Monday 26 April 2010

press



I was in the paper.
Look how bored I look.

Wednesday 14 April 2010

Small world.

It's always funny when you're far away from home and you bump into
someone who know's someone you know.

For example I've met a couple of poets out here who know people I know
from the scene. I met a guy who used to be my neighbor in Leicester.
And then yestrday I found out that my new mate Nick actually went to
school with 2 of the guys in my brothers band.

I read that om faceboom when I was stood behind the shutter near the
window I steel my neighbors wifi from.
Litterally as I did this massive insect that was like a cross between
a flying ant and a crab came wizzing in through the other window.

This things circling me waving its gun-finger in the air and pointing
at me mouthing the words, "you, I want you"

Quick as a wippet I slide through his legs and grabbed a can of raid
from under the sink.

And there we stood.
A Mexican stand off.
Him holding his stinger like a flick knife. Me with trigger finger
poised just before the airosols biting point.

Tumble weed.
Close up on eyes.

As he moved I matched him ducking his strikes and lashing the spray
like a bike chain across his face.
He stiffeled his scream and shouted "out, out, out." before flying
back through the window.

My smug chuckeling was only momentary as litterally moments later he
came back in with his whole firm.
Trust me yeah, this kid rolls deep.
Like 50 mans deep.

The swarm collectivly solidified into the shape of a giant hammer and
I raised my coffee table about my head to shield myself from the
impending impact.

Then out of nowhere I heard a voice, "eh mate ain't you Raff's brother?"

Turns out one of the swarm use to work on site with my older brother
back in England. We had a bit of a laugh about the whole thing and the
first geeza ended up buying me a drink before they left.

Small world eh.


Sent from my iPod

Tuesday 13 April 2010

Up your Contrast.





Language barrier

I’ve been learning a lot of Khmer words.
I thought that’d be a good way to learn the language.
Thing is, it don’t actually work like that.
The grammar is completely different. What it means is that I basically sound like a lazy Kung-fu Villain trying to read a ransom note that was translated using bablefish.
See they’ve also got like 27 vowel sounds witch means
it’s really easy to say the wrong thing.
For example the words that mean black, Ghost, Hot, Rat and Cock (as in penis) are all very close to each other.
I was trying to explain to an older Khmer woman, using a combination of those words and an elaborate gestural mime, that I had seen my friend kill a big black rat and he did it in his pants because it was such a hot day
Well you can imagine the rest.

Original replicas


Check this shit out Only $9.
Bargin

Big Lizard, Small Lizard, Broken Toe.



Bong Jon The Tuk-Tuk Driver.

My mate Jon drives a Tuk-Tuk.


This is a story Jon told me the other week when I saw him sat in a guesthouse looking really confused.


See Jon had picked up some people from the bus station that morning.

He thinks they might be Americans but maybe Australians or Irish.
Anyway he's brought these 2 Barang back to the guesthouse and checked them in.

Incidentally this coincided exactly with the 30-minute window when a family member from another city, who had been visiting Phnom Penh for the past few days, was covering the checking in desk. Keys had been given but passport numbers had not been written down.


The Barang left their luggage in their room and rejoined Jon for the usual tour of S21 and the Killing fields.

Jon drove them to the museum and parked his tuk-tuk opposite the old school building for the hour or so they were in there.

As they walked out of the building the Americans or Irish or Australian or who ever they were, recognised Jon straight away and got back in for the drive to the killing fields.


Now Jon admits he was actually quite embarrassed that he hadn't recognised them until they were sat in the back of the tuk-tuk. So he took extra care on the way to the killing fields so as he to put in a bit of staring at them in the rear view mirror.

Yu know, so he could remember their faces.


Anyway they got to the killing fields and he parked up to wait as his barang passengers wandered off chatting amongst them selves about the incredible atrocities they'd just been witness to in comparison to all the other atrocities they'd seen in their 8 weeks of travelling. And about exactly how lucky they were to come from a place like Australia or Island or America or where ever.


So Jon sat in his tuk-tuk and waited.
And he waited, and waited.


And eventually after a couple of hours he figured, these Barang should be back out here by now.


By the time he'd been waiting nearly 4 hours, Jon had reached the point of shooting his hand into the air every time a barang walked past and shouted, "Hey, hey it's me." Hoping that even if he didn't recognise them, maybe his passengers might recognise him.


Gradually he got less enthusiastic and eventually he got just down right bored. It must have been about 10 a clock at night by the time he decided they weren't coming back. When he'd arrived it was barley mid-day. But now the gates were being locked. He was the last Tuk-tuk kicking about. There was also clearly no more barang anywhere around here. So he went back to the guesthouse.


That's where I saw him. The out of town relative had gone back to his city on a bus about an hour before and nobody else knew anything about any Irish or Americans or Australians either for that matter.

There was no luggage in the apparently unused bedroom and the key was in the lock hanging on the open door.


It's obvious to me what had happened but it was funny to see how confused Jon was about the whole thing.

He blames Ghosts.

Back on the horse

So you may have noticed it’s been a little wile since I sat down and put something up here.
And what with the recent unrest in the area I’m sure a lot of you were wondering if I was in fact dead. (Just check the arrogant subtext of that last sentence, “a lot” like “a lot” of people read this. Classic delusions of grandeur shit.)

Anyway I’ve been busy eh so I was off living my life and doing shit.
I’m still in Phnom Penh Cambodia; please post me music and books and shit.
P.O.Box 1498
Phnom Penh
Cambodia
I am now actually working.
I lecture in Film Language and the History of Multi-Media at Limkokwing University in Phnom Penh. Got my friend Victor to thank for that.
Here is a picture of us in our work clothes.



We don’t ware the dog collars when we’re teaching. Just on the way to work, wearing it in class would be inappropriate.
But that’s not the only outfit’s we’ve been rocking of recent.


Fans of garishly load “Urban” clothes will no doubt appreciate the photo shoot I was part of the other day for my friend Jim (see pics here). It’s part of a fashion thing for the magazine we work for. (I introduced Jim in this story, where I call him Tim.)

Yeah I still work for that magazine. They say someday they might even make me their bottom-bitch but I ain’t been tricking so good since I got all those rejections. And I copy pasted a load of stuff of the old Wikipedia and it ended up getting printed in there under my other name. I rearranged it a little bit but basically 80% lifted.
Funny that it got in.
I think key members of staff were away and whatever but still how else would I come up with a list of 50 celebrities born in the year of the tiger?

Incidentally they printed something under this name.
By John Berkavitch it said. So if you really care what magazine it is you can Google my name plus words like Cambodia, Phnom Penh and Magazine and you’ll probably find out. (Now that is an arrogant sentence. Like people are gunna go trawling around the Internet trying to find out my open secrets. Get a life mate.)

Anyway I’ve got a hot scoop at the minute so I might be able to redeem myself a little bit. And they’ve got me out eating pies for another article so that’s good news.
I live down riverside now and it’s well beggy.

I ended up paying for this kid to go school for a month in exchange for not trying to sell me sunglasses every fucking day. How many pairs does he think I need? Although I did lose my grey ones and my Dr Jackobies. Some motherfucker showed up on facebook wearing them. I lost them weeks ago but I was actually at that same night.

Also anybody who read the thing about me going out in a cyclo on Christmas Eve might remember the break-dancing kids I battled in the street.

Well I tell you what I gave the smaller two lads money for food every day for like, time yeah. Then one day they’re like “hey mister, iiey knoow yoou give me wan dar-la.” (Not actually racist. That's an exact quote of what he said).
I was like “nar sorry lads I haven’t got any money on me.”
So these kids keep on a it for a minute and I’m like “nar look I actually don’t have any money.”
Then this one kid, he’s like “fuck you. You have to give me money or get out my country.”
Straight up this kids giving it the bong un going off at me in the street.
This shit went on for like a week every time I come out of my house him and his mate are telling me to fuck off out of their country.

It reached it’s peak with both the little fuckers came up to me outside the DVD shop and like pressed their heads into my torso and started banging my legs with their book-baskets.
So I did what anyone else would’ve done.
Grabbed them both by the top of the head. One in each fully spanned hand, like I was picking up 2 basketballs or doing some 2-handed melon ripeness testing.

Then I just simply banged their heads together. Admittedly I might have banged them a little hard. I forget they are malnourished little kids after all. Felt a bit bad afterwards. I saw them a day or so later and tried to make friends but when I went to shake the first kids hand he pulled it back and pretended to style his hair then told me to fuck of back to Australia.
I worry about the day when one of them gets fucked up on sniffing glue and comes to stab me in my kidney with a dirty piece of metal.

Anyway.