HK Holiday - Part 2: The Peak

Finally gonna continue my HK trip entry. Rest of the photos can be found in my Facebook.

Day 2 (Saturday) - 1st August 2009

It was day 2 of our trip. We have agreed on 11 am as our meet-up time.



Max took us to Causeway Bay by MTR to have dim sum at a restaurant. I rarely had dim sum (being more of a Western food person) but it was great.

After that, Max managed to get in touch with a friend's friend to show us around some local TCG shops. We took the MTR to Cheung Sha Wan to meet up with him and he showed us around one of the shopping centres.

It was close to 6 pm when we decided to visit the Peak. It was one of Hong Kong's famous tourist attractions. We had to travel up a mountain via tram. It took quite a bit of walking to reach Peak Tram Station. Upon arrival, we saw a massive queue that snaked round and round outside the building.

Max managed to learn that there was a special ticket package that allowed us to join the express queue, so with the power of money (tm), we found ourselves ahead of the pack and actually inside the station. We were marveling at the fact that we just shaved off possibly 2+ hours of waiting time. After some more waiting, we finally got on the tram and were on our way to the Peak.







The first thing we did when we arrived was to have a quick dinner at McDonald's. After that, we were off to the Madame Tussauds Wax Museum. The first thing that greeted us was the wax figure of Obama but we weren't allowed to take any pics because it was a paid photo shoot.

We walked around the place and posed with the various stars. I was actually surprised that they allowed people to touch the wax figures. The place was a lot larger than I thought, spanning several rooms and a few floors. It took well over an hour to check out everything.












It's Jackie Chan! Recognize the pose?

At one point, there was an attraction that was like those 'haunted houses' at amusement parks. Inside, there were no barricades separating us and the actors, so we were told to walk with our hands clutching the person in front of us. We had to keep it that way cos' if at any time we hit the actors or caused any injury, the whole thing would be called off.

It was actually quite well-done. The rooms were very dark and illuminated by dim flashing lights. It was set up to look like a mental asylum. As we made our way through, actors would jump out to scare us or by smashing some props. I definitely screamed a lot.

Looking back, I wondered what the heck was a haunted house doing in a wax museum. It was definitely out of place. haha.

After the wax museum, we went up to the sky tower, which was an open-air balcony where we could view the city. It was quite scary to be so high up in the mountains and looking down with the wind blowing in our faces.



It was finally time to leave. We didn't really want to go through the hassle of taking the tram down again so this time so we decided to share a cab. We all agreed that the cab driver was a real 'pro', driving down the steep and narrow mountain road rather quickly with so many twists and turns. He probably watched a lot of Initial D.

To finish off the day, we went to Lan Gui Fang for drinks.


Max described this place as being similar to Clarke Quay. It was all pubs and bars, chicks and loud music. We stuck around and had a bit of drinks at one of the bars named Coconut before returning back to the hotel.

On the way back, we stopped by at the 7-Eleven and I had curry chicken for supper. HK instant foods are awesome!

STGCC 2009 - Looking Back

I went to the Singapore Toys, Games & Comics Convention on Saturday. Met up with Miya, Akira, Mango and Rhyfe who all came and left at different timings. My experience this time was a whole lot better than last year's since I did not just walk one round then left due to the massive crowd.

I mainly checked out the booths selling graphic novels and toys. I didn't realize that the Mighty Muggs here were tons more expensive than what I saw at the ACGHK2009. This made me feel that I should've bought more from HK; they were only like SGD$10 apiece and would've made great gifts.

Some pretty Japanese collectible figures caught my eyes but, once again, I refrained from buying them. I know that one of these days, I'm so gonna give in. lol

I managed to catch a bit of the cosplay competition that went on. There were a lot of cool costumes like the Predator (of which there were two), Wolverine (complete with cigar!), the Master Chief, the Prince from Hellboy 2, Jason (Friday the 13th) and many more.




Wolverine looking real manly with his cigar.


Master Chief: "You can count on me to Finish the Fight!"

There was this laughable red ghost from Pac-Man (the emcee kept referring to the ghost as "Pac-Man"...). The guy looked like he just draped a large red cloth over himself. What was even more upsetting was that the he actually won the bloody competition.



No offense to the guy, but unless there is some complex wire-frame structure underneath that red cloth holding the costume up, I am very, very unimpressed. 'Thanks' to the audience who voted him just for the lawls.

I stayed on at the event until around 7+ pm. By then, the crowd has mostly cleared out and, while I was making my last pass through the various booths, I chanced upon something that I had missed the first time round:


Many have argued that it's a shameless Mighty Muggs rip-off but I still think he looks cute!

Some cosplayers that stood out to me:


There was a too-cool-for-words home-made Bumblebee (complete with flashing lights) walking around but I forgot to snap his picture.

Real American Heroes

Hooray, another nostalgic remake of an old series. Watched it with Max & Akira over National Day weekend. I was very excited about it ever since I saw the trailers and movie posters!

G.I. Joe was kinda average for me, though if graded purely as an action movie, I guess it passes with flying colors. The entire movie is a non-stop action-packed romp from beginning to end. Strangely, all the fight scenes made me feel as though it is one big commercial to promote the new toy line. lol

It throws any semblance of a plot out the window and all back-story is told through the numerous flashback sequences for the various key characters. Speaking of which, it feels weird that almost every major character is mysteriously related to one another. And fans who watch the movie keeping an eye out for their beloved Cobra Commander might be a little disappointed.


Sort-Of-M.I.A.

Oh, well. Storm Shadow is still a badass!

After the movie, I started digging YouTube for some old G.I. Joe cartoons. I managed to catch the 90's animated movie as well as a darker series named G.I. Joe Resolute which was just released this year.

I found the 90's movie opening very catchy. All the lasers and things blowing up. All the fighting around the Statue of Liberty. This show probably taught American kids to be patriotic when they grew up. lol

HK Holiday Part 1 - Arrival

I woke up at 5 am on the 31st of July (Friday) and the nice uncle gave me a ride to the airport. I reached Terminal 1 at around 5:40 am and it was not long before Akira, Max and his friend, EK, arrived. We boarded our Cathay Pacific flight at around 8 am. Among all the in-flight movies, I chose to watch Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun Li. I finally knew why people kept saying that the movie was rubbish. haha.

It was around 3½ hours before the plane landed in HK. At the airport, our coach was ready to take us to our hotel. We were staying at the CityView Hotel at Yau Ma Tei. We finally arrived at our hotel at 2 pm. We unpacked a bit before moving out.

The plan for the day was just to check out the stores around our hotel. By some luck, according to the little shopping guide that Akira found online, our hotel was located right in the heart of "Hong Kong's Akihabara". We proceeded to check out all the stores that were mentioned in the guide, as well as a couple more that we found along the way.

We spent more time at Sino Centre. The entire building was full of shops that sold manga, music, figurines and games. Akira had a field day picking up several music CDs. I caught sight of a HobbyJapan KOFXII guidebook at a store. However, it was behind a glass display so I didn't bother to ask for it. I thought I may come across another store selling it as we visit more shops.

Soon, it was around 6 pm. I had arranged to meet my mother at the hotel lobby so we made our way back. Max and EK would be going to have dinner with Max's uncle while Akira would go recce the ACGHK2009.

I met up with my mother who had come down from Guangzhou to look for me. We decided to have dinner nearby. I caught sight of a signboard for a steak restaurant and decided to give it a try. It was called Steak Expert, though its Chinese name was a much catchier "扒王之王". I found it difficult to read the menu which was in traditional Chinese (you'd think a Western-style restaurant would have an English menu) so my mother did the ordering.

We chatted a bit. I asked her how she was doing; she asked me how I was doing. She expressed concern on my daily life at home. Normally, I would brush this off as 'nagging', but seeing that we have not seen each other for months, it was only right that I filled her in on what went on at home.

After the sumptuous steak dinner (it was great!), my mother followed me back to my hotel room. She wanted me to try on some clothes she bought for me (good thing Akira was not around...). Before she left, she gave me some extra spending money just in case. It was then I realized that I forgot to take a photo together with her. Doh. Oh well.

It was only like 8:30 pm. I started unpacking my stuff and watched some TV.

Akira only returned much later at around 11 pm with a lot of phat lewt from the ACGHK2009. I was very surprised since he was only there for a couple of hours. hehe. We both went to the 7-Eleven right outside our hotel to buy supper. The variety of instant foods one could find there was astonishing. I went with the chicken baked rice. As we were paying for our food, we spotted Max and EK who were on their way back to the hotel.

When we were all back in our hotel room, we discussed about our plans for the next few days. Saturday would be the start of our vacation proper.


This was just the first day so no real photos yet!

Home Sweet Home

I just returned from Hong Kong on Tuesday past midnight. Home sweet home!

I was very tired but the first thing I did (after taking a bath) was to surf the net. There was like 5 days worth of news and mail to catch up on. Then I collapse in bed and had a good sleep.

I am on leave today so I'll be back to work tomorrow. It'll soon be back to normal working life for me. So sad. I'll be blogging about my trip a bit at a time.

Not So Much of a Broken Plot Device

I recently purchased the book, Nuclear Hoodie to show my support for the Broken Plot Device webcomic and its talented creator who is an independant web artist. It arrived in the mail over the weekend and I was very pleased to be able to hold it in my hands before my trip.


Yup, that is one glossy cover. hehe

The series itself is very well done. The story & humor are great. The characters are unique and the artwork is consistently good. I find myself looking forward to its twice-a-week updates all the time. This has replaced Penny Arcade as my all-time favourite webcomic.

I ordered the Artist Edition of the book so I got to request for a character drawing. I asked for Inix, the dragon mystic. How cute!

Halo Legends Anime

Halo is getting an anime! I was like really happyface when the news was first announced. Now there is a trailer for it as well.



The series will consist of 7 shorts produced by several Japanese studios: The BONES, Casio Entertainment, Production I.G., Studio 4°C, and Toei Animation.

Halo has such a rich universe and backstory with tons of interesting characters. That's a lot of source material right there to base an anime on. Despite the fact that they are standalone shorts (and possibly not heavy on plot), I am still excited at how the anime will turn out.

The action sequences in the trailer reminded me of Gundam. Even more strangely, the characters in this screenshot look like they were taken out of an episode of Gundam SEED (ZAFT uniform lol).


Excuse me, you've got your Gundam in my Halo.

Cracking Open my Box of M10

For the first time ever in a TCG, I actually felt like I got my money's worth from opening a booster box.

Rares from my box of M10 + 1 booster from White Starter deck
Total: 38 rares (36 rares + 1 foil rare and 1 extra)


Ball Lightning x3 (OMGWTFBBQ)
Drowned Catacombs x2 (B/U land)
Rootbound Crag (R/G land)
Glacial Fortress (B/W land)
Elvish Archdruid
Baneslayer Angel
Birds of Paradise
Pithing Needle
Great Sable Stag
Twincast
Darksteel Colossus
Royal Assassin
Gargoyle Castle
Howling Mine
Ant Queen (foil)
Hypnotic Specter
Protean Hydra
Mind Shatter
Guardian Seraph
Traumatize
Clone
Coat of Arms
Earthquake
Might of Oaks
Chandra Nalaar
Djinn of Wishes
Open the Vaults
Warp World
Lurking Predators
Mind Spring x2
Underworld Dreams
Nightmare
Shivan Dragon
Mirror of Fate

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A good mix of good rares and crap rares. haha.

BlazBlue - Calamity Trigger -

Music: -Ao- iconoclast by KOTOKO
(Though I somehow prefer the simpler Arcade opening. haha)

BlazBlue is awesome. I never expected it to be this good. Currently maining Ragna and he plays like Sol Badguy.

Th 2D high-definition graphics are gorgeous. Daisuke Ishiwatari's rock/metal music still kicks ass. The game has a small cast of 12 characters but each is extremely diverse and play very differently. The gameplay system/mechanics is highly reminicent of GG-XX but it's just so much better.

What makes BlazBlue stand out is its great netcode and robust online multiplayer features. Arc System Works really went all out here and it really shows. There is stat-tracking, leaderboards, 6-player lobbies (winner stays, loser rotates) and even the ability to save/download replays.

Despite all that, there is one thing that annoys me: balance. You'd think that, with a small cast, Arc Systems would have realized during testing that v-13 (Nu) is overpowered and playing against her is an exercise in frustration. I think they based Nu-13 on Amuro Ray's Nu-Gundam (heck, her alternate DLC color is proof of this) . "Ike, Fin Funnel!" *pewpewpew*

I am keeping my fingers for a balance patch. Or BlazBlue XX #Reload Slash Accent Core. Then maybe we'll get a Robo-Jin as well (lol).

Somehow, I am beginning to miss this as well.

It's classic!

Magic the Gathering: M10 Pre-Release

I attended the M:TG Core Set 2010 (aka M10) pre-release at Suntec yesterday. I managed to contact Kelvin Soh who met me at the event itself. Saw a lot of familiar faces such as the old AMK MTG guys (most notably Reno!) and even some old VS System players.

I realized that this is actually the first sanctioned M:TG event I have ever attended! haha.

After opening my six packs, I went with a Black-Red deck because I got some pretty good commons/uncommons and these two:


For my four matches, I went like:
1-2 L , 1-2 L , 2-0 W , 1-2 L
At least I played decently and did not get 2-0'ed. Such close matches. Meh.

I was most delighted to pull an Honor of the Pure from the one pack I won.

White Weenie for the win.

Sunday was supposed to be rest day but I somehow got dragged by Raccon to play some more M10 sealed in Pasir Ris. Meh!

Some People Change...

A friend asked me out for dinner today. It has been many months since we last spoke so I was rather delighted. He told me that he had left his job. It kinda made me think that he chose to have dinner near Geylang because... well, maybe he wanted some drinks and some *ahem* interaction with the opposite sex.

So I met him after work and we settled down at a nearby coffee shop.

And then he tried to pull some MLM shit on me.

Turns out that his office was in the vicinity.

I refused as politely as I could but he tried to psycho me for an hour. He pulled the "don't you trust me? I'm your friend!" schtick but I was completely immune. Such things don't work on me.

He was rather persistant despite me dropping a lot of hints that he was crossing well over my comfort zone. Last thing I remembered doing was getting up, cursing out loud, banging my fist on the table and leaving.

The night was ruined. What was supposed to be a night of fun and catching-up turned into nothing but business and sales pitches. I was very, very disappointed.

Weather Forecast: Boring Weeks Ahead

I have been feeling very tired of working life lately. Even the weekends don't seem long enough to be fun anymore.

Oh, well. I got my Hong Kong trip at the end of the month to look forward to. I am excited and a little nervous at the same time. Excited at the fact that it will be a fun & refreshing escape from my routine work life. Nervous at the fact that I have not taken a plane in a long, long time and there is also the global H1N1 scare.

Whatever the case, I just hope the end of the month comes soon so I can spend a couple days away from work.

I started getting back into Magic: The Gathering again. I spent the past two weekends drafting and hunting for cards. I can't believe I am spending $10++ on pieces of cardboard again. I just feel somewhat disappointed that I can only play cards on weekends. Gone are the days when I have free time to play cards on late weekday nights and cab home.

When I am not thinking about card games, I'm playing BlazBlue on the Xbox 360. The game is awesome and far exceeded my expectations. And I didn't even put any tokens into it in the arcades. It's truly a well-designed and polished fighting game. I'll probably blog more about it when I've spent more time with it.