I love this place! Such good food

Check out Baja Betty's in Hillcrest. some of the best Mexican food i've ever had!
www.bajabettyssd.com

1421 University Ave
San Diego, CA 92103
(619) 269-8510

don't know why i just thought of this. i guess i just really like mexican food. Good mexican food too.

I don't think i'm running out of blogging ideas. right?

Garfield Minus Garfield is a site dedicated to removing Garfield from the Garfield comic strips in order to reveal the existential angst of a certain young Mr. Jon Arbuckle. It is a journey deep into the mind of an isolated young everyman as he fights a losing battle against loneliness and depression in a quiet American suburb.

www.garfieldminusgarfield.net

Since the last blog of trying to blog every day, i actually did not. So i admit defeat. However, in order to make up for that, here are the last blogs i've done off of the facebook SDAFF site.

HOW HAPPY I AM:

Thank you facebook and all that is facebook for switching over all the friends we USED to have on our profile and adding to our page. I'm one happy camper- I thought I was going to have to individually add everyone to our page.

For those that are coming to the page- I recommend you do so alot! We've got lots of fun updates and i'll be blogging once a day. Also- we need you to switch over some of the tagged photos that we no longer have.

Dan's useful tip of the day:

When boiling sausages and bratwurst, pour beer into the mix and boil together. Gives it a delicious taste.

-Dan

They're having a programming meeting right now already discussing our plans for the...(gasp!) 10th anniversary of SDAFF! Even though...absolutely nothing has really been discussed, and we've only received 1 film...(which film is that...i cannot say..but it has to do with something that starts with T and rhymes with EVO), it's still pretty exciting. 11 months to go! See ya at the fest

- Dan

I'm going to start blogging here every day!

Hello All,

It's Dan, marketing coordinator for the Film Foundation. I want to test myself. I want to see if i can consistently write a new blog once a day.

Think i can do it? Only time will tell.

Favorite thing #1:
Domo: http://www.domonation.com/

I love domo! you should too.

I'm Mark Gadia. I'm one of several volunteer leads that help the San Diego Asian Film Festival (presented by Toyota Matrix) do what it does best, namely be one of the best film festivals on the face of the planet!

So what exactly do we do? Some of us are your drivers that drove you from the theater to Blowfish. Some of us sold you that festival t-shirt you're wearing (a t-shirt you could have got for $10 instead of $15 because you weren't a SDAFF member *tsk* *tsk*). Some of us gave you your will call tickets and tried to help you out as much as we could if we couldn't find them for you. But most of us direct and manage the veritable army of volunteers inside the theater under the supervision of our volunteer coordinators Emil and Megan.

If you saw volunteers handing out programs, surveys and pencils at one of the theater doors, a volunteer lead placed them there for you. If you had any questions about which theater a movie was being played in, a volunteer lead probably answered your question with a smile. If you registered to vote at our festival, a volunteer lead probably helped you fill it out. If you were a filmmaker and were worried about sound levels for your film (and Phil Luque, our super duper awesome theater operations manager, wasn't available), it was a volunteer lead that probably checked those sound levels for you in conjunction with the good people up in the projection booth. It was a volunteer lead that set up that cool SDAFF logo that shined down outside the theater lobby. It's the volunteer leads that try to lessen the chaos that the theater can create when it's crazy busy (and most days are crazy busy).

... said Jini Shim on the morning of Saturday, 2 weeks ago from today.

and today I am just in my room, blogging (lamenting) about that day of SDAFF Gala -- night full of flashes!

lights!

glamour!

excitement!

and love!!!

despite the grueling work that goes along with it,

oh how I wish for that night again-!

Hey guys!

Just got home from final night of the Riverside film festival and the last night was quite a hit! The documentary and feature film Mystic Ball got the night off to a great start. It told the story of a Canadian man—Greg Hamilton, who also happens to be the film’s director—and his love for a Burmese sport called chinlone. It involves keeping a woven ball off the ground by doing a combination of tai chi and hackey sack moves. One of the things that I found most intriguing was that it is a non-competitive sport. I don’t know about you guys, but I’m a huge sports fan, and when I play or even watch I get extremely competitive. Throughout the film, Hamilton kept referring to a meditative state that players often fall into and that astounded me. When it comes to sport, I am anything but meditative. Hamilton did a really great job of highlighting the uniqueness of chinlone.

Next, one of the main attractions, The Ping Pong Playa, brought in the biggest crowd of the entire festival. Along with the big crowd came big laughs for everyone. The gangster son of a traditional Chinese family realizes he needs to step up and become the new ping pong champion (hilariously named the Golden Cock champion) in order to save his family’s business. Of course along the way, he has his missteps and finds a beautiful girl. Probably the only thing that I didn’t like about the movie was they kept referring to a really cute Miss. Chinatown, and in the end, she didn’t even really look Chinese.

Hey everyone!

The second night of the Riverside Asian Film Festival was great! We kicked off the night with the film House of Sharing, a Korean documentary and feature film that tells the horrific story of eight Korean women who were forced into sexual slavery in Japanese comfort houses. It was so inspiring to see what these women, now in their eighties, had overcome. Every week they travel to Seoul to attend a rally demanding an apology from the Japanese government. This was one of the things that I found particularly upsetting. As far as I could see, the only thing these former comfort women wanted from the Japanese government was an official apology or even acknowledgement for their crimes. These women have paid dearly for something that wasn’t even their fault and I feel that the least the Japanese government could do is apologize. The film as a whole had a really powerful message and I hope it is successful in spreading the comfort women’s story and rallying more people to their cause.

*Note: This was written when I arrived home but I didn't get a chance to complete due to falling asleep at the keyboard. lol.

Oh, don't forget that posts here at the buzzroom get a bit lonely, they love comments ;)

Also don't forget to click the  Read More to read this full blog as well as the other blogs too.

OCTOBER 23RD - Verry Early In the Morning.

It's pushing close to 2AM and I just arrived home after surviving the drive back from Riverside with Richie - our very own Mr.Rich&Creamy. Somewhere prior to passing around Mission Gorge, we hit a spastic patch of fog. It definitely felt like we hit the first ten minutes of American Werewolf in London. A desolate highway, few cars in sight and only break lines on the road to guide our way.

Richie, being the ever funny ice-breaker to tense situations, couldn't help but add as we made a turn along the road, "I hope no one is trick or treating as a deer right now!" Indeed. Suddenly, the idea of werewolves switched to a very plausible I Know What You Did Last Summer.

"So, what did you think of the movie? I love the fight scenes." I turned to ask him while he  leaned forward to see the road ahead of us better. Again, it was that thick of fog. The movie being, Public Enemy Returns.

"Hell yeah, those were badass." he laughed as we took a bitsy slight swerve at the road.

"Okay, I'll shut up now, I want to live long enough to at least get the first day blogged online."

Hi everyone,

Tonight was a particularly exciting opening night because although it was the 9th Annual San Diego Asian Film Festival, it was the first year that the festival had expanded to Riverside.  I have been commissioned to give my views on the festival and keep everyone up to date!

So, as I stand in the balcony of the University Village Cinemas in Riverside, California, I see curious theatre goers move through the lobby and towards the meticulously organized merchandise and pamphlet table.  With t-shirts priced at an affordable fifteen dollars, I saw more than one patron stopped to pick one up.  The balcony where I’m standing has been decorated with fluorescent butterflies that have been derived from the festival logo.  Various volunteers, visiting guests, and press milled around the balcony, snacking on the delicious sushi provided by Niko Niko Sushi of Redlands and waited for the films to start.

The first film shown tonight was Oh Saigon, directed by Doan Hoang.  I think one of the great features that will hopefully be an additional draw for the Riverside festival is that the first showing of each day is free of charge for UCR students.    

The hobnobbing continued on the balcony with director Arthur Dong making an appearance for the showing of his film, Hollywood Chinese.  I was particularly excited that I got to sit in on this film because I was looking forward to the Q&A with Director Dong that immediately followed the film. 

Amid the rush and fast pace in bringing things together this year for the festival, I haven't had a chance to really process everything. All the work gone into making the Buzz Room despite the repeated hiccups in posting, access privies, and of course site maintanence. It's easy, when one works in a fast pace environment to be on the one-track mindset to get work done.

For me, it is definitely a challenge finding the best way to make this place not only interactive but serve as a common room for staff and volunteers to share their thoughts. I truly appreciate all the efforts people have placed in contributing their experiences with the festival here.

Yet, I understand most people stop by here at the "Lounge" to read news, and get insight on what goes on a bit behind the scenes at the festival and do not contribute as much. It's totally understandable because offline life and work get in the way.  So imagine my pleasant surprise at reading a review concerning the festival by Eric Campos over at Film Threat.

With regards to the festival, he had this to say about us:

Seriously, I think the San Diego Asian Film Festival, year after year, has the most solid program of films – diverse, yes – but you can walk into pretty much anything and leave feeling satisfied, if not absolutely elated from your cinematic experience. On top of that, the festival is run by the best of the best. Festival leader Lee Ann Kim and crew deserve the highest accolades possible for all of their kickassery.

Hi everybody. I've been asked, nay, challenged to write a blog detailing the work involved in doing projection at the San Diego Asian Film Festival (presented by Toyota Matrix). For those who don't know me, I'm Chris Paffendorf, the production coordinator for SDAFF. What that means is that I was basically responsible for nearly everything you see or hear on screen at the festival. As one of my projectionists said, it's where the rubber meets the road at a film festival, and that's quite true. Think about it. If something like Blowfish were not to happen, while we'd lose a great and popular part of our event, the festival would still go on. If Guest Services did not do the awesome job they do, we'd lose our ability to attract big-name talent. But the festival would go on. You get the idea. But if technical hangups cause a film to not be shown, the entire festival comes to a screeching halt. It's an enormous responsibility, and I'd like to tell you a little more about the men and women who take on that responsibility, and what the job entails.

First of all, much of what we use to show the movies at SDAFF is not at the theater already. Yes, the 35mm film projectors are all there, but only about 40% of the festival is on film. Most everything else is on video. Filmmakers shoot on DV more often than not nowadays, and we have to show their work in video formats. Oh, and there's those microphones you see in use before every screening and during every Q&A. They're not there either, and it's my job to put them in and have them working beginning on opening day.

Jimmy Tsai (over speaker phone) and Lee Ann Kim talk to high school students about the making of the film Ping Pong Playa.

A dream come true!  Watching Geo take the stage for the Blue Scholars performance! www.bluescholars.com