... seed-pods cauterize
... seed-pods cauterize
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by Iain Banks
Younger Brother - A Flock of Bleeps
And so, suddenly, it began. Team 555242414E4D4158 running our first Urban Max.
Possibly the most intense part of the event was getting our clue sheets. When 800 people get told simulteneously to rush through a single entry point, there's going to be some crush. Fortunately, Naz is small and flexible, so managed to squirm her way through to the front, grab our clues, and back out. A very valiant effort.
Given the scope of the map, it was pretty clear there was going to be some work to do in Centennial Park, so our initial plan was to rush as quickly as possible to a bus to take us down that way, solving the other clues during the ride. Before we did this though, we took a photo of the clue sheet and emailed it off to our three helper elves sitting out in the Interwebs. By the time we were in the centre of the city, it became clear that our best bet was to head first to the Castlereagh headquarters of Bobbi's poledancing studio.
By this stage, we were ahead of most of the other teams, what with Naz's excellent squirm work, and the fact that the prevailing strategy of most teams seemed to be to sit down at the starting line, and work out all the clues beforehand. We figured that once the pack had caught us up, there was likely to be quite a bottleneck for poledancing, so that became our first goal.
We passed a guy selling The Big Issue on the way - the key to checkpoint 4 - and he helpfully not only sold us the magazine, but pointed out the picture clue contained within it, and went on to tell us exactly where we could find it. (It was the bronze statue of a boar that stands in front of Sydney Hospital).
After a false start on the way to pole-dancing (Google told us to go to level 4, when the challenge was really on level 1), we found the studio, and, discovering it was a one-person-only challenge, I left it to Naz, and set myself on deciphering more clues. Naz managed with some panache to climb the pole to the ceiling (it's alright, we're split up now, so I can express admiration for her pole-dancing abilities in a purely platonic way), and I'd marked a few more locations on the map. We decided our initial strategy was still a good one, so headed to Elizabeth St to get a bus.
By the time we were on the back seat of a 380, heading down Oxford St, with our clue sheets and maps spread about us, we were starting to get our reports back from our magical internet elves. By the time we got off, we had all the checkpoints marked, our route pretty much planned, and a sense of overconfident optimism that we could actually do pretty well, actually.
Our next checkpoint was Walter Read reserve, the site of one of Sydney's oldest water reservoirs, where we were told "a pair of clowns awaits". Along with two other teams that had caught the same bus as us, we rushed down some steps for a lesson in making a balloon animal. We were much gratified to hear we were the first group to arrive at the checkpoint for the day. Better yet, I was the first competitor to successfully tie together a respectable looking poodle, which meant (oh yeah), our team was one of only 16 on the day to complete a checkpoint first.
Our sense of achievement didn't last, but our fun was only just beginning.
From the reservoir, we cut through some back streets to get to Paddington Bowling Club. I joked to Naz that I had taken my membership card out of my wallet just this morning, so "let's hope we don't have to sign up for membership again, ha ha ha". Much to my dismay, this is exactly what we had to do, even though our task involved getting one bowl to hit a milk-crate. Naz and I planned an excellent production line, where as soon as one of us bowled, the other stepped up to have theirs. It would have been a wonderful strategy had Naz not hit the target bang-on with her first shot. Not something I can really complain about, I suppose.
After the PBC, we had some misfortune, barely missing the Urban Max double decker bus of fun as it passed by down Ocean St, so we decided to make the dash down to Centennial Park. After a kilometre or so of not-quite-jogging, we made it to the Education Precinct where I was put on a bike, blindfolded, and guided around a set of twisting tracks purely by the sound of Naz's voice. It went pretty well, although the course got pretty crowded, and Naz (walking backwards) kept stepping on the person behind her.
By this stage, I'd drained my hydration pack, so we stopped to fill it up (having a chat to another team doing the same thing. As much as strategy told us we should try to psych them out, everyone we met on the course today was really friendly, so we didn't have the heart to tell them "Oh, yeah, we've almost finished - watch out for the crocodiles in checkpoint 7, by the way"). Now it was another mad dash through the park (avoiding the much-in-abundance evidence of horses) over to the driving range on Anzac Parade.
The goal here was to hit a ball at least 100 yards. Now, I kind of hate golf. I find it quite a pointless sport that takes up a huge amount of room for very little appreciable reward. I guess I just don't get the appeal of chasing a white ball around for four hours. I stepped up the tee, levelled my driver, worrying that I was about to make a fool of myself with an amazing airswing (possibly with an encore of hitting myself in the head with the follow through). But there was no such thing - a sweet "thok" saw me make beautiful contact on my first attempt, and saw my ball soaring majestically well over the 200 yards marker (if somewhat skewing to the right). Naz had a go as well, and managed a respectable 100 yard stroke on her first attempt. Not too shabby, us.
We had intended to get a bus from here back to the realm of the CBD, but there was an easy checkpoint on Crown St in Surry Hills to collect, so we jogged up, had our picture taken with the Nando's Barcelos Cockerel (a flashy name for a guy in a chicken suit), and headed on towards Central station.
Here, we found the Ibero-American Plaza, apparently a commemoration of the contribution made to Australia by Spanish and Portuguese speaking migrants (the wonderful things you learn about Sydney on this course). We clipped our ticket again and decided that our next jaunt might better be done by public transit.
Our goal was Chinatown, specifically Golden Water Mouth, which people may better know as the "dead tree covered in gold" that stands near Market City. Unfortunately, we discovered we'd just missed a tram. It was likely less than a 10 minute walk to Chinatown, so we sadly gave up our opportunity for a brief air-conditioned rest and carried on. Unfortunately, it was about this time that our bodies decided to punish us for this, as we both got sudden leg cramps while riding the escalators down to the ground level. (Is this something about the position you put your legs in when riding an escalator? It seemed kind of capricious that we both got cramps at the same time in the same situation).
Still, it was an easy jaunt to the sculpture, although we had to get the race marshal's attention, as he was busy helping a foreign tourist with a map when we arrived. "Great," he said, "Now your real challenge is to find this guy's hotel for him." I was so pumped with adrenaline it took me a couple of seconds to realise he was joking.
Next, we hit our first error. I, using my shaky high-school French, has misinterpreted the clue "Quai huit terminal d'expedition" as "Hall eight of the Exhibition Centre". Given that the Exhibition Center has halls, and we were quite close, that was our next target. Unfortunately, we rapidly discovered that the Exhibition has a total of six halls, and the staff we asked inside, while generally interested in Urban Max in general ("What, is it like The Amazing Race??"), and indeed very friendly and helpful, were quite adamant that there was no checkpoint in the vicinity. By this stage, I had revised my interpretation of the French (which, I'll admit was a pretty slapdash effort), and correctly reinterpreted the clue as "Wharf 8 at the end of the expedition".
Fortunately, our detour to the Exhibition Centre has not taken us far out of our way, as our next stop was Laser Skirmish at Harbourside shopping centre in Darling Harbour. Here, we had to take shots at rotating targets, and gain at least five points in order to progress. We got a practice round first (on which we missed everything), before the real deal happened and we managed to swing a perfect round for six points straight off the bat. Again, we were much pleased with our execution of the activities, even if our plodding pace between them was a little desultory.
One of the checkpoints we were to collect during the day was to acquire a piece of foreign currency. Once again, I started kicking myself internally, as I had just that morning taken a twenty US dollar note out of my wallet, but at this stage, we were very close to my place, where I had a large assortment of foreign tender from our overseas jaunts. I collected the most esoteric of these (a 200 Syrian Pound note), and we headed to Harris St to get a bus to Circular Quay.
This afforded us an astonishingly wonderful six-minute rest waiting at the bus stop, and another few minutes on the bus, where we tried to massage some life into our mutinous legs, before we were off and racing again. This time, we were headed for the Rocks, and a rather unobtrusive statue of Biggles the dog.
We made our way through the Rocks Market, whose stalls were fragrant enough to remind us of the exotic market places of Bangkok or Phnom Penh (and, possibly, just giving us the illusion that we were running the real Amazing Race). We found the statue tucked behind one such stall, and marked our race card again with the provided control clipper.
We rushed back to Circular Quay, where Naz has spied some Pedapods at Customs House Square - these being bicycle rickshaws designed for carting tourists around the Sydney sights. The rules had clearly stated, "Teams must only travel by foot or public transport, which includes trams, trains, buses, RICKSHAW, monorail, light rail and ferries." We made the guy promise that "Yes! I'm a rickshaw!", haggled him down on the price to take us to Boy Charlton pool, and left on the exhilarating ride through the centre of Sydney.
Because of the way the Sydney streets are devised, we had to go somewhat out of our way - all the way up Pitt Street to King Street, then past the north end of Hyde Park, and down Art Gallery Road, at what was most likely little more than a light jogging pace. We believe that it was actually faster than walking through the Botanic Gardens to the pool, even when we had to jump out and help push him up a hill, but more importantly, it was a really fun trip, especially as our driver was wont to sass every attractive girl we past by honking his horn.
We were slightly bemused at the dichotomous reactions we got from other racers we saw on the way. These ranged from "Hey, why didn't we think of that", to looks of jealousy, to outright looks of outrage as though we were cheating. (Seriously, read the rule-book next time, guys). Better yet, as we disembarked, and told him to wait for us as we completed the challenge, another team rushed up trying to appropriate him for theirselves.
We rushed down to the shore, where we were directed to a two-man kayak and pushed out into Sydney Harbour.
To be honest, this was the best challenge we did all day, partially because it took us a bit of time to paddle all the way out around the hazard marker and back (our sailing course taught us that the marker was warning vessels to stay to the EAST of the marker), but also undeniably, because as we sat down we got wet backsides from the water. The cool caress was divine on such a hot day, and we were very pleased to be able to so enjoy ourselves on the harbour.
We ran back up to our rickshaw driver (who, charitably, has not driven away with the other team), and got him to drop us near Sydney Hospital. We were near complete, needing only the boar checkpoint, and the challenge at the finishing line to have our target of fourteen. We clipped our race card, and managed a fair jog downhill down Martin Place, rounding the home stretch.
Back at Wharf 8, they'd managed to set up an inflatable adventure course which was our final challenge. This I recognised as the type of thing kids always get to play on at fairs and festivals while adults stand around saying "isn't it wonderful how much fun they're having", while thinking to themselves "dear god, why don't I get to have so much fun". So we threw ourselves upon it with aplomb, climbing bouncy walls, and sliding down inflatable slides, and collected our final clip.
And that was it! We were done. We checked in with the marshals, who inspected our ticket, and proclaimed us complete, although disappointingly not making a mention of our rather splendid Syrian currency. We were handed a goody-bag, and sent out to lunch at the Nando's booth outside. Don't get me wrong, this was some tasty chicken, but when what you really want is a bucket of ice to stick your head in, peri-peri chicken and hot chips doesn't really do it.
We talked to some people afterwards, to determine what was at the two checkpoints we'd missed. There was a three dimensional block puzzle on the bus that we never managed to catch (damn, I'm good at those), and coaster flipping at the pub in Kings Cross (damn! I'm good at that too). Oh well, as it happens, I suck at golf, but managed to pull that one off okay. I really shouldn't complain.
Our time? We were disappointed we didn't have timekeepers intently clicking their stopwatches as we crossed the finish line, but our own to-the-closest-minute accuracy put us at five hours and five minutes. We think this was pretty good, even though the top team did it in two hours and forty-one minutes.
So, overall, what were my impressions of my very first UrbanMax? For a start, I thought I was going to be significantly more worn out at the end. Aside from a couple of sore muscles, and tired feet (and, of course, the desire for a head-sized bucket of ice), I felt pretty good at the end. The activities were all heaps of fun, although they seemed to finish too quickly! Possibly why the more lengthy kayaking trip was one of the highlights. My greatest lesson: don't clear out your wallet before you go. The weight you save isn't worth lacking the perhaps invaluable items you might find you need.
I certainly will take away a lot of memories from the day, and that's what life is all about. Bring on 2010!
One of the best films I've seen in a long time. Clint Eastwood once again delivers a powerful, moving and thoroughly gripping piece of cinema. As long as you can accept the rather extreme premise of the story (which Clint makes easy by reminding you that this actually happened in real life), this is a truly epic, detailed and wonderful movie, grounded by an astonishingly good performance by Angelina Jolie. You'll never hear me say she can't act again, although I can't help but feel that Clint should take a lot of the credit.
(As an aside, if Gran Torino were nominated for an Oscar, any Oscar, it would also be flying high near the top of this list).
Best Actress (Angelina Jolie)
And while it might not be as emotionally powerful as Changeling, The Dark Knight is a masterclass in blockbuster film making. A huge and rollicking flick, that was charged with gravitas, through the intricately worked plotlines and, of course, the electric performance by Heath Ledger as The Joker. This did everything right, from the tightly choreographed fight scenes, to the deliciously ill-defined notions of good and evil (brought together perfectly in the plot point of Harvey "Two-Face" Dent), all harking back to the concept of this elusive figure of Batman; The Dark Knight. Every time I see a new Christopher Nolan film I feel as though I've been given another rare treasure. A truly, truly great film. I thought it deserved a nod for Best Picture, or at least Best Screenplay, but I'll be rooting for it in all the other categories anyway.
Best Supporting Actor (Heath Ledger)
This was an astonishingly good documentary, mostly because the story and the lead character are so fascinating. This movie looks at Philippe Petit, the tightrope walker who managed to string a high-wire between the two towers of the World Trade Centre in New York and wire-walked above the entire world. It tells the tale of his initial exploits (including walking between the pylons of the Sydney Harbour Bridge), and his obsession with the World Trade Centre, culminating in an intricate plot to break in with a team into both towers, and rig up the wire. It works so well because you can see the passion in Petit; he is truly a poetic character. A wonderful documentary.
Best Feature Documentary
In my opinion, this was a much hyped, yet much underrated film. The posters scream the names of Leo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet, in a way that suggests the marketers really wanted to call this movie Titanic II. But this is a much more subdued, but intelligent and incisive film about real life, and the struggles against the rules of society that we find ourselves following if we're not careful. I think Sam Mendes shows us his best work here since American Beauty, and one that had great resonance for me. Unfortunately, I wasn't entirely convinced by Kate Winslet, despite the praise (and nomination) she has garnered for this role (I think she was better in The Reader, even though I thought that was an inferior movie overall). But this is a wonderful film nonetheless.
Best Supporting Actor (Michael Shannon) (Runner Up)
This was a real surprise for me, but a thoroughly good one. I'd hardly heard a thing about this film before I went to see it, and often those unassuming sort of films really catch me. This seems a thoroughly bleak film at the beginning, with the very working class, struggling family trying to make their way in the world - always low on money and threatening to break apart. But it develops into a story which makes you come to appreciate, if not admire, the characters and their motivations, and the small risks and chances they take because of the extremity of their situation. I think Melissa Leo is excellent - a worthy Best Actress winner, if not for Changeling - she was thoroughly convincing in her role. A really great, and unexpected film.
Best Actress (Melissa Leo) (Runner Up), Best Original Screenplay
Another great film, if a small and somewhat constrained one. Richard Jenkins grounds this film with a wonderfully truthful performance of the college professor, who rediscovers meaning in his life when he stumbles upon two immigrants living in his flat in New York. There is true believability in the way he approaches the situation, and in the way he begins to unravel his tightly-wound life to discover joy again. I personally think this type of performance is perhaps the hardest to give, and Jenkins does a truly excellent job.
Best Actor (Richard Jenkins)
A great film, fun, larger than life and ultimately quite thought-provoking. Centering around a summer in Barcelona with two friends, Rebecca Hall and Scarlett Johansson, and the straight-talking, exotic Juan Antonio, played by Javier Bardem. Their odd love-triangle gets given an extra right-angle when Juan Antonio's ex-wife, neurotically played by Penelope Cruz, tries to kill herself and comes to live with Juan Antonio. It's a great film, made as though these characters were intricately designed, and then just thrown together in a beautiful location - what else happens is poetry.
Best Supporting Actress (Penelope Cruz) (Runner Up)
This was a really nicely woven film, starting with an innocuous duo sightseeing in Bruges, and then allowing the strands of story to become more and more apparent, tangling and intermingling. This is then laced with a good dose of black humour, injected wonderfully by the conflicted performance from Colin Farrell, and you get a great piece of cinema.
Best Original Screenplay (Runner Up)
What's this? We've finally got to one of the films actually nominated for Best Picture. What are the odds? I feel the academy has really dropped the ball this year with its nominations. But, this is a very decent film, and quite epic in its scope and message. There's nice touches of directorial skill all over this, as we watch the interwoven life of the old and young Jamal. It winds up quite melodramatically touching. Don't get me wrong, this does deserve a Best Picture nomination - it just should be in better company.
Best Director, Best Picture, Best Adapted Screenplay (Runner Up)
There was something very minimalist and pleasing about this film. The story was quite slow, and very languous in its characterisations, but things just wound up becoming layered with meaning, until the final scenes, and the title of the film ("Revenge"), leave a profound impact. It was, possibly, just too slow for its own good eventually, but it still left some great images on me.
Best Foreign Film
This was a great and, let's face it, rollicking tale of politics and the fight for gay rights in America. The character of Harvey Milk is such an enjoyable one to watch, and Sean Penn does a fantastic job inhabiting his skin. There's a delicious dramatic irony in the film, as we know that Harvey Milk eventually is assassinated by fellow city councillor Dan Brown, and the relationship that builds up between them always has sinister undertones. I think this, and Slumdog Millionaire are worthy Best Picture nominees, but there were some much better films which were unfortunately overlooked.
Best Actor (Runner Up), Best Picture (Runner Up)
Entitled in French "Between the Walls" (and a much better title, I believe), this is a pseudo-documentary drama about a French school teacher in a tough school in Paris. Interestingly, most of the characters are playing themselves, including a large proportion of the students, which lends a great realism to the film. Near the start of the film, I was a little dubious, as Francois is portrayed very much as the great and inspiring teacher, who is going to turn all these kids from lives of poverty or crime into fine scholars. But while there are these elements to him, the film doesn't shy away from portraying the less salubrious moments in his dealings with the class. While this ends up possibly making a less Hollywood-like message, it does add to the gritty realism of the film.
Best Foreign Film (Runner Up)
This film suffered terribly at the hands of the public here in Australia - who perceived it as an awful and embarrassing promotional video, often without having seen it. Granted, a lot of the blame for that can be taken by the marketing, which I'll admit was somewhat overblown. But this was just a great epic; a wonderful tale of survival and triumph, and right and wrong. Melodramatic? Sure, but it was big, boisterous and enjoyable all the same. A very, very much maligned film, in my opinion.
A thoroughly scrumptious costume drama, partially, there's no denying it, due to the scrumptious costumes, but also thanks to this fascinating tale, and the way it is well delivered by Ralph Fiennes and Keira Knightley. I found myself thoroughly enjoying the film - but only in the way that one enjoys a good action film or a good screwball comedy. The period drama perhaps has just become a form of idle entertainment. But still, bloody good entertainment.
I actually found this a really captivating film - a war film without the shooting, a boxing match without the punches. This was the sort of film that had you hanging on every little movement, and jumping for joy when the good guys got a punch in. I guess, it's the intellectual equivalent of watching McBain blast some "commi-Nazis" with his flamethrower. Frank Langella is very good as Nixon, but overall, this might have been more suitable for a "notable, but unsuccessful Best Actor nomination" and an otherwise laid to rest film.
Best Adapted Screenplay
I had great difficulty reconciling my opinions on Bolt and WALL-E. On the surface, WALL-E is a much better film - it deals with more serious issues, it is more epic in its scope, and it's technically more masterful. Bolt is really just a fun and comedic story, set on an interesting premise, true, but not deep or earth-changing. But ultimately, I felt Bolt stayed truer to itself, and delivered better on what it promised. It was thoroughly hilarious - I found myself laughing out loud throughout the film, and it was a generally engaging story, if somewhat formulaic at times. In the end, this just gives a great movie-going experience.
Best Animated Feature
...on the other hand, perhaps tries too hard to be something its not. It really aims for true hard science-fiction beliveability, with an in-your-face social agenda. This would be fine if not for the second half of the movie, where we are confronted with the bumbling remnants of the human race, and the comic slapstick of a bunch of efficious sanitary robots. It's elements such as these that create an awkward dichotomy in the film, somewhere between cartoon silliness and bleak dystopia. I think this film would have been far superior if they had have stuck to their initial plan of having no or little dialogue - the first half is much better that the second in this regard. In the end, it just ends up slightly bipolar.
Best Animated Feature (Runner Up)
Something of a difficult film for me. I'm not a huge fan of war movies really, and while this had an interesting visual style, and an interesting way to present the story, it still was ultimately a war story. The most powerful moment is at the very end, when, after we see the atrocities of the war in Lebanon portrayed in the grim sepia-animation, we suddenly switch to real news footage of the end of the war, and it drives it home that these things really happened. An interesting film, a confronting one, but not one I particularly enjoyed.
In a weird way, I'm not quite sure what I expected of this film, but I feel it delivered on it. I like Aronofsky, who does a great job at portraying gritty realism, and does wonderfully well here. Mickey Rourke is very believable in the role of The Ram, and there's a kind of tragic inevitability about the way the story pans out. But all being said, there was something ultimately missing from the movie, or it was as if the mould it had to fill was shallow to begin with. So while I feel as though it met my expectations, I'm still not sure what those expectations were.
This was a truly odd little film - possibly the oddest at this year's Oscars. It provides a character study into Poppy, a young, slightly alternative London woman who always seems to make the best of every situation. But this doesn't lead to an inability to be grave when required. It is an interesting film about being happy, being grateful for every opportunity you get, and living life full to the full. Slightly fractured in places though. Odd.
There was something very constrained about this film, which was largely explained when I discovered that it was based on a stage play. Similar to another stage adaptation, Closer, this film played out very much in the stage style, as a series of encounters not really joined together; just little vignettes that give glimpses into the unravelling story and the characters caught up in it. I do believe the performances are excellent, especially Amy Adams as the forgiving, but perhaps naive Sister James. But overall, this film was certainly lacking something.
Best Supporting Actress (Amy Adams)
This was, ultimately, a rather disappointing documentary from Werner Herzog. He is obviously fascinated by the divers who dive under the ice shelf in Antarctica (he spent a large proportion of his documentary/science-fiction film The Wild Blue Yonder dedicated to showing footage of it), and this voyage to McMurdo station and its surrounds, to encounter the people who choose to call Antarctica home is perhaps just a vague shell around more footage under the ice-cap. Don't get me wrong, it's a very interesting little piece, but it certainly lacked the incisiveness or the narrative drive of his better docos like Grizzly Man.
Possibly my most disappointing film this year. I didn't know a lot about this film, indeed I didn't even know it was a holocaust film before I watched it, so I went in a little blind. This is an incredibly slow-moving, and it feels, laboured production, something that I had great troubles getting into until it was far too late. Don't get me wrong, I really thought Kate Winslet was good, as was Ralph Fiennes again, but Stephen Daldry's excruciating pace made this somewhat unbearable. Maybe it was just the wrong day when I saw this, and maybe I should give it another chance, but right now, I think I've suffered enough.
There was something very, very peculiar about this movie. It's not your average supernatural, good-versus-evil fantasy-horror-action junket. For one, the plot is worse than what you would usually get in such sludge, and the characters are just appallingly caricatured, or just bizarre. But to leaven this, the visual spectacle is just astonishingly good. The amount of detail which goes into the effects and the production design is quite staggering - especially the scenes in the goblin market, which are littered with tiny details catching the eye. Visually, this is a wonderful film, but it just goes to show that you can't just ride one element to the deficit of all others.
What can I say about this one. When I called The Reader my most disappointing film this year, I had yet to take one look down at two films below it. The premise of this movie (based on the story by F. Scott Fitzgerald) was thoroughly exciting, and with a cast of Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett, and directed by the very talented David Fincher, I was set for a mind-blowing experience. And maybe that was the problem. This film was, in every sense, the epitome of empty but bombastic Hollywood film making. Let's leave aside the gratuitous similarities the film bears to Forrest Gump, which have been well "outed" everywhere else, and just look at the story. This should be exciting, it should make enjoyable, comic and profound use of the central premise of a man aging backwards. But it doesn't! It's just a (rather uninteresting) biographical picture, with rather uninspiring performances all around, including from Cate Blanchett, usually one of the highlights of the screen. I'm aware that I probably was so disappointed with it because I had such high expectations, but films like The Dark Knight show what you can really do, even with the weight of the world's expectations on you. This one failed miserably.
This was a very stilted action hero movie - and one that showed up extremely poorly against The Dark Knight; and let's face it, it's hard not to make the comparison. This one was far more cut from the comic-book cookie-cutter, and while Robert Downey Jr. makes a good effort at chewing the scenery, it was ultimately a frothy heap of faff. Perhaps this one was just riding the current superhero fetish, along with the ever more elaborate array of CGI effects in the computer artists repertoire. Not bad, but not good either.
There was something stupid about this film, but it was possible to ignore it for long periods at a time. It was possible to just watch the action, the curving bullets and the impressive fight scenes. But the central premise, the story and characters were all very uninspired. Possibly the best thing it has going for it were its interesting visuals and the very good sound effects that were conceived to represent the whizzing, spinning bullets and so forth. Fortunately, that's what it was up for.
Ben Stiller just pisses me off. There, I've said it. And unfortunately, he has smeared his greasy fingerprints all over this movie. I don't care how much irony he puts into his directing, or his character - a stinking film is still a stinking film. The only thing that saves this from being thrown to the bottom of the list is the very good performances from Robert Downey Jr., who I always quite like (despite his two major efforts this year winding up at the bottom of my Oscars listing), and the astonishingly crass Tom Cruise, who shows that on-screen he can still be a worthy human being.
I found this movie rather dull, although not truly offensive, like bottom-of-the-pile in previous years. Despite the obvious and somewhat pained attempts at humour, I think this movie ended up being Not Very Funny. Perhaps this has to do with the casting, which too often relied on Not Very Comic Actors. Aside from comic voice specialist (and Tobias Funke from Arrested Development) David Cross, there seemed a truly uninspired casting job aiming more for its star power than for real characterisation purposes. Ultimately, I was much disappointed, and I left feeling like, well, like I'd just had a pretty dull cinema experience. No, it was no Transformers, last year's stinker, but neither was it worth very much.
There you have it. See you again next year.
In fact, it is staged by the STC's Actors Company, and, if the name is anything to go by, this shows. The production is largely designed so that little detracts from the acting performances of the ensemble. On the whole, these are very good.
But, at the risk of being branded a philistine, for detracting from "very good" performances of Shakespeare, I found the entire production rather flat. Of course, staging a condensed cycle of eight plays over two nights is an audacious effort, and you have to award credit for the scope of the production, but it is precisely this scope which causes the production to feel paradoxically over-stretched and under-detailed.
The scope of the time period being staged, along with the rapidly changing set of characters, who very often were portrayed by the same actor in adjacent scenes at times blurred the story.
And although the performances are good, every last thing is done to throw attention on the actors, through the minimal set to the lack of costumes, which, as a production leaves a hole. Although, there are some odd choices in the production design, like the constant raining of gold foil in the first act, to the flinging of flour across the entire stage in Henry VI. This imagery is alternately frustratingly obscure, like the emo teenage guitarist who played through Henry IV, to the brutishly obscene, such as the young Henry V giving a blow job to Falstaff, or the killing in Henry VI which involved regurgitating fake blood over whoever it was you just killed.
But when acting is in the spotlight, it is hardly surprising that the gems of the production are in the performances. Indeed, the high points of the play are the very first act, and the very last act. The first gives us a pomp-filled and playful portrayal of Richard II by Cate Blanchett (who from then on barely gets a moment on stage), the second act's highlight is the flawed but jocund absurdity of Falstaff. Part II is dominated by the truly phenomenal portrayal of Richard III by Pamela Rabe. She lurches around the stage in a wonderfully black-comic trance as the increasingly distorted monarch. After watching the performance, one might well subtitle the production: "Come for Cate Blanchett, stay for Pamela Rabe".
Overall, it was a worthwhile experience. It wasn't a theatre experience I will cherish for the rest of my life, but it was one that made a worthy blog entry.
Let's hope that's what they were going for.
The Bays are an interesting group, a live-drum-wielding electronic ensemble who don't ever produce recorded tracks, but rather improvise everything they perform. This performance was possibly bending this rule a little, as I imagine there was at least some forethought put into scoring a film soundtrack, but it was an excellent concept nonetheless, and Naz and I were keen to have a wander to check it out - especially since it's now a five-minute stroll from our place. (Yes, the Sydney Festival rocks even more when you're living amongst it).
As we left the house we wondered "should we close the windows, turn off the lights-slash-TV-slash-music-slash-let the cat off its noose?", to which our response was "Nah, it's ok, I think we'll just go to check it out for five minutes, wander past, you know, then come home - everything will wait for us here".
We decided to walk up on the overpass of the Cahill Expressway, which had a view down on the screen and stage (plus, Naz had said that the foreshore looked pretty packed). This we did, although we believed that the sound would be damaged by the rumbling of traffic behind us. In fact, The Bays like to crank their volume up, and we wound up with what I can only imagine were the best seats in the house. The only problem was that there were in fact no seats, but we stood leaning on the barrier just as the film started.
I have seen Lola Rennt before, but I couldn't quite remember it being so good. The "five minutes" turned into "let's just watch the first iteration of the story" to "let's just see this next scene" until suddenly, we realised we'd stayed for the entire film. It's a great film, and a perfect choice for a lively outdoor presentation.
I can't deny that the music really helped. The Bays were full of energy, pumping around on stage, as they perfectly scored the pounding beat of Lola performing her titular role through the streets of Berlin. These guys are really cool, and they really provided an amazing soundtrack. And the live aspect really engaged the audience as well. Not only did we applaud the band as they finished acts, but it got to the stage where we were whooping and cheering at the action in the movie too.
All in all, it was a supreme triumph. It was truly magnificent, dynamic and exciting. I can only hope that this event becomes a regular feature of the Sydney Festival calendar. It's on again tonight, and I highly recommend it.
Shame about the cat.
(At Festival First Night)
Naz: This isn't the real first event of the Sydney Festival, Dawn Chorus was.
Jez: Why is that?
Naz: Because it was on before this, of course!
Jez: But what about shows like La Clique, which have been going on for several days already?
Naz: But this event right now is called Festival First Night, which must mean it's the first night of the festival, and hence this morning was the first morning of the festival which means - hullo! - that Dawn Chorus wins! In your face! In your face! Yeah, how do you like that, huh? Smart guy? Woo, score one Naz, wikka-wikka...
It so happened that we had awoken early this morning to head to Balmoral Beach, and watch the Sydney Philharmonia Choir singing as the sun rose over the water.
It was quite a nice idea. Of course, in practice, it doesn't work out quite as well as the utopian image of angelic choral music and the rising rays of the sun.
When contending with nature, you have a number of potential setbacks. For a start, there are some seaside sounds that fit in very nicely with a capella choirsong, such as the gentle swell of the waves and the low whistling of seabreeze. The caws of seagulls are less welcome, of course, and the less said about the sailors yelling "Arr, Matey!" the better.
It's also notable that in a slightly windy area, open to the air, the acoustics are not what they might be in say, a concert hall, or the Girls' Bathroom in the Music Centre (which was where our choir at school always used to go to rehearse - at least, that's the excuse I gave). Couple this with the fact that a large portion of the repertoire was fairly avant-garde, where pin-point precision on tone is necessary to get the complex harmonies resolving properly, and there were some funky sounding notes coming from the choir.
That being said, it was worthwhile going, and the performance was good overall. It just suffered from a long ramp-up; by the time we'd got to the African chanting and the amusingly camp "seaside" medley, everything was smooth sailing, if you'll pardon the nautical pun.
That night it was the big, bouncing, boisterous binge that Festival organisers put on to open the show. Festival First Night this year expected around 250,000 people to show up for the open-CBD street party. If I recall correctly, the figure was more like 300,000, although who was counting this, I'm not sure.
We started with a slow walk around Martin Place and the City Laneways, where things were jiggling, but not jumping yet, so Frosty and I headed out to the Domain, where my statistically favourite musical ensemble, The Cat Empire, were set to perform. We managed to phenagle ourselves a spot on the very edge of one of the walkways, studiously ignored the police telling people not to stand in the exit passages until we had a good buffer of about three more rows behind us, and waited for the show to begin.
And it was magnificent. The whole place was jumping, and packed out, and full of celebrating excitingness. I was particularly excited that I got to hear my three favourite Cat Empire songs (Two Shoes, Til The Ocean Takes Us All and In My Pocket). Success! It did strike me though, having never seen The Cat Empire live before, that there are some songs better suited to live performances, and some better to the recording studio. For example, Til The Ocean Takes Us All was good, but lacking energy when they performed it on Saturday night, whereas Fishies, one of my less favoured tracks from their most recent album, was pumping and exciting live.
Once the Cat Empire finished (with Sly, to go out with a bang), we were told (by Adam Hills) that everywhere besides the Domain was packed, and that the best place to stay was right here (although, by this stage, I could barely imagine how things could be more packed than the Domain). We had more stuff to see though, so we decided to risk it.
It was difficult to get out of the Domain, but only because most of the exits had been designated "emergency use only", and we were funnelled through a small gap at the very far north end. Once out though, it was pleasantly calm compared to the sardinical nature of the Domain. We walked past the Elizabeth St stage and through to the top end of Martin Place, where we were able to get space enough to stand freely, and even managed to find Naz again. From here we watched the Pyrophone Juggernaut, a performance troupe who basically used fire to make music, firing blowtorches into long metal pipes arranged to provide different tones. This was combined with much thrashing percussion, and a real sense of theatre to create a huge, dramatic production, culminating in a huge gas explosion above their boat-shaped stage.
Honestly, The Cat Empire... Explosions?? Nothing was going to top that.
We went for a wander down to Hyde Park, where it was technically possible to tell that something was going on, but very hard to get very close to it, and looked at the barricaded entrance to College St, which was being patrolled by some very surly looking police officers. We remembered all too well our encounter with Sgt Fascist of Sydney Central police station last year, so we stayed well away - choosing instead to watch some of the dancing in Martin Place, which was most memorable for the ingenious processed projections which were being blown up to enormous sizes on a huge screen.
We finished with a quick sojourn back to Angel Place, where things had ramped up (and, had I been drinking, was about the only place in the city where you could get a beer without a queue!), and enjoyed the powerful fun of some high-energy French rap, before we decided to call it a night and head home, satisfied that the start of this festival (whenever it happened to be), was a vast improvement on last years'.
Our first goal was to have some breakfast, so we wandered up to Soho, to find a suitable breakfast restaurant. I'm generally happy with non-breakfast food at breakfast (say, pizza, curry, or a deep-fried yak), but we went to a cafe anyway, and partook of their breakfast menu.
We then headed south towards the metro, and caught the train from Central to Wan Chai, on our way to the Hong Kong exhibition centre. Our first stop was actually one of the office towers near the harbour's edge. We found our way in and to the elevator lobby, where we took the lift to the 46th floor, where there was apparently a lobby which is vaguely open to the public (in that, no one's going to stop you from wandering around up there). This was such a tall office block that the 46th floor happens to be the interchange for the lifts - you can get an express to floor 46, then can change for an all stops to the very top.
But the 46th was enough for us, and it afforded us some excellent views over Hong Kong and the harbour. There's much to like about the view in Hong Kong - I believe we happened to be around when the smog was pretty weak - I hear that often it's hard to even see the opposite side of the harbour, which would be a grave shame. We also happened to be gatecrashing some event involving a whole bunch of schoolchildren, but we still managed to wind our way around them and get some photos over the city.
We then headed down to ground level again, and wandered towards the exhibition centre, which is partially built on a slight peninsula sticking out into the harbour. Unfortunately, there happened to be a large convention on at the time (I can't remember if it was the largest or second largest clock and time-pieces fair in Asia), so we were barred from entering the centre proper, from where you can also apparently get good views over the harbour. (Actually, once, after being turned away at a large checkpoint, we wandered a bit further and found ourselves behind the checkpoint, but it didn't help as there were further checkpoints later).
Anyway, we had some fun running about the abandoned areas of the centre, before we took a stroll around the foreshore, and then headed off to get the ferry across to Kowloon again.
One of the things I generally dislike about most of the Asian cities I've been to is that there's the permeating unpleasant smell to them (I count Bangkok, Yangon, Mandalay, Phnom Penh, Macau and everywhere in China in this list). I can't tell quite what it is, but it's the same smell everywhere. As much as it adds "atmosphere" to the town, I like the fact that Hong Kong doesn't have it. It was walking through Kowloon that I first noticed this. It's got all the colour and activity of the other Asian towns, but sans that miasma of stench wafting through the streets.
We made our way through the crowds and the Indian guys accosting everyone to buy "fake Rolex! fake Rolex!" (but they're not very persistent, which didn't bug me too much), and up the shopping streets heading for the Hong Kong Science Museum. This is one of those great Questacon style places with lots of hands-on exhibits and (best of all) a large ball-machine (or, I believe, more correctly termed a Gravity Machine). This, in fact, was what drew me to the place in the first place. Come for the ball machine, stay for the science!
There was plenty of cool stuff here - it was probably not as good as the Deutsches Museum in Munich, but it was probably more modern, and had masses of toy-like stuff to play with. Perhaps the most interesting bit was Naz lying on a bed of nails (big sharp pointy ones). Unfortunately, the ball machine only runs for about 10 minutes every hour, and we happened to arrive just after it started. But we played with lots of cool stuff in a rushed tour. We eventually saw the ball-machine running just before we left (which was very cool, except that it seemed like they only ran it through certain parts of the track - as in, there were some cool looking ramps and obstacles that I never saw a ball go down), and then headed off for the Macau ferry.
We made our way back to our hotel on the metro (what an efficient piece of public infrastructure), and wandered to the international ferry terminal, which was conveniently located very close by. Getting through customs was very easy - so easy, in fact, that we arrived in time for the ferry before ours. Even more fortunate was that we were allowed to change our tickets to the earlier ferry, and were ushered into a pleasant little waiting area. It was only then that we realised we had somehow bought First Class tickets on the ferry, and the sweaty masses were stuck in the bilge water below us.
Oh well. This meant that once we boarded, we were shown to very comfortable seats on the top deck (where we also had window seats, which struck me as quite odd, given that we were only belatedly on this ship), and were served dinner as part of the cruise.
Eventually, we arrived in Macau, passed through immigration again, and headed out towards Fisherman's Wharf. How to describe Fisherman's Wharf? It's like an amusement park without the rides - as in it has loads of really quite shoddily built and tacky themed areas, and overpriced shops, but no rollercoasters or innovative spinning inertia machines. We wandered around the fake volcano, and through the "Aladdin's Cave" area, and up through the mall, which again, was bedecked in Halloween finery (nice views over the water though). All of this is overlooked by the rather garish Arabian themed Sands casino, so we thought it was worth taking a look in there.
Once again, we were struck by how substandard Australian casinos are (at least, substandard in tackiness and neon), and just by the outward appearance of opulence to the interior. Soon though we were looking for some dinner, and a browse through the Macau tourist authority's electronic map revealed an Italian restaurant close to the ferry wharf, so we jumped on the Sands Casino shuttle bus back there.
Unfortunately, where the restaurant was supposed to be, there was now a large bank of stadium seating erected for the Macau Grand Prix. So we were kind of stuck. Eventually, we decided to head into town where we knew there was at least a Pizza Hut. This was to involve negotiating the Macau public bus system, but fortunately, there are generally helpful signs at the bus stop, which even have some English on them (how exciting), so we got on, shoved our fare into the box, Guilin-style, and made our way through the streets past the radioactive glow of the casino-strip to the main town.
Given that the last Pizza Hut I went to was in America, where they seem run down, depressing as hell, and designed for trailer-trash, there was something truly surreal about this Pizza Hut. It was opulently decorated, extremely modern and buzzing with a funky Saturday-night crowd. (It couldn't compete with the view of the Giza Pizza Hut, but still).
Unfortunately, of course, this meant the chance of us getting a pizza were very slim, but we did manage to order some takeaway Garlic bread which we shoved in our bags (our main goal was, you understand, to use up our remaining MOPs), and headed out again.
We had planned to catch a bus out to the airport, as our time was drawing to a close, but the (once again) misguided and misnamed Guide to Macau failed to inform us that the bus to the Airport stopped at about 6pm, meaning we were kind of marooned. So bugger it, we got a taxi again.
True, taxis aren't that expensive, but it was still a pain.
Then it was the airport and home - the major incident to report was on boarding our plane. Given that we had no water, and that the only water on Viva Macau was overpriced Evian, we spent up all of our cash on bottled water from the little restaurant inside security. However, Viva Macau had decided to conduct their own baggage search for liquids at the boarding gates, which not only meant that one was not allowed to bring bottled water on the plane, but that everyone had to empty their entire bag on a table and then repack it before they were allowed on the plane. Naz and I chugged a couple of bottles there and then, in a vain attempt to stave off dehydration on the flight, and then Naz went to attempt to take the unopened water back to the shop.
By some amazing stroke of genius, she managed it, and while we still had no water, we did have an extra 40 useless Macau Patacas. (Not true, we did use them on the plane to buy some overpriced water). We stayed seated almost til the very end - as far as I can tell, everyone else were idiots for standing for almost 45 minutes while they checked everyone's luggage.
And, really, that's about the end of the story. Once we were aboard we slept a little, drank little and were generally unfomfortable. Again, Viva Macau may be cheap, but it was easily the worst airline I've ever been on (including such gems as Air Bagan in Myanmar and (shudder) Jetstar).
Let's just say I was pleased to arrive in the port of Sydney.
If you imagine a regular Australian shopping centre, only with no "wasted" space - as in no space for people to just congregate and sit around, no large foyers or courtyards - you'll probably get an idea. Everywhere is shops. Only the meanest amount of space is reserved for people to commute through, possibly the minimal amount possible. As intriguing as this was, we didn't really have the time or the motivation to stay around for much longer, so we grabbed breakfast from some suitably Western restaurants (I believe they were called Mac-something and Kentucky Fried Whatsit - where we heard the best English we've had yet), picked up our luggage and headed out to the border.
Now I've got "South of the border, down Mexico way" in my head, because indeed, we were heading south. What an anecdote.
The border crossing was relatively painless, however purchasing our Metro tickets on the other side was not. Unfortunately, the lowest denomination of note you could get from the ATM was 100 HKD (fair enough, really, that's about 20AUD), but the ticket machines didn't give change, and the line for the manual human-like ticket machines was exceptionally long.
So we waited.
And waited.
And eventually we got our tickets. We were possibly going from the furthest point on the metro to the other furthest point, and our trip was going to involve no less than four changes before we got to our destination. We'd already figured this out, but the lady at the counter also helpfully pointed this out, which was very nice, if redundant.
The metro system is very efficient, clean and cheap. It's a shame that Sydney's population isn't more centralised, which would no doubt warrant as good a metro system. I spent the time snickering quietly to myself all the rather unfortunate Cantonese station names (Mong Kok and Hung Horn stick in my mind), while Naz composed herself with dignity and maturity.
Eventually, we negotiated our path to Sheung Wan, and stepped out into the steamy streets of Hong Kong. Our hotel was not far away, so we went there first to drop off our bags.
The hotel is rather squashed but quite amazingly modern. Everything in the room could be controlled by the room's computer system which was accessed via the TV, and had a large range of on demand movies, music and other media beginning with M. Small though.
We had much to do, so we set off to do it. Yeah.
Our first stop was a wander to Hollywood Road, the purported street of Antiques. Much as I have a great love for Bargain Hunt, antiques weren't our goal. This was Man Mo Temple, a seemingly inconspicuous little red building, which Naz had picked out as noteworthy because of the wonderful photo of spiralling incense sticks that graces the inner cover of Hong Kong Lonely Planet. We didn't get such a nice photo, but we did get lots of incense smoke in our eyes, and wandered our way blearily through the inside.
Our next stop was the world's longest undercover escalator. In fact, the escalator is split into many small escalators, but it's apparently possible to make your way halfway up Victoria Peak just on escalators. This took us through Hong Kong's SoHo (short for "SOuth of HOllywood Road"), which is a very nice area full of delicious sounding restaurants, all, at this time, bedecked in Halloween motifs. Halloween is a particularly exciting time in Hong Kong, apparently.
Once we'd reached the top of the escalator, we were aiming to take a vague course across the slope of the mountain to the funicular which would take us to the very summit of the peak. This involved a wonderfully weird walk through the pedestrian overpasses which complement the roads in Hong Kong, but seemingly follow their own devious path that bears no resemblance to the proper layout of streets. It was quite fun (and would have been more fun if not for my aching feet), to wander through the maze of little bridges and stairways.
Eventually, we found the funicular - the second stop up the mountain, as it happened, and managed to get on and grab the very front of the train - meaning we had an unfettered view up the mountain.
The funicular is steep - incredibly so. So much that (standing as we were), I was balancing my weight more on the walls than the floor at certain parts of the journey. So much that the central aisle of the carriage is blessed with horizontal stairs for when the track gets too steep.
Anyway, we reached the top of the track without the funicular wire snapping and sending us plunging to our deaths, and went out to view the vista over Hong Kong.
Directly above the funicular station is a rather large, commercial, and tourist-orientated shopping centre, where it's possible to climb to the roof for a large-amount-of-money-worthy panoramic view. We preferred the view from outside Burger King, and once we negotiated out way out of the shopping centre, we preferred the free view you got from one of the walking tracks.
It is, no doubt quite a spectacular view, and despite the smog which was hanging over the city (as, we're told, it often does), we had a pretty clear view over to Kowloon.
But vistas aside, we had things to do, so we joined the queue to get the next train down the hill.
We had a wander (always across the hills, because I had a fear that any descent would involve an ascent in the near future - Hong Kong is a very hilly city after all) towards the street famed for its bars, where we thought we might be able to procure some lunch.
In fact, we came upon Hong Kong's only microbrewery, or at least its outlet, which served very mediocre beer, but delicious chicken burgers, which made me happy enough.
I feel this was all part of Naz's devious plan, because after filling me up with beer and chicken she guided me swiftly to Prince Edward, a section of Kowloon with a large array of (you guessed it) wedding shops. She was mainly looking for jewellery here, although she was checking out the dresses on sale around the place too. This wasn't too bad, because the shopping centre was air conditioned, and I've found myself sweating heavily anywhere vaguely near the tropics. She didn't buy anything though...
After this we went for a walk through Kowloon, making our way towards a different line of the Metro. Our meandering path took us through many themed markets, including a street entirely dedicated to goldfish and aquarium paraphernalia, the flower market and a garden which during the day is apparently rife with owners bringing their caged birds for a walk. It was unfortunately deserted, although there was a pretty packed game of football going on in the nearby stadium. We could just see part of the southern corner, which wasn't central enough to the action to warrant us staying there.
Eventually we reached Mong Kok East station, and took the train south to East Tsim Sha Tsui, where after some confusion in the shopping centres which seem to pop up everywhere in Hong Kong, we reached the Avenue of the Stars, and the nightly Light Show over Hong Kong Harbour.
The light show involves a large number of the office buildings around the harbour (on both Kowloon and Hong Kong Island) setting up spectacular light shows, which projects spotlights across the water, spray laser light into the heavens, or run glistening colours up and down the sides of their buildings. This is all set to rather wonderful symphonic synthpop - I wish I could get the soundtrack. And to cap it all, there was a pleasant breeze off the harbour, so I felt like this was the cap of a very pleasant day.
We caught the old Star Ferry back from Kowloon to Hong Kong island, which was a nice way to travel across the harbour, and eventually rambled our way back to our hotel, this time via another set of rather expansive pedestrian bridges.
What a packed full day. I was exhausted, and would have gladly gone straight to sleep if not for Naz wanting me to listen to her new favourite Robbie Williams song.
Le sigh.
Got up, it was raining, went to breakfast at weird western place. Then headed to the bus stop.
Caught the bus we thought was right, but on the bus, it was obviously going the wrong way. Got off at the next stop. Waited there for about 45m, for the free bus supposedly took us to Reed Flute Cave.
It didn't arrive. So we caught a random bus to the "Crossroads", because the No 3 bus also went to Crossroads and Reed Flute Cave. Unfortunately, we couldn't find a No. 3 bus stop. Despite looking everywhere.
Went for a walk, found that a pretty important bridge was closed down. Boo. We decided that this was probably stuffing up all of the bus routes, so grabbed a taxi.
In the taxi we passed numerous Number 3 buses. Oh well, we got to Reed Flute Cave anyway.
Here we paid our admission, and then followed the very confusing Chinese signs to Reed Flute Cave, which ended up leading us to the administration block, where we wandered around for a while. Don't get me wrong, there was something really quite monumentally enthralling about the administration block, but we did still want to see the cave.
Eventually, we found our way to the right place (who would have thought that just following the largest path with all the tourists on it would have got us there.
We had a fair bit of a line to get in (along with a bunch of flag-waving tour guides), but eventually we arrived in the mouth of the cave.
Let's not kid ourselves - the Reed Flute cave has some pretty impressive stalactic formations. But it is probably the most heavily commercialised caves I've ever been to. For a start, everything is lit in lurid neon lights which cast a rather chemical green glow over the flat concreted path.
I also feel is says something about the Chinese character that the thing that got the tourists oohing the most was the laser-light-show put on in the central cavern every fifteen minutes. Monumental natural structures of stone, which have accrued over hundreds of thousands of years? Eh, take it or leave it. Flashing lights!! Ooh, give me more.
Anyway, all craziness aside, the laser show was actually pretty cool, and it did have a nice location to work with. I just thought it was blatantly unnecessary.
But a nice cave, but I'd rank Jeita Grotto above it, along with both Postojna and Skocjan in Slovenia.
After exiting the cave, we stumbled out in the rain for a bit along the tracks around the area, and eventually wended our way back to the road, where a Number 3 bus was promised to come.
In fact, this road was a little way off from the "main road", as much as there are main roads in the outskirts of small Chinese cities, so we decided to wander along a way until we hit something a little more promising.
Unfortunately, this involved having a bus drive past us on the way, but we did get to another bus stop promising the earthly delights of Guilin's Number 3 Bus. Here we stood in the rain dripping for a while until lo and behold a bus pulled up, we shoved our money in their little slotted box, and joined in the fun.
This bus deposited us back in central Guilin, where we went for a walk along the shores of its small lake, which is a nice public area, and despite the rain, and my (by now) slippery shoes, we had a pleasant walk.
We eventually arrived at two tall Pagodas situated on the water, one of which is (wait for it) the tallest pagoda in the world which is made out of bronze (wearing that hat).
After some photos, we headed out and away to Elephant Trunk Hill, a formation of rock that looks like an Elephant's Trunk. It delivers what it promises at least. In fact, we didn't want to pay the rather silly prices to stand on the actual riverbank and see the hill, so we just stayed above on the pavement and took some photos through the trees, which have no doubt been cultivated to make it difficult to see the hill without paying the silly prices to stand on the actual riverbank.
inhale.
Anyway, after that we caught another bus (this was, after all, our most adventurous day on the wild Chinese public transit system), up to Seven Stars Park, a rambling garden of hills, cultivated vegetation and Guilin's creatively aromatic river.
We took a vaguely arbitrary route through the gardens, at first following the river, which lead us through some old buildings, and some stone arches before depositing us squarely at a dead end, meaning our already stretched time was going to include a long walk retracing our steps.
We went for a bit more of a wander, finding some rather tame monkeys climbing around - this was something that thrilled me, but the Chinese seemed to regard them with the disdain that an Australian would regard park pigeons.
The gardens were quite nice all up, and we could have probably spent a bit more time than we did here. But it was time to vamoose, so we headed off, and wandered lazily back to our hotel, over a garishly lit bridge, and through some more "genuine" streets of Guilin.
We got the guys at our reception (eventually) to write down for us "Please take us to the Airport Bus Office" in Chinese, picked up our sacks, and headed out to find a taxi. None of the taxis directly at the door of our hotel were willing to take us (obviously it was too small a fare), so we had to try and flag one down. Unfortunately, we kept changing our mind as to where was the best place to grab one, so kept crossing the street, or changing directions, only to have a taxi arrive very quickly where we had just left.
Eventually we got one, he read the scrawled Chinese, and nodded, put the meter on and we were off.
We managed to get on an airport bus with little drama, although the little performance we got as a human shield was put across the snarling Guilin traffic, so our bus could merge in was quite amusing.
Guilin airport was... forgettable. In that nothing in particular has stuck in my mind about my time there.
We got our flight anyway, despite the lack of obvious features of the airport, this time on China's "most profitable" airline, China Southern Airlines. I don't know if it's just me, but being the "most profitable" airline doesn't really strike me as a selling point for your customers.
Anyway, we survived the constant ads they put on during the flight and arrived in Shenzhen. Here we were placed on a bus into the city, which apparently took us almost completely to our hotel.
In fact, it took us to the wrong side of the railway station, so we took a long walk through the darkened rubbish-strewn streets of this border town to get around to our hotel. Our hotel room was exceptionally weird, shaped as it was into a big rounded corner of the hotel. It just felt like it had an awful lot of empty space.
Anyway, as you might well imagine we were spent for the evening, so it was off on the sleepytime train to the land of nod. Choo choo, everybody.
It pains me that we seem to be doing so much travel on organised tours on this holiday, but China seems to be very much set up for bus groups. This is mostly due to the domestic travellers, as far as I can tell - Chinese tourists don't just bus around Australia, they do the same thing in their own country. The problem is that there's very little middle ground when it comes to transportation - you are either part of a group (put on your sticker, follow the red flag), or you headbutt the language barrier at full speed, and attempt to take the local transport.
This particular journey from Yangshuo to Longji was likely to involve three changes, so we paid for the coach to drive us all the way there.
Of course, once you're on a tour, you're stuck on a particular schedule, along with the large number of other people crammed onto your bus. In this instance, we were gently pushed into paying an extra 50 yuan for a cultural show at a village at the foot of the mountains. We weren't much up for that so said screw it and decided to make our own way from there.
We walked along the road for about a kilometre until we reached the start of the mountain ascent, where everyone gets unloaded from coaches and reloaded into minibuses which can negotiate the winding paths better. Our tour guide had told us that it wasn't possible for us to go on our own because the minibuses only go when there's a coach of people to take. (She said also that all the parts of the mountain we weren't visiting on the "official" tour were bad because there would be many people forcing us to buy things and hassling us - and honestly, I'm pretty sure the hassling sellers are likely to be where the supply of bus-driven tourists is going to be).
Anyway, for the first little while we were worried that our tour guide was actually right, that it wasn't possible to get up the mountain unless we were with the group. No one seemed particularly keen to take us up (despite the fact we had cold hard Chinese currency with which to pay). We tried to sneak onto a minibus with another tour group (where the tour guide slammed the door in our face), and our attempts to flag down passing cars for a hitchhike went unnoticed, or ignored.
We were about to concede that we'd have to wait until the show had finished and our bus turned up, when a little local minibus showed up packed with local Chinese folk. We pointed up the side of the mountain, said "Ping An? Ping An?", got some nods in the affirmative and so jumped aboard.
The ride up the mountain was hair raising at times. Not only is the road narrow and winding, and mostly next to a precipice, but on a number of occasions we were forced to swerve violently to avoid oncoming traffic. This didn't seem too bad (after all, we've never had a crash yet), until we went up a bit further and saw a bus crashed, tipped over the edge and leaning up against a rock outcrop, and (separately) saw a minivan smashed into the side of the truck. We just held on tight and made it to the top though.
Once there we went to make our way to the terrace lookout points. Unfortunately, we were accosted at the main entrance and asked for our tickets. A small amount of English was to hand for the ticket inspectors, and we managed to explain that we're with a group, but that we'd gone on ahead. They said we'd have to wait for our bus, and we said "nuh uh", and started walking up the hill. They said something after that but it was lost to the wind, and they didn't really bother following us. There's a trip for you Longji Rice Terrace visitors - say you're with a bus tour and you can avoid the entry fee. What a horrible thing to say. We had paid our fees after all.
On our tour, we were supposedly going to the second of the two main lookouts at Ping An, colourfully named Seven Stars Accompanying the Moon Lookout. We decided, as we had more time, we'd do a long loop around via Lookout One as well, entitled Nine Dragons and Five Tigers Lookout. This took us on a winding path through Ping An village (we got lost on numerous occasions, but the locals were always able to poiont us in the direction of Lookout One), and up the side of the larger of the two peaks.
All around us on the ascent we were surrounded by the square outlines of the terraces, looming out of the mist. I say mist, because it sounds more romantic - what I actually mean is smoke and pollution. But the terraces are undeniably cool. In order to live, you need rice, and to grow rice, you need standing pools of water. If you happen to live on the side of the mountain, water tends to flow downhill a lot, so the solution is to create terraced steps cut into the side of the mountain in which you can let water pool.
It's quite a unique landscape - like some great graphic designer has reached down and pixelated the curvature of the mountain.
After a long hike, and some breathless moments, we reached the apex of the nine dragons and five lions mountain, and got a great view over the curving contour lines of the terraces. I note that we were far from being harrassed - at the top of the hill is a single house where a little old lady lives who offered me tea. Hardly much of a tout.
From here we were heading across a slight saddle to the top of the adjacent ridge. We trod our way along the flagged path, which was at this stage starting to get a little wet and treacherous with rain and mud, and wound our way around the mountain until we got to lookout point number two.
I will admit that the view from here was much better than from number one. But there were also far more tourists (we had No. 1 to ourselves), and it was much more built up with souvenir shops on the way too. Still, there were some nice vistas looking over the water-filled terraces and over the roofs of the village.
We had calculated that we were likely to be at Number 2 Lookout about the same time as our tour group, but we weren't certain (and had rushed a little on our way from Number 1, to make sure we were here on time). When we saw no one at the lookout who we remembered from our trip, we decided we should check. We asked around the Chinese tourists to find if anyone had a mobile we could use (our roaming somehow stuffed up, so we are bereft of phone). A nice Chinese man lent Naz his phone (and wouldn't even take money to pay for the call), and we rang the tour guide, managing to glean that they'd just finished lunch. Sure enough, we soon after bumped into some guys from our bus, and decided to follow them until it was time to go.
That was about the end of our adventures for today - but it was definitely worth getting away from the tourist track and up to the less popular lookout. The fact we got some time to explore by ourselves, and without a great gaggle of tourists, meant that walking away from the group was the best decision we've made today.
The trip down the mountain seemed longer than we remember, but the guys at the ticket gate didn't recognise us, or at least, didn't come storming over to us again to get us to pay, so we managed to board a minibus (an officially sanctioned, safe-for-tour-groups one this time), and headed down the winding road back to our coach.
We ate our snacks when we got back to the bus (for the record, Piquancy Flavoured chips are great), and then set off to Guilin where we were set to alight. I had intended to snooze on the bus, but they were playing Children of the Silk Road as the on-board movie, which kept grabbing my attention as it's mostly in English and I was familiar with the story. So I watched the movie instead.
We were deposited somewhere in Guilin (near the train station), but taxis in the city are cheap and plentiful (if not blessed with English speaking drivers), so after a couple of false starts, we were able to flag one down who would take us where we wanted to go on the meter. Helpful note: having printed out Chinese instructions on how to get to a hotel is a must in such Anglophone-poor situations.
We stayed at the same hotel as we had on our previous visit to Guilin, although this time we were unable to get a booking online so were paying full-price, walk-in-off-the-street rates.
A shame.
We had breakfast at a little restaurant on one of the cobbled Yangshuo streets (mueslix and French toast for Naz, a chicken burger and fries for me), before finding a place to hire us out a scooter.
Any regular reader of my travel journals will remember the fun I had scootering around Cappadocia last year - and this looked like a good way to get around where we wanted to go today. We found a shop just down from our hotel which provided that particular service, and we managed to get an electric scooter, powerful enough to carry two people, for $15 for the day. Nice deal, we thought.
I do have to say that the traffic in China (even the relatively peaceful Yangshuo) is pretty hairy, and I didn't much like the fact that the scooter only had the power to get to about 22 km/h. It meant that darting out and away in front of buses wasn't a really good option.
We drove out of Yangshuo and up the Yulong river, a tributary of the Li, which is mostly farmland surrounded by those wonderfully grotesque mountain shapes. I also gleaned a huge amount of satisfaction from freewheeling the scooter down the hills and watching the charge-meter read that I was actually recharging the battery by doing so.
The scenery was very nice, and despite being rural and a rather poor area, the place is very clean and well maintained - from the cropped, neat sheaves of harvested rice to the swept pathways. And driving along the valley floor with these mountains all around is a very pleasant experience.
Finally, we headed out to Yangshuo's Water Cave, caves being a particular drawcard for Naz, and hence for both of us.
We got to Only Non-Fake Yangshuo Water Cave Ticket Office (Number 2), bought our tickets, locked up our scooter, and headed on their rumbling minivan out on the judderring road to the cave.
Here, we changed into swimmers, picked up some non-slip shoes, and were whisked away by punt into the depths of the cave. In fact, the entrance is pretty cool - from the outside, the cave is almost hidden - you have to slide under a very low ceiling of rock before the cave starts to open out in front of you.
As you can well imagine, we're fast becoming quite the aficionados of caves, and we can say with some authority that this was a pretty cool cave. It's a live cave, so it had plenty of growing stalagmites, the atmospheric drip of water, and lots and lots of cool rock formations. It perhaps didn't quite meet the variety of limestone shapes as Lebanon's Jeita Grotto, nor the raw brooding power of Slovenia's Skocjan caves, but it was very good all the same. I do believe though, that this one had more recognisably shaped rock formations; for example, when our guide pointed out the turtle rock, the Lady Washing Her Hair, or the Erect Penis, they actually looked pretty believable. I'm not kidding about him pointing out penis shaped rocks either.
One of the main attractions of the water cave, is the fact that you can go bathing in their mud pool. This was something we were well prepared for, so when the time came, I stripped down to my Speedos and jumped in. Unfortunately, I wasn't quite prepared for how cold it was - for some reason I had imagined that cave-mud came at a pleasant bath-temperature.
Floating in the mud was a weird experience. The mud is thin, and watery near the surface, but becomes thick, dense anad viscous the deeper you go. This means it's incredibly easy to float in, and incredibly difficult to manouevre yourself around once you've got great sucking gobs of it attached to your skin. It was, for example, much easier to float here than in the Dead Sea, famous for its buoyancy.
There is something wonderfully luxurious about coating yourself in mud - as any pig, or wealthy day-spa frequenter will tell you. They even had a carved mud slide that you could slip youur way down. Unfortunately, this just gave me a wedgie, grazed my buttocks and filled my Speedos with great gobs of mud. But you know - if you haven't finished a day with mud down your undies, it just hasn't really been a good day, right?
I should also make note of the little kiosk they have set up deep under the ground near the mud pool, where a bank of computers is available to preview and print out photos of you wallowing in the mud. China's a weird place.
We had a cold shower to wash the majority of the thickening mud off, then headed back out to civilisation.
Another bone-juddering ride later and we were back at our scooter. We took a meandering tour back to Yangshuo, returned the bike, had a shower (where we divested our clothes of their remaining mud), and headed out to dinner.
Dinner was at one of Yangshuo's cafes. There's no particular need to remember which one, as they are all practically identical. I had spicy Sichuan chicken, which didn't lie about the spicy, given it came looking like a plate of dried chillies garnished with chicken. I also had a thoroughly unpleasant Chinese beer. Feel free to skip Liquan Draught beer. It was quite easily one of the worst beers I've had in my life.
We were treated to a performance by a musician playing one of those bowed single-stringed Chinese instruments, who was exceptionally good - he certainly put the guy who plays the same instrument in the big tunnel at Sydney Central station to shame. He was so good I almost unsolicitedly gave him some money. Almost. That's how good he was.
After dinner, we wandered back through the pleasant Yangshuo streets, before we booked our trip to the Longji Rice Terraces tomorrow and retired for the night. Naz headed to sleep - I had journal entries to catch up on. At least now, it's time for sleep for me too.