From The NY Times:

Foul Play Ruled Likely in Case of Spy Found Dead in Bag

Deepening the mystery surrounding the death of a reclusive MI6 agent found doubled up inside a padlocked duffel bag in his London flat, a coroner said on Wednesday that it was unlikely that the case would ever be solved, but that the “balance of probabilities” suggested that he had been unlawfully killed.

Really, ya think?

So that’s settled then.

The New York Times has a (ahem) blow by blow description of the run-in between U.S. Secret Service agents and the prostitute in Cartagena who led to their downfall.   It started “the morning after” when an agent tried to pay the woman who had spent the night with him US$30 – she felt she was worth US$800.  Their subsequent negotiations eventually led to the police arriving on the scene – apparently in Colombia when a prostitute feels that she wasn’t paid enough, the police are there to assist.  The agent wound up paying her US$225.  The woman, for her part, insists that she was worth the higher price because she was an escort, not a streetwalker.  ”It’s the same, but it’s different.  It’s like when you buy a fine rum or a BlackBerry or an iPhone. They have a different price.”

As far as I’m concerned, she was ahead on points until she equated a Blackberry with a fine rum or an iPhone.

I’d say it’s a toss-up as to what is saddest here -

That this is all that’s left of the career of the rich and non-talented Hilton.

That some real estate developers paid her money figuring she’d be a good figurehead for their development.

That some people might be interested to buy a condo thinking that if they move there they’d stand a chance of meeting her.

Along EDSA you can also find billboards with jeans ads featuring Lindsay Lohan.  (Wasn’t able to grab a photo.)

There’s also ads for a Trump Tower being built in Manila – presumably, just as in Seoul, the thick-fingered vulgarian has nothing to do with the project aside from licensing out his name.

The company I work for is expanding rapidly.  One result is that I have a handful of positions I’m trying to fill.  Regardless of the position and who it reports to, I always insist on taking part in the interviews.  I leave the technical interviewing for others, I want to meet the people, find out who they are, get some idea if I think they’d fit in with the rest of the team.

So today I’m interviewing this guy.  I’m looking at his CV and I see he was at his last job for a year and that ended several months ago.  I ask him if that had been a contract position and he says it was.  Since he’s not a native HK’er, I ask him how he’s managed to stay in HK since then.  (I consider it a relevant question because I need to know if I’m going to have to sponsor an employment visa for the guy.)  It turns out he’s got a new job.  It’s not listed on his CV so I take a guess that it’s pretty recent and of course it is.

He tells me it’s another contract position, this time for six months, so I ask when the contract ends. Next May.  So you just started this contract?  That’s right.  And you’re going to walk off it right away?  Yes, he only has to give one month’s notice.  But you just started the job – don’t you feel any sense of responsibility to the company you’re working for or the agency that placed you there?  Well, he’s assuming that they will just dump him at the end of the six months so he owes them nothing and can quit any time.  He had, by the way, no compunction about sharing this information with me.  There was no hesitancy, no attempt to pretty it up in a nice ribbon and a bit of sparkle, he was fine with the whole thing.

Of course, legally speaking, he’s correct.  He can.  And if he goes into a contract with that kind of attitude, then the odds are pretty strong that his contract wouldn’t be renewed when the six months are up, if he makes it that long.  And the odds are even stronger that I have zero interest in hiring someone with this kind of attitude.

Is it just me?  Are there other employers not bothered by that sort of attitude, who don’t think, “If he does it to them, he can do it to me?”

The amazing thing is, over the course of the past few months, he’s not the worst I’ve seen, not by a long shot.  But he certainly was the most brazen.

… By Being a Migrant Sex Worker is the title of a two part article posted a couple of days ago on Bloomberg – part one and part two. (Via BoingBoing)

Basically a Filipino woman by the name of Rhacel Salazar Parrenas wanted to study Filipinos working in the sex business in Japan.  She was in Tokyo but was unable to meet any hostesses willing to participate in her study – so she joined the industry herself as a hostess.  The result is not only this article; there’s also a book titled Illicit Flirtations: Labor, Migration, and Sex Trafficking in Tokyo which was published by the Stanford University Press in September.

After I began working as a hostess, every person I approached agreed to talk to me. By the end of my study, I had completed interviews with 56 Filipina hostesses: 45 females and 11 male-to-female transgendered individuals. After working just one week in a hostess bar, I realized I had entered an unfamiliar sexual world, where people are more open about their sexuality, where both customers and hostesses seem to be ready for extramarital affairs, and where men can sexually harass women with no punishment.

However, what she discovered ran somewhat counter to her expectations.

What I discovered, in fact, was that these women come to Japan voluntarily and gratefully, knowing what their jobs will be. Very few engage in prostitution, and if they do, they do so willingly.

And in the end, she concludes:

Unsubstantiated claims of the forced prostitution of Filipina hostesses are morally charged, and divert attention from the need for regulation and protection of sex workers.

For Filipina hostesses, the goal should be job improvement, not job elimination. What’s needed are laws to prevent abusive behavior by middleman brokers. Club owners should be required to pay hostesses directly, rather than brokers. And labor standards should be enacted to ensure that the hostesses have regular days off and an eight-hour-per-evening work limit.

Hostesses don’t need to be rescued. They need the empowerment that comes from being independent labor migrants. Only then can they remain gainfully employed, free of migrant brokers, and have full control of their own lives.

I can’t not share this one (from here).

Japanese adult video actor Taka Kato and Mainland star Wu Qingqing two nights ago promoted their film 33D INVADER.  Taka Kato demonstrated his “gold finger” ability on a blow up doll and even advised male fans to trim their nails before their act.  He said that he has attended similar events in Macau and was quite fond of Hong Kong.  He hoped to be able to stay in Hong Kong even longer next time because he still had many “gold finger” secrets that he has not unveiled.

Similar events in Macau?  Macau has “gold finger” demonstration events?

I get daily emails from Groupon.  So far I haven’t bought anything from them (though I probably will at some point).  I think the main reason I get them and look at them every day is because whoever writes their copy is clearly insane.  They could simply write, “Here’s a thing, buy it,” but instead they have these little intros for each item.  Some are funny while some are simply over the top bizarre.  Here are some recent examples:

For a discount Thai dinner:

Thai food is apparently internationally famous and whether chilli-hot or comparatively blands, harmony is the guiding principle behind each dish.

For a TV:

While sadly a watched pot never boils, it’s a mercy that a watched TV doesn’t.

For a massage and dinner combo:

A few days ago I tried to buy a transparent Octopus case, but I just don’t know where to get one. It’s funny because you think it’s easy to get a plain one, but it’s not.

For a dinner combo:

Okay, so we read your Facebook statuses, about how you’re upset with your co-workers, annoyed with your boss, and are sick of working overtime without compensation. Or are those statuses really yours? Why complain on Facebook when you could be enjoying a gourmet meal?

For a vegetarian dinner:

Exercising and regularly eating vegetables are the building blocks to healthy living, unlike lying in intersections while munching on plastic bags.

For, ahem, skin whitening treatments:

Smooth skin is like freshly frosted birthday cake: it looks so delicious that no one cares how old you are.

And then, the same day, for facial treatments:

Smooth skin is like a beautifully made birthday cake: eminently lickable and perfect for disguising one’s true age. However, the pressures in life can get to us and make our face and body lose that natural glow.

For a trip to Taipei:

Mentioning a melting pot at a cannibal convention is usually not the best of ideas, much like playing Russian Roulette with a fully loaded gun.

For iPhone cases:

Whether tap dancing, lassoing cows or sitting in the dunce corner, it’s a scientifically proven fact that everything is more fun if done wearing a hat.

For iPhone speakers:

Despite how al dente a plate of spaghetti is, it will not taste delizioso without the Neapolitan or truffle cream sauce on top. The same applies to a rock song: it will not be grungy to the ears and make you feel your blood boil without a heavy-bass, high-fidelity speaker.

For spa treatments:

Much like a tough steak, the human body’s road to ripeness involves tenderising the meat, thoroughly coating it in an aromatic marinade, and topping it off with a shower of tangy barbecue sauce. Explore a sauceless option for soothing the skin …

For a hotel in Shanghai:

Statistically, home is the place you’re most likely to fall asleep under a running lawn mower or spontaneously combust while trying to slow dance with a running lawn mower.

For a royal carviar [sic] facial treatment:

Tired faces can accidentally reveal thoughts and feelings we’d rather keep secret, letting our crushes know how we really feel and taking all the fun out of charades.

For a medical check-up:

The body consists of 3 parts – the brainium, the borax, and the abdominal cavity. The brainium contains the brain; the borax, the heart and lungs; and the abdominal cavity, the bowels, of which there are five – a, e, i, o, and u.

Dinner for two:

A marriage between two cuisines is preferable to a marriage between two clones of Arnold Schwarzenegger, a process that eventually results in a baby reared on raw egg and a terminator suit.

Another dinner for two:

Before fishermen discovered the edibility of fish, they used each catch as bait for larger species, hoping in the end to hook the biggest fish of all—friendship.

So, to Groupon’s copywriter, as soon as you post a deal for some of whatever it is you’re taking, I’ll buy two!

If you follow celebrity news, which I do (and I have no excuse for this behavior), then you’ve probably read that Mike Myers of Wayne’s World and Austin Powers and Shrek and hasn’t made a good movie in a decade fame and his wife Kelly had a baby boy and they named the baby Spike.  Congrats to both of them and kudos on the wise name choice.  Mike, now that you got that out of the way, any chance of being funny again?

There’s one thing that’s gotten me this far in life and something that I tell my friends whenever they get depressed.   You may think this is all a bit Little Mary Sunshine for me but it’s what I truly believe and it has successfully helped me make it through some pretty dark periods in my life.  Someone’s made a nice poster of it.

It’s from here.  I know, you folks thought I was gonna have some bad joke at the end of all this but in this case, no.  Memorize this.  Share it.  It’s true.