This, my friends, was quite disconcerting for me. Never in my life have I had to do my own laundry without the use of a dryer. My history with laundry is short — I didn’t learn to do it until I graduated from high school. My parents, being the wonderful people they are, always did the laundry, and apart from being lazy, I was also rather intimidated by those mysterious machines. Pretty much the only chore I did around the house was manually washing the dishes because there’s really no way to screw that up [arguably]. But the washing machine had so many settings! Do something wrong and all the clothes could get ruined, or worse, I could end up breaking the machine and flooding the house! I probably sound like a total moron, but having a hypercritical mother does that to your self-esteem.

Anyway, when I studied abroad in HK before, our dorm had huge laundromat-style dryers. When I taught English in China during the following summer, one of the church’s prayer warrior ladies [truly a blessing] kindly did my laundry for me. And whenever we visit our relatives in China, there’s always somebody else who will take care of laundry for me. The thought of not having a dryer really flustered me.

Another thing that continues to perplex me is the mystery of my missing laundry bags. I distinctly recall packing my two pink laundry bags into the front pocket of one of my suitcases, but when I arrived in HK, they were gone. Their inexplicable disappearance is annoying because 1. who would steal laundry bags??? and 2. they were a gift from my mother [if you can call it a gift?], and I considered them her blessing to go out into the world and do my own laundry freely. And they were pink!!! Also, not having laundry bags means I can’t haul my stuff to the nearest laundromat.

In any case, I’ve been keeping my dirty laundry in the random Express shopping bag that I used to pack all my toiletries. This turned out to be an advantageous option because the tiny washing machine in the kitchen of this apartment can pretty much only hold the contents of a medium-sized shopping bag, about two pairs of pants, one sweater and some socks.

I examined the exterior of the washing machine for a long time before attempting to use it. Due to my insecurity about messing up appliances, I prefer to read user manuals when possible, which was not an option here. Instead, I was presented with an assortment of buttons and knobs — a paranoid person’s favorite!

The button on the far right reads “Half Load Drying.” I thought I was saved: It must be a magical machine that washes and dries! Technology is wonderful!

Bobby and Tracy had already departed for India by the time I gathered the courage to undertake my first load of laundry, so I asked Aman to show me how it was done. Tracy had told me that the previous tenants just gave their laundry to Aman to do and paid her around $40HK [~$5US] per load, which means that they were either really busy, lazy or rich. I’d rather spend that money elsewhere [AKA buying more clothes that I'll have to wash], thank you very much.

Sidenote: Why does Hong Kong [primarily] use powder detergent while America uses liquid? Is it a British thing?

When the washing was complete, I asked Aman if I could also dry my clothes in the machine. Alas, the language barrier proved too great, and she nodded while grabbing some hangers and showing me how to hang my clothes on the window. Ugh…I resolved to take up the challenge on my own the next time. After all, how hard could it be to figure out?

The thing about Hong Kong is that it’s a really humid city all the time. I washed my clothes on Sunday afternoon, and by the time I took them down on Wednesday, they still seemed damp. How does anybody get their clothing to dry properly in this place?? Annie told me that having a heater or dehumidifier speeds up the process significantly, but I have neither, so I guess I’ll just wait for the week that it takes for my laundry to dry.

The second time I did my laundry, my prior confidence in figuring out the washing machine deserted me, and I messed around with the buttons and knobs uselessly. I asked Aman again if I could dry my clothing in the machine, but she just put it on another drain/spin cycle. Thus, I’ve resigned to my fate. I suppose it’s not so bad. My perpetually hanging laundry blocks the view from outside when I’m too lazy to close the curtains while changing pants and such. And at least, in the current cold weather, there isn’t a damp smell.

As a reward for sitting through 900 words about my laundry ordeal, here are some photos I managed to take of the apartment during the rare occasion when Aman wasn’t home. View from the front hallway:

View from my doorway:

Happy Chinese New Year! I ate lots of dim sum this past week to celebrate, heehee.

Cathy, originally from mainland China, is back in HK doing her Masters. Kathy, who graduated from Cornell, is working in Shanghai. Christian and Danny are both from Australia. Winnie, a friend of Danny’s, grew up in Hong Kong but now lives in Australia. The photographer was Yi, Danny’s cousin, who teaches at Hong Kong Baptist University [and apparently studied at Yale?? I only heard fractions of that conversation]. Everyone except Cathy & Yi were only in HK on vacation and departed with the weekend.

Fun fact: Christian and Danny showed up wearing the exact same cardigan [unplanned]. Which they had bought together at H&M [allegedly]. From the back, they looked exactly the same that day [can you tell?]. I mean, I thought it was pretty bad whenever LC and I happened to wear similar colors to church, but we never took it to their level! That’s true destiny ♥

We had lunch at some hole-in-the-wall place in Wan Chai known for their barbecue pork, which was indeed delicious.

After lunch, we took the scenic route to the pier [not because we got lost or anything >_>] and ferried over to TST to do some shopping. The boys had to pick up some tailored shirts [presumably also matching], so the C/Kathies and I did some shopping on our own. My first interesting discovery was a pair of…Mary Jane socks. Who would actually wear these???

I bought some minimalist socks that are good to wear with flats — so cheap! Only $5HK each:

Without fail, Hong Kong’s streets are exceptionally crowded on Saturdays, so we wandered into a less-densely-packed mall for some respite from the teeming masses. The first shop greeted us with a hilariously inappropriate display:

I also snagged a cute handmade bag to tote my camera around in!

Because Kathy adores HK food, we visited quite a few snack shops. I found these in a bakery:

After exhausting ourselves [and our wallets], we met back up with the rest of the group for some coffee & chit-chat. Alas, it was sad to say goodbye to my friends, but they had to return to their respective countries and carry on with their lives. I, in turn, shall continue my adventures here in Hong Kong. The next blog post will be about a mundane yet troublesome topic…

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After traveling for 24 hours.

My first day in Hong Kong was hectic and endless. The list of things to do:

1. Buy a SIM card for my phone
2. Open a bank account
3. Transfer money from US to HK so I could withdraw it immediately
4. Exchange my USD and RMB
5. Buy some household items, like a pillow and a cup
6. Email my family & access some social networking so everybody knows I’m alive
7. Call my friend Kathy to meet for dinner
8. Shower & sleep

None of those tasks are particularly difficult, but I was a frazzled hot mess that doesn’t understand Cantonese, so it added a layer of complications.

After dropping off my luggage at the apartment, Bobby walked me to the nearby MTR [subway] station, showing me some shops along the way. I popped into a 7-11 to buy a SIM card [852.6702.6379 call me!] and boarded the MTR to Central, hoping to find a Citibank without too much trouble. Thankfully, I found one right outside the MTR exit I happened to choose, but there, my progress slowed to a dispirited halt.

I chose to go with Citibank because I have an account there in the US [is this too much information to be revealing on the Internet??], so transferring money between the two accounts wouldn’t generate any fees. However, lately I had learned [through opening various new bank accounts at home] that banks basically hate people, especially non-rich people, and will do anything they can to squeeze money from even the most basic of checking accounts. I HATE BANKS.

Run...run from nefarious banking fees!

Citibank HK was no different. I couldn’t qualify for the waived-fee work-pay checking account [or whatever it was called] because I was only here for an internship and didn’t have my work contract with me, so I had to open a basic checking account, which has a $100HK monthly fee unless there’s a balance of $10,000HK in there [almost $1,300US]. Well, great. I already have to keep $1,500 in my US Citibank account; where am I supposed to magic this extra money from?? Whatever.

I spent 2.5 hours in that bank. One third of it was listening to my banker [a young man named Axel, as if he were a character from Cars] explain everything to me, another third was spent watching the poor guy run around trying to process my paperwork while I tried to process all the information I was receiving, and the last third was spent at one of the e-kiosks on the side, trying to activate my online accounts and do a global transfer. During the last part, I had to go back to Axel twice for help.

After that experience, I truly understood the value of just keeping all your money under your mattress. Besides, the debit card they gave me starts with “666″…if that’s not an authentic sign of banking evil, I don’t know what is!

I withdrew my funds, visited the currency exchange next door, and finally had enough money to pay Bobby the deposit + one month’s rent, which came out to a total of more than $900US. Damn. I never had to pay that much for an apartment during college. $465 a month could get me a pretty nice place back in Columbia!

Stopping by a Japan Home Centre on the way back, I discovered that pillows were outrageously expensive. Most cost around $100HK [a little less than $13US], and the cheapest one I found was $49HK — but it was an embroidered throw pillow. Like, one you would have on the couch. I was pretty sure that I had bought decent pillows at Wal-Mart for $5, so color me bamboozled. I ended up buying nothing and went home, exhausted and dejected.

Fortunately, the rest of the day went according to plan, and I was happy to be reunited with Kathy, whom I had met while studying abroad in 2010.

My friends have been asking me to post photos, but I haven’t been having that many adventures because I’m working full-time. Seriously, though, I took so many photos while I was studying abroad two years ago. You guys can creep through those while I work on my next blog post, which will definitely have pictures :)

I feel like the only place someone who understands English would wear that shirt would be San Francisco. [Maaaaybe Japan too.] Then again, who knows?

Another aspect of Hong Kong that bothered me a lot is the prolific amount of PDA, especially in the subway areas — young couples just cling to each other like the world’s about to end! Take, for example, these two:

They were originally embracing on the left side of the photo, and then they hug-walked 15 feet to the right. Please…just stop.

Anyway. I had brought my SIM card from two years ago, hoping that it would still work [especially because I had to refill it just three days before departing], but it had expired, so I had to find a pay phone to call my landlord. I took a taxi to the apartment, which was quite a scary experience because I was no longer accustomed to the death ride that is a city taxi.

My landlord also happens to be one of my roommates. I’m living with an Indian couple [probably early 30s], Bobby and Tracy, and their maid, Aman, in an apartment listing that I found on an ex-pat forum. Bobby runs some kind of textiles business; Tracy actually grew up in Hong Kong and can speak some Cantonese. They’re both pleasant so far, but I haven’t interacted with them very much. Aman, probably no older than 20, is a gaunt girl who speaks very little English.

Upon learning that I was to be staying in an Indian household, quite a few of my friends expressed the sentiment that Indian people smell like curry, and their houses even more so. First of all, that’s racist. Second of all, I’ve never experienced a smelly Indian person or house, so I can only conclude that these are mere ignorant stereotypes. Third of all, I like curry, so I guess it wouldn’t be such a bad prospect anyway.

The apartment exceeded my expectations in many ways. The size — oh my goodness, the size. I had only previously been inside two actual Hong Kong apartments, which were both rather tiny, but as I was not living in them, I didn’t really pause much to think about them. Living in the dorm seemed cramped, but the rooms were comparable to American college residencies. Seeing this apartment in its dwarven reality kind of blew my mind. The whole apartment [two bedrooms, living room, kitchen, bathroom] is smaller than my parents’ master bedroom [plus bathroom & walk-in closets]. Granted, my parents’ room is pretty huge, but fitting your whole life into a space this small is mind-boggling.

The washing machine, nestled in the kitchen, is big enough to hold maybe two pairs of jeans and a sweater. The shower is the nine square feet of tiles at the end of the narrow bathroom. Only the two bedrooms have windows. The [folding] kitchen table is the size of a nightstand. I have no closet. Aman’s bed is in the living room, as is the refrigerator. I would take photos of the place, but she’s kind of there all the time, so that would be awkward. I don’t think photos would do the place justice anyway — as someone who grew up in the suburbs of America, I would really have to see it physically to grasp the startling proportions.

The good thing about the apartment is that they keep it very clean. The bedrooms both have rugs to give a carpeted feel, and all three of my…roommates…are very particular about stowing things neatly and keeping everything tidy. The living room faintly smells of curry in the mornings because they eat dinner late, but other than that, I’m pretty impressed at how immaculate the place is. That’s good, because I’d probably shriek and faint if I so much as saw a hint of a cockroach indoors.

Due to the upcoming Chinese New Year holiday, during which pretty much everyone gets the week off, Bobby and Tracy have gone to India for two weeks, leaving Aman and me to get to know each other [not]. I’m still trying to figure out my relationship with her; considering her age, I’d like to be friends, but the language barrier is quite extreme. Having come from midwest America, I’m not really familiar or comfortable with the concept of having a domestic helper, especially a live-in one, which increases my feelings of uncertainty around her. I do wish that I could converse more with Aman and find out her story. My guess is that she was brought here from India to work as a maid so she could make money for her family back home. I can’t see any other reason for someone so young to waste her potential by spending her precious time taking care of a Hong Kong apartment and watching Indian TV.

After five days here, I’m still trying to settle in. Before coming, I imagined that I might be able to do some cooking, which I now have given up as impossible. Cooking takes a lot of supplies — you at least need a pan and some ingredients, of which I have none. I can’t ask if Bobby & Tracy would let me use their pots and fridge space because they’re in India, and even if I could, I don’t know if I would be motivated enough to. On one hand, it’s pretty easy to find a meal in Hong Kong. On the other hand, eating out all the time usually means an acute lack of any nutrients other than fat & carbs, so we’ll see how this goes.

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For those of you who don’t know, I am currently [back] in Hong Kong doing a magazine internship until the end of May.

The first time I traveled to Hong Kong was almost exactly two years ago. This trip is markedly different. For one, I won’t be living the carefree life of a study abroad student; I’ll be working full-time and trying [and failing] to support myself. I won’t have the automatic support system of living in a dorm with other students from abroad, and, having been in this city before, I now know what to expect and hopefully will make fewer mistakes.

Lately, I had been thinking about how it feels to say goodbye. My ruminating led me to conclude that in terms of normal relationships [that is, not death or break-ups], bidding a temporary goodbye is [or can be] harder than a permanent one. When you say goodbye to a friend forever, you leave with what are usually positive memories ingrained in your minds, and you are both free to support each other from afar with the help of technology. There are very few expectations or responsibilities.

A temporary goodbye is quite different. There is the knowledge — often more of a hope — that you will see each other again. That hope is easily crushed should uncontrollable circumstances arise. There are no guarantees, only the substantial expectation that both parties will fulfill the promise to reunite. I suppose all this is to say that I’m going to miss B very much, and I look forward to coming home if only to see him again.

My flight to Hong Kong was my first time flying on Korean Air. It was also the first time in a long time that I’ve ridden an airplane with individual television screens; I think the last time was when my family was flying to either China or Argentina, and I tried watching Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, but it bored me so I ended up watching Disney cartoons all night. [I was young! Stop judging me!]  These days, in-flight entertainment systems are even touch-screen, which reveals nothing except that I must be a Luddite for finding it all so new and remarkable. Before take-off, one of the flight attendants walked around offering passengers the use of an iPad, which didn’t seem to rouse much interest. “Nobody wants an iPad?” she ventured. I love all these options!

Having flown United for the great majority of my life, I was interested in spotting the differences between the two airlines. For one, Korean Air offers those over-the-ear headphones that people used to use with their Walkmans; I haven’t seen one in forever, and I wondered how many travelers these days would actually neglect to bring their own listening apparatuses. Seeing someone use that style of earphone with a touch-screen device would be so hipster. Each seat also contained a flat package that contained a pair of slippers, earplugs and a toothbrush — how homey!

Dad kindly booked window seats for me, and I sat in a row with two Chinese guys in their 20s. One thing I’d like to do at some point in my life is to make friends with the person next to me on a flight. For most people, flying usually means a time to pop in the earphones to try to drown out the screaming baby in the next row [there's always a baby], but it would be nice to meet the person you’re sitting next to for 13 hours, wouldn’t it? Alas, I didn’t find out this time.

People always like to read and make lists of “Words You’ll Have To Explain To Future Generations” or “Sounds Your Kids Will Never Hear” because there’s nothing quite like the power of collective nostalgia to make us feel like our lives were worth living. On the flight, I marveled at the freedom we used to have of bringing something as simple as a bottle of water from home onto the plane. I only barely remember those times — these current security measures seem to have been around forever and are now an ingrained part of the travel experience. I wonder what it would take to loosen or even lift them…will our kids ever have the liberty of flying terror-free?!

While flying over Russia, I decided to watch one of the short travel features offered as entertainment. It was called “Miraculous Mirror of the Sky,” about Bolivia’s Unuyi salt flat, which is a huge stretch of salt nestled between the Andes mountain ranges. As the flattest place on Earth [there's a place flatter than Kansas?], it reflects the sky like a huge mirror when even a centimeter of water collects on its surface. The faux-documentary seemed to have been originally in Japanese, as a young Japanese lady with ridiculously long fake nails played the tour guide. All dialogue was dubbed in English, and the cheesy narrator sounded like he cut his teeth working in a Disney theme park.

As we flew over South Korea, I remembered that the last time I flew to Korea, we were told that overhead photos of the country were prohibited [perhaps as a safeguard against North Korea? I don’t know]. That rule wasn’t repeated to us this time, probably because the sun had not yet risen. During the whole 13 hours from Chicago to Korea, I only went to the bathroom once. Being discombobulated from sleeping restlessly, I wasn’t really paying attention to my surroundings, but on the way out when I passed the particular bathroom I used, I noticed that the door had a sign that said “Ladies Only.” The other three were unisex. How curious!

I arrived in Incheon airport at 4AM Seoul time. B had been telling me about all the fun things that the airport had to offer until he realized that none of them would be open while I was there. Indeed, I read an issue of both Rolling Stone as well as Marie Claire@Work in the four hours between flights after taking a short nap and wandering around in the chilly transfer terminal. I was reminded that one of the reasons I looked forward to going to Hong Kong was because it was so much warmer than Chicago.

The flight to Hong Kong was mercifully uncrowded, and I ended up having a row to myself. I tried to watch a documentary called “Beneath Easter Island,” but it was riddled with bad, “ethnic” re-enactments, the theatrics of which took away from what I was trying to learn from the video. Instead, I browsed through the feature films and found that they had 1911, a Jackie-Chan-produced film about the Chinese revolutions of 1911. I was thrilled to discover it here because I hadn’t been able to locate it either online or in theaters prior to this.

Despite only covering the events of one year, the film seemed epic in scope, introducing many characters right before killing them off. The main three actors were Jackie Chan, Li Bingbing and the guy who played Sun Yat-Sen, but more important that the characters themselves is the film’s main focus: China. And for a movie like this, in which characters are rather underdeveloped and expendable, one can only really enjoy the movie if one cares about China. A story about one person is more effective than a story about many. As I’ve learned in journalism, an article about a statistic — four million deaths, three thousand stranded, etc. — is rarely as compelling as one that details the struggles of one person within that statistic.

Also, I’d like to know why the white people in Asian movies always have such cheesy, laughable acting. It’s as if these people are picked from the most melodramatic of western theater rejects. In any case, I wonder if Chinese people would feel satisfied after watching a movie of this content. Are they happy with where China’s government currently stands? Sure, it’s better than the feudal hegemony of ancient monarchies, but would the current communist-capitalist system make the revolutionaries proud? I wonder.

How’s that for a surprise film review? Anyway, I landed safely in Hong Kong; the rest of the tale will have to wait until the next post!

You literally only have those 2 options.

Yes. The answer in most cases is yes. Yet, Amanda Seyfried‘s character felt convicted enough about that question to have the gall to ask it at two different points during the movie. Unless you’re a superhero with a catchphrase, that’s not acceptable. Then again, she and Justin Timberlake‘s character pretty much thought of themselves as Robin-Hood-esque vigilantes, so I don’t doubt that she would’ve uttered that line more than twice if given the chance.

In the movie In Time, we’re dropped in the middle of this post-industrialized society where people have one year to live after turning 25, and they use their time as currency, dropping dead when the clock on their arm reaches zero. Apparently this is an attempt to fight overpopulation, though I guess I missed that part of the exposition. There are so many questions I had about this society: How could the beauty/anti-aging and pharmaceutical companies let this happen?? Who runs the government, and how the hell did they implement this universal biological clock? Have hospitals become obsolete because people [ostensibly] tend to die of being robbed of time as opposed to ailments from which they can be resuscitated? Did minorities get eradicated early on in this anti-population process? We’re thrown in with little context, but with movies like this, we’re just supposed to accept what we’re told to be reality. Just like when you’re playing Pokémon, it’s better not to ask questions.

For full disclosure, the reason I wanted to watch this movie because one of my favorite actors, Matt Bomer, is in it. Yes, he dies rather early on in the film [it's not a spoiler if it happened in the trailer!], but seeing him on the big screen was like a dream come true. I almost fainted with glee. His character philosophizes about life and death before “timing himself out ” [ie. suicide], which opens Timberlake’s eyes to the injustice around him.

In fact, there’s quite a bit of philosophizing in this movie. It comes out at an opportune time because the similarities to the Occupy Wall Street movement are easy to draw. The In Time society is separated into “time zones,” and only those rich with time are allowed out of the ghetto and into New Greenwich, which is one of those words [like Newfoundland] that should just be pronounced the way it’s spelled. Naturally, all the poor people in the ghetto rob each other and are themselves robbed by the powerful few, who control the markets and get to live forever. [They are the 1%!!!] It’s not hard to see the undertaking of a political message, but the film takes itself so seriously that the audience occasionally laughed when we weren’t supposed to. Oops.

Also, immortality seems like a throwback to villains of my childhood. Maybe it’s because I don’t watch cartoons anymore, but does anybody really want to live forever anymore?

[SPOILER]

At some point during In Time, the movie jumps on the crazy train and derails itself. For example, Timberlake and Seyfried concoct the brilliant plan to rob a bank that magically leaves its vault open and uses no guards. They do this successfully multiple times. In fact, the only times they get caught are when they’re in the street and not brazenly stealing from a vault. They make a sexy Bonnie-and-Clyde-esque couple, but there’s very little substance to their relationship, so it ends up being cringe-inducing. [I wanted to die during the strip poker scene.]

And who else expected “fighting” to mean “intense arm-wrestling”??

[END SPOILER]

Some brief character comments:

Justin Timberlake: Is he just a good citizen for the hell of it? Why does he feel obligated to rescue Henry Hamilton? Why don’t we get to learn more about his father? The character development is lacking.
Best quote: “No one should be immortal if even one person has to die.”

Amanda Seyfried:  She spends most of the movie in 5 inch heels, an impressive feat considering the sheer amount of sprinting she has to do. Kudos! Her character is introduced to us as a super creeper who just stares at Timberlake wordlessly from a distance for quite some time. It reminded me of Olivia Wilde‘s character from Tron. She’s reckless without much reason, and the way she falls for Timberlake after being held for ransom by him is nothing short of desperate.
Worst quote: “You talk like someone who comes from the ghetto. Sometimes I envy them.” Spoken like a truly out-of-touch 1%!

Cillian Murphy: His wardrobe, according to LC, comes straight out of The Matrix. I have to agree. I guess it’s always a challenge to dress these futuristic societies, eh? Somehow, I don’t expect knee-length leather jackets to come back in style at any point in the future, but I guess I could be wrong.

Vincent Kartheiser: As Amanda Seyfried’s father, he served his role as the insecure time tycoon very well. Maybe it’s because the villains get better material to work with, but his acting was the best, in my opinion.

Alex Pettyfer: I can’t believe he’s actually younger than me. Are minutemen like gangsters? Where do they get so much power? Do they work for the rich?

In the end, I’m glad that we don’t have to live like this — literally living day to day, with death looming as palpably as the green neon numbers on our arms. Writer/director Andrew Niccol is behind classics such as the Truman Show and Gattaca, but In Time isn’t his strongest work. He highlights a very real problem, but his solution is a bit too extreme and simplistic.

I had watched anime before, but it had never felt so…deep. [Arguably I had only watched questionable anime series that I don't even remember anymore.] Next was Princess Mononoke (1997), which I barely remember but for the wolf and the forest and the lake. Then, when Howl’s Moving Castle was released in 2004, I watched that one online too. Miyazaki didn’t create another feature film until I was in college, so in 2008, I was delighted to watch Ponyo. It didn’t seem as well-received among my friends, who deemed it weird and childish, but I enjoyed it nevertheless. After that, I waited until this summer to watch The Secret World of Arrietty (2010), which was beautiful to watch even though the storyline didn’t really go anywhere.

Now, I’m going through the archives, digging for films that were released before I was even born. I’m normally apathetic about watching old movies [there's barely enough time to watch all the new ones!], but I love animated films, and these are undoubtedly some of the world’s best. Besides, all the movies currently in theaters are mind-numbingly unappealing, so the choice was pretty easy. It doesn’t hurt that Miyazaki’s bio mentions a few times that he explores feminist themes by casting female characters as leads in his films. Could he be any more perfect and wonderful? Apart from that, some of Miyazaki’s expressed viewpoints remind me of Shel Silverstein, who also produced pieces for children in a deliberately non-condescending and non-patronizing way.

First on my list was Laputa: Castle In The Sky (1986). It came up in a Gchat conversation with VY, and I was all “what is this laputa, sounds like a spanish curse word” [those were my exact words], so I looked it up and decided to watch it. It’s weird to watch old-school animation that isn’t all slick like modern anime, but the hand-drawn style is one of Miyazaki’s many distinct charms, from the way food looks so freaking plump and delicious to the way a character’s facial expression and hair rises when he or she is alarmed.

Unfortunately, I had to watch Castle In The Sky dubbed in English instead of subbed because it’s just easier to find good downloads of the former. One of the joys of watching a Japanese movie is to hear an hour and a half of Japanese, which I consider to be a beautiful language. On the other hand, not having to read subtitles means getting to focus more on the visuals. I suppose for the full experience, I should watch both versions of the movie or simply learn Japanese.

As an ardent cloud enthusiast, I fully appreciate Miyazaki’s preoccupation with flight and the sky. I’ve always wanted to learn how to paint so that I could paint clouds…maybe my artist boyfriend will do it for me hehehe ahem anyway. It’s interesting to see a world where people live rather primitively, yet they have airships and floating islands and sentient robots.

This scenario also appeared in the next film I watched, Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind (1984). Kingdoms do battle with tanks and suppress peasants while princesses ride mysteriously-powered gliders to fend against huge armored insects. It’s a mish-mash of history and science fiction that becomes an authentic world for just a little while. I also had to watch the English dubbed version of this, and because I saw Shia LaBeouf’s name in the opening credits, I just couldn’t take any of his lines seriously.

After that, I proceeded to watch My Neighbor Totoro (1988). I had high expectations for this one because there’s quite a bit of hype with the Totoro-loving culture and whatnot. I found it to be incredibly cute thought rather simplistic. It didn’t explore any grandiose nature or war themes, so I guess it’d be a better film for children than adults. I do love the family in the movie; each of them were perfectly nurturing and helpful. I think I’d like to encourage my future children to believe in fantastical things, though there’s always a debate these days over any aspect of raising your children…

I watched Kiki’s Delivery Service (1989) on a night when I was in a bad mood, and it cheered me up significantly. I had no idea what it was going to be about and imagined a girl riding her bicycle around town, so the whole witch thing was a neat surprise. After all the drama in the Harry Potter series, it’s nice to see witches and humans getting along so well.

I loved everything about the movie. The flying, the cat, the beautiful German(?) town, the story of a 13-year-old girl bravely setting off to find her place in the world and do something useful. Most importantly, I think Miyazaki perfectly captured the internal struggles of an adolescent girl — one minute she’s laughing, the next minute she can’t find words to express her angst, she jokes about pancakes making her fat, and she worries about her appearance. These flaws make an otherwise faultless character relatable and endearing.

Unfortunately, the copy I downloaded had part of the end cut off, so perhaps I’ll never know whether Kiki and Jiji were able to communicate ever again…

After a long day, I wanted to watch something that wouldn’t require too much brainpower, so I chose Pom Poko (1994). I had read about it before on Cracked— yes, it’s the movie with raccoon testicles. I’ve seen a lot of weird cartoons, but this one probably tops them all for having such ridiculous characters yet harping on a “save the environment” motif. It’s been the only film so far during which I paused to note its weirdness instead of sitting through the entire thing. Of course, such weirdness lends itself well to humor, and this movie was hilarious. I was tempted to screencap all of the jokes but obviously that would ruin it for anyone who hasn’t seen it yet. Pom Poko’s straightforward style makes it almost seem like a parody of Japanese folklore and modern society. In fact, by the end, it pretty much becomes blatant social commentary.

I watched Whisper of the Heart (1995) on a relaxing Sunday afternoon. The song “Country Roads” played during the opening credits, and I texted B to tell him that I was watching a movie that featured that song in the beginning. [We have a random and brief history with that song.] He immediately guessed “anime?” which surprised me because Country Roads is not a typical anime song whatsoever. I told him the name of the movie and he said he had seen it before. I was amazed that he could recall the film from just the opening song, though later I realized  that the song shows up a few times throughout the story. Of the movie, B remembered that it was “very calm.”

Indeed: the story starts during a middle school girl’s summer break. Sure, there are high school entrance exams to worry about, but Shizuku spends most of her time reading library books, avoiding chores and chasing stray cats. Sounds like my kind of summer! She even writes song parodies! Obviously this girl and I need to be friends. Or are the same person.

Anyhow, “calm” can be another way of saying “dull” because unlike the charming, magical world of Kiki’s Delivery Service, Whisper of the Heart features Japanese adolescents in a typical Japanese town living out unremarkable lives and reacting to trivial matters such as love triangles [or pentagons]. Their cheeks turn pink when such matters arise, which is adorable. There are some genuinely hilarious parts in the movie, and I suppose that even the tedious parts reveal life-shaping experiences. The film reminded me of the first guy I “dated.” We were both 13. His family had to move to California, and I struggled with the unfairness of it all — two people who are finally together, then torn apart! — but eventually got over it.

Something about the art style of the film threw me off. Miyazaki characters tend to look pretty similar, but the ones in this movie were slightly different — bigger eyes and none of the dramatic hair-raising. Also, and I don’t know if it’s simply because none of the other characters I’ve seen have worn modern schoolgirl uniforms, but Shizuku’s legs looked severely awkward and disproportionate, which was rare for Miyazaki, who is usually quite precise in his portrayal of the human body and its movements. [I have a thing for legs.]

After seeing it alluded to in Whisper of the Heart, I naturally wanted to watch Porco Rosso (1992) next. It was the dubbed version, and at first I thought the main character sounded like George Clooney, but turns out it was Michael Keaton. He has a nice voice. I thought the dubs were going quite well until I realized that the setting was in the Adriatic Sea. Most of the characters speak with typical American accents, while the one prominently American character speaks with a severe southern drawl. On one hand, it’s annoying when movies get non-American accents wrong, but it’s also exasperating when they don’t even try. Oh Disney…

By now, it comes as no surprise that this movie is about flying. Unlike other Miyazaki films, this one has a substantial amount of adult-oriented content. There’s the serious tone of a very real war, obviously, plus the protagonist’s rather realistic sexist attitude and philandering habits [he actually refers to himself as a "womanizer"]. Despite the ending, Porco Rosso is one of my favorite movies of the Ghibli ones I’ve seen so far.

On a day when my Internet connection was refusing to work properly, I settled down to watch The Cat Returns (2002). Though produced by Studio Ghibli, it wasn’t a Miyazaki creation. The difference is almost immediately apparent: Though the artistic style is similar, the characters are drawn to more conventional anime proportions, with impossibly lanky legs and large pupils. The action also unfolds rapidly, whereas Miyazaki tends to take his time in setting up expository elements.

Cats are my favorite animal, so I’m pretty picky about the way they’re drawn and represented. Many animations fail to capture the infinite cuteness of cats, from the nuances of their movements to the sounds that they make. A movie about cats, however, is obligated to get it right, and The Cat Returns does cats justice. Interestingly, the Baron figurine from Whisper of the Heart makes a reappearance in this film.

The parts that take place in the Cat Kingdom are quite surreal and remind me of one of my favorite movies, The Fall. This movie is really short — only a little longer than an hour. If you read the history of the film, everything makes sense: the title, the familiar characters, the length of the film. The story is simple, but the message is strong for those who need to hear it: Believe in who you are. Sounds trite, but it’s exactly what I needed to hear at that moment. Amazing.

I started Tales From Earthsea (2006) one night when I was in need of something comforting to help me sleep. Unlike the majority of Studio Ghibli’s films, this one is about a boy. Although Miyazaki wanted to make Tales From Earthsea and even obtained hard-earned approval from the author of the book series to make the film, he was busy directing Howl’s Moving Castle and so passed it off to his son.

The plot of this one starts off somewhat convoluted, like something you’d expect from a typical life-action historical-fantasy film in the vein of Prince of Persia or Scorpion King. Or maybe I was just being extra critical due to my bad mood. Or maybe it’s because one of the main characters is named Sparrowhawk [I was watching the dubbed version]. You just can’t take a man named Sparrowhawk seriously. There’s also a girl in the movie, Theru. The voice acting for her character was so bad that I couldn’t even bring myself to like her — she doesn’t have many lines in the first half of the film, but the ones she has are uttered in Christian Bale’s Batman voice.

Actually, though, it’s probably because the story was adapted from a novel and wasn’t an original screenplay. Still, book-based movies still need to be able to stand alone as creative works. I’m not convinced that Tales From Earthsea does this successfully. The visuals were quite beautiful [sunsets galore!], but there were plot holes and inexplicable character behavior and important-seeming characters that are introduced and then cast aside. The ending isn’t very satisfying either. If this were a live-action film, it would probably be like Eragon, which I haven’t seen and wouldn’t want to.

Next, I tackled Only Yesterday (1991), which was neither directed nor written by Miyazaki. I found it to be rather dull, and it didn’t help that at first, I was confused by the time jumps. I was surprised to learn that this movie was quite successful in Japan, though it was no surprise that Only Yesterday “remains the only theatrical Studio Ghibli feature not yet released on home video in the United States.” I can’t imagine Americans being very entertained by the minutiae of an old-school Japanese childhood or a trip to the Japanese countryside that gives rise to reminiscing on those minutiae.

I suppose that the point of a banal movie is to say something about quotidian life. The flashbacks to Taeko’s childhood often realistically portray the dynamics of a [1960s] family, from the bickering among sisters to the father’s cold and impenetrable attitude.

Apparently, both the genre ["progressive realistic drama written for adults"] and the art style ["realistic facial muscles and expressions"] made Only Yesterday an atypical anime film. Unfortunately, neither of these really worked for me. Young Taeko is extremely cute [and weird], but grown-up Taeko is just…boring. I suppose the art style has its subtle charms [ie. their shapely noses, jawlines and eyebrows] after watching for a while, but my first impression wasn’t positive.

The final film I watched was Grave of the Fireflies (1988); it was produced by Studio Ghibli without any [credited] input from Miyazaki. I think I saved this one for last because I expected it to be depressing, and I watch movies to be inspired or entertained, not saddened.

The beginning of this movie doesn’t give much context — a homeless boy is resurrected by a tin of candy, and then we get an apparent flashback to some WWII air raid, during which the mother leaves her teenage son and toddler daughter to fend for themselves at home while she flees to a shelter. Okay…maybe I have to be a Japanese person to truly appreciate this.

There are some relatively gruesome scenes of charred and wounded bodies; the movie is unrated and it’s definitely not kid-oriented. A story like this puts into perspective that no matter how impatient I am with my current situation, it could always be worse. The deceased mother and absent father motif is rather Disney-esque, though this film is much more poignant than that, with a realism that is almost excruciating.

Grave of the Fireflies is heartbreaking. It’s not easy to watch in any capacity. While watching it, I just wanted to stop. When it ended, I didn’t want it to end — it couldn’t end like this; it was too tragic, too hopeless. It’s not the kind of ending somebody raised on the Hollywood happily-ever-after can easily accept. Also, I binged on rice the next day because rice has never looked as preciously delicious as in this movie.

I plan to watch From Up On Poppy Hill next, as soon as I can find it.

Now, after watching all these films, I can more fully appreciate the work that Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli create. These stories and animations were uniquely beautiful and inspiring, and not one of them would be considered a waste of time.

A tale of woe:

B is currently enrolled in an online class at Mizzou, which requires the textbook Presidential Leadership: Politics and Policy Making. He figured it would be easier to complete the assignments using an e-textbook instead of a physical one, so on Friday, he bought a copy from the only place it was available: CengageBrain.com. It wasn’t cheap, but he was paying for convenience.

The next day, B wanted to work on something for his class, so he tried to access his book. This is as far as he could get:

No matter what page or chapter he clicked on, only the preview version of the book was available. We were both flummoxed. He had very clearly made the purchase, and it very clearly showed up on his Cengage Brain dashboard:

You’ll notice that in the upper-right corner, it says that the “Unsealer” is “Not Installed.” Well, obviously that was the solution! We quickly went about installing the Oracle Unsealer Reader thing on his MacBook [which also required that he install Adobe Reader] and went back to access the book.

Same result: preview only. Back on the dashboard, it still said that the Unsealer wasn’t installed. Clicking on “Install Now” again led to this page:

Clicking “Verify Install” led to this page:

Seriously? Only Internet Explorer? This was getting ridiculous. B tried installing Unsealer on his brother’s PC laptop but got the same results. There was clearly a lot going wrong.

At this point, B had already wasted enough time in this fruitless effort and needed to study for his other classes, so he handed the reins over to me. Very well then!

We had two options: Either get someone to figure out why the book wasn’t working properly, or return the darn thing. I figured returning it would be the better choice, considering you can buy the book used for less than a dollar. The restrictions regarding returns are somewhat contradictory. Under FAQ, I found this:

But under Terms of Service, it says this:

The bigger problem was that apart from these mentions, I couldn’t actually figure out how to return a purchase. Nowhere on the site could I find a “Returns” page or option. I was flummoxed. If I am unhappy with my purchase [especially if I am hindered from actually using it], I have every right to return it, right? It was time to contact customer service.

CengageBrain.com recommends that people use their 24/7 technical support, so I complied. I poked around on that website and even found a video tutorial on how to use CourseSmart, which was both hilarious and unhelpful. ["Simply click 'Open' and you'll have instant access to your book." NOT!]

I decided to file a case, so I wrote a brief summary of the problem and submitted it. I was then given the option of chatting with a support person, which was what I was looking for in the first place. “Kenneth,” however, proved to be pretty useless. Our unsatisfying conversation:

What’s up with the “Tier 2 level of support” holding everyone back? The main point I gathered from this was that the buyer basically has no power. I understand that the ebook business is a bit different than simply returning a pair of shoes, but I find it absurd that I have to wait an ambiguous length of time to receive an email approval for my return when they give me a 2-week time limit to complete the process. What if they just filibuster my complaint into obscurity?

I couldn’t get very far with CengageBrain, so I decided to try CourseSmart. I don’t understand why it takes two different companies to read one etextbook, but I guess the reading material is hosted on CourseSmart while CengageBrain…takes the money? Except you can also purchase the ebook on CourseSmart. I don’t know what the point of CengageBrain is anymore.

When I went to the CourseSmart “Bookshelf,” this is what I saw:

“Free Trial”?! “Add to Cart”??? Are you kidding me?? B already paid for this book! That is just messed up.

Fortunately, the CourseSmart Help page is infinitely more useful than that of CengageBrain, which at this point seemed more and more like a scam. CourseSmart offers instructions on where to go if you’d like to process a refund, so I dutifully followed its directions and wound up here:

Well. Nothing to refund, eh? I had no choice but to call CengageBrain’s customer service and inquire into their utter uselessness.

When you call CengageBrain’s customer service, there’s a long preemptive spiel geared toward people who are having trouble accessing their purchases. Is this a common problem, or do they just get a lot of stupid questions?

I waited for a while to get through to a real person, and it didn’t take too long for her to approve our refund and process it. I wanted to get to the bottom of our technical issue of not being able to use our ebook, but it wasn’t worth wasting my minutes waiting for an explanation. In the end, we ordered the physical version of the textbook for a dollar and definitely wouldn’t try CengageBrain again.

COUSIN 2

Tian is the daughter of my mother’s second oldest sister [my 二姨]. I think Tian is about four years older than me, though I don’t know exactly. Having just come [immigrated?] from China this past July, she’s currently doing grad school in Houston. This family history is a bit more complicated simply because I’ve spent a lot more time with her family than Jerry’s family. I might get a bit too honest in the following writing, so I sincerely hope that any family members who read this can forgive my unkind thoughts.

I don’t recall ever actually meeting Tian’s biological father. For as long as I can remember, my aunt has been married to my least favorite uncle [step-uncle?], somebody to whom I’m thankful not to be related by blood. This uncle was always a chain-smoker and somewhat heavy drinker, which repulsed my conservative 11-year-old self, but it was his personality that always struck me as most vile.

He always had an air of arrogance [as well as a slight resemblance to Hitler in my paranoid 11-year-old mind]. As a pretty successful English teacher, he made more money than most of my other relatives in China. One time during a meal at a restaurant when I was rather young, my relatives wanted to see who had better English, me or my uncle. So he threw out a word, which I’ve long forgotten, and I probably didn’t know the meaning. After some thought, I responded with “golden retriever.” Ha! That definitely stumped him as he attempted to draw some kind of sports connection out of it. I remember being pleased with my small victory but also annoyed at having to play this kind of stupid game with an adult.

My abhorrence of this uncle meant that I hated visiting their apartment. Unfortunately, this particular aunt has a personality very much like my mother’s: very, very pushy. Like my mother’s other two sisters, she adored my brother and me and would always insist on spending time with us whenever we visited our hometown of Shenyang, which meant going to their home. Last summer when I traveled to China by myself, I realized that I was pretty helpless to stand up to my more demanding relatives without my mother around to protect me. LOL.

Some relatives.

Tian is very much like her mother, which meant that I’ve always been somewhat intimidated by her. I have three other older cousins in China, and Tian was the only one with whom I rarely felt a close, sisterly bond. See, she and her mother are almost exactly alike except that my aunt has mellowed out with age while Tian still needs to soften her sharp edges. At this point, it gets hard to describe her personality because I feel like there’s too much to say; I wanted to write all this last year after visiting my relatives but never got around to it. It’s also a pretty harsh analysis of the people who love me and probably don’t deserve this kind of treatment. So there isn’t much justification I can give other than saying that I just need to get it out.

Tian and my aunt are the kind of people who act like they know everything even when they don’t. If it’s clear that they’re wrong, then they’ll make some kind of excuse, shift the blame or change the subject. This kind of personality, I believe, is an attempt to cover up insecurities. While they’re loud and outspoken in certain, more comfortable situations [Tian has no qualms about prodding me about my weight], they immediately clam up in unfamiliar spaces. Tian’s youth allows her to get through events such as large family reunions with more social grace than my poor aunt [and her unsavory husband, whom I suspect my other relatives merely tolerate as well]. It might seem like a universal truth that people are less outgoing in strange territory, but honestly the only instances I’m talking about are the large family gatherings, where they as a familial unit seem awkward and out of place among my father’s more boisterous side of the family.

In observing these kinds of situations, I feel a mixture of sympathy and aversion, which I suppose isn’t an abnormal mélange of emotions regarding family. I want what’s best for the people I love, but at the same time, I know them a little too well and can see inside them a little too clearly.

I thought pretty deeply about their family during my visit last summer. I noticed that my uncle was drinking more than usual, staying out late almost every night to drink with his friends. There was almost zero affection between him and my aunt, and it made me wonder why they married in the first place. They’re so different — how could they end up liking each other, much less falling in love?

My secret theory was that after her divorce, my aunt needed someone to provide for her and Tian, and my uncle [he might have been a divorcee too, I don't remember] needed a family to come home to and provide some kind of purpose for his money-making. It sounds heartless for me to be speculating about a situation of which I know nothing, but my mind often envisions the worst possible scenario in any given situation, so that’s how I ended up with that conjecture.

You’ve probably noticed that I’ve spent the past 900 words decidedly neglecting to talk about Tian’s visit to our home. This is because I barely spent any time with her. When my parents first told me that she was coming, I imagined staying up late talking about life and boyfriends and such. It probably took mere hours for that anticipation to be replaced with a slight feeling of dread as I recalled her abrasive personality.

As things turned out, I was unexpectedly busy during Labor Day Weekend and didn’t have much time to hang out anyway. I would be in my room working on a story and Tian would come in to ask me something or another, such as why my room was so messy [looked okay to me] and whether she could see my diploma [it was downstairs]. Each time, I would have to tell myself to be positive while immediately feeling bad for having to force it.

I knew she meant well, but I have a very low tolerance for inane questions, and some conversations we had were downright silly. So the second floor of our house has two bathrooms: one between my room and the guest room and one in my parents’ bedroom. On the first night, after my brother came out of our shared bathroom [which has two sinks], Tian asked me without a trace of jest, “If your parents have their own bathroom and your brother uses this one, which one do you use?” What? Obviously I bathe in the mud pit in the backyard. Duh.

Another time, my brother came home from school/somewhere and went into our bathroom while she was in her room, and she came out and randomly asked me who was using the bathroom. Well, if it’s not me and not my parents who have their own bathroom, then it must be the ghost who lives in the attic! What is it to you anyway? At the time I could only avert my gaze and give her a serious answer, but afterward, I was left scratching my head. And despite her stepfather being an English teacher and presumably being an excellent English student in China, she refused to speak any English to me or my brother while visiting. She could barely even recall the English titles of the American shows she asked me about. Maybe she was just self-conscious.

If I sound like a mean person, it’s because I am. I couldn’t be bothered to take time out of my “busy” schedule to hang out with my cousin who flew all the way from China then all the way from Texas, and it was simply because I didn’t love her enough, in feeling or action. I’ve realized that it’s often family members who best reflect your true self, whether it’s a deep love that causes me to do all kinds of random favors for my brother or the just-as-deep ambivalence that results in me not being able to help him with his more profound issues.

I hope I can make it up to Tian someday. Now that she’s in America long-term, maybe we’ll be able to grow close as cousins one day. Maybe.