Middle Eastern Debates

So, the beginning of the Middle Eastern Debates were today. I gave a rough-edged, sketchy, and somewhat rushed speech, but I can blame that on the way Chris controlled the television camera to pan away from me. Whatever. I'm optimistic about the next few days of debate. But first, some time off for the weekend. If anyone wants to hang out, call or IM me; I got a relatively full weekend but I can shuffle stuff around easy.

I'm a little worried about Sharif. He says he has something on me (Olmert) in the debate which I apparently don't know about. It involves nuclear weapons...and me giving them to someone. Plus he wrote a 70 page paper to prep. But I can play psychology well enough too. We shall see what happens.

Today, after school, a couple of friends and I walked downtown to the Commons. After grabbing the obligatory coffee, we...no joke, we hacked a sack for I swear like two hours. Something transcendental about it; I definitely improved mad skeeelz today. Granted, we did eventually leave and chill over at Sasha's. And then saw 300. It's my 3rd or 4th time seeing it, but it doesn't get worse, it just becomes more...internalized. Unfortunately, it came at the cost of coming home at around 12:30AM.

It's strange, but I have a sudden urge to listen to Japanese-German techno music. What's it with those two countries, producing the cheesiest shit ever? Maybe it's a post-axis-of-evil syndrome of some sort...perhaps one day, North Korea and Iran will come up with their own versions of disco-house. Oh god, I'm so politically incorrect.

French exchange?

This morning, I recieved a couple emails from various French exchange groups regarding language-intensive summer programs. I'm pretty interested by the whole idea, but I had sort of already made a previous commitment to the closer (and substantially cheaper) summer music program at Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs.

It brought up an interesting dilemma for me, namely, what was more important for me? Of course, music trumped most things on my list, and French...well, not really. But just being abroad and learning French in France might be a totally different experience. Besides, I can stand 3 hours a day in Therese's class, two and a half hours a day shouldn't be that hard.

In any case, I'm going to France in May with the French trip. And don't get me wrong, I love the French language. I just don't like my French teacher.

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Never give an iguana Viagra

Thu Jan 25, 2007 12:04pm ET

ANTWERP, Belgium (Reuters) - Mozart, an iguana with an erection that has lasted for over a week, will have his penis amputated in the next couple of days.

Veterinarians at Antwerp's Aquatopia had sought to treat the animal's problem, but decided removal was the only solution because of the risk of infection. The good news for Mozart and his mates is that male iguanas have two penises.

Mozart, sitting on the shoulders of his keeper as camera crews focused on his red, swollen erection, seemed unperturbed by the news.

"It doesn't bother him. He doesn't know what amputation means," said vet Luc Lambrecht, adding that Mozart's sexual activity should be undimmed by the operation.

© Reuters 2007. All Rights Reserved.

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In case the header didn't strike you, don't give an iguana Viagra. They like having two penises. Just a little warning for you, in case you guys were thinking about it.

A little funny, when you think about the magnitude of fetish porn on the internet. I can only imagine the amount pertaining to anthropomorphic iguanas non-consensually giving it to hapless young blonde women who just happen to have 34DD breasts and a big tattoo across their spine and just above their ass.

Porn is such cheap shit.

Curse of the Golden Flower/The pPhone

Wanna see a weird movie that makes you really want to be a flying ninja?

Okay, so the ending's a little disappointing, and the plot's just absurd, but I find it typical of Chinese movies. The difference here, is that the fighting scenes are far more natural than other mainstream Asian films, and the cinematography is really a brilliant use of CGI.

That's where the film's high points really are: imagery and symbolism. The golden flower, the chrysanthemum, plays a thousand different roles in the film as the symbol for rebellion, particularly the final showdown scenes where the golden army's blood is spilled over a fresh bed of the flowers.

Go watch it. Next movie on my list is The Last King of Scotland.

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You know, speaking of form over function, Lukas, here's a little gadget that'll make you drool. Okay, so it's actually just a rebranded, souped up LG, but it's got the same features as Apple's new communication toy, it looks sexier than my bike, and it matches my favorite pants with the PRADA sign emblazoned underneath the camera.

And the beauty of it? It's less expensive than the nice pair of PRADA jeans and tight sweater I've been eyeing but will probably never attain. Form shouldn't exactly trump function, but never let school get in the way of your education.

Yeah, so um....fuck the iPhone?

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I cannot stress the beauty of French electronica that's not in French. Though French electronica that's in French is just as good.

Gotan Project - Santa Maria (rUmPeLsTiLtSkIn)

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Lunatico

http://www.sophiakokosalaki.com/ - Sophia Kokosalaki, an emerging New York designer with inspiration from ancient Greek fashion sense. With the draping jackets, oversized jackets, and flamboyant colors, it's more pretty than hot, more cute than sleek, more coquette than sophisticated, but it's still fashion and it's still worth a look.

I realized that I've never taken enough time to thank my friends for providing over half the music in my music library, all of which I listen to. I don't know what I'd do without you guys; I'd probably still be listening to Matthew Shipp and William Parker over and over again.

Thanks to Kai for sharing the Gotan Project with me. This is quite honestly the third sexiest music I know, coming in just after Haddaway and Bjork. I'm joking of course. It actually pulls in at number one sexiest music, and Bjork comes in fourth.

This bears continuity to everything I was saying about French electronica...even though the lyrics in the majority of the songs are in Spanish. (The video below takes place in Buenos Aires.) There's still that little extra that the French do to their music that makes it so much better than say, Italian, Egyptian, or even British electronica.

As for Haddaway, um, don't ask...



Gotan Project - Diferente (Promo Video)

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I'm a little intrigued by WordPress over Blogger. Blogspot could learn a thing or two from WordPress's design schemes and options. Moving over there could be an improvement, then again, it could also be a little messy given the integration my computer has with Google software.

I'm also a little intrigued by this whole concept of multiple authors on one blog. Within that scenario, posting would all show up on one page, but that would also eliminate the need for multiple users. But at the same time, it's nice retaining a little individuality, until I learn how to trick out Blogger to look like something I made.

Vicky's Birthday

Telepopmusik - Love Can Damage Your Health (Promo Video)

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That last video was Love Can Damage Your Health by Telepopmusik. It's not a spectacular plot or anything, and the premise of the scene is a little sketchy at the least, but the video itself is truly a work of art. Plus the music's kind of addicting, as is all good French electronica.

And this picture to the left is Barcelona. A juice bar on the street corner, which is a common sight in Spain, supposedly because of the ridiculously hot summers. It makes me really hate this gray, "lukewarm" Ithaca that we have to put up with these day. There's not even snow on the ground, and I was thinking of riding tomorrow with Sasha, but the temperature's dropping again.

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You know...for someone who hasn't ice-skated in years, I was pretty proud of myself today. I used to figure skate quite a bit. I was pretty good, actually; I've always had good balance in the sports I did, and I caught on to things very quickly. It was disappointing to me to realize I didn't have the skill I used to have, but it didn't surprise me that I could stay up on the ice and only fall once at the beginning. It did surprise me, however, that I remembered how to move. I'm definitely nothing compared to Vicky when it comes to skating, of course. She's pretty damn good. But regardless, I was pretty proud. I think I should do that more often.

It felt a bit weird. Danny and Amir and I were the only guys wearing figure skates. I wonder where the "figure skates are gay" thing came from. My educated guess would be that it stems from the relationship between figure skating and dancing. Dancing can be a beautiful thing. Hey, if we've got the dignity to do it, it just means we're just very secure with our manhood, right?

And come to think about it, a lot of cool things in this world are pretty "gay." Like Myspace and scarves and cranberries in your sandwiches. Not so much the quiches.

Being on ice is an odd feeling. It's not quite the same as rollerblading on the street, yet it utilizes more or less the same motions. The primary difference here is really the sensation you get when you glide. On rollerblades, you get this rough, asphalt sensation that kind of rattles you up to your knees regardless of how much you might have paid for them. Whereas on ice, the feeling's very airy, very carefree, as if one stroke of your legs will take you for a kilometer, if you had the room. It's always colder in a rink too, and it shows. There's something enjoyable about being surrounded by white and bundled in a sweater.

So after the skating escapade, we chilled at Vicky's, which was fun. Dinner, chocolate-coconut cake, and a rather odd pirate movie all preceded the present-thing. And unfortunately, I didn't bring my camera into the rink, since I sort of forgot to take it out of my bag. (Additionally, it didn't have a battery anyway, so what good would it have been?) Speaking of which, I was without one today. I ordered mine online on Monday, so it didn't have time to ship. But I think she'll like it. She's needed it for a while now.

Rommia needs to shut up during movies. :-P So does Mikayla, but Rommia's much funner to pick on.

Happy Birthday, Vicky. <3

Shoes

New pair of shoes from Transit. It was a tight choice between black/gray/green Converses, and black leather dress boots, but in the end I went for the dress boots. They seem to work remarkably well with boot-cut dark washes. Oh, and on a not-so-good note, my favorite D&G sunglasses cracked at the hinge. No worries, I can get them repaired free.

Dinner was at Segafredo again. Tonight we were in time to watch some live jazz: a salon jazz piano trio headed up by a beautiful Egyptian singer, singing in French of course. We watched for a few hours over cheesecake and drinks, while a couple of thet the Montreal jazz scene, and oh yes, the female's scene.

I know. It's not fair I make this stereotype. But it was there, at the table, that I noticed that all Canadian drummers, regardless of genre, look more or less alike. There's a commonality not only in their nervous, edgy-but-composed sticking style, but also in their aesthetic quality: a handsome, slightly rough, stubbly, thin face partly hidden by messy and medium black hair. They all wear a black suit over a white button-down, dark-wash jeans, and oh yes, don't forget the sweat.

But then again, it's a French Canada thing. I mean. Look at Etienne.

Montreal has a charme incendiere.

French Jazz...<3

I don't know why I brought this subject up. My guess was it's a combination of a couple things, from riding on the Montreal subway, to the quality of girls here, to excess spare time.

I figured that sex in a subway tunnel would be pretty erotic. But it'd have to be in a certain place. It couldn't just be anywhere. It'd have to be close to the trains, and it couldn't be too rough. The sweeter the better. Why? It's like public sex, except at the same time, the spectators are moving by too fast to know what's really going on.

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Ah, mon dieu. French jazz is so cool.

There's a unique sound here that you can't really find elsewhere in lyrics and in music itself. It's this quirky, smoky, more organic flavor of jazzmusique, too refined to be bebop and too avantgarde to be west coast. Exotique. The chanteuses are much prettier here too, in this more adorable, classier way.

It's the language too. Jazz was meant to be in French. You know, it's inexplicably cute, the way everything sounds better in French. French can turn the worst lyrics into an art. Ah, this music is so beautiful it makes me cry.

I think I'm falling in love...

Boxing Day

I love the style here in Montreal. People are so well-dressed here.

Surprisingly, financial damages were kept at a minimum. In the end, I dropped 25$ on dark-wash boot cuts, 20$ on a kickass white collar shirt, another 20$ on a tight black sweater, and 3.50$ on a black and gray scarf. My guess is that I would have gotten more had we not been lost for most of the time.

*Note the prices are in CAD, not USD. And then I get my tax money back at the border.

I love Boxing Day.

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I remember my first time in a Segafredo. It was in Tokyo, when we dropped in for a coffee after hanging out on the Promenade. I must say the atmosphere didn't allow breathing; too much cigar smoke. The pastries were thick and crusty, and the coffee was rancid. I didn't enter another Segafredo for another year.

I gradually built up my taste for the Portuguese cafe chain in Lisbon, actually.It was one of the places we frequented for lunch in the Baixa-Chiado before we resorted to an ugly, coach-class Chinese restaurant a block from our hotel that played the same MIDI-driven keyboardist playing cheap riffs over a 20$ drum machine. Every day.

And today, in Montreal, my dad and I went out to pick up a late dinner at the Underground City, but apparently they close early these days. So we went out to St. Catherin Street, a SoHo-like district that cuts Montreal in half between Mont-Royal and the Old City. Most of the pizza parlours were closed, but I spotted...a Segafredo.

And when we walked in, I changed my mind. French house music. Hardwood floors, glasstop bars, walls of spirits, and the white leather chairs. The consumers match the decor; a man on my right wearing a Versace suit and a crisp red embroidered chemise sits down with his friend and pulls out a sixteen hundred dollar Vertu Ascension, one of the world's most expensive cellphones.

I sat down at a window seat and turned on my mp3 player. I made a point of recording the music.

There's a Segafredo that has dignity.

The food came. And the rest of it, as they say, was history.

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Amazing electro-house band:
telepopmusik

Take a look at the song Into Everything, Remix. Takes a while to get into, but it's good stuff.

The Concert at LACS

So ASM was first period, which meant no one showed up.

I had an interesting experience today once I was settled in at Juna's Cafe. I had been talking with my friends online, watching people and sketching them, when I realized that I was being watched as intently as I was watching them. It's kind of an awkward feeling, but I know it was inevitable.

I got downtown at around 3:45, and by then it had already been getting dark. It was totally empty. Ever get that feeling that there's some big event that's going on and you don't know about it? Yeah. That's how it feels. Okay, maybe I just got here early. Oh finally. Hey Sam.

I finally understood why no one was there.

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So the LACS concert was tonight. I didn't realize it until it was already 5:30. It started at 6:30. I got a ride up to ACS and jammed with the rest of the bands for a bit. We were the third to last act, but I had been so fired up on coffee from Juna's that it hadn't worn off yet. Consequence: couldn't keep a real beat, forgot what songs were being played, and oh um yeah, forgot the other musicians' names.

But it was still pretty fun, I gotta say. Some of these people are going to go pro one day. I think ACS has a lot more talent than we're credited for; I don't think I credit the musicians enough for their work. At least 10% of the school performed that night. To imagine a public school where that sort of musical population exists...is beautiful.

Unfortunately, I was too busy being totally out of it, and also playing music, in order to take real photos. But I did ride Max's bike through the hallways. I doubt that Dave was very happy with it, but he didn't speak up.

So I said goodbye to my friends and left. When I got home, I had a message from Simon asking me if I was going anywhere over the break. I said yeah, Montreal. On Tuesday.

But wait. Oh shit. It's his birthday.

Shit!

Turntablism

The most productive jam session in weeks. It was more administrative than anything else, but we also got some time to just chill and noodle around and spend a couple hours arguing about which cables go where and what headphones to use. It was fun, I must say

There's Kai jamming on the turntables on Sunday's jam session on the bridge of The Chicken. I'll say I think it went quite well. Tyler walked in the door about halfway through the jam and we were all like, "Hey Tyler! Take a solo!"

"...and the wheel goes 'round and 'round..."

So without time to react, he takes Zach's tenor sax and I switched into a breakbeat and David hit the electric bass and Tyler breaks out a solo. Chances are I'll put the whole clip of that jam online later today if I can transfer them from the studio computer to my computer. Moving files is really a pain in the ass.

Juna's Cafe

It's well after school now. It's even almost dark.

Yet it's only 4:15.

I'm sitting on the big orange couch at Juna's Cafe drinking Papua New Guniea coffee, juggling time between sips and taps at the keyboard.

I don't really know what I'm doing down here. I don't remember why I wanted to go down here anymore. Oh yes, that's right. I went down to hang out with Sasha for a bit, but he turned back halfway when his parents found him. So then I figured I could use some coffee. Then I got some coffee. So then I figured I could probably start my essay on Holocaust connections, or if I wasn't in the mood I could write a little.

On my way down, I resisted the urge to run. I was in no hurry, but I needed coffee.

Is that a paradox? Wasting energy in order to reach it?

Instead of the essay I promised my teacher or the story I promised myself, I'm caught up in just about everything else. Particularly the other people sitting here at the cafe. I'm watching them, listening to them. No, per se, I'm not barging in and interjecting, but I'm certainly observing from across the room.

Two college students, one with jet black hair hidden under a green bandana, conversing loudly about a Korean preacher with a incomprehensible wife. I think she's also a barista here. The other girl has a round face and blonde hair. She says she has to actively look at her to understand her. But she has to go, else she misses a rendezvous. She picks up her jacket.

The History of Art. A bagel with butter and strawberries. He puts down his jacket and unravels his scarf. He begins to eat his bagel. The book opens. A picture of the Alhambra in Spain. Judging by the book and his interest, he's probably an art or history major somewhere.

A couple, one man and one woman. The woman has her hair in a bun and has beautiful eyelashes. She's reading a book. The man wears a brown sweater, black hair, and tight jeans. He's writing with a green pen. Or doing the crossword. Or doing sudoku. Something that's turning his mind away from his female friend.

Oh my god, what am I doing? Is that how bored I get? So bored that I have to watch other people for my own amusement? I'd be kind of freaked out if I were them, and admittedly, I'm creeping myself out just a little. But I don't think they know I'm doing this. This isn't illegal or anything.

This coffee is good. When I entered the cafe, I thought I'd be coming in for a chai. But I needed more caffeine. The barista behind the counter, a former ACS student with blonde hair, small blue eyes, and an apron, recommended the Papua New Guinea. I eyed the Sumatra, but I went for the Papua as recommended.

It's keeping me awake, at least. I'll go home in half an hour. I'll do some homework, read a bit, then probably resume my life behind a computer screen.

Oh yes, yesterday. Yesterday. Mmm. Jammed with some vibes yesterday. Didn't go well. Couldn't count for shit and David couldn't walk for shit and the vibraphonist played maybe 3 songs. Shit. So yeah. Now I'm tired. Bitch stay out of my way. On a lighter note, I consumed a total of 2 slices of lemon pie at the dinner last night, so yeah. I got that whole near-death feeling you get from all that fat and sugar.

Love.