More Fun Stuff From Asia

As previously mentioned, Taipei has a very good bus system. Aside from the homicidal tendencies of their drivers, the Taipei Metro system has excellent coverage, clean cabins, and frequent service.

Also, in what I am guessing is an attempt to improve the connection between the transported masses and the people serving them, all of the buses have the name of the person driving them attached on a placard to the back of the bus.

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In case you had not already guessed, folks like Jackie Chan, Stephen Chow and the like weren't born with their English names on their birth certificates. Instead, they have the luxury of choosing their sobriquets by employing a few common methods. In no particular order, they typically are chosen based upon:

• Direct Romanization (DR)
  i.e. Ang Lee, Zhang Zi Yi, Chow Yun Fat




• Phonetic Approximation (PA)
  i.e. Kong Fu Zi = Confucius, Chow Sing Chi = Stephen Chow, Li Lianjie = Jet Li



• Whatever Frickin' English Word They Happen to See (WTF)
  i.e. Battery Su, Pony Lin, Singer Huang, Asahi Lin

There are, of course, more common western names, such as Michael or Andy or Kevin or Vincent, but having lived in Taiwan for the past 15 months or so, I can't help but notice the more unusual ones, typically falling in the latter category.

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Getting back to the buses...

What you are looking at here is one of my favorite recent examples from the "WTF" category of names.

That's it.

Yes, that was a lot of set up for a relatively minor payoff. What's your point?

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This one should go a little faster...

Melanie and I ran across this shower gel at Watson's the other day. At first, I thought it was just another example of not consulting an English speaker before coming up with the product name; however, while combining Man and IQ might seem like clever branding to some and an oxymoron to others, it is certainly not the most unusual thing about this product.

The most bizarre thing has to be the active ingredient - 10W40.

That's right - 10W40.

Where I come from, that's called motor oil, so I am still not sure what they were thinking.

Maybe they had a fortuitous mishap while changing their oil and discovered its miraculous moisturizing properties.

Maybe they felt that Penzoil and Quaker State had left too many markets untapped.

Maybe they felt the best way to appeal to the manly metrosexual was by combining cars and skin care...

Whatever their reasons, the coup de grâce has to be the fact that the back of the bottle explains that this shower gel is produced by a company based out of San Jose, California.

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This one is definitely quicker - I promise...

If the Mummy ever decided that the reason his victims always get away is because he simply doesn't have the right footwear, this is what he would buy.