Archive for the 'East v. West' Category

I got a new mobile phone a few months ago and I’ve been slowly exploring all its functions - and in the process, I’m discovering a whole new mobilesphere (I have no idea if there is such a word but it seems an apt way to describe the world of mobile media in the way that blogosphere describes the world of blogs!). My new phone is also a mobile computer, running Windows Mobile and 80% of its front face is given over to the screen - the phone part of it has a virtual keypad for me to touch-type the phone number. It runs a mobile version of Word, Excel, Outlook and Internet Explorer. It has WiFi so so I can surf the internet as well as send and receive emails if there’s a WiFi service available - but I also splashed out and signed up for a monthly data plan so I could be connected wherever I am. With unlimited texting and a huge number of talk minutes on top of all that, the way I relate to my mobile phone has completely changed.

I used my old mobile phone solely for voice calls - and I did not use it a great deal as I don’t like shouting out my part of the conversation in public while I’m on the bus or in the street. I hated texting as I am not very nimble on using the telephone number keys to type out words. My new phone has a Qwerty keyboard (ie like a PC keyboard) as well as letter recognition on a touch-sensitive screen. Now I can email or SMS to my heart’s content in public - an excellent way to pass the time on the bus or wherever I am in transit!

Being a writer with this new writing tool to play with, naturally, I was curious when I came across an article about mobile phone novels. These are apparently huge in Japan. According to Wired magazine: “A mobile phone novel typically contains between 200 and 500 pages, with each page containing about 500 Japanese characters. The novels are read on a cell phone screen page by page, the way one would surf the web, and are downloadable for around $10 each.” The novelists tend to be young twenty-somethings or even teenagers who type their novels via their own cellphones. According to the writer interviewed by Wired, she can type faster on her phone than on a standard keyboard. There’s even a first mobile phone novel award - sponsored by the premier site that hosts these novels Magic iLand: might you call it the MoBooker?

There has been one author in the West who has written a novel on his mobile phone. According to a news report, “Italian writer Robert Bernocco took advantage of his idle time while commuting to and from work by train, writing his 384-page science fiction novel, Compagni di Viaggo (Fellow Travelers is the English translation), on his Nokia 6630 phone, using the phone’s T9 typing system.” The book has been published in traditional book form by Lulu.com.

I have to say, I admire the abilities of these two writers to master the mobile phone keypad. Even with the mini Qwerty keyboard and letter-recognition function of my new phone, I do not have the patience to write more than a few short text messages or emails on the fiddly thing!

It seems to me, in the West, there has not been any novel specially written for the mobile phone, as far as I know. I don’t think that the reason is necessarily the difficulty of writing on a mobile phone keypad - presumably, one could write it on a PC, blog-style, and then post it to whatever mobile phone novel site there is around. I wonder if Wester writers shouldn’t try this potential new genre. It would be a great way for a new writer starting out to write 500 words at a time. It’s great for readers as most of us have our mobile phones with us at all times - it’s a handy way to read short bite-sized chunks. Writing short, gripping prose is pretty hard, to be sure, and reading a lot of text on a tiny screen can be hard on the eyes. But I think these are excellent challenges for a writer to evolve a writing style exactly suited to this new medium - rather like writing poetry to the constraints of the sonnet form rather than just sticking a few lines together in the modern free-form style.

Would you read a novel on your mobile phone? Do you know of any writers in English who have a written mobile phone novel? Would you, as a writer, be tempted to try writing one? Add a comment or email me and share your views.

Photo: thanks to europe.htc.com

Carol Major and Hilda Tam Hio Man are co-authoring a historical novel set in Hong Kong, inspired by a true love story in Carol’s family. Carol’s husband’s grandfather, a white Australian, secretly married a Chinese woman in the 1960s - but her existence did not come to light until after he died, although she had lived in his flat since the late 1960s. She must have been in her late teens or early twenties when they married. The grandfather would have been over 65. Following her discovery she disappeared.

Carol has been haunted by this story ever since - Who was this woman? Why did she agree to be hidden from the family for all of those years? And what became of her?

To answer these questions she turned to fiction, although a fiction that would be based on historical facts. She wanted to imagine the sorts of situations that would lead to such choices. Carol asked Hilda if she could assist from a Chinese point of view.

When Carol told me about this story, I wondered if the readers of Fusion View may be able to help her. I know that many of you love books and stories and have connections with the Hong Kong, China, Malaysia and Singapore. So I suggested to Carol that we might put a call for help up here on Fusion View and maybe some of you could help with this great project.

The authors need your help with the texture and detail of life in Hong Kong in the 1950s and 1960s to help them flesh out the historical details of their novel, inspired by this haunting love story.

Carol writes:

The story is about two little girls, Chloe and Yun, who emigrate from the mainland to Hong Kong in 1950. Chloe is an orphaned Eurasian. She is taken in by a British couple in Hong Kong and attends an Anglican school. Yun is Chinese. Her family had hoped to have a better life in Hong Kong but end up depending on the Triads for their livelihood.

Chloe hopes to make a successful life through hard work. Yun sees no way out of her situation but to marry a westerner who will take her overseas. Events come to a climax when a British official who has been involved in corruption becomes an embarrassment for both the Triads and the British administration. He is banished to Australia with a minder to ensure that he does not tell his story. The minder is Yun.

The women continue to correspond with one another as they try to make sense of where fortune has taken them.

What help we need

We are looking for texture and detail. Did any of our readers live on the Peak in the late 1950s, early 1960s? Did their parents? What would be the response to a little Eurasian girl attending an Anglican school? How would she be treated by the other girls?

We will create a fictional school but need historical details to colour it. Can our readers describe the layout of classrooms, the daily routine, the food in the cafeteria, clique behaviour, summer vacations and so on?

Most of the dwellings that existed on the Peak during that time have been torn down and replaced by high rises. Does anyone have photos of the smaller bungalows? What were the interiors like and so on?

How did people travel up and down to the city in those days? I took the peak tram and also walked up using the escalator. Might Chloe have taken the same route to visit Yun?

Does anyone know what the border at Shenzhen looked like in the 1950s, and the entry process? It has been completely done over now.

Are their any stories or thoughts that run parallel with the plotline that might inform it and add colour? We would love to hear them.

Research so far

We have read much history from general sources and spent time in the Museum of History in Hong Kong gathering information about the time period in question. Articles appearing in the Royal Asiatic Society Journals have also helped. We have also read Elsie Tu’s books about Colonial Hong Kong. A contact who worked with an intelligence service is providing de-identified material on the operations of the Triads and the British Administration. Another contact whose father was involved with the Colonial Office is providing additional detail.

We have found that it is the personal experiences of real people that make the difference. Hilda has asked students to collect stories from their parents and grandparents. It would be fantastic to have more stories about those who came from the mainland in the 1950s—their dreams and what they left behind.

If you can help, please contact Carol (carol.major[at]advancednarrative.com) or Hilda (da_tam[at]yahoo.com). Please also mention Fusion View in your email to them.

More about the Authors

Carol Major was born in Scotland, immigrated to Canada as a girl and settled in Australia in her late twenties. She has been a professional writer for over twenty years with numerous articles published in the health care and social policy field. She is a principal of Advanced Narrative www.advancednarrative.com, a company that specialises in using story telling techniques. She completed both a Master and Doctorate of Arts Degree (Creative Writing) at the University of Technology in Sydney, Australia, during which time she completed two novels. Her short stories have appeared in literary journals and anthologies in Canada and Australia, and on the performance website 1001 Nights Cast.

Hilda Tam Hio Man lives in Macau. Her first novel Ah Xun¡’s 5 Destinies was published by Association of Stories in Macao (ASM) in 2006. Hilda’s poetry and translations have recently appeared in Jacket, Segue, Cipher Journal, Poesia Sino-Occidental and The Drunken Boat. A collaborative volume of translations of the Tang poet Meng Jiao was published by ASM last year. Hilda is now working on the translations of classical poems by women poets of the Song dynasty and writing a novel with Carol. She holds a Master of Arts in English Studies from the University of Macau.

I’ve just spent a week in Barcelona, partly attending the IABC EuroComm Conference 2008 where I chaired a panel discussion on social media and partly for a holiday. I’ll be blogging about the conference and the issues that came out of the panel discussion separately. But being a foodie, my first post about the trip has to be about the food we had there!

They call it tapas, the tid-bits of food that the Spanish serve in the early evening before the main meal. It’s very civilised compared to the UK where you generally gobble a packet of crisps and some peanuts with your pint at the pub. The Spanish lay out fried potatoes, spicy morsels of chorizo, sliced octopus, fried calamari and cuttlefish, fried aubergines - the list goes on. Over a long drink and great conversation, it’s just the best way to unwind after a hard day’s sightseeing or shopping. But I have to say, it makes me think of dim sum, the Chinese tid-bits that you generally have for Sunday lunch - in Australia, they call it “yum chah”, I think. My contention is that the Spanish got the idea from the Asia-Pacific region via the likes of Marco Polo, Vasco de Gama etc.

And it’s not just tapas. In Barcelona, there’s a speciality dish which is stir-fried seafood vermicelli - which looks and tastes exactly like the Chinese “chow mai fan” that you get in Malaysia. We would eat it with chilli sauce but they serve it with a daub of garlic butter - equally yummy!

We also came across a fried springroll thing but instead of veg and pork, it is stuffed with chorizo and onions.

And we were struck by the word for butter “mantega”, which is the same word for butter used in Malay. Staying with linguistics, the Spanish word “nona” means woman - I wonder if it is related to the Malaysian word “nonya” which refers to a Straits Chinese woman?

I’m pretty sure these are not merely fanciful connections on my part. Malacca and the Straits of Malacca were critical in the spice trade between West and East during the 1400s so I’m sure words, food and ideas travelled with the sailing ships between the Spanish ports and Malaya. In particular, I was struck by the Arabic influence in Spanish due to the many centuries of Moorish occupation and of course, Arabic continues to be a strong influence in Malay language and culture.

What do you think? If you have any other examples of linguistic or culinary connections between East and West, please do share your thoughts!

Photo: thanks to Gbworx from flickr.com (CCL)

I’ve never appreciated roast turkey with all the trimmings. I find it bland and lacking in celebratory festiveness. I am especially not fond of brussel sprouts! So the traditional Christmas meal is a bit of an ordeal for me. Which is not to say I don’t like turkey as such. We often eat turkey steak or turkey escalope or diced turkey throughout the year - but cooked with wine Italian-style or soy sauce or curry Asian-style.

The problem with the traditional roast turkey meal for me is that when I was a child in Malaysia, Christmas food was just so much more - more tasty, more spicy, more varied, more exciting. We would spend Christmas with my grandparents in Taiping and the preparations would start weeks in advance. As a child, I never was aware of all the effort and hard work that Grandma put into it - with the help of all the aunties, great-aunties, cousins and second cousins all over Taiping. But everyone in the large extended family would have got involved in the vast cooking marathon that would have been needed to lay on the feast that fed over a hundred people.

In the heat of the tropics, we would have a full-blown Christian Christmas, complete with tree, Santa and carols.

The kids’ job was to decorate the house. The older second cousins would be in charge - tall, good-looking Paul who seemed so grown up to us and broad-shouldered, grinning Jason. They would be the ones up the ladders stringing the paper chains, placing the balls on the higher reaches of the Christmas tree. We younger kids would drape tinsel on the lower branches of the tree, balance cards on shelves.

On the day of the big party itself, the living room would be cleared and chairs set out for the carol service. There would be a churchful of people in there, singing our hearts out. One of the fat great-uncles would always dress up as Santa in the red suit and jolly mask, arriving at the end of the service when the lights went out. He would have a sack full of presents and ho-ho-ho his way round the room, scaring the babies with the strange staring mask.

But when it came to the food, we celebrated Malaysian-style - with curries and spicy fried dishes, rice and satay: and enough to feed an army. Memories of delicious Asia will always be associated with festivities and celebration for me so a pallid turkey for Christmas, no matter how moist you might claim it is or how Christmas-y just does not do it for me at all.

What are your memories of childhood Christmases? Please add a comment and let me know!

Photo: thanks to Mr_Woo from flickr.com (CCL)

So I wasn’t just being feeble, going down with flu a few weeks back. A study shows that the flu virus thrives in cold climates and dies out the nearer you get to the equator where temperatures get nice and hot and humid. The New York Times reports:

“Flu viruses are more stable in cold air, and low humidity also helps the virus particles remain in the air. That is because the viruses float in the air in little respiratory droplets, Dr. Palese said. When the air is humid, those droplets pick up water, grow larger and fall to the ground.”

But before we all up sticks and rush south for the winter, it’s worth remembering that in the tropics, you may not find the flu virus but there are all kinds of other grim illnesses you can get - malaria, dengue fever, yellow fever are some that come to mind.

I was reminded of a bout of fluey-type exhaustion that I experienced in my late teens while I was at Uni in the UK. I went off to the doctor who tested me for glandular fever, also known as the “kissing illness” for its prevalence among college students in the West. It came back negative and my symptoms continued to be a mystery. During the summer vacation, I headed back to Malaysia for the holidays and my parents took me off to a doctor in Kuala Lumpur. This time, they tested me for tuberculosis. I was un-nerved as TB in my mind is a pretty serious, nasty illness that killed off loads of poetic, sensitive types in English literature. But the tests also came back negative, much to our relief! In the end, the symptoms passed and I was restored to full health after some rest and relaxation at home. To this day, we don’t know what it was. But looking back on that time, what is interesting is that the different doctors tested me for wildly different illnesses, based on what would have been the most likely given their location.

It must be tough being a doctor these days in the age of global travel. It seems to me you’d have to know not just about illness that are prevalent in your locality but also about illnesses from the far corners of the earth!

Pic of John Keats: thanks to users.dickinson.edu

These poor Singaporeans have been laughed at around the world for their corporate rap…

But I have to say, I think it’s jolly game of these be-suited, square directors of the Singaporean Media Development Authority (the country’s media watchdog) to get into the rappin’ groove and poke a bit of fun at the square Singaporean image.

Further reading:

The Times - “Singapore’s corporate rap is YouTube hit”

Cheryl Snell left a comment on one of my posts, mentioning her cross-cultural Canadian and Hindu experiences. I was intrigued so I followed the link to her blog and website and found that she had written a novel about a Westerner’s experience of marrying into a Hindu family. Naturally, I had to find out more! So I invited Cheryl to write a guest piece of Fusion View.

By way of background, Cheryl Snell is a Washington DC writer, and the author of four books, including the poetry collections Flower Half Blown (Finishing Line Press, 02), Epithalamion (Little Poem Press, 04) and Samsara (Pudding House Publications, 07). She has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize three times, and is the book reviews editor for Alsop Review. She can be reached at cherylsnell3 [at] gmail.com.

Cheryl keeps two blogs, one devoted to poetry and her sister’s art at http://www.snellsisters.blogspot.com; the other an author’s blog built around her debut novel at http://www.shivasarms.blogspot.com . The novel, Shiva’s Arms (The Writer’s Lair Books) explores the relationship between an American woman and her Hindu Brahmin in-laws.

She writes:

When I first met my new family, this passage from Wonderland’s Alice popped into my head– “What if I should fall right through the center of the earth…oh, and come out the other side, where people walk upside down?” I knew the basics—don’t touch the men, no shoes in the house, have a fry pan uncontaminated by meat handy. But there were an overwhelming number of ambiguities to sift through, from the comic head-shaking that looked like No but meant Yes, to the serious conflict between freedom and family.

I had been pulled into samsara, the important householder stage. The word conjured up images of drowning in the domestic sea, and I had read many novels by Indians—Narayan, Desai, Mukerjee—who touched on its complications. I began to imagine my own project, a new novel built on the swirl of relationships around me. Always drawn to the stories with characters belonging to two cultures, I wanted to know which part of a divided self goes and which part stays.

To pit a fictional family with the weight of ancient traditions behind them against the quintessential unsuitable bride would help me to delve into an immigrant’s liminal state, from both points of view. Thresholds are so alive, with the way dualities merge, overlap and intrude on one another, I knew the intersection of cultures would afford me ample imagery. As a poet, I appreciated that.

Writing poetry transcends the personal, for me, whereas fiction relies on empathy. For both forms, I start with an image, a phrase, or an idea. Both forms distill language and meaning–in a poem every word counts, sound and syllable. In fiction, the sentences must advance plot or reveal character. With a novel, revisions are more rigorous, more of a juggle. With so much to take into consideration—characters, scenes, and points of view—it seems counter-intuitive that a novel is more forgiving. But I find that its sprawl makes it more tolerant . “In the novel or short story you get the journey. In a poem you get the arrival,” May Sarton once wrote.

That’s not to say that it’s an orderly progression. When characters run amok, and suddenly have their own plans, it’s hard to force them back into the author’s. Mary Lee Settle advised that empathy without identity is one way to keep control of a character, but it’s difficult to maintain that distance. Transformation, the way the characters change, what conclusion the narrator comes to, are born out of writing one’s way into the piece again and again, trying on different plots, tone, voice. I feel my way.

Sometimes, when all is said and done, a character has more to say. My new novel follows Nela from Shiva’s Arms, back to India. The woman who has spent her life resisting samsara finds meaning by rescuing a little girl from child marriage, at great personal cost to herself. I imagine I can hear them talking together in my poem “Veranda.”

Above sounds of a sunset world
whoops of children rise. We lean
against verdigris, watch the streetlight evolve
like some star buzzing blue to white,
then a steady nostalgic amber.

lamplighters lit my village gaslights with a hook;
old men rocking on verandas nodded off

The widow in white climbs our hill, secrets
folded in her apron. She naps here
like your auntie, one eye open to the world,
sandals dangling off her toes.

The man next door pedals his bicycle so slow,
we worry for his balance. He waves to us
like laundry on a line, half-hearted surrender.

the veranda became a sleeping-porch on hot nights;
a place for cricket games during monsoon

Houses tuck themselves in. Lamps flicker on,
rising story by story. Silence blooms, holding
its breath. I sweep the pots of flag-striped flowers
from our porch, crockery from the table.

You need more room in this place.
I will make room for you.

Photo: of Cheryl and her husband Krisha - thanks to Cheryl Snell

I was in a business meeting last week in the City of London discussing social media with colleagues and clients. As the meeting wound down, we chatted about personal matters, sitting back in our chairs and packing away our papers.

As we looked round the table, we realised that none of us was a native Englander. There was a Sudanese, a German, an Italian, a South African and a Malaysian-born Chinese. We laughed at how we were all speaking English and how we were so comfortable with each other.

The Sudanese marvelled at how in his father’s day in Sudan, the local people could not own businesses and were truly second-class citizens under the British Empire. And here he was running a thriving business in the City, with clients from all over the world, including the British who had once ruled his home country.

I shared the story that my father and his brothers had told us - of how they were not allowed to enter the gentleman’s club in Kuala Lumpur during colonial rule because they were not white. There have been other stories across the Empire of how even sultans and kings had not been allowed entry to such places because they were natives. And just earlier this year, I had walked into a gentleman’s club - a woman and a non-white - on Pall Mall and I had been treated with respect and even deference by the English staff.

The South African had an ancestor who was closely associated with the creation of apartheid, to her shame and embarrassment, and yet she herself had marched against apartheid in her youth and makes friends based on a person’s character, not their colour.

For many of our generation living in today’s Western, cosmopolitan cultures, it’s pretty much a given that we take each person for who they are and it’s not about colour or gender or orientation or whatever. It’s difficult to imagine what it must have been like for our parents and grandparents - to have experienced blanket unquestioned prejudice, or to hold such prejudices as if they were the unswerving truth. There are still people and places where racism, sexism and all kinds of other “isms” still rule the day, unfortunately - so I’m not saying we live in a perfect world. There is still much to be done to remove inequality. It was just that on that particular afternoon last week, we looked at each other and delighted in our differences and the freedom we had to enjoy those differences here in London.

Photo: from freestockphotos.com

I have to confess that I’m a secret Country & Western fan. Every time I listen to Loretta Lynne’s Coal Miners Daughter or Dolly Parton’s Coat of Many Colours, I succumb to the sentimental twangs of the guitars and the heart-warming heroism of the poor but plucky families in those autobiographical songs. Tears well up and before long, I’m sobbing into my sleeve.

It strikes me that many C&W songs are about “them good ol’ days when we was po’ but we was happy”. And it’s not just in the family saga songs. There are the songs where even though the narrator is now rich and successful, he/ she and their lover now don’t get on but way back when, back when they was strugglin’ to make ends meet - now those were the good times.

Also, many C&W songs evoke the rugged, lonely and mythical American landscape with their use of US placenames to give a sense of location. Think of Phoenix, San Francisco, Aspen, Denver, Jackson, Tennessee - these are all places I learnt about from listening to C&W songs as a kid in Malaysia.

It occurred to me that you don’t get many Asian songs about “how great it was when we was poor”. Nor are there many international hits that involve lines like “By the time I get to Johore Bahru, you’ll be waking” or “I left my heart in Penang”….

So, to redress the balance, I had a go at writing a Country & Eastern song, which I’ve called “The Ballad of the Lonesome Accountant.”

Imagine some steel string, twangy guitars and a gravelly, mournful Hank Williams sound.

I was raised up in Mud Valley*
Right beside the River Klang
We didn’t have much money
Nor much of any thang.

My mom, she fried hot noodles,
Spicy char kway teow,
Every day in Chow Kit Market,
With hardship on her brow.

My dad, he drove a fancy car
For a big time Mr Boss.
We never made much profit,
Only pockets full of loss.

Chorus:

I watch the cars fly out of town
From our porch by the Gombak freeway.
I dreamt of riches and big houses
And escaping far away.
I dream I’m a fancy accountant,
Driving, driving in my car.
I drive all through the highways
And I’m really getting far.

So I worked hard at my studies,
Gave my life up to my school.
Didn’t do no drugs nor liquor,
Nor girls nor played the fool.

And I got a job in business,
Got me some buy-to-lets.
Made a lot of profit
And paid of all our debts.

I bought my mom a great big house
And she sips martinis now,
While days of ladies lunching
Wipe the hardship from her brow.

I bought my dad a fancy car
And now he’s a big time Mr Boss.
He runs things all for profit
And never makes a loss.

I don’t have time to spend with them.
My wife and kids don’t know me.
They go shopping in the fancy malls
Living it up with my money.

Chorus:

I watch the cars fly out of town
From my Porsche on the freeway.
I see my riches and big houses
And my heart is far away.
I’m just a lonesome accountant
Driving, driving in my car.
I drive all through the highway
But am I getting far?

I wish for days so long ago
When my mom laughed out loud
At her stall in Chow Kit Market
And dad’s kindness made me proud.

I wish my wife would look at me
With eyes and heart aflame
And my kids could learn to love
More than just computer games.

Chorus:

I watch the cars fly out of town
From my Porsche on the freeway.
I see my riches and big houses
And I’m escaping far away.
I’m just a lonesome accountant
Driving, driving in my car.
I drive all through the highways
And I’m going very far.

I drive all through the highways
And I’m going very far.
Going, going, going very far.

All it needs now is for someone to set it to music and sing it for us! Any offers?

*Kuala Lumpur means “the muddy meeting place of two rivers”

~~~

Photo: of line dancing in Singapore, thanks to csc.gov.sg

PS. Come back on Monday for some videos of other Asian C&W fans doing their thang ….

For many of us over a certain age, the digital revolution has really changed our lives in a dramatic way - especially if you compare how things are now with what we were doing 30 years ago. I’ve written about such stark contrasts in my post about the difficulties and costs of phoning home to Malaysia from the UK in the 1970s and touched on how our working lives have changed because of the computer. So my interest was immediately sparked when I came across a post on music players on Say Lee’s blog A Pleasant Surprise(s), a personal blog from a Malaysian emigre to Florida, USA, talking about his daily life, family and musings on Chinese and Buddhist philosophy.

He wrote about his experiences of listening to music over the decades, starting with vinyl records played on a gramaphone and progressing via the Sony Walkman to today’s MP3 players. It reminded me of fiddling around with a cassette recorder and leads trying to tape vinyl records off my parents hi-fi so we could listen to taped music in the car. And of songs getting stuck on the turn-table if there was a scratch on the record. And the pain of having your favourite tape chewed by the tape machine and trying to unravel the mess of brown tangle from the mechanism - especially if you’d actually bought the cassette and had no other back up of it.

On the other hand, it was fun to sit around with friends passing the record sleeve around, reading the lyrics from the insert and gazing at the big photos of your favourite singer or band. And making mixer tapes of songs for your friends, writing out the titles by hand and decorating the tape box with stickers. Sure, MP3 players and iPods are much more efficient and easy and portable but doing things the old-fashioned way had a fun of its own, too.

Say Lee also writes about Chinese traditions like the Moon Cake Festival and finds opportunities to muse on Buddhist philosophy from everyday moments. I also like the warmth with which he writes about his family and it’s just delightful how he proudly displays his wife’s Chinese watercolours on his blog.