The King and I

Marco and I have a special guest in our home:  Dave Simpson--missionary to Bulgaria.  Dave's here because we are starving to death.  Both Marco and I are down to 98 pounds with Jamie being gone.  The weird thing is that Marco only weighed 54 pounds when she left.  Oh well...anyway.

It's been fun to have Dave here in Berlin and us guys of the Three-World crew had a good time last night hanging out while our wives are in Istanbul, Turkey.

Marco and I are watching Cecil B DeMille's "The 10 Commandments" again.  I love that movie and wrote about it last year or so, when we were watching it.  Marco recently asked me who the two best villains in movie history are.  For me they are:

1) Darth Vader

2) Yul Brynner in the Ten Commandments (as Pharaoh).

In both cases, when they are on the screen, you can't take your eyes off of them.  They exude evil and charisma.

Yul Brynner was a super interesting guy.  He was from Vladivostok, Russia in Sakhalin---the very Eastern tip of Siberia.  He had Mongol heritage, gypsy (Romani), Russian, and Jewish heritage.  He grew up in Vladivostok, Harbin, China, and Paris where he did propaganda on the radio against the Nazi's during World War II.  He became famous for his portrayal of the King in the King and I.  He also was a renown photographer, an author--and a handsome devil with a cool, deep voice.  He also won an academy award and a few Tony's.  And as if that was not enough, he was also an accomplished musician and sang Russian Gypsy music from Russia's Far East.  He died in 1985 of cancer.  Check this out.  A taste of the sound of the Russian Far East: