Fever

Feeling feverish today

Fever m'attrape:

Onetsu.

Rings of apple rinds multiply

Far and near

Your sleep, my sleep, rest

Bien entendu.

Neither the breath, kage, nor corn. The clam.

Toyota-san, Honda-san!

Hello, I'm obsessed about Japan. Sorry!

What is happening to Japanese cars, though? Both Toyota and Honda are recalling their models. What?!

This, I have to say, shows something about what Japan is really up to. The moment of truth...oh, the moment of truth.

I Say

To an endless thing, I say, "Go, fly, don't look down. Just fly, and be well."

I say, "I'll support you from below and behind, when the time comes."

Finally, I say, "I will keep studying, and you, too."

(n0十e tロ ５e1f)

Books that need to be found:

頼山陽　『日本外史』

Rainer Maria Rilke, The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge

梅棹忠雄　『文明の生態史観』

Erich Fromm, The Fear of Freedom

十返舎一九　『東海道中膝栗毛』

『今古奇観』

永井荷風　『下谷叢話』

森鷗外　『北条霞亭』

東海散士　『佳人之奇遇』

Božena Němcová, The Grandmother

『1946・文学的考察』

『紅楼夢』

Any Romanian books?

(m0K3 1人Tey)

In the Dark

Misdirection, indirection...

They bring the most bliss, the falling leaf

The floating leaf, the leaf, oh, leaf!

Waiting for the answer, I face the dark forest

In the dark, can I see any faces?

Yes, many. Including your own...

But I am lying.

Instead, I only see leaves, mounds of leaves and leaves.

Schubert

Diri said: "Schubert's music saves me.

From crashing my head through a window."

Endless

The revision of an essay -

It is quite endless!

The Haitian Man

The Haitian man, who was rescued after all this time, from underneath the rubble that had been a grocery store -

I'm certain he never lost hope, even for a single moment

If he faltered, he got back again

Came back to his senses, with an even stronger feeling of hope

Alone in the dark

And yes, the food and drinks he found must have given him hope

But if he hadn't hoped in the beginning, he may not have found all the food and drinks lying around him in the darkness

He may not have found the energy to open that Coke can, to take a sip out of it

To tear the cookie wrappings

Swallow, chew, and live...

No One Wants

No one wants a military base in one's own neighborhood.

It's noisy. Just noisy. Terribly noisy.

I do feel sorry for the people who have to live and breathe next to military bases, every day.

The military stinks. It must stink. All day and all year.

But the current Japanese, and Okinawan, opposition to the U.S. of A. regarding the location of a military base, this opposition is at best an insincere one.

What I mean is that this opposition doesn't innocently reflect the opinions of those people who may have to live and breathe next to a noisy and stinking military base. Well, any sane person would never want to live right next to a military base. The Okinawans have suffered so much already, at the hand of the mainland Japanese.... They have been colonized, brutalized, subjugated, and sucked out over the past 300 or more years, by Japan. Okinawa remains the poorest province in Japan, and that must be because of Japan's long-standing exploitation of it.

But the problem is that this whole issue of the American military base, like most other "issues" out there, is being usurped and manipulated by the ruling party, who just wants more votes. More votes, people! This is the insincerity. No one talks about the Japanese exploitation of Okinawa. Or about how much it sucks to have to live next to an American military base. No thorough discussion, very little explanation and careful weighing of the pros and cons from multiple perspectives.

This party has no principle, has no idea what "politics" is supposed to entail. All they care about is the number of votes.

Politics, oh dear party, politics means leading a good life. Elections are just means to an end, quite obviously! We need a degree of idealism, a sheen of it, all over politics. Not too much, but politicians do need to act like fools who blindly believe in the sanctity of certain ideas and ideals. If not, that is, if you believe more in the value of money, quantity, and plain old dirty power, then go into business, please. You may succeed.

Oh, politicians, they will do anything to secure their votes. They think of votes as assets, not as liabilities and obligations which they really are. They are so short-sighted, they should be given eyeglasses and contacts instead of votes.

Forgetfulness is a curse and a blessing, as the saying goes or doesn't go. Have we forgotten already? Poverty, isolationism, war? But remember, forgetting requires as much work and effort as remembrance. Since the energy required remains the same, why not pick memory over amnesia? Does any human being, or living thing, want to be forgotten? Absolutely not.

The country of Japan is on a road to diplomatic isolation at full speed. Let's put on the brakes, now.

By speaking up and out.

Song

I would like to share this song with you, sung by Sarah Vaughan. The instrumentalists also do a great job, I think. The song is strange and eerie - shadowy, yes. This is music!

The booze part, well, right, the backstage is the backstage.

"The Shadow of Your Smile" (1964)

Addendum (February 10, 2010)
Another amazing song, sung by Sarah Vaughan:

"Stardust"

On Your Bed, In Your Car, and Inside the Washroom

What writing is about...

It is not just about writing.

It is mostly not about writing.

It's an attitude toward life...

Continues 24/7, even in your sleep, especially in your sleep:

Erasing, cutting, scraping off, dodging, going back

But basically "practicing" all the time

Every minute, ideally

Sharpening and calibrating

The truth, many truths

On the margins, in the margin

Sinophone Studies

My hope is for Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese, Japanese studies to disappear

And fuse together, albeit loosely, into something like

Sinophone studies.

The Sinophone world should not be thought of as a civilizational sphere of exclusivity à la Samuel Huntingon's terrible book, Clash of Civilizations,

But rather an interface

Or a series of interfaces, interlocked and dispersed,

Very diverse and full of discrepancies and difference,

With a common but very divergent root, both real and imagined,

Sometimes unacknowledged or psychologically repressed,

That is the Chinese language,

Understood not just as linguistic conventions, like the Chinese characters,

But also values, shifting across time and space,

Power (political, economic, spiritual), a source of understanding

And misunderstanding, also of PRIDE and PREJUDICE.

The Earth as of now is largely Anglophone,

Whether one likes it or not,

And soon enough, it will turn largely Sinophone,

Although of course,

There will always, always be other worlds

On earth, as it is ....

Addendum (May 24, 2010)

Now that I think of it, I disagree with myself. Sinophone influences have existed and do still exist, but they are not the only, or even central, currents driving us along in East and Southeast Asia. Better just to have "Literature" with a provisionally capitalized L, or better yet, "literatures" - Department of literatures (or Literatures, is that's visually more pleasing) - or, how about just "Litty Depp"?

You: Hi Litty.

Litty Depp: Hello, my name is Litty Depp.

Strangeness

If you were a character in a novel, would you live differently,

Or in the same way?

Doesn't have to be a novel - what about a movie, a song, a TV drama?

These things, imaginary and fictitious;

How they sometimes seem to limit our imagination and our capacity for change

Rather than making them limitless.

"Say," Murundo said, "I would like to create fictional characters who are so unusual and idiosyncratic, that they could not possibly exist anywhere else other than in real life."

Merrilindo said, "Lived life is strangest, and is the best." She added, "Nothing compares to it, nothing."

Will Not Attend

It is very un-smart of the Japanese prime minister not to attend the World Economic Forum at Davos. Let the man go, Parliament*!

Don't they know that leaders are people, too? And that they like to be personally connected with their colleagues? Superficial connections shall suffice.

We are cascading down, down, down. And soon, there will be a brain drain. (I'm talking about Japan, dear.) It would be a pity to lose what we have accumulated. At least, don't make another war as you get poorer, in mind and spirit, please.

*Yes, I know, it's the "Diet" in Japan, not Parliament. The funny word comes from the name of the Holy Roman Empire's congress, Reichstag.

Man

Today I thank the government for the building codes

Tomorrow I will thank the government for guaranteeing the freedom of speech

Still, I am a thankless man

The Two P's

Passion and patience: the two P's.

PP, two P's are sufficient.

I am Laughing

There are people in Japan who, after delivering a very cogent and well-prepared speech, offer an apology and say, "I'm sorry my speech didn't make sense at all. I'm so sorry."

But your speech did make sense! Why apologize? How absurd! Are you mocking all of us? (Well, no. On the contrary, you are trying your best to demean yourself and be socially acceptable.)

Where is your brain? Okay, I will shut up now. I will choose to laugh instead. Ha ha ha.

Caution

We look too much to society for recognition, for approval, even for sources of inspiration (gods are the sources of inspiration, by definition).

Where is introspection today? Why does no one seem to appreciate quiet contemplation under the sky, by the sea, in the mountains?

The guru said: "Common good begins and only begins with inner good." Why does no one hear him?

I am crying, silently.

Tough as a Snail

You know what, I will go slowly. You?

Tough as a Sail

Ptyotr said: "I'm now as strong as a sail. Let the wind come, blow me to pieces. I will still stand."

The wind blew. The sail pushed the boat eastward.

Ptyotr hastened to add: "Yet I must add: I can never be as strong as the wind."

Professional Politics

I can never become a politician because a politician can never say: "I am wavering."

Well, no one is asking. So...okay!

A Day and a Year

Bibi said: "I lie shivering at night, thinking that my thinking will be outdated in just a few years' time."

A day passed.

"But no," Sagen said. "Because thinking goes on in loops."

"Even if you think you might be turning your back to the future," Trennen said, "you are in fact just tracing a circle that goes on and on."

Go-On then cried: "Pi-pi-pi-pi-pi."

And again: "Pi-pi-pi-pi-pi."

A year passed.

At night, Bibi was no longer shivering. In her sleep, Bibi was dreaming. She was dreaming about her thinking, that was still spinning after two hundred years, in the sky, like a system of stars.

Many moons, suns, and rainbows later...

Pepetela

Did you know about Pepetela, an Angolan writer? I didn't.

The whole world of Lusophone (Portuguese-speaking) literature beckons....

Did you know that Portuguese is the official language not just in Brazil and Portugal, but also in such diverse places as East Timor, Macau, and of course, Angola, and Mozambique, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, and São Tomé e Príncipe? I didn't....

Goa (India) and Melaka (Malaysia) are also Lusophone, and so is, perhaps, Gunma (Japan).

I must find Pepetela's novels.

Eu tenho que encontrar seus romances.

Aphorism from Abroad

Your best rival is your past self.

Internal Monologue

I know...let's float! (Je ne plaisante pas.)

Look at the picture. Look at the shadows on the balloons, look!

Regardez !

Image courtesy of www.clusterballoon.org.

On Why I Long for Southeast Asia

• The existence of chili
• The warm air
• Greens, so many greens, on the plate as well as outside
• Ah! multicultural desu ne.
• Well, I haven't been to most places in S.E. Asia, so I should not generalize
• I haven't seen, let alone experienced, how some people live
• But you know
• You know...
• Dark history, you feel it in the window panes
• China, Arabia, India. Europe. Japan. Neighbors. Les indigènes.
• Tiles, oh, tiles!
• Plants grow, oh, plants.
• Rivers are not clear
• Am I simply longing for the expat life?
• Perhaps.
• You know how FOREX works, don't you?
• There is some guilt involved
• O false sense of security, of understanding and communion
• O!
• The darkened, flickering fluorescent lights
• Oh, if we were audacious enough to attribute an at-the-end-of-the-day philosophy to S.E. Asia, I think it could be: Do not sweat the small stuff!
• What do you think?
• The message is: You know, we are on earth, here & now
• People are not looking!
• Even if they were...meh! Hello? Why care? Please be more practical.
• I need to learn that. I mean it.
• MPH (Malaysia)
  
• Gamelan (Indonesia)
• The open air, not in the colonial sense, though...but perhaps a little bit, I don't know
• The smell of morning
• Frozen takoyaki from Japan, that's just nostalgia, or double/triple nostalgia
• Made-in-Thailand ice cream
• Mmm...orange!
• Fading colors
• Concrete blocks
• You don't feel so lost, even if you are
• Scatter, like islands
• Like islands, scatter
• And watch the sea, trees. If not the sea, hills. Dark and light hills. Towers. Dream.
• Where is New York anyway? Lolo said: "To me, my navel is the center of the universe. To you, it may be different." Lolo added: "Don't think that there is only one map of the world." Then Lolo and her friends said in their hearts: "There are many." Lolo then added: "So don't be confused. Time, too, follows no uniform rules. Time does not wear school uniforms, for sure." Lolo said she learned this while being a resident in Southeast Asia. Or so I thought.
• Oh oh, never mind.... Well. It's just impossible making a list of your really favorite things.

The Incomparables

Let us trace the incomparable through:

Metaphor-linguistics-trauma-psychology-nation-history-religion-philosophy-translation-education-nature-nurture-science-politico-disciplines-food-palate-palette-colors-cultures-money-indigo-blue.

The Beyond in Education

The world is, after all, beyond college,

Beyond school.

Scholarship is in the service of the world beyond,

(Not the misleadingly-named "real-world," but the sordid, anarchic world of the everyday, full of bills, full of worries, also of memories, letters, love, confusion, trash bags, poetry, amnesia, skin problems, babies, old people, calendars, quarrels, peace, internal monologues, solitude, misunderstanding, pride, other people's pride, hazing, paranoia, gluttony, hunger, helplessness, charitable feelings, lots of toothpaste, trees, breathlessness, fatigue, congee, telephone calls, news, growth, thoughts, food, toilet breaks, both real and unreal)

And education in schools is a skylight to heaven;

School is not the heaven itself.

Go out, go deep -

School is your home, your resting place,

Your inn: a bed and a meal, on your way to a new place,

To difference, to storms, to the stars.

The guiding light is always the what? The sky ~

Dig into the sky.

*So, the argument should not be about whether education ought to prepare students for the world out there, which incidentally includes the worlds inside. Of course it ought to. The real debate should focus instead on what that preparation means, not just for the students, but for parents, teachers, and all others. For example, someone might say studying art history doesn't prepare students for the world beyond. A proponent of art history may respond by arguing that education isn't all about usefulness. But that's not the point. Art history is useful! For life! Don't you know how colors and shapes can fire up your life, cheer you up? And through art history, we learn that our vision isn't something that's completely naturally given. How liberating such knowledge can be! So yes, it's just that there are lots of different kinds of usefulness. The question isn't about utilitarianism versus non. You know, utilities aren't just about electricity, gas, and water. Or food. They're also about strength, tolerance, understanding. And versions of truth. To put it another way, usefulness isn't just about usefulness. It's about importance. What's important to you? To us? Sometimes, we are tempted to prioritize, assigning ranks by order of importance. But why bother? Why not concentrate on enlarging our ark, so that cut-off lists are no longer relevant? When we can't hold anymore, let's acknowledge our limit head-on, instead of cutting things off and pretending as if they never existed. Let's acknowledge our narrow bandwidth, if it is really narrow, and fully, verily confront its narrowness.

Pettrie Trips

Pettrie tripped over her trip

Tripping, tipping, point

On her way

The other way

The others' ways

Tripping over her trip

Pettrie jump-ropes over the clouds

Mr. Dove-Mountain, Be Grand

I just posted on the Japanese prime minister, Mr. Hatoyama's Twitter. Hatoyama means "Dove-Mountain," by the way. Love thy dove. What a name!

Do doves twitter?

In any case, I asked him, Mr. Dove-Mountain, to present a clearer and more concrete view of Japan's future. Like, a more focused vision for comprehensive decentralization. Decentralization and breaking apart the bureaucracy have been mentioned before, but everything seems to be so rushed and exist only for short-term gains, if any gains at all. There's nothing grand about it. And grand shan't mean over-simplified. Grand things can be very complex, and yet still grand. And grand shan't mean easy, glamorous, or showy.

For Japan, grand shall mean quite the opposite of: easy, glamorous, & showy. More like grace than grand, perhaps. It needs to learn to step down. From second to third, and further down. It needs to learn to downsize. To grow older but happier. It needs to accept its marginal destiny. It needs to learn English and Chinese. Languages, I mean. (Look at the Scandinavians, peek at them, steal furtive glances at them, who speak such excellent English. You know, Chinese is to Korean and Japanese, perhaps Vietnamese, too, as English is to Norwegian, Swedish, Danish, or even Finnish, pretty much.) Be well-versed in Anglo-American, Chinese, and Indian-subcontinental cultures. (That can be accomplished with the knowledge of just two languages: English and Chinese.) It needs to expand its horizons. And stop being so impractical. For once!

Japan is experiencing a mid-life crisis. It's not seeing things very clearly. It's unable to look beyond itself. Unable and unwilling to acknowledge the heaps and heaps of debt.

Mr. Dove-Moutain, you are actually a Mr. Debt-Mountain. Mounds and mounds...of debt! Please, don't accumulate more debt. Doves are lovely, but any more debt is not. Please realize this. And please be grand. Not glitzy-grand, but solid-grand.

Thanks for the Twitter, though. At least, in this country, no one gets arrested for twittering in front of the prime minister, oh dove!