Filed under: posts | Tags: cars, economics, Fang Datong, Fast and Furious, happiness, Nintends DS, Rhythm Heaven, Shanghai, sights & sounds
A few things going on right now, the most important of which is an agonizing wait for the results of of my final round interview with a leading economics consulting firm. I feel I did fine during the interview and case, but who knows? These things tend to have a way of surprising you.
(This next paragraph is for those who are interested in the otherwise boring on-goings of economics)
My thesis which is about the One Child Policy and its Effects of Women’s Education, is coming along daintily. I have found a newer, more trustworthy dataset, but it will limit my usage of certain statistical methods. I will have to check in with my advisor to make sure it’ll work. I am getting a nice self-led crash course introduction to SAS though. 
On the entertainment front, a few items of note.
Fast and Furious was good. It wasn’t deep, or intellectually stimulating, but from a auto-head POV, it was pretty sweet (minus that atrocious MY2009 STi). I really liked the beginning which paid homage to one of the forgotten greats in American muscle history – the Buick Grand National. These turbo’d Regals are in my mind, still the epitome of no frills American power.
Of course, this movie featured a lot of great cars, including a whole myriad of American classics as well as an awesome scene with an R32, R34 and GTR Nissan Skylines. Honestly, I even thought the fighting scenes weren’t half bad. If you can get over the cringe of a few typical F&F lines, then go watch it!
Rhythm Heaven (リズム天国ゴールド) for the Nintendo DS. With the release of the “new” Nintends DSi, recently released games have not been given the spotlight they deserve. I recently started playing this gem of a game and it is wonderful. It’s like a good mix of Warioware with Elite Beat Agents. It is a collection of rhythm-based mini-games that are all very original and clever. This is the kind of game the DS was made for. Hours of boredom assassination! Check the quick vid of the mini-games in action:
Khalil Fong, a.k.a. 方大同 (Fang Datong). Mr. Fong here (courtesy of my wonderful Serena) has answered my prayers for some different Chinese music. Born in Hawaii then moving to Shanghai (yes!) when he was 6, Khalil possess a less prototypical sound. He a stronger idea of bass and rhythm than his peers and I personally think he sounds Mraz-ish. An added bonus is that his English pronunciation is native, so when he adds that English phrase between the mandarin, it doesn’t add all that cheesiness.
Here are few songs of note:
(1) Love Song from the album Wonderland
(2) Singalongsong (English) from the album Orange Moon
(3) 三人游 (pinyin: san ren you) from the album Orange Moon
Whew. That was a good, long post.
‘Tis all.
Filed under: posts | Tags: Chinese music, Nikon D40, photography, Shanghai, Thanksgiving
Oh wow, Monday is going to be the start of December! How quickly this year has passed – it was been incredible. It seems just yesterday I was in Shanghai celebrating my 21st. Now I’m a few weeks from my 22nd.
[Via kenrockwell.com]
I picked up a Nikon D40 off Ebay today. It was 40% off with live.com’s 30% cashback and my other 10% off coupon. I couldn’t resist. After all, there’s nothing like a DSLR to capture a city like Shanghai in its winter glory. All I need now is a nice Hoya UV filter and a LCD protector and I’ll be set.
Thanksgiving dinner was really good. My family and I headed over a family friend’s home over in Fremont. We were joined by 3 other families that we are pretty close with. We had TONS of food. I literally started eating right when I entered their house to the moment I left. It was a good mix of Chinese (Shanghainese) and American Thanksgiving foods. We had the obligatory turkey, but we also had things like green onion pancake, various soups, tofu dishes, salmon sashimi (?), etc, etc, etc. Dessert consisted of a Coldstone ice cream cake and a mu-er soup. (No idea what mu-er is in English, but it is a kind of fungus).
On the alcohol front, we had (6) bottles of champagne, (4) bottles of wine, a dessert brandy and the other misc. drinks like rum and coke, etc, etc. Being the youngest “adult” in the bunch, I am usually picked on in terms of drinking. I had to open all the bottles of champagne and hurt myself opening two of them. In addition, I was challenged to drink with 3 people, so in the end I had 2 glasses of wine, 3 glasses of champagne and a surprisingly strong glass of dessert brandy. I was okay but had to hide as they opened another bottle of red.
It was nice to see everyone doing (relatively) well and having a good time. It’s pretty nice to spend the holidays with three different generations of people who get along so well.
Ok – different subject. I’ve been trying to find good Chinese music but they all seem SO SIMILAR. If any of you can point me to some Chinese music that had a quicker tempo, I will be indebted to you. Zhou Jie Lun was good for about 3 CDs, I need something new!
I hope you all had a good one.
‘Tis all.
Filed under: posts | Tags: art and lit, family, John Legend, Kanye West, music, Ronald Jenkees, Shanghai, Thanksgiving
Thanksgiving is coming up! From now until that time, I don’t really have any academic obligations! I’m so happy. Only my nuclear family is here in the U.S. so we tend to go to spend Thanksgiving with family friends. This year, like many years, we’re going to one of our family friend’s place in Fremont. We’ve known them forever. They used to live next to my Dad when he grew up in Shanghai and I’ve known their daughter since I was 6 or 7.
I haven’t seen these people since we went down to San Diego together last summer. It’ll be good to see old faces again. Also, my friend is getting married so it’s always fun to drink with her and her fiance and joke about how terrible their lives are going to be.
There’s also this 8 year old girl named Bubbles whose family will also been there. She called me one day (like on a Friday) and asked if I could go over and play. Haha, I just told her I had to write a report of some kind – which confused the hell out of her 7 year old brain. Anyways, it’ll be nice to talk to her again as well. She’s really, really smart for a little kid. She understands complicated social cues already.
I won’t see the rest of my family until mid-December, but this time it’s going to be extra special as we induct new members into our family. And what a family we are – they have no idea what they are getting themselves into. I actually have two cousins getting married. One will be straight forward. 300 people. A banquet, done. The other is some small, but lavish 300,000 yuan affair on some island. This should be interesting, to say the least.
I started listening to the new Kanye album, 808s and Heartbreaks. I kinda like it. I like the beats and the background way more than the vocals. There’s something about autotuned voices that doesn’t fit right with me. Sometimes, the effect can really add something, but when it dominates the album, it gets old pretty quickly. In other musical news, “Greenlight” from John Legend’s new “Evolver” is quite excellent. I’m still waiting for someone to use Ronald Jenkee’s “disorganized fun” (see previous post).
Happy Thanksgiving everyone.
‘Tis all.
