Life

To Do's

Assaulted Fish, a Pan-Asian-Canadian comedy troop does the funnies for the Sketch Fest tomorrow.

Go see and laugh some.

Assaulted Fish
Thursday, Feb 10, 8PM
Waterfront Theatre, Granville Island, Vancouver
Cost: 10 beans

Life

Printakid responds...

Noemi Berlus, President and founder of Printakid actually took the time to respond to my post last week about their product. First of all, big ups for doing that. I think she answers much of my questions about the product quite well.

She made me realize:

• I guess one doesn't HAVE To make one's kid the star of the show, maybe just give the protagonist a name that makes sense for whatever background one is from, say Mohammed, or Riad, or something like that. Ok, that would be cool. I did have the luxury of growing up in Taiwan where most of the kids books had Chinese kids doing freakish Chinese things (like grown men wearing diapers to entertain their senile parents as role models, but that's another blog entry all together), so that's definitely a good thing (not the diaper part, but the reading books with protagonists that looks like me part)
• Chill out already with the skin colour! Basically, get a grip on what skin colour gets called what when you are setting up the story. None of that gets reflected in the actual story. So you know, relax. (ed note, I am paraphrasing here... Noemi at no point uses phrases such as "chill out", "get a grip", or other such silliness...)
• They Charlie Brown the parents, so you never actually see too much of the parents to have to care about what ethnic backgrounds they are. Again, bonus points for making different parental arrangement possible.

So yes, all the political correctness hilarity asides, this is a good effort. At the end of the day, who can argue with giving parents more options as to what cultural images, role models, and stories they can give to their children?

Read her response to my original post

Life

Printakid: I am a white (asian)!

Printakid, a new children's publishing company, is offering customized children's books where you can plug in your kids name and your own name and your kid's friends names, and then they do a mad lib type of thing, and give you a premade story but with your kid as the main character of the book. Honestly... I think that's creepy as hell. I am pretty screwed up as it is, but if i had to read a bunch of books like "A Wacky Christmas" and "In Giddyland" when I was a wee one, starring... um.... MYSELF... I can't imagine the horrific consequences...

Now, that's pretty funny on by its own merit, but then Printakid had to kick it up a hilarity notch. You can also customize the look of your kid, with choices for skin color such as white, white (asian), light brown (hispanic), Light brown (mulatto), and black. um... right... So i guess my Indian friends are... mulatto? Hear that Raj?

Now, while it is totally cool that they give you very liberal and open options about who the child's guardians could be (gay, lesbian, etc), I noticed they didn't give you any choice about what the guardians would look like... so what if a kid was black, and the momma stays white? Or do they presume and make momma black too?

Printakid [thanks ron, found via Mixed Media Watch]

Life

Carnival... in Vancouver?

The idea of Carnival is kinda like the idea of chocolate, how can anyone say no to it? I sure have a hard time resisting heaping servings of gyrating, ridiculously but barely dressed people going bonkers to hot latin music.

Word on the street is that Electropical is trying to throw down a costume/masquerade Carnival party in Vancouver.

It will be in a club, so not quite the same. But hey, cheaper then a flight to Brazil.

Full party invite info after the jump

Continue reading "Carnival... in Vancouver?"

Life

Asian Squat

This might be news to people who haven't spent much time in China before, but Chinese people LOVE to squat. You can find them lined up in squat formation almost anywhere where waiting is possible. A business man in a suit with briefcase, squatting by the side of a street is not an uncommon sight by any means. As the video indicates, this position is no squat in the park. I've tried emulating it since my last visit to China, and I can only get a relatively stable stance that can last me about 5 min. Nothing like the true squat masters who can do it for hours on end. Well, either way, not sure if this is something I want to encourage... there's just no way to look good while squatting. In fact, you'd look kinda crappy (pun intended).

Anyways, click on link below and learn the squat for yourself...
How to do the Asian Squat [short film, found via Yusheng]