Some Einstein in Zhongli decided to name his store “Nigger King” not long ago. Naturally, it was only a matter of time before some westerner saw it and reported it to the authorities, who called the Zhongli police and suggested they pay the guy a visit. The owner was apparently quite apologetic and promised to change the offensive sign immediately. Oh Happy Day. But what did he change it to?

“Niggar King”

Wow, he spent all that money to change a letter. Legally speaking, there’s not much the police can do, as there simply aren’t many laws here dealing with such issues. That’s why we get stores here with English names like this, “Motherfucker” (a clothing shop in an alley off Dunhua South Road) “Darkie toothpaste” “Hitler Cafe” etc. In general it’s not malicious behavior; they simply don’t see what the big deal is. For most shop owners it’s enough to have any English, even garbled nonsense, just to the majority of their customers see them as hip and trendy even though they don’t care what the English actually says, and they tend to be baffled when they’re told the signs are offensive. Though Western “offensensitivity” seems to have no bounds in some cases, it would be disingenuous to suggest that the Taiwanese cannot be racist, however. Just ask a worker from any Southeast Asian nation.

In any case, the Zhongli police apparently made another visited to the owner and suggested that “Niggar King” isn’t quite what they had in mind when they told him to change the sign. The Chinese name, by the way is “Hei ren wang” or “King of The Black People”. Looks like the owner’s going to have to shell out to change more than a letter this time.

Maybe “Nagger King”?

Somebody asked me the other night who I thought would win the 2008 presidential election, Hsieh or Ma? I said Hsieh.

Here’s why: The DPP is simply better at election campaigning than the KMT. The DPP can take any kind of piss-poor governance record and stand it on its head, while the KMT can (and does) do the exact opposite, snatching defeat from the jaws of victory in the last two elections. Poor advertising, poor choice of candidates, just bad management of the whole campaign. The DPP’s Hsieh and Su were forced to recognize that, in the face of a not-guilty verdict in Ma’s corruption trial, that the only chance they stood of defeating him was to put aside their considerable differences and previous conflict and run on the same ticket. If Wang Jin-pyng had agreed to run with Ma, the KMT would stand a very good change at winning. But Wang turned Ma’s offer down, time after time. Some say he was duped by false rumors of a guilty verdict for Ma. I’d think if he were that easily duped, maybe he shouldn’t be in consideration. Most likely, I’m guessing, was that tantalizing vision of his own presidential candidacy.

The DPP gave Yeh Chu-lan the party’s secretary-general position as a consolation prize after Hsieh was forced to pick Su over her. But over on the KMT’s side, Ma doesn’t have a grip on all the party factions, all laboring under the illusion of a certain KMT victory. Wang having basically sunk the KMT’s chances over a matter of personal pride, Ma picked Vincent Siao as his running mate. A better choice would probably have been former Kaohsiung Mayor Wu Den-yih, who, although he has his enemies, is at least on the radar and a good ten years younger than Siao. Perhaps some deal was made to pacify certain old-guard factions of the KMT with a VP position for Siao. I think I see Lien Chan’s icy touch here.

I still think the election is the KMT’s to win, if they really wanted to. The steps are pretty obvious. First and foremost, change the party’s Chinese name to remove the “China” part of it, and make it match the English “Kuomintang” moniker. It would be a big statement of their localization efforts, and they wouldn’t even have to change the English stationary and letterheads. In fact, I have half a mind to march into KMT headquarters and tell them “If you change your Chinese name to just the ‘Nationalist Party’, I’ll sign up right now.”

Another thing they should do, though this could have a limited effect at this point, is invent a “personal crisis” for Vincent Siao and get Wang Jin-pyng on the ticket as Ma’s running mate. Though I personally don’t see much difference between the two as to their abilities, Wang has the greater following in the center and south. The party assets issue needs to be put to rest as well. Also, though I know Ma speaks basic Taiwanese and understands the language, he really needs to improve on this front. The man has lived in Taiwan since he was a baby; he should certainly be able to speak better than, say, I can.

Finally, they need to spend a little money and hire a competent campaign director. Someone who actually knows what he or she is doing. The DPP have run brilliant campaigns both in 2000 and 2004, and there’s no doubt they’re prepared to do everything they can to win this time, and you can be sure that includes paying for a sleek, top-notch, international standard campaign, with moving slogans, compelling commercials and heart-felt exhortations designed to compel anyone and everyone to vote their way. Though the economic angle is a good one, the KMT’s clumsy, cheap and anachronistic appeals have not served them well in the past; it’s really time to retire them. The party needs to stop trying to “balance” the deep greens and play more to the center.

But will they do any of these things? The election is also the KMT’s to lose, and so far it looks like it will be too late before they wake up to that fact.

I was on Camera Street getting my 20D’s sensors cleaned when it started raining. Big, heavy drops, but no big deal; I always keep a small umbrella on me.

Then it really started raining. A solid splooshing from the skies that went right through my comically undersized blue umbrella. I threaded my way through the streets towards the safety of my dry office, where I hoped to gaze out the window at the downpour and pity the poor fools out in the middle of it, but this was a marvel of a storm, soaking me even from Taipei’s handy covered sidewalks. I went down into the basement of the Mitsukoshi, falsely remembering some kind of passage from there to the subway mall, but of course there isn’t one. I had to stalk across the square in front, cursing as I went because I didn’t want my camera equipment to get too wet.

In retrospect I should have just entered one of the many cafes, sat down and enjoyed a hot beverage of some sort. The near constant lightning booming immediately after each flash made computing inadvisable anyway. But I’d bought my lunch already.

The streets filled with water. A waterfall cascaded down the steps of the pedestrian overpass on Zhongxiao West Road. Then a large chunk of wet building slammed down onto the sidewalk along Zhongshan North Road where I’d just passed. A man came out of the store with a broom and pushed the bricks, wood beams and other detritus into a pile, and then went back inside.

Packs of policemen on scooters appeared in traffic as vehicles plowed through the flooded streets. I sat down on a covered sidewalk and watched the show for a while before the rain let up somewhat and I could go on to the office, where I am now. My wet socks are hanging off the lamp behind me, and my shoes, liberally coated with baby powder, are on the floor. it’s still raining.

Typhoon Sepat, previously known as Super Typhoon Sepat, aka the Biggest Storm This Year Yet, took its time making its presence felt here in Xindian. Though the satellite showed it lumbering on shore on Friday, the weather didn’t really change aside from a bit of rain. My boss was nice enough to let me work from home, so I avoided a soaking. The sunset was brilliant, the light streaming through holes in the interesting clouds flying across the sky and turning everything an eerie shade of orange.

That night the wind and rain picked up, and by Saturday morning the storm had begun. My windows and doors shook as they were pummeled by the wind. I took out the false ceiling light panels in the kitchen and bathrooms before the vent pressure did it for me. The water in the toilets jumped up and down.

The wind was shrieking by outside, tossing plastic signs and tree limbs through the air. Our on my balcony, the air smelled of wet, freshly broken wood. Water began to push through the gaps in my bedroom windows, and I had to stuff tissue in them and line the sill with old washcloths to keep the water at bay. I stayed inside all day while I sifted through old photographs to scan, watching the storm sweep over the island via satellite, but just before sundown I decided to go get some dinner at the 7-Eleven downstairs. Before that, however, I decided to visit the suspension bridge, which was banging and straining against its moorings. The bridge itself was bucking up and down, and the unhindered wind tossed anyone brave enough to venture upon it up against the railing. Tree branches littered the ground, and a white egret hopped away from me without attempting flight in the gale.

I rode the bridge for a while, holding the railing to keep from being blown away. I posted a vidlet I took with my little Canon on Youtube last night. The waters of Bitan were high, but I’d seen them higher. The wind was the fiercest thing about this storm. When I left the garage door open and tried to use the elevator, the pressure wouldn’t allow it to rise in its shaft, and it would only run after I’d closed the big metal door, which then groaned beneath the weight of the wind but let me take the elevator back up to my apartment.

All in all, it was a good typhoon, big enough to entertain, clean out the air and resupply the water tables but not big enough to cause massive islandwide destruction. We neeed it, psychologically, I think. It’s gone on to China now, but we’re still getting some rain from the tail end.

It looks like my trusty iRiver H320, which has served me well and faithfully these past couple of years, is having problems holding its charge over a single day. When I asked the iRiver outlet at K-Mall about it, they mentioned that iRiver is releasing a new 20/40Gb player in December. If I can’t get a reasonably priced battery replacement for the H320, the only choices I will have will be a Creative product or another iPod. The reason I ditched my last iPod was due to lack of FM, recording, usable disk space and inferior audio quality. Aside from the disk space, I don’t think they’ve addressed these issues, and besides, buying an iPod now, with a wide touchscreen version supposedly on the doorstep, would seem pretty foolish.

But I gots to have teh music, as books aren’t always convenient on the subway or when walking around as I keep bumping into things as I read. Though technology has come a long way in recent years, I’m still waiting for the Great Mythical Convergence Device appearing in a pocketable form that has all the photography features of my Canon powershot, the audio features and sound quality of the iRiver H320, video playback quality of the iPod video, GPS, Wifi, 3.5G communications, a keypad, tilting screen and oodles of gigabytes in storage. The closet I’ve found to this so far is HTC’s upcoming P4550 “Kaiser”, though the camera doesn’t come close, memory is limited to a micro SD card’s 4 or eventually 8gb, and who knows what battery life is like with all of those applications running. There’s the HTC Shift, but it’s just too damn big. Perfect for the occasional Wandering of Europe, I guess, but not for daily use between home and work computers.

(By the way, I’ve recently discovered, via Facebook, that my old college friend Victor Cheung is now running a tech website out of Hong Kong called Hong Kong Phooey. Vic was a wild man in college; it’s good to see he’s settled down to quietly preparing to take over the city via technology instead of the usual debauchery.)

So anyway, even the Kaiser isn’t quite the be-all/end-all device I seek, and it’s not even out yet. For now, I’m afraid I’ll have to continue hauling around my Canon, the Nokia phone I bought in Beijing and either the iRiver with a cheap new battery or some questionable replacement until the new iRiver and iPod come out.

I saw on a notice posted in the elevator of my building that a meeting was being held for area residents, government officials and police personnel to “explain” why the only police station in the area is scheduled to be removed. I have some amount of sympathy for this cause and had the morning free, so I hopped on the free shuttle bus along with 30 or so other residents and walked to the activity center off Ankang Road where the meeting was being held.

I was told to sign my name, and was issued a booklet containing the details of the situation, which I browsed through after sitting down to wait for the meeting to start. Apparently the police station has been around since 1973, when less than two thousand people lived in the area. Today we have over 11,000 residents, a number that will certainly rise when the new complex over the MRT opens. I know that there used to be a police station next to the old Xindian Train Station, located where the MRT terminal is today, but nowadays the nearest police station on that side of the river is way up Beixin Road.

I noticed that nobody was sitting in the front row of folding metal chairs, so I moved up and sat there, surrounded by three tables’ worth of various officials, including several country council people, city council people, borough chiefs and a couple of legislators. A glaringly empty seat in the center of it all was reserved for the police representative.

This absence was the subject of much scorn when the meeting was called to order. “I didn’t just tell the chief of police about this meeting yesterday, you know,” the County Councilman Tseng Cheng-ho said. “I told him about it on August 1st. He said he could come, and if he couldn’t come, he’d send his second-in-charge.”

One by one, the officials spoke out against the removal of the police office. Most of the complaints centered around public safety. Some people mentioned that Bitan is a major tourist attraction and that a police presence was necessary. The “Six-Star Healthy Community” plan from a couple of years ago was trotted out and quoted. Some of the speakers were boring, but a couple of guys really got into the protester spirit and whipped the audience’s indignation into a near frenzy.

Then it was time for comments from residents. Most of the people there were older residents who didn’t have day jobs, but they could still shout quite loudly. Many accusations of the police only caring about promotions at the expense of The People were hurled about. I wondered if anyone would ask me to speak, and mentally prepared a few points just in case, including the popularity of the Bitan Suspension Bridge for would-be suicide cases, and the opening of the new complex above the MRT terminus. I wondered how much Taiwanese I should use. Most of the speakers began in Mandarin and only switched to Taiwanese when they wanted to express a more emotional plea.

Luckily, nobody called on me. It was just as well, as the police representative had finally shown up, an older smiling man who seemed to be the assistant chief of police.

The police rep explained that the removal of the station was part of a greater plan that would supposedly increase general coverage and more police on the street. “Because when criminals see police officers,” he said helpfully, “they won’t engage in crime.” So nice that criminals only think about committing crimes when they see police officers, I thought. I suppose they don’t have a problem committing crimes in a neighborhood near a police station. The representative also mentioned a lack of manpower and funding, charges the legislators and council people said could be dealt with. Cries of “OBJECTION!” flew from the residents. The woman behind me was especially bent on having her say, starting in on a tirade about how the police were “keeping her down.” The police rep ignored them. He did go on to say that a station would be built inside the new complex over the MRT station, which would answer at least one of my own objections.

The meeting lasted until after 11am, with nothing really resolved. The legislators said they would take the “results” of the meeting back to the Legislature, and the council people said they would report back to the council. Hopefully someone will be able to do something concrete, but the police administration seems to have made up its mind on the matter.

As for me, I hope the station stays. If the city and county government really want to develop Bitan into a proper tourist destination (not necessarily a good thing, in actual fact, as that would only increase the number of mouth-breathers crowding the bridge every weekend) as they say they do, then you’d think they’d want to ensure its reputation as relatively crime-free. They’ve ordered the destruction of the riverside restaurants, including our beloved Rendezvous, in the name of this objective, after all. So why remove the police station? It just doesn’t make sense. Are they going to implement a “Come See Our Lovely Crime Scenes” tourist campaign? They could sell “Gangster of the Month” calendars and have a chart posted by the bridge where you can bet not only on the number of suicides that month, but also on the number that managed to take out a swanboat or two as well.

The problem might have something to do with the current budget issue. Originally, Taipei City and Kaohsiung City got about 40% of the budget subsidies, while the other cities and counties got the other 60%. Then a draft law was passed elevating Taipei County, due to its huge population, to roughly the status of the two largest cities, meaning that it would receive part of the 40% to make up for the difference in funding. Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin was not happy about this, of course, but it really pissed off Chen Chu, who, despite the fact that her election as mayor of Kaohsiung was annulled by a district court, is still apparently playing the part. She threatened to withdraw her support for the DPP candidates in the upcoming elections if Kaohsiung didn’t get a li’l sumtin extra, so the Cabinet dolled out several billion to its darling political powerbase o’ the south, reducing Taipei County’s budget to a couple of billion more than it had when it was just another county. Upon witnessing this act, both Hau and Taipei County Magistrate Chou Hsi-wei got up and walked out of the Cabinet meeting.

It’s possible that during the Legislature’s review of the budget subsidy allocation that someone will try to do something about the issue, but it seems most cities and counties are ambivalent about other cities and counties. All we can do is wait and see, and hope that someone farsighted enough to realize that more money will be lost due to lack of business due to a rise in the crime rate than would be saved by removing the police station. We might have a long time to wait.

(Due to some complaints about the readability of this site, I’ve made the text slightly darker. Let me know if it’s too dark or if you any better ideas.)

I went to see Ratatouille on Friday after work, having forgotten that Prince Roy was going to see The Simpsons Movie until the last minute. It was the best movie I’ve seen in a while, and refreshing after so many sequels (the evil food critic was particularly good, voiced by Peter O’Toole). They also managed the dicey job of telling the story from two different points of view. As for the sequels: Spider-man 3 made me embarrassed for Sam Raimi (we just watched Peter Parker deal successfully with Great Power, and now suddenly he can’t? Huh?), Shrek the Third, while funny, was not up to the standards of the first two movies, and Harry Potter 5 seemed thin on plot and character in comparison with its predecessors, and the Chinese translation of the title mistranslated “order” as the kind you give instead of a group. Die Hard 4.0, while pretty good especially considering how long it’s been since Bruce Willis began the series, sometimes felt like a long Nokia advertisement. I was also disappointed that they didn’t get a single Mac/PC joke in Justin Long’s dialog.

Last week I also saw I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry, the Chinese title of which is quite clever in that it copies a children’s song “When We’re Together” but includes the Chinese word for “fake” which, read in Minnan, is pronounced “gay”. Chinese title-related cleverness aside, it’s pretty much a typical Adam Sandler movie, with the usual stereotypes thrown in. The movie lost me when Ving Rhames adopts a lisp.

As an aside, is it just me, or is IMDB letting anyone post anything (in English at least) to their database now? It used to be that an IMDB listing denoted a certain level of professional filmmaking, but more and more I’m seeing cheap porn and student projects listed as well. It may be only a matter of time before they start listing Youtube videos. This is all sour grapes, of course, because they refuse to list Clay Soldiers because the documents proving it was aired multiple times nationwide are in Chinese. Heaven forfend a film is made in another country and includes, god help us, another language. Not entirely cricket, you know.

The weather’s been cool and rainy-ish ever since the duel tropical storms departed our fair island last week. We hammered out the last of the recordings for the long-awaited Muddy Basin Ramblers album over the weekend, practicing at the Sandcastle on Saturday and then getting the last three songs in the can at my place this afternoon and tonight. I managed to turn in a passable performance, all things considered. The final mixing will tell, of course. Sandman managed to refrain from trashing my place too badly, and we took some commemorative pictures afterwards. I’m going to miss these sessions; it’s always fun having a few good friends over to hang out and make some music. The session was followed by much rejoicing and a slightly drunken waltz, accompanied by singing, down to Rendezvous Pizza for a last meal before they tear the place down in the name of Progress. The owner appeared a bit sad about the whole affair, and told us she hoped that they would eventually be allowed back at that location instead of being condemned to the crowded street behind them. We hope so, too.

The rest of the weekend has been spent tidying up before practices, tidying up afterwards, film editing, tai-chi practice and taking pictures of El Mono Severo, who made a visit yesterday but had trouble moving my old, mildewed, concave mattress downstairs due to logistical issues involving elevatorial dimensions as well as a general lack of motivation. I’d given the “memory foam” mattress a fair shake, but after over a month I still wasn’t quite comfortable, so I sold it to a friend and bought a standard Ikea mattress to sleep on instead. Slim vowed to post El Mono Severo posters in odd locations all over the Taipei basin, but we’ll see if remembers his pledge in the morning, when tonight’s events are not quite as tangible. David thinks I should do an action comic series about El Mono Severo, with the Mattress Conundrum as Episode One. I have to say I am tempted. And that mattress isn’t going to move itself.

“Dumbledore never told you what happened to your father,” Voldemort hissed in his high, clear voice, reaching out to Harry, who clung to the high castle railing, his severed wrist throbbing in pain. Anger flashed through him at the thought of his old mentor.

“He told me enough!” He shouted above the storm. “He told me you killed him!”

For a moment Voldemort seemed lost in thought as lightning flickered through the shadows of his face. Then his slitted gaze fixed itself upon Harry once again. “No, Harry. I…”*

Entranced as I am with the finale to the Harry Potter series, I have to put the book down, as the subway train is pulling into CKS Hall Station.

Of all the stations on the MRT, CKS Hall is my favorite, and no, it’s not just because it’s named after one of the last centuries’ more inept military figures. Mainly it’s because the high ceilings and multiple levels make it feel more like a genuine train station than any other stop, more even than the real train station platforms at Taipei Main Station. The lack of an upper balcony over the trains makes a huge difference, as do the shiny gold station name plaques set at intervals along the tracks. It’s the kind of station where a huge chandelier wouldn’t go amiss, nor a portly uniformed man with a pocket watch dodging the steam blasts of a locomotive.

Another source of endless entertainment at CKS Hall Station is the chaotic race across the platform you can witness if you’re lucky enough to stop just as the train from West Gate Station is pulling in. You can see the anticipation in the faces of the people in the other train as it draws to an excruciatingly slow stop. Will the train wait? How long will I have to make it? Oh, what will I ever do if I have to wait another five minutes for the next one!

After a maddening wait the doors slide open, and students, businessmen and office ladies are thrown aside as the champions of muscling through Taiwanese crowds, i.e. short, squat, middle-aged women with frizzy hair and Mister Donut bags stuffed with market vegetables, charge headlong across the platform to the waiting train, their feet barely touching the ground. Occasionally I’ve seen people in their way actually become airborne as a result of the ensuing collisions.

Breathless, the previous occupants of the other train rush into ours. But the show’s not over yet. At the sound of the door-closing signal, everyone begins making mental bets on who will make it and who won’t, wondering if they’ll get to see that rare and hilarious sight of someone stuck in the door. Those champions who rush through just as the doors are snapping at their heels are greeted as minor heroes, while a slight contempt is held for those who draw up short.

Alas, nobody gets stuck in the doors this time, though there are some satisfying thumps as would-be passengers fail to stop in time and hit the closed doors. Their disappointed faces slide backwards as the train leaves. The show is over, and I return to my book.

“No!” Harry cried, incredulous. “That’s impossible…”

*Please don’t take this seriously, Harry Potter fans.