Poagao's Journal

Absolutely Not Your Monkey

Mar 15 2002

I haven’t been sleeping very well the past couple …

I haven’t been sleeping very well the past couple of nights. The weather has been dark and muggy, like a moldy blanket thrown over the city. Even the sight of the Office Turtle staring raptly at the giant SUV across the way doesn’t do anything to cheer me up. Things should improve when night falls, however. Taipei is the kind of city that comes to life at night, no matter the weather. The careless combination of neon, noise and smoke is repressively irrepressible.

I was thinking of going over to Wanhua to check out the wind ensemble from a couple of weeks ago, maybe play along, but I’m in the sort of mood that would keep me from accurately judging their level and whether I wanted to join them. Or whether they wanted me to join, for that matter. I’d rather go out for drinks, or to a sauna, or drinks at a sauna. I don’t know. It’s 3:45 in the afternoon but it feels like dusk.

The publishers from last night called and asked if I had any further questions this afternoon. Damn, eager bunch, these. Is this good? I hope so. The said last night that the reason they wanted me to translate was because they wanted to keep my own tone in the Chinese. I don’t know if I am as entertaining in Chinese as I am in English, but it’s encouraging that they think I could be, anyway.

I bought Wu Bai and China Blue’s latest album, Meng de Heliu, “Dream River” or something like that. It’s not bad so far, pretty typical Wu Bai stuff, but a little more 70’s lounge act-esque than I would like. Are those temple horns I hear? No, just someone who doesn’t know how to play a trumpet. I personally like it better when he sings in Taiwanese. Some singers, like Lo Da-you and Zhang Zhen-yue, sound better in Mandarin, but singers like Wu Bai and Chen Lei just sound better in Taiwanese. The song Baoyu, or “Heavy Rain” isn’t bad, nor is the title track, but I think my favorite Wu Bai album is still “Lonely Tree Lonely Bird”.

posted by Poagao at 8:04 am  

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