C:\Marlow\

I’m sick of all that anti-MSG razzmatazz. Anyone know anybody that has suffered due to MSG? Seen a study with empirical evidence of negative side effects?

Ok, just checking. Cause it turns out that all negative reports on MSG have been based on anecdotal evidence.

Good ‘ol wikipedia helped me out here.

In April 1968, Dr Ho Man Kwok wrote an article for the New England Journal of Medicine where he said, “I have experienced a strange syndrome whenever I have eaten out in a Chinese restaurant, especially one that served northern Chinese food. The syndrome, which usually begins 15 to 20 minutes after I have eaten the first dish, lasts for about two hours, without hangover effect. The most prominent symptoms are numbness at the back of the neck, gradually radiating to both arms and the back, general weakness and palpitations…”. This comment began a global health scare about MSG and “Chinese restaurant syndrome” was born. Considerable research has failed to find any syndrome related to MSG (or in fact any negative health effects at all), and Chinese restaurant syndrome is largely resigned to urban legend status. However, the damage was done, and MSG is still thought of as suspect by a large proportion of the general public, and many foods continue to be labelled “MSG free”.

Thanks “Dr” Kwok, you asshole. Way to ruin it for the rest of us! Also, have you tasted MSG?!? THAT SHIT IS DELICIOUS!!! I mean, really! I went to a Chinese restaurant in Toronto and they had an MSG dish on the table for spooning onto your food!

The Ajinomoto (???) company was formed to manufacture and market MSG in Japan; the name ‘Ajinomoto’ means “essence of taste”.

ESSENCE OF TASTE!!!

That says it all right there. Rant over, now go and eat some Chinese food without one of those lame-ass “No MSG” signs.

Peace

Not being able to dance is killing me on the inside. It’s affecting me a lot worse than I would have originally thought it would.

The way my bboying has always gone is that everyonce in a while I’ll have a style epiphany that will change my style of dancing completely and when I get one of these creative surges I try and take the most advantage of it as I can. Because if I don’t then I will forget the styles and techniques that I want to experiment with. So I have to get them into muscle memory as quickly as possible by practicing as much as I can.

The problem for me right now is that through I don’t know what I’ve had a huge inspiration and my recent direction of training has had a huge effect on me and I’ve been coming up with new techs and styles constantly. This is killing me because I know that if my knee weren’t f***ed up and I was doing physiotherapy then I’d be getting better so quickly with this inspiration and new ideas.

To make things even worse, my friend from Incheon, Changshin, is coming to visit me next Thursday all the way from South Korea. Practices with Changshin always pushed me to new levels because he has such a positive energy about him and such a strong concept of foundational techniques. I still remember to this day the one practice he took me to in a mall at his hometown and how he and Seungju and I were just going nuts coming up with new stuff.

All I can do is hope that my knee will be 100% healed by Thursday or I can tell you I for sure will be practicing on it, which is a terrible idea because I can’t even put weight on it with it bent all the way.

Here’s hoping.

Have any of you ever felt a similar way after having one of the most important things in your life taken away from you? What did you do and how did you cope with it? All advice and anecdotes are welcome!

I’m about to lose my mind with this freaking wordpres, not being able to embed a youtube video is ridiculous. Anyways, check out this link. I guarantee it will put a smile on your face.

edit: I upgraded wordpress and it works no problem

Moved back into Guelph

I have started school again

I love this city

I’m writing this as I sit in the Charles de Gaulle airport terminal waiting for my flight to Nice. I’m pretty much just typing so that I can have my laptop on to charge my iPod and portable speakers without look TOO weird.

I’m pretty excited for Nice; the weather in Paris has been shit and I’ve caught a acold because it’s been raining on and off since I got here. That isn’t to say I’m not having the time of my life, I’m having a blast here and I’m so glad that I took the chance to go to France alone. I’ve been learning so much about my self and how to meet new people. I don’t think I’ll be able to go about living my life the same way as I was before now.

The main reason of my trip to France hasn’t worked out so well as most people that go to a hostel in France are not French. So most of the people I’ve met I’ve been speaking English with. I have had opportunities to speak French and I take those opportunities every chance I get, though it was a bit disconcerting that the first 3 people I spoke to in French near the hostel all tried to sell me weed But then again, I guess that’s what I get for living in the 20ieme.

On a happier note though I should be meeting up with these 2 really fun Icelandic girls that I met in Paris once I get to Nice and hopefully the warm weather and good company will banish this annoying runny nose that I’ve developped.

Well, I’m not going to pay 6 Euros for 30 minutes of internet so this post will inevitably be delayed and I will append anything of note after this

Bon Journee!

edit1: I think I’m sitting next to the japanese guy from “Don’t Laugh”. Whoever is on the other line can’t possibly know what the hell he is saying

edit2: I just realized that I have no hostel reservation or anything and I’m flying blind. So I’m starting to worry a little bit but hey life always works out, yea?

After thoughts:

Well, I couldn’t find a hostel so I wasn’t crazy to be worried about that. But I was lucky enough to find a hotel with a dormitory style room that was cheap enough. Once I headed out to the bars with 4 american girls 2 got their tits grabbed and a guy tried to fight me. That was 2 strikes for Nice but the next 2 days were so gorgeous that it didn’t strike out.

I’m now in Marseilles though and will write up later about the most recent crazy coincidence but till then stay tuned!

Just thought I’d throw these on my blog quick cause some people I know don’t have or use Flickr.com

It’s funny how every country has their own perceptions of others and their own way of telling you about theirs. I just met some Spaniards in my room in the hosteland their first thought is “You know the Raptors? They have 2 Spanish players”. I met some other Spanish bboys and their question was “Oh you know the Boogie Brats?”.A mexican that asks if our “soccer fields are really ALL grass” or a French girl that tells you she “likes Celine Dion”. An American that says “Toronto, that’s near Niagara falls, right?”.

You have to be ready to answer these questions constantly in a hostel because “where are you from” is the travel equivalent of frosh weeks “What’s your major?”. I’ve tried to spice things up with more open ended questions having been in the same hostel 10 days but I’ve received a few blank stares that change in to smiles once I readjust my line of questioning to a more geographic one.

But do you think it’s our nationality that defines us? It brings up that classic psychological debate of nature vs nurture and there’s tons of arguments for both sides. But it makes me wonder, what defines Canada? A country that struggles to find an identity when it’s just a big mixing pot of cultures. It’s like trying to pin a taste on trifle or budae chigae.

After travelling around a bit I’m intensely jealous of fall these other countries with Cultural identities and histories. The Koreans have their language and Kimchi, the Chinese have so much culture and history they could build 10 more great walls out of the books it filled. Walking around France I’m jealous all over again. There are apartment buildings here that are as old as our country and still have people living in them. I can’t even count the number of French restauraunts I’ve seen here.

It’s not that I begrudge the acceptance or diversity of our country. It’s one of the things I love most about Toronto. Korea-town, Little Italy, Greek-town, Little Portugal, China town, etc… but it leaves me wondering where is Little Canada?

I’ve felt for a long time that everyone in Canada is just a permanent visitor and find it kind of sad that we don’t really have a culture of our own to have in common with other Canadians. Maybe it’s partially my fault for not liking hockey or something. What do we do or have that no other country has in common with us? What makes Canadians unique? In what areas does Canada excel or is number one?

Salut mes amis!

I found a nice cheap internet cafe so I should be able to type out a half-decent post at least; grammar and creativity allowing.

The plane encountered some delays so I was about an hour late getting in the airm but I sat between two interesting people so it wasn’t half bad. The woman who gave me my ticket gave me the pick of the litter for seats (I think she liked me, I have a way with 60 year olds…) and I requested a fire exit seat for the extra leg room. She did however neglect to tell me that my seat would be right in front of the stewardess’ chair. Yeah, bye-bye legroom again. Anyways, the plane ride was fairly uneventful: pleasant conversation between fellow passengers and the stewardess, shitty meal, and all that jazz.

Arrived at Charles deGaule airport at around 11:30 and that place is a dump, it reminded me of a changeroom at a public swimming pool. I beelined to the RERm the Parisian metro, and paid the 8 euros to get to Paris instead of the lsightly higher 30 euro airport bus

Checked into my hostel no problem, once I found the place and immediately met two guys that I approached with “bboys?”. Turns out I was right and we sessioned for a little bit while they were getting our rooms ready and then went out to look around Paris.

We went to the eiffel tower first and took all the standard photos along with all the other tourists and then walked around the park for a little. We decided to stop in at a marché for some food because restaurants are a bit pricier than most in Paris, especially around the tower. We grabbed some cheese and juice and stuff and I stopped in at a bakery for half a baguette and the woman at the counter asked about my accent, who was I to think I could pass as Parisian? So I told her I was Canadian and my friends were from Spain and she got so excited and wanted us to like Paris that she filled a giant bag with fresh (and hopefully un-poisoned) pastries! Nicest lady so far, in retrospect I should have taken a photo with her, damn I hate how hind-sight is 20-20.

On the way back past the eiffel tower we heard the call… “bboys?” There were two other bboys, French and German, waiting under the tower for a third bboy, American. We talked for a bit as we waited and they invited us to go to this big practice at La Defense!

It looked kind of like a scummy mall but the French bboy kept saying it was “the street” and that Parisian bboys “keep it real”. He was super nice and we shook hands with all the bboys at the session, apparently if you don’t it’s a huge insult and there will be beef. Met some more cool bboys and watched a guy get attacked by a pet bulldog.

So my first day, despite delays and terrible weather (cold and rainy) was awesome. I can sum up my second day as completely uneventful because laziness struck the Spaniards that I foolishly stuck with a second day and we did nothing, so we will never speak of this day again.

I’ll be going back to that practice again so hopefully I can finagle a tour guide out of one of the people there

Adieu mes amis! I will blog again when I have the time.