Alive and well in Bangalore. Have been for the past few days. It looks like I probably had heat stroke, since once I arrived in the cooler Karnataka state I started to feel much better. Who knows. Bangalore is nuts. Busier than Chennai, with unbelievable traffic. People who can’t shut up about a ‘war on cars’ in Toronto need to come here and see what too many cars does to a city. It’s an absolute mess. Attended a wedding. It was hype. Going to Mysore tomorrow. Was in Puttaparthi the day before. Then back to Chennai to close out the trip.
Cross your fingers that I’m not totally wrecked tomorrow. Kerela would have been more fun if not for the … sickness. Today I did manage to leave the house, and saw an elephant, so it’s not a total wash.
We spent the first 3 days of our trip in Chenna, formally Madras. The city is absolutely insane. There are people all over the place, and cars and motorbikes and auto-rickshaws everywhere you look. The place is pretty dirty. I guess it’s hard to keep a city like that clean without some serious infrastructure spending. The food is good: hot and mostly vegetarian. I don’t know how people don’t get ulcers here. You go for breakfast and get fried bread (poori) to eat with some hot curries. That seems like a bit much so early in the morning. Driving here is incredible. There are basically no lanes, people just drive where they can fit. Everyone uses their horn to signal they are near by. At first I thought people were being ridiculous, but it’s clear there is a method to all the madness. At around 6-7 you start hearing all the car horns, and it’s non-stop till late at night. In Kerela now. And we have to head out.
I always tell myself that the next time I travel i’ll find someone to post links and other such things here while i’m away. Yet again, I haven’t done that — next time. Shima and I are leaving for South India in a few hours. We get to enjoy a 14 hour flight to Abu Dhabi, and a 4 hour flight to Madras. (Oh dear God.) We’ll be back in 3 weeks.
I really don’t know what to expect with this trip. I have been to South India before, but it was almost 20 years ago now. I can’t say I liked that trip at all. I suspect the country has changed a fair bit since then. I most certainly have.
I’ll probably update the site when I can. See you!
The last decade has ended. I met Shima and got married, so i’d say the last 10 years weren’t a total write-off. On the whole though it does seem like a pretty shit decade. Especially compared to the 90s, which I quite liked. Now it’s twenty-ten. That sounds like a good year.
Me: So … my bill is really expensive.
Her: Sucks.
Me: What the deal with the system access fee?
Her: Well, we don’t charge it anymore, but if you change your plan to one of our new ones you’ll end up paying more to match the features on your old plan.
Me: Oh, I see. So … can you let me know when my contract ends.
Her: July 2011.
Me: And what’s the early cancelation fee on my account?
Her: $200.
Me: That’s great. And if I want to keep my number the company I switch to needs to cancel the contract on my behalf?
Her: Yes. Are you thinking of switching because of all our stupid fees?
Me: No shit, Sherlock.
Her: Well, even though I implied you were shit out of luck previously, I was kind of lying.
Me: Why am I not surprised.
— On the phone with a Fido Customer Support lady.
My bill is now a shocking $12 less. And I lost unlimited call forwarding (they charge for that now?) and visual voice mail in the process. Our entrenched telecom companies kind of suck—a lot. I think i’ll try and speak to a real retention person at some point.
It’s 2:15 on a Friday night. I got back from LeVack Block on Ossington an hour or so ago. It was their two year anniversary. It was a pretty good party. Rather than sleep, I thought i’d figure out how to generate my Blansdowne site using Sinatra, instead of generating all the static pages up front. I’ve actually got it all working, though I need to handle errors better. I’m impressed at how productive I am this late at night.
I was interviewed yesterday about this blog and Blansdowne by Redmond Entwistle for a video installation project he is doing for Gallery TPW. It was a strange experience being interviewed about the area, since I don’t think my website or my opinion are particularly important. I also haven’t lived here that long. I suppose the total dearth of people blogging about the area is what elevates this blog to a position of authority it probably doesn’t deserve. The video he was working on sounds like it’ll be interesting, so if you’re in the city you should go check it out. The opening is this Saturday.
Nuit Blanche was a bit of a bust this year. In previous years my friends and I have usually checked out the area around Yorkville, U of T and the AGO. There is usually a pretty big concentration of exhibits to see. The problem is that those areas are usually jammed full of people. This year we decided to check out Queen West, which is the 3rd zone for art. It’s a bit out of the way, so I thought it would be less packed. This was foolish on my part. Queen West was also shockingly boring. There really wasn’t much happening. We saw them put the ants back on the Cameron House. We saw some nude life drawing class thing at Coupe Bizarre. There was a lite brite installation in Trinity Bellwoods. We saw the hydrophone, again. I had a drink with Matt and my brother at the Gladstone, which was nice. Though the areas closer to the core are more packed, that’s really where you want to go for Nuit Blanche. I think the only way to enjoy the festival now that it’s clearly popular is to start your night at 2:00AM. You should also go through the listings and figure out what you want to see. I think had I seen how little there really was to do on Queen West, I might have suggested a different route for the night. It’s a shame there wasn’t more happening in my neighbourhood this year. Funktion Gallery was open, and across the street was some sort of pole dancing photobooth thing, which was kind of sexy-cool. Now, if only the Run for the Cure wasn’t the next day.
I managed to catch a cold. I think I get them whenever the weather starts to shift. So i’m sitting at home, alternating between sleeping and thinking about eating.
One day I’ll have to experiment with letting other people post to the site while I’m away. It seems strange that the site goes quiet for a week or so when I decide to take a vacation. Edmonton was fun. My mini-cousins are cute. The Rockies are pretty majestic. That about sums up my trip. It was awesome.
I decided to film our toaster making toast. It’s not particularly exciting, but if you’ve ever wondered how annoying I sound in real life, then now is your chance to find out. (In my head I sound way more awesome.)
Shima’s previous place of employment was nice enough to give us a $250 dollar gift certificate to William Ashley as a wedding gift. If you are unaware, William Ashley is one of those shops where you can go and buy fancy place settings and china and other fancy things for your home. $250 is a lot of money, but at a place like William Ashley it actually doesn’t go that far. You can easily get one 5-piece place setting, which might work well if you lived alone and never entertained, but to get a set of four would cost upwards of $600. Because neither of us has been dying to eat off expensive-ass plates, we had made no progress spending the money on the card. And so a year passed. Yesterday we went to the store committed to spend it all. More so, we decided we would only buy things we would never think of buying with real money. These were to be the most opulent purchases we could make — well, within our gift-card budget.
Shima needed a mortar and pestle, so we left with the following:
This is probably the most expensive small-ass cast-iron mortar and pestle you can buy in Toronto. We are going to crush saffron in it. That was $50 bucks. ($50! My god.)
Our second purchase was to be a magnificent toaster. Sadly, they were out of stock. We are waiting for them to let us know when they are back in stock. Expect another blog post about that in the near future.
I attended #hoHOTo last night. It was a bit of a let down compared to the last one. The Christmas party came together rather quickly, and may have contributed to all the hype that seemed to develop around the event. Pretty much every single tech-geek I know attended the event. Added to this mix were a bunch of advertising and marketing people I wasn’t expecting. The venue, the Modclub, was a good spot to host the event, as it consists (more or less) of one big space. It was a party. Last nights event apparently sold out, though you couldn’t tell from the lack of a crowd. The fact the space was split in two probably didn’t help matters much. Almost everyone I knew who had gone to the first event didn’t come to the second. (And I know some people who bought tickets and didn’t bother showing up, there was such a lack of interest in the event.) That’s not to say it wasn’t a nice night out. I saw Ali and Tyler and Laurence. I had some beer. I met some random peoples.
When I was growing up my mom wouldn’t let us throw out our nail clippings in the garbage, like normal people might. You weren’t supposed to keep them in your house, so we would flush them down the toilet or sink. It’s either a Hindu superstition or a Tamil superstition. My grandmother made her do the same thing. I guess nail clippings are bad? I don’t really know. It strikes me as an odd thing to be superstitious about. The thing is, I am 29 years old and I don’t live at home, but I still do this. Worse yet, I’ve somehow managed to get Shima to do this as well. This is how you spread the crazy.
As you may know, I love Threadless. This came up again recently at a fund raising post-bar-exam party Tiff threw. I mentioned in passing that I really like Threadless shirts that have cute cartoon characters doing ridiculous things. For exanmple, Cookie Loves Milk. I also mentioned a shirt my brother recently bought, which features a piece of toast putting jam on itself. That toast is so happy. Tiff, in addition to being a lawyer and a marathon runner, is also a baker. For my birthday she turned the t-shirt into a cake. And this wasn’t some half-assed endeavour: the cake was crazy. (She also entered the cake in a contest, which turns out to be a MetaFilter Project.) I felt bad chopping the cake up.
Threadless looks like it might be phasing out XS t-shirts. I’m hurt and confused, so I shoot them an email.
Hey, I was wondering if you’re phasing out XS t-shirts? Some shirts don’t have the XS option, and they don’t list XS as being sold out. If you are going to get rid of XS, then you should get rid of XXXL as well. Letting super fat dudes enjoy your t-shirts while me and my girly-ass figure don’t get to is just not fair. Please, don’t make me start some sort crazy Internet protest. I fucking love Threadless so damn much. Ramanan
Threadless replies! They are quick. Sadly, my suspicions were correct.
Hey Ramanan! Yeah we are starting to slowly phase out certain sizes. Unfortunately XS is one of them. Take care, Charlie
Son of a bitch. I’m not giving up so easily. The conversation continues.
Damn it Charlie, you’ve got to fix this. You’re my man on the inside. Start talking up XS t-shirts in casual conversation. I’m counting on you. Cheers, Ramanan.
And that’s where the story ends. For now. Actually, probably forever, since I sound like a crazy dude.
Threadless is still the best t-shirt site on the planet. They are — were? — also one of the few that offered XS t-shirts.
I arrived at the Drake early to make sure I got a seat for the lectures by Magnum photographers Peter Marlow, David Allan Harvey, and Christopher Anderson. I arrived so early — before the doors officially opened — I had time to get a drink upstairs in the lounge. I ordered a Manhattan and sat at the bar reading a comic book. Christopher Anderson was sitting near by. If only I knew what he looked like. I finished my drink and went back downstairs, only to discover the room was packed. God damn it. This talk may have been even busier than the last. Somehow I managed to get a seat, after some miscommunication between me and a lady who was apparently not saving one for a friend.
Each photographer discussed the path they’ve taken when it comes to their photography. Peter Marlow was up first, and he was hilarious. He got his start by borrowing his buddies portfolio to secure a job as a cruise ship photographer. What? He managed to get press work while the cruise ship was docked in New York, and things moved from there. He showed us his early work, and then moved on to work he is currently doing exploring a factory closure in Liverpool. His early works are full of people, while this later work is about the absence of people.
Christopher Anderson
was up next. He was actually showing us the portfolio he would present to the Magnum photographers next year when he goes up for full membership. We got to see a full retrospective of his work, and the stuff he is working on right now. He also presented his new book, Capitalio. He studied anthropology, but ended up choosing to pursue photography after working for a newspaper in their photo lab. Much of his work is about people — refugees — so his anthropology studies probably do come in handy. He has some pretty amazing photographs, though many of them seem to be the result of his not being too careful with his life.
David Allan Harvey was last. He started with some of his earliest photographs, an album he made for his grandparents when he was 14 or so, and then moved on from there to show new work he is doing on families that is in a similar vein. His plan is to create an exhibit and book that hopes to captures what he produced as a 14 year old boy — though he feels there is no real way to recapture that innocence. Harvey seems very interested in helping out aspiring photographers. A lot of his talk was advice for budding photographers and passing remarks about former students. I picture him more as a teacher than a photographer.
I was planning on mingling with the crowd after the talks, but Shima was making Persian food, and that trumped talking to strangers.
After meeting a friend for drinks at the Beaconsfield I popped into the Drake. Magnum was holding a free lecture as part of the CONTACT photography festival. Last night, Mark Power, Bruno Barbey, and Chien-Chi Chang spoke about photography and the projects they were working on. I arrived late, at the tail end of Mark Power’s talk. The Underground at the Drake was packed. If you’re short like me you really need to arrive at events like this on time. I stood on my tip toes and watched and listened as each photographer went through their photos. Of the group, I enjoyed Chien-Chi Chang’s ‘talk’ the best, though mostly he made sarcastic remarks, asked for more drinks, and stood in silence. The photographs for his new project on Chinese immigrants living in New York who have been seperated from their family for years are amazing. There is another talk happening on Thursday i’ll definitely have to check out. This Friday there is an exhibit on war photography by Magnum I think everyone should go see.
I mentioned Yathavan in passing in my last post. It’s been about two years since I saw him last, a long time. Early yesterday morning I sent him a text message to see if his number still worked. He replied later that day: good stuff.
After work I went to the Manulife Centre to buy replacement ear pads for my Grado SR60s. Ear pads in hand I rushed off, but forgot my (mom’s) umbrella at the shop. A few minutes later Bay Bloor Radio called me to let me know — this has to be one of the few times giving a store your number pays off — so I headed back. Just as I get to store I see Yathavan walking into the Manulife Centre. What!?
I took this photo a week or so after I met Shima. We’re at my friend Mike’s house for a Konichiwa Japan event — it was cooking day. It’s the very first picture I have of her. It’s not particularly good, since I had to take it secretly. Shima didn’t like it when I took her picture then. (I suppose she doesn’t now, either, though she gets much less angry about it.) In the background is Toshi, who is now back in Japan. On the right is my friend Mike, who passed away from cancer a few years ago. (I know too many people who have died of cancer.) The night I met Shima properly I had come to V2 to meet Mike, who was visiting one of Shima’s friends. He disappeared — more or less — when I arrived with my friend Yathavan, so I ended up hanging out with Shima and her friends. And the rest is history.
I started watching Degrassi Jr. High with Shima yesterday. For each episode, I’d write a little twitter message about what we were watching and send it off. For the series premier:
I’ve seen most if not all of Degrassi Jr. High several times now. Still, if you asked me about the specifics of this episode I’d be at a loss. The show was on so long ago, it’s hard to remember the details. Sometimes the Internet pisses me off. Stuff like this makes me happy:
Degrassi Jr. High is amazing. I had forgotten how well put together it was. Despite some bad acting and 80s cheesiness, it’s still very compelling and smart. Also, I love Catlin. (Who, surprisingly, has no lines 3 episodes in.)
A resident in our building managed to wrangle enough people together to make BeBloor (well, her unit) a drop off spot for Foodshare. Shima and I were one of the initial people to buy a Good Food Box. We opted for the $22 organic small box, being the ritzy-ass people that we are. (For $12 we could have got the small non-organic box.) What does $22 get you? Well, conveniently they gave us a list along with the vegetables and fruit. This is good, because I had no idea what swiss chard looks like. This week:
1 organic lettuce-romaine
1 organic tomato (hot house?)
1 bunch of organic bananas
4 organic oranges
1 lbs of organic apples
1 organic swiss chard
2 lbs of organic mini potatoes
1 bag of organic carrots
1 bunch of organic chives
2 lbs of organic rutabaga
I have no idea what you do with a rutabaga. It was the mystery local produce of the week. Exciting. The apples, potatoes and chives were also locally sourced. Bonus. Now we need to figure out if this is actually cost-effective, though I think we’ll keep buying the boxes: It’s very convenient.
