Other Side of the Planet dot com

Books: The Uncertain Path

Posted on September 28th, 2008 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Blog, Books, Star Wars.

Title: The Uncertain Path
        (Star Wars: jedi Apprentice #6)
Author: Jude Watson
Genre: Young Readers
Anna’s Rating: 4/5 (Yay!  A good book!  I read it in one sitting!)

Yay!  Starting to tie multiple storylines together, it looks like!  What joy I have.  A continuation from book #5, and the story goes on in book #7.  It could be a full adult book, but it’s broken into pieces like, I suspect, a trilogy (to keep the size down).

Obi-wan struggles with his previous rash decision, realizing that he is a Jedi first.  While he recalls that he is always welcome to return to the Jedi temple for guidance, he is too fearful to reach out to Qui-gon and ask forgiveness. 

Back at the Jedi temple, Qui-gon struggles to find it within him to be the perfect mentor, to understand a teenage boy, recognize his short-comings as a natural result of his inexperience, and handle his mistakes objectively without letting his feelings overcome him.  Basically, he strives to be the ideal mentor that not everyone has, and if this book can let a few teens escape into a world where they receive that kind of guidance, then the author has achieved something meaningful in her writing.

As for the storyline, fighting resumes on Melida/Daan as a result of the crazed revolution of the Young…it made me think of the cultural revolution in China, which I’ve never really studied…but I feel compelled to make the effort now.  I find it interesting that, by using concepts similar to real history, the author can introduce young readers to real world challenges.

Overall, I was impressed by the depth of the book.  Real world challenges, characters with normal problems, good moral lessons, and lots of happy Jedi wisdom…I was pleased.

And I am forcing myself to hold off on reading another book until Monday night.

QUOTES:

“Leave you, the Force cannot.  Constant, it is.  If find it you cannot, look inside, not our, you must.”
- Yoda, as recalled by Obi-wan Kenobi, p. 6

“…discipline [needs] to come from within.”
- Jedi philosophy, as related by the narrative, p. 50

“You cannot prevent what you cannot see coming.  You can only do what you think is right at each moment as you live it.  We can plan, hope, and dread the future.  What we cannot do is know it.”
- Qui-gon Jinn, p. 114

“When you don’t know your own mind, you fill it with beliefs of another.”
- Qui-gon Jinn, p. 122
(Quote is in response to a teacher’s least favorite answer: “I don’t know.”)

0 comments.

Books: The Defenders of the Dead

Posted on September 28th, 2008 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Blog, Books, Star Wars.

Title: The Defenders of the Dead
        (Star Wars: Jedi Apprentice #5)
Author: Jude Watson
Genre: Young Readers
Anna’s Rating: 3/5 (I couldn’t give it a 4, but it was a big improvement over the third and fourth installments in the series.)

The series gets back on track now, thank goodness.  I was hesitant at first, feeling distrustful of the series, but I soon got into it.  (Really, you could probably never read books three and four…they don’t seem overly important…)

Qui-gon and Obi-wan head into a war zone, and lead readers through various trials, from simple things like learning to drive safely to more challenging concepts like the consequences of making rash decisions.

While not overly deep, it sets things up well for the next book in the series, which is really good.  Overall, this was a worthwhile read.

QUOTES:  (…well, quote, at least…)

“Awareness of fear can protect you if it does not overtake you.”
- Obi-wan Kenobi, p. 62

0 comments.

Trooping: Anime Festival 2008

Posted on September 28th, 2008 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Blog, Costumes, NYC.

[Myself as the Kitty Trooper…who knew it would be so popular?]

The 501st trooped New York City’s Anime Festival.  I wasn’t going to go, but Ray and Skutch conned me into it.  Skutch wanted to troop the line, so I volunteered to head out early for that, only to have Skutch out of comission with disease and the line to be all of 20 hardcore fans.

 
[The Kinko’s Copy Ninja…brilliant.]

It actually took Ray and I a while to find the convention…we were beginning to wonder if it really was being held at the Javits Center.  I had been told this was as big as NYCC…ah, the lies.  It’s no bigger than Big Apple Con, though the aisles are wider, at least.

 
[Myself with the Robot Chicken Scientist…AWESOME!]

The big difference between the comic cons and the anime cons is that at the anime cons, you might think that costumes are required to get in the door: EVERYONE is dressed up (though admittedly to varying degrees.)  At comic cons, costumes are limited to hired and volunteer staff, plus perhaps a hardcore few.  So largely, this post features costumes.

[Gingi from Shrek - it would have been even better if a leg had been missing, or if he had been on crutches.] 

I guess the boring thing, to me, about the anime festival, is that you don’t find the same variety in costumes that you find at a comic con.  Comic cons have people dressed up as just about anything that anyone ever found an excuse to obsess over.  Anime is almost exclusively girls in short skirts and boys with big weapons.  That may have its appeal, but it isn’t as interesting, IMHO.

[Myself with the No Face from Spirited Away…this was a briliant costume…the person’s got the neck craning down to “look” at me.] 

Same problem with the vendors.  Every few tables is selling the same set of plushies, or the same type of costumes, or the same array of imitation weapons.  I get bored.  But then, there are the random creative costumes that bring joy to my day…

 
[I always see a couple guys dressed up as Mario and Luigi (who I found out that day I know through a degree of separation) but today I found two girls as the Mario brothers…but the tall and skinny one had the Mario costume on…I was confused…]

Having gotten dressed around 9:00am, I was pretty tired by early afternoon (whether the exhaustion comes from work or my classes or an oncoming illness, I know not, but I’m not the trooper I was this past summer.)  I unsuited a bit early, put on my glasses, which don’t fit under my new helmet, and stumbled around the floor.

 
[There’s an Obi-wan quote from Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, when Anakin turns to the Dark Side, and Obi-wan declares: “Only a Sith deals in absolutes.”  This t-shirt: “Absolut Sith: Only a Sith deals in Absolut” is a pun on that quote…and it made me smile.]

We found ourselves self-important, strutting around with our “Professional” passes on.  I’m not exactly sure what we’re professionals of, but hey, it’s not a label that I’m going to push away.

 
[Self-important off-duty troopers, left to right, it’s Lou, myself, and Crashley.]

We also found the need to scream and shriek like giddy school girls every time we saw Rob, our fellow stormtrooper who stayed suited up until the very end of the convention…  I know.  We’re lame.

 
[Trooper groupies.  ‘Nuff said.  Left to right, it’s Lou, Crashley, Rob, me, Jen, and Ruby.]

6 comments.

USA: NYC: Cupcake Cafe

Posted on September 28th, 2008 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Blog, Food, NYC.

[Me, near the end of a long day, suddenly feeling great]

Having missed this spot, which apparently closes at 8pm, before, Ray and I decided to take no chances and met up early to procure cupcakes for our evening dessert at the Cupcake Cafe.

First, I have to say, the cupcake is an under-appreciated dessert.  Once we grew up, everyone decided cakes were appropriate.  But cupcakes are convenient and easy and just as pretty as a cake.  With cupcakes, no one has to fight over the flowers, cause everyone’s got one.  You can order some chocolate and some vanilla to appease all appetites.  Cupcakes are the wave of the future, say I.

Now these cupcakes were gorgeous.  I wondered how they made flowers so beautiful, and if I could really destroy one amidst my cravings.  I ate slowly around the outer edges of the flower so I could at least preserve it for a couple minutes.

The frosting, I must say, was delicious.  A nice butter frosting that was not too sweet or overpowering - it made a nice accompaniment to the cake below.

The actual cake was quite dense.  While yummy, I didn’t think it anything special, but I hear the special part is that it can come in a variety of flavors, such as chocolate, vanilla, orange, lemon, poppy, and walnut.

The Cupcake Cafe is located on 18th Street between 5th and 6th Avenues, and there’s plenty of room to sit down if you’ve been stumbling around the city and are in need of a place to rest your feet and enjoy yourself.

0 comments.

USA: NYC: Rare Bar & Grill

Posted on September 28th, 2008 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Blog, Food, NYC.

[For lack of a better picture, he’s Skutch looking over the menu.]

When we went to Rare, the same burger caught the attention of all three pairs of famished eyes: the M & M Burger. flambeed in whiskey, topped with carmelized shallots, cheddar cheese, and apple smoked bacon. Mmmm…  That’s a $15 burger, admittedly, but worth every penny.

Ray ordered his burger medium, I ordered it medium rare, and Skutch ordered it rare.  The chef made no mistakes - nor did the wait staff - everything was perfect, and everyone was pleased.

We also got sides of onion rings and calamari, as the burgers don’t even come with fries (turned out to be a spendy burger, eh?) but the sides were all very yummy, at least, so although I shelled out $30 at the end of the night, I wasn’t feeling the least bit grumpy.

Located on the corner of Carmine and Bleeker, just off 6th Ave near Washington Square Park, Rare has great location and is worth a stop if you’re looking for food in the area.

[Afterwards, we cracked out the cupcakes that Ray and I had picked up earlier…see the look of delight on my face?  I already had a mini-cupcake that afternoon, so I know what’s in store for me.]

0 comments.

Meaningless Rant: The Slug

Posted on September 27th, 2008 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Blog, Meaningless Rants.

I was stumbling home, oversized suitcase in tow on a night so heavily laden with fog that near-microscopic droplets of water had gathered on my glasses as I passed through the video game-like atmosphere.  I pulled my suitcase up the two steps to the mini-sidewalk that led to my building’s front door when something caught my eye.

Green and yellow.  Long and straight, with edges curled under, and stems sticking out from one end.  A leaf, I thought, even as my foot swerved to avoid it.

I stopped pulling my bag.  Had I really seen two stems on the end of the leaf?

I shifted so my shadow wouldn’t block the light from the front door and squatted down.  Two stems, indeed.  Two antenna, in fact.

I had never seen such a thing before.  Curious, squatting on the damp walkway in front of my building, I watched it inch along.

“Are you okay?” asked a concerned couple as they came home.

I smiled.  “Yeah.  I just noticed this thing on the ground - it remind me of the giant snail I saw in Macau, but it doesn’t have a shell.”  Only in retrospect can I fathom how strange I must have seemed.

“It looks like a slug,” said the man.

My response, wherein I was articulating the idea that perhaps I should move it before it gets stepped on, was overridden by the woman’s shriek of terror - at the slug itself, or at the idea of moving it, I’m not sure.

The couple left as I sat there thinking.  I could leave it and let nature take its course.  But then, if I knowingly leave it in a walkway, am I as good as killing it myself?  Am I killing it intentionally, even?

I blocked the path as children came racing down the walkway.  I frowned as the slug experienced a near-miss with a shoe.

If it was a cute creature, most people would feel compelled to help it.  When it’s a slug, sensible women scream and run away.

I pulled the convention pass off my neck and scooped up the slug.  I deposited it in the nearby grass.  A child help the doors open for me as I pulled my luggage in the main door.  What goes around comes around, perhaps.

0 comments.

Book: Hard Contact

Posted on September 24th, 2008 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Blog, Books, Star Wars.

Title: Hard Contact
         (Star Wars: Republic Commando, book #1)
Author: Karen Traviss
Genre: Sci-Fi/Fantasy
Anna’s Rating: 4/5

So…confusion, yeah.

I hated the first half of this book.

We start off, after scrolling through weapons choices in a video game-like fashion, with a group of hardcore trained elite commandos…who randomly get the mushy feelings to set aside their objective and go help some farmers handle local trouble - it would never happen.  Then we meet the Jedi Padawan who never even had enough control over the Force to even become a Padawan.

The sentimental commandos would have been destroyed on Kamino.  The incompetant Jedi would have been relegated to the Agricultural Corps.  These characters never would have landed themselves in the real world.

As a story about a young girl meeting some soilders, however, it was a very good book.  The last hundred pages had me looking forward to monotonous time on the subway.  Actually, the last fifty I just sat down and read tonight while printing out some worksheets.

The clones’ perspectives were interesting, and it was enjoyable to see Padawan Etain bloom into a knight before our very eyes.  The book made the good point that we all need the right teacher to flourish.  If, for example, our program director at Fordham cared about us and was passionate about working with us, I imagine that none of my classmates would echo the feeling of wanting to break down in tears to me.  We would probably be excited about our work, and proud of our school and the products of our studies.

Of course, the book implied that implied that it was Darman who trained Etain…I feel more that it was the situation that trained her.  Something akin to “need is the mother of all invention”, I think that stress and circumstance breed ability.  We never know what we are capable of until we are put in a situation that forces us to truly give our all.  Only then do we discover our true potential.

So, yeah…deep thoughts.  Personal connections.  All that good stuff.

I guess it was a pretty good book.

QUOTES:

“If you don’t crack sometimes, how do you know how far you can go?”
- Darman, p. 133

“We’re all going to die sometime, so you might as well die pushing the odds for something that matters.”
- Darman, p. 177

“The nice thing about the alphabet…is that it gives you plenty of plans to choose from.”
- Fi, p. 214

Etain: “You enjoy not being understood, don’t you?”
Fi: “Part of our mystique and charm.”
- Fi responding to Etain’s frustration and confusion over the extensive use of acronyms, p. 214

“There’s three things you should never believe - weather forcasts, the canteen menu, and intel.”
- Fi, p. 229

0 comments.

Book: The Mark of the Crown

Posted on September 24th, 2008 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Blog, Books, Star Wars.

Title: The Mark of the Crown
        (Star Wars: Jedi Apprentice #4)
Author: Jude Watson
Genre: Sci-Fi/Fantasy
Anna’s Rating: 3/5 (At least it sucked less than the last one…it was OK, it just wasn’t good.)

So, at this point I acknowledge that I am addicted, regardless of quality.  Obi-wan and Qui-gon finally get to the planet of Gala after the filler episode that was Book 3…to a mission that really lacks in deeper purpose.

Kinda written in a mystery style, yet I feel like, because it’s a kids’ book, you’re just told how the mystery works.  I wish instead that the author would just continue to pile on more hints so that young readers can solve it for themselves.

Maybe I should write books for young readers someday.

But what would I write about?  Hmm…

Anyway, a couple of quotes:

“[Patience] is not a gift, but a lesson to be relearned daily.”
- Qui-gon Jinn, p. 15

“What he taught would live on.  And that was legacy enough.”
- Realizations of Qui-gon Jinn, pondering what he would leave behind in this world, p. 128
(Just liked it as a teacher, really.)

0 comments.

Meaningless Rant: Being Alive

Posted on September 22nd, 2008 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Blog, Meaningless Rants.

To further articulate my thoughts on the whole “Why I do what I do” rant…

When a person is in a coma, with no brain activity and machines suplying oxygen and food, some people begin to stop and think: “Is this person still alive anymore?”

When brain activity stops, are we still living?

So as I go numb and mindless through each day, each week, each month, sustaining my existance on canned and pre-packaged food, falling into monotonous routine, I’m left to wonder: “Am I still living?”

What is it to be alive?

Is it enough to merely exist, take up space on this plane, consume and produce waste?

Is it enough to keep busy, to hold one’s own, sustaining one’s existance by whatever means necessary?

Is it enough to be challenged each day?  To have to think, solve problems, tackle challenges, and go home at night knowing you’ve accomplished something?

Is it enough to push your limits, try new things, and achieve high-set goals?  To do things that perhaps not everyone can do?

My idea of what it means to be alive evolves as the years go by.  When I was a child, I would have said that the comatose individual was still alive, by merit of existance.  In college, I would have said that the person who challenges him or herself is alive.

But now I want more.

I want to push myself father.  Find my breaking point.  Achieve more than I ever thought possible - more than anyone ever believed me capable of.

And let me break, if I must.

And rebuild.

Let me be stronger, more capable than ever before.  Let me know the high end of my limits, and build upon them with my experience, so that I can go even farther.

Perhaps I have been asking myself the wrong question.

It is not enough to be merely alive.

I need to evolve.

(Why talk to a shrink when I can just publish all my innermost thoughts on the web?)

0 comments.

USA: NYC: Shanghai Cafe

Posted on September 22nd, 2008 by Anna Zhan.
Categories: Blog, Costumes, Food, Star Wars.

Note: I’m blogging because I can’t sleep.

[Ahh…xiao long bao…makes me miss Shanghai…]

Every now and then Ray and I will end up fantasizing about Chinese food, and while I may not know where to get the good stuff in town, he certainly does.

 
[Normal, pan-fried dumplings]

We went to Shanghai Cafe in the Manhattan Chinatown at 100 Mott Street.  It’s a medium-sized place, nice and modern, but nothing too fancy.  Piles of steamers are stacked on the counters in the front window where curious tourists can watch…though there’s not much to see.

[There’s gotta be a specific name for these, but I don’t know it…half dumpling, half steamed bun…100% delicious.]

We decided to make it a dumpling night.  In addition to the xiao long bao (or soup dumplings or steamed juicy buns or whatever you want to call them) we ordered plates of a variety of dumpling types - plus a plate of onion cakes.

 
[Onion pancakes!]

Ray ordered in Cantonese.  I later made a request in Mandarin.  Confusion with the wait staff ensued.  In the end, they decided to speak Mandarin to Ray, leading to further confusion.  I forgot they used to do that to me back in the day when I was dating an ABC who didn’t speak Chinese.  It’s like they’re thinking: “The white girl couldn’t possibly be speaking Chinese…these people must be ventiliquists…but I’m not fooled!  I’ll speak to the Asian.”

 
[We should get Skutch this hat for Christmas…]

Oh well.  Afterwards, we went walking up Broadway.  We found a $150 pleather coat for Skutch, plus this trendy hat (omg I can’t believe he can actually pull off this look.) We also went to visit the costume shop by NYU, and while it was disappointingly closed, they did us the favor of leaving a Ruby’s (Rubie’s?) Stormtrooper armor set up on a mannequin in the front window, where we stood around for a good long while, taking pictures and making fun of it.  Cause our armor is better, yet costs less.  Yes, we’re armor snobs.

 
[Ray did not recognize me because I dressed like a girl…]

All in all, not a bad night.  Hit up the bookstore.  Missed the cupcake shop.  Can’t have it all…  Oh, and there was that bit about posing as newly-wed buying bedsheets (huh?) so we could get into Crate&Barrel to use the bathroom…  I think everyone knows damned well if I were married to either of those geeks, we’d be getting our bed sheets from Pottery Barn Kids!

0 comments.