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Saturday, November 05, 2005

NaNoWriMo Progress Report (Day 4)

Excerpts:


He plunged his hand into the pregnant woman's stomach, ripping out the fetus, squirming and oozing with blood. Laughing sadistically, he tossed the fetus into a cooking pot and started cooking.

It was going to be a fine night indeed.

The woman let loose a high-pitched scream, crumbling onto the floor like a rag doll, her stomach a gaping hole. Annoyed by her, he picked up a sledge hammer and bashed her head repeatedly until it was reduced to nothing more than a bloody pulp. Laughing in amusement, he licked the bits of brains and skulls off his hammer.


Junichiro Tanizaki - Naomi

Naomi by Junichiro Tanazaki
Description from amazon.com: Naomi is the first English translation of Tanizaki's first important novel (originally serialized in Japanese in 1924-25). It is a subtle adaptation to a Japanese setting of the basic story in Maugham's Of Human Bondage . Joji, the narrator, finds Naomi, a girl half his age, working in a cafe. He takes her to live with him, tries to groom her (with English and music lessons), indulges her whims, encourages her ``Western'' ways, and eventually marries her. She becomes a torment to him, but he is so obsessed with her that he tolerates even her infidelities as long as she will stay with him. The recurrent theme in Tanizaki's novels of the danger in sexual fascination may here represent a self-criticism of his youthful preoccupation with things.

Friday, November 04, 2005

NanoWriMo Progress Report (Day 3) Trying a Fantasy name generator

I managed to write 2200+ words, which brings my total to 5636, I'm still almost 400 short. I realized that many NanoWriMo writers from Malaysia are writing fantasy stuff, which is quite a surprise considering that just eight years ago, when I was form 1, my oral presentation about the fantasy genre was scoffed at, with most people being amused, or awed by my good looks, than really listening to what I said. Guess Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings have helped many in jumping onto the fantasy bandwagon.

Well, for me, coming up with names is always the hardest thing to do whilst writing fantasy, thus I use the Fantasy Name Generator. Great thingie to abuse. Hah!

More excerpts from what I've written thus far.

Eliar applauded when the man finished his poem by intoning the numerous ‘x’s, (twenty-three of them, Eliar counted) unfortunately, he was the only person clapping his hands. The other patrons were barely paying any attention. Lloyd was busy drinking his beer, while the other two, a young couple, were busy flirting and giggling.

“Seriously, I can never understand his poems.” Lloyd whispered.

“I don’t either.” Eliar agreed.

Thanking Sanford graciously for giving him a small bag of gold coins, Justinius got off from the table he was standing on and moved over to sit near Lloyd and Eliar.

“Ah. Eliar Swiftfire, I didn’t expect to see you here. What do you think of my poem?” Justinius asked, grinning.

“It’s great.” Eliar nodded while desperately finding words to praise the poem, but finding himself at a loss for words. He KNEW he was a MIGHTY wizard, but not a wordsmith nor a poet, so he could only settle for something simpler. “It’s really deep and stuff. Totally cultured, man.”

“Aye.” Lloyd added nonchalantly before ordering another mug of beer.

Thursday, November 03, 2005

NanoWriMo Progress Report (Day 2)

3400 words written. 600 short from my target. As you can see by now, I'm targeting 2000 a day. I'm rather disappointed.

This story I'm writing now was meant to be a bridge between my unfinished novel and my Blogathon story (check my August archives, for crap's sake), a pseudo-prequel to the former and a pseudo-sequel to the latter, however, to really do that can be pretty restricting, My Blogathon story good enough as a standalone, leaving everything else to my readers' imaginations, while my unfinished novel is a product of my teenage fantasies, and writing style, so it is not good enough for me to use it now. Elements can be borrowed, but I can't based everything on it. What I write now HAS TO BE a standalone.

This means that I'm not working with a preexisting template, and without proper worldbuilding and planning. And also, in a way, creative collaboration fucked up my own vision, because I didn't really have any idea what was it that I was trying to write back then, an epic storyline about WHAT??? I had to frequently compromise some of the stuff I wanted with my partner (and he had to suffer the same fate as well). It was all bits and pieces of his ideas, and then mine. I was unable to reach the 4000 mark last night because I was so confused with the main plot that I had to visit Justin and try to spill out my original plan to him. Not because I wanted reassurance, but more like I wanted to articulate my ideas. It was something I used to do with my little sister in the past. Not being the type of person who keeps a note for stuff, this is my own method of remembering story ideas.

And this kinda brings me to an amusing incident with Kyels last night, when I sent her what I've written for NanoWriMo thus far, and immediately within five seconds, she told me it was 'cool!' and 'it has a cool storyline'. My jaw almost dropped open. I guess due to the fact that Kyels herself wasn't really into creative writing, she didn't really grasp the concept of me sending the story to her. And thus when I said "I need a reader!", it became more like I was seeking reassurance for what I've written.

Wednesday, November 02, 2005

NanoWriMo Progress (Day 1)

2122 words thus far. Two seemingly unrelated plot threads that take place in a world that is a fusion of fantasy and science fiction, where my imagination is boundless. It always sucks that so many fantasy writers out there allow themselves to be restrained by D&D rubbish, and not go further than that. And seriously, there are too many Pratchett wannabes out there whose smug and condescending prose style annoy more than amuse, but then, I was even worse than a Pratchett wannabe (since I've only read ONE Discworld book, and Good Omens, which he did with Neil Gaiman), I was a Pratchett wannabe wannabe whilst writing fanfics.

I was a fan of such writing, but when every Tom, Dick and Harry and their moms and grandmothers started praising praising Pratchett as if he were a god, not to say emulating his writing style as well, it was impossible for me not to feel mildly annoyed. It's not as if Discworld's the only fantasy series out there anyway.

Some excerpts of what I've written.

The sorceress muttered and groaned in her sleep. Despite his annoyance, Erik remained silent, carefully searching for an inn. She was heavier than he had expected, and he was soon bathed in sweat, panting and gasping for air. Above him, flocks of dragons flew past, accompanied by dozens of witches in brooms, laughing and singing.

“Damn. Another one of those illegal races again.” A man nearby grunted, looking up into the sky. “Can’t even get a good night’s sleep these days because of them.”

Tuesday, November 01, 2005

Joining NanoWriMo, here's what I'm going to write

And thus, I ended up joining NanoWriMo. Why? Because there is a story that has been floating in my mind for eight years and I intend to use this as motivation to finish it, or at least make something out of it. I'm not getting any younger (a strange phrase from a guy who's only 21), and if I let this wait anymore, I'm afraid I will outgrow this story, and all the efforts I've put in preparing it will be for naught.

What do I plan to write? Sorry, gotta keep this under wraps, let's just say that it's linked to this unfinished novel of mine and my Blogathon Story (go check out the August archives). It's a risky thing to do since I have a Shakespeare final assignment due next Monday, and also a take home exam for Popular Literature and Sci-Fi due on the 24th of November.

Saturday, October 29, 2005

My SPEED mailing list is dead, I guess. Long live the SPEED mailing list.

The age of mailing list is over, message boards and forums are perhaps the best way to build a community these days. Or is it?

THE PREPOSITION

Despite being in Australia for almost a year and a half, I have yet to see an Australian film in the cinemas (but then, I haven't seen a Malaysian film in the cinemas at all throughout my entire life...). The fact is, hell, Hoyts (what it is in Australia is what TGV or Golden Screen are in Malaysia) don't bloody show Australian films much, just Hollywood. Well, there were some lame-looking comedies, and a Delta Goodren film during the first half of the year, but that's it. I could've seen the Delta Goodrem film if her goddamn duet with Brian McFadden hadn't made me hate her so utterly.

Anyway, I decided to remedy this drought of mine by checking out the newspapers, finding places where I can see a damn Aussie film. And voila! Turned out that there's actually a cinema at Fremantle which is hidden at the corner thus never really grabbed my attention throughout the thousands of times I've walked past it.

One Australian film I was looking out for was 'Little Fish', which isn't related to Tim Burton's 'Big Fish', but has Cate Blanchett and Hugo Weaving in it as recovering drug addicts. Galadriel and Elrond as recovering drug addicts, perfect.

Friday, October 28, 2005

Zen Mind Rape, Bitch!

zen mind rape

zen mind rape 2

zen mind rape 3

zen mind rape 4



Many thanks to Sonic Youth and Ludwig Wittgenstein (who is too dead to know about the existence of this blog).

Hitomi Kanehara and Risa Wataya. Young, pretty Japanese novelists.

This afternoon, while I was hanging out in a bookshop (New Edition Bookshop in Fremantle), killing time, I stumbled upon a book called 'Snakes And Earrings' by some chick called Hitomi Kanehara, which, according to the cover, was awarded the Akutagawa Prize in 2004... Japan's highest literary prize. I picked it up cos' it was thin, and I knew I could just finish reading the last two chapters easily. But looking at the back of the book, I gasped when I saw the author photo. The author was a YOUNG CHICK! And not a bad-looking one either. The blurb said that she was 21 when she received the award, and further research when I returned to my flat revealed that she, and this other gal, Risa Wataya, are currently the youngest Akutagawa Prize winners EVER.


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The left one is Kanehara, the right one is Wataya. Kanehara is a year older than I am, Wataya is a month older than I am. Both are yummy. Of course, when I read through the first chapter and last two chapters of 'Snakes and Earrings', I wasn't really blown away. Meditation on angst + minimalist + loneliness + solitude from the detached perspective of an emotionally stunted and confused young woman. Perhaps not my kind of thing.

Hm. But then, seeing how simplistic the entire novel was, I'm inspired to join NanoWriMo myself, after all, I could churn out 10000 words in one day (or 12 hours, to be more precise, since the other 12 was my partner posting up her pictures and illustrations) for the novel I wrote during Blogathon, 50000 wouldn't really be THAT hard. Right?

Thursday, October 27, 2005

NIGHT WATCH (Nochnoy dozor)

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'Night Watch' (Nochnoy dozor) is a Russian film, and it's much different from any of the other Russian films I've seen... oh wait, the only other Russian film I've ever seen was Russian Ark, which broke records as the entire film, 90+ minutes of it was filmed with ONE TAKE. The first film of a planned trilogy, this is a Gothic fantasy/action movie with vampires from opposing sides beating and killing the shit out of each other (okay, not really, one is supposed to be keeping tabs on the other like police), and was the top-grossing Russian film of all time when it was released last year (the record is broken by another film not too long ago). So yes, I've already heard a lot about this film long before it came out.

Tuesday, October 25, 2005

Chairman Mao Explains It All.


Chairman Mao explains it all
Chairman Mao explains it all 2
Chairman Mao explains it all 3
Chairman Mao explains it all 4
Chairman Mao explains it all 5
Chairman Mao explains it all 6
Chairman Mao explains it all 7






Special thanks to Mao Zedong, Lenin and Chiang Kai Shek, who are too dead to know about the existence of this blog.

Sunday, October 23, 2005

Vlog: Hanging out with Kenny Sia

Updated (24/9/2006): Shifted the video to Youtube.com

Unlike most of my other vlog entries, this one will have a bit more words in it. So yeah, two nights ago, I was approached by Cynthia via MSN about a meeting up with Kenny Sia, who is currently one of the most famous Malaysian bloggers with thousands of hits a day and dozens of media coverage and such. So, I dragged Guestblogger Justin along for the thingie.

So, in the end, ten people went. Cynthia, Cynthia's bf Kian (who kindly drove us to the cafe), Kenny, Nadia, Nadia's bf Bruce, Eunice, Jackson, Lena (who kindly drove us home, and has a secret, scariest thing is, she actually lived a couple of houses away from mine years ago before she moved away. A long lost neighbour!) and us. I had feared that this would be a 'bloggers meeting' where everyone would be talking about, er, blogging (kinda like attending a Trekkie gathering). Thankfully, my fears were unfounded. It was a decent meeting, with me straying away once the subject shifted to controversial Singapore celebrity blogger Xia Xue. (a better recap of the discussion can be found in Nadia's entry)

Unfortunately, just moments ago, when I saw Kenny's entry regarding this meeting, there was a photo of me that made me look SO HIDEOUSLY FAT that I almost wanted to gouge out my own eyeballs and crush them with my bare foot:



WHAT THE HELL?????????

How could I look like THIS just two days ago whilst guestblogging for Minishorts and become SOOOOOOO ridiculously bloated after that?



... and think that I actually PHOTOSHOP my own photos into making myself look skinny. Damn, I haven't seen myself look so freakishly obese ever since I came to Perth last year and lost 20+kg (yes, that's 40+ pounds). Oh well, at least I didn't look that bad in Cynthia's entry.

EDITED (31/10/2005): The video should be of higher quality than before as I've changed it from .mov to .mp4. Probably loads faster too.




Video 1: The Great Swifty And Guestblogger Justin Meet Kenny Sia



I'm rather satisfied with this video, since it featured some camera and editing techniques that I intend to use on my Hindi short film, and my experiment actually worked (referring to the scene where Justin and I were hunting for an ATM machine).

Saturday, October 22, 2005

Finding Meaning In Films

I had a rather lengthy MSN conversation with an aspiring filmmaker friend, Sebastian about my personal disdain when people start asking me about the 'moral' or the 'meaning' of a film, which I forgot to save... unfortunately. Take my own Forced Labour for example, I had to put up with people asking me 'hey! i've just watched it! sooo... what's the moral of the story? what's the msg?'.

Friday, October 21, 2005

My Friend Is A Reincarnation Of Xu Zhimo

I was exposed to the famous Chinese poet, Xu Zhimo early last year, and one of the eeriest thing about him is his striking resemblance to my friend (whose name is not really Alan Wong as mentioned in yesterday's post, in fact, he's Alex Yuen, he who worked with me on my novel years ago, but please don't let him know that his photos are being used on my blog).

Now, look at Alex's face in the comic.

Thursday, October 20, 2005

Chubby Cheeks contest

(Updated: 23rd of October, 2005): This entry is actually posted on the day Malaysia's first lady, Datin Paduka Seri Endon Mahmood passed away after a four-year battle with breast cancer. The nation is in mourning, once again remembering the cold sting of mortality and the unpredictability of death's touch. My parents have asked me to write something related to this sad event, but I declined, believing firmly that everything kind to say about her has been said or written already by the media and and many Malaysian bloggers. If I have intended to say something kind about her, I would come off sounding too insincere as my knowledge about her is entirely too limited.

I have already alluded to the Datin's passing with the title of this entry. The following web comic, which may soon become a recurring theme on my blog, was pretty an attempt to 'cheer' the nation up. At a time of mourning, when sadness and gloom pervaded the air, a moment of laughter, brief it may be, can only be the best remedy for everything. That is all I have to say.



Tuesday, October 18, 2005

MUST LOVE DOGS starring Diane Lane and John Cusack

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I am secretly a sucker for romantic comedies, although, come to think of it, it's really not THAT MUCH of a secret anymore these days. They are usually harmless fun, generic and cliched they may be. Of course, some good ones are really good, I still love the likes of When Harry Met Sally, Jerry Maguire, Sleepless In Seattle, My Sassy Gal (which is definitely THE ultimate Korean rom-com, EVER), the list goes on and on, which I don't want to continue sharing with you all since I still have a manly, macho reputation to protect.

Sunday, October 16, 2005

Joss Whedon's SERENITY

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I saw this film on Monday, which is six days ago, and I should've reviewed this if I've not been so busy dealing with the issues plaguing the production of my short films, and also the two assignments I have to work simultaneously on for my Shakespeare class (a Titus Andronicus oral presentation and a Midsummer Night's Dream critical review). Look at the entries during the past week and you'll understand what I mean.

Serenity is by Joss Whedon, creator of Buffy and Angel, both TV series I like. However, I am sceptical about this when I heard about this movie few months ago because:

Friday, October 14, 2005

Both Aisyalam and Hindi Short Film Projects Have Been Postponed. I'm stressed out.

One adversity after another.

The last few days have been exhausting and stressful. My oral presentation for Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus and critical review for Midsummer Night's Review may have been completed yesterday, and my attention shifted upon the film projects, particularly the Hindi sci-fi short film (as Aisyalam is officially postponed).

Thursday, October 13, 2005

The Aisyalam Project Is Jinxed.

Never, when I made Forced Labour, did I have to face such adversity. As I've mentioned few days ago, I lost my actor for Hang Tuah (one of the two main guys), thus jeopardizing the fate of this ambitious sci-fi project.

I acted quick, and immediately contacted Johan's (my other main guy) sister's boyfriend to replace Abu, the original actor for Hang Tuah. On Monday night, he sounded interested, thus I sent an email to him immediately. No reply from him, so I waited until Tuesday, no reply either. Yesterday, I finally called him to speak to him in person (it was stressful, since I was at the same time working on an oral presentation on Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus, and an essay on Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream). Guy seemed unsure, told me to wait as he would return to me. Another night went past.