Kung Fu Panda

Who can resist the charm and wit of Jack Black in a panda suit? He's fuzzy, squishy, and oh so ASIAN! lol. Hollywood these days, tsk tsk, picking at the Far East for their stereotypical roles. Yet it is Jack Black, the most notorious champion of American man-humor, who steps up to the plate to speak some Chinglish.

I've finally settled into being a summer sloth. Let's see..., at first I thought, I must venture into the crowd, unleash my bold foreign demeanor on the unkempt anorexics of bustling Shanghai, and show them what American-born..or rather American-raised means. (in my mind, it means easily offended by Chinese standards: "You can't talk to me like that! I'm the customer, you're the desperate salesperson, how dare you YELL AT ME!"). If only, I was a little more foreign and could simply turn a cold shoulder to their nasty remarks. Instead, I am all too willing to jump up and engage in a kung-fu style fist fight in the streets. It would make some pretty good entertainment for once..considering I've got a 3-month old, clueless, baby, that I have the privilege of guchi-guchi-gooing. So..wrapping up and tossing it aside, I've realized for the sake of my sanity and to preserve an aire of class, I've decided to remain houseridden (for the time being). So far so good.

STEP 1: Watch Kung Fu Panda on 10 RMB "blu-ray dvd". It turns our blu-ray here means crappy-scratched. 30 minutes in, and it stops, oo a glimmer of hope, 2 more seconds of pixelated animation! Then...freeze, for about 2 minutes I wait for 1 second of action. It goes on like this and each time I cling tighter to the screen, screaming obsenities at it in futility. Until, ALAS! I take the DVD out and wipe it. That's it. All it needed was some good ol' TLC, and it was smooth sailing from there. Butttttt, as they say, nothing good lasts forever.

And with 20 minutes left, I was left guessing: does Po beat whats-his-face (Li Fung??), does he make the whiskered Master rat thing proud? Holy Schmuck. I don't think I'll ever know, but if this movie is as crowdpleasing as ratings say, he will. GREAT! I ruined the movie for myself. :(

Anyway, I'm bitter and old cuz I've lived here for all the summers I can remember, and people seem to get more and more rude as technology has caught on. My favorite thing to come back to? The stares. People everywhere just stare at you, like your nose hair or neckline is alllllll their bidness. They don't just do it when your not looking, they look you up and down as your frowning right at them. But in their defense, I guess I'm fuller than the anorexic a-cups here are, and that is simply too strange to fathom and must be carefully examined. They stare so hard I can feel it even when I turn my back on them. I'm not paranoid, but the stares are unbearably discomforting, it's eye-rape I tell ya.

But, it IS my crazy mo-fo motherland. My birth medal (yes, I don't have a certificate, I have a medal, and nice leprosy vaccine scar to prove it) says so. I don't know any other place I'd rather be, for a sweltering 39 degree-celsius summer of love.

LOL.

No pandas here, just some good eats, overpriced brands (YES, Sephora here is haute class, with salepeople outnumbering potential customers (or as I like to call, their "prey"), and STILL in business [how? how???]), and some of the people who are closest to my heart. Here skycrapers and lights tower any mountain you will find, and the streets are polluted with selfish, poker-faced starers and drivers who think of pedestrians as Grand Theft Auto bonus points.

Oh Po, I wish life were as easy as selling noodles.

On a techie note, don't buy the new iPhone, here's why:
For iPhone, the 'New' is Relative

I'm still waiting for the iPhone nano ;) ... Steve Jobs, get on it!