FINALLY!!!!!!! The Taiwanese Tearsheets!!!

I should be ashamed of myself, I know...for making everyone wait so long to see these beauts. I am also beyond ashamed that I cannot find the catalogs tears of me posing in various, divine polyester blend outfits on inflatable furniture....the stuff Versace could have only dreamed of, may he rest in peace.

To make up for some of this (and I will be self flagellating a la old school religion, if that helps any) here are some of the tearsheets I scrounged up from my last season in Taipei....lots of work but I dug it. Workaholic that I am. ;)

Yes, this was a wig, and YES I LOVED IT!



Taiwan was great for my magazine cover repertoire....I was the Teen Cheese Smile Champ on the Isle of Formosa:



(I may have posted this one before...I can't remember which season I got this cover in...but it fits in with the afore mentioned title...)



And from the teen queen look I would go directly to the Ladies Fashion genre....







And throw in some ad campaigns with the super HOT bowl cut:



As well as some more ad campainage in which I stare adoringly at a pair of miniscule mules....



I have to say that one thing I adored about working in Taipei is that I never knew what I was going to end up looking like at the end of a job. Sometimes I looked 15 and sometimes 35, sometimes I would look like Anime, and other times I would look like an starstruck Liz Hurley....but it was all good. I played dress up a lot as a little girl...so I guess I had a lot of practice when it came time to start W O R K I N!

WTF????

Oh, my good lord....I just realized that I have all but abandoned this blog. TWO MONTHS since my last post? Now that is just scandalous. I must admit that life has been insane, busy, immune system impairing....but I was just digging through box of old modeling pics for a career day presentation at my son's preschool and then remembered that I left you all hanging with a promise of pics from my last stint in Taipei. Well....wait no longer. Tomorrow will deliver those hot as hell shots to ya!

Muah!

The Perfect Cup of Tea

Ok, I just had to post about this great cup of tea I just made myself. I am a little bit in awe because ever since the last time I was in Asia which was several years ago, I have been trying to emulate the kind of milky tea that I would always binge on in Asian bakeries from Tokyo to Taipei. The first time I had this kind of tea was with my Brazilian roommate in Osaka in a bakery where I got asked if I wanted tea with lemon or "hotto milku tea". I love my tea with cream and sugar so I went for the latter and loved every drop of it.....And after years of trying to get that mix right and failing every time....this morning I did it. I swear that first mouthful took me straight back to the bakery in Shinsaibashi.....sigh......

I Know I Promised....

I know I'm supposed to have some terribly embarrassing shots of me on here from my season in Taipei....and some pretty good ones too! LOL! I've been caught red handed in busy-ville as well as have started a new blog to ride alongside this one called
"Model Mom Diaries" which you can check out at:

http://modelmomdiaries.blogspot.com

Give me till the end of the week to scan in the pictures I promised....They really will show up on here! ;)

Hello and Welcome!

LOL! Seriously though....I have had some new readers come through and I want to make sure you all know to go to the very beginning of this blog...archives are on the right hand side.....so that this all makes more sense! Peacocks on Leashes is a memoir of my experiences so nothing is current, yet....someday I hope to get up to what is happening LIVE! ;)

Channeling Jack Kerouac

This has to be one of the best journal entries to describe how I felt every time I left a market and moved on to another for season....judging from the date on this entry it was written probably in the limo ride to the airport as I was leaving Taipei:


Maybe it's a curse of my Gemini nature, my Cuban blood, my impetuosity that makes me fall so easily in love with the places that temporarily become my home and the people that for a brief instance in time become my world. And maybe it is a blessing....making my life a mad existance...but I wouldn't have it any other way.

(It's pretty apropo that I would have then gone on to quote Jack Kerouac...)

"What is that feeling when you're driving away from people and they recede on the plain till you see their specks dispersing?--it's the too huge world vaulting us, and it's good-bye. But we lean forward to the next crazy venture beneath the skies."
-J. Kerouac "On the Road"

No better quote had ever been written to describe my life at the time. Reading it now still gives me the chills and makes me ache for the road....

On Leaving Taipei

Another peek into my travel journal at the end of season in Taipei.....

4/30

...so here I am again...on the verge of moving on once more. I leave Taipei, Taiwan tomorrow. I served my time here and survived. 8 weeks of madness and I've lived to tell the tale. Although I came here searching for what I always like to call my proverbial pot of gold, I can say that the memories I Take from this place & the people I have met are absolutely priceless.

Taipei...so often dubbed the infernal metropolis by many a model that has suffered through its endless castings, 200 cut days, and the infamous, pose, pose, pose routines....is actually a city I quite love. I have spent, in accumulation of my trips, 5 months in this city with its mad, confused, labyrinthine streets, its neverending din of traffic and human voices, its aliveness in extreme. I have found the people here to be genuine, the food (which is everywhere) good enough to merit my abandoning all ambitions towards waifdom, the culture so rich, so haunting...and all of this has become completely familiar to me now.

I have learned to speak & understand more Mandarin than I ever would have dreamt possible, have rubbed elbows with Taiwanese, celebs and mafiosos...all colorful characters, all enriching my life in one way or antoher, and have made friends that I hope to keep...such as my boys from the Westside that I came to meet in Taipei and my 5 new girls. Together my girls and I bonded in our estrogen enhanced mood swings...never have so many boxes of Kleenex been gone through or more McDonald's meals been consumed in such a short period of time. And now it's all over. Just like that.

The good times I have had here definitely outweigh the bad. So...now it's time to move on and start all over somewhere else. In my case, Milan.

No more fearing for my life every time I get in a taxi & commence the wild ride to castings or bookings dodging stray dogs, children and entire families on mopeds at speedracer velocity. No more enduring the incessant bombardment of N'Sync and Backstreet Boys at every internet cafe, convenience store and fast food joint. No more late night runs to 7-11 for hot dogs and tuna triangles. No more bubble milk tea. The things I am going to be missed, soon to be replaced but not forgotten by, wild nights at Hollywood, Gasoline and Old Fashion Cafe, lazy days in the sun at Parco Sempione, late night runs to the 24 hour panini stands, and endless miles to be tread on dirt encrusted feet to castings. La vita e veramente bella!

And it's good-bye to Taipei....and I thank this city and all I've met here for adding to my lessons learned in the school of life.