I Just Saw The Dalai Lama At Bodh Gaya!!!!!!

Hello from Bodh Gaya, the place where Gautama Buddha attained enlightenment!

Been here for three nights, will be staying for another night before heading off tomorrow.

And guess what? I saw the Dalai Lama!

Okay, more like, I caught a glimpse of him.

He was in a car, waving to everyone, and the car sped past us.

Couldn't really get a clear video of him.

I do have a video of the car he was in though. Will upload it sometime.

Yay.

The power of Swifty's blog is in my hands

I can either use this clout for things like pornography and rankling but I choose not to. For I must not put Swifty’s life in jeopardy. Not until I kill him with my own two hands for stuffing me into a suitcase.

This is an e-mail I received from Yvonne Foong. (Swifty can kill me later for advertising without his knowledge)

May Zhee's Review

Swifty’s blog is all about reviews right? So indubitably, I, the honorable guest blogger, have to do my part in reviewing something too. Let’s see…what should I review? Music? Books? Movies? Me?

I know! Today, I shall review…

Hello! This is May Zhee guest-blogging from Swifty’s suitcase in India!

It’s implausibly cramped in here but I want to pretend like I’m thin and petite hence I will not grumble at all about my squashed face. Betcha didn’t know May Zhee could type with her breasts!

Okay too much info.

Anyway, one of the good things that come out of being callously treated like a tomato all the way to India is…I get to broadcast to you what Swifty has inside his suitcase, which I am deigning to do in munificent amounts. *cue evil Powerpuff Girls music*

Hey, dude, no one asked you to stuff the hot girl in a suitcase!

Question is, are you ready for it? Can you handle the truth? Are you up for it? Can you take it? Will you still want to know what’s inside if I keep doing this?

Ahem.

Swifty keeps skeletons in his suitcase. *horror* And all this while you thought skeletons lived in closets. *horror, consternation, trepidation, nausea (you, not me)*

Funny thing though, all the skeletons seem to be holding laptops, just like me, and getting their faces squashed by another skeleton’s boney butt, just like me.

Wait a second…

!!!

Holy God I am allergic to skeletons! Get me out of here!!!
Oh, just so you know who is guest-blogging for Swifty, here is a photo of me…



What?

Hello from Bangalore, India. Introducing Guestblogger Lim May Zhee!

Heya, I'm posting this from an Internet cafe at Bangalore, India. I was at this Tibetan Colony few hours away from the city during the past few weeks, hence the lack of Internet access. I took lots of wonderful photos and videos, which I hope I can upload tomorrow.

I won't actually return to Malaysia until the 8th of February, Justin's incapable of posting that much (seemingly), not wanting to keep my loyal Swiftyholics waiting, I have enlisted the help of a guestblogger, give a warm welcome to the sensational, the phenomenal, Malaysian literary rising star, 15-year-old (16 this year) novelist Lim May Zhee! (I've spoken about her, and posted a video of her here)

On the other hand, my sister will also be handling some guestblogging duties.

Yes... my blog has now officially been taken over by teenage girls.

The World Sinks Except Japan 日本以外全部沉没 is insane (and cheap)

Minori Kawasaki's The World Sinks Except Japan 日本以外全部沉没 is the parody of last year's Japanese blockbuster, Japan Sinks! 日本沉没 (aka The Sinking of Japan), which I recently reviewed. Definitely more lo-fi and audacious than the latter, watching The World Sinks Except Japan reinforced my opinion that there's no one crazier than the Japanese!

BACKDANCERS! made me wish hiro of SPEED would do more films

(From left to right: Sonim, hiro, Aya Hirayama, Saeko)
I watched Backdancers! during my flight back from Shanghai, it was the first film I chose from the in-flight entertainment after finding out that it starred Hiroko Shimabukuro, now known by most only as hiro, member of the now disbanded Japanese girl group, SPEED. She who was once an object of my foolish teenage infatuation, the inspiration of my many creative works, my first attempt in video editing, my first attempt in screenwriting, my first attempt in fanfiction. Ah, the foolish whims of an ignorant teenage boy, unsure back then what his true dreams were, only to slowly get into writing and filmmaking, things he fantasized as a child, all because of her.

Inarritu's BABEL

(Back from Shanghai! Finishing up a review that took me three nights to complete!)

Babel had just won the Best Drama award at the Golden Globes last night. Howsy noted my lack of Golden Globes prediction this year, to the few who cared, I make my predictions, but on a message board instead of this blog, because I am insecure, and I feel rotten when my lifelong personal interest in film awards shows is greeted with indifference and disinterest. So yes, my predictions were, as usual, pretty good, getting 9 out of 12 categories correct (I was wrong about Best Drama, Best Screenplay and Best Foreign Language Film).

So, I immediately went to watch Babel upon learning of its victory, because my ego does not permit me to NOT see an Oscar frontrunner when the Oscar nominees are about to be announced. I am so insecure that I can only derive pleasure from telling people things like 'hah! i've seen all five of the Oscar Best Picture nominees! and you haven't neener neener!' Of course, the 99% of the people I know generally do NOT care about the five Oscar Best Picture nominees, so in the end, I just continue feeling as insecure and miserable as before.

Crystal Kay - Call Me Miss

One of the advantages of getting heavily into J-Pop is that, almost unconsciously, I've started to appreciate and enjoy musical genres I once scorned. When I was a teenager, anything remotely pop or commercial was anathema to me, and R&B was the worst of the worst. R&B was irritating screaming melismatic female voices, moronic beats, grating lyrics. R&B was something listened to by people I held in contempt. If you said your favorite music was R&B, I probably wouldn't like much else about you, either, and if you had of given me Crystal Kay's 2006 second albumCall Me Miss as recently as five years ago, I probably would have spat in your face.

VIDEOS: Old Jazz Band At Peace Hotel, Shanghai... The Oldest Jazz Band In The World?

I went to the Peace Hotel two nights ago to watch the Old Jazz Band, which, according to Peace Hotel's webpage, is one of the most famous jazz bands in Shanghai. They have also performed for (from the webpage) former USA president Mr. Carter and Mr.Reagan,the French Prime Minister Lionel Jospin,the Australian Prime Minister Paul Kyten, the Hollend Prime Minister Viam Kirk. And the presidents from Italy, Portugal, Israel, Brazil, Argentina, Mexico.

I myself saw a photo they took with Bill and Hillary Clinton hanging on the walls.

JAPAN SINKS 日本沉没

Also known as The Sinking of Japan, Japan Sinks 日本沉没, the most expensive Japanese movie ever (I heard), is Japan's answer to Korean and Hollywood movies that usually appeal to international audiences. It is a soulless, propagandistic blockbuster that sang praises of Japanese culture (and the country), displaying the sheer Samurai-like courage of Japanese people and their subtle and ridiculously honourable approaches in romance for the not-too-intelligent audiences. The opening credits were played over various famous landscapes and sceneries of Japan, all my years of watching Japanese films and never have I ever seen that many Japanese landmarks crammed in one film, let alone one montage.