Boozou Bajou rocks!

Try it! They're described by Dancemusic in an interview as "slow sultry sounds of bass-heavy dub. Superb Jamaican-style blues...can come from all parts of the world-- even Nuremberg, Germany."

Thoughts on the Ganga (heard on NPR)

The other day I was listening to NPR in the morning (these days, for some reason I'm awake at around 530am; then my routine is to have a couple of cups of tea accompanied by the radio). They were going about the world talking to people about pollution and what causes it. This particular piece caught my attention, since it was about the river Ganga, the holiest one in India - and also, in all likelihood, one of the most incredibly polluted.

Of course, industrialization is a major cause of this, particularly with the proliferation of "dirty" businesses like leather tanneries - they use chromium and other chemicals, all of which enter the Ganga. However, industry is not the only source of pollution. About 1 billion liters of raw untreated sewage enters the river flow every day. And then there are the partially burnt or unburnt human corpses floating down the river, as a result of poor or incomplete cremation. And of course, the occasional cow/ goat/ sheep as well.

The conversation on NPR moved to specific causes, and a small but distinctive reason identified was the traditional "dhobis" that use the banks of the river to launder their clients' clothes on a large scale. They use vast quantities of basic detergent and literally beat the shit out of the clothes. One of the dhobis was asked whether he thought it was good for the river or not, all the detergent flowing into it. He replied sincerely, saying that detergent was good for peoples' clothes and so in his opinion, it could only be good for the river - in fact, he thought it would "kill the germs" in the water. Native wisdom, and hard to find fault with!

Regulation works better for industry, I think. Education is the only large-scale effective anti-pollutant for people.

The embrace

One evening I was walking by the ocean. It was a lovely day - warm and calm even out by the water. The sun was making its way home slowly, the surfers were out, children squealed as shaggy wet dogs blundered into sand-castles. I was smiling as I went up a hill, eager to get to the top so I could contemplate the sunset in full.

As I went, I saw a couple locked in embrace on a park-bench. I say "locked in embrace", because that's precisely what it was, fully clothed, entwined. I didn't take pictures, but I did look back as I crested the hill, and they were still there - almost motionless, murmuring to each other. It reminded me of this poem, its an odd little thing but a favorite for sure!:

The Hug (Thom Gunn)

It was your birthday, we had drunk and dined
Half of the night with our old friend
Who'd showed us in the end
To a bed I reached in one drunk stride.
Already I lay snug,
And drowsy with the wine dozed on one side.

I dozed, I slept. My sleep broke on a hug,
Suddenly, from behind,
In which the full lengths of our bodies pressed:
Your instep to my heel,
My shoulder-blades against your chest.
It was not sex, but I could feel
The whole strength of your body set,
Or braced, to mine,
And locking me to you
As if we were still twenty-two
When our grand passion had not yet
Become familial.
My quick sleep had deleted all
Of intervening time and place.
I only knew
The stay of your secure firm dry embrace.

Milk in bottles tastes better than plastic or cartons

I think so, don't you? Maybe it's just memories from childhood or something. Or maybe it's a design thing - the very "bottleness" of a milk bottle makes it attractive. Anyway, a glass bottle can be recycled easily, so that's a good thing! For a change, there's no difficult trade-off, no existential dilemma. Phew!

Straus Family Creamery is a great example of chunky square bottles, I find these aesthetically better than the old cylindrical fellows. And they're quite utilitarian too!

Check this out: Straus Family Creamery

The mad(ness) doctor? (found floating around on the internet)

Medical tourism or not, somehow I don't think Dr. Nambiar's practice is going to be growing very fast! What d'you say? Is there a future in homeopathic treatment of...psychopaths? Umm...I'd probably consider that to be a VERY questionable proposition (though, I do find the informal branding style quite endearing - "send over the nutjobs to your friendly neighborhood psycho clinic, folks!) Well, maybe, and maybe Dr Nam knows better!

Camera Obscura (the band) rocks!

Cool band, interesting sound. Indie pop though, be warned! To be honest, I was intrigued at first just by the album names (note: a wise friend of mine states that the more quirky and interesting a band's albums, the higher the probability that the music is going to be crap. CamObs is the exception that proves the rule, perhaps?).


http://www.camera-obscura.net/index2.htm

Existential Dilemma #21: Yes, I'm concerned about global warming, but...

...damn I like driving fast on the curves!


Does this mean that gas fumes have finally corroded my consciousness, or am I just a running-dog, capitalist death-merchant like the rest of them?! No, that maybe too harsh, just a whiskey priest, perhaps.

One late evening in Pacifica, another lovely sunset slipped by...

...as humanity muddled on.

Folding wetsuits after another day out surfing the woman shakes out her hair in the fading light, a guy unfolding his spare bed for a friend who dropped by, dogmatic scientists and blow-hard industrialists bickering about CFCs and HFCs on the radio, analysts writing books examining the evolution of terrorists as a global profession of people who would perhaps like to blow up the world to make a point, governments quietly planning to blow up the world to make a counter-point, the Catholic church using insurance money to pay damages to children victimized by smiling priests in suits, a girl lying bundled in bed turns desperate as another insurance company denies coverage for her need of pain medication, an overweight man with a twenty dollar cigar nestled in the inner pocket of his cashmere jacket lurches into a gas station cursing at the thought of re-fueling his custom-ordered 2007 Mercedes S500 with special accident avoidance technology, the cost of a barrel of oil rising steadily till it reached about the same amount of money a person in sub-Saharan Africa and remote parts of India has to eat for a year.

Happy Holidays, all.

Revisited: the migratory birds of Shoreline Park

They say that the birds aren't migrating across the planet as much as they used to, anymore. Some think that it's yet another unforeseen fallout of global warming. I don't know one way or the other, really. But I do know that if the birds stop coming to Shoreline Park next winter, life would somehow have become diminished in a significant way. These lovely surprises will no longer be there for us to delight in; there may be no incessant cries from seagulls punctuated by soft splashes of ducks, egrets, pelicans and others diving for breakfast.

There may be only the buzz of insects, the swish of fish in the lake and the awaiting silence of another cold empty morning.

Tokyo Post #7: Intriguing shops of Asakusa

The perfect shop?

Tokyo Post #6: Slow path to Asakusa

Tokyo Post #5: Stone Pigeons of Asakusa

As I walked through Asakusa Temple, I came across pigeons - both flesh and stone. The live ones are very tame (no-one is allowed to catch or feed them) and they walk about as they please. The stone pigeons are charming too, as you can see - though not too many people pay attention to them - the temple dominates one's consciousness completely. There must be some history associated with them, which I'm yet to find out.


As I stood there, a local person approached and waited for me to finish my picture-taking. When I was done, he smiled and pointed to the pigeons, and I nodded back. Then he said, "Where from, you sir?" I replied, "India." He looked puzzled, so I reiterated, "India, land of Buddha, Buddha - yes?". Upon which he said, "Oh, India hai-hai! Buddha hai-hai!" He smiled, bowed to me (I bowed back) and left.

Tokyo Post #4: Spotted!

Near Asakusa Temple, as I waited for the lights to turn green, watching the traffic go by. Suddenly this pops up, it almost seems as if the gent exerting himself is having fun too. It was a good test of camera reflexes for me.

Any explanations for this? Please do illuminate!

Tokyo Post #3: Ginza St.

A dear friend of mine, while giving me directions on how to spend time in Tokyo, said, Ginza is Tokyo's Park Avenue - only a much more evolved version of it. So I had high expectations of this epicenter of fashionista hipster joyful shopping fiends (yes!). And I wasn't disappointed. Where else can one find a) three huge depatos (department stores) or Haughty Happy Triplets (as I call them) - Matsuya, Matsuzakaya and Mitsukoshi - each with its own impeccable environs, merchandising, charms and attractions. All the stores have enormous numbers of staff - suited and subtly uniformed (I suspect). All are trained to perfection in making the customer feel like an honored guest. They do not show their backs at all, to the extent that I noticed one person backing her way out into an employee exit in a particularly busy section, and bowing as she went. A bit much, perhaps? I don't think so. Compared to these, the treatment that a customer gets at Nordstrom is kind of erratic, even somewhat dismissive...! And then there are shop-within-shops alongside several full-size stores for Prada, Bulgari, Longchamps, Hermes, Louis Vuitton, Cartier, Lanvin...the list is endless.

What is amazing is that the stores are full, absolutely crammed full. Of people buying stuff. On a stormy wet typhoon-beset Saturday evening. Perhaps much more so than ever in Manhattan, San Francisco or Beverly Hills. It is perhaps one of the surest signs of the ongoing democratization of luxury...or the prevalence of a globally extended consuming class.

But again, there's also this - a slow-walking, softly-chanting monk threading his way through the mass of fashionably-clad shoppers...how about that?!

Tokyo Post #2: At Akihabara

Over the weekend I expanded my wanderings around Tokyo, aided by the Metro. It's easy to use, though I hesitated a bit since it was all Japanese (Greek?!) to me at the entrance. The station lights shimmered tantalizingly while peeking in, I could see entire map displays with names in English neatly written up next to the kanji. But the tickets to travel came from vending machines, and the dispensers had little icons and words in Japanese only! Which dispenser to use for a ticket, how much should I buy? Or should I just get a pass, the kind shown in the picture on my Tokyo Metro pamphlet? One of my business colleagues had mentioned the pass, and then said but you can always get a ticket and if you fall short, just do fare adjustment. That sounded a bit tricky to me...so I asked the gentleman at the station, pointing to the Passnet card in the picture and then at the machines. He nodded, smiling, "ichi-ban, hai!" The first machine looked kind of dead, surely he meant the first one that was all lit up? I went to the second one and pressed a few buttons. Didn't realize there was a touch-screen, ended up with a Y160 ticket. The elderly gent opened a window and poked his head out, talking to someone else. I looked over at the other one, then looking carefully noticed a little Passnet icon on it. Ah so! I pushed another button and it came to life, asking for how much (I took Y1000), then dutifully spitting out my lovely little Passnet card! The gent looked at me, smiling. I smiled back and nodded, hai-hai! arigato gozaimashita! So sorry for thinking too much, stationmaster-san... when you say ichi-ban, it means ichi-ban.

My lovely get-out-of-insanely-pricey-taxi-hell-almost-free card

I took the metro to Akihabara and landed in Laox :-) the mega-mega electronics store (all 7 floors of it, include "overseas floors" for international voltages) and immediately ran into a huge bunch of my peeps - its India Time all the time in electronics land, hai-hai! Outside it was pouring rain, the umbies were all out, and so were costumed girls offering cards for something and smiling at everyone (they were dressed, as Fodor's said, as school-girls and are available to fulfill fantasies of all sorts for the otaku, Japanese geeks. Note to self: why hasn't someone introduced this service in Silicon Valley yet? We have geeks...). There was also this sign, that towered above all the umbrellas...

Yes, it's a billboard showing schoolgirl anime poses

So I looked up otaku, and it's pretty interesting. According to Wikipedia,

The term was popularized in the English-speaking world in William Gibson's 1996 novel Idoru, which has several references to otaku. In particular, the term was defined as 'pathological-techno-fetishist-with-social-deficit'.

In an April 2001 edition of The Observer, William Gibson explained his view of the term: "The otaku, the passionate obsessive, the information age's embodiment of the connoisseur, more concerned with the accumulation of data than of objects, seems a natural crossover figure in today's interface of British and Japanese cultures. I see it in the eyes of the Portobello dealers, and in the eyes of the Japanese collectors: a perfectly calm train-spotter frenzy, murderous and sublime. Understanding otaku-hood, I think, is one of the keys to understanding the culture of the web. There is something profoundly post-national about it, extra-geographic. We are all curators, in the post-modern world, whether we want to be or not."

More from Wikipedia on otaku here

Rings true, yes (think about this blog and your's too!)?! And then take a look at this, clearly New York excites a deep fascination within the Eastern imagination (I also noticed a "Times Square" in Hong Kong!):


And in the midst of all this modern stuff...a traditional road-sign, so cool!

Someone clearly provides excellent care and maintenance too

So much to see and then finally I took a break at Mos Burger (HAMBURGER IS MY LIFE" and "Japanese Fine Burger and Coffee") where I had a Mos Rice Burger with Coke - so yummy!

On the way back I hopped off at Ginza (it was raining madly, but I'd taken a raincoat + picked up an umby in the 7-11 below the hotel for 150Y) and as the evening came, the lights kept going on...it was so brilliant, that I kept smiling while zooming into shop after shop...! I've also been to see the Haughty Happy Triplets, that's what I've decided to call the three mega-monster department stores (depatos) - Matsuya, Matsuzakaya and Mitsukoshi. They seem kind of cool in a Juppie (Japanese Yuppie?) kind of way....more later on them...

Tokyo Post #1

Tokyo is brilliant. I've been fascinated by Japanese culture since I was fifteen and always wanted to visit! It's a great city and the epicenter of the world's second-largest economy - almost everything works very smoothly and politely. Most people work long hours as a matter of routine. Luxury-brand shopping seems to be an obsession, but along with that space and resource optimization is a constant part of life. I was thinking about that - the small but well-equipped cars, the big simple cellphones (to accommodate the script for texting). Basically lots of people fitted into very small spaces have to figure things out together and be very polite to get along easily! Perhaps there's a lesson there...

For instance, here's my hotel room, of course it's small - pretty much in the heart of the city. The nice thing though that there's a window (so it's not claustrophobic) and everything is literally within arm's reach! And then there are the details. If you look closely, the chair actually has a leather handle to pull at the back.

And my personal favorite - a single bedside console that controls everything in the room - the radio, air conditioning, clock with alarm and the lights (for the room and the loo!). Really convenient and fewer separate things for the hotel to keep track of!

A Saturday Morning Soccer Story

One Saturday morning I got a call from a friend. What are you doing? he asked. The usual, partly recovering from Friday night excesses (yes, I do still pay lip service to the stereotypical single person's lifestyle!) and getting into the weekend with a cup of coffee and newspaper. Well, he said, you remember mentioning that you were curious about the kids playing soccer? You mentioned wanting to take some pictures? So...your last chance to see them is today! After this, the soccer season is over and they switch to something else, as it grows colder. Ah so, I mumbled, cringing inwardly...I did want to take pictures and I was curious about the whole thing...but it had been a late night, I was feeling lazy and besides. So I took the address of the school, descriptions of the kids' teams and whatnot, mentioning vaguely that I'd probably be there if my place got cleaned up in time.

Just getting warmed up, Coach!

You shoot , I shoot!Next time, stay out of my way!

Allow me explain how this began. Most people with children are invariably talking about their kids' soccer. Some even coach teams. One fellow I met said that he had to be home from travel every Friday nights simply because he'd committed to coaching his son's soccer team. That's a sign of singular dedication to me, but to most folks this is normal. It's apparently an extension of the soccer moms phenomenon, which is pervasive, of course. A couple of those have even surfaced in my neighborhood - a bit surprising, considering the preponderance of condos and townhouses, of single people with erratic lifestyles and zippy cars. As a single person one doesn't really get to see what goes on with them or the kids (unless of course, one chooses to give up the single status - in which case an independent inquiring perspective would probably be out of question!). One could observe either from afar, as they ran about in their homes, or up close on the freeway (cursing, as the soccer mom in question makes yet another insane un-signaled lane change in her giant BMW SUV or Town & Country frantically trying to make her exit, lugging the mandatory coffee and cellphone while 3.5 kids and all sorts of soccer paraphernalia bulged precariously out of the back). The question is what inspires such dedication, what are the kids up to? Surely they're not really playing soccer with any seriousness, considering this is America and David Beckham looks for all the world like a man parachuted onto a desert island, trying to puzzle out why exactly he decided to come here. One would have to find out more.

Goal? Goal!

May I have another one, please?

With all this brewing in my brain, I decided to down my coffee, pick up my zoom lens and head out to the high school playground. As I drove into the lot, I felt like an interloper, an imposter, my little two-seater completely out of place amidst the minivans and SUVs. An illegal alien in a strange country. People stared at me. My singleness singled me out. I almost panicked, considering a possible hasty retreat. These were real children! What would they think I was doing? The kids would point and scream Stranger! Stranger! (note to self: this is what happens when one watches too many movies). Then I found my friends (with many bags and sacks in tow), they were busy pushing and praising, feeding and feuding. They gave directions, and pointed to teams in uniforms. Boys play teams of ten, the little girls teams of five. No scoring for the girls, they're encouraged to "just enjoy playing" by rotation. There were coaches and referees, regular soccer balls and goalposts. Kids warming up and kids chasing the ball like a swarm of bees. Kids running tongues out, kids doing self-goals. Kids showing flashes of brilliance scampering down the line to score while mommies screamed themselves hoarse (Kick it out! Kick it out!) with instructions from the sidelines. Some dads screamed at the referee too. I set about taking pictures, first the boys and later on the little girls...and something else happened...I found myself absorbed in the action. These kids meant business, it was real soccer!

The Top Hundred Cars of the 20th Century

As oil prices steadily move to the $100 a barrel mark, and global warming begins to shape decisions at different levels in governments across the world, here's a look back at the 20th century's best automobiles. The list is compiled by the duPont Registry and is based on reader votes.

Some of these are surprising, others not so. Since the Registry is based in Florida, there seems to be a definite (wealthy? elderly?) American bias here - how else can one explain the presence of the Viper, the Hummer, the Prowler, the Navigator, the El Dorado!

#1 is the Lamborghini Diablo. The Ferraris lead in numbers, and then Porsche (both the Boxster and the 911 Carrera). BMW shows up with the M coupe and the Z3.

Notable absentees include TVR, Lotus and MG!

Link to the list

The TVR Grantura - yet another IEBS!

Meet the TVR (mk-II Grantura)

The question is, would you buy this car? It requires more courage than money (available on Craigslist for the grand sum of $12,000). Why courage? Well, essentially because its the very grand-daddy of IEBS, it is TVR's firstborn - the Grantura.







Question is, why aren't any manufacturers making interesting cars like this any more?

I don't want to be unique!

It finally happened. I had a wisdom tooth extraction (my first), and as a result found myself on the (operating?) table with a couple of ladies (the dental surgeon and the anesthetist) peering and poking around purposefully in my mouth. I was given local anesthesia and some nitrous (laughing gas - about which I shall write separately), so I had a semi-detached view of the proceedings, despite the fact that the scene of action was a scant few inches away from my brain.

While I was lying there, the very competent Dr Wang was poking around, chatting away with her colleague making comments like this:
"Ah Mr D, just relax now!"
"Come now, open wider!"
"Nice watch, Mr D, that's a very nice watch - please would you put your hand down now!"
"Come now, this tooth needs to come out!"
"Oh, it's a bit tough to pull!"
"I'm not that strong you know, just a woman! But let me try here, ummm..."
"Need to try harder, open wider please!"
"Ok once more, uuuhhhhhhhhhh, goodness, strong bones, eh Mr D?!"
"Hey maybe I need to do weight training or something, yeah, hahahahaha!"
"Ah, excellent, well done Mr D, it's out now!"
"What? You want to keep it? Nurse, Mr D would like to have his tooth back..."
(Yes, I asked for it)
(And thank you again, Dr. Wang!)
(Sidenote: Dr Wang did a great job. Then she left a voicemail for me that evening, she was checking in on me as promised. And she reviewed progress the next day with a quick 5 minute check-up, which was reassuring. I'd definitely recommend Dr Wang to anyone in the Bay Area, even though she doesn't do weight training. IMO, she doesn't need it!)

As I lay there helpless, the thought occurred to me that of all the situations I've been in, this is one where I don't want to be unique in any way whatsoever! And it's probably very true for all of us! We want to be unique everywhere except on the operating table, or in any medical context, right? Every time I interact with a doctor for anything I want to be the most boring, most routine, most typical and most predictable case s/he's ever come across. Because that's where it's safe to be...I'll leave all the outstanding medical curiosities for someone else to offer, thank you very much!

By the way, I was googling around about some aspects of this experience, and I came up with a web-site that offers training to become "affiliates", as a path to earning easy cash by riding on the "teeth-whitening craze". Check this out! Next time you want to have your teeth whitened you may want to find out what odd-job background that person about to address your (not-so?) pearly whites has had, and how much relevant experience too! Because quite honestly, the picture on the web-site doesn't inspire much confidence now, does it? What were these good folks thinking when they put that in?!

The rains come

I've been in the Bay Area for a while now. The space, the weather, the beauty of nature so close by - all of these have given fresh perspective, and also helped me understand better the places where I came from. There are some things that I do miss - for instance, the food sold on the streets in India. And the thunderstorms during the monsoon season - there is nothing as exciting here as that. It was something amazing, to actually hear the thunder and lightning - deep bass rumble and crack accompanied by the shuddering cymbals of windows. Hearing first, then running out into the rain, falling in such torrents that it stings a bit till you get used to it. Sheets of rain, pouring so dense that it's hard to see through.

Sometimes I go for a hike here when the weather report predicts a storm, to be out on a hill-top and watch the clouds sweep in across the Bay. The wind is strong, it buffets my solitary figure, I can lean into it though. Rain washes clean the air, I feel refreshed and rejuvenated. There is hope.

Life is a story you have with another person

I just saw this film, and chanced upon this director, Catherine Breillat - somewhat new to me, though she may be well-known to some of you. Apparently she's been controversial right from the start of her career - and the first film she made, in 1976 (A Real Young Girl) was released for distribution only about four years ago. It was banned for having pornographic content. This didn't stop Catherine though, and she continued through the years, becoming well-known for A ma soeur (Fat Girl).

Breve Traverse (Brief Crossing) is interesting in that it is about an older woman-young boy situation unfolding on a ferry between Le Havre and Portsmouth; but also it is about the Anglo-Saxon mindset juxtaposed with what Catherine calls in her interview, a "baby Latin lover".

The interview is almost as captivating as the film - Catherine doesn't hold back on her views about religion, gender identity, coming-of-age experiences for men and women and so forth. But what struck me most was not the more strident parts of her comments. Rather, it was when she was talking about why she makes films that are essentially always variations on the same theme - two people in an intimate relationship, she says en passant, "Life is a story, that you have with another person".

And it doesn't matter who the people are, what the situation is, or what the underlying motivations may be...it is true, isn't it?

The Pace of Movies: An Observation

Movies these days are very fast-paced. Terminal velocity of course is reached in action movies, where the pace is an essential defining aspect of the movie. Movies from earlier times are slower, even the ones with a lot of action in them. The slowness was part of the build-up, the atmosphere. Look at a Clint Eastwood western, for instance. High Plains Drifter is a prime example, the movie starts with a man riding into town and this is shown for about three to five minutes before anything else happens. Was it effective in building atmosphere and anticipation in the audience? Perhaps. I'm not sure, what d'you think?

Lucas, Prince of Darkness

(And covert ruler of IEBS!)

As John and I were driving back from a client meeting, we began talking about cars, particularly old Brit sportscars. He mentioned a Triumph Spitfire he used while dating back in the day. During a particularly crucial date, one that involved a long drive on Highway 1 by the Pacific, the thing stuttered and stalled (inevitably!). Also inevitably, we ended up recounting stories and laughing about Lucas, Prince of Darkness.

The 1972 Mark IV with a 1275 cc engine and 4 speed transmission, in proper BRG

For those of you who've loved and lived with an IEBS (idiosyncratic endearing Brit sportscar), you'll know Lucas well. For others, Lucas Electric was the supplier of all things electric to pretty much every car manufacturer in the UK for a long, long time. My encounters (thankfully?) have been mostly secondhand, through my father who owned the first direct descendant of the Morris Oxford, the first car to be manufactured in India, the one and only (drum-roll!) beloved, ubiquitous, elephantine Ambassador with electrics by Lucas. The Lucas experience (to the best of my recollection) seemed to survive in the sub-tropical context as well, and to have moody electricals specially during a torrential downpour (yes, that's the official description, read any good newspaper in India during the monsoon season) seems quite the recipe for disaster. Though perhaps progressive localization addressed a few typical problems - for instance, putting the distributor near the top of the engine, to minimize chances of it getting damp, wet or absolutely submerged.

There are of course a number of jokes about Lucas available freely on the Internet, but additions in the form of your stories/ jokes of Lucas are welcome! Here's a few to get started:

• The Lucas motto: "Get home before dark."
  
  
• Lucas denies having invented darkness. But they still claim "sudden, unexpected darkness"
  
  
• Lucas--inventor of the first intermittent wiper.
  
  
• Lucas--inventor of the self-dimming headlamp.
  
  
• The three-position Lucas switch--DIM, FLICKER and OFF.
  
  
• The other three switch settings--SMOKE, SMOLDER and IGNITE.
  

More Lucas, Prince of Darkness jokes here...