Collectively short memories

I'm bugged by the comparisons in the media between the Haditha massacre in Anbar Province, Iraq, and the Abu Ghraib scandal. A more appropriate comparison would be the Mai Lai massacre in Vietnam in March 1968.

A 'security analyst' in the USA stated that the massacre was likely conducted by a 'few bad apples'. That's playing down something more serious. Morale is collapsing across the US forces stationed in Iraq - discipline has broken down - understandable when you are constantly getting stoned, shot at, are avoiding IADs, are not given appropriate armour protection, have little idea when you get to return home - and your comrades-in-arms are dying around you.

But to raise a gun against the unarmed is immoral, whatever language you speak. But I guess that's what happens when you send out young kids halfway across the World, fully-armed.

Unfortunately, people don't appear to get that angry anymore - and they tend to have shorter memories too.

The Novel - profiled in The Observer

I read this on Sunday and it made me cringe, laugh, then cringe some more. Literature is like music - you can talk about genres, etc, but essentially, there is only good stuff and bad stuff - and that's subjective, and will vary from one individual to another. The only thing that concerns me is how many young Asian writers are expected to write about 'being Asian'. Pigeonholing is insulting.

Films I need to catch very soon at the flicks:

• 'Friends with Money'
• 'Brick'
• '36'
• 'Volver'
• and more that I can't remember

Women I love this week:

• Sally Hawkins
• Zadie Smith
• Saoud Massi

Music:

• Nancy Wallace and her inspired folk-cover of Candi Staton's soul-disco classic 'Young Hearts Run Free' (a song that connects my sister, brother and I together)
• Candie Payne (on the Deltasonic label)

Viewing

Watched 'The Agronomist' last night, a profile of the late, great, Jean Dominique, a most remarkable individual, who brought the truth to the Haitian people, under the regimes of Papa Doc & Baby Doc Duvalier and General Raul Cedras, all the while advancing the causes of human rights and democracy.

Also checked out 'Wolphin' volume one it came with the Dec/Jan issue of The Believer. The Spike Jonze documentary of Al Gore, if screened, would have blown away his image of being wooden.

What is Wolphin? Well:

Wholphin is a new quarterly DVD magazine from McSweeney's, lovingly encoded with unique and ponderable films designed to make you feel the way we felt when we learned that dolphins and whales sometimes, you know, do it.

Oh dear, i'm going to spend lots more cashmoney.

Lordy Lord

A sucky day. Earthquake in Indonesia, possible coup in East Timor, the death of Desmond Dekker and my father is unwell (and now subjected to my v.limited nursing skills).

Went through all my books today for a dusting down and tidying up session. Realised that I am missing my copy of Granta Travel, as well as 'Catch-22', 'Soccer War' and 'Midnight in Sicily'. There are other books - with the iPod Perv and Em - but they can stay there. I have collected all the poetry magazines (Ambit, Rialto, etc), and will pass them onto Al.

I discovered several books by Paolo Coelho. They have to go. I can't stand him. It's like reading Gabriel Garcia Marquez, but with Gabo's imagination replaced with schmaltz disguised with saccharine. I also have a problem with any author whose bio (on the inside front cover of his books) reads, ' he is an author to inspire nations'. Sorry. Coelho isn't Thomas Paine, Hannah Arendt, Noam Chomsky or JK Galbraith.

Listening to: Sean Rowley on BBC London

Marvelling at: paper dust

Reading: 'A Small Place' by Jamaica Kincaid

Writing: a couple of pieces for use under a pseudonym

Thinking about: people of the crescent moon

Phew!

What a week. If you are near a radio on Friday, tune in to Radio 4 at 9pm and check out 'Abrogate' a play by Larry Gelbart - the man who was one of the writers and producers of the TV comedy show M*A*S*H (inspired by the 1970 film of the same name by Robert Altman, in itself based on the 1968 book by Richard Hooker).

'Abrogate' is set in the future, as a government headed by Hilary Clinton investigates the Dubya administration.

As Gelbart noted in an interview on Radio Four yesterday evening, 'The USA is slowly committing suicide'.

Plus ca change...

Well, here I am, at the new blog address, with everything remaining the same - well, almost. One less pseudonym to write under is a real benefit.

Ouch

Damned early start today, but I managed to sort out my plans for July & August. I am considering writing under my name - not my given name, but my original nickname - in a bid to simplify things (too many pseudonyms). That means the blog will have to be moved, and that I will have to give up the website url and register a different one. Thanks to Al, D and Da Bomb for their thoughts. Need to check with one more upright geezer then flick the switch.

Bang bang bang!

Earlier today I went to see the Master Drummers of Africa, with members from Zambia, Guinea, Nigeria, Ghana and Mozambique. The first half of the show was biased towards children, several of whom (with drums) joined the performers on the stage. The second half involved several adult members of the audience enacting the story of the birth of the night. In front of 900 people, I played the part of Fire (interestingly, as I am a Leo). It was great fun, and I would recommend that people check out the rest of the African Music Festival. Things are tight, but I hope to catch Tony Allen - one of the godfathers of Afro-Beat - and Samba Sunda, in July.

A writer in love

Women I love this week:

• The late Juliet Berto
• Sandrine Bonnaire

Last night I caught the near-epic, three hour long, cherry drop of 1974 vintage that is 'Celine & Julie Go Boating' by Jacques Rivette, starring Juliet Berto, Dominique Labourier and Bulle Ogier. A teeny little bit like Mr. Benn - or rather, Lewis Carroll - on acid. Fantastic fun.

Listening to: 70s & 80s club classics (on a PURE One DAB digital radio)

Writing: nothing, i'm lazy (although I made a stack of notes yesterday)

Massaging: my feet, after two hours of traipsing around Windsor Great Park with the CisternKid™ this morning

Reading: aiming to finish Jose Saramago's 'Blindness'. This moment has been four years in the making (so maybe it can wait a bit longer).

07:02

The very moment this morning, that while in the outside lane of the M25, I drove right past a small deer, crouched both intently, calmly and relatively safely, in the central reservation, while two motorway maintenance men argued on the hard shoulder. I thought that I was perhaps hallucinating through lack of sleep in the last few days, but it appears not. I later heard that the deer was recovered, and given a tourist map, directing it back to the woods.

How it could hold the map without opposable thumbs is something that I shan't trouble myself with.

Promise to self: stop reading Craigslist for kicks, as you seem to run into multiple ads posted by the same former acquaintance. While Craigslist inspires poems of a certain nature/genre/pubic futility, running into ads from this person must be a warning from the gods/fairies/aliens/microbes that I should cease forthwith.

Amen to all that and more, Fearless

Mothballing equipment

Given the recent promise I made to myself, this cartoon seems apt.

Watched: Tokyo Drifter

Writing: due diligence, to keep the grey(ing) matter ticking over

Listening to: pure, unadulterated funk

If you have a little time...

...then please check this out, and consider doing something. Of all the places in the World, our Government should know better than to detain children.

Thanks, Fearless

Funny little things

New laptop ready with all the goods, printer loaded with new cartridges, and ink splashing across notebooks with abandon. A potentially productive phase opens itself up to me.

Received some spam earlier today from 'Trinidad Kincaid' - funny, given that yesterday I started reading 'A Small Place' by Jamaica Kincaid, the text of which was used in the documentary 'Life and Debt in Jamaica', which I had the pleasure of watching again last night.

It appears that some degree of synchronicity is afoot.

A big thank you to D - yes, I got The Times yesterday for the 'Metropolis' DVD. Of course, I did throw the newspaper away imediately afterwards.

Listening to: Gal Costa, Chico Hamilton & Sammy Davis Jr

Women I love this week

• Maysa Leek, the soul songstress
• Jeanne Moreau, a seductive and sexy presence, even in her 70s
• The late Françoise Dorléac
• Angie Stone
• The late Syreeta Wright
• Carmen Maura (it's an Almodovar thing)

Wouldn't you be careful about picking an entertainer?

It still makes me laugh - Stephen Colbert roasts Bush. Reasonably accurate transcript and video. Fox News deservedly gets a kicking in.

Hsinchu Vee-Dub

Here are the pics of that Beetle in Hsinchu I referred to a couple of days ago. The pics were taken with a Sony Ericsson K700i.

Logo usage:

Coincidentally, I have just unwrapped my new copy of 'English as She is Spoke'.

It's true. Happiness is the man with rhythm!

Listening to:

• Billy Larkin & the Delegates (only been searching for something on CD for 6 years), especially "Pygmy' parts one and two & 'Cuchy Frito Man'
• Tropicalia - revolution music from 60s Brazil (Gal Costa, Os Mutantes, etc)
• The New Mastersounds
• OST for 'Sweet Charity'

Almost...

...home. Landed at 5am this morning and was driven to the office (breakfast and conference call before I get to skedaddle).

How does one end a trip? Probably not by getting drunk with the general manager of the hotel you're staying in. But Joachim and I spent ages talking about Taiwan's politics, the hotel trade and my pet hobby, Lebanon. Interesting character, and I look forward to meeting him again when I go back out in early July.

Thursday morning didn't get off to a good start, as I dropped my breakfast tray (coffee & croissant) at Taipei airport, causing heavy destruction in a small area, without a speck on me - not comforting for the lady whose ankles were splashed with hot coffee. Sorry. Spent a few hours in the New Territories of Hong-Kong for a meeting, then jumped back on a plane for the London leg.

I am glad to be back (it's been nearly four weeks) and I have lots of packages waiting for me - CDs (e.g. Tropicalismo/Tropicalia), DVDs (Japanese & Chinese cinema) and books (Kapuzcinski & Saramago) - as well as a big family bash tomorrow (get to see my little nieces and my not-so-little nephews), but I already have slightly itchy feet.

I like to hobo.

Stroll on, Fearless

I'm not...

...big on Taiwanese newspapers (way too partisan, making Stateside rags a paragon of balanced reporting), but I liked this headline from today's copy of The China Post:

'Chinese man buys MiG-21 fighter jet, wants refund'

Twisted seductive things

A couple of days ago I went to have a meeting with one of our customers out here in Taiwan. In the car park, I was stunned to see a black VW Beetle (original shape), with a swastika on the side (yes, that globally infamous brand logo). I took a couple of snaps, and if I can get my phone to talk to my laptop again, i'll post them here. Was it driven by a Nazi sympathiser? Who knows, but probably not - I remember a former Japanese colleague of mine who, while attending the Oktoberfest in Bavarai several years ago, climbed on the table - during a particularly rapturous, climactic episode in some especially compelling Bavarian oompah band music (yeah, right) - and raised his arm in a Nazi salute. My colleagues immediately pulled him off the table before it caused a controversy. Was he a Nazi? No, he just liked armies and uniforms - you know, a twat.

I wish I had seen the Billy Wilder film 'The Lost Weekend', starring Ray Milland. There, I said it.

Anyway, brain breeze aside, I hope I can get a ticket to see 'Celine & Julie Go Boating' by Jacques Rivette at the NFT for when I get back to London.

I have just bought a new laptop for personal use , after my father lovingly stuffed the last one. I can now go back to keeping my private stuff separate from my work thingies (salary porn). That means more writing, but I am still unlikely to pull my finger out and submit more tat for publishing - i'm just not that interested. Writing is fun, why ruin it by trying to get stuff published? I only do it under duress (I like the gag and chains).

Learning about: top ten monkey sex positions (thanks, SH)

Whip it on me, Fearless

C'est fini

I have finally removed all my old poetry and prose from WriteWank. The Showcase page was removed some time ago. All that's left are the comments I made on other people's work. It's almost as if I was never there. I have restricted membership (to view the directory of writing opportunities) until July, then it's adios. I get a better heads-up of appropriate writing opps from Da Bomb, and I should also rely on my own initiative. Edits start late June, when I next take some downtime.

The road trip to Marrakesh is back on, hopefully before year-end, APAC tours permitting.

Conclusion for the day: Craigslist is still the best cure for writers block. Particularly this afternoon.

Deep in the Foreign Office, a civil servant sings...

'Musical Interlude #147,659'

Presidents do it,
Prime Ministers do it,
even crooked local priests do it.
Let's do it,
let's bomb Iraq.

11th March 2006

Relocating...

'A Day in the Life'

Shooting up to get down,
your eyes spin round and round.

With monkey aboard
you double the dose
to lift your load -
higher and higher -
getting you close…

…but sky-high is coal mine-low
as deeper and deeper you go -
euphoria and depression
ricochet with pin-ball certainty
as you flounder in pin-sharp clarity,
caught on CCTV in a town centre alley.

30th January 2006

Deer meat

Yesterday I caught Faiyaz Jafri's Mobile Fawn at the 'Oh! My Deer!' exhibit - a 'feast of mind, buffet of art'. The Fawn is designed as the ultimate eco-friendly RV (recreational vehicle).

Here it/she is:





















Occupants of the fawn at rest:
















In-Fawn entertainment system:




















Architectural design:
















Banner:

Weekend wander

Did the chilli pork again last night, as per our tradition every time i'm here. Unusually, we didn't go for seconds or thirds. I'm getting lardy, and need to cut out the ale & ciggies.

I spent the afternoon at Art Taipei 2006, at the Huashan Cultural Centre, showcasing contemporary art from Taiwan - with some works from China & Australia. It was fresh, funky and original. I was a little annoyed by people taking photographs of the artworks, rather than absorbing and imagining - is to use the memory and heart passe?

Some of the artwork explored the theme of loneliness and isolation, e.g. even when there's a bunch of you in the same boat (like when a rural economy becomes an industrial one) you're all alone, together. What several of the artists have noted is that many people are not feeling homesick as they move around. Not because they are tough - rather it's because they are disconnected, alienated.

Although I didn't take photos, here's a link to one of the galleries that were involved - the Joki Gallery. Unfortunately, I couldn't find a link to the 'City Massage Group' of Taiwan, and their latest work, 'Devouring'.

I also visited the flower market and the jade market. It's monsoon season, so very humid. It was a joy to walk amongst lillies and sunflowers, but a bit of a wrench to look for some jade - not that I really know how to identify the quality stuff (i'm still learning).

Off to the gym (yes, really), then Shihlin Night Market.

Stuffed

Max took me to the Grand Hotel up in the hills of Taipei, so we could enjoy lunch and take in the panoramic view. As lovers of Hong-Kong cuisine, we ordered too much. We suffered for it. Until we had the octopus later in the evening, in Danshui - one of the few places to see the Taiwanese at their most laidback. But with my new red jacket (GuaranteedGay™ as Max and the shop assistant exclaimed), I break wind in the face of indigestion. Profusely. Loudly. Sme -

Naya zindagi, naya jeevan*

* 'New way, new life'

First full day in Taipei, very nearly missed thanks to my predilection for deep sleep, albeit punctured by a phone call in the early hours from the UK - my friendly mobile operator, confirming that my mobile number change has gone through ( a text message would have been enough). That I am now down to one mobile (the other contract being terminated through lack of use) is sheer bliss, and now only work and the ClosestOfTheClose™ can get hold of me. With the landline also being ditched in favour of a SkypeIn number, I have much more control and pay an awful lot less. Naya zindagi, naya jeevan (barring the pending sex change).

Spent late afternoon in Taipei's top tea shop. Was treated to a tasting session and told that I could stop by for free tea whenever in town - I don't even have to buy any more tea. The sweet guy gave me great advice (and a practical lesson) on brewing tea the Chinese way, as well as tips on how to make the best fruit tea.

People are just great.

Even assholes.

Stuck in a long queue, passport in hand?

Then listen to reggae. Try 'Dulcemania' by Drumbago & The Dynamites, produced by Clancy Eccles on Trojan c.1968 - reggae with flute and horns. Under the same circumstances, I wouldn't recommend that you listen to Bob Marley's 'Waiting in Vain'.

Question: why does the 'guest relations manager' of a hotel only introduce themselves to you after you have checked out?

'You're not married, are you'
Bell Boy at The Ritz Landis Taipei, on learning that this is a three and a half week business trip

'Didn't I see you in Shanghai on Friday morning?'
My 3Pm meeting today in Seoul (before I flew to Taipei)

From ping-pong to pinball...

Minimal Stories

A shitty day, laden as it was with work that I had to catch up on. Anyway, I managed to catch (having the DVD with me) 'Historia Minimas' from Argentina. The thread regarding the character of 'Don Justo' reminded me of 'Alvin Straight' in David Lynch's 'Straight Story'.

This week's 'women I love' are director Julia Solomonoff, actress Sally Hawkins and Indian actress Rekha.

Things not to do: squirt shaving oil in your eyes (by accident, in case you still think I take mad bets).

Two more meetings tomorrow, then it's 'annyonghi kyeseyo Seoul', as I take the late flight to Taipei.

Obit

The NY Times obit of John Kenneth Galbraith. Have just discovered that former UK ambassador to Washington & presenter of Weekend World, Peter Jay, is a professor at Henley Management College. I wonder if they'll accept my application?