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conceptuaiizing · 4 years ago

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I did EAs job for them and created a hypothetical teen-centered game pack. (Complete with jobs, aspirations, and events!)

All of the credit for this goes to this amazing person: @silent-spirits The original post can be found on Reddit. THIS IS AMAZING.

Teens need more in-game. They basically are just adults who don't work and it's really sad. I think teens could be one of the best life stages to play but there as of now just isn't enough for them to do. So I tried to brainstorm some ideas for a game pack based on them. Would love to hear your thoughts! If you have more ideas please tell me!

I wanted the main selling point for this pack to be an all-new group of teen-only aspirations, jobs, events, and interactions. This focuses more on the gameplay between teens than it does their interactions with adults such as parenthood.

I realize I've put more in this game pack idea than most expansion packs but listen I'm desperate for teen content and I ain't stingy the more the merrier.

Also, I know a lot of this would be cool as a free update but I decided to still put it here because it fits the theme okay.

New School Option:

Private vs Public School

When your sim becomes a teen the guardian will choose to send them to either a private or a public school. I think its ridiculous a family making $1,000s a day each sends their kids to the exact same school as families pushing $1,000 max all together. Obviously it happens in some cases but not too often.

Sims going to private schools have to pay money to do so and wear uniforms. They also have higher chance of getting scouted by universities cause that's life ya know.

Sims going to public schools don't have to pay or wear a uniform. They have a lower chance of being scouted but as a result, have a higher chance of getting a full-ride when they are because they have lower incomes typically.

Sims from the two become rivals and will play each other in games and other events like in University

Teen Only Aspirations:

Valedictorian

Reward Trait: Overachiever

Must not only have an A in high school along with high mental skill but also must be involved in some social activity. This would boost mental and social skills as a teen and once they get the trait they get two benefits. First, they have a higher chance of getting into a distinguished degree program in discover university if you have it. Otherwise, it allows adult sims to choose the socialize option while at work and still gain not lose promotion progress as an overachiever would have mastered the balance of work and socializing.

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Prom Queen/King

Reward Trait: Social Royalty

Focuses on mostly social but also creative skills. Sims must be friends with at least 7 teens and introduce themselves to at least 15. They also have to gain skills specifically in painting and charisma because they would be campaigning as a Prom Queen/King to other teens. Allows them to create posters to put up around venues with the teen hangout trait and they have a new school interaction to "gather support" for their campaign. Ties into the new prom event and allows sims to ask a teen to be the person they run with.

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Mr / Miss Evans

Reward Trait: Sole Lead

Your sim better be ready to bop til they drop with this creative aspiration. This focuses on sims who wish to go into acting, comedy, or music careers. Basically anything involving the big stage. Your sim will need to gain skills in the social categories as well as acting and dancing. Ties into the new school rabbit hole play event where sims can try out after school as they need to get one lead role at least to complete the drama route. They must choose to either be in the play (drama), be in band (music), or being in an improv club (comedy). This allows teen sims to have various interactions with other teens like "discourage from trying out" or "bost about being the lead." Sims who specifically wish to pursue music can join the after school band event which will be at stadiums for performances. Sims with the Sole Lead trait having higher success in stage-related careers, getting into the distinguished drama degree, and can mentor sims in related skills as long as they are a higher level (they don't have to be maxed out)

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Mandatory Participant

Reward Trait: Fighter of the System

For sims who are only at school because its a legal requirement. Sims boost all skill categories in this aspiration but the main focus is mischief and athletism (as they need to escape and play pranks). Sims in this aspiration will skip school with friends, crash prom, and skip their graduation ceremony. They also can't have more than a B in their class and must have a part-time job. This is for sims who believe they don't need school and are able to learn everything themselves. Sims focus on learning skills from books and mentors as well as a part-time career. Sims with the Fighter of the System trait earn higher for freelance, plopsy, and programming jobs as they don't want to work for the man. They also will have a harder time befriending those in the politician and education careers.

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Future 1%

Reward Trait: Big Brain

These teens aspire to be like Elon Musk or Jeff Besos aka the top of the top. Focusing on mental and social skills sims must reach the highest rank of a part-time job in either office assistant, tech intern, or tutor. Sims must also max out at least one skill by the time they become a young adult. Sims who get the Big Brain trait will have a boost to career/degrees related to the law, engineering, technology, and business careers. They also earn a new interaction to "destroy a sim with facts and logic" in the mean category.

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Advisors Pet

Reward Trait: Flexible

These are for the teens who have absolutely zero idea about what they want to do in life. Sims in this aspiration will need to quit at least one part-time job for another, have 7+ in at last 3 skills, and need to have a best friend. Sims will also need to do interactions such as "ponder about future" and "ask sim future plans" to get ideas. Sims with the Flexible trait will not get upset if they switch careers/degrees and have the ability to switch their degree mid-semester, unlike other sims.

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Future "Influencer"

Reward Trait: Attention Wench

For your classic insufferable teens dead set on being the next biggest youtuber, steamer, or simstagram model. Social media is fully opened up to all teen-elders (you don't have to be in the social media career to get all the options) and teens will have to grind for the numbers. Sims also can do interactions such as "ask for shoutouts," "invite to be in video," or "ask if photoshop looks real." These sims don't care about school much and focus on building up social skills. Due to their constant social media grind, they often will annoy other sims and if they annoy another influencer they can get in a social media drama. If they complete the aspiration they get the Attention Wench trait which makes them less embarrassed, gives a bonus to social media success, and makes them more successful at apologizing because they simply made a serious and severe lapse in their judgment.

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Teen-Only Careers:

Office Assistant

Gain experience in social and mental skills by working in a local office. Levels include paperboy/girl, secretary, intern, and future hire. Sims who make it to the future hire level will get offered to join the business career and gain promotions easier immediately when they grow up which will start them 2 levels ahead. However, they lose this opportunity if they goto University.

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Tech Intern

Sims must have at least 3 levels in programming to apply for this job. Gain experience in programming and logic. There aren't any levels (just bonuses) and the higher the bonus the higher signing bonus they will get if they immediately join the programming career. Like the OA they lose the opportunity if they choose to go to Uni instead of being hired by the company.

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Tutor

Sims must have 5 levels in at least 3 skills to be eligible to become a tutor. Sims gain skills in charisma, research and debate, and writing while working. They also will befriend the student they are tutoring. Becoming a tutor will give sims a bonus to the Valedvitorian aspiration and will also boost them in applying for distinguished degrees.

Note

I wanted to add more careers but I felt there are so many that shouldn't be locked purely behind a teen age. So I figured id stick to careers that actually hold benefits for teens in the future than simple pocket money ones.

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Events:

Prom

-Prom is an event that takes place at a lounge venue during a teen's lifespan much to the nature of the talent show event. Your sim will get notified when Prom begins and they can choose between three options, skip prom, attend, or show up late to crash it. When your sim travels to the venue for Prom they will change into formal gear (unless they showed up later to crash it then they'd be in normal clothes or a special outfit your choice) and have goals like any other event. Other teens that your sim know will be there and the venue will only have teens minus any workers at the venue or chaperons.

-Sims can dance with their date (who they must ask out before prom), try and steal someone else's date (and risk a fight), dance with friends (in case they went alone), take pictures together, and a prom king and queen/king announcement will be made.

-If your sims there to crash it they can mess with the music, steal the food, and even get up on stage to crash the prom royalty announcement. If you go as far as crashing the announcement you will have a little timer that pops up which is your time to escape the venue before the chaperons get you. If you successfully leave without getting got you will have a crown in your inventory and will receive a confident moodlet. If you get caught you get no crown and your guardian is called giving the teen an embarrassed moodlet and the guardian an angry one. Both however result in getting suspended for one day (they stay home) as well as a drop in school performance.

-The day after prom your sim will get texts from their friends regarding prom. If your sim went it will be about what happened there or someone asking since they didn't go. If your sim chooses to crash it they will either get congratulated by their friends for having the guts to do it or the prom queen/king will text them angrily. If your sim didn't go the others will inform them about what happened.

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Graduation

Graduation is much like the one in University where you only get it if you get at least a C and it is a rabbit hole. Your sim can choose to go or skip both results in getting a high school diploma either way. If your sim goes they will show up to the stadium in their uniform with their family if they choose to and will disappear. During the graduation a few things will pop up asking for a choice such as "your friend's name has been called do you A) Scream loudly or B) Act natural" or "your walking to receive your diploma do you A) Do something crazy or B) Act natural." Afterward, your sim will have a confident/happy moodlet and so will whoever attends. They will have time to mingle with the other teens and their families before being asked if they wish to bring their friends over to their house for a party.

Venues

Stadium

-Where sims go for graduation and athletic careers

-Allows sims outside University to go to sports games

-Includes NPCs that are food vendors, players, etc.

-Can be large football stadiums or a small town local one

-If a game or graduation is not occurring sims can play soccer, football, lacrosse, etc with each other on the felid

-Band kids will go here for performances

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After School Activities

Plays

-Anyone can try out for the play (as an actor, tech, or designer) and it happens twice in a teen sims lifespan. If your sim is high enough in acting to get a call back they will be able to choose a specific role to try out for and have the chance of being an understudy if they are beat out. Sims who choose to apply for a tech role will get it instantly. Sims who apply for a designer must have at least a level 3 in painting to receive it.

-If a sim is in production, no matter what aspect they will have to go to practice daily. They also must practice on their own and can do so with others. During practice, they will meet other teens and improve on skills related to what they chose. Sims can also ask others to go watch the play.

-After the play, you will find out how well your sim did relating to how much they practiced/the level. Sims who did great will get a moodlet bonus while sims who didn't will get a negative moodlet. Sims who did poorly also have consequences. If they acted badly they cant apply for the lead in the next play, if their tech or design they won't be allowed to participate next play.

-The night of the play sims and whoever they invited will travel to it as a rabbit hole.

-Allows for sims in the acting branch to get scouted by a college scout and will receive a college scholarship potentially.

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Sports

-Sims can apply for a sports team in various sports.

-All are rabbit hole except for soccer, football, and lacrosse which can be played at the stadium for practice

-Adds more variety of sports equipment that can be used by child-elders (which should also be a free update js)

-Sims on the sports team use the same system as the soccer team from DU

-Like the plays, sims have the ability to get scouted and they can either get a scholarship or if they decide to pursue an athletic-related degree a full ride

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Band

-Adds more instruments (which should be a free update)

-Sims must audition to be in the band and whether they practice or not will mean whether or not their position in the band increases

-Perform in their own rabbit hole events and at sports games for the highschool

-Can also get scouted which can result in scholarships

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Clubs

-Sims can also join various rabbit hole clubs such as anime club, chess club, social related issues clubs, cooking club, d&d club, etc you get the point

-Clubs happen after school but do not occur every single day some might be once a week while other might be three times which allows teens to either join multiple clubs or have time to do a job or simply their homework

-Clubs do not result in possible scholarships but they do increase skills and allow sims to meet friends

-Some clubs will have special weekend events like bake sales or trips

-Being an active club member will increase your sims chances of getting into a distinguished degree as they will look better to the schools

School Trips

-Teens will come home some days and be notified there is a school trip occurring the next day which can either be educational (a museum for example) or for fun (the beach, park, etc)

-If your sims grades are lower than a B they will not be allowed to go

-Sims must have a signed permission slip to attend the trip. When they get home they can ask their guardian to sign it (if you have parenthood and your sims not the best kid their guardian will be more likely to refuse) or if their mischief is high enough they can forge it

-Sims who forge a signature can get caught, sent home, and lose school performance while causing their guardian to get an angry moodlet

-If you have a vacation park (Jungle Adventure or Outdoor Retreat) and your sim has an A they will get the option for an overnight school trip

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astrologysvt · 5 years ago

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Chart First Impressions: Seungkwan

In celebration of Seungkwan’s bday, I’m starting the “Seungkwan is Best Baby” club and here is my list of reasons why you should join it.

These are just the first impressions I had to all of their charts – the parts that popped out to me as being notable, things I personally liked, things I thought were interesting or contrary to the image I have of them. Things like that. I’m not looking at anything in particular with each reading. Some of their readings may be more aspect focused, where some may just focus solely on their personal planets. If you have any questions on specific aspects or want to request a more specific reading, feel free to send me an ask!I adore this boy

our little capricorn baby

lets have a nice little capricorn talk.

another misunderstood sign

caps can be seen as stubborn, maybe judgmental.

maybe sometimes overly practical and inflexible.

i’ll be honest and say that caps have been the hardest for me personally to understand, but learning to understand them has been incredibly rewarding and enlightening.

the first hurdle you need to address if ur struggling to understand caps is to understand that they aren’t miracle workers.

they are so easy to write off in readings as the hard-workers, the ambitious ones, the ones who get stuff done.

lmao there is an expectation that, if no other sign can do it, a cap probably can — but these things are obviously more complex than that, and no one is immune to failure.

honestly, i think the main reason why people think this is, is because a cap is gonna be the last one to be okay dropping things if they know no one else is going to pick it up after them.

even if they’re over it and don’t want to deal with it anymore — they’re gonna be the ones who know how to find the patience and perseverance within themselves to see it to completion.

i went into it a little bit with seungcheol, but i think the primary identifying factor for a cap is their sense of responsibility.

how they decide to address/focus/direct this sense of responsibility is up to them, but i’ve met various capricorns at very different places with their sense of responsibility.

some ignore it, some are CONSTANTLY THINKING ABOUT IT.

caps who struggle to focus it in any which direction can tend to be pretty fickle with their time and struggle to justify imputing excessive amounts of effort into things they aren’t sure about.

if they don’t see it amounting to something, they’d rather not do anything.

and then you have the caps who are so committed in one direction who really feel as though time is constantly passing them by.

this is because they’re so focused on their goals that they struggle to grasp the progress they are actually making.

either way, what’s looming over them both is this hyper awareness of a sense of purpose (or lack there of).

and in my experience, they both tend to be rather insecure regardless of the place they’re at with their goals.

they’re either insecure in knowing they need to be doing things and aren’t, or insecure in not knowing whether they’re being the most efficient with their time.

that’s just something to think about with both seungkwan and joshua, though i think this is much more prominent in seungkwan

(not to say joshua doesn’t have the same sense of responsibility, he just seems to be less quick to action than seungkwan is).

with seungkwan, he’s the opportunist capricorn.

they’re the ones who don’t wait for people to hype them up to start doing things.

if they see an opportunity, they’ve already signed on and have started preparing.

this makes sense considering his approach to variety shows.

if he sees the opportunity, he reaches out.

same with his cover of love poem, he saw the opportunity to make this connection with IU and it ended up being this really beautiful exchange.

this cap attitude is the one he exactly expressed in the behind the scenes, too, when he was explaining that he didn’t know where the courage came from but he really wanted to directly ask IU for the instrumental.

he didn’t HAVE to per say, but his lack of fear allowed him to pursue this project in a very sincere, touching, and authentic way.

it goes to show how good these caps are at putting the effort forward before they can think themselves out of it.

these caps are just a mystery to me because you can’t even imagine where the idea to do the things they do come from, and before you have time to ask them what they’re up to, they’re already knee deep in the project and starting new ones as you speak.

but lets look at the rest of his chart

we’ve got a virgo moon!

so i feel like people don’t give virgos enough credit for being some of the funniest people in the world, honestly.

they are naturally very clever people and consequentially very great conversationalists (so long as they don’t have other, more reserved placements that may interfere).

they are this way because they are so observant and detail-oriented.

they can talk for hours about the intricacies of the most random things and can talk about them with such passion because they genuinely think the little things are the most interesting.

they’re very similar to gemini placements in the sense that they want to know everything and study everything, and honestly just love being able to share their findings with people.

i think the primary difference is that geminis do it because they are so curious and inquisitive, almost to a fault.

where as a virgo approaches it more as research/getting their bearings.

they feel the most comfortable in situations where they can account for all the details, understand how each part functions, and can have enough information where they feel as though they can comfortably predict all possible outcomes.

they’re so good at this to the point that they manage to come to these findings incredibly fast, almost subconsciously.

which is why you can hardly ever get anything past someone with a strong virgo influence. even when you think they’re not paying attention.

they keep tabs on the most random, minuscule things and man will they let you know if something is not how it should be.

but how does this make him funny?

virgo’s take that attention to detail and they apply that to their humor.

they’re the ones to point out that random thing they noticed you did that you didn’t think anyone would notice, but boy did they notice it and did they think it was hilarious.

or the kind of things that wouldn’t be funny inherently, but are funny because they put it in such a specific context that now you think it’s the funniest thing on the planet.

it’s because they’re resourceful comedians who are super in tune not just with the nuance that puts those jokes over the top, but they are so good at finding the most obscure, random things to pick fun at.

they’re humor also def leans more towards the satiric/absurd realm.

i mean, john mulaney is a virgo idk what more i need to say to prove how funny and weird virgos can be.

seungkwan honestly has such a big heart.

so i know earth signs have a habit of coming across cool or impersonal, and with a cap sun, mercury, venus & virgo moon you’d imagine he’d be too cool for school.

but don’t forget virgo influences are one of the healers of astrology.

in astrology there are two “healers”

pisces are the emotional healers, and virgos are the physical healers.

this could explain his ultra obsession with helping the others maintain their health, and also why he manages to nag them about it in the sweetest way.

but we’ve also got a virgo moon trine cap mercury.

this makes him incredibly emotionally competent.

having this aspect associated with both earth signs makes it so that his concern with health and stability is how he expresses his care.

he truly and deeply understands the role he plays in taking care of his members and takes it very seriously.

this also makes him really good at giving advice!!!

he’s so attentive and is really good at balancing emotional support with guidance.

this can also make him incredibly great in stressful situations as he’s able to take in chaos and turbulence through his moon and effectively process it. then his cap mercury’s quick brain and knack for logics kicks in and starts problem solving.

his moon is opposite jupiter

this is the aspect that really makes him that fun-loving, sweet, warm-hearted boo we all know and love.

he’s so generous with affection and humor because it comes from this bottomless well within him.

he’s so accessible and i think this is one of the reasons why people are so quick to warm up to him.

hehehe tho he does have a tendency to over do it due to that opposition.

the jupiter influence gives him this super open and free energy from that added sag influence while making him incredibly optimistic at heart.

he’s just so easy to be around, and when you see him open up his arms to you there’s no reason for you not to return the gesture.

not only that, but talking with him is so fun because he is so animated and so passionate yet so invested in the conversation because he genuinely enjoys hearing from different perspectives.

he is truly a happy, and optimistic person at heart and associating this with his moon makes him incredibly stable and enduring in the face of emotional turmoil.

it doesn’t make him immune to emotions or sadness, but he is certainly always able to find a silver lining while also allowing him to be constructive on the reasons he may have ended up where he was.

but you take that and then you add his already super committed capricorn energy, and what you get is this incredibly resilient guy.

it’s because of this that he’s so capable of being present in every single aspect.

there is at no point that seungkwan checks out, may it be professionally, personally, emotionally.

he is truly someone you can depend on in all fronts.

#seventeen #svt #seungkwan #boo seungkwan

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imperfekti · 5 years ago

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Tenipuri Party: Tezuka Kunimitsu profile translation

TN:

In the absence of an official English version, this translation is intended to help those who can’t read the material in the original language. Please support Tenipuri by getting your own copy of this book - it is worth it! There are various ways of purchasing it even for those not living in or visiting Japan.

The pictures I have included in this post do not show full pages.

On the translation: this time I’m aiming for a more direct, “Japanese-sounding” translation to share the mood of the content more as it is. This will probably cause some sentences to appear weird in English.

On Tezuka’s style of speech: his word choices and sentence structures are mostly polite and serious.

I’m still working on Japanese, so there might be mistakes. Please let me know if you spot any translation errors so I can fix them here!

Tezuka Kunimitsu

U-17 German representative player Seishun Gakuen Middle-school player

Beyond the imagined future - the released challenger!!

Message

“For the support every day, I’m grateful. For the sake of becoming a professional, and for the sake of my tennis, I intend to earnestly keep confronting myself. I think you are the same. In the future as well, together. Let’s go without carelessness.”

Extra prize: A voucher for two at a high-class mountaintop hotel “An undeserved honor. I’m focusing on tennis right now, but… If I can make the time, I will gratefully use it. For two, huh…”

Profile

[DATA] Middle-school 3rd year / October 7th (Libra) / Blood type O / 179 cm / 58 → 61 kg / Left-handed

Special techniques: Drop shot, zero shiki drop shot, Muga no kyouchi, Hyakuren jitoku no kiwami, Saiki kanpatsu no kiwami, Tenimuhou no kiwami, Tezuka zone, Tezuka phantom, Zero shiki serve

Playstyle: All-rounder

Family: Grandfather, father, mother

Father’s occupation: company employee (business) (grandfather is a judo instructor for the police)

Hobbies: Mountain climbing, camping, fishing

Favourite saying: The enemy is within yourself

Favourite color: Green or blue

Favourite food: unacha (a dish with eel carefully broiled in soy-based sauce), Räucheraal (TN: smoked eel)

Favourite book: German-Japanese-German dictionary (to carry with him)

Favourite music: Classical (Beethoven)

Preferred type of person: Trying not to think about it at the moment.

Preferred date spot: Zugspitze

Most wanted item: A mountain model kit

Things he’s bad at/with: Being idle, colourful cakes

Elementary school: Seishun Dai Daiichi Elementary School

Committee: Student council president

Strong subjects: World history

Weak subjects: None

Often visited place in school: The library

Uses allowance on: Books

Skill outside tennis: Woodworking, preparing fish for cooking

Routine during tournament: Keeping a diary in German, watching foreign comedy-dramas.

Favourite anniversary: 23rd August

Preferred travel destination: Macchu Picchu ruins and Huayna Picchu

Present for a special person: Writing a letter of gratitude

Scenes

Injuries, seizing the nationals… Tezuka Kunimitsu overcame numerous challenges that waited for him and seized glory. But he is not a man who would be satisfied with that. From now on too, I want to pay attention to the steep path of him who moved over to Germany.

(Quotes on pictures:)

“I will not lose.”

“Saiki kanpatsu no kiwami!?”

“And then Seigaku’s era will begin once again!”

“Now, let’s go without carelessness.”

Indeed, it should perhaps be called a “Tezuka zone”.

“Hyakuren jitoku no kiwami!?”

This boy’s tennis is certainly Ten’imuhou no kiwami!?

“No matter who I will end up fighting… I will win!”

The German representatives’ strained atmosphere connects to rapid development (*1)

Tezuka-senshu (*2) becoming a German representative was a shock. Did you not have worries about this decision?

If I said no, it would be a lie. However, as to what is important for me as someone aiming to become a professional, I judged it to be fighting as a German representative and based my decision on that.

Specifically, the currently important thing for Tezuka-senshu is…?

Most of all, it is actual experience of fighting at a higher level. At the German training centre, I have the fortunate chance to rally with top pros like Volk-senshu. Even in practice, they are always making hypotheses as to which shot they should hit, what kind of a play they should make in any kind of match circumstances when they are standing on the court. Having put myself in such a strained atmosphere, I can truly feel my level of experience rising rapidly.

Any bewilderment at facing your former comrades…?

Whoever will become my opponent will not be a problem. But, at first, I thought I was feeling sorry. However, at the time of fighting Japan in the exhibition match, I came to realise my heart was throbbing about competing against them. But just fighting as sworn friends, it is not to elevate ourselves. Rather, by putting a net in-between and confronting each other, the light can come from a new angle and hasten growth - that is what I believe right now.

Then, what is Tezuka-senshu’s current objective or dream?

Upon seizing the world, to hold up the flag of Germany that showed in me, a foreigner. If the opponent for that match were to be Japan, there would not be higher joy.

In a well-ordered and non-negligent environment, pleasant days go on

Have you already grown accustomed to life in Germany?

Yes. Everything proceeds very systematically, so in that sense, it sometimes feels like it is actually even more pleasant than in Japan.

What things for example are like that?

Everyone is already gathered around 15 minutes before the set meeting time. The notion of ecology is growing, so most customers carry eco bags for their shopping, and the separation of waste is enforced thoroughly. Everything is done logically, and it’s an environment without negligence.

I see. It suits the serious Tezuka-senshu perfectly. Then, how do you spend your days off?

Touring antiquarian bookshops is currently my biggest enjoyment. From Goethe to Ende, I have been able to acquire several original texts that I couldn’t in Japan. Also, when time and money allow, I try to go to classical concerts.

What about the German language?

The German language too is a very systematic and logical language. There are very few exceptions, as long as one memorises the basic grammar and idioms, it is quite effective to use. Of course I still lack study, and there are many points where I lack experience, but words are not the only means of communication. Rather, sometimes it is facial expressions that speak more eloquently.

Facial expressions…?

Yes. Facial expressions.

Message for Tezuka Kunimitsu

As expected… should I say. Congratulations. (Inui)

YEEES! CONGRATULATIONS!! (Kawamura)

You should still be able to grow one rank higher. Put effort into your training. (Volk)

I will definitely not forget the thing that you taught me. Let’s meet on the court. (Fuji)

I’m glad you seem to be doing well in Germany too. Eat your meals properly! (Ooishi)

Tezuka-buchou-senpai, congratulations. We are protecting Seigaku. (Kaidou)

I’ll win one day, both in popularity and tennis! (Momoshiro)

You’re not planning on ending it at this? I’m waiting for the next opportunity to fight you. (Atobe)

Congratulatioons. But I’ll overcome you soon. (Echizen)

Are you doing well Tezuka? Send something tasty from Germany! (Kikumaru)

This guy is in 4th place!? Gimme a break! You can go higher than that! (Siegfried)

Party talk

Q: Who would you like to inform about this time’s rank and feelings? A: My family. My grandfather too is always supporting me.

Q: You are being served a lot of food. A: Ooishi. I’m grateful, but it’s already enough. I’m eating sufficiently… I tasted Japanese unacha for the first time in a while.

Q: You can also take part in an improvisation skit competition. A: … No, thank you. I was able to enjoy it quite a lot just by watching.

Q: You got excited with Bismarck-san, though... A: … I was merely unilaterally lectured about how to flirt with women.

Q: Who did you come to the venue with today? A: With the German representative senpai. In addition to training, we measured the time and ran to the venue.

Q: Oh? Is there something the matter with Echizen-kun? A: No. I just thought he seems to have gained experience and grown somewhat.

History

Age 0 October 7 Birth

Age 5 Makes a mistake in dance moves in a kindergarten’s play

Age 10 June Climbs Switzerland's Matterhorn with his father

Age 11 Summer Meets Yukimura and Sanada after the Jr. Tournament, has a match Goes fishing with grandfather, catches a sea bream

Age 12 March Graduates from Seishun Dai Daiichi Elementary School

April Enters Seishun Gakuen Middle School Is hit on the elbow with a racket by a senpai in the tennis club Is told to become "Seigaku's pillar of support" by Yamato

Age 13 November Displays a sketch of mountain grass in the culture festival

January Goes to the first shrine visit of New Year with the club’s 1st year members, makes a vow of conquering the nationals

April Becomes a 2nd year Becomes the vice captain of the tennis club

June Participates in a bread eating race in an athletic festivals, places second

September Gets lots of recommendation letters and becomes the student council president

Age 14 Declines the Jr. Senbatsu invitation Around autumn Has an uncomfortable feeling in his arm

October On the field trip (Taiwan), buys tea utensils for souvenirs

November At the Allied music festival (*3) , participates in the class chorus as a musical conductor

February For the first time in his life, forgets something

April Becomes a 3rd year Becomes the captain of the tennis club

May Wins Tokyo preliminaries championship Is mistaken for a teacher at Kawamura Sushi Has a match with Ryoma on courts underneath the railway

June Wins prefecturals championship Declines offer from the special overseas JFH program Goes to the drawings for the Kantou tournament

July Is invited to Hyoutei’s opera appreciation party as the student council president but declines Start of Kantou tournament In the first round against Hyoutei, loses to Atobe in S1 Goes to Kyuushuu for rehabilitation

July 27 Wins Kantou tournament championship

August 14 Drawing for the nationals, returns from Kyuushuu

August 17 Start of nationals Faces Higa in the 2nd round, wins against Kite in S1

August 19 Quarterfinals against Hyoutei, wins against Kabaji in S2 Semifinals against Shitenhouji, wins against the Chitose-Zaizen pair in D2 Yakiniku battle, is one of the last members remaining

August 23 Finals against Rikkai, loses to Sanada in S3 Wins nationals championship Goes to the victory celebration at Kawamura Sushi

Age 15 (*4) September Is invited to Rikkai’s ocean festival, makes guest participation in a play

October 12 Climbs Kitadake with father

November Participates in U-17 camp Wins against Kaidou in the “friendly fire” matches Learns about a fishing mobile game from Marui and Kirihara In the court shuffle between 3rd and 5th court, wins against Yamato Abandons the match against Fuji midway, departs for Germany Aiming to become professional, participates in the German representative team

December Participates in the U-17 Pre-World Cup drawings U-17 Pre-World Cup starts In Vs Japan, wins against Irie-Atobe pair in the second match U-17 World Cup starts Is drawn into a fight about food by Siegfried, eats Japanese food together Wins against South Africa and Canada

Plan

(Pictured: two documents of mountain climbing plans, including itinerary, packing list and map.)

“This is from when me and father climbed during consecutive holidays. When climbing mountains, let’s make plans properly and climb without carelessness.”

Fashion

It seems he didn’t bring much clothing with him from Japan. I will give you something next time. (Volk)

With Kunimitsu’s hair style, clothes from any country would suit him. (QP)

Wearing clothes you received just like that. That’s like you. (Fuji)

Whether the person in question is aware of it or not, wearing a waistcloth is quite stylish. (Kite)

“I am not a person who is particular about clothes, but only when it comes to shoes, I make it so that I can play tennis in them.”

Room

Bedroom of the room I’m staying in in Germany There’s only bare minimums like the bed and desk that were part of the furnishings. But I’m thankful that letters and daily necessities have been delivered from Japan. Overall, I like the things made from wood and seeing the townscape from the window.

TN:

*1 張り詰めた, haritsumeta. Strained, stretched, tense. Not strained in the sense of anxious or having problems. It seems more like everyone is ambitious and focused.

*2 選手, senshu: player, athlete. I chose to leave this as it is since the interviewer uses it all the time as an honorific, and couldn’t figure out a natural expression in English.

*3 連合音楽会, rengou ongaku kai. This seems to be some kind of an annual music event that at least schools participate into.

*4 It seems like a mistake that age 15 is placed at September, not October.

#my translation #tezuka kunimitsu #prince of tennis #new prince of tennis #seigaku #fuji shuusuke #otp #my captain

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sumukhcomedy · 5 years ago

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How Some Comedy Clubs Have Fallen Behind the Times

For a generation now, the public’s perception of the venue for stand-up comedy has been the comedy club. A comedian stands on a stage with a microphone and a brick wall is the backdrop.

This was intensified by the “comedy boom” of the 1980s that found the public heading to plenty of their local comedy clubs to watch live stand-up comedy or seeing it depicted on television with presenters like Johnny Carson, Rodney Dangerfield, or even later with it being the start of episodes of Seinfeld. Stand-up comedy had its place and it was the comedy club.

While the “boom” created stand-up comedy’s advancement in the public eye, some of the relics of that era still persist to this day. Comedy was funny but also chaotic at that time and the overall predominant perception the public has of it as well as the manner in which the comedy club may run and interact with it still lays supreme.

Stand-up comedy, like everything else, is still a business. As fun as it may look or as fun as it may be to be a part of it as a comedian or an audience member, it is still a business. A comedy club is looking at what is best monetarily and what ensures their survival and profit just like every other business out there.

But, times change, and with that, businesses must change as well. One must modify with society in order to ensure long-term success. It’s why so many of the comedians of certain eras who were once popular fade. They do not update with the times or attempt to reinvent themselves or create something new. In the same way, if businesses do not attempt to do the same thing, they are likely to fade as well. This is where we may find ourselves with the comedy club.

Much like any other business and organization, it is about building a culture. Nothing presents your culture better for comedy shows and comedy clubs than the comedians you present on stage, how your audience is treated, how you treat your staff, and the list goes on and on that should be common sense for any business. But the culture of many comedy clubs is stuck in another era or in a realm that defies such common sense.

Individuals who may wield the power in the clubs are likely focused on one thing: money. However, they are not focused on the culture component and customer service factor that could draw in the money. It’s true that most of the public does not know much about comedy and is usually drawn in by “big names.” But, still, their experience when dealing with a show with a “big name” matters. It’s great to get “big names” but when those “big names” no show, are too drunk or high to perform, don’t deliver much in the realm of comedy or entertainment, or are known sexual assaulters, what does it say about the culture of the club? Is the money and association with these individuals worth more than the dignity of comedy and one’s own employees and audiences? Logic says it would not but logic is, for whatever reason, not driving many comedy clubs’ decision making.

It happens on the lower levels as well. I’ve had the opportunity to host, feature, and headline at a variety of comedy clubs. There are plenty of comedians that work the road consistently at the feature level. Adam Cayton-Holland wrote a hilarious and perceptive piece on this kind of person a few years ago. I know of plenty of comedians at that level who have been too drunk or too high or too insulting in their performances. And yet, they are still out there getting 2nd chances, 3rd chances, 4th chances, and maybe 80th chances with the same comedy clubs. Somehow, bridges are not burned, and it’s what keeps bitter and ungracious relics of stand-up comedy’s “boom” era still around. It makes even less sense when I could name a ton of comedians who are hilarious, professional, and hardworking who would deserve to take those individual’s places and likely do a far better job fulfilling the comedy club’s customer service goals.

On a personal level, I’ve worked comedy clubs. Some are great and truly value comedy. Some are horrible and just happen to have “comedy club” attached to their name but have no notion at what it entails and what having a culture to a comedy club is about. I’m certainly appreciative to the comedy clubs I’ve worked and that value themselves, their staffs, and their audiences. So this isn’t an indictment on every single comedy club at all. There are great ones out there and you can ask me and just about any other sensible, working stand-up comedian of my generation which comedy clubs are the great ones and our lists would match up. We are now more connected than ever so it doesn’t take much to tell you which are the awesome comedy clubs in the country to work and see comedy.

Thanks to social media, we see a lot of comedians complain about comedy clubs and their booking practices and attempt to push for improvements on booking from them. But, from my perspective, the clubs should no longer be the goal unless they actually change and many don’t seem to be on the horizon to doing so. As many comedians are doing, we all seem better served to producing independent shows in quality, supportive venues with great comedians. Or, as is happening in a place like Fort Collins, creating a comedy club that, from its foundation, is clearly building an appropriate culture and attempting a sensible business plan that cares about all factors that are involved.

When it comes to certain comedy clubs, everyone can yell and demand change but it’s the equivalent of getting into the stereotypical argument with an elderly family member about politics. Change can’t happen with someone who doesn’t wish to be changed. If a comedy club is unwilling to stop booking problematic comedians or promoting shows properly or opening the doors to others then it will cease to exist. The consumer and the comedy community want it. The comedy club is just a venue and it can be dispensable just as we can be as employees of that comedy club. If the clubs are not willing to understand that, then they are willing to fade into the periphery as well. Comedy clubs will then become more of the stage for the equivalent of YouTube star rallies or wrestling conventions than comedy just to draw and generate money. The reality is that all they have to do is produce consistent, quality comedy and customer service to generate trust and reliability with an ever-changing society and consumer.

I’ve noticed some comedians at the lower levels call for boycotts of specific clubs or venues based off a certain booking they may have done. If that’s what a comedian feels in their heart that they need to do, then so be it. But I don’t know that it really resolves anything and only causes more unnecessary attention and uproar. Comedians already have very little power in such matters. Rather than cause uproar, boycott, and negativity, I’d prefer to put my comedy, energy, and money to supporting the comedians, causes, and venues that I feel worthy of it.

The comedy club “boom” now feels more like a sputter. What motivates me to spend money to see a live performance other than providing a great experience? And, unfortunately, many in the comedy club business do not seem to understand that the culture that they build within their walls is imperative to this generation’s great experience and, as a result, their future.

#comedy club #comedy #stand up comedy #feature #fort collins #business #money #organization #culture #comedy business

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pass-the-bechdel · 7 years ago

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La Femme Nikita s01e13 ‘Recruit’

Does it pass the Bechdel Test?

Yes, seventeen (!) times.

How many female characters (with names and lines) are there?

Three (33.33%)

How many male characters (with names and lines) are there?

Six (66.66%)

Positive Content Rating:

One.

General Episode Quality:

The best of times, the worst of times.

MORE INFO (and potential spoilers) UNDER THE CUT:

CONTENT NOTE: This episode and the discussion pertaining to it deals with rape.

Passing the Bechdel: Too many to individually , almost all involving Nikita and Karyn, and on occasion, Nikita and Madeline. Nikita and Karyn talk about the mission, Karyn’s rape, training, Karyn’s prospects and lies. Nikita and Madeline talk about Karyn.

Female Characters:

Karyn

Nikita

Madeline

Male Characters:

Michael

Operations

Walter

Brian

Andre Kreizel

Birkoff

Other Notes:

The episode’s first mission takes place at a lounge called the JuJu Club, which is fantastic in that none of its elements make sense when taken together. It appears to be a high-end venue, with a formal dress code and an upper-class, hetero clientele, except it’s also got muscle-bound male waiters in tight t-shirts and entertainment consisting of a drag queen with burlesque back-up dancers who may or may not also be male. It may be the most surreal thing in the show.

This episode has some fantastic incidental characters: in addition to the sadly nameless drag queen at the JuJu Club, the final mission features a female bank teller who shoots Michael in the back and is automatically my favorite character in the series. Unfortunately, she doesn’t finish the job. : (

This episode features yet another instance of a woman being slapped by a man, and within the first minute. No guesses as to who does the slapping.

This episode confirms that Walter’s sexual harassment isn’t limited to Nikita, as he “jokingly” asks Karyn to remove her bra while outfitting her for a shooting test.

La Femme Nikita, up to this moment, has not been a show about women. It usually manages to be about a woman, and occasionally it has featured women in close proximity to one another, but it has been quite reluctant to have them in a position to relate to one another, or to focus on their relationships. “Friend” and “Mother” did, so, but focused on relationships borne on false pretenses. Carla appears only occasionally, and only for single scenes at a time. Nikita and Madeline’s relationship, at this point, still exists mostly as potential. It’s why, when Karyn, the Section recruit which has been placed under Nikita’s wing until Nikita decides whether she’ll become an agent or be canceled—confesses that she killed her trainer Brian because he’d raped her, it feels significant. It’s a terrible thing to bond over—and utterly unnecessary, given that logically, Karyn and Nikita should have A MILLION THINGS to bond over, and Nikita shouldn’t need to learn that the Section enables rape to choose to work against them—but in a show that gleefully denies its female characters positive connections, that for a moment, Nikita and Karyn understand each other completely feels momentous. After half an episode of Nikita being ambivalent about Karyn, and acting, despite her complaints, way too complacent about doing their bidding, she remembers who the real enemy is.

And then the episode goes and fucking ruins it, by revealing it that it was all a lie, and that Karyn is a liar who actually just likes murdering people.

Fucking fuck, show.

So fuck you, show, for making me wish that a character had been raped, because the alternative is seeing the show propagate the myth that women frequently lie about their rapes. Fuck you show, for your continued denial of the possibility that women can be kindred spirits. Fuck you show, for including utterly unnecessary scenes where Nikita watches uncomfortably as Karyn speaks flirtatiously with a smiling Michael, because of course this had to be, to some degree, about a man. Fuck you show, for the shitty final twist where Karyn was always going to be canceled, and the whole exercise is revealed as a test of Nikita’s assessment skills, making her “choice” the objectively correct one and removing all agency from her choices and “freeing” her of being forced to live with the consequences of her actions.

(She chose to have her canceled, of course.)

And the thing is, there’s no reason to tell this story this way, unless you’re specifically committed to a “bitches be crazy” narrative. You want to tell the story of Nikita being forced to select one of two terrible choices, with someone’s life on the line? You want to tell the story of a Nikita who, now more or less fully committed to the cult that is the Section, and / or her own survival, chooses to prioritize her life over that of someone who is no more or less deserving than her of their fate in the Section? Then tell those stories. Or better yet, tell the story of how Nikita finally realizes that the only chance she’ll have to ensure her survival and mental health is to eliminate the Section, and decides to recruit Karyn as her partner in her endeavor. Sure, I could name one or two shows with that exact same premise, but the thing is, they’re consistently better works than this.

#La Femme Nikita #La Femme Nikita season one #Recruit #Bechdel Test #female representation #submissions #mimeparadox #submission

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rickhorrow · 5 years ago

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10 To Watch : Mayor’s Edition

RICK HORROW’S TOP 10 SPORTS/BIZ/TECH/PHILANTHROPY ISSUES FOR THE WEEK OF OCTOBER 14 : MAYOR’S EDITION

with Jacob Aere

A single tweet from Houston Rockets GM Daryl Morey escalated into a geopolitical crisis, pitting the NBA's progressive brand against the influence of Chinese money. According to CNN Business, all of the NBA's official Chinese partners have now suspended ties with the league in the wake of Morey’s provocative (and soon deleted) tweet about Hong Kong freedom last week. And months after paying billions of dollars to extend its streaming deal with the NBA, Tencent Holdings has "suspended all reports/streaming of Houston Rockets." Notably, nearly 500 million people in China watched the NBA on Tencent last season. The New York Times further quoted a source who stated that “China’s punitive response could cost the Rockets around $25 million this season,” and Yahoo Sports last Wednesday reported that “at least five unnamed teams fear that the $116 million salary cap projected for the 2020-2021 season could drop by as much as 10-15%.” Obviously, the NBA has significant business interests in China. At the same time, it has positioned itself as the most progressive of mega American sports leagues by supporting social activism. Will those values be upheld now that the league's bottom line is at risk?

Elsewhere in MLS, DC United has ended their broadcast deal with subscription-based streaming service FloSports after less than a year. The four-year local media rights deal, which was only signed in January, was worth a reported $12 million, according to the Washington Post. The team’s final regular-season home game of the year, against FC Cincinnati on October 6, was made available to all fans for free through a live stream on DC United’s official website. The move brings to an end what proved to be a problematic deal for DC United. Fans of the franchise were initially unhappy at having to pay between $5.99 and $8.99 per month for FloSports, which was compounded when the streaming service suffered technical difficulties. DC United’s draw against New York City FC in March, for example, was marred by interruptions. The partnership never fully recovered and now the club is on the hunt for a new local media rights partner in time for next year.

The Los Angeles Chargers are struggling to sell personal seat licenses at SoFi Stadium. One high ranking team executive told JohnWallStreet that Dean Spanos’ organization is roughly $350 million short of their initial $400 million target. While it’s not uncommon for large scale construction projections to be slightly off, off by nearly 87.5% is an abnormally wide miss. An initial study conducted by Legends subsidiary CSL suggested that the market could support $1 billion worth of PSL sales (Rams: $600 million, Chargers: $400 million). When the Chargers stumbled with CSL’s suggested pricing, a second study was done and the team’s sales target was lowered to $150 million. But Spanos’ club isn’t even close to reaching that number. A source said that while the Rams are nearing $500 million in PSL sales, the Chargers have sold only $50 million worth. Rams owner Stan Kroenke is understandably upset about his tenant’s inability to move PSLs. Those revenues are supposed to go towards the new venues’ constructions costs (about $5 billion) and Kroenke is responsible for the difference. The Chargers’ second class citizen status in L.A. has also made it difficult for them to sell high-priced products.

A lawsuit is holding up redevelopment of the Oakland Coliseum site, and MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred threatens relocation. According to JohnWallStreet, Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf confirmed last Tuesday that MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred has threatened relocation of the Oakland Athletics if the city fails to drop a lawsuit filed to prevent Alameda County from selling its stake in the land on which the Oakland Coliseum sits to the team; the city wants the county’s 50% share, but lacks the funding necessary to make the purchase. A’s owner John Fisher intends on redeveloping the 155-acre site to help pay for a new $850 million “privately financed” waterfront ballpark and mixed use space. It should be noted that “many people believe the most logical solution is to build a new ballpark - much less expensively - on the Coliseum site.” Manfred has made it clear, however, that construction of the Howard Terminal ballpark and the Coliseum redevelopment project (which does not include construction of a new sports venue) are a package deal. Unless the lawsuit goes away, the city risks losing the A’s to Las Vegas, just as it lost the Raiders.

U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee relaxes Rule 40 guidelines. The guidance relates to Rule 40 of the Olympic Charter, which restricts the use of athletes’ names and images for advertising purposes. U.S. Olympic and Paralympic athletes will be able to thank personal sponsors, appear in advertisements for those sponsors and receive congratulatory messages from them during next year’s Tokyo Games under guidance released last Tuesday by the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee. Official partners will maintain exclusive use of Team USA and Olympic Games logos and imagery, but athletes’ personal sponsors will be permitted to run generic ads. The same brands will no longer face a deadline to put a campaign into market prior to the Olympics and will have more freedom on social media. The loosening of marketing rules gives athletes more freedom to benefit from sponsors they deal with directly, rather than limiting advertising to official partner companies of the USOPC and IOC. Are you listening, NCAA?

AdWeek shows how the NFL connects television, advertising, and American culture. This month, AdWeek notes, network TV “returns once more with a shiny slate full of fall debuts. It’s an annual ritual of foreordained failure, with the vast majority of shows unlikely to survive to see a second season. Only one form of broadcast programming really matters anymore, economically for the media industry and existentially for American culture: sports, broadly—and the NFL, specifically.” Some of the metrics are obvious: 19 of the 20 highest-rated broadcasts in TV history have been Super Bowls. More than a billion people reportedly tuned in for the 2018 World Cup final. Other stats are more surprising: At peak, 93 of the top 100 rated shows in a single season were sports programs. Tellingly, through Week 5 of the 2019 season, over 142 million people tuned into an NFL game, with each game averaging 16.7 million viewers across TV and digital, a 6% increase over last year. Streaming is up 51%, and all 20 of the top 20 highest-rated TV programs this season are NFL games.

The Sacramento Kings will reward fans with CryptoTokens that contributes towards charity. According to CoinDesk, the Sacramento Kings are the first U.S. pro sports team to develop a crypto token for fan rewards. “Kings Token” will pair with a predictive gaming platform the team has developed in anticipation of the legalization of sports betting in California. Last year, the Kings became the first pro sports team to mine cryptocurrency, setting up a program called MiningForGood that donates the funds to charity and now they are even donating to loyal cryptocurrency to fans. Kings Tokens will exist within a token wallet added to the team’s Golden 1 Center app, which tracks the engagement and accumulated points. Fans can earn rewards through the predictive gaming platform and redeem those points for access to unique events, signed merchandise or courtside tickets. This initiative is getting fans involved with current tech advancements in crytocurrency while also helping the MiningForGood program which donates the funds to charity.

The NBA’s San Antonio Spurs Silver & Black Giveback program awards $180,000 to local nonprofits. According to News 4 San Antonio, the $180,000 in facility grants have been given to three local nonprofits whose programs serve the youth of San Antonio and support SBGB’s mission to empower youth through service and sports. Grant recipients include Rise Recovery, the San Antonio Zoo, and Good Samaritan Community Services. Rise Recovery aims to help teens, young adults, and families overcome the effects of drugs and alcohol while also partnering with the community in education and prevention and were granted $100,000 to provide furniture, fixtures, and equipment for the sport court and surrounding outdoor educational classroom at their new campus. Meanwhile, the San Antonio Zoo will use the $75,000 Operation Renovation facility grant to renovate the San Antonio Zoo Education Center, which hasn’t been renovated since it was first occupied in 1984. Lastly, Good Samaritan Community Services was awarded $8,222 to purchase two evaporative cooling units for outdoor basketball courts. The SBGB program will help to keep youth in San Antonio active, educated, and comforted.

The World Health Organization (WHO) announced a four-year deal with FIFA to promote healthy lifestyles through football globally. According to SportsPro, the agreement includes multiple areas of collaboration, including: Advocacy to promote a healthy lifestyle through football; Policy alignment to ensure tobacco-free environments at FIFA events; encouraging national football federations to adopt tobacco-free policies, including at stadiums; and enabling WHO to provide technical advice to FIFA on health matters; Building on FIFA events to institute lasting improvements in health and safety; Joint programs and initiatives to increase participation in physical activity through football, in line with WHO guidance, as well as working with national associations and networks of WHO goodwill ambassadors, football players, coaches, and volunteers to increase physical activity through football. While we continue to take smoke-free sporting environments and related health initiatives for granted in the U.S., that’s not the case in much of the rest of the world.The new WHO-FIFA tie up can make inroads in these policies that benefit all sports fans.

Merging Vets and Players (MVP) charity teams up with the Atlanta Falcons to reduce military and veteran suicides. According to KOAM News, the MVP charity aims to bring together combat veterans and retired professional athletes to help them adjust to life outside their professions. The organization has set up chapters in four major U.S. cities, and the Atlanta branch is working closely with the Atlanta Falcons. MVP was founded by FOX's NFL insider, Jay Glazer, and Nate Boyer, U.S. Army Green Beret Veteran and former NFL athlete who played for the Seattle Seahawks in 2015. After recently running some physical activities as a group, MVP coaches run “The Huddle” – a 1:15 long support group where participants are coached to be proud of their scars. Some of MVP's ambassadors include former NFL players Michael Strahan, Olin Kreutz, and Chris Long, who have struggled with retirement. By crossing the interactions between NFL and combat veterans, both ex-players and veterans can help express their emotions and struggles in a positive way.

#10 #10towatch

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scotwresnet · 4 years ago

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Creativity can come in many formats and not just through the normal channels of painting, drawing, writing or making music. The mere act of gathering, editing and presenting ideas is an art form in itself and I am lucky enough to have had the chance to speak to someone who does it for a living and on a grand scale. All very cryptic I’m sure you’ll agree but it’ll all become obvious to you very shortly so stay with me. Welcome to another edition of SWN Behind the Art. Let’s begin…

Can you start by introducing yourself and what it is you do?

My name’s Scott Reid, and I’m one of the Creative Producers for ICW.

My job covers a lot of bases, but long story short, I work with Dallas to put together and book ICW shows, produce Fight Club episodes, work on our video content that the company puts out, and generally help drive the creative direction of the show. Basically, if you can see it live or on screen, I’ve probably got something to do with it!

When did you start and how did it all come about?

It’s been a bit of a long journey to where I’m at right now. I was at the first ICW show at The Garage in 2012, and was just blown away by what I was seeing. A few chance meetings and conversations later over the next year, I started writing and creating the official ICW magazine in 2013. From there, I just became more and more involved with the company, be that through editing videos, filming backstage, helping sell merch, but the whole time, I was also around booking meetings and creative sessions, just soaking up knowledge, and learning as much as i could about how and why things are done.

Dallas always welcomed my opinion on things, even as far back as 2014/15, but it was probably from around early 2016 that I started making any real major contributions creatively to the show. Now I’m a fully fledged writer on the show, which is a great job. Definitely worth the time it took to get there.

To many of us fans it would be considered one of the dream jobs in the wrestling business but I’m sure it’s got as many fulfilling moments to complete headaches and heartaches. What are the highs and lows of being a creative producer?

Its definitely a fulfilling job. It’s an incredible feeling when you’ve been working on a show like Fear & Loathing for months, and then it all comes together on the night. Not just from a perspective of everything going the way you hoped it would, but knowing that fans enjoyed themselves is a great feeling. It’s one thing to write something and think “I would love to see this”, but when you hear an audience react to something positively in the venue, you just can’t beat that. If people are paying their money to come to our show, I want to leave the venue that night knowing they had a good time.

On the flip side, there’s definitely hard times with the job, specifically with things that are just completely out of your control. When you’re writing a show, you have your plan for the matches, but there’s so many things that can cause a change to a match, or even a whole story line, that you can’t do anything about.

Wrestling’s very physical and dangerous, and with that comes injuries that can happen at any time. If someone gets injured the day before an ICW show, then we don’t have any other choice but to come up with an alternative. The show must go on, as they say! Learning to roll with the punches in a calm and logical way can be hard, but its just something that comes with the role.

In wrestling, I’m presuming, it’s easier to get a crazy angle or story line through than a tame one right? What is the craziest angle you’ve ever suggested?

We’ve had so many ridiculous conversations that I’ve probably forgotten most of them, but the most prominent one that springs to mind that actually happened was having Good Housekeeping III main event at Fear & Loathing. When Liam Thomson returned to ICW after his injury, there was initially very different ideas of what he would be doing. Fan outcry for a second Good Housekeeping Match was so loud though, so I went to Dallas, and suggested doing it, and building towards a third match at Fear & Loathing. The fact that we could even get a second match out of such a mental concept was amazing in itself, never mind doing another one a year later in the main event of the biggest show of the year! It’s a testament to how good Liam and Wolfgang are though. Those two made those matches really special.

I’m also responsible for the giant sponge in Good Housekeeping II. I didn’t really pitch that to anyone, I just showed up on the day of the show with a 6 foot tall sponge. I still don’t tell folk where it came from. I want it to become an urban legend of Scottish wrestling!

Haha I won’t persue that any further then, I like an urban myth too. With that being said what’s your favourite angle that you’ve created? Favourite people to work with?

It so hard to really appreciate how something’s going at the time, because so often, it’s over, and you just move onto the next thing.

That being said, i remember being really happy with the BT Gunn/Mikey Whiplash feud into Barramania 4, with the Death Match for the World Title. I was really heavily involved in that story, and the creativity from the others involved just made it all the better. The best stuff comes from collaboration, in my opinion. Ideas from one person building on the ideas of another can create gold.

There’s so many people that I enjoy working with. Coming up with ideas with The Kinky Party is always a lot of fun, as there’s very few things that are off the table with them. Wolfgang is another one who’s a lot of fun to work with, because despite having done this for 15+ years, he’s still got the same enthusiasm for wrestling. I say all the time, and i really mean it in the best way, he’s like a big kid who just loves wrestling, and it’s hard not to be drawn in by that type of love for what you’re doing. Kay Lee Ray’s always someone i look forward to working with as well, especially on a show day. Kay Lee’s someone I could probably say two words to, and I could trust that she’d still go out and absolutely nail it, but she’s a perfectionist, so it’s always good to be able to sit down and really flesh out ideas with her at a show.

I really enjoy writing some of the darker elements on the show, and when stuff like that is being put together, BT Gunn is someone who I can really get on the same wavelength with. He’s fearless when it comes to trying out ideas, so when we’re trying to push the envelope, he and I really work well together. Mikey Whiplash is very much the same. Producing stuff with him has always been like a treat for me. There’s almost nothing that’s out of bounds with him, and that makes my job a lot more exciting.

Has lockdown been a blessing or a curse for you? Have you had more time to write new storyline’s or plan for future shows etc?

At the beginning of Lockdown, i was obviously really gutted. I felt like we had some really good stuff going on, so it was sad to see it come to a halt, plus i love the thrill of a show day, so not having that has been weird. That being said, I feel like lock down has allowed us to shift our focus and do some good stuff elsewhere. We’ve really worked hard to make ICW On Demand as accessible and interesting to people as possible during this time. People are bored, so we wanted to make sure we can still give them some entertainment! The ICW iPhone/Android App is something that we’ve spoken about for a while, so it was great to get that released, and we’ve even recently launched the ICW App on Amazon Fire TV. That’s something people have been asking about for a while, so hopefully a lot of people are happy with it.

As far as storylines go, there’s not a day goes by where I’m not writing ideas down, but it’s everything’s so up on the air at the minute, that everything we’re doing creatively has a bit of a question mark over it. Once we have a clearer idea of when we’ll be able to run shows again, we’ll be diving head first into things though.

Now that I’ve completely freaked you out about what you’ll have to go back to after lock down, all the stresses and strains of being a creative producer haha. Are you creative outside of wrestling as well? Do you draw, write, create music or anything?

I’m nowhere as creative elsewhere as I once was. As a young kid, I was never without a pen or pencil in my hand, drawing something, but then I got older, and wrestling caught me! haha!

I really engulf myself in work, so when i’m not doing that, I just try and relax where I can. Cinema and comic books are two of my biggest loves. I’m always watching or reading something, and even then, I’m usually working in the back of my head. I’m always watching something and thinking how I can draw influence from it in filming promos, or the how I can present something a specific way on a show. All my creativity goes to ICW!

Is there anything else you’d like to add?

Just really want to thank all the fans who have continued to support ICW in the past few months. Means a lot that in such a difficult time, people are continuing to share our content, pick up merch, subscribe to On Demand, and engage with us on the lock down show on YouTube and Facebook each week. Hopefully we can get back to normal sooner rather than later, and see everyone! Until then, everyone stay safe!

Where can people contact you? Social media pages etc.

Both my Instagram and Twitter are @scottreidicw. Nice and easy!

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I’d like to thank Scott for taking the time to answer my questions and giving us all an insight into how the creative process works in the world of professional wrestling. An absolute pleasure to talk to him.

And if you’d like to be featured in Behind The Art you can send in your art to:

Instagram: @themaskedembroiderer Twitter: @TEmbroiderer Or email us [email protected] Or use the hashtags #scottishwrestlingart or #scottishwrestlingfanart

Behind The Art #17: Scott Reid

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scottish-wrestling-network · 4 years ago

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Can you start by introducing yourself and what it is you do?

My name’s Scott Reid, and I’m one of the Creative Producers for ICW.

When did you start and how did it all come about?

In wrestling, I’m presuming, it’s easier to get a crazy angle or story line through than a tame one right? What is the craziest angle you’ve ever suggested?

Haha I won’t persue that any further then, I like an urban myth too. With that being said what’s your favourite angle that you’ve created? Favourite people to work with?

It so hard to really appreciate how something’s going at the time, because so often, it’s over, and you just move onto the next thing.

Has lockdown been a blessing or a curse for you? Have you had more time to write new storyline’s or plan for future shows etc?

I’m nowhere as creative elsewhere as I once was. As a young kid, I was never without a pen or pencil in my hand, drawing something, but then I got older, and wrestling caught me! haha!

Is there anything else you’d like to add?

Where can people contact you? Social media pages etc.

Both my Instagram and Twitter are @scottreidicw. Nice and easy!

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

And if you’d like to be featured in Behind The Art you can send in your art to:

Instagram: @themaskedembroiderer Twitter: @TEmbroiderer Or email us [email protected] Or use the hashtags #scottishwrestlingart or #scottishwrestlingfanart

Behind The Art #17: Scott Reid

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otisoverturf · 5 years ago

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Craig Xen Is XXXTentacion’s Musical Successor: Members Only Rapper Details His Favorite XXX Memories & “Broken Kids Club”

This week marks the one-year anniversary of XXXTentacion’s tragic death. One of the core artists in the Members Only collective, XXX had an impact on his immediate surroundings and on the entire world, connecting with a group of young people who live life every day with worry, fear, anxiety and depression. During his time on Earth, the late rapper crafted several singles that would become early classics, like “SAD!,” and his closest friends, family and collaborators are doing everything in their power to keep his memory alive. That brings us to Houston artist Craig Xen. Having lived with Jahseh, Xen knows X better than anybody else. He was often in the studio with him and lived through tons of crazy experiences with the rapper. If you think of it, he is the logical choice to take over from where X left off and Broken Kids Club is where that all begins.

Craig Xen and XXXTentacion came up at around the same time. They were both creating heavy music and they gravitated towards each other, building a tight bond, which eventually culminated in Craig Xen joining Members Only. After the release of Members Only Vol. 4, Xen felt it was time to make a proper impact by himself, showing everybody what he’s all about and growing his personal brand.

We had the pleasure of speaking with Craig on June 17, just days before the release of Broken Kids Club, to learn more about the project, his connection to Members Only, and where he might be headed next.

Read our full interview below, edited slightly for clarity and length.

Craig Xen: What’s going on man?

HNHH: Not much man. It’s a pleasure to speak with you. Thank you so much for coming to the office.

Yeah. I appreciate you having me.

No worries man. I know you’ve lived in a few different places: Houston, Los Angeles, Florida, etc. Where do you consider home?

I’d say where my brothers are at. Wherever my people are at. I feel at home with certain people because I move around so much, now especially, just getting off tour. Anytime, at a show, after work, the meet and greets, or just performing is when I feel most at home. There’s no specific geographical location. It’s more so with a certain group of people.

I feel you. Home is a feeling.

It is. I can’t deny going back to my mom’s in Houston, but my mom is home. It doesn’t matter. If I see my mom in LA, sometimes she’ll be travelling and I’ll see her out and that feels like home too. Yeah, it’s a feeling bro.

I know your father was in prison. I wanted to ask if you hear from him ever.

It’s funny you say that. I guess he was released recently because somehow he got my phone number and he texted me so I auto-replied since I didn’t know the number. I hit him with “Sorry, I can’t talk right now” and then he sent me a selfie of himself. I didn’t respond. I had to change my number a few times also. He’s out somewhere.

So, you guys don’t have a good relationship? I’d say we just don’t have a relationship. It’s not necessarily bad, it’s just that I learned how to do everything without him. I think a part of me when I was younger was really resentful that he was locked up but, as I got older, I learned to forgive and understand. I’ve just been so busy and it’s such a touchy spot to make time to develop that relationship.

I read somewhere that he was friends with DJ Screw?

I actually don’t know where that came from. There was some misinformation that I was DJ Screw’s nephew, which would’ve been really badass. I don’t know how close they were but I know my dad and my uncle hung around FCC and hung around those guys. I didn’t ask too many questions but one of my uncles produced for the Geto Boys. Rest in peace to Bushwick man.

For real man. You’ve got your Broken Kids Club project coming out on Wednesday. How would you describe it?

I haven’t heard anything like it be released this year. It’s for after the party. It’s not necessarily party music. It’s for after the party, when all the smoke clears and everyone goes home and you’re still up late at night and you have to deal with your emotions.

There’s a lot of people that need music like that. X was making music like that too.

Absolutely, I’d say X, Peep, Mac was hitting that spot.

RIP to all three of those dudes. How did you come up with the title Broken Kids Club?

Yeah, there was this girl named Julia and we were hanging out, talking about how sometimes you’ll be in a room and you won’t necessarily know everybody, you’ll go to a party and not know anybody but you feel certain people on certain vibrations resonate with you. It’s a resiliency thing. You can detect people who have been through shit. I felt like I wanted to be and I needed to be the voice for the kids and I wanted them to know that not only are they not alone but it’s okay to not be “perfect.” It’s okay that you’re struggling with depression, it’s okay that you’re struggling with anxiety, it’s okay that you didn’t grow up with a picture-perfect household. Sometimes some kids who grow up in picture-perfect households are broken on the inside also. I felt like it’s a club. I felt like there was no title to it but we can detect people like ourselves who are resilient.

You’re part of Members Only. What’s it like to be in such a tight collective of talented artists?

I’d say we’re all brothers before we’re rappers or recording artists or performers. We hang out. We’ve spent so much more time together bullshitting and kicking it than we do making music and I think you can attribute such an organic sound over the past years and projects to that: just friends making music together. That’s what it’s always been. Obviously, everybody’s working really hard on their solo stuff right now and we’re all really proud of each other. Everybody’s got their own moves to make and then we all come together for the Members Only tour. We’re always ready to come together and have all of us in one spot.

What’s it like being on tour and seeing all the different types of people that fuck with you?

So many different backgrounds. At the meet and greet, I’ll sit there until the venue kicks me out. That’s another thing. When I was younger and I would go shows, I remember there were two artists that I paid for meet and greets with. I took a picture with one of them and that was it and I was like “When I get in that position, I’m gonna meet and greet and get to kick it with my fans.” I’m grateful that I’m in a position where I’m able to help so many people in so many different ways. Just having kids come up to me, some of them have similar backgrounds, some come from opposite socioeconomic backgrounds but it’s really cool man.

Who did you pay for meet and greets with?

One time was Wiz Khalifa and, I don’t know what the limit was, but there were so many people. I remember with Wiz it was a good experience. I told him I wanna make music and he said “chase your dreams” and we took a picture. Regardless of that being a cliché response or not, it gave me so much inspiration and motivation that I remember watching him perform after that and I knew one day I was gonna be on that stage. That night I went and recorded my first song and I think him just sharing his energy with me really inspired me.

Have you spoken to Wiz since then?

Nah, I haven’t spoken to Wiz yet. It’s coming though.

I wanted to also ask how you met XXXTentacion.

We met on Twitter and we both had maybe a couple of songs out. We just fucked with each other. The first time we got to hang out was when he came to LA, I wanted him to stay at my crib, we had been talking for a while. He came when I was asleep so I didn’t see the text message until the next morning but there were so many people staying at the crib that there wasn’t enough room for him and his manager at the time. I know Ski [Mask the Slump God] was with him. He told me “Man, I really appreciate the gesture.” He ended up getting a hotel. The first time we hung out after that was the South Side Suicide tour with Pouya and the $uicideBoy$. When we met, instantly there was a connection. At the time, both of our music was really heavy and hard-hitting so we decided, since we were both openers for them on tour, that we’d share a set. I knew his music, he knew my music, he fucked with me, I fucked with him so when we met it clicked, so we decided to share a set. It was phenomenal man. It was an experience. I remember every show there was something we couldn’t do. There was one time he performed in his boxers. That was funny as shit. I remember the guys with Buffet Boys were like “Hey man, can you guys not do that at the next show?” Then, the next show would be some other shit. Me and him were like “One day we’re gonna have our own tour,” because we didn’t wanna disrespect anybody, we were just in the moment. After that tour, we just ended up kicking it. I think I ended up staying in Miami for like two weeks and we just hung out. That’s when I met all the guys. I met Flyboy Tarantino. That’s when I got to meet everybody and he was like, “You wanna be in Members Only?” I was like “Sure.” It was a really natural, organic thing.

What’s your favourite memory with him?

I’d say whenever we were riding three-wheelers. We would go at like three, four in the morning. We would argue like brothers do and, we were living together at the time, so I’d go to my room, he’d go to his room, time would pass, three or four hours, then I would go knock on his door or he’d knock on my door and the ice-breaker was always “You wanna go riding?” That was our thing. We’d ride these three-wheeled motorcycles. Just riding those around. There were a couple of times where we’d go invite girls over and they’d hop on the bar and we’d go to a bar. Just go kick it man. Those rides were really special to me because they were a time where he wasn’t X. He had his helmet on and nobody could tell who he was. There was nobody on the roads; it was just us. That was our thing. Good memories.

Tomorrow marks the one year anniversary of his death. If you could tell him anything tomorrow, what would it be and why?

It’s hard to encapsulate that into one statement. Not only that, but he’s still here. Just because he’s not here physically, I know he’s still here in spirit. He experiences all the growth. I felt like his energy was there with us and the fans on tour. We would play a lot of his music and everybody would get lit and hype. I would just tell him how proud I was and still am of him and how many people he’s helped. I remember that was his biggest thing. He just didn’t want anybody to feel alone. I just wish he could see the impact the way that we see it. I would just tell him that he did it. He wanted to be a legend and he did it. Not on like some underground shit, not even on some mainstream shit, timeless music– a legend.

You just released “RUN IT BACK!” with X. What does that song mean to you?

To me, that song is such an important piece to the culture because a lot of the new fans either don’t know about the roots of his sound or haven’t gotten into the older work, whatever it may be. Personally, I love the song, not only because we made it in person, but I can remember all the times where we listened to it together. We were really listening to it a lot when we got into working out. We got a CrossFit membership together which was a funny story too because, for some reason, he just wouldn’t carry around a fucking card so we went to sign up for personal training at a CrossFit and the guy was like “It’ll be [x] amount of money” and Jah was like “Alright, can you help me count this shit?” He just pulled out hella bands. So, we listened to that song a lot pre-, and post-CrossFit. I feel like it’s really important for the culture, for the OG fans to have that itch satisfied like “Oh man, I want that old X so bad” because we made that song when he still had half black and half blonde hair. It’s one of those. It’s an artifact, a fossil dude.

I read that you were obsessed with Eminem and Lil B. Obviously, they run two completely different spectrums, what led you to both of those artists?

As a creative, I’ve grown to appreciate something about every artist. I feel that every artist is a genius in their own way and their own fashion. It’s hard for me to dislike an artist because I feel every artist is special in their own way, whether it be lyrically or sonically. There’s always something that I can take and appreciate from an artist. With Eminem, it was his resiliency. That was also the first album that I bought, The Eminem Show. I remember my uncle didn’t fuck with it so that was the first rebellious thing that I had. I had a CD player and I would listen to it and his pain resonated with me. Him being an outsider and being proud and speaking firmly, saying “Yes, I’m different and I’m not gonna fucking change for anybody,” helped me with my confidence in that area and, “If my uncle doesn’t like it, fuck him.” I love this shit. You don’t have to like this shit, I like it which was really rare for a kid like me because I was heavily influenced by my uncle and idolized him. I’d say Lil B, in high school, when I was going through a dark time in my life, he helped me find courage. He made being positive cool to me, and being yourself cool, and being raw and unfiltered cool. I think that’s somewhere Eminem and Lil B both meet. They’re both really rare and unfiltered with what they say. I still got love for Lil B to this day. I feel like he’s set so many trends and opened so many doors for so many artists. Even the way he went about business, being independent and his marketing and the way he released a lot of free music, I love the way that he moved and that he genuinely felt great being himself.

After Broken Kids Club, what’s coming next?

I’m gonna be working on my album and in between, I’m gonna be releasing singles and I’m definitely gonna drop a bunch of videos. I’d say there’s gonna be collabs, there’s gonna be solo singles and there’s gonna be a new album coming. People have found out about me through features and now I’m ready to show them that this is my solo work and this is me.

Is there anything you want to add about Broken Kids Club?

The only thing I would touch on is that I used the EP as an introduction to the movement. I feel like, me personally, there’s no movement right now, there’s nobody doing what I’m doing and I feel like it’s really important to the culture and to the kids that they know what it is and that the doors are open for them to be apart of the Broken Kids Club. I wanna welcome them somewhere where they feel at home and that’s something that’s hard to come across. For instance, at shows we mosh but we’re not actually trying to hurt anybody, nobody came to fight. We’re just trying to let all that negative energy out in a healthy way. That’s the same thing I do with music and I hope the way that they digest it. Even with my loud, angry shit, I told my fans, “Don’t go fighting anybody to this shit.” You can scream as loud as you want. You can swing at the air as much as you want. I just want my music to be used as a tool to get that negative energy out and for them to know that they are not alone.

STREAM CRAIG XEN’S “BROKEN KIDS CLUB” HERE.

The post Craig Xen Is XXXTentacion’s Musical Successor: Members Only Rapper Details His Favorite XXX Memories & “Broken Kids Club” appeared first on Social Juicebox.

Source: https://socialjuicebox.com/ Craig Xen Is XXXTentacion’s Musical Successor: Members Only Rapper Details His Favorite XXX Memories & “Broken Kids Club” published first on https://socialjuicebox.com/

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theinvisiblebookofqp · 6 years ago

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CHAPTER 3: 14th of January – RECEIVING SIGNS FROM VENUS

It’s 00.55 of a brand-new day, and although I should be dancing in a local and very familiar club with friends and colleagues, I decided to head back home around 20 minutes after I arrived and write this chapter for you, my invisible friend, instead.

You have probably noticed that I did not mention a certain someone in the last chapter. That is no coincidence at all. Did you really think that this is the typical story about “boy meets girl, but they can’t be together, so boy screws it up and goes into sorrow and do all kind of pathetic things instead”? Well, maybe to an extend… but at the same time think again. It is true that deep emotions are the strongest fuel that moves the world. It is also true that this frustration and pain mixed with the sweetest of feelings is my biggest motivation at present, and that the events that happened during New Year’s Eve are the match that set fire for this book to exist.

However, what I am trying to tell you through this book is about much more. It’s about life, consciousness, psychology, energy, love, courage, fear, pain, reality, fantasy, thoughts, reason, truth, physics, death, inspiration, determination, falseness… I am trying to write down the reflection of my soul in words that anyone may comprehend and feel identified with at some level. I am trying to show you that Universe as we perceive and study it right now is complete, and in order to thrive as a species we need to dig and riase our awareness of the power each one of us holds on how the world and our life is presented to us. I want you to find your unique way to sit down in the steering wheel of your life, and I believe Quantum Psychology is the key to give sense and answers to some of the biggest questions that there are.

But today I wanted to come back home to talk to you about life signs. And I’m not talking about the kind of signs explained by probability or coincidence. Have you ever had the feeling that something happens, often small and meaningless to everyone else, but that for you has a very deep and relevant meaning at that moment in your life, that the unlikeness of the event it’s just too big to be explained by pure chance? And right when that happens, you have some short of inner shivering going through your spine and a brise in your soul whispering you that sometimes the Universe is capable to talk straight to your soul.

Before we go into detail and dirty examples, it is time for further introductions. As I said before, you can call me S.M. Why? You will know soon enough. When? Time is totally relative when you enter the Quantum Realm (or the part of the reality forming the Universe ruled by the laws of the subatomic particles), as you will learn later. The next person I want to introduce you in this story is that special someone I have been referring to: her name is Venus. Because right now she is my Venus; beautiful, magnetic, inspiring, the brightest star in the sky when the night is darkest before the daylight; and, at the same time, so far and acid to survive its atmosphere, so wild and untamed, independent and rebel within her unique beauty.

The best way to describe Venus is as an alluring and dangerous rose. With a sense of simetry and balance when you are at her presence; and with thorns ready to bleed you if they must. Because make no mistake: she might look angelical, fragile and sweet to the eye, but as soon as you are close enough to her you realise she is independent, unpredictable and adventureous enough to take on the whole world if needed. Because she knows how to find her way in any type of situation in a natural and soft way, hidding her manipulation techniques to the naked eye. She can achieve things out of reach for the vast majority of human kind. Her eyes shine like 2 big round, crystal blue, quiet lagoons where you can drown yourself in and lose sight of everything else in this world. Her hair is long, voluminous and indomitable, between brunette and soft blonde depending on the light, and falls with a harmonious grace below her shoulders. And, just like her, seems in quiet and controlled despite its wild nature.

Her smile is big and genuine, with the rest of her facial expression following that curve of warmthness, even when she is telling you off. Her voice sounds soft and innocent, spelling some sort of charm in you that brings you inner peace even when you don´t like what you are hearing. Because don´t let the apparience deceive you: Venus will not hesitate to tell you things straight if she must no matter how hard they are; yet, she will find the way to present them to you with a sweet aroma around them. Her body language is paused and measured, transmiting a sense of self-control and control over everything happening around her. And, when she looks directly into my eyes, my soul feels naked and vulnerable; there is a deep sense of mutual understanding within which comforts and exposes me at the same time. Because sometimes you can feel that her eyes can see everything that happens in the room: what you say and do and what you don´t. And this information is carefully used and synchronise with her calculated next move or word. Her skin is soft and made of pure silk, but she will rarely make physical contact with you. Her energy shines with a magnetic field that attracts my own, like a bug would run into a source of light in the middle of the night, without questioning whether it will die by getting too close.

Coming back to the signs, some years ago I used to think that the kind of strong, meaningful and smooth signs that I’m talking about would appear in your path to guide you in the right direction and to point you out what to fight for. Over time, I started to switch the control and importance of those signs: I stopped believing that they were due to a supreme force trying to influence my life and me being a passive being that just tries to make this supreme entity’s will a reality the best way possible.

I think the nature of those signs is much more interactive and retro-influential. Say for example that there is a subject that really occupies your mind most of the time, therefore it drives your attention and energy. As you have most of your energy focused at this particular subject, your cognitive system, neurons, cells, mind, soul, and even the atoms you interact with will be gathering all the available information (true or false) possible related to that thought.

But this is a two-direction path: you will be sending to the Universe a message shaped by your own energy, thoughts, wishes, ideas or obsessions consistently. As a response, there will be a degree of counter-reaction from all the energy connected around you, sometimes in the shape of this type of small and meaningful signs. ON the top of that, you also have the predisposition to pay attention to this type of cues since to since the idea is occupying your mind already. Basically, all your senses perceive food when you are starving.

The problem comes when we must differentiate whether those signs are a genuine response to your own energetic message, or a consequence of your own obsession and willingness to be right about that specific situation. Because, as we will discover in a few weeks´ time, wanting to be right is one of the strongest and most dangerous psychological principles that there is.

But, throughout this (sub) conscious interaction between ourselves and the energetic or quantum world around us, if you pay enough attention, sometimes you will listen the whispers coming back at you from that energy around you, giving you answers to the questions that your Quantum Self (or you can call it soul, energetic field, or spiritual self) is broadcasting to the world. I am talking about the kind of ideas that, despite existing only in your head at present, they still find a sort of correspondence and equilibrium in the quantum or energetic world. And, if you can filter all the irrelevant noise that the willingness of being right about that idea makes in your head, you will hear the truth right in front of you: whether you should follow that path or let it go and move on.

So, when this happens, you face a real dilemma: you have a strong emotion (which always blurries all logic) channelling a great amount of your energetic resources, which also makes you vulnerable to experience a cognitive confirmation bias. And often you will experience signs and details that, whether they are real messages from the Universe or not, you will happily tend to interpret as confirmations of your own wishes. We always need to be aware of the dangers of the confirmation bias, but we will dig deeper into that down the road.

The bottom line is that you need to be really careful to differentiate your personal desire from what really makes sense from a “quantum balance” point of view. Because I believe that when we are in peace with ourselves, doing what’s right on our own subjective existence, we also project our balanced energy into the world, and we then interactact with the energy in people or situations that has the same valence, making us feel better and and in control.

It’s like screaming in a cave where all the responses you get it’s your own echo, and therefore even if you can hear a voice it will be your own repeating your message. On the other hand, you could be having a conversation with someone else where you both share a vision, yet the information provided by the other person enriches your own point of view and vice versa.

Deciding whether what you feel as real corresponds to reality or is only part of your imagination is a tough challenge; because when I see those silly signs with meaning only to Venus and I that are too unprobable to be explained by chance, I have no other certainty than they come from my balance with the Quantum Realm; it just feels that way in my soul. And, at the same time, they hurt and pinch my soul, wondering why I keep receiving the same unprobable message over and over again; why anything else doesn’t make any sense; why I know I must complicate my life this way because I know is the right thing to do no matter what, even if I don’t know its destination yet.

To further explain this, I will give you real and personal examples of both situations - confirming my own thoughts and where my Quantum Self knew what I had to do). Back in 2012 I was living in Spain (my home country), working full time in a job that didn’t motivate or estimulate me, while studying my Bachelor’s Degree in Psychology, which I finished it that September.

I was also in the process of sweeping out different toxic relationships with people close to me that had dried my soul to its bones. But, to be fair, pretty much everything about my life was toxic at the time: my job, a broken and complicated relationship with almost all the members of my dysfunctional family, which led me to move alone after my dad kicked me out of the house, a failed romantic relationship, and the lack of purpose in my life after achieving the only clear goal that I had at the moment (my Degree). My life was a total caos: nothing to look up to or any clue about how to move forward, I was stuck. Yet looking backwards I feel grateful for the situation I was in, as I truly gained mental strength, perspective and knowledge about my own self.

In the middle of that, I met someone who lived in Valencia, which was around 3 hours driving from me. We started to see each other, and after a couple of months things seemed to be going well. Then things, as my life, just got stucked. I wasn´t aware back then, but just “going well” wasn´t enough. It was a relationship condemned to never succeed for different reasons, and therefore it needed to end. But back then I was surrender by darkness, and I didn’t have the clarity about the situation that I have now.

I got to the point where it was clear that the only way to try to work this relationship out was by moving to Valencia. I tried to convince myself that this was the onoy way forward, probably motivated as an easy way to scape from the shitness of my reality. I started to perceive all kind of little signs that seemed to point me towards this direction. I even got job offers from Valencia from random sources.

My conscious and logical mind wanted to see self-confirmation that by moving there my life would thrive. As you can imagine, with all the negative noise, energy sucking and toxicity around me at the time, my head got to a boiling point and about to explode wondering what I should do. At the same time, there was something inside of me that didn’t feel right about this. My heart, soul and Quantum Self were screaming at me that this wasn’t the path I should take. Yet I was so scare to listen to them that I sent such a strong message to the world that got me those signs in return, even if they were caused by my own willingness.

However, that inner part of my subconscious, kept whispering me realities that I was not ready to listen out of fear. When I was finally ready to accept that something about this whole idea didn’t fit, I started to consider alternatives to my original plan of moving to Valencia. Once I opened my mind for other options, a chance for me to move to Brighton, in England, araised as one of my best friends decided to move there and asked me to accompany him. I happily lived in Brighton between 2005 and 2007 (that’s another great story from one of my previous lifes!). Even though my Quantum Self knew straight away this was the right choice to follow and fulfil my own potential, my self-destructive side kept insisting that I should move to Valencia as it was just easier and made more logical sense.

Eventually I came up with one of the most random, brave and crazy decisions I have ever made to make up my mind, one which would change my life forever in a hearbeat. I drove to my favourite secret beach, where I lost someone close to me. I used to go to this beach, always alone, to think, listen to music, play the guitar, or just to be melancholic, to try to gather a fresh perspective on whichever was troubling my mind.

There I was, thinking for about 1 hour about which course of action I should take: in one hand, pursuit the signs I had been receiving and move to Valencia; on the other side, pack everything again and go back to the city where I were once happy. I didn’t realise at the time, but I attuned my Quantum Self with the energy around me in order to decide. Then I decided to flip a coin; that coin would change my life forever; heads, Brighton. Tails, Valencia.

And as they say, the rest is history. Brighton was the destination that the atonement between my Quantum Self and the infitine number of possibilities simultaneously exiting in the Quantum Realm, set me on for. Thanks to that sole act of random craziness I made one of the best decisions in my life. Thanks to that coin, I started a path that allowed me to know new amazing people; expand my comfort zone in so many new levels; study my Master’s Degree in Research Methods in Psychology in London; to truly break through and deal with my past; to test some of the theories I have about the world that can change the way we perceive everything; to move to Prague and take on my biggest professional challenge to date; to meet Venus; to be here now talking to you across space and time; and to set in motion wherever this path will lead us to...

Now I comprehend inside me that the other option would have deemed my own destruction. Because there is no possible outcome where I would have been happy with this person or my new life in Valencia. Around 5 months after I moved to Brighton, this person asked me for advice about whether she should truly give a chance to this guy she had met. Maybe what she was really asking me was whether I was coming back and if there was still a possibility for us. And I won’t lie to you my friend, I still had some feelings for her, yet I knew inside that was not what I was meant to do with my life; that even if I did not know why yet, my destiny was where the coin took me.

I did what was right, against my own selfish interests (my peace of mind is not negotiable); I advised her to give him the chance to get closer to her, to try and start a relationship with this new guy and to move on with her life. Nowadays they are married and with one child according to social media. I have no doubt that I would have never made her anywhere near as happy as she is now. Now I can look back with confidence, perspective and peace of mind knowing that I defeated my own dark demons by doing the best thing for someone I cared about.

Because sometimes the biggest decisions you will ever make in life can be revealed to you in a heartbeat. And even if at first sight they may scare you and challenge everything you know, be brave enough to listen to your Quantum Self. Just follow your path no matter what; no matter how many times people discourage you or tell you how wrong they think you are; no matter how crazy it might look to the social conventionalisms; just follow what you know will help you deliver your full potential. It is only when we are the most scared when we have the chance to prove ourselves how brave we can be.

Something similar happened when I decided to move to Brighton for the first time back in 2005. I was 20 and I had been win my first serious relantionship for 2 years with an English girl, to whom I got engaged when I was 18. The reason for us to get engaged was mainly because I was young, naive, and even if we met in Spain, she moved back to her hometown, Brighton, to study. I was only a teenager starting the university, but it seemed such a clever idea to get engaged and have a long-distance relationship while I worked part time at my father’s company to pay for my recurring trips to the UK.

After over 1 and a half years the relationship really went downhill (more details when we speak about my different lifes within my life) and a lot of shit and crazy stuff happened in between. However, after those ups and downs, I found myself visiting her in Brighton at the beginning of October 2005, when I had just started my 3rd year at College. Back then my life in general wasn’t easy, and I was clearly not ready to move on from the first meaningful and comforting emotional relationship I had ever experienced in my life.

During that holiday week in Brighton I had an ephipany. One of those revelations where you instantly know what you need to do, and you feel a mix of immense fear, aware of the challenge ahead, and an incredible peace and balance finding a long seeked answer. I was having a hot chocolate in a cafe, and the song “Fix You” from Coldplay started to play. It was the first time I heard that song, and by the time it ended I understood what I had to do, which I said out loud: “I am moving to England”.

For you to get an idea about how big of a decision that was to me at the time, I was raised in a small city called Cartagena, in a family where no one had ever lived anywhere outside the county, or spoke English, or studied in College. Back then I did not know how to pay a bill, or rent a flat, and all my experience was focused on studying or working in my father’s air conditioning company. Additionally, this was a time before all social media: no so Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Whatsapp, Skype, smart phones or any easy and fluent way of communication with anyone from outside your city. Basically, I was leaving behind everything that I had ever known and jumping into the unknown with both feet.

Yet, the moment I said those 5 words, I understood deep inside that my life had changed forever. Somehow, I comprehended that I had to walk that path, even if I wasn’t sure what was the reason behind it. To this day I can tell you that, if I hadn’t had that revelation at that exact moment, I would probably be homeless or dead by now. You think I am exaggerating? Keep reading my invisible friend…

The very same day I landed back in Spain, I told everyone that I would move to Brighton within 3 weeks, no matter the cost. Everyone tried to take the idea out of my head: “you are crazy”, “you will fail”, “I cannot support you on this”, “she doesn’t deserve it after all that happened”… what they didn’t understand (as hardly could I to be honest), was that I did not take that decision because of my ex-girlfriend; she was only the excuse. Deep inside I knew I had to do that for myself; everything inside me told me that was the right thing to do. It made sense only to me, but I didn´t need anything else. I won’t lie to you my friend, a part of me was scared to the bone; however, I felt that inner peace with myself and a sense of balance with the Universe that I had never felt before.

I dropped from university and moved to Brighton on the 25 of October 2005, as I said I would. I can now say that it was a turning point in my life. Despite all the discourage I found everywhere, and my young age, I somehow found the reasons to stick to my instinct and follow my heart. It wasn’t the easy or logic thing to do, but it was the rightest.

There has been only a handful of times I have had that clear, sudden and revealing feeling understanding that my life was about to be changed forever in a sudden moment of crazy bravery. The last time was last New Year’s Eve, and as you can imagine Venus was involved. I had the most peaceful and spiritual moment of my life on the night of the 31st of December, followed by a shit storm that totally rocked my world. And, even if I’m not sure where this path leads, all I know is that my life was changed forever for the better or worse.

Because it’s 03.24 am, and I left a Latin club called La Bodeguita del Medio to write to you about signs because, as you can imagine, the last time I went there I was with Venus; and only with her. And, just as it has been happening for a few weeks, some signs were presented to me there tonight.

But it’s not the first weird sign I have had involving this club where I had an incredible night with Venus: only 1 week ago, while I was speaking to a client over the phone, he told me that he visited Prague a couple of months ago and loved a certain club where they play Latin style music. I knew which club he was talking about before he told me the name. And, again tonight, I was led to go to this club by the people I was spending the evening with, even if they had never been there before…

As I decided to leave the place surrender by sweet memories, a meaningful song – Venus’ favourite Latin song now, which also resembles the situation we are in – started to play, with a rhythm that seemed to drag me back to that night when there was only Venus and I in La Bodeguita del Medio.

Even more, even though I am Spanish, doing the Spanish market in my company, talking and contacting only people and companies in Spain, I was still contacted by two Chinese people this week at work, even if no one from this country ever contacted me before. For you to understand the importance and singularity of China as a sign, Venus lived in China, concretely in cityt where one of those people live.

Not only she lived there, but she speaks the language as well. This is a language that is not unfamiliar to me either, as I decided to tattoo a Chinese symbol in the back of my neck around 10 years ago: the Phoenix Bird (confirmed by Venus and another 2 people that’s the real meaning of my tattoo), consumed by its own flames, yet reborn from his own ashes over and over and over.

I was also contacted by an old friend from Nigeria whom I met in England, who I have not seen or spoken with for 8 years. As he told me he lives now in Cape Town, and invited me to visit, a very sarcastic smile came to my face. Cape Town happens to be the city were Venus was born and raised until she decided to start conquering the world. I now understand that one day I will visit Cape Town, even if I don´t know when or why.

I could go on and on about all those little signs that are meaningless for the rest of the world and keep popping up to me daily. To you they may not make sense; or perhaps you think that I am falling into the confirmation bias that I mentioned before. Rest assured that this idea also goes through my head every time I bump into one of those signs. Yet again, my Quantum Self communicates them to me as if I were picking up the signals left in my path leading me to my real achievement, even if I don’t know what that is yet. Like if you leave bread crumbs to find the way to your destination, and every bread crumb you find you know it means that you are on the right track to reach your goal.

And it all really exploded right after the house party I organised for New Year’s Eve, as until then I only had the suspicion that Venus would be someone important in my life. It all kicked when a song I had never heard before from Enrique Iglesias played a bit after midnight, when the party for the rest of the people was at its peak; because what that song said to me in that exact moment was too much to be explained by chance. The lyrics reflect very accurately the storm of feelings I was running through in the middle of the confusion of that party. Furthermore, the fact that it was Enrique Iglesias has a huge meaning in this context, as you will discover later.

Finally, it was in that moment where I realised, also pushed by the amount of alcohol in my organism, what I had to do next: cancel the party straight away and kick everyone out, as there was somewhere else I needed to go…

#QuantumPsychology #PositivePsychology #Positivism #Optimism #QuantumMechanics #Consciousness #QuamtumConsciousness #Physics #MyRealGoal #Science #SocialSciences #LifeSciences #Theology #MotivationalSpeaking #Philosophy #PhilosophyOfMind #PhilosophyOfScience #PhilosophyOfReligion #AtomicPhysics #Empowerment #SelfEmpowerment #Venus

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roccodreamholidayasia-blog · 6 years ago

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Angeles City Nightlife: 4 Best Nightclubs to Pick Up Filipinas

Angeles City

Do You Enjoy Going Out At Night and Getting Laid With HOT Girls?

“If yes, then you’re going to love this mini guide about Angeles City’s nightlife focused on the best Nightclubs and Disco to meet local Filipino girls”

Angeles City is best known for the numerous girlie bars, sleazy nightlife and thousands of hookers strolling around town. That’s is history…

… The new Angeles City has much more to offer nowadays.

A new form of nightlife is emerging revolving around traditional nightclubs and pool clubs where you can chill out, dance and pick up WILD Filipina girls…

The next logical question is: “what type of girls can you find in Angeles City nightclubs?”

There are mainly 3 types of girls:

Bar girls working in the numerous bikini and BJ bars who are the majority;

Freelancers who are looking for some easy money;

And then, party girls who love to drink, dance and are looking for a nightstand with a foreigner.

Every single girl you see in the clubs is hot for action, whether she’s a hooker or a fun-loving party girl.

If you’re looking for good girls, I’m afraid, Angeles City nightlife isn’t going to give you that.

However, you can still meet good girls working in restaurants, shops or hotels. There are also dating sites where you can chat with Angeles City girls that are interested only in foreign men.

These girls haven’t been ruined by radical feminism and Western fast-food diets – and it shows in the tightness of their bodies, the respect shown forward men and need for submission.

Most Filipina girls you meet out at night, can have a lot of attitude and play hard to get… But deep inside they are hot for action.

Keep in mind that they don’t like to be treated like hookers, even if they are business women.

And that is where things can get frustrating.

You need to follow the classic flirting steps like in any other nightclubs in the world; Small talks, having a few drinks, dance and working around her tests before getting her in your room.

Now, you might be wondering: “Rocco, what are the best nightclubs in Angeles City where I can pick up the hottest local girls?”

Good question, Bro…

Today, I’m reviewing the 4 best night clubs in Angeles to meet sexy girls with pictures, description, pick up tips and whatever else you need to know to have a blasting night…

1. High Society NightClub

High Society is probably the best nightclub in Angeles City to recruit local talent. Yes, there are many hot – hot – hot girls!

The atmosphere is just great after midnight with plenty of freelancers waiting for a pickup and a 1.000-1.500 Pesos bill.

The majority of girls want money or no honey, that how things work in Angeles City anyway.

Keep in mind that the disco can be empty until around midnight, that’s when the party mood starts to happen so be aware of going too early.

Don’t worry, before midnight you’ve so many lady bars to keep your hands busy until the clubs get busy.

They play techno/trance up to about midnight, then they switched to hip-hop which makes the crowd grow in excitement and the girls start to shake their asses

You can get a VIP table by tipping the security guy where you can drink without being disturb.

The entrance fee is 200 Pesos on Friday and Saturday only for guys.

The local drinks are cheap around 120 Pesos, and the bottles start at 3.500 Pesos up to 15.000 Pesos for Jack Daniels.

It is open until 5 am.

2. Aqua Beach Club

A new arrival in town where you can enjoy both of the best worlds: all the good things of a nightclub and girls in Bikini.

This club is an open roof place with several pools, a DJ station and bar.

It is also open during the day, being a service offered to the customers staying in ABC Hotel.

During the week isn’t much busy but it gives its best during the weekends, especially when there are pool parties. Many HOT Filipina in bikini having a great time while getting drunk.

You might be thinking to meet only Filipino girls here, right?

Well, surprisingly there are also foreign women…

All in all, Aqua Beach Club is a wonderful place either you visit during the day or at night.

Furthermore, it’s the perfect place to take photos of your girlfriend…

Keep in mind its an upscale venue with prices comparable to the West.

There is also an entrance fee is asked if you are not an ABC Hotel costumers but they offer a free drink.

3. Skytrax Superclub

I visited Skytrax Superclub for the first time in 2009. Today, it’s still the same as I remember it.

This club is small, dark and loud. It’s a typical Filipino Disco.

Rarely you see inside Westerner but it attracts a lot of Asians and Filipino. If you prefer a Western-style nightclub, you better off to High Society, except that you like “innocent girls”.

You see, local girls in Skytrax are of two types:

The typical hooker who goes with foreigners only for money but love Filipino men;

Filipina girls having a day job in restaurants, shops, etc. that are tired of cheating Filipino men and are curious about foreign men.

Yes, Filipina girls with a day job are the deal and the reason you should add Skytrax to your nightclub list.

I go hunting down them because they are genuine, loving caring and free. Furthermore, they are a bit shy at first but once behind closed doors, they are hot and horny.

You should consider doing the same if you want to have a truly Filipino girlfriend experience with a woman that is into you, not your money.

Those girls don’t go to High Society because their working friends know and recommend only Filipino nightclubs.

Also, Skytrax SuperClub is the perfect place to go with your new date. The reason is simple: to make her comfortable.

She is going to feel less intimidated to be in an environment with many Filipino people.

4. Mega Dance Center

This club is the latest and most important addition to Angeles City nightlife.

In fact, with its opening Angeles City has finally become a destination for nightclub lovers and not only for girlie bar’s addict.

Now, Angeles City is attracting upper scale girls from all around the country, not only bar girls.

I was surprised to see a nightclub so big in a small town like Angles City. It reassembles the style of Manila flagship nightclubs like Valkyrie and Exklusive.

What I love the most is the big dance floor and not as much hip-hop/r&b music, something I really hate about High Society.

The music here is harder and dance-oriented though in my opinion could be improved.

Nice to see sexy dancers on stage which adds exclusivity to the place together with a modern European style design.

What about girls?

In Mega Dance Center you can meet the hottest girls in Angeles City. It is not uncommon to meet HiSo girls coming down from Manila to have fun away from the big city indiscrete eyes.

And trust on me on this: they’re HOT for action!

However, the pickup game level is much higher and competitive. You need to dress sharply and burn some cash if you want to catch the big fishes…

All in all, the club is intimate, comfortable, and has a very good atmosphere.

Opens at 10 pm but don’t bother to visit before 1 am and only during the weekends, at least until it does pick up in popularity.

Let’s Wrap Up Angeles City Nightlife – Are You Ready To Party?

You don’t need to dress too sharp to get into those nightclubs as they have an easy door policy.

However, the better you dress and the easier is to pick up girls.

For example, if you want to pick HOT girls in Mega Dance Center, especially the one from Manila, your only chance is to dress “smart”.

Generally, Filipino women put a great weight in appearance but Manila’s Filipinas are eccentric about it.

So, make sure to dress properly and look at your best.

Consider getting your hands on the Be Stylish Ebook, a great resource that shows you how to go from a common man to a stylish lover.

There are two specific reasons to change your look for the better:

First, it increases your confidence and so your ability to approach.

Second, it eliminates most seasoned workers and boosts your chances of finding a young and attractive girl.

Here is an example:

This guide has helped me a lot in attracting the hottest girls which before were inaccessible to me.

Furthermore, improving my everyday look has helped me in other parts of my life like business, friendships, and health.

For example, in business, I noticed that people treat me with more respect, resulting in more influence and accessing better circles.

When you make the conscious decision to reinvent your style and start presenting yourself in a different way to the world, a whole host of new people and opportunities are going to present themselves to you…

… And HOT girls will flow into your life.

So, don’t let your look fail you, you can easily improve it and get better women.

http://dreamholidayasia.com/destination/philippines-guide/angeles-city/nightlife-nightclubs/#ixzz5Yi97sHJu

#angeles city nightlife #angeles city nightclubs

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wionews · 7 years ago

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Life on a (Bollywood) film set

I arrived in Mumbai like legions of aspiring actors before me, and doubtless many more to come: with heady dreams of Bollywood stardom.

I have to admit that before moving to India, I had seen exactly one Bollywood film, and that was “Dhoom 1”, not exactly the height of cinematic achievement, I realise in retrospect, but I was hooked. I also (as mentioned in a previous post) had the dubious honour of singing “Tere Liye” from “Prince” at a Diwali Ball in graduate school. I didn’t have the faintest idea what the lyrics meant, and (having been trained in opera in my youth) I sang it like Brünnhilde. It was all very weird. When I learned that during my tenure in Mumbai, I’d be living mere blocks away from the legendary Shahrukh Khan, I believe my words were “Sharoo Who?” (Oh the heresy! The naiveté!)

I’ve been an avid thespian since I was 7 or so, chiefly acting in Shakespeare plays and musicals, so Bollywood – with its flair for melodrama, fondness for spectacle, and characters’ propensities for spontaneously bursting into elaborate song and dance routines – was a logical extension of my tastes. And once I got it into my head that I would portray the ingénue in Amir Khan’s next blockbuster (Dangal 2), I set about doing my homework.

I bought bootleg films in the local market and visited nearby movie stores to purchase boxed sets of Greatest Hits. I polled my coworkers for their all-time favourite Bollywood films and made a point of watching every movie they suggested [1]. A fellow Clinton fellow and Bollywood fanatic, the lovely Yasin Khan, and I teamed up to watch an Alia Bhatt flick “together” over Skype: her in Darjeeling, me in Chennai. Poor internet connections on both ends meant we had to re-sync our copies dozens of times, but we persevered.

One of my seminal experiences as a temporary Mumbaikar was patronising a matinee screening of Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge (DDLJ) [2] at the Maratha Mandir theatre. This particular venue has been showing DDLJ, perhaps the most iconic movie in Bollywood history, every. single. day. since its debut in 1995 [3]. When Katrina and I attended a showing one weekend morning in early February, I expected to find the theatre virtually empty – for who could possibly want to watch a film that’s been running for 22 years at 11:30 am on a Sunday? To my enormous surprise, the balcony was absolutely packed to the gills with raucous moviegoers. Thus began one of the most absurd and electrifying crowd spectacles I’ve ever experienced; indeed, it felt more reminiscent of a football game than a film screening.

When Kajol and SRK made their first appearances onscreen, the spectators erupted in cheers and wolf-whistles; they sang along with every song and recited large chunks of dialogue word-perfectly; at intermission they streamed out into the lobby for samosas and steaming cups of chai, chattering delightedly; and moments after the final epic train scene, when Kajol’s dad utters the now iconic lines “Ja Simran, ja, jee le apni zindagi!” (“Go Simran, go, live your life!”), the whooping and hollering crowd almost instantaneously dispersed, leaving an eerily quiet balcony littered with samosa wrappers and paper chai cups in their wake. It was an experience as bizarre as it was delightful, and it ranks among my warmest Mumbai memories.

Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge celebrates 900 weeks of continuous showings at the Maratha Mandir: “The One with Heart Will Win the Bride”. (Others)

My first decisive step towards Inevitable Stardom was to enrol in Anupam Kher’s evening acting course, thinking it might be a good way to hone my technique and make contacts in the industry. Alas, I quit after the third session: the course was conducted entirely in Hindi, and my language skills weren’t nearly strong enough for me to grasp the finer aspects of the Stanislavski Method. I also didn’t particularly relish the thought of spending three hours every evening for the next month pretending to be a snowflake [4].

I set about creating half a dozen online audition profiles and cold-emailing scores of casting directors. In time, all manner of bizarre audition notices began trickling in. At one point it seemed likely that I would be the face of India’s leading deodorant brand (huzzah!), but sadly that particular career-making windfall never came to pass. There were several offers that offended my dignity: I turned down a chance to advertise razors since doing so required posing nearly nude. I was cast in a web-series as a stock western character with “loose morals” but I did not feel comfortable with the behaviors I would be required to portray, nor did I wish to perpetuate stereotypes about my race. My most persistent pursuer – who regaled me with dozens of emails and phone calls despite my repeated refusals – seemed quite desperate to find Western actresses willing to wear a revealing Mrs Claus costume at a gentleman’s club in Delhi.

A few of my attempts to break into the Indian acting world came tantalisingly close to fruition. I was cast as a British publisher in an independent film and met personally with the director to review the script and discuss scheduling, but the filming dates kept getting postponed until finally, it was time for me to leave India. I was asked to make an emergency appearance at a Bandra studio to play a bit part in a Marathi serial, but the director never followed up with a specific location. I gave a screen test at Yash Raj Studios, to no avail. I was also invited to audition for the lead in a Niraj Pandey film (my big break at last??); but once again, the agent never provided audition details. Quite near the end of the fellowship, I joined the cast of a Hindi-language production of Macbeth (a ludicrously improbable confluence of so many things I adore), but ultimately work and family obligations took precedence.

At around the halfway point of the fellowship, I resolved to take matters into my own hands. Mumbai guidebooks will tell you that a Westerner hoping to serve as an extra on a Bollywood film set can often get “scouted” in certain touristy areas of town. I sipped countless cold coffees at the Leopold Café on Colaba Causeway, with my hair coiffed and a neat stack of resumes resting coyly on the table beside me. I repeatedly visited a hostel where tourists can sign up for same-day gigs and was told (much to my bafflement!) that all the studios in the city were “shut for the season.” I religiously attended theatrical performances all over Mumbai – at the Prithvi Theater, St. Andrew’s Auditorium, the National Centre for the Performing Arts – in hopes of forging directorial contacts. I even tried to put up my own production of one of my favourite musicals, “The Last Five Years,” but was unable to cast a crucial role.

In the end – spoiler alert, dear friends! – I never “made it” in the way I had envisioned. I guess Bollywood stardom is just one of those bucket list items I’ll have to consign to the failure pile, along with becoming a guzheng (Chinese zither) virtuoso and successfully knitting socks. Perhaps I am doomed to spend the rest of my film-watching days bitterly coveting all of Kalki Koechlin’s roles. In the end, however, I have no regrets about my misadventurous foray into the Mumbai film world: after all, almost becoming a famous antiperspirant evangelist is something I can be proud of. And along the way, I gained firsthand insights into the sometimes frustrating, sometimes exhilarating and always the capricious world of Indian cinema.

But to end this post on a slightly more positive note: I haven’t entirely given hope. Somewhere in the bowels of the Yash Raj media archives is a 30-second clip of me speaking terrible Hindi; so perhaps one day, Amir Khan will come to his senses and FINALLY cast me as the lead in a remake of Rang de Basanti.

I’ll be keeping my Indian mobile phone charged just in case.

[1] Incidentally, the results of this informal survey constituted a fascinating study of my colleagues’ personalities and tastes: one co-worker suggested the delightfully goofy classics “Mr. India” and “Amar, Akhbar, Anthony;” another raved about “Mughal-e-Azam,” which is a cinematographic masterpiece but LONG and SLOW; while a few of my younger colleagues favored modern movies with political slants and social commentary, such as “PK” and “Pink.”

[2] I was also interested to note that many of the canonical Bollywood tropes – scenes shot in exotic locations, “bad boys” wooing “good girls,” unwelcome engagements and wedding mishaps, a final dramatic climax unfolding on a train – can trace their origins to the wildly popular DDLJ.

[3] At one point in the early 2000s (so the legend goes), the Maratha Mandir Theater decided it was time to end the daily showings of DDLJ; so the lead actor, Shahrukh Khan, simply purchased the establishment to keep his signature film running. This story is apocryphal, but fun to think about.

[4] As much as I adore and deeply respect the craft of acting, training in this field can sometimes be accurately characterised by my favourite Fry and Laurie sketch).

This article was originally published on 09/ 08/ 2017 on American India Foundation

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houstonlocalus-blog · 8 years ago

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An Interview with Power Trip

Power Trip. Photo courtesy of Facebook

Dallas’ crossover phenomenon Power Trip recently embarked on their national tour in support of Nightmare Logic, their latest album that released February 24. Based on their album, it’s apparent that the band has stuck to their craft while kicking up the melodic and rhythmic skills. As one of the craziest live shows around, it’s apparent why the group have selected Iron Reagan to give direct support: a match made in the mosh pit. Other groups performing include Skourge, Omertà and Sexpill. Power Trip vocalist Riley Gale spoke to Free Press Houston about their latest release, his craziest memories on stage, and who really runs Dallas.

Free Press Houston: Can you talk a bit about the the time spent recording Nightmare Logic? Also, was it recorded solely in Dallas?

Riley Gale: It was, uh, tedious and slow, but it was good. I had a really good time. It was two years of writing and getting together between tours when we could. We finally got together and began to pound it out during the recording sessions. It was a lot easier this time than the last one, for sure, because I think we knew what we were doing in the studio.

And no, some of it was recorded in Denton, and some was recorded in Philadelphia. It was basically split between the two.

FPH: What is going to be the biggest surprise for fans on this record, if any?

Gale: I guess it would be the traction that we’ve picked up over the last couple of years. I did not expect the band to be this successful ever, really, or as big as we are and as fast as we did.

FPH: You are playing with Iron Reagan, another obviously energetic group; how did you get in touch with them?

Gale: Oh, they’re just good friends of ours. Tony [Foresta] was a big fan of Power Trip from early on, and he started to hit me up and was like, “Oh, I’m doing this crossover band, Iron Reagan.” I decided that if they were able to get their shit together, we would be there to help out. They’ve done a lot on their own, but they’ve been, like, a brother band to us, I guess because we’re both crossover bands. But our members get along really well, we’re all good friends, not just tour-mates. It was a no brainer: they had a record out, we had a record coming out, so it seemed like the obvious move rather than compete for crown of our music, you know?

FPH: I know you and other members met at various hardcore shows around town, but when it was time to start Power Trip, was there ever any thought about going either metal or punk, and not going in between?

Gale: I have a desire to start these bands that were, sort of, influenced by these hardcore bands that were influenced by other metal bands. But as we got out chops up and got more talented as a band it made sense to bring more metal into the fold, you know?

FPH: What was the importance of the DIY culture to you and for the creation of the band?

Gale: It was pretty important. When you say do-it-yourself, it’s more of a team effort. We wanted to have control over what we do as a band, artistically and all, and you don’t put that stuff in the hands of people you don’t trust. We have a tight-knit group. We have a producer, a permanent road-guy, and his job is to build the brand, so to speak. That’s sort of the way it is with bands these days: a lot of it feels like you are a traveling T-shirt salesman. You go up there and your 30 minutes on stage is your pitch to get people to buy merch. People have gotten better about buying records, which is great. I love that people are starting to support in actual, physical formats again. It’s not like it used to be, obviously. If someone wants to steal a record [online] they’re going to steal a record; if they want to collect music and buy it, they’re going to buy it. We saw that our record was leaked two weeks earlier before it’s release date, but we didn’t care. It busts that hype bubble, which kind of sucks, but it is what it is. We’re just happy that we’re able to get to get the record out there. I think it helped sales, though: if anyone was skeptical, they could check it out. It seems like this album has already shit up a lot of the critics that weren’t big fans of the first record. We had a lot people who liked it, and we were very receptive to it, but there are people who are going to say “we didn’t like the first one, but I already bought this, downloaded that.” It goes back to the DIY thing, where we are in control of trying to create a product that appeals to anyone. We have control over what people see and hear. It’s a good thing that we have that control, so to speak.

FPH: What were you listening to growing up? Was there any particular label that you were drawn to?

Gale: When I was first getting into punk it was just anything and everything. I’d say, when I was really young and getting into punk at 13 or 14, Epitaph and Fat Wreck were the big ones, and that was cool because they actually put out hardcore records, too. They had a broad mix of sound. For a long time, I thought bands like Sick Of It All or Madball on Epitaph were just another punk band, you know? It was the same with bands like Bad Brains, I just thought that they were another punk band. There hasn’t been a specific label, I’d say, that has anchored what I’m into. If I discovered a new label, I’d look up a lot of their releases. But you had labels like Dischord and Jade Tree that were really important for a while. In their heyday, Bridge Nine was putting out some good hardcore records that I liked. But you also have the metal labels like Nuclear Blast and stuff like that. Nuclear Blast put out the really legendary thrash records. Combat Records was another good one. I didn’t worship a label, but labels were very big in helping me find other bands, for sure. I hate to admit it, but Victory Records — I loved stuff like Earth Crisis — showed me bands that blended hardcore with punk and other stylings.

FPH: As you got older, did you delve into their weird stuff, like Amphetamine Reptile?

Gale: I got into AmpRep around the time I got into that sound, so I would put it around 18-20 years old, when I was getting into bands like Kyuss, Fudge Tunnel, and the Melvins, obviously. Some of their connections to the punk world were cool. But yeah, the label put out some great stuff.

FPH: My first time seeing the group was at Fun Fun Fun back in 2016, and I was blown away by the high energy. In fact, the energy was so intense that I imagine venues are even more so. Do you ever get worried that something can go terribly wrong on stage, or perhaps did when you were starting?

Gale: Eh, I wouldn’t say nervous. I was nervous at Hellfest in France, because of the sheer size of the crowd. I was like, “if they don’t like us, I don’t know if our ego could handle 20,000 people booing us off,” you know? A lot of the earlier shows with Lamb of God were the same, I was just a bit nervous about the reaction. But I’ve never been scared for anyone at a show. I mean, some people have gotten hurt, but we’re really good about making sure they’re OK. I’m not up there singing “kill your fellow neighbor” or anything like that. This whole culture of mock-violence — we have to understand and draw a line that there is a pace to take out your aggression. If you want to punch a guy who is participating in the same thing, then cool. There are obviously people who come to just watch the band, though. I do feel bad sometimes, when we’re playing a show and the kids get going — if a fight breaks out, we’re going to stop and say something. I’ll tell them to knock that shit out, or if they want to fight, come on stage and fight us, you macho-man kid. I don’t promote actual violence or anything like that.

FPH: What’s been the craziest show moment from recent memory?

Gale: Oh, man, we have we so many of those! There’s a lot. Sometimes, people like to go crazy. Two shows that always stand out would be Moscow and St. Petersburg, when we first went to Russia, because they were well-attended shows, and the number of people participating and moshing was crazy. To see people go that crazy over a band that — we didn’t know anything about Russia or what to expect. It was just a cool moment.

We’ve had shows with fireworks, people setting stuff on fire, etc. There was a SXSW show that was another favorite of mine. We played a venue called Barbarella’s — it’s usually a dance club — that had a nice patio setup. This guy set up the showcase and it was Power Trip, a few others, and Cro-Mag’s. During our set, people were throwing anything that wasn’t attached to the group: trashcans, etc. Some guy threw out a fake wad of money, which led my friend to throw out a real wad of money, so there was actual money flying around. The bouncers were trying to get between the stage and the fans, and they were just beating up the security. It got so hectic, that [the venue] just pulled the power to the stage, because it almost looked like a riot. I was trying to tell the staff to get out of the fucking way, like don’t do it and you won’t get hurt. The owner comes on stage with the promoter of the show comes on stage and is like “What the fuck is going on? What do we do?” All of the kids are chanting our name, so I told the venue that they had two options: let us play our final songs with security out of the way and I’ll tell them to watch out for the monitors. I don’t want people to show up to a show and disrespect the venue, I’m not that kind of person. Of course I incite a lot of excitement, but I don’t want people tearing apart a venue. The other option was I turn to these kids and yell “Riot!” I asked which one they wanted to do, so we went to finish. It was a lot of fun. Some kid kept flipping me off right to my face and spat on me, so I punched him in the face and broke his nose. But our set was so crazy, that when Cro-Mag’s went on, the venue had to take on more security. It wasn’t as exciting. They’re a great band, but it didn’t feel the same.

FPH: Finally, does Power Trip actually mean more to Dallas than the Cowboy’s?

Gale: I mean, if you don’t give a shit about football, maybe. There’s no way that the whole metroplex actually cares. I would never say that. [The Noisey write-up] was just my friend giving us a nice little nod of hyperbole, so I’ll take it, sure. But no, I don’t think we will actually mean more to Dallas than the Cowboy’s. I doubt we’ll mean more than Pantera. If we’re lucky, we’ll mean more than Drowning Pool. I’ll take that as a goal.

An Interview with Power Trip this is a repost

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