Can't We All Just Look Alike?

I was riding the bus downtown yesterday when a middle-aged Latino man came up to me, totally unprovoked (i.e. no eye contact or brushing past each other) and asked:

Do you know how I can get money to China? You know, for the earthquake?

Seriously.
In disbelief, I blinked incredulously, but then said with no tone of offense:

I have no idea.

and turned 45 degrees away from him, with decisive annoyance. But! The guy confronted me again and repeated his question:

You don't know how to get money to the earthquake victims in China? My wife and I would really like to help them out.

And so now I'm feeling bad, you know. Like, "yeah, maybe I ought to know how to get money to China." This is what I wanted to say:

Why don't you just give me your money, and I'll make sure my people get it.

What I ended up saying:

Try the Red Cross.

On a related note, People magazine thinks all Asians look alike.
Mistakenly (but confidentally) identifying that Korean actor in Speed Racer as K-Pop singing sensation, Rain.

[To be fair, the producers of the film probably made the same mistake.]

The South Korea.

(picture taken at a noraebang that had tambourines, wigs, and...a chicken mask?)
Last post on Korea.

I frequently find myself in the middle of a convergence, and the trip to Korea was no different. It wasn't just that Korea has so much in common with the rest of the world I've seen (admittedly limited). It was that things went out of their way to answer my quiet questions. Things...facts, really.

I came into Seoul to see a friend get married, along with his college buddies. Two guys who grew up in The South and had more "Casian" and "Seoul food" jokes than I thought were mathematically possible. [My favorite neolo-pun though, was "getting Han jobs." But be careful who you say that to. One Korean dude thought we were serious and told us where we could get two minute rim jobs.]

Concurrently, this guy left an entry for my Dry T-Shirt Contest #2, which encouraged readers to come up with a new tourist slogan for Korea. His entry:

Korea: The South Will Rise Again!
(confederate soldier holding a Korean flag)

Moving on...

One thing I've heard from countless American women going abroad, and specifically, to Asia, is how frustrating it is to try on clothes. You leave New York a size 4 and end up in Seoul a size XXL. For my part, I'd already actually gained a chunk of weight this year, so I was prepared not to take the size discrepancies too much to heart. But I suppose it's especially heartbreaking for Asian-American women like myself, to have to keep up with the same exorbitant eating habits as the rest of the locals, share the same DNA, and yet, keep getting chunkier...something older women will say is "your body getting ready to have kids!" [Anne puts head in hand.]

So I came to the wedding mantra-lizing something about inner beauty, and left it at that. Mere moments after arriving at the wedding hall, a mentally retarded guest showed up. He immediately took to me and the other Americans. He kept trying to give me his handkerchief, asking that I promise to give it back to him at the end of the night. He kept apologizing for creeping me out. He kept taking my camera, then other people's cameras, to take my picture. I can't say I did the right thing (endear him), but I eventually took a picture of him.
Inner beauty y'all.

Concurrently, a woman seated at my table said through her bilingual boyfriend, totally unprovoked, "Anne, you are a perfect beauty. Your face is perfect." She said this almost as if apologizing for my insecurities. And she said it in a tone somewhere between the expectation of my reciprocating into small talk and likeminded inner defeat. But seriously. How do you respond to that? You don't.

All that to say I gave off major psychic vibes and they were all answered across oceans and across tables, across words and images.

Lastly, my favorite convergence:The look on the Korean man eating his ice cream is priceless, made more so by the fact that we American tourists later replicated it eating silk worm larvae.

Korea, Bowls

Don't open your stoner eyes just yet. I mean bowls like "bowl cuts."

A few months ago a KA friend of mine got a bowl cut that I thought was cute, but was ultimately misunderstood. I concluded that Asians had a harder time rocking the nerd-core look; bowl cuts and thick glasses are construed as sincere until you put on five billion dollar sneakers or a big red plastic brooch in the United States.

But then I came to Korea, and there were bowl cuts. Everywhere. On everyone.

Exhibit A: Traditional Bowl Cut Nouveau:
This is the bowl cut you saw most frequently around Seoul. I for one can tell it's hip, but I'd understand if this noona got big mouthy "hello"s from servicemen.

Exhibit B: Matching Bowl Cuts:
Boyfriends and girlfriends matching their shit up is not uncommon here. Case in point: lingerie. Yes, I said panties and bras. They sell matching his/her panties at the local equivalent of Spencer's Gifts/Claire's Accessories. So why wouldn't you get a haircut to match the one you 're boning? [This couple was really cute, but I couldn't help thinking they looked a little related (she's wearing a plain white shirt under that black cardigan)]

Exhibit C: Born-Again Bowl Cut:
This is me at the wedding. I went in for a "trim" and came out with a bowl cut. Go figure...It's kinda ok though. I think I'm pulling off the ajumma-core pretty well without giving off too much Han.

Exhibit D: OG Bowl-Cut, aka the Bowled Over:
Undoubtedly my favorite -- the bowl cut that can't help itself. Years of bowlish habitude have forced him to dig deep in the back of his head for something he can comb over...or maybe it's just a toupee.

Korea Trip, Teaser Post

As if to counterpoint a week spent in a dorm suite with four other people, a backed up sewage drain and a functionless telephone (i.e. almost total radio-silence), the last couple of days of my trip to Korea were spent at an uber-luxuriant mega-complex known as The Lotte Hotel in the heart of Seoul.

We're talking serious extravagance. I mean, I would guess someone who actually ASKED for more would have their world rocked into a new dimension. As it was, I went in meek as a foreign mouse, and got a french press, fresh grounds, ridunculous furniture, a full set of real glassware, remotized everything, every bathroom product imaginable, Venetian showers (is that what it's called when the 12-inch diameter head hangs from the ceiling?), and get this...complimentary access to an indoor friggin' driving range, equipped with clubs, gloves, gear and all.

Unbereebabo.

So it should not have come as any surprise to turn on the TV and get this:
Have you ever seen so many adult movie options on a hotel tv? I mean, what's an "all day adult movie," and why is that different from "on demand"? Of course, I was doubly blown away by what I perceived to be a "disabled adult movie" option. That's disable, as in porn starring the handicapped. When I showed this picture to a friend, he shook his head and said, "Anne. It says 'disable adult movies,' as in the option to turn off all those movies."

Dry T-Shirt Contest #2

Alright. You guys didn't vote for any one DRUG acronym en masse. Y'all voted for different people! And I admit most of the entries were in fact equal in quality. So here are the runner ups, and I'm going to try this again. Vote...or as Puff once said, die.

Don't Rape Underaged Girls, Silly
Don't Repent Unless God Says
Doped Regularly, Ultimately Gonads Shriveled

Special dibs go out to this gem of dialogue:

Gerry from PDX's entry: Damned Rand Upsets Grumpy Socialists.

Email response: Who's the smart-ass with the "Damned Rand Upsets Grumpy Socialists"? (...)Rand jokes aren't funny(...)God, I hate Rand.

Socialists...sheesh.

On that note: Dry T-Shirt Contest #2!!!

In light of the fact that I'm going to Korea all of this week, I'd like to see your best tourist slogan for the Peninsular Paradise. [strictly forbidden: blatantly racist jokes. I will cut you if you try anything lame.]

Winner gets their slogan printed on a T-shirt!

BTW everyone, prints in and of themselves are free for anyone who wants one without entering my stupid contest. "Maine, I wanna live there forever...I'm gonna learn how to fly (fish)" and "Don't Seattle For Less" are both available for free provided you send me your own shirt and a SASE. I mean, you probably got some danky ole shirt and a buck fitty lying around your house right?

Coin From Ipanima

Brazilian sculptor doesn't want the Japanese mint to use his design on their new 500 yen piece.

story

Via Boing Boing:

James Jean's animation for Prada...

is goooorgeous,

and CocoRosie is a perfect fit for it.

Trembled Blossoms

Boris and Pitchfork

I hate to sound snarky, but on the one hand, this interview asks for it. It's too many hip elements all on the verge of being ironic-lame or ironic-cool -- a noise band, Pitchfork, homoerotic manga...

Pitchfork: With all that touring you've spent plenty of time abroad, is Tokyo still important for the band?

AM: It's really important, yeah, definitely, Tokyo is one of the craziest cities in the world, I mean, there are some neighborhoods where crazy, fucked-up things happen, stuff you wouldn't normally think about.

Pitchfork: Like what?

AM: It's not necessarily dangerous stuff like in other cities, but more deranged stuff here like fujoshi, you know that?

Pitchfork: No, what's that?

AM: [laughs] I think it translates as, "rotten girls." Let me see if I can explain...these girls take a regular comic book and subvert the storyline or plot into something homosexual. They pick out two male characters and rewrite their lines and even change their order of appearance in the story to make the male characters in the story fall in love with each other.

Pitchfork: And this is a hobby of some Japanese youth?

AM: Yeah, girls. They trade books with their friends or actually publish them DIY or via some indie press. It's kind of big, I'll go so far to say it's influential on the Japanese economy.

Pitchfork: [laughs] What?

AM: Yeah, like you know Masked Rider? It's like Power Rangers out here. The new version has all the male characters positioned in such a way just so it would appeal to these kinds of girls so they could subvert and, well, buy it, and further get it out there.

It's like all these Visual Kei bands are a branch off of that. The band members dress themselves up to the extreme so [these] girls will like them, so they wear lots of make up or go for an allusive feminine image. It's so twisted, you have to see it for yourself. Because in Japan, compared to foreign countries [where] gays and lesbians can exist openly and freely, here it's so suppressed and so taboo that it comes out in the most twisted ways, and that's part of why it's so crazy living here. Now, it's like all these people are wasting their time day dreaming about twisted subversive things and it's really changing modern Japanese society. I'm telling you, man [laughs].

Pitchfork: I had no idea...

...On the other hand the hip elements in question are surprisingly naive and old-fashioned. "Fujoshi...deranged"? "I had no idea..."? Uh, it's called SLASH fiction in the US, and there's butt-loads of it, guys.

kind of in total disbelief.

Things seem to pile up in pairs (I know they're supposed to come in "threes" but...).
I've just attended my first burial and something about it...mourning death is sad in general, but the physical act of burying someone is really frightening. Watching the remains of someone be taken away from you physically was much more symbolic than I had granted. But it's cathartic too. Like waving bye to someone in a train slowly accelerating from the platform.

And though on a totally different note, but still in light of how we honor the dead - news of Sean Bell's killers' aquittal is simply, BRAIN boggling.

This is as good an opportunity as any for me to re-recommend The Death Penalty in America. It's written by someone who is anti-capital punishment, but the book is pretty unbiased since it's mostly statistics. The most amazing data point he makes is that a large percentage of capital convictions are made on the murders of white women, though a disproportionate number of actual murders are committed against black men.

How do we value life?

My Bloody Valentine is coming to New York!

!!

Burka

This is how you rock a chador.

Dry T-Shirt Contest #1

Alrighty Kids-

Let's start voting. Here are the entries for Dry T-Shirt Contest #1. Remember, the prize is a "Maine, I Wanna Live There Forever" or "Don't Seattle For Less" shirt, both printed in my boilerroo...I mean, Grade A facilities. Also, a 4-color bic pen.

Object: Best Acronym for DRUGS.

Entrant A:
Did Reefer Until I Grooved with Steely Dan

Entrant B:
Doped Regularly Until Gangrene Surfaced
Doped Regularly, Ultimately Gonads Shriveled


Entrant C:
Driving Recklessly Under Gold Schlager

Entrant D:
Damned Rand Upsets Grumpy Socialists

Entrant E:
Don't Rape Underage Girls, Scumbag
Don't Rest Until Girl Submits

Entrant F:
Don't Repent Unless God Says
Dangerous Response Urges Getting Stronger
Dancing Raining Umbrella Gene Sings
Dinosaurs Really Upset Giant Snowfall

Entrant G (close your eyes if you're under 18...now):
Delightful Rimjobs Using Giant Suppositories
Draconian Rules Urge us to import Great Shit
Dang Rolling papers Ugh Gimme the Scissors
Darling, Reach Under my G String

Entrant H:
Delicious Regimen Underlying Gigantic Stupidity

Entrant I:Dude, R U Gonna Spew?

So now you write in telling me which Entrant's work you like best. I got my personal faves, but won't say anything till you do.

Rules on voting: Don't go voting on your own entry. Leave only one comment. And remember, if your comment is funnier than the entry, you might get something too.