Sunday, August 29, 2010

Edinburgh Fringe 2010 : Chef!

Last night we went to the see the Korean martial arts/breakdancing/beatboxing comedy, Chef. Similar to shows in previous years (e.g. Jump, Breakout), Chef! is physical comedy which uses martial arts, dance and beatboxing to tell a story. In this case, the story is that of the Korean dish Bibimbap. We start off in the past where a martial arts master's strength and prowess is attributed to his secret Bibimbap recipe. When two evil fighters try to steal his dish, he travels forward in time to a modern day kitchen where a group of Chefs are trying to make their own Bibimbap. He arrives just in time to teach them the art before the evil duo from the past turn up and start to cause trouble.

Chef! is both hilarious and awe inspiring. Some of the beatboxing is ridiculous, the martial arts show a lot of gymnastic prowess and the breakdancers are also very talented. This makes for a show with never a dull moment, you're either laughing, or gasping in amazement.

This show is must see, especially if you enjoyed Jump or Breakout, which were both excellent as well.

5/5

Saturday, August 21, 2010

Hot Hot, Home Street, Edinburgh

Last Thursday we were out in town and looking for somewhere to grab some tea, we had initially headed for the Lee-On Chinese restaurant in Bruntsfield to stuff ourselves on their ridiculously good value set meal. But while walking up Home Street, we noticed a place we must have walked past hundreds of times but never thought of going in.

Hot Hot serve a kind of Chinese hotpot, each table has a heater on it on which is placed a large bowl of broth (we got a special bowl split into half normal, half spicy). You are then brought a lot of raw food and you cook it at your table in the broth. It costs a flat fee (around £15 per person) for as much food as you can eat. The food provided ranges from reasonably normal to the exotic. Thinly sliced beef, lamb, pork, raw prawns, scallops, razor clams, kelp, tripe, mushrooms, potato and all sorts of other stuff I can't remember. Once cooked in the broth, you take it out and dip it in a range of special sauces.

The whole experience is great fun and the broth and sauces made the ingredients taste amazing, even if there was a fair amount of stuff I would probably never think of ordering.

Overall, something a bit different, but still tasty and you get a lot of food, Hot Hot is worth a try if you want something a bit more fun than other restaurants.

Score: 5/5/

Labels: , , , , , ,

Tuesday, August 10, 2010

Bonsai, West Richmond Street, Edinburgh

After the show yesterday we thought we'd head out for something to eat and as we were over at the South side, we decided upon Japanese from Bonsai. Bonsai was one of the first places I'd had Japanese food in Edinburgh and I think it's also one of the oldest Japanese places in the city. I hadn't been for a while mainly because I'm not over that side of town very often and so Sushi-Ya on Dalry road and Tang's on Candlemaker row are both a bit more convenient and are both pretty good anyway.

So, between the four of us we ordered up a feast consisting of Dragon Roll, Sashimi Platter, Teriyaki Beef, Yakisoba, Prawn and Salmon Nigiri, Wasabi Peas, Char-Sui bun, Mixed Tempura, Rice, Kim-Chi and Okonomiyaki. Everything was excellent and although the sashimi pieces seemed a little small, we were still pretty full once we'd eaten everything. I can especially recommend the Char-Sui bun and the Okonomiyaki. We followed this up with desserts (I had a chocolate torte).

Overall, Bonsai is pretty good and definitely one of the best Japanese restaurants in Edinburgh, it's just a shame it's over the other side of town from where I live.

Labels: , , , , ,

Edinburgh Fringe - Inside

Last night we went to see Inside (Zoo Roxy - 18:25), described as physical dance theatre revolving around themes of violence and incarceration within the prison system, the production sees 5 male dancers tell their story on stage.

You might think that this doesn't sound like the kind of thing I'd be interested in ... you'd be right, if not for the fact that the whole thing has a live musical accompaniment by none other than 65daysofstatic.

I have to admit, the dancing didn't really interest me and I didn't have a clue what was going on for the most part, but 65dos sounded amazing and it was worth going to see just for that.

Overall 3/5

Labels: , , , , , , ,

Monday, August 09, 2010

House Season 1

We've just finished watching the first season of House. After seeing a couple of episodes from a later season on Sky 2, I thought we should start from the beginning and so got hold of a copy of the Season 1 box set which contains 26 episodes of the show.

The show follows a team of diagnostic doctors led by the enigmatic Dr. House (Hugh Lawrie). House hates patients and often takes a line of treatment which is morally ambiguous but he always gets results. Each episode the team get an interesting case and after about 5 diagnoses, eventually get to the root of the problem.

While it can be a bit repetitive with each episode following a similar template, the drama and character elements make for interesting viewing and even after 26 episodes, I think I'm ready to start of Season 2.

3.5/5

Labels: , , ,

Thursday, August 05, 2010

Highland Wildlife Park


Amur Tiger, originally uploaded by chored.

Last Saturday Rosie and I attended a Go Wild Scotland Photography Event at the Highland Wildlife Park near Kingussie.

For your money you get entry into the park for the day, accompanied by professional wildlife photographer Arron and his wife Kirsty. Arron is on hand to answer any technical questions you may have about photographing the animals and Kirsty has a wealth of knowledge about the animals themselves. There is no tuition per se and I felt I should have made more of Arron's expertese, but didn't really know what to ask.

The big attraction of the day out is that you get closer to the animals than you would as a normal visitor to the park. The tour started off by visiting Mercedes the Polar Bear, she is in an enclosure which you can normally only see from the car when you drive round the park, but we got to walk in and get right up to the fence. This all happened before the park opened and we gotto see her at feeding time, so got some great shots of her eating sweetcorn and swimming.

A similar setup is also in place for the Japanese Macaques where at feeding time you get to go through a gate and get a bit closer to the fence. I found the fence on the Macaque enclosure harder to get shots through, but it was still nice to get in there.

The other animals you get to see in close quarters are the Amur tigers, again you get through a fence and it is literally you on one side of the fence and the tigers on the other. The fence has nice big holes as well, so there's no problem with having to shoot through the fence to get good photos.

Rosie and I shared the A350 and the A700 on the day and I was surprised that there is little discernable difference in image quality between the two, some of my best shots were taken on the A350. I still prefer the A700 since it has a bigger viewfinder, screen and more buttons to access things like white balance etc. as well as more control over ISO etc. but the A350 is still nice to shoot with.

We were also trying out a lens I borrowed off my brother, the Tamron 70-300. It performed really well and is so sharp at f/8 which we had little trouble shooting with at ISO 400. I even managed some shots with my Sigma 400mm which came out really well, I think my feelings about that lens were dampended a bit when trying to shoot handheld in low light wide open, but stopped down in good light, it's sharp and manageable. If only it still had working autofocus.

If we're going to do this kind of thing more often, Rosie and I really need another zoom with a good range and I'm torn between getting the same Tamron as Neil and going for the Minolta beercan which almost every Sony Alpha owner seems to crave.

Overall, a great day out and worth the money if only for the special access to the animals. If I go on a similar course again, I need to get some tips from the Pros though as you are paying for their time as well as the access.