Libera me, Domine, de morte æterna, in die illa tremenda

So obsessed with Harvest Moon it's not even funny. Damn video games, making me ignore other media! Anyone else play it?

( ramblings about stuff like video games, nails, and suitcases )

So, I heard about this drama the other day. Somehow it escaped my notice. It's called Lucky Days (or 第二回合我愛你, which means, essentially, "The second round of I love you"... in general). It's about the trials of a young couple who recently got married for the wrong reasons (in order to save money), and how that caused their relationship to break down. I assume the drama is going to focus on how they go about finding love again (thus the Chinese title).

I'm, uh, not too excited about it. It's not that is looks bad, just not my style (I like stories that are more about the start of a relationship, rather than the rescue of one). Also, I watch dramas mainly for the casts. I'm not familiar with either of the main actors (Chen Yi Rong, the main actress is an established actor, though she does mostly historicals and wuxia, thus me not having seen her in anything yet).

Though, since Lucky Days is a SETTV drama, I know a good portion of the character actors, including Lin Mei Xiu (who plays the awesome mother character in TONS of twdramas, and the not-so-awesome mother character in True Love 18), Chen Bo Zheng (a great older character actor), and Song Xin Ni (who I think is fabulous, and plays the 姊姊/older sister type very well).

(SETTV is known [to me at least] for using the same actors over and over. To an extent all networks do that, but SETTV does it a LOT. Out of the ten dramas Chen Qiao En has done in Taiwan, eight of them are for SETTV. I wonder if they have some sort of relationship with J-star...)

Anyway, I can't embed it, but a subbed preview is here. For now I'll post this unsubbed one.


(I LOLed during the scene where she's in the hospital, Chen Yi Rong's character is like "I don't have a husband right now", and the nurse is like "lets not get excited, miss". And the Chen Yi Rong's character is all like "我不是小姐, 我是太太!" (She's saying she's not a "Miss", but a "Mrs")... probably not supposed to be that funny, but it was so random, and filled with Mandarin I understand!)

As far as I can tell, it's not subbed yet (or rather, the first episode has been partially subbed on youtube).

Also, CTV pulled a fast one on me, and pushed Down with Love back another week. It will air on 31Jan09, with another behind the scenes airing today. Last week they said the first episode was airing this week... *sigh* I should expect this out of my twdramas already. Things are CONSTANTLY being pushed back.

OMG my peeps, I have a seemingly unending post to write.

It encompasses several days with several major(ish) trips/activities. Plus other random stuff. Because, really, that's just how I work.

First off, I think I'm finally starting to love Taiwan. Sure, it's still 8 millions degrees, and a billion percent humidity, but I feel a TON more comfortable here than before. Took long enough (just over a month! OMG I've been living here a month. Time is passing too quickly!) Still not watching ANYTHING, and still reading far FAR too much POTC fanfic.

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SECOND, the stray/wild/domestic animals of our neighborhood:
Cats -> Frodo, Samwise (they chill together, it made sense), Sensei, Autumn Sadie, and Socks
Koi -> Jaws, Supernova, Creamsicle, Sushi, Sashimi, Sesame, Shoyu, and Amos
Lizard -> Mr. Wang (in english, no less)
Cockroach(s) -> 大衛 (Da Wei). Whenever we see him/them, we yell at it "他叫大衛!"
Tadpoles -> They don't have names, really. Maybe they will once they grow into frogs. If Mr. Wang doesn't eat them all first.

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THIRD! We had our first Taiwanese language class today. It was pretty awesome. Taiwanese is SO different from Mandarin, more akin to Cantonese in tones (Cantonese has 6/9 tones, Taiwanese has 8). It's very fluid. And nasally, which is fun. Lisa and I are now randomly saying "li beh ki do ui" to each other (你要去哪裡, 'ni yao qu na li' in Mandarin).

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( On Saturday we took a night time trip to Shilin Night Market )

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( OMG MY FIRST IDOL STORE )

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On the way back to the station we stumbled upon Tian Hou Temple (天后宮), a place I'd been wanting to see. It's so randomly placed, but totally amazing. ( My first temple visit )

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Have I mentioned the popular Taiwanese doll/puppet show? ( I haven't?! )

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( Random school stuff! )

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GD's new MV ( Breathe )

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( And an EPIC FAIL OF HUGELY EPICLY EPIC PREPORTIONS )

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Have I mentioned Zai Zai lives in my apartment building? I saw him out for a walk with his mother, and a girl named Zai Mei that he must live with ( ..... )

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October 3rd (I THINK) is the Moon Festival. The school is providing us with vegetarian moon cakes! GLEEEEE! (I soooooo want an ice cream mooncake from Haagen Daez) I'm not sure what we'll be doing, but it'll be awesome.

ALSO September 28th is Confucius' birthday. They have a big thing at the Confucius Temple, but I don't know if we'll go... I want to though. I bet it'll be amazing.

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AND I am done. DONE. Despite still have a bunch to say. I swear I've been working on this entry for four hours or so. *sigh*

But one thing before I go... I will leave you with one of Mine and Lisa's randomisms...

"There's a big difference between it not mattering and micropenis"

I'm not even going to explain.

I adore Mandarin class. Right now we're working on pronunciation and learning pinyin and zhuyin. Pronunciation is HARD. I have conquered my initial issues with second tone, but now I'm having issues with fourth tone. Oh well, such is life.

We've been learning all sorts of random vocabulary. I know the words for stuff like: cat (māo, ㄇㄠ), fruit (shuǐ guǒ, ㄕㄨㄟˇ ㄍㄨㄛˇ), and gymnasium (tǐyǜguǎn, ㄊㄧˇㄩˋㄍㄨㄢˇ). I'm not learning zhuyin as much, as I started with pinyin, so it's easier for me.

We have tests basically everyday, which is fine. So far we've been doing really well.

Oh! And my teacher changed my Chinese name (we have to have Chinese names, and we go by them there). It's now 伍美俐. It's pronounced basically the same as my old name (Wǔ Měi Lì). It's funny, responding to a name that isn't really mine.

We haven't done much other than school recently. I personally have been too exhausted. The other day it was really nice out though. Very little humidity, and only the low 90's (which is cool, believe me). I've been neglecting dramas and reading a LOT of Pirates of the Caribbean fic instead. It'll burn out eventually.

I took this picture on Sunday when we went shopping in south Danshui. Mountains. SO pretty.


I'm not even going to talk about poor Jae leaving 2PM. It hurts me a lot, and will for awhile. Jae was the reason I got into 2PM, and now that he's gone, they lose a lot of appeal.

Random -> The lady who plays Qiao En's grandmother in Easy Fortune Happy Life is the same lady who played Ethan's grandmother in Fated to Love You (Tan Ai Zhen).

Everytime she's on screen I squeal and call her Nǎi Nai.

HAHA! OMG I love twdramas! Fu An (Qiao En) and Da Feng (Cheng Long) are stuck in quicksand VERY close to each other, and Fu An is trying to lighten the mood, and is like "I hatched a dove once!", and Da Feng is like "Lust Caution had doves it in..." So then Fu An starts talking about playing the trumpet (which the subs call a woodwind...), and Da Feng is like "So, you know how to blow..."

I love jdramas, but man, I missed blatant sexual inneundo.

Watching this drama has reaquainted me with my love of Mandarin. I keep reading and hearing stuff, and then frantically looking it up (like their names... very contradictory, and interesting to the plot). I've been watching jdramas for so long, I almost forget just how dear to my heart Taiwan is.

Still feeling like crap (I. Hate. My. Coworkers), but I've been trying to be better about getting back to people. Unfortunately there will be delays. I've been extremely tired recently from being worn down by work related shit. Only a month more to go ;D

LOST is awesome. I'm too tired to write more, but wow. I love that show. And I love Ben.

Someone was fired from my group at work today. Which will make my life THAT much more difficult. Because, in general, I kinda dislike my coworkers. Despite that, I AM one of them. But I'm also the closest with my boss. So I'm kinda stuck between them. I liked the guy who got fired well enough, but I also know why she fired him.

Work politics are so confusing, and tiring. It's like being in high school again. You'd think people would grow up. But no. They don't. Sometimes I think I'm the only person who sees it for what it is; a job, not a social network. And I really think they owe more respect to our boss. She's the one we work for, not the best idea to distance her.

Anyway, job-life's going to be difficult for a while.

I was going to watched another episode of Utahime today, but of course the copy I had was corrupted, so I had to download it again.

But I DID get another of my YesAsia shipments, oddly enough the one that shipped last; the TOKIO album. I didn't take pictures yet. It's cute, because I bought the Korean version (it was about half the price as the normal Japanese version), and it came with a booklet of the lyrics translated into Korean. I TOTALLY have a Japanese release Big Bang album where there's a booklet with the lyrics translated into Japanese. Maybe tomorrow I'll finally get one of the other shipments.

I also just downloaded a shitload of ipod applications, including several Chinese character (traditional) / Mandarin ones. And one that shows you pictures of Chinese food. Mmmmm Chinese food. I basically only eat two things (I'm not kidding); soydogs, and Chinese style tofu stir fry.

I should sleep. Maybe.
Oh! Random quick Big Bang stuff. First off, Lollipop was featured on PEREZ HILTON! I kinda love how he's into K-Pop. Link here. Seriously, DO NOT READ THE COMMENTS. Most people are racists assholes, so it's not worth it. But he got it wrong. He said it was 2NE1's single FEATURING Big Bang. It's not. If anything it's Big Bang's single feat 2NE1.

Also, a teaser for the new w-inds / GD song has been released. So exciting! I might preorder after all. But which to get... there are three versions.

I'm only 5 minutes into The Seventh Day, but the Cantonese is really screwing me over. Sometimes it sounds close to Mandarin, and I get confused. Plus, you know, the writing is the same, so I keep looking at the Chinese subs, and thinking they're going to pronounce stuff in Mandarin (I do the same thing with Japanese kanji, I read them in Mandarin).

Doesn't help that occasionally they actually DO speak Mandarin.

I know Cantonese is supposed to be more melodic, and flow-ey, but it just sounds really strange to me. I like Mandarin better! :D

Other than the Cantonese (CAAANTONEEESE! *shakes fist*), I'm liking it a lot. This is my first HKDrama, and it's shaping up well. Plus, Kevin Cheng is Hoooooooooot. He looks a lot like Joseph Chang to me, which is nice in many many ways.

Hehehe! One of the characters started talking to another one, and she's like "Oh! You're Taiwanese?!"... That made me unreasonably happy. Yay Taiwan!

Ohhhhh shit. Excuse me while I FREAK OUT.

Apparently the deadline to apply for the Huayu Enrichment scholarship for studying Mandarin in Taiwan is the end of the month. THE END OF THE MONTH.

I've got to get my ass in gear if I'm going to make that timeline. It's not like it's impossible for me to go there without the scholarship, but hey, if I can save some money...

Wow. seven_trees, you were right. Shan Wu Shuang has to be the BEST drama heroine I've ever seen. She's so awesome! How can you NOT love a woman who says things like this;

"This is a one-night stand! You've been without love for 6 years, and now you're suddenly at the "one-night stand" stage. You're so awesome." (Talking to herself, btw)

"When I was in elementary school, you were just a small fertilized egg.... A fertilized egg carrying condoms like a grown up."

"Didn't your mom tell you not to go into stranger's houses? Not to mention you're going back so late. Your mom's gonna worry, got it? Does your mom know about you carrying a condom around in your pants? Now go back and wait for your mommy obediently."

She also swears a lot. In English, no less. She's totally my type of person.

Also, Ethan = SEX.

Uhhh... I never knew the Chinese for Sailor Moon was 美少女 (beautiful young girl)... The character for moon (月) isn't even in there. The subs keep saying sailor moon, but I'm pretty sure it's supposed to be literal (beautiful young girl), not sailor moon. (BTW, you would not believe how excited I was when I could read the Chinese subtitles! I've been practicing my Mandarin more recently!)

Um, my 75 year old aunt just said she shot her wad... I have NO IDEA.

In other, less disturbing news, I downloaded Rain's album, Rainism (the Asian edition). I'm enjoying hearing the same songs sung in four different languages; Korean (obvs), English, Mandarin, and Japanese.

Rain cutely refers to himself as "boku" in the the Japanese version of Rainism, which is hilarious, considering the song.

I like the english versions, because I can actually understand it, but I also REALLY like the Mandarin versions. I just really like Mandarin. Mandarin = awesome. 我愛國語! 加油!

OMG I'm so dying. I'm exhausted, bored, and anxious about my freaking final exam that is due TODAY. Stupid class and it's tests.

Not that I don't have work to do. I have plenty. I just totally don't want to do it because I'm so damn tired.

In other news, Mandarin learning is coming along. I'm doing the Pimsleur stuff. I can ask people if they speak english or mandarin (I know the mainland word for mandarin... but I'm sure taiwanese would understand), tell people I'm an american, and stuff like that. Yay!

I'm still watching Hotaru no Hikari. I haven't had much time lately to really see a ton of it, but oh wells. Weekend.

I also updated this thing awhile ago, but forgot to post.

( Drama/Anime/Manga List update 21Nov08 )

I added like, 10 new twdramas. As if I need more to watch. At this point, it's kinda like a reference for me, a list of things I'd eventually like to watch.

Oh! Hilariousness!!
Lu Yi is making the EXACT SAME face in both these pictures. It's weird. Maybe they took the stock photo of him to make the drama poster?