Stuff happened.

Well, the rest of my family went back to New Zealand, but i am staying behind for a little longer to tie up loose strings (and go to more anime stores to search for ARIA stuff). One thing I noticed when I got to the airport... THERE ARE ACTUALLY BURGER KINGS IN TAIWAN. Just not a lot. I am back at my grandmas house until I go back on the 18th (arrives 19th ~ 1:30pm?). Will be going up to Taipei tomorrow for the book exhibition. Probably won't buy too much though, can't take anymore D:

I'll try to take more photos though...

Grave matters

Literally.

It's been like ages since we visited our dear grandpa (sleeping down under), so we did that today. We got there at about 9. Then we had a 2.5-3hr mantra. Here, I need to make one point on Buddhism, their mantras are impacting me so much now that I actually understand what they are writing. For example, they list a number of "Hells", eg "Tongue-pulling hell". Any guesses to what happens to you there?

That aside, we burnt some paper money and stuff. The kids enjoyed it.

Afterwards, we went to the actual grave. Imagine an urban area with streets and houses. Now replace the houses with graves and you have a general idea. I swear they are living better than we are. So anyway, we got there, lit some incense sticks, and bowed a number of times. Must have done over 9000 bows today. Then we returned to the world of the living and had lunch.

The Chinese respect their deads so much more than the Westerners.

Moving~

Parents are back today, so therefore we moved away from our grandmas (and the anime stores D=), into one of my Uncle's spare flats. It's pretty much a 3LDK, so its will be quite comfy. Internet and stuff has also been set up and working, so everything should be fine.

Now that my parents are back, we have transport and can actually go places now. *polishes camera*. Prob will watch some ARIA then sleep, lol.

National Science Museum

Well, we spent quite a bit of time at home today, so I was catching up on all the little bits I needed to (namely ISML stuff). Got that all done. Still need to watch Tora 12 but...

So anyway, we went to the National Science Museum this afternoon. We wanted to see the mammoths, but there was a huge line, so we will probably go there some other time. So we just spent some time looking at other things (photos are currently going on photobucket), like satellite images of Taiwan and photo shoots of penguins and polar bears.

Also was a Chinese inventions display, I was like "wow" when I read some of the stuff. They had newspapers in the 1600's and a physicist then stated that "time and space cannot exist without the other", so I was like "where did all the REALLY smart Chinese go?". Also took some photos of a giant squid, while thinking about BBQ's.

Will need to spend a whole day there next time, they seemed to have a lot more exhibits than 4 years ago, or I just missed them. They have 980,548 pieces of stuff in this museum :o (as of Oct 2008)

Photos: Here

Citizen ID

It's like the Passport you use within Taiwan. Has your address on the back and stuff. Needs one to get free money from the government next month, so off we went to the local council. It took about an hour to process it, since we had to change address and sign lots of forms because we came back from overseas. Then it took 10 mins for them to print our new cards, much faster than NZ lol...

Gonna go to the tech exhibition tomorrow, and buy a new laptop!

Old memories gone...

Went to visit my Nana today. Glad to see that she's doing well. However, they have moved to apartment complexs, and the old area they live in has been demolished and stuff, and its no longer liveable. You probably don't know this, but Taiwan has these things we call 眷村 (military dependents' village) (see wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_dependents%27_village), which is a bloody fun place. Everyone knows each other etc etc, and most of them have military backgrounds. They are getting knocked down left and right from development, though D=

Basically, we went around the old village they lived in. Most of the buildings have been damaged (due to demolishment), with anything that could be sold (metal pieces, doorknobs) taken. Rubble and wood lay everywhere... it was kinda saddening, to think that I used to play there often when we went to Nana's. However, the tree we used to climb was still there, so its somewhat a relief. Walked around a bit, but didn't get in too far because there's apparently snakes now >.>

Didn't bring a camera, but if I get to go there again I will take some pictures of how deserted and runied that place is... T_T

Going to Taipei tomorrow, gonna take looooooots of photos. FES & Nagato... I'm coming!
See you for now~

ZGMF FREEDOM

Or something, can't remember any suit serials from Seed.

On topic:
Finished my last exam today. HURRAY.

Now I have 4 days to oack and all that to get back to Taiwan. I will be taking orders too.

Creature, Alexu, Lure+Breaker, Twilight ,and whoever else...
Give me how much you are willing to spend, and what the hell you want. I have an animate membership card now. Rawr.

Winter anime 08/09

BIG PIC IS BIG

Lots of stuff, so lets see:

Sequels I want to watch:
Natsume
Birdy
Druaga

Want to watch:
Tales of Genji - Classic story is classic. Interested in the anime version (and the story)
Kurokami - will be either awesome or fail. Hope its the former.
White Album - Awesome cast is awesome. MIDUKI NANA DDDD:
Maria + Holic - SHINBOXSHAFT, need any more reasons?
Z Mazinger - give me a reason not to watch it. Come one... I'm waiting...

Theres a bunch of sequels I haven't seen before, like Afro Samurai and Mar(ia)mite. Prob dl and archive slayers for later.

I'm supposed to be studying, but w/e.

Teh Spoils.

Didn't actually get that much since my money is gonna FLY in Taiwan. So yeah >.>















Giant Eva poster. Ooh yeah. Ignore my small Haruhi Yakusoku poster D:















Oops, GitS is the wrong way up. Oh well. Left to right: Gravion, GitS, Gunslinger girl.
They aren't actually mine, they are gonna be prizes for the anime club quiz. Ya.
















Rest of the stuff. I told you there isn't much. Oh well, Nadesico is awesome and so is the Zaku disc case. Rawr.

Armageddon Auckland 08 - Saturday (+H!ACP)

http://pulpexpo.com/ For you who doesn't know.

Went on Saturday mainly for the Panel by Crispin Freeman on dubbing. Was great fun, we got him to say "All Hail Britannia!" and called him ORENJI-KUN.

All those aside, the con was pretty good. As usual, it lacks ANY Japanese anime/manga related peoples. But it's NZ, so bleh. However, there was a random draw thing for $10 so I went and got a Zaku CD carry case. My other friend got the Zaku MP3, which put me into despair. There was also a lot of overpriced figures and gunpla for sale, lol. Although you could haggle. Also spotted the Eva movie for sale for $30 + free poster, so debating whether I want to buy :o (or just the poster for $10).

Bought a few DVD boxes + 1st volumes for $5 ea. They were Gunslinger Girl, Gravin and GitS: SAC. Gone by friday, due to it being used as prizes. Alos some pretty good AMVs. One of them was a TTGL one which spoils people anyone who hasn't watched it. (Episode 8, anyone?)

After the Con, ignoring the Eva movie that was being shown (seen it on big screens in July XD), we headed to the H!ACP party.
It's hosted by Tammy of the Auckland Cosplay Forums. http://cosplaynewzealand.forumotion.com/
We had lots of food and drinks, and random games. They kept trying to get me to do the fish on a cutting board (don't ask. PLEASE), so I had to do it and won some chocolate, so I guess it wasn't all that bad. Pretty fun when there is like 40 people in a room doing Caramelldancin, and whatsnot.

Going again on Monday for the Cosplay comp (saw awesome ones today, love you ACP guys), and a panel on Giant Robots vs Superheroes. Also discouts like half an hr before the con ends XD