Culture

What’s new in 2022?

By Anya Ow / December 6, 2021 / Comments Off

How is 2022 nearly here? Maybe it’s work from home compressing all our weeks into a singular time loop, but I was surprised to head into the city recently and realise that Myer had put up their Christmas decor. Is it really December already? Time seems to be compressing further and further… it feels like […]

Holiday Season Retail in 2020

By Anya Ow / December 15, 2020 / Comments Off

If you’ve been remotely online for the last few months, you’d have likely seen retailers like John Lewis crank out their usual high budget Christmas ads – with a twist. Some of the ads, like Disney’s, don’t acknowledge the 900 pound COVID19 elephant in the room. Others, like John Lewis’, try to encourage people to […]

Conspiracy Theories and Other Stories

By Anya Ow / February 20, 2020 / Comments Off

I’m beginning to fear my family’s Whatsapp chat. My Chinese Singaporean parents are in their late 60s and aren’t very good with technology, but sadly they’ve learned how to share videos and memes on the platform. Despite the Singapore Government’s crackdown on fake news, quite a few things they’ve shared won’t exactly meet any sort […]

Fantastic Scams and How to Avoid Them

By Anya Ow / January 30, 2020 / Comments Off

I fell for a scam recently. It was one of those phishing emails, set up to look like something they’re not, leading to a landing page that usually asks you for credit card or personal details. In this case, it was a Woolies email about a “survey that I’d done”, arriving only days after I’d […]

Tearjerker Advertising

By Anya Ow / October 5, 2019 / Comments Off

I hate crying during films, even if I can’t help it. I don’t like how you have to hide your sniffles and try to surreptitiously palm tissue out of your bag, or how I pretty much felt emotionally drained after films like Moana and Coco. Ads are worse, since I usually watch them in the […]

Melbourne Food Recs

By Anya Ow / October 4, 2019 / Comments Off

Australia’s Good Food Guide’s Awards just came out for 2020, sparking off the usual round of amusement and drama. Arguing about food is a nice reprieve among the global political shitshow. If you’ve been keeping up with food news around the world, you might have seen the lawsuit filed against Michelin by French celebrity chef […]

What To Do When You're Expecting (Climate Change)

By Anya Ow / September 26, 2019 / Comments Off

September 20th saw hundreds of thousands of people in Australia turn out in a massive climate strike, joining millions around the world. Speeches kicked off at 2pm and the march began around 3ish, with schoolkids supported by a variety of adults, including many businesses that signed on to the strike under Not Business As Usual. […]

The Disney Monopoly

By Anya Ow / September 7, 2019 / Comments Off

When I first played Kingdom Hearts, I was still in uni. I wasn’t expecting much. It’s a game where you play a kid with huge shoes, big spiky hair, and unrealistic clothing called Sora. Sora wields a “keyblade”, and goes on adventures with Donald Duck and Goofy through different “Disney/Square Enix worlds” such as the […]

Influencers: Nothing is Real on the Internet

By Anya Ow / August 3, 2019 / Comments Off

In 2019, as the Disney industrial machine regurgitates a spitfire volley of dead horses in the form of Toy Story 4, a “live” action Lion King movie, yet another Avengers film, yet another Spiderman film, and whatever else they’re planning on inflicting on us once they open Netflix: Disney Edition™ in November, you’d think that […]

Racist Branding and Sushi Pizza

By Anya Ow / August 1, 2019 / Comments Off

When I sat down for lunch in one of Melbourne’s most popular fusion restaurants and saw Engrish in its branding, it felt like a kick in the gut. The most egregious, on the business card: “Sum-Ting-Wong? Let Mr. M know and we fix.” Australian Restaurant Named MR.MIYAGI Owned By Whites Slammed For Being RACIST And […]