Live from the Olympic Torch Relay in San Francisco

I’ll be posting live audio updates all day Wednesday. Click play on the widget above, or click here for the full play list. There’s a feed, too.

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Costco in Korea: Americana in large portions

The Costco in Seoul is like every other Costco on the planet. That’s why I went there.

A few weeks ago, a friend back home (who shall remain nameless), expressed what I’ll generously describe as shock that there is a Costco in Seoul. There are three.

And so, I was asked to reconnoiter said whole-sale food and merchandise outlet and send back video describing it. My good friend James was kind enough to host:

That was a tasty hot dog.

Production notes: I shot this on James’ camera, an HP, which I didn’t like. My Canon A530 was sitting at home. There was only about five minutes of space on it, so I was constantly culling shots I knew I wouldn’t use. Made for tighter shooting, I think.

It’s hard to calculate total production time on this, since I shot while shopping and edited at 3 a.m. using new software while IMing with someone back in California. Best guess is about 90 minutes, including learning curve.

The Tattoo

Fithi Garza decided to tattoo his late brother’s name in Chinese on his arm. He did it in a back room in Dalian’s Nepalese Bar. There is, by my estimation, exactly one advantage to getting inked in the back of a Chinese laowai bar: the characters will probably be right.

Production notes: This was all done on my Canon point and shoot, as usual, and I’m pretty satisfied with the sound quality. Note to self: Get all primary interviews done before the subject’s friends show up with beer. Editing went faster this time. I think I’m getting the hang of this.

Seeing Dalian

Four local photographers have work on display right now in Heping Guangchang. The exhibition, called “I love Dalian” (they didn’t get to choose the name) runs until Oct. 15, after which two of them will move to their own show. Details aren’t available for that one yet. Directions to the current show are at DalianDalian.com.

All four studied photography in Dalian over the past year, three completing masters degrees from Bolton U./Dalian Medical University. Much of what they photograph is the same, or follows similar themes: beaches, migrant workers, strange food, blue skies. Yet they see it very differently from each other.

Curious about their perspectives, I interviewed each one and built audio slide shows with their photos. The result is here.

Production notes:

This started as one slide show but became four when the interviews got too long. I figure anything over two minutes better be damn important, so I gave each photog their own piece. Doing that meant I needed a launch page of some kind. There are ways to do that in Flash (tutorial at Multimedia Shooter) but I neither know nor own Flash. And considering that I really just started learning web design for real, I figured that was a bit out of my league anyway, so I did it in html. So, for those of you keeping score at home, this would be soundslides number three, stand-alone, coded-from-scratch web page number one. As always, critiques are welcome and appreciated.

How to play Gaelic Football in China

The Irish (and those aspiring to be so) invaded Dalian this weekend. The city hosted the All China Gaelic Games, a round-robin tournament of Irish football. Teams from Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen came to compete.

Shanghai took the men’s cup, with Dalian coming in second. Beijing won the women’s division, beating Shanghai in the finals.

I spent Saturday squinting through my camera’s view-finder getting video of the event, which I’ll put up over the next few days. For those who’ve never heard of Gaelic football, let alone played it, I’m starting with an overview of how the game is played. Here, Joe Keating, a staffer at the Irish Embassy, explains the rules of the game:

I recommend using headphones if you have them. The wind was awful and I did what I could to fix the audio. If you can’t make it out, here’s what he’s saying:

Unlike soccer you can catch the ball in Gaelic Football. However, after four steps, you have to release it. That can be a bounce, or it can be a kick. It can only bounce once and then you must kick. However, as you’ll see in the game, you can kick to yourself, and the better players will continually kick to themselves. Others find it easier to bounce.

So, four steps then bounce or kick. Second four steps, you must kick, but can kick back to yourself.

At any time you can hand pass the ball to one of your teammates.

You eventually score either a goal or a point. The goal is equal to three points.

After that, it’s easy. Just hit the ball, kick the ball, over the bar, under the bar. What else can you say?

The game often gets described as a combination of soccer and basketball. To me it looks sort of like rugby, but since I don’t actually play any of these sports (tennis, anyone?) I’ll leave it to others to explain.

Coming up: Why the heck are you playing Irish football in China?

Note: This is cross-posted at DalianDalian.com. Since I was shooting video all day (three gigabytes worth) I didn’t actually take any still photos. If anyone has stills of the event, tag them “daliandalian” on Flickr or send them (or a link) to eyeseast at gmail.com.

Will Work for Travel; Will Dream for Free

Here’s a tough job: Spend the next year traveling to every province in mainland China. Hang out with cool people. See everything you’ve ever wanted to see in this country. Blog about it.

David DeGeest and Lonnie B. Hodge (aka One Man Bandwidth) somehow landed this job. Theirs is the China Dream Blogue (like travelogue, get it?), and the project aims to raise money for two charities through ad revenue and help deserving people make good one their own best hopes. The pair stopped by Dalian last weekend, and I grabbed them for some barbecue and brought the video camera. Here’s how they explain the project:

The two charities directly involved are Tom Stader’s Library Project and the Reading Tub, run by Terry Dougherty.

Now, I’m a little skeptical of the amount of cash a blog can bring in. I know there are those that make heaps, but there are mountains more that don’t. So I gave Tom a buzz, and he’s optimistic. Even if it just brings his cause more attention, that can translate into money or volunteers or more opportunities. “I have had good luck with getting donations from blogs,” Tom said. “I received one US$300 donation from Lonnie’s previous blog.”

Three hundred dollars built Tom’s first two libraries. Both are in Dalian, and I watched each be hammered together by energetic volunteer teachers who were already thinking of ways to expand the project. Tom’s planning to be back in Dalian next month, so I’ll get a progress report then.

From Madagascar: Searching for the whales of St. Marie

The whales weren’t there to give us a show.

Through July and August they migrate north to the warm waters in this unnamed strait between Madagascar and Ille St. Marie. They’d float up around our boat, maybe checking out the noisy craft intruding on their winter home, then exhale and drift back under the turquoise ocean.

That’s how whale watching goes sometimes, even in the farthest place from anywhere.

The humpbacks come here to do more important things, like give birth and spend the southern hemisphere’s cold months away from their usual home around Antarctica.

Our guide was a talkative local named Albert. He owns the beach-side bungalow where we stayed and the 12-person boat that took us out.

He used to ferry people across from the mainland in the same vessel, a harrowing prospect as choppy waters bounced us up and down, even close to the coast.

The Balmito is small enough to ride the current; it feels like surfing over short distances, which is fun until someone throws up.

The rainstorm that was hanging over the island caught up with us as we headed back to shore. We were soaked by the time we returned to our place.

But the whales we worth it, and we were thrilled.

Production notes: I originally narrated the above into my slide show (click the image) but decided against it at the last minute. This is the second time I’ve used Soundslides, and the first time using gathered sound, so any feedback puts you on my good side. These things take forever to upload on uber-slow, pay-by-the-minute Malagasy internet, so I think the rest of the multimedia will have to wait until I’m back in the PRC. That’s August 25, if you’re curious. Posts in old fashioned text and non-moving pictures are still forth-coming.

Another one rides the bus

I spend a lot of time on buses in Dalian. Living on Heishijiao and studying downtown adds up to about two hours a day dealing with public transport. I’ve written about it before, so I thought I’d give my students a chance to explain the situation.

For my English majors’ final project, I asked them to perform a short play explaining some part of their lives in Dalian. Most have been in the city for two years, unless they grew up there. Four groups used the bus as their lens. This is what they produced (with me filming and editing).

A bad day on the 801:

People on the Bus

A thief on the bus

The Heroic Bus Driver

All in all, I was pretty satisfied with most of the performances. Most of the videos are now on YouTube, and are available at my channel page. Enjoy.

A one-man show for a one-man audience

I must have walked past the Alps bar dozens of times in the past month. I never noticed the little neon sign that said “Live Music,” and I’m pretty sure I never heard any coming from inside. Yesterday, however, I did hear music when I walked by, not live but enticing enough, especially after I saw that sign.

The place was empty. Not just dead or quiet. I mean abandoned. A woman behind the bar hurried me inside. “Live music?” I asked. She said it started in 20 minutes, around 10:30 p.m. I promised to come back, with friends if I could round them up. The stage had enough instruments lined up to keep several bands busy all night.

I was alone when I came back at 11, and I was alone for most of the show. None of my friends came along, and serendipity found no one else. “Do you like folk music?” the barista asked when I returned. I nodded. “Do you like Korean music?” I shrugged, having never really listened to much. It sounded good, though. There was a man at table tuning a classical guitar, and all those instruments were still on stage. I sat down and ordered a Cass.

It was a one-man show. The man’s name is Bang Il Son, and he manages the bar. Before and after his set, he answered phones and delivered plates of food to another few guests who came in, one of whom I later learned was his brother. He was good, though, and I wish he had more of an audience. The bar is in a tough location, his brother told me before I left: Halfway between Yonsei University and Sinchon, where most of the area’s nightlife is, Alps gets little walk-in business from either place.

Aside from location, the place is cozy, with soft couches and low tables, a large Che painting peaks out from an alcove hiding secluded booths. Al Pacino looks down from a Godfather II poster near the bar. It’s the kind of place I probably should have found a month ago, not three days before I head back to China.

Little Masters of War

Remembering wars can be a tricky thing. How does a country view its actions? What does it count as just and unjust? Are the millions killed martyrs or victims?

Of the memorials I’ve seen, the Korean War Museum in Seoul is possibly the most comprehensive and most respectful of the 4 million who died. It is a far cry from its Chinese counterpart in Dandong, where signs boast about how many “enemies” were “eliminated” each day, and where the North’s breach of the 38th parallel is overlooked and blame is placed on the UN for responding.

What struck me most was the number of children at the Seoul museum on a Sunday. Mostly, I saw them running and playing, climbing over old weapons and treating the awful relics like one big jungle gym.

This video is what I saw, and the song I had in my head all day. It is a rough edit, and my first time doing something like this. Mostly, it was an experiment to see if I could do it. All critique is appreciated.