Taidong was ok, though we didn’t stay as long as we had expected. The Bunun festival was pretty fun, with dancing, singing, drinking and shooting guns into the air, basically a powwow without the drum circle. The sun was so fierce I began to wonder if the camera batteries in my bag were in danger of exploding, and I had to keep the camera itself covered with the tripod bag most of the time, lest it get too hot. Dean was quite red afterwards in spite of putting on sun lotion that morning. Though everyone was very busy with festival-related activites, we did manage to find a couple of actors for our planned shots, though we only had about half an hour with them and the fellow playing our elder rushed off in the middle of the first take. Oddly enough, Taiwanese seemed to be considered the “foreigner” language instead of Mandarin. I guess they associate it with outsiders. That was just one of many ways in which the standards differ from the Han Chinese population of Taiwan. Another difference I noticed when we were sitting down in a Bunun household, when the parents were cooing over how beautifully dark their daughter’s skin was. “Just like copper, or almonds!” they said. A refreshing change from the “Ooh I’m almost caucasian!” campaigns of the skin-whitening crowd in Taipei.

On Sunday I tranferred the last of the footage to get to Dean so he can catch up with the editing and special effects. I would have liked to stay in Taidong longer and enjoy the fresh air, scenery and just not being in Taipei, but Dean wanted to get to work as soon as possible. Ah well, maybe next time.

This afternoon as our daily thunderstorm swept through town I watched this hilarious short (warning: huge file) from Trey Parker circa 1995 (via Womble). It’s a wonder he could get all of those celebrities in his film pre South Park.

According to my site meter I’ve surpassed my quota for this month, but the site’s still up. Still, I should upgrade my service so I don’t have to cut it so close all the time. It’s not much to upgrade; I’m just still feeling the punch in my wallet after having to pay much more in taxes than I had expected this year.

Adventures in Customer Service

So Manny and I went to see Troy last night at the Breeze Center theater. After the movie, which was pretty good (if a bit long), several theaters emptied into the 7th-floor lobby at the same time. Usually you get a chance to take either the escalators or the elevators down, but they had closed down the escalators and blocked them off. The crowd had overwhelmed the elevators, so we tried to take the stairs, only to be blocked by a Breeze employee named Vera. She told us the elevators were the only way down, that they had locked the stairways. “Uh, fire code?” I said, but it didn’t register. Other people were trying to get to the stairs as well, but Vera was blocking them like a hockey goalie.

“What happens if there’s a fire or any other problem where people need to leave?” I asked.

“Then we will turn on the escalators,” she said. I think she was even serious, which is problematic, as I was tempted to pull out one of my media-related namecards (Apple Daily or Next Magazine would be best) and say to her “You know, this blatantly illegal action which could potentially result in a disaster that would mean the downfall of your entire corporation interests me; are you or your boss available for an interview?” It would have been nice to see her squirm, if not for the fact that the utter ignorance of employees like her, added to their inability to take a foreign face seriously, would have jeopardized any chances for the success of such an effort.

Then, just this morning, as I was trying to find out just how deeply in credit card debt I am, I ran into more trouble. I called Citibank and got very good service, as well as from American Express. When I called the service number on the back of my ABN-AMRO card, supposedly a large, well-known corporation, nobody answered. I dialled information, who gave me the same number plus a fax number. Still nothing. I called the bank, who gave me another number for the credit card division. Nothing. I called the bank headquarters and told them their credit card division had all gone off somewhere, but the receptionist said that was impossible. To show me, she called them herself while I listened. Same result. So what did the receptionist do? She hung up on me. Lovely.

Now is it just me, or is there actually little point in applying for a credit card where you have absolutely no service options at all from anywhere in the entire bank? If anything happens, you’re screwed. I doubt I’ll be using that particular card again. I also doubt that ABN-AMRO cares.

Dean and I are once again headed into the wild this weekend to film Bunun people for his project. This time we’re jetting to Taidong for a few days, with the aim of getting some footage of their deer ear-shooting festival. Unfortunately, Katie is off on a European vacation with her husband, so she can’t join us this time. Still, I’m hopeful that we’ll get some good stuff down there.

I can’t keep quiet about this any longer.

Erichian has this groovey website, great taste in music, cars, clothes and everything else, he writes well, takes cool photos, lives in cool places like Maui and San Francisco, takes great trips, and on top of all that he’s the single best-looking guy I have ever seen.

Report: Damn. I mean, damn.

My friend Manny, an American living in Taoyuan, was up visiting yesterday, so after some intense swan-boating action at Bitan, I took him to see the Muddy Basin Ramblers at The Living Room. We were a bit late, but things were just getting started as we sat down at a table with Sandy’s wife Jojo and some other friends of theirs.

The Ramblers started slow, but as the evening progressed they just got better and better. Of course, Alcohol played a large role in both the performance and the audience’s perception of it, but I was sorry to see it end. On some sets Zoe would play the fiddle, and on some others some guy with a clarinet joined in. Dave Chen was amazing, and his steel guitar is a wonder to behold. The air was so full of cigarette smoke that my eyes stung, though.

The weather was so perfect today I tore myself away from my cheapo NT$38 Giant DVD(side A) and took Gendoyun on a little ride up into the mountains, just to run the engine a bit and get out of the house. I rode up the hills in Ankeng, past the water treatment plant, and up into the mountains along paths so steep I had to stay in first gear most of the time. I was surprised to see parasail swirling around in the sky above me.

When the pavement stopped I got off the bike and started hiking up to the peak of Lionhead Mountain. The wind was strong up there, and cool. I climbed until I was looking down on the paraglider, across rows of tidy, Americanesque housing complexes, all the way to downtown. Later, on my way back down, I passed an interesting house built over a waterfall. Taiwan’s answer to Frank Lloyd Wright, I suppose.

This evening “Norman Szabo”, Darrell and I filmed another Above & Below scene on a mountain road just across the river. It turned out it was so dark we probably could have filmed the scene in a large darkened room just as well, and without the mosquitos, millipedes and other insects that yearned to ruin our shoot by dropping unannounced on various actors’ heads during takes. I was still fun, though, and we had Athula’s delicious Rothi for dinner afterwards.

Altogether a delicious weekend, I must say; last week feels more like months ago. But damn I’m bushed. Sleep should come easy tonight.

PS: Doteasy tells me that once again I’m approaching my bandwidth limit for the month. Urgh. I need to do something about this sooner or later.

It was Birthday Day at our office today for everyone with birthdays in the first half of the year. I’m a Christmas Baby(tm), but everyone was invited regardless of Actual Birthday, so I took some time from enjoying my new work computer (the old one finally went belly-up, thank god, no more Windows 98) to check it out.

First, let me say that the people I work with, while very nice and well-adjusted in most ways, have possibly the worst musical sense I’ve ever come across. How do I know this? Because they couldn’t even clap to the Happy Birthday song, even though it was on a Karaoke machine. The secretary who was operating the machine kept trying to change the tempo of the Happy Birthday song so that people could get in tempo, but it was hopeless, and the song ended up sounding like “Haaaaaappppppy BiiiiirthdaytoyouHappyBirthdaaaaaaaaaaaay tooooooooo YoouHappy!”

After the singing and some boring speeches, a gray curtin was swept aside to reveal our banquet, which consisted of several pounds of MSG arranged tastefully in the shape of various Chinese dishes. The MSG springs rolls were especially nice. To be honest, I was surprised they even made the effort, so I can’t complain too much.

In the afternoon I went to record a TV program called “Taozi 10e”. It’s a talk show with “experts”, “panels”, big fuzzy microphones and signs with “X” on one side and “O” on the other so that complex issues can be summed up in simple, easily digestible ways. The “10e” is read “yi-ling-yi”, which is confusing as in Chinese it sounds like “101″, but it’s not. In the back was a geeky fat guy who played silly riffs on a synthesizer at various inappropriate moments to make whomever was speaking at the time seem more “entertaining”.

The set was mostly pink, which, I admit, is not my favorite color. Shocking, I know. Bubbles with random English phrases adorned just about every surface. Taozi, the host, I knew from my days as a cameraman at TVBS. She even recognized me despite the intervening years and extra pounds. I think I might have originally been scheduled to be on the “expert” side, but then they changed me to the “panel” side, which meant I had to use a big fuzzy microphone and sit in a substandard chair. There were four of us on the panel, three guys and one woman, none of whom I recognized. Behind us two college students sat on bar stools at the show’s equivalent of the kid’s table at Thanksgiving.

Across from us sat the two “experts”. One was a legislator named Li Qing-an, and the other an “artist” named Jiu Kong. The topic? Whether Taiwan should switch to a volunteer army.

The show started off with the hosts, Taozi and Some Guy, making humorous remarks about military service. The Jiu Kong would say something stupid and get a laugh. Occasionally the hosts would ask other people questions. I quickly figured that not only was Jiu Kong an idiot, but he apparently had a grudge against military service in general because he was thrown out of the Air Force Academy. Legislator Li was trying to promote Lien Chan’s policy of mandatory military service for just three months; she sounded surprisingly earnest despite it being a laughable plan. Most of the arguments presented went along the lines of “The military has a lot of problems, so we shouldn’t have a military”, and “China can beat us anyway, so why have a military?” I tried to point out the obvious fallacies of such idiocy, but I soon got the feeling that the debate wasn’t really the point of the show. We were really there was laugh at Jiu Kong’s jokes, which were more desperate than actually funny. Sometimes Some Guy would take a stab at humor as well, but his jokes didn’t even have the advantage of being motivated by bitter failure, a host of insecurities and psychoses, as with Jiu Kong. Taozi breezed through the whole thing, laughing a lot and not taking it too seriously. She hasn’t changed a bit.

Soon enough the taping was over. I gave Taozi a copy of my book and a DVD of Clay Soldiers to look at, but she had some kind of legal discussion going on with Legislator Li, so I chatted with some of my old co-workers from TVBS who had made the jump to Dongfeng. It was an interesting experience I guess, and I could use the extra money, as always. At least they didn’t ask me my political affiliations; in that case I would have had to mumble some BS about “every party having it’s good points”, etc.

It’s been pouring outside for the last few days, and no sign of letting up. Sandy’s band is playing at the Living Room tomorrow night, and if my cold hasn’t gotten too much worse, I think I wouldn’t mind some live music.

So I’m back. It was an interesting four days as we shot what will hopefully soon be a video version of a Bunun legend.

Dean and I started out on Thursday from Taipei in a rented Tercel, picking up Katie, a classmate of Dean’s at Chengchi University, on the way. The car was painted a rather limp shade of green and had so little acceleration it seemed to be going backwards most of the time. That was ok, though, as the people we were following kept stopping, turning around, and asking for directions. Why they needed directions to their own village I have no idea. Perhaps the village, to amuse itself, moves around when they’re not looking.

It was late afternoon by the time we arrived, so we spent the rest of the day getting to know our actors and talking about the upcoming shooting before settling down in our rooms, provided generously by the local church. They even threw in several thousand insects that acted, at various junctures, as ear-cleaning devices, wallpaper, and the object of merry chases around the room.

The next day we piled into the back of a little blue truck owed by Aziman, the village head, our lead actor and a solid guy altogether. When I say ‘we’, I mean Dean, Katie, myself, Aziman’s son, a handful of village children, and a white rooster in a basket. The roads were impossibly steep and narrow, gorges traversed by plates of sheet metal laid across PVC pipes, but Aziman had no trouble despite the fact that he had gotten very little sleep the night before, due to the sudden hospitalization of his wife’s father. The children were fearless, often standing up in the back of the truck despite the danger of being thrown out or being hit by a tree branch. One of the children, a little girl of about 4 or 5, soon became entranced by Dean’s “seperated thumb” trick. She kept demanding he do it, and then squealing in delight when he did. Later she impressed us by shouting pro-Chen Shui-bian slogans and to passing villagers, earning shocked rebuffs from the rest of the children in the truck.

We were pretty high when we finally ran out of passable road, so we got out, covered the chicken with palm leaves, and set out for a suitable mountain pass. Just as we got set up for shooting, however, we were beseiged by a group of Taiwanese tourists. There were about 30 of them, and they turned the peaceful setting into chaos worthy of a night market in downtown Taipei. Some were yakking on cell phones, others poking around our stuff, and some staring at Aziman, who was dressed in traditional regalia. One woman took her kid over to take a dump right on the path, after which she threw some paper napkins on the mess. The clueless tour guide was spouting off about Atayal tribal culture, apparently unaware that he was in Bunun country. We sat and waited, muttering in a rather unsubtle fashion about how uncouth and rude the tourists were. Eventually they got the hint and left before the very real possibility of being thrown off the cliff became reality.

We got the shot in the end, but to our dismay when we returned to the truck, we found that the rooster had died from the heat. Though we paid for the chicken, it was still a pretty embarrassing thing.

Our locations were varied and sometimes surprising. We didn’t know what we were doing until we got there. Later that day we filmed in a millet field bordered by strangely bent trees, though we haven’t had a sizable typhoon in a long while. For one scene we needed a traditional drinking cup, and so Aziman stopped by the side of the road, disappeared into the forest for a minute, and then came back with a large hunk of bamboo, which he promptly cut into a traditional drinking vessel.

Saturday was the day of a large wedding, a major event for the village, so we lost all of our actors for several hours. Early that morning we got some shots in what we had thought would be a nice soft grassy field, but instead turned out to be a large patch of sawgrass. Naturally, I had chosen that day to wear shorts, and both my and Aziman’s legs were covered with red welts in short order, his more so as he wasn’t even wearing shoes (his son had conveniently “forgotten” his regalia that day). Apparently it was the former site of the village, a place they had lived for hundreds of years, before they were moved to their present location. I would have liked to do more exploring, but we simply didn’t have the time. Maybe some other time.

Instead of partaking in the festivities later in the day, we went out and got some extra shots of things that didn’t involve the actors, including a waterfall we’d passed the previous day. As we approached it, however, I noticed that there didn’t seem to be any water beneath the falls. Upon closer inspection we found that every single drop of water had been routed into pipes that led to an illegal fishery down in the valley below. The villagers had told us about the illegal fisheries set up on their lands and how they couldn’t do anything about them because they didn’t have the legal means to challenge them, but seeing it firsthand was revealing; the fisheries seemed very solid and above-board in their manner, not furtive at all, as you’d think an illegal operation would be. Apparently they’re confident that nobody will challenge them.

Bastards.

That afternoon we got some more footage of the actors in the millet field, followed by some river-crossing shots. That night, after we wrapped up the shooting part, we sat around in the courtyard in front of Aziman’s house with him and his friends drinking some Mongolian vodka that Katie had brought as a gift.

Poor Katie; she had to endure the slew of Sci-fi-movie related quotes and references Dean and I call conversation. Still, she took it better than most people, I have to say, and even got into the spirit of things.

“Norman Szabo” called me in the evening and said the Above and Below shooting was cancelled for the next day, so we decided to stay another night with the insects, who were ecstatic at the news. Actually, I was getting more and more used to sleeping there each night; unlike the sauna-like conditions of Taipei, the air was fresh and cool, the sky glowed with stars at night, and waking up to the broad view of the mountains and the valley was a breathtaking experience. I’m not sure if daily mosquito spray would be too good for me in the long run, though.

In any case, we had to get back, so we said goodbye and headed out. I was coming down with a cold and my throat hurt pretty badly, but the nice twisty roads, the sunshine and the views made it a pleasant drive.

Now I’m back at my old company filling in for someone. No sign of Whiny Woman, but plenty of unanswered cellphones and pretentious English usage to make me feel right at home, though the Vampires must be at a meeting. Already I miss Nantou.

Here’s a vidlet of the trip.

On a recent Above and Below shoot with “Norman Szabo” and Darrell.

I realized on the subway the other day that there were only two MRT stations I hadn’t visited, the two over in Banqiao, Xinpu and Jiangzicui stations. A couple of friends of mine live over in Banqiao, a place I’ve never had much interest in despite their glowing recommendations. I used to ride through there from Yonghe to my job in Wugu way back in the day, and I saw little to impress me.

I was already riding the blue line and had some time to kill, though, thanks to my landlady’s reluctance to replace my hot water heater causing me to include a night at the sauna in my plans, so I decided to pay Banqiao a visit. I took the train all the way out to the last station, Xinpu, and emerged from the station to find a gritty industrial scene with a veneer of fancy new apartment buildings struggling to uplift what was obviously not a well-to-do neighborhood. An elevated highway cut across the landscape perpendicular to the subway line, and I walked down a couple of sad-looking streets thinking to myself that it wasn’t that much better than Sanchong, which is my measure of a Place I’d Rather Not Live. On my way back to Jiangzicui Station, though, things started to look up. More and more nice apartment buildings, some aspiring to Hong Kong-like heights, had obviously brought a large number of well-to-do office workers to the area. After checking out some real estate boards, however, I realized that they weren’t necessarily all that well off, as prices seemed rather cheap out there. There were more parks and tree-lined streets, but it was obvious that before the MRT line was built there were few attractions outside of the Cultural Center where I saw the indie movie “Baodao” many years ago.

As I was walking down a street/alley wondering if it was the sort of alley I could get away with openly pissing in, all the loudspeakers came alive with announcements pertaining to the community. This went on for about ten minutes and was very annoying, but nobody seemed to mind. I imagine this practice was once much more popular than it is today.

I climbed a pedestrian overpass, interrupting a couple of chatting high school students, as the sun set in order to get a better view of the area. At least I think the sun was setting, as the air was so full of haze I couldn’t tell except for the gradual loss of light. Streams of office workers were pouring from the MRT exits and heading up into the highrises. It could be a very nice place to live I suppose. I still think I’m much better off in Xindian, though I could really use some hot water.

Speaking of hot water, Dean and I are going to be heading down south to shoot a short film on the Bunun Tribe in Taidong, famous for its hot springs, later this month during their “Deer Ear Shooting” festival, when youths prove their worth by shooting deer ears (I hear it’s like their version of the SAT). I’m not sure whether the ears are still attached to the deer at the time, but I’m sure it will be interesting in any case. And you know I’m getting desperate for a change of scenery when I go to places like Banqiao to see something new.