Melody's wonderland

最近VISA的廣告強打一個中年男子在世界各國跳舞的影片，他就是dancing Matt，看到他的舞蹈配合著周圍的人開心的笑容和動作，心情也不禁跟著開朗了起來，或許這就是Matt的目的吧！我只能說他做得很好，以下是他的遊記中對台灣的看法，大多集中在101，可見他並沒有在台灣停留太多地方。

我在知識網看到一位達人關於配樂的回答，太酷了

"Where the Hell is Matt?" 的自製影片配樂

曲名：Praan
作者：Garry Schyman
演唱：Palbasha Siddique 　　（來自美國明尼蘇達州的孟加拉裔高中女生）
單曲：Praan (June 20, 2008 )
這首歌的歌詞改編自印度詩人Rabindranath Tagore(泰戈爾)的作品“Stream of Life”，由作曲家 Garry Schyman 編曲，完整歌詞（印度文與英文）如下： http://musicandlyrics.wraithstrider.com/2008/07/07/praan-palbasha-siddique-where-the-hell-is-matt/ 另外，Matt Harding 因為在YouTube 受到世界各地網友矚目 & 接受媒體訪問後，VISA組織決定邀請他拍攝廣告。 VISA最新廣告 裡的廣告曲，是廣告公司的版權音樂～～一首很熱鬧舒服的合唱曲（請至YouTube搜尋 "2008 廣告VISA Matt Harding " 即可找到VISA的電視廣告影音試聽）。
.歌詞中譯如下： 生命之泉 就是這股生命的泉水，日夜奔流我的血管，也奔流過世界，有節律地舞動著。 就是這相同的一股生命力，從大地的塵土裡快樂地伸放出無盡的芳草，迸發出繁花密葉的波紋。 就是這相同的一股生命力，在潮汐波動中，撼動著大海的搖籃的生和死。 我的四肢，因受著這一切生命的撫觸而感到無比光榮。 我的驕傲，源自於時代的脈搏，此刻正在我血液中舞動著。


以下是節錄自他的遊記，關於台灣的部份
January 23, 2008
Taipei, Taiwan
"She's so Heavy-Handed!" Direct flight from Seattle to Taipei. Thirteen and a half hours. Some Asian airlines are among my favorites -- clean, roomy, with good food and good service. China Airlines is not one of them. The guy next to me was a major noodle slurper. He sort of held the plate in front of his mouth and vacuumed it up, the fork used only as a peripheral aid. This method is perfectly polite in China, but then again so is genital electrocution. He also had terrible body odor, a penchant for protracted ball-itching, and a bad case of the jimmy-legs. I mimicked his slurping sounds in open mockery. He didn't seem to notice. I mounted a rock hard thigh wall to limit the range of his leg wiggling. It had little effect. Finally I resorted to the pettiest of retaliations: farting. The plane did have private screens with loads of movies. I watched Across the Universe, which is an atrocity. It's like half-baked Hair, only with inexplicable access to the greatest song library of all time and free reign to butcher it in service of a trite, ham-fisted narrative. I like Julie Taymor, but in the "I Want You" number, when she had a group of G.I.s in Vietnam carrying the Statue of Liberty on their backs and singing "She's so heavy!" I wanted to grab a parachute and crack open the emergency exit. Lady, your visual metaphor license is suspended indefinitely. Boy, am I cranky!

Darjeeling Limited made me miss trains in India. And they made the country look exactly as orangey-brown as I remember it. I landed at 6am and I can't check in until noon. I'm downtown, so I'm going to go wander. January 25, 2008
Tokyo, Japan
Suntory Time
My second favorite thing about Taipei is the crosswalk signs. They tell you how many seconds you have left to cross, and by way of illustration, they show an animation of a little green man walking.



As the timer counts down, the animation plays faster until the last few seconds when he’s in a dead sprint to get to safety before the cars start buzzing by. It expresses the following statement with concise iconography:

“Dear God, run for your life! You are about to get flattened!”

My favorite thing about Taipei is Taipei 101. It is the tallest skyscraper in the world…well, sort of.



It’s the tallest by three standards of measurement. None of those, however, is the most straightforward: ground to peak. That title still belongs to the third ranked Sears Tower in Chicago. Taipei 101 doesn’t top it and the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur, which claim the number two spot, don’t even come close.

The measurement that matters most to me and pretty much anyone else is how high up you can get as a plain old tourist. In that contest, the Sears Tower still wins handily with an observation deck at 412 meters. Taipei 101 puts you at 392 meters, and the weasely, trumped-up Petronas dumps you off on the skybridge at the halfway point around 170 meters.

The Petronas Towers really piss me off.

In any case, Taipei 101 is still impressive, claiming the record for tallest structure and highest occupied floor. It’s a particularly daring achievement given its location on the Pacific Rim, which is prone to both earthquakes and giant monster attacks.

Taipei 101 has the tallest, fastest elevator in the world, reaching a top speed of 60 kph on the way up. And it has a thing called the Super Big Wind Damper.



The Super Big Wind Damper is a giant steel ball that weighs 660 tons. It hangs from galvanized steel wires in the center of the building right up near the top.





It sways up to 1.5 meters in extreme wind conditions and is said to reduce the building’s motion by 40%. It is also yellow.

Despite its monstrous size, the Super Big Wind Damper has proven vulnerable to the regional predilection for anthropomorphized cutesiness. The building’s marketing department used it as inspiration for their mascot: Damper Baby.



Damper Baby loves you.

I was stunned to find an uninterrupted stairwell leading to the ground floor. I guess they have to have that for safety reasons.



Must…resist…urge…to drop…coin…

The observation deck has what I would imagine is a very impressive view. Unfortunately, on the day I went up you couldn’t see a damn thing.



This made the outdoor observation deck a particularly creepy place to be.





Taipei 101 was completed just over three years ago, and it’ll hold on to the tallest building title for about another half hour, when the Burj Dubai will completely obliterate all other competitors.



Like most things in Dubai, the Burj seems to transcend reality with its absurd grandiosity and pointlessness. It is designed by Americans, overseen by South Koreans, constructed by Pakistanis, and paid for by guys who are really into Baywatch.

While the best skyscrapers are, in my opinion, a testament to human ingenuity and vision, the Burj will be a testament to just how incredibly much money they will blow to get our attention.



Nevertheless, someday, inshallah, I will be up there.

Taiwanese seem to be really into food. I estimate that at any given moment, at least half the country is eating. I don’t think I’ve gone 20 feet without hitting a restaurant or food stall of some kind. And yet they are all skinny.

Had I enough courage and a companion, I would definitely have eaten here.



This is just a thing I saw.



I bought some grape tomatoes from a street vendor. I'm a big fan of grape tomatoes as they are a mindless snack that still qualifies as actual food. When I popped one into my mouth, the vendor lady shuddered and took them away from me. She put the plastic bag on the ground and let the water from a hose wash them clean. I alerted her that tomatoes were spilling out onto the street. She rushed back over and started pulling the tomatoes out of the gutter and dropping them back into the bag.

We clearly had different ideas about what qualifies as clean.

This is a terrible name for an event.



I am looking forward to the women’s deafnastics and the deafathlon. There are certain to be some fine deafletics on deafsplay.

I watched a woman in a mall demoing this fascinating device.


For some reason it is targeted specifically at women. Now what gender specific value could it possilby have? I am confounded. It is a mystery.

The poopy weather held out for my whole visit in Taiwan. I wanted to get a dancing clip on a hilltop overlooking the city so as to feature Taipei 101 in the frame. I held out for clear skies until the last possible minute. Early this morning, shortly before my flight out, I took a taxi to a recommended viewing spot hoping for a miracle. When I got there, the entire city was still veiled in fog. Then I looked up from my cab and right in front of me was something a hundred times better than some dumb skyline. I told the driver to pull over and ran out to get one of the weirdest clips I’ve ever taken. I am quite fond of it and pretty sure it’ll make the cut.