The Never-Ending Blog.

Mecha-Rudhraigh vs the WTO!!

2005-12-13T18:28:00.000+08:00

Well, as you know everybody's favourite trade regulator, the good old WTO is in town having a meeting that's apparently aimed at solving the burning trade issues that cripple the poor and molest the rich of their god given dignity. They surely are a bunch of good Samaritans at the WTO, kind, considerate and truely concerned for the fortunes of their fellow man. Sadly, not all agree with this righteous point of view and a few of these malicious minded thieves thought it proper and appropriate to litter the streets of Hong Kong with their maloderous presence today.
I, thinking it an interesting situation, tagged along for the ride. To start with, it was pretty sedate although some of the walking bands and megaphone shouting was pretty cool. They closed off a long part of Wan Chai, there were representetives from every conceivable anti-globalisation organisation around, if Hong Kong is anything it's a mish mash of people from everywhere around the world so pretty much everyone has access to protesting here. Indians, Brits, Germans, Chinese, Koreans, French, Brazilians and of course the Irish. When I first got there it was pretty standard protest stuff, hundreds of people all walking in the same direction trying to make it look as though it represented something, even though the something in question was slightly different depending on which banner you were walking behind.
Some people wanted genuine fair trade, others wanted fair trade strictly for homosexuals, yet others wanted fair trade as a part of international communism and thene there was me, who wanted to take photos. Then there were the Korean farmers, who wanted to have the right to sell their products at the same prices as the multinational corporations who are edging them out of the market with mass production. Those pesky Koreans have a habit of dying of starvation and making everyone look bad as a result.
While I was walking next to the Oxfam group, I noticed that I was beside the dude from Amorres Peros and the Motorcycle Diaries. He was small, hairy and had a camera.
When we finally got to the ground outside the conference center, all the groups stopped by the seaside and took out the megaphones. An hour of shouting in Chinese and heavily accented English, nothing much had happened. The problem with these sorts of protests is that at the core of your mind, you're always a little bored and you hope there will be a little action. Luckily, I was not dissapointed. I was lucky enough to be beside some railings that overlooked the main poiint of entry to the conference when the Korean farmers attacked the Hong Kong police barricade. They tried to dump a burning funeral pyre on the police, but luckily they didn't achieve it. The cops were replaced by a forty person deep line of police officers, all of whom seemed to be about ten, in full riot gear with shields, pepper spray and batons. It was a crazy thing, people were getting sprayed, cops were getting hit, it's weird to see someone hit a cop and know that they won't get arrested cause there are just too many of them. It really drives it home how much the police rely on the support of the people to do their job.
When the Koreans started getting out of hand, they got pepper sprayed like crazy, I was about four meters away from this one guy who got a load of it straight in the eyes. He was on the ground writhing in pain, the kind of pain you don;t really see first person these days. I was on top of the railings taking photos for about an hour and a half whilst a full on riot was going down less than two meters below me. The photos I took were pretty unbelievable, you really can't beleive the craziness of see a guy get beaten with a baton, especially when you know he kinda deserves it for trying to smash a policeman in the face with a piece of wood.
Eventually things calmed down somewhat, the Koreans had all been peppersprayed and beaten so there wad no-one left to go crazy. It was odd, you could see loads of crusty Europeans in the mix, giving a lot of shit. Very weird to see that, kind of wanted them to get arrested. After a while I decided to leave and went off. As I walked home, I kept looking at all the people, amazed by the fact that no-one was fighting.
So all in all, my first riot was a glorious success, except that nothing actually got acheived. Some people got smacked around and yet others couldn't see yet, thank god, the WTO conference goes on and we can all go to bed safe knowing that the world is an ordered place. Apparently Saturday is going to be the hardcore day because 600 more Korean farmes are arriving so I may go again if I get time. I'll post the pictures I take then too..

30 things that I have learned in Hong Kong

2005-12-09T18:23:00.001+08:00

1] Chinese People love money, work hard and will be all of our masters in a short time. Our Kids will be naming their kids "Fung" and sending them to Chinese schools to learn accentless Mandarin.
2] Living in a big city can actually be a very small experience.
3] People on cocaine are not as much fun as you might think.
4] Chinese people tend towards being unimaginative.
5] Chinese girls love to date Europeans but want to marry Chinese.
6] Advertising is not as easy as you might think.
7] I like living in a place where things work properly.
8] Living in a different time zone to everyone you love is both good because you can pick when you're going to talk to people and shit because sometimes you can't when you want to.
9] Long distance relationships are extremely hard when you're in love.
10] Reno 911 is a great show in bits.
11] Paying full price for DVD's is stupid.
12] Meeting new and interesting people is hard in aplace where everyone is remarkably similar.
13] Living in a small flat can be a lot of fun if you have a good flatmate.
14] The internet is a small place.
15] The fact that every conception of the future in film looks like a mall in LA is depressing.
16] There are places on this Earth for everyone, even the fuckers have their own place where they can do exactly what they want.
17] I hate the word "Expat"
18] Blogs are a diamond mine of shit and excellent music.
19] I have a distinct interest in particular parts of the internet.
20] Being white and the much debated minority is not easy when you're trying to blend in.
21] You don't need Cantonese to live in Hong Kong, you just need Cantonese to talk to anyone worht talking to.
22] Within ten years, Hong Kong will rival any city in the world in terms of popular culture and celebrity.
23] Cantopop is crap, but popluar in mainland China.
24] Deadwood is a good TV show, in fact everything by HBO is great.
25] Rocky is a good game until you get good at it, then it's just boring and repetetive.
26] The music scene here is progressing well, but still shit and underdeveloped.
27] I like being able to buy cheap beer whenever I want in 7-11, but it makes me feel poor.
28] I like to live in a warm climate, but constant air conditioning is mind sappingly tiring.
29] Life is not an easy thing to predict.
30] I'd come back to Hong Kong, but I couldn't live here.

30 things thatI have learned in Hong Kong

2005-12-09T18:23:00.000+08:00

20 Things that have changed in the last 2 months

2005-11-28T17:53:00.000+08:00

1) I quit my job.
2) I moved out of the Sykes’ into a closet. But it’s a closet with a PS2 and an ashtray, so it was okay.
3) I’ve been writing a lot more.
4) I’ve started smoking.
5) I’m now smoking Menthols.
6) I don’t think I can go back to regular cigarettes.
7) I’ve become radically unfit but I’ve lost a load more weight and look more fit than when I was going to the gym twice a day, how hilarious is that?
8) I’m now on my natural “go to sleep at six in the morning and get up at three in the afternoon” sleep cycle.
9) I’ve been watching a lot more TV/movies
10) I eat out at almost every meal.
11) I now have to do my own washing.
12) I go out drinking a lot less now that I live thirty seconds away from all the bars.
13) I’ve started going into work solely because they let me use the internet. This means that hilariously enough, there are days when I sit on the net for hours, browsing and downloading, exactly what I did when I actually worked here.
14) I stopped playing the PS2 as playing Rocky for two days straight made me hit someone.
15) I’m planning on either coming home early to do some research for my book or going to Malaysia.
16) I finally saw “The Talented Mr. Ripley”, very good, although I was surprised by all the gay stuff. Not because I have a problem with including homosexuality as a narrative device but because I hate the gays.
17) I’ve been buying up small bankrupt corporations, amalgamating them into single corporate entities and selling them on to the US government at a vast profit.
18) I’ve started lying in this entry.
19) I discovered to my simultaneous glee and anger that the couch in my flat is actually a sofa bed. I have been sitting on that couch for days on end and my flatmate didn't think to tell me that it pulled out into a bed. That enrages me What's worse is that I didn't think to check.
20) I’ll be home for and after Christmas, this place is dead anyway.

My Day In: Air Conditioning

2005-11-15T11:25:00.000+08:00

04:40 AM
I wake up at with a comprehensive motherfucker of a sore throat because the air con always dries me out like I've been French kissing a sponge. After a few seconds of staring into the dark, I realise that reason I'm awake is because the fan has popped back on, making a loud "CLick" noise, it does this every fifteen minutes or so. Most times I'm able to ignore it but every sixth or seventh time it builds to a crescendo of sudden scary night noising, one of those "CLICK"'s makes me sit up in bed grasping for the light switch as I ready myself for the mortal struggle with the house sized cricket who seems to be trying to eat me. Of course I could just sleep without the air con on, but I have this thing about having to wash gallons of sweat out of my one set of sheets three times every day because my washing machine doesn't work very well. So, instead, I sleep badly and have a sore throat, it seems like a fair trade.

09:00 AM
Phone goes of and then goes back to sleep so that I can too. Room is freezing, yet somehow I am still sweating. Pull covers over half of me as compromise. Uncovered half now far too cold whilst covered half far too hot.

09:10 AM
Snooze mode # 1 kicks in, switch covered/uncovered sides. For brief moment am comfortable enough to escape back to sleep.

09:20 AM
Snooze mode # 2 kicks in, merely a transititory stage, perhaps change sides/hug pillow. On occasion if I'm feeling active I might turn off the air con and open my door a little at this point so that I can enjoy the next half an hour of cool air mixing with the war form the living room.

09:30 AM
Snooze mode # 3 kicks in and is ignored as I sleep. Room is pleasantly temperatured if I opened the door, or freezing if I didn't.

09:40 AM
Snooze mode # 4 kicks in , I debate whether to get up and instead go back to sleep. Throat is beginning to smart.

09:50 AM
Snooze Mode # 5 kicks in. I usually get up about now as I have to be in work for ten. I go out into the sweltering furnace of the living room, take a three minute shower, brush my teeth get dressed and am out the door and at my desk by 10:05 AM.

10:05 AM
Sitting at the desk, the office is freezing if one of the Chinese staff has had to walk to work, or pleasant enough if they didn't. The problem with Air con is that most people only really think about it when they're either too hot or too cold. So they end up turning it on or off and you have to just put up with the adjustment to your ambient temperature, you just have to take it.
It's not like you can for example, stand up and bellow in their face " Hey! Fuckwad! I realise you may be overly hot but for Christ's sake why don't you stand in the corridor where the building AC makes it Sub Artic for five minutes instead of making me sit here with goosebumps for the next twenty until I finally awkwardly ask if you mid if I turn the AC down a bit?" You can't do it cause your throat is far too sore.

12:30 PM
Lunch time means going outside, outside means a variety of ambient temperatures ranging from teeth chattering to sweltering. I walk from the relatively comfortable office, into the Artic wasteland of the corridor. I actually have a jacket that I wear just for when I'm standing in the corridor, it's that cold. Someone once told me that apparently in New York, more people die of pneumonia in the Summer than the Winter because they just live in the vast extremes of Outside Hot and Inside Cold. I can believe it. I tell that story at least once a week. I find it comforting in a "Generation X'er continuous appreciation of the vague sarcastic irony of our existence" kind of way.
Going outside right now is actually okay, it's like a really warm day in a temperate country, but coupled with massive humidity and even worse pollution it ain't doing your sore throat any favours. The Air conditioning units of Hong Kong are the single biggest drain on the power grid, massively outclassing their nearest rival. This also means they're the main contributors to the worsening pollution problem here. It's funny, in other places I would feel genuinely bad to be adding to this problem, here I don't even think about it as I reach for the AC. It's just too fucking hot.

In terms of AC, Walking through places in Hong Kong is a bit of an international tableau of differing climates. People here have actually figured out a way to make the kind of AC you subscribe to be a kind of social stratification. For example to many Hong Kong Chinese people, temperatures just short of freezing are the only acceptable standard, whilst Europeans with their added layers of fat prefer a more temperate option. So if you go into a Hong Kong Chinese business here and they favour a temperate AC, you can immediately tell that they're trying to cater to the Europeans, and vice versa. It's an odd little thing.

Also, to a certain extent climate control is another form of wealth classification, since more expensive air con units run into hundreds of thousands of HK Dollars, if you only have one of the window boxes {as I have had since I moved out of the Sykes's} you're doomed to half-measured air con. So if you have da money you can be comfy, tis as simple as that. The theft of air conditioning units from apartments here is apparently pretty massive, an interesting fact if you throw in the "bling" factor of having good air conditioning in your flat. Some people actually refer to each other's Air con units by model name. "Hey Yao lets go back to yours and crank up that sweet AC-1050 Beeatch!" "Fan, your Zannusi 55k is tricked out Muthafucka!"

17:00 PM
Been sitting at desk all day, throat even worse, feel like germs have spore colonies in the spongy air con filters and are busily invading my body. I have never had so many colds and flus in my life. It's like uin the office we all have one glass that we all drink out of, except every time we do it's always the backwashed bit at the end that's thirty percent spit.
I sneeze, everyone else here immeditaely covers their mouths. If someone coughs, I immediatelty cover mine. Germs and air con go hand in hand, the little buggers just love to get into the filters and go mental. Because it's all recirculated air, you get this weird stale smell, a kind of "diet-smell" of everything. For example if someone’s having a smoke, you get a kind of "Fresh-air Smoke" smell all over the place. When we get food in, you can smell the tinge of it everywhere. Because the air is cold, you're constantly taking deep breaths, I have yet to see a place where it's so cold you can see your breath, even though it's definitely been cold enough for that to happen. as far as I can figure that's largely because air conditioned air doesn't conduct vapour the same way as normal air, presumably because it's so devoid of moisture or some such other pertinent scientific fact.
I'm looking forward to going home, usually at around 18:30 PM, so that I can go and regulate my own air con and stop putting my jacket on and off every twenty minutes. Living in air conditioning is pretty much all about the five minutes after you've taken off an article of clothing or walked inside from the heat. All the other times, it's pretty shitty.

02:00 AM
I turn on the AC in my bedroom before taking a shower, the room has to be cool before I go to bed, it's just a pain in the ass trying to sleep otherwise. It begins to "CLick" as I leave the room. I hate that "CLick". More than I hate Osama Bin Laden, at least he lets me sleep.

Elaine.

2005-10-31T17:35:00.000+08:00

I found out on Saturday that Elaine, one of the two staff writers from BC magazine where I used to work, tragically committed suicide last Friday.

When I heard, I really didn't know what to do, I didn't know what to say, I didn't know how I felt other than I knew I felt insensibly bad. Since then, thinking about it I have to admit that I didn't know Elaine terribly well, we worked together in an office where we never really talked, but sometimes, even all you have with another person is a shared awareness that you're both alive, that they will share in part of your own life's memory and as such the death of that person is inexpressibly tragic, woefully all encompassing, personally devastating.

It's funny, now that I want to try and describe her I find I can't, or maybe it's that I don't want to try because now that she's not here to disprove my inevitably innacurate description of her, my insipid simplification of her life, I don't want to confine her to words like "a good person" and "sweet" because they're not who she was. She was so much more than that. She was a living, breathing person with all the millions of unique traits both good and bad that we all have and that's the tragedy, the world is a little less special now that she's gone. It's selfish for the rest of us who are still here and who knew her, but we can't help it, I know I can't. I miss her. Even though I didn't know her very well.

It's funny, for the most part we really do live in a culture of denial when it comes to death. Anti-aging this and plastic Beyonce that, death is really not something that we like to acknowledge. It's just something we genuinely wish wasn't there at all and the denial is so huge that it dwarves any ability on our part to compare it to something in our lives that we understand, something ordinary. Death, it seems, is an emotional trigger we can't stand being pulled.

Our denial is mostly made easy by the fact that for the most part, all the people who are reading this, ie. people with computers, treat death as a rather unnatural part of their lives because the seldom experience it in others and never in themselves and when it does happen to others it's usually to people that you can kind of tell are going to die. So, when we are confronted with sudden death, the very rapidity of it means that it's something that we can't ignore because the absence of that person, combined with the total lack of solid dependable knowledge as to what has really happened to them means that we are confronted by a reality much realer than the one we've been living in. We find ourselves stumped as to how to deal with this new reality, we wish that we could go back to living in the old one because it was a lot less complicated and it didn't hurt as much. Death brings desperation. In response to this problem some turn to religion, others to addiction, many just shut down from the all encompassing nature of the pain, living for the rest of their lives in quiet, unassailable agony. I wonder, is there another option?

I am one of the luckier ones in that with regards to Elaine's death, I was on the emotional periphery because I didn't know her very well. Sadly enough, I can deal with it, apparently this event is not large enough for me to really learn anything really real about death. My sadness aside I can fall back into my life and this merely ends the chapter marked "Elaine" in my head, in the story of my life. I think the real tragedy of suicide is for the people who are closer to the dead, those who cannot escape or evade the pain. Elaine impacted on many people throughout her life, more than she knew, more than any of us knew.

The saddest thing of all is that if suicides knew how many people will genuinely miss them after they are gone, they'd probably never do it in the first place..

Written this morning in work "Jesus II - Payback Time!"

2005-10-27T13:09:00.000+08:00

VO
Two thousand years ago the world was changed forever when our lord God sent his only son to Earth to die for our sins. Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace sacrificed himself so that we, the filthy sinners of the world, could be forgiven for all time. Since then many bad and evil things have happened, World Wars, Plagues, The Spice Girls, Terrorism. Looking around the world today you could be forgiven for thinking that the Dark Lord Satan has won the war for Earth’s soul, but you would be wrong. It’s not a question of if Jesus is coming back; it’s just a question of when. It’s not a question of why Jesus takes all Satan’s evil, it’s a question of just how much he can take, and what will it be that pushes Jesus over the edge of heaven and back down to Earth.

EXT – The United Nations Building in New York City-New York, it is a busy and baking hot day in New York. SAIED, a confident and good looking looking young Arab man walks towards the building carrying a rucksack, you can tell he’s an Arab because he’s wearing a turban, has a long beard and robes and is continually muttering “Allah U Ackbar” in an Oxford accent under his breath every couple of seconds. He meets another obviously Arabic man with a massive beard in front of the fountain JAFFAR who is holding a briefcase

SAIED
Greetings Jaffar, is it not a fine day to bring the fiery wrath of god to the infidels?

JAFFAR
Indeed Saied, today the whole world shall know that there is but one god and Allah is his name.

SAIED
Is everything in place?

JAFFAR
It is brother.

SAIED
So, sha..

His is interrupted by a man dressed in a shirt and tie wearing a badge that identifies him as a Mormon

MORMON [Loud and friendly]
Hello there gentlemen, my name is Elder Johnson from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints! Have you heard the good work about Jesus Christ?

SAIED [Maliciously]
Hey, why don’t you go fuck yourself?

MORMON
Well, there’s no need for that, I’m just trying to save your eternal souls.

JAFFAR
Well go save somewhere else you diseased patch of camel urine!

The MORMON walks away, shaking his head, he immediately accosts a pair of suited types with the same schpiel as they pass by.

SAIED
God, I hate the fucking Mormons.

JAFFAR
Yeah, the fucking bastards they’re always calling to the apartment during dinner, really pisses my second wife off. If it was up to me they’d all roast in fiery pits for eternity.

SAIED
Anyway, shall we do this thing?

JAFFAR
Indeed. Let’s get our bomb on.

SAIED and JAFFAR walk towards the back of the building.
CUT to EXT an unguarded service entrance where a shuttered grate has been left open to allow a nearby truck to unload it’s cargo of coffee beans and fresh tomatoes. They sidle up the truck, grab sacks and enter the building unnoticed amongst the workers.

Cut To INT Security office – A security camera screen clearly shows the two men entering the building, but MOHAMMAD THE SECURITY GUARD at the desk is also of Arabic extraction, you can tell this because he is wearing full Arabic robes, a turban has a long black beard and a little badge that says
“Security – Mohommad Smith”

SECURITY GUARD [Whispering to himself]
Allah U Akbar Saied! Allah U Ackbar Jaffar!

CUT TO INT Un Building – SAEID and JAFFAR are standing amongst a tour group consisting of an OLD MAN FROM TEXAS, a few young people and a group of small Catholic school children including a cute little blond girl called JENNY who are being chaperoned by FATHER MCGETTIGAN, an old Irish priest who looks as if he might have a drinking problem. The attractive female TOUR GUIDE is standing by to lead them through different areas of interest.

TOUR GUIDE
Now, if you’d like to move along, we’ll start the tour.

JENNY
Father?

FATHER MCGETTIGAN
Yes Jenny?

JENNY
Billy Batson just asked me if he could touch my heiny but I said no cause Jesus says heiny touching before marriage is evil.

FATHER MCGETTIGAN [shouting]
Indeed it is. Well Jenny, if that’s that case don’t you worry because then Billy is going STRAIGHT TO HELL!! Aren’t you Billy? Where you will be forced to eat liquid hot lava for all of time and burn in everlasting turmoil and torment, right Billy?

BILLY [Quietly, looking like he’s about to cry]
Yes father.

FATHER MCGETTIGAN [Shouting]
That’s right, now all of you little bloodsucking cretins, come on! There’re millions of starving black babies right now in Africa who aren’t as lucky as ye who are getting to swan about on school trips to the United Nation s Building!

The tour Group begins to walk through the building

TOUR GUIDE
The United Nations headquarters building was constructed in New York City in 1949 and 1950 beside the East River on land purchased by an 8.5 million dollar donation from John D. Rockefeller, Jr. The building, which consists of

Whilst the speech is going on, JAFFAR is reaching into his briefcase and subtly assembling a submachine gun under his robes. The gun is completed as they reach a small room with only one entrance which has a number of posters that are relevant to the building’s history. He looks over at SAIED and nods, as soon as SAIED nods back JAFFAR grabs the TOUR GUIDE and points the fully assembled MP5 Hechler and Koch at her head. SAIED pulls out a massive Mini-Gun that he had secreted under his voluminous robes and points it directly at the children

JAFFAR
No body fucking move!

The room erupts, all the children are going crazy and trying to run away. The TOUR GUIDE is going absolutely hysterical. JAFFAR and SAIED are trying to keep the whole group together by pushing them together and screaming mindlessly in Arabic but somehow JENNY manages to break away and make a run for the door, she is about to make it when suddenly MOHAMMED THE SECURITY GUARD appears in the door with what looks like a Scud missile launcher.

MOHAMMED THE SECURITY GUARD
And where do you think you are you going little girl?

JENNY
AHHHHHHHHHHHH!

MOHAMMED THE SECURITY GUARD pushes JENNY back into the room and closes the door behind him, locking it with a key from his belt. He walks towards the still crazy crowd.

MOHAMMED THE SECURITY GUARD [Screaming]
Shut up!!

MOHAMMED THE SECURITY GUARD points the Scud launcher at JENNY and the room quietens down. Once they are calm, SAIED pushes Jenny back into the crowd

MOHAMMED THE SECURITY GUARD
Having trouble Saied?

SAIED
Don’t give me any of that backtalk! Is everything on schedule?

MOHAMMED THE SECURITY GUARD
Yes, Thank Allah for equal opportunity employers. Stupid Christians won’t know what hit them. By now videotapes have been given to all the major news networks explaining what we do here today.

JAFFAR
Shall I set the explosives?

SAIED
Yes Jaffar.

JAFFAR pushes the petrified TOUR GUIDE back into the mass of people and walks over to a certain wall, pulls off the posters and opens his briefcase which is full of explosives, he begins setting them up. Meanwhil,the OLD MAN FROM TEXAS and FATHER MCGETTIGAN are having a heated whispered debate.

OLD MAN FROM TEXAS [Whispering]
I’m telling you father, I’m not going out without a fight.

FATHER MCGETTIGAN [Whispering]
But what can you do?

OLD MAN FROM TEXAS [Whispering]
I can take them down.

OLD MAN FROM TEXAS surreptitiously pulls out a small knife from his boot and puts it up his sleeve.

OLD MAN FROM TEXAS [Whispering]
I’m a cop. I know what to do.

FATHER MCGETTIGAN [Whispering]
But there are three of them, they might hurt the children!

OLD MAN FROM TEXAS [Whispering]
I can get them.

SAIED [SHOUTING]
You two! Come here!

OLD MAN FROM TEXAS and FATHER MCGETTIGAN look at each other and then walk out.

SAIED
You were talking?

FATHER MCGETTIGAN
No

SAIED
It wasn’t a question.

SAIED shoots OLD MAN FROM TEXAS in the face, he falls back and hits the ground, everyone screams.

SAIED
No talking.

CUT TO – EXT An infinite cloud of purest white, in the middle there is a hole through which the hostage room can be seen. As OLD MAN FROM TEXAS is shot a beautiful, soft and gentle voice can be heard to say

VO
NO!

CUT TO – INT Hostage room – SAIED is now pointing his gun at FATHER MCGETTTIGAN, the room is in pandemonium.

SAIED [Shouting]
SHUT UP!!

The room quietens down.

SAIED
You [points at FATHER MCGETTIGAN] you are a Christian priest yes?

FATHER MCGETTIGAN
I am.

SAIED
And what do you think of what we are doing?

FATHER MCGETTIGAN
I think it is an abomination before God.

SAIED [laughing]
That is very funny, because I think it is God’s Will and since there is no God but Allah, surely you are wrong?

FATHER MCGETTIGAN
There is one true God and Jesus Christ was his son.

SAIED
Well, that’s a good point, I too am a priest and since I represent the Will of God if I were to say, shoot this girl here in the head to teach you not to talk, what would you say?

SAIED points his mini-gun at JENNY who cowers in fear. SAID starts the barrel of his gun spinning. JAFFAR and MOHAMMAD THE SECURITY GUARD look on with sniggering laughter.

CUT TO – EXT An infinite cloud of purest white

VO [very strongly]
NO! This is it, I can watch no longer my children suffer, now is the time for action!

CUT TO – INT Hostage room,

SAIED [Shouting]
You! [pointing at Jenny] Come here!

FATHER MCGETTIGAN [Shouting]
No Jenny! You stay there!

SAIED
Talking again? Maybe this will teach you.

SAIED begins to fire at Jenny and into the crowd of children, he laughs maniacally as the mini-gun blazes away, the small room quickly fills with smoke from the gun’s cordite until the children are obscured. Screams are heard under the whine of the gun’s motor. Eventually SAIED stops firing, but keeps laughing. FATHER MCGETTIGAN falls to his knees in abject despair, crying and sobbing. SAIED’s face is maniacal as he turns to FATHER MCGETTIGAN and starts the gun spinning again.

SAIED
The lesson is over.

Suddenly, magically, the room clears of smoke and the children are revealed to all be standing there, not knowing what has happened. On the ground about three feet in front of them there are thousands of bullets and there is also a man with long brown hair and a short brown beard. He is wearing a pure white robe.

JESUS CHRIST
No, the lesson is just beginning.

SAIED is absolutely shocked, JAFFAR and MOHAMMAD THE SECURITY GUARD are lying dead on the ground. FATHER MCGETTIGAN looks up at SAIED and smiles. JESUS CHRIST waves and SAIED is suddenly totally frozen in a stance of absoulte terror, only his eyes are moving.

JESUS CHRIST
Enjoy the eternally tormenting lava, tell Satan I’ll see him soon.

JESUS CHRIST waves his hand again and SAIED bursts into flames, he writhes in agony as the flames consume his body. Eventually he stops moving and the ashes turn into a disgusting blood coloured goo, as do the bodies of JAFFAR and MOHAMMAD THE SECURITY GUARD

FATHER MCGETTIGAN
My Lord? You’re back?

JESUS CHRIST
Yes I’m back, and now it’s Payback time.

One part of every sentence here is a lie. Guess which!

2005-10-26T17:15:00.000+08:00

Two weeks ago I went through a Machiavellian plan to secretly surprise my family by coming home for my brother’s birthday but they were still to be unaware of my other, more savage secret, that since moving to Hong Kong I had joined the CIA as the international assassin and part-time spam-monger Fanciful D Delphiniu!

I surprised my brother on the morning of his birthday by lying my way into his flat but once I had pushed past the third naked male prostitute dressed in a sexy Klingon outfit I realised that I was not the only one in our family who had secrets.

Later that day, I surprised the rest of my family at a restaurant which was lovely because my mother cried, of course I was unaware that she was crying because she realised that she’d have to pay for my dinner.

For the next few days, I mostly spent my time in Wicklow, playing computer games, talking to my mum, enjoying the fresh air and killing would-be Israeli assassins.

Later that week I attended Charlie Slevin’s Pirate-Themed 21st Birthday in Mayo which was totally not full of Charlie’s rough attempts to put his “pork sword” in everyone’s ear while they slept.

I saw all the guys I hadn’t seen in a while, Mano, Eddie, Dave Wall, Johnny Illan, Skec, Ben Ullman which was great.

Once home again, my friend Paul came over from Hong Kong for two days for some drinking, some chatting and to keep me up to date on an upcoming job in Russia regarding a certain corrupt Irish TD who needed “retirement”

For the next few days I wasn’t looking forward to leaving Ireland, my family and paying six euro for a watered down pint of piss.

Of course the day eventually came, I said goodbye to my loved ones, said goodbye to my father, hugged my older brother and my younger sister, kissed my girlfriend, garrotted my traitorous informant for not telling me about the second kill-team in Bangladesh.

When I was on the plane on the way back to Hong Kong I was sitting next to this guy, an Arab guy.

He claimed he was a police officer in Hong Kong, soon to join the Police Tactical Unit we had a nice conversation but thanks to my extensive CIA training I noticed that he kept drawing in a scrapbook which featured large pictures of what seemed to be exploding planes full of dying, screaming white people, one of which looked just like me.

He was very interested in my lifestyle in Hong Kong but I think he was somewhat put off by the fact that I kept openly readjusting the Glock 45 in my Leg Holster so that it pointed in his direction.

When the food service arrived he seemed to be unable to make the decision between the chicken and the beef lasagne, but it didn’t matter which he chose as I had poisoned both.

Later he slept for most of the journey, the poison was a fast acting neural toxin that gradually paralysed his breathing making it look like deep vein thrombosis.

I didn’t sleep as I wanted to try and normalise my sleep patterns as quickly as possible, plus I didn’t know if there were any more terrorists on the plane.

Landing in Hong Kong I was glad to be back but I had extremely mixed feelings, I missed Ireland, I missed my family, I missed my girlfriend, I missed my target when a stupid fucking bodyguard got in the way.

Now that I’m back, I’m back working away in advertising; good cover stories are hard to come by.

Ass Piracy on the Extremely High Seas

2005-10-26T10:46:00.000+08:00

Bueno
Originally uploaded by buen0.

Whilst back, I went to Charlie Slevin's 21st birthday party, I think this is the photo of the evening.

Well done Bueno! Two Gold stars!

Previously on Rory’s Blog.

2005-09-30T18:39:00.000+08:00

Cut to Chad and Rory backstage, Rory is lying on the ground in a puddle of vomit.

Chad
Hey Rory, you’ve changed man! It used to be just about the music! Now you spend all your time hanging around with all your new friends, drinking and partying, me and the guys hardly never see you no more

Rory [Shouting whilst Drunkenly waving around a half drunken bottle of Jack Daniels]
Get off my back you fucking albatross! Every time I achieve something, you fuckers are there to claim that you did it, that it was al about you and that I was just there at the time, doing fucking nothing. That’s it! I’m fucking leaving this shitty band and going solo!

Cut to Rory and Emma, sitting at the dinner with her parents, the room is silent, there is vomit on the table.

Rory [Shouting whilst Drunkenly waving around a half drunken bottle of Jack Daniels]
Listen, all I’m saying is that I’m too much man to just get it on with one woman, I’m an international Rockstar in China for God’s sake, what do you expect? Over there I’ma God!! Men, Women, Children, some animals that are capable of such emotions such as dogs, cats and maybe dolphins, they all fucking love me! Your daughter should be appreciative that I’m not fucking bored with her already.

Christopher [silently]
Get the hell out of my house.

Cut to Rory and Emma standing outside the Syke’s building,

Emma [Crying]
But you said you loved me!

Rory [Shouting whilst Drunkenly around waving a half drunken bottle of Jack Daniels]
I said a lot of things.

Cut to Rory driving a pimped out super tricked speed boat out of Hong Kong harbour to sea, his long hair is blowing in the wind, a Coastguard boat is following him.

CoastGuard [Through Loadspeaker]
Rory! Don't throw your life away! Turn back immediately! You’re heading into Tsuen Fan Wu: Dead Man’s Bay! There are underwater reefs! You'll be killed!

Rory [Shouting whilst Drunkenly waving around a half drunken bottle of Jack Daniels]
Fuck you you motherfucking bastards! You all make me sick! You all want a piece of me, everyone wants a piece of Rory, Well, you know what? You’re not fucking getting it! Fuck You!!!!

Cut to shot of boat hitting a reef, there’s a large explosion, Cut to shot of bottle of Jack Daniels falling underwater.

VO
AND NOW, THE CONTINUATION OF RORY’S BLOG

Lazy is Beautiful!

2005-09-14T15:38:00.000+08:00

Today, I spent some time perusing the work of the good people at www.goodplasticsurgery.com

This is basically a site that rates the plastic surgery that celebrities get done, showing before and after pics of everybody's favorite American sweethearts. What I find interesting about this is not the fact that someone is interested enough in this phenomenon that they'll actually spend some serious time posting hundreds of thousands of lines about Hilary Duff's new veneers, I was well aware that people were that pathetic, it's actually the sheer number of well known celebrities that have had plastic surgery, a long and painful process that's pretty much just a form of self-mutilation when you think about it.

Now I know this is hardly big news. We've all heard about this for quite some time,I could go as far as to say that I knew this already, everyone doed. But I knew it in that passive "no-one I know well has ever gotten plastic surgery simply to look better" kind of way. I think this site really hammered it home, people get this shit done for no other reason then 'cause they don't like aspects of how they look. It's funny, you hear about people getting plastic in a kind of "reading one of your mother's Cosmopolitans in the toilet" kind of way and you think "Wow, people are fucked up!" and it adds to your whole "Fairytale Kindom of America" concept, but I have to say I never really realised how truly prevalent it is, like even people who are by any standards already good looking get surgery to make themselves that little bit better.

Besides all the crazy Korean's and Brazilian maniacs, thousands and thousands of celebrities and celebrity wannabees routinely go under the knife! It's part of their daily routine, their daily life, like my life! It's like going to the dentist for them! It's banal! Like my going to work!
There are people out there who study healing people for ten years to be able to be paid vast amounts of cash to shove pieces of plastic under other people's skin to advance their social structure! It's insane! And then I inevitably thought, would I ever get something tlike that done?

No, no I wouldn't. Not Botox, not a nose job, no face lifts, no breast implants, no nothing. And not because I just think it's fucked up [although I do]I wouldn't because I'm already totally perfect so the question doesn't apply.

I'm one of the lucky few, the elite, those of "natural beauty" for who the concept of looking better is simply a non issue beacue they already look perfect.

So I of all people can understand why people would want to look like me, looking like me is great! People listen more, they're more likely to forgive you or give you another chance when you fuck them over or fail to do something, to lend you money, take your advice and put up with you continually ignore theirs, or even when you've broken a law or cheated on them! People are dumbstruck by physical beauty! Being good looking is the lazy man's answer to everything! Just look at how fucking useless models are! They have no talent, no profession or function in society whatsoever other than to wear clothes and walk! And people idolise them! Cause they're useless!
Jessica Simpson? Paris Hilton? FUCKING USELESS!!!!

So, yeah, if plastic surgery is for lazy people then the laziest person in the world would ergo be the most beautiful! I know what you're thinking, I thought it too. This means that Rudhraigh McGrath is the most beautiful man alive!

I'm so lazy I won't ever need to consider getting plastic surgery because getting plastic surgery is a real fucking hassle and I'm far too lazy to actually do it, so ergo I must be the most beautiful!QED!! I'm so lazy that I can't be fucked getting plastic surgery but at the same time I also don't need plastic surgery because I'm the most beautiful!

I AM A GOLDEN GOD!!! I AM THE MOST BEAUTIFUL, FLAWLESS BEING IN THE UNIVERE!!!! I AM BEYOND ENTROPY!!!!

Well..actually....now that I think about it, maybe a small chin implant, just to look more like The Hoff you understand.

"Nite of Champions"

2005-09-13T15:09:00.000+08:00

DSCN0989
Originally uploaded by Rudhraigh.

So, last Friday, no....wait.....this story begins before then.....I
have to go back further.....back, to whan it all began.

The year is 25,000 BC, man is but a distant and beautiful dream, a
mere speck in the eye of God, the universe's postman. Earth is busily
waiting for her husband to go out to work so that she and the Almighty Postie can get biiisaaaay. Soon, according to Stanley Kubrick, primitive apes are
learning to hit stuff with stuff, changing everything forever.
"Ape shall not kill Ape" was the refrain up until this point, but one
Ape wasn't listening, he was starting a series of events that would
lead to a Friday night 27,005 years later where I, and three of my
friends, watched Muay Thai Kickboxers knock several differing
varieties of shite our of each other. It was worth the wait.

I have to say, you watch the early Van Damme movies like "BloodSport" and apparently if you're any kind of man you think "That's so cool! I
love Blood! I love Sport! Ergo I must love BloodSport!" Now I loved
those movies, but blood makes me feel queesy and I feel that sport is
for people who don't know how to sit down, so I have to say, when I saw the poster for the event whilst dinnering in a crappy litle Thai restaurant, I was conflicted. On one hand I could watch some guys fightingm real hardcore and have fun, on the other I could get my fork and jam it into my leg. After careful consideration I decided to do both, so I limped to the fight with Ben, Bryan, Gordon and Tom, all of whom you probably don't know because

A] The internet is a big place
B] The world is a big place
C] Muay Thai is cool
D] That's it, Muay Thai is cool.
E] I realise I was talking about
something else, but what's much more
important is that Muay Thai is cool.

So anyway, we turn up and outside the stadium to see this crazy looking Belgian guy in a black suit. Bryan does Muay Thai Kickboxing as he's in the CIA {not really] and he knew this guy to be one of the big Kickboxing trainers in Hong Kong. The most hardcore trainer, the one that makes you crap blood for a week after a training session. Apparently he is what Jean Claude would have been if he hadn't quite made it, or alternatively he is what Jean Claude is on his way to becoming, now that his career is effectively over. He was hilarious, he had this real "Kick the shit out of you" stagger, even thought he was surrounded by some of the dodgiest looking bodyguards ever. He had an almost comical arrogance about himself. He's the type of guy that you'd kinda like to meet, have him give you crap and then casually shoot in the leg with a Glock like that sword guy Indiana Jones shot because he had dysentry, just cause you want to see him realise that Muay Thai is only really effective in a meter radius. What made it even funnier was that there was this other trainer, from the PRC, a little Chinese guy who was dressed in an entirely white linen suit. He was like the little guy in the white suit from that episode of the Simpsons with the Triads. They both kept chatting all night, I bet the Chinese Guy's name was something like "General Chang"

Anyway, once we were in the stadium it got underweigh, a hilariously tacky and drunken announcer in a sparkly jacket, unnattractive ring girls of indeterminate sex, thousands of screaming Chinese and Gweilos, including a troop of Hell's Angels, and I think there was some fighting.

Actaully, the fighting was pretty ridiculously hardcore. If you've never seen someone repeatedly bash their elbow across someone's else's face, I sincerely reccommend that you do. How you react is one of those "getting to know yourself" kind of life experiences.
There were seven fights, the whole thing lasted from 7:30 till midnight and as soon as we got there we realised we had made a tactical error, they didn't sell beer to the cheap seats. This was a real pain in the ass, until we realised that Gordon was still to come, so we got him to stop at one of Hong Kong's illustrious, omnipresent 7-11's where you can buy loads and loads of massive bottles of San Migueal for about a Euro each in order to rectify this situation. Now let me say something, there are many things in life that alcohol makes worse, vomiting, walking, working, not laughing, not losing your temper, shuouting, but one of the things it definitely does improve, is watching Muay Thai Boxing.

Once we were a couple of beers to the bad, it wasn't entertainment, it was war! It was pugilism! When The Chinese guy fought the Hong Kong dude, I swear to God I wanted somemone to die. Watching this stuff, with the doctors on standby and the mob mentality and the beer and the betting [I won lots, lost it and then won it again, paying nicely for my beer for the eveing] you really don't think it's that fucked up when a guy savagely knees another guy in the face. You just don't, the knee in the face is really just part of the ambience. Like drapes.

Anyway, there was a huge attempt to represent the nationalities, Australians, Japanese, Thai, French, even a fucking massive British guy who was knocked out in ten sceonds by this fat Chinese dude. I have video of us all on our seats screaming "Fatty! Kuma-tae! Fatty Kuma-Tae!" That's how drunk I was..

I got a picture, as you can see, with this guy who is the most Russian looking guy I've ever seen, but for some reason came into the ring wearing a leapordskin Turban, which was actually pretty cool. He proceeded to savage his opponent massively, splitting his lip inside five seconds with a wicked kick and knocking out inside a minute. All the fighter's had names like "Carnage" and "The Tatooed Frenchman" whcih further added to the overall level of taste and discretion.
As a professional copywrighter, I have to say that the fighter's bio in the Programme that they gave you was truly a piece of art. Apparently they all trained with the legends of Muay Thai in the mountains of Thailand, even the guy who was apparently a Shoaolin Monk, but looked like some piss scared guy they brought in off the street. He came in and, I swear to God, asked the announcer what the rules were. I didn't know what to think, I'm sure he recovered. At least I hope he did, he looked pretty dead.

I realise that this is a somewhat fractured account of the evening, but you have to understand, I was very, very drunk. After it was over, we went to this Fashion Launch Party [oo ee]where Ben and I got absolutely trashed and spent the evening trying to convinve the security that we were reporters that had an interview scheduled with Christian Dior, even though he wasn't there. This, as you might have guessed, was a lie.

Later, when I was too drunk to stand around drinking any longer, I left Emma, Ben and Lauren to the party and I got a taxi home. After about ten seconds in the cab, I realsied I was going to be sick, racked my brains to try and remember how to say stop, said my Address, "Hello", "Bye Bye", "Are You"and then finally "Left Here Please!". He didn't understand, so I had to mime vomiting, he suddenly understood, pulled over, I open the door, fountain Champagne heavy vomit [I stared getting full Champagne flutes from the barman and putting them into pint glasses, and I hate champagne] out of the door a couple of times, then finally, I close the door and we drive off. On the way home, the tai guy was on the radio with all his mates, miming vomit, looking at me semi-comatose in the back and laughing at the fucked up Gweilo in the back.

I have to say, I'm really looking forward to next Friday..

Punished.

2005-09-08T09:57:00.000+08:00

So yeah, due to overwhelming pressure from my adoring public [Gaz] I thought I'd post this hilarious tale of hilarity.
Okay, well basically, China, as you might know, produces a fair old whack of pirated DVD's. It's a bit of an industry, perhaps you've heard about it? They burn them in the millions and you can pick up dodgy videocamera versions or DVD rips from Oscar Screeners a couple of days after a movie comes out in the cinema. They're of varying quality but they're all ridiculously cheap so you end up buying a lot of shit you would never consider getting in the first place. The last time we went into China for example, Lachlan returned with a copy of "The Aviator" amongst other things, "Aliens vs Predator" and a genius copy of "The Punisher"

Now the funny thing about these DVD's are that they all come in pretty snazzy looking covers, most of which are made up by the guys who rip the DVD's, none of whom speak English. Sadly the above cover is of the above the board version, so no hilarity. But anyway, most of the time they write something in Chinese and then just load it into a translation program with hilarious results. So you read the back of "The Aviator" and it says "Good Luck man never speak French with his Mistresses Wife fanciful looks of death. Who can contain his lustful spirt for the life that he was wanting? Never, since the time of legends, has a French gate loved to live so much but till tomorrow, who knows?"

Other times they just copy another DVD's blurb wholesale or just Google the name of the movie looking for critic's quotes and stick that in. This can be pretty hilarious when the critic is saying something negative about the movie, but I digress. Also for some reason almost every cast list on the back of every DVD in China comes from Disney's "The Kid" with Bruce Willis.
I don't know why this is, maybe the Chinese just really love that movie. Makes sense though, you really would have to have no understanding of English to think it was good.

So anyway, we had gone through of the crappy DVD's, each one was accompanied by the collective ritual mocking of the blurb on the back. Most of them were just mildly funny anachronisms, like watching "Whale Rider" and it saying on the back "A High-Octane Thriller that grips you by the nose and never lets go!!!"
Eventually we got to the Punisher.

It was only then that we realised that this crappy re-make of Dolph Lungren's version on the classic Marvel Comic, that's about killing mob guys and righteous, glorious revenge had printed on the back in large letters:

"A Glorious Study of Homosexual Lust!! - The San Franciso Chronicle"

I have to admit, that was much more entertaining than the movie turned out to be.

Ahh, the nieevatay of youth

2005-09-07T15:19:00.000+08:00

http://www.kimyadawson.com/reliefthroughmusic/

The Alphabet

2005-09-07T09:51:00.000+08:00

Well, I've been getting flak for my lack of Blogging lately, although the complete absence of comments I get is indicative of the fact that we are all lazy (Other than my mum, love you mum!) so I've made a decision, I'm going to try make this a more daily occurrence, shorter entries but more to the point, and also it's going to be more bloggish in that it's going to be yet another uninformed idiot commenting in a completely superficial manner about the same stuff that everyone else sees on the internet every day because frankly folks, looking at the internet is all I do all day. At the end of all this, I will have developed net-browsing skills beyond the ken of mortal dial-up user.
My erstwhile flatmate and co-A-team watcher David Wall always claimed the internet was his bitch, having had some experience with office life I now realise that he was lying, both to me and to himself. It's actually the other way around. We, in office life, are all the internet's bitches.

And that sweet info crack taste so good!!

But let's not fool ourselves, I've said this before, I may say it again. It's a bit of a case of "No Darling! I love you! I swear I'll never hit you again........now why don't you go on and make me breakfast and we'll forget about all this......PIZZA'S NOT FOR BREAKFAST!!!!"
So, here are the obstacles.

A)Laziness and general malaise.
B)The ghost of periodic busyness at work constantly interrupting my real work, which is doing nothing apparently.
C)The fact that the Blogger page is in Chinese here, so don't understand any of it.
D)The fact that I know no HTML and cannot figure out how to post pictures of a nice size.
E)Laziness (So good they named it twice)
F)A complete unwillingness to comment on anything of substance lest it reveal how ignorant I am on all fronts.
G)The feeling that I should be working, even when I have no work to do, so writing a blog during office hours will be probably accompanied by all the many and varied types of guilt I go through as I sit at my desk doing nothing, for the vast majority of the day.
H)A complete unwillingness to give the industurial military complex anything other than a false and cursory look at my brilliance, lest they deduce my geniosity, attempt to abduct me and force me to orchestrate their plan to bioengeneer a thousand Flying Monkeys and send them into Iraq to swoop down at the head of the enemies of Freedom, cackling and knocking their fez's off and thus scare them into ending the conflict as well as making some evil Iraqi's poop themselves, much to the amusement of the onlooking fifteen year old American soldiers.
I)A real need to write extremely long Blog entries, I love to write and when I get going I find it very hard to stop. Ie: This supposedly short entry.
J)My Busy Life! I'm far too involved in other projects to even consider writing this at home, because I never go home! I'm out all the time! Tonight, for example, I'm going down to get a haircut and play Ultimate Frisbee in Victoria Park, Tomorrow it's the movies! Friday I'm off to Muay Thai Boxing extravaganza!
K)The fact that I know, no matter how much time I put into this, my mum is the only one who's going to comment with regularity and thus reassure me that people are actually reading this. Not that I have any problem with writing a blog solely for my mum (Love You Mum!) but I talk to her pretty regularily over the phone which is a much more time-efficient method of communication, blogs are for twats with too much time on their hands. Like me. And you who are reading it. Twats, all.
L)My laziness. So Lazy!
R)The fact that I don't know my alphabet very well.
M)The fact that I suspect that sometime in the near future, our blogs will be used as techno-evidence in our light-speed space-trials to prove we are Godless Athiest Communists Pinkos who deserve Excommunication, from our bodies.
N)The fact that no matter how hard I try, the internet is still twinged with neredery for me. This may amuse some of you who already consider me a nerd, but this is not the case. I am a geek and proud of it. Nerds suck.
O)The fact that I hate people who make arbitrary classificatory differences such as between "Nerd" and "Geek" and that regardless of what they say they are plainly just a "Twat" and this blog thing does this to me.
P)The fact that after a while, I get bored of trying to maintain an hialrios joke because frankly, I have better things to be doing.
Z) The way the End is NeverEnding!

The end.

Or is it?

[Queue hand picking up Ming's Ring and a voice Laughing Maniacally]

Battlefield Earth: Space is Lebensraum!

2005-08-06T03:01:00.000+08:00

The year is 2042, mankind is at war with a race of viciously fundamentalist space mutants called the Kreen Deltas Kappa Aieee's, who are intent on colonizing Earth for the purposes of spreading the message of their Holy Church, to spread Blogs.
"Sir!" shouts an emaciated corporal through the narrow slit in the back of my bunker, "You have to get out of there!"
"What?" I repliy, too intent on watching the perimeter for possible threats to notice such a pissant annoyance as some shitty noncom trying to cope with his own cowardice.
"Sir!, They're advancing on this position! There are too many of them, they're going to overrun this hill whetehr we're here or not!"
"Get back in your hole soldier!"
"But sir!"
I turn to him, giving him the full benefit of the four stars on my shoulder and the death in my eyes
"Soldier! Either way you're wholly fucked because you either get back in your foxhole or I take my shotgun and blow you another asshole! We are going to hold this place from those dirty Blog-reading freaks if it takes you, me, or the entire Mormon fucking Tabernacle Choir!"
"Yes Sir" he tremored, the hollow sound of a slow wetness covering his pants being the only distraction as he left to contemplate his death.
I turn back to my post and resume my vigil. The mist on the perimeter is thick tonight, I think, the bottom of the hill is out of site. Shit, those dirty Bloggers better not try anything or I'll fill that ground so full of lead that forty years from now people will still be dying of lead posioning.
Then suddenly, out of the darkness comes a light, and a sound!
"Is it just me or does George Bush resemble a kind of cross between a drunken Colin Farrell and a female Orangutan?"
The fuckers! I bellow, it seems they've sent in an advance guard of their political division, some of the worst of the Blog Armies, always ranting in an eloquent manner about the political events of the day.
"I mean come on!" the voice continues " He fits the bill perfectly, he's slow, simian looking, is illiterate, obsessed with himself, convinced of his own righteousness and also a complete fucking liar!"
From the natter I can tell it's alone because there's no fucking piddly little voice shouting "Comment! Comment" in the background. Good, I think, this should be easy. I cock my rifle, aim down the long barrel until I see movement to my right, an indistinc shape forms, falls out of the mist, it's a backpacker!
He's holding a Lonely Planet and everything.
And indeed, there were many of these on my recent trip to Vietnam, which I just returned from and it was lovely. Emma and I went to Saigon and then down to Mui Nei and then back up to Saigon and it was fantastic. A Couple of days of relative chilled outness and I even managed to read the new Harry Potter that all the kids are talking about. Otherwise, I've been working, chilling, formulating, playing, sleeping, eating and writing, but not neccesarily in that order. I'm still looking inot a few of my projects and hopefully some of them will be coming to fruition soon. Work is good, I've just submitted two TV Commercials and I did some general assistance on a Print Campaign for Mercedes in China which will soon go in every major newspaper across the country, which is cool. So I'm pretty happy with it, even though I should have done much better. Emma's cool, she's finished her internship so she now starts the fecking about stage of the holiday that I so love and she so hates. Otherwise, just the usual struggle de-la-Rory McGrath, One man against the Man!
Oo Ee.

Honesty is the best Fallacy.

2005-07-15T00:06:00.001+08:00

Okay, I feed bad. I've given you the most incredibly shallow idea of what the Hell I'm doing am that must end. Here's the story.
1] I am working in an Ad Agency, it's pretty great, they represent Mercedes and Virgin Atlantic in Asia, if I get the job permanently I'll be the English-speaking copywriter with loads of perks, responsible for Ads, grammar and various other stupidities.
2] I'm still living at Emma's parent's place, I love her parents but recently I feel that I want to move out becaue not a huge number of crazy intercontinental travellers have maids that iron their clothes, cook their meals and never talk back.
3] I'd like to move to New York, but I love Hong Kong and think I need to move out before I make any decision.
5] I want to write a book, more on this later.
6} I also want to write a screenplay, more on this as well.
7] I want to stop feeling intimidated by the fact that people I know read this, I want to feel good about writing it casually . It would help if you pasted comments god Damn it!
8] I want this to be day to day, rather than sleep to sleep.
9] I want you all to know I miss the Hell out of you and I look forward to seeing you again,
10] I'm sick of sorting out photos to make my post's more visual. I can't find the cable that connects my camera to my computer so you're just going to have to find my words entertaining, that's how it is.

Word. That's it.

Rudetc.

Reactionary reactions are mostly wrong.

2005-07-08T12:01:00.000+08:00

DSCN0307
Originally uploaded by ruadhraigh.

Well yeah, London got bombed. As I'm sure you know by now, if you don't then you should go have a look at the BBC, although the likelyhood of it not being common knowledge in the British Isles that London got attacked by terrorists is pretty low, not like here. Very few people over here seem to give a shit really, they don't really care. It'll take a bombing of a Hong Kong landmark like the MTR or the Peak Tram before the Chinese Nationalistic fervour gets going and God help us if it ever does. There'll be no "Maybe we shouldn't invade Iraq" or "Blair is a liar!" There'll just be a lot more dead people. But as it is now, it's a bit surreal here because you say to people "Did you hear about London" and they say "No" then you tell them and then they go "Oh" and then they change the subject and two seconds later they're laughing maniaclally about something inconsequential. I suppose it makes sense, we are thousands of miles away and the news coverage is pretty sparse but I suppose I would have thought that more people over here would care. It's pretty weird to be freaked out when no-one else seems to be.
So yeah, I'm kind of at a loss as exactly what to say, I hope everybody I know is okay, although I still don't know. The thing I do know is that quite a number of people are not okay and that is completely horrific.
The six degrees of separation thing means that the likelyhood is that I at least know someone who knows someone who was involved, the internet is full of reports of people like this who are trying to keep it together to whatever extent that they can.
Personally, I was supposed to be going to drinks with a Christopher and a bunch of other people from the British Consulate last night to celebrate London's winning the Olympic Bid, I was really looking forward to it, everyone was but that was obviously downplayed as most of the people involved had to go and talk about things that were slightly more pressing than getting drunk.
It's funny, my opinions on terrorism have always been slightly between the two majority views, pro-war and For Bush and Blair and anti-war and against them. I've never really known how to really articulate them until recently. I'm anti-war but pro-peace, and before you think otherwise they're not the same thing. I don't want war, I want peace, but the reality is that no matter how you look at it if we're not at war now we soon will be. The majority of people out there who are pro-war have no idea what they mean by that statement, and equally true of those who claim to be anti-war. People usually just pick whatever knee-jerk, peer supported crap that suits them and then go from there, spreading division and hatred because of their ignorance. If you don't agree look at some of the ridiculous cardboard cut dogma that instinctually came out of the mouths of people from both sides, here on the right and on the left less than a day after this all went down. People are so ready to see enemies where there are none, even in each other. I mean, I might differentiate myself from some gun toting crazy in America or some irresponsiblly Anarchistic moron in Britain but that doesn't mean that people who want to blow up Westerners do. I think that the time has come to really stop hating each other and start hating the people who are doing this to us, whoever they are. The worst thing about the crap that both sides are sprouting is that on both sides, some of it is true, we do need to be vigilent, but we also have to recognize that the policies of our collective governments seem to be involved in the problem. If we don't all start realising that there are no all knowing goods or all hating evils and that we just have to work with what we have most of us will end up being destroyed by a maniac with a nuclear weapon, be it one or thirty thousand. Jesus, I hate political rants, they're always so stupidly fucking reactionary. Like this one I suppose..

Screw Yiz.

2005-07-04T14:14:00.000+08:00

Well well, long time no blog. I admit it’s getting to that point that my fantastic electronic output might be near to being downgraded to some kind of semi-secondary status in your day and I realise that this is probably pretty distressing owing to the near sacred position it probably takes. You might have reached a point where re-reading my old entries is becoming slightly stale, maybe not so current and interesting. “What’s up with Rudhraigh?” I hear you say, “Is he okay?”, “Has he replaced us with a whole new genre of persons that are in every way superior?” "Has his new job gone to his head and put into a bracket of arrogance that defies rational belief?" Well the answer to all these questions is Yes. Yes I am up, very much up in the world. I am okay and I have replaced you all with other people, all of whom are so much more interesting and dynamic as to make you all seem like the personal equivalent of eating snot you found on the ground in the men’s lavatory.
So, why haven’t I written? Because as usual I have been both very busy and very lazy. I realise that I should be making more of an effort but goddammit I get up at 8:30 every day!!! I work all day and then I go home and go to the gym!! And all the day long I'm adulated and nagged by people that mean more to me than any of you!!! What more do you want from me you bloodsucking freaks?? It’s all Me! Me! Me! With you people, I can’t stand it any more. That’s it. No more Blog for you. None. Not even a bit more. Nada. Zip. Zilch. Nichts.

Comin' to you Real as Pentientiary Steel...

2005-05-30T15:28:00.000+08:00

So yeah, as usual of late lots has happened since my last post. First of all I finally quit my internship, the less said about that the better. I'm now looking for a job, again. I realise that most of my life seems to have been spent in pursuit of some apparently illusory job. The proble is that every job I do seems to be marred in some respect and I end up hating it. If I could just get something that I was enthusiastic about, I think things would be different. I wonder my life would be like now if I had gotten a job I really and truly enjoyed that paid well as soon as I first tried when I arrived in Hong Kong, all those months ago.
{Blur to Imaginary Fantasty)
I am lying in a massive bed, surrounded by silk pillows, hypoallergenic sheet, piles of money and many beautiful lady servants.
Servant 1: Good Morning Master, did you sleep well?
Me: Of Course my dear, I always sleep well, It's impossible not to sleep well when you're ridiculously rich and you made it doing something you love, but it's especially easy in my brand new tricked out 4.1 Litre Golden Mercedes Four Poster Bed, complete with Virtual Reality Plasma Screen, Multicolored Underlighting and GPS.
Servant 2: Don't forget the Interdementional Silk Sheets and Automatic Catheter.
Me: Ah yes, the Automatic Catheter, you know I can't even remember what it was like before when I had to actually leave my bed to go to the bathroom.
Servant 3: Yes sir, I think we can all agree that things are much better now that you're indescribably rich.
Me: Yes, and I suppose I can put it all down to finally getting a job that I enjoyed. That and my brilliance of course.
Servant 4: Oh yes, your brilliance is mighty!
Me: Well thank you for saying so, so how's my day looking?
Servant 5: Well Master, first you Breakfast with your lovely girlfriend Emma who you respect and adore above all else and to whom you continually prove your love by refraining from having sex with any and all of the beautiful ladies who adore you and wih whom you could indulge your many and varied sexual fantasties at your smallest and most meagre whim.
Me: Ah, good.
Servant 6: Then it's on to your heliport, to travel across to your Space Yacht, Robert De Niro has requested an audience, apparently he wishes to make a movie of your life and star as you.
Me: That talentless hack? Never! I shall star in it myself.
Servant 7: Of course that would be much better, De Niro's really gone downhill since Taxi Driver.
Servant 8: Actually, I quite liked Meet the Parents.
Servant 7: [Bitchily] You're just saying that because you know the Master likes that movie.
Servant 8: [Enraged] You Whore!! How dare you embarrass me in front of him!!
Servant 8 smacks Servant 7 in her lovely face and they proceed to fight. I look on with interest.
Me: I wager 2000 Quatloos on the newcomer.
Servant 9: It shall be done Sir.

Anyway, I could go on with this, I really could. There is no limit to how long I could indulge myself in this particular little post, but I've got to go get a job, which is shit. Because I like not working. It's great!
No it's not. I need a job.

Blood, Greg and Pink Champagne.

2005-05-18T16:42:00.000+08:00

So yeah, how much better is my life than yours? Much.
It’s much better.
It’s much, much better.
Than yours.
Which is not as good.
As mine.
Not at all.
In preparation for the visit of my good friend Gregory Morrissey esq. who is of late of Japanese extraction, I went through a surfeit of effort the likes of which has never been seen in human history.
The Pyramids? Pah! Mere child’s play in comparison with my labours!
Magellan’s Voyage of Discovery? He had a boat! I didn’t even have that!!
World War II? Why would you try to compare it to my recent hard work? It’s plainly not even in the same league in terms of human sacrifice!
The Holocaust?………………………..I would like to state for the record that I have now and always had nothing but solemn respect for the Jewish nation and the suffering and death they underwent and how dare you insinuate otherwise! Do you think I have such bad taste as to insinuate that spending fifteen minutes on the phone organizing two spectacularly good evenings out in any way compares to the deaths of millions of innocent people? Do you?
That’s right, hang your head in shame!…IN SHAME!!!!!
So, I guess the only way to proceed is to pretend that you never brought that up, but just so it’s been said I think your trivialization of my moral fiber is despicable and reflects more upon you and the calibre of your upbringing than any conceivable action in the entirety of your life, but lets say no more about it.
Anyway, Greg arrived at around half sixish –an hour after he had said he would the fucker- and we went for a wee drink in Lang Kwai Fong, which is sort of the Hong Kong Island version of Temple Bar. Incidentally did you know that the Temple Bar was originally named for a political movement by Catholic shop-owners in the 1800’s barring Jewish people from entering anywhere in the area except the synagogue that was situated there? So it was a “Temple Bar”? Isn’t learning fun? But racism isn’t, but we’ve already talked about that, so lets move on.
After the drink we went up the Flat where Greg dropped off his stuff –Sandy and Christopher very kindly said he could stay there cause they’re the nicest people ever- and we got ready to go out. We were attending the launch of a new line of lingerie from Agent Provocateur. I have to say, contrary to what you might think, it was fan-fucking-tastic, although we foolishly turned up in suits when suits are for old people. The whole thing was a decidedly classy affair, full of what are loosely termed “the beautiful people” and by that we really mean good-looking cocaine prostitutes who are so world-weary and ironic only because they’re always demeaning themselves by hanging around ugly men hoping for a line and think their pleasant visage will earn it for them. But other than that as soon as you entered the room, it was amazing. The whole place was done up like a burlesque house, pink and blood red fabric adorning everything, hot models in minuscule lingerie mingling with sleek and young whilst also energetically handsome and talented go-getters like myself and Greg, it was a great laugh. Then, once we’d met up with the socially omnipresent Lauren, [who hooks me up big style with the conexxxions] we found a nook and drank some free pink champagne. It was very pleasant, good choons, chats with Greg, very pleasant. But even the best formal party gets a bit samey after a while, that’s when a good party-planner brings in strippers. So then the physically unlikely figure of Dita Von Teese, Marilyn Mansons’ present fiancé and international burlesque star came out to the pounding beats of the Peter Gunn theme and stripped around a huge glass of pink champagne, which was nice. Once I was about six glasses of pink champagne to the bad, there was a fashion show where a lot of women wore very little, and then took it off, which was also nice. I can safely say that everyone was riveted.
At this point I’d like to state for the record that I spent the entire thing thinking of how much I love and admire my girlfriend Emma whom I also love and admire in as much as a man can. Of course I covered my eyes when things got too risqué, but sadly others were not quite so retiring, I think one middle aged man threw his underwear at Dita, he was probably a multi-billionaire, they’re everywhere here and they’re always making fools of themselves. Damn Billionaires.
Afterwards we went out to a place called Dragon-Eye where the after party was. I must say, I have never had a doorperson look at me with such comprehensive scrutiny. I realize now how hard it must be to decide if someone is well dressed these days if you work in a fashionable bar, especially because today messy is stylish, so doorpersons have to become effective fashion consultants, it’s not enough to just say that you’re stopping people with white socks in HK, it’s a little bit more involved than that. It depends on whether or not they’re wearing cheap white socks.
Anyway, after an evening spent dancing around like chic-muppets and Greg spectacularly failing to score a girl we later found had a boyfriend, we went home and went to sleep, as we mere-mortals have want to do from time to time.
The next day I had gotten the day orf work, so we went for a wee explore. I had a meeting with a guy from this thing called the Brunswick Group for a possible internship. It didn’t pan out but I had a great chat with the guy, a really nice guy he was. He made some interesting points about my CV, my aims and about what I should be expecting to achieve in Hong Kong as well as how I should go about achieving it. Afterwards, we walked about a bit, I showed Greg some of Hong Kong’s touristic delights such as the Escalator and the Wall-Tree and then we returned home again to ready ourselves for another hard night spent getting on the wrong side of right.
That evening we were attending a high-class launch for a global concierge service called “Quintessentially”. We made an executive decision to not look like executives like we had the evening before so I wore my now legendary misplet “Nietsche is dead” t-shirt and Greg wore a similarly informal affair, understated in the way he overstates himself.
Upon arriving at the mall that was housing the party around 7ish, we found that we couldn’t find it and Lauren wasn’t picking up the phone. You know the really annoying thing about HK is? According to the all the American movies that I know and love, Chinese people speak English when there are no foreigners around!! They just have a heavy Chines accent, biut it’s English!! So every one of those people I asked about the party was pretending!! After wandering the mall for about twenty minutes and cursing the name of the Chinese while also looking fantastic the whole time, I finally got through to an acquaintance of mine who was also going called Maddie Thompson and we went upstairs to meet her. She’s a card. At least I think she is, I’m not exactly sure what a card is when it refers to people, but instinctively I think that Maddie is one. So we accompanied her and her gaggle of beautiful model friends downstairs, she showed us the way and we finally found the party. Without any help from the bloody secretly English-speaking Chinese.
1] The party was amazing, full of the usual mix of beautiful young people, rich old people and free drink.
2] Said people all wearing formal dress, Greg and I only ones wearing t-shirts.
3] Got away with it because people just assumed we were too cool to care, which we
plainly were.
So we sat through the launch, sipping drinks and making pertinent conversation. Apparently Quintessentially are hardcore large, being spread across the fashionable capitals of the world. Top level membership costs about $30,000 a year. It entitles you to have no hassle about anything, ever again. And you have to be invited to get it. If you want to go skiing in the alps with a Chalet and a helicopter, they’ll sort it out for you but if you want said Chalet to be painted bright pink and smell like Mutant Space Walnuts they’ll sort it out for you. Reputedly Phil Collins had a bet with a friend who said that he couldn’t ring them up and get them to deliver a bongo drum to the boat they were on in the middle of the Mediterranean within an hour, they got it on and Phil played the night away. On his $30,000 bongo drum. Pontificating fucker has the tenacity to tell me to think twice about homeless people and he spends $30,000 a year getting bongo drums delivered to his Mediterranean yacht.
Anyway, we went to that, had a laugh, met some good people, some not so good people and drank a lot of free champagne and then left. It was an interesting foray into Yuppieville, hilarious in one respect, deeply disturbing in another. Afterwards we went out to a bar, got drunk and then ended up at this bar that I continually seem to go to called Yumla, I like to think of it as one of the techno holes from the Blade movies where all the vampires drink. We were drinking cheap beer out front that we bought in a 7-11 and chatting with the peeps.We drank and we drank and we drank. We certainly surfed the Light Fantastic that evening, I can tell you!
Actually……. I can’t really,…..cause I was drunk. Really really drunk. For all I know I spent the evening vomiting blood into an icecube tray that Yumla then put in their Bloody Mary’s for the consumption of their secret elite techno-loving vampire clientele, I can’t really comment either way because I don’t remember, cause I was really, really……really, really drunk. It’s possible of course that we did some Light Fantastic surfing, but I can’t be sure…..cause I was too drunk. I guess that’s pretty much the only thing I can say about that evening, that I was really, really drunk. And I didn’t die. Or if I did, I somehow managed to come back to life and have no recollection of it. Or maybe I’m now some kind of reverse vampire? I woke up the next day and now that I think about it I seem to remember some kind of ritualistic feeding, a newfound craving for blood, a desire to sleep by night, haunt the world by day? Wait a minute…..
DAMN YOU REVERSE VAMPIRES!!!!DAMN YOU ALL TO HELL!!!!! I HAD A LIFE!!!!! A LIIIIIIIFFFFEEE!!!!!!
So anyway, the next day, which was apparently my first as a newly born reverse vampire, we both woke up with hangovers and with much trepidation at the prospect of a day of required activity due to the fact that it was Greg’s last day in town.
I took him down to Wanchai where we met my highly blood-filled friend Tom, a hilarious young-un who I like to think of as the Hong Kong equivalent of the Artful Dodger, and by that I don’t mean the shitty DJ who released the questionable “Moving Too Fast” some years back, no, I mean the cheeky chappy young street urchin from Oliver Twist, and by that I don’t mean the crappy cooking show with that South London twat who can’t pronounce his r’s, no, I mean the movie of the great Charles Dicken’s novel, and by that I don’t mean Charlie Dickens of West Lafayette in sunny Algeria who was born in 1983, no I mean the Victorian author who revolutionised the world of populist media with his serialised novels that examined the themes of the industrial revolution in a method that was immediately comprehensible to the newly literary society, and by that I don’t mean me, because I’m a reverse vampire and they don’t write novels because they don’t want the world to know of their existence. Instead we write Blogs, they’re much cooler than crappy old books and when you can play techno music while you write in them.
So anyway, we all went over to Kowloon side. I wanted to go and find a coffin but they wanted to go to the crappy Science museum. I demurred, knowing that Ic ould use my vampiric powers of mind control any time I wanted, but in the end it turned out that we were unsuccessful because we couldn’t be bothered walking. Instead we took a taxi [There was this scary cross hanging from the rear-vie mirro, I had to shield myself by going to sleep] to the Temple St. Market so that Greg could buy some shitty tack for the folks back in Japland. Once there, we saw they absolute miasma of stalls, shops and people that is a Hong Kong market. I had to control my new-found cravings for blood, but I was able to sate myself on a small pig I bought from a fleshy-looking man in a backstreet stall when Greg and Tom were busy looking at porn. It wasn’t very nice and I thought he overcharged me so I ate the man too. Sadly he was no tastier than the pig.
Meanwhile Greg was busy getting some hilarious stuff, and I bought some classic VCD’s Godzilla vs MechaGodzilla!!, McBain!! Cyborg Cop!! They all cost about 1 euro each so I was quite happy with this. Quite happy indeed. So I didn’t kill and eat the owner as I had originally planned.
Greg got some hilarious stuff, I want to re-iterate this. I’m not going to tell you what it was. This is an editorial decision, I have a responsibility to my investors, but needless to say it was hilarious so you’re just going to have to imagine something hilarious that you could buy in a Chinese market, like an exploding cow or a porcelain piece of crap. Or something.
Anyway, afterwards we were wrecked from walking around in the heat, so, hungover and despondent and tired from all the laughing at Greg’s hilarious purchases [They really were hilarious!! HAHAHA!!] we headed home on the Star Ferry. We didn’t get home however because we went for drinks with some of the other Interns again.I didn’t kill anyone and they got drunk, it was funny, then we left and went to a couple of bars in Soho. We ended up back at Yumla because I had to commune with my fellow vampires and scope out potential “Chow” [That’s not a racist slur on the Chinese by the way, it’s what we reverse vampires call people, duh.]. We drank a little, but the fight wasn’t really in us so we went home relatively early. Greg had to leave at 5:30AM to get his train to the airport so we watched the movie Seabiscuit [Which is probably Jamie Oliver’s favourite movie as it is shit, like he is.] until he had to go. We bid each other a fond farewell and he left for parts unknown with a tear in his eye, a bounce in his step and minus several pints of blood. I went back upstairs and went to my bed/crypt to ready myself for a new day of hardcore reverse vampirism.

Mia muchas Infantigo con el Interim Grande!

2005-05-11T02:20:00.000+08:00

RSCN0558
Originally uploaded by ruadhraigh.

Before I go any further I'd first like to apologise to all those people who are plainly hooked on my random twitterings and are lamenting my recent lack of updates. I'm sorry but after an entire day of sitting around doing nothing but writing witty repartee, the last thing I feel like doing is sitting down and giving a run-down of what I typed about earlier on. But of course I have to keep on going! For the Fans! Such an outporing of raw human emotion I've never seen! "We love you Rudhraigh!! Why don't you post hilarious things in your hilarious Blog the way you used to? We miss your hilarious adventures and awkward moments of social infantigo!"
Well you know what? I don't think "infantigo" is even a word. I think you're just making up complicated sounding words in order to try and impress me as I am very intelligent and regularily use long and complicated words such as "Reson Detre" and "Periphary". Normally any attempt on your, or anyone's part to subtley test me on whether I will prefer to risk being thought of as stupid to point out someone else's mistake or if I'll wimp out and let any stupid shit fly will result in your glee if you're an asshole or your dissapointment if you're intelligent. As such your use of "infantigo" could be a blind, maybe there is no such word? Maybe you're just making shit up to see which way I'll jump? I could check on the interweb, but I won't, I will not make this blog into a house of lies, or a house of effort. So your test may have worked again. I will say nothing about infantigo and we'll continue like I didn't just point all this out...... or make it up myself. So anyway yes as I was saying, of late my social infantigo has been massive!! Much infantigo for Rory!! I have had another week of various activities, I've been keeping up with the mental metaphor of work as Summer Sports camp and it seems to be working quite well, although I think the people at the office are getting a bit weirded out when at 12:30 every day I do a lap around the room and then sit down with a plate of orange halves.
I'm not sure how much longer I'll stick with BC, it's been great but I kinda need to start making money. For my own dignity if not for the actual process of money-making, which I've heard is pretty good in and of itself. The last couple of days have been interesting, there are two new interns, a guy and a girl. When the girl turned up, she was acoompanied by a fifteen year old school kid, I assimed the kid was a new intern and my self respect went down a few hundred notches as I don't think either of my leaving certificates, my four years of university, my hours of study and reading, my thesis or my numerous essays could have really felt like they were being utlised to the full extent of their ability if they were put on the same qualifiactions level with a fifteen year old girl who thinks "Britney is the Coolest!!!" Now admittedly Philosophy isn't much of a degree, but it has to be worth mroe than that? Luckily I was to be proved right when it turned out that the kiddie winkle was actually doing her work experience for school for a single day, so my self-dignity went rocketing back up the scale, back to it's normal habitation alfway between "self-loathing" and "self-hating" I had to take her over to Kowloon Side to a restaurant I was reviewing to giv her the skinny on the true meaning of journalism: Free stuff. Over my fourth helping of sushi and ramen, I explained in my typically imperious manner why she should do Philosophy in Dublin in college. I tell this to all the smart kids that I meet so that I remove them from competition for my jobs. No-one wants to employ a philosophy graduate.
Anyway, the other two inters are great, it's a measure of the atmosphere of general communication in our office that by the second day I didnt actually realise that Patrick, the other intern, knew them both and they were all like best friends. It's great to see that, people being friends, its refreshing from all the networking freakos I've met so far that qualify friends as people who have given them their business cards more than twice. The two newbies are called Ryan and Danielle, they're going out and their constant canoodling makes me miss Emma with a fierce and amazingly omnipresent tenacity that I cannot describe in this format, it would require something altogether more complicated.
Otherwise, non-business as usual. Going to parties [I secretly went to a kickass one in Shanghai Tang, full of models and the beautiful people and didn't tell anyone in the office because I didn't want them to know I was hungover the next day, except that they're probably reading this right now so I guess the jig is up on that one] Tomorrow, my friend Greg Morrissey arrives from Tokyo, I have a full calender of events planned. Tomorrow night Agent Provocateur, the sexy lingerie people, are putting on a massive party that I have arranged for us to attend. Beautiful people in various states of undress, models slinking around in lingerie, free drink all night and half the interesting people of Hong Kong, not a bad thing to do first thing off the plane. Otherwise, it's just going to be regular Hong Kong stuff, I got the days off work so we're going to have an absolute blast.
In other news, Stiff with internships has happened but I'm reticent to say "I might" this or "There's a possibility" that, because every time so far that I've said something like "I met this guy last night who's the President of the Universe and he says that God is looking for Interns and he can hook me up" I've ended up an looking like an idiot because plainly the universe isn't a republic, it's more of a socialist oligarchy with inherently self-perpetuating physical norms. But anyway, I'll give it a go: I might be doing an internship in the Financial Times here. It's truly impossible to put that in context if you don't understand how important the FT is, and how important Hong Kong is to the FT. So if I become an IT in the HK branch of the FT, it'll be pretty fucking GT. I'll know more about that soon hopefully although I've stopped holding my breath for these things, I keep passing out in public and making much social infantigo for myself.
I've also been made a contributer to www.pixelsurgeon.com. It's a designy linkpage with reviews and hilariousness. At first this was admittedly just a roundabout way of pissing Dave Wall off by casually putting myself a notch higher than him on the imaginary "cool" ladder that he tries to scale daily, but I have to say I really enjoy writing for it. I can just think "Hey, I'll review this" and then it turns up online looking all cool and designy, I like that a lot. Also it'll let me claim to be a journalist even after I sell my shiny soul to the corporate magpies who keep flying around my house/body. So I've spent rather a lot of time taking photos of myself for my bio for the page and this is the one I chose in the end. I have others, including many taken of me in a pith helmet that I brought home with me after a particularily good night out. Anyway, I'm going to sleep now. You demanding assholes have kept me up to 2:00, again!! Ah well, I guess you're worth it.

Weak-end

2005-04-26T15:28:00.000+08:00

DSCN0413
Originally uploaded by Rudhraigh.

Friday
Woke up, throat sore as had forgotten to turn off air conditioner.
Didn't sleep well.
Went to work. Was very tired. Had stayed up late watching episode of OC. Very good, much scandal. Worth it.
Upon arrival familiar confusion by lack of specific things to do.
Confronted old problem, left to own recogniscence have always been quite lazy.
Stared at screen in vague manner, hoping that it looked like work but actually incapable of reading any of the text due to tiredness.
Span on chair for a bit to wake up, was upset because someoene had broken its tilt function.
Checked my websites.
Checked my mail.
Wrote a mail.
Went to water cooler for some hot Cold Tea Action.
After a while was suspicious that the sub-editor was suspiscious of my lack of work.
Went to lunch in Times Square Mall: Sushi
Came back. Still nothing to do.
Finally got so bored that I asked for something to do.
Was given boring work.
Shit.
Eventually, after spending four hours researching listings for the "Le French May" cultural festival, was told that actually we didn't need the listings.
Shit.
Was informed that I had to cover a wine tasting that evening and a restaurant opening on Sunday.
Shit.
Left work and went home to FlyPad.
Had dinner with Sandy and Christopher, both very tired and jetlagged, but suspiciously energetic as usual.
Checked my mail.
Watched second episode of the US Office. Suprisingly funny.
Watched episode of Malcom in the Middle. Very funny.
Listened to bloody cat meow for an hour. Not so funny.
Went to Wine Tasting in Bar on Peak.
Took Photos
Tasted Wine.
Met PR people.
Went home again to FlyPad and played Hero's Quest 2.
Eventually went out to Bar to meet friend Lauren and friend Tom in Lang Kwai Fong.
Bar had beergarden, so I bought beer in 7-11. They cost roughly 40 cents each.
Drank.
Drank.
Drank.
Met varying different people.
Wanted Cigarette.
Hated smokers.
Drank.
Drrank.
Dkank.
Snrnsk.
People were suddenly very funny, everything was funny. Talked loudly and with much Gusto.
Noticed little anthill on the ground behind where we were sitting.
Was suddenly obsessed with the hilarity of the anthill as it seemed to be making witty comments that paralleled and complimented my own.
Anthill made good point, maybe I was drunk?
Went home drunk.
Staggered past gate-guy. Doorman called elevator and pressed floor button. Said "Good Night!!"
Tried to call Emm, no answer. Sad. Missed her. Maybe cried a little. Drunk.
Slept in clothes on top of bed, air conditioning was too confusing to turn off.

Saturday.

Woke up around two to hear Lauren's story of vomiting in her room the previous night.
Mouth tasted like teeth had melted.
Underwear had ridden up around neck.
Sore throat.
Headache.
Felt Sick.
Hungover.
Went out to find Carmen had set table.
Sandy and Christopher had apparently gone to the cricket club.
Had previously said that would play squash with Christopher on Saturday.
Rang Christopher and recieved rather curt question as to whether I was coming or not.
Was a bit weirded out as didn't want to upset anyone, but said was coming.
Went to club, looked like death, brought squash rackets for expected game.
Upon arrival, realised that I wasn't there for squash as it wasn't just Sandy and Christopher as expected but a group of ten people, all looking very spiffy and well turned out.
All important friends of Christopher's
Was unshaven.
Had just woken up.
Was hungover.
Was the only one there not wearing a polo shirt.
Was Incredibly Embarrassed.
Was increbibly aplogetic.
Apparently Christopher had come in while I was asleep/unconscious and told me about change of plans earlier that day.
No recollection of said information.
None whatsoever.
After lunch, said hesitant goodbye to Christopher's friends, one of whom said he knew the editor of the Hong Kong Standard and would ring him for me. Went to buy little TV for little office in FlyPad.
Returned and set up TV.
Had dinner with Sandy and Christopher.
Tried to call Emma, no answer.
Sad and worried that she might think I wasn't trying to call her, confused as to how to solve the problem.
Went to computer, set it to download more Office, Scubs and Oc episodes from the Interweb. Left it lying upside down on the floor to better allow the air access to fan to keep it cool, thus preventing breakage as things work better when cool, except my throat.
Grew suddenly frustrated by recent lack of writing.
Tried to solve this but ended up playing computer games instead.
Read minute parts of book "The Last Governer" by Johnathan Dimbleby while game was loading. Confusing, slightly boring but informative and useful.
Felt good that I had read a little of a book that I wasn't really enjoying.
Unpleasant sensations are charatcter building.
Eventually was called for dinner.
Ate dinner with Sandy and Christopher. Tasty food.
Went out to same bar and did same thing with same people.
Drank.
Drank.
Drnak.
Met an American guy who used to work in a nuclear missile silo in Germany during the end of the Cold War.
He was a dick. He only liked Asian girls and was creepy.
Drank.
Drnk
Drnk.
Dk.
Intimidated by all women present, didn't know how to relate to them owing to my non-single status and eternal terror and being judged inferior by a female.
Instead, ended up talking with Tom about eighties computer games for a while and sweating in the heat.
Decided Hero's Quest 2 is my favorite game of all time.
Checked for precence opf hallucinatory anthill, but no longer there.
Drank.
Drank.
Watched Lauren Drink.
Wondered about the voint in her room.
Went home, shared taxi with Tom.
Talked about disconcerting effect of many gay men's inability to not take advantage of the fact that due to the laws of PCness, most "cool" straight men are obligated to not get pissed off when said gay men take liberties.
Got out of Taxi.
Waved at man at gate.
He opened gate.
Door man opened door, called elevator, pressed button said "Good Night!!!"
Went to bed, got out of clothes but still forgot about air con.
Tried to ring Emma, didn't get through.
Rang Home.
Talked to Mum, Lachlan, Dave, Sean Katie.
Was Drunk.
Went to sleep at 4:30am.

Sunday
Woke up at 7:00am to Emma calling me.
Called her back.
Had Chats.
Emma was upset, missing me and slightly drunk.
So cute.
Loved her.
Got up.
Hung over like a fox.
Sore throat from sleeping with air con on.
An hour or so later went out to brunch with Sandy and Christopher in Life Cafe, an organic vegan/vegetarian cafe on Escalator.
Had the Shepardess Pie, no meat. Was very tasty. Mango and banana juice a little tasteless.
Had good chats about whole slew of pertinent issues.
Eventually finished brunch and walked around doing some exploring.
Saw some cool shops.
Talked to some weird old women about China.
Saw a tree growing out of a wall twenty feet in the air. Was pretty cool.
Went to IFC for exhibition. Not very impressive but fascinating ideas, based on Chinese cave paintings. Oldest record of Chinese civilisation.
On return to flat around 4, realised that had to go cover the restaurant opening.
Hurried down to "Fat Angelo's"
Went in, family Italian restaurtant, lot's of kids. Not helping Hangover.
Ran into Luke "Takeabreath" Hunt whom I had preciously met in the Foreign Correspondent's club.
Found out that Luke had somehow read my blog entry about him and that he wasn't in fact going out with Diane Stormont. His real girlfriend was unamused by my insinuation.
Very embarrassed.
Downplayed it though. Hopefully
Also found out that Andy, the owner of the Restaurant was another guy I already knew.
Met Chris, he makes documentaries for MSNBC, The Discovery Channel and the National Geographic channel
All good people, many chats were had. Luke still hardcore.
After many beers and Irish coffee's they invited/informed me that there was a thing at the FCC that they were attending and that I should go.
Got Taxi with Chris and Luke, Andy followed behind with others.
Arrived at do, was youngest person there by ten years.
Was a memorial service for the Far Eastern Economic review, apparnty the magazine of substance in Asia that had folded the previous year.
Apparently every heavyweight journailst that had worked in Asia in the previous thirty years was there. People had come from all over the world. these were the people who had shaped Asia with their talent and their tenacity and their journalistic integrity. War correspondents, editors, columnists from every major magazine in the world. People who hadn't seen each other in twenty years.
I was wearing shorts.
I was working for BC magazine, it stands for Bars and Clubs.
Very embarrassed.
Everyone in the room other than me was in some way a heavyweight in their own right.
Was introduced by Andy to the news editor of the International Herald Tribune, he gave me his card.
I didn't have a card.
Very embarrassed.
I didn't want to have to hang off the guys all night because I didn't know them very well and this was such a huge and completely unique event that they wanted to split off on their own to see people they hadn't seen on their own so mostly stood on my own for majority of time there.
Took photos, trioed to keep up pretense that was covering event for BC. Not actually doing so as I knew too little about the night.
Watched speeches. Very cool. Pure vitriol in parts. Dow Jones is a fucker.
Had nothing to offer the conversation of the evening owing to complete ignorance of economics and total inexperience. Tried to stay out of the way.
Felt like others should have been ther but weren't.
Enjoyed myself immensely but was overawed.
Eventually went home, as was getting a little bored and more obviously on my own.
As I went out bumped into Andy, had nice chat about future in Hong Kong. Andy's a nice guy.
Walked to MTR, got train to Happy Valley. As I emerged into Times Square was suprised to find myself alone and confronted by large group of men with pump-action shotguns.
Midnight money transfer, Times Square to Securicor van. Took some blurry photos. Didn't want themn to think I was taking photos to plan a robbery. They look like they're guarding a Starbucks.
On way home passed little bar that looked interesting, went in. Totally empty. Ordered Coke. Cost Equivalent 5 euro.
Shit!
Got bus up hill to FlyPad.
Went up to gate, gate guy opened it up. Doorman called elevator, pressed button. Said "Good Night!!!!!!"Went to bed. Watched episode of Scrubs.
Turned off air conditioner and went to sleep.

SARS 2 - Viral Ninja Gweilo of Death!!!

2005-04-15T00:37:00.000+08:00

DSCN0286
Originally uploaded by ruadhraigh.

Well, a lot has happened since my last post. Every night since the first night it occured to me that I was actualy working I've come home from work
(I love saying that...work....work......work wroks!)
and I've thought, "Hey, a lot has happened but I haven't posted any of it on my hot new blog site that all the kids are reading! I haven't fed the pack of ravenous sensationalists at home that hang on my every written word! I have to make sure that everyone knows what's going on in my fabulous new cosmopolitan lifestyle or else they'll grow bored and insecure and find someone to replace me who has a name that's easier to spell and a demeanor that's more entertaining to tolerate!"
Well, luckily for you guys this Rudhraigh Christopher Kevin John McGrath isn't going anywhere eithout one fucker of a fight and I'l take all comers, be it Bob Smith or whatever! Oh yeah! I've known about you guys and Bob Smith! I knew all along! I knew how you were sizing him up, how when I left you thought you could just have him move into my house, wear my dressing gown, drink my tea, watch my movies and make my sardonic comments and that I wouldn't know about it! I knew! Well here's something you didn't know, Bob is a plant! He works for me!! He's been keeping me up to date about all you fools!! I know all your dirty little secrets!! That was your fatal flaw!! Bob was too charming and he listened too well!! For shame you sickos, for shame. You know who you are, and now so do I, and a couple of my trendy new Hong Kong friends too because I tell them everything, we're that close, they're that cool, how we laughed at your perverse monkey antics, ha ha ha ha!!!
So yeah, that's right! I have shit on all of you now, some real dark shit too and it would be a real pity if I had to send the polaroids to your respective family members, especially as some of them are involved.
So when I come back there better still be a Rudhraigh McGrath shaped hole in your life because no mere Bob Smith will do the job. He, unlike you it seems, knows his place.
Anyway, now that that's finally settled we'll say no more about it, you know where I stand and where you kneel, let's get back to the topic at hand.
I started my job in BC magazine on Monday and I was at my first press conference about two hours later. There's a 7 a side tournament coming up with the big players from Arsenal, Man U, Eindhoven, Celtic, Rangers and Aston Villa. Get this, hilariously enough, I of all people have to go and interview all the players about their careers and their experience of HK. This is somewhat like asking the Pope to interview Ron Jeremy, I don't really think I'm the guy to ask to interview Footballers about football, but there you go. At the time I let it slip that because I saw friends playing Championship Manager that knew the names of a couple of the players involved. Apparently that was enough for my new Editor, a very nice, very talkative man called Simon Durrant who then decided that I was one up on the alternative of one of the girls. I think I might ask them why they prefer football to watching Star Trek, it seems only fair, I've had to answer the reverse for most of my life.
Most of my time in the office has spent been doing a fair amount of boring bitch work, putting research stuff into Excel spreadsheets, checking facts, compiling listings. This isn't really that bad, I expected that no matter what they said about "This office is different, we make our interns do important work that they can really learn from", I knew that no human being can turn down the opportunity to make someone else do something boring that you don't want to do, especially when you don't have to pay them for it.
The office is quite small and contains three staff writers [all Chinese girls from America], one editor, one sub-editor, two interns {Including me}, one designer, the publisher {Simon}, one receptionist and three sales personnel.
One of the staff writers is called Elaine, she's Hong Kong Chinese who lived in California, is about nineteen and has been working for BC ever since she finished as an intern after leaving school. She's really nice but quite odd in small ways. She says that her only ambition in life is to work in McDonalds. When I asked why she wanted to work there she replied that she "really likes McDonalds". I keep expecting her to give some sort of ironic snort, but so-far no joy. I think she just really likes McDonalds. Weird.
The other staff writer is a bit of a conundrum owing to the fact that I haven't been introduced to her yet. We've actually chatted about a whole range of subjects, she sits about two meters away from me yet I don't know her name, I chat to people that are further away than her because we haven't been introduced. I think her name is something like Althea, but I'm not really sure. I keep on waiting for one of us to breqak this up but either she doesn't care or I'm too timid. This sort of non-introduction awkwardness is bad enough when you only see that person every once in a while but when you have to sit there for hours it's pretty hard to handle. Actually I'm quite enjoying it, it's quite an odd situation. I like odd situations.
Patrick is the other intern, he's Canadian, and that's about it. As such he's about what you'd expect for a Canadian, speaks French, thinks Budweiser is the "Best Tasting Beer in the World", likes Hockey, says eh?.
In short, he's Canadian. Woo Hoo. Actually I'm giving him a hard time, he's genuinely nice and unassuming, like most Canadians. Damn, I mean, he's not one to get excited. He's quite outdoorsy......Damn, that guy is one incredibly Canadian Candian!!
Actually the fact that he's pretty young initially made me question what the hell I was doing here. Then I found out they get a wide range of people interning there, apparently they have five more of us drudges coming in soon.
The designer is called Henry, he's gay and won't stop staring at me. This is fine, until he starts talking in Chinese to the girls in the office while he's doing it. He talks and stares, pouts occasionally, they laugh and laugh and reply and laugh, he smiles, keeps staring, pouting, they keep laughing. I sit there, not knowing what is being said, assuming the worst, only knowing that I would cut off a toe to find out exactly what was being said. Not my toe of course, someone else's. Mine are too precious.
Liz, the Editor is Americanish New Yorky sardonic sarcasm personified but actually she seems to be pretty nice under it all and also very good at her job. She loves films and I think she's secretly writing a screenplay, I've seen the shape on her screen from my desk but every time I come near her she minimises it. I want to read it, and if it's any good, to steal it. Then I could put my name on it and eventually pitch it, get it green-lighted and made into a major motion picture. Then, inside six months, I'll be living the high life in L.A. doing cocaine off a hooker's back as I drive my Porsche at 120 MPH down the freeway through my tenth homeless guy and as I carelessly miss my fifth pitch meeting of the day. I can't wait, Liz is going to hate me. I'll send her a postcard, I will!
Otherwise, the rest of the office staff don't speak English and while I'm sure they're very nice I'm assuming they probably hate me because I'm white and therefore a foreign devil. Of course this is just a suspicion of mine. It's pretty unfounded and largely down to my inferiority at my minority status but still, they give me the evil eye sometimes when I'm going to the bathroom. I think they think that I don't always wash my hands. Which is untrue. I always wash my hands in public toilets. I'm obsessive about it.
So basically in the last couple of days I've gone to a restaurant and gotten free Thai food and beer while coming up to complete strangers and asking them if I could take their photos, started stealing CD's [they have every single cd ever released in the office] written two cd reviews [one positive and one where I insinutate that the only way that someone could produce such a shit album was if the artist was insane] visited Victoria peak to get ideas for an entry in a tourist guide I now have to write, stolen an idea for an article from another magazine, been given the cover story for the next issue [ooee!] and washed my hands a lot. It seems to be going well, now if only I could stop being so addicted to that stupid StrongBad site I'd be doing well. It's stupid because it illustrates my weakness as a person. That and the hand washing, I should just throw caution to the wind! Germs for all! Atchoo...

Day of Inform-Me.

2005-04-04T00:16:00.000+08:00

Titus's concern for Pakistan is touching.
Originally uploaded by ruadhraigh.

Well now that I'm here on my own, I have to say things have changed somewhat. Because Emma left as well as her parents who went to Tokyo for a few days I stayed here on my own to look after Titus the cat. Spending the last couple of days alone in the flat has given me a bit of an opportunity to give myself a kick in the ass, something I think I needed. From here on in I can't in good conscience sit around and do the typical Rudhraigh thing of treating my dressing gown as office dress.
I suppose in a way I could get away with that a little bit more when I was staying here with Emma, it was her house after all, I am her long-term boyfriend, I didn't feel as much of a need to legitimise my presence because I knew Emma wanted me here and since she lives here I had a slight proxy right to be here via her permission. Also she makes great demands upon my time. She doesn't tickle herself into unconsciousness herself goddamn it!
So now I'm here entirely because Emma's parents have demonstrated a downright saintly capacity for tolerance of my some what tiring presence. I'm now living in their flat when their daughter isn't even here, I'm here totally at their leisure and totally due to their innate niceness. This, combined with the fact that Sandy and Christopher are some of the most together and motivated people I've ever conceived of with gym in the morning, work all day and organizing the following day's gym and work in the evening, so I've felt somewhat more motivated to get my act together. As such I've gotten more done in the last few days than I have in the previous month, probably the last year actually. To be honest the last five years of college. So anyway, here's where I stand.
A} Next Monday I start an Internship in BC magazine. It's an unpaid 10 to 6 thingamy at a lifestyle magazine with casual dress, an incredibly rigourous group of job-related activities and an apparently pretty comprehensive expense account. As it's my first full-time job, I'm trying to stop myself from completely freaking out by mentally treating it as a kind of Summer camp, like the fantastic sports-fests I got bundled off to as a kid. Wait, a minute, I hated those things! I always got beaten up!! Those fuckers in BC better not try anything, I've got moves now, I'm a big guy, they try anything and I'll kick their puny little asses for them I will.
B} After the month or so of that I'll probably start something, be it another inernship or more likely an actual job, with an Advertising agency called Get Smart. I'd be writing copy for ads as well as doing some light design work, mostly conceptual stuff which I would then hand on to the company's actual graphic designers. They have a pretty impressive client list for such a small company, which leads me to believe they're pretty damn good. They seem to be anyway.
C} I seem to have about four grand in my bank account and more coming in, so I think I'll be okay for money for the moment.
D} I've been finishing off my TEFL course which leads me to believe that if I really need money quickly I can just get it by doing the odd English class..
E} I'm going to finally start watching the first series of 24, something I've been meaning to do for quite a while now. I've been unable to have a proper conversation with my brother for quite a while due to his obsession with the show and my fear that he'll spoil it for me by accidentally dropping in hints of what's going to happen. Finally I'll be able to sort that out.
Otherwise, being alone for the last few days has been pretty much business as usual. Sleeping, eating, exploring Hong Kong. Sleeping. To be honest I was slightly worried that the solitude might be driving insane but thankfully some light conversation with Titus, the family cat helped me out. He's a smart guy that cat, funny, deep, witty, suprisingly informed on a wide variety of contemporary topics of great and relevant interest. He just has this knack of just seeing past all the bullshit to the core of the subject at hand, like the way Jamie Oliver would be conversationally if he spoke English.
Actually no, not really, Titus is a beautiful fiend. He waltzes in, ignores you, expects you to pay attention to the fact that he's ignoring you and then ignores the fact that you're paying attention to his ignorance. The worst thing is that you keep forgetting how much of an asshole he is because you're just so mesmerised by how damn beautiful he is. A bit like me actually..