The Ranting Jamaican on Star Trek

May 18th, 2009

I am exceedingly apologetic for the long delay in writing the long anticipated second entry on this wonderful blog. My time was consumed in the search for Red Vines. It seems that in this country where everything is produced and there is a counterfeit for pretty much everything, there are no Red Vines and no Red Vines imitations. I have been subjected to the horrible punishment of not being able to enjoy red vines while I enjoy watching movies in my cinema of choice. This brings me to the topic at hand…. Star Trek.

I saw Star Trek at 3:50PM on May 8th, here in Taipei (12:50AM in the US). This was their first showing, and I must admit that when I left the theater I was somewhat dissappointed. I had been distracted by the fact that the theaters here do not sell candy (just fried Chicken and Churros. huh?) and I was not enjoying red vines. But after some contemplation I decided that except for some minor setbacks this movie is like 10 billion times better than Iron-Man (and I am pissed they got rid of Terence Howard although Don Cheadle is amazing). Although the action was somewhat distracting and pointless and really added nothing to the movie, like wtf is the point of a sword fight on top of a drilling platform? shoot the man with your phaser and get it over with.  But actually now that I am thinking about it the point of that sword fight was for us hardcore star trek fans as a throwback to that one episode where sulu went crazy with his sword. But I think they could have ffound a better way.

With the exception of what was mentioned in the preceding paragraph I friggin loved the movie. It was hilarious, it had a message, it was Star Trek. One thing that makes this Star Trek movie amazing is that it has something for everyone from the Star Trek newb to the person who has seen every single episode and happens to know Klingon. I especially loved the little add-ins that were for the hardcore fans. Although it is not as good as star Trek IV or Star Trek II it is a great addition. So if you are reading this and you haven’t fallen asleep you had best go see Star Trek this instant! Because Star Trek is way better than Star Wars and so on and so forth. so go see it!

Posted in Gripes, Movies, Travel | 5 Comments »

The Ranting Jamaican on Taipei

May 9th, 2009

If you take New York City’s Chinatown, and I am talking about the REAL Chinatown in flushing not the manhattan one, and spread it out to take up all of New York city and then multiply it’s size by two or maybe four then you would almost have an idea of what Taipei is like. But what you will not find in New York is the fast fast fast pace of Taipei. Taipei is like New York City on Speed. what? you say new york is already crazy fast paced? come to Taipei and you will understand my friend.  The streets look like one huge accident waiting to happen. You have busses all over the place, hundreds of thousands of scooters zipping around and weaving in and out of cars, plus all the normal traffic, and to top it all off lots of crazy J-walking. I love it.

The one sour spot about this city is that the myths about dirt cheap electronics are completely 100% FALSE. The prices are slightly lower than in the US but nothing to write home about. But there is a really cool 6 story building totally dedicated to selling electronics and tech services. This place is really cool for technophiles like myself to walk around and just take things in, but as I said the prices are not that great. The prices are good but not dirt cheap.

What is dirt cheap though is the food. If you know where to go you can get a complete meal for 2 people for about 100 New Taiwan Dollars (3 US Dollars). That is cool but I would rather starve and get dirt cheap electronics than vice versa. But what can you do? I say that you can cry about it.

And finally there is the public transit system. Their public transit system is  far better than anything we have out in Los Angeles and from my experience in New York it is far better than there also. The Subway system is 100% climate controlled and doesn’t look like it was built in the 19th century.  The bus system though is pretty equivalent to what is in New York. The only problem is that if you cannot read chinese characters you are pretty much assed out with the bus system because all of the signs are in, you guessed it, traditional chinese characters!!

Anywho when all is said and done Taipei is great you should come here.

Posted in Taiwan, Travel | 4 Comments »

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