One my greatest disappointments in my life was seeing Highlander II. The first movie was a mystical epic that left out just enough for the imagination, and pre-teen me was thoroughly moved. It had a tremendous influence on my values and world-view. The second movie managed not only to be a really bad sequel. By revisiting the major themes in the first movie and answering the unanswered questions in a breathtakingly stupid way, it managed to defile the first movie to such an extent that your memories of the first one were irreversibly damaged.
Highlander II was a really shoddy movie. I do have to admit though, that there were aspects of it that were so stupid that they approached genius. For instance, the naming system. The evil corporation that provides an artificial shield over the sky to replace the damaged ozone layer is named: “The Shield Corporation”. The bar where our hero meets his future love-interest is called “Bar” and there’s a diner called “Diner”. Etc etc.
During my excursion into the old town of Chiang Mai yesterday, I found a pretty little bar called the Writer’s Bar & Restaurant. In Highlander II, this would be the location where the our meets the hungry author who will change his political views and finally accept his fate as the rightful ruler of the world. Imagine my surprise then when my neighbour at the next table turns out to be just that: a professional writer and aspiring disseminator of subversive political views! I’m sure it was rude of me, but I did point out the bizarreness of a writer in a Writer’s bar.
Although at the time it did feel quite natural, now in hind-sight it’s also kind of bizarre that the topic of our highly enjoyable conversation turned out to revolve aroud the proposal by AT&T to charge internet companies in the US different rates depending on their level of service. In Chiang Mai?
I am pleased to report that I’m getting better and better at not using the level of my voice as a substitute for a good argument. Unfortunately, I did notice another worrying habit- I tend to bring up obscure concepts as-a-matter-of-fact, intentionally to make my counter-part worry that maybe they don’t know something everybody knows. Not good.
I'm attaching some cool pictures of Chiang Mai that I took with my camera phone. The first is of my finger and a Wat, a Buddhist temple. These are all over the place, some of them big temples, some small cupboards. Buddhism permeates Thai daily life, and I've noticed the locals can't pass these buidlings without nodding to them in a respectful way.
Second pic is of the moat surrounding the old town of Chiang Mai. I live outside of the moat, and the Writer's cafe is inside the moat. You can see some remains of a city wall on the right. Chiang Mai is an old capital, and apparantly there was lots of wars going around here back in the days. Funny how these former defensive structures are now reduced to lovely additions to the city-scene.
I also passed these "Three Kings". They looked impressive to me, but when I got back home I noticed none of my tourist guides mention them in any way. So they're just, you know, these three kings hanging around looking all imposing. Thought you might like them...
