The Portfolios

It has all come down to this.

Two weeks ago, Chuck Norris Fan Club faced its toughest match yet. We were down, 2 games to 1 in a best of 4 series, and with only one player left on the court, we were staring a virtually impossible to overcome 3-1 deficit in the face.

Fortunately for Team Chuck, that one remaining warrior was none other than Bulgarian Dodgeball Legend Yanita Karatchorova.

Facing six opponents, the odds were highly stacked against Yanita, and the fans of Team Chuck could feel the legend of 10 straight victories with no defeats was slowly evaporating from the air. But Chuck Norris had other plans.

In the most inspired performance in the history of the Shanghai Dodgeball league, Yanita channeled the power of Chuck Norris directly from his ranch in Texas into her very blood. Charging forward against all hope, she quickly laid waste to three of her enemies, including one of their biggest killers. Having nearly leveled the playing field, she wisely retreated to the rearcourt to dodge her opponent’s counterattack.

With missiles flying in from every direction, Yanita stayed strong and alert, deftly weaving her way between the incoming projectiles, until her enemy was nearly out of ammunition. Then, her enemy wound up with his one remaining bullet and hurled it at Yanita with all his might. Like a lightning bolt of pure Chuck, Yanita stood firm and pulled off what some had considered impossible.

She caught the ball.

The crowd erupted as CNFC’s star player, Jamey Harding, took the court after Yanita had decimated four of the enemy. With only two remaining, it was only a matter of time before she and Jamey cleaned up and evened the score at 2-2.

After such a momentous charge, the enemy was unable to recover and CNFC cruised to a 4-2 victory, extending their winning streak to 11 and keeping their title of “Undefeated for Life” well intact.

Declaring Yanita the Player of the Week was a no brainer.

After a week of rest (reward for its position at the top of the league), CNFC tonight faces the Dirty Half Dozen in the semi-finals - and assuming all goes well there, either the Golden Balls or the Urban Cowboys in the final. Team Chuck has defeated all these teams in the past. But anything can happen out there.

Still, after all we have been through, having stared defeat in the face so often and come out victorious every time, I have every confidence that the Chuck Norris Fan Club will walk away with its second straight League Title tonight.

CHUCK YEAH!!!

Pholph’s Scrabble Generator My Scrabble© Score is: 16. What is your score? Get it here.

Pholph’s Scrabble Generator My Scrabble© Score is: 12. What is your score? Get it here.

I found this neat page on the web that calculates Scrabble scores. Quite useless, really, but fun. Can anyone beat Xianyi’s 16 with their name? I doubt it. Unless you have a Z in there somewhere. Incidentally, Yoyo was born on April 16th, so that sounds like a golden Scrabble score to me.

Magazines, TV, Movies, Commercials, Ads, Posters, Billboards……. show me one that is not about “Fuck Me”!

Look around your street, restaurant, office, gym, cafe, museum……..women have less clothes on their body. Isn’t this sad? Do women need to look like prostitutes to get a man? Or do men just have worst taste about women, because men are dogs?

We can’t blame anyone, we make the rules, so we follow the rules. I’m not really sure who made the rules that women should dress like prostitutes, probably it’s Hollywood, and those dirty business bastards.

Have you seen the movie “Thirteen“? Maybe all our babies are going to be like the kids in that movie, and no one can stop them, because of the biggest murderer - Media - who can hide and become visible, they are washing our brain in civilized way.

Answer a question quickly- how can we pick up our self-respect and dignity? Everyone should answer yourself, because everyone should be more responsible. We are absolutely stuck in a complicated situation: money, fame and status, who does not care about that? Nobody. But women, we can get some of them with some of our digntiy and self-respect, if you are not very avaricious.

So, please go home, pick some nice clothes and put on your confident body, if you can.

Yoyo and I witnessed Tiger in the flesh on Sunday at the HSBC Champions tournament at Sheshan Golf Club here in Shanghai. Here you can see him lining up a putt on the 9th, but when I get my next role developed I expect to have a much better shot of him, which I shot up close after he finished his round.

It was really a great event. I, who love golf, was bound to have a good time - no surprises there. But many doubted that Yoyo would be amused at walking around a vast expanse of land for hours on end watching large men hit little balls at faraway targets. The doubters were wrong; she loved every minute.

In fact, this was not Yoyo’s first golf tournament. She accompanied me to the 2004 China Open, also in Shanghai, which gave tickets away for free because Chinese people don’t care about golf Tiger wasn’t there. The biggest name at that event was Thomas Bjorn.

But this one was huge. I guess there were over 10,000 people there Sunday. And media were all over the place, as were the corporate sponsers. They had an area set up to play games, and I took shots of Yoyo playing mini-golf and getting a free ten-minute lesson.

The Chinese love Tiger, and some will say it is because they love a winner. All Chinese F1 fans (that I have met) love Michael Schumacher. All basketball fans love Jordan. And all golf fans love Tiger. People become golf fans because they love Tiger. This is not limited to the Chinese at all; it’s a worldwide phenomenon.

I have to admit, the guy is MAGNETIC. Just knowing that I was on the same course as him made me feel electric. When I saw him up close, I felt magic. I can’t describe it. Star power, I guess.

I got tickets by playing up the media angle, getting a pass to the media tent and a free lunch. That meant that I got to go to the press conference the Tuesday before the tournament started, at which Tiger made an appearance and answered some questions. I tried to ask him if he would ever design a golf course in China (he recently announced the formation of a design company), but the moderator never called on me and eventually a Chinese journalist asked my question. Tiger answered in his usual loquacious, noncommital, and media-savvy way.

On Friday he shot the course record, 64, but in the end he didn’t have enough to win, and came in second - the same as last year. And again, a relative unknown won. This year the champ was Yang Yung-eun of Korea, who beat out third-round leader Retief Goosen in the final holes. Cool finish.

This lovely shot courtesy of Candice.

Things have been real busy lately for the Portfolios. Here are a few random updates to keep our slowly growing list of readers in the loop:

• We are still waiting for “the letter” from the US Consulate in Guangzhou that will inform us of our interview date. When it arrives, we will have about one month to prepare for the interview (which won’t involve much other than booking a flight and hotel; all the paperwork is prepared). I have learned that if we are approved, which is virtually guaranteed, Xianyi will be issued a visa the day after the interview. That visa is not actually a “Green Card” but an immigrant visa, most likely valid for one year. When we arrive in the States we will apply for a change of status, but the point is, once the Letter arrives, we’re going to have to start putting things in order to move. It will be a gradual process, but we will have to begin it immediately as the visa will have a limited time period of validity.
• Xianyi is doing well in her new job. She is working for a large and famous American PR firm which I will allow her to name here if she wishes. The hours are a bit long, but they’re a bit long in all jobs, so that’s nothing new. But it is definitely the best company she’s ever worked for, and she’s getting used to it. The jury is still out on whether she likes it.
• Chuck Norris Fan Club extended their winning streak to 10 and remained Undefeated for Life. We lost the first game of this week’s match but came back in stellar form to steamroll the opposition 4-1. Candice took some pictures which I will post here when I have them.
• I have been really busy with work as we are coming to the end of the China Business Guide 2007 project. We should be done with it in another week. Long hours lately.
• The band has been busy and November looks to be the busiest month since spring. We are going to Nanjing this weekend for a money-making sellout company gig, and next weekend we are playing the Five Dollar Shake at Yuyintang, which is supposed to be a real cool venue, so we’re looking forward to that. We’ve also been invited back to the GigLive event at Bonbon and are scheduled to do a show or two when Nate returns to Shanghai for a week. His hand is recovering from when he broke it playing basketball the last time he was here. For a good insight on what kind of stuff he’s made of, check out this video of him playing bass with a broken hand during our studio cut of “Fellow Man.”
• Sandro is finally going to return to Shanghai, after a five-month absence. He has been working some miserable desk job in Italy and can’t wait to return. We can’t wait to have him back.