Computing

I am just waiting for my old slow computer to finsh printing a PDF of a 26 page drawing package from Autodesk Design Review 2010.
It is taking forever, so I am playing Bejeweled Blitz for Facebook on my iPhone.
Hopefully I will be able to work again soon.


-- Posted from my iPhone

Travel

I am sitting at the lounge at LAX waiting to head back to Singapore for the next 3 weeks. While I am really enjoying the project and I really like the team I am working with, I am really over being away from Seth, the cat and my house and friends.
Hopefully the next 3 weeks will go by quickly. Then I get about 2 weeks home and then I will be back in Singapore for 3 months with no beaks.
Definitely glad to be working, but bummed to be away from home.


-- Posted from my iPhone

Bitching

I want a new computer.
I want internet that works at a normal speed in Singapore.
I want to sleep in my own bed.
I want to cook on my own stove in my own house.
I want to NOT be living outof a hotel room!
I want iTunes not to hang up in the middle of my movie.
I want this damn project to be over!
I just want to keep bitching!

Blahg Blahg Blahg

Blog blog blogity blog


-- Posted from my iPhone

Home

At dinner a colleague asked me the following question:
If you could be anywhere in the world right now where would it be?
My answer was that I wanted to be at home sitting on the couch with Seth watching TV.
After talking for a minute and realizing that we have all been away from home for at least 3 months now the question wad rephrased to ask:
If you hadn't been away from home for so long where in the world you you want to be right now?
My answer to that was;
In Tuscany having dinner in a villa in a vineyard with Seth.
I really miss Seth right now.


-- Posted from my iPhone

Zombies v Mummies

Just goofing around the other day a bunch of my coworkers and I decided that a movie where zombies battle mummies would be cool as hell.


-- Posted from my iPhone

Mythology II

For me the whole religion/god thing is an all or nothing deal.
I mean either everyone's god(s) exist or no one's god(s) exist.
A few basic premises (from my point of view):
First: the gods did not create us in their images. We create the gods in OUR image. Well, most of them anyhow.
Second: Gods have a life span (as do religions - but that's another thing altogether for another time). Look back through time. Take the caveman (or cave woman) sitting in the dark painting images of animals on the walls. I think the gods that are worshiped are born as simple things: woolly mammoths, wolves, clouds that create storms. They then begin to mature into animal-human hybrids (more animal than human), then they further evolve into human-animal hybrids (more human than animal). The next step is that they become entirely human (in form) and/or super-human (in size and abilities). The next step may be where we are right now: many of the old gods have been rolled up into one (or three) [at least in the Judeo-Christian-Muslim pantheons].
Third: I believe that the next evolution of gods is science. Scientists talk of finding a "god particle" and of over-arching theories that describe the universe (or multiverse) and its (their) internal workings. What difference is there between that and primitive man huddling in a cave trying to explain the thunder and lightning of the storm outside. I truly believe that religion and science will become one in the search for the creator(s); that string theory and tachyons and particle physics and quantum theory are the new gospels of an ever evolving religion.
Nuff said for now, methinks.

Mythology

Why is your god real and theirs isn't?

If you were able to go back in time and ask an Egyptian from 5000 years ago, or a Roman living under Caesar Augustus or a Spartan if their gods and goddesses were real and actually influenced the world they would believe as strongly and argue just as hard as a current day Christian, Muslim or Hindu. We look back and name these older and extinct religions “Myths” and “Mythologies”. But, how do we know that they are not as valid (or as ridiculous) as any of the current religions on this planet? In another 1000 or 3000 years will that populace look back and consider the Christian faith or the Muslim beliefs to be mythologies and their various fables, stories and parables to be myths? Will the stories we tell now and the legends we currently hold become the new religions?

Light vs. Dark

In the U.S. we try to get darker. We bronze and tan and go to tanning salons and the beach and lay out. All in the name of getting that lovely golden brown glow to our skin. We have TV, radio and print ads all hawking things to make us darker.

In Singapore it is exactly the opposite. There are all kinds of ads on TV, in the newspaper, on the subway and buses selling products to make your skin lighter and whiter.

Just very interesting is all.

Wine Country - New Zealand Style

Seth and I spent the last few days of September and the first few days of October of 2009 in New Zealand visiting my in-laws - Meredith & Jerry and we had a great time.
We met up with them in Wellington where they are living for the year. We spent a couple of days hanging out in Wellington and then took a great 20 minute plane ride (in a small prop plane) over to Picton & Blenheim in the Marlsborough region of New Zealand wine country.
The best part of the plane trip over was that I got to sit in the co-pilot seat (so i guess I was God for about 20 minutes!) I have no idea how pilots actually take off and land as the "dashboard" must be 3 feet high with no possible way to actually see over it. It is a 3 foot tall by 6 foot long wall of dials, gauges & read out screens and it is cool as hell!
So we got into Picton early in the morning, rented a car and then headed into Blenheim to rent bikes to ride through wine country. We rented bikes at Wine Tours by Bike:
http://www.winetoursbybike.co.nz/

We hit 3 wineries and one brewery.
By the time we got on the bikes and got out to our first winery it was time for lunch. We started our Marlsborough tour at Allan Scott Winery (http://www.allanscott.com/ )where we had lunch and a glass of wine. I had a great penne with lamb and their Sauvignon Blanc and we ordered the rapsberry "cheesecake" and the blood orange creme brulee. (Cheesecake is in air quotes for a reason, but I'll explain about that at a later date.) The setting was quite nice. We sat out in a covered courtyard on these nice old wood slat tables and after lunch went into the tasting room to try some of their other wines. We tries a couple of their whites, one of their reds and their Blanc de Blancs (their Methode Traditionelle sparkling wine). The 2 that really stood out for me were the Sauvignon Blanc and the Blanc de Blancs. We then left Allan Scott and biked over to the brewery Moa (http://www.moabeer.co.nz/ )where we were met by the cutest little puppy ever. We did a sampling in their small but very charming tasting room/bar. The 2 young ladies behind the bar that were serving us did an exceptional job of pouring and describing the beers. They even let us know where we could get it in the States!
Once done there we biked over to the winery that makes m very favorite Sauvignon Blanc - Cloudy Bay (http://www.cloudybay.co.nz/Mainpage ). I actually fell in love with another of their whites while at the vineyard - their Te Koko white. (and this is saying a lot as I am generally a red drinker).
At this point we thought we were in pretty good shape. We had been biking most of the day and were not too tired. We felt that we had enough energy for one more vineyard. Well as we stared making our way from Cloudy Bay to our next destination the wind began to pick up an we spent the time riding from Cloudy Bay to Villa Maria biking into a pretty strong wind. But we were well rewarded.
When we got to Villa Maria (http://www.villamaria.co.nz/ ). We got to Villa Maria and were pretty exhausted after fighting against a pretty strong headwind. We tried a couple of their whites, which I thought were pretty average, and then we tried their Pinot Noir and were richly rewarded. I was pleasantly surprised. I really think Villa Maria makes a pretty outstanding Pinot Noir and I would highly recommend it to anyone.
Once we finished at Villa Maria we returned out bikes and then headed back into Picton to via a scenic route that took us up into the hills of the sounds that surround Picton. We saw the most intense rainbow I have ever seen. It was a full rainbow and you could even see the most of the second rainbow above it. And the colors of the main rainbow were very intense, it was almost like a child''s drawing in terms of color intensity.
We then headed to check into the hotel, had a bit to eat at a charming Bistro in Picton. We all slept well that night and the next morning we caught a ferry back into Wellington. The ferry trip was a good 2-1/2 hours and took us through some of the most beautiful sounds in New Zealand.
Overall the trip to New Zealand wine country was amazing and I can't wait to do it again and see more of Marlsborough.
For pictures from our trip check out the photos I have online at Picassa:
http://picasaweb.google.com/KevinCardani/WineCountryInNewZealand#

Cheers

How Do You Create?

I have started thinking about how people in creative fields get their ideas from inside their heads and out into/onto their chosen medium(s).
This has led me to the following quetsions:
How do you create?
How does an idea start in your head?
How do you get that idea out of your head and into/onto your medium?
Where do your richest/strongest/most intense ideas come from?
How do your ideas germinate?
Is this line of questioning ruining your creative process?

People I would like to ask this question of:
Jimmy Pickering
Craig Hanna
Joss Whedon
Zane Jensch
Jeremy Railton
Dave Cobb
Sam Lundquist
David Wally
Tim Burton
Neil Gaiman
Gwen Ballantyne
Robbie Williams
Annie Lennox
Kevin Smith
J. Michael Strascynski
Steve Olson
Scott Zuber
Scott Sinclair
John Barone
Alex Ross
Bill T Jones
The Pilobolus guys
Chuck Lorre
Eric Parr
Dave McKean

Man Shoveling Water

This video shows a guy shoveling water into a wheel barrow in order to move it to some other location on site.

This way of working is pretty common here. You see people working on the latest high tech modern buildings, but working in a very old fashioned, simple straightforward way.

I don't yet know what it all means, but it IS pretty interesting.

That's all I got for now.

Ciao.

WETA Cave

Seth and I spent a week in New Zealand visiting my sister-in-law and brother-in-law, Meredith & Jeremy Moreno.
While we were there we got to go to the WETA Cave.
http://www.wetanz.com/cave/
WETA is the place where Peter Jackson and company created the props, models, costumes & effects for the Lord of the Rings trilogy, King Kong and a number of other films & TV shows.
WETA Cave is pretty cool, even though it really is mainly a gift shop that also has a 20 minute video on a large flat screen TV. The video talks about the history of WETA and the people there who create the effects and what not. The Cave is in what looks like a large house in a sort of combination warehouse park & suburb. There are a few other soundstages & warhouses that are industry related in the area.
Unfortunately, but for obvious IP sensitive reasons, they really cannot do a full tour of the facilities. So, while it's got some pretty cool props, artwork, maquettes et cetera, it really is just a gift shop.
Nonetheless we had a grea time. To see more images from our trip and our visit to the WETA Cave check out my pictures on picassa at:
http://picasaweb.google.com/KevinCardani/WETACave#

Racist Bastard

Okay. So I am in Sinagpore and really haven't been following the news back home (crazy busy art directing this project and all doesn't leave much time for news watching) but this whole interracial marrige fiasco is ridiculous.
My only comment to this is:
I don't care what excuse that bastard of a justice of the peace gave for his decision - he is a racist bastard and should be removed from that office.
(And then run out of town and burned in effigy)

Nuff said.

One Night In Bangkok

I was in Bangkok on Wednesday of this past week.  Well, I flew in Tuesday evening, was a ATECH for a shop visit all day Wednesday and then I flew back to Singapore Wednesday evening.
It was all pretty much the same as the other 6 or 8 times I have gone to Bangkok in the past couple of months. However, this time when P (the driver from the vendor) picked me up to drive me to the hotel we took a slightly different route as traffic was pretty bad. We left the airport and for the first 45 minutes or so the trip was the same as usual along the freeway.  About 45 minutes into the 1 hour trip, the traffic got pretty thick, so P took an exit and we started to drive through the city on surface streets (and I will have to have a whole separate blog about the city of Bangkok itself).
At one point we turned down a side street or alley and I noticed what, at first, looked like a couple of grandparents and another older couple (though younger than the "grandparents") sitting at a table on the side of the road next to an abandoned building. I also noticed a couple of young ladies in very short shorts and low cut tops. Then I noticed a few more standing next to some run down (or abandoned) cars. I then realized that the whole alley was a hooker alley.
P, the driver, commented that they were all prostitutes. I said "Yes, I figured that. Are they all women or are some of them guys?"
He looked at me in the rear view mirror and asked "You are familiar with this?" in a sort of disbelieving tone. I explained that I had lived in New York City and that I now live in Los Angeles and that I had seen amny prostitutes and many transvestite or transsexual ones. He looked at me, again in the rear view mirror, and asked "You have prostitutes in America?" I explained that all of the major cities, and many smaller towns, had them. And that indeed most major cities and many small towns in every country in the world have them.
At this point we had pulled up to a very long stop light and while we were waiting for it to change he turned around and asked me: "Do you have beggars too?" and cupped his hands in the sort of universal motion of begging for money or food. I explained that, yes we do indeed have beggars in America, and many of them in the larger cities.
He made the comment "But you live in a civilized country?!?" as if asking a question and making a statement at the same time. He then shook his head and said, almost under his breath and sort of chuckling in dis-belief at the same time, "Beggars in America!". It was almost like the subtext of that thought or the continuation of it was "Hmmmmm, who knew?"
I think that I may have caused him to seriously re-think his ideas of our country or maybe even his world view.

Not What I Expected

Singapore really is the land of the unexpected. No matter how familiar I think something will be, it always turns out to be "...not what I expected...". Whether it is a toy museum or a chicken sandwich or Japanese ramen or a black & tan or "Hawaiian Pizza", it always seems to be 3 degrees to the left of what I thought it would be.
This seems to be the case with food, more than anything really, but it is also the case with other things.  I've had cab drivers refuse tips, wait staff that stands behind you, patiently & politely but not about to leave, until you pay the bill and "American Breakfast" that is, again, 3 degrees left of what we'd really eat back in the States.
It's all similar, but just different enough to make you really miss or crave some basic things from your life back home. It all ends up being more surreal due to the similarities, rather then the differences.
Anyway, just some thoughts for the evening.

Toy Museum in Singapore

Okay, so today I went with a number of co-workers to the Mint Toy Museum over by Raffles Hotel (the home of the Singapore Sling) in Singapore.

It's a very cool place. I have a number of friends who would be in heaven there (Zane & Dave Cobb to mention two).

The museum has some great, some wierd, some creepy and some down right racist toys from the past 80 years or so.

The place is divided into 5 floors:

Ground floor: cafe, shop & ticket sales

2nd floor: Collectables (Beatles, Monkees, Matchbox)

3rd floor: Childhood Favorites (Disney, Warner Bros., Etc)

4th floor: Superheroes & Characters

5th floor: Outer Space

We started at the top floor and worked our way down.

The place is pretty small. It's maybe 20 feet wide by 60 feet deep, so, each floor is really just a stairwell, a sort of hallway with shelves along one side, and then it opens up a bit to another type of display area.

It wasn't until we were down on the 3rd floor that I realized what the architects had done (see the video below):
Overall, the Mint Toy Museum was very interesting. I think that what was most notable was the repetition of toys within the variety displayed there. I know that sounds odd, but the best example is the tin toys. There must have been a thousand tin toys on one level, maybe several hundred per case, and within that case of several hundred there were, say, 15 or 20 tin elephants that were all from different countries, with different paint jobs, yet all from the same mold and having the exact same form. really, really interesting stuff.

I'll put together a Picassa album of this little adventure:
http://picasaweb.google.com/KevinCardani/MintToyMuseumSingapore#


Enjoy.

Dinner with Chuck

So, just got back from a great dinner with Chuck Spina at an Italian joint in Holland Village.

Holland Village is a little foodie neighborhood in Singapore about a 15 minute cab ride from the hotel. It's probably fairly touristy, but in a different way than the Clarke Quay area here where the Gallery Hotel is located. There are some pretty cool looking little restaurants, bars and shops there.

See the video above for a typical sign and the sort of typical flavor of the area. It's really a pretty neat little place here in Singapore.

I always enjoy having dinner with Chuck. He's a very interesting guy and works with some pretty fun people, so his stories about work and his job and his co-workers are fun to hear. And he is very excited that his wife and kids will be coming out to Singapore to visit for 2 weeks. They get here next weekend I believe. I'm sure they'll have a great time.

http://www.browhaus.com/

Work & Travel Abroad

I was thinking of titling this post "One Night In Bangkok", but I'll save that for another post.

Not a whole lot to report right now.

Let's see:

Sunday afternoon I flew to Bangkok on business (I'll have a whole post about that later, with pics & video and what not)

Monday I was at the fabrication vendor in Bangkok all day and I flew back late Monday night. I didn't truly get to sleep until about 1:30 am.

Tuesday I got up pretty darn early and had a VERY long day. I feel like I am way behind on things and I dropped the ball on one particluar thing I really needed to get done (and I am STILL not done with it yet. I hope to finish it this evening). The upside to the whole day was a fantastic dinner at Bella Pizza at Robertson Quay (again - I'll do a whole post on that later).

Today - got up late, but I had a pretty good day problem solving and (I hope) averting a couple of crises (and STILL not getting my project from the day before completed). I had a love futo-maki (spelling?) roll at a Japanese restaurant near the hotel with my colleague Adela. Talked to my folks on Skype. Now I am finishing this blog, working on some drawings and waiting for Seth to call me before I go to bed.

I think that's it for this one folks. See ya soon!

Mr. Curry Restaurnt in The Central @ Clarke Quay

This is a very typical food display for a restaurant in a mall.

In this case the restaurant is Mr. Curry Japanese Curry & Sweet House at The Central, a mall at the end of Clarke Quay.

Dysentery & Swollen Bug Bites

So, I have been in Asia for the past 6 weeks or so, based in Singapore with weekly trips to Bangkok, Thailand.
I must say that both Singapore and Thailand are truly amazing places. I must also say that they have things we just don't have in Los Angeles, both good and not so good.
Examples in Singapore: good: Mangostines, bad: small bugs that bite me and leave a puffy red swelling the diameter of a soda can
Examples in Thailand: good: beautiful temples, bad: dysentery
So: the backstory:
I am here in Singapore working as an Art Director for Jeremy Railton on 4 attractions at the new casino that is being built at Resorts World on Sentosa Island in Singapore. Our main fabrication vendor is based in Bangkok, Thailand.
I flew out to Singapore from Los Angeles at the beginning of August. I landed on a Tuesday, was at the site office on Wednesday and then flew to Bangkok on Thursday and then back to Singapore on Friday. I (unknowingly) drank the water and got dysentery. Luckily, it was  amild case and the doctor near our hotel (and the hotel is a whole 'nother blog in and of itself) immediately diagnosed me with dysentery and gave me antibiotics. So, I suffered through about 3 days of it, got the antibiotics and was all better about 5 days later. Jeremy was not so lucky. He also got dysentery and then flew back to the US, where it took his doctor about 2 weeks to get him all sorted and back to health.
So, that's the dysentery from Thailand story. Now for the puffy red bug bite story:
Part of my daily (well every other day-ly) routine is to go out to several of the attraction sites to review the current progress. Now, remember that we are essentially in a rain forest about 4 feet from the equator. This is hard to visualize as Singapore is now a large city that pretty much does a Disney Spray to keep the bugs to a minimum. However, the construction site that we work on has literally been carved out of the jungle.  Where the raw concrete and dirt end, the jungle begins (I'll dig up and upload some pics soon). So, between the jungle being very close, the fast that it rains regularly, is more huimd than Florida and there is a fair amount of standing water, bugs are pretty common. Now, I haven't really ahd any issues with the bugs other than a couple of mosquito bites. However, on my Thursday evening site walk with young Rob Palmer, I got bit about 3 times by a small bug that looked like a small black fly. I had a couple of mosquito bite looking bumps on my left arm and didn't think much of them until...I woke up Friday morning to several large red puffy areas on my hand, wrist and near my elbow. Over the course of the day they got redder, itchier and hotter. I didn't get off work in time to go to the local clinic by the hotel, so I waited until this morning.
In explaining to the doctor the whole bug bite and swelling thing, he looked at them and said that he knew what caused it (though he couldn't recall the name of the insect) and that I was lucky as sometimes the bites blister within minutes of the person being bitten. Well, I now have some anitbacterial cream and the swelling and itching and redness are going away.
So, for all the fun I am having working on this project and with my co-workers (again, another blog on them at a later date) I am running into some things that I would most likely never see back home.
On the up side, the food both in Singapore and Bangkok is AH-MAY-ZING!

Ciao

Blog #1 2009-09-12

Welcome to my blog.



This is the first of what I hope will become a weekly or even daily update. (I am the one on the right in red, Seth, my partner, is the one in blue on the left, and the kid is our nephew.)



I figure that, as I am doing some travelling for work right now, and since I have a lot of family and such who are NOT on Facebook, that this might be a goodway to keep people up on what's happening while I am travelling.



Once I am done travelling, we'll see what this turns into, but for now, it's going to sort of be a travel blog.