Voucher day!

As per title, today’s voucher day! =D Well as is the Malaysian’s nature, every one must be spent before the deadline passes, otherwise it would be wasted. I actually have quite a number of them, all expiring either today or tomorrow. And since mom’s been nagging for ‘us’ to use, I thought, “Okay, I’ll use it today.”

Mission: Use up all vouchers. And have a good time. XD

Items:
2 KFC vouchers
2 GSC vouchers
4 Popular vouchers with total value of RM35

When we set out for 1u, it was still pretty early (1230pm) so first place we headed to was GSC to get tickets.

Used: 2 GSC vouchers (Expiry date: 16 Jan): Bought tickets to watch the movie “A Chinese Tall Story”.

Saw chiayee and her brother khengxiong, so we chatted for abit. He got Mr Yap as his chem teacher (lucky at least in that sense: he’s got a ruthless math teacher and the rest he claims are just so-so) so at least he’s guaranteed an A there. XD Apparently they were getting tickets to watch KingKong.

Wandered into Popular, just to scout out what I want to use the vouchers for… I saw the book Eldest, the sequel to Eragon. I was sooo tempted to buy it, since I just finished reading Eragon just today at about 130am. XD More on the Eragon spoilers in another post, allow me to finish. I also saw a number of interesting books, including a selection from Neil Gaiman; Stardust, Mirrors and Smoke, American Gods, Anansi Boys, and Everwhere. @___@ I was quite spoilt for choice, as I didn’t know what to buy. I thought, maybe I’ll decide and buy before I leave. And I was just looking to see if they have ‘The Memoirs of a Geisha’ which doesn’t feature Zhang Ziyi’s face as the cover, but I don’t think it’s possible now since the movie’s been getting its desired attention. Took the chance to also check out CDRama, where I surprisingly found some pretty recent (original mind you, not the Taiwanese ciplak-ed versions) Japanese albums like Chemistry – f(ou)r, L’Arc~en~Ciel – Awake and ORANGE RANGE – Natural. I wasn’t expecting this, maybe I’ll keep it in mind next time I go hunting. Sadly, still a very limited selection, but there’s one worth taking note of. I might want to buy the ORANGE RANGE album in near future, since their songs are pretty good.

Met up with ti for lunch, and I thought I’d never live to see the day where KFC is crowded with people until we had difficulty finding seats. Well that’s the main reason we avoid the outlet at 1u, but today was an exception; with the mission in mind, we bravely ventured in.

Used: 2 KFC vouchers (Expiry date: 15 Feb): 2 X-Meals, drinks, and an extra Fish Burger for ti. Never underestimate the appetite of this kid.

By this time, it was bout 3pm that we had ‘lunch’. It was raining heavily outside, which made me feel thankful that I’m in a sheltered place eating warm food. We ate slowly, so by the time we were done, it should be time to enter the cinema.

OMG: I saw this dude that looks so much like Vincent when I was passing this clothing store; I forgot which one. For a moment I thought I wanted to snap a pic and post it here, but ti was already walking off, so too bad Vincent. Just be proud that someone looks like you okay? Just that…he’s abit thinner XD but your hair looks better than his.

Before entering, we bought some Choco Babies (XD really good chocs and the perfect companion if you don’t like popcorn) and ti insisted on having a huge Coke, despite having drunk a regular one back at KFC. To no matter. On entering the cinema, we didn’t have to agonize too long either since the movie started 5 minutes after. =D Talk about good timing.

A short review: A Chinese Tall Story
Note: Don’t worry; I’m trying very very hard to be spoiler-free, so no disclaimers needed.

Don’t be fooled by the title. It is a literal representation of the movie; it is a VERY tall story to pull off. XD It’s in Cantonese, with irritating subtitles at the bottom, but useful enough for someone like me who doesn’t know Cantonese like I do the back of my hand.

The first thing that caught my attention: The music producer is no other than Joe Hisaishi, the very same who did all the music of all the Studio Ghibli feature films:

Fact bite:
Here are some examples of the feature films by Studio Ghibli out of the multitude of titles that I remember the kanji:
千と千尋の神隠し(sen to chihiro no kamikakushi = spirited away)
猫の恩返し (neko no ongaeshi = the cat returns)
もののけ姫 (mononoke hime=literally meaning barbarian princess)
となりのトトロ (tonari no totoro = my neighbour totoro)

I consider this a BIG plus point because it is pretty pointless to have a movie with lousy music. Moving on, the story is based on the story of the Journey to the West. The twist is that once they reach the final city where the sutras are supposed to be, a clan of big bugs attack the city and kidnaps his 3 disciples, but not before he manages to be transported to a safer place. So the main point is to save his 3 disciples and finish the job. Of course, to make the movie last, the journey of rescuing them is quite another as he meets an imp Meiyan, who in my opinion is the rather cute irritating type. But still, interesting.

The main 4 characters of the Journey to the West:
玄奘 is played by Nicholas Tse, and his character is rather…idiotic (this is the first word I can think of) since he practically (and literally) talks people to death which I feel is probably what every other skeptic would think of a monk trying to be holy. So he’s a pretty funny dude.

孫悟空 is played by Chen Bo-lin, he sure is super-yeng. His fighting skills are pretty out-of-this-world, but still amusing to watch. He sure has a good sense of humor And his troop of monkeys are so so so cute! XD They’re all little kids, and little kids having a war cry is like the ultimatum to drive parents up the wall =D

沙悟淨 is played by Steven Chung, and he’s next to the monkey in terms of yengness factor. He doesn’t even look fat, and he fights well to boot. He doesn’t appear much in the story though, but he sounds like the most level-headed one. And if you’re asking, I think the monk is hardly thinking.

豬八戒 is played by Kenny Kwan, his character being an apathetic one. Quote the monk: “You’re stupid, and you can’t fight…so by running off you’re better off dead.”

Followed by the female protagonist:
Meiyan played by Charlene Choi, who is a butt-ugly imp (well not really, in my opinion…because she has this cute look attached to her…and knowing most shows, she’ll probably turn pretty or something later) She is supposed to have the inability to have emotion, but she sure has her funny moments. Especially the way she brutally (but honestly) chides the monk and the way she speaks is like a child.

I’d probably give this show an 8/10 because the action somehow reminded me of sakuratetsu taiwahen (if you don’t know what this is, go check it out) but still good. And the cg for the show is pretty good, seeing how they made the bugs look like something out of Starcraft (like the Zurg clan) and of course all those pretty fireworks. Who can resist a movie with pretty fireworks~

The movie’s quite short though, after 90 minutes we were free to go.

So I went back to Popular to muse over the choice of books. Soon after, dad called to say that they were coming back real late, so we’d better get home on our own. Tried calling reeis for a recommendation, but she didn’t pick up. I suppose she was sleeping or doing something else. Took a deep breath, closed my eyes and picked one of the Neil Gaiman books; ended up with Smoke and Mirrors. Will read it later before I go to bed, but seeing how Eragon has kept me up for 3 nights… XD I hope this one will be just as good if not better.

Used: Popular vouchers with a total value of RM35 (Expiry date: 16 Jan): Needless to say, my possession of it was guaranteed.

While I was paying, the blur cashier forgot to add my mechanical pencil (buying one cause I gave mine to ti as he had no working one) to the list. And since the system does not comply with refunds if the total purchase is less, he was sort of confused. The pencil solved the problem. XD

Log: Mission accomplished.