so, it has simply been ages. a thousand pardons. but i have been too busy being completely and utterly surprised by joy to create the space to blog. query as to whether although i was ostensibly using this space to write about china, i was actually using it to heal and breathe and learn to love. even if i've never managed to say anything clever about china, i have learned to love. and to be loved in return. i couldn't be happier. the 'white dress or what?' comes from among the more amusing poems i've read of late, which is shared below. although there will be another white* dress of consequence in my future. also in my future, and more immediate - shanghai! i marvel at how life unfolds. and how blessed i am. i feel so grateful and lucky and then some. joyce said god is a shout in the street. that makes sense insofar as that shout is an expression of pure love. that is what my shouts are these days. i am not sure whether i will continue writing in this space once in shanghai. perhaps this space has served its purpose. perhaps i will find another agenda. for now, here's to joy and to laughter and happily ever after.....
and now for something less precious, an amusing poem. ahem:
Emily Dickinson's To-Do List by Andrea Carlisle
Monday
Figure out what to wear--white dress?
Put hair in bun
Bake gingerbread for Sue
Peer out window at passersby
Write poem
Hide poem
Tuesday
White dress? Off-white dress?
Feed cats
Chat with Lavinia
Work in garden
Letter to T.W.H.
Wednesday
White dress or what?
Eavesdrop on visitors from behind door
Write poem
Hide poem
Thursday
Try on new white dress
Gardening--watch out for narrow fellows in grass!
Gingerbread, cakes, treats
Poems: Write and hide them
Friday
Embroider sash for white dress
Write poetry
Water flowers on windowsill
Hide everything
*although i'm little tempted to go with gold! too much? too much. maybe off white? ivory? cream? white dress or what?
Thursday, December 16, 2010
Sunday, October 31, 2010
timshel
apologies in advance. i am still not able to collect my thoughts sufficiently to pontificate on the subjects i noted in my last post as urgently needing to discuss. so much for placeholders. seems silly to reach back two weeks in time to talk about any of those significant occurrences and the implications thereof. also there has been so much delightful forward movement in my life of late that i don't want to disrupt it by reaching back*. i am in northern california at the moment. and, as usual, am struck by the land. hence the reference to steinbeck in the subject. my understanding of the hebrew word timshel comes from steinbeck's east of eden. the pertinent passage, in part, is as follows:
"[T]his was the gold from our mining: 'Thou mayest.' The American Standard translation orders men to triumph over sin (and you can call sin ignorance). The King James translation makes a promise in 'Thou shalt,' meaning that men will surely triumph over sin. But the Hebrew word timshel—'Thou mayest'—that gives a choice. For if 'Thou mayest'—it is also true that 'Thou mayest not.'"
there is so much in that one little world - individual responsibility and the invention of conscience. and then some. free will and the capacity to forge our own moral destinies. hope. redemption. opportunity. yearning.
the novel is also a lovesong for this land. the descriptions of the salinas valley are so rich and vibrant you cannot help but appreciate the rugged beauty in this part of the world. steinbeck apparently wrote the novel for his two sons, so that they could know the land as he knew it, when he knew it - early 20th century. he also apparently considered it his greatest work. he said of east of eden, "It has everything in it I have been able to learn about my craft or profession in all these years." he further claimed: "I think everything else I have written has been, in a sense, practice for this." anyway, it's a great work. so i often recall it when i come to northern california, and then recall timshel. here endth my sixth grade book report for this blog.
i have been embracing the beauty of timshel of late. perhaps even more than usual. i have also been surprised by joy. more on all of that later, or not. i am feeling less inclined to share things in this space at the moment and simply appreciate them in private. once the whirlwinds of these weeks calm down and something remarkable occurs (or does not), perhaps i'll be inspired to resume. i mayest, after all. or i mayest not. xx
*and yet as i write that, i think of the closing lines of the great gatsby - "and so we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past". not that it is related. although i think somewhere deep down we all believe in the green light.
"[T]his was the gold from our mining: 'Thou mayest.' The American Standard translation orders men to triumph over sin (and you can call sin ignorance). The King James translation makes a promise in 'Thou shalt,' meaning that men will surely triumph over sin. But the Hebrew word timshel—'Thou mayest'—that gives a choice. For if 'Thou mayest'—it is also true that 'Thou mayest not.'"
there is so much in that one little world - individual responsibility and the invention of conscience. and then some. free will and the capacity to forge our own moral destinies. hope. redemption. opportunity. yearning.
the novel is also a lovesong for this land. the descriptions of the salinas valley are so rich and vibrant you cannot help but appreciate the rugged beauty in this part of the world. steinbeck apparently wrote the novel for his two sons, so that they could know the land as he knew it, when he knew it - early 20th century. he also apparently considered it his greatest work. he said of east of eden, "It has everything in it I have been able to learn about my craft or profession in all these years." he further claimed: "I think everything else I have written has been, in a sense, practice for this." anyway, it's a great work. so i often recall it when i come to northern california, and then recall timshel. here endth my sixth grade book report for this blog.
i have been embracing the beauty of timshel of late. perhaps even more than usual. i have also been surprised by joy. more on all of that later, or not. i am feeling less inclined to share things in this space at the moment and simply appreciate them in private. once the whirlwinds of these weeks calm down and something remarkable occurs (or does not), perhaps i'll be inspired to resume. i mayest, after all. or i mayest not. xx
*and yet as i write that, i think of the closing lines of the great gatsby - "and so we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past". not that it is related. although i think somewhere deep down we all believe in the green light.
Thursday, October 21, 2010
life rocks
so i am woefully behind in writing in this space and saying anything of consequence* or saying anything at all.... and so much has transpired! in china. in the world. in me. and there has been much to say. and yet i have found not a moment amid the whirlwinds to process and share. i felt especially sheepish when a sweet friend said she was looking forward to reading my blog and seeing my thoughts about liu xiaobo's nobel peace prize (i leapt with joy!). i had to say that i was so busy appreciating the unbearable lightness of being that i had remained silent on what was perhaps one of the most important and poignant occurrences of late related this rambling given my ostensible purpose of reflecting on human rights in china, among other things. this friend, being a wise and generous soul, said that i she thought liu would understand and appreciate my soaking up whimsy rather than writing. perhaps all the more so because i don't imagine there's much whimsy in prison. i say that not to be funny or silly, just true. of course, i am now running late and ought to be out the door, so am considering this post a placeholder to remind myself of what i actually ought to write about in the not so distant future.
- liu xiaobo wins the nobel peace prize and everything (nothing) changes
- xi jinping will likely be the next president; 18th party congress is going to be sweet
- is there really a hu / wen divide or is it all hooola?
- i'm transitioning to a new job which is terribly exciting!
- i'm also moving flats. i ought to have done so long ago, but now it's happening and ushering in all sorts of exciting other unexpected momentum. such is the way of things.
- last night i caught up with the president of the national committee on us-china relations and then went with him to the first part of a program on us-china relations. i did the mingling bit and then realised i just couldn't handle the rest (which was a v last minute invite anyway and involved watching an hour long video of him interviewing the us ambassador last week which is also available on their website), so thanked him and said i was leaving before the program started. he said, 'it's a walk out?' i said, 'yes, it's a walk out'. i went for blind massage and then a lovely late dinner with friends instead. which felt like following the path with heart for that wednesday night.
- the title of this post describes how i've felt all day. i became a godmother this morning!!! (which naturally involved weeping with joy and wonder and delight.) and found a new flat! when i was walking to meet the real estate agent to finalise things, janis joplin came on my ipod. and i thought it was about right. life rocks. completely rocks.
and now, i am running out the door feeling blessed and joyful. and a little bit 'don't cry for me gongjian hutong [current flat]' in light of the move, so am wearing fishnets and red suede pumps. life rocks.
*query as to whether i ever do.
- liu xiaobo wins the nobel peace prize and everything (nothing) changes
- xi jinping will likely be the next president; 18th party congress is going to be sweet
- is there really a hu / wen divide or is it all hooola?
- i'm transitioning to a new job which is terribly exciting!
- i'm also moving flats. i ought to have done so long ago, but now it's happening and ushering in all sorts of exciting other unexpected momentum. such is the way of things.
- last night i caught up with the president of the national committee on us-china relations and then went with him to the first part of a program on us-china relations. i did the mingling bit and then realised i just couldn't handle the rest (which was a v last minute invite anyway and involved watching an hour long video of him interviewing the us ambassador last week which is also available on their website), so thanked him and said i was leaving before the program started. he said, 'it's a walk out?' i said, 'yes, it's a walk out'. i went for blind massage and then a lovely late dinner with friends instead. which felt like following the path with heart for that wednesday night.
- the title of this post describes how i've felt all day. i became a godmother this morning!!! (which naturally involved weeping with joy and wonder and delight.) and found a new flat! when i was walking to meet the real estate agent to finalise things, janis joplin came on my ipod. and i thought it was about right. life rocks. completely rocks.
and now, i am running out the door feeling blessed and joyful. and a little bit 'don't cry for me gongjian hutong [current flat]' in light of the move, so am wearing fishnets and red suede pumps. life rocks.
*query as to whether i ever do.
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
give in to love or live in fear
so naturally the subject of this post is a line from 'rent', although it is actually a poem that is inspiring me to write at the moment. i subscribe to the writer's almanac and so receive an email with a poem each day*. for some reason today's poem struck me such that i felt i needed to stop what i was doing and consider it**. i think i was struck by it because i found myself sharing one of my inspirational 'rent' mantras with a friend yesterday - forget regrets or life is yours to miss. it's a good mantra because is propelling and good for perspective. i'd like to think that it points to living boldly, taking risks, making the most of each moment and opportunity, focusing on joy, and not taking things too seriously. it is an especially useful mantra for those of us prone to over-thinking. (to borrow from emerson: finish each day and be done with it. you have done what you could. some blunders and absurdities have crept in; forget them as soon as you can. tomorrow is a new day. you shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense.) pleasantly, i realise as i write this that i am reasonably good at actualising this mantra. (see my saturday afternoon-to-evening activities, which i will briefly describe below, as evidence.) actualisation aside, today's poem struck me because it articulates a a real and legitimate actual regret. ahem -
The Man in the Yard
by Howard Nelson
My father told me once
that when he was about twenty
he had a new girlfriend, and once
they stopped by the house on the way
to somewhere, just a quick stop
to pick something up,
and my grandfather, who wasn't well—
it turned out he had TB and would die
at fifty-two—was sitting in a chair
in the small back yard, my father
knew he was out there, and it crossed
his mind that he should take his girlfriend
out back to meet him, but he
didn't, whether for embarrassment
at the sick, fading man
or just because he was in a hurry
to be off on his date, he didn't
say, but he told the little,
uneventful story anyway, and said
that he had always regretted
not doing that simple, courteous
thing, the sick man sitting in
the sun in the back yard would
have enjoyed meeting her, but
instead he sat out there alone
as they came and left, young
lovers going on a date. He
always regretted it, he said.
i almost burst into tears when i finished reading this. not, however, because i found it sad. i don't think it's actually about regret so much as it is a subtle expression of the rent lyrics mantra above. forget regrets or life is yours to miss is really telling us to live in a way that we don't have regrets. to always make the bold, frightening, loving choices even when they are daunting or more painful or inconvenient. more succinctly: give in to love or live in fear. yes, that's another line from the same song but it is also perhaps the best mantra of all. if the poet's father were to have chosen to give into love - that tug he felt to bring this (seemingly insignificant) girlfriend to meet his sick father - rather than his fear of the awkwardness of that moment, he wouldn't be sharing this small regret with his son all these years later. it is sometimes shocking to me how we can still shy away from living as boldly as we possibly can and making the most of every moment even when the universe again and again reminds us how ephemeral our lives are, how fleeting our chances to love and be kind. and yet we squander them. we look away and leave things unsaid and suppress our laughter all too often. (oooh, i am totally talking myself into stopping work for the afternoon and going for a long, rambling walk in the neighbourhood and bringing a delicious and special bottle of wine to dinner with friends tonight!) my brother-in-law used to say that love is the absence of fear. for the longest time i didn't understand that. but now it is too clear. not unlike the imperative of this poem. in addition to almost bursting into tears, i had a tremendous impulse to simply run in the sunshine or kiss someone handsome and strong or dance for simply hours****.
thankfully, there is still time to do all of those things yet today! i actually did all of those things, minus the kissing, on saturday. saturday was an absolutely beautiful day here in beijing - sunny, blue skies, perfect early autumn weather - and a friend was having a housewarming lunch in his new hutong home. it was a superb day for bbqing in the courtyard with a small collection of souls*****. we enjoyed a delicious lunch and then lingered on. some of us half-napped, mostly chatted lying on my friend's new bed (a 'heavenlyTM' bed from the westin hotel - kind of like cloud but better). some dealt with household improvements. some chatted outside. my ipod, our musical inspiration for the day, behaved amazingly and shuffled together a perfect soundtrack*******. as afternoon began to turn to evening, we all contemplated whether we ought to part ways and head off into our various evening plans. we did seriously contemplate that. maybe for four minutes. and then we opened a bottle of red wine. and cancelled our other plans. the afternoon turned into evening turned into night. we drank wine. we ordered dinner. we wore funny hats. (i spent a few hours in a very classy top hat. another friend had a rather fetching gold turban. and there was a safari hat involved too.) we climbed the tree in the courtyard. others came. and left. (once again, we scared all the straight men away.) we sang. (at least two of the straight men might have been scared away by my singing toto's 'africa' to a teaspoon at the table along with another girlfriend. when i was sober. (on fellow asked how much we'd been drinking and i said that i'd only had two glasses of wine over the course of many hours (which was true at that point), but was somewhat inherently silly and just having fun. i offered him my teaspoon microphone to join in for a bit, but he wasn't into it. i shrugged. his loss.)) we danced. we began dancing around the courtyard and then moved into the living room. i may or may not have been inspired to do the splits multiple times. a friend may or may not have pulled a groin muscle attempting to do the splits. we also may or may not have done the running man. and the roger rabbit. the neighbours called the police. (they were concerned my friend was starting a club in his new home. we assured them he was not.) others did shots of baijiu. (shots of baijiu for me are always regrets that i cannot forget.) in the end, four of us ended up climbing into my friend's (heavenlyTM) bed and giggling like schoolgirls for hours. and staying the night. i was perhaps not the most popular person at the slumber party because once i got tired i kept encouraging slumber, saying 'too much chatting, not enough sleeping!' it was a very impromptu, amusing, hilarious saturday. we certainly warmed the house. and, i suppose, we gave into love, not fear. though i suspect that some of my comrades regretted the shots of baijiu on sunday morning.
*confession - much as i enjoy seeing this mail surface in my inbox each day, i do not always read the poems. i sometimes only skim. or don't read them at all. shhhh.
**a second confession - i am working from home on transition memos and other materials related to my impending career move and its a national (hotly love the motherland!) holiday this entire week and the weather is gorgeous and i am finding it exceedingly difficult to focus***. even if today's poem were about a rodent or farm implements or slugs i probably would have found it necessary to stop and consider it. and so.
***let's be honest, productivity is overrated.
****as per my confessions above, these impulses may or may not also be related to having been sitting and writing memos for too long. actually, they also may or may not be regular impulses unrelated to this poem or prose of any kind.
*****amusing true story: i arrived at said collection of souls saying that (inspired by my recent experience in clean living in koh samui) i wasn't drinking any alcohol or eating any sugar. but then a sommelier friend opened a bottle of wine from one of my favourite vineyards in napa and a sweet girlfriend arrived with homemade toffee cake generously topped with chocolate and nuts. one and half hours after my statement, i was enjoying a delicious glass of wine and eating too much toffee cake in the sunshine. my friends said they were very impressed with my will power for lasting over an hour. i didn't regret my choices. some mantras are more meaningful than others.
******my ipod on shuffle can be very unpredictable. unsurprisingly, we are almost always teetering on the edge of musical theatre or hiphop. but it performed admirably on saturday. especially during the dance party, but also in the quieter moments.
The Man in the Yard
by Howard Nelson
My father told me once
that when he was about twenty
he had a new girlfriend, and once
they stopped by the house on the way
to somewhere, just a quick stop
to pick something up,
and my grandfather, who wasn't well—
it turned out he had TB and would die
at fifty-two—was sitting in a chair
in the small back yard, my father
knew he was out there, and it crossed
his mind that he should take his girlfriend
out back to meet him, but he
didn't, whether for embarrassment
at the sick, fading man
or just because he was in a hurry
to be off on his date, he didn't
say, but he told the little,
uneventful story anyway, and said
that he had always regretted
not doing that simple, courteous
thing, the sick man sitting in
the sun in the back yard would
have enjoyed meeting her, but
instead he sat out there alone
as they came and left, young
lovers going on a date. He
always regretted it, he said.
i almost burst into tears when i finished reading this. not, however, because i found it sad. i don't think it's actually about regret so much as it is a subtle expression of the rent lyrics mantra above. forget regrets or life is yours to miss is really telling us to live in a way that we don't have regrets. to always make the bold, frightening, loving choices even when they are daunting or more painful or inconvenient. more succinctly: give in to love or live in fear. yes, that's another line from the same song but it is also perhaps the best mantra of all. if the poet's father were to have chosen to give into love - that tug he felt to bring this (seemingly insignificant) girlfriend to meet his sick father - rather than his fear of the awkwardness of that moment, he wouldn't be sharing this small regret with his son all these years later. it is sometimes shocking to me how we can still shy away from living as boldly as we possibly can and making the most of every moment even when the universe again and again reminds us how ephemeral our lives are, how fleeting our chances to love and be kind. and yet we squander them. we look away and leave things unsaid and suppress our laughter all too often. (oooh, i am totally talking myself into stopping work for the afternoon and going for a long, rambling walk in the neighbourhood and bringing a delicious and special bottle of wine to dinner with friends tonight!) my brother-in-law used to say that love is the absence of fear. for the longest time i didn't understand that. but now it is too clear. not unlike the imperative of this poem. in addition to almost bursting into tears, i had a tremendous impulse to simply run in the sunshine or kiss someone handsome and strong or dance for simply hours****.
thankfully, there is still time to do all of those things yet today! i actually did all of those things, minus the kissing, on saturday. saturday was an absolutely beautiful day here in beijing - sunny, blue skies, perfect early autumn weather - and a friend was having a housewarming lunch in his new hutong home. it was a superb day for bbqing in the courtyard with a small collection of souls*****. we enjoyed a delicious lunch and then lingered on. some of us half-napped, mostly chatted lying on my friend's new bed (a 'heavenlyTM' bed from the westin hotel - kind of like cloud but better). some dealt with household improvements. some chatted outside. my ipod, our musical inspiration for the day, behaved amazingly and shuffled together a perfect soundtrack*******. as afternoon began to turn to evening, we all contemplated whether we ought to part ways and head off into our various evening plans. we did seriously contemplate that. maybe for four minutes. and then we opened a bottle of red wine. and cancelled our other plans. the afternoon turned into evening turned into night. we drank wine. we ordered dinner. we wore funny hats. (i spent a few hours in a very classy top hat. another friend had a rather fetching gold turban. and there was a safari hat involved too.) we climbed the tree in the courtyard. others came. and left. (once again, we scared all the straight men away.) we sang. (at least two of the straight men might have been scared away by my singing toto's 'africa' to a teaspoon at the table along with another girlfriend. when i was sober. (on fellow asked how much we'd been drinking and i said that i'd only had two glasses of wine over the course of many hours (which was true at that point), but was somewhat inherently silly and just having fun. i offered him my teaspoon microphone to join in for a bit, but he wasn't into it. i shrugged. his loss.)) we danced. we began dancing around the courtyard and then moved into the living room. i may or may not have been inspired to do the splits multiple times. a friend may or may not have pulled a groin muscle attempting to do the splits. we also may or may not have done the running man. and the roger rabbit. the neighbours called the police. (they were concerned my friend was starting a club in his new home. we assured them he was not.) others did shots of baijiu. (shots of baijiu for me are always regrets that i cannot forget.) in the end, four of us ended up climbing into my friend's (heavenlyTM) bed and giggling like schoolgirls for hours. and staying the night. i was perhaps not the most popular person at the slumber party because once i got tired i kept encouraging slumber, saying 'too much chatting, not enough sleeping!' it was a very impromptu, amusing, hilarious saturday. we certainly warmed the house. and, i suppose, we gave into love, not fear. though i suspect that some of my comrades regretted the shots of baijiu on sunday morning.
*confession - much as i enjoy seeing this mail surface in my inbox each day, i do not always read the poems. i sometimes only skim. or don't read them at all. shhhh.
**a second confession - i am working from home on transition memos and other materials related to my impending career move and its a national (hotly love the motherland!) holiday this entire week and the weather is gorgeous and i am finding it exceedingly difficult to focus***. even if today's poem were about a rodent or farm implements or slugs i probably would have found it necessary to stop and consider it. and so.
***let's be honest, productivity is overrated.
****as per my confessions above, these impulses may or may not also be related to having been sitting and writing memos for too long. actually, they also may or may not be regular impulses unrelated to this poem or prose of any kind.
*****amusing true story: i arrived at said collection of souls saying that (inspired by my recent experience in clean living in koh samui) i wasn't drinking any alcohol or eating any sugar. but then a sommelier friend opened a bottle of wine from one of my favourite vineyards in napa and a sweet girlfriend arrived with homemade toffee cake generously topped with chocolate and nuts. one and half hours after my statement, i was enjoying a delicious glass of wine and eating too much toffee cake in the sunshine. my friends said they were very impressed with my will power for lasting over an hour. i didn't regret my choices. some mantras are more meaningful than others.
******my ipod on shuffle can be very unpredictable. unsurprisingly, we are almost always teetering on the edge of musical theatre or hiphop. but it performed admirably on saturday. especially during the dance party, but also in the quieter moments.
Thursday, September 30, 2010
hotly love the motherland (death or glory)
it's that time of year again. time to drag out our commifabulous red star twinkling best and live it up! for me, that involves red hot pants. for beijing, that involves flags all over the place and large red banners reminding us to hotly love the motherland. (incidentally, for it me it also involves some flash dance moves and for china it also involves some very fast and fancy footwork to erase potentially provocative materials on the internet before anyone can read them. along those lines, if someone can somehow access this blog post, copy and paste, and send it to me in an email, i'd be much obliged - http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_4e00bcd90100lxhm.html.)
ahh, 'tis the night before national day and all through the sky, the streaks of pinkish smog make us all sigh. for some reason observing the pinkish smoggy sunset out my office window has me thinking about how swiftly time flies. perhaps because, although i will be working during this holiday (dancing a sure-to-be impressively complicated tornado ballet involving transition memos and closure and other such stuff as dreams are made of), our office will be closed and by the time my chinese colleagues return on october 11, it will be my last week here. which is rather astounding. tempus fugit. i am also recalling national day last year - and all the red glory* around the 60th anniversary of the PRC while i personally fled to HK to avoid said glory. hard to believe that was a year ago. then again, also not. i've done a lot of dancing since then. in so many senses. and my curious mixed metaphor about tornado ballets and transition memos aside, i'll certainly be doing a lot of rocking out in my office over the next week while the rest of my comrades in this city are hotly loving the motherland. it's hard, i've never left a job when i'm still generally happy with it (or where i am so close with my colleagues as i am here) but simply had a worthier challenge come along. but that's life. and time. it whirls forward and you need to keep on running - or dancing - along as furiously and fabulously as you can.
other than pondering the passage of time, i have another question on my mind this evening. to wit: does a one become a revolutionary out of the belief that one is entitled to joy rather than submission? sometimes i think that is what starts the process of becoming a revolutionary. maybe it's always what starts it. and no, i don't have anything more profound to say about this question now. perhaps you do. please share. once upon a lifetime i might have chided myself about this or considered trying to make a more tidy point here before moving on. but i came across this line from antoine blodin recently and am taking it to heart tonight - "the only duty of the writer is not to have one". also, wasn't it joan didion who said she writes to find out what she thinks? i can relate to that.
and so. on this fine mid-autumn eve, i think that i am glad to still be in china. with all of its complexities, challenges, and imperfections. with all of its death and and all of its glory. i appreciate it all the more in this evening moment feeling as though i am watching time fly swiftly by outside my window, inspiring me to live all the more fully and make the most of everything**. death or glory. (or dancing.)
*writing that made me want to listen to the clash song 'death or glory'. so i just put it on and am now rocking out to it as i watch the sunset and write the rest of this post. i suggest you do the same and listen to it as you continue reading. maybe i should also add it into the subject. why not?
**speaking of making the most of everything, we had a meeting at a german NGO this afternoon where they served serious german cakes (black forest, cheesecake, apfel strudel, etc) & fresh coffee on real plates with proper silverware. so civilised! love those deutschers. talk about a charm offensive. anyone would forgive two world wars in exchange for regularly being served delicious baked goods and fresh coffee during meetings. very, very clever. also makes me think of death or cake rather than death or glory. or more precisely, the great eddie izzard skit from dressed to kill - "thank you for flying church of england, cake or death?"
ahh, 'tis the night before national day and all through the sky, the streaks of pinkish smog make us all sigh. for some reason observing the pinkish smoggy sunset out my office window has me thinking about how swiftly time flies. perhaps because, although i will be working during this holiday (dancing a sure-to-be impressively complicated tornado ballet involving transition memos and closure and other such stuff as dreams are made of), our office will be closed and by the time my chinese colleagues return on october 11, it will be my last week here. which is rather astounding. tempus fugit. i am also recalling national day last year - and all the red glory* around the 60th anniversary of the PRC while i personally fled to HK to avoid said glory. hard to believe that was a year ago. then again, also not. i've done a lot of dancing since then. in so many senses. and my curious mixed metaphor about tornado ballets and transition memos aside, i'll certainly be doing a lot of rocking out in my office over the next week while the rest of my comrades in this city are hotly loving the motherland. it's hard, i've never left a job when i'm still generally happy with it (or where i am so close with my colleagues as i am here) but simply had a worthier challenge come along. but that's life. and time. it whirls forward and you need to keep on running - or dancing - along as furiously and fabulously as you can.
other than pondering the passage of time, i have another question on my mind this evening. to wit: does a one become a revolutionary out of the belief that one is entitled to joy rather than submission? sometimes i think that is what starts the process of becoming a revolutionary. maybe it's always what starts it. and no, i don't have anything more profound to say about this question now. perhaps you do. please share. once upon a lifetime i might have chided myself about this or considered trying to make a more tidy point here before moving on. but i came across this line from antoine blodin recently and am taking it to heart tonight - "the only duty of the writer is not to have one". also, wasn't it joan didion who said she writes to find out what she thinks? i can relate to that.
and so. on this fine mid-autumn eve, i think that i am glad to still be in china. with all of its complexities, challenges, and imperfections. with all of its death and and all of its glory. i appreciate it all the more in this evening moment feeling as though i am watching time fly swiftly by outside my window, inspiring me to live all the more fully and make the most of everything**. death or glory. (or dancing.)
*writing that made me want to listen to the clash song 'death or glory'. so i just put it on and am now rocking out to it as i watch the sunset and write the rest of this post. i suggest you do the same and listen to it as you continue reading. maybe i should also add it into the subject. why not?
**speaking of making the most of everything, we had a meeting at a german NGO this afternoon where they served serious german cakes (black forest, cheesecake, apfel strudel, etc) & fresh coffee on real plates with proper silverware. so civilised! love those deutschers. talk about a charm offensive. anyone would forgive two world wars in exchange for regularly being served delicious baked goods and fresh coffee during meetings. very, very clever. also makes me think of death or cake rather than death or glory. or more precisely, the great eddie izzard skit from dressed to kill - "thank you for flying church of england, cake or death?"
Monday, September 27, 2010
midnight mooncake meltdown
ok so enough kumbayaing. it's midnight. i'm in the business class (royal silk! (sounds better than it is)) lounge in the bangkok airport. and i am meeting my nemesis. well, not meeting so much as we are in fact well-acquainted. but confronting is more like it. (appropriately, and i kid you not, a cheesy piano version of 'don't cry for me argentina' is playing.) this nemesis is in fact a small pastry*, so really no match for me at all. and yet. and yet, my cackles are up. aside from all of the joy of spaciousness and space and sea and sky and sunshine and such, a very exciting added joy of this particular escape was avoiding the mid-autumn festival in china (zhongqiujie). i have nothing against celebrating mid-autumn, the new harvest, the new moon, the old moon, any moon at all really. my gripe against this particular holiday is entirely related to its signature food - the mooncake (yuebing). (collective sigh of relief. anyone out there who has ever endured one knows what i'm talking about but is afraid to verbalise. it's ok, exhale and continue.) the truth is, the chinese culture has created many amazing things (in fact, perhaps all amazing things). it is an ancient and great culture with an ostensibly equally ancient and great culinary history. that said, you'd think that someone somewhere along the last five thousand years of great creative civilization would have stood up and said, 'these yuebing bite, and i don't mean in a good way, so let's do something about it'. mooncakes are simply bad. terrible, even. and the traditional kinds only seem to get worse. it's a texture thing (we used to joke in my family that they were really best used as hockey pucks). it's a flavour thing (they even make my beloved red bean bad). it's just a mooncake thing. (also, let's be honest, nothing with an egg yolk inside should be preserved for an extended period of time. at least i don't think so.) i have never met a mooncake i can say i truly liked. except for non-mooncake mooncakes. because apparently the chinese civilization was content with the status quo and re-gifting the same seven boxes of nasty egg-yolk-centered, hockey puck pastries for centuries, it took in the intervention of hagen daaz and other foreign devils to lead a small mooncake revolution**. to wit: ice cream mooncakes, chocolate mooncakes, this year i've even heard of cupcake mooncakes. anyway, i avoid mooncakes with a passion (that cannot be chased indoors for anything! (geesh, i am so dramatic sometimes when i'm over-thinking***)). thus, i was especially pleased to avoid this year's mid-autumn festivities altogether and escape to thailand. i avoided feigning delight at receiving another box of (re-gifted) mooncakes; i avoided re-gifting them myself; i avoided having to pretend to eat a piece of one in the presence of others (although thankfully that rarely happens, i think we all collectively avoid eating them in public, it allows the same seven boxes to be re-gifted indefinitely)); i avoided all of it. or so i thought. until i arrived in the royal silk lounge, sat comfortably in my generic boring airport lounge chair, and found myself staring down an abandoned mooncake on the table next to me. now, mooncakes were not a part of our complimentary buffet this evening so how this fiend found his way before me, i know not. but we are currently in a bit of a showdown here in the silk lounge. mr. mooncake vs. meiling and all that is good and sacred (ok, so maybe i'm dramatic even when i'm not over-thinking). i suspect that i will win this particular battle for two reasons. 1 - i am a person, he is a pastry. 2 - he will very soon be tidied up by the silk lounge staff and swept swiftly into oblivion. i, meanwhile, will board my flight and arrive bleary-eyed back in beijing in all its mid-autumn glory. kumbaya.
*line from a book i just read that i appreciated - a first impression of paris: scowling grey universe relieved by pastry. nothing like clinging to a tarte tatin or a croissant for katharsis, weather-related or otherwise.
**curious, at dinner with a commercially-minded entrepreneur friend in bangkok this evening, he noted how all of the great chinese entrepreneurs of the last decade basically just took a foreign business concept, copied it, translated it into chinese and made bazillions. query whether there is some common thread here related to the inability to innovate the mooncake without outside intervention.
***a new guy friend who visited this blog recently said he found it a bit much. i asked which part was more upsetting, the over-thinking or the over-sharing. he blinked very rapidly a few times and changed the subject. i smiled at life.
*line from a book i just read that i appreciated - a first impression of paris: scowling grey universe relieved by pastry. nothing like clinging to a tarte tatin or a croissant for katharsis, weather-related or otherwise.
**curious, at dinner with a commercially-minded entrepreneur friend in bangkok this evening, he noted how all of the great chinese entrepreneurs of the last decade basically just took a foreign business concept, copied it, translated it into chinese and made bazillions. query whether there is some common thread here related to the inability to innovate the mooncake without outside intervention.
***a new guy friend who visited this blog recently said he found it a bit much. i asked which part was more upsetting, the over-thinking or the over-sharing. he blinked very rapidly a few times and changed the subject. i smiled at life.
Saturday, September 25, 2010
passion that can't be chased indoors for anything
it is my last day in paradise. cloudy for the first time, but just as well*. i don't mind the slightly overcast skies as my spirits are soaring, my thoughts lofty, and i still have passion that can't be chased indoors for anything. this, however, is not news. what is news is the sense of calm and stillness these last few days have allowed. and the seismic shift in my life that is about to take place. although perhaps that's a bit dramatic. it's just a shift in career, after all. the fundamentals shall stay the same. (they always do.) it's curious though, how much of who we are seems to hang suspended on what we do. at least in some cultures. however, who we are and how we exist in the world may in fact have very little to do with our occupations. and yet ideally we should find careers that nourish in many senses - literally (food on the table), personally (engaging and feeding the mind), spiritually (cultivating compassion and inspiration to better oneself), and communally / worldly (contributing in some small way to bettering us all). i know that sounds terribly cliched, but i am a world-impover after all. yet when i write this, i don't mean to suggest that we all need to be saving baby turtles or knitting sweaters for war orphans. i think you can just was easily find that nourishment - in all of those senses - on almost any path. (almost being the operative word in that sentence.) i read a quote about this once. ahem:
What the world needs more than anything is bodhisattvas, active servants of peace, “clothed,” as Longchenpa said, “in the armor of perseverance,” dedicated to their bodhisattva vision and to the spreading of wisdom into all reaches of our experience. We need bodhisattva lawyers, bodhisattva artists and politicians, bodhisattva doctors and economists, bodhisattva teachers and scientists, bodhisattva technicians and engineers, bodhisattvas everywhere, working consciously as channels of compassion and wisdom at every level and in every situation of society; working to transform their minds and actions and those of others, working tirelessly in the certain knowledge of the support of the buddhas and enlightened beings for the preservation of our world and for a more merciful future.
hear hear. i'm all for a more merciful future. particularly after these most merciful few days. on my first day, as i enjoyed an cool tall glass of red zinger (beet, carrot, cucumber and ginger*** juice), a charming member of the staff came over to introduce himself. attractive, of medium build, and wearing distinctive glasses, he greeted me in thai and then switched to english, introducing himself as 'wut'. we chatted a bit. he then asked if he could tell me something. i said, what? and wut said, 'remember that you are here to be on holiday and you need to relax and be happy'. what? wut? wooot! in that moment i decided i loved this wut. and what. the what of pure fascination with life as it is, however it is. it has been a blissful few days of yoga, mango & sticky rice, rambutans, reading, swimming, running, writing, reflecting, & enjoying my own company. i declined to meet up with my friend's friends in the end. although i felt a bit sheepish about doing so. (it felt so selfish to guard my desire to be alone.) all the more so when on my second night here wut was already encouraging me to join the communal dinner table. this is a table full of other travelers (single or otherwise) keen to share their meal and be social. not even two days in and already there was pressure to be social! wut suggested i might enjoy meeting new friends. i politely declined. (what?) i was really more than content on my own. i spend my whole life at the communal table. half the time i am constructing the communal table myself, or at least laying out the place settings. i came all the way here to escape the communal table, much as i enjoy it in my real life. thankfully wut didn't press it further, although he still made a point of checking in on me every day.
other than wut's whats (and hows and whys and wheres), the main assessing of my days here has involved alignment. i had a 90 minute private yoga session each day with a charming flemish woman who had a very precisely kind way of describing the world, the body, and how the two converse and are one. we worked in very small, subtle ways and i appreciated our time together on a wooden floor overlooking the ocean. i hope i can hold onto just some small part of the new openness we've nurtured into my mid-back. i think when i start this new job i think i need to insist on bringing a medicine ball or some sort of spine-friendly chair to sit upon even if it looks silly. it's time.
and of course amid all of this beauty and grace and sunshine and inspiration, i found myself overflowing with passion(s). love and a desire to give and give again. in many ways. thus the subject of this post. even if i will be chased indoors (and in fact chased into autumn as summer has fled beijing) tomorrow and need to leave this paradise behind, i can take my irrepressible passion with me. who could ask for anything more? what?
*just as well because i allowed myself to be in the direct sun for a very brief amount of time yesterday. maybe an hour and a half. with 85++ sunscreen on. (i know, i don't know if it makes any difference either, but it sounds impressive and i reckon i need all the protection i can get. some say that nothing over 15 makes a difference. probably true. but i try to involve 8s in my life as much as possible, so there is also that.) reapplication was also involved. and yet. and yet i still managed to get burned on my chest. you can very clearly see where the sunscreen wasn't sufficiently rubbed in. sigh. i know we all lack some vital nutrient since we don't get enough exposure to sunlight in our modern lifestyles, but i had a soup that involved pureed carrots and coconut oil yesterday at lunch and i'd like to think that made up for it since i clearly cannot handle sunbathing anymore. (it is vitamin d that we lack, yes? and that is also in carrots, no? yes, no, maybe so?) aside from the splotchy burn, and even though my head was almost always covered with my hat, the pregnancy on my face** also came back. which means enough sun for meiling this trip. and to think i just to be able to lie in the sun for long, languorous stretches of time! ahh the folly of youth and young skin. (although i always burned then too. i just didn't mind as much.)
**the pregnancy on my face is a skin condition, otherwise known as melasma, that was diagnosed on valentines day in 2008, almost exactly six months before my 30th birthday. i recall these details because this was my first trip to a dermatologist and in my naiveté i confused going to see this medical professional with going to the spa. after a straight male friend commented on the 'dark splotch' on my cheek, i decided it was worth exploring what the increasing discolouration i'd noticed might be. i made an appointment for valentine's day thinking this would be a nice treat for me. it was not so much a treat. i arrived, ready to be pampered. (yes, i know magical thinking.) instead, after examining my skin, the doctor announced, 'you have the mask of pregnancy'. she asked if i was pregnant. i said no. she asked how old i was. i said 29 and a half. she asked if i had been on birth control pills for a long time. i said i had. she said that explained it. the splotches, she said, were a skin condition that effects white and south asian women and appear during pregnancy or after having been on hormonally-based birth control for a long time without becoming pregnant. it gets worse in the sun. she said given my age and my having been on birth control for several years, this was quite normal and there was nothing to do except go off the pill and avoid the sun. she also said i could expect to have it return when and if i ever become pregnant. to be sure i understood, i clarified that this was basically my body's way of crying out for a baby, by putting its demand all over my face. she said, more or less. i said, 'happy valentine's day to me!' she offered me prescription skin-whiteners, but that felt a bit extreme. i told her i'd stop taking the pill immediately and otherwise drown my sorrows over my splotchy skin and childlessness in excessive sunscreen application. i have since worn sunscreen (in my moisturizer) on a daily basis. i have done such a thorough job of drowning these particular sorrows that i think the damn things have learned to swim! that is, they swim swiftly back to the surface of my skin at even the slightest exposure to sunlight. but no matter. melasma is hardly of serious consequence and i find my slight mustache more amusing than anything else.
***curiously i have been craving ginger incessantly since i've been here. ginger juices, fresh ginger tea, ginger at almost every meal. unsure what this means. if anything. (note to self - there is not meaning in everything. perhaps craving ginger signifies nothing more than enjoying that particular spice.)
What the world needs more than anything is bodhisattvas, active servants of peace, “clothed,” as Longchenpa said, “in the armor of perseverance,” dedicated to their bodhisattva vision and to the spreading of wisdom into all reaches of our experience. We need bodhisattva lawyers, bodhisattva artists and politicians, bodhisattva doctors and economists, bodhisattva teachers and scientists, bodhisattva technicians and engineers, bodhisattvas everywhere, working consciously as channels of compassion and wisdom at every level and in every situation of society; working to transform their minds and actions and those of others, working tirelessly in the certain knowledge of the support of the buddhas and enlightened beings for the preservation of our world and for a more merciful future.
hear hear. i'm all for a more merciful future. particularly after these most merciful few days. on my first day, as i enjoyed an cool tall glass of red zinger (beet, carrot, cucumber and ginger*** juice), a charming member of the staff came over to introduce himself. attractive, of medium build, and wearing distinctive glasses, he greeted me in thai and then switched to english, introducing himself as 'wut'. we chatted a bit. he then asked if he could tell me something. i said, what? and wut said, 'remember that you are here to be on holiday and you need to relax and be happy'. what? wut? wooot! in that moment i decided i loved this wut. and what. the what of pure fascination with life as it is, however it is. it has been a blissful few days of yoga, mango & sticky rice, rambutans, reading, swimming, running, writing, reflecting, & enjoying my own company. i declined to meet up with my friend's friends in the end. although i felt a bit sheepish about doing so. (it felt so selfish to guard my desire to be alone.) all the more so when on my second night here wut was already encouraging me to join the communal dinner table. this is a table full of other travelers (single or otherwise) keen to share their meal and be social. not even two days in and already there was pressure to be social! wut suggested i might enjoy meeting new friends. i politely declined. (what?) i was really more than content on my own. i spend my whole life at the communal table. half the time i am constructing the communal table myself, or at least laying out the place settings. i came all the way here to escape the communal table, much as i enjoy it in my real life. thankfully wut didn't press it further, although he still made a point of checking in on me every day.
other than wut's whats (and hows and whys and wheres), the main assessing of my days here has involved alignment. i had a 90 minute private yoga session each day with a charming flemish woman who had a very precisely kind way of describing the world, the body, and how the two converse and are one. we worked in very small, subtle ways and i appreciated our time together on a wooden floor overlooking the ocean. i hope i can hold onto just some small part of the new openness we've nurtured into my mid-back. i think when i start this new job i think i need to insist on bringing a medicine ball or some sort of spine-friendly chair to sit upon even if it looks silly. it's time.
and of course amid all of this beauty and grace and sunshine and inspiration, i found myself overflowing with passion(s). love and a desire to give and give again. in many ways. thus the subject of this post. even if i will be chased indoors (and in fact chased into autumn as summer has fled beijing) tomorrow and need to leave this paradise behind, i can take my irrepressible passion with me. who could ask for anything more? what?
*just as well because i allowed myself to be in the direct sun for a very brief amount of time yesterday. maybe an hour and a half. with 85++ sunscreen on. (i know, i don't know if it makes any difference either, but it sounds impressive and i reckon i need all the protection i can get. some say that nothing over 15 makes a difference. probably true. but i try to involve 8s in my life as much as possible, so there is also that.) reapplication was also involved. and yet. and yet i still managed to get burned on my chest. you can very clearly see where the sunscreen wasn't sufficiently rubbed in. sigh. i know we all lack some vital nutrient since we don't get enough exposure to sunlight in our modern lifestyles, but i had a soup that involved pureed carrots and coconut oil yesterday at lunch and i'd like to think that made up for it since i clearly cannot handle sunbathing anymore. (it is vitamin d that we lack, yes? and that is also in carrots, no? yes, no, maybe so?) aside from the splotchy burn, and even though my head was almost always covered with my hat, the pregnancy on my face** also came back. which means enough sun for meiling this trip. and to think i just to be able to lie in the sun for long, languorous stretches of time! ahh the folly of youth and young skin. (although i always burned then too. i just didn't mind as much.)
**the pregnancy on my face is a skin condition, otherwise known as melasma, that was diagnosed on valentines day in 2008, almost exactly six months before my 30th birthday. i recall these details because this was my first trip to a dermatologist and in my naiveté i confused going to see this medical professional with going to the spa. after a straight male friend commented on the 'dark splotch' on my cheek, i decided it was worth exploring what the increasing discolouration i'd noticed might be. i made an appointment for valentine's day thinking this would be a nice treat for me. it was not so much a treat. i arrived, ready to be pampered. (yes, i know magical thinking.) instead, after examining my skin, the doctor announced, 'you have the mask of pregnancy'. she asked if i was pregnant. i said no. she asked how old i was. i said 29 and a half. she asked if i had been on birth control pills for a long time. i said i had. she said that explained it. the splotches, she said, were a skin condition that effects white and south asian women and appear during pregnancy or after having been on hormonally-based birth control for a long time without becoming pregnant. it gets worse in the sun. she said given my age and my having been on birth control for several years, this was quite normal and there was nothing to do except go off the pill and avoid the sun. she also said i could expect to have it return when and if i ever become pregnant. to be sure i understood, i clarified that this was basically my body's way of crying out for a baby, by putting its demand all over my face. she said, more or less. i said, 'happy valentine's day to me!' she offered me prescription skin-whiteners, but that felt a bit extreme. i told her i'd stop taking the pill immediately and otherwise drown my sorrows over my splotchy skin and childlessness in excessive sunscreen application. i have since worn sunscreen (in my moisturizer) on a daily basis. i have done such a thorough job of drowning these particular sorrows that i think the damn things have learned to swim! that is, they swim swiftly back to the surface of my skin at even the slightest exposure to sunlight. but no matter. melasma is hardly of serious consequence and i find my slight mustache more amusing than anything else.
***curiously i have been craving ginger incessantly since i've been here. ginger juices, fresh ginger tea, ginger at almost every meal. unsure what this means. if anything. (note to self - there is not meaning in everything. perhaps craving ginger signifies nothing more than enjoying that particular spice.)
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