Two out of three ain't bad

Last Monday I quit my job.

From September on I'm going to work at yet another mail order company.
It's not particularly my dream job - it's more a kind of compromise. I had wanted to change my field of work, at least a little bit, and get out of eCommerce. But I didn't want to move, so the choice of jobs was limited. I applied at other companies, but I only got invited to one, and that didn't work out (a shame, it would have been a scientific job). It's really hard to make people see that you can do their work when you've never done it before.

Well, so it's ecommerce again. It seems I kind of became an expert in a field I never even wanted to work in...
I'll have to commute, it's gonna cost a lot more time and money. But I thought I might be able to use that time, maybe catch up on reading books or maybe even surf the internet, check my Twitter or Pinterest (unfortunately mobile internet connection is a little expensive in Germany).
I'll earn a little more, but not as much as I had hoped. I'll also have to work a little more, 40 instead of 37,5 hours per week. So probably, considering the higher costs for commuting, I won't earn more. But money wasn't the main motivation.

I just had to get out of my current job.
I can't deal with my bosses and the atmosphere at work anymore. And who knows? Maybe they wanted me gone. When I told my team leader that I was quitting she wasn't surprised. She said she was sorry - but honestly I didn't think it sounded honest.

So even if this isn't what I had hoped for, I hope it will be a change for the better. The only way to change something about my situation was to change my situation. Read more on this article...

short k-drama reviews: Boys Before Flowers, Mary Stayed Out All Night, City Hunter, You're Beautiful, Secret Garden

Lately I've been somewhat obsessed with Korean drama shows. I hardly have time for manga and anime! Help?

I have to say there are quite a few things that annoy me though, for example the constant friend-zoning of the nice guy, while the girl for some reason (I don't know why) falls for the mean guy. Apparently I'm supposed to feel pity for the mean main guy because of whatever - but it doesn't work on me.
The female main character... well, it depends. They seem to start off as these strong women, but quite often it turns out different. That may lead to some disappointment.


Boys Before Flowers

I've already seen Hana Yori Dango and I started watching the Korean re-make... well, probably because of Lee Min Ho. I have to say though the one who suprised me was the second male lead Ji Hoo, the nice guy of F4, the one the girl originally has a crush on. He's a lot more charming and good-looking than in the Japanese version, in my opinion.
I stopped watching when she gave up on him and choose the other guy, after about seven episodes. I really got too annoyed at this (even though I knew before).

Watch? No.

DramaWiki

Mary Stayed Out All Night (or: Marry Me, Mary)

This one is a little different.
Mae Ri's dad has a lot of debts and when he meets an old friend again (who's now very rich), he wants his daughter to marry his friend's son - as they promised back when they were kids. Everyone involved has their own secret scheme - but Mae Ri doesn't want to marry. She talks a talented indie singer (who she perviously ran over with her car) into posing as her spouse. Then things get complicated. Very complicated.

In this drama the male lead is poor, both of the guys are nice and Mae Ri actually shows some initiative and backbone. It also has nice music and Jang Geun Suk (whose smile is amazing). I really loved his outfits, too.
What drove me mad was how everyone seemed to always do what their parents told them to, no matter how sick and messed-up it was.

Watch? Yes, especially if you like rock music.

DramaWiki

City Hunter

I've heard a lot of good things about City Hunter. And also there's Lee Min Ho. So I gave it a try, though I'm usually not into action series.
I very nearly stopped after the first episode. I don't like violence and there was a lot of that (and no Lee Min Ho). But I gave it another chance and that was a good thing.
Of course things are a bit fishy... A young man raised by drug dealers in the Asian jungle goes to the U.S. and within a few years graduates from MIT? Yeah, right...
Anyway, Lee Yoon Sung starts to work for the government - while he's planning a revenge on the people who caused the death of his father, a former soldier. A friend of his father kidnapped him as a baby and brought him up just for this revenge, but Yoon Sung plans to deviate from the plans by not killing people. At the same time he promised a friend to look after a girl called Kim Na Na, who happens to start working for the government as a bodyguard. So he's quite a busy bee. And of course romance ensues where it shouldn't and lifes get entangled and there's lots of secrets about their parents to be unveiled.

It was really suspenseful and not as violent as I expected (though also people don't wondrously stay unharmed). The female lead kicked ass - literally. I really liked that, you seldom get a tough female main character in Asian dramas. Or actually in any movie or series - where is there a scene when the female action hero saves the live of the male action hero and is allowed to fight against guys, not only the cliché evil woman? And also Lee Min Ho looks especially yummy in this one (though I'm not quite sure about some office clothing choices). I liked the issue of loving someone who stands on the opposite side and who you might have to face in a life-or-death situation.
The thing with the cliffhangers got a little too much. You know, sometimes you just want an episode to end normally without any catastrophe. Also they killed off a character I liked, one I didn't expect them to kill off. And of course wearing a mask that covers your mouth will not keep people from recognizing you - but that's the usualy unrealistic stuff you have to deal with in action series.

Watch? Definitely.

DramaWiki

You're Beautiful

Again Jang Geun Suk as a singer. This similarity to Mary Stayed Out All Night is what made me watch.
The famous idol group A.N.JELL adds a new  member to their band - but he's in America for an emergency surgery. Good thing he has a twin sister - no-one will notice, right? So the girl, who's set to become a nun, is thrust into every girls dream, working and living with three famous good-looking musicians. Well, there's not many surprises from there on, just the usual for that genre. People all fall in love with her, some discover the secret and keep quiet or have to be kept quiet, and all that.
This drama was pretty much the worst one concerning friend-zoning the amazing guy. Seriously, seeing Kang Shin Woo being shot down yet again really broke my heart. The female lead was a little annoying, being shoved from here to there, mainly doing what others want her to do. But Hwang Tae Kyung wasn't as "evil" as the main male characters the girl falls in love with usually are; so that was somewhat acceptable.

Watch? Maybe.

 DramaWiki

Secret Garden

I started watching this one because of Philip Lee (the doctor in Faith) - do you see a pattern in my k-drama choices there? *cough* But I'm not too sure that I will continue with this one.
Arrogant rich guy mistakes a stunt woman for an actress but for some reason is fascinated by her and keeps stalking her. She's a big fan of "aging" pop star Oska, who happens to be that guy's cousin. I can hardly repeat any plot here, it's so insignificant. At some point they switch bodies - not sure why, but it makes for some episodes of funny body switch comedy.

I really don't like the main male character. Like not at all. He's an arrogant asshole and a creepy stalker. The female main character is supposed to be a tough stunt woman - but really isn't. She's just getting pushed around, gets a little angry, but doesn't do anything. Big disappointment here, she looked like a cool character in the first episodes.
I kind of like Oska, the aging Hallyu (Korean wave) pop star. He seems to be the best developed character, a wealthy professional, player and a pop star, but insecure about his own abilities. As in Faith Philip Lee is somewhat under-acting, but I do like that calm, strong presence. Plus there's a shower scene.

I'm not sure whether I'll go on watching. The body switch part was amusing, but it's now over and I just know she's going to end up with the asshole guy and it already makes me mad. On the other hand I'd like to see how Oska's story turns out (hoping for some shonen ai there...) and of course some more of Philip Lee.

Watch? Meh.

DramaWiki

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My first love

I met my first boyfriend when I was about 18 years old. At school there was a carneval party with the theme "Lost in Space" and I was going as a Trill from Star Trek. For a picture I needed a communicator and a friend of mine borrowed one from her friend. As I gave it back to him and said my thanks, I thought he had beautiful eyes.
He knew my friend from the Scouts, but he was also in the school's theatre club, as was another friend of mine. He was nine months younger than me. As we now shared a circle of friends, we got to know each other. I fell in love with him. Apparently for everyone else it was quite obvious that there was something going on, but for me not so much; though of course I hoped.
We became close friends. When watching Interview With The Vampire together he got me to promise to tell him who I'm in love with. I was terribly nervous. I didn't know what to do. But somehow I managed to kiss his cheek and say "You know very well who it is that I'm in love with" (sometimes probably it's best if you just do something without thinking). He said he had hoped I'd say that and we kissed.

He was amazing. He was highly intelligent, one of the most intelligent people I ever met. He joked about inventing a number that will turn every calculation true and will be divisible by zero. He was funny, he made me laugh. He loved to discuss things and wanted to become a lawyer. He loved Star Trek and did role-playing (pen & paper and live-action). He smelled good, I think he used Tabak Culture. He was handsome, he had very blue eyes.
Actually... one blue eye. When he was 13 he had a tumour in one eye and since then had a glass eye (which was blue, too, of course). I think it was something very rare and usually not malignant.

It didn't last that long. I don't know how long exactly, maybe three months. I have forgotten what he said when he broke up with me, but he was charming. I can remember that he put a hand on my shoulder as I cried. He said we could stay friends, but soon later seemed not interested in it anymore. So for a while we had not much contact.
But he still owed me a pizza because of a bet he lost. So sometime later we had dinner together and got along well. Very slowly we became friendly with each other again.

By that time I had finished school and didn't see him so often anymore. He was preparing for his finals. But he had been ill for a while and they couldn't quite figure out what it was. At one point they thought it was hepatitis, something with his liver. I had been trying to call him for a while, but couldn't reach him. Finally one of his parents answered the phone. They told me he was in hospital - and the diagnosis was cancer. At that time I was too dumbfounded to say or ask anything more. Later, through friends, I found out he had cancer in his liver, kidneys and lymphatic system. As I understood it, it was something very rare and there was no best practice treatment.
Of course it sounds like a death sentence. But somehow, hope always remains.
He was treated with thermotherapy and chemotherapy. It was hard trying to reach his family. By a friend I was told that he didn't want visitors, but when I finally got his brother on the phone, he said it was OK, except during thermotherapy when he wasn't feeling well. To this day I'm mad at this girl - I suspected she was in love with him, but saying something like this in such a situation...
So it came that I only saw him once more. I visited him in the hospital and as usual he was joking around with the nurses.

I got the call some time later, from a friend. She told me he had died. I stayed calm; she said she was glad, she had been afraid of telling me. My parents were in the living room, my mum was ironing and my dad was watching TV. I was trying to tell them, but I couldn't say anything. What are you supposed to say? "He's dead" - just like that? I started crying. My mum somehow understood what happened and hugged me. My dad was asking us to tell him what was going on.

He had been Catholic. I heard there were so many altar servers wanting to serve at his funeral that they couldn't let all of them. It was in March. He was 19, he would have had finished school that summer, no doubt with top-notch grades.
The chapel was full of young people.I sat apart from my friends, the girls of my class; I can't really remember why. I remember a friend of his sat beside me, he had been doing live-action roleplaying with him and his girlfriend had known him since they were kids. There were some speeches. When the priest said that probably all the people here were asking themselves these questions: Why? Why him? Why so early? - that's when I started to cry. I remember the guy next to me putting his hand on my shoulder. He left it there throughout the whole service, his crying girlfriend in the other arm. Someone of the family held a speech, too, and a friend. I wondered back then and I still do, how he managed to do this, how he could be so brave to stand up there and talk about one of his best friends who just died. He said if he could see him standing there in a suit and telling everyone what a wonderful person he was, my ex-boyfriend would probably laugh and say "nah, enough, it's ok". He reminded us of all the good times we had together. It was heart-breaking.
There was a memorial at school, too. And his family rented the café we were always going to for one evening and invited all of his friends. Reminiscing, sharing stories. There were a lot of young tough guys that night, being drunk and crying.

Actually it's that time that made me realize that rock guys are the best. It wasn't my friends, the girls from my class, taking care of me at that time. It was the guys, his friends. It was his friend, putting his hand on my shoulder when I cried. Other friends kept looking out for me, telling others to wait when we were walking somewhere and I was falling back.


I forgot a lot about my first love. I forgot how he sounded, I forgot his laugh, I forgot his smell. Sometimes I find myself wondering what he'd be doing today. Would he be a lawyer? Would he have his own family (he loved kids)? I find myself thinking "oh, he would have loved that" about some new movie or something. Sometimes I might miss him a little. I wish I could call him and talk things through with him, and maybe then I'd know what to do.

He's burried in the same grave as his grandparents. It's not far from where my parents live and sometimes when I'm visiting them I go there and put up a candle.
Next to his name there's a sign, a circle with a dot in the middle. I've been told it's a sign the Scouts use, it means "I've fulfilled my task here and went home".

Read more on this article...

drama review: Faith/The Great Doctor

If you're lost you can look and you will find me
Time after Time
If you fall I will catch you, I'll be waiting
Time after Time

I haven't yet reviewed an Asian drama here, but I loved this one so much that I just had to.

I'll right out admit that what made me start watching it, was a teaser picture and me thinking the guy was good looking... I only realized later that I've already watched a drama with him, Personal Taste, which by the way has a really beautiful house playing some part in it. Anyway, the summary sounded interesting, too, so the decision was made.

The plot starts in a former kingdom of Goryeo, about 700 years in the past. The new king returns with his wife, but they are attacked and the queen is fataly wounded. Since the queen is a Mongolian princess of Yuan, to which Goryeo is a tributary state, her death would cause great political problems for the kingdom and the newly appointed king. Coincidentally they're close to a magical gate through which a legendary doctor is supposed to have gone to Heaven 1000 years ago. The king sends the head of his body guards, Choi Young, to go and bring back a doctor to save the queen's life.
Choi Young enters the gate and comes out in today's South-Korea. By chance there's a congress of plastic surgery close by and there he meets Yoo Eun-Soo, a former general surgeon. He kidnaps her back to his time and she indeed manages to save the queen's life. Though Choi Young promised to take her back, the king orders her to stay, thinking that having a "doctor from Heaven" by his side is going to help him secure his claim to the throne.

What follows is a fast-paced plot full of power struggles, intrigues, schemes for a coup d'état - and romance of course. The plot is based loosely on actual Korean history, but adds fantastic elements, like some people having a magic powers ("X-Men" as Yoo Eun-soo called them).
In the beginning there's some comedy through the time travel element, but only in the first few episodes, then things get more serious. Of course, especially the men are not used to dealing with a modern day woman. The consequences of time travel aren't really dealt with, though the paradoxes make up some of the plot, the characters never really talk about it in detail. One topic however is the amount of violence in the past - of course as a modern woman, Yoo Eun-Soo has a hard time dealing with that; but she may not be the only one. The surgeon also has to deal with being a doctor under ancient circumstances - which means no pharmacies, no antibiotics, no clean environment, etc.

It's really quite exciting and sometimes I wish there'd been a bit of a break sometimes, everything was going so fast, you'd not have peace at the end of even a single episode. The romance between the two main characters develops nice and slowly. At first they don't get along very well, but Yoo Eun-Soo clings to the warrior because he's the only one she knows and Choi Young has to protect her in order to fulfill his promis to bring her back. They start to trust each other and that develops into more... but they both know that eventually they have to part when Yoo Eun-Soo goes back to her own time.
But before you can relax, enjoy the romance and catch your breath, the next disaster strikes. Up until the very end you can't be sure about how it's going to end - will she get back, will he come with her, will she stay, will they both even survive? You're still wondering about it even within the last 15 minutes.

Besides the beautiful historic setting, great costumes, sword fights and a good-looking main guy, I really liked the characters. Even side characters are well developed. For example the doctor and the warrior aren't the only romantic couple, we also see the king and queen getting closer. You get to know and like the Woodalchi bunch (the king's body guards) and the Suribang gang, even though they're only side characters. I also thought the female warrior guards of the queen were pretty cool, especially the head of the queen's maids, Young's aunt. And the "flute dude", one of the bad guys, was interesting as well.
I especially liked the Royal Doctor, who became a friend of Yoo Eun-Soo, listening to her, helping her out, teaching her. I'd really liked to see more of him, very calm, fascinating character.

 But one last word of warning: some of these side characters will not make it out alive.

Sometimes I wish those things were easier to get your hands on in Europe. If there was a DVD set with subtitles, RC2, at a reasonable price - I'd get it in an instant. I'd read the book, too.
I really loved this series, it'd deserve more fans worldwide.

Wikipedia article about the TV series
Wikipedia article about Choi Young
AsianWiki
DramaWiki Read more on this article...

No second chance

I'm cold and hungry and exhausted and I just got a refusal e-mail from a job application.
So I feel like shit.

I'm really, really fed up with my current job. It was good at the beginning, but after several reorganisations and especially with new bosses, it's just torture. I dislike my team leader, I feel exploited, our departement leader is absolutely not qualified. My new team mates are an incredibly stupid and confused girl who can do nothing on her own and opportunist who thinks of everything as "funny" but has a bad taste in jokes. My team leader's not qualified for leadership (and doesn't do any), likes to spend a lot of time on making things pretty, but none on testing functionality and is very good at delegating unpleasant duties. I don't fit into this team anymore.
The only thing I see ahead of me for the next year or so is testing the same thing over and over again (for various reasons); stupid, repetetive work. A waste of my qualifications.
Plus I question a few strategic choices of the management - I am not sure this company will last a few years longer.
From these "10 Signs That It's Time To Leave Your Job" at least 7 apply to my situation.
So I really want to leave there. As soon as possible.

But I don't really want to move.
Finding jobs in my field here is difficult.

I applied at fours jobs so far. And got two refusals. They didn't even invite me to an interview.
I really thought I was qualified for that job. I must have done something wrong. Was the covering letter bad? Am I not as qualified as I thought? Did I want too much money (we could have talked about that)?
In job applications there's only one chance and you never get to know what you did wrong, you never get the chance to do it better next time. There is no next time.

It's really wearing me out. I wonder how much longer I can last.



Well, I guess I'll get something to eat now, turn up the heating and watch some anime or read Natsume's Book of Friends or something.
And maybe I'll feel better afterwards and ready for another day at my crappy job. Read more on this article...

Hire & Fire

Lately I'm not happy at work. It's not the work itself, it's everything surrounding it.
Our departement manager sucks, he annoys everyone with his ignorance and stupidity, and he has hired a girl for my team leader who's not qualified for the job. She's not a team player herself, so she knows nothing about how to lead a team and is doing an awful job at it.
Our company has problems and fired some people, among them some in our departement and in my team. And now another team mate has quit (not surprisingly, she didn't get along with our team leader either). Which leaves our team down from 5 to 2 - my team leader and me.
I work in a mail order company and for some reason there's a rather hostile attitude towards eCommerce (where I work). It results in bad cooperation and last week comparatively many people from our departement were fired, which makes no sense considering the development away from the catalogue towards the internet. It doesn't give one the feeling that this company fit for the future, and the mail order business in Germany is in a tough spot anyway, with two big players already down.

My mum keeps telling me that I should look for another job. But I wasn't sure. I like the work I'm doing and there's some benefits to working in this company, like a 37,5 hrs working week.
But if it's annoying me too much and making me unhappy, should I not leave?
I don't know where to go though. I'd be fine with getting out of eCommerce, I never wanted to work in this area anyway, it just kind of happened. But I like the flat I'm living in, I like the city, it's close to my hometown; I really don't want to move again. And since there are hardly any jobs for me in this city, the alternative would be commuting.
I guess I should start updating my LinkedIn profile...

And another thing I'm worrying about: what if the next place isn't any better? I thought this place was better than the last, and though I like the tasks better, the working environment got worse and worse. How can I know it's not the same at the next job?

I wonder whether I'll find a job that I'll like, even after years, a place where I can stay. Or will I have to change jobs every 2 or 3 years? I don't think I'd like to live that way. Read more on this article...

reviews: Brave 10, Kuroko no Basket

It's been a while, but here's more anime reviews.

Brave 10

Brave 10 is a reverse harem full of bishonen samurai/ninja. Yay?

Unfortunately it has the annoying helpless female lead, too. Isanami is the usual useless anime girl - you could substitute her with a dog and it wouldn't make much of a difference.
There's the big-breasted ninja woman with ridiculous clothing, too, but she's not as kick-ass as she could be.

The male characters are more interesting. There's a bunch of fighters of different kinds. You'll know some names, because some are based on historical people. This isn't an historical story though, it's more fantasy.
Saizo is an interesting main character, trying to find his way. Is he better off without a master, or will he feel better serving Yukimura Sanada?
The writer of the manga apparently does yaoi, too, and it shows in the outfits. I'm not complaining though. There's a little fan service and some shonen ai hints, but nothing really obvious. Well, except for Kamanosuke Yuri, the bat shit crazy guy with a blood-fetish who's falling for Saizo. A lot of people seem to be unsure about whether he's a woman or a man; I think it's obvious that he's male, but apparently his sometimes non-gender-typical behaviour confuses others. Yuri is one of the most entertaining parts.
Sanada totally reminds me of Shunsui Kyōraku from Bleach. Sasuke's really cute, being all shy and with his animal friends. Rokuro Unno, the uke-ish servant of Sanada - what's with that outfit?! I wish he'd have had more fighting scenes though. The others are interesting, too, Kakei Juzo and Nezu Jinpachi (and Ishida Matsunari), but they don't get enough character development.

Actually no character gets enough development. It's really frustrating: there's all these guys with so much promise, but you just don't get anywhere. The anime clearly suffers from having only 12 episodes. I'm really not sure what story would work with 12 episodes. This one hardly does; it's really a shame. Especially the last episode is a complete letdown.
Also, there's too much talk during the fights.

But since I found the setting and characters interesting, I started buying the mangas. Those are much more "ecchi" than the anime, the girls' nipples show all the time and not only that... But I'm really looking forward to the onsen trip and the drunk party on Jinpachi's ship - my favourite parts of the anime.

TV Tropes
Wikipedia

Kuroko no Baskuke

I started this one after seeing fan art on deviantART. I thought, ok, I'm not interested in basketball, but I loved Chihayafuru even though I never heard of the card game before.

I couldn't stop watching! Seriously, I was glued to the screen. The suspense in some episodes was so intense, it was very nearly physically exhausting just to watch it.

Kuroko is a strange main character. You hardly get any background on him and he's not the strong hero, that's Kagami. He always seems serious and is really innocent-looking (apart from when he gets down to business in a match). He's only really good at passing and otherwise weak, but he can still change a game - and it's not only his special skill. There's something else, but I can't place my finger on it. He seems as uke as one can get, but in a way he isn't (though judging from the fan art out there I might be the only one thinking that).
There's a whole bunch of other male staff, of course, but they're not as interesting as Kuroko. Since it's a shounen anime, there's not a lot of fan service for girls. There's also the big-tits-girl versus small-tits-girl - seriously, I'll never understand what's up with that.

As far as basketball goes, it's probably not realistic; even though I don't know anything about sports, I can see that. But come on, who expects an anime about basketball to be realistic?
The extremes (the next player being amazing, the next even more amazing, the one after that...) are a bit annoying, but Kuroko no Basket is very entertaining and hard to get away from.

TV Tropes
Wikipedia

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