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• Too Late: a Short Story Part 2

  2011-10-04 15:14 / 标准博客

  This week’s column is part two of a three-part short story inspired and continuing from my latest music video 說時遲.

   

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6RouiGMSJyU&feature=channel_video_title

   

  March 15^th, 2011

  11:30PM

  The flight over to Tokyo was pretty uneventful, though I found it hard to get any rest.  Just checked into a capsule hotel in Akihabara.  Trying not to get too comfortable here as I feel like I’ve already wasted enough time.

   

   

  March 16^th, 2011

  Since the Sendai airport is still heavily flooded, I took the 7:00AM Shinkansen instead.  Telecommunications are still largely damaged here so no word from her yet. The wreckage everywhere is starting to worry me.  Cracked roads, swept up cars, displaced furniture… I can only imagine what she’s been through these past few days.  I hope she’s still in Aoba.  I heard it’s still relatively safe there.

   

   

  5:00PM

  I found the school, but there’s no one there.  It doesn’t seem particularly damaged, but people have clearly left.  Doors to the buildings and dormitories are padlocked with signs saying, “School closed until further notice.  Please return to your homes”.  Though it seems I have reached a dead-end in my search, the fact that the buildings are still intact gives me hope.  On my way out of the campus, I found a student’s organizer lying on the ground.  It wasn’t hers, but it had a contact number and address on it.  Maybe this person can tell me where to go next.  It’s a long shot, but this is the only thing I’ve got right now…

   

  

   

  To be continued…

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• Too Late: a Short Story [Part 1]

  2011-10-04 14:47 / 标准博客

  This week’s column is part a three-part short story inspired and continuing from my latest music video 說時遲.

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6RouiGMSJyU&feature=channel_video_title

   

   

   

  I always hear them say, "better late than never".  Is this supposed to be encouragement for those who can't get themselves to act, or consolation for those who fear that they may have missed their chance?  

   

  March 12th, 2011

  As I stare in disbelief at the television, with wave after wave of bad news from Japan, the shock finally settles in.  For a place I've never visited, Sendai suddenly seemed awfully close.  Two days without a word from her and I don't know what to think.  The news says telecommunications are down and lines to remaining telephone booths stretch on for days.  Maybe it's just not her turn yet.  All I can think to do is pray.

   

  March 14th, 2011

  Still nothing from her.  I've been calling the music school and her friends, but there’s been no response from any of them yet.  I hear rescue teams are still discovering survivors amongst the thousands trapped and lost… Anyway, I don’t want to over-think this.  Still early.  There's still hope.  I just wish she'd call.

   

  March 15th, 2011

  I can’t wait any longer.  Just bought tickets to Tokyo since it’s impossible to get a flight directly to Sendai at this point.  Whatever it is that’s happened to her, I need to see for myself.  Haven’t figured out exactly how I’m getting to Sendai after I touch down yet, but I can sort that out on the plane. 

   

  10:00AM

  There’s hardly anyone on the plane right now.  Is it really that bad?

   

  To be continued…

   

  

   

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• Responsibility

  2011-10-04 14:13 / 标准博客

  

   

  One of the hottest topics in international news lately has been the social responsibility of mass media.  A certain tabloid infringed the privacy of countless individuals in the name of news and entertainment, bringing about public outrage worldwide.  While we are right to be upset about such a blatant disregard for human rights, is this really the first time something like this has happened?  Did we bring this upon ourselves without knowing it?

   

  

  What I mean is that the invasion of individuals’ privacy has long been a common practice of tabloids (one of their major attractions in fact) and has become so through the encouragement of its readers.  Stealing private phone messages, taking pictures of people through their bedroom windows, digging up wedding registration certificates, stalking family members for information on a subject, “creative” journalism, public defamation… you name it, the tabloids have done it.  The major difference between what they’ve always been doing and what they’re being persecuted for now is that the subjects of such invasions are usually celebrities and not ordinary Samaritans. 

   

  By purchasing such content (for whatever reasons), we not only give it value, but encourage its continued procurement.  Perhaps by making this month’s issue of “XX” tabloid a best seller, we are emboldening its writers to tap into our voicemails too.       

   

   

  J-Wo

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• Writing

  2011-07-12 14:45 / 标准博客 / Label...

  The past couple of days have been pretty hectic.  After a week in Japan for work, I returned briefly to Hong Kong for a day, then headed straight for Canada the next.  Now jetlagged, another day of interviews and rehearsals later and pretty deep into the night before my performance on Canadian television, I’m making use of this time writing to figure out what the heck has been happening to me in the past 72 hours.

   

  It’s times like this when I remember why I write.  Writing (words and music) allows me to make things real for myself.  Periodically taking a break from tumbling through life and putting the pieces together allows us to remember and therefore take ownership of what’s been going on.

   

  A rainy day, a bad break-up and discovering an old picture of your best friends from high school -- these events, though happening on the same day, probably had no direct relationship to each other.  Upset and nostalgic at the time, you might have thought to you yourself, “the wind and rain ushered in memories of things left behind – things I left and things that left me” (or something like that).  From then on, that’s what that day becomes in your world.  Without that moment of reflection, all of this might have been lost, just another gloomy day.

   

  This is why writing my upcoming electronic book “Beyond”  (超越三部曲) was such a fulfilling experience.  Sorting through heaps of videos, photos and sound clips from the past twenty or so years has allowed me to further understand what has brought me here today.  Check it out if you want to see what my world looks like from the inside J               

   

  

   

  - JWo

   

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• Revisit

  2011-07-12 14:34 / 标准博客 / Label...

  My official Japan Website:

  http://www.avexnet.or.jp/jonathanwong 

   

  Here's the link to my first Japanese Music Video:

  「君は薔薇より美しい」(You're more beautiful than a rose)

   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KTAm_phrOY

  ---

  A TV travelogue producer recently told me an interesting story about traveling to a foreign country for work and talking about public transportation with a local.  He asked the local, “do you know how many subway lines there are in this city?” to which the local answered “there’s the #1, the #2, the #3, the #4…the orange one, the yellow one and some others…”.  To the local’s amazement, the producer then responded, “there are actually 8”, before proceeding to describe specific destinations within each route.

  

  
   The point of this story is not that the producer was particularly well informed – he should’ve been since he was preparing to shoot there. The point is rather that the local, having lived there for so long, had grown unfamiliar to the parts of his surroundings over time, and knew even less than someone who was just visiting.  This might have happened for a couple of reasons.

  
   First of all, living and working somewhere probably means you have very specific habits and places you frequent; over time, anything that falls out of those particular areas will most likely be slowly forgotten. Secondly, as they say, “familiarity breeds contempt”; the better we know something or some place, the less we take interest in its merits.

  

  
   Coming back to Hong Kong after a month of work in Japan, I can totally identify with the “local” in the above story.  Struggling to get used to daily and working life in Tokyo, I learned things about that environment that I have long since taken for granted in Hong Kong.  With that being said, I now definitely have a whole new appreciation for what I’ve been missing here.  It’s good to be back.

  

  

  
   JWo           

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