So everyone under 30 is now officially lame. That's right. It's no longer cool to be under 30. Everyone 30 and over is officially 3 points more awesome than everyone under 30. ^_^

I was going to go out horseback riding and having a super fancy dinner, but there was a massive heatwave going on, so I decided to stay inside. (My hatred of getting too hot is well recorded.) I opened the door to go down to the grocery store, and it was so hot in the hallway of my apartment building that I closed the door and called the grocery to deliver everything. (Interesting fact about China: Absolutely everything will be delivered. I don't like to do it for small orders, but I have friends who will call the grocery to have a single candy bar delivered.)

But Nick is tough and manly and walked across the street to buy some champagne. (He was soaked through by the time he got back, and it really is right across the street.)

I ordered an apple pie from http://www.piehouse.com.cn, and it was genuinely the best apple pie I've ever had. And I've had a *lot* of apple pies. (My dad hates cake. Likes pie.) One of the owners delivered it, and it was still warm when it showed up. It was really, genuinely amazing. (If it had been less awesome, we probably would have some left.)

Last Chinese lesson my coworker didn't come with me, so I decided to use the time to grill the teacher about different words for different kinds of clothes. (She grilled me back, because apparently "boot-cut" and "skinny jeans" are not part of the standard English lesson. She was a bit flummoxed by "spaghetti strap.") Next time he cuts class, I'm going to ask about types of fabrics. (I suspect that will be difficult. I could ask a native English speaker for an acetate twill and get a blank look.) July 31st, 2010 by Betty Valentine | Comments Off

Blarghl. I want to get paid already. (My first check was v. light due to the way the months are chopped up.) I'm feeling weirdly, painfully shoppy.

I want to buy so much fabric it's ridiculous. I bought 20 yards and accidentally had it sent to my mom's house in Chicago. (I'll go pick it up in October.) In the meantime, clearly that means I must buy another 20 yards to be here. (Even though I have more important things to be doing than sewing right now.) But for some reason I am in a serious mood to go shopping right now. (Wait no, not shopping. Buying.) Also shoes, and clothes, and like 4 scarves, and purses, and part of me kinda sorta wants to buy the Chanel temporary tattoos. (I'd just copy them onto tattoo paper on my printer so I could wear them without using them up.)

They look like this:




I'm bored and waiting for pages. This always happens when I get bored waiting for pages. July 27th, 2010 by Betty Valentine | Comments Off

Sample sales.

Seriously. I really miss NY's sample sales. They were fantastic. You can wear all ridiculous designer clothing all the time, because if you hit the right sale Halston is cheaper than H&M. Sigh. July 25th, 2010 by Betty Valentine | Comments Off

At Amsterdam Fashion Week, Iris van Herpen showed plasticized water cascading off her outfits. "Not everything has to be wearable," she said.

From Style.com July 17th, 2010 by Betty Valentine | Comments Off

Huh ... it appears I am able to read and even post to LJ today. Who knew? (These things keep changing. When I first got here, all blogspot addresses were blocked, but just by URL so I could still see it by going to www.ambiencechaser.com. Then a week later, that was blocked too. I haven't been able to get at Facebook or LJ, but now I appear able to see LJ again. Neat! ^_^)

So, I'm in China. I've been here a month now. It's extraordinarily hot. I started Chinese lessons last week. I got in a cab and asked to go to work, and instead he took me to the bar district at 9am. Clearly, I found a magic, mind-reading cab driver. (and did not, in fact, mispronounce the name of my office building).

Also, my classmate/coworker and I went to lunch and he ordered a glass of water, and the waitress brought him a bulb of raw garlic. (Yay, Chinese. (x_x))

The food is really, really good. Well, the Chinese food is. And it's freakishly cheap. My coworker and I got out for $2.50 apiece at lunch, including beers.

Work is cool. I made one of my writers get a snake massage. (The headline was "Snakes on a Pain").

What is going on in the US? July 7th, 2010 by Betty Valentine | Comments Off

I've got a Juki 3-thread serger with a roll-hem that someone can have. It needs a new needle, because I broke it, but otherwise it was working just fine. I also have a metric fuckton of fabric if anyone wants it. Lots of different types. There are several yards of a really cool gunmetal metallic vinyl, and a bunch of a high quality black poly rayon. (It's the same fabric I used for R Dorothy and for Shimako from Marimite. It's good stuff. But I bought 10 yards a couple years ago, adn at this point I don't want to store it.)

I also have a ton of amnga and toys and plushies. I'm not sure what yet. Does anyone need any books? I have all of the Dresden Files and the Sookie Stackhouse novels if anyone wants them. Drop me an email. You'll need to come get them, but if you do, they're yours. Also Harry Potter.

And there's So. Much. Manga. We've been selling it at a serious loss on ebay, but now I can't find my camera and can't get it up there. So if anyone wants anything, please drop me a line. Some stuff we're keeping, but a lot of stuff we're getting rid of.

Oh yeah, I have a red queen-sized pull-out couch by La-Z-Boy that is really comfortable. Also a chair-and-a-half that pulls out into a twin bed. (The chair has been scratched up by the cat. I mean to patch it, but might not get into it before we leave.) If you can come get either of them, they're yours. May 20th, 2010 by Betty Valentine | Comments Off

Phew! My Haute Couture Embellishments class is over. I'm glad. It was great fun, but for three days I've just been looking forward to today. "No matter what happens today, by this time tomorrow I'll have champagne and Glee."

Homework is done and turned in. For now, I'm just hanging out. Tomorrow I have to start sorting the fabric stash into keep and throw-away piles and putting a bunch of stuff up on ebay.

Oh, right! I'm moving to China! I got a job offer that's very exciting, and I'm moving out in 2 weeks. Phew! Lots of stuff to do. May 18th, 2010 by Betty Valentine | Comments Off

Does anyone have any ideas about that thing? I'm complete fail at google search. Do I buy one? Do I make one? And what, specifically, does the damn thing look like? x_x

May 14th, 2010 by Betty Valentine | Comments Off

First, a question: Does anyone know where/how I can get my hands on a copy of volume 32 of Costume: The Journal of the Costume Society of America? I want to check out Lynne Sorge's article on stays (w/pattern, of course) but it's not available online, JStor doesn't have it, and it's non-circulating at the Columbia library. (Worst case scenario, I wait till Ten Suns gets back to NY and make him photocopy it for me.)

And on to other stuff:
Hangzhou was beautiful. We went to West Lake and the Silk Museum. We were there till Monday, and now we're in Beijing. We stopped by several very good bars and restaurants, scoured China's largest bookstore for fashion books, visited some cosplay stores, and went to the Forbidden City. (I'm seriously in love with the Empress Dowager's parlor, especially the Venetian glass chandeliers.)

Yesterday we went by Twilight, a Japanese bar in Chaoyang. Beijing's high-end cocktail scene appears to be dominated by the Japanese.

Back at Hangzhou, CICAF was cool. I've never been to a con that big in my whole life, and cosplay is very, very different in China.


Like, people belong to cosplay clubs. The smallest clubs are 20 or 30 people, and the biggest are 5 or 600. If there is a character you really want to cosplay, you have to petition your club president to be allowed to do that character. Then the executive board will vote on whether or not they think you'd be good enough at it, and if they decide you'd be OK, then you're responsible for acquiring the costume yourself.

They also have a ton of rehearsals. Apparently, the president of one of the Beijing clubs is known for being very strict, and the choreographer directs rehearsals with one of the sticks, "Like they use to beat you with in primary school." And if you miss more than 3 rehearsals, you're out of the club.

The end result of this process is that the performances are *amazing.* There are 20-40 people on stage all dancing in unison. You've got whole armies doing kung fu, and everyone is really, really beautiful and can dance or do kung fu or gymnastics. The skits are very long, like 15 minutes, so the masquerade lasted for 3 days. I performed a Macross skit with a robot and a Ranka, and it was only 2 minutes. Nick says that when we finished, the people in the audience were like, "WTF? Are they coming back out? Is there more?"

Since not everyone gets to perform on stage, those cosplayers really do have "fans." A lot of people were collecting autographs. We were part of the judging panel with a bunch of the famous guys, and they gave us a bunch of their products, like personal photobooks and stuff. The photography aesthetic definitely involves a lot of photoshop, but they just consider that part of the overall effect of the photo. It's about creating an impression. (I didn't recognize anyone I met from their pictures, though.)

One of the more famous cosplayers we met was a guy who goes by Huangshan. He and his brother own a BJD company called Ringdoll, and Huangshan does all the designs for the dolls and their outfits. (http://www.ringdoll.com)

This is Huangshan:
May 7th, 2010 by Betty Valentine | Comments Off

I got my luggage! Yay! Now I have makeup, sunblock and clothes that I have worn for fewer than three days straight.

Renee is like candy here! Everyone is obsessed with her. I'm not kidding, we were walking around the convention hall and three different people came and asked for pictures with her, and she was not wearing a costume.


Also a quick US WCS update from Ed, just FYI:

The US representatives for the WCS will be picked at Fanime, but it will NOT be as part of the Fanime masquerade according to what he told me this morning. Ed thinks it will take place sometime on Saturday. Someone from the WCS will probably be there to judge, and Ed will be along to translate and wrangle and do all the things Ed does. (Look for the enormously tall affable Canadian with curly blond hair.) There may be just the one judge, I'm not sure. I don't know how judging will take place, if there will be pre-judging, or if there will be a separate craftsmanship judging. They don't know how long it will take. Ed seems to be hoping for at least 10-15 groups to show up. I think he's crazy if he thinks it will be that few.

If you want to enter, it must be as a team of two, you have three minutes for your performance, and you must be cosplaying from a Japanese anime, manga or video game. You *can* enter the preliminary with costumes from Shueisha properties, but you cannot compete at the finals with them. So if you win with a Shueisha skit, you'll have to do something else at the WCS. But it's OK for the preliminary. (Editorializing: Last year's Team Brazil did a One Piece skit at the prelims, and at the WCS it was a FMA skit. I highly recommend you look it up. I don't know One Piece or speak Portugese, and it still knocked my socks off. It's fantastic. I wanted to ask for their autographs.)

They don't care if your costumes have won a prize or been in a masquerade, or if you enter them in other masquerades in the future.

Ed says to bring your audio prerecorded on a CD. He thinks there will be a stage and an audience, but doesn't know specifically what the deal is with that, or on microphones. That's all kinda up in the air still, but prerecorded audio is probably safest.

The specific, official requirements for the WCS are on the WCS website somewhere, but I'm not sure where. I'll post the link if i find it, but my Internet connection is *really* slow here.

Good luck everyone! If you've finished reading this post, you now know as much as I do. Also, just to clarify: I am in no way acting in an official capacity, I'm just relaying what Ed told me. If you have any specific questions, I'll try to ask for you, but I have absolutely zero power in any of this.

Good luck to everyone! Tell your friends if you think they'd want to know, and please let me know if you have any questions. I'll be happy to help to the best of my ability. Thanks! April 30th, 2010 by Betty Valentine | Comments Off