Shutter Island

You have to see this movie. It was extremely good, in a messes with your head sort of way. I don't have much time and I dont want to give anything away but the movie is more thriller and less horror. Not at all what I thought.

Last Minute

I have a last minute trip to China in the morning. So I wont have facebook or blog access. Not sure if I come back first of go to Bangkok.

We shall see.

Hamas Hit, The Iranian Connection?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8537740.stm

This is interesting stuff that I have been following for the last few weeks. It is very unusual to see something like this get pulled out into the open. I'm interested because I think it shows an intersection of regional and global politics.

Depending on your side you have the Dubai police to blame/praise for shedding light on this stuff. The Dubai police have done a lot of work on this one--just look at the CCTV video they put together of the hit teams (check youtube if you have 30min and watch it since at the very least it is interesting). In fact, it is fascinating to watch this play out. I was actually surprised by the number of people involved and how the various teams switched off duties.

Everyone seems to be pointing the finger at Mossad. Yes, this does fit with their MO. But there is likely much more than meets the eye here.

There are a few strange things: 1. Why didn't they do anything about the cameras? 2. There are now a total of 30 or so suspects, why are there so many to kill 1 guy when Mossad likes smaller crews?

A lot of people are calling these guys and gals amateurs because there is so much CCTV footage of them (let's also not forget Mossad has screwed up and gotten caught before so despite their reputation they don't always get their man). But even to someone without any background in this stuff, like me, it's clear from the footage that these guys aren't amateurs. They go about things, prepare, make the hit, and get a large number of people out of a foreign country on faked passports all while hiding in plain sight. That's good.

I think these guys wanted to be seen--unless I'm completely off base (a distinct possibility) they had to know about the cameras, yet did nothing about them. I think they wanted to send a message and make sure people saw. Or they may have believed that messing with the cameras would leave an even more clear trail to them and so they gambled that the Dubai cops wouldn't be able to piece things together.

That would explain the first strange thing.

The article I link above posits that there is a potential that Dubai was a Mossad station, and that station has now been uncovered. Hence, the number of people. This is a distinct possibility. But what deserves more attention is why there would be a station there. To me the answer is Iran.

Just this week Israel unveiled a new UAV that can fly to Iran and their military continues to view Iran with great alarm. Dubai--a country not overly hostile to Israel and close to Iran--would provide a great place for a station. If the focus was indeed on Iran, then you can bet the US and Britain had knowledge of the station and potentially its activities. This could explain the reason so many people were involved--not all were Mossad. It would make sense that a Hamas military operative in Dubai would have contact with Iran for weapons or other materials. Just being Hamas opens him to the Israelis but the second part would bring him to the attention of Western intel agencies.

So the large number of people could be from various agencies. Their goal was potentially to send a message to Hamas and Iran (by killing a go-between) that they are being watched and they are vulnerable.

That would explain the second strange thing.

The one thing that I have been wondering though is how much did Dubai know? Dubai doesn't like Iran (too much that is) and many Gulf states are nervous about Iranian nukes. So I wonder if there is a possibility that Dubai invited Israel to set up a covert station to focus on Iran. During this course of events Mossad finds the Iran-Hamas contact is in town and put a hit on him. That prior knowledge could explain how quickly Dubai pieced things together. Or if you really want to go another route, you can even wonder if Dubai knew in advance hence their quick and thorough investigation.

My view: Mossad all the way on this with Western support. Mossad likely had a center for operations in Dubai to focus on anti-Iran operations that was supported by other intel agencies. Realizing this was in their midst Dubai has been working over time to shut them down so they don't appear like they are stooges to the Israelis. Mossad is happy to send such a loud message and Israel figures it can patch things up over fake passports over time.

Chinese New Year Part 2

Following the posts below, this stuff took place last on Tuesday February 16. The previous night I got home a little late but the plan was that we would all go to a place called Wulai that is famous for hot springs, water falls, scenery, an old cultural street, and a large aboriginal population.

When we took off it was cold but not raining. Then along the way it started to pour. We were already pretty far out of Taipei city so it wasn't worth it to turn back, and we had rain gear (as you can see in the picture of me below with the moped).


The rain continued but we eventually made it to Wulai. Once we got there and parked the hard rain stopped and it just sprinkled a bit. Made me want to wink.

From there we went along the old cultural street. We had some wild boar and veggie kabobs (see below). We watched the guy below make some candy. But most of all we tried, in vain, to avoid the rain, which had since picked up and was coming down pretty hard. Despite the rain the area was still cool and still packed with people on Chinese New Year vacation. As the rain wore on we got a little tired of things and decided to head back.

By this point we were all cold, wet, and tired. But my friend decided that he would forgo his umbrella on the walk back. He is uber Christian, not as rare as you would imagine in Taiwan, and said in his usual sunny manner, "Well God will take care of me." Wouldn't you know it, we hadn't walked 100m when he found an umbrella laying on the street. He loved it.

From there we got colder and wetter on the moped ride back. The only good part was stopping for some hot lamb soup along the way. Still despite the cold and rain I had a good time.

Chinese New Year Part 1

Before I did all of the things in the two posts below, I had my own adventures this last Chinese New Year (hence the lack of recent posting).

The first night I went to my boss's house for a great big dinner. It was a lot a of fun to relax and eat some great home cooked food. It was not so fun to lose some money playing dice. Still it was an awesome time.

The next day I went out with a friend of mine and his girlfriend to see the plum blossoms on Yangming Mountain. They rode their mopeds up there and I hitched a ride on the back of my friend's moped. There were not many blossoms but it was fun to get out, walk, and joke around a bit.

When it started to get a little dark my two friends got on one moped and I got on the other and we rode to a huge department store/entertainment plaza/theater. I promised myself I would never ride a scooter in Taipei. So much for that. We hung out and watched a new Taiwanese movie called Monga that shows the lifestyle in some areas of Taiwan during the 1970's.

We left at 3:30am and rode mopeds in the rain. Take it from me, that sucks to do. But I did get to take a sweet picture of me at 4:00am in the Monga (same as he movie setting) area of Taiwan in my moped rain gear.

What a badass.

The next day I joined those same two friends for a hot pot and some drinks at my friend's house. It was funny since his grandmother who only speaks Taiwanese (no Chinese) kept trying to talk to me--and since she is old she kept forgetting I don't understand Taiwanese.

Nerds!

So I went out with my girlfriend for after I came back to Taipei for what I was thinking would be a nice stroll on the campus of National Taiwan University since they are on vacation for Chinese New Year. Instead, we started seeing people dressed funny. More and more we began to see these people dressed in comic or anime costumes. Now I love anime and comic books just as much as the next person (not at all) but I was shocked to see this.

It was nerd central! Every comic book fan in Taipei was there with some dressed in costume. Below is a complete stereotype, but it's funny.


There were tons of guys with cameras there. They hadn't been out of their parents apartments or seen real women for ages judging by how rabidly they were snapping pictures of the costumed ones. It was such great fun to make fun of all of these people in English--just that made it worth it. I mean it was almost like a super nerd competition in which the prize was completely ruining any and all future chances of marriage.

Some of the costumes these people were wearing were pretty ornate.

I also learned if you dress like a comic book character you have to wear boots with HUGE heels. The bigger the better. The two girls below had comparatively standard heels. I kept wondering how much fun it would be to "accidentally" bump them and see if they could keep their balance.

To give credit where credit is due, I must say that some costumes were pretty good. Case in point was this girl dressed like Avatar.

Like all of the characters or mildly attractive girls (nerds loved them). There were packs of nerds surrounding them to madly take pictures (and hopefully get an email address to send them the pictures) while they posed. It was a symbiotic relationship. People with no hope of finding a boyfriend/girlfriend because they are so involved in comics dress like characters and then have their pictures taken by people who have no hope of finding a boyfriend/girlfriend since they are so involved in comics.

I kid, but only a little

All of these pictures are from my girlfriend's cell phone. I was dumb enough to think, "Camera, I'm just going for a walk. Who needs a camera?"

Met the Folks

Well to say things went better than I would dared to hope would be an understatement. I thought went vey well--especially compared to my expectations going in (maybe that says something for low expectations more than anything else).

Besides meeting the folks it was a great trip overall. I was able to see a bit of the central Taiwanese city of Taichung. My first day in town my girlfriend and I went to the Science Museum for a few hours. It had been a long time since I had been to a Science Museum so it was cool to go back and see it (I was pumped to see the cell exhibit since I was really into bio when I was in high school). In addition, it helped that I was seeing my girlfriend for the first time in a week. So even the overabundance of kids swarming the place and the rain outside didn't dampen my spirits.
After that we went back to my girlfriend's home for dinner with the whole family. I had dropped my stuff off earlier in the day but this was my first chance to really make an impression and talk to them (the whole weekend was in Chinese save some talking with my girlfriend). The home-made dinner was great and everyone was pretty talkative. My biggest mistake was to dip a small cake in the wrong sauce but after some laughter it was fine. Thankfully I have been to a good number of Chinese dinners so I knew how to behave and how to handle and give toasts.

What did catch me off guard was that my girlfriend's dad gave me a red envelope! It is a traditional Chinese gift at the Lunar New Year and is given to close friends and family (it is filled with money). I was beyond shocked that they gave me one.

So then after dinner everyone went out to the family room. I looked at some calligraphy with my girlfriend's mom and then since it was raining outside and no one wanted to go bowling I ended up sitting down with the family for about 2-3 hours to talk. Frankly, I had a good time and they were impressed that I could express myself fluently in Chinese and hold a conversation about a variety of topics. When that began to wind down my girlfriend, her dad, and me all went to drive around the town for a night-time tour. Let me tell you there are a lot of hostess bars in that town. It caught me off guard.

The next morning we got up and I went out with my girlfriend, her brother, his girlfriend, and her sister by train and then bus from Taichung to Changhua and then to the old town of Lugang. The town was cool and had lots of history but was jam packed with people, which made getting around a bit of a pain. It was also cold (for Taiwan) and that would normally put a damper on the fun.


However, everyone had a pretty good time and luckily the rain held out until we went back to Taichung. But in spite of the rain everyone walked out to a nice dinner that night.

The next day caught the High Speed Rail back to Taipei with my girlfriend. All in all, it was a really great few days. I did a lot, spent a lot of time with my girlfriend, and met her family (all while living to tell the tale).

On The Horizon

At the risk of giving away a little too much about my personal life, I decided to make this post.

This week has been incredibly insane on account of tomorrow being the start of the week long celebration for the Chinese New Year. So that means a bit of rest and lots of eating with friends who were kind enough to invite me to their homes over the next 2-3 days. When you live alone it is always great to have people to spend a break with so that you don't just sit home and surf the web for a week.

After those 2-3 days things will get a little more interesting for me. Next Wednesday I take a trip to central Taiwan to my ladyfriend's home town. When I'm there I'll be meeting her family for the first time. Usually that is an experience that would make most people a little nervous, the added curve ball is that they don't speak English. Thank God my Chinese is good enough that I can hold conversations/follow conversations with people.

Right now, I would call my feeling nervous anticipation. It is something that I want to do and I'll go through with it but at the same time there is a bit of nervousness in the back of my mind (which is normal). I would liken it to a cross country race. Right before the gun you were always nervous about what was ahead, even though you had run that race innumerable times. You were always tense, but then when the gun went off you settled in.

To say that I'm a little nervous should go without saying. I want to make a good impression but right now I have to wait to do that. Once I get to the doing phase and have less thinking then things go well. In the meantime, I know I'll be ready. Just a matter of waiting for that gun to sound.

Company Year-End Party

The Chinese Lunar New Year is almost over. So that means it's time for the company to have our year end party. The Chinese New Year is analogous in importance to Christmas back home in the States. Everyone gets off for a week and all the companies have a year end party. That means a lot of food, karaoke, and drinking. Minus the middle part, all are things that I enjoy.

After a nice little party with everyone from the company (it was even better since I didn't have to give a performance) my fine ladyfriend came by and we joined a few coworkers for karaoke. When I was doing the karaoke thing I decided to show the people there how to shotgun a beer. They were quite impressed. So much so in fact that I had to repeat the process several times and teach them how to do it too.

You Know Your British When...

Today I was reading about the Falkland Islands War on Wikipedia and I learned a nice little tibit that I found pretty funny and very British. When some of the Royal Navy ships where sunk in the sea fights during, the sailors would sing as the ships went down and they abandoned ship. The song? "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life" from the end of the Monty Python's "The Life of Brian."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WlBiLNN1NhQ

When your ship is going down and you want to sing to Monty Python you are most definitely British.