Madame Ching

            On Tuesday morning I finished translating the fifth verse of “Valse Dingue” (Mad Waltz) by Boris Vian. 

            I finished posting my translation of “Oh Soliman” by Serge Gainsbourg and memorized the first verse of his “Alice hélas” (Alice Alas). This is the last song of the album he wrote for Catherine Deneuve in 1981. 

            I weighed 84.9 kilos before breakfast. 

            Around midday, I tackled the stuff that I pulled out from under the kitchen yesterday. Some of it I threw away, some of it I cleaned, some of it I put elsewhere, and I organized everything that I put back under. Next, I’ll wash the cutlery drawer and its contents. 

            I weighed 84.8 kilos before lunch. 

            In the afternoon I took a bike ride downtown and back. 

            I weighed 84.9 kilos at 17:00. 

            I was caught up on my journal by 18:20. 

            In my Movie Maker project of making a video for my song “Instructions for Electroshock Therapy”, during the first instrumental I finished replacing the clips from the 1940s shock therapy video with others from the same video that show convulsions. I alternated those clips with parts of the concert video that show me playing guitar. Next, I need a different clip that shows a mouthpiece being inserted. I did a search and the only one seems to be the shock therapy scene from “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.” 

            I re-downloaded 4K Video Downloader because I hadn’t done so yet on this new computer. Tomorrow I’ll download the YouTube video. 

            I went through another folder of my writing but only found two pages of superfluous material. Once I’ve gone through all the folders for that I’ll have to start from the beginning and start separating the material chronologically. 

            I had a potato with gravy and a slice of roast beef while watching the most recent Doctor Who Easter special episode, “The Legend of the Sea Devils.” 

            This story begins in 1807 somewhere on the coast of China. In a small village, there is a statue of a monster. A female stranger named Madame Ching arrives and a father Ying Wai and his son Ying Ki know that she is after the statue. The father tries to stop her but she cuts it open to get a certain stone that’s inside, but the monster Marsissus emerges to kill the father and then begins slaughtering the village. 

            The Doctor arrives and recognizes his species as the Sea Devils. She, Yasmine, and Dan trap him in a net but then a flying ship arrives. He easily frees himself and jumps aboard. Ying Ki sees Ching standing over his father’s body and thinks she killed him. The Doctor tells him she couldn’t have because his death was caused by poison from a Sea Devil sword. 

            When Ching introduces herself the Doctor is excited because she is a real historical figure, having been the most successful female pirate in history. She is searching for the treasure of Ji-Hun who died looking for the treasure of the lost historical Portuguese ship the Flor de la Mar. 

             Dan and Ying swim out to Ching’s ship because Ying still thinks she killed his father and he wants revenge. She captures them and strings them up by their feet. Since her ship has no crew, Dan offers his and Ying’s services, and she agrees. Her crew and her two young children are being held for ransom and that is why she needs the treasure. 

            The Doctor and Yasmine go into the past and see Marsissus betray Ji-Hun. They return to 1807 at the bottom of the ocean where the Tardis is grabbed by the mouth of a sea monster controlled by the Sea Devils. They are taken to the Sea Devils’ lair at the sea bottom where Marsissus shows that he has held Ji-Hun captive, in stasis in a transparent case for almost 300 years. The Doctor, Yasmine, and Ji-Hun escape to Ching’s ship. Ying is in possession of the Keystone that Marsissus seeks to shift the poles and flood the Earth so his people will rule it again like they did millions of years ago. Marsissus steals the stone. There is an old-fashioned pirate sword fight with the Doctor and her friends against the Sea Devils. 

            The shift of the poles has begun and so the Doctor and Yasmine go to sabotage the Sea Devil technology so they are trapped. But the cable comes apart and so someone has to hold it and be trapped as well. The Doctor says for Yasmine to leave but then Ji-Hun says he will do it because he is already out of his own time, so the Doctor and Yasmine escape. 

            The Doctor tells Yasmine she can’t be romantically attached because time always runs out but if she could it would be with her. She tells Yasmine she is the greatest person she ever met, and that includes her wife. That’s a reference to the amazing River Song from three Doctors ago. 

            I wonder if Yasmine will still be in love with the Doctor after she regenerates as a male. It could create some interesting dynamics. It looks like whatever sex the Doctor becomes, on the rare occasions when the Doctors show a romantic attraction, they are always only attracted to women. 

            Madame Ching, more formally known as Zheng Yi Sao was a sex worker on a floating bordello when she met her future husband, the pirate Zheng Yi. After he died she took over his pirate confederation, which included 400 junks and 60,000 pirates. They fought battles with the East India Company, the Portuguese Empire, and Qing China. She negotiated a surrender with the Qing authorities in 1810 that allowed her and her stepson Zhang Bao to avoid prosecution and to retain a fleet. She personally commanded 24 ships and 1400 pirates. After retiring from piracy she ran a gambling house in Guangdong.