Christiania (here’s its Wikipedia entry), the sort-of-self-governing neighbourhood located in Copenhagen, Denmark is one of those places I’d been meaning to visit (along with the rest of Copenhagen, of course). It was created in 1971 when a group of hippie-types took over an area that housed abandoned military barracks. What resulted over the following three [...]
Monthly Archives: December 2005
Dec
31
2005
Chanukah, Night Six: The Dreidel
I don’t know how many current computer games have this feature, but back in the dark ages of DOS, many IBM PC games featured a “the boss is coming!” key. This key, when pressed in mid-game, quickly suspended the game and hid it with a screen that looked like a word processor or spreadsheet. Once [...]
Dec
30
2005
Chrismukkah Dinner
A Christmas tradition at our house is the extended family Christmas dinner in which my aunts, uncles and cousins as well as friends of the family get together for a big dinner party, exchange Christmas gifts and often gather around the piano and sing. As our family gains new members, we add their traditions to [...]
Dec
30
2005
Chanukah, Night Five: And the Dreidel Will Rock!
Okay, I’ll admit it — we Filipinos don’t rock the airwaves that much. As far as rock and pop music in North America goes, I can think of only two Pinoys: Joey Santiago from the Pixies and Apl.de.ap (a.k.a. Allen Lindo) from the Black Eyed Peas.
However, Wendy’s people have been bringing the noise from almost [...]
Dec
29
2005
The Boxing Day Shooting
A Little Background
Boxing Day,
for those of you not familiar with it, is a statutory holiday in Canada
(as well as the UK, Australia and New Zealand) that takes place on
December 26th. While folklorists have debated its origins for years,
it’s associated with post-Christmas bargain sales these days. Stores
[...]
Dec
29
2005
Chanukah, Night Four: The Chanukah Song, Part II
It’s rather odd that Eight Crazy Nights, Adam Sandler’s animated film about Chanukah, has been translated into the languages of two out of three Axis powers, but it shows how far the world has come in sixty years. Well, that and the fact that the biggest Axis fans probably live in Montana and Saudi Arabia [...]
Dec
28
2005
Chanukah, Night Three: The Chanukah Song
Adam Sandler first performed The Chanukah Song [3.3MB, MP3] on Saturday Night Live. Written to make Jewish children feel less isolated during Christmas season, The Chanukah Song is essentially a laundry list of famous Jewish people, and it’s my gift to you for the third night of Chanukah. Enjoy!
It took me a while to find [...]
Dec
26
2005
Chanukah, Night Two: "Stop! Hammer Time!" [Updated]
The best-known character in the story of Chanukah is Judah Maccabee,
the leader of the revolt against the Greeks and Syrians who had
outlawed the Jewish religion and defiled the temple. Maccabee was give
the nickname “The Hammer” for his Buffy the Vampire Slayer-like ability
to kick serious ass despite being [...]
Dec
26
2005
Chanukah, Night One: Is it the Jewish Christmas?
This is the first time that Wendy and I are
celebrating Christmas and Chanukah as a married couple. Since she’s
Jewish and I’ll celebrate any holiday as long as there’s food and
booze, I’ve extended the goodie giveaway started with the Accordion Guy
Advent Calendar to include the eight nights that [...]
Dec
25
2005
Merry Christmas!
Have a great one, everybody!
Here’s a quick preview of photos to come: it’s our Christmas tree
during the first round of decorating. Note the dreidel ornaments –
they’re a gift from Eldon Brown. He bought some multicoloured plastic
dreidels, drilled holes in their spindles and attached Christmas
ornament hooks to them. [...]
Dec
23
2005
Accordion Guy Advent Calendar, Day Twenty-Two: Christmas Carols, Hawaiian-Style
While Christmas card imagery features often snow, most people here in Canada would consider the forecasted temperature for Bethlehem rather springlike (10 degrees C / 50 degrees F) and call the forecast for my hometown of Manila almost summery (26 degrees C / 78 degrees F). The Christmas day temperature in Honolulu is expected to [...]
Dec
21
2005
Accordion Guy Advent Calendar, Day Twenty-One: Dar Williams’ "The Christians and the Pagans"
Cut my metaphorical heart open, and you’ll find many things: Wendy,
chocolate, computers, bacchanalia, bare-bum spankings on the fire
esca…okay, scratch that one. But among those things near and dear to
me are the wayward children of the wayward African child known as the
blues scale: jazz, pop and [...]
Dec
20
2005
Seen at the Pacific Mall
Up in the northeast outskirts of Accordion City is the Pacific Mall, which proudly declares itself “North America’s Largest Indoor Asian Mall”. If you’re looking for good food, anime and Hong Kong cinema DVDs, cell phone accessories, a hair salon that can spike your hair properly, every known flavour of Pocky and some decent competition [...]
Dec
20
2005
Accordion Guy Advent Calendar, Day Twenty: My Two Favourite Comics on the Subject
Click the comics to see them at full size.
Dec
19
2005
"The Chappelle Theory"
I love Chappelle’s Show and I also love a good conspiracy theory, so I couldn’t help but enjoy reading The Chappelle Theory.
Its anonymous author claims to be a retired PR executive who claims to
have many “contacts closely related to the individuals involved”,
allowing him or her to “to [...]
