Old lamp into new windchime

The arts and crafts just keep coming! I recently had this inspiring thought pop into my head. "Why not turn that old lamp that has been standing in the livingroom into a windchime!" Random, huh? It may have been seeded by my Dad who recently made a set of windchimes.

That evening, I proceeded to disassemble an old unrepairable halogen light and turn it into a windchime. Again, being environmentally conscience, I tried using only materials that I had on hand. The wind paddle, for example, I cut out from an empty plastic laundry detergent bottle.

It took two nights to make, but it turned out great! Not only does it look cool, it sounds just wonderful!

Just hope it's not too loud for the neighbors.

Temple Cinema

H and I were wandering around one of the larger night markets in Taipei searching for yummy stuff to eat. H wanted to eat boiled green onion squid with wasabi near a temple. When we got there, we found that a movie was playing courtesy of the temple management.

We ordered our food and sat down in front of the screen, a makeshift affair made out of a long white sheet stretched in front of a building across the street from the temple. They were playing a movie titled "彰化脫褲莊" (Take off pants village in Chuang-hua). A little explanation is in order here. H said that the movie was about a village in the township of Chuang-hua where people had to take of their pants in order to cross a stream to reach it. This flick was made in the '80s and pretty silly.

The interesting point of this was the fact that the temple was playing this movie in this throng of people at the night market, most of whom weren't even paying attention. They had two huge movie projectors spinning film reels. Apparently, in the past, this was the most common way for people to see movies. A local temple would hold a movie night using carbon-arc projectors and huge sheets of linen as screens.

When I was here in Taiwan ten years ago, I would occasionally encounter at least one "movie night" at a temple every month. Most of the time they would play older, locally made movies, but every so often you'd see a modern Hollywood film playing. These local "temple theaters" are becoming more of a rarity. That night at the night market, only a seated audience of about ten people were seriously watching the movie, most of them being elderly folks. Time and technology march on and unfortunately, these temple cinemas are quickly fading into memory.

Froggie

Meet Froggie!

This cute little guy enjoys getting out and about and going on adventures. He practically has been all around China and parts of the US! Well, at least the minature version at the "Window on China" amusement park. But he has been to Phuket, Thailand!

Stayed tune for more picts of Froggie and his adventures!

Kong Ball

I was eating at a Burger King one evening and found this advertisement for the promotional toys offered with some of the set meals. This was when King Kong just came out and practically all marketing was swirling around this movie.

I was practically laughing during the entire time I was eating my burger and oily fries. And just to think I'd probably fall for these gimmicks toys when I was younger. But when I was young, no one washyper-marketing under the sun. Heck, movie soundtracks were things that you heard only when watching movies and tying them to everything movies and not some separately sold CD!

I get a kick out of what kind of English can pop up here anywhere at any time. I never really figured what the Kong Ball was.

Recreating Nature

This past Saturday was arts and craft day. I had snagged a big old clay urn from my neighbor with the intention of turning it into a little fish pond of sorts. Well, the old urn sat on my balcony for the longest time when I suddenly was hit by a big rush of inspiration this past weekend.

My goal was to create this fishpond using only things I had on hand if possible. I took a big plastic pot, which I had bought previously just for this project, and cut out a little semi-circular section so that water would run out of it into the bigger clay urn. Rummaging around the house, I grabbed an old vase and proceeded to chisel away a small hole in the base where I inserted some tubing. Chiseling way the hole took some time and a little patience.

After hooking up a small aquarium water pump, again previously purchased, and arranging everything in the right order, I placed in some rocks and filled the pots with water and let the motor run. It took some adjusting to get the water to come out of the topmost vase in just the right manner.

Went out on Saturday evening and Sunday afternoon to get some fish and fauna to stock the little fishpool. Now, I can enjoy the sound or trickling water whenever I want.

I now get totally enthralled watching the little fish swimming about in search for food. When I came home this evening, I must have spent half an hour just soaking in the sound and sights of this little ecosystem. It's kind of nice to have a little bit of Nature on your own balcony, even though it is man-made.

Just getting started . . .

Just getting started on this blog. Still figuring out how to work things and get posts up and running.

Typing these few initial lines kind of feels like when I first used a cell phone or instant messaging - - kind of clumsy and akward. I remember thinking that I would never be a regular user of instant messaging but now I use it every day for work purposes!

My friend John has a cool blog up; http://bridgepacific.blogspot.com/. Check it out for insights into life in Japan.

I have a website I'm playing around with right now: http://www.mahster.com . I'm thinking of posting brief blubs here and more detailed info on the other site. We'll see how that goes!