Archive for the 'Culture & Society' Category

We were having lunch with my pal Michael Spencer over the weekend and he was telling us about the educational workshops he runs in Japan to bring music into the lives of school kids. Here is a video of Mike doing his thing, bringing together the cultures of Europe and Japan in one concert. I’m particularly intrigued by how he used Skype for some of his workshops to bring the music of Spain to the Japanese kids!

I was having lunch with a friend the other day and the talk turned to our upcoming summer holidays. She was off to Norfolk for a week with some friends and a convoy of all their children. They were packing bicycles and kayaks and everyone was excited about having trips on the water and cycle rides on the flatlands and hikes across fields. But, my friend said, a part of her just wanted to veg out on a sun lounger and read the pile of books she’s had by her bedside now for months.

We talked about how much we loved having a good book to absorb us. She laughed, “Are you like me? I just don’t want to be disturbed. Never mind the kids. Never mind Pete (her husband). I just want them to go away so I can just get on with my book…”

Doesn’t it make you wish you were a kid or a student again? With all those long summer holidays - weeks and weeks of nothing to do but read and read? Nowadays, in our busy grown up lives, we all seem to have to squeeze in the pleasure of reading on commutes or in the few minutes before we go to bed.

Flashing through my mind are memories of many summers I’ve passed over the decades and the books that defined those long hot weeks. In my next few posts, I’m going to be blogging about those books and the times of my life that they conjure up for me.

For now, I’ve already started on my summer reading list and thoroughly enjoying it. I’m cheating a little as it’s not quite accurate to say that I’m reading my summer books - I’m actually listening to them: as audiobooks downloaded from Audible. I make sure to get the Unabridged versions so I get full value for money and also the full efforts of the author. Being read a story is one of the loveliest pleasures in life and I’m basking in the indlugence. I’ve ploughed through a few since spring and today, I’ve just started on a perfect summer book - and I’ll be blogging about what that is in a few days…

What I am more interested in knowing right now is: What’s on your list of books to read this summer?

~~~

Photo: thanks to Matt Seppings on flickr.com ((CCL)

***WARNING: This review of The Wrester contains spoilers.***

It’s late at night and outside the rain is falling. It seems an appropriate setting to reflect on the dark side of the American dream, or the dark side of following your passion. We are encouraged by so many self-help books and self-styled gurus and coaches “to follow your passion” with the promise of riches and happiness at the end of the hard work and tough choices. But what if that passion has you so much in its hold that there is no time or space, or even emotional or psychological resources, left for anything else?

We’ve just been watching The Wrestler, the movie that came out recently starring Mickey Rourke as a professional wrestler who was once at the top of his game but is now past his prime and just barely keeping his battered and tortured body in the ring. The opening act is relentlessly brutal showing the physical beatings he takes for the sake of his sport and for the adoration of the fans. Wrestling at this level is partly pre-determined in that the wrestlers agree the general flow of the match and the moves they are going to make but it’s very real in that they really do brutalise their bodies to some degree. It’s part of the show and showmanship that sends the fans into cheering hysteria. The climax of the first act is a match that involves barbed wire, a staple gun, broken glass and falling from a high ladder.

In the ring, the wrestler, Randy “The Ram” Robinson moves with ease and in the locker room, he is the top dog, comfortable, confident, genial and a hero among the other wrestlers. But outside, in the real world, he lives in a trailer and is late with his rent payments. He is estranged from his daughter and the only human contact he has is with a stripper whom he pays 60 bucks to for a conversation and a lap dance. He takes casual work in a superstore, packing meat, to make ends meet but he’s gone the moment the next gig comes along. He is monosyllabic and uncomfortable in his bulking form and the people around him keep calling him by his real name Robin and he keeps having to correct them. “Randy,” he keeps saying, “It’s Randy”.

He gave up everything to follow his passion - his wife, his daughter, steady work, a house. And for a time, it is clear, he had the fame and the glory, those great prizes that we are promised for following our passion, all documented in faded press cuttings. But now, after a heart attack, he finds that he is left with nothing and no-one. On his doctor’s advice, he retires from the ring and for a little while, he tries to start a new life, re-connecting with his daughter, taking a permanent job at the deli counter at the superstore, tentatively building a real relationship with the stripper outside of the bar. But he seems smaller, emasculated, bumbling and ill-equipped for his role as father. He comes to be a pathetic figure, like a huge, pacing lion caged in a plastic cap and apron behind the deli counter.

The film is about a wrestler on the face of it but it might be about any artist, sports person or performer - or an entrepreneur or business person or anyone with a career - who has gives their all to their profession and who may achieve the heights of fame and glory in their endeavour. You might be like the wrestler in the movie with nothing to your name but your skill as a showman in the ring. Or you might be a rock star on endless tours or a golfing genius who works relentlessly to stay at the top of your game or a partner in a global accountancy firm with wealth and recognition within your industry. If the ring or arena that you have chosen for yourself is the only place you come alive then the rest of the time, you may one day find yourself in the same, dark, empty trailer where Randy lives all alone. If you do not take care of your life outside of your chosen ring, if you do not pay attention to those who love you beyond that arena or practice the skills it takes to live your life after the match, you may find that there is nothing and no-one waiting for you after your moment in the spotlight.

Did Randy become so unskilled in the real world and in the real relationships in his life because he spent too long in the world of wrestling and honing the skills that made him a star there? Or was it that in the final analysis, the only real skills he had were those that made him a success in the hard macho arena of a wrestler’s life and the world of the ring was where he found his place - and ultimately, the life where he belonged? Perhaps there are aspects of both those views that are true. Might it be that someone who is highly skilled in numbers and finance and spreadsheets might find themselves top dog in the world of multinational accountanting but have no real skills in building good relationships outside of that “ring”? And so they are celebrated as chief executive and a leader in their field, acclaimed and admired by business associates, colleagues and strangers within that industry - and they love their lives in that arena because their skills there make success so easy. In the meantime, they may be spending all their energy in that world to obscure the uncomfortable fact that they have no real skills with the wife (or husband) and children or in developing relationships that are not based on business or in bonding with friends who value them for who they are and not what they can do.

Following your passion is a great piece of advice because it can give you a sense of purpose and meaning as the many self-help books and success coaches tell us. But there is a dark side, especially if your passion becomes a replacement for the real relationships in your life - or perhaps a grandiose excuse to neglect them - because those relationships are too difficult or lacking the grand emotive drama of fandom or simply because you’re not very good at them. For someone like Randy, through the choices he makes, his passion becomes his real life because there is nothing else left. I found The Wrestler heart-wrenching, depressing, and poignant. Like all the classic tragic heroes, Randy is trapped by his fatal flow and you know from the beginning that there is only one way it’s going to end but you just watch on, helpless and crying out for him, as the inevitable conclusion rolls ever into sight. But what makes the film so powerful is that when the end comes, even while you despair at his choice, you also know that in some ways, it is a happy ending because it is in the ring that he comes alive so it seems apt that it is there that he chooses to embrace his death - and his only way out of the ring.

Poster photo: from Wikipedia, with thanks

Aaah, the 80s! Big shoulder pads, big hair, big earrings - those were the days… And I had ‘em all.

I was clearing out some cupboards the other weekend and came across these old passport photos. Hilarious!

I would often be mistaken for Brazilian or some such exotic Latina… Hola, chicos!

Inspired by the musical based on life of Doris Day that we went to see a while back, I had a hankering to see her Calamity Jane again. Thanks to Youtube, there’s a treasure trove of clips.

This is one of my favourite set pieces from the film:

As a kid I was a tomboy and there were very few films or books at the time where the heroine wasn’t some limp lettuce of a girly girl, always in need of rescue by some energetic, self-determined and heroic guy. In Calamity Jane, I was astonished and hypnotised by this feisty tomboy portrayed by a major Hollywood star in a big cast-of-thousands musical, in a storyline where she’s the heroine who saves the day and gets her man and is the at the very heart of the community of Deadwood. It was a story that told me that, regardless of what other people around me wanted me to be or how they wanted me to dress - a sweet, demure girly in frilly frocks - I could succeed being just who I was : an outspoken tomboy in jeans and sneakers!

The recent volcano ash travel crisis has really shown up how dependent we’ve become on fast international travel by air. We do business across continents and holiday in far flung places without a thought for how huge those distances are. We have second or even third homes in different countries that we expect to visit every weekend or so. We conduct relationships with partners, spouses and family who live in other nations as if they all lived in an adjoining neighbourhood. We expect fresh fruit and veg from distant climates such as strawberries and lettuce in winter and newly cut mediterranean flowers in our centrally heated homes. But the natural world is not the kiddies playground that we have to think it is - there’s no rubberized, bouncy ground for us to fall on or health and safety legislation to give us someone to sue if we hurt ourselves by being in places and doing things that put ourselves at risk.

All this came to mind as I read stories of travellers having a horrendous time getting to their destinations by alternative means like ferry, train and coach or car. We expect to be able to fly from southern Europe to the UK in a couple of hours and are devastated and exhausted when it takes us 24 or 48 hours or more by other mechanized means. We’ve forgotten that we’re talking about crossing a continent here. We’ve forgotten how tiny and puny we are without the mechanical, electronic and industrialized extensions of our selves and identity that have been created for us over the last century. We’ve forgotten to respect the vastness of the oceans, the ruggedness of the land mass and the power of the mountains that surround us. When you have to make your way by foot or horse or by sail, you are at the mercy of whatever you encounter - brigands, flood, scorching sun, high winds and storms. In centuries before our time, travel was dangerous and took a long time - and people understood and were in awe of the natural landscapes and forces around them.

That is not to say that I would want us all to go back to those times. But I think this current travel crisis is an opportunity for us all to reflect on how complacent and cossetted - and distanced from the natural power of our world - we have become. It’s no bad thing to have the time suddenly to think about how we’ve set up our lives. Do we really need several homes in several countries? Do we need to fly across continents for a weekend break? Do we need strawberries in winter? I’m no greeny tree hugger and I’m not advocating a puritanical lifestyle but taking the time to question some of our expectations and constructs about what makes a good life, slowing down to become more aware of ourselves and the desires that pull us unsustainably can only be a good thing.

Photo: thanks to Powerhouse Museum from flickr.com (CCL)

I’m a great fan of the TV crime series Bones, about a forensic anthropologist who helps the CIA solve crimes from analysis of skeletal remains. Dr Temperance Brennan, created by novelist Kathy Reichs from her own experience as a forensic anthropologist, can look at a skeleton in an impromptu grave and tell you that the victim was a female (from the shape of the pelvis), under 30 (from the hardening of the bone, Caucasian (from the shape of the skull) and from Eastern Europe (from the dental work). Yes, I learnt all that from watching telly so if ever I come across skeletal remains, I too can give you an on the spot identification…

But, seriously, if you want to learn this stuff for real - without going through many years of arduous professional training - the Museum of London is running a course for folk like you and me that will give you some basic skills such as:

“# how to age and sex skeletons
# which bones are important to measure
# what these measurements can tell us about physique and stature
# how we use bones to learn about health, disease and injury”*

You get access to the Museum’s 17,000 skeletons and get a chance to actually handle the bones…

Check out their course on The bare bones: Introduction to the study of human skeletons which runs from 28 April to 07 July.

~~~

* extract from course description on the Musuem of London Bare Bones webpage

Photo:
- of the Bones TV series DVD from Amazon.co.uk
- of skeleton

My father has picked up his pen again to continue his Memories of Malaya series, sharing his memories of his boyhood in Malaya.

He writes:

When I first went to the Victoria Institution it was into Form One. In addition to arithmetic we were introduced to geometry and algebra. For some reason I had difficulty in arithmetic although I was very good in the other two subjects. In arithmetic I think it was the question of language which was causing the difficulty. The problem was this: there are 3 rulers; ruler A is 3 feet long; ruler B is half as long as ruler A and ruler C is half as long as ruler A but is one and half times longer than ruler B. I may not have stated the question correctly but it was this kind of question.

But the odd thing is this: the boys who had come from Chinese schools still continued to do very well in arithmetic although the English language is not their strong subject; they did not seem to encounter any difficulties. After my brilliant results previously it was a great disappointment when I came out in the middle of my class in the half yearly examination. Father then started intensive coaching of me and I improved my position. So I crept up the form every year until about Form 3 when I began to come up to the top 3 in the class always competing with the other doctor’s son.

The school started streaming the two top classes when we were in Form 4. It was a simple process: the top forty boys in the form in the Form 3 exams were sent to the science stream in Form 4 and the next forty to the Arts streams. The rest went on to the lower classes in the form. In the science stream we had to do the 3 sciences, that is, Chemistry, Physics and Biology as three subjects and not one as general science. They were not all that difficult and I enjoyed them. Then came Form 5 when we were introduced to Additional Mathematics which I also enjoyed.

As I wanted to read law I started to take private tuition in Latin in preparation for taking the subject in Form 5. Again it proved not difficult because it was a logical language. Latin is helpful in two ways for learning the English Language: firstly if you have a large Latin vocabulary it helps with your English vocabulary and vice verse of course; secondly it also helps your English sentence construction; the dative and ablative cases make one aware of the use of prepositions in an English sentence.

One of the highlights of this period in school was the celebration connected with the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II. The country organized parades and there was a street procession with the various communities contributing floats to go round the town. Every class held a tea-party on the day. We did not have television, so we did not see the proceedings but the school children were able to see a film of the coronation when the film came to the country much later on. We could hear the music of “Land of Hope and Glory” whenever we turned on the radio.

A less happy event was the killing of the High Commissioner for Malaysia whilst he was traveling to Fraser’s Hill on a Saturday: he was shot together with one or two of his military and police aides and escorts by the communists. The school scout troops were given the honour of lining the route where his cortege would pass on the way to the church. I was in the contingent. It was a great blow to the government - the country was still not independent - and demoralized it.

His successor was General Sir Gerald Templer who was a no-nonsense soldier. He would put a village or town under a twenty-four hour curfew if after some soldiers or police were killed and no one came to give information. There was a case that involved the small town of Tanjong Malim which created quite an outcry in the newspapers in England. There was no actual fighting with the communists in the large towns. Most of the confrontation was in rubber estates, secondary jungle and sometimes further inside.

One of the ways the government devised to combat the threat was to resettle all persons living in outlying areas into a settlement which was surrounded by barbed wire fence and guarded by special constables to prevent these villages from supplying food and medicine to the communists. According to official reports this method worked to a certain extent. The civilian population was not allowed to carry any food when traveling between towns and persons in buses and cars were searched at check points placed along the main and trunk roads. For the civilians this was the only contact with the military operations.

General Templer wanted to involve as many communities and as many people in the fight. Special constables and home guards were formed. Both were drawn from persons who had no military training but after a little bit of marching drill and practice with the rifle they were given a rifle and an arm band with the word “Special Constable” as they had no uniforms and their main job was to patrol the resettlement-villages or New Villages as they were called or to assist in manning road blocks. Boy scouts were called in to act as couriers to deliver mail amongst the military and police establishments. I was involved and went to a briefing but was never called upon to do anything.

A General du Fonblanque was assigned to organize the Home Guard. Their presence was not much in evidence in the towns as far as I can recollect. I met his daughter, Patricia, who was at Newnham at the time I was at Corpus Christi, Cambridge when she attended meetings of the Malayan Association of the University.

Photo: of Victoria Institution, thanks to hbp.usm.my with thanks

memmlya

This week’s blog posts seem to be themed around food and restaurants. I guess they’ve been on my mind…!

For some reason, occasionally, a number of people say to me, “Oh, you don’t eat meat” or “You’re vegetarian, aren’t you?” - eg when we’re arranging to go for a meal or when we’re talking about gyms we go to, running and health and fitness.

“What makes you think I’m a vegetarian?!” I find myself crying out in horror.

These people don’t know me very well, clearly!

My instinctive reaction is to be insulted. No offense to my friends who are vegetarians (and some of my best friends are!) or to anyone else who is a vegetarian. It’s just that I don’t see myself as one and my self-image and identity is tied up with being a Malaysian ominvore with a hearty appetite for meat. So for me, the possibility that others might see me as anything but that upsets my sense of self!

But then I calm myself down by telling myself that what these acquaintances probably mean is that I seem healthy and fit and I don’t drink. Perhaps in their eyes, I have an “alternative” or non-establishment air about me - and maybe even an aura of loving-kindness?. So, maybe in their thinking, someone like that must also have a very healthy and pure diet that excludes dastardly deeds done to living creatures but focuses on lush, juicy, wholesome fruit and veg. That’s a compliment, right?

Well, the funny thing is that I may be half-way to becoming more vegetarian. I started at a new gym the other week and had my first personal training session. For some time now, I’ve been trying to lose what my sister calls my “muffin top” that peeps out over my jeans. However, despite much running and huffing and puffing on the cardio machines and weights at my old gym, the muffin is still defiantly there. The new personal trainer has recommended that I cut out carbs after lunch to solve this problem.

So I am trying out a new habit of substituting loads more veg and salad instead of rice, pasta or potatoes with my evening meal. He said that I could have as much fish or meat as I wanted so I’m leaving my usual portions of protein as they are. The idea is that I don’t go to bed loaded down with carbs that have nowhere to go but round my tummy and other such undesirable locations while I sleep - in contrast during the day, carbs are burnt off as energy while I move around etc.

It hasn’t been too arduous so far as it’s only one meal a day that I have to tweak. By having extra portions of veg instead of rice etc, I’ve been nicely full and that’s one of the main priorities for me in the evening - to have a feeling of contentment and satisfaction after a long day rather than going to bed hungry and craving more food. I think it will be fairly easy to follow, too, when I go out for meals with friends in the evenings if we go to a Western restaurant where the meat and veg offerings are fairly bland. But it’s going to be a challenge when we go to Malaysian or other Asian eateries for dinner where the spicy dishes need rice to blend and dilute the strong flavours….

So for those of you who might see me with a plate piled high with vegetables at dinner time, before you assume I’m a veggie look again and you will see the meat lurking underneath. I’m not a vegetarian, ok?

Photos:
veg - thanks to Muffet from flickr.com (CCL)
muffin - thanks to yomi955 from flickr.com (CCL)