美乐加油 Mei Le Go

Right on, if you ask me now what I immediately (offhandedly) remember from 美乐加油, it is simply two lines sung by Cyndi Wang who plays the main female lead together with Mike He who plays the first male lead.
 

忍着不哭我要忍着不哭
 望上天空不让眼泪流出

I sounded almost fan-girl right there. *giggles*

Well... I am a fan-girl when it comes to dramas, and why should I not be, when it is a market worth billions and spans international audiences ranging from Turkey to America and Asia?

Truth be told though, I'd not seen dramas for a long, long time. During the years of the Japanese dramas and the Korean dramas and the Taiwanese dramas- we're talking the Tokyo Tower show, the Meteor Garden show and Winter Sonata- I was unfortunately busily engaged elsewhere.

Which makes this show significant, for it catapulted me directly into dramaland- and I've not looked back since.

Was it the script?
Was it the plot?
Was it the acting?
Was it the characters?
Was it the style of dialogue?

All of the above.

With a good looking first lead thrown into the mix. "Whaaaat?"

You know it's a significant show when four years on, you continue to gush at first mention of it and you can still remember significant scenes in various episodes despite NOT having re-watched it on Viki.

Maybe it's the way 美乐 endears herself to you with her quirkiness and cutesy ways and the way she puts her heart to do even the smallest tasks and manages to charm the gruffiest of characters. Maybe it is the way she's dressed in jeans and T-shirts and sneakers and glasses and ponytail and side bangs as she drives around in her little white car.

But the whole show is about Toast.

I never heard so much about Toast as much as I did in this show.

Whether it was about the flour,  getting the flour all over their clothes, entering a baking competition for the price money, whether it was about the survival of small bakeries, the competition between the small bakeries and the franchise chains, whether it was about the sincerity placed in making the sides of the Toast, or the need for fresh spring water to make the Toast taste different, or the way the Toast provided inspiration to a musical arranger, or the script that the Toast separated one couple but brought together another...

It was all about the Toast.

Which you know you're hearing and seeing but you're not really hearing and seeing- because (besides the handsome male lead)- you're looking at the beautifully-shot frames, the immersive and contemplative light, the peaceful scenery of Hangzhou and the idyllic scenery of their 民宿 in the mountains.
 

是美乐笨笨却可爱的那一面吗?
或是剧本里头所写的闽南语?
无论如何
好多简简单单的词好多简简单单却少用的词终于顺耳了.
投入。疯狂。无所谓。
还有好多好多。
但最熟悉应该是。。土司的土司边..
永不忘记..
永不忘记多年对中文华语国语的恐惧感慢慢消失了..



i like my Fonts too much, SO THERE

It's possible to become obsessed with fonts. And when I mean obsessed, I mean seriously obsessed.

I'm the sort that can spend an entire day downloading and amending and changing and alternating fonts until I get the 'feel' right. I'm the sort that will keep doing it until I can live with it and stare at it and feel comfortable and at ease working with it. After all, if I'm the one who is going to be staring at it and think about it and bang on the keyboard, shouldn't I have the right to do just that?

The funny thing is....

I didn't even know I could change fonts until 10 years of personal computer usage had gone by. It had always been Times New Roman all the way until one day I changed it to Arial. Then I decided on Georgia and I stuck with it for awhile until I decided that Garamond looked nicer and off to Garamond I went. Then I changed the gear and because I changed the gear, it seemed that Segoe UI looked nicer so I went along with that.. after which I headed to Lucida Grande and Lucida Sans and right now I'm in the Kristen ITC phase.

Yeah, I know that it's a kiddy, babyish font. I know that it reflects me in a certain way, and that  technically, it can only be used for children below a certain age, but truth is, I don't care. Firstly, I'm in the Media & Entertainment business where my work and my visuals can move from toddlers to geriatric. I'm in a line where I can be serious whilst expressing it otherwise. More importantly, I'm the one looking at it on my screen, and if I'm happy seeing it appear as my fingers over the keyboard whilst getting work done, why not?

It's not as if I'm using it for official documentation or legal representation or submissions or whatever that's official. I change it back to Arial or Times New Roman for that.

Hey, as personalities and quirks go, common sense still prevails! :)

yeah i Felt like S***

sadako audition shot

Yes, I looked like this that day. I felt like this too. And I'm making no excuses for it.

It wasn't intended that I'd take this picture- I didn't even pose for it. I just dragged out the phone and snapped. I knew I'd look like s*** but honestly I already felt like a piece of s*** and since the washroom lighting made the selfie look the way I felt, I decided I wasn't going to prettify it further.

A selfie can either reveal the best of ourselves, or it can be a mirror memory of what's really happening that day and though it might seem depressive and frightening and fearful and angry and everything, that's what it is.

It was a mode where one had had restless sleep, where showers had been hurried (whilst being thankful for), where one stayed still hungry despite having had a filling meal, where one's life was in its down-down mode and although I knew that tis' a season that will pass, tis' also a season that I didn't bloody want to have.

It was a season that scared the s*** out of me and forced me to re-look at my present beliefs and adapt new ones that challenged my own thought processes and long-held principles. In this season alone, I re-examined two long-held theories and tossed them inside out and upside down. The circumstances alone made me invert the Maslow's pyramid theory (to the level that I know it) and made me reframe what I'd been taught of Satir's theory.

Conclusion: The current two theories are s*** when it comes to real-life survival.

Perhaps some would disagree with me. But I'm one of those who feel a lot, I'm one of those who don't give a f**k about theories and applications of inner strength and coping mechanisms and whatnot. I've heard them before, I've joined others to encourage others to apply it in their lives before and today I repent of whatever it was that I said all those years ago. The believers can just take the theory and go screw themselves. I'm not being harsh. You don't have time to be kind when you're just trying to live, and I  just go for what works for me and I'm making no excuses for it.

Maybe I'll write another post about what I think of those two theories. But I'll wait till I'm less mad. Being mad gets you nowhere when trying to rationalize. Ha. There'll be other theories, I surmise, but I'm not keen on them- for now- and may I never have to use them too. :)

On another perspective, I still stick to the fact that I don't have to like it, nor cherish it, nor be thankful for the s***. And when it's over, it's over. So, GOODBYE, DON"T COME BACK and I don't ever f**king want to look nor feel this way again.  



action Action time

Got it there, finally, I'm glad to say, despite the fact that whatever is banged in still remains as it is- a draft- one that needs to be amended and corrected and revised and amended and revised again and added upon and taken away until the final copy is completed and ready to meet the world.

I've changed it a few times.

Because each time there is this nagging suspicion that it isn't good enough and sure, it really isn't good enough when you sit down and ponder on it and chew on it.

You don't stop thinking of what you're doing. You don't quit leaving where you left the poor elderly lady, even if she's been going backwards and forward through the corridors and courtyards and sat on the same bench and rehashed through her "traumatic" scenario over and over and over again whilst talking to the same person over and over and over again.

I'm feeling so bad about this that I feel like I've gotta apologize to her for putting her through this s***. And hopefully she'll look at me with kind, understanding eyes when I tell her that I'm getting there. 

to The gate, And back

I'm screwed, I'm telling you.

She is supposed to move forward, but I keep sending her back.

Not that I want to, but I have to, and every time I do it, it's so embarrassing. But that's how it is when I'm in the middle of a narrative and I attempt, and attempt, and attempt to get it right.

In the meantime...

More than once she's reached the gate, and one time she actually stepped out of the gate but whilst she stood there searching for her sense of direction, she had to be sent back to the beginning where she was still wandering.

It's become sort of a playback, like how we used to play our movies in reverse on the VCR, and honestly, as unprofessional as it sounds, it can be really quite comedic...

I'm glad she hasn't gone quiet on me completely.
I'm glad that she's still speaking to me and hasn't decided to shut up for good on me.

That would be a disaster.

A total nightmare.