Mitty pumped me up

I watched the trailer some time ago, and I immediately jugded it as a good movie. And finally the HD version came up a few days ago, I watched it and loved it helplessly. What a heart-pumping movie experience. It makes me want to get up right now, get my backpack, go to the airport, pick a random destination and just go.

There is so much product placement in it, but who cares! If it is a good movie and the product fits into the context, then it doesn't really matter. Another movie of this kind with almost excessive product placement that I can think of is Cast Away, another really good movie. 

I saw some reviews and many complain about the lack of logic behind the storyline and it is a movie packed with clichés. But I think those clichés are good clichés. The whole movie is very well shot, especially those shots of the scenery. The visual component of the movie perfectly conveys the magnificence of mother nature and the sense of adventure. 

A good movie needs also a good movie score. The soundtracks of Walter Mitty are what give the movie the "umff", the edge that makes the movie so damn heart-pumping. These songs make you feel like a hero, an adventurer, like Indiana Jones. Listening to them actually motivated me go to school yesterday. Yesterday there was only one class and I had decided to skip it. But these songs changed my mind. Next time when I travel, I will make sure that I have these songs in the playlist of my phone. 

Just like what Richard said in The Beach, the paradise is not a place you can go but how you feel for a moment in your life when you are part of something. Many people travel for the food, for the monuments, for the photos, etc.. I travel for the stories, for the experiences, for the moments of paradise. Watching Mitty, many memories flashed back in my mind : the starting line of Annecy triathlon, stucked on the mountain top at night with snow and cold, the thick early morning fog during my walk from Blois to Orléan, sitting in the plane heading to Mumbai with my one-way ticket, the hitchhike from Tunis to Tozeur...

I travel for cool stories and I have already accquired plenty.

  

A paranoid dinner

An unique dinning experience, today I am going to talk about a dinner I had in Antica Focacceria San Francesco in Palermo. It was almost 3 years ago.

Hours of wandering in Palermo, sun had just set. It was a Sunday night, it probably explained why the streets were so dead. Apart from a few cars passing by occasionally, almost all the shops were closed. My stomach was churning, telling me I should search for dinner. I walked and walked and finally stumbled upon this beautiful antique restaurant in a dark alley, the only restaurant still opened that I could find.

People always know about Sicily as the birthplace of mafia, so do I. Plus, that day was just my first day in Sicily, I was being very cautious about gangsters and stuff. I walked in, there were a few customers but they were all dressed up. Women in dresses, men in suits. Why they were all dressed up, I thought, while the all the people I met during the day weren't even like this. They all looked at me at once when I stepped in, probably because I awas the only foreigner there. They probably just wondering why an asian kid came into the restaurant alone. But then my paranoid brain kicked in, thinking that they were all mafias and they despised me because I had intruded their little private dining space.

Panicking, I think I probably wet my armpits. But I thought I couldn't walk out again after just walking in. That would create suspicion. I gulped down my confusing thoughts, walked in anyway, trying to be casual. I lined up like everybody else, to order food. Not many people like I said, but it was the longest queue in my life. When it was my turn, the waiter didn't speak English, so I turned around looking for help. I looked back and behind me a lady with a cold-blooded face, a face as if she could kill anybody in the room with her gun in between her thighs. She gave me a chill in the spine, almost made me cry out mama. Helpless, I turned back to the waiter, randomly pointed on one line in the menu and ordered a plate of pasta quickly. I saw everybody also ordering some sort of burger, and there was a separated stall where there was the cook preparing it on spot. I thought it was an obligation to order it since everybody did so. So yet again, I pointed at the burger stall, and signaled to the waiter that I would like one of that burger.

The restaurant serves like a canteen. I ordered the food and paid at one end, and then collected the food at the corresponded stalls. I collected my pasta, and then the burger. The cook said something to me in Sicilian that I certainly didn't understand but I guessed it was a question, I just nodded as hard as I could. I finally sat down with my food. I wanted to take a picture of the food, but I didn't dare to do it openly. I sneaked out my camera and then took a quick photo. At this very moment, two wild policemen walked in and my flight or flee mechanism broke down entirely. My brain was shut down, confused. Try not to make eye contact with anyone and eat your food obediently, I told myself again and again.

Literally a quick snapshot. The photo of the food I ordered. 

From my peripheral vision, I saw the policemen walking around and greeting the waiters, the cashier and the cook, and also some of those well dressed customers. Even the policemen knew them! They must certainly be mafias, I thought. All my assumptions were correct. Holy shit! Frightened, I only knew I had to finish my meal immediately and run run run! And that is exactly what I did. Of course that I didn't run. I paced quickly out of the shop and told myself not to look back. After what I assumed a safe distance away from the shop, I finally had the courage to turn around and I took a zoomed-in picture of the shop from far.

The photo of the restaurant I took from a "safe distance".

Days after, I was so damn embarassed by my paranoid behaviour. Come to think it, there is a higher chance that those people in the restaurant that night were not mafia. It was just my imagination. They must have thought that I was a weirdo. Recently I tried to check out the restaurant online again and to my surprise, it is a really famous restaurant. It is even featured in the Michellin guide. A touristic spot is what I got from reading the reviews. Some say it worths its reputation, some say overrated. For the period of two years after my visit to the restaurant, I always thought that it was only known by the locals. I thought I had found a hidden treasure that I could brag about. But in the end, it is just another typical touristic spot. I probably went there during their low season.    

Anyway, it was a funny experience, a funny story to tell people, my story. That is why this restaurant always has a special place in my heart. I don't remember the details of the interior nor the taste of the food. I only remember that the building kinda gave me a nostalgic feeling and the food was really cheap. For what I ordered, I paid only 4 euros and the quantity was so much that I couldn't even finish my food that night. But on the off chance, there was also the possibility that my appetite was disturbed by my only wish to get away as soon as I could.

The longest way

Recently I stumbled upon a video I have known since long time ago, The Longest Way 1.0 by Christoph Rehage. It is a video about the evolution of beard during his long walk from Beijing to Urumqi. The video is fun and creative. No wonder why it became viral since its day-view. His original plan was to walk from Beijing all the way back to his hometown in Germany. He abandonned his project at Urumqi and last he decided to continue his quest. 

To my surprise, Christoph's mandarin is insanely good. He even acquired the accent of the Chinese in China. From his videos, I thought that his speeches in mandarin were well scripted and that's why he could speak so well. But during his presence in a show I regularly watch, his level of mandarin is confirmed. His mandarin is good!

The other interesting thing about his video is the background music from TLW 1.0 - L'Aventurier by Kingpins. It is in french, about a fictional character, the adventurer Bob Morane. It just has an exciting vibe in it, makes me want to go for an adventure just like Christoph and Bob Morane. To my surprise, the song is just a cover. The original is sung by Indochine, a french band I have also known since a long time ago. The song is in fact the first major success from the band. The original even has an oriental vibe in it, which fits in the name of the band - Indochina. 

Spartans copyrighted rock hard abs

Just watched 300 : Rise of an Empire. First thing I notice, only Spartans have rock hard abs. Athenians, not so much, so as the main character, Thermistocles. It is understandable that Spartans are trained to be soldiers, so their bodies are well-sculptured than other Greeks, as if Spartans had copyrighted rock hard abs, and only they can have them. 

So, this movie is less hardcore, less manliness than the original 300. But the movie makers compensated this fact with tonnes of gallons of blood on screen. This movie focus more on other Greeks than Spartans, notably Athenians. Spartans are beef cakes fully pumped with testosterone, and death in battle is a glorious moment to them while Athenians are less hardcore, less crazy than them. However it doesn't make them less a warrior. They are portrayed as bearers of democracy, charaterized by their love for freedom and they fight as hard as the Spartans. Thus Athenians are more relatable for me. 

Another major difference between 300 and this movie is the battleground because it is hardly a battleground so to say. All the battles take place on sea. In this movie, it showcases more tactics such as boat formations and geographical advantages rather than pure fighting force. In 300, they have an advantage and that is the narrow passage of Thermopyles. But other than that, not many tactics used by the Spartans other than their individual figthing skill and superior muscular body. Spartans basically muscle through the Persians. 

In the end, it is a fun movie if you enjoy on screen violence. Apart from the fake blood, I personally did enjoy it. But I don't think it surpasses the first movie. The first 300 is so memorable that I think the name Leonidas is hardburned into memory of everyone who had watched it. And the battle of Thermopyles is also very famous even before the movie. The name Leonidas and the Spartans certainly echo in eternity. Now Leonidas is even making chocolate and it is a well-known belgian chocolate brand. 

      

BBC's Sherlock review

I watched the first episode long time ago but didn't take time to continue the series. My friend kept complimenting about how good and how epic Sherlock is, and I got one week holiday with nothing much to do, instead of sitting idly, why not watching something like say, Sherlock, while sitting. Now that I caught the series up to date, I really love it. It makes the two Sherlock movies by Robert Downey jr. look stupid and London look interesting again to me. 

It is a series but with an unconventional format. Each season has only 3 episodes and there are 3 seasons for now, and each episode is one and a half hour long. But who cares! I find no weak link in the series. Strong characters is a fact without a doubt. In my mind now, Benedict Cumberbatch represents the ultimate version of Sherlock Holmes and so does Martin Freeman as Watson. One downside of the series though is that the british accent and vocabulary are difficult to understand sometimes, but it is just me not comfortable with them. Sherlock's fast thinking and fast talking makes the issue worse, without subtitle is simply impossible to follow. 

I like the fact that it is set in modern days to differentiate itself from the movies and the original literary work. Season 1 is good, season 2 is epic, season 3 is a bit of a let-down. I suppose it is very difficult to surmount the epicness of season 2, so I make no complain about that. And I suppose the sequel is always the best, just like Godfather 2, Terminator 2, Aliens, Empire Strikes Back and Dark Knight, the third movie just can't top over the second one. However there are always exceptions such as Iron Man.   

Like I said, my favorite season is season 2 because it contains both my favorite episodes of all - A Scandal in Belgravia and Reichenbach Fall. The Baskerville's episode is not bad but it reminds me of Scooby Doo kind of mystery and this fact makes it feel slightly goofy. However the most jaw-dropping turn of event isn't in season 2 but season 3 - the true colour of Mary Watson. 

My favorite character has to be Mycroft, or I should put it in another way - Mycroft is the character I would like to be. He is the elder brother that I can relate to. He is kinda like Sherlock in a way, but has more human character and choose not to show it very often. He is kind and caring about Sherlock, and at the same time powerful and dangerous. Not as brilliant as Sherlock but he certainly understand and can look beyond alot of things.