Re: THE STAGE48 post dump! This whole "why won't he show us his birth certificate" nonsense around Obama is just... it's seriously the most childish and petty thing I've ever heard, and it's absolutely appalling that it's going on. To an outsider, it looks like people are looking for any excuse to bash him and blame him for America's woes, regardless of the truth (or what he inherited from the previous president...). I'm honestly so dismayed with the way the USA's politics are going at the moment, I woke up at like 3am to watch Obama's inauguration speech and the hope and energy and optimism I saw from the USA then is a faded memory. It was the same in Australia, too. In 2007 we got a new prime minister, Kevin Rudd, replacing the conservative John Howard who had been in the job for about a decade. When Rudd got elected it felt like Australia had been renewed, people felt better about the future. But then he got stabbed in the back by his own party and replaced (by our current PM, Julia Gillard). Now she's getting destroyed by the conservatives and I wouldn't be surprised if they took control again and brought back the negativity of the last time their party was in power. Goodbye rights for immigrants, homosexuals, basically anybody who isn't a conservative heterosexual christian white male (that poor oppressed majority)... Does anyone remember when the government and the politicians were supposed to represent and serve the needs of the people, instead of being all about power for themselves and forcing their moral and religious views on the public? Yeah, me neither...
Re: THE STAGE48 post dump! Tell me about it. Customs confiscated all three fly-swatters that I tried to bring in because they were deemed to possess 'potential danger'. Yeah, I can so seriously commit serial murder with them. Zoro swatter-style. And I was sort of looking forward to a quiet and peaceful summer. :nothappy: That reminds me of something I read a while ago. Some place in Canada/US tried legalising drugs? Poor Ruddy. I dunno if he ever saw that coming, but when it did, they left him with no other way to amend the situation but to resign. And now Gillard is scraping bits and pieces of Rudd's work off the walls and repackaging them to present to the public. You should take a poke at Taiwan politics. It's just hopeless. I don't think you would find the word 'honesty' in any of the Taiwanese politicians' dictionary. It's like...against the definition of being a politician.
Re: THE STAGE48 post dump! Last summer, I went through the U.S. customs in DC and the security thought my address was fake (at my uni, individual adresses are our mail box number). I used the same one for my visa app too. Although he was skeptical, he let me through eventually. I was kinda ticked later when he passed by me at the gate with a smile and acting all nice to me. I'm flying home to Tokyo next month, so I'm really excited. But since so many people cancelling thier seats, the plane looks empty now (I have an aisle to myself now). I always fill out my customs in English rather than Japanese because I don't want to mess up. OT, I really need to get the Myao and Suu-chan blog translations done. School work and co-curriculars keep piling up .
Re: THE STAGE48 post dump! Yes, that's sad. The travel agency where I had booked my trip to Japan phoned to say that all trips to Japan are cancelled this year. I phoned 'the competition' and they still haven't cancelled their trips, but they are not allowed to fly to Japan by the Government (at least for now)...I wish you a nice stay in Japan! [hi5]
Re: THE STAGE48 post dump! Over here, most politicians don't even care about forcing their moral and religious views on the public. They don't really care about doing anything to the public really, aside from taking their money Happens sometimes though. There was this horrible happening in Rio where some guy went into a children's school shooting the kids, it was a tragedy. And then this guy, I don't remember whether it was the mayor or the governor, was talking about how this showed that the law about making teaching religion in schools compulsory that he has suggested and had been denied should be reconsidered, and I was facepalming so much..... In the topic of politics, last year my country elected a clown as a deputado (don't the word in english, something like "member of parliament", according to wikipedia?). The slogans for his political campaign were "Do you know what a deputado does? Me neither! But vote for me and I'll find out for you!" and "It can't get worse than it already is, vote Tiririca!" (Tiririca is his "stage name", and this slogan rhymes in portuguese) Also, just now they approved a law that people with criminal records can't be elected. But after voting, they decided that it'll only be applied from now on, so people with criminal records who had already been elected will keep their spots. Oh god what is this crap.... Seriously though, we have people from the time of the military dictatorship who were responsible for killing and torturing so many, STILL in positions of power. And there's a bunch of politicians that have been proved to have done a bunch of crimes and been corrupt and have stolen public money, yet some how they are not arrested and don't even leave their positions Lol there's actually this politician that, not even his supporters could deny he stole public money. So they refered to him saying "Steals, but does" (as in, does things for the people, so it's fine even if he's stealing money, because most politicians just steal the money and don't even do anything). I don't know whether this is funny or sad.
Re: THE STAGE48 post dump! It'd be hard (and highly embarrassing) for anyone to actually tick "YES" to pornography on the form. Apart from customs officers actually tearing through your laptop/USB drive/CD+DVD's files (which would both be time consuming and potentially have ramifications in regards to privacy rights), I don't see how this would be effectively enforced (unless you brought a stackload of gentleman's mags in...). On the flipside, it'd make watching Border Security that more interesting . Too many same-old instances of Caucasian blokes returning (usually from SE Asia) held-up for contraband, and innocent Asians for not declaring food... Ah yes, Aussie politics... Now amidst all the infighting and bickering about the "new" ETS, media outlets are pushing for Rudd to re-replace Gillard, judging by all their newspolls and opinion surveys out there. Wish they'd start getting stuff passed through and done, though (stupid red-tape; I'm looking at you, state government [wonder] ).
Re: THE STAGE48 post dump! Nope, they've done that to me before. Coming back into Australia a couple of years ago, one Customs agent at Brisbane airport walked off with my laptop to look through it while the other looked through my camera's photos asking me questions about all of them. "Who is this in your photo?" "A friend" "you said you travelled alone" "I did" "why is there a photo of your friend then?" "because he was there too" "but you said you travelled alone" etc over and over... asked all sorts of bullshit questions, questioning everything from my job to my friends to my sexuality. Fucking asshole. That experience was probably the most insulting and degrading of my life. I don't mean to sound overly dramatic, but that's when I stopped being naive and realised law enforcement officers don't give a shit about people, all they care about is the law and trying to bust you for breaking about it. Never trust them to have your interests at heart.
Re: THE STAGE48 post dump! So now they treat everyone that comes in as terrorists/major criminals, I suspect? I feel sorry for you =/ One can't even have a little friendly photo-shot during their overseas holiday without coming back being questioned as if you're a wanted criminal/terrorism suspect/illegal migrant And I thought Australia was less paranoid about these things than, say America, is... Hope that doesn't happen to me in Cairns Airport once I come back from Japan... (at least I can bypass Melbourne Airport's busier customs/quarantine department )
Re: THE STAGE48 post dump! I guess they have their reasons to maintain 'security and safety', not to mention keeping their jobs. But sometimes it's just too ridiculous. They even confiscate little sharp clippers that women use to pluck eyebrows with. I was scanned for powder explosives by Qantas when I took a flight from Sydney, it came up positive. So they took everything out of my baggage and scanned them for 'explosives'. I got positive for 3 consecutive times, so the lady was glaring at me like crazy and started demanding all these details about my flight, my trip, and personal information. Guess what happened in the end? She had accidentally dipped her probber into a jar of samples sometime between the last person and I.
Re: THE STAGE48 post dump! Nice to see they're so careful when it comes to something so unimportant as checking for explosives... it's like that security worker in Japan who forgot which suitcase he snuck marijuana into to test the sniffer dogs a couple of years back... all he got was a "stern reminder of policy" or some such bullshit... nevermind what would've happened to the poor guy he did it to if he'd been on his way to somewhere like Singapore where they don't look too kindly on smuggling drugs...
Re: THE STAGE48 post dump! Epic airport security fail, much? That's absolutely ridiculous though. Surely a revision of protocols and training is in order? Surprisingly, once I arrived back at Melbourne passing through quarantine. Since I only went overseas for a couple of days, and never purchased anything back home, I just ticked "nothing to declare". For some weird reason, once I queued and they checked my card, they just let me out to the arrivals hall without even passing my bags (they're all hand-carried, but still...) through the scanner
Re: THE STAGE48 post dump! It really depends on how much they feel like working on a particular day. I always attempt to bring back instant-drinks (e.g. powdered-instant milk tea bags, etc) which sometimes contain milk-powders. And since Customs always like to 'confiscate' them for some reason, I always tick "No food" nowadays. They just wave me through without checking at all. I know that makes me dishonest and all that, but I really don't see the harm in bringing powdered drinks. (I never bring in FOOD of course, just these.) I ticked "Yes" this time coming back though, because I was carrying some dried-fruits and food. It was funny 'cause Customs say you can't bring in any fruits right? He tore my box open, and on the very top were 5 packets of dried Durion. They had Fresh Dried Durion in biiig bold letters, not to mention several large, delicious pictures of yellow durions. He goes through the entire box pretty thoroughly, seemingly to be reading everything. After he finishes, the dude asked me... "Are you carrying fruits?" In the end, he didn't confiscate them for some reason. Weird Customs huh? Not that I'm complaining though.
Re: THE STAGE48 post dump! Haha it amuses me so much to read these interesting customs stories. I can't believe how strict yet fail they can be at the same time >_> he would be dead now.
Re: THE STAGE48 post dump! Thank you! I hope someday you can visit Japan (it's not as bad as people make it out to be, but I understand their concerns).
Re: THE STAGE48 post dump! YEAAHHH hotel booked for anime north [cool] WHO WANTS TO HAVE A HOTEL PARTY you have to come to anime north though. *looks at terry*
Re: THE STAGE48 post dump! IF YOU GO TO ANIME NORTH I SWEAR TO GOD YOU BETTER NOT AVOID ME. you make me out to be a lot scarier than I am T___T
Re: THE STAGE48 post dump! Only if you promise not to embarrass me in front of my friends Mommy~ (´・д・｀)
Re: THE STAGE48 post dump! no really, do you actually think I'll come over to you screaming MAYUYUUUU? because REALLY, TERRY. REALLY. I'M REALLY NOT THAT OBNOXIOUS. well I am but I'm not THAT obnoxious. o_o and I'm usually just really miserable at conventions.
