Hobnobbing

A few weeks ago I got an email from my cousin Bertha. She's a writer/director/producer and owner of her production company Slew Pictures. She wrote, produced, and directed an indie movie called "Face", which premiered at the 2002 Sundance Film Festival. She's made a second movie, "Almost Perfect", starring Kelly Hu, Ivan Shaw, and Hong Kong superstar Edison Chen. She invited us to the world premiere of "Almost Perfect" at the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival.  Todd and I debated for a couple of days and decided to fly up to San Francisco and attend the movie premiere and party the night before.  How often does one get invited to such an event and get to hobnob with talented actors and film crew?  Most importantly, I don't see Bertha as often as I'd like because she lives in New York City.

We arrived in San Francisco on Saturday afternoon around 2:00pm.  After a BART ride downtown to our hotel, we rested and grabbed a quick dinner at Naan N Curry across the street.  It was pretty good Indian food, but not as good as our San Diego local favorite, Punjabi Tandoor!

After dinner, Bertha met us and we walked over to the Otis Lounge for the cast and crew party. As soon as we walked into the party, I saw my auntie Rose and uncle Solomon (my mom's oldest brother). My cousin Erica was also there!

The party was in full swing.


My cousin Erica talking with Bob, a family friend.


Auntie Rose, me, Bertha, and Erica.


Bertha, Bob, and Erica.


Auntie Rose, Bertha, Erica, and Uncle Solomon.


We met and chatted with the lead actor of the movie, Ivan Shaw.


Here he is in a production still of a scene from "Almost Perfect", with actress Kelly Hu.

Kelly couldn't make it to San Francisco for the premiere, because she's filming a TV series pilot with Don Johnson (yes, of "Miami Vice") called "Mann's World".

More chatting and having fun.




Around 10:30pm, I felt tired all of a sudden. We headed out with my cousin Erica. On the way out and while saying goodbye to Bertha for the night, we were introduced to Hong Kong star Edison Chen. (Think Asian Justin Timberlake. He acts, sings, raps, and has his own clothing company.)

The next day, while having breakfast with Bertha at the hotel, she told me that they went to a film festival after-party and stayed out until 3:00am! With the daylight savings time change, it was 4:00am. Wow, I'm way too old for that! Glad I got some good rest on Saturday night. I'm so proud of Bertha and all her accomplishments, yet she's the same down to earth cousin that I grew up with. We still giggle around like we did when we were six years old. I'll blog about the actual movie premiere as my New 52 blog post tomorrow! :)