Recent Blog Posts



All Recent Posts

fight of the decade

Submitted by on

I'm not a big fan of prize fighting.

But I am a big fan of the Philippines. In fact, I lived on the island of Bohol for close to four months back in ought six with my then girlfriend and well, as is my MO, I've since moved on.

I'm back in AmericA. And one thing that I have with me here in America, after my many years in Asia, after nearly a year of my life spread over the last 10 years in the PI, one thing that I'm wearing right now is a Manny Pacquiao tee shirt that I won at some shopping mall's giveaway in 2006. It's a Dolly Tuna tee shirt with his picture on the back. It was then I first heard of this prize fighter who was a hot up and coming boxer.

On November 15, 2009 in Las Vegas, Manny Pacquiao fought Miguel Cotto for the WBO Welterweight Championship title and it was not a 'Filipino' event. It was a world wide sports event. I had the pleasure of being in Angeles City, the most 'Westernized' city in the Philippines on that day in November and all along the strip, bars were charging 300 peso consumable cover charge for the fight. That means, entrance is free, but you have to drink at least 300 pesos worth of beverages. That's like 6 bucks. Also, the nearby, newly created MARQUIS MALL, in their cineplex, they would be showing the fight live in the theater on a big screen, and they charged a non-consumable admission.

Being that the fight would be shown live, LV time, and that Pacaio probably wouldn't fight till about 11:00 since the program began 9 am and there were two preliminary fights...

I basically hung out at my favorite hotel, the Ponderosa, which is far enough from the strip to be in another world than the Tijuana-esque Angeles strip, but close enough to get there after a short 20 minute walk. I ended up watching the fight live via the internet on a computer with the entire staff of the Ponderosa, many of whom I know since I've began staying at the Ponderos years ago. I'd retired relatively early the night before, and in the morning had coffee, cinnamon (sic) toast, and did laps in the pool. It was 10ish. I was lounging around the pool area. Shortly thereafter, the fight began.

The day before I'd read an opinion article in some Filipino daily about how Pacquiao no longer belongs to the Philippines. That with his house in Beverly Hills and his many other houses around the globe and his many millions of dollars, he is now a global player. Be that as it may, Pacquiao still hangs with local Filippinos everywhere he goes, be in Manila or Las Vegas. He is still one the people. And that's a large reason why he is loved so much by all his compatriots. He was born on the island of Cebu and for Cebuanos he is god. I was drinking in a bar the night before the fight with this Filippino man who was telling me that he's got his life savings -- 3 grand -- riding on the fight. And that if Manny loses, as he told me, 'My wife's gonna kick me out of my house!' Good thing Manny won.

One week before, I'd seen the movie, Once we were Kings, which is a documentary of the Ali-Foreman fight in Zaire back in the 70's -- 'Rumble in the Jungle' they billed the fight. It was mc'd by Howard Cosell. James Brown played a show the before the fight. Watching that kind of put me in the mood for a championship bout.

I remember in the days before my trip to the PI, days before the fight. I was on Cheju Island. I'd just returned to Korea after five and a half months in Nepal and India. It was cold. I was leaving for America in three weeks and had little choice but to find somewhere warm. The PI. 80,000 won each way on Cebu Pacific Air. I was at THE BAR, staying upstairs with J, the owner and whilst shooting pool downstairs, the name Effren 'Bata' Reyes came up. He's a big name among pool enthusiasts. In terms of Famous Filippino Athletes, Bata and Pacman are probably the most famous. I can't think of any others.




In closing. After spending 40 days in Nepal, 3 months in India, 2 more weeks in Nepal, 3 days Thailand, 7 days PI, 1 week Korea, 10 days PI, 4 more days Korea, I've returned to Los Angeles to begin the next phase of my life -- becoming a published/paid author. "In this economy?!?!"

Yes. Wish me luck. It's gonna the fight of the decade.

Canada trip- Winnipeg, Manitoba

Submitted by on

Alright you can check out the video of my trip from Vancouver to Winnipeg in Canada. Winnipeg is the city I grew up in. When I went back I went to the Manitoba Museum, the forks, the BDI and a Winnipeg Blue Bombers game. By the end of the day I have compiled 2-4 hours of footage on two cameras. I then cut that footage into the five minute video you see here. The video features music by The Weakerthans. The song is titled “One great City”. I was in Winnipeg for my birthday and figured that being back in Canada I would finally have my name(Jeff) spelled right. Apparently I was wrong. The best Pizza in the world! My grandmother. She is 93 years old and still bowls every Monday.

Honeymoon: Food in Macau

Submitted by on

One of Macau's most famous landmarks is the remaining facade of a cathedral known as the Ruins of St. Paul's. Originally Asia's largest cathedral, all that remains is the southern entrance, with the rest being destroyed by fire a couple of hundred years ago. The Macanese government set up a restoration effort in the 90's and now it's listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The structure has intricate carvings depicting different religious events. It emanates an impressive contrast, lavishly decorated due to the riches of the time, but now an entrance to nothing but empty sky.

Nearby is the newly built Museum de Macau. In general I'm interested in museums, but some are much better than others. For some reason I usually get pretty bored in craftsmanship or maritime museums.

Museum de Macau is pretty good.

The museum begins with the history of the Portugese settlers meeting the local Chinese inhabitants. The first explorers of the time often encountered kingdoms who, at that point, had only heard stories of other countries far away. It must have been like First Contact in Star Trek.

The photo above shows a model layout of an old fireworks factory. The Chinese invented gunpowder and Macau was once an exporter of fireworks to the West. In the middle of the compound is a lake with a hut built over it. This was where they used to store the more volatile chemicals. On the bottom right are the packing facilities, with concrete blast walls.

I think I would have chosen to be a fisherman in those times.

In the photo above is the world's scariest coat hanger. The irony here being that a lot of time and effort probably went into making this thing for a small child, only for that same child to be terrified of opening the wardrobe.

Here's Heather sitting in one of the openings on top of the museum complex, which was originally a smaller fort. The openings were for cannons to fire upon unruly neighbours.

Semi-tropical areas like Macau get a lot of sun, which stimulates the rapid growth of foliage. The museum grounds are typically Macanese, with a nice blend of faded stonework and greenery.

You don't see too many stone benches around the place these days. Which is a shame really, because they tend to last a few hundred years and never need to be painted. Perhaps when I retire, I shall become a stonemason.

And perhaps not, also.

We left the museum grounds and went for a winding walk to try and find the main road. A noticeable difference between the apartments in suburban Hong Kong and those in Macau are that the Macanese ones have cages around them. Good for security, but can be a problem if there's a fire.

And here's an interesting mix of Portugese and Chinese in a name: Edificio Kam Lin.

It seems that the pleasure to be derived from spending hours finding a miniscule stripey man in a crowd knows no borders.
When I was young, some other kids in the school library had already circled the location of Wally on all the pages, in a bright green highlighter. I remember being somewhat displeased at the accelerated reading experience.

After a fairly pleasant walk, it was time to eat. When travelling, Heather and I usually try to find small restaurants that are popular with the locals. A good trick is to buy something at a store, and then ask the shop attendant to recommend a good local place to eat.

For entree' we had a fish curry sandwich. Three of my favourite foods, all in one.

And in the photo above is ostrich meat. More interesting than the fact that they sell ostrich meat, is that they garnish it with Pringles on the side. Quite common in Macau.

I'd never eaten ostrich before, but I've heard it's popular in some places. It doesn't taste like giant chicken, as one might expect. More like a mixture of pork and beef.

And we also had spaghetti in octopus ink. Octopus ink is slightly salty and tastes nothing like real ink, which you may have had the misfortune to taste if you chewed your ballpoint pens in middle school. The flavour was pretty agreeable and had subtle seafood undertones. On the top was a battered fish fillet.

Probably Macau's most famous delicacy are these egg tarts. I had read about them in a tourist brochure and was eager to try them. Even though I don't like sweet things.

Well, they were alright.

And I guess Macau's second most famous delicacy is meat jerky. I say meat jerky because it's made from all sorts of things from the animal kingdom. Best not to ask.

That guy you can see in the middle was one of a number of vendors giving out free samples. By walking from one end of the street to the other and trying every sample on offer, one could easily consume enough jerky to never want to come back.

And then we ended up back where we started, looking at the Ruins of St Paul's again. I like it when I find myself back where I started again, and it gives a nice rounded feeling to a blog post.

But to take us out this week is a pharmacy sign proclaiming a lack of fake products. Makes you really wonder about the pharmacy next door, that suspiciously has no such disclaimer evident.

Perhaps they just can't read English and spend the days wondering why all the customers go next door.

Well, that's all for me this time. See you soon!

Image for the Day

Submitted by on

I just got back from an all-afternoon urban hike around Busan. The weather was gorgeous and the air clear - it was a lovely way to kill an afternoon (and burn some calories...). On the way back I took the path along the Oncheoncheon - a small river that runs near my house. At one point I passed a disheveled man sitting on the ground next to the walking/bike path. He looked extremely drunk or batshit crazy or more likely, both. What cemented this was the fact that he was EATING DIRT. That's right, he was taking huge handfulls of dirt, stuffing them into his mouth, and trying to chew and choke them down. He was gagging and slightly moaning, but he kept at it, as if possessed by a dirt-eating demon. An older Korean guy had noticed it was well, and looked at me with the same look of shock and disbelief that was undoubtably on my own face.

Should I have done something? I tend to give anyone that nuts a very wide berth.

Gwangwho? Gwangju!!

Submitted by on

Would you say either of these photos is worth losing a cell phone?





yeah.
Me neither.


This is how the weekend reunion began in Gwangju. The plan was to meet an old friend from my school days in Ireland and run around town for the weekend.
But then .... 20 mins into the visit, before I met up with the girl, I lost my cell phone.

PANIC!!!!


Oh My God!
I don't have her number written down.

Oh My God!
If I lose her now I'll never find her in this town!

Oh My God!
Why didn't I just take the ride with the Mormons who approached me and offered a lift?

Oh My God!

I immediately jumped into the first empty cab I could find and dashed to the train station... and found the girl ... and then we doubled back AAANNNNNDDDD look who we found taking a nap in the grass.




So we shopped and ate, and drank and ate, and drank and danced in order to reward ourselves for our sleuthing skills.








Some of the classy art on display in our class motel.














It was alot of fun.
.... and then MB's bus took a wrong turn on the way to Suwon and it took her too many hours to get home.







Jinju Fortress

Submitted by on

17 Oct 2009, I come to Jinju to explore the history of JinjuSeong fortress as the Joseon Dynasty fought against the Japanese Invasions of the 1590's.

Off Screen

Submitted by on

We travelled all over Busan looking for a television, but it rapidly began to feel like there were only three types of stores - the official manufacturer outlets of Samsung and LG, the second-tier electrical stores Hi-Mart and Etland, and the third tier volume discounters E-Mart and Tesco Home plus (sic). And this pretty much summed up the price differences as well, so inevitably it wasn't long before we had worked our way down the pricing scale and were honing in on buying from 'Home plus'.

Not that price was in any way a fixed concept as it turned out. It's understood where I come from that while there is some scope for negotiation in the large 'high street' electrical chains, it might be considered lucky to shave 10% from the advertised price - and negotiating in a Tesco supermarket is normally out of the question. By comparison, it didn't take long to realise that the prices on the store stickers in Korea bore no relation whatsoever to the price one might actually be expected to pay, with staff discounting the advertised prices by up to 40% without batting an eyelid. It reached a point where I started mentally discounting everything I saw by 30% as a rough guide before converting it into British Pounds - which I'm still given to do in order to consider its attractiveness, and we rapidly learnt to enter a store and immediately ask what the 'real price' of a particular model was

Presumably having sticker prices which bear no relation to the actual price is meant to encourage the notion of having found a bargain in Korea, but I just found it annoying; every now and again there would be a price that would look genuinely good, but the staff would go on to explain that as this was a special offer they could only discount a little from the sticker price. If there was consistency in advertised pricing and the discounting, it would have been much easier. I was left wondering what the point was. At least it explains why Samsung and LG TVs appeared to be more expensive in Korea than the UK - something which has always mystified me; they probably weren't - it just looked that way. Hefty discounting was rampant from the manufacturer's branded stores down to the likes of 'Home plus'.

There's another thing which they all had in common - the range of manufacturers to choose from - Samsung or LG. Yes, you might spot the occasional rather neglected-looking Sony Bravia LCD here or there desperately trying to undercut the domestic brands - but otherwise, you were choosing one or the other. Confusingly, not that Samsung and LG TVs are actually branded Samsung and LG. No, on the whole, for Samsung read PAVV, and for LG read Xcanvas. You might very well wonder why, when you've invested a considerable amount in creating brand names like Samsung and LG, you'd want to hide it from your products, and so do I, but that's the way things are here. LG is Xcanvas for TVs, and DIOS for refrigerators, whereas Samsung is PAVV for TVs, Hauzen and Zipel for refrigerators, and so on. I'm sure there's some method to it, and to be fair I can see it creates the (false) sense of living in a more diversified society with more consumer choice, rather than a two-horse town (as my American cousins would call it) or more appropriately, a duopoly. And perhaps, if you're living in a rather shoddily constructed LG apartment block (for instance), you might be less motivated to go out and buy an LG TV because there's that logo again from your ill-fitting window frame (yes, I do live in an LG-built apartment block and yes, the logo is everywhere).

If by some chance we wanted to live the LG life any more than we already did, we could buy an Xcanvas LCD with a built-in 'Time Machine' hard disk and IPTV system to deliver video on demand. In principle, this seemed like an option because we hadn't yet decided which cable TV provider to subscribe to. However, this was discouraged by one particularly knowledgeable and younger store assistant, who pointed out the redundancy of paying for video on demand when 'everything is on the Internet (in Korea) within fifteen minutes of it being broadcast'. Good point.

Everything may be on the Internet in Korea, but surprisingly, shopping for TVs online proved more complicated than in the UK, where it is a given that the likes of Amazon, Play.com and Ebuyer would offer the best prices. Yes, there are large 'online malls' such as Auction and Gmarket, but these really serve as venues for a style of peer-to-peer trading which has more in common with the eBay model. Consequently, there are real trust issues involved, and potentially scant protection from fraud in a country that - as far as I can tell - thanks to the power of the Chaebols was never big on consumer rights in the first place.

So when we chose to buy our 42" Xcanvas LCD from 'Home plus', it was in the full knowledge that the cheapest Internet price was almost 15% less. As it turned out though, it was about this time that our friends who were getting married wanted to buy a TV for their new apartment, and through a personal contact of theirs who worked at a 'Home plus' store, coupled with an additional discount for buying two TVs together, we actually ended up getting a better price than on the Internet. Buying locally also meant that we had an engineer come round from the store and set it up and test it for us, which might not sound like a big job, but did involve the annoyance of extending an existing TV socket which saved us some work. He gave us his card before he left as is the norm here.

And as it turned out, for the first time we actually came to use one of these cards for an after-sales enquiry. Our three-year old PCs don't have HDMI outputs, but I did bring a DVI-to-HDMI cable with me from the UK, which I'd been using to link to a TV there. Since DVI doesn't carry sound, this requires an additional audio cable, but I was unable to get this working with the Xcanvas. The engineer was able to suggest a solution over the phone which worked. Another win for Korea's customer service ethic. So once again we are able to watch Hulu properly...
--

Source: Busan Mike

—

Busanmike.blogspot.com
 
Twitter:  @BusanMike
YouTube: /BusanMikeVideo
Flickr:  /busanmike
 

Singapore Street Food Exhibition

Submitted by on

Yesterday I attended a Singapore National Museum exhibition on street food. Housed in one of the museum's "Living" exhibition halls, Eating on the Streets documents the city's relationship with street food over the years. On display are several antique food stalls, as well as numerous artifacts from Singapore's colourful history of mobile catering.



Along with accompanying video and text, these artifacts tell the stories of a dozen or so of Singapore's most famous street dishes. One of these was Roti Prata, a type of flat bread predominantly made by Singapore's Indian community, which has its etymological roots in both the Malay and Hindi languages (Roti is Malay for bread, whilst prata is a corruption of the Hindi paratha.) The flatbread, as the exhibit explained, is a unique evolution of the paratha that is only found in Singapore, and a good example of how cultural exchange and innovation has fueled the City-State's culinary growth.


Another exhibit demonstrated the advertising methods of the Tok Tok Mee sellers. The vendor's young assistant would walk through the neighbourhood beating a bamboo stick against a wooden block. Different sizes of Bamboo would make different tones, which in turn would signify the type of noodle used in the dish.


It also featured an excellent display on the various ingredients used in Singaporean cooking, explaining how they are used, and in many cases, how they got to the island in the first place. Besides getting a little training in for the identification round of masterchef goes large, I learned that nutmeg is a hallucinogen, (though eating a whole one would most likely kill you.)

The exhibition is free between 6pm - 8pm, but at all other times a 10 dollar ticket gets you into the museum's incredible history exhibit. I strongly urge anyone interested in the city's history and food to attend.

Singapore Street Food Exhibition

Submitted by on

Yesterday I attended a Singapore National Museum exhibition on street food. Housed in one of the museum’s “Living” exhibition halls, Eating on the Streets documents the city’s relationship with street food over the years. On display are several antique food stalls, as well as numerous artifacts from Singapore’s colourful history of mobile catering.


Along with accompanying video and text, these artifacts tell the stories of a dozen or so of Singapore’s most famous street dishes. One of these was Roti Prata, a type of flat bread predominantly made by Singapore’s Indian community, which has its etymological roots in both the Malay and Hindi languages (Roti is Malay for bread, whilst prata is a corruption of the Hindi paratha.) The flatbread, as the exhibit explained, is a unique evolution of the paratha that is only found in Singapore, and a good example of how cultural exchange and innovation has fueled the City-State’s culinary growth.

Another exhibit demonstrated the advertising methods of the Tok Tok Mee sellers. The vendor’s young assistant would walk through the neighbourhood beating a bamboo stick against a wooden block. Different sizes of Bamboo would make different tones, which in turn would signify the type of noodle used in the dish.

It also featured an excellent display on the various ingredients used in Singaporean cooking, explaining how they are used, and in many cases, how they got to the island in the first place. Besides getting a little training in for the identification round of masterchef goes large, I learned that nutmeg is a hallucinogen, (though eating a whole one would most likely kill you.)

The exhibition is free between 6pm – 8pm, but at all other times a 10 dollar ticket gets you into the museum’s incredible history exhibit. I strongly urge anyone interested in the city’s history and food to attend.

Pages

more
Subscribe to Koreabridge MegaBlog Feed