I am. Back in Korea. And will be for a few years, off and on of course. Long story, buy me a beer and I’ll tell you it. Or I may parcel it out in bits here, if I ever get the time to blog more often. Rome was outstanding, and I have places to recommend, which I’ll write up sometime this coming week. Hong Kong was a mad rush, and I have only one or two places to recommend, but they’re very good ones. I slept too little, including close to no sleep for about 40 hours the last …
Tag: TRAVELS
“Ya!”
(This post was written during my flight home, on 6 Sept. 2010.) Before I came to live in Asia, I’d hear people explain how a phrase like “so desu ne” could mean all kinds of things from “I see,” or “really?” all the way to, “I’m glad you see it my way, and acknowledge the responsibility that falls upon you in this position given your involvement with my enemies, and the inevitability of this confrontation between us.” I’m alluding, of course, to the ambiguity of language which is universal: “Uh huh” can denote all kinds of things in English, and …
Monash Utopias 4 Conference/WorldCon 2010 (AussieCon 4) Review
Most of what was great about this week in Australia was personal stuff — seeing (however briefly) old friends, spending time, meeting new cool people, and of course having a brief bit of time outside of Korea, because it was about the time when I was needing a break. Also, Melbourne has some really good beer, and I highly recommend the Belgian Beer Cafe Eureka, which is down near Dockside. It was amazing. (More about that latter place in posts yet to come.) Most of what was good about the conference and convention had to do with regular conference/con stuff: …
Whew!
Well, I’ve been home for about 48 hours now, but it was a busy couple of days. Tuesday I had a full day of classes, well, from noon to 7pm; and today, I had an empty day but had some things to do, especially getting my ankle looked at. Oh, yes, sprinting across the Sydney airport on Monday morning, as well as the cold weather in Melbourne, resulted in a recurrence of the tendinitis in my left ankle. Which sucks. But it’s getting better, with hot packs and pills and so on. I’ve written a few posts that I’ll be …
In Melbourne
I’m in Melbourne, now, and will be till next Monday morning. I have a presentation to do at the Utopias 4 conference as well as a presentation and some panels to participate in at WorldCon later in the week, along with some catching up with friends and so on. I also have to get some video lectures recorded and uploaded for my students for Thursday and Friday classes I’ll be missing, so it’s time I got up and got some of that done. I’ll post my WorldCon schedule as soon as I get a chance to check it!
You Know You’re in the Tropics When…
… you see a lizard on the bathroom wall and it doesn’t particularly surprise or alarm you. The driver who was sent to pick me up didn’t quite get the explanation he should have, so he drove to Depok, on the wrong side of town So I’m now waiting for a taxi. Hmm… another day in Jakarta.
Remix Ubiquitous & on the Jakartan Mall
Of all the songs that one might have expected to hear remixed in an almost endless variety of forms — swing jazz, strings & voice, glittery upbeat techno –this is the last song I thought would start following me around Indonesia. By the way, what the hell was with the original mix video? It sucks in a large variety of ways, so much so that I daren’t get started on it: (Update: Okay, if there’s any more proof that anyone can do anything, one of the main members of Black Box was a classically trained clarinet teacher., says Wikipedia. Sure, …
Random Observations
While I really would prefer to be blogging something a touch more substantial, I’m overloaded with The Freelance Project That Refused to F*cking Die. So, while I’m a little tied up with that — and unable to dive into the fiction-writing project I thought I’d be well into by now — all I have time to post for today are a couple of random observations about stuff in Indonesia, in the vein of my earlier mention of rock star styles here.
When ATMs Attack, or, How Things are Going in Depok/Jakarta
I’ll be going back to Jakarta tomorrow because a certain ATM has decided to swallow my Samsung Card (a credit card) and not spit it out again. Put the card in the machine, watch it crash, watching Windows reboot (with the Diebold brand name proudly displayed, of course!)… quite a sad sight. The first time it happened was a week ago, and I thought it was a freak accident. Turns out, no, not at all. Samsung Cards crash BNC ATM machines in Jakarta, it seems. Or at least, at the mall I was at. Other than that, things are going …
Jakarta Blues
No, not blues in the Robert Johnson/Mississippi Fred McDowell/Miles Davis sense. Blue is the color of the cabs you want to take in Jakarta: Blue Bird Taksi (Taxi) are cabs I have found most trustworthy around here. To answer a few questions: yes, I am in an apartment in Jakarta, which I have rented for the months of January and February, the break between fall semester 2009 and spring semester 2010. No, I have not permanently relocated to Jakarta. Yes, I am enjoying the warm weather, though mostly because there are air conditioners all over the place. That said, it’s …