K-pop is good pop!

Here's SuperJunior's Sorry Sorry



No, sadly these aren't the real translations

DBSK

T-shirts after my own heart

If the blog name doesn't give you a clue, I am a grumpy person. I complain about weather, my job, my university, my grades, expensive silkscreened T-shirts. I am too much of a Scrooge to shell out money for T-shirts with "clever" sayings. Yet, the following t-shirts are so awesome, they even make me smile.

Here's Grumpy girl T-shirts

Image is from popgadget.net
Oh Grumpy Girl, that's how 99% of my mornings are. Infact, writing the blog is one of the few times I am not a grumpymonster.

Another great website for great T-shirts is ThinkGeek.

Wish, I could wear this at work.

More from Think Geek

Isn't The Big Bang Theory awesome?

This one's called Beware of perverts. Must be gifted to Shojo manga heroines from their bishonen boyfriends.


P.S: I like how the prices of these shirts are reasonable and so many of them go on sale. Lovely!

Life is Ironic eh?

So, I do a blog post on Indian movies that are actually good and of course, the next day I end up watching one of the worst Bollywood movies ever. The  movie Tees Maar Khan sucks! My expectations were not very high before I saw this movie but OMG, I want the wasted hours back. What's worse, I found out it was a remake of After the Fox. Akshay Kumar ain't no Peter Sellers! Infact, Akshay had terrible comedic timing. Now, that I've finished ranting, I promise the next post will be more exciting.

Bollywood for people who hate it!

I know what you are thinking when you hear the word Bollywood. Movies that are 10 hours long with 30 songs that have hundreds of costume changes. Movies that have no plot whatsoever and the cheesiest dialogues and horrible acting. Well, I've got Bollywood movies for you that are actually good. Most of these are not musicals, aren't very long and have a plot.

1. A Wednesday! : A thriller that has an interesting take on the issue of terrorism. Best of all, no songs.

2. Khosla Ka Ghosla: Indian comedies usually suck but this is great with a realistic setting. I highly recommend the director Dibakar Banerjee's other movies.

3. Black Friday: A movie based on 1993 Bombay bombings.

4. Peepli Live: It is the Indian contender for Oscars, a satire on farmer suicides. Got an awesome soundtrack from the band Indian Ocean who also gave music to above mentioned Black Friday.

5. Dor: A movie for people who liked Deepa Mehta's Water. It is also about widows but captures it differently. Warning: It's kinda slow in the beginning.

If you are the type of person who only watches movies that have been liked by critics, you'll like these movies because each of them got highly positive reviews.

Here's a trailer for A Wednesday!

Since its Christmas...

Hey guys, since today is Christmas, a time of miracle and other joyous stuff, I leave this video for you to enjoy.

Asian Drama: Resources

Now, that I've given you an overview of East Asian dramas, you might be wondering where do I start?
You can watch Asian Dramas at Drama Fever which is legal. It is mostly Korean dramas although according to Wikipedia, they are in talks to legally license Japanese and Taiwanese dramas. You can also watch dramas at Mysoju, Youtube where videos are streamed from various sites but isn't legal. Crunchyroll is a site that has some content that is legal. However, I personally do not go on their site because of popups.
Here's my suggestion: Sometimes the only way to watch a Japanese or Taiwanese drama is through Mysoju or Youtube. However, if you like the show, go buy a legal copy. You can buy many popular titles at amazon.com. To all the people living in Eastern Ontario, a friend told me that many popular Asian Dramas can be bought at Pacific Mall. So, try your Asian shops or Chinatown.

Here are some websites/blogs that are very helpful:

Dramabeans: Excellent recaps in english of Korean Dramas. Trust me, the recaps are sometimes better than the drama itself.

PopPopKiss: A blog about Asian popculture. It's got great content and the blogger likes the manga Skip Beat which automatically gets her my respect. She's also got some great links to other Japanese/Korean blogs.

Wikipedia: Always, a great resource especially if you are trying to learm nore about Asian dramas.

Drama Wiki: According to this site, it is a "rereference repository for Asian television entertainment that use the following Eastern Asian languages: Chinese (Mandarin and Cantonese), Japanese and Korean.ference repository for Asian television entertainment that use the following Eastern Asian languages: Chinese (Mandarin and Cantonese), Japanese and Korean." It is a great resource, trying to find who is cast in a certain drama and when it was produced. Like Wikipedia, it also has actor/actress bio.

 If you know about a great blog or website in English, that's got great Asian Drama related content, please share.

Taiwanese Dramas: how I really got addicted to Asian Pop culture

I didn't just wake up one day and decided to start watching Asian dramas. It was really an accidental discovery. Back in 2007, I was searching for the Hana Kimi Anime on Youtube. I didn't find the anime, this is when Youtube was starting to enforce copyright regulations. However, I did find the live adaptation of the manga and it was in Taiwanese. I was curious, so I clicked on the first episode with english subs and I was pleasently surprised. I found myself liking the show and it led me to discover other dramas. So, I really request anyone to try watching an asian drama, maybe one from my list or one that you happen to find the most intersting.
Taiwanese dramas are made in Taiwan and have the same format as K-dramas but with more episodes. I found that Taiwanese dramas tend to do a lot of adaptations of mangas and they seem to stick much closer to the original script than the J-dramas. One can also find Taiwanese dramas based on a manhua. You can read more about Taiwanese dramas here.

As always, I give you my list of Taiwanese dramas to watch:
1. Hana Kimi
2. Fated to love you (based on a manhua)
3. Devil Beside you
4.Romantic Princess
5.Prince Turns to Frog
6.Smiling Pasta
7. Why Why Love?
8.Autumn's Concerto
9. Down with Love
10. Bump Off Lover (Very different from any other Asian dramas)




I know this post is long but the next post is going to be much shorter.

Japanese Drama 101

First, I'd like to say that this blog post almost didn't happen today because I had a cramp in my damn arm. Anyway, back to the post, Japanese dramas are also in miniseries format, but have lesser episodes than Korean dramas. I believe the number of episodes usually average from 10-12. Japanese dramas are a boon for manga lovers since we get to see live adaptation of many popular mangas. You can learn more about Japanese dramas here.

So, here's my list:

1. Hana Kimi
2. Hana Yori Dango (Boys before Flowers)
3. Yukan Club
4. Love Shuffle
5. Absolute Boyfriend (Zettai Kareshi)
6. Nobuta wo produce
7. Nodame Cantabile
8. Kurosagi
9.Hotaru no Hikari
10. Q.E.D

 Seriously though this list doesn't even skim the surface in terms of great dramas out there. There are so many live adaptations, it is hard to keep up.
I, now end this post with a soundtrack from Hana Yori Dango. The song is called Flavor of Life and sung by very talented Utada Hikaru.

Indian is a nationality, not a race!

I get pretty angry when people always ask me if so and so is Indian because he/she looks Indian and I obviously must know because I am "Indian". I really don't get what they are trying to say. There is no Indian race or etnicity. India is a country. Someone can be born in India and hence have an Indian nationality but their ethnicity is Punjabi, Gujrati etc. India has many ethnicities and is a multicultural society. Really, asking someone whether someone is Indian because they look Indian is a stupid question. Most of the time they confuse people from other countries in South Asia as Indian. If someone is from Pakistan, some people still refer to them as that Indian man/woman. If someone is fom Sri Lanka, they refer to them as you know that Indian girl? Although, some cultural similarities are shared between all South Asian nation states, there are also many differences. For instance, there are some ethnicities that are found mostly in pakistan. South Asia is quite vast geographically and you have people with varied facial features.
Here are some examples of Indian people:

This picture is of a Rajasthani Boy

A girl from Arunchal Pradesh

Bollywood actress Kajol

Kalki Koechlin, an Indian actress of french ethnicity.

All these people in the pictures are Indians by nationality but have different ethnicities. So, next time you see a brown person, ask them about their ethnicity!

(P.S: I got all the pictures from Google Images and do not claim to own any of them.)

Korean Dramas: An Intro

Well, first of all you might ask what are Korean dramas? Well, they are Dramas made in Korea (South) unless you've found an intriguing TV show made in North Korea, then please do share. Korean dramas or K-dramas are popular not only in South Korea but also in other countries around the world. According to Wikipedia, most of these dramas are in miniseries format and they usually tend to be romance, romantic comedies or historical dramas. You can read more about K-dramas at always helpful Wikipedia.
 
 The K-dramas I'll be mentioning are mostly romantic comedies. Here are some of my favorite K-dramas:

1. My Girl
2. Goong/Princess Hours
3. The 1st shop of coffee prince
4. Boys before Flowers
5. Full House
6.Coffee house (not the same as #3)
7. Queen of housewives
8. The Devil
9. Secret Garden (currently on-going)
10. My girl friend is a nine-tailed fox

I know the titles of these drama sound like they come from bad Harlequin Romance but these dramas are very good. For people who might not want to see romantic comedies, The Devil is a suspense thriller. Since these are mini series, the length of these dramas are quite short, so you can easily fit them in a busy life.
I end this post with soundtrack from My Girl.

Top 5 reasons to watch Asian Dramas

There are plenty of reasons to watch Asian Dramas. Here's some of my list:

1. There are plenty of gorgeous male and female leads to swoon over.

2. Many of the dramas are good, well acted and modest. Yes, there is kissing in Asian Dramas but I find them far more modest than regular American TV shows like Gossip Girl.

3. Many Dramas are live adaptation of mangas, manhwas and manhuas. Don't know what mangas are? Well, they are basically Japanese style comic books. Manhwas are the korean comic books and Manhuas are Chinese comics.

4. You want to experience a new culture. Yes, they are TV shows so you do have to keep in mind what is shown in Japanese drama is not the norm for most Japanese folks. However, you do get some interesting tidbits about the culture.

5. You want to be entertained. I find Asian dramas to be far more entertaining than the boring American tv shows that seem to dish out the same stuff every year. I mean, seriously how many crime procedural dramas are they going to make?

So, now that I've given you plenty of reasons to try watching dramas from Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, Go ahead and watch an Asian drama this Christmas!

I did it... YAY!

Dear friends and strangers, I started a blog. Now you might ask, what's so great about that?  Bazillions of people do that you nerd. But let me tell you what this blog is going to about. This blog is going to mainly focus on Asian pop culture, mainly Japanese, Korean and Taiwanese dramas, movies and more. To all fellow South Asians, fret not, I'll mention bollywood. Okay, I'll throw in some politics, mangas and other random stuff this brain will cook up. So, I hope y'all enjoy the future posts!