2010 Reflections. A Year of Pushing Boundaries! So I guess I finished off 2009 with a bang by quitting my desk job, winning gold at worlds, and then taking off to live in Taiwan for 2.5 months. I finally broke free of this...
One - It all starts with taking the first step.
So I've been out in Beijing for a little over 2 weeks now. Why did I move out here? I got an offer to work for Jet Li / The One Foundation and in less than 24 hours I...
A moment of reflection on 2009 - A recap on the past... Taipei 101 New Years Eve moments before the countdown I would summarize 2009 as the year of taking the leap and the year of pushing limits. It was a year filled with incredible...
My Life's To Do List My To Do List: An updated evolving list of accomplishments I want to achieve in the next 3 years:
Start an automated 6 figure business ($3k/mo cash flow) that is self-sustaining...
So Misa and I among a group of other young entrepreneurs have a monthly meeting we like to call Young CEO meetings.. we try to model the meetings like the big boys in EO… but either way it’s a great way for us to get good feedback on ways to improve our businesses and also keep each other accountable. This meet up wasn’t specifically a “CEO meeting” but it was awesome in that we both usually met up in LA and this time we were able to update each other while both being in Hong Kong.
Alfred and Jet Avenue of Stars
We took a walk on the Avenue of Stars so of course I had to say what’s up to my boss’s hand print!
Mango Smoothie and Tea
After that it got hot from all that walking around so we kinda randomly stumbled our way around and found a chill spot to have some drinks. This day was a much needed day of chillin out because Jet didn’t have anything really work related planned and I actually got to meet up someone I knew from LA which was a nice change of pace. Moreover, due to our monthly meetings, Misa pretty much knows everything that’s going on with WushuKicks up until I left for China and I was pretty up to date with her food truck business NomNomTruck so there was tons to talk about.
Rockin out at Racks in lkf
We hit up the Jade market, did a couple of other things, met up Ryan for dinner in Central, and then ultimately ended up at Racks to hang with Pat from AliveNotDead!
Pat and Alfred at Racks
It’s nice to be able to meet up other AnDers in all different places from LA to Beijing to Hong Kong. Pat, Ryan, and I caught up over dinner. Unfortunately I couldn’t stay out too late so I’ll have to continue where we left off and hang with Pat next time I’m in Hong Kong.
Misa and Alfred at Racks in LKF
Surprisingly, some of the pictures that Ryan took – that Misa and I both thought he was totaling messing around… came out okay!
In the past 3 days I got 3 auditions. I had an audition per day Wed, Thurs, and will be going to one today Friday. I also had an audition last Sat so that makes 4 in the past week! I’m glad that I feel more active progress. This is the area I have been trying to focus more on this past month… and its manifesting!! Of course, now I just need to actually book these gigs. haha! I’ll wait to hear back in the coming days/weeks to see how I did on these 3 auditions.
I also updated my demo reel which I posted in the post before this. It seems fitting that I have it in this post as well since I’m mainly discussing my entertainment endeavors.
Someone told me it was pretty epic.. and I said.. I hope it would be slightly epic since it’s everything I’ve done in the past 6 years or so compressed into 1 minute and 30 seconds. =P
I finally finished reading this acting book that I bought 7 months back. It was a great read. It taught me new things and reminded me of things that I knew. Acting is fascinating because it really lets you learn more about yourself, people in general, and human nature. I feel like the more I delve into acting, the more gates I am unlocking in myself.. freeing myself of limitations, judgments, and fears.
The audition I went to today (Thurs) was some “Unitled Project” which I thought was going to be some glorified extra role, but it ended up being a top secret project at Paramount Studios. I don’t even know what its about, but it would be sweet to land that.
Saturday I will be going back to do adr for Barry Baz pilot project. It was supposed to be done done final 2 weeks ago, but little things keep coming up and these guys want it perfect so I’ll be back one more time on Saturday. After that hopefully this thing will be signed and sealed. It has already been submitted to the LA Pilot Festival. This is the same festival that It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia got noticed.
its always sunny in philadelphia
Currently still planning on shooting a short in June and either episode 1 of a web series or just a trailer before I go to China. When I’m not auditioning or practicing I’m going to be doing a lot of writing.
Beijing Night
International Travel
In other news… I booked my flights to China, HK, and Taiwan… so it is OFFICIAL OFFICIAL. (When I say something twice you know it’s official) Here are my official but never permanent travel dates:
Aug 19 LAX -> PEK
Sep 09 PEK -> HKG
Sep 13 HKG -> TPE
Let me know if you will be in ASIA at this time! Even though I only booked flights for Beijing, HK, and Taipei, it doesn’t mean I won’t end up in Thailand, Vietnam, or anywhere else. Hoping to follow up with a few entertainment contacts while I’m in Asia. I am really looking forward to seeing a lot of good friends. I’ll also be training wushu and sanda in Beijing. It should be a really good trip.
The Beijing part of the trip will be covered, but for HK and Taipei, I’m still finding places to live. In Taiwan if anyone is renting a place, let me know!
Martial Arts
I’ve been going to the gym, tricking, doing wushu, or kickboxing at least once a day 7 days a week. I might be adding one or two more private lessons. I feel like it’s going to be awesome.
As far as competitions go, I got quite a few potentially lined up. I might be doing a ton of traveling in the next 2 months (next 4 months if you count all the flying to Asia).
June 12-13 – Tiger Claw KungFuMagazine BASKA tournament in San Jose
June 18-19 – AKA Grands in Kentucky
June 26-27 – Strikeforce Cung Le Fight (as media / to watch) in San Jose
July 09-10 – NASKA US Open – in Flordia
July 30-31 – NASKA US Capitol Classics – Marlyand
Aug 25-30 – Sport Accord Combat Games in Beijing
Looking for New Roommate
This part of my post refers to exactly that – I am looking for a new roommate available to move in starting June 1st. My old roommate is moving out in a week. Please spread the word if anyone needs a room in the Alhambra area. Lots of good Asian food in this area!
Business
Finishing up some ads, negotiated better merchant transaction rates, and set up my shipper account. Focus has been on the entertainment stuff this week. Sales have been steady and the business is much more cleaned up. Little minor to do for the business will be to clean up FAQ on the email response portion, add in “how do shoe sizes run” question and response, switch over to dedicated work email, test run new shipper account.
Well its been a while since I actually posted a blog entry with my thoughts in writing. My latest entries have been filled with video blogs of my random and fun adventures in Taiwan. I’ve actually been without a stable internet connection for the past week or two. In Hong Kong I only had the lobby internet and since I moved in to my new place in Taipei, I was also internet-less for a few days. I just got a wireless card from http://www.ivideo.com.tw/rent_memory/video_detail.asp?film_id=39545 yesterday so now I can finally go online at home. Yay!
Let me first give a shout out to Pat / rottendoubt for inviting me to a cool party at the W hotel in Hong Kong and introducing me to a lot of other artists on Alive Not Dead. I had a good time and not just because it was open bar. =P
Seriously though, with the amount of “going out” I’ve been doing in each country bouncing back and forth from Taiwan to Hong Kong to Macau to Hong Kong to Taiwan… its a wonder that I am still alive… not dead literally. Don’t get me wrong.. I am having a GREAT time, but my body has needed to rest/recover from Day 1 upon arriving in Asia. I mean after all prior to arriving in Taiwan I flew from LA to SF to Toronto finishing world games then back to SF before flying to Taipei… so my body was already pretty tired.. then the first day I arrived Sarah took me clubbing at Primo – and since then it has been non-stop.
However! My partying has not been in vain. I have met some really cool friends and had really memorable experiences that you can’t put a price on. Also I met an agent through randomly going out. The agency is called Evert agency – www.evert.com.tw – Has anyone heard of it? If so, what are your thoughts as far as their capability in the tv and movie area? I would like to be referred to a few more agencies so I can see what they are all like. Evert just sent me out to an open casting for a 7-11 commercial. It was my first experience auditioning in Taiwan. I think the casting guy was cool with me, but I could use more practice nailing the feeling he wanted faster. I am going in for headshots on Friday. So far the agency has been cool and quick with things, but I haven’t signed anything and just want to learn the ropes out here first.
One thing I do notice out in Asia is that casting is a lot “easier” in some ways. I don’t mean that it’s necessarily easy to get work, but I just noticed that the day I went in to talk to the agency, the next day they were able to send me to an audition.. the reason being.. its Taiwan so more than 90% of commercials/work are FOR asians whereas in the US asian males most likely only audition for roles that specifically mention “Asian Male” or possibly “Mixed Ethnicity” which is far less roles out of the total possible. Anyways, it will be interesting to see how it goes out here this month.
JC Stunt Team Victy Wong
Meanwhile, while I was in HK I met up with Jackie Chan stunt team member Victy Wong who mentioned he would be interested in having me teach wushu for an action/martial arts/stunts school he is opening up for kids and actors. Of course these were just talks and I was just in HK for a week so we will be in touch and playing it by ear. I also met Daniel Wu and also ran into Jackie Chan’s son at Racks.. apparently I hear he is out partying in Taiwan quite often as well.
As a means to clear my own thoughts I came up with my GOALS for the acting/entertainment world.
1) Star or Co-star in:
1 HK gangster feature film
1 Chinese Wu Xia Period feature film
1 Hollywood action blockbuster
1 National Commercial
2) Demo for or work with Jackie Chan in a film
3) Host a Travel Channel show
Those are my clear cut goals. If I achieve that I would be pretty happy with my acting/entertainment career.
…and if you are curious why I want to be in those specific types of movies, it’s because I love action and those are the movies I grew up loving. I want to be a part of the movies that inspired me in so many ways and contribute to paving new paths in those movies to keep inspiring others.
I think I’ve also decided I would like to give Asia a shot and live here for a while, but first before I do that I really need to get my ass in gear and set up my businesses properly in the US. When I get back in January, it’s purely hard work and focus.
That’s it for now, time to eat. I’ll be uploading more taiwan and hong kong adventures soon!
This week was filled with craziness from clubbing to bar hopping to club hopping to lounge hopping to more drinking. Yes, it was a very productive week for my liver. I went out probably 5 nights in a row- Wed, Thurs, Fri, Sat, and Sun.
Wed- Jazz lounge near Shi Da with Kiyoshi, Ray, Doug, Christina from HK, and a few others. Thurs - Babe18 with Kevin. The only night I really get pretty messed up. The other nights I did take a little easier. Fri - Room18 followed by Primo with Kevin and Max. Sat - SOHO with kev, sarah, monica, kiyoshi, followed by good food place with Ma La spicy ass food and then Sarah going crazy and still wanting to go KTV at 5am and me wanting to pass out. Sun - Barcode and then Babe18 again with Jeff and Charlie. Jeff just flew in from the US that morning I believe.
So anyways! FRIDAY I lost my precious casio exilim digital camera which I have been using to document my trips around the world and specifically documenting tons of stuff here in Taiwan. =( I was sitting on the curb with Kevin and Max and I was making some video commentary. Then I set the camera down to relax for a bit. After a while we got up and walked 20 feet to go get our hands stamped at Room18. Not more than 10 minutes pass and I realized I left my camera on the curb. I run up to find it and lo and behold… its gone! It’s obviously my fault for leaving it there, but it was snatched up pretty quickly by someone looking to slang my camera for a few bucks probably. At this point I am pretty bummed because I just lost my digital camera along with my memory card that has pictures and videos on it!
I still make the most of our outing and have fun. Max gets a call and has some friends at Primo so we head on over. It was lightly raining this day so we had our umbrellas. Long story short, at the end of the night, I get in the cab to go home and realize I left my umbrella at the umbrella check-in and forgot to pick it up so in one day I lost my camera and umbrella. Losing the umbrella just tops off the night.
I am and have a been a believer that whenever bad things happen that means something good is about to happen. It’s my own personal idea of karma or a circulation of energies. Also, having a positive outlook on negative situations tends to help turn the situation around anyways so whether I’m right or wrong, it’s been working for me. Also a quick interjection – whenever something good happens I don’t believe something negative will necessarily happen because that “good thing” is probably the result of hard work, energy put in, or positive attitude that helped cultivate that positive situation. Additionally, I do try to repay any super awesome good luck by giving back in some way or helping others in some shape or form. (This is my random tangent on positive vibes.)
The night after I lose my camera, I wake up to find a fantastic surprise in my gmail inbox. In fact the email was justly titled “got a little surprise for ya.” Well to me, it was much more than a little surprise. A friend who I recently got to know through common interests in wushu, entertainment, and business knew that I was going to HK in a few weeks and decided to reach out to some Hong Kong actors/stuntmen. This act alone, I am already really grateful for. It means a lot that someone has faith in your abilities and capabilities that they would refer you. However, on top of this, Les also helped me make this incredible resume package! I have a few headshots and a film resume in a word document. I was just planning on cleaning up my resume and making something a little more professional looking when I got back to LA. I was so surprised when I opened this attachment and found this:
Alfred Resume. Thanks Les!
You can click it and see it in slightly higher resolution. It is a professionally done alfred hsing entertainment resume package! I’m pretty excited about everything and how this turned out. I’m not going to go into all the details, but I know a lot went into making this. You should see my old resume. It looks so wack compared to this. In the midst of all the hectic cool and crazy things that have been going on, I think this really stood out and surprised me. I honestly can’t express my thanks enough so I just wanted to blog about this and share it with everyone. Hope that’s cool. It means a lot to me!
Other good news that I need to report on.
* Angels Tea SOLD OUT in the 2 stores that they are being sold at in LA. In the process of restocking them. It would be easier if I were in LA, but not a major problem.
* Cirque du Soleil contacted WushuKicks and made an order with us. We at WushuKicks are very excited to work with Cirque du Soleil because it is such an awesome show and I have friends in Cirque! Cheers!
* Randomly found this article online on 2 sites.
I can’t really read it that well, but I think the reporter thought there was another gold won in female sanda in the past. The US sanshou coach said there were no sanda golds in the past so I’m not sure where the reporter got her info. In any case, cool article. I am glad I am getting myself out there in Asian news.
*I was interviewed by CTV and on the 7 oclock news in Taipei. They had me demo and talk about wushu at Bei Ti Sport University. Been on TV in Taipei twice within my first week here!
US Wushu Team with Taiwan Wushu Team
I have a few more videos to upload for Taiwan Adventures part 2, but until I get a new camera… I won’t have any more awesome picture updates. This is the new camera I plan on getting to replace my old casio exilim.
Hopefully my new camera soon.
Do you guys know if it would be cheaper to get this in the US, Taiwan, or Hong Kong? =P
If I get this camera I will probably do a mini review on it and let u guys know what I think of its functionality.
Time to get some chong you bings now. I haven’t eaten all day and its 3:50pm.
Yesterday I went to the Channel 10 TV station near Kunyang in Taipei. Famous Taiwan TV show host Zhang Fei interviewed me on my achievements on winning the 10th World Wushu Championships on the show “Zhong Yi Da Ge Da”. I’ve seen this guy host many shows even while living in LA. My aunts, uncles, parents, and grandma has had him on their tv back at home in the states. In any case, it was a fun show. I did a wushu performance and interview. There were actresses and singers on the side that comment along with Zhang Fei and Zhang Fei himself makes a bunch of jokes and comments. All in all, interesting show.
Getting my hair did at Channel 10 in Taipei
I got on the show so randomly. I guess it wasn’t completely random, but it just happened all of a sudden. My mom referred me to a contact in Taiwan and I sent over my demo reel and information.. and before I knew it next day I was called in to be on the show.
It airs Saturday at 8pm Taiwan local time, channel 10. If someone can TIVO this for me, that would be awesome!
Xing Guang Da Dao
Channel 10 is the same channel that airs “Xing Guang Da Dao” the Taiwan Idol singing contest show. They are on their 5th season.
HONG KONG DECEMBER 4th-9th
Hong Kong Time First Week of December
Looks like I will be going to Hong Kong because I am unable to stay in Taiwan for longer than 30 days on my US passport.
Hong Kong City
If anyone is around or can show me around in Hong Kong.. or if there are any dope parties.. let me know. I will be there. Still looking for a place to stay – hotel/hostel/crash. Open to all suggestions. Thanks!
It’s been decided! I am going to Taiwan Nov through mid January 2010! I will be spending new years in Taiwan and watching the Taipei 101 building ignite as the seconds count down to the new year! I’ve never been abroad for a new years celebration so this will surely be an exciting occasion!
I am up in Northern California right now. I will soon be in New York and drive to Toronto then fly back to San Francisco just in time to jump on a plane to Taipei. I just decided ALL of this yesterday for some reason. Somehow it all made sense.
Here is where I need help! I basically have to decide today by 5pm. My flight stops in HK to transfer to Taipei. I was thinking of stopping in HK which I’ve done in the past, but I don’t really have any particular plans in HK and not sure what I would do. I would love to meet up with some of you AnDers but this is all very last minute so I am just throwing it out there and curious to see if there are any compelling arguments to make a stop over in HK.
This is a sudden decision, but I guess it makes sense because I feel like I have a calling to be in Asia. Plus when I finish competing at worlds I am going to want to chill out for a bit so I figure I’ll spend that time in Asia. The entertainment industry along with some businesses slow down during Christmas and the holidays so its a perfect time and when I get back fresh in Jan 2010 I will be ready to go!
Loading ...
