Sleek Hong Kong: The Departed

© Joselito Briones

Just so you won't get the impression that Hong Kong is all old and monotonous, here's a photo of one of the best buildings there, in Admiralty. It's already an icon in Hong Kong, of course, the Bank of China, by I. M. Pei. The best time to look at it is the early evening in Autumn, when the sky is clear and deep blue, there's no fog, and you can see the lines clear and sharp all the way to the top.

As this is the last Hong Kong image I'll be showing you for a while, I'll just write here something else that Hong Kong is famous for. Movies! Action movies to be exact. Okay, fine, it's not about a Hong Kong movie, but something based on one.

The movie, of course, is "The Departed", based in Hong Kong's 2002 critically acclaimed thriller "Infernal Affairs".



And what a movie! The cast was excellent, especially Mark Wahlberg and his filthy-mouthed character. Jack Nicholson just cruised through it, like it's all fun and play for him. Matt Damon adopted his inscrutable poker-faced persona in the "Bourne Identity" franchise, and even Leonardo di Caprio, who showed teen-level angst in what is meant to be a grown-up role, managed to project a bit of grit in his eternally pre-pubescent voice. The star of the movie though, no question asked, is director Martin Scorsese. The way he constructed the twists and plots was the work of a true master. It was also great that, in what I assume other people would see as plot holes, instead of spoon-feeding us, the audience, with every details, he let us figure things out for ourselves. Ok fine, there are still holes in the plot, but who cares! The tension was unrelenting in the whole movie, there was no chance to think of inconsistencies - until the next day when you've had about 24 hours to mull things over.

I'm not even putting a synopsis here. Go watch it, it's great!


XXX

Ein Brief

© Joselito Briones

Erlangen, den 30.11.2006

Lieber James,

vielen Dank für deinen netten Brief. Du hast richtig gehört, ich wohne jetzt in Deutschland. Die Stadt, wo meine Wohnung ist, heißt Erlangen. Diese Stadt is nördlich der Gegend, wo die Leute Lederhosen zu tragen lieben. Ja, ich lebe in Bayern.

Erlangen ist eine schöne Stadt, aber zu klein. Es gibt kein kino für Filme auf Englisch. Es gibt auch kein Geschäft mit dem A3 Fotopapier.

Die Leute hier sind nett, aber manchmal gibt es auch hässliche, alte Damen in den Geschäften. Ich glaube, sie sind wirklich unzufrieden mit ihren Männern. Sie sind ganz, ganz unfreundlich.

Meine wohnung liegt in einem roten Haus, das Gebäude ist sehr modern. Du musst mich besuchen.


Herzliche Grüße,

dein Joselito

XXX


Yep, another homework sent to you. My Lehrerin, Aline, has corrected the mistakes I made in the text.

The photo is of a house, right in front of the building where I live. It will soon be demolished, to be replaced by a new multi-family building, similar to ours.


XXX

Filipino Food

© Joselito Briones

This is something I see everytime I go to my German class - a Siemens building, an annex to the tallest one in the neighborhood, that is used as company canteen. I always like to peep in to see what sort of things they cook there, there's always a few white-hatted employees visible from the street, busy preparing enormous amounts of food. I like the building's horizontality and openness, it reminds me of the pictures of modern buildings in architectural books that I used to browse through in uni.


XXX

I was browsing through magazines when I saw this mention of a new cookbook, from one of my favorite restaurants in New York, "Cendrillon". The book is called "Memories of Philippine Kitchens" (Stewart, Tabori & Chang). Can't wait to see the more than 100 recipes inside.


XXX

Berlin Revisited (Literally)

© Joselito Briones

As last time I was here, it's dark. Only now it's cold and raining too. Argggghhh!!!


XXX

Hearst HQ

© Joselito Briones

I was browsing through magazines and saw a full-page photo of this building, so I thought I'd show you my version of it, taken early this year.

The building is the Hearst Corporation Headquarters, in 8th Avenue and West 57th Street in Manhattan, designed by Sir Norman Foster.


XXX

Old Manhattan pictures

© Joselito Briones

When I saw "The Devil..." last night, I realized how much I miss living in New York. There was a scene in the beginning when the main character bought something from a bakery and started eating it, while walking, and in the subway, on the way to work. I just blurted "That's me!" in the cinema... I used to buy "everything bagel" with cream cheese extra and coffee from a shop in 48th and Broadway, close to where I used to live, and have my breakfast while walking south along Broadway, past Times Square. I was usually done by the time I reach 40th. I worked in 37th. The story in the movie pretty much took place within this stretch of blocks.

© Joselito Briones

Anyway, I dug up some old pictures and posted them, both in my photography site and in flickr, here they are. The one on top was taken in Midtown, close to the Carnegie Deli (remember that one?) and the other one, in the bottom, was taken in Central Park, looking south.


XXX

Yet another old building

© Joselito Briones

This one's right next to the Asian grocery where I buy Thai vegies.


XXX

An old building

© Joselito Briones

An old building by the city center, in Erlangen.


XXX

More from the recent B/W batch

© Joselito Briones

I like the way that the tones came out on this one.


XXX

Photo Finish

© Joselito Briones

I could've spent my last day in New York just relaxing and waiting for the time for me to go to the airport. Instead, I spent it literally running around in Manhattan with Eric, who decided to do a hooky today (I'm sure if he had known how today would turn out, he'd have gone to work instead).

I had two last things to take care of before leaving, to go to the bank to inquire about an erratic letter that I got from them, and to go to a notary public to get some documents sealed and faxed. An optional thing I was going to do was to take photos of 1 Astor Place, a project I worked on while working for Ismael Leyva Architects.

A friend, who shall remain anonymous due to his refusal to make public the fact that he's indulging my materialistic side, gave me a digital camera (WOO HOO!) last night for my forthcoming birthday, so I thought, what better way to break it in than to do the optional photo-taking in Astor Place. The memory card that came with the camera was too small though, so I decided to get a bigger one at J&R today. Before we left, I received an email from Mati with a couple of purchase requests for kids in Germany: a pair of trainers and a Knicks cap, with instructions as to where to get them. So a to-do list of 2 items within 2 blocks of where Eric lives became a 6-stop task all over the place. And we had a maximum of 2.5 hours to do everything.

First stop. The bank. Fast walk. Non-conclusive. I was advised to check the internet for answer. 10 minutes

Second stop. Fast walk. Notary public. Everything went fine. 15 minutes

Third stop. J&R. It took 40 minutes just to get there by subway, running to and from the station. Ended up buying a leather case and extra battery for the camera in addition to the memory card. 55 minutes

Fourth stop. Astor Place (Cooper Square). Subway. Missed the stop and ended up in Union Square because I was too busy installing the new card in the camera. Had to take another train back one stop. Running at this point. Click. Click. One photo above. 25 minutes

Fifth stop. Urban wear/shoe store in 34th Street, as specified in the email. Took the subway again. They don't have the shoes, nor the Knicks cap. The sales clerk looked at the photo of the trainers (I printed Mati's email) and looked at me incredulous, as if to say, "Why the hell would we sell such shoes?!?!?". I tried to defend myself by saying that the shoes are not for me, but he wouldn 't hear any of it. He spoke politely though and said they don't carry this brand. 15 minutes

Last stop. NBA store, 5th Avenue. Took the subway. Ran 3 blocks. Ran into Dermot Mulroney. Stared for about 5 seconds, but only because he was staring back, as if to say, "Well, either say you recognize me so just go ahead and ask for my autograph already, otherwise go on along and don't look at me all disappointed because I'm not shaven and my hair is not fixed and you can see all my gray hair and gray beard stubble". I did the latter. I looked back and saw him cover his head with a beanie. Store didn't have the shoes either, nor the Knicks cap. They had lots of Knicks cap, but not the one in the picture. "Must be exclusively an online product from our store", clerk said. 20 minutes

Grabbed a couple of sandwiches and drinks on the way to the subway to go back to Eric's. We were both running and panting and sweaty at this point. Subway took some time. When we got off the train we ate the sandwiches (either they were really good or we were really really hungry) while running to get back to his apartment. 25 minutes

Okay, so we weren't able to do everything in the alloted time, but I think it was still good. I had to hurry collecting all my stuff so I won't be late getting to the airport. I was in such a rush that I wasn't even able to thank Eric properly, or say goodbye properly. I expected him to just give up at this point and be glad to get rid of me, but, good friend that he is, he walked me to the train station.


XXX

Service fit for Queens

© Joselito Briones

Turns out this hotel that we booked is really nice. It's called "The Balmoral Hotel", a 5-star hotel, pictured here. It's right on Princes Street, which is the main city center street of Edinburgh. It is very conveniently located in between the old city (castle and all) and the new (Georgian) part of the city where all the nice shops are (Harvey Nichols, etc.). Too bad sale season ended yesterday.

© Joselito Briones


XXX

What do you get when you google yourself?

I googled my name and one of the top entries was this... from 3 years ago. I'm surprised it's still online. It was a group effort, from when I was still working with Ismael Leyva Architects, in New York. And no, we didn't win the competition.

My online store, tenderware.com, is on top of the google list, and my online portfolio, branded.as is also there. Good to know that if someone wants to find me, all he gotta do is google me.

Anyway, I googled you, and was pleasantly surprised to find a picture of you in Trafalgar Square.


XXX