Here I Go, Here I Go, Here I Go Again

Long-suffering is the man who queues up at the long-queue Punggol nasi lemak place on Tanjong Katong Road to ta pao for the sore-footed fiance lazing on the couch in his flat, watches 3 episodes of the X-Files with her while she squeals “AWWWW POOR SCULLLEEEEE…DEAD??! HE CAN’T BE DEAD!…HE’S ALIVE YAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYY!” (studying in England screwed up my X-Files viewing, so I haven’t seen any episodes from the middle of season 8 onwards) intermittently throughout the evening and finally, sits calmly while said fiance gleefully searches out old Salt’N’Pepa videos on Youtube and raps to them because she fucking feels like it.

I bet you’re thinking this is a poor excuse for a post, and so far, you would be right. But you see, although all of the above did happen, I wouldn’t normally bother blogging about it. But then I found this:

Chiang Mai: Day Two – Lampang

The usual elephant camp / handicraft village / long-neck tribal zoo day tours that most Chiang Mai travel agencies offer don’t appeal to us so we decided to go to Lampang instead to see Wat Phra Tat Lampang Luang. Our hotel wanted to charge us about 2000 baht for a driver to do this, so that was a fairly simple hell-no decision.


Alec in songthaew

Instead we did it ourselves for considerably more fun (and yes, also a little more difficulty and frustration) at these costs:

  • Songthaew to bus station: 30 baht
  • Return bus trip to Lampang: 142 baht each (284 baht total)
  • Return songthaew trip to Wat Phra Tat Lampang Luang: 400 baht
  • Tuk tuk from bus station into town: 20 baht
  • Total: 734 baht

 

Lampang, or at least the bits we saw of it, was really quiet considering it was a Sunday. We came across so few songthaews that I was worried the temple would be closed by the time we arrived, and visiting Wat Phra Tat Lum Pah Pah Lan as the sum total of our day’s adventures would have been a bit depressing. We probably didn’t haggle hard enough when one eventually arrived, which explains the slightly high price, but at least with some of the usual maniacal Thai driving our songthaew driver unleashed we arrived at the wat in good time.

Naga temple guardian
Sexy beast

It’s an imposing complex, situated on an incline and surrounded by fortress walls and you enter by an elaborate flight of stairs flanked by lions and nagas.

 


Candle wax residue

Once inside there was a real feeling of reverence, with Thai pilgrims outnumbering gawking tourists about 9:1. One group intoned chants in front of a chedi containing a relic of the Buddha as other worshippers processed around it silently with hands clasped. We snuck around trying to be discreet and respectful.

 


Boy at bullethole shrine

Another small shrine commemorated a historic battle victory against the Burmese, apparently featuring the bullet hole in the stonework from the actual bullet which killed the Burmese commander in question. Um, okay.

 

Being a woman, I was unfortunately deemed unworthy to enter a small viharn at the back of the complex to experience one of the most interesting features of the wat, but according to Alec it was really cool. It was pitch dark inside with light only entering through a small hole in the wall, such that a detailed, panoramic camera obscura image of the entire temple was projected onto the back wall. Ladies could glimpse a scaled-down version of this in another viharn to the left of the main temple where a colour image of the chedi was projected onto a concrete slab next to the entrance, again, through a chink of light in the window.


Offer-tree

Very lame Catholic mass pun there in the caption, sorry. I don’t remember coming across this method of collecting donations from worshippers in Singapore’s Buddhist temples, though of course it’s possible I just didn’t notice or haven’t been to the ones where it’s done.

 


Money shot

Very lame porn pun there in the caption, sorry. Can you tell it’s been a long week?

 


Chicken bling

This is where the temple’s chickens live. I think it’s nicer than most of the backpacker hostels I’ve stayed in.

 


The shrining

I found the gold-leaf monks in Wat Phra Singh quite touching, but I must say the life-size, super life-like monk figure encased in this shrine creeped me out a little.

 

I don’t have any experience with taking, Photoshopping or appreciating black and white photography, but tried some out anyway with the bodhi trees in the temple compound. I’m not sure if the results are decent or just meh, but I do quite like them and how they work as a pair. Comments/advice from more clued-in photographers very welcome.

 

Jens Lekman (Bar Baa Black Chic, 24 Jan 07)

I have to give it to Jens Lekman, it takes a certain je ne sais quois to start your gig in a packed club of indiepop kids by playing a yodelly folk track, segueing into dancehall, and then playing about 3 or 4 more tracks on the console without singing a single note into the microphone while intermittently tossing glowsticks into the crowd. I can’t say I thought it was the best way to start off (dude, I didn’t stand in this sardine can for the past two hours in my pointy work heels just to hear you DJ) but hey, maybe that’s just the way he rolls.

I quickly forgave him when he finally started off his set with Black Cab, my favourite song on Oh You’re So Silent Jens, though it’s a pity the backing track was a little too loud and drowned out his singing. The next highlight of the gig for me was how enthusiastic the crowd was in singing along, most audibly to the chorus of I Saw Her In The Anti-War Demonstration, the “ba-ba-ba-ba” bits of A Sweet Summer Night On Hammer Hill, You Are The Light and the “I’ll come running with my heart on fire” bits of Pocketful Of Money, where he basically let the crowd take over and only needed to sing the backing vocals.

The last two highlights of the night for me were completely unexpected. A Postcard To Nina, which I wasn’t familiar with, is a hilarious account of a visit to Berlin to see his penpal Nina, before she moves to San Francisco with her girlfriend. She invites him to dinner (“great vegetarian German food”) at her parents’ house, only to inform him on the doorstep that she’s told them he’s her boyfriend. He delivers the next line to us with deadpan understatement: “And then it gets really awkward.” I can’t really do the rest of the song justice by describing it here, but a quick Google search suggests it’s a crowd favourite at lots of his gigs so perhaps a copy will surface online.

After finishing Pocketful Of Money, he wondered aloud what song he should sing next and someone shouted A Man Walks Into A Bar. Deliberately mishearing (I assume), he said “A man walks down the street?” and promptly launched into You Can Call Me Al! To the American-accented guys next to me who had the following conversation – “I’ve actually not heard this one before. Is it a cover?” “No, I don’t think so.” – I can only say I envy you for having escaped one of the most annoying songs of the 80s. But in that funny way that things go, I loved his cover, so here I am today digging out Graceland and listening to it again for the first time in a while.

By the end of the gig, Jens had a glowstick-waving, flower-strewn (during the gig he’d been throwing orange gerberas into the crowd) audience in the palm of his hand. He ended things off much like they began – a little strangely – by playing Scala’s cover of Heartbeats on the console, then leaving the stage to come meet the crowd. My track record of debilitating mortification from meeting people I admire suggested I shouldn’t attempt any communication with him, so I waited outside while Atarashi got his autograph, after which the least I could do to thank her for rocking so hard was to buy her prata.

Setlist:

  1. Black Cab
  2. I’m Leaving You Because I Don’t Love You
  3. The Opposite Of Hallelujah
  4. I Saw Her In The Anti-War Demonstration
  5. A Sweet Summer Night On Hammer Hill
  6. You Are The Light
  7. Maple Leaves
  8. A Postcard To Nina
  9. Pocketful Of Money
  10. You Can Call Me Al
  11. Julie

Jens Lekman Plea

Because I suck, I left it till too late to buy Jens Lekman tickets, and now they’re sold out. If anyone knows of any extra tickets that become available, or existing tickets that aren’t being used for whatever reason, PLEASE hook me up (email syntaxfree at gmail) and I’ll display my gratitude by buying you beer and singing your praises. Alternatively, if you hate my guts and are willing to give up your ticket to see me humiliated, I’ll stand in the road outside Bar Baa Black Chic proclaiming my undying love for Coldplay and singing a Coldplay song of your choice.

Addendum:
Q: HOW MUCH DOES ATARASHI ROCK??!
A: PRETTY FUCKEN HARD.

Thanks ever so much, I owe you one. :) :) :)

Mo’ Money Mo’ Mosaic

Lord have mercy, the Esplanade has more than compensated for the borefest that was last year’s Mosaic festival (Jason Mrazzzzz and Kingzzzzz of Convenienzzzzz) with this year’s lineup. My bank account’s going all “Bitch, please,” but I’m justifying it as a week of birthday celebrations.

So far, this is what I intend to attend:

12 March: Yo La Tengo (third time!)
13 March: Jaga Jazzist
14 March: DJ Vadim
15 March: Chick Corea and Gary Burton
18 March: Femi Kuti

This is just the trimmed-down list I arrived at after a painful priority-setting exercise resulted in the Duke Ellington Orchestra, Terry Callier, Jose Gonzalez, Rickie Lee Jones, Nerina Pallot and Ursula Rucker being relegated to my second “if I can spare the cash” tier. I’m still a little wracked with guilt over the choices given that I’ve seen 2 of the first-tier acts before already (YLT and DJ Vadim), so if you think it’s a travesty that I’m passing up the chance for one of the bands in my second tier (or any others in the lineup) please let me know and I might waver.

Dork Love

Okay, so I really do have to come completely clean at some point about why I neglected this blog for several weeks. I was consumed with lust for a reality TV show contestant. To be exact, this man.


Yes, srsly.

I didn’t actually start off liking him much. I’m not keen on the Showcase swing dancing he specializes in – basically, lots of choreographed lifts and tricks – so I wasn’t particularly impressed when I saw him dance one of his championship routines during his audition for the show. Plus, how do you take someone seriously whose actual, official name is “Benjiman”?

So when he started off the competitive rounds by being paired with gorgeous curvy hip-hop/jazz diva Donyelle for a booty-pumping Shane Sparks hip-hop routine, I was all ready for him to suck, but he totally didn’t. This routine set the stage for what would be one of the most awesomely enjoyable seasons of reality TV I’ve ever watched (and I’ve watched a lot, y’all), and Benji and Donyelle went on from strength to strength with a rather delightful cha-cha, a pretty fierce (in the Tyra Banks sense) pop-jazz and a dreamy Viennese waltz. Benji also did some great dances with other people, like this joyful jazz routine with Natalie and two crazy slick Latin dances with his cousin Heidi, but my favourites are unquestionably the ones he did with Donyelle because I went crazy for their partnership in a way I haven’t since Mulder and Scully. Yes, I’m fully aware this is a bizarre thing for a twenty-six year old to get sucked into, but talk to the hand.


Hot moves.

Hot ass.

Hot chemistry.

Hot couple.

I also started coming across Youtube videos which showcase what I really admire about Benji’s dancing. Jack and Jill routines are almost always my favourite part of a swing dance event because I love being blown away by what good dancers can improvise on the spot, with a randomly assigned partner and music they haven’t heard till they’re standing on the dancefloor and it starts playing. This one’s my favourite because halfway through it becomes obvious that he loves the same superstar dancer who ruled my teenage years. This one’s got lots of nice slinky moves. It’s frankly hard to believe this one isn’t choreographed because they’re so amazingly in sync, but I guess that’s what you get when two swing champions get paired.

So perhaps you’re thinking, this is all very well but I still don’t get why this skinny dorky Mormon swing dancer constitutes her biggest celebrity crush of the past few years?


Perhaps this will help?

Um, yee-hah?

Other stuff that works for him is his endearingly goofy personality, and I admire the fact that he walked away at the peak of his dance career to serve a two-year Mormon mission in Mexico, then came back, set up a charity to continue helping their community, and reclaimed his US Open Showcase swing title the same year. Boy has heart, gumption and is ripped.


What’s not to love?

The Accidental (Ali Smith)

I’m quite enjoying The Accidental so far, although it appears some Amazon reviewers would strongly beg to differ. (“This book won the Whitbread Novel Award. According to another website, the Whitbread Award lost its sponsor and ceased to exist the same year.”) Here’s a passage from where one of the characters, a professor of English, finds himself suddenly and overwhelmingly enthralled by the family’s houseguest. The rather convenient entry of a large moth into the room, and its doomed flight into a candle flame, sets us up for the following:

Moths and candlelight! Like a moth to a flame! Dr Michael Smart had been reduced to cliché!

Deeply exciting, though, cliché was, as a concept. It was truth misted by overexpression, wasn’t it, like a structure seen in a fog, something waiting to be re-felt, re-seen. Something dainty fumbled at through thick gloves. Cliché was true, obviously, which was why it had become cliché in the first place; so true that cliché actually protected you from its own truth by being what it was, nothing but cliché. Advertising, for example, loved cliché because it was a kind of pure mob truth. There was a lecture in this, maybe for the Ways To Read course. Source? clearly French, he would look it up. Larkin, for instance, the Sid James of English lyric poetry (now that was quite a good observation, Dr Michael Smart firing on all cylinders) knew the power of cliché. What will survive of us is love. His old racehorses in that horse poem didn’t ‘gallop for joy’ but for what must be joy. Larkin, an excellent example. Comic old sexist living all those years in the nether librarian circles of Hull, no wonder he was such a curmudgeon, but he could crack a cliché wide open with a couple of properly pitched words. Or when Hemingway, for example, wrote it before anyone else had even known how to think to express it, didst thou feel the earth move (or however it was he faux-peasantly put it in the not-very-good For Whom The Bell Tolls, 1941 Michael believed), could he have had any idea how his phrase would enter the language? Enter! The language! Cliché was earth-moving, when you understood it, when you felt it, for the first time. Earth and movement, an earthquake, a high-pitched shattering shift in the platelets far down in the heat, below the belt, beneath the feet. Moth plus flame.

Chiang Mai Weekend Market

The weekend night market in Chiang Mai’s Old City is lovely. Just to make things clear, this isn’t the permanent Night Market which I suppose every tourist in Chiang Mai visits at some point. That one has built-in stalls crammed along a nondescript main road, this one has ad hoc stalls sprawling along the wide thoroughfares of the Old City (pedestrianized when the market is on) and spilling into temple compounds, where many of the prayer halls remain open and people sit outside eating on the grass. There’s a really laid-back atmosphere to the whole place, with absolutely none of the heat or claustrophobia that make Chatuchak a little trying even for a shopping junkie like me.

Plus, prices are great. The same slippers I saw here for 99 baht (as in, the sign said 99 baht so the real price would have been even lower) here were apparently 250 baht when I asked about them a few days later in the Night Market. I made smiley good-humoured attempts to convince the guy to match that price, but he wouldn’t go lower than 180 baht, so I walked away. S$7 is a bit much for slippers which will spend most of their time getting slept on by our 5 driveway cats.

I must admit I was a little more absorbed in SHOPPINGGGG! than committing myself to doing much photography at the market, but here’s what I did get.

I took this from the street surrounded by stalls and shoppers, but only a few metres away all is peaceful.

 

The market stays open till about midnight, which I guess is a little late for some of its stakeholders.

 

We passed these guys on the way home, playing chess on the fringes of the market. I don’t know if they actually knew each other or were just bonding through shared shopping avoidance.

 

Good News For People Who Love Bad News

Back from Siem Reap. The bad news is that almost as soon as we arrived, my beloved digital camera went missing and is still missing.

The good news is that because Russ is the sort of photography nut who brings both film and digital cameras with him on his travels, at least I was able to use his digital camera throughout the trip. Apart from the shock of losing the camera, being somewhere as amazingly beautiful as the temples of Angkor and not being able to take pictures of them would have depressed me even more.

So, despite the circumstances there will definitely be Siem Reap photos up here in the near future. You’ll just have to ignore the tear-stains. :(