Category Archives: Asia

Asia, Colorado, Faith and Spirituality, Feelings, Politics, US History, World History

Obey

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Fall                                                                                      Falling Leaves Moon

 

Students in Jefferson County, Colorado and Hong Kong reacted strongly against authoritarian regimes that would limit the teaching of history and studies focused on the homeland. This is no accident. Children and teens are acutely aware of the BS factor in adult pronouncements. They learn some of that at home no doubt, matching parents words with their deeds, but school authorities often say one thing and do another. Kids always notice. Sometimes, like reasonable human beings, they dismiss it, probably saying something like, adults will be adults, but sometimes they notice a danger to their future, perhaps even to the adult’s future.

Especially when governments, the schoolboard in the instance of Jefferson County and Beijing in the instance of Hong Kong, try to shape teaching to conform to their own ends. In Jefferson County the schoolboard wanted a more “patriotic” curriculum that emphasized the values of free enterprise and loyalty. They also wanted a curriculum that downplayed the role of protest and other civil disobedience in the shaping of American history. In Hong Kong the movement led by Joshua Wong wanted public decision making in who would be chief executive of Hong Kong. They also opposed a moral and national educational program* that had critics among Hong Kong teachers, just like Jefferson County.

Children know that their birthright is a world in which they have a voice, in which their decisions and choices matter, in which the information on which they make those choices is as unbiased as possible. In particular they oppose bias by so called “authorities.” Why? Because children instinctively know that authority shapes reality for its own purposes.

As we grow older, we become that authority. If we are wise and can remember our own youth, we will listen to the voice of the young when they say, “I’m calling bullshit on that.”

 

*”The “China Model National Conditions Teaching Manual”, published by the National Education Services Centre under government fundings, was found to be biased towards the Communist Party of China and the so-called “China model“. The teaching manual called the Communist Party an “advanced, selfless and united ruling group” (進步、無私與團結的執政集團), while denouncing Democratic and Republican Parties of the United States as a “fierce inter-party rivalry [that] makes the people suffer”” analysis by teachers, from Wikipedia

Asia, Politics

Joshua Wong

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Fall                                                                                           Falling Leaves Moon

 

Here is my new hero. He’s 17 and got his political activist credentials at 15 when he opposed the adoption in Hong Kong of a “patriotic” curriculum. His name is Joshua Wong and his efforts, which have led to the huge protests reported in the media recently, are a larger scale example of the same kind of energy seen in Jefferson County, Colorado that I reported on this week.

Joshua quotes the movie “V for Vendetta” saying: “The people should not be afraid of the government, the government should be afraid of the people.” He’s 17 and looks younger. But this kid has courage. It was his call to occupy the Civic Square, just as a democracy movement action had begun to weaken, that resulted in his arrest, then the flooding into the streets of many other Hong Kong citizens.

Saul Alinsky said, “The action is in the reaction.” How right he is. This is a perfect example.

There is some deep part of me that is moved by the bravery and leadership of individuals against overwhelming odds, and moved profoundly. A swell begins in the chest and moves up through the heart and into the eyes, bringing tears. It is a mixture of pride, anger, fear and wonder. And underneath it all beats solid resolve. If I were in Hong Kong, I would stand with Joshua. If I were in Jefferson County, I would stand with the students there.

Make no mistake. Joshua Wong is Chinese, facing down the Chinese government. He does not want to be an American, to have our history or even our institutions. He wants the chance to participate in his, to be a Chinese citizen actively supporting his country. If we can’t support that, then our experiment here counts for nothing.

 

Asia, Faith and Spirituality, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant.

Down, In

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Lughnasa                                                                          College Moon

Something I haven’t done since Tucson. Meditate. Thought I would, but, like every other Journal workshop I’ve collected and acted on the insights, then shelved the process.

Got back at it this afternoon for a bit. Had an interesting interior journey. I walked into an ancient building made of stone, maybe a castle, and inside it I found a spiral stair case, stone, that went straight down into the earth. There were no rooms around it. A pit the size of the stair case was dug, then the stair case was built inside it. The stair case went down hundreds of feet and ended in a domed room with a mosaic roof, stone walls and benches around its circular walls.

In the center was a holy well, the water bubbling gently. I knelt before it, why I don’t know. Tilting over my body fell into the well and swam out of the well into the deep ocean.

The deep ocean was the cosmos itself. At one point I feared finding my way back, would I be consumed, depersonalized in this vast oneness. The Brahman, I suppose. No, it came to me, no matter where I was in the wholeness, I could be no other than me.

Sure enough, when I swam back I found the well easily and leaped out of it, drying before I landed on the stone floor. There were others there now, all in capes. We acknowledged each other, then I climbed the stairs, went out of the ancient building into the room where I sat.

Asia, Faith and Spirituality, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant.

Something Swims Up

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Lughnasa                                                                                   College Moon

Something is swimming in the deep ocean of my Self, circling higher and higher, moving toward the surface. It’s tempting to view it as a condor, swooping in wide circles, riding the thermals, seen by my mind’s eye, but that’s an illusion. In fact what I see with the mind’s eye is only a clue, a reminder to look down, into the interior.

( at the foot of Wu Shi Mountain (Five Lion Mountain), located beneath the spectacular Qiandao Lake)

There in the Holy Well that connects me to the All That Is the waters bubble slowly, often still for moments at a time, then roiled a bit by the artesian pressure the cosmos brings to bear on all its creations. It is in this water that something swims, something big and commanding, I think though I can’t be sure. This is where the novels live, somewhere in the benthic realm. Could be a novel moving around.

Or, it could be, well, I don’t know what. But I can feel it riding the change in the seasons. It’s sensitive to the decreasing daylight and to the increasing weakness of the Sun’s light. Might be melancholy. This is its season.

Whatever it is, it keeps pressing up, sending small waves to jolt the surface of the holy well. I look forward to its arrival.

Art and Culture, Asia, Commentary on Religion, Faith and Spirituality, Family, Minnesota, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant.

Midwest Lughnasa Festival

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Lughnasa                                                                      College Moon

We’re off to the fair today. The last hurrah as residents of Minnesota. I’ve gone many times over the years, probably a bit more than half of the years I’ve lived here, say 25. As I’ve gotten older, stamina has become a modest issue, but a bigger one is sameness. Even with the amazing number of new food products and the changing line-up in the 4-H buildings and the animal barns there is a regularity, a predictability. On-a-stick! Blue ribbon! Necessary kitchen gadget!

Of course, that very predictability is one of the fair’s charms, too. It will always have that slightly wacky, down-home feel. The Midway will have lights; machinery hill will have tractors and the GOP/DFL booths will have politicians racing their engines for an upcoming election. And, there will be cheese curds.

For a guy trying to figure out how to connect Americans with the land, with what I think of as a kami-faith for this land is our land, the state fair is a huge ritual moment. Too often an opportunity lost to take our head out of the work-a-day cubicle world and go outside, to look down, to see the amazing, miraculous things happening in the soil and among the plants. And cows. pigs. llamas. rabbits. horses. In that sense it’s the ur-moment in the year for effecting change.

 

 

 

Art and Culture, Asia, Cinema and Television, Colorado, Faith and Spirituality, Garden, Great Work, Humanities, Latin, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., The Move, Third Phase, Translating Metamorphoses, Writing

A Purging We Will Go

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Lughnasa                                                     Lughnasa Moon

Over the weekend and as deep into this week as I need to go, I’m packing up my former study. I’ve purged one file cabinet and consolidated its content into boxes for moving. A horizontal cabinet awaits attention. A large plastic tub full of art supplies went into the move with care pile. One small bookcase has been emptied and moved. The shop work bench I’ve used for storage is empty, too. That old printer, the one I bought in 1994, is in the truck and ready to go to a recycler.  An HP laserjet, it still functions.  That leaves three larger bookcases and some miscellaneous things on various surfaces, plus the art on the walls.

(what I hope to create in Colorado, my own version of this.)

When this room has been tidied up, the next and last big push begins. My study. This room has walls of books. Many will go in boxes with red tape, but most will not. The other areas have gone well, but this one will present some difficulty. So many projects. Some of the past, some of the future, some of today. Which ones do I imagine I’ll continue in Colorado? Which ones have enough spark to be valuable in the final third of my life? These are hard decisions for me and packing this room will be both valuable and difficult.

This is a chance to prune my work over the last third of my life, clear out the branches that have grown across each other. Take out that large branch that flourished then died. Increase the circulation amongst the remaining branches so they have air, can breathe. Pruning gives renewed vigor to plants and I hope to achieve the same thing when I pack up these materials, those closest to my heart, leaving behind what I no longer need.

Asia

Huh

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Summer                                                             Most Heat Moon

Over to Beisswinger’s hardware store to pick up the mower after repairs. While there I noticed a group gathered amongst the riding mowers on display, two men with Beisswinger tee-shirts and two Chinese or Japanese men taking notes, while a third took photographs. Here’s what surprised me. My reaction.

My first thought. Hmmm, Chinese investors getting ready to make a bid for the Do It Best hardware corporation. In taking care of the mower and payment I forgot to ask anyone who the visitors were, but my reaction itself is noteworthy. How the economic landscape has changed.

Asia, Commentary on Religion, Commentary on the news, Faith and Spirituality, Humanities, Myth and Story, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., World History

Aurora

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Summer                                                               Most Heat Moon

Well. The dogs have encouraged me to see another dawn. No, this is not some heroic clawback from the edge of terminal illness attained by the promise of canine companionship, rather it’s occasioned by canine demand for outside and food. So, here I am posting an Aurora just after a Nocturne. This might not be unusual for many, but for me, it’s downright odd.

The front page of the three papers I read consistently all feature the Malaysian Airlines disaster. The New York Times follows it with a long story about preparation by Israel for a ground assault on the Gaza Strip. Grim news from a part of the world that has been and continues to be a flashpoint for international conflicts.

Crimea, a major part of the Ukrainian/Russian violence, has featured in many wars and as part of the Great Game, the struggle between Great Britain and Russia for control in Central Asia. The Middle East, not far away, and its oil resources has become more prominent of late, particularly since the partition of Israel and Palestine. No one covers themselves with glory in any of these disputes and the politics are intractable, the product of ancient grudges coupled with the very modern demand for oil.

The ancient grudges often have their roots in this region’s other primary export, monotheistic religions. Though there were many polytheistic faiths in cultures there-from Babylonia to Assyria to Persepolis-it was with the Abrahamic covenant and the Egyptian diaspora of his descendants that monotheism began its ascendancy. In sequence came Christianity, then Islam both variants of that original turn toward one god.

The bitter soup concocted from petroleum and theological certainty, endemic to all three faiths, has bloodied nations and peoples over the whole globe. Where will it end? Oddly enough climate change might bring a peace of sorts in both central Asia and the Middle East. As the world backs away from its dependence on carbon based fuels, the relative importance of the oil rich regions and their conduits to markets (much of Central Asia, with pipelines headed toward China and toward the West) will decline.

Could be.

Asia, Cinema and Television, Literature

Her and Journey to the West

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Summer                                                          New (Most Heat) Moon

By way of cinema reviews. Saw “Her” last night and “Journey to the West” tonight. Though very different culturally both encourage us to stretch our understanding of reality to include the fantastic, Her through science fiction and Journey to the West through very loose adaptation of Chinese classic literature.

Kate found Her too slow, too odd, too much altogether and declared, “This isn’t holding my interest.” got up and did other things. In spite of the dorky ear plugs that signaled connection to the Operating System (btw: OS seemed like a bad techno-term for Samantha, the artificial person created through use of computers. Not sure why they didn’t go with program, but the oddness of the choice distracted me.) I found the questions raised by the movie intriguing.

What would it be like to be an intelligent, feeling entity with no body? What it would be like to have a non-corporeal lover? What algorithm could cause us to fall in love? What would fidelity mean to such an entity? All these questions get raised. Ironically the main character, Joaquin Phoenix’s job is to write real letters, often love letters, for other people.

Yes, it was a little slow at times, though I felt the time necessary to play with the idea of a computer/human relationship.  Amy Adams and Scarlett Johansson (voice of Samantha) added contemporary female starpower.

Journey to the West was a major disappointment. It combined the sometimes entertaining but very broad comedy sometimes seen in Chinese cinema, think Kung Fu Hustle by the same director, Stephen Chow, with ridiculous set piece scenes and a remarkable lack of fidelity to the Chinese class, Journey to the West. The Monkey King is the key character in Journey to the West as literature, but here he comes in very late in the movie, well into the final third and he comes in as a caricature and not a good one.

The original Monkey King is mischievous and unpredictable, but he also has a noble, courageous side that this movie ignores. The CGI effects were often very good, but used in the service of a juvenile script. China can do better than this with their own literary classics.

Asia, Politics

Readings on China and Military Power

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Beltane                                                               Emergence Moon

Here are a few recent articles that have informed my thinking on China. They are not uniform in their approaches at all, but I find in them the threads of a woven together by commerce and geo-political realities narrative that is more compelling to me than the scenario’s of doom.

Estranged Over Rising China

China: Engagement Vs. Estrangement

Growth in Global Trade Is in Ideas not Stuff

In China: Dawn of a Gilded Age

Investigating Family’s Wealth, China’s Leader Signals A Change

Calling America, From Asia: A Dispatch from Japan

Review of ‘Asia’s Cauldron’ by Robert Kaplan

We’re Not Number 1