#23 - December's Times

A documentary, two music videos, a restaurant promo, tutorials, ten story templates, multiple educational lessons, a facebook photo album, an animation project, a vacation video and those are just the ones that I can remember, I didn't even look at the list. Additionally I have a host of administrative tasks and lists to keep and update. I'm busy.

Then there's the play which opens tomorrow night for it's run of ten shows in twelve days. It sort of turned into a bit of cluster fuck as it was conceived of and executed in a way unlike any other B-Floor show, oh yeah and did I forget to mention it's also the largest technical undertaking they've ever had. I guess that it's one thing to put on a show with actors and a stage crew but when you add moving scaffolding, an exhibition in the courtyard, shadow puppets, Italian set and costume designers and a high profile composer for sound design you kind end up needing eight arms but only having seven...or as it actually is, two.

As Nana pointed out in her comment on #22 - Christopher it is somewhat surreal to be working on a play about survival when actual death in more ways than one has visited me in the very recent past. Still, the overall message of the play has been somewhat perverted from it's conception and I fear the serious as well as the comedic points of the show have been somewhat dulled by a lack of artistic vision. Still, I'm speaking after a lengthy rehearsal process that has completely skewed my objectivity of the show. In addition to that I also just watched a truly awful dress rehearsal of the show. But dress rehearsals are always bad so who knows, maybe I'm totally wrong, I hope.

Aside from all this work there has been some fun to be had. Christmas on the island of Samui with Nana's family was nice if not a bit awkward at times. They're all nice people and interesting but apparently Nana's boyfriends get a cold shoulder from the men in the family. I shudder to think what the other boys endured since Nana told me they were nicer to me than she expected they would be.

Nana at Crystal Cove

The first day on the island we went on an all day trip that took us out to a small group of minor islands an hour and a half from the main island. We snorkeled, kayaked, had lunch on a deserted beach and climbed up to the viewpoint of crystal cove, the image that inspired the book The Beach of which a movie with the same title was made staring Leo D. The second day we went zip lining amongst the tree tops. It was fun except that when the wind blew the platforms situated in the tree tops, upon which we stood, swayed quite unsettlingly. 

The pool party

The climactic day of Christmas was spent at a pool party at a resort (not our resort, we stayed at a family friends home) where Kevin Hart the comedian and Ludacris the rapper appeared for a short swim. I felt bad for them though. It was easy to see the downside of celebrity as they were bothered by a number of people for pictures. They didn't stay long once people recognized them. People can be such lemmings, such absolutely brainless self centered idiots. Did you even know the last movie Kevin Hart was in? Can you recite more than one song lyric from Ludacris? No??? Then don't take a fucking picture with him. It doesn't give you some magical bond to him and no one is going to think any higher of you just because he was a nice enough guy to indulge your idiocy. Anyhow, we flew home the next day instead of taking the thirteen hour train and ferry trip that got us to the island.

New years was nice too. We joined a small house party at a co-workers and chatted to a guy who lived in Singapore for a long time and had a very interesting set of anecdotes and experiences to share about the dictatorship of the country with the highest percentage of millionaires at one out of every six households possessing one million USD in disposable wealth. Of course they don't call themselves a dictatorship but any time a government has been run by the same political party for over fifty years and the popularly elected president is seen largely as ceremonial you pretty well can be sure it's some type of dictatorship. Some examples of interesting policies in Singapore: Cars cost two to three times normal and you're only allowed to own them for ten years before the governments repossesses them. When you get married the government sells you an apartment at an extremely low price. They built a park in Singapore which they modeled after Hyde Park including the speakers corner Hyde Park is famous for. They announced that speakers corner would be a safe haven for freedom of speech. The first person who went there to speak was taken to jail. Now no one even goes in the park to take a walk.

Ah well, time to leave you all for a short while. I hope to see you soon. Be HEALTHY!

The quaint little family house we stayed at on Samui

The actual Crystal Cove

-Adam