in pursuit of the perfect dumpling

wednesday night, downtown sydney with a hankering for dumplings. with the ubiquitous chinese obsession to throw pork into every possible dish in sight it's often a tough call to fight it out for the few vegetarian[ish] options on the menu which is what happened on our late night circuit.

all the passover fiends with a taste for chinese must've been out in force prior... even the alleged best dumpling house in the world had a choice of one. but it was delicious especially washed down with an ice cold asahi beer.

best dumplings in chinatown:

1. chinese handmade noodle [has fat fake grape vines hanging from ceiling]

thomas st, haymarket [next to dumpling king but not]

2. dumpling house [cheap & delicious but they run out fast of diff. varieties so get in early]

dixon st, haymarket

3. grand china room [yum cha menu heavenly fresh fresh fresh, no MSG]

top floor, market city complex, haymarket

4. din tai fung (hugely overrated but with cool seat coat covers -- try the cucumber salad & sesame icecream)
world square shopping centre, george st, haymarket

freaks, magnetic misfits & fiery juggernauts

what do the world's smallest tap dancing self-parodying woman, the sword swallower with surgically implanted magnets in his chest cavity & the largest multi-octave pyrophone ever seen capable of shooting fireballs into the air up to 15 metres high have in common?

answer = adelaide fringe festival. the annual season is now over but for lovers of the bent variety, the garden of unearthly delights is sure to hold similarly promised mystique in the many years to come.

a moral prohibition

in some countries it's still a punishable crime for women to seek termination for unwanted pregnancies. abortion is many other places is still considered a cultural & ethical crime.

82 women died last year in nicaragua because the practice is outlawed even if the woman's life is in danger & the women who tried to do so anyway subsequently haemorraged out their last breaths in a bloody shameful secreted-away heap.

the third world: it's a minimal existence: not enough money, food, housing, healthcare or opportunities to feed the already existing mouths & minds on demand whilst you're being ass-raped by major corporates (thankfully you can't conceive from that).

with recent reiteration by the catholic church on the world papal african tour that the use of condoms are a crime against god "a clear moral prohibition", illegal clinics not nearly as quaint as these pictured above from the 1950s in sydney will result in many more souls making their way to heaven: women & embryos, expulsed or not.

[photos courtesy of sydney justice & police museum]

on meds

icebergs. on bondi beach. instead of cough medicine, flanelette & bed. bloody marys are strangely restorative as is fine company, the view & fresh salty sea air.

mother/whore dichotomy grows leg [s]

as an ongoing part of my passion/research into femme fatales as iconic film characters, sunday saw me with fellow punk monks, ky & derm at sydney's justice & police museum where femme fatale: the female criminal exhibition draws to a close.

fab pulp covers & iconic poster art from the film noir era are juxtaposed with historic female criminal accounts through print & video installations. where mythology meets reality --> the vicious vixen & the fallen woman.

pictured above is eugenia falleni, no faye daunaway, she was known as the "man-woman" murderer. at the end of the 19th century she emigrated to australia from her native italy, disguised as a man: a ruse she continued all of her life [until incarceration].

in fact she was so good at it that with the aid of her enormous member [see pic] she went through two wives, one of whom she murdered along the way. it is unclear whether her true sexual identity was ever revealed to her former wives. it would seem they were left in the dark [and arguably rather well taken care of until their/her untimely departure].

drink [chinese] tea = yum cha

the ritualism of taking tea in china is long revered & deeply embedded into the national cultural history. originating in canton, yum cha combined the serious business of tea drinking with the grazing of small dishes, traditionally dim sum & dumplings. today it's an integral part of the social structure where east often meets west.

it is said that the custom commenced when an errant tea [camellia sinsesis] leaf flew into the emperor's boiling water cup around 3000 BCE. the rest is history.

what westerners call chinese tea actually refers to four main variants [white, green, oolong & black]: green being the most common. all types stem from the same plant harvested from different parts, genus, areas creating a variety of strains, oxidization & flavours.

when waiting for a refill it is customary to either remove the lid or slant it so. otherwise it is assumed you may be harboring a precious bird, perhaps even the emperor's lost nightingale...

[for evan]

the horror ends

when a night of horror international film festival did close after an incredible ten day long power-packed programme -- it got down, dirty and damn sexy once the awards went out & the all night partying began.

people were licking the trophies, licking each other, they were even licking the walls...

abandoned car garden

a post modern urban initative
the streets are our fields

harbouring thoughts

for momentary escapism from the exhausted chaos in my mind i indulged in a lunch meeting on the water today.

the ultimate reality check that you're in one of the best cities in the world is to hang on sydney's harbour, peruse the MCA, eat sublime food, and drink excellent french champagne with jorn utzon's infamous landmark in the background watching the ferries to & fro, richard scarry style.

an absolute reminder you that you're not in kansas anymore dorothy: fervent goals of regular gallery visits et al are created to be almost immediately forgotten again.

how is it possible to just leave this for the tourists? there is no place like home.

*clicks heels*

it's a dog's life...

...dealing with sydney morning traffic in the rain.

it's almost as if urban planners were negligent of considering variable weather conditions when developing major arterial routes. after all, rain is inevitable unless instantaneous translocaton to the sahara desert occurs.

you'll always find me in the kitchen at parties

or conversely the foyer at film festivals...

at a night of horror, the film playing inside might be kerry anne mullaney's scary indie scottish thriller debut feature "the dead outside" but this isn't really the case at all.

whilst the projector rolls out a neurological pandemic strike to the dark hushed room within, it's a lot more chilled, out where the wine flows & festival branded T shirts sell like hot cakes. the festival underbelly quietly continues to seep into the newtown zeitgeist.

our (ware)house...

in the middle of the street.

this is the beautiful humble start-up base for PUNK MONK PROPAGANDA, mine and our collective trainer-wheels home & hub. ideas are bigger than spaces but sometimes it's hard not to get attached.

i love our house. i love our self-generated techno bloomsbury family deviation even more.

nostalgia over, time to face the music.

"...i remember way back then when everything

was true and when

we would have such a very good time

such a fine time, such a happy time

and i remember how we'd play,

simply waste the day away

then we'd say nothing would come

between us two dreamers"

ALGAE RHYTHM is the new matmos

this is one of the things i've been doing lately with the ever industrious talented PUNK MONK family. it's true, we gave birth: to a lovely bouncy green ALGAE RHYTHM and with it event 0.01 was launched on march 23, 2009 including flaming lips sound experiment "zaireeka", screening of their film "christmas on mars", the first print run of our collectible zine, the commencement of our inter-connected video installations & loads of bubbles and algae swamp punch with food to share.

this announcement is somewhat belated but then this blog was born less than a week ago... kate has another rendition because she is the blogger extraordinaire. if you want to see our full manifesto please check her site: http://movingkatiedid.blogspot.com/.

the txt below taken from the original vision document which clare and i cooked up together in the lab AKA warehouse after invaluable input from the tribe: stevie dunstan, kate taylor, raen waghorn-hughes, dermot mcguire, ky-lee menzies, barry saunders, andy finn, mathieu ravier, alex pappasavvas & alex parker.

ALGAE RHYTHM is:

an organic evolution partially influenced by progressive experimental thinkers including alan turing, ada lovelace and andy warhol. ALGAE RHYTHM is a juxtaposition of the ever-changing & dynamic world of colliding interfaces and the pulsing fabric of visually undefinable zeros and ones which mesh it all together.

ALGAE RHYTHM is a mutating evolving organism, an event, an exhibition, a happening which will occur once a month. track us down on facebook if you want to know more.

we didn't start the fire...

no KINO due to fire, no power in sydney's CBD, no rooftop to play on because of the rain... what are a bunch of film orphans to do?

play how many people can we squeeze into karina's apartment & stairwell instead (with marianne's famous crepes)!

every night is a night of horror... (well maybe ten)

this (a night of horror international film festival)is on right now till friday [april 3, 2009] at the dendy, newtown. each year dean bertram and lisa mitchell put on a night which doesn't end for about ten days. a monster marathon.

i'm judging the short films [60 all up] but have seen a couple of standout features thus far: most notably, "midnight movie" which played appropriately at the witching hour & is a wonderfully executed satirical tribute to the slasher formula crossing metaphysical planes. the uncontained film within the film.

there should be more midnight movies...

every night is a crazy sex party!

well not really. but isn't perception a crazy thing? to live up to the mythology & madness it seemed only right we apply some method one rather dull rumour-mongering sunday night at the warehouse...

tagged

this couch belongs to someone bitches!

why are there so many songs about rainbows?

if platform ten does not have the answers, will the eyes have it?