March Means Basketball . . .

. . . and my return to the pages of The Observer with a column about Mike Brey . . .

http://www.ndsmcobserver.com/viewpoint/my-love-hate-relationship-with-coach-brey-1.1272688

Clear the Roads, Mike is Now 16

A couple days before I was going to return to Notre Dame at the beginning of my Sophomore year, my bedroom was a mess of things spread around that I was trying to organize for the upcoming semester.  I was asleep that morning when there was a knock on the door to my bedroom.  My dad was standing there to tell me that my sister had bashed into my car as she was on her way to swim practice that morning.

The damage to the car wasn’t that bad, just a sizeable dent in the driver’s side door and a side view mirror that was hanging by a wire.  If you saw my car in any of the three years between that day and whenever my parents took it to the dump last fall you would know that we never spent the money to get the dent fixed.  While we had to get the side view mirror fixed, that dent stayed with the car for the rest of her natural life (see below).  It went to New York to visit friends, to Iowa to interview politicians, to Canada on more than one occasion, and back and forth between South Bend and Northbrook more times than I can count.

Everywhere the car went, people asked me about the huge gash in the driver’s side door, and I always told them the story about how my sister hit the car when she was going to an early morning swim practice.  As it turns out however, that has shockingly been my sister’s only screw-up behind the wheel to this day.

***

Today is my youngest brother’s sixteenth birthday.  Someday soon he will go to the DMV to take his driver’s test, and our parents will celebrate because their 23-year careers as drivers to sports practices, school, friend’s houses, and movies will have finally come to an end.  While I wish that they’d celebrate by throwing Molotov cocktails at the seven seat Lincoln Navigator that is no longer necessary (the only car they own that can fit us all, albeit uncomfortably), it’s more likely that they celebrate by throwing ridiculous sums of money towards a company that will insure Mike in his new adventures on the road.

In honor of that, here are some stories about driving.

***

Late on a Thursday night about seventeen months ago I was driving my friend’s car down a country road in West Virginia (nailed it) when the all too familiar sight of police flashers appeared in my window immediately after I exited a toll booth.  A couple friends and I were driving from South Bend to Chapel Hill for the Notre Dame-UNC football game and it was getting late on I-77 near Charleston, WV.  The West Virginia State Trooper slowly made his way towards our car shining his flashlight towards me.

“Is there something wrong, officer?” I asked, perplexed about why I had been pulled over exiting a toll booth.

“License and registration, please” the trooper asked as my roommate started to fish through the glove compartment looking for the registration to his car.

After handing the officer my driver’s license and watching my roommate sort through a disaster of papers in his glove compartment, my mind started racing about why we had been pulled over.  Because it was dark, and the road was curvy and hilly; I was pretty sure that I hadn’t been speeding.  I hoped it was just confusion about the California plates driving south through Appalachia because I couldn’t afford to get a ticket.  Not then. 

Four months earlier I had been pulled over on that stretch of I-80 right near Michigan City for cruising from South Bend to Chicago close to 90 mph.  It would still be a couple months before that ticket was expunged from my record and the last thing I needed was for my insurance rates to go up (something that probably would have convinced my parents that I needed to pay for my own car insurance).

“Is there something wrong, officer?”  I asked again, as my roommate continued to search through the glove compartment for a registration that actually said 2008 on it.

“Have you boys been drinking,” the officer asked as he shined his light into the backseat towards my friend.

“No sir, we’ve been driving for the past eight hours from South Bend, we’re on our way to North Carolina for the Notre Dame Football game,” I said, hoping that the Notre Dame reference might get us out of whatever trouble we were in (I’ve actually seen that work before, in the middle of Alabama of all places).

“Well, we had somebody call in about twenty minutes ago telling us that you sideswiped a guard rail,” he said, as my roommate finally found the registration for the car and we passed it along to the trooper.  I might have been a little tired at that point in the night, but I certainly hadn’t sideswiped any guard rails; something the three of us immediately told the trooper before he retreated to his car with our information.

As we sat there in the car waiting, I was nervous and scared.  Getting another ticket then would have been disastrous, and I was pretty certain that I hadn’t done anything wrong.  I was pretty sure that he couldn’t give me a ticket for something that he didn’t see (something that I didn’t think had even happened), but I really had no idea what to expect as he walked back towards the car.

The trooper gave me a written warning (which I proceeded to nail to the wall behind our bar when we returned to South Bend) and told us that we shouldn’t drive if we were too tired.  We told him that we were planning to get off at the next exit for the night (which was true) and we parted ways as my heartbeat fell back to a normal pace and my roommate tried to organize all of the things that had been in his glove compartment.

***

The first and only time I got in a significant car accident was my senior year of high school.  I was leaving the high school parking lot, making a left turn onto a small (but often busy) street* adjacent to the school and I just didn’t see the other car coming.  Because neither car was moving very quickly, it wasn’t really that eventful.  Sure there was damage to both cars, but each could also still be driven just fine.

Despite the fact that the signage at that intersection was changed some time after I graduated to prevent this type of accident (stops sings were added in every direction), it really doesn’t make a good story.  I just felt obligated to include it here for full disclosure.

*It was the curvy street that Ferris Bueller speeds down as Cameron is coming out of hiding after they pick up Sloan from the high school.  I think we should rename this street Hughes Boulevard in honor of the late director.  Does anybody know somebody I can propose this to?

***

Before I left for China I heard about something called an International Driver’s Permit, something that I knew I had to have (even if I’d never use it).  As soon as I arrived in China and saw the crazy mayhem that is the streets here, however, I knew that I would not be actually using the driver’s permit, because I had no intention to ever drive while in Asia. 

Things changed once we left China.

On our first day across the Chinese border, we rented motorbikes in Luang Namtha, Laos.  I had never driven a motorbike before, and one of the first things I did on my bike was crash into a small sign outside our guesthouse.  After figuring out how to stop and accelerate the bike (although not really knowing when it was appropriate to change gears), we were on our way motoring around the beautiful Lao countryside.

In this area of Laos, the only trouble we encountered with the motorbikes was the motorbikes themselves.  Once I figured out how the bike worked, there wasn’t really anything else to worry about.  There was hardly any traffic and there were certainly no major intersections in this area of the countryside (in fact, I’m fairly certain I only saw one traffic light the entire two weeks we were in the country).  In northern Laos, the degree of difficulty with the motorbikes was relatively low.

Things changed when we arrived in Indonesia. 

After a week of diving on the small island of Gili Trawangan and one day in the supposedly “relaxed” city of Ubud, Gavin and I found ourselves back at Kuta Beach (9 days after my birthday) and looking to spend one night further south on the Bukit Peninsula of Bali.  To do this, we left our bags at our hotel and walked down the alley where it didn’t take long for somebody to say, “Yes, transport, yes, motorbike.”  This time, we actually wanted to rent motorbikes. 

With our motorbikes all gassed up from the guy selling fuel in old vodka bottles further down the alley, we began to ride towards the main road when I thought to myself: “there is going to be a lot of traffic on the main road,” and then “oh shit, they drive on the left side of the road here.”  Whatever happened, this was certainly going to be a lot different than driving down the country roads of rural Laos. 

The main road that the alley dumped into was luckily a one way street, so the first right turn I made was somewhat normal, except for the fact that I was on a motorbike and I was turning into a pack of motorbikes that I would have to somehow keep up with.  I tried to stay in this pack for a while and do what everybody else was doing, but it wouldn’t last long.

Over the years when I have been driving around the United States, I often encountered traffic on highways or regular streets.  Sometimes motorcycles will take this opportunity to drive straight through the traffic between the lanes.  Whenever I was driving my car in America I wished I could do that to avoid the traffic, but when I was on a motorbike driving across Bali I desperately wished that it wasn’t expected of me.

When traffic was slow on the streets of Bali, the motorbikes all drove down the center lane or the shoulder to get around cars, which was one thing; but when cars were moving faster, the motorbikes would move in the lane of opposite traffic to get around cars.  Gavin had gotten farther ahead as I trailed a car and looked for an opening where I thought I could get through.  I moved towards the right side of the lane and the center of the street and followed some motorbikes into the oncoming traffic and around the car.

Soon enough we were turning onto a larger highway that was about the size of a state route such as Route 31 near Kokomo, Indiana.  Each direction had a couple lanes to it, and there was a happy median in the middle of the road which meant that (at least for the moment), I wouldn’t have to cross into oncoming traffic. 

The problem, however, became the speed.  Since it was only my second time EVER driving a motorbike, I was still not entirely comfortable cruising at 65 with the wind in my face.  I tried to keep speed with some people around me, but every time they would pass a car I would become apprehensive and hang back.  It wasn’t that I was going incredibly slowly, I just wasn’t going quite as fast as the majority of the motorbikes on this street.  When I finally got around one car and sped up enough to catch up with Gavin, I saw a man riding next to him in uniform and followed them off the road at the first turn. 

We had been pulled over.

The officer asked for our International Driver’s Permits, which we didn’t have, and then he told us what a serious offense it was to drive motorbikes in Indonesia without an International Driver’s Permit.  He told us that we would have to go to court and that there would be a trial.  He said that I had been driving too slowly and that it wasn’t safe, but I knew the real reason why we had been pulled over. 

For the same reason why we were pulled over in West Virginia driving a car with California plates, and why I was pulled over five months earlier driving up US-31 from Dayton to South Bend in a car with Illinois plates; we were pulled over by that officer in Indonesia because we were white.  He knew that we wouldn’t be going to any court date and we wouldn’t be having any trial, and he told us that the fine was 600,000 Rupiah ($65).

After telling him that we only had 300,000 Rupiah** with us (something I instantly regretted), he agreed that would be enough to pay the bribe fine and we were on our way.  As I strapped my helmet back on and prepared myself to get back on the road, there was a fleeting moment where I worried that the ticket he wrote would somehow make its way back to the courthouse near Kokomo, Indiana where I still had about a month left until my driving record looked clean again.

Then I remembered that I was in Indonesia, and there was no way their system was organized enough to send a traffic ticket all the way to the states.  So I rode my motorbike back onto the highway, and we made our way to Uluwatu.

**I later found out that we probably could have gotten out of this situation for roughly 50,000 Rupiah ($6), so next time I have an encounter with a police officer in a developing country, I’ll probably pretend like I have a lot less money.

***

Last winter I left our apartment in South Bend in a brutal snowstorm.  I don’t know why I left (although if I had to guess, I was probably picking up some McNultys), but there was a lot of snow that night.  Being from Northbrook, I had plenty of experience driving in the snow, and I had grown accustomed to it.  I didn’t really think twice about going out that night.

I was driving down a dark street near my apartment when I saw a car in front of me slow down and stop.  The street had not yet been touched by a plow and we were driving through an inch of fresh powder.  I started to pump the brakes.  Pump . . . pump . . . pump.  Nothing happened, and the car was still coasting.

As I continued to pump the brakes to no avail, I thought to the second accident I had ever been involved with.  Only a few weeks after my first accident I was following a friend out of school during open lunch and it was snowing.  I followed him into the left turn lane and watched him stop in front of me.  Pump . . . pump . . . pump.  The car was slowing, but not fast enough, as I tapped the back of my friend’s car.  Luckily his car had no damage, and the aesthetic damage on my car was there till the bitter end (see below).

In South Bend on that snowy winter night, I knew that I couldn’t hit the back of the car in front of me.  I kept hitting the brakes, but the car was still slowly coasting towards its inevitable union with the bumper in front of me.   I couldn’t let that happen, not this time, not again.  Seemingly out of options I quickly spun the steering wheel all the way to the right and rolled the car into the snowy curb next to me.

The car in front of me continued on its way like nothing had happened as I turned out of the snow bank and straightened my car out on the road.  My hands were shaking, but my car had survived once again.

***

The thing about driving is that more often than not it comes down to factors you can’t control.  Maybe the weather is terrible, but you have to drive across a snow-covered highway.  Maybe a construction barrel comes rolling out in front of you while you are going 75 mph with three trucks surrounding you (only by the grace of God did that barrel roll just to the side of my car).  Maybe you get pulled over because your license plates are from the wrong state, or because some Good Samaritan in West Virginia thought they spotted a drunk driver. 

Driving isn’t always easy, Mike, and the truth of the matter is that you are probably going to get into an accident or get pulled over at some point over the next couple years.  You’ll probably have to pay a traffic ticket or two for going too fast, and you’ll probably see those flashing lights in your rearview mirror more often than you want to.  The objectives should be to not get pulled over while you are still on supervision for the last ticket, and not to get in an accident so bad that your car can’t drive away from it.

The key, I suppose, is to control those things you can control without becoming too slow and irritating.  So here are some rules to help you out:

Rules to remember:

1)       Don’t drink and drive.  Seriously, this is stupid. 

2)       Don’t go faster than 90 mph, especially in Ohio (although, if you’re stuck with that Hyundai, it probably won’t be possible anyways).

3)       If you’re driving as the lead car in a caravan and you see a light turn yellow, don’t speed through it, as it’s just impolite to those following you.

4)       If you’re driving in an inch or two of unplowed snow, stay the hell away from the guy in front of you.

5)       If you’re going to do doughnuts in the GBN parking lot at 5:30 AM before swim practice on the first day it snows, make sure Coach Runkel doesn’t see you.

6)       If Julie, Tim, or I call you to pick us up somewhere because we have drank too many McNultys, it’s your younger sibling obligation to do it.  If you say this is unfair, then you haven’t thought it through because five years from now you will be 21 years old and looking to sleep on Julie’s couch in Miami for spring break, or Tim’s in Chicago for a night, or mine in New York for a weekend; and it will be our older sibling obligation to let you do this regardless of whatever kind of more important stuff we have going on.

For a 16-year old, driving gives you the freedom to go to Wendy’s and Sarkis whenever you feel like it and to see movies without getting a ride from Mom and Dad.  As the years go on, however, this freedom will be expanded to show you places and things that are a lot more awesome than the few suburban areas you’ll drive in the next couple years, but for now enjoy what you can. 

Happy Birthday Mike!!

Big East Tourney Semifinal Running Diary

10:11 (Yanji Time)-Welcome to my first college basketball running diary for the Notre Dame-West Virginia Big East Tournament Semifinal game.  Georgetown and Marquette just ended, so we still have some time before our game starts.

10:13-Digger has gone with the orange tie and highlighter today.  It looks much better than the yellow on yellow he had yesterday, but he does like payback games.

10:18-Certain people (cough, my parents, cough) think that I have been writing too much about drinking.  Because of this I told myself that the next couple pieces I wrote for this blog wouldn’t mention drinking at all, but then I decided to do this running diary.  Therefore, any time I would normally use an alcoholic word in this diary, I am going to replace it with the name of a character from The Wire (which we are currently watching on DVD).  If you haven’t seen The Wire, too bad.

10:22-I’m going to go make some eggs.

10:36 – I finished cooking the eggs and popped open a nice, cold McNulty.  There’s some sort of ESPN montage going on right now.

10:37-They show some West Virginia fans going crazy in the street.  Is it because there teams is playing, or is it because they have escaped the state of West Virginia.  This is unclear.

10:38-Jay Bilas thinks West Virginia will speed the game up.  Apparently the magic number is 69.

10:39-First words from Sharky at the Garden: He gets bad cell phone reception at the Garden.  Hopefully, I’ll get a few updates as the game goes forward.

10:41-Tim Higgins is an official for the game.  I remember there used to be an ND fan that always made a big deal about hating Tim Higgins.  I’m not exactly sure why this was, but he’s the only college basketball official who’s name I recognize.

10:43-Irish get the first score

10:45-McDonaugh tells us that there are a lot of WVU players from the New York area, which is really surprising as I thought they all came from West Virginia.

10:46-Bob Huggins has as many wins as John Wooden had?  That’s upsetting to me.

10:48-Mike Brey has summoned Harangody AND Peoples. I don’t know if our best strategy here involves giving Peoples playing time.

10:52-Coming out of the commercial break, I have now finished my eggs and am watching the cheerleaders do something on the court.  I wonder if the cheerleaders are able to have a spring break?  It seems like they would love Cancun more than any other Notre Dame Students.

10:53-When I make a movie about this basketball game, I am going to cast Alec Baldwin as Bob Huggins.  Picture Baldwin in a sweatsuit, picture it.

10:54- Sharky says a Bunk (a large McNulty) at MSG costs $9.  The Chinese McNulty I’m drinking cost less than 50 cents.

10:56-A commercial for Bud Light with Wheat that includes a huge bottle of Bud Light making out with a huge bushel of wheat on the beach.  I’m confused, I thought all Beer was made from wheat.  I’m going to do some research.

10:59- Raftery: “Did you think Mike Brey would be this good when you coached with him?” Jay Bilas: “Yes, I did.”

11:00- Harangody dropping threes again, this isn’t what we want him to be doing.

11:04 – ESPN is really pushing the World Cup.  They’ve got the U2 song going, and at the end of the commercial they’re using some sort of African style font. 

11:05-LOCAL ADS, coming to you this week from . . . North Texas, and a car dealership.  Hopefully it’s Buddy Garrity.

11:07- Alright, I’ve found it.  According to Wikipedia, the new Barksdale from Anheuser-Busch is “Bud Light Golden Wheat,” which is apparently a response to the amount of golden wheat obtained from craft breweries around the country.  If I want to drink a Golden Wheat McNulty, I think I’ll just stick with Samuel Adams.

11:10 – The Irish have only had one field goal in the last ten minutes, is it because of the Mountaineer zone, or because of the Irish Slow Burn.

11:11- Hansborough for THREE!!!

11:12-The Mountaineers have opened up a six point lead going into a commercial with mechanical arms dropping oil in a car.

11:13- 3:07 left in the first half

11:15-There’s a montage leading into the commercial break, and I’m pretty sure that the West Virginia mascot is a female.  I have no problem with this at all, and wonder when we will have a female Leprechaun.

11:17-Rece Davis uses the phrase “wall to wall” when discussing Kentucky.  Ha, Ha, Ha, boooooooooooooo

11:19-Our  feed is skipping a lot.  A couple minutes ago, it skipped over an entire Irish score.  We have no idea who scored the last points

11:20-Hansborough for THREE!!!

11:21-HANSBOROUGH AT THE BUZZER!!!

11:22-They’re reviewing it . . . what is this football.

11:23-Rece Davis is touting how good their camera crew is because they got the shot that overturned it.

11:25-I don’t think that Alec Baldwin is the best Baldwin brother to play Bob Huggins in my movie.  My halftime project is going to be looking through pictures of the other Baldwin brothers.

11:28-I just got distracted from my project by a commercial for the movie Hot Tub Time Machine with John Cusack, Daryl from The Office, and Michael Cera’s friend.

11:30-I’ve found some pictures of Daniel Baldwin, Stephen Baldwin, and William Baldwin.  I’m torn between Stephen and Daniel for the role.  I’ll wait until I see Huggins again to make a decision.

11:36-Halftime word from Sharky, apparently the crowd at MSG is mainly pulling for West Virginia.  Thus proving #76.

11:39-I think they just played Jay-Z’s Empire State of Mind, but I’m not sure because I haven’t heard the song before.  This despite the fact that I just bought the song on iTunes solely because Bill Simmons mentioned it in his mailbag today.  I have yet to listen to it though.

11:41-The second half has begun, and the Irish quickly tie it up.

11:42- I think we’re going to need some more production from Harangody in this half if we are going to win the game.

11:44-West Virginia takes a six point lead, and we go to a commercial.

11:46- Sharky’s girlfriend has commandeered his Blackberry and I am now explaining to her the idea of writing a running diary for a basketball game.

11:51-I just popped open my second McNulty.  Hopefully this means that I don’t have a The Wire problem. 

11:53-WVU lead is back up to six

11:54- Abromitis at the line.  Apparently he is a great player this year, even though he didn’t play at all the past two years.  This is how Mike Brey operates.

11:56- I think I’m going to go with Daniel Baldwin to play Bob Huggins in my movie of this game.  Not only does he have the weight on him, but he has that alcoholic look on him, and we all remember Bob Huggins DUI issues of previous years (although, understandably he was living in Ohio back then).

12:01 – Kansas State is good this year?  Do you remember when Bob Huggins was the coach of Kansas State?  Neither do I.

12:05-The ball has been going back and forth for awhile, but we’re still down eight.  Mike Brey is smiling about this for whatever reason.

12:07-We are now down ten with less than ten minutes to play.  McDonaugh tries to console the viewer by saying how tough it has been with the rims in this game.  I am not consoled.

12:11-The announcers are now talking about ND giving up its football independence and all that stuff Swarbrick was saying earlier this week.  It’s not a good sign when the announcers of a basketball game are talking about Jack Swarbrick’s comments on our football independence. 

12:13-Less than eight minutes remaining.  We’ve gotta get something going now.

12:14-Harangody makes a couple free throws, we’re down eight.

12:16-Harangody is fouled while shooting a three.  The real question is: WHY IS HE SHOOTING THREES???

12:18 –Da’Sean Butler has scored half of the points for West Virginia, and Harangody sends him to the line.

12:19-The team is falling apart.  McDonaugh mentions our short bench.  I wish they’d ask Brey about that one.

12:22 –Abromitis gets fouled, and misses the first one.  Brey takes the timeout with the team down seven and 4:50 remaining.  Let’s see some Mike Brey strategery.

12:24-Hansborough for THREE!!

12:25-Four point game, make that six.

12:25- HANSBOROUGHT FOR THREEEEEEEEEE!!!!!  FROM THE NBA LINE!!

12:26-Three and a half to go, it’s a three point game.

12:27-Ben Hansborough has brought us back into this game.

12:28-Offensive Foul, it’s going our way into the media timeout.  Huggins is mad.

 12:30-Is that Ellen Page in an ad for Cisco?  Is this what her career has come to?  Oh wait, she has a role in Inception this summer, never mind.

12:32-It’s a ONE POINT GAME (have I overused the caps function yet)

12:34-WVU opens up a five point lead, as Tim Higgins stops the action for no apparent reason

12:35-I’m doing Mike Brey style fist pumps as Hansborough makes it a three point game.

12:37-Butler’s free throw makes it a four point game, and the Irish keep possession on their end. 

12:38-Hansborough at the line, makes them both and a two point game

12:39-There’s a timeout, 47 seconds left.  I think this diary has shown how I watch basketball games.  I spend three quarters of the game thinking about superfluous shit like commercials, coaches, and announcers, and then spend the last ten minutes of the game caring. 

12:41-That’s it, the Irish lose.  After Butler (a.k.a. the only player on West Virginia) missed his chance for the dagger, Tory Jackson had a three point shot for the win and missed it

12:44-Well, that’s all from here.  The first Notre Dame Basketball game I’ve watched in its entirety all year ends with a last second loss (reminds me of football season).  Two days from now we’ll all have brackets to fill out, and thanks to the last two weeks, the Irish will be back in action once the Madness begins. 

GO IRISH, BEAT BOILERMAKERS!!

Bob’s Lost Power Rankings: Season Six, Episodes 1-6

A couple years ago, when the majority of my writing was for a film and television blog that was even less read than this one, I wrote weekly power rankings of all the characters of Lost.  Like power rankings in football, basketball, and the movie Love, Actually, these rankings have nothing to do with the ‘power’ of any of the characters, but rather with how much I have liked them over the course of the past six episodes.

This is written for readers that are caught up on Lost through the episode Sundown. 

25) Lennon and Dogen

While I was kind of surprised when Sayid ruthlessly murdered these two, I was pretty happy that their run on the show has apparently come to an end.  I don’t think any viewer needed to see new Others brought into the mix, and I’m pretty sure these two brought about more questions than answers.  Not that I desperately need answers like most fans, but I definitely don’t need annoying Japanese guys that refuse to talk English.

24) Aldo

Three years ago when Rob McElhenney appeared first appeared on Lost, he had a small bit role in the background that nobody really noticed.  At that time his show (It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia) was a somewhat unknown FX comedy, and his appearance on Lost wasn’t even noteworthy.  Three and a half years later, there are Green Men at every conceivable sporting event and The Night Man Cometh is widely recognized by many fans.  While the Lost producers have said in the past that they don’t want to cast well-known actors that would be distracting, McKelhenney’s appearance this season was kind of distracting.

Furthermore, his character was incredibly annoying.  He pretty much whined the entire episode and made me really happy when Claire shot him to death.

23) Kate

It’s not that I hate Kate episodes like most bloggers; it’s that I’ve been incredibly confused about what she is trying to do in the early part of this season.  While I understand that she is trying to find Claire, is the best way to go about that really to wander around in the jungle for three episodes and then just head back to the Temple?  Why did she even return to the Temple when she did?  Hopefully her story will get more interesting as she has now decided to follow Man-in-Black (although I’m pretty sure she has no clue what is going on).

22) Nadia

Some day in the future, when I have a girl that likes me, I’m going to try to push her on my brother.  I’m fairly certain this won’t work because most people aren’t as stupid is flash-sideways Nadia.  “Oh, Sayid doesn’t want to be with me so he can brood, that means I should marry his brother, this isn’t a bad idea.”  It wasn’t a stupid storyline (I liked the episode); it just showed that Nadia proved that she was a stupid person.

21) Sun

We’re now 19 episodes into the “How can I find my husband?” storyline for Sun, and I think I’ve been sick of it for roughly 18 episodes.  I think my friend Jack put it best when he wrote me saying, “Next thing we know we'll be watching a "Hard Day's Night" type scene (the hallway with all the doors, with Jin going in one door while Sun comes out another, etc). Honestly, no one cares.” 

20) Jack 

I think I need to see Jack brood some more.  Is it just me, or do most of the characters on this show now spend an inordinate amount of time brooding?  Sure I would be mad if I used to be an amazing doctor and am now characterized by my inability to fix things, but why’d he have to go and break Jacob’s magic mirrors.  The real question for the last 12 episodes is whether or not Jack will become likable.

19) Sayid

He’s a killer, we get it.  Do we really need this fact hammered into our heads once a season?  The best thing that Sayid has done this season was give Sawyer the opportunity to say, “He’s an Iraqi torturer who shoots kids, he definitely deserves another go-around.”  Sure his fight sequences are kind of fun (although I’ve been watching this season on my iPod), but I felt like his story was concluded when he shot young Ben last season.

18) Jin

Unlike Sun, Jin can be marginally interesting every so often.  Luckily he stepped in Clousseau’s (get it, Claire + Rousseau) traps and hasn’t had the opportunity to pull the Kate-plan and wander around the jungle searching for somebody, because his time in Claire’s camp was pretty fun.  Oh, and he was being held by Keamy in the sideways world.  That’s more interesting than anything that happened to Sun in two years.

17) Desmond

I’m trying to have complete faith in the writers of the show, but when they phase out one of the three best characters in order to focus more time on formerly interesting characters brooding/wandering through the jungle, I get concerned.  Desmond better play a big role at some point this season or I’ll be more than a little upset.

16) Juliet

Hopefully, when she said “It worked”, she was not talking about ABC’s new series V, which Elizabeth Mitchell is starring in.  I think my biggest problem with Juliet is that she was still alive after they shifted back through time.  Her and Sawyer’s goodbye at the end of last season was perfect, and one of the most emotional moments the series has ever given us.  Having Miles communicate a vague phrase to Sawyer wasn’t emotional, and it wasn’t necessary.

15) Richard

When Nestor Carbonell was promoted to a regular cast member heading into this season, I thought that meant we would see more of his compelling character.  This hasn’t happened yet, and until the oft-rumored Richard episode occurs (in which ALL OUR QUESTIONS WILL BE ANSWERED), we’re left waiting around for him to do something interesting.

14) Jacob

While I am very skeptical about the whole Jacob vs. Man-in-Black storyline that this season is centered around, I think that Mark Pelligrino’s performance has been awesome.  For a character that had been talked about for so many seasons, his introduction was a difficult challenge that Pellegrino has fully met.  I also think that his ability to communicate with Hurley because of Hurley’s gift is a lot of fun and brings necessary humor to the proceedings.  I hope we see Jacob often as the season continues.

13) Man-in-Black

As disappointed I am that Locke is no longer alive (at least in the normal timeline), Terry O’Quinn has done an amazing job as the doppelganger with all the answers.  I’m a little worried that every question the audience has is going to be answered by saying that either Jacob ‘made it that way’ or ‘it was Man-in-Black’, but the guy is a lot of fun to watch.  I also hope that we can see his original incarnation (Titus Welliver) again soon, because that guy was great as well.

12) Helen

In the wonderland where Flight 815 lands in LA, Helen is a stabilizing force in Locke’s life.  She is the reason why he laughs when he falls into the grass, and the reason why he isn’t a beaten man in that life.  While we all know that she wishes she could dance with him at their wedding, she knows that she must help him get past the loss of his legs.  Helen is a smart and great woman, and the complete opposite of the other wonderland love interest we have seen (Nadia).

11) Keamy

Before Sayid ruthlessly shot him to death, Keamy looked like the type of high class gangster that had his act together.  Anybody that decides to fry eggs while grilling a guy about a debt that sent somebody to the hospital is my type of gangster, and the fact that he had Jin in the back room makes me wonder if he’s still working for Mr. Widmore in the reflection-timeline. 

10) Rose

It sucks that she still has cancer when she doesn’t get to the island.  I mean, if Jack can have a teenaged son in the cuckoo-world, then why can’t Rose be healthy?  Why couldn’t Jughead’s explosion have spread the islands healing powers all the way to LA?  Even though she still has cancer, Rose is still spreading her pearls of wisdom to anybody she can while helping Locke find his place in the world.  This is why we’ve always liked Rose, and why I’m glad that her and Bernard probably had their happily ever after on the island.

9) Illana

I’m pretty certain that Illana knows a lot about the island, and is going to start spilling her knowledge soon, but for now I like her because she led the rescue party into the Temple.  Their appearance at the end of the episode was a great sequence made for any action movie.  Just when things look perilous, help comes at the final moment and whisks everybody (or, just Miles) off to safety.  That sequence bumped her up immeasurable (or nine) spots on this list.

8) Locke

Sure he’s six feet under (or probably more like two or three feet) on the island, but back in LA he has finally found his  calling as a substitute teacher that is about to marry the woman of his dreams.  To make things even better, he’s now working with Benjamin Linus, European History.

7) Ethan

Dr. Goodspeed was our first surprise cameo of the flash-sideways, and it was a great one.  Ethan was one of the original, more interesting, Others, and I only hope the rest of his brethren can join him in the other universe (namely, Tom).

6) Claire

After missing an entire season because she wandered into the jungle in the middle of the night, Claire is now back and completely different than she was when we last saw her.  Three years of apparently living in the jungle on her own has morphed her into Rousseau (or Clousseau as one might say) and convinced her that the Others have her baby.  While she is crazy (I mean, she did leave her baby in the middle of the jungle), the craziness also caused her to ax an Other in the chest (which was awesome).  I don’t know where they are going with this, but it had clearly been planned for awhile, and should be awesome.

5) Hurley

Hugo continues to be one of the best characters on the show.  His interactions with Miles and Jacob are hilarious, and his reminiscing with Jack while they were walking through the jungle was awesome.  He says, “This is cool, dude.  Very old school.  You know, you and me, trekking through the jungle, on our way to do something that we don’t quite understand . . . good times.”  Hurley works best in the show because he is the voice of the audience.  Not only is he able to ask the questions the audience wants to ask (specifically when it involved time travel), but he is also able to connect things back to previous seasons.  This is what makes him so great.

4) Ben

“John Locke was a believer, he was a man of faith, he was a much better man than I will ever be.  And I’m very sorry I murdered him.”  While Ben hasn’t been in nearly enough of this season thus far, the two or three episodes that have featured him have done so brilliantly.  Aside from his awesome eulogy of John Locke, Ben also had great a great scene in the Temple with Sayid, and another equally awesome scene in the flash-sideways when he ranted about the coffee machine in the teacher’s lounge.  With next week’s entitled Dr. Linus, I have a feeling we’ll be in for a treat because any episode that makes Ben a focal point is usually a great one.

3) Sawyer

If we were giving out awards for the first third of this season, Josh Holloway would have edge out Terry O’Quinn and Michael Emerson for the best actor award.  Sawyer’s grief over Juliet’s death has been pitch-perfect for the character, and his scenes following Man-in-Black through the jungle and into the cave were equally compelling.  Sawyer has definitely developed the most as a character over the past couple seasons, and he is the few original cast members that is actually tolerable. 

2) Frank

While the characters that have been around the longest have become the dullest, Frank has been one of my favorites in the 2+ seasons that he has been around.  His comment that it was the “Weirdest damn funeral I’ve ever been to” pretty much shot him towards the  top of this list, and makes me hope that we’ll be getting a lot more Lapidus as the season wears on. 

1)  Miles

This island medium might not be the most compelling character on the show, but right now he is definitely the most fun and down to earth of them all.  Whether he is making banter and playing Tic-Tac-Toe with Hurley, telling Sayid that he was really dead (I wonder what he heard when Sayid woke up), or updating everybody on what is going on, Miles has been my favorite character in the early episodes of this season.  Furthermore, his remark to Kate about considering going after Sawyer reminded the audience that while Kate has only really been near Sawyer for roughly 100 days, Miles and Sawyer had three years to develop a friendship (something that is unique in this show).  His position atop these rankings was solidified in the last week when he described Claire by saying, “She just strolled in here a couple hours ago acting all weird, still hot though.”

Chasing the Night

“You can’t chase the night.  When the night is over, the night is over.  That’s just the way it is.  You just gotta wake up tomorrow and hope for a better day.” –Worldwide Wes, as quoted here (below #8)

Any American that has ever felt the joy and relief of finally turning 21 years old knows that a true birthday celebration starts the night before ones actual birthday.  For my 23^rd birthday this year, this night started at a bar across the street from the beach on the Indonesian island of Bali watching Everton FC* (my Premiere league team) take on their rivals, Liverpool.  While Liverpool is widely seen as the better team (ok, right now they are the better team), my team put up a good fight before losing the game 1-0.

*As some of you might know, sophomore year of college my roommate and I somewhat randomly chose Everton to be the team that we supported in the Premiere League.  We bought jerseys and a flag, and attempted to follow games online.  While we didn’t follow them as much junior year; supporting them senior year was a joy as they reached the FA Cup final and had a great second half. 

Today, Everton has two of the best American players (Landon Donovan and Tim Howard), and ESPN is apparently trying to push them on the American public.  I’ve been first on the bandwagon for ‘The Office’, Tony Romo’s fantasy viability, and ‘The Hurt Locker’s Oscar chances, so hopefully I can add Everton to the mix.

Anyways, while watching the game and drinking some Bintang, Gavin and I began to talk with two guys from England that were also watching.  These two were Tottenham supporters and weren’t really pulling for Everton as much as they were rooting for Liverpool to lose.  We conversed for the rest of the game and afterwards the four of us made our way to Paddy’s Bar.  We specifically chose Paddy’s Bar because it was the target of terrorist attacks in 2002 (albeit in a different location, as the original location is now a memorial).  This is how two Americans and two Brits determine what bar they want to go to.

Standing there in the middle of a bar that was the Kuta version of Finnegan’s, I followed my clock down to midnight as sweaty Australians were dancing in each direction I the final seconds ticked away of my 22 year-old existence.  Not really wanting to make a big deal about it, I didn’t mention it to anybody, and figured I’d only mention it if somebody specifically asked me how old I was (which was highly likely considering how many times it had already happened on our trip)

After a few drinks at Paddy’s, I decided it was time to make like Sarah Palin and go rogue.  As per usual, this seemed like a good idea at the time, and I was off to my second bar of the night. 

The second bar I entered was Bounty and featured a huge pirate ship that had a dance floor on the top and a foam room underneath.  While I’ll happily admit to being fairly intoxicated at this point, I’ll probably never be drunk enough to think that a foam party is a good idea.  Let’s just say they look A LOT more fun while watching Wild On ‘E’ from the comfort and cleanliness of your own couch. 

Turning away from the disease filled location of the foam party, I made my way to the upstairs dance floor where I got another drink and started walking in circles looking for an upright standing 19-year old Australian girl that might be willing to dance with a guy that appeared two years younger.  A couple drinks later, and I decided it was high time to head to bed.

Our hotel was essentially in an alley that was lined with hotels and storefronts.  During the day the alley had a dangerous mix of pedestrians and motorbikes moving down it, with the occasional car driving through causing havoc (it was roughly the same width as most cars).  The storefronts were open all day with Indonesian men and women constantly trying to sell things that I didn’t want.  A simple walk down the alley from the beach to our hotel would include roughly 8-10 Indonesian guys saying, “Yes, transport, motorbike, yes.”  Walking in the other direction from our hotel to the bar street would not only include a different 8-10 local men offering to rent us motorbikes, but probably 3-5 local women offering massages.

What annoyed me most about all of these hawkers and sketchy street merchants wasn’t necessarily that each and every one of them had to make their offer as we walked past, but it was how they all would use the word ‘yes’ while doing it.  It was like they were assuming we were going to rent a motorbike or get a massage, even though it was probably rare that anybody actually paid them for these things (not that people don’t rent motorbikes or get massages, but I’m pretty sure the supply of massages and motorbikes in this alley was much higher than the quantity demanded).

Through this alley of motorbikes and massages I was making my way back to the hotel when drunken Bob realized that he missed his friends and decided that it was a perfect time to go to the internet bar and send them an e-mail (the traveler equivalent of a drunk dial).  Since there was a readily available converstation in my Inbox related to the upcoming “Puppy Bowl” on Animal Planet, I sent out this marvelous piece of work:

So I was debating whether or not to reply to this, but since sharks did, and it is my birthday, and I am in paradise, here it goes:

(I am pretty drunk right now)

In China, the puppy bowl would be much more comparable to (say) things Michael Vick likes.  It's not that the Chinese hate dogs, it's that they love how these animals taste.

(note, I have eaten dog meat twice, and think that it is far too tough).

In China, the puppy bowl would consist of two dogs fighting each other on the street, and the loser becoming dinner.  What is worse, is that to become dinner a dog must be beaten to a pulp so that the blood drains out (apparently this makes for great meat).  

I wish I was joking about the fighting, but in China we don't get The Price Is Right, which means no Bob Barker, which means that the dog population is NOT controlled at all.  I had never seen a dog with female organs before Asia, and I had never seen two dogs doing the dirty deed before Asia.  Now I have seen both of these things, and I have seen dogs fighting on the street.

I hope you all are doing well, and that my DC friends stockpiled plenty of provisions (I hope [NAME OMITTED] has enough condoms) for the Snow-pocolypse that has apparently hit the east coast.  I won't be at Tostal this year, but I will see you all in September.

Go Carrie Underwood, hold your notes long and make the over.

[The last line about Carrie Underwood was a reference to her singing the National Anthem before the following day’s Super Bowl, and my bet that she would go over 1 minute and 42 seconds singing it]

Soon after clicking send on this e-mail that I am not at all ashamed of, I walked back out into the alley and made the critical decision to return to the bar street and go to yet another bar.  Five minutes later I was on the roof of Sky Bar buying a drink for a somewhat attractive Balinese girl.  I don’t have the slightest idea what the drink was, but at 90,000 Rupiah (roughly the cost of four 750mL bottles of Bintang) I had purchased the most expensive drink on the menu.  Of course, since this was Indonesia, it was still less than $10.  Regardless, I had clearly not thought this through because soon after I purchased the drink, this exchange occurred:

Girl: “So where are you staying?”

Me: “I don’t know the name of the place.”

Girl: “Do you want sex?”

Me: “Ummmmm, no,” as I get up and walk out of the bar, leaving my beer on a table.

When you have a close call with a Balinese prostitute at roughly 4:00 in the morning, the only option left is to stumble back through the alleys past mongrel dogs and peddlers back to the comfort of an air conditioned hotel room.  As I made my way down the alley this time, I was again heckled by Indonesians saying, “Yes, transport, motorbike, yes,” but this time I couldn’t take it anymore:

“NO, I DON’T WANT A FUCKING MOTORBIKE AT FOUR IN THE FUCKING MORNING!!”

I yelled at the hawkers and peddlers that would appear around ever twist and turn in the alley until I was in the final stretch towards my hotel.  As I rounded the final corner and had the hotel in sight, I also saw the light of a motorbike coming straight towards me in the alley, and stopping 20 feet ahead of me.  In the shadows of the street and dim lights of other hotels I saw a large women get off the motorbike and come towards me. 

Now I’m not good at judging things like size and weight, but I imagine this woman probably weighed in around 250 pounds, and she was walking right towards me at four in the morning saying things like “blow job” and “sex” while she tried to act seductively and stand in my way.  I somehow made it around her and to my hotel, but I think I had a nightmare about her after I went to sleep

When I woke up the next morning, I got some breakfast, watched some Lost, and hoped for a better day.

My Weekly Run-Down: 3/3/2010

 I apologize for not updating this as often the past couple weeks, but I’ve been busy travelling and all the things that I will hopefully write about in the next couple weeks.  I’m now back in Yanji, but I’m hoping to share more stories from our travels periodically, while also sharing stories from the present.  If this is confusing for you then you probably don’t watch Lost (and will get even more confused when I start writing about the parallel timelines where I didn’t go to China). 

Where was I?? (a continuing saga of poorly drawn maps)

When I last updated this blog with stories from my travels, we had just left Laos.  The map below shows our flights from Vientiane, Laos to Bali in red and includes our layover in Kuala Lumpur that was long enough for us to see the Petronas Towers (discussed below), and attempt to sleep in a hot and sweaty hostel.

 After arriving in Bali, we spent a few days relaxing on the beach and celebrating my 23^rd birthday before taking a boat to the smaller Indonesian island of Gili Trawangan.  This is shown on the map below in red.  Following a week of SCUBA diving on Gili T, we took another boat back to Bali (the green line) followed by a van to Ubud (the blue line).  We concluded our time in Bali back in Kuta before flying up to Macau through Singapore (the blue lines on the map above).

Unable to find a suitable hostel in Macau, we decided to pull an all-nighter in the casino (probably the worst idea we made all trip) before taking a boat over to Hong Kong where we would finish our trip.  This boat ride is depicted below in red.

After four days in Hong Kong, it was time to return to Yanji to begin our second semester as English teachers, so we flew back via Beijing.  These flights are shown in green on the above and below maps.

  

Three Things I’m thinking about This Week:

A Story About Pants

On my last night in Yanji before the trip, I opened up Christmas presents from my family.  While the presents had been sitting for nearly a week since Christmas (and probably two weeks before that), I had been waiting to open them until my family received the gifts I had sent them.  However, mail delivery takes a long time from this side of the world (as any of you that have seen my postcards can attest to), and when it came time for me to leave Yanji for two months my gifts had not yet arrived in Northbrook.

So there I was, two months ago, Skyping Northbrook and opening the gifts that were incredibly thoughtful.  I got season 4 of How I Met Your Mother, a travel towel that I would use on the following trip, a second pair of gloves because (as I have written at length) it was really cold in Harbin.  My brother gave me a Wisconsin scarf, and I also received two pairs of sweatpants. 

Because I had already packed my bag for the trip, I didn’t bring the pants with me, but the first pants I went to wear when I got back this weekend were the pants I had received for Christmas.  The first pair were Notre Dame pajama pants (which I am actually wearing as I type this), and they are excellent.

The second pair were Chicago Bears sweatpants, and they were strange.

When I first put these pants on a couple days ago, I became annoyed with the fact that they didn’t have pockets.  While I have running shorts without pockets that I deal with, I’ve never worn a pair of pants without pockets.  Assuming that I would only really be wearing them around the apartment, I went ahead and put them on.

Once I put on this pair of pants, however, things became even stranger.  Now I’m aware that I am a thin person, but these pants could not stay around my waist at all.  I thought this was odd because even though they were enormous around the waist and hip region, they were an almost perfect length.  These pants must have been bought at one of those Big and Tall stores or something.  I would probably need to wear them with suspenders.

Luckily, they had a drawstring around the waist, and I pulled it tight and tied them in.  This might have been a weird pair of pants, but the material was incredibly comfortable and I wanted to find a way to make them work.  When I tied them up at the waist however, I noticed that the waist area was strangely narrow.  Curious to see what was wrong with these pants, I went to my wastebasket and picked up the tag I had removed earlier.  The tag said they were medium, so I guess they should be fine.

Later that night, Gavin and I went to dinner at our favorite downstairs restaurant and I noticed that the pants were kind of sliding down my backside.  I’ve never really thought about my ass as something that is there to hold up my pants, but with this bizarro pair of pants I almost had to keep my butt out just so they stayed up. 

After dinner, I went to use the restroom and realized that the pants had no fly on them.  Again, I’ve worn athletic shorts that have no fly on them, but those shorts also stayed up on their own.  These pants had a highly sophisticated knot tied along the front to keep them from only falling down as far as my ass.  So as I stood there in the bathroom untying my pants it hit me:

Are these women’s pants?

After I got the knot undone, and after I had relieved myself, I looked at the tag that was actually attached to the pants, and sure enough it had the word Women’s in white letters across it.  As comfortable as they were, I promptly went to my room and put on the Notre Dame Pajamas. 

I don’t know which one of my family members gave me these pants, and if they were trying to make some strange joke that I just don’t understand; but I assume that I won’t be able to return them when I get back stateside this summer, so I might just be regifting these pants next Christmas.

Tall, Taller, Not Quite Tallest

Over the course of the past two months I’ve visited 2.5 major international cities (Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Kuala Lumpur) as well as the amazing airport of one (Singapore, but I’ll save that story for later), and seen a lot of tall buildings in each of them. 

Having grown up relatively close to Chicago* I have a small obsession with skyscrapers.  This obsession manifests itself by spontaneously Googling the phrase ‘Chicago Spire’ every so often just to see if any progress has been made with the building that will put Chicago back on the map (no progress has been made) and occasionally perusing the pages of Wikipedia detailing the tallest skyscrapers in the world.

*In my last three years at Notre Dame I refused to say I was from Chicago.  I’m from NORTHBROOK, not Chicago.  While I was travelling, however, I lied and told people that I’m from Chicago.  I’m sorry if I deceived anybody.

My obsession with skyscrapers has caused me to sometimes be confused while visiting cities whose central area does not include them (London, Paris, Beijing) because when I think of cities, I think of skyscrapers.  Luckily for me, many Asian leaders feel the same way, so I was treated with views of some awesome skyscrapers.  Here are my thoughts of a few:

Shanghai World Financial Center: Shanghai, China

The thing about the Shanghai Skyline (at least the Pudong side) is that while it is pretty sparse, this building is actually enormous.  While it doesn’t look that way from the other side of the river, standing next to this building I could tell that it was tall.  What I didn’t realize was that it is actually the 3^rd tallest in the world.

Jin Mao Tower: Shanghai, China

I think part of the reason this building doesn’t look as impressive is because it stands right beside the much taller one I just wrote about.  However, this tower is actually the 11^th tallest in the world, and somewhat deserving of that measure (although some of that does come from the spire).  We had drinks at the ritzy bar on top of it, drinks that were far too pricy.

The Petronas Towers: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

In 1998, I was an 11 year old in Northbrook when I heard that my beloved Sears Tower was no longer considered to be the tallest building in the world and that some twin towers in Malaysia had taken the new title.  At the time I probably couldn’t even point out Malaysia on a map, let alone comprehend the idea that one day I would stand in front of these towers and exclaim out loud how they are definitely not taller than the Sears.

The fact that these buildings are 5^th and 6^th tallest in the world is a crime against humanity, and their mere 88 stories are proof of that.  While they might look cool, call me unimpressed.

International Commerce Center: Kowloon, Hong Kong

I spent far too much time inside this building than I should have spent (more on that at a later date), but it is spectacularly beautiful and clean.  The exterior also looks great, but the problem is that I never got a good look at it from afar.  This building is actually across the inlet from Hong Kong Island and not part of the beautiful skyline of the city.  It really is a shame because the building has yet to get the credit it deserves as the 4^th tallest building in the world.

Two International Finance Center: Hong Kong

I’m fairly certain that Batman stood atop this building before he flew across the Hong Kong sky and kidnapped Lau in The Dark Knight.  Any building that Batman stands on top of (like the Sears Tower) is fine by me.  This one is so tall (12^th in the world) that I have pictures across from it where the top is shrouded in fog.

Central Plaza: Hong Kong

This building suffers mainly because the Hong Kong skyline is so massive; it is difficult to get a good picture of.  For this reason, you can’t really stand across from the skyline and get a picture of this building and it’s two more famous friends.  It is still a decent building though.  (16^th tallest in the world)

Bank of China Tower: Hong Kong

Probably one of the more famous buildings in Hong Kong, even if it isn’t the tallest, it is probably the coolest looking.  I’m also fairly certain that Batman crashed through the windows of this building in The Dark Knight, so I think it’s even cooler.  (17^th tallest in the world).

One Note on Lost

While I was travelling, I met many people that came from various parts of the world.  Because it takes some level of wealth to be able to travel around the world (although not that much) we can assume that none of these people came from poor beginnings.  One thing I noticed was that no matter what country they were from, they all spoke some level of English.

This got me thinking about Lost, and about the characters of Sun and Jin.  While I can accept that Jin came from poverty and would only understand Korean, it makes no sense that Sun wouldn’t have been taking English lessons for her entire life.  If we are to believe that her family is one of the wealthiest and most powerful families in Korea, then it would only make sense that Sun would have an excellent education that not only would have included English instruction, but probably studies in an English speaking country.

The fact that Sun doesn’t learn English until she takes sketchy lessons with some guy she is hooking up with is probably the most unbelievable aspect of the show.  I can accept crazy smoke monsters that turn into humans, frozen donkey wheels that move people through time, and even parallel universes; but the fact that Sun doesn’t speak English from a young age is more ridiculous than any of these things.

One Meal Worth Mentioning

While we were still in Bali I realized that in Macau we would be able to get some Portuguese food.  At the time I wasn’t entirely sure what Portuguese food entailed, so I decided that there was one person I knew that I could ask.  My sister had just been to Lisbon (which, unlike Macau, is actually within the country of Portugal) so I sent her a message asking what kind of Portuguese food we should get.  She responded by telling me that when she was in Portugal, she actually didn’t eat any Portuguese food.

When we arrived in Macau a couple days later, I was determined to eat a Portuguese dinner just so that I would be able to outdo my sister that was actually in Portugal.

My Portuguese dinner included an appetizer of Portuguese sausage, which was excellent; and a main dish of Portuguese-style beef which was also very good.  While I wish I could do a better job of describing these things, there was nothing all that unique about them.  It seemed like a lot of thinly cut steak like you could get in America.  It was great, however.

               

Beers of Note:

Bintang

In Bali, the beer of choice is Bintang, and while it is almost as ubiquitous as Beerlao was in Laos, it doesn’t quite have as large of a stranglehold on the market.  There are so many westerners in Bali that imports like Heineken and Guinness can be found in most convenience stores.  While Bintang is a satisfactory beer (especially to get drunk off of); I didn’t like it as much as Beerlao.

Storm

Apparently the only microbrewed beer on the island of Bali, I found this in Ubud and really enjoyed it.  The pale ale reminded me a lot of Sierra Nevada, which was a welcome surprise in the middle of Indonesia.  I only had it twice, however, as it was a bit pricier than Bintang.

Brooklyn Lager

I had this on draft when I was in New York last summer, and was so shocked when I found bottles of it at a restaurant in Hong Kong that I had to drink some.  While this is a solid beer, it is more notable for me because it  exemplifies the fact that you really can get anything in Hong Kong.

Quotations of the Week:

“Hopefully it will be cloudy so that it will be nice out.” –A crazy girl hoping for a lack of sun so that it isn’t as hot in Indonesia

Picture of the Week:

This is a picture of me in front of part of the Hong Kong skyline.  Like New York, Hong Kong has an incredibly long skyline and it really isn’t possible to get it all in one picture.  Just above my head you can see Two International Finance Center (as discussed above), and the taller, more futuristic building to the left is the Bank of China Tower.