January 30, 2008
[bush = incompetent] OMB, check out what the Philadelphia Inquirer's editorial board had to say about the SOTU:
"President Bush's last State of the Union address offered no grand initiatives, which is fortunate because many of his bold plans of yesteryear await a new president to clean up."
"Bush spoke of America's 'unfinished business.' Talk about understatement. The question isn't how to finish the jobs; it's how to limit the damage."
ROTFL! Rove it!! @ 17:09
[showdown] With this announcement by Sen. Edwards today, there will be a Democratic "Tsunami Tuesday" primary showdown on Feb 5th between Senators Clinton and Obama. FETCH!
The big prizes are -- and all eyes will be on -- California, Illinois, Massachusetts, New Jersey and New York. All told, 52% of the Democratic delegates will be allocated next Tuesday. This will be the largest-ever simultaneous number of state US presidential primary elections.
At this point, I am happy with whoever wins on Super Tuesday. But it's still going to be damn exciting!!
As for the Republicunts... well, seriously, who the fuck cares anymore. Goodbye Giuliani, it's McCain v Romney. And whoever wins is going to lose to either Clinton or Obama.
I feel it coming! I cannot wait for Inauguration Day 2009. @ 11:43
[repugnant] Will somebody PLEASE perform the "it's not torture" waterboarding procedure on Attorney General Mukasey and then ask him then whether he thinks it's torture or not?
What a repugnant human being. @ 11:33
January 29, 2008
[fetchlebrity] OMB, it's Ellen Greene at JR's!!!
The picture is a lil' blurry coz the picture-taker was drunk. Plus, he was white. And white boys can't operate Asian electronic devices. Natch.
OK, gotta go. Meeting time. Will tell y'all about last night's fetchtabulous star-fucking fetchlebrity-sighting later *giggle* @ 10:54
January 28, 2008
[is anyone listening?] The State of the Union is FUCKED UP. And the person delivering that SOTU address tonight bears all the blame for that.
WaPo's "Is Anyone Listening?":
"President Bush has a lot to accomplish in tonight's State of the Union address. He needs to lay out a plausible agenda for his final year in office, justify a war that the American people overwhelmingly oppose, stave off a recession and persuade the nation and the world that he's not been a colossal failure."
"But his biggest challenge may be getting anyone to pay attention in the first place."
Yup, it's that time of the year again. Frankly, I tuned out this heinous President a long time ago. I mean, who wants to listen to a colossal failure babble away about nothing of consequence? I wish he was just a colossal failure, and not also a murderer, a war criminal and the destroyer of our Constitution.
The Columbus Dispatch:
"This speech will have all the suspense of the 500th rerun of I Love Lucy."
*giggle*
David Leland, former chairman of the Ohio Democratic Party, conceded that Americans might watch the State of the Union tonight but not for the reason Bush wants...
"There's always a crowd around an accident."
"What can he say after seven years? He's got to be the worst president ever."
LOL!
And stop all the presses because I can't believe I'm quoting the WSJ...
"With Mr. Bush's approval ratings near record lows, many Americans likely have tuned him out already."
Hillary Rodham Clinton in Connecticut today:
"Tonight is a red-letter night in American history. It is the last time George Bush will give the State of the Union. Next year it will be a Democratic president giving it."
"Bush has never understood is that the State of the Union is not about a speech in Washington. It is about the lives of the American people who feel they are moving toward the American dream."
The State of the Union is NOT strong, Mr. President, no matter what you say. And it's all your fault.
And no one's listening.
W is for Worst EVER.
I, for one, will be partying the SOTU night away. At JR's for Showtunes. With, OMB, guest fetch-lebrity, Ellen Greene!!! Suddenwee Seee-mwohhhhhh! @ 14:30
January 24, 2008
[annoyed] I'm so tired... and annoyed. Work is exhausting. And annoying. The cold is annoying. Everything is annoying!
Even more annoying is the fact that I won't get a $600 rebate check, waaa! I don't really care anyway and I shouldn't because the money should go to the less fortunate and the most needy, but free money is free money and I wanted some too *pout*.
Yes, I am whining about making too much money so shut it :-p
Now that Kucinich is out and I'm betting (hoping?) that Edwards will most likely quit after losing SC this weekend, it will be Clinton-Obama for Super Tuesday and that's gonna be eff-ing fierce! Just the way I wanted it to be, although if Clinton and Obama continue bickering over debates and soundbites and so on, I am going to get seriously annoyed with them; but obvi not enough to support a Republicunt. Stop fighting, bee-yotches!
I am so bloody annoyed with this "mercury in tuna" story coz I love sushi and I ain't givin' it up, no sirree. Anyho, here's a list:
High mercury/pollutants: Atlantic halibut, king mackerel, oysters (Gulf Coast), pike, sea bass, shark, swordfish, tilefish (golden snapper), tuna (steaks and canned albacore), farmed salmon
Moderate mercury: Alaskan halibut, black cod, blue crab, cod, dungeness crab, Eastern oysters, mahi-mahi, blue mussels, pollack, tuna (canned light)
Low mercury/polluants: Anchovies, Arctic char, crawfish, Pacific flounder, herring, king crab, sanddabs, scallops, Pacific sole, tilapia, wild Alaska and Pacific salmon, farmed catfish, clams, striped bass, and sturgeon. Also, Atlantic cod, Atlantic flounder, Atlantic sole, Chilean sea bass, monkfish, orange roughy, shrimp, and snapper.
I guess I can do without tuna sushi (I am going to miss my toro long, long time!).
Oops, look at the clock. Time to jet out of work and onto my dinner appointment. Lates! @ 18:30
January 22, 2008
[rip heath] OMB, Heath Ledger is dead?!
I've actually seen him in person; in a famous restaurant (Fiaschetteria Toscana) in Venice that served TDF white truffle pasta. I didn't really know who he was at that time (this was pre-Brokeback so Tony had to point him out to me) and I only noticed because he ordered not one, but TWO takeout orders of said TDF white truffle pasta (at 30 euros a pop!). He was upstairs the whole time celebrating with his movie star buddies, no doubt. They were there filming something? Who knows, but I digress...
I'm shocked. He's only 28. RIP Heath. @ 16:59
[combustible?] I knew there was a reason why I love Whole Foods besides its fabulous seafood counter. The elimination of plastic bags by Earth Day (April 22) in all 270 of its stores will definitely make me shop there more often (not that I go grocery shopping very often).
It is shocking to realize that plastic bags take 1,000 years to break down in a landfill, compared to just 2 to 5 months for paper. Armed with this statistic, it is almost inconceivable why governments across the world haven't mandated the use of paper bags instead of plastic. San Francisco has banned them and Ikea has begun charging 5 cents for plastic bags. That's a good start, but so much not enough.
I remember the first time I was charged for plastic bags at a grocery store. I think it was Italy and I was like, WTF? Even though the cost was only a few cents, it definitely made me think twice about getting another plastic bag when one would do.
And then there's Japan. I know, I know, I've noticeably been on a pro-Japan rampage since I came back from Tokyo but they really do do some things right on that side of the Pacific.
It's almost impossible but Tokyo is one of the cleanest cities in the world despite the fact that there are hardly any trash cans to be found on the streets. Some of the general cleanliness can be attributed to the disdain the Japanese have for eating in public. There's also something to be said about the general orderliness of their entire society.
So when I finally find a trash can in Tokyo, I squeal with glee mostly because I have been carrying mounts of trash in my pockets awaiting disposal. But then the fun begins -- which trash container do you put an empty plastic water bottle in? Or a Halls candy wrapper?
One says "Plastic", yet another one says "Bottles". There's also one for "Paper", "Steel cans" and "Aluminium cans". And finally, we have the utterly perplexting "Combustible" and "Incombustible". So... you can imagine this poor Malaysian boy standing in front of what are 7 color-coded containers in some department store in Tokyo... paralyzed... staring at each one and alternating between them hopelessly for minutes on end trying to figure out what on God's green Earth am I going to do with this empty plastic bottle. And are candy wrappers combustible or incombustible?? Lost in Translation indeed.
In the meantime, of course, lots of people have come and gone and disposed of their "junk" in one (or more) containers like they've had a recycling chip implanted in their brain at birth. And they probably did. The Japanese throw out roughly 900 pounds of trash per person per year; a staggering 96% of which is either incinerated or recylced. Doesn't sound too impressive? Germany recycles 57% of all its waste, including nearly 90% of all glass and over 70% of paper and cardboard. Japan and Germany are leaders when it comes to being green.
And wait till you hear the statistics for the average American -- 1,600 pounds of trash and a 31% recycling/composting rate. Where does the rest go? Landfills. Tragic.
Yokohama (population 3.5mn) has 10 garbage categories. TEN. Residents get a 13-page booklet on how to sort their trash, with detailed instructions for 518 items. No, I'm serious. And if you think I'm shitting you, I have proof!
Apparently, lipstick is combustible. Empty lipstick tubes, however, are small metals or plastics. Kettles or sauce pans are small metals, except if they are over 12" and then they go into bulky refuse. One sock = combustible, one pair = used cloth but only if they match (LOL). Neckties = used cloth only if they have been washed and dried. Ping pong balls = combustible.
Kamikatsu (population 2,200) in the mountains of Shikoku has 44 trash categories :-o
I would rather that someone have a job at the recycling center sorting out my trash into different categories than me doing it myself, of course. I mean, I don't mind sorting out the common sense stuff -- paper, plastic, bottles/cans, etc. -- but I sure don't want the hassle of figuring out whether paper is really newspapers, magazines, or really just plain white/brown paper.
Whatever it is, we need to do a better job at reusing our waste. And we need to start paying (like a deposit) for the plastic materials -- bottles, bags, etc. -- that we use and discard without reusing/recycling. It is a shared responsibility and the only way to spread the burden is to charge everyone for it. There's no better incentive than one that comes with a monetary penalty.
In the end, I threw the plastic bottle into "Bottles". I neglected to remove the cap and the label (both go into "Plastic"). And I threw the candy wrappers into "Combustible" (plastic wrappers are "Incombustible", who knew...). There is a short Japanese man cursing me right now for mis-sorting/-dumping my trash. Gomenasai! *giggle* @ 15:55
[whiplash] Wow, this morning's financial headlines were enough to make any stomach churn, much less one that is loaded with champagne and cosmos -- a lethal mixture that I will never, ever repeat again :-)
Ben Bernanke most likely had a sleepless night what with the overnight headlines -- Australia's All-Ordinaries plunged the most (-7.1%) since Oct 1987 and is down 18% YTD, Japan's Nikkei had its biggest one-day loss since the 9/11 attacks (-9.3% in two days and -18% YTD), Shanghai was down 7.2%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng had its biggest one-day drop ever measured by points (-13% in two days or 3,300 points), and trading was temporarily halted in Mumbai when the market nosedived almost 10% on opening.
He was also obviously as panicked about the worldwide sell-off as I was and was expecting the worst this morning after a holiday weekend lull in trading, because he woke up this morning and went at the federal funds rate with the biggest axe the Feds have seen in more than 23 years. The Feds slashed rates by a stunning 75 basis points (0.75%) -- from 4.25% to 3.5% -- in one fell swoop.
This was the biggest rate cut by the Fed since October 1984 and it was the first intermeeting cut since the 0.5% cut on September 17, 2001 -- the day the market reopened following the 9/11 attacks -- and on January 3, 2001 in the wake of the dotcom bust.
And just like a defibrillator set on max, the jolt resuscitated the US and global stock markets which were all flat-lining (towards the bottom) after a massive multi-day global selloff that started in Australia (-7.3%) and Tokyo (-5.7%), ravaged Hong Kong (-8.7%) and China (-7.2%), and pounded Europe (London -5.5%, Paris -6.8% and Frankfurt -7.2%) before hitting Wall Street this morning.
Weighed down by the prospect of a recession brought on by the deep housing slump and ever tightening credit conditions, the Dow -- compounded by the global selloff -- opened close to 500 points down at the start of trading before recovering most of its losses by midday. Europe responded by swinging from heavily negative to positive territory by the end of the trading day (midday in the US).
Still, the Dow is down almost 10% this year and the global selloff has wiped out more than $5 trillion from stock markets this year. I am getting queasy just watching the stock market indices...
Is the first worldwide recession in the era of globalization just around the corner? Will this one turn out to be the worst post-war recession? @ 14:14
January 17, 2008
[fluffy] OMB, what's this white fluffy stuff falling from the sky? Oh, that's right -- SNOW! It's snowing cats and dogs (is that even allowed?) and they're calling for more on Saturday, woohoo!
Frankly, I'm pretty much as over snow as I am winter in general. I am so done with sub-40 temps (though I get to parade my psychedelic hues of scarfs that I bought in Tokyo) and I am so ready for warm nights and long days.
Fluffy white stuff everywhere... Fluffy would not be the term I would use to describe the cake that I made last night *giggle*. Um, pick yourselves up from the floor and cover your mouths -- Yes, I baked :-p With Tony's help of course. I can't whisk to save my first-born. (Harro? Manual labor...)
The recipe was kinda unclear, but it clearly did not call for any leavening agents so Tony and I decided to whisk the egg whites halfway between liquid and stick-to-the-bowl foamy. Well, he decided and he whisked. I just stood and watched :-D
Well, the cake turned out pretty hard (not too awful hard) but it was quite good, if I could say so myself. I found the recipe for this so-called "double chocolate financier cake" on Lily's Wai Sek Hong. If you're not Canto-proficient, "Wai Sek Hong" means Greedy Eaters' Alley i.e. a space where people who love to eat would go to. She has some great Malaysian recipes on her blog and since most of her stuff has turned out pretty good in our kitchen (thanks to Tony), I thought we would try out one of her dessert recipes. And it came out yummy too! I keep telling my mom that she should publish her mouth-watering recipes online...
OK, I have to admit... the snow is pretty. The flakes are drifting across -- like from left to right -- outside the window of my office on the 7th floor here, and they sometimes drift very, very slowly like in slow motion or captured in paint on canvas. Other times, they fly by like a swarm of white bees chasing after the ground. And then there are those moments when they just appear to be levitating effortlessly on a slow but determined descent onto the dirty road below where they will go from pristine calming white to dirty grimy brown in seconds.
I love snow :-) I shall attempt to make the cake as fluffy as the snow next time...
p.s. For all of you that had some... if only you knew how much butter and sugar I put in the cake, OMB! It would make Willy Wonka (or Jason) blush.
pp.s. Full disclaimer! OK, I lied. Tony made the ganache coz I had to go to work for part of last night... But I made the cake, doesn't that count?? :-p @ 11:20
January 16, 2008
[thin is phat] I think I'm a closet MacBook Air fan.
I know, right? Saying goodbye to Wintel and my Dell notebook in exchange for an Apple MacBook is akin to going straight (for me anyways).
As with all things that are desirable, at $1799 base, she costs a pretty penny! Gotta start saving now :-D
MacBook Air is def the laptop I'd switch for. J'adore! @ 13:47
[i ♥ fenty] If I wasn't the biggest fan of Mayor Fenty before, I am now!
With one stroke, the masterful populist Mayor Fenty gave the residents (and visitors) of DC everything they wanted in lower taxi meter rates. Like, *every*thing.
Flagfall rate = $3; not the $4 they were originally proposing. Yay!
Surcharges for rush hour = Gone. I was kinda OK with this though.
Surcharges for additional passengers = Gone too. This one's HUGE coz it was the one thing that pissed me off royally the most before.
President Wright of the Taxicab Industry Group threatened to ramp up the taxi strike more fervently and frequently, claiming that the cabdrivers will go out of business.
Well, you know what Mayor Fenty should say to them? "Party's over, the scam's up... You wanna strike? BRING IT ON!"
I imagine there are tons of other cabbies waiting in line to take the place of our sorry taxicab drivers and their even sorrier vehicles.
I cannot wait for April 6th! Go Fenty! @ 13:34
January 15, 2008
[catch-ass-trophy] Rick's response:
champagne + cosmos = catch-ass-trophy!!
LOL! @ 12:09
[math-aholic] Since I am (we are?) purportedly good at math (and science), I shall reduce my past weekend to a math equation:
champagne + cosmos = catastrophe!
I blame it all on Rick. It was so not pretty. Just ask Tony.
Suffice it to say: Lesson learnt! @ 11:57
January 14, 2008
[long numbah] So I have these really fun "I ♥ ..." stickers, and I stuck them in appropriate places at work. There's an "I ♥ MY CUBICLE" next to my name on the door. "I ♥ HOLIDAYS" is stuck to my monitor -- not that it's not already public knowledge but as a reminder to myself that it's always time to plan my next vacation.
There are a few other good ones but I haven't decided where to put them yet... like "I ♥ BACKSTABBING", "I ♥ REBOOTING", "I ♥ MARKER SMELL", "I ♥ WALKING FAST TO LOOK BUSY", "I ♥ USING MY GOOD LOOKS TO GET TO THE TOP" :-o
And then there's this one (my fav!):
"Harro? Who you? Long numbah!"
*giggle* @ 15:49
January 9, 2008
[feb 5th] The results of last night's NH primaries were perfect. We now have 4 different winners after 2 contests each on both the Democratic and Republican sides.
If the nation's media and all its ADD glory want to do a service to the general public (which they generally don't), they should gloss over the results of SC and NV and concentrate on Super Tuesday (February 5th) -- the largest in Presidential election history. That's the date when 24 states accounting for more than half the nation goes to the primaries to decide who is gonna battle it out on November 4th.
Note: DC, MD and VA's primaries will be irrelevant as they vote on Feb 12th;; a week after Super Tuesday.
Not that that is ideal or going to happen, mind you. First off, the nation's media is a bunch of irresponsible fools and they are going to whip everyone into a frenzy about the importance of the upcoming SC and NV primaries. The nation will be transfixed and, voila, the cycle repeats itself every 4 years. Ridick.
But far more importantly, for something with as much global impact as choosing our next President -- after we fucked it up the last two times -- and the whole world is watching us do this, every single American should have a say in the primaries; not just IA, NH or even half of the country's population.
It is absolutely ridiculous that IA, NH, SC and NV should get all the limelight and select our next Presidential candidates when they only account for 3.7% of our entire population!
2 down, 48 to go. Here's to Edwards and Romney (or whoever else, not that it matters) winning SC, and then onward to Super Tuesday! @ 10:14
January 8, 2008
[terminal 3] In a year of huge new airport terminal openings, Singapore fired the first salvo with the opening of the 7-storey, 4.1mn sq ft Terminal 3 at Changi Airport in a few hours' time.
SQ001 from SF (via Seoul) will arrive at the new terminal at noon on Wednesday (SST) marking the opening of the new terminal. SQ318 bound for London will depart an hour later.
Built at a cost of S$1.75bn ($1.22bn), Terminal 3 will boost Changi's total capacity by 22mn to 70mn. Terminal 3 will add 28 gates with 8 of them designed to handle the superjumbo A380.
By the end of February, the terminal to end all terminals -- the monstrous $3.6bn Norman Foster-designed Terminal Three at Beijing Capital International Airport -- will throw open its doors to passengers. At 2.2-mi long, 1/2-mi wide and 10.6mn sq ft in area, it will easily dwarf the largest airport terminal today -- Hong Kong's 6.1mn sq ft terminal at Chek Lap Kok -- and can handle some 65 million passengers. Shocking.
One month later, the long-awaited £4.2bn ($8.3bn) Terminal 5 at London's Heathrow -- the world's busiest international airport -- will open. It is about the same size as Changi's T3.
I love new airports! @ 18:28
[global warming] Lots of 8s in today's date -- how auspicious!
We had a 69° day yesterday, woot! But can you believe it hit 73° today?! That mark smashed the previous record high of 69° set 10 years ago.
My co-workers and I wanted to sit outside for lunch today but damn Nooshi did not have it set up. It doesn't matter that it's January what with global warming and all. They should know to be prepared for gorgeous days like today, me thinks. Hrmph.
Anyho, seeing the setting sun outside my window right now, I am noting -- with lots of happiness -- that the sun is setting past 5pm these days. I am literally counting down the days till we spring forward. 2 months and 1 more day till DST begins! On March 9th, the sun will set at 7:10pm; instead of 6:08pm the day before.
It feels like spring these past few days and, even though I know it'll snow once or twice between now and March, I am praying that spring is just around the corner.
Yay, global warming! @ 17:05
January 7, 2008
[mondays suck...] *YAWN* mornin'...
loves |
loathes |
staying in all weekend |
staying in all weekend |
sleeping 11 hours on sat night |
insomnia on sun night |
highs of 69° |
mondays |
warm, sunny winter days |
not wearing my fetch scarfs from tokyo |
being back in dc |
how provincial dc is after tokyo |
chocolate for breakfast |
getting fat |
the fashion in tokyo |
the fashion in dc |
new business class on united |
not making 1K for '08 :-( |
Mondays suck... @ 09:09
January 4, 2008
[and the winner is...] ...for the category of best New Year's text message, that is:
Before the sun sets on 2007, before the memories fade, before the networks get jammed & before I get drunk and lose my phone, I'm wishing you a wonderful 2008!!
LOL! Rove it. @ 18:05
[drunk/tired] OMB, I just got a message from our partying-like-rock-stars-on-New-Year's-Eve buddies who were with us until about 6am New Year's Day...
Wanna know how drunk we were?
"BTW, if someone asks if we were a little drunk/tired, you might want to consider that we had a hard time finding the busiest train station in the World."
LOL! We were in sight of Shinjuku Station which would've taken us back to our respective hotels but, for some bizarre *cough* inebriated *cough* reason, we just couldn't find it stumbling around in the dark.
Ahhh, good times :-)
p.s. Wanna know how busy the "busiest train station in the world" is? 3.31 million people use its 200 exits per day (in 2006). @ 14:19
January 3, 2008
[something's coming] OMB, I had missed the Desperate Housewives' tornado episode because my stupid hard drive broke (grrr), but I caught it tonight and, OMB!
Carlos:: I told you just to pack the essentials
Gaby:: That's what I'm doing...
Carlos:: Is that a boa?
Gaby:: Carlos, if you are taking me somewhere where I don't need a boa, then I don't want to go
ROTFL! Wait, it gets better...
Carlos:: I should probably go over and say something to Edie
Gaby:: Like what? 'Rot in hell, you maggoty whore?'
OMB, I love Gaby.
Gaby:: Thanks to her, I'm giving up my home, my friends, half my wardrobe. So do me a favor and never mention her name again. Unless it's followed by the phrase 'that conniving skank'.
I love it when they use the word "skank" on TV.
Some of *the* BEST lines in primetime television. Ever. Love it! @ 22:24
[tokyo pics] Feeling much better, been working on getting pics from Tokyo up using a new Picasa template called SimpleViewer. It's actually quite cool coz you can just hover your mouse on the big picture and click the right-edge to fast-forward and left to go back. I'm not liking the fact that you have to scroll through the thumbnails as well but, oh well... you can't have everything can you?
Anyho, here are the pics from Christmas and New Year's :-)
[L] Christmas Eve in Tokyo
[R] New Year's Eve 2007 in Tokyo
I can't wait to go to work tomorrow. Our offices were closed Mon and Tue, and I was too sick to go to work yesterday and today, so tomorrow will be a one-day workweek for me. It sounds funner than it actually is, trust me. (a) Being sick is stank, and (b) I don't get paid when I don't work :-p
Enjoy the pics! @ 21:50
[ten more months] Wanna know how trivial I think the Iowa Caucuses are? I just started caring, like, a few minutes ago when there was nothing on TV but wall-to-wall news coverage about the Iowa Caucus that will start in about 45 minutes, and so I tuned in. I learnt that it's make-or-break for Edwards, Romney will seriously lose face if he loses, and Giuliani might be making a fatal mistake sitting this one out.
This whole caucus thing more than TEN months before the actual elections is just plain ridiculous. First of all, the election campaign started a year ago and we are only at the halfway mark. I'm already so incredibly sick of it it's not even funny. And the attack ads haven't even begun yet -- not, at least, in this region.
Second of all, Iowa is 91% white! How can a caucus in an overwhelmingly caucasian state be a good indicator of how America -- which is only 66.4% white -- should or will vote in ten months' time?? Why do we even care WTF Iowa thinks?
Well, we don't. And we shouldn't. The media should boycott this circus and next week's equally non-representative circus in New Hampshire -- even worse at 94% white -- and should focus, instead, on the bigger and more ethnically-diverse states. Ridiculous, I tell you. I'm not sure if I can put up with ten more months of this silliness.
Regardless, I hope Clinton wins tonight. Or Obama. Or Edwards. Oh hell, does it matter? Whoever wins is gonna kick McRomLiaBee's ass. The Republicunts can all go to hell. And stay there. Where they belong.
p.s. It is interesting to note, though, that in the past three Iowa Caucuses, the winners have gone on to win their respective party's nomination.
pp.s. I'm feeling better. No more fever. Body still hurts though :-( @ 19:26
[tokyo flu] OMB, it's 10:45 and I just woke up. Jet lag sucks. Plus, my entire body aches. Parts of my body have been and still are swollen and not in a good way -- fingers, joints... My left eye is also red and I have no idea why. Oh, did I mention I have a fever too? And my whole body aches?? Ugh.
I am falling apart! Maybe it's SARS or avian flu or Tokyo flu or an asian flu of some sort. Whatever it is, it's not fetch coz I haven't been able to function (no, I'm not too gay to function :-p).
Maybe I should just continue sleeping... I hate being sick *pout* @ 10:53
January 2, 2008
[181] New York City should be proud of their 17% drop in murder rate, for a total of 494 in 2007 which is also the lowest total since reliable data became available in 1963 (548 that year). It is a huge drop from 1990 when 2,245 murders were recorded.
DC, on the other hand, recorded 181 homicides in 2007, up from a 21-year low of 169 in 2006 -- the first time in 4 years that murders have increased in the nation's capital. 77% of the homicide victims were killed by gunfire. Black males, which comprise 25% of the city's population, made up more than 80% of the victims. In fact, DC and PG county alone accounted for 78% of all 418 murders in the DC metropolitan area.
In DC itself, Police District 2 recorded no murders. Dupont Circle is in that district. On the flipside, Police Districts 6 and 7 (aka East of the Anacostia) notched up more than half of the total murders in the city.
But here's some perspective: DC's homicide rate (per 10,000 people) is TWENTY times that of Tokyo. Even NYC's homicide rate is more than four times that of Tokyo. We never, ever felt unsafe in Tokyo no matter how late at night it was, how dark it was or how alone we were. You almost get complacent and let your guard down. I don't remember checking to make sure my wallet was still in my backpocket the entire time we were in Japan. I never feared that anyone would steal any of our possessions even though we had bags and cameras and were the perfect target especially when we were looking at maps half the time trying to figure out where we were.
Read this "No crime too small in Tokyo" article and you will get an idea of how ridiculously safe it is in the world's largest city where the density is as high as the buildings.
We have so little to be proud of when it comes to crime. @ 12:45
[around the globe] Here are some New Year's pics of celebrations around the globe (courtesy of NYT). As the earth turns...
GMT +11 -- First up Sydney, Australia! 2 hours before Tokyo and 16 hours before EST, Sydney exploded fireworks for 12 minutes from the iconic Sydney Harbour Bridge at midnight as a million watched (a quarter of Sydney's population!). It was still only 8am on New Year's Eve in DC! BTW, the first people on Earth to celebrate New Year's are the 1,600 residents of Christmas Island -- the easter most outpost in the island nation of Kiribati -- who do so 3 hours earlier than Sydney followed closely by Tonga, Fiji and New Zealand.
GMT +9 -- Next up, Tokyo! 3,000 balloons with New Year's resolutions are released by worshippers at exactly midnight at Tokyo's Zojoji Temple in the shadow of Tokyo Tower to celebrate Oshogatsu or Japanese New Year. We, obvi, didn't go coz we were getting fit-shaced at the Ritz!
On Dec 31st, the bells at temples throughout Japan are rung 108 times. According to Buddhist belief, man has 108 sins. The tolling bells are meant to ring them away.
GMT +8 -- 2008 promises to be Beijing and China's year as the city gears up for the start of the XXIX Olympic Games in Beijing in 220 days on August 8th.
GMT +8 -- Still in China but further down the coast, Hong Kong ignites a spectacular pyrotechnics display over Victoria Harbour as part of the popular celebration countdown, "A Symphony of Lights", which combines interactive lights from 44 buildings on both Hong Kong Island and Kowloon.
GMT +8 -- Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia! My hometown puts on a 10-minute fireworks display with the iconic Petronas Twin Towers as a backdrop. Spectacular.
GMT +1 -- The famous Champs Elysees and the Eiffel Tower was central to Paris' New Year's celebrations.
GMT -- Revelers packed Trafalgar Square and along the banks of the Thames River to watch a fireworks display, shot from three barges in front of the London Eye, and hear Big Ben welcome the New Year with 12 resounding bongs.
GMT -5 -- And finally, the New Year's party to end all parties, literally, as the globe spins towards the last continent to celebrate the arrival of the New Year. It was 2pm in Tokyo when the ball dropped in NYC's Times Square where more than a million people gathered to cheer the 100th drop of the giant Waterford crystal-encrusted ball lined with 9,576 LEDs that generate a kaleidoscope of colors. And 25 hours after Christmas Island entered 2008, the celebrations will end as quietly as they began -- in the village capital of American Samoa, Pago Pago, deep in the South Pacific Ocean.
Happy New Year, Planet Earth! @ 09:30
[25 hours] As you know by now, our final day of '07 and first day of '08 in Tokyo was 25 hours long starting with waking up at 7am after a fitful night's of sleep -- vodka-induced from partying the night before -- and ending with watching the first sunrise over Tokyo at 8am the next day. It was a kwazy fetch day but also very, very tiring; of which I am still paying for it today.
We started off the day with brunch at a tonkatsu (aka breaded, deep-fried pork cutlets) place in Roppongi Hill's West Walk called Katsukura. I was blown away by how tender the pork was but, after having it three or four times now in Japan, I've decided that tonkatsu is not really my thing. The whole deep-frying thing is not appealing to me. Still, the meal was lovely and memorable.
Not that we had much of a choice. See, Tokyo pretty much shuts down for the week surrounding New Year -- the last business day of the year was the Friday (28th) before. That includes the Tsukiji fish market and when Tsukiji is closed, almost all establishments relying on the freshest fish available for their raw courses (i.e. all high-end Japanese restaurants) are closed for that duration of time. It was damn near impossible to get good sushi/sashimi in Tokyo, unless the fish was flown in from a market that was still open elsewhere in Japan (which was the case at Ryugin... more on that later). In any case, finding a good restaurant was tough -- we called multiple places to no avail -- so we winged it most of the time.
BTW, if you are ever in Tokyo, Roppongi Hills and the new Tokyo Midtown is a must. They are both tourist-friendly (i.e. English is widely-spoken) and are zen temples to commercialism in ultra-high-voltage Tokyo.
Roppongi Hills opened by Mori Building in April 2003 and is a $4bn complex crowned by the 54-story, 238m/781ft-high Mori Tower; then, Tokyo's tallest. We visited it a year after it opened when we were in Tokyo last and the complex is still as amazing today as it was then. The array of shops, restaurants -- from the super-high-end to the casual -- and entertainment -- the view from the Tokyo City View observation deck is the best in the city -- ensures that you will never get bored with this place. Plus, it is directly connected to the Roppongi subway station AND it is open on New Year's Day.
Only 1km away, the US$3bn Mitsui Fudosan project called Tokyo Midtown is also connected directly to the Roppongi subway station -- on the other end and, sadly, not connected via underground passage to Roppongi Hills -- but it closed on NY's Day. I know, stank. Plus, there's no observation deck from the 248m-high Midtown Tower, Tokyo's tallest building by 10m and Japan's fourth-tallest, unless you are staying at the Ritz Carlton at which point the views of Tokyo, Tokyo Bay and Mount Fuji in the distance are pee-down-your-pants amazing. Like Roppongi Hills, Midtown is also packed with shops and restaurants -- on a smaller scale -- and is surrounded by lovely gardens, a huge luxury in the hyper-inflated land prices of Tokyo.
Both complexes were beautifully decorated for the end-of-the-year festivities and are definitely worth the effort if you happen to be in Tokyo.
Wow, I digress. After lunch, we made it to Shibuya (finally) and shopped till we dropped. You know the scenes of Tokyo they always show with high-rises plastered with neon signs and enormous LCD screens like Times Square looking down on a street crossing that is all-way stop (aka scramble-crossing) with thousands and thousands of people walking diagonally across intersections, inundating it to almost but never quite mayhem in order-obsessed Japan? That's Shibuya Station's Hachiko Exit and quintessentially Tokyo. The (narrow) streets that fan out from Shibuya Station -- one of Tokyo's busiest -- are home to countless restaurant, retail and nightlife establishments. Located on the southern-end of the Omotesando-Shibuya retail axis, Shibuya is heaven for Japan's youth fashion crowd and we bought the whole lot.
We went to Seibu Loft and Tokyu Hands for creative lifestyle goods, and they did not disappoint. We hit a whole bunch of clothing stores as well and I think if we had had more time, I would've tried on and bought a whole lot more clothes coz they were all funky and cool and inexpensive! As it were, I was super exhausted from the night before though that didn't stop us from spending 5 hours prowling through Shibuya's retail pleasures. If we had more time, I would've loved to check out Takashimaya Times Square (one of the largest in Japan), Omotesando Hills, Harajuku, etc. Oh well.
We crashed back at the hotel for a few hours before preparing for our highly-anticipated dinner at a recently awarded 2 Michelin Stars restaurant called Ryugin (龍吟 aka Dragon's Chant) near the hotel. BTW, Tokyo rocked the culinary world in late NOv when the widely-followed and respected Michelin -- in their first-ever guide for Tokyo -- awarded 191 stars to the city. Unimpressed? Well, that is more than Paris (98) -- Michelin's birthplace -- and New York City (54) combined! Even London, at 50, pales in comparison. Culinary aficionados all around the world have dubbed Tokyo's culinary dominance the Land of the Rising Stars.
For me, I only had to sit through a few courses by Shikoku-born 37-yo Seiji Yamamoto at 26-seat Ryugin to confirm Michelin's findings that Tokyo should be honored with eight 3-star and twenty-five 2-star restaurants. Note that the entire US has five 3-star restaurants -- NYC's Jean Georges, Le Bernardin and Per Se, the Bay Area's French Laundry, and Joel Robuchon in Vegas (where we're going in 18 days!). Interestingly, Joel Robuchon garnered 6 stars in Tokyo -- one 3-star, one 2-star and one 1-star restaurant -- bringing his global haul to 17, 2 ahead of Ducasse. He is a genius and I cannot wait to go to his restaurant in Vegas.
Anyho, I won't bore you to death with Michelin or our meal in Ryugin -- especially after all those food pictures I posted -- but suffice it to say, the meal at Ryugin was fantastic to the last morsel of liquid nitrogen-frozen cinnamon apple dessert and far better than our disappointing New Year's Eve 2006 meal at Jean Georges in Shanghai the previous year. The raw fish course -- flown in from Shikoku that day -- were sublime but nothing in this world could prepare you for the sensational barely-cooked crab course or the buy-a-ticket-to-Tokyo-right-now grilled fugu guts that sounds like Hell but tastes like Heaven.
When we were first led into the restaurant, I was kinda surprised by the Western-style seating arrangements which kinda brought the fear of fusion food out of me. I flew 14+ hours to Tokyo and I wanted Japanese food, dammit. And guess what? Yamamoto-san not only delivered, he gave me multiple gastronorgasms.
Belly happy and sated after a 3 1/2-hour long, gazillion-course meal (matched by a gazillion yen price tag) with sake-pairings that rocked my world, we stumbled back to the hotel just in time to meet up with newfound friends Stephane, Patrick and the fabulous Montreal diva Louise for a celebratory New Year's (Laurent-Perrier Rose) champagne toast at midnight complete with countdown (in English) and balloons falling from the ceiling. Sake and champagne, Heaven!
We then cabbed it to Shinjuku Ni-Chome -- Tokyo's gay district -- piling five of us in a cab made for four breaking all sorts of rules in Japan but didn't care one lick coz we were all completely inebriated. We visited GB again and this time it was packed to standing room only (and only if you were 160 pounds or less). We, of course, closed it down but by then, we had met up with some MI-based folks and they took us to Kinsmen down the street which was surprisingly still open at past 4am.
I was so drunk at this point that I pointed to a bottle of Veuve and bemoaned for a few minutes about how they didn't have Veuve at the Ritz so I had to settle for Laurent Perrier instead, and lo' and behold one of the Detroit guys gets up and buys me a $120 bottle of Veuve! *giggle* He just wanted to feel me up in return (my back, not my crotch :-p) so I let him. I know, I'm such a whore but I've still got it so shut :-p
At 5:30am (just a guess), we were so super drunk we decided to walk to Shinjuku Station to get back to our respective hotels. Well, we couldn't find Shinjuku Station, LOL! What, the streets look different at night when the neon lights are out. We did stumble into a shrine and did what most Japanese do on New Year's -- toss coins and say a few prayers at a Shinto shrine. I don't remember being obnoxiously drunk at a Japanese place of worship but I couldn't have cared at that point. I really wanted to go to a shrine before dawn (Meiji being my first choice) so I was quite happy with that.
After wandering around lost for a few, we tried to pile all five of us into a cab again to get to Shinjuku Station but was met with a stern cab driver who told us that "in Jah-pahn, four only!". Whatev. We said our goodbyes and sent them home in a taxi (which are 20% higher between 10pm and 5am). Oh btw, they raised the taxi fares in Tokyo a few weeks before we got there, from a 660 yen flag drop and 80 yen increments thereafter to 710 yen flag drop and 90 yen increments. Shocking.
Anyho, back to Shinjuku. We wandered around aimlessly some more before finding Shinjuku-Nishiguchi subway station. Yup, we had gotten lost all the way on the west side of Shinjuku (we were on the east before). Thank God that the trains run all night but it didn't matter coz the subway had re-opened at this point. We hopped in a train bound for Roppongi and stumbled into our hotel as the first dawn was peeking through Tokyo Bay at just past 6:30am.
We had a (stank) buffet breakfast at the Ritz's "45" -- um, don't bother coz the buffet was tragic and the $38/pp price tag was astronomical -- as we watched the floor-to-ceiling glass windows let in the first sun rays of 2008, bathing the entire hotel in an orange glow and illuminating Mount Fuji in the distance. Inspiring, spectacular, and oh-so-exhausting when we finally passed out at 8am. We were up 3 hours later, packing and hurrying to catch our 2-hour bus ride to Narita.
And that's how we spent New Year's Eve 2007/New Year's Day 2008. Talk about starting the year with a bang! :-) @ 08:40
[ass cold] It's 5:46am. And I woke up an hour ago. Jet lag, ugh. Today is gonna be a looooong day (at work). I feel it.
It's also balls cold outside -- 30° with a windchill of 17°! They're calling for some flurries today though it remains to be seen if it'll actually materialize. Cold and snowy. Just what I wanted to come home to -- dead winter.
And then there was the cold, Cold toilet seat at home yesterday which practically jolted me out of needing to poop. It was especially shocking after experiencing -- no, enjoying -- 8 days of seat-warming Japanese toilets. What a jarring end to a vacation indeed. @ 05:59
January 1, 2008 - Happy New Year! Ake mashite omedetou!
[home soon] We are just now entering West Virginia with about 200 miles to go to Washington's Dulles so I'm gonna have to be quick.
We screamed across the Pacific today at 37,000ft on this 777 non-stop from Tokyo's Narita, shaving 50 minutes off our flight time and making it from Asia to the East Coast in under 11.5 hours. Amazing! Yay to super powerful winter jet streams.
As a seasoned veteran on transpacs, we both watched a movie (Rush Hour 3, haiii-yah!) during dinner before crashing for 8 hours and then waking up for a light beef sandwich (yum) lunch prior to landing. Sleep is all we do anymore on long flights, and sleep was all we needed. Oy.
By the time we went to bed on New Year's morning (literally, it was 8am), we had been up continuously for almost 25 hours (!). Yup, we love to partay! To top it all of, we had partied the night before as well (der, the final night of 2007) at a local gay bar (GB) and club (Arty Farty) until 2am and I sustained New Year's Eve in Tokyo on 5+ hours of sleep. I know I just slept almost the entire flight today but I'm still sleepy!
I am super exhausted right now. My whole body aches in places I never knew could ache. The recovery (jetlag- and alcohol-induced) is gonna take a few days. It's a good thing our next trip is not for another, oh, 18 days :-D Don't get too excited, it's just a mileage run to Vegas; as well as a food run to the only 3 Michelin Stars restaurant in Vegas -- Joel Robuchon. No, not L'Atelier, *the* Joel Robuchon.
Anyho, we did have a spectacular final day of 2007 and first day of 2008. I'd tell you all about it but we are descending into DC. I was happy to be in Japan for Christmas and New Year's but I'm so happy to be home! I'm completely partied out for the year and it has only just begun ;-)
Didn't it feel like the past year was over almost before it began? I almost never knew thee, 2007. I miss you long time, 2007, and I won't ever see you again *pout*.
Here's to more health, more happiness, more love and more life to everyone in the New Year. I love you long time, 2008! @ 13:36 EST
[goodbye 2007, hello 2008] It seems like only yesterday that we arrived in Japan and now, after , we're leaving *sigh*.
In fact, it seems like only yesterday that 2007 began on a rooftop Dom Perignon party overlooking the Bund in Shanghai! And it just ended (well, about 11+ hours ago) on the 45th floor of the Midtown Tower at the Ritz Carlton Tokyo's lobby! I can*NOT* believe it's 2008 already. Kwazy.
I'm so hungover, LOL. I am determined to not repeat last year's I-got-so-wasted-we-missed-our-flight-home shenanigans in Shanghai. Our bus to Narita leaves in an hour. Time to pack/shower/shit/shave!
See y'all back in DC :-) @ 11:45 Tokyo
[HAPPY NEW YEAR...] ...from Tokyo!!!
The first dawn of 2008 in Tokyo
I know it's not 2008 yet for you guys but Happy New Year, bitches! Tokyo was the first city after Auckland and Sydney to usher in the new year, and a full 14 hours before you guys do on the East Coast.
I am *so* hungover this morning. We partied like rock stars till 8am and took a quick 3-hour power nap and are now packing and getting ready to head to Narita for our flight back to DC.
See you all in the New Year (soon)! Love, licks, hugs and kisses to all that I love... @ 11:41 Tokyo
30 :: bush = incompetent
30 :: showdown
30 :: repugnant
29 :: fetchlebrity
28 :: is anyone listening?
24 :: annoyed
22 :: rip heath
22 :: combustible?
22 :: whiplash
17 :: fluffy
16 :: thin is phat
16 :: i ♥ fenty
15 :: catch-ass-trophy
15 :: math-aholic
14 :: long numbah
09 :: feb 5th
08 :: terminal 3
08 :: global warming
07 :: mondays suck...
04 :: and the winner is...
04 :: drunk/tired
03 :: something's coming
03 :: tokyo pics
03 :: ten more months
03 :: tokyo flu
02 :: 181
02 :: around the globe
02 :: 25 hours
02 :: ass cold
01 :: home soon
01 :: goodbye 2007, hello 2008
01 :: HAPPY NEW YEAR...