Proof of Karma

Hong Kong, December 2011
“This is not hotel, la!”
“Yes,” my wife and I took in the grimy horror that was the Cosmic Guesthouse surrounding us. “We can see that.”
So began a battle of wills that would pit my wife and I against one of history’s great evils: the slum lord.

Day 2
Us: “There’s water on the floor. Maybe there is a leak?”
SL: “It’s no problem, la! Cleaning lady just didn’t clean it, la!”
Us: “Right, so that’s… better?”

Day 3
Us: “Uh, someone took the cover off our bed. We just have a sheet now. A really small sheet.
SL: “Cover is decoration only, la! You no need!”
Us: “We’ll just take the cover off the other bed that’s taking up all the remaining floor space in our room then, eh?”
SL: “Huh?!”
Us: “Okay, see you!”

Day 4
Us: “So, my wife is, like, preganant*. We have to leave urgently. Oh no.”
SL: “No refund!”
Us: “That’s fine. That money is tainted now. And it smells like childhood fear sweat.”

* This was a lie. No excitement please, Mums.

Day 4 (an hour later)
Us: “Hello. We’d like to check in, please.”
Receptionist: “Good morning. Welcome to the Royal Hotel. We are heavily booked right now, so we’ll have to put you in one of the top floor executive suites.
Us: *Grin*

There you have it: absolute scientific proof that karma is a real thing.

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A Comparison

Cosmic Guest House


Shower pressure: Pretty good.
Number of minutes you can enjoy the shower pressure before the base of the shower floods through to the toilet: Three
View: Nestled amidst the other 13 guesthouses in a rambling tenement building, all of which are draped in sheets that may have once been white. May have.

Royal Plaza Hotel


Shower pressure: Would flay the flesh from your bones in the best possible way.
Number of minutes you can enjoy the shower pressure before the base of the shower floods through to the toilet: Potentially unlimited. (Tests were concluded after about half an hour.)
View: Overlooking the entirety of Kowloon. Amazing.

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To ward against the encroaching insanity of Cosmic Guesthouse, we binged on theme parks. Now, I’m not going to spend a lot of time going on about Disneyland – you’ve either been, and therefore know how amazing it is; or you haven’t, and I would just be making you sad. Suffice it to say, Disneyland is perfect, and despite all Disneylands being completely identical the world over HK Disneyland is the most perfect.

America? France?Japan? Who cares!

This is because nowhere else in the world do they just make shit up to put on their name badges with such reckless abandon. That’s just a Chinese specialty. When I was in China I got paired with a university student to show me around (I made her take me to the nearest video game store, then bookstore, in that order). “My name is Yuqin,” she told me. “Please call me Flower.” “How about I call you Yuqin, since that’s your name? That thing over there’s a flower,” was my response.
 This kid was supposedly one of China’s top academics, so get real, but at Disneyland, a place of magic and whimsy, anything goes! Here’s a list of names that Chinese Disneyland employees think English-speaking people have and wanted to emulate in their job:
- Wandy
- Staryan
- Yellow
- Kitty
- Shalom
- Paper
I just want to clarify that not all of these nametags were on girls either. For that reason alone, I declare Disneyland worth the price of admission. At the other end of the Hong Kong theme park spectrum is Ocean Park. This place was possibly designed by the same guy responsible for the stairs at my last apartment. He was head of the class at the De Sade Design Academy. The central tenet of this guy’s park design philosophy is walking. “If the rubes have to queue for 40 minutes to get on a ride then they won’t mind a 20 minute walk between rides. Uphill. I don’t even know how it’s possible, but it seems like the whole place was uphill! Goddamn Escher Park.

Ocean Park

At the end of the day we ate New Zealand lamb at an outdoor restaurant overlooking the bay. We finished our dinner at about 9:00 on December 31st, but that will be my prevailing memory of New Years 2012, because that moment was the best Hong Kong gave to us. 2011 was, for the most part, totally Cosmic Guest House. I intend to make 2012 a lot more Royal Hotel. I hope the same holds true for you, because you read this. So you must be okay.

The Problem with Skyrim

Have you played Skyrim? I have. It’s only the biggest game to be released during the incredibly competitive Christmas season, and a frontrunner for game of the year! Like a proportion of the geek population probably numbering in the millions, I was gripped by Skyrim madness. Then I won it! 

I did, Sean Bean. In your face.

(Note: this marks the first inclusion of a picture with photoshopped words over it in my blog. Don't get used to it though.)

Now that I have completely finished the game, getting the platinum trophy and everything (thank you thank you, please hold your applause until the end) I realized something about Skyrim: I’m an enabler.

Now, don’t get me wrong, when there are dragons wreaking havoc and destroying cities then I am proud to be the Dark Elf who stands up and says “no more, Dragon!” with arrows. That’s fine. I mean, I’m the only one who can, apparently. Because of destiny or something. (Spoilers: I think your character’s Mum, like, had sex with a dragon. Eww.)

Mum!!

But anyway, yeah, no problem.

 The part I take issue with is when some character who doesn’t even rank a name asks you to do some kind of menial task in exchange for 50 bullshit gold coins.

For instance, once I was in one of the game’s major cities and I was trying to sell all the junk that I had looted off people I killed. People I killed and then took their stuff from right off their cooling carcasses. Even though it doesn’t show it in game, I like to imagine that’s how my character makes the sales pitch when he’s standing at this store, “So I just killed a bunch of guys, three giant crazy seal things and a ghost. I know, right? I didn’t believe in them either. Anyways, I pried all this stuff off their bodies – or the pile of goo left behind, in the ghost’s case. What’ll you give me for it?”

Now ask yourself: Does this seem like the person you want to ask to deliver your shipment of spiced wine?!

Apparently it does. 

So I was asked. And these were my options for answering:

“Okay, I will deliver your wine” or

“I don’t have time to do that right now.”

Hold up.

So even if I was dead set against delivering that wine, I still had to make the lame excuse that it was only because I was so busy. Um, too busy saving the whole world’s ass!

Here’s option C as it should have been presented:

“Motherfucker, did you see that 60 foot dragon out there?! Did you see me punch it in the face?! What part of that makes you think that I want to deliver a shipment of wine for you? Do it yourself! It’s your goddamn job! You have one job! Do I ask you to punch dragons?! Do your job!!!”

Then, to drive the message home, there should be a short cutscene of my character kicking him in the balls.

Alas, that patch has not been released as yet. Let’s start a groundswell, huh?

“Will you find me a book about herbs?”

“Could you get my necklace back?”

“Does that wheat look like it’ll pick itself?”

“Have you seen a dog that could be my friend?”

“Can you find out who murdered my wife?”

Not all of these questions are appropriate for a one-of-a-kind-destined-for-greatness hero, but the people of Skyrim don’t realise this because no matter what race or character type you choose you don’t get the ‘tough love’ dialogue options. Shit, even Jesus kicked some guys down temple stairs or something. (I’m not 100% on that one though. Haven’t seen Jesus Christ Superstar for some time.)

Is that old guy trying to hold Jesus back?! Holy hell, literally.

I know Skyrim is a fantasy game, but whose fantasy is it?! Getting the most powerful guy in the world to pick lettuce for you? That’s like asking Barack Obama to help you make a sandwich. That’s assuming you could get to him past the army of guys keeping spastics like you away from him. And you would have to allow for the fact that he was armed to the teeth and his hands were on fire. With all those conditions being met, what do you think he would say to you? (Hint: The correct answer is not, “Yes, we can!”)

Did you just ask me to deliver wine?! Somebody hold my dogs, it's about to get tragic.

As the game is now, I fear talking to people will give them a chance to blindside me with an offer of menial labour that I can’t refuse.

Get your heads out of your ass, Skyrim NPCs. I’ve got important shit to do! 

Just as soon as some DLC is released...