 with some serious humidity. i wasn't ready for that. the guy showing me around was a dude named arman - i was expecting the browntown - but he was a short little chinese man. one thing i did notice is that he, like many americans, had his keys hanging down from one of those chains on his belt loop. is there a name for that? i was never into it but i guess it's worldwide. i remember an a-hole teacher name mr pedulla (who brewed his own beer called pedu-brew) who had his keys on his belt loop and he always banged them onto his desk and chalkboard i thought he was such an asshole. arman's keys were banging around and he thought he was offending me so he pulled them off and held them. weird. the apts he showed me were decent, one better than the other, but neither super sweet like i want.

i had to go back to mike and sara's apartment after seeing those apartments cause i was drenched from the fucking heat. i spent a few hours sending emails and bidding on priceline for a flight to tokyo (niiyama here i come!) and finally made an appointment to see another unit in causeway bay near times square. this is where the shit really hit.

i took a bus down there which was surprisingly easy. the public transportation system here makes so much more sense than in ny. you pay for how far you go, even on a bus. the fare shown on the meter actually drops depending on how close you are to the destination. fucking genius. they're also double deckers so there are plenty of seats. real rocket science. so i get off the bus and figure out where i'm going (read: asked someone in the sogo department store to send me in the right direction) and i finally get on my way and i see this....



fuck me. thanks for the reminder! what i would do for a juicy double double - i probably shouldn't say out loud as i don't know what's [il]legal in this country. i salivated for 20 minutes and finally moved on to see this apartment. it was good - no, really good. i think this will be where i live for the next few months. it's on the 15th floor of a building right near an awesome area. it's a little shady, which i'm down with, but it has a queen bed and tv and a bathroom that isn't in the bedroom and has a separate showering area. the woman who showed me the place (pa-mela) not only is the person who shows the rooms, but also cleans them weekly. talk about efficient. there were people in all of the other rooms around, which is promising. there's a nice view of the area through a large window and shelf right in front, which will house my sneakers in as best a way possible given the fact that i'll be in such a small space.

i met up with a friend for a few minutes and got back on the bus. i sat in the last row like a shmuck and took a picture of the bottom deck....



i was already the only white on the bus so who gave a shit if my flash went off. the dude on the left looks psyched to be involved and the sleeper on the right was probably tired from a long day of studying that english. i don't blame her. the sweet spot about my seat was that there wasn't a seat in front of me so i could stretch my long white legs out and make everyone hate me even more. i was pumped to be wearing my new granny sneakers from yesterday. all comments on those will be ignored, you motherfuckers!

in other news, i got a call from a friend i met when i was out here in july. she didn't really understand why i came all the way to hong kong to learn mandarin. i really am just obsessed with all of the support i've received along the way. i'll show her when i'm talking around the streets with my BALLS t-shirt!

draft beer not soldiers

finally got some sleep last nite. i'd say i probably slept more overnite than i had the entire time i've been here. i was forced to watch espn this morning (to my absolute dismay) but it was worth it to watch the chinese version of game 4 of the world series. my commentary isn't as good as the chinese broadcasters, but i think i have a pretty good idea of how the game went.

i spent most of today in causeway bay just walking around and looking for awesome shit. the proverbial games may now begin as I bought my first pair of sneakers at the new nike sportswear store in times square.



not to be confused with times square in ny; it's an area/mall that has 2 nike stores in it. if you want to know what i'm talking about, check out the new nsw store @ 21 mercer st it has some of the same stuff. i had seen these online but can't remember if they had them in the soho location. fuck it, these are gonna look good with everything. they're grey and have velcro like the aarp recommends and have rubber soles. butterdrums.

i went to look at a studio apartment today near the aforementioned times square. i was greeted by a white guy named david who was somewhat polish and couldn't understand how my family has polish roots but i wasn't fluent in the language. i said i knew the word "shvitz" and he didn't even laugh. i was expecting an asian guy given we're in hong kong and i'm looking at apartments but hey whatever's good. this "studio" was not the advertised 130 sq ft. it was a room the size of a double bed + 9 square feet. the bathroom was also in the room (great feature!) except the shower wasn't separated from the room with the toilet in it. the showerhead was literally above the toilet. i guess the drain on the floor of this room is good for both the shower and any potential toilet floods that may occur. needless to say, i happily passed on this location. i'm going to look at a few more tomorrow. i'm starting to think sharing an apartment with someone else may allow me to have a reasonable amount of space vs just a studio. tomorrow's space sounds promising though so we'll see how it goes.

i've seen all kinds of shirts on guys here since i've arrived. the nite i got here i met a friend for dinner and saw a local guy wearing a shirt that just said BALLS. my friend didn't understand why i thought it was so funny. i said "what if there was a shirt that just said DICKS?" she thought that was funnier. watch out causal 6, for all you know i'm gonna get into the t shirt design business. "draft beer not soldiers" was today's favorite, which ironically was on the same block as the BALLS shirt. maybe that's just sweet t-shirt row over there. now i know where to hang out.

tonight i'm trying to re-visit this bar i went to twice last time i was here. x bar. i think theres a facebook page (http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=565839351&ref=frmf#/group.php?gid=5523625747&ref=mf). make sure you quote "eric" for that special discount.

It takes 7 days to install the cable TV

so i made it after a long journey. got to jfk on thursday morning at 3a only to learn the terminal doesn't open til 4a. i'd recommend not making that mistake. i ended up napping in the area near where the airtrain operates. i wasn't the only one it was pretty weird. nothing like that 3-3:45a naptime with friends. i wasn't really expecting that to happen but hey, thanks super shuttle for letting me have that experience! apparently if the terminal door is open, it's good enough for the driver to make me get out of his van. i guess for $20 door-to-door you can't expect much.

i slept during almost every minute of the flight to sfo (bulkhead, bitches!) not that it would have mattered as i remember neither taking off nor landing. i guess that airtrain nap didn't do much. had a sweet layover in sfo where i saw this in the duty free area....



not sure how that makes sense but we'll run with it. i was also pretty disappointed to learn that the taxi drivers at sfo want $30 round trip to take me to in-n-out which according to some inside sources is no more than a 5 minute drive. perhaps i should return to sanfrancisco and start driving a taxi. seems like a lucrative business.

that being said, ceteris parabis, i got on a 14+ hour flight to hkg sitting next to a slightly overweight asian woman who likes to sleep with her legs wide open. inviting isn't the word i'd use to describe the situation. apparently the movie lineup wasn't designed for me (in order:)

• http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0455805/
• http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0846308/
• http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0811080/

that's right. kit fucking kittredge. classic film. 14 hours on a plane and those are the (only) movies we get. sitting next to an open-legged-sleeping-overweight asian woman. sweet!

needless to say i got to hong kong, found my friends' apt and am doing ok. yesterday's goal was to get my blackberry to work and that was a success thanks to my main man maxx. so bbm me @ 2458748b if you're down and we can chat. email is good too. i got an hk number which is 9736 3152 which per my selection has the same first five digits as my us number. oh yea. it's almost as good as sandy's mobile number having the same last 4 digits as her home number. we know how to live.

now all i have to do is find a place to live for the next three months. i've been e-mailing with dorothy at one of the service apartments in causeway bay and she says she can find me whatever i need. but if i want cable, i need to give her a week's notice. the currency exchange is pretty good so far. dorothy wants $20/month extra for cable which it looks like i can swing.

if you know anyone in hong kong, or you want to, let me know. i have nothing but time on my side and i'm looking to hang out. this is what i'm looking at right now.....