Joe Wong and his humor

This Chinese-American is a scientist-turned comedian. He jokes pretty much on everything: marriage, politics, and most successfully, being ethnic. His accent is part of what makes it work. One thing I like a lot about his performance is the clever connection of his storyline, so that jokes are linked in a natural way. I used to perform the Chinese stand-up comedy, or crosstalk (相声). A number of my friends are quite good writers and performers of it. From them, I even learned there are theories and patterns in designing the jokes, especially in lining up elements. When I'm watching Joe Wong's performance, I'm convinced that he did his homework in writing them. In fact, Joe started exploring his humor by writing for a campus newspaper at Rice University.

Another principle in comedy is adjusting contents to specific context, primarily depending on audience group, to maximize the effects. In Chinese stand-up comedies there are such terminologies like 把点开活儿, meaning "Do your work according to the environment". Joe does this really well too. If you watch the show at RTCA Dinner (see below), you will find he customized his contents by telling a lot of political jokes, even making fun of the Vice President and C-SPAN. It is nothing but clever, isn't it!

Joe Wong on Letterman (1st appearance)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gD0s7gfTotk

Joe Wong on Letterman (2nd appearance)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLktc0hc6UU&feature=rec-LGOUT-exp_fresh+div-1r-8-HM

Joe Wong at RTCA Dinner

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buSv1jjAels

Joe Wong's Homepage:

http://www.joewongcomedy.com/

More Videos

http://www.videowasi.com/videos/joe-wong/1/

Joe Wong's Comedy Deportation Center on Facebook:

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=58255253084&ref=ts

Joe Wong tells his story on

http://www.videowasi.com/yt-HLxskfCRCEo/joe-wong-seriously-funny-with-joe-klocek-episode-1/

Think 'Interesting"

I have discovered one recent change in my mentality. Instead of saying something is useful or important, I started to keep saying something is 'interesting'. This turnaround from obligation-oriented to interest-oriented thinking has a fairly significant impact: I sort of stopped procrastinating...

I'm finally back to myself, a positive and productive person.

Patriotism, Jealousness, or Prejudice?

I don't want my blog to be political at all. But today I feel want to comment.

Sina is said the largest Chinese language blog community. This week on top of Sina blog site was a post by Chinese Mainland actor Jie Zhou (周杰), titled "Forgetting the past equals betrayal". Of course it was posted in Chinese. But here is the background.

Jie Zhou became known 12 years ago, in 1998, for his performance in a TV series called "Princess Pearl", or Huan Zhu Ge Ge (还珠格格). This TV series was produced and shot by Taiwan-based companies, and two former members of the Taiwan idol band "Little Tigers" (Xiaohudui) starred in it too. This series turned out so popular that both leading actresses, Vicky Zhao 赵薇 (Mainland Chinese) and Ruby Lin 林心如 (Taiwanness) became household stars overnight. It even popularized Bingbing Fan 范冰冰 who played a supporting role. Two sequels (HZGG2 and HZGG3) followed, and the novelist Yao Qiong （琼瑶）conquered millions of audiences with her romance stories.

Jie Zhou has been a famous yet controversial figure since then, too. Rumors about his tensions with Taiwan-born actors and staffs in the cast became a topic for paparazzi. The recent post (12 years after!) on his blog included his explanations and comments behind those conflicts. According to what he wrote, actors from Taiwan (he apparently indicates the two Little Tigers - Alec Su 苏有朋 and Zhipeng Chen 陈志朋) were holding arrogant and insulting attitudes towards Chinese Mainland. Taiwan had a much more mature and commercialized show business at that time, compared with Chinese Mainland, so they were already superstars before the shooting of HZGG. They frequently gave complaints and negative comments on Chinese Mainland, viewing it a different country to where they are from. In his blog, Mr. Zhou sounds critical and somewhat furious about these attitudes, even after 12 years.

Most readers sound supportive for Jie Zhou on his blog, which did not surprise me at all for two reasons. One, most readers of celebrities' blogs are their fans. Two, the One-China view is rooted in most Mainland Chinese's minds as a principle. Any claim about Taiwan independence usually stimulate instinctive antipathy among Chinese Mainlanders. In fact, many people who have not lived abroad also assume that most Taiwan people favor "returning" to China. This illusion is a big part of the reason behind many misunderstandings between the straight. Due to different conditions between the political contexts, Taiwan is much opener to whatever voices on political views. This fact, neglected by many Mainland Chinese, also creates a gap in communications.

The timing of his post is interesting, too. Only three weeks ago, the singing group Little Tigers had a shining reunion show at CCTV Spring Festival Gala, which is televised all over China and countries. Their show reminded millions of audiences of the good old days, and rejuvenated the Little Tigers' popularity again. Jie Zhou, in contrary, has been away from center of spotlights for a while. Though he frequently emphasized his intention to stay away from media and be a low-key celebrity, the interesting timing of his post triggers me to question his motivation behind the post.

Now, here is my point.

The conflicts between Little Tigers and Jie Zhou are essentially cultural conflicts rather than political or interpersonal ones. Jie Zhou apparent lacks full understandings about Taiwan and its people. At the end of his post on blog he wrote: People from both sides of the straight should all know there is only one China. This is the bottom line that all Chinese should stick to.

I would not comment on the intention of this red-sounding statement, but I guess not many readers from Taiwan (if any) would agree. Jie Zhou is also making serious mistakes by transforming personal experiences to a generalization about all Taiwan people. This approach does no good to cross-straight communication at all. If there were to be a war between two sides (though I will never believe there would be one), people like Jie Zhou are the first to blame.

l'auberge espagnole

If you ask me to describe my life here and now, I would recommend a movie titled "l'auberge espagnole", or Spanish Apartment.

Living in an unfamiliar European city, but suddenly having new friends and experiencing something that will make your life different. I have to say I fell in love with the flavor of Europe, the excitement, the spectacle of diversity. Cross-culture experience is not all about stereotyping each other, but real parties, real people, love affairs, and anything you can imagine. It's rather a celebration than illusions. Voila. C'est mon vie.

It's a good movie. Watch it!

French Life A-Z

A = anpe
B = boulanger
C = cdiscount
D= deezer
E= ebay
F= facebook
G= gmail
H= hotmail
I= ikea
J= jeux.fr
K= kiabi
L= le bon coin
M= mappy
N= nrj
O= orange
P= pages jaunes
Q= quelle
R= ratp
S= skyblog
T= telecharger
U= ugc
V= via michelin
W= wikipedia
X= xxl video
Y= youtube
Z= zara

Canadian Life A to Z

I'm trying one way to observe the typical lifestyle of a country: let Google tell you. I am doing this on Google.ca, recording what follows each single letter that I enter, to see the most searched words starting with each letter. Here's the list:
A: Air Canada
B: Best Buy Canada
C: Canadian Tire
D: Dictionary.com
E: Ebay
F: Facebook
G: Gmail
H: Hotmail
I: Ikea
J: Job Bank
K: Kijiji
L: London Drugs
M: Mapquest
N: NHL
O: OSAP
P: Plenty of fish
Q: Quotes
R: Rogers
S: Sears Canada
T: TD Canada Trust
U: Urban Dictionary
V: Via Rail
W: Weather Network
X: XS Cargo
Y: Youtube
Z: Zellers

My comments on this list: Canadianized, commercialized, urbanized, electronicalized, google-ized!

First Christmas in Canada

Today was a fantastic Christmas, spent with a bunch of Chinese Canadians, and Chinese food. The host Lao Liu's house and garden were gorgeous too!
In fact these people are REAL Chinese (their kids are not). Talking to them made me feel at home. They shared experience of how to push their kids to learn Chinese. Chinese characters are so damn difficult to learn.. for the poor 'second generation immigrants', we have to say sorry...:(
One buddy is even from Baotou, my city, now working in Singapore. He actually went to my parents' middle school. That's funny. He told me a lot about Singapore, labling it as the 'best society of all Chinese communities'.
I'm grateful for their party, their stories and their being together. Have to say it's so good to be able to live in the Chinese way, in a developed, beautiful, and safe country like Canada. Many strange questions popped up in my mind, like...
- when I have my kids can I get them learn Chinese? will I push them to learn their dad's mother tongue when I know it tortures them?
- when I'm 50, will I still share what I see and think in Chinese, like I'm writing my (other) blog in Chinese now?
- ...

I don't know...
Anyway, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all my friends!!~~