Meet the Dragon Year Head On With Cantonese

Posted on January 26, 2012 by cecilie

So it’s a new year again, this time rather more important than just old 2012 – it’s the year of the DRAGON. Full of upheavals and excitement, it is also the luckiest year in the Chinese zodiac.

With only a basic understanding of Cantonese, you will be so much better equipped to take on this year. Why not take a course in Cantonese, learning it the Natural Way – From a Norwegian? I have free slots throughout the week for groups and individuals, especially in the late afternoons and on Saturdays. You’ll laugh when you see how easy it is!

If you don’t have time to commit to weekly sessions, why not get your own personal pocket Norwegian right into your home? My two DVDs Cantonese – The Movie (for total beginners) and its successor Going Native (scroll down) are yours for less than the price of one hour of one-to-one teaching.

Learn Cantonese this year! Your future will thank you for it.

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Incinerator Insanity (Important! Correct link is www.livingislands.org.hk!)

Posted on January 24, 2012 by cecilie

I have mentioned that damned incinerator the increasingly unhinged government is planning to spend 13 billion of your tax money on, right? (The alternative will cost 3 billion. I’m just saying.) Well, on Sunday I swung around the Chi Ma Wan Peninsula on a hike. “Hey, there’s that island you were talking about” remarked my friend.

What??? It’s two hundred meters from the shore! Then we walked on and saw it’s even closer to Cheung Chau, where more than 23 000 people live. What’s wrong with this administration’s heads?

Please go to www.livingislands.org.hk and sign the petition against this madness. Cheers. Your future will thank you for it.

Posted in Beauty, corruption, Environment, Eyesore, Government, Hong Kong, Injustice, Media, politics, Pollution, property | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Oh, And Just In Case Anyone Wondered..

Posted on January 20, 2012 by cecilie


how the common or garden mainlander sees HK people…

No. of course not. This geezer is just an army of one. A rabid minority misunderstanding his own nationality.
Say it again? Hong Kong people are bastards. Running dogs. And … oh yes. Yes, running dogs. Yes, it is the 1960′s.

At least the presenter had the grace to look really uncomfortable. But this kind of spouting is very common on the mainland today. He and other of his kind hide behind the cloak of ‘anti-imperialism’ to let rip. He can just say what he wants unchallenged because he knows it suits the mainland government. Imagine what would happen if he said “well, I think Tibet should be free, actually.”

Note how “everyone must speak Mandarin” features prominently in his rant. What is it I always call that language again? Oh yeah, “Imperialist Communist speech-making language.” Heh.

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Government: Stay The F**k Away From The Internet!

Posted on January 20, 2012 by cecilie

So now people on Facebook and other places are saying “Awwww, what’s the big deal? Shouldn’t our intellectual property rights be protected?”

Of course they should, and there are laws already in place for that. But this PIPA and SOPA thing is not about protecting your intellectual property rights. Do you really think Big Government gives a shit if your book is stolen by a Chinese publishing company and pirated there?

No, something much more sinister is at play here. It’s about government itching to regulate, control and put its slimy fingers in the last free and unregulated space on earth: The Internet.

In my book Don’t Joke On The Stairs
I argue that one of the driving forces behind China’s relentless quest for world domination is a deep hatred for the USA while at the same time admiring the country and needing to emulate it in every way. China’s blueprint for infrastructure is visions of 1950′s cartoon The Jetsons, with large highways criss-crossing a landscape devoid of trees and other signs of nature, where people whizz to and from their work and living capsules in little cars while satellites circle overhead.

Now it seems that it’s the US (Congress) that wants to emulate China, with that country’s semi-hard and ever-tightening control of the internet. This is all about controlling what you can and cannot see and read, not about protecting your rights which you already have.

If they’re so concerned about pirates and rogue sites, why don’t they go directly after them? Why involve Google, PayPal and Wikipedia?

One of Obama’s closest advisers is one Cass Sunstein. In his book Republic.com he says this: “A system of limitless individual choices with respect to communications is not necessarily in the interest of citizenship and self-government.”

Oh really? Then what is? You are reading this precisely because we currently have ‘limitless choices’. Anyone who’s ever been across the border to China to find they can’t get on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Vimeo and intermittently Wikipedia as well as seeing TV news from Hong Kong mysteriously shut down in mid-sentence will know what I’m talking about.

Last week the website Bare Naked Islam was shut down by its host Word Press because 20-odd Muslims had complained about its content. Ironically Word Press is also very against PIPA and SOPA. Well, Word Press is the host and they have the right to shut down Bare Naked Islam as long as they give the owner of that website his money back. It’s stupid, misguided and cowardly, but it’s their right.Word Press is a company and can decide for itself. But no goverment has the right to tell Word Press to shut down any site. Ever. But that is exactly what will happen if these terrible laws go through.

OK, how about this: Someone steals my online stuff. I sue them, based on my intellectual property rights. I call the police. I beat them up in a dark alleyway when nobody is looking. What I don’t do, and should never do, is get the government to shut down sites that could potentially be linked to these people, stop their PayPal and credit cards and make sure Google is so scared they will take down every word that can possibly be linked to them.

If you want to lose your freedom of expression and make sure you can only access facts that the government has decided are fit for you to see, by all means, support PIPA and SOPA with all your might.

If not: Tell them where to get the fuck off.

Posted in Book Production, China, communism, corruption, Government, Hong Kong, Injustice, language, Media, politics, property | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 14 Comments

This Means You Too. Yes, You!

Posted on January 19, 2012 by cecilie


So this is this administration’s ultimate plan for Hong Kong: A gigantic Disneyland with lots and lots of luxury flats, malls and really, really wide highways.

That’s it! It’s going to be a playground and storage space for mainlanders with some rich foreigners scattered around mid-Levels but eventually leaving as Hong Kong and mainland becomes one large expansion of concrete. With potted plants – hello!

The super rubbish incinerator which will be visible and smellable from all the islands including parts of Hong Kong Island so you can’t say this doesn’t concern you! is only the beginning. A large network of artificial islands full of lovely concrete and connected by bridges or probably just roads plonked down on the water (We are the engineering department! We do stuff because we can!) is eventually going to criss-cross every empty water surface of Hong Kong, leading to that paradise-like state: A world without water.

I IMPLORE you to sign the petition below and get involved! We can’t let these little jumped-up officials with their side partings, glasses and clipboards ruin the last un-built up spaces in this former pearl of the Orient. Join Living Islands Movement, help with handing out leaflets – do something. For if these monsters are allowed to run free and the last sea view is blocked up snarling spaghetti junctions and shopping malls shaped like Hello Kitty, there’s no use complaining that things used to be so beautiful. You have a chance to stop this now.

write to the government

I include the letter from LIM (Living Islands Movement) in its entirety:

Dear Members and friends,

As some of you may have heard this week the Town Planning Board agreed to the EPD’s outline planning application for rezoning SKC, removing one more barrier to them starting work on the incinerator. Although many of us attended and put forward objections from every angle, the TPB did what they normally do rubber stamp everything.

Now we urgently need your help again to get lots more signatures for our online petition. We are planning a large scale protest after CNY and plan to present our petition to Government at that time. This is timed as part of the build up to EPD’s application to the finance committee for funding. Probably our best opportunity to stop this project.

As we are expecting many extra visitors during the holiday we feel this would be a great opportunity to spread our message to a wider audience.

Attached is a suggested schedule of places and times which we believe will give us maximum coverage. Any other suggestions are of course welcome. If you can spare a few hours during the holiday please let us know either by email or by my phone (9461 6907) which time slots you can manage.

Two sets of roll up banners and a large supply of leaflets will be available from Friday night at the China Bear in Mui Wo

Thank You.
Mark Parlett
LIM secretary

Posted in Beauty, communism, corruption, Environment, Eyesore, Government, Hong Kong, politics, Pollution, property | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Occupy This! (Excellent Rant)

Posted on January 18, 2012 by cecilie

When I made my latest film on YouTube (see below) I was surprised to find people still camped out below the HSBC building in Central. At least some tents were there and some tatty posters. “Shame HSBC”!

Well, yes I also really detest HSBC for many reasons, for example that they have hired so many employees who don’t have a clue what they’re doing and that we the customers must pay for all the dead weight that company is carrying for exampleby paying a penalty of HK$ 50 for having less than HK$ 25,000 in your account at any time.

You didn’t know that one? Me neither, until I read it in a letter to the editor in SCMP yesterday. I’d say the amount of people with less than 25 thousand bucks in their account is rather large, wouldn’t you? Nice little earner for HSBC for doing, one would think, pretty much absolutely nothing.

And yet, the Occupy movement, what I’ve seen of it (a lot) – no. If I don’t like HSBC I still have the choice to discontinue my hateful affair with that bank, buy oil or gold with the money and stash it at home. But if Occupy people had their way, I wouldn’t be able to do that, because they would take my money, saying it belongs to them, the 99% (or something) and call it distribution of wealth.

Of course in Hong Kong’s rather pathetic Occupy Central there have been no rapes and stabbings, no murders, no defecation on cars (there is an excellent public toilet just across the road and they are, hello, Hong Kong earnest youth) and no violence, theft and public sex. You have to go to the US to enjoy those Occupy perks. Also the movement in Hong Kong isn’t growing and blocking roads and bridges so people (the 99%) can’t get to work, and Occupy is not a subject taught at university like it now is at for example Columbia. (You know, the same university which has so tail-waggingly welcomed the great visionary Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to speak there, twice).

I’d say HK people are too sensible to get caught up in all that. Too knowledgable about how society works. Above all, they haven’t been raised to think they’re entitled to everything they want, free.

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Hong Kong and Norway – Almost Identical?

Posted on January 16, 2012 by cecilie

So I have this new book, right? Don’t Joke on the Stairs (available from www.happyjellyfish.com and Dymocks etc)

In it, I describe how Norway and China are almost identical. Both are situated on the edge of a continent. The inhabitants of both countries are crazy about drinking and shouting out “Cheers!” And both countries have a long tradition of eating disgusting stuff. Anybody who has ever seen her own mother clutching a big, boiled cod’s head and sucking out its brain will know what I’m talking about. In Norway people eat cod and sheep heads. In China: Any heads. Norway: Sheep legs. China: Anything with legs except the table.

But to anyone who wonders if this identicalness between China and Norway extends to Hong Kong, I would say a resounding no. Let me give you an example. Two years ago I registered a company, Happy Jellyfish People’s Democratic Language Bureau, (which isn’t allowed to be called Bureau, only the HK Government is, so I have to call it Language Gaff.)

Anyway, January 5th I received a tax form. What took them so long? It was all in Chinese but there was a helpful number where I could call for an English copy. Yes I can read Chinese but… well. In tax matters I think one wants to be absolutely sure, and also not have to spend time looking up words in the dictionary. The bored woman kept asking if I lived in Tai Tei Tong, when the tax form was clearly sent to my current address. After explaining three or four times that I indeed didn’t live in Tai Tei Tong, she promised to send the form two days later. That’s ten days ago.

I then sent an email to the relevant department begging them to tax me. The subject line was: I want to pay tax!

Nothing.

If it was Norway, officials would have been camping outside my house from the day I registered the company, serving me with this and that subpoena or whatever they do. They would have been measuring all the doorways to see if their width were compatible with intake of more than three students a week, as well as sending the health department around every five minutes to see if my kettle complied with health regulations section 3A: Boiling water to be used for tea and/or coffee for use in a Cantonese and/or Mandarin setting if and only if students were older than 35.

Above all: They would have wanted my tax money!!!!

I can only assume that the Hong Kong government doesn’t want/or isn’t too worried about, taxes. Are they mad?

Anyway, I think you should buy the above mentioned book. A total stranger twittered that it was “hilarious and insightful”. www.happyjellyfish.com

Posted in Book Production, China, Government, Hong Kong, language, Media, Movies, My Website, Norway, Writing | Tagged , | Leave a comment

New Cantonese – The Movie

Posted on January 13, 2012 by cecilie

It’s been a year but finally more Cantonese. If you want to be in a film, give us a shout!

Posted in Beauty, Cantonese, China, communism, corruption, Dudes, Government, Hong Kong, language, Media, Movies, Travel, TV | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Rubbish Talks

Posted on January 10, 2012 by cecilie

I thought I’d post this as a tease. It was taken… maybe three years ago? and yes, not photoshopped. Hong Kong used to look like this most of the time not so long ago, except before and during a typhoon. Ah, the skies we used to have! All forgotten now. So I was thankful to the government for pointing out in yesterday’s South China Morning Post, one the front page and in that curious uppercase they’re doing now: ROADSIDE POLLUTION WORSE THAN EVER.

You don’t say? This is news, suddenly. Our ever-modest government blames it on weather, naturally, and something they call “worsening background pollution”. I won’t speculate on what that could possibly mean, but will remind you that when air pollution was rumoured to be less awful for a couple of weeks two years ago, the government took all the credit.

But with the increasing density of air particles at least we don’t have to look at (and smell) super incinerators every time we look out the bloody window, just like the one our engineer-pleasing government is planning just around the corner from these rocks:

Last week the government unveiled no fewer than 20 new destruction construction/reclamation projects, a large number of which are to be built on water.

This is how they do it: Two government officials in a room with a map of Hong Kong.

GO 1: It’s getting crowded.
GO 2: Yeah, but we have six major construction companies needing 20 new projects this year.
GO 1: Oh. Hey, do you see what I see?
GO 2: Wot
Go 1: All that empty space
GO 2: That’s water!
GO 1: That’s fantastic! Nobody lives there.
GO 2: Wong, you’re a genius

Please watch the below film and write to the government protesting against this and other harebrained scams schemes.

Posted in Beauty, communism, corruption, Environment, Eyesore, Government, Hong Kong, Injustice, politics, Pollution, property | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

New Podcast!!! (From Sober to Drunk in 10 Minutes)

Posted on January 9, 2012 by cecilie

Last weekend saw me in Guangzhou with the ridiculously handsome and delightful Kendall, a Guangzhou resident (above) to shoot my new Cantonese-worshipping movie ‘In a Whorehouse – The Sequel’. I will say no more about that film, except it does contain whores and it will premiere soon.

After the strenuous and mentally challenging shoot, we repaired to a nearby Sichuan restaurant to make the podcast Like A Kendall In The Wine (see below) a heavily edited journey from sober to drunk, with lots of Cantonese thrown in, naturally.

During the meal it was revealed that Kendall didn’t play Cho Dai Di (??D) or any other games
for that matter. Yes, in the podcast it sounds like I’m just saying “let me teach you after we finish this dish” but in reality I was gagging discreetly on my ????? (dry-fried potato slivers). Can’t play Cho Dai Di! Not even after having watched my instruction video! (See below)

It didn’t take long for Kendall to pick up the rules of the game, but as we were only two, it wasn’t as wildly exciting as it could have been. We needed ??geuk, or legs. (Like a table, you need four legs for Cho Dai Di.)

Fortunately the area near the Guangzhou East Railway Station has developed to include quite a number of bar-like restaurants, where we soon found geezers who were bored just talking to each other for hours and who immediately welcomed two media-weary foreigners into their midst. They didn’t know the game either, but being mainlanders they started thrashing us after two minutes of instruction. It was always thus. No gratitude.

Talking of which, the Kendall was hooked on Cho Dai Di as I knew he would be, but now he is taunting me by sending me emails and texts every night about how much fun he is having playing cards. I’ve created a cruel monster.

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Posted in Beauty, Beer, Cantonese, Cards, China, food, language, Media, Movies, My Website, Travel | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment